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Rowen felt old. And, he supposed, pulling himself out of bed and heading to the bathroom, he sort of was. The wrong side of 30, heading rapidly towards forty in the type of business where he should have been long dead and buried. This hero shit was for the young’uns, and Hashiba Rowen was no longer fourteen. Hell, he wasn’t even seventeen anymore. Wasn’t 21, wasn’t 25…wasn’t even 30.
He missed his friends. Of them all, only he remained. Even those that were still alive, were not themselves anymore, and each day he grieved for what he’d lost. As he stared into the mirror, they flashed before him, how he’d lost each one. He thought of Ryo, who’d married a pretty girl (who wasn’t Mia, making the decision the stupidest in Ryo’s horrible history) from a rich family. He’d gotten her pregnant (her choice, not his) and he’d faced the music. He’d been murdered in his office, in the building of his new father-in-law. His pretty young wife, it was rumored, had lost the baby, due to medical complications that resulted from her grief. She’d been shuttled to a permanent facility, where, from what Rowen had seen, she drooled away her days.
Tears burned in his eyes. Ryo, their fearless, headstrong leader, who in his personal life was always so cautious, hadn’t been cautious enough when dealing with the pretty foreign student whose family (starting a ‘business venture’ in Japan) had mafia connections. He glanced away, back to his room, where, on a shelf, sat five small yoroi balls, forever darkened. From where he stood, Ryo’s looked black.
Wildfire…gone.
Rowen inhaled deeply, swiping away the tears. Today would be different. Today he would not wallow. He was supposed to meet Yuli; they were going out for coffee. They were going to put flowers on the graves of their loved ones, before Yuli caught his flight back to America-
He shook his head again. He would not cry. Not today, not about Yuli leaving. He had promised. Yuli wasn’t a little boy anymore, he was a man grown. He had a family, a life, in Chicago. He couldn’t come back every time that Rowen had a rough month, year…Rowen hung his head. He kept coming back for Rowen, because he felt bad for the archer. Left his wife and children, to go back to a life that didn’t exist anymore, because Rowen needed him, and how do you ignore the last part of your childhood when it called out so piteously?
A knock out of the door startled him so badly that he cut himself where he’s been shaving. Yuli called out as he entered and locked the door behind him. Rowen kept telling him that since he had a key, he needn’t knock before entering, but Yuli staunchly refused. This was Rowen’s apartment after all, and he would respect Rowen’s privacy.
“You ready?”
Rowen smiled weakly, looking down at himself. He wasn’t dressed, was half-shaved…he looked like hammered shit, and he knew it. Yuli returned the smile warmly, and, wordlessly, crossed to Rowen’s closet to find him something to wear. He helped his old friend get dressed, and shuttled him out the door. They had a long road to travel today.
*
They started with Ryo, buried in the city, in a plot of no significance. He had no family to be buried with, and, as far as the world was concerned, hadn’t been of any particular importance. But his friends had had enough of money to make sure that he was taken care of properly, and buried with at least a modicum of decency. Unsurprisingly, his father-in-law had not been interested in helping pay for the expenses of the bastard who had ruined his little girl’s future. Rowen’s eyes burned as he watched Yuli bend low over the stone, placing the flowers delicately and whispering softly. These were American traditions, but somehow, they seemed more fitting for Ryo. He fingered the yoroi balls in pocket, he never left the house without them, and he hoped that today, they would give him strength. He found the one that instinct told him was Ryo’s and squeezed it tighter. He should have buried it with the armor’s wearer, he knew, but he was selfish, and unwilling to part with such a powerful memento.
Yuli touched him on the shoulder, and together they turned, and continued down the road.
*
It was in the car that Yuli tried to start.
“Rowen?” He asked softly, keeping his eyes focused on the road in front of him. Rowen was curled in the passenger seat, staring at the dark marbles that rolled around in his hand. “Rowen, I spoke with Mia-“ Rowen cringed. No one had spoken to Mia in a very long time, since Ryo had gotten married. She had cut all ties with them, and he had been unaware that she and Yuli had been conversing. “I spoke with Mia, and she suggested that, perhaps you should give them up.” The younger man looked pointedly at the yoroi. “She thinks that they may be a major part of your depression. If you give them up, let them go, maybe you’ll be…” he trailed off, unable to finish. Rowen stared down at the spheres, and pocketed them swiftly, switching his gaze to the window.
