WARNING: Spoilers! If you don't know who Kenji is, please read at your own risk! POSSIBLE CHARACTER DEATH AT END OF STORY.
WITH DUE CREDIT: This fic was loosely spun off from two fics - "Over the Sting" by sasori and "Chronicles of a Rurouni", one of my earlier fics.
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Yesterday's Shadow is Tomorrow's Twilight
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Chapter 47: Trapdoors and Tunnels
Kenji sighed.
He was sitting beneath a huge tree, looking up at the cloudy skies, wondering what he was doing.
And wondering where in the world he was.
After his hearty and courageous declaration that he would make Hiko eat his words just that morning, the teenager realised that he was hopelessly lost, and in addition to that, that he had absolutely no idea where he should go to find the rest of his comrades.
He let his thoughts wander a bit, and for a while he considered finding his way back to Hiko's hut to ask to old man for directions. As soon as it crossed his mind, however, Kenji shook that particular option out of his head vigorously. He rose to his feet, suddenly filled with energy to go on again. He would show that smirking old man what he was really made of /without/ his help, too!
He took a brave step forward, gaped when he saw a flash of silver fur standing where his foot was to land, swerved, and crash landed into the tree he had been sitting under just now.
Then the forest was silent.
Eventually, Kenji peeled himself off the bark of the tree. He rubbed his smarting face doefully, muttering a string of indecipherable curses under his breath before peeking out from behind his fingers at the silver fox, who sat regally in the same spot, looking at Kenji somewhat expectantly.
Kenji sighed. "What is it this time?" He squat down to look at the fox in the eye. The fox remained unmoving, returning Kenji's stare. The redhead made a waving movement outwards. "Shoo! Shoo! I have no food for you!" He informed the fox.
The fox stood and pranced rather happily towards Kenji instead of away from him. Kenji shook his head, when the fox came just one step shy of touching noses with the human. He stood and turned his back on the fox. "I'm busy now and have no time to play tag with you. Go back to your den and hunt for some pests or something, okay?"
Before he had even taken two steps, the silver fox had bounded up from behind to block his way again. Kenji stopped, frowning at the fox. He folded his arms across his chest and relaxed, giving the fox an 'okay-what-now' look. The fox yipped once, very softly, and bounded off quickly to a certain tree somewhere nearby. From behind the trunk, the creature pulled out a thick parchment by tugging at it furiously. Kenji's curiosity was instantly piqued. He unfolded his arms and sauntered forward in a slow jog to where the fox was.
Upon sensing Kenji's arrival, the fox hopped away on its paws. The redhead glanced at it questioningly, then shrugged whatever doubt or question he had on his mind and reached out to pull the parchment away from the grass.
"Phew!" Kenji was quite disgusted at the amount of mud and soil covering the parchment, which had obviously been dragged a long way out. "Where did you pull this piece of junk out from?" He asked the fox, who tilted its head and twitched an ear. The boy nevertheless uncurled the ragged piece of cloth-like paper and placed it on the ground, looking at what was written upon it.
"Hmm..." He was initially very bored, for what he saw was a huge, rather intricate map of the Kyoto outskirts, where certain prominent mountains had been circled and indicated with an entire slew of Chinese words. Slowly, though, Kenji's eyes grew wide. He grabbed the parchment with both hands. "This map..." He gasped in disbelief. He folded it up faster than he had opened it, eyes darting around furtively. He needed to let Soujirou and Enishi look at this as soon as possible.
Scrambling onto his feet, Kenji blinked at his surroundings, confused once more. He suddenly remembered that he was lost in the first place, and had no idea where to go at all. He cursed and would have taken off in a random direction, had he not suddenly notice the fox was perched atop a fallen tree trunk, shooting him an almost beckoning look. Kenji stared at the fox. And the fox stared back. "Oh, what the hell!" The young boy threw his arms and common sense into the air. He broke into a run towards the silver fox, who, as soon as it saw Kenji coming, took off as well, running deeper and deeper through the unyielding forest.
/Still a long while more to sunset/ Kenji thought to himself. /I need to get there before then/
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"The tablet at the entrance of the temple is out of place," Soujirou remarked, when the trio eventually came to a stop, as indicated by the instructions Enishi was holding. "The words aren't facing the stairs," he continued, making a face of wonderment. As if on cue, Enishi looked up from the paper and glanced at the tablet Soujirou was talking about.
"This is the trigger," Enishi pat the tablet at the tip, once he finished his evaluation of the item. Then, without explaining what he meant, he gave the upright stone a rough kick, making it flip and return to its normal position with a low, rumbling sound. Soujirou went 'ooh!', but Aoshi remained unmoving. Enishi waited for about two seconds, closing his eyes as if trying to listen for something he could not otherwise hear if he had them opened. When he next opened them, they were clear and focused. He stepped eastwards, where a smaller house stood, comparatively run-down in its spot next to the grand temple hall. "Over here."
