Turning Swallow

Summary:

OR, One morning, four-year-old Sasaki Kojiro remembers a life not yet lived, and decides to do something about it. History changes. SI!Sasaki Kojiro. Expect general lightheartedness, but dark topics when the time comes.

CH. 20 START

With Takamatsu Castle now under Oda control, Nobunaga could begin the next part of her plans, to conquer the rest of Shikoku. Takamatsu Castle oversaw the shipping routes between Shikoku and the mainland, and when it'd been in enemy hands, had prevented Nobunaga from transporting supplies by ship for one reason. The Castle had cannons, five of them, arrayed side by side and facing the in-land sea. They were each roughly twenty-five feet away from one another, and given that they were breech-loading, trying to cross the nearby sea without permission, in the wooden boats of the Sengoku, was a death sentence. Breech-loading meant that after being fired, the chamber could be removed, cleaned, refilled, and replaced within a minute, or outright replaced by a fresh round. The place was well-stocked too, with a couple dozen cannonballs and three extra chambers for each gun. It was no wonder the place was so important.

Still, now that it was in their hands, the rest of Nobunaga's Shikoku campaign would be much easier. Weapons, food, and new soldiers could all be received within days, rather than weeks. With Mori Terumto conscripted into Nobunaga's forces, her entire army was approximately one hundred and fifty thousand men strong. Even with the thirty thousand men left behind to man the Castle, they'd be able to absolutely sweep through the remaining powers on Shikoku Island, given that the rest had either fled or been wiped out. There was only one of any significant, a man named Chosokabe Motochika, patriarch of the Chosokabe clan. Even then, the man's forces barely posed a challenge; he only had forty thousand troops at his disposal. Despite his numbers, and the fact that Hideyoshi had already sent overtures of truce and peace, the man refused to surrender. Thus, Nobunaga and her army were preparing to break his army first, before asking again.

Unfortunately, it seemed that Motochika had a different plan, and was intent on fighting to the very last man. The man had indicated that much, given the fact that he'd had his men launch an attack in the middle of the night. A rain of arrows descending towards the camp had been their introduction. When the arrows fell, Kojiro was walking with Nobunaga and Suzue. They'd been engaged in banter, a relaxed smile on Nobunaga's face.

She said, "Y'know, Kojiro, now that we've come this far, I feel like five years is too long an estimate. Three more years, and Japan will be ours. Imagine that, Sasaki Kojiro, co-conqueror of Japan, aged thirteen."

Kojiro scoffed, "Nobunaga, you speak as though you're not in the exact same position as I am. Who'd ever heard of a sixty-!"

Something felt off, abruptly. Maybe the camp had gone too quiet, or maybe the crickets had stopped chirping, or maybe the wind had stilled for a moment too long. Whatever it was, something from within Kojiro screamed for him to move, so move he did. His eyes scanned the night sky above, and within moments, he caught sight of an arrow, several dozen arrows, screaming down at him. He moved, grabbing Nobunaga by the back of her uniform, before all but tossing her through the flaps of a nearby building. Fortunately, the flaps didn't lead to a tent, but rather a small armory, meaning that it'd been constructed with wooden planks for a roof. Nobunaga would be safe in there. Though she was certainly a better leader in battle than he was, and rather adept with a sword, the woman couldn't argue that he was better with a sword, in all of the ways that mattered. Once he'd settled the matter of Nobunaga's safety, Kojiro grabbed Suzue, before pulling her behind him. The first arrow fell, lancing directly towards his chest, but a flick of his blade cut the shaft of the arrow, rendering it inert. The second would have flown over his head, but that meant that Suzue was in the line of fire, so he slashed downwards, catching that arrow and splitting it in two. The third came in at too high an angle, so Kojiro just grabbed Suzue and pulled her towards him. He let go of her, just in time to cut down a fourth and fifth, which had come slightly later. He scanned the sky again, but no more arrows came. Then, the screams began, as people realized that their comrades had been stuck down by an invisible threat.

Just then, Nobunaga rushed out of the building, her face set in an annoyed frown.

"Kojiro," she said, "what'd you do that-!"

She saw the arrows then, and fell silent, before the irritation and playfulness that had been there vanished like the wind.

In a whisper as chilling as the Arctic winds, she hissed, "An ambush?"

Suzue shot a grateful glance towards him, before answering Nobunaga, "Yes. Arrows from the forest, Oda-sama."

Nobunaga nodded in thanks, then speaking loudly to the greater camp, "Scour the woods. I want them dead."

