Part Two: Morning Has Broken
Chapter One
June 1879 - 11th year of the Meiji Era (over three months later)
Sanosuke moped around his little house, alternately yawning and kicking ineffectually at the floor. Katsu had disappeared a few days ago to meet a contact and follow up on a lead, abandoning him to his own company. Sano loved his friend, and admired all the dangerous work Katsu did, but it was inconvenient to be without the only person who didn't drive him insane with worry and nagging.
Sanosuke sighed and flopped down onto the dirty wooden floor, then got back up and started walking again. It was only early afternoon, long after his hated early morning bathing ritual, and he was already bored out of his mind. He'd tried going to the dojo, but some nutcase, who had taken a disliking to Yahiko, had recently forced Kenshin into a fight. The outcome of the battle had been in Kenshin's favour, but in obeying his vow not to kill, he had ended up getting a semi-serious injury.
Sano had heard all about the incident from Tae, and although he'd truly wanted to check in and make sure Kenshin was okay, he'd also selfishly supposed the stir over the rurouni's health would distract attention from his own zombie-ish appearance.
He was disappointed to learn that even though his prediction of the situation was right, it had not made the incessant weeping of Kaoru, fawning of Megumi, and general exuberance of Yahiko any less annoying. So, after confirming Kenshin hadn't gained any lasting scars from his fight, Sano had removed himself from the busy and loud world of the dojo and returned home for a nap.
The week previous, he had tried visiting Megumi at the clinic. Once away from Kenshin, she was much less calculating and irritating--competition brought out the worst in her--but, in the role of doctor, she was just as prying. He had fled in the face of her direct and shrewd questions about his health and his distinct change in attitude over the past year.
So now, Sano was bored, edgy, and wearing clichéd ruts into the floorboards. He would have liked to sleep, but it was early enough after his most recent dream that he still felt pumped with a strange alertness and restlessness.
On an impulse, he felt like going into town, losing a little money, downing several drinks, and picking a fight with any man who could stand without the aid of a wall or drunken buddy. At least if he were plastered he would have a reason to act oddly. Maybe if he were lucky he would even pass out. Of course, Sanosuke knew that if he fell asleep or passed out while still in the bar or on the street, there was a good chance he would end up with his purse and throat slit.
It bothered him that he, a strong young man fully capable of taking care of himself, should have such concerns, when they'd never troubled him in the past. As he thought about the rest of the old life he'd lost to his own subconscious, the other things he was prevented from doing because he couldn't control himself while asleep, he found himself becoming angry. The injustice that so much he cherished could be made unbearable because he was a little tired was ludicrous and unfair. But he was helpless, he hadn't found a single way to force his body to sleep properly, and out of his confused frustration came fury.
The building anger and pent-up energy filled him like a good old-fashioned adrenaline rush. He realized his hands were shaking, as well as the rest of his body, and the strange familiarity of the situation shocked him.
Sanosuke knew this feeling, this trembling, giddy madness; it used to keep him alive. This was the feeling of a fight waiting to happen. He had survived on this feeling for years, loved it more than getting drunk, eating a good meal, or finding a decent lucky streak. Those had been the in-betweens, the stuff he did while waiting for the next tough guy--the heart of life had been the feeling of hard skin giving way under harder knuckles, always with the image in mind of a unknown man wielding a gun. Most of the time, he'd even loved the fight more than winning it, although they often accompanied each other.
But living on his fists and anger was something he'd given up long before his first early morning surprise. And he'd given it up willingly, after a tiny redhead who packed a hard hit had shown him his grudge wasn't everything it was cracked up to be. Going out to bust the skull of some idiot would never have a clue about what a real fight really looked like--a fight between men who truly understood the beauty and terror of battle--was no longer very appetizing to Sano, no matter what his body was telling him.
He really only wanted the life he'd been given by Kenshin, which had been short lived, but satisfying. He wanted to be the friend and companion of the noblest spirit to ever hold a sword. To mix with the greatest and most terrible men of his country's newest era. To be a champion, fighting alongside or against those men. Not to go silently crazy in a tiny room where he should have been sleeping peacefully. Not to be shying from the outside world because he couldn't get a decent night's rest.
