Samurai X Fan Fiction / Rurouni Kenshin Fan Fiction ❯ A Bloody Sunset ❯ A Bloody Sunset ( One-Shot )

The sakura blossom that fell into the water caused only a minor rippling sensation across its surface. It barely disrupted anything, and least of all the thoughts of a dreaming girl who was sat by the edge of the water. Cherry blossoms held many memories for her, and the fleeting peace she found in moments such as these were the essence of her life.

Her eyes misted with a single thought. To be in his arms again, to feel like the world was nothing more than a picture in an empty hall, and to feel that despite the country being submersed in the chaos of revolution they would always remain together. Alas it was not to be, and now in this new corrupted era, her soul felt heavier than ever before.

She closed her hazel eyes, and let the tears run their course. Ten years and she couldn't let go. Her mind replayed the images of his sweet features, and her loss doubled in her heart. His duty was everything to him, and his duty had time after time coldly ripped him from her embrace as she hoped to the moon and stars for his safe return.

Her nails dug into the fabric of her kimono as she thought of what he looked like after a decade of decay. She hadn't aged an hour but now he would be dried flesh and bone. They had laid him to rest in uniform, and she hadn't even the right to stand beside him then. The angel of death had done her damage.

Still the letters came and the telegrams too, the killing fields needed her, and the calls of the dying were not something she could ignore. Her presence was fundamental, and the slaughter was what she owed to a nation that was still coming to terms with its new and unsteady government.

She was a blind sword, not defining a difference between the lives of the men she ended. To bring a swift and memorable end. That was the goal of Tenshi Shi. It had been trained into her from seven years of age, and ten years later she was practicing that same philosophy. And now, thirty years on from accepting the legacy of the immortal demon that preserved her youth and her life, Rachiru was sat collecting her thoughts and meditating on her history.

At last the girl heaved a sigh and opened her eyes to look out over the water. And for a brief moment her heart bled with the bloody setting sun, as she thought she saw her love across the water. He appeared to be looking at her with his most playful of smiles, and his own silhouette overshadowed his crouching form. His ebony hair moved in the last of the crisp spring zephyr, and the tattered and stained blue and white of his clothes discolored to pink and lilac in the dying embers of the light.

But then time moved again, and he was gone, taking the day with him, leaving only the petals in the water and the murmur of a girl.

"Okita…"