He had first seen her at the market. She'd been dressed in crimson with
her hair pulled back into a thin dark braid against her back, peeking out
from beneath the hat she wore to shield her eyes from the afternoon sun's
glare.
She had been feeling different fruit to see what was ripe and what was not. Under the guise of doing the same, he had watched her as they came closer and closer. Finally, seemingly by chance, his hand brushed against her's as they both reached for the same apple.
"Oh!" She looked up and he was startled by her eyes. Where he'd be prepared to meet brown glittered greenish yellow, "Was that your apple?"
"No," He shook his head, taken by her beauty. Until now he'd thought such beauty only exists within books of mythology, "Excuse, I was just...I've never seen anyone so..."
She waited, seemingly curious at to what he was about to say, one delicate dark brow lifted slightly.
"Beautiful." He breathed, and just then remembered his manners and bowed to her formally, "Please pardon me! My name is Yoshi..."
"Kioko," She smiled, looking away for a moment, then, quite unexpectedly, she reached across the fruit to grasp his hands, "I am so happy to meet you, Yoshi-san, but I cannot linger..."
She indicated the group of young women chatting amiably on the corner, waiting for her. There were three in all. "My sisters are waiting for me," She explained, feeling a strange ache in her breast when the young man had gripped her eyes within his own.
"Wait!" He spoke softly, not allowing her to go just yet, "Have dinner with me. Please."
"I don't..." She shook her head, uncertain as to what was the right thing to do, surely her sisters would disapprove! "I...have to go now..."
"Please?"
She nodded and he let her go, smiling. She fought the urge to giggle like a schoolgirl and ran off to join her waiting siblings. They had pretended not to notice the handsome young man who had approached their little sister but as soon as they'd flanked her once more they began with their questions.
Mina was the first to start, as always, being the eldest and left in charge after their parents' deaths. Even though all her sisters were very nice looking, none were as beautiful as Kioko, and, having had very modern- thinking parents, neither girl had been claimed by a husband yet.
The only one who seemed not to care about this was Kioko, to the others finding a husband was the most wonderful thing that could ever happen to a girl.
"Who is he, Kioko?" Mina asked, slipping her arm about her little sister's waist, "We saw him eyeing you from across the street!"
"Hmph!" Hot-tempered Ami tossed her dark hair over her shoulder, "He probably just wanted the time. Kioko could never catch a man's eye for more than a few moments...once he found out what freak she was he'd run away screaming."
As she laughed cruelly, Kioko narrowed her eyes at her spiteful older sister. It was true that while she was not all human and they were, she did have feelings and Ami, being envious of Kioko's beauty and grace, often sought ways in which to speak barbs that stung. Mina reached over and hit Ami across the shoulder, "Be quiet!"
"He asked me to dinner," Kioko said quietly, "But I can't go!"
"Why not?" Kiku asked, she was the sweet one whom everyone babied, even though she was only a few years older than Kioko, "He was certainly good looking and the way he pretended to touch the apple you held by accident! How romantic!"
"Oh, hush, you!" Ami said, "We all know why she can't go through with it, don't we? Have you forgotten, Kioko, your going to be married in three days!"
Kioko grew silent. She had not forgotten. She'd just shoved the thought to the back of her mind. She did not wish to be married, to be tied down to some man's wants and needs, cooking his meals, baring his brats. No, she longed for freedom to continue her training, to come and go as she willed and not have to answer to anyone, least of all some man!
"You know how I feel about that, Ami," She said coldly, turning on her heel, the dust from the path kicked up, "I am not getting married and I will never get married and that is that!"
Without waiting for any of them to speak, she lifted her feet and ran gracefully swift down the path, leaving them far behind to gape after her.
"Hmph!" She heard Ami with her sensitive ears, "She'll never be able to keep a husband with that attitude!"
~*~*~
Master Splinter drew himself back to the present. He only recalled those scenes in which he, himself had been in, but he remembered Kioko telling him about the walk home with her sisters and what they had spoken of between themselves after he'd asked her out to have dinner with him.
"So, Your telling us that you knew Amiko's mother, when she was younger?" Donatello asked, serving to bring Splinter's thoughts even farther from the past, "Was she...a...friend of yours, Sensei?"
Splinter nodded his ancient head, "Yes, It's been many years since I've thought of the girl she used to be, though..."
