From Blue Sky - Chapter 5/15
Title: From Blue Sky
Status: 5/15
Fandom: Hey! Say! JUMP
Pairing: None. Main characters are Yabu, Hikaru, Yamada and Chinen.
Overall rating: PG-15 for minor character death and depictions of violence
Warnings: AU. I made Chinen 11 years old which is what the plot revolves around.
Wordcount: 3780
Summary: "He's a cute boy, isn't he?" Takaki says, his voice dangerously low as his eyes follow the young boy, probably around ten years old, walking next to his classy mother and seemingly trying to nag her into something. "I think he'd be even cuter lying at my feet with his throat sliced."
Notes: This is inspired by the Mayonaka no Shadow boy PV and a movie which I won't admit to ripping the plot from until someone calls me on it. I love the atmosphere of the PV and wanted to write something similar to it, and I've had this plot lying around for years, so I thought it was finally time. I'm planning on posting twice a week if you want to stick around~
Hikaru chews jelly candy while watching Chinen eat cream bread and get splotches of cream on his cheek. Yabu already complained that they didn't exactly buy anything healthy, and Hikaru teased him about being a mother, which made Yabu groan and grab a melon bread.
The division of who got to eat what probably didn't get that equal, since Hikaru figures Chinen's the smallest while he himself or maybe Yamada is the largest, but still Chinen hogged most of the things.
"Yama-chan, how tall are you?" Hikaru asks, as he ponders if maybe Yamada is larger after all.
Yamada looks up from one of Chinen's magazines spread over his lap with a look that practically tells Hikaru to get lost. "What."
"How tall are you? Not too tall right?" Hikaru asks, not bothered by the tone.
Yamada makes an ugly face that still doesn't make him look any less pretty, and crosses his arms. "165."
"Aww, really?" Hikaru grins, because that's pretty cute. "You're so small."
"Shut up or I'll make sure you lose a couple of decimetres yourself." Yamada growls, but Hikaru's not that intimidated. Yabu made Yamada lay away his guns after the conductor passed, and as he sits in a plain black T-shirt and a pretty silver necklace, he looks smaller, or maybe younger, and much less intimidating.
"Easy there." Yabu reaches over to pat Yamada's head, which makes Yamada growl more threatening things and shove at Yabu so hard he almost falls over.
"What do you weigh?" Hikaru asks cheerfully, interested in knowing so he can count if he's biggest himself or if Yamada can rival him.
Chinen looks between them, biting his lip as if he doesn't know whether to be nervous or not.
"... What the actual fuck." Yamada growls, and Chinen cringes, but Hikaru just smiles.
"Hikaru, I'm sure you know never to ask a lady about her weight." Yabu reprimands sarcastically, and Yamada looks like he just tasted something sour as he spares Yabu a glare.
"I was just thinking whether Yama-chan is bigger than me or not, then you need height and weight." Hikaru explains, and both Yamada's and Yabu's eyebrows rise. "What? I thought it might be of matter if someone wanted to argue the food sharing."
That only makes their eyebrows rise higher, and even Chinen looks surprised, his small mouth falling open a little as if he hadn't even considered sharing the food in any particular way but him getting his favourites. It's pretty cute when there's cream at the corner of his mouth.
"Hikaru, who are you?" Yabu asks suddenly out of nowhere, and Hikaru blinks. What?
"I'm... me?" He says, not sure he understands the question because it sounds deep.
"Yeah, I mean, where are you from, what do you do, why don't you have a wallet?" Yabu asks, but his questions are more intrigued than those angry forcing ones he asks Yamada.
Hikaru shrugs. It's not a very interesting story. "I'm from Sendai, I don't particularly do anything and my friends took all my stuff when they left before I woke up. I'll find them once we've left Chii."
Yabu just looks at him for a moment, before sighing like Hikaru's a lost cause. "Whatever."
There's another long silence, and Hikaru spends it looking at the trees flashing by outside the window while eating the remains of whatever candy bags Chinen opens before deciding he wants something else instead.
"I'm bored." Chinen finally whines, pouting as his legs dangle aimlessly from the seat. "Are we there yet?"
