Storm Clouds and Sweet Delirium: Samurai Champloo (Jin/Fuu Oneshot: Part One)

[freelancerjin]

Summary: Jin had never meant to touch her in such a passionate way, but what was done is done, and he can never look at her the same way again. But perhaps he can just blame it on the fever.

Storm Clouds and Sweet Delirium (Part One)

For Part Two, Click Here

"Hey, Jin!"

Jin sighed as the persistent clip clop of Fuu's geta slippers grew louder against the sodden dirt road. His right hand reached to his left hip, until long alabaster fingers settled into a lax position upon the hilt of his katana, giving his injured shoulder temporary relief. Only the pain coursing up and down his dominant arm kept him from shrugging at the uncomfortable rubbing sensation of his gi sleeve, which was soaked almost stiff with blood.

"Jin, wait up!"

The stoic ronin came to a halt so that his lagging female companion would be able to catch up to him. When she finally appeared at his side, he continued ambling on towards the tiny village he and Fuu had chosen as their destination. Their goal was to reach the village and find shelter before the much talked about blizzard rolled through in chilly white gusts over the dull mountain peaks.

After the unlikely but extremely close trio had each gone their separate ways, Jin had resumed his life as a wandering samurai, no roots to hold him down and no rules to restrain him excepting his own.

As fate would have it, two years later he stumbled across a much more grown up but still very obnoxious Fuu who, still adorning her bright pink kimono, had somehow gotten herself kidnapped again.

And here Jin was, practically babysitting with every step across the rural countryside-not that he minded, really.

If he was honest, he had always been quite fond of the girl.

The pair had been traveling together for nearly two months, wandering from town to ambiguous town until either of them found a somewhat steady job to earn the two of them enough wages to rent a place to stay and buy food to eat. But that never lasted long.

Trouble seemed to tail both of them like a seething, rabid hound that never stopped to rest.

Even the weather and its rapidly dropping temperatures seemed to have some kind of grudge against them; Fuu was just recovering from a cold and Jin was stricken by a serious virus they could not identify.

Fuu began to hum and reached up in another useless attempt to wind her mussed brown hair into some semblance of a style. Only three days prior they had been attacked by six or seven roadside bandits. Jin, who was severely lacking sleep and practically delirious with fever at the time, had been taken by surprise and one of the bandits had managed a lucky slice to the skilled ronin's shoulder. Always kindhearted, Fuu had tried her best to patch Jin up after she overcame her zealous bout of panicking, but she was no doctor and her dear friend was still showing signs of being ill, such as nausea and breaking out randomly into cold sweat in the middle of the night.

Which was why they needed to get to the small fishing village of Sakana as soon as possible.

Fuu looked up at her traveling companion fondly and patted his uninjured arm in what she hoped was a reassuring gesture, "Neh, Jin?"

He turned and his dark, narrow eyes met her own overly large ones. A ray of sunlight cast a blinding glare on his glasses.

"Hn?"

"How much farther is it until we get to Sakana? I'm starving! Aren't you?"

Jin nodded in the affirmative and turned away to look at the sight of roofing and fishing boats bobbing up and down on the surface of the large lake before them. The sun was shining but the surrounding air was extremely cold. However, Jin's ears grew warm with the sound of Fuu's aimless, yet pleasant, chattering.

He smiled slightly.

It would be an absolute lie if Jin said that he hadn't missed Fuu's bright personality, her loud voice, lovely laughter, and maybe even her obnoxious eating habits.

Perhaps it would be too much of a stretch to say that he genuinely missed Mugen, although his memories of the vulgar pirate were certainly fond in an odd and dysfunctional way. Jin and Fuu often engaged in meaningless musings about what Mugen was up to. They could only hope that he hadn't gotten himself thrown in jail somewhere, but both instantly agreed that no amount of guards or metal bars could hold his rambunctious spirit in for any amount of time to cause worry.

