{Fukase}

"You wear your heart on your sleeve // So I can see how you see //
While my heart stayed within me"

- Hold Fire (by heart★breaker)

"Um... are you okay?"

I sighed at the stack of work in front of me. "No, clearly," I replied deadpanned, though he probably couldn't see those papers in front of me to really understand. Or maybe he could?

As if he could hear my thoughts, the red-haired asked. "What's all those papers for?"

"Something that we humans dread called school," I answered, smacking my face to my desk in exasperation, cueing a short gasp from him. It's not a polite thing to do in front of others, but I couldn't help it; I hated doing work like this for hours on end.

"If school for you is anything like 'Lost One's Weeping', then I guess I can understand your struggle a bit," Fukase remarked, poking his head through the screen already and staring down at my delirious state.

Ah, of course he'd have some memory of that song. He wasn't the original singer for it, sure, but he did mention before that Vocaloids gain memories of both original and cover songs that they were tuned for. And considering how many people have made covers of the iconic song with Fukase, it made sense that he'd remember it.

"It's not completely like that," I tried to reason, raising my head to the left to look at him. "Though if you're looking at the negative side of school life all mashed up into one heaping mess, then yeah, 'Lost One's Weeping' covers it pretty well,"

Instead of replying back, Fukase had his eyes trained on me, an eyebrow raising at me as if something was amiss. Despite my calm (and mostly-dead-tired-inside) exterior, I became slightly nervous under his gaze. Those red eyes were practically piercing through me, after all.

It was kinda funny that I was paralyzed by his fiery red eyes and not by the fact that there was a disembodied face staring at me.

"What?"

"Your forehead," He replied bluntly. "It's red,"

I blinked. "It is?" My hand rubbed against the aforementioned part of my face as I sat back up on my wheelie chair. "Uh, there's no blood, right?" I absentmindedly asked him.

"What's blood?"

Right, he's a Vocaloid, not a human. Of course, he wouldn't know what blood is.

"Um, like there's no bright red liquid on my forehead? Or tiny specks of red liquid?" I explained half-heartedly while looking around my room for a handheld mirror somewhere. This 'red' on my forehead better not be because of that table smack from earlier...

Meanwhile, Fukase tilted his head sideways. "Not that I can see... Then again, you always have your lights off so it's kinda hard to tell... Hold on,"

Before I could respond to his request, the red-haired Vocaloid had reached both his hands out into reality again, gently pressing his palms against my cheeks and essentially cupping my face as he took a closer inspection of my forehead.

E-excuse me WHAT?!

The strange warmth emanating from his calloused fingers could barely rival with the heat growing in my cheeks. Despite the awkward position that we were in, my mind was too focused on the spectacle of Fukase eyeing my face with a focused stare, only for it to lighten ever so slightly after a few moments. "I don't think there's any red liquid on your face," He reported, seemingly oblivious to the situation. (This guy has absolutely no romantic experience whatsoever-!) "Your skin's just really red, that's all,"

You couldn't just say that before?!

"Ah, well maybe it's just a rash or something from earlier," I hurriedly replied, trying to hide my embarrassment. "This is what I get for smacking my head on the table, I guess, heh..." My attempt to fake a nervous laugh actually became a nervous laugh, and it didn't help that Fukase was not letting go of me.

Instead, his eyes were locked on me again, the details of his own face staring back at me. I couldn't help as I stared at him, scrutinising the details of the deformities on his left cheek and his fully red left eye. In the dimness of my room where the only light source was my computer screen, I could see his eyebrows furrowing and his mouth drooping into a frown.

"Uh, Fukase," I whispered, finally regaining my voice. "You can let go of me now," I continued with a sheepish smile.

He blinked. "Oh, sorry," It seemed that he was hesitating to do so, however, as his palms continued to hover over my cheeks for a little bit before he retracted them completely back to his sides.

There was a short silence between us before he spoke again. "Is it okay if I step out there for a little bit?"

I nodded silently as I stepped aside, watching as he leaped out of the computer screen just like last time, landing on his feet gracefully without a single stumble. As he turned back to me, I could spot him gripping tightly to his cane with his bandaged left hand while his right was located on his upper left arm... If anything, he looked... nervous?

"Uh..." I started, my mouth curving into a sheepish smile yet again. "Are you gonna sit down or are you gonna stand there all night?"

