Chapter Text
The inn is so small, but the walls seem to go on forever.
Or maybe it only looks that way because his eyes stare at the ceiling, burning holes into it like the burning he feels all over. He can’t move, and it feels like he’s been lying here for an eon, fighting going on all around him.
His master tossed him aside-- and Kashuu fears, through the throbbing pain, that it might be permanent.
(Not this time. But next time, yes.)
There’s a flash of blue, and Kashuu wants to speak at the sight of the Shinsengumi uniform, say please, please don’t leave me here, don’t throw me away, it hurts, I can’t move and it hurts--
“I can change this…”
Kashuu feels like he should recognize that voice. But he doesn’t. Maybe it’s the pain.
No words come to his throat, and whoever spoke walks away.
He continues to stare at the ceiling of Ikedaya Inn.
---
They are tsukumogami. Spirits of the sword-- representations of what they embody. Their maker’s wishes, and their owner’s intentions.
So, Kashuu probably embodies filthiness, now that he lies here with his head on someone's arm. He hasn’t stopped bleeding. He’s red all over.
(He’ll stay red all over.)
At this point, he’s still wearing the Shinsengumi uniform-- and so is the other sword in front of him, who holds a smile on his face.
“It’s okay, Kashuu,” Yasusada says with full confidence and a gentle voice. “You’re going to the blacksmith, so he’ll definitely fix you.”
Kashuu stares at the red on his hands.
“...Yeah. I guess so.”
And Yasusada continues to carry (carry! like he’s inept--) Kashuu in his hands, like how Souji Okita carries his real body, with the barely-concealed fear that with one wrong move, he’ll snap in half.
Their master cannot see them, but it’s okay.
“Even if you stay like this, I definitely won’t leave you,” Yasusada adds on.
(And he is screaming when Kashuu is melted down to nothing, but Yasusada still left him, so as the uniform burns off his shoulders, Kashuu will never forgive that.)
---
“Uhh. I'm the child beneath the river. Kashuu Kiyomitsu. I may be difficult to handle, but my performance is good.”
He does not wear the Shinsengumi uniform, or reflect the wishes of his maker, the intentions of his old master.
Instead, he simply smiles at the saniwa in front of him, because he’s completely fine with the idea of being brought back into existence for someone who cares enough to drag his soul out.
---
Transferred.
There was absolutely no warning. His saniwa was absent, most of the time-- and new at this whole thing, apparently, and most of the swords weren’t used to battle. Tantous, even, with a wakizashi or two. He was the top performer. The most valuable, the most beautiful--
“Here I am.”
Kashuu’s voice is in a complete deadpan, and at this point, he’s almost ready to give up even looking good for his new saniwa. But his cloak is still ironed, hair still combed and gelled into place, fingernails still perfect.
And yet, here he is. The person in front of him is carrying a pleasant smile Kashuu almost wants to punch, and he can’t even muster the energy to shake his hand when he stretches it out. Behavioral problems, his previous saniwa said. You’ll do better in this army. There’s going to be a few swords you recognize there to keep you grounded. When you start getting along, you can choose to come back.
Yeah, getting along. Playing nice with swords that might as well be kids, scampering around his feet, dragging mud everywhere-- that was impossible, so Kashuu made up for the it the best he could by being a fighter. And a beauty, on top of that.
So he’s not yet panicking, not yet fully accepting this. “Well now, are you the shy type? It’s alright. I’m Mikazuki Munechika. Kashuu Kiyomitsu, is it?”
“You don’t have to bother remembering my name. My saniwa will come back for me by the end of the day.”
The ends of Kashuu’s lips turn down further when Mikazuki’s smile doesn’t disappear at all.
“Hahaha, is that so? Even so, as the assistant of your saniwa, I welcome you to the Citadel.” And Mikazuki picks his words carefully, hammering in that this saniwa is going to be Kashuu’s saniwa, and there is no ruling against it. He picks up a paper from the desk.
“Your room is to the east. Your new squadmates should meet with you soon.”
Kashuu decides to give into one more graceless action, the last one before he walks away-- he sticks his tongue out at Mikazuki.
When he keeps laughing, Kashuu just grabs his bags and stomps away, heels clattering on the wood.
---
“--He’s here! Honebami, he’s here!”
