She stood in a burnt meadow. Her memories surrounded her here... vivid images of friends, family, brothers, sisters, rivals; all of those people were taken from her within minutes. They were all that she had lived for, and now they were the very people she was dying for now.
The fateful night that took it all away from her. She would never forget a single fraction of a second that took place.
Blood, screaming, fire, and death.
That morning she could remember too...a beautiful morning.
~*Flash Black*~
The young pin haired samurai smiled with a bold look, her grip on a bottle of sake, across from her was an older man; he had to be in his late 50's. They were enjoying a plentiful drinking game. Already around her was her trophy collection, 30 or so bottles settled around her while he was still working down his ninth.
“Come on old man! Give up; you can't even catch up to me!” She barked in laughter. The alcohol in her system could barely fazing her. If it did anything for her, it washed away the shyness of her. She was barely twenty and able to drink any man under the table.
To her it was a gift.
Her two bright peach colored eyes beamed with excitement as the man collapsed in his drunken state. She screamed with delight as she wobbled to stand. Again she was victorious, but it wasn't as if she had any doubts.
Her friends and closer friends lifted her in cheer. There was to be a celebration that night. There was to be a party for the woman. She was finally gaining her right as Samurai. She was to become elite with her colony leaders. She had proven many times she was more than capable of a title of master swordsmanship.
The other women in the colony never approached her unless flirting; she was never perceived as a woman. She was a man. At least in her mentality and for how people addressed her. Baiken had never fit in with girls; she would never step to their likes. She had gone far enough to have a tattoo placed on her forehead and down her cheek that symbolized her separation from women.
A few men had attempted in being more than just friends are, but she shunned them away. Dating or being with anyone was not really her thing. However, there was one man she favored over others.
Haji.
The young man had short black hair that was cropped just a little above his ears. Dark blue eyes that were warm while still holding too many secrets. He was always smiling...that stupid smile. She liked it no matter how much she acted as though she could not stand being around him.
He was a dear friend, he was not a brother, but he was not a boyfriend either. She had...something for him, but she could never really act on it. It was a certain kind of love. A love that did not particularly need any intimacy. However, it was not platonic either. She did love him. The love she had for him, meant that he was one person, that she could not live without him. She could not be without. However, she did not need to become intimate with him, only be in his presence. That was all she needed.
He was the only one to make her laugh. The only one who could crack her prissiness when she would hide herself away from everyone.
As their colony leader had once explained it, to a few men who were incredibly jealous of this relationship, Baiken was a wild sword. Quiet, elegant, but burning with something deep within...an anger that was almost uncontrollable. Haji was passionate, warm, sincere, and understanding. He was her sheath.
A sword is nothing but a dulling, and dying blade when it has no sheath. It would cut, sever, disassemble, disembowel, and destroy whatever it could with its anger, unless it had its sheath.
This was just Baiken's way. Baiken was an angry and bitter woman, but over nothing really. At the time, she was just angry at the world when she wasn't drunk.
That was just how Baiken was, except when she was with Haji.
~Fast forward to the party~
Baiken was enjoying herself. She had been given her new kimono, her new katana that had been handed down from the colony leader. An honorary moment that was something really no one had been able to have since the first colony leader handed his sword down to the man standing in front of her.
The leader.
This man had been somewhat of a father to her, she had never known her parents, and he took her in and made her who she was. It was the only reason this handing down of his sword meant so much more to her, as he had gone against handing it down to his own son.
BOOM!
The dojo the celebration had taken place had now been blown apart. A monstrosity of mechanics overhead began firing missiles in every direction. People were screaming, she felt hold blood on her as she sat up from the floor.
Something heavy was on her...
The Leader!
His lifeless body lay over her in a mangled heap. The site bringing bile to the back of her throat as she looked him over...slowly her eyes wandered to see more of these mangled bodies. The horror of it all was a severe shock to her senses. The screaming and crying of injured friends and family were shattering to her heart. The fire swelled over the walls of the building.
Suddenly she felt herself being lifted from underneath the corpse.
Haji!
He was pulling her out from underneath the leader. He was unharmed. Something she felt rather thankful for it.
Once she had her feet underneath her, she and Haji were outside. The destruction had swelled over the entire village.
“Ha-haji!” She turned to him in her panic, her fingers gripping her new sword.
“It's going to be okay, we have to defend the rest of our people, come on!” This was a rare moment for Haji...even at the scale of destruction he was usually never this serious. He had always been a lighthearted man, never really seeming to take anything serious at all.
