Fushigi Yuugi Fan Fiction ❯ The Girl Who Didn't Believe ❯ Kamui ( Chapter 17 )

The Girl Who Didn't Believe

Hi, minna!! I'm back. Duh. ^^ Well, thanks to everyone who bothered to review this little fic of mine. Heheh…Nothing much except to please forgive me for the usual spelling, tenses and grammar mistakes. Gomen nasai!! And please, please review after reading this chapter!! I need all the feedback I can get, be it positive or negative. Arrigato gozaimasu!!

DISCLAIMER: I do not own any of the FY characters. They belong to Yuu Watase. I do own Kitten and Sable though.

`…' = thoughts

//…// = telepathic conversation

########## = at another place

^^^^^^^^^^ = recall

********** = dream sequence

That's all, minna!! Enjoy!!

Chapter 17-Kamui

The group had just reached Kutou. True enough, it was mid morning when they arrived at the capital. Chichiri, Tasuki, Kitten and Sable had awakened early in the morning and after a hasty breakfast, had break camp and continued the walk on to Kutou. The journey had been smooth, for everyone, actually mainly Tasuki and Kitten, who were still feeling sluggish from sleep.

The streets of Kutou were just as busy as that of Konan, only that the atmosphere here is more…feral. Whereas Konan exuded a generally cheerful ambience, Kutou's was slightly menacing.

Unconsciously, the two girls pressed closer to their male counterparts and the two seishi tensed slightly in preparation for whatever that might happen.

"Tasuki, no da, I think it is best if you go behind and guard the mules while I stay in front. In this way, it is harder for anyone to try to attack us, no da."

"Hai." Tasuki nodded and fell back to the rear.

Chichiri turned to the girls next.

"Kitten and Sable, no da, can you two please stay in the middle, no da? I don't want anything to happen to the both of you, no da, and Tasuki can help guard your backs and I can guard the front, no da."

Kitten raised an eyebrow.

"In other words, we puny little girls are to stay in the center with the mules while you two strong, macho men protect our weakling hides, is it?"

Sable sweatdropped.

"Anou…Kit, now is not the time for feminism…"

"Hai, no da, and I did not mean it by that way, no da. I know that you girls can protect yourselves; I just do not want us to be caught by surprise, no da."

Kitten nodded at last.

"Well…okay then. Let's go, Sab." Kitten pulled Sable to the center, where the mules were.

Sable rolled her eyes but she followed obligingly.

"Honestly, Kit, must you know the reason for everything?"

Kitten did not bother to answer.

The group traveled in silence for the next five minutes.

"Hey Chichiri!! Do you know where we are going? Or are we just gonna walk round and round this place?"

Chichiri sighed. Was a little peace and quiet so much to wish for?

"Iie, Kit, we are not going to walk round and round Kutou, no da; it is too dangerous to do so, no da, and hai, I know where we are going, no da; we are going to an inn as soon as I can find a respectable one, no da."

"Oh I see…" Kitten said thoughtfully. "When are we gonna find a `respectable' inn?"

`Judging by the fact that most of Kutou are slums, we aren't gonna find any for a long time.' A certain redhead thought sourly.

"I heard you, Tasuki!!" Kitten laughed.

Sable sweatdropped while Chichiri shook his head.

Tasuki ignored all of them.

Suddenly, a gang unkempt-looking men intercepted the group and sauntered over to the girls. They leered lecherously at Kitten and Sable, who glared back.

"My, my…" The leader said. "What beautiful women you have here…how much are they?"

Kitten was flabbergasted.

Those morons actually thought that both of them were for sale!!

"Sirs," Sable said firmly. "You are mistaken, we are not for sale."

"Yeah," Kitten snarled. "What did you think we were, fucking whores?!!"

The leader touched Kitten's chin then. "Fiesty, eh? I love it." Turning to an astonished Chichiri and a rapidly angering Tasuki, he said. "I want her. How much is she?"

