Authoress' notes: Gosh darn, this chapter was so much fun to write, it was almost sinful. I (heart) writing fight scenes!
Also, I saw Bankotsu's last episode last night on Cartoon Network. Even though they should have made his fights with Inuyasha purely physical (swordfights), which would have been beyond awesome, it was still nice seeing him on the screen for a little longer. Either way, I'm bummed. Please...send condolences to my email address. (sigh.)
But don't forget to review, review, review. I'll take constructive criticism too! People reviewing and saying how much they like the stuff I write encourages me greatly to write more! I have a tendency to cringe every time I hit "add chapter" to this story, ("funny" is so much easier to write! Argh!) so reviews help more than you could ever know.
Wayward Ransom, chapter 14.
Akiko stayed rigid in fright as Bankotsu's right hand continued to smoothly run up to her shoulder. He still had her pinned against the tree with his body, his face hidden by her ear.
Quick as lightning, his hand snapped upward, and slapped the bark with a solid sound. His forearm was right in line with her neck. An instant later, Akiko heard a horrifying thock! by her left ear, and felt his body flinch. For half a second, he rested his head on her shoulder, and she could almost sense him gritting his teeth.
When she turned her head towards the sound, she let out a frightened gasp as she saw a blood-stained arrow impaled right through Bankotsu's solid forearm, and well beyond that, an archer readying another arrow.
Bankotsu tore himself away from her, givingthe slightest trace of pain, and searingly looked over his right shoulder, his hand still on the tree. In a small patch of foliage alongside the pathway, he could see at least six other men besides the archer getting up, ready to fight.
One of them looked very angry upon seeing the young man's steely expression. He faced the archer to his right. "Idiot! I knew that guy was the mercenary that was hired to guard that wench!" he said. "Don't you know who that is? You were the one who thought it was ridiculous to have so many of us sent here at once!"
The archer nocked another arrow, oblivious to the fury of his comrade's tirade. "He looked too young. And they were acting like lovers."
"Well, I told you that you should have shot him first, stupid!" he said, loudly scolding the archer.
Not having my weapons or armor made them think I wasn't her bodyguard, he thought. So they underestimated me. His cobalt eyes narrowed. Good. He removed his right hand from behind Akiko's head, and pulled it away from the tree. He grabbed the impaled arrow with his teeth and slowly pulled it out of his arm, this time without even the slightest concern, and spat the arrow aside. Akiko grew wide-eyed and turned about ten shades of green watching him.
"Get behind the tree," he quietly ordered her. She scampered around to the far side and watched Bankotsu shoot away from the tree, heading right for the group of men like an animal.
"Wait!" Akiko called to him as he ran right toward the men. "Don't you want some armor? Or a weapon...?"
Not even hearing her, he was halfway down to the men waiting in the shrubbery already.
"...or...anything? Even if it's...just a big stick?" she quietly added, knowing she was talking to no one but herself now. He didn't need any of her concern.
The sleeve of his shirt quickly turning red, Bankotsu raced toward the archer, who by now had a nocked arrow aimed perfectly for Bankotsu's neck.
The archer let the arrow fly, and Bankotsu gracefully stepped aside just in time to dodge it. The arrow continued on and impaled itself in the tree in back of which Akiko hid. Akiko twitched when she heard the arrow strike wood.
The archer's face filled with terror as Bankotsu stepped towards center again and just continued toward him. The archer desperately reached into his quill to get another arrow, but he no sooner brought his arm back before Bankotsu had already knocked the bow out of his hand by pounding down hard on his arm with his right fist. He threw a left straight into his face, knocking the man down to the ground, too.
In an instant, he had the archer's katana, and sliced through the remaining 6 men effortlessly even as they were all leaping toward him. The archer, in a courageous last stand, tried to jump Bankotsu from behind, but all Bankotsu had to do was impale him in a backward stab, and the archer was dead, also.
Three more archers, previously hidden in the shrubbery, stood up, their arrows nocked and aimed at Bankotsu. Bankotsu immediately dropped the katana and picked up the dead archer's bow and three arrows. He nocked one, holding the extras in his teeth, and let it fly, hitting one of the opposing marksmen dead in an eye before he could even release his own arrow. He reloaded the bow in a flash, as it had been beaten into his head that this was the biggest waste of time, and to continue to live, he had do it more quckly than anyone else.
In one motion he dodged the second and third man's arrows and fired twice again, hitting the remaining marksman square in the face.
Akiko heard the opposing daimyo's soldiers shrieking loudly, making terrible sounds until they all stopped moving. It was horrifying.
After the third arrow flew into the last archer, the young man heard a frenzied "Bankotsu!" coming from the direction of the tree. He whirled around toward his right and heard Akiko, who had come to the front of the tree again, shrinking on the ground as two more men ran toward her from opposite sides.
There was no time to waste, as they both almost reached her. The dark young man grabbed two more arrows and simultaneously nocked them, using his bow hand to get just the angles he needed. He let them both fly and each arrow hit one man square in the neck. The men fell over in agony, and soon were also dead.
