Shiawasena Owari Katanantenai
A Recca no Honoo fanfic
By Tenshi no Ai
Does. Not. Own.
(A/N: Just to let y'all know, Kasumi is not an original character, she's this chibi girl in vol. 23 of the manga who has a crush on Domon. She's the same age as well. I'm sorry if I totally mangle her character, but I'm working off of a character featured in one chapter...a touch hard to portray correctly'. And yes, she's fairly important to this story.)
Ch. 2: Brutal Truth
(Kasumi and Recca's POV)
(Kasumi's POV)
Sometimes I really dislike this job.
My aunt thought that this would be a great opportunity for me, to really work with people and make a difference in someone's life. She told me that I couldn't hang around flowers all day, what's the importance of flowers in the real world? Through her guidance, my parents quickly agreed to get me into the medical field, so that is my major for college. I wanted to study botany, but I didn't want to go against my parents' wishes. And due to my aunt's job as head nurse of the city hospital, I was able to fill an intern status as well.
But my heart still lies with flowers.
The worst part of my job is that I always have to do the worst jobs. I can barely stand the horrid filing of medical charts and the monotonous typing to enter said charts into the computer, but there's one thing worse.
Whenever the doctors and the nurses don't want to share the bad news of a patient's condition to their loved ones, I'm always made to do it. Kasumi-chan, you're just so good with other people, so it's natural that you should do this line of work. That's what they always say. It's just because that I look like a child, the hospital staff thinks that I help to reassure the next of kin. Wouldn't the patient's loved ones want personnel who looked qualified to tell them the bad news?
But I keep doing it anyway.
This time though, I really don't want to. One of the senior nurses gave me the chart of a recent patient when I came in, about an hour ago, and told me to go and tell the parents when they came in. I glanced at the basic information and saw that it was a girl, age nineteen. Same age as me. Because my weekend shift is from midnight to eight in the morning, I could already tell that this was going to be a bad case. A girl wheeled into the hospital in the early hours of the morning has to be a worse case than in the daytime.
Worse things happen at night.
I'm now sitting behind the reception desk, glancing at the rest of the chart, anxiously awaiting the parents. Sakoshita Yanagi...I've heard of someone with that name at my old high school. I think we graduated the same year.
I've already read the rest of the information on the injuries sustained already. I'd rather just focus on the name instead of that other stuff.
The front doors slide open, and a middle aged couple briskly walks inside, followed by a guy my age. They immediately go to the first nurse they see shuffling about, who immediately points them to the reception desk. I stand up and make my way around the desk, cursing fate the whole time. Why am I going to them?
Then they'd hear about their daughter's rape that much faster.
Ohayo gozaimasu, Sakoshita-san? I ask just to make sure. As much as I don't want to tell them, they're even more anxious to know. The man, looking very worn out and weak, nods tiredly. The woman by his side clings onto him and stares at me with frightened eyes.
One is already resigned to fate and the other expects the worst to happen.
How bad is it, nurse? Is Yanagi almost dead or what? How bad is it that the police wouldn't even tell us? Please, just tell us straight out! Yanagi-san's okaasan blurts out. Even more unnerved now , I grip the chart to my chest. Her husband just pats her on the shoulder, eyes asking the same question.
I look past them, to the spiky-haired guy behind them. He's staring at his feet, so I can't see what kind of panic he's going through. I'm only allowed to tell direct family members this information, I drag out. He looks vaguely familiar, but I can't place him.
It's okay, nurse, the otousan says quietly, he's our daughter's boyfriend, Hanabishi Recca. He's as close to her as we are.
Hanabishi Recca? I've heard of him. He went to my high school. He thinks he's a ninja and he's a good friend of...someone else I know.
But this just turned from unbearable to horribly unbearable. I have to tell her parents and boyfriend that...
I look up at the parents and attempt to keep my breathing the same. I don't want to do this I really don't want to do this... Sakoshita Yanagi is currently in a coma, due to the nature of the attack, but is expected to wake up in a couple of days. She has various bruises and contusions on her body, as well as a broken left arm.
