"I will be honest with you," Miryu said to Kenshin, "I was the one who was tasked to kill Shishio ten years ago, before the Emperor hired me as his bodyguard." Gasps rang around the sitting-room where she and Algren led them to, adorned with the finest porcelain and the best furniture, all previously under Katsumoto's possession. "But before I could hunt him down, he found me, and he tried to entice me into his service."
Shishio Makoto looked at Tsubasa Miryu, her katana drawn, her sapphire gaze filled with a raw fire that he knew that would be his if he could convince her to become his ally. "You and I are the same, do we not seek for a better Japan?" he asked her gently, "The two of us knows what bloodshed does to people like us, it either invigorates our souls, or plunges them into utter darkness… I have seen you fight, Tsubasa Battouryu, you are like a dragon soaring in the sky, matchless, the best among the best of Japan. I beg you, see through the blindfold that the politicians we served!"
Miryu looked at him and scoffed. Her quarrel with politicians had ended the moment Katsura Kogoro reassigned her and Kenshin into becoming mobile attackers. "Japan will be at peace, as the Ishin-Ishishi have promised, I swore an oath that I will destroy every single dissident that stands in my way of assuring that reality lasts," she spat. Her anger was building, but none quite yet. She still had patience to bandy words with this would-be corpse.
"Dissident?" Shishio asked with a raised eyebrow. "Four years ago, all those under the Ishin-Ishishi were called just that, you know it better than others. How sure are you that what those above said are no different than what the Bakufu had said as well?" His words struck through her mind like the swordsmith's hammer against the hot steel when a weapon was made, and she pondered her answer for a long while. She was not blind, that as a country newly reformed, as a country that would embrace a new system, a new philosophy, there would be many hiccoughs at first, and that they must find their own footing in their own time. "Tsubasa Miryu, you are indeed a visionary, why don't you take control instead?"
The look on Miryu's face became one of amusement. "It is because I wish to be free," she replied, "Free to serve my people as I would, free from no order or command unless I wish it to be." Shishio noted the state of her sapphire eyes, they looked as if she was describing a dream… Even if she emerged victorious over four years of war and blood, she was still a child, of 18 years of age, an idealist as she was a beauty.
Striking his most charming smile, Shishio dropped his katana and took one of her hands in his. "These hands are so beautiful, they are not made for a katana. They are made for the young, beautiful lady, for fans and for tea, for silks and jewels," he told her, cornering her until her back was against a tree. "You are a jewel among warriors, Battouryu, you do not know how many men will die for a wife like you… Me including…"
Miryu's eyes turned from sapphire to amber. "I yearn no love for any man like you," she scowled. "I am not a thing to be won, a jewel to be taken when and if you desire to. I am Tsubasa Miryu, a student of the Hiten-Mistsurugi Ryuu…" Before she could complete her sentence, Shishio closed his lips upon hers, in a kiss that she did not want, that she could not anticipate.
"You do not know how long I have watched you from the shadows," Shishio told her. "Join me, and you and I will rule this country together. You will be known as a warrior-Queen, and you will have no need to serve any master…"
"I served no other master," Miryu fought back, "Even under the Ishin-Ishishi, I fought for the people of Japan, the others did no more than to guide me, and I am grateful."
A smile crossed Shishio's features, this time, it no longer served to charm. "Ah yes, you are a student of Katsumoto Moritsugu… How could I have forgotten such an important fact? That is why you are different from Battousai, who is driven by blind ambition like Katsura. You have the skills of a politician, do you know that? You take what you have and use it, from the greatest arsenal to the slightest shred of hope, it makes you strong, and the strong will prevail…"
A gunshot was heard, and in the center of Shishio's forehead, was a bullet. "Tsubasa Battouryu, you shall not speak of this to anyone," said one of the shadowed figures. "We shall burn the body, and we will meet again. The Emperor wishes to see you, and we plead that you do not add this to your report."
Algren took Miryu's hand as she told Kenshin what had happened. She had never told anyone that part of her tale before, not even Graham. "Days later, I swore myself into the service of the Emperor, and the rest, is history... Kenshin, Shishio is no common foe of yours, his treachery goes deeper than you know."