All at once, the desperation of his plight struck him. It was too much to handle in the tiny space of his home, and he snapped and ran.
Like before, when he had been walking the length of his home, the forward motion gave a linear sense to his turbulent thinking, giving him the ability to focus only on his movement and not depressing tangents. Only now, he was actually traveling somewhere. Quickly too, out of the city. He tried to laugh at his peculiar behaviour, his manic reaction, but he couldn't run and do that at the same time, so he decided he'd rather be moving than collapsed shaking on the roadside.
He didn't even know which way he was headed as his feet took him farther from urban areas and into forest, eyes aimed at the ground so he wouldn't trip over a root and kill himself. Arms and legs pumping at a frantic pace, he couldn't decide whether he was running away or chasing something. And when he finally fell to his knees and wrapped his arms around the trunk of a tree for support, his breaths were like sobs.
Then Sanosuke experienced the strangest moment, among all the other strange part of his life. He was so concentrated on the breath in his tortured lungs and the burning of his legs, arms, and heart that he found the dark thoughts had stopped. He was free for a moment and it was as if he had dumped off a weighted cloak to discover his ankles were winged. The strangely poetic and wholly bizarre turn his mind was taking almost made him cry, but the moment of clarity was enough for him to reconcile some of his sleep-deprived agony.
He suddenly thought his friends showing how much they loved him wasn't a bad thing, and he wondered if he had hurt them through his withdrawal. Also, that he should probably show more interest in Katsu's work, because he really was doing amazing things for people and deserved acknowledgment. Sanosuke knew he should ask Megumi for help instead of avoiding her, she was a doctor after all, and maybe his insomnia was a medical issue she could help remedy. Even if not, she at least deserved the chance to try, for all the hard work she'd put in on Sano's behalf in the past.
Amidst all these sappy ponderings, he took advantage of his calmed state to go back to the dreams, which he'd almost forgotten in his madness.
There was no disquiet or anger in him now. It was only the symptoms of confusion and fear that had made his life a living hell. Without them, the dreams weren't threatening at all.
He slowly began to remember snippets of the fantasies, tiny puzzle pieces his mind started to fit together. He realized it had been the exact same dream every night. Bit by bit, the dream came back to him and he discovered the secret picture lost at each wakening.
There was never any true setting in the dream, just mist around darkness. The entire time he would feel another presence, strong and powerful, but not fearful in the least. It was comfortable instead, more like something meant to be. The presence made perfect sense, and there was total trust.
Strong arms wrapped around him in the dream. Male arms, but Sano had come to terms with that possibility already, months ago.
Along with the arms came a bitter and familiar smell, carried on the breath of his companion. One unique to the unidentified man alone. Also, rough and strange clothing, and rough and gentle hands would touch every part of his body at once. Soft hair Sano could remember feeling under his hands, incorporeal dream or not. And that sense of rightness pervading every moment.
Most of all, he recalled eyes blazing like the sun rising over water. At the same point in every dream, Sano would look into his shadow-lover's face and the eyes would open and stare into him. It was as if someone had painted over a fire, leaving only two spaces for the light to burn through, an impossible container for an uncontainable inferno that should have burned away the man and Sano too.
The dream and the passion would then become so intense Sano wouldn't be able to bear it and he would wake. It was the loss of that feeling of right and perfection that had been so terrible to face in the early morning hours. But now Sano was comforted with the memory of it. Even as his moment of clarity drifted beyond recapture, he sat in the middle of unknown woods with the world righted in his heart.
Memory regained, though details fading, as always happens with dreams, the pause in his insanity over and mind and heartbeat already slowing to normal, Sanosuke finally knew the secret of his sleep that had ruined his waking hours. And everything was going to be all right.
As he sat next to the tree, retrieving his sanity and his life, a year of sleeplessness and a day of madness and an hour of sprinting caught him up and laid him down on the ground where he promptly fell asleep.
