[Ongoing] Dréd-Son - Chapter 40: Where the path leads you
Title: Dréd-Son - Chapter 40: Where the path leads you
Fandom: Johnny's & Associates
Pairings/Characters: Kis-My-Ft2 (8 People) - in this chapter: Kitayama, Fujigaya Senga, Nikaido, 4U, MA, T&T & more
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Fighting, dark themes...
Disclaimer: Not mine. Owned by J&A. The AU is mine though as well as aymagun's.
A/N: I think some of you have been waiting for this :)
Summary: It's called the 'gift' or 'soul' by most. A strange, mysterious force only few possess on the planet that is half ocean and half desert. The people on the planet have lived in harmony with each other and their environment for centuries but something yet unknown is threatening to throw everything into chaos.
The soul had wrapped itself around him like a bubble. He was thrown into the sand at first but then he broke to the surface again. A soul-path appeared in front of him. It took Fujigaya few attempts to whisper a soft command, weave a sing-song out of it but when the ship disappeared from his view completely, it worked.
Wiping some blood from his lips - he’d get Kitayama back for that at some other time - he got onto the soul path and followed it.
His soul had picked up the signature of another soul. A familiar soul. Kitayama had been right about this being a ‘good’ part of the desert. He just hoped he would make it in time and would be welcomed. After all, he had never dealt with these people before.
The pirates and bandits of the desert. The masters of hiding, camouflage and surprise attacks. They were their last hope now. His last hope.
Should he fail, the results would probably be the same as when he would have stayed on the ship with everyone else. Capture and ultimately death.
Fujigaya balled his fist. Well, they had bet everything on this card. He didn’t have a choice but to follow through with the plan. The flicker of soul energy he was picking up gave him hope though. If Master Tsubasa was somewhere close by, maybe he wouldn’t have to risk venturing into unknown territory by himself. And maybe his master would have a better idea.
The soul-path would lead him towards his destination.
After a while, he felt how the soul energy signature was getting stronger but when he looked around he couldn’t see anything. He wasn’t surprised. These people knew how to hide themselves. He wouldn’t find them if he relied on his normal senses.
He got off the soul path carefully and sure enough, the sand stayed under his feet and didn’t pull him down. Fujigaya still moved carefully, slowly.
It didn’t take long for him to stop in his tracks again and a burst of sand later, he was no longer alone. He had found who he had been looking for but they didn’t look like they were going to welcome him with open arms.
“What are you doing here? And what might you be looking for?” one of the masked bandits asked him and eyed him suspiciously. Three others were to his sides and behind him, Fujigaya counted as he looked around carefully.
Lifting his arms to show that he didn’t have any intention of attacking them, Fujigaya stated, “My name is Fujigaya Taisuke. I’m looking for someone.”
“Someone? Who might that be. Here in the desert and on foot nonetheless!” one of the bandits asked. “Why were you looking here of all places?”
“Do you know someone by the name of Imai? Imai Tsubasa,” Fujigaya ignored the question and asked a question of his own. It might have been the wrong move but he felt that continuing to play ten-questions with the bandits wouldn’t get him anywhere.
The quartett fell silent. Then one of the bandits said, “Follow me.”
Apparently he had asked the right question. Fujigaya nodded and did like he was told, following at a safe distance. Suddenly, as if out of nowhere, something that looked like a small village appeared in the sand. Unlike Sunäa this village hadn’t sunk into the sand, it had been hidden there deliberately and it could still move. It would never stay at the same place for very long. Despite being able to hide, being on the move made them harder to track down.
A tall pirate was waiting at what looked like the entrance.
“What did you guys bring back this time?” the man asked and eyed Fujigaya. A smile tugged on his lips, “Ah, the only type of feline Tsubasa can actually stand?” He motioned towards one of the tents. “Be our guest. He’s been waiting.”
The man took a drag from his long pipe. When Fujigaya passed him he asked quietly, “How’s the lion cub doing? I do hope he’s fine?”
Fujigaya halted in his steps briefly and answered, “I don’t know who exactly you might be referring to but chances are that the answer is ‘I really hope so’.” He gave the man a nod and then proceeded towards the tent, stepping inside.
“Master Tsubasa,” he didn’t have to look around to know who was inside.
A smile tugged up the corners of Master Tsubasa’s lips, “Taisuke. So it was you. You seemed to appear out of nowhere.”