~*~*~
"Saki, please!" Kioko screamed, her voice barely reaching past the whispered state as she gripped the bars of her prison weakly, trying to drag herself upright and failing to do so, "If you've ever loved me...let me out!"
She sobbed and her tears mingled with the dried and crackled blood upon her face.
Seated at the control console, trying his best to ignore Krang's constant nasally whine, The Shredder winced at the sound of his prisoner's cries, even so softly he could hear them in the near still-ness of their underground battle station. His head ached and his heart felt little worse, pounding as it was beneath the metal of his armor.
His eyes closed as he thought of the distant past...a past he thought had been forever forgotten...at least so he had tried...
He was walking through the streets that day. Head high and stance aloof as he feared no one or anything in the same village. He was the second best in his class of would-be fighters and succeeded nearly all he'd set out to do. He longed to be the best. In all. His thoughts upon finally besting the one who claimed the title of being better than he, he strolled the streets, paying little attention to the people he scattered before him rather than stopping to allow them passage.
A voice caught his attention and he paused, eyes drawn towards the sound.
"Have dinner with me. Please."
He narrowed his dark eyes, recognizing the voice and fighting off the sudden urge to break into a run towards the other man and pound his face in. Then, just as suddenly, his dark gaze was caught up by the most alluring set of womanly curves he'd ever glimpsed. As if in slow motion, she turned her head and the hat upon her head lifted a bit to reveal her wondrous green eyes and kind soft mouth as she half-smiled away from the man she was speaking with.
"She's so...perfect..." He breathed, and decided that he should be the one to court her, if anyone, and as he watched her leaving with the group of girls, none could match her in looks or grace he noticed, he made up his mind to pay a visit to her family home. "I'll not allow anyone to touch her but me!"
He showed up at her house later that night, but found himself too taken by her to approach her right away. He needed time to think, to plan, to watch her and decide exactly how he should speak to her.
A good warrior takes the time to prepare before battle, he found himself thinking, as he watched from a secluded area between the garden walls and the main house. He often thought of things in terms of war and combat, even things as unwarlike as love.
So, he watched as Yoshi came for her and they left to have dinner together and waited for them to return. He watched as she allowed him to kiss her cheek and blushed slightly as he said his goodnights to her. He felt his blood boil that he should be allowed to mar to perfect face with his mouth and growled low in his throat his rage and hatred towards the other man.
"I see you dead, Yoshi-san!" He growled, a little louder than he had intended, for she turned from her door and looked around, fear in her eyes, dark with the shadows of the night.
"Who's there?" She asked, sniffing the air, she turned until she faced his hiding place, smiling slightly, "I know you're there! Come out now!"
"You think you know much," He spoke, his voice did not shake as he thought it might, his heart still beat loudly beneath his breast, "How can you not know that I am not someone not to be trusted. Perhaps I've come to ravage you and leave you for dead for your sisters to find in the morning. Maybe it wouldn't be so wise to be calling out to shadows in the middle of the night."
For some reason he was enjoying toying with her. She laughed and sat down on the step, saying; "If that were so, than why did you wait until after we got back from our date, why not just spring out and kill my companion and whisk me away to do as you pleased with ease enough to take your time? Why wait all night in the bushes 'til my return?"
She knew I was here?! He asked himself, but to her he replied, "Perhaps I just didn't want to bother with having to deal with...him."
She seemed to think about that for a moment, nodding, "Perhaps."
And so they kept up their conversation, well into the wee hours, only when she began to yawn did he think to even ask her name.
"It's Kioko," She said, smiling, "You would have known that all ready had you been more observant."
"How can I pay attention to words," He said, in mock offense, "When being around someone of such comeliness tends to clog all the senses..."
After a bit, she told him that she had to go inside but begged for him to come out of the shadows so that she could at least see the one with whom she'd been conversing with for the past few hours. But he refused. She pouted prettily, but did not argue. She turned and walked into the house instead. He was left smiling to himself before he decided it was time to leave as well.
Little did he know, she had paused in the hallway towards her room to lean against the wall and smile. She had rarely had a conversation with anyone, male or female, that was so stimulating. Oh, Yoshi-san was nice and they spoke of many interesting things and she really, honestly enjoyed his company....
"Please!"
He was brought of his thoughts by her cries. He shook his head, mentally denying her in his heart and thoughts. There would be no mercy for her, he thought cruelly, a man much changed from the one she had spoken with that night long ago, After how she betrayed me so...No mercy!
