demarcates | IC INBOX

[ It occurs to him only after he's started on his way that he's not entirely sure of where Hijikata will be. The Shinsengumi have laid claim to some classrooms, so he decides to check there first, or at least hope that Hijikata may be in the general area. It takes him longer than he would have liked to get there, considering the Void had managed to do a number on him, but Kondou tries not to let it slow him down too much. ]

Toshi?

[ that's exactly where he'd be. ]

I'm here.

[ over by one of the windows to be exact, and the only suggestion that he's moved from that spot at any part is his watch laying near the entrance.

he doesn't look to kondou, though, keeping his gaze out the window because he's trying so hard to formulate a way to do this—this is the first time he's heard kondou's voice and it's been days he realizes by now for the other but him it's been months and months of never hearing that voice again. but he doesn't even know how any of that matters right now other than everything feels so incredibly numb. right now, to him, this place is harboring ghosts and he just saw the only one left of them still alive be torture and murdered as a result of it.

what's left...? ]

[ Hijikata isn't looking at him. That isn't a good sign. None of this is good, Kondou realises, but he doesn't know how to do anything about it either. Standing by the door and watching him only makes Kondou feel even more ill at ease, somehow, like there's something utterly wrong. For once, he decides to follow his gut instinct, knowing that it couldn't possibly get too much worse than this.

Could it? ]

What happened?

[ what didn't happen is what he wants to say, but hijikata is going to assume that he means why the fuck was he awol at a time when he wasn't supposed to be and why he wasn't there when they needed him most. ]

Entertaining Kazama Chikage, looks like he showed up here this go around.

[ ... say what, Hijikata. ]

I didn't see him at the station... How can this be possible?

[ It's a sign of his trust in Hijikata that he doesn't ask: why didn't you tell me? ]

I don't know.

[ all he knows is it was definitely him. ]

I wasn't aware of it, either. I don't know if any of us saw him.

[ and good that he doesn't ask because he couldn't!!! ...that and he'd never tell kondou something like that anyway, not when he was in a situation that would make him do something stupid.

...and that's if he had had the heart to be able to talk to kondou in the first place. this week just... this week. ]

I doubt that either of us could have... After all, the others likely would have said something.

[ Truthfully, even Kondou isn't exactly sure how to approach this issue either. One step at a time, he thinks, that's the trick to this. ]

...It doesn't really matter even if they did.

[ or, it does, but it's so hard to care, now. what is there to worry about if there's no one to protect, anyway. ]

Nothing would have changed.

... What did he do to you?

[ It's obvious that something has happened. ]

[ he's so tempted to say nothing. tempted because it's true. for all the venom spitting for all the threats and taunts, he's not bleeding all over the floor or suffering injuries from that sword of his that he carries and he's in one piece and nothing's broken. ]

Nothing special. I watched what he wanted me to watch and he left.

[ watched as he couldn't do anything, wouldn't have been able to do anything even without kazama there because it wasn't kazama killing them but some different entity all together, but there was very much a heel dug in the entire time. and kazama knows about kondou's fate, as well, and that, too, did not go unspoken or unreminded (because how many people is he going to let be captured and executed for crimes they didn't commit? how many of them have to die before he gets it?) ]

... For him, I'm sure that was enough, to break your spirit for the time being.

[ Kondou could imagine just what it was that Hijikata had been forced to watch, especially just now. It must mean that Kazama can't have been long gone, and his blood runs cold at the mere thought of that. At least, it's a relief that he isn't physically harmed, though it doesn't make him feel very good in the wake of everything else that has come to light. For his part, he looks a total mess. (Just how many times can he get blood on his haori?) ]

I'm fine.

[ he's alive, he has more than any of the others on that fact alone even if he doesn't want it. he's just glad kazama didn't stick around because after what just happened, the last thing he could handle was kondou crossing paths with that oni and his want to break everything of hijikata's he could get his hands on.

(and so long as there's cold water to get it out, it's a free for all as to how many times!) ]

No, you're not.

