Not What You See
A/N: *rolls eyes at discussion by friends of plans for trick-or-treating* Oh! And in the fic, Kai doesn't have those cool stripes on his face. Guess if you want a pronunciation guide to the world of NWYS, here it is, present and future characters with unusual names!
Regine: Reh-jean
Saadii: SAY-dee
Blanche: Bl-ahn-shay
Gemma: Jem-AH
Roarke: Roar-keh
Sebastien: Seh-bas-tee-ehn
Larysa: La-REE-sah
DISCLAIMER: I own… well, a lot of people in this fic, at least! ^.^
Chapter 5: Saadii and Kai
Thursday, January 30, 2003
About a month and a half after Kai's return to Nagasaki, and a month and three weeks after Rei's trip to Nakoemi
"Oh, thank goodness, Rei, you're back, I was so worried about you!" Regine gushed, throwing her arms around her foster son. "Are you sure you're all right? Come into the kitchen and have something to eat, you must be starving."
"No, really, Regine, I'm fine." Rei said unconvincingly.
"You
need to eat," Regine insisted. "Get into the kitchen and sit down at the table now."
"Rei!" the three younger children all yelled happily. "You're back!"
"Yeah," Rei said vaguely, eagerly digging into the sandwiches on the plate in front of him.
While the four kids were busy talking and stuffing their faces, the phone rang. Kirk grabbed it before anybody had the chance to get up from his or her seat. "Hello?"
"Is this Kirk Toshiro I'm speaking to?" a quiet, trembling voice came over the line.
"Yes, who is this?" Kirk asked suspiciously. He wouldn't put it past Lian to get one of Rei's other sisters to fake a terrified voice begging them to let her make sure Rei was all right in person and then go and take him again.
"I'm sorry, sir, I don't believe you would know me, but you do know my brother. Kai Hiwatari?"
"What are you talking about?" Kirk asked immediately, and a little too harshly, it seemed, because there was frightened silence on the other end of the line and the kitchen fell silent. "Sorry."
"Oh, no, it's all right, sir. I don't think Kai would've told you about me any way, judging by what seems to be his current behaviour. My name is Saadii, I'm his twin sister."
"Oh, right," Kirk said, vaguely recalling Kai saying something about a twin that afternoon in the Rav, what seemed like a thousand years ago. "I do remember him saying something about a twin, didn't realize it was his twin. What's the matter?"
"Well, sir, this is the part that's difficult to explain."
"Try to."
"Well, sir, we both decided we'd had enough of our stepfather and left, but we had to split up. Kai told me to phone you when I reached Tokyo." She answered hesitantly.
"Okay, where are you? And where is Kai?"
"I don't know where Kai is." Saadii said regretfully. "Like I said, we split up not far from Subaru. I'm at Tokyo Civic."
"What's wrong?"
"It appears I am in the beginning phase of hypothermia. No doubt because I have just spent about ten hours outdoors in only jeans and a sweatshirt."
"How can you sound so calm?"
"I believe I'm in shock."
"All right, that sounds reasonable. Do you want me to come down there and bring you back here while they keep looking for Kai?"
"I would appreciate it, yes. But you don't have to."
"Ten minutes sound okay?"
"Very well."
Kirk hung to find all his family watching him suspiciously. "What?"
"Who was that?" Regine asked.
Kirk hesitated only the slightest moment before answering, "Kai's sister. She said that they both left their stepfather's place but she doesn't know where Kai is, he could be anywhere between Nagasaki and the North Pole. Well, maybe not the North Pole, but you get what I mean. Apparently Kai told her to phone us when she reached Tokyo."
"And how, pray tell, did she get to Tokyo from Nagasaki?"
"Subaru." Kirk said absently, retrieving his coat from the closet. "Probably hitchhiked."
Kirk pulled up to the parking lot of Tokyo Civic Hospital and entered the waiting room of Emergency to see a teenage girl wrapped up in blankets and having hot drinks forced upon her by nurses. At her feet was the smallest duffel bag you would ever see.
