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| How to Be a Friend |
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Madder Red eyes, please. No more.
Summary: -and a hero, if the giant possessive snake in his head had any say in this. Let it be said, though, that Shintaro didn't like back pedaling eleven years into the past with one missing genital, nor did he like how nothing was turning out the same. But for now, this is reality. [Time Travel] AU/T.
Warning: gore (Kuroha), character death (everybody) angst (kagepro) tragedy (Jin) alternate universe and timeline (the author, HD) and yaoi (legit canon, definitely. Don't dare contradict me!). Shin and Ayano are BFFS (canon).
Pairing: Slight Shinkano/Kanoshin and Kokoshin/ShinKokonoses.
Disclaimer: I don't own the song lyrics, nor the anime or manga or PVs, or most of the characters and their dialogue. I own only the idea of an eleven year back pedal in the Kagepro universe, my writing, and some character personalities.
EDIT: 18.07.2014: ATTENTION. PLEASE DISREGARD THE FEMALE PRONOUNS USED TO DESCRIBE YOUNGER!SHINTARO. I have decided to keep Shintaro a male. May the male population of Homo Sapiens have a party. The female population have my sincerest condolences, but do not bring a riot to my front yard. Also, I added details to some scenes towards the end, so you might want to read this again.
Meanings: Shintaro no danna: Master Shintaro.
Shintaro-danna: a shorter version of it.
\ . . . Had to force myself to wake up
I just had to start my day
Didn't want to leave my room
Didn't want to see the things out there
. . .
I don't know how to be your friend
I don't know how to be your friend
I don't know how to be your friend . . ./
-Red Kross,I don't know how to be your friend
chapter 01 has greek myths and lusting snakes
Did you know, red is the color of heroes?
(In one timeline, Shintaro keeps his socializing with Konoha to a minimum, because he just can't talk to him without seeing bloody clothes and yellow eyes. He can't talk to him without the feeling of betrayal coloring his actions and words, without hatred and fear and something he can't name curling in his stomach.
When it's about to end, he wakes up to cold red eyes, and he's wet with warm thick red, and he's forced to drink the blood of his sister, with her red eyes open and staring at him blankly few feet away.
He's forced on his knees, his head digging into the ground as he tries not to choke on his sister's fading life.
"Why did you ignore him?" Konoha asks. Shintaro forces his head to tilt upwards, and he sees sad, sad yellow eyes and hears accusations.
He wishes he didn't look. He feels guilt and hatred and nostalgia.
"I see." Konoha smiles, and he looks like Haruka, so much like him that Shintaro almost vomits when he thinks of sweet, kind Haruka with mad red clothes and murdering his friends with a happy smile. "I have something for you."
Konoha kneels down, and shows him red –red-red-red-red-red-red-red-red—
Shintaro vomits all over the eyes of his friends.
Konoha smiles patiently, murmurs assurances – "it's not over yet" – and heads toward Momo to stop her blank gaze and bring them to Shintaro.
Shintaro screams.)
A hero goes through lots of things to become one! Lots and lots of things. But it's easy for a hero to be painted red.
(Kido's body is a mangled mess, almost entirely, mercifully, covered by the hungry snakes. But up in the second floor, Shintaro can still hear her cries, the groans of a person hanging on by taut threads, screams of dying hope and quite pleads.
Her eyes are guarded by a hazy barrier and tears, but when their eyes meet and she closes her eyes and smiles—
Shintaro shoots her.)
Oh, a hero gains friends! A hero is happy and has a family. He loves, his heart is open and pure and he understands.
(He's surprisingly gentle with him, after killing all his friends, Konoha is close; so close his breath warms Shintaro's neck. Konoha is hugging him.
Shintaro's neck snaps.)
A hero is selfless. A hero fulfills promises, Shin-taro-kun.
(Red scissors.
"You promised the queen."
Snakes.
Marry.
She's crying—
I don't—
I'm not a hero.
I want to be the one to kill myself for once.
Maybe…if I die, maybe the tragedy won't happen. Because…because Tateyama would need my eyes and if they aren't there…
If I'm dead…
And maybe this is a nightmare and the only way out is through this.
"I died. I'm sorry."
Lonely phrases.
"Shall we say our farewells?"
Please don't say them—
Don't leave me!)
Of course, a hero doesn't break under his fate. A hero is too strong for that, a hero will always caress the border between sanity and breaking, will be close to it, but they won't break.
