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dear god i’m in still my xukun brainrot (are we surprised, it’s actually 25/8) but i am also up for some uh angsty stuff i love always love me some >:( until happy ending like just tug at my heart strings pls i like to be hurt and i’m not saying i’m hoping you’ll write something angsty + happy ending with xukun but i am saying that -A.

LIKE THE ONE WITH ZEREN oh my god that was so perfect -A.

dakdsjf;lkadsj 25/8 i- but yes, we all know i love writing angst >:) with a happy ending :P (also the fact that i had to go back and read the zeren thing. 🤡)

this is my first attempt at any type of superhero thing so.. its mainly based off of the copious amounts of batman and miraculous ladybug fics ive been reading lately and the fact i’ve been watching smallville. kinda like a superhero who gets powers like in ml but living in a place like gotham and trying to live a normal life like clark <3 it is implied that it takes place in the dc universe, or at least in a universe where batman and superman are heroes there

warnings of swearing, allusions to mind control, brief mentions of murder by animal in forest but nothing descriptive, the rabbit spirit is just an ancient lil dude and it says what it says, a nice kiss at the end, and of course as always our yn is they/them <333

---

“This isn’t fair,” you protest, trying to give the box back to your mother.

“This isn’t about fairness,” she says sternly, “it’s about doing what’s right and honorable.”

“I didn’t ask to become the next one in line.”

“I didn’t either. In fact, I firmly believed that my older brother was better for the job. But your grandmother didn’t and here we are now.” She pushed the box back to you, her hands coming to rest on your shoulders. Her voice grew gentler, “I know that this is difficult. I am probably the only person in your life right now that can understand how difficult this is. But you need to pick up the mantle. Everyday I get older and everyday I can feel that in battle...” She trails off, her gaze looking through you rather than at you. “It won’t be long until our enemies, our city’s enemies, figure that out and use it against us.”

“But, but,” you stumble over your words, trying to grasp at any thread to keep you from taking on this great responsibility. Your fingers tighten around the box, the corners digging in. “I don’t know anything! I’m not trained for this!”

“And you aren’t being sent into the field just yet, my love,” your mother reassures, brushing your hair away from your face. “I can last until you’re out of high school and are trained... I have to.”

“Ma...” You steel yourself as well as you can, “Can I have a few days to think about it? To acclimate myself to the idea?”

You mother presses a kiss to your head, smoothing your hair down. “Of course. Training can start after your midterms.”

After she leaves your room, you sit on your bed, setting the box down next to you. You know your mother will be using it until you’re ready, but she wanted you to get to know what you’ll be working with. With who you’ll be working with. Tùzǐ was the spirit that would give you the abilities to do what your mother does. Enhanced senses, faster healing, the ability to jump higher and further than a normal human. Tùzǐ is channeled through a bracelet, though once you take full ownership of the role, Tùzǐ can be channeled through whatever wearable item you wish. According to your family records, your great-grandfather literally had a lucky rabbit’s foot.

---

It’s been several years since that conversation with your mother. Lù Tù, or Green Rabbit, has now become your role, though a secret one from your civilian friends. It was hard at first trying to balance your regular life, like academics and friends, with your superhero life, but with your family helping you and supporting you, it did become much easier. You keep secret your true life, but still you wear the characters for Tùzǐ around your neck, 兔子 proudly there in gold, gleaming almost supernaturally sometimes. Your friends asked about it once, back when you were still getting to know them. You claimed it was to do with your zodiac animal, which was true to be fair, and left it at that. None of them pushed the issue, but sometimes you could feel someone watching you, doubting your story. And every time you looked for those eyes, you always saw Xukun.

---

Xukun and you met in your second semester of university. Ironically enough, it was in a class that discussed the existence of superheros throughout the ages. And while your own city was no walk on the beach, after hearing about Gotham you were certainly glad that Batman and his associates were looking after it. When it came time to discuss your family, though of course you didn’t say it was, the Green Rabbit is what ended up bringing you and Xukun into each other’s orbits.

Xukun is a journalism student, one that would follow his story to its (sometimes) bitter end. He is tenacious and his research is well-done. While your class had been learning about Metropolis, you had joked to him that he was just a younger Clark Kent. Except, unlike Mr. Kent, Xukun’s focus was not on Superman. It was on you.

Well.

Superhero-running-over-rooftops-leaping-over-buildings-you. You, as Green Rabbit, were his Superman.

You were wary at first, for several reasons. The first being he would look too far, try too much, and find out that you were his hero. If Tim Drake could do it, Xukun could too. The second being what if he was another creep who was into Green Rabbit for, uh, less-than family friendly reasons. And the third was, well... you could see yourself falling in love with him all too easily. You were, still are when you’re honest with yourself on a rooftop looking over the city, sure that he could become the most important person in your life after your family. The other two concerns weighed against his favor and helped you not fall for him. But as you got to know him, because apparently making friends with Chengcheng and Shuxin meant that you made friends with him, you felt your second concern dissolve. It was obvious that though he idolized the Green Rabbit, he wasn’t into the hero like That. There was a professional admiration he touted and you were grateful to see that.

