Moonrise

Once they were at the villa, they packed up their belongings and then went through the painful task of packing up their friends’ things. They packed each person’s effects into a box, and then labeled them neatly. After they were finished, they sat around the kitchen, discussing their plans for the immediate future.

First thing they all agreed upon was to deliver the things belonging to their friends to their family members. Mitsuhide pulled up their files and gave addresses for the solemn deliveries. Since there were so few of them left, they also decided that everyone would go, out of a show of respect and love for their fallen teammates.

Bokuto and Kaori would give the twins’ boxes to their parents.
Kuroo volunteered to give Fukunaga’s box to his little sister, and Inuoka’s box to his little sisters.
Eita would give Kawanishi’s box to his older sister.

The rest were Crows, and the surviving members of the original team were adamant about delivering their teammates boxes themselves. Of course, the rest would go as well, as support, but it would be up to the Crows who would hand over each box. The slight hitch they had was Kiyoko’s and Ryunosuke’s boxes. Eventually, they decided to give both boxes to Saeko, Tanaka’s big sister. They also knew the hardest delivery of all would be Hinata’s box to his mom and little sister. Kei insisted he be the one to give them the box, which after some grumbling from Noya and Suga, was agreed upon.

Second, they talked about where they’d be going after they were finished.

Eita and Yachi were going home to Sendai. They wanted to discover where their budding relationship would take them. Already, Eita was itching to get his hands on his guitar again, and Yachi wanted her mom to meet him.

Noya wanted to travel a little bit before settling down to something permanent. This was something Asahi and he had wanted to do anyway, so Noya was going to make his travels a tribute to his lover.

Suga and Hoshiumi had nowhere to go, nowhere to call home, so they were going to stay at the villa, and move into the bungalows. Mitsuhide offered them work, as he’d need help dismantling Grandmother’s organization, such as it was. They agreed.

Bokuto and Akaashi were going back to Tokyo. They promised each other to rest as much as possible, and they wanted to reconnect with family they hadn’t seen in years. Plus, wedding plans. Everyone was invited, of course.

Kaori was going home to her family in Chiba prefecture. She hadn’t really spoken much since rejoining the group, and no one forced her to. She was mourning Osamu and what they hadn’t yet been able to start before he was taken from her.

Yuki, Tetsu, and Kei would also be heading back to Tokyo as well. Yuki had to get back to her quilting club, if only to tell them all the stories she could about her time away. Both Tetsu and Kei groaned and buried their faces in their hands. There’d be no avoiding the club once Yuki was done with her stories.

Tetsu, unsure if he still had a job with the JVA, was going back to pack up his stuff… and move in with Kei, above what was to become their little bookshop. Like Kei, he’d formed an attachment to the little shop, and couldn’t imagine not having it as a place to call home. And, as far as Tetsu was concerned, Kei was his home.

But before they did any of that, Kei remembered something important: his backpack and carry-on he’d left in a locker at the Osaka train station before arriving in Himeji. Also his laptop, and his own keys to his bookshop. He only hoped everything was still in the locker, or with the station authorities.

After they ate dinner, cooked by Yuki, Yachi, and Kei, they spent another couple hours talking and hanging out, and then split up to go to bed. Kei and Tetsu stayed to clean up, and then Tetsu left to get things ready in their bungalow.

Kei was just about done when someone walked in, taking a seat at the table. He heard a soft clink of metal, and after drying and putting away the last dish, he turned to see Oikawa. The man wasn’t looking at him, but at the shuriken loosely wrapped in a faded orange cloth. A black leather bag sat beside them.

“Do you need anything,” Kei asked carefully. “There’s still some food leftover. Or maybe…”
“No. Thank you, though,” Oikawa replied quietly, slowly looking up at Kei. “Join me?” and he gestured to the seat across from him.

Kei paused slightly, before walking over, and then sitting down. All Kei remembered about Oikawa was that he was the captain and setter for Seijoh, and that there had been no love lost between their two teams. That said, the two of them had never really dealt with each other before, so this was not only piquing his curiosity, but also giving him a chance to meet the man who had shared second in command with his brother.

