Chapter Text
Sara’s bed was already rolled up when dawn cracked open the sky. When her goddess asked something of her, the general never dallied. Bow in hand, sword on her hip, the Kujou’s honorary third wheel aimed to please the Raiden Shogun’s desire. The mission was supposed to be an easy one, she would ride at dawn, to retrieve an electro artefact which couldn’t possibly be corrupted by the Tatarigami. Easy. And with a few of the shogunate’s soldiers, she should be back in two days, at worst.
The sun shone on Sara’s helmet as she climbed on her horse. One hack, and she was gone, her fate nested in the Shogun’s ever so powerful hands.
***
“Please tell me again you want us to go and save Kujou Sara who, for all we know is out in the wild?”
It was a sunny morning in Hanamizaka, and Itto was up unusually early. The one at fault for this, other than a distraught circadian rhythm, was none other than Kuki Shinobu. Sitting on a chair, across the oni’s breakfast table, the Arataki Gang’s best and only second in command sipped tea from a porcelain cup. She looked very much anxious about her friend’s whereabouts, considering that she left five days ago.
“I just want to find her, I never asked you to help me ” said Shinobu.
“I can’t let you go out in who knows where like that!” Itto said, after swallowing a spoon of rice. “If Sara’s not back, do you think you could just go in easy peasy lemon-squeezy and save her?”
Shinobu looked at the cup in her hand. Its green enamel designs of flowers were brittling on the outside.
“Maybe you’re right…for once”
Itto did not exactly want to go. The few times he tried to be friendly towards Sara after getting his vision back, she’d meet his invitations and other extended hands with contempt and harshness. The oni thought she hated him - which he found was particularly rich coming from the woman who took his vision from his weak hands after defeating him - and in return had started to be wary of her, abandoning all plans to become friends. A real shame if you asked him, he’d wish for someone as strong as her for a sparring partner. But Shinobu came up to his door first thing in the morning, anguished to the point that her tone reflected what she was feeling… that he couldn’t let that happen. Arataki Itto always made sure that the people he cared about were safe and sound. And archons, did he care for Shinobu.
His best friend going, without him, to retrieve Inazuma’s best general who could be severely in danger, which could then put said best friend in danger, without him - again? That is a no-no. A negative no-no if he did say so himself.
“Do you have any idea of where she could have gone?” He asked, putting his hair up.
“If I’m not misled by her soldiers, she went to Yashiori Island, to retrieve some sort of artefact.”
“Ok, so Tatarigami territory, that’s a rough start.”
“Yes. We will have to exercise utmost caution. I think we should pack for maybe three days or so, and tell the gang that if we’re not back by then…”
“We’re as good as dead.” He said, grimly.
“No, that they should come with reinforcements. What? Do you think we’ll die?”
Itto furrowed his brow. They were too young to die, right?
“Naaaah, I don’t think so. You got me, and has there ever been a time where we were in danger together? I don’t think so!”
Yes, countless times.
Shinobu sighed. Itto was well intentioned, and he offered to help. Plus his physique and raw strength would help a lot. She couldn’t in her right mind refuse the oni’s help, despite the chaos that he would bring… and of course, he would come anyway. Finishing up his breakfast, the very tall young man rose from his chair, grabbing the kitchenware to wash it.
“You should go and get your bag”, he said to Shinobu, cleaning his bowl. “I’ll take care of the snacks and other stuff, you could get uh…. I don’t know, medicine? And maybe flares? What else…”
“I already packed my bag, I am just waiting for you now”
Itto lifted his head from his cleanup, to look back at Shinobu. He looks at her with an expression that she can’t quite decipher on the oni’s face.
“I should hurry up then” he says.
“You don’t have to do this, don’t put yourself in harm’s way for someone you don’t appreciate, Itto.”
