in spring, i saw the sun

[softpunks]

suna rintarou/miya osamu // ~2.5k
> written for the Studio Haikyuu Zine; Princess Mononoke AU.

The wolves had raised Suna to be ruthless, and Osamu never had a problem with it the same way he rarely had a problem with Suna himself, so a part of him always knew—despite how he always said otherwise—that when Suna said he’d someday kill Osamu if he got in the way, he meant it. Shot in Irontown not only after stopping Suna from killing Eboshi, but defending his childhood friend at the same time from the villagers, Osamu knew there was a slim chance he was getting out of this alive.

So when they tumbled to the ground and Suna drew Osamu’s own knife over his throat, Osamu thought—this is it, and accepted it the same way he accepted the curse wrapped around his arm, gradually eating him alive. Death by Suna’s hand would’ve been the kindest death, in the end, so Osamu told him, expecting it to be his last words, “You’re beautiful.”

Suna looked furious, but he already said enough was enough, and when he made death threats, he never made a habit of repeating himself twice. Osamu closed his eyes, expecting a killing blow, and feeling somewhat relieved when he lost consciousness before it could come, like the deities out there wanted to spare him the pain.

He dreamt he drifted through states of consciousness, tethering the lines of life and death with the notion that the latter would grace him soon from how he hadn’t managed to comprehend what was going on around him, despite knowing something was.

And then, sometime after, Osamu woke up—alive.

He registered where he was even before he looked around. He recognized the sound of the gentle way of the leaves and the ripple of the still water that could only belong to a particular place in the forest, where he first saw the Great Forest Spirit. Half his body was submerged in the pool, but he could no longer feel the ache of his wound. He realized, when his head turned, that a kodama and its friends stood beside him, as if watching him curiously for his next move. Suna smiled, but Osamu found that he couldn’t speak, caught off guard by how dry his throat felt and how foul his mouth tasted.

Osamu settled for a wave instead, and the kodama made a nattering sound before moving, one spirit carrying its friend, another pair feeding one another as they lay sprawled on the floor, recreating what had apparently happened after Suna lost consciousness. Something soft landed on his cheek, and he picked up a dried, dead leaf. Glancing up, he saw the stem it had once been attached to, and the pawprint of a creature that had stood above him.

“You’re lucky the Great Forest Spirit decided you were better off alive,” Suna’s voice cut in. He stood in the water with Yakul, stroking his fur. Yakul’s straps had been removed, which didn’t surprise Osamu, because Suna was always trying to convince Yakul to leave Osamu’s side to be free, even if Yakul always stayed by Osamu’s side. Until now, neither of them knew if it was because Osamu wore the same face as Atsumu, but it no longer mattered. “The bullet was lodged in too deeply. You were going to die.”

“I think my luck has more to do with you, wolf prince,” Osamu replied, sitting up only to wince. The blood had been washed out by the water and all that was left was a small hole in his clothes, the skin smooth and left without scar, but his insides still felt wrung out, and the bark that Suna likely fed him while he was drifting through consciousness made him parched. His clothes were soaked though, which felt like the more pressing matter. “You couldn’t have placed me somewhere dryer?”

“No,” Suna said shortly, either because he never liked it when Osamu used that nickname, or because he was still angry about what happened back in Irontown. It didn’t stop him from moving to Osamu’s side when he tried to bend down and scoop up some water to drink. Suna rested his hand on the small of Osamu’s back. Unsurprisingly, it helped calm him down, and the controllable, almost unexplainable shaking in his hands ceased.

Osamu would’ve been more concerned about being on the receiving end of someone’s ire if that someone hadn’t been Suna. It was easier for him to be harsh when he had so much reason to, and the times he was more likely to soften felt so long ago. Realistically, it had only been a year since, Osamu thought. His village had been one of the few places with people that the animals tolerated, and Suna would’ve been more likely to be swayed that humans were worth giving a second chance. But then Suna had disappeared right as cityfolk began populating the forest spaces and tearing down nature to establish their dominance, Osamu had been infected with a curse a boar that tried to attack the village carried, and now, here they were, dwelling in the Great Forest Spirit’s sacred space licking their wounds.

Suna’s loathing was bad enough; it didn’t help that Osamu had been shot by none other than a human.

“Whatever you’re thinking, stop it,” Suna suddenly said. “Especially if it’s about gratitude.”

Osamu pulled himself up so he sat on the dry land. His arm twinged, but he purposely gripped it slowly, to not give away that he was in pain. “From me or from you?”

“You didn’t need to do that,” Suna answered instead, though he moved so he sat beside Osamu, staring at Yakul, who had drifted to another patch of dry land across them and settled there to nap, as if he wanted to give both Suna and Osamu their own space. “I could have handled it.”

“You would’ve been killed,” Osamu said. “If not from Eboshi, then from her people.”

“I could’ve at least taken her head. She wouldn’t be able to hurt Moro anymore,” Suna pointed out. “But that was still no excuse for you to stop me. And the fact that you—I can’t believe you mingled with those humans. They’re destroying the forest, our home.”

