One Word

He does not like to admit it, but it's true. Just months later, Tetsuo no longer needs fear.

It was survival to first forge his vital instincts. The urge to end the day without bloodstains on his rags — it was the wings on his feet and the frantic breath, the blaze shooting through his muscles.

For years, he never made it; he was crashed against the dead ends of alleys, as his skin painfully turned to black. The humiliation grew, steady, with each time his nose was broken. The one solution he had left was crying – he was the little creep, the one out of any gang, alone and defenseless.

But one shouted name is all it takes, when he is not enough for himself. He calls one name, and the whole gang rushes to him – it is their signal to run and to crush bones, to chase the bastards, if necessary, to the end of Neo Tokyo.

As they lie on the ground, so young and so lost already, his bullies now bend to forward the message. Kaneda's fury does not spare anyone. More than they could dream of, he does not forgive – not when it comes to his gang, never with his best friend.

*
It is not long before they steal motorcycles and start drinking. Even within the safety of the gang, among the fumes of alcohol, the matter changes shape.

Tetsuo has a pride that is bitter and swollen, scarred by his eternal second place, and there is nothing he can do without being ignored – he is the leader's favourite toy, stuck in his jokes and his unbreakable power. His own position of friend, so high and vastly recognized, makes him stand out more as a loser.

He starts twisting that name in his lips, tearing apart the reverence with each syllable. The very sound of his voice, too lucid to fit all the drinking, is a tease and a challenge – every time he pronounces it, one inch of Tetsuo slips away from the gang.

And Kaneda's smile is mockery, a grimace, almost too rigid to show he wants to play along. For what lies behind it is the scorn of a wounded leader – while deep down, in between the empty glasses, a seed of pain has fallen.

*
What Tetsuo has lost is too much to keep track of. Even now, in the last moments, he feels his memories drip one by one, to get lost on the humid ground. After so much vanity – his wishes to be the centre of his own life, his wishes to be swallowed by the earth – all of him is finally dissolving.

A precipice lies between his will and his nature. Tetsuo's soul is welcoming the call of his race, of the people he actually belonged in. Yet, in the ascent he can only give in to, his lips still move on their own.

It always was one name, that name, the joint between now and the future. It means his aim and his certainties, all his changes and resistances – it is his best friend and his fiercest hate, the name he gave to a whole life he must leave behind.

Kaneda can only listen, on the edge. He listens to the sound of his own name, as it fades with his memories. He can only hold one hand and drift back to life, letting Akira swallow their whole past. Tetsuo fades to the opposite direction.

What is left, between the two of them, is just one word.