Author's Note: Donut anybody? Now what the hell am I talking about? You see, I finally got a job! Yes, I'm working in a Tim Horton's (Canadian people know what I'm talking about). For you, American people, it's a bit like Dunken Donuts but with a bit of Subway mixed in it. I did my first dozen yesterday and got my fingers all sticky with the cream… I'll never thank my grand parents enough for having own a donut restaurant when I was till a little girl. I basically grew up with the sweets, and my boss was very impressed because of it. So I got the job with no wait! ^-^ Today's my second day of training and I think it's going to be better than the first one. Lets hope I won't make as many mistakes and remember to ask for the kind of bread the costumer wants. White or brown bread? Is it a special? Don't forget to hit the right button on the cashier! At least, I'm good with math! No mistakes in giving back to cash! But no tips for me as long as my training's not over… sigh. But thanks goodness, I don't have to mop yet! A compensation for not getting any tip. As for this chapter… It's a bit short, but the part that should have been the real end of this chapter was too long and I just postponed it's writing for the next one. So you can read now, my rambling's over! ^-^
Warnings: This chapter is rated R, there's heavy violence and sexual theme, so you've been warned!
Disclaimers: Don't own, but now that I have money, I don't really care if you sew me! Hehe
Within Soul
By Evil Karyta
Chapter Six
"The basis of optimism is sheer terror."
Oscar Wilde
Soft footsteps padded down the hall, a bit uneven, a shacking breath, soul lost in the horror of a moment that lingered with a bitter taste. Disgust, it had its hand dripping and sticky, wrapped her in a fierce grip, not at all willing to let go. A long, elegant and elaborated, kimono trailing, covered by a rich coat, obi hurriedly knotted around slim hips. Curses forming on lightly painted lips, turning what was lovely into a angry scowl. Hate, deep and turned toward male in general, all of this for one purpose only. With each foot that connected with the cold wooden floor, an image took place.
Hands touching her, undoing the beautiful clothing, fingering the silk. A raspy, smelling, breath near her neck. Forcing her face into a blank expression, willing her consciousness far away, where the sea clashed into the rocky hills, forming a smooth and destructive dance, where she lounged to be. A wild grin, lusting eyes the color of defecations, a mocking smile crossing her face when the comparison entered her mind, mistook for pleasure. A pinch to her lower back, not a sound escaping her throat, just eyes closing willing to push away those feelings that were swelling inside, ready to consume her. Her clothing pilling at her feet, a feeling of exposition, hatred taking all the place in her heart, unmoving temptress, waiting, eyes expressionless, mind into a turmoil, fighting. Young woman's heart torn bit by bit, no one to tend it, no one to cure, just those hands, grazing her skin and lust darken gaze, burning her flesh. Must not think, must not see. Don't think, don't see, be blind, be deaf, be a doll for forsaken desire to be felled, be the eyes of truth, seek the information, forget everything else.
She stumbled, her foot hitting the ground in a wrong angle, making her trip, arms reached out for stabilization. Nothing there to stop her fall, the wood coming fast to her face, alone in the world, the beautiful kimono flaring to life like a silken animal, floating in the air for seconds before joining the fallen woman. Delicate white hands in tight fists, a sob tearing her throat, but no tears to ocean deep eyes, dry water, locked behind flesh windows. The woman forced herself to a stand, legs shaking, but determination clear on her face. She kept walking, willing the memory out of her, screaming silently for deliverance, a salvation from her own hell, which would not come before rest, if there was any tonight.
