The Three Great Spears of Japan, renowned for their strength and infamous for their tales of war and victory. It's inevitable that they would be summoned here, put to use by their saniwa, and grow to be just as celebrated in these new forms as they were before.

"The captain for the second unit will be Otegine-san," Horikawa—attendant for the day—announces to the courtyard, his light voice carrying on the summer breeze. "Alongside him, we'll have Midare-san, Chatannakiri-san, Atsushi-san, Nihongou-san, and Tonbokiri-san. Please report back when you're all prepared!"

The courtyard buzzes with energy as everyone talks about the training missions, Nihongou laughing good-naturedly as Namazuo complains about not being invited on the excursion yet. Otegine has been on these missions before, but captain holds a different status than simply being on the team. He takes a deep breath as he readies himself for the long, strenuous training days to come.

"We'll see you on the water." Sasanuki, who is currently headed out with the First Unit, waves to them with a smile.

Summer training is, in theory, serious team building work. The sort of practice that will make them more cohesive as a unit, that will make them stronger as they progress into more and more difficult battles, but in practice—

Horikawa hands each member of the team a water gun, pulled from a bin that they only use in the middle of every summer.

"Really, I'm no good at—" Otegine starts, the protest ringing hollow. It is his fifth time at the regiment, after all.

"’Anythin' but stabbing,’ we know," Nihongou comments, taking the water gun into his hands without complaint. He adjusts the goggles sitting on his head.

"It will be a wonderful opportunity to expand our skills, then." Tonbokiri smiles at him.

Midare cheers as they're transported to their destination, his voice getting lost somewhere in the winds of time.

Their feet land on sand, the salty smell of the ocean air hitting each of them all at once, the deep, calming sound of waves crashing at the shoreline again and again and again. Otegine takes a deep breath. This sensation is familiar only to this body, these sounds and this smell and the easy comfort of the water gun in his hands, the sound of water sloshing and the patterns of this sort of training battle all come back to him as easily as waves roll in.

Nihongou's hand claps down on his shoulder at the same time that Sasanuki and Chiyoganemaru from the First Unit call out to them, a surfboard under Sasanuki's left arm, and a paddleboard stuck in the sand behind Chiyoganemaru.

---

He is born from fire and steel, sweat and hope; inspiration seeped into a blade, and a hint of pride burning in a signature. His creator smiles, dazzling like dew in the bright morning sun of spring. (At the time, he doesn’t know of this image. He is but an infant without a name.)

“You are complete,” he says, and the sweat on his face looks like tears.

Those who see him say he is beautiful, if not a little peculiar; worthy of protecting and, because he is so unique, worthy of being protected. Their hands caress him with wonder and a sense of admiration, as if he were a precious thing. He doesn’t know what makes them act this way, lacks the comparison to understand what exactly makes him so special.

Happy as it makes him, he doesn’t care that much. He is a sword, and as such he has one duty to fulfil. That’s all there is to it, the only wish he has.

*

Wrapped in cloth so soft it might be what humans call an embrace, he is sent to meet his master. All he sees from the journey are the various changes in light, but he listens.

The people talk of various things, a lot of which he doesn’t understand, because he lacks the images to picture them. Sometimes they talk about him – he notices that much – but never to him. He understands though: To humans, swords can’t talk; there is no use in striking up a conversation.

The men carry their own swords, much older than him. (He is so young, but so eager.) One of them is kind and sounds worn. Some others snarl; acting as if he couldn’t hear their hisses born from what he will later recognize as jealousy and a different sort of pride.

They scold him for being carried like a prince already when he has yet to fight his first battle, let alone win it. They wonder if the cloth is playing a trick on them, or if he really is so small.

“Just wait,” he wants to quip. “I will earn myself a name, and you will understand what Awataguchi Kuniyoshi created with me.”

He stays silent, because he has nothing to show aside from his creator’s name, and yearns to arrive in his master’s hands.

*

One time when the light is gone and all is silent, someone prods at the cloth he’s wrapped in. He thinks their hands must be very small and soft – certainly, they wouldn’t be able to hold him, even as small as he is.

After some more prodding and poking (he thinks there is some scratching as well), a voice speaks up, and a curious voice it is in two ways:

One, it’s unlike all other voices he heard so far, a little high and grinding against his mind, though he finds that he doesn’t mind it as much as one would think. It’s rich and direct in an almost physical way.

Two, the owner sounds curious about him when their low mumbling turns into audible speech. Directed at him.

