Kirikae

By lawless

Takani Megumi woke up with a start. The first thing she noticed was the overwhelming stink of…garbage? She grimaced and took in her surroundings. Bright, sunny sky, partially hidden by a banana peel barely hanging on to a yakitori skewer sticking from a –

Megumi's eyes widened as she sat up, hitting her head on a plank of wood in the process.

The high-pitched scream startled from half-slumber an old geezer sitting on a stool in front of a store a few blocks away.

Chikushou! Megumi grabbed her head in pain while at the same time scrambling on all fours, trying to get up. Her head was pounding and not just from the bump. Judging from the way it felt like tiny little oni were merrily hammering away from the inside of her skull meant that she was having a hangover. The worst one she'd had in years since – well, probably since she left Takeda's mansion.

In the struggle to get up on two legs, Megumi's gaze caught sight of her hands and did a double-take. She held up the offending limbs in front of her eyes, aghast. They were rough, dirty, scarred, with scabs half-concealed by bandages badly in need of changing. Then Megumi had an epiphany, along with the terrible, horrifying, violent realization.

She glanced down at the rest of her body, half-hoping she wouldn't find what she expected to find. But at the sight of her half-naked torso and the tent between her legs, she felt for the first time that she might faint. The blood rushed up her neck all the way to her ears. But they weren't her torso, no. Just as these weren't her hands. Megumi raked her fingers through her hair and found them stuck in there, amid the muck and the grease. Slowly, with a kind of conscious dread, she noticed all the other tell-tale signs: the tight, oddly damp sensation around her forehead, the inexplicable aches she seemed to feel all over her body, and finally, and this was the worst, the overwhelming need to go to the bathroom.

Somewhere in Tokyo….

Nanja korya. Sagara Sanosuke sat up, rubbed his eyes and blinked a few times for good measure. But they were still there, that tantalizing valley of flesh sitting right on his chest. His own chest. Out of sheer curiosity, Sano grabbed at the collar of his yukata (why the hell was he wearing a yukata? was the question at the back of his mind) and parted them to reveal…breasts. Beautiful, soft, pink-nippled breasts.

Nanda? Nanda kuso?

"Yo, Zanza!"

Megumi froze. In front of her was a rough-looking man seemingly stalking in her direction. She dropped her gaze and quickly turned.

"Oi, Zanza!"

She ignored him.

"Oi, what the hell are you doing, baka yarou?"

Yabai. He sounded angry. Megumi quickened her pace. Mou, why did Sano have to know so many people? This morning, she barely got out of the public bathhouse without being assaulted with friendship from a naked fiend who was so pleasantly shocked to find Sano there so early and at all that he'd insisted right there and then to compare sizes, much to Megumi's mortification. She'd just wanted to be clean, dammit! Not to compare ochinchin. But instead of getting angry or shocked at her crudeness, the man merely laughed at the way she called Sano's penis. His laughter had followed her out of the changing room, out the door, into the street. By the time Megumi was out of earshot, her face was bright red with indignity.

And now, this.

She glanced behind her and saw the man still following her. Oh god, stop, please. Why the hell is this happening to her? She started to break into a run, only to end up bumping against something hard and unmoving. Then, there was the strangest sensation of being yanked from gravity by the collar of her gi.

"Oi, kusottare!" A deep voice came from the hard, unmoving something whom, upon taking a good look, Megumi realized was a large tub of a man. Because he was so tall and so big, he didn't see Sano's face right away until he finally lifted her up at eye level. "Monku akka?" He boomed.

"G-gomen," Megumi tried to say but the man didn't seem to hear her as he kept repeating the question, his vocabulary seemingly getting cruder by the minute.

Finally, the man who was following Megumi arrived. "Baka ja nai no?" He said to the big man.

"Haah?" The man's voice boomed even louder. He sounded pissed off.

"Don't you recognize that guy? That's Zanza, you idiot!"

"Nani kuso?" The man looked at Megumi again, who lowered her brows and tried to look dignified? Cool? Pissed off? The question was: what would Sagara Sanosuke do in this situation?

"Put him down, Hiroto," the man said, "before you really piss him off and he gives you the beating of your life."

Hiroto put her down carefully. But he still continued to stare at her skeptically. "Ano, gomen na, Zanza. But there's something weird about you today. You don't look normal."

"I don't know what –" Megumi started to say until she remembered to say instead: "Urusai yo" as she smoothed out her gi and wrapped it around her, covering her bare chest in the process. It was a decidedly un-Sano-like gesture.

"Sou desu," the other man agreed, watching her with pointed eyes. "I mean, I saw him earlier and called his name and he just started running away from me like he owed me money or something."

To Megumi's horror, Hiroto began sniffing her, and it was all that she could do to slap him. How dare he?!

"Na, Zanza," Hiroto said, his face very close to Sano's, "why do you smell like a girl?"

Sano emptied his fifth bowl of rice. "Kutta! Kutta!" He exclaimed, leaning back and rubbing his stomach.

