From: "Dena Strong" All That Matters (Chapter 7) by Risu-chan (dlstrong@prairienet.org) --------------------------------- Konbanwa, minna... When I started writing All That Matters about a year ago, I started it as a prequel to Tae's Strengths and Weaknesses, because I thought Kiriko was an adorable character and I loved the story. Tae sent me an outline of what she wanted to do with her plot (no, I won't give away any spoilers!) and told me that the title, "Strengths and Weaknesses," was about Kenshin's family and his loved ones. They've always been his weakness; someone's going to use that against him; but they're also his strength, and they have strengths of their own to share with him, and that story was going to drive it home to him: he can't be what he was when he was the Battousai and alone; he needs them as much as they need him, and every one of them has their own strength to offer, even (maybe especially) Kiriko. I've been trying to explore what I think is the opposite side of that family-stress-on-Kenshin plot: in Strengths, Kaoru and the others share Kenshin's battles and together they're stronger than they are apart. (I'm not going to say much more so that I don't give away details!) In Matters, the battles are Kaoru's, not Kenshin's, and Kenshin's greatest weakness is himself. The pattern that was being set in the manga was that Kenshin's woman -- either Tomoe or Kaoru -- was helpless and threatened and he had to do everything to save her; she couldn't help save herself (or when she did, as in Tomoe's case, it turned out _spectacularly_ badly). So Kenshin's been treating Kaoru like a child or like a fragile thing to place on a shelf and coddle -- and the more her pregnancy advances, the more he's trapped in that way of thinking: can't let the world touch her, have to guard her from everything, even if it includes her pregnancy or herself or anything that could possibly threaten her. But the battles here are Kaoru's. He can't help her with the pregnancy, he can't help her with the birth, and the harder he clutches at trying to protect her from everything, the more she resents being treated like a child rather than his partner and the mother of his child. He has to learn to let her fight her own battles -- and he's much less graceful at letting her fight her battles than she was at letting him fight his. There are also things she needs to learn before she can become an equal partner for him and share her strength with him --- first, she needs to learn that she can be strong enough to be a partner rather than just a protected thing; second, she needs to learn that she can protect him too, in her own ways. Recently, Tae decided that she wanted to shelve Strengths and Weaknesses because she was concerned it had been on hold for too long and that some of the ground we both wanted to cover might look too much like duplication. For example, Tae told me she's got a scene with Saitou being his usual charming self when Kenshin and Kaoru come to him together in a situation where they'll desperately need his help. I've got a scene where Kenshin goes after him alone after deciding he's just about ready to tear Saitou's head off in order to extract what he needs to know from the skull. I don't think the scenes will be too similar to be worth reading in their own places, but if they are, it's MY fault. Like I said, she sent me her outline months ago; I'm the one writing in second place. I'm very, very sorry that Tae ever thought she couldn't write what she wants to write because of something I'd written. I want her to want to write what she loves; I know I want to read it! I think Strengths and Weaknesses and Taken with the Notion are beautiful stories and Kiriko is a wonderful character. I also think Kenshin really, *really* needs to learn what he's going to learn: that the people who love him are strengths as well as weaknesses; that Kaoru can be his partner and share her strength with him in ways Tomoe never could; and that everyone in his family, everyone who loves him, has a strength to share. I don't think that's a lesson Matters could ever teach him; they can't share the battles there, they have to face their own battles alone and try to comfort each other when they can't share everything. I'd love to read Tae's full version of Strengths and Weaknesses and I don't think I'm the only one. If you'd like to see the rest of Tae's Strengths and Weaknesses, if you think there's room for both and interest in both, please let us know. I think there's a need for both -- someone's used Kenshin's family to pressure him in lots of places, but the responses are different. In the manga the response was almost entirely "okay, I've got to go fix everything alone, they only cause trouble when they try to help themselves too." In Matters the response is "Kenshin no baka, you've done that too darned much already; you can't go off half-cocked again, particularly when your sword's useless in this situation." In Strengths the response is going to come to the conclusion of "We have to fix this together. All of us. You can't fix it alone and we can't fix it without you." If Tae does decide she wants to finish Strengths and Weaknesses and you think something is too similar to Matters, please