Akaku Irozuku
"To Turn Red"

Rurouni Kenshin Fanfiction
by Laura Gilkey

*

From the hill overlooking it, Kyoto was a breathtaking sight, but walking down its commercial streets, it looked far more ordinary. The shifting patchwork of commuters' kimono, the shopkeepers shouting out the same wares as they would anywhere—Soujiro felt reassuringly grounded by the plainness of the moment as for him, both apprehensions about the future and memories of the past lurked around every corner.

He knew he had walked these streets before. Maybe something had happened, right around here... He didn't remember anything clearly, but the supposition was enough for the ghosts to flit across his mind. Policemen in the way of—what had it been, even? Ruby-red streams inching forward across the pavement, crimson blot in cloth starting to feather at the edges... The images were just flickers behind his eyes, barely connected, but surely ready to unite and spring on him if he actually came to that place and looked at it. Better to look at the kiosks ahead and smile at the flowers for sale and the smell of still-warm bread.

The walk itself was unexpected, though. Walking into the city off-guard and intending surrender, he had half-expected to be snapped up by the police within moments of setting foot in Kyoto again, but so far, no one seemed to recognize or notice him, and so it was up to him what to do next. Of course, he knew that by the end of the day, he would go to the police station and present himself if the freedom lasted that long, but in the meantime...

The meantime was so short, the city so full of possibilities, each one now bearing the allure of "last chance." After this short time, no telling what options might or might not be open.

His stomach growled from eating light on the road. He didn't really feel like food, but still, it was one last chance to have a nice meal in a restaurant. He'd have preferred Reiko-obachan's cooking, but that was already beyond possibility. When he'd lived in this area, the flavor of food had meant nothing to him. After waking up from that, everything seemed to taste good, so he still easygoing about it, but back then there was no such thing as a favorite dish, a favorite restaurant. Places to eat in Kyoto..., trying to think of one that was in any way significant...

Aoiya.

He laughed at himself aloud for even thinking it, but in the next moment, he knew it was a good idea. After all, he wasn't worried about avoiding detection. Like going back to his childhood home, surely it would be best to take this one last day here in Kyoto to settle accounts, although doing so now was even more frightening, to come face-to-face with old enemies, with people who not only knew about his sins but had been the ones harmed by them.

But now, having had the idea, he knew that it was best, and that he would feel deservedly guilty if he avoided it for the sake of his own comfort, so he set out for his chosen destination at a more purposeful pace.

**********

"Okina!" Masu called to him as Misao was walking past the kitchen with him. "I thought I should tell you, one of the customers was asking for Aoshi-sama."

"Who was it?" Misao asked, cutting forward.

"I don't know his name, but it's the man eating alone in the corner, with his arm in a sling.(1) I told him Aoshi-sama was gone and he seemed all right with it, but..."

"And he didn't say anything about what his business was?" Okina asked.

Masu shook her head.

Misao had already gone over to one of the doorways into the dining area, easing slowly into the angle where she could just see the corner booth. Even from across the room, a glimpse of the person's face was enough to make her back off with a gasp.

"Misao?" Okina noticed her reaction.

"Whatever he wants with Aoshi-sama, I'm sure it's nothing good," she said quietly, coming back over. "That's Seta Soujiro!"

"Ah! Shishio's...?" Masu asked.

Misao nodded. "The smiling psycho killer, yeah."

"I see," Okina said calmly. His voice was more serious and his eyes had narrowed slightly. "Misao, stay here."

"But—"

"Let me take care of this," he said, and set out for the corner of the dining room.

**********

Soujiro savored the tonkatsu slowly, chewing every bite with his eyes closed to appreciate the crisp breading of the pork and the gummy texture of well-cooked rice. He smiled contentedly at it.

The sound of footsteps came up beside his table and stopped on the other side of it. He opened his eyes to see a tall, straight old man with a bow in his pointed beard sit down across from him. "Do you mind if I sit here and talk with you?"

"Not at all," Soujiro said. "You're Kashiwazaki Nenji, called Okina, right?"

"That's right, Heaven-Sword Soujiro."

He laughed. "I knew you'd recognize me here. I don't want to cause you any trouble, really, I just want to eat, so if you wouldn't call the police just yet, I'd really appreciate it."

"I know that you didn't come here just for the food," Okina said. "This is the first time in over a year that you've been seen in Kyoto, and then you come here and ask to talk to Aoshi."

"Oh, that was..." Soujiro started, trailed off, and tried again. "I didn't mean to scare you. I just wanted to tell him one thing, before..."

"What?"

Soujiro looked down at his tonkatsu. "I just wanted to tell him that I was sorry. When he was involved with Shishio-san, the truth is, that was something I did, so..."

"So if we attack his restaurant, Aoiya—" Houji said.

"We can use that new torture thing to make him talk, right?" Soujiro surmised, smiling brightly as ever.

"What do you say?" Shishio asked Aoshi. "Do you care if we send your Okina to Hell?"

Soujiro started back, shaking his head to get free of the memory. "Sorry, I was distracted... But really, to you, too, and everyone here, I should apologize. Maybe it doesn't really do anything, for me to come here and say that, but..."

"At the least, you should look someone in the face when you say such a thing," Okina told him.

He laughed again, nervously. "That's right, isn't it?" The memory flash dragged at his bones, and it took a determined act of will and strength to lift his head and look the old man steadily in the eyes. "The things I did when I was with Shishio-san... Now I know that I was wrong, and everyone here was hurt by my mistake. I can't take it back, what I did, but I'm really sorry..."

Okina nodded. "I accept your apology."

Soujiro stared at him for a moment in disbelief before he let out his breath with one unsteady laugh and a sigh at the release of effort. "Thank you..."

"What is it that's going to happen?"

"Eh?"

"You said you wanted to tell Aoshi this 'before...' what?"

"Oh, before I go to jail," he said. "I came back to Kyoto to turn myself in to the police."

"I see. Because you've forsaken Shishio's way?"

"Eh? Well, it isn't quite like that," Soujiro said. "Really, I'm not even sure what I think now, about Shishio-san. He'll always be my master who saved my life. I'll always think of him as a great man. Now, though, I disagree with a lot of what he did and said, but if I want to live in a different way, I don't need the police to make me do it. It's just that I'm tired of being a fugitive. I don't want to just keep running from them by myself, so I have to turn myself in and face it. Even if it's twenty-five years in prison or something like that, I have to get to the other side of it..."

"Are you prepared for what might happen to you, if you put yourself in their hands?"

Soujiro paused for a moment, then nodded. "I heard what they did with everyone else, and just lately that they wanted to bargain with me. I'm sure it'll work out to something I could live with."

"I do hope so," Okina said.

Soujiro half-heartedly pushed the tonkatsu around on his plate with his chopsticks before putting one last piece in his mouth. He chewed it slowly—the taste was still just as good, but he found it difficult to swallow. "The food here is really delicious," he said when he had finally managed it.

"Thank you."

"...But I just don't feel like eating anymore, right now..."

"It's all right if you want to take your time," Okina told him. "Aoshi will be back before long and you could talk to him."

Soujiro shook his head slowly, and turned to face the glow of the nearby window. "I think I want to get outside and feel the sun and the breeze for awhile. Then I'll go to the police station." He turned back to face Okina. "How much is it?"

"Don't worry about it; I can add it to your tab."

"Areh?"

"And you can pay it, when you come here again," the old man told him, with a knowing smile.

Soujiro understood and smiled brightly. "Okay," he said, and stood. "For this, after everything, thank you so much." As Okina rose, Soujiro bowed to him deeply from the waist.

"You're welcome."

"So, I'll see you later," he said, and started for the door.