A twinge in his right shoulder caused a sweat to break out on Jin's brow, and he looked up to see the rundown entrance to the fishing village growing closer. What worried him was the sight of the foreboding black clouds that reared in the distance, just behind the large mountain range bordering the far eastern grounds of the village.

He looked down at Fuu again to see her staring up at him with the same worry in her eager brown eyes. The ronin found his own gaze softening, a common response when he looked at her. He had discovered this little fact long before their journey in search of the Sunflower Samurai had ended.

Never in his life had he encountered a more constantly pleasant companion. He considered Mugen to be his friend, of course, but that lunatic was anything but pleasant.

Finally Fuu and Jin made their way through the simple wooden gate that welcomed visitors into the quaint fishing community, and they immediately rushed towards the first dwelling they saw that appeared to be an inn. They stepped onto the rickety bamboo engawa and through the doorway of the small establishment. It was warm enough inside and a dim, red paper lantern hung and swayed due to the air currents that wormed their way in through the cracks in the aged paneling.

Beneath the lantern was a low table, where an elderly woman sat recording figures on a scroll in her comfortable and warm looking kimono. Two other small tables were placed on the far side of the room, where a couple and a young boy were eating fish and rice.

After scanning the room with his always efficient and perceptive gaze, Jin absentmindedly observed Fuu as she kneeled at the kotatsu table before the old woman to ask for any available accommodations.

Her form appeared to be more lithe and full beneath the pink kimono that had once surrounded her body in a loose plethora of fabric. Wayward locks of her deep brunette hair, which very much matched the color of her eyes, fell over her back once they came undone from her haphazard bun-it was much longer than two years ago, Jin noticed.

She smiled at the innkeeper and rose excitedly, "Guess what? We have enough money for two rooms!"

Jin nodded and began to walk towards her, but stumbled to a stop when a wave of dizziness clouded his vision. His brain felt like it was being slowly suffocated and compressed by his already pounding skull.

Fuu stopped when she saw the look on his face and reached out a hand to steady him.

"Oh, no," she murmured, her voice taking on a distressed tone that attracted the attention of the four other people in the room, "not again. I thought you were getting better, Jin."

The young woman placed a doting hand to his forehead and bit her lip, brow furrowed in stress and concern for her dear friend. His handsome face was drenched in sweat; Fuu began to panic as she watched the navy blue collar of his gi begin to blacken as it was soaked by the perspiration.

Once Jin was able to see more clearly, he looked intently into Fuu's large, deep brown eyes. They were alight with worry, and so, so bright as they always were. It seemed that no matter what emotions Fuu was struggling with internally, her eyes would always remain a constant, glowing either with sorrowful tears, pure joy, or flaming anger.

Only when Fuu reached up urgently to remove his glasses and dab at his face with a piece of damp and cool cloth, did Jin realize that he had been staring.

He blinked in confusion.

He looked around the room to see the old woman holding a bucket of water, and the couple and their son watching in curiosity.

His vision began to waver until all he could see was a hazy image of Fuu's shocked face and her large doe eyes.

Then everything corkscrewed violently until it turned to blackness and all Jin could feel was the searing, burning pain in his shoulder and the sudden sensation of his back making contact with the floor.

Though he was certain he felt a small hand cradle the back of his head just in time, before it thudded harshly against ground as well.

Jin was roused from his fever-induced slumber by the sound of thunder and the monotone whirring of ice shards glancing violently against the walls. How long had he been unconscious?

It was very cold.

After several moments of shivering and gazing sightlessly up at the darkened ceiling, Jin pulled off the now lukewarm cloth that had been placed on his head and began to observe the unaccounted for change in his surroundings. He vaguely noticed that someone had taken the time to unbind his ponytail and comb out the tangles for him.

A well-used futon separated his damp body from the chill of the flooring, and the two blankets covering him didn't seem to be nearly enough to barricade against then night chill that was apparently already in the throes of the violent, storming blizzard that was always the notorious sign that winter was coming to an end in this region.

