Everything ends, Chapter 1/??
Title: Everything ends
Chapters: 1/??
Author: fffriction1984
Genre: historical, drama, romance (actually I have no idea how to label this, sorry)
Warnings: AU, un-betaed, English is not my first language, Wikipedia helped me a lot but I’m not sure how accurate this is (I suck when it comes to historical things XD), character death
Rating: PG-13 for now
Pairings: No pairings yet
Characters: All gazemen, Yoshiki, Tora [Alice Nine], Suzuka [OFC], mention of Waka [danger*gang], more characters to come, this will be an jrock-all-star-cast XD
Synopsis: Everything he lived for was gone
Disclaimer: Uruha is still duct taped to my bed and Aoi is locked in my closet Don't own anyone, but the idea is mine, BWA HAHAHAHA HAAAA!
Hours later, it was long since dark, Uruha returned home. Nowadays his home was not what it used to be. Only six months ago, before the end of the Boshin War, he rarely came home at all, but every time he did he could sense the special aura of this place. Ever since he had joined the Suzuki clan over 15 years ago, after his parents had died, he had valued the hospitality of his new family, of his clan. They had granted him training, food, shelter, a home.
He remembered the usual busyness of this place. The premises had always been in a hustle and bustle, with proud Samurai everywhere, young men like himself, younger boys still in training. It was a very lively place.
Most Samurai of the clan had been called out to the new military, now using western style weapons, spurning their traditions against their own wills.
The grounds were almost deserted by now.
His clan leader, Suzuki Akira, had accepted his inheritance as the Boshin War had started, although he was as young as Uruha himself. Yet he had had no other choice. His father had been killed by assassins of the Shogun, another point that had added to the anger already boiling inside of them at that time.
On that day Akira had changed his name to ‘Reita’, a family tradition for over 6 generation already. But not only had his name changed, his personality changed as well. It seemed to grow darker with each day and with each of his clan members dying in battle while fighting for a better future.
A young housemaid, a child still, ripped Uruha out of his thoughts as she patted his arm almost suddenly. “Ne, Uruha-kun, are you hungry?” she asked.
“No, thank you, Suzuka-chan…”
“But you have been away all day. And I’m certain you didn’t get to eat anything.” With that she pulled two Mochi out of her sleeve and smiled all over her face.
“Oh well…”
“You have to eat something!” she commanded while putting her hands on her hips and Uruha couldn’t help but smile fondly at her. Suzuka was 10 years old, she was an orphan child and Reita’s mother felt such sympathy for the young girl before she died of fever that she had decided to take care of her. And though Suzuka had to work hard every day she had the nicest personality of all the servants working for the clan. Her manners were not the best, but she was a child, everyone was indulging her.
“You’ll be angry with me if I don’t eat, huh?” he asked her and patted her head.
“Yes! And I’ll tell Aoi and the others! They won’t be happy about that either.”
“Then I don’t have any other choice. Hand that Mochi over to me, Suzuka-chan.” Uruha really wasn’t hungry, he just ate that Mochi so Suzuka wouldn’t run and tell his fellow Samurai about it.
“I’ll go and get you some tea.” she smiled and hurried across the court in between the houses on the premises.
Uruha sat down on the porch and started eating his rice-ball. Yet again he could feel his nausea coming back with quite a force. Sometimes he had no problems at all, sometimes he just had to think of eating something and he’d have to throw up.
As Suzuka returned she was pulling Aoi by the hand. Aoi seemed to be quite grumpy, but that was usual. “You see? He’s back.” she explained and placed a small pot of tea next to Uruha on the porch.
“Yaaa, I told you he’d come back sooner or later. He has nowhere else to go to really.” Aoi replied and kicked a stone across the courtyard.
“Thank you, Suzuka. But you know, when Aoi is grumpy like that, I don’t really like to have him near me. Why did you bring him?” Uruha wanted to know and sipped his tea, totally ignoring his best friend glaring at him for that remark as if he wasn’t even there or deaf or anything.
“Because everyone else is sleeping already. That’s why. Or did you expect me to wake up Master Suzuki?”
“Perish the thought!” Aoi said and quickly placed one hand over the young girl’s mouth. “I’m still wondering why you’re not scared of him like everyone of us is by now.”
