His focus was on his master, he remembered.
He had run past the chaos around him, blind to the bodies falling, deaf to the explosions, deaf even to the voices calling out his name. He was alive only to his rage, like a demon in him, buried deep inside, had finally surfaced after years of waiting and had taken over. It felt utterly real – real to his pain, real to his sorrows, real to the ones he had lost, and real, most of all, to the master he feared he would lose.
His anger, uncontrollable, was what pushed him forward. He grabbed an object; he hadn't known what it was, and he hadn't cared to know. He simply knew it was meant to destroy. He aimed it forward, inhaling gun powder, the dust, the scent of blood…
The scent of the battlefield.
From deep in his throat, a cry came forth, uncaging all his emotions, which had grown turbulent inside him. Whether it was a battle cry, a cry of unspeakable anger, or something else entirely, he didn't know. He didn't care. All he knew was that it came from the depths of his heart and towards only to the life he so desperately wanted to save.
He pulled the trigger.
"You'd never want to feel what I'd felt." Katsushiro's voice was raspy, just above a whisper. He had his palms pressed to his eyes in gentle pressure – the kind of gentleness he felt he urgently needed.
"It's horrible – more horrible that anyone would imagine. I lost myself, my sense of being. My humanity was lost in a fit of rage and I had become what I had feared the most: a madman." He pulled his hands away from his eyes and stared at an indistinguishable point in space. His eyes, lighted only by the light of the candle fire reflected in them, were otherwise void of emotion. "Do have any idea how scary it is, arising to the fact that you'd acted blindly on rage? It is absolutely horrifying; you wake up from an almost dream-like, possessed state, and you suddenly realize that you've become what you feared you'd become: an animal. A mindless killer."
He remembered how it was: every detail of the horrible experience was with him every second of the day. They haunted him, the ghosts of his past, like a nightmare that dawned to him even in the brightest of days.
"I can still feel it, you know." He stared at the floor. "The cold steel of the gun, I mean. It was heavy, hard, but its weight almost seemed to…fit well in my hands. It was like holding it had become an integral, natural part of me. I still feel that way, up to now." He averted his gaze to his palms. "And I still see it every now and then, the red stain…" He paused for a minute, as though certain facts had only begun to clear before him. "I killed..."
From expressionless, his eyes turned to helpless. They seemed to be calling, pleading...
"May the gods have mercy on me…" his voice cracked as he spoke the words, and at once a shiver broke out through his body. "I only did it to save my master."
A gentle nod. "You had good intentions. You did what you had to do."
"It was inhuman."
"Your being his student had to include loyalty and duty," her voice was laced heavily with reason. "You had both."
Katsushiro looked at her then. Her attractive face was softened by the shadows created by the small but luminous candle light. Her dark eyes, which had stared at him years before as they did, only now with newfound maturity, overflowed with care.
"Those lost at the height of the war would have honored you. I suppose they do now."
"I have gained that honor by spilling a comrade's blood. I cannot see how that's honor."
"It was unintentional. You have gained due respect." She nodded, her eyes closed, as though to affirm him.
Katsushiro closed his eyes, helpless remorse overcoming him once more.
"Kirara-dono," he opened his eyes and looked at her. His gaze was not hard. "Won't you purify me once more?"
Silently, but carefully, she moved a little closer to him – just a little – until she was positioned directly in front of him. She took only one of his hands and held it gently in front of hers. And then, with a sigh, she smiled; regretfully? Resignedly? Wistfully? He could not tell. Perhaps it was a mix of all three.
Her grip on his hands loosened. "I'm sorry. I couldn't possibly do it."
Disappointment was apparent in his face. "But…why couldn't you?"
"You fought to gain the position you hold now; it was a position you so dearly wanted. You can't have any regrets now, and the others can't be angry. Purification is not needed. You've only begun to live like this, and like this, you'll continue." She smiled at him – the truest of all smiles since their last meeting years before and the time in between. "Katsushiro-sama, you are a samurai now."
The use of the honorific returned many memories; one, in particular, was his promise to never let her go.
They both stared at their hands – his in both of hers – and remembered, wistfully, that they had gone through both heaven and hell together.
The gazed into each other's eyes, and smiled gently. They knew they had been forgiven at last.
Completed 29 July 2008
"Take 5" – Utada Hikaru, Heart Station