They're too strong.
(Shintaro doesn't want to open his eyes. He doesn't want to see Ene again.
If he doesn't see it, it isn't real. He hasn't just seen his new found friends die again. Hasn't become attached to them. Hasn't been hurt to see they didn't feel the same way, because they didn't know him.
He knew them.
They didn't know him.
"Master!" Ene's undeniable voice screeches near his ear, "Wake up! Now! Or else those pictures of your will be all over the internet…Ten! Nine! Seven! Four! Two! One! Aaand…Master? Half! Point 49! Point! 48!"
Ene is quite for a few moments. Shintaro tries to breathe.
I can't take it anymore.
"Then scream," the snake suggests and every single good end in sight goes out the window.
Shintaro stops believing and hoping.
Shintaro laughs. Then he starts crying. After that, he stuffs his face into his pillow and screams and screams and tries not to breathe when he can't scream anymore, just so that he'd suffocate or go unconscious. And nobody's there, because he has no friends, his sister has severed all bonds she had with him, and his mother is in the hospital dying.
It's just him, Ene, and the snake.
Ene. Poor, darling, Ene.
Poor, dead, little Takene.)
A hero is not someone that hurts another person or does bad things; they help people. A hero doesn't always fight crime. They don't even have to help people face to face; they could be designing a product that helps many people.
(Ene's voice wakes him up. It's Saturday.
Of course.
It always comes back to Saturday.
Ene is annoying, she keeps on talking and talking and making noise in his room, a room stranded from society, and Shintaro is glad.
It's better than a silent, mute Ene.
But Shintaro doesn't greet her, just stares at her pale face and it hurts.
Again.
How many times?
Fifty?
The outcome is always the same.
Goddamn it.
God damn it.)
A hero cares and sacrifices a lot.
(His entire world is once again straddling the border between death and life, borders fading into agony as long nails digs into his eye, as it burrows deeper and deeper, twisting into the soft flesh and eliciting scream after scream from him. He can hear the soft squelch as his eye is destroyed, can feel the pop as it's ripped from the socket. His remaining eye squeezes shut as Konoha laughs at him, tears flowing freely as blood oozes out of his new injury. He will never get used to the pain; it differs from first loop to second to third, this time he's choking on his own sobs as he pathetically begs for it to stop.)
And a hero is mad, the Mad Hatter is a hero, and they are always painted madder red.
Heroes die nobly! How could (you) ask for another, peaceful death? Or an instant one? Don't you want to be a hero…?
If so…
They always die in tragedy.
"Shintaro no danna?
"Shin…?
"Ah, will you die today? You have a few more days left, do you want to sacrifice them?
"Let him die.
"…are you sure?
"…
"…See, I told you, you're a hero.
"You will always, always die."
"…What are you doing?" Shintaro feels his world narrow down to Kuroha (that name suits him and lessens some of the heart ache; he's not Konoha anymore), the gun in his hand, and the long, long distance between them.
This is wrong.
Kuroha smiles bitterly at them (at him), a long trail of clear negatively emotional liquid drips down from his right eye (why is he crying? He's never cried, always laughing and grinning sadistically). He's pressing a gun against his temple –
That idiot, Shintaro gapes, thatidiotthatidiot—
I'm supposed to be the one facing your gun.
Kano was.
(Oh god, oh dear god—
"No, please, no, Konoha, please don't do this –"
"KANO!")
Ah, will you die today? You have a few more days left, do you want to sacrifice them?
Shintaro's hands find themselves knotted into his pants into tight fists, and his heart is beating like the rain drops on the windows of his room during a terrifying storm (and he's not bothered because once you're chased down by a murderer again and again your heart is that by default).
Kuroha's lips let out whispers that can't be louder than breathes because Shintaro can't hear them; he just hears his heart, the rush of his blood, and the calm, serene voice of the snake in him.
…are you sure?
Shintaro rushes towards his (friend? Murderer?) Konoha as soon as he lowers his head so that he's smiling at them from underneath bangs that shadow his eyes, coils his hand around his friend's gun grasping one, lowering it to almost exactly under his arm pits and pushes his friend's head back.
Bang.
The air stills and its silent, it's suffocating and god damn it he feels like he's done something right but he doesn't want this; he knows there are wide eyes tracked on his back. Shintaro grins and opens his mouth to say something, and like a marionette detached from the strings controlled by the leering face (death) above him, he crumbles. Several heart wrenching screams rise from behind him.
