icarusalsoflew | relationships: the war hounds

the war hounds ☈ the fourth.

Joshua LaRue
SIN-EATER {STRICKEN, CELEBRANT} > BLADE LEADER

"I think he saved my life."

No, he didn't see this one coming. Not at all.

What few people know is that Hikaru's story with this one started back when Joshua LaRue was still Joshua Brennan, and years before the War Hounds ever existed. The setting: a community college in San Diego, year 2055. The characters: a girl named Annie, a boy named Josh, and an fearful audience far below them both. Backstage: one Hikaru Shinta, one Rethe Kyriff. The conflict: Annie wanted to end her life. Rethe had been ready to intervene: he was no longer one of Elaine's, but he was certainly one of Aidan's, and that was enough to make him ready to save as many lives as possible without considering the possibility that it might all end the same way. Hikaru had told him to watch and wait. So they waited, and later watched as Josh coaxed the girl away from the edge and convinced her to give living a second chance. Hikaru filed that away in that section of his brain that files away every little detail about the Fifth World, and moved on.

They met again eight years later, on a plane that the remnants of Grendal had ~~stupidly~~ decided to mark for Death without really asking for Death's take on the matter. It was not that Hikaru didn't remember who Josh was; he remembered perfectly. It was more because Josh didn't have to know that he had been there back then, watching him save his first life. Unfortunate circumstances and one too many instances of believing and getting nothing had changed the kid, hunching those shoulders down and shattering his confidence. Still, Hikaru had not thought much about it: he had an assignment to complete for Lia, and quite frankly, he was far more interested in seeing how far along his girl Yulia Bostova had come around than he was in scoping out the others who were with her. So, with a few choice words and a dose of the usual charm, he went on his way.

To be completely honest, Hikaru was ready to walk right away from the War Hounds after Josh figured everything out, and after the lot of them had decided, even after reading up nearly everything one had to know about the lives he had led in the past, to stick with him. The pattern had been there, the groundwork laid even before the Blade King realized it for himself, and at that point in time, he had not been ready to invest in another group that would inevitably leave him behind. Then South Korea happened. Then Josh figured out the ban. Then Josh told him, without really having to tell him, that he was going to keep that secret.

From that point on, Josh became not a footnote in the Blade King's life, but a possibility. He was another person who had very quietly decided to trust him, and clearly respected him enough to be just close enough to be available without crossing all of the lines. He was somebody who knew his past well enough to understand, to an extent, what he was signing up for, but did not know enough to start passing judgments and lording it over him. And, later on, even after he learned more, he continued to see Hikaru Shinta as Hikaru Shinta. Yes, he was a Malice King and the Wolf of Zangyaku. That didn't change the fact that the one behind that was no unthinking, unfeeling god.

He fell in love with that first, perhaps: that almost divine amount of respect for boundaries and careful attention to detail, patterns. The interest in that potential happened later, because Josh, like anyone taken too soon, was only too full of possibilities. And then, that mind. It had been easy to leave it at that, and enjoy the Sin-Eater's friendship: he was someone new and eager to learn, and he could actually keep up with Hikaru. He was also a steadying presence even while he was dealing with his own shit, and more reliable than a whole lot of other things were in the Blade King's life. All the elements were there except for that small but significant factor called "awareness", and that was something that Hikaru could readily blame on the fact that his eyes had still been on Aria Skye and his guilt had still with Alistair Mordechai.

It had frightened him when he had finally figured out why he had started to look for Josh at every soonest opportunity, why those club runs had mattered so damned much, why disappointing Josh bit a little more than it should have, why he was a little too ready to make sure that things worked out for Josh no matter what the cost. Those months between March and July had been full of too many goodbyes and closed calls: after being forced to let Aria go and realizing that neither he nor Alistair wanted to jeopardize whatever it was that now lay between them by falling back into old habits, Hikaru was at the end of his rope. By that point, he knew that losing what he had with Josh by putting love into the equation was something he would not be able to take. He was also not about to ruin someone who had so much going for him by getting involved with him, because that was always what ended up happening with anyone who got involved with the Blade King, right? They broke, and he was left pulling their splinters out of his hands.

