"And Always, Sweet Dreams."

History can Flare

Hawk's POV

"You ready?"

It was noon, and we were at the meeting place. Eraserhead was going through some final protocols with the rest of the selected hero team and the backup and Special Operations unit. There was something cold lingering in the atmosphere above, moving with the wind, and causing a chill down my spine. Something was going to change tonight. Something bad, or something good. I could only hope it was the latter.

Touya glanced over at me, blowing a puff of smoke from between his lips. The nasty smell of a burning cigarette filtered towards my nose, and I scrunched my face.

Touya smiled at the look I made, and took another huff of the horrible cigarette. "As ready as I'll ever be."

I lightly smacked his covered arm. "Would you stop smoking those? They're so terrible for you, and it's not like it makes you look cool. You're setting a bad example, and killing yourself at the same time." I argued.

At that, Touya smirked again. "Me? Setting a bad example? Pfft, please. It's not like I've killed a couple of people before or anything, so what bad example could I possibly set?"

I frowned, and had to physically restrain myself from slapping the scarred bastard across the face. "Now's not the time for sarcasm, you dumbass. And watch what you say, or I might have to seriously have you arrested, and our deal will go to shit."

At the mention of the possibility of him going to prison, he took the cigarette from his lips and flicked it to the ground before crushing it with his heel. He took a deep breath, and looked towards me with a blank face. "Happy now?"

I huffed and shook my head. "It's so unhealthy for the environment for you to just leave the cigarette on the ground like that. Jeez, what happened to saving the world?"

He scoffed and bent to pick up the paper of the cigarette. "We're not saving the world – we're saving Japan. The world is too big for us to save it all." He then placed the paper in the bin, which was literally five steps away.

I pressed my lips together and swallowed. The wind flittered through my feathers. "The world might be too big, but we can try. We can at least try, or everything we do here today would be for nothing."

At that Touya looked back at me, and placed his hand on my shoulder. his grip was firm, but comforting. "This is the first step, Hawks. This, right here, what we are doing, is the first step, and it's been long overdue."

At that, I could only nod.

We didn't talk after that, and were quickly pushed into the hustle of final planning and arrangements, and a quick, in detailed talk through of the plan for tonight. For this to work, nothing can go wrong. But knowing our luck, we know that something bad is going to happen. The past year has been the calm before the storm, and this was it. We were in the eye of the storm, now, and there was no turning back.

When the sun started to set, we charged and marched.

When we reached the base, the sunset wasn't golden this time, but a fiery red.

And among that red, I held my gaze with blazing turquoise eyes, and felt an intense emotion of dread that settled heavily over my shoulders. Lips spoke, and words were mouthed.

"Courage to the end."

This is the first step. This is the beginning of the end.

And for some, this was the end.

We charged inside, and the rest is history.

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