Chapter Text
Everyone knew what soulmates were.
Someone you were destined for, a person that completed you, the missing piece to your puzzle, with all sorts of hints to guide you to that person.
It was all that and then some.
All sorts of soulmarks have appeared throughout history, from tattoos that inked themselves onto your skin to the elusive and mystical red string of fate.
For one Ren Amamiya, it’s almost like the universe was out to hand him as many soulmates as he could, from the words written across his chest that he needed a photo of to be able to read, to the wonderous works of art that appear all over his hands and arms. Only a fool couldn’t see the red string cheekily tangling and wrapping its way around his finger, or the name messily yet endearingly scrawled on his wrist.
When his parents first consulted a specialist about this strange phenomenon, they were shocked to say the least.
Then came the even bigger bomb.
“Your son most likely has a lot more soulmates than the four marks present on his body already.”
Perhaps the sheer amount of soulmates that Ren had was a stressful notion for his parents, or maybe that was the breaking point for them. Maybe they thought that Ren’s soulmates would’ve provided him with more care than they ever could. Either way, their care for him had slowly diminished over time, eventually reaching to the bare minimum they could get.
And then he was put on probation.
April 9th, 2016
“Ladies and Gentlemen, thank you for riding with us today. We will be arriving at Shibuya shortly, this is the last stop for this line. Please transfer here for all-”
Ren tuned out the voiceover that woke him from his brief nap on the train. He could see the city skyline outside the window, and what a sight it was for a silly little country boy like him. The red string around his finger was waving about, bouncing back and forth.
How did we get here?
Ah, right.
Apparently, trying to stop a drunk guy from assaulting a woman screaming for help was (apparently) a bad idea, especially when said drunkard had ties to the police and a considerable amount of power over the police. He didn’t even do anything criminal, the guy just fell over by himself and decided to blame it on something else instead of his own incompetence. Alas, one incorrect and forced testimony and unfair arrest later, Ren Amamiya was now officially branded a criminal and thrown onto probation.
Now that their kid was a horrible, terrible, no good crime child, Ren's parents had decided that they'd had enough of parenting and essentially disowned him.
In Ren's opinion, they weren't even good parents anyway. Actually, he had a new father now. Who was actually technically his guardian while he was under probation, but Ren liked to hope that they'd be a decent father figure in his life.
Back to the situation at hand, Ren found himself thinking without thoughts as the train pulled into Shibuya’s train station, overhearing two schoolgirls talk about mental shutdowns and occult things. Just girls being girls.
Now here he was, in the big city. People swarming around at every left and right, all too overwhelming in the face of Ren’s itty bitty country self. He looked down at his phone for assistance, only to find an app in the form of a big red eye glaring back at him. Now, Ren was a certified crime boy who didn’t dare hesitate in the face of danger, but malware on his phone was too dangerous for him, so into the bin it goes.
Before he can do anything however, time seems to freeze around him. The busy citizens of Tokyo slowing to a stop. Ren would’ve written this off as a minor panic attack caused by just how overwhelmingly large the city was and how indescribably small Ren felt, if not for the giant pillar of blue flame in the middle of the road morphing and changing shape into an absolutely gorgeous winged figure for just a moment, the wisps reflecting in his false glasses.
What briefly looked like a devilish smile manifested on the surface of flame, before Ren found himself back in bustling busy Tokyo again. Gods above, he probably looked like an idiot standing in the crosswalk, what was he doing again? Right, deleting some app that showed up on his phone. Into the bin it goes, he hasn’t interacted with it other than that, so his phone should be safe, right? Maybe, who knows.
Just as Ren begins to make his way around the station square to look for the line to Yongen-Jaya, punishment for standing in the middle of the street with no thoughts head empty seems to hit him like a bike. As in, a bike kind of rammed straight into him, toppling both him and the unfortunate cyclist over as Ren’s glasses seemed to fly off anime-style. At least he was lucky enough that with the physics-defying height that his glasses flew, they landed right next to his hands unbroken. A bit battered and scratched, but unbroken nonetheless.
“Sorry, my apologies, I didn’t see you there, are you hurt?”
Were those the words on his chest? Probably not, definitely not, Ren remembers those words as something other than a generic apology.
“No, it’s alright…”
Returning the glasses to their rightful position on his face, Ren turned to his unintentional assailant and possible murderer had that bike hit him in some other way. They were busy offering him a gloved hand up, to which Ren quickly took. After dusting off his clothes from whatever dirt what on the ground, Ren met face to face with the cyclist that had run into him and -Oh no, he’s hot .
Say that the individual that had crashed into him was a young man with brown locks (shaggy locks, but he’d rather keep that adjective locked away in his head), red eyes and a gorgeous face, Ren can totally definitely forgive him for accidentally being rammed into with his bike. No, Ren would be the one apologising for getting in the way of his bike, having him apologise and even daring to breathe the same air as him. Pretty privilege is definitely a thing and Ren is not ashamed of being a prime example of showing it.
“I should be sorry for uh, standing in the middle of the street like an idiot. Sorry, I-uh. Is your bike okay?”
“The bike is fine, are you sure you’re not-”
“Oh, haha, look at that-I should, really get going-”
Cutting off both himself and that really hot stranger, Ren decided now would be the time to disappear into the crowd like a background mob character. He’ll figure out how to get to Yongen-Jaya later, right now he’s going to do his hardest to disappear within the shadows of the crowd. He’s had enough of being a horrific embarrassment to his name.