When she looked up, Kirk could tell immediately that she and Kai were twins. If it wasn't for one slight difference, the little genetic thing called 'gender', she could pass for Kai with different styled hair. Rather than the navy blue hair cut short in the back, and spiked and bleached in the front, hers was bleached in streaks all around her head and was currently falling down around her face. It was probably about waist-length and didn't look as though it had had a proper washing in a while. When she looked up, Kirk noticed the same crimson eyes as Kai, with the same world-weary, mistrusting look in them, only right now it was replaced by full-blown panic.
"Are you Kirk Toshiro?" a nurse asked, standing up. Her nametag read Ernestine.
"Yes." Kirk answered.
"Could we see some ID?" She examined Kirk's driver's license and then said, "Can you come with me for a moment, please? Keep giving her drinks, Nancie. Don't let her talk you out of it."
"Mr. Toshiro, I have some serious concerns about this girl's home life and the safety of her brother." The resident said.
"Hear, hear." Kirk muttered.
"Have you heard anything from her brother? She has been adamant that we find him as soon as possible."
"Not yet." Kirk said. Just as he was finishing that sentence, his cell phone rang. "Sorry, one moment. Hello?"
"Hey, um, Kirk?" Rei's voice came over the phone. There some kind of commotion in the background: from what Kirk could distinguish was Regine's voice fretting over someone, Marina and Griff talking over one another and Max was either not doing anything or wasn't in the room.
"What is it, Rei? What's going on back there?"
"Kai just showed up on the doorstep."
"Can I change my answer to that last question?" Kirk asked, covering the receiver with his hand. "He's just shown up on the doorstep at home."
"How is he?" Saadii's frantic voice came from the doorway. "Can I talk to him?"
"Rei, how is he? Can he come to the phone?"
"I don't know. Man, he's bleeding all over the place and shivering like a wet dog in January. Geez, Kai, what'd you do to yourself?"
"Hold… semi… ground…" Kai's voice came faintly. "Stop… fine…"
"Rrrright." Rei said. "Um, I don't know. Why?"
"His sister wants to talk with him."
"Yeah, I don't think he has conversing capability right now."
"I can hear that. What's happened?"
"Like he said, something about a hold, a semi, the ground."
"Somehow I don't think he got run over by a semi if he's still conscious."
"Yeah, that's what I think. He does got a nasty cut on the back of his head, though. Max had to leave the room."
"I'm not surprised." Kirk sighed. "Hold on a second. Hey, Doctor, what should they be doing? He's got a cut on the back of his head from what I can tell."
"How's his speech right now? Is he fluent, is he sort of dazed and confused, not really articulate?"
"From what I can hear, can't really form complete sentences at the moment. Insists he's fine. Rei says he's shivering really hard though."
"How's his balance?"
"Rei, how's his balance?"
"How should I know, Regine forced him to sit down. Walking pretty unevenly when he came in, though."
"Off-balance."
"Ask him to make a fist." Doctor Yamaguchi ordered. "Actually, give me the phone."
Kirk handed it over.
"Okay, this is Doctor Yamaguchi. I want you to listen to my instructions carefully, all right? Give the phone to…" he stopped for a moment. "Who just got brought in?"
"Kai."
"Give the phone to Kai. If he can't hold the phone properly on his own, don't force his fingers around it, just hold it for him. I need to hear him speak myself." He waited a moment, then started speaking in a calm voice. "Kai, can you hear me? All right, Kai, are you holding the phone yourself? I need to know the truth. All right. Kai, how are you feeling right now? Thanks. What happened to your head, Kai? What are you doing about the cut, Kai? All right, good. Can someone else take over holding that and get Regine to get on the phone." He waited another moment while the shuffle took place. "Mrs. Toshiro? This is Doctor Yamaguchi. What's the situation like over there right now? How are the other kids reacting? All right, maybe get the little guys out of there. As long the older guy stays calm, it's fine for him to stay. You may need him to help you any way. What I want you to do is get something clean to use as a bandage. Where is the cut exactly? Thank you. Keep the bandage on the cut and get something else to go around his head to keep it in place. Take a look at his face and tell me how it looks. Don't skip out any details, even little ones… all right. Oh great combination." He growled slightly in frustration. Then he sighed. "Is the laceration firmly bandaged? All right. Get him to lie down on the ground. Don't put anything underneath his head, get a blanket or something warm to put over top of him. I'm going to need to send somebody out there to see if he should be brought in." He hung up, handed the phone back to Kirk and growled, "I hate doing prognosis over the phone."
