Chapter Six – Fate, Love and War
It was the place Rowen had not expected to see that day, not after the hectic morning anyway. The grass was glistening with the noon sun, and the brook turned into a river of diamonds under the sparse light that breached the canopy above it. He sniffed the fresh air, the scent of wildflowers drifting lackadaisically up his nose and clearing his mind. The clang of steel blade on steel blade alerted Rowen that someone was walking through the high weeds behind him, stirring the grasses into another all-out war. But instead of jumping into battle position, the warrior of Strata merely craned his head slightly, enough to notice who was creeping up from the forest edge.
"I see you have found me with your powers. That is good," the old man in the reed hat commended, "very good. Now that you are starting to control your Awakening we can use it to combat the Dynasty. A proper weapon, I should say. As great as the Hankyu you carry, if not more so."
Rowen finally faced the Ancient One, a contented grin on his face. "Actually, it was rather easy."
"As well it should be, Strata, and it will only get easier. Now why did you seek me out and disturb my meditation?" he questioned immediately, surprising the young man.
"I am sorry if that is what I did, but I have urgent questions for you that possibly you alone can answer." The Ancient nodded for him to continue, and Rowen never missed a beat. "Last night, outside my window, I swear I saw a figure, and not just anyone's figure, but Mirichu's. When I asked Ryo about it, he said he didn't have an inkling to her late night presence, but I swear she was there! Even Miri says she was at her own home; however, I am beginning to question her veracity. It seems she's been lying to me more and more frequently, but I don't know why. Perhaps you cannot solve the second riddle, but how about the first?"
The old man had tipped his hat lower during the course of Rowen's soliloquy, completely obscuring his dark eyes from view and most of his face as well. Maybe he was hiding something from Rowen, too. Then the mysterious man spoke. "I confess that I do know why she was at Mia's home last night; however, I am truly sorry to disappoint you, but I cannot tell."
"But why, Ancient One? What could be the harm?"
"Messing with the powers of Fate is a tricky business, and one into which I would not like to submerge myself. Fate shall not be trifled with, for she will not take kindly to it. He who abuses her shall regret it almost instantly."
The blue warrior exhaled noisily. "That's a fine speech and everything, but what does that have to do with anything we were talking about?"
"For a genius you are not very bright." Rowen frowned intensely, as he was offended by that unkind remark. "If I were to tell you, Rowen of Strata, about Mirichu's visit, I would be immersing myself into a swirling sea of trouble, and I could potentially endanger your life as well as the lives of many others."
"I still don't see how that can be…" The horizon seemed to flash a vibrant red for one moment, then faded back to its normal, pale blue color dotted with a line of black clouds that supported Dynasty gates.
"Warrior, fear nothing. All will reveal itself throughout the course of time. Know that although Mirichu may not be totally candid with you at this time, she has valid reasons to back her actions up. And when the right day comes along you and the Ronin Warriors will know all of the story, even though by that time you five may not want to." The old man turned his face skyward, a bit of yellow light creeping under the lip of the hat to reveal a twisted look to his weathered face, one of immense sadness. Rowen could barely see his eyes, but they appeared to be a mystical sea of melancholy that could only result from incredible loss, and their corners were glistening with unshed tears.
"I am under the impression that you know much, much more about this topic than you wish to speak. Listen, if Miri is in any sort of danger, you must tell me. I don't give a damn about the consequences if knowing what is going on will save her from the pain."
"I wish it were that simple. If it only involved you, Rowen of the Strata, I would tell you in a heartbeat, but too many lives depend upon my utmost silence. Do you understand my predicament?" Rowen tried to desperately; however, for the life of him, he could just not see why if Mirichu were in danger, the Ancient would not share this information. But the obedient warrior simply nodded his head in concession and whispered meekly that he understood. "Fine then. I suppose this is the close of the conversation?"
"I suppose," Rowen muttered with a tinge of disappointment.
"If you would be so kind as to leave me to my meditation…"
"Right, of course, Ancient One." He bowed politely at the dismissal, and in the following silence Rowen exited through the way he came into the meadow, using the beaten path.