“We’re here.” He murmured, staring up at the place he hated most. The Daté family shrine. Of all the places he knew he would go today, this was the one most bitter. Here, his lover’s shrine sat, next to all the members of the Daté clan, away from Rowen, and the life they might have had together.
He let Yuli go through the motions first. It hurt too much to do this yet, and Rowen needed time to gather strength. He clutched at Sage’s yoroi in his pocket, wishing with all his heart that it was him that was dead, and not the blonde. Of all the losses he suffered, it was this one that threatened continually to break him. People as close as he and Sage had been were not meant to be separated by anything, not even death, for this long, and Rowen found it a cruel joke of faith that he must remain behind while his lover traveled on.
Numbly, he sat down on the floor of the shrine, and slipped into his memories.
It was in the fall, on the train. Rowen was waiting in their cabin, waiting for Sage, because his classes had let out a day early, and he wanted to make sure everything was ready for their weekend away together. They were getting harder to arrange, Sage was busy with the dojo, and his grandfather was loathe to let him leave, even for a few days. Rowen was in school with a grueling class schedule, and they were spending less and less time together. Last time, Sage had brought the heart shattering news that his family expected him to be married, that the girl had already been chosen.
This time would be better. This time it would be for them. Rowen made dinner, and sat down to wait. Sage was getting in late tonight, but Rowen wasn’t expected until tomorrow.
They would have a whole extra night…
He shuddered, remembering the radio broadcast, interrupting the quiet music. The train, derailed. Bodies everywhere, flaming wreckage. Remembered the man’s cracking voice.
No apparent survivors.
He remembered flying out into the night, praying, trying to find Sage, knowing darkly that he was already dead. The emptiness was all consuming, a black hole beneath his breast, the finality sinking in as he stepped on the yoroi ball in the darkness, feeling it sink into the soft dirt beneath his sole.
Not far from there, he’d found Sage.
“Rowen.” Yuli’s soft voice startled him. The young man was standing in the doorway, about to exit. “I’ll be outside if you need me.”
He nodded.
*
Yuli sighed as he walked out. Rowen was getting worse. Dying by degrees, and each time that Yuli saw him, he looked a little farther away. His grip on reality and sanity was slipping, he could see it, and it broke his heart.
He wished he could be here more, for his friend of so many years, but his family and business kept him on the other side of the Pacific, back in Chicago. He came out as often as he could, but it wasn’t enough. Rowen had lost his grounding, and he needed someone to stay close by. In a perfect world, one of the four others could have watched over him, but then, if they had been alive, Rowen might not be as bad as he was.
Brilliant people always have the most persuasive demons.
They had all taught him that.
He could hear the archer’s muffled voice from the shrine, the slow click of the yoroi balls as he rolled them in his hand. Five demons, and his old friend kept them in his pocket. Mia had told him what a bad idea that was. The armors themselves were nearly sentient beings, they desired like humans desired. The virtues they were carved from were not enough to silence the hunger within, and they murmured restlessly to be worn, to be used. To be active once more. They channeled their desires through whoever bore them, and each person became the embodiment of that virtue. Why else had Ryo’s temper flared so hot, Sage’s calmness exuded over them all, and Sai believed in each living thing upon the earth? They were meant to be born by different souls, so that they might each be the epitome of that virtue. They were never meant to be carried by one.
It would drive that soul mad, for each virtue warred to come out on top.
The body isn’t meant to sustain such a war within itself.
Yuli’s head snapped up. Rowen was talking, not to Sage, but to the yoroi. He made his way back to the entrance of the shrine. His old friend would listen too him this time. He would make Rowen come back with him, to Chicago, and get him some help. Throw history back into the ocean, and let a new generation take up arms against evil. Rowen could stay with his family and him for a little while, until he got back on his feet, until he could make it on his own again. He could start teaching at the University near Yuli’s flat; Yuli had friends there that would be more than happy to have the archer teach. Rowen could be happy again, could forget about all this-
“Rowen?” He interrupted the soft clacking of the yoroi. “Rowen, I don’t want to rush you, but we need to get going. We still have to-“
Rowen rolled to his feet, pocketing his treasures, and brushing past Yuli. The younger man looked back toward the shrine one last time. There was a wet stain on the floor, where Rowen’s head had rested. He had been crying.
