Please Come Back: PCB

A/N:  Ak!  I don't understand why the site stripped away my quotes, but it did and I should have noticed it :(  It ought to be better now.  I apologize to my reviewer and all who read this. 

 

"Please Come Back" by Abraxas (06-08-24)

Trees swayed, branches rattled; the petals of their blossoms – their colors obscured, muted by the darkness – scattered through the shadows and fell upon the earth.  A demonic caravan sliced through the graveyard of blossoms like conquerors.  The triumphant leader, Sesshoumaru, strong and steadfast, blazed the trail.  The loyal servant, Jaken, worried yet determined, covered the rear.  The gallant stead, Aun, accompanied the reptilian.  The double-headed creature looked as if it knew of something its companions would not or could not acknowledge.
A hollowness blanketed the landscape.  About the world, the emptiness was as unnatural as it was eerie.  It was spring.  It was a time of life, not of death, yet the yawning reach of the black abyss was inescapable.
Sesshoumaru's eyes, electric and cold, kept their gaze fixed into the distance.  That night there was no path, there was no destination, only wander – onward, forward – one step after the next.  In time things would be different, there would be purpose, but then and there it was not that time.
The dog-demon inhaled the air.  Internally, it concerned him that the air was sterile.  That it lacked the scent of –
Sesshoumaru stopped and looked back.
Jaken stopped and gazed up.
Why were his eyes so wide?  So wet?  As if with tears.  Sesshoumaru's sight was shocked by Jaken's visage though his face did not betray any remnant of emotion.
"Little Youkai."  Jaken bowed.  "We are far enough away."
Jaken nodded.  He tied Aun's reigns to a tree and retreated into the wilderness.  He gathered the twigs of the right size and dryness.  He cleared the terrain, built the pile.  He set the work ablaze with the aid of the staff.  It was the reptilian's task to build the canine's fire and after centuries of wander and service he was the master of the art. 
The flicker of the flames reflected across Jaken's and Aun's eyes.  The crackle of the fire was the only audible sound.  The camp had not always been that dead.  Would it be alive again?
How profound the simplest change could be.
Jaken straightened.  He tensed, looking caught and annoyed.  He thought that – he felt that – his sleeve had been tugged.  Alas, it was imagined.  It was not real but by his sigh he wished it were.  It was her habit to tug his sleeve that way to urge him to tell her a story.
"Jaken."
"Yes, Lord Sesshoumaru?"
The dog-demon stood by the trees beyond the camp.  Only his back, the vague, dreamy outline of his body could be seen.  "Story, Jaken."
The reptile-demon gulped.  Was the urge reflexive as for master as for servant?  He wondered if one needed to hear it as much as the other needed to tell it.
"Once upon a time…."
When Jaken finished the campfire was as vivid as it used to be.  He, too, was tired.  Aun slept.  Sesshoumaru lingered within the realm of the wilderness.  Even in the shadows and darkness of the midnight hour he forced himself to be unreadable.  And the servant wondered what could have been watching the master that he needed to be enigmatic.
"Tomorrow we obtain food."
"Food, Lord Sesshoumaru?"
"Rin is hungry.  Mortals are more fragile than us.  We have been through too much adventure."
"Naturally, Lord Sesshoumaru."
So began that most curious dynamic between the demons.  At night the fire.  Jaken and Aun warmed themselves by its flames.  Sesshoumaru watched and waited afar looking into the horizon.  Sometimes by request, sometimes by instinct, the little, green youkai recited a story.
It came to be natural.
