Comrades

Chapter One

Shouta

Shouta was the only person he knew without a soulmate, and it hurt. Who doesn't have a soulmate at thirty-two? Hizashi's soulmate, the pro hero Sphinx, had been with him in the hospital!

He pushed his thoughts away and rolled out of his bed. He only had a few hours of sleep the previous night, because there was trouble and he was the only one willing to do the work.

His bedroom smelled like peanut butter- and sadness. Lots of that. If Shouta was responsible for half of the smell, and the louder man caused the other half, it wouldn't be too difficult to link the scent of failure to the caterpillar and the peanut butter to the louder of the two.

"You're finally awake! I was about to come in and wake you up!" Hizashi said loudly and he closed the dishwasher with his foot.

Shouta wasn't even in the kitchen yet and Zashi knew he was up. He wasn't even downstairs! No point being silent when your fiance can practically sense you coming.

"What day is it?" Shouta asked the other person in the kitchen as he walked over to the fridge to grab a cereal bar.

"Monday! The best day of the week." Hizashi said as Shouta flicked the switch on the coffee machine. "Yay... Monday. No better than any other day, but I don't see how it's worse. People and their groaning about something as annoying and idiotic as one of the seven days that wasn't any different from the other six," Shouta thought.

Shouta scooped coffee into the filter and left it to go get ready in the bathroom. He trotted up the stairs and used his face to open the bathroom door. He didn't really care...

He brushed his teeth, attempted to wrangle his greasy black mop, and tugged his shirt over his head to put on his signature black sweater in its place. When he got his sweater over his head, his left sleeve was still up, so he could see his tattoo that should have disappeared by now, according to normal social standards.

He knew it would happen eventually, but he didn't know it would be so soon.

His tattoo almost looked like a cross between the "&" sign and a treble clef. It was like an almost-eight with a squiggly line through it. It was bright yellow like his favorite sleeping bag.

He then went to his room to toss his bandages over his shoulders and grab his bag for work. He slung his sleeping bag case over his shoulder and left for work.

As he stepped out the front door of his penthouse apartment, he walked down the pathway to the gate and down the street to the bus stop. The bench and small roofed area was rotting, and the smell of mildew was a familiar one. "This is such an eyesore sitting next to the gated apartment just down the way from here. I don't want this thing near my house!" Shouta thought.

The wind began to blow, and Shouta was at least thankful for the bit of shelter the old wooden bus waiting area provided. It was better than nothing.

"I hope the weather is better later. I wouldn't want those kids to have a bad day at the sports festival... They may not take my class seriously, but maybe they'll learn something from this," he mumbled.

A man can hope.

He heard the tires crunching over the gravel that signalled the bus, and he stood up. He stepped up the few stairs into the vehicle and sat down near the back.

A young child waved at him, but he pretended he didn't notice. He didn't have the social skills for that. If Zashi was with him, he would've been squealing like he was a child himself and playing with the kid. Did he realize how loud he was all the time? That was one of the many reasons Shouta loved the other man (though he wouldn't care to admit it).