Title: Firefly High.
Fandom: Samurai Deeper Kyo.
Primary Character(s): Hotaru, Shinrei.
Secondary Character(s): Yuya, Kyo, Kyoshiro, Shiseiten, Yuan, Anthony, Angelica, Mahiro, Benitora.
Rating: T for violent and language.
Genre: General, drama, humor, family, friendship, crime, horror, vague background romance.
Warnings: Canon cross-dressing and slash in the case of Akari. (Akari will be portrayed as a male dressing as a female with an infatuation with Kyo, when they show up. And a relationship with Hishigi. It's so obvious in the manga, though!)
Disclaimer: Samurai Deeper Kyo (1999-2006) is owned by Akimine Kamijyo-sensei.
Author Notes: Several months ago, I discussed the idea of a modern-era story with HotIceRed briefly. However, I faded out of the SDK fandom for a couple months and only recently re-entered. (It's actually very, very easy to get back into it!) I had this concept in mind for a while, but I refused to start writing until I got a good plot going in my head. While I was working on my Hotaru/Yuan&Family drabble collection – "Remembering Fireflies" – the plot finally came to me and I started writing this story. It won't be too long, just enough for me to enjoy writing, but not get bored with it and think, "when will it end!?" Notes on the story: Surnames are made-up. They're so original, I know! Unmarked spoilers for the Crimson King Arc (names, relations. Just that, really!) And just a bunch of other things... God, I did so much research for high school in Japan. You'd be shocked at how different it is in Japan than it is in the US. Thank you very much and enjoy. (This extensive note will not reappear, thank god!)
It was a pleasant April morning, but in the eyes of Honou Keikoku – better known as Hotaru – it was a bad day. Why was this a fact? It was clear, warm without it being enough for a person to sweat uncomfortably. The sun was shining and the breeze was strong. A perfect day, really!
No, it had nothing to do with the weather. The reason why it was so horrible is because it was the first day of school. Hotaru grimaced as he buttoned up his white uniform dress shirt, leaving the top button undone. He tugged on his jacket and ran a brush through his poofy blond hair. Making sure nothing was tangled or sticking out, Hotaru nodded to his reflection in the mirror and went about hunting for his school bag.
"Keikoku!" A woman called from downstairs, her voice faint and muffled by obstacles. "Hurry up or you'll be late!"
Hotaru nodded, though he knew she couldn't see him. "Aa, Kaa-san!" He spotted his bag under his bed and yanked it out, bring out several missing socks, a shirt, and an old shinai. Standing, he brushed the ruffles from his clothes and left the room, trudging downstairs lazily and meandered towards the kitchen.
Honou Ian stood being the counter, making bentou for the younger children with the haste of several years of practice. She smiled towards him when he entered the room. "Good morning, Keikoku," she greeted.
While technically speaking, Ian was his adopted grandmother, Hotaru still referred to her as "Kaa-san," or mother. Ian was young in appearance despite her age of fifty-three and could easily beat him in kendo. "Morning, Kaa-san," he replied around a jaw-cracking yawn.
Ian sighed in disapproval. "I knew it. You and Anthony were up last night sparring, weren't you?" She asked, already knowing the answer.
He shrugged, feeling uncharacteristically sheepish. "Yea, sorry." His eyes sparked with a sudden mischief, though. "I beat him," he said. "Again."
She grinned, already forgetting that she was upset a few moments ago. "Is that right?"
"He didn't beat me that bad," someone said behind Hotaru. He turned and blinked in surprise at his uncle (brother). Anthony stood in the doorway, his uniform arranged in a similar manner of Hotaru's. His hair was messy and his several facial piercings gleamed in the sunlight he was standing in.
Ian glanced at the aforementioned piercings and sighed. "You'll probably get in trouble for those," she said, gesturing with her right hand to the pieces of metal.
Anthony shrugged carelessly. "I'll suffer detention – I'm not removing them. They're irritating to put back in," he explained with a shrug.
Hotaru cocked his head to the side. "Huh," was all he said on the situation and walked across the kitchen, hunting for a bagel to munch on. "Where's Yun-Yun?" He questioned Ian. Yun-Yun, or Yuan, really, was Hotaru's adopted father. The thirty-five year old was a gym teacher at the school that Hotaru, Anthony and his sister went to, the younger four still in secondary school. Hotaru really, truly hoped he wouldn't have gym this year. He needed a break from Yuan's insane curriculum.