**********

Misao stole glances through the kitchen doorway as Okina and Soujiro spoke, but it was too far away to hear what they were saying over the bubbling, sizzling kitchen sounds, and she only caught Soujiro's occasional laughter—which hardly seemed like a good sign. At last, she looked out to find them both standing, and withdrew into the kitchen as Soujiro walked past.

The moment he was safely gone, she charged out into the dining room, where Okina was walking slowly toward her. "Jiya, what is it? What did he want Aoshi-sama for!?"

"He only wanted to leave a message," Okina said.

"What was it?"

"'I'm sorry.'"

Misao stared at him for a moment, then suddenly her face clamped tight in consternation. She whipped around and ran for the door, after Soujiro.

"Misao, wait!" Okina called after her, but she dashed out, unheeding.

Masu diffidently stepped out of the kitchen. "It looks like she thought you were the one apologizing."

**********

Soujiro was able to use the crowds milling around the street to buffer himself from the violent memories still threatening from every bend and alley, but before long, the noisy city began to feel stifling, and he knew he wanted more open air. Out in the forest... Well, one last time... He turned off the main busy streets in the familiar direction. The memory of the way from here to the shrine in the mountains had a strange sensation from over a year of disuse, but came back with total clarity.

As he walked out through the fading edge of the city, he knew that he was being followed. He was only able to catch slight glimpses of his "shadow," but it wasn't hard to recognize the unusual clothes of the girl he'd seen in the kitchen at Aoiya. That would be Makimachi Misao. Well, it's okay if she follows me. With a smile of slight amusement, he set out into the surrounding woods, but he was glad that he had already noticed her. How many "tails" had he bloodily severed in this forest? If the sensation of being followed had come upon him here, it would have touched those memories in a frightening way.

But as it was, he didn't care, and lifted his head to the cool autumn breeze as he walked leisurely. As he looked up, branches swayed slightly against the sky, their variegated leaves brushing with a dry rattle so abundant that it made that soft, soothing music. Even in this place, things like this were happening all the time, right in front of my face and I never saw it... On a whim, he walked over to one of the trunks and felt its rough bark, rubbing between his fingers and inhaling the earthy scent of the dust it left on his hand. Maybe his sword had nailed someone to this tree at some time in the past—several trees along this path had seen that happen—but now it was beautiful and ordinary, and didn't seem to be holding any grudges. He looked up and smiled, both at this view of the trunk reaching upward to the sky with boughs radiating out, and also at the thought of what Misao behind him must be thinking, watching him do this.

Some of the leaves hung within reach, and he found one that was still verdant green and held it, gently stroking it with his fingers for a moment and savoring its deep green color, its coolness and moisture, still clinging on amid the advancing autumn red and brown.

He remained aware of those sensations as he continued up toward the mountain, and the entire forest seemed very changed—but he knew it was himself that was very changed, and in fact the sensation felt all the more precious for the fact that the woods looked exactly the same, enough that he could coast along the remembered route. But as he came near the mountain, the familiarity faded and left him stranded, and he looked around curiously. I know I didn't take a wrong turn, but didn't the stone path start here...? Instead, he walked through thin underbrush and saplings in a swath between the taller trees, where the path would have been. It led him though an area growing back around charred husks of tree trunks, and into an unyielding wall of mountain stones.

It was all so strange, but the charred trees—that was from the fire that destroyed the fortress. I know it was here... He lifted his hand to the stone and found it rough and sharp-edged. Somewhere on the other side of these rocks had been that wide, tatami-floored room, filled with yellow-white light from the afternoon sun...

Soujiro gripped his head; his mind was blazing out of control as he looked up at Himura. "Your existence disgusts me! You're driving me crazy!! Even if it's right or wrong, I don't care!!!" he screamed. "This time I'm going to KILL YOU!!!"

Soujiro snapped back to attention as he heard a breath behind him, too deep in tone to be Misao. He whipped around and saw that someone had taken advantage of his distraction to come dangerously close. A tall man stood there, with slicked-back black hair and a battle-worn face. He wore a police uniform—and a katana.

"It isn't here anymore," Saitou said.

"Eh?"

"After you were all defeated, the government's policy became that Shishio Makoto had never existed, so this place also had to be erased. The entrance was blasted, what the fire had left of the six gates was pulled down and hauled away, and even the stones in the path here were pulled up and carried off. They tilled the ground and planted these trees to cover it. In ten years, it will look like nothing was ever here."

"Oh, really...?" Soujiro could see now that it was true, by the fresh roughness of the stones where the entrance had been, the thinness of the ground-cover where the path had been, thinner even than what had burned, and the too-regular size and spacing of the new trees. "Maybe it's better that way," he said, with a wistful smile at the rock. "But it's a little sad, for me... Like saying those ten years of my life never happened..."

Saitou raised an eyebrow when Soujiro uttered the word "sad." "If you ask them, they'd be happy to say that none of your life ever happened," he told him. "You were an idiot to come back here."

Soujiro shook his head. "Not really. It's fine with me that you found me. In fact, that's the reason why I came back here to Kyoto."

"Hm...?"

He offered his right hand, open and palm-up. "I surrender."

"I see." Saitou sized him up carefully, then seized his left hand, twisting the cloth sling as he raised it up and Soujiro cried in pain.

"These bones don't seem to be broken."

"It's the shoulder," Soujiro whined.

"Yes, that's right, isn't it, where Hakata's men shot you." But he still wrung out a scream and tears pulling Soujiro's arms behind his back to cuff his hands there, which also pulled the sling against his neck at an awkward angle. With a firm, painful press on the broken shoulder blade, Saitou was apparently satisfied, and he aimed Soujiro back toward the city and began pushing him foward at a walk.

Soujiro sighed in relief as he found a less painful position to situate his arms. Recovering his smile, he turned and shouted into the woods. "It's okay, Misao-san! He's got me! You can stop following me now!"

A crash sounded in the brush.

"Oh, you noticed the weasel, did you?" Saitou said.

Soujiro nodded. "But it's okay. The weather is so pretty today, even if I wasn't able to visit the old base, it was really nice to walk out here..."

**********

"You can stop following me now!"

In surprise, Misao lost her balance on the branch and fell into the bushes below.

"Oh, you noticed the weasel, did you?"

Why that...!! she growled internally. Her face burned with embarassment that they'd seen her, but still, better not to reveal herself outright. She watched quietly from the bushes until Saitou and Soujiro were gone before she emerged and started back along the same route Soujiro had used.

As she had come, she'd noted the tree he paused at, and she stopped there now and looked at it. She carefully scrutinized the trunk where he had touched it, looked over the ground at its foot and up into the boughs, but could find nothing unusual. She took hold of the low-hanging branch he had reached up to and pulled it down into the light where she could find the still-green leaf whose slight prickly texture had been rubbed smooth where Soujiro touched it. She plucked the leaf and stared at it, turning it over and over in the sunlight, but she couldn't see any kind of message in it, and continued back toward town with it still in her hand.

Seta Soujiro... What could he be up to? What kind of a plot could it be, that would include turning himself in to the police? He must be terribly sure of himself in that case. And how did it involve Aoshi-sama? Is he still thinking of the alliance he had with Shishio?

Her face was darkened, still trying to puzzle it out as she walked inward through the outskirts of Kyoto. Footsteps and a tall shadow came up beside her as she walked, and she looked up. "Ah, Aoshi-sama!"

"What's wrong, Misao?" he asked her.

"Seta Soujiro was at Aoiya asking for you," she said, her previous temper cooling into a tone of concern. "Jiya wouldn't tell me what he said, he just apologized to me, so..."

"So Tenken no Soujiro is here in Kyoto again..."

"I followed him up to the mountain where Shishio's base was, and he turned himself in to that psycho-cop Saitou. I wish I knew what he was planning..."

Aoshi stayed silent, just looking thoughtful.

