*** We waited mostly in silence. I drifted for a little while on my own. Saku soon came and found me. He pulled me into his arms. I fell into them softly. I buried my face in his warm chest. I felt my hands latch around his shirt collar. I felt the tears come then. Glistening water seeped through my soul and on to his shirt. I had no idea why I was crying. Then words spilled from my mouth. I wasn’t exactly sure what I was saying just that it was completely true. “Saku…. I missed you so much… I was scared that I would return and you wouldn’t be there when I got there! I wish that….. No one had to die… I don’t want to kill anyone! I just want to go home to the little town,”. I kept crying. He geld me like that for a long time. “I missed you too, it annoyed Riku. I was scared that you would be taken from me. I don’t want to be here either, but it helps that I’m with you. When this is over we will go back to the town to grab our things then we will move out to a place where we can be happy.” he whispered in my ear. I peered into his eyes. The ocean was calm. It was funny this time I saw him on the beach. He meant everything he said. That helped. The sparkling tears stopped rolling down my cheeks. He brushed my hair away from my eyes and tucked it behind my ear. He slowly brushed his lips against mine. It was almost time to go. I settled down to enjoy the last few minuets with him. *** We laid in silence for a long time. His arms wrapped around me protectively. I slowly took out the letter I had written to him. I slowly let my hand inch toward his pocket. I had just managed to get it securely tucked in when the sun started downward. He got up slowly. I rose with him. We went to meet up with Riku and Sorrow. “Alright, what’s the game plan?” Riku asked. “I think we need to stay together if we can,” I offered. “Yeah, we should. We should go to the dungeon first to make sure that there are none of people on our side there,” Saku suggested. Everyone stiffly nodded, knowing that we may be the only people alive. Saku took my hand and started to lead. I glanced back to see Riku and Sorrow’s face. After all, his might be the last time I see them…. alive. *** I watched Saku’s face as muck as possible as he lead us through the hallways toward the dungeon. He navigated the hallways never once stopping. Our only objective was to keep moving, and pray to God that we would some how find the dungeon. I tried to follow where we were going in my mind, to somehow plot our course, but after a while of trying I got a head ache. After an hour we stopped in a deserted. We were all tired. We stumbled in. Sorrow settled into Riku’s arms and slept. Riku stayed alert for about the first five minuets, he soon fell asleep after that. I felt Saku’s warm breath on my hair. I tried to sleep, but my nerves wouldn’t hear of it. “Saku?” I whispered, I didn’t expect a reply. “Yes?” he whispered. “I’m scared,” I hesitantly choked. “Me too,” was his simple reply. After about twenty minuets we woke Riku and Sorrow. Then we set out again. *** This time our strategy was different. We were going to make for the Queen Sechi. They called her Kurohime. We crept the halls this time. Saku in the lead again. We got as far as the sleeping quarters before we saw guards. They were patrolling. They were fairly easy to sneak by. I could feel the sweat pour down me every time we sneaked by one. Then something caught my attention. There were two guards standing outside a door. Every guard that we had seen that night had been moving, patrolling a corridor. These were just standing at a door. I motioned to Saku and the others. Once they had seen I pulled them into a nearby closet. “So what?” Saku whispered. “They are just standing there! They are guarding something or someone. I’ll bet all my money that that is the Kurohime’s room,” I whispered back. Sorrow nodded her agreement. “How do we get in?” Riku asked. “Only one way will need a distraction,” I whispered. I glanced at everyone. They all seemed to realize that it was the only way. We all stared down it was grim that we would have to split up. “I’ll be the distraction,” Riku volunteered. “Then I’m coming with you!” Sorrow piped up. “We’ll go to the kitchens and pull pots and pans down, basically make lots of noise. Then we’ll run back here as fast as we can. Once the guards are gone you go take out the Kurohime,” Riku whispered. Saku and I nodded. Riku glanced at Sorrow “Are you ready?” he asked. Sorrow stepped forward and hugged me. “Be careful,” she whispered. “You too,” I muttered. Riku nodded at Saku “Take care of yourself,” he said. “Same goes for you!” Saku shot back. The Riku and Sorrow left. I watched them go…… maybe for the last time. *** We waited in a small closet that wasn’t far from the Kurohime’s room. I felt Saku’s arms wrap around me protectively. “Saku will they be alright?” I asked. “I don’t know…” he answered truthfully. We waited in that small, cramped space for about five minutes. Then the banging started. Loud clatterings shattered the once peaceful night. We heard the guards rushing to the source of the sound. We could hear their nervous conversation. When the noise quieted down outside the door we opened it a crack, and peaked outside. *** The corridor was peaceful again. No more noises shook the night. There were still the two guards outside of the Kurohime’s door. I glanced at Saku. His expression mirrored mine. We would have to take them out. I didn’t want to have to do that it might attract attention. “I’ll rattle some buckets and