Jaken/Rin Platonic, Set #2 Theme #067 "The Hidden Thought"
Title: Bell of Mourning
Genre: General/Introspective
Rating: K+
Pairings Represented: Jaken/Rin (platonic)
Theme: Set #2, Theme #067, "The Hidden Thought"
Word Count: 2,070
Warnings: slight dark themes and heavy allusions ::shrug::
Universe: Canon
Bell of Mourning
Water. The child’s conscious was, for the moment, dead and yet she knew what was around her. Eyes closed, her body reveled in the coolness it spread to her fingertips and toes. Splash- the moon was erased for a moment and then returned. Splash- again strikes were hitting the lunar birth upon the stream and still they had no effect. Was it some demon, angered by its own reflection- or some angry god wishing to rid itself of its final competition of beauty and power?
Fish. Like ghosts they past in and out of the glowing sphere of the moon, demystifying the clever mirage it had achieved. The small child felt the coldness of the water once more and saw her own two hands come up with a fish, dripping wet and writhing against her already shaken grip. This was familiar, she thought. Somehow the child knew this place… these events, but how?
Footsteps. Quaking like thunder to the child’s ear, sudden fear rose up in her. Hide- she must hide from these people. Attempting to run, the child soon found she could not, strangely her vision blurred and instead of seeing the men eye-to-eye she looked up at them, far more than she was used to. Strange, it seemed, that they had not seen her. She felt light- calm and when she noticed the men dash at her in her stream she understood that the moon had taken her into its refuge among the water. She had become the moon. She had become the frightened celestial body that hid from sight until nightfall- hiding its face. She became the moon that even in the night hid from sight, never knowing if or when it was safe. When the men cast their canes into the water’s edge, attempting to drive the moon out of sight like that same demon or angry god, it was she that they physically dragged out of hiding. The moon at least was safe. She was still tense and wrought with danger, but at least the man of the moon was safe- safe underneath a tree.
“I knew it!” Cried the beast that had dragged her out with its claws. Fire breathed from his hands as others, also breathing flames from their fingers, joined him. Pain. She was in pain. These creatures had beaten her, she remembered.
“How dare you steal the fish!” they cried. Indignantly, she felt herself frown, suddenly outside her own body. They were all the same-bandits with spears and a pleasure for heedless killing. They were no different than the creatures that had killed her mother and father, mercilessly. Hate. How she hated these creatures. How she hated to be one of them. How she longed to be with the moon, if only a speck of a star at his side.
“Pathetic,” they cried as the moon again took her to safety- as if she were alive again though she had been snuffed. “Won’t even cry,” they accused. “How pathetic.”
The beast raised its arm up as the flames soon became a claw and it’s teeth gnashed out from its lips. Howling it struck her across the chest. Blood.
Pain. Young Rin heaved in gasps as she awoke into the night, grasping her chest in reassurance that she was still there. It had been weeks since she had begun traveling- more like lurking around the two strange creatures, the man of white and his small green companion. Turning to her left, she spied the small one she had heard being called Jaken. Upon his back, head lolled off to the side and mouth agape, he snored peacefully. A dream, she shivered. It had only been a dream. Tucking her legs underneath her, she curled again into sleep and with a last look at Jaken’s lazy form, hoped it would be a quiet one. At least physically she would be safe as she slept. If nothing else, she held comfort in that.
- - - - -
He had been a leader- great in fact, among his people. They had not understood him then, when he had left them to join Lord Sesshoumaru. They did not understand opportunity and they did not understand true power. True, if he had remained it was not a question that he would have had loyalty, but Jaken had always been astonished with the new. When the strange tall demon of white had appeared, all were in awe. He had saved many of his men and so he was indebted, but such actions still did not require his abandoning of his own clan. Fascination- fascination and intrigue had driven him to follow the indifferent dog. Being demeaned in status, as he was now nothing but a servant, had not thwarted his attempts at gaining repose at his master’s feet. His master offered him the chance to travel beyond the dusty lands he had known and Jaken had no doubt his master would one day accomplish true and supreme conquest over the lands.
As long as he stayed by Lord Sesshoumaru’s side he had something to gain- as long as he remained he could reclaim the honor that had been stolen in the heat of battle when an outsider had won his own war in the imp’s stead. Jaken had been tied to the demon that moment on, whether it was by choice or not had no relevance. Jaken had been resurrected, both in the physical realm and in the non-physical as had the small child. They were both slaves to the same master. Sesshoumaru had always been his lord, but only when his life, not only his fate, was tied to the demon did Sesshoumaru become his master.
Perhaps one day he would become a master once again, but for now his thoughts drifted away as the day breathed anew and its lungs contracted in brightness. Teasing his muscles to awaken, Jaken stretched outward as his beak opened arbitrarily to the sight of Rin wandering off before leaning in to see the other looming figure that had made his presence known. Jaken happily took in the sight of Sesshoumaru, but his beady eyes warily lingered in the direction the child had traveled. Catching his servant’s eyes, Sesshoumaru looked in the same direction, but his face remained impassive as he turned back to the small demon. “She has not gone far,” he explained to relieve his servant’s caution and worry.
