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When the Roman legions appeared over the horizon, the red-eyed general raised his pike and silence fell over the Greek army like a curtain of mist. There, marching towards them on the soil of Asculum, was the face of the enemy.
The Greeks’ elephants were stuck in the narrow pathway of the riverbank, and the eyes of the soldiers were haunted from the losses of Heraclea. They had fewer men, fewer horses, and fewer supplies.
Nevertheless, the general’s face split into a hungry, feral grin. Not for a moment did the Greeks forget who they were, or how things had ended at Heraclea. They came out battered, and bruised, and decimated—and always, always victorious.
It wouldn’t be any different this time.
The red-eyed general gave the command, and the Greeks charged.
The armies melted inside each other at the riverbank, dying the current a bright scarlet. As soon as the Romans were close enough, the general brandished his pike and, with the same crescent grin, hurled himself into the fray.
Soldiers fell left and right around him, both his and the enemy’s, but he couldn’t tell them apart. Blood drew arches in the sky, red against the canvas-white of a sea of clouds. Soon, it would start to rain.
The general searched, with his gaze, his one true target as he buried his pike in anonymous chests and anonymous necks.
A flash of green caught his eye. A rush of euphoria washed over the general and, teeth bared, he clashed with his pike against the sword of the green-eyed soldier.
“Found you.”
The green-eyed soldier was a boy, one of the youngest recruits in the Roman army. And yet, his sword had slashed amidst the ranks of his army like a knife through butter. It was only the fray that had prevented a victor from emerging between them, when their weapons had crossed in a rain of sparks.
Now, the red-eyed general was determined to see it through.
The green-eyed soldier yelled a battle cry, pushing him back against the riverbank. His eyes were twin coals of anger and, for a moment, they reminded the general of Greek fire. So odd, that a Roman recruit should have such a Greek look on his face.
“Die!” the soldier roared with the voice of a lion cub, and the general’s grin only grew more savage.
There was battle all around them, but they couldn’t feel it. Their bodies were locked together in a dance of push and pull, and nothing else existed but the fire in their eyes as they tried to burn each other to ashes. With each blow, gravity shoved them apart and yanked them back together, twin stars struggling at the center of a black hole.
“This is our home!” the green-eyed soldier growled, mere centimeters from the general’s face and the steel of his pike.
“Not anymore” the red-eyed general smirked. “The world belongs to those strong enough to seize it. And, right now, that’s me.” As the armies clashed, the battleground shifted under their feet, and soon came the moment he’d been waiting for. He sent the soldier flying back, rolled his pike, and called forth the giants.
Elephants started trampling the enemy lines, free at last from the bottleneck of the river, and the soldier looked on with dread as he heard the terrified screams of his comrades.
Then his eyes turned back to the general, and the fire blazed tenfold.
The soldier yelled, twisted his sword, and managed to land a slash right across his dominant arm. It was a reckless, desperate move born of agony and grief, and in that instant, the general saw his own eyes reflected in the soldier’s after he’d buried the dead at Heraclea. It was a moment’s pause, but it was enough.
The green-eyed soldier seized the opening. He swept a foot under the general’s legs and knocked him on his back, sword coming to rest at the hollow of his throat.
“Surrender” he commanded, looking every bit a general himself.
But he was just a kid, and kids should never set foot on a battlefield. Kids, no matter how thirsty for victory, just weren’t ready to die in its name.
The general grabbed his sword from the blade, yanked, and the green-eyed soldier lost his balance. They fell into each other, and so did their weapons.
The red of the general’s eyes spread to his chest, around the kiss of the soldier’s sword. The fire in the soldier’s gaze flickered as the pike impaled him through his stomach. It dimmed into small flames, and then embers.
It reminded the general of the tales of gods and men. It reminded him of Hector and his misguided honor. It reminded him of Achilles, driven mad with grief until it became his ruin. He brought a bloodied hand to the soldier’s freckled cheek and rasped, in a smiling, voiceless whisper: “Well fought… hero.”
And then, the fire went out.
The general threw his head back and laughed. He laughed and laughed until his laughter turned to coughs, and his coughs painted his armor with a river of blood.
That night, Nike would look favorably upon Epirus and its soldier, crowning them victors of the battle of Asculum. But she would also inflict punishment upon them, for daring to slay one of her worthiest.
She would crown them in victory—but it would be a victory in name only.
