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Legend of Sawamura	By : eternalstarhaven Category: -Misc Anime > Yaoi - Male/Male Views: 971 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: For fanfiction. I do not own Ace of Diamond, the characters, and do not write this for money or profit. Ace of Diamond is the work of Yuji Terajima.

Chapter List
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~ Yoichi’s POV ~

Panic attack was an understatement. And considering he could pull off some incredible pranks, he really thought his boyfriend was still trying to get back at him for what he did to Eijun two years ago. How many times did he have to say he was sorry about that? He woke up, planning on kicking his little brother awake to find out that it was one of his sisters in the bed with him and to really make him feel as if this was the prank of the year, she had wet the bed and he was cold and sticky.

With a shriek, he jumped from the bed, not caring that he had dumped his little sister on the floor and dashed to the bathroom. He had thought these days were long gone and no amount of scrubbing could take this filth off of him. God he hated little girls… He hated kids… Why was his sister sleeping with him in the first place?! He was supposed to be at Seidou with a game to play!

And then it started to slowly sink into his mind that he wasn’t in his room at Seidou, but his run down apartment, with only one bedroom, a couch in the living room and blankets on top of a futon. His mother slept on the couch and his little sisters had to share with him if he didn’t want to sleep on the floor or in the bathtub. This was beyond not funny. He hated the time he had spent in this place… His mother was a drug user and a prostitute. The food they had came from the streets and vendors that were distracted with other customers. Stealing was wrong, he knew that, but his mother didn’t have a decent job and it was amazing that social services had never picked them up.

After he went to Seidou, they eventually took his sisters away and holding it off was probably not doing them any favors. Shit, this wasn’t happening and he sank to the floor, his fingers clutching at the wash basin. His face told him everything… He was thirteen, his birthday two days after Eijun’s, meaning that they were technically the same age for 48 hours. The brat never let him live it down either.

What was going on? What was he supposed to do, go back to middle school and pretend that those idiots were his friends? His baseball team had sucked; it had been no different than Eijun’s. At least Eijun had been friends with his classmates and perhaps that’s why Yoichi had had such a hard time liking him. Eijun had come from a good life prior to Seidou and a lot of the kids that went to that school hated him for it. No one went to Seidou if they could avoid it and Eijun could have, but he had been such an idiot that he had come there without thinking that there were safer and healthier options.

Was he really going to have to do the rest of middle and high school over again?! What about his friendship with Eijun? What about Ryo? He whimpered, struggling not to make a sound as he started to sob in distress. Did that mean their relationship didn’t exist anymore? Being gay had been a nightmare for Yoichi, but Ryo and Eijun had made him feel normal and that it was okay to have a relationship that wasn’t considered or deemed as traditional. He never thought a day would come when he would grab his jacket and go to the one person that could make everything better, and it wasn’t Ryo.

He got on a train, sneaking in with the large crowds as if they were his parents. As short and small as he was, no one would question it. One person would look at him and see him beside someone else, think that he was with him and then go back to ignoring him. As soon as the train reached Nagano, he got off, trying to figure out where to go and how he was supposed to find one loud-mouthed idiot. And yet, he never heard him. For two days he wandered the vast countryside, the houses so far apart he couldn’t rationalize this as normal. Where he came from, space between houses was a few feet away.

It was pure luck that he spotted him coming down from the mountain, wearing that god awful hoodie he had worn when he first came to Seidou. Unable to stop himself, he took off after him, shocked that he was still as fast as he had been as a shortstop. He’d have to figure that part out later. Rationally, he should have thought this through. Eijun wouldn’t know him; he was twelve instead of seventeen, but they were brothers now! Time shouldn’t matter and he had a growing terror that it did and he would have to do this over again as well.

Eijun looked stressed out, pale and with dark circles under his eyes. His body looked like it was on the verge of collapsing, as if he was pushing himself far too hard and he only did that when he was upset or anxious. Yoichi could relate and just as Eijun got back down to the base of the mountain, his gaze drifted in Yoichi’s direction, those golden eyes going wide in shock. He knew him… Yoichi didn’t have to ask and without thinking the two collided in a bone crushing hug. He didn’t care how stupid this looked, but with everything being turned upside down, Eijun was the only thing he had that was certain.

“Yoichi,” Eijun whispered… He could hardly believe that he was real, but he couldn’t help but hope that this wasn’t another cruel joke. Two years of being his roommate, Eijun could never recall where Yoichi seemed so relieved to see him and with a shout of shocked happiness, he wrapped his arms around Eijun’s neck and started to whisper over and over that he was glad Eijun wasn’t just a memory or a dream.

“I want to ask if we’re going to wake up anytime soon, but I think I’ve pinched myself enough at this point,” Eijun sighed sitting down on the ground. Yoichi did the same, the two of them staring up at the cloudy sky. “What are you doing in Nagano?”

“Honestly, I think I just hopped on a train and went to the town I read about in all of your text messages. Dude, why are all of the houses spaced out like this?”

“This is normal.”

“Eijun, you and I have completely different definitions on what normal is. I’m just glad that you’re not like everyone else. I woke up in my old apartment and thought Ryosuke was finally getting back at me for what I did to you two years ago.”

“He would never go this far and neither would you.”

“Little brother, this is way too much work for a prank and even I know this isn’t something you should do. I hate living in that apartment; not that Seidou High was any better. Any ideas what happened?”

“The only thing I could think of was that what we said became a reality. I’m not much into scifi or anything, but I guess everything has some grain of truth to it. Yoichi, I hope this convinces you to never watch that stuff ever again.”

“I’m more than fine with that plan. Eijun, does this mean that everything we did hasn’t happened yet? What about Ryo? I mean I know we wanted a second chance, but I wasn’t expecting to lose so much in the process.”

“Yoichi, there’s something I need to show you.” Eijun asked if Yoichi was able to continue running. He wanted to say no, but to his surprise, he wasn’t tired like he thought he should have been. Eijun, when he first came to Seidou, he could barely last half a mile, but he seemed to have no problem now as he took to a dirt road and made his way into town. Yoichi looked horrified when he saw the supposed library. “Is this out of the prehistoric era?”

“They didn’t have libraries like this back then; it’s small, but they do have a computer or two.”

“On dial-up maybe. Eijun, do you guys even know what the internet is out here?”

Eijun ignored him and took him to where the archives were and started pulling out some of the stuff he had found. “I think we triggered something… When we said that we wanted a second chance, we mentioned wanting to save Seidou. While it meant something totally different to us…” Yoichi felt like he was going to hurl… He had no idea that Seidou had this kind of hidden secret or past. Tetsuya, Ryosuke, and Jun… This had been their world. It was violent and hopeless, a place where kids went that didn’t have a future. “Yoichi, when you went there, did you have another option?”

