From: "Jan Story" FUSHIGI NA INOCHI A Rurouni Kenshin Fanfic by Jan Story Kenshin and his universe belong to Nobuhiro Watsuki etc. The idea isn't mine either, though I don't know who wrote the story that It's a Wonderful Life is based on. Fureiya is mine, but she was inspired by the work of Kosuke Fujishima. This takes place at midwinter, a few weeks before Act 1 of the manga. A branch burned through and sent a shower of sparks upwards into the night, against the few snowflakes that swirled down on the cold breeze. Neither fire nor cold penetrated the inner desolation of the man who sat on the riverbank, a sword resting against his shoulder, staring at the dark, swift-flowing water. /*Thirteen years since it happened. Ten years since I walked away from the Ishin Shishi and vowed never to take another life. Ten years of wandering. Ten years of trying to atone for the lives I stole in order to build the new era.*/ /*Was there... could there have been another way? Without all the bloodshed, the madness... without the hitokiri? If I had never joined the Ishin Shishi, never learned Hiten Mitsurugi Ryuu, never been born at all... the people I killed would be alive in this new era. Kiyosato, Tomoe... if Hitokiri Battousai had never existed...*/ "May I share your fire, swordsman?" "Oro?" He turned, startled out of his brooding. The voice was a woman's, her accent and intonation unfamiliar to him. He was doubly surprised to see that the woman was gaijin. What he could see of her hair was pale gold under the hood of her fur-lined cloak, and her blue eyes made him think of endless expanses of cold sea. Without waiting for further invitation she swept closer and sat down near him, stretching her slender, white hands toward the fire's warmth. "And what brings a swordsman to camp on a riverbank in the cold and snow, when in town there are warm inns and friendly people?" He shrugged. "I am a rurouni. And you, my lady? Forgive me, but... I have met a few foreigners, and none speak our language as well as you. And there is another thing..." She laughed. "You wonder why I walk about alone at night, rather than clinging to some man for protection. Am I right?" "I would not have said it so..." "I don't mind. I am not from the same place as the foreigners you have known; my customs are different. As it happens, I am visiting a kinswoman of mine here. She had to go away for a short while; I looked out and saw your fire, so I came to see. But I am being rude, inviting myself to your camp without even giving you my name. In your language, you would say it as Fureiya." "Fureiya... Fureiya-dono," the wanderer repeated. "This unworthy one is called Kenshin Himura." "And so, Kenshin Himura, will you allow me to repay you for the warmth of your fire? Perhaps new eyes can more readily see an answer to what troubles your spirit." He shook his head. "There is no answer. What has been cannot be changed." "Are you so very sure of that?" Her voice was gentle, yet at the same time with an edge that could draw blood from the wind. He half-rose, hair whipping around him in a wind sharp as a blade's edge, his eyes glowing slits of gold-tinged orchid. "Can you change the past?" he demanded. "Can you return the lives I stole?" She did not change to his physical sight, but to his inner senses she suddenly towered against the night sky, and her voice came from immeasurable distances. "Yes. I can." He took a step back. "What are you...?" "As I have said. My name is Fureiya; I am in your country for a short time, visiting a kinswoman. That is all." No... it had to be more... *megamisama*? "Make your wish, Kenshin Himura. And consider it carefully." "I have spent thirteen years considering it," he replied. "I wish that Hitokiri Battousai never existed!" "Are you very, very sure this is what you want?" she asked him. He blinked. "Oro?" "A stone thrown into water... might never know what its ripples touch. And the easiest path is not always the best one. But... this is not my place, and therefore I cannot permanently grant your wish. My kinswoman will return at sunrise, and if it is still what you want, you may speak your wish again to her. Or you may take it back, and remember nothing of this night." "Take it back? If those I killed could be alive again -- I would give anything for that, even my own life!" "Ah, but would you give others' lives as well? Come, look at the world that never knew your killer's sword." She extended her hand. He took it, and the riverbank vanished. There was a city around them, a neighborhood that at first glance looked prosperous, the sort of area occupied by samurai of the middle ranks, with good posts. On closer examination