"Nee, Aoshi-sama," Misao said, thinking to offer him the leaf. "Does this mean anything to you?"

"Hm?" He took it and looked closely at it as they walked. "Even at this time of year it's still fully green and hadn't begun to dry. From being picked and handled, it's wilting and becoming soft instead of breaking."

He handed it back to her and she could see what he meant. Holding it by the stem, the leaf drooped under its own weight and lay limp against her palm. "So..."

"That's all."

They walked together back to Aoiya, where Okina was waiting. "Okaerinasai," he said. "Misao, I told you to wait!"

"But Jiya—!"

"She said that Seta Soujiro left a message for me," Aoshi said.

"Yes, he did. An apology."

"Come on!" Misao protested. "Surely—"

"And what did you tell him?"

"I accepted it," Okina said.

Aoshi nodded. "Good," he said, and continued back into the inn.

Misao stood dumbstruck, watching him go as she began to work out what they'd said.

"You misunderstood, Misao," Okina explained. "He came here to say that he was sorry, because he had involved Aoshi with Shishio and caused us trouble."

"And you believed him!?" Misao bounced back incredulously.

Okina nodded. "And I don't envy him. When he spoke to me, his mind wandered for a moment, and his eyes had such a haunted look..."

"'Haunted look'...?"

"Do you remember Himura's face, just before he looked at his new Sakabatou?"

Misao nodded. She didn't think she could ever forget it.

"It was something like that," he said. "There are old sword-masters in mad-houses whose eyes look like that all the time, and I've seen its shadow cross Aoshi's face when he looks at me. I think sometimes he has to give in to it when he's off by himself." Okina started back inside, and Misao followed him quietly.

"I can accept an apology from anyone who has to go through their life with a feeling like that."

**********

Soujiro spent the night chained hand and foot, sitting in a corner of his maximum-security cell. Inside it was dark and cold, yet stifling, as the only window was the one in the heavy iron door, just the size and height for someone's eyes. His hands were bound behind his back again, so when his face inevitably itched, he had to rub it against the stone wall.

But altogether he didn't consider the situation too unpleasant. In fact, when Saitou had brought him in and told his colleagues who it was, they had all seemed unnerved by his cheery, uncomplaining demeanor as they applied the shackles and locked him up. But whatever they might think, he could still smile because he was genuinely satisfied that this was the next step forward, what he should be doing. Because of that, too, he had little difficulty situating himself comfortably enough in the corner, and he slept soundly through the night. Even when he woke, there was nothing else to do, and almost no light to announce the morning, so he sat and dozed until someone called him from the tiny window.

"Hey, you!"

Soujiro roused himself and looked up, moving carefully with his left shoulder sore from the previous day's rough handling. Even the narrow view through the door was enough to recognize Chou's one closed eye and headband, and Soujiro could see the first inch of his upward blonde hair. "Ah, Chou-san, it's been a long time, hasn't it? Good morning," he said with a yawn.

"Soujiro, it really is you, huh? Dammit!" he said. "Stupid brat! Do you know how much money you're gonna cost me?"

"Ehh??"

"I had bets going with three people that they wouldn't catch you!"

Soujiro laughed. "Well, you can tell them they didn't catch me really. I meant to give myself up, so maybe you won't lose money."

"You did wha—!?" Chou's other eye came open, and he slapped one black-gloved hand to his head. "Kid, that was fuckin' stupid."

He laughed again. "Maybe. But it worked out all right for you, didn't it?"

"Yeah, but—" Chou turned from the window as more footsteps approached in the hallway, and he spoke to someone else outside. "Geez, what are you doing here?"

A wizened voice answered amid the clanking of the door being unlocked. "I was asked to take some time away from my very important work, because they thought Seta-san would rather deal with a familiar face."

"Yeah, great, if it ain't Old Home Week..." Chou's voice faded down the corridor as the door groaned open.

Soujiro stood as he saw Saizuchi there, flanked by guards, and even his rather slight frame rose two feet above Saizuchi's bulbous, bald head. "Saizuchi-san, how have you been?"

"Oh, always so busy but well," he said. "And you're looking like your usual chipper self. Come on and let's see what to do with you."

The guards took Soujiro by the arms and led him behind Saizuchi, out from the cellblock. They passed by where Saitou sat at a battered desk surrounded by plain wooden chairs, and he glanced up at them briefly with his sharp eyes before turning back to his paperwork and his cigarette. Chou stood against a wall nearby and frowned at Soujiro as they passed, but not an angry frown.

Soujiro had little time to wonder about that before being led into a conference room; here the furnishings were very different. Stern faces watched from the shadows of their formal oil portraits. The room was lit only by a small glow rimming thick-curtained windows and a lamp on the large and polished dark wood desk, and the only sound was the ticking of a tall clock against one wall—it read quarter of nine. He was led across a richly-patterned rug and placed in a deep upholstered armchair in front of the desk while Saizuchi sat down behind it. The chair there was obviously taller, and with anyone else, it would have left Soujiro being looked down on, but as it was, it brought him and Saizuchi to eye-level with each other.

The old man clucked his tongue, and his voice creaked as ever like a rusty hinge. "We can't discuss things properly with your hands tied like that." The guards took the hint and unlocked his wrist-shackles, giving him the opportunity to stretch his right arm, but he left his compromised left arm resting against the chair-padding.

"Let's see now..." Saizuchi leafed through a conspicuously large sheaf of papers on the desk. "I must say, Soujiro, I knew you when we worked together, but seeing everything together in one place like this has been truly eye-opening. I never realized how much Shishio must have relied on you."

"Not really," Soujiro said, with a nervous laugh. "He would always just send me to do little things."

"And assassinating Okubo was a little thing? Here I have the names of probably a dozen more key government officials whose deaths are attributed to your skill. Altogether, you've committed more capital offenses than I have time to tell you."

"Ah, I guess so..."

Saizuchi put down the papers and pushed them aside. "But you've seen me and Chou here, and you're still smiling, so there's no point in threatening you with all of that, now, is there?" he said. "You know as well as I do that we're here to cut a deal, so let's get to business, shall we?"

Soujiro nodded; his hand tensed on his lap. His body felt full of energy for this, the step forward, in which direction? It was time to decide...

"It's all really very sensible," Saizuchi rattled on. "As they say, 'if you can't beat them, join them,' or maybe Shishio's way, the rule by the strongest, and we found out that's the government, eh? So the natural thing is to join the winning side. And for their part, they say 'waste not, want not.' It wasn't an easy thing, after killing Okubo especially, but they can let bygones be bygones with you, because who would want to waste the best assassin in Japan, after all?"

"Well, not anymore," Soujiro told him. "I haven't done that since I left Shishio-san..."

"Oh, don't worry. I'm sure you'll be surprised how quickly it all comes back to you."

"No, I mean—" he started to protest. That energy had suddenly frozen inside him, and it gave him a strange, paralyzed feeling. "I mean, I don't kill people anymore. I'm just not that kind of person, since then."

Saizuchi stared at him for a long moment, thoughtfully twisting one of the four tendrils of his mustache. "That's a problem," he said simply.

Soujiro felt his heart falter, but caught himself and laughed it off. "Come on, don't sound so serious!" he said. "I came here because I wanted to work something out instead of causing trouble. That's just a little thing to work around. If I don't want to hurt or kill anyone, that's a good thing, isn't it?"

"Well, what else are you good for?" Saizuchi asked him.

Soujiro's face fell, and he was jolted with a feeling that at first brushed the edge of anger, but retreated into hot shame as he was tongue-tied for an answer. What he did best... He already knew that being good at hospitality service wouldn't carry much leverage. Back in Tomi's hometown came closer. "Well, I've worked as a guard..."

Saizuchi laughed once aloud before pointedly catching himself. "Soujiro, you're an enemy of the state. You were Shishio's right hand of death that had these politicians too spooked to move against him, and they still remember that fear. Do you think they're going to trust you to guard them?"

