Sanosuke stared at Saitou's katana as if it were the only thing that existed in the world. The light in the sword's reflection filled Sanosuke's eyes like water into cups. He felt himself trapped in its rays, the moon coursing through his blood like a river. He knew by looking at this sword that it was different somehow from the one Saitou had before. It seemed stronger, more carefully built and undeniably more fascinating. Outside of Sanosuke's wonderings he could hear the arguing of the two men before him. But the voices seemed far, far away, echoes of another place.
"I cannot let you arrest him," Kenshin said forcefully.
"That's not what I am here for," insisted Saitou.
"Then why?" Kenshin demanded once again.
"That idiot standing behind you killed a man, and it is my job to keep him clear of danger."
At Saitou's words, Sanosuke pulled out of his trance.
"I don't need your kind of help," bit Sanosuke.
"I think you do."
Sanosuke knew what Saitou meant. He meant he was helpless. Sanosuke gritted his teeth and clenched his fists until the press of his fingernails sent a sobering wave of pain through him.
"You mean to protect him from ... what? The police? Other gangsters?" Kenshin asked.
Saitou chortled, a small smile appearing and then disappearing as quickly as it had come. "There are more dangerous things than gangsters out on a night like this."
"Like shapeshifters?" Kenshin asked, his eyes narrowing and voice so calm they couldn't tell what he was thinking.
Saitou let out another short laugh, his smile wider and longer lasting than before.
"So, Sanosuke has already told someone about us. I would have expected at least a week to go by." Sanosuke began to step forward, but Kenshin spoke before Sanosuke could make any sort of move.
"Is there any truth to this?" he asked.
Sanosuke let out a griping cry. "You can't be serious! What are you asking him for? He's the liar, remember?"
"I would like to hear it from his own lips," Kenshin answered.
Sano could feel a little piece of himself crumble. "What ... you don't believe me?"
"That isn't it at all," Kenshin said, turning his head to look at him.
Sanosuke backed away; his eyes narrowed at teeth clenched, feelings of betrayal naked on his face. "Fine. Don't believe me then."
"Sanosuke ... " Kenshin started, turning around.
"I mean, why would you? I'm so fucking stupid. Just an ahou, right?" Sanosuke glared at Saitou, whose face was dark and unreadable.
"You are being paranoid," Saitou said, reaching into his pocket.
"Piss off," Sanosuke growled as he felt the tears burn beneath his eyes. They were not tears of sadness, but the sort of tears only hatred, fear, and betrayal can bring. The emotions threatened to bubble to the top, but he wouldn't let himself cry. He swore he would die before he found himself crying in front of Saitou; rage suited him better. Instead he flexed his fist until all his knuckles cracked, and he ground his teeth together until he could hear nothing but the sound of his jaws grinding together.
Saitou pulled out his cigarette case and tapped it against his hand, packing the tobacco.
"Whatever you want from me, you aren't going to get it," Sanosuke swore. Without thinking about it for one moment he was off running, his legs pumping underneath him with energy he hadn't thought he had. He went up the hill and into the forest as quickly as he could, disappearing into the first patch of trees he came across.
Kenshin called after him, but Sanosuke had disappeared out of their sight. Kenshin stood and pondered for a moment; he had never seen his friend move that quickly.
"Yareyare," Saitou muttered. Kenshin turned back to Saitou, who had an unlit cigarette hanging from his lips. "I can never find the time to smoke around that boy."
Sanosuke ran between the trees, getting as far away as he could. As he ran, he felt a feeling course through him. It was exhilarating, as if every part of him had come to life in a new way. He could smell all the sweet scents of the forest: the dew, the flowers, the fruits, all of it. Prisms of light patterned his skin, and the moon hued everything a shade of blue, the few things too pale to be blue glowed white, glowing as if they had a light inside of them. As he moved, he dodged every tree, every shrub that would have made him fall. He felt as though he had run the same stretch of woods since he was a kid, and yet he knew he had never been there before. It was like running through a dream, everything wasn't quite real and yet his mind accepted it.
From the darkness in his mind came thoughts, teasing, mean voices to taunt him as he escaped. "Why are you running?"