Kashuu hears the words before he even opens the door, and realizes that whoever his roommate is has incredibly good hearing-- or an unfairly honed scouting ability. Taking a step back to assess the situation, he’s immediately relieved for that decision when the door swings open outwards.
God, that could’ve smashed into his face.
“It’s nice to meet you!” The person who was speaking previously steps out first, smile far too wide and messy black hair absolutely everywhere. Kashuu’s about to comment on that-- tie up your hair, goddamn-- when said person suddenly pulls him into a bear hug, forcing him to drop his bags.
“I’m Namazuo Toushirou! Nice to meet you!”
“Gck--?! Let me go!”
Namazuo actually listens, which is a small mercy. The man behind him is someone with short hair who’s gone grey way too young-- Honebami, then. “Sorry, sorry. I’ll carry your bags in--”
“No,” Kashuu spits, grabbing his bags again. God, if anything broke from his dropping them, he’s going to scream. “Just free a bed for me, and I’ll be gone by tomorrow.”
And Kashuu feels some sort of grim satisfaction when Namazuo’s face falls, with his mouth forming a dejected ‘o’. With that, he turns on his heels and into the doorway--
--only to have Honebami suddenly slam the other side of the doorframe with his hand, blocking Kashuu’s way in with his body.
“Excuse me.”
“What do you mean, you’ll be gone by tomorrow?”
Kashuu bends his knees and ducks right under Honebami’s arm, which seems to sour his expression further. And that prompts Kashuu to pick up an even more mocking tone. “Of course, that means my saniwa will come back for me. It’s only a matter of time.”
“But--”
Honebami stops Namazuo short, and while he’s not exactly glaring, Honebami’s expression isn’t pleasant by any means. He doesn’t say anything more, as if telling Namazuo to just let him be.
And Kashuu does appreciate that, so he puts his bags down--
“Kashuu?”
He recognizes that voice.
Kashuu turns around so fast, he almost trips on his heels. They weren’t kidding when they said there would be people he recognized. Standing at the doorway, with two other people behind him, dressed in that uniform--
Namazuo steps aside, suddenly back to smiling. “Oh, Yasusada! His name is Kashuu?”
Yasusada doesn’t reply immediately, walking in to let Kanesada and Horikawa enter. What does someone do, when you’re reunited with the comrades you haven’t been in years? Decades, even? Well, Kashuu--
--decides to just turn around and kick his shoes off as though they weren’t there.
“Hey, did you just…? You couldn’t have forgotten us, right?!” And Kashuu can tell that’s Kanesada speaking, and he’s stomping closer. Stuffing his shoes under the bed, he looks over his shoulder, not bothering to put a smile on his face.
Right, the saniwa sent him to an army with the other Shinsengumi swords. Familiarity would be good.
It’s too bad his past the is the last thing he wants to remember.
“Of course I couldn’t have,” Kashuu just rattles off, seating himself on the bed and staring down Kanesada. He supposes that it’s just expected, that Yasusada would play nice with them.
(Kashuu was used in assassinations and ‘small conflicts’. He’s never actually seen war. Especially not alongside these people. Even if Yasusada’s only been in one real battle.)
Kashuu decides to continue-- “I just thought the past between us shouldn’t matter.” And somehow, that seems to grab Namazuo’s attention.
“I agree! If you just want a fresh start, we--”
“Jeez, I mean I don’t care about what happened before!” Kashuu snaps back at Namazuo, cutting him off, though he’s not sure sure if he believes those words. “I’ll be gone soon, you can just forget about me.”
(Like they always have. They’re not worth the effort to get love from. He’ll go back soon, so none of them are.)
Kanesada’s the first one to finally react again, this time finally glowering. “Why, you little--”
“Kane-san!” But Horikawa manages to stop him, and that’s the first thing he’s said since he’s stepped in. Kashuu can’t blame him, he’s made the atmosphere pretty awkward. (So they can get the hint and get out.)
Yasusada’s the one who steps up next, while the Toushirou brothers just stare.
“You can’t possibly not care at all, can you?”
And the first thought Kashuu has, after grabbing the fabric of Yasusada’s sleeve, is that he’s going to wish he could take these words back.
But it’s too late, they bubble up his throat, at this point, Kashuu still has that damn grin on his face.