Neither Aoshi nor Soujirou had the time or chance to argue Enishi's decision. And neither of them really wanted to, anyway. They quietly trailed the leading Enishi, watching as he roughly tore the shouji of the small house down. Soujirou rubbed the back of his head in slight exasperation at his partner's demonstration of awesome destructive powers, but said nothing. Following the rest of them into the darkened room, the younger wanderer's first instinct was to cover his mouth and nose.
"Oh my," he quipped, none too pleased with what he was seeing. "I don't think anyone has been in this hut for the past ten years at least!"
"If they did, they certainly did not stay long," Aoshi agreed somewhat. Their eyes were getting used to the strange darkness, so he started looking around. Enishi was off to a corner, rummaging through a layer of books on a shelf. Deciding he was better off helping out than standing in the doorway and blocking the light, Aoshi carefully strode over where Enishi was, followed closely by Soujirou.
As soon as they came somewhat near the white-haired man, they heard a distinct click which resounded loudly through the room. There was rumbling immediately thereafter, as the shelf Enishi had been rummaging through began to move automatically to one side, revealing a blank brick wall behind it. Enishi stared at the wall for a while, then reached out to touch a particular brick, pushing it further in than it should have been able to be pushed. Immediately, a separation occurred between an entire area of bricks, and the wall turned inwards to reveal yet another darkened room. Both Aoshi and Soujirou stared at it, perhaps wondering if it was really safe to enter yet.
Enishi was the one who stepped in first. He felt his way around against the wall first, trying to find something. By the time he appeared to have found it, Aoshi and Soujirou had also already entered the hidden room. But they certainly knew better than to interrupt Enishi in his current state.
They waited. And were rewarded when a bright spark of light burst into their vision, lighting up the room completely, but also making the hidden door they had come in through close up again.
"Dark and creepy tunnel," Soujirou giggled. "Windy and wet, too!"
"This tunnel must lead us to where the others are," Aoshi offered. "The wind in this indoors location is a good indication."
"Let's just walk on," Enishi sighed. He was holding a fire torch he had grabbed off the wall, apparently also the trigger for shutting the hidden entrance. "This should be a one way road to wherever it is we should be going." He started to walk, not bothering to check if the other two were following as well. "And Shinomori," he prompted, "you could help us ease our boredom by telling us what you've been doing while we were snooping around the Hiten master's stupid workshop."
At first there was silence. Then, "Saitou wanted to mobilise the force immediately to stamp down the Yuugure, except that he had no concrete proof to his conclusion. But it seems like his idea of gathering evidence to incriminate means that he will slay them all first then collect the evidence from there." He paused to check if Soujirou and Enishi were still listening. They apparently were, so he continued.
"As at that point of time, even the Oniwabanshuu cannot really be sure where the real location of the Yuugure hideout is, we were unable to tell Saitou anymore than we could tell you. Although we knew that you would eventually trace the location of the hideout with Hiko Seijuurou's help, we had several other contingency plans in mind."
"And that was why you asked me to inform you immediately when people from the Yuugure show up to press for the goods?" Enishi interrupted. Aoshi merely nodded, keeping his peace for now. "One hell of a contingency plan that was, I must say," Enishi snorted. "I'm actually somewhat impressed."
Ignoring that half-hearted compliment, Aoshi said, "Of course, the police had their own plans in mind as well. I believe you may have seen Kamatari on your way down. That was Saitou's method of making doubly sure we knew where to find the Yuugure. As of now, Saitou, Kamatari, Chou and Misao are stationed where the entrance of the Yuugure hideout is. I believe we will see them once we get to the end of this tunnel, if what the man Guang was saying is true."
"But the fact that Guang-san was there to greet us," Soujirou asked, "means that the enemy already knows that we are here, right?"
"With a headquarters as big as this, you can hardly hide away from public sight for long," Enishi pointed out. "It was to be sooner or later that someone will stumble upon this place. I'm guessing they've given up trying to hide anymore and are instead openly challenging the local police force." A satisfied smirk slowly stretched across his face. "They've got some guts. Not bad... not bad at all..."
Aoshi and Soujirou could only stare at the mumbling man as they continued their walk, wondering what he actually meant.
In a matter of a short while more, Enishi held a hand out to indicate that the tunnel procession was coming to a halt, which it was. Aoshi was silent and calm as usual, but Soujirou kept squinting around the darkness, trying to see what was up ahead. Enishi turned and walked to the left, reaching out with fire torch in hand to touch its unused counterpart, hanging upon the wall. The tunnel now glowed with a lopsided light. Walking over to his right and touching the wall there, Enishi eventually found a second unlit torch, and lit it.
With this part of the tunnel wholly lit now, Enishi snuffed the fire on the torch he was holding out. He then tossed it onto the ground, not needing the item anymore.
"Wow." Soujirou smiled. "It looks like we've hit the end of the tunnel!"
