Disclaimer: Watsuki Nobuhiro owns Rurouni Kenshin. I?m just borrowing
them. So please don?t sue me. I?m broker than broke.

Summary: Kenshin?s past comes back to haunt him and a new danger starts
to hunt in Tokyo.

Rating: R

Info: It?s the question and answer chapter. Arrrgggg.

 

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Chapter 11a

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Kenshin looked up at the night sky with a warm glow in his heart.
Despite everything that had happened and everything that was happening
the brief moment he held Kaoru in his arms made none of it seem to matter.

Unfortunately times like that don?t last. He felt the heat that Kaoru
had left along his body leave, suddenly sucked away by the presence that
sat itself in the spot that the young woman had vacated minutes before.
He turned and found with no great surprise that he was sitting next to
the woman in the sea green kimono.

?Shall we talk??

?Yes, that we should.?

They both stared at each other for a moment as if waiting for the other
to speak. The Sea Green Lady gave a small smile and said, ?I believe you
should go first, you probably have more questions to ask than I do.

Kenshin nodded in acceptance and asked his first question. ?When we
first meet you seemed rather..... Kenshin?s sentence drifted off as he
thought how to phrase the last word. ?

The girl took pity on him and said. ?Scatterbrained??

?Ah, yes, only now you seem quite focused, what changed??

The Sea Green Lady smiled slightly and said ?I found you.?

Kenshin?s eyes widened momentarily to the size of small dinner plates.
?Oro, what do you mean, you found me??

The Lady leaned back against one of the dojo?s supports, as if getting
comfortable for the long haul. ?After I died I started to search for
you. I really don?t know why, but it has been the one thing that kept me
going. However, during the last few years I started to realize that I
was no longer keeping track of time the way I use to. Days would seem to
pass that I would later learn had actually been months. It became harder
and harder to concentrate on things. I think...,? she said. ? I think I
was losing myself. In a short time I believe that I was going to just
stop being, or at least stop being here.? She smiled at him again. ?Then
I found you.?

She looked over at Kenshin, staring at him as if to memorize his face.
?If you think I was bad when you first talked to me you should have seen
me when I first found you. My mind was an echo of what it is today. All
the time I watched you and all the time you where gone I gathered myself
back together and after I had talked with you a couple of times the rest
of it just seemed to snap back into place.?

Kenshin interrupted. ?Does this mean you remember who you where before
you died??

?No, it does not,? she replied softly. ?But I doubt that who I was
really matters. She paused for a moment to gather her explanation. ? I
may have left people to mourn me. I may have left people I should have
been looking after. So I have to think that the fact that I don?t
remember may be something of a blessing. The memory of not being there
for them or that my disappearance may have caused them pain, this memory
can not hurt me because it doesn?t exist.?

Kenshin looked into her eyes. ?Perhaps,? he said. ?But perhaps the
thought that those people are out there and you can not remember them
hurts far more then watching their pain ever could have.?

The girl looked away from him. ?Perhaps.? She shifted a bit as if
needing to find a more comfortable position. ?Do you have any more
questions? She asked.

?Several, that I do.?

?Then please, go on.?

Kenshin nodded and continued to the next thing that had been bothering
him. ?If you died under that tree why did it take you so long to follow
me? I was right there.?

?I was stuck.?

?Stuck??

?I was tied to the spot I died in for two weeks.? A vague look came over
her face as she delved back into the memory. ?At least I think it was
two weeks. Either way I wasn?t able to move from under that tree until a
local woodcutter in the area came to cut it up for firewood and found my
body.? Her mouth quirked up into a half smile. ?Actually I had to wait
until after I was buried until I was able to move out of the area at
all. By then you where long gone. I did try to track you with the
rumours about you that I picked up along the way. However, I didn?t have
enough power at the time to ask anyone questions, or even let myself be
seen.?

Kenshin winced inside at the thought of being aware of being dead while
stuck under a tree for two weeks.

?Next question??

?Hana says that you are a vengeful ghost, that she does.?

?Yeah well, Hana?s been rather angry with me ever since I killed her
grandson.?

This announcement brought Kenshin to his feet and he looked at the woman
in shock. She stared back at him as if daring him to judge her. The
swordsman felt a soul numbing sadness as he took that death as well as
any others that might have followed into his heart as his own
responsibility.

A look of pure incredulity settled onto the dead girl?s face and she
startled him by standing up and planting her fist in his stomach.
Kenshin slid off the veranda to his knees, fighting to recover his lost
breath.

The Sea Green Lady looked down at him, her face cold. ?Don?t take that
death on. He isn?t worth it.?

Kenshin, wheezing a bit, asked ?why, what did he do to you??

The ghost sat down again and rearranged her self against the post. ?Did
Hana talk about having a granddaughter??

Kenshin, looking confused at what seemed to be a change of subject,
dragged himself up to sit beside her. ?Hai, she did mention one.?

The Lady sighed. ?Shioko was a beautiful young woman. Just the fact that
she could see me and talk to me saved me at a time when I think I was
going insane from loneliness. However, even if I hadn?t been dead I
would have wanted to be her friend. I have never met anyone who was as
alive as she was. It was impossible for anyone not to notice and be
drawn to her and she never turned away from anyone. To her everyone was
equal; everyone was worthy of being a friend.?

Kenshin felt a tendril of dread start to wind its way through his abused
stomach. ?So what happened to her?? He asked.

