From Blue Sky - Chapter 15/15 [END]
Mar. 14th, 2017 12:51 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
h_itoshiTitle: From Blue Sky
Status: 15/15
Fandom: Hey! Say! JUMP
Pairing: None. Main characters are Yabu, Hikaru, Yamada and Chinen.
Overall rating: PG-15 for minor character death and depictions of violence
Warnings: AU. I made Chinen 11 years old which is what the plot revolves around.
Wordcount: 3098
Summary: "He's a cute boy, isn't he?" Takaki says, his voice dangerously low as his eyes follow the young boy, probably around ten years old, walking next to his classy mother and seemingly trying to nag her into something. "I think he'd be even cuter lying at my feet with his throat sliced."
Notes: This is inspired by the Mayonaka no Shadow boy PV and a movie which I won't admit to ripping the plot from until someone calls me on it. I love the atmosphere of the PV and wanted to write something similar to it, and I've had this plot lying around for years, so I thought it was finally time. I'm planning on posting twice a week if you want to stick around~
WE ARE DONE EVERYONE. See my massive end notes for separation anxiety rant. And look what I did, a Chinen POV chapter.
Chinen looks out the window of the car as his father drives, sees the landscape change from city to nature rapidly. He doesn't think a car ride has ever felt as long as this one, feels like he can't sit still and he just wants to get there already.
“Are you sure about this?” His father asks for about the tenth time today, and Chinen rolls his eyes.
“Yes. Stop asking.” He says, crossing his arms.
“If you're not back at this time tomorrow I'm sending out helicopters, do you hear me?” His father goes on, and Chinen sighs.
“They won't hurt me.” He says for the hundredth time since this first came up.
He'd never gotten a letter addressed to himself that wasn't from any of his grandparents before. It was Hikaru's handwriting, he could tell from the envelope, recognizing it from the letter they wrote to Yamada. So he tore it open to read, then showed it to his father, who first blatantly refused, and Chinen had to take to all possible measures for it to happen.
He was going on that camping trip. It was a promise.
“I'm still sending out helicopters.” His father insists, and Chinen doesn't reply.
He was made to tell the story about what happened those days so many times after he came back home. To his father, to several other people who wrote it down and recorded and did all kinds of things with it, to the point where he got sick of talking about it. They kept asking about things he didn't want to talk about too, like the name of “the men that took him” and things like that. So he only said the names they'd used even though his father kept trying and trying to make him say full names. It's not like Chinen's stupid. He knows what his dad wants to do, and if they go to jail, there will be no camping trip.
He's seen a psychologist too, has to meet her every week still. She keeps making him tell everything again and again, but she's nice, not like the others. She doesn't try to make him say all the bad things that happened, but listens to all of it. That he got to eat cream bread every day. And buy a pink shirt.
Things he could never do at home.
He doesn't fit into the pink shirt anymore, but he got to buy a new one with his grandmother. He likes pink, and no matter what his father says, he can wear it. Boys can wear pink too.
He dares talking back to his father these days. Back then, he only talked to him through his mother, but he's not afraid of his father anymore. He's sure his father doesn't like it, but Chinen's sick of him deciding everything he can or can't do.
So he threw the tantrum of his lifetime, screaming and then the silence method and he even refused to eat, until his father agreed to let him go on the camping trip. On conditions, that were argued back and forth until Chinen was satisfied and his father accepted it.
“I can't believe I'm doing this.” His father mutters under his breath, and Chinen doesn't say anything.
Gorilla in the back seat does though. “It'll be okay chief. It's a secured area, they can't get anywhere.”
“They could if they wanted to!” Chinen turns in his seat to glare at the security man who looks like a gorilla. Big and stupid.
“Yuri, don't.” His father sighs, and Chinen reluctantly drops it. “I just don't want to lose you again, and I'm not at all fine with letting my 12-year-old out into the woods with three men I don't know.”
“I know them.” Chinen argues, even though not as fiercely since he senses his father's lowered guard.
“I hope so.” His father says quietly, then sighs again. “God I hope so.”
They finally, finally arrive and Chinen sees the three of them as they pull up at the parking lot, almost wanting to jump out the door before the car has even stopped.
