A fanfiction dedicated to Fate/Stay Night and Servant Assassin
Rating : K
Pairing : OC-centric
Genres : Romance, Angst
Characters : Assassin, OC
...
The young woman had been wandering the streets of Fuyuki for how long she could not know. The streets were bustling with vehicles and people, all busy in a hurry. The chill of winter seemed not to prevent people from flocking to the streets, jostling, chaotic, not unlike a broken ant hill from which the ants crowded out in all kinds of clothes, plain and gaudy, simple and luxurious. None bothered to pay attention to a staggering figure on the street. Chill crawled down her spine; the young woman shivered in her thin coat, her heart worse than the chill.
Heat from her throat and stomach blazed up, fighting back the chill invading her body. She seemed to get stuck between two extremes: the bone-chilling cold from outside and the scorching heat inside. Her breath came out a thin veil of fog and she felt a little at ease after releasing some of the heat in her throat, even if it did not last for long.
Tonight was the first time she tried the bitter liquid which many believed to be able to relieve one's sorrows. It was not 'taste" but rather gulp down, bottle after bottle, until her tongue got numb and each gulp was a ball of flame rolling down her throat, flaring up each fiber of her nerves, her blood. She got herself drunk in a slight hope that she would get wasted, that she would fall into a peaceful sleep and never had to open her eyes once again. She opened her mouth; her voice was so low that even the creature with the sharpest hearing sense could not make out what she was saying. She was whispering to herself or perhaps, cursing with the most venomous words that made even herself shudder, her monstrously good tolerance. She WANTED to get drunk yet, the more alcohol she injected into her body, the more sober she became, the better she felt the bitterness of sake penetrating her taste.
"Nothing can compare to a warm bottle of sake while delighting in the scenes of the cherry blossom petals leaving their branches in spring, of the starlit night in summer, the fall of the autumn's end with its waves raging furiously to fight back the forming ice chips, threatening to transform the flows into an unanimated ice block. However fierce the fight, the fall will eventually lose, surrendering to the fate nature has prepared for it and resurrects when spring comes."
Those were lines of a character from a movie she had watched so long ago that the content got forgotten on her mind, only the lines remained. Those were words of an old man who had once been a samurai speaking to his grandson, a young samurai, while the two were drinking in a humid summer night, moonless, starless, with neither the cherry blossoms nor the autumn fall. Plain as it was yet it had engraved in the mind of a child who could not remember even the shortest poem.
Samurai.
Those were people who had become legend, the symbol of a nation. The people who harmonized into their souls both aspects of life: a brave warrior who could sacrifice himself on the battlefield and a man of arts: tea ceremony, flower arrangement, poetry and sake. Those were what she learned from books and her late grandmother. "To learn" and "to understand" were two different matters; in reality, she never knew what it meant to be a samurai, or the ideal they were resolute to protect, even if it cost them their life. She was not so ashamed of it; after all, people could always blame the hurried life which buried parts of the old traditions.
Her grandmother used to tell her many tales about samurai; most of whom were anonymous ones. It was "anonymous", not "nameless" since her grandmother's memory had faded much with years and she could only recall the legends surrounding their existence. Still she listened with eagerness and just like her grandmother, she knew not a single name.
Her most favorite tale was about a young samurai who once cut down a soaring swallow. Often she insisted on her grandmother telling the story again and again, to the point that she knew by heart even the smallest detail. Every time it ended with the samurai's death, she would always burst into tears and her grandmother, in order to console her, had to alter the end so that the samurai went on living forever. Only with that would her crying cease.
She often dreamed about a samurai in her younger days. That dream was her own imagination of the swallow-slashing samurai: under the silvery moonlight he stood, a proud smile playing on his lips and a katana in his hand. Why was it the moon and not the splendid sun? In her young mind, the blazing hot sun was not beautiful as the pale cool moon. Perhaps it was because she could never look straight at the sun. Moreover, when the sun rose, she had to wake up and the beautiful dream about the samurai had to come to an end. The sun killed him; only the moon could bring out his prominent features.
...
If possible, she wished that she had never grown up. As she grew older, she also realized that dream and reality were greatly different. Reality had no room for dream; reality was not so easily altered to her liking like her grandmother's tale; reality was real, ruthless and callous. In reality, she almost wore herself out with all the vying and scheming. And the worst thing was, in order to survive, she herself had to vie, to scheme, even to deceive, both others and herself. How painful it was to realize that it was her own changes rather than the sun that had been killing the samurai, little by little, until he vanished into thin air.
She kept on walking, allowing her feet to guide her to wherever they wanted. And the most unexpected thing was their taking her to a place which seemed to have been completely erased from her memory: Ryudou temple.
