Behind a Smile: 12: Hakken no Jiken
Author's notes: So glad you guys reviewed!!!!! I'm so happy!!!! I'm also happy that I finished Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix in a time span of…maybe two days!!! Yahoo!!!!! *dreamy sigh* Ah, my beloved Sirius…
I forgot to mention that I'm not sure if there IS such hospital as the London General Hospital. ^^;
Anyway, let's go back to our poor and beloved Seta Soujiro. YAAAY! I was soo happy I got to see the episode where he fought Kenshin again!
So, let's go and make Misao suffer…but I guess not much suffering this time. ^^;
In this chapter, I mean.
***
12::Hakken no Jiken//Discovery of the Accident::12
***
It was a dark and chilly night, with the moon shining brightly as clouds passed by the glowing orb. The soft rustle of water hurrying down a little man-made stream echoed through the quiet house of Himura, silently accenting the beautiful peace and quiet that surrounded the said household.
A certain red-haired teenager, about the age of nineteen, ruffled his long locks a few times as he reread his notes one more time. Uneasy about his note taking, Kenshin took out his pencil and erased a few characters off his notebook.
Startled, he was, when the phone beside him suddenly rang. The shrill sounds of the ringing rang throughout his Japanese-style bedroom, making the said teenager lean to his phone and pick it up.
"Hello?"
"Kenshin?"
The reception was quite fuzzy, but nevertheless Kenshin could still make out the voice of Shishio Yumi. Startled that the lady would give him a call at this time of night, he queried her.
"Is something of the matter, Yumi-dono?"
She was speaking in a quiet, hushed voice – something was definitely wrong. "Kenshin, I need to talk to you. Something happened…"
And with that, she trailed off. "Something happened to who, Yumi-dono?" Kenshin asked; apparently Yumi has tapped into his concerned curiosity once again.
"It's about Soujiro."
Amethyst eyes widened in worry. "What happened to Soujiro-dono?"
Several seconds passed by as the teenager awaited the answer with bated breath; Yumi apparently having a hard time spelling it out. She was sniffling a few times, taking deep breaths as if she was crying.
"He…tried to kill himself."
The silence was definitely unbearable to the lady – she wasn't sure of what Kenshin would say. Soujiro wasn't the type to commit suicide – Soujiro was always the levelheaded member of the Kenshi-gumi apart from Kenshin himself. "What do you mean," Kenshin started in a hushed whisper, unable to believe the fact that Soujiro tried to commit suicide. "That he tried to kill himself?"
"Alex and the girls are trying to get the answer out from Soujiro." Yumi answered, continuing on taking deep breaths. "The details of what drove him to, I mean. But he said he couldn't remember a thing about the reason – all he remembered was that he was thinking about someone."
"It could've been Misao-chan." Kenshin alleged. "No doubt about it – it seems impossible for Soujiro-dono to kill himself for any other reason."
Yumi didn't reply; it was another thing about his love for Misao-chan. All of a sudden, it disappeared – he couldn't even remember who Misao was. He seemed to know bits and pieces about everyone; Yumi was still unsure of what the cause of his selective amnesia was.
"Yumi-dono?"
Yumi finally shook her head and tried to reply, but not in shacked sobs. "It's another thing – about Misao-chan. When he…tried to kill himself, we hurried him to the hospital; he was bleeding quite badly from a long gash on his neck. It was a miracle that he survived, really – the doctor said it wasn't THAT deep."
Kenshin was still puzzled. "What does Misao-chan have to do with all this?"
"He…he can't remember her."
The set of words continued to be a shock bomb to the redheaded teenager. "But he remembered us?"
The lady gave a small mumble of 'Yes'.
"He can't remember her?" Kenshin repeated, in a state of shock. How the hell would Soujiro manage to forget Misao? Unless…Soujiro bumped his head or something to trigger amnesia… "You said he still remembers bits and pieces, right?"
"He does."
"Then did he bump his head on something…? When he fell? After he slashed himself?"
Kenshin sounded hopeful for some reason. It was better – for Kenshin, anyway – to know that there was some acceptable reason for Soujiro to forget who Misao was.
Yumi, meanwhile, replayed the events of the previous mind repeatedly in her mind. Soujiro was holding a katana…he slashed himself…Misao-chan was barking…
Purple eyes widened in realization. Right after Soujiro closed his eyes, his head thumped noisily on his cabinet before he fell down to the carpet. She started to entangle her fingers on the phone cord as she narrated the whole story to the understanding 19-year-old millions of miles away.
