Rurouni Kenshin Fan Fiction ❯ Terms of Engagement ❯ Shifting Ground ( Chapter 4 )

 

AN: I have a tendency to write complicated characters and twisted plots. I'm trying to keep this fic simpler than some of my other multi-chapter nightmares, but I still love tinkering with character's heads…

 

Terms of Engagement

Chapter 4: Shifting Ground

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Tokio

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Toki seethed as she paced around her rooms. Her maid and other servants had long ago darted off to find important things to do in other rooms of the house as their mistress stalked back and forth snarling like an enraged tiger.

 

Saitou might be a bit more than you can handle.

 

“Me! Not being able to handle Saitou!” Toki growled to herself. “And you presume to think you could…” She glared at the neat stack of letters and correspondence she'd collected over the past weeks on her darling wolfish fiancée. “He'd eat you for dinner.”

 

That thought however brought other thoughts of other things Saitou might sink his teeth into if left in the same room with Sumire or Midori. What was it that Midori had said…

 

I wouldn't mind being bitten by that wolf.

 

Toki snarled, and stamped away from the letters, as if they had insulted her. “You both should stay with your well equipped boys. Saitou is out of your class.”

 

He is quite a man, and you are…well, very young.

 

“And you are very old. Face it Midori, the reason you were willing to lower yourself to marry one of a group of ronin was because you're getting past marriageable age. In a year or two, the only place left for you is to become a temple maiden.” Toki glared at a flower arrangement then swung back around to snarl at the letters. “And sweet Sumire, the only reason you are there is because your father doesn't have the money to bribe some poor idiot to marry you.”

 

He might need someone a bit more experienced…

 

“Experienced! Ha!” Toki scooped up her intelligence reports. “And you nominate yourself to be his consolation, is what you meant Sumire?”

 

Toki dropped the letters as she pictured Sumire's face: round, with a soft pouting mouth, beautiful slanted dark eyes, a tiny button of a nose, and perfect porcelain skin. Just like Saitou's common woman Mei. She drooped a bit, then shook her head. “It means nothing. Nothing!”

 

“Lady…” A timid knock came from the door. “Lady. Your esteemed uncle wishes to speak with you in the garden.

 

Toki turned her head away with an irritated huff, then took a deep breath and nodded. “Very well, I will come directly.”

 

She quickly hid her reports, straightened her robes, and smoothed her expression into a serene, placid mask. As she stepped out the door, she nodded to the servant and walked down the hall to the garden. Her uncle as usual was sitting in expensive luxury, surrounded with all the trappings of an educated, pampered man.

 

“Tokio.” Her uncle gestured for her to attend him as she entered the garden, “I have some news for you.”

 

Toki bowed respectfully, and knelt on the indicated cushion. Her uncle had been out all morning and part of the afternoon, dressed in a formal kimono. An occurrence that had spread alarm through the house. Her uncle was notorious for lazing in till mid afternoon, and only wore formal clothes on rare occasions. That both had occurred at the same time, proceeded by him summoning her to the garden , boded little good.

 

“I have been talking to Serizawa.” He tapped an ornate fan distractedly against his palm, not looking at her. “We have come to the conclusion that Saitou is not the man for you. When making these arrangements, I was not informed that his lineage was so humble.”

 

Toki nodded, keeping her expression carefully neutral and her eyes demurely down on the ground, staring at the grass next to her uncle's cushion. She knew for a fact that her uncle had done an extensive background check on Saitou before he ever agreed to the betrothal. He could probably name Saitou's sister's neighbor's pets.

 

“When I brought this up to Serizawa, he was quite apologetic.” Uncle Choju smiled distantly. “Yes, quite apologetic.”

 

Toki nodded again, wondering what form of apology her uncle had extracted from Serizawa. Serizawa wasn't a fool, but neither could he risk offending her uncle, or more importantly her and through her, her father and the Lord of Aizu. Whatever her uncle had gained, to supposedly sooth their family's offended honor, must have been lavish.

 

“He agreed that a marriage between you and Saitou would be a disgrace to our family, however, he did suggest a remedy to the situation.” Uncle Choju was nearly purring in happiness.

 

Toki braced herself. Whenever her uncle sounded like that, it meant trouble. He had come up with a new way to make her life difficult.

 

Saitou

 

Saitou shifted on his futon, trying to relax. He had finally arrived back at headquarters, after putting up with his companions idiotic posturing, and just wanted to try to get the stain of a mission gone horribly wrong out of his head. Serizawa probably wouldn't agree with him about the mission's success. After all, the traitor was punished for the death of two good men. However, Saitou considered it an absolute failure. It was one thing to punish a traitor, and protect the lives of others whose only duty was to see to the protection of the citizens of Kyoto, but to purposefully…

 

Saitou twitched again. It wasn't that he hadn't seen worse in the bloody mess that passed for Kyoto's streets. Cleaning up the butchered remains of both fighters and innocents had become as much a part of his patrol duties as trying to prevent those crumpled discarded bodies from appearing in the first place.

 

It was the glee in his crazed partner's eyes that made the whole thing a mockery. Killing was not a game to delight in. It was a duty, a requirement to protect others. It was an end to all possibilities. It was a dirge to the soul, singing the loss both to the dying and to the killer. All balanced on the edge of a blade as it rushed through the air.

 

Saitou sat up staring at the shadowy forms that inhabited his room at night, looming shapes in the darkness that in the light faded into harmless chests, racks, and other everyday things. At night, they took on a different look, a different demeanor. He looked around the room, feeling suddenly cold. Wasn't this his life? In the day all was bright and honorable, but at night, things became harder to distinguish, all shades of gray, everything taking on different faces, making everything more difficult to understand.

