“Thank you for coming”.
“Have a good night.”
“Be careful of patrols.”
Five young, feminine voices sang out their
farewells to their group of five, accompanied with much giggling and coy looks.
Kenshin felt his cheeks redden as Sakamoto Ryoma bid his own effusive good byes
to the women standing at the back door of the pleasure house. When one of them
turned sly, painted eyes at him, he resolutely fixed his own gaze on the dark
alley they were standing on. In this situation, sensitive hearing was not a
blessing as he heard several clear invitations for the ‘red-haired boy’
to come visit anytime he wanted.
Mortifying, at the very least. And the unholy glint
in Sakamoto’s eyes as he looked at him convinced him without a doubt that he
would never hear the end of this. His chin sank deeper into the folds of the
scarf wrapped around his throat, tugging the soft folds higher up to conceal
his too distinctive scar. What the cloth could not obscure, the falling bangs
did well to conceal. It was why he had let his hair grow uncut over the months,
the longer strands serving to cover his scarred cheek and some of his face. He
thought that he had successfully kept anyone from seeing it, keeping his head
down and sticking to the shadows during the quick walk through the house’s
corridors. For sure, if the women had recognized him, they would not be teasing
and tormenting him like this all throughout the short walk… would they?
Tasuki took point, the weak light of his
half-covered lantern leading the way, the other two men taking guard position
behind him. Small roads criss-crossed the path they were taking and Tasuki deftly
took a turn here, a bend there, guiding them through confusing twists and
turns. The dimly lit warren of alleys was the reason why they had taken the
short cut through the brothel. The alleys were seldom patrolled, the guards
staying more on the main roads. These times, getting caught outside during late
hours could very well result in immediate charge of illegal activity and
summary execution on the spot. In the past, many patrons seeking night
entertainment had been smuggled discreetly out through the back door of the
house. Recently, the sympathetic owner and workers of the house had extended
the custom to allow many shishi to come into their domain and made use of the
back roads to disappear.
As they walked, Sakamoto fell back to where Kenshin
trailed behind to guard the end of their little procession.
“They seemed to like you.”
Kenshin stifled a groan. “Can we not talk
about this, please?”
“About what?”
He laughed softly when Kenshin glared at him and
put his hands up. “All right, all right. Let’s talk of something else then.”
Sakamoto slowed his walking until a distance had opened up between the two of
them and the rest of the escort, then he murmured, “Do you know that Okubo
Toshimitchi will be coming tonight?”
Kenshin threw Sakamoto a startled glance and
lowered his voice. “No, I didn’t. When did he contact us?”
“The girls back there just told me.” At Kenshin’s
look, he elaborated, “We often use them to pass messages. So far it has worked
beautifully. What, do you think I’m there just for fun?” He gave Kenshin a
wicked grin, but sobered quickly. “But I’m telling you this for a reason.”
Sakamoto’s voice was pitched low enough that Kenshin could barely hear him.
“When we get back, whenever Katsura goes to meet him, I want you to stay with
him. If he tries to send you away, tell me and I’ll come and make him see some
sense, even if I have to sit on him.”
Kenshin stared at him. “You believe…”
“I believe nothing,” Sakamoto cut in, his face
hard. “For something as important as this, it’s better to be prepared for the
worst – if just so that it may never come to pass. And Kenshin… I want you to
watch for attacks from more than one direction.” His grim eyes caught
Kenshin’s. “The last few days, Katsura had managed to sweet-talk and bully
those hard heads back at the mansion to agree to a meeting, but some of them
were very unhappy about it. Most of those men I wouldn’t trust as far as I
could throw them, but you and Katsura went a long way back. You, I can trust.
Don’t let anything happen to him.”
Kenshin hold his gaze without flinching. “I won’t.”
Hesitated, then added more softly. “Thank you.”
Sakamoto just patted him lightly on the shoulder.
Suddenly he frowned at something in front. Kenshin looked up and stopped. The
lantern light that had been leading them was no longer moving. Tasuki raised a
hand and everyone froze where they were. Kenshin tilted his head, listening
hard. For a moment, there was nothing. Then faint sounds of footsteps drifted
on the silent air, coming from where the end of the small alley in front opened
into the main road. Faint sounds of idle conversations drifted to where they
were standing. Tasuki waved his hand back urgently, making a handsign. Patrols.
Suddenly the lantern light was gone, doused. Darkness leapt back to surround
them, but not enough. Kenshin looked back to see the long narrow alley they had
come from, and the few scattered lights hanging from some of the houses. The
lights were very faint, but it was enough to illuminate their group of five.