*~*~*
Chapter One
June 1879 - 11th year of the Meiji Era (over three months later)
Sanosuke moped around his little house, alternately yawning and kicking ineffectually at the floor. Katsu had disappeared a few days ago to meet a contact and follow up on a lead, abandoning him to his own company. Sano loved his friend, and admired all the dangerous work Katsu did, but it was inconvenient to be without the only person who didn't drive him insane with worry and nagging.
Sanosuke sighed and flopped down onto the dirty wooden floor, then got back up and started walking again. It was only early afternoon, long after his hated early morning bathing ritual, and he was already bored out of his mind. He'd tried going to the dojo, but some nutcase, who had taken a disliking to Yahiko, had recently forced Kenshin into a fight. The outcome of the battle had been in Kenshin's favour, but in obeying his vow not to kill, he had ended up getting a semi-serious injury.
Sano had heard all about the incident from Tae, and although he'd truly wanted to check in and make sure Kenshin was okay, he'd also selfishly supposed the stir over the rurouni's health would distract attention from his own zombie-ish appearance.
He was disappointed to learn that even though his prediction of the situation was right, it had not made the incessant weeping of Kaoru, fawning of Megumi, and general exuberance of Yahiko any less annoying. So, after confirming Kenshin hadn't gained any lasting scars from his fight, Sano had removed himself from the busy and loud world of the dojo and returned home for a nap.
The week previous, he had tried visiting Megumi at the clinic. Once away from Kenshin, she was much less calculating and irritating--competition brought out the worst in her--but, in the role of doctor, she was just as prying. He had fled in the face of her direct and shrewd questions about his health and his distinct change in attitude over the past year.
So now, Sano was bored, edgy, and wearing clichéd ruts into the floorboards. He would have liked to sleep, but it was early enough after his most recent dream that he still felt pumped with a strange alertness and restlessness.
On an impulse, he felt like going into town, losing a little money, downing several drinks, and picking a fight with any man who could stand without the aid of a wall or drunken buddy. At least if he were plastered he would have a reason to act oddly. Maybe if he were lucky he would even pass out. Of course, Sanosuke knew that if he fell asleep or passed out while still in the bar or on the street, there was a good chance he would end up with his purse and throat slit.
It bothered him that he, a strong young man fully capable of taking care of himself, should have such concerns, when they'd never troubled him in the past. As he thought about the rest of the old life he'd lost to his own subconscious, the other things he was prevented from doing because he couldn't control himself while asleep, he found himself becoming angry. The injustice that so much he cherished could be made unbearable because he was a little tired was ludicrous and unfair. But he was helpless, he hadn't found a single way to force his body to sleep properly, and out of his confused frustration came fury.
The building anger and pent-up energy filled him like a good old-fashioned adrenaline rush. He realized his hands were shaking, as well as the rest of his body, and the strange familiarity of the situation shocked him.
Sanosuke knew this feeling, this trembling, giddy madness; it used to keep him alive. This was the feeling of a fight waiting to happen. He had survived on this feeling for years, loved it more than getting drunk, eating a good meal, or finding a decent lucky streak. Those had been the in-betweens, the stuff he did while waiting for the next tough guy--the heart of life had been the feeling of hard skin giving way under harder knuckles, always with the image in mind of a unknown man wielding a gun. Most of the time, he'd even loved the fight more than winning it, although they often accompanied each other.
But living on his fists and anger was something he'd given up long before his first early morning surprise. And he'd given it up willingly, after a tiny redhead who packed a hard hit had shown him his grudge wasn't everything it was cracked up to be. Going out to bust the skull of some idiot would never have a clue about what a real fight really looked like--a fight between men who truly understood the beauty and terror of battle--was no longer very appetizing to Sano, no matter what his body was telling him.
He really only wanted the life he'd been given by Kenshin, which had been short lived, but satisfying. He wanted to be the friend and companion of the noblest spirit to ever hold a sword. To mix with the greatest and most terrible men of his country's newest era. To be a champion, fighting alongside or against those men. Not to go silently crazy in a tiny room where he should have been sleeping peacefully. Not to be shying from the outside world because he couldn't get a decent night's rest.
