This is a time travel fic with inspiration from Shakespeare's Twelfth Night that's all about fun mistaken identity! It's also about the intergenerational trauma of Kenshin's crazy wild sword style, Hiten Mitsurugi Ryu. (I'm sure there are better ways to teach the succession technique. But. Have you seen that red and white cloak? Hiten Mitsurugi Ryu masters are just dramatic.) I need to say up front that this fic is 11 chapters long but unfinished. Please see the notes at the end.

June 2020 Edit: this fic is now ongoing.


It is 1848.

Five years from now, in 1853, everything would change come the foreigners landing their ships on Japanese ports for the first time, frenzying the Tokugawa Shogunate and the old ways which had ruled supreme undisturbed and unchallenged for centuries.

Twenty years from now, in 1868, the throes of war unlike anything which this tiny, agricultural, dynastic country has ever seen will break out, embroiling the land in civil unrest and revolution, blood and fire; which will see its greatest assassin rise and go down in history.

Thirty seven years from now, there will be a fragile, fragile interlude of peace found in 1885.

For now, a woman walked the outskirts of the countryside, kicking up a fine layer of dust. A reminder of the particularly dry season, hard times for farmers and villagers. She lifted her straw hat, blinking away dirt from her eyes. She does not see any of the aforementioned come to pass. She did not live to see the Black Ships arrive, nor the horrors of the Bakumatsu war, because she died within five years of 1848.

Today, under the midday sun, the horizon was a blur of heat and dust. The low hum of singing cicadas reverberated through the air, sounding distant and familiar in a way that was more calming than any footsteps or chitter-chatter could be. She was completely alone on this barren road.

Right before her eyes, the Tokugawa Shogunate was weakening and with this, tensions seemed to be heightening. None of this made a difference to her, except that unsure times called for unsure tensions, which led to confusion, disarray, and advantages taken. It wasn't so long ago that these roads were full of travellers, merchant traders, fisherman with their wooden wagons and piled-on goods, travelling theatre troops with children, or people just going out for a pleasant stroll. But bandits had become more and more common around this area, people becoming more desperate. Highway robbers, child-snatchers. That was what worried her.

All of a sudden, the chirp of the cicadas stopped, one dropping off after the other like candlelights extinguishing. She spun around, cloak whacking through the air, dancing back as she clasped the sheath of her sword with her left hand, the hilt with her right. With sandalled feet parted and shoulders haunched, her brown eyes darted from side to side under the fraying straw weaving of her conical hat.

A moment's silence beat over her body like a wave, the rest of the day bracing with her. One cicada began to chirp again behind her. Then another. And another. Before long, the wind came back and the heat of the noon overcame her. There was no one there. The insects might simply have been affected by the absolutely repelling, guilt-ridden ki flowing off her in droves. She sighed, relaxing, and slid the six inches of sword safely back into the sheath before carrying on.

Not even the insects wanted to be near her. Wonderful.

She was an onna-bugeisha: the last of the vanishing class of women samurai, trained as warriors. No woman would be caught dead in armour and a sword now, but she hid her weapons under a cloak and her face under a hat, and hoped her anonymity would serve her as well as it had in the past. She feared the bandits not for herself, but for the ugly stains she might leave on this wide, quaint road, the head-ache inducing screams she might elicit with her blade.

But above all, she feared the bandits wouldn't hesitate to snatch a child from these dusty paths. Even a child trained in the sword was no match for leeches when tired, hungry, penniless, and on the brink of exhaustion.

She had a runaway child on her hands, and was going to find him and bring him home.

The onna-bugeisha tottered to a stop again. There to her side was the statue of a buddha. Once painted gold, its regal colours had being stripped by the passage of time. The nose was chipped, dry, dead moss was growing in the crevices between the neck and robes, and long grasses ticked its sides, obscuring its body. Staring at the miserable thing, the onna-bugeisha sighed lengthily.

