Chapter Text
Everyone except Rei are orphans. Renji lost everyone but his older sister when he was young, Itori had been found outside a run-down church and Uta is a product of a terribly planned teenage pregnancy and left in his grandmother’s living room without as much as a note to explain the entire situation. They all live close by each other, went to the same playgrounds, got to know each other, attended the same schools and grew into a tight group of four friends. Rei doesn’t have a mother, she passed away after a difficult childbirth, but she did have a father.
Though he had been killed in a shooting in Shinjuku a year ago. Rei never quite recovered from that experience, and her dark hair had turned white and that incident led to a whole new set of problems that brought the girl near to the breaking point.
But her friends won’t let her break that easily.
Uta is at the train station, two huge bags by his feet and a heavy backpack strapped to his back. He’s dressed in ripped jeans, a coat which is far too big for him and combat boots. He’s hidden his eyes behind big shades, but he knows Rei will recognize him anyways when she arrives. His bright bleached blonde hair is a dead give-away amongst the dull colours in the station. In his hands he is cradling two tickets to a train that will take them away from Tokyo. He glances at the clock and frowns. Ten minutes until the train departs, and Rei is nowhere to be seen. He contemplates about calling her but discards the thought quickly. Rei had explained that she had to sneak out and he’d rather not alarm her uncle to their plan by calling her. He is becoming slightly worried though, because it is far past their agreed upon meeting time.
He sighs and glances at the tickets in his hands. He remembers when he found out about the uncle that had stepped up to become Rei’s guardian after her father’s death, the man who had moved into her house, so she could stay there and continue to attend the same school until she graduated. A man Rei can’t ever remember. At first none of them thought anything was wrong, but then Itori noticed a few minute changes that made her think a bit, and Uta witnessed Rei nearly toppling over in pain when someone had barely touched her. That’s when he knew, and he confronted her. And after her confession a plan began to grow in his mind, which he included Itori and Renji in as well.
His brows furrow deeper at the thought. There’s no reason for him to jump onto the train if Rei doesn’t show up. He thinks to himself that he can’t be all that surprised if Rei doesn’t come. He has read that most domestic abuse victims don’t dare to even attempt at escaping their abusers. Rei, at least, had tried to put up a fight in the beginning, had tried to report it in to the police. She is just unlucky that her uncle had a man, if not more, within the police force in Tokyo. Uta is just a teenager still, barely a young adult who just graduated high school, there’s a limit to what he can do. All he can do is bring her away, help her escape the hell in which she currently lives in and hide her away, keep her safe. Itori and Renji will do the rest. They all passed their exams, as far as anyone else believes, they are all going to the universities they’ve applied to. Only Itori and Renji will do that. Uta hasn’t even told his grandmother that something is wrong or told her he is leaving. She’ll notice though, when he returns with the bags after suddenly just disappearing without giving notice. He can just imagine the lecture Tsumugi will drop on him if he returns. He should have told her, he knows this, he is all she has left, but he can’t bring himself to do so. It’s dangerous enough to do this on his own, it’s scary to think about what kind of trouble he’ll put his grandmother in if she knows what is going on. She’ll argue with him on it, say that there are other ways and he knows there are, but Rei can’t take much more. The other paths to her rescue will take too long. She’ll break before she’s free. And neither he, Renji nor Itori intend to let that happen.
Uta realizes that even though they have planned this little adventure for months, it is rushed. He would have come up with a better plan if Rei had caved in and begged for help earlier. She has been too strong for her own good, suffering for the better part of a year before she broke down on the back of his bicycle. As it is, the best he can do is help her hide until Renji and Itori has given the lawyer they’ve found enough information and helped secure enough proof to get the bastard locked away forever. Rei has, hopefully, already given them a lot of material which she had taken herself secretly in hopes of bringing the man down and far, far away from her until it had become too much.
Uta checks the clock one final time. Only two minutes are left until the train leaves. He’s lost count of how many sighs’ he has released the past few minutes alone but accepts that their plan has gone to shit.
Rei isn’t coming.
He shoves the tickets in his coat pocket and hauls the bags over his shoulders and turns towards the exits, feeling not annoyed or angry but… a little bit lost. What is he supposed to do to help his friend? How can he help her? If it has come to the point where Rei will no longer attempt at running away, to escape her abusive uncle, how will she be if an actual trial happens? Will she be able to fight?
A sudden shriek captures his attention and he looks up to see someone fall down the stairs and roll across the ground. It looks painful, and they seem disoriented as they rise up on all fours slowly, reaching for the glasses they had lost and shaking their head until they get their bearings back.
“Rei-san?” He mutters as the person scrambles to her feet and turns her head left and right hurriedly, eyes wide in panic, until they land on him. She rushes forward, stumbling in her haste and nearly topples them both over. Her cheek is swollen, he notes, and her glasses have a long crack in it.
“He’s right behind me!” She whimpers and Uta hears the train attendant call for the last of the passengers to hurry and board the train as it is ready to leave. He grabs her hand and yanks her along with him, jumping onto the train and finding them seats. He hides her behind the curtains in the window and throws their luggage onto the shelves above them. The train jolts and starts moving, and Uta dares a glance out the window only to see the man hunting his friend storm down the stairs into the station, looking around frantically. He appears to be absolutely livid, and Uta wonders how many bruises his friend would have blooming on her skin if the man had ever caught her. Rei whimpers and he sits down beside her, pulling her further back to hide her and turning her face away from the window. The man opens his mouth, but there’s no sound reaching the pair’s ears. He is being approached by workers on the station though and the last Uta sees is the man shoving them away violently.
“We can’t see him anymore.” Uta tells her and she clutches his jacket, breathing heavily and trembling terribly. She is terrified still, it’s obvious to anyone who’ll throw a glance at her with tears cascading down her cheeks as she fights to control her breathing. He soothingly brushes her hair as he continues to tell her that it is over, that they have finally escaped, that he knows what he is doing. And he does. He may have studied for his exams the last few months, but he’s made a lot of preparations for this escape as well. Well, as many as he had had the time to, at the very least.
“We got away.” Her trembling doesn’t stop, but she looks up at her friend and while he still sees terror in her jade eyes, he does catch a glimpse of something else, something he thinks is a spark of hope.
He tells himself that it is.