DISCLAIMER: Hmm... I actually own a lot in this one... but I still don't own FY. Duh.
AUTHOR'S NOTES: Hey, don't throw things! ~ducks vegetables and iron pots~ I know you think I'm chickening out by not posting a new chapter this time, but give me a chance!
Actually, a lot of you are probably angry because this delays Amefuri's appearance that much more. I'm not doing this to be mean, I swear I'm not (even I get tired of cliffhangers, after all); I'm doing this because I seem to have lost inspiration for the main story of Market. I just can't write it now for some reason. I want to, I really want to! But nothing'll work! I open the file and just sit there staring at the screen. If I was desperate enough, I could put down words anyway, but if I do that then I know I won't be satisfied with what comes out and will only end up more frustrated with myself. Besides, you all are so wonderful that I want to give you my best. I hope you understand when it comes to delays.
In the meantime, I'm still posting! I actually wrote most of this last night, but I think it's all right to post today. Just don't expect it to be as thoroughly proofread (if you see a mistake, tell me and I'll fix it when I get the chance!). It's a Kokie-Inoue side story! No, not romantic, you perverts. The plot's kinda predictable, but I couldn't really think of what else I could write for them and seem believable. I hope you like it, it's not that happy.
Soundtrack: El Tango Roxanne from Moulin Rouge, and Tactics, the ending theme song from Rurouni Kenshin. A lot more El Tango, especially considering how not-happy this is. Try listening to that while you read.
The late autumn moonlight dove through the window at a suicidal angle, plunging into the wooden floor like a knife blade, almost seeming to bore a hole in the wood it struck. The cold of the night air also seemed to be visible in the strange light; it was far chiller than anyone living could remember it being at that time of year, and every living thing was taking refuge. Stray dogs and cats were crowded in alleys next to buildings whose chimneys were built along the outer wall, a temporary truce called until all could adjust to the early cold. Street children huddled together in old, abandoned buildings, sharing body heat for lack of anything else. Even those with the money to afford oil for lamps and wood for fires shivered under blankets and sheets dragged out of storage on this particular day.
It wasn't quite so bad in one home as it was in most others. In a rather small, yet tall, comfortable house near the middle of the city, a woman of about thirty finished putting her two children to bed in their shared room. "Sleep well, you two."
"Good night, Kaa-sama," they replied on cue, both of them snuggling down under two extra blankets. The girl of about thirteen, her long black hair splayed around her head on the pillow, quickly shut her eyes tight, waiting for her mother to leave the room. The sounds of retreating footsteps reached her ears, nearly completely covered by the blankets, and then the door creaked as it was pulled shut.
She breathed quietly for a few moments, giving her mother time to get away, before she opened her mouth and drew a shallow breath to call to her brother - but he beat her to the punch. "Nee-chan? Are you awake?"
"Hai, Joji," she replied softly, slowly pushing back the blankets and drawing out small feet to set on the cold floor. "Ready?" She yanked the first blanket off her bed and slid her feet into the thin slippers she wore around the house, wrapping the blanket around her to keep herself warm.
Inoue, are you sure we can do this?" Joji looked at his older sister with apprehension, his silvery eyes worried and stealing occasional glances at the door. "Tou-sama and Kaa-sama said-"
"But Uncle gave them to us! He wouldn't give us something that offended Byakko. Now come on Joji-chan!" She padded determinedly across the floor and dragged her brother's blankets off him by force. He yelped at the sudden cold and tried to yank them back, but only succeeded in getting his feet tangled in them. Inoue giggled. "Oh Joji, sometimes you're so silly."
"I am not! And you're not much better!" He got up at last, yanking his feet out of the blanket cocoon, yelping again as he felt the cold of the floor through his soles and hopping around until he too could shove his feet in his house shoes.
Inoue watched it all with a small grin on her face, and when her brother calmed down she shoved a blanket under his nose. "Here you go."