Paint and colour returns to his palms as he maneuvers his way around the train lines of Tokyo. Despite only being little splotches, they don’t fail to cheer Ren up with their vibrant hues. He pulls out a pen as he snags a seat, having finally, hopefully, figured out the route to Yongen-Jaya. With quick handiwork, he writes a little something on the back of his hand.
‘Working on something?’
The reply comes just as quickly, with elegant handwriting and rich ink.
‘For sensei.’
Ren absolutely could not keep the smile from creeping onto his face, his artistic soulmate may be eccentric at most times but their devotion to their craft and respect for their sensei made them so endearing. They haven’t shared names with each other, preferring to let fate decide when they’d eventually meet, but they know so much about each other. In fact, they were perhaps the only other person that knew Ren was on probation other than the parties involved.
‘I’ll leave you to it, I hope your sensei likes it.’
Come to think of it, Ren’s soulmate tends to make a lot of art for their sensei. He shrugs it off, their sensei mentors them in art so its probably assignments or however art mentorship works.
Suddenly the train speakers blare out the- “Yongen-Jaya, this station is-” and suddenly Ren realises that he needs to get off the damn train and head to the address provided for him in the backstreets of Yongen-Jaya. Starting today, his guardian, one Sojiro Sakura, will be taking parental responsibility for him for the year that he’s on probation. So, like a good little crime boy, Ren navigates over to the Sakura residence…while exploring the backstreets of course.
It is not easy to get lost in such a small place, but boy does Ren like to push limits, he swears he passes by that exact same clinic three whole times before finding the residence with the nameplate reading Sakura . He rings the doorbell, only to get no answer. He’s half tempted to ring the bell again when a friendly neighbourhood parcel deliveryman shows up and explains that this Sojiro Sakura is busy at his cafe during these hours.
And ‘cafe’ makes Ren perk up almost immediately, his caretaker runs a cafe ? That’s like, half of his dream come true.
Leblanc , that cafe, was located in the back alley. No, Ren absolutely did not make a wrong turn at the supermarket and passed the clinic again before finally managing to make his way here. It’s a quaint little place, and Ren takes a moment to take it all in (petting the ginger cat sitting on a stand in front of the cafe) before walking inside. Leblanc, coffee & curry . Sojiro is doing gods’ work.
The little bell jingles as Ren walks inside, immediately hit with the mouthwatering scent of curry and the tantalising air of coffee. He’s met with a man in a dusty pink shirt hunched over on his seat, staring at what looks to be a crossword puzzle as the TV in one corner starts to speak about accidents within public transport, with an elderly couple talking about the situation. Behind the counter were shelves, shelves full of beans . Different variants of coffee beans, sweet lords above, Sojiro is doing gods’ work.
“And down is…the name of a shellfish used in pearl farming…”
“Oysters, sir.”
Whoops, Ren couldn’t help that one. But that comment grabs the man’s attention and he makes a nod of acknowledgement. Ah, so this was Sojiro Sakura.
“Oh, right. They did say it was today.”
The couple stands up to leave as Sojiro puts away the crossword, as they do, Ren could hear Sojiro mumble something about “-four hours for just a single cup of joe…” before focusing his attention back onto Ren. In response, Ren takes a stand to greet his guardian.
“Please take care of me.”
Sojiro nods. So far, so good.
“You’ll be in my care over the next year. I was wondering what kind of unruly kid would show up, but you’re the one, huh? Four soulmates with more on the way, heh.”
Sojiro turns around and gestures for Ren to follow him. There is an upstairs to Leblanc, a messy, dusty attic, and then Sojiro informs him that it will be his room . This means that Ren gets to wake up to the scent of delicious coffee and curry every single day. He sees no downsides to this.
“I’ll get you sheets for your bed…You look like you want to say something.”
“I see this as an absolute win.”
That gets a chuckle out of Sojiro before going back to being serious, informing Ren of his duty with cleaning up the rest of the attic, not to get into any more trouble, the likes.
“I got the gist of the situation. You protected some woman from a man forcing himself on her, he got injured, then sued you, right?” Sojiro lets out a sigh, “That’s what you get for sticking your nose in a matter between two adults, you did injure him, yeah?” Ren shakes his head, but he knows better not to interrupt.
“And now that you’ve got a criminal record, you were expelled, disowned, and the courts ordered you to transfer and move out here.”
Sojiro goes on to brief Ren about what he should be doing, keeping himself in check and behaving himself. Juvie gets brought up for a hot second, until it isn’t and suddenly Ren finds himself hearing about the highschool that would be taking him in. Shujin Academy, and surprise, they’ll be heading over to said Shujin Academy for a quick briefing on classes and introductions. With that, Sojiro leaves Ren on his own devices for the rest of the afternoon.
The afternoon in which he spends cleaning.
Sojiro pops back in quickly to compliment him on his hard work, and Ren spends the rest of his evening playing with his red string. In another universe, he’d think back on that fateful night where he stopped an assault. But here, Ren feels his phone buzz and is met with the same red eye that he swore he deleted just this morning. Was that the malware? Is it just going to reappear even if he deletes it? Ren doesn’t know, but tonight, he’s going to sleep.
…
He wakes up in a jail cell.