Fingers, dirty, attached to a rough hand, gripping her arms so tightly it left red marks of fingerprints, painful. The callous that craved the hand, catching the soft black hair, pulling it. Wet tongue, smelly, disgusting, lashing at her throat that battled with the cry that threatened to unleash. Damn duty that bounded one to things that were not theirs to care passed down from someone long gone, a shadow looming and the light to reveal it all. The ultimate sacrifice of a woman for knowledge, bounded to a pledge, suffering for something she was not even sure of. Now the hand was pushing her head down, forcing a hardness to her mouth, a commending voice, demanding her to compile to greedy wills. Bitter taste, coarse grunting disturbing her mind, shattering the fragile image her mind had created so she could not feel or see what she was doing. Hateful, ugly, dripping in misery, world smashed to smithereens, nothing left to held dear to ones heart. Monstrous image of man's desire, painted in dark blood red hideous lines, anything to get what she was told to. Once again, a doll to those who wished to use.
She pinched the bridge of her nose, a gesture that spoke of her annoyance or aversion. Shocking her head, the woman kept walking, just maybe, she could walk away from the memory of the night. No such luck, it is when you will yourself to forget that it comes back full force, gripping at your heart and making your world spin. The moon ray's touched her satin white skin as it freed itself from the shadow of a passing cloud, making a bruise bright in all its repulsive glory. A deprecating reminder of gory moments in the arms of a man that made the bile find its way up her gorge, burning, bitter in taste, choking her. And the silver light returned to its confinement, shining no more, just as the glitter in her eyes darken.
No matter how many times, no matter how gentle, no matter how willing she was, it always hurt. The movement, in a haze, back and forth, the sound, irritating sound, despised sound, of grunts and pants surrounding her, caging her, trapping her. Face devoid of expression, eyes glued to the oil lamp in the far corner, reflecting its soft light on her discarded kimono, wishing she were still in there instead of underneath a smelling, sweating beast, hairy and demanding, biting, sucking, linking, ravishing her. The pain gaining in intensity, she could no longer see, she could no longer hear, she could no longer breath, only pain, throbbing, cursing through her. Her mind screaming, disgust, misery, disgust, dirty, disgust, reeking, disgust, bitter, disgusting, salty blood… disgust, hatred, odium, revulsion, hate, abhorrence. A loud, bestial roar ripped through the man, it was over, he had what he wanted, she got what she needed. It was over, but she couldn't help feeling filthy. Must take cloths back on, must flee, must retire, must run away, where there is no smell, where there is no sound, where there is no living, alone, away from remembrance. Must wash, must scrub that putrid smell off of her. Please god, just make it all away, washed by a giant tsunami, a wave that break everything, a wave that killed, a wave that cleaned.
Her alabaster hand gripped the door's frame, trying to keep her balance to a straight one. Her blue eyes scanned her surroundings, the bluish glow if the night showing her barely enough of the room's furniture, but the basin was there, with the bucket, waiting for her patiently. She heaved a sigh, a hand to her pounding heart, how she longed for water, cold and pure, it will wash everything away and, along with it, take all the memories. Falling to her knees, exhaustion taking the better of her, a smile adorning her delicate face, long silken strand falling over her shoulders, she uttered her gratefulness.
"Finally…"
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The room was silent, only the breath of the sleeping form that lay in the middle could be heard. The lamp had been forgotten, lighting the narrowed room with its soft golden glow, slowly eating out the oil that feed the fire. Kenshin's eyes narrowed, it was too easy, something was not right, a missing piece. It hit him, that perfume that hang around, lingering to the sheets like a stain. Sex, it was everywhere, reeking from the walls, hinting in the discarded clothing, mixed with the natural odor of the slumbering lone man. So, there was the reason of the lack of vigilance, that man had wished to be alone with whomever had been his partner, now long gone. Along with the strong smell came a more subtle one, enticing his senses, feeling very familiar, a light fragrance, shy and sweet. The mark of a woman, supposedly the one who shared the futon.
Carefully, he tip toed to the sleeper, lost into a hem of dreams, to sweet for someone like him. Iizuka had came in the morning, as sneaky as ever, handing him the usual black envelope for his nightly duty. It was very different however from any other assassination he had carried out through out the past few months. Where there was usually a name and a place, there was also an hour. It was obvious that he should not be there before that time, and he now understood. Katsura clearly did not wish to have any witnesses adding their weigh to the already growing numbers of innocent sacrifices.