He looked out to the car, where his old friend sat, staring blankly ahead, and waiting for Yuli to bring him to the next marker. Another year of this would break the archer; Yuli knew it as inherently as he knew his son’s birthday, the color of his daughter’s eyes. Each year brought this same trip down Rowen’s memory lane. But for Rowen, memory lane was set with gravestones, paved with blood-soaked cobbles, each mile marker another hurt, another betrayal, another moment of suffering, either his own, or someone he loved dearly.
*
The next stop was the lake, out by Mia’s property, in remembrance of Sai, whose marker was buried far from here, in Britain, where they had never been, not even for their friend’s funeral. It had been made perfectly clear by Sai’s lover that they were neither wanted nor welcome. Sai, who had fled the country with his heart broken, as the only man he had ever loved married another, a beautiful woman Kento’s family had set him with up, and who he had fallen for. Sai, who in his heartbreak, had turned to one abusive relationship after another, wanting physical pain to eclipse the pain that weighted his heart down. He had cut ties with all of them, even Yuli, who had learned of his death from Mia, who heard it from Sai’s mother, who was looking for the rest of Sai’s possessions to send back.
Sai had beaten to death, either at the hands of his lover, or by someone else, Yuli never knew. By then, those who might have once avenged his death were dead themselves, or too far gone in their grief to discover the truth. Yuli had done what he could, but his influence did not extend across the pond, and Sai’s last lover had powerful friends in high places.
Of all the deaths of his oldest friends, Sai’s hurt Yuli’s the most, cut the deepest. The man whose virtue had been Trust, who had loved deepest and most fully, had died the emptiest, heartbroken and hurt, body shattered and torn. Yuli had seen the newspaper reports, had searched for them. The warlords and Talpa himself had never hurt Sai so badly.
Sai’s was the one that had shattered Rowen.
It went in a line, a perfectly linear equation. Ryo, and the hairline fractures had appeared, Sage, and he had broken. But Sai had picked up the pieces, glued them back together, kept him safe and clothed and fed during those horrible days following, when Rowen didn’t register anything in life, not even the need for food or sleep, or the bathroom. Sai had started to build him up, he was becoming whole again…
Sai’s flight had destroyed all that. Rowen had come home to Kento and Sai’s flat, had seen the aftermath of Torrent’s departure. Had confronted Kento, who was packing his belongings.
Had lost everything all over again…
Yuli looked over. Tears were streaming down Rowen’s face as he looked out across the glittering water. Lilies clenched in one hand, the other thrust deep into his pocket, where Yuli knew the yoroi lurked.
*
They were driving home now. They had paid their respects to the dead, and Yuli had remembered the one living, to whom no one spoke to anymore, and who was certainly never spoken of in Rowen’s presence. Kento had given up Sai, for family, had killed a man, just as surely as if he’d been the one to beat Sai bloody, and Rowen could never forgive his oldest friend for that. Kento had retreated to his family’s restaurant where, from what Yuli had seen, he lived as empty a life as Yuli had seen outside of Strata’s. Kento’s marriage was in shambles; his wife disgusted by him when he found out his lover of so many years had died so horribly. She had poisoned the minds of Kento’s own children, and together, they waited for him to die so that they could be free of him, take the money he would leave behind, and forget that his taint had ever existed.
Kento could not forgive himself for what he had done, and Rowen could not forgive him either. Yuli knew that if they tried, they could bring each other back from the brink, and maybe be each others salvation. But there was too much bitterness and bad blood between them now. Yuli had seen the shallowness in Kento’s eyes. He was lost, just like all the others.
*
He dropped Rowen off at his apartment, watched as his friend climbed the stairs, clutching at the railing as if he was seventy-three, and not thirty seven. He had almost done it this time, almost brought Rowen home with him. But he couldn’t. Rowen was poison, and he didn’t want it to seep through to the other parts of his life. He didn’t want to admit it, because admitting it made it true, but deep in his heart, Yuli was afraid. If he brought Rowen home with him, what the archer might do to his wife, and his children. What sadness might he expose them too, what the consequences might be.
Didn’t want to think what might happen if Rowen brought the cursed yoroi back across the ocean with him.
