(no subject)
Name: 4 eras Kis-My-Ft2 never lived in (+1 they do)
Author: Rin
Beta: Elindar (thank you!)
Fandom: Kis-My-Ft2
Genre: history, AU, one-shot
Rating: PG
A/N: Ebikisu ficathlon made its job and inspired me to write! The history prompt hit me immediately and it was surprisingly easy to write this. I mean, I don't remember when was the last time I got a fic finished this fast. :'D
Comments are <3, as always! (^.~)
- - -
1259, Germany, Catholic monastery
“Kyohei, what are you doing?” Wataru asked gently, when finding his young comrade sitting still and staring out of the window. “You were supposed to copy the Holy Writings, weren’t you?”
The startled novice seemed to wake up from his trance and nodded apologetically.
“Yes! Yes, I’m sorry, I was -”
“You were thinking of outside world again, am I right?” Wataru asked, smiling sadly.
“I wasn’t! Or... well. Maybe a little...”
The older one sat down behind his table and opened his own ink bottle continuing his earlier work. Slowly and strictly he copied even the smallest details of flourish styled letters on his own parchment. Only after couple of minutes he saw the other boy daydreaming again and he sighed. Kyohei was a typical newcomer - he was eager to serve God and learned new things quickly but he tended to fall in his dreams in the middle of work every now and then.
Life in the monastery wasn’t easy, not at all. The monks had to wake up before the first cockcrow, work hard all day, and then sleep alone in their simple rooms until next morning. The walls of the monastery were thick and cold and the woolen fabric of the brown monk cloak felt rough on skin. It wasn’t a lifestyle for everyone.
Each year many new boys came but only one or two became monks and stayed the rest of their lives. Kyohei was also definitely the type to leave: reckless, idealistic, emotional and a bit careless about the rules of the monastery. Yet, for some reason Wataru wished Kyohei would stay. He liked the boy and the way the younger one brightened his monotonous days with childish questions and thoughts.
“Brother Wataru,” Kyohei said slowly, “what’d you do if you had to choose between being handsome or wise?”
“I’d choose wisdom, of course,” the older answered surely. There was no way he’d ever be handsome so the decision was easy.
“But who says pretty people have to be stupid anyway?” the novice wondered, leaning against his palm. “I mean, you are wise - and still I like your face.”
Suddenly, Wataru was happy he sat behind the other. He had never heard anyone saying that and it made him smile, a bit embarrassed.
“Er... thank you. You’re not that bad either,” he said.
“I know,” Kyohei chirped, continuing his work happily. Wataru could only shake his head, smiling at their conversation. To talk about such secular things as their looks when they should have been working... It wasn’t really what monks were supposed to do.
Though, Kyohei said things like that very often and he never lied. Maybe that was the reason Wataru liked his young friend. Even though he himself had already lost that naive way of thinking, he wished Kyohei could keep that lively nature of his forever.
“God bless that boy,” Wataru whispered, smiling. Suddenly it seemed as if the Holy Mary had smiled more softly at them in her painting, and Wataru felt like his prayer had been heard.
- - -
1504, Italy, Florence
Yuta sat at his usual place on the riverside, waiting for his best friend to come. Sun was shining and the boy drew small pictures to sand with a wooden stick.
“Hi, Yuta! Sorry I’m late, I had to finish my math exercises before the teacher let us go,” the young, brown haired boy said breathless, having run all the way from the town centre.
“It’s okay, I was bit early today. I did everything master told me to, so I’m free whole afternoon!”
Miyata sat down next to his friend and watched him curiously.
“What is he like? Your master, I mean. I heard he’s crazy...”
“Crazy?!” Yuta said, shocked, “he’s a genius! And a bit crazy, too. But in a good way. His inventions are glorious! Just think about it! He has invented a machine you could fly with, and one that moves you around on wheels but without horses!”
Yuta’s eyes were sparkling as he told about his new employer and Miyata just couldn’t tell the boy how ridiculously stupid those so-called “inventions” sounded like.
“I’m sure he could build any kinds of machines he wants to,” Yuta said, smiling, “though, nowadays he mostly draws and paints more than anything else. I like his pictures of animals and flowers... And every week there comes a young woman who just sits on her chair and then my master uses her as a model for his painting.”