Yamada rolls his eyes and looks at Yabu with dejection in his eyes. "If he says he needs to pee, can I at least slap him?"
"No." Yabu says firmly without even looking at him, instead turns to Chinen with a pedagogic voice. "And no, we're not there yet. It's going to take a while and we'll be switching trains in a couple hours."
"Hours?!" Chinen's eyes widen as he whines even more, making Yamada's mouth pinch in irritation. "That's so long, I'll die of boredom!"
"Read your magazines." Yamada suggests dryly, since he's the only one who's touched them yet, and if Hikaru's to judge, they're not exactly his kind of magazines. One of them is a shoujo manga.
"… I can't read them alone." Chinen mutters and crosses his arms, and the tips of his ears get a little red.
Hikaru can't help but think that's cute. "I'll read them with you, if you want?"
Chinen looks at Hikaru for a moment and Hikaru doesn't quite understand what he's thinking, but then he decidedly turns to glare at Yamada instead. "I want Yama-chan to do it."
Yamada's mouth forms a little o in surprise, and it's pretty comical before he frowns instead. "Why me, I already read them! And if you call me Yama-chan one more time I swear to God I'll-"
"Hey." Yabu grabs Yamada's arm and effectively cuts him off. "You wanted to take care of the kid, right?"
His voice is irritated and Hikaru can hear the point made between the lines, but Chinen clearly does not.
"I call you what I want." Chinen decides, and Hikaru almost wants to laugh at how much his bratty attitude clearly bothers Yamada. "I always call the security guys what I want. There was one who looked like a gorilla once, so I called him Monkey. But only when mom couldn't hear it."
That has Hikaru laughing for real, but Yamada just rolls his eyes and tugs his arm free from Yabu's grip. "Fine, get over here, I'm not moving."
Chinen grins, content, and scuttles over to snuggle in next to Yamada and open the shoujo manga magazine, and Yamada looks so mortified at the close proximity that Hikaru laughs even more.
"Yama-chan, you're really cute." He tells him. "Like an angry teenager."
Yamada raises an eyebrow at Hikaru. “Are you always like this? No wonder your friends left you.”
Hikaru just shrugs with an apologetic smile, then stretches out on the empty seats to take a nap while Yamada explains kanji to Chinen in the story that appears to be about cute boys and girls with animal ears.
~*~
“I've been thinking.” Yabu's voice in his ear wakes Hikaru from a dream about having Inoo as a pet chameleon and losing him in a shopping mall.
“What?” Hikaru slurs, and it takes him a moment to remember where he is. He sits up, looking at the messy compartment and then smiles sleepily as he sees Yamada and Chinen asleep in their seats, Yamada with a magazine still in his hands and Chinen's head on his chest.
Yabu's standing next to him, but sits down now that there's room for it. “I've been thinking. Chinen's picture was in the newspapers this morning. We need to do something to disguise him.”
“Like what?” Hikaru yawns, not really catching up with Yabu's thoughts yet. “Yabu-chan don't you ever sleep?”
“Not much.” Yabu admits. “I normally have a lot to think about.”
“That's probably another reason you're really skinny.” Hikaru says wisely, and stretches as he yawns again, nearly smacking Yabu in the face with his arm.
“No, it's not.” Yabu insists, frowning. “No, enough about my looks already, we need to do something about Chinen's.”
“Not much we can do, can we?” Hikaru frowns, contemplating the boy's peaceful sleeping face.
“We can cut his hair.” Yabu says simply, and it takes Hikaru a few sleepy seconds to take in that statement and realize a few problems.
“We don't have scissors though? And no one who can make it look decent.” He comments, but Yabu brandishes a small pair of scissors.
“I had these in my luggage.” He says, and looks thoughtfully at Chinen. “We should have thought of buying him a new jacket as well. But the shirt works.”
Hikaru smiles at the fact that Chinen got to buy the pink shirt in the end.
“I'm not cutting anything, I don't want him to die.” Hikaru declares.
“I'm not sure I can do it either.” Yabu breathes a sigh through his nose. “Not sure if he'll let us.”
