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Suegaku Na Aki

Chapter 23

Orochi and another man stood near a crowd of people who gathered to listen to a public address by a politician. A few police officers nearby watched the gathering warily. As the politician ranted on how he was sacrificing a lot to help the ungrateful people he represented, Orochi made a comment to his companion "It seems that the Meiji government has realized our intentions, what do you think, Meikira?"

The man named Meikira shrugged and put his hands in his pockets. "Right, but I suppose you knew that this will happen, old man"

The other man only smiled. "That is correct. However, the timing is a bit too soon"

"And you also have a backup plan to that"

"My thanks to you for helping me prepare"

"No problem"

They turned their attention to the crowd as there was a commotion. A man brazenly insulted the politician who was making the speech, telling him that he was a crook.

"And why are you making such a wild accusation?" the politician retorted. Nearby, a few policemen were beginning to make their way to the protester.

"You took my farm by force and built an illegal gambling den. And now you're saying that you're breaking your bones to serve us. What crap is that!"

A few murmurs could be heard from the crowd. The politician noticed them and nearly panicked. "Ladies and gentlemen, surely you can see this man is lying?"

"Oh? I'm lying? Then how do you explain about where you get the money to enlarge you house then? A long lost uncle inheritance?"

"Yes, in a way. My uncle Guruma left quite a tidy sum in his will"

"Ah. Gomen. Silly of me. I didn't know that pigs could write wills"

The politician hopped off the stage and walked toward the man. "Let me hear you say that again"

"Fine. I didn't know that pigs could write wills"

Everyone nearby looked with interest at the two as they exchanged insults and barbed comments, including Orochi and Meikira.

"You have found a good actor, Meikira"

"Yeah. Pretty natural too. And he's willing to work for us for peanuts"

"Peanuts?"

"An expression I heard from the foreigners. He was angry with the Meiji government. But the best thing I like about him is that he could easily manipulate the crowd's emotions"

Orochi glanced at the crowd to see that hostility began to show on some of the people's face. "Getting the crowd to form a mob is a good plan"

More and more dissatisfaction began to show as the protester talked about the alleged corruption.

"Then getting them to attack the police and create an uprising here will be easier. You have done well, Meikira"

"Hey. I learn from the master himself" Meikira performed a small bow. "And, of course, not to mention my teacher who was killed by Aoshi" He snickered. "I always told him that's he was too old but he wouldn't listen, working with that Enishi. In the end, his career went up in smoke. Another one of the foreigner's sayings"

"You know a lot of the foreigners' language"

"Yes. In France and Britain, I'm known as the Asian Marionette. Now, you'll see the pinnacle of my puppet show" He snapped his finger.

A shot rang up and the politician fell down like a rag doll. A wave of silent horror swept throughout the area. Then a woman's scream broke the spell. Instantly, panic ensued as everyone ran to save themselves. Meanwhile, the police force was doing its best to keep the chaos to a minimum, trying to ensure an orderly dispersal. Nevertheless, a few people got trampled by the fleeing crowd. Another shot rang out and the crowd became wilder and more people got injured. Meanwhile, Orochi and Meikira had moved to a roof top, watching the commotion.

"Can you tell me what are you doing?" Orochi asked. "Why did you kill the politician? Surely this will cause the crowd to panic"

Meikira shook his head in disbelief. "It was not supposed to happen this way"

"Oh? Then what was supposed to happen? We were supposed to shoot our man instead?"

Meikira looked at his leader for a moment until realization sunk into him. Orochi thought that the man who opposed the politician was the one working for them. "Let me explain. The politician, not the agitator is the one who's working with us. And he's supposed to provoke the agitator into a fight with him, that's all. And that in turn will cause a riot by the people, forcing the police to subdue them"

"I see. And where is the assassination part is supposed to fit in?"

"No where. As you already know, killing him will do us no good"

Orochi shifted his attention to the surrounding buildings. "So, it is the Meiji government's plan to counteract our own. Interesting. I never thought they would resort to this" A flash at a distance caught his attention. He moved his head. At the same time another shot could be heard.

Meikira looked at the spot where the sound originated. He almost rushed to the spot when he stopped. "Are you okay, old man?"