It was rare that Shinobu used his name rather than to call him “Boss”. Usually he’d ask her to use the honorifics, but maybe was it their proximity at that moment, or the situation altogether. Though it would have been foolish to consider that their relationship was purely and only professional. Itto considered her as a best friend, and Shinobu as a friend - which was a start. Shinobu also knew that Itto was very bitter of Kujou Sara’s attitude towards him, which he sometimes interpreted as thinly veiled racism, something he had grown accustomed to in Inazuma. Of course, the former shrine maiden knew this was not the case and that Sara, despite the respect she had for Itto, found him particularly annoying. Maybe it would have been different if both gave the other a chance.
“Look, I do this for you. I don’t want you to get injured…or worse.”
Shinobu crossed her arms, a half smile on her face hidden behind her mask. Itto’s a good guy. A reckless and impulsive-to-the-point-that-it-borders-stupidity guy, but good nonetheless.
“Soft sucker” she said, under her breath. Itto ignored it, as he went for his room to pack his bags.
After having carefully worked out his style for the excursion, put together a huge bag that he would carry over his back, and written a note to his oh so sweet granny, Itto was finally ready to depart for Yashiori Island, not entirely sure of the state he’d come back in. The duo closed the door, and left word of their departure as well as what to do in case they didn’t come back. And off they went.
***
The journey to Yashiori was a bit tedious, especially for two civilians (bargaining that one of said civilian was the famed best and first leader of the Arataki gang had no effect on civilian Inazuman marine officers, who had the gall to tell them to go back to their place in the queue). Itto and Shinobu spent a night on a boat, playing cards until they both fell asleep on the deck. The next morning, they were arriving in Yashiori harbour, where their journey would only begin.
“So we have to walk for half a day up until that inlet that we have to cross by row boat, and then we’ll have to search for them… there.” Shinobu said, as she pointed to a very small island on the map.
“Oh that’s super easy!” shouted Itto. “We’ll be there so fast, Kujou won’t have the time to die, and then once we save her, she’ll be indebted to us and she’ll agree to a revenge and then I’ll show he-”
“Boss, you’re getting ahead of yourself.”
He was. During the night, Itto found the energy to hype himself up for this. No more friendship, only revenge now. Itto pouted, and pointed in a direction, to which Shinobu nodded, as they started walking.
Yashiori Island had changed a lot in the last few years. The Tatarigami’s influence had waned, but not totally disappeared, here and there, the landscape still wore the marks of the curse; the land had become wild again, villages were totally abandoned, sometimes they could swear they felt some shadow presence around. Much to Itto’s dismay who spent a lot of the time singing very loudly to scare the ghosts (or his own fear) away.
The walk was pleasant nonetheless, as Shinobu appreciated Itto’s presence to at least boost up the morale…even if he was the noisiest living being around. Miles after miles that they walked they crossed forsaken shrines reclaimed by nature, vines growing at the foot. Bed of flowers on the side of their path, here and there arrows in the ground just next to dendrobiums. The birds sang heartbreaking songs for who knew how to decipher them. A mother called for her chicks, freshly devoured by wolf pups, starved by the scarcity of the land. Such was the very cruel law of nature.
What the best of the best of The Arataki Gang felt on their necks as well was the gaze of the few people who crossed their path. Well, not on their neck, rather on the red horns planted on Itto’s head. This is normal, he thought. Folks might not be accustomed to seeing such a hunk of a man, let alone of an oni! He was used to it, always had been. He couldn’t care less, he thought. People whispered behind their backs, and sometimes Shinobu heard the words “curse” or “demon”. Itto felt her contempt as if it was pouring out of her skin.
“Let them talk” he said. “I don’t have time for people who’ll judge immediately”
“I know” she said, sighing. Shinobu had been at the front row of many attacks suffered by Itto, and if things got a bit better in the capital the countryside remained narrow-minded for now. Not that both of them had any hope of something truly better.
As the landscape changed to something bleaker and bleaker, so did Itto and Shinobu’s conversation, as they spoke more and more openly about the Tatarigami curse and what they might find. Though none of them ever went as far as saying that they may find Sara dead. None of them wanted to actually speak the thought into existence… but it was an eventuality that they couldn’t rule out.
