Tag: Anji Mito

Swipes of Sword and Fan 9:

After a long, long while, another Baiken and Anji drabble! Yay! 

And it’s angsty! Yay!

Title: Graves and Names.

Word count: 927

Baiken remembers very little of her parents.

She remembers their names (Kimura and Ryuko), and what they did for a
living (her dad was a construction worker, her mom was a homemaker), but
besides that only vague impressions of the people who raised her remained.

(The smell of fresh rice as she woke up, the sound of her mother humming
in the kitchen.)

The years had been a blur of blood and hate, she could barely afford
time to find a place to rest her head, much less reminisce about people she
would never meet again. She can’t say for sure if they were good parents, or if
they were harsh. She hardly remembers their faces.

(The feeling of her father gently shaking her shoulder, the sound of his
laugh when she only buried herself deeper in the covers of the futon.)

Anji, in contrast, never had any parents to forget about in the first
place. Barely 11 months old and found on the steps of an orphanage. Being raised
by someone who wasn’t paid to do it was a novel concept for him, so he tended
to ask about hers when he thought she was in a good mood.

(A large, calloused hand on her shoulder gently guiding her to the smell
of rice, her mother started to sing.)

She indulged him eventually, if only to shut him up. He asked her some
ordinary things and she answered from what she could remember. His joy and
wonder over the tiny, bleary details of her parents was just this side of
absurd. The most interesting thing she had to say about them was that her mom
was, supposedly, an Enka singer for a few years before she married.

Boy did he love that tidbit.

(A warm bowl in her hands, the rice slowly rousing her as she ate it,
her father swaying off tune to the song with a smile.)

Eventually she ran out of answers for him, and he stopped asking. She
doesn’t miss them, she can’t. How can she miss people she barely knows, that
she barely had the chance to know before it all got taken away.

(The sound of something exploding outside the house. The feeling of
being knocked off her feet and the roof collapsing on top of her.

Pain. So much pain.)

She still visits their graves every year, more for tradition than
anything else. Not that there’s anything beneath the makeshift tombstones, no
time to carry such useless things as dead bodies in the middle of the chaos,
but it has their names. That should be enough. It needs to be. It’s all she can
give them.

(The smell of fire, the sounds of screaming, the sounds of everyone
screaming. She can’t hear her mother singing beyond all the screaming, can’t
see her father dancing from behind the flames.

A monster in the sky in gleaming armor.

Hate. So much hate, building up in her chest to the point where she is
sure it will burst out and split her in half.

Nothing, absolutely nothing. She can do nothing.

Not yet.)

“How can so much dirt build up in one year?” Anji
grumbles as he cleans soot from around her father’s name on the stone, breaking
her out of her reverie as she glances at him from the corner of her eye,
“Doesn’t this place have a groundskeeper?”

“Not for twenty years.” She says lightly, glancing down at the
base of her mother’s gravestone before reaching out to brush a few stray leaves
away. “No one left in the colonies that wants to deal with the corpses
here, that generation is long dead.”

“Except for us.”

“…Except for us.”

He traces a finger on the last name on her father’s stone, carefully
moving along the groves of each character.

(The first thing she threw away, she didn’t need it, didn’t deserve it.

Kimura and Ryuko’s daughter died along with them, burnt to ashes until
there was nothing left and then sank to the bottom of the ocean with the rest
of their home.

She is Baiken. That is all she
will ever be.)  

Anji sighs and pats the stone gently, “I always wanted to meet you,
sorry we never got the chance.”

“The stones can’t hear you Anij.”

He looks at her from the corner of his eye, hand still on her father’s
marker, “the stones are all that I have to speak to.” He frowns.
“Soon not even that, at the state their in.”

She clenches her jaw. “Stones wither away.” He faces her fully
now, an unspoken challenge in his gaze as she keeps her gaze on her mother’s
name. “Everything withers away, eventually.”

For a long while, he says nothing, turning away to stare at the
gravestone again. A gust blows through, clearing away what was left of the dead
leaves.

Eventually he sighs, and groans as he gets up on his feet. “Yes,
eventually.” He offers her a hand with a soft smile. “But not for a
long while yet.”

