an ineffable plan (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
ineffabilities) wrote2011-12-22 09:41 am
ineffabilities) wrote2011-12-22 09:41 am
Fic: Homecoming
LJ is being a twit, so I'm going to write all my fics here, in Tumblr, in AO3 and, if the mood so strikes me, in FF.net instead. This fic is a fill for a prompt that asked for amnesiac!Kotetsu in a relationship with someone else, but I decided to take a few liberties with it and created this.
Hope you like it!
Title: Homecoming
Chapter Title: Setting Things In Motion
Summary: A while ago, Barnaby lost his partner, Tiger lost his memory, Mao lost his way home, and Laharl lost someone he cared for very much. Now Harry Dresden's stumbled on this case by way of Tiger, and with his arrival, there may be a way to find all those lost things again.
Too bad someone else has another idea...
Rating: T, for Mao and gay subtext.
Sometimes, when Barnaby wasn’t focused on something, he thought of Kotetsu.
Once upon a time, they had been partners, then friends, then something...more than that, but they never quite crossed into “lovers” territory, spending the entire time dancing around that little issue. But the feelings were definitely there, which made the time when he’d moved in into his empty little flat a little awkward, but soon they’d grown so comfortable he couldn’t imagine life without waking up to the sound of Kotetsu making breakfast.
He’d planned on telling him soon, but things just kept cropping up. Then he just...disappeared, one rainy day.
“I’ll just be visiting Kaede for the weekend!” Kotetsu had said, grinning brightly as he’d thrown on his raincoat and his ever-present hat. “I’ll be back by Monday.”
He never returned. Then Barnaby had found out that he never reached his destination, when Kaede called him and demanded to know where her father was. It was like somewhere along the way, Kaburagi T. Kotetsu had vanished into thin air.
They had looked, of course. He and all the Heroes, First and Second League alike, had combed the entire city for a sign, but the only lead they had was a teenage punk who’d been caught with his wallet, who said that he’d knocked someone out and taken most of his stuff, but he didn’t know where he went.
The last part was only confirmed after Barnaby dragged it out of him.
Two years had passed, since then. Two years had passed since he’d lost his partner, two years since a part of him disappeared.
Two years.
--
Two years.
That was how long he spent in Chicago, looking desperately for a name to put to a face--his face, surviving each day with the bare minimum, getting out of tight situations and familiarizing himself with the streets, and especially arming himself with something, anything he could use against strange things.
Strange things lurked the streets of Chicago, at night. Gangs, runaways, and the dangers of the day seemed like child’s play, compared to the monsters that came out when the moon rose.
He’d learned to survive, to fight, after that disastrous first time that left him with an ugly scar down his leg. He’d learned not to rely so much on his eyes than on his instincts, learned to keep an ear out for strange things going down, learned to sleep with one eye open, just in case. Most of all, he’d learned which places to avoid, both at day and at night.
But he was starting to get desperate. For two years, all he had to go on was his dreams, vague though they were, and the few memories he could reliably recall. Those spurred him on, gave him the strength to get through the day.
But now the need to know was getting stronger. He had to know who he was, even if it was just a small part of his name.
He was running out of leads, and he had only one place to go.
--
Harry Dresden was having a slow day, and as he was a professional wizard, that was saying something.
He was...thankful, somewhat. The past few days had been rather stressful, since it was the start of Molly’s apprenticeship, and then there were his duties as a Warden, plus a case he had only just recently closed. A slow day was just what he needed.
Of course, it didn’t change the fact that he was bored and had nothing to do.
He drummed his fingers on his desk, eyes furtively darting towards the phone in hopes that Murphy might call him and need his help on a case that Special Investigations needed help in closing. Sometimes his eyes darted towards his door, in hopes of a shadow of a person who needed the help of the only professional wizard in the phonebook. Maybe Molly would call up, or someone. Anyone.
He’d been just about to start humming “Bohemian Rhapsody” when, finally, someone came in.
No, actually, scratch that.
Someone stumbled in.
He blinked at him. Tanned man, probably in his mid-to-late-thirties, wearing a paperboy hat and clothes that looked like they had been through hell and back. Not exactly what he was looking for.