Joji glared up at this sister, still miffed about her having reached her growth spurt and now being taller than him. He wrapped the blanket around his body with more than a few grumbles, then knelt and reached under his bed for a small, plain wooden box. It was a moment before his groping fingers found what they sought, but when he finally felt the box, he couldn't keep from grinning in excitement and feeling his heart speed up with anticipation. He yanked it out and quickly pulled off the lid, then turned the box over and listened to the musical clatter of metal hitting metal as eight tiny figures fell from the shadows to clatter onto the floor next to their blanket-encased knees.
It had become a ritual with them, after their parents had first learned what the toys were for almost a month before, a few days after Joji's birthday: almost every night they would complacently go to bed, then wait for their parents to leave. When they were sure they were alone they would scramble out of the covers and remove the box from its hiding place. It had been their uncle's birthday present to Joji: a complete set of figures of Byakko no Miko and her seven seishi, each masterfully shaped out of copper down to fine details such as hair. Of course they probably didn't look anything like the real miko and seishi, as no one knew who they were, but there were two figures among the rest, the miko and one of the seishi, who bore more than a passing resemblance to the siblings.
Unfortunately it had been those fanciful images that had made their mother ban the figurines when they'd found their children playing with them just four days after the present had been received. She had been shocked when she learned that Inoue and Joji were using the figurines to play "Miko and Seishi," and immediately swept up the pieces and dumped them in the box, chattering all the time about how it was blasphemy against Byakko to determine his work for him and not give him a chance to complete it first. They were playing at being gods, she said, and it was all right to pretend to be make-believe gods, but not real god like Byakko, or any of his three brothers. When their father learned about their activity he reiterated the same sentiments in different words, adding that the box had been hidden and they were not going to get it back until the real miko and seishi had appeared.
Of course Joji found the box the next day, stuffed in their mother's usual hiding place at the bottom of her sewing basket, and smuggled it back into his and his sister's room. There they played the forbidden game nearly every night, making up new powers and alter egos for every seishi and the miko. Joji kept a couple of his imaginings secret from his sister, though…
Inoue stared at the eight pieces scattered in front of her and considered them carefully, tilting her head to the side a bit as she did, keeping the blanket clutched about her small shoulders tightly. "Tonight I'll be…" she said slowly, making her choice carefully, "…these four." She quickly reached out and pulled the small boy that resembled her brother, the miko that resembled her, a man who appeared in his early twenties, and another man who seemed almost middle-aged to her.
"Nee-chan… can I be him?" Joji asked almost timidly, pointing at the boy who resembled him. He picked up the only other female piece in the set, a girl of about fourteen, and held it out to her in his open palm. "You can be her if you do."
His sister gave him a strange, sideways glance. "You're always him, Joji-chan. Don't you want to be someone else for a change?"
"I am someone else." He gestured to the pile of tiny metal dolls next to his knee; two boys in their late teens, one slightly older than the other, and a man about twenty-five lay there. "Besides, you're always the miko. Can't I have my seishi?"
"Oh all right," she said with a sigh, putting the boy in his hand and taking the girl in its place. "What are you going to call him this time?"
"Kokie," Joji replied without hesitation.
"Always you, always Kokie… Joji-chan, you're becoming obsessed."
He flushed brilliantly, something that wasn't really attributed to the blanket around him. "I am not!"
"Shhhhhhh!" she whispered insistently. "Kaa-sama and Tou-sama will hear!" He subdued, glancing worriedly at the door, as Inoue glanced at the figure now on her palm. "She will be… Toroki," she stated. "She's a talented dancer with lots of pretty costumes and dozens of adoring fans even though she just started working, but she has a jealous rival…"
For fifteen minutes the siblings made up names, both real and seishi, pasts, personality quirks, and powers for their new round of Miko and Seishi, and then they progressed right into the game without a moment's delay. For another hour the seishi faced life-and-death peril from enemies made of walking fingers and recalcitrant pieces from other games, and, once, a stray pillow. Then, just before the sixth seishi was to appear, they both found they couldn't keep their eyes open any longer and fell asleep together on the floor, curled up in a bundle like kittens, Joji still clutching his little Kokie figure tightly in his right hand.