send the flame mails to me. I'm the one who's writing "second." I'm very, very sorry that she ever thought she didn't want to write something she loved writing and I -- and others -- loved reading. What do the rest of you think? Would you like to see Tae's finished version too? (and how often am I allowed to vote in the "I'm interested in reading Strengths!" poll? ^__^) That's one of the reasons I decided this piece had to come next. The other is that I can't think of another excuse to get Heidel drunk. ^_~ ---------------------------------- Chapter 7 (a midnight scare, and misunderstandings) ---------------------------------- Kenshin woke abruptly in the middle of the night, and didn't move -- didn't even breathe -- for a moment. Footsteps, an unfamiliar weight and hesitance -- too heavy for Yutarou; Shiro or Heidel-- Heidel. Shiro wouldn't need to hesitate so much; even at night he could see enough to walk the porch, with a half-moon out at this hour. Kenshin waited for the footsteps to pass... ...they hesitated at the door. His hand closed around the sakabatou's sheath. *Why isn't Aoshi doing anything?* *Because I invited him in. I invited him under our roof. My guest. My choice to offer trust. My responsibility. My irresponsibility--* The door slid open, then closed, and, very soft and hesitant, Heidel walked toward them. *I don't feel a thing from him. Nothing but... curiosity. Either he is incredibly stupid, or mad-- broken like Soujirou was-- or the coldest assassin in the world, or I am mad...* *Wait for him to move. Wait for him to commit to a direction.* *If he speaks, if he wakes me to ask directions to the washroom, I think I may break a rib laughing.* *Please let him speak. Please let him ask.* *Please.* Something wild and terrified was clawing at the back of his mind as well: *white hair and the moon-flash on the lenses, and the lanky height; too easy for it to be Enishi in the darkness... if they met... if they...* *...no. Not again.* Kenshin closed his eyes tight, to block out the sight of too familiar a figure, and ground his teeth against the impulse to strike first and ask questions later: *Not Enishi. Not Enishi. Not Enishi. Don't let the fear color everything; it's over, it's done, never again. Not Enishi, please, not ever again...* Fortunately for Heidel, he walked to Kenshin's side of the futon. Despite himself Kenshin breathed a sigh of relief. *...Not sent for her. Now I can settle this. Either way.* Heidel heard him sigh and hesitated for a moment; to set the hook, Kenshin shifted a little and sighed again. *Sound asleep. Perfectly oblivious. Clumsy little rusty old ex-assassin that I am. Now what will you do, gaijin?* He felt the floorboards shift, felt the air stir, felt Heidel kneel beside him almost as clearly as if he'd seen it. Then... nothing. Then Heidel bent closer. *Please let him speak. I can't wait for him to touch me, I don't know if his hands are empty...* *too long. Too late -- forgive me --* Kenshin rolled to his feet and slammed Heidel's back into the wall, startling a cry of pain from him when the injured shoulder hit. Kaoru woke as soon as he moved, and turned over anxiously: "What...?" With the flat of the half-drawn sakabatou against Heidel's throat -- so that life or death depended only on a slight flex of his wrist, and so that even the stupidest assassin in the world would recognize that -- Kenshin said softly, "Now you're going to explain yourself, gaijin." "Kenshin!" Kaoru cried. Heidel stared at him, mute, with tears filling his strange pale eyes. There were feet running along the porch from Heidel's cry and Kaoru's; Sano knocked on the door impatiently. "Kenshin? Jou-chan?" "It's all right, Sano," Kenshin said, his eyes never leaving Heidel's face. "Go back to sleep. Tell the others it's fine." He didn't have to see Kaoru to know the fright and bewilderment she felt, but she trusted him; she kept still. Sano sighed. "If it's a mouse or something, I'm really going to have to tease you guys tomorrow." "Something like that," Kenshin agreed. "Go back to sleep. I'll take care of it." When the sound of Sano's footsteps faded, he eased the pressure of the blade off Heidel's throat enough to let him speak. "Well?" Heidel shook his head faintly, and the tears spilled down his face. Kaoru whispered, "Kenshin, please... you swore..." "I know," he agreed, as gently as he could. "But I also need to know why he was bending over me silently in the dark. --Gaijin, you are very lucky you chose me. If you had moved to bend over her, I would have done worse than dislocate your shoulder before you hit the wall." Heidel gasped a little, and whispered something in German. "What?" "Su-sumanai... sumimasen..." Kenshin stared at him. "What were you doing? If you had a question you would have woken me to speak. If you wanted me dead... I'd have known. And there's nothing to steal here. What else is there to do in a stranger's room at midnight? Gaijin, I don't understand you. Give me a reason to believe you weren't sent to do this. And tell me what this is." Heidel shook his head, and whispered again, "Sumimasen. Gomen nasai." He brought a hand up; Kenshin leaned on the blade in warning, and he froze. "Slowly." Slowly, Heidel took his glasses