Often, Jaken could have sworn his sleeve was tugged.  Night after night, though, he dismissed the idea as soon as it formed.  It was either the wind or Aun nipping at his cloak.  Or it was what he knew it was all along:  simply and purely imagination.  There would not be, forever, those little, flower-stained hands prompting him into story.  There would not be, ever, the yawning, sleepy eyes of that girl drifting off into asleep.  It was gone.  It could not be again.
Yet Sesshoumaru persisted.  He sniffed about the air as if searching.  He gazed into the void as if seeking.  He did not wander, he combed the world.  Because she was there, playfully and mischievously hiding, teasing her friends with her absence.
He started the fires for her.  He set the food for her.  The flowers and clothes he offered, he lay by blankets.
Once Jaken suspected, now it could not be denied.  Sesshoumaru lived oblivious to Rin's death.  But what he could not tell was if Sesshoumaru truly did not know or really did not want to know.
The rouse continued.  Because of Jaken's eagerness to deny the inevitable and Sesshoumaru's willingness to believe the impossible, it was as if she lived again.  For together, almost without deliberate, conscious thought, they reconstructed the effects of her life.  Her blankets were ruffled.  Her food was taken.  Her clothes were washed and mended.
Along the journey Jaken talked to Rin – warning her about wolves or demons nearby and telling her not to stray too far.  It eased his mind because he missed her.  He could not explain it.  She was a human, he was demon, they were from far, different worlds. 
And, of course, it helped Sesshoumaru.  Though the dog-demon did not let slip the idea anything was wrong.  His countenance, enigmatic and emotionless, was constructed like a fortress to strengthen the illusion that all was well, normal.  Jaken, while he should have known better, allowed himself to be fooled – until – what the face could not hide was unmasked.
It was dawn.  Autumnal chills brushed Jaken's face.  But it was not the climate that awoke him.
Sesshoumaru was inside the camp.  The dog-demon hunched over the blankets that had been set aside for Rin.  He felt it – it was warm though unruffled.   He spread the cover and revealed the kimono.  Orange and white.  Torn a bit, here and there, around the cuffs, its back was dotted with holes.  As if cupping and raising water, he lifted the garment gently.  A breeze caught it and it dangled, loosely, off of his tight grip.
Was it just last night that her body fit into that kimono?  The softness of her steps.  The warmth of her arms.  The sweet smile of her lips.  Was it just yesterday that those things fit into that garment?  And now? Now it only constrained the air?
Without its wearer, was it dead too?
He caught glimpse of a hair, long and dark, entangled amid the collar.
He brought the cloth onto his face and inhaled its scent anew.
Sesshoumaru trembled.  The white and orange cloak tumbled through his fingers.  He brought his hand onto his face.  What he did next Jaken could not see even if he wanted.  A moment later he clutched the kimono, quickly almost panicking, and refolded it into the blanket. 
Without a word the great, dog demon left the camp.
Jaken's heart skipped a beat.  He shut his eyes as if to will away the image.  But the image would not go away.  The servants did not have the master's defiance.  The world was just too real for Jaken.
Sesshoumaru was filled with a different kind of terror.  One he did not imagine could be possible.  Until he awoke that morning and he froze at the realization.  It seemed to be that he forgot her scent.
Lately Rin was distant too.  It was the way of things.  Children grew, changed.  They formed lives entirely and uniquely their own.  Even demons evolved.  Did he think he would be immune?  Did he believe, truly and deeply, that she would not grow away from him?