***
The green-eyed soldier swallowed the consecrated host and drank from the chalice of wine—the body and blood of Christ. Then, when the army of the enemy appeared across the river, he uttered a prayer to the sky before steeling his immortal soul and yelling out a battle cry.
The Persians came to yank the rebels back to their ranks, and they came to do so by force. But the green-eyed soldier didn’t consider himself a rebel. How could you be rebellious towards someone you were never loyal to? Someone you never made a choice to follow?
A pair of red eyes crossed with his from the other side of the river, and the soldier allowed himself a single moment of stupor he couldn’t explain, before dodging an arrow and rolling into the sand.
The red-eyed soldier was like a king on his throne, riding an elephant across the water and dodging arrows with the agility of a spirit. His hair gleamed white under the desert sun.
As soon as the elephant touched the opposite bank with its gigantic foot, the Persian soldier rolled off its back, threw his bow on his shoulder and dove into the fray. His twin daggers sliced hands off their bows and heads off their bodies, and soon came to reflect the color of his eyes.
The Armenian soldier threw himself between him and his next target, blocking both knives with the shaft of his spear. For a moment, their eyes met over their raised weapons, and he felt once more that faint flicker of recognition.
“Haven’t I seen you somewhere before?” the red-eyed soldier drawled, but it was accompanied by a cruel grin, as sharp and bloody as his knives. The green-eyed soldier tried to put the strange feeling out of his mind and knocked the Persian back.
“Perhaps in another life” the Armenian shot back, feeling his lips curl into a defiant smile.
The red-eyed soldier smirked, threw his head down, and charged again.
They exchanged blows as the sun traveled through the sky, sweat running down their backs and skin heating up like a furnace. The red-eyed soldier was oddly light-skinned, and the sun bit into the exposed parts of his body with an angry, fire-breathing mouth. The Armenian knocked him off-balance with the shaft of his spear, sending him flying down in the sand, and for a moment, he thought he almost looked like an angel.
But there was nothing angelic in the blood-red pit of his gaze, nor in the feral lunge that followed. That moment of hesitation cost him dearly, and he found himself flat on his back with the Persian holding both of his arms down. Next to his ear, he could feel the gurgling water of the river.
“Perhaps we’ll meet again, then” his opponent whispered, his face close enough to touch. “In another life.”
Another life. Those two words were the very reason he was here today. It was the promise that he had chosen to embrace, the purpose he had chosen to live for, breathe for, and, when the time came, die for.
The water rushed by his side, and the Armenian remembered the day of his baptism with a strange sort of clarity.
“In another life” he agreed, sending a mute apology to the skies.
The green-eyed soldier took a deep breath, uttered a prayer to his Lord, and hurled them both back inside the murky waters of the river to take their first—and final—baptism.
The battle of Avarayr would go to the Persians, but the war would reward the children of his God.
***
When the Spaniard looked up at the Sandhill Fort, he felt an immediate surge of annoyance.
That damned Englishman again.
From the fort, the young commander of the English companies looked him over for a moment, paused his recon, and all but stuck out his tongue at him.
He decided, then and there, that at the next proposed stealth mission, he’d be the first to volunteer.
Crouched inside a wooden box, he let himself be rattled by the waves as his resolve only strengthened. This siege was wearing on all of their nerves, and if he did one thing before it was over, it would be to take that Englishman’s head himself. He could still see green eyes and freckles every time he tried to sleep, be they behind a bow, darting between his men as he shouts his orders, or simply looking at him with that mocking air from above.
When the boat docked, he bade his time until nightfall, and then made his way into the impenetrable city of Ostend.
Sandhill Fort was never left unattended, not even at night. But there were only two guards, both exhausted, and the red-eyed soldier made quick work of them. Atop the fort, bathed in the light of a torch, was the freckled face of his enemy.
For one long moment, he remained still under the cloak of night and watched him quietly. The commander was studying a map, gaze flashing left and right as his brain no doubt went through a hundred possible scenarios a second, searching for a way this war could end in their victory.
The focused look in his eyes gave him a strange sense of déjà-vu, but he put it decidedly out of mind.
“Who’s laughing now?” he called, and the young commander twisted around like a bolt of lightning.
However, the Spaniard was faster. He’d already drawn his bow, and his arrow buried itself in the other’s chest. There was a cry of pain, but only just, and then the Englishman muffled it in a weird mixture of pride and defiance.
“What, not gonna call for help?” the red-eyed soldier couldn’t help but ask.
