Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

"Heel, Sadaharu!" Kagura commanded, but it was too late; by the time she had squeezed through the estate gate and reclaimed the leash, Sadaharu had already raised his leg and liberally watered the rosebush at the edge of the garden. Its pink flowers wilted under the pressure of the pungent yellow stream.

Gintoki and Shinpachi pushed through the gate and caught up with the others in time to witness the aftermath. They looked at the drooping rosebush, then looked across the impeccably tended gardens to the sprawling estate house beyond them, and the old woman in the expensive kimono on the porch, who had stood and was staring at them.

As one they bowed, turned and headed back for the exit at double-time, only to get stuck when the combined width of their shoulders proved greater than the width of the gate.

"Excuse me!" the old woman called behind them, coming down off the porch and making her cane-assisted way down the path of polished stones. "Is that your dog?"

"Sadaharu!" Kagura scolded, tugging on the leash to no avail, as Sadaharu sniffed discerningly at his production, then began digging at the earth at the rosebush's roots.

"O-our dog?" Shinpachi stammered.

"It's hers," Gintoki offered. "Never seen it before. Or her. Let's go, Shinpachi-kun," and they made another determined yet futile effort to simultaneously exit through the narrow gateway.

Before they were free, the old woman's hand, wrinkled and dry as a chicken foot, fell on Shinpachi's shoulder. He shrieked and jumped, bashing his head on the gate's wooden lintel, the old woman's bird-talon fingers still clutching at him.

"That rosebush," the woman said, staring at Sadaharu. Her cloudy eyes were liquid with coming tears. "My late husband..."

"I'll remember you fondly," Gintoki muttered, nimbly ducking around Shinpachi and making his escape out the gate alone.

"My late husband always hated that rosebush!" the old woman wept, laughing through her tears. "I don't know how many times he used to talk of digging it up, but the thorns...oh, thank you so much, for honoring my beloved Yukihito's memory like this! I don't know how I can repay you."

Gintoki stopped midstep, spun on his heel and sidled back through the gate.

Shinpachi looked at Kagura and Sadaharu, adjusted his glasses and remarked, "But we didn't actually do anything—"

Gintoki's elbow to his protégé's ribs was perfectly placed to drive the air from his lungs, silencing him. "He means, it was nothing," Gintoki said smoothly. "All in a day's work for Edo's best Yorozuya. So what kind of repayment did you have in mind?"

"Stay right here," the woman said, and hobbled back to the house. Shinpachi stared after her, dumbstruck and slightly cross-eyed, possibly from the blow to the head.

Sadaharu finished his rosebush excavation, having mostly uprooted the plant; he sniffed at the tangle of roots, whined, then turned away, tail wagging. Kagura pulled him by the leash over to the others, his giant paws leaving lasting impressions on the flowerbeds in between.

"So what did the grandmother want?" Kagura asked. "Is she fining you, Gin-chan?"

"Fining me? It's your dog that did this!"

"Or maybe she's calling the police to arrest you..."

"She's coming back," Shinpachi said, rubbing his head with one hand and his ribs with the other.

Indeed, the old woman was already hobbling back down the path. She had traded the cane for a long, wide leather scabbard; the sheathed sword had a solid steel pommel and a grip big enough for two hands, and was obviously heavy for all that she carried it carefully in her arms, not using it as a crutch or letting it drag on the ground. One of her bony hands was wrapped around the hilt, and Gintoki shifted slightly, stretching his arms and letting them fall at his sides such that his hand was resting on the grip of his bokutou.

But she didn't draw the sword when she reached them; instead she stopped and held it out towards them, laid across her arms like she was presenting a scepter. "This was my Yukihito's last sword," she told them. "He always said it yearned to be wielded by someone with the strength to be worthy of its strength. He would want you to have it."

Kagura blinked. "But Sadaharu doesn't use swords."

"Neither do we; they're illegal," Shinpachi said.

"And that's not a Japanese sword anyway," Gintoki said.

"No," the woman agreed. "It was forged after a European design, a flambard."

"Thanks for the offer, lady, but we'll pass today," Gintoki said, waving his hand in dismissal. "You can offer it to the next dog which discovers your garden."

"But I know this is for you," the old woman insisted. "You could do great things with this sword!" After a brief struggle with its mass and with Shinpachi's assistance she drew the sword partway from the sheath.

Its long, heavy blade was straight instead of curved, but its edge was serrated, the cutting blade forged in undulating waves, glinting sharply silver in the sunlight. Glittering even brighter, however, was the massive diamond set into the blade itself, directly above the hilt, a clear, shining, unflawed crystal as big as a goose egg.

Gintoki's, Kagura's, and Shinpachi's eyes widened to approximately the size of eggs as well, seeing it. "On second thought," Gintoki said, "since possessing a bladed sword is illegal these days, we really ought to take it off your hands..."

"But, Gin-san," Shinpachi hissed, "we can't accept something like this, not for not even doing a job—"

"We carried out her esteemed husband's last eternal wish," Gintoki whispered back, "why shouldn't we get a small reward for our kindness?"

"That's not a small anything—"

"Hey, thanks!" Kagura said cheerfully, and grabbed the sword out of the old woman's hand. Drawing the serrated blade fully from the sheath, she swung it experimentally, inscribing a gleaming arc through the air and avoiding giving Gintoki an impromptu tonsure only thanks to his quick reflexes.

The old woman beamed and nodded, and Shinpachi sighed his oft-practiced sigh of the thoroughly defeated.

"It's probably a fake anyway," Gintoki said, back at the Yorozuya apartment. "Probably just glass costume jewelry. We did right to get it off her hands before she was disappointed by it. Her husband was probably a toymaker and it's probably only a toy sword."

The flambard whooshed like the howl of a wind through a canyon as Kagura swung it in a circle about her, docking the corner of a couch cushion and carving a groove in the table.

"It doesn't cut like a toy," Shinpachi pointed out, ducking the blade's sweep past his ear.

"A toy's no fun if it's not realistic. Besides, whoever heard of putting a gem in a sword blade? Decorating the hilt is one thing, but the blade, that's too showy for a real weapon. And not with a diamond that big. It has to be fake. Diamonds don't even come in this many asparaguses."

"I think it's carats, actually," Shinpachi said. "And the Star of Africa..."

Kagura feinted, leapt over the couch to stab an invisible opponent, then turned and with a ferocious battle-cry slashed the air behind her, neatly bisecting the issue of JUMP on the table.

Gintoki shrieked like it had been his own heart cleaved in twain, rocketing out of his chair and almost sending Shinpachi sprawling as he dove for the magazine. Kneeling, he helplessly picked up the two pieces, but it was far too late; two rolls of cellophane tape wouldn't be enough to save it. The rent pages rustled desolately. "But I'd only read half of it," Gintoki mourned. "And it's already Friday; it'll be all sold out everywhere."

"You can buy all the tankoubons new, once we sell this!" Kagura proclaimed, brandishing the sword to display the diamond set in the blade.

"It's glass, I tell you, glass!" Gintoki said. "That rock couldn't even scratch the finish of a BMW."

"Oh, yeah?" Kagura said. "Then what about this?" Going to the window, she set the sword against the pane, so the flat of the blade and the cross-guard were parallel to the glass and the crystal's facets rested against the surface. Then she scraped it down the window with an earsplitting screech. Sadaharu, sitting in the corner worrying at the scabbard, whined and put his paws over his ears.

Kagura lowered the sword, so that the deep white score the stone had inscribed on the glass was clearly visible.

Gintoki and Shinpachi took their hands from their own ears and stared at this new and unexpected evidence. "Is-is that a scratch, Shinpachi-kun?"

"It's a scratch, Gin-san."

"Did that rock scratch the glass like a diamond can, Shinpachi-kun?"

"It scratched it, Gin-san."

"Told you," Kagura said smugly. "We're going to be able to buy all the JUMPs and sukonbu we want."

"Forget about that!" Gintoki cried. "Melon parfaits! Swiss chocolate!"

"The new special limited collector's edition Otsuu Live DVD set!"

"Tsukemono pickles from Kyoto for rice!"

"A new Vespa! Or a Harley! Or a Bentley Space-car! Or a yacht!"

"Real beef sukiyaki!"

"I—I could pay off the debts on the dojo. All of them..."

"You could buy a new dojo! And a mansion in the countryside. And a castle!" Gintoki considered. "Well, maybe I couldn't loan you enough for a castle."

"You couldn't loan him anything!" Kagura protested. "It's my sword, so my diamond."

"Ah, you're mistaken, Kagura-chan; that's my sword. But since I do owe you and Shinpachi a little back-pay..."

Kagura folded her arms around the sword and stuck out her jaw belligerently. "The grandmother gave the sword to Sadaharu, and Sadaharu's my dog, so it's mine."

"Ehh? Who pays for seven bags of dog food a day to feed that monstrous canine's monstrous stomach?"

"I believe that's Otose-san, usually," Shinpachi asserted. "Though Catherine and Ane-ue contribute sometimes."

"Well, maybe so, but who drags those heavy bags up the stairs?"

"We should get it appraised," Shinpachi said. "To find out how much it's actually worth."

"Then let's do it!" Kagura started for the door.

"Wait, Kagura-chan!" Shinpachi yelped, wresting the scabbard from Sadaharu's paws and scrambling after her. "You shouldn't go outside without it sheathed—and maybe we could put it in a combini bag—pretend it's an umbrella—"

Gintoki glanced out the window at the dark night sky. "What jeweler is going to be open at nine P.M.?" he asked.

Sadaharu cocked his giant white head and yipped emphatically.

"It was rhetorical," Gintoki informed him, and got up to follow his erstwhile employees.

It was past eleven when the Yorozuya finally conceded that there were no diamond appraisers available outside of business hours—at least not any that they would want to do business with; Gintoki had a few suggestions about where to look, but Shinpachi vetoed all of them. So, discouragingly poor for one more night, they headed home, with the sheathed sword, wrapped in its plastic bag camouflage, tucked under Gintoki's belt after Kagura had bored of carrying it.

Outside Otose-san's they ran into Catherine, who was standing under their sign shouting up to their window, "Keep it down up there, you good-for-nothing freeloaders! Your racket is disturbing the customers!"

"Whose racket?" Gintoki inquired, leaning over her shoulder.

"Your racket," Catherine said, then looked down at the three of them, before craning her neck to peer up at the window again. "That you were making...up there...?"

"Only we're not up there," Kagura said.

"Sounds like someone is, though," Gintoki said, angling his head to listen to the crash of something breaking overhead. A dish, he hoped, and not a window. Pieces of a dish could just be thrown out, but window panes were work to install, and Otose objected to boards being nailed where windows were supposed to be.

"If it's burglars, maybe we should call the pol—" Shinpachi started to say.

"There's someone in our house!" Kagura cried, and shot up the stairs, two at a time, to wrench open the door—it had been locked, too, Gintoki was reasonably sure, but by the crack of splintering wood it wasn't anymore. "What are you doing here?" she shouted, loud enough to be heard down the block.

"We better make sure no one gets hurt," Shinpachi said. Gintoki was already heading up the stairs. What if that crash had been the TV? Well, after selling the diamond they could get a widescreen anyway, but he had so many memories of watching Ketsuno Ana on that TV...

The door's latch was snapped, Gintoki had time to observe, and then he sidestepped to avoid the body that came hurtling toward him. Humanoid but not human; its legs and arms were augmented by a long lashing tail. With all these five limbs spread it managed to catch itself on the railing of the balcony before it fell over the edge, dragged itself up with a hiss like an angry snake.

It wasn't a race of Amanto he recognized: lanky, oddly jointed body in a dark uniform, and a flat lizard face with no nose or hair, only olive scales. It had a knife in its left talon, a short thing only a hand-span long, but glowing with a peculiar green light through the dark. The alien's round yellow eyes fixed onto Gintoki and it hissed again, a black tongue flicking out of its lipless mouth.

Gintoki raised one hand. "Yo. Welcome to Yorozuya Gin-chan's. We're closed for business tonight, but you can come back tomorrow morning, whenever." Then he brought around the bokutou in his other hand. The wooden sword caught the alien across the shoulder with a satisfying crack and flipped it over the railing. It landed on the street on its feet and tilted up its head to glower yellowly up at him, hissing an Amanto curse that Gintoki hadn't heard in some time, and never off of the battlefield.

Shinpachi was clutching his bokutou as well, trying to simultaneously peer over the edge of the balcony while looking about wildly for other attackers. "Hey, Shinpachi," Gintoki said, setting his hand on the railing to prepare to leap down to the street, "why don't you help Kagura make tea for our customers, while I get out the cakes?"

Shinpachi steadied his grip on his wooden sword and glared at him. "Gin-san, this isn't—"

The scream which cut across the night then was no lizard's—a high-pitched girl's voice. Shinpachi's eyes went wide behind his glasses. "Kagura-chan!"

"Kagura!" Abandoning the lizard-man in the street, Gintoki charged for the door, right behind Shinpachi.

The lights were off, but in the illumination from the streetlamp outside they could see Kagura standing on the table in the middle of the room, facing three more lizard-men in front of Gintoki's desk. The aliens' green daggers glowed eerily, reflecting little creepy points of light in their yellow eyes as they hissed at her.

Kagura was braced in a fighting stance, but her left hand was pressed over her right forearm. She glanced back over her shoulder at Gintoki and Shinpachi, whined, "Gin-chan, he bit me! Right on my arm! With his teeth!"

"What else is he supposed to bite you with?" Gintoki asked, or started to ask.

Before he could finish the question, Kagura fell, suddenly and without so much as a whimper for warning, simply toppling backwards as if she had been cracked over the head, for all that none of the aliens had moved.

"Kagura-chan!" Shinpachi leapt to catch her, barely in time to keep her head from knocking against the corner of the table; they both tumbled to the floor in a sprawl of limbs and dead weight.

The lizard-men went for them, but Gintoki was faster; one sweep of his bokutou caught two of the aliens in the bellies and sent them careening into the wall.

The third was nimble, though; out of range of the wooden sword, it lunged for the already downed prey. Kagura didn't move to defend herself, lying motionless on the floor, but Shinpachi got out from under her and launched to his feet in time to parry its glowing dagger with his bokutou.

Then he yelped like Sadaharu when his tail got trod on, as the knife sliced through the sword's wooden blade as easily as if it were cutting a tomato on a late-night infomercial. He flailed with the remaining stump as the lizard-man advanced on him, backing up against the wall, only to change tactics at the last second, pushing off the wall to throw himself at the alien, tackling it around the midsection.

"Not bad, Shinpachi," Gintoki approved, as he faced off against his own attackers, keeping an eye on their green daggers—having to get a new bokutou would be a pain; even when he ordered them express the mail-order company would dawdle a day or two before dispatching. Luckily the aliens were fast, but not that fast; it was no great matter to avoid their cautious jabs, though it made it more difficult to return the hits.

Shinpachi yelped again, and Gintoki dodged between his two opponents to see the lizard-man facing Shinpachi strike—like a snake more than a lizard, its flat-faced head darting forward, fangs flashing in its open mouth. Its lunge was so quick that those fangs had sunk into Shinpachi's neck before he could block or evade.

Shinpachi shouted, as much from surprise as pain, and swung his stub of a bokutou, but the lizard-man let go and somersaulted away from him, out of reach.

"Gin-san," Shinpachi gasped, his hand pressed to his neck as he dropped to his knees; then his face went slack and he went down, just as Kagura had, slumping forward in a limp heap on the floor.

"Shinpachi!" Two enemies behind him; Gintoki moved without looking, slamming his elbow into one's gut, smashing the other over the scaly head with the butt of his bokutou, then hurtling toward the third alien as it crouched over Shinpachi. Not giving it a chance to do anything more, Gintoki grabbed its skinny tail in both hands, scales scraping his palms, yanked the alien off its feet and hurled it like a hammer throw over the table, into its compatriots.

The bastards were tough, though; already they were scrabbling to their feet, daggers in their clawed hands, snarling at him, "If you have it, you won't keep it from us, samurai—!"

"Samurai, eh?" Gintoki said. "How about I show you a samurai's weapon, then," and he ripped the plastic bags off the scabbard tucked in his belt and drew the sword. The green glimmering of their knives sparkled in the diamond's facets and shone in ragged patterns off its rippled blade. "Will those mini-glowsticks of yours cut through this, I wonder? Or will it cut off your tails first?"

The lizard-men drew back, hissing to one another in sibilant undertones. Gintoki didn't give them time to decide; he charged for the nearest one, swinging the sword to lop off a limb—tail, arm, leg; he wasn't feeling picky. The alien flung up its arm to block—successfully repelling the blade; its outfit must have been some kind of reinforced body-armor, but he heard something crack at the impact and the alien squawked in pain. Leaping backwards, it dove for the window, crashing headfirst through the glass with its armored arms shielding its big yellow eyes.

Gintoki turned to face the others, but they were already scurrying out the broken door, their boots thudding on the wooden steps.

He could have gone after them, but it would mean running through busy night streets with an illegal sword, and he had other things to take care of anyway. Sheathing the flambard, he fumbled for the light switch on the wall, turned it on and surveyed the damage.

One of the couches was overturned, and the lamp on his desk had been knocked to the floor, shards of its broken bulb mingling with the shattered window. Otherwise the room wasn't much different from its usual condition. Even Kagura, flopped there among the wreckage—that wasn't so different from normal, except that usually she would be snoring.

Shinpachi, however, wouldn't so cavalierly stretch out face-down on the floorboards even in the worst summer heat. Gintoki cleared his throat. "Shinpachi? Kagura? Please don't be sleeping eternally; it's lazy of you, and Gin-san doesn't want to be up all night searching for a time machine..."

"No'slee'!" Kagura said, or mumbled, rather. "M'wake!"

"Eh? Kagura-chan?" Gintoki crouched next to her, tentatively poked her shoulder with one finger. "Was that you mumbling? Are you getting up now?"

"'rying!" Kagura garbled. "Can' ove!"

"If you can move, why don't you get up?"

"I 'aid I can'!"

"Ahh...I can' 'ove ei'er, Gin-han," Shinpachi mumbled into the floor.

Gintoki turned around to look at him. "Oi, Shinpachi, when did you become an Osaka man?"¹

"Gin-han!"

"All right, all right." Gintoki pulled Kagura up to a sitting position and propped her against the table with her head flopped down, then went and picked up Shinpachi's limp body and deposited him on the couch, on his side facing Kagura. He picked up Shinpachi's glasses, too, and set them on his nose. "You're lucky these didn't get broken."

Sadaharu poked his head out of the bedroom, padded over to nudge Kagura with his big wet nose. "There you are," Gintoki said. "What kind of watchdog do we have here, huh? Hiding when the lizard-burglars come."

"Gin-han, don' 'e 'ean 'o 'adaharu!" Kagura protested incomprehensibly.

The bite-marks on Shinpachi's neck and Kagura's arm didn't look serious, hardly more than a pair of pinpricks and swelling less than mosquito bites. And they didn't have temperatures and weren't sweating when he laid the back of his hand across their foreheads—no signs of poisoning. Gintoki prodded Shinpachi's wound cautiously. "Does it hurt?"

"No," Shinpachi mumbled. "I'sh nu'n. Like 'y 'ody."

"Maybe it's not venom; maybe your legs have just fallen asleep. Like when you've been kneeling on the sidewalk before the cafe begging for a chocolate parfait because one of your hundred-yen coins fell out of your pocket and rolled away, so you can't afford to buy one, even though you haven't had any parfait for a week, and then you can't stand afterwards because your legs are numb."

"Who'd kneel' for tha'!?"

"Wha' are we going 'o 'o, Gin-shan?" Kagura cried, as best she could. "Wha' if we have 'o go to the 'athroom? You can't take me, I'm a girl!"

"Ah, Kagura, you've got more consonants now! And look, your foot is moving!"

"Hey, it is! It's all pins and needles, though—"

"You've got to get up, walk around so the blood moves," Gintoki said, taking her hands and pulling her to her feet.

After a few tottering Sadaharu-assisted laps around the table, Kagura was bouncing about as lively as ever. Shinpachi, however, lacking the supernatural stamina of a Yato clans member, was still inert on the couch. He couldn't even manage a proper glare when he couldn't get his eyebrows to lower, but he made a noble attempt when Kagura poked him in the cheek for the fifth time. "Come on, Shinpachi, don't be lazy!"

"I'm no'! I sh'ill can' 'ove! Sh'ah' tha', Kagura-han!"

"And he's still speaking in Osaka-ben, too," Gintoki observed.

"Gin-chan, what does 'sh'ah' mean in Osaka-ben?"

"Hmm, I think it's 'stop'. Or is it 'shot'?"

"Aren't you getting bored lying there?" Kagura inquired. "Here, how about this?" She pulled Shinpachi upright and pushed his legs off the couch, so he was sitting wedged against the arm. After a moment's deliberation she arranged his hands to be folded in his lap, and adjusted his glasses. Standing back, she eyed her handiwork critically and nodded. "There, that looks more Shinpachi-like."

"Kagura-han," Shinpachi moaned miserably.

"Kagura, Shinpachi's not an action figure to pose," Gintoki said.

"Gin-han, 'hank you—"

"If he was, he'd have more accessories," Gintoki continued. "Maybe we could get some laundry and set it up like he's folding it. Or a feather duster?"

"I know!" Kagura rifled through the pile of old papers under the table, came up with an entertainment magazine from a few months back with a cover article on Otsuu. This she placed in Shinpachi's hands, curling his immobile fingers around the pages, over the idol's photo.

"Kagura-han, don' 'ut my 'inger there! Kagura-han! Ahh, Otsuu-han, I'm 'orry!"

"Hm, you can still say Otsuu's name," Gintoki remarked.

Kagura stepped back again, planting her hands on her hips. "It's still off."

"It's his face," Gintoki said. "It's blank even for Shinpachi—

"Wha' do you 'ean, ''or Shin'hachi'—"

"—It needs more lines to be a proper expression. Where's that marker we write the chores list with?"

It was a good hour before Shinpachi could do more than feebly twitch his fingers, and even after he was recovered enough from the venom to wobble to the bathroom and clean the marker off his face, he was still unsteady. When he made it back to the couch, he flopped down on his stomach, tucked his arms under his head and shut his eyes, without so much as taking off his glasses or muttering good night.

He didn't stir when Gintoki pushed back his hair to feel his forehead again, but he still wasn't feverish and his breathing was even. Gintoki removed Shinpachi's glasses and set them safely on his desk, then went and sat on the couch opposite the boy, putting his bare feet up on the table and folding his arms over his chest.

Kagura went to the bedroom and came back with two blankets, one to toss over Shinpachi, the other to wrap around herself as she sat on the couch next Gintoki, legs curled under her, mimicking Sadaharu's pose on the floor beside them.

"It's late," Gintoki said, "good kids should be in bed."

"It's after midnight, so it's not late, it's early," Kagura countered. "Besides, what if—what if those guys come back and try to steal the sword?" and she pointed to the sheath that Sadaharu had between his paws and was gnawing on contentedly.

"Right, the sword," Gintoki said, nodding. "That's why I'm staying up, to watch out for it. Since Sadaharu's such a bad watchdog."

"He's not! But still, it would be really bad if something happened to that sword," Kagura said.

"Since it's so valuable," Gintoki agreed.

On the other couch, Shinpachi grumbled in cranky unintelligible dream-speech, pulling the blanket tighter around his shoulders as he rolled over.

"So I think I'll stay up," Kagura said, muffling a yawn. "And make sure nothing's really wrong. With it. The sword."

"Yeah," Gintoki said. "Me, too."

Chapter Text

No member of Yorozuya Gin-chan had passed out yet, but it was only a matter of time. Kagura had been holding her breath since they walked into the jeweler's shop; Shinpachi had forgotten to exhale since the appraiser had taken the sword and brought it over to his mounted magnifying glass to study the stone in the blade; and though Gintoki was leaning against the glass counter, picking his nose in a bored fashion, by the time the jeweler was finished, his lips were turning blue.

The jeweler was a balding, elderly gentleman who moved with slow, fastidious deliberation. He set the sword down on the counter, the blade chiming on the glass, then blinked at them through his thick spectacles as if he'd forgotten why they were here.

"Well?" Kagura finally growled, looming as menacingly as she could manage with the counter and a foot's difference of height between her and the old man.

"You shouldn't talk to your elders like that, Kagura," Gintoki berated her, then turned to the blinking jeweler. "Well?!"

"Gin-san," Shinpachi reproached him, "that's not any better." Then he leaned over the counter, staring the jeweler in the rheumy eyes as he banged his fist on the glass. "WELL?!!"

"Well...?" the jeweler repeated dubiously, cocking his head as if to hear better.

"WHAT KIND OF ROCK IS IT?" all three of the Yorozuya hollered into his ear.

"Oh," the jeweler said, taking off his spectacles to polish them on his sleeve. "It's a diamond."

"What?" Gintoki looked at Kagura to his left, Shinpachi to his right. "What was that? What did he say?"

"He—he—he—he—" Shinpachi stuttered, then leaned over to put his head between his knees, gulping air like a beached fish.

"We're going to have yakiniku tonight!" Kagura cried, jumping up and down and rattling the rings in the counter case.

"We're going to have yakiniku every night ever!" Gintoki gloated. "Except when we're having sushi, or Kobe steak..." He leaned over the counter to put his arm around the jeweler's shoulder. "Okay, okay, old man, how many millions is a diamond this big worth?"