“What’s up, Oikawa?” he asked after several minutes’ silence.
The man grinned ruefully. “Call me Tooru. Oikawa sounds so… formal.”
Kei raised an eyebrow. “It’s also polite. I don’t know you that well.”
“True enough. Tsuki, I…”
This time, Kei grinned ruefully. “If I’m going to call you Tooru, then it’s only fair you call me Kei.”
“Fine. Kei.” Tooru looked a little irritated, and smirked. “Gonna let me talk, now?”
Kei sighed dramatically, and returned the smirk. “If you must.”
“I must.” His expression returned to what it was before: serious, and perhaps a bit concerned. Kei waited him out. “Do you know these?” he asked, nodding to the stars.
“I mean, they are shuriken.”
“At least you’re keeping up. Look closer.”
“Okay, but why..?” Kei did as he was asked, and then his eyes widened. He quickly looked up at Tooru. “Shoyo’s stars?”
“Right. I’m sure you knew I had them, yeah?”
Kei nodded.
“Hinata gave them to me for safe-keeping. He told me he wasn’t going to use them again, which really should have tipped me off to his end goal, but I wasn’t really minding what he said. The fact that he was letting someone else touch his shuriken was, honestly, shocking enough to stop all thought.”

Kei touched a corner of the orange fabric, and turned the stars toward him. Shoyo’s name was engraved in script on each star, with the numbers 9/10 underneath. Under the numbers, Tobio’s name had been etched, the writing a little less careful.

“They were a gift,” he whispered, his fingertip just barely touching both names.
“Yeah. Tobio gave them to him after their wedding.”
“But… Shoyo gave them to you, Tooru.”
“No, he asked me to hold on to them. He wanted someone else to have them.”
“Wanted someone… else…” and then it clicked. “Oh. No, I can’t…”
Tooru pushed the shuriken closer to Kei, who started to push them back.
“He told me he was going to give them to you. I asked him why, and wouldn’t that be kind of mean, seeing as how he blamed you for so long.” He took a deep breath and exhaled. “Shoyo didn’t see it that way. He told me he wanted you to remember them as they were, back in school, and that he was happy you were at least frenemies, even if you weren’t quite friends.”

Kei blinked, and realized he was crying. Tooru smiled gently and handed him a handkerchief. Taking a few moments, he patted his face dry, and gently wrapped the stars in the orange fabric, and then slipped them into the leather bag. He couldn’t trust himself to speak, and Tooru seemed to understand that. Kei nodded, and started to rise, intending to go to Tetsu. But the other man stopped him by grasping his wrist and slipping a piece of paper into his hand.

“Keep in touch, okay? If you need to talk, rant, scream, cry… whatever. I know we aren’t close friends. Hell, I’m not even sure we can consider ourselves friends, but still. It helps to have someone outside to talk to, right?”
Kei nodded. “Yeah,” he replied, his voice scratchy from tears. “But, for what it’s worth, and after everything we’ve just been through, I think we can be friends.”
“Thank you, Kei.”
“You’re welcome, Tooru. See you in the morning?”
Tooru sighed again. “No. I’m leaving soon. I only stayed long enough to give these to you. Mitsu promised me I could leave as soon as we were done, and I miss my Iwa-chan. I’m going home.”
“Tell him I said hi.”
“Will do. See ya around?”
“Yeah. See ya around.”

~*~

“I’m not entirely sure how I feel about this,” Kei said softly as he sat in the middle of their bed, on top of their quilt. The leather bag holding Shoyo’s shuriken in front of him. “I mean, I believe we were friends, at least as much as we could be, but… to give me his stars?”
Tetsu sat behind him, his arms wrapped around him and holding tight.
“Maybe he considered you a friend even before he said anything?”
“But he really didn’t say anything. Not until he…” Kei’s voice stopped.
Tetsu’s arms tightened just a little more.
“What did Oikawa tell you?”
“That Shoyo wanted me to have them. That he wanted me to remember them as we were in high school,” Kei repeated. “That he was happy just being frenemies.”
“And before he passed, Hinata said…”
“He was glad we were finally friends.” Kei sighed, and tilted his head back to rest on Tetsu’s shoulder. “I wish he had told me, given me the stars himself.”
There was a short silence. “Would you have accepted them, then?”

