5.
A Siberian summer is more beautiful than any other for being so brief. It seems nature tries to make up for the little time it is granted to bloom. The tundra is like a sheet of water, glittering blue under a sun that never sets.
No trees grow here : these are the frozen marches, the land of permafrost, of rough grass and mosses.
And yet they bloom : violets , forgetmenots, red clover, wild roses, foxgloves and brown-red thistles.
They fight for a little air and space and light. Some form wreaths on the fields of moss : a sea of brightly coloured flowers.
Siberia's people reflect this brightness : they are cheerful and happy when the long, harsh winter had passed.
Not that Hyoga had ever had much to do with them. Camu's training camp was a little outside the village of Kohutec, and his master had not encouraged fraternising with the natives anyhow. He had only tolerated Jacob because the boy brought in supplies ("I wonder if those were ever paid for." "Hmmm…nah, the common mortals were probably bullied into handing them over, just as they were bullied into keeping their mouths shut about the existence of the training camps in the first place." "Or hypnotised." "Makes you feel proud to be a Saint, doesn't it?" "Oh yes, we were adorable."). On the other hand, it was just possible that his master had, too, seen promise in the lad, and had merely been waiting and hoping for his aged grandfather to kick the bucket to take Jakob on as an apprentice.
Hyoga felt a sudden pang of guilt. He would be as much to blame if Jakob were to choose to become a Saint : he had encouraged the boy to visit him, and had sought out the his company (more and more so after Izaak's disappearance) when loneliness overcame him. The child had become attached, close on hero-worship.
It had been Jakob who had saved him from Alexer's dungeon in Blue Graad, having brought him his Cygnus cloth. Still, despite the hero-worship,the boy had so far kept his feet firmly on the ground and though he had watched Hyoga training often enough, he had never shown any inclination to follow in his footsteps, sensible lad.
"Last time we met, he promised me a feast of borsjt. I should take him up on that."
So instead of going straight for Camu's izba, he headed for Kohutec and its local store, over which Jakob lived with his grandfather.
He noticed the change already from afar : the dead quiet of what should have been a lively village. When your chances of going out in the sun are limited to a few months a year, you tend to make the most of it, and the people of Siberia lived the summer outdoors. Yet there wasn't a soul in sight, and as he came to the shop, he found it closed.
Should he knock? Should he try some other time? Perhaps Jakob's grandfather was ill. Yes, he should knock, offer his help, his sympathy, anything. Jakob had always been a good friend , a little brother he had never had, though at times far 'older' than he, being more world-wise, and he, Hyoga, should not turn his back on him now. He knocked.
"They are dead and gone"
A woman's voice : old, cracked, but still firm. It was one of the many baboesjka's in the village : he could never tell them apart.
"So you've returned." She spat on the ground; "What about the french fellow, is he coming to?"
"he…he's dead." Hyoga answered taken aback by her hostille manner : the village had always held him in awed respect - frightened respect perhaps? Somehow that had changed.
"What…what do you mean dead?"
"I mean dead. Starved, the old man did, like most of the village when the supplies stopped coming with the storms. But not me! I buried them all!"
She cackled.
"But …Jakob?"
"How should I know? Ask your friend. He took him, didn't he?"
"Who..What..When…Where..?!!"
But the old woman had lost interest, turned and hobbled away to her own home, leaving Hyoga aghast and full of questions.
"Whàt friend? Shun? Shiryu? Why should they?Why should they come in the first place,Or…"
His heart skipped a beat. Only two other persons could qualify as friends, and as the woman had asked after Camu that left the other…
"Isàààààk "
He ran all the way to the isba.
"It hàs to be Isaak… he was as strong as Camu , and hé managed to come back from the dead…twice! It hàs to be!"
It was Ichi.
Hyoga had not seen much of the Hydra Saint since returning from Elysion, nor had he wanted to.
Through combat and pain and the mutual need to survive, Cygnus, Andromeda, Dragon, Pegasus and even Phoenix (though he'd never admit it openly) had bonded somehow : something that was neither friendship nor brotherly love, yet both : a comradeship that can only form between people that have faced death together for a long time: the other five Bronze Saints had had no part in that. And Ichi had never been a likeable fellow to begin with. Hyoga well remembered their confrontation during the Galactic Contest.