They look different, all of them, he thinks as he watches them talk to each other on the other side of his shaded window. Hikaru's hair is not blonde anymore, some kind of reddish brown, but he still looks like himself. His teeth are still as crooked and he's wearing his yellow scarf with a blue jacket. It doesn't match, but Hikaru somehow just isn't meant to match.
Yabu looks happier, Chinen thinks, even though he's not smiling. There's just not that annoyed, sort of scary frown on his face anymore. Yamada looks happier too, but Chinen is just so happy to see him being okay that he feels like a soda can exploded inside him and his whole body is bubbling.
As soon as the car stops he undoes his belt and leaps out the door, not caring about his packing or anything as he runs towards them.
“Hey Chi!” Hikaru sees him first, grinning widely as Chinen's easy decision is to hug him first. He smells exactly the same if a little more detergent, safe and earthy and Hikaru. “Shit you grew, didn't you?”
“3 inches.” Chinen tells him proudly because that he did. He's not planning on being tiny forever.
“Damn.” Hikaru laughs, then lets him go in favour of letting him greet the others too.
Yabu holds his arms out next, and Chinen almost tackles him as he wraps arms around him and his face gets squished in Yabu's shirt.
“Hi.” Yabu says quietly, and Chinen mumbles hi back into the soft knit material covering Yabu's sternum. There was always something about Yabu that felt most like a parent, and he still feels that. Like Yabu is his second father in a way.
When he lets go of Yabu, he throws himself at Yamada, not caring about that Yamada probably doesn't want to be hugged. He's much softer than he used to be, Chinen notes, since he's wearing a normal black jacket with nothing strange underneath.
“You're soft now.” He says out loud, and he hears Hikaru laugh and say something about Yamada gaining weight now that he can't run, which he's clearly slapped for. But Chinen mostly listens to the heartbeat inside Yamada's chest as he holds on to him for a moment longer, thinking that Hikaru was right. Yamada was fine.
He hears footsteps behind him and turns around to see his father approach along with Gorilla, who's carrying his packing.
His father stops right before them, a reluctant look on his face as he glances from one face to another.
“I don't like this.” He says out loud, and Hikaru grins.
“It's okay, we'll take care of him.” He says, and Chinen sees that his father doesn't seem to be able to get a grip around Hikaru. But then again, his father isn't very good at people who aren't made by the rulebook.
Chinen feels a hand on his shoulder, and it's not huge so he knows it must be Yamada, whom his father turns to look at for a long moment. 'The one I never saw' he usually says about Yamada, and now that he looks at him, he seems so confused Chinen has to laugh.
“Are you... Yamada?” He asks, raising an eyebrow, and Chinen looks up to see Yamada watching his father, seeming mostly unimpressed.
“At your service.” He says, but he doesn't sound serious at all, and Chinen's father frowns in dislike before clearly deciding not to pick that fight, instead turning back to Yabu.
“I'll have you searched for weapons before you go.” He says, and Chinen rolls his eyes, a little ashamed of his father. “And if you're not back here exactly this time tomorrow I'm sending out helicopters. And dogs.”
“Yes sir.” Hikaru says happily, and Chinen laughs out loud at how disgruntled his father looks about that.
Chinen does hug him before they go though, promising him to stay safe.
It's the best camping trip Chinen's ever had, and that's not just because it's his first real one. They're having fun, Hikaru and Yamada continuously bickering, but in another way than Chinen's used to. Like they're actual friends now, and not whatever they were before.
Yabu steers about the important things, like where the tent is supposed to be and who's lighting the fire, which Chinen gets to help with.
He also gets to go look for wood with Yamada, who apparently has some difficulties walking, but it just makes him a bit slower than he should have been.
They have so much more food this time than last, meat and vegetables and Chinen eats until he doesn't think he can get another bite anywhere near his mouth. But then there's cream bread, and he can't say no to cream bread.
“So how are you doing these days?” Hikaru asks after it's already dark and they're sitting around the fire, lazily grilling marshmallows. They didn't have much opportunity to talk about other things than what they were doing during the day, and Chinen can't wait to ask about them, finally. “Is your dad all right?”
“Mostly.” Chinen makes a face. “He nags. But I can do more things that I want now.”
“Yeah?” Yabu asks, quickly pulling his marshmallow out as it catches fire. “Like what?”