Her house used to be close to Ryudou, so close that it took her only a few steps to "discover" that ancient temple. Counting the steps to the temple used to be one of her childhood game. Yet she had never reached the end. Those endless steps leading to the mysterious temple at the mountain peak always stirred up her childish curiosity like a pretty box placed at the top of the cupboard, where her hands could not reach. She had promised herself that, one day for sure, she would see for herself an ancient Ryudou retired from the woods which never knew of autumn like her grandmother used to tell. A promised she had made and a promised she had broken, all by herself. Her family moved and Ryudou, together with the dream about the samurai, faded away like the sceneries outside the car window as the vehicle sped up.
At the moment, she was once again at Ryudou, looking up to endless stairs like the little girl of the past. However, she had grown while Ryudou seemed to get older as the steps were covered with a thick layer of moss. She had changed; Ryudou had changed; the merciless hand of time did not spare a single thing. Only the curious and fanciful feeling upon "discovering" Ryudou remained intact. Suddenly, in her heart rose an aspiration to fulfill the childhood's dream. This time, she would definitely reach the end of the stairs.
The last remaining steps were within her vision. She was surprised to find out the temple was not all out of her reach like she had imagined. Just a few more and she would have the "honor" to discover the "mystery" of Ryudou.
The night winds blew coolly against her skin. She exhaled and stood still to allow the winds to put out the smoldering fire the sake had lit in her parched throat. Shuddering with a chill running down her spine, she hastily sat down. Too much sake and hours of walking in the night's cold could beat down even the strong body of man, let alone a weak, fragile one like hers. Not thinking through, she imagined her own death. Would her body be discovered? Or would it rot and become a part of Ryudou until some fool found it? Would her death have any impact on the world? If a head of state died, people would say it was a great loss to the nation. If a celebrity died, people would bemoan a talent lost. But if she died, would anyone care? She was but a nobody; her disappearance would be the same as a pebble thrown into the river. It might stir the water for a moment; still its eventual fate was to quietly drown at the river's bottom, leaving not a trace left. Perhaps the owner of the noodle restaurant where she frequented for a hurried meal might be a little surprise at the loss of a regular customer but that was all. Life would move on. Without her.
This was precisely the reason why she did not want to die too soon. Many a time had she meant to throw herself into the river flowing through Fuyuki, ending her over twenty years of life in a splashing sound. Still, she did not want to share that pebble's fate, gone and forgotten. It would be a shame when she had no one to remember her, to keep her memory alive. Thus she still wanted to live, to live to meet that person.
As the level of alcohol lowered, her mind also calmed down. Her whole being was enervated, her limbs weary, her dry mouth bitter and sour with everything inside her stomach threatening to come out, yet she was of sound mind. She wanted to go home, to have a shower and wrap herself in warm blanket. A sound sleep had to be a thousand times better than the bitter liquid she had compelled herself to imbibe. It was already past midnight and her cell phone had long run out of battery. She gave a hollow laugh. What if the battery hadn't run out? Who would she call? Her friends? It was better just to think of them as "partners" who only came to her in need and vice versa. Would she call him? Her self-respect never permitted her to seek help from a man who had forsaken her for a filthy rich woman already married twice. That woman could give him whatever he wanted; she couldn't. The only thing she could do was to devote to him her love, her unblemished and passionate first love. On second thought, her love could not be traded for something with a better price. And thus he casted her aside indifferently, as if disposing a used can. Begged she had not, for what did not belong to her would never be hers. Cried she had neither; she was only tormented with the pain of a razor blade ruthlessly slitting her flesh open. Continuously it carved deeper and deeper into her blood-smeared wound, severing streaks of tender nerves. Who would survive such brutal torture? On physical body, perhaps not. But it was only a mental suffering which she could eventually overcome. It took more time to have a memory stored in the mind than to have it deleted. People often blamed the hurried lifestyle that caused them to be forgetful of what they should engrave into their memory. Nevertheless, it might be a good thing in her case.
…
Ryudou was so silent that even an owl's cry was not heard. The quiet atmosphere brought calmness to her tumulus soul but this silence seemed too frightening. To her surprise, the least expected thing happened.
A sound which resembled a fallen leaf landing on the ground was softly heard, following by a string of footsteps. She had to admit she could not detect someone approaching without the leaves on the ground. Her heart was racing in her chest. Aside from a world-weary one like herself, who would be silly enough to wander this cold and desolate place instead of snuggling in the coziness of their blanket. Those recent murders in Fuyuki… could it be…
Taking a deep breath, she gathered all her courage to turn around, picturing a murderer with cold smile and a knife in his hand. From the depth of darkness emerged a figure, gradually getting distinct under the moonlight.