As he neared his victim, the shadow assassin noticed something on the corner of his eyes, nagging him almost. It was small, it was silk, and it was blue. Turning his head in a graceful arch, intentions on closer investigation as to what it was, his foot hit a chopstick that was naively waiting there to be picked and back to its rightful place. The long wooden utensil cracked a bit, rolling away like a scared animal, before finishing its course at the foot of the wall. Eyes wide in horror, Kenshin twisted around just in time to see the nude man searching blindly for his katana and sizing it with force before jumping to his feet. He never had the chance to see who was the intruder. With a swift and skilful slash, faster than the eye could see, as if the movement never happened, the man was beheaded.
The burgundy swordsman observed the corps, an expression of surprise in his brown eyes before the rolled backward and the heavy skull hit the floor loudly, the sound sickeningly akin to the thud a fruit would make when it fell from the tree. The blood flood out of the body in a high fountain, droplets flying everywhere, some staining his face and clothes, before falling numbly, creating a scarlet pool on the tatamis covered ground. Kenshin turn, but his eyes caught once again the indigo on the corner which was threatened by the thick scarlet pool washing the floor. Not really thinking, he bent down and shoved it in his guy, not aware that a single drop of blood had stained a corner of it.
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The sound of water splashing greeted him as he closed on the water room. Violet eyes narrowing in curiosity, he peered inside and stop every movement, as if glued to place, unable to twitch even a finger such is awe was great. The beauty of the scene that unfolded before him was beyond human conception. She was perfection made tangible, graceful and innocent, lovely goddess of midnight seeing. Her long ebony air left lose, cascading down to reach her slim and curvy waist. Her elegant kimono clung to her body showing the outline of her legs, hugging her form like a second skin.
She dipped a wooden bucket into the large basin, filling it with the cold transparent liquid and then rose it above her head before pouring the content over her. The water fell in a tiny chute and pooled around her feet. The lose obi seemed not to be able to support any more weight and slid undone to fall limply in a wet mass to the drenched floor. She breathed out, tiny droplets sent flying in the air by the force of her outtake, the long strands of midnight locks covering her eyes, heavy on her back. She repeated her first movement, sliding the container in the water, but stopped in mid way, parallel to the ground, arms shaking, shoulder as if sustaining an unbearable burden. Then, without any other warning sign, her trembling hands let go of the pail witch hit the floor with a splashing sound, the frigid water spilling out.
"It's useless…" she uttered, head low, gaze closed.
He saw the wavering of her shoulders as a faint sob escaped her throat, but then his attention was drawn to the puddle which was closing on him in a fast pace. In the swordsman mind, things got confused, what was colorless turning into thick red. The woman was no longer soaked in water, but soiled with vivid scarlet blood. Her pale face turning darkened by the rivulets of crimson, falling to the ground to add to the growing pool which was threatening him. Kenshin took a step back, rash and unthinking, he tripped over his own feet, amethyst gaze glazed and blurry, nothing seemed to be what it was. He shook his head, willing the vision to disappear, but it stayed, vivid in all its morbid glory.
Soft distant purple turning to flashing ambers, then back to violet as the world turned into a spinning flicker of red and black, memories fighting over his sanity. He was coming close to an invisible edge, only one push was needed for him to fall. So many dead faces, from the first to the rolling head of the last death, all of them surrounded by a substantial puddle of bright burgundy. The small man felt helpless in a world that seemed to held only murder and demise deeper than any torment the world as seen. The bloody figure of the woman turned to him upon hearing his stumbling, the red fading away as her sad ocean pools set on him, too weary to even be surprised by his apparition by the door frame.
