Through Other Eyes

Chapter Two: The Dead

Three days and nights of travel through the desert brought them right into the middle of a Picker camp. Their honoured hosts, whose moniker was short for Garbage-Picker, punks and outcasts from society who lived in the desert wastes and scavenged or, sometimes, attacked travelers, were initially a little too interested in the new arrivals...after all, the attractive young man was too slender, and the tall woman too old and battered, to put up any real resistance.

All it took was a look from Katsushiro and a hint of drawn blade from Hokuto to warn the Pickers how badly things could go for them if there was trouble. Instead, they made space for the two around their fire and let them be.

After about an hour, Hokuto had them calling her "Auntie" and was swapping bawdy stories with the men, as some of the younger women approached Katsushiro and made him some very specific offers about services they would normally charge for, but he was a special case since he was so very pretty...

The fourth time he turned down such an offer, politely but with increasing firmness, Hokuto let out a loud, drunken bark of laughter (she'd not touched a drop of the Pickers' alcohol, letting it drain into the sand when no one was looking), and roared "No use, girls, no use! Give it up already!"

"So he likes men, then?"

"Ha! Who knows? You know what they say about us samurai!"

"...but Auntie, you ain't no samurai, you're an ex-cop."

"I'm samurai here!" Hokuto slurred, thumping herself on the left side of her solid breastbone, causing great mirth among her audience. "But I'll tell you why it's no use: he's got a woman he wants already, he's just too dumb to go back to her..."

Katsushiro's gaze fixed on the older woman. "Shichisei-dono, please don't."

"Oh shut up, kid. Anyways, this girl..."

"Yeah, tell us!"

"Shichisei-dono..." Katsushiro's tone became warning.

"Really classy type she is, long brown hair, slim, pretty, pale skin, good build, great legs...got high standing in her village, too, don't know why he ain't asked her to marry him yet..."

"Shichisei-dono!"

The whole encampment looked up with a start at Katsushiro as he practically vaulted into his traveling companion, his hands landing on her shoulders with a sharp thump. His eyes were dark with fury.

"Stop. Talking. Now."

Hokuto blinked, feigning surprise, then lowered her head in assent. "Yeah, yeah, sorry about that, Okamoto."

Katsushiro let go of her shoulders and made himself scarce among the tents. The Pickers looked after him, then at Hokuto, who shrugged and did a good job of looking uneasy.

"He gets pretty strange sometimes. Best not bother him anymore." Her audience nodded sagely, the girls wandering off to find other sources of amusement, the stories beginning again in earnest.

Later that night, as she sat wrapped in her cloak on top of a moonlit dune, Hokuto felt, rather than saw, Katsushiro sit down behind and slightly to the left of her. She grinned. "They let you be, huh, kid?"

"That was a dirty trick," Katsushiro said mildly.

"So? I'm a dirty fighter, and I lie like a dog whenever I can. That business about being a samurai, for instance."

"You're not a detective anymore. They rescinded your commission after you failed to arrest Kyuuzou-dono, and Ukyo ordered you executed. If not a samurai, what are you?"

Hokuto looked over her shoulder into the younger man's calm eyes, and huffed with annoyed amusement. "So you've matured some, huh? I'll tell you what I am—a crotch-kickin' old half-ronin, a bandit's ex-whore, a poor excuse for a mother to three sons."

"Kikuchiyo-dono thought you were a true samurai." Katsushiro curled up in his own cloak, his back to the other. "I think he was right."

Hokuto remained awake for some hours after that, listening to Katsushiro's steady breathing and studying the shifting sands of the dune.

Underground in the caverns of the Shikimoribito, Kanbei sat in a kitchen and listened, eyes closed, to Honoka's chatter as she argued with Mizuki, set the table, and rushed to fuss over the rice cooking alongside the miso soup. Mizuki, more relaxed than her sister, was stitching up a tear in the side of Kanbei's shirt, grinning as Honoka got more aggravated by the minute, taking every breath that wasn't absorbed in talking to her sister to gossip at the older samurai about this and that, a nice boy she'd met, the younger girls she'd made friends with.

