The Gun & The Sword Chapter 8: The Path Of The Blade, a love hina fanfic

The Gun & The Sword

Chapter VIII: The Path of the Blade.

Keiranto knocked on the door of Motoko's room. After much begging, Tsuroko had given him permission to say one last goodbye to Motoko before he left. He heard quiet sobbing, but no answer. He pushed open the door to see Motoko, a look of despair on her face, moving a short blade towards her chest. He made a split second decision, made more from the heart than the head, leaping forward.

Motoko felt a slight prick as the tip of the blade touched her skin, she had expected it to hurt more. She had decided to commit sepukku as she knew she could not live without Keiranto.She felt a warm wetness spreading across the front of her hakama and looked down to see blood soaking the cloth. It took her a few seconds to realise that it was not her blood and she looked up. The blade had gone right through Keiranto's abdomen; the prick Motoko had felt had been the tip of the blade poking out the other side. He turned his head and, blood dripping out of his mouth, whispered, "I came to say goodbye, I j-" he coughed, "just wanted to say, I'm sorry and, and I will always love you, Motoko-Chan."

"Oh, Kei-kun, I'm so sorry, I love you too."

He leaned his head back and smiled. Then his eyes flickered closed. Motoko was on her feet instantly. He has to get to a hospital. She picked up his limp body and ran out to the waiting motorbike.

She sat by his bedside for four days, waiting for him to open his eyes. She got almost no sleep, and only ate and drank when Tsuroko brought her food. There had been two pieces of good news. The first was that Keiranto was expected to make a full recovery, the blade had missed all his organs apart from one kidney, which had to be removed, but he would be fully functional without it. The second, and most surprising piece of news was Tsuroko's statement that Keiranto's willingness to sacrifice himself for Motoko, and Motoko's dash to save his life, meant that the two were obviously meant for each other, and she would not come between them. However, she still had a bone to pick with Keiranto over the death of her beloved bird. Motoko was cut off from her musings by a noise. Keiranto had opened his eyes and was murmuring her name. She fell on him, kissing him and hugging him until she thought she would burst with happiness and joy.

-----------------------------------------------10 days later-------------------------------------------------

Keiranto had been finally discharged from hospital, and was able to walk back to the Hinata Inn under his own steam, although Motoko walked by his side. When he pushed open the door to the building he saw a large banner, streamers, and a huge table of food awaiting him, with all the other residents yelling "WELCOME HOME KEIRANTO!!"

His jaw dropped, "you did all this for me?" He stammered, still totally amazed.

"Yup, and there's more too," said Kitsune, pressing a small box into his hand, "we all bought presents!"

Keiranto opened the box to find a pair of silver cufflinks shaped like bullets and stammered out his thanks to Kitsune, not having much time as the other residents pressed their gifts towards him; a set of spanners from Naru ("I thought you could do something to quieten down that infernal motorbike of yours"), a large homemade chocolate from Shinobu ("I, - I made this for you, sempai") and a small computer from Su ("its for your bike, it will show where you are, where you are heading and where you want to go. It'll also play pinball, but don't push the red button!"). The best gift of all, however, was from Motoko. She pulled out a case from a hiding place under the stairs and he opened it to find a shiny copper saxophone. "I remembered you saying you wished you had your saxophone from when you were a child, this is unfortunately not the same one, but I hope it will suffice?"

His reaction surprised her almost as much as everyone else, he picked her up and hugged her tight, saying: "Thank you Motoko-chan, this is the best gift anyone could have given me, and it is made better by the fact it is from you! I am surprised you remembered about me saying that, I only mentioned it in passing. Thank you, Motoko-chan, for this, and for everything you have done for me."

The residents the clamoured around him, pestering him to give them a tune. He eventually gave in and obliged, putting the reed to his lips and playing the opening notes of one of his favourite songs. To everyone's surprise, Motoko joined in, singing the lyrics:

I wanna show you that anything is possible
I wanna show you that your wildest dreams can come true
And I swear some day I'm gonna figure out how to just that
But until then, I guess trying is all I can do

At this, the other residents joined in with the tune, Kitsune dredging out an old blues harmonica from somewhere on her person, Su jamming away on a synthesizer with her trademark three-eyed logo on it, Shinobu rushing to her room to bring out a small flute and Naru strumming on an old guitar. Motoko kept singing:

Maybe I'm wrong thinking you want something better
Maybe I'm wrong thinking you got no problem making it through the night
Maybe I'm wrong about every little thing I'm talking about
I said maybe I'm wrong, but just maybe, maybe I'm right

No, it's none of my business but I think I can make you happy
But it really doesn't matter if it's me or it's someone else
All that I know is that I think that your kinda special
And one way or another gonna see that I can treat you well

You seem to think that Lady Luck just doesn't like you
Well, I've been trying to belive that the Lady just ain't that dumb
Oh, just give her time to get here
And I'm sure that when she gets here
She'll be really glad to be here when she comes

After this, Keitaro, Haruka and Seta, who had just come through the door applauded wildly and the residents took a bow. Keiranto then kissed Motoko gently and whispered to her, "that was for you, my darling." All Motoko could do was blush.