“That’s because she only knows him like that.” Uruha said and sighed.
The gates of the estate flew open suddenly and two former Samurai were riding in on horses at a rather rapid pace. Foam drip off the horses’ mouth’s as their rider’s jumped off of their backs and ran towards the large entry hall to the main part of the premises.
“I sense trouble…” Aoi mumbled and sighed. “Suzuka-chan? You should better get into the house. Okay?”
She nodded and ran off without even asking questions.
“These aren’t our people, are they?” Uruha wanted to know and got up from the porch.
“I’m not sure… Yet we both have never met any of our people from Edo…”
Uruha had his sword at the ready as he heard two more horses approaching the property not much later.
“I wonder what’s going on here.” Aoi said, now slightly annoyed about all the noise the horses were making in the middle of the night.
“No look, that’s Kai and Ruki.” Uruha let his sword sink and approached his two fellow Samurai. “Would you mind telling me what’s happening?”
“I wish I knew!” Ruki snorted as he climbed off of his horse. “Honestly, these guys are crazy!”
“Ruki, calm down. It won’t get you anywhere if you go on being angry at them…” the slender Samurai known as Kai said soothingly.
Uruha and Aoi just looked at them in a confused way, they didn’t understand a thing.
“Okay, to make a long story short: Our people from Edo want to unseat Reita from his mastery. I don’t really know why. But we have been discussing this with them the last two days. They won’t back off, no matter what we’ve said.” Kai explained and hurried into the entry hall as well, followed by a huffing Ruki, Uruha and Aoi.
The Suzuki clan had an ongoing companionship with the Hayashi clan in Edo, it had been a rather strategic partnership up until now, but now that the government and the Emperor Meiji were no longer located in Kyoto, internal fights and clashes started to occur. As a fact the Hayashi clan was closer to the powers right now, they didn’t lose as many people in battle as the Suzuki clan did, but it didn’t give them any right to try and ‘dethrone’ Reita, the only living family member and heir of the Suzuki clan.
“Seriously, someone needs to stop them!” Ruki said angrily and drew his sword.
“Whoa, hold on a second, Ruki!” Uruha said and stopped the shorter man from just bursting into the next room to the entry hall. “Put that sword back, will you? It’s to no use if you kill them, they’ll only seek revenge for it.”
“Then so be it!”
Kai grabbed Rukis arms from behind and pulled him back out of the building. “I’ll take care of him.”
Kai wasn’t a guy for battles. He was more of a logical kind, he liked to think about things and strategies, but he didn’t really like fighting according to his strategies. But that’s why he became the counsel of their clan leader not so long ago. Basically he was a really collected and calm personality; he never made mistakes because he tended to think twice about everything relating the clan. Due to this he took a lot of pressure off of their leaders back.
“It’s too late for things like this!” the clan leader yelled in the next second and bumped through the door. “Uruha, Aoi, would you be so kind to escort our… guests to the guestrooms?!”
They did like they were told and decided to stand guard, just to be sure they wouldn’t try to do anything stupid during the rest of the night.
“Would you finally tell me what the doctor said, Uruha?” Aoi made another attempt to get his friend talking as it was already about dawn again.
“Everything’s fine, don’t worry.” he answered and yawned.
“So? And why do you get these spastic cramps sometimes?”
“He said it’s due to exhaustion.”
“You’re a liar! What kind of exhaustion should that be?! We’re doing nothing since the war is over!”
It was sad but true. They were no longer needed now, their rights had been taken, they were like a living memory already, nothing more than history.
“Aoi, you’re going to wake our guests if you go on screaming like that…”
“I just want an answer, Ruha… I’m worried about you, for God’s sake!”
“I’m fine.” he tried to put it off and shook his head like a silent warning for Aoi not to go on nagging on it, but he wasn’t quite sure if Aoi would get that hint.
Aoi huffed and crossed his arms in front of his chest while sliding his hands into the sleeves of his Haori. The raven haired Samurai was known to have a short fuse, though usually the fuse seemed to be a little longer, if spoken literally. Then again his temper and short fuse saved his life several times, his life and the lives of the people fighting amongst him. Aoi was the last to stand back, he would never accept defeat. “We’re not through with this…”
“If you say so.” Uruha shrugged and forced a sick smile onto his face, anything to calm his friend.