Shintaro doesn't want them to cry for him. He feels frustration pool in his suddenly light head.
Stupid, stupid Kuroha wraps his arms around his shoulders halfway through so that when they fall on their knees Shintaro's fore head is pressed against Kuroha's chest.
See, I told you, you're a hero. The snake sounds empty.
Kuroha lifts his chin up, and it's strange, Kuroha is breathless and that's wrong and absurd; shouldn't the action be reversed?
Kuroha is looking at him with wide, traumatized eyes in a pale face, and his mouth is hanging slightly open. His lips twist and his teeth are biting into them.
Footsteps thunder near Shintaro and he's wrenched (gently, he's sure, but it feels like a nail deep in him is being wrenched out) and his back is on the ground. Several faces cover his view of the sky (which he suddenly wants to drink in desperately) and he hears an agonized, animalistic scream near him before he's in the source's lap.
Kuroha is crying.
"Sh-shintaro," Kido, he thinks it's Kido's green locks and twisting mouth, says in a breaking, angry voice, "don't close your eyes. Don't close them."
"Onii-chan." Momo gasps between tears, and her hands lift up to cover her face, all her face but her eyes. It's all she's capable of, gasping out 'onii-chan, onii-chan' like a mantra.
Seto's face is pale white, and tears drip on his face from him. In fact, salty drops of water fall on him from everyone, particularly Momo, but Konoha's tears are the most evident because he's never seen him tear up and his face is right above him. Seto's hands lean over Shintaro's body, not knowing what to do and terribly shaking.
"S…top crying," he whispers and his pronunciation is all wrong, but everyone is suddenly hanging on his every word, even Momo isn't crying loudly. "Is not supposssed to be like this; you're…s-suppood to be happy."
Again, it's all silent before he's roughly wrenched upwards and face to face with the most lying scumbag he's ever seen. Kano is straddling him and his eyes are wild and he's screaming at him, "Don't you dare, you bastard, don't you dare leave us. Stay awake you bastard, how dare you initiate that we'd be glad you'd die?! You fucking coward, don't leave, fucking goddamn bastard, don't dare—"
Momo's back to wailing frantically and Kuroha's forehead presses against his neck. Kuroha's roaring out in agonized pleads and curses, "No. Don't, Shintaro, don't, you fucking idiot."
Shintaro starts to use his gifted sarcastic tongue, and then breaks into whimpers. Or tries to; he's too busy wheezing and trying to breathe to really be able to reply, much less whimper.
Kuroha's arms tighten and Kano's gritting his teeth and screaming something about hospitals and paramedics and phones.
"D-don't b-bl-ame Kono." He's too far gone to much register anything other than Kano's panicked, crying face and his head trembling for some reason, possibly because of the sudden earthquake Konoha's shaking forehead is causing. "Be...happy..."
His ears are deaf, maybe from the crying or maybe it's because he's a crippled, dying mess on the floor.
You will always, always die.
"Can you hear me?" is the last thing he hears, and it's the same voice of the person who haunts his dreams and reminds him to remember, to never forget.
Because that's all he's good at doing.
(And she's an idiot for thinking he could change anything.)
Things had gone crazy.
By the time I noticed
I couldn't tell anybody.
"No, no, I don't want to be destroyed!"
Madder red eyes, please. No more.
Don't bring ruin to anyone else's future
"If I had those red eyes myself, could I save someone's future?"
"I'm sorry, Shuuya, your onee-chan isn't as tough as you thought she was."
"…I'm actually really scared."
Do you remember me?
They all do in the end.
Don't forget.
"Let's move on to more important questions. Questions you need to know the answer to, Shintaro-kun."
"Why did I die?"
Happiness is a curious thing.
"Can you hear me?"
Shintaro is standing, a few meters to the side of Medusa, facing her body's sideways profile, loathing her, and recognizing his form, wrapping his arms around his knees and staring blankly at the ground. He pities him. He's surrounded by his memories (and feelings and pain) and he's alone with the person who caused it all.
Medusa is staring at Shintaro, but not at him. She's staring at him, that time he had committed suicide, but she isn't paying attention to him, now that he'd done soemthign right.
He loathes her.