All at once, the desperation of his plight struck him. It was too much to handle in the tiny space of his home, and he snapped and ran.
Like before, when he had been walking the length of his home, the forward motion gave a linear sense to his turbulent thinking, giving him the ability to focus only on his movement and not depressing tangents. Only now, he was actually traveling somewhere. Quickly too, out of the city. He tried to laugh at his peculiar behaviour, his manic reaction, but he couldn't run and do that at the same time, so he decided he'd rather be moving than collapsed shaking on the roadside.
He didn't even know which way he was headed as his feet took him farther from urban areas and into forest, eyes aimed at the ground so he wouldn't trip over a root and kill himself. Arms and legs pumping at a frantic pace, he couldn't decide whether he was running away or chasing something. And when he finally fell to his knees and wrapped his arms around the trunk of a tree for support, his breaths were like sobs.
Then Sanosuke experienced the strangest moment, among all the other strange part of his life. He was so concentrated on the breath in his tortured lungs and the burning of his legs, arms, and heart that he found the dark thoughts had stopped. He was free for a moment and it was as if he had dumped off a weighted cloak to discover his ankles were winged. The strangely poetic and wholly bizarre turn his mind was taking almost made him cry, but the moment of clarity was enough for him to reconcile some of his sleep-deprived agony.
He suddenly thought his friends showing how much they loved him wasn't a bad thing, and he wondered if he had hurt them through his withdrawal. Also, that he should probably show more interest in Katsu's work, because he really was doing amazing things for people and deserved acknowledgment. Sanosuke knew he should ask Megumi for help instead of avoiding her, she was a doctor after all, and maybe his insomnia was a medical issue she could help remedy. Even if not, she at least deserved the chance to try, for all the hard work she'd put in on Sano's behalf in the past.
Amidst all these sappy ponderings, he took advantage of his calmed state to go back to the dreams, which he'd almost forgotten in his madness.
There was no disquiet or anger in him now. It was only the symptoms of confusion and fear that had made his life a living hell. Without them, the dreams weren't threatening at all.
He slowly began to remember snippets of the fantasies, tiny puzzle pieces his mind started to fit together. He realized it had been the exact same dream every night. Bit by bit, the dream came back to him and he discovered the secret picture lost at each wakening.
There was never any true setting in the dream, just mist around darkness. The entire time he would feel another presence, strong and powerful, but not fearful in the least. It was comfortable instead, more like something meant to be. The presence made perfect sense, and there was total trust.
Strong arms wrapped around him in the dream. Male arms, but Sano had come to terms with that possibility already, months ago.
Along with the arms came a bitter and familiar smell, carried on the breath of his companion. One unique to the unidentified man alone. Also, rough and strange clothing, and rough and gentle hands would touch every part of his body at once. Soft hair Sano could remember feeling under his hands, incorporeal dream or not. And that sense of rightness pervading every moment.
Most of all, he recalled eyes blazing like the sun rising over water. At the same point in every dream, Sano would look into his shadow-lover's face and the eyes would open and stare into him. It was as if someone had painted over a fire, leaving only two spaces for the light to burn through, an impossible container for an uncontainable inferno that should have burned away the man and Sano too.
The dream and the passion would then become so intense Sano wouldn't be able to bear it and he would wake. It was the loss of that feeling of right and perfection that had been so terrible to face in the early morning hours. But now Sano was comforted with the memory of it. Even as his moment of clarity drifted beyond recapture, he sat in the middle of unknown woods with the world righted in his heart.
Memory regained, though details fading, as always happens with dreams, the pause in his insanity over and mind and heartbeat already slowing to normal, Sanosuke finally knew the secret of his sleep that had ruined his waking hours. And everything was going to be all right.
As he sat next to the tree, retrieving his sanity and his life, a year of sleeplessness and a day of madness and an hour of sprinting caught him up and laid him down on the ground where he promptly fell asleep.
*~*~*