Miyata nodded and took the paper he had carried with him. He had always wanted to learn drawing, but as a son of famous doctor he couldn’t even dream about going to art school. He was to take over his father’s job as soon as his father would retire so he had to study math and biology. Yuta had always been a good drawer - he had even ended up as an apprentice of a famous artist. Ever since Yuta had taught his friend on their free time with everything he had learned watching his master’s work.
“Darken this shadow here,” Yuta said thoughtfully, “and don’t forget to keep your wrist relaxed as you draw. The line will be softer then.”
“Well, how does it look like?” Miyata asked after a few minutes and they examined the drawing for a while.
“I like her smile. It’s so vivid somehow,” Yuta said approving. “You did it well. My master makes the girl in the painting look strange... No matter how long time I watch it, I cannot decide if she’s smiling or not.”
“Well that’s strange, isn’t it?”
“Yeah. It’s not very special painting anyway. All brown and dull. And it’s so small, too. Someday he’ll forget it somewhere. I like his other works much more!”
“Like the machine one could fly with?” Miyata asked carefully.
“Yes, for example,” Yuta said dreamingly and Miyata rolled his eyes.
Almost-smiling girls and flying machines... That Leonardo-guy had to be really crazy, and as an apprentice of his, Yuta was starting to turn same kind of a person.
Madness, Miyata thought. Pure madness.
- - -
1807, England, Manchester
Enormous machines were clattering all around Nikaido as he balanced his way slowly out between the conveyor belts and jumped back down on the floor. He was now ready with greasing the moving parts of the weaving machine and could next move on to fix the weft strings of the machine FM7 in the next hall.
It was already seven o'clock, he noticed. Where was Senga? The younger boy was supposed to be on morning shift today, too. Nikaido decided to wait for his friend and tried to watch out from the dust-grey window. The only thing he could see was his own oil-stained face and dirty clothes, and he frowned at his reflection. He had no idea how he could ever get all this oil and stains washed from his skin and shirt since he had run out of his last piece of soap earlier the same week. Well, he'd worry about that when it'd be time for that.
"G' morning, Nika!"
Oh, there. Nikaido turned around to see his friend - as stained as he was - coming and waving his four-fingered hand.
"I thought you overslept," the older boy teased but Senga just chuckled.
"Look who's talking! Aren't you the one of us who overslept twice last week?"
"What's gone is gone," Nikaido said simply, "We have work to do, come."
The boys weaved between the working women and fabric machines to the broken one.
"We're supposed to fix this," the black haired boy said thoughtfully.
"Well, the easiest way is to climb up there," Senga said pointing the ladder next to the machine.
"Can you do it?" Nikaido asked, a bit worried, eyeing Senga's damaged hand. Only couple of weeks ago the boy had fallen down on a machine and his hand had slipped to the machinery causing the little finger to cut off.
"Of course I can! I'm not an invalid you know," Senga said indignation clear in his voice.
"I know, I know," the older one said quickly, "It's just… your hand. Does it still hurt? And I want to hear the truth."
At first the brown haired boy seemed reluctant but then he sighed.
"A bit. Especially when I forget to be careful and hit it somewhere. Though, usually it just tingles and I don't understand it. There's no finger anymore so how can it feel anything?"
"Dunno…" Nikaido said quietly, shrugging.
"It's annoying anyway. But don't worry, I can do my job. Believe me, okay?"
After all it was Nikaido who climbed up to hold the wefts as Senga threaded the strings through the needles and then fastened them down inside the machine.
"I'm ready here, you can come down now," he shouted over the noise of the working machines.
"What? I cannot hear you!" Nikaido yelled back.
"I SAID: COME DOWN."
Next second he wished he hadn't said it as he saw Nikaido taking one wrong step and falling down somewhere in the machine.
"NIKA!" Senga shrieked and rushed to the ladder. He climbed up trying to see his friend.
"Nika, where are you?"
For a moment he couldn't see anything but then his eyes caught a hand waving to him down between the big reels. He couldn't hear if the older tried to answer and there was no way he could help Nikaido up alone.
Senga climbed down as quickly as he could and run to the next machine.
"Someone please help, he fell down there!"
Three women from the machine six heard his voice and run to him.
"What's wrong my boy?" one of them asked.
"Nika, he fell!" Senga stammered. "We were fixing the machine and he fell in it!"
No more words were needed - the women left their places immediately.
"Where is he?" the one with red dress asked.
