Bone-Deep and Star-Crossed
Title: Bone-Deep and Star-Crossed
Story Continuity: Returning Away
Rating: PG-13 for coarse language, violence both implied and done, and murder (also both implied and done)
Wordcount: 922
Summary: Pre-story fic. Before he was Fuma Endo, he was Michael Igarashi, a man in entirely the wrong time and place. Tom Brand only made it worse. New York, 1956, in an anonymous, dead-end alley all their own.
They met in alleys, because there was nothing that light had to give them except grief. And there was something to be said, Mike thought, for being taken like a half-dollar whore in a halfway public place, something of a rush. Didn't seem to matter here what they had between them was likely as not to sweep him away to the nearest loony bin, or get him and Tom both strung up by their intestines to a street light. No one ever seemed to see them, and no one ever heard them.
Being with Tom had with it a sense of unreality that made the risk worth it. The man was crazy, Michael couldn't deny that. He was a hell of a magician, but he got too into the act, thought he could control fire. Michael did well enough in school to know that it was impossible, and his father, the last parent standing, told him that nothing good could come of associating with anyone claiming to control fire, whether demon, god, or spirit. Or, Atsushi Igarashi had added after prodding, human. It was the presence of people like Atsushi and Tom that had Mike believing that his life was run by asylum escapees. And if that wasn't enough...
Tom was talking, the words coming out a page a second. Nothing good ever came of that. Mike recalled many instances, some dreamed up and forgotten ("a night like this, dark and still; a bayou, unnaturally calm and forever moist; some moonshine, and the moon shining on his blood and the knife which held it..."), some from a more recent and real time ("A sunny day and a woman scorned, shocked, and disturbed by the love of the man she admired being so freely given to another man - a Jap, at that!")
"I heard you talking to your girlfriend," Mike said, ignoring the stream of consciousness that made up Tom's current nervous yammering. The yammering died like a brushfire in the Deluge. Tom looked at Mike, and said, "Did you?"
It was no secret between them that Tom had a girl, but it was seldom brought up. Mike looked up at the sky, tonight hazy with smog and partially blocked from view by buildings that didn't know when to quit. "I know what she wants, Tom. She wants me dead. So do her friends."
"So would everyone who would know about us," Tom said, looking dead straight ahead at a brimming dumpster. "You...can't take what she says seriously. No one does. But...yeah, she wants you dead. So do the rest of my girls, even Alexandra."
"This world isn't fair," Mike said, brushing his fingers against Tom's hand. "This world..." Mike closed his eyes, and the men, women, and children of Auschwitz stared without life, waiting for him behind his eyelids. He smelled the dark, rotting flesh of the black men hanged in Burnham County, Georgia, the men he'd shared his whiskey with. He remembered seeing them buried from far off, afraid of being disrespectful by being around. It was just that kind of night, that kind of lifetime. He sighed, and rephrased: "I wish it were fair." There were too many being burned to wish the whole of creation would follow. They'd all get there soon. What point would there be in wishing for it to hurry along?
"Ain't nothing fair in love and war," Tom muttered. It was the first time either of them had said the word even in implication to their liaisons, but Mike felt the undercurrents of wrongness charged beneath the words. Mike said, "Which is this?"
Tom grasped the fingers still running over his hand lightly, then held the hand. He looked into Mike's eyes, dark, slanted, still new to him after all this time. And quietly, he wanted many things for the both of them. "Maybe it's both."
"If you're going to kill me, do it quick," Mike said haltingly, memories both his and not his pouring into his mind. "The anniversary of mom's death is coming up. 'Tousan gets more embarrassing every year he gets farther away from her."
"Mike..."
"I remember," Mike said. "Or I'm insane. You keep killing me. They've sent you to kill me since we've known about each other. If you don't kill me..." Mike sighed, averting his eyes from Tom. Staring at the dead end a little further down, he said, "Tom, it's halfway too late. Sato's been in my head, and he's not coming out. I get it. You...love me. I...love you, too. Now how is this going to work this time around?"
Mike thought, See, Tom. I understand it just as well as you. Sugar helps the medicine go down better and Sato helps the knife ease into my back.
Mike said, staring into Tom's eyes, "My mother is waiting for me. All of my mothers are waiting."
Something broke behind Tom's gaze, remembering Eriko and Ling and Haruna, and as Tom kissed Michael tenderly, left hand in the other's right, he made sure the knife went through Mike's chest, not his back.
"It's the little lies that keep you going," Mike had said, three lifetimes ago. Tom wondered if it would ever stop hurting, if one incarnation would be less charming than the previous. Gently settling Michael Igarashi down, looking like a lord amongst the trash, Tom kissed the man's forehead and walked away, secure in the knowledge he had stopped Sato, drowning in the loss of another icon, friend, and lover. The guilt washed off with alcohol, or a fight. Too bad nothing else did.
