The Door That Never Closed

Posted on Fri Sep 4th, 2026 @ 8:53pm by Captain Taiga Aisaka

1,713 words; about a 9 minute read

Mission: Kintsugi
Location: Kanagawa, Japan, Earth
Timeline: April 6th, 2397

Her hands shook as she checked the address on the note again.

4-17-6 Hon-Kugenuma, Fujisawa-shi, Kanagawa 251-0027, Japan.

She checked the number of the house, she checked the block number and she had the right house. There it was, a little white house. Two storeys, set back from the road with a neatly tended garden. A path of stonework led up to the wooden front door, and Taiga could see a potted plant hanging from a bracket in the small covered entryway.

The property had no gate, just an open driveway that led to an incorporated garage. She stood there for a moment as she checked the note again. The handwriting was Ryuuji's. He had been the one who had looked up the address. Taiga had faced enemies in the blackness of space, chased down Herald and Iconian ships, commanded an entire starship in the heat of battle. Yet, she hadn't been able to look up this address.

She folded the note, and then noticed another small line of written text on the back. She hadn't noticed that before, as her tunnel vision had been locked on this one thing she had to do.

'You got this Taiga.'

She felt herself relax a little. Even when he wasn't there, he was still standing by her side.

She stuffed the note into a pocket in her skirt as she took a step forward. Her foot hovered for a brief moment over the stonework path. She hesitated as she pulled it back, returning to her standing position.

"Come on Taiga..." she muttered to herself as she took a long deep breath. She tried again, her foot hovering over the path. Then it finally made contact. The first step led to the second, then the third until she was standing in front of the door.

She reached out to touch the control panel that was usually located on the left of the door. Only to realise she wasn't on a Starship any more. This was a house, it didn't have door panels. It didn't have a warp drive, it didn't have artificial gravity, it didn't have phasers. It didn't have anything that Taiga had known to be normal for the last eighteen years.

Shaking it off, she reached out slowly with her hand clenched into a fist.

Three knocks, then silence.

The butterflies in her stomach multiplied. More and more of them were emerging, she could feel her knees starting to wobble and her heart began pounding in her chest as she awaited a response.

Three more knocks. Yet again silence.

Those butterflies had changed from dancing and were now swarming like a plague of locusts. She could feel the uneasy feeling slowly taking her over. Her eyes looked down at her feet, she couldn't look at the door. It was towering over her and it was growing taller and taller by the second.

Then, her body turned on its own. 'I'm running away again...' she thought as she watched her own footsteps. She had lost control of her own body. It felt like she was in some sort of trance, some sort of illusion and she was watching from behind a wall of glass that turned the world into monotone.

"Taiga?"

The glass shattered. It fell to the ground all around her like rain. The incredible noise of it falling deafened her as she stopped mid-step.

"Taiga; is that you?"

The colour of the world returned as she turned back to face the door. A pair of feet stood at the door. They were wearing light green slippers, and she could spot grey socks poking through the end. Her mother hated green, which meant they couldn't belong to her. Slowly she raised her head, to follow the feet up the legs clad in simple blue trousers, then a collared white shirt and finally a face she hadn't seen in eighteen years.

Haruto Fujimura.

She looked directly at his face. He had been the man who had entered her life when she was only eleven years old. The man who had married her mother at age fourteen, and then got her mother pregnant when Taiga had turned sixteen. Yet, he was still here and he was smiling. He was smiling at her... The runaway who returned after eighteen years without a single word, letter, or even a New Year's Card.

"H..." she stumbled on her words. "H..." she tried again, but she could feel her heart pounding in her mouth. "Hi."

Before she knew how to follow up that pathetic excuse of a greeting, she was suddenly enveloped by Haruto's arms. Her eyes widened as she stood there as rigid as a board. 'He's... hugging me... But. Why?' She didn't understand, He should be scolding her, Telling her that she was a bad girl for running away, for cutting them out for so long. She couldn't move, her mind was just short-circuiting. Why wasn't he angry? Why wasn't he ashamed? Why wasn't he annoyed or confused at her sudden appearance on his doorstep? What was actually going on?