[ As much as Hijikata thinks that he may be able to lie to almost anyone else, Kondou can see right through him most of the time. More than that, he knows that Kazama is a sore subject for his friend, and the last thing that he wants is for him to try and deal with this alone.

Once again, Kondou is putting his needs aside to cater to other people's. That in itself is nothing new. ]

[ that stings and while he doesn't visibly flinch, if he had bothered to look at kondou even once this entire time it would have been visible that he might have well with the way his expression falters. if he could stop there, he would, but it's never simple and it bleeds into his posture, it sinking a bit and he takes a breath, feeling this surge of distraught.

it's not that he's being called on his lie so much as its significance. it's not that so much as everything it drags that's clawing at the surface.

things he doesn't want to remember—things he wishes he could forget to fear remembering in the first place and he's mad at himself on another level, too, for letting this get to him, when he'd had to sit there and read those text messages over and over again, even afterwards once kondou said he was coming before he'd lost it and thrown the watch across the room.

( we need you. )

hijikata's fingers tighten about his arms with them crossed, clenching into the material of his coat. they need him, do they? that's funny. but, that isn't quite as funny as

( i need you. )

and that one sentence could drive him to insanity, especially with it burned in his mind and suddenly now kondou is speaking to him again and these are the words he's getting. ]

...Don't tell me what I am and what I am not. You don't know me, anymore. [ he tries to say kondou's name, to address him directly and straight to really give his nasty words an extra shove of personal touch but he can't. his name dies in his throat and that just pisses him off more.

why the fuck is he here? why is he doing exactly as he's always done, exactly what got him killed in the first place?

why is he doing it right after what they just all saw and to him, out of all of them? ]

[ After hearing those words, something inside him snaps cleanly in half. He’d been doing his best to stay strong, to help the captives find a way out of their prisons, to do everything in his power to free them and not force them to go through with that horrendous torture. He’d spent the week down at the cages, trying to get in, injuring himself in the process as the Void mercilessly fought back against him. He hadn’t slept, exhaustion was seeping through his whole being, and still he hadn’t let it stop him.

Not until now, at least, and upon hearing Hijikata say such cruel things to him, it feels as though all of the fight has gone out of him then, and Kondou barely registers it as he sinks to his knees.

Whatever had happened this week, whatever had happened to Hijikata, more had changed than what he’d been told. But Kondou felt a wall up between them that had never been there before, and he didn’t know how to break it down. He knew, now, that he was dead, that there was no escape for him at home – did Hijikata know that? Was that why he was acting so cruelly? Was there something else?

Suddenly, it felt as though everything that he’d said to him last week was pointless. Unheard, unreturned, as though he’d wasted his breath and now Hijikata scorned him for his feelings.

Despite his desperate gasps for air, Kondou couldn’t breathe. ]

That’s not true! How can you say things like that to me? You vanish for a week without a word, and suddenly you’re behaving this way. I don’t understand!

[ Fear cuts through him then like a warm knife through butter, as he suddenly realises that maybe Hijikata is right. Maybe he doesn’t know him anymore, and the thought terrifies him more than almost anything else in the world at that moment. ]

There isn't anything to understand!

[ he knows he knows but he can't bring himself to turn around because if he turns around he'll lose his will just like he would have with souji at the beginning of the week and gone after him, just like he would have gone back to chizuru as she cried after him, just like he would have and should have gone back for kondou.

but not with any of them did he ever once look back. ]

You still... [ I still... ] You still put everything and everyone ahead of yourself, don't you. [ like he didn't see him last week. like it's been forever and this is some bad memory being conjured up that he's trying to suppress. ] How are you supposed to tell me you know whether I'm fine or not when you're not in your right mind, yourself? You can't keep doing this!

I want to understand you, Toshi! Why do you have to doubt me when I tell you that I love you? That I'd do anything for you, anything for the rest of the Shinsengumi? If that means putting my own needs aside for once, why is that such a bad thing?

[ For once, he says, but the reality of the situation is that he does it more often than not, but Kondou doesn’t care. For once he wants the rest of the people that he cares for to have something decent in their lives, to have a chance, and that was why he’d given up his own last chance. So that Hijikata had one, for once, so that he didn’t need to give up everything that he’d ever had for Kondou for the rest of his life.

