Notes:
- Haruko's native dialect, Nankai'an, which Ayame also speaks, is very close to the Common Tongue of the Empire. This is why Ayame chooses temporarily to speak to Haruko in another language - the speech of the Northern province of Juushuu (which she wrongly assumed Kanbei could not understand). Ayame's father is of Juushuu'an descent but their family had been living in Hokuhei City for a few generations, so Ayame's first language is actually Kokuryu'an. Her second language is the Common Tongue (Ayame spent many years in Mount Kei'an Dojo in Nankai Prefecture; Nankai'an speech is a regional variation of the Common Tongue) Her third and fourth languages are Akashiman (her mother's ethnicity, as well as Kanbei's ethnicity) and Juushuu'an. Haruko learnt a little Juushuu'an because she had to travel to Juushuu on covert missions in her youth, but she can understand much more of it than she can speak.
- Kanbei and his enemy Haruko first crossed paths in Juushuu Province when they were 27 years old. (They're now 41).
An afternoon passed in Mount Kei'an Dojo. The sleeping Kyuuzou remained silent and unmoving, oblivious to the white-clad watcher sitting next to him. When evening descended, Yasue and Ayame came by Kyuuzou's room. Ayame was holding a bowl of rice soup in her hand.
"Did Kyuuzou show any signs of consciousness?" The dreadlocked former samurai asked the tall ronin as the two women knelt down beside the sleeping Kyuuzou.
"I called his name, but he did not respond." Kanbei admitted.
A look of disappointment crossed Ayame's face, then she stated in a businesslike tone. "It is time for us to feed him."
The old ronin obligingly moved aside as Yasue propped Kyuuzou up. Ayame forced her kouhai's mouth open and poured the rice soup down his throat. Sitting by and watching Kyuuzou's senior and junior manhandle the skinny young blond, Kanbei finally asked, "Can I be the one to care for him from now on?"
Ayame's flashing golden eyes shot him a glare that seemed to say, "And just what do you mean by that?! Is our care not good enough for him?!! Think you can do better?!!!"
Observing that her senpai's volatile temper was starting to simmer, Yasue intervened cautiously. "Kanbei-dono, why don't you make make that suggestion to Sensei over dinner? Now that Kyuuzou senpai has been fed, it is time for the rest of us eat. Come with us to the dining room. Kazumi is setting the tables even as we speak."
With some reluctance Kanbei left Kyuuzou's bedside and followed the two double-sword fighters downstairs.
--
Haruko was already seated at the low center table in the dojo's dining area when Kanbei and Yasue entered. Ayame took her seat at the small wooden table on the Sensei's right while Yasue joined the young disciple Kazumi at a family-sized dining table nearby.
"Please take a seat," The master of Mount Kei'an Dojo addressed Kanbei, gesturing towards the low table on her left. Kanbei suspected that under normal circumstances, the Mount Kei'an people would eat together at the family table, but he was not complaining about the current arrangement. In a way, he was glad that he did not have to eat at the same table with the samurai who annihilated his regiment.
"Did Kyuuzou show any signs of consciousness while you were with him?" Tashiro Sensei asked Shimada when he had taken his seat.
"He does not stir from his sleep," the long-haired man said sadly.
At this, Ayame turned to Haruko, addressing her senpai in the language of the northern province of Juushuu. "This man has proven himself to be absolutely useless! Don't tell me I went through all that trouble of bringing him here for nothing!"
Kanbei's unchanged expression hid his irritation at the woman's discourtesy. It was obvious to the old soldier that Ayame had assumed that he did not comprehend Juushuu'an. Kanbei had once been stationed in Juushuu State during the Great War and understood a little of the Juushuu'an tongue. Most high-ranking commanders would not have bothered to learn the native languages of the regions they fought their battles in. Young Kanbei, however, was a different sort of samurai. He made it a point to visit the peasants of Juushuu and even had one of the military interpreters instruct him in basic Juushuu'an. Some of his aides told him that learning the local language was a waste of time – many natives of Juushuu could speak the Common Tongue. Commander Shimada had disagreed then – the peasants were cunning and sometimes they pretended they could not understand the Common Tongue if they did not feel like cooperating with Allied Forces samurai from out-of-state. On a different note, what better way was there to break the ice with the locals than by speaking their language? Yet sometimes the commander thought that perhaps his aides had been right – every time he had occasion to speak with Juushuu'an peasants, they had in fact conversed in the Common Tongue.
Shimada never thought that his Juushuu'an language lessons would come in handy. Until now. Kanbei could understand part of what Ayame just said, enough to know it wasn't flattering to him. But he kept his eyes ahead, not looking directly at either of Kyuuzou's seniors.
Tashiro Sensei apparently did not share Ayame's assumption about Kanbei's linguistic deficiency. "Peace, my sister," The tall warrior answered her kouhai in the Common Tongue while eyeing their guest warily. "It has not been a day since Kanbei-dono arrived. Perhaps there is hope yet."