But falling in love with him was far too dangerous. For you and for him.

It’d be nice if your heart knew that, too.

---

Panting, you pushed yourself off of the concrete roof, getting back on your feet and turning to look at your enemy again. You swipe at the blood trickling from the corner of your mouth where Earthshaker had gotten a lucky hit in.

“Awww,” Earthshaker says, false sweet concern dripping from her voice, “is the widdol bunnie okay?” The wind on the top of building whipped around you, and you could feel the heat of the spotlights illuminating the peak of the building on your back.

“God, do you ever just shut the fuck up?” You ask, already knowing the answer. Earthshaker is one of the lesser villains you deal with in the grand scheme of things, but she is one that knew how to get on your nerves quickly.

She glares at you, the robotic cuffs on her arm sparking. She raises her arms and starts to move to clack them together and you remember that the both of you are on top of some apartment building. Earthshaker’s power as a villain was being able to control the ground around her using those cuffs. You weren’t sure exactly how she was doing it, but you figured it had something to do with static electricity or something similar. It’d explain the sparking. You hop a few times in place, psyching yourself up, and run at the villain. You grab her around the waist and the both of you go tumbling over the edge of the building. The city lights flicker around the two of you as you fall 80 stories. Earthshaker is pounding her fists against your back and you struggle to wrap your legs around her enough to free up one hand to grab at your utility belt for a rope.

“Fuck’s sake,” you mutter, finally grabbing the rope. You call on the power of Tùzǐ and the rope glows faintly as it shoots out of your hand of its own accord. You watch it slither away into the lights around you as you struggle to keep your hold on Earthshaker. You shifted your focus to her and watched as she was futile in her attempts to call the earth to her. In an ironic twist, it seems, despite the two of you falling fast, you were too far away from the ground for her to make any progress. You looked at the streetlights getting closer and felt a pang of fear that Tùz- that the rope failed. You consider the superhuman abilities you had while as the Green Rabbit and decide that even if the rope doesn’t return, you would feel sore in the morning but you wouldn’t break anything. Even if you turned to take the brunt of the fall off of your enemy.

Just as you decided that, an end of the rope appears from the lights whizzing by and wraps around your waist. It doesn’t abruptly stop your descent, you think you would break your spine if it did even with the protection of Tùzǐ, but it takes the momentum the two of you built and swings you towards where it was anchored. You hear Earthshaker shouting insults under you, but with the wind in your ears you aren’t able to make anything out clearly. Not like you’d really care anyways. Unfortunately the power of Tùzǐ can only do so much, and you let out several grunts as the two of you tumble onto the roof of the police station. The two of you are separated in the fall, a loss of which you don’t mourn, and the rope leaves your waist to coil into your hand, shrinking down to a few feet. The door to the roof opens and several officers file out, fanning out to form a semi-circle around you, guns drawn.

"Uh," you say, "delivery?"

Your ears twitch at the sound of of half a dozen guns cocking, but that’s all that happens. Chief Zhang steps out of the circle, holstering his weapon, and takes in the situation. You, standing in a half-crouch, rope in hand, and Earthshaker, pushing herself up, jaw clenched while she favors her left arm. The other officers follow his lead and put their guns away as well. Zhang motions towards two of his officers and they come forward, helping Earthshaker up and checking for serious injury before cuffing her hands behind her back.

You raise an eyebrow at the officer holding her by the shoulder, an unspoken question of Earthshaker's right arm. The officer responds, "Ah, nothing more serious than a strain, Rabbit." She motions towards the robotic cuffs, "These probably kept her wrists from breaking completely, what with the several inches of metal there." You nodded and turned your attention back to the Chief.

"Get those cuffs off of her, but place them in evidence after you tag it." He says. The two officers nod and lead your enemy away to the rooftop entrance. You, Zhang, and the remaining officers watch as the three are swallowed by the stairwell lights, the metal door closing firmly behind them. There's a beat of silence before Zhang dismisses the rest of the crowd with a wave of his hand. They follow the unspoken order and soon it's just you and the Chief of Police on the roof of the station.

"Good evening, Chief Zhang," you say politely after a few moments, hating the awkward silence he left hanging between the two of you.

"You know I don't care for surprises, Hare," he says, crossing his arms. In all the time you've known Zhang Yixing, and all the time your mother has, he has never referred to either of you as Green Rabbit. Always Hare. Your mother found it endearing, and she would banter with him. Probably helped that she grew up with him, though he was in the dark about her true identity. You, on the other hand, grate against the refusal to use your proper name. It was too close to Tùzǐ's truth. "Falling onto my precinct with no prior notice..." he trails off and you can feel the disapproval radiating from him.

