To Kazuki, September had always been a dreary month, with the dwindling heat and encroaching chill in seasons.
Somehow, September only managed to get worse as he grew older.
Kazuki tightens the scarf around his neck, the rare frown on his face pulling tighter as he crosses off yet another memorial visit off his calendar.
The first week is over, and the second is halfway through. Still, Kazuki cannot bring himself to release the tension settled in every knot of his body just yet.
Normally Juubei would have a ready hand at his shoulder, kneading out the knots. But today was...special. Today everyone silently left him be, and for that Kazuki was grateful.
His heels click against the pavement, and he mentally winces at how loud every step seems to be. Dress shoes were so stiff and uncomfortable, but he supposes, belatedly, that they were a tad better than geta.
Kazuki glides his train pass through the reader, then crossing the barricade in a smooth motion. The train comes running up the platform not five minutes later, and he gratefully takes a seat in one of the near empty carriages.
Not many visited this part of Shinjuku, not anymore. The greenery and bushlands had grown far too thick for recreational activity, and with the ever thickening botany, even wildlife seemed to shun it.
But Kazuki knew better. Everything was hidden from sight, that was all. The flowers, the sunspots, the animals.
Even the ancient households that bore the proud names of Fuuchouin-Kokuchouin and Kakei.
Crossing his ankles, Kazuki neatly folds the cellophane wrapping he'd been holding onto in halves. Condensation clings to the plastic, to his fingers, and he wonders if the chrysanthemums he'd left at the base of the mountain would be washed away by the rain; and decides cryptically it wouldn't really matter.
After all, the act of leaving flowers and tombstones, existent or imagined, were all done for the comfort of the living. And he was comforted enough, with the familiar sight of the arching mountaintops and heavy scent of dew.
Sometimes Kazuki wasn't sure if there was anything in him left to comfort.
The train jerks over a particularly rough spot on the tracks and Kazuki allows himself to be shaken with it.
Watching the scenery roll by, Kazuki finds himself unable to think of any other reason he'd returned, other than obligation and routine.
'There isn't anything left, anyway.' Kazuki thinks as he leaned his head against the glass divide. 'Even if there was, none of it would belong to me.'
At that, a pang strikes his heart. He isn't so greedy to thirst after silly things like title and heirship, but he does miss his mother's koto and his father's short sword.
Abruptly, Kazuki shoves the cellophane into his bag by his side, physically pressing all these thoughts back into his mind. Into the very recesses, where they should stay until next September.
He pulls out his dairy, absently flipping to the ninth month that's littered with neat writing. Kazuki is tempted to scoff at himself for trying to believe that by keeping a journal, it would mute the reality that every event of every day in September has been etched painfully into his brain, able to be recited at a moment's notice.
Kazuki's weary gaze drifts down the page. Two days later, the annual string-spar between the houses.
"If I may, I would like the right to spar with the heir of the Fuuchouin main house."
- Silver slicked grace bearing honour most men would have crumbled under, had said.
Without his noticing, the scenery had melded into highrises and telephone poles, mixed with the occasional spray of leaves. Kazuki takes it, and the following announcement as a timely signal that his stop is nearing.
"The next stop is Shinjuku station. You may change to routes B, C and E here. The next stop is Shinjuku station. Please mind your step."
Kazuki neatly packs the notebook away, standing as the doors slide open.
Stepping out into the crowded station, he briefly takes a breath and notices the ash filled gray it tastes like.
Putting one foot before another, he decides that he doesn't want to spend on taxi fares today. Besides, if he moved fast enough, he would get there just on time for his appointment.
Leaves crunch and crackle beneath his feet. Kazuki doesn't look down, nor does he think of the way leaves and fire sound too similar, too loud.
His mother's kind words, stuttering past blood filled lips, blends into the reds. As did the passion of the Toufuuin heir, led back with a mayday string of the same colour.
The blacklit glow of his scorched kimono sleeve caressed orange. As did the vicious glint of reflected moon on spectacles, a moment before it had swallowed the man whole.
That bright, frightful blaze burned into the yellow. As did the pale uniform stutter, before it gave way to a clump of black strings and a forceful hand that tore it out.
Kazuki's next step is especially vicious.
When he turns into Ura-Shinjuku, he's mutedly glad that the metal fortress is devoid of nearly all plant life.
His walk to the Honky Tonk is quicker than it usually is, despite the roundabout to avoid Central Park. The bell clanks into the door that swings shut behind him, and Kazuki smiles at the duo that had called him here.
"Kazu-chan!" Ginji happily greets. Kazuki figures the pastry in his hand was what kept the blond from his customary pounce.
"Yo, thread spool." Midou says, care less as ever. When he turns to face Kazuki, his grin all but falters at the brunette's all-black attire. Kazuki chooses not to comment at the way Midou falls silent for a second too long.
"Hello Ginji-san, Midou-kun." Kazuki says, instead. "I understand I was called here for a retrieval…?"