it had an air of desolation. Many houses appeared vacant. Even those that were occupied looked to be in disrepair. Slogans had been scrawled on the walls facing the streets. Litter blew along the pavement: handbills, dead leaves, dust. "Do you know where we are?" Fureiya asked him. "Kyoto," he murmured. "But different... is this what Kyoto is like now?" "This is Kyoto in the world of your wish," she replied. "It is the thirteenth year of Shounin. " "Shounin? Not Meiji?" "No, Himura-san. Not Meiji. In this world, the leaders of the most powerful anti-shogunate factions were killed by loyalist samurai from Aizu, as they met to discuss an alliance. It is known as the Suzuya incident. "The Suzuya..." he whispered, memories playing back. /*Katsura-san and Saigou-san not talking, not even looking at each other... Sakamoto-san told them they had to talk if they were going to change the country, as if they were children... and then...*/ He had been the first to feel their killing ki, had signaled to douse the lights. Saigou's squad, who a little while ago had scoffed at Katsura for only bringing one guard, had scrambled to get out first, to beat Choushuu to the glory of cutting down the intruders. In the moonlight, the ground around their bodies had been dark with their blood. A moment later, the remaining Aizu men had fallen to his blade... and then he met their leader, Gentatsu, in the moonlight, in a grove of young bamboo... "Without your presence, the most capable leaders of the revolution all died that night, and the dream of a new era died with them. The Shogun still rules Japan... and foreigners rule the Shogun. And anything else they want. It is... dangerous... to oppose them." In another of those strange transitions, they were inside a house. He saw a man, holding a woman in a protective embrace. "Remember, you do not exist in this world," Fureiya said as Kenshin turned away, not wanting to watch their intimacy. He turned back and a gasp escaped him when the woman raised her head. "Tomoe..." "...There is nothing to be done, anata?" Tomoe was saying. Her companion -- husband -- closed his eyes in sorrow. "Nothing. They will come for me tonight. I am afraid my ideas have made too many people... uncomfortable." He traced the curve of her lips with one finger. "Forgive me, my wife. I wanted so much to make you happy." "You have made me happy, anata. Being your wife has been my happiness.." The man turned and left the room. Tomoe took out a brush and paper and knelt at her writing-table. She wrote a few lines, and then took a tanto from its case. "No!" Kenshin cried. "Tomoe!" "She cannot see or hear us," Fureiya reminded him. "We do not exist in this world." They were back in the main room of the house. A squad of men, their blue haori bordered with stylized mountain peaks, pushed past a servant into the room. "Akira Kiyosato, we have a warrant for..." one of them intoned before he really took in the shape on the floor, the scarlet pool spreading under it. "Neesan!" A cry from the entrance, and two more squad members came in, half-dragging a struggling young man. "Hold it!" The leader drew his sword and gestured sharply at the intruder, who collapsed to his knees. "Who are you and what is your business here?" "Enishi Yukishiro. My sister... I heard of the order to arrest her husband, and I wanted to take her home before you came." "Naruhodo." He jerked his head at the two guards. "Go with him." Enishi darted into the interior of the house well ahead of the guards. When the Shinsengumi caught up with him, he was kneeling on the floor weeping, Tomoe's blood-soaked body cradled in his arms. Her ankles were bound and her throat slashed, making it only too obvious she had chosen to join her husband in death. They moved on, into the hills. He saw two men poking through the charred ruins of a small hut. There was a potter's kiln nearby; it looked as if the fire had gone out of control and spread to the house. "There's nothing here but empty sake jugs, sempai," said the younger of the pair. His hair was done up in a long, flowing topknot and his profile showed a sharp nose and chin. "It looks like he got drunk and burned the place down around his ears." "It's meant to look that way, Shishio-kun," replied the elder from under the rush hat that obscured his face. "Have you found a body yet?" "No, sempai." "And you won't." He stared off into the woods; Kenshin could see his eyes glowing like twin fires in the hat's shadow. "No, that would be too boring, if the legendary Seijuurou Hiko were to die like a common drunk." His gaze drew distant. "Seijuurou Hiko... destroying you is the one interesting thing left in my life." /*Hitokiri after Shishou?