"You are a good warrior, Rowen of the Strata, with a brave heart, but you are an even better friend for Mirichu. She values the insane sort of balance you bring to her life, even if at times she does not show it."
Rowen never looked back at the old man in the concealing reed hat. Already he was too lost in thought about what the Ancient had said throughout the course of their conversation. Who was the Destiny lady? What did she have to do with Mirichu and the Ronin armors? Was she a threat? The stream of questions was unending, and the flow of answers was non-existent.
@~~`~~~
The sun was to set on another day just as before. Sage relaxed on the rooftop of Mia's house, glaring at the dwindling orb of glimmering golden light. He wanted to see for himself just what his best friend found in the rising and setting of the eternal sun. What was so magical about something that happened every single day? Wasn't there a saying that went something like "as sure as the rising of the sun"? So, if the rising of the sun was so assured, why bother to see it come up every morning if it would just come up the same way tomorrow? What a ridiculous stream of nonsense! the blonde thought to himself. There were some aspects about Rowen that he could never interpret no matter how many years he knew him.
With surprised awe the warrior of Halo watched as the redheaded beauty dipped below the mountain peaks in slow motion, the last strands of her fiery hair lassoing the tops of the great stony beasts. Almost immediately the blue heavens turned black like evil infesting a pure soul, and stars popped up around him, their silver petals budding with the change in colors of the sky. The purple horizon faded to a satiny onyx, too, and the night took over completely, expelling all traces of the day. Fate was a beautiful artist…
Amazing. Sage got it now. He finally understood what was so fantastic about the sunset. The colors and then the lack thereof. The peace of a never-ending war, which was a paradox within itself. The symbolism of good versus evil. It was incredible – a natural high so hard for him to reach unless Sage was fighting in a battle. Now the warrior understood that it wasn't merely an everyday occurrence to be taken for granted, but a thrilling experience to appreciate and use for meditation and quiet thought.
Sage began to wonder what the sunrise was like, for it had to be greater than the sunset if that was what Rowen enjoyed the most. Definitely, Sage would make it a priority to accompany his best friend to his meadow tomorrow for the morning drama. He would make it a point to ask Rowen when he came home.
@~~`~~~
Ryo tapped his foot impatiently on the floor of his room. His head swam with the mere thoughts of his problems in his sordid life. His dilemma with Mia, his war with Talpa, his love for Miri. When would the cycle end? Surely never, for Ryo was a Ronin Warrior to the end of his life, the wearer of the armor of Wildfire and the unannounced leader of the group. The obstacles in all his friends' lives would become obstacles in his life, as well, until they could be overcome.
Fate was a bitch, and if Ryo ever met her, he swore to take her down. She had ruined so many lives. Arguably though, she had also helped many, but Ryo didn't know anyone personally that could be considered proof of that statement, so he would still kill her if he met her.
How could Fate be so cruel to him? He struggled with a woman whom he respected. He fought a war that he could easily lose. He loved a woman he could not have. Where was Justice to intervene? Probably in the kitchen fixing himself a snack, Ryo thought as he pictured his always hungry friend Kento.
At least Fate had given him friends, friends he could trust with his very life. Not too many other people could say the same thing. Blessed and cursed in the same existence, how ironic.
Ryo stood up and stretched. His stomach growled. All day he had had to make his own meals because Mia refused to make them. Now, Ryo wasn't the greatest chef to begin with, but at least he wasn't nearly as terrible a cook as Rowen, thankfully. Maybe Kento could fix him something to eat as well.
The red warrior of virtue made his silent way down the stairs to the kitchen; however, before he got there, he was struck with the sight of his buddy Rowen sitting contemplatively on the sofa. He trod softly to his slumped figure, resting a hand on his shoulder. "Rowen? You okay, man?"
"Huh?" he asked, startled. "Yeah, fine, I guess…
"No, I'm not!" he shouted suddenly, raising up off the couch angrily. "I go out to get answers and I only get more questions!"
