A/N – These scenes are from my story "Gai-Jin", which I took down some months ago.

Disclaimer – I don't own Ruroken, any of the canon characters, situations or settings. Don't sue.

The Demon's Path

I.

The meeting was not going well.

Katsura, Saigo Takamori and Sakamoto Ryoma had been closeted together for more than two hours, their voices rising and falling in discussion, in speculation, and in argument as they spoke. Kenshin, kneeling in the corner, listened more to the rhythm of the meeting than the details, but he could sense the undercurrents of unease and indecision flowing between them. He kept a cautious eye on the other bodyguards, all kneeling discreetly, as he was, all concentrating on every sharp, sudden movement in the room. Many of them, in fact, were watching him extremely closely –

There was a growl of dissent, a sharp exchange of words, and Katsura stood up and walked out. Kenshin followed suit, emerging into the hallway at Katsura's heels, his eyes carefully blank. "Are we leaving?" was all he asked.

Katsura flicked him a look. "There is nothing more to be gained here. We might as well go back."

Kenshin nodded. They walked out into the street in silence, Kenshin going ahead, making sure the way was safe – a strange reversal of his normal role that he still had trouble adjusting to. It was so much harder to protect a man's life than to take it.

"I believe we have a dangerous leak." Katsura spoke suddenly, his cool words falling like stones in the dark night. "One of our liaisons with the foreigners has turned. Saigo insists that we eliminate him."

One by one, Kenshin's muscles stiffened as he tensed, an involuntary reaction to what Katsura-san had not yet asked. "Shishio will be happy to oblige," he said tersely. His hand clenched on his sword hilt, and he forced himself to breathe slowly and deeply.

"Shishio… No." Katsura's voice was low and grave. "I know that you have relinquished the role of hitokiri, Himura, but this time we need a subtlety, a discretion, that Shishio simply does not possess."

Kenshin searched the Choshu leader's face, knowing that he would see only what Katsura wished him to see. Now that he no longer blankly followed orders, Kenshin was becoming more and more aware of the other man's manipulations – but it could not all have been a lie. Surely that quiet, flexible strength and understanding was not entirely feigned.

"Why?" he asked simply.

"If Yasuda believes that we have found him out – and he would be a fool not to fear it – he will seek protection from the foreigners. To kill him, the assassin would have to reach him in the midst of the foreign trading enclaves at Yokohama – and you know as well as I the price for murdering a gai-jin."

Shimonoseki.

Yes, Kenshin knew the price of a foreigner's life.

II.

The next day, Himura was still turning it over, considering the consequences and the terrible toll of such an assassination. Katsura recognized the pensive, closed look on that youthful, innocent face – the look of a man who has learned that every choice he made had painful consequences, and that no matter which path he took, people would still die.

It was a look he saw on his own face, sometimes.

But Katsura had embarked on this course willingly, in the full knowledge of what it would entail. Himura had not had the luxury of such a choice; he had brought him into the game an innocent pawn, unable to understand the price he would pay for his ideals.

Another deliberate step on the demon's path. A choice made, willingly, ruthlessly; given the choice, he would do it again, even knowing what would happen.

Madness. Justice. Yoshida-sensei had advocated extreme, unflinching ruthlessness in the face of overwhelming oppression, and Katsura had embraced this philosophy wholeheartedly. Over the years, his goals had changed, his focus shifted, but the one single, overriding dream remained – Japan, united, strong enough to resist the encroaching Westerners, powerful enough to take its rightful place as an equal in the forefront of the world.

The old kingdom had fallen, rotted from within, but Japan would survive, and thrive, in the new world he would create in fire and blood.

Below their balcony, the busy, deceptively peaceful streets of Kyoto bustled, a glimpse into normal, every day humanity, alien, now, to himself and to Katsura both. Men, women and children went about their business, marketing, haggling over fruit and vegetables, concerned about getting the best value for their money, discussing the latest murders with shuddering horror and fear, and then shrugging their shoulders and turning their attention to the latest neighbourhood gossip.

He wondered, bitterly, if any of them cared that an Ishin spy had run to the foreigners, and that the whole Satsuma-Choshu alliance teetered on the edge of a sword, which could not – could not – be turned against the foreigners. He wondered if any of them cared that he had murdered hundreds of men in their name –

"Himura," Katsura said, a brief touch on his shoulder drawing him out of his dark reverie. "You look very fierce."

"Katsura-san. I was thinking."

His leader, the man he had willingly followed down the road to hell, knelt down beside him and watched the street for a time. Kenshin wondered what he saw.

"Of Yokohama?"

"No," he answered, rather curtly. "Of foreigners."

"Oh?" He sensed, rather than saw the sidelong look.

"I thought," Kenshin murmured, "that sonno-joi was about casting the foreigners out."

There was a moment of silence.

"But you've been dealing with them, haven't you? Takasugi-san's gunship, and the rifles for his Kihetai – all purchased from foreign merchants, with money supplied by foreign governments."

Katsura sighed. "We tried, in the beginning, to deal with the gai-jin as we would other invaders. We fired on their ships, and they showed us the true power of their modern ships. We killed one of them because he did not show the proper respect, and they retaliated with more force than we could ever have imagined."

He turned to look at Kenshin, those fine, grave eyes dark, intent, and fanatical. "Our isolation, our safety from the outside world betrayed us – if we are to defeat them now, Himura, it must be with their own weapons. But," and here he smiled, a little cruelly, "they will sow the seeds of their own defeat. Their traders risk their money, competing for future concessions and favours from the men they believe will be the new government; they pour money into our cause. We will take their money, their weapons, and their technology, and turn it to our own ends – and then we will force them to deal with us once more, on our terms this time."

It was clear that Katsura saw this as fitting. The irony of the thought pleased him, and Kenshin was reminded once more of the gap between a high-ranking, educated samurai, and a boy raised in isolation on the mountains. He knew the history, because he had knelt on guard through too many meetings and policy discussions, but he could only see the rebels' choices as hypocrisy.

"That is why it's so important that Yasuda be eliminated without any foreign casualties. If there is another death, then the merchants will be up in arms…"

Kenshin drew in his breath. "They will know that it was the Ishin Shishi who killed their pet informant."

"Of course they will. But he is a traitor; they will expect us to try to kill him. They cannot retaliate if it is only one more dead Japanese."

It was chilling, in its classification of acceptable and unacceptable deaths. But he had come this far on the demon's road. Could he in good conscience say, thus far and no further?

He sighed. "Very well, Katsura-san. I will go to Yokohama."

III

"Will he do it?" Saigo Takamori asked, hands clasped behind his back as he paced back and forth, his famous displeasure with assassination and intrigue all too apparent.

Sakamoto Ryoma threw Katsura a questioning glance. He knew the Choshu leader's affection for the boy, Himura, the odd consideration that he showed him in return for his uncommon loyalty. He also knew the extent of Katsura's commitment to the cause.

"He knows how important it is that Yasuda dies," Katsura said curtly.

"It is not just a matter of Yasuda's death," Saigo snapped. "Else we'd have finished him ourselves, long since. Surely he knows the delicate implications of this mission. What are his scruples, against the success of the Revolution? He is only one man."

Only one man, Katsura thought. One man, whose sword had created so many opportunities – one man, who had lost or sacrificed everything, in his service to the Revolution.

"And, after all, it's only one more assassination…"

FIN