Soon Ruki and another samurai called Nao replaced their positions to stand guard and finally released them to get some well deserved sleep.
“Good night, Uruha…” Aoi said with a wide yawn and strolled into his own bedroom next to Uruhas.
Uruha nodded in reply and watched his friend walking away, but he still didn’t move from his position to go to bed as well. He was tired. At the same time he thought sleep was just a waste of time, at least in his state.
He picked up his katana and slid it into his obi, not really caring about the consequences of still wearing a sword in public, before getting up and leaving the premises for a walk.
Kai watched him leaving with a stern but concerned expression from his position next to the entry of the main building. Before he had left Kyoto to take up negotiations with the Hayashi clan in Edo… No Tokyo, it wasn’t called Edo any longer. Anyway, before he had left Aoi had told him that Uruha had been quite confused at times, as well as he often had cramps, so bad he couldn’t even hold his sword. It just added to all the other signs of something being wrong with him, although he always pretended to be alright.
When Kai joined the clan, ten years ago, he was surprised as he first saw Uruha. It was the first time he had seen a Japanese with blonde hair. Later he came to know that Uruha’s father as well as his grandfather have had blonde hair too, it seemed to be some sort of genetic defect. On the other hand Uruha had been a skilled swordsman at the age of 18 already, but his delicate looks were treacherous. People expected him to be as harmless as he looked when actually he was merciless when it came to killing people.
Memories of seeing Uruha in blood-soaked clothes with killed people’s blood dripping off his face and hair still gave him goose bumps.
Something about Uruha had changed during the last ten years, since he knew him. His eyes had hardened, he rarely smiled these days and if he did it was clearly visible that he forced himself to do so. It didn’t stop here. Uruha had always been slender, but never this slender. He seemed to be way too fragile and could count himself lucky that he was able to hide his slim form in his Kimono and Hakama, but just looking at his sunken cheeks was evidence enough.
Rather suddenly a voice startled Kai.
“May I talk to Suzuki-san now?!”
Kai looked up at the leader of the Hayashi clan, Yoshiki Hayashi, and rose to his feet. “Of course, I’ll call a meeting immediately, Hayashi-sama.” he answered with a subtle bow.
“No, I want to speak to him alone, without anyone listening in.”
“I’m sorry to say this but that won’t be possible. He always has his guard in attendance.”
As the leader of the Hayashi clan was talking to Reita Kai was standing close to the door, ready to draw his sword and interfere to anything that might happen.
“Do you really think it’s suitable for you to listen in to their business like that?” Hayashi’s guard queried after a while.
“I’m not listening in, I’m just careful.” Kai answered coldly and went on staring straight ahead.
Something about that guy, Tora, didn’t feel right. He was creepy, to say the least.
“I must say, I’m disappointed they won’t let me attend that meeting. Why is his guard allowed to anyway? He’s no different than me.” Tora went on and glanced across the yard in front of him.
“You see, Tora-san, that’s none of my business. If Hayashi-sama really wanted you to attend, you would be in there right now.”
Suzuka approached them with a tray in her hands and two cups of tea on it. “Where did Uruha-kun go, Kai-san?” she asked and served the men with tea. “He didn’t even touch his breakfast…”
“Don’t be disappointed about it. I’m sure he’s got some important things to do.” Kai replied and gave her a short smile.
“Ah, the legendary Uruha. I heard he’s quite skilled when it comes to his Kenjutsu? Too bad I’ve never seen him in battle.” Tora said and pulled a pipe and tobacco out of his sleeve.
Suzuka glared at the man. “Don’t talk about him like he’s dead!” she snapped.
“Guard your tongue, missy!” Tora glared back and straightened his back to stand to his full size. His height was impressive, that’s for sure, but Suzuka had seen worse than this.
“Don’t you have business in the kitchen to do? I can swear I heard Waka-san calling you.” Kai soothed and shooed her away before she’d anger the tall samurai more.
“I’d really like to fight him.”
“What?”
“Uruha. If he’s as good as people say, I want to fight him.”
A/N: I’m trying to do cliffhangers, lol
As always, comments are <3
Prologue
next Chapter
Chapters: 1/??