"It wasn't intentional, Chief," you protest, "it's just where we landed. If I would've been able to send you a text or a pigeon beforehand, trust me, I would have." You can't help the snark in your tone. You were tired. Midterms coming up, stopping Earthshaker from whatever the fuck she was doing with the office building, Xukun was starting to ask questions you didn't want to answer, and now you have the Chief of Police on you about prior notice. As if you can just stop in the middle of a fight and go, "Hey, real quick, I just need to call the Chief of Police and let him know I'll be throwing the both of us onto the roof of his station."

He stares at you, unimpressed. "I understand that you cannot always notify me, " he takes a deep breath as if he was trying to restrain himself, "however, I do recall what powers your predecessor had and she always found a way to let the precinct know that she was on her way. I suggest you consult her and take her response into your repertoire." Be responsible, is what you hear. And with that, he turns abruptly and leaves you alone on the roof, sounds of the city the only thing to break the silence.

---

"Shit," you say, looking down at your notebook and back at the front of the class. You brought the wrong one for today. You prefer to use good, old-fashioned pen, pencil, and paper for taking your notes. Something about the process of actually writing the information helped you retain it better. But, it does have its downsides, such as now, when you look at your notebook full of physics formulas and equations and look at the front of the class where your professor was in the process of getting the video about some civil rights protest documentary properly running.

Xukun looks up from his notebook. "What's up?"

You just let out a frustrated sigh and slide your notebook towards him, breaking into a small smile when he over-exaggerates his response to seeing all of that math and science. "Yeah," you agree, pulling it back to you. "Can I borrow your notes after class? I'll give them back tonight when we meet with Chengs and Xinxin." You bat your eyes, channeling your inner Shuxin.

Xukun agrees, "I'll do it! I'll do it! Anything but your Shuxin impersonation."

You glare at him but drop it a moment later. "Thank you, Kunkun~"

He isn't able to continue your banter as your professor chooses that moment to start class, the lights being turned off as she goes over the information about the video she gave last week. You just stare at the screen, not really taking anything in, as you feel the pain medication you took earlier start to wear off. Like you predicted, nothing was broken or sprained, but damn was there a lot of bruising. To be fair, you did fall 80-something stories onto the hard roof of another building, but still. At least you could cover them with your clothes, most of the bruising on your left side which hit first when you and Earthshaker landed on the police station. Unfortunately, that thought led to you remembering what Zhang said to you that night. All but calling you irresponsible and incompetent. As if you didn't bring a villain to his doorstep.

You blink away from your daze as the lights flick on, confusion grabbing hold of you before you realized you had completely wiled away your class thinking of different ways to mildly inconvenience and annoy the Chief of Police rather than watch the documentary. Xukun stood, his things already packed away, and waited patiently as you grabbed your physics notebook and shoved it in your backpack.

"Hey, can you do me a favor?" Xukun asks once the two of you are out of the classroom.

"So long as it doesn't involve complex blood rituals," you reply.

"Oh no," he says, playing along, "it's not a complex blood ritual."

You can't keep the smile from your face, all thoughts of connecting Chief Zhang's paperclips together slipping away. "Oh, well then of course I can. What do you need? Newts? Oxtail? The leftmost talon of a hawk born on a new moon?"

"All of the above," his eyes crinkle at the sides, "and for you to hold my backpack while I stop in the bathroom quick."

You give him a look. "Why do you need me to do this?"

You watch as Xukun slowly turned a light shade of pink. "Last time, unbeknownst to me, my backpack kind of, uh, got tangled in the toilet paper and I had about three feet of it dangling behind me until some kind student mentioned it. Unfortunately," he takes a breath, "I was already on the train."

You curl your lips in, trying to keep the laughter at bay, and nodded rapidly. When you were mostly confident you could talk without cackling, you said, "Yeah, no, I understand. I will protect it the way Shuxin protects her coffee."

"That inspires so much confidence," he says flatly, "it's not as if she keeps leaving it everywhere, including at the counter of the coffee shop." Despite his response, he slips off his backpack and hands it to you.

He starts walking away when you remember something. "Oh! The notes from class! Can I just steal them now?"

"Green notebook!" He calls back, still walking down the hall.

You frown. Green notebook? For a history course? Everyone knows green is for science. Red is for maths, yellow is for literature, and blue is for history. You roll your eyes as if to say, "Anyways," before propping his backpack on your knee and opening it. You cringe at the state of his backpack and notebooks, papers and writing implements loose or shoved into other books or notebooks. Journalism majors, you think to yourself as you parse through the mess only to find two green notebooks, one darker than the other. "Cai Xu Kun," you mutter under your breath, before picking the darker one that looks like it has more papers and notes shoved into it. You zip up his backpack and set it on the floor, stepping through the straps so no one could snatch it from you, before swinging your backpack off one shoulder around to the front of you, and put the notebook in, zipping your bag up as well.

Xukun returns soon after you pick his bag off the ground and hang it off one shoulder. "Thanks YN, I appreciate it. You found the notebook aright?" He takes his backpack and puts it on, tilting his head towards the other end of the hall where the doors to the rest of campus are.

"Yeah," you say, "but really, Xukun? Green? Everybody knows that that is the color you use for science classes!" The two of you bicker the rest of the way down the hall until you separate, him to one of his journalism courses and you back to your apartment. You loved only having one class on this day; Xukun being in it was just a plus.