"Down there, in the reels of FM7," Senga said. "I can go down there but I won't be able to get back up alone."
"Number seven? The broken one?" the woman repeated and seemed suddenly relieved.
At the same time the woman wearing dark blue dress nodded.
"Okay, this is what we're going to do. You boy take the rope and climb up there with it. Then you'll wrap it over those pipes on the ceiling and tie the other end around yourself. You go down, take your friend and we'll help both of you up pulling the rope. Any questions?"
There weren't any, so they moved to carry out the plan.
"Be all right… Nika, please be all right," Senga mumbled desperately as he went down to the place he still saw Nikaido's hand moving. At least that was a good sign.
"Were you having a cup of tea or something up there?" Nikaido asked the second Senga reached him. "You sure took your time."
"Idiot, I got some help," Senga snorted. "Are you okay?"
"Yeah," Nikaido said with a bit unsure tone. "But I think I hurt my leg. I cannot get up."
"Don't worry, I'll help us out," Senga promised and clenched his best friend next to him, twitching the rope.
"You can use your hands anyway? Hold on," he said as the women outside started to pull the rope up.
After many long, painful minutes the both boys sat on the floor, panting in relief. One of the women checked Nikaido's leg and then rushed to get a doctor.
"Now we can both be invalids," Nikaido said smiling widely even though the pain in his leg was almost too much to bear.
"You were lucky,” said the third woman, "if the machine had been working, you'd be dead by now."
"I know," the black haired boy said slowly. "I thought about it there. And…"
"And?" Senga asked, worried.
"And then I looked around and I was so proud of us. We've done great work - the reeds are perfectly greased!"
When hearing Nikaido's words Senga couldn't help laughing with the other.
- - -
1903, United States, Kansas
"One more step and I'll blow your head off, you filthy cattle rustler!"
Sun was shining burning hot and even the little breeze sweeping over the prairie felt hot. Droplets of sweat slid down on Fujigaya's forehead as he took a deep breath and then, quickly grabbed his revolver.
One shot, two, three, and the dark character fell down on the dry ground.
"Ha, maybe you now learned to leave my cattle alone!"
"Aren't you overdoing it a little?" asked Kitayama who was lying on the terrace of their cottage. "I mean, our scarecrow won't scare any birds anymore if you shoot it once more."
"But I have to practice - I won't be able to catch that dishonorable filth who keeps stealing our cows!"
"Practice as much as you want to," Kitayama said, "just don't involve my scarecrow in it."
Fujigaya looked a bit discontent but then he put his revolver away.
"Ok, I got it. But I will stay awake this night and catch him. And then I'll teach him to leave my cattle alone!"
"Go ahead Mr. Boaster," Kitayama shrugged.
-
The hot day was followed by a cool night but small oil lamp in Fujigaya and Kitayama's small cottage didn't die. The older man yawned widely and watched as Fujigaya prepared himself with his revolver and a small lantern.
"Are you really sure about this?"
"Of course I am! You go and sleep, I'll handle this. You'll see the robber in the morning."
"Lookin' toward to that then," the older one grinned and left to the bedroom.
-
Fujigaya sat behind a thick bush near the enclosure and stared the peacefully sleeping cattle. His position wasn't the most comfortable one but he didn't dare to move or he might scare the thief away.
Minutes went past, hours after them. The pale moon crept slowly over the dark blue sky and stars were blinking drowsily. Fujigaya was just about to fall asleep when he heard faint noise close to the cows, and he rushed out behind the bush.
"There you are, you cockroach!" he yelled but the stranger didn't answer, neither did he stop what he was doing.
"Can't you hear me? Stop it!" Fujigaya snapped and shot once for warning. To his horror the other one whimpered and fell down on the ground.
"Did I really shoot him?" Fujigaya mumbled as he run to the other. He had practiced this for days with big words, but to tell the truth, it was really different when the opponent was an inanimate object. Never ever had he really wanted to kill a living person.
When he got to the man lying down and saw his pained face, he felt worse than he ever had.
"Mitsu?" he asked weakly, "is it you? It cannot be… I didn't shoot you, did I?"
"Yeah, you damn idiot did," the older one gasped. "What the hell do you think you're doing?!"
"I'm sorry!" the younger one said terrified and kneeled down next to his friend. "Did it hit bad? I didn't know it was you, I thought it was the thief! Did you sleepwalk again? I didn't mean to -"
"Just shut up you moron and help me back inside!"
