Background Link: There's some general information about the world itself here, but I'll write up Haku's personal history over the series myself since there's no link readily available for that. I'm sorry for the length but there's just a lot to cover even leaving out half of the less important things, feel free to skim..
Haku grew up under fairly shitty circumstances. As a young kid he had to deal with his mother's lover who constantly abused him and his older brother Sou. His older brother tried to shield him from the abuse, practically being the only one who cared for him, and brought him simple pleasures like candy (a fact that still seems to remain with Haku even now, considering the copious amount of candy he consumes all the time).
After a while it all went wrong though. During a particularly violent fit the older man started beating up Haku's brother really badly. Haku witnessed it all and called out for him to stop since he was going to end up killing his brother if this kept up, but the man didn't listen. In a fit of emotions, Haku grabbed a heavy object and beat him with it in an attempt to make him stop - but it was too much. The hit ended up killing his mother's lover instead and his older brother proceeded to take the blame instead for what had happened, wanting to protect Haku.
The incident ended up seperating the two of them - especially because of the aftermath, which Haku didn't learn of until much later in his life. The Northern Union, the biggest enemy of the organisation Haku would later join and basically a group of Not Really Great People, came to the brothers to look for a new recruit for an agent provocateur (basically an undercover agent whose primary role is to incite another person to commit an illegal act and/or falsely implicate another person in an illegal act) and wanted to recruit Haku. Sou didn't want to see that happen to his little brother and let himself be taken away in Haku's place.
Left in the world without anyone to take care of him, a young Haku was approached by Ichijima, the leader of the organisation called Sakura that trained people to be spies. Promising that Haku would be able to see his older brother again if he joined the organisation - the one thing he wanted more than anything, especially since he had no clue where his older brother was -, it was not a difficult task to convince Haku to go along.
Not that his time with Sakura was all that much better. Everyone at that organisation is appointed a Messiah: the one person they're allowed to befriend (or a little more than that, wink wonk) and have to work together with at all times. One can imagine that this sort of system makes you heavily dependant on one person for your general stability, and that's exactly what happened. Haku's codependant feelings for his brother instead transferred to his Messiah, except sooner or later disaster struck - Haku's Messiah died on a mission. It's not too strange for members of Sakura to die on missions considering the high levels of danger involved, so it was just routinely brushed off by the organisation as a whole. Not so easily by Haku himself though, but he managed to somehow pull himself through it.
Except then it happened again. After being assigned a new Messiah, the very same thing happened to said Messiah as did to the first. Once more Haku's Messiah died on a mission. And while it's not that strange for people's Messiah to die, for it to happen twice in a row was pretty unique within the organisation. Rumors started buzzing around and Haku started to be called a "jinx" - the guy whose Messiah will always die. It only further isolated him in his grief from everyone around him, turning him in a very aloof sort of person.
But then Haku was assigned a Messiah once more, his third, a new cadet called Eiri Kaidou. Since Haku at this point also believed in his own curse and was fully convinced Eiri would just die because of him too, he tried to keep the other at a distance. It wasn't too hard considering the fact that Eiri was like an angry chihuahua whose buttons were way too easy to press - annoying him and teasing him was the easiest way to keep a safe distance between them. To maybe save Eiri's life and to at the very least save his own feelings from getting hurt over losing a Messiah all over again.
Working together with another Messiah pair they grew fairly close to as friends, Shuusuke Shiba and Souma Gojyo, the pair completed quite a few missions for Sakura, with things more or less remaining the way they were. Haku was still aloof, he was still pushing Eiri away and more or less living life on auto-pilot. It didn't change until they were involved in the Higayama incident - Higayama was one of their enemies that had already tried to mess up quite a few of their missions, but by the time Haku finally came face to face with the guy himself, Higayama revealed that he knew about the whereabouts of Haku's older brother. The reveal hit Haku so hard that he seemed to mentally shut down, being unable to do anything but stand there and stare blankly even as everyone else was fighting around him. It wasn't until Eiri, his Messiah, grabbed him in the middle of a fight with Higayama and yelled at Haku to get back to his senses, to believe in him and listen to him since he was his Messiah.. right before getting shot by Higayama multiple times since it left his back uncovered.