Kitten broke away from the man's hold and raised a hand to slap the bastard. However, the man saw it and put an immediate stop to it by gripping hold of both her hands. Thus held, Kitten was helpless.

"Let go of her now!! You fucking baka!!" Tasuki roared then, even as he whipped out his tessen.

The man smirked and deliberately lowered his oily lips to touch Kitten's exposed neck. The blue-haired girl growled and struggled, but to no avail.

"Or you will what? Hit me to death with that toy fan of yours?"

Tasuki snarled but knew that the man was right. With Kitten acting as an unwilling shield, he could not make full use if the harisen.

Sable edged slowly towards the man who held Kitten captive.

//The usual, Kit?//

//Hai, the usual.// Kitten nodded.

However, before Sable could do anything, one of the men spotted the brunette and held her captive.

Tasuki started to cursed fluently then, and even Chichiri hissed out a swear word or two.

"Boss!! Looks like this girlie wants to have a piece of you too!!" The men laughed.

"Okay, then, I will take her too, and maybe gift her to you guys when I'm done!!" the leader said, looking at Sable lecherously.

Kitten hissed and started to demand for the men to respect Sable.

Sable, on the other hand, merely kept quiet but in actuality her mind was rushing for an idea. Sure enough, she got it.

//Chichiri, can you hear me? Chichiri?//

Silence for a moment, then an answer.

//Hai.//

//Listen, Chichiri, can you use your magic?//

//Hai, I can, but not without hurting you two.//

Sable pondered that for a while. Then she remembered an episode in Fushigi Yuugi where the blue-haired seishi had managed to freeze Nakago.

//What about freezing spells, Chichiri? Can you do that?//

Chichiri started. Sable was right. However, he had not thought of it as he had been beside himself with worry.

//Hai, I can. Be prepared.//

Chichiri chanted an incantation rapidly and sure enough, the two men holding Sable and Kitten suddenly found themselves unable to move.

"What is going on?" The men asked even as the two girls wriggled out of their grasp.

Tasuki looked confused too. However, when he saw that the two men were now defenseless, he grinned a fanged grin.

"Time for some fun."

The redhead swung his tessen in a wide arc even as the girls scrambled out of range.

"Rekka Shin'en!!"

Fire burst out of the fan and engulfed the squeaking men. When the smoke cleared, the two men were still frozen in position, the only difference from before was that they looked slightly charred.

"That is what you get for messing with my woman!!" Tasuki smirked.

The rest of the men who had escaped unharmed, upon seeing that their leader was frozen and burnt, immediately leapt in to fight the seishis, figuring that their sheer numbers would defeat the two men.

They were wrong.

Firstly, they had not taken into consideration that both men had seishi abilities.

Secondly, they had not counted on the girls joining in the fight.

Sable and Kitten had gotten separated during the fight. Somehow, Kitten had managed to end up fighting beside Tasuki while Sable had ended up somewhere in the thick of things. She got her hands full in fighting men.

Chichiri, on the other hand, was at the opposite end of the trio, somewhere beside the mules. The once crowded street, upon witnessing Tasuki's holy fire, had emptied.

Chichiri ki blasted people left and right as he fought hard to reach Sable, whom he could see was rapidly tiring. However, he took too long as one of the men suddenly got the upper hand of Sable.

Chichiri watched with horror as the man raised a hand and hit Sable hard on the face. The brunette flew backwards, hitting a wall hard.

Chichiri grimaced. He had felt the impact against the wall and also the slap on the face as keenly as if he was Sable. Such was the strength of the bond the pair shared.

Chichiri fought harder when he realized that the man was still not done with Sable.

The man smirked and walked to where Sable was sprawled on the floor. He drew back his foot and was about to direct a vicious kick to the brunette's middle when he was abruptly interrupted.

By a sword.

Protruding from his middle.