"Everyone's abandoned you too, haven't they?" she muttered sourly. She grinned sarcastically at the statue.

The statue just stared.

Because it was a statue and couldn't speak back if she paid it to.

She felt pathetic.

Bobbing down by the side of the road, end of her sword scraping the ground, the onna-bugeisha bent to pull the weeds from its roots. They upheaved harshly, upturning some soil that dangled from the ends as she tossed them aside. Then, in a careless instance, a blade of grass swiped across her hand, slicing her palm open.

"AH — ouch!" She recoiled, reflexively flinching to her sword. She had a good deal of luck she didn't take hold of it and smear her newly furnished hilt with blood. Blood that was hers, anyway. She opened her palm, frowning at the blood beginning to pool and trickle into the dirt. Plick, plick. What a formidable enemy. A blade of grass. Bought to her knees before the statue, she was about to draw a blade of tamahagane steel against its offender, the great, honourable blade of grass.

She glowered at the statue. The statue glowered back. "Damned buddha," she said, feeling an irrational amount of anger go into her bloodstream and flow straight to her head. "Is there any more karma for me to go around?" she announced to no one in particular. "Ow!"

The onna-bugeisha huffed, tugging out the last bit of weed from the statue's carved, folded feet, and rose. She looked around. The cicadas were still singing. The breeze was still blowing. The earth was still turning. Her kid was still lost. The buddha stared at her as she struggled not to rest her face in her lacerated palm. At least there was no one looking, no one bar her and whichever gods were paying attention.

"Hey," she started, facing the statue again. She put her palms together, suddenly, trying to look presentable to the slab of rock. "Whatever comes to me, comes to me. But…watch over the kid for me." She swallowed, her throat feeling suddenly extremely tight. It became hard to breathe, for a short, strange moment. She pushed her palms together hard until her fingertips went pink. "Please. Keep him safe. He's young, he's stupid. And I'll take whatever you throw at me. I'll do goddamned anything. Just help me find him."

The sounds of the cicadas had stopped again.

"I'm begging you. Help me find him. I…"

Her palms separated as she lost balance. She tensed, throwing her head around in every direction and seeing miles and miles of dirt road and grass pastures. She threw her hands before her face — there was no way she'd lost that much blood to feel as dizzy as she was feeling right now. Her hands were coated in red, the dirt before the statue was dotted like poppies, and she wondered when she had acquired four hands and two swords and twenty-something fingers—

"What?"

The onna-bugeisha slammed into the ground, mind reeling from everything, the world growing more and more distant as her breath sped up and her heart beat hammered, eyes of the buddha seemingly blinking open and beckoning her, further and further away from here…

Thirty seven years into the future.


1885

"Kenshin, you dunce, you don't have to stare at your sword when I try to serve you tea! I swear it's not poisoned!" Kaoru chided, splashing tea all over the table as Kenshin startled awake at once, pulling his hands off the surface. The wet mess was not solely the fault of Kaoru, the metal box they were in bumped and coughed like a rattling pot every so often. A technological marvel that was threading them across the country in speeds that had been utterly unheard of a few short years ago. Their bags lightly packed, their friends gathered on short notice, their course had been set for Kyoto for the last twenty hours.

"Why — yes — Kaoru-dono," Kenshin said, reacting and not listening.

"I don't know about that." Sano picked up his cup, eyeing the steam suspiciously. He wafted it beneath his nose, taking a big, dramatic whiff of it. "Coming from Jo-chan, how do we know it's not poisoned?" He bought the cup to eye level before frowning and then slowly tracing his sight to where Megumi had suddenly gripped his clothes. "What? How did I manage to offend you this time? Woah!"

Sano was viciously tugged to his left, narrowly missing the splash of cold, undrunk tea Kaoru had launched into his general direction.

"You haven't, yet." Megumi stated it as a square fact. She let go of him to daintily to swirl at her own tea.