“Where are you going?” The voice asks and something butts against him. Not the tiny hands, but something else. ‘To the place where the Akimoto family resides’, he thinks and wishes he could answer like a human.

“Ah,” makes the voice, and then, after an awkward pause: “I heard they have good food.”

He wouldn’t know. He is confused. No one has talked to him yet but the scolding swords; however he is certain that this voice doesn’t belong to any of them or the men. He doesn’t dare to address another thought at the voice, in fear of it all being a coincidence.

“You’re the silent type, aren’t you? That’s okay. Ah, and I guess blades like you wouldn’t eat food, they only cut it.” The bigger something pokes at him again. “Hey, you’re not a reeeaaally big and supposedly pretty kitchen knife, are you?”

If he could bristle, or duck a head, he would. ‘I’m not!’

He doesn’t know what exactly he is, but he knows his purpose is battle, not slicing meat.

“Mhm~” The voice makes a few pleased sounds while poking at him again. “That’s better. Very well. You know what? I think I will come visit you at that house. Until then, make sure no one mistakes you for a kitchen utensil, because that would be just sad.”

Then, he notices noise outside and hears the owner of the voice – so light on their feet – shuffle away. “Time to go, or they might throw real knives at me. That wouldn’t do at all. People are so greedy.”

That is how they met for the first time.

*

At his new home, things go rather unexpected. Granted, his master is elated, admiring, complimenting the fine work of Awataguchi; comments on how peculiar he is – however again this proves to change things for him.

They barely grant him a first breath in the real world, a chance to taste the air of battle. In fact he wouldn’t know what a real battle is, if it weren’t for the words echoed by the walls. To the Akimoto’s he is too precious, too fine, too beautiful to risk. He is loved and treasured.

He doesn’t know what all of this means when he is a blade, made to be anything but an ornament to brag about, even when he is so different and his creator so well-known. It makes him angry, and sad. The utmost care with which he is handled, sometimes being taken for a mock battle but never more – they don’t change the fact that there is only so few room for him to grow, tucked into the safety of a room so big.

All he can do is wait. And wait.

For a day where things change.

*

Change walks in on a summer night, with tiny steps on not as tiny paws.

One of the attendants forgot to close the sliding door leading to the yard, and from there a fox comes in.

He thinks the animal is here for food – it won’t be lucky then, unless the same girl who was in charge of closing up for the night had kitchen duty as well– because why else would it be here?

If he could talk, he would tell the fox that food is stored elsewhere, not here. It’s in the wrong building. Shouldn’t it know, with a fine nose like that?

The fox, however, sweeps its surroundings with one glance until it sees him. It comes to sit down in front of him, eyes bright and knowing. “There you are,” it says. “I almost didn’t recognize you. You seemed bigger with all that cloth wrapped around you.”

He is confused. He recognizes this voice – it’s the only one who talked with him, not just to him – but he is still confused.

‘Foxes don’t talk.’ The thought is loud enough to be heard. With a tilted head, the fox only replies: “Well, the same goes for swords. Yet here we are and hold a conversation.”

At that, he feels a surge of… happiness? Yes, he is happy. So happy, he can’t think properly.

The fox doesn’t mind his silence and walks up to him, leans up to poke him with a paw. He recognizes that feeling. (So it was not a tiny hand, back then.) If he weren’t made of steel, he’d lean into the touch, the familiarity.

“It looks like they take good care of you,” the fox says after some prodding.

‘They do.’ His master himself always makes sure, and whispers words of adoration when no one else is there to hear. ‘I am treasured.’ He keeps the ‘A little too much’ to himself, because he is not ungrateful. Being taken care of like this is a treasure in itself, and he is not too young to know this much.

The fox looks at him, thoughtful. Finally it hums. “I will come back again and check on you then. They better continue to treat you well, or I might have to steal you away.”

The last part sounds like it’s smirking, but the promise sounds true. ‘Please do,’ is all he thinks in reply.

*

The fox never steals him away, because the family keeps treating him well.

He still is not ungrateful – how many blades get lost or broken? – however, he sometimes wishes that he could see more of the world; be of more use to his master. He is loved, but feels like he didn’t earn that love.

The few things he learns of the world, he learns them from meetings where he is there to inflict a sense of wonder and admiration – the signature on him speaks of prodigy and honor, after all. It’s far from what he yearns for, but he is thankful nevertheless.