Luckily, Fujigaya had only hit Kitayama's left arm and it was easy to tie up. Though, seeing all the blood made him feel even guiltier.
"Just stop apologizing already," Kitayama finally grunted, "I told you it's not that bad. But you better leave these gun-playing things to those who can handle it, right?"
Fujigaya promised immediately, not even daring to think anything else.
After couple of days Kitayama went to see the doctor in the nearby town. When going back home, he heard someone calling him.
"What is it?" he asked when he saw Sheriff Yara standing on the stairs of his office.
"What a coincidence! I was just about to come see you! Did you know some of your cattle have been found wandering around? Ten cows wandered free in the prairie and someone found them. It took time to find out who they belonged to. But they're yours, since there are three cut marks in their ears, am I right?"
"Yeah… They're ours," Kitayama said, surprised. "How did they… in the prairie?"
"Well, some of them had small wounds on their skin. It seems they have found a weak part of their enclosure and broken their way through."
Kitayama immediately remembered the oldest part of their enclosure, which Fujigaya had been supposed to fix. The younger man hadn't got it ready, he realized, the work having left halfway when Fujigaya had started hunting the cattle rustler.
"Taipi, you total father of all idiots," he mumbled after thanking the sheriff, riding to the Kawai farm to get their cows back.
- - -
2007, Japan, Tokyo
Senga shut his history book angrily and threw it to the corner of the room.
"Why" do I have to study history?!" he whined. "I hate it. It's so damn boring and difficult. There are only stupid people doing stupid things! I don't need to know anything of this."
"Oi, don't be so sure about it," Wataru said, picking up the book and leafing it through.
"There're lots of interesting things, there."
"Yeah, think about it! I bet you can't even imagine how interesting lives those people in the past had," Taisuke noted and poked his finger on the middle of the book Wataru was holding.
"This page, for example, is about industrialism in Europe. Factories, machines and first electric lamps. There were boys of your age working in the most dangerous jobs, you know?"
"Were there really?" Senga asked, astonished. "Wow, I never knew. I think… I might read it through again."
"Good boy," Taisuke grinned as Wataru gave the book back to the youngest boy.
- - -
Author: Rin
Beta: Elindar (thank you!)
Fandom: Kis-My-Ft2
Genre: history, AU, one-shot
Rating: PG
A/N: Ebikisu ficathlon made its job and inspired me to write! The history prompt hit me immediately and it was surprisingly easy to write this. I mean, I don't remember when was the last time I got a fic finished this fast. :'D
Comments are <3, as always! (^.~)
- - -
1259, Germany, Catholic monastery
“Kyohei, what are you doing?” Wataru asked gently, when finding his young comrade sitting still and staring out of the window. “You were supposed to copy the Holy Writings, weren’t you?”
The startled novice seemed to wake up from his trance and nodded apologetically.
“Yes! Yes, I’m sorry, I was -”
“You were thinking of outside world again, am I right?” Wataru asked, smiling sadly.
“I wasn’t! Or... well. Maybe a little...”
The older one sat down behind his table and opened his own ink bottle continuing his earlier work. Slowly and strictly he copied even the smallest details of flourish styled letters on his own parchment. Only after couple of minutes he saw the other boy daydreaming again and he sighed. Kyohei was a typical newcomer - he was eager to serve God and learned new things quickly but he tended to fall in his dreams in the middle of work every now and then.
Life in the monastery wasn’t easy, not at all. The monks had to wake up before the first cockcrow, work hard all day, and then sleep alone in their simple rooms until next morning. The walls of the monastery were thick and cold and the woolen fabric of the brown monk cloak felt rough on skin. It wasn’t a lifestyle for everyone.
Each year many new boys came but only one or two became monks and stayed the rest of their lives. Kyohei was also definitely the type to leave: reckless, idealistic, emotional and a bit careless about the rules of the monastery. Yet, for some reason Wataru wished Kyohei would stay. He liked the boy and the way the younger one brightened his monotonous days with childish questions and thoughts.
“Brother Wataru,” Kyohei said slowly, “what’d you do if you had to choose between being handsome or wise?”
“I’d choose wisdom, of course,” the older answered surely. There was no way he’d ever be handsome so the decision was easy.
