Hello hello! It's been some time (nearly a decade!) since I've posted anything here, but recently I started watching the series on netflix again, so of course I had to rewatch the OVAs and reread the manga and check out the live action movies. From all that, this little scene lodged itself in my brain. I've been playing with it for a bit, and I'm not sure it's really finished, but I felt it was time to put it out in the world. Unbeta'd, so please bear that in mind. I hope you'll let me know what you think.

Enjoy!

The evening still held winters sharp bite, but it was warm inside the dojo, and smelled comfortingly of woodsmoke and clean laundry. After dinner, Kaoru had found the boy something clean to change into and sent him off to the bath house while Kenshin tended to the dishes.

She'd cleaned out an unused room, and together they had made up a futon and found some extra blankets to keep away the chill. When they had finished, Kaoru had gone for her own bath, and Kenshin had retired to the kitchen to wind down over a pot of tea.

It was dark by the time he had finished - the days had already begun to grow longer since his arrival, but spring was still a long ways off.

As he walked to his room, Kenshin paused, struck by tender impulse. He listened outside the door, and, hearing nothing in the darkness, slid the shoji open a crack to peek in on the boy. He was bruised and battered, but quiet now. The boy - Yahiko, Kenshin reminded himself - was curled into a tight little ball. On hand was in a loose fist by his head, and his mouth was slack. Sleep smoothed his brows, easing the angry lines of his face to those of a child rather than the mien of a young samurai.

From the moment they had met on the bridge, he'd been stubborn, throwing Kenshin's purse back at him with a roar of frustration. "I'm not a child!" he'd yelled, spitting on their pity. Kenshin was reminded of himself at that age, all assuredness and certainty, and growing every day in strength. Had he not hurled those same words - or close enough to make no difference - at his own master before he'd left? Yes, stubborn Kenshin had been, and arrogant too, thinking to save the world with his single blade.

Not quite ten years old, and already Myojin Yahiko, son of a samurai, had seen enough pain for a lifetime. The death of his father, the shame and loss of his mother, his bondage. Yahiko had cursed softly all the way home, cursing his own weakness as Kenshin carried him. When he had set the young man on his feet again, there had been tear tracks cutting through the dust on his cheeks, but he'd held his back straight and kept his eyes forward.

Kenshin turned the thought in his mind. Ten years old… If the strings of fate had been woven differently, he might have a son the same age, he realized with a soft pang in his chest. Would his own son have taken after him - frustrated, and desiring to change the world? Would he have inherited his father's stubborn streak, or… or would he have carried himself with the quiet dignity and pride of his mother?

There wasn't pain in the thought, not exactly. Not after all the years and space between then and now. It was something closer to sadness and regret that filled his heart. One such as he had no right to such a life.

And yet… would his own son have been so very different from the boy sleeping before him now?

"Kenshin?" He hadn't heard her approach, and he wondered vaguely what that said. He felt his rurouni mask slide into place as he turned to face her.

"Yes, Kaoru-dono?"

"Is everything alright?" She asked, blue eyes bright with concern, hand clutching at her collar. Her hair snaked in a damp braid over her shoulder, and the candle she carried bathed her a soft, yellow light.

He considered her for a moment, this woman who had opened her home to him - to him, knowing what she did about his past. And he considered, too, that he had stayed. He had meant to speak his name and walk out the door, but something had flickered in him, something he had no name for, and refused to allow himself to consider too closely, that had stayed his feet after ten years.

It flickered again now, not even as bright as her candle flame.

Kaoru…

There was strength in this woman, strength in her convictions. And now she had opened her home to two strays, because of her ideals, her need to protect. Only hours before, she had stormed into a yakuza den with no thought for her own safety, thinking only of what was right, what was just, wanting to free the boy. It was quite a shock to see her fearlessly facing down half a dozen thugs, though he supposed he should have expected nothing less of the woman who had attacked Hitokiri Battousai on her own.

It was very stupid.

It was something he would have done.

She had lost too, he thought suddenly. Her family, her place in the world, and her good name. But she bore it with determination, and there was only kindness in her, no malice or cruelty or depict. Kindness, and a sense of rightness and the potential for good in the world.

If the threads of fate had been woven differently…

"Kenshin?" She asked again.

"He will be fine, that he will," Kenshin allowed himself a true smile, and slid the door closed with a soft click. "Everything will be fine."