Samurai Champloo Fan Fiction ❯ Wayward Wanderers ❯ Chapter 4

Wayward Wanderers: Chapter 4

 

He had the dream again two nights later. There were no details added. He awoke knowing nothing more than he did the last time, except that in his life, he'd never had the same dream twice. This time, Jin was not awake to talk him down from the numbing irrational fear that gripped him as he came out of it. Mugen wasn't about to admit that he needed to hear another person's voice to block out the sound of that goddamn chain. He decided once and for all that he didn't when he shoved himself to a sitting position and went down to the river. The water was high and muddy and filled his ears with a wide white roar.

 

He stood several paces away from where he'd heard Jin and Fuu talking earlier that night, when they thought he was asleep. He dropped onto his heals and sat there, wondering what the fuck was wrong with his fucking head that he was so hung up on things these days. His companions, for one. He thought his head was already too crowded with thoughts of food, booze, sex, and violence, and the occasional sprint away from shogunate men who kept coming after him. Now he had to go and add those two losers sleeping behind him to the mix. What a pain in the ass they were. He liked thinking about his upcoming fight with Jin. He liked thinking of Fuu laughing her head off at one of his jokes, but that was it. He didn't want the bother of worrying about their safety. He was really bad at worrying about other people.

 

Then there was this dream that he couldn't get out of his head.

 

He leaned to the side and picked up a smooth pale rock, worn down by years of current and then tossed on shore during a flood. He ran his hand across its surface, wiping away dust and a few ants. Then he straightened and started walking down along the bank, keeping it tucked under his arm. He walked until he came to a small pool out of the main current and kicked off his geta, stepping into the cool water up to his knees. He slid his tanto out of it's sheath and waited as tiny fish, frightened away by his entrance, began to return to the pool, some of them clustering around his ankles. He held his breath, automatically adjusting the angle of the blade for the illusions rippling water created. The knife flashed in the moonlight and stabbed downward. He brought it up with a wriggling, thrashing fish on the end. He held the tanto up to his face and looked the dying fish in the eye.

 

“Sorry, buddy,” he muttered before wading back to the side and picking up his rock. He squatted on the bank again, gutting the fish with quick sure slices of the knife. He stuck his fingers in the bloody mess and then, tongue between his lips, he drew with great care the man from his dream. Well, he drew the outline anyway, since he didn't ever see more than a shadow. His fingers drew the staff and the scythe at the end with as much detail as he could recall. As an after thought, without anything more than a vague whisper of intuition, he stuck his thumb where the man's left eye should have been, leaving a swirling red mark. Then he rinsed his hands in the river and picked up his handiwork, admiring its accuracy in the glowing light of the moon.

 

He went back to the campsite, satisfied that, after this, he could stop worrying. He dropped down in front of Fuu where she lay curled up by the fire and jabbed her shoulder with his finger. “Hey.” She rolled onto her back, mumbling something about castella. He poked at her again and then didn't stop until she snatched his hand out of the air and glared up at him, yawning at the same time.

 

“What.”

 

“Get up. I wanna show you somethin'.”

 

Her eyes narrowed and instantly she looked suspicious. “Is it bigger than a baby's arm?”

 

He scratched his head, confused. “Well, yeah. It's a rock.”

 

For some reason that he could never guess, which he chocked up to the stupid mystery that was “woman,” she looked intensely relieved. He grabbed her elbow and hauled her the rest of the way into a sitting position.

 

“Ow! Hey, easy. Still sore, remember?”

 

“Yeah, yeah. Here, look at this. And keep it down, okay? Don't want fish-face over there wakin' up.”

 

“Why not? Is it disgusting? Am I going to be grossed out?”

 

He snorted softly. “Think I'd wake you up in the middle of the night to show you bugs or somethin'?”

 

She looked at him like the answer was obvious. Then she looked down at the rock with his fish blood drawing on it and flinched back. “Ew, it is gross! Mugen, what is that?”

 

“It's a man,” he said with as much patience as he could muster.

 

Now she cocked her head to the side and stuck her nose closer to the rock, turning it with one finger so the light caught the drawing a little better. “I dunno, it looks more like a.... hmm, more like-”

 

“It looks like a man because that's what it is,” he growled, shoving her hand away so he could explain better. “Now look, I'm only gonna say this once. This right here- Look at it Fuu,” he said sternly. She glanced up at his tone and raised an eyebrow - she must have gotten that look from Jin - before she turned back with exaggerated attention. He tried again. “This here is a scythe.”

 

“Yes Mugen, I know what a scythe looks like.”

 

“Sure, but this one's different. The blade comes off here on a long chain.” He pointed to where the blade and staff joined. “And this is the dude who carries it.”

 

“What's that?” she asked, pointing to the thumb-print eye.