The shock of seeing Eiri shot (and therefore facing the possibility of his Messiah dying once more) was enough to drag Haku out of his haze, since he had become more attached to Eiri than he was telling himself he was going to after all. Higayama told him that his Messiah would always die, so it would be easier to just avoid that pain and come with him and join the Northern Union (Sakura's biggest enemy). Haku refused though, saying he believed Eiri would pull through and telling Higayama off until the latter left.
Eiri did manage to miraculously pull through, surviving all the bullet wounds, and it was this event that brought the two of them together as Messiah. Haku decided he could believe in Eiri despite his jinx and stopped pushing him away as much. (The teasing stayed, though - it was far too entertaining to give up at that point.)
A few more missions later brought them to the point that their friends Souma and Shuusuke had graduated from Sakura, leaving the organisation and therefore cutting all contact with Haku and Eiri according to the rules. In their place Haku was assigned (along with Eiri) to mentor four of the new Sakura cadets and try to train them: Mamoru Shirasaki, Kaito Yuri, Ryo Ariga and Seiren Mamiya.
For a while everything went relatively well in Haku's life like that, but then everything blew up once more. Serizawa, a member of the Northern Union who had tried to mess stuff up with one of their earlier missions, was revealed to actually be Haku's long-lost brother, Sou, who had been taken away by the Northern Union and had quickly gone up through the ranks. Serizawa also revealed that he was the one who had been causing Haku's Messiah to die all along - he was the origin of the 'jinx'. Unable to watch his older brother die despite him being an enemy now and despite what he had done, Haku stopped Eiri from shooting the man during their first confrontation, leading to Serizawa getting away and a small crack starting to emerge in both their relationship and Haku's emotional and mental stability.
The real thing that shook Haku up though came during a mission they were leading the four new cadets through later on. In the middle of the action he lost his ear piece contact with Eiri, and after running into his brother there only a moment later he realised what had happened, and when one of the newer cadets came to him to tell him about it, his suspicions were confirmed - Eiri had died during the mission, adding another dead Messiah to Haku's jinx, not to mention one that Haku had grown even closer to than his previous two Messiah.
Even though Haku didn't shut down the way he did during the Higayama incident, he still was a lot less stable after it. He snapped at people left and right, acted more distant than ever seemed generally jaded about everything (when their boss told him he'd need to be assigned a new Messiah to complete the mission, Haku just snapped back to ask who would die because of him this time). He ended up mostly operating alone, only cooperating with one of their former-enemies-turned-sort-of-good-guy Misu to bring the mission to an end - until Misu betrayed him, that is. Haku was caught off guard by the action, being beaten up by Misu and his subordinates until Eiri suddenly appeared out of nowhere to save him, apparently still alive. In his beaten up stupor Haku tried to reach out for Eiri, but instead passed out from the strain.
After he returned to consciousness, Eiri explained to him that his death had been faked all along as part of the mission and that they couldn't have let Haku in on it. It was the only way to push Haku to go along with the mission and cooperate with Misu, who only fake betrayed him back there so he could get Serizawa to trust him and they could catch Serizawa off guard and capture him that way. Still emotional over the fact that it was all a big plot he was left out of, Haku ran off to confront Serizawa in the place they were keeping him. Serizawa confronted him with the fact that he had only joined the Northern Union to protect Haku and keep him from being taken instead ("I'm the monster you created", he tells Haku), only bringing Haku's emotions to a height - and when Serizawa told Haku to kill him, he couldn't. He pointed his gun at his older brother, but couldn't find it in himself to pull the trigger and kill the big brother that had been so important to him growing up, who he had longed to see again all this time. Even though he knew Serizawa was the enemy, even though he knew Serizawa had been killing his previous Messiah-- even so, he was still his brother. He still saved him, it was still Haku's fault that he became this way, or so Haku told himself.
Realising that it meant his "jinx" would never end this way (because Serizawa would still be alive and doubtlessly find some way to escape since Haku couldn't bear to see him killed), Haku ran away to instead confront Eiri, drawing his gun on him and making it seem like he was just going to kill him himself and be done with it. But at the last moment Haku pointed the gun at his own temple instead, saying that he he decided the only way for the jinx to end was for him to die. He doesn't want to see anyone die for his sake anymore, let alone see Eiri die, so it's better this way.