He saw the point, but he couldn't believe the way he was being steered. Surely that's not the only way... Surely... "I'd be happy to work with the police, like Saitou-san or Chou-san..."

"Asking them to bargain for a cop who refuses to kill anyone..." Saizuchi sighed with intentional weariness, and pulled the pile of papers back in front of him. "I don't think you realize the position you're in here. I told you, they're still angry about Okubo and the others they lost, and not even just to you directly. You're the closest thing to Shishio they have left to put the blame on. To some degree, he and Houji died and left the whole thing on your head."

"Ehh!?" he struggled to make sense of it. "But all of that— I didn't... That's not fair!"

"I agree, but the dead can speak very loudly," the old man said. "The government is willing to put that aside to have the Tenken for their own, but to them, forgoing your proverbial crucifixion is a high enough price to pay. They're not going to deny themselves revenge in exchange for you taking it easy," he pointed out with condescension.

But that tone wasn't surprising. Soujiro wouldn't have expected Saizuchi to understand what it meant to him, how right it felt to have tried Kenshin's way, to give up killing forever and instead to live his life and share it, protecting Tomi, helping Ojisan and Obachan with any simple daily task, back in Yokohama, at his home—which now felt a million miles away. But to cling to whatever little bit of that gift he still could... "I'd even be happy to go to prison, if that's what—"

"Oh, you won't go to prison, I can promise you that," Saizuchi said. The words had a wicked edge.

"But, Anji-oshou—"

"Was a completely different case."

Unable to smile, Soujiro took several deep breaths, trying to build his courage to speak, but inside he still trembled, as if those breaths were just enough to keep him from collapse. At last the threw himself into it—such a terrifying question, but he had to know... "So you're saying there's no other choice at all? That I have to either be their assassin, or be executed?"

"Oh, I doubt that you would rate an execution as such." Saizuchi said it as calmly and lightly as morning gossip—especially remembering past experience with him, Soujiro had the sickening impression that he was enjoying himself. "As I said earlier, with Shishio and Yumi dead in the mountains and Houji cutting his own throat last year, you're the only one of the 'inner circle' still left among the living, and it's not quite a dead issue, even with Shishio gone. If they can't have Japan's most skilled assassin, they can at least have some of Shishio's secrets to put in their book, so for you, I'm guessing interrogation and truth serum, and when they decide they've exhausted those possibilities, then they'll see what choice bits they can squeeze out of you while they torture you to death."

Soujiro collapsed back into the chair, pressing his left hand into the cushion behind his back while his right hand dangled over one of the plush armrests. That surge of energy had entirely left him; if he'd taken a step forward, it had carried him over the edge of a pit and he was falling...

"So?" Saizuchi queried.

But he was too overcome to speak. Neither his body nor his mind would move. All he could fathom was the harsh chopping sound of the tall clock meting out the seconds he lay there, until he numbly turned his head to look at its face.

Ten minutes had passed since he'd entered this room. Ten minutes ago he had sat down in this chair with a hopeful smile—it seemed unbelievable. But then, such things happened, didn't they? Okubo Toshimichi, when he realized the carriage's door-handle was turning, he'd been saying something hopeful in a way, focused on saving Japan from Shishio, and less than two minutes later he was dead. Soujiro remembered it, the sensation of that man's lips and whiskers grasped in his left hand—he clenched that fist and pressed harder on it with his back, blindly almost-trying to cause it pain.

To go back to that place, to do such things again... The thought of it flung his mind to another image entirely: Kotori-san falling from the tree, Kotori-san falling from the window, Kotori-san's broken body laying in the street. It had been a devastating sensation, even through his handkerchief, picking her up with her bright black eyes and twittering song smashed into a lump of twisted meat and shattered bones... She had been the one to give him such a horrific and precious lesson—or was it a reminder?—of what it really meant to kill. Even just a little bird, what it meant... Never, never, never again...

What was it Anji-oshou had said? That there was a story about the Buddha becoming a rabbit and feeding himself to a hungry tiger. 'You could have chosen to die'... Surely, even that would be better... But...

He had told Junzo-ojisan that he would come back when he could. He had told Tomi that they would go back there, go back home together. Everyone, I'm sorry... I have to break my promise... But there was nothing for it anyway. It was such a gift that it had been too much to ask, to be accepted having been a killer in a forsaken past. How could he go back to them if he accepted this devil's bargain and dragged that back into the present? Better just to disappear, to hope that they would forget him and move on...

Maybe he had been stupid, to bring himself to this moment, but wasn't it worth it, for that brief slice of heaven? Wasn't it better, a few months of that, than a lifetime of survival of the fittest? Yes, it had caught up to him in the end, endangering everyone around him and almost costing a bullet in Tomi's head, but now, he could face even this to protect them. Even this would be better...

"Are you all right?" Saizuchi asked.

"It's okay," Soujiro said, very softly, not moving a muscle except to speak.

"You were so quiet, I thought maybe you'd fainted."

"I mean, what you said," he breathed.

"Ah, so you'll accept the job, then," he surmised brightly.

"No," Soujiro said. He didn't even have the energy to shake his head, but he managed a tiny smile. "Even if I have to die, it's okay. Shishio-san is gone, so I don't have to worry about keeping his secrets... If my life is over anyway, it doesn't really matter... how much it hurts..."

A long pause. Soujiro still lay staring at the clock as the second hand crested twelve and started down the side of the fourteenth minute—one minute until nine.

Saizuchi clucked his tongue. "You're a stupid boy. I don't know why you're so stubborn about this. The people you're putting your neck in the noose for are the scum of the earth, you know."

"Kind of like you and me, eh, Saizuchi-san?"

He shut the cover that was struggling to hold his pile of papers together. "If this is the way you want to do it, it's your decision. Take him back to his cell," he told the guards. "It'll probably be a day or two before they're ready to get to work on you."

**********

When he'd looked over it, Chou flipped the edges of the report with his thumb. "Guess I'll check this out, then," he said, but as he was turning to leave, he stopped and looked around at the sound of the conference room door, and he watched the guards lead Soujiro back to his cell. In fifteen minutes, he'd gone from bright-eyed cheer to downcast silence, and didn't look up as they led him away.

Chou rolled his papers up in his hand and went into the conference room, where Saizuchi was arranging papers on the desk out of an overextended file-cover and poring over them.

"That's gotta be some kinda record."

Saizuchi looked up. "Oh, I'm not finished with him yet. I thought this would just be open-and-shut and I'd have the day off, but now it seems I'll have to put my considerable mind to it..."

"What the hell did you tell him?"

"Death by slow torture," the old man said with an unconcealed grin. "I was sure he'd decide to take the job instead of that, but no. I can't imagine what's going through his mind."

Chou sighed and frowned. "Looks like Himura Battousai gave him the whole head-job."

"Such an expressive face, I could hardly believe it!" Saizuchi crowed. "There's something more to this, something he's desperate to protect. Once I find that key, we can have anything at all we want, and that should be simple enough. I just need to do the reading, and he has food for thought in the meantime... This will be a lot more fun than open-and-shut." His smirk twisted into a frown at the papers. "It's not enough light for these old eyes... Draw the curtains, will you?" he said without looking up. "Oh, and tell the guards—"

"Do it yourself, shithead!" Chou snapped. "I ain't your fuckin' errand boy!!" He stormed out of the room, loudly slamming the door behind him.

**********

"Yo!" Sanosuke greeted as he entered the gate of the dojo, carrying Tomi on his shoulder.

"We're back!" she said, waving a few sheets of paper.

"Okaerinasai," Kaoru answered. "Ah, Tomi-chan, are these your lessons?"

Tomi nodded as Sano let her down. "Did Soujiro-oniichan come while I was gone?"

