Two Sides of a Sword: To Fight For Her...

Long Long Author's notes!

Hello everybody! Sorry it took so long to post this up, been busy with school projects, work, and all. Finals week is evil! I tell you, evil!!

...*ahem* Sorry, just had to blurt that out ^^. I'm just glad that I'm not in Physics class where most of my friends are *sweatdrop* Since it took me so long for me to post this chapter up, I made it a little longer than usual, just for your reading pleasure. See how nice of a person I am? ^^.

Anyway, just a few lil' shoutouts o some of my reviewers:

Perry - I have NO clue how long this'll be. I make up everything as I go, but I think that this chapter is the climax, so don't worry. It *might* end sooner than you think ^^.

Noa - You asked for sister intervention and here it is! Finally ^^. Sorry for all the cliffhangers to leave you hanging like that!

Seychella - Without having the chapters as long as it is already, I decided that Ryu is easily accepted via my magic wand. He's just got a lot of scars on his face during a previous encounter with Rokou a while back (it'll be explained in the next chapter) and pretended to be his loyal servant by going under the alias of Toraki. He's under a lot of suspicion by the school, though, so he's not really out in the open just yet. Ah, yes, you guessed right about Ling (been wondering if people have figured it out yet, you're the first and only to tell me in the review ^^). Her entire purpose of hiding herself? It will be revealed in Chapter 18 ^^. Yeah, I got this nifty lil' scene I want to put in Chapter 18 and ladida...you just have to wait ^^.

Thank you to all my other reviewers for the feedback as well! Your words and support help me a lot in continuing to write.

Now enough rambling from me, on with the show!

...Oh yeah, almost forgot. I know Aoshi's an idiot right now. I got so frustrated with him that I decided to knock some sense into his head in this chapter *hinthint*

Chapter Sixteen ~ To Fight For Her...

How many times in his life was he going to fall away? To push himself away from her? To deny happiness?

Did he even deserve happiness?

Shinomori Aoshi pondered on these thoughts while watching the candlelight and remembering back to the day's events.

"Matte, Aoshi-sama, what do you mean about my grandfather breaking ties?" Misao asked. When he tried to slip away from her hold, she pulled him back. "You're hiding something from me and I know it! Aoshi-sama, please tell me! Onegai!"

Memories hidden deep within his heart began to resurface. The day when Okina had found him and Ikumi, the day when his mother hid them before she died by the hands of the Azuma, the day when he was surprisingly appointed Okashira through Okina's decline and wise words...

He slightly turned his head, not wanting to look into her eyes, "It's best for you to not know, Misao..."

"Doushite? Why can't I know??"

Why didn't I tell her? he asked himself. His mind had screamed to him at the time to set her down and explain what dangers lied ahead. However, a small voice, that young boy inside of him, the one that remained scarred to the death of his parents, said not to. She would be killed if she knew. He was the only target of the Azuma, the only one that Miraimoto Rokou wanted to destroy.

Or so he thought.

When he had left the room and out of her view, Misao let out a breath of air that she didn't realize that she was holding. She fought back the tears that immediately sprung into her eyes, remembering the vow that she took earlier that day when she left his room. She vowed to never cry over him anymore. Ever.

But why, oh why, was it so hard to do?

Her stomach growled with a menace, signaling Misao that it was time to eat and stop the tears that came dangerously close to falling. She hadn't eaten much the past few days and wouldn't have eaten anything at all if it had not been for Ikumi's persistent persuasion.

Just forget about everything for now and keep your strength up, she repeated the words in her head and stepped out of her room. She could hear Setsuko's laughter in the grand courtyard, and her mind drifted back to the days when she was her age. To the days when Misao could care less about the events happening around her. All that mattered to her back then was not to lose Aoshi like how she had lost his sister. Then he, Hannya, Beshimi, Shikijou, and Hyottoko left the Aoiya without saying good-bye.

"Makimachi-san?"

The unfamiliar voice startled her out of her thoughts and Misao turned to face a young woman around Ikumi's age carrying a large tray filled with bowls of steaming soup. Misao remembered seeing her around the school in one of the lessons. What surprised her was that the woman could speak her language with ease, which was rather unusual in the school.

