Up in Smoke: A Heisei Kumi Fanfic (2/36)
Author: ryosukekoibito
Pairing: Hikato, Chiitaro, Ariyama
Rating: R/NC-17
Warnings: Graphic Violence, Minor Character Death, Strong Language
Genre: Slice of life/Angst
Disclaimer: I do not own anyone.
Summary: After months of peace an attack leaves the Heisei Kumi reeling, and when an old enemy returns to the area reclaiming that peace starts to feel impossible.
A/N: The next installment in my Heisei Kumi AU, this one starts in the last days of December 2016 and continues on into 2017. If you'd like to read the other stories in this AU, please check out my masterlist. All Heisei Kumi fics have 平成組 next to their titles, to mark them as part of the AU! I'm actually working tonight, so with any luck Anna will post this for me so it won't be late! (hi it's anna I'm doin it love u ♡)
Previous Chapters: 1
Takaki opened his mouth to protest, tears already visible in his eyes, his hand gripping one of the little boy’s arms. Hikaru bent down, shoving past Yabu to put his fingers on the little boy’s neck, checking for a pulse, his eyes wide and face pale, but after a few moments he shook his head in defeat. Keito felt numb, not wanting to process what this little boy’s body meant, not wanting to think about the tragedy lying at their feet in the cold.
“What-what do we do?” Yamada asked, and next to him Keito felt Yuto quivering, shaking as silent tears began rolling down his cheeks.
“Bring him inside. Yabu and I will go do a sweep of the underling housing. We need to figure out what the hell-” Hikaru cut himself off, visibly upset, and he ran a hand through his hair, lips pursed. Takaki scooped the boy up in his arms, and he’d just crossed the threshold back inside when off in the distance there was a sound that for a moment Keito thought was the sound of celebratory New Year fireworks being shot off, before a wash of panic came over him as Hikaru declared
“Gunshots.”
“But that’s the direction of the underling housing. They aren’t allowed to have guns.” Inoo’s confused words added to the churning feeling in Keito’s stomach. Ryutaro let out a long string of curses, and he pushed out the door, running off in the direction of the noise, Hikaru yelling “Fuck. Let’s go! C’mon. You too Takaki. Now!” The tension was palpable, everyone confused, angry and afraid, and Keito turned to see Takaki still holding onto the little boy’s body, not moving.
“There’s nothing we can do for him.” Yabu said, putting a hand on Takaki’s shoulder, and Takaki turned, taking a few more steps inside and laying the boy down on their couch, the arm that had been cradling the boy’s head slick with blood, before he nodded, and together they all ran out into the night. It was freezing, wind whipping at their faces, but Keito barely spared a thought to the temperature, his hand digging into his pocket for his knife as his heart raced in his chest.
As they got closer to the underling housing there were sounds of distress, screams and curses reaching their ears before they could see the cause. The apparent danger made Keito run faster, but when he turned the last corner he froze, shock hitting him like a wall. He'd seen plenty of terrible things, been in plenty of fights, but he’d never seen anything quite like the scene before them. It was chaos, fighting in doorways of buildings, but mostly the fighting was spilling out onto the dark street, bodies of the boys and their attackers shrouded in shadow, and while about half of the figures were on their feet, still in the fight, the other half were in huddled masses in the street, bodies crouched over other bodies.
Those boys, the ones no longer in the fight were the ones that disturbed him the most, because most of the noises of distress were falling from their lips, and in the darkness of night Keito couldn’t tell why. The huddled masses of boys and the awful, fear inducing noises coming from them speaking of unknown injury and grief paralyzed him, and his eyes flicked around the scene for a moment, wondering where to even start, afraid because in the darkness he couldn’t even tell which of those still standing were underlings and which were their attackers. He was put back into motion when one of the figures fighting fell to his knees, and from somewhere in front of him there was the earsplitting crack of a gunshot, the noise snapping Keito out of his spiraling panic.
