The Dog Boy and the Kendo Girl
Chapter 1
She stood on the edge of the precipice, looking down into an infinite abyss.
Something at the bottom of the yawning pit glimmered, sky blue. She squinted, trying to see more clearly just what lay at the bottom of the pit.
It wasn't a pit she was looking down, she realized. It was a tunnel. It led down, down into the earth, and opened up to something on the other side.
Something moved in the tunnel, quick flashes of motion on the dark walls and the sound of scrabbling floated up to her ears. Her hand fell to the grip of her katana; the feel of the blade in her hand calmed her, and she took a step back, ready to confront whatever came out of that pit.
The scrabbling grew louder, resolved into the sound of thousands upon thousands of tiny feet moving over roughly mortared stone. She drew her katana and shifted herself into a fighting stance, took a deep breath to calm—
—the ground exploded before her, and the hideous armored head and back of the monster appeared, causing her to lurch back in fear and shock, and the deep breath she had just taken to burst from her lips in a half-choked whisper.
"Kame."
The huge turtle stretched forth its disgustingly flexible neck, trying to free its bulk from the confines of the tunnel it had just emerged from. She recovered her stance, and was about to launch an attack, when the head of the turtle exploded towards her, telescoping from its shell like a jack-in-the-box, jagged snapping jaws opened wide to snatch her up. She screamed, and fell to the side as the head flew past her, dropping her katana and desperately scrabbling on her back away from the monster.
The turtle's head turned on its impossibly long neck to look at her, and she could see that multiple sets of insect's legs sprouted from its neck, and that the flesh of its neck was segmented and armored, like the body of a centipede. It fixed her with a malicious red-eyed glare, and then opened its mouth.
Her hand groped in the dirt for her katana and found it, her fingers closing on the handle and bringing it up in front of her just as the turtle-centipede vomited in her general direction, a silent black-green mass of vomit, that hit the ground and skittered towards her, thousands upon thousands of similar turtle-centipedes, only far smaller. She rose to her feet, too late; the turtle-centipedes were already crawling up her legs. She danced madly, trying to dislodge the creatures from her body, but they swarmed relentlessly upwards.
And then she tripped, and fell directly into the middle of the black-green mass, and the horde swarmed towards her, crawling onto her body. She desperately slapped them away with her hands, and felt a sharp pain in her side. She tore open her gi, and watched in stunned terror as the turtle-centipedes chewed into the flesh of her side, just below her ribs. She couldn't scream as the first turtle-centipede looked up, flashed her a grin with its horrible turtle mouth, winked, and, with a cheerful wave of its flipper, disappeared into the gaping hole in her side—
Aoyama Motoko shrieked and fell out of her train seat, landing with a loud thump on the floor. All around her, passengers turned their heads to look, and murmuring filled the air. Motoko looked around in a daze, then, realizing that there were no evil turtle-centipedes in the vicinity, she returned to her seat, and mumbled quietly, "gomen nasai."
She leaned her head against the head of the seat and closed her eyes again, feeling the vibrations of the train tracks thrum through her body. 'Sleep… sleep…' she thought to herself, but sleep would not come. The image of the turtle in her dream kept returning to her mind. She suppressed a shudder.
'Why a centipede?' she wondered. Now that she was awake, some of the imagery in the dream became clear. The "tunnel" through the ground had been a well… a well with a patch of sky at the bottom, as if she were inside the well and looking up. The turtle wasn't all that strange; Motoko did not often have nightmares, or at least nightmares that caused her to wake up screaming, but when she did, the nightmare always involved a turtle.
The centipede, however, was a new and entirely bizarre touch. Where had her nightmare image come from? Had she seen any centipedes recently? She could not recall the last time she had seen one…
"FIFTEEN MINUTES UNTIL THE TRAIN STOPS AT TOKYO STATION. ALL PASSENGERS PLEASE CHECK UNDER YOUR SEATS AND MAKE SURE YOU DO NOT LEAVE YOUR POSSESSIONS BEHIND. THANK YOU."