She looks at her mother’s name for a moment more, lifting her hand to
trace it on the stone, before reaching for Anji.

She doesn’t look back as they walk away, her hand holding his until the
horizon swallows up the stones.

(The first anniversary of their death, she stopped for a moment to
wonder if they would be proud of her if they saw what she amounted to.

The day after, as she slit a man’s throat open, she decided that it
really didn’t matter.)

Wounds (and how they heal)/part 2!

done! Man I tell ya, writing with a possible ear infection is not easy! But worth it so write more stuff for my baby girl ;_;

Significantly less blood and gore and this one, as well as next to no swearing (yes even though it still involves Baiken. Crazy I know)

Eri gazed mournfully at the pile of clothes at her feet, dressed in
pajamas and the memory of the previous night still fresh in her mind.

From the moment she had revealed her true nature to Baiken and Anji, the
samurai had been…quiet. Right after she told her she was a Gear, Baiken had
stared at her for a long second, as if she wanted to make sure she heard right.

Before she or Anji could say anything, Baiken rose to her feet, stating
that they couldn’t stay where they were any longer. Eri shuddered as she
remembered the corpse, slumped on the wall and bleeding not two feet away.

(Chisaki was slumped like that, bleeding in the street. She could still
scarcely believe it, sometimes, that a nightmare could be felled like that. She
still woke up at night, thinking he would appear over the edge of her bed, the
blood from the hole in his head staining the sheets.)

They snuck into the inn room they rented, grabbed what they could carry,
and left. Eri felt a bit bad about the inn staff since they hadn’t paid, but
keeping up with Anji and Baiken meant not having time to voice such concerns as
they hurried to the next village over under cover of darkness, for fear of more
assassins attacking them.

It also meant that there wasn’t any time to fix the large tear in her
kimono. Starting at the top of her right shoulder and running down the length
of the arm. And even if they had the time, the blood stains dotting the edges
ruined the precious, overly expensive silk.

She begged for that kimono, the pink flowers near the hem, and the blue crescent
moon on the back. It was so beautiful. It was the first thing she had ever
asked for since her rescue that wasn’t food, the first thing she had ever asked
for period.

And now it was a pile of cloth at her feet, a waste of money. And Baiken
still wouldn’t speak with her.

The wound on her shoulder sent a quick prick of pain through her arm,
Eri reaching up to rub it to try and alleviate the pain, with minimal success.

“Eri!” Anji called out suddenly, softly knocking twice on the
wooden screen dividing the small inn room between her and the other two, “May
I enter?” She looked up at the silhouette he cast on the screen to see he
was holding a small parcel and shaking it slightly, “I have a present for
you!”

“Um…” She mumbled, a
bit surprised and glancing between the screen and her kimono nervously before
she cleared her throat, “I-it’s okay! Come in!” Anji quietly moved
the screen, coming into view with a quiet smile and a brown parcel in his hands
as he calmly entered Eri’s side of the room.

She briefly caught sight of Baiken on the other side, back facing the
screen and completely still. She was not asleep. She did not look in Eri’s
direction.

Her shoulders slumped minutely, a pit digging into her gut.

A pat on her head brought her attention back to Anji, whose smile had
turned a bit sad, “Don’t mind her too much Eri, she just has…a lot on her
mind.”

Eri bit her lip and looked away, “She…hates me…”

“Nonsense,” Anji snapped gently, “of course she doesn’t
hate you Eri, she promised as much remember?”

She snapped her gaze to him, eye damp, “Then why won’t she look at
me?” She rubbed her eyes miserably, looking away again, “She hates me
because I’m a Gear…”

Anji was quiet for a second, before narrowing his eyes slightly,
“Eri…how much do you know about Gears?”

Eri sniffed for a moment, “Only what Chisaki told me…” She
didn’t see Anji clutching at the fabric of his pants at the mention of the
name, “A long time ago, Gears…killed a lot of people, and then the Holy
Order fought and killed all the Gears…they’re monsters…”

Anji’s eyebrows pinched, “Eri…”

“I’m a monster…” Eri wrapped her hands around her legs and
rested her head on her knees, “No wonder Baiken hates me…”

“Now you listen to me.” Anji stated, putting a hand on the top
of Eri’s head, “You are not a monster just because you’re a
Gear.” She lifted her head to look at him with tear filled eyes, “A
monster is someone who hurts people for no good reason, and for as far as I’ve
known you, you have never hurt anyone period.”