Hikaru ponders that for a moment, and he can practically see Chinen cry and hold onto his hair before his eyes. “Good question there.”
Yabu rises, clearly about to wake the two, but he doesn't get his outstretched hand closer than 20 centimetres before Yamada's eyes fly open and the magazine falls to the floor as he grabs Yabu's wrist, lightning fast. Hikaru jerks almost as much as Yabu does in surprise, but Yamada releases him as soon as he's conscious about his surrounding.
“What?” He asks, voice a little thick, and then he looks down at Chinen sleeping on his chest and makes a grimace, raising a hand to shove the boy away. “Hey.”
Chinen whines as he wakes up at the brusque manhandling, and he groans something about being tired. Hikaru could only agree, but it's still bothering him that Yabu didn't get any sleep yet.
“We've been thinking about maybe cutting Chinen's hair.” Yabu says, not as determined now since Chinen's actually listening, and seems pretty grumpy to begin with.
“... Yeah?” Yamada asks, like he's waiting for more, and Hikaru's a little impressed with how quickly he looks awake.
“We need to disguise him somehow and that's the best idea I have.” Yabu shrugs. “I have a pair of scissors but I guess none of us can cut.”
Chinen looks between them with wide eyes, and there's a small hand creeping up to touch his pretty long bangs defensively.
“I'll do it, I have sisters.” Yamada says like that explains something, but Hikaru's just happy about the first piece of personal information he's volunteered yet.
But Chinen shrieks and crawls backwards from them, looking like they want to kill him. “No!”
Yamada just rolls his eyes and stretches a hand out for the scissors. “Give me those.”
Yabu blinks once, then glances at the pile on the shelf over Hikaru's head that consist of Yamada's jacket and guns.
“Oh c'mon, I'm not gonna stab him or something, give me the scissors.” Yamada insists in annoyance when he sees Yabu's glance.
“You sure?” Yabu raises an eyebrow, but his tone is ironic as he hands Yamada the scissors.
“I don't want to cut my hair!” Chinen nearly shouts, and Hikaru and Yabu both shush him at the same time, which doesn't help lowering his volume at all. “I refuse!”
“Chinen.” Yamada says, and his voice is low and stern as he turns to look at the boy. “Do you want them to recognize you?”
Chinen makes a face as if he's not sure whether to shout and protest or not, his nose twitching rather cutely.
“If we cut your hair, they won't.” Yamada promises, voice firm and calm, but it sounds like an ice crust over a lava ocean, which Chinen seems to pick up on.
“... But I've saved it. For weeks.” He whines, but he seems to have given up already.
“I won't cut it too short I promise, now get over here.” Yamada motions towards the seat next to him and raises an eyebrow expectantly.
“... You promise?” Chinen finally asks, slowly loosening his grip on his hair.
“I promise.” Yamada assures, and Hikaru glances at Yabu, who looks pretty stunned that it actually worked as Chinen slowly crawls back towards Yamada.
“What if you cut it too short anyway?” Chinen pouts as he sits before Yamada again.
“What do you want if I do?” Yamada asks, sighing like he's really tired of this already.
“... If you do, I'm sleeping in your bed. With you.” Chinen settles, and Yamada doesn't do very well covering his shock; Hikaru bursts out laughing at his indignant expression.
“... Fine.” Yamada finally agrees after sending Hikaru a glare. “Now turn around and someone hand me something to gather up the hair.”
~*~
Yamada's actually kind of pleased when he puts the scissors down, Chinen's hair roughly 3 centimetres shorter and not too uneven. Having Chinen ask every other cut how short it got was pretty unnerving, and Hikaru and Yabu watching didn't make it easier, but it turned out okay.
“Yeah I'm done.” He says, and Chinen's little hands immediately fly to his hair to check it. “It's not too short.”
Chinen reluctantly agrees, and Yamada can't help but wonder why Chinen wanted to sleep in his bed as punishment. The only reason he can imagine is that Chinen feels safest with Yamada, which doesn't really settle well with him considering he did shoot Chinen's mother to death in cold blood.
“That looks good.” Hikaru says in his loud voice, leaning closer to examine Chinen's new hairstyle. “Yama-chan are you an undercover hairdresser?”