Daiki pushed past him, and Keito followed in his lead, running at a mass of fighting people, Daiki tackling a man much taller than himself. Keito knew better than to attempt to help Daiki, and he saw a boy no older than fifteen get knocked to the ground next to him, and he turned to help that kid instead, slamming his fist into the back of that boy’s attacker’s head. He kicked out, connecting right between his opponent's shoulder blades, pushing him forward and sending him tumbling to the pavement. Once he was down all it took were a few well placed kicks to his skull before he stopped moving. Keito turned to help the teen that had fallen, and as he was pulling the kid to his feet he heard an unfamiliar voice yell
“Let's go! C’mon!” He turned, looking for the source of the shout, and he wasn't the only one, Daiki freezing for a moment, treating the person he'd been fighting to one last punch before letting them scramble away as he looked for the owner of the voice. Keito's attention was quickly drawn back to the boy however when the kid fell into him, his legs seeming unable to hold him up any longer, and the boy said, his voice quiet and rough with exhaustion
“Prince, help us. Please.” Keito flipped his knife shut with a flick of his wrist, wrapping his tattooed arm around the boy’s torso to hold him up while he shoved his weapon in his pocket, before lifting the kid up in his arms. All around them the enemies were leaving, running off into the night, and while Keito didn’t get a good look at any of them, they were all fleeing in the direction of the Wakaba territory. The Wakaba had never behaved this way, had never sought to punish the underlings before, and between this unprecedented behavior and the dead boy on their doorstep Keito was fighting to push down the panic churning his stomach. Still, he looked down at the kid in his arms, and he promised
“Everything is going to be okay. They’re leaving now, and the Kumi-cho is going to make sure everyone is all patched up.” The teen didn’t say anything, and Keito looked around for a familiar face, eventually spotting Jesse Lewis and Kouchi Yugo standing together at the edge of the street light wrapped up in each other’s arms. Their familiar faces were a welcome sight, and he yelled out, causing their heads to whip around in his direction. They immediately rushed to his side, asking questions that Keito didn’t know the answers to and insisting that they take the boy-who they called Haba-chan-inside one of the buildings.
Kouchi was called away seconds after that decision had been reached, and he ran off, Keito following Jesse inside one of the many buildings, going into a small apartment, where Jesse said this boy lived with three other kids. Keito set him down, and as he did Haba turned to Jesse, asking about someone named Soya, but Jesse just shrugged, digging under the sink for a moment before emerging with a small first aid kit. He told Keito that he could handle anything the boy needed, and Keito hesitated for a moment, before nodding, remembering the groups of boys out in the street, knowing that there were more kids that needed help.
When he emerged from the building Hikaru was yelling. He ran to the noise, and he realized after a moment that the Kumi-cho was giving orders, slowing down so that he could listen properly.
“-that can run need to go into every apartment and house, and get any medical supplies and bring them to this house.” He pointed to the building closest to himself. “If you think you can carry the unconscious ones, then do so. If you have any skills in doing stitches or dealing with any other serious injuries-broken bones, bullet wounds, dislocated limbs-you’re to meet with Yabu, over there.” Hikaru pointed to a patch of pavement, where Yabu was standing with Kyomoto Taiga, the two talking seriously, Yabu barely taking notice of Hikaru’s instruction, belatedly raising his hand to indicate where he was.
Keito reached Hikaru in that pause, glad to find that most of his housemates were also there, falling in beside Chinen and Inoo, trying to quell the frantic fear still bubbling inside of him, trying to tune out the sounds of distress that were still coming from some of the boys around them, and focus on Hikaru. Now wasn’t the time for panic, not when there were so many kids that needed their help.