"No, not yet."

She frowned. "I hoped maybe he'd be here, so I could show him what I wrote at school..."

"I'm sure he'll be back soon," Kaoru assured her. "It's just that Kyoto is a long way away. It'll take awhile for him to get there and back."

"I know, but..." She peeked at her papers, holding them close to her chest.

"Can I see?" Kaoru asked her, and looked over her shoulder at the unbalanced-but-clear characters. "That looks good," she said. "Let's save these so Soujiro can see them all when he gets here."

"Okay!"

As they talked, Sano walked over to where Kenshin was cooking lunch and sat down on the porch nearby.

"It looks like you had a good morning," Kenshin said.

"Yeah," Sano answered. "She was kind of a handful at first, but the teacher just loved her, like all the kids. Only thing was he had to give the government some kind of a paper with her dad's signature."

"Oh? That is troublesome..."

"Nahh, got it covered," Sano said. "I know the guy's name, and who's gonna make a big deal out of it, anyway?"

"Does Sasaki-dono(2) know about that?"

"Yeah. I told him the whole story and he watched me do it. Since he's kinda like you and Soujiro, he understood it a lot; I think Tomi'd even be safe at school with him there, if we weren't around."

"That's good to know."

"Those cops have cleared out, I wonder if we have to worry about guarding her quite so much," Sano mused. "I know Genzai'd take care of her, and she'd like hanging around with Ayame and Suzume more."

"Soujiro is depending on us to keep her safe," Kenshin said. "I don't want to take chances. I only wish I could feel more confident about it..."

"You wish you could trust your government not to be jackasses about this," Sano surmised.

Kenshin sighed.

**********

Chou returned to the police station in the late afternoon, when the windows threw their grids of yellow light as far as the opposite wall. Saitou had already returned from his rounds and was putting things away for the night, and Saizuchi was there, too, in the corner, hovering over a telegraph machine and relaying messages through the officer operating it.

"Time to call it a day and go home to the Mrs., eh?" Chou asked Saitou, getting the customary stony silence in reply.

"Where is Hakata now? I'd like to talk to him about some of these reports," Saizuchi remarked.

"He's in the country somewhere, visiting family," Saitou said. "When his resignation was refused, he took all the leave he could."

"Well, no matter, plenty to work with here."

Chou heard a wail in the distance, as if someone had brought in a baby or a yowling cat, and he looked around, but no one else paused.

The telegraph officer cleared his throat to catch Saizuchi's attention. "To answer your previous question, they're reminding you that they want him alive if—"

"I know that!" Saizuchi scolded. "But some of the more physical forms of persuasion come with some small risk you know."

"All right..."

As the officer started another message, the room fell silent except for the tapping of the telegraph machine and that wailing sound. He realized it was coming from the cellblock.

"He's been like that for the last few hours," Saitou said, noticing Chou's reaction. "If you think you can shut him up, go right ahead."

Saizuchi turned to protest, but seemed to think better of it as Saitou handed Chou the key to Soujiro's cell.

The telegraph officer stretched the strip of paper the machine had fed out and read the broken line. "The risk is acceptable."

**********

When the guards had brought Soujiro back to his cell, his hands chained behind his back again, he hadn't made a sound. When they had shut and locked the door behind him, he had been so drained and numb that he had stood there for several minutes, just where they had left him, before slowly walking over to a wall, leaning his good shoulder on it, and sliding down it to a seat on the floor.

He had sat still there for a very long time. Occasionally he would say it in his mind, It's over now. I'm going to die, but it hadn't meant anything. It had been hours and hours before he fully realized what was happening, and when he had, he had rested his forehead against the wall and wept, screaming out his tears like a child.

At intervals, he would lull into silence and become lost in an endless tangle of tormented thoughts. Tomi-chan, Obachan, everyone, I'll never see them again... Never even get out of here, never even see the sun, never even see trees again... The green leaves opening in the spring... One time he had truly gotten to see it. Why just one time? Why so little? Why do things like this keep happening to me!? It's like before, before Shishio-san... Why was it so wrong? I don't want to kill anyone anymore—that was all I wanted! Why was that so wrong!? Each time, that tangle would grow to overwhelm him, and he could only drown out those thoughts with his own anguished cries.

As the hours passed, no one entered the cell, not even to bring food or water. In the dark, he had no awareness of time, but at length he was hoarse from crying and thirst. By that time, he expected no one but the promised interrogators, so he gasped and looked up with wide-eyed fear when he heard the key in the lock. The light from the doorway clearly revealed Chou's hair and flame-patterned kimono. "Chou-san!"

"Dammit, stop screaming like that!" Chou snapped as the guards closed the door behind him. "If you're that upset, then do something about it or shut the hell up and take it like a man!"

Soujiro blinked at him in shock and bewilderment.

"Shit, how old are you supposed to be, anyway? You're lookin' at me like a little girl."

"Chou-san!" he burst out, although his voice was dry and serrated. "Tell me, isn't there anything else I can do? Anything at all would be—"

"Hell, I don't know."

"But... Isn't there anyone else I could talk to?" he pleaded. "You know how Saizuchi-san is. I don't know if what he's telling me is true..."

"It doesn't matter. He can make it true," Chou said.

"Eh?"

"Maybe the government big-shots won't cut you any more slack that he says, or maybe they will. Either way, he's done told them he'll get them anything they want outta you, and they're not gonna say no to that. —And if you think he won't, then you're shit outta luck! If you were the old Soujiro who didn't give a damn about anything, I might say you had a chance, but..." He frowned deeply. "Kid, he is gonna break you."

"I guess it looks that way..."

A long silence descended. The first thing Soujiro could think of was just a haunting curiosity, but he gave in to it as Chou began to turn away. "Nee, Chou-san..."

"Hm?"

"This cell... Was this Houji-san's cell?"

"Nah. They put him in one with bars; he wasn't deadly like you," Chou answered. "There a reason you're askin' me that?"

"Well, not—"

"'Cause if there is, I'm reporting in sick tomorrow, dammit, I don't wanna see that."

Soujiro jolted to attention and stared at him. He doesn't want me to die, he realized. He remembered Chou as a heartless man who cared only for his sword collection and the thrill of fighting and killing—but really, that was no worse than the way Chou must remember him. "Chou-san, I never..."

"What?"

"I didn't think you would understand..."

"I don't!" he snapped. "Damned if I know where you picked up this fuckin' martyr complex! At first I thought you got it from Battousai, but now you're just all-out stupid! I'll tell you this right now, if that shrimp was here, he sure as hell wouldn't be tellin' you to kill yourself!"

"I know..." Soujiro said softly. The night he had left Tokyo...

As the cool autumn wind ruffled the leaves, Kenshin fixed him with an intense gaze. "Listen, Soujiro, don't forget that you are also part of what you're protecting. Your family in Yokohama, Tomi-dono, and all of us here... If at the end of this, we lose you, then we haven't won, so don't be too willing to sacrifice yourself. Remember that when you get to Kyoto."

"I know that, but..." Soujiro turned his face toward the wall. His voice began to break again. "I just don't know what to do..."

Chou looked down at him for a long moment, then sighed hotly. He crouched next to Soujiro and spoke inches from his ear, in the slightest whisper. "I don't know why I'm stickin' my neck out, 'cause someone is bound to hear this, but look, if you say no to their job, they're gonna kill you, and if you say yes, they're gonna screw you the same way they did Shishio; they'll use you as long as they feel like it, and then they'll take you out with the garbage."

"But then—"

"I'll tell you what to do. I know if you put your mind to it, you can get out of here. And if you know what's good for you, you'll do it, and run like hell, and don't ever let them get hold of you again." With that, Chou stood, walked back to the cell door, and rapped for the guards to let him out.

