*screeches*
Relieved because I haven't updated in a while?
Well. Uh. This was hard to write, and I've been increasingly busy...
I'm not quite satisfied with this, but here it is anyway. A real toughie to spit out, this one was.
FUN FACTS:
Ch. 32: illegal drug smuggling inspired by the one NCIS episode where DiNozzo is undercover and in the hospital with his gf, the doctor Benoir. (I think that's how you spell it?)
Disclaimer: Sadist batting cage belongs to Sorachi Hideaki.
Eyes of Wolves
- 33 -
.: AUGUST, PRESENT :.
"Well Blue, it looks like I'll finally be able to visit my daughter."
Sometimes, Umibouzu was so scatterbrained that Zenshi wondered how in the world the man was so strong.
"If you ever need my help, just call." The bald Yato patted his companion on the back and sauntered down another busy street, leaving Zenshi with two suitcases and a sense of incurable frustration. With unanswered questions and a strange bodily malaise, Zenshi watched the universe's strongest man march off to Kabukichou with as much pomp and circumstance as a king.
The crowd engulfed him, one suitcase, two suitcases, and a Yato.
.: SIX YEARS AGO :.
"Hey, have you—" Tabs breaks off mid-sentence to stare at his tall, aloof crewmate. "You fly some fancy colors, sir."
"Lieutenant," Abuto provides, clapping a lofty palm against Zenshi's shoulder. "Lieutenant Zenshi, here. Sounds nice, right?"
"Well," Tabs offers, in his roundabout, half-abashed but mostly satirical way, "the uniform matches your umbrella."
The newly appointed lieutenant in question glances down at his parasol. Tabs is right — the gold filigree of his new attire glints alongside the reverberating family crest on the base of the hilt.
Mocking him.
.: AUGUST, PRESENT :.
Zenshi, upon stepping off the metro line, was not awed by the resplendent fervor of Kabukichou's verve and vibrancy. Instead, immediate unease and apprehension saturated his limbs as the familiar ungainly entourage of the Yorozuya party came venturing down the street.
With them, two young women: one who sported plain brown hair and a vivid aura, and another with a soft, reserved voice and an eye patch masking the left side of her face. Evidently, they seemed to be dragging along the resident silver samurai and his charges, to who-knows-where.
"Anego, we're going to lunch, yes?" chimed Kagura with enthusiasm. "To the Korean BBQ place, yes?"
"Sure are, Kagura-chan," replied the brunette, toting a few shopping bags and smiling kindly at the younger girl. "We're meeting up with all the girls. It'll be a girls' day."
"I'm sorry, but," said the human-wearing glasses, "if it's a girl's day out, then why are we here?"
A rather unsavory expression crossed the bespectacled boy's face as he gestured to himself and their presumptuous leader.
"We're going shopping. You two will carry the bags." The sadistic smile that flashed obdurately across the girl's face was almost as terrifying as Tsukuyo's brooding on a bad day. In fact, the pernicious expression was so nostalgic that Zenshi's impression of the Yoshiwaran courtesan floated about him, lingering ubiquitously.
He loathed his disorientation, struggling to realign specific smells and sensations with the right people in the right places.
"Oh, Otae-san!" whistled another voice. "I brought her!"
Zenshi realized that he was not wrong in the fact that he sensed Tsukuyo; rather than an illusion of the senses, he had mistaken the brunette's cruelly pleasant smile for Tsukuyo's fierceness. The blonde in question appeared in tow behind the ever-peppy Sa-chan, the polar opposite of the lavender-haired kunoichi's excitement. The ominous expression on Tsukuyo's face portended to imminent doom — most likely for Gintoki.
"Please don't tell me you're going to drink," blurted the white-haired samurai abruptly, his hands suddenly unable to find a place to settle. He backed up a few steps.
Tsukuyo flushed. "What're ya tryin' to say, Gintoki?"
"Well, I'm just—"
"Tsukki!" exclaimed Kagura. "Tsukki, let's party!"
The Yato girl grasped Tsukuyo by the arm, joining Sa-chan in their collective tug of war with the courtesan.
"Ya know, I, uh —"
Gin, momentarily relieved from Tsukuyo's glare, sidled alongside Shinpachi with plaintive discontent. He grumbled to himself, reluctantly joining his one male employee in leading the girls to the metro station.
Zenshi swept briskly behind a pillar, setting the suitcases down and turning away. There would be no good in running or hiding; in fact, he had no idea why he was running and hiding.
Idiot, he hissed inwardly, cursing his luck. Umibouzu had long since vanished, and had left him in, to say the least, an awkward situation. The encounter would be bad enough, what with his deliberately disinterested stance and his downcast gaze.
"Ah!" Kagura abruptly stopped in her tracks, causing Tsukuyo and Sa-chan to tumble around her. The subtle whiff of Yato was enough for the perspicacious girl, whose heightened senses acutely pinpointed her target of interest. "Isn't that Zen-chan? Zen-chan!"
And in that moment, Zenshi discovered exactly how Kamui and Kagura were related — both so bluntly involved in the moment that even if they tried, they refused to accept a nonchalant dismissal of attention. The difference, however, was that Kamui's predation on the susceptible could be classified as malicious. Kagura, on the other hand, witnessed an air of innocence (if it could be called such) that illuminated her panache, her liveliness.