He stood up and sweeping his cloak behind him, found his way to his private quarters, away from her desperate wails.
"No mercy!"
She had been feeling different fruit to see what was ripe and what was not. Under the guise of doing the same, he had watched her as they came closer and closer. Finally, seemingly by chance, his hand brushed against her's as they both reached for the same apple.
"Oh!" She looked up and he was startled by her eyes. Where he'd be prepared to meet brown glittered greenish yellow, "Was that your apple?"
"No," He shook his head, taken by her beauty. Until now he'd thought such beauty only exists within books of mythology, "Excuse, I was just...I've never seen anyone so..."
She waited, seemingly curious at to what he was about to say, one delicate dark brow lifted slightly.
"Beautiful." He breathed, and just then remembered his manners and bowed to her formally, "Please pardon me! My name is Yoshi..."
"Kioko," She smiled, looking away for a moment, then, quite unexpectedly, she reached across the fruit to grasp his hands, "I am so happy to meet you, Yoshi-san, but I cannot linger..."
She indicated the group of young women chatting amiably on the corner, waiting for her. There were three in all. "My sisters are waiting for me," She explained, feeling a strange ache in her breast when the young man had gripped her eyes within his own.
"Wait!" He spoke softly, not allowing her to go just yet, "Have dinner with me. Please."
"I don't..." She shook her head, uncertain as to what was the right thing to do, surely her sisters would disapprove! "I...have to go now..."
"Please?"
She nodded and he let her go, smiling. She fought the urge to giggle like a schoolgirl and ran off to join her waiting siblings. They had pretended not to notice the handsome young man who had approached their little sister but as soon as they'd flanked her once more they began with their questions.
Mina was the first to start, as always, being the eldest and left in charge after their parents' deaths. Even though all her sisters were very nice looking, none were as beautiful as Kioko, and, having had very modern- thinking parents, neither girl had been claimed by a husband yet.
The only one who seemed not to care about this was Kioko, to the others finding a husband was the most wonderful thing that could ever happen to a girl.
"Who is he, Kioko?" Mina asked, slipping her arm about her little sister's waist, "We saw him eyeing you from across the street!"
"Hmph!" Hot-tempered Ami tossed her dark hair over her shoulder, "He probably just wanted the time. Kioko could never catch a man's eye for more than a few moments...once he found out what freak she was he'd run away screaming."
As she laughed cruelly, Kioko narrowed her eyes at her spiteful older sister. It was true that while she was not all human and they were, she did have feelings and Ami, being envious of Kioko's beauty and grace, often sought ways in which to speak barbs that stung. Mina reached over and hit Ami across the shoulder, "Be quiet!"
"He asked me to dinner," Kioko said quietly, "But I can't go!"
"Why not?" Kiku asked, she was the sweet one whom everyone babied, even though she was only a few years older than Kioko, "He was certainly good looking and the way he pretended to touch the apple you held by accident! How romantic!"
"Oh, hush, you!" Ami said, "We all know why she can't go through with it, don't we? Have you forgotten, Kioko, your going to be married in three days!"
Kioko grew silent. She had not forgotten. She'd just shoved the thought to the back of her mind. She did not wish to be married, to be tied down to some man's wants and needs, cooking his meals, baring his brats. No, she longed for freedom to continue her training, to come and go as she willed and not have to answer to anyone, least of all some man!
"You know how I feel about that, Ami," She said coldly, turning on her heel, the dust from the path kicked up, "I am not getting married and I will never get married and that is that!"
Without waiting for any of them to speak, she lifted her feet and ran gracefully swift down the path, leaving them far behind to gape after her.
"Hmph!" She heard Ami with her sensitive ears, "She'll never be able to keep a husband with that attitude!"
~*~*~
Master Splinter drew himself back to the present. He only recalled those scenes in which he, himself had been in, but he remembered Kioko telling him about the walk home with her sisters and what they had spoken of between themselves after he'd asked her out to have dinner with him.
"So, Your telling us that you knew Amiko's mother, when she was younger?" Donatello asked, serving to bring Splinter's thoughts even farther from the past, "Was she...a...friend of yours, Sensei?"
Splinter nodded his ancient head, "Yes, It's been many years since I've thought of the girl she used to be, though..."
~*~*~
"Saki, please!" Kioko screamed, her voice barely reaching past the whispered state as she gripped the bars of her prison weakly, trying to drag herself upright and failing to do so, "If you've ever loved me...let me out!"