stuff in the closet. Since it’s so close they will have to come check it out. Meanwhile you sneak in the room. I’ll follow as soon as I can” he whispered. I nodded to give my approval of his plan. He looked so worried. I couldn’t tell if it was for me or someone else…. like Riku. “Don’t worry about me” I whispered. He looked a little better after that. I watched as he turned his back to me and slipped into the closet again. *** I sprinted around a corner that had the closet in view. Where I wearily came to a halt. So many things were running through my mind….. It made it so hard to focus on what was happening now. Then I heard the soft clatter. The guards rushed by. I watched as they opened the closet, and the battle commenced. I had to tear my eyes from the battle. Saku was fighting. I could see the emotion in the way he moved. He was fighting to protect me. I tore my unwilling gaze away for his fierce face. I raced to the double doors where the guards had stood only a moment ago. I skidded to an unsteady stop. My trembling hands quickly found the handle and pulled open the two huge doors. I slowly entered the room beyond. *** I gasped at the open room. There was a girl. She was sitting on the queen bed. Her black hair parted as she smiled up at me. I gasped. This was the face that had haunted my dreams. The only difference was that the heat that had once radiated off her skin had turned chilling. Her beauty was one of memory. My heart stopped beating. I knew that she was here to take him back. I expected her to kill me then and there, but all she did was stand up and say “I’ve been waiting for you Ruka”. I had heard that voice, it was agonizingly familiar. It was her from the beginning. “What do you want Neko?” I asked quietly. I had to restrain myself from glaring or lashing out with my voice. Every cell in my body wanted her dead. I blinked and Saku’s face danced behind my lids. I felt the water swim behind my lids. I carefully wiped them away. “You know what I want” she said coolly. “Well you can’t have him!” I wasn’t so lucky this time. The envy and anger filled my voice. I drew my zanpaku-to. She smiled and drew hers. “So, your willing to fight for him?” she challenged. I nodded. She chuckled. “It’s to bad you feel so strongly for him, because he will never love you like he loved me. Compared to the love he feels for me the love you two share is a joke! He was always mine! He will always be mine!” She said it so lightly. Every word cut me. “Funny……how you think so too, isn’t it? I know that you are afraid of what he feels for me. You feel threatened by the fact that he is still so attached to my memory after I left. I can see right through you. You can’t hide that you know he will always choose me,” This she said calmly. All these things were true. I was threaded by that. I know that it is likely that he will chose her. All my worst fears exposed, and I hated it. I hated that she knew these things….. things that I had a hard time admitting to even myself. This time I couldn’t keep my temper. I lashed out again, but not just with my voice. I gracefully lunged at her throat while a wild scream of rage issued from my mouth. I felt my zanpaku-to connect with something hard. She had blocked my attack she was smiling. As she watched my anger and hate and hurt pulse through my veins. She enjoyed that these things tortured me. I hopped away from her. I would kill her if it was the last thing I do! This was my last thought before I gave the control of my body over to my emotions. *** I sprinted at her again attempting to slice any part of her. She blocked and attacked my midsection. I parried and jabbed for her foot. She parried my strike and came in I back flipped out of the way. She flowed me and sliced aiming for my head. I hopped out of the and lunged in. She dove back and blocked. She didn’t pull back and neither did I. We were locked in a stale mate. “Neko……..” I knew that voice it was his. We booth glanced at the person who had spoke the single word. Saku was standing in the doorway gazing at us. *** I ran to Saku. “Hey Saku….” she answered. “Don’t you dare speak to him!” I yelled at her from his side. “It’s okay Ruka” he told me. He took a step away from me toward her. “Neko w… w… why?” he stuttered “Why did you leave?”. The way he was looking at her…… made my heart tear. “I had to” she answered simply. “But why?” he asked again. “I was never on your side Saku” she whispered. “I was a spy for the sechi”. “Then how are you the Kurohime?” He asked. “My mom died recently…. She was the previous Kurohime. So the title and responsibility was passed to me” she answered. “Why did you leave me?” he asked. “Because there wasn’t supposed to be a we! You were a complication. I knew I would see you again anyway, and then we could be together” she whispered. He and taken several steps toward her. They were so close now…. She reached out and stroked his face. I felt my heart shudder wildly. “Everything was going to plan until she showed up!” She stopped and glared at me. “Why didn’t you just tell me?”