off, and rubbed the tears from his face, and put the glasses back on. "...There's no explain. I'm... sorry. I'm very much a fool. And still drunk. I can't give you explain." Kenshin studied his face in the shadows. "I think you should try." "No. Nothing but stupidity... I'm sorry." "Do you understand," Kenshin said, "that you are all but inviting me to kill you?" Heidel closed his eyes tightly, and said nothing. Kaoru whispered, "Kenshin..." "Just let me hear you say you were not sent to hunt us!" "But why would you believe me?" Heidel asked. "It is what I said. Too much stupidity..." "Say it, Haideru-san," Kenshin murmured. "Please." "I was not sent to kill you. I wouldn't know how. I was not meaning even to wake you... I..." He blinked at tears again. "I'm very much stupid. And much sorry. There's nothing else. Will you kill me? I am not much wanting to die, but... it might be better..." "Than what?" Heidel shook his head carefully, and swallowed even more carefully, and closed his eyes. "If you will, just do." Kenshin lifted the blade edge from his throat and slid it back into the sheath. Heidel flinched at the sound but didn't open his eyes. It took him almost a full minute to realize Kenshin hadn't moved -- and wouldn't. "Sir...?" "No one would send an assassin after *me* so unprepared," Kenshin said. "You don't even know what I swore. Or why. Haideru-san, I wouldn't have killed you if you had begged me to." "...why?" Soft-voiced, Kenshin asked, "Why would it be better to die?" Heidel opened his eyes and looked at him in despair. "Are you afraid of someone?" Warily, Heidel gathered himself, and got his feet under himself again. And didn't speak. "Haideru-san, at least tell me what you wanted." "Sumimasen..." He stumbled toward the door, and couldn't find the section that opened. Kenshin followed him; he heard the steps and turned in panic. "Sumanai--" Kenshin caught his wrist and curled his fingers around to the pulse-point, then bowed his head. "Like a little bird's wings, fluttering in terror... I'm sorry. I'm very sorry to have frightened you so." "N... nani?" "Here, little bird." He set Heidel's palm agianst the edge of the door, and pushed it along its track a few inches, enough for the moonlight to spill through. "I truly am sorry. But you must understand how much you frightened me, too. We need to stop doing this to each other." Heidel stared down at him. "Can I... can I go now?" Kenshin gestured toward the door slightly, and the boy fled. Bundled in blankets, with her braid falling over her shoulder and the ends of her hair spilling in a tousled tumble around her cheeks, Kaoru looked very precious and terribly vulnerable. "Kenshin," she asked in a tiny voice, "what was that about?" He sighed, and moved to set the sakabatou on the floor again, and knelt beside her. "I wish I knew, koishii. Do you think you can go back to sleep?" "Maybe," she said wistfully. "You?" "Maybe." He slid his feet under the blankets again, and ran his knuckles lightly across her huddled shoulders. "My turn to rub, I think." "But... thank you, but... no. I can't lie on my stomach... and..." She gave him a sleepy-eyed glare. "Don't you dare sit up all night watching." Since he'd vaguely been planning it, he said, wide-eyed, "Hadn't crossed my mind." She snorted. "I know you better than that." "Maa, maa..." He turned strong fingers to rubbing the tension out of her shoulders, so that she started to relax despite herself; she sighed and let her head drop forward. "Not fair. Keep doing it." "Hai." He shifted his hands lower on her back. "Forgive me?" "'Long as you keep doing that, yes." He leaned more of his weight into rubbing, and she made a small mewling sound of relief. He smiled, and kissed the nape of her neck, and coaxed her into leaning back against his chest so that he could follow the aching muscles from her back to her sides and her abdomen. She sighed deeply. "Remember... don't you dare. --Promise me..." "Aa." He bent his head closer to hers, to watch the patterns he traced over the softly swollen mound of her belly. Simple enough to shift the flow of chi in her, to help her relax... simpler, just now, with her usual balance-points so distorted by the child. The old familiar channels had shifted and spilled over; very gentle guidance was all that was needed to shift the new ones, since they hadn't worn themselves into place... ...and, rather more mundanely, it had been a long day and she was already wearied with the burden of carrying herself and the child. It didn't need much coaxing at all to encourage sleepiness in the middle of the night. She reached up and ran a fingertip down his cheek. "Promise you won't just take a catnap either..." "Hai, hai." He rubbed until she was drowsing against him, then settled her gently on her side and lay behind her to keep rubbing. She made a contented sound and snuggled against him. He had to fight back the desire to waken her again for something far more pleasant than a midnight intruder; it was enough just to hold her, or so he told himself firmly. Enough to hold her and let her rest. When her breathing settled into the soft even rhythm of sleep, Kenshin gently brushed a stray lock of hair back from her cheek. Everything about her seemed