Maybe there are a few more people who can speak Japanese like Ling-san and Ryu...she thought.

"Daijoubu, Makimachi-san?" the woman asked, cocking her head curiously to the side. "You seem a bit distant today."

"Oh, I-I'm fine, really," she lied and plastered a fake smile to her lips. "Just...tired, I guess."

Her stomach involuntarily rumbled loudly in the empty hallway. Misao blushed with embarrassment. The woman laughed and handed her one of the bowls of soup.

"Hai," the woman said with a twinkle in her eye. "I should be giving this to Ling-sensei, but since you're hungry, I don't think that she'll mind if you eat first."

"Arigatou," Misao replied and gratefully accepted the bowl. She examined the bowl curiously, careful not to let the soup spill. Intricate red patterns engraved into the bowl were the first things that struck out in Misao's eyes. She smiled at the enigmatic pattern, trying to figure out its true meaning.

"This is so pretty..." she complimented, which brought a smile to the other woman's lips. "Um..."

"My name is Kai Xuan, Makimachi-san," the woman replied, her golden brown eyes twinkling in anticipation. "I made that bowl myself."

"You did? Wow..."

"Maa, I have to bring the rest of the dinner to the others," Kai Xuan replied and began to turn away. "I hope you like it, Misao." And I hope you live the death of the poison as well.

Misao nodded in reply, not noticing the slight change in Kai Xuan's behavior nor the sudden change in tone of voice. "Mm, I will! This soup smells delicious!"

Kai Xuan had already disappeared around the corner when Misao said her words, but she really didn't care. All that mattered to her right now was to get her stomach under control and took her first sip of the soup. It tasted just as delectable to her taste buds than what her eyes saw; she wanted to take another sip when it hit her. The searing pain of the poison rushed through her entire body like fire, and it soon became unbearable to contain. The beautiful bowl she was given shattered to the floor, spilling its contents out like blood. It became hard to breath, almost as if someone managed to enter her body and constrict her lungs with needles so that each and every breath she took was as painful as walking upon sharp rocks.

What's going on? she thought frantically. What's happening to me?

"Misao!" a familiar voice shouted behind her.

She managed to turn her head at the sound of the voice to see a tall, dark figure running to her. Was it Death?

"Aosh---" she managed to cry out before darkness completely overtook her.

Funny thing was: she welcomed it.

He had been too cold towards her; she deserved an answer. She deserved to know what was really going on. She wasn't a child anymore.

Those were the thoughts that continuously ran into Aoshi's mind as he slowly made his way back to Misao's room from the long hallway in between light and darkness.

Light and dark, that was how he portrayed his life. The darkness always allowed Aoshi to fall into solitude: it was the reason why the other members of the Oniwanbashuu, those who were older and wiser than he, were able to follow him as Okashira. It was also the reason why he had fallen to the path of chaos. Very little light entered in the darkness and those that entered were eventually engulfed by the darkness of faded away. Yet...one light did stay, and it was the only one that managed to keep Aoshi sane.

He saw Misao talking to a young woman and stopped. He stood where he was and watched, knowing that he was pretty far from their view and knowing that he was not yet ready to talk to her just yet. In Misao's hands, he could see that she was holding something but wasn't sure what it was because the item had been obscured by her petite hands.

The other woman turned and walked away, leaving Misao alone. Aoshi waited a few moments before deciding to approach her, not looking up from his shoes as he walked, when he heard a crash. His head snapped up at the noise and instinct began to take over. Misao was clutching at her throat as if some searing fire suddenly ran through her.

His ice blue eyes, usually devoid of emotion, widened in shock. His feet, normally planted in one place, quickly began to move. Lengthy, athletic limbs made use of themselves and ran towards Misao's crumbling figure, fear taking over the gut feeling he had earlier.

"MISAO!"

She turned her head at the sound of his voice, and he could see that whatever she had was slowly overtaking her petite body.

"Aosh---" she managed to croak out before collapsing into his arms.

"Misao! Misao!"

No matter how much he called her name, she would not respond, only writhe in pain from the deadly drops of poison in her body. His eyes painfully turned away from her to the broken bowl of soup nearby as a portion of the school's students and Ling rushed into the hallway. Incomprehendible voices scoured into the room, voices that were in a different language but asked the same question: what was wrong?

