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He trains every day.
Counter to his “normal guy” attempts.
It’s not like he’s known anything else. His parents (fake parents, but they’d adopted him when he was small, so what else does that make them?) had explained, when he was about 10, what a child soldier was, and why he’d always have a choice.
They also explained the stakes.
(They did it again at 15, and they took his word after that. Hikaru doesn’t blame them. He would never make a different choice.)
All his life was just the same cycle, and it plays in his head even now. Even when it’s in the past.
He learns secrets at home. He gets good grades in school, but not the best. Martial arts is an escape, where he can be himself.
Maybe that’s why he always liked Sakura. She was always herself, and she was always strong, and kind, and smart, and a little bit dense, but in a jock way.
He never had any problems watching her.
(He is nonetheless unsurprised when she chooses to go into medicine .
He understands, in the aftermath, just sitting there and wishing to make things better .)
Sakura had a normal family, or so she thought. She didn’t know her good dad once housed a violent demon. She didn’t know her family needed protection.
She was normal on the outside, but Hikaru never envied her.
He only wanted to protect her.
(She could protect herself. But she could also protect others, with the right push. With the right help.)
…Martial arts is still an escape.
A normal one?
Hikaru doesn’t know. He knows he has money to live on, left by his not-family.
(They were his family in every way that matters. His mother knew how to bandage cuts better than most from her time as a medic, she told him once. He’d torn a huge gash in his leg and been unable to hide his tears, and his father carried him to her.
She wasn’t an expressive or talkative woman, but she was serious and skilled and good at her job, even faking being a normal mother. He misses her
His father, too, was a closed off man, but he taught Hikaru so much of what he knows. Even if it was clear the semblance of a relationship Hikaru’s father had grown was with Karizaki Masumi, not Ujishima Kimiko.
It didn’t have to be real in the way most people thought, to be family.)
He gets tired of training. The fight is over. They won, and nearly everyone survived.
Hikaru knows he isn’t important, in the grand scheme.
A knock on his door. Hikaru blinks and opens it.
“Tamaki?” He asks. “Hana?”
“We brought food,” Tamaki says with a grin.
“Sakura couldn’t make it,” Hana says, arms crossed. “Something about studying?”
(Hana, he thinks, is someone he can understand, because she too is alone, in a way.
Tamaki , he’s sure he understands. Tamaki understands a desire to protect and a knowledge that neither of them matter .)
“That makes sense,” Hikaru says. “Wait. Why are you here?”
(He does not think about how he and Sakura have avoided each other. How he’s avoided everyone.)
“Since it’s been a couple months now,” Tamaki says. “We can leave the Bluebird base! And you haven’t visited.”
“Sorry,” Hikaru says. “I’ve been…”
“Busy?” Hana offers.
“Sure,” Hikaru replies.
“You know you have an offer there,” Tamaki says, as Hikaru leads them inside.
“I know,” Hikaru says. “I just don’t know if I should take it.”
“Something new can help,” Hana says. “When leaving a cult—”
“It wasn’t a cult—”
“They took you as a child, same as me,” Hana says. “It was good people there, I think, but Weekend was definitely still a cult.”
Hikaru blinks. He… can’t argue with that reasoning.
Tamaki sets down the food, apparently from a place he discovered shortly before Hana found him.
“I would cook,” Tamaki says. “But it’s been so busy.”
Hana nods.
“I’m glad I took the plea deal,” she says. “It does more good to fix things than sit in jail.”
“And the therapy,” Tamaki says. “That helps.”
“Does it?” Hikaru asks. “I’m not sure…”
“There’s a couple that focus on… transforming people like us,” Hana explains. “It’s really strange, thinking about how common this is.”
“It felt so isolated when we fought,” Hikaru agrees. “But I’ve met a few people related to other Riders and Sentai, over the years. They’d help Karizaki-San with things.”
Tamaki sits down, very close, next to Hikaru. Hikaru tries not to flinch, unused to any kind of physical contact not during a fight.
“Cool,” Tamaki says. “I’d say I almost envy your childhoods, but I know they were awful.”
“So was yours,” Hana says. “Before you ran away. And then…”
Tamaki looks down.
“I still made my choices,” he says.
Hikaru doesn’t ask. That’s not something he ever really learned to do.
(He only found out he had a “sister” while arranging his parents’ funerals. He wonders if putting his father with his old family was right or not.
He hopes so. He hopes they’re together.)
“ …Anyways ,” Tamaki says, instantly brightening. “This is supposed to be a nice night so let’s talk about nice things.”
“Like?”
“Uhh…”
And Hikaru can’t help it, he laughs.
“Wow,” he says. “We’re all so fucked up.”
“Yeah,” Hana says.
“Maybe a little,” Tamaki acquiesces. “Wanna watch TV?”
“Sure, I got stuff. Let’s watch Donbr*****.”
“What?”
“Remember those random hero related people I know?”
“Sure. Sounds about right, for our lives.”
Hana joins on the couch, on Tamaki’s other side, and takes his arm. Did he finally properly start dating Sakura and Hana?
Hikaru hopes so. Tamaki is nice, and sweet, and a bit clueless, but Hikaru can’t help but like and trust him.
(Tamaki is warm, and Hikaru doesn’t want to ever move from here.)
He… it’s not his place. He’s not important.
“Oh, and this is a weekly thing, now,” Tamaki says. “For the record.”
None of them are normal.
Hikaru isn’t even sure who he is.
But it’s a start.