Chapter 4: Wooing a woman requires a set of skills that no man owns in full.
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The flicker of cameras deafened and the flashes blinded as Hijikata stood behind Keiko and Kondo as the press and various reporters badgered them with questions.
The Vice-Commander took the chance to finally get a good look at their charge without worrying about getting frozen.
Until now, he's only been able to get a vestige of how she appeared. Obviously, her icing powers prevented him from getting a good look and, really, he hardly paid attention to women, especially to details (and especially the ones that joined Sougo in attempts to murder him).
But it is not as if he ignored women – it's just that only a very few could ever capture his attention and only a few actually did.
Sougo mentioned something to him about her resembling a trophy wife and he couldn't agree until he saw her stand before the reporters. She did look like any other decently pretty Japanese high-profile mistress - a comely face, long black hair that fell in obviously styled waves, smug posture, and he couldn't deny that she had a fairly nice body since he did get to see her in her striped panties. But unlike other women, her features were overwhelmingly sharp and cold to match her stupid attitude. She reminded him of that assassin associated with the Mimawarigumi.
He noted that she did resemble the Joui patriot. But, really, any person with long dark hair looks like him. So he couldn't claim their relation simply through that and the report Yamazaki gave him just a few hours ago didn't reveal much of a connection. Then, he realized that she wore all black. He hadn't noticed since black is standard for the Shinsengumi but dark black silk kimonos aren't very standard at all – for a woman, no less. And were those gloves?
"Yamamoto-san, are you really Katsura Haru – despite the fact that her death has been confirmed?" a reporter shouted out to her, bringing Hijikata's attention off from her.
He mentally shouted at Yamazaki for failing to bring that detail to him during his report.
The questions continued.
"Can we get a statement?"
"If you are a daughter of the Katsura family, how did the Jouishishi faction find out if you've been going by the name of Yamamoto Keiko?"
"Yamamoto-san!"
Keiko raised her hand and her eyes, politely demanding their silence. When they complied, she bowed her head slightly. "Arigato-gozaimasu. I am Yamamoto Keiko. I am an employee of Sunset* Advertisement and Image Enhancement. Three weeks ago, I was asked to act the part of the hostage in a real hostage setting to prove to the Edo society that the Shinsengumi is a functioning and competent police force. The rumor that I was Katsura Haru was leaked out to the Jouishishi as bait to have them attempt a kidnapping."
Hijikata attempted to mask his surprise at her statement. He glanced at his superior who, uncharacteristically (but not completely rarely), carried a stoic face as the cameras continued to flash and click.
Keiko went on, "I was chosen, specifically, due to my similar appearance to the late noblewoman to whom I was actually a close friend. Therefore, on behalf of Sunset, we apologize for the deception to the public and to the Shinsengumi for even they were unaware of this agreement which was decided only between me, my superior and Matsudaira-san." She said as she bowed.
"Will you continue to work with the Shinsengumi to improve their image?"
"Was this in response to the increasing appraisal of the Mimawarigumi?"
"Were you compensated at all?"
"Yamamoto-san!"
Question after question bombarded her but all she did was bow again and stated that she had no further comment.
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"She's awfully good at saving face." Johnson muttered as she watched Keiko enter back into the Shinsengumi Headquarters through a television screen. She leaned and sprawled on the tatami of the Japanese-style room, her small and old frame taking up hardly any space.
"More that she is good at weaseling out of things." A voice responded from behind her.
"Well, haven't you turned into a dog with a bite? You were such a nice boy too." With a flick of her wrist, she popped a whole dried persimmon into her mouth and smacked her lips as she chewed.
"…"
"You don't need to force yourself to watch any of this, ya know." Johnson peered over her shoulder and examined the man who kneeled in disaffected silence. Another persimmon thoroughly chewed as she eyed him up and down.
Powerful yet restrained – seemliness ran from his fingertips to the muted expression on his face. He was a servant of competence and potency, this man of mystery… a mystery even to her and she wasn't sure if she liked that.
The man responded, "Johnson-dono, I am the one in charge of her performance. I must observe her progress." He replied, his gaze lowered out of respect.
"Why the Shinsengumi? With your history with them, you certain you would wanna put her in their midst?"
"They are all capable men with loyalty and skill that rival my own. The Amanto would need that if their wants are to be fulfilled."
"But their pride and arrogance is overwhelming. That's why you cut off ties, innit? You sure you want that and her stubbornness to be carried down into the next generation?"
"That is why I am assigned with the task of raising her child, Johnson-dono."
"…Why do you insist in using such titles? They are not even your own to use."
The man took a moment and then bowed apologetically but compulsorily. "If you do not mind, I would still desire to address you with the terms that belong to my father and my homeland."
Johnson simply sighed and returned her attention to the television. Another persimmon.