“I'm learning how to shoot.” Chinen says proudly, which is one of the things it took him longest to nag his father into. His father tried to get out of him why he knew so much about guns, but Chinen just said that he wanted to learn. In the end, there was a self-defence argument that won out.
“What, really?” Yamada asks while laughing at Yabu's disgruntled face at his half-black marshmallow. “I can't believe it.”
“Also, I can go to friend's houses after school.” Chinen goes on, trying to remember all the things he can do now that he couldn't before. “And sometimes, dad and I have hot chocolate even though it's evening.”
Hikaru smiles widely at that, putting another white floof on his stick. “That. Sounds great.”
“What do you do?” Chinen asks, because it's not fair if he's the only one talking.
Hikaru groans like he didn't want to be reminded and leans on Yabu's shoulder for a moment because he's closest. "I had to go see my parents."
"Don't you like them?" Chinen frowns, because he didn't think Hikaru disliked anyone.
"No, they're just... I'm their baby you know? I have three siblings older than me, so they always act all overprotective. That's why I kind of related to you there when your dad wouldn't let you do anything." Hikaru explains, and Chinen makes a face thinking about anyone considering Hikaru a baby. "And so one of my dad's friends recognized me at the police office aaand I was screwed."
"Wait. … Who is your dad exactly?" Yabu asks, sounding surprised and suspicious, but not that frightening kind of suspicious like he used to.
"He's a lawyer." Hikaru says casually, and Chinen doesn't think there's anything strange about that, but Yabu and Yamada exchange a glance that makes him feel like he's missing out again. "An expensive one, and quite strict and grumpy too."
"... Yaotome?" Yabu repeats, expression disbelieving, and Chinen doesn't get it.
"What? What's special?" He asks, frowning and looks around to see if any of their faces tells him something.
Yamada smiles and shakes his head, so Chinen focuses on him. "I'm pretty sure your dad and Hikaru's dad know each other. Didn't he work with the government?"
"Yep. Super important and top secret and so on." Hikaru agrees with a careless shrug, then burns his tongue on the marshmallow he tries to eat. "Ouch!"
Chinen laughs because it looks funny, but he still doesn't understand what the fuzz is about. His father knows a lot of important people.
"Did... They kick you out? Or why... Are you like this?" Yabu asks, seeming confused, and Hikaru makes a second attempt to eat the marshmallow but smiles at Yabu's description.
"Nah, I left. They forced me through university though, which was interesting, I must admit. And I met Keito, we got real close there. But enough is enough when it comes to books you know?" He says, looking up from his sticky stick. "So after I told them I didn't want to work a suit job, my dad got really pissed. So I just threw in that I liked boys too, while I was at it, then I packed a bag and left. Best decision ever."
“And you're okay now?” Yamada asks sceptically, shifting his weight where he sits. “That sounds like something that tears apart families forever. At least in dramas.”
“Sure, we're okay. My mom likes me too much to be mad at me, and I'm not mad at them so.” Hikaru smiles. “Besides, my older brothers already have kids so who cares if I don't.”
Yamada nods like Hikaru has a point, and Chinen frowns. He's never really heard about someone liking boys before, and he can't quite connect it to why Hikaru couldn't have children. He's a good dad, after all. Better than Chinen's own.
"What... What is that degree you have, exactly?" Yabu asks slowly, watching Hikaru with mild disbelief.
"Dad obviously wanted me to go to law school, but do you know how boring that was?" Hikaru asks, and Chinen files away that information. Never go to law school. "So I quit and did psychology instead."
Yamada actually laughs, and Chinen frowns because he doesn't get this either.
"What's so funny?" He asks, because he wants to understand.
"You're a psychology graduate?" Yamada asks Hikaru, still smiling like he can't believe it and completely ignoring Chinen's question, which is rude but it's okay. "That's... So unexpected but still so obvious."
"What, what did you think I did?" Hikaru asks, but he sounds mostly interested, spearing another marshmallow.
“I don't know, something vague, like art or whatever." Yamada shrugs, and Hikaru laughs.
“Yeah I guess that's reasonable. But nah, I got mostly into vagueness when Keito and I went off to travel without a goal, honestly.” He says, smiling with a little sparkle in his eyes like he enjoys surprising them. “Anyway, what do you guys do? Yabu-chan, how's your nasty secret of a cat?”