"You came back. I knew that you would." Haruto said as he released her. He placed both hands on her shoulders and stepped back to an arm's length. "Look at you. You've turned into a beautiful woman. You've grown up so much."

Taiga was a little surprised if not shocked by this sudden change of events. "But... I ran away..."

Haruto nodded. "To Starfleet Academy. Yes, we know."

"We?"

"Yes. Your mother, myself and Akari all knew where you went. I knew that you would come back. It was never a matter of if, but when."

'Akari'. So that was the name of her sibling she had never met. The sibling she had never even given a chance to in her life. The sibling that she had neglected due to her anger. The sibling she could have watched grow up, helped nurture and actually known, only to run away. Somehow those thoughts didn't make it any better, she could feel her stomach churning as she stood there and simply stared at Haruto.

"I'm..." She could feel something welling up inside her. Eighteen years of always thinking she was the girl they never wanted, the belief that she was simply being replaced. It was starting to surface, and her speech started to become sadder, filled with more remorse and she wasn't sure how she was ever going to say it.

"Nope." Haruto said as he placed a single finger onto her lips. "We're not having any of that out here. You probably have a lot to say, don’t you?" he looked around as if expecting one of the neighbours to be peeking over the fence at them.

He let go of her shoulders and turned to the door. It had remained open and a tabby cat was watching them from inside the hallway. It seemed interested in what was happening outside. As Haruto approached the door, the cat meowed then disappeared deeper into the house. Taiga remained perfectly still and erect. She was once again frozen, as if stuck in ice.

Haruto reached the door. He looked over his shoulder at Taiga. "Come on in," He said softly, his voice warm and affectionate. "Your mother and Akari aren't home right now. We're having Sukiyaki for dinner... I know you like that. Unless your tastes have changed."

Sukiyaki. The very same dinner that Ryuuji had made for Yasuko when she had visited them.

"I don't want to be a waste of space... or to get in the way..." Taiga said as she once again lowered her gaze towards her feet. She could feel her pulse increasing, not from anger, but from the feeling of nervousness overwhelming her. Her chest began to hurt as her breathing began to increase, once again becoming small uncontrolled breaths of air. It was like her entire body wanted to do one thing, the only thing she knew what to do.

To run away.

A pair of slippers entered her vision. She felt her head being lifted by a single finger under her chin. She didn't resist as her head was slowly lifted. She was once again face to face with Haruto. "You're not in the way. You never were."

'You never were...'

Taiga couldn't help it, she looked up into his eyes and she could feel hers starting to become wetter. They soon glistened in the light as the tears rushed up to the surface. However, she didn't let out any sound, as the tears ran down her cheeks. She had been wrong, so very wrong and she had been the one in the wrong. She had been the one who chose to leave, but she still didn't have the full picture.

"Look..." Haruto told her softly. "You've probably come a long way, haven't you? And I'm not talking from the next city, town or prefecture. You've travelled millions of miles, if not more. Yet, you still end up here standing in our front yard."

He reached down and took her hand gently. "Come on in. At least, see for yourself that you're still a part of our family," he paused as he pulled Taiga along gently, leading her towards the threshold of the front door. He stopped in front of the front door, still holding firmly only to Taiga's hand. "If it gets too much for you, I'll drive you home. We understand that this is difficult. It has been a long time..."

Taiga pulled back her hand. She reached up to her face and wiped the tears with her sleeve. She slapped her face lightly with both hands as if to shatter the illusion and the mindset of running away. "I'm... ready..."

Haruto smiled as he stepped to one side. "Welcome, Taiga." He said softly as she took a step past him, and over the threshold of the house. As she passed he looked away briefly, hiding his own tears. Just like Taiga he wiped them quickly with the end of his sleeve.

"I have both of my daughters back... Thank you..." he said under his breath.

Posting by:

Taiga Aisaka
The Daughter Who Returned

Haruto Fujimura
The Father Who Waited.

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