---

You kick off your shoes gently in the entryway and slip on your house slippers before venturing into the rest of your apartment. Tùzǐ appears in a small flash of golden-green light as the spirit leaves your necklace before it's zipping off to the kitchen. You watch it leave and hear the telltale sound of a head of lettuce turning into a meal. You continue walking to your room and unsling your backpack from your shoulders, letting its own momentum carry it to the leg of your desk. You flip through the stack of notebooks that are in the top corner of your desk until you find the proper, blue, notebook and sit down. You putz around a bit, not really wanting to copy the notes but knowing you have to so you can do work for other classes.

"Alright," you say to yourself, getting Xukun's notebook out of your bag, "time to decipher his handwriting." You flip open your notebook to a clean page and set Xukun's on top, just until you find the notes from today. You open the cover and find a messily sketched rabbit, almost like he was trying to draw one from memory. You roll your eyes at it. Nerd, you think affectionately. Even if you were concerned about him finding out the truth, you did appreciate how much he seemed to value your hero self. You flip through a few more pages, looking in the top corner for a today's date, not really taking anything in until you find a page with a newspaper clipping carefully glued to it. You stare at it, a sudden chill entering the room as the Green Rabbit stares back at you, arm up in greeting to the news media.

NEW RABBIT HOPS ONTO THE SCENE reads the headline. And what's worse is that you remember this day perfectly. Your first official day taking over for your mother. The article was written by journalist Tsai Jolin, the Lois Lane to your mother's Clark Kent. Jolin was one of the few people outside the family who knew the truth, and only because she and your mother have known each other since they were 12. The interview was specifically geared towards the hope and excitement you were to portray to the citizens. It reassured them, your mother had said before you left the house that day, that they are able to trust the new Lù Tù, that the person filling the shoes is just as ready, just as eager to protect the city as the previous holder was.

You were grateful to Jolin, having already arranged the questions and answers that you were going to give a few weeks before your official debut. She had told you that the reason she became a journalist was to help keep your mother's identity secret and that she would do her damnedest to do the same for you.

But... why did Xukun have this article carefully clipped out and pasted into his notebook for this random history course? Unless... You feel every muscle in you tense as the realization hits you. You grabbed the wrong notebook.

You flip back to the first page, reading desperately over the entry. It wasn't anything life-changing, really. Just a few paragraphs about how Lù Tù had saved the then-Chief of Police, Chief Li. He was in charge of the precinct for half of your mother's run as Green Rabbit before Zhang was promoted. You vaguely remember the incident, but having grown up listening to your family's exploits, you were mostly desensitized to it all. Xukun, apparently, decided that that rescue was what launched his passion into journalism if his writings were anything to go by.

You start to feel sick as you flip past your debut, a few dozen pages, until you come to the date that you first met Xukun. Your memory of this event was different to his, of course. You are two different people. However, you were reluctant as hell to make any friends past Chengcheng, his sister Bingbing, and Shuxin. You recall being standoffish and cold, not really answering or paying attention to him besides when you had to.

His recollection was different. Chengcheng had pulled me aside as I was leaving Professor Wang's office hours. He said he finally coerced his and Shuxin's friend into meeting more people and that I was the least worrisome of the rest of his friends. Shuxin and their friend were waiting for us in the small courtyard with the fountain. Their friend looked like they wanted to be anywhere else in the world but here.

"This is YN!" Shuxin had cheerfully introduced, reaching out behind her and pulling YN fowards. YN glanced up at me and then away again. It was obvious that Chengcheng and Shuxin only told them what was happening seconds before Chengcheng went in to get me. I offered my hand politely and YN ignored it until Shuxin elbowed them none-to-gently to respond. They shifted their weight as they uncrossed their arms, one reaching out to meet mine, the other tucked around their torso. It was almost as if they were holding on to bruised ribs or something. Our mutual friends led us to the dessert cafe that was a short walk from the courtyard and I watched YN out of the corner of my eye. It looked like - no - not looked like, they definitely were favoring one side over the other. Had something happened on the way here? I looked back over to Chengcheng and Shuxin but they didn't seem concerned at all, so it must not have happened earlier today...

Perhaps YN was involved in martial arts and was sore from a missed block from practice? When I inquired about if they took any martial arts courses once we had gotten to the cafe, ordered, and sat down, YN tensed for a quick moment, barely a blink of an eye, before nodding. They muttered something about practice the night before and Shuxin took over the conversation, elaborate stories about YN from high school. Apparently, Shuxin and YN had become friends because YN had knocked out one of the jocks who had been harassing her for a date. YN had heard enough after Shuxin refused the guy for "the tenth time, I swear it! He just never got the hint. Well, never got the hint, that is, until YN came along! My warrior in pleated argyle."