He said humans with so much venom, as if he wasn’t human himself. But he’d grown up with wolves and other forest animals all his life—the only human he ever spent so much time with was none other than Osamu. When he thought about it, what made someone human was hard to define to begin with, and maybe it wasn’t worth figuring out.

“I’m human,” Osamu offered. “So are the people of my village. Not all humans are bad.”

“These ones are,” Suna replied. “We must fight. That’s how we protect what we care about most. Isn’t that what you’re doing?”

He was staring at Osamu’s arm. The ache didn’t stop, but it was easy to pretend like it was, as if Suna’s glance and the fact that he noticed meant something significant. If his brother had still been around, he would’ve said Osamu was running away. But he had to leave his village because that was what was best for his people, and it didn’t matter whether it was the right decision to make or not. He knew where Suna was coming from, how he was trying to appeal to him. Suna was raised by the wolves, who always came in packs and instinctively reacted mercilessly to protect the things they cared about. Osamu knew a thing or two about that feeling, but still.

“I don’t like war,” Osamu said, reaching out towards the kodama with his cursed hand. The kodama tilted its head and inched closer, but did not climb on top of him like it normally would’ve. “Violence breeds hatred, and hatred breeds curses. If we fight to protect the forest, we might sicken it instead.”

Suna shifted, before he took his mask and brushed a thumb against the paint. Osamu had been the one who gave it to Suna, much to the disapproval of Moro, who Osamu was never really able to grow on like he’d been able to with Suna. “Even if we don’t do something, they will.”

He was right, but Osamu still couldn’t find it in him to agree with him. What the people of Irontown were doing was far from good, but it didn’t automatically make them bad people. Eboshi was good to her people, and she simply didn’t see the good in the forest. Osamu thought the same applied with the forest and the animals themselves. Everyone only cared about the things that personally affected them; never truly trying to understand what it was like to be in the place of another.

Osamu thought he would’ve been the same if he didn’t meet Suna, who taught him how limited his own perspective was on the world. Osamu wanted to believe everyone could co-exist together in peace. If Atsumu were still alive, he would’ve said Osamu was only so stubbornly naive because of how they managed to live well together as twins despite being so different.

“It’s not a kind thing to be cursed,” was all Osamu could say. “To live knowing this thing inside me could kill me soon, and there’s nothing I could do, because I didn’t deserve it. Is it so wrong that I don’t want anyone else to experience it, wolf prince?”

“Don’t call me that,” Suna said, but it lacked the bite he normally had. Osamu suddenly remembered Eboshi had referred to Suna with the same name, only in a more mocking tone, and Osamu had to hold back from snapping at her, giving away that he knew the enemy of her and the Irontown folk in more than name. It was far from relevant, but Osamu found himself wanting to tell Suna that he never meant it like that anyway. Suna called him stupid despite his affection and Osamu called him wolf prince with nothing but affection. “I still didn’t need you to rescue me.”

Osamu only splayed out his hands. He noticed that Suna was holding onto strips of bark that he fed him while he’d been unconscious. “If it helps you sleep better at night, then you can think of it more as a tactical retreat.”

Suna scoffed. Still, he caught Osamu’s gaze and offered him the bark without a word. They were stretchy and tough, not the kind of thing Osamu could swallow with ease, and he recalled the kodama retelling him everything that had happened, how Suna had fed him himself by chewing the bark to feed him. The memory made Osamu smile. Then, Suna said, “You should know that the boars are coming.”

Osamu turned to him. “The boars?”

“It took them months to get here, but Okkoto-nushi had called for them. Moro told me they want to make a last stand against the humans. It’s the only way they can protect the forest. Osamu, regardless of what you believe in, the creatures here will do something about those humans. You need to decide where you stand.”

”And you?”

“I’m not changing my mind. No matter what history we may have, I will not be swayed,” Suna told him. He paused, as if hesitating to say it, but he did anyway, “But I hope—it will mean something to you. That you will fight alongside me in protecting what matters most to us.”

It didn’t surprise Osamu, but it didn’t stop the pang of hurt he felt anyway. He didn’t want to fight just as much as he didn’t want to be on the opposite side. He didn’t want there to be a side he needed to pick to begin with. The fact that he was running out of time, that the curse would kill him no matter what he did, had not changed that.

It wasn’t about living or dying, after all. It was about how he was going to live and die.

“Suna,” Osamu finally said, and he didn’t remember the last time he actually called Suna by his name. He didn’t know if he imagined the way Suna had shifted almost uncomfortably, like he didn’t like it, like it made them more distant than they really were. “If I got in your way again, would you kill me?”

Suna looked at him, as if trying to memorize how he looked, as if it was the last time he’d get to do this. All Osamu could think of was that Suna was beautiful. “Always,” Suna told him. It wasn’t something he promised out of ruthlessness or frustration. He said it was like it was inevitable—like it was reassurance.

There were worse ways to die, Osamu thought, and worse ways to live. To have both with Suna was probably more than he could ever ask for.