Author's Note: Greetings... um, not much to say except I would just like to thank you all for reading!
Review Responses:
Jumbo: Comments not appreciated, Jumbohead... - But you know, it is PG-13. But you're 14 already, aren't you? You should be as impure as Putt-putt is... Elmer, Jumbo, glad you guys liked! I DIDN'T LIKE WHEN YOU GUYS SAID YOU WERE FALLING ASLEEP!!! But that's alright, I suppose, when you guys can't take great literature like my fanfic! -;;;;; I'm making myself laugh, the thought is so ridiculous. Oh, Elmer, when you give me 14 punches/kicks, Mr. Stanley will notice and comment on it again! Hahaha!
Shihali: I'm so sorry for making you feel that way... (now there's going to be a rally of apologies -;) About Okubo's assassination ...now there's a definite problem. I would just say that everything is booted up a day late- does that interfere with the real story? I hope that doesn't... Maybe I'll just discard the important event because it never happened in my fic... but that's disrespectful... AUGH!! Oh, um, the time thing is a bit strange, but time is always everyone's enemy. Yes, I agree, Kaoru's weight and Soujirou's weight, when put in a ratio, is quite bordering on impossible but let's just say that for now, hmm? - And, the Kyoto Arc timeline will be very useful, thank you! That way, I don't make any similar mistakes like this one on any future stories-thanks for all your research! I now know the full extent of how much Nobuhiro Watsuki wanted 'Rurouni Kenshin' to be based on history. Once again, thank you, and I apologize if I made you feel horrible!
star0704: Yeah, it is short, isn't it? There'll be more chapters later on. I agree with the damsel in distress part-when I was editing it, I realized I was making Kaoru seem like one. That's when I stuck in the part about her wanting to fight back, though she didn't have her bokken.
Arteme: Don't worry, Soujirou will later reveal why he's being so evil. And thanks for the nice compliments!
Brittanie Love: Thank you! I will!
rurouni madness: Thank you! Soujirou is being a bit evil, ne? I'm glad you like the waking-up part-I had a lot of trouble with that description.
GoldAngel2: Yes, exactly what I wanted-Kenshin's fury with Shishio is a point I would like to make clear. It is important in the story's climax and conclusion. Whoa-I can't even think that far...At long last, you are the only one of my reviewers who understands that Soujirou must be evil for the plot to finally unfold.
Disclaimer: Characters-not-mine-but-the-fanfic-idea-is-mine... I should copy and paste this statement every time I do a new chapter or a story. --;
A Cloak of Protection
Chapter 4: Burning EncounterDAY ONE--4:45 pm
Kaoru pressed herself against the soft back of the couch, feeling her cerulean eyes widen in fear. Her fingers dug into the couch beneath her, and she almost forgot to breathe.
So this was the great Shishio-she had heard horrible details about him from Kenshin, whenever he reminisced about the past.
Kenshin. Kenshin. Kenshin. Did Kenshin know?? Did he know where she was, that she was in desperate need of him more than ever??
The bandaged ex-hitokiri's lips slowly formed into a cruel smile, as he saw Kaoru lying there on the yellow couch and Soujirou perched jauntily next to her, a huge smile again plastered on his face from the sight of Shishio.
Shishio's hard black hitokiri eyes glimmered, and the bandaged man made his way over to the couch, dark blue robe fluttering as he moved. Kaoru held her breath, feeling her wounds throb.
Soujirou gave Shishio a huge smile and hastily leaped off the couch and went over to stand next to Yumi, who had her arms folded, the flowing sleeves of her red dress scrunched up. Soujirou beamed at her, and Yumi felt a tiny surge of annoyance. Does this boy ever tire of beaming at the cruel world? She thought angrily. She knew better... her past proved that... but she was not to relive it here.
The bandaged Shishio slowed to a stop before the couch, in front of Kaoru. Speechless with terror, she raised her frightened eyes slowly to look into his glittering ones. In his eyes, triumph shone like a bright wall of fire. Kaoru could feel waves of heat emanating from his very being.
Then he spoke, moving that burned, browned mouth with the dark lips. "Battousai will be very distraught indeed to hear about this," he declared boldly, a tiny smile flitting about his mouth. "You, woman, will serve a very important purpose in my monstrous plan..."
The air seemed to chill drastically, temperature sharply plummeting to an impossible number.
Kaoru slowly sat up, using her hands, pressing against the couch, to give her leverage. What was this evil murderer saying? Her bare feet brushed the carpeted ground and she shivered.
