Chapter Three

Scars

"What do you mean by the world has not been kind to you?" Kaoru asked as everybody sat around a small fire within the inn. Night had fallen and dinner had been eaten, but Kenshin's body had been meticulously examined from a distance by his friends.

"They are mostly from the war times. Some are not, as you may recall that gash across my chest? And the one on my palm," he showed Kaoru his palm; a line of slightly discolored and raised skin sliced from his thumb to the opposite side of his hand.

"How could we have never noticed?" Sano asked, looking amazing. Sano looked at the scars that seemed to plague every inch of Kenshin's body. He now noticed scars on his arms, his neck, and the rest of his stomach and chest.

"We were all too happy to care I suppose," Kenshin sighed. He glanced over to Hayato and Sayuri, who were helping Hana walk around carefully.

"Kenshin?" Yahiko's voice made him turn to face the three.

"Yes?"

"Am I old enough to understand now?" he asked, amber eyes glittering. Kenshin thought back to the day he, Yahiko, and Sano walked back to the dojo after they had witnessed the three bodies. Kenshin remembered pretending to be happy, but something told him that Yahiko could feel his uneasiness.

"Yes. I think you are." He began. "While I was fighting in the war, I let go of everything I felt. I wanted to be the best samurai, and not be hesitant. When I was about sixteen I completely was able to dull my emotions. The men I called my friends suddenly became mere faces that I saw every day.

"I didn't care whether I lived or I died. In fact, on multiple accounts I did attempt to take my own life. I was tired of being trapped in this world where I felt nothing but numbness. That's when I turned to the killing. Something was born in those years, and it took hold of me during that time of numbness. I came to feel joy while taking a life. It was invigorating. I never felt so…alive.

"My 'friends' came to me sometimes, telling me that what I felt was wrong. They accused me of insanity. So I left them. I came then to believe that I had sinned far more than any human being could. I traveled to repent, but that longing to kill never left me.

"Even during my stay at the Kamiya dojo, I felt that want, that need. I could hide it so well. Being around people who can just live with virtually no fear…it made me feel as if fear was necessary." Kenshin stopped for a few minutes. His face flickered between so many emotions, and Kaoru could see the conflict in his lavender and gold eyes.

"You don't need to tell us more if you don't want to." Sano spoke up. Kenshin looked at him, his eyes holding an emptiness and a longing. The brown haired man looked worriedly at his friend before sitting back and listening again.

"When I was walking in that forest near the dojo, I was nearly ambushed by three men. I warned them, but the fight broke out. It did not take much to reawaken that part of me that was so joyous during times of death. I felt it, deep inside of my heart. It felt as if ice had been poured into my veins, as if hooks and nails were being shoved through my brain…begging me to kill again. And I did.

"I took the life of one man, and then I couldn't control it. The feeling of being utterly alive was overwhelming; so I killed the other two. From then, I couldn't keep the urges hidden any longer. I left. In these past years, people have rejected me. I've been hated, hurt, left to die. And I wouldn't have traded any of that…but I still live with what I have done. And I…still am unable to control it," Kenshin's voice faded softly. He looked ashamed, beaten, and exhausted. His eyes held a deep sorrow that none of the others could possibly understand. Everyone sat in silence for a very long time. Kaoru looked at Kenshin, and his eyes met hers. They stared for a few moments until a new emotion flickered across Kenshin's lavender eyes; rage. Not merely anger, but full blown rage. Lavender faded to gold and he glared at her, making her eyes grow wide in horror. Kaoru could almost feel his thoughts in her mind.

"You didn't even wait to see if I'd return, did you? Did you even care? You bitch. You married my best friend and had a child. You disgust me. I hate the very look of you; I hate your scent, I hate everything about you. You ruined me more than Tomoe had." He thought at her. Abruptly, Kenshin stood and looked down at Hayato with cold golden eyes. The young boy seemed saddened, his smile dropped to straight line. In the blink of an eye, the small child drew a dagger from his sleeve and flung it directly at his 'father'. The red head felt the cold iron slid into his skin and hot blood swell and leak down. He didn't so much as flinch. Sano, Yahiko, and Kaoru sat in terrified silence as they watched Kenshin yank that bloodied dagger from his stomach.

"It's gotten so bad you see," Kenshin started to speak, but it wasn't Kenshin. His voice was slowly dropped, each word growing deeper, colder, and more emotionless.

"That the pain hardly helps." He said so softly, that it became a fierce threat.

"Kenshin, how about we just sit down and talk?" Sano asked, standing to look at his friend's face.

"Take your wife and go to a room. Leave me to my children," he hissed, an edge to the word 'wife'. Kenshin stabbed the dagger into the wall next to him and picked up Hayato and Sayuri in both arms. They hugged him gently and started speaking to him quietly as he headed toward his room. Sano caught some of the words before he shut the shoji.

"Please calm down Father…we love you…don't be angry…they love you…"

"He hates me," Kaoru whimpered, picked up Hana as she stood with Yahiko. Sano looked at her in dismay.

"Maybe this was a bad idea." He admitted. Yahiko scowled and punched Sano's arm roughly.

"We have to help him," he said, determined. Sano sighed and shrugged. Together the three walked to an open room and got ready to sleep. Yahiko lay in silence, staring up at the ceiling as the others slept. A noise caught his interest; the opening and closing of the screens. He got up swiftly and quietly, tiptoeing out of the room and out of the inn. Silhouetted in the full moon's light, Yahiko looked with pained eyes as Kenshin stared up at the moon; alone in his tortured world.