Archive of Our Own

He really didn't want to think about what he should have done,  if the wounded, pissed off vice-chief had insisted on going further. Probably he would never have spoken to him again, had he taken advantage of his injury and forced him to rest.

It felt like he didn't need a lot to throw everything to the dogs and launch himself who-knows-where, march off into the blue.

Someone might gently inquire with a moderate amount of curiosity what events led to this, to this lonely and silent wandering in the middle of the night through the snowy slopes of the mountains, away from any human settlement.  However, he wanted to frickin shout the question.

HOW THE HELL IT CAME TO THIS?! 

Did it all begin with that evening in a dim-lit bar, with alcohol pleasantly buzzing in their heads, making their movements a bit less coherent and thoughts less guarded and more wandering? 

When in the middle of meaningless banter he grabbed the collar of Hijikata's out-of-duty yukata what resulted in a sudden close-up of all different shades of blue of his eyes, staring at him defiantly and haughtily even in the drunken daze.

When suddenly he was filled with mischief. 

Back then, it seemed hilarious to push the hot-blooded jerk's buttons in an unexpected way that somehow would have given him an upper hand.

Who knew that the prudish prick would treat that prankish and whimsical peck on the lips like a thrown down iron glove and will dive straight into this as into a battle? How the hell was he supposed to know that he kissed the way he worked - single-mindedly and devotedly, even while being sloppily drunk.

You can't blame him for an unexpected thrill and sudden desire to see the other man sober with messy hair, to observe the way he acts during the morning after, to learn all about different sides of him that were unknown to him in their friendship.

This in turn, what brought them together that evening, has been affected by years of acquaintance and shared fights. And something fragile woven from those moments between them, but he wasn't going to inspect it closer,  that wasn't the issue at hand.

That particular memory might have helped to warm up for a moment, but well, no, that wasn't it.  They could continue meeting up with that fake disinterest and a renewed, over and over again, exaggerated surprise upon meeting each other -

- oh my, who would think you were there, don't remember you mentioning that at all, exhaustion looks horrible on you, you look like a stray cat dragged through the pipeline, what about onsen ? -

- they could do this for years, that's how stubborn they both were.

But noo, that was too much to ask, to never examine closer particular stomach storms, some palpitations, and hot flashes. He was never the one in a rush to see a doctor or fret over some symptoms - why would he start doing that now? - and live happily in this blissful ignorance, with an unspoken longing for hell-knows-what. 

Apparently, it was not okay in some people's books. 

Apparently, it needed fixing. 

Apparently, it gave you a right to meddle in other people's businesses doing businesses and question in what circumstances they were doing those businesses. 

Yep, like most troublesome things it started with the kids. 

More precisely, it started with carelessly saying to them "For now, there is nothing to talk about" a few months ago, in reference to this whatever-it-was. 

Who knew it would become their point of honor to make them have something to talk about? 

He couldn't predict it; there were no signs of upcoming storm, of hushed conversations and betrayal brewing in the halls of Yorozuya.

For months they didn't mention it. Neither him going out alone at random hours, coincidentally related to other people's work schedule, and coming back with mussed clothes and a barely noticeable spring in his step, nor rumors of doom coming upon them when the particular demon of police force suddenly have started to smoke less and smile creepily out of nowhere, how Shinsengumi were on the edge of mental breakdown; it was nerve-wracking and agonizing, this waiting with held breath for outburst which wasn't coming. 

Something in the air was changing, but they didn't talk about it. 

Huh, maybe that was a mistake, hadn't he promised to talk with them when there would be something to talk about? 

Oh, don't you worry, he could have made up some story alright if he just had known they were so keen on listening to it. 

Wasn't this strange, though? Since when they were so obsessed with details of his private life? Usually, they would call it disgusting and embarrassing, and you two better keep your mouth shut and your hands where we can see them, or we are calling child protection services and making your life miserable forever. 

That would be a normal reaction, wouldn't it? 

Why did they suddenly start to act like nosy in-laws pestering about things which had nothing to do with them ? Were they looking for some dirt on him, them, quite literal, if he could with satisfaction mention? That was too messed up, even for them and totally unexpected. 

The invitation to work part-time at a winter resort seemed innocent enough. Otae inviting Kondo to come along was a bit of a stretch of goodwill, and by bit, he meant like a distance to the moon and back, and yeah, he probably should have stopped to think twice about it, but there was no bad premonition, actually, he could understand that.