“No, not after that fight I got into.”

“The people going to Seidou didn’t have a choice either. They lacked the money, the grades, or got into some kind of trouble that they couldn’t pick another high school. This school, it became a place where society turned a blind eye on who or what they considered trash. Poorly paid teachers, a new head coach with no experience… This is the last place we would want to play baseball at and yet we somehow turned it around, one pitch shy of getting our senpais to Koshien. That dream meant far more to them than it did to us and it’s because of what they had to go through to make it there.”

“I remembered hearing rumors about Tetsuya, Jun, or Ryo, but I thought that’s what they were; just rumors.”

Eijun shook his head and guided him over to the computers. While they seemed outdated, they did turn on. Eijun typed in Tetsuya Yuki’s name and several websites came up that had his name and face all over them. “I wasn’t sure what I would find when I typed in their names, but he’s been fighting all of the known gangs in the Tokyo Metropolitan Area. The police tried to arrest him, but they couldn’t prove that he had studied martial arts anywhere. Eijun typed in Jun Isashiki’s name and there were youtube videos of the fights he had gotten into. It was usually ten against one, sometimes more, but Jun had no problems over powering them. And then there was Ryosuke Kominato. Most of his information had gone to local media stations.

“Did you ever stop to ask how these three were so good at baseball, or this case, complex and advanced martial arts? Tetsuya’s year was classified as the ‘hopeless generation,’ and yet these three don’t fit into that category. Yoichi, there’s more.”

He took him back to his house and walked into the barn. “When we first started learning baseball, could you hit a four or two-seam?”

“I was lucky to hit the ball at all; what are you getting at?”

Finding a metal pipe that was about the size of a bat, Eijun handed it to Yoichi and asked him to try swinging at one of his pitches. Yoichi felt a chill run down his spine when he saw Eijun’s form. It wasn’t what it should have been. Eijun couldn’t pitch like this before Seidou, and yet it was like everything they had accomplished, all the hard work they had put into baseball had stayed with them. “You had washboard abs in your third year… Have you even checked to see if you still have them?”

Yoichi hadn’t. The only thing he had noticed was that he wasn’t eighteen anymore, but thirteen. Lifting up his shirt, he almost fainted from the mental overload. “We get to keep our memories, skills, and strengths, but somehow revert back to the age we were.” Eijun showed him a photo that had been taken about a week ago… Eijun looked different. There was no baby fat on him now, where as in the picture, he looked as if he could use a lot more exercise. It wasn’t that he was fat, but he was not an athlete either.

“I have no idea what’s going on, but Tetsuya, Ryosuke, and Jun are just like us.”

“That’s a bit of a stretch… What if you’re wrong?”

“Ryosuke lives maybe three hours away from here in Kanagawa; if we get on the train now, we can find out if we’re right and still have time to get back before my parents know that I’m gone.”

“Eijun, I… what if he doesn’t remember? This is hard enough as it is; what if he doesn’t want me this time?”

“We just have to find a way to get him to fall in love with you a second time; it’s not that big of deal. Isn’t that more than enough reason to go back to Seidou?”

“Eijun have you ever been in love?” His ears and face turned bright red and he scratched the back of his head… “I’m not even sure that I know what that word means. It’s not like I’ve heard anyone say it to me, or why they would bother. People’s usual response is ‘I hate you.’ Yoichi flinched. Eijun had had one hell of a time at Seidou, but what about before, when he was going to school here in Nagano? “Well… if we’re going to go, now would be the time.”

It wasn’t as easy to sneak onto a train in a small town like Nagano, but they managed. Taking a seat near one of the doors, they began their journey to Kanagawa prefecture.

~ Ryosuke’s POV ~

Tetsuya had once told them that he used to travel back beyond high school, but because it had never happened, none of them paid much attention or thought they were past a certain point where it was possible. Without being able to meet up with Jun or Tetsuya, he had no way of knowing how they had gone back and this time it wasn’t a month or two, but five years.

He was angry, depressed and he couldn’t find enough people to hurt before the day would end. Ryosuke had just gotten done visiting Yoichi before time reversed itself again… everything had been fine, or that’s what he had thought. Eijun wasn’t in the room before or after that visit. Why didn’t he go looking for him like he usually did. Tetsuya was always asking about him and, right now, he didn’t know if he could look his friend in the eyes.

How could they have thought that they were finally free of the curse? Eijun still had another year to go and without Yoichi; there was no guarantee that he would have been safe. Coach Ochiai hated Eijun and more than once, he had indicated that he didn’t want the southpaw leading the team, but that broken pitcher, Satoru Furuya. Hands in his pockets, the streets pathetically empty of people, he wandered around looking for something that could make the pain in his heart lighter.

How many times would he have to make Yoichi fall in love with him? It hurt every time he had to repeat meeting him, saving him, protecting him… but at the same time, seeing that look of anxiety turn into awe and then unwavering love and trust… Ryo never got tired of trying to win Yoichi’s love and he never failed at telling him either. His family was worried about him and it felt awkward around his brother. Before he had gone to Seidou, he had had a close relationship with Haruichi, now all he could do was watch him playing baseball in the backyard, the bat too big for his small hands, and his helmet made it almost impossible for him to see what he was swinging at. It was so comical to watch, but that felt like a lifetime ago and he tried to appreciate being with him without the fear of having to keep an eye out for anyone trying to hurt him.

Passing through the park, a place the locals avoided, he spotted two kids sitting on a bench, probably around twelve and thirteen. Just looking at them from behind, he could almost imagine that it was Eijun and Yoichi, but there was no way those two would know each other yet. Plus, one lived in Tokyo while the other came from Nagano. “This is gross!” Ryo froze… He knew that voice. It wasn’t quite as loud as it should have been, but that was definitely the southpaw he should have checked on the night before everything restarted.

Needing to verify the impossibility, he made his way back over to them. They weren’t paying attention, instead they were sharing some kind of ice cream, a flavor that was Yoichi’s favorite. “How can you eat that?!”

“You wouldn’t say that if your last meal was two days ago and plus, you’re stupid. It’s awesome because I say it’s awesome!”

“Yoichi, I’m starting to wonder why we adopted each other. You like horror movies, I hate them. You like butterscotch ice cream, and I prefer sherbert. You suck at video games…”

“I do not! And for the record, we both agreed that we would never watch another horror movie for the rest of our natural lives!”

“Does this even classify as a horror movie, or science fiction?”

“Both.”

“How?”

“Losing the love of my life to time travel is classified as horror.”