Kanbei listened and nodded and thanked them both for their hospitality. He pretended not to see how Honoka's eyes narrowed when he deflected Mizuki's questions about Shichiroji and Yukino with a counter-question about the former handmaiden's newfound ambition to learn medicine.

An hour later, Ayamaro arrived, beckoning Kanbei outside with the imperiousness he'd never been quite able to rid himself of, and the two of them held a whispered conversation.

Kanbei made to leave later that evening, only to be stopped by Honoka. The young woman's expression was pained.

"Are you going off to die for some mad cause again? Kanbei-sama, you've already done enough!"

He just shook his head at her and moved her aside gently but firmly. She almost made to go after him, but Mizuki grabbed her sister before she could and hugged her firmly from behind.

"Neesan, if Shichiroji-dono and Yukino-san couldn't stop him, what makes you think we could? Remember, he's a samurai..."

Kanbei carried on towards the tunnels without looking back. If he told them why he was leaving and where to, if what Ayamaro had told him was true, it would almost certainly expose them to danger.

He would do this alone. He had no other choice.

Komachi sat beside Kirara, across the fire from Tenmon and glared at him ferociously. Villagers hovered around the windows and door of the council house, curious, but they fled when Komachi gave them the evil eye. The only ones undeterred were Richiki and Okara, who'd taken up residence in the hut behind Tenmon and across from the sisters.

"So let me get this straight—you're a famous medium and fortune-teller?"

"Some people know about me, yes."

"Hm. And you were just going about your business when you got a vision of Kanna. Why so surprised? Had you maybe never had a real one before?" Komachi's eyes narrowed warningly at the man across from her; Tenmon had to make an effort not to squirm under her gaze.

"Wow, pipsqueak, so cynical," chortled Kikuchiyo, obviously deeply amused. "Keep it up and Ten-noji's gonna wet his pants!"

I am not, the young man thought warningly at his biggest ghostly visitor, before turning his attention back to the world of the living. "It's not that way at all—I've always been able to control my visions, to seek out the futures of specific people. They don't come to me without an effort, much less so unexpectedly that they knock me over."

"Knocked you over? Were you hurt?" Kirara enquired suddenly.

"I—no, Kirara-sama, just very startled."

"So tell us about this 'vision' of yours," Komachi demanded, ignoring her sister's nudge of warning.

Tenmon nodded. "Yes, as I said, I saw your village—saw Kanna. But it was in the winter, and it was on fire."

"What?"

"I saw many people lying dead."

Rikichi shifted in his seat, silent but intent. Even Komachi's suspicion was beginning to give way to her curiousity.

"That was...the worst part, really, to see all those people like that...but then it changed and I saw four men standing there. They told me—you see, my visions of the future have never been speculative: they tell me what will happen if a person does this or that, but if the first vision I see for them is death, then there is no escaping it for them, and there's nothing so terrible as that."

"Are you saying Kanna will be destroyed?!"

"Well, no, because the men told me that I could change it if I came here. They said two threats were coming—one to the peace, and one to the heart—and that by coming to Kanna, I could somehow help stop them...that was all four of them together, you see. But each one of them wanted some specific help, for themselves."

"Help?" Kirara murmured, all four villagers watching Tenmon with wide eyes as the farmers hanging around outside pressed their ears to the wall in worry.

"They can't rest yet. They each feel they failed to do something in life, that they need to do now for those who still live."

The suspicion had all but left Komachi's face; she looked at her knees and whispered, "Nunky..."

Tenmon stopped and looked away, unable to bear seeing the girl's expression.

"You didn't tell them what it was we failed to do, Tenmon-san," Gorobei noted wryly.

That is your own business, thought the medium, and not my place to tell them.

"Good." This was Kyuuzou, his crimson eyes ablaze in defiance of the paleness of his shade.

"I failed to thwack that darn Kanbei over the head in life for being an idiot!" Kikuchiyo announced to the world at large. "Might have done him some good, too!"