Speechless, she stared at the man in front of her. His outfit. His hair. Especially his eyes. His deep eyes which seemed to conceal light in themselves. Eyes which could not be found in people of this era.
The young man standing before her was wearing the outfit of a samurai from the feudal era, with a cobalt blue haori bordered with intricate gold lines. His long hair was pulled up in a pony tail, fluttering in the winds. On his back was a very long object. A katana!
Who are you, the one in front of me?
She wanted to speak up but words seemed to clot in her throat. Astonished, overwhelmed… She could not define these bizarre mixed feelings which were rising in her.
"You did not come for me. What is a young lady doing here in the middle of the night?"
"I…I? What're you doing here?" Nervousness was in her tone; she was trying to suppress her emotions.
"It's my duty to guard this place."
Was he kidding me? To guard this place?
"You do not look well to me." With a smile still playing on his lips, the young man continued. "Sake is for savoring, not for drowning one's sorrow."
He can read my mind? She was dumbfounded.
"The moon is so lovely tonight, don't you think? To let it pass would be a pity."
He sat on the stony steps, gazing at the distance beyond the borderless sky.
Suddenly she looked up to the firmament, where the luminous full moon resided, gathered around by millions of glittering gems. The darker the sky, the more striking those gems would shine. Many full moons she had passed yet this was the first time she had noticed the wondrous beauty of the moon. Gazing at the moon from her small window simply could not compare to bathing in its light here, at Ryudou.
"It's beautiful indeed!"
The words blurted out were meant for him or herself, she could not distinct.
…
It was like a dream, the night she had encountered that man. It had only been a few hours and still, her life had changed. She gave up her habit of being engrossed in working overtime. She spoke a little more; she smiled a little more; she spent a little more time for herself. It might be "a little" but for her, it was already a huge change. No longer was she the last one to leave the office, quietly coming to her familiar restaurant for a hurried meal before leaving to catch the late train. She was changing. Because of him, a perfect stranger? Her lips curved up in a smile every time such thought popped up in her mind. Why not?
She had formed a new habit of taking a train to Ryudou after her work, leisurely taking the steps and waiting for him to appear. To say "appear" because he only made his appearance after the sun set, giving up his place to the moon. From the shadow of the temple he would come out and they would talk about matters others might deem trivial. They talked about the beauty of nature, of moon and winds. They talked about the tea ceremony, about sake and even Ryudou. With him, memories of her grandmother, of her tales seemed to revive in her. Sometimes, being with this man gave her an impression that she was with a real samurai, a samurai from the prosperous feudal period rather than from the withering Meiji era. For that she had a feeling that he did not really belong to modern world.
"It seems I haven't known your name. I'm Yumi. This is the name my grandmother gave me."
"Sasaki Kojiro", he replied. "You could call me by that name."
In a moment, the name had provoked in her a sense of familiar.
"You live in the temple?"
"Not quite. It's just my duty to guard it. After a while, I've become accustomed."
"Accustomed?"
"Surrounding this temple are the plants and woods and animals, you see? Like a place…"
"A place you used to live?"
He kept silent. If he did not want to tell, she would not constrain him either.
"Have you ever made a wish?"
Silent.
"It may sound ridiculous but I once wished to see a samurai. Yet the older I grow, the more I've come to realize that it was a foolish wish. The age of the samurai ended hundreds of years ago."
He turned back and met her in the eyes.
"You know, now I start to believe that it might not be a vain wish after all. Because I've met you."
He did not say a word, only smiled.
"How about you?'
"I have neither a wish to fulfill, nor a place to return."
His words evoked many thoughts in her. She didn't truly comprehend their meaning; to be more precise, she didn't understand why he had said those words to her, someone he had barely known. She had thought, briefly, that he had been joking but he wasn't the kind of man to be trifled with such matter. Moreover, in that moment, his smile had completely vanished.
…
If she was asked what she favored most about him, the answer would be his hair. It was hard to describe his hair, which should belong to a woman who cared about her look rather a man. Please don't get the wrong idea that she thought he was feminine; she was only charmed by its beauty. She wanted to caress it, to feel every strand like she had done with her mother's hair. It was not just a want but rather a strong craving of a mortal who yearned to steal an angel's wings. That was a raw and pristine covet she had never experienced before, a desire even the man she had been convinced to be the love of her life could not evoke. That desire was a wave crashing down on her soul which seemed to have turned apathetic to all kinds of feelings after his leave.