“At least I don’t let it weigh me down,” Kashuu almost hisses, staring at Yasusada’s uniform. It’s been ages, ages since he’s last saw him, and at this point, it’s been ages too many. “You can’t keep declaring your allegiance to a dead master in front of your saniwa, you know. It’ll get preeetty nasty if they think you’re going to betray them.”
And that’s all it takes for Yasusada to nail him right in the jaw.
It’s almost comical. At one moment, he just stares at Kashuu, words failing to reach his lips and eyes widening. And then, that entire expression drops too fast for his target to reach, and he’s going backwards with his teeth aching.
“Uwa…?!” Kashuu manages to balance, raising his right arm to his mouth. And with Yasusada’s sad little face turning into a glare you’d expect from an enemy, this is where even Kanesada backs up from surprise and Honebami raises his hand.
As in, walks in and puts his hand between the two of them.
“Get out.”
“That’s right. My blood is boiling,” Yasusada seethes.
And then Honebami repeats-- “Get out. Not him. You.”
Yasusada goes back to looking surprised as Honebami stands firm. “The one who raises his hand first is the one in the wrong.”
“--And this is our room,” Namazuo says, not quite sure what expression to put on and starts shooing Kanesada and Horikawa away. “Maybe he’s just had a rough day from the transfer. We’ll save all this for tomorrow, alright?”
Kashuu wants to say there won’t be a tomorrow, but then he tries to move his jaw and realizes it hurts like a bitch.
Kanesada reaches out to grab Yasusada’s shoulder. “That’s right. Save your enemy for someone who’s worth your time, Yasusada.”
And that’s definitely something Kashuu wants to protest to, until he stops himself. Of course he’s not worth their time. That was the objective from the start. They’ll just be separated soon.
But with how the pain in his mouth is real, his saniwa seriously can’t be any slower in deciding to get him back.
“Good-bye!” Namazuo waves the trio off, even if they’re definitely not in high spirits anymore.
And Honebami turns to Kashuu.
“Good night.”
That’s apparently the cue for all of them to fall into an awkward silence.
But the lights go off, and Kashuu welcomes the sleep.
---
--At least, until the alarm sounds, and he’s jolted back awake.
The Citadel has quite a lot of modern technology, including a loudspeaker system. Kashuu’s used to it, of course, but he’ll never like being woken up at ungodly hours by a siren call that seems to come from all over.
“Squad 3, report to the Main Hall immediately.”
“We’re Squad 3,” Namazuo helpfully adds, and he only gets the most pathetic groan from Kashuu as a response.
But he gathers up his presentable clothes and walks into the Main Hall-- sword at hip, heels on his feet, and a small bruise on the bottom of his jaw that he tries to cover with his scarf.
“So, who are the rest of Squad 3?”
Honebami’s the first one to answer, while Namazuo deliberates whether he should tell the truth. “Yamato no Kami Yasusada, Horikawa Kunihiro and Izumi no Kami Kanesada.”
“You’re kidding me.”
And Kashuu rounds the corner, to come face-to-face with the guy who punched him in the jaw a few hours ago.
Well, if Honebami was trying to joke, it would’ve been a pretty bad joke anyway.
“Excellent, you’re all here.” Kashuu remembers this guy-- the one who just keeps smiling away, no matter what he said. Mikazuki grabs a notebook, like he’s going to be the one giving out the briefing rather than the saniwa, and suddenly Kanesada speaks up.
“Hey, it’s not a great idea for us to sortie now, is it? We’ve finally got a full team, but--”
“I know,” Mikazuki says, and Yasusada looks down on the floor. Does that mean he tattled on himself for punching--? That would be admirably stupid, Kashuu has to admit. “Hmm. I believe the saniwa knows as well. The decision was made, nonetheless.”
“But--”
“This is urgent. Please let me go through with the mission briefing first. The Retrograding Army has...”
Kashuu’s saniwa can’t come get him any slower.
And he keeps thinking that, when Mikazuki goes through the layout of the area around Toba, and exactly where they need to travel to in order to intercept. He keeps thinking that so he doesn’t need to think about how he never came here, and still thinks that until his feet touch down in 1868 and the captain Namazuo tells them to take formation.
Kashuu’s last saniwa-- yes, last saniwa, not current-- was only allowed to let them sortie through small conflicts that had profound effect on history. Never battles like these.