Author: fffriction1984
Genre: historical, drama, romance (actually I have no idea how to label this, sorry)
Warnings: AU, un-betaed, English is not my first language, Wikipedia helped me a lot but I’m not sure how accurate this is (I suck when it comes to historical things XD), character death
Rating: PG-13 for now
Pairings: No pairings yet
Characters: All gazemen, Yoshiki, Tora [Alice Nine], Suzuka [OFC], mention of Waka [danger*gang], more characters to come, this will be an jrock-all-star-cast XD
Synopsis: Everything he lived for was gone
Disclaimer: Uruha is still duct taped to my bed and Aoi is locked in my closet Don't own anyone, but the idea is mine, BWA HAHAHAHA HAAAA!
Hours later, it was long since dark, Uruha returned home. Nowadays his home was not what it used to be. Only six months ago, before the end of the Boshin War, he rarely came home at all, but every time he did he could sense the special aura of this place. Ever since he had joined the Suzuki clan over 15 years ago, after his parents had died, he had valued the hospitality of his new family, of his clan. They had granted him training, food, shelter, a home.
He remembered the usual busyness of this place. The premises had always been in a hustle and bustle, with proud Samurai everywhere, young men like himself, younger boys still in training. It was a very lively place.
Most Samurai of the clan had been called out to the new military, now using western style weapons, spurning their traditions against their own wills.
The grounds were almost deserted by now.
His clan leader, Suzuki Akira, had accepted his inheritance as the Boshin War had started, although he was as young as Uruha himself. Yet he had had no other choice. His father had been killed by assassins of the Shogun, another point that had added to the anger already boiling inside of them at that time.
On that day Akira had changed his name to ‘Reita’, a family tradition for over 6 generation already. But not only had his name changed, his personality changed as well. It seemed to grow darker with each day and with each of his clan members dying in battle while fighting for a better future.
A young housemaid, a child still, ripped Uruha out of his thoughts as she patted his arm almost suddenly. “Ne, Uruha-kun, are you hungry?” she asked.
“No, thank you, Suzuka-chan…”
“But you have been away all day. And I’m certain you didn’t get to eat anything.” With that she pulled two Mochi out of her sleeve and smiled all over her face.
“Oh well…”
“You have to eat something!” she commanded while putting her hands on her hips and Uruha couldn’t help but smile fondly at her. Suzuka was 10 years old, she was an orphan child and Reita’s mother felt such sympathy for the young girl before she died of fever that she had decided to take care of her. And though Suzuka had to work hard every day she had the nicest personality of all the servants working for the clan. Her manners were not the best, but she was a child, everyone was indulging her.
“You’ll be angry with me if I don’t eat, huh?” he asked her and patted her head.
“Yes! And I’ll tell Aoi and the others! They won’t be happy about that either.”
“Then I don’t have any other choice. Hand that Mochi over to me, Suzuka-chan.” Uruha really wasn’t hungry, he just ate that Mochi so Suzuka wouldn’t run and tell his fellow Samurai about it.
“I’ll go and get you some tea.” she smiled and hurried across the court in between the houses on the premises.
Uruha sat down on the porch and started eating his rice-ball. Yet again he could feel his nausea coming back with quite a force. Sometimes he had no problems at all, sometimes he just had to think of eating something and he’d have to throw up.
As Suzuka returned she was pulling Aoi by the hand. Aoi seemed to be quite grumpy, but that was usual. “You see? He’s back.” she explained and placed a small pot of tea next to Uruha on the porch.
“Yaaa, I told you he’d come back sooner or later. He has nowhere else to go to really.” Aoi replied and kicked a stone across the courtyard.
“Thank you, Suzuka. But you know, when Aoi is grumpy like that, I don’t really like to have him near me. Why did you bring him?” Uruha wanted to know and sipped his tea, totally ignoring his best friend glaring at him for that remark as if he wasn’t even there or deaf or anything.
“Because everyone else is sleeping already. That’s why. Or did you expect me to wake up Master Suzuki?”
“Perish the thought!” Aoi said and quickly placed one hand over the young girl’s mouth. “I’m still wondering why you’re not scared of him like everyone of us is by now.”