“She's fine, thank you.” Yabu laughs and Hikaru makes an uncomfortable face, while Chinen's surprised to hear Yabu has a cat. But he doesn't have time to ask about that before Yabu goes on.
“I quit my salaryman job. Actually...” He pauses to laugh at himself, and Chinen tilts his head wondering what the irony is. “I'm helping out at a preschool.”
“I knew it!” Hikaru punches the ground and then points at Yabu. “It's your divine calling.”
Yamada just rolls his eyes but grins, and when the silence stretches a few seconds, Chinen reaches over to nudge him with his stick, finally asking what he's been lying awake at night wondering. “How did you get out?”
Yamada's smile falters at the question, like he didn't expect it, but Chinen doesn't regret asking.
“... Yuto helped me.” He says slowly, and Chinen has an unpleasant flashback of black shining eyes and a mocking smile. “He got me out and helped me to a mutual friend who's brother is a doctor. So they helped me with... Getting some blood back and such. I'm still healing, I hope.”
“But it's been really long.” Chinen comments, thinking that wounds normally heal after a few weeks, and it's already April. It's been months.
“Yeah, but this is a deep one, so it's like... there are some nerves still trying to find each other.” Yamada explains, but Chinen doesn't really get it. Biology isn't his favourite subject, but he trusts Yamada is right.
“As long as you'll be okay.” Chinen decides, and Yamada smiles and agrees softly.
“... No one's been trying to find you?” Yabu asks, his voice low as it gets when he talks about serious things, and Chinen turns to watch Yamada's expression.
“They did, at first.” Yamada sighs, looking like he doesn't want to talk about that. “But in the end, Daiki became the new leader and... We go way back, so his last favour for me was to forget me, I guess.”
Chinen thinks about that for a moment, and even though he doesn't know who Daiki is, it seems weird for friends to forget each other. But he knows that Yamada couldn't stay there, he never wanted him to either. So it would all be for the best anyway. “So what do you do now?”
“Nothing, yet. Healing.” Yamada says with another sigh. “I'll see what happens, I guess.”
There's a silence following that, and it feels a little uncomfortable, Yabu looking like he wants to say something but isn't sure he should, and in the end, Hikaru does what he does best.
“Okay everyone.” He speaks up to break the tension, then rises to head for the tent. “This is the moment you've all been waiting for. Time for guitar.”
It makes Yabu laugh and Chinen watches with interest as Hikaru returns with the instrument. He still can't play, but he enjoys watching Hikaru do it just as much. Music is nice.
“What songs do you know, come on. We have to sing together.” Hikaru urges, and Yamada looks absolutely mortified, which makes Yabu laugh louder.
In the end, they find a few classic songs that they all know, and even Yamada joins in to sing, followed by Hikaru abruptly pausing the playing to call Yamada on being really good, saying that they have to go to karaoke sometime. It makes Yamada blush, and Yabu laughs and points out that's a first, which makes Yamada complain that he's never singing with either of them again. But then he does anyway, and they all sound good together, Chinen thinks.
It's really late when they finally go to sleep, and Chinen falls asleep squished in between Yabu and Yamada, and it's been a long time since he felt this safe. Just before he slips into dreams, he decides that this has to become a tradition.
~*~*~
END
End notes:
Okay, here goes. First, thank you so much for sticking around and reading this. Not sure if I would have kept posting it without you guys. I would never have clicked this fanfiction myself, since it's a chapterfic with no pairings and a shitty summary, but I'm so happy some people did. I've really enjoyed hearing your thoughts after all chapters (and occasionally laughing to myself when you were right and occasionally panicking because I didn't think of things you were asking about).
And if anyone reads the whole thing later, please tell me what you thought too.
Second, I can't believe I actually managed to finish this, after having had the idea for almost ten years (holy shit it really is almost ten years where did time go), and then started writing it just after getting into Jump two years ago. Thanks mayonaka no shadow boy pv for making me finally write this haha.
