Rurouni Kenshin Fan Fiction ❯ Lost, But Not Forgotten ❯ Chapter 1

Lost, But Not Forgotten

 

A town, he said. Not far from here. That's where I should go. Go to the town. There's nothing for me here.

 

But still my legs won't move. The bodies... How can I leave the bodies to the animals? I look around at them. There are so many. Perhaps if I go to the town he mentioned... Perhaps one of the men will help me...

 

But I know they won't. Why would they help a slave? Who would help me besides these three women who died for me?

 

Besides that man who didn't even tell me his name?

 

I go back to the destroyed wagon. No shovels there, but I find a shorter sword that I can use to cut into the soft earth.

 

I will bury them. I will bury them all. Dig them holes. It's better that I'm doing it now. I couldn't have handled seeing their bodies destroyed by animals if I ever returned.

 

I'll bury them. It has become a mantra. It's how I forget about eating. How I manage to live for a week on nothing more than rainwater and the thought that these bodies couldn't be left to rot. Not one of them.

 

Digging holes takes a long time. But the worst of the jobs is moving the bodies. They are almost all men, and they are heavy. At first that is the only problem, but the last few bodies are worse. There is a stink now. So bad that I no longer have a wish for food. I only want to finish this difficult task. Throw dirt upon the last bandit and be done with it.

 

I'm exhausted when I'm done. Ready for that town now. Knowing it will be bad for me there. That it will be bad for me anywhere. A boy, a slave, whom the men called “pretty” and leered at. A boy would couldn't even protect three women who would die for him, let alone himself.

 

I hang my head in momentary shame, looking at their three sad mounds. I should mark their graves at least. They deserve more than that, but it's all I can do. Luckily there must have been a storm in this area not long ago. Several trees are down, their branches easily accessible. I have a hard time cutting with the sword. Its blade is dull from breaking the earth for me. But I have no choice. I have buried the other swords with their owners. This will have to suffice.

 

I make three crosses. Large markers, but something feels wrong about it. They should all be marked, shouldn't they? Is it right to only mark these three? Each of these men once had families and friends. They were once more than just bodies. They had lives and people who cared about them. Maybe no one would ever find these graves, but if I didn't at least mark them somehow, these people would be gone for real.

 

Something about that makes me sad. The idea that a person could disappear so completely. I begin the work of cutting more wood. Fashioning more markers.

 

I don't get the idea for the stones until I am done with the others. The stones were ugly, but they will work. Everyone is now marked, but these three are different. Clearly special. I only wish I could have found flowers for them. But sadly this isn't the time of year for that. Not even plum blossoms. Nothing.

 

Still I stand, as though waiting. Waiting for what? No one knows I'm here. No one cares. I'm only a slave with no family. I'm nothing, and no one would care if I died. No one would remember me.

 

No one would even know I had existed. Except for that man in the white cloak.

 

It is only then, with that thought, that I hear the footsteps approach. Looking up, I see him next to me. My savior. The tall, sad looking man.

 

What is that strange expression on his face? Why does he look at me like that? Like I'm something he's never seen before? I'm not anything special. I'm just a nobody.

 

And it isn't until he asks me for my name that I realize he cares. Isn't until he tells me my name won't work, that I am now Kenshin, that I realize that I'm not alone. That I'm not forgotten.

 

His name is Hiko Seijuro, and he says he will teach me.

 

Me... Shinta... whom he has renamed Kenshin...

 

And I think for a moment that maybe my life could matter after all.