“Not gonna kill me as soon as I do?” the commander bit back breathlessly, and there it was, that glint of dark amusement shining out of his green eyes. As if the upper hand was still within his reach, even in a desperate situation such as this.
“Probably” the Spaniard conceded. “But at least you’d take me with you.”
Looking at him up close, he could see that the commander was very young indeed. The spray of freckles on his face made him look even more so.
Kissed by angels, his memory of Church supplied.
There was no reason why such a young face should be capable of making the tired expression the commander fixed him with then, not even the arrow sticking out of his chest. And yet, there it was.
Even more surprising was the realization that he knew that look intimately—that he’d seen it on countless faces ever since the siege had started to drag out, including, recently, his own.
“What would be the point?” the commander muttered tiredly, and lay with his back against the wall of the fort, directly beneath the torch.
The red-eyed soldier blinked. “Victory?” he supplied, and got a dark huff of laughter in response.
“Victory. Right.” He reached for the arrow and immediately pulled his hand back, wincing. The Spaniard almost found himself wincing in sympathy. “Can I ask you something?”
“Sure. Consider it your last wish.”
Another haunting chuckle filled the air.
“Was it fun?” the green-eyed boy asked, and he shook his head with little hesitation. Fun was not a word he would’ve used to describe this joke of a war.
“Was it profitable?” the commander pressed on, and here, too, the Spaniard shook his head. He knew from the raised voices that came from the general’s tent in the night that this siege was costing them more and more with each passing year.
The commander nodded, as if deep in thought. Then: “Was it worth it?”
And to that, the Spaniard didn’t have an answer.
But he didn’t have to come up with one. The boy’s breathing grew labored and he coughed hard into his hand. Some of the blood splatter bounced back on his face, painting the spaces between his freckles with bright spots of red. And then, with one last look of defiance, his green eyes dimmed for good.
The red-eyed soldier missed the telltale sign of steps climbing on the fort. He was a second too late to react, and an arrow pierced his chest before he could release his own. He landed with a thud, his body a mirror image of the boy under the torchlight.
This happened on September 17th. Three days later, the city of Ostend would be surrendered to the Spanish forces, the accord having been agreed upon by the States General almost a week prior.
***
After two weeks in the ice, whatever was left of the U.S. Corps was scattered by a merciless snowstorm.
The green-eyed recruit waddled uselessly in the knee-high snow, protecting his face as best as he could from the frostbite and trying to find his way back to his comrades. But everywhere he turned, all he could see was an endless stretch of white.
He didn’t realize that he’d stumbled upon something until he fell with his face in the snow, and the something pointedly groaned at him.
The recruit looked down, brushed some of the snow off the obstacle, and recognized the uniform of the Chinese Army.
He jumped back, and the body groaned again. A string of muffled words made their way to his ears and, although he didn’t understand a single one, he didn’t have to think too hard to realize they were insults.
The body stirred, and the recruit stumbled backwards, reaching for his gun. It was useless—he’d run out of bullets a whole day prior. However, the other didn’t know that, and he hoped he was pointing it convincingly enough.
Then, as the Chinese soldier shrugged the ice off his body, the recruit looked on in wonder as he realized that the white that covered him everywhere wasn’t just from the snow. His hair was indistinguishable from the flurry—like a thousand snowflakes woven together—and his skin was the color of porcelain. For a moment, he forgot to be afraid.
Then, the soldier stumbled, and the recruit rushed to his side without thinking, empty gun forgotten.
“Go away” he growled in perfectly understandable English. “Fucking Americans.”
There was absolutely no reason to do anything other than obey. There really, truly wasn’t. But the recruit trained his green eyes on the shivering man in the snow, then on the surrounding snowstorm, and he made a split-second decision.
He hauled the Chinese man over his shoulder and headed for the trees.
“Hóng máo guǐzi ba” the man muttered under his breath.
“Okay, first of all, I know that one” the recruit replied with a tinge of annoyance. “Secondly, I don’t have red fur, thank you very much.”
He laid the man down against a tree trunk, and the man finally opened his eyes to look at him. They were a deep, dark shade of red.
The recruit knew, for a fact, that he had never seen this man before. And yet, inexplicably, as he gazed into those blood-red eyes, a part of him tugged with a sense of unmistakable recognition.
“No” the man agreed, once again in English. “You just have the quèbān of red-fur people.” There was a strange sense of suspension in his gaze, as if he, too, had been caught unprepared by the same impression. But he guarded it carefully, and the recruit opted not to press the issue. If they had indeed met, it couldn’t have been for any good reason.
