❛ don’t we deserve to be happy? ❜ ( GENOSSS )
There is … nothing to salvage.
A few burnt pages flutter in the wind and he analyzes his own handwriting as they float by. Most of his journals had to be moved to neighboring rooms in the building given how small the space had already been and he felt a well of regret beginning to puddle at the loss. Of course there were dozens upon dozens of back-ups of all the wisdom and lessons imparted upon him, but the hard copies were well and truly lost.
He reaches up, taking a half torn sheet into hand. "100 Push-Ups, 100 Sit Ups—" It slips from between his fingertips.
Genos shifts his attention as the ground rumbles beneath his feet, watching as his companion flicks aside a concrete slab. Miraculously, theres a couple familiar volumes of manga virtually untouched beneath it. Before he can express his delight in the find, the man is speaking.
Uncharacteristically, he is left speechless. "Sensei ——" he breathes out, faltering, then quieting. Brows furrow as he gazes at the back he is greeted with.
For all his strength, Saitama was a rather small framed man, and he appeared significantly smaller in this moment crouched down in front of where their apartment once stood before it'd been torn asunder. It was not often that Genos could say his mentor was so open, the grief plain in how he held himself. The fatigued slump of his shoulders, the distance in his gaze.
Had it not been for its abandoned location, it would've been condemned. Upkeep was daily. While monsters were too frightened to approach, that did not mean the foundation did not require repair, or that the water always ran clean, or that the stove did not often manually need to be lit. It was cramped even for its original owner, and the slumlord did little to maintain utilities.
But for Saitama, it'd been home.
Because of its precarious placement and dubious ownership of the land, Saitama wouldn't be compensated for the fact it was a loss caused by the Heroes Association. Near everything he owned was simply gone. It was a great and cruel injustice. All that had been offered was one of the rooms at the newly established Hero Apartments.
He steps forward until he stands at his mentors side, and then lowers himself. "Saitama-sensei," he starts and stops once more, staring out into the uninterrupted skyline as if it could perhaps tell him more of what the man was thinking. "You have saved us all yet again." And he was safe — not that Genos ever doubted him. "I will not be happy until I possess enough power to defeat all manner of foe and avenge my losses … but I have been content to be as I am as long as it has been with you. I have learned a great many things that I find valuable in your company."
He pauses, and then frowns.
"Forgive me, Sensei. That was more words than you prefer. Shall we go? I have already previously cataloged all of your belongings." Even if the H.A. wouldn't do what was just, Genos would.
this meme was a year and a half old what the fuck