“It’s a long story,” Fujigaya sighed. “I have no time to tell you all the details, though. I need your help! And I need it quickly!” He didn’t beat around the bush. Time was something he did not have a lot of right now.
Master Tsubasa got up, “I had a feeling. Tell me the most important bits.”
“We need to track and follow a ship,” Fujigaya nodded and told Master Tsubasa the necessary information. He just hoped, prayed, they would make it fast enough. Unless they could follow the ship or trace it somehow, he didn’t have any clue as to where his friends were being brought and there was no other way to find them with their souls blocked out.
~*~
Fujigaya stepped over to where Kitayama had sunk onto the floor. The other didn’t seem conscious anymore but that wasn’t the case. “You sure took your sweet time, Fujigaya.”
“Shut up. I just saved your ass,” Fujigaya grunted and helped the other up. “Show me some gratitude at least.”
“What do you want me to do? Kneel down and grovel?” Kitayama cracked an eye open.
Putting one of Kitayama’s arms over his shoulders, Fujigaya commented in an overly dramatic manner, “Oh yes. That sounds like music to my ears.”
Snorting, Kitayama half muttered and half coughed, “Not even in your dreams, Fujigaya.”
“As if I’d ever LET you into my dreams.” Fujigaya huffed indignantly.
After a few moments of silence between them, Kitayama whispered, “I’m glad you are okay and found your way to them safely.” His voice was barely audible.
“Shut up, you idiot. You’re not allowed to talk anymore before a healer has looked at you and given you the okay to talk again,” Fujigaya grumbled and since walking with Kitayama supporting himself on him heavily was not working because the other could barely walk anymore, he lifted the other up and carried him, pointedly avoiding eye-contact with anyone around them - especially Kitayama himself.
One of the bandits, Tatsumi, had mercy with him and came over to help Fujigaya to support Kitayama, so that they could get the other over to one of the vehicles to be treated, while Nikaido freed Senga from his restraints.
“You two knew about this all along? You planned it?” Nikaido was staring at them as he helped to get Senga off the contraption the other had been strapped to. “You guys make your shit too believable. I seriously thought for a while that Mitsu had gone around the bend for real and had betrayed us!”
Kitayama laughed dryly. “That was the whole plan.”
“When did you come up with something like this?” Senga asked, “We didn’t even notice.”
Fujigaya snorted softly, “It’s a long story.” He couldn’t believe that it had only been but a few days ever since everything had happened or had it only been hours? Things seemed to be so long ago already, so much had happened and their capture had totally messed with his sense of time. “You thought he was still unconscious but he wasn’t. He had discovered something but he couldn’t risk anyone else seeing it.”
~*~
“Listen, Fujigaya, pretend I’m still out. There’s something I need to tell you,” the voice was barely audible but Fujigaya was sitting close enough to hear.
He didn’t make a move and just kept staring ahead as if nothing had happened. “You’re awake?”
“Have been for a while,” Kitayama replied. “And there’s more.”
“More?” Fujigaya had to close his eyes then, pretending to be falling asleep. Pulling his legs up, he rested his head on his knees, hiding his face. He was afraid things would show on it otherwise.
Kitayama continued, “Has your soul come back to you?”
“You don’t mean…!” Fujigaya’s eyes widened and he whispered a soft command but there was nothing. His shoulders slumped a little bit. Kitayama’s words had given him hope for one moment but it was gone again. Then he realized something about the other’s words. “Wait, does that mean…?”
“Yeah,” Kitayama’s fingers twitched a bit. “I don’t know why or how long this will last. If this is the part of the dessert I think it is, there is only one thing we can do. It’s risky but we have to gamble.” He knew that Fujigaya knew what he was talking about, even though he wasn’t saying it. He expected the other to argue with him and disagree and then work on a compromise and alternative plan but that wasn’t what happened.
Fujigaya stayed silent for a few moments. When he spoke again, he asked, “Hey, Kitayama, do you remember what I said that night on the ship? That something terrible would happen the day we actually agree on something?”
Kitayama would have stared at the other in surprise if it wasn’t too dangerous to do so right now. “Yeah, of course I remember.”
“Well, let’s see if it will really turn out to be terrible then,” Fujigaya snuck a short glance at him, hidden by his long bangs.
One of Kitayama’s eyes twitched a little bit as he willed them to stay shut. “I wouldn’t have thought that the time would come so soon.”