"I do not wish to be a burden to you," Kanbei spoke in a polite tone to Kyuuzou's two senpai. "If I may so request, I would like to make myself useful by caring for Kyuuzou's daily needs from now on."
"Very well," Haruko said. "You can feed and bathe him henceforth, until he wakes."
"WHAT?!!!" Ayame mouthed the word soundlessly, but her contorted expression more than made up for her silence. It was quite clear that Third Sister strongly opposed the idea.
But Big Sister did not seem to pay the younger woman any heed. The sword teacher gestured at the compartmentalized meal trays set before them. "Please, let us eat before the food grows cold."
--
As soon as he had finished his meal, Kanbei returned to Kyuuzou's room, resuming his vigil next to the sleeping blond. He passed the moments listening to the nearly inaudible sound of Kyuuzou's shallow breathing.
Twilight turned into night. Kyuuzou still showed no sign of stirring. Kanbei laid himself down next to the sleeper, wrapping his arms around Kyuuzou to give that thin body a little more warmth. But the old ronin who embraced the sleeper did not slumber. The dark-eyed man spent the night gazing at that still, pale face under the moonlight.
"I will hold him until his body dies and his spirit fades, if that is all I can do." The dark samurai thought resignedly, "This may be the only time that Kyuuzou would allow me to embrace him like this." Yet the white-clad warrior did not stop whispering the young man's name, hoping to call him back to the waking world.
Thus the old soldier spent another day, and yet another, holding the pale samurai in a desperate embrace.
--
A small, thin boy sat alone in the Sands of Time, on the shore of the Sea of Shadow. The dark gray sea ahead reminded Kyuuzou of the ocean at the south end of Nankai Prefecture. A long time ago, Mizuho and Ayame had taken him to a beach there. It was their last trip together before his two senpai left the dojo to join Haruko's platoon.
There was nothing to do at Shounan Beach except watch the waves and look at the strange shapes of the wind-swept beach pines, blown and bent by the vagaries of coastal weather year in and year out. Yet there was one constant amidst the seasons. The water was always cold. Few people swam in the Southern Ocean for pleasure. The sea also held danger for those on the shore. Big waves sometimes swallowed the carcasses of fallen beach pines, sweeping them out to sea and suddenly casting the great logs back onto shore when least expected, putting the lives of fisherfolk and beachgoers in danger.
But for the quiet Kyuuzou, the unwelcoming south seas held their own charm. All those years ago, his fourteen-year-old self had felt a strange thrill when he dipped his bare feet into the bitingly cold waters of a crystal clear stream cutting through the sand to meet the open sea. Kyuuzou liked visiting the edge of the Southern Ocean, even though he could not swim and build sandcastles there the way people did on the shores of the warm, turquoise Northern Ocean that he had heard of but never seen. The violent grandeur of Nankai's crashing waves and the cold melancholy of the sea winds struck a chord with that young, hollow soul who thought of himself as a man who shed no tears and who needed no love.
Now Kyuuzou was facing a strange sea like the one he visited in his boyhood. But this sea was darker and more forbidding than the sea at Shounan. He could not see the horizon beyond the dark waves – somehow sea and sky seemed to merge into shadow in the distance. Kyuuzou stared and stared, trying to discern where the sky started and the sea ended. There was nothing else for him to do. Nothing else he could think of doing.
For a very long time the slender blond child sat in the sand. He might have sat there forever if left undisturbed. But a figure appeared in the distant mist behind him, striding towards the edge of the sea. It was a broad-shouldered young man with dark wavy hair. This striking figure with the stature of a warrior came to a halt next to the child. He too sat down in the sand.
For a long time, the odd pair sat side by side without saying a word, listening to the gusty sea wind whip their garments about.
It was the dark-eyed samurai who broke the silence. "Kyuuzou," the tall young man said, "come, let us go home."
The boy did not look at the warrior. He quietly ran his fingers through the fine gray sand.
Finally the child answered softly. "Home? I don't have a home. You destroyed it, remember?"
But he said those words in a voice without rancor, without anger, and indeed, without life.
"Yes, I remember," the dark man took a deep breath. "But will you come home with me?"
The pale child's dull red eyes continued to stare at the crashing waves before him. "Go home with you? Where to? To your home?"
"I don't have a home." The handsome young samurai answered in turn. "You and your comrades destroyed it, remember?"
But he spoke those words in a voice without bitterness, without hate and without blame.
The small boy replied. "Yes, I remember… everything, even the things I tried to forget."
"I cannot wipe away your memories," The tall man said earnestly as he gazed down at the small figure sitting cross-legged beside him. "But we can make new memories! Beautiful ones! Come with me! I will make a new home for you. No, we will make a new home together!"
The thin pale boy sat motionless in the Sands of Time, his unblinking ruby eyes still fixed on the dark waters in front of him. Then the child suddenly spoke in an unreadable voice. "Did you know that I used to dream about you? … They were bad dreams."
"No, I did not know." The man responded slowly. "But we can make new dreams, good ones."
