Reflected Moonlight

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Chapter Eight: Here in My Heart

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Kaoru was dreaming except for these dreams weren't nightmares.

"What is this place?" Kaoru asked as she looked around. She was in a green meadow filled with tiny blossoms that stirred gently in the wind. The sweet smell of flowers hung in the air around her as she began to walk down a much trodden path. Then she saw a figure ahead of her growing closer with each step. She knew that figure well. It was her father.

"Father!" She cried out as she ran to him. He held her in his arms and laughed.

"I'm sorry I didn't have much time to talk to you before, but you had to return to your body before your life ended." He said.

She looked up at him. "Where is this place?"

He sighed. "It is not important right now. But I came this one time to tell you something gravely important."

Kaoru could see that his eyes were troubled. "What is it father? What did you want to tell me?"

"Fate will not leave you alone, Kaoru. Death draws near to your group again. If you are not careful it will take the ones you love. I came to give this warning. We will not meet again till we are both in the afterlife, but please, heed my warning." He said as he started to fade away.

Kaoru cried out and reached for him, but it was like trying to hold water in her hands, it all slipped through her fingers and left her nothing behind.

Kenshin slowly nodded off to sleep. He too began to dream, but his were not as soothing.

Kenshin was small again. A little child. He shivered as he looked at his parents dead bodies and hugged himself tighter. Hot tears streamed down his face, and the darkness began to converge in his heart. Slowly he dropped to his knees and the scene faded away into something more horrible.

A whip flashed cruelly over the group of shuddering children. Kenshin stood in the middle of them huddled to stay away from the edge of the cruel whip. He closed his eyes to block out the image and the pain, but it could not block out the screams. His screams, the screams of the other children echoed in the silence of the dark void in his heart. A wave of crimson splashed across his vision sending him tumbling in a dark abyss, the screams pursuing.

Then out of the darkness came a bright blinding light that seared through his very heart. He closed his eyes for a second against the light, and when he opened them he could see Kaoru standing there. He smiled and reached out a hand. Slowly she took his hand in hers entwining their fingers together.

"Kaoru, what's happening? Where are we?" he asked as she grew closer to him running her hands up his face.

She didn't answer. She simply stared at him as though waiting for something. Then she turned away and slowly began to fade into the light.

He reached out to grab her, but she was disappearing too fast. "No, Kaoru! Don't leave me!" He cried out.

She simply shook her head. "I'll never leave you.....Always.....I'll be in your heart. All you have to do is look...."

Kenshin closed his eyes again and whispered softly. "Yes, you will always be here in my heart."

"You're here, there's nothing I can ever fear as long as we are together. As long as we walk together we can make it through." Those were Kaoru's last fading words before Kenshin awoke.

Sano and Yahiko both sat out on the table eating. Sano had explained everything that had gone on that night and Yahiko was a bit frightened though he would never admit it.

"So when Kenshin becomes the Battousai, he becomes another person?" Yahiko asked still not clear on that part.

Sano nodded and fingered his chopsticks. "Yeah, it seems that way. He was so cold, so vicious. It couldn't have been Kenshin. Kenshin would never hurt Kaoru much less try to kill her. There's something wrong about this whole thing. I think he's still hiding something from all of us and he isn't willing to tell."

~I really don't know what Kenshin's past was like so I hope I didn't really screw it up..and if I did..oh well.~