“I already told you that if he fell in love with you once, he’ll do it again.”

“How the hell would you know?! Your idea of love is making out with a tire!”

Ryo felt light headed. How many times had he wished for this, hoping beyond hope that Yoichi would one day join them? What he couldn’t quite figure out was how Eijun had gotten caught up in this? Tetsuya was hard enough to handle as it was; he wanted Eijun as far away from Seidou as possible and now Eijun was involved with the curse, a curse that had started with him in the first place? And yet, something told him that maybe this was supposed to happen all along. If Eijun had felt any kind of regret or a need to save Seidou… This was the same school that had taken his life. While he might not have inflicted the curse on Seidou, something else had.

Walking over to the icecream truck, he paid for an orange sherbert, knowing it was one of Eijun’s favorite flavors and as he pouted at not being able to enjoy the cone with Yoichi, Ryo extended an arm between them. Eijun’s expression lit up with pure excitement and then fell… He wasn’t supposed to take food or candy from strangers, but the sherbert looked so good.

Eijun followed the owner of the arm and then gasped, and with a shout of happiness he took the ice cream and devoured it. “You idiot! Don’t take food from…” Yoichi stopped in mid-lecture, eyes trembling with hope, fear, desire… “Ryo…” He couldn’t stop himself from saying it and when his lover gave him a fond smile, one filled with so much love, he couldn’t stop the tears that started to slide down his cheeks.

“We should go somewhere safer.”

“What’s wrong with the park?” Eijun asked, not seeing anything dangerous.

Ryo guided him with gentle pressure against his back, almost reminded of his younger brother. Haruichi never saw the danger either and it usually resulted in a lot of nasty fights before he managed to get him home.

“You really should pay attention to the news more, Eijun. The park is a common meeting spot for drug swaps, robberies, and assaults.”

Yoichi wanted to wrap his arms through Ryo’s, but was this really the person he had given his heart to? What if he was wrong? “Ryo… I… This might sound really awful, but the last thing we did together… I need you to tell me what it was.”

“Is that really something you want your self-proclaimed little brother to hear?”

“Yoichi, he knew what my favorite ice cream was; if he wasn’t our Ryo, he could have easily picked a different flavor, or better yet, he would have ignored us.”

“He isn’t wrong,” Ryo agreed. “I can count on one hand how many friends I have. The two of you don’t count; due to you adopting this little brat, I’ve now acquired a second brother and he’s more of a handful than Haruichi ever was.”

“I am not!”

“Eijun, both of you jumped on a train and stupidly walked into a gang infested park… Let me ask you something, little brother… Is this something you want Tetsuya to find out about and I would think about the question before you answer.”

“I would have ran away…” he pouted, kicking at a rock on the ground. Ryo suddenly didn’t envy Tetsuya… This kid was awful to look after and it was no wonder he never managed to survive without the three of them around. “I probably don’t have a lot of time before my family wants me home.” He told them.

“Eijun,” Yoichi started to protest, but Ryo stopped him. The kid wasn’t wrong. He was probably one of the few that came to Seidou that didn’t have a bad life. It was his behavior and grades that had landed him in that school and if Tetsuya had his way, he’d never have a reason to go there, but that wasn’t something he could avoid.

“I’ll see if I can track down the others and we’ll come to Nagano,’ he promised. Eijun nodded, dusting off the dirt on his legs. “Eijun, you really need to watch yourself outside of Nagano. There are places that are safe, and this isn’t one of them.”

“I would tell you that I’m not a little kid anymore, but that’s not true anymore. Ryo, do you guys know what’s going on,” Eijun asked him.

“Yes and no; I think the one that can best explain all of this is Tetsuya and he’s not in a good mental place right now. Before you go, I need to tell you both something so listen carefully. This is not the first time that Tetsuya, Jun or I have travelled through time and it most likely won’t be the last. If, for whatever reason, time reverses, don’t panic, and we’ll figure out a location to meet. If it’s before high school, we can make it Nagano, but first I have to see if I can find Jun or Tetsuya. He’s the only one out of the three of us that has ever gone back this far.”

Yoichi grabbed onto Ryo’s arm, shaking with fear and panic. He just found Ryo, was happy that he hadn’t forgotten about him, and now there was a chance this was going to happen again? “I should get going,” Eijun told them and he was gone, heading towards the trains as fast as he could go.

“I always felt bad about all the running the coach made him do, but maybe it really will keep him alive,” Yoichi whispered.

“If Tetsu doesn’t kill him before a thug does, then yes, he’ll survive if he can just keep running. That’s his problem though… Eijun has a habit of getting involved in things that’s better left alone and Seidou was one of them.”

~ Eijun’s POV ~

It wasn’t that he really wanted to say goodbye to either one of them, but staying wasn’t an option and Yoichi needed Ryo. Eijun had gotten used to being alone, not that he was happy about it, but it had taught him the meaning of resiliency and he sighed in relief as the train pulled up to the station about thirty minutes before he had to get home. He didn’t have a phone and if they decided to check in with any of his younger friends, they were going to ask a lot of questions about where he had been.

His behavior was more than likely different from what he had been like prior to returning to the past. In truth, his friends were the same age as he was, but he had to mentally refer to them as younger because he had the Seidou timeline to think about and this one. Ryo had said that this wasn’t the first time for those three and while his head was hurting from how hard he was trying to figure this all out, he really had no idea how science, time and all of that worked. Eijun had hated science, but that was probably because he had never given it an honest effort, but the same was true of the other subjects as well.

And then there was Tetsuya… Ryo wasn’t joking when he said Tetsuya was going to have his hide for this, but he wasn’t even sure what he did that was going to set him off. His uncle still had a few days before he had to fly back to the United States and normally, there was no way you could pry Eijun away from him. He had his reasons for that, ones that he tried to keep quiet about. As far as his family knew, Eijun believed that the man was his uncle instead of his actual father.

He kept waiting for them to tell him the truth and maybe it wouldn’t hurt to finally make demands of his own. Stepping in front of the water basin they kept outside, he washed the dirt off his face and arms, liking how cold it was and it helped to push away some of the confusion and fear from the back of his mind. Losing his head because he was afraid was something he might have done in his first year, but he had gone through too much at this point, to become unsteady or unreliable. He still wanted to help them, but he didn’t know what he was dealing with yet. He hoped that Ryo was enough right now to keep Yoichi from getting too out of hand.

His roommate might act tough, but he had boundaries that he operated in and this was way outside of that. Perhaps Eijun never wanted to date anyone because he never saw anything good result from it, even if Ryo and Yoichi were proof that there was at least one couple that could go the distance, but he didn’t know enough about either one of them to know if there was something that could survive past high school, or if it was just that… a high school crush.