Having lost any interest in the new details of the room, Jin turned his aching head to the left and was met by the sight of a rice paper screen. He instantly found himself wondering-with an air of uncharacteristic consternation-whether or not Fuu was warm and sleeping comfortably in the room next to his own. He hoped the sound of thunder wasn't keeping her awake. Nevertheless, it would not serve any purpose for him to worry if he wasn't rested enough to protect her in the first place.

He forced himself to stop worrying about his companion and pulled the musty smelling blankets up closer to his chin before squeezing his eyes shut against the darkness.

A loud boom of lightning striking in the distance echoed for miles around until it felt as if waves of thunder were roiling right overhead.

But it wasn't loud enough to completely smother the soft padding of small, tabi-wrapped feet in the room to the left of Jin's.

He was already half asleep when his attuned ears registered the sound of the shoji screen sliding smoothly over its threshold and back again. It was silent until the distinct crinkle of fabric resonated right next to Jin's dark head.

"Jin?"

The sleepy ronin, still delirious with fever, opened one eye and looked up at the silhouette of Fuu. Though she was deeply entrenched in shadow, he instantly recognized her smell and the outline of her body.

"Why aren't you sleeping?" Jin slurred drowsily, slowly swiping wet strands of his ebony fringe out of his visage.

"The nice obaasan who runs this inn told me to check on your fever every few hours," Fuu explained softly.

It was odd to hear her sound so forlorn; she was usually bubbly or adorably haughty most of the time. However, the worrisome crease remained on her forehead, and Jin wondered when she began to look so . . . mature. As if she had experienced many life-changing events following her departure from him and their ragtag group's resident pirate.

He was surprised by the overwhelming feeling of guilt that began to creep up on him. Of course he cared about her, but he was unfamiliar with the harsh pangs of regret that gripped him at the thought of her being harmed or helpless.

Jin watched as she picked the cloth up from the floor, where he had carelessly deposited it earlier. She gave a soft tsk at his stubbornness and re-soaked the rag in a small tub of water that rested near the head of his futon. The ronin hadn't noticed its presence before; neither had he registered seeing the cold ceramic teapot sitting on a woven mat next to it.

The young brunette turned and positioned the pink cloth back upon Jin's forehead, and he released a sudden groan at the cool relief. He opened his eyes again and realized that Fuu must have torn the cloth from the hem of her own kimono.

"Fuu-" Jin began to speak but was cut off by the need to hack violently to clear his throat.

Fuu turned quickly and returned with a small cup of cooled tea.

Jin downed the liquid as if he were vanquished and used the shaky hand of his injured arm to return the cup, only to drop it. He cursed and tried to sit up, but Fuu placed a firm hand on a shoulder and eased him back down onto the futon. The young man cast an irritated glare her way, his subconscious appalled by how easily he was losing his patience at the smallest things.

"You need to rest," Fuu insisted. Her voice rose slightly from her previous whispers, however. "The wound on your shoulder was infected," she looked down at the tightly clasped hands resting on her lap, as if she were feeling responsible, "so the innkeeper had to fetch the doctor after you fell unconscious. . . . Oh, don't give me that look!"

Jin huffed at the way she was glaring at him, but became enthralled by the way the lines of her face almost instantaneously softened into a sad smile.

"I was so worried, Jin."

The nonplussed ronin furrowed his brows in confusion, and he began to wonder if the fever had not only affected his mind and sense of reasoning, but his vision and hearing as well.

Why else would the sound of Fuu saying such an insignificant word as his name sound so tantalizingly melodious and natural rolling off her tongue.

He watched her curiously. Watched the way she wrung her fingers as if she couldn't possibly contain her distress any longer.