Hilariously, this moment in time reminds Shintaro of one of the ancient Greek myth, about death and entering Hades' realm to be judged on by three judges who would inspect every single memory you contain, before deciding if you would go to Eternal Punishment or heaven or purgatory. Endless torture or eternal happiness or walking around with no memory, no purpose, nothing at all. Just a piece of walking soul torn from all the things essential to a soul.
And Medusa is a Greek myth, a hated villain, to be frank, and would have gone to Eternal Punishment had she been judged, had she been the Medusa from the tales he read.
The evil, demonic, misunderstood and pitiful creature. The villain. The one whom the hero has to kill to prove his worth - a sacrifice to the hero's rise to glory.
But instead, this woman isn't the same.
(Nothing's the same anymore.)
He hates her.
But he doesn't, really.
He used to hate her.
But now...
He knows how misunderstood she is. How sad her existence is. He knows, realizes, has wondered it during long nights, how similar she was to a human. And after hearing it from Marry herself - why Medusa had done what she had - and after piecing it together, after seeing her face every damn time he died. After that massive regret on her face, and the shining glint of her eyes that he's sure is tears, he can't help but forgive her for something she hasn't meant to do. She's Medusa, but that's just a name. And a name makes her more humane (which isn't something she should feel she has to be, really).
And isn't that what she is, just a caged existence?
"That's a peculiar way of thinking." Her voice is ancient; unused. It trembles slightly and changes pitches over letters until she sounds like a broken music player.
He doesn't bother driving the sudden haze of memories that shroud his eyes from really seeing the woman; he might jump on her and rip into her chest and squeeze around her heart. Past Shintaro doesn't bother, either.
He doesn't look also because he knows what he will find. Disgust and close mindedness and discrimination of his race and deep, deep sympathy shrouded by a cloak of heavy blankness.
Shintaro has gotten better at seeing people.
(Knowing them.
Ah, isn't that what got him closer with Kano?
…yes, Kano has always hated Shintaro's ability to see through him. He loathed Shintaro, but he also had desperate hope clearly painted all over his antics, and the way he always edged closer and closer to him was obvious. Shintaro is a genius, after all, with an IQ higher than Einstein's, and Kano is a human who lusts for risks and freedom.)
He closes his eyes, but it's futile; his memories are passing through his retina, his eye lids aren't important.
Shintaro is a disgusting, selfish, apathetic human.
(The perfect type to survive.)
It…hurts. It really hurts.
It's not the physical pain of digging your eyes too hard into your knees, as Past Shintaro is currently doing. The physical pain of gouged out eyes, of stabbed hearts and swallowing metallic liquid and burning lungs and throats, of being shot until he looks like he wrapped some kind of torn blanket around him instead of skin, riddling with holes and representing his state. It isn't the pain of tumbling three stories head first, or being disemboweled.
Those physical pains didn't come close to what he felt.
The pain that has him closing his stinging eyes is the feeling of his friends' hands wrapping around his heart and squeezing, of his sister's heartbroken shrieks deafening him, of tears travelling down his spine and the cold realization of betrayal and helplessness and fear dawning on him.
It's knowing what will happen, how they will die, how they will cry and break—too late, and not doing anything. Or doing something, but it's too fucking late, Shintaro, you stupid, useless NEET, I hope you die, you fucking piece of worthless existence. It's never changing those deaths. It's waking up again and again and hoping again again again and then dying.
(It's watching yourself fail at your job, at being "onii-chan!". At being a friend.)
It is the pain of being Kisaragi Shintaro. The pain of being a useless bastard apathetic cold idiotic traitorous weak big brother.
(Useless fake friend.)
And Shintaro (the big mess) was useless. He was a bad friend.
But not anymore.
Shintaro has redeemed himself. Ah, he's well aware redemption is not so easily gained, he's redeemed himself not in front of the universe, but in his own eyes.
He sacrificed himself for his friend with no side, selfish, thought.
Shintaro is satisfied, if only for the few moments resembling purgatory.
He forces himself to stand the instant the Medusa woman closes her eyes. When he passes her in a brisk walk, with a determined expression and the ghost of a smile (he forgives her), she steps back with wide alarmed eyes, something similar to pleasant shock and a bit of…pride, of something nice in her eyes.
(Shintaro wonders if in that moment she sees him or the snake in him.)
One step, two step, he blinks and he's standing in front of a window framing a dying sun and with his back pressed into the back of someone else. In the shadows of said dying sun was a rather familiar silhouette. Shintaro squints against the strong light to make out the shadow in the scene, even though he knows who it is.
