There Are Only Strangers In My World
A Rurouni Kenshin Fiction
= Chapter Two =
~ A Wanderer's Life ~
Disclaimer: Rurouni Kenshin does not, in any way, belong to me…
Author's Note: Here's the next chapter...hope you'll like it! Review please, and give me your comments.
Replies:
darkangelwings: Thanks! Kenshin's here...Kamimura Kaoru: Sorry to disapppoint, but this story takes place when Kenshin himself was a rurouni...so no Kaoru...gomen! But I've written K/K fics as well...go check them out!
"Who's there?" Her muscles tensed. She held a small dagger in her hand, a gift from Murashino Matsuko for her twelfth birthday. For self-defence purposes in a tumultuous era. She heard a rustling in the grass. Then a small figure emerged. He had red hair, and carried a sword.
"I mean you no harm. I am just a rurouni." A rurouni. With a sword. Who was this man? She never relaxed.
Then, he lunged. She, in a reflex action, threw her dagger at him. He had moved too fast, it missed this chest and hit his arm. His scabbard fell to the ground. But his sword had been thrust not at her, but at something, or someone, behind her. He clutched his left arm with his right hand, having thrown his sword. He looked at her. With friendliness in his eyes. She looked at him, then turned to check behind her. The thug who had tried to rob her once before lay unmoving, blood flowing from a non-fatal wound in his right shoulder. Actually, he had tried more than to rob her. Which explained why he had followed her. In any case, she was now in debt to the mysterious rurouni.
She helped to bandage his wound after they had retreated a fair distance away. Then, she noticed for the first time the huge scar on his left cheek. An X-shaped scar. Her fingers stopped. They held the edges of the bandage, but they had ceased to move.
"Battousai." Her voice was an almost inaudible whisper. He heard it. His jaw hardened. Then relaxed again. She regained her self-control and continued tying the bandage. A silence came up between them. He was first to speak.
"I was a hitokiri. Battousai, some called me. But I have sworn never to kill again. I sincerely apologise if I have done anything, past or present, to harm you."
Yumiko shook her head. "No, you have not killed my family, none that I know of."
She began to tell him, a complete stranger, about her life. A stranger. But she felt so comfortable talking to him. As if, maybe, he understood. But no one, hardly anyone, can understand so fully without having actually had the same experience. Little did she know that, to a certain extent, the Battousai's early days had been much like hers. When they had finished talking, it was darkness was gathering. The two fellow wanderers, each seeking a different life, travelled, with unspoken consent, to the nearest inn.