“Can you help me?” the man gasped. “Please?”
Well, he’d said please. And those eyes.
“Sit down,” he finally said. “Start with the basics. What’s your name?”
“That’s the thing,” the man replied, settling into his chair. “I don’t know my name.”
--
Two years ago, he’d been slaughtering all those who stood in his path to his way to Overlord, showing no mercy to the people who’d dared challenge him.
Two years ago, a young angel had come to assassinate his father, and decided to teach him love—the emotion he had buried and dismissed as too trivial for an Overlord, so long ago.
Two years ago, she’d been turned into a flower, and in his rage, he’d killed the only one who could possibly help her.
Two years ago seemed like two centuries ago, as he walked down the sidewalk, one arm clutching a pot with the white flower that was once a blonde angel while the other had settled on the knife strapped to his hip.
He was walking into what could be a trap, he knew. This...Hades person was his last hope, though. He had the last thing he needed for restoring her to her original state, something so valuable that he couldn’t find it anywhere else. In return, though, he’d have to help him out with whatever he needed.
He was fine with that. So long as he got what he needed in the end, he’d make the deal.
Flonne needed him.
--
Approximately one year, eight months, three weeks and two days.
That was how long he’d been stuck in this city, cut off from the Netherworld and any way out.
For him, it was far too long. He didn’t want to be stuck here in the first place, with no way out and no other way but to adapt and survive as best as he could in this new environment. He’d learned that on his very first day, when a gang of teenaged villain wannabes had thought they’d make mincemeat out of him, just because he looked like an easy target.
He’d given them a fight, and in the end, they came away empty. Unfortunately, he came away sporting new scars, bruises and suffering a significant amount of damage to his HP, and no way to heal it but with time.
He’d adapted quickly, after that. And the first time he got in jail for shoplifting, he’d busted straight out, gave those who tried to pursue him hell. Of course he’d been captured in the end—it was rather embarrassing, really—but he’d sneaked back out the moment he was sure he wouldn’t be caught.
That was the way his life went, these days. He avoided capture as best as he could, changing names and appearances with every time he screwed up and got caught. His favorite was the wig that reminded him of his erstwhile servant, Almaz, and the wire-rimmed glasses that, coupled with blue contact lenses, seemed to render him totally unrecognizable to law enforcement.
But he missed the Academy. He missed bickering with Beryl, spraying graffiti on the walls, littering as freely as he could, fighting without worrying about whether today would be his last, playing video games till the wee hours of the morning, conducting experiments till the wee hours of the morning, researching heroes till the wee hours of the morning (what? Being able to stay up late was awesome) and sleeping in an actual bed. With real pillows, not a wooden bench that gave him a crick in his neck or, when he was really desperate, in a dumpster with plastic bags full of trash. Or, if he was really desperate, on the pavement.
“How the mighty have fallen,” he’d once muttered to himself, as he’d curled up on the cold hard asphalt and tried to lull himself to sleep, to no avail.
Now here he was, about to pull off another heist. (A part of him reminded him that this wasn’t really a heist, more like snatching a handbag from a random person, but he immediately silenced that part of him.) He had his tools: his hands, his innate strength, his 1.8 million EQ and a lot of skill and experience.
The plan was to go in and out. Piece of cake.
...except for the part where it wasn’t.
--
Joe had been having a slow day. It was like all the small-time criminals of Sternbild had decided to just take a day off and leave the crime to the ones who were Hero TV material, which was fine if you were a civilian, but not so when you were a cop and you were bored out of your mind.
He drummed his fingers on the dashboard, listening to the velvet tones of Blue Rose as she sang her way through her rendition of Miku Hatsune’s “World Is Mine”. It sounded much better when a human was singing it, honestly, he had no idea why Kate preferred Miku to Blue Rose. The fact that the Hero had a very nice figure helped.
He immediately slammed his head into the steering wheel, reminding himself that Blue Rose was no older than his little girl, he couldn’t entertain those kinds of thoughts about her.
Then a scrawny kid with blue hair and a red coat ran past, with a pink handbag. Seconds later, a young girl with a scarf ran after him, yelling, “Stop! Thief!”