"Let me assure you, I am only 35 years old. As for my safety, you can see that I am all right"

"Should we go after the sniper? I think we can easily catch up with him. I can imagine the joy I'll get from torturing information out of him"

"No" Orochi answered. "We have to return to our headquarters now. This new development is something that we need to consider before proceeding with our plan"

Yamagata stood beside Aoshi while looking at the map of Japan. "I've carried out what you suggested"

"Very good. Now proceed with the surveillance"

The general of the Japanese Imperial army felt annoyed at the curt response, but kept quiet. However, his assistant couldn't stop from protesting.

"You're acting as if we are your errand boys, telling us to do your bidding. Who do you think you are?" Sageru demanded.

Aoshi ignored him and said to Yamagata while pointing to a spot on the map, "It would be advantageous for us to move some of the police force in this area to other places to bolster their numbers"

Yamagata was shocked at the suggestion. "Are you MAD? We have just killed one of our people there and now you want us to reduce the number of police officers there! What will people think!"

"Correction, Yamagata-san, he was one of the Orochi's men" Aoshi took out an envelope from his jacket. "Here is the proof"

Yamagata took it and examined its content. When he finished, he look at Aoshi. "Why didn't you give me this earlier? It could have made my task of convincing the others a lot easier"

"I need some evidence that you trust me"

"This is not a matter of trust!"

"It is. We need to trust each other in order to work together. I appreciate what you did for me"

Yamagata could only nod.

"As for the district, I'm sure that Orochi wouldn't attack it"

"Yes. I understand" Sageru answered. "To do so would cause the people in other places to support us. Although what we did is quite dirty, it served its purposes. And for the people there, we can take steps like assigning one instead of three police officers to a patrol, while increasing the frequency of patrols to give an impression that we have increased our manpower there"

"It wouldn't fool Orochi, but would make the people there feel safe," Aoshi concurred.

"Now, what should we do?" Yamagata asked.

Aoshi turned toward the two. "We have to wait until our enemy makes his move"

A day after that, in Orochi's headquarters, he was also looking at a map of Japan. Then the door opened and his followers, along with Neuwindst entered. "Welcome to the meeting. I am sorry for calling forth this emergency meeting" he said.

"We've heard about the shooting," Neuwindst answered. "Never thought the Meiji will grow some spine and do such a thing"

"I admit I find this new development a bit disturbing, the current government is not as naïve as we thought" Orochi said. "They are willing to do everything to achieve their objectives"

"Feh, like that is something new" Shingo said.

"So what should we do?" Yuri asked.

Orochi smiled. "Why, take advantage of the current situation, of course. Remember Saigo Takamori's revolt?"

"Can't say I do" Neuwindst replied. "Care to enlighten me?"

"For your information," Shingo said, "Three years ago, a prominent samurai named Saigo Takamori wanted the government to preserve the samurai status. As you know, the samurais are full time warriors, and are not needed in the peace that the Meiji government advocates. So he wanted the government to send them to Korea and China to conquer some lands, thus improving their reputation and influence"

"And the government policy makers, not being half assed idiots all the time sensed Takamori's intention and refused. Then Takamori got pissed off and got his men to attack the government. And both sides got hurt pretty badly" Meikira continued.

"During the revolt, we had a chance to seize power, but due to some unforeseeable circumstances, we were unable to do so" Orochi said. "According to my previous calculation, the opportunity to topple the Meiji government will present itself in three months' time. But now, due to an unexpected move made by them, the general population will be in a state of fear"

Meikira crossed his arms. "And the government gets to play the role of the protector of the people. And the people will be very hesitant to voice their discontent against the government. So, our plan to cause a popular uprising against it has failed"

"True," Orochi admitted. "But to play the role of the protector, they will need to take steps to increase the sense of security, such as increasing the number patrols or the number of policemen on duty. They win the psychological war, but at the cost of straining their security forces. With proper planning, I believe that we can seize control of the country within a week"

Murmurs and questioning sounds echoed throughout the room.

"A week! That's way beyond me," Neuwindst remarked.

Meikira grinned. "I think I got understandwhat you're planning. Since the police force wouldn't want to protect the politicians, you want us to kill them, inducing more fear and forcing them to use more of their personnel and resources on protecting the people"

"The killing will not be done by us, but the other ninjas under our pay or those opposing the Meiji. But they will need some weapons"

Neuwindst shook his head. "Oh, no. I don't think my people can work that fast. We're still finishing your order of weapons. You'll get them in two or three days, no problem. But for theirs, I'll need another two weeks"

Orochi nodded. "I have had anticipated that. That is why we will get them from the military's weapon warehouse not far from Tokyo tonight at midnight" He turned toward Yuri.