so soft and so terrifyingly precious -- she looked even younger asleep, with her face slightly rounded by the weight she gained with the child. Her lashes were a soft smudge of shadow against her cheeks, and the tip of her nose tilted up at the perfect angle to beg a kiss, and her lips were parted just enough to breathe... just enough to... Kenshin sighed to himself, and eased himself out from the blankets, and tucked them about her carefully so she wouldn't waken at a chilly draft. As tempting as it was to watch her sleep, there was unfinished business still. He still heard small noises from the garden... small and desperately unhappy noises. He walked out to the porch and lit a lantern. Trying not to resent the intrusion of a half-drunk, stupid gaijin who lacked the sense to explain himself to a man holding a naked blade to his throat, Kenshin wrapped his gi around himself more securely and told himself he would not shiver as he stepped out. But the frozen earth was *cold* underfoot... *So late in the year. So late... everything reminds me now...* *Snow, and silence, and a shape falling through the snow...* *...and our child will be born to this. The snow, the cold... the smell of frost, and of blood...* *...no. No. Megumi said the baby was small, and that she's not too small to bear it; she's not so very big for her time.* *But the baby will keep growing, and she won't.* *It's dark. It's cold. I've spent too much grief in the darkness; when the sun rises it will be warmer. Find the gaijin, keep him from catching his death out here. I have all the nights of the world to brood, and Kaoru would quite sensibly scold me for it.* *The laughter in her eyes when she scolds me... the sunshine in her heart, warming all the shadows. I can't live alone in the dark again... not again...* Closer, the sound of the boy's sobs touched him even through his preoccupied fears and his resentment. But he wasn't quite noble enough to speak first: *let him taste the fright he gave me.* Kenshin laid one silent hand on Heidel's good shoulder; the boy choked off everything, which mildly surprised him. He'd been expecting at least a startled sound... ...and breathing. Breathing was definitely expected. "Haideru-san..." The boy huddled up tighter, face buried in his knees, shaking uncontrollably -- but not from the cold. Suddenly understanding far more than he'd ever expected to understand of how Hiko must have felt, walking in on his baka deshi whimpering in pain and refusing to admit it for fear of punishment or more teasing, Kenshin sighed and stroked the gaijin's strange white-gold hair. Not that the stuff would ever lie smooth, but surely parents soothed their children this way in foreign places too-- "Haideru-san, tell me." "...stupid..." "You can say that all you like, but I can't believe you unless you tell me." Heidel pulled his glasses off and tossed them aside, forehead bowed against his knees. "Can't do anything... I'm so, so stupid..." "No," Kenshin said wearily. "You're terrified. And hurting. Badly. What is hurting you like this?" "Can't... do anything... I just..." He stopped, gulped, and whispered, "I just wanted to see your face..." "What...?" "I hate this! I hate going blind and I can't do anything to stop it and I can't even slow it down and... all I wanted... I wanted your face... Yutarou-kun said not to touch, so I couldn't, I couldn't even ask... but... I wanted to know... before I can't..." He took a ragged breath. "Shouldn't have intruded, stupid, *stupid* fool, I'm always too much forward now, too much desperate... I know nothing is to be done, I know it, why can't I live with the knowing? Shouldn't have even-- I had no right... no right to touch your pain..." *Yutarou told him not to touch. So, in the middle of the night, terrified and alone with the world darker than ever around him, he didn't speak because he didn't want to wake me... poor, poor child. And cruel of me... I couldn't afford to wait, but surely I could have been kinder. If I'd had any idea. Why wouldn't he just say it?* *Because he's alone in the middle of the night in a foreign country where he doesn't understand what gives offense and what doesn't... and Yutarou told him not to ask. And I, the 'legendary swordsman,' wake to greet him with a blade to his throat and ask him if he was an assassin. No wonder he felt stupid...* Kenshin coaxed Heidel's good hand out of the knotted fist he'd made in his trouser legs; then he lifted the boy's fingers to his scarred cheek, and tilted his head to rest against the palm. Heidel lifted his face out of his knees and blinked back tears. "Not for pity," he said stiffly. "No. Not for pity. Just that... we keep misunderstanding each other, and hurting and frightening each other, and if I could go back and undo..." "No," Heidel said, and summoned a lopsided, wavering attempt at a smile. "Symptom, not cause, ne? You were only private, and scared out of sleeping by large stupid foreigner sneaking around in the dark still half drunk and *not* thinking of... what you were... and anyway, you didn't cause my eyes. So, not your fault. Not your fault I'm all tangled up in my head." *'Tangled up in my head.' Young one, if you understood how much that makes a pair of us...