*/ Kenshin wondered. What could his master have done to earn the attention of assassins? Shishou had always been adamant that Hiten Mitsurugi Ryuu should take no part in political struggles, that its sole purpose was to protect the happiness of ordinary people. That was why its master bore a hidden name, and why the world knew the current incumbent only as a potter. He didn't even recognize the two hunters. They weren't men he had ever faced. From his name, the younger might have been Makoto Shishio, who had taken over doing assassinations for the Ishin Shishi after Katsura-san agreed he was no longer effective as hitokiri. Kenshin had never met his successor and had no idea what he looked like. He had no idea who the craggy-faced elder with the burning eyes might be, though there was a vague whisper in his mind about someone who had been cast out of the Shinsengumi and survived. The scene changed again, to a provincial town. Men marched up the main street, men in peasant clothes, with grim eyes and tight-set mouths, carrying torches. At the gates of a large mansion, they halted. Armed men barred their way. "We ask leave to present a petition to Lord Tani," the leader said. His manner was courteous, but not humble. He was an older man, tall and lean, who looked like he was more used to using his fists than talking. "We ask that he allow us to buy egg-cards on the open market, that we be permitted to sell our silk to the brokers without having to bring it to his agents first, and that he reduce the amount of the land-tax. If he does not do this, we will not have the means to continue as farmers." "Then what good are you?" jeered the guard, and shot the man dead on the spot. The rest of his squad raised their weapons. "OYAJIIIII!" A single youth charged out of the ranks of peasantry. He looked like a younger version of the dead leader, tall and rangy, with spiky hair, and he now attacked the armed guards with his bare hands. He must have been inhumanly strong, because even after the first bullets struck him he managed to bring five of them down with his fists before the guns cut him to tatters. /*No new era,*/ Kenshin thought. /*Tomoe married... that was the man I killed, that night, her fiance, and now both dead. Shishou hunted. That young man, killed. I don't think I ever knew him, but somehow he, those peasants, die because I was not hitokiri. It must be important or Fureiya-dono would not show it to me. And the merchant, there was a Tani in the Ishin Shishi. I never cared for him, he always struck me as a fox borro wing the authority of a tiger...*/ "Fureiya-dono? What is this world? Isn't anyone happier in it?" "You want to see someone who is better off because of your choice?" "Yes, please, if there is anyone." "Oh yes. Let me show you." She took his hand, and the village vanished. They were in a tiny cottage, the house of someone very poor. In the center of the room, near a scant fire, a woman squatted. Her face was white, her clothing sweat-damp, and she cried out in agony. A serious-faced girl knelt before her. Supporting the woman's back was a tall man who murmured instructions to the girl. Suddenly the woman gave a loud shriek, then collapsed into the man's arms, limp as a wet rag. The girl drew something red, wet and squirming from under the woman's robes. A baby's cry rose into the air. "It's a boy," the young woman said. "You have a fine, strong son." She looked at the man, seeking approval in his face -- and finding it. "That was well done, Megumi." "I can understand Aizu people being better off, Fureiya-dono, but... are they the only ones?" "No, Himura-san. There are many who are happy in this world. Watch." Scenes passed by in rapid succession. A burly priest told stories to a group of children. A sly-faced merchant paid court to a beautiful, hard-eyed taiyu. He saw his shishou, undaunted by the men who were hunting him, teaching a short, crop-haired boy whose speed surpassed even his own. Remembering how difficult he had found his early training, Kenshin wondered how the boy had managed to gain such phenomenal strength in his legs. They glided through the gates of Edo Castle. By now he was getting used to being a phantom; he no longer protested when they intruded on precincts that would have been forbidden to his physical body. Through the gates of Edo Castle, and into the quarters of the innermost guards, the Oniwabanshuu. A tall, serious-faced young man was sitting at a desk. One by one other men, most of them older, came in, gave reports, and received orders. He finished and went outside, into a training yard where a young girl, her long hair tightly braided, was sparring