"Wrong," Enishi shook his head. He gestured at the pile of uneven soil behind them, which Soujirou had thought to be a wall. "This was a tunnel turning, but it has obviously been sealed up." The white-haired man glanced at Aoshi from the corner of his eyes. "Does this place look familiar to you?"
The sombre man nodded, without needing to think. He tilted his head towards the space in between the fire torches Enishi had just lit up. "That is the door I came out from to lead the both of you here. And indeed, I remember coming from this path," he glanced momentarily at the blocked up exit, "but apparently you are right. Somebody has tampered with it." Enishi nodded in approval. But Soujirou was confused.
"What door?" He asked, innocently. He pointed at the inky darkness that was in between the fire torches. "I see nothing but darkness. Isn't this just another path somewhere down?"
Enishi sighed. He picked up a random large rock lying on the ground near him and tossed it in the air a couple of times, testing its weight and tenacity. Once satisfied with it, he took aim, stretched, and flung the stone in the direction of the darkness.
The stone hurtled obediently there, but instead of going through and being engulfed by the darkness, as Soujirou thought it might, the stone simply hit something with a huge metallic 'twack!', and then fell to the ground, bouncing twice. Soujirou stared at the stone. Then at the darkness. Then at Enishi. "I see." He smiled, but the smile was weak and somewhat embarrassed.
"Good." Enishi had already turned away. "Shinomori. You said you just came out from that door. I'm supposing you have an idea how we can get in, then?"
If Aoshi kept his silence any further, he would have blended in completely with the background. He shot Enishi a questioning glance, but nevertheless moved from ruminating while leaning against the cavernous walls. He approached the door, still unseeable in the darkness, and reached a hand out. Both Soujirou and Enishi watched with undisguised interest as he wound his hand around something that looked like a latch. "Here is how you open the door," Aoshi informed.
"A latch!" Soujirou exclaimed. "This means that we're not supposed to push, but pull the door, right?" He turned to Aoshi, who nodded.
"That can't be all there is to it," Enishi interjected. "What's the snag?"
"Nothing that serious, not to you anyway," Aoshi released the latch and knocked soundlessly on the door with his knuckles. "You may even like the challenge." His cryptic tone intrigued both listening wanderers. "This door," Aoshi stated, "must weigh at least 500 kilograms."
The tunnel resounded with silence.
Soujirou and Enishi were looking at Aoshi in absolute disbelief.
As expected, Enishi was the first to burst. "Five hundred kilograms?" He narrowed his eyes at Aoshi. "Do you know what you're talking about?" He advanced towards the stoic ninja, who refused to budge or give in. "How could you think of calling five hundred kilograms..."
"Yukishiro-san" Soujirou chirped and waved from where he stood with the opened door. "I opened the door!"
"...a /challenge!" Enishi snorted. "Hah! It's peanuts! See, even the Tenken can use his little pinky to open the damned thing. If /that's/ a challenge, then what's the real thing?" The ex-mafia boss sneered and stormed away. "Dammit! And here I was, looking forward to a /real/ challenge! Bah." He continued to murmur, stepping through the door Soujirou had opened. Soujirou continued to hold it, waiting for Aoshi.
Aoshi proceeded to give a small, long-suffering sigh. "I /told/ you this door would be nothing serious to you guys," he grumbled half-heartedly under his breath, turning and walking towards the door as well. As he passed through and entered the next room, he leaned against the wall beside the doorframe and crossed his arms. "Well, Yukishiro," He asked out loud, questioning the wanderer, who was staring at something with wide eyes and a tied tongue. "Is /this/ door perhaps worth being called a challenge, then?"
"What door?" Soujirou asked cheerily, stepping through the one he had been holding for the others. He released it, and the door slammed against itself with much grating and rumbling.
The room they had just entered was large and had an incredibly high ceiling, compared to the cramped tunnel they had been in just now. It was at least fifty metres tall, complete with solidifed stone stalagmites jutting out precariously from its roof, waiting to fall at any given time. This large room was brightly lit, the fire torches within shining with an uneasy glow.
Aoshi tilted his head slightly forward, to indicate to Soujirou what he was talking about. Soujirou obliged by looking further down instead of up.
And he had to suppress the gasp that immediately came to his lips.
At the other end of the huge, volumous room, was a door. But it was not just a simple door. It stretched the entire length of floor to ceiling, and was as wide as the right and left sides of this particular cave. It was obviously a stone door, judging by the nooks and crannies it had on it. There were also elaborately carved images of a dragon and tiger on each leaf of the door, dancing around each other in an eternal circle.
Only one thing seemed sure to Soujirou as he continued to scrutinise the humongous door, trying to make something out of it.
They certainly were not going to get through this door by a mere simple push or pull.
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... to be continued
21/2/05
tougenkyou . net / xd
a/n
the meiji introduced the metric system of measurements in 1891, therefore kilograms.