Motoko was shaken out of her thoughts by the train PA's announcement. She checked the carrying case for her katana that was sitting under her seat. Her sister had sent her on this trip to Tokyo to some shrine or another, to pick up an ancient blade that had some history within the Shinmei School, and deliver it back to the main Shinmei dojo in Kyoto.
She settled back in her seat, and pulled out the map of Tokyo that showed the way to the shrine. After getting off of the train, she would take a bus, and then, walk three blocks from the bus station to a shrine located in the middle of the residential district… the shrine was circled on the map with permanent marker and neatly labeled as the "Higurashi Shrine."
"Ah, you must be the representative from the Shinmei school," the elderly caretaker of the shrine said. "I have the katana you're looking for in my inventory. Feel free to walk around the shrine while I get it for you."
Motoko bowed. "Arigato, ousho-sama."
The caretaker turned away, then suddenly pounded his fist into his open palm. "Sou ja!" His hand dipped into his sleeve and came back out holding a charm. The charm had a pink glass ball attached to it.
"This is the Shikon no Tama, a relic closely tied in with the history of the Higurashi Shrine. This charm will bring you good luck, good health, and good fortune if you keep it with you. It costs 200 yen, but I'll give it to you for free."
With that, the elderly caretaker departed, leaving Motoko holding the charm. She sighed, tucked the charm into her gi, and began to walk slowly around the outside edge of the courtyard in the middle of the shrine complex.
'It's so peaceful here…' She thought, her view alighting on the massive tree that grew in a raised enclosure at the "head" of the courtyard. Inexplicably, she felt drawn to it. She took a deep breath, and slowly headed towards the tree, looking at the patterns of dappled shade and sunshine on the ground made by the tree's branches.
Walking up to the tree, she slowly reached out her hand and touched the rough bark. Her fingertips tingled at the contact… and she felt… something. A sense of profound belonging. Belonging here. In this place. Motoko felt like she was returning from a long journey.
A breeze softly rustled the leaves above her.
It was like the tree knew her. Like it had been waiting for her all along. She closed her eyes, and her fingers trailed over the bark, and she felt a sense of déjà vu… but not disorienting as the feeling usually was; instead, it was warm and comforting… the air filled with birdsong, the avian life in the branches of the tree above her abuzz with activity, and the sweet notes too were familiar.
Home.
She was home.
Motoko stood for a few more minutes, lost in the sweet sensations of comfort and familiarity, before slowly pulling her hand away from the bark and opening her eyes. There was something old and powerful about this tree, she knew. No wonder a shrine had grown up around it. She slowly turned around and headed back into the warm sunshine of the courtyard, and began once more to walk slowly around the shrine.
She was halfway across the shrine grounds when a chill shot down her back, and she halted in mid-step. She'd never felt anything like it before, but she had been schooled in recognizing it for what it was, and she knew instantly from the moment the feeling entered her body, prickling her skin and turning her bone marrow to frozen slush.
Youki.
Youki was seeping slowly from a small building set in the back of the shrine courtyard. Not very strong, but definitely youki. Motoko's hand dropped to the hilt of her katana and she began moving towards the small building in short, cautious steps. As she reached the door of the building, the sun went behind a cloud, leaving the building in shadow.
Motoko slowly eased the door open and peered down into the gloom. There, at the bottom of a small flight of stairs, was an old well, its worn wooden covering latched firmly in place.
The youki was flowing up and out through the cracks in the well cover.
Motoko steeled herself, and drew her katana from its sheath.
The well cover exploded into a shower of splinters, and a tangle of filmy transparent arms reached out of the well and for her. Motoko danced out of the way of two of the reaching arms, and swept her katana around and sliced at a third arm as it reached for her—but her katana merely passed through the gossamer limb without doing the least bit of damage.