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Back at the headquarters, Hijikata lit his cigarette and followed his superior and Keiko through the hallways, utterly and completely frustrated.
"Kondo-san," Hijikata slurred, "Did you know any of this?"
Kondo stopped dramatically, causing Hijikata to stop and flinch. Then the Commander turned around, his eyes full of tears, and sneered.
"NOOO!" He sniffled. "Why doesn't Pops tell me these things?"
Hijikata exhaled in frustration.
Keiko simply blinked at his behavior. She awkwardly patted him on the shoulder in attempts to comfort him.
"I'm sorry, Commander..." she muttered.
Hijikata glowered. Did she just apologize to Kondo? So does she really only hate him?
"...But it all turned out for the better, no?"
Kondo nodded and wiped away his manly tears. Then he suddenly stopped his blubbering.
"Ah, Keiko-san, your hands are very dainty." Kondo muttered suddenly in a low and tender voice. He held her hands in his and gently peered into her eyes…
- leading Hijikata to scream "WHAT THE FREAKING F*CK" in his head and Keiko to drop her jaw in horror.
Without warning, she thrust her forehead into Kondo's and sped off all before Hijikata could even register what had just happened.
"Kondo-san!" Hijikata cried out, worriedly. He rushed to his Commander's side only to find him out cold. "KONDO!"
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"Where the heck is she?" Hijikata mumbled as he roamed after putting Kondo in his room.
As the Oni no Fukuchou stalked around for his prey, he tried to make sense of what he just saw…it wasn't really working.
'Seriously, what was that? Did Kondo just – no, no, no – he's too obsessed with Shimura Tae to make moves on another woman, right?'
Hijikata spat out his distaste with his standard "Tch." He would rather deal with the crazy cabaret girl than the ice queen any day. He could handle being roughhoused but he wasn't sure how long he could handle getting frozen every hour or so by a woman who obviously hated his guts.
He could feel his frustration growing ever since he had reluctantly accepted the order to protect her and when he felt like everything was about to reach the boiling point, he realized that the headquarters were empty.
Eerily and unsettlingly empty – like the feeling that would form in his gut whenever she unleashed her freeze-ray-for-eyes on him.
"…where is everybody?" he questioned aloud.
"They're all in the mess hall." Sougo's voice resounded from the room besides him.
Hijikata immediately flung the door to the side, revealing the 1st Division captain in mid-air - hanging from the ceiling by a rope that tied him in a familiar masochistic position (that the female kunoichi Matsudaira hires would typically put herself in).
The Vice Commander soaked the sight in. "Oi, Sougo…Did you decide to become an M?"
"No no, it's not like that, Hijikata-san," the captain droned as he swung to and fro. "It's just that our charge really knows her knots."
"…did you force yourself onto her?" He wasn't sure if he should add an 'also'.
"Eeh, I'm not that kind of person, Hijikata-san,"
"Really? Really? Your characterization says otherwise, you S-b*stard."
"I simply asked her if she was willing to have my **** *** her ***** ***** **** ***."
"Oi, that's worse than forcing yourself onto her! Anymore than that the author is going to be forced by the admins to change the rating."
"Does it really matter though, Hijikata-san? This is a Gintama fanfiction, the readers should know what they're getting into if they read/watched this vulgar silver soul crap for 10/7 years."
"Don't justify your profanity with half-truths!" Hijikata stuffed a hand into his pocket as he again released his returning frustrations in a hardened sigh. "Why is everyone in the mess hall?"
"Yamamoto-san ran towards that direction, screaming about taking hot ramen broth and burning our overexcited crotches-"
"OI! That wasn't even censored!"
"-then the rest of the men ran after her."
"Tch. That woman's really asking for it if she's bringing everyone to one place." Hijikata spat as he started running off towards the cafeteria.
"Hijikata-san, are you really going to leave me hanging - like this?" Sougo called after him, still swinging. "…Hijikata-san…
…but this actually isn't that bad."
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"Come on, old lady, just let us see her!" some Shinsengumi officers shouted at the large woman guarding the door to the kitchen of the Shinsengumi mess hall.
"As if I'd let you dirty men into the kitchen!" she shouted back. "The kitchen is the haven of all women! There is absolutely no way we're going to let you in!"
"Argh, just let us in!"
"Hell no!" She screeched.
Keiko blinked her deadpan eyes as she heard the brawl starting just outside her refuge in the confines of the kitchen.
"..." She turned to the other women manning the galley. "As much as I would like to displace some of the typical gender stereotypes, thanks for letting me stay here and eat ramen." She mumbled as she slurped up a couple noodles.
"No problem," one replied as she washed the dishes. "A pretty girl like you deserves better company. And get off the table, we make food on that."
