Unmei no Kodomo

Destiny's Child

By Nami

:::Chapter 1:::

"Ken-san!" the pleasantly high-pitched voice sounded from behind Ken as he walked away from the school in the direction of the training hall. He turned with a smile and saw Tsukiko jogging towards him, black ponytail waving behind her.

"Tsukiko-san!" he waved and stopped to wait for her. "Did you need something?"

"No, not really. Just thought I'd walk with you." Tsukiko said, smiling. "Where are you headed?"

"The Nanase Dojo. I teach classes there on Thursdays."

"Really? I live right next to the dojo. Mind if I walk with you?"

"Sure." He moved over on the sidewalk so she could walk beside him and shortened his stride to match hers. They were nearly the same height, but Ken was taller than her by five or six centimeters, and his legs were longer.

"You've been practicing kendo for a long time, huh?" she said conversationally.

"Since I could hold a shinai, it seems." Ken said, half-smiling.

"You always seem so serious and dedicated. A lot of the people in there aren't dedicated at all, and it annoys me." She adjusted the straps of her backpack and hooked her thumbs through them.

"So I noticed." Ken said wryly. Earlier that day, she had (rather loudly and publicly) chewed out one of the upperclassmen for coming in late and not having his gear.

"We rarely get new members in the club, so I really appreciate your commitment, you know?"

"Well I love kendo."

"You seem so very loyal to it."

"It's my life." He said vaguely. There was a long pause.

"What about family?" Tsukiko said finally. Ken looked at her incongruously. "What?" she said defensively. "It's a conversation topic, right?" Ken laughed.

"Well, I live with my parents and sisters."

"Oh, how old are your sisters?"

"Emi's eight and Sara's six."

"I love little girls!"

"You want 'em?"

"No thanks, my landlord doesn't allow pets." Ken laughed at that.

They chatted the rest of the way to the training hall.

"I live in the apartments over there." Tsukiko pointed over her shoulder at the complex across the street. "Number 211. Why don't you come over after practice?" they had agreed to meet to study history together. Ken nodded,

"All right. I don't get done till almost six, though."

"No problem. We can order Chinese." She smiled and waved before jogging across the street. Ken smiled and headed into the training hall.

Seitou-san, a friend of Nanase-san and the owner of another Kendo training hall in town was there when Ken arrived.

"Ah, Yanagi-kun!" Nanase-san greeted. "How are you faring?"

"I'm doing well, sir." Ken said respectfully. "But could you please call me Ken?"

"Why? Yanagi is the name your parents gave you, isn't it?"

"Well, yes sir." Ken said hesitantly.

"Well, then! Honor them by using the name they chose for you!"

"Yes sir." Ken said, looking at the ground.

"Good boy! Your students are waiting for you in the main hall. And Seitou will be observing you tonight."

"Thank you, sir." Ken bowed and walked towards the main hall, Seitou-san following him closely. Ken took time to change into a kendo gi and grab a shinai before entering.

:::

Two hours later, Ken dismissed the class. Yamazaki, a fourth grader at the neighborhood elementary school, was the last to leave. He was, by far, the most dedicated in the class of twelve. Seitou approached Ken when everyone was gone.

"Midorikawa-san," he began, "I have a proposition for you." For the next five minutes, Ken listened as Seitou-san explained his idea. He recognized that Ken had a special talent for the sword and wanted to take him on as his disciple. "Think it over, Midorikawa. I'll ask you again next week." He walked to the door and turned. "And I agree with you, by the way."

"Sir?"

"While Yanagi is a very good name, it is not the name of a swordsman." Ken bowed in appreciation and Seitou left.

:::

After Ken's one and a half hour work out in the yard of the training hall and a half an hour of meditation in the meditation room, he hit the showers. Fifteen minutes past six, he rang the buzzer for Tsukiko's apartment. Her face appeared on the screen, smiling.

"Ken-san! Come on up." she let him in and he climbed the steps to room 211. "It's unlocked!" was the shouted response when he knocked, so he let himself in.