with a tall, thin man who wore a hannya mask over his face. She was very good, nimble and quick as a weasel, and the man's saturnine face broke into a smile as he watched her. Then from the castle they went toward Ueno, into a district much like the first one they had visited, the home of fairly prosperous samurai with small stipends and minor administrative posts. In one of them a domestic argument seemed to be taking place. "Oi, chichi! I can read good enough! How come I still gotta go to school?" demanded a sturdy boy of about ten, with spiky hair and bandaged fingers. "Baka!" This was a neatly-groomed older man in formal attire, the picture of samurai rectitude. "How do you expect to get a good post if you don't do well in the examinations?" "I'd rather learn kenjutsu," the boy muttered. "Don't be ridiculous, boy! Kenjutsu has no place in the modern world, that's why the Shogun closed down the dojos. The foreigners think little enough of us as it is, do you want them to think we're a backward country? Even a boy's careless words can come to the wrong ears these days! Now get to school, and I don't want to see you with moxa burns on your fingers today!" "Yes, father." Subdued, dragging his feet, the boy trudged off to school. "Is that true, Fureiya-dono?" Kenshin asked. "Is there no more kenjutsu?" Her eyes were sad. "Your countrymen's swordsmanship frightens the foreigners. They have much influence with your Shogun, and so he has ordered all dojos to be closed. The few who still teach the way of the sword do so in secret." "And are hunted, like those men were hunting Shishou?" She nodded. "Come, there is one more thing I must show you before my kinswoman returns." They stood outside a large building. A dojo, once, in better times, in a more honorable world. Men, most of them foreign, were going in. "This is the last place I will show you," Fureiya said. "Go on in. As before, no one here will see or hear you." An inexplicable sensation of dread gripped him with icy fingers. He gazed at her, his amethyst eyes terrified, pleading. "Go in." Her eyes were ice in answer, her voice implacable. It seemed to come from crystal caverns that had nothing to do with warmth or humanity. Against his will, he entered. The place was a gambling den. Men were gathered in little groups, playing the games he was familiar with: dice, shoji, cards. Some, mostly the foreigners, were playing unfamiliar games with strange cards. Painted women moved among the groups, serving sake and foreign spirits. Presiding over everything was a human mountain. He sprawled in a vast chair, surveying everything with an owner's smug pride. One hand stroked the long, full beard that covered his chest. The other caressed the girl who knelt by his side, dressed in a sheer, loosely-tied kimono, pulled down to reveal her shoulders and bosom to anyone's gaze. Kenshin could feel his face burning. Even the lowest, cheapest street whore might have been ashamed to be displayed that way. As Kenshin watched, the girl flinched away from the giant's touch. The big man jerked her closer. His caress became more intimate, deliberately offensive under the eyes of strangers. The girl's sapphire eyes burned with shame and fury. With the speed of a trained fighter, she lunged for the giant's dagger. He swatted her to the floor before she could plunge her prize into her own throat. "I thought I'd cured you of that, little girl. It looks like you need another lesson in humility." He jerked her up by the hair, pulled her into his lap, and then yanked the revealing kimono from her shoulders. She wore nothing under it. "Kisamaaaa!" Kenshin's blade snapped from its saya. His eyes flamed amber. "Yurusenai!" He was standing on the riverbank under the distant, cold stars. The gambling den, the giant and the girl had all vanished. The only sound was his harsh whispered "yurusenai..." His hand shook so hard it took him two tries before he was able to resheathe his sword. And around him, the light, brightening... The images beat at him like so many attackers. Shishou, hunted through the mountains, still training his new pupil. Tomoe and Kiyosato, dying together after a few brief years of happiness. A young doctor in faraway Aizu. A peasant youth's strong body torn apart by gunfire. An onmitsu girl, and a reluctant young scholar who wanted to be a swordsman. And the girl, the girl with a swordsman's reflexes, her spirit unbroken even by her body's shame... the light was so bright it was like standing in the heart of the sun. The girl's eyes... and his own voice crying out. "NO!" he screamed into the light. "I... will... PROTECT!" "So be it," said a woman's voice, not Fureiya's, her