The okaasan nearly collapses. I...I thought worse...almost dead or...oh, thank kami, I thought of the worst... she buries her face into her husband's chest and begins sobbing in relief.
Although it's bad, at least it's just a broken arm and some bruises...at least that's all the attacker did to her. And she'll wake up soon enough, the otousan closes his eyes and sighs, holding his wife close to him.
I look away. How can I possibly tell them the worst of it? How can I tell them when they seem so perfectly relieved right now? I don't want to...
Oi, chibi-nurse, a new voice cuts through my thoughts of denial. I look up into the stormy blue eyes of Hanabishi Recca, who's crouching in front of me. That's not all, is it?
Why do you want to torture yourself with more, I nearly cry out. And then I look deeper into his eyes.
He knows.
Iie...it isn't, I murmur. Sakoshita Yanagi's parents look at me, fear back into their entire being. It was...she was...
I take a breath. I was thinking earlier about the loved ones and how they should be facing someone competent instead of a little girl playing dress up.
No matter how much I may wish that I wasn't in this position, how much I may want to be with my flowers, I have to do this.
Was I truly forced into doing this, like I always tell myself? If I'm going to do this, I'm going to have to assume the role completely.
But I still don't want to do this.
The okaasan stares at me in shock for a timeless second, then collapses to her knees and starts wailing loudly. The otousan stumbles back a bit, before catching himself. He mutely crouches down, picks up his wife, then half carries, half drags his wife out the hospital. I drop the chart, and Hanabishi-kun picks it up, hands it to me, then sprints out the door after them. But I still saw his face.
I think I saw...tears?
There's nothing I can do about how they feel. I never wanted to tell them.
Mechanically I walk back to behind the desk, barely noticing the nurses who were watching the whole scene but didn't want to interfere. I place the chart on top of all the other medical charts of other seriously injured people who have been entered in the hospital while I was dealing with the parents and Hanabishi-kun.
And then I start to cry.
This is the worst job in the world, and it's now reached new lows.
And it's my job.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
(Recca's POV)
Bam!
I shout as my last punch to the wall cracks something in my throbbing hand. It's all scrapped and bloody from me punching the hospital wall for the last...I don't know. But it doesn't help me forget what I heard.
I want to rip that bastard who hurt my Yanagi-hime into pieces and use each of my flame dragons on each and every piece of his body.
I should be doing that to myself for failing her.
I lean against the bruised wall, breathing heavily. It's all my fault. It's all my fault. I'm supposed to protect Hime from anything that tries to hurt her. I promised that, not just to her, but to myself too.
Chikusho...I broke the very first promise we made to each other, to never show anybody else our powers, so what's another broken promise?
Yeah, did you hear about that girl? The rape victim? I turn and see two nurses leaving the hospital. They're talking about Yanagi-hime, so I hide in the shadows of the wall.
That's a ninja skill, y'know, one of those skills I promised to protect Hime with.
Oh, yeah, Kasumi-chan had to tell the parents. Who keeps on sticking her with those jobs anyway?
Who knows? She just does whatever anyone asks her to do. She's just a cute little mindless doll. Anyway, I heard that the victim's the only child of the Sakoshita family.
Hontou ni? That's one of the richest families in this city!
Hai. I bet you it's one of those revenge things. You know, some guy who couldn't get a job blames all the rich people and tries something like this. But really, I heard that the girl was found in an alley near Kibou Way.
Kibou Way?
Hai. I'm just thinking that any half-way intelligent girl would know not to be going through dark alleys at night. Even if we have a lesser crime rate than, say, America, still. You have to have common sense with these kind of things.
Maybe she was rushing to somewhere?
Yeah, well, the only place she was rushed to was the hospital.
I slump against the wall. Yanagi-hime was going to my house when she was...
...
The next thing I know, the sky seems to be getting lighter. It's almost dawn. Groggily, I stand up.