"Eh, stop it," Keiko half-laughed through a subdued smile while pulling her feet onto the table to sit cross-legged and to not-so-subtly rebel against her caretakers, "You're making me blush." She started chugging the rest of the soup then released a sigh of satisfaction.
"If you keep eating your ramen like that, you won't be the only one blushing. And get off the table." Another cook noted.
Keiko glanced to the side, finally noticing the crowd of men crowding around the serving area with wide grins and dark blushes on their faces. Some of them even drooled.
She cringed and turned to one of the cooks.
"Did I, perchance, eat my ramen with my lips perked and my face all flushed and in a way that was erotic at all?"
"Yeah, you weren't doing it on purpose?"
"Dammit." She finally stood on top of the metal table.
"We told you to get off!" a cook screamed at her while throwing ladles in her direction as Keiko spoke patronizingly at the Shinsengumi: "You all better finish your food then rot in hell or I will personally cut off your Neo Armstrong Cyclone Jet Armstrong cannons before you can say ''Calcifer'."
But that just egged the men on even more and they hollered excitedly in masochistic joy. "Hai," "Yes, Sophie*," "Yes, ma'am, "Nee-sama, please spit into my food," and "Get off the d*mn table!" were shouted at her.
Suddenly, a large explosion burst through the line of horny men, knocking nearly everyone (even the kitchen staff) down except for Keiko, who magically stayed on top of the table and simply had her black clothes billow about her.
"You can't stay in there forever." Hijikata muttered as he stepped into the mess hall that he had just bazooka-ed into shambles.
"Sure I can." Keiko calmly retorted. There's food, sake, and women – everything that a person needs to live a life is all in here. "
"That. Shouldn't. Apply. TO YOU!" He yelled, repositioning the bazooka onto his shoulders for another go, his eyes ablaze.
"Fukuchou! Stop! She's supposed to be protected by us!"
But any warning was unheeded because the Demon Vice Commander had already released his anger in the form of missile flying straight towards the woman in black. She threw up her gloved arms to block it and felt herself being thrown against a wall.
Then, after the explosion, after the smoke settled, she forced her eyes open and found herself in a mess of …
"Mayonnaise?" Keiko lifted her mayo-covered arm in shock.
Indeed, the woman had been thrust into the Vice Commander's personal mayonnaise reserve by the force of the explosion.
"This is such a waste." She muttered, inspecting the lumps of the off-white cream that covered her body.
"Oi." Hijikata snarled as he slowly stomped into the kitchen. "Have you calmed down yet, you little -?"
Then he paused.
Yamamoto Keiko was licking mayonnaise off her wrists.
She stared up at him with her large, beautiful eyes. A sumptuous tongue parted her rosy lips, indulging in the bits of heavenly cream that peppered her soft skin.
He blinked. Hard.
But the image hadn't disappeared, instead, a deluge of completely uncharacteristic fantasy swept over him and he started to imagine himself pushing her down and helping her clean up the mess with his own mayonnaise-starved lips and-
Wait.
'What!? Beautiful!? Tongue…No, wait, I'm looking into her eyes-!'
And he was frozen.
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[You probably noticed that I put a bunch of zeros in for page breaks. I really don't like how this site does page breaks. Totally ruins the flow. Oh, wait, crap. That's what I'm doing right now, huh? Oh, well.]
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Keiko sat crouched over her left arm, a myriad of technical tools at her feet and a cloth bag at her side. She found refuge in one of the storage facilities a good distance away from the sleeping quarters. There were blankets, portable heating units, a stash of ramen in her bag and an extensive barricade of old building parts and boxes blocking the door.
She felt safe, well, for now.
"Dammit." She threw down a small screwdriver and wiped her hands on her pants. "They completely restructured the technology. It's going to take a while until –,"
Then a loud crash and the sound of her barricade crumbling erupted about her.
"So this is where you ran off to, huh?" Hijikata's typical slurring voice emerged from the midst of the wreckage.
Keiko stood up quickly, gloving her left arm with remarkable speed and arming herself with a screwdriver.
"What were you doing?" Hijikata asked, eyeing the mechanical tools.
"Giving myself a tattoo." She quickly responds, again, in a completely subdued tone.
She lowered the hand that held the screwdriver, realizing that he posed no threat…yet. "I see that you managed to thaw off and find a way in."
"No thanks to you, you damned woman."
"The author didn't even try to censor that one. Anyways, may I ask for a reason for you being here, Vice-Commander?"
"I need a heating unit. Winter is coming and the heated floors aren't enough." He stalked his way towards one of the ones Keiko had pulled out from the dusty homes. "Especially with you around, you d*mned ice woman."
"Ah, there we go."
"What have you done? It's like a shoujo manga here." Hijikata kneeled beside one and inspected it.
