Seed of Hope
Chapter 3: Dreams of Old
(A/N: Ok, this is edited chapter number 3! Hope you guys are still with me. On with the chappie!)
Disclaimer: I have never and will never owe the Rurouni Kenshin series, so get that out of your system
Soujirou looked around him, he couldn't see anything. The darkness was fast closing in around him. He searched for any sign of life, anything at all to assure him that he was still alive and breathing. Groping his way in the darkness, he stuck his right arm out, hoping to maybe find a wall of some sort to guide his way. To his immense relief, he felt his skin momentarily graze something that felt akin to the touch of someone else's skin. Before he could do anything though, the other person had found his hand and now was violently pulling at it. Confused, Soujirou tried his best to retaliate, but to no avail.
Suddenly, as if by magic the darkness seemed to clear like a rainbow after a storm. He looked around, he was now standing in the middle of a field. To his left was a large was a large wooden house and on his right there stood three even larger houses. Just then, he felt the same person pulling his arm again, and he looked up to meet the familiar eyes… of his older cousin.
Try as he might, there was nothing that he could do. He could not escape from the grip of his cousin. Tripping over a stone, he fell face first into the ground. He was roughly gripped by his collar and dragged in the direction of the large wooden house. From within the house, Soujirou watched as the shoji door slid open. The face he saw made his blood ran dry.
There in the doorway, stood his uncle drunk as ever.
"I caught him out in the fields pops, must have been trying to escape again."
"You bastard! Trying to sneak away again huh? Looks like its time for me to teach you another lesson in discipline!" With that statement, Soujirou found himself pinned to the ground and surrounded by his two cousins. The two then proceeded to attack Soujirou, kicking and punching him reveling at the sight of Soujirou curling himself into a tiny ball in defense. Then, almost as suddenly as their attacks came, they stopped. Soujirou looked up only to see the taller of his two cousins glaring sharply at him.
"What are you smiling at, you little bastard?"
To that, Soujirou could not help but to smile an even wider smile. He wasn't smiling out of happiness; he was smiling out of instinct. He didn't know why, but something in him was telling him that if he smiled, it wouldn't be as bad as him crying. At that moment, Soujirou looked up, just in time to see the older of his cousins swinging his now unsheathed katana towards his right. Panicking, Soujirou quickly dodged to his left narrowly missing his cousin's attack by a few centimeters. Looking at a tiny puddle in the ground, Soujirou was shocked to find himself staring at his ten-year-old self, but before he could ponder about anything else he had to jump out to avoid being slashed again.
"A fast one eh? We'll see about that, come here you little brat!"
Finding strength in his knees, Soujirou got up and ran for his life. He ran as fast as he could not knowing where he was going. He raced past the house, past the fields, hoping against hope to find somewhere he could hide. Running aimlessly, he found himself coming face to face with the door that led right into the three warehouses. Relief coursing through him and his heart palpitating, he pushed himself to run faster towards the welcoming doors of the warehouse where he knew he would be safe from his attackers. Even in his worst nightmares would he ever have imagined that the doors would suddenly swing shut. Banging his fists on the now closed doors, the little boy tried his best to open the doors; pounding his fists in desperation until his knuckles had split and blood oozed from them. The footsteps of his attackers became louder and louder, until finally they stopped. Swallowing back his fear, Soujirou turned around to come face to face with his two cousins.
"You thought you could get away huh? You're nothing but a lowly bastard child whom we took in out of the kindness of our hearts! We raised you and this is how you repay us?" Standing rooted to the ground in terror, Soujirou could not say or do anything in reply to his cousin's demand but smile.
"Still smiling eh? We'll soon fix that!" With that, the katana was swiftly brought down onto Soujirou's head…
Soujirou sat up in bed, cold sweat running down his back. Bringing a hand to his forehead, he shakily brushed back his hair and sighed. He had long since been accustomed to being blind. He didn't know for how long he had been blind, but for some reason he was not in any rush to see again. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath as he calmed himself down.
