He walked through the barren fields that sat on top of a plateau, shuffling his sandaled feet through the dust. Looking up to the clouds he heaved a heavy sigh, his rib cage rattling with the air entering his lungs. Fresh mountain air was the sweetest, and as it entered his lungs he could taste the tsubaki flowers.

The man's feet played a metronome rhythm on the soil as he walked; his mind trying not to concentrate on the two sets of heavy metal on his hip that felt even heavier with the invisible bloodshed he knew had collected on each blade. It was because of his blade that his entire world had collapsed. A correspondence had been sent by his eldest child, a daughter, telling him of his wife's death because of the famine in their home town. Now he was just a Ronin, a wandering samurai, trying to forever make his way back home to his children in order to bury his wife properly.

Most of the time he kept his head down, focused on the moving earth beneath his feet so that it looked as if the earth was moving and he was standing still, but today the world beckoned for him to look at it, to look up.

"Don't come any closer!" A shrill voice cried. A young woman with short black hair, covered in a black kimono that was ripped and torn all over was standing before him. Her bare feet were covered in dirt as she slowly walked back towards the edge of the cliff.

"My name is Arigatona Sohmatzu. I am just passing through. I do not want any trouble." The man's voice was soft but strong and deep as he spoke to the woman.

"Seriously? I don't care about what you're doing here. If you are just passing through then just move right on along there." She waved her hand in front of her in a patronizing gesture as she took another step towards the edge.

"I can't do that." Arigatona walked forward a little bit more, his food purposefully kicking a rock and sending it flying over the edge of the cliff. The woman leaned over and watched the rock before looking back at Arigatona and crossing her arms.

"Point taken, but that isn't going to change my mind." She snapped back before taking a leap off of the cliff, her eyes closed, he body poised for death.

Arigatona heaved a heavy sigh before running off of the cliff as if he were diving into a pool. He reached out his calloused fingers and secured the woman's arm, forcing her body on top of his. He watched as her eyes opened and the crimson fired irises settled on his.

"You really are thick headed, you know that? You said that you didn't want any trouble and now you are going to die for your efforts of trying to not get into trouble. Congratulations on being an idiot." The woman rattled off so frantically that Arigatona hadn't time to catch everything as he shifted their position in the air, landing feet first on the ground, working his legs so that his waist took the brunt of the impact, leaving the young woman and himself very much alive.

"You were saying?" He flashed her a casual smile and began walking away, his gaze once again shifting down towards his feet, the scent of flowers once again illuminating his senses. He took a deep breath as he lifted his head, catching a familiar scent in the breeze.

"Just who do you think you are, sir? I was in the middle of a very important mission and you just happened to postpone it." The woman was following him, which made the corners of his lips curl into a proud grin.

"I am Arigatona Sohmatzu. Suicide is never a mission. You will not die by your own hand now."

"You are an arrogant bastard. How do you know that I won't try something like that again? You don't even know me." The woman had caught up to him and was trying to stay in step with his brisk pace. Arigatona noticed that she was probably not even seventeen, though the dark circles around her flame red eyes would suggest that she was much older.

"Give me your name."

"What?"

"Give me your name. Then I will know you." Arigatona stretched his arms above his head, his spine cracking as it lengthened. He could feel the young girl stare at him.

"Who do you think you are? You can't just know someone by their name." She shrugged and rolled her eyes when Arigatona muttered a throaty chuckle, "Fine. My name is Tiako. Just Tiako."

Arigatona returned his gaze to the dirt road, satisfied with her answer. There was a reason why she did not have a last name. Either this girl was an orphan and had never had her own surname, or she had abandoned that surname because of some tragedy. He didn't want to push her, though he hoped that if she was going to continue to follow him he would eventually get some answers. Throughout his life he had learned never to question someone's past, for their past was the link to their soul and their heart. It was almost like an extravagant key meant to open a very specific lock. Finding the lock was the easy part, but finding the correct key proved to be a challenge better served when spending much time with the person who harbored their hidden key safely tucked away.

"So you said your name was Arigatona, right? Do you think that I could just call you Ariga, or Tona, or Ari?" Tiako finally broke the silence, crossing her arms in front of her torso. She was looking up at the sky and studying the clouds.

"Arigatona is my name. Use it properly." The man saw the young woman's mouth drop before she shook off the expression, crossing her arms in front of her chest and heaving a heavy sigh, "You do not have any reason to follow me."

"Despite the fact that I am still going to kill myself one of these days, I've decided that you deserve my company for the time being. I might as well express my thanks at what you obviously thought was kindness, and then I will be on my way to the grave as soon as I have thanked you to my own satisfaction." Arigatona looked up towards the heavens, mirroring the path of the young woman's eyes with his own.

"Tiako is a lovely name. It suits you." His gruff voice split the sky, and he was sure that he heard the voice of the woman walking next to him crack a little before he observed her cheeks turn the faintest shade of a cherry blossom.

IIIII

A/N – Thanks to all of you that have read this far. This is just a random idea that I had. Unfortunately our favorite characters may not play a part in this story as it is somewhat of a prequel, so we will see how this goes. I am going to try to focus more on my other stories rather than this one unless I get a fair amount of reviews for this story because it really isn't worth focusing on this one if no one is going to give feedback. Yeah, that is kind of harsh, but I am a firm believer in reviews and never read something that I do not review. So, I am going to try and get five reviews before I post a second chapter. We will see what happens though. Thank you guys for reading this so far, and I hope that ideas come for it as well as the motivation for those ideas.