"This stone?" the jeweler asked.

"Yes, this stone—how much? You'll get a nice commission out of this..."

The jeweler adjusted his glasses as he looked down at the shining crystal. "Well, if it were removed from the sword setting—it's a shoddy job, devalues the stone substantially; it would cost a little to remove it, perhaps three thousand yen. But if you did, then this stone should be worth about, hmm, five..."

"Five—five million yen?"

The jeweler shook his head. "Five hundred."

"F-five hundred million yen?" Gintoki stammered. Shinpachi put his head down again, gasping even harder. Kagura patted his back.

The jeweler blinked at him. "Five hundred yen."

"Five hundred yen?"

For a moment, the peaceful hush of early morning settled over the shop.

Then: "WHAT?" Gintoki and Kagura both shrieked, loud enough that crows on rooftops three blocks away took to the skies, cawing fearfully. Shinpachi only continued gasping, as Gintoki raged, "What kind of con are you trying to pull on us, geezer? What kind of piece of shit giant diamond couldn't even buy us a single platter of meat at a barbecue place, huh? No diamond's that cheap! If diamonds were that cheap then I'd be eating parfaits off of them! Why aren't they serving diamond parfaits at Battle Royale, then, if they're this cheap?"

The jeweler adjusted his glasses again, squinting as if to make sure Gintoki was not merely a particularly noisy hallucination. "If this were a natural diamond, it would indeed be valuable," he said. "However, this is an artificial stone, an Amanto construct. Crystals far larger than this are used in much of their technology—ansible transceivers, wave-form manipulators, holograph generators, certain ship engines—"

"What are you, a science teacher? Are we starring in a science documentary now?"

"—and I don't know why they don't serve parfaits on them, sir, but perhaps you could request one, the next time you visit a sweets shop." He pushed his glasses further up his nose. "Though I've never heard of a grown man ordering parfaits anyway."

"I'm never going to be ordering one again," Gintoki moaned, flopping limply across the counter as if providing a visual aid to Shinpachi's dying fish impression. "Last time they told me they wouldn't put anything more on my tab..."

"You sure he's not lying to us, Gin-chan?" Kagura asked, eyes narrowed. "Maybe he's just making things up so we'll sell him this diamond."

"I wouldn't buy it, miss, even if you offered it to me. This establishment only deals in natural gemstones."

"How about the sword?" Shinpachi asked, finally catching his breath. "Maybe the sword's worth something..."

"Right," Gintoki said. He hauled himself upright, picked up the sword and slid it back in its tooth-dented scabbard, then thrust it defiantly toward the jeweler. "Do you hear that? We won't give up on all our dreams, simply because of one blind jeweler—you can't hold us back, old man! Our hearts are as pure as this crystal, and in this dirty world purity is more valuable than anything!"

"Magnificent, sir," the jeweler said. "That will be four thousand yen for the appraisal, please."

"Shinpachi, Kagura," Gintoki said, glancing at them. "You heard the gentleman. And you know how we Yorozuya honor our debts."

"Yup."

"Yes, Gin-san."

"All right, then," Gintoki said, and as one they turned and bolted from the shop.

By mid-afternoon they had stiffed four more appraisers, two gemologists, and a guy on the street who claimed to be selling Rolex watches but was hoping to branch out. He had offered them two hundred yen for the diamond and sword together; it was the best (and only) offer they received.

The sword, as it turned out, was a modification of a limited collector's edition replica of a European flambard. However, thanks to an error in the original order, one hundred thousand replicas had been produced instead of one hundred. Since there weren't a hundred thousand humans in Japan legally allowed to possess swords, the venture had been a dismal failure, and the flambards now were worth significantly less than the steel they were smelted from; it hadn't even been cost-effective to melt them down for scrap.

"Maybe we could go find that watch-guy again and sell it to him," Kagura suggested. "Then we'd have enough to buy two pairs of rubber gloves at the hundred-yen store. Then we could sell each glove for one hundred yen, and then we could buy four more pairs—"

"Kagura-chan's right, Gin-san," Shinpachi said. "We can't give up now; what about our pure hearts? What about our dreams?"

"Who's got dreams these days?" Gintoki sighed. "Who can afford them?"

"At least Sadaharu likes it," Kagura said. "It is his sword anyway." The gigantic pooch was pacing beside her, happily gnawing on the scabbard again.

"He doesn't even like the sword," Gintoki said, "just the sheath. Wait, maybe the sheath is worth something...we could sell it to a pet shop, at least...gimme that!" and he grabbed the end of the scabbard, or tried to; the leather was slippery with dog-slobber. Sadaharu growled playfully and tugged at it; Gintoki struggled for a better grip and finally ended up clutching at the sword's hilt, yanking it out of its scabbard. He fell onto his butt on the sidewalk with Sadaharu standing over him and the flambard in hand, the synthetic diamond in its blade twinkling mockingly in the sunlight.

Naturally, that was when a troop of uniformed Shinsengumi marched up. Most of the men, recognizing the giant dog and the silver-haired samurai under him, quickly crossed to the other side of the street to give them a wide berth. The vice-commander and the first captain, however, stopped on the sidewalk before them.

"Good afternoon, Danna," Okita said politely, craning his neck to look down at Gintoki sitting between Sadaharu's paws.

Hijikata's eyes narrowed. "Is that a sword? An illegal sword?" he asked, and started to draw his own absolutely legal and exquisitely sharp katana.

Gintoki blinked at him in confusion. "This? No, don't be ridiculous. It's obviously a toothpick."

"A toothpick," Hijikata said, not letting go of his sword.

"It's rather a large toothpick," Okita observed.

"Much bigger than yours," Kagura said.

Okita smiled at her in such a way that Shinpachi began backing to the other side of the street where the other Shinsengumi were gathered, in a casual 'I have never seen these people before in my life' manner.

"An extra-sized toothpick, for these extra-sized teeth," Gintoki said. "Don't you know an inugami toothpick when you see one?" He poked the tip of the blade at Sadaharu's mouth. The enormous dog snapped at it friskily. "See, I've picked his teeth, and now I'm throwing the toothpick away," Gintoki said, and tossed the sword onto a pile of trash bags set on the curb for tomorrow morning's collection.

Hijikata's eyes narrowed further; then he sheathed his katana and turned away, as he said flatly, "You can't throw that there. Toothpicks should be put out with the burnable trash."

"Oh, right," Gintoki said, retrieving the sword and returning it to its scabbard.

"And get out of here," Hijikata said over his shoulder. "There's going to be a lot of officials coming through here shortly, and we're supposed to be arresting any troublemakers before they make trouble."

"What's going on?" Shinpachi inquired of Yamazaki, from the safety of the alley they both had retreated into.

The Shinsengumi inspector shrugged. "An Amanto diplomat is going to be taking a tour of Edo. He's from one of the most influential clans, and it's his first time visiting Earth. So it's crucial we make a good impression. Commander Kondou and Matsudaira-dono are with his entourage now."

"...I thought you wanted to make a good impression?" Shinpachi said incredulously.

"Yeah, well..." Yamazaki scratched the back of his head awkwardly. "Shinpachi-kun, Matsudaira-dono was urging us to make a few high profile arrests, so we look effectual—the commander was hoping we'd find Katsura, but if he's not available..."

"Got it," Shinpachi said, "Thanks, Yamazaki-san," and he hurried out of the alley to rejoin his comrades and urge them on their way, which just happened to be in the opposite direction of the Shinsengumi.

Okita watched them go with something that might have been regret in his unreadable eyes, returning his rocket launcher to whence it came. "I wonder if the danna would cross toothpicks with me sometime," he remarked as the troop continued down the street. "It'd be interesting to see him fight with something other than a bokutou."

"Whatever—he just better get rid of that prohibited 'toothpick'," Hijikata said.

"But then what about their dog's dental hygiene, Hijikata-san? You're so cruel, wanting a dog to get a cavity."

"But that—he isn't—that was no toothpick!"

"How embarrassing." Okita sped up his pace to keep up with Hijikata's longer strides. "You probably don't know what a toothbrush is, either, if you can't recognize a toothpick. It's bad for the Shinsengumi, to have a vice-commander who doesn't even know how to brush his teeth."

"Sougo?"

"Yes, Hijikata-san?"

"Shut up!"

The next morning dawned peacefully in the Yorozuya apartment, disturbed only by the clink of the rice paddle against Kagura's bowl and Gintoki's faint snores from the bedroom, up until Shinpachi burst in shouting, "Remote! Where's the remote?"

Kagura piled another heaping serving of breakfast rice into her bowl and mumbled around the chopsticks in her mouth, "It's remote that you'll get a girlfriend?"

"The TV remote," Shinpachi clarified, "and I said 'where,' not 'what,' and anyway why are you insulting me before you even say good morning?"

"You didn't say good morning, either," Kagura replied, scooping the rest of the rice cooker's contents into her bowl and nodding in satisfaction.

"Ah, you're right. Good morning—but the remote! The TV, on the news—!"

"Oi, what's with this noise?" Gintoki demanded, wandering in from his bedroom with both hands pressed to the sides of his head, as if he were trying to keep the two halves of his skull from falling apart. "Keep it down, Gin-san didn't sleep well last night."

Shinpachi spared him a glance long enough to remark, "You might have slept better if you hadn't passed out in your clothes, Gin-san," and went back to digging under the couch cushions.

Gintoki looked down at his rumpled yukata, made a desultory attempt to straighten it out and then slumped down on the other couch, massaging his temples. "How do you know I didn't just change into this now, huh?"

"You didn't," Kagura said. Taking a seat on the other end of the couch, she busied herself with filling her stomach, her chopsticks shoveling so fast they were almost a blur. "When you got back last night you went right to sleep on the tatami, without getting out your futon. That's why you've got lines on your face now."

Gintoki rubbed the faint grid of bamboo weave impressed on his cheek. "Well, I was tired. It had been a long day."

"And a long night at the bars, too," Shinpachi said, in a tone that would do any chastising mother proud, for all that his head was stuck under the couch.

"Maybe I was exhausted by grief, losing our fortune like that."

"Grief smells a lot like sour sake," Kagura remarked around her last mouthful.

"All right," Gintoki admitted, "so Hasegawa may have found a new job, and may have invited me out to celebrate, and may have bought us a round of drinks or two. Or three. Or six. Or was it eight...? But still, after that, I had—"

"Found it!" Shinpachi called out in triumph, crawling out from under the table as he switched on the TV to the morning news. "Here, remember the route the Shinsengumi were clearing yesterday? This is who it was for—"

"—welcome the lord ambassador to Edo," the newscaster was saying. "The Gekkon will be visiting for the next month as they decide whether to negotiate a regular trading accord with Earth—"

Gintoki made a face. "What good's a male announcer? Who wants to watch a boring balding drone drone on about boring bald-faced things?"

"Gin-san, Kagura-chan, just look!" Shinpachi insisted.

"Here the Gekkon Royal Legion are practicing maneuvers, an impressive display of grace and strength," the reporter continued, as the image switched to a platoon of long-tailed, scaly beings in purple uniforms marching through the steps of a military drill, or possibly a ballroom dance routine.

"Eh?" Gintoki said, peering through the fingers splayed over his eyes. "Those tails..."

"Those are the guys who bit me!" Kagura shouted. She grabbed the TV with both hands and shook it as if it were one of the lizard-men. "Come back here, you bastards, and I'll bite you!"

"They bit me, too," Shinpachi said. "And broke in here, and smashed a window, and might have stolen something..." As far as they could tell, nothing was missing—Gintoki insisted he had had ten emergency chocolate bars and now only had eight; but Shinpachi had seen Kagura's face when he'd said it and suspected that the Amanto responsible was closer to home. Otherwise their inventory hadn't come up short anything—though admittedly Gintoki didn't keep track of anything else as carefully as he did his sweets supply, and Kagura didn't care how much rice or sukonbu was in the house as long as there was enough for her. But as Shinpachi doubted the lizard aliens had broken in to steal old issues of Jump, he couldn't think of what they could have been after anyway.

Still, they had to have come for a reason, and since Gintoki and Kagura weren't inclined to worry, Shinpachi considered it his duty to fret about it. Unconsciously he rubbed his neck where the alien had bitten him—the marks were already almost invisible, but he could still feel the little bumps on his skin.

Feeling the itchy sense of eyes on him, Shinpachi glanced over to see Gintoki watching him with that special Gintoki-exclusive brand of laidback, unfocused observation that somehow missed nothing. With an self-conscious cough, Shinpachi put down his hand, said, "So these Amanto, the Gekkon, they're going to be in Edo for a while, that could give us a chance to figure out what they were doing here. If it was these diplomats at all, and not criminals from the same race—maybe there's a new syndicate. We ought to report the break-in to the police—"

"We can ask about rumors about these guys while we're on our job," Gintoki suggested. "Since we'll be meeting plenty of people."

"Yes, we could do that—wait, what job?"

"The job Hasegawa is hiring us for—didn't I tell you? We're meeting him at the local ward office at eight A.M. this morning."

"Hasegawa-san got a new government position?—Did you say eight A.M.?"

Gintoki scratched his head, wincing with the effort of recollection. "Unless it was seven..."

"It's almost nine now!" Shinpachi shrieked. "Gin-san! Kagura-chan, stop grappling with the TV—" especially since the TV somehow seemed to be winning—"we've got to go!"

Chapter Text

Hasegawa's new government job, it turned out, was coordinating the Kabuki district's census takers. It was a temporary position, but he could hire them for decent wages for the next couple of months, Hasegawa promised. "We need catch-up workers," he explained. "As you know, a few months ago the census went out in the mail—"

"They censored our mail?" Kagura said. "Is that why I never got my mail-order turkey fryer?"

"You ordered a what, now?" Shinpachi said.

"Not censor, census," Hasegawa said. "Counting people, so the government knows how many citizens live here. Mostly it's done by mail, but some residences never returned their forms—"

"I didn't," Gintoki volunteered.

"—so we need census takers to go around to peoples' houses and get the data from them in person. And what do you mean, you didn't? Don't you know that the census is how the government chooses where funding goes? Funds for schools and hospitals and everything like that, the census is how the apportioning of tax money is decided—"

"Did you send in your form?"

"Well, no, I forgot," Hasegawa said, rubbing the back of his head, "I was busy, and things came up, and then I lost the envelope...but it's okay, you can do it now, here."

The form was fairly basic, with boxes for filling in names and ages, and a checklist of species—"What do I put for Sadaharu?" Kagura asked. "There's no listing for Inugami."

"That's okay, pets don't get counted on the census."

"Sadaharu's not a pet! He's our precious Sadaharu! If your sunglasses count then why doesn't he?"

"My sunglasses don't count!"

"Ah, so your form was just a zero."

"I've got a name even without my sunglasses, don't I? I've got a birthdate, don't I?"

"Let the sunglasses get back to work, Kagura," Gintoki said. "We've got funds to collect."

"Gin-san, I don't think they're going to be giving the funding to us..."

"Oi, it's not the sunglasses doing the work! It's me, Hasegawa! Oi!"

Census taking proved more challenging than might be expected. The concept was straightforward, but in practice their visits played out like an old joke:

"Knock, knock."

"Who's there?"

"Census takers."

"Ah. Sorry, no one's home."

"What about you? Aren't you home?"

"Ah, no. Sorry!"

By the afternoon they'd stopped by two dozen residences but had a paltry three forms to show for it. "We're going to have to change tactics," Gintoki declared.

"You mean, speak even more politely, so people will be glad to open their doors to us?" Shinpachi said. "Or else chat with their neighbors, to figure out the best time to come see them?"

"You mean, lie? Say we'll give them a big prize if they let us in and talk to us?" Kagura said. "Or else light fire to their houses, so they have to come out?"

Gintoki looked between them. "Well, I was thinking about lurking outside their doors and grabbing them when they emerged, but politely lying about why we're there is a good idea, too."

"That wasn't my idea!" Shinpachi protested.

But getting people to talk to them turned out to be only the beginning of the trial.

"What do you mean, you don't remember your own name?" Shinpachi asked weakly.

"I remember most of it!" his respondent retorted indignantly. "And I know that's the kanji, I just can't quite remember right now whether it's pronounced Kaoru or Kaori. ...Unless it's Sumire?"

"That's totally different!"

"Or Tadashi...or Isao..."¹

"Totally, totally different!!"

Gintoki encountered other difficulties:

"Okay, so you're thirty-six. And how many children do you have, sir?"

"Well. I'm not sure."

"...You're not sure."

"Well, my wife would be, but she's out shopping right now. Just give me a moment to count them. Let's see, in the kitchen is Ichirou, and Kakiko is helping him do dishes, then Jirou and Kashiko are doing the laundry, and Saburou and Kachiko airing out the futons, and Shirou and Kaneko are watching the little ones, Gorou and Kahoko and Rokurou and Kamiko—"

"...You must really love your wife, Papa!"

"Well, actually, my wife and I...we haven't been close in some years. You know how love sometimes doesn't survive the honeymoon. But the children, they keep coming—they're all the love I need! And my brother, too, he's always around even when I can't be, my wife says he's a great help to her whenever she goes out shopping..."

"...I feel sorry for you, Papa."

Kagura, on the other hand, had the least trouble:

"So you don't know what your birthdate is on the standard calendar? That's okay—what's your favorite number?"

Which went fine until they finally returned to the ward office late that evening, and Hasegawa reviewed their forms—"Why is this person over two hundred years old, according to their birthdate?"

"Oh, that's okay, she's a crane alien."

"Why is this person only four weeks old but living alone, according to their birthdate?"

"Oh, that's okay, he's a crane fly alien."

"Is there any such thing!?"

They had completed forms, though, and Hasegawa dutifully filed them, then gazed back at the three Yorozuya as they stood before him, staring expectantly.

Eventually he sighed. "Wages won't be paid until the end of the week. I'll see you tomorrow? Please? If I don't get at least five hundred responses by the end of the week, I'll be in trouble..."

"All right, all right," Gintoki said. "But know this, old man—we're only doing this for the money!"

Gintoki actually didn't go out drinking that night, but he woke the next morning in as bad a mood as if he were hung over, and even after two glasses of strawberry milk he was still grouchy. This worked to their advantage; when the person at the first residence on their list shouted for them to come back later, instead of sitting down to lurk or talking to the neighbors or lighting fire to anything, Gintoki simply hammered his fist on the lintel as he hollered, "Get out here now or else!"

"Or else what?"

"Or else I'll keep knocking until I crack your doorframe, you bastard! And how are your neighbors going to treat you, with a noisy guy like me banging away and shouting out here for hours?"

It was their fastest and most efficient interview yet. By the end of the day they had it down to an art:

"Knock, knock."

"Who's there?"

"The census takers."

"The census takers who?"

"The census takers who are going to BASH DOWN YOUR DOOR AND DRAG YOU INTO THE STREET FOR A GOOD COUNTING, YOU LAZY TAX-AVOIDING FREELOADING INGRATE."

It wasn't an idle threat, either; practice makes perfect, and by the end of the next day even Shinpachi had picked up the trick of kicking a lock just so.

They still hit a few snags. Kishin Mademoiselle Saigou had dutifully returned the forms for family and employees, but left the gender designation blank on all of them. Gintoki didn't waste much time on that—"They're ladies, aren't they?"

"Fabulous flowers, every one!" Saigou assured him.

"Fine, then," Gintoki said, and entered "female" for all.

Then there was My Baby.

Mr. Nakajima looked like a sensible enough gentleman when he answered the door, middle-aged but accomplished, sophisticated in a dark Western-style suit: Hasegawa's negative image. After giving his and his wife's information, he asked, "Should My Baby be counted, too?"

"Yes, yes, babies count, too," Gintoki said, putting pen to clipboard. "Boy or girl?"

"We don't know yet," the gentleman said.

"Oh, is it still in your wife?"

"No, not still."

"So when was it born, then?"

"My Baby's not born yet. My wife's with My Baby now, let me show you."

So he led them in to his immaculately styled apartment, to the kotatsu in the living room, where his wife, with immaculately arranged hair and an immaculately pressed and embroidered kimono, was gently fluffing the blankets around an immaculately white egg twice the size of her head.

"Here's My Baby. Have you seen any so lovely?" Nakajima asked, crouching to stroke the eggshell, crooning softly.

Gintoki, Shinpachi, and Kagura processed this for a moment. "Ah, so what species are you, again?" Gintoki finally ventured.

"Oh, we're both Earthlings, my wife and I. We were born in Edo."

"Born how?" Shinpachi whispered.

"Shinpachi-kun, you can't hold it against a fellow Edo-ite just because they came from a shell instead of a mother," Gintoki whispered back.

"But Gin-san, doesn't an egg have to come from a mother?"

They looked back at the immaculate wife, calculating the size disparity. At last Gintoki shook his head. "No, no, it's impossible—even if giving birth is like pulling a watermelon through your nostril, that's bigger than any watermelon, isn't it?"

"Much bigger."

"How nice," Kagura said, bending to pat the egg on its smooth white crown. "It's the largest egg I've ever seen."

Husband and wife beamed proudly.

"And the most delicious-looking," Kagura continued. "Are you going to put it on rice with soy sauce, or hard-boil it, or—"

"Ah, Kagura-chan—!"

"We'll be going now," Gintoki said hastily, "see ourselves out, thank you for your time, you and your wife have a beautiful omelet—um, infant—"

Once back in the street Gintoki and Shinpachi looked at the form; then Gintoki marked down "2 human beings," and Shinpachi folded the form and tucked it away in the envelope of completed questionnaires.

"I'm hungry!" Kagura declared. "Can we go for dinner now?"

"Kagura-chan, it's only two in the afternoon—"

"Good idea," Gintoki said. "It's bad to work on an empty stomach. What do you want for dinner?"

"Oyakodon!"²

"...That's very wrong." Shinpachi said.

"What do you want, Gin-chan?"

"Tamagozake."³

"That's not only wrong, it's not even food!—hey, wait for me!"

The next morning Shinpachi was late to turn up at the Yorozuya apartment, and even more panicked when he burst through the door to find only Kagura up. "Where's Gin-san? We're supposed to be at ward office already! If we're late after leaving early yesterday, we'll definitely be fired."

"Gin-chan's still in bed," Kagura mumbled as she polished off her morning rice. "He's playing hooky. We're raising a delinquent, Shinpachi, what are we going to do!"

"Gin-san! Get up now!" Shinpachi flung aside the sliding door, marched into the bedroom and grabbed Gintoki's top futon. He would have whipped it off with a flourish except that Gintoki, wise to his methods, took firm hold of the cloth in both fists and held it in place.

Shinpachi planted his hands on his hips. "We have a job, Gin-san, and if we don't complete at least a week of work we don't get paid for any of it!"

"You go," Gintoki said, throwing his arms over his eyes. "I'm sick, feverish—it's influenza—or pneumonia? Yes, influmonia, probably. Even last night's tamagozake didn't help, though it's always helped colds before."

"Not if you drink seven in a row," Shinpachi said.

"And I had bad dreams, too..."

Shinpachi paused for a moment, then asked, soft and dreading, "They weren't about a giant egg that hatched a giant chicken that pecked down every building in Edo, and when they dropped a bomb on it all its feathers fell off and its skin was fried like the Colonel's special recipe, but it still kept pecking, were they?"

Gintoki lowered his arm to look at his protégé. "...No. What kind of nightmare is that?"

"Who has dreams like that?" Kagura called from the office.

Shinpachi's ears turned a shade of red to match Kagura's dress. "No one! I don't know anyone who has nightmares like that!" Then he took advantage of Gintoki's unshielded face to press a hand to his forehead. "And you don't have a temperature, so come on, get up, before we lose all our wages."

"But Shinpachi-kun..."

"Now, Gin-san!!"

Despite their late start, Thursday went smoothly. There was the matter of the hermit with the laser-shotgun who took poorly to his door being taken off its hinges, and the misunderstanding with the Kabuki Hostesses' Bowling and Archery Club, which might have gotten ugly if Otae hadn't happened by; but overall the Yorozuya were in the census-taking groove.

Friday began even better; they were on time in the morning and had completed some five dozen interviews by noon. So when they knocked on the apartment door of the sixty-first residence on their list and Katsura Kotarou answered, it was likely only in the name of staying on a roll that Gintoki immediately grabbed the handle and slammed the door shut again. "Never mind."

Katsura opened it again. "What do you want?"

"Nothing," Gintoki said, and tried to close the door again, but Katsura had wedged his shoulders between it and the frame, forcing it open.

"Are you doing the work of government dogs?" Katsura asked him suspiciously.

"Well-paid dogs," Gintoki said. "We're getting lots of kibble. It's okay, Shinpachi, just put 'Zura' on the form and we can go."

"Not 'Zura', it's Katsura! Katsura Kotarou."

"Yeah, yeah—put down 'Zura', Shinpachi," Gintoki repeated impatiently. "Zura Togurado, that will work."

"Are we really getting kibble, Gin-chan?" Kagura asked. "Sadaharu's been hungry lately..."

"Not Zlatograd, it's Katsura!"

"All right, fine—put down Zuran Zuran."

"Not Duran Duran, it's Katsura!"

"Ah, Gin-san, maybe I should..."

"How about Zuran Daa?"

"Not Zoolander, it's KA-TSU-RA!"