Japanese old-fashioned even to his ears, and the light swallowed him. "Oi, kenkaku-san!" "Oro?" He opened his eyes. The sun was shining brightly, and several people were standing around him, gazing at him with worried expressions. "Ah, you're awake. We were afraid you'd frozen to death, kenkaku-san. That would have been a bad omen for us pilgrims. Are you bound for Ise too?" He blinked at the plain, concerned faces. "Ise?" "Aa. In this Meiji era we don't have to get permission from our lord, we can go where we want, so we decided to make the Ise pilgrimage while we're still young enough to enjoy the trip. So what of you, kenkaku-san? Does a holy vow make you camp out on a cold night where you might freeze?" The man's simple faith touched him. "No vow," he smiled. "This unworthy one is simply a wanderer." "No money, huh?" The man's eyes flicked over the threadbare kimono. "Ororoo..." He knew his clothes had seen better days, but was he that ragged? "No matter," the man laughed. "It's a long road to Ise, and there are still bandits in places. We'd be glad of a swordsman's company." /*To Ise? I dreamed... I can't remember... only... Tokyo. There's something important in Tokyo...*/ "I'd be glad of the company too, as far as Tokyo. That's where I was going." "Going to try your luck in the capital, are you? I've heard it's a great place for opportunity." Kenshin picked up his small bundle of belongings and fell into step beside the talkative pilgrim. The sun shone bright in a cloudless sky. Somebody started the Ise song, and one by one the others in the party joined in. The last half-memory of disturbing dreams evaporated like mist. It was a glorious morning to be alive. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ NOTES, EXPLANATIONS ETC. Last year when Christmas fics started showing up, a Wonderful Life story seemed the obvious thing to write. If *anybody* had reason to wish he was never born, it had to be Kenshin, especially back then, in the shadows of Rakuninmura. Anyway, I've always liked Brian Drozd's "A Truly Wonderful Life," and so Fureiya sprang full-grown into my head -- from then on my only snag was playing what-if with history I didn't know very well. Requiem for the Ishin Shishi gave me my turning point -- a single incident where Battousai's absence could have changed the course of history -- and my husband suggested the Western powers' unease at Japanese swordsmanship. The rest was simply plugging characters into the situation and having them act more or less like themselves. The era-name Shouin means agreement or consent, it is supposed to indicate a sort of national passivity. I picked the first thing I found that looked like it would fit; I needed an era-name and didn't want to spend a lot of time thinking one up. The riot where Sano and his father died is modeled on an actual peasant uprising that happened in the early 1860s in Fukushima Prefecture, with a couple of other things added from other riots. Historically, Aizu supported the Bakufu to the bitter end and suffered savage retribution as a result. Obviously, this is one place that would have been better off without the Meiji Restoration. Megumi's family would not have been broken up and she would never have gone to Tokyo and fallen into Kanryuu's clutches. Other people who would have been better off are Anji, Yumi, and of course the Oniwabanshuu. Whether Yahiko would have been better off is a matter of opinion -- a normal adult's versus his ^_^. Growing up in an intact family is of course a good thing, but then there's SCHOOL. I found at http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/ottwell-japanschools.html an American account of Tokugawa-era education for boys. Teachers had a number of ways to discipline inattentive students, including applying burning moxa to their fingers. One can just imagine Yahiko! Under the Shogunate, ordinary people had to have their lord's permission to leave their domain, even temporarily. One of the few trips peasants were permitted to make was the pilgrimage to Ise, holiest shrine of Amaterasu. Villages formed pilgrimage societies to gather enough money to send one or two of their number, who were supposed to bring back talismans to bring good fortune to the entire village. Anyway, that's my Christmas special. Next: New Year (well, Adults' Day...) --------------------------- ONElist Sponsor ---------------------------- Register now and you could win a Volkswagen New Beetle at LiQ.com! Click below, 'cause it's going fast! While you're at it, check out our great entertainment products at fantastic prices! Click Here ------------------------------------------------------------------------