Yuri bowed. "I'll carry out the mission"

"No. Shingo and Neuwindst will do it"

Disappointment was evident in the female ninja's eyes.

"You, Meikira and Ryo, along with your squad, will lay a siege to a fortified military outpost 50 miles from the warehouse. I need all of you to keep it under attack for at least two hours so that the military will send backup from the warehouse. It will make Shingo and Neuwindst's job easier"

Yuri was shocked by the order. It was apparent that Orochi still believed in her abilities, asking her to carry out a task some people would have said as impossible, as the place would be heavily guarded. She looked at Meikira and Ryo. Meikira, dubbed as the 'Puppeteer from hell' was a master of mechanical contraptions. Together with Neuwindst's cooperation, he had just completed a new contraption. It was probable that it would be used in the mission. Ryo, Asuka's teacher was unequalled in close combat. She smiled. Impossible was a word to use around the two of them. "I understand, Orochi-sama"

1

Author's note (1 October 2005)

1) Well, with the publishing of this chapter,it marks the end of the second phase of my story. So, the story is COMPLETE! Thank you! BYE!

Okay, the story is not finished. But this chapter marks the corner stone where there's no turning back. Barring any problems and accidents, I will write to the finish. It's been going on and off for two years, sometimes I thought of stopping, but well, with this chapter,chickening out is out of question, not unless I want my conscience to haunt me. I'm posting this from a Starbucks (Which is for me a kind of a celebration by itself as I don't frequent that place so much).

2)When I started, I was a bored kid (ha! a twenty three years old) with nothing to do. Funny how much time passed. Now I'm a twenty five man with no life and nothing else to do. I was aiming for 50,000 words. But I'm halfway done and I have passed the 50,000 marks!

3) I checked the stats and I calculated around 60-70 people read my story. That's good enough. I know my story is a bit lengthy and not much into action, but although I write for you, I also write for myself. I thank you for your patience (or impatience)

4)There's a question I would like to ask for you who will review this chapter (but don't feel forced to answer). Would you prefer Kaoru kill or not? I haven't written any thing on that one, so you answer the question, it will somehow affect the story a bit.

5) I would like to thank these people who has supported my work
:fujifunmum (being my editor, you can say she's my cowriter, rewriting sooooo many errors. And yet I still make more. :D)
ranma15177301291
keikoJ dog The Fic Critic
Annabella5
Geminidragon
Shandrial
WriterNotViking
kitiarauthmatar
funkmasterGT
Xenogenesis
Miguela
Nekotsuki
misenagi
kik-ting
bewarethemel
lolo popoki
star0704
kuroi
Crewel
TearsOfInfinity
flaming-amber
Hanabira
A lilmatchgirl
gabyhyatt
onime no kyo

(Am I missing someone here? If so, please tell me and I will put yours in the next chapter, that will be more exclusive. This offer is only to those who has reviewed before. Not to worry, as long as there's less than 100 reviewers, I'll put in you name later, probably in phase 3)

And all of you readers of this story. (Fanfiction gave me a bit of stats info, so I know you're there)

A lilmatchgirl -- I wondered whether I was in la-la land when I saw your comment. I rechecked and rechecked and felt something was amiss. But then I remembered typing more than that. I managed to delete it somehow. Sorry about that. But really, I meant the reply for you.

Crewel -- Well, I believe, we even have a bit of Aoshi/Misao and Orochi/Yuri. Ah, the beauty of having an aimless story with that built up slowly. In fact, I'm already considering writing another story that cut to the chase, but it wouldn't be this one.

lolo popoki -- glad you like it. I wanted Tomoe to appear at a very crucial moment later, but I somehow managed to come up with a better idea to replace that part. Although that seems like demoting her, but that part was inspired from an anime; this chapter is not (at least as far as I can remember. If there's a similarity with another story out there, it's a coincidence)

Hanabira -- Well, to tickle your imagination a bit, her fiance's name is Akira Kiyosato. So, what do you think happened up there? ;-)


This chapter was preread by fujifunmum