Arcade Game | Chishiya x Reader ¹

32

The beach was louder than ever, the cheering was deafening and the clapping was like that of gunshots.

The excitement was almost contagious, but there was a small crowd within the grand one and they had purposely kept their harsh exteriors up as they scanned Hatter smiling pompously.

The militants and the executives - those were the ones with somber looks washing over their gestures - scattered around the corners of the crowd forming around Hatter who was standing up in the nicest car the inhabitants had been able to get ahold of, his arms outstretched wide by his side and his sunglasses reflecting the light of the sun beating down on him.

Almost like a spotlight, the sun had welcomed him, flattered him.

I had wondered how long the excitement in the crowd would last... there was a stark contrast of the feelings I had and the others felt in the moment everyone had sent Hatter off to his game with the expectation that he would come back unharmed and survive; as always.

However, the pure joyous moment was a severe contrast to the moment I was experiencing. Despite the contagious happiness and delirium that has swept over the crowd I couldn't share it... I was overcome with plague like anxiousness.

Maybe it was because of the strange look on Niragi's face who stood opposite Chishiya and I, leant against the structure of the beach with his gun positioned by him (the large gun had never left his side), the younger man had looked almost excitedly at Hatter as if he desperately wanted something deleterious to happen to the man, his face was etched with his own twisted desires in which were ever so simple to read... he wanted Hatter dead.

And he wasn't the only one in the crowd who did, The Last Boss was surprisingly hard to spot (usually that wasn't the case for his unique tattoos, bald head and unnerving presence had been enough to alert me he was around), he was leaning on his katana by the entrance of the beach and he stared at Hatter with a twitching smile, I could almost imagine his unusual ragged breaths.

However, my worried mind had been put at an unusual ease with the sudden hand that had connected around my waist. Wrapping me up tightly beside them.

"You have to at least smile a little y/n, don't look so worried" Chishiya had whispered, his mouth had barley moved as he uttered the words to me. Trying desperately to keep up his usual unfazed exterior... but he wasn't smiling either.

"You should smile too" I managed, despite being so quick to reply my mind was still dangerously caught up in the mere fact his hand was around my waist.

The action so deviant to his character, so unusual... maybe he had gained some new found romantic confidence after kissing me only moments ago despite the fact he hadn't truly admitted his feelings for me, instead he simply just kissed me.

Maybe now we were just friends with benefits? Only he knew the answer to that question... only he knew if we were a couple or not and I certainly didn't want to ask him that; however, as I dwell on the idea of refusing to ask him I had merely remembered those unfortunate thoughts were the ones to become a reality and therefore I had found myself trying to create a date of when the wish would become an ever so unfortunate reality.

"I don't smile, only around you, I think Hatter would be scared if I smiled"

And although his words had made me rather surprised - the fact that he had managed to bring me into almost everything - I had found myself laughing momentarily at the mere truth of his words.

He hadn't often smiled, in fact I was sure I'd never seen him smile infront of the executives. Not even a good joke could get under his skin.

Hatter had his ever so smug smile over his face, with his lips closed and with his slim eyes smiling with him he had seemed rather self obsessed as he looked around at the crowd that formed around the moving car he was in.

He was admiring his work; his ability to suddenly become a god like figure to the empire he built.

He had seemed exceptionally calm... almost as if he believed he weren't being sent off to a game in which his life was at an incredibly high risk of being snatched away from him.

Hatter and I had met eyes on his pondering vision, he had looked at me almost as if he were thankful.

I had noticed it then, the calmness behind his eyes, the content was shining behind them, and it was almost as if in the moment he held my eyes with his lips now ajar he was thanking me.

Thanking me for helping him achieve everything he wanted.

Thanking me for helping him build the beach and allowing it to become his distorted version of a utopia.

But I had just smiled back, ever so softly, I didn't want to give him anything to go off of (I didn't want him to believe I truly agreed with his distorted vision, instead I just wanted to present my own kindness in the moment our eyes connected).

And he had looked away, eventually fading away in the distance as the ever so noisy car had turned a corner.

The cheers had died down, now just excited mutters, loud laughters, whisperers of cautious suspicion.

"What do you think will happen to him?" Chishiya had asked suddenly, for a few seconds there had been a silence between us both... I knew we were both wondering the same thing, thinking of the same ideas and presenting ourselves with our own negative thoughts of just what could happen to the leader of the beach in his game and what would happen to the beach if he weren't to survive.

"I can't tell" I managed, and I couldn't; everyone at the beach had a '100% success rate', that's the exact reason they were alive, I could never understand why Hatter prided himself off of that fact when the reality of it was that we were all the same as he was... We each survived our own games, just like he had. "I just hope he lives, for the sake of everyone here"

Chishiya hummed, I had noticed his eyes fell over Niragi who had made his smug turn to the entrance of the beach as towards the last boss; before his turn Niragi had eyed us both intensely, he seemed to be looking at us both with such an unusual amount of his own twisted excitement, and even with his turn his gentle smug smile had played on his lips.

Niragi had stepped towards the Last boss, the pair standing still at the entrance for just a moment.

I had wondered just what they were doing, if they we're planning  to turn... to kill us so suddenly or taunt us so childishly.

But they both had turned, rather slowly at that, I knew Chishiya was staring at them too.

And the duo had merely laughed a little, an unsettling laugh, an unnerving simper in our direction.

But they left after their fear striking action - It was so usual of them to try and inject fear, however, they definitely had done it at just the right time for even I was tense with just what their actions meant, hung up on my own interpretations of their gesture.

"I just hope the militants don't take over" Chishiya managed, he looked towards me now, his eyes showing his uneasiness. "Because it'll be harder for me to protect you"