"You read shoujo manga?" She said incredulously and pulled something out of her bag and places it on her face.
Hijikata coughed as soon as she turned to face him with a pair of Groucho glasses and its obnoxious fake nose, fuzzy eyebrows and moustache. "Maybe that's why I can't take you seriously." Keiko continued, her voice completely humorless despite.
"I don't want to hear that from you with those on! Take those off!"
She complied and stuffed them into her bag. "Besides, it's more like a seinen reverse harem bordering on a hentai than a shoujo manga, right?"
"How would I know!?" He yelled, hoping to disguise the fact the he was blushing at the mention of the more adult genres. "Either way, it's as if this universe turned into Hakuouki."
"…You do read shoujo manga, huh?"
"Shut up. What have you done to my men? Why are they coming to you like dogs in heat?" He frowned, trying not to remember that even he had nearly succumbed to the "heat" despite the cold.
She framed her face with poised fingers and batted her eyes. "It's cuz I'm so beautiful and sh*t."
"Oi."
Keiko simply scoffed and started rebuilding the barricade.
"Well, fukuchou, I'm hoping to camp out in here for the night so if you could kindly leave and not tell anyone – that'd be great." She said, half-hearted in her attempt to be polite.
"As if I'd let a woman – as d*mned as you are – stay out in here."
"And into a den of Bakufu dogs in heat? Thankfully, last night was spent in the interrogation room where I only had one bas- you to worry about. Besides, women aren't allowed in the Shinsengumi (which makes this whole arrangement absolutely ridiculous)."
"Unless we're ordered to protect you. And you were going to call be a b*stard, weren't you."
"Well, you men are doing a fine job of -," she stopped herself and sighed. "It is really my fault that your men are acting like it's mating season even though it's nearly winter and I cannot quite explain it now so please," she bowed her head and gestured hard towards the door, "leave."
Hijikata repressed his groans as he reluctantly decided to comply because he could feel the flood of fancy seeping into his better judgment when she suddenly became polite. If he stayed any longer, who knows what he could have tried. And he didn't want to find out. He still had his pride and wanted to consider himself as being better than any other man who had no control over his carnal desires.
But, damn, her in those striped panties- 'STOP! Stop. Stop. Stop. Crap, the author didn't even censor- you could censor a lot quite a bit if she – NO! No. No. No. Okay, leaving now.'
He managed to maintain his composure as he walked past her.
"You should change into something else than that. Wearing all black is ominous – it's like you're in mourning." He muttered while he crossed the threshold.
"…It sure seems that way, huh?"
'What the hell does that mean?' he asked himself, making his way to his quarters.
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The moon was high in the dark and chilly sky when Hijikata finally crawled into his futon, ready to go to sleep. The day had been long and tiresome. The time Hijikata spent between the incident in the mess hall and him finding her in the storage shed was devoted to finding the d*mned woman in compromising situations with his men, KOing his men, and repeating.
Who knew that keeping his men from humping a girl would be so hard?
Who knew that keeping his own desires in check would be so hard?
He didn't even like her. In fact, he might even hate her. Yet whenever he was in her presence, he could feel something in his resolve weakening – he couldn't quite name what was happening but articulating it hardly mattered because, in the end, he didn't like it...at all.
"God d*amn it, this better not end up like Hakuouki."
He settled his heavy head into the pillow, eager for some rest and disliking the idea of what tomorrow might bring with that mass of pheromones that he was assigned to protect.
Then, he could hear the door to his room slide open and close and sensed someone enter but no killing intent. He squinted his eyes open and saw Keiko's figure kneeling besides him.
"Dammit. I'm actually hearing things and hallucinating now, huh? Freaking fantasies." He grumbled and rubbed his temples.
"Oh? You have fantasies about me?" Keiko whispered and while Hijikata reacted, he found himself face to face with the barrel of a gun.
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A/N: The creators of Howl's Moving Castle and Hakuouki: Shinsengumi Kitan probably wouldn't care that I made references to them in this piece because, hey, it's only fanfiction. I'll probably bring up the latter again, though, since that's the main thing I've been working off of even though I haven't played/read/seen most of it - the main character is so Mary Sue, I almost threw up. (Sorry if you actually like her).
And the company Keiko claimed to be a part of is a play on Sunrise, the animation studio that serializes Gintama.
Either way, I've been spending Spring Break rewatching Gintama for the third time. God, I love it. Then the thought of it ending really saddened me - seriously - it got to the point where I was depressed for the whole day because I know that it's eventually going to have to end. AND I DON'T WANT IT TO.
Ah, in case you were wondering, most of the major characters will have meta-awareness that they are in a piece of (fan)fiction and Keiko totally has a dark and tortured past that will be revealed more in the future because she is a Mary Sue, ya know.