The rest he learns from the fox and its tales. It speaks of battles to the death and children from the rivers, complains about how smart some humans are about storing their food and how others can’t seem to take care of their money. (Foxes have no use for coins, as pretty as they are.)

A part of him always waits for the fox to get tired of him, because unlike the animal he has nothing to tell apart from the occasional (somewhat unneeded) maintenance, or show battles, or how much he yearns to pay his master back for all the caresses and whispers.

The fox always comes back as it promises.

One night, it returns to him being in an exceptionally silent state. The house is silent too, and so the fox’s voice is very soft when it asks: “What happened?”

He can’t explain it well, because how do you explain grief? He thinks that, as a mere weapon even as useless as he is, he shouldn’t experience grief. ‘He is gone,’ is all he can think in one go. ‘This house is in mourning.’

The fox doesn’t offer its condolences, and it doesn’t apologize.

With a surprisingly solemn voice, it asks: “Do you want to cry?”

He doesn’t know if he wants to, but he knows that he can’t. ‘A blade can’t cry, Mister Fox.’

Unperturbed, the fox tilts its head and replies: “Well, a blade can’t talk either, yet we still hold a conversation up.” One of its ears twitches.

‘I don’t have eyes to cry out of, or a voice to cry out with,’ he manages to explain before the weight of that knowledge comes crushing down on him.

The other ear twitches while the fox answers.

“I do,” it says, moving so that its back is turned to him. And then, it starts howling.

(It’s the fox’s real voice, not the one it uses to talk with him. It’s the sound of an animal, and he also feels like it’s the sound of his own grief, carried with the winds. He wonders if his master can hear it, wherever he is now.)

The howling doesn’t stop until dawn, even ignoring the humans coming to see what the noise is about and standing frozen on the threshold.

The story about how he got his name will be forgotten in the tangles of time, but this is how it came to be.

*

(“So they call you a Crying Fox now, do they? Ah, I wonder if that means I am famous now,” the fox muses during its visit a few months later. Someone had decided to put him closer to ground level as well as leave food offerings in case the fox came back, and it’s curled up next to him. The warmth it radiates reminds him of his late master’s hands.

He’s sure there will be a few stray hairs sticking to him, because that’s what animal hairs do. He learned that from the cats.

When he notices later that some cling to him indeed, it makes the silence of the room much more bearable.)

*

He witnesses the new head of the family growing into the role, and is happy to accept him as his new master. Weirdly enough, it doesn’t surprise him that his own role doesn’t change. If anything, they are even more careful with him.

(He wishes that he could tell them that the thing he wants the most is to be useful.) There are things the fox can’t do for him, because humans do not understand foxes just how they can’t understand blades.

As such, their meetings stay the only excitement in his life.

*

The thing is, foxes do not live for eternity. (Even swords don’t, but they can come close, he knows.) His friend grows old over the years; the colour of his fur pales and his steps are less soft than before.

They both know that this might be the last time they see each other, and there won’t be someone to cry in his stead. ‘I will miss you,’ he thinks, and the fox headbutts him in way of reply. ‘I won’t forget you.’

He is sure of that, and feels that his friend believes him.

“You know, they say that as long as someone remembers you, you are not truly dead. Does that mean I will live as long as you do?” It yawns, as if the question wouldn’t be so important.

‘Yes.’ It’s a strong thought. To him, this is a very important thing.

“I think I will take a nap here, just for a bit.”

*

Over the centuries, he stays with the same family.

Long before the age of blades and bows fades into something else, he has already resigned to his fate of never being known for protecting his house, or his country.

(Some weak moments catch him thinking that maybe, he wouldn’t be able to protect anything at all, with how different he is from the rest, and that this may be why he’s always kept secure.

But then he remembers the sweat and pride that accompanied his birth, and shoves those thoughts away. Or tries to.)

He catches a glimpse of a more “modern” land when he is transported to a “museum”, but that’s all. The most he sees of that world are people with small devices in their hands, but they can’t touch him – like his masters did, all of them – because the glass is in the way.

He still feels their admiration in waves, but thinks it’s not for him. It’s all for Awataguchi, and while he is proud to be his work, he feels he didn’t earn to be here. Not like the other swords he sees sometimes. Compared to them, he is still a child in an old vessel.

*

… He misses his friend, just as he claimed all those centuries ago.

*

Much, much later he is taken out of his display and brought to a human. They brim with a power he doesn’t understand, and touch him with gentle hands. As soon as his carriers let go of him and leave the room, as soon as this human holds him, they lower their knees to the ground so that he is touching it as well.

