Disclaimer: Rurouni Kenshin is owned by Nobuhiro Watsuki. I claim no ownership over this wonderful series.
The Taste of Good Sake
By: Beyond Doubt
July 25th, 2012
Recalling The Days
The muscular man breathed a deep sigh.
It was a warm summer's night, swathed in darkness and silence except for the blinking fireflies and the low chiming of crickets heard far off in the distance. The midnight sky shined dimly against the scattered clouds moving across it's smooth surface. Hiko thought he would never get out of the hut for the night. He was relieved more than anything to have an opportuned time to himself to relax and gaze ahead to nothing but the thick expanse of forest.
His pottery had kept him cooped up in the house, taking out bits and pieces of his day without his even realizing it until his dark chesnut eyes captured a shaft of red light draining through the doorway a little too late.
Hiko's head bowed slightly. Three years was enough to make even the Hiten Mitsurugi swordsmaster feel old, though he would never find himself voicing such a thought aloud.
Lately, however, he found himself helplessly lost in the reminiscings of his past with the former deshi he had named Kenshin. The redhead had come off as an annoyance to the man at first, and for a while, Hiko had doubts that the boy -so frail and small- would ever be an accomplished heir to the Hiten Mitsurugi sword art. In the years dedicated to training, Kenshin had begun to prove the older swordsman wrong over time.
It's too bad all those years of discipline in the style went to waste, Hiko thought disappointedly, remembering the day the boy walked out of his life for a good remainder of fifteen years in an attempt to pave a way of peace with his sword.
He gradually sipped his sake without another thought to accompany the previous idea.
Fifteen years of making a living off the pottery he molded and existing as nothing more than a mountain hermit for a good portion of the time his deshi departed seemed like nothing to anyone looking in from the outside until a reason for it sprang forward to give an explanation for his way of life meaning.
Hiko never expected Kenshin to return.
Yet, somehow he found himself disbelieving his own skepticism entirely.
Had the concept been more convincing, Hiko would have been shocked when the redhead returned. However, an unexplainable feeling provoked the master into believing otherwise. Whether it was a false sense of hope or just a nagging feeling alone... he didn't think he'd ever truly know. The moment he felt that familiar flicker of ki ignite from behind him, there was no question that the baka had revisited his old master.
Hiko did not suppress the smirk that splayed across his lips. "And even after all those years toiling in the bloodshed of the Bakumatsu," he muttered. "He still had reason for coming back."
The grounds met upon Kenshin's arrival were once roughened by the buried resentment and long held frustration the swordsmaster had out for his ignortant deshi. Nevertheless, those grounds gradually flattened out as the following years of the redhead's return cushioned the old feelings away and brought forth a new outlook leading to his deshi's recent life.
Hiko had to admit, he could not have felt any happier to see the young man again, despite that he was no longer the little boy he once raised beneath his wing...
Tsuzuku...
Authoress Note: I know, it's a very weird idea. It spontaniously combusted in my brain as of this morning for no apparent reason... I'd actually thought to writing something like this for the past several months now. In all honesty, I'm happy with how it's turned out so far. I plan on making it a story rather than a one-shot like I previously had in mind. So, with that being said, I hope you'll stick around for the following chapters to come! Reviews on my progress thus far would be lovely to hear. I'd really appreciate it. Thank you.
-Beyond Doubt
P.S. The title of this fanfiction was inspired by Hiko's saying about sake that Kenshin thinks back on during his days as a Hitokiri in the manga. It seemed like an ideal title for this story not to mention a great saying too.
"In spring, cherry blossoms by night. In summer, the stars. In autumn, the full moon. In winter, the snow. These are always enough to make sake delicious. If it tastes bad, that's proof that there's something sick inside you." ~ Seijuro Hiko XIII