Work Text:
Hitoshi hasn’t really thought much about the countdown on his wrist. He doesn’t try to hide it or anything, but he doesn’t treat it like the sacred text a lot of his peers do. He doesn’t whisper about how much time he has left with bated breath and barely contained excitement. In truth, soulmates in general are far from his mind. Hitoshi has a plan, it’s not full proof but it’s all he wants. Go to graduate school, graduate with honors, and become the best marine biologist there is. His soulmate is the last thought in his mind.
Well, they were, until the countdown on his wrist went from 14:07:02:23:46:25 to 00:00:00:00:43:04 in the brief moment it took him to sneeze embarrassingly loud during class. It had caused him to choke into a coughing fit that got him kicked out. After that he had watched the forty-three minutes quickly drop to twenty.
Now here he is, standing by the bus stop, staring mindlessly as the clock slowly shifts from ten minutes to nine. Hitoshi can’t tell what he’s feeling, but there’s a bubbling beneath his skin he never felt before, not even when he received his acceptance letter to the college of his dreams. It feels like the hum of electricity or the buzz of too much coffee and staying up late at night, but never running out of energy.
He never thought about soulmates that much, but now as he stares at the clock slide to eight then seven minutes, he wishes he had considered it before. It’s universally unanimous that soulmates are two halves of a whole soul, no one is complete without them. However, Hitoshi has no interest in dating at the moment, not even his soulmate. He has his studies and his part time job at the aquarium. Hitoshi doesn’t have time for a soulmate.
The bus stops in front of him, the hissing sound of the door opening drawing his attention up. People start climbing in.
Hitoshi takes a deep breath. His dorm is a ten minute walk, but he can get there in five by bus. Somehow, someway, he knows that if he takes the bus, his watch will go back up to fourteen years. It’s probably better that way.
Yet.
Yet, he thinks of his adopted father, with his tired eyes glaring balefully at his paperwork only to soften considerably when his soulmate presses a coffee mug into his hands. The ease in which they walk around each other, with a hand on their back or a nudge of an arm, a support system so unique to them that no one else can copy it.
The bus slides shut and leaves Hitoshi behind. As he starts walking, the clock shifts from six to three minutes and the electricity in his nerves heightens, fingers tingling. Hitoshi is tense with a mixture of uncertainty and anticipation and even the rare gust of cool summer breeze can’t calm his nerves.
He very carefully doesn’t look at the countdown, but the more he ignores it the more he’s aware of it branded on his skin. He never noticed before, but he can feel the countdown tick down like tiny vibrations on his skin.
Droplets of rain hit the bridge of his nose, enough to startle him. Hitoshi glances up to watch the dark clouds loom over him, warm rain falling around him. It feels good on his skin, rain always makes him want to curl up under his blanket and nap.
He supposes it might be considered romantic to meet your soulmate in the rain, but really Hitoshi just feels sleepy. He glances at his countdown, the thirty second mark making his breath freeze.
His feet start slowing down without permission at twenty seconds, his clothes quickly being soaked, pressing into his skin. Through the rain, he hears commotion coming from around him.
:15
“HEY STOP!”
Hitoshi freezes on instinct, but he’s pretty sure the yell isn’t for him. There’s a crashing sound, quickly followed by a quick and hasty, “SORRY!!”
:10
He turns around, watching a trail of disaster from across the street. A raindrop falls into his eye and his vision blurs. He catches a glimpse of police officers chasing someone before he makes a noise of annoyance and rubs his eyes.
:07
“I SAID STOP!”
Crime isn’t unusual on campus, but watching the cops chase after someone is. Hitoshi doesn’t exactly care, as long as he doesn’t get involved in the mess and no one gets hurt. Still, he glances back over again, curiosity officially piqued.
:05
He doesn’t expect the person to veer off the sidewalk and cross the street, causing a car to break harshly.
:04
“HEY WATCH WHERE YOU’RE GOING YOU IDIOT!”
“SORRY!”
:03
Hitoshi blinks, he can see a glint of golden hair. The person is hunched over slightly, as if they’re holding something close to them.
:02
What he does notice, somewhat belatedly but full of alarm, is that the person is heading straight towards him at full speed, with security guards still trailing after them.
:01
Oh shit.
The full weight of a human body crashes into him, knocking him down hard enough that air is forcibly ejected out of his lungs. The person on top of him releases a groan, hand placed besides Hitoshi’s head to lift himself up. Hitoshi’s eyes meet with bright gold, almost glowing around the torrent of rain. Dark gold hair sticks to his forehead, water sliding down his cheek. Out of the corner of his eye, he can see the clock on the other’s wrist shift down to zero.
He doesn’t have to look at his own wrist to see the same thing.
For a split second, they just stare at each other. Hitoshi isn’t sure what the expression on his own face is, but it must be something similar to the wide eyed, shocked and dazed look on the other’s face.
His soulmate’s face.
