Curate, connect, and discover
:Author’s Note:
A little something that I have been hesitant and a little shy to share, but this is a fic that I wrote a few months ago at this point, and since the Khori angst comic that I teased a few weeks ago is taking longer than I thought, I decided to treat ya’ll Khori enjoyers with a little something while waiting for the finished comic.
I wanted to write a fic like this in the first place because we needed a Khan breakdown in the show (in my opinion at least), and I basically said, “Fine. I’ll do it myself~! >:3”
(This is more of a self indulgent character study if anything lol)
By the way, a little disclaimer; if the formatting, wording, or pacing seems a little off in some spots, that’s because I was VERY rusty at the time of writing this. I was just starting to get back into the rhythm of writing fics properly after not writing anything for a REALLY long time.
I hope y’all enjoy reading this fic as much as I loved writing it!!
ENJOY!!! >:]]
Breaking Point
A Khori (Khan x Nori) one shot
This story is intended to take place sometime after Episode 8 (post-canon). The Doorman’s are finally living together as a family again, and Nori has a new body now! :DD
TRIGGER/CRINGE WARNING : emotional breakdown, angst, hurt/comfort, implied self hatred, self blame, implied low self esteem, implied lack of healthy coping mechanisms/skills, repression of emotions, bottling up emotions
- - -
Nori and Uzi are having a mother-daughter conversation and Khan is observing the interaction from afar.
Khan is analyzing Nori and Uzi’s expressions— Nori is smiling wider than he’s ever seen, and Uzi is genuinely laughing. He hasn’t seen Uzi laugh like that since… forever.
Khan tries to ignore the scene, but he can’t seem to look away. He slowly walked out of the room.
Nori was happily giggling until she sensed that something in the room was off.
Nori turned her head to look at the spot where Khan was previously standing— he wasn’t there anymore. Nori’s brows furrowed.
Uzi noticed that Nori was partially turned away.
“…What’s wrong, mom?” Uzi asks.
Nori snaps out of blankly staring into nothing and realizes Uzi was talking to her.
“Oh! Uh, N-Nothing. I um…” Nori replies with a reassuring smile on her face.
She glances at the doorway to the other room— which was a very small living area. She turns back to Uzi.
“I’ll be.. right back…” Nori says.
Uzi is confused, but she doesn’t want to question it any further.
“Uh… okay.” She says.
Uzi is of course clueless as to what exactly is the problem, but she does know that Nori doesn’t stop everything like that for no reason. Whatever is going on, it can’t be something good.
Nori pops in on the side of the doorway. She sees Khan sitting quietly on one side of the couch in the small room sitting with his arms crossed— he looked distraught.
“Hey.” Nori calls.
Khan looks up.
“What’s wrong?” Nori asks.
Khan looks back down.
“It’s nothing.” He says.
Nori lifts an unamused eyebrow.
“So you’re totally fine when you suspiciously just left the room silently and now you’re sitting here in the opposite room lookin’ sad?” She asks.
Khan doesn’t respond and instead nervously glances up at Nori but then immediately looks away.
Nori is not buying it.
“Pff. Yeah, right.”
She walks over to sit next to Khan.
“Alright, what’s going on with you?”
Khan sighs before he responds.
“Why did you come back?”
Nori raises a brow.
“Because I care about you and Uzi? Frickn’ duh!”
Nori thought that her teasing would faze Khan at least slightly, but he still stayed silent. He turned further away. Khan was not in the mood for jokes.
Nori switches to a more serious tone.
“I realized that Uzi still needs me. And it was selfish of me to not come back until now.”
She scooched closer to Khan.
“Uzi still loves me, and I still love her.”
Nori pauses. Her expression softens.
“I came back because…”
She reached to gently hold Khan’s hand.
“I still love you.”
Khan was looking up at Nori but he quickly looked back down. He pulled his hand away.
“You shouldn’t..” Khan said.
Nori’s brows furrowed.
“Why..?”
She asked with a frown.
Khan tensed up.
“Because I’m a fraud…”
His voice was almost a whisper. He could barely be heard.
“What did you say-?”
Nori asked, but she was abruptly cut off.
“I SAID I’M A FRAUD!” Khan blurted out.
Nori flinched at Khan’s sudden outburst.
“Do you not understand?! I’m a horrible person!