…
Another full moon had passed and she had already known him for a month. The word "know" sparked a fantastic and interesting feeling in her. It was not really the romance normally felt between a man and woman; it was stranger; it was something even she herself could not define. Let's take him for a friend, a friend to give her a sense of tranquility in this bustling and hurried life. Let's take him for a friend, a friend to awake in her soul a part she had neglected in all those years of living. And let's take him for a friend to be just a friend in this society where "friend" was a luxurious concept.
…
For two nights she hadn't come to Ryudou. It wasn't because she was busy with her work or working overtime though; such habits had been slumbering since last month and she did not mean to wake them up. Working herself to the bone might give her more money but it certainly did not give her any happiness. She just wanted to present him with a surprise which she herself had prepared. The result didn't turn out as her expectation; it took her several painstaking hours and a messy kitchen which needed a few more hours of cleaning. She had thought kitchen chores were a piece of cake; a bachelor of economics like herself could finish them blindfolded. Once starting, she immediately learned they were not easy as all; they required strength, dexterity and patience. A good housewife could be a bachelor of economics, but a bachelor of economics may not necessarily be a good housewife, she concluded and decided to give up. "Giving up" was a pretty common word for humans in this era and she herself was not an exception.
After her work, she visited a shop for some good sushi and sake. Tonight was another full moon and it would be very interesting to share a cup of sake with him. This time, he would teach her how good sake was if she wasn't trying to drown her sorrow in it. Holding the packet in her hand, the thought of whether he would miss her made cheeks flushed, for she really missed him, as though they hadn't met for a month rather than two nights. Of course, she knew which was to her preference.
…
"Would you like a cup of sake?"
She would have been reading her documents to while away her hour on the train, a typical diligent worker's habit. However, at the moment, she was busying herself trying to come up with a way to invite him for a drink. To offer a man a drink was probably the strangest thing, even in her case.
…
Slowly she stepped up the stair. The sun had yet to set and she was in no hurry. In fact, she never had to be in a rush when coming to Ryudou. The quiet atmosphere would make her feel sorry if she was to make a sound.
She sat on the cold damp stone, anxious for his arrival from the darkness of the temple. And the space would light up with the gaze from his deep eyes, with his hair and outfit. Was it real or just a figment of her imagination, she could not tell. Perhaps this was the reason she had never seen him under the sunlight. The blazing sun was too intense; it would burn up the blue light. Only the pale moon could bring out the blue light, especially on the nights of full moon, like the first time she had met him.
…
The moon was already high in the sky and he had not shown up. She had been waiting for a while. Though she was not really patient, she could not reason why she didn't feel even the slightest irritation when having to wait for her date. Oh, he was yet to be her 'date'; they were no more than two people who just had a nodding acquaintance with each other. She felt disappointed nevertheless; she was used to seeing him step out from the temple's shadow, like a samurai of legend. Perhaps tonight, her samurai would not arrive.
…
Nights after and still he didn't show up, leaving her all to herself to wait until she fell asleep on the stony cold steps. She began to think there might be a chance that he would not show up again. More than once that thought occurred to her and immediately she dismissed it. Was it a strong belief or just a self-deception of an obvious truth?
Not long after, Ryudou was renovated. Some said it had been struck with lightning. Some said it had been set on fire. Some even claimed they had witnessed flashes of light from the temple and heard metal clashing, as if there had been a sword fight. The true reason, no one knew. But from now on, Ryudou's ancient and somber look was forever lost. Together with her samurai.
But that did not mean she gave up. Human can be very yielding but there are times they can get unbelievably persistent. She was of the latter: to have faith in a vagueness, to spend time and effort seeking a fantasy. Was it all because of a man she had barely known for a month, she sometimes wondered. In this society, friends could turn strangers or even foes in mere minutes, let alone months or years.
She had inquired many people, from the monks in the temple to the neighboring inhabitants; none of whom knew of the existence of a man with long hair- her samurai. Some old ladies even suspected that she might have seen a ghost, a spirit attached to Ryudou, unable to pass on. Perhaps it was really the case. She did not mind if he had really been a ghost though. He had not done her any harm; he had not been frightening as those seen in horror movies. A ghost like him proved to be far better than the living.
…
Over a year had passed and she had accepted that she would never see that samurai again. Though she had regained her former habits of overtime working and perfunctory eating, still she came to Ryudou, renovated and redecorated, to seek for the peaceful feeling she had had in a month with him. The cold and damp steps in front of the temple she would choose as her place to read her books, books about history or the old tales of the samurai. Today, she was reading a tale of a samurai renowned for the swallow-slashing technique. When the name "Sasaki Kojiro" caught her eyes, a drop of water fell onto the page.
The sun still shone, the winds blew and the world existed as it was. Without him.
End.