Bamboo Grove [Atsushi x Reader] ✓

8. ʙᴀᴍʙᴏᴏ ɢʀᴏᴠᴇ

The marks on Takeuchi's neck had not been inflicted by the fangs of a feline. The orphanage director was reluctant to believe that they were scratches inflicted by the blade of young bamboo, reluctant to believe that you had killed Takeuchi.

Aido Takeuchi did not deserve to die by the hands of a friend.

Takeuchi had just turned five when you hugged him before a shallow pit, holding his limp head protectively to your shoulder as though the child was merely asleep. You had accompanied him for the past three years of his life, how little yet how much he had grown in that period. In the silence of his deceased heartbeat, you still heard his dreams beating against your skin; he was trapped in a fantasy and he believed he was the modern-day Mowgli who in the last few minutes of life had befriended the tiger like he always wished to...

Every orphan had witnessed the murder, but Takeuchi was the only one too naïve to accept that it was the malice of your ability that had killed him. The bamboo grove was the product of your ability and home to everything you had greater control of; you were able to bend each branch at will, spirituality connected to the humble simplicity of each hollow culm.

Atsushi was contemptuous towards the child, intractable in his jealousy and misled by mistaken speculations, but he would never hurt Takeuchi like you did. The two had never been so close as they were before that night, and contrary to your supposition, they had managed to get along just fine... perhaps they would've been friends if only you did not stand between them...

Blaming the murder onto an ability-user that could not control their ability was not a product of you seeking a scapegoat. Knowing the director, he would blame the bloodshed on the albino regardless, embedding in the boy's heart false guilt for a crime he did not commit... Atsushi would hate you if he'd known earlier—the orphanage director acknowledged that you were not ready to lose two people in one night.

Ever since you'd reunited with Atsushi in the Agency, your deepest fear resurfaced, hindering your ability to perform your duties at work with efficiency and likewise cluttering your mind with obscure visions for the future. You could not let Atsushi believe he'd hurt a defenceless child forever. You needed Atsushi to know the truth... even if he grew to hate you.

You were not ignorant of his feelings. You were not what Mrs Yasui had considered "dense"; you were fully aware of the sentiment he had towards you for years, the light of admiration in which he idolised you, and even how he had just tried to kiss you... He was never supposed to love you like this.

Unable to control his reasonable wrath, Atsushi's flesh plumped significantly under the cotton of his yukata sleeve, striped fur motioning towards the claws which he scratched across the nearest bamboo tree to help himself up. You winced as he pierced his claws through the sleeve clothing your upper arm, wishing that he would not close his paw so tightly over your flesh.

"I've hated myself for this, for the past year, thinking that you left because I killed Takeuchi before your very eyes!" he yelled at you, pulling you so close to shout against your ear as you turned away to look at the ground beneath you, silent. "The director told me I was a good-for-nothing killer who drove the only blessing I had in my life away! — Blessing! He considered you a blessing! A blessing, [Y/N]!"

You could not find the strength to struggle against his tightening grip, but it became unbearable and you could almost feel his claws digging through your skin, reopening wounds. Atsushi was beyond infuriated to see past his anger, unsympathetic as you tried to ease the pressure of his hand from your arm.

"I struggle to understand what kind of person would kill a friend and settle in a city as if nothing happened!" he persisted, the tip of his nose twitching as you attempted to pull his hand from your flesh, motioning abrupt steps backwards until your back hit against a tree. "What kind of friend even are you? The type who kills others just to stay afloat in society, huh? Is that the kind of person you are behind the mask?"