The man stared with bewilderment at the weapon that had skewered him. He continued staring as the blade withdrew slowly from its hideous sheath. When that was done, the man finally realized that he had been stabbed and screamed a scream of pain before collapsing in a bloody heap beside Sable.

Sable looked with morbid fascination at the bleeding man beside her. Her vision extended to the bloody sword. Fighting fear, she looked up.

"Na…Nakago?" She muttered, incredulous.

She squinted at the man standing before her.

`No,' she thought. `no, he is not Nakago. He may have the same handsome blonde features of the former shogun of Seiryu, but he was not Nakago. Who is this man?'

"Who are you, no da?"

Sable looked to a side and saw Chichiri. He was still fighting off some men.

"Chichiri…" Sable struggled to get up to help fight.

The blonde man stared at her sharply then.

"Stay put. I will take care of the rest." He merely said, no, commanded as he turned to stand beside the blue-haired seishi, sword raised and ready for conflict.

Sable watched within the relative safety of the two men as they fought: Chichiri with his magic and ki blasts; the blonde man with his flawless sword skills. She also could not help observing that the man was very tall, even taller than Chichiri was. Where Chichiri was slim and nimble, this man was slickly muscled and very agile. Very soon, Tasuki and Kitten joined the duo and most of the hooligans were vanquished, except for the leader.

Tasuki was about to finish off the disgusting man when he interfered.

"Iie."

Tasuki turned to stare at the blonde. Amber eyes widened when the redhead saw the man's uncanny resemblance to Nakago.

"What the…"

He walked forward, ignoring Tasuki's sputtering.

Once he was in plain view of the pathetic, quivering man, he flicked his sword to remove all stains of blood and returned it back to its sheath in one smooth motion.

The barely veiled threat was not lost on the man, and he whimpered. However, the blonde's next word gave him temporary relief.

"Go."

"Go and hide." He said, much to Tasuki and Kitten's protests. "I am giving you a chance to live after what you had done."

The man nodded desperately and started thanking the blonde man feverishly.

The man's eyes merely froze over and he moved away with veiled revulsion.

"Don't thank me. I am giving you one day to hide before I set my people on you." The leader's eyes widened with dawning comprehension.

The blonde smiled slowly then, a smile full of malicious promise. "And let me tell you something before you take your leave; nobody hurts Sable and live to tell the tale. Nobody." He emphasized.

The man finally understood. He whimpered, turned tail and fled.

"Happy hiding."

The five watched as the man disappeared from their sight. Then Kitten broke the silence.

"My god, Sable, are you all right!! I saw the bastard slam you against the wall. Are you feeling okay?"

Sable attempted to stand up but failed miserably. It seemed that her legs were not working too well, thanks to the fright she had earlier.

Chichiri was about to go to the brunette and help her up when the mysterious man strode past him and scooped the surprised girl up, much to Chichiri's secret annoyance.

"Iie, it's okay really. I can stand by myself…" Sable trailed off when she realized that he was not going to listen.

Kitten frowned then.

"Who are you and why did you help us?"

"Yeah," Tasuki added. The man's resemblance to Nakago had unnerved him slightly, not that he would ever admit it. "And how did you know Sable?"

The man turned and stared them all in the eye.

"My name is Kamui, and that's all I will tell you. For now, Sable's health is more important. We will go to my place, where there will be medical assistance." He said expressionlessly.

`Kamui…so his name is Kamui…' Sable mused. She squeaked and clutched on for dear life when Kamui started moving.

"Let's go now; if you want your answers." The man tossed the words behind him.

Kitten shrugged but she did gather the leads of the mules and fall in behind Kamui.

"Come on, Tasuki, Chichiri. He is going to leave all of us behind if we don't hurry up!! Let's follow him!!"

"Follow him?" Tasuki asked incredulously even as he started walking after Kitten. "For all we know, this man might be leading us to our deaths!!"

The blue-haired girl rolled her eyes.