“But who says pretty people have to be stupid anyway?” the novice wondered, leaning against his palm. “I mean, you are wise - and still I like your face.”
Suddenly, Wataru was happy he sat behind the other. He had never heard anyone saying that and it made him smile, a bit embarrassed.
“Er... thank you. You’re not that bad either,” he said.
“I know,” Kyohei chirped, continuing his work happily. Wataru could only shake his head, smiling at their conversation. To talk about such secular things as their looks when they should have been working... It wasn’t really what monks were supposed to do.
Though, Kyohei said things like that very often and he never lied. Maybe that was the reason Wataru liked his young friend. Even though he himself had already lost that naive way of thinking, he wished Kyohei could keep that lively nature of his forever.
“God bless that boy,” Wataru whispered, smiling. Suddenly it seemed as if the Holy Mary had smiled more softly at them in her painting, and Wataru felt like his prayer had been heard.
- - -
1504, Italy, Florence
Yuta sat at his usual place on the riverside, waiting for his best friend to come. Sun was shining and the boy drew small pictures to sand with a wooden stick.
“Hi, Yuta! Sorry I’m late, I had to finish my math exercises before the teacher let us go,” the young, brown haired boy said breathless, having run all the way from the town centre.
“It’s okay, I was bit early today. I did everything master told me to, so I’m free whole afternoon!”
Miyata sat down next to his friend and watched him curiously.
“What is he like? Your master, I mean. I heard he’s crazy...”
“Crazy?!” Yuta said, shocked, “he’s a genius! And a bit crazy, too. But in a good way. His inventions are glorious! Just think about it! He has invented a machine you could fly with, and one that moves you around on wheels but without horses!”
Yuta’s eyes were sparkling as he told about his new employer and Miyata just couldn’t tell the boy how ridiculously stupid those so-called “inventions” sounded like.
“I’m sure he could build any kinds of machines he wants to,” Yuta said, smiling, “though, nowadays he mostly draws and paints more than anything else. I like his pictures of animals and flowers... And every week there comes a young woman who just sits on her chair and then my master uses her as a model for his painting.”
Miyata nodded and took the paper he had carried with him. He had always wanted to learn drawing, but as a son of famous doctor he couldn’t even dream about going to art school. He was to take over his father’s job as soon as his father would retire so he had to study math and biology. Yuta had always been a good drawer - he had even ended up as an apprentice of a famous artist. Ever since Yuta had taught his friend on their free time with everything he had learned watching his master’s work.
“Darken this shadow here,” Yuta said thoughtfully, “and don’t forget to keep your wrist relaxed as you draw. The line will be softer then.”
“Well, how does it look like?” Miyata asked after a few minutes and they examined the drawing for a while.
“I like her smile. It’s so vivid somehow,” Yuta said approving. “You did it well. My master makes the girl in the painting look strange... No matter how long time I watch it, I cannot decide if she’s smiling or not.”
“Well that’s strange, isn’t it?”
“Yeah. It’s not very special painting anyway. All brown and dull. And it’s so small, too. Someday he’ll forget it somewhere. I like his other works much more!”
“Like the machine one could fly with?” Miyata asked carefully.
“Yes, for example,” Yuta said dreamingly and Miyata rolled his eyes.
Almost-smiling girls and flying machines... That Leonardo-guy had to be really crazy, and as an apprentice of his, Yuta was starting to turn same kind of a person.
Madness, Miyata thought. Pure madness.
- - -
1807, England, Manchester
Enormous machines were clattering all around Nikaido as he balanced his way slowly out between the conveyor belts and jumped back down on the floor. He was now ready with greasing the moving parts of the weaving machine and could next move on to fix the weft strings of the machine FM7 in the next hall.
It was already seven o'clock, he noticed. Where was Senga? The younger boy was supposed to be on morning shift today, too. Nikaido decided to wait for his friend and tried to watch out from the dust-grey window. The only thing he could see was his own oil-stained face and dirty clothes, and he frowned at his reflection. He had no idea how he could ever get all this oil and stains washed from his skin and shirt since he had run out of his last piece of soap earlier the same week. Well, he'd worry about that when it'd be time for that.
"G' morning, Nika!"
Oh, there. Nikaido turned around to see his friend - as stained as he was - coming and waving his four-fingered hand.
"I thought you overslept," the older boy teased but Senga just chuckled.
"Look who's talking! Aren't you the one of us who overslept twice last week?"
