Koenma raised his eyes from the empty glass, having drunk as much as would be allowed. He was a fugitive, now. What else could he do but drink? In the human world, he stayed hidden, both from his father and from humanity itself. There was not much else to do when one has to be invisible to society's eye. Even with his dislocation from the underground where he once thrived, rumors had come to him, as they always did.
Hundreds of years, thousands maybe, since he had taken up the guardianship of the Earth. It was not a voluntary decision, but rather thrust on him by the necessity of his times. He would not lie to the empty glass: he had taken his father's deal for the amnesty it offered. This time, however, the past haunted him. Before he was guardian of the Earth, before he had the pacifier put in to limit and subdue his own power.
Sensui had not terrified him the way the memory of his own acts had. This was something new.
He knew Sensui would hardly be the last threat to this fragile domain. He had not expected the evil that came forth. The tyranny that would rain down from the demon world to envelop this one.
Sensui, for all his philosophical meandering, had committed a grave error in the end.
There was one person who he could ask for help. He looked into the glass again, considering another shot.
It had been a long time since they had last met.
And ironically, it was on the battlefield, fighting to the desperate truce to save this very planet that they had separated.
Koenma sighed. He had cut off all communications with his little band of brothers since Sensui's fall. He needed to think, he told them, and he needed to think alone.
Now, however, he was certain that it had been fear that had driven him to his solitude. Fear that the great battle, the ragnarok of these times, had yet to come. Sensui, precocious as he was, had no idea he would be the herald, not the ending.
His secret was finally unraveling. His past stared him in the face, mocking him in the dirty glass he held. It was time to use the past, his past, to save the future of this world. Where now do I go, he wondered, tapping his fingers rhythmlessly on the table. It seemed a futile question to ask.
There was only one place to go, after all. Only one person he could turn to, now, when his cards were down.
The question, of course, was whether the person he needed still existed on this side of the universe.