The words themselves weren't spoken with any sort of passion or fury, just with a cold judgment, as though Nobunaga considered the attacks already dead. The order spread through the camp quickly, as groups of hundreds left the camp and rushed into the woods, intent on following through with Nobunaga's commands.

Nobunaga turned to him, then asked, "Kojiro, can you go oversee the searchers?"

"That's fine with me," Kojiro replied, "Suzue, stay with Nobunaga. I wouldn't put it past them to attack again."

Despite Kojiro's words though, he knew that the ambushers had probably already scattered. The army would keep getting ambushed though, over and over again until they were exhausted and irritable from the constant danger. The best way to deal with a superior army was to split them up, and if Nobunaga ordered the army to split into several sections to hunt the attacks down, then Motochika's army would probably be ready to ambush the smallest one. That wouldn't do. So despite his doubts, he stepped into the disorganized group of searchers, and marshaled them into formation. He split the disorganized group into eight, before sending each of them in a different cardinal or intermediate direction. That way, even if the troops were loud and alerted the ambushers, there was a high likelihood that they'd run into another group. They were organized into groups of a thousand, before Kojiro sent them off with orders to return after an hour or two. The next groups were given similar directions, just directed to fill in the spaces that first groups wouldn't cover. The last group were simply ordered to scour the nearby forest for any one suspicious. All in all, twenty-four thousand men had been sent out to search. Even if Motochika attacked them with his entire army, the commotion would likely alert the camp. After the last group set off, Kojiro himself entered the woods, racing single-mindedly in his chosen direction, until he lost sight of the camp, the place far behind him. From there, Kojiro pulled himself into a tree, and set himself to wait.

The ambushers couldn't have run far, most of them likely ducking into trees or small alcoves or hideouts scattered throughout the forest. The searchers would make a great deal of noise, no matter what they did. Their numbers worked to their advantage here, since with so many people searching, they were bound to find at least a few people. Kojiro wasn't looking for stragglers though, he was looking for the big prize. Kojiro waited. The best way to catch an ambusher was to ambush them yourself, when they least expected it, when they figured that they'd have gotten away. Sure enough, after an hour of silently lurking in the canopy of his chosen tree, Kojiro caught sight of a target. It was a tall man, dressed in dark colors with a bow slung over his shoulder and a short sword strapped to his waist. The man was panting heavily, obviously having just run quite the distance, and he stopped, leaning against the tree for support. Kojiro dropped to the ground silently, the man's own heartbeat in his ears hiding Kojiro's approach. Rather than cut the man, he crept up behind him, before launching himself forwards and slinging his left elbow around the man's neck. He gripped his right bicep with his left hand, before using his right hand to shove the man's head down. The man clawed at Kojiro's arm furiously, until the choke-hold began to take effect. The clawing became ineffectual slapping, before that disappeared altogether and the man went limp.

Kojiro continued to hold the choke, to make sure the man really was unconscious. Those few seconds could prove fatal, but the man's life wasn't his priority, it was the information he might be holding. This man was already an enemy, and thus, had to be treated as such. He flipped the man over, before pulling the man's own tanto from the sheath at the man's side and slitting the man's throat. He nabbed the sheath, before stripping the man of his clothing. He riffed through it, shaking it, until he heard the crinkling of paper. Kojiro zeroed in on the sound, locating a sewn-pocket within the sleeves of the outfit. Using the tanto, Kojiro cut open the pocket, revealing a small scrap of paper. On it, scrawled in messy handwriting, was the location of a hideaway, one that the now-dead man was supposed to report to. It was within walking distance, so Kojiro followed the direction after slipping on the clothing to serve as a disguise, and storing his clothes and sword on the tree. He entered a small clearing, before checking the note again. After rereading it, his eyes zoomed in on a loose patch of dirt by the roots of an old tree. According to the note, there was a small trapdoor in the dirt, just large enough for an adult man to pass through. He knocked on it, three rapid taps, followed by a long silence, then two more quick raps. He waited, silently, then spoke the password in a gasping and choking voice, "The essence has returned to the origin."

The door opened in response to the pass phrase, and a pair of eyes peered out.

Before the man could speak, Kojiro choked out with an affected hiss of pain, "Help me in, quickly! I've not got much time left and don't want to leave a body outside."

He was pulled in with due urgency, and he hunched over, making himself look smaller and clutched at his side. The man that he'd killed was taller than him, but hunching over made it look like he was just doubled over in pain, not short.

"What happened," asked the man, "what's wrong?"