The incorporeal hand latched onto the front of her gi. No matter how insubstantial it had been to her katana, its grip was iron-hard and strong. Before Motoko could infuse her blade with her ki and launch an attack that could sever the incorporeal arms, several more hands seized her arms, pinning them to her sides. The hand holding the front of her gi tugged viciously, and Motoko found herself flying head-first into the dark pit of the well.
Motoko fell into sudden darkness, and then the walls of the well around her seemed to shatter and break away, revealing swirling blue fog and vapor and twinkling purple lights. She fell through a void that seemed to have no up or down… and no bottom.
"At last!"
The voice seemed to speak from the depths of the void around her, and Motoko noticed for the first time the bones that were falling with her. She watched, fascinated, as the bones flew towards one another, attaching to the ends of the arms holding her. The arms ceased to be ethereal, becoming flesh, and the flesh extended upwards around the bones, wrapping them in tendon and muscle and skin.
A woman's face appeared out of the void, snarling and feral.
"Shikon! You have it! My Shikon no Tama! Give it back to me!"
The hand holding to the front of her gi gave another vicious tug, and the charm that the caretaker of the shrine had given her spilled out, tumbling in the void as it fell alongside Motoko and the creature holding her. One of the thing's hands snagged the charm, and the creature's grip loosened for a moment, as an expression of pure delight crossed its face.
It was all Motoko needed. She yanked her left arm free of the creature's grasp.
The delight on the youkai's face vanished, and it turned back to Motoko, its face distorting, mouth widening and two huge tusks growing from its upper jaw.
Motoko swept her hand towards the thing's face. "Ryuugeikihaa!"
The ki attack launched from her hand was not very powerful, being channeled through only her hand and not through the blade of her katana, after all. It was intended as a distraction, to confuse the enemy and give her an advantage, but never intended to be used as an offensive attack. At worst it caused a moment's debilitation, and oftentimes it simply had no effect other than blowing hot air towards an enemy.
Motoko was shocked as the youkai's face ripped down the middle, tusks splintering and sending shards of bone into the air around them. Its arms released her, and it reared back, clutching at its ruined face and screaming. As it flew back, Motoko caught sight of a woman's upper body with six arms and the immense lower body of a centipede before the entire creature vanished back into the glimmering void.
The walls of the well reappeared around her, and Motoko lightly touched down on the dirt floor of the dry well—and then immediately fell backwards on her butt, panting.
A little giggle escaped her lips, and she burst out laughing in relief. Her own laughter sounded a bit hysterical to her ears, so she choked off the laughter.
"Come on, Motoko, get a grip," she told herself. "It's not like you haven't been training your entire life for something like this."
Looking around the dry well, her eyes fell on the massive tusk that had been severed from the centipede youkai. She shuddered. Training was one thing, but to actually encounter a youkai…
It was several minutes before Motoko could keep her legs from wobbling long enough to stand up. She picked up the youkai's tusk, and held it up to the light shining into the well to examine it.
Wait… light?
Motoko looked up the shaft of the well in confusion. A square of blue sky met her gaze. Hadn't the well been in a wellhouse? Had something happened to the roof of the wellhouse during the fight? If the centipede youkai had escaped from the well and smashed through the roof… She swallowed hard.
The youkai was loose in Tokyo.
Her heart suddenly in her throat, Motoko leapt to her feet and began to climb up the roughly mortared stones of the side of the well. Slowly picking her way from handhold to handhold, foothold to foothold, she gritted her teeth; she was ascending so slowly! In the meantime, that creature could be wreaking all kinds of havoc on the city… she paused for a moment to evaluate the vines that hung thickly down the well walls. Could they support her weight? She reached out and tugged on one gingerly and winced as it pulled free of the wall. No good there. Something about the presence of the vines in the well was making her uncomfortable, but there wasn't enough time to ponder that.
A few minutes later, an arm in a billowing white sleeve reached out of the well and snagged onto the wooden lip, and Motoko hauled her head out of the well, looked around, and gaped in astonishment at the grassy clearing she had just emerged into, in the middle of the woods.