"Yuan? Oh, he left a couple hours ago, saying that he needed to get ready for class," Ian said as she went back to the bentou she had abandoned in replace of conversing with her eldest grandchild.
He nodded, accepting this answer. Anthony spoke up suddenly, "It's almost eight, Keikoku. Hurry up."
Hotaru, with a bagel in his mouth, nodded. He tore a bite out of the bread and pressed a quick kiss to Ian's cheek, grabbing his school bag on the way out. He heard Anthony shout for his younger sister, Angelica, to get down there. Angelica, like Hotaru, was starting her second year in Onmyou Gakuen, an academy in Tokyo. Anthony was a third year and their older sister, Anna, had finished school the year previous. With the loss of Anna was the loss of their ride to school (she went to university now and left before they did. Anthony, at eighteen, failed to get his license. Hotaru didn't have the attention span, or the age, required to get one and Angelica was too young as well.
"Will you be walking or riding the bus?" Ian asked, remembering their lack of convenient transportation.
Angelica stood at the landing of the stairs, straighting out her uniform skirt in dismay – she hated skirts, really. She shrugged and answered, "We'll walk. It's a nice day out, right?" The boys shrugged noncommittally. They didn't care either way.
"Alright, well, you'd better hurry. It's a fifteen minute walk to school and you should be on time at least once, right?" Ian handed the three their respective bentou, smiling in that dangerous way only a mother could. The three nodded in unison and left the house.
Like Ian said, it was a fifteen minute walk to their academy, the majority of which was spent in silence, broken by Anthony's annoyed comments on whenever Hotaru would lag behind, observing the random butterfly that flew on by.
They made it to the school at exactly eight-twelve and were immediately ambushed by Hotaru's friend Shiina Yuya. The small blonde haired, green-eyed girl gave Hotaru only a delighted cry as a warning before she threw her arms around his neck. "Hotaru-san, it's been forever!" She said, despite it having only been four weeks since they had last seen each other. Yuya had gone to Kyoto to visit with her adopted family.
Hotaru's reply was muffled by her arm (it covered his mouth in the haste of her embrace). He stepped back after loosely returning her affection. "Mornin', Yuya," he mumbled. "How was Kyoto?"
Yuya grinned. "It was great! Oba-san got be an iPod for my birthday... which is in a couple weeks, I might add," she said with a grin. "Anyway, Nozumo-nii-sama kept teasing me. Sakuya-chan and I got him back, though. And with the oldest trick in the book!"
Anthony and Angelica had abandoned Hotaru to visit with their respective friends by this time, though Hotaru felt no annoyance by that. "Oh? With what?"
"The whole shaving cream in the hand trick. I can't believe he actually tried to scratch his face when Sakuya-chan tickled him with a feather!" Yuya exclaimed, grinning at the memory.
A faint grin appeared on his lips. "Huh."
"Hotaru!" Someone else yelled. Hotaru turned, catching sight of a pink haired "girl" running towards him, "her" uniform a combination of both male and female. "She" stopped in front of him, grinning. "How've you been?" "She" asked, grinning mockingly. "Yuan-sensei said you broke your arm."
Hotaru frowned, glancing down at his left forearm. During one of their sparring sessions, Hotaru lost his grip on his shinai, stepped on it, slipped when it rolled and cracked both his humerus and ulna in one fell swoop. Despite this, it had been a hair-line fracture and healed quickly. So Yuan had mentioned this embarrassing incident to Akari already, huh? "I'm going hurt him," he muttered quietly.
Akari smiled. Despite "her" looks, Akari was a man – or as he put it, a woman trapped in a man's body. Hotaru had been friends with Akari since primary school, but despite this, honestly didn't his anatomy for sure. His real name, Mitarai Tokichiro, was a taboo and he had everyone, including the teachers, calling him Akari. Even a few people called him "Akari-nee-chan," including Hotaru's adoptive father, despite their obvious age difference. "Anyway," he said, smile brightening, "have you seen Kyo!?"
He shook his head. Mibu Kyo, one of Hotaru's oldest friends, was the object of Akari's affection (and several others, much to Yuya's displeasure.) "Nah. Me and Angelica and Anthony just got here."
