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When Takeomi found out about the attack he never once imagined seeing his fiancée again and yet here she was, dripping wet with tears streaming down her face as blood soaked her clothes.
"Ta-mi," she smiles as her eyes close and she collapses forward.
Takeomi caught her, of course he did. That was his fiancée after all; his strong, courageous, drop-dead gorgeous fiancée, who smiled even when she got hurt. His fiancée who would verbally eviscerate anyone who opposed her without reason or proof. His fiancée who would sooner die than abandon what she perceives as hers. His fiancée whom he loves wholeheartedly, even when he thought her dead. Because, oh, she's real, and he isn't hallucinating — not when he can hear Senju in the background asking who she is.
He can feel a pulse, hear a heartbeat, and smell the iron scent of blood. He can feel her shallow breaths against his skin and the way her clothes wrinkle at every move. And oh, she's real, so so real. But she's hurt. She's hurt and he'll bathe in the blood of whoever did this to her. He'll use their bones to make a sword only to bathe it in the iron of their blood because she's hurt. She's hurt and he won't let the culprits get away with it.
"I'll kill them," he whispers darkly as tears run freely down his face, "I'll kill whoever did this to you. I'll kill them all." His teal eyes glow with fury as he carefully takes the woman to their room — he'll be damned if he lets her stay anywhere else. He won't let anything happen to her. Not when he stopped mourning after 12 fucking years. Not when he finally got his shit together and started mending his relationships with his siblings. He won't fall into that hole once more. He won't allow it.
He's methodical in the way he goes about her injuries; removing the clothing that surrounds each wound, cleaning them, and wrapping them with bandages he had his sister buy. Her wounds were numerous, and large, and it made his heartache at the pain she'd experienced. His hands are slow but meticulous, careful not to further aggravate her injuries, and when he's finally done he stares at her.
He stares and stares because he'd begun to forget what she looked like — he would have forgotten if not for the paintings and sketches he made all those years ago. He stared at her dark skin, marred with scars and wrapped bandages. He stared at her face. The splattering of freckles and thin scars from sharp bites of winds.
The birthmark on her forehead —a diamond in the centre with a half on each side and small dots along the same line of points— that she usually hid when visiting. The beauty mark just below the crevice of her left eye. Her wild hair —not in braids or some complex style; not a single accessory; not a single feather— and missing right ear.
"Haa...just what happened to you, Kasofyn?" Takeomi's voice cracked as his vision became watery. His hands firmly clasped her left hand as he hunched over the bed. Sobs and the occasional hiccup escape his mouth as his mind works overtime — trying to process everything; trying to make it all make sense. Seeing his fiancée, his love, his Isofyn (Beloved Singer), in such disarray did nothing to ease his thoughts.
In all the time Takeomi has known her he has never once seen her like this. Sure, she's been hurt, broken bones and sprained ankles, but never like this. Never once with bandages covering nearly her entire body. She'll be unable to walk for weeks at the very least. And isn't that jarring he thinks to himself.
To see the girl who would jump so freely from branch to branch while sporting a broken wrist, sprained ankle, and the most infectious laugh he'd ever heard — wrapped in so many bandages and missing her right ear. He wonders how that happened. Wonders if she'd still have it had he joined her on her trip.
He has a lot of regrets he realises but he has so so many things he wants and at the very top of that list was for his Isofyn to live. He hopes and he prays to every deity he knows that she won't die — that he won't mourn her once again because for all he's worth, he doesn't think he can handle it again.
It was unsettling, Senju decides. Haruchiyo was with Toman at the moment, leaving her at home with Takeomi. Not that he was ever bad to them, actually he's really cleaned up his act this past year. He started making them homemade feasts —given they weren't really feasts but there was always plenty of food— and keeping an active stock of snacks they like. Stars, Haruchiyo even moved back in with them!
He got a legal job, as some business consultant or whatever. He got a car, made them bento's for school with little notes, and he'd drop them off and pick them up from school too. Although, Haruchiyo usually does his own thing, but he takes the bento and it's always empty when he comes back.
When he comes back...Senju smiles just at the thought because Haruchiyo moved back! He moved back in with them. It makes her happy that they all talked because Haruchiyo moved back in!!
Takeomi started asking them questions too, asking about their day, friends, hobbies, and all sorts of weird stuff. He'd started nagging at them — being an actual role model and she can't find it in herself to hate him for it. Rather, she's happy, because for once her big brother's putting his time and energy into them, into her. He's caring instead of indifferent and Senju loves it. She's getting the parental/older brother experience she had envied others for.
All in all, the past year has been a dream for Senju, and Haruchiyo too, even if he won't say it aloud. However, that doesn't make it any less unsettling or strange when some random lady appears at their doorstep only to collapse into her eldest brother's —because she has real elder brothers now! Ones who actually cares about her beyond her existence— arms. That in itself was not unsettling, rather it was what he said after.
"I'll kill them," Senju barely heard it but she did and his tone unsettled her, not his words or violent protectiveness. His disturbing tone sets her on edge. "I'll kill whoever did this to you. I'll kill them all." No...no, it wasn't just his tone but the finality with which he spoke, the murderous glint in his glowing eyes —she wants to believe she's hallucinating that detail, but it seems so real and, and right—, and the way he curled protectively around the strange woman with a really long left ear.
What was with that anyways? It's gotta be fake but again it seems so right. As though it were wrong to even entertain the thought of it being fake.
