I do not own Sengoku Basara, only the original character(s). This piece was written for meaning, not monetary gain.
Thank you for the feedback =)
Creative energies required to actualize this chapter spanned several days, but at last, it is finished!
At the risk of his zanmetsu, I must say Mitsunari is such a child. :P
Ch 5: Lamentation
The swallows awoke her. Leaving her seat against the wall, Ran paddles over to Mitsunari, a colorless form obscured by the morning sadness. She sits by his side, unaware of the twitching edges of her mouth when she notes how his features soften in slumber and how his short, platinum hair gives him a boyish appeal usually masked by the razor in his voice and eyes.
Like second nature, she reaches over to his forehead.
In the blink of eye, his trademark scowl surfaces and those steel eyes, sharper than his odachi, entrap her brown ones.
"Stay your hand," he grumbles, voice hoarse from disuse, "least you desire to lose it."
"Your fever broke," she announces, expression mild as ever. "I see your voice returned as well." She tells him to rest before calling Tschiyo-san in to stay by his side.
Ran returns when the sun hits its peak, having tended to the soldiers and setting Mitsunari's taper dose of antidote to cook. She sits by his bedside, fingers weaving edamame from its shell, vaguely recalling the conversation with a teary-eyed Tschiyo-san in the hall.
"You saved his life. The gratitude I feel cannot be measured in words. Thank you for taking care of him."
Of course, Ran had rubbed off the compliment from the elderly woman with equally polite words, but despite how trying last night had been, it isn't why Ran reminisces.
"In all the years I've taken care of Sakichi, I have never seen him so ill."
Ran forms the word silently with her lips, and for the second time in the day, the corners of her mouth twitches. She is about to muse over how a dangerous, fearsome general could've had such a cute childhood name, when said person stirs.
At first, it's tossing and turning, which Ran attributes to discomfort. Flailing arms follow, and at a closer distance, right by his futon, she hears hushed cries. A small, whisper of names. Two she doesn't know.
"Hanbei-sama…"
"…Gyobu"
She reaches to his turned-over form and sees his countenance contorted against the soaked sheet. The third name; one that she knows.
"…Hideyoshi-sama"
Her outstretched hand holds back and the sad reality of losing those you love to war washes over. She had rebuked him on Ieyasu's behalf during her first day here for not understanding bonds, but maybe he did understand. Maybe he understood more than she did, because maybe true comprehension lies in shouldering the weight of loss. A burden she hardly knows compared to the young warrior.
Her eyes fall to his slumbering face, etched with lines, and she decides that it's also bearing the brunt of guilt. Another package to carry on the long journey of life, except this is a poison that festers the soul from inside out. An insidious toxin most travelers on the road are unaware they carry. Another burden that he is too young to shoulder. She considers him with the tiniest smile.
Young he maybe, but weak he is not.
Her hand reaches over for his tangled covers, but at that same moment she regrets.
In a flash of activity, Ran is on her back, wind rent from her chest and pinned in place by the strength of unfettered anger.
"What are you doing?" he growls.
She would answer but her voice is sealed by a grip of iron. His eyes burn into hers, but Ran finds no malice. There is only pure, simple and wholesome anger reminiscent of children throwing tantrums.
"What. Are. You. Doing?" This time, it's a desperate pitch with wails bubbling beneath the surface. A tear from above lands on her cheek and the image comes together. These are not the eyes that strike fear into enemy hearts, she decides. Her eyes soften despite a compromised airway. She sees it now…
Eyes moist, clear and angry resembling those of a child who demand that which was lost be impossibly returned.
Mitsunari reels away, relinquishing his grip to run a sleeve by his face. "Go away!" he snaps.
A silence.
"They must feel fortunate that you mourn for them" she wants to say before the owner of heavy footsteps tears down the corridor and slams open the shoji door.
"Mitsunari, I got the letter from-" His eyebrows furrow at the sight of tossed covers, scattered edamame, a flustered young lady and the Ishida general who wouldn't look him in the eye.
"Okaerinasai," Ran bowed, being the first to recover, "thank you for your swift return Ieyasu-dono. I hope all has gone well with your endeavor."
Ieyasu is casting his ex-comrade a look Ran could not decipher when he answered her. "Yes, it went well."
The resident doctor excuses herself to go check on medication boiling in the kitchen. With a polite bow, she apologizes for the mess and promises to have it cleaned up.
"What happened?" Ieyasu asks when her footsteps fade. He absently plucks an edamame off the floor and extracts a soybean.
"Poison." The other man stares off into space, drawing one knee up.
Ieyasu decides Mitsunari wouldn't indulge his initial curiosity even if he rephrased the question. So he drops the issue.
"Food?" Ieyasu picks up another and repeats the process while leaning against a wall.
"Aizu no Shinobi" Mitsunari murmurs, fist clenching.
A silence as Ieyasu chews thoughtfully. "Aizu clan has been a problem lately," he considers and turns to the Ishida general. "But I came back because Ran wrote you were seriously wounded…"
"Tch." That meddlesome woman...
"You seem better now", Ieyasu says with a nod. "Looks like I recruited the right person for the right job."
Mitsunari shoots him with his trademark glare to erase the smile off Ieyasu's face before staring off into space again.
"Ah."