“It needs to be done.”
“I know.”
They had used the next opportunity that had presented itself to them. Fighting between them wasn’t anything atypical after all. Actually, them not fighting each other was probably more suspicious really.
Neither Kitayama nor Fujigaya heard any of the other protests. “We have one shot. Don’t waste it,” Kitayama said and took hold of the other’s hand.
Fujigaya snorted, “I won’t be the one to screw this up.”
“Good,” Kitayama muttered and then closed his eyes. He could feel Fujigaya do the same next to him. After a few moments of complete silence, they shouted a command and their souls flared up, blasting a small hole into the shield around their flying cage underneath them.
Kitayama’s hand holding onto Fujigaya was the only thing that separated the other from the flowing desert sands. “Go,” he looked at Fujigaya one last time and let go, pretending to blast the other out of the cage.
He watched as the other was pulled down into the sand and sunk in, disappearing completely. Kitayama winced when he saw there was blood. He prayed that they hadn’t overdone it and that he hadn’t accidentally done anything to the other he shouldn’t have. Who knows. Their souls could have gotten scrambled by whatever shield this was. Said shield closed again and Kitayama let himself fall against it as he collapsed on the floor, energy used up.
~*~
“They say that to fool your enemy, you have to fool your friends first,” Fujigaya looked at Nikaido and Senga. “We wanted to make it look as believable as possible.”
Nikaido shook his head, “It was believable alright. Mitsu scared the hell out of me.” He looked at the other. “How did you do whatever you did to your soul anyway? That scared me the most.” He remembered the dark streaks in the other’s energy signature.
Kitayama looked down, “Truth is, I don’t know either.” His voice became very quiet, “Maybe what Akut’ou said wasn’t a lie after all. Maybe I am different from all of you.”
“I told you to shut up, didn’t I?” Fujigaya grumbled. “Enough chit-chat you guys.” And with that he moved Kitayama over to one of the pirate vehicles with Tatsumi, leaving Nikaido and Senga to deal with any enemies who might be interested in attacking their retreating backs.
Grabbing Nikaido’s hand once he was free again, Senga smiled, “Let’s kick some ass, Nika.”
“Let’s,” Nikaido grinned and tightened his grip on the other’s hand.
To be continued...
Fandom: Johnny's & Associates
Pairings/Characters: Kis-My-Ft2 (8 People) - in this chapter: Kitayama, Fujigaya Senga, Nikaido, 4U, MA, T&T & more
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Fighting, dark themes...
Disclaimer: Not mine. Owned by J&A. The AU is mine though as well as aymagun's.
A/N: I think some of you have been waiting for this :)
Summary: It's called the 'gift' or 'soul' by most. A strange, mysterious force only few possess on the planet that is half ocean and half desert. The people on the planet have lived in harmony with each other and their environment for centuries but something yet unknown is threatening to throw everything into chaos.
The soul had wrapped itself around him like a bubble. He was thrown into the sand at first but then he broke to the surface again. A soul-path appeared in front of him. It took Fujigaya few attempts to whisper a soft command, weave a sing-song out of it but when the ship disappeared from his view completely, it worked.
Wiping some blood from his lips - he’d get Kitayama back for that at some other time - he got onto the soul path and followed it.
His soul had picked up the signature of another soul. A familiar soul. Kitayama had been right about this being a ‘good’ part of the desert. He just hoped he would make it in time and would be welcomed. After all, he had never dealt with these people before.
The pirates and bandits of the desert. The masters of hiding, camouflage and surprise attacks. They were their last hope now. His last hope.
Should he fail, the results would probably be the same as when he would have stayed on the ship with everyone else. Capture and ultimately death.
Fujigaya balled his fist. Well, they had bet everything on this card. He didn’t have a choice but to follow through with the plan. The flicker of soul energy he was picking up gave him hope though. If Master Tsubasa was somewhere close by, maybe he wouldn’t have to risk venturing into unknown territory by himself. And maybe his master would have a better idea.
The soul-path would lead him towards his destination.
After a while, he felt how the soul energy signature was getting stronger but when he looked around he couldn’t see anything. He wasn’t surprised. These people knew how to hide themselves. He wouldn’t find them if he relied on his normal senses.
He got off the soul path carefully and sure enough, the sand stayed under his feet and didn’t pull him down. Fujigaya still moved carefully, slowly.
