Disclaimer: ::laughs:: if you think I would be able to own Rurouni Kenshin then you need to recheck a few things, the series belongs to Watsuki-sensei and that's that!!
A/N: I guess I should update seeing how it has been forever and a day since I last updated, sorry for taking so long! Oh and I am having a hard time with the theme of this story it really should be Action/Adventure Romance Angst but I am just gonna keep it as the first two (sorry if that is a problem for some of you) I just look at where this story is going and I think 'Gahh make up your mind!!'
Eight day's passed before Kenshin entered Tokyo. He was running across the bridge when a familiar voice stopped him in his tracks.
"Hey Himura!"
"Oro?"
Kenshin turned around, it was Misao's voice, but how could she have made it there at the same time as him? He had run most of the way to Tokyo, how would it have been possible for her to make it at the same time? He turned around to see not only Misao but Aoshi as well.
"You know you can get here faster if you take the train Himura?" Misao said smiling and bounding towards him.
Kenshin nearly fell over, 'the train why didn't I think of that?!' he thought. 'Because you're an idiot with no money,' responded the battousai side matter-of-factly.
"Why are you here anyway?" He asked trying to sound polite, but it just wasn't working, his mind was elsewhere at the moment.
"Because of this." Misao handed Kenshin the letter written by Yahiko to him. At least, he thought it was Yahiko it was more legible than Sano's but not as clean as his wife's.
"The letter got to us a day or so after you left, we came as soon as we could." Misao said trying to read Kenshin's reaction.
Kenshin looked over the letter twice to make sure he was reading it correctly, then cursed himself, he knew it was stupid of him to leave Kaoru and Kenji alone, 'Why does this always happen!' Kenshin didn't even wait any longer, he ran off towards the dojo dropping the letter in the process.
"Hey!" Misao said surprised by his sudden action.
- - -
Kenshin ran through the gates at a speed meant for the gods. The first place he went was the sitting room where he found Yahiko and Sanosuke sitting and talking somberly.
"Kenshin, you got the letter?" It wasn't Sanosuke's normal tone it was more apologetic and serious than anything.
"It met me on the way here." He looked from Yahiko to Sanosuke. "Where's Kaoru, and my son?"
Yahiko cringed at his question he knew that he was going to ask it, but that didn't make things easier. "We found Kaoru, but to say we found her whole is something different." Yahiko felt a weight on his heart. Why did he have to be the one to tell him this?
"And Kenji?" His voice was a little more forceful than he meant for it to be.
Yahiko gulped at his tone and dodged his second question, "Ka-Kaoru's in Rakuninmura."
Kenshin looked at the two as if it were a terrible joke. "What happened?"
"Well that's part of the problem, we don't know what happened. We were working at the Akabeko-" Sano began.
"Did I just hear right Rooster head was doing honest work?" Misao piped up as she walked into the kitchen with Aoshi right behind her.
"Why do you guys have a hard time believing that!?"
Kenshin ignored the side conversation, "Yahiko where is Kenji?" he looked into the boys eye's when he asked this a second time.
"I...I don't know Kenshin, he's not with Kaoru and we can't get close enough to ask her what happened." Yahiko was shaking with frustration, the past week had start to put a major strain on his patients.
Sano snorted "You can say that again, it's not like we haven't tried to ask her but hell, shades is sitting right next to her and won't let us get near her."
"Enishi?" A whole new fear grasped at Kenshin, his wife was in the company of Enishi, the one who no more than three years ago kidnapped and faked her death for revenge on him. Sure he may not be a threat now but still he wasn't the most trust worthy person Kenshin has met.
"Yeah, sitting in the same spot as you were, holdin' on to that diary." Yahiko shook his head, "He's a sad sight."
Kenshin turned towards the door and went to leave the Dojo.
"Where are you going?" Sanosuke asked.
Without turning around to face his friends. "Subaru has returned, this time he is serious and will show no mercy, he is a larger threat now than before. He now has an army along with his delusions."
Yahiko chocked on the rice-ball that he had just put in his mouth, "You can't be serious!"
"What are you guys talking about?" Sanosuke scratched his head utterly clueless.
"I'll tell you later" Yahiko said still reeling over what Kenshin just said. "But Kenshin how is it possible that he built his followers back up so fast? Weren't they all, arrested? And there where only like thirty how did he get enough for an army!?"
"Fear" Aoshi interjected talking for the first time, "Fear makes you do anything, he probably brainwashed them to fear anything that went against his way of thinking."
((A/N: I think that's like the most he has said in a very long time!!))
"I'm still confused." Sanosuke said cursing himself for not being around.
"I am going to see Kaoru," Kenshin said as if it were a final decision. "If Subaru is out there then she is in trouble I can't just leave her in a place like Rakuninmura."
"What do you plan to do when you get there Kenshin?" Sanosuke asked looking at his best friends back.