Despite that, Kashuu still sees it like a small conflict, because it’s just a few enemy forces. But before he can even plan anything--
“This place is… Toba…”
And Kashuu finally thinks about where he actually is. Turning to Yasusada, he decides to break the silence and speak.
“What're you getting all gloomy over? It's annoying.”
Right. A+ comfort. Not that Kashuu was trying. Yasusada doesn’t glare, only stay in formation. “Because, I mean... in the end, we couldn't return here together with Okita-kun, could we?”
(Being brought here before doesn’t mean shit when you couldn’t fight, and Kashuu sure as hell fits that bill.)
“I guess. Well, as much as that person liked a hard-to-use sword like you, he had a weak body, after all.”
“You're just as ‘hard-to-use’, aren't you?”
Hard-to-use, and still unable to find a good saniwa, apparently.
“...Well that's true. Geez, for swords like us, it's a real pain if our master doesn't live a long life…”
Yasusada’s calmed down quite a bit from the last time they spoke, and Kashuu’s not sure how to feel about the fact this this is the first civil conversation they’ve had in years. As ‘civil’ as it can be, with Yasusada obviously caring so much more than Kashuu. Their former master is dead, after all. The only thing they can do now is just move forward.
And now, Kashuu will have to win the love of the new saniwa. They’ll be wiser this time, perhaps. They’ve been at this longer. They’ll know.
“Don’t worry about me,” Yasusada suddenly says, gripping the handle of his sword. “I’ll take all my anger out on the enemy.”
So Kashuu isn’t exactly Yasusada’s enemy right now. At least that much he can ascertain.
Before he can reply, Namazuo yells over them. “Enemy incoming! Assume horizontal formation!”
Everyone backs off into a line, including Kashuu. Namazuo’s eyes are good-- they spot out the enemy formation before they can spot them, and he raises his sword to point at the target.
“Alright! Attack!”
And they break off into a run.
Kashuu is, at the very least, good at running. His heels are clicking against the floor and this job, at least, he can do-- he’ll perform well on his first sortie, that’s the plan. His sword slices into an enemy uchigatana, absolutely destroying it.
--Or not, because when he backs off to avoid a counterattack, it rises right back up. He doesn’t have time to dodge, and he never needs to, because Honebami’s sword sweeps in at that exact moment to tear through its sword-- and neck.
And just like that, the battle’s already over.
“Wow, Honebami! You got two of them!” Horikawa’s words make Kashuu turn his head, and he spots another sliced-apart enemy lying at Honebami’s feet. So he can’t stop himself from saying:
“Hey, I cut him down for you first.” Honebami spares Kashuu a glance, before moving on.
Oh.
Asshole.
The next battle goes the same way, and Kashuu’s watching Honebami this time-- he moves the fastest, not quite breaking out of formation but also taking a risk by running closer and ducking down while his sword arm remains high to sweep away the head. Not something an uchigatana can do, and Kashuu can’t use his non-dominant hands to fight either, which is how Honebami quickly switches to finish off any remaining enemies nearby.
Still, the chance of finishing off the captain of the strongest enemy force on his first sortie here is a chance he doesn’t want to give up.
“Take the Crane Wing formation! Kashuu, come with me into the middle.” Namazuo gives out the orders, and for now, he decides to follow. This position puts him the furthest away from the enemy, however, and they’re already in sight.
So it’s now or never, then.
He can’t move as quickly as Honebami can, but if he scores a direct hit, they’re as good as gone. “I’ll distract them! Go finish off the rest when they try converging on me, alright?”
“Eh? What--”
Kashuu follows through with his words, leaving Namazuo’s side and rushing past the rest. The enemy might be surprised by him, or maybe they’re not, but the point is, they don’t move fast enough to stop him and Namazuo’s yelling and Yasusada’s yelling too, but his sword is already slashing through its shoulder and disabling it, and he jumps closer to embed the lower end of his blade into the right shoulder before finally pressing onto the neck and now the neck isn’t there anymore.
The captain of the enemy squad has fallen.
