Teal'c surveyed the SGC gym……..it was deserted at this hour and he found that quite to his satisfaction. DanielJackson had given him much to think about earlier this day with a movie and a book of pictures and words. The book had at first defeated him, he had become used to reading a book in the way that that they were printed in this country and the book…..'manga' he had found it was called, was printed in the opposite direction from the books in this country. That and the fact that the language they called English was not his native tongue made it too difficult to comprehend….but he had been able to find out the same story was also available as 'anime'. So he had watched instead of trying to read the story of this Kenshin Himura. And now he had much to think about and sometimes he still thought best while using his staff weapon he had been trained in by Master Bra'tac.
Teal'c centered himself in a guard stance, blocking out any distractions except those that would mean he was being observed, and started swinging his weapon in the simplest of attack and defense forms. This was not meditation like Kel'no'reem once would have been to him but it felt appropriate for this line of thinking.
Battosai, the character had been called first, 'manslayer' and Teal'c had slain many in his time. Some were those that had attacked him in their False God's name but other's HE had attacked in the name of the False God Apophis. Indeed that title of Battosai fit him as well as it fit the character Kenshin. Teal'c's body moved fiercely in various forms of attack as he remembered every occasion in which HE had been 'Battosai'. He attacked what he had been from every angle; envisioning himself, the First Prime of Apophis, as the opponent that his weapon struck down again and again. But each time he knocked that old self- that Battosai- down it rose up again to be attacked again……a part of his past he could never quite escape.
But at the beginning of the true story of Kenshin he had no longer been Battosai. He had renamed himself 'Ruroni' or wanderer and Teal'c himself still wandered as a member of SG-1. He constantly looked for the way to free his people, better than the Tretonin that now kept him alive in the absence of his symbiote, he wanted to free them of the False Gods. Kenshin also strove to protect in that first episode…..just a few people. Indeed he as 'shol'va' had striven at first just to be accepted as part of SG-1 and to protect them from the dangers that their wanderings had lead them to time and time again. Even when his past came to haunt him at the Cor'Ai on Cartago so many years ago. Now he took a defensive stance blocking envisioned blows he had shouldered with becoming 'Shol'va'…..and also in his way 'Ruroni'. Protecting SG-1 as Kenshin had protected Miss Kaoru and her Kamiya Kashin Dojo. A corner of his mouth quirked, the idea of a Dojo……a place simply for learning not only how to fight but how to fight with honor reminded him much of his youth and training with Master Bra'tac. Although they had only what land the False God Apophis had given them and not a fine training hall such as the 'anime' had shown, the ideal was familiar to him as his skin. That the Tau'ri, at least some of the Tau'ri, had this concept as well as the Jaffa made him feel a bit more at home on this world. DanielJackson had guided him well, to guide him to this culture, whose remnants still survived on the First World…..on Earth.
And now this gym…..far under Cheyenne Mountain had become HIS dojo but although he had taught how to fight he did not often have to teach honor here. Those that had been assigned to the SGC often were highly honorable warriors and he had noticed those who were not usually disappeared within a short space of time….if they were not also cunning like ColonelMakepeace had once been. He had hid treason to his own world behind a mask of what was acceptable in an SGC officer…..requiring O'Neill to make the great sacrifice of lying to SG-1 and go 'under cover'. Alone, O'Neill had to capture the thieves that the government of this country had allowed out among the stars to do 'whatever was necessary' to guard Earth. And, he suspected, this country against the other enemies they had on this world. That O'Neill had done what he had, even to the point of destroying the great friendship between DanielJackson and himself, was to O'Neill's credit. And never would Teal'c break his promise to DanielJackson and tell all the things that Makepeace had done….or rather TRIED to do to the archeologist but Teal'c relived in his movements and his mind what he had wanted very much to do to the temporary 'commander' of SG-1 in those weeks. And what he HAD done to keep it from being worse than it was at the time on his young friend. He had been much relieved when O'Neill had prevailed and eliminated the plot he had 'gone undercover' to find, fastening the restraints on Makepeace with his own hands. Although Teal'c himself would not have been satisfied with simply putting that Tau'ri in a prison….he would rather it had been a grave.
But Teal'c defended this place this…dojo as Kenshin did the Kamiya Kashin Dojo that he had decided to stop wandering for. And now it was one part of the story that focused his attention, and he pushed himself into more complex routines with his staff weapon as he remembered the Ruroni speaking softly about what a weapon…a 'sword' was.
"A sword is a weapon,"
Teal'c brought his own weapon around in a sweeping movement, it's momentum and weight enough to kill as surely as a blade.
"Swordsmanship is learning how to kill."
As he had killed so many, many times before he had even thought to doubt the creature that he had thought his God…..as he still killed without thought at times to this day.
"That is the Truth,"
Teal'c knew in his very bones that was the truth of a warrior….that he killed, whether it be for a good cause such as the freedom of his people, or merely for personal gain. Death was Death.
"What Miss Kauro said is play-talk that only those who have never stained their hands can say."
That Miss Kauro, in her innocence, had talked about a weapon being used only to bring out a person's potential WAS the words of one who had never had the stain of another's blood on their hands. Even DanielJackson had never been that innocent. But sometimes he saw people on the television, in this country, who treated weapons as only something to 'play' with. And he had sometimes watched O'Neill's face when he saw children playing with 'toy' weaponry and knew that that idea had very probably cost O'Neill his only son.
"However, I prefer Miss Kaoru's play-talk more than the truth, I do."
And with the memory of that line ringing once again in his head Teal'c turned a last slow guarded turn with his staff weapon and brought himself to a halt. He looked down at the staff in his hands and considered himself, as he often had, a living weapon. The truth was he killed and he would have to keep killing in future years to free his people. But the Wanderer Kenshin had turned the sharp edge of HIS sword inward….making it a Sakobato, a reverse of the usual Japanese Katana. Teal'c could also follow that path…….he tilted his head. That was the path that DanielJackson had given to both O'Neill and himself as much as O'Neill sometimes rebelled against it. A way to face life only turning the 'sharpened' edge of their warrior selves out when it was absolutely necessary. Or sometimes not, as he had seen O'Neill use the blade of his tongue on DanielJackson many times to wound. Sometimes he felt that that was why Daniel had not cared enough for himself and took the lethal dose of radiation on what was Kelwona. Then that blade O'Neill had used turned inward on his warrior-brother and at times Teal'c had feared for O'Neill's life.
Now DanielJackson was back and seemed calmer, his time among the Ascended had allowed him to see all their lives from a distance, even if he did not exactly remember his time among them. O'Neill looked calmer these days as well, his eyes not the dark tortured holes they had been when DanielJackson had not been among them. He now too could find a way to turn himself from a sword that cut both ways indiscriminately to a Sakobato that cut others only when it was absolutely necessary. Steel was steel after all and the blunt edge could be used for defense where the sharp was only meant to injure. This would require more thought…..more investigation into this fictional character Kenshin Himura….but in the end he too would rather be Ruroni than a Battosai. He would devote his life to that ideal, and find other ways than a weapon, to maintain his discipline and his honor. He knew which way to look now.