Walking into the house, he knew immediately that he was in trouble? It was just that feeling you got when everyone was quietly tracking you through the room, as if they had been waiting and it was something he knew all too well after dealing with the head coach and the third years when he first went to Seidou. “This is the second day that you come home just before dark, Eijun! Where have you been going and this time, I want an answer!” his mother shouted.

“Do you want to tag a long tomorrow,” Eijun asked quietly. The fact that he wasn’t shouting, but talking in a normal voice had all of them on high alert. Eijun probably should have walked away at this point. They didn’t need to get involved with what was happening to him, but he was alone and when he was backed into a corner, he became angry and unmanageable. He didn’t have a close bond with the others and the one person that he did want comfort from, was with Ryo and Eijun lashed out as a result. Although, the way he was doing it now was something Kazuya would do, not Eijun. “I get up at 0400, so you might want to set an alarm clock. Not even the rooster gets up that early. I start running to town, towards the mountain, up and down the other side, back up and down and through town again. Sometimes I’ll stop at the library and read the old archives they keep in the unsolved crimes section, surf the internet for about an hour, and then repeat the circuit all over again. I run so much that my legs start to hurt, but I ignore it and keep going.” He had been running enough for the past three days that he grabbed his shoes and showed them the holes in them. They weren’t designed for long distance running, but he had kept his mouth shut because running was the only way for him to clear his head enough that he wouldn’t do or say something he couldn’t take back.

“Eijun…” she tried to appease, suddenly feeling as if she was the one doing something wrong. “We just thought that you were looking forward to your uncle visiting…”

“Don’t even start by bringing him into this,” Eijun snapped. “You know what… I think I’m tired of waiting for all of you to talk to me as if I’m old and smart enough to handle the truth. Fact number one, adults lie when it suits them, but if I do it, I get smacked on the head or grounded. It taught me that adults make the rules and kids just have to suck it up and deal with the double standards. So, I have a question, when were the two of you going to fess up that the man I call my uncle is actually my biological father?”

From the way his mother paled, he knew he had caught her by surprise and his ‘father’ looked furious. She tried to open her mouth, but it seemed that his real father didn’t seem all that surprised, as if he had known, but hadn’t been able to do anything about it because he lived in the United States. His grandfather on the other hand, seemed as if he hadn’t known and the darkening of his expression spoke volumes. His grandfather had a lot of pride and when people in his household did something that brought shame on them, it was also a reflection on him as a parent. “You never told him, but he found out when he did an unexpected visit to see his ‘nephew.’ He never made it past the dirt path that leads to the house and when I commented on his eyes, you told me to go in the house and then he was gone.”

“And did you think that I wasn’t going to listen in on the fight you had later… Grandpa was gone so he never heard it, but I sat in the stairwell and heard everything. He was a professional baseball player and after mom got pregnant, both of you tried to cover it up. Why didn’t you tell him? It was his choice to give up baseball and to deal with the media, but you had no right to lie to him. I might have wanted to know my dad… He isn’t a criminal, so why?! Honestly, I don’t think it matters anymore. My parents are liars, my uncle isn’t my uncle and my father isn’t my father. You think you know me, but you don’t. Did you know that I stopped caring about school after that? I didn’t want to become accomplished if it meant that I had to bring a kid into a world like this. I don’t even like women… when were either of you going to say that I love you, or that I’m proud that I had you?”

Having said what he wanted to, he retreated, letting them deal with the backlash. As far as he was concerned, he had done nothing wrong, and neither had Sesshin. It seemed all he could do was watch the boy leave. He closed the door to his room and tried to go to sleep, but he couldn’t. One of these days his temper was going to get him into a lot of trouble, but he was far too stubborn to care until after the damage was done.

His mother had looked like she was going to faint, his uncle looked terrified, and Sesshin, well, he had no idea what he was thinking because Eijun was too scared to find out. Long after he should have been asleep, he heard his door open and close and then a heavy weight settling on his bed. “There was probably a better way to handle that.”

“Fact number oneI hate it when people yell at me in front of everyone and she never bothered to hear my side of the story before yelling at me. Fact number two, double standards don’t work on me. If you set a rule, then I’m going to hold the person that set it accountable as well. Fact number three, I have no respect for liars. Did you know I was your son?”

“I suspected it, but because of the way the laws are in Japan; I settled for just being allowed to see you. That was the condition they set and I really didn’t have much of a choice. Neither one of them wanted me to visit and I had to go through your grandfather in order to get permission.”

“I’m trying not to hate them. Why would they do that? What did I do wrong to have them deny either one of us the right to know each other?”

“I have no idea; I mean I wasn’t expecting or wanting a kid, but I wouldn’t have said no to having one either. Eijun, was it really that bad here? I mean other than the fact that everyone was being lied to, this was your home.”

“What exactly is your definition of good or bad? Did I have a roof over my head? Yes. Did I have clothes on my back? Yes. Did I ever go hungry? Maybe a little. I can’t say your brother ever had a stable job and farm work doesn’t always provide a reliable income. Did I have friends? That’s a big maybe. We hung out, we played together, but in the end, I can’t say that was close enough to ever talk to them about anything personal. I’m loud, stupid and never think before I act and I think I finally figured out why I became this way. If no one has any expectations, then I don’t have to become an adult that has to lie to a child about who his real parents are.”

Eijun sat up, still not lifting his gaze to look at the man everyone wanted him to see as an uncle. “Did you know that no one in this house will say ‘I love you?’ My grandfather hits me on the back of the head a lot… I probably deserved it most of the time, but he’s never once said anything positive. Someone asked me today if I’ve ever loved anyone and I couldn’t answer him. The truth was… I have no idea what that word is or means. It has four letters and I’m sure it has a text-book definition, but emotionally, I’m stupid about it as I am everything else. I can tell you how I see it? Love is a lie that you spin around people to get what you want. If you had known that she was pregnant with me, would you have continued playing baseball? I think that’s what I overheard that night. Your brother said that he didn’t want you to quit, but I don’t think that’s the real truth. Baseball players have kids all the time and still play.”

Sesshin could see that this question had bothered Eijun for a while and leaving things alone had been the wrong answer. There were hints that this boy had suffered, but he was bottling it up, just as he had about knowing about his background. “Eijun, look at me, please?” Those golden eyes were definitely the real proof of who his dad was, that and he didn’t have a lick of music talent. “I’m not sure if I would have retired, but I do know I would have wanted you in my life. It’s probably a good thing I didn’t find out about this in the United States; I would have sued my brother without a second thought and then demanded full custody.”

