Pointless

Every single night, I go to sleep hoping the dream will bring me some relief, but every time it begins, I see it has all become pointless.

"The ice cream flavor I picked today was so good... I think it is my favorite." I say washing the dishes.

"...I thought it was NOTHING special." He chuckles.

I turn off the sink.

"I said it's my favorite, can't you at least be a little nice about it? Or maybe happy for me?"

"Oh, I'm sorry, how was that rude? I didn't think about offending you, I just thought you wanted to know my opinion."

"Yeah, of course I wanted to know your opinion, when I fucking got here with the ice cream and asked you if you liked it."

"I HATED it. It's terrible, but I don't tell you because just saying I didn't think it was 'nothing much' is enough to make you THROW A TANTRUM."

"I'm not the one who's SCREAMING."

"YOUR. LOSS."

I lock myself into the bedroom without even looking into his eyes.

This bedroom has become a warzone.

"Look, you need to have the maturity to keep a conversation. You can't simply run away." He says outside the door, waiting for me to open.

"It's NOT a conversation if you're SCREAMING AT MY FACE."

"...Well, if it helps... You're still screaming too."

I sigh. I hear him take a deep breath.

"...Can you apologize for the thing you did...?" He says more calmer than I've seen him in days.

"What thing?"

"You know what you're talking about."

I stay silent for some seconds.

"This is about the Bunny thing, isn't it?" I say hugging a pillow, not wanting to let him in.

He sighs again.

"Can I come in?"

I reluctantly open the door. He has his arms crossed, it looked like it was hard to say it.

"It is. It's all about it... I didn't really actually care about any of the fights we had this week... None of it mattered, I can't remember what were the things we argued about. What was it this time, napkins? Oh no, that was yesterday." He says sitting pn bed.

I let out a little giggle.

"I don't know if this is supposed to be reassuring or not..." I sniff. "...I'm sorry."

I sigh. He looks still so very depressed.

"It's okay, I'm sorry too.

Things didn't change much. Even if we talked about it, the mood of the apartment just doesn't change much. The stupid little verbal attacks could come off anywhere, at any point, like both our brains were too used to it to let go.

I spot Hero slashing trees with his sword near the council.

"Morning, brick head." I say as I pass by

"Good MORNING, my little fucker!" He says in the most cordial pose possible. I hold my laughter.

At least things still feel the same in here.

"How are you?"

I turn around to make sure I'm not hallucinating. He's smiling at me with red cheeks, timidly waiting for a response.

"...A little better now." I say smirking, unpretentiously walking to his direction in an unconscious attempt to regain the thrill of the vice I got in my dreams. "How about you?"

He smiles more, even redder.

"Over the moon..." He says taking a deep breath.

I chuckle a lot as I stop walking, standing right next to him. As I smile to him, I notice I've never seen him looking this weak before... I smile more, it clearly works.

"Plans for the night?" I ask.

His eyes don't believe what he hears.

"None. No. Absolutely no plans at all, not a single plan. Free the entire night and tomorrow too." He says with a huge smile. "You?" He looks into my eyes as if he was waiting for something. I only chuckle.

"I was actually heading for some resistance test on this new arm. I think when I dashed at you into a punch, it broke the knuckles." I open and close my hand. "...not that you can see it, it was on the insides." I chuckle embarrassed. "So I'm going to try to test all the limits of this arm before building the new one! SO I know exactly what to change.

His eyes open wide in surprise.

"So that's how you make those things? I noticed it was practically unbreakable now."

"...Not exactly." I giggle. "The tests are usually a little unhelpful... I can never break the arm on my own... You're the only one to have ever broken it."

He squints one of his eyes, trying to understand.

"Wait, where do I come at?"

"I make the arm, I test on you, you break the arm, I find out what to fix. Simple, all again and again." I say chuckling more.

He looks extremely in shock.

"...So you've been testing on me? All those years? "

"...I guess you could say so." I break in chuckles.

He laughs, nervously.

"So... So... All the pointless fights we've ever had... Actually had some use to you? I was helping?" He says extremely red and not smiling anymore.