Gintoki moved so fast that even Katsura, for all his not inconsiderable combat instincts, couldn't dodge before Gintoki had gathered up the collar of his kimono in his fist and slammed it, and Katsura with it, back against the frame of the door. "I'm not passing in any damn government form with your real name on it," Gintoki said flatly. "I've seen you arrested enough times; reusing the same gags gets boring. They're going to find you here soon enough, with your crappy cover-up skills, but I'm not helping any."

Katsura freed himself with a deceptively easy twisting motion, folded his arms as he eyed Gintoki narrowly. Then he nodded. "All right, then. Make it Captain Katsura Koutarou. 'Kou' instead of 'Ko'."

Shinpachi hesitated, pen hovering over his clipboard. "...Gin-san?"

Gintoki dropped his head and let out a breath that somehow seemed to deflate him two inches in height. "Ah, whatever."

"Katsura Koutarou," Katsura said musingly. "I wonder when he was born...thirty-two years ago, so he was twelve when the Amanto came. A day he would always remember, though not because of the spaceships in the sky; it was the first day that Nanako truly saw him for who he was. They'd always played together as children, but Nanako-chan was a year older and a grade higher in school, so for a year they'd only ever seen each other when out shopping with their mothers. So for all that Nanako lived but one house over, every day she felt further away, until the day that Koutarou-kun—"

"Er, Katsura-san, should I add Nanako-san to the census, then?"

"Don't be an idiot," Gintoki said. "She doesn't exist."

"She exists in the hearts of anyone who believes in the pure love of childhood sweethearts!" Katsura declared.

"What about Eli?" Kagura asked. "Eli lives here, too, right, Katsura?"

"Right, Elizabeth," Shinpachi said, carefully writing out the name in the next box. "Um...what should I put for species?"

"Is there a listing for Unholy Abomination?" Gintoki suggested.

"No, there's not—oh, wait, yes there is. There we go." Form completed, Shinpachi hastily stowed it with the others. "Thank you for your time, Katsura-san, now we'll be on our way..."

"Wait," Katsura said. "Gintoki," and there was something different in his tone; for all that it was too quiet to be a command, barely even a request, Gintoki stopped at the top of the stairs to look back at his old comrade.

"Are you feeling all right?" Katsura asked, studying his friend's face.

"A hangover," Gintoki said, shrugging. "Can't you tell from the red eyes? You don't go out drinking as much as a healthy young samurai should, Zura."

"Not Zura, it's Katsura!"

It wasn't until late in the afternoon, when Gintoki was busy inveigling his way into the restricted apartment building lobby of the last residence on their current list, that Shinpachi thought to ask Kagura, "Did Gin-san go out last night?"

Kagura shook her head. "No, he went to bed when I did."

"And we're out of alcohol at home. So how could he still be hung over?"

"Dunno. But his eyes are red now like he said, aren't they?"

"Yes, but aren't Gin-san's eyes always that color?"

"Maybe he's always hung over."

"...True."

"Oi, guys, I made it, get in here!" Gintoki called from where he had jammed the door open with his boot, and they hurried over.

Next Monday, when the Yorozuya showed up for work, a man with hair as gray as his suit was waiting for them along with Hasegawa. He turned out to be the Shogunate official in charge of the census, dropping by with the payroll and a reprimand. Apparently as census takers they were theoretically representing the government, and the Yorozuya methods had been less than properly representative.

On the other hand, their successful interview-to-visits ratio was some sixty percent higher than the next best census taker's in the city, and anyway it wasn't as if they could make the Shogunate's reputation that much worse than it already was. Hasegawa's temporary boss sounded genuinely regretful when he said he had to let them go. The ward office had received some two hundred letters of complaint over the weekend, and also all of Kabuki-chou was pretty well and goodly censused, so no more temporary workers were needed.

"I never should have hired you," Hasegawa said despondently. "This job was supposed to go for another month at least..."

"Well, it was good while it lasted," Shinpachi said as they trudged back to the apartment. "And at least we did get paid."

"And now we can go back and sleep in, finally," Gintoki said, yawning with a spine-popping stretch.

When he put his arms down he found that both Shinpachi and Kagura had stopped walking to stare at him. "...What?"

"It's Monday," Shinpachi said.

"And you haven't bought Shounen Jump yet!"

"Ah, you're right."

"Maybe he is sick," Shinpachi said to Kagura.

"It must be influmonia," Kagura solemnly replied.

"I don't think there's any such thing, Kagura-chan."

"Wouldn't it be just like our Gin-chan to get it, then?"

"Oi!" Gintoki said, "wouldn't you brats like something better to do than make fun of poor tired overworked Gin-san?"

"Overworked or hung over, which do you think, Kagura-chan?"

"Hmm, well, his eyes are reddish today, too, aren't they? Such a yucky irritated color."

"Hey, that's the color they are! Are you insulting the eyes I was born with?"

Gintoki made to swat at Kagura's head, but she ducked his hand and ran ahead in the street with Shinpachi, both of them weaving between the morning commuters and grinning at him over their shoulders. Rolling his eyes to suppress his own grin, Gintoki took off after them at a jog, accelerating into a diagonal sprint as they turned the street corner, to cut off their escape and tackle either or both of them.

At least that was the plan; it would have worked, too, if at the corner he hadn't been unexpectedly flattened by some half a ton plus of furry white canine.

"Sadaharu!" Kagura said, "what is it?" The inugami was urgently barking his improbably high-pitched yip. He nuzzled Kagura in the chest, hard enough to have sent a normal girl flying ten feet back. Kagura just hugged his head, scratching behind his ears. "What's wrong?"

"There's something wrong right here," Gintoki gasped from under the dog's enormous paws. "I can't breathe; everything's going dark...please, Kagura-chan...name...a parfait...after me..."

"Kagura-chan," Shinpachi admonished, "you have to let Gin-san up, he's got all the money," and he put both hands to Sadaharu's shoulder and made to shove him aside, ineffectively until Kagura grabbed the dog's collar and dragged him off.

Gintoki was almost back to his feet when a figure rushing through the crowd bumped headlong into him, nearly sending him sprawling on the pavement again. He grabbed Shinpachi to catch his balance, who in turn grabbed for Kagura, and they might have all gone down if Gintoki hadn't glanced between the passers-by and seen who had run into him.

Forgetting the physical comedy routine, he sprang up onto the nearest rooftop in two seamless leaps, balancing easily on the glazed tiles as his eyes followed the figure darting through the congested morning streets. His head was ducked low, but Gintoki wouldn't have recognized his face anyway; the purple uniform and long whipping tail were all he needed to see.

"Is that one of them?" Kagura asked, joining him on the roof. "That's one of those guys!" She waved her umbrella indignantly in the air. "Come back here, you bastard, so I can bite you!"

The lizard-man was running from the direction of Otose's, heading in the direction of Edo Tower, and the auxiliary palace where the Gekkon dignitary was being kept in style. Only a coincidence, Gintoki told himself, but it didn't sound convincing even in his head, unfortunately. He sighed. Going back to bed had sounded like such a nice idea, too.

He took hold of Kagura's collar before she could chase after the sprinting Gekkon, and they both hopped back down to the street, where Sadaharu and Shinpachi were waiting anxiously. "Gin-san, was that one of those lizard Amanto again?"

Sadaharu barked again, as if answering. "Are you trying to call yourself a watchdog now?" Gintoki asked. "A little late for that, when you were running away ahead of the burglars," but he patted the dog's head. Sadaharu was a force to be reckoned with, true, but who knew how he would fare against the lizard-men with their venom and glowing daggers. Gintoki would just as soon not find out, in case the answer was less than fine.

When they reached the Yorozuya apartment, Shinpachi stayed with Sadaharu down on the street while Gintoki and Kagura went up to their rooms to see if they were entertaining any surprise guests. The place was empty, but the hunk of cardboard Shinpachi had taped over the broken window had been torn off. Gintoki picked it up from the floor, shrugged. "At least we don't have to replace more glass. Maybe we should just keep it off. Like a cat flap, only for lizards."

"So was that guy here?" Shinpachi asked, coming upstairs with Sadaharu's heavy footsteps thumping behind him. He saw the cardboard and blanched. "They broke in again?"

"They might've been coming by every morning, for all we know," Gintoki said. "We've been out."

"Nuh-uh, Gin-chan, Sadaharu would've scared them off! Like he did this time."

"Is anything missing? Did they take anything this time? What'd they get?" Shinpachi zipped about the apartment, buzzing back and forth like a bee who'd misplaced its hive, taking inventory of their paltry possessions.

Gintoki shook his head and dropped down on the couch. "Whatever they were looking for, I hope they found it this time. It's annoying, having them dropping in like this. And without even calling ahead, that's bad manners, isn't it."

"It's so rude," Kagura said, throwing herself down on the other couch. "Though biting people and paralyzing them, that's even ruder!"

"Especially if you don't ask for consent first," Gintoki agreed. The paralysis might be original, but the impolite imposition was par for the course for Amanto, and that was about all they knew. While census taking they had asked various residents about the situation, but no one from Earth knew anything about the Gekkon beyond what the news had reported; and most Amanto weren't interested in discussing other species with the apes of Edo. The Gekkon were high on the intergalactic food chain, they'd gathered, but that was as far as they'd gotten.

Kagura cocked her head. "Gin-chan, is that what's been going on?"

"What's going on? I don't want to consent to paralysis. Or biting. If I were a masochist I'd be hooking up with the four-eyed ninja, wouldn't I?"

Kagura shook her head. "No—is that why you haven't been sleeping well? Because you've been expecting these lizard-guys to come back and attack us again?"

"Who said I haven't been sleeping well?"

"You said, last week. And this weekend I heard you tossing and turning all night."

"You did."

"It was harder to sleep. It's better when you're just snoring, I'm used to that."

"Who snores louder, huh, brat? Maybe the noise from the closet's keeping me up."

Kagura stuck her tongue out at him. "That's Sadaharu!"

"Sure, if that's what you need to believe, for the sake of a young woman's pride." Gintoki waved dismissively, but Kagura was still looking at him, her arms folded decisively, more perceptive than a brat had any right being.

He leaned back against the couch, tipped back his head to gaze idly at the ceiling. "So maybe I've felt eyes on us, a few times last week. On this place. Yellow lizard-eyes, maybe; I don't know. But someone's been watching, it seems." He tilted his head back down to look at Kagura's expression—serious, a certain aware seriousness that was unfitting to her silly immature energy; but not any kind of recognition. "You haven't noticed anything."

Kagura shook her head. "Nope."

The Yato were arguably the strongest fighting race in the galaxy; their combat instincts were tempered and honed by millennia of battle. That Kagura might defy the worst impulses of her clan didn't mean that she wasn't as capable and attuned a fighter as anyone Gintoki had ever encountered. If she hadn't sensed anything... "Whatever, it's probably my imagination," he said. "I shouldn't read too exciting stories before I sleep."

"Or watch scary movies that give little kids nightmares," Kagura said, nodding.

"Oi, are you calling me a little kid?"

Shinpachi came back from the bedroom and sat on the couch next to Kagura. "I can't find anything missing; all your futon covers and kimono and everything are where they should be. You weren't hiding a secret fortune under the tatami anywhere, were you, Gin-san?"

"I'd have spent it all by now anyway, feeding this bottomless pit and her bottomless pit of a dog," Gintoki said, aiming his thumb at Kagura.

"But I don't get it—what were they after? What if they come back again? It's our house and office getting broken into; we really should report this to the authorities—"

"All right, then," Gintoki said, standing up and stretching with a yawn, "let's go see the authorities."

Kagura and Shinpachi got up with him. "We're going to the police?"

"Kind of," Gintoki said. "The Shinsengumi are guarding the lizard-men, aren't they? So let's find out what those government tax wasters have to say about them."

Chapter Text

The Shogunate, eager to make a good impression on the Gekkon empire, had offered Edo's finest accommodations to the diplomatic entourage. The auxiliary palace hosting them was better equipped and more extensively modernized than the shogun's own home. Moreover, in addition to the Gekkon legion forces, Edo's elite Shinsengumi themselves were assigned to guard the Amanto ambassador, with half the squads, including most of the top officers, relocated to temporary barracks on the palace grounds.

To an outside observer, the discussion presently transpiring between three of those top officers would have looked like serious business. Commander Kondou was speaking forthrightly, while Vice-Commander Hijikata listened with his arms crossed and his brow fiercely set, and the first squad's Captain Okita nodded along with his commander's emphatic gestures. The nation's entire future could be at stake; the fates of countless citizens might be being determined.

In actuality, anyone close enough to listen in on the conversation would have had expectations of a higher purpose cruelly shattered. "—which was why we got kicked out of the Kamakura Cabaret," Kondou was saying, "so then we went to that gentleman's club outside Sensou-ji, you know the one, because Matsudaira-dono wanted to show the ambassador the full range of human potential—or was it the full range of proportions?"

"Ah, yes," Okita said, nodding, "the girls are very proportionate there."

Hijikata opened his mouth to ask how an underage brat like Okita would even know that, then thought better of joining the conversation and clamped his teeth around his cigarette instead in stoic endurance.

Corporal Ibaraki, approaching his superiors, noticed Hijikata's expression and hastily changed course, bypassing the vice-commander for the commander. Hijikata might provide a faster response, but Kondou was less hazardous. "Commander Kondou, the Yorozuya Gin-chan are at the east gate," he reported with a salute.

"Hmm, what do they want? And is Otae-san with them, by any chance?"

"No, sir. And the danna says he'd like to talk to one of you."

"Which one?"

"Whoever's available, I think. Well, actually he said that he wants to speak to the mayonnaise prince, and if not him then he'll speak to the sadist, and if not him he'll speak to the gorilla..."

"I'll give him a talking to," Hijikata said, or rather growled through his teeth clenched around his cigarette. Dropping his hand to the hilt of his sword as if to confirm its presence, he headed for the gate.

Naturally Okita followed. Hijikata had yet to determine if Okita's interest in the Yorozuya's boss was born of respect, or genuine fondness, or simply that Okita found Sakata less boring than most people, but something was there. And possibly it was returned, though if getting a read on Okita was an ordeal, then determining what was actually going on in the Yorozuya's naturally permed head was an epic feat. One not worth the effort, as Hijikata was fairly certain that ninety percent of the time the answer was, 'nothing whatsoever.'

The Yorozuya trio were loitering outside the main gate, leaning against the wall to get shade from the midday sun. "Hey, Danna," Okita said, friendly enough, and added a polite, "Good afternoon, Shinpachi-kun," partly on Kondou's orders, mostly because his amiable manners clearly terrified the kid—his eyes went ping-pong-ball-wide behind his glasses as he stammered back, "G-good afternoon, Okita-san."

"Oi, and what about me?" Kagura demanded.

"Yes, what about you, why the hell are you here?" Okita inquired.

"It's got nothing to do with you; we're here to talk to the mayo-otaku," Kagura growled back.

"Okay, then talk, already," Hijikata said, then caught himself, "—and I am not a mayo-otaku!"

"Yes, yes, your mayo majesty," Gintoki said, sketching a curtsy.

"I'm not a—"

"It's about the Gekkon you're playing watchdog to," Gintoki said, and like that the jokes and the joker were gone—he didn't visibly move, nothing as obvious as shifting his stance, and his eyes were as dead-fish vacant as ever; but the man asking that question wasn't the slacker jack-of-all-trades but the samurai with whom Hijikata had crossed steel once, and never challenged again.

Hijikata narrowed his eyes, dropped his cigarette on the sidewalk and stubbed it out with his boot. "What do you want to know?"

"Do they stay in their shells all day like turtles? Or do they sometimes wander out without you escorting them?"

"Usually we accompany them," Hijikata said, "the ambassador and his entourage, anyway. But they're not prisoners; they can go where they like throughout the city. Why?"

"We've had uninvited guests dropping by our place. Guests with yellow eyes and long tails and nasty paralytic bites, who break the windows and overturn the couches and generally make a fuss. And I'm curious if they're from here or somewhere else."

Hijikata frowned. "Far as I know, these are the only Gekkon on the planet—they're a powerful clan, but their numbers are small. You're sure..." The description fit, and there weren't any other Amanto who looked like the Gekkon—paralytic bite, though? He hadn't heard any rumors of that. "Any other distinguishing features? What were they wearing?"

"Purple outfits, like the ones running maneuvers on the news," Gintoki said. "Only our guests weren't using laser pistols—they had these alien daggers, about this long, glowing bright green like low-rent copyright infringement."

Okita, whose clash with Kagura had devolved into trying to poke each other's eyes out in spite of Shinpachi's futile attempts to quell them, looked over long enough to meet Hijikata's eyes. "Hijikata-san, do you think...?" Then he winced as a particularly deft strike from Kagura's finger caught him in the left iris.

"Beamknives," Hijikata said. "Special weapons, difficult to come by—they're used by the Gekkon Imperial Sentries, their top-class warriors. Only a few sentries came to Earth with this entourage, though."

"Let me guess," Gintoki said. "Four of them."

"...Yeah, actually."

"Have those sentry bastards been stepping out? Spending nights on the town, going for a morning jog?"

"We don't know. I've only even seen them a couple of times—they don't march or train with the legion troops; they report directly to the ambassador. Anything they do is at his orders, that's all I know."

"So what are our chances of getting an appointment with the honored ambassador?"

Hijikata smirked. "Shouldn't be too hard—you have a spare five hundred thousand for a bribe?"

Gintoki smirked back. "My wallet's a little flat right now, but can I get special dispensation if I bash in this palace gate, maybe a couple of your heads along with it?"

The vice commander shook his head. "Won't do any good—we're just the physical line of defense. After us is the bureaucracy, and you can't slice that web apart no matter how sharp your sword is."

"But we could try, couldn't we, Gin-chan?" Kagura asked. She was smiling, hand on her umbrella; Okita was smiling back, his hand on his sword's hilt. Shinpachi covered his eyes.

"No, forget it," Gintoki said. "Let's not give the sadist here the chance to have fun with Shinpachi—it'd be too disturbing if he found out he liked it."

"Gin-san!" Shinpachi yelped in protest.

Okita widened his eyes with disarming earnestness. "But, Danna, how is it fun if he likes it?"

"Yorozuya," Hijikata said, as Gintoki and the other two turned to leave. "I'll keep an eye out for the sentries, see if I catch them stepping out."

He wasn't expecting any thanks, of course; but Gintoki raised his hand in acknowledgment as they walked away.

"Hijikata-san," Okita said thoughtfully, "bureaucracy aside, do you think my sword's sharp enough to slice you apart?"

"Not if I kill you first, bastard," Hijikata replied.

The sunlight streaming through the open door was warm on the side of his face. Gintoki yawned and turned his head into that warmth, leaning his cheek against the sword in his arms, not opening his eyes.

At the front of the classroom, Shouyou-sensei was lecturing, the ebb and flow of his calm voice as soothing as the sunlight. So this was a dream, then. Gintoki was fine with that; he'd never been one to turn down a pleasant moment merely because it wasn't real.

"When you are resolved, when you have truly committed your will to what you must do, your spirit will be strengthened," Shouyou-sensei was saying. It was odd, how clearly Gintoki could hear the lecture, when he'd hardly listened to any of them, all those years ago. He'd always intend to listen, but then the sky would be a particularly distracting shade of blue, or the classroom would be a particularly sleepy quiet. But he could hear their teacher now, not just the familiar comfort of his voice, but the words, too. "Anyone's will is hard to deny; the lowliest peasant might move a mountain, but a samurai, resolved, can sway ten thousand men, without even raising their sword."¹

Those words were growing harder to make out, though; a crackling noise was starting to drown them out, the hiss and pop of rising flames. He could smell the smoke in the air, ash tickling his nose and throat.

Shouyou-sensei was a silhouette against the fire's yellow, a shadow amidst the light. All the kids in the classroom were watching him; all they did was watch, sitting there placid and obedient, as the tongues of flame licked at the hem of their teacher's robe, flaring up around him hungrily. And Gintoki sat with them, only sitting, only watching, holding a useless sword, while the ash choked him.

Amidst the roaring blaze, Shouyou-sensei's head turned, as calm and purposefully as he ever moved, to look at Gintoki. "And what have you resolved to do, Gintoki?" he asked, and Gintoki jerked upright, opening his eyes, with the snickers of the other kids ringing in his ears and the smell of smoke filling his nose.

Opened his eyes to his bedroom, walls and ceiling outlined in the weak gray light of the predawn sky outside the window. It was early enough that the street traffic was still quiet; the only real noise was the thump of Sadaharu's wagging tail hitting the closet door. The dog at least was having good dreams, it sounded like.

The futon over him was heavy and too hot; Gintoki tossed it off and flopped back on the bottom futon, put his hands behind his head and stared up at the ceiling. He waited for sleep to come back, but it spitefully kept its distance. Though when he heard Kagura awaken an hour later, Gintoki kept his eyes shut and didn't get up, not until Shinpachi arrived to scold him into it, refusing to give anything so stupid as insomnia an easy victory.

They hadn't had a real client to speak of in three days—a little girl who had lost her favorite stuffed animal (Gintoki solemnly accepted the job in exchange for a chocolate bar; the missing toy rabbit was located in her neighbor's tree-house, having tea with his toy tiger) and a desperate salary man in need of exterminators (for a single spider, with legs spreading no wider than a hundred-yen piece. Kagura had gleefully stomped it flat, Shinpachi had swept the remains into a dustpan and flushed it down the toilet, and Gintoki solemnly presented the arachnophobe with a bill for ten thousand yen (plus expenses.))

Otherwise it had been quiet around the office. Sometimes Shinpachi worried that there wasn't enough work for him to honestly earn his keep, but the downtime now was convenient; he hadn't had a chance to give the place a thorough cleaning for a while, and contentedly settled into waxing the hallway floor and making sure the last grains of glass from the broken window were swept out of all the corners. He tied a layer of plastic over the cardboard covering the empty pane as well—they would have to get the glass replaced eventually, but with summer coming it wasn't urgent, as long as it was waterproofed for the rainy season.

By mid-afternoon he finished polishing the kitchen, wrung out the rag and took a step back to admire his shining handiwork. There was something satisfying about a clean kitchen, sanitized and ready for any meal to be prepared. It was Gintoki's turn to cook, which were always the best nights, as long as he wasn't out drinking or playing pachinko and coming back past nine with cheap and sometimes cold bento.

"Hey, Gin-san," Shinpachi ducked into the main room to ask, "what are you making for dinner? Do we need to pick up any groceries?"

Kagura glanced up from where she and Sadaharu were wrestling on the floor, but Gintoki at his desk didn't answer. He had turned his chair around to look out the window, but when Shinpachi came about the desk he found their boss was sound asleep, slumped down in the chair with arms crossed over his chest and his head tucked down at an awkward angle.

Shinpachi shook his head. "Your neck is going to ache if you nap like that, Gin-san," he said. He might have suspected Gintoki of trying to get out of his turn for dinner, but Gintoki tended to fake snores when he was pretending to sleep; he was breathing quietly now, and drooling to boot even though he swore he never did. "Come on, Gin-san, if you're going to be cooking you ought to—"

He put his hand on Gintoki's shoulder to shake him awake, but when he touched him—no, before that; the instant Shinpachi's hand brushed his kimono, Gintoki sprang up out of the chair, so forcefully that he nearly knocked it off its legs. At the same time he spun around toward Shinpachi, such a swift, certain motion that Shinpachi didn't even register what was happening.

Not until he was pressed back against the desk, the wooden edge digging into his spine, and Gintoki's hand was at his throat. Shinpachi could feel the callouses on his fingers, the same callouses as on his own hands, legacy of years gripping a wooden sword; only this grip was far stronger than anything he could manage, solid as iron and as immovable. Gintoki's eyes were iron, too, rust red and blank, not tracking to meet Shinpachi's—dreaming eyes; sleeping with his eyes open was one of Gintoki's useless skills. "Gin-san?" Shinpachi gasped, forcing a voice through his constricted throat.

That wheeze was enough; Gintoki's hand sprang opened like a released trap. He blinked once, his eyes abruptly awake, aware and seeing Shinpachi.

Then Shinpachi was coughing to clear his throat, and Gintoki was somehow several feet away, on the other side of the desk with his hands hanging harmlessly at his sides, looking at Shinpachi. Staring, really, his eyes wide enough to look confused, and his mouth slightly open, like he still wasn't entirely awake.

"Gin-san?" Shinpachi asked, just as confused.

"Gin-chan?" Kagura said, getting up from the floor to stand between Gintoki and Shinpachi, looking back and forth between them.

Gintoki shut his mouth, wiped it with the back of his hand. "I—" he started to say, but then the phone on his desk rang. Gintoki lunged for it with a speed that might have been desperate. "Yorozuya Gin-chan, at your service," he said, listened for a minute, then replied, "Okay, we'll be right there," and hung up.

"Job," he said, bypassing Kagura to head for the door.

"Where are we going?" Kagura asked, bouncing over to follow him.

Gintoki held up his hand to stop her. "No, you two stay here. We have another client coming in; you take care of them while I cover this."

"What client? There's nothing on the calendar," Shinpachi said.

"I must not have written it down. The name was No-something. Nomura, Nozawa, something like that. You wait for them here; I'll be back whenever," and Gintoki was out the door, sliding it shut behind him with a click and leaving Shinpachi and Kagura looking at one another in silent bewilderment.

