What controls the heart
Pain.
But not just physical pain. It was the kind of pain nobody can describe in words, though many may or may not try. It was emotional pain, like when you lose a loved one.
Joe felt this pain.
He came from an orphanage before he joined the Zangyack. He was alone, and in the Zangyack, he knew he would've died if he'd never met Cid.
Cid.
Sempai.
This kind of pain was tugging heavy on his heart as he strode down the street. Running away isn't usually how you solve things, but if anybody else got hurt like Marvelous did, he was going to break down.
Marvelous.
Now that he thought about it...he was kind of Marvelous' sempai now. Sure, he was Captain Marvelous, and Joe was only first mate, but still. Gokai Blue was older, stronger in some ways, a lot more serious, and a disiplined two-sword fighter. He was a fierce warrior, and Gokai Red was the brash and cocky little brother.
But Joe wasn't always like that.
I used to be a weakling, straight from the orphanage, he thought, scowling a bit. What could he have possibly been thinking, enlisting to join like that?
Well...he didn't exactly have a choice...
Flashback
He was perched on the top of his bed, of which he had to share with two other younger boys who found it funny to harass him. He found them annoying, bratty, and spoiled, but there wasn't much to do about it. His bedmates were currently playing some cheap game called hopscotch with some girls, so he was, for a moment, in peace.
"Listen up!" and suddenly an Action Commander was in there, and he felt a fighting urge well up inside of him. He'd always hated the Zangyack...
None the less, he stood up and listened as the Action Commander spoke, "All boys above the age of seventeen will be coming out to one of our camps and doing a test course. If you do well, you live. If you don't...well, you won't be walking out."
Joe's eyes widened a bit as his two bedmates ignored everything. He was nineteen...
Damn, he had rotten luck.
"Joe Gibkin," the Scourmin observing with the Action Commander smirked, "you will be coming with us."
The course was grueling, with the fire balls and forced to fight a LOT of Gourmin. And to know he was going into the army...
Well, maybe he'd get to have his own bed
End Flashback
That was all he tried to have hope for: To have his own bed. Well, the army was absolute hell. He found himself not wanting to sleep after the first day of 'real' training.
Another Flashback
Phyiscal pain was eating his body alive.
He lay there in the cot thing they'd given him to sleep on, which was kind of a big deal, since if you did bad, you slept on the floor. He kind of preferred to floor, since that meant he was being loyal to them. He would never be loyal to Zangyack.
But he couldn't get out, or he'd die. Just like if he didn't get in, he'd be murdered.
"We got some luck..." an older man mumbled from beside him on the floor, and he had to agree, nodding best he could with an almost broken neck.
"I want outta here already," the younger sighed somewhat sadly, actually missing the orphanage, "I'd be better off homeless."
"I was homeless," the man chuckled, "yeah, it's better than this shit. My name's Cid."
"Joe," he replied, and the second they shook hands, the would-be Gokai Blue had a feeling they just might friends.
"Oh my God..." the male with a ponytail was in agony as he rolled over to his side the next day, clutching his heavily bleeding wound in his abdomen. He was going to die...
"So tell me something, Joe..." Cid was suddenly there, looking him seriously in the eyes, "do you want to live and become a warrior? Or do you want to die and leave?"
Joe had to ponder that. He wanted to die, really...but the look in Cid's eyes showed they could and would get out one day. If they became stronger, they could do it...they really were friends.
Their empanthy power spoke they were more like brothers now.
"Cid..." he grabbed the outstretched hand that was offered, "sempai..."
End 2nd Flashback
Brothers. They were just as close as he was to Marvelous now, if not closer.
Gokai Blue sat on a bench, filling dizzy from the heat and all of the rememberence of his past. It was grusome...he winced as he remembered the run he'd taken on and the emotional pain.
It was just as bad now as it was then.
Oh yeah, another flashback
'I have to go back...'
That was the only thought going through his head. But he kept running.
That's not what Cid-sempai would want him to. But it's what he wanted him to do. His sempai was probably dead by now, overwhelemed and caught...and he would be next. His hand felt at the eletric tracker collar as he sighed heavilly, sweating out his body weight and then some. He was going to die.
But he still wanted to go back.
He would always regret he never did, and he knew it.
End Flashback...a third time
Joe rose after another moment.
He had to keep moving, like he did then. He was running away again while his comrades battled and suffered consquences. He may be a fierce and disiplined warrior, but he was human. He was scared, and he was insecure, now more than ever.
All I'm good at is running away...he thought bitterly as he walked.
But this time, he had a good reason. He was going to save Cid-sempai. If he didn't...he was going to die.
He wanted to go back just as he did when he ran from the scene of their little uprising. But he couldn't for the same reason. Deep down in his heart that was iced over so long ago, he knew that it was because he had a brother who needed him.
And what controls the heart also controls the mind.