I do not own Samurai Champloo.

Amatsu Mikaboshi is the "god of evil," according to Encyclopedia Mythica.
This was supposed to be a one-shot, but I lied to myself. I'm going to have a Mugen part after this, and possibly a Jin chapter.

Chapter One

Let's meet up again. It's easier said than done. At the end of the line, Fuu realizes this.

I'm old.Kami damn it, I really am. I throw things at all the kids that even mention my age, but inside I know it as well as they do.

I am wrinkly, my hair is thinning, and I am weakening painfully. Even worse, I am dying.

My mother died slowly, as my father probably did as well. That is, before that bastard killed him. And now it's my turn. It makes me sad, though, to think I'm the last one left. My mother, my father, me. Who will go around to the kids, and tell them about the adventures of Fuu, Mugin and Jin?

I remember telling that man—memories grow dim after so many years—that I wanted to die beautiful. I was so naïve, then. I know what he means now. He told me—I remember this perfectly for once—that there was no such thing as dying beautiful. Death is ugly, like a smudge on a perfectly printed parchment.

Having had so many brushes with it throughout the years, I recognize it by smell now. My little one-room cottage reeks of it.

I never married. Fuck, I rarely even had the simple pleasure of sex. At seventeen, I was once again in a brothel, paying off a few debts. Only this time, there was no Mugen or Jin to bail me out. I remember thinking that when I really need them, they aren't there.

It wasn't so bad. I mean, it was horrible, but it could have been worse. I could have been beat mercilessly by a deranged maniac with a blade in his hands—again. It kind of got me off sex for quite a while, though. It also was a slap in the face, courtesy of the world. Mugen and Jin were gone, and I had begun to rely on them too heavily, anyway. No more betting, and it was time to get myself some damn talents.

Bottomless stomach did not count.

I managed to get myself a good bit of training on my travels, from different students of nearby dojos. Some were kinder than others, offering the lessons for free. A couple were not quite so . . . charitable. The fact that the brothel stripped me of my petty modesty . . . well, I'm still not sure about whether that was a good thing or a bad thing. I undressed myself for them, and felt nothing.

I barely remember a time when I blushed furiously when a man caught the merest flash of my pale, milky skin.

Anyway, my skill level was—is—nowhere near Mugen's or Jin's, or in fact, that of practically any of the opponents they beat. But it was enough to keep pickpockets, smugglers and perverts at bay. Once I even got hired as a bodyguard, but it was just while the woman traveled to Edo with child. I sharpened my blade only on fish bones, that time.

I never stayed at one spot for long, that is, until I caught this fucking disease, and my legs don't carry me so well anymore.

I wonder where Mugen and Jin are at this moment. Why them, I wonder, staring up at my straw ceiling. I've had plenty of friends and companions and lovers over the years. Why am I thinking back on the men I haven't seen since I parted company with them nearly half a century ago?

If my math is right, that is. I've never been good at math.

Mugen and Jin. Yes.

They're probably dead. Well, Mugen, at least. He's a wily little asshole—or was, and I don't see him changing—but even one such as him makes mistakes, and he was always too reckless not to.

Jin? He probably met up with his escaped whore after her three years of solitude. Maybe they had children. I chuckle at the image of hard-ass Jin cooing at a couple of thin-faced, pasty children.

And Mugen? With children? This is worth an entire laugh, even though I end up sitting up just so my breakfast can come climbing back up my throat. I can see Mugen throwing his own children into a well as punishment for waking him up from a particularly vicious hangover.

I'm exhausted, and I don't expect to get any better. Is life worth living if I can only manage to wring out a couple more days before I bite the dust? I might as well use this strength now, while I have it, to carve out my own heart. Traumatize the poor child that comes in here for a story. I've grown too much like Mugen in my old age, really.

I might as well, I think to myself, reaching over with an outstretched arm to grip the jaded brown grip of my secondhand katana.

"Old fart!" comes the 'affectionate' nickname the children of this particular town have dubbed me with. I postpone my thank you speech a few minutes while I hear what this child has to say.

"Have you heard the news? Someone is coming!" Like that could be any vaguer.

"Really? Amatsu Mikaboshi, perhaps, come to wreck havoc?" I like messing with the heads of these impressionable kids. It is odd, though, to see no recognition when I speak of things that once were common knowledge. Christianity isn't exactly prominent, but it is far more accepted and common than it was in my childhood. "The god of evil," I add quickly, before the boy can ask who I'm talking about.

"No! Anyway, he doesn't exist. My mother says that you're a heretip—"

"You mean heretic, don't you?" I correct casual, barely paying him any mind at all. I don't really care what any of these people think of me. Most of them wouldn't know one side of a sword from another. They have no place judging me.

"Yeah! And that you're going to burn in hell for your lies and . . ."

At this I laugh, long and hard. Oh, this is classic. This woman thinks I'm going to burn in hell for . . . lying? How ridiculous. How utterly ridiculous. "Oh, boy, I'm going to burn in hell for much more than lying." I can barely get the words out before I'm hacking, like there's something lodged in my throat, but I know very well that there isn't.

Eventually the boy leaves me, bored.

I wonder if I should really kill myself, as I realize the katana is still at my side. Isn't that the coward's way out?

But there's nothing more I can do. I can barely leave this room; what kind of life is that for me?

Fuck this. I plunge the katana into my chest. As I feel myself dying, the red spreading, staining my kimono, I wonder how long it will take for someone to find my corpse.