"Let's see, Kyuuzou-dono didn't get to fight Kanbei-dono, Kikuchiyo didn't get to marry Komachi and make her happy, Gorobei-dono feels like he didn't really pay back his life—you did, you know, Gorobei-dono..."

"Hush, you, or it's the dress again!"

"...and I failed to atone for being a traitor and a hypocrite, so we've all got something bothering us, ne?" Heihachi finished brightly, avoiding Gorobei's half-hearted swipe.

Your hobby seems to be tormenting yourselves, you samurai, Tenmon thought sadly.

"Can it, you smart-aleck! Are you gonna help us clean up our mess or not?"

Tell me what to do. Tenmon paused for a moment and looked at Kirara oddly; the priestess stared back at him, wide-eyed. You know...

"Haa?"

I'm surprised she hasn't seen you four already. Her latent psychic ability—her power—far surpasses mine.

"Ten bucks says pining for Katsu-noji's what's keeping it blocked up."

"Kiku-noji, you scare me sometimes," Heihachi teased the bigger samurai. "Maybe you have some psychic powers."

Kyuuzou caught Tenmon by the shoulder. The cold seeped into his bones and made him shiver, even as the man's eyes burned him. "This is was you must do..."

In the Firefly House, the evening was in full swing, the music loud and the sake flowing freely. Yukino was entertaining a group of merchants, regulars; she'd been set to duck out when one of them remarked on her gently swelling stomach and jumped to the logical (but frequently misapplied) conclusion, but all three men had been immensely congratulatory and inundated her with tips and advice gained from their own wives by osmosis. Two of the younger courtesans relieved her half an hour later; she left the little party flustered but pleased.

Shichiroji was not in the kitchens or in the entrance staircase, his usual haunts on such nights. Yukino couldn't bring herself to be annoyed, not now; since Kanbei's departure, both of them had dealt with their unhappiness in their usual way, through affectionate bickering and throwing themselves into their work utterly, and if her Momotaro had to disappear for a few hours to wrestle with his personal demons, she wouldn't grudge him.

She spent an hour going over the House's accounts with Tashiko, the third-youngest person in the house and formerly one of the tea servers, but now unofficial deputy to Yukino where monetary matters were concerned. It was therapeutic, she explained to her disbelieving employee.

Shichiroji came back in just as Yukino was really starting to get worried. His expression did nothing to assuage her concern.

"Shichiroji?"

"Just chatting with one of the customers," the blond man said lightly. Yukino just stared at him. "I would have heard if anyone started causing trouble inside."

"Oh, for...it isn't that. What are you up to?"

"I told you, nothing. Aa, hear that? It sounds like Fubuki-san tried to get fresh with one of the dancers again...I'm kicking him out for good this time, he's had enough warnings already."

Her lover was out in the hallway again before Yukino could say another word. She sat back on her heels and tried to calm herself by staring at the numbers in front of her. It didn't work.

"Yukino-san, that face Shichiroji-san was just making..."

The woman looked down at Tashiko's solemn expression. The child was so serious and practical, Yukino reflected, it was hard to remember her difficult origins sometimes.

"...when I was little, I saw that detective who saved me make that face before she went in to get the man who bought my services. She and that other samurai came back with his chopped-off head in a bag."

Oh yes; rescued from a man whose tastes ran to the sickeningly young, fragile, and broken, Tashiko had been brought to the Firefly by "that detective" because nobody else would take such a child. Damaged goods, the scar-riddled woman had explained with a look on her like thunder. Shichiroji and Yukino had talked with the detective, with the girl, then taken her in and given her a place and a way to earn a living with her clever head and able hands instead of her little child's body.

The detective the Tashiko was referring to was a known loose cannon, the antithesis to Yukino's easygoing, flirtatious Momotaro. Why would he be wearing her face unless...

Yukino got up without another word and slipped out; Tashiko shrugged and went back to her beloved figures and arithmetic.