Sano rubbed at his arm. More for the sake that he ought to rather than for the meagre pain. "I appreciate the sentiment, Megumi, but the hot tea I was holding still spilled all over my leg. Thanks."

"You're welcome."

"Hey, hey," Kenshin started, scratching his head with that sheepish look on his face, "I think Kaoru-dono's cooking is fine. All it needs is a little augmenting for effect. It's quite unique."

A few seconds of silence followed. The steam train rattled beneath their feet, drowning out the little squeaky snores of the child in their compartment, chugging and roaring along the rail with methodical grace. Outside, the green countryside rolled past their window, dots of small people scattered in stretches and stretches of open farmlands rushing by. Some raindrops were dappled on the glass and sill, there had been a sun-shower before, but the weather had been celebrated for its grace in creating generous yields in the past months. It was a peaceful and idyllic day, inside and out. But none of this good cheer and calm peace could put Kenshin's mind to rest.

"Kenshin."

"Yes, Yahiko?"

"We weren't talking about her cooking. We were talking about her tea making skills."

"Tea making skills?" Kenshin went a soft shade of red. "Yes, that's what this lowly one was talking about when he said 'cooking,'" he said quickly. This did not save the situation.

"Well, now that Kenshin's out of his daze, should we go over what exactly our plan was supposed to be?" Sano said in the awkward break.

Kenshin quietened. Then, belatedly, his face scrunched into a frown. The motion pulled his cross-shaped scar a little awry. "This one was not daydreaming. I just…I was thinking about something."

Kaoru tapped his shoulder with something hard, pressing Kenshin's sheathed sakabatō into his hands as he turned to her. He looked at her with some worry. Kaoru shrugged to dispel the tension, sighing languidly as she joined the table again. "I know you can't bear to part with your dear sword so just hug onto it. You don't need to show such courtesy around us anyway."

Kenshin smiled, attaching the sakabatō safely to his obi belt. "Thank you, Kaoru-dono. But this isn't the dojo. I have to make an effort to oblige to courtesy in the Aoiya. I don't want to be rude."

"You've literally been carrying a giant-ass sword everyday for over ten years since the sword ban…Just saying," Sano said. He lifted his tea to sip it, forgetting that it was empty and currently all over his leg.

"Yes. But besides that. This one doesn't wish to be too big a burden. I did not think we'd be back here so soon, that I did not," he mused, soft smile playing on his lips.

The last time they'd come here, they had travelled fractured, each going their own way until they converged in the middle of a plot against the country. The Kyoto Inferno that wasn't. It was there that their friendship and family had strengthened the bonds that would tie them together forever. Now, they were headed to Kyoto again, but this time together.

"What are you so worried about, Ken-san?" Megumi piped up.

"Pardon?"

"You've been out of it for quite a while. Not all of us are half brain-dead," Megumi stated, eyes flitting accusatorially to Sano for a moment, who opened his mouth to protest.

"Oh, it's nothing of concern, forgive me for putting you at unease." Kenshin said it like he'd practiced the line. And Sano closed his mouth, opting to stare at whatever was up with him instead of retorting at Megumi.

"This one was just thinking of his Shishou," Kenshin admitted. All the eyes on him relaxed, though only meagrely.

"Gods," Sano rolled his eyes, "If you were just about to tell us you had thirty days to live, I wouldn't even have damn-well questioned it. What's up with your Shishou now?"

What do you mean now? Kenshin thought, but did not voice. "N-no, Sano." He slumped a little, looking at the edge of his teacup intently. "…My Shishou lives near Kyoto. He must have heard of these allegations. I wonder what he'll think of my return. I wonder what he thinks of me."

Yahiko put his fist down onto the table, jostling all the remaining cups on it, the used dishes. "What do you mean?! You saying that he'll suspect you?"

"Pipe down Yahiko!"

"Kami, Yahiko — I still wanted to eat that—"

Kenshin swallowed, smiling at them all about to fight over the table over this.