"Exactly! It wouldn't be practically unbreakable now if you hadn't helped me find the weak spots."

His smile grows wide in happiness like I've never seen him smile before. He yields his sword.

"...So I aim for the arm?"

I look surprised at his smirk, but then I understand what he means.

"You go for the arm." I smile."

It begins. We both seem exceptionally motivated today for this. For these 15 years we've been fighting, I don't thing we've ever spend this long trading hits. I shoot at him but we quickly learn the sword really is perfect to block them. The new metal on the arm is so strong that I can practically flurry his sword with it. The sword comes clashing at my arm, I hold it with my hand, it slightly enters the metal. Very close to him, looking into each others eye, still trying to push harder than the other, he says:

"Should I break the leg too?"

"No, the leg is too much work, and I won't be able to walk home."

"Okay, just the arm." He pulls his sword back and the dancing continues.

I end up using the cannons more than anything at him. He doesn't get bothered by the explosions, but he still tries to avoid them. After many hours of shooting lazers at him, we're both clearly mentally drained, only doing it still because it was fun. A swing of his sword accidentally drops me to the ground. I try to shoot, but I notice the amno is over. I keep deep breathing as I sit on the grass, until he suddenly steps on top of my metal arm, gently pressing it.

"It's still overheating." He takes his foot off, you can see the imprint of his shoe. "I don't think it was because the cannons on your leg were too strong, but the arm is overheating the inside, that's probably it."

"It usually cools down very quickly..." I say out of breath as well.

Dying, Hero slowly sits under a tree, exhausted. I was already recomposing myself.

"I tried to not destroy the arm this time, just find the weakness." He giggles. "Tell me if it's better to upgrade it like this or not, but if destroying helps, just bring a spare set! Even a leg. If anything, I can take you home."

I blush

"Again." I say standing up and looking down at him. "The metal cooled off. If I don't use the cannons and just force, I'm sure I can beat you."

He looks surprised at my determined face.

"Again?? Ahah... Alright."

He doesn't hesitate. I don't throw a single bomb, I just use both my fists to punch him as much as I can. He presses the sword against my arm, I stop it from going further again.

"Oh? It's that strong? Look..." One of his hands let go of the sword, the weight drops more against my metal hand, trying to hold the sword by the blade. "One hand, wanna see no hands?" He smirks, teasing the hell out of me.

"Gh... Fuck... You..." I push the sword with force, he looks terrified for one second.

"No hand." He drops the sword onto my open palm. Trembling, I use both my hands to hold it, not believing I was lifting it.

"You... Can hold it..." His shocked face slowly turns bright red, he takes the sword again from my hand. "This is starting to get fun," He smiles, I giggle.

"Yeah, this is the best fun I've ever had in months." I try to kick his face, but I end up tripping. He puts one hand behind my back so I wouldn't fall and looks into my eyes.

"Yeah, right? I love it." He says still really excited even though we have been fighting for an entire day with not a single break.

We laugh and laugh, it was all so fun, I just didn't think a good time like this could ever exist.

He suddenly stops laughing, I look to see he's frozen, staring at my eyes from so close. He throws that stupid sword on the floor, and at the same time, we both lean in for a kiss. An irrational, unnatural, irresistible kiss. My hands hold his face tightly, then slowly pace through his arms, that are wrapped around my torso in a hug. I close my eyes tightly as this takes way longer than any kiss we've ever had in my dreams, my body trembles, my mind goes blank, and I don't want to ever wake up again...

"Wake... Up?"

I feel the metal in between our bodies, and our lips finally go apart, as he practically can't take my quivering mouth out of his. My eyes, hypnotized, look up at him. Sudden but not aggressively, my expression changes into a hybrid in between immense sadness and anger. I begin to cry as I'm so extremely mad.  As his eyes open wide and his face burns realizing what has taken place, I slap his face in the heat of the moment, but so weakly it was shameful.

"H-How dare you... how dare you take this long to kiss me you dumb idiot??" I say continuously crying. His mouth trembles, I see his eyes clearly about to cry just as much, but before he could say anything, I run away as fast as I can.

"THIS NEVER HAPPENED." I impulsively scream on the way out.