This fic has no affiliation with Rurouni Kenshin and does not support nobuhiro watsuki.
Just last minute decided to make this a new fic rather than add it onto 'Gentle boys' because the subject is just wildly different. Another reworked piece.
How the war was fought ten years ago
Since he was eighteen years old, Saito had worked for the Shinsengumi. He fought day in and day out, killed when instructed, and knew all about living as a war dog.
During the first few weeks of his arrival in the Bakumatsu, few had believed in Battousai's purported abilities. Able to move faster than the eye could track? Able to strike down five men with one stroke of the sword? Able to split a man's body in half like people were made of tofu? It was ludicrous fantasy.
Until it wasn't.
"Hidesuke ," Saito said calmly, helping the man slide down the wall onto his knees. Blood wiped down the stone behind him as he did. Hidesuke was breathing harshly, like all his breath was leaving him at once, all his strength wilting away.
"He's real, Captain." After spending so much energy and will on holding his katana — holding onto his weapon with a death grip so that at least he wouldn't go down unarmed, Hidesuke dropped it to clasp Saito's gi.
It startled him, but Saito didn't back away. It — he had left no trace at all, not a careless strike on the wooden building, not a footprint in the dirt, and no blood. In fact, it was almost bloodless. That was what surprised Saito the most. The only blood in this place was where Hidesuke was, pooling under his hakama. Whatever had gotten Hidesuke had struck once and vanished.
"I believe you," Saito said. Hidesuke's eyes were going cloudy. He wasn't just cut, he'd been skewered clean through. Saito removed his hand from where he was pressing in on his wound. Hidesuke hissed, and tried to hide it from him.
"Give me traits. Something identifiable. Clothes, hair, sword."
"Captain…Captain…" Hidesuke gurgled, and Saito wasn't sure if the information could be credible coming from him, seeing his unit soldier like this. "…Hajime — listen…"
"I am listening."
"He's…so young."
Hidesuke was on the only one alive long enough to say so. The Third Unit spent months trying to find patterns, find mistakes, find something. But there was nothing. Only bodies signed by the Ishin Shishi, blood pooled in neat, closed off patches, a murderer vanished into thin air.
Hitokiri Battousai appeared out of nowhere most cases, killed, and then disappeared back into nowhere. No one could find a name. There was certainly no one who could tell what he looked like, no one had ever even heard him speak, and Saito kept losing good, reliable men to him in droves.
Instead of laughing at black humour told to lift soldier's spirits in the neat barracks lined in tatami, sweeping whispers of a demon under the rug, Saito tied up his long hair until it was tight, and bound the blisters on his hand. He learned to tend to his own wounds when the doctor hadn't the time to fit in a mere chest laceration or an odd finger lost, and learnt to do it quiet, in the dark, out on the streets, alone. He knew in this noisy, chaotic war, the only way to not let it get to him, to stay useful, was to be sharp. Always sharp, knifelike.
Saito Hajime was the Third Unit Shinsengumi Captain, twenty one years old.
The Ishin Shishi's newest top asset was Hitokiri Battousai, so young.
"Oh, he's real, Hajime-san," the First Unit Captain said to him in a side dive, hugging his sword like a child did a toy. "And the rest of the Shinsengumi will have to figure it out sooner or later. This many bodies in this many places — it's obviously a new assassin. And a good one."
"Because you killed one of the last ones and this is his replacement?" Saito said with a smirk. He did not partake in the drinking, not when it was getting this close to nightfall. "And don't call me Hajime. We are not on first name terms, Okita."
Okita Soji made a dumb, pleased sound. "Him? Oh, he was a no one. Anyone could have killed him. But this new guy, Saito-san?" Okita said, smiling despite his grip going white on his wakizashi. "No anti-government faction pulls out all the men they've got stationed — reassign all their nightly assassins and replace them all — with one killer." Okita's voice wavered slightly. "…Unless they are a good one."
Okita smiled, and then began to cough.
More reports of assassinations came through like flood waters. Soon it was not just the First and Third Units rambling on crazily about their mystery assassin. All factions of the government were inundated by the assassinations.
For once, the Ishin Shishi seem to have turned the tide — with just one good killer.
It was pitch dark and Saito cut down a Shishi trying to run in a back alley, then went around a corner to finish the other two attempting to escape. Saito swiped his sword once through the air, reflexly getting blood off it before following.
Before he rounded the corner, one of the men gasped and called out with all the relief in the world crammed into a single set of lungs.
"Himura-san!"
Saito thought it misplaced. He skidded into the open. He did not see this Himura silently nod, alleviating the fears of the two Shishi like smoke in the open air. He did not see him throw away the red rag in his hands, sheathing his sword in the face of danger instead of drawing it. The stragglers had already turned to run, their swords neatly put away.