The recruit sighed, and plopped down to sit next to him.
The Chinese man eyed him carefully. “What are you doing?”
“I…” the American paused. He could lie. He could make up anything at all on the spot, and the man—who was clearly more of a ghost than a living person by now, if the blueish hue of his lips was any indication—wouldn’t have the strength, mental or physical, to fight him. He could also just stay silent, letting the snow do the talking for them both.
But, if the war had taught him anything, it was to recognize pointlessness. “I don’t think anybody should die alone” he murmured, almost too quiet to hear.
The man turned his head to look at him, in a mixture of disbelief and something dangerously close to compassion. He didn’t ask which one of them the recruit was talking about, and he felt a surge of gratefulness towards the stranger.
Silently, they began to shift closer, chasing whatever undercurrent of warmth still ran inside their bodies. It wasn’t much, but it still made the young soldier sigh with relief.
“What did you say I had, before?” the recruit asked, then, looking up into red eyes. “Que…”
The other slowly brought a hand to his own face, dotting it around the cheekbones with his fingertips, and he felt a lightbulb go off in his head. “Oh” he said, touching the spray of freckles on his face reflexively. “Yeah, I guess…”
The storm abated until only a few flakes fluttered quietly to the ground. Perhaps they could try to get themselves to their feet and waddle in the snow a little more, and with any luck, they’d stumble into an encampment or something. Perhaps they could.
The green-eyed soldier looked up and saw no sign of smoke, or airplanes, or anything at all. Only a white blanket that extended from the sky to the earth in a numbing, seamless horizon. A land that didn’t belong to the Americans or to the Chinese—a land they had no place walking, or watching, or touching.
The fall of the snowflakes was hypnotic, and soon the boy felt himself drift.
“Going to sleep?” the Chinese man rasped, his breath coming out in a weak, white puff in the frozen air.
The recruit shook his head. “Just… resting my eyes…”
He drifted off to the quiet lullaby of the snow and the soft, weakening presence of a heartbeat next to his.
On the 17th day, the battle of Chosin came to a close. The light of dawn found them as sunset had left them, slumped against each other against a backdrop of white.
In the aftermath, no one would have been able to tell which side had won—only how much each side had lost.
***
“Found you.”
They clash up in the sky of Jakku like shooting stars.
“Shigaraki!” Izuku yells, fist crackling with green lighting and face contorted by rage.
The villain grins with unabashed glee, meeting his blows in kind.
The war is a storm around them and below them, filling the air with screams and dying the battlefield the same shade of red as Shigaraki’s eyes.
They clash with punches, kicks, elbows, knees, even with their heads pressed together in a challenge to tear each other to pieces.
“Tired already, hero?” Shigaraki teases when he loses momentum, reaching for him with five, deadly fingers. Izuku barely dodges in time.
They clash like sworn enemies, carrying the will of centuries.
Izuku knows he can’t afford to be distracted, but something keeps pulling at his attention. Something like an answer demanding to be decoded.
Something buried in the red pits of his opponent’s eyes.
A rivet comes dangerously close to slicing his entire arm off, and Izuku cries out as it still manages to catch on his shoulder.
“What, not gonna call for help?” the villain mocks, and the words send a shiver down Izuku’s spine in more ways than one. Shigaraki grabs the hero by the hair, but doesn’t activate Decay, apparently deciding to savor this.
It’s an opening, and Izuku takes it.
He sweeps him off-balance with a single charged kick, making a nasty crack echo from the juncture of his knee. “Who’s laughing now?”
Shigaraki looks at him, then, with a strange flash of surprise, but it’s only for a moment.
They clash again, and again, and again. They clash until the air will take them, and when neither one of them has the strength to keep himself afloat, they go hurtling down into a grove of trees like a single comet.
Their bodies lock together in a dance of push and pull. Nothing else exists but the fire in their eyes as they try to burn each other to ashes. With each blow, gravity shoves them apart and yanks them back together, twin stars struggling at the center of a black hole.
“Surrender” Izuku commands, pinning Shigaraki’s wrists to the ground, breath coming heavy to his lungs.
The word echoes through them both. The boy can see it plain as day in his enemy’s eyes—that whatever strangeness is going on, he can feel it just as much as Izuku does.
But the sounds of battle don’t leave them any room to think, and the angry thrum of the blood in their veins is a constant demand—and, before Izuku knows it, he’s being flipped on his back in the grass.
“Well fought… hero.”
They clash again, voices in their heads forgotten.