"Kenshin, we're not leaving until we clear your name. So you don't have to do the long face," Yahiko continued. "And if Hiko is too stupid to see that you've come here to help, not kill people, then that's his loss. Who needs him!"

Kenshin's eyes widened. Losing Hiko's good grace would probably be the very least of his problems, if he was really convinced of Kenshin's guilt. Privately, Kenshin looked away, feeling that loss deeply even though he wasn't yet sure of its reality.

The Kamiya Dojo had gotten a letter, a week ago. An official letter with a Kyoto police seal on it, stamped with a sun insignia, specifically transferred and delivered by the Tokyo force. But inside was not a neatly printed, government-sanctioned notice. It had been a personal letter, handwritten and short. It had been signed with a cryptic 'one,' but Kenshin had already guessed who it was just by the blunt frankness of the letter, without hedging words or a line more than required to get the point across. One.

To the layman, it would have looked like nothing more than a number.

But Kenshin knew that this particular stroke was able to, and should be read, as Hajime.

Kaoru walked over to sit next to Kenshin, still deep in thought. "As much as I hate to admit it…Yahiko is right."

"What?" Yahiko said, temporarily stopping his Sano-hair-pulling.

"Oh for the love of Kyoto!" Kaoru said loudly, and Kenshin grinned as he cupped a hand over his ear.

"You said I was right. Say it again! I'm right!"

"No, I only said—"

"Admit it Kaoru, you said I was right!"

"Don't be such an immature—"

"Did you hear that, Kenshin, she said I was right."

Kenshin backed away to stand as Yahiko forgot his bickering with Sano in favour of his bickering with Kaoru. "I'm fine, everybody," Kenshin finally said, and they all stopped jabbering. "No, I'm more than fine. Thank you all for coming this time to Kyoto. Again. It's a lot to ask and understand that. Thank you. Truly."

"Stop right there, Kenshin," Sano said urgently, throwing up a finger to point at him. "You're not bowing to us. You're not—"

Kenshin dipped his head, short and polite.

"For god's sake—"

"Did you really have to say that? We have children here."

"We're doing this for you and we're doing this together, why can't you just accept it without being so nice about it!"

Kenshin just sighed at them.

It had started slowly. Strange murders happening in Kyoto. Of disembodied gang members and criminals being sliced apart. Perhaps a hostile takeover. Perhaps just every day killings. As time went on and more and more bodies piled up, investigations made it clear that this was no gang or clan warfare. All these bodies had been products of targeted attacks. But they had been singular, one body found after the other. The latest one had been found in a batch, and identified for the first time as the fruits of one single person using a swift, deadly style for one to fight many.

"Kenshin," Kaoru piped up. Kenshin smiled brightly at her, brows lifting. But Kaoru frowned, looking serious. "There's no plausible way for these killings to have happened by your hand, anyway. No matter what the Kyoto police say — there's no reason for you to be suspected. Forget us, even Hiko Seijuro would know."

She touched a hand upon his. Kenshin looked down. He didn't know when he'd started a death grip on his sakabatō, but he let go, holding onto Kaoru as she gently pulled him away from it.

"He'll know, don't worry."

Kenshin sighed softly. "I know. I know, Kaoru-dono, there is no way. There's only one thing that is weighing on my mind amidst all of this, and it's something I must consider." Kaoru's hand tightened over his.

"Shut up, Kenshin. Saito could be wrong. Hell — he's just plain wrong. Why are we listening to the likes of his ass anyway?" Sano got up too, pacing around the room once before leaning against a wall. "There are only two people who know the Hiten Mitsurugi." He wagged a finger around. "And that's you," he popped a second finger up, "and that shishou of yours."

Sano sunk back into his seat, hands leisurely supporting the nape of his neck. "Do the math."