 

Not for the first time, he wondered what he had gotten himself into. His father had drilled into him early that he had a duty to his country. He was meant to serve, to give all so that Japan could become a place of beauty and greatness. But where did that leave him? At the end of the day, after seeing a foolish, desperate man butchered by an insane, and probably just as traitorous, man, could he really say that Japan was a place of beauty and greatness? That it was even a place he wanted to stay in when the insane returned to a hero's welcome while the foolish were left to rot at the side of the road?

 

He shook his head and settled back, wondering if he would be able to relax if he went to see Mei. He needed the physical release she could provide, but again, is that what he wanted? Or perhaps Serizawa had the right idea? Could a wife really be the answer? Someone to come back to and say, “Yes, this is what I am fighting for. See those children, they are mine and they are the future. See that woman, she is my wife, and to keep her safe, I will fight.”

 

He didn't want the woman Serizawa had selected for him though. Serizawa had given him the joyous news of his freedom from his not so beloved fiancée as soon as he had finished describing the events that had taken place on that damned bridge. Perhaps his superior had seen the misery…

 

Not bloody likely. Saitou snorted, rolled over and tugged the blankets up over his shoulders irritably. He was getting maudlin in the night. Next he'd shedding melodramatic tears of self pity and maybe swearing off killing for the rest of his life, like a dimwitted hitikori he was acquainted with. Maybe he'd take a vow and spend the rest of his life wandering around in a melancholy fog trying to redeem himself for all the world's failings. After all, wasn't that what the heroes of old used to do after they had slaughtered their way into legend? Maybe he could shave his head and become a monk. That would go over well with his family. His sister would glare at him and ask if he'd received any head wounds lately, while his brother snickered and rolled his eyes from the sidelines. His father would stomp away swearing that he never fathered such a son, while his mother would try her best to see something, anything, positive about the whole disaster. She'd probably comment that being bald was a refreshing change, and so easy to care for while traveling.

 

He twisted around again, impatiently kicking his feet as the covers tangled around them. Sleep. Just go to sleep. Perhaps he should go see Mei. At least for a few moments, he would be able to forget the sight of Takada screaming for mercy as Shinohara laughed and slowly, piece by piece, cut the life out of the pathetic remains of what had once been a man.

 

Tokio

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Toki trundled down the street escorted by her doting and adoring husband-to-be. The fact that her adoring fiancée was no longer Saitou, but a rather shocked Okita, made her want to throw her head back and howl with frustration. Instead, she burped, wiped her mouth on her sleeve, and gave her head, once again adorned with a battalion of gaudy ornaments, a shake, causing the little bangles to chime together like coins in a tin cup.

 

“Oh, look at the beautiful flowers.” Okita gave her a wobbly imitation of his usual charming smile as he gestured to where a street vendor had pots of flowers for sale. “not that they compare to your beauty.”

 

Toki glanced at them dismissively, and shrugged her padded shoulders. “Flowers make my nose itch.” She grinned inwardly at the falter in the already waning smile. Sorry Okita, Saitou already tried pointing out the beauty of nature. It didn't work for him; it won't work for you. “I had to have them all dug out of my garden.” She looked off into the distance pretending to be lost in memory, and picked at one of her fake acne eruptions for good measure. “There was one stubborn old wisteria plant that had to be chopped out with an axe… Must have been about two hundred years old. A real nuisance.”

 

“Uh, well, I'm glad that…” Okita faltered at the thought of the desecration of a two hundred year old wisteria but rallied back. “…your garden is now a source of tranquility for you.”

 

Toki grunted. That comment is just too easy. She turned and waddled delicately over to a vendor selling some of the cheapest, most hideous cloth in the whole market. “Look. Wouldn't that look perfect as seat cushions?” She paused to bat her overly kholled eyelashes at him coyly. “I'll make you some.” She paused, frowning and tapping her chin thoughtfully. “Well, I'll have someone make them for me.” She turned to the vendor and gestured to a bolt of cloth that looked like a cow had been sick on it, concealing a small smirk at the horrified look on Okita's face. “I just could never find the sense of learning to sew. That's what servants are for…Right? I'll have them embroider our names on them too. You can use them in that common room of yours where you play games.” She motioned for the vendor to cut off an obscene amount, enough for plenty of stomach-churning cushions for the entire Shinsengumi. “Won't that be nice.”

 

Okita made a tiny choking sound that might have been a yes. She didn't blame him. It had been a trying day on his nerves, and while he may have been equal to or better than Saitou with a sword, he didn't have Saitou's…stamina for dealing with the horrors of… well, her. So far, she had wallowed her way through a group meal at a fine restaurant with all the elegance and grace of a pig at a trough; hauled him through a hellish episode of him trying on new, not to mention gaudy, badly made, and itchily cheap robes; and made sure he knew, intimately, that she had eaten miso, garlic and liver before meeting with him and the others. And Saitou had looked jittery over a bit of sweat and dirty fingernails.

 

Toki took a deep, pleased breath, turned to the rest of the market square and considered her options. There was a small booth selling noodles, a perfect place to drop food on Okita. There was the cobbler, ideal for showing off the dirty tattered socks she'd unearthed from the gardener's shed. Over at the other end of the market was a small booth selling sake and western ale, just right for a few more deep throated burps and perhaps a comment or two about flatulence and bodily odors. Of course the leavings of the cattle and horses that moved through the market would supply endless amounts of opportunities as well.

 

She smiled at Okita, whose large brown eyes were already looking a bit stunned. You're no match for me little man. Next time, stick with swords. You aren't cut out for this type of combat.

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