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norihisahyuga-archived · 7 years

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The Color Red

Kitano Shiori/Onuki Keiko Battle Royale 4000~ words. Sfw.

Shiori Kitano and Keiko Onuki find out they are soulmates in the worst way possible at the worst time possible and swear they want nothing to do with each other. That doesn’t mean the laws still don’t apply to them, and that doesn’t mean they’ve lost their soulmate vision either. The final chapter of the soulmate AU that no one took away from me.

“I don’t understand why I have to transfer to Shiroiwa Junior High just because she is.” This is not the first argument Shiori Kitano has had with her father, and it will likely not be the last. Kitano is rarely home to spend time with his wife and daughter and when he does come home, it’s always to deliver terrible news like this. “I told you a long time ago I didn’t want to have anything to do with her, and I meant it when I said it. I still mean it today.”

Kitano sighs softly at her and shakes his head; he’s old, his hair already gray and his face lined with wrinkles. How can he possibly understand how she feels? “It isn’t my rule, Shiori, it’s the Republic’s. If it was up to me, you wouldn’t have to transfer with her.”

Shiori huffs and stares at her unmade bed where three open suitcases are waiting. Though she should have started packing to move by now, she hasn’t. The prospect of living with her father at his apartment is far from a thrilling one, and she can already feel the homesickness for Kobe settling in before she’s even had a chance to leave. Her mother promised to move as soon as possible, just needing to tie up a few loose ends here before the moving crew comes in to empty out their house, but Shiori can’t wait with her. Her soulmate transfers to Shiroiwa next week, which means she has to move out of her room this weekend to get ready.

“Shiroiwa is one of the worst schools in the area,” she grumbles, flopping down on her floor.

Her father sighs from the doorway once again. “I know that even better than you do,” he says, and she winces at the memory of him walking away from his teaching position after being attacked by one of his students. “Please just be ready to go by tomorrow night.”

With that, he leaves the house, and her mother deposits a piece of cake and a glass of milk on her side table just inside the door. Neither of them speak to each other; her mother no doubt can feel the animosity rolling off of her in waves and does not want to engage her in conversation right now. Unlike her father, her mother knows better than to try to comfort her when she’s in this state. It’s best to let her stew and work through her own thoughts in silence.

Shiroiwa Junior High School. Shiori knows about the school and dully remembers Shogo Kawada transferring there at the start of the year, around the same time Kazuo Kiriyama had. The two of them had been at each other’s throats and the decision had been to move them out of Kobe, believing the urban area had pushed them into a world they did not want to be a part of. That had been an annoyance. Shiori had run with Kiriyama until he had been forced to move away, and Kobe had been much more boring without him and Kawada to entertain everyone.

The only other person affected by the change was Keiko Onuki; she had been upset to see Shogo leave, though the two had promised to keep up with each other despite the distance between them. Shiori has no idea if they do or not, and frankly has no desire to find out. She has avoided Keiko like the plague since the day the two of them ended up in a fight and were forced to realize something about each other neither of them ever wanted to know.

Red was the first color Shiori Kitano saw with her soulmate vision. It was a color she had read about plenty of times, had heard about from those who could see it. It was the color of anger, of violence, of blood. It was the color of the blood streaked across her bruised knuckles, dripping from her nose, smeared across Onuki’s lips. The two of them had been arguing, as was their custom; they had been on opposite sides since the day they first met.

Kawada and Kiriyama being gone meant the sole buffers that usually kept their arguments from escalating were also gone. For what it was worth, Onuki could throw a punch much better than her perfectionism would bely. She was always perfectly made up, always well-dressed, always pristine in every way possible, so when her right hook caught Shiori right under the chin, Shiori was not ashamed to say she was surprised at how good it had been.

Of course, that hardly meant anything. She was the better fighter and always had been, and whatever Onuki had obviously picked up from Kawada was not going to keep her safe for long. If the teachers had not come to separate the two of them, things likely would have gotten much worse than they did. Just the same, both girls ended up suspended from school.

They also ended up realizing they were each other’s soulmate in the process. When the dust had settled and the gym teacher’s strong hands had caught Shiori by the shoulders to wrench her off of Onuki, she had seen for herself the red smeared across Onuki’s pretty pale face, the deep blue lowlights in her black hair.

It was wildly unfair, all things considered. There was only one person she hated more in the world than Onuki; why did they have to be connected to each other?

Sighing, Shiori pushes herself to her feet and opens her closet door, pulling clothes off of hangers and folding them up as neatly as she can bring herself to before trying to organize them into her suitcase. Years of history had been made in this house, in her school, and she had been relatively happy even though Kiriyama was no longer around. She had friends, and they understood her for what it was worth. They had fun together even if that fun often got her into trouble, and she wasn’t ashamed to say she enjoyed spending time with them.