. I watched as he took her hand from his face and stroked it. My heart was slowly cracking. “I was afraid that if you knew that you wouldn’t want to be with me anymore”. “No” he whispered. I fell to my knees. I wanted to run so badly! But my legs wouldn’t move. He leaned in and gently kissed her lips. My heart broke. I felt pools of water collect behind my lids. One spilled over and ran down my cheek. “Saku……” was all I could say. He heard and turned toward me, but I had finally managed to get my legs working and I ran from the room. “Ruka!” I heard him yell, but I didn’t care. I ran down the hall into a cleaning closet. There I slowly let myself die. *** I cried for what seemed to me like hours. I knew that they were looking for me, but all I could think about was Saku. In that single moment he broke my heart. After my tears ran dry and I had more control over the heaving of my chest I went to look for Riku and Sorrow. I glided invisibly through the halls. When I felt the hands fly over my mouth and pull me into a room I nearly bite my tongue in surprise. Sorrow slowly soothed me. She briefed me on what they had found out since they parted fro me and ……. I couldn’t even think the name it brought so much pain. She explained that they had overheard the conversation of two guards. Sorrow, Riku, me and …… where the last people alive from the mission. The others had been executed. I explained that Saku and I got separated or that was the story I had decided to tell them. I informed them of my false situation. Eventually we agreed that we should evacuate the city and retreat to Little Chick. That was fine with me then I wouldn’t have to worry about seeing him and his new bride. Every time my mind strayed to him it hurt. There was this ache in my chest that plagued me seamlessly. It never went away. It took several days to leave the city. I cried during the day when we slept. Well they slept. I couldn’t get to sleep anymore. He was always in my dreams. After a couple days time we finally made it out of the city. I could not have been sadder. *** I stopped eating. I never slept. The night we got back to Little Chick. I went to my room and packed everything. Then I grabbed my stuff and headed into the pouring night. I remember how it made me feel better that it was raining. It was like the world was dieing with me. I went to the place where I let myself loose control that one time on the way to the city of the sechi. Over the days I built a cabin to live in. I almost never slept, if I did it was not heavily. I would sleep just below the surface where I could sense if anything changed. This way I couldn’t dream of seeing him. The pain still continued. I didn’t wash. I ate only when the pain in my stomach got so bad that I couldn’t ignore it. My whole body suffered. I was pushed to the brink of life and death, so that i would not remember him and what it felt like to be loved. *** For many months I stayed that way. Not feeling, not healing, not seeing. Wishing the end would come. I threw my zanpaku-to somewhere that I couldn’t see it. It only made me sadder. Anything that reminded me of him was thrown away. The one day, I don’t know how long it had been months a year? I heard a noise in the night. I awoke from my subtle slumber. I crept out of bed and to my door. I slowly opened it and stepped out into the night. I was grabbed from behind, and forced to my knees. Normally I would have struggled against whoever it was, but I didn’t. I saw her sitting on the rock that I had la crying on so many times before. She was sitting there. She finally turned toward me. “You look terrible!” she replied disgusted. Then my eyes focused enough to make out the figure beside her. It was…….. him. Saku. I felt my heart jolt. I felt the tears slide down my face. I made no attempt to hide them. “Kill her!” she called to the person binding me. Saku looked shocked for a moment then protested. “That’s not what you promised me” he said. “She is a threat to us!” Neko yelled at him. I laughed to myself in my head hardly. “No she’s not! She hardly had the will to live!” he protested. Neko smiled coldly at me. She drew her zanpaku-to. “I’ll do it myself” she whispered. I watched her pull her zanpaku-to back. I couldn’t help smiling this was the end. Oh finally! *** She smiled as she started to plunge her zanpaku-to toward me. Then suddenly her expression twisted to shock. She stumbled backward onto the rock. Bleeding a whole through her heart. Saku had drawn his zanpaku-to. “Why?” she whispered. “You promised me she wouldn’t die!” he yelled. The her stare turned to ice. The air around her turned normal. She was dead. Then the person behind me fell. Dead too. Saku slowly picked me up and carried me back into the cabin. He laid me down on the bed. I felt him beside me. It was the first night I had slept in weeks. Epilogue Saku and I got back together. We eventually moved back into Little Chick. We married at the place with the rock, I was 18. We just celebrated our 5th Anniversary. I have a son named Kikyo. He turns two today. We retired from the officer service. We live in Little Chick, but we own a summer home by that rock in the forest. We picked that spot to remember our past. I will always love Saku and Saku will always love me. In the end Neko couldn’t even stand in our way. There is a story told in Little Chick about two women one fierce a strong the other more beautiful than life itself, and a man that was forced to make the choice between them. My husband and I will always be remembered, because this story is passed from generation to generation. They have changed the names and some facts, but Sorrow, Riku, Saku, and I all know the truth. I the story he picks the one who is strong and together they kill the evil one. They left out all of my months of suffering. That’s okay with me though because Saku knows and he will never forgive himself. In the process of avenging y parents and Fuji-sensei’s memory I fell in love, and even made a legend.