The corner of YN's mouth ticked up at Shuxin's antics. I could see the long standing friendship between them. Chengcheng, and his sister Bingbing I learned, entered the picture soon after that. Chengcheng had seen what went down and immediately went up to YN begging them to teach him what they just did so that he can protect his older sister if she ever needed it. Bingbing fit right in with Shuxin and YN; serious enough in personality that suited YN, but she had enough passion for drama and the arts to compliment Shuxin. Chengcheng joked that he was just there to get them coffee and sweets whenever the four of them were together. YN shook their head, glaring slightly at him, but he waved it off. Shuxin started to tell me about how Chengcheng was the perfect mix of relaxed and stressed out to compliment any of them at whatever emotional state they were in. She didn't say it, but it was implied that he was the glue that held their little group together.

Shuxin didn't distract me from my observation of YN, though. A good journalist never loses focus of their story. There was something different about YN... I just need to figure out what.

-

You finish reading his recollection, barely breathing, and you slowly realize that you are holding on to the notebook so tightly your knuckles are white. "Tùzǐ!" You call out. When no response from the rabbit spirit comes, you call out again, more desperately. "Tùzǐ! Tùzǐ, we have a problem!"

There's a beat of silence before a semi-transparent golden rabbit leaps out of the wall and lands on your desk, becoming more opaque. "What is the issue, YN?"

You set the notebook down, forcibly uncurling your fingers from it. "He knows."

"There is no possibility of him knowing," the spirit dismissed. Its nose twitched.

You flipped ahead another dozen pages, quickly skimming down the page, before turning back to the rabbit. "No, Tùzǐ, he knows."

The spirit stands up on its hind legs, crossing its paws behind its back as it reads the page you pointed at.

YN showed up to breakfast with us late today. Green Rabbit was fighting late into the early morning hours. I know because I watched and documented the fight. Green Rabbit was fighting some animatronic octopus creature in the Bay, trying to keep it from destroying the dam and flooding the lower parts of the city. A man, who I can only imagine is a mad engineer, was in a spider-like robotic structure, perched on one of the towers of the bridge, watching the fight. I couldn't make out much of what he was saying, but there was something about 'the rebirth of the few will salvage the whole'??? I don't know. Honestly, I was more concerned about the fight itself rather than the creator of the octopus automaton. I crept closer, keeping myself hidden from the view of anyone involved in the fight, and saw as Green Rabbit took down the octopus, a jagged piece of metal from it cut across the hero's face. An uneven line going from the temple to the chin, curving from where Green Rabbit jerked away in what I can only imagine was intense pain.

The hero somehow managed to pull most of the creature onto shore and took out from the tool belt some sort of... stick? Again, I was too far away to make out any clear view of what Green Rabbit was holding, but I did see how the stick transformed into a welder's torch, the bright blue fire sparking as it reached the wet metal of the dam. I don't think that Green Rabbit intends for that to fix the damage done, but I'm sure it would hold overnight. Long enough for the repair crew to be able to fix the dam up properly.

YN looked drained as they sat down with us, only holding a black coffee and a banana for their breakfast. Shuxin and Chengcheng were too far away to see, as they were sitting opposite me and YN, but I could see the cut from the fight underneath the makeup YN used to hide it. I assume that YN has some sort of advanced healing ability given that only the deepest parts of the cut on their cheek seemed to still be in the process of scarring. There was virtually no other evidence that could point more strongly at YN being Green Rabbit. When Chengcheng inquired as to why YN was late, they just said that they had some plumbing issues that morning. The city shut off the water until the dam was fixed. Chengcheng nodded in sympathy before flipping his phone around and showing Ms. Tsai's newest article about the battle last night.

On the opposite page, there was once again an article that was carefully clipped out and pasted on.

COMMOTION IN THE OCEAN: GREEN RABBIT VS. THE MAD ENGINEER A picture of the now-defunct octopus robot surrounded by police tape and officers was under it. You remember how Jolin and your mother both called you as soon as the paper hit the streets, asking if you were okay, asking about the dam-age (haha, get it? Jolin had asked you), asked if anyone was hurt. Yes, you were okay. Just a few cuts and bruises from where the suit didn't cover your skin. The dam-age was momentarily fixed, at least enough to last overnight before the crew came in and repaired her properly. You didn't think anyone had been there, the bridge having been under repair for some weeks and the people living by the Bay were far enough back from the battle that the most they got would've been slightly flooded yards and decks. But, reading over Xukun's notebook, you found you were wrong. And wrong in the worst way possible.

"Tùzǐ, what do we do?" You asked, looking at the spirit as it sat on its haunches having finished reading the entry.

"This..." Tùzǐ pauses. "This is not an ideal situation. Had this been in the time of your great-grandfather, I merely would have enchanted him, sent him into the wilderness to be devoured by whichever carnivore was hungriest and closest." You gag slightly at that. You realize that being an ancient warrior spirit changes perspective, but you didn't need to hear the details of said perspective. "However, if I were to do that now, there would be a media frenzy surrounding his disappearance and death. Too many questions would be asked and I highly doubt that your mother and her friend would be unaware of it being my doing." You appreciate that the spirit leaves you out of its plotting.