But he couldn’t leave Rowen alone. He couldn’t come back for another funeral, were no one came, and Yuli stood alone in remembrance of another soul lost. Rowen needed a keeper, a watcher. Someone who would care for him like Sage had cared for him, like Sai had after Sage was gone, like Yuli wished he could. Driving to the airport, his called Mia.
*
Against her better judgment, she came. Stood downstairs, and fingered the key in her pocket that Yuli had given her, standing at the gate, waiting for his flight to board. Rowen needed her now, maybe with this; she could put her own demons to sleep. Maybe she could learn to forgive Ryo for his stupidity, and finally move on with her life.
Maybe she could help Rowen move on with his.
If nothing else, she told herself, clutching at the key in her hand, the yoroi balls were coming with her when she left today. They were going into the deepest ocean, the most volatile volcano, the darkest forest, and buried deep into the heart of a mountain. As for Rowen’s…he wasn’t dead yet, technically, she had no right to take it…Rowen’s she would shatter. If it took a sledgehammer and all her strength, she would destroy it. And if she couldn’t destroy it, she would bury it. Drop it down a well, a canyon, into a river. It would be lost, like all the others, and a new generation could take up arms.
Even if it killed Rowen and herself in the process, she would see it done before she dropped.
Mia had devoted her life to the knowledge of the yoroi. But more specifically, when her life had become entangled, she had devoted her life to these yoroi. To the men behind them, and their stories. They were her friends; she had cared for them all like brothers. The last one needed her now, to save him. Even if it meant destroying those things he held most dear.
She entered.
*
She didn’t bother to knock. She didn’t want him to have time to prepare for her, or have time to hide anything. She knew Yuli had told him about what she thought; Yuli himself had told her so. She didn’t want him to try to pull himself together for her. She wanted to see him as he was. Broken.
His head snapped back as she entered a reaction from long ago, when an entry into his sanctum would have meant death. She found herself struggling to draw a breath, because even though Yuli had warned her, it hadn’t prepared her for the truth of it. He looked like someone who had not just one foot in the ground, but was waist high and was ready to lie down and sleep forever. His body just hadn’t caught up with the thought yet. He was sitting on the floor, not that there was much else for him to sit on, his worldly possessions seemed to be comprised of a moldy mattress on the floor, take out cartons in various states of rotting, and a handful of clothes on bent wire hangers poking out from the closet.
This was not the brilliant man she knew. Surely this could not be the man who had taught Yuli the constellations, who’d processed his lover’s complicated taxes each year, just for fun. This could not be the man who yearly received invitations to teach, lecture, anything at her college, to share his knowledge with a new generation. She’d always wondered why he’d refused each time, this man who loved sharing knowledge so much.
Now she knew.
He dropped his gaze from her, back to the tiny shrine that held the yoroi on a low shelf across the room, the reason she was here today. Looking at them now, Mia felt the same pull she assumed Rowen did. She could feel the spirits of her dead friends wrapping around her, felt Sai’s smile, Sage’s warmth, and Kento good humor. She felt Ryo holding her close, dancing around her living room, whispering to her in bed. She had to lock her knees just to keep upright. Yuli hadn’t warned her it would be like this- she shook her head. He must not feel them. But she did, just like Rowen did, and she couldn’t take them away just yet. She couldn’t part with the only piece of Ryo left in this world, just as Rowen couldn’t.
She closed the door to just a crack, and the feelings melted. She reached outside the door to the bucket she had brought with her, and began the long process of cleaning Rowen’s living room and kitchen.
*
Rowen knew why she was here. Yuli had finally ratted him out, after all the years he had wanted too. Rowen couldn’t blame the kid; he was a living specter, a ghost who should have died so many years ago. It was only fate’s grim sense of humor that he was still here.
He could hear Mia’s reign of terror against the vermin of his apartment, and the forest of take out cartons. He’d always meant to do something about it, but then he’d always gotten busy swimming through the memories, sliding through them as Sai had once taught them all how to slice through the water, how to dive into the heart of the wave so it didn’t tumble you. He hadn’t meant to loose touch with the world, it just…happened, and before Rowen knew what was happening, or how he could stop it, he was too far gone. The wave had tumbled him, and he didn’t know which way was up anymore. He felt like he hadn’t seen daylight since Seiji had died, and the metaphor there was too close to the truth of things for him to feel comfortable.
He lay back on the bed and let the colors swirl around his head, closed his eyes, and slept.