"But how come it was selective? How come he only forgot about Misao?" Kenshin continued to ask, still curious on how the hell it happened. Amnesia, as he knew, never selected any memory – it would just wipe your memories clean off. But it was different – Soujiro only forgot Misao, and Misao only. Did Misao hurt Soujiro so much to the point that the Fates pitied him…and decided to erase her existence from his world?
"We really don't know, Kenshin." Yumi answered. "We have no idea how. He didn't even remember who gave Misao-chan to him."
The redhead was silent. This was something he wondered about and was often confused; naming the dog 'Misao-chan', as he thought, was a small mistake – Soujiro'd remind himself of Misao often just by saying the dog's name. Besides – people were often confused on who he was talking about.
"I'm talking about the dog."
Kenshin, startled at the sudden reply to his silence, chuckled sheepishly, but returned to a serious mode right after. "I see…are there any improvements on his memory, then?"
"No. I don't really know, since Kamatari-chan and the others are with him at this very moment."
"Kamatari-chan?"
Yumi laughed. "She's also a student from Japan – Kyoto, in fact. She was with Alex and Emily when they fetched us from the airport. She's really nice."
Kenshin looked thoughtfully at his hands – he had nothing else to say now. Bringing up the topic of Misao recovering should be quite inappropriate, so Kenshin decided to say goodbye.
"Thank you for informing me, Yumi-dono."
"I needed for you kids to know. Don't tell Misao, all right? I don't want her hurt."
Kenshin only murmured his response, and then, with an appropriate goodbye, set the receiver back on its base.
He sighed.
"How am I going to tell them..?"
**
September 8th, 2003.
3:00 pm.
The afternoon sun shone lazily throughout the busy streets of London, the cold autumn wind howling past buildings and people. With a few golden leaves of maple fluttering inside his hospital room, the soccer star shifted slightly in his sleep.
Tendrils of short, dark-hued hair were scattered among the heavenly-white pillows. His cheek graced the pillow on which his head rested, with his hands carelessly placed beside his body. The sunlight illuminated a few parts of his body as he once again shifted.
He seemed to be having a dream – maybe a nightmare; you can tell by looking at his face. He had a pained expression, with eyebrows arched slightly and a small frown gracing his pale, supple lips. He tossed and turned a few times, seemingly finding every position unsatisfactory.
*
September 7th, 2003.
9:45 pm.
Silence has fallen upon the huge mansion, with lights slowly blinking out of existence. Everybody was going to sleep, or probably were asleep at that time, for almost every bedroom in the huge house were lit by nothing.
He was smiling rather strangely – looking apparently pleased with something he has done. He was staring out into nothingness, dark blue eyes fixed on the large mirror placed before him. The night sky was dotted with uncountable twinkling stars, a pale, full moon glowing in the dark clouds' wake. Everything around him started to feel like the things were sympathizing him, pitying him right now, at this very moment.
'Misao-chan…' he suddenly murmured, dark eyes straying to the picture frame beside him. He was sitting on his bed, pictures of him and his beloved scattered throughout the sheets. A smile was still pasted on his face.
'Silly boy, silly boy,' said an unknown voice inside his head. 'You shouldn't have fallen for her.'
Seta Soujiro's smile faltered. He knew that the voice was right – it was always right. He didn't answer the little voice inside his mind – he didn't need anyone else to shove the fact up his face.
Silence passed. By now, Soujiro's smile returned, and once again he was staring quite fondly at his reflection.
'Would she ever love someone like me?' Soujiro asked himself, studying his appearance on the mirror. There was absolutely nothing wrong with what he looked – he looked effeminate, but manly in some sense; dark, blue-black hair that framed his face (often changing into a blackish-brown hue); and captivating bright blue eyes. Was there something wrong with whom he is, then? Was there something wrong about how he acted, how he lived his life, what his personality was like?
'The question is…' said that annoying little voice inside his brain, 'Are you capable of loving someone else? Someone else…besides her?'
The boy looked curiously at his feet. Was he, then, capable of loving someone else? The soccer star knew nothing of what to say to the annoying little voice. It was a question he never bothered to answer from the start. It was a question he always eluded from answering for it beckoned so many complications to arrive. He never thought of loving someone else, for he only loved someone and that was…
He tried to, though. He tried to so much for his love for her to be erased from existence and to love someone else. He had tried so much – but this forestalling of his feelings went so far to the point he could never forget her. He always worried so much about her, became so selfless just for her. It was as if his world would crumble down to a million, shattered pieces of she were to disappear from him.
But it was the other way around. He finally realized that in order for her to be happy, for her to achieve her long-wished happiness, he had to leave. He had to leave his beloved behind to trouble her no more of his presence.
So his world was then shattered. Slowly falling to the earth, awaiting its destruction like a precious, falling orb. He never did anything to save his world though – for he only believed in one thing.