Was she there?  During the trek, was she there?  Struggling behind the group?  When Jaken hissed and grunted, was it not his reaction against her prodding?  Oh, mischievous imp!  When Aun went astray, was it not that creature's nature to watch and protect her?  Oh, troublemaking demon!  What fix did you get yourself into?
And when he left to venture through the forest, was it not her song that echoed through the air?
"In the mountain, in the forest, in the wind, in a dream, where are you, Sesshoumaru?  I wait with Jaken until you come back.  Sesshoumaru, please come back."
Were those the words or had time and distance affected the memory?
It seemed to be the words, clear as if they had been whispered anew into his ear – but, like a wanderer returning home something felt different, askew.
He spun, seeing nothing yet expecting something.  He could have sworn it.  His sleeve rustled.  His armor clamored.  As they did when she brushed his side.
"Rin.  Where are you?  Where do you go?  What do you do?"
At that moment he recalled a song.  It was not from his mother but from an era confined to dim, dark memory.  It was sung at night, at bedtime, by the children he knew once that now were faceless, eroded into shapeless void and shadow.  It had been nonsensical until that instant, when he whispered,  "Lady Star, Lady Star, how old are you?  Fifteen and five.  How can you be so young?  Through the void you embark across the infinite."
In the day and in the night Rin hid.  But, when the light of the sun was muted by the cloak of the moon, the subtlety of her presence became more and more obvious.  Until it was impossible to ignore the effect.
"Rin."
He called and by reflex the clatter stopped.  As it always stopped.
"Where are you?  Rin.  Are you hiding behind the tree?  Do not run too far.  Are you swimming in the lake?  Do not jump too deep.  Be careful, that you do not go where I cannot defend you.  Where are you, Rin?"
There was no answer except the stirring of Nature.  Trees unwinding branches.  Leaves falling.  Blossoms scattering.  Occasionally it was punctuated by the sounds of a bird's wing fluttering or an animal's call echoing.  At night the forest was like a void, vast and unfathomable.  Danger and beauty, often intertwined, melted into and out of the void.  It was a realm of death alive through the action of the living.  And it was not a place for a girl to be alone.
How could it be her realm?  But, then, was she ever truly afraid?
"Why are you fearless, Rin?"
Sesshoumaru spent the winter the way he spent the summer.  Defiant of the world.  Lost as much in thought as in reality.
"Rin must be cold," he said to Jaken.
"Yes, Lord Sesshoumaru."
It was noon.  The sun reflected brilliantly across the snow.  The countryside, from horizon to horizon, was blanketed by the frozen, bitter rainfall.  The corpses of trees, finger-like and brittle, lined the banks of a river nearby.  Its waters, resembling crystal clear glass, cascaded around the boulders within its path.
With a little more effort than usual Jaken collected the material.  Built the pile and lit the debris with the staff.  It was a beacon of light amidst a sea of death.  And again, as it was eons ago, the fire's flicker and crackle were the only palpable signs of life within that camp.
"Rin."
How often was it that Jaken heard that name issue forth out of Sesshoumaru's lips?  Yet, in the past, when it came, it came suddenly, forcefully, more like a command than a name.  Now, hearing its latest incantation, it occurred to the reptilian that the name underwent an uncanny metamorphoses.  Sadness, whose depth was inscrutable, echoed across the narrow confines of the syllable.  It was as if the cries of a mother for her liter, mixed with equal measures of grief and denial, were contained within the utterance of that name, which was not a name anymore but a wound, open and bleeding.What had become of the servant's master?

