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Jyushi looked out the hotel room window at the falling snow.
"Ugh," Kuko spat, standing next to Jyushi and looking at the same (admittedly pretty) sight. "It looks so fucking cold out. Maybe I should call Ichiro and move our practice session somewhere other than the park."
All of Bad Ass Temple had come to Tokyo together. Hitoya had come for work, and he was going to go on his own, but as soon as Kuko heard the word "Ikebukuro"… It became a team event. Hitoya got wrangled into getting another room at the hotel he was at, complaining the entire time but never actually saying no. And then Kuko got in touch with Ichiro, too, and scheduled a meetup at the park for both teams. Jyushi didn't have much say in the matter. Kuko was usually right about training-type stuff, though, wasn't he? …Wasn't he?
"I told you it was too damn cold for your dumb games," Hitoya said. "The weather report's predicting record snowfall."
Kuko scoffed. "No, nevermind. Adversity fortifies the spirit. Get your jackets on and let's go."
And then he turned around to get ready. Kuko couldn't stand Hitoya being right.
Hitoya's meetings weren't until later in the day, so he didn't have an excuse not to come. The three of them set out for the park. The snow was piling up on the grass when they got there. Now where were the Yamadas…? Were they not here yet, or…
"Ichiro!" Kuko shouted. Oh, he'd spotted him.
Kuko marched right over to him. Ichiro was kneeling behind a bench. What was he doing that for? "Oh, uh, hey! Kuko!"
"Get ready to get destroyed by my new team, Ichiro! Once your little brothers get over here, we'll wreck your shit!"
Ichiro was barely paying attention. He watched Kuko inbetween stolen glances over the rim of the bench. "Th-that's great, but, uh, you really might want to get—"
"This might be a practice match, but there's no way we're going easy on you!" Kuko continued, oblivious to Ichiro's concern. "We're gonna—"
Thwack!
A snowball hit Kuko on the shoulder.
"…Might want to get down…" Ichiro finished. "You got here right in the middle of a snowball fight. Sorry, I'll get my brothers to stop and we can—"
"No," Kuko stopped him, eerily collected. "There's no need for that." He brushed the snow off himself. He took a deep breath.
Everyone waited for the other shoe to drop.
"Because this means war!!" Kuko shouted. "You hear that, whoever just hit me!? You won't be able to get in any more of those cowardly sneak attacks! I'll fucking destroy you!" He dropped down next to Ichiro and started making snowballs like his life depended on it. He called behind his shoulder at his teammates, "Well, what're you two waiting for? Go find the other brothers and introduce yourselves! This is a team thing now! The form our practice session is taking has changed!"
So Kuko had decided they were having a snowball fight…? "Okay!" Jyushi said. Because if this was what they were doing for practice, then he'd put his all into it!
Hitoya sighed and wandered away.
Jyushi was pretty sure he'd seen what direction the snowball that'd hit Kuko had come from, so he went that way. He hadn't met the Yamada brothers before, so he wasn't sure what they looked like, but… Oh, there, there was a guy squatting behind a bush packing a snowball. That had to be one of them.
Jyushi took a deep breath and introduced himself. "Greetings, mortal. You may not know me, but I am an agent of darkness, come to ally myself to you on this frostfall battleground. You may call me Jyushi Aimono, twilight raven of Nagoya Division."
The guy just… stared.
Jyushi tried not to be self-conscious.
Eventually, he exclaimed, "Oh! You mean you wanna like, join in the snowball fight? Awesome! Get in here!" He scooted aside and let Jyushi lean down behind the hedge with him. "I'm Jiro! Sorry for staring, I just thought I recognized you from somewhere… You're not in a band or anything, are you?"
With a flourish, Jyushi said, "That I am. For I am the vocalist of that dark coven of musicbringers, the Argo ξ Orchestra."
Jiro lit up. " That's where I know you from! One of my friends loves you guys! I always thought you were totally cool, woah!"
"M-me…? Cool…?" Jyushi muttered, the praise making him go kind of mushy before he caught himself and covered it up with a deep chuckle. "That's only the natural reaction to my overwhelming stage presence. You may ask for an autograph later… For now, the task at hand." He gestured over the bushes, where Kuko and the others were probably waiting for them to get in on the battle.
"Right, right, yeah. Snowball fight first." Jiro nodded. "Check this out. I picked the best hideout." He pointed at the bush. "You can see through it, so you don't even need to put yourself in danger to get hits in."
Jyushi joined him in looking through the branches.
He… couldn't see anything. Like, maybe if he squinted, and moved his head just so, he could kind of almost make out the silhouette of the bench Ichiro was behind, but… "Are you really sure this, um—" He cleared his throat— "Perhaps for the best view, it may be necessary to extend our view to the horizon…"
"No, no, it totally works. I hit my bro smack in the shoulder right before you came over."
Ah. Jyushi didn't even know how to phrase it, so he dropped his dramatic voice and just said, "Uh, that wasn't Ichiro, though, that was Kuko. He was standing next to him."
Jiro's eyes widened. "F-for real!? Jeez, I'm sorry! I was wondering why Ichiro was so short all of a sudden!"
"He kinda deserves to get hit with a snowball once in a while, so it's alright…" Jyushi mumbled.
Their conversation was interrupted by Kuko grandstanding again, shouting loud enough that everyone in the park would be able to hear him. "Well come the hell on, everyone! Are we doing this or aren't we!? Cowards! Show yourselves!"
Jiro and Jyushi peeked over the hedge just in time to see Kuko get hit right in the face. He fell back behind the bench with an indignant shout.
Jyushi looked at the source of the snowball just in time to see Hitoya duck back behind a tree.
They ducked back down. "He's right," Jiro said. "We should get on this!"