All though she was shaken, Baiken gave a sudden nod and found herself. She had a sneer on her face that would normally send grown men to their knees. She had been called a devil for her look when she would have a hatred directed towards anyone. The pain and sorrow at the loss of so many already was enough to drive her. To hone her skill in the instant her feet were set in stance.
The two of them now moved swiftly to reach the automaton that was rampaging through the countryside.
Nevertheless, all too quickly...this fight would end.
Baiken now unable to dodge a missile directed for her, but...it did not directly hit her. It should have! Why didn't it hit her!?
Her thoughts instantly fell to the new body that lay over her own. There was pain in her left eye and right shoulder. She could not feel her arm. She could not really see. What happened?! Who was on top of her now?! The monster? What was-...NO!!
A quiet cough came from the body as his head lifted enough to smile to her. Blood now gushed from his lips as he continued with that stupid fucking smile. Why was he smiling!?
Tears came from the man’s eyes. Slowly he showed a small grin.
“Baiken...you have to keep going.” The words he spoke were almost nothing but a gurgle. His hand spattered with blood cupped her cheek as he just, kept smiling. That big stupid smile. Haji was missing over half of his body. Only a portion of his torso remained. His legs completely gone, and his left arm gone as well. Her own right arm was completely gone. She knew now her eye was too. There was some large portion of something sticking out of it. She was losing a lot of blood and her vision was blurring.
As he collapsed over her, she screamed. She screamed and began crying. The hazy visions she now saw of the carnage and complete hell that surrounded her. Corpses torn apart, homes completely destroyed, there did not seem to be anyone left. Now Haji was gone too. She was...alone.
She lay still screaming at the top of her lungs as she cried. She wanted to die now. Why was not she dying yet? Why was she still there? Why was she still conscious?
Overhead of her something was moving. It was the automaton. It was...leaving. She screamed now louder than she had ever done, wanting it to return and finish her, she could not stand the idea that she would be left with no one.
Her hatred now boiled hotter than it had ever done for anything. Whatever that thing was, if she were to live after this night, she would never rest until it was in pieces at her feet. As her own body grew tired, her throat dried of everything from her screaming. She lay still staring at the still smiling corpse of her closest friend.
At the loss of so much blood, she finally fell unconscious, and prayed she would never wake.
~*Days later*~
Baiken had been slaving away. Tears no longer streamed from her cheeks as she finished scooping the last bit of dirt over another grave. She had a very vacant expression. Her head wrapped in bandages where her eye was now missing. Her right shoulder wrapped up as well. He remaining eye was swollen and red from her crying. She had woken the next day while it rained. The rain had washed most of the blood away from the colony and put out the remaining fires.
She had been unfortunately lucky to live. She had buried so many people. There were no survivors in her colony besides herself. The final few graves she had taken her time with covering. Many times, she had thrown up from the gruesome truth that was around her, from the horrifically dismembered bodies to the homes that had been destroyed.
The final grave she now sat down in front of belonged to Haji and The Leader. Staring at the few flowers, she had placed over the top. Each grave of a Samurai was marked with their sword; families buried now outside of their homes.
She had run out of tears, but still she began sobbing uncontrollably in front of the grave. Her heart completely blown apart. A suicide would only bring dishonor to her colony. Complete dishonor for what her people had done for her.
~*End Flashback*~
Her head slowly tilted back as she looked towards the cleared sky. Japan now had fallen under the ocean; the destruction had ruined the entire continent. How one single being was capable of such maddening destruction was beyond her comprehension.
There were maybe six survivors of japan left. The Japanese were now being treated specially. It was annoying. Here it was fifteen years after her loss, and she would still have tears come to the corners of her eye.
She narrowed her site to the clouds that hovered above her. In the white canvas that the created she could see the faces of the people she missed.
Haji.
The leader.
The drunkard.
The flirting girls.
Her colony.
Her homeland.
The sword that had been given to her now rest on her hip, a scar over her missing eye, and the sheath to Haji's own sword now replaced the original of her own. Slowly she closed her eye and let out a quiet sigh.
“I won’t rest until you are all avenged.” She said in a heavy tone.
She looked forward, a cold expression on her face as she began walking forward again. She was still on her hunt for the blasphemous monster. In addition, she would keep hunting until her passing day.
Subject: A Samurai's Memories 
Thu Jan 31, 2013 1:58 am