The nearest intersection was a long way back, too far away to reach without
running and making enough noise to give themselves away.
Tasuki and the other two men was starting to inch
their way back cautiously, but they were moving too slow. All it took was one
casual look down the alley mouth from one of the patrols, and they would be
discovered. Tasuki’s expression looked strained. When he caught Kenshin’s look,
he put both hands’ index fingers and thumbs together, forming a triangle.
Shinsengumi.
Kenshin’s heart sank. The patrol was not supposed
to pass here so soon. By necessity, the Ishin Shishi agents in Kyoto
religiously kept track of the various night patrols, particularly those by
Shinsengumi who were more prone to kill first and ask questions later. But
lately, their pattern had changed and no one knew why. More frequency, more
areas covered, less predictability. Just their rotten luck to chance upon one
of their variations.
His heart began to pound faster. Tasuki and the two
guards’ body seemed to move in an exaggerated slow motion out of a Kabuki play.
The patrol would pass right in front of them, and the Shinsengumi was not
likely to miss them. A memory of the too-fresh image from last night twisted
inside him. An inevitable fight was coming, yet he found himself intensely
reluctant to face it.
But maybe...there was another way. He narrowed his
eyes, furiously trying to weight the advantages against the dangers. It had
worked before. Hopefully it would work again.
Kenshin leaned towards the man beside him.
“Sakamoto-san,” he whispered, “whatever happens, just follow Tasuki’s lead. And
don’t go after me.” He ignored the man’s questioning look and quickly,
soundlessly from long practice, moved to the mouth of the alley. On the way, he
looked at Tasuki whose eyes widened before he nodded back in understanding.
The footsteps were less than five meters away.
Kenshin took a deep breath, readying himself. Then he stepped out of the street
corner and walked into the open.
Right in front of the Shinsengumi patrol.
They saw him immediately. One of them called out to
him gruffly, not yet realizing the identity of the man in front of them. “Hey,
you! No loitering in the street after dark. What are you doing there?”
Kenshin stood with his right side facing
them. As the man with the lantern walked nearer, the former hitokiri tossed his
head aside to reveal his left cheek. The light of the lantern gleamed off the
dark reddish sheen of his long hair, and the very distinctive cross scar on his
face.
The reaction was instantaneous.
“BATTOUSAI!!”
The scream of recognition was the signal Kenshin
had been waiting for. He exploded forward, fingers taut around his katana’s
hilt. One deadly flash of arcing steel, and the scout with the lantern fell to
the ground choking on blood from a slashed throat. The Shinsengumi had not been
prepared for anything like this, and they instinctively flinched aside. Kenshin
shot through their loose formation and out the other end. His dash quickly took
him around the corner and out of sight.
“Nan…”
“KUSO!!”
“GET HIM--!”
All nine men turned right around and chased after
the fleeing swordsman, leaving behind the dead scout and four Ishin Shishis
peering out from the alley mouth.
Sakamoto barely had time to gape before Tasuki
grabbed him by the arm and he was dragged headlong down the now empty street.
“Wait,” he hissed, craning his neck back, “what about him? He had the whole
*troop* after him.”
Tasuki did not even bother to slow down. “Aah,
he’ll be fine. He’s faster than they are, they’ll never catch him. He’ll just
lead them around for a while, then come back home. If we take it slow, he might
even arrive before we do.”
Sakamoto stared at the other man, only to see that
he was dead serious. “Hee…”
Tasuki veered into another dark alley, and after a
couple more twisting turns, they finally dropped into a fast walk. Sakamoto
glanced at the younger man. “Tell me,” he murmured, bemused despite himself.
“Do they always do that? Drop everything and run after him I mean.”
Tasuki’s teeth flashed white in the darkness
as he gave a quick grin. “Not always, no, but the Shinsengumi has this thing
against him. They absolutely hate him - he always managed to slip through their
fingers and make them look bad, you know? Not to mention the number of men he’d
killed. They always lose it when they see Himura, so we can slip people off
while they’re chasing after him.”
“Why do I have the feeling this is not the first
time you’ve done this?”
One of the guards laughed softly, “This is the
third time.”
Tasuki nodded, “We told Himura the last time
that it was too dangerous to try again. They have to wise up sooner or later.”
His eyes flickered towards Sakamoto. “But I suppose he thinks tonight is important
enough to take the risk.”
Sakamoto looked back at where they had come from.
Shaking his head at the whole outrageous thing, he had to ask one final
question, “Who the hell had come up with this crazy idea?”
Tasuki had a funny look at his face. “What, are you
mad? Of course it was Himura himself. D’ you think any of us is crazy enough to
suggest something like that to his face?”