She sobbed and her tears mingled with the dried and crackled blood upon her face.
Seated at the control console, trying his best to ignore Krang's constant nasally whine, The Shredder winced at the sound of his prisoner's cries, even so softly he could hear them in the near still-ness of their underground battle station. His head ached and his heart felt little worse, pounding as it was beneath the metal of his armor.
His eyes closed as he thought of the distant past...a past he thought had been forever forgotten...at least so he had tried...
He was walking through the streets that day. Head high and stance aloof as he feared no one or anything in the same village. He was the second best in his class of would-be fighters and succeeded nearly all he'd set out to do. He longed to be the best. In all. His thoughts upon finally besting the one who claimed the title of being better than he, he strolled the streets, paying little attention to the people he scattered before him rather than stopping to allow them passage.
A voice caught his attention and he paused, eyes drawn towards the sound.
"Have dinner with me. Please."
He narrowed his dark eyes, recognizing the voice and fighting off the sudden urge to break into a run towards the other man and pound his face in. Then, just as suddenly, his dark gaze was caught up by the most alluring set of womanly curves he'd ever glimpsed. As if in slow motion, she turned her head and the hat upon her head lifted a bit to reveal her wondrous green eyes and kind soft mouth as she half-smiled away from the man she was speaking with.
"She's so...perfect..." He breathed, and decided that he should be the one to court her, if anyone, and as he watched her leaving with the group of girls, none could match her in looks or grace he noticed, he made up his mind to pay a visit to her family home. "I'll not allow anyone to touch her but me!"
He showed up at her house later that night, but found himself too taken by her to approach her right away. He needed time to think, to plan, to watch her and decide exactly how he should speak to her.
A good warrior takes the time to prepare before battle, he found himself thinking, as he watched from a secluded area between the garden walls and the main house. He often thought of things in terms of war and combat, even things as unwarlike as love.
So, he watched as Yoshi came for her and they left to have dinner together and waited for them to return. He watched as she allowed him to kiss her cheek and blushed slightly as he said his goodnights to her. He felt his blood boil that he should be allowed to mar to perfect face with his mouth and growled low in his throat his rage and hatred towards the other man.
"I see you dead, Yoshi-san!" He growled, a little louder than he had intended, for she turned from her door and looked around, fear in her eyes, dark with the shadows of the night.
"Who's there?" She asked, sniffing the air, she turned until she faced his hiding place, smiling slightly, "I know you're there! Come out now!"
"You think you know much," He spoke, his voice did not shake as he thought it might, his heart still beat loudly beneath his breast, "How can you not know that I am not someone not to be trusted. Perhaps I've come to ravage you and leave you for dead for your sisters to find in the morning. Maybe it wouldn't be so wise to be calling out to shadows in the middle of the night."
For some reason he was enjoying toying with her. She laughed and sat down on the step, saying; "If that were so, than why did you wait until after we got back from our date, why not just spring out and kill my companion and whisk me away to do as you pleased with ease enough to take your time? Why wait all night in the bushes 'til my return?"
She knew I was here?! He asked himself, but to her he replied, "Perhaps I just didn't want to bother with having to deal with...him."
She seemed to think about that for a moment, nodding, "Perhaps."
And so they kept up their conversation, well into the wee hours, only when she began to yawn did he think to even ask her name.
"It's Kioko," She said, smiling, "You would have known that all ready had you been more observant."
"How can I pay attention to words," He said, in mock offense, "When being around someone of such comeliness tends to clog all the senses..."
After a bit, she told him that she had to go inside but begged for him to come out of the shadows so that she could at least see the one with whom she'd been conversing with for the past few hours. But he refused. She pouted prettily, but did not argue. She turned and walked into the house instead. He was left smiling to himself before he decided it was time to leave as well.
Little did he know, she had paused in the hallway towards her room to lean against the wall and smile. She had rarely had a conversation with anyone, male or female, that was so stimulating. Oh, Yoshi-san was nice and they spoke of many interesting things and she really, honestly enjoyed his company....
"Please!"
He was brought of his thoughts by her cries. He shook his head, mentally denying her in his heart and thoughts. There would be no mercy for her, he thought cruelly, a man much changed from the one she had spoken with that night long ago, After how she betrayed me so...No mercy!
He stood up and sweeping his cloak behind him, found his way to his private quarters, away from her desperate wails.
"No mercy!"