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Title: "Little Sister"
Disclaimer: Being a bloke who likes to slash pretty men doesn't make me RTD, I don't work for the BBC, and as much as I might like to, I don't own Jack or Ianto or any part of Torchwood. I do, however, order pizza under that name on principle.
Pairings: N/A
Rating: Gen
Notes/Summary: A "what-if" character study/backstory piece. This fic was sponsored by an anonymous donor who contributed to my charity drive effort in Feb/March. Beta-fu by![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
kel_reiley.
Hideki Sato sits, tucked into the corner of the park bench like an onigiri. He has always been told that if he is lost, he should sit and wait in one place until he is found. Kyoto is very large, and Hideki himself is very, very small. Even if he is still and waits, he wonders if his parents will find him. He does not think they will. Perhaps, he thinks, his mother and father have abandoned him here in the park so that they can raise his little brother without him.
Grandmother is always saying that he was too clever to care for easily. She shouts at him when she discovers him taking his toys apart. Hideki wonders if perhaps he is being punished, if his parents know that he took apart his radio, even though he also put it back together. He doesn’t want to promise that he’ll never look at the insides of things again. He is too curious. But Kyoto is so very big, and Hideki only wants to go home.
Frightened and lonely, he begins to cry.
“Why are you crying, little mouse?”
Hideki looks up. A beautiful white-faced woman leans over him, and the fronds of her hair ornaments dangle and waft before him in the breeze. Her bottom lip is painted a perfect red. Her kimono and obi are brilliantly bright and ornately painted. She is a maiko – an apprentice geisha – and he has never seen one face-to-face before. She surprises him so acutely that he stops crying instantly.
“Are you the kami of the park?” he asks, wide-eyed, and she laughs at him.
“No, but I can sing you a song about him if you’d like. Where are your parents?”
He squirms. “They have gone away with my baby brother because I took apart my radio, and left me here in the park in Kyoto to live on persimmons and be raised by cats.”
The maiko laughs at him again and shakes her head, then sits down on the bench next to him. “Why would your mother and father leave you in a park in Kyoto when you are so clever? Most little boys break their radios. What did you find inside?”
Hideki looks down at his hands and pictures the pieces. He moves his fingers as he remembers what each part had felt like. “The speaker was like a rice bowl, and everything was tied together with rainbow colored wires. And the little board inside looked like a city, and –”
“Hikun!” his mother calls out behind him, and he twists around. Hikun is his nickname, and what she calls him when she sings him songs. He stands up on the bench and shouts back to her, waving his arms.
The woman beside him stands and then bows to his mother as she hurries over. The maiko and his mother speak to one another briefly in that boring way that adults do, and then his mother picks him up. “No more adventures for you, Hikun. Time to find your father and then we’ll have dinner. Say goodbye to your new friend.”
“Goodbye,” he says, and waves.
“Goodbye, Nezumi-kun,” she says, and makes a little bow.
When his mother has carried him down to the bottom of the hill, Hideki rests his head on her shoulder. “Will I ever be beautiful like the kami of the park?”
His mother chuckles. “No, Hideki. You will be a handsome young man.”
“Oh,” he says, and is unaccountably sad. He wants to wear a lovely kimono and paint his skin. He does not want to be brown and muscular like his cousins. He wants to look like the maiko.
Six years later, when he is ten, his mother walks in on him wearing her wedding kimono. He is staring at himself in the mirror, hands folded daintily across his lap. His makeup is all wrong, and his hair is too short. The kimono hangs open and still too-large at his shoulders. He is in tears.
Another year later, when they move back to Britain, things have changed. Hideki Sato disembarks from the plane wearing a ponytail and a dress and carrying a purse. Inside the purse, there is a plastic compact full of birth control pills. When the officer reads Hideki’s passport, he smiles.
“Welcome home, Ms. Sato.”
“Thank you,” she says with a smile, and bows out of habit when he returns her passport. Even her name, Toshiko, is new. It’s a beautiful gift from her mother. There will be many more of these before she is twenty: contraceptive pills and trips to Thailand. Electrolysis when she is fourteen. There are questions when she applies to work for the Ministry of Defence, but her grandfather, who worked at Bletchley Park, sends a letter to prompt an old work colleague to give his highest recommendation. “Toshihiro’s granddaughter, Toshiko, is one of the geniuses of her generation,” it reads. “It would be a mistake to presume too much about her based on her childhood.”
It’s this detail that convinces Jack Harkness that Toshiko, locked away in a UNIT prison, is worth the risk. There was no cynicism in her actions. No greed, no hatred for her country. She acted out of love.