(You know, the goal of the enemy squad was to protect the Shinsengumi. To make sure they get out alive, so history would think. Fighting the Retrograding Army this way, it’s almost like betrayal--)
If Kashuu had time to celebrate, then it passed by too quickly in his euphoria, because the shift in formation is hard to adjust to, and a few seconds wasted means everything in battle. And suddenly, for the first time in a long time, Kashuu finds himself outnumbered.
(And yet, it feels unfortunately familiar. Maybe he should’ve spoken a bit earlier. But he knew they would stop him. ...Should he really have gone if he knew they would stop him--?)
“HONEBAMI!”
Kashuu spots the enemy to his right a bit too late, and he can’t get away, but once again, he doesn’t need to. It goes down to the same person as before, but by someone (everyone’s?) yell, he can guess that it didn’t go too well.
Honebami only spares a moment to wince at the huge gash on his left arm, and scans the area to check for any remaining forces. Finding none, he just looks back at Kashuu with that same expression he wore when they first met--
“Don’t run ahead.”
By the time Kashuu realizes Honebami took a blow for him, they’re already walking back in time, and he only has a graceless “Ah” to answer him with.
---
”We used to work together well in the past, but until you shape up, that’s not possible anymore.”
And it’s also been a long time when Kashuu was the one who has to ‘shape up’.
Honebami’s going to be stuck in the Citadel to heal for quite some time-- that’s already one strike against him. Namazuo doesn’t seem too bothered, only worried for Honebami (“I guess first battle jitters always happen!”). Kanesada thinks this incident has only proven his point, and Horikawa rushed off to help prepare everything to heal Honebami the moment they touched down in time. Yasusada was the only one who remained, with a smile that looked far too familiar, as he told him those few words--
(Why did he copy their old Master’s smile? It’s a very dangerous smile.)
“It’s not possible anymore.” Kashuu leans on the wooden steps, looking out at the sky. Everything about his appearance is still perfect. The bruise on his chin is already turning red.
Neither saniwa has spoken to him yet, and he doesn’t know what’s going to happen now.
“Just what am I supposed to do?”
“You look like you’re deep in thought.”
And if Kashuu still had his sword on him, he would’ve probably pointed it at Mikazuki’s throat while scrambling away.
Instead, his foot nearly kicks away the tea in his hands, the end of his heel hovering far too close to his hands. Upon realizing who he is, Kashuu keeps his foot in the air for a few more seconds before finally standing up instead. “What are you doing here?’
“To enjoy the view.”
He’s still smiling that same smile, and that infuriates Kashuu to no end.
With that, Kashuu’s about to turn away and leave out of spite-- but Mikazuki raises his arm, with another steaming cup of tea. “It looks like I’ve made too much for this evening. It’d be a shame if it went to waste. Would you mind taking this cup?”
Kashuu just stares.
And sighs before taking the cup, still making sure he’s seated a few feet away from Mikazuki.
“Hahaha, thank you. I heard you took down the enemy captain today by yourself. That’s quite impressive.”
“Yeah, it is.”
If Mikazuki was trying to see if Kashuu would show any sign of remorse for what he’s done, he won’t get it. Even if he actually regrets getting Honebami this hurt, it’ll be because the saniwa might assume he’s too hard to handle compared to his worth.
When that thought graces his head, Kashuu consciously brushes his hand over his hair to see if there are any loose strands. He can’t stop being hard to handle. But he can still look--
Pretty.
Under his old saniwa, he was always the most high-performing. Why is he here, where he’s so much more useless than before?
“Can I ask for a favor?” Mikazuki definitely asks that while Kashuu is drinking so he can continue on without giving him a chance to reject. At least, that’s what Kashuu thinks, tea dripping down his throat. “Be kind to Honebami, will you? He’s an old friend of mine.”
And most of the time, Kashuu doesn’t care about whatever histories any other sword has. At least, only ‘most of the time’, because Mikazuki adds on-- “Even if he doesn’t remember it.”
“Eh?”
But no one can walk away from a statement like that without a question. “What do you mean, he doesn’t remember it?”
“You don’t know?” Mikazuki says it in a way that makes Kashuu think that this is common knowledge, how can he not know, and so he’s immediately hooked on.
“Come on, don’t just say that!” Kashuu’s tone is, at least, a bit more conversational now. “If I’m asking, I don’t know. Tell me.”
“My, do you really want an old man like me to tell a story? You might get bored.”