Just as he's about to pull the trigger, he'll find himself in Norfinbury instead.
no subject
Haku grew up under fairly shitty circumstances. As a young kid he had to deal with his mother's lover who constantly abused him and his older brother Sou. His older brother tried to shield him from the abuse, practically being the only one who cared for him, and brought him simple pleasures like candy (a fact that still seems to remain with Haku even now, considering the copious amount of candy he consumes all the time).
After a while it all went wrong though. During a particularly violent fit the older man started beating up Haku's brother really badly. Haku witnessed it all and called out for him to stop since he was going to end up killing his brother if this kept up, but the man didn't listen. In a fit of emotions, Haku grabbed a heavy object and beat him with it in an attempt to make him stop - but it was too much. The hit ended up killing his mother's lover instead and his older brother proceeded to take the blame instead for what had happened, wanting to protect Haku.
The incident ended up seperating the two of them - especially because of the aftermath, which Haku didn't learn of until much later in his life. The Northern Union, the biggest enemy of the organisation Haku would later join and basically a group of Not Really Great People, came to the brothers to look for a new recruit for an agent provocateur (basically an undercover agent whose primary role is to incite another person to commit an illegal act and/or falsely implicate another person in an illegal act) and wanted to recruit Haku. Sou didn't want to see that happen to his little brother and let himself be taken away in Haku's place.
Left in the world without anyone to take care of him, a young Haku was approached by Ichijima, the leader of the organisation called Sakura that trained people to be spies. Promising that Haku would be able to see his older brother again if he joined the organisation - the one thing he wanted more than anything, especially since he had no clue where his older brother was -, it was not a difficult task to convince Haku to go along.
Not that his time with Sakura was all that much better. Everyone at that organisation is appointed a Messiah: the one person they're allowed to befriend (or a little more than that, wink wonk) and have to work together with at all times. One can imagine that this sort of system makes you heavily dependant on one person for your general stability, and that's exactly what happened. Haku's codependant feelings for his brother instead transferred to his Messiah, except sooner or later disaster struck - Haku's Messiah died on a mission. It's not too strange for members of Sakura to die on missions considering the high levels of danger involved, so it was just routinely brushed off by the organisation as a whole. Not so easily by Haku himself though, but he managed to somehow pull himself through it.
Except then it happened again. After being assigned a new Messiah, the very same thing happened to said Messiah as did to the first. Once more Haku's Messiah died on a mission. And while it's not that strange for people's Messiah to die, for it to happen twice in a row was pretty unique within the organisation. Rumors started buzzing around and Haku started to be called a "jinx" - the guy whose Messiah will always die. It only further isolated him in his grief from everyone around him, turning him in a very aloof sort of person.
But then Haku was assigned a Messiah once more, his third, a new cadet called Eiri Kaidou. Since Haku at this point also believed in his own curse and was fully convinced Eiri would just die because of him too, he tried to keep the other at a distance. It wasn't too hard considering the fact that Eiri was like an angry chihuahua whose buttons were way too easy to press - annoying him and teasing him was the easiest way to keep a safe distance between them. To maybe save Eiri's life and to at the very least save his own feelings from getting hurt over losing a Messiah all over again.
Working together with another Messiah pair they grew fairly close to as friends, Shuusuke Shiba and Souma Gojyo, the pair completed quite a few missions for Sakura, with things more or less remaining the way they were. Haku was still aloof, he was still pushing Eiri away and more or less living life on auto-pilot. It didn't change until they were involved in the Higayama incident - Higayama was one of their enemies that had already tried to mess up quite a few of their missions, but by the time Haku finally came face to face with the guy himself, Higayama revealed that he knew about the whereabouts of Haku's older brother. The reveal hit Haku so hard that he seemed to mentally shut down, being unable to do anything but stand there and stare blankly even as everyone else was fighting around him. It wasn't until Eiri, his Messiah, grabbed him in the middle of a fight with Higayama and yelled at Haku to get back to his senses, to believe in him and listen to him since he was his Messiah.. right before getting shot by Higayama multiple times since it left his back uncovered.