Well, at least he had something to do.
He slammed his foot down on the pedal, and the police car shot out of the alley like a rocket.
The kid never stood a chance, in a race against the best driver in the police force, but damned if he didn’t give him a hard time.
--
“So let me get this straight,” Harry finally said. “You ended up here, two years ago, without any memories, and have been looking for anyone who might recognize you. And the only things you remember are a guy with blond hair, a woman with brown hair, and something about tigers.”
“That’s right,” the man confirmed.
“And you’ve been running into the spooky side of Chicago for two years.”
The man scratched the back of his neck in reply. “I guess,” he admitted. “I mean, it’s really weird. Sometimes I go days without seeing something out of the ordinary, then something really crazy happens. Like, I dunno, a dinosaur.”
Harry quirked an eyebrow. “A dinosaur, you say?” he asked, trying (and failing) to feign innocence as his mind flashed back to the events of a year ago.
“It was weird, someone who looked a lot like you was riding...it...” the man trailed off, then stared at him. “That really was you, wasn’t it? The guy on the dinosaur.”
“Guilty as charged,” he admitted.
“You saved my life,” he said. “I don’t know if you noticed or not, but there was this tiny thing—with really sharp teeth—and I think it wanted to eat me but I’m pretty sure I taste horrible but your dinosaur squashed it. Flat. I didn’t know who you were at the time but man, that was awesome and you saved my life and thank you so much.”
Harry blinked at him, trying to recall when this had happened, then remembered hearing a squashing sound and not really being able to look, because there was a great big necromancy thing going down and he had to stop it before something bad happened. As in, “megalomaniac god creating” bad.
“You’re welcome?” he tried.
The man beamed for a moment, then sighed. “Anyway, I...kinda need help,” he began. “I’m no detective, and all the leads I’ve managed to dig up have gone nowhere. And you saved my life before, so I can’t think of anyone else who could help.”
He thrust his hand into his pocket, then pulled out a small collection of odds and ends. “I’ll find a way to pay the fee,” he added, looking rather desperate.
Harry held up his hand. “No worries,” he said. “Look, how about you pay up after we’re done?”
The man beamed again. “Great, thanks!” he exclaimed.
Something in Harry's gut told him he wasn't going to get out of this case with his fee.
Hope you like it!
Title: Homecoming
Chapter Title: Setting Things In Motion
Summary: A while ago, Barnaby lost his partner, Tiger lost his memory, Mao lost his way home, and Laharl lost someone he cared for very much. Now Harry Dresden's stumbled on this case by way of Tiger, and with his arrival, there may be a way to find all those lost things again.
Too bad someone else has another idea...
Rating: T, for Mao and gay subtext.
Sometimes, when Barnaby wasn’t focused on something, he thought of Kotetsu.
Once upon a time, they had been partners, then friends, then something...more than that, but they never quite crossed into “lovers” territory, spending the entire time dancing around that little issue. But the feelings were definitely there, which made the time when he’d moved in into his empty little flat a little awkward, but soon they’d grown so comfortable he couldn’t imagine life without waking up to the sound of Kotetsu making breakfast.
He’d planned on telling him soon, but things just kept cropping up. Then he just...disappeared, one rainy day.
“I’ll just be visiting Kaede for the weekend!” Kotetsu had said, grinning brightly as he’d thrown on his raincoat and his ever-present hat. “I’ll be back by Monday.”
He never returned. Then Barnaby had found out that he never reached his destination, when Kaede called him and demanded to know where her father was. It was like somewhere along the way, Kaburagi T. Kotetsu had vanished into thin air.
They had looked, of course. He and all the Heroes, First and Second League alike, had combed the entire city for a sign, but the only lead they had was a teenage punk who’d been caught with his wallet, who said that he’d knocked someone out and taken most of his stuff, but he didn’t know where he went.
The last part was only confirmed after Barnaby dragged it out of him.
Two years had passed, since then. Two years had passed since he’d lost his partner, two years since a part of him disappeared.
Two years.
--
Two years.