The words ‘old man’ make Kashuu give Mikazuki an entire glance over, though he doesn’t look too old except for that voice, along with that dumb smile. --He is the assistant to Kashuu’s new saniwa, though. So maybe he should just continue playing along.
He doesn’t have anything to lose. Except, you know, everything. But that’s already on the line right now, so he might as well.
“Well~ if I get too bored, I’ll tell you, old man.”
---
And yet, Mikazuki takes no time at all to explain everything, and now he’s standing outside the damn repairs room with no idea about what he should do.
We were both prized swords of the Ashikaga family. We were both separated during its fall. Something terrible happened, and he can’t remember anything before the flames. One of these things are not like the others. Something similar allegedly happened to Namazuo-- both swords who survived to 2205, the ‘modern age’. Perhaps death is sometimes the better fate, especially in their case, where the saniwas reach through time itself to pull sword spirits into the living world.
For cases like Honebami, it was easy. They just took the sword itself and brought forth the tsukumogami. For Kashuu-- well, they pulled him from the veil of non-existence, giving him new form, a new sword as a body.
And the reason for that non-existence is something he swore to never let happen again.
So here he is, Mikazuki’s damn smile still burned into his head, still wondering why the hell Honebami-- who has even less than Kashuu-- would’ve risked his life for someone who’s just pissed his friends off.
Ah, but that’s the point, isn’t it? Mikazuki’s words are said in an agonizing way, not quite know-it-all and yet letting on that he knows more than it seems. A squad must work together to cover the faults. Honebami is eternally loyal to our saniwa. And he does have more. He has friends, does he not?
And Kashuu answered, So you think I don’t have friends.
Well, do you?
…
“Make friends.” Kashuu stares at the floor. Mikazuki assured him that they don’t care too much about appearance, but he still makes sure he’s presentable.
Even if what he’s finally decided to do, will probably shame him for the rest of whatever existence he has left.
“...Heeey! Honebami.”
--Maybe choosing to slur his words in such a casual way isn’t the best choice when it comes to someone as seemingly stoic as Honebami. It’s a good thing only Honebami and Namazuo are here-- if there were more, maybe he would’ve chickened out. Maybe Namazuo greets him, but Kashuu doesn’t hear it, only looking to Honebami.
“You. What is it?”
Kashuu walks closer.
He looks up at Honebami, nicks still on his face, hand still in a bandage.
And then he falls right to his knees, forehead almost slamming onto the floor.
He already regrets this.
“I’m sorry for breaking formation and getting you hurt!” Despite the fact that his face is staring at the floor, he says the words a bit too quickly, and somehow the whole thing comes off as a little less than sincere. “I mean, seriously. I am.”
Silence for a few seconds while Kashuu can only see the ground. Did he say something wrong again--? (He is the child beneath the river. He was never good at speaking, at all those refined things, so he makes do with his appearance.) Of course, of course that’s it, even though he’s finally accepted he’s going to be stuck here--
“Aww, you don’t need to bow down like down! Here, get up.” Kashuu makes an undignified noise as Namazuo hoists him up by the shoulders, and he realizes Honebami is now pointedly staring away from him. “Honebami just didn’t want you to get hurt. Right? He’s just too shy to look at you right now.”
Honebami just continues staring holes into the opposite wall, before saying, “You’re forgiven.”
“And I’m sure everyone else will agree to forgive you to,” Namazuo chirps, confirming that Kashuu was indeed one step away from making everyone hate him.
Still--
“Well~. I can’t argue against that.” A beat. “Don’t tell anyone I bowed, though.”
---
Unfortunately for Kashuu, there are three faces peering through the windows, and they were the people Honebami was staring so intensely at.
“Hey, what did he say? He just bowed!” Kanesada tries peering closer, and Horikawa puts his ear to the glass to try overhearing the conversation.
“Yasusada!” Horikawa gestures at the last member of the squad. “Look here! I think Honebami said that he’s forgiven him!”
There’s a smile on Yasusada’s face. Just vaguely, both Kanesada and Horikawa find it eerily familiar.
“Is that so?” And Yasusada does lean in to look closer, only to have Honebami lock eye contact with them at that exact moment.
Kanesada’s response is to grab Horikawa and Yasusada’s shirts before yanking them both down and away from sight.
(But they agree to forgive him too. Apparently.)