Well, that was all about to be over.

On her first day at Shiroiwa, a note appears deposited on her desk when she’s doodling in the corner of her notebook and refusing to pay attention to what Mr. Hayashida is saying. She had blown off her class introduction, taken her seat, and found herself surprised to see Kazuo Kiriyama on the other side of the room. He had waved to her, and she waved back, thinking it might not be so bad to have him around again.

The note is not from him. She squints at the chicken scratch writing, struggling to make out just what it says. If you aren’t busy after school, maybe you can hang with us. You look like you’d fit right in with our gang. Meet us at the flagpole after last bell.

The prospect of joining up with another group is tantalizing, so she tucks the note into her pocket and goes back to doodling in her notebook. Just out of the corner of her eye, she can make out Onuki’s hair showing up blue under the harsh fluorescent lights.

She hasn’t thought much about Onuki since the incident; they had returned from their suspension and never spoke a word to one another, knowing it was for the best that they never became friends or tried to make any kind of relationship between the two of them work. To be honest, Shiori had been grateful; Onuki had always struck her as the type who would want to make things work no matter the circumstances. Maybe here, she can hook back up with Shogo Kawada and Shiori will never have to think about her again.

After all, not all soulmates are really destined to be with each other.

There is a group of girls waiting by the flagpole when she exits the school building and she walks right up to them, ignoring the whispers around her as she does so. “One of you wrote me a note, didn’t you?”

“That was me.” A girl with long black hair steps forward from the group and Shiori easily sees her as the leader of this little outfit. “Mitsuko Souma. I’ve heard rumors about you from your old school and seeing you in person only really confirms it. You’d probably have more fun with us than you would with anyone else in class.”

Shiori doesn’t even have to mentally flip through the groups she had noticed in her head to be able to answer that question. “That’s probably accurate. I’m game for anything.”

Out of the corner of her eye, she notices a telltale flash of coppery hair that materializes as Kazuo Kiriyama; Mitsuko throws a companionable arm around his shoulders and smiles at him, and he smiles back at her before turning to nod to Shiori. So he’s also one of their outfit? That would make sense then as to how Mitsuko had heard about her before she even had a chance to make her presence known, and a part of her that had kept her hackles raised just in case relaxes. She’s among friends here and has no real reason to be concerned.

“Kazuo said you two used to run together back in Kobe,” Mitsuko says.

Shiori smiles faintly at the memories before giving Mitsuko a brisk nod. “We did. If that’s what kind of trouble you and yours get up to, then I’m game for it.”

“And your soulmate isn’t going to pose us any issues?” Another girl asks, her eyes sharp.

Mitsuko sighs. “Hirono—”

“No, she won’t. We aren’t interested in having anything to do with each other in the first place. We never really got along.” Shiori figures that should be enough information for them to understand the situation. “Do any of you—”

“Hirono and I both,” Mitsuko says quickly, “and Kazuo. With a few people, and Shogo Kawada.”

Shiori has to fight to keep her composure at the news; she almost wants to laugh at the idea that Onuki had been so upset to see Kawada go, and he had ended up with her best friend of all people. Any hope of the two of them getting back together has been dashed, which is more amusing than it has any right to be. Maybe she’s just looking for some kind of silver lining in the horrible shit that is moving to Shiroiwa in the first place.

“How’s Kawada?” she asks Kazuo instead. “He all right?”

Kazuo smiles and gives her a nod, and she nods in return.

Mitsuko makes a soft tch noise but nods. “Well, if that’s how you feel, it can’t be helped. But if you do want a group to run with while you’re here, we’re open to accepting new members.”

“As long as no lovey dovey crap gets shoved down my throat, I’m in,” Shiori assures her.

“We won’t shove any advice or bullshit on you, but you’ll see us with our partners on occasion and have to deal with that,” Hirono says. “Is that acceptable or not?”

Shiori shrugs. “Fine by me. As long as no one expects me to participate in that.”

The girls have a brief meeting while Shiori catches up with Kazuo— an essentially one-sided conversation that is made easier by the fact she learned to understand him when they were still classmates— before Mitsuko accepts her into the group. It isn’t a big deal, at least not to her, and she’s glad to not have to be alone in this hell hole any longer.

The day Kawada and Kiriyama moved away, Shiori was quiet. She was upset in her own way that Kiriyama was gone, as the two of them had gotten on well together, but she also understood why his parents had deemed it the best decision. How many more fist fights with Kawada were going to be acceptable to them, anyway? And Kawada was hardly the only person who crossed their group from time to time, so it wasn’t like things were ever going to truly get better to begin with.