(You can't see your dead first friend every time you try to rest and not be able to find her in any scenery, dark alleyway or magical sun kissed class room.
You can't forget when you clutch on to the past so tightly, when your eyes will remember every emotion, memory, death, and etcetera.)
He starts walking in a fast, determined way to his best friend.
Ayano peers up at him with blank eyes, and he doesn't bother returning the favor, just lets a grateful grin spread across his pale face and pouring every single emotion: hope, happiness, grief, gratefulness and regret into it.
Ayano stares at him in stunned silence and he can almost see the tip of her gaping mouth over her huge red scarf. Then, she's smiling her million watt cork screw smile and lowering her messy dark haired head with the two red pins barely hanging on, accepting—no, she has always accepted him— forgiving him.
Shintaro feels his chest ache and then relax from his involuntary tenseness, and his cheeks ache from his happiness and eyes sting in relief.
Before he can start crying, Ayano unwraps her scarf and stands on her tip toes, encasing his own neck with her signature cloth, and she has a delighted, proud expression on her face. It makes him remember the times when she would insist on pretending to be a knight and asking him to repeat:
"I'm honored to title thee as a noble knight, the protector of all who live in this kingdom."
He'd glare at her and smack her head while she was smiling, and then she'd erupt into obnoxious laughs.
"I'm honored to call you a hero," Ayano softly whispers, "and a true friend." Her voice sounds slightly weird, like it was coming from everywhere around him, and it was so soft and distorted it seemed like it was fading and he almost didn't hear it.
His eyes widen at her actions and words, and he is made aware of the sudden burning behind his eyes and the tingling feeling spreading across his cheek bones.
Ayano fades and entwines with the orange sun rays until orange and bruised pink is a synonym of Ayano.
He was aware of a desperate, breaking cry from behind him.
He falters; he wants to give words he had needed desperately to his past self, but instead he just closes his eyes and enjoyed the feeling of soft fabric against his nose and mouth.
Shintaro finally let his tears slip.
(He suddenly wants badly to change everything.)
Kisaragi Shintaro was a genius seven year old boy. At least, that's what his parents kept on saying whenever they handed him textbooks and homework and signed him up for boring classes and bought him games like chess (which, honestly, he really liked). It was an excuse they used frequently whenever he'd stare up at them blankly with the beginning of a pout, that, unless you dealt with apathetic children every day, you wouldn't really notice.
Shintaro just wanted to read fiction books, interesting criminology text-books, how-to philosophical books, time travel theories, and play.
He'd really like to stray around the park with a friend and banter with them before it went into a full out friendly fight. Then, they'd play a game of 'Find the Treasure' or 'Hide and Seek' and it would be completely competitive and challenging. Finally, they'd buy sodas and sit down staring at the sun set in comfortable silence and start conversing in hushed whispers about urban legends and wishes and dreams and horror stories deep into the night all while staring at the stars. It would be dark and the only thing they'd focus on would be the sky and they'd be the only people existing for a night, before falling into a drowsy, content sleep.
Of course, they'd stay a feet or two away from each other, because as much as he identified the slight ache he felt occasionally as loneliness and longing for the magical term of friendship, Shintaro just wasn't that cliché and he didn't really like people. That was a trait of his she knew.
Shintaro didn't like people.
The only reason he had such fantasies was…okay, maybe he longed for mutual understanding and unbending loyalty, but they were really only fantasy terms his fiction books indoctrinated in him. He was sure that he really just wanted the 'complete understanding' part, not the friendship. Just…people who understood him.
He just wanted one person to understand him. No more. A..a friend who would completely understand him and wouldn't mind the dark traces in his personality, or his apathetic view of the world, or his horrible sarcastic and mean tendencies.
Nevertheless, that childish dream was too farfetched. His fellow classmates didn't understand his cynical views and pastimes and weren't really bothered to appreciate individuality, if their bullying was anything to go by with. His parents were entirely focused on turning him into a success story and their legacy. They wanted a perfect eldest daughter to take their name to high places, until 'Kisaragi' was a famous household term and children aspired to be 'Shintaro' and parents envied and modeled themselves after the 'Kisaragi adults', although his father certainly was less strict and bought him a lot of sodas with a wink and a bright, sly smirk.