He didn't end up losing anything at all, and he owes it to a mildly obsessive ex-boyfriend and a goddamned shoe.

In the simplest of terms, Joshua LaRue is the man who has made Hikaru believe, for the first time in his life, that he had a place in the world and that - for all of his fucked up tendencies and inhumanely intense/quite possibly damaging devotion to the people he cares about the most - he was somebody worth falling in love with. He's also the one who's shown, rather plainly, that sometimes, Hikaru needs to remember that he is human first before anything else, that every second counts whether you're finite or practically immortal, and thinking ten steps ahead as veritable gods are wont to do isn't going to do anyone any favors. Maybe this sounds horribly poetic to most, but this is the reality of it: every blood cell and nerve ending in his body is attuned to that one because Josh has broken his old world down and started to build a completely new one for him, and Josh is the one with the map between them. He's taken Hikaru out of himself, and given him things that he never thought he could have or once believed he simply did not deserve.

He does not know where things are going to go from here. He knows, for a fact, that the time he has with this one will pass in a practical blink of an eye in him. At this point, though, it does not matter. He is going to have Joshua LaRue for one time lifetime and then some, and - long after Josh is gone - he will always remember his heart.

Yulia Bostova
BLADIAN {Singer: Anya} > SECOND OF THE WAR HOUNDS

"I do like it when she smiles, but... shouldn't she be the one who decides when she smiles and when she doesn't?"

Yulia was a thing in Hikaru's life before he even knew her name. He had met Anya Bostova first, when Anya was no longer Anya but a curious wreck of a creature who was too weak to remember herself but strong enough to keep the hunger from killing the people she had known when she had still been human. This was the first thing she had said, the moment Hikaru had turned her into one of his own:

"I have a sister. I was the only thing she had left."

The Blade King walked into her village the very next day, cut out the cancer of Grendal for miles around, and sought the girl out. He gave the girl the knife that he had made from the remnants of Anya's flesh. A gift, he had told her, without explaining exactly what it was. It was not yet time.

It would not have mattered to him if Yulia Bostova had never decided to leave her village for Jotunheim, and train hard to become an oni-tsukai. He had thought, back then, that saving her village and reuniting her with Anya was more than enough. Granted, he was fully prepared to come step back into her life on the unfortunate circumstance that Anya had not choice to awaken and make a Deal with her own sister. It was the right thing to do.

Suffice to say, the unfortunate circumstances did not end up being so unfortunate, and as a result, things just became much more interesting for all three of them.

There's no better way of saying it: Yulia is his girl, his Sworn Wolfheart before she ever actually became one of his wolves. He never saw her initial failure to make the cut as "failure", because she had pressed on without a second thought and continued to aim for the top in order to follow him. He knew, on sight, what she was going through, and always tried to stay just close enough to lend her a helping hand whenever she needed it. Time was essential to healing wounds like hers; grief was not something you could just drown away with the so-called power of friendship, much less being ridiculously trite and talking about it. Watching her start to open herself up to the Hounds and to other people has been a great source of happiness and relief for him, because he knows, for a fact, that doing something like that means putting her one step closer to healing. He knows it's going to take a while, and he knows that she's got a lot to work on. That does not make her any different from anyone else, in his opinion.

He wonders, these days, what they're going to end up talking about whenever the next opportunity for a "conversation" strikes up. It doesn't have to be about anything important at all, really: he'd be perfectly content to smile, nod, watch the light in her eyes, and listen to the cadence of her voice.

Estanislao Marisigan III [Heraclitus]
OBRIMOS MAGE {BANISHER} > Third of the Hounds

"Just remember: that particular dead man has got a serious hard-on for bacon."