Bankotsu dropped the bow as three men ran up the small hill toward him. One had a morning star on a chain, the other two held spears. Bankotsu grinned and chuckled. He was just starting to get warmed up, and this seemed to be the last of them! Well, at least he could have some contact this time instead of using arrows. Long-distance warfare was always so dull to him.
He finished off the man that reached him first quickly, grabbed his spear, and drove it through the second spear-carrying man after blocking a few times. The man with the morning star threw his weapon, but Bankotsu blocked it with the spear he was borrowing, and the chain wrapped around the pole. Bankotsu, using brute force, pulled on the chain and the man, still grasping the morning star, was thrown toward him. Bankotsu wrapped his arms around the stunned man's neck, and broke it in a split second.The soldierfell to the ground with a heavy thud.
How...satisfying.
Sure that it was all over for now, he closed his eyes and placed his left hand on a hip, smirking and inhaling deeply a few times. Warfare was truly like a drug for him. His posture became more relaxed, oblivious to the bottom of his right sleeve, which wasnow covered in redness. Blood fell steadily in large drops to the ground from his still fingertips.
He turned around and, still calmly smirking, gazed partway over a shoulder at Akiko. She was sitting under the tree, but now she was white as a sheet and scared out of her wits. The irresistible, innocent boyish charm she saw on his handsome, dark face as he grinned at her in the bluish twilight belied the fact that he was truly a highly trained killing machine.
At that point Akiko couldn't decide whether to be appalled or amazed. This man, who she knew was somewhow the Bankotsu she knew as a child, had just single-handedly killed a total of fifteen men, using a variety of skills it would take most others decades to learn individually. She didn't know what was more frightening...getting ambushed by so many assassins at once, or watching one man so easily kill them all.
"I...guess you didn't need a big stick after all..." she whispered to herself. She hid her hands in her kimono again, crossing her arms and pressing them to herself.
Still grinning, and with his eyes locked on her, Bankotsu casually walked over to where Akiko was seated beneath the tree. He stopped when he reached her, and stood in front of her for a moment, looking down at her. He noticed how she cringed away slightly. She stared at him with wide-open yellow eyes for a long moment and held her arms to herself tighter.
His face softened, but he was still grinning. He held out his left hand, palm-up to her. He cocked an eyebrow. "Want to finish your walk?"
She couldn't do anything but stare at him. And his outstretched hand.
Sensing her fear again, seeing it in her eyes, his face softened even more and became slightly pained, his lips separating just enough to see white teeth between them. "I am not here to..." He paused a bit, not being able to complete himself. She almost made him feel...ashamed. The first one to ever do so.
Burying the shame as far down as he could, his face hardened again. "You...know perfectly well why I am here." Stubborn persistence was the only thing keeping him from withdrawing his hand. After a long uncomfortable pause, he managed to say, "So. Your walk...?"even more quietly, and even humbly.
She flicked her eyes back and forth for a minute between his dark face and his dark hand, then finally put one of her fair, red-ridged hands in his. He noticed how small her hands were compared to his. His own hands were very large compared to the rest of him. They were almost disproportionately large. In contrast, her own hands were tiny.
She pulled herself up, Bankotsu's hand countering her weight easily. She righted herself very quickly. It seemed she was expecting him to release her hand just as quickly so she could dust herself off, but he held it just a few moments longer than necessary, gazing at her with a searingly intent face. That same haunting, pained expression. She let out a little gasp when he didn't release her hand right away, and his face even more strained for a second again. But he quickly recovered. He let her hand go.
She folded her arms up into her kimono again, but let one hand briefly out to point at the young man's bloody right arm.
"Um...your arm-"
No sooner had she mentioned it than he mumbled something like "eh, that," took off his shirt, wiped down his messy right forearm with it, then ripped off the collar going around the neck and down to the waist in one long piece, and in a flash, started twining it around his arm. He was used to doing this.
She studied him intently for a moment, now that he was shirtless. She took in how the last few moments of twilight reflected off him. He looked like his entire torso, especially his arms, were made of solid steel, right down to the tips of his fingers that helped get her off the ground earlier. Each muscle could be seen flexing and relaxing as he moved around to fix his arm. Just like everything else about him, it was frightening and intriguing all at once. She struggled to speak as she watched him patch himself up. "Bankotsu...thank you. Thank you very much."
He said nothing, but flashed another cocky, boyish grin in her direction as he finished tying the knot in his bandage. It was certainly no problem for him. He might have mentioned to anyone else that the price was right for this job, so technically, he didn't need any thanks. But right now, it was getting to be about more than money. No matter how far away she was from him, he could still see that annoying scar on her cheek. And even when she was turned away from him, he knew it was still there.
He was secretly hoping he might have even gotten a kiss to go along with her thanks, just like he did when they were three, but when he didn't, he didn't press the issue. Killing fifteen men was enough of a rush for today, though if the opposing daimyo were to send more assassins, he could just as easily go another round and kill fifteen more, too. And that was without the banryuu.
She looked around and saw the bodies of the other men strewn about, and hugged her arms closer to herself again. "I want to start heading back."
He obliged and swung his bloody, ripped shirt over a shoulder. She was the first to turn toward the cottage, and, not without relief washing over her face, started softly walking back towards it. Bankotsu followed close behind, never letting her out of his sight...just in case.