"Yes, Sanosuke," Kenshin agreed. "Our plan," he started, replying to the earlier comment, and Sano turned his head to listen, "Is for me to give myself up to the central police, and see Saito to help us find the culprit. I know Saito Hajime. And Saito Hajime knows me."

He lifted his head, smile on his lips growing fainter and colder. "Saito knows death by the Hiten Mitsurugi. And I do not doubt him."


Clinks sounded every time he stepped a foot in front of the other, of porcelain touching porcelain, but it was not an annoyance as he'd come to associate it with booze. A lot of booze. A hearty, generous amount of booze. Booze that will last him months without having to leave the sanctity of his hut. He'd let vermin get into his storage room and he couldn't trust any of the sake he'd made lest they were dipped in rat's claws. He wouldn't be able to survive making more from scratch and waiting for it to be drinkable. There was simply no time. Hiko Seijuro needed alcohol immediately.

After a couple weeks trip up into Osaka, Hiko Seijuro the Thirteenth had come back with jugs of good sake on his hands and more jugs hanging on his belt under his cloak. He sauntered across the dusty road back to Kyoto city, keen to get back to his isolated mountain where he didn't have to interact with any more people than he could stand. He'd walked methodically until he reached the outskirts of town, when he came across a rather weathered and run down buddha statue.

Hiko stopped in his tracks, switched a particularly handsome jug of sake from right hand to left, and tipped his head at the statue. "All I need is an uneventful trip back and a rest in my house," he muttered more to himself than the statue, loosening the lid of his prized jug to take a sip. Cicadas sang around him, long grass swayed easily in the wind.

On cue, what looked like a raggedy piece of newspaper flew through the air and slapped itself loudly over the face of the buddha. Hiko paused his sipping. Shortly, he plugged his jug with the cork. As he did, one of his brows lifted up in contemplation, wondering briefly if he was to allow a buddha to be desecrated by shitty, sensationalist Kyoto news. Hiko had already resumed uncorking the lid again when he sighed dejectedly. "Haah." He bobbed down, peeling the paper off the statue and, on a whim, smoothed it out.

New Victims Named: Hitokiri Battousai confirmed returned to Kyoto.

Beyond the Bloodbath — the Bakumatsu's ghost haunts us all.

The new victims of the nefarious hitokiri have been confirmed to be Hakota Ya—

Hiko's angry ki began to vaporise the edges of the paper, searing a hole over Hakota Whoever's name so that he couldn't get through the list and see whether it was anyone important that had fallen prey to the provincial press.

Then the initial rage fell away as he suddenly and rationally thought, My deshi lives in Tokyo.

Hiko took a breath of air, squinting at the lines again to see who had died this time, lest it was anyone who bought his pottery or sold him candles who fell and he'd have to rethink his current business model. The police loved to tout the success of the permanent sword ban, but what had they really achieved when they let madmen run around stabbing people at random? It seemed this problem had gotten worse since he left on his trip. He folded what was left of the paper and slipped it under his cloak.

"I'll be taking this," Hiko said gruffly to no one in particular — the buddha statue, he supposed.


Notes.

I started writing this fic in 2017. It was slow going, but I'd work on it here and there and I enjoyed writing it :) However, once the news about Watsuki being a straight up pedophile dropped, I lost all motivation to write this. Three of my other fics, "How the war was fought ten years ago," "Careless Men" and "Gentle boys who go to war" were all segments of this fic that I repurposed to post standalone.

But I've read lots of beautiful unfinished fic. I was better for reading it than not seeing it at all. Even though those fics remain unfinished, I'd be so sad if they were never there in the first place. So I decided to post this for anyone who did want to peruse. Even if it's just to archive it here. (I've mostly moved to ao3 under an_earl.)

Also, the time travel in this fic is taken straight from the movie 'A Boy and His Samurai,' ちょんまげぷりん Chonmage Purin/ Chonmage Pudding - a 2010 Japanese time travel comedy. I just needed an excuse for the time travel to happen and this silly movie provided it for me!