"Isn't that the truth," Ryo muttered a bit bitterly.
"I just had two simple inquires to make to the Ancient One, and he doesn't even answer one straight up. Oh sure, if I had wanted the most oblique reply one could possibly give, then, yeah, he helped me bunches. But I didn't want that! Just two easy questions for him!" Rowen practically whimpered in frustration. Everything always had to be so frustrating!
Ryo patted his friend on the back, trying to sooth his ragged nerves, for he grasped the Ancient's cryptic ways the best of them all because he had the most intimate relationship with the old man. "You hungry, buddy, because I'm staring."
The warrior lifted his downcast eyes and smiled widely at Ryo. "You sound like Kento."
Wildfire grimaced, then his lips turned upwards in a grin. He interpreted Rowen's remark as a signal for yes, and he lead the young man into the kitchen where, sure enough, they found Kento in front of the refrigerator. "Why do the both of you look so down?"
"Oh, I don't know," sighed Ryo. "I think it's got something to do with Fate."
Rowen's head bucked backwards in shock. Fate was the exact same thing he and the Ancient had been talking about previously. Had Ryo's life force been the strong one he detected earlier? He squeezed his eyes shut and searched for Ryo's essence, but once he found it, he knew it had not been the thing he had felt by the lake today. Although his was remarkably brilliant, to the point where it was almost blinding, the Wildfire spirit could not match the unknown Rowen had experienced. "Excuse me, Ryo? What did you just say about Fate?"
"Ah, nothing. Just a random thought that entered my head today. What've you got to eat, Kento?" Wildfire asked, eyeing the full plate Hardrock had before him.
"Nothing for you, so back off! Get your own grub!"
"Can't you spare one noodle for your friend Ryo?"
Kento shook his head furiously. "Nope, not one. Sorry… Looks like someone should have apologized to Mia when he had the chance."
"Fine, eat it, monkey, but don't come crying to me when Cye starts kicking your ass for being one!"
Kento headed off on his merry way to the dining room to eat his "snack" while Rowen and Ryo scrounged for anything that might have been spared from Hurricane Kento. Needless to say, they found very little. "I always wondered what three-day old fried rice tastes like," Ryo whined miserably, removing a small container of the brown grain from the VERY back of the fridge.
"You know he's right, don't you?" Rowen said absentmindedly as he poked his finger at a package of ancient beef tenderloins.
"Who, Kento? About what?"
"Mia. You should apologize to her before she stops cooking for us permanently. Unless, that is, if you want me to cook our meals from now on…" Ryo looked disgustedly at his friend, a bit of what appeared to be pity dancing in his blue eyes. "That can easily be arranged, and I'm sure the others would love you for your very intelligent decision."
"All right! All right! You got me! Anything to spare us from your, um, cooking, if anyone could be so bold as to call it that." Ryo exited the kitchen and slipped down the first floor hallway to Mia's room. Rowen heard a knock, then the sound of a door opening, then a click as the jamb sealed it shut again, this time with his friend inside the room.
@~~`~~~
Down in the valley, where the moonlight shone best, Sage saw the dancing figure, hypnotic and beautiful, swaying gracefully amongst the grove of Ginkou trees. The blackened creature twisted and flowed to an unheard rhythm, the dark ballerina from the dead. She spun fantastically like a child's top, her leg in a perfect accent. The moment she stopped her spin, she dipped forward into a flawless arabesque, her movements seeming to tell an archaic love story lost long ago to the ages.
Sage was mesmerized, unable to look away for a second for fear he would miss her next amazing stunt or eloquent move. The ballerina swiftly entered a grand jetê leap, landing without stirring a blade of grass. He gasped in awe at the fluidity of her movements. She couldn't be real…
On point, the woman tip-toed into the light, letting her face be bathed in the rays of the moon. The black beauty was Mirichu, but whom else did he think it could possibly be? Sage was surprised he hadn't learned by now that anything mysterious or beautiful within his life was always Miri herself or something having to do with her. Suddenly she was an ever-present force in all the Ronins' lives now for some yet unexplained reason. It was just like before when she, Rowen and he were growing up in school. They met and became inseparable, Miri dubbing their trio the Three Musketeers. After a brief hiatus away from the two, it looked like Mirichu was back home.