“No, I've never cut hair before in my life.” Yamada admits, leaning back in his seat and can't help but feeling a little smug, at least enough to ignore the nickname. He's only watched his sisters cut the hair of their dolls, with various success.
Chinen turns to stare at him with mouth open in shock, like he can't believe he just let Yamada cut his hair with that lack of experience.
Yabu doesn't comment, just gives Yamada one of those knowing looks that he's been sending him since the clothing store, and leans down to fold and pick up Hikaru's scarf which served as a hair collector. As soon as Yabu slammed him against the door Yamada knew he'd slipped up in the store, when Hikaru nearly pulled his jacket off. And now, Yabu's even more watchful of him than he was before.
“He doesn't look the same at all.” Hikaru sounds impressed, still looking at Chinen like he's never seen him before. “A little... older?”
“Really?” Chinen asks, sounding excited, and Hikaru immediately picks up on the positive attitude.
“Yes, definitely.” He says, smiling, and Chinen looks pleased again.
“We should gather up our things.” Yabu says seriously. “We're changing trains soon.”
“Buzzkill.” Hikaru calls him, but can't keep his grin away when Yabu turns to glare at him, eyes narrowed.
When they finally get off the train, it's raining and it's already past lunch. Chinen keeps inquiring where they are and when he can get something to eat and whines that he's bored, which honestly makes Yamada want to slap him and tell him to behave, but he knows Yabu's watching him.
At least they don't have a lot of things, only Yabu's luggage and a plastic bag that Hikaru's carrying, and it helps keeping Yamada's mind from the image of a family on vacation.
Chinen stays close to Yamada as they hurry from the outdoors platform and into the station building, and grabs Yamada's jacket sleeve when people start accumulating around them, almost forcing them apart.
Yamada easily pushes his way through the crowd and inside, more than used to it from his years in Tokyo, but Chinen clutches harder onto his arm as they make their way to an unoccupied corner inside.
“There's a lot of people.” Chinen comments, and his voice sounds small as he glances up at all the businessmen and women walking past that are all taller than him.
“You've never been to Tokyo, have you?” Yamada asks, but he's not too invested since they lost Yabu and Hikaru on the way and his mind immediately wanders to ways of getting out of here without them. But then he sees Hikaru's blonde hair and figures there's no way with this little time.
“No.” Chinen answers, and there's nothing annoying about his tone this time. Yamada glances down at him, finding him looking thoughtful and a little sad while glancing at the people around him. “Dad never let me.”
Yamada frowns, not entirely sure what's going on right now, but then Yabu and Hikaru show up before he can decide whether he should be comforting Chinen or not.
“Don't lose us like that.” Yabu scolds, and he sounds a little annoyed.
“I'm not running off with him, just drop it.” Yamada rolls his eyes, and then narrows them when he sees Yabu glancing at his chest. He got his guns back, and Yabu can't stop looking at him like he's a bomb waiting to explode. To be fair, he's not all wrong, because if he's going to keep doing that Yamada would gladly aim a gun at him.
“Oh do you have to fight all the time?” Hikaru whines, and Chinen's grip on Yamada's jacket loosens as Hikaru takes his other hand. “Let's get some food, we don't have all day?”
“All you think about is food.” Yabu sighs, but lets his eyes off Yamada and takes charge of finding somewhere to eat.
They end up at a cheap restaurant at the far corner of the station, while Yabu keeps reminding them that they only have another 40 minutes until their next train leaves, and Chinen picks out what he wants before scurrying to the bathroom to look at his new hair.
Yabu's a little hesitant at letting him go alone, but then Hikaru starts calling him a curling mom and it distracts Yabu long enough for Chinen to slip from his chair and sneak away.
“Might as well let him go. The waiter doesn't need to see him, does he?” Yamada points out quietly and pours himself some water.
Yabu glances at him, but it's obvious that he sees Yamada's point. Still, he turns back to Hikaru. “I'm not a curling mom. I just care for him, that's all.”
