Always wanted to illustrate one of Jczala’s fanfics, and Wayward Turbulance was my choice back in 2019~ I sill love this fic!!!
Go and read Wayward Turbulence here !!!
Story by @jczala
“Tell me, Pandor, dearest,” Ai began, “what did you find in the end?”
He and Pandor sat, side by side, in the duel discs belonging to their respective partners. Ai sat cross-legged, dejected. Shackled by his guilt but elated by what had come from it: he achieved his goal, he brought them back from the end. Meanwhile, Pandor knelt in Ryoken’s duel disc, straight-backed and facing the future. Her face was hard to read. Ai couldn’t understand her. Not yet at least. She was a little slow, as blithe and helpful as she was.
“I found myself. You found others; I found myself.” she replied.
Ai nodded. “Cool, cool.” he murmured. “And what does that mean?”
“It means that I’ve grown.” Pandor lifted her head and her pink-maroon eyes, so insect-like, glittered. “I can see the possibilities. I chose humans, not because I was programmed to, but because I was given the opportunity to.”
Ai snickered. He couldn’t believe a program created by Kogami Ryoken of all people wished to monger philosophy and self-love and peace over war, hate, and eradication of all else.
“I hope to understand you one day. By knowing myself, I hope I will understand you better. I want to share the burden, your great sadness.” Pandor said.
“You’re just saying pretty things.” Ai said.
“I know.” Pandor confessed. “But you were the one who asked pretty things of me. Until then, that’s all they are. Baseless and saccharine but at least I have myself, my joy, my naivety. I will continue to pick humans so I can better know myself.”
Ai put his arm around Pandor. She blinked. “Pardon?”
“Your alright, Pandor.” Ai said, overly affectionate.
“Thank you, Ai. I like you quite a bit as well. You are wild and surly but I find it endearing.” Pandor replied.
Ai laughed. “Now there’s a backhanded compliment if I’ve ever heard one. You wound me, Pandor, dearest.”
“It was not my intent. But I like hurting you. It’s cathartic.” Pandor said.
“Oh, you’re going to get very good at that game when you’ve learned a bit more. Figures, look who your Papa is.” Ai said and he rubbed the base of his rounded face; not quite a chin as it didn’t jut out.
“I’ll try to adapt from all sources. Good, bad, neutral - playful, hard, and so on and so forth.” Pandor said.
“You should learn from me.” Ai said and he stuck his face in Pandor’s. “I’m the best when it comes to being all those things.”
Pandor laughed. “Yes, I know.” she murmured, her eyes glittering with some kind of adoration. “But perhaps, you ought to tell me something, Ai, dearest.”
Ai laughed. “Yes, Pandor?”
“What did you find in the end? Was it worth it?” she inquired. “Was it worth being broken, beaten, guilty, and sad? Was it worth hurting others and being hurt?”
Ai thought of how Pandor’s face looked. It was shiny and new, smooth and teal. He liked it quite a bit. Nearly human; definitely not Ignis: all in all, it was Pandor, something else entirely and that appealed to him. Her voice was not cutting nor was it scathing. It wasn’t empathetic or sympathetic or compassionate either. It was neutral. Perhaps curious. More for her to take in and help her discover this strange world around her and how she was webbed into it, now that she felt as though she had some right to this world despite the circumstances which she had been brought into. Stilted, slow, imperfect; cast aside the moment the battle was over, for her to watch and learn from because Revolver didn’t know how to be a father because his father didn’t know how to be a father either.
Though, little Ryoken would probably not be pleased with Ai’s discernment of his lineage: both blood and virtual. The thought of him being ruffled and miffed over it did greatly amuse Ai, even when Pandor stared at him, awaiting an answer.
“Yes.” Ai said. “It absolutely was worth it. You may have found yourself, Pandor, dearest, but I found others and contrary to what four people in an elevator with no exit might tell you, heaven is other people. Not hell.”
“Interesting thesis.” Pandor praised him.
Ai took her hand and Pandor caressed him a tandem reaction. It was soft; they were both soft, silicons and synthetic skins. Hurting slightly but it was their hurt that they could speak.
If there was one thing to be said for the newfound peace between the (former) Knights of Hanoi and Team Playmaker was that Ai found he had more freedom, something he discovered one day while diving the network.
Aside from the fact that Yusaku had removed the lock on the duel disk, allowing him to go where he wanted he discovered another duel disk he could sneak into, Ryoken’s. Well, there were actually a bunch of unsecured duel disks he could get into if he wanted, but working through Ryoken’s safeguards was much more fun.
Unfortunately he wasn’t as stealthy as he thought and the moment he stuck his head out for a look around he was spotted.
“What do you think you’re doing?” asked Ryoken, cocking an eyebrow curiously.
“I uh...just checking your security, looks like it’s all good here bye!” He went to dive back down only to be caught between Ryoken’s thumb and forefingers.
“Ai...”
“Ehehehe.” After having been called ‘Ignis’ and ‘Dark Ignis’ for so long, hearing Ryoken say his name was still fairly strange to Ai.
After the initial encounter, Ai found himself going freely between Yusaku and Ryoken’s duel disks, if only to spy on them and see what they did in their off times. Or to visit Earth-as he was staying with Specter who was staying with Ryoken.
