Weiss Kreuz Fan Fiction ❯ Watch Me As I Fade Away ❯ A Peculiar Yohji ( Chapter 4 )

This isn't happening. It's not real. I'm asleep. I'm hallucinating. No one's dead! I'm not dead!

I suddenly get a vision of a movie I watched with Omi last month. It was about this entire family that lived in a house and they thought they were being haunted, but all along they were actually the ghosts, but they never realized it! And then there was that older movie I watched with Yohji where the man was dead and had no idea! Come to think of it, in most good ghost stories the ghost always thinks they're alive! Oh god oh god oh god oh---

Run faster! The more I move, the less I think!

I concentrate on the noise of my shoes pounding against the pavement. There! A ghost wouldn't make noise by running! But maybe I'm just imagining the noise, and no one else can hear it.

As long as I keep running, I'll be okay! I'll just never stop, and then I'll never have to think about this! Um. That has got to be the most retarded idea I ever came up with. I can already hear Yohji's voice in my head, mocking me; What, does being dead make you stupid, too?!

"But I'M NOT DEAD!"

Oh crap. I didn't mean to say that aloud.

Shut up Ken, and keep moving.

Ooh, my head hurts. I'm definitely losing it.

Add another mark to the 'stupid-Ken tally.' In an attempt to block out my disturbing thoughts I scrunch my eyes shut. But I forget to stop running and---

SMACK!

Classic Ken, just classic. Even dead I'm a klutz.

I hesitate opening my eyes. The object I ran into was fairly soft, and had a distinct person-y feel to it. I'm not really in a good mental state to talk to anyone right now. Maybe if I just sit here with my eyes shut they'll go away? Now there's another brilliant thought. I'm on a roll.

I start by cautiously opening one eye. Whoever I ran into is standing right over me, their hands menacingly placed on their hips. Scary!
I gulp and open the other eye. The shadow looming over me slides into focus. It looks sorta familiar. It looks like….

YOHJI!

Oh my god, I never thought I would be this happy to see annoying-old-Yohji! But wait, what's that he's holding?

A katana!!!

Shit! Did I go back in time or something? Did all this weird stuff happen just so I could go back and stop Yohji from killing himself?!

If that's the case, why am I still sitting here on the ground like a fucking idiot?!!

I spring to my feet and tackle the arm holding on to Aya's weapon. Yohji lets out a yelp of surprise, and the force sends us both keeling over backwards, landing rather painfully on the ground.
Funny, the ground ought to have been more painful than that though. I thought I was running on pavement just now? But we landed in the dirt!

No time to worry about that, I have to save Yohji!

He's got a vice-grip on the blasted thing. Does he really want to die that badly? And all because of -Aya--?!

All my twisting and pulling seems useless though. I thought I was stronger than him! I'm the one with the short-range weapon!

Well, normally I wouldn't fight dirty, but I AM trying to save his life here, so….

"YOWTCH!"

Heh, heh. Worked like a charm.

"You freak! You bit me!" Yohji recoils back from me, cradling his now katana-less hand against his chest. "What the fuck is wrong with you?!!"

"What's wrong with me?! Is there something 'wrong' in caring about your friends?! I was trying to save your life, you ungrateful cretin!"

::blink blink::

"Uh. Save my life?"

"Yeah," I reply, a little less certain of my previous convictions, "I thought….weren't you…about to kill yourself?"

Yohji suddenly bursts into a laughing fit so violent he falls back into the dirt.

Christ, you'd think I'd get a little credit for being worried.

"You thought…-ha ha ha-….that I was….-snort-….about to….-heh-….kill my...-snerk-…self?!"

"Um, weren't you?" I ask, uncertainly.

"Of course not! What on earth gave you that idea?!"

"The sword! You were holding a katana, and I thought-"

Yohji gives me a weird look. "You thought I was going to kill myself just because I was holding a Katana? What, do you tackle every person you meet?"

"What do you mean?" That was a weird answer….