***
“Stop!!”
Kenshin
sprinted along with half of his attention focused on the commotion behind him. He
could hear the Shinsengumi cursing and clattering behind him. Judging from the
sound, they were keeping up with him, and they were taking care that to stay
together, not strung out from the main group. They were learning, or their
leader was a smart man.
In
truth, it would be easy for him to outrun them. Their precaution protected them
from being cut down one by one, but it also slowed them down. However that was
not his intention. The further he could string them along, away from Sakamoto
Ryoma and the others, the better it would be. Which was why he had taken care
to keep only one step ahead of them, dangling himself like a prize capture in
front of them.
However,
it was time to end this.
Kenshin
put on a burst of speed, nearly slamming on a wall during a full-speed turn,
one palm slapping the wall to aid his turn without slowing down. The shouts
behind him grew more frantic as he turned a corner.
He
had not been running blindly. In his two years in Kyoto, he had tried his best
to memorize the areas, especially the complicated web of alleyways that connect
the back doors of the main roads. Ahead was a narrow six-roads junction, an
intersection in the middle of poor housing areas, each branching off into dark
alleys. This section of Kyoto was a veritable maze, and it would be easy to
loose them here.
He
burst out into the intersection, chose one road at random and ran down the
lightless passageway. He had nearly reached the end when a wavery yellow light
appeared from the opposite end, previously hidden by the walls. He had less
than a heartbeat of horrified realization, then he nearly collided head-on with
a group of men just turning into the alley.
There
were six of them. And they completely blocked his way out.
In
retrospect, it was probably better for all of them if he had just bulled his
way through, the way he had through the Shinsengumi. But it was too sudden and
his reflexes reacted faster than his thoughts could form, his legs skidding to
a stop a bare moment before he slammed against the first person.
The
man stared down at him in astonishment - a youth barely older than Kyosuke,
supplied his mind irrelevantly. The lantern he was carrying cast a weak light
on his black uniform, its somber color in contrast with the Shinsengumi’s more
flamboyant white-and-blues, and just as recognizable.
Iwamarigumi.
Oh gods.
They
locked eyes for an instant, Kenshin’s heartbeat thundering in his ears, seeing
the man’s mouth opening in slow motion to ask a question.
Then
another man behind him recoiled violently and cursed.
“Battousai!!
Kojiro, get away…”
The
blanket of ice snapped around his mind and his hand was moving before he was
conscious of it. Steel slashed through the lantern and the youth carrying it, a
barest of resistance as it sheared through rib cage. Blood spurted out of the
opened chest and the man’s mouth.
He
rammed his body against the dying youth and the body fell back, tangling some
of the men. His blood was singing in his veins, the visceral smell of fresh
blood hitting into his nerves and everything slowed down.
He
could see the men screaming in front of him, trying to shove the dead body away
and get to him, the narrow alley hindering them. He could hear the
Shinsengumi’s running steps behind him, drawn to the correct direction by the
sound of fighting.
He
only had seconds before they would trap him in the middle with no way to go.
Nine behind, five in front.
The choice was very clear.
He
was barely aware of his lips drawing back in a snarl and he sprang up and above
the tangle of men in front of him, both hands drawing the katana up and
slamming it down like a hammer from heaven. A glimpse of wide-open eyes, mouths
sagging in shock and his Ryuu Tsui-sen cleaved through two men at once,
one man’s head bursting like ripe melon and another sheared through from
shoulder to halfway down his chest. He twisted and wrenched his katana back,
landing lightly on the men’s still falling bodies and launched himself forward.
He
could hear the Shinsengumi halfway down the alley. He kept his concentration
focused ahead, to the remaining four men. Open space was behind their bodies,
the way out of the constricting walls, the way to life and freedom.
Speed.
Speed and viciousness. He had no time for anything else.
A
spear came thrusting for his chest and he smoothly half-turned his body away
from it, his katana angled vertical and slid screeching along the handle’s
length. The razor sharp edge sliced through the fingers holding the spear, and
into the man’s chest. Blood sprayed out in a curtain of red. The remaining man
hesitated, halfway between running away and charging him, terror and rage
making his pupils dilating in terror. If he ran, Kenshin would have let him go.
Instead,
the man charged him.
Kenshin
ducked down under the man’s clumsy thrust and sliced up from his lower
position, opening the man’s bowel in one ruthless slash. The man gave a wet
choke and hunched above him. A wet squelching sound from behind alerted him, and with an abrupt twist, his free hand thrust
his sheathed wakizashi angled and back. A heavy jarring skinned his left palm
bloody and nearly tore the hilt from his hand, but it deflected the thrust
coming for his back.