“Is there no chance of fixing this? I’m not familiar with Japanese law, but is it really that hard to change what’s on paper versus what’s real?”

“Honestly, I have no idea. They threatened to take and hide you from me if I pushed the issue; think of it like this. I’m a man that generally has no weaknesses, but in your case, they were holding you hostage and if all I could do was have you in an ‘uncle’ capacity, I had to tag along or risk losing you completely. There are ways to get a person banned from a country. Eijun, you’re twelve, which means that if they somehow keep me from coming back, I won’t get to see you again until after high school.”

Eijun had been through a lot, team banishment, team isolation, the ‘yips’, but this felt far worse than any of that. Sitting beside him was a man that did seem to want him as his son, but wasn't able to have it without fighting a battle that would take years in a court system. Add in the fact that he was from the United States and Eijun was living in Japan, there was no guarantee that the courts would hear him out. “You know something, people always wanted to know what I wanted to do after high school. I think I’ve made my decision,” Eijun growled. He was so angry right now… He had gotten like this once before and it was when Kataoka had refused to pull Furuya out of that game against Ichidai. “I’m going to become a lawyer that can cross international borders and fight shit like this. A father, if he’s done nothing wrong, has the right to know his child. I have the right to know who my father is and I shouldn’t have to worry about you being banned from the country because of something they lied about!”

“What about baseball?”

“I can still play while I’m in college. Professional baseball was just one thing I wanted to pursue and I can put money aside to pay for the schooling. Dad, I have friends that need my help; mentally and physically they’re not okay and maybe if I can become a lawyer and get smarter, I’ll become their strength rather than a weakness.”

“The friends you have here in Nagano?”

Eijun shook his head. “There’s something I need to talk to you about, but I’m afraid that you’ll think I’m crazy, but I promise that I’m not. You’re a lawyer and that usually means you’re really smart and can set aside your emotions to solve a complex problem. Did you know that I run the way I do when I get frightened or angry? It’s just a habit that I fell into and no matter how far I go, I can’t come to an answer about what I’m supposed to do or what the question even is. The one person that might know… He terrifies me on a lot of levels, but deep down, instinctively, I know he’s one of four people that I can’t walk away from.”

“You say you don’t understand love… I think you’re closer to understanding it than a lot of people are. It’s not something you can describe like what you read about in a dictionary. It’s a feeling and it’s not specific or tied down to gender, religion, or laws. Get some sleep and if I’m still allowed to stay here after that little stunt you pulled, we can work on that problem of yours.”

“I don’t really have to leave Japan; I just want you in my life and not as my uncle,” Eijun whispered.

“If this is all we can have, we can sort it out after you’re eighteen.”

The next morning, Eijun didn’t go running like he normally would have, afraid that his family had sent Sesshin packing, afraid that he would notice the house without him in it and he really didn’t want to deal with the emotions that would result from it. Eijun was sitting in a chair near his window, not noticing the quiet opening of his door, or the shuffling of an old man limping across the window.

“I will not have your father sent away.” Startled, Eijun snapped out of his thoughts and looked at his grandfather. He was waiting for a hard slap to the head like usual, but the old man’s hands stayed tucked behind his back. “I’ve been hard on you over the years, but it’s because I have high expectations that don’t result in you living on a farm for the rest of your life. Eijun, do you really need to hear words of praise to know that you’re doing a good job? When people like myself add on more responsibilities, or give you something that you’ve been wanting, it means that we trust and have acknowledged the current expectations we were wanting you to accomplish.”

“As for the mess those two have made, I will ensure that it is corrected. Sesshin is your father, and through no fault of his own, has been denied the right to acknowledge or provide for you as he should have been doing. Financially, he has the means to take care of you. Emotionally, it seems he has that capacity as well, judging from the way he’s accepted the restrictions he’s been forced to acknowledge over the years.”

“What if they refuse to listen?”

“This is Japan and as the senior living person in this house, I make the rules that they will obey if they wish to continue living here. Not only do I reserve the right to throw them out, I can and will disown them, and before they go, I will ensure that they have no further legal rights to you.”

“Grandpa, like I told my father last night… I can call him that right?” His grandfather nodded. “I don’t want anyone to suffer because I want something that’s more for my personal gain than theirs. What I want is to call that man my father and to have him in my life. What my mother did to him was cruel and the choice to quit or stick with baseball was his to make. If you send them a way, how will they ever atone for what they did to him?”

“That heart of yours, Eijun, is far too kind.” His grandfather lifted a hand and watched as Eijun flinched away. Perhaps more than one thing needed to change in this house and he started with ruffling his hair and then retreated, telling him to get dressed and eat something. When he stepped into the living room, his mother was pale and crying, but no one was going to her and he couldn’t see any sign of the man that was actually his uncle. This was weird on so many levels, but Eijun had caused this and he wasn’t sorry about it.

Sesshin was at the kitchen table, his back turned away from her and his grandfather talking to him about the legal rights he had available to him. “Japan is all he knows… Taking him away would probably hurt him in the long run, at least until he can learn English well enough to later decide if he would like to live in the United States versus here. He mentioned something about wanting to become a lawyer and he can do that in either country.”

“His grades aren’t good enough for that,” his mother snapped, but one look from his grandfather, and she stopped. Throwing down her dish towel, she walked out of the house.

“Are you sure she can’t take me away,” Eijun asked, his heart pounding heavily against his chest.

“No. I’ve already contacted a few lawyers about getting your paperwork corrected. Japan does not look on what they did kindly; it’s disgraceful and I share some of the blame as their parent.”

“Grandpa, I’ve never once blamed either one of you; they’re the ones that told the lie. If society started arresting parents and grandparents because of their kids, I don’t think we’d have enough prison space to contain everyone.”

“Eijun, with a personality like that, you’re never going to make it as a prosecuting attorney.”

“I never said I wanted to put people in prison; I said I wanted to stop people like them from hurting and lying to people like me. That means I want to protect people and that, I think, would make me a defense attorney or at least a private detective. Don’t you have to go back to the United States?”

“No,” his grandfather answered. “Due to the circumstances, because you’re his son, as soon as it becomes official on paper, the law can grant him citizenship because of the relationship you have to your mother and myself. I have half a mind to dissolve their marriage, but if you’re wanting things to end with him being acknowledged as your father only, I will take no further actions against them at this time.”

Eijun couldn’t remember the last time he had felt this content with life, but it was only temporary and it didn’t absolve him of what he had to do. Ryo said that he would find the other two and make their way to Nagano. That meant he had to semi-talk to his father about all of this before they arrived. “Do you have a bat with you?” Eijun asked him later.