“But…” Eri hiccupped, “But, Chisaki said-”

“With respect to the dead, Chisaki apparently left a lot of details
out of what happened…” Anji scratched his chin for a moment,
“Though to be fair, generally speaking he told you the truth.” Anji
sat down next to Eri, folding his arms as he looked at her, “A long time
ago, Gears attacked the world, and hurt a lot of people in the process.”
He looked at the screen from the corner of his eye, pausing as if waiting for the
person on the other side to speak up, before looking back to Eri, “…Baiken
included.”

Eri’s eyes widened, turning her head quickly to look at the screen door,
as if expecting the samurai to open it at any moment. She then turned back to
Anji, one of her hands touching her face, “Is that how she lost-?”

“Yes.”

A light shuffling sound came from the other side of the screen, and then
nothing.

Eri was quiet for a moment, eyes still wider, “And her-?”

“Yes.” Anji nodded solemnly, a faraway look in his eye, “When
she was very young, Gears attacked her home, destroying it completely.” He
sighed, “She was one of the only survivors.”

A frown deepened on Eri’s face, “No wonder she won’t-”

“She spent a long time after that being…very angry,” He
interrupted, looking away, “Angry at everyone, and at everything.” A
sad smile rose on his face, “And she hurt a lot of people while she was at
it. Very badly too.”

Eri’s eyes grew wetter again, though for an altogether different reason.

“Eventually, Baiken grew past it…though not completely.” He
glanced at Eri’s bandages peeking out of the sleeve of her pajamas, “Some
wounds never really heal.”

Eri bit her lower lip, but said nothing.

“You being a Gear complicates things, no question…but Baiken isn’t
that single minded, not anymore.” He grinned and ruffled her hair,
laughing lightly, “give her some time, she has a lot on her mind to sort
out…but have faith, she’ll get there.”

Eri was quiet for a moment, before rubbing her eyes dry and nodding resolutely,
blushing mildly as Anji kept ruffling her hair.

“And another thing,” He said, mock seriousness lacing his tone
as he leaned down to stage whisper into her ear, “about this whole ‘Gears
are monsters’ business,” He grinned, mischievously, “I actually know
a few Gears that might change your mind about that.”

Eri’s eyes turned into dinner plates, disbelief etched on every feature,
“Really!?”

“Really.” He clapped his hands suddenly, grinning even wider,
“But! That’s for later! For now…” With a flourish he drew his
fans, did a few fanciful twirls accompanied by a faint swirl of blue ki, the
display capturing Eri’s attention completely. Putting one palm forward placing
the ceiling, he hid it by opening one fan and then, pausing briefly for effect,
he closed the fan to reveal the parcel he came in with, “Your present!”

Eri, caught up in Anji’s theatrics, was bouncing slightly in her seat,
the previous heavy thoughts drifting away slightly as she looked at her present
with shining eyes, carefully taking it from Anji’s outstretched palm.

She sat the parcel down on the floor between her and the pile of her
ruined dress, slowly opening the brown wrapping paper. She reached her hand
inside, and when she grabbed it and pulled it out a light red cloth followed.

It was a kimono, colored the same ruby hue of her eyes. Butterflies of a
blue shade swarmed the length of the sleeves and up to the pink blossoms on the
shoulders. A few more butterflies littered the hem with a lighter shade of
blue.

Eri’s eyes shined brighter and brighter with each inch of the kimono
that she pulled out of the wrapping paper.

“It’s a bit much I know.” Anji said humbly, a gentle smile on
his features, “But seeing you so bummed after last night made me want to
cheer you up!” He tapped his head with one of his fans with a goofy grin,
“And when I saw it in the store it reminded me of cute little you! So I
had to get it!”

Eri’s sniffed. Then sniffed again. Anji’s grin quickly fell into panic

“Eri?” He fretted around her, unsure of what to do with his
hands as she kept sniffling, “Are you okay? Do you not like it? I can give
it back just let me-”

“I love it.”