It didn’t take long for him to stop in his tracks again and a burst of sand later, he was no longer alone. He had found who he had been looking for but they didn’t look like they were going to welcome him with open arms.
“What are you doing here? And what might you be looking for?” one of the masked bandits asked him and eyed him suspiciously. Three others were to his sides and behind him, Fujigaya counted as he looked around carefully.
Lifting his arms to show that he didn’t have any intention of attacking them, Fujigaya stated, “My name is Fujigaya Taisuke. I’m looking for someone.”
“Someone? Who might that be. Here in the desert and on foot nonetheless!” one of the bandits asked. “Why were you looking here of all places?”
“Do you know someone by the name of Imai? Imai Tsubasa,” Fujigaya ignored the question and asked a question of his own. It might have been the wrong move but he felt that continuing to play ten-questions with the bandits wouldn’t get him anywhere.
The quartett fell silent. Then one of the bandits said, “Follow me.”
Apparently he had asked the right question. Fujigaya nodded and did like he was told, following at a safe distance. Suddenly, as if out of nowhere, something that looked like a small village appeared in the sand. Unlike Sunäa this village hadn’t sunk into the sand, it had been hidden there deliberately and it could still move. It would never stay at the same place for very long. Despite being able to hide, being on the move made them harder to track down.
A tall pirate was waiting at what looked like the entrance.
“What did you guys bring back this time?” the man asked and eyed Fujigaya. A smile tugged on his lips, “Ah, the only type of feline Tsubasa can actually stand?” He motioned towards one of the tents. “Be our guest. He’s been waiting.”
The man took a drag from his long pipe. When Fujigaya passed him he asked quietly, “How’s the lion cub doing? I do hope he’s fine?”
Fujigaya halted in his steps briefly and answered, “I don’t know who exactly you might be referring to but chances are that the answer is ‘I really hope so’.” He gave the man a nod and then proceeded towards the tent, stepping inside.
“Master Tsubasa,” he didn’t have to look around to know who was inside.
A smile tugged up the corners of Master Tsubasa’s lips, “Taisuke. So it was you. You seemed to appear out of nowhere.”
“It’s a long story,” Fujigaya sighed. “I have no time to tell you all the details, though. I need your help! And I need it quickly!” He didn’t beat around the bush. Time was something he did not have a lot of right now.
Master Tsubasa got up, “I had a feeling. Tell me the most important bits.”
“We need to track and follow a ship,” Fujigaya nodded and told Master Tsubasa the necessary information. He just hoped, prayed, they would make it fast enough. Unless they could follow the ship or trace it somehow, he didn’t have any clue as to where his friends were being brought and there was no other way to find them with their souls blocked out.
~*~
Fujigaya stepped over to where Kitayama had sunk onto the floor. The other didn’t seem conscious anymore but that wasn’t the case. “You sure took your sweet time, Fujigaya.”
“Shut up. I just saved your ass,” Fujigaya grunted and helped the other up. “Show me some gratitude at least.”
“What do you want me to do? Kneel down and grovel?” Kitayama cracked an eye open.
Putting one of Kitayama’s arms over his shoulders, Fujigaya commented in an overly dramatic manner, “Oh yes. That sounds like music to my ears.”
Snorting, Kitayama half muttered and half coughed, “Not even in your dreams, Fujigaya.”
“As if I’d ever LET you into my dreams.” Fujigaya huffed indignantly.
After a few moments of silence between them, Kitayama whispered, “I’m glad you are okay and found your way to them safely.” His voice was barely audible.
“Shut up, you idiot. You’re not allowed to talk anymore before a healer has looked at you and given you the okay to talk again,” Fujigaya grumbled and since walking with Kitayama supporting himself on him heavily was not working because the other could barely walk anymore, he lifted the other up and carried him, pointedly avoiding eye-contact with anyone around them - especially Kitayama himself.
One of the bandits, Tatsumi, had mercy with him and came over to help Fujigaya to support Kitayama, so that they could get the other over to one of the vehicles to be treated, while Nikaido freed Senga from his restraints.
“You two knew about this all along? You planned it?” Nikaido was staring at them as he helped to get Senga off the contraption the other had been strapped to. “You guys make your shit too believable. I seriously thought for a while that Mitsu had gone around the bend for real and had betrayed us!”
Kitayama laughed dryly. “That was the whole plan.”