Inoue slowly returned to consciousness as something tickled her nose. It was a smell, a familiar smell; the smell of wood smoke. How did I get down in the kitchen? She thought groggily, before she was fully awake. It's so warm… She also didn't feel that rested, but then again, she had slept on the floor. She sat up, stretching her arms up as far as they could go, then brought her hands down again to rub the sleep from her eyes. When she opened them she was caught in mid-yawn by the sight in the window. The moon was still there, barely past its highest point. The sky was still splattered with stars, as if a clumsy painter had overturned a can of bright silver paint and let it drip through a sieve onto a black canvas. But immediately around the window was a glow, orangish-red, that for some incomprehensible reason made her breath catch in her throat and her heart thud in her ears.
She quietly unwound herself from the blankets, careful not to disturb her brother, and crept to the window to peer out. The smoke was now in her mouth as well as her nose, and even though it was only a little it felt like she was being choked. She glanced down, saw nothing instantly suspicious, then glanced up.
And shrieked at the top of her lungs.
The entire top story of their house was on fire, the wooden roof and walls doing little to stop the ravenous flames that were even jumping between the rafters to find more fuel. The fire almost seemed to dance merrily against that spotted backdrop, as if it were cackling for glee at finding such easy prey while destroying her entire life.
Her shriek sent Joji flying into a frenzy as if he were being attacked, swinging twelve-year-old fists in all directions before his eyes were open. "What is it?! I'll protect you!"
"JOJI! THE HOUSE IS ON FIRE!"
He froze in his tracks, staring at her in complete disbelief, willing her to be playing the sickest joke she'd ever pulled. "You're lying…"
"No! Upstairs is burning! IT'S BURNING!"
His eyes, thought it had seemed impossible for them to get any wider, widened. "Tou-sama and Kaa-sama.." he managed to get out in a choked whisper. Their parents' bedroom was on that floor.
Without another word they both rushed for the door and yanked it open at the same time, then yelled in terror at the top of their lungs and shut it just before the sudden draft of air pulled a huge fireball into their room. Not only the floor above them, but at least the other half of their floor was burning. Their parents were probably trapped or… they didn't want to think about that. They were trapped. And they were starting to panic.
Or, Joji was. Inoue was already far beyond the starting point. "What do we do what do we do what do we do help Joji!" She shrieked again and clutched onto her brother as something cracked and crashed outside their door.
Joji struggled to keep a calm head, though he could feel the door steadily warming against his back. It would take the fire much longer to eat through everything that was on the second floor than the top one, but they still didn't have much time. Also the fire that was now eating away at the hallway had cut off their escape route. He started desperately trying to remember what their uncle, who worked with fire every day, had told them about it during one of their many visits to his forge…
He broke away from his sister and grabbed his blanket, stuffing it in the crack at the bottom of the door to keep smoke out. Smoke is more dangerous that fire, Joji-chan, he heard his uncle say in his mind. The smoke can knock you out long before the fire gets there to burn you up, so keep it as far away from yourself as possible. What else had he said? Find a way out. Jump off a five-story building if you have to, but find a way out. The door was out of the question; they would be roasted if they went that way. The only other option was the window. He made Inoue sit in the middle of the floor, next to the scattered seishi pieces, and he threw himself at the window with all his might, yanking, straining, willing the decorative bars to come free.
But his uncle had made those bars, specifically to guard against robbery. They were twice as thick as normal window bars, as were the ones on every window in the house. The way was blocked.
Damnit! he cursed in his head. What's the use of doing what I can do if it won't work?! He pulled, he tugged, he nearly wrenched his back heaving, but the bars wouldn't move from their comfortable positions for his feeble hands.
He fell back, panting and sweating heavily, tasting the smoke and soot in his mouth and feeling a stinging in his eyes. He glared in contempt at the window one more time before going to sit next to his sister, simply waiting for whatever would happen next.
"We're trapped…" she moaned. "Trapped like rats."
