Disclaimer: I do not own RK.
Okay, enough with the suspense on Okita-san. What really happened then? All is revealed? As if...
Chapter 5: Saitou's Confession?
"Creep! he didn't have to hit me!" Megumi fumed. She glared at Saitou. Aoshi nursed a very red and painful cheek. After confronting Saitou, he returned to the waiting room to find Megumi still out cold on the floor. He decided he better not leave her sprawled like that and carried her to the bench.
When he was laying her down on the bench, the foxy woman opened her eyes, screamed bloody molest and slapped him. So much for trying to be Mr. Nice Guy...
They were in her clinic's waiting room. Aoshi had sent Misao back to Aoiya to fetch Kenshin when he saw the unconscious Megumi. The ninja girl soon returned with the red-haired samurai in tow. Megumi excused herself and left to attend to her young patient.
Kenshin almost failed to recognize his arch nemesis. For once, the man actually looked, well, defeated. No cutting remarks, no hint of the animosity that had existed between them since that era of crimson rain. Was the man a friend or enemy? Their relationship was ambivalent at the best of times.
They had cooperated out of sheer necessity when dealing with Shishio and later Enishi. Saitou had failed to show up for their final duel... Then came the news of his resignation, of course, Kenshin did not believe that one bit. He believed Saitou was still working as a spy. Saitou was a reminder of Kenshin's own past as Battousai.
Saitou Hajime. Kenshin respected his skill as a swordsman, but questioned his principles and his morals. Former Shinsengumi captain turned Meiji government spy. Then there were those rumors concerning Okita. Were things really as straightforward as the official records claimed?
If the rumors were true, then the man's on the same level as pond scum. Time to come clean, Saitou. Three men waited in silence. Shinomori Aoshi, Himura Kenshin and Saitou Hajime. The three of them had gone through that hell more than a decade ago. Misao decided it was time for her exit and went to help Megumi.
It was Saitou who broke the silence. "What do you want to know about Okita?"
"Did he really die in the Kyoto TB Hospital of his illness, Saitou?" Aoshi's eyes narrowed dangerously. "Or did you throw him to Butcher Miyagi as they say you did?" Kenshin restrained Aoshi. The normally cool young man was positively furious. Only scumbags betray their closest friends...
Saitou sighed. He reached for his cigarettes, only to have Aoshi knock them out of his hands. "Cool it!" Kenshin snapped. His violet eyes were flecked with gold as he separated both men.
"Saitou, please! The deaths of your family may be tied to Okita's death and you know it," Kenshin grated. Somehow, he understood how Saitou must be feeling. He had felt the same way when he thought Kaoru had been killed. Had the wolf given up? If so, why was he following the trail of the Miyagi massacre?
Twelve years ago, near a Shinsengumi field camp...
"Hijitaka, please give it up. The Shogunate's a lost cause. You don't have to die for a lost cause..." Saitou tried to reason with his one-time superior and friend. His new masters had sent him to meet with the outlawed Shinsengumi leader with an offer of amnesty. Hijitaka was stubborn as always.
"They executed Kondo!" Hijitaka Toshizo countered angrily.
"Nagakura and Harada accepted and they're both doing fine." The man glared at him. He opened his mouth to say something. Then young Tetsu came running.
"Hijitaka-san, Okita-san's in bad shape!" The boy all but fell over himself in his haste. A worried Hijitaka and Saitou followed the page to where Okita was coughing blood. The young First Patrol captain was very weak. Running about the countryside with the remnants of the Shinsengumi was taking its toll on him.
Hijitaka reached a decision. Okita will accept amnesty whether he wants to or not. Saitou had Okita admitted to a hospital when they both hoped he'll be able to live out his remaining days in peace...
"Saitou?" Keshin pressed. Saitou was brought back to the present. He was facing Himura and Shinomori in the waiting room of fox-woman's clinic.
"I let Miyagi get to him," Saitou admitted. You are a scumbag, both Kenshin and Aoshi glared at him. "They took him from the hospital... Tokio tried to stop them..." He lowered his face into his hands. The other two men exchanged glances. Saitou was crying. He was actually crying.
He should have been there... After admitting Okita, he had been called out of Kyoto on government business. They wanted him to negotiate the surrender of some pro-Shogunate Takagi kinsmen. The Takagi was his family by marriage.
A week later, he had returned to Kyoto to find that Tokio had suffered a miscarriage. Miyagi's goons had beaten her when she tried to stop them from taking her cousin from the hospital. Okita is a close friend of Hijitaka, the last Shinsengumi leader still on the run. He would know where Hijitaka was heading. He was too valuable a source for the Ishii to overlook. Saitou rushed to the Kyoto goal and found Okita barely alive in the street outside where they had left him for dead.
Okita lingered on for two more days before dying of both injuries and illness. He stayed by Okita's side until he drew his last breath in the hospital, not daring to leave. Then he set off to find the person Okita had pleaded with him to find. He failed. The goal caught fire. Saitou always believed the Butcher had burnt to death.
He failed his friend, failed to fulfill his last wish and failed to avenge his death...
Author's notes:
Figured Aoshi is the type who would take a very serious view of friendship. Kenshin playing peacemaker? Saitou crying? Saitou's confession?
Poor Okita-sama (sob). R&R