 She needed him to use for something just to toss aside later on. It was some excellent strategic thinking on her part, using every accessible pawn to fulfill her whatever-plan. He should respect that and not meddle in. Requesting too much information was not encouraged behavior, it went without saying. 

He could probably have foreseen two closest friends of Kondo coming along with him. One overworking himself, in urgent need of rest, other looking for any opportunity to idle and annoy the other. 

That way they all gathered in a breathtaking valley buried under snow, situated at the foot of mountains, surrounded by them and secluded. Connected with the outside world only by a rusty bus going a winding road once a three day, on the random hour so nobody could know for sure when it will be coming, usually passing the resort like a ghost. 

In short, in the place that almost looked like a perfect setting for a locked-room murder mystery. 

He had this thought at dinner upon arriving. 

On the spur of the moment, he sat beside the vice-commander of Shinsengumi who, with his clothes drenched, looked like a  wetter, more miserable version of himself. 

All due to a snow fight that had broken out just outside the door.

Unpacking his things he missed its beginning. He came just in time to see Kagura throwing an alarmingly huge snowball at startled Hijikata while shouting viciously, "You-don't-get-to-keep-someone-as-a-dirty-secret-stupid-mayora-ice-attack! " 

Hijikata somehow dodged it, what seemed humanly impossible, just to be assaulted by Shinpachi and a series of carefully aimed shots. 

"With all due respect, you-need-to-think-about-your-intentions-avalanche-attack!" the boy proclaimed sending snowballs straight into his head.

"This seems like no respect at all!" the officer snorted, spitting out the snow.

"That's the exact amount you deserve," Sougo didn't miss a beat to join in on taunting him, even if he didn't quite know the reason yet. Not like he needed any.

 "Check the bottom of a chasm for some criminals, rotten vice chief." He flung a bunch of snowballs at once at him, dropping all pretense and not masking the insult as the name of the attack.

Well, on a typical day it would be funny. Playfully ganging up on someone who didn't need any help anyway, but something about this picture didn't sit quite right with him. Like he had eaten something not entirely spoiled, but not entirely right either, a feeling of slight discomfort.

Maybe something about wording, something about the way kids called their attacks, as tango didn't need two. Before he could remember have they taken any medicine with them, and how you could pick a side without making it look like picking a side, Kondo entered the scene to save the day. 

"TOSHIII!" He darted between them and unceremoniously leaped into the path of attack. Arms outstretched like some dramatic anime heroine, to catch all the snow thrown at him." Don't worry,  I have your back!"

He started his counterattack with some icicles tossed at Sougo. "Your swordplay is excellent in more than one way!" 

Before they could question the double meaning of his words, he cast a chunk of frozen snow at Kagura with loud "Your fighting spirit is something to be envious of! " 

Lastly, he turned to Shinpachi and shouted excitedly, "You have nice glasses! "Either this or a handful of snow delivered to his face had the boy spluttering like fish. 

"Toshi," Kondo looked then to his vice-commander and put a hand on his shoulder. "I couldn't have imagined leading Shinsengumi beside someone else." 

Then,  he smiled at him brightly, and suddenly the surly samurai seemed less annoyed, and-

Well, it just made everyone uncomfortable. Read a room and follow exact instructions of a game, don't just make up your own and throw some unsolicited compliments around, gorilla! 

It was a perfect moment for Otae to appear at the door of their living quarters." Stop dicking around, the food is waiting." 

Her smile had an edge to it that had them immediately brushing off the snow and in a row to the entrance.

On the way to it, he accidentally tripped Kondo up. Oops, must be gorilla's slick-talking, he clumsily slipped on it, what a klutz.

While the poor man was getting scolded for messing around, somehow he ended up sitting beside Hijikata and opposite Kagura. The latter one immediately glared at him like he had stolen her snacks.

It was too early for that. He preferred eating them after dinner; he stared right back at her. 

"Is a look of a drenched rat popular now among Shinsengumi?" he asked no one in particular.

Kagura raised one eyebrow in a way she definitely had practiced in front of a mirror. 

He raised both.

He was going to win this glaring contest.

"Y-you don't get to talk about fashion, aberration of samurai and every look." The officer's response was immediate and uttered despise chattering teeth.

Gintoki probably had laughed at him for a long time,  until he finally would have changed his soaked clothes, but, ah, behind them was a fireplace burning with a crackling fire, so he let him be.

Just to conclude that his engagement with the game was one-sided. Kagura abruptly broke their eye contact and turned to Shinpachi, sitting next to her. She gave him a pointed look whose meaning he couldn't decipher. He didn't have time for that as the teenager looked at the policeman.

