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"You look like you've got something to say," Koito glares at Ogata defensive in advance.
a brat will always be a brat.
maybe it’s the irony of fate, should ogata believe in fate at all, or maybe another force was secretly at play, and they’d always be bound to meet halfway, in the same position as all those years back. ogata huffs out a mirthless laugh, ghost-pains where his eye should’ve been - had been not longer than a few days before - anchor him to the present. second lietunant koito, sprawled on the ground, helpless, a wounded puppy for all the barking he did around tsurumi’s feet on the daily. it’s annoying, it makes him want to break him badly.
he doesn’t, only keeps the urge at bay, for now. his gun remains still against the back of koito’s head, feeling his muscles tense below the barrel. he won’t hold out for much longer, the aching wounds becoming more persistent by the second, but he finds enough strength in himself to roll koito over and on his back, heel digging in the crook of his adam’s apple and sharp collarbone. ogata knows what it feels like, to feel cartilage giving into the pressure of a heavy step. it would be so easy…
“heh, i sure do. didn’t realize you were so concerned about me that you’d come visit. i’m moved.” ogata watches him with a dark gleam in his eye, mockery undisturbed, only heightened by the morphine traversing through his veins finally kicking in in-between words. “it’s not the first time you’ve been cornered like this. how many times is that going to happen until it sticks, that you’re not cut out for this?”
his foot presses lower, above koito’s ribcage, and the gun hovers on the space between his eyes. the gun's been unlocked from the start; it's unfinished business. at last his foot was in the throbbing expanse of his chest, which had only grown broader, a man's frame, even larger than ogata's had been when he was koito's age. heartbeats rumbled against bare skin. sweat pools like jewels on his temple, framing those features, as though painted from the finest inks. as if everything about him is a mirror of his lineage.
“spoiled brat.” the vowels come sharper than japanese, rusty from misuse. he searches for that feeling again, sour on his tongue, invokes the anger that had made him try and riddle his pretty skull with bullets back then.
instead he watches, quietly, as koito squirms. fights to regain control. the kick comes faster than he assumed his body could take, but he strikes koito’s face with the unceremonious grace that you’d haul corpses on the battlefield. he throws a last glance over his shoulder, for memory’s sake, perhaps. or because he just wanted to see him cry a little, as he’d done at tsurumi’s lap many times before.
@muddsludge
"You're losing my interest and that's very dangerous." Usami to Ogata
interest came in many forms.
for the privates of the 7th division, interest could only be defined by the free-fall act of rebellion coiling in the guts of their infantry, the belly of it all. a less prominent interest, but existing altogether within the rows and rows of hungry men looking for recognition was, undoubtedly, the merciful caress of their first lieutenant’s hand.
like a kid searching for their father’s approval, soldiers lined up for morning call expecting to hear or witness first lieutenant tsurumi’s fanfare, the speeches that could go on for hours on end, basking in the sound of his own voice. ogata could almost see it, had wanted it for a while before he’d found something else - amber eyes, the asymmetry of a war-scarred face - to keep his rapt attention and stomach well-fed.
usami doesn’t seem the type who’d rather look anywhere else. their gazes meet, locked in place by the silent feeling of recognition: he saw in usami’s expression a familiar sort of necessity, the kind he’d found himself stepping back into every time he brought a dead bird back home, in ibaraki. whether tsurumi glanced back and gave usami the attention he sought for, that’s entirely up for debate. he doubted it would be any more different than appraisal, the kind that officers perform routinely with every new stock of mosin-nagants.
it’s only then that be becomes aware of the thickening smell of antiseptic, gunpowder and death. an amused smirk tugs at his lips, voice falling a few octaves, words slurred by the remnants of anaesthesia lingering in his system. “dangerous, for who?”
“prey animals don’t turn their backs to their predators. it's in their best interest, don't you agree?”
@muddsludge