Shichiroji dusted his hands off and slammed the front door on the drunkenly protesting Fubuki. He'd been positively gentle with the man, as far as flinging him out into the night went; the grabby bastard would barely bruise at all.

He was really, really itching to deal with something besides a drunk pervert.

Shichiroji wasn't a warmonger; he'd descended by working at the Firefly House, and he was aware of it, but he didn't especially care. He wasn't like those who longed for the glory days, for the age of the samurai all over again (Kanbei had been accused of this in the past, and it never failed to make Shichiroji laugh at the thought of his oldest friend and lover wishing for an era of such warfare). But...

But ever since Kanbei had left, his kamayari had been positively crying out to him, so much that its hum had even begun to drown out the dank grief of separation.

He couldn't understand why.

Today, he'd found out. Thank goodness for the well-traveled customer who'd visited the port cities to the east of Japan, and who loved to chat, whether with the friendly courtesans or the amiable house yojimbo, it didn't matter.

Shichiroji's hands tingled for his blade even as his heart was torn in two.

"Stay with Yukino and your child. If you try to follow me..."

He'd never disobeyed a direct order from Kanbei. Interpreted creatively, oh yes indeed, but he'd never, ever disobeyed.

Even if, in this instance, it looked like Kanbei was going into the fight that would finally claim his life.

"Momotaro..."

He realized he'd been standing in the hall outside the guest rooms, staring at nothing, for so long Yukino had been able to track him down. He looked into her sad eyes and felt the blade's call grow fainter—not silent, but markedly fainter.

She reached out and clutched his sleeves with fierce hands. "You've got to tell me what's going on."

"There's been some...arrivals in the port cities. In the Miyagi province, specifically."

Katsushiro hurried through the desert, easily keeping pace with Hokuto as they leapt from dune to dune. Normally such a rush would be inadvisable, but a storm was whipping up the winds and the nearest cover was ten miles away, so speed was of the essence. But he listened intently to the older woman's words as they went.

"I see. Trading ships from other nations?"

"Yeah, that's what I thought at first, they styled themselves that way anyway. But I kept tabs on them. Something about that bunch didn't feel right."

"Are you sure that's not just xenophobia talking?"

"Hah! I've known more foreigners than you have, brat, yeah, and liked 'em too. Decent people so long as they ain't the type to convert you, shoot at you, or sell you shit. Same as us really. But this lot...no question there, not after I did a little investigatin' on what they were bringing in their big ships."

"What was it?" Katsushiro asked, his uneasiness clearly growing.

"They're bringin' over war-cruisers, big ones, not as solid as the Citadel-class ones we have left over here, but flashier, faster, better-armed."

"They must be planning an invasion, then."

"Oh no, kid, that's where it gets tricky. See, I had a few words with the portmaster, had to smack him around a bit 'cause he was bein' reticent with me, in terms of the truth, but for all their sneakin' around those bastards have their papers worked out all proper. Signed and sealed. They've been invited, by someone in Japan who knows exactly what they're bringin' and doesn't care, or wants it for themselves." Hokuto's smile was grim. "I've been trying to find out more, but there's a lot of dead ends, and in some cases I mean that literally. A lot of the low-levelers connected with this affair tend to fall down stairs or stab themselves in the neck before I can get to them."

"I wish you wouldn't beat people up for information," Katsushiro said distractedly, "it's deeply unbecoming of a samurai."

"Whaddaya want me to do, ask him nicely? Give him a damn written request? You don't know anything about this, kid..."

Katsushiro's silence was thoughtful enough that Hokuto looked over at him, pale green eyes narrowing.

"...do you?"

"I might. Have you heard of "Samurai above all Samurai"?"

"Nope, and already I don't like him. Sounds like a pretentious shithead."

"I think that, whoever he is, he must be linked to your foreigners with the war machines."

"Oh? What makes you say that?"

Katsushiro darted around the side of a dune and pulled up short; Hokuto almost ran into the back of him.

In the shadow of what loomed above them, the green-haired young samurai's expression was deeply troubled. "Well, perhaps we can start with this."

TO BE CONTINUED