Kojiro replied in a stilted tone, saying, "Got caught. Managed to gut one of them, but got stabbed deep. No blood trail. Rushed here."

The man leaned in to steady him, concern in his eyes, but as he did so, the man inadvertently dropped his guard. Kojiro moved, straightening himself and yanking the tanto from his side, before plunging it into the man's throat. Using his other hand, he covered the man's mouth, pressing it to the wall. The guard's eyes widened with the shock of sudden betrayal, and he died with confusion written across his face. After a solid fifteen seconds, the guard bled out and Kojiro laid the body softly on the ground. A spurt of blood had rushed from the man's throat, trickling onto Kojiro's hands after dripping down the blade. There was something different about killing with a knife. It was more intimate, harder to maintain that emotional fortitude when you had to cover a man's mouth and stare into his eyes as he died. Kojiro took a deep breath and kept moving. There was a small tunnel in front of him, and he traveled down it. He entered the room casually, acting as though he belonged there, and a man called out to him.

"Hey, be quiet, Jin's sleeping." he said.

Kojiro grunted, "Got it. Wake me when something happens."

The response was enough to get the man to ignore him, assured that Kojiro was friendly given his clothing. That would be his last mistake, as Kojiro walked past him just far enough that the man wasn't able to react when Kojiro pulled out his tanto again. Kojiro wrapped his hand against the man's mouth, before plunging the dagger straight into the man's spine. There was a single moment of surprise and a breathless gasp, before the man went limp. Kojiro began to search for 'Jin,' eventually locating him in the only adjacent room. The man was snoring softly and all it took for Kojiro to kill him was to lean down and slide the tanto against the man's throat. 'Jin' died in his sleep, unaware that his friends were dead. At that thought, something violent roiled within Kojiro and he had to pull his mask down. He vomited across the floor of the hideaway, as the faces of the people he'd killed rushed at him in nauseating clarity. The bandits that had ambushed him near Ichijodani, the would-be ronin from Minamiechizen, the men at Honno-ji, then the men at Takamatsu Castle, Shimizu Muneharu, and finally, that ambusher as well as the people in this hideout.

A flood of foreign emotion overwhelmed him, demanding that he break down and repent for his actions. Kojiro frowned. His other self had already lived a full life, and yet, it wanted to dictate this one too? This wasn't the peaceful modern era, but the Sengoku. If Kojiro did not act, then others would act upon him. The morals of the twenty-first century had no bearing upon the lives of those in the sixteenth. All the people he had killed were those that wanted to kill him first, those who'd hurt the people he liked. What was wrong with that? The memories served as guidance, but they were not him. He was Sasaki Kojiro, friend to Oda Nobunaga, mentor to Suzue, and son of Toda Seigen. That was all. With that thought, an emotional burden was cut away from his shoulders, and a white light seemed to leave him. A figure formed in front of him, features indistinct, but Kojiro knew that this was his other self, a lingering spirit. Had he carried this spirit with him for so long? No wonder it leaving felt so freeing. The spirit placed its hand on his shoulder, before vanishing like mist, leaving Kojiro standing there with a foul taste in his mouth. His memories were still all in place, the memories of his other self still there. Good. Kojiro had never been a particularly spiritual person, but blatant confirmation of the supernatural three times over tended to change that.

With a groan, he grabbed the glass of water that the man at the table had been drinking, and rinsed his mouth with it, before grabbing the stack of papers that the man had been looking through. To his surprise, the stack was entirely made of classified military plans and orders. Kojiro smiled, these would prove valuable. He extricated himself from the hidden base at the foot of the tree and made his way back to the tree. Kojiro headed back towards his tree, and arriving there, he changed back into comfortable clothing. He had planned to leave the tanto with the body, but a second glance at it convinced him to keep it. Turning to leave, Kojiro began to head back to the Oda army's camp. A determined set crossed into his eyes. Chosokabe Motochika would be handled, very swiftly.

A/N:

Wanted to establish that while Kojiro has memories of someone from our world, he is not a person from our world. The memories will still affect him, but from a distance. Wanted to clarify, since it seems kinda weird that a person from our world could like, murk a thousand people and be cool with it. In the Sengoku though, that stuff was no issue. At its core, the story and the character remain the same and will progress as it has so far, Kojiro is still an SI with all that entails. Foreknowledge, eventual power-munchkining (like OG Fate Sasaki isn't already busted lmao), etc. also, working on a formatting fix over the next week. Finally figured out how to do that. Fun fact, did you know fanfiction deletes spacing?