Anji stopped when Eri looked up, mouth wobbly and thin lines of tears trailing
down her cheeks, sighing with relief, “You’re welcome.”

Eri sniffed for a few more moments, Anji sitting across from her with a
calm smile and resting his head in his palm as he chuckled. Eri gave out a
mildly louder sob trying to calm down, and right on cue the screen slid open,
revealing Baiken in loose fitting pajamas, her hair flowing free around her
shoulders.

Her one eye giving out a rather mean and tired look to the other two
occupants of the room, who quickly quieted down in her presence, their faces
heating a bit from embarrassment.

“Do you two know what time it is?”

Anji and Eri exchanged a quick look, and Anji looked back at the samurai
with a nervous smile, “Late?”

“Very late, Anji.”

He visibly shrank and cowered at her calm glare, smiling wilting as he swallowed
the lump in his throat.

Baiken glanced at Eri specifically, her gaze softening noticeably when
she caught the wetness on her cheeks…and then went right back to unamused when
she saw the kimono in her grasp.

“Anji…”

“Yes dear?”

“Where did that kimono come from?”

Another audible gulp, “Well, I bought it, of course.”

She looked back at him, a curious look in her eye, “Oh? Did you
now?” She took a few steps closer to him, Anji sweating more and more with
every inch she overtook, “And with whose money did you buy it,
exactly?”

A moment of silence, “Mine, obviously.”

“And what exactly made it your money?”

“…the fact that I’m going to skip lunch for the next week?”

Anji and Baiken locked eyes for a few moments, Eri looking back and
forth between them in confusion. Eventually, Baiken sighed and rubbed her
forehead tiredly, “Fair enough.” She thrust her thumb behind her to
their shared futon, “Bed. Now.”

Anji got up with minimal ceremony and a quick bow, “Yes,
ma’am.” He left the room in two strides, leaving Baiken with Eri, who was
still clutching her new dress.

A few moments of awkward silence sank between the two, Baiken looking
away and clearing her throat.

“…how’s your shoulder?”

Eri rubbed her arm where newer bandages covered the wound from yesterday,
“It’s better…” Eri looked up at Baiken, the woman still looking away,
before lowering her gaze to her feet, “…I’m sorry for waking you up.”

“…don’t worry about it kid.”

Eri worried the cloth of her kimono between her fingers for a moment,
before getting to her feet and walking towards the futon with the folded gift
under her arm, her eyes trained on the floor the whole time. As she lifted up
the covers to lay down, she heard a frustrated sigh and a soft thump, looking
back to see Baiken resting her forehead on the side of the screen door.

“Bai-Miss Baiken-?”

“I’m not a good person, Eri.” She said, solemnly, her forehead
still pressed to the door, “never was, and chances are I never will
be.” She took a deep breath, and raised her head to look at the young girl
directly, eyes steady and serious, “But, when I make a promise? I always
keep it.”

Eri bit her lower lip, her eyes pricking at the edges.

“Do you understand?”

The girl nodded once, not trusting her voice.

“Good.” Baiken rubbed her forehead, watching Eri as she used
her sleeve to dry her eyes, catching sight of the red fabric again,
“Eri?” The girl looked up with a ruddy face, “…could you show me
the dress?”

Eri blinked a few times, before she blushed hard enough to glow and got
to her feet, grabbing the sleeves of her dress and spreading it over her form
above her sleepwear.

Baiken was quiet for a moment, eye roaming the designs on the cloth and
the vibrant red color, a soft smile gracing her usually hardened face, “Looks
good on ya kid, wear it tomorrow when we head out.”

The girl nodded rapidly, face still glowing red “Yes, thank you!
Miss Baiken!”

“Just Baiken is fine kid, I already told.” The samurai
rolled her eye, but the soft smile still rested on her face as she turned to
her side of the room, her hand grabbing the screen door in order to close it.

But before that she stopped, and looked back at Eri as she folded her
kimono and put aside before she crawled under the covers.

“…Good night, Eri.”

The screen door quietly slide closed, shutting with a feather soft thump
of wood and paper. The little girl bundled herself up in her blanket, and sunk
into a deep, dreamless sleep.

The wound on her shoulder, though still pulsing with quick moments of
pain, didn’t bother her at all.