“Aw, Yabu-chan, you are too sweet.” Hikaru grins, tilting his head and twirling a strand of his hair in an imitation of a lovesick girl. “Just my kind of man.”
Yabu makes a face at him, but then puts his normal business expression back on as the waiter arrives and they order their food.
Yamada's starving, if he's honest, and it might be an additional reason to his snappy behaviour.
Hikaru seems to be too, since he orders extra almost everything, making Yabu purse his lips.
“... Am I supposed to pay for this too?” He asks, sounding a little irritated.
“Ehm... I don't have any money?” Hikaru says, and he has the decency to look a little sheepish.
“I can't cover all of these costs just for fun you know.” Yabu says, frowning, and Yamada rolls his eyes, sick of any more bitching before food.
“Jeez shut up already, I'll pay.” He groans, making both Yabu and Hikaru turn to him in surprise. “... What, do I look like someone without money?”
Hikaru scrunches his face up in thought for a moment, but then nods. “You're right, you're too pretty to be broke.”
The comment has Yamada raising his eyebrows, because that could mean a lot of things, among some which he could punch Hikaru straight in the face for saying, and his voice comes out a little threatening. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”
“Easy pretty boy.” Yabu says, but he's grinning as he pats Yamada's shoulder, and Yamada wishes he would stop doing that.
He shrugs Yabu's hand off in annoyance. “Quit that, I'm not a kid.”
“How old are you?” Hikaru asks, leaning forward with genuine interest in his eyes just as Chinen returns, hopping back onto his chair and looks between them, trying to get a grasp of the conversation.
“None of your business.” Yamada snaps, but of course it just runs off Hikaru like water from a goose.
“Oh come on, we should get to know each other.” He encourages with a smile, and Chinen's eyes are lit up with interest while Yabu just sighs. “I'll go first. I'm 26.”
“What?” Yabu sits up straighter, looking like someone slapped him in the face, and Yamada's actually a little surprised since he would have pegged Yabu as older. “You're my age?”
“You too?” Hikaru asks, delighted. “What month?”
Yabu rolls his eyes as he crosses his arms and leans back in his chair again. “January.”
“Aw, December.” Hikaru pouts. “Almost a year apart then.”
“I'm born in November.” Chinen says, and Hikaru turns to him instead.
“Yeah? Early, late?” He asks, that look of kind interest on his face that he only gives Chinen.
“30th.” Chinen smiles, and then looks at the waiter arriving with their food, smile brightening even more.
“Oh, then we're close, I'm December 2nd!” Hikaru tells him excitedly and receives his food with a pleased 'thank you'.
Yamada sighs at the conversation topic since he doesn't see why it matters at all, but he just ignores it in favour of the huge pile of grilled chicken before him.
“Yabu-chan, what date are you born?” Hikaru asks around a mouthful of rice.
“31st.” Yabu seems as uninterested in the conversation as Yamada, but plays along to make them happy.
“Almost February.” Chinen comments, also with too much food in his mouth and it's almost hard to hear what he's saying.
Yabu just nods, busy shoving food into his mouth, but Hikaru turns to Yamada again, making clear he didn't forget about him. “Yama-chan?”
“Why?” Yamada inquires, waving his chopsticks in annoyance. “What'd you do with that information?”
“Get to know you better?” Hikaru explains, tilting his head in a gesture that is actually his own this time.
“I want to know.” Chinen says, his bratty tone enough to make Yamada's leg itch to kick him under the table.
“... If I tell you, will you leave me alone then?” Yamada finally asks, because he really just wants to eat in peace.
“For now?” Hikaru chuckles, and Chinen beams.
“Fine.” Yamada sighs. “I'm 23 and my birthday is May 9th. Have fun with that knowledge.”
Hikaru and Chinen both grin and start discussing that Yamada looks younger, drawing Yabu into the conversation, and Yamada makes a final remark about that Hikaru acts like he's seven and Chinen looks like it.
He returns to his food then, and is, as promised, left in peace until he has to pay and Chinen whines a little about dessert.
“We don't have time for dessert.” Yabu settles that argument firmly. “We have another train to catch. Let's get moving.”
~*~
Chapter 4
Chapter 6