"What's gone is gone," Nikaido said simply, "We have work to do, come."
The boys weaved between the working women and fabric machines to the broken one.
"We're supposed to fix this," the black haired boy said thoughtfully.
"Well, the easiest way is to climb up there," Senga said pointing the ladder next to the machine.
"Can you do it?" Nikaido asked, a bit worried, eyeing Senga's damaged hand. Only couple of weeks ago the boy had fallen down on a machine and his hand had slipped to the machinery causing the little finger to cut off.
"Of course I can! I'm not an invalid you know," Senga said indignation clear in his voice.
"I know, I know," the older one said quickly, "It's just… your hand. Does it still hurt? And I want to hear the truth."
At first the brown haired boy seemed reluctant but then he sighed.
"A bit. Especially when I forget to be careful and hit it somewhere. Though, usually it just tingles and I don't understand it. There's no finger anymore so how can it feel anything?"
"Dunno…" Nikaido said quietly, shrugging.
"It's annoying anyway. But don't worry, I can do my job. Believe me, okay?"
After all it was Nikaido who climbed up to hold the wefts as Senga threaded the strings through the needles and then fastened them down inside the machine.
"I'm ready here, you can come down now," he shouted over the noise of the working machines.
"What? I cannot hear you!" Nikaido yelled back.
"I SAID: COME DOWN."
Next second he wished he hadn't said it as he saw Nikaido taking one wrong step and falling down somewhere in the machine.
"NIKA!" Senga shrieked and rushed to the ladder. He climbed up trying to see his friend.
"Nika, where are you?"
For a moment he couldn't see anything but then his eyes caught a hand waving to him down between the big reels. He couldn't hear if the older tried to answer and there was no way he could help Nikaido up alone.
Senga climbed down as quickly as he could and run to the next machine.
"Someone please help, he fell down there!"
Three women from the machine six heard his voice and run to him.
"What's wrong my boy?" one of them asked.
"Nika, he fell!" Senga stammered. "We were fixing the machine and he fell in it!"
No more words were needed - the women left their places immediately.
"Where is he?" the one with red dress asked.
"Down there, in the reels of FM7," Senga said. "I can go down there but I won't be able to get back up alone."
"Number seven? The broken one?" the woman repeated and seemed suddenly relieved.
At the same time the woman wearing dark blue dress nodded.
"Okay, this is what we're going to do. You boy take the rope and climb up there with it. Then you'll wrap it over those pipes on the ceiling and tie the other end around yourself. You go down, take your friend and we'll help both of you up pulling the rope. Any questions?"
There weren't any, so they moved to carry out the plan.
"Be all right… Nika, please be all right," Senga mumbled desperately as he went down to the place he still saw Nikaido's hand moving. At least that was a good sign.
"Were you having a cup of tea or something up there?" Nikaido asked the second Senga reached him. "You sure took your time."
"Idiot, I got some help," Senga snorted. "Are you okay?"
"Yeah," Nikaido said with a bit unsure tone. "But I think I hurt my leg. I cannot get up."
"Don't worry, I'll help us out," Senga promised and clenched his best friend next to him, twitching the rope.
"You can use your hands anyway? Hold on," he said as the women outside started to pull the rope up.
After many long, painful minutes the both boys sat on the floor, panting in relief. One of the women checked Nikaido's leg and then rushed to get a doctor.
"Now we can both be invalids," Nikaido said smiling widely even though the pain in his leg was almost too much to bear.
"You were lucky,” said the third woman, "if the machine had been working, you'd be dead by now."
"I know," the black haired boy said slowly. "I thought about it there. And…"
"And?" Senga asked, worried.
"And then I looked around and I was so proud of us. We've done great work - the reeds are perfectly greased!"
When hearing Nikaido's words Senga couldn't help laughing with the other.
- - -
1903, United States, Kansas
"One more step and I'll blow your head off, you filthy cattle rustler!"
Sun was shining burning hot and even the little breeze sweeping over the prairie felt hot. Droplets of sweat slid down on Fujigaya's forehead as he took a deep breath and then, quickly grabbed his revolver.
One shot, two, three, and the dark character fell down on the dry ground.
"Ha, maybe you now learned to leave my cattle alone!"
"Aren't you overdoing it a little?" asked Kitayama who was lying on the terrace of their cottage. "I mean, our scarecrow won't scare any birds anymore if you shoot it once more."