(They left early in the morning. She had just barely enough time to get
dressed in her new clothes, taking Anji’s hand and grabbing Baiken’s pant leg
as they walked down the street.

She threw away her old kimono without a thought, determined to take
better care of this one.

Her shoulder stopped throbbing as she did, and soon she forgot about
it.)

weird crossover prompt Idea: Baiken’s rage crumbling before the adorableness that is Eri.

(my daughter and my wife??? what a concept….)

—-

(warning: lots of blood and mentions of grievous injuries) 

Anji was always quick to take in a situation, no matter how odd or seemingly overwhelming it might first appear.

Going from place to place mostly on foot looking for criminals to either apprehend for money or discuss safe passage required that he make snap decisions based on the reality of whatever predicament he found himself in.

Whenever he was at a loss, the first thing he always did was ascertain the facts.

The facts of this particular situation being that Baiken was currently sitting down while holding onto a sobbing child with her one arm, and her sword was lodged firmly between the eyeballs of someone with a bird like mask strapped to his face.

The man was also missing both arms, though Anji couldn’t really bring himself to look around for them.

Anji didn’t say a word as he surveyed the area, his mind itching to jump to all sorts of wild conclusions, both about the man and why Baiken might want to kill him, but he refrained, instead choosing to focus on the other person of interest in this matter.

For what he could see of the girl as she sobbed into the front of Baiken’s kimono, she was very young, perhaps six or seven at the oldest. She had ivory white hair, and was dressed in looked to be a hospital gown.

The most interesting thing however, was the single slightly stubby horn sticking out of her forehead.The sight of it throw him for another loop, the possibility she might be some kind of Gear (and goodness would that complicate matters if that was true and Baiken was not aware of that) swirled in his head for a moment, before he took a deep breath and focused his eyes on Baiken once more.

Her hair was a mess, falling around her face and partially obscuring the crying girl. Her clothes were heavily stained in blood and ripped, a few deep cuts around her arms and legs showing through the gaps.

Her eye-patch was missing, another shallow cut going through her forehead and spilling blood over the much older scar.

Her face was calm and measured, her eye focused squarely on the top of the girls head as her arm traced slow and deliberate circles on her back, the girl’s loud sobbing gradually slowing.

Soon the girl fell silent and the death grip she held on Baiken grew slack and her hand fell down to her side without a sound. Amidst the now quiet breathing of the girl a few more scant sniffles and hiccups sounded before all was silent.

Baiken let out a slow breath and raised her head to look at him, the first time she had acknowledged him since he showed up.

Anji thought very carefully for a few moments, knowing he can only ask a few questions before they would need to get as far away from the fresh and bleeding corpse as possible, clearing his throat.

“Baiken, who was that man?”

He pointed behind her to the corpse, the sun glinting off the blade stuck in his skull.

“A bastard.”

She answered quietly and calmly, her gaze firmly on Anji and without a hint of glancing back at the aforementioned dead man.

“….Why did you kill him?”

Her eye narrowed and stabbed through him, but her voice remained calm, “Didn’t you hear me? He was a bastard.”

He didn’t flinch from her glare, and on his tongue the possibility to mention the dozens of other bastards that Baiken had met and not killed rested, but he chocked it down.

“How did you know he was a bastard?” Was what he inquired instead, voice level, “since, unless I’m forgetting something, this is the first time either of us had ever met him.”

She glared at him for another half second, before she sighed and began raising to her feet, her arm curling around the little girl in her lap, “She told me.”

Anji couldn’t help the scoff that rose from his throat, “A little girl told you that someone was a bastard?”

Baiken adjusted her hold before she walked, well limped more like, towards Anji, stopping when she reached him ,”She didn’t need to.” And then, with more gentleness than Anji has ever seen her employ, she deposited the girl in his arms. Anji adjusted his arms to cradle the child on reflex.

A bit bewildered Anji glanced at the girl in his arms, noticing the massive amount of bandages wrapped around her limbs for the first time, the raggedy state of her clothes, and the ashy texture of her pale skin for the first time.

He looked back at Baiken, she stared right into his eyes, the shadows of the alleyway bringing the scar on her left eye into relief. She was waiting, daring him to object to whatever she was planning to do.