Sanosuke tried to push the voice aside, but it found its way back into his consciousness, seeping in like bad water.
"You know you're strong enough to take on Saitou. What are you afraid of? That you still aren't?"
Sanosuke ran even faster, almost out of control of his speed. He closed his eyes against the torrent of emotions, trying anything to make the small voice stop.
"You are a fool to run. Just a useless ahou ..."
His eyes flew open and he wanted to stop running. Yet his momentum was so swift he knew that it would be impossible to stop, unless something stopped him. At the moment he could think of nothing else to do: he picked an object ahead of him and ran towards it.
He raised his arms forward and ran into a tree, his arms out to keep his entire body from colliding with it. He felt his elbows complain, but he was stopped and didn't care about the pain. He let out a sigh of relief and bent into the tree that was still shaking from the impact, pressing his forehead against the solid, steady wood as he breathed in the smells of sap and moist wood. He dug his nails into the bark, sending slivers into his fingernails. Once more he didn't care about the pain. He didn't even feel it. It was nothing compared to the burning in his heart, and the confusion in his mind.
Sanosuke stayed there for many long moments, reliving that night and the night before. He clung to the tree as if it were an anchor, the only thing keeping him connected to the earth beneath him. Standing next to the tree, he felt a prickling at his neck, but scolded himself for feeling it; the feeling was too indescribable to be anything other than supernatural. Sanosuke knew the tree couldn't possibly be giving off energy like a living person. Yet at that moment he could feel a calm, strong energy coming from it. It was signature, unique, just like a person.
He tried not to think about it and let his arms fall. He laid next to the roots of the tree, his head against them like they were a mother's lap. Although he didn't remember his mother, he imagined she would be much like a tree, deep-rooted and strong, grander and wiser as she got older. And so, in the mixture of guilt and confusion was also added loneliness, something he had been feeling somewhere inside him for longer than just the past few days. He curled into a ball, his legs pulled against his chest firmly as his arms clutched them. He moved in between sleep and bitter wakefulness, wishing for only one thing.
"I wish all this shit would stop," he thought, clutching his head. "I want it all to be like it was before ..."
He heard something coming towards him through the brush and sat up in a flash. He whirled around to look, but saw nothing. Yet still, the sound of rustling leaves were loud, as if they were right next to his ears. He stood and spun around, looking for the source of the sound, but all around him was eerie stillness.
He froze as he realized what he was hearing. There was somebody running towards him, and the noise was getting louder, and he knew somehow that he was hearing somebody far away.
A gust of wind blew in from the other direction. He heard it coming closer and closer until finally it was surrounding him. The howling and rustling was so loud that Sanosuke had to cover his ears and close his eyes against the torrent of sensation. The wind passed and all was still again, but he still felt the ringing in his ears. His skin felt alive as well, every hair on his body standing on end, stimulated by the cold wind.
He opened his eyes and found himself face to face with Saitou once again, only inches from the man's face. He cried out and stumbled back, nearly tripping over his own feet. He swore and narrowed his eyes at the older man.
"You think you can stop trying to scare the shit out of me?" he yelled.
"You heard me coming. If it weren't for the wind you would have heard me arrive," he said, his tone soft and non-threatening, but still unreadable.
"I don't know what you're talking about," Sanosuke said with his teeth grinding together, trying to deny what he knew to be truth.
Saitou snorted. "I'm not expecting you to take in everything I say and simply accept it. But you've felt it yourself and you know it is more than just my word."
"Find somebody else to torture ..." Sanosuke spat, backing away.
"Are you going to run again?"
"No."
"Then why do you smell so unsure?"
Sanosuke stared at Saitou sideways, one brow raised in confusion. "Smell?"
"And your muscles are tense, like you're ready to move quickly. You really want to run, don't you?"
Sanosuke narrowed his eyes again. "I want to. But I'm not going to. I shouldn't have in the first place," he admitted. He tried to read Saitou's face, to see what kind of trick he might be using to tell all this.
Saitou took a step forward and Sanosuke jumped back. He scolded himself for being so jumpy and held his ground as Saitou came closer. He held out his hand to Sanosuke's face ...
