Weird, weird little existential thing, dedicated to MariphasaHecatene, as always, for betaing and generally being wonderful and supportive, and to Dupidnavagog, for helping me find a title that fits this bit of surreality. Definite spoilers for episodes 24-26, and probably some incidentals for the rest of the series as well. I wish I owned Champloo, because then there could be many beautifully animated samurai love scenes, but it actually belongs to Manglobe, Geneon, Watanabe, etc...and I bow down to them.
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Six months on the road straining to get away from each other only to be thrown back together as if they were dogs leashed to the same tree.
Six seconds, it seemed, to all be sundered permanently.
Fuu had only just made enough sense of what Jin and that demon assassin had done to each other for horror and shock to set in when she heard the explosion—and whirled around just in time to see Mugen fall. And thus she stayed for a long while, too battered by loss for any kind of action—for once, she had no idea whatsoever what to do.
She might have stood there until she turned into stone except that a barely audible voice croaked her name somewhere behind her. She was at Jin's side without even knowing she'd moved, her breath leaving her all in a rush when she realized he was still—barely—alive. Tears rose instantaneously—but he checked them with a murmur.
"I need your help."
It wasn't exactly hard to guess what he meant: Kariya had died without freeing his blade. Jin could not move until it was extracted.
"Both hands. Foot against my back. And then straight up."
So simple...but her hands shook violently, and she felt the strength leaving her arms. He sensed her paralysis.
"Child, you cannot do anything to me that would matter now. Just pull."
Fuu did pull--until her arms ached and her back screamed, and then it was out with a sound that made her head spin and her stomach lurch, and a soft intake of breath from Jin. She pressed a bit of what was left of his kimono to the wound, and his hand came up to gently replace hers.
"Mugen is—" was out of her mouth before she knew what she was doing.
"--never what you expect him to be," he interjected. She wondered if he might be delirious—from any number of causes--as they rose together slowly, his weight on her shoulders. He was different now. Always before there had been two Jins, the human one who stumbled on the ground, and the one that glided through bloody legend. Now the two were one--for a time.
"To the beach." She might not share his opinion, but alive or dead Mugen was theirs to deal with. They knew where they had to go.
"Aa. The beach."
All my promises honored, all my bonds broken—save one. It is time for heaven and earth to meet.