Around him, Kenshin, Kaoru and Yahiko were all staring at him bug-eyed.

Sano did not notice right away as he fished around his pockets for a toothpick. When he remembered that he couldn't find any in these clothes he was wearing, he reached out and broke off a piece of bone from the fish he just demolished and placed it between his teeth. He finally noticed the silence around him and remembered to be polite. "Oh, right. Gochisousama deshita!"

"Heeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeehhhhhhhhhhhh?!"

"Come on, Zanza," urged the stalker, whom Megumi finally recognized as Genji, one of Sano's gambling hall buddies. "Just one drink. It'll do you some good and get you out of that weird funk you're in right now."

"Kekkou desu," Megumi replied and realized at once that it was too polite. Shit, how do you say "NO" rudely?

"Aa, hen na, choo hen na," Hiroto muttered under his breath.

"Kuso, alright!" She said, annoyed. By god, she didn't ask for this. Why was this happening? If she were dreaming, she should have woken up by now. But she was wide awake and no matter how much she didn't want to believe it, she had for some reason or another become that idiot Sanosuke.

She didn't even know sake houses were open at this time of the morning. But they ended up in a stall by the side of the road, drinking sake from a masu cup, being served by a roundish lady who kept trying to flirt with Megumi in Sano's body. It was beyond embarrassing. She drank faster and passed out by the fifth round of drinks.

Kaoru had decided to bring Megumi to Genzai-sensei for a check-up. There was something clearly not right about her. Sano thought otherwise. Judging by what he saw this morning – and he saw (gomen na, kitsune) everything – everything was right about Megumi.

"Megumi, are you ready?" Kaoru's light footsteps were padding down her way.

Yabai. Sano looked around in panic as he once again tried to unsuccessfully loop the obi around Megumi's impossibly narrow waist. What the fuck is this thing? How the fuck does this thing work?

"Oi, Megumi-sensei." Kaoru appeared through the partially open shoji and drew to a stop.

"N-na, Kaoru-chan, I have no idea how this thing works." At least he remembered not to call her "jouchan."

Somebody was tickling her. She felt it – that light, stroking feeling, making his skin itch. She moved his arm to scratch it and heard a giggle. Nani? The light stroking returned, this time the finger – she was sure now that it was a finger – was making circles around his nipple.

Megumi sat bolt upright, saw the serving lady from the stall grinning at her flirtily, and screamed.

"Oi, Zanza, calm down and stop acting like a virgin," came the voice of Genji. He was still drinking. They were still at that stall. The serving lady was cackling at her expense.

She had passed out – how long was she out? "How long was I out?" She repeated aloud. The worst thing about it was that she was still drunk.

"Not long." Genji poured more sake and nudged it her way.

"No, I don't think I should have anymore," Megumi muttered.

"What are you talking about? You've had like two drinks and you're acting even more like a lunatic. Drink some more."

"I can't. I think I'm gonna huuurrrrl –" And she did. Right there on the dirt next to her feet.

When she finished, Genji put down his masu cup and said, "Na, Zanza, you should get yourself checked. Maybe see that doctor friend of yours. You're not right in the head, buddy."

"Fascinating," Genzai-sensei murmured as he moved a finger from side to side while Sano followed it with her eyes. Next, the old doctor checked Megumi's pulse, then checked her heartbeat. When his hand slipped and accidentally brushed against Megumi's breast, Sano made an annoyed sound.

"Oi, hentai-sensei, watch it!"

"Gomen, gomen, it just slipped," the doctor said. "I thought you were going to slap me as Megum-kun would have done."

"You'll get punched, doc, is what I'll do," Sano growled, although in Megumi's voice, it sounded more like a purr. The hell, was this what Megumi had to go through working at this clinic?

"So you really are Sagara Sanosuke."

"Aa."

"And this really is Megumi-kun's body."

"Aa. Can you do something about it?"

"I'm not sure what I can do."

"Haaaahhhhh?"

Megumi arrived at the familiar clinic, still slightly tipsy but at least she was walking steadily and no one tried to stop her on the way. She opened the small wooden gate and strode in. She realized a while ago that, with Sano's long legs, she could actually do that – stride into places, hands in her pockets. She thought she was getting the hang of the way Sano walked until she met him at the doorway to the clinic.

"Yo," he greeted casually.

As she came close, she exaggerated her strides and even incorporated spitting to make her look more rough-hewn as she imagined him to be. It soon became clear however that she did not know how men do it – spit at a trajectory with precision. She ended up with spit dribbling down her chin.

Did she mention she was still a little drunk?

"Ore wo baka ni suru tsumori ka?" Sano asked, perfectly serious. Was she trying to make him look like an idiot?

"In this body? Baka mitai ni kanjiru!" She retorted. Utterly.

Tbc

AN This is just a silly, nonsense fic idea I had, inspired by the gender-swap theme in Makoto Shinkai's Kimi Na Wa. It's a character study in a fish-out-of-water setting. Also because I just wanted to write these two again in a completely new fic.