"Hijikata-san, I don't know whether you've heard, but on every long trip of Yorozuya we have a certain  ritual to recreate to ensure a good fortune ."

"In a similar way to barbarian tribes? "Shinsengumi member asked with an unreadable face, carefully picking up bite-sized meat from a grill built into the table.

Thereby stopping eyeing the kids weirdly, like looking for a lost clue, what he had been doing since the snow fight.

 Shinpachi wisely chose to ignore his slightly provocative words. You don't pick a fight with the demon vice chief twice a day, well, unless you are a prodigy sadist. Or just a sadist.

"Due to mental injuries I just got, I can't participate in it. Could  you stand in for me?"

"I choose to decline that kind offer," Hijikata answered smoothly, not missing a beat.

Gintoki unwittingly smiled under his nose. The kids had to up their game if they wanted to lure him into their shenanigans.  

Wait, what was the game again? What precisely those devil spawns were trying to do? What's up with the sudden atmosphere of intrigue and hidden motives? And prolonged staring at each other with unclear intention, was he supposed to do that too?

Well, it's not like he had any reason to objectify, Shinsengumi were free to get their feathers ruffled by anyone. 

Meanwhile, Shinpachi had the decency to look bashful. "I understand. That was disgraceful of me to ask you of such a thing in the first place," he sighed. "I just wish that we could spend this winter break peacefully, not haunted by a vengeful ghost who can't stand us enjoying a single holiday with no accident. "

Hijikata's chopsticks froze on their way to his bowl. 

"A vengeful ghost, you say?" he asked casually, slightly leaning back.

"Yes, unfortunately, Gin-san seems to attract this kind of spirits lately." Forget any decency, Patsuan apparently had balls to lie straight to their faces and make up an unrealistic story right on the spot for no reason whatsoever.

Before he could throw some rice grains at him,  or do anything, really, the boy had the audacity to lean in and wink-wink-nudge-nudge  whisper, "You know his past ."

He frickin choke on his first bite of meat in all week.

Oi, what that four-eyed brat was doing?

Did he just casually mention his past of Shiroyaha, out of nowhere and in front of Shinsengumi?   Had they ever talked about it, even? Why bringing this up now, he wondered while coughing violently that earned a passing glance of the man sitting beside him.

"Not to mention, he is such a slob who has difficulty finding his socks among a mess he had made himself.  If he had been in the Shinsengumi, he would have broken every rule, "Kagura suddenly joined the party whose theme, apparently, was bashing him.

"Twice. To make a point, "Shinpachi added helpfully.

Oi, oi, why nobody had mentioned this meeting was that for. He would have brought his notebook with self-deprecating jokes and who would feel out of place then, losers?

"Oi, brats, Gin-san is still here, have the common decency to badmouth me behind my back." He finally could apathetically start to chew a piece of meat that had tried to kill him. It tasted like revenge.

Kagura promptly ignored him. 

"We are extremely moved and grateful you want to be friends with him. You need to think about your future and what's best for you, though," she continued in a tone of worn-down mother, tired of the antics of her troublemaking son. " Maybe you need to look for another playground."

Oh, crap. That sounded quite ambiguous, didn't it? Like the kids were hinting on something they weren't supposed to know.

After all, he and the hot-blooded tax-theft had a mutual agreement not to tell anyone about their..  shared playtime. Not to jeopardize their positions or other relationships. Not for a meaningless but controversial hook-up.

Besides, talking about something pointless could give you the wrong impression that it wasn't pointless.

That was their reasoning back then, which, frankly, he had difficulties to remember now.

He very carefully avoided looking in the direction of other samurai and set for subtle glaring at the kids that probably gave him a  cross-eyed look.

"Before that, let's not forget our Yorozuya thing, the ritual. We need only some blood, one tooth, and a few mushrooms. Then we can proceed to chanting and dancing."

Did those little shits on purpose were trying to sound weird and behave like a more creepy version of themselves? And selling it as a Yorozuya thing? Without consulting him first?

He was an undeniable expert in a field known as Making-Anyone-Uncomfortable-One-Way-Or-Another, excuse-him-much. 

He would have done this with a finesse they lacked, not making him question their common sense.

The key was to focus on small details, slowly but steadily proceeding.  In the beginning, your victim will not even question your strange behavior. In the end, however, they will question themselves, their sanity and their ability to process things.

Ah, did their cunning get to him and he sounded like a gaslighting monster? That led him to another, more urgent question - was it a horror story? 