And third and final, I'm sure you want to know what story you just read, and I'm going to tell you if you promise to still be able to take this fic seriously:
It's Ice Age haha. Yep, the animated children's movie. It started out as a cracky visual kei fic idea, to make it into a human setting with three reluctant guys having to take care of an annoying kid, which we had a laugh about all those years ago. Then I half-consciously kept that idea, thinking it'd be cool to make something serious and kind of adult out of it. And then there was that PV, and I was all OH. MY. GOD. This is it. I knew barely anything about Jump back then because I was still in learning phase, but decided I had to give it a go anyway, it was AU
Then I was stuck for like half a year after chapter 9 because I had no idea how to adapt the end of my story in a good way, and I have obviously heavily modified the storyline, but I think you'll find the main pivotal points from the original are there. And yes, if I didn't have an original to go by, I would have killed off one of the main characters. Instead I made a happy ending, so let's everyone be happy about that. (No, I am never writing a sequel, if anyone ever wanted to suggest that)
I could rant for a long time about the difficulties of adapting this plot, like Chinen being old enough to talk and understand so I had to make up 500 believable excuses, and all the travelling having to be made somehow, nobody finding them too easily (did anyone think about what time period this is set in?? Because I made sure never to mention cell phones or internet or credit cards, hoping nobody would consider that strange haha), and fitting in all the characters I wanted. Originally, I didn't even have Inoo and Keito actually appearing in the story anywhere, but figured I could use them.
But, I won't go on for too long about all that. I just hope you're all surprised to learn what the inspiration was because I was so convinced it was obvious the first few chapters heh.
Again, thank you all for reading, I love you so much and I'm happy I made something you enjoyed. And I hope I answered most of your questions with this final chapter xD <3
(I'll just... Try and figure out what I'm going to focus on writing now)
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2017-03-14 01:38 am (UTC)THIS WAS SO FUCKING CUTE OF AN ENDING AND I'M SO GLAD THAT CHINEN GOT HIS CAMPING TRIP. Also I'm so glad that they all got to meet again and they got their happy ending
Honestly? It never crossed my mind that Hikaru's Dad could be a lawyer??? Not at all. And just the whole reason why he got away from them was so brilliant I can't stand it. He's too perfect
Also really glad we got to see Yamada smile and how Daiki was such a bro and helped him get away like Yabu got away
AND FINALLY I CANT BELIEVE THIS WAS ADAPTED FROM ICE AGE I AM SCREAMING. I THOUGHT IT WAS SOME FRENCH/AMERICAN MOVIE SET IN EUROPE AND I WAS SO OFF
BUT IT MAKES SO MUCH SENSE I CANT BELIEVE THIS. HOW YOU GOT THIS AMAZING FIC FROM ICE AGE IS BEYOND ME AND IM SO GLAD YOU WERE ABLE TO FINISH IT
Now I can't wait until your next fic to see what you do Anna!
no subject
Date: 2017-03-14 11:08 pm (UTC)Honestly, I hadn't given much thought to Hikaru's backstory when you started asking about it like halfway through the fic, except I had all these random details written in all over that I thought fit him. So I started puzzling them together and figured his character was definitely too carefree not to be rich af, well educated and such, but still had somehow rebelled against, hence the carelessness and will to trust people. So I settled that was the best way of putting him together, then had to actually fit it in somewhere orz. (... That became a little rant, sorry xD)
I really liked Daiki. And he got practically the least spotlight so I felt I had to mention him and that they were actually friends for real. So yeah.
SURPRISE ;D I was like "oh god I can't write that out nobody's gonna take this seriously I'll give it a go and see if it can pass without the source" lol.
I just really love adapting things, give me anything and time and I'll make AUs haha xD
Thank you for sticking around for me, I love you!!
no subject
Date: 2017-03-18 12:48 pm (UTC)Nah I don't mind the rant! It's definitely interesting to see that you pieced it all together at the end of it all. And I'm definitely glad we got to find out a little more about him (also just the shock of Yamada and Yabu realizing they never got into Hikaru's past but they did talk of their own was amazing. I loved hat part)
Daiki always seems to get the least amount of time in fics. I'm glad he got a good ending too.....well, somewhat of a good one xD
I don't know if I would have been able to take it seriously if I knew xD But if you read the plot of the movie on wikipedia and think about the fic.....everything lines up so well and their characters fit the part so well. It's just amazing
And I'll always stick around for your fics <333 I love you too~