Soujiro raised his head, once again staring at his reflection staring blankly at him. It didn't take him eternity to realize what the answer was. The answer was just lying there – in the form of a treasured katana.
His world was to crumble without her – so he will crumble.
He will make his belief come true.
…why?
For he knew the answer to the question – he can't love someone else. He had devoted himself to Misao, the one and only Makimachi Misao, and he would and could never devote himself to someone else.
He had spent his life in building Misao's happiness and not his. He had sacrificed so much for her, lost because of her, loved because of her.
And if needed, he'll die for her too.
He had loved her so much. And so, Soujiro thought, if his love would never be returned, it would be better for him to die than to live his life in terrifying agony.
He'd live for her.
But he'd die for her.
Silently, the soccer star stood up from his comfy spot on the bed, stepping over his dog as he approached the katana sitting peacefully atop his cabinet. Unsheathing the weapon slowly, with the pale moonlight bouncing off the razor-sharp blade, he looked at himself one last time.
His lips were curled in an empty smile; his fingers clasping the white-and-blue hued handle of the precious sword. He looked painfully down at his dog, now barking and pulling on his pant leg with a picture in her mouth. With one last smile, and choosing to ignore the scream of dissent from his aunt, he said his supposed-to-be final words.
'Misao-chan…Sayonara.'
**
Soujiro suddenly sat up from his bed, sweating profusely as beads of perspiration traveled down his flushed face. His blue eyes were widened slightly; unable to take the nightmares he started to have. He slowly clenched his fist, and feeling no handle between his palm and fingers, he sighed in relief.
Author's notes: So how was that? I hope you guys liked it. Don't worry – Aoshi will come soon enough. Next chapter, I suppose. ^^;
The Special Notes for Special People portion….
SON LIN-san: Sou desu ka? *raises eyebrows* I never knew there were such animals. ^^;
PIXIE AYANAMI-san: Seems that everyone wants Misao to go on and head off towards London. ^^ Anyway, Kamtari would be *coughcough* linked to our beloved Sou-chan. ^^
GEE-YOUKNIT-san: I couldn't kill someone as sweet as Sou-chan! And Misao's definitely going to suffer, but not in this chapter. I think in the next one. ^^
ZEONREBORN-san: Well, you know love…can make you stupid things. He'll get only, as far as I've planned, fragments of his memory back, but not right now. ^^ Kamatari is a GIRL, 100% and everything, and Aoshi will appear the next chapter. ^^
PERSON-san: Don't worry, Sou-chan will get fragments of his memory back. ^^ Aoshi's going to appear in the next chapter, although Misao will…have a hard time knowing if Sou did try to kill himself. *slaps mouth* Too much spoilers…
REGINA-TERRAE-san: You agree with me too! Yay!
Lord Cirenmas: *bows* thank you.
KEN-san: ^^ well, Misao was kinda cruel to Sou, wasn't she? ^^ I'm really starting to wonder how come people don't call you great reviewers '-san'.
SOUJIRO-FAN-san: YES! *insane laugh* Let us go and let the torture begin!
SILVER-NIGHTINGALE-san: WOW! And daming pinoy!!!!!!!!! Nakakatuwa! *dances around*
WHITE WITCH-san: I'm starting to feel really bad…I've been making you guys hate Aoshi and Misao…^^;
DRAGONA-san: Hope you liked the chapter!
SOJU-san: I would like to ask why I have gotten you so pissed off at my story, and why the hell do you want me to pissed off. I think 'shiatsu' is a form of massage, isn't it? But of course, I'm not Japanese so I don't know anything. ^^ Also, I would really like to ask why the hell do you want me pissed off and not want me to hurt you. ^^ I'm curious about that. Anyway, I hope you had a good day. ^^
SASAMI9876-san: I hope you now understand why. ^^ Thank you!
MYVAN-san: Arigato gozaimasu! I'm really happy about your comments! *bows* About the surname thing, well, I kinda got used to using that technique. It's a bad habit of mine. ^^; I think it's cute, Soujiro calling his dog after the one who gave it to him! ^^
VIOLETTEGAL345-san: Don't worry, Sou will only suffer very little at the end of the story. It IS Misao's turn to suffer. ^^
MIDAORU-san: Hisashiburi! Oi, hindi ko gets ung sinasabi mo about soap operas…=.= Ayaw gumana ng utak ko ngayon…^^;
JAP_GIRL-san: Ah, yung Florante at Laura? Lesson kasi naming yun. SO assignment naming basahin ung chapters tapos sagutin ung exercises sa book and everything. Nakakainis nga eh. ^^;
So, that concludes our session for today! Thank you very much, and I hope you review! Sorry for the late update!