Endings. Resolutions. Finalities. Here, we part ways, dear reader. This is as far as the story would let me go.
And no, I still don't own Rurouni Kenshin. I don't even know the people who do. -sniffle-
He bowed his head, exhaled sharply, and desperately attempted to save the remnants of his pride.
"What would you know about being a warrior?" he snarled, lighting a cigarette and gripping it in his fingers tightly. "You're just a stupid little girl playing with a wooden sword. You practice a martial art which you say is never intended to be used in the real world. You're ridiculous. You're a nothing and a no one and you'll never be anyone of value. You know nothing. Nothing. You pretend to be wise and caring, but the truth is, your words aren't even worth the breath it takes to form them. Go back to your foolish little dream world and leave the business of real living to the rest of us."
He stood abruptly, prepared to storm off into the night, away from the woman who saw too much.
She did not move to follow him; she remained silent, calmly sipping her tea.
He made it all of three steps away from her and her wall of serene disregard before his anger and frustration had him turning back, glaring at her. He was goading her now, the same as he would have goaded the Battousai, had that bastard been there as he should have been. A fight, he could have coped with; a fight, he understood – one man won, the other lost. It was truth at its most basic and simple. What use was his sword against her words? He might cut her down to silence them, yet they would remain, more deeply imbedded in his psyche for the fact that he had yet to understand them, and might never fully do so.
"You little – " he began.
"Sit down," she said. Her voice was hard, harder than he'd ever heard it. It was a voice to be obeyed without question, to be listened to without interruption. Any other time, he might have rebelled, scoffed at her, called her names or simply ignored her; but now, when she spoke like that, the way a general might to an army, the way his own old teacher had spoken to him, he found he had no will, no ability to defy her. He sat.
"You have absolutely no patience," she muttered. "You want all the answers handed to you, but life doesn't work like that. There is no absolute guide, no surefire way to make it through your life without regret.
"You say I know nothing of being a warrior? It is all I have ever been, Saito Hajime, and all I ever will be. Do you believe it is easy to be a woman and do the things I do? Do you think it is an easy thing to teach boys the art of death? To stand in front of my community and have my ability and character questioned time and time again because of my sex? My wars have not always been on a battlefield and have not always involved swords, but they have been constant and unwavering. I have faced criticism and doubt; I have been harassed and attacked physically, verbally, mentally and emotionally every single day of my life. And yes, I have lost friends and family; I have watched some fade away and others die in the most painful of circumstances. You say I have no value, no purpose, no meaning? Look to yourself, Saito Hajime, and see that it is not I about whom you are speaking, but you. All the doubts, the fears and the questions you assigned to me are the ones you fear most in yourself.
"There is a difference between us, though," she said, quieter now. She paused, lifted her teacup again and stared into its depths as if hoping to find the answers there.
He knew better than to interrupt her, but he did so anyway.
"What difference is that?" he muttered, looking away.
She shook her head at his bitterness.
"I have never lost my belief in myself, in who I am and what I am doing. And that, Saito Hajime, is why you are lost."
He shook his head and frowned, twisting his cigarette between his fingers.
Silence reigned.
"Why did you take up the sword, Saito Hajime? Why did you choose to fight?"
He glanced up at her sharply, the rest of his body going completely still, frozen by her question. And for the life of him, he couldn't answer her.
He couldn't answer because he couldn't remember himself.
Lost. He was lost.
"Once upon a time, there was a warrior," she said softly. "And one day, he became a warrior without a war, a warrior with blood on his hands. A warrior who had done terrible things to survive, only then emerged from the battle into a world which wanted to forget him, a world which desperately wanted to pretend that all of the horrible things he had done had never happened. This world told the warrior to forget who he had been, to denounce all the things he had done, to bury his past in some dark, secret corner like a dog. The world told the warrior that he had no purpose, no value in the new age and in order to survive, the warrior would have to become no more.
"And so, the warrior tried. He buried himself, hid all he'd been and tried, so desperately, to wedge himself into the new life, frantic to find some justification for his continued existence. He continued this path until he forgot everything, even who he was. The weakness of this warrior, this proud man, was that he needed someone, anyone, to believe in him. It was something he'd forgotten how to do for himself.