"Well, just about everyone carries a katana. I hope you don't run around trying to save the lives of every single person walking down the street, you're gonna get pretty tired…."

Everyone carries a katana?! I look down at the weapon I wrestled away from Yohji. It's not Aya's. I've never seen this sword before in my life. Oops.

Yohji's tone is now very serious, and he places his hands on my shoulders. "If anyone here has a death-wish, my friend, I'm afraid it's you."

"Wait-what do you mean by that?!"

Yohji gestures towards my shirt. "Your clothes. No one would dress like that unless they wanted to be arrested and publicly executed."

"My--my clothes?!" I suddenly take a better look at Yohji and place what it was that bothered me about him. His clothes are too baggy! I've never seen him dress like that before! And-they're not just different because they're baggy….they're not normal clothes at all! Yohji's wearing a hakama and gi!

Looking up, I notice that his hair is longer than usual, too. I couldn't tell at first, because the strands in front of his ears are their normal length…but, when I look at the back-it's in a long ponytail….

Why…why does Yohji look like he just stepped out of the Edo period?!

I stop focusing on Yohji, and finally take in my surroundings. It's not just Yohji that's caught in a time warp! The buildings are all low and made of paper and wood! It looks like the historic district in Kyoto….yet, there's not even pavement on the roads! Or telephone wires, or….

"Yohji! What year is it? Why does it look like the eighteenth century?!"

Well, that certainly got his attention.

He pulls me further to the side of the alley and crouches behind some crates.

"Eighteenth century you say? You're definitely not from around here, are you? Most people here have never even heard of the Western calendar before."

He looks me over, in a creepy, sort of evaluating manner, muttering to himself. "…Knew my name, too….Geeze, I knew I was unpopular around Edo, never dreamed my infamy went all the way out of Japan…."

Outside of Japan? What the hell is he talking about?!

"Look, I don't know what makes you think it's the eighteenth century, but it's the twenty first. And if you want to make it any further into the future, you'd better follow me home so I can put you in something less conspicuous. You're damn lucky you ran into me. The average person would have taken off in terror at the site of you and fetched the police. Fortunately, I have no honor to sully, so I'm not afraid to be caught associating with the 'wrong sort'--though, once I've got you fixed up you may want to avoid being seen with me. Come on."

Okay, it's official. The world has gone fucking mad.

I don't fight it.

* * *

The next few moments play out like a bad spy movie. Yohji peers around a corner. When he thinks the coast is clear, he waves frantically at me before running like a bat out of hell and then skidding to a stop and diving behind a bush, or cart, or insert-convenient-hiding-place-here. And to think that in the un-insane world this man was supposed to have been a detective. Christ.

By the time we reach the wall that apparently signals our destination, I'm so covered in dust that I sincerely doubt anyone could tell I'm dressed strange anymore.

Yohji stops and laces his fingers together, holding them out to me expectantly. Like…he expects me to…step on them? Oh, he has got to be kidding. We're going OVER the wall?!

"What are you waiting for?!" He hisses, "Over!"

"But….shouldn't I be the one helping you get over? I mean, you're wearing sandals!!"

Yohji just looks at me like I'm stupid.

"I'm also wearing tabis! Which are better for climbing them your weird shoes! Now GET!"

Before I even have a chance to start, Yohji grabs me and attempts to throw me over the wall. But he's not nearly strong enough, and I just barely manage to grasp a bit of the wall and avoid landing on his head (and probably breaking his neck.) God, this Yohji is a friggin' nut case.

Without too much effort I pull myself over and drop down onto the moss below. As I suspected, Yohji has a bit more trouble accomplishing the feat. Several minutes of scuffling and muffled curses elapse before Yohji's head (with sandals in mouth) finally appears. It's another several minutes of scuffling and mumbling before he manages to roll himself over the top and rather painfully fall over the edge. I get a bad feeling he does this on a regular basis too.

"Are you alright?" I ask the moderately battered Yohji laying on the ground.