Her hair, though it appeared to be freshly damp from a bath, hung around Fuu's finely shaped face in a smooth curtain of the darkest russet. Some strands frayed adorably and some stuck to her forehead in stubborn clumps that Jin remembered her often complaining about. Faint shadows rested beneath the crease of her eyes, evoking Jin to question himself about how worried she really had been during the past few days. Tears began to bead along the corner of her eyes, glistening silver in the wake of the moonlight and the gray atmosphere inflicted upon the inn by the blizzard raging ceaselessly outdoors. And rather than rising up to comfort her like he was usually wont to do, Jin could only wonder at how . . . how utterly pretty she looked, eyes closed as tears raced down the smooth apples of her blushing cheeks.

Jin's absentmindedly fisted the blankets in his hands, altogether ignoring the shot of pain the sudden movement caused to rocket up his right arm. His thoughts were completely shrouded in a veil of ponderous conflict.

All he could think of was . . . when, when had Fuu become so very attractive? And why was he finding her to be undeniably alluring now, at this moment when they were isolated together, and with him being consumed by a questionable delirium?

With a not-so-carefully controlled burst of anger, Jin grabbed the wet cloth from his head and cast it across the room before turning to face away from the girl that was filling him with heady thoughts. He screwed his eyes shut yet again and attempted to fall asleep, but was accosted by an uncontrollable shiver that wracked through his system when his sudden movement caused the blankets to let in a good amount of the chilly air.

He stilled his shaking and hoped that Fuu hadn't noticed, but the sound of her leaving then returning to his room with blankets alerted him to the fact that she had indeed seen him shiver like a helpless weakling. Yet again, he found himself getting irritated to no end, and the breakdown that the fever had caused in his normally strong sense of inhibition only served to rile him further.

The sick ronin felt two more blankets settle over him, and he was contented to finally fall asleep under the comfort of the added warmth, until he became aware of the alarming sensation of another body settling down next to him in the futon.

Fuu's warmth seared into the contours of Jin's muscled back, despite the fact that she kept her distance and made sure that they were not touching. Jin tried very hard to ignore the feelings that coursed up and down his spine in response to the action because he knew that Fuu only had his best interests at heart. She always did, despite her good-natured nagging and excessive talkativeness.

This act, while completely innocent because, well, it was Fuu, created a permanently stagnant tension within all the muscles of Jin's body.

He was beyond frustrated at this point. He was frustrated with his recent lack of control over his emotional responses, seeing as he usually had a stifling penchant to be prone to ridiculous levels of self-control. And he was frustrated that a mere woman could unwittingly evoke such responses from him against his will, and in the process undermine years and years of his life's training.

And so he scooted to the farthest end of the futon away from his female comrade, painful though it was, until the cold aura of the bamboo floor nearly pressed against his front.

"Goodnight, Jin," Fuu called softly.

Jin kept his eyes closed and gradually forced himself to loosen his fingers' death grip on the blankets. Blood began to flow back through the now sore appendages, and the rest of Jin's body fell into a more relaxed state once Fuu ceased her shifting.

" . . . Goodnight."

Minutes elapsed beneath the endless drone of snow slamming like colliding katana against the roof and walls of the inn.

And Jin was driving himself absolutely insane.

His thoughts were running rampant behind his tired, drooping eyes. The pain in his shoulder, which had somewhat lessened into a dull throbbing, caused him to grow even more irate by the minute.

And the length of Fuu's soft, lithe body was practically glued up against him, her figure exuding warmth into every dip of his own.

Not a minute. He hadn't gotten a single minute of sleep after the young woman repositioned herself on the futon and pressed closer to him in an inadvertent search for warmth. It didn't help that she readjusted every ten minutes or so to find a more comfortable resting place. The ronin wanted desperately to turn and push her away, but he denied himself any hasty reactions for the sake of Fuu's slumbering. He knew that she probably sacrificed hours of sleep already while just waking up to check on him, and now that his fever had receded he wanted her to rest as much as possible in preparation for the unknown journey ahead.