The door had closed behind him, and his footsteps had faded into almost-silence before Soujiro answered under his breath, "I can't do that."

He couldn't run anymore; he'd known that when he came, and in fact it was the very reason he had come here. As long as he ran away, anyone he involved himself with was in danger. Everyone he had left behind in Yokohama and Tokyo would be threatened, and to keep it from happening again, he would have to keep going on, always alone... But then, wasn't it still better than the alternatives?

In asking if this had been Houji's cell, it really had just been a haunting curiosity, and he hadn't been considering Houji's route of escape—but logically, wouldn't even that be better than what lay ahead of him? He could never have consented to become the killer he had been; he knew that more surely than anything. Wouldn't it be simpler and better to die quickly now, instead of slowly and horribly as Saizuchi had promised? Even now in a bare room, with shackles on his wrists and ankles, there were still ways to do it...

But even as he thought it, he knew that those pragmatic considerations were meaningless. Death would finally stuff out the last irrational shred of hope, some small corner of himself that still believed somehow he would walk back to Tokyo and pick Tomi up and carry her, and walk back with her to Yokohama, up the front path of Sumidaya through the peach trees... He could never destroy that last, stupid glimmer of optimism with his own hands, but if he didn't, it seemed he would only be waiting for it to be done more cruelly, for that innocent hope to be teased and torn and tortured, then finally crushed without mercy.

Chou was right; escape would be the best thing to do. Even on the run, even alone, he could live for the sun and the wind in the leaves; he had done it before, and had seen a great deal of joy in it. He could never let go of his Tanabata wish, the hope of going home someday, but a fugitive life held more possibility than none at all. If I live long enough, things could change. If I was still alive, something good could maybe happen someday...

But his hands were still chained behind his back, and the only outlet from the cell was still a barred window in the door, at the level of his forehead and hardly larger than his hand. Moreover, his body ached and weighed him down; he was tired from crying, hungry and thirsty, and his broken shoulder still rendered his left arm almost useless. He had gotten in and out of so many unlikely places before, probably he could do this, but it would take his full skill and concentration, which he now found evading his grasp.

The guards at the door didn't have the key, so even if he could reach through the window, he couldn't get it. —Couldn't go back for Tomi-chan, couldn't go home...— He couldn't open the door himself; how could he get to the other side of it? —Himura-san told them he helped me, and even if they believe I made them do it, they know Ojisan and Obachan kept me. If the police are looking for me, they'll ask them...— Couldn't open the door by himself, so how...?

He frowned at himself for the distraction and squeezed his eyes shut, trying to focus. There was only one way he could see his life going on from here, out on the road—why couldn't he make up his mind to take hold of it? I don't want to run anymore, but if I don't... I don't want to die, either. Kenshin had told him 'don't be too willing to sacrifice yourself.' Himura-san, and my family... They wouldn't want me to die. They would want me to... To risk them? He didn't feel he had any right to think that. They wouldn't want me to throw away my life for them... But... But I... He imagined being on the road, hearing or finding in a newspaper somewhere that Sumidaya had been raided, or that Tomi had been 'rescued' and returned 'home'... For his own part, could he really risk that?

But if I don't... If I just stay here...

But no matter how long he thought about it, he couldn't summon the will to take that step. He kept trying to commit to it, or at least to decide one way or the other, but the conviction simply wasn't there, and he was only exhausting himself trying to find it. He kept up the search until, barely even aware of it, his thoughts broke up and dissolved into a fitful sleep.

His exhaustion gradually dragged him down further and further, and when the door opened again, he was very deeply asleep. He heard the sound and woke, but he was still trying to wrench himself up from the darkness when rough hands lifted him to his feet. He walked along blindly as they led him out of the cell, and on the way he gradually managed to open his eyes.

The station was dim and mostly empty except for his heavy escort, and the furniture was just touched with a rosy glow amid long, sharp shadows. Through the window by Saitou's desk, he could see that dawn was just breaking outside, scribing a line across rooftops and through silhouetted trees in a deep, sweet pink. The sight began to lift the haze from his mind, and he paused to look at it, but at an extra push from his captors, he yielded and kept walking.

They brought him back to the same conference room and deposited him again in the same plush armchair, which he collapsed into under slight pressure. He was waking up to find his throat seared dry; his whole body ached and didn't want to move, but he turned toward the window. The curtains were drawn again, and the glow that peeked around their edges was mostly drowned out by the lamp on the desk, which gave the whole room a cast of flame-gold instead of dawn-rose.

"Good morning," Saizuchi said from the other side of the lamp.

For a moment, Soujiro could only utter a dry wheeze, but with effort, he croaked out a "Good morning." He couldn't help but notice a pitcher on the desk.

"Have you given any more thought to the offer?"

He paused a moment to understand the question, then shook his head.

"Are you sure you won't reconsider?"

He nodded. He was totally sure of that.

Saizuchi gave a sigh and made a show of putting on a mournful face, but it didn't look genuine. "I had held out one last ray of hope that you wouldn't say that. It was the one thing that would have saved you."

"Why?" Soujiro managed. "That was the only thing... I really wanted to be good... Anything else at all would be okay..."

"Listen, my boy, I'd like to help you," Saizuchi said, in a saccharine voice, "but I don't have anything to work with here. I spent all day yesterday pleading your case, but that skill truly is the only thing you have that they want, and you keep insisting, even at the point of life and death, there's nothing they can give you that will get that for them. You've made it a into a futile situation."

To Soujiro, too, it seemed to be a futile situation, here in this place. He looked at the window again, although with his guards more numerous and standing close around the chair, they partially obscured his view. But still, there was no iron door here, just a layer of cloth and a pane of glass. This would be a good opportunity, if he could just fix his mind on it and make himself move. His attention was mostly on the window as he heard Saizuchi rambling on.

"I did everything I could for you, truly I did. Although it was difficult and, sadly, the best thing I could manage, I was able to convince them that you were really just Shishio's exceptionally lethal errand-boy, and that you didn't actually know enough to make it worth interrogating you. Small consolation, perhaps, but at least we can get this over with right away."

At that, he whipped around. "Eh!? What?"

Saizuchi looked at him over steepled fingers. "I would have made it easier on you, but no one wanted your blood staining the carpet in here."

Soujiro's eyes widened. Right now!?

"Goodbye, Soujiro."

At the same moment Saizuchi spoke, the man on Soujiro's right side seized his arm and pulled him forward in the chair. Someone reached over his head from behind, and their white-gloved hands descended in front of his face, with the black line of a taut cord between them.

Like a falling blade, that line sliced away every bit of weariness and hesitation, and Soujiro threw himself out of its path, sideways and down. As he pivoted over the armrest of the chair, he braced his feet against the man who had grabbed his arm and uncoiled his legs—the legs strong enough for Shuku-chi—hurling him against the opposite wall. Soujiro's shackles kept him from controlling his landing, and he hit the floor on his side like a fish. Immediately, he moved to right himself, but someone seized his left arm, and he screamed in pain as they savagely and intentionally wrenched his broken shoulder. Another man took the opening and grabbed his head by his hair and under his chin—no good! He managed to pull out of their hold, but by then he was already pinned to the floor with someone's knee in his back, and someone already had the garrote around his neck.

As his cry of effort was choked off into silence, he knew he couldn't afford to panic, and he seized his own mind and held it too strongly for it to squirm out of his grasp. He could feel the hands tying the knot against his nape, and trained absolute attention on it—the knot had a loop in it, which just touched his right ear. Pull one end and it would come loose. Pushing past the pain in his ravaged shoulder, he wrapped the chain connecting his wrist-cuffs around his left hand to take up the slack and hold it. He pulled and twisted, concentrating the force on one link—he knew he could break it, and with his hands freed, he knew he could free his neck and breathe again, escape through that window and then—

And then nothing. He didn't know.