By now Kondou is crying, but he can’t yell even if he wants to, because his throat is already raw from screaming for Heisuke and Chizuru. It hurts to even talk, physically and mentally, but he keeps going – he has to. There’s no other option available to him. ]

Because I know you. And I know that you’ll pretend that everything is fine, just so that others don’t have to worry about you anymore! Why do you have to do this every time? Why?

[ Why, he sobs, he begs and he pleads for answers, but he doubts that he’s going to get them. ]

[ fucking hell.

he wants to understand him?

( 'i just want to be able to stay with you!' ) ]

Both of you... you always want things that could do everything but make you happy.

[ he doesn't doubt him and that's perhaps what makes this the most fragile of a situation. there's nothing to doubt—he did it and he paid the ultimate price. and hijikata knows souji knows now, too, and he himself has no hope of avoiding inevitable things that have yet come to pass because now they have.

there are answers, but they're not answers that are going to give kondou any solace. he bows his head forward, tipping it against the windowsill. ]

And the only thing it's ever done for both of you is get yourselves killed.

[ the wants pertaining to him, at least.

kazama's version of what happened at utsunomiya is just the grave digger for answer question left there. ]

I am happy! You and Souji never believe me, but being with you all, being able to see what the Shinsengumi grew into… I don’t need anything else. I already have more than I ever thought I would in my life.

[ His words are hoarse now, barely whispered, but he wants to be able to shout them, as though that will drill them into Hijikata’s head somehow and make him believe them. If only it was that easy, he thinks bitterly. ]

Please. Have faith in me. That’s all I can ask of you anymore…

[ Just one last time. ]

[ no.

he wants to say no.

but he's stopped because as he lets the words sink in, there is the undeniable nagging that it obviously doesn't matter what he does. if he pushes them away he hurts them and they seem to fare no better (he still wonders if he had been here, if he hadn't lost a day in this place, could he have done something for chizuru and heisuke? no, but it still is going to haunt him because he doesn't know that because he didn't get the chance to try).

slowly, hijikata shifts, moving to straighten. it's not as if he can walk away here considering he's at a dead end in more than one sense. they're not... why them? why all of them, but why them when they wanted so little? ]

...All right.

[ ,this is awful but he can't see a reason to hold onto to keep going this way and neither of them are going to get anywhere. kondou's already broken down, but he's not going to be the first one to leave and hijikata can't so it's... well.

he turns but god he still can't really bring himself to look at him directly even as he heads towards him before finally coming to kneel down in front of him, his eyes closed in slight frustration. ]

...So stop this.

... Forgive me for taking up your time.

[ Hijikata doesn't have to say no for Kondou to be able to hear it in his tone anyway, and he just can't keep on fighting for this when he's lost before the battle even truly began. It's difficult to force himself to his feet, but he does so even if there's nothing steady about the way that he holds himself.

Coming here was a mistake, wasn't it? All that it had done was confirm his worst fears, that by letting himself die he'd well and truly lost Hijikata and there was nothing he could do about it. It was his own fault.

Death was far easier to bear than this was. ]

[ that sounds so final, doesn't it?

hijikata tells himself that it should (there's nothing here, there's nothing to gain and this place this fucking place wants to bring every single person he's ever cared about and rip them apart piece by piece in front of him again and again).

he doesn't look even when kondou speaks, doesn't look when he goes to get up but that's fine (he can't do this, he can't keep promising them things and watching those promises crack into pieces as he fails them time and time again—once is enough).