Chapter Text

Gintoki didn't get back until well after sunset. Kagura, lying on the couch watching TV, took one look at his visage in the doorway and shrieked, "Shinpachi! Get the mop, it's a mud monster!"

"Gin-san?" Shinpachi asked, as the vaguely Gintoki-shaped mountain of dripping brown glop stomped down the hall to the bathroom, leaving a thick trail of muck in its wake. It smelled distinctly of the clay and algae of the river.

"I'd rather not talk about it," Gintoki said, and slammed the bathroom door shut. The shower started a moment later.

By the time he emerged half an hour later, his hair dripping but properly silver and his skin scrubbed pink under his pajamas, Shinpachi had managed to mop up most of the sludge. He gave Gintoki a plastic bag to stuff his muddy laundry into, and set his boots outside the door to dry, where the flaking mud wouldn't track everywhere. Though really there wasn't much point; his waxed floor was entirely ruined, and the bathroom was amply spattered with slime.

"You could've at least rinsed off the sink!" Shinpachi wailed, even as he defeatedly got out a fresh sponge.

Kagura had her own priorities. "What are we doing for dinner, Gin-chan?"

"You guys can go down and see what the baba's serving up," Gintoki said. "Tell her to put it on my tab." He sank down on the couch, leaned back his head and shut his eyes.

"What about you?"

"Forget it, I'm not going to be able to taste anything but river water for a week," Gintoki said, screwing up his face in disgust. "And I think I swallowed a frog anyway. Maybe a carp. A couple turtles."

"Mm, fresh frog legs, fresh sushi, fresh turtle soup," Kagura said longingly.

Gintoki opened one eye to regard her suspiciously. "Fresh, good. Raw, not."

"What about the job, Gin-san?" Shinpachi stuck his head out of the bathroom to ask. "Did you complete it?"

"More or less." Gintoki made an indeterminate gesture with one hand. "I billed them for later."

"That's good," Shinpachi said, stripping off his rubber gloves and joining them in the main room. "By the way, No-san never came."

"No-san?"

"The client who was supposed to stop by this afternoon."

"Ah, right."

"What was his name again, Gin-san?"

Gintoki idly picked his ear with his pinky, eyes closed again. "Who did you say came today?"

"No one! Absolutely nobody!"

"Oh, yeah, that was it. Nobody-san."

"Who the hell goes by 'Nobody'? What kind of name is that for anyone?!"

"Eh, maybe he was an Amanto, I can't remember. Did he look like an alien, when he stopped by?"

"I already told you, nobody stopped by!"

"Yeah, I know, and I want to know what he looked like!"

Shinpachi drew the biggest breath his lungs could manage, opened his mouth.

Kagura chucked him on the head, a sort of scolding tap, and Shinpachi shut his mouth again without hollering a word. He exhaled through his nose instead, shaking his head. "This is a very old and tired routine, Gin-san. Not to mention it's confusing, what with the language issues we have here. It wouldn't be 'No-san' if we were actually speaking Japanese, you know."

Gintoki opened both his eyes this time. "It's still a possible gag. Just use 'da' from 'daremo'—I could have easily said it was a name like Dashima or Darien..."

"It's still a dumb gag, Gin-chan," Kagura said.

"Everybody's a critic," Gintoki said, rubbing his hands over his face; then he lowered them to look at the others and ask, "or should that be 'doitsumo, koitsumo'?"

"If you're going to keep trying to pass off idiom translations as actual jokes, then we're going down to eat," Shinpachi said with dignity. "Come on, Kagura-chan."

Kagura lingered in the office long enough to say, "You should go to bed, Gin-chan. You look more tired than your jokes."

"It's the mud," Gintoki said. "Mud is exhausting. That's why they give mud baths in spas to relax you."

"Maybe you shouldn't go to the spa so much, then," Kagura said. "You're exhausted enough lately."

"I wasn't at any spa—!"

"Good night, Gin-chan," Kagura said, in just the tone of a mother tucking in her recalcitrant son, and skipped off after Shinpachi.

Gintoki listened to the door slide shut behind her, then rolled his eyes and addressed the ceiling, "Every one of them...don't they have anything better to do?" But he dragged himself off the couch to the futon in his bedroom—he hadn't spread them; Shinpachi must have done so, and Gintoki rolled his eyes again, then burrowed between the blankets to get what sleep he could.

"Seconds!" Kagura shouted, holding out her rice bowl.

"That's not seconds," Catherine protested. "That's eighths! Maybe ninths!"

"Ninths!" Kagura cheerfully agreed, still holding out her bowl.

"So who's paying for this gluttony?"

Shinpachi hastily shoveled the last quarter of his own bowl into his mouth, guaranteeing it couldn't be taken away, before admitting, "Gin-san said to put it on our tab."

"Hmph, as if I'd give that permanent perm a tab," Otose said. "Some business sense that would make."

"And yet they're eating anyway. You're too weak to hopeless strays and losers, Otose-san," Catherine said.

"You would know, wouldn't you." Otose lit a new cigarette as she looked around the bar. "And why isn't he here himself to take advantage of my foolish charity?"

Shinpachi glanced at Kagura, occupied with her rice, then said, as casually as he could, "Gin-san had a difficult job today; he went to bed early."

Otose gave him a look not quite severe enough to make him uncomfortable. "Ah, is he," she said. "Then why is he stomping around up there now?"

"Eh?" Shinpachi cocked his head, listening. He couldn't hear anything as distinctive as stomping, but the bar's wooden ceiling was thin enough to carry the vibrations of footsteps above. "Maybe he's getting a snack..."

Except that Kagura had pushed away her bowl and stood, her stance braced and tense as she listened. "Shinpachi," she said, "I don't know if that's Gin-chan."

And it probably wasn't a client, this late at night. Shinpachi reached for his bokutou, only to remember that he'd left it upstairs, and Kagura hadn't brought down her umbrella. But Kagura was already out the door and pounding up the wooden stairs. Shinpachi took off after her.

Gintoki would be okay, of course; it wasn't like he would sleep through another break-in—though he had been awfully deep asleep this afternoon. But hardly helpless, Shinpachi reminded himself; it was easy to forget how strong a fighter Gintoki was, but he wasn't going to lose to any burglar, cat, lizard, or other.

Still, Shinpachi's heart was thumping hard enough that he yelped in involuntary surprise when the door crashed open and a shadowy figure ran smack into Kagura. She tripped back into Shinpachi, who stumbled backwards and would have taken a header down the steps if Kagura hadn't reached out and snagged him.

By his hair, and Shinpachi shrieked in earnest as that hold yanked tears from his eyes and strands from his scalp, before he convinced Kagura to let go.

"Did you see it? Where'd the bastard go?" Gintoki demanded, pushing past them to lean over the balcony's railing, staring down at the street.

"Who, Gin-chan?"

"One of the lizard guys," Gintoki said. He was still in his sleeping clothes but had his bokutou ready to defend. "Or maybe two of them—I didn't get a clear look. Did they come by you?"

"No one came by us," Shinpachi said.

"Except for you, Gin-chan. Only not so much 'by' as 'right into me and Shinpachi'."

"Yes—and did you have to catch me by my hair?" Shinpachi said, rubbing his abused scalp.

Gintoki turned from the railing to raise a pair of silver eyebrows at him, remarking, "There are worst handles she could've grabbed."

"Gin-san...!"

"Are you all right, Gin-chan?" Kagura asked as they headed back inside. "Did they attack you? Did they bite you?"

"They didn't try anything," Gintoki said. "I was mostly asleep when I heard them in the other room; by the time I got in there they were already running for it. I only got a glimpse. Long tail, green knife, yellow eyes—it was those bastards again."

The main room looked undisturbed, except for one of the couches being pushed out of place. But then, the burglars wouldn't have had much time; they'd only been down at Otose's for half an hour. "And you're sure they didn't bite you?" Kagura asked again, poking Gintoki experimentally in the arm.

"Yes—"

"Maybe just a little nip?"

"No! Cut that out, brat!" Gintoki swatted her hand away.

"Aw," Kagura said. "Shinpachi was so much fun when he was poisoned, too..."

"It wasn't any fun at all!"

Gintoki yawned. "That's all right, we just have to wait until he falls asleep and then we can draw on him again."

"I'm not falling asleep around you two jerks! Ever!" Shinpachi declared.

Gintoki just yawned again, flopping down on the couch and putting his bare feet up on the table.

"...Though you should, Gin-san," Shinpachi said, more quietly. Under the fluorescent light Gintoki looked more tired than he did in daylight, the artificial illumination casting bruise-blue shadows under his eyes. He looked—well, hung over, really, but he hadn't seemed drunk when he came back from the river, just muddy and cranky.

"It's okay, Gin-chan," Kagura said. "You can sleep—if those guys come back, I'll be ready for them."

Gintoki was still holding his bokutou, Shinpachi realized, fingers curled around the wooden hilt, for all he was sprawled so lazily.

"Kagura-chan and I will both keep watch," Shinpachi said. "I'll stay over tonight."

Gintoki eyed him. "You brats just want me to sleep so you can scribble all over my face."

"No," Shinpachi said.

"Yup," Kagura said.

"No, we won't!" Shinpachi insisted, elbowing her in the ribs.

"Um, I mean, of course not?" Kagura said.

"She's got the marker right there behind her back," Gintoki pointed out.

"Put that down, Kagura-chan!"

"You have to sleep, Gin-chan," Kagura said, dropping the marker back on the desk. "Growing boys need to get their rest."

"Oi, who's the only actual adult here?"

"Not you," Shinpachi said. "You still read Jump."

"All right, all right, Gin-san's gotten enough disrespect." Gintoki picked himself up off the couch and plodded for the bedroom, stopping at the door to say, with an admonishing finger-wag, "But you better not try anything, Shinpachi-kun! Be careful, Kagura-chan, you don't what a teenage boy might do when there's no responsible adult around..."

"Try anything? Who's going to try anything? What would anyone try? And who the hell is a responsible adult, anyway?!"

Kagura just fluttered her eyelashes. "I'll try to keep from seducing him with my feminine wiles, Gin-chan."

"Feminine what?! Oi! What kind of pervert am I supposed to be now—"

But Gintoki had already shut the door.

Shinpachi exhaled, shaking his head. After a moment he said, keeping his voice low, "Was that too easy? Did Gin-san actually listen to us just now, when we told him to do something?"

Kagura sat on the floor, propping her elbows on the table. "Maybe the obedience training is finally working."

"Gin-san's not a dog, Kagura-chan; we don't have him in obedience training." Though maybe it wasn't a bad idea, at that...

Kagura put her chin in her hands, staring thoughtfully out the door to the hall. "Shinpachi, did you see any of the lizard-aliens tonight?"

"The Gekkon? No, I didn't see anything, before you knocked me over."

"Neither did I," Kagura said. "I wonder how they got by us."

"Gin-san said there might have been only one this time. Maybe he went out the window?" Though when he checked, the cardboard was still securely in place over the empty pane, and the tape holding the plastic hadn't been lifted. "They might have other ways of sneaking around," Shinpachi suggested. "Like a chameleon's camouflage, blending in with the shadows, or something."

"Yeah, that'd be cool." Kagura slumped down lower over the table, so her chin was resting on her folded arms. "It's weird, though, that Sadaharu didn't do anything."

"Sadaharu?" Shinpachi looked around for the absent dog. "Did he run away again?"

"No, he's still snoozing in the closet where we left him before dinner. The burglars didn't wake him up."

A strange, unpleasant feeling twisted in Shinpachi's stomach—not as painful as eating bad crabs, but almost worse in another way. "Kagura-chan," he said, no louder than a whisper, "when we were down at Otose's, did you actually hear the burglars' footsteps?"

Kagura shook her head. "Not really. But it didn't sound like how Gin-chan usually walks—it was quieter, like someone sneaking around."

"And you didn't see anything, either. And neither did I, and neither did Sadaharu." Shinpachi pushed up his glasses to rub his nose. "Kagura-chan, are we sure there were really burglars here at all? That Gin-san didn't...make a mistake?"

Kagura straightened up from the table and blinked at him. Then she firmly shook her head. "No. Our Gin-chan is lazy, crazy, irresponsible, immature, obnoxious, and generally good-for-nothing, but he's not...you know. Crazy."

"...You just said he was, Kagura-chan," Shinpachi hissed. "Only a dozen words before!"

"Okay, so he's crazy. But he's not going to be seeing things that aren't there."

"I didn't mean like that. But if he was dreaming—he could have been sleepwalking? If you didn't see or hear anything..."

"Gin-chan can see Stands when I can't," Kagura said. "My body's stronger, but he's better. If he saw something..."

"Those weren't exactly Stands at the onsen, but...okay, if Gin-san saw them, then they were here. But, Kagura-chan, it's not only that—you know how Gin-san's been lately."

"He could be coming down with something. It's hard to sleep when you've got a cold."

"Maybe, but he doesn't have a fever and he's not coughing. And he hasn't been complaining about it, either, not for a while now." Which, Shinpachi thought, he really ought to have been worrying about earlier. "But he's not..."

Kagura nodded, not smiling. "Yeah. And it started the first time those Gekkon jerks showed up here."

Shinpachi frowned. "You think they did something to Gin-san? But we were the ones who were bitten; he didn't even get hurt."

"They still could have done something! Maybe it's why they keep coming back. They're not stealing our stuff, they're stealing Gin-chan's good night's sleep."

"If they are—what can we do about it? Do you think if we asked Gin-san, he could tell us what's wrong? Like what he'd been dreaming about?" Shinpachi said, remembering the afternoon, the callouses on Gintoki's hand and the blankness in his eyes.

"Of course not," Kagura said. "'Oh, what kind of dreams have you been having, Shinpachi-kun? Boys have interesting dreams when they're first turning into men, it's nothing to be embarrassed about'—that's what Gintoki would say, and he wouldn't tell us his. He's one of those guys who thinks he can handle anything, if he tries hard enough."

She had a point. True, Gintoki generally tried hardest to avoid doing anything whatsoever, but once he did decide to do something, he did it. It was difficult to conceive of something that he couldn't do, really. "But if he can't handle this—"

"Who said that? Of course Gin-chan can handle it. But he might need our help."

"So what do we do?" Shinpachi said.

"That's obvious," Kagura said fiercely. "It's our Gin-chan, so we help him!"

Chapter Text

It was all very well and noble and samurai-like to vow to help a friend. Actually helping was somewhat harder. Especially when one couldn't tell said friend what one was doing. "Are you stalking me?" Gintoki demanded. "What, are you taking after your idiot brother-in-law-to-be now?"

"Kondou-san is not my brother-in-law-ever-to-be!" Shinpachi cried, leaping out from behind the telephone pole. "And, um, no. I just thought I'd help."

"Help," Gintoki said. "Help me get to the market. One block away. Which we go to every week. Am I amnesiac again? Did I hit my head and forget about it?"

"Help you carry the groceries," Shinpachi hastily amended.

"There won't be that many. Not like we can afford sukiyaki. Hey, I've got an idea—you do the shopping, and I'll go back and start preparing." Gintoki pushed a list into Shinpachi's hand.

Considering Gintoki rarely bothered writing lists, usually planning meals by wandering around the store until some key ingredient caught his eye (Iron Chef style, he called it), Shinpachi had a feeling he had been played.

The surveillance—not stalking—had been Shinpachi's idea. Since Gintoki tended not to talk much about many of the places he frequented (beyond saying that underage brats weren't welcome at them), taking turns clandestinely following him was the best way to find out what he got up to, and if anything was happening to him while he was out.

What Shinpachi and Kagura hadn't counted on was that Gintoki was not only rather more perceptive than he let on, but also was used to being tailed—Sa-chan had given him plenty of practice honing his skills in observing being observed. Kagura could make it a couple blocks before she got found out, by keeping to rooftops and other unlikely positions; Shinpachi, forced to take more pedestrian routes, was spotted within a hundred feet, every time.

The first few times, Gintoki had snapped at them but let them come along; now he was resorting to other tactics. With Kagura busy elsewhere, Shinpachi took the grocery store at breakneck speeds and ran all the way back to the Yorozuya apartment, only to find Gintoki puttering in the kitchen, oil for the tonkatsu heating on the stove.

Whatever might be going on with Gintoki, it hadn't affected his cooking, which was as excellent as always. Shinpachi usually put aside a portion to take back to his sister, to make sure Otae got proper nutrition and also in the thus-far vain hope that some of the chef's ability might transfer through the food. Said portion usually had to be separated out before the meal, as Kagura's appetite rarely allowed for leftovers.

This evening, however, Kagura wasn't around, though she rarely missed one of Gintoki's meals. After they'd waited half an hour with the dishes covered, Gintoki tossed down the TV remote, picked up his plate and chopsticks and said, "All right, where's the brat?"

"Kagura-chan? Um, I have no idea," Shinpachi said.

Gintoki shook his head. "I've failed as a master, if you can't lie any better than that. Where is she?"

"She's, er..." He had failed as a master; Shinpachi's mind was blank. But then weren't samurai supposed to be honest anyway? "She's visiting Hasegawa-san," he confessed. Interrogating Gintoki's friends had mostly proved a bust; he hadn't been by Gengai's for a few months, and Katsura hadn't seen him since the census taking. But Hasegawa went out drinking with him regularly, and Kagura intimidated the older man such that she could get anything out of him, were there anything to get, and make sure he didn't mention it to Gintoki later.

Which wouldn't help if Shinpachi mentioned it to him first. Kagura was going to kill him. "She's, um, asking Hasegawa-san about a job he said he might have," he added hastily.

Gintoki looked less than convinced by the excuse. "Sunglasses doesn't have a new job yet," he said. "Unless scrounging up enough spare change from payphones to play pachinko counts as a job, which I'm fairly sure it doesn't, or else I've been gainfully employed for years."

"Or maybe it was that Kagura-chan wanted to hire him for a job instead?" Shinpachi suggested weakly.

"And she's going to pay him in, what, chewed sukonbu?" Gintoki considered. "Actually he might accept, the way things have been going for him lately."

Shinpachi hoped he accepted whatever Kagura offered—hoped he had something. They had hit a dead end otherwise. No one in the Kabuki district knew anything about the lizard Amanto. A couple of people might have glimpsed something resembling a Gekkon Imperial Sentry, but no one was sure about where or when. If the Gekkon weren't actually chameleons, then they were nevertheless as good as any ninja at concealing themselves.

Or else they had all been seeing things, he and Kagura as well as Gintoki, and they had never been attacked at all. Though Shinpachi could still remember the cold prick of the venomous fangs piercing his skin, the panic when he'd realized he couldn't move. He'd had the bite-marks for a few days after. Besides, the green beamknives were real; the Shinsengumi had confirmed it.

Shinpachi supposed that going back to the Shinsengumi was their next best bet, even if he shuddered to think of facing their authority and Okita's sadism without Gintoki's easygoing confidence. Perhaps he could just ask Kondou, the next time he crawled out from under the dojo's floorboards? No, Kondou sadly wasn't likely to know anything...

"—Yo," Gintoki said, waving a hand in front of Shinpachi's face.

"Ah, Gin-san, sorry! I was thinking. About how sad Kondou-san's—I mean, Hasegawa-san's situation is. Well, Kondou-san's is pretty sad, too; there's so many pathetic men in Edo..."

"True," Gintoki said, "but you can't spend too many thoughts worrying about them, or that's all you'd ever have time to do. I limit worries to one a day, myself."

"...So what's your worry today, then?"

Gintoki gave him a sharp look so brief Shinpachi might have imagined it, then put his hands behind his head as he gazed dolefully up at the ceiling. "I worry that my precious student Shinpachi-kun is so distracted that he's failing to appreciate the delicious meal that Gin-san dedicated so much effort in the kitchen to prepare."

"Eh? Oh—itadakimasu!" Shinpachi picked up a strip of fried pork with his chopsticks and popped it into his mouth. It was indeed delicious.

Maybe he was worrying too much. Gintoki still looked tired, circles under his eyes, but he hadn't been so different otherwise. No more burglars, reptilian or otherwise, had invaded, and Gintoki hadn't been napping in the afternoon more than usual. When he went out, it was to bars and pachinko parlors, the same as ever.

Though Kagura said that he kept getting up in the middle of the night to pace around, even if he was curled up in his futon as usual when Shinpachi showed up in the morning. And the few times clients had dropped in, Gintoki seemed...odd. Brusque, still, and rude sometimes, like always; but his smile when he accepted a request wasn't quite right. And then he'd go take care of them himself, or else tell Shinpachi and Kagura to do it without him; they hadn't done a job together for a week.

He would flip through Jump, but wouldn't stop on any chapter long enough to read it through. And yesterday he'd thrown out half a pudding cup uneaten, as if he hadn't noticed any was left, though usually he'd wipe up the last drops with his finger. Kagura had wanted to take Gintoki directly to the hospital after that, had suggested breaking one of his bones (only a little one) to make sure he'd get admitted; Shinpachi had only barely talked her out of it.

Gintoki didn't seem sick, after all. Just tired, and distracted, like he was always slightly preoccupied.

Even now, as he ate, Gintoki had one ear cocked to the traffic outside. He might have been listening for Kagura to get back. But he had his bokutou tucked in his belt, too, even though he generally left it on the table or in the umbrella stand when he was relaxing at home.

And they were eating in silence, though usually Gintoki would be making fun of Shinpachi over something ridiculous, or complaining about Kagura's appetite. Or else Shinpachi would be ranting about their table manners, or about Otsuu's latest performance, or about anything—except that Gintoki wasn't, so he wasn't, and every second that ticked by in silence but for the crunch of chewing and the click of chopsticks felt longer and heavier than the one before it. It didn't matter how tasty the food was; Shinpachi would rather be at home eating his sister's cooking—and since when did the Yorozuya apartment not feel as much like home as the dojo?

Finally Shinpachi couldn't take it anymore; he set down his plate and asked, "Gin-san, what's wrong?"

Gintoki took another bite, chewed and swallowed before he said, "What's wrong with what?"

"You know," Shinpachi said. If Kagura were here, maybe he wouldn't have, but he was tired of this. They were friends, weren't they? Surely Gintoki would understand, would appreciate their concern. "With you, how you haven't been sleeping, and your bokutou, and—and everything. Something's wrong, Kagura-chan and I both know it, but we can't do anything if we don't know what it is."

Gintoki put down his own plate and slouched back on the couch. "And what would you do if you did know?"

"We'd help you out, of course! Whatever you needed us to do."

Gintoki's gaze on him felt strange—not blank, not like he was sleepwalking; but unreadable. Like the way he'd look at a client, before he had them figured out, except that the clients usually thought Gintoki wasn't paying attention or that he wasn't thinking at all, and Shinpachi knew that he was; he just didn't know about what. "Why do you think you could do anything?" Gintoki asked at last.

A test, Shinpachi thought; it wasn't very often that Gintoki bothered to test him, but all masters did eventually. He sat up straight, thought of Kagura's conviction and said confidently, "Whatever it is, it's just another job for Yorozuya Gin-chan—and we take any job, right? So no problem!"

"I take any job," Gintoki said. "But I can't take myself as a client. And you and Kagura, what are you going to do by yourselves? A brute of a girl with no self-control, and a babied baby brother who's barely even held a steel sword—who'd hire a pair like that? I wouldn't, even if I had the money."

"G-gin-san..." It's only a test, Shinpachi reminded himself, rallying; it wouldn't be a real test if it wasn't tough, if it didn't hurt a little, like all hard effort hurt. "We're strong enough, Gin-san—haven't we been with you through all kinds of jobs? The Shinsengumi takeover, Ryuuguujou, Yoshiwara—we couldn't have done it alone, not yet, since we're still learning, still getting stronger; but together we're always stronger. As strong as we need to be."

"Like any good Jump hero," Gintoki said, cool and sardonic. "Except that you're not the hero; you're the sidekick at best. Or the comic relief, since Kagura's more the sidekick, when it comes to fighting. Don't pout, Shinpachi-kun, the straight man's an important role, usually. Except when the story is serious, and then the comic relief's superfluous."

"No." Shinpachi set his jaw and folded his arms across his chest. "I'm not falling for it, Gin-san. You're trying to get me mad, but I'm not going to let you."

"No, I'm not," Gintoki denied, scratching the back of his neck as he yawned. "If I were trying to piss you off, I'd tell you how you're the only guy I know whose glasses don't make him look any smarter; or that Otsuu is an industry-manufactured idol without a speck of real talent—"

"YOU TAKE THAT BACK!" Shinpachi roared, rocketing to his feet; then he coughed delicately and sat down again, placing his hands across his knees. "I mean, go on, Gin-san."

"That's what I'd tell you if I wanted you pissed off. But this isn't about your glasses or your idol—this is about you. About who Shimura Shinpachi is."

"So who am I?"

Gintoki raised his head and looked at him, not a sidelong glance but straight in the eye, as he rarely did. "You're my friend," he said. "You're part of Yorozuya Gin-chan; you're my employee and my student and as close as I have to a little brother. You've got honor enough for any samurai, and as much guts as any man I've ever met, and more heart than that. And your kendo is better than you think—when you fight for what you have to, and aren't worrying about how good your opponent might be.

"But you're only a kid. You and Kagura both, you're still just brats, and there's too much that you know nothing about. There are questions you ask when you should already know the answers, or else you shouldn't ask at all; there are promises you make that you won't be able to keep, only you don't know enough to realize it. And you still believe that there's always something you can do, even when there isn't."