"Nothing ever escaped you, Miryu," Kenshin replied with a smile similar to that of hers. "What do you think that I can do, what path can I choose? If we kill Shishio together, if I draw blood again, I shall be nothing but the hitokiri we were, but if we spare him, Japan will never be safe…" He did not realize that the others were shocked by the sudden change in the manner of which he spoke. Miryu, however noted it internally, but said nothing of it, for she knew the answer. The bond shared between them was special, alike that of a brother and a sister, but something even deeper.
The reply from Miryu was one that Kenshin could not expect to come from one such as her. "Last year when Katsumoto staged his war against Minister Omura, I killed at least a hundred men, does that make me a hitokiri all over again?" she asked him, demanding an answer. "I am you, I know that. I do not have the ability to promise that I shall never kill again, but I know that I have killed because I needed to, because if I do not, I cannot fulfill my mandate to protect those than cannot protect themselves…"
"The samurai can indeed protect themselves," Kenshin replied, but was cut off by Miryu almost immediately.
"Can they, Kenshin? How could we have protected ourselves from a growing nation of peasants and merchants that have gained political power, embittered by centuries of exploitation and reverence, to and by, the samurai?" Miryu replied, "We had nothing at that battle, nothing but the same armor our ancestors had, arrows, spears, and the katana in our hands, against cannons and Gatling guns, have you ever once thought that against such hatred and anger, we were defenseless?
This is why, Kenshin, why I chose to fight last year. I knew that you disagreed with my stand, but it was my stand to take. I did what I had to do, and now, you must choose the same."
Kenshin knew that Miryu had sensed his disagreement at her participation in last year's massacre that almost threatened to destroy their nation, but luckily, went by with merely a whisper in the wind. He had thought that it was all a rumor, that the Emperor's beloved teacher, who was also his former comrade had decided to march against the government, not until he saw Katsumoto's retinue in Tokyo, with Miryu and Algren in tow. He also knew that she had not wished to play the card of social rank. She was a daughter of nigh nobility among the samurai, but he was a farmer's son, given a surname by his Ishin-Ishishi comrades… "So, you are saying that I should kill Shishio, if the situation calls for it?"
Kamiya Kaoru had not seen Kenshin wearing the expression he had worn that moment. She knew that his soul was a perplexed one, but still, the confusion within him, was staggering. She had always believed hitokiri Battousai and Battouryu were monsters with black hearts that only lived for bloodshed. In her childhood, she had grown up listening to stories as to how those legends had fought in a conflict that lead to a completely new era, where democracy was soon to be achieved, where the sons of peasants were able to hold high offices, but she had never imagined the depth of their internal struggles.
"I am saying that you should choose whatever you must, whatever you can and wish to do, and stand by it, without any remorse or fear," Miryu said, "I will answer Minister Ohkubo's call, and I will do what it takes to end what I have started, to end the menace that will certainly destroy everything I have strived to accomplish… Take it this way, Kenshin, those sons we had killed, those fathers, uncles, brothers, nephews and cousins that were our victims ten years ago, they would have died for nothing if we do not stop Shishio."
Sanosuke had had enough. In his young mind, she spoke the same way as did all the others they had seen. She had only made her words easier for Kenshin to understand and absorb. "Come on, only Kenshin can decide what he must do!" he exclaimed, slamming his fist on the ornate table, rising in anger. Miryu just smiled and told him that he had grown much since she had last saw him, but not enough to comprehend the slightest tremor within Kenshin's own thoughts.
Yahiko was incensed as well. To him, Kenshin was the best and wisest warrior he had ever known, regardless of his past as a hitokiri. He would definitely find a way to do it the way he had chosen to. In that case, it would be defeating Shishio Makoto without killing him.
"There is a way, though," Miryu finally said. "You need a set of skills superior to that of what you currently have. You need a new way to take down your enemies, and there is only one man who can give it to you. You know who he is, Kenshin, and you know where to find him again…"
Kenshin blinked for a moment. How could he have been so blind? He had almost forgotten that he had left his training to join the Ishin-Ishishi, while Miryu remained. He had always acknowledged that she was the more powerful one of the two of them, even if he was more notorious and more prominent among them, and he also knew why. But was that road still open to him, would that man still accept him, after how he had left? If that option was indeed available to him, would he take it? Would he gamble with this shred of hope in exchange for his own life and sanity?
Japan had weathered worse than this apparent coup of Shishio Makoto, with Tsubasa Battouryu still guarding her, will her people still be safe if Himura Battousai would not fight as well?