Her long silken strands of midnight fell wetly around her delicate features and his vision disappeared just as unsuspected as they came. The front of her kimono had been slightly open, leaving a fare amount of cleavage glowing under the moonlight as they silvery rays it the droplets of water that still clung to her velvety skin. He stared longer than he had first intended, she did not seem to even notice, her eyes as faraway as his had been moments ago. An aura of drowning sorrow enfolded her as she fully turned in his direction, barely registering his presence. At the moment, she had transformed into some sort of lost goddess, forgotten amid humans, waiting in grief-stricken silence for her fellow to remember her existence and send the carriage that would lead her back to the stars where she belonged.
"You need to clean too?" murmured the deity.
"I…" he was at a lost of word.
"There is not much water left in the basin, I'll go and get some more by the well," she uttered weakly before brushing pass him.
He watched her as she slowly padded away, her wet clothing trailing on the floor heavily, her shoulders and head low, lost in self-loathing it seemed. Kenshin extended an arm, her body to far for him to reach, wishing he could take that secret weigh that seemed to crush her. He felt helpless, something he was quite used to feel, but this time, it appeared that it was worst than ever. He who wished to help those who suffer, he found himself unable to relieve the young woman from her load. Worst, the assassination he did weighed a thousand more tones than the few kills that kept him alive. Guilt gave him a bitter taste that lingered to everything his mouth tasted, even water.
He turned his head back to stare at the mess that had become the small room. Water was splattered all around the wooden flooring, catching the milky rays of the night lady that shown softly on the star lighted night sky. Kenshin uttered a deep sigh, sign of his weariness. How he wished things would have been different. Not meant to live, he survived decades and centuries, seeing what Japan had suffered of. Constantly been either awaken to the occidental civilization or completely closed to it in a blind self absorbing reclusion. The numerous eras, the countless emperors, the wars, the rise of shogunat, the coming of the daimyos and then their fall, only to rise again. Such was their history, a come and go of political ways, returning the power to one and then taken back again. A vicious circle that might as well never come to an end.
And through all of this, his life, mixed in the blood shed, the pain. Maybe it was such a existence that pushed him toward the path he was now leading. But was his staying alive a good thing? Was he been a complete coward, shying away from death each time he took a new soul in, or was he strong in his doing? He was confused, and his plea to explanation meeting deaf ears, the gods bound into silence, spirit only a creation of human will not to feel alone. But the truth was there, living things held a soul deep within that contained their everything to the living breath that kept them bounded to existence. And he shamelessly took them away from those unlucky victims that crossed his path when the urge to feed was just to strong to be ignored.
He wondered long what he was. No legends had been passed down for the likes of him, maybe the reason of such silence was that none were sure of the reality of a soul. Kenshin was nothing to the world, a simple aberration, a creation that should not even breathed the air that was given to the living. The redhead had once hoped that it would come to an end, that maybe he would finally find the one spirit that should have been his and that it would all be over, and he would live a normal life without crave, without the deadly desire to take what was never his, without his abnormality, and just die of old age as anybody would. Wishful thinking, he was not meant to be given such a sweet end, he had did too many wrongs, sinned countless times. If only one was strong enough to defeat him, than he would atone for his misdeeds in the underworld and maybe find a way to retrieve all those souls that were not his. However the question was, without a soul, would he even go to hell after he would pass away? Somehow, the oblivion he thought would be his when he would succumb to death was too good of a decease for his abominable life. Was it fare for him to simply vanish when so many who ended the same should have attained the long awaited heavens?
As if the body had caught on his silent pondering, his started to ach. At first, it was a light numb that gripped his guts before spreading to reach all extremities and it started, painful and raging, vengeance of a deprived need. World spinning, vision blurry, eyes fiery and nothing to stop it. Kenshin's legs were trying to keep his shaking body in a standing position, but they were failing miserably as he watched the floor rapidly coming to him. He did not felt like falling, more as if the ground was rising to embrace him with a hard connection, hitting him violently, and his sights was nothing but vivid light and the distant echo of feet pounding toward him, the flicker of water that spilled to the floor as a clumsy hand clashed the bucket. A faint whispered. His name in a rasp outtake that sounded caring and worried. Everything seemed to go slower that it should, something falling to the floor and water surrounding him.