He didn't feel up to contradicting her very correct statement.
A creaking, inhuman groan came from above their heads, and they both looked up cautiously, blinking as flakes of soot fell into their eyes. The ceiling above them had begun to glow a dull red, the light showing brighter through the narrow cracks in the boards.
And then, with no more warning but a tremendous SNAP, the ceiling caved in and dumped burning wood like hellfire from above. Inoue and Joji screamed and dove for the floor, trying to get away from death, trying to evade the firebrands that were tumbling down to them. Suddenly the air was filled with several reverberating crashes, directly above the two terrified children, as if several things were having several head-on collisions not two feet above their heads. They just kept waiting to feel the first touch of flame, screaming all the while.
After a few moments the crashing stopped with a final dull CLANG, which was barely heard over the siblings screaming. Nothing else happened. No fire. No burning. Nothing touched them.
Inoue was the first to realize that they were still alive and in one piece, and her screaming gradually died down in her confusion. What… happened? Why are we… What… She slowly opened her eyes, frightened to find out that she really had died and just didn't know it yet, slowly uncurling her hands from the back of her head where they had flung themselves protectively. She was greeted by a small statue: the figurine of the girl she'd termed "Toroki" that very night hovered in front of her eyes, five inches above the ground. It was embedded in a sheer wall of metal that stretched completely around them, and even over them as far as she could tell. The wall - or was it a dome? - was made up of strange things, too: she saw not only most of the figurines, but the two-foot tall statue of a tiger rearing on its hind legs that had been kept down the hall, all her hair pins, and several things that looked as if they belonged in the kitchen. There were only small gaps to be seen, enough to let air in but not big enough for much fire. What did come through, if any would, they could put out with their hands.
She took all this in in a second, then grabbed her brother's shoulder and shook him, making sure not to get too far off the ground. "Joji! Joji! Look! Look!"
He stopped screaming and his eyes popped open to the widest they'd ever been; he too had figured out that they were miraculously all right. "WHAT THE-OWWWWW!" he yelled, but tried to stand up at the same time and ended up banging his head on the dome.
Inoue pulled him back down to the floor, rubbing the back of his head. "Stay down! I don't know what happened, but we… need to… keep…" she trailed off into silence as she glanced at her brother.
The light that had enabled her to see everything had not been coming from the fire, as she originally had thought; the fire couldn't get inside their protective dome, and the light was trapped outside with it, and in any case the metal would have had a red tinge to it in the firelight. No, the real light cast a bright white glow over everything so it looked purer than the sun, almost completely washing out her brother's hair, which was easily as dark as hers. And it was coming from his back.
"Joji… turn over," she said, her voice sounding ethereal to her own ears. He gave her a puzzled glance, but obligingly rolled onto his side, as far as he could go. But it was far enough so she could see all of his back clearly, and shining clearly through his nightshirt in the area of his left shoulder blade was the brightest light she'd ever seen. Without asking she pulled down the shirt at the collar, earning a strangled yelp from her brother. "Stomach…" she read the character shining there, squinting and half-covering her eyes to see through the light. "Joji…"
"What?"
"YOU'RE A SEISHI!"
He went limp in her hands.
"JOJI! JOJIIIIIIIII!"
They were dug out the next day, when the men with chisels and hammers, their uncle among them, finally managed to chip a big enough hole in the dome for Inoue to push Joji through, then follow herself. The fire had been put out only minutes after the dome had formed above them and Inoue had made the discovery about her brother, but very little of the house was left. Almost all that remained was the floor of their room, one of their walls, the room below it, and half of the room next to that. Somehow, someone figured out that their house cat had knocked over a stray candle that had been left lit in the third floor corner farthest from the siblings' room, and the fire had started from that. No one mentioned their parents.
Joji was still unconscious and didn't appear to be waking any time soon. Nothing anyone at the site could do would rouse him from his coma-like state, but his breathing was steady and his heart seemed to be beating at a normal rate, so in the end they decided that the best thing to do would be put him to bed. But the beds were gone as well.