"Gin-san..."

Gintoki got to his feet—not quickly, but not stiffly either; a smooth sure motion. "I'm going out," he said. "Want to practice your stalking again?"

It should have been a joke, the way he said it, only it wasn't really. Shinpachi shook his head, looking down and not meeting Gintoki's eyes, keeping his lips clamped shut, though he wasn't sure himself if it was because he was too ashamed to speak, or too angry.

When Kagura got back half an hour later she found Shinpachi still sitting on the couch, with his fists balled on his knees and the leftovers getting cold on the table. "Oi, Shinpachi!" she said, as she picked up a cutlet of tonkatsu and bit off half in one mouthful. "Where's Gin-chan?"

"Out," Shinpachi said. "He doesn't want us following him anymore."

Kagura swallowed. "Of course he doesn't want stalkers," she said. "So?"

"He doesn't want our help, Kagura-chan."

"If he wanted our help," Kagura said, "then he wouldn't need it. Come on, Patsuan, we have to hunt him down, before he gets in trouble, all alone in the big city!"

Shinpachi got up, but only to pick up the plates on the table and neatly stack them. "No. You go, Kagura-chan; I'll stay and clean up the kitchen."

"Shinpachi," Kagura said, suddenly standing in front of him, nearly knocking over the dishes as she stared keenly into his face. "What'd he say to you?"

Shinpachi shook his head again. "Nothing," he said, and the only reason he met her eyes was because he knew that she'd see nothing through the reflection on his glasses. "Nothing I shouldn't have already known."

Otose's was crowded tonight, and the air was murky thanks to all the cigarette addicts who found the snack bar one of the few remaining havens for tobacco. The smokescreen was nearly enough to camouflage the silver hair of their patron sitting in the far corner from the door. The way he was hunched over the bar helped, too; he might almost pass for a gray-haired old man, rather than a naturally permed freak.

Catherine had been keeping an eye on Sakata since he came in, but he hadn't yet tried to bum a drink off Otose or any of the customers. Naturally he had no money to order anything, either, so he just sat there, nibbling on kakipea from the complimentary bowl. Better for him that he was only nibbling; when the bowl was emptied, Catherine had no intention of refilling it. Sakata could pay for his meals.

He wasn't doing anything else to earn his place, certainly. Sometimes Sakata brought a rowdy spirit to the bar which their patrons appreciated, enough that Otose would let him stay. He was quiet tonight, though, sullenly brooding like a man whose wife had walked out on him, except that there wasn't a woman born foolish enough to marry Sakata to begin with.

After a while Catherine got fed up with it. "Hey, Tama," she told their robot waitress cum bouncer. "This worthless wavy-haired guy who sits at a bar but can't even be bothered to order a drink, why don't you ask him if he'd like to see himself out?"

"Gintoki-sama," Tama said politely, "would like to you see yourself out?"

Sakata's dead-fish eyes slewed to the robot girl; then he shrugged and picked up another handful of kakipea. "I'm good here."

"He says he's good here, Catherine-san," Tama reported.

Catherine got out from behind the bar and elbowed her way over to Sakata. "Are you going to order anything, Sakata-san?" she asked.

Sakata didn't answer or even look at her, tossing a couple crackers into his mouth and crunching them between his molars. At the other end of the bar Otose raised her eyebrows and took her cigarette out of her mouth to say, "Catherine, don't—"

"Because if you're not, you should offer your seat to a paying customer," Catherine said, going to grab Sakata's arm and haul him off the stool.

Except that Gintoki grabbed her first, twisting his arm under her hand to close his fingers around her wrist and bend it back painfully. "Keep your hands off me, Amanto," he growled, low and lethal, his head still lowered so that his silver hair hid his eyes; then he shoved her away, hard enough that she stumbled back into Tama.

Catherine had been called plenty worse things since coming to Earth, but not with more venom than that. And not from Sakata; that was more passion than he ever bothered mustering, practically a different man's voice. Ears flattening back against her head, Catherine hissed, "Let's see you toss my claws off that easily," and raised her hands.

"Catherine!" Otose rapped out, and Catherine recalled herself, straightening up and retracting her claws. "Gintoki," Otose went on, oddly mild, "if you're going to sexually harass my staff then I'll have to ask you to leave."

"Harassment?" Catherine started to protest, only to stop, because Sakata had risen off his seat and was staring at her. His pale brows were drawn low, but not in anger; he looked more than anything like he'd just been bashed over the head with a blunt object.

There were plenty of people in the world who would gladly perform that service for Sakata, Catherine being one of them, but she hadn't, and neither had anyone else that she'd noticed. He hadn't looked this out of it when he'd been concussed and suffering from total amnesia. It made him appear oddly young, for a single startling second—helplessly innocent, for all that those were two words which would never apply to him.

Then he turned away. "I'll go, then," he said. "Spirits taste better when the girls are pretty anyway."

"No," Otose said. "Stay." It was neither a suggestion nor a request, by her tone.

The rest of the bar was gawking at them, Catherine realized. She leveled a glare at them, and the drunkards quickly returned their attention to their glasses.

Gintoki took a step towards the door, but Otose said simply, "Tama," and the waitress planted herself before him, blocking his egress.

"This bar's too dull and boring, old woman," Sakata said, turning his head toward Otose but not raising his eyes to her. "Not the place for me tonight."

"Those kids are running around the whole neighborhood now, looking for you," Otose said, lighting a new cigarette. "Kagura missed you, hiding there in the corner, when she ran off earlier. But eventually they'll come back, and then they'll find you, provided you're still here. So you'll stay."

"So you're making my decisions for me, you dried-up old hag?" Gintoki said crossly, but it was his usual half-assed, apathetic ire, no sharper than his wooden sword.

"Apparently so," Otose said, blowing smoke in his face as he sat down again at the bar. Sakata coughed and waved it away, then scooped up a handful of kakipea from the nearest bowl and began crunching on it as before.

He was sitting closer to the door now, though; anyone walking by outside wouldn't miss that silver hair.

"Catherine," Otose said, and Catherine got back behind the bar and busy serving their customers.

Later, during a slow spot, she poured a glass of shochu and slid it down the bar to Sakata. He blinked down at the glass between his elbows. "I didn't order this."

"It's the dregs of the cheapest spirit we have," Catherine informed him. "Not worth closing the bottle again for just those drips."

"Catherine," Sakata began, with a hint of that hit-over-the-head look about him again.

Catherine shook her head, cutting him off. "You're a freeloading layabout who's not even worth holding a grudge against, and I only put up with you because Otose-san wants me to. And the next time you try to sponge a drink off of us, I'm going to grab you and kick you out of here on your worthless ass, and don't you even bother to fight back, because you couldn't be strong enough to hurt me in a hundred years."

Gintoki studied her for a moment; then, with a half-smile that was still twice his usual effort, he picked up the glass and sipped, savoring the cheap swill as if it were an aged kusu awamori. "Delicious," he said, "and don't let anyone tell you different, Catherine."

Before he could finish his drink, Kagura crashed into the bar, hands on her hips like a furious fishwife, yelling, "Gin-chan! How long have you been here? I've been looking everywhere! And what'd you say to Shinpachi—you shouldn't have, whatever it was, it wasn't nice; he's gone home all sulky, like a kitten who got rained on, or Asado Mao-chan after losing the gold—" and then she had him by the arm and was dragging him outside and up the stairs to their apartment.

Which was convenient timing, because with him out of the bar there was no one to notice Catherine's small, unavoidable smile, except for Otose, who only shook her head with a sigh, and said nothing. Otose had tended bar quite long enough to know how to keep her worries to herself.

Night on the battlefield could be as bright as day. The Amanto ships with their hyperspace engines and energy canons illuminated the sky as brilliantly as any sun, blotting out the stars they had descended from; and the dust and smoke they raised blocked the sunlight come dawn. Sometimes it was hard to remember whether you'd fought through the night to sunrise, or fought all day until sunset. And then sometimes it felt like no time was passing at all, with the sky unchanging like a painting. Like you were only ink figures brushed on a parchment page, always fighting the same unending battle, trapped forever in the twilight under the gray charcoal clouds.

You slept when you could, ate when you could, breathed when you could. You fought at any time, because you had to. It wasn't quite like living, but it was better than death.

And sometimes it didn't seem to matter either way. There were always more Amanto, in the air and on the ground. Every new wave came with more incredible weapons, more powerful attacks. More warriors fell with every strike; it was just a matter of time before everyone had fallen, before Japan's last samurai were slain.

But until then he fought; until he were struck down himself he would keep fighting, to protect those few still standing with him. He didn't mind the blood on him; Amanto blood or his own, either was fine, as long as it wasn't a friend's. He didn't mind standing guard another night without rest—or was it another day?—if it meant an injured comrade might have the chance to recover. His eyes were gritty and his muscles aching, so that the sword felt three times heavier in his blistered hands than it should; but his defense meant one more friend living one more day, and that was worth it.

It was dark when Gintoki opened his eyes, the deep quiet darkness that falls just before dawn, and for a long moment he was confused, not understanding why he saw no ships in the sky overhead. But no, that was a ceiling above him, and the soreness in his shoulder was only the old lingering twinge. The only smoke in the air was the faint whiff of car exhaust.

And yet he was as tense as if he were still on that decade-old battlefield, every fiber on edge. This was his home now, and Edo was at peace; but it wasn't safe.

Amanto, his sixth sense told him, beyond sight or sound, playing on his nerves like the charged atmosphere before a thunderstorm. The invaders, who could breathe their air and speak their language, but would never belong. Earth itself rejected them, marked them as separate. Even the Amanto shaped like a human couldn't pass as one of them, not entirely; they would always be foreign. Their eyes, their smell, their skin—something would always be wrong. He'd fought enough of them to know. To know that one was in his home now—one of the invaders, come back again.

Gintoki reached for his bokutou as he rolled to his feet, silent as a cat and sure as a bat in the darkness. He was no blind swordsman, but an experienced warrior never relies on only their eyes. Cocking his head, he focused on the faint sounds around him, tuning out the traffic outside and the thudding of his heartbeat to zero in on what didn't belong. He crept along the dark floor, lifted the fusuma door up in its track to slide it aside with scarcely a whisper.

He'd had enough of this, had enough of alien assholes breaking into his home and messing with his stuff. About time he put an end to it. His fist tightened around the bokutou—the wooden sword might not have any edge to speak of, but it could deal damage. Not all the stains on the wood were from spilled curry. Dump the body somewhere away from his place—it might cause a diplomatic incident, which would be a pain if the police unexpectedly developed any intelligence to speak of; but it was late and Gintoki was tired and would rather still be asleep and didn't much give a damn.

But when he'd tracked the intruder to the closet—they must have heard him coming and hid—and silently slid open the door, it wasn't one of the lizard-men after all. Almost human, so very close in form and figure; and yet so insanely far apart in strength.

Yato. There'd only been a few on the battlefield at the war's end; Earthlings weren't considered worth the journey to fight, so those few were mostly low-grade mercenaries for hire. And still they'd been monsters, able to take down five or ten men with a single blow. A human had only one chance against a Yato clansman: to strike first and with all one's might, without warning. Dishonorable, maybe; cowardly, certainly—but a fair fight doesn't mean shit to a corpse.

Gintoki raised his bokutou, and the Yato rolled over, rubbed her eyes with one fist and blinked up at him drowsily. "Aww, can't I sleep a little longer, Gin-chan?"

In the bottom of the closet, Sadaharu's tail thumped on the floor as he yipped a good morning from the other side.

"Gin-chan?" Kagura asked, sitting up. "What is it?" Noticing his raised bokutou, she leapt out of the closet with her fists ready, peering apprehensively around the room. "Is it the lizards, are they back?"

"No," Gintoki said. "I don't..." If he could have uncurled his fingers from where they were locked around the bokutou, he would have dropped it to the floor. Instead he lowered the wooden sword, slowly. The pounding of his pulse in his ears was distractingly loud, and the rasp in his lungs as he breathed.

"Gin-chan?"

"You can sleep in; we don't have a job," Gintoki said. Shinpachi could wake her later, when he came in for the day. If he bothered to come in at all. Gintoki turned away, headed for his bedroom. "Just go back to bed. I'm going out."

Kagura yawned enormously as she trailed after him. "This early? Where are you going? When will you be back?"

"Later," Gintoki said, and slid the doors shut in her face, before she figured out that he was lying.

Chapter Text

The club had its callers work from dusk until dawn, so Katsura and Elizabeth were at present living more on an owl's schedule than a man's. There were advantages: government agents tended to be less alert at night; and some hotels rented cheaper in the afternoons, conveniently, since they no longer had an apartment after last week's police raid. Katsura still wasn't sure how they'd found out his address—perhaps there was a mole in the Jouishishi? Surely no ordinary person could have penetrated the pseudonym he'd given on the census.

With the sun almost risen above the rooftops, it was nearing quitting time, close enough that Katsura had quit trying to flag down random gentlemen passers-by in favor of surveying the restaurants along the street, contemplating meal options. Perhaps a bowl of udon, or would Elizabeth prefer soba? Then again, curry wasn't traditional samurai fare but it was delicious, even if spicy foods before sleep could cause indigestion...

"Oi, watch the drool, Zura, it's disgusting."

Katsura turned toward the voice behind him, frowning. "Not Zura, it's—Gintoki?"

"...No, I'm pretty sure I'm Gintoki; I don't have a freakish giant duck costume following me around."

"And I don't have a ridiculous white perm," Katsura returned. "Also don't call Elizabeth freakish. Also what happened to you? You look terrible."

"At least I wasn't standing in the bar district all night getting puked on by wasted salarymen. And I bet that lipstick on your cheek wasn't from any girl," Gintoki said. "Those look like a man's lip-prints."

Katsura didn't ask how he knew; he simply wiped his cheek with his sleeve, not taking his eyes off his friend. "I was working all night, but you look like you've been up longer. Are you ill?"

Gintoki shook his head in a show of assumed disillusionment. "I tell you, Zura, after all your time working here, that you can't even recognize a hangover—"

"Not Zura, it's Katsura. And that's not a hangover, either." He'd seen Gintoki falling down drunk and seen the aftermath; he'd also seen Gintoki near-mortally wounded, more times than Katsura really cared for, and Gintoki's drawn face now looked closer to the latter than the former. For all that he had no obvious signs of injury, no bandages or bruises, and he wasn't moving with an injured man's care.

Their shift wasn't quite up yet, but with luck the club manager was busy with the register and wouldn't bother coming out to check on them. "Elizabeth, can you fulfill my duties as well as your own?"

Roger that, Elizabeth acknowledged via sign and the best salute that a flipper could manage.

"I'm going to eat," Katsura told Gintoki. "You can join me."

Gintoki shrugged. "Not hungry. And I don't have the cash besides."

Katsura sighed. "The bakery down the street sells cake. My treat."

"Chocolate torte," Gintoki said. "Triple-layer."

The bakery had just opened for the day. The middle-aged lady who ran it was partial to long hair; she gave Katsura a wide smile and a discount on the cake and curry bread, and added a couple bottles of iced tea for free, though she eyed the messy silver curls of the man with him suspiciously.

Gintoki ignored her, which wasn't so unusual; he'd been getting odd looks for that involuntary sin all his life. But once they were seated at the single table outside the shop, he also ignored the cake, poking it abstractly with the little plastic fork as he gazed out over the street, watching the suited salarymen hurrying to catch the early trains and the sellers in their happi coats setting up shop for the day.

In turn Katsura studied him sidelong as he ate his bread and sipped his tea, waiting. At last Gintoki said, "Do you ever think about the old days, Zura?" not looking at him, still watching the street.

"Sometimes," Katsura said.

"Do you ever dream about them?"

"Sometimes."

"What do you do if you can't stop?"

"A man can't stop thinking or dreaming," Katsura said slowly. "Nor should you want to. If the mind dies—"¹

"Don't," Gintoki said, low but furious. Katsura only could recognize it because he knew what rage sounded like in his own voice; he wasn't sure if he'd ever heard it in Gintoki's before. Not like this. "Don't go quoting him at me, Katsura."

Gintoki might have dozed through the lessons of their childhood, but he'd learned them all the same. Of all of them, Gintoki perhaps best lived the most important aspects of Shouyou-sensei's teachings, for all that he fudged most of the details of being a true samurai.

"What have you been dreaming about?" Katsura asked instead.

Gintoki shrugged. "Anything. Everything. Our classroom, the war. All of it."

"You must have had such dreams before," Katsura said. "Even you couldn't just forget all of that."

"I haven't. And I do. But sometimes, like you said. Not like this. Not like..." Gintoki drew a deep breath, released it. "They'll feel real. Not memories—like life. I wake up with my heart pounding like I'm back on the battlefield, and this stupid sword," and he nodded at the bokutou tucked haphazardly under his belt, "it will feel wrong. Too light and fragile and useless."

"I could get you a real katana," Katsura said.

Gintoki's eyes flicked over long enough to glare at him. "I could get my own damn katana, if I wanted. This sword's fine by me.—Well, maybe not this one, I've been hoping to order another since the finish got scratched on the inscription, but the interstellar shipping fees have gone up, so—"

With Gintoki momentarily preoccupied, Katsura took advantage, inching his hand across the tabletop toward the chocolate torte. He had just brushed the paper plate's edge with his finger when Gintoki's hand slammed down, pinning his wrist to the table. "—Oi, what are you trying with my breakfast?"

"Since I purchased it, and it doesn't seem to be to your taste, I thought I would have it instead."

"You don't even like chocolate!"

"It's a terrible sin to waste food. Especially when it was baked with love."

"Baked for profit, you mean—I think I saw that evil-eyed woman mixing sawdust in with the flour when we came in." But Gintoki forked up a bite and stuck it in his mouth defiantly. "All right, so the sawdust may have been coconut flakes," he allowed after swallowing. "This isn't too bad."

Katsura nodded, satisfied; a Gintoki who still willingly corrupted the temple of his body with childish sweets wasn't completely lost. Still, the chocolate couldn't erase the dark patches under his eyes, or his edginess, which Katsura could feel more than see, his own combat instincts rising in response. The tension in his shoulders, the darting of his eyes to track every noise on the street—even sitting here eating cake, Gintoki was fighting-ready, set for battle, a man braced for an ambush from any angle.

Katsura himself had lived as the government's quarry for years, but it was strange to see such wariness in Gintoki; it struck like flint on steel in the depths of Katsura's own memories, sparking recollections of the white demon he'd once fought alongside. How quickly Gintoki had been able to go from laughing with his comrades to fighting their enemies—he'd always been one of the first to throw himself into battle. Not for honor, or even because he'd especially enjoyed fighting; some of them had, but Gintoki had always liked the laughter more than anything on the battlefield. But he'd always been first, all the same.

His edge hadn't really been blunted in the years since, Katsura knew, neither dulled by disuse nor filed down by regret. It was just that he'd sheathed it, tied the metal blade into its scabbard and taken up a dull wooden one instead. But now that old edge was drawn; Katsura could see it in his eyes, the silver glitter of sharpened steel.

Now or then, there was only one reason Gintoki ever drew his sword. Whatever else might be wrong, that wouldn't change. "You know, they came to me a few days ago," Katsura said. "Leader and Shinpachi-kun."

"Did they?" Gintoki said, his flat tone such that he'd already known this, or else guessed it.

"They were asking about you. If I'd seen you recently, if I knew if anything had happened to you. They were concerned—they didn't tell me about what, but that they were worried, that was obvious."

Gintoki glanced down at the plate of half-eaten cake, dropped his fork and pushed it away. "It's none of their damn business."

"They care about you," Katsura said.

"Too much. There's enough other things they could worry about in this city."

"Yes, but not as important as this. Not to them."

"Kids never understand what's really important," Gintoki said. "They just think they do."

"Why won't you let them help?" Katsura asked. "You've never cared about doing things all by yourself; you've never had that kind of stupid pride."

"If they weren't kids—"

"We were hardly older ourselves, ten years ago. We managed."

"Some of us managed. How many more of us died?"

Katsura looked at his friend sharply. "They're not so weak as that. I know what Kagura is; I wouldn't want to take her on myself. And Shinpachi-kun is resourceful, and willful besides. You've never doubted them before—what do you think you're facing, that you doubt them now?"

"I don't know," Gintoki said. He looked down at the table, at his hands clasped together on the plastic tabletop, fingers interlaced and the knuckles were whitening. "I don't have any goddamn idea what's out there, but I know what's here—what they could be up against, if this...if I..."

"Gintoki, you..." Katsura could scarcely credit the idea; he would have thought it a joke, and a bad one, except for the way that Gintoki was sitting, his shoulders hunched with the tension humming through him, like a live wire, and woe betide anyone who touched it (Katsura had learned an important lesson about electric sockets and where not to stick a knife some years ago; it had left a strong impression, if no lasting scars—all the hair had grown back eventually.)

"Surely you can't think that you'd ever..." Katsura shook his head. "During the war, there were those men who lost themselves on the battlefield, or claimed to lose themselves, to justify the atrocities they committed, to excuse their lapses of principle. Who were overwhelmed by the tides of battle, by bloodlust and fighting glory. But you were never one of those, Gintoki. We called you a demon, but that was only because of how you looked attacking, how fierce you were. You never forgot yourself; you never once forgot who you were fighting, or who you were fighting for."

"That was before," Gintoki said, with something that wasn't a smile at all. "Right now—now I wake up from these dreams, and I don't know anymore. Like I'm not myself, and I don't know who the hell I am."

"I know," Katsura said. "And they do, too, Leader and Shinpachi-kun; they've been by your side long enough. They can decide for themselves if they trust you; you can't decide for them."

"No," Gintoki said, spine straight and shoulders rigid. "But if something's coming—and something is coming, I can feel it, every damn nerve in me can feel it—it's coming for me. They don't need to be involved."

"What if they want to be involved?"

"I don't want them involved—I can't. I can't protect them, not when I'm like this. I can't protect anyone," and Gintoki's teeth were gritted, as if it were physically painful to say, as if someone were forcing the words out of him. If they hadn't been sitting out in open air under the morning sun, then Katsura would have been looking for whoever had the knife to his back.

"Then let them protect you," Katsura said.

Gintoki stared at him as if he had said something completely insane. It was a comfortingly familiar look, and Katsura nodded, encouraged. The privilege of protecting someone came with a heavy price, and one of the heaviest was that they would want in turn to protect you. Gintoki had always been a natural-born freeloader, though; he never bothered to pay for anything if he could get away with it. "Go home, Gintoki," Katsura told him. "Tell them what you've told me. Let them decide whether they want to leave, or if they'd rather stay by your side and face whatever might be coming."

For a moment he thought he might have been heard. Then Gintoki shrugged and leaned back in the chair. Pulling the paper plate back toward himself, he polished off the rest of the cake in three messy bites and tossed the plate in the trash behind them. "I have to get going. Thanks for the treat, Zura."

Katsura sighed. "Where are you going?"

Gintoki pushed back the chair, stood. "Got an appointment."

His hand was resting on his belt, seemingly casually, but close to the hilt of his bokutou. Not touching it, but almost; he could have it drawn and ready in a quarter of a second.

"Where's this appointment?" Katsura asked. "I could walk with you."

"Don't know yet," Gintoki said, with the not-smile. "When I find it—when it finds me—maybe I'll let you know." He turned, started to walk away.

"Gintoki," Katsura said.

Gintoki paused, his mop of silver hair bright in the sunlight. Without looking back he said, "Zura, do you remember what you told me, on the Harusame ship, before Takasugi."

Gintoki, don't ever change; it would take too much effort to kill you. "I remember telling you it's Katsura, not Zura. Or Lupin."

Gintoki said nothing.

"Yes," Katsura said. "Yes, I remember."

"Good," Gintoki said. He took another step, then stopped again, turned back halfway so Katsura could see his profile. "One more thing. If I—if they're left... "

"Of course," Katsura said. "Leader and Shinpachi-kun both. I'll protect them however I can."

For an instant Gintoki closed his eyes, head bowed with a gratitude too deep for words, though when he looked up a second later it had passed. "You're a pal, Zura," he said with a flippant wave, and strode away.

"Not a pal," Katsura said softly after him. "A brother."

He had almost finished his bottle of tea when a junior member of the Jouishishi came jogging up, panting for breath. "Katsura-san," the man reported between gasps (he really should encourage a more regular fitness regime; sound minds in sound bodies and such), "we think we've found the location."

Katsura nodded as he stood, and ignored the twinge of guilt. It was fortunate in one respect that Gintoki had been so distracted; he'd never thought to ask for Katsura's insight into his situation. Katsura was used to lying, and even falsehoods could be honorable, if your cause was just; but it was still a poor way to treat a comrade. Besides, Gintoki had always been too good at reading him. Though perhaps if Katsura had told him...

Well, no matter. What was done was done. And this should all be over soon.

Endure a little longer, Gintoki...

"Shin-chan? Are you up yet? Are you feeling any better?" Otae called from outside Shinpachi's bedroom door.

Shinpachi rolled over onto his stomach on his futon, bundling his pillow under his arms. "I'm sleeping in," he said. "And yes, I'm okay. I told you last night, I don't have a cold."

"But it's almost ten in the morning," his sister said. "Shouldn't you be up by now?"

"I'm sleeping in," Shinpachi said again. "I'm oversleeping in."

"I made you tamagoyaki."