I have to see Hime.
Room 347. That's what it said on that chibi-nurse's chart. And that's where I'm in front of a short while later. Just another one of those ninja skills that I'm supposed to use to protect my Yanagi-hime. I open the door and nearly run out again.
She's in the bed, looking all peaceful and neatly tucked in a sea of white. I walk up to the bed. Her light-brown hair's all spread out under her head. She really looks like an angel.
Beep....beep....beep....beep....
That's the sound of the heart monitor.
I look again. Her left arm's in a cast. She has these red marks on her face that look like finger marks. There's some sort of breathing mask over her nose and mouth. Her face has no expression, but her right hand's gripping her blanket. And there's a tube leading from her right arm to an IV bag positioned up next to the bed.
I don't even want to think about the bruises and stuff under the blanket.
I stand over her bed. If she woke up right now and saw me, what would she do? Would she want to be comforted and have me hold her, or would her only comfort be seeing me commit seppuku?
Whatever you want, I'll do it.
I reach over and gently touch her hand. She immediately loosens her hold on her blanket. I rub my fingers against her smooth palm, then entwine my fingers in her own. Her face still has no expression, but she seems to be sleeping better.
I whisper hoarsely, not wanting to wake her up but wanting for her to hear this, I've failed you so many times. I've tried...to make it up to you, and I'm going to try again. I swear that I'll find whoever did this to you and rip him apart, and then I'll submit myself to whatever punishment you have for me.
I lean over to get a closer look at her face. Even with those red marks on her cheeks and that mask over her nose and mouth, she's still beautiful to me. I reach with the other hand and touch her bangs covering her forehead. They're so soft.
It's all my fault, Hime, but we're going to get through this together, okay? Because we're Hime and ninja. We get through everything together.
I wonder how you would respond if you could hear me, Yanagi-hime?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
A little about Kasumi-chan! She's so chibi that when Domon first saw her, he thought that she was a little kid looking for flowers for her mom. Then she glomped onto him and started crying. Good one...anyway, she really likes flowers and the reason why she likes Domon so much is because, early in the school year, he pummeled the guys that didn't apologize for trampling her flower garden with their soccer ball and then he helped her replant the flowers. She becomes his tutor to help him stay in school and confesses her feelings to him, but he tells her that he's in love with someone else, which she already knew...but she's so nice that she gives him flowers as he goes to bring back Yanagi from SODOM...ah, sorry, talking too much...
A heartfelt thank you to each of the reviewers. If I thought that it was hard writing that first chapter, I can't imagine how hard it was to read it for the very first time...especially with that warning blaring off at the top of the page like that. I worried and fretted about what kind of reaction I would get to that....explict scene, and I honestly wondered how many flames were going to roast me alive. Apparently, it seems like people who would've flamed or would've had angry reviews took the hint at the warning. I think that rarely happens, so I'm thankful to the ones who hightailed it too.
With that in mind, I would like to thank ReccaGirl, who seems to be the true perma-reviewer now....excepting Karen and Hoowee, of course! Anyway, I also appreciated your reply to my email, it really made my day (especially since I was having such a crappy one). Mi-chan's Fan...he seems to have a lot of them, I've noticed...I think the fact that I made you pity a character that you don't like is probably the most interesting compliment to my writing. I hope you read the next chapters and see how you like the way I portray the other characters. Oh, and Karen, my fellow S. Californian, thanks for showing me the FoR WinAmp skins. Um, but, y'know, I have an iMac, so...well, at least I have pretty pictures! Oh, and Um? That was an interesting review....um, I don't condone that kind of language, but it *might* make sense later...more info on that later, though. And to The Blue Sorceress (I'm doing this late at night, forgive if I mispell your name'), thank you very much. It was very hard for me to write that chapter, and it's just going to be harder for me. But I appreciate all the kind comments so far, and y'all are going to have to forgive me for rambling. ^+^V
See you next week (or whenever I post and you read) for 3!