Jaken instantly sighed in relief, his small ears perking back to their usual cheerfulness for when his master would return. “Milord! What have you discovered further on the whereabouts of the despicable Naraku?”
Jaken halted awkwardly as his master made no sudden movements to show he had heard him. Instead his lord had directed his gaze once more in the direction of the human child. “Mi-lord?”
“My travel was inconclusive.” The phrase was tight and gave a hidden warning that the matter was to be dropped; yet, there was a lingering in his voice as if his thoughts still roamed. “Tell me. Has the human spoken?”
“No, Lord Sesshoumaru. The child has not uttered a word since the day my lordship found her.”
“I see...” Lord Sesshoumaru’s contrite voice clipped as he turned away from them both. “Then she has not yet grieved.” It was now Jaken’s turn to gaze in the direction of the human girl with curiosity. ‘Grieved?’ For what reason has she to feel sorrow and pain? It was then that Jaken remembered the village and its overwhelming stench of blood. She had been alone and his lord had not found the scent of other humans upon her for days. Had her family been slaughtered as well, in the tirade of the wolves? Was this the reason that she had shut herself up inside? Without another word Lord Sesshoumaru caught, from the corner of his eye, the small demon venturing off towards the girl. Sesshoumaru’s eyes flickered not in distended disregard, but rather in satisfaction that his subtle hint had been planted well.
When Jaken next spotted the young human child, her back was to him. Slowly, she lowered herself to the ground and without passion, broke a few flowers and their stems away from the roots. It was a tedious process and the small imp watched with narrowed eyes as she lubberly walked from blossom to blossom until she reached the incline of a small hill, undoubtedly edging off into the nearby valley. Lost within her own thoughts, the child tripped and yet even upon scraping up the side of her arm and face, she did not shed tears, but allowed her downcast composure to only deepen. “You are a fool,” Jaken noted, from his spot behind the brush. His sudden voice startled the child until all but a few blooms dropped from her hand.
“Do you honestly believe that your silence will bring them back?” Jaken knew his words would bite, but he only spoke the truth and unless the child accepted such matters, they would consumer her. In doing so, not only would she never speak, she would only become a further hindrance and liability. “Your silence does nothing- your sacrifice means nothing.” The child’s eyes widened as her grasp upon the flowers tightened. “How pitiful to have had a child such as you that treats a memory with disregard.”
“S..s..top,” came the guttural plea from the child’s trembling lips. Her eyes closed shut, attempting to block Jaken out, but this the small imp would not allow. “Do you fear that by speaking you will show weakness- you will forget them if you do not force yourself into such torture?”
‘No,’ the child seemed to scream as her head shook wildly. Jaken could see that her eyes still did not brim with tears, but the pain was awakening. “Do you hate them then? Do you hate those that loved you and yet left you alone?”
The child’s eyes clouded as she turned to run, Jaken at her heels. She could see them, her human parents, as they laughed with her and the simple smiles they shared between each other when they believed she was not looking. She saw the looks of fear that spread across their faces as they were brought down and the blank stares that still looked upon her with the same love they had always done. Slowly, the child realized that even though she could not ever remember shedding tears at their deaths she could feel them wet upon her cheeks as if they had always been there. She saw the beady face of Jaken contort into shock as she felt herself falling back. The tears stilled for that moment and the child knew what would happen next, but she did not fall into the rift of the valley below. Holding desperately onto her hands was the small imp, who struggled to pull her up.
Sesshoumaru watched from a distance and took a silent step forward, thinking his assistance was needed at the pinnacle moment, yet halted as Jaken was finally able to gain leverage and pull the girl up safely. Tears flooded full force down along the child’s cheeks and neck as she threw herself at Jaken, unknowingly thrusting the crumpled remains of the flowers into his hand. The two remained in place for a few moments before Sesshoumaru walked forward and ushered them onward. “Come,” was all he commanded as he turned from them.
The girl scrambled out of Jaken’s grasp, much to the imp’s relief, as he had been attempting to free himself since the girl had attached himself onto him. For the first time, as she wiped the remains of tears from her cheeks, she smiled. Grabbing the imp’s hand, she urged him to follow her. “Come on, Master Jaken,” she had cried jubilantly.
Master. It was not until the child had already left his side to join that of his lord’s that the word stuck. As he watched the child’s smile widen even further as she proudly gave her name (Rin), it was the crumpled flower still in his hand that caught Jaken’s attention. “Pathetic,” he whispered, but the malice seemed to be gone as pride remained. Jaken walked proudly after the two, the bellflower still teased between his fingers blew in the wind as if ringing out in silent victory, conquering death and tying the girl once more to the mortal world.
- - - - -
A/N: Wow, a lot of allusions in this piece. For one, in case it was not caught, in Rin’s dream the moon is that of Sesshoumaru, hiding and saving her. The Japanese Bellflower is also used here, not only as an allusion for Rin’s unnatural bringing back to life, both from the canon event of her revival by Sesshoumaru using the Tenseiga and the elaborated event here, but also to allude to Kikyo’s unnatural rebirth by Urasue. The Japanese Bellflower, after all, is commonly known as Kikyo. (The flower is also a play on words for Rin’s name, meaning “bell.”) I just thought you might be interested in knowing. ;o)