Shishio, his eyes on hers, pronounced slowly and with clear syllables: "You, alone, will bring down the Battousai...become his weakness. You will be of great help to me, and the amount of how greatly you will help me will be equivalent to if you killed the Battousai with your own hands."
Kenshin.
Kenshin.
Kenshin!!
Kaoru turned her head to the side and gave a choked sob, tears beginning to brim from her sapphire eyes. No, she would not help Shishio; no, never, never while her body had breath.
Then, her sapphire eyes turned dark with concluded resolve, and narrowed with anger. Flinging her head around to face Shishio, her eyes blazing with fire, she hurled her next words into his startled face.
"And what if I refuse?" she screamed in raw anger. Her wounds seared with pain. This gave her more anger, as it reminded her that probably Shishio had himself ordered them inflicted on her. Well, not really, but still. He was the cause of all her pain; all her confusion; all her terror. A horrible lump grew in her throat with her anger.
Shishio's startled face gave Kaoru great satisfaction. But then her satisfaction turned to perplexity as his face evened out, and he threw back his bandaged head, roaring in laughter.
His laughter was simply primitive-the classical bad-guy laugh. However, no bad-guy laugh had ever made Kaoru feel so frightened and wary before. His bandaged chest rumbled with every roar of laughter, his whole body shaking.
Kaoru waited, mute, hands clenched tightly in her lap.
Shishio's roaring laughs finally died, and he lowered his bandaged chin to stare Kaoru into the eyes once more. His contempt smile still remained on his face, as he moved his burnt face so close to Kaoru's smooth one that their noses were almost touching. Kaoru swallowed, feeling burning waves of heat radiating from him.
Shishio reached up a bandaged hand and grabbed Kaoru's chin, jerking it up and toward him. Kaoru winced, and glared down at Shishio, her hands curled into fists, wanting to punch him, sock him in his most vulnerable part of the body. Her white swan's neck trembled with suppressed anger and indignation, raven hair falling all along it and flowing down her back.
"Listen, girl," Shishio sneered. "You can't refuse. You don't have a choice in this. You will just be a puppet for me to maneuver around, tinker with. To think that you can stand a chance against I, Shishio, future ruler of Japan in a few days, is laughable."
Kaoru squeezed her eyes shut in pain as Shishio jerked her chin higher, his fingers burning her neck and the bottom of her chin.
"And furthermore," Shishio snarled in her ear, his hot breath assaulting her skin, "you don't have a say in whatever I do to you."
Kaoru gasped for breath, her mouth opening wide to take in as much air as possible. In this position, it was difficult to breathe.
Shishio dropped her chin abruptly; Kaoru accidentally bit her tongue as he withdrew his burning fingers from her chin. She tasted the metallic ting of blood in her mouth, and tried to swallow it away.
"You don't have a say in whatever I do to you," Shishio repeated, his burnt mouth curling into a smirk. Raising his left hand, he brought it forward to Kaoru's worse wound of the two gashes: the right side wound.
Kaoru shrieked in pure agony as the searing heat of his skin connected with her still fragile and painful wound. The blood was just starting to stop flowing, but now it flowed with new intensity and purpose as Kaoru screamed in pain, tossing her head back and forth, shiny black hair swaying frantically from side to side.
Shishio kept his burning left hand on her side still, grinning as Kaoru felt the searing burn. Her screams, filled with raw pain, left him with a longing for blood spill. Even the stream of blood flowing from her side wound and over his left hand didn't satisfy the call of bloodlust.
Shishio managed to keep down the bloodlust to a minimum, and kept his burning left hand on Kaoru's tender gash.
To Kaoru's horror, she dimly saw, through a red haze of pain, that a cloud of steam was rising from her burning and bleeding wound. The pain built up to its climax, and she screamed once more, the scream scraping her throat raw.
Then she collapsed forward, not able to stand the burning pain any longer. Her eyes fluttered and closed, dark lashes standing out among her ghostly pale face.
Shishio caught Kaoru as she plummeted forward, and tossed the limp girl back onto the couch unceremoniously. A haunting glitter flickered in his eyes as he observed the blood spilling from the unconscious girl's wound, soaking into the couch's yellow cloth cover.
Almost absently, Shishio brought his bandaged left hand, soaked with the girl's fresh blood, up to his burned lips and licked off the blood. He strode around to face the grinning Soujirou and the approving Yumi, his blood-covered hand still up to his lips, and walked to them, shoes clacking against the hardwood floor as he stepped off the green carpet.