On the other hand, they seldom paid as much attention to Momo. Oh, they cared for him more than they cared for Shintaro (because they couldn't make a genius emotional. They needed a strong, slightly distant person to lead the family, not a dependent, emotional one), but their antics were mostly centered on him: Take Shintaro to the scientific center, let him meet the children of that business woman, don't forget to drop him at the library, buy him a couple of textbooks from the fifth grade section of the elementary school store, and don't forget to check for marital arts classes for both of the kids. And buy Momo a toy, dear.
They had hoped, that by turning the genius of the children into the head, they would gain reputation and success, and then said genius would continue providing for parents that way because of gratefulness. That child would be the legacy they left on the entire country. The rest of the children would be cared for on hope that they would care as much for them as they grow older and they would leave an emotional important to one person so that they would be loved and remembered immensely after their death. After all, humans were selfish and feared being way, they would leave a legacy on the future generations of the Kisaragi family, and their names would be traded in stories and tales.
Also, the eldest child would be the caretaker of the younger child, teaching them ideals and giving them childish love and friendship and rivalry, things the parents couldn't give.
Honestly, that was what Shintaro guessed it would be. And Shintaro also guessed Momo was desperate for attention from her foolish antics and weekly fits.
It was funny how one strived for attention and the other tried to escape it. How one received care and another had to give and long for it.
Shintaro thanked God his bed was right besides the window, and while it was completely frightening and it was hard to find a star in the middle of the city, Shintaro pressed his forehead to the cool glass and searched the sky for miniscule beacons of light.
There were none. For some reason, Shintaro's heart sank and his eyes burned. It felt like he was being denied her wish - right before he asked for it. Not being able to see stars, Shintaro realized, made the connection between him and the universe disappear, maybe even a part of his soul, and just increased Shintaro's suspicions that he was just dreaming. Dreaming everything - 'kaa-san and 'tou-san and Momo and Kisaragi Shintaro - up.
Silently, he pressed his palm against the glass screen separating him from the sky, and while it felt a bit ridiculous to be asking for such idiotic wishes and even researching about how to do it, he still managed to breathe out.
"Star light, Star bright, the first Star I see tonight, I wish I may, I wish I might, Have the wish I wish tonight. I wish for..." he trailed off, "I wish I could be a hero, with friends and living and happy and - and..."
He swallowed. "Thank you." he meekly whispered, and felt his eyes burning. His throat went dry, and something in him, once nothing changed, left him.
It was the next August day when Kisaragi Shintaro finally realized what came with being a hero, and that wishing was very dangerous.
Shintaro blinked continuously as he sat on one of the dinner table chairs, but trying to blink away the clutches of dazed sleep proved futile, so instead he let his chin attach to the table and looked at his food from under thick lashes.
"Shintaro," his mother immediately scolded, "its bad manners to sleep during a meal."
"But I'm not, kaa-san," he replied. Her mother showed her distaste at Shin's defiance through her tight lipped frown. Her mother didn't like retorts.
Thankfully, tou-san had told her a long time ago that Shintaro was a defiant, dominant person, much like her and could she please encourage her sharp tongue?
"Well, then, have some good form." And then her mother went on eating and fussing over Momo who didn't like peanut butter, and really didn't want to eat it.
Shintaro sat straighter and tried not to face slam into the plate.
It was a good thing peanut butter sandwiches were good cushions.
Momo turned her bright eyes on him and gasped. "You like peanut butter?"
Shintaro nodded.
Momo sent him a conspiring look and Shintaro quirked his lips slightly upwards; it wasn't good to let their mother get suspicious when her usually blank faced, sometimes smirking son sent an evil smirk to her youngest daughter, weather because she suspected potential homicide or food swapping, but there had to be a clue that the other participating party in the conspiracy was really participating and not just blinking some dust from her eyes, thus the slight smile.
The moment their mother turned her gaze downwards to her plate, Shintaro shot his hand under the table to Momo's waiting hand and took the sandwich. He munched into it, effectively stuffing half of it into his mouth and returned the sandwich via the 'under table subways'.
What they both didn't expect was the sudden appearance of a leg between them. Lifting his eyes towards Momo's in hope that it was hers, he was met with disgruntled gray eyes.
So it wasn't Momo, Shintaro resigned himself to destiny and faced his mother.
His mother's smile was cherubic and she looked at him from underneath thick lashes.
"Aw…" Shintaro half pouted with his stuffed cheeks.