 

“Dunno. I just-”

 

“Why'd you put it there if you don't know what it-”

 

“Would you just shut up for a minute?” he snapped in a loud whisper. Jin was probably awake over there listening to this whole stupid conversation. He grabbed her arm and turned her to face him. The red mark at the corner of her mouth had darkened to a small bruise, not visible in the dim light. He wanted to touch it, to press on it and see if she yelled at him. “Fuu, if you see this.” He pointed at the rock and the drawing on it. “If you see anything like this, you run, okay?”

 

She glanced at Jin and then back up to him. “Well, what'll you guys do?”

 

He almost said, 'Jin won't be there.' But he swallowed that, thinking that perhaps he was preventing the whole thing right now. “I'll take care of it. Do not try and fight this guy. Just run.”

 

She shook him off and he let go, not realizing that he'd still been holding onto her. “Yeah, okay, I get it; I get it. Jeez.”

 

“Good.” He picked up the rock and started to rise to his feet, intending to throw it as hard as he could back into the river. He froze when she grabbed his hand.

 

“Mugen,” she started, not looking up at him. She said it softly, in a tone that made him twitchy. He recalled the bit of conversation he'd overheard and didn't want to know what she had to say to him. Even if she had stopped Jin from making whatever offer he was about to-

 

“I'm going to sleep,” he said, jerking his hand out of her grip and stalking off to throw his rock into the river.

 

Fucking disaster.

 

***

He should have said something else, something more. 'Run' obviously hadn't been clear enough. He hadn't meant 'Run away without telling us where you are going and when you'll come back.' What he'd meant was, 'If you see this scythe dude, run away so Jin and I can kick his ass. Do not run off by yourself while sending us to buy dumb-ass, expensive cake.'

 

How could she not have known that's what he meant? Dumb broad.

 

***

As he hauled himself out of the water, keeping his eyes on the two samurai comparing the sizes of their dicks up on the road - why didn't they just fight; why were they still staring at each other? - he felt distantly vindicated that now they had to go after the stupid bitch anyway. This Kariya dude was Sara's replacement; he'd go after Fuu if or when he got through them.

 

The fight moved down onto the docks and it became abundantly obvious that he was no match for this guy. He slid up and down the rough boards, trying to see through the spraying seawater, just trying to get close, while Jin fought like he'd been born to face this asshole.

 

Sara had been much hotter, as Mugen had known she would be.

 

At least he knew he still preferred women. Kariya moved like a god, had the physical power of a god, and his head seemed to be up on some god-like plain, given all the garbage he was spewing about technique and weakness and whatever bullshit. It looked like he really was the Hand of God. But Mugen still did not find him nearly as attractive as Sara. He hadn't wanted to kill Sara at all; he wanted this dude very dead. So at least he had his sexuality sorted out in this particular case.

 

***

“No, you go after her,” he shouted, waving his sword like it mattered.

 

Jin looked up at him from down on the dock and he saw familiar resignation in the ronin's pale face. It made him want to scream. He'd seen it in Sara when she died in the rain, and he hated it then, too.

 

“Mugen, take care of Fuu.”

 

There it was. Nothing he'd done had made a damn bit of difference. Two nights of paralysis in his dreams and a handful of days to try and make it so this didn't happen, and here he was chasing after Fuu, and Jin was not coming with him. He felt like he was being ripped in half when he jumped down onto the ferry and shouted at the driver to go back the way he'd come. “Don't let him kill you!” he called back. He felt that they were hollow words.

 

Don't let him touch you; don't let him fucking near you; don't you abandon us; don't die because you think it's honorable; death turns you into crow food and you're of no use to us that way.

 

That's what he should have said.

 

***

He swam with strong, sure strokes, his left hand throbbing and burning underwater. He felt like the ocean was going right through it, saltwater scraping along sinew and bone and out the other side. He rose to the surface and sucked in a great breath of air, seeing the island looming ahead of him. He saw a broken down church on the shore and thought that the colors looked familiar. He went under again and kicked his legs hard, surging forward with the rolling current.

 

He looked down and opened his eyes, ignoring the sting of the salt. The bottom was coming up under him, and he saw blurred rocks and stretches of finer pebbles and sand where the different currents had worn down parts of the earth. He saw a few wrecks, the broken remains of ships lying like corpses. He saw the shadows of larger fish lurking inside them. He thought when this was over, he'd make a few dives to see if there was any loot to be had. With luck he'd find enough to pay for a few weeks of nothing but the best of his four favorite things. Maybe he'd even catch one of those big nasty fish and cook it up. He was tired of freshwater fish, anyway.

 

His clothes dragged against his strokes and he debated shedding his haori and dropping the geta he'd stuck in his hakama. But these were the only things he had, so he didn't.