“I mostly came to Japan to give you my glove and a signed baseball; it was something I had wanted to do when I first ran into you, but your mother didn’t want you to have anything to do with baseball. When they heard about what you were doing in the barn… that was a conversation that you shouldn’t know about, but… They couldn’t hide the truth any longer. Your grandfather was starting to ask questions and the more they evaded, the more it confirmed what he had probably started to suspect. Your talent was nothing like my brothers, but mine. You also had my colored eyes, my obnoxious personality and most importantly, stubborn pride. As soon as your mother went off on you last night, none of us were prepared for what came out of your mouth. Out of nowhere, you declared to the entire house that I was your father, and while they tried to send me packing, your grandfather interfered and let me talk to you. He was listening in on that conversation and that’s when he started contacting legal channels about what my options were and if he was allowed to represent you on my behalf.”

“You guys really shouldn’t cater to tantrums, but I don’t think I would have apologized for what I said either. Do you have a bat or not?”

“No, but I can buy one.”

“Good, what I have to talk to you about will involve the four people I was telling you about and they’re not from Nagano.”

“Alright.”

When they were alone, Eijun started to tell him about what happened, sticking with only the facts. He didn’t know enough about the other three to tell their story, but he could confirm that they had been repeating time for an indefinite length of time. When he was finished, he waited for his father to tell him that he was crazy, but he didn’t say a word for a long time as he sat, processing the information and trying to make sense of it.

“Pending what you’re saying is true, and granted without further evidence I’m not siding for or against you, but… for the sake of the problem you’re presenting, what do you think caused this?”

“At first, Yoichi and I thought it was because we both wanted second chances. His was more of a regret for what he did on my first day of high school, while mine was centered on getting Tetsuya, Jun, and Ryosuke to Koshien. I wasn’t always good at baseball and while I want to blame it on the fact that I didn’t know how to play, that was my fault entirely. I never once tried to get better, not until it was too late to become a reliable teammate. It’s the same with my studies. I’m sure if I actually opened a book and read it, I could pass those tests, but I couldn’t see why I had to read and write if all I was going to do was play baseball. And you say you want proof, I can easily do that.”

“How?”

Eijun ran into the house and asked to borrow the family photo album. He came back out and showed him the photos that were taken a few days before he had travelled back in time. While his facial features were about the same, he did not have the appearance of an athlete. And as much as he hated to admit it, he looked like a complete idiot running around chasing butterflies with his mouth hanging open. There were also pictures of him chasing a group of ducks and then the ducks pounding on his head with their beaks. “My mother told you that I never played baseball before, right?”

Sesshin nodded. “She wasn’t lying about that. The first time you gave me the glove, you spent maybe an hour to show me what they were for and then got back on a plane for the United States. That was the last time I saw you, but after what happened last night and this morning, I think I know what happened. You gave me a link to your world and she wouldn’t allow you to come back. That’s more of a guess because I can’t exactly go back and ask you now that you’re here instead of on a plane.”

“So what does this have to do with now?”

“I didn’t learn how to pitch the way I do until the second half of my first year of high school. After I hit a player in the head, I couldn’t pitch to the inside any longer, and honestly, that almost ended my career as a pitcher. Eventually, I developed what I refer to as the numbers and I started to master the grips on the ball, my confidence started to come back and eventually I could throw the ball where I wanted it to go., The catcher made a promise that if I couldn’t control the pitch in practice, he wouldn’t use it in a real game. The other four that are coming, they’re the same… I take that back, at least three out of the four are on another level entirely. I can’t describe how good they are and it defies logic. We keep all of our memories and it seems the skill and strength of the previous time.”

“That sounds like a time loop more than time travel. With time travel a person can go back briefly and then return, but with a time loop, everything repeats over and over again until all the conditions of what caused it are met. Things can and will change and other than retaining memories, skills, and strength, the five of you are human. I’m talking text-book definition, but I’m afraid a photo isn’t quite enough to fully convince me that this isn’t just some really complex dream and it seems real enough for you to try and find proof that it doesn't exist.”

“You’re not denying it either,” Eijun noticed.

“I’m a lawyer. Until I’ve had all the evidence presented, I will withhold my final decision.”

“Fine, as soon as they get here, I’ll let them present their testimonies. If anyone can prove that this isn’t a dream, I know Tetsuya can. That guy is really smart and I never got away with anything without him knowing about it… not that I didn’t try.”

“So that bratty personality was on purpose.”

Eijun sometimes wished that he could hit a reset button. How many times did he say something and the person he was talking about would end up behind him? In this case, it was Tetsuya Yuki, and beside him was Ryo, Jun and Yoichi, all of them giving him an unimpressed, you’re about to have an early death, look.

“I… well… If I say anything, it’s just going to make it worse; isn’t it?” he asked. Everyone, to include Sesshin nodded. “Then to protect my innocence, I’m going to plead the fifth and not say another word.”

“The what?” Yoichi asked.

“It’s an American phrase that individuals use in order to protect themselves against unwanted questioning from lawyers or law enforcement,” Tetsuya explained. “Eijun is half-American and the man at his side is a lawyer that represents athletes in the United States. He was also a former catcher that played professionally until Eijun was about five years old.”

“Tetsuya…” Jun asked, clearly surprised at Tetsuya’s extensive knowledge of Eijun’s background. “How do you know all of that?”

“I had a lot of time on my hands recently; Ryo isn’t the only one that can hack into computers. It’s rare that we go back this far so I decided to break past all the firewalls of interpol, the FBI, CIA, and every military organization. If you think they don’t keep tabs on all seven billion people in the world, you’re dead wrong. I can go back almost a century or two on all our families, but Eijun was my primary focus.”

“Why?” Sesshin asked.

“In every time loop, Eijun has either died or quit Seidou,” Tetsuya answered. He didn’t bother to hide the truth, nor did he care if this man believed him or not. If he wasn’t on their side, time would repeat and he would never remember the conversation. “I tried keeping him away and for a long time I succeeded, but that never broke us free of the time loop. With the kind of curse we’re under, until we figure this out, we get to repeat this as many times as necessary until we get it right.”

“Well that sucks,” Eijun sighed. “So if I don’t go to Seidou, we have to start over. If I go to Seidou, I risk dying and we still start over. Apparently, I’ve quit, but that also caused a repeat. Tetsuya, I don’t think that’s enough information for us to go on. If I really have to go back to Seidou, then maybe I’d like to know what I’m up against so I’m not intentionally stretching my neck out onto a chopping block.”

“You’re not doing anything!” Tetsuya snapped. “My job is to keep you alive and if you start acting reckless, I’ll never see my twentieth birthday!”

“Tetsuya…” Jun started to ask.