Fate. Was it Fate that brought them together? Fate that ripped them apart in the first place? Was she responsible for all that was happening? Sage had sensed her being in the sunset, and now he sensed her below in the valley, as if she were dancing with Miri.
The ebony creature pirouetted, then arched her back as she exited out of the spin, her arms in a dramatic swoop above her body. Sage could almost see another dancer there with her, twirling her this way and circling her like a moon around a planet. By the time Sage began to fully see the other dancer, he also seemed to here the music to which they were dancing. It sounded very similar to a song he had once heard on Rowen's opera CDs – the ones he kept hidden from the other warriors – called "Carmen." The music fit perfectly with their motions, the great sweeps of their arms, the startling fans of their legs, the punctual strikes of their hands and feet. Every time the song would crescendo, the two would leap into the air and drift softly back to the Earth. For Mirichu, much like for Rowen, it seemed as though gravity did not exist.
As the music came to a dramatic conclusion, the ghostly second figure faded, and Miri was like she had started, alone. But she didn't seem to notice it, for she kept on going, as though a lover had her in his arms.
Then the song stopped and Miri froze, with her green eyes focusing directly on Sage's spying form atop the house. Even from the distance he could see her eyes widen in embarrassment, and he couldn't help but smirk at her expression. To his horror, he watched Mirichu raise a fist above her head and start shouting at the top of her lungs all the terrible things she would do to him once she got up to the house. "Time to make my dramatic exit," he announced to himself as he swung over the drainpipe and through his open bedroom window.
@~~`~~~
"Protect me, Rowen!" Sage wailed as he skidded to a stop before the curious Ronin. He dove behind the body of his best friend, clinging tightly to the fabric of his jacket.
"From what?" he asked, trying to get a look at Sage from the front, but the blonde refused to let Rowen move him from behind his human shield.
"Not from what, from whom!"
At that very second, the front door burst inward, a raging Mirichu standing in the frame. "Die, you little peeper!" she screamed, lunging at Rowen when she saw Sage's head peep out around the other warrior's frame.
"Eep!" Sage squealed, throwing Rowen at her.
Her arms encircled Strata instead of Halo, and she squeezed him tightly to her. "Sorry, luv, you're not the one I want." Almost carelessly Miri tossed him aside, diving for the escaping figure of Sage. She disappeared through the doorway through which the blonde had escaped – only the wind was left to show she had been there.
Rowen merely stared at the emptiness, the plate of cheese and the cup of tea in his hands. He shrugged. I don't want to know, I don't want to know he told himself as he slipped up the stairs to his bedroom.
@~~`~~~
In the deceptively peaceful living room, Sage hid behind the concealing sofa, hoping to fool Mirichu into thinking that only Kento and Cye were in there, playing a rousing round of Go Fish. They had promised to keep him a secret so long as he told them all about what he had seen Mirichu doing.
I should have never started watching her! he scolded himself. Now look where it got me… knee-deep in trouble. I, a Ronin Warrior, am afraid of a girl I've known for almost ten years! Where is the logic in that?
The room went silent – cards stopped being shuffled, people stopped breathing, thoughts stopped being thought – as a colorful spirit floated in through the entranceway. Her hair flowed like a black ocean behind her, waves of the dark substance lapping at the air. Her impossible green eyes searched the entire room in great sweeps, halting on the two now shivering forms stretched out before a spread of cards. "Where is he?" she inquired in a sweet yet poisoned voice.
"He who, Miri?" Kento replied, trying his best to look innocent.
"Oh, you and Cye both know very well of whom I speak. But since he has you playing dumb, I want you to tell me where Sage Date of Halo is or else."
"I'm almost scared," Cye said, choking on his own brave words.