Disclaimer: Being a bloke who likes to slash pretty men doesn't make me RTD, I don't work for the BBC, and as much as I might like to, I don't own Jack or Ianto or any part of Torchwood. I do, however, order pizza under that name on principle.
Pairings: N/A
Rating: Gen
Notes/Summary: A "what-if" character study/backstory piece. This fic was sponsored by an anonymous donor who contributed to my charity drive effort in Feb/March. Beta-fu by
kel_reiley.Hideki Sato sits, tucked into the corner of the park bench like an onigiri. He has always been told that if he is lost, he should sit and wait in one place until he is found. Kyoto is very large, and Hideki himself is very, very small. Even if he is still and waits, he wonders if his parents will find him. He does not think they will. Perhaps, he thinks, his mother and father have abandoned him here in the park so that they can raise his little brother without him.
Grandmother is always saying that he was too clever to care for easily. She shouts at him when she discovers him taking his toys apart. Hideki wonders if perhaps he is being punished, if his parents know that he took apart his radio, even though he also put it back together. He doesn’t want to promise that he’ll never look at the insides of things again. He is too curious. But Kyoto is so very big, and Hideki only wants to go home.
Frightened and lonely, he begins to cry.
“Why are you crying, little mouse?”
Hideki looks up. A beautiful white-faced woman leans over him, and the fronds of her hair ornaments dangle and waft before him in the breeze. Her bottom lip is painted a perfect red. Her kimono and obi are brilliantly bright and ornately painted. She is a maiko – an apprentice geisha – and he has never seen one face-to-face before. She surprises him so acutely that he stops crying instantly.
“Are you the kami of the park?” he asks, wide-eyed, and she laughs at him.
“No, but I can sing you a song about him if you’d like. Where are your parents?”
He squirms. “They have gone away with my baby brother because I took apart my radio, and left me here in the park in Kyoto to live on persimmons and be raised by cats.”
The maiko laughs at him again and shakes her head, then sits down on the bench next to him. “Why would your mother and father leave you in a park in Kyoto when you are so clever? Most little boys break their radios. What did you find inside?”
Hideki looks down at his hands and pictures the pieces. He moves his fingers as he remembers what each part had felt like. “The speaker was like a rice bowl, and everything was tied together with rainbow colored wires. And the little board inside looked like a city, and –”
“Hikun!” his mother calls out behind him, and he twists around. Hikun is his nickname, and what she calls him when she sings him songs. He stands up on the bench and shouts back to her, waving his arms.
The woman beside him stands and then bows to his mother as she hurries over. The maiko and his mother speak to one another briefly in that boring way that adults do, and then his mother picks him up. “No more adventures for you, Hikun. Time to find your father and then we’ll have dinner. Say goodbye to your new friend.”
“Goodbye,” he says, and waves.
“Goodbye, Nezumi-kun,” she says, and makes a little bow.
When his mother has carried him down to the bottom of the hill, Hideki rests his head on her shoulder. “Will I ever be beautiful like the kami of the park?”
His mother chuckles. “No, Hideki. You will be a handsome young man.”
“Oh,” he says, and is unaccountably sad. He wants to wear a lovely kimono and paint his skin. He does not want to be brown and muscular like his cousins. He wants to look like the maiko.
Six years later, when he is ten, his mother walks in on him wearing her wedding kimono. He is staring at himself in the mirror, hands folded daintily across his lap. His makeup is all wrong, and his hair is too short. The kimono hangs open and still too-large at his shoulders. He is in tears.
Another year later, when they move back to Britain, things have changed. Hideki Sato disembarks from the plane wearing a ponytail and a dress and carrying a purse. Inside the purse, there is a plastic compact full of birth control pills. When the officer reads Hideki’s passport, he smiles.
“Welcome home, Ms. Sato.”
“Thank you,” she says with a smile, and bows out of habit when he returns her passport. Even her name, Toshiko, is new. It’s a beautiful gift from her mother. There will be many more of these before she is twenty: contraceptive pills and trips to Thailand. Electrolysis when she is fourteen. There are questions when she applies to work for the Ministry of Defence, but her grandfather, who worked at Bletchley Park, sends a letter to prompt an old work colleague to give his highest recommendation. “Toshihiro’s granddaughter, Toshiko, is one of the geniuses of her generation,” it reads. “It would be a mistake to presume too much about her based on her childhood.”
It’s this detail that convinces Jack Harkness that Toshiko, locked away in a UNIT prison, is worth the risk. There was no cynicism in her actions. No greed, no hatred for her country. She acted out of love.
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