Inoue was sitting in her uncle's lap, huddled against him with her arms around his neck and his around her back, just as she had been since she and her brother had been freed. When asked a question, she only responded with small nods or shakes of her head. Her frequent tears had carved clear paths in the soot on her face, and the parts of her nightgown they'd fallen on were washed clean.
One of the neighbors, who had been up all night controlling the fire and picking over what was left for anything the two children could take with them, approached the two of them cautiously. "Excuse me, Tsumura-san… could I talk to you for a minute?" He wanted to spare the girl of what was coming up.
"I don't think I'll be able to stand up." Tsumura-san looked calmer than anyone. He was still in shock. "You better say it here."
The neighbor glanced at Inoue, who turned and buried her small face in the hollow of her uncle's shoulder and neck, tightening her grip on him. The poor girl… and her brother… "We… We found…" he gulped and gestured up, hoping the older man would understand. Tsumura-san nodded, as if he'd known this all along. "The children… They… the need to go… somewhere… My wife and I, we… we'd be happy to take them in, or there's a good…" He stopped before the word "orphanage" left his lips.
Tsumura-san looked at him for a moment in incomprehension, then slowly began shaking his head. "Iie. I am taking them with me."
"But… But Tsumura-san… Your health…" he stammered, shocked for the fiftieth time that day.
"I don't care," he said, softly but firmly. "They are my brother's children." We're the only family we have left in the world now. "They are living with me."
"Uncle…" Inoue said, her delicate voice raspy because of smoke inhalation. It was the first word she'd spoken since she'd been rescued.
He glanced at her quickly, then looked back at the road, concentrating on not driving his cart into a wall. Joji was nestled in the back, in a nest of blankets donated by friends and neighbors. "What is it, Inoue-chan?"
"Joji… He's a…"
"A what, dear?"
She looked down at her hands balled in her lap. "A seishi."
Tsumura-san turned to stare at her in unabashed amazement, rendered speechless by two simple words, the reins falling slack in his hands.
"His symbol glowed last night after the dome formed…" she said quietly. "It was so bright I almost couldn't see it…"
"Are… are you sure of this?"
"What else could it be?" she asked quietly.
Tsumura-san faced the road again and drove on in stunned silence. The day had had too many surprises for him already: first hearing that his brother's house was burning, then the assumption that the entire family was dead, then the discovery of the two children, then having them almost taken away. And now to find out this monumental thing on top of it all? That his nephew was in fact a legendary warrior who would help save the country, who was prophesied by Taiitsukun, the controller of the world, who would become one of the most important people in Sairou's history?
"I don't want him to be…"
Her voice was so low he could barely be sure he heard it, and it felt like he had to drag his verbal feet through syrup to talk. "Why not?"
"Because… we'll be separated…" she whispered, leaning into his side, her shoulders shaking with sobs.
He freed up one hand from the reins and looped it around her shoulder, hugging her tightly. "We won't be," he said firmly. "I swear to you we won't be. He's still Joji, and Joji would never leave us. We'll be together."
"You're all we have now… Please help us stay together…" she sobbed quietly.
"I will, Inoue-chan. I will."
AUTHOR'S NOTES II: See what I mean by "not happy"? ~hugs them both~ I'm so sorry you two... I love my characters, I hate torturing them outside of the "fun" torture (like Toroki bursting in on Subaru and Tokaki in 24, that's fun torture). But sometimes these things... you can't avoid them.
At least this helps answer a few questions: why Kokie was so reluctant to go with them, their connection with their uncle, one or two more. I know someone's gonna be confused and ask "Wait... Did he already KNOW he was a seishi?" and the answer is yes, he did, but his powers had only shown themselves in very small ways and he didn't know how to tap into them and control them, which is why he couldn't do something to the bars on the windows. That's also why he always chose that little figurine for himself and named him "Kokie." And no, he hadn't told anyone.
~hugs the siblings once more and lets them go recuperate from reliving the trauma~ Hopefully next time I'll have chapter 25 ready for you all. I hope so! Bye!