Tsukiko's apartment was small, only one or two bedrooms, but it was well furnished in a modern way. She had a white couch, white carpets, white walls, an oak and steel coffee table, a steel and oak desk in the corner with a laptop computer opened on it, and a flat TV mounted on the wall with a DVD player, PS2, and VCR hooked up to it.

"Hello!" he called when he didn't see anyone.

"I'm in here!" a voice called from one of the back rooms. "Make yourself comfortable!" Ken did so, removing his shoes and slipping on a pair of black slippers that were left by the door. He walked into the front room and set his bag on the couch. "Ouch! Dang it!"

"Tsukiko-san, are you okay?" Ken called back. "Need any help?"

"Ngh! No! I'll be there in a minute! Blast it!" Ken laughed softly and sat on the couch, digging his history book out of his bag. He looked around, noticing a few portraits on the walls of a small girl who looked like Tsukiko with… her parents, it must have been.

"Aieeee!" Tsukiko's scream was followed by a loud crash. Ken leapt to his feet.

"Tsukiko-san!" he ran to the room the crash came from and was met by a very comical looking Tsukiko sitting on the ground, an overturned step ladder beside her. There was a pile of odds and ends in her lap. She looked up and smiled sheepishly.

"I found it." She held up a pink cell phone. Ken laughed and moved to help her stand.

"Are you okay?" he asked, still laughing.

"Yeah, I'm fine. A little embarrassed is all." She smiled and brushed herself off. She was wearing a blue jumper that came to mid-thigh and a white mock-turtleneck and her hair was in a loose bun with two locks framing her face. She straightened a black ribbon that hung around her neck, an old key hanging from it.

"You want a drink?" Tsukiko asked when she and Ken reentered the living room.

"Sure. You got any guava juice?"

"Are you kidding?" she opened her refrigerator. "Carbonated or not?"

"Not. Thanks." She handed him his drink and sat cross-legged on the floor.

"Oh, good, you found the slippers. They're my dad's old ones. I was afraid they wouldn't fit. I had to dig those out of a box in that unholy pile back there."

"Are your parents not home?" Ken asked, taking a sip of his juice. Tsukiko's eyes got sad, though her smile stayed in place.

"My mother died when I was seven. Dad died a couple of years ago, after he bought this place."

"I'm sorry to hear that."

"Dad used to own the training hall across the street, you know. And I took classes there until last year."

"Why don't you live there then, instead of here?" Ken asked conversationally.

"Dad wasn't very responsible with money. Mom was an accountant, but after she died, things went down the tubes. We went into debt and had to sell the hall. Nanase was a friend of Dad's and when he bought the hall, he let Dad keep teaching. But Dad had a heart attack and died."

"I'm really sorry to hear that." Ken looked around. "But, if your father was in debt, how could afford all of this stuff, if you don't mind my asking."

"No, not at all. Actually, Mother set aside a large inheritance for me while she was alive and Dad had some money, too. And I inherited over 100 million yen when my grandmother died three years ago. And Nanase helped Dad pay off his debts 'as a favor', he said."

"Wow." Ken smiled. "You're pretty lucky to have had such careful parents."

"Huh?"

"Well, they planned for every contingency, right? With the inheritances, I mean."

"Yeah, I guess so." Tsukiko smiled in return. "So! What do you want for dinner?" she asked, brandishing her phone.

:::

Ken didn't dream very often. And when he did, he usually forgot all of it when he woke up. Which is the main reason that, when he woke up later that night, he was confused by the images floating around inside his head.

"You finally awake?" he started and looked around at the sound of the familiar but still strange voice. Tsukiko was sitting behind him, remote in hand.

"What happened?"

"You fell asleep around section four." She motioned to his open book and smiled.

"What time is it?" he sat back and stretched.

"About eight."

"Let me call my parents." He said, reaching for the phone. A few moments later, he hung up. "Okay, should we keep going?"

"Oh… I just found the Nationals." She pouted. Ken looked at the screen. It was kendo, and he knew both of the competitors. They decided to call it a night.