He instantly springs up and clamps his hand over my mouth.

"Sshh! Questions later! Follow!"

Grabbing my arm, he drags me behind a low and meticulously pruned pine tree. Didn't we already do this?

Dash to a quince bush. Stop. Look around. Crawl on hands and knees behind an azalea hedge. Pause at end. Check. Run over to large rock. Catch breath. Look around. On to next rock. Stop. Persimmon tree next. Stop. And on and on and on. Damn, this is a large garden! Is Yohji rich? And why do we still have to hide now that we're in Yohji's yard, anyway?!

"Okay, wait here!"

Huh? I look up and realize we've come to the house. Dang, it's huge!

"Wow, is this really your hou---mpffft"

Hand over mouth again. Sigh.

"No. Talk. Till. Inside. Got it?"

"Mrrpft."

"Good."

I just roll my eyes.

"Now stay here. When you hear a screen opening, run inside quick. Okay?"

I nod.

Yohji leaves me crouching below the porch, presumably to go in through the front entrance. A few minutes later I hear the screen sliding open and I climb up onto the porch and dart inside. The screen has barely been closed when I feel myself being tackled and stripped.

Gah! Don't tell me Yohji's now in love with me too?! What the hell did I do to deserve this?!

Oh wait. The stripping stops as soon as he's wrestled my boots off. He looks at me apologetically.

"Sorry, but I didn't feel like spending the rest of the afternoon scrubbing mud out of the tatami."

Obviously. I was going to take them off anyway, you know. Psycho.

"Hang on a sec, and I'll give you something to change into."

Yohji turns and walks across the room to a built-in closet. It doesn't take him very long. The room is only four tatami mats large.

The room is almost empty. The floor contains only a small table with a rather rugged looking tea bowl on it. The walls are empty except for a single scroll; a simple sumi-e rendition of an orchid. The signature on the painting looks suspiciously like Yohji's.

The closet Yohji is currently rummaging through houses only a few folded garments and a rolled-up futon.

"Um, can I talk now?" I ask cautiously.

"Quietly, yes." Yohji answers, tossing me a light green gi.

"Where are we?" That seems like a good place to start.

"My room." He replies pulling out a brown hakama, and handing it to me.

Woah. I can maybe picture Aya living in a room like this. But Yohji? This is sooo not a Yohji place to live. It's too…neat.

"Why do you have such a small room, when your house is so big?" That was probably rude, but the question just slips out. I forget that this Yohji doesn't seem to know me.

"Not my house, my father's. And in his eyes I'm just an ungrateful freeloader; lucky to have a place to sleep at all, really. Now, don't you have more pressing questions to ask than that? Because if you don't, I have a couple."

"Well actually, I---" Not even half a question gets out before Yohji interrupts. He's slowly walking around me in a circle, and looking me over like I was some oddity at the zoo. It's seriously creeping me out.

"Damn, if I didn't know better, I'd swear you were Japanese." He mutters to himself, "Not even a hint of an accent, and you barely strike me as Chinese, but…that's got to be it. What part of China are you from?"

Huh? China?! "What in the blazes makes you think I'm Chinese?!"

"Well you're obviously not Dutch" is his simple reply. Now just what is that supposed to mean? Of course I'm not Dutch!

"Why would you think I was Chinese or Dutch? I'm Japanese!"

"Like hell you are. You don't strike me as a merchant though…. Were you a stowaway? It's been months since the ports were open, how'd you survive?"

"Huh? What are you talking about?"

"And how did you get so fluent without learning a thing about the country? Surely someone must have warned you about the risk of coming here?"

"What?"

"And finally, this one's been killing me: I'm used to being recognized by local strangers and all, but how did you know who I was?!"

Uh oh. How do I answer that question? I know you from a futuristic world where we arrange flowers and kill people? Yeah, as if he doesn't already think I'm nuts.

"Um, Yohji? Maybe we should sit down. I think we're going to have a very long talk."