Fuu's breath exited in soft puffs of moist warmth against the expanse of Jin's neck, raising goose flesh across the pale skin. A shiver that wasn't quite as unpleasant as it should have been flowed through Jin's body; he immediately attributed this response to the freezing temperature outside, although he hadn't felt a single chill for many hours. When the guilt grew to exceed that excuse, he would probably begin to blame the fever-induced haze of delirium that hadn't quite been lifted from his thoughts.

He wondered if this made him a terrible person.

"Ngh."

Every muscle and tendon in Jin's body tensed until he felt as taut and alert as a crouching predator as it prepared to spring upon some helpless creature.

Another murmur sounded behind him in the form of his name. She was dreaming of him? The ronin had always known that Fuu talked nonsense in her sleep due to their many travels together, but the thought of her breathing his name in such a way was working terrible controversies in the pit of his abdomen.

"Jin," she sighed, her breath sliding tantalizingly over the sensitive flesh of his ear, deliciously hot in comparison to the surrounding air in the room.

Trying to ignore the sweat that dripped from his temple, Jin closed his eyes and tried in vain, for what seemed like the hundredth time that night, to evenly space out his breathing so that he would hopefully allow himself to be dragged beneath the thoughtless paradise called sleep.

Until Fuu shifted and her small foot began to run up the curved muscle of his calf. The nails of her toes scraped his skin and forced him to twitch away in a desperate attempt to regain control over his desired reactions.

All he could think of was the softness of Fuu's skin and the compassion always present in those pretty, pretty eyes that he had grown so accustomed to gazing at from the time he woke up to the finality of nightfall, as they walked the terrain together in aimless wanderings, speaking of nothing, yet everything, because that's just how their relationship was. And Jin would be damned if he did anything to compromise the delicate balance they had managed to establish after being reunited again.

He scooted away from her until he was completely off of the futon and resting on the frigid floor, but Fuu seemed to follow him, innately desiring that familiar sense of comfort and protection that she constantly craved.

However, there was enough distance between them for Jin to relax, minute muscle by muscle, until the waves of sleep slowly began to crest his psyche and the storm of thoughts that plagued him began to fade-

And the fragile span of Fuu's hips pressed against his backside.

Something vital snapped in Jin's mind and he spun around in a sudden blur of movement until Fuu was pinned beneath his heaving body. Adrenaline flooded Jin's system until the pain in in his arm was numbed altogether. He supported himself on his forearms and gazed longingly down at Fuu's sleeping face, which was twitching cutely as she began to rouse from her dreams.

Jin watched anxiously as bright brown orbs appeared from under the young woman's eyelids. The cloud of sleep disappeared from over her irises and her eyes snapped open once she registered the image of a sweaty Jin crouched and panting heavily above her. She bolted forward to sit up but though better of it, and instead reeled backwards a few inches so that she could look better at her friend.

"J-Jin?" she gasped.

His sweat dampened gi had slipped off completely, revealing his thin torso. One of his hands was gripping the swell of her hip, fingers flexing spasmodically with each of his much labored breaths.

Then his body was covering her, his chest pressed onto her own and his hips resting in the cradle of hers. Fuu began to panic and her mouth dropped open to protest, but no sound was emitted once she realized that she truly didn't mind the weight of his firm body bearing down on her. She wasn't scared of Jin-she could never be truly scared of him; she was frightened of whatever was driving him to be this way. So unrestrained and passionate. His hands had long left her hips and were often entangled in her hair or running over any part of her body they could reach.

All Fuu could hear was the sound of Jin's breathing against her ear and the rubbing of her kimono on skin as his bare chest rose and fell against her with every heave.

Her eyes dropped shut when he began kissing her. The ronin distracted her with his firm lips as he ran them urgently up and down the slope of her smooth neck and melded them with her own soft lips. Fuu moaned at the contact and arched her back, unknowingly pushing her soft breasts against Jin's chest. He gasped audibly and began thrusting his hips against hers, shocking both of them and creating a hole of clarity in the cloudy lust that had settled throughout the rented room.