Story Continuity: Returning Away
Rating: PG-13 for coarse language, violence both implied and done, and murder (also both implied and done)
Wordcount: 922
Summary: Pre-story fic. Before he was Fuma Endo, he was Michael Igarashi, a man in entirely the wrong time and place. Tom Brand only made it worse. New York, 1956, in an anonymous, dead-end alley all their own.
They met in alleys, because there was nothing that light had to give them except grief. And there was something to be said, Mike thought, for being taken like a half-dollar whore in a halfway public place, something of a rush. Didn't seem to matter here what they had between them was likely as not to sweep him away to the nearest loony bin, or get him and Tom both strung up by their intestines to a street light. No one ever seemed to see them, and no one ever heard them.
Being with Tom had with it a sense of unreality that made the risk worth it. The man was crazy, Michael couldn't deny that. He was a hell of a magician, but he got too into the act, thought he could control fire. Michael did well enough in school to know that it was impossible, and his father, the last parent standing, told him that nothing good could come of associating with anyone claiming to control fire, whether demon, god, or spirit. Or, Atsushi Igarashi had added after prodding, human. It was the presence of people like Atsushi and Tom that had Mike believing that his life was run by asylum escapees. And if that wasn't enough...
Tom was talking, the words coming out a page a second. Nothing good ever came of that. Mike recalled many instances, some dreamed up and forgotten ("a night like this, dark and still; a bayou, unnaturally calm and forever moist; some moonshine, and the moon shining on his blood and the knife which held it..."), some from a more recent and real time ("A sunny day and a woman scorned, shocked, and disturbed by the love of the man she admired being so freely given to another man - a Jap, at that!")
"I heard you talking to your girlfriend," Mike said, ignoring the stream of consciousness that made up Tom's current nervous yammering. The yammering died like a brushfire in the Deluge. Tom looked at Mike, and said, "Did you?"
It was no secret between them that Tom had a girl, but it was seldom brought up. Mike looked up at the sky, tonight hazy with smog and partially blocked from view by buildings that didn't know when to quit. "I know what she wants, Tom. She wants me dead. So do her friends."
"So would everyone who would know about us," Tom said, looking dead straight ahead at a brimming dumpster. "You...can't take what she says seriously. No one does. But...yeah, she wants you dead. So do the rest of my girls, even Alexandra."
"This world isn't fair," Mike said, brushing his fingers against Tom's hand. "This world..." Mike closed his eyes, and the men, women, and children of Auschwitz stared without life, waiting for him behind his eyelids. He smelled the dark, rotting flesh of the black men hanged in Burnham County, Georgia, the men he'd shared his whiskey with. He remembered seeing them buried from far off, afraid of being disrespectful by being around. It was just that kind of night, that kind of lifetime. He sighed, and rephrased: "I wish it were fair." There were too many being burned to wish the whole of creation would follow. They'd all get there soon. What point would there be in wishing for it to hurry along?
"Ain't nothing fair in love and war," Tom muttered. It was the first time either of them had said the word even in implication to their liaisons, but Mike felt the undercurrents of wrongness charged beneath the words. Mike said, "Which is this?"
Tom grasped the fingers still running over his hand lightly, then held the hand. He looked into Mike's eyes, dark, slanted, still new to him after all this time. And quietly, he wanted many things for the both of them. "Maybe it's both."
"If you're going to kill me, do it quick," Mike said haltingly, memories both his and not his pouring into his mind. "The anniversary of mom's death is coming up. 'Tousan gets more embarrassing every year he gets farther away from her."
"Mike..."
"I remember," Mike said. "Or I'm insane. You keep killing me. They've sent you to kill me since we've known about each other. If you don't kill me..." Mike sighed, averting his eyes from Tom. Staring at the dead end a little further down, he said, "Tom, it's halfway too late. Sato's been in my head, and he's not coming out. I get it. You...love me. I...love you, too. Now how is this going to work this time around?"
Mike thought, See, Tom. I understand it just as well as you. Sugar helps the medicine go down better and Sato helps the knife ease into my back.
Mike said, staring into Tom's eyes, "My mother is waiting for me. All of my mothers are waiting."
Something broke behind Tom's gaze, remembering Eriko and Ling and Haruna, and as Tom kissed Michael tenderly, left hand in the other's right, he made sure the knife went through Mike's chest, not his back.
"It's the little lies that keep you going," Mike had said, three lifetimes ago. Tom wondered if it would ever stop hurting, if one incarnation would be less charming than the previous. Gently settling Michael Igarashi down, looking like a lord amongst the trash, Tom kissed the man's forehead and walked away, secure in the knowledge he had stopped Sato, drowning in the loss of another icon, friend, and lover. The guilt washed off with alcohol, or a fight. Too bad nothing else did.