Kei picked up the bag, opened it, and carefully took out one of the stars. As far as he could tell, they had never been used. Even if Tobio had survived, he doubted Shoyo would have used them. The stars were simple, yet beautiful, which pretty much summed up how Tobio and Shoyo saw each other, even when they fought like a pair of tigers. Each star had four points, edges still razor sharp, and made of black stainless steel.

“No, I wouldn’t have. I was just as determined to convince him to stay alive as he was to kill Ushijima and die. I guess his will was stronger than mine.”
“In this instance, yeah,” Tetsu agreed. “You’re pretty willful yourself, though.”
“Am I?” Kei asked, leaning forward just enough so that Tetsu would loosen his hold. Then he turned so that they faced each other. “How so?”
“Let me see…” Tetsu smiled and brushed his fingers through Kei’s hair. “Someone I love traveled practically non-stop, all over god knows how many prefectures, practically driving himself into the ground, refusing to stop or be caught. I’d call that willful.”
“I was surviving.”
“You had the will to live.”
“Well, I had someone I wanted to come home to.”
“And you call me a sap.”
“You are. A bigger sap than I could ever hope to be.”
“Oh yeah?”
“Yeah.”

They were both laughing softly as Tetsu pushed Kei down on the bed, settling between his legs. Both of them groaned at the contact, even if they were still fully clothed. In their pajamas. Which could easily be removed.

“Why don’t we finish what we started in the garden?”
“I almost wish we actually started.”
“Oh really?”
“Yeah. I wanted to see Grandmother spin her way into orbit.”
“Smartass.”
“Tetsu?”
“Yeah?”
“Shut up and show me what you were going to do.”

Tetsu didn’t need to be told twice.

~*~

The next morning, everyone (except Oikawa, who had already left) met in the kitchen for a hearty breakfast. Their bags, and the boxes containing their friends’ effects, were all stacked by the front door. Mitsuhide had arranged transportation for them, and also called family members to arrange meeting times. It was going to be a sad journey, but one they had to make.

Mitsuhide and Hotaru saw them off, and took turns shaking hands and hugging the young men and women who had been a part of their lives for years. No one said goodbye; they all exchanged phone numbers and written down addresses, so that at any time, they could call or visit.

They finally left, sitting quietly in a private car on the train to Kitakyushu in Fukuoka prefecture. For most of the four hour trip, they napped, or talked quietly. From there, they hopped on another train, for the hour and a half trip it took to get to Yamaguchi Station. Another three hours later, they made it to the Miya residence.

Bokuto and Kaori each took a box and went to meet Atsumu and Osamu’s parents. But they weren’t expecting to see Kiyoomi Sakusa as well. He accepted Atsumu’s box and quietly took it inside. The group was invited inside, and they gladly accepted. They spent time remembering the twins, consoling their parents, as well as Sakusa and Kaori.

When they had to leave, Kaori told them she was staying behind. It turned out that Osamu (and Atsumu) had spoken of her to their parents, and they offered her a place to stay until she had to go home. She accepted, and now they were down by one.

The next day, they traveled to Nerima ward in Tokyo, and it was Kuroo’s turn to give Fukunaga’s box to his sister, and the same for Inuoka. These meetings didn’t last for very long, but they made sure to spend a little time with the ladies, making sure they were okay to go home after they cried. Before they left, Kuroo gave them his number and told them to call if they needed anything. He’d be sure to help them out as best he could.
Then they made the three hour trip to Sendai. Since it was later than they expected, they stayed over at Eita’s parents’ house. This was a benefit to him, as well, since he could introduce Yachi to his parents. No surprise to anyone; they loved her almost immediately.

Eita and Yachi delivered Kawanishi’s box to his sister the next day. Since he was relatively new to the group, only Eita could share memories with her, and those Kawanishi was with before he passed were able to share a few stories. She thanked them, and they were on their way to the next meeting.

In the time it took them to get to Sendai from Miyazaki, Tanaka’s sister Saeko had reached out to other family members. It just made more sense if everyone was there at once. The only two that couldn’t make it were Hinata’s mom and sister.

Because they’d already traveled far too much, and she took care of the survivors. It didn’t matter if they went to another school, either. They were now her family, by virtue of her little brother and his wife. With the help of other family members, the small group of survivors were fed and given a place to sleep.