The shock of seeing Eiri shot (and therefore facing the possibility of his Messiah dying once more) was enough to drag Haku out of his haze, since he had become more attached to Eiri than he was telling himself he was going to after all. Higayama told him that his Messiah would always die, so it would be easier to just avoid that pain and come with him and join the Northern Union (Sakura's biggest enemy). Haku refused though, saying he believed Eiri would pull through and telling Higayama off until the latter left.
Eiri did manage to miraculously pull through, surviving all the bullet wounds, and it was this event that brought the two of them together as Messiah. Haku decided he could believe in Eiri despite his jinx and stopped pushing him away as much. (The teasing stayed, though - it was far too entertaining to give up at that point.)
A few more missions later brought them to the point that their friends Souma and Shuusuke had graduated from Sakura, leaving the organisation and therefore cutting all contact with Haku and Eiri according to the rules. In their place Haku was assigned (along with Eiri) to mentor four of the new Sakura cadets and try to train them: Mamoru Shirasaki, Kaito Yuri, Ryo Ariga and Seiren Mamiya.
For a while everything went relatively well in Haku's life like that, but then everything blew up once more. Serizawa, a member of the Northern Union who had tried to mess stuff up with one of their earlier missions, was revealed to actually be Haku's long-lost brother, Sou, who had been taken away by the Northern Union and had quickly gone up through the ranks. Serizawa also revealed that he was the one who had been causing Haku's Messiah to die all along - he was the origin of the 'jinx'. Unable to watch his older brother die despite him being an enemy now and despite what he had done, Haku stopped Eiri from shooting the man during their first confrontation, leading to Serizawa getting away and a small crack starting to emerge in both their relationship and Haku's emotional and mental stability.
The real thing that shook Haku up though came during a mission they were leading the four new cadets through later on. In the middle of the action he lost his ear piece contact with Eiri, and after running into his brother there only a moment later he realised what had happened, and when one of the newer cadets came to him to tell him about it, his suspicions were confirmed - Eiri had died during the mission, adding another dead Messiah to Haku's jinx, not to mention one that Haku had grown even closer to than his previous two Messiah.
Even though Haku didn't shut down the way he did during the Higayama incident, he still was a lot less stable after it. He snapped at people left and right, acted more distant than ever seemed generally jaded about everything (when their boss told him he'd need to be assigned a new Messiah to complete the mission, Haku just snapped back to ask who would die because of him this time). He ended up mostly operating alone, only cooperating with one of their former-enemies-turned-sort-of-good-guy Misu to bring the mission to an end - until Misu betrayed him, that is. Haku was caught off guard by the action, being beaten up by Misu and his subordinates until Eiri suddenly appeared out of nowhere to save him, apparently still alive. In his beaten up stupor Haku tried to reach out for Eiri, but instead passed out from the strain.
After he returned to consciousness, Eiri explained to him that his death had been faked all along as part of the mission and that they couldn't have let Haku in on it. It was the only way to push Haku to go along with the mission and cooperate with Misu, who only fake betrayed him back there so he could get Serizawa to trust him and they could catch Serizawa off guard and capture him that way. Still emotional over the fact that it was all a big plot he was left out of, Haku ran off to confront Serizawa in the place they were keeping him. Serizawa confronted him with the fact that he had only joined the Northern Union to protect Haku and keep him from being taken instead ("I'm the monster you created", he tells Haku), only bringing Haku's emotions to a height - and when Serizawa told Haku to kill him, he couldn't. He pointed his gun at his older brother, but couldn't find it in himself to pull the trigger and kill the big brother that had been so important to him growing up, who he had longed to see again all this time. Even though he knew Serizawa was the enemy, even though he knew Serizawa had been killing his previous Messiah-- even so, he was still his brother. He still saved him, it was still Haku's fault that he became this way, or so Haku told himself.
Realising that it meant his "jinx" would never end this way (because Serizawa would still be alive and doubtlessly find some way to escape since Haku couldn't bear to see him killed), Haku ran away to instead confront Eiri, drawing his gun on him and making it seem like he was just going to kill him himself and be done with it. But at the last moment Haku pointed the gun at his own temple instead, saying that he he decided the only way for the jinx to end was for him to die. He doesn't want to see anyone die for his sake anymore, let alone see Eiri die, so it's better this way.
Just as he's about to pull the trigger, he'll find himself in Norfinbury instead.