"I am going to bring her home-"
"There is a reason why the girl is there," Aoshi said blocking Kenshin's path.
Sano looked at him seriously, "Yeah, you don't just go to that place to have a cup of tea. You can't just go in there and take her out, it would have been like us trying to get you out of there. If you do that you will never get your Kaoru back."
Kenshin turned to face his friend and nodded.
"Heh, I guess when you live with someone long enough you start to act like them," Sanosuke laughed feeble trying to lighten the mood.
"That's not funny Sano..." Kenshin hesitated, he knew they were right but he couldn't just let Kaoru suffer alone, wasn't he supposed to protect her? 'Well you failed that now didn't you?'
'Why have you decided to speak up now?' he asked his other half.
He walked out the dojo, "Don't worry I am just going to watch over her I'm not going to do anything." He tried to reassure his friends.
Once Kenshin left an air of tension had filled the room stronger than before.
"DAMN IT!" Sanosuke yelled making Misao jump "WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED WHILE I WAS GONE?!"
Yahiko looked at Sanosuke a little startled, then he felt sorry for the rooster head. Yahiko knew that he didn't like being left out of everything; but what do you expect from some one who was in another country at the time?
Yahiko began to explain to the ex-gangster, and the two members of the Oniwabanshu exactly what happened. About Kaoru's brother, Subaru, and his plot to kill Kaoru's family, and then her brother's untimely death.
Sanosuke listened quietly for once, and when the boy was done explaining he could only say one thing.
"Shit!"
"Watch your mouth!" Misao yelled throwing one of her kunai's at his head. She was a little taken aback as well; this was the first time she had heard the whole story, she knew about Subaru, but she didn't know about Kaoru's brother.
Aoshi just walked out of the room.
"And where do you think you're going?" Sanosuke snapped.
"To get answers" Aoshi walked off not saying another word.
"Wow that just explains a lot, but what else should I expect from the human ice-cube..." Sanosuke muttered. "OW! What was that for weasel girl?" Misao had just hit him upside the head.
"Don't say stuff like that about Lord Aoshi!" She exclaimed ready to hit him again.
"Calm down Geeze."
- - -
Never before had Kenshin felt so helpless while watching Kaoru from afar. It killed him to watch her stuck in her own world of turmoil. 'What has happened my love?' His eye's narrowed in on the person sitting next to her, if he did anything Kenshin would be down there so fast that the crazy idiot wouldn't know what hit him.
- - -
Kaoru closed her eyes for a moment before opening them again, she couldn't help but feel like she was being watched. 'Kenshin what are you doing now?' she wondered as she looked up at the stars and sighed.
"What's with the content look?" Enishi said.
"I'm not content, far from it, I was just thinking about something."
"..."
"You have been quiet, have you found the truth in that diary of yours?" she asked her voice slightly laced with pity for the man.
Enishi shot her a glare, how dare she ask him something like that? He couldn't help it though he did feel connected to Kaoru now, as much as he didn't like it. Though that didn't stop him from keeping an indifferent attitude when it came to her, she was the wife of the man who stole his sister from him. How she could love that man as she did he couldn't even begin to comprehend. Though he knew his sister had loved him as well. And that, even though he had read her diary over many times; was still something that he couldn't figure out her reason for.
Enishi looked up at the sky just as Kaoru had, a vision of his sister looked down at him frowning at him as he looked at her. "Will you ever smile for me sister?" a tear of anger and frustration escaped his eye.
Kaoru looked at him a little perplexed, 'Poor Enishi, he still suffers now the full pain of that day, his pain must be worse on him than it is on Kenshin...' True that the pain both men felt was not something to be compared, but the feeling of helplessness, and blame that coupled with Enishi's pain, hatred, and self loathing, doubled any emotion toward the subject of his beloved sister, it was something Kaoru knew all to well now.
- - -
Somewhere in the shadows of Kyoto a man was running through an ally, he was stopped by a tall man smoking a cigarette.
"Officer Fujita," the man who was running came to a hault and saluted Saitou, "They plan to strike in late March, Subaru is still building up forces, and you were right he does have the Himura child."
Saitou sneered, 'Just as I expected.' He looked at the man "Good, report back to me when you can, I will be in Tokyo next time."
"Right," and with that the man was gone again.
'Time to pay Battousai a visit; wonder if he's figured anything out yet.' And then Saitou laughed at the thought, 'What am I thinking? He's about as dense as that Rooster-head.' Saitou disappeared into the shadows of Kyoto only to resurface in Tokyo days later. (Not as many as Kenshin had, because he actually thought of taking the train also.) To be continued...
A/N: Well not my best chapter, but I hate not being able to update as often as I should. Please forgive me I will make the next chapter make up for this one I promise.
Yahiko: You scare me sometimes
BC: Good =D