"I suppose," Tùzǐ continues, "that I could do some sort of memory alteration to this Xukun. But it comes at the risk of him forgetting everything associated with the Green Rabbit."

"So he wouldn't only forget me as Green Rabbit," you picked up the thread Tùzǐ had started, "but also since he knows it's me, he would forget me as myself along with Shuxin and Chengcheng."

"Yes," Tùzǐ says, seemingly proud of you following its train of thought. "Furthermore, an alteration of that magnitude may end up worse in the long run, for if he remembers, the memories wouldn't trickle in in a vague dream or sense of already knowing someone. The memories wouldn't come back conveniently."

"The chances of him remembering might be small," you say slowly, trying to predict what would happen in this situation, "but the sudden influx of the missing parts of his memory, of himself..."

"Yes, it would likely drive him mad to say the least." Tùzǐ confirmed. "Worse is he tells someone the truth about you."

Tùzǐ falls silent, holding back what it wants to say. But you already know. "Worst is that he comes after me. Worst is that he becomes my next villain."

---

Suffice to say, you beg off dinner that night, claiming your parents and Jolin were taking you out for dinner. A sudden change to be sure, you said, but it isn't often that your parents and you are able to just go out for dinner anymore. What with your running around at night, a masked vigilante is what you don't say.

Shuxin's text was classic her, dramatic but understanding. Chengcheng took it in stride and told you to tell your parents that he and Bingbing say hello. Xukun... He didn't say anything. You assume that by now he figured out that you have the wrong notebook. That you know he knows the truth about you. That he knows about the unending series of lies that you've been living since you turned 17.

The dinner with your parents and Jolin, though, that was a truth. It's sort of hard to get out of a dinner with the three people who know about your secret life after the warrior spirit that gives you superpowers tells them someone else knows about the family legacy. Which leads to you and your parents sitting in Jolin's living room in her penthouse in the nice part of the city, your parents both looking grave as Tùzǐ tells them what happened.

The notebook, opened to that fateful octopus article, sits open on the low table in front of you. You've tucked yourself into the corner of the couch, a heavy quilt over you. Your parents sit on a loveseat angled towards you and Jolin is in a plush chair that she had pulled over to the couch to offer support. Her hand was resting halfway between your wrist and elbow, thumb stroking methodically over the skin, trying to keep your panic at bay.

"You realize what we have to do," your father says after Tùzǐ finishes speaking.

"Unfortunately, YN and I have already dismissed the idea of sending him into the forest to be devoured by the creatures that live within," Tùzǐ says with the utmost resignation.

Your parents look at the spirit, faces in differing stages of disbelief. "No," your mother says, voice pitching unevenly, "no that was not an idea that was on the table."

Tùzǐ hops back over towards you and you swear that you hear it mutter, "It was for your grandfather."

"No, what I was going to say," your father picks up the conversation from where he started it, "was that YN can no longer be in any contact with this boy. It's too dangerous for the both of them."

"Ba," you protest despite knowing he's right.

"But how long until it falls apart?" Your mother says. "It took him only three months to figure out YN's identity. If we separate them from him, have them cut off all contact? That involves turning away the Fan siblings and Shuxin. They're all too interconnected now."

"And," Jolin chimes in, voice as soothing as she can make it, "who's to say he still doesn't pursue the story? From what we've read in this journal and from what YN has said about him in the past, this Cai Xukun is a tenacious journalist in the making. His name is already been thrown around in the lower rings at my paper. Professors are recommending him for internships there." She sighs, her thumb coming to a stop and letting her now-still hand ground you. "If he gets access to the resources that we have, the connections that we know, he'll find YN. Regardless of if they want to be found."

"So then what do we do?" You ask, voice rising from stress. "Give him back the notebook and pretend nothing happened? Tell him that he was wrong about it all? Make him think he can't trust his own instinct? His own journalistic integrity?"

"There is another option," Jolin floats out, voice sing-songy. "We could always bring him into the fold."

You and your parents all burst into disagreement.

"No!"

"Absolutely not!"

"I'm not putting him in danger!"

Jolin tsk-ed, her eyes coming to rest on your mother. "A word?" She says pointedly towards her. Your mother closes her eyes and takes a deep breath before exhaling and standing up to follow her best friend out of the living room. Tùzǐ follows behind them after a glance from your mother.

After they leave, your father comes over and sits next to you. "You know that suggestion I made wasn't meant to hurt you," he says, holding out his hand.

You place yours into it and he covers it with his other hand, holding your hand between his like it was a precious pearl. "I know," you say, voice quiet. "But it still hurt."

"You like him," your father states. There's no judgement in his tone and you look up at him from where your were picking at a loose thread on the quilt.

"Yeah, of course I do," you agree, "he's one of my closest friends."

"No," your father says, a small, endearing smile appearing on his face. "You like him. That's why you were so upset at the thought of not being able to talk to him anymore."

"I... How did you know?"