Jin's eyes grew wide in both shame and self-disgust, never leaving Fuu's longing face as he reared backwards off of the futon and stood up. A rush of dizziness gripped him, but Jin ignored both it and the sudden wash of freezing air that met his shirtless form, in favor of walking rapidly into the nearby room that had been Fuu's. Yet, an uncontrollable sense of attraction jarred him until he stopped at the threshold with his hand gripping the edge of the pretty shoji screen. It pulled his gaze back into the room he had just left.

The young woman had pushed herself up until she sat perched on her knees. Her soft and still damp hair appeared mussed well beyond the point of presentable, and the collar of her kimono, which had been stretched until the top curves of her small breasts were made visible, bore an ugly tear that ran and zigzagged to the lower portion of her right side.

The overwhelming feeling of shame forced the ill ronin to shut his eyes against the sight of his dear friend kneeling before him on the futon, unbelievably tempting with her body awakened to the sensation of sexual arousal. It was all because of his irresponsibility.

His black eyes snapped open again at the slight weight of a hand warming his bicep.

Fuu stood nervously before him. He noticed that she must have straightened her kimono, but it did nothing to erase the blush on her pretty face or the attractive gleam of wonder from her wide and-he noticed with a pang of both guilt and awe-innocent eyes. Never before had he been so aware of her seventeen years of age.

He was twenty-three years old.

He should have known better. He should have used better judgment; but instead, he had invaded her personal space and took advantage of her naivety by indulging in the pleasant appeal of her body, for the sake of satisfying his virile desires and frustration. Perhaps Mugen would have acted with such brashness and such uncalled for vulgarity. But Jin was not Mugen, and he had just betrayed every honorable sense of morality he ever stood for. This could not be written away by the power of any delirium.

So how could sweet, overly vibrant Fuu stand before him like this, with her trusting eyes and her worrying gaze?

"Jin?" she rasped. Her white teeth appeared, bearing down on her already swollen lip, "Are you alright? You look so pale."

The ebony haired young man felt her hand slip down his arm and into the motionless hand dangling uselessly at his side.

She began to pull him gently back towards the futon, "You should come lay down. Your fever hasn't broken yet, and the obaachan said-"

Jin held up his other hand to put an end to what he knew the awkwardness would only turn into nervous rambling.

"Do not dote on me, Fuu."

The statement was said much more harshly than the speaker intended, but the damage was done, and the lines of Fuu's face dropped minutely before she reconstructed her outer wall and tried to appear unaffected, despite the fact that it was against her very nature to do so.

Jin inwardly berated himself. He had hurt her yet again, when all she ever did for the duration of time he had known her was care for him, only looking to him for protection in return.

He never dreamed that his most difficult struggle would be to protect her from his own need, a need that he normally controlled and regulated with a success that was almost freakish, as Mugen had oh-so-eloquently let him know, whenever he turned down the pirate's flippant offers to accompany him to the nearest brothel.

Fuu stepped backwards as if she had just been slapped.

Jin sighed and began to approach her, "Fuu . . ."

"It's fine, Jin," Fuu murmured, her back still turned towards him. Newly formed suckling bruises were vaguely visible beneath her haphazard brunette locks, much to Jin's horror. "You should . . . you should get some rest. We have to move on tomorrow, once the storm clears."

Doe brown eyes closed against Fuu's impending tears. Within only a few moments, the soft tut of the partition shoji screen shutting echoed throughout the room, and Fuu was left alone with the cold, abandoned futon.

Fuu blinked rapidly against the glare of sunlight. It peeked in and out through the gaps of early morning sky left visible by the towering evergreens overhead. The rich verdant color contrasted pleasantly with the surrounding snow banks.

The only visible ground was that of the dirt roads, which were specially constructed by the villagers to make travelling easier for traders during the colder weather.