That moment of indecision brought the panic and pain bursting up in his mind like the uncoiling of a broken spring. His grip on his chains faltered, and the links spilled over his fingers. He knew that he was lost, and he tried to scream, but couldn't force the slightest breath or voice through his strangled throat. All he could see, feel, or think of was the pain in his neck, his head throbbing, his thin chest heaving desperately but unable to escape, like pulling against the end of a tether.

He had no idea how long it went on. Every moment felt like it must be the breaking point but was not, and only melted into a timeless expanse of agony and fear, but at last, gradually, it faded into a soft, prickly numbness. Even just a little bit, uncontrolled as dreaming, he began to have his mind back. His eyes were wide open, but a rim of darkness was closing in on his vision, which pulsated in and out of light and focus. A chill crawled over his body, like the cold breath of approaching death.

Or, better than that, like a cool wind on his skin, raising goosebumps in its contrast to the hot summer sun. Now he could also feel the sweet, cold grass against his chest, and he raised his head as much as he could. Emerald grass and leaves, dazzling white sun, the blue sky clear and intense... He was home, in the back yard. The pulsating light was the shadows of the swaying peach boughs and the sheets on the lines flapping in the breeze. Junzo-ojisan was there, taking down dry sheets and trying to keep Tomi from playing with them, while Reiko-obachan watched from the back door, dressed in her uniform and apron. They couldn't see him.

Tears swelled in Soujiro's eyes, but didn't blur the vision before him. He longed to take a breath, inhale the sunny scent of the peaches and laundry and call out to them, but his efforts to do so were in vain. His chains having vanished along with the dark room in Kyoto, he reached out toward them. Although they were meters beyond his reach, he fought with all his fading strength to stretch out his right arm, stretch out his fingers...

He knew he was dying. He knew this was goodbye, and his lips silently formed the word, but at least... At least one last time he could see them, feel the breeze and sun... A slight smile touched his lips as his hand fell in the grass, and his fingers wilted into a helpless half-curl.

As he lay there, he heard sounds from the conference room, voices so far away they were like the chatter of distant birds, but suddenly, from that place, a hand descended on his head, and although there was little force behind it, it was a stunning blow. He felt it keenly; someone was pulling on the cord around his neck, but he wasn't absorbing the force.

The loop popped out of the knot. At first a harrowing trickle, but with another pull from that hand, he dragged breath deep into his chest. Air and light flooded his head, beautiful and overwhelming. He remained in a senseless rapture of gasping for breath as they lifted him back into the armchair and unchained his hands.

Gradually, he collected his wits to find himself sitting in the chair, collapsed forward with his head and arms spilled awkwardly onto the desk. His body was even more severely compromised than before; the pain in his left shoulder was worse even than when the bullet had gone into it, and twinged with the motion of every hungry breath. Even that was less intense than the pain in his throat, and the occasional compulsion of a dry cough stung almost enough to drive him out of his mind. His entire body had been utterly drained of strength by the brush with death, so much so that when he felt someone—he thought it was Saizuchi—push a cup of water over to him until it nudged the back of his hand, it took him some time to grasp it and lift his head to drink.

The cool water was an immense relief, but he knew that he was still deeply in danger. Why didn't they kill me? The loop in the knot—it had been made to be untied from the start. It had never been meant as an execution, only as torture. Angry heat flooded his face, and he was seized with a desire to throw the pottery cup at Saizuchi's head, but he didn't have the energy for it. After a few more sips, he was able to lean back in the chair and brace the cup on his knee, and could manage a hoarse growl. "You did that on purpose."

"Not at all!" Saizuchi insisted, doing a very poor job of disguising his glee. "I just acted prematurely, and I am terribly sorry. The trouble is that I just now recieved a message from someone in the police department. While they decided against questioning you about Shishio's organization, I neglected to note that there are some current investigations you might be able to shed some light on, so if we can just get these few questions out of the way, then we won't have to drag this on for you..."

Soujiro struggled to listen to the droning voice. He was still trying to catch his breath and nursing the cup of water.

"Point number one," Saizuchi said, looking at his papers, "where is Inoue Tomi now?"

The cup bounced off Soujiro's lap and splashed on his knee before hitting the floor, and he stared wide-eyed. He had left himself entirely open for the blow and was now struck speechless; his efforts to reply only had him gaping.

"Do you know?"

He shook his head dumbly.

"Well, so be it," Saizuchi said. "We have a good idea where to start looking, but they just wanted to know if you might say something different. Battousai is such a nuisance, you know, they were all hoping they wouldn't have to deal with him."

Soujiro struggled to shake his voice loose and made a broken sound.

"Point number two," Saizuchi pressed ahead. "I'm seeing some reports about a couple you held hostage for a period of some months it seems. Is that true?"

"Um..." He suddenly realized what he meant—back at the inn, he'd told Ojisan and Obachan to claim he'd forced them to stay there, so they wouldn't be arrested for harboring him. "YES! YES!" he burst out, throwing himself into a painful coughing fit which Saizuchi ignored.

"Really? Given what they heard from the witnesses there, so many conflicting reports, it's very odd." He put down the papers and looked up. "Well, that's for the judge to decide in the end, eh?"

"No!" Soujiro cried.

"Oh?" Saizuchi cocked his head quizzically, but he was wearing a confident smirk.

He knows he's got me, Soujiro realized, and he knew it, too. That was the real reason they had made him think he was dying, to break down his resistance for this main point, and it had worked. He was so hurt that he could barely move or speak, and had no strength to hold himself back from sobbing. "Why don't you just leave them alone!?"

"We have to uphold the law, pure and simple," Saizuchi said. "If we just shrugged off all the kidnappings and harborings of fugitives, our society would fall apart. It could be possible to make arrangements in these particular cases, though. If you wanted such a thing, my dear boy, you should have told me. It's not such a big problem. I'm certain I could get that for you, if you just offer something in return."

He was putting on too civil a show to deliver the ultimatum directly, but his meaning was clear. They were threatening Soujiro's family in order to manipulate him, and what could he do? It was the government. They were the strongest; they could do what they liked and had no one to answer to.

"He told them he'll get them anything they want out of you. If you were the old Soujiro who didn't give a damn about anything, I might say you had a chance, but, Kid, he is going to break you." Chou-san, you were right... I didn't know you meant it like this... Somewhere along the way he'd begun assuming that turning himself in was enough to protect everyone. Why was I so stupid!? And now it was too late to run. They had his weakness, the chain that would pull him back to them if he tried to escape, that they could use to drag him anywhere they wanted to lead him. After all, his family had only him to protect them, and if he didn't, he would never forgive himself. Whatever it cost...

He had fallen to crying with his face on the desk, and pounded it one time with his fist. "Please!" he screamed. "Anything you want to do to me!"

Saizuchi looked down at him with a wicked grin. He at last had dropped his facade and was openly enjoying watching Soujiro crumble. "You can't give us something we already have," he said. "Tell me, to have Inoue Tomi as your own child, to buy amnesty for Sumidaya and Kamiya Dojo, what would you do?"

Soujiro knew that it was not an open-ended question, but only yes or no—no, not even that. Not even one option, not any possibility at all. It was unthinkable: the tears in the rain, the broken bird, but if not that... The vision he had seen on the edge of death hovered in his mind, so simple and precious. To keep that from being destroyed, even if he could never speak to it or touch it, even if it cost him everything...

"Don't be too willing to sacrifice yourself." They wouldn't want me to throw away my life—no, not even just his life, but everything, to the point of his very heart that was worth more than survival. They wouldn't want me to do that, but I... To protect them...

"So..." Saizuchi prodded at his silence, "for those people you would do... nothing, I take it."

"No! No..." Soujiro sobbed. "Anything... I'd do anything..."