"Oh, Mr. Other Yato," called Gin in his flat voice with his flat smile and his flat dead fish eyes. "Going somewhere?"
The summoned Yato slowly glanced over his shoulder, his eyes sweeping from one member of the group to the next. When he reached Tsukuyo, the urge to sweep along and feel nothing flared instinctively. He had established no bonds with humans. At least, that was what the trained, coldhearted politician within him preached with pervasive conviction.
"Kagura," he decided to call. "Your father was looking for you."
"Papi?" said the girl, excitedly. "Papi was here?"
Zenshi nodded. His eyes lingered about Tsukuyo, who watched him with her typical, apathetic glare. Wordlessly, he stooped to pick up the suitcases.
"Nice of ya to leave a note," she suddenly apprehended. "If only I coulda found it."
"Come to think of it," Gin interrupted, "we haven't really seen you in a while, Mr. Other Yato. What's your name again?"
Tsukuyo tossed a few kunai at the man, the gesture almost affectionate, despite her apparent annoyance.
Zenshi grabbed the other suitcase.
"Yer not gonna answer me?" A brief expression of hurt crossed her face. "Seita's been failin' math, ya know."
It was her way of saying she was angry, her indirect statement of indignant discontent. Did she miss him? He wouldn't know, couldn't know. He hesitated to believe that he shouldn't know, for it was none of his business. Or was it? The questions rambled through his head in shameful fanfare.
"Hire a tutor," he answered simply. Gripping the handles of the luggage, he began a brisk walk to the exit. He would not be taking the train after all.
But then again, he hadn't known where he was going, anyway.
.: EIGHT YEARS AGO :.
His mother quietly embroiders a name in fanciful text. He realizes that it's his own, and mildly protests. There's no need for decoration, he claims. But she is a kind, patient, and often stubborn woman, and she fastidiously continues her work.
It's the fabric of his old umbrella, the small one he toted in early childhood. It hardly even spans the length of his arm now.
His mother notices the perplexed grimace on his face. It's not quite a frown, but there is a slight angle to his brows that makes her laugh.
"I'm redecorating the house. Your old umbrella will go with mine, and we'll hang them just for show." Not a mention of his father. "You've seen plenty of families hanging up old umbrellas, right?"
His slight nod urges her to continue.
"I've always liked this umbrella," she reveals, spinning the sky blue parasol in her delicate but calloused fingers. "It's so bright, isn't it? You only carry those dark ones now, like everyone else."
He stirs the saucepan of soup with a silver ladle, watching his mother at the kitchen table with her needle and threat.
"Maybe someday I'll change this name," says his mother. She runs her fingers along the work she's done so far. "A girl? A boy? Who knows. What color hair? What color eyes? I think this blue will go with anything."
"Mother," he finally says, exasperated.
"I can daydream, can't I? Don't you make that face at me." She beams through her admonishing. She reads the weary drop of his shoulders and his uncomfortable shift of weight from foot to foot with a wry chuckle. "Don't be ridiculous? No, I'm not ridiculous at all. I told you, it's a daydream."
He glances over at her pointedly.
"I can hope, right?" Another careful character embroidered. "I would like a girl. Maybe twins? Then I could have both."
"Mother."
"All right, gloomy boy," she relents, smiling from ear to ear. "We'll save it for another rainy day."
.: AUGUST, PRESENT :.
He was startled by the hand that clamped down almost viciously on his forearm. Tsukuyo whipped him around with such unexpected force that he was momentarily stunned. As if Earth had cast a sluggish, sedative spell on him, Zenshi struggled through the hodgepodge of heat, fatigue, and surprise.
"Where d'ya think yer goin'?" came the heavily accented accusation. The glower of her lilac eyes forced him into inadvertent submission. Privately, he snarled at her manipulation of his bewilderment.
"Don't you have a luncheon to attend?" He addressed flatly, devoid of any emotion, never once allowing his apprehension to cross his features.
"I do."
"Well, I wouldn't want to keep you."
From afar, the group waiting for Tsukuyo's company could feel her self-control snapping. The two males instinctively shied away; they would not want to be the target of Tsukuyo's fist.
The tension was palpable. For a moment, Zenshi considered turning away, but realized that in that moment, he did not dare; whether he wished to refrain from hurting her, offending her, or disrespecting her, he was not sure. Most likely, an awful mixture of all three, as well as his own pride. He refused to let her come after him, even if he'd abandoned her without a word.
She didn't say a thing.
She never allowed any expression to cross her face, but he saw it. He saw, in the paleness of her old scars and the swimming remorse in her eyes, so painfully reflected in his own, that she was confused.
And he would let her be.
That is, until he realized that his face was stinging, the world was spinning, and the clap of her hand against his face was but a delayed echo in the train station, harsh and jarring.
I had the urge to put Zenshi in potentially awkward situations.
And there it is.
Tell me what you think. This was hard to write.
You know, this is hard to read. If anyone actually makes it this far, leave a review and I will shower you in figurative Olympic Golds.
The little Russian girl, the 15-year-old, she's a boss.
And so is Yuzuru Hanyu and his Winnie the Pooh tissue box.
That triple toe loop tho. So GRACEFUL. And such personality...