Remembering how he saw Kuko making a pile of snowballs earlier, Jyushi suggested, "How about we make a stockpile and go for an all-out attack?"
Jiro nodded. "I like your thinking!"
They both started making snowballs, pulling snow in from anywhere they could reach and piling the finished products up between them. Jiro was way faster at this than Jyushi was…
Probably because Jyushi hadn't brought gloves. He didn't think they'd be having a snowball fight! He thought they'd just be rapping… He didn't want to let everyone down, but his hands were getting cold.
"Oh, no!" Jiro said. "Your hands are all red. Are you alright?"
"U-um, I'm fine…"
"You don't look fine… Here." Jiro took his gloves off and handed them to Jyushi. "I've been wearing them the whole time, so you can borrow them for a bit and warm up, alright?"
Jyushi thanked him and put the gloves on.
And then Jiro took his hands in his own.
"My hands are warm… I'll warm you up a bit. We've gotta win this thing, after all!" He smiled at Jyushi, holding his hands tight. He was right, his grip really was warm, even though the gloves…
Jyushi could feel his face heating up, too. Holding hands like this… was kind of embarrassing. He avoided Jiro's gaze.
"H-huh? What's… O-oh, yeah, I guess this is kinda close for us just having met, huh…" Jiro took his hands away and got back to making snowballs. Jyushi felt colder as soon as he let go.
But okay! He had snowballs to make! They finished up their stockpile, using up all the snow they could grab without getting too far out of the safe zone of their little hideout. Well, not quite—Jiro did go out of the safe zone once, and was pelted with snowballs by Ichiro and Kuko until he ducked back behind the bush, screaming. That incident aside, they were ready now. Ichiro and Kuko had doubtless been doing the same thing while they waited on everyone else. But, ah—one more thing before they started.
"You can have your gloves back," Jyushi said to Jiro, handing them to him.
Jiro only took one. "But you'll get cold again, right? You need a snowball-throwing hand! We can share."
"Are you left-handed…?"
"I'll wear it backwards." Which seemed to work alright, actually. Now they were ready for the battle.
Jiro leapt up, snowball in hand, and was immediately hit in the face.
Hitoya was smirking from the cover of his tree. The youngest Yamada brother, behind him, pumped his fist.
Jiro shook the hit off and staggered back up. Jyushi joined him this time, and they faced across the park at Ichiro and Kuko's bench. Ichiro and Kuko met their challenge with arms full of snowballs.
No one was spared from the onslaught.
Except Hitoya and Saburo, who miraculously managed to not be hit a single time. Jyushi swore he felt some snowballs come from their direction, though!?
Jyushi focused mostly on Kuko, trying to see if he could get as good a hit on him as Hitoya had at the beginning—right in the face. He couldn't quite do it, but he got his chest and grazed his hair a few times. He had to admit… it felt pretty good to chuck these things at him. He aimed at Ichiro, too! If Jiro had gotten to throw one at Kuko right at the start, then Jyushi was going to go for his leader!
And Jyushi took some hits, too. …A lot of hits. He wasn't exactly a small target. When it was from Ichiro, it was fine, but when Kuko was the one throwing? Why did he pack those things so hard!? That hurt!
When Jyushi and Jiro finally ran out of snowballs, both of them were covered in snow. And it was starting to melt and get down into his jacket boots.
Once the fun wore off, he was just plain cold.
Jiro looked about the same. Ichiro and Kuko, though, had no intention of stopping.
"We may have to surrender…" Jyushi said.
"Y-yeah… That's my bro for you, he just can't be beat…"
They came out from behind the bush with their hands up. Kuko threw one more snowball at Jiro before Ichiro stopped him.
Kuko cackled. "Couldn't stand up to me after all, huh!? That's what you get!" He gloated. They all came together in the center of the park. "Where the hell's Hitoya…"
On closer inspection, Kuko and Ichiro weren't any better off than Jyushi and Jiro were. Actually, they looked even worse. Their clothes were practically soaked through with melted snow. Were they even retaining any heat at this point? Kuko's cheeks were beet red, but his brow was still sweaty with exertion. Jyushi and Jiro hadn't hit them that much, had they…?
"Woah, bro! What happened back there?" Jiro said, voicing Jyushi's concern, too. "You guys look wrecked."
Hitoya spoke up, coming out from his hiding spot with Saburo. "They were fighting each other more than they were fighting you."
"How would you know!" Kuko spat, his face somehow getting even redder.
Saburo held up his phone. "I hacked into the traffic cameras just outside the park so that we could see behind you and tell when you were going to come out of hiding."
Hitoya nodded along. Both he and Saburo wore the exact same smirk. "Work smarter, not harder. With his timing and my arm, our accuracy was 100%."
Ichiro looked almost bashful. "So me and Kuko shoving snow in each others' faces was caught on tape, huh…"
"Don't worry, Ichiro!" Saburo said, smirk replaced by a bright little smile and a cheery tone. He tapped something on his phone. "I just corrupted the footage. Nobody will ever see!"
"Cheaters aside," Kuko said, "I'm fucking cold. Let's go get something to eat!"
Everyone brightened up. "I know a great cafe just over this way!" Ichiro said, taking the lead.
"They better have good coffee," Hitoya grumbled.
Jyushi and Jiro walked together at the back of the group. He still had one of Jiro's gloves… His bare hand was cold, so Jiro's must've been, too. There was only really one way around that, wasn't there…? "Um, Jiro… My hands are a bit cold again."
"Oh? D'you want the other glove? Since we're gonna be at the cafe soon, I don't mind—"
"Maybe, um—" Jyushi held out his hand—"you'd be able to warm me up again…?"
"O-oh." Jiro's cheeks flushed, and it wasn't from the cold. "Yeah, uh." He cleared his throat. "I'd better help you with that."
They held hands for the rest of the walk.