 

He dragged himself out of the water and headed for the church, feeling tired and heavy. Swimming didn't usually wear him out. He could swim for ages. Hell, he'd tried to swim to different islands a bunch of times when he was younger, and he'd almost made it. He could swim further than any of the other kids. But some patrol always came for them, always found him, dragging him from the water, holding him by his tattooed wrists and throwing him into the bottom of the boat with the other half-drowned prison children.

 

Swimming was not the problem.

 

By the time he reached the church and heard Fuu's broken voice stretched in ways he'd never heard it before; by the time he walked through the broken-down doors and saw the colors from his dream, right down to the glinting silver scythe, he knew it wasn't that he was tired.

 

Sara had allowed him to end her life because she saw his sword as the end of her path. She didn't have any choice in the matter. She'd been used her whole life, her son was dead; she only had one skill and she would die making use of it. Jin had spent his entire life training to be a great swordsman. Then he found out all his training was meant to serve the shogunate and he left the dojo a disgrace - a disgrace who only had one skill. The Hand of God came from the shogunate to put him down. This was how it was supposed to be for him, what his life was building towards. It was his path.

 

Perhaps both Sara and Jin had seen their deaths in their dreams right before they happened. Maybe that's why they'd looked at Mugen the way they did the last time he saw them alive. Maybe that's why he felt the way he did now, seeing Fuu tied to the cross, bright light streaming down around her. She looked like hell, but she was still drawing him to her with her wide eyes and little girl voice.

 

“Mugen?”

 

The man with the scythe faced him with a wide ugly grin twisting his face. He had a patch over his left eye. Mugen leaned on his sword and took a slow breath.

 

“Alright, time to give her back now.”

 

***

When the scythe ripped open his side and then the chain snapped his arm, he decided he'd had enough of this destiny bullshit. He was also real tired of hearing about 'living in disgrace' from Eyepatch Freak. He had a feeling both destiny and disgrace were supposed to come together in his head somehow and get him really depressed, but he didn't have the time or the inclination to try and make that connection at the moment. Jin and Sara could die for destiny if they wanted to, but dammit, he had options! There wasn't just one thing he was made for. Sure he was a bad-ass swordsman, but he was also a mean-ass pirate and a good fisherman and, fuck, he was a great baseball player.

 

Plus he'd told Fuu to trust him. He'd never asked for trust before. He'd told her he wasn't going to die, and he didn't make promises often either, so she'd be pissed if he broke that trust and his promise by dying. And if Jin failed at the docks, if Kariya came after them, then someone had to be around to try and prevent that disaster too. Pains in the ass, both of'em. No, Mugen definitely couldn't afford to die by his sword today. In fact, fuck his sword! It wasn't doing him much good in this stupid church anyway. He couldn't get close enough to Eyepatch to take a swing.

 

Mugen always fought better when he had lots of space and when he didn't have a building falling down around his ears, so when the rubble settled, he made a break for the beach, running as fast as his wiry legs could take him across loose rocks and sand. Eyepatch was right behind him, swinging his fucking scythe and screaming like he didn't know how to do anything else. Mugen ran and he ducked when the whistling and clinking got close. He took shelter behind boulders that were quickly demolished. He dodged and hid and ran again while he struggled to figure out a way to bring this tenacious bastard down. If he could just get the scythe out of his hands, get it on the ground.

 

Or if he could use it himself in a way Eyepatch didn't see coming...

 

He took off, heading straight for his opponent. He threw his sword away from him and followed it, ignoring the shrieking ridicule he received for missing his target. Damn, this guy's voice made Fuu sound like a songbird. His muscles barely responded to his demands when he got right in Eyepatch's face and twisted to the ground, body boneless and loose. His feet slapped the scythe from Eyepatch's grip, the blade shooting out from the staff, landing several paces away. Mugen landed on his back, slipping around behind as quick as he could, kicking up again to hook his legs under Eye Patch's arms and roll him to the ground. He got him in as much of a hold as he could with the use of only one arm, grabbing on with his teeth. Eyepatch jerked the staff and the chain looped around Mugen's cast-away sword and swung back around his leg, sliding to a stop behind them both. Growling around the cloth he had in his mouth, Mugen grabbed for Eyepatch's short-sword, but he couldn't keep up the hold any more and rolled down onto his back again, grabbing onto the staff when Eyepatch dropped it to draw the short-sword the rest of the way. Mugen hauled on the staff, the chain grinding on his sword, bringing the scythe whistling back towards them. Eyepatch was dead, head sliced clean off, before Mugen could draw breath to shout in pain and relief.

 

He got to his feet and all his nerve endings were firing; the danger wasn't over, but he couldn't think straight, had barely begun to turn around when something small punched him in the back - hard. He stumbled forward a half step and looked down to see red soaking through his already ruined undershirt. He turned to see the last brother smirking at him, holding a lighted match. His vision went white with rage that he still wasn't finished. Then it went lots of colors - red and orange primarily, and that was the last he knew.