"Oh my sweet child, you are so similar to your mother in so many ways. But you are similar to me when it comes to the people we have feelings for." He lets go of your hand and puts his arm around your shoulder, pulling you willingly into a strong embrace. "We both have the subtlety of a clowder of cats in a salmon factory."

You let out a snort and bury yourself more into your father's side. The two of you sit there in companionable silence. "I don't want to hurt him." You whisper, your throat tight. A few tears make themselves known and your father just presses a kiss to the top of your head.

"I know you don't, YN, I know."

---

By the time your mother and Jolin return to the living room, both you and your father have fallen asleep.

Your mother lets out a fond sigh. "Can't take them anywhere, can I?"

Jolin smiles before running a hand through your hair, gently bringing you back to the waking world. You look up at her, squinting despite the low light from the small lamps in the room. You nudge your father awake, and he wakes up with a start, looking around for a moment before he realizes where he is.

"So we've come to a decision," your mother says, sitting down next to your father. Jolin nods and sits down in the plush chair she was in earlier. "We are going to bring him into the fold."

You and your father share a shocked look with each other before gaping at the two women. "Are, are you sure?" You ask your mother, sitting up straighter.

"Oh, not immediately," Jolin says. "I'm going to approve his internship, but he's going to be working with me in my office. I'm going to gauge how much he knows and how dedicated he is to keeping it a secret. If he's not, well, Tùzǐ has a plan in place for that unfortunate situation." The rabbit, sitting on the table on the notebook, nods.

"You guys," you say, throat getting all tight again from emotion. You take a few calming breaths. "Thank you."

"We talked about it, and Jolin isn't going to be a journalist forever, and it has been helpful having someone who has certain connections when working on a case." Your mother reaches around your father for you. You wriggle slightly under your father's arm until you're able to meet her hand. "We are so proud of you, regardless of what happens next."

"I appreciate that," you say. The five of you sit in a wonderful silence for a few minutes before a thought strikes you.

"What do I tell Shuxin, Chengcheng, and Bingbing?"

---

Despite having the okay from your family, you are still hesitant to be around Xukun. Something felt different for you and you've been avoiding him pretty much since that night. It's one thing, you muse, chewing on the straw for your smoothie, to think he might know. It's probably the plausible deniability of it all. Not on his side, but on mine. If I don't believe he knows the truth, than I can simply ignore any clues about it. Though, that is what led me here I suppose. You stand up and leave the smoothie shop, heading towards the subway.

Twenty minutes later, you're at Xukun's apartment, your knuckles hovering inches from his door. You stare at your hand telling it in your mind to hit the stupid wood and let him know you're out here. Tùzǐ gets fed up with your lack of action and appears from your necklace. It hops down the length of your arm before using its paws to rap against the door, before turning and jumping back into your necklace. The characters shine unnaturally for a moment before fading as you hear footsteps approaching.

"YN," Xukun says, obviously surprised. His hair is messy and he has his glasses on, huge circles that take up a good portion of his face. He's dressed the way people are dressed when they aren't expecting anyone except maybe the takeout person to visit. He has on a hoodie with a design on it that's since faded almost completely and a pair of plaid pajama bottoms. His slippers make a slight noise against the tile of the entry way as he moves aside to let you in.

"Xukun," you greet, matching his tone. To be honest, you didn't think that he was going to answer, much less let you in after the way you've been ducking his calls and avoiding him in class the past week and a half. Shuxin and Chengcheng decided that they were going to stay out of it and hung out with you both separately. You feel like you can't bear the things he could say. "It's, um, bit a been," you stumble over your words. "I mean, it's been a bit." Tùzǐ, I am politely asking for you to kill me now, you say silently in your head, cringing as you change from your sneakers into a pair of house slippers. You hear laughter and you know it's not coming from Xukun. You ignore the lack of solidarity from your partner in justice and follow Xukun into his apartment.

The two of you are awkward, acting as if you haven't been at his place before. And, to be fair, you guess you haven't. At least, not with the full knowledge that he knows that you know that he knows about you. He guides you to the small living room and sits down in a chair. You sit down across from him and pull out his notebook from your backpack. "I think that this, uh, this belongs to you." You try for a joke but it falls flat.

"Yeah..." he replies. You nod awkwardly, setting the notebook down on the table. Silence hangs between you like a fruit fly by a bowl of strawberries, annoying and refuses to leave. After several false starts at conversation, Xukun finally says, "So I guess you know now... you know, that I know?"

"Are you asking me if I know that you know that I know that you know or are you telling me that you know that I know that you know that I know?" You feel the tension in the room dissipate with your question.

You watch as Xukun mouths the question you asked, eyes focused somewhere random as he tries to work out what the question was. "I'm telling you that I know that you know that I know that you know that I know that you know."

"This is the most nonsensical conversation we've ever had," you say after you unintentionally do exactly what he did with your question, figuring out what he said.

"That is not true." For the first time since you got to his place, he cracks a smile. "The most nonsensical conversation we had was about whether or not Batman would own a weinermobile and if he did, would he call it the Bat-weinermobile or would he call it-"

You cut him off. "He wouldn't call it anything because the only one in Gotham who would be caught in that is Oracle or Nightwing."

