The earth reeked of blood. The sky was a musty, metallic colour, the air thick with the smell of death and smoke.
A stark figure dressed in white, his silvery hair stirring slightly in the breeze, walked desolately over the barren landscape. He seemed lost. His crimson eyes stared bleakly at the bodies that littered the ground – clad in armour, some monsters from distant stars, some fallen comrades whose names he daren't try to remember.
He seemed to be searching for something. Blood was trickling down his face, and he was limping. He clutched his bleeding shoulder tightly, trying to staunch the blood from flowing out the ugly wound that dug deep his flesh. Badly wounded and dizzy with fatigue, he still trudged forward, eyes scanning the distance for something familiar –
There.
Lying in a throng of dead bodies, still clutching his sword, face down in the dirt was another young man, the deep green of his clothes instantly recognizable.
The wounded young man drew in a breath. With what little energy he had, he surged forward towards the fallen boy, whose long hair spilled around him, pooling in congealing puddles of blood.
The young man stumbled forward as he reached his friend. Breath falling in ragged gasps, he cradled his friend's head in his lap, gently brushing wild strands of hair from his face.
"Oh God …" he murmured, unable to control the shaking in his voice. "Please be alive."
The young man in his lap didn't stir. The silver-haired boy – who felt, at that very moment, just a young boy, human and terrified and alone, and nothing like the invincible White Demon he was named – placed a trembling hand over his friend's face, lips – and could feel his shoulders sag in relief when he felt warmth, soft breath brushing past his fingers.
"Please." He clutched his friend close. Their blood and breath mingled. "Wake up. Wake up."
Katsura was a master tactician and genius swordsman. Graduating from their academy at the top of the class, there was always an air of promise about him – that he'll have a bright future, successfully taming all his dreams – which became more apparent as he wielded the sword, seeming to dance across the earth, treating combat like an art form.
But now he looked so broken and delicate, his pale complexion almost porcelain in the dusky twilight. Half-dying in his friend's arms.
Gintoki pressed his forehead against Katsura's, his eyes shut so tight they hurt.
"Don't die, Zura," he begged. "You're all I have left."
His eyes snapped open in shock when he felt a fluttering touch on his cheek. Looking down, he saw Katsura's eyes were half open, and a faint smile danced across his lips. He was reaching out, gently brushing Gintoki's face with his fingertips.
"It's not Zura," he murmured hoarsely. "It's Katsura."
Gintoki already felt the grin tug at his lips. "Yeah," he whispered in relief. "You scared the hell out of me back there, Zura."
Katsura's grip on his sword tightened. "I'm not going to die here, not now," he promised quietly. "Not when I still can fight."
Gintoki narrowed his eyes, bristling with fury. Teeth clenched, he murmured, "Fight? You still want to fight, Zura? A few minutes ago, I thought I'd never-" he choked on his last few words, unable to express them without a broken sob welling up in his throat. He lifted his comrade to his feet. "Let's get out of here," he just said tiredly, angry tears welling up in his eyes.
Katsura felt himself being lifted onto Gintoki's back, and carried from the scene of their nightmares. The adrenaline rush and loss of blood made him feel dizzy and faint, and, resting his cheek onto Gintoki's shoulders, he gave into the black depths of sleep.
Drifting fleetingly between unconsciousness and consciousness, Katsura thought he could hear his friend mutter under his breath, "No more. No more."
It was springtime. The faint sound of birds twittering could be heard from the branches of an enormous tree next door, where a considerably scary space-demon was managing a flower shop.
Katsura warmed his hands on the surface of the mug of tea he held, sipping carefully and courteously as he listened to his host ramble on and on about why young China girls shouldn't be allowing their giant pet dogs loose in the park during cat-shows, pausing occasionally to insert a few complaints on how JUMP wasn't coming out this week, annoying chain-smoking Shinsengumi Vice-Captains showing up at unexpected moments, stalker ninjas with obscene agendas and nightmarish landladies who demand rent at the worse possible moments.
"Must be tough for you. We sympathize, don't we, Elizabeth?" Katsura indulged, when his host paused to pick absent-mindedly at his nose.
The ambiguous creature sitting next to him – resembling a penguin and a duck, with a mouth that looked like a coffee bean, or a doriyaki seen from the side – remained silent.
Gintoki stared nervously at the creature Katsura brought with him everywhere and called his pet, before continuing, "Anyway … what brings you here, Zura? I thought you were incredibly busy, blowing up government buildings and such."
"That's precisely what I came to talk to you about." Katsura immediately reared up, the enthusiasm coursing through his veins. "I've come to invite you again to our noble cause! We'll once again bring this country back to the glory it once was! We'll return to an era of honour and splendor, our brilliant Edo –"
He was interrupted abruptly by a karate chop to the head, administered expertly by his host.
"Shut the hell up, Zura. You stopped making sense at 'precisely'."
Katsura rubbed the back of his head, eyes narrowed in annoyance. "It's not Zura, it's Katsura! And I can't understand why you're being so difficult, you bastard. You're a slacker, and you complain about your job practically every day. What happened to the proud Shiroyasha, the champion of our cause?"
Gintoki leaned back in his sofa, looking jaded and unaffected. But his stare was unwavering and fierce. He held Katsura's gaze in silence for the longest time, his crimson eyes silently speaking what he didn't say.
Somewhere it that silence, Katsura could feel the smoke once again on his cheek, the sounds of clamour echoing distantly in his ears. The fading screams of his comrades as they charged to their deaths. His friend's arms clutching at his shoulders, begging him to stay alive, so that he won't be alone.
Katsura broke the gaze, looking sullenly at his feet. Suddenly, softly, came Gintoki's voice. "You know what happened."
Katsura looked up again, and met his friend's eyes. But there was something different there, something changed. A raw moment of great depth passed between them, touching a hidden core within Katsura, confusing and sobering him. Somehow, he could almost hear the same man as a boy years younger, murmur, "No more."
He placed the unfinished cup of tea on the table. "Thanks for the tea," he muttered. "Come along, Elizabeth. We must be leaving."
Gintoki saw his guests to the door. He watched as they stepped away into the spring sunshine, their straw hats obscuring their faces and protecting their identities from the sharp eyes of the law (he wasn't so sure about the penguin-thing, though).
He sighed. You'd never understand, Zura. Times have changed. Back then, there was something worth fighting for - it meant something to die honourably, defending your beloved country. But, during the still, dead moments after battle, he realized.
There was a person that meant more to him than a country. Whose life he'd rather protect, even if it meant damning a city to a lifetime of servitude and indignity at the feet of an invading race.
He reached into the refrigerator for a carton of strawberry milk, and gazed out onto Edo as he sipped from it, smiling slightly as sakura petals fluttered by prettily, carried by the breeze.
Somewhere in the back of his mind, he could see a brilliant young man locked in combat, his long jet-black hair streaming behind him as he wielded his sword like an artist wields a brush, beautiful and stately and forever frozen in time. And alongside him, a dangerous creature in white clothes and silvery hair, their swords flashing together like streaks of lightning against a stormy sky. The image vanished like smoke.
Gintoki sighed.
It was a beautiful spring day.