"But I have to practice - I won't be able to catch that dishonorable filth who keeps stealing our cows!"
"Practice as much as you want to," Kitayama said, "just don't involve my scarecrow in it."
Fujigaya looked a bit discontent but then he put his revolver away.
"Ok, I got it. But I will stay awake this night and catch him. And then I'll teach him to leave my cattle alone!"
"Go ahead Mr. Boaster," Kitayama shrugged.
-
The hot day was followed by a cool night but small oil lamp in Fujigaya and Kitayama's small cottage didn't die. The older man yawned widely and watched as Fujigaya prepared himself with his revolver and a small lantern.
"Are you really sure about this?"
"Of course I am! You go and sleep, I'll handle this. You'll see the robber in the morning."
"Lookin' toward to that then," the older one grinned and left to the bedroom.
-
Fujigaya sat behind a thick bush near the enclosure and stared the peacefully sleeping cattle. His position wasn't the most comfortable one but he didn't dare to move or he might scare the thief away.
Minutes went past, hours after them. The pale moon crept slowly over the dark blue sky and stars were blinking drowsily. Fujigaya was just about to fall asleep when he heard faint noise close to the cows, and he rushed out behind the bush.
"There you are, you cockroach!" he yelled but the stranger didn't answer, neither did he stop what he was doing.
"Can't you hear me? Stop it!" Fujigaya snapped and shot once for warning. To his horror the other one whimpered and fell down on the ground.
"Did I really shoot him?" Fujigaya mumbled as he run to the other. He had practiced this for days with big words, but to tell the truth, it was really different when the opponent was an inanimate object. Never ever had he really wanted to kill a living person.
When he got to the man lying down and saw his pained face, he felt worse than he ever had.
"Mitsu?" he asked weakly, "is it you? It cannot be… I didn't shoot you, did I?"
"Yeah, you damn idiot did," the older one gasped. "What the hell do you think you're doing?!"
"I'm sorry!" the younger one said terrified and kneeled down next to his friend. "Did it hit bad? I didn't know it was you, I thought it was the thief! Did you sleepwalk again? I didn't mean to -"
"Just shut up you moron and help me back inside!"
Luckily, Fujigaya had only hit Kitayama's left arm and it was easy to tie up. Though, seeing all the blood made him feel even guiltier.
"Just stop apologizing already," Kitayama finally grunted, "I told you it's not that bad. But you better leave these gun-playing things to those who can handle it, right?"
Fujigaya promised immediately, not even daring to think anything else.
After couple of days Kitayama went to see the doctor in the nearby town. When going back home, he heard someone calling him.
"What is it?" he asked when he saw Sheriff Yara standing on the stairs of his office.
"What a coincidence! I was just about to come see you! Did you know some of your cattle have been found wandering around? Ten cows wandered free in the prairie and someone found them. It took time to find out who they belonged to. But they're yours, since there are three cut marks in their ears, am I right?"
"Yeah… They're ours," Kitayama said, surprised. "How did they… in the prairie?"
"Well, some of them had small wounds on their skin. It seems they have found a weak part of their enclosure and broken their way through."
Kitayama immediately remembered the oldest part of their enclosure, which Fujigaya had been supposed to fix. The younger man hadn't got it ready, he realized, the work having left halfway when Fujigaya had started hunting the cattle rustler.
"Taipi, you total father of all idiots," he mumbled after thanking the sheriff, riding to the Kawai farm to get their cows back.
- - -
2007, Japan, Tokyo
Senga shut his history book angrily and threw it to the corner of the room.
"Why" do I have to study history?!" he whined. "I hate it. It's so damn boring and difficult. There are only stupid people doing stupid things! I don't need to know anything of this."
"Oi, don't be so sure about it," Wataru said, picking up the book and leafing it through.
"There're lots of interesting things, there."
"Yeah, think about it! I bet you can't even imagine how interesting lives those people in the past had," Taisuke noted and poked his finger on the middle of the book Wataru was holding.
"This page, for example, is about industrialism in Europe. Factories, machines and first electric lamps. There were boys of your age working in the most dangerous jobs, you know?"
"Were there really?" Senga asked, astonished. "Wow, I never knew. I think… I might read it through again."
"Good boy," Taisuke grinned as Wataru gave the book back to the youngest boy.
- - -