“That’s because she only knows him like that.” Uruha said and sighed.
The gates of the estate flew open suddenly and two former Samurai were riding in on horses at a rather rapid pace. Foam drip off the horses’ mouth’s as their rider’s jumped off of their backs and ran towards the large entry hall to the main part of the premises.
“I sense trouble…” Aoi mumbled and sighed. “Suzuka-chan? You should better get into the house. Okay?”
She nodded and ran off without even asking questions.
“These aren’t our people, are they?” Uruha wanted to know and got up from the porch.
“I’m not sure… Yet we both have never met any of our people from Edo…”
Uruha had his sword at the ready as he heard two more horses approaching the property not much later.
“I wonder what’s going on here.” Aoi said, now slightly annoyed about all the noise the horses were making in the middle of the night.
“No look, that’s Kai and Ruki.” Uruha let his sword sink and approached his two fellow Samurai. “Would you mind telling me what’s happening?”
“I wish I knew!” Ruki snorted as he climbed off of his horse. “Honestly, these guys are crazy!”
“Ruki, calm down. It won’t get you anywhere if you go on being angry at them…” the slender Samurai known as Kai said soothingly.
Uruha and Aoi just looked at them in a confused way, they didn’t understand a thing.
“Okay, to make a long story short: Our people from Edo want to unseat Reita from his mastery. I don’t really know why. But we have been discussing this with them the last two days. They won’t back off, no matter what we’ve said.” Kai explained and hurried into the entry hall as well, followed by a huffing Ruki, Uruha and Aoi.
The Suzuki clan had an ongoing companionship with the Hayashi clan in Edo, it had been a rather strategic partnership up until now, but now that the government and the Emperor Meiji were no longer located in Kyoto, internal fights and clashes started to occur. As a fact the Hayashi clan was closer to the powers right now, they didn’t lose as many people in battle as the Suzuki clan did, but it didn’t give them any right to try and ‘dethrone’ Reita, the only living family member and heir of the Suzuki clan.
“Seriously, someone needs to stop them!” Ruki said angrily and drew his sword.
“Whoa, hold on a second, Ruki!” Uruha said and stopped the shorter man from just bursting into the next room to the entry hall. “Put that sword back, will you? It’s to no use if you kill them, they’ll only seek revenge for it.”
“Then so be it!”
Kai grabbed Rukis arms from behind and pulled him back out of the building. “I’ll take care of him.”
Kai wasn’t a guy for battles. He was more of a logical kind, he liked to think about things and strategies, but he didn’t really like fighting according to his strategies. But that’s why he became the counsel of their clan leader not so long ago. Basically he was a really collected and calm personality; he never made mistakes because he tended to think twice about everything relating the clan. Due to this he took a lot of pressure off of their leaders back.
“It’s too late for things like this!” the clan leader yelled in the next second and bumped through the door. “Uruha, Aoi, would you be so kind to escort our… guests to the guestrooms?!”
They did like they were told and decided to stand guard, just to be sure they wouldn’t try to do anything stupid during the rest of the night.
“Would you finally tell me what the doctor said, Uruha?” Aoi made another attempt to get his friend talking as it was already about dawn again.
“Everything’s fine, don’t worry.” he answered and yawned.
“So? And why do you get these spastic cramps sometimes?”
“He said it’s due to exhaustion.”
“You’re a liar! What kind of exhaustion should that be?! We’re doing nothing since the war is over!”
It was sad but true. They were no longer needed now, their rights had been taken, they were like a living memory already, nothing more than history.
“Aoi, you’re going to wake our guests if you go on screaming like that…”
“I just want an answer, Ruha… I’m worried about you, for God’s sake!”
“I’m fine.” he tried to put it off and shook his head like a silent warning for Aoi not to go on nagging on it, but he wasn’t quite sure if Aoi would get that hint.
Aoi huffed and crossed his arms in front of his chest while sliding his hands into the sleeves of his Haori. The raven haired Samurai was known to have a short fuse, though usually the fuse seemed to be a little longer, if spoken literally. Then again his temper and short fuse saved his life several times, his life and the lives of the people fighting amongst him. Aoi was the last to stand back, he would never accept defeat. “We’re not through with this…”
“If you say so.” Uruha shrugged and forced a sick smile onto his face, anything to calm his friend.