Shintaro carefully lugged two suitcases up the stairs. It felt uncomfortable having something shoved into his armpits just to keep it still because the suitcase was big. Really big, as in taller-than-Shin-gasp!-big.
Tou-san was two steps ahead of him, singing curses under his breathe and smelling like women's perfume (because most of his colleagues were female) and ink. He held a giant, fifty kilo suitcase that was dancing in his hands.
Warily, Shintaro stepped to the right and hurried up so he wouldn't be behind it when it fell.
And it would fall.
Two steps from the second floor and he learned a new curse as the bag danced out of his father's hold.
A hand clamped over his shoulder. He turned to find his dad's orange eyes tightly closed and his cheeks turning red from anger.
It was adorable. If tou-san knew about how much people thought him adorable, he'd have went on a murderous spree.
Shin quirked his lips downwards in the clarification that by default, he'd be adorable too; people said he resembled him. Same sharp intense eyes, same childish features, same lean and skinny body. His father was attractive, and so he had to admit he felt an ego inflation surgery occurring in her mind, but being attractive meant women and men bothered you a lot. Being adorable meant lots of pinching and cuddles and kaa-san pinning his tou-chan to the wall.
Besides, Momo had the same childish face and orange eyes he had. Same optimistic personality too. So as far as he was concerned, Momo was going to be the attractive 'idol'.
"Shin-chan," 'tou-chan said, a pout flickering on his lips, "wanna go buy soda later?"
"Yes!" he grinned widely and then started standing on his toes, then heels, and switching every few seconds, before wrapping his arms around her dad's shaking waist. "Want me to bring that suitcase up?"
Her dad stopped laughing momentarily to shake his head. "Nah. I can carry it myself…I just wish it could be less slippery! I swear, it feels like I'm holding a snake."
Shintaro nodded, "and should I put those bags in your room?"
'Tou-chan replied in a soft, incomprehensible voice and a thumbs up as he walked down the stairs. "Seriously," Shintaro made out, "…snake…bag…rot in hell…"
He let a silly, relieved grin loose; the happiness in the house was back. The family just didn't feel complete without all of the members.
He swiveled on his heels, suitcases in hand, and dragged them to his dad's room. He inhaled as soon as he reached the door and held it in as he kicked open the door.
His eyebrows furrowed when the door didn't open. A dash of red appeared over his cheekbones as he glanced around for an invisible audience. Of course the door wouldn't open. It had a handle – anything short of breaking the handle wouldn't open the door.
How very genius of you, Shintaro-kun.
Oh. Wow. Shintaro quickly memorized the room's details. Shintaro and Momo weren't given a free pass into their parent's bedroom –something about privacy and whatnot- thus the few times they had an excuse to sneak in they tried to lengthen the time spent in the spacious room.
The nice thing about the room was the large window covering the wall almost entirely. It was right over Shin's parent's bed, and the room always smelled like a garden. The nature-like atmosphere increased because of the colorful see-through fabric covering the window.
'Kaa-san sat at her drawer, sorting through her drawers for 'tou-chan's gift. Shin had noticed his mother almost frantically combing through every store inside Tokyo Avenue, despite some stores being way too expensive for their middle class status, for 'the perfect one'. 'Tou-chan was the photographer of a group of architects whom were very interested in myths and legends. He used to work in a magazine before he had gotten his 'sweet job'. Now, he travelled a lot with his group and grew in touch with his paranormal side.
"Shintaro," his mother regarded him, "your father is coming up stairs?"
"Yes, 'kaa-san."
'Kaa-san sighed and let her fingers pass through her scalp, untangling nonexistent knots of black hair. She stayed quite for a while longer, before turning her head towards Shintaro. "Would you distract him?"
Shintaro smirked. "'Course, 'kaa-san."
A smile played on her lips. "Thank you."
Shintaro hesitated at the door. His cheeks flushed an obvious red hue. "I wish I smelled good." He mumbled.
Her mother's eye softened. Silently, she grabbed a glass tube (one that was unisex, and not entirely feminine) and beckoned Shintaro with her hand.
'Kaa-san touched the area behind Shintaro's ears. It felt cool and smelled extravagant, like pineapple gum and, if the label on it was correct, orchard blossom. Shin almost let out a sigh. He'd always liked pressing cool things to his back or ears. When 'kaa-san slyly slid it along his collarbone, he shuddered and curled his toes and hands inwards; his neck had always been sensitive.
His mother lifted the glass tube and gently pushed him. "Now go. Don't let him up for a few minutes."
