light and shadows
Title: Light and Shadows
Series: Sengoku Basara
Summary: Another side of the first season Senbasa OVA.
Notes: I drop a couple of the known Murakami retainers’ names in this. You can ignore them. Dialogue taken straight from the subs of the OVA.
Warnings: Lots of light and dark things everywhere. Depressing things. OC centric.
They were to mount headlights on all of their ships, the kind that would blind a man if he looked directly at them. Takeyoshi imagined that was part of their purpose. He also imagined the Mouri lord just wanted stage lights reminiscent of the sun for his grand performance. Not that he had told him anything of the matter, of course. After Takeyoshi had finished his octopus meal* he stood casually outside the underground jail quarters waiting for him to emerge and just like Motonari expected he would be there, he had barely looked at him when he gave his order and swiftly walked on. Takeyoshi had bowed slightly in agreement, but Motonari did not see it that time nor did he ever bother to make sure he saw it any other time. It was flattering, if not a bit unsettling.
Motonari had invited him to join the battle only a couple of days before when he was inspecting a toll pass near Futagami. The letter had the usual, including a snippet about wishing to improve family relations,** obviously a small thoughtless formality but an endearment that Kushiwashi Otogi*** couldn’t help but smile at when he read it aloud.
“Shall we get your great uncle’s approval for this? I know a spirit medium in Futagami.”
“You tell horrible jokes, Kushiwashi.” Takeyoshi says blankly, but his retainer can tell he is smiling. Chuckling even.
“Sorry captain.”
The few of his crew who knew about Takeyoshi’s sense of humor had been with him long enough to tell the difference when he was pretending to sleep and actually trying to sleep. Fresh recruits were always at the end of all practical jokes, most of them being about how the captain was going to shove an entire live baby octopus down their throats and throw them overboard if they did something wrong. ‘You scare entire provinces into giving you gifts each month just by visiting. Why wouldn’t we believe it?’ Imaoka, one of the younger retainers, confessed.
(The late Murakami Takeshige had not been particularly pleased with his lack of honorifics but Takeyoshi just slapped the cabin boy across the head and ordered him to retrieve some takoyaki.)
He had dreams of the past often. If they were day dreams or night dreams or reminders he did not know but they were pleasant ones nonetheless. He had learned from an early age that reality was often much more terrifying. Loud voices echoing in the night lulled him to open his eyes. Shima Yoshitoshi, standing by his side, coughed and silently handed Takeyoshi a telescope. The Fugaku was huge. Not that it mattered. The cannon wasn’t pointed towards any of his boats.
“Now, shall we begin our trade, Chosokabe?”
It would have been hilarious to have nothing happen then, to have Motonari standing around in the dark in awkward silence. But Takeyoshi knew better than to risk his mens’ lives with the other Mouri boats around. His hand rose in the air and dropped just as quickly. The light spread across some fifty odd ships. The Noshima was only to watch and make sure that no one escaped from the circle. Yoshitoshi had found it odd, if not insulting, that Motonari intended only to turn their boats into a mere fence. After all he had plenty of ships of his own, even if the Murakami made up two thirds of the Mouri navy.
“Motonari is an actor who writes his own scripts, you know that don’t you? Sometimes he needs extras and sometimes he needs backstage helpers. As long as he pays the same either role is doable. Isn’t that right, Sojitaro?”
His young infant son had agreed with an incomprehensible word so Yoshitoshi had no more say in the matter.
The conflict of the play had began to unravel, Motonari delivering lines and looks with ease. And then something unexpected. Two of the extras began speaking, which wouldn’t have been a problem if they weren’t Mouri extras. The arrows that shot out in the night were silent, the audience’s reactions were anything but that. A younger version of himself wouldn’t have felt anything, much less experience a bad taste in his mouth. He would have found it natural; kill or be killed, winner takes all. But that was the youth who was intoxicated by power and didn’t bother to count the bodies of his men after battle, the one who had been thrown into the sea by his late uncle because he had forgotten who it was who helped him achieve what he had now and what he owed them for the rest of his life.
“Cheat, steal, lie; be ruthless, greedy, selfish, because that’s just what we are. But don’t ever forget who deserves all the good things left inside you.”
What if nobody deserved it? Would the good things just disappear?
The Mouri spies fell into the water with a loud splash. Yelling. Crying.
“How could he do that?”
“Are you fucking insane? They risked their lives for you, you bastard!”
‘They risked their lives for the Mouri. I am the Mouri.’
“There aren’t that many good things left inside you I’m sure. So choose wisely.”
“Aren’t they your allies!?”
“Soldiers are mere pawns.”
I’ve made my choice long ago.
The cannons echo in the distance. Green light, fire and sparks from the clashing of weapons threaten to tear up the darkness. But it is still night.
Suddenly a light. A light brighter than any of the lights on the Noshima boats, brighter than even the stars. Motochika and Motonari are frozen up on what appeared to be one of Fugaku’s cannons. Takeyoshi cannot hear their words but what he does witness a moment later is an even brighter light, one that could disguise the night as day. Sakura petals.
“What we need to do right now is fight a war to get rid of future wars. You neighbors can’t work together? That disgusts me!”
Takeyoshi claps slowly and Yoshitoshi eyes him curiously.“It’s better than the tragedies Motonari is so fond of. Leaves a strange taste in my mouth though. I need to spit it out. Begin preparations to head back to Noshima.”
“Captain?”
A figure on a kite in the distance screams as she falls into the water.
“The show is over. Our lights are hardly needed anymore.”
____
Motonari does not look at Takeyoshi again as he passes by in the hallway and this time Takeyoshi doesn’t bother to bow, but flips a gold coin up and down as he leans against the wall.
“It seems that my lights were outdone by the Maeda Keiji. I do apologize. But... you do not fancy that light very much anyway I assume.”
Takeyoshi wasn’t expecting an answer. A threat maybe but not an honest answer. “The only light I desire is that of the sun. A mere wanderer’s light cannot compare,” Motonari replies, almost as if he were talking to himself.
“Hm. You know, I don’t fancy it much either. That light I mean. Not that I enjoy the sun’s rays all that much either. I much prefer darkness. ”
“Oda Nobunaga would have granted you eternal days of darkness had you joined him.”****
“Darkness without light is too much. Even for me. Do give him my regards when you see him later tonight.”
Motonari says nothing and continues on. Takeyoshi watches as his shadow as he walks past the torches. Abnormally long and wispy, as if one breath could blow it away. Not that it mattered. When day arrived it will have disappeared. Takeyoshi pockets his coin and begins to head off back to his boats, wondering if the stars and the moon were bright enough to light their way back to Noshima until sunrise.
____
*Sengoku pirates had a custom of eating octopus before they went into battle. The 8 legs were to suppose to represent protection from all 8 sides.
**Takeyoshi’s mother was a woman from a Katsura clan. Which Katsura clan is still a mystery, but for story purposes the Katsura clan I refer to is the one that branched off from the Mouri clan. Katsura Hirozumi rebelled against Motonari when he became clan head and was one of the main supporters of his half-brother.
***Kushiwashi (Otogi). Cannot find his given name so I made one for him. He was one of Takeyoshi’s retainers responsible for negotiations between the Noshima and the Mouri and was also credited with establishing the flag passes system on the Inland Sea.
****Nobunaga had attempted to court the Noshima’s services but they refused all his offers. The reason for this is unknown.