Chapter Text
Chifuyu’s announcement about his partial blindness had worried Takemichi. In retrospect, he should have known that something was off about Chifuyu. Looking back, Takemichi could now see the times that Chifuyu would always keep him on the right during a fight. He could see the times that Chifuyu would startle ever so slightly when people approached him on that side.
“You’re staring again,” Chifuyu sighed.
“S-sorry,” Takemich bit his lip.
Chifuyu was right. He had been staring again. Call it morbid fascination or guilt, but Takemichi couldn’t help but look at Chifuyu’s blind eye. Right now, that eye looked particularly leached of color in the midday sunlight.
“Sorry,” Takemichi apologized once more.
“It’s fine. It just makes me feel uncomfortable,” Chifuyu shrugged.
“Right. Sorry,” Takemichi looked down at his hands.
They were hanging out on the shrine steps, waiting for a few other friends from Toman to arrive. They were supposed to hang out for the afternoon. As it turned out, everyone else was running a bit late, but that didn’t worry Takemichi too much.
He leaned back on the step, enjoying the sunshine. It was a wonderful day.
“You look like a cat,” Chifuyu laughed.
“I feel like one,” Takemichi sighed happily.
He didn’t get a chance to enjoy his new found comfort for long.
“Oi! What are you shitheads doing here?” Chifuyu barked.
Takemichi opened his eyes in surprise. Chifuyu seldom used a tone like that. Coming up the steps was a group of rough looking, older teens.
“Who are they?” Takemichi breathed.
“Scythe,” Chifuyu said grimly, “It's a gang mostly made up of violent ex-juvie inmates. Mikey ran them off a few years back. I haven’t seen them since.”
“What do you think they want?” Takemichi swallowed nervously.
“I don’t know, but something tells me they aren’t here for a friendly chat,” Chifuyu muttered, quickly arranging himself so that Takemichi was on his blind side.
“Toman grunts,” one of the older teens snorted, “Where’s your commander?”
“Around,” Chifuyu kept the answer vague.
“Around as in he’s not the commander or around as in he’s hiding somewhere?”
“Around as in he’s not here at the moment but he will show up,” Chifuyu shrugged.
“We’ll wait and see him,” the leader spat.
It sounded like he was looking for a fight. That was something that Takemichi wanted to avoid if possible, not because he feared that Toman would lose but because he didn’t want it to interrupt the plans that the group already had.
“We can deliver a message, if you want,” Takemichi offered.
The opposing gang members sized him up. Takemichi was more than a bit grateful that Chifuyu was at his side, glaring at the older teens.
“You know what. That sounds wonderful,” the leader shrugged.
Takemichi had no time to prepare himself for the sucker punch to the gut. He doubled over wheezing.
“You tell Mikey that Scythe is ready for a re-match. If he refuses, well…. he’ll just need to look at the state of your bodies,” the older teen sneered.
With that, a brawl broke out. Takemichi did his best, but he wasn’t particularly very good at fighting multiple opponents at once. Sooner than he would have liked, Takemichi found himself all but surrounded.
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw one of the larger delinquents set his sights on Chifuyu. Takemichi’s blood ran cold when he realized the other teen was approaching on Chifuyu’s blind side. Chifuyu didn’t see the punch coming. It struck him hard in the temple and he went down. Once he was on the ground with his blind side facing up, he had no way to protect himself from being ruthlessly pummeled.
It was around this time that Takemichi went down as well. The beating seemed to go on forever. Takemichi felt at least one of his ribs give and he was fairly certain that he had broken his wrist. Finally, the gang seemed to have their fill. The group left Chifuyu and Takemichi laying bloodied on the ground. After they were alone, Takemichi staggered over to his friend. Chifuyu’s face was swollen and bloody. Takemichi wasn’t sure if he was conscious or not.
“Chiufyu?” Takemichi felt like he was choking on his words.
At the sound of his name, Chifuyu slowly began furrowing his brow. After a minute, his eyes somewhat cracked open. He looked dazed and disoriented.
“Chifuyu?” Takemichi tried again.
“Mi….tchy…” Chifuyu groaned.
“Yeah. I’m here. Are you alright?” Takemichi knew it was a stupid question, but he just wanted Chifuyu to answer him.
Chifuyu grumbled something incoherent.
“What was that?” Takemichi tried to ignore the fear that was swirling in the back of his mind.
Chifuyu didn’t answer. He just blinked sluggishly.
“Hey, no. You need to answer,” Takemichi cried frantically, cradling his injured arm to his chest.
Takemichi wasn’t sure what to do. His phone had been smashed during the fight so he had no way to call for help. He also didn’t want to leave Chifuyu laying in the dust alone. He almost started crying in relief when the other members of Toman came into view.
“Takemitchy? Chifuyu?” Mikey frowned as he took in the sorry state of the two younger teens, “What happened?”
Nearly stumbling over his words, Takemichi explained what had happened with the other gang.
“I’ll kill them,” Mikey growled.
Kazutora nodded in agreement while Baji cracked his knuckles. They had joined the group during Takemichi’s story and both were clearly angry about what had happened.
“We’ll help with that, but it has to be later. We should move them inside,” Draken jerked a chin at Takemichi and Chifuyu, “Can you walk, Takemichi?”
“I… I think so?” Takemichi nodded.
He staggered to his feet. He was more than a little unsteady so Kazutora put an arm around his shoulder to help support him.
“Good. Mitsuya, Baji, help me,” Draken nodded at his friend.
With Mitsuya and Baji’s help, Draken got Chifuyu onto his back. Chifuyu didn’t protest at all. It was a testament to how disoriented he was. In fact, Chifuyu didn’t seem to register that he was being moved at all. He just remained a limp weight on Draken’s back, his eyes only half-open. Takemichi spent all the time that he wasn’t stumbling over his own two feet worrying about Chifuyu’s condition.