That was how long he spent in Chicago, looking desperately for a name to put to a face--his face, surviving each day with the bare minimum, getting out of tight situations and familiarizing himself with the streets, and especially arming himself with something, anything he could use against strange things.
Strange things lurked the streets of Chicago, at night. Gangs, runaways, and the dangers of the day seemed like child’s play, compared to the monsters that came out when the moon rose.
He’d learned to survive, to fight, after that disastrous first time that left him with an ugly scar down his leg. He’d learned not to rely so much on his eyes than on his instincts, learned to keep an ear out for strange things going down, learned to sleep with one eye open, just in case. Most of all, he’d learned which places to avoid, both at day and at night.
But he was starting to get desperate. For two years, all he had to go on was his dreams, vague though they were, and the few memories he could reliably recall. Those spurred him on, gave him the strength to get through the day.
But now the need to know was getting stronger. He had to know who he was, even if it was just a small part of his name.
He was running out of leads, and he had only one place to go.
--
Harry Dresden was having a slow day, and as he was a professional wizard, that was saying something.
He was...thankful, somewhat. The past few days had been rather stressful, since it was the start of Molly’s apprenticeship, and then there were his duties as a Warden, plus a case he had only just recently closed. A slow day was just what he needed.
Of course, it didn’t change the fact that he was bored and had nothing to do.
He drummed his fingers on his desk, eyes furtively darting towards the phone in hopes that Murphy might call him and need his help on a case that Special Investigations needed help in closing. Sometimes his eyes darted towards his door, in hopes of a shadow of a person who needed the help of the only professional wizard in the phonebook. Maybe Molly would call up, or someone. Anyone.
He’d been just about to start humming “Bohemian Rhapsody” when, finally, someone came in.
No, actually, scratch that.
Someone stumbled in.
He blinked at him. Tanned man, probably in his mid-to-late-thirties, wearing a paperboy hat and clothes that looked like they had been through hell and back. Not exactly what he was looking for.
“Can you help me?” the man gasped. “Please?”
Well, he’d said please. And those eyes.
“Sit down,” he finally said. “Start with the basics. What’s your name?”
“That’s the thing,” the man replied, settling into his chair. “I don’t know my name.”
--
Two years ago, he’d been slaughtering all those who stood in his path to his way to Overlord, showing no mercy to the people who’d dared challenge him.
Two years ago, a young angel had come to assassinate his father, and decided to teach him love—the emotion he had buried and dismissed as too trivial for an Overlord, so long ago.
Two years ago, she’d been turned into a flower, and in his rage, he’d killed the only one who could possibly help her.
Two years ago seemed like two centuries ago, as he walked down the sidewalk, one arm clutching a pot with the white flower that was once a blonde angel while the other had settled on the knife strapped to his hip.
He was walking into what could be a trap, he knew. This...Hades person was his last hope, though. He had the last thing he needed for restoring her to her original state, something so valuable that he couldn’t find it anywhere else. In return, though, he’d have to help him out with whatever he needed.
He was fine with that. So long as he got what he needed in the end, he’d make the deal.
Flonne needed him.
--
Approximately one year, eight months, three weeks and two days.
That was how long he’d been stuck in this city, cut off from the Netherworld and any way out.
For him, it was far too long. He didn’t want to be stuck here in the first place, with no way out and no other way but to adapt and survive as best as he could in this new environment. He’d learned that on his very first day, when a gang of teenaged villain wannabes had thought they’d make mincemeat out of him, just because he looked like an easy target.
He’d given them a fight, and in the end, they came away empty. Unfortunately, he came away sporting new scars, bruises and suffering a significant amount of damage to his HP, and no way to heal it but with time.
He’d adapted quickly, after that. And the first time he got in jail for shoplifting, he’d busted straight out, gave those who tried to pursue him hell. Of course he’d been captured in the end—it was rather embarrassing, really—but he’d sneaked back out the moment he was sure he wouldn’t be caught.
That was the way his life went, these days. He avoided capture as best as he could, changing names and appearances with every time he screwed up and got caught. His favorite was the wig that reminded him of his erstwhile servant, Almaz, and the wire-rimmed glasses that, coupled with blue contact lenses, seemed to render him totally unrecognizable to law enforcement.
