Title: The Imaginary Town
Rating: G
Fandom: Akiba's Beat
Relationship: Aihara Mizuki & Tachibana Asahi
Wordcount: 460
Short summary: Mizuki figures out what's going on and it's time to make it all stop.
Mizuki had figured it out pretty quickly. Maybe it was the confidence he had in knowing Asahi for years, that his friend would not suddenly be outside, running about, interacting with girls after withdrawing into NEET life. His friend would not suddenly turn around his life without saying a word to him, even going so far as to block his number. Unless the Asahi out there wasn’t actually his friend, because something changed, because something else mattered more?
When Mizuki figured it out, he became angry. How dare Asahi just block his number, just never say anything, just leave him alone, abandon him? How much had Mizuki done, had Mizuki been to him, and then he just? Nothing? Was it all so easy to break…?
It was anger that fueled him, not hurt. He wasn’t a crybaby anymore. He wasn’t going to wait for his sun to shine on him. He was going to go out and do something about it himself.
And then he found them. Boss, Akari, Aoi. They were loud, they were annoying sometimes, but he was never left alone. He was never abandoned. He didn’t think they would become his dearest friends, but then again, they did have some similarities with a younger Asahi.
Mizuki became strong with them. He faced off with Asahi. He saw that it wasn’t just fun and games for Asahi but that didn’t matter. He had his own convictions. He had comrades and a shared goal.
But it came crumbling down. Of course. A Sunday that kept repeating was not natural. A Sunday where Asahi and his new comrades ran around “solving” problems, a Sunday where Mizuki and his new comrades also ran around “solving” problems… Running around this “imaginary” time, this “imaginary” town…
Because it couldn’t actually be real.
In hindsight, the way he cried as his imaginary friends, his own “delusion” disappeared, was rather embarrassing. But it doesn’t matter now that Asahi is back in his life. It doesn’t matter so much when Asahi had been hurting too. Every previous event, ever since this Sunday started repeating and even before that, when Asahi started slipping into worse and worse lifestyle habits, felt minor compared to what they are preparing to do now. They are going to take on the source. They are going to take this Akihabara and break it, get themselves out of this world of delusions.
Akihabara is great. Mizuki visited it before this all happened and he’s sure he’ll be back once this is all over. This Akihabara has also been great, blessing him with friends and memories he never plans to forget. But it’s time to break the illusion, to dispel the imaginary.
It’s time to leave delusions as just delusions and return to reality.