Onuki came to school quiet as well, though her eyes were red and there were tear tracks dried on her cheeks. She and Kawada had been their own kind of insular, keeping their relationship quiet and to themselves, away from the class gossips. To have him yanked away so suddenly must have been upsetting in a way Shiori couldn’t imagine if she tried.

A few people in class glanced her way with raised eyebrows, then looked at Onuki. The silent gestures were clear; everyone was wondering why she refused to go comfort Onuki despite the fact they were supposed to be together. People were wondering if Kawada had been the only thing who stood between them and thought she might make an attempt to get closer to Onuki now that he was out of the picture.

Shiori tucked her earbuds into her ears, turned her music up louder, and stared down at her desktop. Nothing was going to make her reach out to Keiko Onuki. Nothing.

The first thing Keiko does when she comes to Shiroiwa is look up Shogo Kawada. It’s how she gets the news that Shogo has found his soulmates— plural, as in more than one— in a less embarrassing way than if she had asked in front of a classroom full of students. In more ways than one, it makes sense. Shogo has always had one of the biggest hearts she has ever seen, and so of course he was able to love multiple people at the same time.

She also met those people, and in the case of Kazuo Kiriyama, finally introduced herself in a real and meaningful way. Though her heart ached a little at the thought that she and Shogo would never be able to rekindle what they had together, she was happy to see him happy, and in the end, it was the closure she really needed. Besides, she has his friendship, and at the very least, that is a priceless treasure to hold onto.

Her parents had been the ones to inform her that Shiori Kitano would be making the transfer with her, and Keiko is not really surprised. Despite the fact the two of them had made it clear they wanted nothing to do with each other, their soulmate vision had not faded, and thus the Republic acted as though they were a happy couple and refused to separate them. It was part of the laws pertaining to younger people still in school, rules that Keiko has memorized as she poured over them as soon as she realized they now applied to her.

At least she makes fast friends. It helps that Noriko is so friendly that she brings her into her friend group almost immediately, and the other girls are nice. It’s at lunch one day when Yukie Utsumi clears her throat, drawing everyone’s attention to her across the table.

Keiko looks up from her rice, realizing she can feel Yukie’s gaze fixed on her. “Yes?”

“I don’t mean to be nosy,” she says, and Shiori raises an eyebrow at her. That’s usually what people say right before they start trying to pry into business that has nothing to do with them. “You and that Shiori Kitano girl are… Soulmates, right? Like, you have color vision.”

“We are and I do,” Keiko confirms softly.

Yukie nods slowly, and Keiko braces herself for the questioning to begin. “I guess I just wanted to ask if you know if she’s related to Yukiko Kitano at all.”

“Who? Oh, wait, Yukiko.” Keiko can vaguely remember the girl from her class; she hasn’t been here long enough to have solid face-name connections just yet. “As far as I know, they aren’t related to each other. Why do you ask?”

“Because that makes two pairs,” Yuka says, holding up her fingers. “Me and Noriko, and now Yukiko and Shiori. People sharing the same last name without being related to each other.”

“Oh! Oh, I see.” Keiko joins in the soft laughter at the table, more relieved than she has words for that she doesn’t have to answer questions she doesn’t think she’s qualified to answer in the first place.

Out of the corner of her eye, she glances over at the table where the class’s bad girls are gathered. Shiori is with them, predictably, and all in all it’s a perfect fit. This is precisely the divide they were in in Kobe, so it’s just repeated itself here perfectly.

All of the pieces always fall back into place.

The rain came out of nowhere, predicted by exactly none of the news stations in town, and Keiko winced as she glanced out the window. It was just to be expected that the first day she was without Shogo, something like this would happen. Even the weather was revolting at his absence. Nothing made sense without him here, and her heart hurt, was open and bleeding in her chest even though she kept patiently trying to remind herself that he was not the one she was meant to be with anyway.

The day had already been too long for her taste, and now she was going to have to walk home in the rain without an umbrella or even a jacket to keep herself from getting soaked. It was unfair, especially after all she had lost in the last few days.

The classroom emptied without her noticing it, her mind so fixed on the windows she didn’t notice when someone walked up behind her. The loud thunk of something landing on her desk startled her and she twisted around to see Shiori Kitano standing over her shoulder. The two of them had not spoken to each other since their fight.

“You need that,” she said. “You walk home, right?”

Keiko glanced down at her desktop, at the umbrella that had been placed in front of her. “I, um… Thank you, I guess.”

She turned around to thank Shiori to her face but the girl was already walking out of the door, leaving Keiko alone in the classroom without any explanation for her actions.