“I think Takuya told me once he’s been affected by Tatarigami hallucinations, thought he was seeing his mom being chained or something” Itto said.
“Hm. I don’t think I’ve met someone who fell prey to the Tatarigami. Back at the temple, we had this one guy… an old man, who came to get some help. He had scars all over his back, as if the flesh was cursed… and he lived in Yashiori for a moment.”
The sheer reminiscence of that old man’s purple and scarred flesh sent a shiver down Shinobu’s spine. She remembered how she used to feel when other mikos asked her to grab the disinfectant and lather it up on the poor man’s skin, the way he flinched and sobbed, trying to keep his composure. All the blessings he asked for, in vain.
Itto, on the other hand, had his thoughts fixated on what to do if they actively found Kujou Sara’s corpse. The thought of having to deal with dead bodies never really fazed him since he was a child, ghosts were another matter.
They’d have to bring it back, maybe file a report with Sara’s colleagues. Surely she would not want to be forgotten, dead in a Yashiori hamlet ditch, that was unworthy of her, that was not right. Plus Itto thought that Shinobu would probably want to put flowers by the grave, if Sara had indeed succumbed. As they kept on making their way towards the inlet, and as the luminosity dimmed severely, a kind of anxiety took hold of the Oni. He didn’t want Shinobu to find Sara’s body. Life had been fair to her and he feared that encountering a cadaver - of someone that she cared for, moreover - would traumatise his friend. Plus a boss protects his guys, it was only right to shelter her from such a heartbreak. Plus if there were threats to their security on the island, Itto couldn’t possibly bear to put her in harm’s way. He came up with a plan. A mighty good plan.
Soon enough, a small, bleak and grey beach appeared before them and on it, boats. They had arrived at the shore, just a little rowing and they would be where Sara and her men were supposed to be. They both threw their bags in a small row boat and as Shinobu went up to pay a fare, Itto unfastened the knots keeping the boat on the shore. Shinobu found him awfully quiet for more than a minute and when she turned her head, the boat was too far for her to reach.
“Boss! Row back a bit!”
“No! Sorry Shinobu, this is for your own good!”
Shinobu glared, understanding what the big idiot was doing.
“Come back you idiot! You’re going to get killed!!” She cried.
“Go get reinforcements! I won’t die!” He said, as he sat down to start rowing.
Shinobu threw a rock, which splashed on the water in a comical wet noise that would have made Itto and the guys laugh. The thought of whipping the water with electro energy to stop him crossed her, but that would kill the fishes, biodiversity and also Itto on his stupid boat.
“Fucking moron” she said under her breath as she pinched her nose bridge, looking for a plan. She’d have to go to the nearest encampment, he didn’t think this through at all!
“Itto! Don’t do anything too brash that could get you killed!”
“Ok!! I’ll try!!” He said, his voice in the distance as he was already disappearing under a thick curtain of fog. Both of them shouted louder
“Be careful of the ghosts!”
There was a long pause, which Shinobu attributed to a growing fear from the oni.
“The what?”
“The ghosts!!!”
Another pause.
“What hosts?!”
Shinobu sighed, desperately.
“JUST DON’T DIE, OK???!”
“OKAY, I WON’T!!!”
Shinobu sighed once more and hurried back to the nearest village in the hopes to find a shogunate’s soldiers’ encampment.
Itto was alone now. If he didn’t like the thought of risking his life for Kujou Sara, she at least deserved to be saved. And Shinobu deserved not to almost die. The oni rowed for a moment, maybe an hour. He felt the boat gradually touch the ground as he approached the other side of the shore.
Leaving the small row boat, Itto’s nose immediately picked up a metallic smell, almost sickening. He looked at his feet to find the sand had taken a maroon hue. It did not take long for him to notice the corpse sporting the colours and emblem of the shogunate. A soldier and his horse had been taken down here, probably by a blade he thought as he looked the poor guy over. The cuts were sharp, an animal would have torn down the skin and ripped through the flesh, it might have been by a weapon. The only question left was whose blade. He was right in the belly of the beast. And alone. Oh what an idiot.