Current mood:	creative
Entry tags:	char: akito, char: azuki, char: saiko, fandom: bakuman, type: ficlet

[ficlet] Bakuman: The Third Option
Rating: PG
Pairing: Takagi Akito/Azuki Miho/Mashiro Moritaka
Disclaimer: Bakuman is created by Ohba Tsugumi and Obata Takeshi. I claim nothing~
Notes: This is very early, considering the scanlation for the first chapter only came out yesterday. I'm not even sure how all the characters refer to each other or how the fandom will refer to them, but when inspiration strikes, who am I to deny it? *now expects to get jossed as soon as the next chapter comes out, somehow*




It never occurred to you that Azuki might be the one to fail.

Through it all her path seemed easier than yours, somehow. She started small, of course, but while you were throwing scrunched up balls of paper at the bin at three in the morning the day of a deadline, copying Akito's homework, struggling to get a single publisher not to dismiss you at a glance, her emails spoke of minor but steady successes, and you couldn't help but be envious sometimes of how easy it seemed to be for her. She was doing well, making useful acquaintances. She wasn't getting held back. She didn't have an annoying partner that people kept trying to drag away from her (the number of artists in Akito's highschool who had never given up on the dream was a statistical impossibility), or who'd be so overjoyed with finally getting published that he'd gleefully steal -because 'accept' is not a word you want to think- her first kiss.



Getting published, however, was only the first step. Then came staying high enough on the charts not to get cancelled, again and again, and too many short nights made downright sleepless because it was the only time you could take to write to her. Only good news, ever; Akito was the one who took the brunt of the complaining and held you up through the worst days with his blind, senseless optimism.

At least until you figured out that on those long afternoons when he never told you where he went, he was actually meeting up with her.

For someone so smart, he sucked at noticing he was being followed. She too seemed so engrossed in their conversation, in a small but trendy café that she'd once mentioned wanting to go to, that she didn't notice you walking right past them to sit at the next table, back turned to them but listening to their every word.

They were talking about you.

More exactly, he was talking about you, telling her all the things you'd censored in your past emails, and she drank every word. "I wish he'd tell me more about this," she said in a sigh when he was done.

"He doesn't want to worry you," Akito answered. "You're doing your best too, he doesn't want to hold you back. It's kind of sweet, no?"

"But it makes no sense, if you're telling me anyway."

There was a moment of silence, then the sound of someone sucking the last drops of liquid through a straw. "Well, I'm Cyrano," he said finally. "I don't count."

You never called him on it, even after you looked up who that Cyrano was and why he mattered. But the next email you sent included details on some of the less pleasant aspects of your life, and his address in the CC line.

He started answering back, and stopped disappearing. To this day, you're still not sure if he knows what happened.



Getting the anime deal was the last obstacle, and it was passed just as the buzz in the community was that Azuki's next audition would clinch her first major role.

Six years of hard work were paying off, and the timing seemed like destiny.

You were terrified.



That was yesterday. Now she's just stepped out of a studio, a smile on her face that seemed wrong for reasons you couldn't quite define, until she told you - and Akito standing by your side - that she'd just signed her first contract for a main role.

For another series than yours.

"Well," Akito says after too long a silence, "let's go celebrate, then."

You want to punch him in the face, which is hardly a rare occurrence. "Show proper contrition, you bastard!" you say instead. Azuki giggles, probably at his innocent expression.

"But I'm really happy," he says shamelessely in the face of your crushed dreams and broken vows (but you were sure, so sure that she'd get the role that it didn't occur to you not to see her afterwards). "Because there's still something to aim for. And in the meantime," he wraps an arm around your shoulders, the other around hers, and pulls the two of you until you're facing each other. He doesn't let go. "You two aren't leaving me behind yet."

You want to answer that you wouldn't leave him for anything, but the girl you've liked since middle school and haven't seen for almost as long is standing in front of you, so close, and your heart's in your throat.

"Plus, even if you can't get married you can still have other relationships."

For a few seconds Azuki and you blink at each other, unable to figure out what he means; then your eyes widen and she blushes, and then you blush, because, of course.

Akito always has answers to the problems you haven't even considered yet.