?She disappeared. Earlier in the day both Hana and I felt worried about
her but we brushed it off. It wasn?t until I finally meet up with Hana
while looking for Shioko that we realized something was truly wrong. We
didn?t even have to say anything to each other. Meeting someone else
with the same worry crystallized it into pure panic.?

?We tore the area apart looking for her. When she hadn?t come home by
nightfall Shioko?s parents contacted the police and over the next few
days, three actually, the police and all of her friends and family
searched for her.?

?You found her, didn?t you??

?Yes,? she said, nodding. ?I was looking for her in the woods; I had run
out of places to search in the city.? She stopped for a moment and
blinked rapidly as if to ward off tears. Then so quietly that Kenshin
had to strain to hear it she said, ?it was the first time I ever felt
someone dieing, the first time I ever felt drawn to a death.?

She cleared her throat and continued. ?I found her inside of an old
shack, chained to the floor. For the three days that she had been
missing she had been tortured, raped and starved. She died in my arms
and all the time all she could ask was why, why would Tsuneo do that to
her. After she died she didn?t stay, which considering what happened
later was probably for the best.?

Kenshin dreaded to ask but did so anyway ?and Tsuneo was??

?Hana?s grandson. Not to mention Shioko?s brother.?

?How......??

?How could he??

Kenshin nodded.

?When you met Hana I believe you notice how she covers over a
marshmallow centre with several layers of nastiness??

?Yes.? Kenshin answered once again looking confused.

?Tsuneo could do the same thing but it turned out that he was layering
friendliness and courteousness around what was actually an empty void.
At his centre he was dead and he believed that everyone around him was
nothing but shadow puppets that where equally as dead.?

?Shioko was the only fly in that ointment. Even he could tell she was
truly alive and for whatever reason he felt he had to take that from
her. To crush what she had and he didn?t. So I hunted him down and
killed him.?

Kenshin?s confused look grew larger. ?There seems to be a lot of that
story missing.?

She nodded. ?Yes, but I have no desire to go through all of it again.
Suffice it to say that those where the highlights and all, perhaps more,
then you need to know about that subject. If it makes you feel any
better he was the first and last person I killed. I can never be sorry
that I did it but it doesn?t mean I ever want to do it again.?

Kenshin actually did feel relived that the woman he had killed, however
accidental, had not become a multiple murderer. In fact he could
understand the path she had taken, for the events that led up to it were
far too terrible. However, what comforted him most was the fact that she
had no desire too tread that path again. This was something that Kenshin
could also understand very well.

The Sea Green Lady?s gaze suddenly became unfocused and she looked off
into what appeared to Kenshin to be thin air.

?Is something wrong?? He asked.

?No, it?s nothing. However I think it?s your turn to answer a few
questions.?

?What would you like to know??

?Everything you know about the murder you were helping the police with.
That includes anything you know about the other murders as well.?

Kenshin nodded and settled back against his own post before giving her a
run down of the afternoon?s information.

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_Chapter 11b_

Zenko felt briefly pissed off at the girl in the green kimono for
dismissing him to the red head as nothing. He got over it as soon as he
realized that that same red head actually had some information that he
might need. He wondered if maybe he should have stuck around and watched
him instead of searching after the other ghost when she disappeared from
the crime scene.

Listening to the swordsman reeling off the information he had gathered
Zenko found that he was becoming angrier than he had thought possible.
That those bastards had taken him on was one thing but from the sounds
of it they were even going after desperate kids and that really pissed
him off.

Not that Zenko had ever been a model of goodness because yes, he did
have kids working for him. They made some of the best thieves he had
ever seen. However, he made damn sure that those same kids where taken
care of. The last guy he had under him that had taken to hurting one of
them had been beaten into a bloody pulp before being tossed out of the
place. He just wouldn?t put up with that kind of shit.

When he caught up with those guys he was going to take his time killing
them.

Just as soon as he figured out how to do it.

In the middle of reds recitation Zenko noticed something black and
fluttery at the edge of his awareness. He didn?t see the other two stand
up in reaction to it, but he did notice when a fast moving form came out
of the dark and made a very familiar slicing motion in front of the girl
before disappearing back into the shadows.

The gangster was off after it in a flash, leaving the uproar that the
other two were in behind him. There was no way he was letting this guy go.

If he followed him he would take him to the rest of them. Once he knew
where they were he could go back to that kimonoed... woman and learn
what he needed to know to take them out.

The man in front of him moved amazingly fast but Zenko kept up with no
problem. He didn?t get tired or out of breath so running full out was no
longer a problem. He could keep it up all day if need be.

Zenko felt a prickly sensation all over his body as he suddenly realized
that he wasn?t alone. Sure the other guy was there ahead of him but that
wasn?t what he felt. Every now and then something brushed against him
that seemed to be almost welcoming him. Once he could feel them they
started to take on a physical form that he could see. Whatever they were
they moved in perfect sync with the killer. The gangster could only make
them out as black tendrils, rather like long smudges of drawing charcoal
on white paper. They followed the killer who was oblivious to them as
they drifted over and around him. Like a sentient cloak they were
constantly wrapping themselves around his body as if in a futile attempt
to squeeze the life from him. For no matter how they shifted and
contracted they couldn?t pull enough power together to hurt the man much
less be noticed by him.

Zenko realized with some horror that each of those smudges of darkness
was a ghost, like him. There were, he noticed, a lot more than just
three of them.

A hell of a lot more.

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End of Chapter 11

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