"Ah, c'mon!" half an hour later, Ken and Tsukiko were sitting on the couch munching on microwave popcorn. Tsukiko was loudly cheering on her obvious favorite, Shidou Hikaru**, and Ken was watching both her and the screen with barely contained amusement. Hikaru was off, but so was her opponent. It was a very close match, but Hikaru won in the end.

"Ha!" Tsukiko clapped once and nearly spilled the bowl of popcorn that rested on her knee. "I knew she could do it!"

"She was slow." Ken said mildly.

"What?! What do you mean?!"

"Her reflexes. I've gone up against her before. She's better than that."

"She won didn't she?"

"That's because her opponent was worse than her." Ken pointed out. He smiled and took a drink of his canned tea as Tsukiko fumed for a moment.

After a few moments, Ken began gathering his belongings.

"I should go." He said. "Thank you for studying with me." She looked up at him, a little disappointed. For a moment, he thought her eyes reminded him of something from a dream…

"Do you have to go?" she asked plaintively.

"Well, it is nearly nine." He said calmly, pointing to the clock on her microwave.

"You could stay here tonight!" Tsukiko said quickly. "I—I mean… Well, it is late. And I don't want you to get hurt or anything on the way home… and… and… never mind." She rose and began to walk to the door. "Sorry."

"Well," Ken said with a smile, "it really is late. And I don't want to bother my parents this late for a ride." Tsukiko turned and smiled. "Let me use your phone again."

:::

It was settled five minutes later. Ken convinced his parents that he was staying with "a member of the kendo club". When they asked if his classmate's parents minded getting him to school in the morning, he answered with a cryptic "they didn't say anything against it."

"So," Tsukiko carried an extra futon into the living room, "where'd you move from?"

"Okinawa." Ken said.

"Do you miss it?"

"Sometimes, yeah. I didn't have a lot of friends, but the ones I had are all great people. Except that my girlfriend's little brother was way too possessive." Tsukiko smiled at that.

"What was your girlfriend's name?"

"Shirou Tori. Her mother was American and insisted on naming her an English name."

"What was she like?" Tsukiko was sitting on the couch, leaning over where he was lounging on the futon. They had moved the coffee table to make room for him to sleep comfortably.

"Tori was… Tori was special." He said slowly. "She was smart and sweet, but quiet and she got depressed a lot. The guy she was dating before she met me had to leave suddenly. He was in the American military and he got transferred. She would think about him a lot and that made her upset. I think we both knew that she wouldn't ever care about me like that, but we were still close."

"Hmm…" Tsukiko's eyes got an unfocused glaze on them.

"Tsukiko?" she blinked up at him.

"Huh? Oh. Sorry. I zone out every once in a while. She sounds really special. A little strange, but special."

"Well, she had to mature fast, since her mother died after her bother was born. She raised him and took care of her father."

"Was she beautiful?" Tsukiko blushed. "S-Sorry!" But Ken pulled out his wallet and showed her a picture. Her hair was short and black and tapered around her face. In the picture, she was wearing a full kimono with a light shawl. She had a small smile on her face, but there was sadness in her eyes. She looked very formal and she was, indeed, beautiful.

"Wow." Tsukiko handed the picture back to him. "She looks like a princess." She swung her feet over the edge of the couch. "I should go to bed. Thanks for staying with me tonight, Ken-san." She smiled as she walked towards her bedroom.

"Good night, Tsukiko-san." He smiled and she waved, yawning. Ken laid his head down on the small pillow as Tsukiko turned off the light.

::: End of Chapter 1:::

Nami's Notes:

Oooh! Chapter 1 is done! I've never done that before… So, can you guess which series this is an AU for? Hmm… Let me see…

The original characters are not mine! But Midorikawa "Ken" Yanagi, his family, Tsukiko's mine too. So are Seitou and Nanase and all the others. They may be ooc, but that's because these are my own characters. They're just based loosely on the Kenshin-gumi.

That's all. Comments/questions are always welcome. I don't like flames, though. It's because of my aura. It's blue and sensitive and over emotional. So keep your negativity to yourself, 'kay? If ya don't like it, don't read it, silly!

** CLAMP rules! And Shidou Hikaru belongs to them, not me. Duh.