LxLawliet, thank you for your review, my first for this series on this site. Although I'm a few days behind now, I'm very committed to fulfilling all thirty of the prompts. So I hope you continue to enjoy these short little stories.


Shinsenvember 12 - Tuberculosis

"This won't work, you know." Okita only raised this objection after he was already lying on his stomach, waiting for Yamazaki to apply the moxa to his back.

Yamazaki frowned at his patient. "Why are you doing this if you think that?" he demanded.

"To make Kondou-san happy," Okita responded. "I don't want him worrying that he could do something for me, but didn't. So, go ahead, start burning."

"Lie still. You shouldn't discount it, Okita-san. Moxa's been used in China for thousands of years." He carefully placed a small cone formed from the herb near a meridian point on Okita's back. "It wouldn't have been used so long if it didn't help people, would it?"

"Tell that to Doctor Matsumoto."

"Doctor Matsumoto knows a lot …" Yamazaki carefully chose his words as he continued to place the cones. "But he doesn't know everything. The medicine he gave you isn't helping either, so . . . "

"So why not try this? Yeah."

Yamazaki wasn't confident the process would help either. But, just as Okita had said, why not? Yamazaki had learnt how to do this from his acupuncturist father, his father had learnt from his father before him, and so on up the Yamazaki family tree. There had to be some benefit to it. Yamazaki had seen people recover remarkably after undergoing moxibustion. None of them, though, had tuberculosis, and although no one here spoke the word, they all knew by now that was what Okita was sick from.

Matsumoto's Western medicine could diagnose the disease, but his treatments weren't helping. They might as well try Eastern medicine. He carefully lit the cones of moxa one by one. The pungent smell of the burning herb began to fill the room.

Okita didn't flinch when the flame reached his skin. Some patients yelped at the pain, others moaned or at least took a deep breath to steady themselves through the burning. If the ancient Chinese doctors were right about this whole business, warming the meridian points helped release obstructed qi. The short term pain made one healthier in the long term.

When the small points of moxa had finished burning, he examined Okita's back. The burn marks were livid. They'd be coming up in blisters, as they should.

"Are you okay, Okita-san?"

Okita turning his head to his side, gave him a peevish look. "I will drink the entire bottle of Matsumoto's medicine before I let you near me with an open flame ever again."

"I hope it gives you some relief," said Yamazaki diplomatically.

"Who thought this up? Oh, you can't stop coughing, why not burn your flesh? You've got the measles, burn your flesh. You're constipated, burn your flesh. What sort of maniac thought that one up?" This was typical Okita. Go along with orders, but then complain like crazy. "It's an Ancient Chinese torture method, that's what it is."

"It's not –" Yamazaki bit his tongue. He should know better than to react to Okita's rants.

"You can tell Kondou-san you tried your best," Okita added. "Don't tell him I complained about it hurting, though. He'd feel bad about it."

"I'll tell him the truth. That you didn't even wince," Yamazaki assured.

A small smile crept onto Okita's face. "Yeah, tell him that. He should know I'm tough. I won't let this disease kick my ass."


Author's note: Moxibustion was a very popular medical treatment in the Edo Period for practically everything. As the son of an acupuncturist, Yamazaki would have known all about it. The new Dutch-style doctors like Matsumoto didn't believe in all that, but with a disease as intractable as tuberculosis, people reached for every possible cure.

Moxa is a variety of the plant called mugwort in English. I looked up what burning moxa smelt like for this ficlet, and everyone said, like pot. Well, unfortunately, I couldn't use that vivid description, since I also looked up cannabis in Japanese history recently, and there's no historical record of people smoking it in the Edo Period. It's possible some people did, but then they'd think hey, that smells like burning moxa, not hey, moxa smells like weed.

So that's why I'm just sharing this great fact with you in the notes instead of the story itself. Now you know.