Hydra had moved in concentric circles around him, gleefully explaining how exactly he was going to die, slowly and painfully, through poison. Not a honourable way of combat at all, and hardly worthy of a Saint of Athena.
("Hah" Ikki would snort at that , "Was my soul-ripping thing any better? We were fighting machines, who cared how you got your man down?" "And slowly and painfully is soooo much more amuzing." Shina would add.
And Sun Rei would again burst into tears. This time none would try to comfort her, too close to crying themselves. Cursing or crying, whichever suited their temperaments best. Mostly both.)
Ichi was in full Saint regalia (which explained why the baboesjka had called him Hyoga's 'friend') and was sitting laid back in a chair - Camu's chair, the only one there was - with his legs up on the table.
On the floor a small form was doing push ups : Isaak, stripped to his underwear.
"672…673…674…"
The child was clearly exhausted, but kept going, like an automaton. Sweat was running down his face, and through the worn grey flannel Hyoga could count his ribs.Skinny arms that were all bone kept pumping :
"677…678…679…"
The boys breathing went ragged and wheezing. Ichi clapped in his hands at every up.
"681…682, hello, Hyoga, welcome home. Hey kid! Who told you to stop? Continue : 683…"
"Enough!"
In a flash the Hyoga was at his friend's side, grasping the boy and putting him on his feet : he slumped back in the Cygnus Saint's arms.
"Jakob! I am so sorry! So very sorry!" he whispered in russian, and he craddled the child,rocking him sofly, as one would do a newborn babe.
Trying to contain his rising anger, for Jakobs' sake, he turned on Ichi.
"What the hèll do you think you're doing! Jacob's nearly half starved as it is, how dare you put him through this..this…" he spouttered as he struggled for the right word. "Cruelty!"
Ichi shrugged.
"Standard training , I would say. No worse than what we went through, even before the training camps;"
"This is not the Kido training grounds nor is Jakob an apprentice either!"
Ichi flicked his feet off the table.
"Not yet, but he will be. Athena has ordered it."
Hyoga bit back a "Stuff Athena" and instead hissed between clenched teeth : " Athena asked only to check for potential in the boy".
"So I checked. Good of me, no? And he hàs, so I decided to start training right away; What's the matter Hyoga, gone soft all of a sudden?"
The Russian was too furious to answer. He fought down the urge to strike Ichi right in the smirk. But for Jakob, he had to remain calm : the boy needed him. Without a word he carried the almost unconscious child to the bedchamber.
The whole room smelled dusty and mouldy. He had been away for so long and noone had bothered to come clean and air the place. The mattress of Camu's bed - like the chair, the only one, he and Isaak had always slept on fur rugs on the floor - had taken a green tinge and it's grass filling was rotting, but the blanket was still useable. He wound it round Jakob's prostrate little body. The boy stirred, and opened his eyes.
"Hyoga, Is it really you, Are you truly back?"
"Yes.. yes, I am. Don't worry, you'll be fine."
"You are never around when we need you." the boy muttered, and fell fast asleep.
Hyoga made him comfortable on the furs, then went back to confront his half-brother.
Ichi had put his feet back up again and was chewing something.
"Nice enough place you've got here…want some?"
In a cloud of garlic breath he offered Hyoga a dried sausage.
"I heard there had been a famine here, so I brought a packed lunch."
"Did it occur to you to bring enough for everybody? Everybody that's left, I mean. People have starved to death in the village."
"Sad. Not my look out, though. I only came for the kid."
Again Hyoga had to fight the urge to strike him. But now Ichi had as good as avowed that he had not come on a chance visit in a whim of his own : no, the Hydra Saint had clearly been sent for a purpose.
It was not hard to guess what that purpose was : to spy on him, Hyoga. To see if he was doing as he was told, like a Good Boy. Sent by Athena to make sure he was training new Ice Saints, new assassins at her service.