Underneath the steps of Fuu's worn out geta slippers, the once moist, fertile earth was now rock solid. And that was where her eyes had been pinned for the majority of that morning.

Long legs taking rapid footfalls across the terrain, Jin maintained a gait that kept him a good ten feet ahead of his fairer travelling companion, and he hadn't said a single word to her since they both woke long before dawn, ate the meager breakfast of fish and rice prepared for them by the generous innkeeper, and set out just when the poppy-orange sun crested the lip of the blindingly white mountain range.

Jin sighed. Thanks to Fuu and the old woman's treatment, the crippling pain in this shoulder had long been reduced to a memory.

But he was tired. So tired that the vivaciously bright, post-blizzard surroundings only appeared to him as a narrow line of color behind his drooping eyelids.

The events of the previous night had done more than rattle the convictions that were always so much a part of his life. They completely changed the way he looked at the person he considered one of his only two friends in the world. He couldn't even bring himself to look at her, and he knew it was causing her pain, but the battle raging on inside his normally rational mind wouldn't let him do otherwise.

And he most certainly would not-could not-let her touch him, for each press of her body against his own, even accidental, brought images of her lusty eyes and searching lips rushing back to the forefront of his amorous thoughts.

The ronin was absolutely appalled at himself.

The two travelers ambled quietly past the village docks, where the local fisherman were setting out on the freezing lake that had begun to thaw with the end of winter fast approaching. Fuu's eyes lifted from the ground as she followed Jin off of the dirt trail and onto a rickety dock that looked like it hadn't been repaired in a few decades.

Light waves and the fishermen's hearty chatter were the only sounds that surrounded Fuu and Jin. It was unsettling.

"Well, damn."

Jin heard Fuu gasp behind him and he also found himself stiffening in slight alarm. Normally he wouldn't be so easily taken by surprise.

Glancing forebodingly across the docks, the pair watched as a pair of dark, gangly legs swung over the edge of a filthy looking fishing boat.

Feet shoved into steel-lined geta slammed loudly onto the boards, which seemed like they were about to snap under the rough contact. The person spoke again.

Jin angled his head defensively and his hand snapped instinctively to the hilt of his grand katana, the movement little more than a smooth and olive-toned blur.

One end of his mouth rose in a slight quirk.

"Mugen."

The pirate snorted obnoxiously at the greeting from his friend-sort-of-rival and scratched distractedly at his chest, "Four-eyes."

Then he turned to regard Fuu, a toothy sneer beginning to form.

"Well, Girlie? You just gonna stand there gawking, or are you gonna say hello to your favorite bodyguard?"

Jin grudgingly observed as Fuu's face lit up at the appearance of the vulgar vagrant.

She smiled and sprinted past Jin and down the dock until she was able to throw her skinny arms around Mugen's waist.

"Mugen!" she reached down to teasingly pinch his waist.

He scowled, "Watch it, you scrawny little-"

Fuu cut him off with another squeeze and buried her face in his dirty red shirt, "You've gotten so skinny, Mugen! Where have you been?"

"Meh," Mugen made a show of pushing Fuu away from him, but both she and Jin could see that he handled her with a gentleness reserved for Fuu and only Fuu, "I been here and there. Got me a job on a fishing ship a few weeks ago," he propped his hand on his hip, bottom lip lowering into a pout, as if he had just smelled something bad, "Bastard that hired me tried to cheat me, but let's just say I convinced him to pay up. Greedy asshole."

After much good-natured bickering the trio walked on down the docks together until they reached a small roadside stand that served food to weary travelers. Jin tried his best not to notice how Mugen's presence and crude jokes kept Fuu smiling so widely that he was certain her cheek muscles would surely be sprained later.

The middle aged vendor at the stand made a disgusted a face while observing Mugen's less than . . . typical eating habits.

The pirate negated chopsticks altogether and was using his large hands to scoop up the rice and fish, while his other hand attempted to dump mouthfuls of sake into his mouth. At. The same. Time.