Or murder mystery one, where all started with a group of acquaintances stranded in a remote place. Some secrets and old grudges revealed with each passing day, unnoticed tension growing here and there. Where one morning they would find a dead body of someone of them, stuck to the dining table with a dull knife, all plates shattered.  That way they would need to use the plastic ones and eat separately in their rooms. Isolating each other even more and provoking the killer to go on killing rampage.

"Ah, there is no need for that. "This throwing him under the bus for no reason could not go unchallenged anymore.  He needed to cut it off right at the beginning, that wasn't the right behavior for underlings. "The Thing canceled it." 

"The thing?" Patsuan was bold enough to look puzzled.

"The Thing," he affirmed with all authority he could muster.

"Could you for a moment stop kicking each under the table, I can't spread mayonnaise evenly ." Their struggle for the upper hand was interrupted by annoyed Hijikata.

Something in his tone was apparently enough to make the sparks fly, along with their bowls. In answer to his request  Kagura kicked their table with such force, it sent flying even the built-in grill.

Such malice was a bit unusual for her, he thought while a housekeeper scolded them and threatened to throw them out into an upcoming blizzard. She never had anything against Hijikata, did she? If he remembered correctly, he was the one she would turn to in a moment of distress, shouting "Toshi" and "Help me out", while he reluctantly would ask her not call him that and did as asked.

It definitely did not merit a vicious look she had sent the officer on her way to the woodshed. There, with the help of Shinpachi, she was supposed to chop down some wood to make up for the broken plates.

Such a strange defiance, what did it remind him about? He was still pondering over it when a chocolate muffin appeared in front of him.

He looked sideways at Hijikata.

Arms crossed, the man was studying him with a blank face.

"What's their deal?" Ah, he wasn't the one to beat around the bush. At least not in some situations.

Did he really think one muffin was sufficient to make him stay to talk about things he had no intention to talk about?

The answer was yes, until the last crumb. 

It would be suspicious otherwise.

"No idea, "he mumbled between the bites.

Well, to be honest,  he had an inkling what the strange kids' behavior was about, but he needed to talk to them first. Privately.

"Is it something you would tell even if you knew what was going on?" Oh my, he was like a dog with a bone, refusing to let it go. Let it go, turn away and slam the door, stubborn mule.

"Am I really so shady in your eyes? What that says about you, vice-commander, getting involved with such a person?" he sent him a lopsided smirk.

Unfortunately, the taunt in his voice was not enough to distract the policeman hot on the trail of something suspicious. "Did you tell them about us?" he asked, frowning.

Ah, proceed with caution and the correct amount of nonchalance.

"Is there any us to talk about?" The moment he uttered it,  he cursed inwardly. Somehow it sounded a bit over the top, but, well, it wasn't a lie.

Not like not mentioning that the kids had figured out the nature of their relationship on their own was a lie per se. Hijikata just really didn't need to know that. It would raise too many questions he felt uncomfortable to answer. Or hear the other man answering them.

 As if. It was just troublesome, and he had better things to do than participate in a soap opera.

For instance, clearing snow off the winter resort, the job he had come here for. Building a snowman. Burying under it his traitorous kids in sacrifice to the mountain gods, local people surely would be grateful.

And apparently checking on Hijikata who suddenly fell silent. 

He glanced at him.

Still frowning, burning holes in the table with a glare, like it owed him some money. Or concealed a groundbreaking clue.

Don't ask him how he recognized that look, trespassing a crime scene was a crime itself,  he never had a sudden urge to take a look at people working there.

"What is it?" he found himself asking against his better judgment.

"Do you remember what they were shouting during the snow fight? I feel like they are saying something to me in a very roundabout way."

Oh, damn. 

"Oh, what, them? We are still talking about them?" he casually picked his nose." Did they say anything significant at all? Weren't they shouting "Kamehameha" and "Now dance Hijikata dance, they call you a  homewrecker, you are only happy when you are on the run", some random song lyrics? "

This still could be called a genuine question, not a lie.

He really needed to talk with the kids. He didn't want to feel guilty for something he wasn't responsible for.

Unfortunately, he didn't get a chance to go after them. He was still speaking with other samurai when he felt a heavy hand on his shoulder.  "Don't you have a job to do?" Ah, the housekeeper was breathing down his neck. His build resembled that of Saigou, owner of okama club back in Edo.

Needless to say, he felt encouraged enough to go to do what he was asked of.

When he talked to the kids a few hours later, they had already proceeded to another part of their plan.

As far as carelessly said words were concerned, there was no way to take them back.