She should have been on her way home by now, but upon realizing she had left her earbuds behind in her desk, Shiori had to reroute in the middle of the hallway and return to the classroom. It was an annoyance and nothing more, and she’s already reminded herself about three dozen times to check her pockets next time to make sure she has them with her. It isn’t like her to leave them behind in the first place after all.

There should be no one in the room, for the record. The last bell had already rung, and not eager to go back to her father’s apartment, she had drug her heels getting ready to leave and return home. Mitsuko and Hirono will both be busy this afternoon with Takako and Haruka respectively, and Shiori doesn’t really want to do anything anyway. She’s tired and wants to go home and have a nap, or maybe slip into a coma until Monday morning when she comes back to this hellhole for another week of school.

At least Shiroiwa hasn’t been as bad as she expected it to be. At least, that’s what she’s thinking as she pushes open the classroom door to find Kazushi Niida hovering by Onuki’s desk, keeping her pinned in place and leaving her no escape route.

When he reaches down to touch her face, Onuki twisting her head away violently in the process, it becomes painfully clear just what’s going on here.

Not for the first time in her life, Shiori sees red.

The thing was, there had been boys harassing Onuki as soon as Kawada was gone. She was one of the prettiest girls in class and so of course as soon as her boyfriend was gone, there were unwanted offers piling up at her feet. Most guys were smart enough to take “no” for an answer and leave things alone, but not all of them were smart. Shiori had kept an eye on the situation, and as to why, she would never truly know. She never questioned it.

Maybe it was simply the right thing to do, and she was doing it for the first time in her life. Boys their age were perfectly capable of being awful, after all. And Onuki shouldn’t have to physically defend herself from all of them.

There were rumors, because of course there were. They were in junior high, and when one guy who’d tried to grope Onuki in the hallway ended up with a broken nose and a trip to the hospital and no clear idea of who had punched him, people wondered. There was the general idea that she had a secret admirer keeping her safe, which was stupid. Most people never thought for once her actual soulmate was the one watching out for her, but why would they?

The thing was, Onuki caught her. One guy had gotten too close and made her uncomfortable, and Shiori had been in the process of sending him scampering home with his tail between his legs when Onuki had walked up behind her and demanded to know what was going on.

“I’m not fucking blind, you know, I saw how he freaked you out.” Wasn’t that obvious? Everyone knew a creep when they saw one.

Onuki huffed, and it blew her bangs up out of her face. “I don’t know why you’re wasting your time with this. You don’t like me, and I don’t like you. You don’t owe me anything because of any stupid bond we have, all right? Just… Just stop, okay?”

“And what if the next creep is even worse than that one?” Shiori stepped right into her face, unwilling to back down. This was not an argument she was going to lose. “You could get hurt, and I can handle them better than you can. I’m the better fighter, remember?”

“And what if you get hurt?” Shiori thought she detected the slightest waver in those words.

In response, she shook her head. “I don’t give a fuck if I get hurt. Now stop making this more difficult than it has to be and get home. It’s getting late.”

She stalked away with Onuki still yelling after her.

Niida is tall and athletic and should, therefore, be more of a challenge than he actually is. But he’s also afraid, his eyes blowing wide when Shiori fists her hands in his jacket and throws him toward the front of the room. He hits Mr. Hayashida’s desk and loses his footing, his back slamming against the metal front of the desk, his pupils blown wide. He’s terrified and easy prey, not even enough of a challenge for Shiori to feel good about kicking his ass.

That doesn’t stop her from sending him out of the room with his mouth busted up and whimpering like a beaten dog, though. She has a point to make, after all.

Onuki is still sitting at her desk, her head down. When she raises her head, it’s clear she’d been on the verge of tears under Niida’s harassment. “How did you know?”

“I didn’t. I came back for my earbuds.” Shiori walks to her desk to retrieve them, sliding them into her pocket before turning to look at Onuki. It makes her throat tight to see her this way, which is stupid. “Come on. You probably shouldn’t be alone right now.”

When they reach the front doors leading to the outside, Keiko laughs, the sound soft and watery in her throat. “It’s raining and I didn’t bring an umbrella.”

“We can just share mine.” After all, Shiori always has it on her. She doesn’t plan for anything but the worst and never will. “Come on. I’ll walk you home.”

No one is on the school campus to see the moment when Keiko sways closer to her, wrapping her arms around Shiori’s, resting her cheek against Shiori’s shoulder.

It doesn’t mean anything, but just the same, Shiori smiles for the first real time since she’s moved to Shiroiwa.

#battle royale #keiko onuki #shiori kitano #*f: mine #*f: br #*f: keiko #*f: shiori #*f: soulmate au #THE FINAL CHAPTER I FINSIHED IT

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