"So that's how it is."

why does he feel like he's just gotten hit by souji all over again? why... why does he feel that souji would hit him again over this, too?

it's not any of that really gets him to do much of anything, but as the other gets to his feet, his haori ends up brushing against hijikata, against the side of his face and suddenly before he himself even realizes he's reached out to grab at it, pulling in a clinging manner to try and get the other to wait.

that... that. he made a mistake getting this close to try and make a point—he thought if he didn't look it'd be fine, but the touch of fabric is just as real as having to look at the other (if not even moreso) and his reaction to grab—to cling for him to not— ]

...Don't. I'm sorry, I... [ he swallows, finding that a hollow request after making such an effort to push him away. but how is he supposed to do that still when he has to acknowledge this person is indeed real, that he's not talking to ghosts, that he's not seeing things, that there's something actually tangible in all of this and not some nightmare he's going to eventually wake up from.

how is he supposed to not be a child and actually push away the one thing he's always wanted more than anything in life and lost it through his own faults...?

his voice is quiet, fingers clutching tighter in the process. ]

...Please don't go where I can't follow.

[ he can't do this. he can't let this happen. not again. not after seeing them die like that. not ever again no matter the circumstances. he's holding something of kondou's in his hand now, and he realizes there's no way he's going to have the ability to follow through with his previous intentions because he's not going to let go. ]

[ As much as he hates to admit it, in that moment it’s very tempting to pull away, to walk out that door despite Hijikata’s pleads for him not to. Kondou isn’t able to understand no matter how much he may wish to, and right now it’s making him feel worse. Last week, he’d begun to think that perhaps he had an opportunity, a chance, one that he’d never get again because he’d given away his last one and the universe was tired of giving him more.

I already have is the response that he wants to give when Hijikata begs him not to go where he can’t follow, and the thought leaves a bitter taste in his mouth. There’s no way that they can change that now, no matter how much either of them may want to, (and it’s not as though he knows how his friend is feeling, what would he know?).

Kondou knows nothing. Has he simply been deluding himself this whole time? ]

I don’t know what to do anymore, Toshi. I'm the one that can’t make you happy.

[ While he may not be making a move to pull away from Hijikata, Kondou doesn’t make any other move in any other direction either, to do anything else. For all intents and purposes it seems as though he’s frozen on the spot, and that nothing will be able to coax him, to breathe purpose into his soul. Sometimes, it feels as though he’s lost it altogether. This time, he wonders if he ever had it in the first place.

Kondou’s mouth is dry at the thought that Hijikata may have been right after all. Did he truly know his best friend?

His heart screams yes while his gut churns, while it repeats no no no until he’s sick of hearing anymore. ]

I'm not looking to be happy.

[ happiness, while he wants to see it in others, while he fully believes in the aspect, is never something he sought: because his purpose was what mattered and kondou's dream was the only thing that drove him as far as it did. and through that, working to make that happen along the way, the small things were enough. they were always enough.

chizuru, on the other hand, he wanted happy. kondou, he wanted happy. he wanted them happy because they were good people who wanted to see others happy themselves. and if that was such a intricate part of their lives, didn't they deserve the same opportunity in turn? ]

This is just so. . . I can't stop anything here. [ he can't stop them from dying, he can't make anything move, he has no control to push anything forward or hold something back and that's jarring. and hasn't life just been worthless those past few months without her? she'd been the only reason, he realized, that he hadn't gotten himself killed and the only reason he even survived so long with kondou gone from his world.

...and continuously, as each one of the shinsengumi fell away to their deaths, as well. ]

I left her on the mainland for her own good months ago. [ he's not sure where he's going with this yet, but he feels obligated to say it, like he owes it to kondou to tell him but it's more guilt, more the sudden connection that he left both of them for difference reasons under different circumstances and neither one has panned in their favor. he can't say if he hadn't woken up here again if he'd see chizuru again, but now that's he's here and he watched her die, it doesn't matter. home doesn't matter. here in this place right now is all that matters. ] But then I wake up to this and all I can wonder is why did I ever leave her at all? Why did I leave her after leaving you when this is what happens?

...And I can't think of a good enough answer to rationalize it, anymore. I can't... provide either of you with what I want to be able to, but I also don't want to lose you again. I can't just stand back and watch either of you die all over again.