"Everyone needs someone to believe in them. It gives us the courage to go on, even when we don't believe in ourselves – no, especially when we don't believe in ourselves. This is not a weakness; this is simply a fact. This is what it is to be human."
She paused a moment, staring out over the empty dojo yard. Her eyes were distant – looking at things he had no hope of seeing, memories that he had no place in, and thoughts that he couldn't even begin to understand. He watched her face, noticing, perhaps for the first time, the fine lines of worry already etched around the creases of her eyes and beside her mouth. She was too young to be so old. Too naïve to be so wise. He did not like having his comfortable illusions shattered.
Not that she seemed to care what he wanted.
"You have never been alone," she spoke so softly, the words barely breathed into the quietness of the night, so gently whispered that he had to strain to hear them.
"You have never been alone," she said again.
"I have been alone since peace was declared," the words slipped out; he didn't know where they'd come from.
"You have never been alone," she repeated.
"I have no one," he whispered. "I have nothing."
"You are not alone," she said. "And you have everything you could ever need or desire. You have friends who know your past and accept you anyway. You have a family that loves you, a wife who wed you, even knowing your faults. You have comrades who share your burdens. You have a purpose. Your life has meaning. All that is left now is for you to choose what to do with it.
"But I can tell you from personal experience that the people who care about you the most will continue to believe in you and support you, no matter what it is you end up doing."
She glanced at him, steady blue eyes unwavering, perhaps even slightly accusing. Her mouth quirked in a suddenly self-deprecating grin as she cocked her head to the side and studied him.
She smiled.
He saw it then, what the rurouni and the gambler and the lady doctor and the thief saw in her. Infinite patience and goodness, strength and forgiveness, kindness and courage.
Infinite belief.
He had not been so humbled in a very long time.
He opened his mouth to speak, then shut it again and looked away. He took a breath as though he was going to try again, but could only snort softly and shake his head in disgust.
He took a long drag off his cigarette instead. The silence spun out between them.
When she stood suddenly, he was startled. He glanced up at her but she wasn't looking at him. Instead, she stretched a bit, pressing her hands into her lower back, yawned and looked up at the sky.
"Getting late," she said, conversationally. "It's going to be a beautiful night."
"Nn," he grunted, eyeing her warily.
"That was a hint, wolf," she grinned, all traces of the serious, world-weary woman gone, hidden under a cheerful, if slightly violent, façade. "It's time for you to get outta my house. I've got enough to do with all these freeloaders hanging around without adding another."
He blinked, startled by her sudden change in demeanor.
"I mean it, pal," she raised an eyebrow in what might have been intended to be a threatening manner, but merely came off as quirky. He stood, flicking the remains of his cigarette out into the yard. He smiled lazily. More work for the brat to do later.
She walked with him to the gate, but he hesitated then, suddenly strangely uncertain. He half turned to her, then back to the gate and paused there, hand on the wooden frame, his brow wrinkled in consternation. She studied him for a brief moment.
"Go home, Saito," she said, her quiet voice surprisingly firm. He glanced at her. She had mood changes like, well, like a woman, he supposed. Who understood what was going on in their heads half the time?
Her face softened then, the lines around her eyes creasing just a bit as she gave him a half smile.
"Go home," she said, softer this time. "There are people waiting for you. You shouldn't make them wait too long."
Coming from someone who obviously knew something about waiting for others, he took her words to heart. He nodded and stepped over the threshold and out onto the darkening street. He paused and glanced over his shoulder.
"You know," he said slowly, "for a tanuki, you're not as idiotic as you appear."
She snorted.
"And for a wolf, you're pretty dense. I suppose you've been hit in the head one too many times, though, so it can't be helped. Still, maybe I can knock some sense into you…hang on while I grab my shinai…"
He chuckled and knew, even without looking at her, that she was smiling. He shook his head, his heart, for the first time in a long time, light.
"Kamiya," he said quietly, "Thanks."
"Anytime."
He stepped away from the pool of light at her door and into the darkness.
It was enough.
-Owari-