If you ever manage to sit the Blade King down during Honesty Hour and ask him why he gives a shit about Taning Marisigan, his answer will be simple: he hates wasted potential, and he's never been one to buy into that crap about Banishers being "lost causes". He'll tell you that what people should have seen, when they looked at Taning, was not someone who did not step up because he was a coward, but someone who did not step up because he had seen what it meant to have power and seen how it could destroy everything that you love regardless of your intent, and it had rightfully frightened him. It helps, of course, that the Blade King will always have a soft spot for Theurgists (they are right up there with the Warlocks for him: blame Aidan and Liandrin, Elias and 108), and that Tohru became keenly interested in Taning's case the moment he caught wind of the swordsman. A good leader bends to the wishes of his men, does he not? And a good son will always try to make his father happy.

Something that might not come out so easily even with Honesty Hour active, though, are the other reasons why Hikaru makes it a point to take care of Taning as best as he can, and counts the Mage as one of his friends. And who can blame the Blade King for it, really? It's a hard thing to deal with, seeing one's past reflected in somebody else's story. He read Taning's file, and remembered not the fact that the man had blown up his house at the age of eight, but the weight of Akihiko Aoi's body in his own arms/the look in Katherine Stiles-Shinta's eyes right before the light in them had gone out. He looked on as Taning knelt before him and offered his sword, and briefly wondered if the fire in the Mage's eyes had been similar to the fires in his own on the night that he became Marrigan's General in the name of his sister. He catches those little tells of Taning's that write his feelings out for the Hounds between the margins of their interaction and his thoughts instantly turn towards the three blades who once walked with him and how, in spite of everything, they always wait for him to come around. He sees the way his family has taken Taning into their home and adopted him, and recalls that quiet New Year during the eighth year of this cycle, where he had woken up, taken one look at Tohru's face and felt like he had ended the man's one good chance at living a normal life without even meaning to.

Taning's deep regard for Tohru and the love he now has for the rest of the Fukuzawas appears to have become his jumping point towards serving as Hikaru's surrogate older brother. Hikaru honestly doesn't know what to make of it. He can deal with Taning looking out for him, as a Mortician of Zangyaku is wont to do. He can even deal with the possibility of the two of them being friends. What he might not be able to handle is Taning truly becoming a part of his family from this cycle, because that would mean having one crazy stubborn Theurgist all ready to drag him back to the Fukuzawas properly and make him face the lingering regret that he still has for disrupting their lives. Honest to Elaine, if he had his way, he'd simply present Taning as his replacement and gracefully bow out. That would be a surefire way of keeping them safe and preventing more loss, wouldn't it?

He brought Taning into his conspiracy because he wanted to make sure that the man had every possible means at his disposal to save his sister - it's something he can relate rather well to. He also did it because he knew that he could trust the Mage to one day be strong enough and smart enough to challenge his decisions and keep him on the straight and narrow: it's always been what Obrimos like him do.

On the other hand, he introduced Taning to the Fukuzawas because he firmly believes, at this point, that Taning could be a better son to his parents and his siblings than he could ever be to them. He also knows, for a fact, that between the two of them, Taning will have an easier time staying with them throughout the years. There is, after all, so much that lies well beyond his control, and that includes the possibility of dying and coming back too late to see his mother pass on and help his father with the grief that's sure to follow at the heels of her departure.

Those are the things that you won't hear from Hikaru, even during Honesty Hour. Those are the things that the Blade King is probably going to lock up tight behind his lips, and never tell a soul.

Brigade [Roland Stevenson]
PROMETHEAN {TAMMUZ} > HECATON'S LAST SOLDIER

"What can I say? I've got a thing for men in uniform."

Originally, Hikaru involved himself with Brigade not because he was a fascinating creature and potential Keeper of the Vigil (he is a Promethean, yes, but he's one of a kind in many ways due to the research behind his origins), but because he wanted to make Saitou Oyama happy. Saitou and Brigade had promised each other that they'd meet again if the both of them ended up surviving World War II. Hikaru happened to be accompanying Saitou on his Pilgrimage: that covered one side. The best way to cover the other was to pull in a favor with the conspiracies and have them watch over Brigade. No big deal, right?