Aoshi did not hear any of their words. All he could understand were the dancing red scorpions laughing back at him in shattered porcelain. He at first thought they were just illusions and blinked to make sure, but they were still there. Crimson scorpions revealed themselves in his eyes, showing their secret and mocking him, taunting him, haunting him, whispering:

Too late, too late...

More footsteps, more voices entered, but they meant nothing to him.

You failed her...

"Aoshi..Aoshi!" a familiar voice shouted at him, but he did not reply. Firm hands took a hold of his shoulders and shook him, continuing to repeat his name.

But all he heard were three words: You failed her.

Then another word shined into the darkness. "Ao-chan!"

Aoshi's head snapped up from the ground and he stared into familiar brown eyes and a familiar face. Ling stared at him with concern written over her features, knowing that the wall had been broken. Stray, gray-black strands of hair slipped out underneath the hat she wore and curled around her face, portraying a hauntingly familiar picture of his past. Aoshi blinked, the picture not fading away.

Okaasan?

"Aoshi, can you tell me what happened?" Ling asked him in a soothing voice as Ikumi and the others, who had just returned from their trip, ordered the other students back to their lessons.

Didn't she call me 'Ao-chan'?

"I...left the room and...came back to find Misao talking to...one of the students," he slowly replied to gather his thoughts.

Unconsciously, he handed over Misao's writhing form to Jun who had asked him before but didn't hear. Jun nearly retracted back her hand before she was even able to check Misao's temperature.

"She's running a fever," she said to nobody in particular.

Ikumi, Ryu, and a new face for Aoshi to recognize had finished sending away the students and returned to see Misao's condition. Everything came in a blur for Aoshi then, barely able to catch Jun's husband's name, and found himself standing in a distant corner of Misao's room as Jun attended to her.

"Misao-chan, I know it's hard, but you have to stay still!"

"What does she have?"

"I'm not quite sure yet, but we have to bring this fever down. Isamu, I don't care how you do it, but get some ice and a bucket of water right now!"

"Uh...right!"

"Get me some blankets. She may be running a fever, but she's shivering. These won't be enough."

"Where did you send Ryu to?"

"He's getting Set-chan and interrogating anybody else who had seen what happened."

"Aniki, did you see anything else?"

Aoshi looked up from the floor at the sound of his sister's voice, his own emotion beginning to seal themselves away again as they always did. "She was given a bowl of something...I think it was soup."

The realization suddenly hit him then. How could he have been so blind? Rokou had sworn vengeance upon Aoshi, the one who had effectively reduced the Azuma to this deadly few during the Bakumatsu. Aoshi was certain the Rokou would only go after him, but he had forgotten that the man had indirect ways of extracting pain, no matter who the person was. Miraimoto Rokou was a master in exploiting weaknesses of his enemies.

Ikumi gently laid a hand upon her brother's arm. "Aniki?"

"That woman..." Aoshi murmured, still not looking up from the floor. "Who was in charge of the kitchen?"

"Kai Xuan was," Ling replied while she and Jun continued to struggle with Misao.

"Kai Xuan?" Ikumi and Jun asked simultaneously.

"Aa. She just transferred from the south."

Kai Xuan...he had heard that name somewhere before.

"Just transferred? I didn't know that you COULD transfer from the different schools, sensei."

Aoshi kept repeating the name in his head as if it would somehow strike a cord in the memory bank. He HAD heard that name somewhere before.

"I was surprised myself, but Wong-san allowed the transfer. She arrived here about a week ago."

Kai...it rhymed with the weapons he had once loved before turning to the kodaichi: sais. Everything came clear to him now.

"That name is an alias," Aoshi blurted out. All eyes turned to him. "Her real name is Nakamoto Sai. A member of the..."

His eyes widened in shock and, without even thinking, his feet took him out of the room in search of the woman responsible for Misao's suffering. He could barely hear his sister call out to him nor did he care right now. All that mattered to him was revenge, even if he didn't know what to do. He had to find that woman.