Before
the Shinsengumi who had attacked him recovered his balance, Kenshin twisted
around the last man’s falling body and ran for the exit. He burst out of the
alley and veered away from the rest of the Imawarigumi, stragglers who had
arrived too late to help their friends.
Kenshin
fled down one lightless road, chased by enraged howls and leaving a grisly
trail of dripping red behind him.
***
The
pursuit had taken on a quality of a nightmare, one that would not stop. He ran past
alley after alley, turned corners until he ran out of count. Several times he
thought he had lost them, but always they returned back, hot on his trail.
Kenshin
was acutely aware of the kind of trail he was leaving. The massacre in the
alley had practically drenched him with blood. Thin trails of it still dripped
from his hair, his clothes, his zori. The Shinsengumi could probably find him
simply by following the smell of fresh blood on him. It enveloped him in a
cloud, in the air he gasped in.
Blood
called to blood. The litany kept circling in his mind - the red in his vision
would not recede. He had to get the blood off of him somehow.
An
idea came to him. He put on a burst of speed, turning a corner and skidding
over the wet street surface. Puddles made splashing sound as he ran over them.
This alley he turned into was behind houses. He spied a low wall. There! Once he was out of sight, he
gathered all his strength and leapt up at the wall. He landed lightly, the
tiles under him barely making a sound, then jumped down into the deserted
backyard on the opposite side. The Shinsengumi would be thrown off for a while,
but that was not his only reason.
He
spied a well on one corner, two full buckets of water prepared for the night
standing beside it (or from the rain). A small piece of luck on this abyssmal
night. He ran over to it, and grabbing the bucket, he upended it over himself.
The cold water poured over him, sluicing off most of the still running blood on
him.
“Dare-ka?!”
Biting
off a curse, Kenshin threw the bucket to the middle-aged man emerging from the
outer restroom. He sped past towards the side yard, going for the front gate of
the house. He heard the man yelped in pain, but his concentration was focused
behind him. The shouts from the Shinsengumi indicated that they’d heard the
brief commotion and was onto him once more.
He
burst out of the front gate to the main road, his lungs burning from the run.
Some of the Shinsengumi were running for the main road, obviously trying to encircle
him and trap him in the house. There was no way he could reach the crossroad
before they saw him.
A
dim outline caught the corner of his vision. A shadowed side alley, the narrow
entrance blocked by wooden planks that had fallen across. Decision made, he
skidded and ran for the alley. The gap under the planks was barely big enough
for his small frame to squeeze through, definitely not big enough for a grown
man. He flattened himself against the wall and stilled himself.
Just
in time. The first of the Shinsengumi burst into the main road, encircling the
house. Shouts rang harsh in the late night air.
“Did
you see him?”
“Where is he?”
“He
didn’t pass your way?”
“Damn it, he can’t have gone far!”
“One
of you stay here, the rest split up and down the street.”
“Harada gumichou’s gonna kill us if
we lose him…”
“Get
going!!”
Kenshin
flattened himself against the alley wall. One trooper had loitered behind near
the alley. There was only one exit to this alley, but the moment he stepped out
the trooper would see him.
He’d
had to kill the man without any sound.
His
katana and wakizashi were too long for that kind of work. He reached over to
his back, where he kept Tomoe’s tanto. It would be perfect for slitting the
man’s throat. That conscious thought froze him before his fingers close over
the smooth handle.
No.
He
drew back his hand, silently drawing out his wakizashi instead. He would not
stain her tanto for this kind of thing.
The
sentry was facing the wrong way, hand lax on his katana hilt. He was not really
expecting any danger. Kenshin crept near the entrance on silent feet, his ki
damped down to its lowest level. The man did not move.
Hitokiri
Battousai leapt out of the alley, crossing the distance to his prey in one
bound. The man started to turn, but it was too late. One swift kick to the back
of knees, and he crumpled to the ground on his knees, his cry of surprise
silenced by one ruthless palm clamped over his mouth. The blade of the
wakizashi pierced his back, through the heart, the stained steel-tip jabbing
out of the man’s white and blue vest. The man gave a faint, incoherent gurgle,
clawing at the blade poking out of his chest. It took a mere two seconds for
him to fall limp, another second for his killer to step back, allowing the body
to fall to the ground face-first.
Kenshin
gave the man one final appraising glance, satisfied that the trooper was dead,
then took off the other direction. He was four blocks away and out of the range
of the searching Shinsengumi when the thought hit him.
It
would have been just as effective to hit the man unconscious as to kill him.
***
continued
in chapter 13b…