* "Still," Kenshin murmured, "I'm sorry." Heidel said faintly, "I am your guest only through knowing of Yutarou, I sneak into your room where you are sleeping in the middle of the night, to try of seeing your face that I was already told you would not show me, and you are trying to apologize to me?" Kenshin smiled. "Well, yes." Heidel must have been able to feel his smile; his hand shifted a little, then hesitated. "Are you sure you are not minding?" "No. Not at all." Still a little timid, Heidel bent cautiously toward him, eyes wide in the dark and pupils dilated. He explored shadows carefully with his fingertips, to be able to distinguish different planes and the sweep of his jaw; at one point Kenshin closed his eyes hastily to keep from losing one to a roving fingertip, and offered the lantern. "...oh -- I'm sorry, that was your eye?" "Is. Don't worry." He smiled again, and ventured one eye open -- the one that had been farther from the fingers. Heidel blinked, and caught the lantern, and tilted his head closer. "Your eyes..." "Hmm?" "Are they always that color?" "No," he said softly. *Either way, the answer is no.* "But if you mean are they always... a little unusual, then yes." "Oh." Heidel looked down at the lantern, and murmured, "Thank you. I think... I... it's dark now, so I think I want to try to remember that color, later, in the dark... so I can remember..." He struggled with himself, then opened the wind guard on the lantern and blew it out, and set it down, and bent his head. "Thank you." Despite himself, Kenshin shuddered at the leap of shadows. "You didn't need to..." "Yes I did," Heidel murmured. "I... have to get used to it, one night at a time." Suddenly, Kenshin understood the rest of it. *It might be better to die... so that the darkness would come all at once. Poor, poor child...* "Young one," he murmured, "there is nothing at all I can do for you but listen... but I think perhaps my master could. Or-- another like him. One who can teach you some of what I have had to learn. There is nothing to do for your eyes, but we who survived the Bakumatsu learned to rely on other senses, in Kyoto's darkness..." He stopped, and brushed through the grass for a small rock. "Here." He stood and took four steps away, then stood with his back to Heidel. "Look at it. Be sure you would recognize it. Then throw it at me." "You are sure?" "Aa." Kenshin waited. "I'm going to throw it now--" "Haideru-san, the point is for me *not* to know when it comes, ne?" "Oh. But... my aiming is not much good." Suddenly, Kenshin realized the limits of the boy's vision in the darkness. "Haideru-san... I'm standing with my back to you. I'm not going to see it coming." "Oh." "Don't worry," he murmured. "Throw it." Heidel threw it lightly; Kenshin had to spin to catch it out of the air before it hit the ground behind him. He sighed, and sat on his heels beside the boy, and offered the rock back. "It's actually easier when the rock is going to hit you, but that's all right." Heidel looked at the rock, blinked, and looked at it again. Then he looked up at Kenshin. "You said, your back to me? How...?" Kenshin began to explain the principles of chi. He deliberately softened his voice, so the gaijin would listen to the tone more than to the words; when he saw Heidel's head nodding forward, he carefully did not let himself grin and touched his shoulder. "The rest can wait," he murmured. "As long as you're a little less frightened now, as long as you can sleep now, that's all you need to know tonight. Come on." He found his glasses for him, then led him back to the porch, back to the room with the others; Heidel hesitated with his hand on the sliding door. "I'm... sorry..." Kenshin shook his head. "It's not your fault. Just let yourself rest, all right? Don't think about guilt. Or fear. Just sleep. There's time enough for tomorrow when tomorrow comes." He waited until Heidel had carefully felt his way through the sleeping figures strewn about the room, then closed the door and sighed and sat on the edge of the porch. *I promised... but... Aoshi...* He lifted his face to the wind and closed his eyes, seeking. The 'noise' of so many lives behind him was a distraction; he walked out into the garden again, and let his feet find their own path. A shadow loomed; he opened his eyes... ...the pine trees. He looked up into the shadows intently, watching each flicker of movement... branches in the wind... A soft voice said, "Go." "If you need rest--" "*Go.*" That voice allowed no discussion. Kenshin sighed again, and bowed humbly, and left. It was a very guilty and somewhat fearful pleasure to slip under warm blankets and lie beside Kaoru... *in some ways it was easier when I had nothing to lose; I had nothing to fear either. How very strange the world is.* --------------------------------- Next time: Shiro's morning after... o-tanoshimi ni! --------------------------------- ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com --------------------------- ONElist Sponsor ---------------------------- GET A NEXTCARD VISA, in 30 seconds. Get rates as low as 0.0 percent Intro or 9.9 percent Fixed APR and no hidden fees. Apply NOW. Click Here ------------------------------------------------------------------------