"Doctor, if you don't mind, the next shift starts in two minutes and if you were able, could you possibly drop by?" Ernestine asked, shoving another hot drink into Saadii's hand.
"Oh, sure." he agreed. "Mr. Toshiro, do you mind if I trail you back to your house?"
"No problem," Kirk assured him. "We don't live all that far from here."
Kirk entered the house with Saadii and Dr. Yamaguchi behind him to find Max curled up in the armchair in the living room, looking green. Sending a reassuring smile to his fellow weak-stomached son, he directed Dr. Yamaguchi to the kitchen, then suggested to Saadii that she stay out here.
It obviously piqued her, because she snapped that she wanted to stay with her brother and stormed into the kitchen behind the doctor. Kirk, being just as weak-stomached as Max, joined him in the living room.
Regine and Rei both exited the room about five minutes after that, informing that the doctor was going to put stitches in Kai's head.
About half an hour later, the doctor reemerged, carrying his medical bag and both Kai and Saadii following him. "All right. I want you two to change out of those wet clothes pronto and keep a warm blanket around you. Saadii, you can stop having those drinks now, but Kai, I want you to have plenty of hot drinks. Not coffee, not alcohol. Be sure to be careful around that area of your head for a while, get someone to clean it for you daily and come in and see me in about two weeks. Come tomorrow, you should stop feeling quite so cold, both of you." He turned to Kirk and Regine and added, "And do try to get the story of how this came around out of them. I'd particularly like to know the story behind the semi."
"T-t-t-t-told… y-y-y-y-you…" Kai muttered through chattering teeth. "… h-h-h-hold… s-s-s-s-semi… g-g-g-g-ground…"
"Yeah, I got that part." Yamaguchi told him, smiling slightly. "It's the rest of it I want to know."
After the doctor had left, Regine ushered all three older teens back into the kitchen and Max back up to bed. All the blood that had been spilt had been cleaned up, and Regine then plunked down a HUGE cup of hot milk in front of Kai, who glared at her halfheartedly, then shook his head. Upon being giving the evil eye by both Regine and Saadii, he reluctantly (and with difficulty) picked it up and drank a bit. This satisfied the both of them.
"Kirk, can you call Stanley?" Regine asked after a moment of utter silence in the kitchen. Kai's head snapped up. "Just to let him know that you came here on your own, so we don't get accused of kidnapping you. Keep drinking."
Kai eyed the both of them warily but obeyed.
Stanley told them that Nagasaki hadn't said anything about them leaving, but if they were really that adamant about not going back, he would contact Nagasaki and have them go get the stuff they had left out there.
Saadii nodded emphatically. Kai would've done as much, but the bandage and painful stitches in the back of his head were inhibiting too much movement in that area.
After a while, Regine ordered both Rei and Saadii up to bed, Saadii being put in Kai's room for the moment. It wouldn't kill Rei and Kai to share a room for a while, at least until they got to move into the new house in a couple of weeks.
"Not until you finish up at least three more drinks, Kai." Regine told him, sticking another cup in front of him. Kai growled under his breath. "The story can wait until tomorrow."
"Is it all right if I take a shower before I go to bed?" Saadii asked uncertainly.
"Oh, sure, dear." Regine told her. "Go right ahead. Rei, go get some of the flannel sheets and blankets from the linen closet. Put two blankets in Kai's room for Saadii and bring the sheets, a blanket and two extra blankets into your room for Kai. Kirk will bring up the spare mattress in a moment."
The three left the kitchen and Regine took a seat again across the table from Kai, who was still grumbling about having all these hot drinks, a lot more than he was used to. "Don't complain, Kai. Just drink."