Noya and Suga gave Kinoshita’s box to his younger sisters, and Narita’s box to his older brother. They also gave both Tanaka’s and Kiyoko’s boxes to Saeko and Kiyoko’s older brother. For the rest of the day, and half the night, they shared memories, told stories, laughed, cried, and overall became the family Saeko declared them to be. She also declared them all to be the new Crows, which suited them all just fine.

Before bed that night, the survivors discussed the delivery of the final box. Kei would be the one to give Hinata’s box to his mother and Natsu, but Noya, Suga, and Yachi also wanted to be there, as they were part of the original team, the original Crows. The others also wanted to go, as a show of support and solidarity, considering they were also Crows, albeit new ones. Of course, this led to them scrapping with each other, and Saeko smiled from around the corner, with tears in her eyes. Even if they hadn’t really thought of it yet, they were Crows in spirit, and she could just imagine those that were missing were looking down on them and laughing.

~*~

“How did he do this every day?”
“Coach Ukai said he had unlimited stamina. Guess we know why, now.”
“I still think we should have taken the bus or something.”
“Oh come on! It’ll all be downhill when we go back!”
“That’s if we survive this.”
“It’s only biking uphill, guys.”
“How the hell did he do this every day?”

This bantering continued all the way to Hinata’s house. They thought it would be a nice tribute to their sunshine to bike there and back again. However, they hadn’t considered the steep grade most of the way up. Still, they kept up with each other, and made sure no one gave up along the way.

Kei remained silent, however, determined to get to the top. Just like Shoyo had been in school. He also carried the small box with Hinata’s things, and around his neck, the leather bag of stars. He’d made a decision last night, and only told Tetsu about it. This last task motivated him more than anything.

Eventually, they made it, and found Hinata’s mother and sister waiting for them with chilled water and a light snack. This was what she had done for her son every day and each year of his high school career. It was the least she could do for his friends. When they were rested, and ready, they all stood up and circled around Shoyo’s family. Kei stepped forward and handed her the box. She was already crying, and Natsu had unshed tears in her eyes. Kei could barely stand it, seeing Natsu cry, but he kept it together for a little while longer.

There were so many memories and stories to tell, and Natsu shared many of her own, as did his mom. As they had the day before, they laughed and cried, listened and spoke. The one thing they all noticed later was that Hinata had left a huge impression on each of them, and they’d never forget the smallest Crow.

When he had the chance, Kei drew Natsu to the side, and hoped for a few minutes of privacy. He sat her down, and knelt before her, holding out the leather bag.

“Shoyo gave these to me,” he explained quietly. “But I think they should be yours.”
“Do you not want them?” she asked, looking genuinely curious.
Kei paused. “I’m happy that he considered me a friend, and trusted me to take care of them, but…”
“Then they’re yours, Tsukishima-san. If he wanted me to have them, he’d have sent them home along with Tobio’s things, don’t you think?”
He lowered his arms, the bag still in his hands.
“Tsukishima-san…”
“Call me Kei.”
Natsu’s smile was as bright as her brother’s. It was like looking at the female version of Shoyo, sunshine and all.
“Kei. Those stars are yours now. Shoyo wanted you to have them, to take care of them. I’m sure he had a better reason than that, but I also know he’d want you to keep them, not give them to me.” She bit her lip, and her eyes went to the bag. “Can I see them?”
Kei smiled back at her. “Of course.”

He carefully opened the bag and took out the orange cloth, unwrapping the stars. Natsu’s eyes flooded with tears as she read the names on the shuriken, and she gently traced the engravings with her finger.

“How about a compromise?” Kei suggested, and Natsu looked up at him. “There are several stars. We can split them in half.”

Natsu managed to look so happy through her tears, and she nodded, agreeing to his idea. From around the corner, her mother came and gave them another piece of orange cloth, and Kei took it to wrap up half the stars. Natsu made him keep the leather bag; she had something she could put her stars in.

Before they left to go back, Natsu went up on tip-toe and kissed Kei’s cheek, surprising him (and everyone else). She didn’t need to tell him why, but he still flushed scarlet, and only shook his head with each question fired at him as they coasted back down the mountain.