“If there's someone that is in dire need of attention, please tell one of the ten of us and we'll make sure they get seen to first. Kouchi and Matsumura will be doing a head count; we can't afford to lose anybody.” Hikaru turned away from the crowd of boys, focusing on on the circle most of their housemates had made around him. “Inoo, I need you to go back home and grab all of our medical supplies. Daiki, Keito, Yuto, I'm going to assign each of you a handful of boys that are strong enough to help and you'll go through the injured kids and prioritize. Check the apartments and the street. Everyone's going to get fixed up eventually, but I don't want a kid with a few cuts getting helped before someone with a gunshot wound. Send the worst ones in immediately. Any unconscious ones will need to be carried over too. Got it?” Keito nodded, and Hikaru continued
“Anyone left will be helping Yabu and I.” He turned back to a mass of underlings standing close by as most of their housemates scattered, getting to work. Hikaru leaned in, talking to a few of the boys, and pointing toward where Keito was standing with Yuto and Daiki, Keito feeling Yuto lean into him, Keito leaning back as six boys made their way over to the three of them, the boys splitting up into duos as they drew close, two in their teens placing themselves in front of Keito. They were thin, their eyes wide with fear, and they were clinging to each other, but they didn’t seem to be very hurt, and after quick introductions-in small, tiny voices that their names were Inoue and Hashimoto-the three of them got to work.
It was mind numbing, Keito trying to distance himself from his work as he went through the boys that were still huddled on the streets, assigning numbers to them correlating to their level of injury, just like he did after raids at home. Inoue and Hashimoto followed behind him, staying for the most part silent as they walked through huddled groups of boys, and Keito was starting to feel relieved; he hadn’t seen anyone yet that required immediate, life saving attention, when he entered a quiet, dark apartment, and found a young teen lying slumped against the wall, covered in blood, unmoving. He felt a jolt of sickening dread cut through the numb horror he’d settled into, and he rushed to the boy’s side, feeling with trembling fingers for a pulse.
That boy was one of five that were found dead that night, and one of two that were found by Keito. Their bodies were scary in a way that still things shouldn’t be, and his first instinct was to shy away, but the trembling boys Hikaru had assigned to help him kept him going in a way that he knew he couldn’t have if he’d been on his own. He just needed to push on, just for a little bit longer, and then he could-he could-. He never got to what he could do, not truly able to see past that seemingly endless night of horror he’d been thrust into. They worked for hours, Keito and his two boys rushing back and forth between the house that had become the medical hub, and the wounded in the streets, following orders and helping as best they could.
They worked for hours, as the moon arced across the sky, the chill of winter seeping into their bones. It was only an hour or so before sunrise when the last boy was finally tended to, and Keito found himself standing around with a few of his housemates and some of the older underlings, suddenly without a job to do. He instinctively looked for Hikaru. Hikaru could tell him what was next. Hikaru could make this better, or at least provide Keito with a distraction. Something. He found his leader sterilizing what looked to be the last of their medical supplies, as around him Inoo and Yabu were cleaning, scrubbing blood from surfaces and filling a bag with countless dirty bandages and scraps from ruined bloodstained clothing.
The room was silent except for the sounds of their work, the three older men diligent in their tasks, an energy in the room, a tension that Keito had felt a handful of times in the past after particularly bad raids. Keito felt apprehensive, not sure what to do, not wanting to announce himself and break into the scene playing out. His presence was noticed after a few moments of fidgeting on his behalf, Hikaru turning from the sink and meeting his eyes. There was pain in his face, but it was buried under a level of closed off professionalism that Keito rarely saw from his boyfriend. Hikaru was opening his mouth to speak when Kouchi and Matsumura walked in, their bodies no longer smeared in blood, bruises on their knuckles and faces swollen where they'd been hit, notebooks in their hands.
“Kumi-cho!” Hikaru’s attention was immediately stolen, turning to the two underlings, and they stepped up closer to him, flicking through their notebooks and talking fast, listing off names of boys, some of which Keito recognized, but most of which he didn’t, fingers trailing down the pages as if going down a list, their voices low. Hikaru was listening, silent, and Keito went over to the sink, taking up cleaning the medical supplies Hikaru had been working on, wanting to do something. He could feel a well of emotion in his chest, pressing against his ribcage sharply, but he kept it down. There would be a time to cry, and yell, and feel, but it wasn’t right now. No one else had lost it; he couldn’t.
He tried not to listen to the conversation Hikaru was having, and it wasn’t until he’d finished cleaning that he found himself tuning in to what the three of them were saying.