But he missed the Academy. He missed bickering with Beryl, spraying graffiti on the walls, littering as freely as he could, fighting without worrying about whether today would be his last, playing video games till the wee hours of the morning, conducting experiments till the wee hours of the morning, researching heroes till the wee hours of the morning (what? Being able to stay up late was awesome) and sleeping in an actual bed. With real pillows, not a wooden bench that gave him a crick in his neck or, when he was really desperate, in a dumpster with plastic bags full of trash. Or, if he was really desperate, on the pavement.
“How the mighty have fallen,” he’d once muttered to himself, as he’d curled up on the cold hard asphalt and tried to lull himself to sleep, to no avail.
Now here he was, about to pull off another heist. (A part of him reminded him that this wasn’t really a heist, more like snatching a handbag from a random person, but he immediately silenced that part of him.) He had his tools: his hands, his innate strength, his 1.8 million EQ and a lot of skill and experience.
The plan was to go in and out. Piece of cake.
...except for the part where it wasn’t.
--
Joe had been having a slow day. It was like all the small-time criminals of Sternbild had decided to just take a day off and leave the crime to the ones who were Hero TV material, which was fine if you were a civilian, but not so when you were a cop and you were bored out of your mind.
He drummed his fingers on the dashboard, listening to the velvet tones of Blue Rose as she sang her way through her rendition of Miku Hatsune’s “World Is Mine”. It sounded much better when a human was singing it, honestly, he had no idea why Kate preferred Miku to Blue Rose. The fact that the Hero had a very nice figure helped.
He immediately slammed his head into the steering wheel, reminding himself that Blue Rose was no older than his little girl, he couldn’t entertain those kinds of thoughts about her.
Then a scrawny kid with blue hair and a red coat ran past, with a pink handbag. Seconds later, a young girl with a scarf ran after him, yelling, “Stop! Thief!”
Well, at least he had something to do.
He slammed his foot down on the pedal, and the police car shot out of the alley like a rocket.
The kid never stood a chance, in a race against the best driver in the police force, but damned if he didn’t give him a hard time.
--
“So let me get this straight,” Harry finally said. “You ended up here, two years ago, without any memories, and have been looking for anyone who might recognize you. And the only things you remember are a guy with blond hair, a woman with brown hair, and something about tigers.”
“That’s right,” the man confirmed.
“And you’ve been running into the spooky side of Chicago for two years.”
The man scratched the back of his neck in reply. “I guess,” he admitted. “I mean, it’s really weird. Sometimes I go days without seeing something out of the ordinary, then something really crazy happens. Like, I dunno, a dinosaur.”
Harry quirked an eyebrow. “A dinosaur, you say?” he asked, trying (and failing) to feign innocence as his mind flashed back to the events of a year ago.
“It was weird, someone who looked a lot like you was riding...it...” the man trailed off, then stared at him. “That really was you, wasn’t it? The guy on the dinosaur.”
“Guilty as charged,” he admitted.
“You saved my life,” he said. “I don’t know if you noticed or not, but there was this tiny thing—with really sharp teeth—and I think it wanted to eat me but I’m pretty sure I taste horrible but your dinosaur squashed it. Flat. I didn’t know who you were at the time but man, that was awesome and you saved my life and thank you so much.”
Harry blinked at him, trying to recall when this had happened, then remembered hearing a squashing sound and not really being able to look, because there was a great big necromancy thing going down and he had to stop it before something bad happened. As in, “megalomaniac god creating” bad.
“You’re welcome?” he tried.
The man beamed for a moment, then sighed. “Anyway, I...kinda need help,” he began. “I’m no detective, and all the leads I’ve managed to dig up have gone nowhere. And you saved my life before, so I can’t think of anyone else who could help.”
He thrust his hand into his pocket, then pulled out a small collection of odds and ends. “I’ll find a way to pay the fee,” he added, looking rather desperate.
Harry held up his hand. “No worries,” he said. “Look, how about you pay up after we’re done?”
The man beamed again. “Great, thanks!” he exclaimed.
Something in Harry's gut told him he wasn't going to get out of this case with his fee.