Shintaro humored the idea of saluting her, but thought otherwise and left the room.
As Shintaro ran towards the stairs, he saw Momo shyly chattering with their dad at the foot of the twenty step stairs, holding onto her dad's sleeve and adamantly refusing to understand his 'I gotta go see my waifu' cues, and fondly thought, 'Good old Momo', he hurried his pace for his mother's sake and managed to noticed the sudden, large snake climbing the side of the stairs. He opened his mouth to scream but found himself momentarily in the air with the thick, long snake wrapped around his legs before gravity took over.
The last thing he heard was a sickening crack and Momo's—
—gasps between tears, and her hands lift up to cover her face, all her face but her eyes. It's all she's capable of, gasping out 'onii-chan, onii-chan' like a mantra—
—and all he can see is more of those damned snakes—
—Kido's body is a mangled mess, almost entirely, mercifully, covered by the hungry snakes—
—and then he's swallowed—
-he dies-
W-where am I?
Shintaro wakes up enveloped in strangling darkness, tangible, and, with no small amount of horrification at this realization, capable of moving. He struggles, tries to get out the hell out of there while voice in his head screams at him, about how he's going to die, you idiot, you apathetic waste of humanity, get the hell out of here and saying he's terrified is just so hilarious he starts weeping. He's blind and bound.
Not again not again not again the voice screeches at him. For a second, he screams back that he's the sub-human, screaming like a cornered animal, screaming at a clueless, dying little boy.
"Welcome," a serene female murmurs, and her murmur is so loud, it's coming from everywhere, "to the heat haze, Shintaro-kun."
…Heat haze? It's cold. This is no heat haze. In that moment, the dark patch in his eyes shifted and he felt bile rise up his throat, burning it.
Snakes. The black mass surrounding him were hundreds upon hundreds of writhing black snakes, and they're binding him down and slithering around his body and he doesn't even notice because it feels normal. The barrier of cloth and skin didn't keep them from attaching themselves to him like an extendable body part and Shintaro finally, finally realizes how right the voice is. He is sub-humanity if the one, massive snake that was away from the rest of the horde with the disgusting smile carved on her face and the glittering, affectionate black eyes she had feels like part of Shintaro. He's disgusting because -
-because he thinks the snake is him, and that's not possible, is it? He can't be Kisaragi Shintaro and snake at the same time.
- and just increased Shintaro's suspicions that he was just dreaming. Dreaming everything - 'kaa-san and 'tou-san and Momo and Kisaragi Shintaro - up -
It's just not...not possible. Just a nightmare. He hit his head hard and he's currently in a coma, and his mother is untangling his hair strands while Momo is cutting off the blood circulation in his hand and slobbering all over his shirt, and 'tou-chan was buying sodas for their anime marathon, waiting in anticipation for him to wake up.
"But of course, this is not the usual heat haze. You two are special, special people. You're heroes, and today you're going to realize what it means to be one. Good luck, Shin-ta-ro-danna and Shin-ta-ro-chan-"
…-danna?
"May the best hero survive!"
Meanings: Shintaro no danna: Master Shintaro. The snake uses it to refer to the older Shintaro, and also to tease him and as a sign of growing respect and affection. This is a pretty ancient endearment, because the snakes are ancient.
Shintaro-danna: a shorter version of it.
A/N: Why yes, yes I did just pit two Shintaros against each other. Am I not awesome?
Anyways, if you have any questions, submit them in a review or PM me. Some questions might be featured in a FAQ at the end of a chapter just to clear up any messes. I hope you continue reading this story :)
My last warning is: Alternate Timeline and Universe ahead! Yaoi ahead! Angst and dark themes ahead! Actual friendship ahead! I warn thee, I am a bit sporadic in my updating schedule and might put this story on hiatus during school weeks.
Leave a review?
Hopeless Desires.
P/S: If there's anybody who has read the manga and is a decent beta editor, would you mind becoming my advisor? I don't have WIFI during the day and I haven't read the manga yet, and I need to go through the canon events I'm going to butcher with someone more sane and neat. Basically, someone who could add details to some of my vague description and give me detailed criticism of my chapters.
Question: Third person present tense or past tense?
EDIT: NO MORE FEMALE SHINTARO
ALSO - WOW, THIS WAS THE FIRST FEMALE SHINTARO FANFICTION, HUH? At least, on ffnet.