Instead, he sighed, and offered a smile, “Alright…who is she then?”

Her glare softened considerably before she looked down at the girl, her hand reaching up to move a few stray white hair from her face, “Eri.” She lowered her hand and turned on her heel, walking towards her dead opponent.

He threw a tired smile at her back as she walked, chuckling a little, “Right, so then, what do you think we should do with little miss Eri?”

She reached her sword and grabbed it, “Get her as far away from her as we can first off,” She intoned blandly, tugging at her sword to try and get it out of the skull of her enemy, “Then we feed her, bath her-shit it’s stuck-and put her in some clean clothes.”

Anji turned himself away from the gruesome sight of Baiken trying to get her sword out, keeping his eye on her while he made sure Eri would not witness it, “And after that? What?”

With a growl of frustration, Baiken stomped on her opponent’s face for leverage, crushing the bird mask in the process, and with one last yank finally retrieved her sword with a load squelching sound.

Anji discreetly removed his palms from Eri’s ears.

Baiken huffed as she wiped her sword on the legs of her kimono, staining what little white was still left, “Ask me in the morning.” She sheathed the katana and walked away from the body, her boots splashing slightly as she stepped on a few errant puddles, “For now we need to move.”

She walked passed him, only sparing half a second to give a quick glance at the sleeping Eri, and he followed a few steps behind, trailing her as she choose the most out of sight route out of the city.

He looked down at the girl and smirked, “Who knew? You actually had some maternal instincts after all.”

“Shove it up your ass.”

He clicked his tongue, “Now now, if Eri is going to accompany us, you will need to watch your language a bit more dear.”

She scoffed and shook her head, but said nothing.

(Kai Chisaki would be found a few hours later, a quick investigation is conducted but soon grows cold for lack of any leads. A few sightings of Eri would be reported over the following months, accompanied by two people dressed in long kimonos.

A samurai in white and black, and a dancer in blue. Eri herself would be dressed in salmon colors, a short dagger and fan tied to her hip.) 

rckumon:

Bacon is that one girl that respects your opinion enough to ask you for advice, but will still blatantly ignore it and do whatever the fuck she was gonna do anyways

Anji voice: you should give up on your revenge 
Bacon voice: You’re right but you forget…
Louder Bacon voice: I AIN’T A BITCH

Swipes of Sword and Fan 8

after a bit of a break, here’s another slightly longer one! 😀

Word count: 1384

Chapter 8: Shoes and Pity.

Baiken
can tie her own shoelaces.

That
sentence by itself may not make that ability sound very momentous, and Baiken
would be inclined to agree. But when one takes into account that Baiken lost an
arm when she was about seven years old, and that the arm she had left (pun not
intended dammit) wasn’t even her good one, might make it sound a mite
more impressive. (If you heard it from Anji anyway, but Baiken doesn’t put much
stock into biased opinions.)

Point
is, Baiken can tie her own shoelaces. It took a few years of walking around in
wooden sandals, lots of bullheaded stubbornness and refusal to try zippers
while she practiced, but she could do it just fine.

It
takes her a bit longer, but she compensates by getting up a bit earlier than
everyone else does. The fact that her footwear these days were a pair of one
lace boots that only went half way up her calf also helped.

They
provided good enough protection to her feet both when walking and in combat,
they were less likely to be knocked off in a fight as well, and she could lace
them up with one hand in about a minute each.

At
least, that was the standard.

Baiken’s
shaking fingers were making it a bit more difficult than she was used to.

Her
and Anji were having a bit of a slump lately, apparently their reputation had
spread far ahead of them and most petty criminals, on which they made their
living, went deep underground, thus depriving the two of them of any income.

Less
money, which meant less food.

Baiken
was fine with that, she once went a whole two months without any fresh food,
she went through worse, through infinitely worse, she can stand to not
eat for a few weeks.

Now
if only her fingers would stop trembling.

“…Are
you alright Baiken?”

She
stops, doesn’t move an inch, before he shoulders sag with a sigh, “You’re
up a bit early.”

“Your
cursing woke me up.”

She
clicks her tongue and goes back to trying to tie her shoe, not looking in
Anji’s direction, “You better not be expecting an apology.”