Akari's smile dimmed as he deflated with a loud sigh. He turned to Yuya and hugged her, whining softly. "Kyo's never around!" He cried out in mocking dramatics, earning a giggle from Yuya.
"He'll show up, Akari-chan," she said, patting his head gently.
"Oi! I thought I'd find you idiots over here!" The three turned, watching as a large man – hard to believe it was only eighteen! – approached with a blond teenager at his side. Date Masasume – otherwise known as Bontenmaru, or simply Bon – grinned, waving. Kouri Akira smiled kindly at Yuya, ducking his head shyly when she grinned back. It was obvious to everyone – except maybe Yuya herself – that Akira had harbored a crush on her for several years. He kept his polite distance, however, knowing that Yuya was in love with Kyo. "Hotaru, you're here on time," Bon commented, half in awe.
Hotaru shrugged. "Kaa-san made sure I was," he said. He paused for a moment, looking dazed as his attention went to Akira. "When'd you get here?" He questioned.
Akira rolled his eyes, hidden behind his eye lids. When Akira was ten, a car crash had stolen both the life of his father and his eye sight when glass from a shattered window pierced them. Despite his handicap, he could navigate around perfectly. "I've been here since Bon came," he said.
"Oh." Hotaru nodded. He went to ask a question, but as he opened his mouth, a white haired teenager walked by at a brisk pace, pointedly avoiding looking at Hotaru. Hotaru's mouth closed and was pressed into a thin, hard line, eyebrows furrowed.
Akari saw this and rolled his eyes. "You two really need to clear the air between you," he muttered in irritation at Hotaru's sullen glare.
He scowled. "No way – he's a prick," he said and looked away.
The teenager was Mizu Shinrei, Hotaru's biological half-brother. Shinrei was eight months old when Hotaru was born. Their father had an affair with Hotaru's mother while his legal wife was pregnant with Shinrei. It had been brief, but ended with Hotaru's birth. Serious issues were raised, like the right of succession, among other things. (Their father had been a founder of a kendo dojo.) When Hotaru was two, his mother, Hotaru – were he got his assumed namesake from – had died in a train crash. Yuan, her good friend and cousin, adopted the child.
Their relationship was rocky, to say the least. Yuan had moved to Hokkaido soon after the adoption was finalized and for four years, Hotaru had never known he was even adopted. The family moved back to Tokyo during Hotaru's second year of primary school, where he met his current friends and half-brother. During a school festival where parents were invited to join, a confrontation between Yuan and Hotaru's father had taken place, ending with their having the threat of police being involved. Hotaru's father forbade Shinrei, who had started a firm friendship with the younger boy, from ever speaking to him again. This alienated him from his other friends, one who included Kyo who saved the white-haired boy from a kidnapper when they were young.
Shinrei childishly blamed Hotaru for this, even years later, along with several other things. Hotaru rolled his eyes at the thought. Really, it wasn't his fault their father was an asshole! Only good thing that man ever did was die. He sighed lightly and wondered if it was a sin to be grateful that someone was dead.
The loud chiming of a bell signaled the start of classes. Students, who were previously engrossed in conversation, began to flock to the entrance doors. Hotaru fished through his pockets, hunting for his time-table. He groaned aloud – fist class was science!
Akari peered over his shoulder and grinned viciously. "Science. Nice. Lots of vocabulary to kill poor Hotaru's brain." He paused and frowned as he read the characters of the science teacher. "Ooh, nice. You got Hishigi-sensei!" He grinned, metaphorical stars in his eyes. "Oh, he's so hot! It's hard to believe he's twenty seven already! Gotta learn his secret on how to age so well!"
Hotaru shrugged and followed his friends as they approached the doors of the school. "He's not the only one. Yun-Yun's thirty-five, remember?"
"God, that's right! He's cute, too!"
Rolling his eyes, Hotaru unknowingly took his first step into the worst, most dangerous year of his life.
Yay! The prologue is set! I'm excited. I feel like a little kid again. Though, I'm a little worried I made Hotaru seem not-so-dense. This story will be both silly and serious, so I might have a bit of a hard time keeping that aspect of him in character. Argh. Anyway, haha, their surnames are so original. Fire, ice, water. Hehe I'll update soon and hopefully the first real chapter isn't feeling as rushed as this was. This prologue was just a quick introductory to who everyone was and who they were connected to and how. Please read and review!