Sesshoumaru unsheathed the Tenseiga and stared at its blade.  It was as if the demon and the weapon were locked in a contest of wills.  His amber gaze.  Its metallic shine.  Corpses and hellhounds, the demonic cats and a human girl, the past reflected its tale between the duelists."In the mountain, in the forest, in the wind, in a dream, where are you, Sesshoumaru?  I wait with Jaken until you come back.  Sesshoumaru, please come back."

She lived then.  And she lived now.  It had to be.  It was that she grew up, moved out of the nest and into the world.  But he would find her again, if just to see her smile, to know she was happy.  Even if it were for a moment; to mortals – and, perhaps, to demons as well – a moment could be eternal.
The dynamics transformed as Sesshoumaru's mood changed.  Gone was the illusion that Rin followed.  There was no food to be set.  No blankets to be unfolded.  No stories to be told.  An outsider would have thought the group reverted into its stable and ancient customs but Jaken knew better than to assume all would be well again.
He demonstrated compassion unlike his former cold-hearted manner.  He showed a concern for Jaken and Aun.  And on those rare occasions when the dog-demon encountered the humans, he was patient and unwilling to kill even when the punishment would have been justified.
In the middle of the day, of the night, at random moments here and there, Sesshoumaru drifted away from the group to the wilderness, searching for what did not exist beyond his mind.  Often the journeys ended at the site of villages.  He stopped and watched the boys and girls from afar.
"Do you think Rin is there, Jaken?"
His questions had become less questions and more conversations.  One-way conversations to be sure.  Yet there was enough intimacy revealed to lift the veil of his icy and cold demeanor and make concrete this enigmatic nature.
"I hear the play of children.  I wonder, do you think she is there, with them?  Jaken?  The human world absorbed her and she does not need this Lord Sesshoumaru anymore.  Could it be?  How could it be?  Then in whose arms were found that new hero?  And what kind of man is he?  We must have been like a dream – Jaken – do you think that is what she believed we were?  Imaginary friends?  Like the kind a lonely child might imagine and wish to be real."
More often than not when Sesshoumaru spoke it was to voice the name of Rin.  Increasingly aware his call would be ignored.  Always hopeful it would be answered.
The caravan stumbled into the orchard.  Its trees were cherry; its blossoms full and delicate.  The colors of the petals mirrored sunset with blends of white and red shades.  The landscape was like a dream.
Inhaling the air Sesshoumaru stopped and the group stopped, too.
"Little Youkai."
"Yes, Lord Sesshoumaru?"
Jaken rushed toward Sesshoumaru's side.
"Stay with Aun."
"Yes, Lord Sesshoumaru."
The reptilian bowed and drew aback.
Within the orchard the great, dog-demon felt he stepped into another world altogether.  Flowers fell at his feet.  Blossoms shattered like glass.  The winds scattered the remains, obliterating every last atom of its existence.
He caught a blossom and rather than drop it, as he would have normally, he cradled it.  Another and another fell into his palm.  With thumb and forefinger he interlocked petals with stems.  Already a tiny arc of chained flowers dangled off of his hand.
She loved to carry flowers.  He could not remember a time when there would not be stems bunched into her grip.  That little human hand.  Through his own hand he saw hers anew.  He sighed, recalling those moments when she threw petals into the air celebrating the return of her Lord Sesshoumaru. 
He walked – and hummed, involuntarily, the melody of it melted into the words he thought echoed through the orchard.
"In the mountain, in the forest, in the wind, in a dream, where are you, Sesshoumaru?  I wait with Jaken until you come back.  Sesshoumaru, please come back."
"Rin."
He smiled confident only she saw it.
The lei, which was not one more than ten blossoms, was curled about his palm.
"I offer a gift."  He cut his words short fearing it would be too hard to speak without breaking.
He stopped and knelt, lowering his arm into the darkness.
"Rin."
The sun was dying and at that instant its rays swept the space between the trees.  The fall of the petals wafted and swayed though there was not a breeze.  The advance of shadows and darkness suggested the silhouette of a child approaching.
"Rin!"
In the darkness the blossoms sparkled like stars then faded into oblivion.
"Rin?"
Something – something real or imagined – touched his hand and rattled the lei.
"But.  You're dead."
The effect, like the illusion, faded out of view.
"Rin."
Enraged, he fell forward.  He clenched his fist and pounded it into the ground.  The lei, destroyed, scattered.  And realizing the horror of the act he shook as if in terror.  He could not decide between standing or falling further, deeper.  At last gravity decided the fate.
"I will have that sweet smiling face again!"
Tenseiga freed itself of the sheath – the handle of the weapon worked into his grip.
"Will I see you again?  Rin.  I will see you again!  Where are you – where are you – why did you fail me!  Why did you fail me!"  He stabbed the sword into the earth and wept over it.  "Why did I fail you?  Rin, forgive me!"
A breeze carried the scent.  His eyes, wide and wet, stared into the emptiness.  He straightened, nervous and afraid at the idea he would be disappointed again.  But this time there was no mistaking it.  It was the scent.  And now his hand was tickled by the brush of something soft and prickly.  It was the lei, revealed by moonlight, it was whole again.
The necklace slid from his fingers to the weapon's handle.
He cradled the flowers against his palm.
"Was it true that you were, in fact, always there?"
Sesshoumaru did not have to imagine her anymore than he had to conjure up the sun or the moon.  Rin was there.  In the whisper of the cool, autumnal air. In the scents of flowers of spring.  In the warmth of the campfire.  In the company of friends.  In the play of children.
Everywhere, forever, wherever he looked he found her always because she was not confined just to memory alone.  She was real.  Alive or dead that could not be destroyed.  No mystical sword was needed; it was life that conquered death.
Just as it appeared so it vanished – the lei ruptured and the breeze carried the flowers away.
But he smiled.  He was happy.  Complete.  He had that sweet, smiling face again. 

END

A/N:  Awarded 1st Place for Best Oneshot at the IYFG (3rd Quarter 2006)