Shinpachi pulled his covers over his head. "Actually, Ane-ue, I might be coming down with something after all..."

"And Kagura-chan wants to see you."

"Maybe tomorrow," Shinpachi started to say, but then his door slid open and Kagura charged into his room with all the delicacy and deference of a herd of sugar-high wildebeests.

"Come on, Shinpachi, time to get up! We've got lots of stuff to do," and she grabbed his top futon in both hands and flipped it off him like a magician pulling aside a curtain. It was a technique he often used on Gintoki, but Shinpachi had little practice being on the receiving end and was far too late grabbing for the blanket.

He settled for throwing one arm over his face to block the daylight outside his window. "You can work without me, Kagura-chan. I'm not coming in."

"Today?"

"Maybe not ever again." It was difficult to say; the words felt like lumps of charcoal lodged in his stomach, like he'd eaten one of his sister's egg dishes.

"Yes, you are," Kagura said, fists planted on her hips. "It's not Yorozuya Gin-chan without you."

"Yes, it is," Shinpachi said. "My name's not in there anywhere. Just 'Gin-chan'—it's only Gin-san."

"Well, right now it's not," Kagura said. "It's only me. And you, because it's silly if it's only me; I'd have to change the name to Yorozuya Kagura-chan. ...Or maybe Super Master Sledgehammer Kagura-chan, that'd be cooler."

"'Sledgehammer'?" Shinpachi shifted his arm to squint at the red-and-pale blur that was Kagura. "Where is Gin-san? You never found him last night?"

"No, I did," Kagura said. "But he freaked out this morning—more of the lizard-guys showed up or something, I dunno—and went out and he hasn't come back."

"And you're going to look for him again." Shinpachi put his arm back over his eyes. "Good luck."

"No, I'm not," Kagura said. "Even if I found him, he could just take off again."

"So what are you going to do?"

"We're going to find what's freaking him out, and beat it into the ground!"

"You can," Shinpachi said. "I'm not. It's Gin-san's problem; it doesn't have anything to do with us." He yawned. "Besides, we've been looking for days and we haven't found out anything."

"The Shinsengumi might know something new, if we asked them."

"Great. Good luck." He rolled onto his side, tucking his arm under his pillow.

"Shinpachi?"

Kagura didn't say anything else, but he didn't hear footsteps, either. Finally Shinpachi cracked open one eye, and yelped in surprise when he found Kagura bent over him, her nose almost brushing his ear. She pulled back in time to keep from accidentally breaking her nose on his skull when he jerked up, but stayed squatting close enough that even without his glasses he could clearly see her face, the furrows in her brow. "Are you really sick, Shinpachi? Ane-go said you weren't feeling well, but I thought you'd just had some of her breakfast."

Shinpachi shut his eyes again, dropped his head back to the pillow. "Sure," he said. "Yes. I'm sick." It wasn't really a lie; he was sick of all of this, sick of trying to help and failing, sick of trying to stay positive and responsible and pretend like everything was all right when it wasn't. Sick of pretending he was strong, when he was only a weak kid and everyone knew it. Maybe this was what Gintoki had meant about those things he should already know.

He was surprised to feel the soft weight of his futon settling over him. "I'm sorry, Shinpachi," Kagura said. "I'll go see the Shinsengumi—you just get better, okay? Because I really can't be Yorozuya Gin-chan by myself. Even if I changed the name."

Shinpachi swallowed. "Okay," he said, and kept his eyes closed, listening to Kagura's footsteps on the tatami and the snick of the door opening and shutting.

A minute later someone tapped lightly on the fusuma's paper paneling. "Shin-chan?" his sister asked through the door. "Should I make you some rice porridge? Or ginger tea?"

"No—I'm okay, Ane-ue."

"Kagura-chan told me to take good care of you," Otae said. "But you don't really have a cold, do you? This has something to do with Gin-san, doesn't it."

"I don't want to talk about it," Shinpachi said, burrowing deeper under the futon.

"Kagura-chan sounded worried," his sister said. "I don't know if I've ever seen her so concerned."

Kagura must be sick of this, too, Shinpachi thought. She was with Gintoki even more than he was; whatever Gintoki was to him, he was to Kagura that much more. Kagura didn't have a dojo or a family house, didn't have any place else she belonged, not anywhere on Earth. If Gintoki left the Yorozuya, then she'd have no home.

For all Gintoki's lazy reckless carefree irresponsibility, Shinpachi didn't think he could be that cruel to Kagura. But then what Gintoki had said to him, Shinpachi hadn't thought he'd say. Like the Gintoki they knew wasn't who he was now, not anymore.

Kagura was still doing all she could, though. Not for Gintoki now, but for the Gintoki she knew, that Shinpachi knew, or thought he'd known. Trying her hardest, even alone—going to the Shinsengumi alone, and sure, she was strong enough to take any one or two or five of them, but what if Okita tried something? If she happened to get in a fight with Okita—what if she hurt him or worse, without anyone there to remind her not to let him get to her? They'd arrest her; they could deport her...

Whatever was going on with Gintoki, it didn't have anything to do with him; Gintoki had told him so. But Kagura was still his friend—"Kagura-chan, I'll come with you!" Shinpachi shouted, scrambling out of his futon and yanking on his hakama as fast as he could. "Wait for me!"

Chapter Text

"So what do you want?"

Shinpachi swallowed and stood his ground, staring up at the infamous demon vice-commander of the Shinsengumi and wishing Tosshii were still around. True, Tosshii had been the product of a curse, and had caused no end of trouble for Shinpachi himself as well as for Hijikata, and it was good for the balance of the world that he had been laid to rest. But he and Shinpachi had shared the unique bond of true otaku. Plus he had been so much less terrifying than Hijikata. Even when it had really been Hijikata in costume it had been better—Hijikata was maybe the only man on Earth who looked less intimidating in sunglasses.

Shinpachi steeled himself. "We're here to, that is, we wanted to—have to—ask you..."

Okita ignored him to look around, right and left and up and down, curiously. "Where's the danna?" he asked, then made a show of blinking at Kagura. "Oh, my, you didn't eat him, did you, China?"

Kagura looked about herself in turn, then clapped her hands to her cheeks in shock. "Where's the gorilla? You didn't chain him up somewhere and forget him, did you?"

Okita smiled, at odds to the low growl in his throat, and crouched to draw his sword, as Kagura raised her fists, smirking back at him.

"Kagura-chan," Shinpachi scolded.

"Sougo," Hijikata snapped at the same time. Then he and Shinpachi looked at one another, momentarily united in exasperation.

"We're here to ask about the Gekkon," Shinpachi said. "Have you found anything out?"

"Right, the Gekkon," Hijikata said. He took a drag from his cigarette, shook his head. "No, they haven't been doing anything. Most of the time they're closed off in their quarters, won't let us in."

Shinpachi looked past Hijikata and Okita through the open gate and the grounds spreading beyond, the wide white gravel promenade leading to the first wooden buildings of the auxiliary palace estate. Men in familiar dark uniforms were scattered about the walk. Most of the Shinsengumi squads were boarding here; even if he and Kagura could make it past Hijikata and Okita—and that was a big if—they probably couldn't get to the ambassador before they were arrested.

If Gintoki were here—but he wasn't. Shinpachi gave his head a firm shake, said, "What about those Imperial Sentries you told us about before, Hijikata-san? Have you seen any of them?"

"Hardly at all," Hijikata said. "I've had someone positioned to keep an eye on them, but they're busy guarding the ambassador; they've never left the grounds."

"Never?" Kagura said. "You're sure they haven't slipped out? Like, early this morning?"

"Or last week?" Shinpachi asked.

"They haven't gone anywhere," Hijikata said. "Not since you came by before."

"I've asked them out to play a couple of times," Okita added. "They've declined. No sense of fun."

"Sounds like pretty good sense to me..." Shinpachi muttered. "'But okay—thanks, Hijikata-san, Okita-san. We won't take up any more of your time—come on, Kagura-chan."

"Hey, Megane," Hijikata said as they started to leave. When Shinpachi looked back the vice commander took his cigarette out of his mouth, exhaled smoke. "Where is your boss, anyway?"

"Gin-san's busy," Shinpachi said after a moment's hesitation. "Out on another job. See you later," and he turned back and continued walking off down the street, strides faster than before.

"See you later, if you don't die first, which I hope you do," Kagura told Okita with a wave, and followed Shinpachi.

"That kid needs practice lying," Hijikata remarked as he watched them turn the nearest corner and head out of sight.

"You would know, wouldn't you, Hijikata-san," Okita replied.

"Oi, what's that supposed to mean?"

Okita put his hands behind his head, thoughtfully, as he followed Hijikata back inside the estate walls. "Where do you think the danna really is?"

"I don't know, but I don't like it. They're up to something."

"If I were trying something," Okita said, "like, for example, planning your assassination, then I would want to case the place first, clear my exit strategy."

"They didn't even try to come in, though, and there's not much they could see from outside the gate. Also I don't like your example."

"It's purely hypothetical, Hijikata-san. But, hypothetically, if I were going to murder you in cold blood—such as for example dropping down on you from the ceiling as you crossed from the bathroom to your bedroom after brushing your teeth, as you do at nine o'clock every night, and firing at you point-blank with a borrowed pistol, using the towel you always carry to muffle the shot—then I might arrange a distraction before I got into position, so no one would notice me sneaking in."

"You think the Yorozuya sent those two to distract us, while he got onto the grounds? And I really, really don't like your example." Hijikata frowned. On the one hand, assuming that dead-fish-eyed bastard was running any sort of complicated, effort-requiring scheme was almost certainly overthinking the matter. On the other hand, assuming that said bastard was incapable of planning and executing such a scheme was equally blind. And if Sakata was on the grounds, for who knew what purpose...Hijikata reached for his radio. "Yamazaki, come in."

The radio popped with static; then the Shinsengumi spy answered, "Hijikata-san! I was just going to contact you—"

"I need you out here; you're off the Gekkon sentry-watching detail for the moment."

"That's what I needed to call you about—the Imperial Sentries, they're gone. All four of them, though the ambassador's still here. I don't know how they got past me, I didn't see them leave, but I just checked on their quarters, and they're empty. It couldn't have been long since they left, but—"

"Damn it," Hijikata said.

"Hmm, I wonder," Okita said. "Do you think the danna accepts political assassination jobs? I've never thought to ask, but they do say they'll do anything..."

"Damn it!" Hijikata said again. He turned to the tenth squad in charge of the gate, ordered, "Close it up for the afternoon, now, and don't let anyone else in or out," then pointed at Okita. "Sougo, get together your squad and get to the ambassador's chambers. Guard that lizard lord like he was Kondou-san. I'm going to find Kondou-san, let him know what's going on." If anything was. Better safe than sorry, but this was probably nothing. The sentries had probably gone out shopping or sightseeing or something.

There had been something off about the Yorozuya brats, though. And not only that their silver-haired slacker of a boss hadn't been with them. They'd both been wound up, anxious.

Okita must have noticed it, too; his, "Whatever you say, Hijikata-san," was slightly less sarcastic than usual as he jogged off to the manor housing the Gekkon ambassador.

Probably nothing. There was a rainstorm coming, Hijikata had been smelling it all morning. People always got weird before a storm.

But he doubled his pace as he headed for the guard barracks where the Shinsengumi troops were temporarily quartered, scanning the rooftops as he went for a flash of silver hair against the cloudy sky.

"If Hijikata-san was telling the truth, then Gin-san couldn't have seen the Gekkon sentries," Shinpachi told Kagura as they walked down the market street. They were heading in the general direction of the Yorozuya apartment, but that wasn't actually their destination; it wasn't where he intended to go, anyway.

"Those Shinsengumi jerks could've been lying," Kagura replied.

"Yes, but you think they were? It didn't sound like it, to me," Shinpachi said. But if the sentries hadn't been what Gintoki had seen...what had he seen? Or had he been imagining it? A dream? A hallucination?

Shinpachi shook his head. None of his business. This had nothing to do with him; Gintoki had said so. If Gintoki was in some kind of trouble...it didn't matter; he didn't want their help, and there probably wasn't anything they could do anyway, and Shinpachi really had to figure out how to stop thinking about this.

"Shinpachi," Kagura said, more softly than she ever spoke, scarcely audible over the clashing music and sales pitches of the market. She hardly sounded like herself at all and Shinpachi almost didn't want to listen to her; as annoyingly loud as Kagura could get, this quiet was a thousand times worse. "If Gin-chan was seeing things," Kagura said, "if there's something wrong with him, and it's not something someone's doing to him, if it's not the lizard-guys or anyone else, but Gin-chan..."

If it even was Gintoki, Shinpachi thought. Gintoki looking him directly in the eye and being so cruel—it was Gintoki, but it wasn't. Could he blame Gintoki, if it wasn't really him? "It'll be okay, Kagura-chan," Shinpachi found himself saying, before he could decide. "Gin-san's gotten...confused, before—remember when he hit his head and got amnesia, he came back to us, right?"

"Right," Kagura said, wiping her sleeve across her eyes with a defiant grin. "Right! Whatever happened to Gin-chan, even if it's not anything anyone did, we can figure it out."

"Maybe..." With the amnesia it had taken time, and them standing by him. But it wasn't amnesia now; Gintoki still knew them. He still had his memories; it was other things that were different. Gintoki himself who was different.

Though they'd seen that before, hadn't they, someone becoming someone else. "So what did happen to him?" Shinpachi said. "The way Gin-san's changed, it's almost like Hijikata-san was with Tosshii. Except that Gin-san doesn't have a cursed sword; I don't think he's even held a real sword for months, except for that useless flambard with the diamond, of course, but we threw that out..."

Shinpachi realized then that Kagura was no longer walking beside him. He stopped, looked back behind him.

Kagura was standing stock-still in the middle of the street, like a tank dropped in a river with a whitewater of pedestrian shoppers churning on either side around her, looking even paler than her Yato complexion could account for.

"Kagura-chan?" Shinpachi said.

Kagura gulped. "That sword was just a replica, wasn't it? It couldn't have been cursed."

"Yes, but that doesn't matter, since we threw it out, right? It wasn't worth anything, and it was illegal for us to have it—you put it out with the non-burnable trash, the day after we got it appraised." Shinpachi paused. Kagura didn't say anything, her head down, studying the toes of her black slippers. "Didn't you?"

"I was going to," Kagura mumbled. "Except it was Sadaharu's sword, really; the lady gave it to him. And he loves it! So..."

"So we still have the sword?" Shinpachi said slowly.

"It can't be a cursed sword," Kagura said. "And if it is, why'd it curse Gin-chan? He hasn't been using it; he doesn't even know it's there! And Sadaharu's been using it every night and he's just like always, there's nothing wrong with him."

"...Sadaharu can use a sword?"

"Well, he chews on the scabbard."

"Then why didn't you just keep the scabbard for him and throw out the sword!?"

"Huh, I never thought of that..."

"We got that sword the day the Gekkon sentries first attacked us," Shinpachi said. "And Gin-san only got strange after we'd had it a while."

"Shinpachi..." Kagura was still staring down at her feet. "If it is the sword, if that's what's been hurting Gin-chan...I'm the one who kept it, it's my—"

"It's not your fault, Kagura-chan," Shinpachi said, putting his hands on her shoulders and giving her a little shake. "You didn't know. And it might not be that anyway. But we should check it out—come on, we're almost to the apartment."

"...Thought you said you weren't coming over today," Kagura said, looking up at him through her red bangs.

"Well..." Shinpachi glanced up at the sky. "It looks like it's going to rain soon, and I didn't bring my umbrella."

"You can borrow mine," Kagura said, smiling.

Upon reaching the apartment, Kagura made a rush for the main room, yelling, "Sadaharu! Where are you, Sadaharu?"

Sadaharu yipped from the futon closet. Kagura pushed aside the door and grabbed the scabbard between the dog's teeth. Sadaharu growled playfully and tugged back, but even his mass was no match for a determined Yato, and he was smart enough to let go before he broke a tooth. With a disappointed whine he tucked his tail against his haunches and lowered his head to his paws, as Kagura presented Shinpachi with the prize.

The scabbard was well-gnawed, leather perforated with ragged holes from outsized canine teeth, but it was still holding together. Kagura had at least thought to secure the sword into it before giving Sadaharu his chew-toy; Shinpachi wrestled with unsticking the duct tape wrapped around the hilt for a minute, then gave up and fetched a pair of scissors.

Out of the scabbard, the flambard was intact, its weird rippling blade gleaming sharply. The enormous diamond inset in the steel seemed to glow, cloudy light from the window shimmering off its facets as Shinpachi turned the sword, grasping the hilt with both hands. He didn't notice anything unusual, holding it; it was just a sword, heavier than a katana and double-edged, but nothing preternatural about it.

"So," Kagura said, in a whisper louder than some people's shouts, "do you feel cursed?"

"No," Shinpachi said, leaning closer to study the crystal. "But maybe we should go talk to Tetsuko-san, she might know something—"

Sadaharu suddenly snarled, hackles rising.

"It's okay, Sadaharu, we'll give you back your sword soon," Kagura soothed. "Or here, have the scabbard."

Sadaharu snarled again, shaking his head out from under Kagura's patting hand as he rose into a crouch. "Sadaharu—"

"Kagura-chan," Shinpachi said urgently.

He hadn't heard anyone coming up the outside stairs, and no one had rang the doorbell. But there were figures standing in the office doorway—four of them, with scaly skin and long lashing tails.

Shinpachi's hands tightened around the sword, hefting its unfamiliar weight. The light shone on the scalloped blade, and all four pairs of bulging yellow eyes locked onto it. Then, moving with a swift and perfect coordination that any synchronized swimming team would envy, the four Gekkon sentries drew their beamknives. The diamond's facets caught the green glow of the daggers, reflected and multiplied the light to a dazzling emerald prism.

"Shinpachi," Kagura said, sidling in front of him, crouched in a fighting stance with her umbrella at ready, "why didn't you tell me we had clients scheduled?"

Shinpachi smiled back tightly. "Sorry, Kagura-chan, it must have slipped my mind."

"You have stolen the greatest treasure of the Gekkon empire," the tallest of the lizard-men hissed, a rasp like sandpaper on concrete. "We will reclaim it from you, and you will pay for the transgression," and then, with no signal nor any further warning, the four sentries struck.

Chapter Text

Rain was coming, Gintoki thought, tipping back his head to watch the clouds gathering in the eastern sky. He found himself looking forward to it. Later in the rainy season the constant muggy, muddy drizzle was wearing, but the first rains were refreshing; the city always smelled clean afterwards, renewed. He wasn't a little kid, to go splashing in puddles, but it was nice.

By the dampness of the air he had a couple hours yet to buy an umbrella. Or else...Gintoki paused at the next street corner, considering. He was only a few blocks from the apartment. Kagura might not even be there. And Shinpachi almost certainly would not be, not for another day or two at least.

He would be back eventually. Shinpachi was reliable that way. And most other ways as well. Like Katsura was reliable, even if Shinpachi wouldn't appreciate the comparison; Shinpachi hadn't known Katsura when he was younger and...not less insane, but he'd had different obsessions.

Katsura before, Shinpachi now—Gintoki had never quite understood it. Something to do with how nature abhorred a vacuum, maybe, that his own unreliability somehow drew reliable people to him.

Kagura, now, was more like Gintoki himself. Except that she was still so young, and unsure of herself, and she relied on him, even if he was the worst person she could've picked for that in all of Edo and possibly the planet. If she had a mother, or anything like an ordinary father, they might have taught her to stay far away from disreputable older men.

Not that Kagura would have listened to her hypothetical honorable parents anyway, of course. No teenage girl did, that Gintoki had ever heard of, and then Kagura was Kagura. Unique, among teenage girls or Yato clansmen or people in general.

This morning—she hadn't been unique this morning. Just another Amanto.

His gut clenched, but it wasn't the same churning upset as then; like remembering a nightmare, when you could recall how frightening it had been but couldn't feel the fear, couldn't quite understand why you'd been so scared. He'd been dreaming this morning, or almost; he'd still been half-asleep. But he was awake now, finally.

Gintoki had left Katsura at the bakery intending to—well, he hadn't entirely figured it out, but he'd been ready for a fight and thinking he might pick one, if no one tried to hit him first. Harried by a nebulous, aching restlessness, as he hadn't felt for years. He'd wandered through the bar district, but by then it was too late to run into all-night drunks and too early for losing gamblers, and though he made sure his wallet was a visible bulge under his yukata, no one tried to jump him for it. Everyone in Kabuki-cho knew that it wasn't worth the challenge, and was probably empty anyway.

And he'd still had the taste of the chocolate cake on his tongue, whetting his appetite for something other than a confrontation. So he'd stopped for donburi and a parfait for dessert, and then there was a stand still selling sakura soft-serve a month out of season, so naturally he'd had to buy a cone. And by the time he finished it Gintoki realized that he was feeling like himself—realized how long it had been since he had felt like himself. Like when you've eaten too much but don't realize how tight your belt has gotten until you unbuckle it; he could breathe fully again, and he hadn't realized until that moment that he hadn't been. As if there'd been a buzzing in his ears and he'd only noticed when it finally went away.

All the same, the prospect of going to the apartment, of having Kagura look him in the eye and demand to know just what the hell he'd said to Shinpachi, like she had last night; or trying to explain this morning to her, if she asked...maybe she wouldn't ask, but maybe she would, and what was he supposed to tell her?

Why didn't they make greeting cards or something for this? 'You are cordially invited to Sakata Gintoki's mental breakdown, RSVP ASAP.' He should have asked Katsura about it—if there were any such thing, Katsura would know where to buy them. Hell, he might write them. Zura's calligraphy always had been splendid.

Regardless, it was going to rain soon, and the fifty-eight yen left in his wallet couldn't buy the cheapest vinyl umbrella. He'd hardly have to go into the apartment; there should be an umbrella by the door, if one of their clients hadn't borrowed it. If Kagura were napping or playing with Sadaharu, she might not even hear him come in.

Resolved, Gintoki took the next left, onto his street. It was early enough in the afternoon that Otose's was still closed; he didn't see any movement behind the bar's door, either, so Tama was either in standby or out running errands. He tiptoed up the stairs, put his ear to the door but heard nothing. So he turned the key in the lock with care, cracked the door with an automatic, muttered, "Tadaima," as he reached inside for the umbrella.

Only for the greeting to stick in his throat.

The scent of blood was distinctive, the nauseating coppery tang it left in the back of the throat; nothing else in the universe could be mistaken for it. And human blood was distinctive again; a butcher's shop or a slaughterhouse could not prepare anyone for the stench of a battlefield. The blood of most Amanto, for all their alien natures, smelled more like a human's than an animal's; it was one of the bizarre truths of war.

Gintoki's first memory was of that unmistakable smell; and for an instant now, in his mind's eye, he was back there on that desolate battlefield, hidden among the safety of corpses that few people would willingly approach.

He shook his head and the memory was gone, but when he swallowed he could still taste iron in the air. "Hey," he said, and then, louder, "Hey!" when no one answered. He slammed the door aside hard enough to dent its frame, but there was no response inside.

The hall was empty, but both pairs of Kagura's slippers were in the entryway, along with sandals that looked like Shinpachi's—he might have left a pair at the apartment for emergencies; Gintoki couldn't remember.

He had been hoping to miss them anyway, but now he raised his voice, called, "Kagura! Oi, Shinpachi! Are you here?"

The silence which answered was strangely deafening. It rang in his ears, made him dizzy, and the blood scent made his stomach turn; he'd had worse hangovers, but not many.

He wanted to leave, go outside and breathe the clean coming-rain air. Except that he'd already come forward down the hall, already had one hand on his bokutou and the other on the door to the main room, sliding it open, and it was too late to stop, even though he wanted to. Even though he already knew, in the pit of his stomach and the base of his spine, in the darkness behind his eyelids where four A.M. insomnia keeps its most potent nightmares, what he was going to see.

If Kagura's eyes hadn't been half-open, she would have looked peaceful, her face slack and tranquil, lips parted and head tilted at an angle that seemed almost curious, as if she were wondering about the gash that had opened her throat. The red of her dress would have matched the red of her blood at first, though now it was drying brown and tacky on the silk.

Shinpachi was lying on his side before her, and his staring eyes were as empty, but not at peace; his teeth were clenched, and one hand was stretched out before him, reaching desperately. His other hand was tucked against his stomach, but that hadn't been enough to staunch the blood; it had pooled under him, staining his white uwagi and seeping between the cracks in the floorboards.

At his fingertips, just out of reach, lay the sword—the rippled blade inset with the massive artificial diamond; Gintoki had thought they'd gotten rid of the worthless flambard weeks ago, but here it was. Shinpachi would have gone for it when they were attacked, wanting a real blade. He'd used it, too—trapped under the sword was the hilt of a dagger, chopped nearly in half and trailing circuitry; broken, but Gintoki didn't need to see it operational to recognize the Gekkon beamknife. It was spattered with a viscous liquid, thicker and purpler than human blood, and traces clung to the sword blade as well—the sword had cut more than the dagger.

For all its quiet, the room told its story loud and clear. The overturned couch, knocked aside by a kick hard enough to dent the wooden frame; the splintered tabletop, where a body had fallen hard on top of it, or been thrown into it, more like. And the blood spray and splatter, red drying brown and purple drying darker, diagramming the course of the battle on the floors and walls.