His soulmate blinks slowly, but the dazed look quickly clears as those pretty golden eyes slide down his face, mouth curling into a lighthearted smirk that has Hitoshi’s heart skittering in his chest.
“Hey,” he purrs, voice like the electric feel in his skin, “you come here often?”
“What?” is the only thing Hitoshi can say, brain still lagging behind slightly. Before the blonde can respond, Hitoshi feels something shifting on his chest, this time he’s pretty sure it isn’t his heart, and all he hears is a muffled mrr ? before the head of a kitten pokes through the neck of the blonde’s shirt.
What.
“THERE HE IS!” Rapid oncoming footsteps thunder against the cement, just barely jarring Hitoshi’s attention back from the cat and the collarbone peeking out behind it. He looks up in time to see panic flash through his soulmate’s eyes before he’s pushing himself up, hand grabbing Hitoshi’s arm to drag him up with him.
“ Run,” he hisses, then starts running before Hitoshi could respond, dragging him along with him.
It takes two seconds for Hitoshi to decide fuck it and shift so that he grabs the other’s hand instead, speeding up as he begins to lead. His soulmate gives out a yelp, stumbling a bit before following along. He yanks the other towards a small alley between a coffee shop and a used bookstore, quickly sliding around the dumpsters. He often uses it whenever he overslept and can’t wait for the bus, which happens every other day, maybe twice that on exams week. On the other side is the astronomy building and Hitoshi’s dorm is on the other side of that. They keep running until they burst through the astronomy building. Hitoshi drags him to an unused classroom that’s never locked. He often goes there to take a nap before going to class.
There’s a beat of silence, the classroom filled with the sound of heavy breathing, then a loud, sharp wheeze pierces the air.
“Oh my god,” the blonde beside him cackles, hunching over, “that was amazing.”
He looks at Hitoshi with a wide grin and Hitoshi takes a step back out of pure self preservation instinct, like looking away from the sun when it shines right on him. Except he can’t possibly look away from this.
“Oh!” The blonde exclaims, then lifts his shirt up. Hitoshi chokes on his breath.
“What-”
“I’m so sorry, Mr. Teetles,” he coos, lifting the kitten up to cuddle against his chest, “but we’re safe from those scary people now, this sexy hero saved us.” The cat responds with a small mew.
Hitoshi has multiple questions.
“Mr. Teetles?” Hitoshi asks dumbly, instead of the important questions like why were you running from the cops or did you realize I’m your soulmate or you think I’m sexy? The other looks back at him, eyes still bright and glowing and it warms the lingering chill of the rain.
“Yeah!” He beams, holding up the cat- Mr. Teetles- proudly. The cat blinks at him and Hitoshi blinks back, “isn’t he cute?”
“Mrr?”
“Incredibly,” Hitoshi deadpans, as if his heart isn’t actually melting past his ribs at the moment. The cat isn’t the only thing that’s cute and usually Hitoshi finds it hard to look away from cute kittens, but his soulmate’s smile might be an exception.
“Right? I’m Kaminari, Kaminari Denki,” Kaminari wiggles his brows, “you can call me Denki, but I would prefer if you called me babe,” he winks. Hitoshi is too stunned to react when he slides over to him, pressing against his side while still holding on to Mr. Teetles.
“You’re my soulmate, right?” Well that answers one of his questions. Denki looks at him up and down in the same manner he did before when he just scanned his face, letting out a completely awed, “holy shit, dude, I hit the jackpot.”
“What?” Hitoshi wants to slap himself for his inability to respond correctly, but Denki just laughs. A light flush appears on the blonde’s cheek and Hitoshi watches it with a warmth pulsing in his chest and in his own cheeks.
“I mean, you’re like, impossibly hot. Like I could cook breakfast on you, a nice big breakfast, then maybe lic-”
“Hitoshi,” he blurts out. He doesn’t trust his heart to take whatever Denki was going to say, and he has a feeling he knows exactly what his soulmate was going to say, “Shinsou Hitoshi.”
“Hitoshi,” Denki says his name as if he’s taste testing it and finding it savory. The sound of it makes adrenaline pump in his blood and he’s distinctly aware of how warm Denki is pressed against his side, “I like it! Damn, maybe I should run from the cops more often.”
“Please don’t.”
His soulmate laughs again and the sound is bright and infectious, much like everything Denki does.
“You’re right, I just needed to do it once,” he turns to him and beams, eyes closed from the force of it, “I only get one of you, after all.”
Hitoshi thinks of his adopted parents, the way they walk around each other, the ease in every touch they share. He thinks of how easy it was to grab Denki’s hand, how comfortable it feels to have him by his side, how his smile and his laugh makes Hitoshi want to respond likewise.
He’ll have to send the cops a bouquet of flowers some day.
“What were you running from the cops for?” Hitoshi asks. Denki gives him a mischievous grin and winks.
“That’s a secret, one I will gladly share over dinner tonight.”
Hitoshi gives out a small sound of amusement, mouth curling up into a warm smile.
“It’s a date, then.”
He can live with that.