For Now
By EmptyWord

Disclaimer: Rurouni Kenshin is the property of Nobuhiro Watsuki, Shueisha, SPE Visual Works, Anime Works, and others I may have missed. I have no part but that of a fan's, writing for enjoyment and not for monetary profit.

The year is 1870, and the Revolution is over.

The infamous Shadow Assassin has vanished from the annals of Japanese history.

Red hair clung to the back of his neck in thick, silky strands, sticking to the sweat beneath the beat of the sun. It was too bad he'd left the straw hat back with the guru. As stained and frayed of an affair it was, it had kept him shaded for nearly a year, since he'd first acquired it from the poor murdered farmer in Otsu.

He winced, briefly, at the memory of the innocent. It had been fourteen months and twelve days since he had last drawn a blade in murderous intent. Not that time absolved him of guilt in any way. No, he had the burden of hundreds of deaths to bear, and bearing it was his lot in life.

The first eight months had been the worst in his life. Not even the days he worked in the shadows could compare to the endless nightmares that haunted not only his sleep but his every waking moment as well. He had trouble drinking both water and sake, his imagination tingeing whatever liquid slid down his throat into the thick, metallic tang of blood while he struggled not to gag. The smell of white plums, his wife's scent, dogged his steps like a vengeful ghost, and he had woken many a night screaming her name for forgiveness.

Forgiveness was out of the question, he'd told himself. Not for one such as him, who had the price of a revolution on his head. But, all the same, he had dared to hope for redemption. He had hoped, in his ignorant conceit, to work out karma by his own hands. For four turbulent years, he had destroyed; for the next forty, he would protect.

So it was he had reversed the edge on his sword and set off on his journey through this new Japan. He would champion the weak, the innocent, the good, and he would atone. That had been the plan, at least, until he'd met the old monk on the outskirts of Fuji six months ago.

Spotting a juniper grove at the roadside ahead, he thought to rest beneath the shade for a while. He was in no hurry, after all, and wasn't even sure he wanted to continue on this path for Tokyo. The desire to suffer for his crimes was no longer foremost on his mind.

With a chuckle, he recalled the moment his thoughts had changed, when beautiful clarity had swept him into another world. He owed too much to Master Gensai.

A cloud of dust obscured his vision of the skirmish up ahead, and he could make out only a few limbs flaying here and there. As he approached the scene, he suppressed the urge to jump in immediately and put an end to the violence. He had had enough blood and gore to tide him over this lifetime and perhaps the next as well, but he'd also learned that meddling was seldom if ever appreciated.

As he drew closer, the dust seemed to dissipate, and he realized with consternation there were three grown men laying in on a young boy, who was putting up a fair fight considering the odds. Sudden anger coursed through him at the injustice, and he could no more resist drawing his sword than he could beat that boy himself.

It was over in seconds, and in the settling dust, he crouched beside the boy's bruised body. Hesitantly, he reached to check for injuries, but the boy leapt to his feet, glaring with injured pride and yelling, "I don't need your help!" before taking off.

Surprised, he remained standing, staring after the young rascal. He shouldn't have expected gratitude of course, but foolishly, he had wanted more than a parting glare. He would not ever begrudge his help when it was needed and often when it was not, but there were times he admitted he would have appreciated some acknowledgment in return. Japan had carved an image of him as a brutal murderer; he could not help wanting to create a different vision of himself, to be remembered as a good man.

A cackle sounded behind him, and he spun around to see a short, white-haired man leaning on a walking stick and regarding him with laughing eyes. Uncomfortable, he would have left had the old man not spoken then.

"Well, well, well, if it's not a guilt-ridden assassin."

He froze, fear-tinged dismay crawling over him. How could he know? Even before he had reversed his sword, he'd taken pains to bandage the conspicuous scar on his cheek and donned a straw hat to cover garish red hair. He should not be so easily recognizable. Rigid with tension and struggling not to react, he turned to escape.

"Wait, wait. What's the hurry, young man?" The old man hobbled to catch up. "You're not planning on running forever, are you?"

The barb stung, and he turned to tell the smirking man he was not running but found himself unable to utter the words. Was he not running, after all? Running from the death and destruction of his past, running toward a dream of future redemption?

Catching his brooding expression, the old man let out an irritated noise and whacked his shoulder with the walking stick, nearly sending him to the ground. "What are you so depressed about? You took care of those three men easily."

The flash of annoyance in his eyes faded back into a haunted weariness. "They're not dead," he said softly, trying to reassure them both. Never by my hands again.

The old man fixed him with an eerily shrewd gaze but only said mildly, "Come with me. There is a place I think you'd like."

He was led to the Shiraito Waterfall at the foot of Mount Fuji, where he would stay for the better part of five months, engaged in general monkey business (1) and the occasional epiphany. The old man introduced himself as Master Gensai, a Buddhist monk, and took him on long walks through the mountainside, always ending at the White Thread Falls. During this time, he learned of Zen and of the wisdom his companion imparted, not from any serious study but from simply spending time with the wise old man.

For the first few months, he was too consumed with his atonement to heed Master Gensai's off-hand religious remarks. He didn't need comfort; he didn't deserve comfort. He needed his anguish and his torment because he had yet to pay for his wrongs. Besides that, he admitted he had never put much stock by religion.