"What do you propose then, Tasuki? That we leave Sable with him?"

"Tasuki, no da. Kitten is right. We have to follow them. And if he wanted us dead, he would have killed us earlier, no da. I have seen his sword skills, and they were magnificent, no da."

Tasuki grumbled but said no more. The rest of the trip was made in silence as the group pondered on this sudden twist of events.

##########

Sable stared at Kamui.

She had been doing nothing but that for the past five minutes.

Not that she had anything else to do.

"Have you stared at me enough?"

Sable started. Kamui had not looked at her ever since he picked her up; how did he know that she was staring at him?

"I can feel your stare, you know."

Sable was REALLY surprised now.

"Na…NANI!! You can read thoughts too?!!"

The blonde man looked down at the girl then.

"Iie, I cannot; but your face tells me all that I need to know."

Sable was feeling very stupid now.

"Oh. Anou…when will we reach your house, Sir?"

"Another five minutes more. And call me Kamui. I have called you Sable, didn't I?"

"H……hai, Kamui."

Kamui decided that he liked hearing the sound of his name coming from the Sable's mouth, and he nodded.

A few minutes passed by in silence.

"Are Kitten, Tasuki and Chichiri still behind?" Sable asked anxiously, craning her head backwards to look.

Kamui did not even bother.

"You have loyal friends; they will stick with you no matter what. You should be feeling lucky."

Sable stared at Kamui, surprised.

`That dratted man seems to be able to surprise me all the dratted time,' Sable thought with irritation. `But what had he meant by that? Don't he have friends too?'

Sable was about to ask when Kamui stopped in front of an impressively gigantic mansion.

Tasuki, Chichiri and Kitten drew up then.

"Anou…" Tasuki sputtered. "This is YOUR house?!!"

A raised golden eyebrow.

"Is there any problem with that?"

Tasuki shook his head.

"Damn, but you are filthy rich."

Kamui said nothing but waited patiently as scores of servants descended upon them.

Like the master they served, they were fast and efficient. In a matter of moments, the group was ushered into the foyer. One of the servants offered to take Sable but Kamui refused, ordering the man to go and get a physician instead.

Tasuki and Kitten looked at each other at the implication that Kamui had made with raised eyebrows. Chichiri looked slightly peeved.

Kamui and Sable did not see the reaction of the trio as the man was already striding somewhere else.

"Anou…" Kitten called after Kamui. "Where are you bringing Sable?"

"To a room."

"To a room?!!" The blue-haired girl squeaked, but the pair had already disappeared around the corner.

Kitten looked at Tasuki for help then. The redhead actually shrugged and even had the gall to grin back at her. Huffing slightly, Kitten rushed after the pair, with Tasuki and Chichiri trailing slightly behind.

It turned out that Kitten had worried for naught, as Kamui did not do much except to gently prop Sable on a bed. A harried looking physician came then, and he examined Sable under the watchful eyes of the four.

"She is not seriously injured, just badly bruised in the back and face. Nothing a few days' worth of rest can't cure."

"This settles a lot of things, one of which is that the group of you will be staying here for the next few days."

The foursome protested.

"We can't!!"

"You are too kind!!"

"We don't know you!!"

"We need to travel around Kutou, no da!!"

Kamui swept away all their objections with one question of his own.

"So, you will refuse me even if this concerns the well being of you friend here?"

Silence.

"Well…" Kitten put in a long time later. "I suppose that there is no harm in staying here; at least we won't have to look for an inn."

Tasuki and Chichiri looked at each other before agreeing, albeit a little grudgingly.

Kamui nodded with satisfaction and pulled a rope hanging beside the bed. In a matter of moments, a servant arrived.

`Prepare three more rooms for the guests. Put their belongings inside."

"Hai." The servant retreated.

The physician gathered his belongings and put them in his case.

"If there is nothing else, Kamui-sama?"

Kamui shook his head and dismissed the man.