"Listen to me, Blue Boy, I want that warrior, and if I don't get him shortly, I'll have to take my aggressions out on you two!" The pair wondered if Mirichu would really do that, but they decided not to question her when the saw the extreme impatience glistening in her eyes.
Kento was the one who finally ratted Sage out, but it made no difference to him once he was in the tightening grasp of the surprisingly strong Mirichu Tenku. She lifted him off of his feet by the collar of his shirt, raising him to the point where his head almost bumped the ceiling. It didn't really hurt, for it was just an insane way of getting Sage's attention; needless to say, it was had. "Sage, my dear, best friend, who just so happens to be a peeping Tom!" she shouted in what seemed to actually be mock anger.
"Leave us," she commanded Kento and Cye, who immediately obeyed without even bothering to pick up their cards. "Now, where were we?"
"You were calling me a peeping Tom, I do believe."
"Oh yeah, shut up! Speak only when I tell you to!"
"Yes, ma'am."
Miri grabbed him behind his knees – his secret ticklish spot – and started tickling unmercifully, all the while keeping Sage off the ground. "You don't get it. I didn't tell you to speak; therefore, this is your punishment and will be from now on unless you answer me straight and true. We clear?"
"Yes!" he squeaked without dignity. "Anything to st…stop the ta… ha ha …tickling!"
Miri removed her hand and threw him over the back of the couch, and he landed with an oomph! on the cushions. Meanwhile, she gracefully leapt over the back, the ballerina's fluidity shining through her new warrior exterior. She pinned him underneath her body, and if Sage weren't terrified of another tickling, he would have been unimaginably pleased with the turn of events. Was it right that a girl should know where her guy friend was ticklish just so she could exploit him to her advantage? Wasn't that the guy's job? "What were you doing on the rooftop in the first place?"
Sage kept his eyes focused on her pretty face so she would know he wasn't lying to her. "In truth, I started out merely watching the sun set, okay? That's all. I just wanted to see what you and Rowen see every day that's supposedly so amazing."
"And did you?"
"I sure did. Actually, I was on my way back inside to ask him if I could come with you guys tomorrow morning for the sunrise…" Sage paused to breathe, as he realized he'd been holding his breath the entire time he'd been looking at her. "But then something – someone – caught my eye instead."
"That's when you saw me…"
"Dancing? Yes. You know, you're pretty good."
Mirichu grinned at the comment, but quickly wiped the smile away and instead slipped one of her hands behind his knee, poising it to attack lest he say anything wrong. "Shut up! Flattery will get a dead man no where! And that is what you are: a dead man walking. I catch you spying on me one more time, Sage, and so help me God I will rip your eyes from your sockets. Now get out of my sight before I kick your ass worse than I did Dais'!" Miri gave him a good tickling until Sage lay gasping helplessly for air, then she booted him from the living room and said good night to the remaining Ronins.
As she walked toward the door, Miri thought to herself how wonderful her friends were. Even if Sage had spied on her, and even though Rowen was more frustrating now than ever before, and even if Ryo was a bigger mystery to her than she was to herself, she loved it all. There was not one thing for which she would have traded in her friendships with the Ronin Warriors. The bonds she held with them were strong like the North Wind, although they were ironically as uncontrollable, too. But that was what she valued: their unpredictability as well as their safety.
When the raven dark woman opened the front door, she was chilled, not by the night, but by a premonition for a frightening future. It was a future ruled by a cruel Fate where one of them would be lost to the others. She saw death and destruction all around, and Sage, Cye, Kento, Ryo, Rowen and herself in the center of it. Everyone looked like they were dead, their eyes black with rot and emptiness, and overhead laughed a striking woman with hair as black as Miri's own and a pair of ebony eyes to match. One eye glittered with hatred and malice while the other sparkled with love and hope. She was Fate, there to make sure that her evil deed was completed, though Mirichu had yet to learn what exactly that evil deed was.
She slammed the door and stood hyperventilating on the front porch. Someone was going to die very soon, and Fate would make sure that the death would be unavoidable.