His Saintly Duty.
But not with his friend! Not with Jakob!
"Out."
Ichi gaped at him in an even worse whiff of garlic, bits of sausage trailing from his openhanging mouth.
"Wha…?"
"I said : out! This is my home, my domain, you will not interfere with how I run things here!"
"Oh but you don't, and thàt's the trouble!"
The Hydra Saint sprang to his feet, and began circling his half-brother.
"I'm here to cut the slack! You've been loitering about...."
"I was in Blue Graad at Athena's bidding, forging an alliance!"
"Oh, you have to come up with better than that to convince us! You see, your lack of enthousiasm in forming new Saints has been noted, Hyoga. Afraid of competition perhaps, hmm? "
He gave a half-giggle, half-cackle.
"Afraid of no longer being the One and Only Ice Saint? Afraid of losing your much-vaunted 'edge' over us?
Proud you are of that power, yesss? Want to keep the sssecret all to yourssself ? Forget it, the Warriorssss of Blue Graad are Ice Ssssaints too…" " Warriors whom I won over to Athena's side, may I remind you…"
"Piffle! Athena could have sssent anyone elssse!"
The Hydra thrust his face close to Hyoga's : the smell of garlic became almost unbearable .
Ichi had always been creepy, even as a child, with overhanging brow and jutting chin, making him look more like a primate that a human boy. Several broken jaws and noses later had not improved his looks. His eyes were so sunken in that it almost seemed he had none, just whites. Hyoga was looking straight into them : dark and squinting.
Ichi cackled again.
"One more time and I swear I'll hit him…"
"Don't you get it? You've done your bit, you've saved the world, thank you very much, and you thought : that's it? Not good enough! Constant vigilance, that's what's demanded of you, or àny Saint! But you and the other three, you think you're so great, you're half-devine, you've faced down Death himself, and now you think you can just sit around and mope! Well I've got news for you : the world doesn't revolve around you, nor does it around Seiya!"
Hyoga hit him.
The Hydra Saint flew backwards halway across the room, trailing teeth and blood.
In two strides Hyoga was upon him and had him by the troath.
"You listen, and listen good! True, you are my half-brother. True, you are a fellow- saint. True, I am sworn to protect the Earth from harm. But I will not hesitate to rid it of shit like you first, got thàt? Don't èver speak of Seiya like that, EVER !!!"
Dragging the other to the door he added :
"You can tell Athena that I will do mu own training in my own sweet time ! Better yet : I'll have all prospective candidates take a good look at YOU and then let them choose! Now gèt out and stày out!!!!!"
He threw Ichi out, head first in the snow.
Leaning back against the door after he had slammed it shut, he felt bad. Very bad. Worse than bad : foul.
It wasn't just that he had given in to a fit of uncharacteristic temper; It wasn't just that he had hid his own brother (he had done so before, knowingly, anyhow). It was that he now fully realized that being a Saint did not automatically mean being one of the 'Good Guys'. Quite the contrary. He wielded formidable powers, and Absolute Power corrupts absolutely. Witness Deathmask. If he had, in the end, joined the other Gold Saints to break down the wWall of Lamentation, that may heve been more out of opportunism than comradeship or love for Athena. Athena who also wielded Absolute Power.
"Why does a Saint allways resort to violence first?" it was a question Shun had often asked : Shun who abhorred violence. Hyoga knew he was no excerption to the rule, he had just proven it with Ichi. That knowledge left a bitter taste in the mouth.
And then there were the last words of Jakob's :
"You are never there when we need you."
It wasn't the first time his friend had spoken tose words to him. Back in Blue Graad , he had reproached the Cygnus Saint in the very same terms. And he was right.
No Saint was ever around when truly needed : when needed to do something réally useful, like…like…he couldn't think of a single thing. All a Saint could do was fight and that was not usefull ; not constructively usefull, that is; He had destroyed so much. So many lives. He wanted to build; not houses and stuff, but build. Help build lives;
It slowly dawned on him that, in order to do that, he would have to begin by building his own.
But first, he had to go to Japan. With Jakob.