The next morning
"Why aren't you and Daddy at work, Mommy?" Griff asked curiously at breakfast.
"We decided to stay home today." Regine told him, setting down a plate of eggs on the table in front of him. "Eat up, your bus comes in fifteen minutes. Marina, darling, leave Driger alone."
Grumbling, Marina released Rei's cat and took a seat at the table.
Rei and Max both came tearing down the stairs at that morning. "Sorry I overslept!" they both gasped out, flinging themselves into chairs and fighting over the last piece of toast.
"Rei, give it to Max. You're not going to school today." Regine sighed. "You can have some toast later. Tell me you didn't wake Kai up."
"Nope!" Rei responded. "Why aren't I going to school today?"
"Because Stanley is going to be here shortly to talk to you and Kai and Saadii. If either one is awake by then. Do me a favour, though, and call Li and Mariah before they leave for school. Neither one has stopped calling for the past month and a half."
"I'm awake," Saadii's much-more-cheery voice came as she came down the stairs, dressed in what looked like Kai's clothes. She had brushed out her hair and braided it for the moment. "Now who's this Stanley character again?"
"Well, aren't we Miss Sunshine today." Rei told her, while dialing in Li's number.
"Hey, I'm in one piece, I'm far from Subaru, I'm clean, I'm dry and I'm warm. What's not to be happy about?" Saadii asked, entering the kitchen.
True to her word, her cheeks had lost the frozen look, but were still rosy, her eyes sparkled with a renewed spirit. Her hands were tucked inside her sleeves, but otherwise, she looked perfectly fine.
"That's Mr. Dickinson to you," Kirk told her. "He's the social worker for this family."
"Really." Saadii said, her eyes suddenly losing their sparkle.
"Don't worry about it," Rei said, hanging up after assuring Li he was indeed in one piece. "Mr. Dickinson? He'll probably just say it's too much trouble to bother sending you guys back." He picked up the receiver again and dialed in Mariah's number. "Hey, Mariah? It's Rei. Yikes! Mariah, stop screeching! Don't worry about me, I'm back! I'm fine! No, I'm not going to school today, Mr. Dickinson wants to talk to me. Yes, I'll be at school tomorrow. Mariah, Mariah, stop crying, for heaven's sake! It's not like this is the first time it's happened!"
"Somebody call me?" Kai yawned, coming downstairs, still dressed in the pajamas he borrowed from Rei last night. They didn't quite fit him: Rei was built a littler more delicately than Kai. But they were fine. "Oh, and the bus is here."
"Oh, man! Marina, Griff, gogogogogogogogo!" Regine groaned, ushering her two youngest out the door. "Max, you have to leave soon."
"Already on it, Regine." Max said, popping the last bite in his mouth and jumping off the bench and grabbing his schoolbag and lunch from the counter. "See you this afternoon."
The doorbell rang about half a second after Max left and Kirk dashed for the front door, opening it to reveal not only Mr. Dickinson but a woman as well. She had almost white-blonde hair, a lightly tanned complexion and clear blue eyes.
"Kirk, can I speak to you out here for a moment?" Stanley asked softly.
"Sure," Kirk answered, frowning.
"This is Blanche Amiko, from the Sapporo Child Welfare Services."
"Oh, now you're going to tell me Sapporo's actually where Kai and Saadii are supposed to be?" Kirk asked, sarcasm dripping from every syllable.
"Actually, no." Stanley responded. "Blanche's maiden name is Hiwatari. She's their oldest sister."
Kirk was stopped dead in his tracks.
"What are they discussing out there?" Regine sighed, standing up and leaving the three teens in the kitchen.
"Kirk, what's going on out there?" Regine asked, poking her head out the door. "You can't discuss this inside?"
"Not really." Kirk told her.
"Who's this?" Regine asked.
"This is Kai and Saadii's sister, Blanche." Stanley responded.
"Well, discuss whatever it is you're so deep in conversation about inside." Regine said, clearly ignoring Stanley's comment and its implied meaning: Don't get attached to them, she's taking them back with her.
Kai and Saadii both paled when Blanche entered the room.