The tall warrior held out his hand to the child in a silent plea as the sun, the moon and the stars slowly continued in their set paths in the heavens above. The thin boy sat staring ahead, and the young man beside him offered his hand still. For a long, long time, they sat together, until at long last, the boy turned to face his companion.
"I do not need your pity." The tow-headed child stated firmly with cold pride. But his stiff upper lip trembled just a little.
"It is not pity that brings me here and keeps me here," came the dark samurai's reply.
Cold crimson eyes met warm brown eyes, and two souls looked into each other's depths for the first time.
"I need your forgiveness!" The tall man pleaded, holding the child's gaze. "But I know it is a privilege to be granted, not a right to be demanded."
Kanbei closed his eyes as if to prevent his tears from forming. Kyuuzou's thin frame quivered momentarily.
"Do you regret that you ever loved me?" The young boy finally asked in an almost plaintive whisper.
"No," Kanbei answered plainly. "I have never stopped loving you."
--
The first thing Kyuuzou saw when he opened his eyes in the morning was Kanbei's worried face next to him. "Why is this man lying so close to me?" The silent samurai wondered as he shifted slightly on the thin sleeping pad. He could feel the warmth of the other man's body enveloping him. But Kyuuzou did not pull away from the dark samurai's embrace.
"Thank Heaven you're awake!" The dark ronin's lips quivered. "I am here for you to dispose of as you wish! Kill me if it pleases you! But I will not leave you again unless you tell me to go!"
All the other samurai said in response to the older man's impassioned declaration was, "You reek of cheap deodorant. That smell alone is enough to wake the dead."
"I am so sorry," the old soldier said with an embarrassed expression as he sat up and drew back. "Maybe I should have taken a bath, but I did not want to delay my journey here…"
It was the younger man who closed the distance, slowly raising his hand to the other samurai's face. Kyuuzou's scarred fingers wiped away the tear that, unbeknownst to Kanbei, was running down his cheek. When those slim fingers trailed their way from cheekbone to chin, the dark man seized the pale hand tightly with both his hands, as if he was afraid that it would be snatched from him once more. Kanbei pressed that scarred palm to his lips as he closed his eyes and took a deep, ragged breath.
"Can I have my hand back now?" Kyuuzou finally asked after a few seconds of silence. A vague look of hurt crossed Kanbei's face but the older samurai complied immediately with Kyuuzou's wishes. The crimson-eyed swordfighter slowly sat up. Then, without warning, he flung his slender arms around the man sitting beside him, brushing his lips against Kanbei's ever so lightly.
A brief look of astonishment flitted across Kanbei's face as he saw an almost imperceptible smile pass Kyuuzou's impassive features.
"Do you not want to kill me?" Kanbei asked cautiously.
The blond shook his head slowly. "No," he said quietly. "I forgive you."
The next moment, the tall ronin was returning Kyuuzou's chaste kiss with overpowering passion. The broad-shouldered warrior wrapped his strong arms around Kyuuzou. The young blond closed his eyes, allowing himself to be lost in the older man's heated embrace as his slender fingers tangled in Kanbei's long wavy hair.
Finally, Kyuuzou broke off the kiss so he could catch his breath. The young man opened his eyes and looked into Kanbei's dark eyes. It was at that moment Kyuuzou realized he was looking at a world of color for the first time in sixteen years. He saw that Kanbei's eyes were dark brown, nearly black. His hair was dark brown too, with strands of gray in them. Kyuuzou saw for the first time the ceiling of his room was blue. And he noticed that the morning sun cast a warm orange glow on the white walls.
The beauty of the morning light was moving, but not nearly as moving as the look of love in the dark man's eyes.
Then the silent samurai knew his world was red no more.
Author's Comments:
- "Did you know I used to dream about you? They were bad dreams."
The backstory to this line spoken by Kyuuzou is told in the "Twisted Destinies" chapter of companion fic Unforgiven.
- The backstory of Kyuuzou's 'crimson vision' is in the "Crimson Blindness" chapter of companion fic Unforgiven.
- The image of Kyuuzou getting lost in his dreams and finally sitting down in the Sands of Time of the Sea of Shadow was inspired by songs/text from two anime:
- Samurai 7's own opening theme Unlimited: "Lost in the sands of time, I had given up, until I met you…"
- One version of Twelve Kingdom's ending theme Getsumei Fuuei also uses the expressions "sands of time", and "lost in a false dream… "
- "Sea of Shadow" was also used as part of the title in one of the Twelve Kingdom chapters.
- The idea of Ayame (and even Haruko) knowing multiple regional languages is inspired by friends and associates from India and Africa. For example, an Indian acquaintance who is of Sindhi origin but born and raised in Tamil Nadu is able to speak his home language Sindhi, the state language of Tamil (belonging to a different linguistic family from either Hindi or Sindhi) and the most common national language Hindi, not to mention English. Similarly, a West Central African friend could speak the language of his ethnic group, the language of the dominant neighboring ethnic group (which is as different from his mother tongue as say, Italian is from Spanish), as well as the colonial languages French and English. So people who can speak multiple languages are actually quite common in some parts of the world.