“No, don’t try to calm me down! I was three months from turning twenty! I’m tired of being between the ages of fifteen and nineteen, tired of trying to figure out who’s going to die, tired of waiting in the shadows for an assault to happen, tired of watching Ryo break down every time he has to start his relationship over with Yoichi… Eijun, I want you nowhere near Seidou, but we can’t break free of this curse without you!”

“I was already planning on coming back to Seidou,” Eijun said. Jun and Ryo looked as if they were about to pass out… This wasn’t what they had expected. Eijun had hated Seidou, and Azuma strengthened that feeling, so why… after everything he had been through, would he willingly come back? “And so was Yoichi,” he added.

Ryo’s gaze turned lethal and he turned on the spluttering shortstop, his hands waving back and forth in an effort to calm his lover down. “Not that we can do this without you either, but you have no reason to want to go back there either; why would you?”

“We figured the three of you had no choice but to go there either, and thought that if we went back it would give all of us a second chance.”

“A second chance to do what?” Jun asked.

“Koshien was something really important to you guys and I felt that it was wrong to win without having given that to you guys. I kept wanting a second chance so that instead of failing you guys, I would become more reliable instead. I know I was a brat and I think you guys were hoping for something from me and I never lived up to those expectations and I’m really sorry.”

“You idiot,” Tetusya sighed. He walked over to the southpaw and wrapped a strong hand around the back of his head and pressed their foreheads together. Under normal circumstances, this would have been amusing, but Eijun saw all the pain and weariness in those carmel colored eyes. Tetsuya was here only because the curse wouldn’t let him go, but if he could die, he’d commit suicide without a moment of hesitation. “I never blamed you for Koshien; that’s not what the three of us were crying about. With us retiring, we were forced to realize that there were still people that had to survive and we couldn’t do anything for them once we graduated. Eijun, when you stayed and survived this last time, you became the one beacon of light and hope in a place that, to us, has no sunlight. It’s cruel, deadly, terrifying and evil to the core. Every individual that you see with me, aside from myself, has died over and over again. I never did find out what was going on with Jun… I wasn’t even looking for him, but I must have changed something or he wouldn’t have ended up in the time loop and in a way, he became my voice of reason until I could recover from what was going on with Ryo. And then it was Yoichi… Ryo never stopped loving him and over and over again we had to watch time repeat, splitting those two apart, and yet he went after him every single time. That’s how you know someone loves a person beyond time… He held onto the hope that the curse would end, or that Yoichi would learn to regret something about what he did at Seidou and join us. It’s strange, you were the reason for the curse and here you are, willingly putting your life on the line and got yourself caught up in this.”

“You don’t think he put the curse on Seidou?” Sesshin asked.

“No,” Tetsuya answered. “Eijun, even while he was dying, wanted someone to save and forgive Seidou.”

“Then this is perhaps part of the curse,” he suggested.

“I don’t follow,” Ryo said. “If we’re supposed to save someone, shouldn’t we keep them away from what’s going to kill them?”

“That’s not what Eijun wanted or asked for; is it? He wanted you to save Seidou, not himself. He was already dying, so he must have been referring to other people that were just as trapped and helpless. I know this is asking a lot, but I need the entire story and if you’re willing, I’ll try my best to help you figure out the answer.”

“I know this is going to sound kind of selfish, but he is your son, so why would you want him near Seidou?”

“Does he have a choice?” Sesshin asked. “As a father, I don’t want him in harm's way, but that’s not always avoidable. What I can do is make sure he has a way of staying alive and hopefully getting to the other side. He mentioned that he can’t turn his back on you four and so… I guess I’m in.”

“You believe us?!” Eijun asked.

“Yes and no. On the off chance that the five of you aren’t crazy, I have more to lose if I said that you were than if I just tried to help you guys figure all of this out. There’s a lot leaning towards you not being crazy; all of you come from different parts of Japan; right?” They nodded. “Which one of you has repeated time the most?”

Everyone pointed at Tetsuya and Sesshin came up with a surefire way to prove that they weren’t crazy or dreaming. He asked Tetsuya to predict one game, it didn’t matter what the sport was and tell him who the winner was and the score if he could remember that much. Tetsuya went above and beyond their expectations. He chose a team in a random country, named off every player, what position they would play, who would get hurt, who would replace that individual and play by play, how the game would turn out. It was a game that was being televised on youtube, not local or national television, so when the score came out on the internet, everything happened just the way he had predicted and it was all on paper before hand.

Tetsuya, at first, didn’t want to open up to them or Sesshin. However, this was the first time that someone outside of Seidou had gotten involved. Not only could he help them, but if he got caught up in the time loop with them, there was a way for him to work outside of the school system that would do far more good than what they could accomplish as teenagers. Jun and Ryo had no idea how much Tetsuya had been bottling up, especially from when he was operating alone rather than with either one of them.

It was a painful story to listen to and Yoichi spent more time curled up against Ryo than he did actually looking at Tetsuya. The Captain wasn’t even crying, but those three seemed to do it for him. Eijun, having spent a lot of time observing these four, picked up on something that Yoichi and Ryo hadn’t. Jun was stupidly in love with Tetsuya; it was so obvious that it dumb founded him that the Captain couldn’t see it. Perhaps it was because of the curse that he couldn’t and while everyone thought he loved Eijun, the southpaw had another view point on it.

Tetsuya never showed that he cared about the others in his group because he assumed they were out of harm's way. Without realizing it, he probably did save Jun and neither one of them were aware of how. Every time he showed some type of emotion was when he found someone in his group that he had to save after he became aware of them and failed to stop the tragedies that had been their existence in every time loop until he noticed them.

Jun had been with Tetsuya for an extremely long time and Eijun knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that the anguish he felt over Eijun’s, would pale in comparison to how he would react if something happened to the Vice-Captain. It was getting close to the winter season and it was only a matter of weeks before Eijun had to start middle school. With the exception of Ryo, no one checked on Ryo, Tetsuya, or Yoichi, so they spent a large portion of the time in Nagano, working with Sesshin to piece together the massive time loop. Jun and Ryo told their sides of it, but Tetsuya was really the main piece to it all. It had started with him and while Eijun might have been the reason for the curse happening, Tetsuya was chosen because of his interference with the one girl being assaulted.

The Vice-Captain was sitting at the top of the mountain where Eijun liked to run, not surprised to hear the southpaw come jogging up. The kid, despite being twelve again, was more like how he had been prior to the time loop and he couldn’t say that he was unhappy about it. He liked the kid better this way and let him join him on the cliff’s edge. “Aren’t you worried about falling off?” Eijun whispered, feeling uneasy.