"No." Kai said immediately, standing up and stalking out. There was a slight silence as the adults and Rei were stunned, and Saadii looked at Blanche with a betrayed look in her eyes for a moment longer before following her brother.
"Well,
that was a quick answer." Stanley muttered. "We'll go back to them later. Now,
Rei, what was your complaint again?"
"Take a wild guess," Rei
said, sounding scarily similar to Kirk with the sarcasm in every syllable.
"You claim Lian tried to kidnap you again." Stanley sighed.
"She did!" Rei snapped. "I was supposed in Nakoemi for one week! I just got back here yesterday evening!"
"Kai, Saadii, come down here, please." Regine called. "Rei, why don't you go back upstairs for the moment?"
"All right." Rei acquiesced and loped upstairs, passing the twins on their way down. He knew in his case that Mr. Dickinson would decide that nothing could be done as of yet and that Lian would lay off for a while and then send Nami or Neko out here to tie him up and drag him back.
"Absolutely not!" Kai argued as he winced slightly. Regine had pulled the bandage off from the back of his head and cleaned out the wound while he was angrily discussing the proposed (or rather, forced) course of action with Mr. Dickinson.
"Kai, this your sister we're talking about here." Stanley sighed.
"Yeah, well, where was she when Kurasu killed Father? How about when Kurasu made the rest of them run off? When he killed Anna?" Saadii burst out suddenly, and venomously.
Blanche now looked completely lost. "What?"
"You appear lost, Mrs. Amiko." Regine said softly.
"'Course she's lost," Kai scoffed, inhaling sharply as the antiseptic seeped into the stitches. "She was gone before any of that happened."
"Who in the world is Kurasu? Who the heck is Anna? What are we talking about now?" Blanche asked bewilderedly. "And what in the world happened to your head, Kai?"
"Actually, I'd like to know that, too," the rest of the room chorused.
"I tried to hitch a ride back to Tokyo on the back of a semi, but I didn't get a good enough hold and fell onto the ground." Kai muttered.
"Ah, so that's what the whole hold-semi-ground thing was." Kirk said.
"Mm-hm." Kai said, glaring briefly at Regine when she patted the bandage back down on his stitches.
"I'm confused." Blanche muttered. "Somebody shed some light on this matter for me?"
Between Kai and Saadii, the generalized story came out.
Shortly after Blanche had left when they were 4, a new farm hand had arrived at their place: Sebastien Kurasu. He was a nice enough guy, a bit of a temper, but nice. Anna was the youngest Hiwatari, born about two years after Blanche's departure. Then Kurasu had killed Wade, their father, in order to marry Larysa, their mother, about three months after Wade's death. After that, it all went downhill. Gemma, the second Hiwatari child, left about a year after that, Roarke barely two years after her and Camden about a month after him. About two weeks after Camden's departure, Kurasu had killed Anna in a moment of rage and Kai and Saadii had been removed from the house and sent into the foster care system in Nagasaki. Kurasu's daughter with Larysa, Natalie, hadn't been removed.
"And it's all move after move after that." Kai finished. "At least for me."
There was a bit of a stunned silence as they mulled it over. Finally, after a few more hours of arguments between the twins and Blanche, they managed to convince her that they had no intention of leaving with a sister who considered her own safety a higher priority than her siblings.
The other three children returned from school not long after that and for the first time in a month and three weeks, Regine truly felt like nobody was missing from this scene.
Rei and Max had gotten into another one of their silly tiffs about who was the better manga character: Kenshin or Naruto. Marina and Griff were discussing some reptile guy who had come to the elementary school today and how one of his snakes got loose in the gym. Kai and Saadii were conversing about something that wasn't quite understandable.
"But Naruto's a nine-tailed fox!" Max protested.
"Kenshin's realistic!"
"Naruto's normal!"
"So's Kenshin!"
"Did you see that big snake? It crawled up Mrs. Tachigawi's leg! She was screaming so loud!"
"Tiffanie Nyoku had to be carried out of the gym 'cause she fainted!"
'Yep. This is more like it.' Regine told herself in satisfaction.