After an especially long plea from both, might he add. They had been coercive at best, and desperate at worst. It was the lengthy phone call and Juubei's silent shrug that eventually wore Kazuki down to at least, agreeing to listen to the terms of the job.
Settling down at the barstool next to Ginji, Kazuki tilts his head, not missing the way he exchanged a look with his partner.
Ginji seemed unusually nervous. Fidgeting around much more than he would, constantly messing with the poorly knitted sweater. Kazuki suppressed a need to ask for the strongest shot of espresso.
September never bore good tidings.
"Actually, Kazu-chan," Ginji twisted his barstool to face Kazuki, who followed suit. "The job's done."
Kazuki blinked, not understanding.
"I mean, we never needed your help for a job! Well, I mean this is still related to the job but not the doing part, just the retrieving! I mean, retrieval. The client wanted us to bring something back for you." Ginji explained, floundering gestures at Kazuki's encouraging nod.
Retrieve something for him? Kazuki wasn't sure what there was of anything of his to retrieve that wasn't ash and bone. An awning ache in his chest grows.
Ginji shoots a glance over his shoulder at Midou, who simply takes a mouthful of his coffee. Clearly, Midou had no plans in interfering with whatever reward this retrieval entailed. Kazuki isn't sure what this forebodes.
Then, a warm hand is enveloping his own and his attention is switched back to the blond. Ginji clasps Kazuki's hand, giving it a squeeze.
"...This is the retrieval item." Ginji says softly, retracting his hand to dig into his pocket.
Gingerly, he pulls out a loosely held fist, turns it around and -.
An audible gasp escapes Kazuki's lips before he can help it, throat clenching shut and brain wiring to a halt at the sight of a feathered accessory resting in Ginji's palm.
A wild flicker, a charged grin and a dance too fast for eyes and string to follow.
Kazuki didn't even notice his fingers were shaking until he grasped the earring, digits curling protectively around it. His other hand comes up to cup his first, a delicate shell protecting the one thing Kazuki had longed to take off his friend as he draped Fuuga's flag over him.
String-accessories were considered the vessels of one's spirit. To remove it from the dead was akin to desecration; and although Kazuki knew Saizou would hardly have minded him taking it as a memento, Kazuki knew the Eastern family would have mourned tenfold.
So he'd left it dangling quietly from Saizou's ear, carving the peaceful smile into memory instead.
Kazuki wanted to smile, thank Ginji and Midou and even their mysterious client. But he found himself frozen, nothing but the feather soft against his calloused palms registering in his broken mind.
Facial muscles unable to move, eyes glazed and hands shaking.
"Kazu-chan?" Ginji tentatively asked.
Somehow, Kazuki was aware of the electricity user's worried, floating hands, the concerned side eye of Midou, Paul, Natsumi and Rena's careful disappearance.
Kazuki opened his mouth, willing a thank to roll off his tongue, even a careless comment or goodbye to sweep him out this establishment, but all that came tumbling out was a crooked wail.
Bending over, Kazuki sobbed.
Anguish cracked his weak pretense, the reds and oranges and painful blues bleeding through all the blacks.
Reality cracked into Kazuki once more - kind, beautiful Saizou who protected and loved honourably his whole life was no more.
The wails were almost unbearable, tearing him apart inside out, fighting to be let out.
Kazuki cried for all the years he didn't, cried for all the funerals he couldn't attend, cried for the Heavens that denied him passageway time and time again because duty and love would never have allowed him entry.
Guilt and regret and hurt flooded every sense of Kazuki's, ringing in his ears.
What was he worth so much of, that people threw themselves to sacrifice for? What made his flesh and bone any more valuable than all those who had died protecting it?
"I'm glad I could protect you, my prince."
"I - ," Kazuki gasped, through the salty tears continuously rolling down his flared cheeks, "I ne-never got to thank him. I never even got to say - to say - goodbye - !"
Voice cracking, Kazuki bowed his head further, pressing the earring to his chest.
"He shouldn't have - shouldn't have died! I was - I was - The reason - And he still - still - !" Kazuki found his sentences half finished, uncompleted.
So he wailed, willing all the sadness to escape him in the form of the unsightly sounds.
Somewhere along the line, Ginji had captured him in a tight hug, muting the anguish with his sweater.
Eventually, when the anguish had exhausted itself into murmuring sadness, Ginji spoke.
"Saizou was a good man." Ginji whispered, watery and sad. And Kazuki nodded, knocking his forehead on his clasped hands.
Blood torn uniform, a sad smile, thankful words.
"I wish," Kazuki whispered back, "I had told him that."
"Pretty sure he knows." Midou says. "Anyone would figure that crying over a dying man meant that you treasured them."
Kazuki sniffs, and Ginji presses his face into Kazuki's hair.
"...Thank you." Kazuki says, softly. "Both of you."
.
.
September is still an awful month, Kazuki decides as he walks out the Honky Tonk half an hour later with bloodshot eyes.
But when the wind blows past and sets the feathered earring fastened to his left ear flying, Kazuki figures he can stick it out a little better this year.