Soujirou beamed up at the approaching Shishio, and waited for Shishio's new commands. Shishio reached him and commanded, "Soujirou, you must stay here in the room with Battousai's girl. Keep her company, give her water, allow her to use the bathroom. Keep here until the Battousai is informed of his girl's whereabouts and we are about to start our... battle." At this last word, the bloodlust in Shishio's eyes grew to a great intensity.
Fighting down the urge to kill-anyway, he reminded himself, he really couldn't afford to fight anyone on a whim, else he would like to be reduced to a cloud of red vapor-he turned to Yumi. He offered his blue-robed arm to her, and she slipped it through her own red-sleeved arm. They started to depart out the doors of the room, but then Shishio stopped in his tracks.
Twisting his neck around to look at Soujirou, the bandaged ex-hitokiri added, "And don't forget to keep all doors and... secret passages... securely locked at all times."
The Western-style dressed boy acknowledged his command with a slight nod and a big smile, and then raised his hand in a gesture of farewell as Shishio and Yumi swept out of the room and into the hall.
Yumi turned around, red dress sweeping around her, to see the double wooden doors swinging to a shut behind them. The boy, Yumi thought. Shishio trusts him so.
Soujirou turned around, inside the room, to face the bleeding, limp girl. His smile faltered for a second, then returned with blazing intensity as he gazed upon the pale Kaoru.
--------------------------------
5:00 pm
Kenshin dropped down next to the wooden dojo gates, feeling an uncomfortable trickle of sweat run its way down his flushed cheek. For the past two and a half hours, he had been exploring every single centimeter of the dirt path down to the town, where he had been knocking at every shop's door. At each door, he had been inquiring if they had seen a (beautiful) girl in a blue kimono and pink-purple obi come by their door.
"She has radiant sapphire eyes and shiny, long, raven-black hair," Kenshin had told each shop owner.
At each stop, before the owner opened the door, Kenshin would assure himself that yes, Kaoru-dono had been seen by the owner. At each shop, each owner had shaken his/her head no.
Discouraged, Kenshin brought his white hakama-covered knees up to his chest and lay his bushy red head down on them. Now he knew something had happened to Kaoru-dono. She wouldn't intentionally skip Tae-dono's little birthday get-together. At least the shop owners could have seen her.
Kenshin placed his hands on either side of him and boosted himself up, sandaled feet skidding on the crumbly dirt as he pushed himself up. Dusting himself off, he wiped away another trickle of sweat and slowly breathed deeply in and out.
His next plan of action: search the trail that ran through the shady woods. On a hot day like this one, there was a high chance of her cutting through the woods to get to the Akabeko early and also to avoid the scorching sun.
Kenshin shook out his long fiery-colored hair and took a step onto the trail leading into the woods. If he couldn't find Kaoru-dono, then-then-
He felt his eyes narrowing, flickering amber.
At that moment, he heard a familiar shout behind him. Kenshin, startled, swiveled around, his eyes reverting back to its familiar amethyst color.
Sanosuke, gangly in his white outfit and spiky chocolate-fudge-with-almonds- and-cholate-chips-and-chocolate-ice-cream hair (A/N: I'm a little hungry now... --;) dashed in his direction-red ribbon flapping behind his head--, propelling his arm back and forth over his head in an effort to catch Kenshin's attention.
Kenshin waited as Sano caught up to him, perhaps if a bit impatiently.
Sanosuke stopped in front of Kenshin, towering over him by at least a spiky head. "Kenshin, Yahiko and the kids've been asking where you were. You left like three hours ago and never told anyone where you went. You were starting to worry everyone. And where's the Missie?"
Kenshin's eyes grew troubled. Digging the toe of his right sandal into the dirt, he told Sano everything-Tae's hurt, the shopkeepers' unawareness, how long Kaoru had been out, his suspicions of Kaoru getting kidnapped.
"And now," Kenshin concluded, violet eyes wide with worry, "I'm about to look for signs of where Kaoru-dono might have been on the trail through the woods. The trail also leads to the town so Kaoru-dono could have gone through there."
Sanosuke volunteered to help search ("'cause how can I freeload without anyone to hand out food?", though Kenshin knew Sano deeply loved Kaoru as a younger sister), and together, the two dashed out to the forest trail, hoping to find a sign of where Kaoru could have gone.
TO BE CONTINUED
Author's Note: I'm so TIRED! What a burst of creative energy! This is possibly the longest chapter of all, and I didn't even combine two chapters together. I'm so proud - ... Anyway, I hope you guys all enjoyed! I sure did.
-Twilight Sky