"Nightmare again?"
Soujirou could only nod mutely in the direction of the voice of his caretaker. He heard what vaguely sounded like a sigh that came from his right. Curiousity overwhelming him, Soujirou found himself asking the one question he wanted to ask since the first day.
"Who are you? Why did you help me?"
There was a momentary silence almost as if the person the question was addressed to was reluctant to answer.
"My name's not important. After all, a name is merely but a word. It holds no significance. As for your second question, it would be the same as me asking you why do you hold a katana?"
The answer came as a surprise to Soujirou. He had never known anyone who could care so little for themselves save himself. No one had ever asked him such a question before. To him, the katana was his life, the katana was like the oxygen he breathed in. He couldn't live without it.
Before he could say anything else, he heard his caretaker ask, "Why do you have such horrific recurring nightmares?"
Soujirou just sighed and was about to ignore her question when he heard himself say, "I didn't have a good childhood. I was a bastard child and when my father died, I was left in the care of my uncle who didn't like me. He had only taken me in because he was afraid of what the neighbours would say about him."
"Like? Judging from your screams, sounds more like your uncle was planning your death everytime he saw you." Came the biting reply from his mysterious caretaker.
"I guess in a way my uncle had tried to make life as difficult for me as possible. He made me move bags of rice day and night. Both he and his two sons would beat me up for even the slightest of mistakes such as dropping the bags of rice when I got tired. Then one night, I met Shishio-sama. You see, I had just witnessed him killing two policemen. For that, he was supposed to kill me, but he was amused by the fact that I was still smiling, so he spared my life. I didn't know what to do with him, so I placed him in my uncle's warehouse. For two weeks, I would secretly pass him bandages and food. However, my uncle and his family realised that something was wrong. I overheard them saying that it was best that they killed me before my harbouring of the wanted criminal would affect their rice business."
It was a weird thing that Soujirou was feeling. It felt somewhat reassuring, as though a great gib burden was lifted from his chest. He never did like mentioning his past, but somehow he felt that this person was someone he could trust. In fact, he felt like he had known this person his whole life. It was strange. Was this the thing people called trust?
"But what my uncle didn't know was Shishio-sama had given me his katana. Along with his token of gratitude for his food and lodgings, he had told me these words…" Soujirou took a deep breath as he remembered the words that would later become his motto and his way of life just as the Juppon Gatana had become his family no matter how dysfunctional.
"The strong live and the weak die. It was because of those words that I found the remaining strength in me to take up the katana and protect myself, thereby killing my family members before they had a chance to kill me."
The stranger took in all that the rurouni had said. Indeed, the rurouni had had a hard life. Judging from the boy's relieved smile, all he needed was probably a listening ear.
"You know, there were many a time this question would always be at the back of mind, forever haunting me no matter what I do. To be honest, although I never tell anyone but deep down I never wanted to kill my uncle or his family, but I had no choice because if I didn't kill them… they would I have killed me and I was… scared…" At that point, Soujirou could feel the tears flowing down his cheeks. Chuckling softly, he wiped the tears laughing at the irony of things. Here he was, a blind rurouni pouring his heart out to some stranger he didn't know and yet he still felt at ease.
He was surprised when he felt the weight of someone else on the tatami mat. He was even more surprised when he felt a pair of arms embrace him and a warm gentle voice that said, "Daijoubu, You don't have to be alone anymore. Just cry as much as you want to."
Shocked, Soujirou closed his eyes and cried his heart out as he rested his head on the person's shoulders. The night gave way to dawn as the rays of the sun shown down to reveal the picture of Soujirou leaning on the shoulders of a figure dressed entirely in white, a warm smile on his face.
(A/N: And that's chapter 3 folks! Hope you guys liked it, this chapter was particularly hard to rewrite. Well, remember to review. Cya all in the next chapter!)