The lady's clothes were ripped and stained with blood. She had so many cuts and bruises and massive open wounds. Her hair looked thick and dark, maybe black or a very dark brown? It was difficult to tell from the matted, blood soaked, and is that mud? Forget it the thing was a mess and Takeomi kept ignoring her when she asks who the lady was because he clearly knows her. They must be close if Takeomi's so shocked at her...existence let alone the fury radiating off of him now that he's processed her injuries.
"Senju," she straightens at the authority in her Kyovi's voice, "use my card to buy bandages and gauze. Now." Walking on autopilot she reflects. What the fuck? Okay, maybe she questions first it doesn't matter. She doesn't even know what Kyovi means. Well, she does know, she knows it instinctively and she can't put it into words — even now as she leaves store bags of bandages and gauze in hand. Somehow, she knows exactly where Takeomi is — she could smell him she later thinks. Smelling of cigarettes, blooming Jasmine flowers, and...and the sky?
It surprises her. How he brought the bloodied woman to his room, placing her on his bed. She must be important to him if he's being so gentle and meticulous about her injuries instead of dropping her off at the hospital. But why hasn't he said anything about this lady to her and Haruchiyo? Why isn't he taking her to a hospital with those horrific injuries?
Taking the chance to see her better, Senju peeks around her big brother. He cleaned her hair; is the first thing she notes. She was wrong about its colour; it wasn't black or a dark shade of brown or a brown at all; in fact, it was pure white. It made for a stark contrast to her dark skin.
Speaking of her skin, at least her face, it was pretty. Foreign, very foreign, but pretty, nonetheless. She had small lines of scars, a splattering of freckles on her gaunt cheeks, and a strange tattoo (or birthmark? It doesn't really look like either though) on her forehead. Regardless, Senju decided that while the lady was strange and foreign, she was pretty, emaciated she may be.
Before she could continue her staring a sob is heard quickly followed by more with hiccups every so often. Turning her head to the side Senju finds they were coming from her brother who held one of the woman's hands to his forehead.
It was eye-opening she concludes, to see her eldest brother cry so openly, or at all really. She has never once seen him cry, now that she thinks about it. It makes her realise that Takeomi, for all his prior indifference and newfound attitude, isn't numb to his emotions. No, he was bottling them, shoving them into a proverbial box and keeping a tight grip on the closed lid.
Senju leaves the room, doubting Takeomi even noticed with his current state. Hmm, maybe she'll leave the house too. Yes, she'll go harass her other brother and his gang friends at their meeting. Apparently, there's sometimes girls that tag along so she may make some new friends. With that decided she grabs her keys and heads to the garage that houses her precious baby, a customised VRSC A V-Rod.
Her brothers got it for her birthday and it's the best present she's ever received. She's not just saying that because of what it was but rather because her older brothers choose it together, the model and customisations. They weren't on the best of terms (read: they weren't talking after a massive argument) at the time either so that makes it all the more special.
Senju loves how much closer they all are — even if they bear different surnames.
Even if it was her fault, they grew distant. Her lies that gave Haruchiyo his scars. Her lies that alienated Haruchiyo from her and Takeomi. Stars Above, she was horrible to Haruchiyo. She was a real and true bitch; she knows that now and she regrets it all so so much. She regrets pushing Haruchiyo away from their family, from his family.
Words will never express her immense amount of guilt and regret. They won't make up for all the hurt and sadness she caused but she will try, with an honest mouth and kinder actions. She will do everything and anything to atone and make-up for her prior actions and words. To Haruchiyo and Takeomi. Her brothers who had done nothing but shower her with affection until she fucked it up time and time again.
Jarring. Haruchiyo is Jarred. After living by himself for a long while, he's learned to do his own chores and apartment maintenance. He's independent like that which is why it was jarring to wake up with food already set on his table. A still warm, homecooked, spread he didn't recognise and yet he knew he'd love it regardless.
It could have been drugged or messed with some other way. He didn't know how it ended up there after all. He knew, somewhere very deep inside his mind, that he should've been wary. That he should've checked or thrown it all out, but he didn't because it was homey and intoxicating. It felt like a piece of him he hadn't know was missing finally returned. So, he ate it. He ate the entire spread that could've feed more than half of Toman and he loved it.
He was happy that entire day and didn't that freak everyone out. He started humming songs he hadn't known the lyrics of while beating people up or doing more mundane things. Started walking with a more relaxed posture. His hair is better too, silky, shiny, still long, but pink rather than bleached, and smelling far better than he can vocalise. Not that he needs to, given the hatred and envy directed at him whenever Baji sees him.
When others (Baji almost always eavesdrops) ask about his hair, Haruchiyo makes sure to tell them it's about what you consume and the genes you were born with. He would then walk past Baji and allow his hair to fly just past his face, glance at his clenched jaw smugly, and then disdainfully at his hair.
It had been a few months before he decided to move back in with his siblings. After a long discussion where they all talked about Takeomi's lacklustre caregiving (Haruchiyo knows he shouldn't have been parenting them, but he did. Because their parents were apparently dead and their adoptive? Er, Aunt and Uncle? Whatever, they weren't nor are taking proper care of them), Senju's bad behaviour, his own terrible copping — basically all their issues, grievances, and ways to move forwards.
They forgive each other but never forgot. They moved on with their lives as a family. Takeomi started teaching them stuff while still making the strange dishes that Haruchiyo and Senju demolish. They started building bonds as siblings and by the Stars has Haruchiyo ever felt as full as now.