In his dreams, he was walking through the forest, near their cabin, walking with Sage on a clear fall day, when all their problems had seemed far away. His head was on Sage’s shoulder, no small feat given that they were essentially the same height, but Rowen slouched and Sage had perfect posture, hands interlocked. Rowen had a blanket tucked under his arms, and Sage carried the picnic basket Sai had packed before he’d let the two leave.
They found a sunny little clearing full of wildflowers, and while Rowen spread out the blanket, Sage wandered off to pick flowers, which he deftly wove into a flower chain and plunked them on Rowen’s head.
Rowen moaned in his sleep. He remember this day so perfectly, how they’d kissed and snuggled and lain together in the cool grass and he’d tried so hard to make Sage name cloud shapes with him, which had turned into a science lecture on cloud particles by future PhD Hashiba Rowen. It had been a perfect day, and they had fallen asleep among the flowers and the grass.
*
Cruel enough punishment that he should be reminded of these happy times now lost to him, but the dream took a turn for the darker, wandering around the streets of New York, looking for his lost lover, hearing Sage’s agony in his head like a feedback loop he couldn’t turn off.
Mia’s soft knock on the door was almost a blessing, it brought him out of the dream and into reality, but his reality was worse than the nightmare. At least in the nightmare Sage had been alive. He stared blankly off into space, unaware of Mia’s presence until the soft clicking of glass snapped his head towards the low shelf. The little stands stood empty, and as he watched, Mia began to dismantle the shrine.
With a low snarl, he launched himself at Mia, who had clearly been prepared for the attack. She brought her knee up hard into his solar plexus, and he collapsed back onto the floor, clutching his chest. She knelt beside him, pushed the dirty hair out of his face.
“It’s better this way. Rowen, I know you feel them, I feel them too. I didn’t want to lose them any more than you did, but they’re gone.”
“I should have gone with him,” Rowen gasped, pushing himself into a sitting position against the wall. “Give them back. They’re mine.”
She shook her head slowly. “No, no Rowen, they belong to time. They’re meant to be passed on to the next generation. You should have all given them up when Ryo died.”
He held his hand out. “Mia. Please.”
“No Rowen. They’re for a new generation now, and it’s time to let them go.”
“I need them,” he whispered.
She pushed herself to her feet. “No Rowen, I think you’ve held onto then for quite long enough.”
As the door closed behind her, she tried to pretend she couldn’t hear him crying.
*
She did it, even though it nearly killed her. She dropped Sage’s in the middle of the forest, in a grassy field far from anything that might recognize it as something important, Sai’s into the deep whirlpool in the Naruto Strait, the water pulling it away and down into the swirling depths. Kento’s went into a deep ravine in a far away mountain range, and Ryo’s she flew to Hawai’i, to drop into Kilauea. It was the hardest thing she had ever done, because as she held the tiny red ball in her hands, she felt Ryo’s arms around her, his breath on her neck. She loved him, and this was all that was left. She kissed it goodbye, and dropped it into the swirling lava.
All that was left was Rowen’s.
She didn’t know what to do with it. It belonged somewhere she couldn’t take it, and it felt wrong to throw it somewhere that belonged to one of the other armors. Finally, she took it to the Shrine of the Ancient, and hid it. She lit a cake of incense, and said a prayer for her friend.
She cried the next day when she read in the paper he had died in his sleep.
*fin*
Every time that I look in the mirror
All these lines on my face gettin’ clearer
The past is gone
It went by like dust to dawn
Isn’t that the way
Everybody’s got their dues in life to pay
I know what nobody knows
Where it comes and where it goes
I know its everybody’s sin
You got to lose to know how to win
Half my life is in books written pages
Live and learn from fools and from sages
You know its true
All the things come back to you
Sing with me, sing for the years
Sing for the laughter, sing for the tears
Sing with me, if its just for today
Maybe tomorrow the good lord will take you away
Sing with me, sing for the years
Sing for the laughter, sing for the tears
Sing with me, if its just for today
Maybe tomorrow the good lord will take you away
Dream on, dream on
Dream yourself a dream come true
Dream on, dream on
Dream until your dream come true
Dream on, dream on, dream on...
Sing with me, sing for the years
Sing for the laughter and sing for the tears
Sing with me, if its just for today
Maybe tomorrow the good lord will take you away