Footsteps ran behind him, playing catch up. He didn't hear them until a hand grabbed his arm and spun him back the other way. Reflex told him to counter attack, but he had no weapons on him and met the matching eyes of his sister.

"Aniki, I know what you're thinking, but clear your head for a second!" she exclaimed.

"My mind is clear, Ikumi, now let me go," Aoshi ordered in an unusually cool and cold voice.

As he tried to slip away, Ikumi pulled him back. Unlike Misao, however, her grip was strong and determined to not let go.

"And how exactly are you going to find this woman?" she demanded and pulled back even harder as Aoshi tried to pull away. "Oniichan, listen to me!"

He froze, not having heard the name in twelve years. Ikumi took in a deep breath and bit her lip, slowly forming the next set of orders in her mind.

"Look at me."

He slowly looked to meet his sister's eyes. Eyes that reflected back his own pain and guilt. Ikumi finally let go of his arm and let out a deep sigh.

"Oniichan, do you love Misao-chan?" she quietly asked him. When no reply came from him, she repeated, "Do you?"

It took Aoshi a while to respond "...Ikumi, it's..."

"Has nothing to do with you because you know how Misao-chan feels about you. But how do you feel about her? Truthfully from the hear? Because if you go out and chase that 'Sai' woman, then you're going to be seeing Misao-chan's deathbed."

Aoshi's jaw tightened, his eyes narrowing. "Why are you telling me this?"

"Because you're doing the exact same thing as I did when Fei was poisoned!" Ikumi blurted out, not wanting to hide her past any longer. She added a bit more quietly, looking away from him, "...and how I reacted when Ryu fell off the cliff two years before." She looked back up at her brother again, her eyes determined to find an answer. "So tell me before you start to go off on a rampage: do you love Misao?"

Aoshi sighed, releasing all the years he had spent pushing his emotions away and remaining in control. He was tired from sealing everything away, and he knew he was hiding from the truth from himself. He closed his eyes and brushed back his hair. "I do."

"Truly?"

He nodded, letting his own words sink in. "Hai."

"Then why do you hide from her?"

"Because I'm afraid."

"Afraid of her falling away from you?"

Again he nodded.

"So now what is more important to you? Trying to chase after a woman who gave the poison to the one you love or trying to save her with the poison's antidote?"

Aoshi began to think of the various possible herbs for a cure. "What does she have?"

"Paralysis poison."

Again he closed his eyes, fearing the worse. "What type?"

"Kodoku."

Kodoku was a poison difficult to cure because the herbs used for its medicine was rather scarce and few. Only a few knew the true sources of the antidote, and most of the time they kept those secrets to themselves.

"There's a much faster way to find the cure," Ikumi added as soon as she saw the hope die in Aoshi's eyes. "But it's much more dangerous than finding the herbs themselves."

"...Finding the headquarters. But how..."

"I can ask Ryu. He should know where it is." She paused. "It's your choice, oniichan."

Ikumi began to walk away, back into the trenches of her own world and leaving her brother to ponder about is, before Aoshi stopped her.

"Matte, Ikumi."

She stopped in mid-step and turned around.

"You're hiding something from me. What really happened to you when you came here? You never explained what happened to Fei and how Setsuko arrived."

Ikumi smiled back at her brother, a smile that reflected upon the years of pain and melancholy she faced. "Let's just say that I have a grudge against Rokou as well, oniichan. I don't want you to waste your life away if Misao dies as it happened to me upon Fei's death."

What really had happened to his precious little sister, he hadn't really found an answer for. When he encountered Ryu and then Jun later that day, they were both reluctant to explain.

I don't want you to waste your life if Misao dies as it happened to me upon Fei's death...

When she said those words to him, she had pointed and proven that he loved Misao dearly. It was more than what he had told himself to believe, told himself to hide away from his heart. He realized that Misao was the only thing that separated him between the sane and insane. The light and the dark. What would he do if she was gone? He was too afraid to know. All that mattered now to him was to save her....and save himself.

And by all means he would find a way.

Aoshi stood from his seat and blew out the candle in the room, grabbing his ni-kodaichi. He finally had a goal to focus on now, and he was determined to keep that goal alive.

He would fight for Misao, until death.