Pricks on Kagura's arms and neck—bite-marks, three sets. She hadn't gone down easily; she'd have realized the stakes, and wouldn't have soon surrendered to any stupid lizard's stupid venom. And when she had finally fallen, Shinpachi would have stepped forward, with the sword—knowing what he faced, knowing what his chances were; but Shinpachi was reliable, wasn't he, and he wouldn't have hesitated.

Kagura's blood flecked Shinpachi's sleeve, but only on the back, where the drops would have landed if he'd already been lying on the floor—they hadn't had a chance to kill Kagura until after Shinpachi was down. And her eyes had been open; paralyzed but still conscious, if their bites worked like they had before, if more venom hadn't been more merciful. Her head was tilted toward Shinpachi; she would have seen him lying there, the last thing she saw before she lost more blood than even a Yato could survive losing.

Gintoki took a step into the room, and another, and then something crunched under his boot, a tiny pathetic snap. He lifted his foot, knelt down to pick up the pair of glasses—ruined now, one lens cracked down the center, and they were expensive to replace, he'd been told so enough times. "I'm sorry, Shinpachi-kun," Gintoki said, tracing his finger over the white line of the crack. His voice was steady, he thought, though it was hard to hear over the absolute silence ringing in his ears. "Though really you shouldn't have been so careless, leaving these on the floor where anyone could step on them. It could have been Kagura as easily as me, you know. Since you never watch where you're going, do you, Kagura-chan? But still, I'm sorry..."

Chapter Text

Somewhere in the back of Gintoki's mind a little voice was telling him to get up. It almost might have been Shinpachi, shouting from the other room that he had overslept; in a few minutes he would come in and open the curtains and let the piercing sunlight sear Gintoki into hung-over awareness.

Or it might have been Kagura, whining that she was hungry and it was Gin-chan's turn to make breakfast and if he didn't get to it soon she was going to eat his last pudding cup instead.

Only it couldn't be either of them, and he hadn't overslept; but still there was that little faraway voice, telling him all the things he ought to do now. How he ought to take off his boots, if he were going to be walking on the floor. How he ought to scoot back so he wasn't kneeling in blood, which stains were always so difficult to get out of white cotton.

The phone had been knocked off the desk. He ought to pick it up. Call the police. Call Otose. Call Otae.

Get a mop. Get a towel. Get a sheet to lay over them.

Go over and close their staring eyes.

Stand up.

He didn't want to do any of it. Too much effort, when he could just stay kneeling here and all he had to do was remember how to breathe.

The blood under his knees was cooling—maybe an hour, maybe less. If he'd walked faster, if he'd decided to drop by sooner, if the rainstorm had been more threatening, if that stand hadn't been selling sakura soft-serve.

Shinpachi shouldn't have even come by today. Not until tomorrow, at least. It must have been Kagura who convinced him to come. Why hadn't she just stayed over at the dojo? Her stomach could manage even Otae's lunches.

I'm sorry, Gin-chan.

"No," Gintoki said, shaking his head. He kept looking straight ahead, out the window, rather than risk glancing down and catching sight of her slack, empty face. "No, it wasn't your—"

I tried—I tried so hard, Gin-chan, but you weren't here—

I'm sorry, Gin-san, I tried my best, but you weren't—

"No," Gintoki said again. His breath rasped in his ears, grating, like his lungs were full of sand. Outside the rainclouds were gathering, flattening the sky to featureless gray. "I should have been—I should have—"

No, Gin-chan, don't—

It wasn't your fault, Gin-san—

"If there was anything I could have—"

"There's still something you can do, Gin-chan."

"We can't do anything, Gin-san, not anymore, but you still can."

Their voices were faint and far away, but becoming clearer, the words more distinct. "I tried, Gin-chan, I tried to fight them, but I wasn't ready, not in time, I couldn't kick their damn tails, not before—"

"I tried, Gin-san, I tried to protect her, but I couldn't do it, I wasn't strong enough to stop them, not in time, not before—"

"But it's not too late for you, Gin-chan, it's not too late for you to beat them into the ground, for me—"

"It's not too late for you, Gin-san, it's not too late for you to stop them, for me—"

"Is that what you want?" For a moment his gaze fell—blank blue eyes, blank brown eyes, staring past him with neither accusation nor understanding nor anything else. He couldn't look at them; he looked down instead, at the sword on the floor beside his knees, the glinting diamond in its blade brighter than their glassy eyes. "Vengeance...is that what this would be? Is that really what you want?"

"I don't want vengeance, Gin-chan, I don't want any dumb noble thing like that—I just want those asshole lizards defeated; I want them to lose, completely and totally and for always!"

"I don't know if I want revenge—but wouldn't it mean something, if they were stopped? If they were stopped once and for all, if the one who sent them was stopped, so they'd never do this again, to anyone else's family—that's what I want, Gin-san."

"All right." Gintoki reached out, wrapped his hand around the hilt of the sword and climbed to his feet. The sword was heavier than he was used to, but weighted decently for its straight blade. When he tested one of its rippled razor curves on his little finger, it cut the flesh with barely a brush of pressure, drawing blood long before pain, as the sharpest blades do.

It felt as if he were moving slowly, as if the air were as thick as water; but he knew it was an illusion, the way everything slows in combat, an hour stretching between each beat of his heart. He knew as well they couldn't hear him, and yet he knew that they were listening. "All right," Gintoki said. "Then I'll give you that. I'll do that for you."

"And you're sure there's no one on the premises who shouldn't be," Hijikata said.

"No, sir, no one," Yamazaki assured him. "We've checked every building, underneath, on the rooftops, in the eaves—we haven't looked into every closet, but that's because Commander Kondou told us that no one could get into some of them—"

Kondou nodded assuredly. "Some spaces just can't fit a human body, even a body molded and pressured by the unrelenting power of love."

"—and I figured he would know," Yamazaki said. "So it looks like the Gekkon ambassador's safe. Though we still don't know where the Imperial Sentries went, and they haven't come back yet, either."

"I could ask the ambassador," Kondou suggested. "He's the only one who can command them, so he should know."

"Yes, but then he might realize that we've been watching them," Hijikata said. "And they might already be suspicious—we don't want them to think our security could be compromised, or make them doubt our ability to protect them."

"Why would they doubt it?" Kondou asked. "We are protecting them—no one's gotten in here past us."

"But they could have," Hijikata said. "If anyone could get by us, it'd be that silver-haired bastard. And this is a target like no other—if we piss off the Gekkon Empire by letting their ambassador get killed, it won't just be our heads on the block..."

Kondou frowned with the blithe confusion of a man with zero grasp of intergalactic politics, then shook his head. "Do you really think the Yorozuya would take on a job like that?"

"We know he associates with the Jouishishi—"

"We've never gotten any proof. Just because Katsura's been seen near the Yorozuya's place a couple of times...."

"On his street, in his office, out to dinner with him, at a driving exam—"

"And honestly, Toushi, even if Katsura is a friend of his, do you believe Sakata would take a job as dishonorable as assassination?"

"As if that guy even knows what honor is," Hijikata growled.

Kondou folded his arms and did the waiting thing he'd been doing lately—something to do with Otae telling him he sounded wisest and most impressive when he wasn't speaking; the irony was that she was totally right. Especially when he combined it with an expectant, meaningful eyebrow-raise.

Hijikata sighed. "All right, no, he wouldn't." Sakata Gintoki was a lot of things, most of them contemptible and all of them irritating, but cold-blooded murder wasn't his style. He didn't follow any recognizable bushido code, but he had his rules. And the kids who tagged along after him, neither would have the stomach for that kind of work.

But they'd been up to something, all the same. "Whatever, something's still going on. I don't like it."

"But really, Hijikata-san, is there anything you do like?" Okita inquired from uncomfortably close behind him.

Hijikata spun around, snapped, "What are you doing here? You're supposed to be guarding the ambassador."

"Saitou's squad is handling that," Okita said. "Though nothing's going on there to be handled anyway. The ambassador wouldn't even let us into his quarters to share his lunch."

"He's an imperial ambassador; he's not expected to share his lunch—!"

"And he didn't like the collars I offered him, either, though I even gave him a choice of colors..."

"—Very well, Sougo," Kondou said hastily. "We can use you and your men to watch the grounds, right, Toushi?"

Kondou would spoil Okita, and usually Hijikata would protest it; but if something was going to go down, it was better to have Okita in plain sight, rather than off who knows where doing who knows what. And something was going down; Hijikata could feel it. Something was coming, more than the rain. "Fine," Hijikata said shortly, and didn't miss the curious look Okita gave him, that he'd acquiesced so easily.

It had been a long time since Gintoki had walked the streets of Edo with a real sword on his belt. The flambard's scabbard was longer and broader than his bokutou; with every stride it bumped his knee under the yukata, but it was mostly concealed by the cloth's folds, such that he wasn't stopped by any overly attentive cop.

The scabbard had been chewed—it hadn't occurred to him until he picked it up that Sadaharu was nowhere in the apartment, not in the bedroom or hiding in the closet. The inugami must have fled—fled far, Gintoki hoped, far enough that the lizards had spared him, at least. At least a single gram of leniency for a stupid, ridiculous, hopeless pet dog.

Later Gintoki would have to search for him. Canvas the neighborhood, put up flyers. Have you seen this giant walking appetite? Make sure Sadaharu found his way home, or somewhere else that he would be cared for, walked and fed, coddled, loved.

But that was later; so many things Gintoki would have to do later. He didn't have to think about them now. Now there was only one thing he had to do, the one thing he was sure he could do, the one thing that he knew his strength would not falter before it was accomplished. One purpose to walk towards, one step and then the next and then the next.

There were footsteps on either side of him, sandals on the left, slippers on the right, soles slapping on the cobblestone in tempo with his own strides, echoing every step. It would have made his spine tingle, if he'd had enough left in him to feel fear.

"Why are you still here?" he asked at last.

"Aren't you used to this, Gin-san? Aren't you used to the dead talking to you? Aren't the dead walking step-by-step beside you every day, everyone you've left behind, everyone you failed?"

"Maybe," Gintoki said, "but their footsteps aren't this loud. And whoever heard of ghosts with feet anyway, huh?"

"Maybe you need us this loud, Gin-chan. Maybe you need to hear us."

There were people looking at him, when Gintoki raised his head from the street, men and women staring at him, not one of them glancing at the figure to his left or the figure to his right. Some of them assumed he was drunk; he was familiar with those disapproving glares. But some of them knew he was crazy; they backed further away, gave him space to keep walking, keep talking to himself. "Maybe you should go bother someone else. Go haunt your sister. Go haunt your father."

"But won't it be lonely without us, Gin-chan? Won't you be lonely?"

"Yes," Gintoki said, "so lonely it'll be like dying, but no one ever dies just of loneliness, except in shoujo manga. And this is shounen, you know, shounen."

"But we want to stay with you, Gin-san."

"Do you really want us to go, Gin-chan?"

"No," Gintoki said. "No, never."

When he raised his head he saw the gates at the other end of the street, the heavy wooden doors of the auxiliary palace, closed and barred, walling the Amanto off from the world they had invaded. Six uniformed Shinsengumi stood before it, the government's loyal dogs. They wouldn't open those gates, not for him; not for a samurai too weak even to protect what he'd said he would.

That was all right; he'd brought his own key. Pushing aside his yukata, Gintoki drew the flambard and walked toward the gate, one step at a time, and two pairs of unheard footsteps keeping pace beside him.

Hijikata was on his eighth attempt in the last few weeks to explain to Kondou how influential the Gekkon were in the greater Amanto hierarchy, and why their royal ambassador was such a prime target for the expulsionists. At Yamazaki's suggestion, he was having some success comparing Amanto member races to the national baseball league teams, and was winding up to casting the Gekkon as the Yomiuri Giants of their intergalactic league, when his radio crackled. "Um, Vice-Commander, this is Harada at the front gate. We have a... sort of...situation?"

Hijikata was striding out of the guard barracks by the second syllable and was out on the white gravel promenade by the time Harada was done speaking. "Yes, what is it?" he demanded, as Kondou and Okita caught up behind him.

"There's a man here who seems to want to come in. He's...it might be the boss from the Yorozuya?"

"Curly silver hair? Eyes like a dead mackerel's? The guy's pretty unmistakable."

"Yeah, it looks like him—mostly—except I thought—he doesn't use a sword, does he?"

"He's got a bokutou," Hijikata said. "One of those infomercial deals." Barely this side of legal—probably that side, really, given how Gintoki used his, but every legal system needs some flexibility; they couldn't very well arrest half the city. Even if it would make their jobs easier.

"That's what I thought," Harada said. "Whatever he's wielding now sure the hell isn't wooden, though—"

"Wait—Sakata's got a real sword?" Hijikata's fingers clenched around the radio as he started sprinting for the gate. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Kondou and Okita staring after him in confusion, but there was no time to explain. "Do not engage!" he shouted into the radio. "Do you hear me? Don't let him pass if he asks for permission, but if he challenges you, don't—"

The radio only sputtered static, but Hijikata was close enough now to be able to hear the ringing of clashing swords through the closed wooden gates. The Shinsengumi standing guard on the inside of the wall looked to their vice-commander; Hijikata only shook his head and shoved through them.

Harada was a decent swordsman and strong as an ox, but he was nowhere near Hijikata's or Okita's level, and the men below the rank of captain would be entirely outclassed. Hijikata headed for the stairs to climb up to the watchtower, only to be stopped by a crash loud enough that most of the troops looked up at the sky, expecting lightning.

The second thud jarred the gate; with the third Hijikata saw the massive beam barring the doors bow, as the wooden planks of the gate shuddered and splintered. "Out of the way!" he ordered, gesturing, as he took position in the center of the promenade before the gate. The other Shinsengumi scrambled back, just as an arc of silver stabbed through the breaking gate and sliced through the heavy timber beam like it was a chunk of firm tofu.

The two pieces of the beam dropped to the ground separately with matching thuds; then the doors gave way under a final kick and Sakata Gintoki strode inside, long steel blade in one hand as he rubbed at his shoulder under his yukata with the other.

Hijikata already had drawn his own katana. Still, he paused for a moment to take in Gintoki's weapon, with its bizarre undulating edges and the absurd jewelry stuck on the blade. "Didn't you throw that thing out? What the hell is it? An extra-large cellphone accessory? Did it come in a box of snacks?"

Gintoki, atypically, didn't rise to the occasion; in fact he didn't even look at Hijikata, simply kept walking forward like he hadn't yet noticed anyone was in his path, the ridiculous sword in his hand at his side.

Hijikata glanced past him, through the remnants of the gate. Harada was on the ground but sitting up, and the other five men were gathering around him, so Sakata hadn't done any major damage, at least. "All right," Hijikata said, lowering his katana slightly as Gintoki approached. "What's this about? What do you want?—Oi, look at me, you bastard—"

Hijikata brought up his sword, but Gintoki was faster. He didn't attack with his own blade; instead he parried, sidestepped and ducked under Hijikata's katana to grab the folds of his uniform's cravat in his fist. Then he heaved the Shinsengumi vice-commander over his shoulder. The entire maneuver was effected with such swift certainty that Hijikata didn't work out exactly what had happened until he was already flying through the air, the white swathe of the gravel walkway spreading out before his eyes.

Something in Sakata's eyes, Hijikata thought—something there that shouldn't be; or something missing that should be there... Then he slammed into that stony swathe headfirst, and the pure white of the stones was shuttered by painful, unyielding black.

"Toushi?" Kondou hollered, two parts worried to one part baffled, as Hijikata went head over heels into the gravel path, touching down with a respectable thump. Gintoki's throw had been both neatly calculated and viciously executed; Okita rather admired it. Hijikata's nearly insensible groan into the gravel was a tasty bonus.

Still, the Shinsengumi couldn't go being shown up by any samurai with a good arm. And Kondou was looking perturbed; he didn't like his men being tossed around. Okita indicated for his commander to stay back with a polite nod, and stepped up to face Gintoki, drawing his katana. "Yo, Danna."

Gintoki didn't so much look at him as in his general direction, but that was par for the course for him, and Okita was used to people avoiding meeting his eyes anyway. "I know how much fun Hijikata-san is to play with," he said, "but you can't come in here. We're supposed to be guarding this place, you see."

"Out of my way," Gintoki said, and he made a grab, but after Hijikata's skyride Okita was ready for it and weaved out of the way, then feinted with his sword, a teasing thrust.

Gintoki countered with his own sword; the rippled edge caught against the curved blade of Okita's katana and sent it skipping up, jarring his wrist. "Oh," Okita said, raising his eyebrows as he adjusted his grip to compensate. "That's a nice toothpick after all, Danna."

In answer Gintoki brought his sword around, dropping his right hand to grasp the hilt with both. It was a two-handed weapon, to judge by its size; longer than a standard katana and probably a fair bit heavier, too, but Gintoki swung it as easily as if it were his usual wooden sword.

Okita smiled slightly. He didn't have any idea why they were going to have this fight, but it would be an interesting exercise. Kondou was bound to break it up eventually, but he'd be busy fussing over Hijikata first, and until then—"You're almost as fun to play with as Hijikata-san, Danna; do you mind substituting for him?"

Gintoki was more challenging to provoke than Hijikata, but Okita expected some kind of reaction—denial of the comparison, or else a derisive judgment of his sadistic tendencies. He got nothing, though; Gintoki's expression didn't change, and his next lunge was no more rash, devilishly fast but deliberate. Okita dodged rather than parried, sweeping his katana up under the heavier sword to go for Gintoki's arm—just a scratch; first blood would be satisfying, better than Hijikata had gotten off the Yorozuya, in their only real duel.

But Gintoki realized the attack in time, and brought back his sword to hook Okita's blade on the wide crosspiece, twisting down at an angle that almost wrenched Okita's katana from his hands. The Shinsengumi's boots skidded on the gravel as he struggled to maintain his grip—the hilt of Gintoki's sword was long enough for substantial leverage, and the man was brutally strong besides. That, Okita had already known, and Gintoki's astonishing speed too was expected.

And yet this fight was not, somehow. Okita wasn't sure what the difference was. It wasn't that he'd anticipated facing Gintoki to be anything like facing Hijikata. True, their swordplay had similar original elements, relying on raw ability more than any educated technique. But Hijikata had beaten those skills into his body over years of hard practice, and Okita had practiced with him for much of them; he knew Hijikata's habits, and half a dozen counters for each.

Gintoki, on the other hand, was unpredictable, and not only because Okita had never trained with the man, nor because he was unused to facing a European-style sword, nor because Gintoki's lightning-fast feints were as hard to read as his heavy-lidded eyes. There was no real pattern to his movements, as if he had never bothered to develop a true style, not even his own; like every attack was on a whim, invented on the spot.

But that was expected, Okita thought. He lunged forward, only to find Gintoki was not there at all—that he'd gone up instead, launching himself airborne to bring his sword slamming down like a sledgehammer. The leap should have left him wide open, but it was so absurdly unlikely that Okita only just got his katana up in time to block.

This was all expected, from what Okita knew of Sakata Gintoki and his unfocused, unmotivated, unintentional ways; and yet this was not the fight Okita had imagined. Barely minutes in, he was panting for breath like he'd been working out for an hour; it wasn't just the exertion but the frustration. Gintoki's usual indolent indifference might make him hard to read, but he was still a human being, predictable like all human beings: pain and pleasure, action and reaction, give and take.

So what was changed, to make this feel so wrong, to make this a fight Okita couldn't even enjoy?

Piqued, the Shinsengumi captain sidestepped and feinted, high and low and then he went for his triple thrust—three attacks with one strike; Okita had never met another swordsman who could quite imitate it, nor one who could block all three hits. Though he pulled the thrust to the neck slightly, as he would in a practice duel, and Gintoki somehow realized it; he parried the two stabs to his shoulder and took the hit to his neck, a graze so shallow it scarcely drew blood.

Overextended from the strike, Okita hastily shifted his weight to his back foot to compensate. He was a little too slow; Gintoki took advantage of his imbalance to slip his hand past his sword and grab his wrist, trying to throw him, but a single-handed grip was easy to break, and Okita used the leverage as a pivot point to regain his footing. Still, the blunder was embarrassing, and Okita grimaced. Kondou had warned him before that the follow-through on his triple thrust was less than stellar, but since he rarely had to deal with an adversary afterwards, it usually didn't matter. With multiple opponents it was a different game, but against one man all you had to do was keep your eye on his sword—

The sword; where the hell was his sword? Gintoki had grabbed him with his left hand, but hadn't he been wielding two-handed? So where was the—

"Sougo, left side!" someone shouted behind them—poor etiquette, Kondou-san, Okita thought, to interfere with a man's fight—but he automatically flung up his katana, and just barely blocked the incoming blow, a strike hard enough to jar his shoulders in their sockets and chip his sword's blade.

Better that than his arm taken off, though, as it would have been otherwise. Then Okita's mind caught up with his reflexes, and he realized that the shout hadn't been Kondou's voice. But no, Hijikata wouldn't have—why would he—

But then, why would Gintoki strike to maim him, when this was only a duel, not a battle to the death—

"Yorozuya!" That, now, was Kondou at last. "What the hell are you doing?" the commander demanded, stomping forward to plant himself on the promenade before them.

Gintoki paused, the first moment of hesitation Okita had seen in him since he'd busted down the gate.

"I should think it's obvious, Kondou-san," Okita said agreeably, though he kept his katana raised—Gintoki might be still, but he hadn't yet lowered his sword. The first raindrops started to fall, pattering on the gravel; Okita felt a splash of cold on his wrist but didn't let himself twitch.

"Out of my way," Gintoki said, low enough to be a growl. His curly silver bangs curtained his eyes. "Both of you."

In the corner of his eye Okita saw Hijikata finally struggle to his feet. His nose was bloody and swelling, but he lurched after Kondou, katana drawn and his eyes narrowed—as if he were angry, but Okita was well-versed in all one hundred and eight variations of Hijikata's ire, and this wasn't any of them. The vice-commander jerked his head at the troops around him—quite a crowd had gathered, Okita noted; even some of the Gekkon soldiers had emerged from their accommodations—and the Shinsengumi jumped to attention, falling into position behind him and their commander.

Gintoki lifted his head to sweep an assessing gaze over their numbers. He wasn't even breathing hard, that Okita could see, and his face wasn't flushed but pale, gray and impassive under the clouded daylight. "All of you," he said quietly. His sword was still at ready. "Get out of my way."

"You ought to double-check the script, Danna," Okita remarked, "you said that line already."

"What's going on?" Kondou asked—not very commandingly, more bewildered. "Are you really here for the ambassador? Is that really why the others came by earlier—oh no, you haven't started training Shinpachi-kun to be an assassin, have you? Even if it pays well, Otae-san would never approve, I can't condone this—!"

"Kondou-san," Hijikata said, not impatiently—cautiously, and he stepped forward as he spoke, to stand between Kondou and Gintoki with his sword raised and ready.

Even though Gintoki hadn't moved, sword not wavering and his eyes were still on Okita—on his katana, gaze locked and steady. He might not have heard Kondou at all.

And yet Hijikata had raised his sword.

There were stains on the Yorozuya's yukata, Okita realized abruptly, more than the smattering of raindrops collecting on the white cloth. Rusty bloodstains, still fresh enough to show some dull red, a match to his eyes.

"Oi," Okita called, turning his head slightly toward the others, though not taking his eyes off Gintoki, "Harada's squad—which of you idiots was too slow and got slashed?"

"None of us, sir," Harada called back. "He didn't cut anyone."

Indeed, there was no red on the rippled blade of Gintoki's sword. Neither was he wounded, except for the scratch on his throat, and that was already closed over.

But there was blood on the trailing edge of his yukata, smeared across the blue swirls, as if he'd knelt in it.

There was something wrong with all of this. Something missing. Just as Kondou had said, the others had been here earlier, without their boss; why wouldn't they be here now, with him?

"Where's the China girl, Danna?" Okita asked. "Where's Four-eyes?"

Gintoki didn't answer and his expressionless expression didn't change, but he whipped the flame-bladed sword around fast enough that Okita had to jump back. He was ready for the next blow, though, and threw all his weight forward to parry with the force to drive the Yorozuya boss back a step, leaning in as he shouted into Gintoki's blank face, "Oi! Where's Shinpachi? Where's Kagura?"

"Ask him," Gintoki growled, so low that Okita wasn't sure he heard right.

"Ask who?"

"Ask the son of a bitch ambassador you're guarding—the son of a bitch I'm going to kill," and Gintoki tilted his sword, so the blade slid against Okita's, gliding down its length until it caught in the chip in the katana's blade. Then he rammed it forward, cracking the steel, snapping Okita's sword in two like a twig, and Okita's eyes widened as he realized he had no way to block the next swing aiming for his head.

Chapter Text

The Gekkon Imperial Sentries were a crafty bunch of lizards; they'd apparently jimmied the lock of the south wall's unused gate for their own private egress. Well, they wouldn't be slipping past the watchful eyes of the Shinsengumi's top inspector again. You could fool Yamazaki Sagaru once—maybe twice, on a bad day—but definitely not three times.

Yamazaki enjoyed exactly one second of pride in his accomplishment, upon which he noticed that all the Shinsengumi members guarding the grounds were suddenly running for the main east gate. By the time he caught up with his comrades, most of the available squads had already gathered on the promenade, and a group of the Gekkon royal legion in their purple uniforms were approaching as well.