A delicate hand appeared out of nowhere, hesitant before turning his body around gently so he faced the ceiling and the worried indigo gaze that observed him in the void of darkness that swallowed him. He felt a tearing pang at the heart upon the sight of a soul. No, not that soul, anyone but not this one. He groaned, forcing his eyes close, she must not see their amber glow, must not know his torment. If he push it father, he might fall unconscious, then she would be safe. Her sweet voice, asking the wrongs of his state, his voice too strained to utter a single word. Lids tightly clenched, he ignored the demand to open and take. As he succumbed in deep pain, a far away laughter filled his mind, so much like Saitou's hateful voice when he first witness the Battousai's attempt not to kill. Maybe, just maybe, this time he would not awake and his consciousness would rest, be gone for all it worth, to be lost in the void of nothingness that was his dieing fate. Yes, and she would be safe, her eyes would still be blue in her death, her soul would reach the sky when she would part with her body and he would be in peace, just a piece of thin air that would watched the world in the wait for a soul of his own.
It would be a bliss…
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To be continued………
a/n: I finally gave a name to my thanks to the reviewers. Yup, so one with the "KARYTA'S RAMBLING TO HER LOVELY REVIEWERS" by the way, I got about 10 reviews for the last chap! And to think I thought it was the worst chapter ever… life's strange.
Ferai: Thank you! It's really kind of you to review! I never thought someone would actually go around and review under an author's demand… The action will be coming somewhere around. Maybe next chapter or the one after. Keep up reading, I'll keep writing! ^-^
Aerin-Chan: You were right about Seisou Hen, it's just me who got confused with all the titles… I've not seen Seisou Hen yet, though I got the movie!!! I saw it trice now! Can't get tired of it! About Angel Sanctuary, I got the manga and the OVAs. Me is such a lucky girl ne! ^-^ Don't worry about the cat killing thing, it's just an old saying. I'm just as curious as you, so just don't stop asking questions, as long as they don't sounds the same… Thanks for your compassion, that thing with my friend got better, though he still hints toward me… and it's kinda unnerving. I made Kaoru look a bit like me when I get frustrated and am not able to vent my rage the right way. I personnaly believe that it's better to brake objects than to brake someone's bones, don't you agree? Matsu has her reason to keep Kaoru around, but it'll be explained latter on, so just keep reading! Next time around! ^-^
Ryoko: I think I took a bit longer than entended to update, but thanks for your review!
Serene: Yes, my first language is French. You're from Québec too? Question, what is Tamil? Rather, where does it come from? Never heard of that language before… But yeah, it feels great to know I'm not the only Quebecoise around! I'll be in Montreal for studies in two years… who knows, maybe we'll meet there somewhere. Life sure is weird sometimes ^-^
emsdesire: I'm glad you were happy about it! Question, why do people always as if we'll keep it up when we made it clear that we intended on continuing? Just been wondering, that's all.
omochi: It seems so, but everyone has their bad days… it's just that Kaoru is a special case, always in a bad day it seems… he he. Wait till Kenshin tastes it! That's gonna be a fun thing to see! Match making? (look around in a bad acting of innocence) I don't know what you're talking about…. You know, in the manga, and I suppose in the anime too, when our lovely Rurouni is around Kaoru, he tends to forget many things such as looking out for a boken that is sent toward his head… I got more to come up, so stick around!
D-Chan: Abducted? Come one, I'm not that predictable! Do mind telling me just what make you assume such a cliché thing would get into my fic? I'm not that kind of writer who just rewrite other's idea! I've got my own. But surely, Kaoru will find someone to kick their poor ass… Just wait and see, lil me got very good things up her sleeves!
Thanks for your reviews everybody! Keep reviewing, it's only with those nice comments that I know I'm doing the right thing! I'll be looking forwards to words from you and will start writing the next chapter as soon as I get a break from my job… he he. Feels nice to say I'm finally working!
See you guys around!