I literally left you and Uzi for dead in some way shape or form. And do you know what my excuse was?! I blamed it on the Murder Drones!
Can’t you see?! I only care about myself! I blame all of my problems on everything but myself!
…I never deserved Uzi. I never deserved you. …I made you and Uzi’s lives a living hell. All I’ve done for both of you is make your lives unnecessarily harder.
All I am is a pathetic coward who would rather run away from their problems instead of solving them.”
Khan paused for a short moment.
“…When I saw you two laughing together, and.. being genuinely happy, it… made me see that… I can’t make Uzi happy even if I try.
I should have been the one in your place, Nori. You and Uzi would have been better off without me. …I’m sorry.”
Khan went silent again like nothing happened.
“Khan…”
Nori said.
“I know that you’ve made mistakes. But…”
She reached to hold Khan’s hand.
“That doesn’t make up who you are.
We have all done something stupid in our lives at least once.”
She humorously snorted.
“I know I have. Don’t beat yourself up about it. You set way too big of standards for yourself.
You tend to bite off more than you can chew. Trust me, I’ve seen you do that many times before.
Cut yourself some slack. I think you’ve been through enough emotional burnout for one whole week.
The whole point I'm trying to make is that..”
Nori paused for a moment. She held Khan’s hand tightly around her palms.
“You don’t need to be perfect for me to love you.”
Khan was finally fazed.
Nori continued.
“You have good intentions. You have shown me things in myself that I would have never seen if you did not come into my life. And I am incredibly grateful for that.”
Nori lowered her voice to make it sound as comforting as possible.
“You are an amazing person, Khan. And I want you to know that.”
Khan was shaken by Nori’s words.
“I..”
Nori smiled as tears formed in her eyes.
Khan’s entire body began to tremble and he panted heavily. He clutched onto his chest, and pulled his other hand away.
Khan held the side of his head. A warning symbol flashed on his visor in the place of his left eye that said, “REPRESSED EMOTIONS UNSTABLE”. His frantic panting turned into whimpering. He tilted his head down and sobbed.
Nori’s eyes hollowed for a few moments. She fully turned herself towards Khan and immediately pulled him close to her.
Khan sobbed in Nori’s arms as she gently rubbed his back.
Khan hasn’t cried like this in a very long time. He has been hiding his true emotions for way too long at this point. It was about time he broke down.
Both stayed in each other’s arms for a while. Khan eventually slowed down his sobs. He leaned against Nori’s chest, tears still streaming down his visor.
Khan blinked slowly. He looked, and felt, completely defeated. He felt like he didn’t have any energy left to cry anymore. He was exhausted— physically and emotionally.
Nori had her hand gently resting on top of his head.
“Are you okay now?” Nori asked.
“I…”
Khan paused.
“No… I-I’m not…” His voice wavered.
Khan sat up and wiped the tears from his visor. He crossed his arms against his midriff. His eyes slowly drifted away from Nori’s gaze, and he turned his head away.
“Hey.”
Nori gently turned Khan’s head towards her.
“You matter. Never forget that.”
Khan sniffed. He finally cracked a small smile.
Nori smiled back. She fully embraced Khan. He actually hugged Nori back this time. Both stayed in each other's arms.
“Nori…?” Khan mumbled.
“Yeah?” Nori replied softly.
Khan lifted his head to look into Nori’s eyes.
“Thank you.”
Nori smiled. “You’re welcome.”
She gently grabbed either side of Khan’s face and gave him a small kiss.
Khan flinched as he felt his core whir in surprise. He was blushing so hard he thought he was going to overheat.
Nori didn’t say anything else. She just smiled.
Khan finally snapped out of his flustered trance and leaned back into Nori’s arms.
Both held each other close.
Fin~
- - -
:Authors Note #2:
If you have made it to this point,
THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR READING!! :DDD
By the way, it wasn’t mentioned in the story, but after Nori paused the conversation, Uzi decided to just end the convo there and go her separate way lol.
I was just too lazy to describe anything further without accidentally making the sequence too long or making the pacing seem stiff and awkward lmao-
Much love to y’all! <3
-ruf >:3
Random asf, but like- HEAR ME OUT FOR LIKE TWO SECONDS-
No idea why but this song gives me slight Khori vibes lol. /gen