Soon Ruki and another samurai called Nao replaced their positions to stand guard and finally released them to get some well deserved sleep.
“Good night, Uruha…” Aoi said with a wide yawn and strolled into his own bedroom next to Uruhas.
Uruha nodded in reply and watched his friend walking away, but he still didn’t move from his position to go to bed as well. He was tired. At the same time he thought sleep was just a waste of time, at least in his state.
He picked up his katana and slid it into his obi, not really caring about the consequences of still wearing a sword in public, before getting up and leaving the premises for a walk.
Kai watched him leaving with a stern but concerned expression from his position next to the entry of the main building. Before he had left Kyoto to take up negotiations with the Hayashi clan in Edo… No Tokyo, it wasn’t called Edo any longer. Anyway, before he had left Aoi had told him that Uruha had been quite confused at times, as well as he often had cramps, so bad he couldn’t even hold his sword. It just added to all the other signs of something being wrong with him, although he always pretended to be alright.
When Kai joined the clan, ten years ago, he was surprised as he first saw Uruha. It was the first time he had seen a Japanese with blonde hair. Later he came to know that Uruha’s father as well as his grandfather have had blonde hair too, it seemed to be some sort of genetic defect. On the other hand Uruha had been a skilled swordsman at the age of 18 already, but his delicate looks were treacherous. People expected him to be as harmless as he looked when actually he was merciless when it came to killing people.
Memories of seeing Uruha in blood-soaked clothes with killed people’s blood dripping off his face and hair still gave him goose bumps.
Something about Uruha had changed during the last ten years, since he knew him. His eyes had hardened, he rarely smiled these days and if he did it was clearly visible that he forced himself to do so. It didn’t stop here. Uruha had always been slender, but never this slender. He seemed to be way too fragile and could count himself lucky that he was able to hide his slim form in his Kimono and Hakama, but just looking at his sunken cheeks was evidence enough.
Rather suddenly a voice startled Kai.
“May I talk to Suzuki-san now?!”
Kai looked up at the leader of the Hayashi clan, Yoshiki Hayashi, and rose to his feet. “Of course, I’ll call a meeting immediately, Hayashi-sama.” he answered with a subtle bow.
“No, I want to speak to him alone, without anyone listening in.”
“I’m sorry to say this but that won’t be possible. He always has his guard in attendance.”
As the leader of the Hayashi clan was talking to Reita Kai was standing close to the door, ready to draw his sword and interfere to anything that might happen.
“Do you really think it’s suitable for you to listen in to their business like that?” Hayashi’s guard queried after a while.
“I’m not listening in, I’m just careful.” Kai answered coldly and went on staring straight ahead.
Something about that guy, Tora, didn’t feel right. He was creepy, to say the least.
“I must say, I’m disappointed they won’t let me attend that meeting. Why is his guard allowed to anyway? He’s no different than me.” Tora went on and glanced across the yard in front of him.
“You see, Tora-san, that’s none of my business. If Hayashi-sama really wanted you to attend, you would be in there right now.”
Suzuka approached them with a tray in her hands and two cups of tea on it. “Where did Uruha-kun go, Kai-san?” she asked and served the men with tea. “He didn’t even touch his breakfast…”
“Don’t be disappointed about it. I’m sure he’s got some important things to do.” Kai replied and gave her a short smile.
“Ah, the legendary Uruha. I heard he’s quite skilled when it comes to his Kenjutsu? Too bad I’ve never seen him in battle.” Tora said and pulled a pipe and tobacco out of his sleeve.
Suzuka glared at the man. “Don’t talk about him like he’s dead!” she snapped.
“Guard your tongue, missy!” Tora glared back and straightened his back to stand to his full size. His height was impressive, that’s for sure, but Suzuka had seen worse than this.
“Don’t you have business in the kitchen to do? I can swear I heard Waka-san calling you.” Kai soothed and shooed her away before she’d anger the tall samurai more.
“I’d really like to fight him.”
“What?”
“Uruha. If he’s as good as people say, I want to fight him.”
A/N: I’m trying to do cliffhangers, lol
As always, comments are <3
Prologue
next Chapter