And, after bouncing between the living quarters of his favourite human and his favourite human’s special person he began to notice some things.
“You know,” began Ai one day, sprawling out on the duel disk as they sat our front of Cafe Nagi. “I’m surprised you two,” he gestured to Yusaku and Ryoken. “Haven’t moved in with each other.”
Ryoken almost choked on his drink while Yusaku just stared at Ai.
“Ai, you’ve seen my place, there’s barely space for me in it.”
“Yeah, but he has a huge mansion that he never uses. Did you know he still lives on his boat?”
Ryoken sank down slightly in his seat, trying to avoid Yusaku’s gaze. It was true though, while Specter and the other Knights had moved out of the boat, Ryoken was still living in the boat, rather than the house.
“I do now. So where are you going this?”
“Well...it was something Aqua told me, when I asked her about the what ‘home’ is.”
Oh, this again. Some days earlier Yusaku had made an off hand comment to Ai wondering why he’d chosen to remain with him rather than going back to the Cyberse World which had set Ai off on wondering what exactly ‘home’ was.
“She said that, home is where the heart is, that your home is where the people who care about you are. And I don’t know if I actually have a heart, but I know you two do, and they’re clearly with each other. So it would make sense for you two to move in together, right?”
Ryoken looked about ready to crawl under the table and hide, or die on the spot either one really, his face buried in his hands as he turned an impressive shade of red.
Yusaku’s cheeks had turned a deep pink and somewhere behind them Kusanagi was laughing from within the truck.
“Please don’t go and die on me you two, it’s bad for business,” he called out between chuckles.
He honestly, to me, seems like someone who would try very, very hard not to be and/or would try his hardest not to show it. He’d even lie to himself about it. He’d just try unbelievably hard to convince himself that “No, I am not jealous. That’s absurd.” and keep all his feelings about it bottled up behind a facade of passive-aggressive politeness until it exploded on him. Maybe he wouldn’t even bother giving the feeling a name, too. I suppose the whole thing depends on what caused his jealousy in the first place, though. Like whether he’s jealous of a person or a concept or a truth he doesn’t want to accept. With being jealous to something that concerns Yusaku, I can see that going multiple ways.
If it’s of another person Yusaku interacts with, I can’t see him being openly hostile, but it probably depends on who the person is to begin with. In VR, he’s fairly aggressive, but IRL, he’s a lot softer and can be much more polite in how he speaks to others. Let’s use Shoichi as an example. He’s arguably the closest person to Yusaku and is probably one of the few who can pull a smile out of him without trying that hard. I can absolutely see Ryoken being envious of that closeness and feeling jealous of how easily Shoichi is able to protect and care for Yusaku. I doubt he’d act on his feelings and blow up because, well, this is Shoichi, who is like an older brother to Yusaku. Shoichi is someone to respect, but he can still feel jealous of the close bond he and Yusaku share without making it obvious he’s envious. I think the same thing applies for a love rival tbh.
Ultimately, I see Ryoken as the type to suffer his jealousy in silence and keep his feelings to himself.
Yusaku being jealous~
I’m sure Yusaku does and has felt jealousy at some point in his life (like with seeing other kids happy with their family or knowing his abusers were living pleasant lives while he struggled just to function on a daily basis), but he’s a bit harder to headcanon it for. He’s very closed off in his emotions and doesn’t really open up to anyone aside from Shoichi, possibly Roboppi (and that’s a whole other headcanon on it’s own), and Ryoken. Similar with Ryoken, Yusaku would probably just suffer it in silence. I doubt he’d even acknowledge his jealousy, if he realized he even had it. He might discuss it with one of the three as just “a weird feeling” and try to describe it only to have the other person “That’s called jealousy.” and Yusaku just “Oh.” Depending on who he’s speaking about it with and the subject matter (and for our purposes, it’s Ryoken-related), the answers would change. Shoichi would tease him about it, Ryoken would probably find it amusing, Roboppi would offer moral support in the form of teeny robot hugs. Those could be ways to make him face his jealousy and I think it would apply to all situations since again, he’s so closed off emotionally.
Ultimately I feel like he wouldn’t put much thought into it or act on it without being coaxed into it. haha
jczala replied to your post “You should definitely make more FB posts for AkaFuri. I love it when...”
At some point, Akashi's gotta wonder... Why Kuroko has so many pics of Furi in his phone XD
lmao yes, i imagine furihata would be confused as well: “i have no idea you’re my.. fan, kuroko. idk if i should be flattered or creeped out by this revelation.”
Mesmerised, Ryoken stared into his fathomless green eyes while his fingertip traced the curve of Yusaku’s flushed cheek.
Yusaku’s cheeks reddened even further and he instinctively leaned into Ryoken’s touch with a soft sigh and a smile, letting his cheek fall into his hand and earning a startled noise from Ryoken.
“Something wrong?” he asked, catching Ryoken’s silver eyes with his green ones.
“Ah n-no nothing,” stuttered Ryoken.
A teasing smile tugged at Yusaku’s lips as he moved to catch Ryoken’s hand with his before turning and pressing his lips into the dip of his palm, still looking up at him with half-lidded eyes.
Now it was Ryoken’s turn to blush like a mad fool as his brain short-circuited and his cheeks turned an impressive shade of red, to captivated by Yusaku to actually do anything.