“It’s not like I can die,” Jun answered back. Eijun’s sharp gaze studied his face and he moved to sit in front of him, even though a gust of wind could grab and launch him over the edge and into the deep chasm below.

“Tetsuya would care.”

“I doubt it… He’s never looked at any of us the way he does you.”

“Have you given him a reason to, or does he assume that all you see him as is a friend?”

“You know… for a kid that seems to make a bunch of fives on his tests, you’re extremely perceptive.”

“My grades got better, but that has nothing to do with this. What’s your story Jun? Tetsuya says he doesn’t know about what was going on with you before you joined him and considering how perspective he is, that’s saying something. Something did happen to you and he stopped it without knowing about it; didn’t he? Why haven’t you told him or us?”

“Do you really want me to add on to it all? Yeah… something did happen and yeah… I probably should have died, but I didn’t. He wasn’t even aware of what he stopped. Before I met him, I was dating someone and for a while we kept it a secret. I guess someone found out and to save his own hide, he said I forced the relationship on him. I really don’t want to describe what happened after that and it was progressing from a severe beat down to something beyond terrifying. Just as they were about to finish working me over, I heard a bunch of screaming and cracking bones outside of the shed we were in. Minutes later, the screams stopped and then I saw him peer into the shed. He couldn’t see where I was lying, or that I might have covered myself with some blankets. I didn’t want anyone seeing what I looked like and before those idiots woke up, I cut myself free and spent several days recovering before I approached the angry and lonewolf Tetsuya Yuki. I could see right away that no one was going to go near him, so I stuck to him like glue and I’m almost positive that he was wanting to rid himself of me, but he was the only thing keeping me alive.”

“You love him,” Eijun said.

“Do you not have a filter?!” Jun shouted. “How do you go from respecting someone as a friend to that?!”

“Am I wrong?”

“No! I mean… Tetsuya loves you, so what I feel doesn’t matter!”

“Can’t he love us both? I’ve borrowed your books… more than one of them have same-sex couples or harems… I’m not saying I really understand this relationship or love nonsense, but I do know that I want to save you both and if I knowingly agree to anything with him, it will hurt you. I won’t do it, not when you’ve sacrificed just as much as he has and how can anyone understand what you’ve been through if they haven’t been through it.”

“That stubborn mule will never agree to a relationship.”

“Are you sure about that?”

“You’re a pain in the ass,” Jun growled, flicking him on the nose. Eijun yelped and almost went flying backwards when Jun snatched and tossed him back to safety. “I’d like to not get on his bad side, brat!”

Neither one of them spotted Tetsuya as they made their way back to the farm house. Tetsuya was a bit startled that both of them felt the way they did about him, but what pained him the most was hearing Jun talk about his past. He had to assume that there had been something that he had missed, but Jun had acted like a complete idiot when they first met… like… it was almost comical, but personality wise, Jun and Eijun had a lot in common when it came to covering up how they were really feeling. Loud, smiling, and laughing, but inside they were crying and hurting.

It also bothered him that Jun was wanting to die, not even bothered that it wouldn’t work. The only thing it might accomplish was giving them a long break from both middle and high school for a while. Sesshin no longer doubted that they were from another timeline and all the regret of not spending time with his son, was made up with him trying to help them stop the cycle these kids were caught up in. Tetsuya wondered if Sesshin would repeat the time loop with them now and he spent several days thinking about it.

There was no doubt in his mind that he wanted the years back that had been stolen from him, and it seemed Eijun, emotionally, was better around him and didn’t seem as inclined to act out. Committing suicide wouldn’t send them back as far as he wanted. Tetsuya had to involve someone else, what the curse considered an innocent victim that was on the list to keep alive.

The next time he found Jun on the mountain, he stepped up to the edge. Jun didn’t even try to reach for him; it was enough of a hint to tell him that his friend really was weighing the option of jumping or not. Even if it resulted in a repeat, they were both mentally worn down and wanted a long break from playing hero or detective. “Tetsu… do you really think that kid’s father is one of us now?”

“If he’s not, what I have planned won’t happen. More than likely, if it fails, we’re going to get our asses royally handed to us by Ryo or Eijun.”

“Not Yoichi…”

“The kid regrets what he did to Eijun and that was probably the bare minimum to how he got involved in this. He’s more fragile than the rest of us and to my surprise, the one that seems the most stable out of our group is the southpaw and his dad. That kid doesn’t know how to hate, or if he does, it’s extremely limited.”

“What’s the plan?”

“The last time I went back to the diaper or crawling stage… it involved killing someone that was classified as innocent.”

“The high school bombing…” Tetsuya nodded. “I’d rather not blow up another school and I don’t think Sesshin would approve of it either.”

“Well… I guess I’m up for a vacation. Maybe if I get this feeling out of my system, I can focus on our problem again.”

“You know, the rest of us had massive tantrums before we broke down…”

“I guess holding out this long was my way of saying thank you for what you’ve done for all of us; Tetsu… I… There’s no words that I can say that will make any of this better. Even if we free ourselves from the curse, we won’t forget.”

“No, but I might find some satisfaction of making it past college and to my twentieth birthday.”

“If you’re doing something stupid like jumping, we’re going with you,” Ryo said, Eijun and Yoichi coming up the mountain path.

“What the hell are you three talking about?” Jun demanded.

“Eijun doesn’t think Sesshin will have enough time to make a difference. He said the magic words… I regret this and I regret that… He wanted more time to ensure he could stop anything from happening to us, but it extended to all of Seidou. So… before he decides to take a nap, whatever you’re planning, we want in on it.”

“Suicide isn’t enough,” Tetsuya told them.

“Will throwing all of us off the side of this mountain work?”

“Eijun, I know you’re reckless, but you do realize that you have to hit the ground” Tetsuya growled.

“Yeah well… don’t hold back when you push us. I’d rather we not become brain dead vegetables.”

Yoichi glanced over the edge and flinched. “Did I ever tell anyone that I’m afraid of heights?”

“We can jump at the count of three,” Ryo suggested. “I really think we have to do this voluntarily or we risk falling out of the time loop. Sesshin needs more time, but that doesn’t mean he won’t have a way to help us if he really does get caught up in the time loop. Jun isn’t the only one that wants a bit of a break and maybe I would like to spend more time with my brother and make up for being such a heartless ass to him.”

Eijun reached for Jun’s and Tetsuya’s hands. He felt the Captain and Vice-Captain tense, but when Ryo and Yoichi finished their human chain, they took a deep breath, counted to three and jumped. It was perhaps the most terrifying moment for all five of them, but when they hit the ground, time did exactly what it always did and reset, pushing them back and starting it all over from the very beginning.
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Legend of Sawamura