Their brief story could have ended with Saitou died. Hikaru had his network pass the former Promethean's last message down to Brigade together with a lifeline; he had thought, knowing Brigade's particular tendencies, that it would never get tapped. That was fine: said "lifeline" happened to be Saitou's Crest, and that made it easier to keep track of the soldier. He had done some reading; Brigade was interesting enough to watch, at the very least.

One can only imagine Hikaru's amusement when he checked in on the Crest, and saw that its current bearer's trajectory would lead him straight to two things: his former mentor, and the people he had inadvertently collected for Netsach. It was also amusing to meet Brigade again, and see his surprise at the fact that the "kid" he had met in some Philippine jungle under fire had only aged a few years in the span of a couple of decades.

What WASN'T so amusing was South Korea. Yes, it was certainly one of his weaker moments. Maybe if he had not already been so fucked up ('Fucked Up' has kind of been the State of Hikaru Shinta since 2013), he might have been able to take an ignorant shithead insulting his people, insulting his methods, and unknowingly insulting pretty much every decision he has made in order to bring him to a classroom above a dying kid, poised to take his life because - until they intervened - saving him wasn't really an option. Heck, the entire incident had been so upsetting, it had made him start experimenting with some of Brother Death's abilities in the hopes of finding ways around the unfortunate stipulations of his condition (the results came out in Angela Brennan coming back from the dead, among other things).

Perhaps it is understandable how, had Santa Cruz never happened, Hikaru would have been perfectly content to cross out that small notebook he had on Brigade and leave it at that. But it happened, and the one person on the Hounds that he was trying very actively to not care about had not just extended the olive branch, but also ended up reuniting him with his sister. His fucking sister, after decades of trying not to be too bitter about the fact that he had never managed to say goodbye.

That was the start of their beautiful friendship. The rest got hammered out after Quiapo, through regular drinking sessions and the kind of trash talk and easy affection that one could only get with a fellow soldier. Their rhythm was comfortable, easy. It could have also very easily stayed that way, and Hikaru wouldn't have had to worry about a thing.

Then there was their big "Brother, we need to talk" moment after Seigi, and a conversation that should have been about Brigade's feelings for Kasumi but ended up being about why it still hurts for Hikaru, referring to the woman whose husband had been stolen away from her as his "mother". There's a reason, LaRue, why Hikaru passed on the booze when he found you drunk at his doorstep. It's called "Brigade".

It has become painfully obvious to Hikaru how his relationship with Brigade is defined by uncontrollable circumstances (read: Weapons), chance encounters, unfinished business, old loyalties, liberal amounts of booze and cigarettes, and Brigade bumbling into sensitive topics with little regard for Hikaru's feelings on the matter simply because the big lug is inclined to give more of a fuck than pretty much anybody else without caring too much about boundaries. They are brothers in more ways than Hikaru is comfortable with, which might explain why he continues to try to keep his distance as best as he can. Knee-jerk resistance, really, but old habits are hard to kick.

On another note, he would be perfectly fine with you going for Kasumi. The decision, though, is hers to make, and Hikaru's a good son: good sons respect their mother's privacy.

Brianna Lopez
CHANGELING {FAIREST, FLOWERING} > THEIR DEPARTED PRINCESS

"They grow up so fast, don't they?"

And they really do grow up so fast, and they always make it a point to grow up when you're not looking. You blink, and they're taller and stronger, faster and smarter, and right about ready to go in a direction that will take them far, far away from you.

But let's start from the beginning.