[ his fingers loosen on the haori, although it's a very slow and trying process. ]

You don't have to do anything. [ he doesn't want kondou to have that responsibility or that burden. he's done enough. too much, and hijikata knows that from hearing him speak and even smelling the lingering blood on his clothes. he wants the others to come first and he wants to help kondou keep them safe. heisuke had said—

...that's right, heisuke had said... ]

I'm not looking for you to do anything—I never have—other than stay with me. Just put up with me so I can keep you near so I don't keep losing you. [ and right now, chizuru's dead and kondou's here—it's like some awful curse they're stuck with dealing with hijikata's problems concerning the other party but he's just so hateful and so upset and he knows he's being contradictory and sending mixed signals and breaking things of kondou's he has no right to and never has wanted to even chip only to reverse and make it seem pointless to have taken a swing in the first place...

...he doesn't know, he doesn't know if he wants to know. he doesn't want kondou to deal with him any more than he did seconds ago which prompted him to be cruel in the first place in hopes of avoiding that extra piece, but it's not working like it should. maybe he's made kondou worse off by doing it like that, maybe he's known this all along and just insisted it was for their own good like he always did with how he treated souji despite the other's protests and pleas and tantrums.

maybe he just has insisted all along that the only reason what he's done is the lesser of the two evils because the other choice was far too self-indulgent to possibly be the better.

all he knows for sure is that without chizuru he can't live without kondou. and, now, there is absolutely no way without him that he can live without her. it's dependent and it's awful and it's shitty selfish needs and desires, but there's... no reason for this, anymore, is there? there's no reason to push them away if that doesn't save them. ]

I'm so tired of losing.

Edited 2013-12-19 17:41 (UTC)

Why shouldn’t you be able to find happiness for yourself? Toshi, if you keep going on in this way, if you keep putting other people’s needs before your own all the time… All that you’re going to end up achieving is driving yourself into the ground. I don’t want that for you. Not here, not at home.

I… I'm honoured, that you followed me all this way, but I understand that I can’t continue to be selfish with you anymore. Others need you, too. I don’t want you to hold back. There has to be some kind of happiness that you can find. Yukimura… Yukimura, she makes you feel that way, doesn’t she? And it’s hard because here, in this world, she doesn’t remember any of that. So you have to pretend that you don’t want to be happy, while your heart still cries out for the smallest shreds of it.

[ A lot of this is an assumption on Kondou’s part, he knows that, but he still feels fairly confident in his assessment of the situation. His smile grows more wistful, then, and he finds himself kneeling down in front of Hijikata despite his earlier intentions to get up and go. He reaches out for his hand, then, holds onto him tightly to try and reassure him that he’s here, that he’s not going anywhere if he can help it. While he may have run out of chances at home, he knows that he has another one now, right here with Hijikata, and he doesn’t want to lose that. If he doesn’t make the most of it, then he’ll never be able to forgive himself. ]

It’s difficult to stop anything here, that much is true. It makes things difficult, to say the least, but aren’t the Shinsengumi used to these kinds of conditions? If we let ourselves stay down after someone had shoved us, then we never would have made it this far. We’d still be crushed beneath Serizawa’s heel.

[ That too had been a trying time, and in some ways it was different to this, but in others it wasn’t that dissimilar at all. ]

You can’t keep trying to push people away. Only we know what is for our own good, Toshi. Yukimura and I both are particularly stubborn, you should know that by now. If there’s something that we want, then we’re going to go for it, no questions asked. We both want you to be happy. Is it so wrong to be selfish for a change?

[ As much as he wishes that he could say that Hijikata won’t lose him again, that’s a promise that Kondou just can’t make. Instead he thinks that he can give him something close enough, or at least he hopes that it’s enough, because hearing him talk like this breaks his heart in ways that he never would have thought possible. Or should it really be that surprising? It’s Hijikata, he’s held Kondou’s heart in his hand for so long, perhaps it shouldn’t be surprising at all that there’s no one who can affect him this much. The only one is right here, in front of him, asking him not to go anywhere.

What a strange turn of events. It almost makes him smile. ]

Wasn’t I the one just telling you that I needed you? I will stay with you as long as I am able. That, I can promise you. Though now that you’ve told me this, I hope you’re aware of just what you’re getting yourself into, having to be stuck with me. It’s not something that a lot of people can manage.

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