Disclaimer: I do not own Samurai 7 or any characters contained therein.

A/N: I might have taken out Kanbei a lil early in the story, but still, it was to show just how much Katsushiro has grown, and Kanbei has aged. If you're not too sure what i mean about Kanbei's 'degenerating' body, i borrowed heavily from Samurai X: Reflections(Rurouni Kenshin). Once again, i seem to have to leave it at this chapter length, though i have a lil more written, so i hope no one minds terribly. With all that said, enjoy!

Chapter 3: Reunion

"Ungh.." Katsushiro groaned as he shifted his weight, trying to reduce the sudden pain that he felt, flaring up his muscles. Gods, how long had it been since he could afford to sleep like this, so peaceful and calm. He actually felt refreshed and rested, and it seemed like he'd almost forgotten what that could feel like, always sleeping lightly and on the move, always wary of assassins trying to kill him, deep sleep was a luxury he had long since given up. He felt pure bliss as feelings of surety, familiarity and peace washed over him, a stark contrast to the whirlwind of emotions he had gone through for so long since he had killed his sensei.

Then it struck him. Maybe he was dead. Maybe, at long last, the Gods had deemed it fit to end his torture and send him to this afterlife. Inwardly, he thought, "This isn't so bad after all." The many years of hardships and ceaseless mental and physical torment he had gone through had been worth it if this was what they deemed him worthy of. He was humbled. To think that even after all the sins he had committed, all the lives he had taken-the lives of comrades and enemies alike, he would be honoured enough to deserve a place as heavenly as this. He was content. Silently, he murmured a prayer of gratitude to whichever higher power had allowed him such contentment.

From where she sat, next to him, with a bowl of medicinal herbs in one hand and warm water in the other, she watched over him. She had been told that the man he had carried had indeed been Kanbei, but one look at the position of his wound told her it was not necessary to check for a pulse. A large area of red had spread, Kanbei's blood had diffused down the front of his robes, dying it a dark, crusty shade of reddish brown, but she had been able to almost immediately locate the wound from which it had originated. The strike had been sharp and incisive, and she knew he had died quickly, and almost painlessly as compared to other samurai. The samurai or Nobuseri who had done it was obviously very skilled, and even though she saw that Kanbei's body had degenerated a whole lot from the time she last saw him, she knew enough to know that whoever it was, had to be at least as good as Kyuuzo had been, perhaps better. The samurai who did this had run Kanbei through, directly through the heart, and she knew he had been dead for a long time now, maybe even before Katsushiro had begun carrying him around.

The green haired man in her care suddenly groaned, waking her from her reverie of the incidents a little more than a day ago. She watched him stir in his blankets, then sink back into unconsciousness, her brow creased in worry for the man who had suddenly reappeared in her village after all this time, then changed the wet medicinal towel on his forehead which was supposed to bring his temperature down and cool his raging fever. As she leaned over him, she noticed that his lips had curved slightly upwards, revealing the slightest hint of a smile. She heard him mutter something incoherent, and almost inaudible to her ears, close as she was, and before she could stop herself, she smiled. This was nothing like the time long ago when he had been injured and wracked with fever. His mutterings from a moment ago were not the ravings caused by fever, and he was not in as much pain. She knew he would not die just yet, and it relieved her. Her smile widened as his face took on a content expression, and before she knew it, her cheeks were heating and her face was flushed from just looking at him. She had missed that smile, from so long ago. It seemed like after their first few meetings, everytime he had seen her he had worn a scowl or a serious, neutral expression, as though trying to live up to the stoic nature that Kanbei had possessed. Even then, infatuated with Kanbei as she was, her heart went out to him. She knew how it felt to try so hard, yet feel that your goal was so far away, unattainable. Knew simply because all farmers knew, as they were helplessly pushed around by the Nobuseri. She had wanted to tell him it was alright, that he didn't have to be emotionless to be a samurai, but couldn't. Her heart, and her body, could not give voice to those thoughts, for if she did, Kanna would have had one less samurai defending it.

Years ago, when Kanna had directly attacked by the most powerful warship known to man at the time, the Capital, he had arrived alone, without the other samurai, claiming he had been led there by Gorobei, who had been dead at the time. But that didn't matter to them. What mattered was that he had stood, one man against hundreds, and marshalled the village's forces, which enabled them to at least take out some of the soulless Nobuseri on their own. He had repelled the laser from the Capital's main cannon with his sword, he had cut down Nobuseri who approached the village, and without him, they would never have survived the first wave of the attack for as long as they did, and Kanbei would have had nothing left to save.

Timidly, she reached out a hand to brush a stray strand of hair from his face, and for the first time since he had been found, she peered closely at the man who, many years ago, had stolen her first kiss, who had claimed to love her, the man who had started killing to protect her and her village. She saw that the years had made him hard, his cheeks were now hollowed and no longer was his body covered with baby fat or any sort of fat. He was all muscle, lean and hard and cold. Even unconscious, she could feel the coldness of his spirit, the emptiness of his soul. He had grown taller, leaner and inevitably, stronger. But that had come at a price. He had walked down the path that he had always foreseen himself walking down on, into the footsteps of Kanbei. He had become a samurai through and through, neglecting his emotions, acting on instinct, and just by looking at him, she knew, he had barricaded his heart. Strangely, she felt a pang of sadness within her, as though somehow, it were her fault. Then again, she told herself, maybe it was her fault. She had rejected him in favour of an infatuation she now knew to be hopeless, crushed his hopes and dreams of finding love, after she had led him on, although unintentionally.

