The Survivor
by Ms. Kinnikufan
Disclaimer: Don't own.
When Suguru Kinniku looked at his son Mantaro, he saw a survivor.
Many would/had laughed at that statement.
Spoiled pants-wetting Mantaro Kinnniku a survivor? What a joke!
Very few knew of Akira, Toshio, or Nana, who would have been Mantaro's older siblings if they had been stillborn or miscarried.
Nor did they know of Junko who would have been Mantaro's younger sister.
Many of Earth didn't know about the tendency for Kinniku queens to miscarry because "it would make us look weak", his father would say.
"Pretend it never happened" his father told him when Akira was miscarried.
He didn't know why he and Binibida did, but they did. He was buried in a graveyard made specially royal stillbirths.
Because they were the royal family, everybody else did.
This repeated with Toshio and Nana.
Suguru found himself wishing that someone, anybody, would break the silence, even insensitively.
The memory of the children who might have been burned inside him and Binibida both.
It would erupt in Binibida as crying jags and fits of anger. People assume it was just "that time of month" or "lady hormones", which only sadden/angered her more.
It would erupt in Suguru as fits of extreme goofiness, clumsiness and on a few awkward occasions, gas.
When he acted this way, the people would say "He's a dumb ass. We love him, but he's a dumb ass."
Neither husband or wife said anything to each other.
So it was kept a "secret".
Then Mantaro was born. That was the word: born. He staid alive.
In order to keep it that way, Suguru sheltered from every sort of harm and stress. Some would say he unreasonably spoiled the boy.
Suguru was real excited when Binibida got pregnant five years later and went on and on how Mantaro was going to be a big brother.
Mantaro had been so adorable, he assumed that a stork would really appear and had waited by the mailbox with a big bag of birdseed. He later made a phone call to the kinniku planet post office to know where it was.
He learned that it was "inside mommy" and started to asked very awkward questions.
Suguru presumed that since Mantaro had lived, this baby would too.
He presumed way too much.
Binibida went into labor at six months.
Mantaro didn't understand the consequences of this, he thought the baby wouldn't come out if it wasn't safe to do so.
Junko died, and they was nothing he could have done about it.
Mantaro, unlike everybody else, refused to forget about Junko and kept asking when the funeral was.
The answers were always "shut up, you're making your mother sad" and sometimes a smack in the face by grandfather Kinniku.
Mantaro eventually stopped asking.
Binibida never got pregnant again thank to surgery.
Mantaro was left the only survivor. The only heir. The precious only child.
Suguru didn't show it, but he secretly hoped Mantaro would have to become a guardian chojin. He wanted Mantaro to keep living. Mantaro just being his son instead of a champion would have more then enough.
But he his son was a guardian chojin and more importantly, was still very much alive.
His son was still a survivor.