He didn't respond. Or rather, he didn't verbally respond. He did react by stepping towards me, bending down a little so that his eyes met mine again. After hanging his cane on his arm like a hanger, his hands reached out to my face once more, my nervousness from earlier immobilizing from any movement whatsoever.

And then in the midst of the new quiet, I could hear him muttering in frustration. "There it is again..."

"What is?" I asked shakily as he retracted his hands back to his sides before slumping to the floor in a cross-legged position, a wide frown all over his face. "It's just... Ugh, I don't really know how to explain it," He mumbled, his eyes downcast to the ground.

I stood up from my chair and knelt in front of him, my heart trying really hard not to beat out of my chest. "Maybe I can help with that?"

Fukase refused to look back at me. "Um, well..." He stuttered helplessly as he scratched his head. "I feel kind of... embarrassed saying it out loud but..."

"Do you ever feel... something warm in your chest?"

"Something warm? Can you describe it a bit more?"

He grumbled inaudibly. "Uh... It's uh... Basically, every time I get really close to you, there's this really warm feeling in my chest, like a fire? I'm sorry but I don't know how else to describe it," He replied quickly, turning away from me entirely as I sat there, dumbfounded.

Oh my freaking god.

He doesn't know how it's like to feel affection towards someone else.

To be very honest, the revelation caught me off-guard. After all, there were quite a few songs and covers of Fukase singing love-related songs, but for him to have no idea of what they even meant? That was just...

... That sounded tragic.

My heart ached for the Vocaloid. It seemed so silly for me to do that, but I couldn't help it. To sing something and not understand what it truly means, was that meant to be the fate of all the Vocaloid voice banks? Now that I thought about it, was that meant to be the only reason they existed?

But that isn't true anymore. This figure in front of me is real. He can feel the same emotions that I feel.

" ... Fukase, I know what you're feeling," I said softly, tapping lightly on his shoulder. It seemed that after his bout of sulking to himself, he was willing to turn back to me, his eyes still looking towards the floor accompanied by a guilty look on his face. He looked like a child about to get scolded.

That expression made me chuckle. "Why the guilty look?" I asked, cueing him to look up a little. "I'm... not really sure," He started. "I think it might be because I touched your face two times earlier...?"

I smiled kindly, the same way I smiled at Oliver the other night. "Well, you did nothing wrong, if that's what you're wondering about. Also, that warmth in your chest? It often appears when you feel all kinds of emotions, but more often or not, it means that you feel safe,"

"Safe?" The boy tilted his head to the left and I was surprised that his hat still wouldn't fall off.

To answer his query, I nodded. "Yeah, safe and... I guess comfortable, too. You basically feel like nothing could harm you or you're with someone that you truly trust. The reason for that warmth isn't always the same for everyone, though. Sometimes, it depends on the situation," I explained in the simplest details that I could think of.

Fukase blinked at me a few times before taking a glance at his bandaged hands in front of him. "Human emotions are so weird," He remarked with a frown, still visibly confused.

"Hah, I guess that's to be expected. Humans are complicated," I admittedly shrugged. "It's only natural that you don't understand, being a Vocaloid and all,"

"I want to try,"

"What?"

Fukase turned back to me, his eyes now serious, a complete change from the guilty look from before. "I want to try to understand human emotions," He stated simply.

~~~~~

Fukase couldn't really get it. Even after listening to his owner explain the warmth in his chest, he still couldn't get it. There were so many questions popping about in his head, like 'how does a body generate that warmth out of nowhere?' Or 'how does it come in and go away so quickly?' It was almost as if every question only begged for many more to be answered.

That wasn't to say that he was deterred by that, though. In fact, the prospect of finding answers was what motivated him to tell his owner that he wanted to better understand human emotions. The red-haired Vocaloid had memories of all the songs he sang, all the covers he was tuned for. He knew what he was singing; he just didn't understand it.

What did it mean to 'love in secret'? What was it like to fall in love in 'Suzhou'? Why was it 'game over' after you fall in love with someone?

It was hard for a voice bank, a mere computer program, like him to really understand the meaning behind those lyrics, but... Something was ailing him to still try. Maybe it was because of that anomaly that made him and all the other Vocaloids come to life?

Fukase found that he didn't really care about that. He could only focus on the fire in his chest.

~~~~~

(A/N: ... I sold my soul to this boy, okay? I just...I love him- >////<)