Fuu cringed and shot an apologetic smile to the vendor, who had smartly retreated to the back of his little shop. She then picked up her bowl and chopsticks and began shoveling food into her own mouth in an attempt to quench her seemingly endless hunger.

"So," Mugen garbled rudely, with a mouth full of an odd gray matter assumed by his comrades to just be thoroughly ground food, "ya mind tellin' me what the fuck you two are doing 'round here?"

Jin sighed at the carelessness with which the vagrant threw around his vulgarity, until his conscience began screaming in his mind that he was a hypocrite. He chanced a quick glance at Fuu to see a young man, who must have either been the vendor's son or employee, charmingly striking up a conversation with the brunette. His eyes narrowed and his teeth seemed to grind together against his volition, until the ache in his jaw forced him to take notice and at least make a decent attempt to control himself.

When the quiet ronin finally managed to drag his eyes away from Fuu, he was unsuccessful in focusing on his food because a pair of steely gray eyes caught his own.

It looked as if Mugen was actually thinking, and that alone was disturbing as all hell.

Jin and Mugen narrowed their eyes at each other, in that same way when the samurai and pirate were about to draw their swords to fight and finally settle their unspoken challenge, just when something would intervene. Like a peacemaking Fuu, for instance.

But not now.

Now, their lady friend was too busy chatting oh-so-kindly with the boy to pay any attention to her ex-bodyguards.

"Tch." Jin snapped his chopsticks apart a little too harshly and stabbed a piece of seafood that looked like grilled eel, before shoving it unceremoniously between his pursed lips in an attempt to rid his tongue of the bitter taste in his mouth.

Mugen leaned over and nudged Jin in the arm a little more roughly than he had intended, unless, of course, it had been his intention to inflict more pain on Jin's obviously bandaged and healing shoulder, "Hey, Four-Eyes. You didn't answer my question."

Jin sighed and set his chopsticks down gingerly, "We intend to pass through this village to reach Nagasaki by tomorrow."

"Why the hell would ya wanna return to Nagasaki for?"

The wild-haired man plucked a fish bone from the mountain of rice in his bowl and began to noisily pick his teeth with it.

"Well," he muttered distractedly, "I sure as heck ain't goin' with you and the Missy all the way to Nagasaki. Got s'more business with a man 'cross the lake, but I figure I'll go ahead and follow ya for a bit. Can't let you two get your asses kicked by some bandits."

Mugen wasn't a very perceptive individual when it came to observing the nuances of social behavior. If he ever thought tactically, it was usually during a sword brawl when he needed to read his opponent's movements as quickly and as efficiently as possible. It was either that or death. But right at that moment, he thought he saw the outwardly emotionless samurai flinch defensively. Besides that, the way he had been glaring at Fuu and the young kid was more than slightly unsettling; all the time they had travelled together back in the day, Fuu and Jin had gotten along very well, contrasting his own relationship with the flat-as-a-board girl.

What the hell was going on with that four-eyed samurai and Fuu? What was Jin hiding, and why did it involve Nagasaki?

Never being one to stress intellectually or be overly nosy, except when it meant getting some cash, Mugen resorted to shrugging his observations off in the meantime, and returned to the task of ravenously devouring his food, demanding seconds from the disgruntled vendor shortly afterwards.

Jin had long lost is appetite, however, and he focused his efforts on glaring stealthily at the young employee from the corner of his eyes. The little fool, who seemed to be around seventeen or eighteen years old, had finally stopped talking to Fuu and was now washing a pot of rice. Every few minutes he would quickly turn and shoot Fuu a boyish smile, but the only attention he seemed to be earning was Jin's contempt.

The ronin wanted to hit himself for acting so childish, but that kid had no right to flirt with a young woman that he would obviously never see again.

Yes. "Never" suddenly seemed like a very appealing word to Jin right at that moment.