The third soldier before Saito was young.
Saito dashed, swinging his sword expertly, aiming immediately for the head. It was only when he was stopped, centimetres before his kill, that he realised the other man had even drawn. The third Shishi turned, going past him in a half-spin, and Saito caught the full momentum of that spin in his ribs. At the very last moment, Saito had switched hands, parrying the attack. Even so, the blunt end of his sword pushed into his ribs with the Shishi's immense power, forcing him backwards. He grunted, immediately switching back to his left.
Saito caught the Shishi looking at him for a strange, encapsulated moment. It was too dark to discern the expression on his face, but Saito knew the Shishi hadn't expected to be blocked. It was like he was noting down Saito's ambidextrousness for the betterment of the next attack.
Surprise was what saved him, that was all.
Saito scoffed, picking up his sword and reaching out into the dark, and the Shishi shifted to face him side-on, shielding his sword from Saito's view.
They would both make it out alive. They always did, but this time was the first.
At the end of the sudden exchange, shouting came from the streets. A lit, handheld lantern illuminating the end. Without another look, without speaking at all, the Shishi scaled the wall with a jump, disappearing.
Saito stood, gauging the distance and power of the leap with his eyes.
"…Himura."
They had a name.
It was nightfall and Okita took one exit and Saito the other, cutting the Shishi runners off and closing in on either end.
"I'm injured too badly — it's not — it's not worth it anymore, Ushiro," the first man said to the other. "Leave me and run!"
"Shut up. What's the point of dying here? The new era we talked about is finally — it's within reach…" the second man said quietly.
"Your sideways hobble stops here," Okita chimed in. "Sorry. But you know how it goes — First Unit Shensengumi Captain: Okita Soji," he greeted.
"They caught up…Ushiro—"
"Then we fight!" This Ushiro man drew his sword, only for the injured one to collapse onto his side.
If Saito had to describe what Battousai's voice was like, it would be — slight.
"Let me handle this," said the man beneath the dark of the eaves, his strange brownish hair framing a darkly young face.
Not a man, no — but a boy.
Saito gripped his sword in his left hand and stretched out his right, bending into the stance of the Gatotsu. His lips curled upwards, unbidden. It was him again. He'd appeared.
"Battousai…die."
In the first six months of his tenure, Battousai had already killed over one hundred people, quickly gaining the title of Manslayer — quickly becoming synonymous with death.
A year went by and a fifteen year old assassin had become one of the most feared human beings in Japan at the height of the revolution.
On another moonlit night, there were ten men in the scuffle ahead. Saito ran forward with his Gatotsu pointed, cutting down two Shishi with his sword. Then he spun, advancing on the next with a taut scowl.
"Third Unit Captain."
His voice — he would never get used to it. Slight and commanding all at once. It was absolutely disconcerting hearing a voice that hadn't yet broken come from a murderer that good.
"Battousai." Saito dropped the Shishi's collar currently bundled in his fist, completely ignoring him, and faced Battousai.
They attacked. Saito's tall frame and long limbs had always put him at an advantage when dealing with ranged attacks. Battousai's small body and quick legs, however, somehow made him faster than Saito could ever achieve.
He disappeared and Saito scrambled to get his bearings. In the air, Battousai came down, sword glinting. It was a little known fact that the skywards-Gatotsu stance was modified by Saito especially to combat the hitokiri's falling Ryusuisen. Saito growled, aimed upwards and thrust up with all the power he could muster.
Battousai's eyes went wild as he stretched out his legs at the last moment, kicking Saito in the face with the full force of the fall — but not before Saito stuck the tip of his sword into his shoulder.
Hm, Saito thought, with blood running down the lower half of his face from his nose. Not deep enough.
On an old wooden bridge, Saito backed Battousai into a corner.
"I thought I liked untalkative people," Saito said, shifting his blade whenever Battousai shifted himself, a shadow in the dark. "Untalkative people have things on their mind. They only talk when it's pertinent to the point. They don't pester me with drivel like Okita. I always wonder what they expect me to say, in our line of work."
Saito thrust forward, but it was still too slow, his sword wedging into the wood of the rails. Battousai swiped his sword upwards, forcing Saito to have to choose between having a split skull and a sword, or no sword and a complete skull. Saito chose his skull and let go of his weapon fully.
"Ah, yes, I murdered a few more of the Shishi last night, not as productive as I could have hoped, but not tragic either. And you?" Saito got out his wakizashi, starting to advance again.
Battousai blinked at that.
"…The Shinsengumi do not know how to retreat," he said, full of venom.