(It’s the most contact he had in probably an eternity, both with a living being and with the earth.)

“I need your help,” they say. “Will you lend me your hand?”

He muses that a sword doesn’t have hands, but the louder thought is another: ‘I’m not sure that I can.’ No one ever let him help with anything before; whatever this human wants, he is anything but confident that he could deliver.

Unexpectedly, their hands give a squeeze and their lips light up in a smile.

“Oh, I know that you can.”

‘How?’ An almost cynical part of him thinks. The rest of him works himself up into a frenzy, all messy thoughts: ‘No, you don’t understand, I never---‘ Suddenly, this all too known feeling of being useless since birth grabs him with full force, making his mind tumble around in knots. ‘I can’t, what if mess up, I really can’t because what if, what if, what if what if what if what if…!’

“Nakigitsune.” Their voice is firm. “You can.” Their hands are soft, soothing. “You’re not treasured for sitting on display, but for what you could have done. Surely you have more faith into your creator’s ability than this.”

He can hear a smile in their voice, but doesn’t dare to focus on their face. It’s all too much after a life-long lull.

“Don’t you know? They say you are part of the path to others like you. Back then, you couldn’t do what you were made to do… But now I need you to.”

A short pause. “Ah, I wonder if it would be easier for both of us if you could reply directly.”

He wants to think ‘but I do’ when they elaborate. “I will have to do something to you, and listening to you like this is… draining. It takes a lot of concentration.”

Right. Usually, humans can’t hear him. The conversation started so naturally, he almost forgot how unusual it is. There’s a twitch inside him, of something that he thinks human would call “guilt”. This human – a saniwa, as his carriers had addressed them earlier – is working to make things easy for him.

‘Would doing this something first make the drain disappear?’ This time, he sees their following smile.

“It certainly would.”

*

He doesn’t know what exactly the saniwa is doing to him, just that he feels twisted around, and as if something – someone – touches his very core. It’s bright and dark at the same time, and absently he wonders what his old friend would say to all this; this story of a certain group changing history, of a single human gathering forces by asking parts of that very history to defend it.

When he is able to focus on the room before him again, he first notices that suddenly the saniwa’s face is much lower than before. They’re almost at the same height now.

The smile that greets him is both tired and blinding. “There you are,” they say.

He blinks. And blinks again. And then he notices that he did just that. Blinking?

“Do you think you can help me like that?” Like what? It’s at that very moment that he realizes various things: The saniwa’s face is not lower, but his point of view is higher. And speaking of view, his field of sight seems different now, too. He has to turn to see what’s around him. Below him.

Wait.

Below him, human legs support his weight on the ground. He’s slumped, a mix of sitting and kneeling, and touching so much of the floor at the same time is the weirdest sensation ever. Suddenly, despite his decision to help, he feels overwhelmed. Disconnected.

He doesn’t know anything about how the world works, how this world works, how it used to work. How humans work. He doesn’t even know the work of a sword properly.

His hands fly up to cover his mouth – his human hands covering a human mouth – and the saniwa looks at him, a little worried, before their gaze wanders sideways, as if something distracted them.

That’s when he feels something bump against the small of his back.

He knows what it is before he hears the familiar voice in his head: ‘Looks like you really did remember me.’

The fox’s claws dig into his skin as it climbs up to his shoulders. (The feeling of pain is so foreign, he doesn’t recognize it as such at first.)

‘You’re supposed to be dead,’ he thinks. Immediately the fox scoffs: ‘Well, you’re supposed to be a blade, and yet here we are.’

Then, he can feel its tail rub against his back. ‘Shouldn’t we do some proper introduction first and sort the rest out later?’

For some reason he knows for certain that the saniwa – now smiling again – can’t hear their conversation anymore, but he is also certain that the fox is right. The problem is, he never had to introduce himself. What should he say?

His (new) throat is still scrambling to start working when suddenly the voice he always heard only in his mind echoes off the walls. The fox mentions all the important things he wants to say, the few things he actually has to show for himself. Its voice sounds louder now, but less clear than he is used to, and he realizes that his friend is talking, to a human, and the human understands. They smile at the fox, without any hint of surprise, as if it were a normal thing that a fox speaks for another being.

When it falls silent, he still doesn’t know what to do. What he knows, though, is that he feels grateful for whatever the saniwa did to make this possible. He really wants to give this feeling back and wills his throat, his vocal chords to work.

“… Please take care of me.”