He
chuckles, she can imagine him rubbing his eyes, “An apology? From
you?” He laughs a bit louder, she can picture the stupid grin on his face
that goes with it, “I would never dream of insulting you like that.”

She
clicks her tongue again, too busy with her unlaced boot to continue their early
morning back and forth, a few more muttered curses grinding out between her
teeth, the sound of Anji getting up and putting on his kimono serving as white
noise.

“…do
you need help?”

“No.”

The
answer is sharp and quick, as automatic as the beat of her heart. Help was a
thing other people needed, help was a thing Baiken offered when
it suited her, she went her whole damn life without any damn help.

Anji,
bless him (damn him), did not even flinch, his voice level and polite,
“Your fingers are shaking.”

“Thank you for the observation.” She
was growling at this point, a desire to use her teeth to assist her fingers
pushing on the back of her nose. “Get dressed, we’re moving to the next
town.”

“I
am dressed,” He says, and she whips her head towards him to see
that he speaks the truth, he even did up his top and put his shoes on, which
she thinks is just adding insult to injury at this point, “I am only
waiting on you.”

She
grinds her teeth and glares at him, grabbing her shoe and lifting it over her
head, “Well sorry for only having one fucking arm!”

She
throws the shoe; it passes next to his cheek and hits the wall. It flops down
to the ground with a pathetic thump of leather on concrete.

They
stare at each other for a bit, Baiken huffing for a moment before her actions
catch up with her and she slams her palm against her forehead.

Anji’s
eyes are soft (not with pity never with pity never Anji) and he
offers a small smile, “I apologize if I offended you.”

She
shakes her head, “No, no don’t I-” She lets out a harsh breath,
“I shouldn’t have done that, shouldn’t have snapped at you.”

She
hazards another glance at him, he doesn’t judge her when her eye meets his
gaze, only waiting for her to continue.

“I
fought Gears for decades,” she started to mutter, barely loud
enough to hear, “killing them for decades, I travelled the whole
world and back going against all sorts of freaks and monsters,” she
growls, “I went toe to toe against that crazy witch and won, I
should be able to tie my own damn shoelaces.”

“You
can tie your own shoelaces.”

Her
voice sounds petulant to her own ears as she barks, “Yeah, until now apparently.”

Anji
sighs long-sufferingly and looks at her shoe slumped against the wall, before
turning back to her with a tired gaze, “Just let me help.”

She
looks away with a twisting scowl, reaching out her hand impatiently, “you
can help by getting me my damn shoe so I can tie it.”

“Baiken…”

“It’s
three miles of gravel road between here and the next town and it rained
yesterday,” she looks at him from the corner of her eye, “You’re not
going to force me to walk on a muddy gravel road barefoot are you?”

“Are you willing to walk on a muddy
gravel road barefoot?”

She snaps her head to look at him wide eyed
her jaw hanging a bit loose, “You’re not fucking serious.”

Anji only raised a single eyebrow and
waited.

“Anji for the love of-”

“There’s no shame in it.” He says
quietly, stopping her mid growl, “No shame in asking me
for help, you know that right?”

Despite herself, her face heats up
marginally, she looks down on the ground as she scratched the back of her head,
at a loss for what to do.

Finally she throw her hand up in defeat,
“Too damn early to argue…” She looks away and waves her hand dismissively,
“Just…do whatever you want.”

A moment passes, she hears him walk towards
her and kneel down on the floor next to her feet, she one more looks at him
from the corner of her eye as he grabs her right foot and helps it into the
shoe.

He handles her like an ancient blade, sharp
and priceless.

“You
know how to lace it?”

“I’ve
seen you do it enough times.”

“Hmm.”

His
hands grab the edge of the lace, working it through the holes going up the
front to close it. She sees both sets of fingers hard at work, one holding
things in place while the other moves the string.

“You
can do it with one arm you know.”

“You
can do it with one hand,” he says pleasantly, his eyes focused on his
task, “I need to use both.”

Her
face heats up and an urge to argue the point raises in her chest, but she
brushes it aside with a sigh, letting Anji grab her second shoe and help her
put it on.

Five
minutes later, she’s standing and moving rolling her feet back and forth,
testing the tie.