Saito smiled. "The Ishin Shishi do not know how to die."
Saito dived, but not before Battousai cut open the side of his torso, which would put him out of commission for the coming month. Saito dived and pulled his sword out of the bridge, getting immediately into the Gatotsu position on his knees.
He was breathing heavily, with a bit of a wheeze.
Battousai looked down on him. Saito looked up, seeing own blood running down Battousai's knuckles. Battousai's eyes narrowed fractionally. "Now look who does not know how to die."
A muscle in Saito's lip twitched. "Now look who learned how to drivel."
Battousai sighed, and Saito caught a small upturn of lip. "Himura Kenshin, wielder of Hiten Mitsurugi ryu," he introduced himself formally, with an air of finality. "A Sengoku sword style designed to take many at once. Here's your drivel," Battousai continued, sheathing his sword with the blood still upon it, "If it wasn't for you, Saito, know that half your division would already be dead."
They fought, and every time Saito fought him it was like he was consumed with it, consumed by the adrenaline rush and battle cries and defence drills finally put to use, every single part of him screaming to keep pushing. And every time it felt like going back to the beginning — back to a time where he wasn't a soldier in a war killing dissenters because they were Aku and it was what was ordered of him. It was going back to before this, just Saito Hajime picking up a sword because he was good at it, and there was fun in it, and fighting was just his forte.
One day Battousai was gone for a time and came back with a scar on his face. Saito wondered for the longest time who managed to do it.
"Ryusuien is an attack from above," Saito stated, overlooking an entire room of outfitted soldiers. "Do not try to counter. Do not try to be smart trying to counter — you — idiots. Let me tell you right now, you will never be fast enough to counter Battousai's mid-air attacks," he said soberly, looking over the wide-eyed faces. "Evade."
"What about the battojutsu variations?" Harada, another unit leader, asked. "Are they really as stupendous as they say? I find it hard to believe."
"Then, graciously, Harada, die," Saito finished his little show and tell with.
He studied Himura's sword. Speed faster than the eye could follow, the little twitch of his pinky when he tightened his grip, two step manoeuvres that defended and attacked all at once, one designed to take down many.
In the snow-veiled woods piled up with bodies and shouting and war, a smirk graced Saito's lips, tense and knife-like. From chaos, there was clarity. Because no matter how toiled, how convoluted, how grey the war became; because no matter how high the bodies piled, how frequent the sound of falling men, the sound of ripping flesh, or all the times he wiped his blade — the Wolf of Mibu would fight Hitokiri Battousai.
Sometime in the middle of the uneasy, silent stretch of time after Saito led Shinsengumi into the Ikedaya Inn, Battousai had gotten his first improbable scar crossed with another. He was different, then, more withdrawn. But that wasn't what mattered — what mattered was that he fought with more fire than ever.
Saito was twenty four, and he tightened his grip, his fingers spastic and jittery from the fighting, and raised the Gatotsu above head. Battousai was eighteen, at the age Saito was when he joined the Shinsengumi, and he did the same, instinctively sheathing his katana to sink into his battojutsu. He always faced him with every intention to kill.
"Strange, not seeing you backing Okita these days," he said, slamming his sword against Saito's.
"Okita's dead," Saito remarked.
The thing about chaos was that it always rubbed off on you, seeping in deep when you least expect it, until you couldn't get it out. Saito crossed swords, again and again, thrust forward and switched arms and went again. By then, he'd lost his preciseness.
Sometime from him holding Hidesuke 's wound shut, letting him call him Hajime as he died, to him searching for Battousai in a crowd to fight him, shouting at the hitokiri to come at him, it got harder and harder to be sharp, knife-like. His fingers trembled on the hilt of his sword, having drawn on so much power it hurt. His breathing got heavy and irresolute, having exhausted himself too many times. His preciseness became conditional. But it was fine. It was fine because Battousai was the same, he had also grown chaotic inside, let the war reach him there, too — and so long as they were the same Saito knew this was just how it was.
It was 1868 in Toba Fushimi, and Saito Hajime had not dared to think that he, as well as Battousai, would ever live beyond this.
Notes
And then they both went MIA for 10 years before the start of RK. Saito and Kenshin have the most fascinating relationship. They fought on opposite sides of the war, yet are still somewhat amiable because of the history they share...fighting on opposite sides of a war.
Not that I agree with him, but I get why Saito is so incensed about Kenshin being a wanderer. Like, why are you acting like a goody two shoes, I've literally seen you stab a guy in the face, Battousai. YOU won the war you absolute banana. Saito had a really high opinion of Battousai to be that let down by wanderer Kenshin.
The Shishi soldier 'Ushiro' is a shoutout to SiriusFan13's Out of Time series!