The shrine had disappeared.
For a moment she hung there, halfway out of the well, her mind refusing to process what she saw in front of her. When she had fallen into the well, there had been a well house, but now there was no well house, no paved courtyard, and no shrine buildings. There were only the trees, and grasses, and the breeze.
Motoko pulled herself out of the well, her mind working furiously. Had the shrine been some kind of illusion? Was the clearing that she was standing right now in an illusion? She took a few steps away from the well. The centipede youkai in the well had something to do with the disappearing shrine, that much was certain. If she could find the centipede, she would find some answers. She closed her eyes and focused, trying to find the trail of youki that the youkai left behind it when it fled from her.
The living ki of the clearing flowed like water around Motoko. The birds roosting in the trees, the flowers and grasses bending in the gentle wind. She even felt the life pulsing slowly in the insects and worms beneath the soil under her feet. But nowhere, as far as she could push her senses, could she feel the malevolent taint of the centipede youkai's youki. It had vanished, along with the shrine. She opened her eyes, and peered around, hoping to see anything around that might—
--her gaze locked onto the large tree, its branches soaring into the sky far above the rest of the forest canopy. It was the same tree from the shrine. Motoko shrugged mentally. One direction was as good as another, at this point, and if she headed towards this tree that had been at the shrine, she might be able to find something that would help her get out of this situation. She walked into the forest, heading for the gigantic tree.
The undergrowth was surprisingly sparse in the forest, and Motoko easily picked her way around the trees. She wasn't prepared for what she saw as she suddenly emerged from the trees into a small clearing, in the center of which sat the large tree from the shrine.
There was a figure in red, somehow stuck to the trunk of the tree. Motoko's hand dropped to the grip of her katana as she saw the triangular ears that sat atop the figure's head… and then relaxed. Even if he was a youkai, he wasn't going anywhere, due to the arrow protruding from his chest. Motoko felt the familiar tingle of spiritual energy, gathered around the arrow and projecting into the youkai's body and the tree. Someone extremely powerful had sealed this youkai. She stepped closer to get a better look at the arrow.
A twig snapped in the trees behind her, and Motoko spun around, sweeping her katana out of its sheath and into a ready position in front of her. "I know you're there!" She yelled. "Show yourself!"
The bushes at the treeline rustled, and several men stepped out, sheepish looks on their faces. They were armed with an assortment of weapons; spears and bows and a rusty katana, none of which were pointed at her, thankfully. Motoko eyed them warily; the men were wearing simple, undyed hakama and gi, and wore their hair in topknots. Had she wandered unknowingly onto a movie set? The men before her looked like… feudal peasants?
One of the men, apparently their leader, stepped out in front of the others, moving slowly and deliberately and keeping an eye on her katana. He inclined his head in the barest of bows and spoke.
"Miko-sama, our apologies for following you. Inuyasha's Forest is full of youkai and other mononoke, not to mention bandits. We mean you no harm. We are simple farmers from the village nearby and we had to make sure that you were not someone who would do harm to our village. Our village is a small one and these times have been hard for us of late." He continued to eye her katana. "Will you sheathe your blade, Miko-sama?"
Motoko considered briefly, and then slid her katana back into its scabbard. The men were looking at her nervously and their leader had spoken to her with an almost reverential air. It didn't look like they were going to try anything funny, and even if they did, she was confident in her ability to defend herself… it was the rest of what the man had said that really boggled her mind, however. He had said "youkai," and "mononoke," and "bandits."
Just what was going on here?
She looked at the men in front of her, who were looking considerably more at ease now that her katana was put away. Well, there was at least one way of finding out more information. The world had gone nuts, and going in any one direction was as good as going in another, so…
"You said that your village was nearby? Could you… take me there?"