Xukun rolls his eyes and shakes his head. Pushing up his glasses, he says, "You're wrong about this and you've always been wrong about this."

"I am not!"

"Are too!"

"R2? Like, D2?"

"Hey, that's the worst thing you've done actually."

You stick your tongue out at him and your eye falls on the notebook, reminding you why you were here, and you sober up instantly. "I read the notebook," you say. "Well, not all of it, but... I read enough."

"Ah," he says, his demeanor changing as well. "What did you think?" He asks carefully.

"You have a great future ahead of you as a journalist," you answer truthfully, but avoiding the question. "The stories were well-written."

"Thanks." A pause. "But how do you feel about knowing that I'm right?"

"Right about what?" You fervently hope in that moment that he's going to say something completely out of left field, like maybe that he believes the Earth is flat or that Freud was right.

"That you're Lù Tù, you're Green Rabbit."

"Why can't you be the Lois Lane to my Clark Kent?"

"So you are Green Rabbit! Because Clark Kent is Superman. Glasses are the dumbest disguise ever." Xukun says, pusing his glasses up again.

"Ah," you say. "That I can neither confirm nor deny." You give him a small smirk, one side of your lips quirking up. Your phone vibrates in a three-beat staccato. Something requiring Green Rabbit has happened. You glance at your phone and see that Jolin sent you a picture of another automaton. This time, you roll your eyes internally, it's a wolf. "I have to go," you say, standing up.

Xukun frowns, but stands up regardless to escort you out, ever the gentleman. "Is everything okay?"

"Yeah," you reassure, putting your sneakers back on. "Just have a furry little problem on my side of town."

"Okay..." he trails off, unconvinced. "Are we good?"

You turn around and take him in, his shoulders hunched slightly as he leans towards you, his fists in the pocket of his hoodie. His hair falling into his eyes just right, his lips slightly red like he'd been biting them in worry while your back was turned.

Fuck it, you think. You put your hands on his shoulders, stepping into his personal space, and you feel like the distinction between you and your hero persona isn't so stark as you say, "If I wanted to kiss you right now, would you be okay with it?"

You are close enough to see how smudged the edges of the lenses of his glasses are and as such, you can also hear how his breath stutters and watch his eyes widen slightly. "Ye-yeah," he breathes out.

"Good," you say before leaning up into him and pressing your lips to his. There's absolutely no motion on his end for a few seconds, enough time to make you start to regret your impulse and pull away, when his hands come out of his pocket.

One goes to cup your face gently, angling you to make the kiss smoother. The other hovers uncertainly by your hips and you roll your eyes, thank goodness they're closed, before grabbing his hand and putting it firmly on your hip. Having been given consent, his fingers immediately slide into the belt loop of your jeans and he uses it to tug you closer. The hand you used to guide him to your hip slides up his arm, over his shoulder, and settles in his hair. The hand that was on his shoulder in the beginning makes its way down slowly, reaching the hem of his hoodie and toying with it a bit, fingers dipping underneath it to tease lightly at the skin beneath.

He makes a noise of approval as he turns the two of you, pushing you towards the wall, and you let your hand fully slip under his hoodie, feeling blindly at his torso. He starts to trail his lips from yours, making his way down your jawline to the side of your neck as he searches for the spot that he knows will make you gasp when your phone vibrates in two more three-beat staccatos. The situation has escalated.

"Kun," you gasp out, tugging slightly on his hair, trying to put some distance between you.

"Yeah?" He mumbles against your neck, clearly enjoying the hair pulling part of this moment.

"I gotta-" you cut yourself off as he bites down on a spot near where your neck and shoulder meets before soothing it with his tongue. "Babe, I gotta go. S'm'thin' important's come up. Babe.."

He finally pulls away as your hands reach his shoulders again. He goes willingly but reluctantly. "YN," he says, his voice a little breathy. His face is flushed. His lips are definitely red from being kissed and doing the kissing, and his pupils are a bit blown out. An image you desperately don't want to leave.

But your duty to the city and its citizens comes first. "I'll come back when I'm done, I promise. I swear," you ramble, eyes flicking between his eyes and his lips. "By the gods I swear I'll be back when I'm done."

"Complex blood ritual happening?" He jokes, smile growing on his face.

"Very complex," you agree, fighting the urge to kiss his smile. "I gotta leave now or else, y'know? Timing is everything with these sorts of things."

"Yeah," he says absently, still looking dazed. "Just," he pauses, pushing his glasses up again, "just one more thing."

"What's that?"

He kisses you again. A shorter one, a sweeter one, than before. "Good luck with the complex blood ritual." He bites his lip as he steps away from you, letting you leave the wall. You thank Tùzǐ silently for the power it gives you to walk and not have your knees give out on you.

"I'll let you know how it goes," you say, opening the door.

"Good," he says back, standing in the doorway until you disappear down the stairwell. He closes the door and walks back into the living room just in time to see his favorite superhero leap into action.

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