When he turned back to face Sable, he noticed four pairs of eyes staring at him with surprise.

"Kamui-sama?!!" Kitten asked.

An imperceptible nod.

"Hai."

Tasuki was flabbergasted. Who the fuck was this guy? He narrowed his eyes. He wants some answers and he wants them NOW.

"Now that Sable is certified healthy, you can tell us who you really are."

Kamui stared at them long and hard, making all of them, with the exception of Sable, fidget with discomfort.

"I am the chief advisor for the emperor of Kutou." He said at last, and Chichiri had the impression that he was humoring them.

`Chief advisor!!' Sable thought. `That is the highest post an official can get, if I am not wrong!!'

"Nani!!" Tasuki cried out in disbelief. " Uso yo!! You are what, only twenty-one years old? You are too young to hold such an important post!!"

Kamui raised an eyebrow.

"I am twenty five, Suzaku shichi seishi Tasuki."

"Demo…demo…" Kitten sputtered. "That is still quite young an age for a chief advisor."

A negligent shrug.

"So? They say that I'm good."

There was a moment of silence as everyone digested that fact.

"I believe that you are from the Hin tribe, no da?"

"Hai."

Tasuki stiffened then.

"Are you by any chance related to that fucking bastard Nakago?" He asked in a dangerously soft voice.

Kamui stared at Tasuki with mild amusement.

"Iie."

Tasuki relaxed visibly then, much to the chagrin of Kitten.

"How did you know of Sable when the two of you have never even met, no da?"

Kamui stared at Sable then, and Sable stared back, drawn unwillingly into the sky blue depths.

"I had known of her existence two days ago." Kamui said, still holding Sable immobile with his eyes. "I had also learnt of the reason of her being here; which was why I came and helped to get rid of those men."

"Suzaku told you about us?" Kitten asked.

But Chichiri knew better.

Magnificent, efficient, fast, alert, intelligent and so much more, Kamui was the exact embodiment of one god and one god only.

Seiryu.

"Iie, Kitten," the blue-haired seishi cut in quietly. "Suzaku didn't tell him…it was Seiryu who did…"

The girl reared back with shock and Tasuki whipped out his tessen.

Is Kamui supposed to be a challenge sent by Seiryu?

The man in question merely smiled.

"Iie, Seiryu had told me about what happened; about why you were brought in; about the challenges. Believe it or not, I am not Seiryu's challenge."

"If you are not Seiryu's challenge," Tasuki asked cautiously. "Then why did he sent you to us for?"

Kamui looked at Sable again, making the brunette squirm slightly.

"I am here to protect what is mine."

Kitten and Tasuki, not to mention Chichiri and Sable, were all confused.

"What do we have that is yours?" Tasuki asked again.

The man didn't reply.

Instead, he strode to the bed, bent down, captured a surprised Sable with his hands and kissed her tenderly on the lips.

"Na…nani?!!" Sable stammered.

Kamui smiled, and for once it was a real smile, one of genuine amusement.

"Don't you understand, Sable? I am here to protect you."

Chapter 17 completed!! Nothing to write except to please do not try to think of Kamui as Nakago. If you do, you'd realize that Kamui is too OOC to be Nakago. However, in a way, Kamui is like Nakago, but he is not evil. Not that evil anyway. I try to think of Kamui as what Nakago might be like if he had had a happy childhood without all the war and rape and the emperor abuse and thingy. ^^

If you have noticed, I did not add much of Chichiri's thoughts and feelings in this chapter. I didn't put it in because I wanted to focus on Sable and Kamui first. Furthermore I didn't want Chichiri to sound jealous and all when he was supposed to be thinking of Kouran. Therefore, for this chapter, all his thoughts would be for me to know and for you to guess!! ^^

Okay, that's all for now, minna!! Until next chapter (which will be most likely be up on next week), please help me review!! Arrigato gozaimasu!! ^__^