“When did you come up with something like this?” Senga asked, “We didn’t even notice.”
Fujigaya snorted softly, “It’s a long story.” He couldn’t believe that it had only been but a few days ever since everything had happened or had it only been hours? Things seemed to be so long ago already, so much had happened and their capture had totally messed with his sense of time. “You thought he was still unconscious but he wasn’t. He had discovered something but he couldn’t risk anyone else seeing it.”
~*~
“Listen, Fujigaya, pretend I’m still out. There’s something I need to tell you,” the voice was barely audible but Fujigaya was sitting close enough to hear.
He didn’t make a move and just kept staring ahead as if nothing had happened. “You’re awake?”
“Have been for a while,” Kitayama replied. “And there’s more.”
“More?” Fujigaya had to close his eyes then, pretending to be falling asleep. Pulling his legs up, he rested his head on his knees, hiding his face. He was afraid things would show on it otherwise.
Kitayama continued, “Has your soul come back to you?”
“You don’t mean…!” Fujigaya’s eyes widened and he whispered a soft command but there was nothing. His shoulders slumped a little bit. Kitayama’s words had given him hope for one moment but it was gone again. Then he realized something about the other’s words. “Wait, does that mean…?”
“Yeah,” Kitayama’s fingers twitched a bit. “I don’t know why or how long this will last. If this is the part of the dessert I think it is, there is only one thing we can do. It’s risky but we have to gamble.” He knew that Fujigaya knew what he was talking about, even though he wasn’t saying it. He expected the other to argue with him and disagree and then work on a compromise and alternative plan but that wasn’t what happened.
Fujigaya stayed silent for a few moments. When he spoke again, he asked, “Hey, Kitayama, do you remember what I said that night on the ship? That something terrible would happen the day we actually agree on something?”
Kitayama would have stared at the other in surprise if it wasn’t too dangerous to do so right now. “Yeah, of course I remember.”
“Well, let’s see if it will really turn out to be terrible then,” Fujigaya snuck a short glance at him, hidden by his long bangs.
One of Kitayama’s eyes twitched a little bit as he willed them to stay shut. “I wouldn’t have thought that the time would come so soon.”
“It needs to be done.”
“I know.”
They had used the next opportunity that had presented itself to them. Fighting between them wasn’t anything atypical after all. Actually, them not fighting each other was probably more suspicious really.
Neither Kitayama nor Fujigaya heard any of the other protests. “We have one shot. Don’t waste it,” Kitayama said and took hold of the other’s hand.
Fujigaya snorted, “I won’t be the one to screw this up.”
“Good,” Kitayama muttered and then closed his eyes. He could feel Fujigaya do the same next to him. After a few moments of complete silence, they shouted a command and their souls flared up, blasting a small hole into the shield around their flying cage underneath them.
Kitayama’s hand holding onto Fujigaya was the only thing that separated the other from the flowing desert sands. “Go,” he looked at Fujigaya one last time and let go, pretending to blast the other out of the cage.
He watched as the other was pulled down into the sand and sunk in, disappearing completely. Kitayama winced when he saw there was blood. He prayed that they hadn’t overdone it and that he hadn’t accidentally done anything to the other he shouldn’t have. Who knows. Their souls could have gotten scrambled by whatever shield this was. Said shield closed again and Kitayama let himself fall against it as he collapsed on the floor, energy used up.
~*~
“They say that to fool your enemy, you have to fool your friends first,” Fujigaya looked at Nikaido and Senga. “We wanted to make it look as believable as possible.”
Nikaido shook his head, “It was believable alright. Mitsu scared the hell out of me.” He looked at the other. “How did you do whatever you did to your soul anyway? That scared me the most.” He remembered the dark streaks in the other’s energy signature.
Kitayama looked down, “Truth is, I don’t know either.” His voice became very quiet, “Maybe what Akut’ou said wasn’t a lie after all. Maybe I am different from all of you.”
“I told you to shut up, didn’t I?” Fujigaya grumbled. “Enough chit-chat you guys.” And with that he moved Kitayama over to one of the pirate vehicles with Tatsumi, leaving Nikaido and Senga to deal with any enemies who might be interested in attacking their retreating backs.
Grabbing Nikaido’s hand once he was free again, Senga smiled, “Let’s kick some ass, Nika.”
“Let’s,” Nikaido grinned and tightened his grip on the other’s hand.
To be continued...