“So?
How is it?”

She
wiggles her left foot slightly, making the sole shift a bit, “This one’s
loose.”

Kneeling,
a sound of string moving across leather, a feeling of mild tightness around her
calf.

He
looks up, “Better?”

She
tries not to think of how this position, kneeling and looking up, makes him seem,
tries to push the sound of certain words out of her head at the look he gives
her, kind, faithful and adoring.

She
shrugs noncommittally and starts for the door with an unhurried step, knowing
Anji will stand back up and follow her without needing to look, “It’s
fine.”

The
grin he throws at the back of her head is another thing she doesn’t need to
see.

(A
few days later they get drunk and Baiken tells him, unprovoked, to never kiss
her feet. Despite her disposition, she isn’t into it.

He solemnly
promises to only to do so metaphorically.)

Swipes of Sword and Fan 7

shortest one so far, but I still like it 😛

Word count: 701

Chapter 7: Money and Honor

“Is it just me, or are these guys weaker than the bounty would have us believe?”

Anji takes half a step right, not looking in the direction of the angry looking bandit attacking him as his rusty mace rushed past his head and lands harmlessly in a wall.

“What do you expect? Villagers are super jumpy in this part of the colonies; every little band of thieves might as well be a vicious band of marauders.”

Baiken said all this as she used her sword to block the mad swings of a battle axe being wielded by a another bandit twice her height, her arm moving the blade a few inches every time to masterfully deflect each blow as it raced towards her.

“But at this rate if we actually charge full price for these guys, I’ll feel bad for a whole week.”

Anji took another half step to dodge a frankly embarrassing punch from his would be opponent, using a closed fan to strike at his neck, and grabbing the soon limp body and placing it gently on the ground all in one motion.

“Feel bad then, it’s their money to throw away, who are we to judge?”

Baiken sliced the battle-axe into a clutter of metal shards, twisting her right shoulder to shoot out her club. The metal hit her opponent on the side of the jaw, and several teeth flew out as his head snapped aside. She turned away as the body hit the ground with a loud thud to face two more bandits, both of them shaking in their boots.

“So we just preform high way robbery on these people? Have you no honor?”

Anji twisted his body this way and that in and out of three attackers, fluidly blocking, parrying and striking back in a manner more akin to a dance than fighting. He stops with a flourish of fans, his enemies falling to their knees with pained moans, their bodies covered in bruises.

“Honor and two mon might buy you a half decent cup of tea Anji, we can’t afford to be generous, not if we want to keep ourselves fed.”

Baiken slowly sheathed her katana, gazing directly at the last bandit, his forehead pressed to the floor as he muttered pathetic pleas for mercy surrounded by the three dozen beaten bodies of his allies.

Anji didn’t reply, tapping his chin with the tip of a closed fan as the bandits groaned in pain around them. He hummed in thought for a few moments, absentmindedly kicking a bandit that tried to reach for a knife between the ribs, before turning to face Baiken properly, “Why don’t we help with the repairs to the village? If we undo the damage these criminals caused, the villagers would get their money’s worth!”

Baiken scowled at him for a long second, “You’re not letting this go, are you?”

Anji shrugged with a light smile.

Baiken groaned, “Fine, if it’ll stop you from hounding me about this for the next month,” She pointed a finger at him with a snarl when he opened his mouth, “And don’t pretend like you wouldn’t!” Anji wisely decided to keep quiet. “Then fine.” She scoffed with a shake of her head, “Never pegged you for a bleeding heart.”

“I’m not, I just have this thing about earning my pay.”

Baiken clicked her tongue, “Well if that’s your problem, you can earn your pay by carrying these losers back to the village.” She kicked the pleading bandit in the head without looking at him, raising her eyebrow at her companion. “I’m not throwing my back for this job any more than I have to.”

Anji grinned, and with a flick of his wrist the fan in his hand grow to a considerable size and floated in mid-air.

“….Cheating bastard.”

(They did end up helping to fix the village, and the sight of Baiken on a roof with a hammer in her hand and nails in her teeth as she put roof tiles back in place was an image he would treasure for a long while.

The look she had while throwing the hammer at his head when she noticed him staring, a bit less so.)