Jinchuu's End

spoiler warnings!

If you don't know what Jinchuu is, then you don't want to read this. Terribly spoiley. The reactions of Kenshin, Sano, and Megumi in the minutes following the climax of the successfully executed Jinchuu.

All standard possession disclaimers apply.

"Kaoru…

dono…"

The dojo floor buzzed and spun around his tunneled vision, his lips and extremities suddenly numb and bloodless. She wanted to stay with him forever. The pain from his chest that shot down through his solar plexus to his gut pulled him out of woolen nothingness and doubled him up farther where he crouched on the ground. White plumb filled his nostrils and pierced his brain, somehow emphasizing rather than masking the heavy reek of blood.

Thirteen years ago his hand had killed a beloved woman, and now, despite how he had fought, despite all he had sacrificed, the momentum of that blow had moved through time to this moment. The ghost of that hand had pinned another, better known and just as dearly loved, to the wall of his home in a pool of blood.

His violence had destroyed her exquisite warmth.

He could still feel the phantom pressure of her shoulders under his arm, so sweet with the staccato of her laughter as they watched the sun set…yesterday…had it been only yesterday? Her joyous, trusting eyes soft on his face; forever, she had said. Only yesterday.

Kaoru now looked at nothing, eyes still open, seeing whatever shadows a corpse saw that did not lie in this world.

She had been waiting for him, he knew. Trusting that he would save her. The world shrank away until it held only her eyes.

And forever had been taken. His fault.

"KAORU!"

He squeezed his lids shut and her unseeing eyes slipped behind them as he brought his forehead to balled fists pressed against the floor, body shaking. There was no atonement now. Forever had been stripped completely away.

"Jou-chan!" Sanosuke, after a moment of shocked paralysis, jumped forward and pulled the sword out of the body, cradling it as it slumped gracelessly awkward-limbed to the floor, his hands pressed firmly over the wound, struggling to save a life already gone. "Jou-chan, don't you do this…Megumi!"

"Sano," the doctor choked, recognizing death for what it was.

"She's—Fox, help me, goddammit!"

Megumi knelt by the girl, feeling for a pulse, for breath. With a sigh that snagged in her throat, she closed her younger friend's eyes.

"Aw, god." Sanosuke's hands froze, then pulled away, into himself. "Ah, dammit. Jou-chan." He shoved his hands into his hair and clutched them there, his jaw working around the spreading blank of shock in his mind. Megumi's eyes found his as he tried to look away, look anywhere.

"Sagara Sanosuke. There was nothing anyone could have done." She reached forward and grabbed his reddened sleeve. "Do you hear me? Sanosuke, you couldn't do anything more than you did. Sano."

At a shaking intake of breath, harsh and half a sob from behind them, the street-fighter's gore smattered hands unclenched.

"Kenshin."

He was on his feet, the Rurouni, as pale as cold wax, staring at the body on the floor between them as he backed away.

"Ken-san…"Megumi struggled to stand as well. "Your wounds…."

He looked at her, bewildered, horrified, and then his expression stilled.

He turned and walked out of the dojo.

"Kens-san!" Megumi went after him.

Left alone in the dojo, Sanosuke wiped flecks of blood off of what used to be Kamiya Kaoru's face. "Aw, god. Aw, Jou-chan. What a mess. Dammit. He'll-he'll be back, Jou-chan. Let's just-let's just get you cleaned up. Hey, huh; look at me cleaning, Jou-chan. Lazy my ass, you crazy tanuki. Aw, god. Fuck."

Takani Megumi sat down on the steps leading into the empty, devastated yard and wept without sound.

This update…it's Zosocrowe's fault. Blame her. Four years, and I get an email from her, and she's updating her delightful and dearly loved stories, and in a fit of guilt I put up this little drab piece of melodramatic insert blank I recently ran across in an old writing folder that I never managed to stick on ff. Eeek.

Jinchuu is such a ghastly head-job. Such torture for all. How dearly I love it. I hope more fics pop up dealing with it.

Also, thank you all for your reviews on Moment of Growth these past years. I was touched at how positive a response I received for my little hiccup of a fic.

Oh, and hey, if anyone wants to take this and run with it, please be my guest. Just follow the rules of acknowledgement, please (and then let me know so I can read your fic!).