“-four, and there is only one that still hasn’t been found. Ozeki Kafu. Juri is out looking for him, we sent the boy to get you and bring help, but no one’s seen him.” Kouchi was saying, his brows pushed in, furrowed in serious concern. Hikaru sighed, and his jaw clenched as he let out a heavy exhale through his nose.
“Ozeki is dead. We found him on our doorstep...his body is still at our house.” There was a long pause, the silence heavy, Kouchi in particular looking immensely distraught, before Hokuto nodded, pulling a pen out of the spiral of his notebook and making note on his page.
“Can...can you bring him back home? Kouchi asked. Hikaru nodded, promising
“I’ll send someone with him tonight.” Kouchi thanked him, and after handing Hikaru one of the notebooks he and Hokuto headed up the stairs, Hokuto pulling out a cell phone, saying something about calling Juri as he left. Hikaru tucked the notebook under his arm, and turned back to Keito, sighing. He didn’t seem to really be looking at Keito, his eyeline passing right through him as his fingers curled around the edge of the notebook. After a moment he declared “Let’s go. We still have some work to do once we get home. Yabu, can you round up the rest of them?” Yabu nodded, and slipped away, out the front door and into the street. The three of them left in the kitchen followed him at a much slower pace, Keito falling in right behind Hikaru.
It didn’t take long for everyone to gather, and as soon as they had the group started making their way back home in silence. The cold winter air and the horrors of the night kept everyone huddled in one big mass, and Keito kept close to Hikaru, and once he felt that no one was paying much attention he slipped his hand into Hikaru’s. Usually Hikaru discouraged any displays of affection past a friendly arm over the shoulders, but when Keito laced their fingers together he held on, squeezing tight to Keito’s hand. The grip was comforting, and Keito watched a little of the tension in Hikaru’s shoulders wash away, feeling a small sense of relief. It wasn’t just comforting for him; Hikaru needed it too.
They held hands all the way home, Hikaru finally letting go when they turned the last corner and red door of their house came into view. The first thing they’re greeted with when they crossed the threshold was the sight of little Ozeki Kafu’s body lain out on their couch, the boy’s head surrounded in a small pool of red, his blood having seeped into the fabric. With everything else that had happened that night Keito had somehow almost forgotten about the kid, the catalyst that had started them on what had to be the longest night of his life. He didn’t know what to do, what to say, all he wanted to do was sit down, somewhere where there were no reminders of what had happened, somewhere where he wouldn’t have to think about what the events of the night meant, and forget.
He paused just inside the doorway, as some of the others went over to the little corpse, huddling around it. He wasn’t the only one standing back, Yuto pressing himself into Keito as soon as he crossed the threshold, curling into Keito and shoving his face into Keito’s neck, Keito wrapping his arms around Yuto’s shoulders, feeling Yuto’s hot wet face press into him. He’d been crying. Keito squeezed his friend hard, and Yuto didn’t move to pull away, or to reciprocate, just allowing himself to be enveloped by Keito’s arms as across the space the others talked amongst themselves, Keito watching over Yuto’s shoulder as Hikaru murmured something to Yabu, the oldest man nodding and scooping up Ozeki Kafu’s corpse.
There was a moment of stillness, and then confusion, as Inoo leaned in over the boy’s tiny body, brows furrowed, before he pulled a piece of paper out of the kid’s jacket pocket. It was an envelope, all folded up to fit into a child sized pocket, and Keito murmured to Yuto that something was happening, as Inoo unfolded the envelope, before handing it over to Hikaru. Yuto pulled himself to his full stature, and Keito kept an arm around Yuto’s lower back, pulling him close in an attempt at maintaining some comforting touch as they moved closer, watching as Hikaru pulled a paper out of the envelope. The whole house was silent as he read over it, and then there were a few moments of pause, Hikaru lowering his hand, Keito making out the words on the page, written large, and thick I’m home before Hikaru declared
“Wakaba Ichinojo. He’s back.”
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