She looked at the sword that lay at his side. It had once belonged to Kanbei. She wondered, just how many people had he killed with that sword? And now, how many had Katsushiro killed? She wondered, involuntarily, how much his skills had improved, and whether he still hesitated before killing. Shuddering at the thought of Katsushiro truly being a heartless killing machine, she realised that, in so many ways, he had become the embodiment of a true samurai. He was truly Kanbei's successor and apprentice, in almost every way, except that he was still Katsushiro, and strangely, she began hoping that he hadn't changed that much, and that he hadn't completely turned into Kanbei.

Kanbei...Now that she knew Katsushiro was safe, her tears started flowing freely, her shoulders shaking as she tried to contain her sobbing so as not to draw attention to her hut, and in order not to wake Katsushiro. Rivulets of her tears streamed down her face as she buried it in her hands, trying to wipe off the tears that were steadily flowing down her flawless cheeks.

Drip

A droplet of her tears leaked from her hands, onto Katsushiro's eyelid. Unable to stem the flow of her tears, they were now dripping downwards onto Katsushiro's face, drenching his eyebrows and pooling up on the crevices of his face.

As he sat and meditated in the fields of pure green, watching the yellow stalks of rice bend in the wind, Katsushiro felt a drop of water wet him. It was raining. He chuckled, resigned that even in Heaven, there would be rain. As he had nowhere to shelter, he decided to sit out in the rain, embracing it for the first time in years. He had not had a chance to enjoy the sensation of being splattered by rain water which drenched his body, as though sent from Heaven to cleanse him. He closed his eyes, letting the rainwater wash away his sins.

The edges of his vision blurred as he opened them again, just in time to see a rivulet of water stream down directly into his eyes. He blinked from the slight pain of the intrusion of water in his eyes, and looked up, directly at the face of a very distraught, crying Kirara. He twitched his muscles, all sore from the strain he had put himself under, and labouriously moved his body into an upright sitting position, wincing at the pain that bodily assaulted every part of his body as he did so. "Kirara..dono.." he croaked, his voice hoarse with disuse.

Consumed with trying to stop her tears, Kirara had not noticed Katsushiro waking up, her mind simply not registering the shifting of the mat beneath her as she struggled to master herself. Not until he called out her name did she even register him looking down at her from where he sat, his content expression now gone, his face creased with a frown of worry, and his green eyes riddled with confusion. "Kirara dono..." he ventured again, his voice less shaky, though still no less hoarse.

She looked at him, entranced by the compassionate dark green eyes which had seen so much, which were now holding hers, but her tears would not yet stop flowing, guilt and regret now mingling with the grief that she felt over Kanbei's death, just by looking at Katsushiro.

He did not know where he was, and how he had ended up here, but seeing Kirara crying, he was sure he was alive. She never cried in his dreams. She was always smiling, welcoming, and loving. He had never stopped loving her, in all the years that he had been away, she was the only one that lived on in his heart, her name resounding in his head, the sound of her voice echoed in his ears, and he saw her face in most, if not all of his dreams, and always, always she had been smiling. So he knew, he was either alive, or he was in hell. Katsushiro knew, if he was alive, she must have been crying over Kanbei, and immediately, a feeling of dread and guilt crept over him. Yet, he knew he could not tell her now, not now, as it would devastate her, losing a friend and the man she loved all at once.

Against his will, his conscience hijacked his body. It moved his arm up to her shoulder, gripping it firmly as he turned her towards him, her face directly in front of his. It used his voice, and said, "Kirara dono..Kanbei..I-I.." Just in time, he had regained control of his body, delaying that speech for just a moment longer.

Again, she heard him whisper her name, and suddenly felt his hand on her shoulder. By now, her sobbing had ceased, yet the tears still flowed, silently down the sides of her face and onto the mat below, in the space between them both. She heard him, again. He called out to her, then said Kanbei's name. Suddenly, she felt a burning anger grow inside of her, boiling white and hot. She wanted to hurt him, push him away and chase him out. After all, he had brought bad news to Kanna once again. He'd not only been unable to save Kanbei, but also had not the common sense to leave her alone in her grief. Instead, she closed the distance between them and threw her body onto his, holding him with all that she had, all that she was. Her anger dissipated as in that moment, she realised how wrong she had been. He knew how she felt. They shared the pain of losing a precious one, the father figure they had both seen in Kanbei. It was in that moment that she realised her true feelings for Kanbei. It had been love. Yet, it was not the love she thought she had felt, nor was it the infatuation she thought it might have been, until she kept wondering about his wellbeing well after he had left Kanna. She loved him, like a daughter would love a father. She loved him for caring, for saving her, and for saving her village. As the realisation hit her, she collapsed into Katsushiro's body, feeling his arms wrap themselves around her in a warm, protective embrace.

It was not the reunion either of them would have expected, but it was a sort of reunion nonetheless, and as they sat there, in each other's arms, each felt tremulous at being reunited, yet, to both of them, though it remained unspoken, it felt..so right. It felt as though the culmination of all the emotions they had both experienced throughout the years had converged into this one single embrace. He felt at peace with himself, lost in the moment and forgetting all else as he held her with all his heart, wanting the moment never to end. She felt the same, and for the first time in her life, she was well and truly content. Then, as she cried into his shoulder and melted into his embrace which was both loving, yet respectful, she heard him whisper, "I'm sorry..Kirara dono.", and the moment was gone.

She said nothing, only gripped him harder, pulling herself against him to regain the lost warmth, burying herself deeper into the crook of his shoulder. Resignedly, he held her close to him, a mixture of love and guilt reflected in his eyes.

Author's Notes: I'm not too confident that i got the actual scene of him waking up, and the embrace well enough. I dunno, it just didn't really seem to flow that well. I might come back and rewrite it i guess. In the mean time, tell me what you think! Anything that you feel needs to be corrected or improved, please let me know. Looking forward to it. Thank you for your time.