"For this, you would become the Meiji government's assassin?"

Why did he have to say it? Saizuchi knew he had won already; why did he have to twist the knife? It was almost more than he could bear, but after choking out several sobs, Soujiro at last cried "Yes!"

"...yes..."

**********

"Ya got anything for me today?" Chou asked, coming in and leaning on Saitou's desk. He looked over and found Saizuchi in the corner at the telegraph machine again. "How are you and Seta-san getting along?"

"Seta-san joined the ranks an hour ago," Saizuchi crowed.

"Reluctantly," Saitou pointed out, taking one last drag before grinding out his cigarette. "He'll do shoddy work."

"That's no problem as long as we don't give him any critical information," Saizuchi argued. "Shoddy work gets him killed, the politicians get their revenge, and in the meantime, a shoddy Tenken is better than most swordsmen on a good day."

Saitou picked up his hat and left to make his rounds without another word.

"Where is he now?" Chou asked.

"In the conference room, waiting for the doctor. He landed one good kick, so we're waiting for someone's cracked ribs to be taped up," Saizuchi said with a chuckle, then turned back to the telegraph officer. "Yes, that reminds me, Seta-san is still hurt, so make sure it's an easy job, but as soon as possible. Tonight would be ideal."

"Yeah, and tell them this guy's a fucking rat-bastard," Chou added in a snarl as he walked past.

"Young people..." Saizuchi griped behind him.

In the conference room, Soujiro was curled up sideways with his feet in the chair in front of the desk, hugging his knees and sobbing quietly.

"Shit," Chou cursed, and crossed to the chair. "What did I tell you about—"

Soujiro screamed out loud as Chou unthinkingly clapped him on his forward shoulder—his left shoulder. Chou started back from him and swore again under his breath. He knew he'd touched the broken bone, but worse than that, when Soujiro had cried out, he had tipped his head up into the corner of the winged chair-back, revealing a dark red bruise encircling his throat.

Chou stared at him awkwardly for a long moment. He finally looked around and picked up the papers Saizuchi had left laying on the desk. They were stray pages out of police reports—Hakata's overly-meticulous work, mostly—and he carried them over to the window and pulled the curtains aside for light to skim over them. Saizuchi had even added some circles and underlines to go by.

"Girl kidnapped by Seta, witnesses in town identify as Inoue Tomi ... abusive father ... Seta often seen with child, witnesses describe them as friends..." Flip a few pages. "Sumidaya ... owners insist they were coerced; Fujikake corroborates, not in his previous reports ... witnesses describe Seta and owners as amiable ... Sumida may be lying to avoid prosecution. Fujikake may be lying (why??)..."

Chou turned from the papers to look back at Soujiro. "You should have listened to me, Kid. You ain't cut out for this job anymore."

"I know... You were right..." Soujiro answered, in a strained, breathy voice. "But now it's too late for me..."

**********

With the lunch dishes finished, Reiko could take a little time to rest or chat with the guests. As she emerged from the kitchen, she heard Junzo and the doctor next door talking near the entrance.

"I wondered if you could put her up here for a few days," the doctor was saying. "I know you're busy, but..."

"Sorry, you'll have to get your walking exercise this time," Junzo answered. "We're all filled up."

"I thought maybe Soujiro and Tomi's—"

"We're filled up."

"Ah. Just thought I'd ask. Sorry."

Reminded of 'the kids,' Reiko wandered back to that empty room and let herself in. She'd been in here every day these past few weeks, keeping the room clean and inviting for whenever Soujiro and Tomi might be able to return, but it was still a regretful feeling, to stand here in the stillness and silence. Soujiro had warned her that he had a dangerous past and that the police would come, but she had still allowed herself to become attached, and hadn't prepared herself for them to be gone. After all, it had been so refreshing—if occasionally exhausting—to again be near the viewpoint of youth. She smiled at recalling Tomi's untamed energy, her charmingly simple, unlearned and wild ideas.

But at times, Soujiro had even seemed like more of a child. Reiko didn't understand how a nearly-grown man could posess such innocent naivete, or that sense of wonderment. How could Soujiro, with his innocent blue eyes, have been an infamously skillful killer? In her mind, she believed him when he said it, and knew that it was true, but on him of all the people in the world, the notion didn't fit, and it baffled her.

She could even look at the paradox given form on a shelf here in his room, where Soujiro kept the only two posessions he had arrived on their doorstep with: an openworked tsuba decorated with leafy branches, and a silly-looking toy horse made of threadbare cloth(3)—a piece of a deadly weapon, and a love-worn children's toy.

Reiko knew it was an unwise sort of thing to wish for, but she vaguely hoped that someday she would understand it.

**********

Through the afternoon, dense gray rainclouds gathered over Kyoto, and by dark, fat raindrops pelted down, punctuated by the boom and rumble of thunder. The path through the forest was barely visible except in the occasional soft flash of lightning.

But Soujiro had gotten a feel for this place beforehand, enough to perform his task in the rain and darkness. He stood waiting with his back against the damp trunk of one of the trees and faced down the path, a sword gripped in his right hand. The messenger who was his target would be coming on horseback from behind him; the tree would hide him from their view until the last moment.

But not even the tree was shielding him from the rain. He had been here so long that his clothes and the new sling holding his left arm were sopping, cold enough to make him shiver. His hair was soaked, and his bangs stuck to his forehead in gummy points that directed streams of rainwater down his face.

Why did it have to rain tonight? Or maybe... Maybe it should rain at a time like this... again... Soujiro clenched his fist tighter around the sword-handle, squeezing off the thought. He couldn't afford to think about this anymore. Couldn't afford to think...

A heavy raindrop knocked a brown, dead leaf out of the tree and brought it down on his head. It clung in his drenched hair, but he made no move to brush it away.

A rumble of thunder faded to reveal the sound of hoofbeats. Soujiro tensed and listened to them come closer. As the sound swept past him, he launched himself across the path with an arc of his sword, meeting the old sensation of resistance as the edge sliced through flesh and bone.

The horse's hind legs were suddenly ripped away, and it screamed and thrashed as it dashed against the wet ground, hurling its rider and sending up a splatter of mud. Nothing for it now, no reason to make it suffer—Soujiro took one more stroke through the animal's writhing neck before darting to cover.

At the THACK of the blade, the rider whipped up, too late to see Soujiro, but in time to see his mount's head flung away into the trees. He scrambled back, falling over his skewed straw raincoat as he cried out in horror. Soujiro was already waiting behind him, with one sword-thrust through his head from the back. The doomed messenger didn't see it coming; he probably didn't even hear himself stop screaming.

The act was done, and nothing could erase it now. Soujiro stood there, frozen. I'm this kind of person again, who does things like this... Tomi's best friend, the person Reiko-obachan had made a uniform for, the person who sat on the porch of Kamiya Dojo, looking at the night sky and talking with Kenshin as though they were friends... That's not what I am anymore... I'm a killer... Not just as something I've done, but what I am, right now...

His eyes ached as the tears came, joined by raindrops running down his face, bloody sword in hand. He bit his lip. Don't smile... Not again... Whatever you do, don't smile...

A silent flash of lightning washed white light over the scene before him. The man's body lay lifeless, pitched at a strange angle into the mud. The headless horse was obviously dead, but its corpse twitched; one hoof blindly pawed the stormy sky.

The revulsion of that image and the reality of what he had done ripped through Soujiro's mind. He let the sword fall and grasped his hair, staggered back against a tree, screaming. His voice was drowned and swept away in the deafening crack of thunder.

Owari

Footnotes:

1. His shoulder is still broken from Changing Leaves.

2. The teacher Sano mentioned is Sasaki Heihachirou, from the Jin-pu-tai story (eps 15-16); remember him?

3. See Okaerinasai for the horse, and Owaranakatta for the tsuba.