Brianna is the result of a chance encounter in his own base and Tala Vega's personal crusade against Arcadia. She had been with her class on an exposure trip to Seigi. Hikaru had taken one look at her and known that the real her was wrapped in cutting thorns and vines, spread out for the pleasure of all of the Treemen for miles and miles. Her case should have been closed the moment Tala and Selene - the first and second of his "daughters" - had pulled her out, helped her get rid of her fetch, and made all of the proper arrangements to have her transferred to a team that had his mark all over it (he had not really planned it that way, okay?).

Operative words: "should have been". What can he say, really, in his defense? He was not even drunk the day that Brianna had called him out to that coffee shop, and "I was still a little sick" sounded fucking lame. He has got to work on saying no. Maybe if he had never let her start calling him "Daddy" in earnest, he would not have been inclined to think that this could go anywhere, that she could be right up there with Tala and Selene and he'd have yet another family member to turn to when he needed to.

They had a good run. It sounds quaint because it IS quaint. He knew, as all fathers knew, that his children - adoptive or otherwise - had to grow up. Heck, he would have been bored or annoyed if they didn't. What he had hoped for, at least, was that Brianna knew him well enough and loved him enough to tell him what was happening, and inform him, beforehand, of her decision. That was all he wanted, really: a simple head's up. You know he hates surprises. (You know how poorly he handles betrayal.)

Say what you want about being "just Arcadia". "Just Arcadia" also means that years could pass for her, and it would have been a matter of hours for you, or years could pass for you and it would have been a matter of hours for her. There are other things there, as well, things that no amount of preparation will help you with. It doesn't matter if you're going to be in a "friendly" Court, your father's Court. You are, after all, your own worst enemy in the realms of the Fae.

He is proud of her, he really is. She finally found a direction that she had wanted to take, and was pouring her heart and soul into it. She had found a cause. Perhaps that had been his mistake: believing, wrongfully, that being her "father" was definitely going to be a part of that.

Mitsuru will be well taken care of, Brianna Lopez. You can count on that.

Karlo Antonio Zobel de Ayala
CARD {FOOL; PERSONA: ROXAS} > LITTLE BROTHER IN VIOLENCE

"And to think that all I wanted for Christmas was somebody new to torment..."

It's a bit horrible of him to admit it, but he had not been thinking about Kaz's welfare at all back then. He had been thinking, instead, of how interesting the Wings of Therion were, and how Kaizen was probably going to go ballistic over them. He had been thinking, later on, how while it would have been fun to give a gay boy over to a bunch of oftentimes prudish priests, he still loved Yue like a little brother, and he didn't want to inflict that particular headache on him in his old age (his daughter was bad enough). He had been thinking sometime after that, that pointing Kaz out to Alistair was going to hit on that special Mordecai love for the underdog, and that meant that maybe ~~that fucker~~ the Seer would finally have no choice but to come home.

No, he did not think that he and Kaz could be friends. He did not WANT more "friends". So yes, you could only imagine how he wasn't too pleased to see his plan of driving them away by showing the future Hounds his past had not quite worked out.

At present, though, he calls Kaz his little brother because he is working towards meaning it. The kid has grown up a whole lot, even more than anyone could have expected (that is definitely Neeka's influence and her adopted son's genes at work; he still refuses to believe that Alexa had anything to do with it). He is also mature enough to admit, if only to himself, that he had been wrong, and he had to stop being so selfish. Only an asshole takes a kid's feelings and throws him under a bus with them, and the Blade King would like to think that he's only somewhat of an asshole, not a total one.

This is why he is trying again. It is still difficult, calling Kaz his friend and brother. Practice, though, makes perfect, and each time he does it, he has discovered that it does get just a bit easier than the last time. It is even easier now than ever, because without Kaz, he wouldn't have ever discovered the fact that he could go back to the cycle and maybe win his life back in earnest. There is also that small matter of how Kaz was totally fine with helping him take Natalie Rukia out just the way he wanted to (sorry he isn't more sorry, Yue).

It is also really awesome, by the way, how Kaz has a video game character for a Persona, and that he is doing the one thing that Hikaru is pretty sure he will never be able to do again: get married to these love of his life. He has the coolest friends.