He remembered the writings a passing Hindu had left with his teacher many years ago, before he'd gotten involved with the war. It was his first brush with spiritual matters, but even then, he'd pulsed with too much youthful vigor and quixotic excitement to fully comprehend Brahman, Samsara, Atman, or any of the other innumerable terms his teacher ordered him to memorize. To his fourteen-year-old mind, surrendering all attachments was an unacceptable concept, even in figurative terms, because there was so much in life to strive for and to lay hold of. He could remember reading the words Krishna spoke, "Be thou merely the means of my work" (2), and rebelling against such a passive interpretation of life. He refused to believe the universe was so entwined with every being within it because he hated shades of gray.

And, in the end, against his teacher's wishes, it had been that tendency to categorize good and evil, right and wrong, that had driven him to precipitate a war bloody enough to devour his soul.

Master Gensai never mentioned his obsessive drive to help: how he would wake up an hour before the old man to ensure he would be the one to drag in the morning's buckets of water, how he would insist on carrying all the baskets when they made their weekly trips to the market, how he would apologize profusely for the smallest of mistakes or trespasses, like the time he forgot to mend a tear in the old man's outer robe. More often than not, Master Gensai would simply bash him over the head with his walking stick rather than bring up the odd behavior.

He in return allowed the monk to talk his ears off when occasion arose and never voiced his desperate desire to leave. It was not that he didn't enjoy the company of Master Gensai or that he wasn't accustomed to living within nature; both, in fact, recalled fond childhood memories. Rather, he could not shake the building urgency in his chest, the pulsing need to continue his journey. There was an overwhelming sense of something left unfinished, something he wasn't sure he could sate, but it was driving him mindless not being able to try.

One late afternoon, he sat on the rocks beside the falls, watching the streams of water sparkle and dance before plunging into the frothy whiteness below. For a moment, he did not think of his past or his future; he forgot the smell of white plums mingled with blood and the dying cries of a thousand voices. For that moment, he was content to simply sit. The cascading water threw out light in a rainbow of hues, and despite himself, he smiled.

"It is good to see you smile once in a while."

Startled, he slipped off the rock, barely managing to keep his clothes dry while he found another foothold. "Master Gensai," he acknowledged the monk. "I am always smiling." As if to prove the point, the corners of his lips stretched upwards in a veneer of calm, one he had carefully cultivated since the end of the Revolution.

To his surprise, he received an angry thwack across the shoulders for his efforts. "Don't you dare give me that," huffed the old man. "You think I don't know the difference between a real smile and that mask you put up? A smile that comes from a peaceful soul is very different."

Shoulders aching not just from the walking stick, he answered evenly, "Peace is foreign to me, as it should be."

Master Gensai gave him a measuring look. "Will you always try to be a hero?"

"No! I am not. You are wrong." He wasn't playing the act of a hero. He wasn't sacrificing himself for no reason. "I – it is judgment. Only what is due."

"And what do you think your self-imposed suffering would accomplish in the long run?"

He trembled with the force of dawning doubt. Had he deceived himself into imagining a better world if only he would complete his road to redemption? Did he believe punishing himself was the answer? Could his convictions have been so wrong all this time?

A pair of warm, wrinkled hands enfolded his. "Your hands will never be clean. No amount of scrubbing can wash away the past, and no amount of searching will procure the future you want. But what is done, is done. What will happen, will happen in its own right. There is the present to think of."

For the next month, they spent even more hours together, mostly meditating. Master Gensai, who he came to regard as his guru, guided him through the winding pathways of the restless human mind. With new-found clarity, he discovered the simple facts in life and learned to accept them as they were. His sporadic lapses into struggle and the desire for change were met with a whack to the shoulders and an old monk's laughing eyes. His ghastly dreams lessened, the burden on his shoulders seemed to lighten, moment by moment, and he didn't mind so much.

The sun hung low in the sky when the red-haired wanderer finally made it to the outer regions of a town. At the closest inn, he asked for a meal and a room. Curious stares followed his blood-colored hair and the swords at his side, but he smiled in spite of the uncomfortable attention. There were times he wished for his straw hat, but generally, he was glad he had left his masks back at Shiraito Waterfall.

His guru's parting words had been, "Everything is right here, so we do not have to go any further than this to prove who we were or are or might be" (3).

When the shadows fell that night, his memories threatened to wake every demon he'd ever dreamt of, and despair lurked dangerously nearby. But he sat at the edge of his borrowed futon and took calming breaths, slowly expelling the past and the future.

For now, he would just breathe.

Footnotes:

(1) Monkey business is usually defined as mischief but can also refer to frivolous behavior, which is what the main character at first considers his time with Master Gensai as. Of course, there's a double entendre hidden somewhere here.

(2) Quote taken from The Bhagavad Gita, page 55.

(3) Quote taken from Cutting Through Spiritual Materialism by Chogyam Trungpa, page 89.

A/N: My Philosophy as in Literature class just finished a unit on Buddhism and Hinduism, and we were asked to write a paper. There really weren't any requisites for the assignment, and my teacher did tell us we could be as creative as we wanted... and I needed an excuse to write RK fanfiction. Hope it wasn't too bad or obscure of a tribute. Thanks for reading!