The spokesman bowed briefly again. "Hai. It would be an honor to have you as our guest, Miko-sama. Please follow us." He and the rest of the men turned and began to walk into the woods
Motoko sweatdropped a little as she followed them. "Ehh… I'm not exactly a… a miko. I don't really do much at the shrine, except on festival days." She looked down at the white gi and red hakama that she was wearing and winced.
The spokesman looked more at ease now, and slowed his pace so he was walking at her side. "So you are still in training?"
Motoko sweatdropped some more. "Ehh… I guess you could say that… may I ask what your name is? My name is Motoko. Aoyama Motoko."
"I am Sonada Kenichi. It is a pleasure to meet you, Aoyama-sama. "
Motoko nearly flinched at hearing him address her as "Aoyama-sama." That was a title that she had mostly heard being used to address her sister. She looked at Kenichi and was surprised to discover that he wasn't as old as she had thought he was, in his late teens or early twenties, if anything. "It's a pleasure to meet you too, Sonada-san."
"So… Aoyama-sama. Were you in Inuyasha's Forest as part of your training? It's not often that a miko in training leaves the shrine. Are you from around here? Sorry about all the questions, but we don't often get visitors…"
"Uh…" Motoko paused for a moment. "The answer to that is a little complicated. I don't suppose you know where Hinata is, do you?"
Kenichi shook his head. "I'm afraid I'm not familiar with that place."
Motoko wasn't surprised. Not many people knew where Hinata was… and she wasn't really expecting someone from this place to know. Wherever "this place" was…
"Hinata isn't that far from Tokyo itself, actually… just half an hour away by train."
"'Tokyo?' I'm afraid I'm not familiar with that place either. …and what is a train?"
Motoko was unable to voice a reply; her vocal cords refusing to work as she tried to deal with this newest piece of information, although she continued to walk on. How could this be? That someone could not know what Tokyo was, or a train, for that matter? Just where was she?
Kenichi peered at her face intently. "Ah… Aoyama-sama, are you okay? You look a bit… dazed…"
Motoko jerked, and then forced her mouth into a strained smile. "I'm fine, Sonada-san. I'm sorry, I'm just a lit…" She trailed off as they suddenly emerged from the trees.
They were on a hill, she saw. And just below that hill, right across a rapidly-flowing stream that had been diverted from a nearby river by dikes, was a perfect replica of a medieval village. Farmers, submerged to their calves, slowly moved across rice paddies that were being fed from the stream, tending rice seedlings that had just begun to sprout. A man led an ox across a small rope bridge that crossed the stream. Just beyond the rice paddies, Motoko could see children at play, chasing one another with sticks and yelling and laughing. Behind them were irregular rows of wooden buildings with thatched roofs, smoke curling from their chimneys. People bustled among the buildings, going about their daily business.
Motoko's knees went weak, and she toppled backwards, and would have fallen had Kenichi not grabbed her arm and steadied her. She managed to get her feet underneath her after a few seconds.
"Aoyama-sama, are you sure you're alright?" Kenichi asked, sounding concerned. "You're not feeling ill, are you?"
"I'm fine," she replied in a thick voice as she took in the sight of the village spread beneath the hill. "I just… Sonada-san… what year is it?"
Kenichi's face screwed up in confusion. Clearly he hadn't expected her to ask that question, of all the things she might have said. "What year is it? It's the second year of the reign of the Emperor Gonara."
At first the name didn't click, but then lessons in history class kicked in. Motoko's mind whirled. Gonara's reign was over 400 years ago! That would put her sometime in the 1500's! Her knees threatened to buckle again.
Kenichi saw her nearly topple over again and misinterpreted it. "Aoyama-sama, perhaps we should go see Kaede-sama. She is the miko of our village and she is quite skilled in healing and herb lore. If you are feeling unwell, she would be sure to help you."
Motoko looked over at Kenichi in a daze. "Um… thank you, Sonada-san. I think I should visit this Kaede-sama."
A/N: so how was that? not too bad i hope? kind of slow for now but it'll really pick up in the next chapter!