"Don't touch me," Sanosuke threatened, pulling his face away.
Saitou smirked and snapped his fingers. It sent a brutal shiver of pain through Sanosuke's ears.
"Don't do that!" he yelled, putting his hands to his ears again.
"I can make it stop for now, long enough to get you back to my home."
"Make what stop?" he asked.
"You're sensitive to everything right now, am I wrong? It must have been the smell of blood; that sometimes triggers it prematurely."
"What the hell are you talking about?" Sanosuke grumbled, glaring at the other man.
"You're not used to having the keen hearing, sight, and sensations of a wolf. I can help you suppress them until I can begin teaching you control."
"I'm not a wolf ..." he said, repeating what he had said earlier in the night.
"Was I ever this impossible?" Saitou asked, holding his chin as he wondered nostalgically.
"How the hell should I know?" Sanosuke growled, rolling his eyes.
"It was a rhetorical question, genius."
The two men seethed as they glared at each other, but Saitou found his head again quickly.
"You should come home with me. The last place the police will look for you is in the home of an officer," Saitou offered.
"Why would I want to go back there? I woke up in bloody clothes, you nearly molested me, and told me this fucking wolf story!"
"Because you have no place else to go," he said, utter confidence lifting his stern brow.
Sano could think of nothing to say back. The two of them stood in silence while Sanosuke glared and Saitou stood still as a statue.
"I'm going to stay at the dojo," he began, all the confidence gone from his voice.
"The police chief will visit Kenshin to ask questions first thing in the morning, I'm sure of it. It wouldn't be a good idea to stay at one of the first places the police will investigate."
Sanosuke's lip curled as he realized how right Saitou was. He paused for a long time, his arms folded across his chest. He opened his mouth to speak, but he heard a rustling noise behind him. The wind was blowing once more and coming too fast for Sanosuke to prepare for it. A torrent of sound and sensation ravaged him and he pressed his hands against his ears to chase away the sound.
At once Saitou pulled Sanosuke to him, holding the boy close to his body. Sanosuke barely noticed the embrace, as every inch of him was alive, howling and shaking against the violent wind. Saitou held Sanosuke's head to his chest and began concentrating. Slowly, the sound of the wind became more and more distant, and the sensations of cold didn't feel so foreign. Everything turned back to normal except for one thing; he could hear a throbbing like the pounding of drums close to his ears. He began to realize that he was hearing a heartbeat, but it was not his own. He could hear two separate heartbeats, although they beat in unison. He stiffened as he realized he was hearing Saitou's heart.
He pulled himself away from the circle of Saitou's arms and backed away, his eyes wide. The wind was still moving around him but there was nothing abnormal about it at all, except that instead of the wind he heard the sound of Saitou's beating heart, like distant drums.
"What did you do?" Sanosuke whispered, touching his ear and staring at Saitou in wonderment.
"I lent a bit of my control to you. It is only temporary. You will be much more sensitive in an hour or so."
It all sounded like Greek to Sanosuke, who just kept staring.
"I have more control over what I hear, see, and feel, as well as how I use that control. For now you will hear what I hear, feel what I feel."
Sanosuke shivered and clutched at his chest, the thought of being inside Saitou's skin unnerving.
"Why are you doing this to me?" he whispered, shivering and trying to pass off the sensation as something else, anything else.
"The Ou-sama has asked of me to be your sensei. I honestly can't think of anyone else who could keep track of you other than me. So I'm stuck with you." Saitou sounded genuinely disgruntled.
"Why not just arrest me and have me executed?" Sanosuke spat, returning to his familiar anger and sarcasm. "Certainly would save you time and effort, huh?"
"That would be easy, but we don't let our own wander lost in the world." Saitou's eyes glowed brightly in the darkness, the only thing not hued by the light of the moon.
Sanosuke stared at the forest floor. He weighed his options carefully in his head as he warmed his arms by rubbing them together. He could do one of two things: go someplace to hide where the police would undoubtedly find him, or with Saitou where an unknown fate waited for him. It was either death, or the unknown. He looked up to Saitou, sighed, and gave his answer.
"You got any more of that eel?"