As Yamazaki elbowed through the crowd he heard the mutters, but barely credited them—that the Yorozuya boss had tried to kill Vice-Commander Hijikata, or vice versa, was hardly news. One simply had to adjust for rumor and replace 'tried to kill' with 'challenged to a drinking contest' or 'challenged to a sauna endurance contest' or 'got handcuffed together' (though that last one Yamazaki was honestly surprised anyone had survived, when you got down to it.)

Given such past performance, Yamazaki was ready for just about anything. Anything but what he actually saw—anything but Sakata Gintoki slashing at Captain Okita with a steel sword, and Yamazaki might prefer to swing a badminton racket more than a blade, but he knew enough swordplay to recognize a blow meant in deadly earnest.

But that didn't make any sense; Gintoki didn't even wield a real sword, and wasn't much for dueling with his wooden one anyway. Besides, Okita liked Gintoki, as much as he liked anyone who wasn't Kondou Isao; and it was hard to be sure but Yamazaki had always had the impression that the Yorozuya danna didn't mind Okita. And it wasn't terribly likely that Okita would have stolen Gintoki's girlfriend, or that Gintoki would have a girlfriend to begin with, but otherwise...

Hijikata was with Kondou; Yamazaki headed over to his commanders, searching the crowd as he did for red hair or the shine of glasses. If the danna was here, the other Yorozuya might be, too, and Shinpachi might have a clue on what was going on if Hijikata didn't.

Yamazaki didn't see either of them, though, and when he reached Hijikata the vice-commander was intent on the fight. His nose was bloody and his sword was drawn, and he didn't glance over when Yamazaki asked him, "Hijikata-san, what is this—"

"Where's Shinpachi? Where's Kagura?" Okita shouted, and Yamazaki snapped around; Okita never sounded like that, even in the heat of battle, not unless someone had threatened Kondou.

Yamazaki saw Gintoki's lips move, but not enough to read his inaudible reply; then the Yorozuya shifted his sword against Okita's. With a crack, Okita's katana broke, close enough to the hilt to leave him without the blade to make a dinner knife. A solid defeat, except that Gintoki didn't accept the win; instead he brought his sword around again. Okita leapt back—not surrendering, that wasn't the first captain's style; but with no sword he'd lose, and in such a duel he might lose his head with it—

"Shit," Hijikata snarled, and lunged for the fighters; but his way was blocked by one of the Gekkon legion soldiers—the troop captain, Yamazaki recognized, by the shiny black scales above his eyes and the green stripes on his purple uniform.

The Gekkon screeched a call to attention, and a formation of eight Gekkon soldiers took position beside their captain, moving out of the crowd like they'd materialized. Each had a laser pistol in their clawed hands, raised and trained on Gintoki and Okita before him.

"Wait, you can't—" Kondou started to protest.

"Put those down!" Hijikata snapped, loudly enough that Okita spared him a glance over his shoulder, even in the midst of his desperate defense.

Seeing the legion's threat, Okita somersaulted aside, just as the Gekkon captain squawked a single sharp syllable in his alien tongue. Either 'dirigible' or 'fire', Yamazaki thought—apparently the latter, as the Gekkon soldiers as one triggered their pistols, and eight scarlet bolts hot enough to sear through a foot of concrete lanced toward their target.

With Okita out of the way, Gintoki was wide open—"Danna!" Yamazaki shouted, too late; light was faster than sound, and by the time his warning reached Gintoki's ears he'd already have been hit—

Falling raindrops caught traces of the lasers, spread them into glowing ruby radiance, but not enough dispersal to make a difference—at least it shouldn't be; but when that glow faded, their target was still standing, Gintoki upright and unburned, braced with his sword before him.

There was a trick, Yamazaki had once heard, a trick conceived by the rebelling samurai in the last days of the Expulsion War, that a well-polished sword could deflect a laser bolt, if one realized exactly where it was aimed and angled the blade just so. A magic trick, purely theoretical, not anything any human being could actually do; except that Gintoki had just deflected eight.

There was another advantage, if the trick could be pulled off, that a fired laser pistol needed a minute to recharge before it could fire again—and Gintoki was already in motion, coming in low and too fast for the Gekkon to avoid. Before they'd lowered their pistols, he'd already sheared the barrels off three with one swing of his sword; he'd destroyed the other five by the time the Gekkon captain had wrestled his own unused pistol from its holster.

Yamazaki saw Gintoki deflect the shot this time, saw him bring up the sword just as the captain brought up his pistol, saw the beam caught in the crystal set in the blade, scarlet bolt refracted and scattered into harmless light.

He saw it, but it was still hard to believe that anyone could move like that—much less Sakata Gintoki, who was so lazy he would rather stand in the middle of a block waiting for a gap in traffic to jaywalk, rather than walk twenty feet out of his way to use the crosswalk on the corner.

Gintoki's blade came down, slicing the Gekkon captain's pistol in half. "Stop him!" the alien shrieked—to his own soldiers, presumably; the Shinsengumi had retreated to give them space, wary of getting in the way of anyone who could give Okita a challenge. "Don't let him advance a single step closer to the ambassador!"

Obediently the Gekkon soldiers charged the swordsman, tails lashing crazily, bare-handed—bare-clawed, Yamazaki supposed that should be, and needle-teethed, and their body armor was tough enough to repel blades as well as bullets. And there were eight of them, mass enough to ram Gintoki back a body length along the rain-damp gravel.

Eight alien soldiers against one silver-haired samurai; it was hardly a fair fight. But the Gekkon were only following their captain's orders, after all. Yamazaki almost might have sympathized with them, if he hadn't had other things on his mind.

"Commander?" he demanded. "Hijikata-san? What is this? What's the Danna doing here?"

Hijikata's nose was dripping red and he had a cigarette clamped between his teeth, smoke trailing up between the dashing raindrops. "He's after blood," he said.

"But he got yours already, Hijikata-san," Okita said, limping over to them. His tone was the same dry cool as always, but his uniform was torn across the arms and chest and he was panting shallowly for breath.

"Not my blood," Hijikata said, his sharp gaze falling on the pink tinge to the rain soaking Okita's collar. "And not yours, either. That damn lizard lord's we're babysitting—and the question is, what the hell did the bastard do, that Sakata wants him this badly?"

"We could...ask..." Yamazaki looked out across the promenade, where the lizard soldiers had Gintoki and his sword surrounded—five of them now; three were on the ground. One of them didn't have his tail anymore; it lay on the gravel a yard away, twitching spasmodically and leaking purple ichor the same color as their uniforms.

In the midst of the remaining Gekkon, Gintoki's sword was a silver blur—Gintoki himself was a silver blur, relentless, thrust and feint, weave and stab. A well-performed kata can be as smoothly graceful as a dance; but there was no grace in his attacks, no style or display, only a brutal, driving purpose.

There were few things Yamazaki could imagine that could drive a man as aimless as Sakata Gintoki, and he didn't want to contemplate any of them.

"Yamazaki," Kondou said suddenly.

"Sir?"

"Go to Otae-san," Kondou said. Yamazaki opened his mouth to protest that now wasn't the time for that—but when he looked, there was no hint of infatuation on his commander's face; Kondou was looking out through the rain at Gintoki's battle, his brow lowered and his jaw grimly set. "As Shinpachi-kun's sister, she might know if he...she might know what's going on. Bring her here—tell her that guy's here. She'll come."

"She might not be able to get through to him," Hijikata said.

"But she might," Kondou replied.

If there was anything left of the Yorozuya's boss to get through to, Yamazaki thought.

Hijikata unclenched his teeth around his cigarette. "Hurry!"

"Yes, sir!" Yamazaki said, and took off, circling around the fighters—four Gekkon left standing—and heading out the destroyed gate.

The port on Edo Bay had always been one of the busiest places in the city, for legal and illegal enterprises alike. The coming of the Amanto hadn't changed that, though the ships there now were as likely to be airborne as seafaring, and half the products sold and shipped and smuggled were things that previous generations hadn't dreamed existed.

Katsura visited the docks not infrequently, and had a number of acquaintances there at all levels and in all manners of business, including those of reputes too ill for any respectable samurai to deal with. But such were the sacrifices of his mission. And some of those men, he'd found, had their own sort of respect; some of them even were members of the Jouishishi, putting their country above their own prosperity.

Then there were those places on the docks that Katsura avoided going, and told his people to do the same. He was unsurprised when the trail they had spent the day tracking led into the heart of the darkest of those no-man's-lands.

The rain was just starting to fall in earnest when the last Jouishishi man rejoined the rest of their group assembled at the port, taking shelter under a warehouse's eaves. "It's definitely coming from there, Katsura-san," Tanaka reported. "We traced a signal from that airship—look, you can see the antennae."

Katsura checked the indicated vessel through the binoculars and nodded. "Good work," he said. "That's all for today; you can go home."

When nobody said anything, he put down the binoculars and looked at the group. The men looked back at him. "Yes?" Katsura asked them.

"You're going in there now, aren't you, Katsura-san," Tanaka said, grasping his sword's hilt. "So, we're going with you."

"No, you're not," Katsura said. "You're going home."

"But, Katsura-san—"

Katsura sighed. "I'm sorry," he said. "This isn't rightly Jouishishi business; in all honesty I never should have involved you at all. It's a personal affair—a family matter. It was wrong of me to request the assistance of any of you for it."

"But we'd do it for you anyway, Katsura-san; you only need to ask—"

"I know, and I can't my express my gratitude for that. But all the same, this is as far as I can accept your help; as a samurai I cannot ask more of you. Please, if I truly have your loyalty, respect that and go home."

They grumbled and they dragged their heels and they looked back over their shoulders at him appealingly through the drizzling rain, but they went.

Elizabeth did not. Katsura sighed again. "Elizabeth, you go with them."

Elizabeth didn't bother with a sign, just a pointed look.

"I know you're not like the other Jouishishi," Katsura said, "but that's why you have to go—I'm counting on you, Elizabeth, to make sure the mission continues, should anything happen. A mission without a leader is doomed to failure."

The flap of Elizabeth's flippers had a certain, oh, fine, then, be a martyr quality to it. Katsura smiled fondly as Elizabeth turned and waddled off. "Thank you, my friend."

Elizabeth stopped, webbed feet in a puddle, and without looking back held up a sign. 'See you later.'

"See you later," Katsura said, and Elizabeth nodded and continued on. Katsura waited until the wide white figure was out of sight between the warehouses, then strode out into the rain himself, heading for the docks and the airship berthed there.

Chapter Text

The Gekkon legion soldiers were putting up a decent fight, but they were no match for Sakata. Okita's eyes were fixed on the battle, unblinking, but Hijikata finished his cigarette and looked down long enough to fish out another, cupping his hands around the lighter to block the rain. He didn't need to watch to know how this fight would go. He'd seen enough of the legion training to have a good grasp of their capabilities. Gintoki, on the other hand...well, a few armored lizards weren't enough to stop the son of a bitch. Not now.

Hijikata doubted anything would be enough. Getting the ambassador off-planet, that might do it. For a while.

What the hell had the ambassador and his Imperial Sentries done?

So the Yorozuya turn up claiming that the Gekkon had raided their place a couple of times. Kondou had asked the ambassador about it—Hijikata had instructed him in phrasing the inquiry inoffensively indirectly—but the lizard's lipless mouth had stayed shut tight, ignoring any questions like they didn't apply. And his sentries hadn't tried anything after that, as far as Yamazaki had observed.

But then the Yorozuya kids turn up again today, minus their boss, and worked up over something that had gone unspecified.

Scared, maybe. Hijikata had thought they were being suspicious at the time, sneaky; they'd been edgy the way Okita used to get edgy when he was dreaming up something diabolical, before he got better at hiding it.

But maybe they'd just been scared.

If they'd taken the wrong job, if they'd offended the Gekkon—the royal family's retainers operated on some crazy-ass parody of bushido; Hijikata didn't know the details, but it definitely didn't include any respect for Earth laws or Earth people. Not that any of the Amanto did, but the sentries were the ninja of the Gekkon empire—Green Fang of Death, that was the name the legion soldiers used—and if those fangs had bitten...

In a fair fight Hijikata wouldn't give any of these lizards a chance, no matter how well-trained or armed. Not against a samurai, much less Kagura.

If it hadn't been a fair fight, though?

Damn it, he should have asked the junior Yorozuya what was wrong. It was only a few hours ago that the pair of them had been here, all shifty and nervous and breathing. If Hijikata had just asked them then, maybe Gintoki wouldn't be here now, with blood on his kimono that wasn't his and that crazy flame-bladed sword and that look in his eyes which should have been crazy, if there'd been enough of anything left in there for that.

The battle was down to two remaining Gekkon, lieutenants who'd been hanging back with the privileges of rank and/or cowardice, while the soldiers under them got crushed. Gintoki disposed of one of them with a whack to the head with the pommel of his sword, so smooth and spare a motion that it almost looked casual, though the lizard went down like a sack of bricks.

"Stop him! Now!" cried the legion captain to his last soldier, and the lieutenant screeched like a boiling kettle and charged, tail thrashing and needle-toothed jaws gaping. Hijikata gave him credit for guts, if not brains; he at least could have gone in at a different angle. Gintoki didn't take a step back, simply changed the cant of his blade with that same sure speed to meet the attack.

Luck favors the reckless, though, because another half dozen Gekkon showed up then, pushing through the surrounding Shinsengumi. At their captain's squawked command they encircled the lone swordsman, a different formation from before, aiming their laser pistols at six different angles, too spread out to block from all sides.

It didn't do any good; by the time they pulled the triggers, Gintoki simply wasn't there. Sleight of hand—the samurai is faster than the bulbous lizard eye. Then he came down between the closest Gekkon, knocking them over like bowling pins, a silver lightning strike.

The legion captain continued to watch from a safe distance, head tucked down like an turtle more than a lizard, shielding himself from the rain behind his collar. "Oi," Hijikata called over to the Amanto, taking his cigarette out of his mouth to ask, "so that's your strategy? Keep throwing men at him until you've got none left?"

"Toushi," Kondou said, in what might have been a reprimand if it had been more forceful. But Kondou was looking too shell-shocked for that.

Kondou knew. Hijikata had seen it in Gintoki's eyes, and Okita guessed from the bloodstains; but Kondou, for all that he got the kanji wrong most of the time when he wrote 'Shinsengumi', could on occasion read a man's soul like it was a kindergarten primer, all in hiragana.

Even if it was entirely in his own idiotic head, Kondou genuinely thought of Shinpachi as his little brother-in-law. And he'd met Kagura too many times not to get attached. Kondou's heart was like flypaper, sticking to damn near anyone and everyone around him. It hurt him badly, any time someone close to him got ripped away, left his big sticky heart torn up and crumpled. He always got through it, because he was strong enough to straighten it out again, tape the pieces back together and go on.

But it hurt him, every time. It was hurting him now, as he stood there staring at Gintoki's battle with his jaw set tight and the rain flattening down his inimitable hair into an ordinary, miserable mess.

Hijikata stuck his cigarette back in his mouth, clamped his teeth around it. Better to chew on the butt than grind his teeth. The dentist had warned him that he might crack something.

Meanwhile the Gekkon captain apparently took Hijikata's comment for an invitation to conversation, sidling over to say, "You're an astute man, Commander Kondou," in his slithery cold-blooded way. "Keeping your men out of this fight, rather than sending them against that monster. I'd heard the stories, but I didn't believe them, I admit."

"Stories?" Okita asked, not taking his eyes off the fight, but the low intensity in his voice sent a frisson through Hijikata. Sougo was taking this seriously. Hijikata bit down harder on his cigarette.

"The Gekkon weren't involved in your nation's little expulsion war," the captain said, with an indifference that made Hijikata want to 'accidentally' tread on his tail. "But some of the Empire's retainer races committed troops. One was an acquaintance of mine, the son of my family's housemaster. He was surprisingly impressed with the defense you apes mounted, how bravely your samurai fought. A few especially—there was even one, he said, that they wondered if he was an ape at all. Some of the soldiers fancied he was a demon. Shiroyasha, they called him."

"Yeah, yeah, that was just a name," Hijikata said. "At the end of the war, the revolutionaries were getting desperate, trying to boost spirits however they could. Making up stories about some incredible demonic...white-haired...samurai..."

A second later Hijikata realized he had managed to chew through the paper around his cigarette and was gnawing on the filter. He spat out the butt, stamped it into the wet gravel under his boot.

"Really, Hijikata-san," Okita murmured, "that never occurred to you before? Seriously?"

"It's not white anyway, it's a ridiculous silver perm...he probably dyes it...Oh come on, when you meet that idiot, it's not like 'demon' is the first thing that comes to mind!"

"You could ask them," Okita said, nodding at the knot of Gekkon soldiers and the white whirlwind in their midst, sweeping them up in a steel-bladed storm, "but right now, I don't know what else would come to mind."

Hijikata would have told him to shut up, but Okita got a particular dry tone when something appealed to his sick sense of humor, and he didn't have it now; there was pain enough here for any sadist, but he wasn't enjoying it, not now.

Instead Hijikata turned his bile on the Gekkon captain. "What did you do? Your Imperial Sentries, what the hell did they do?"

The captain blinked, translucent membranes flicking over his yellow eyes, disconcertingly asynchronous. "The sentries? How would I have any idea what the Empire asks of them? Do my fangs look green to you?"

"Where are they now, then? Shouldn't they be here to guard your precious ambassador?"

"If they didn't have another mission. No matter—the legion wouldn't be here if we weren't worthy of the privilege to protect our honored lord," the Gekkon captain said. "Look there; we can take care of this...situation."

Two more Gekkon soldiers were approaching; their captain waved them over with a talon. They were carrying a net between them, both hunched over as if it were massively heavy. Within the webbing hung a round, matte green sphere the size of a soft ball.

"Eh?" Kondou said. "How can a shot put take care of anything?"

Hijikata released an unsteady breath. "That's not a shot put, Kondou-san..."

"Is that an antiproton shell?" Okita asked. "I've never seen one before..." He crouched to tap the sphere with his index finger.

"Sougo, do not poke the mega-yield explosive!" Hijikata turned on the Gekkon captain. "What the hell do you have that for? They're banned on planets for a reason—that thing could flatten half of Edo!"

"Don't be foolish; its yield is hardly that high. A third of this town at best. And it's equipped with a repel field; we can contain the blast. Simply clear your people off these grounds—a two-hundred meter circumference would be recommended—and we'll solve the problem of this demon."

All three of the Shinsengumi stared at him. "Don't worry," the Gekkon captain assured them, "damage to your quaint structures will be minimal, even given their flimsy construction."

It wouldn't be enough, Hijikata thought. If this stupid lizard believed he could handle a samurai with only his little round bomb...

Two Gekkon left, when he looked at the battle, and all their fallen comrades were scattered on the white gravel like leaves in autumn. That effort hadn't slowed Gintoki; if anything he was faster now than when he'd deflected their laser bolts, his sword a streak of silver through the rain.

Fast enough to outpace an antiproton explosion. Maybe.

"No," Kondou said. "No, we can't allow this."

"Kondou-san," Hijikata started to say.

Kondou folded his arms resolutely as he glowered down at the Gekkon captain. "We vowed to protect your ambassador when he came to Edo; we swore to keep him safe. This threat is from Earth, from Edo, and as samurai of Edo, it's our responsibility and duty and right to stop him. So while we appreciate your help, Captain, we, the Shinsengumi, are going to have to take over now. You and your soldiers can return to your quarters; we promise you that this man won't harm a hair—er, a scale—on the head of your lord."

"Do you, now," the captain said. He sounded amused. "And how are you apes going to do that?"

"We're not all gorillas here. That man's not the only demon on these grounds," Kondou said with a fierce, tight smile. "Toushi! Sougo! Can you hold him back? On your honor as Shinsengumi?"

Are you insane? Hijikata wanted to ask, but it would have spoiled the mood.

Okita had no such compunctions. "No, there's no way I can hold him back," he said calmly. "Not without a sword."

Kondou unhooked his prized katana from his belt, tossed it over. "Now?"

Okita's hand was already raised to catch the scabbard. He closed his other hand around the Kotetsu's hilt, unsheathed it with the hissing whisper of lethally sharp steel against leather. "Now," he said, "yes."

"Toushi?"

He was the Shinsengumi's demon vice-commander. And this was a matter of principle, as Kondou had said. About protecting what they swore to protect.

About protecting who they had to protect, on their honor as samurai and as men.

Hijikata looked at the lone man battling the Amanto, silver hair and silver sword and the blood on his kimono; then he looked at the bomb again, the little green sphere, with all the incomprehensible destruction contained so modestly within its shell.

"Yes," he said, drawing his own sword. "We'll hold him back."

When Yamazaki climbed into one of the Shinsengumi patrol cars stationed outside the wall and ordered, "Take me to Otae-san's," the junior officer at the wheel immediately protested, "This isn't a taxi cab, Yamazaki-san."

"It's Commander Kondou's direct order!"

Moriguchi rolled his eyes. "Isn't it always?"

"This is different," Yamazaki said. "Take me! Now!" and the officer rolled his eyes again, but started the cruiser and pulled them out into the street.

Rush hour traffic hadn't hit its peak yet, though the rain was slowing the roads. And naturally Moriguchi knew the most direct route to the Shimura family's dojo; most of Shinsengumi did, from the various times they'd gone on commander-seeking errands.

Still, after barely a block, Yamazaki tired of the monotonous swishing of the windshield wipers and switched on the siren and lights. "Yamazaki-san," the driver protested, wincing at the racket.

"Faster," Yamazaki told him.

"What's this about, anyway?"

"Didn't you see the gate getting knocked down? You were right outside it!"

"Yeah, but I also heard Hijikata-san on the radio, telling us not to engage—Yamazaki-san, they were saying it was the Yorozuya boss? What is it, another bet with Hijikata-san or something like that?"

"No," Yamazaki said. "Nothing like that. Can you go any faster?"

Moriguchi opened his mouth again, then glanced at him sidelong, shut up and put the pedal to the floor.

The faster the wet Edo streets streaked past, however, the more Yamazaki regretted the speed. What was he going to do when he got to the dojo? What was he possibly supposed to say? Couldn't the commander have gone instead? One would think he'd leap at the chance to have anything to say to Otae.

We have reason to believe your beloved little brother is...

No, Kondou could never have said that.

What had happened? Why would the Gekkon, or anyone else, have hurt Shimura Shinpachi? He was hardly more than a kid, a good-hearted, loyal, hardworking kid, too polite and nondescript to piss anybody off.

Kagura, now, Yamazaki imagined pissed off all kinds of people; with her it wasn't a question of why, but how. He'd seen her fighting monsters usually reserved for battleships; heck, he'd seen her and Okita face off—and though he wouldn't admit it under pain of death, if he'd ever had to place a bet between them, Yamazaki's money would have been on Kagura. He wouldn't have given the Gekkon a chance, elite sentries or not.

Besides, she'd only been a kid herself, battles against alien incursions notwithstanding. Just kids, both of them, civilians, the kind of people the Shinsengumi were supposed to protect.

Yamazaki leaned forward to put his elbows on the dashboard, rested his head against his hands. What the hell could have happened, that the Yorozuya boss would show up with a real sword and no sign of either of his friends? If they'd been hurt, if the Gekkon had hurt them...

He would have been angry, yeah. Furious—Gintoki could get fired up; it took a lot, but he was a samurai, under the carefree sweet-toothed idiot, and once set ablaze he was a force to be reckoned with.

But he hadn't been angry. He hadn't been burning with rage—he'd been fighting Okita but it had been Okita who had been shouting. Captain Okita, who never lost his temper, who was so ice cold that the men joked that his Chuuberts didn't melt in his stomach—but he'd been shouting, while Gintoki hadn't raised his voice loud enough to carry. Had raised his sword instead, spoken with that, and all it said was death...

"Yamazaki-san," Moriguchi said, "we're here."

"Right," Yamazaki said. "Wait here," and he climbed out of the cruiser into the drizzling rain. The gate of the Shimura family home was a familiar sight; he'd been here often enough, to fetch Kondou and for various investigations that had never proved anything except that Shimura Shinpachi's home was as boisterously, wildly eccentric as he himself was ordinary.

Had been ordinary, Yamazaki corrected himself, swallowing back the sudden thickness in his throat. Would he even be coming here again? The Shimura's dojo, the Yorozuya's shabby apartment—none of that would be the way it had been, after today.

He rang the bell and knocked on the gate, but there was no answer. Rather than wait, Yamazaki resorted to one of his alternate routes, going over the western wall where the worn plaster provided easy footholds. It was as fast as climbing a ladder; a moment later he was jumping down into the garden.

A moment after that, something bashed him hard in the back of his head. Yamazaki dropped to his knees, half-stunned and bewildered—he'd been keeping an eye out for Otae as he always did, but he'd seen no one in the garden, and had heard no footsteps over the patter of the rain.

On his hands and knees he scrambled in a direction he hoped was away from his attacker, trying to orient himself, but before Yamazaki had made it a foot a cold blade pressed to his throat, and a low voice warned, "Move, and I'll kill you."

There were a few men walking out on the docks, even in the rain. They had umbrellas and seemed to be occupied; two were involved in conversation, while a third idly watched the sea, as if waiting for a ship to come in.

None of them so much as glanced in the direction of the mid-sized airship berthed at the end of the marina, but Katsura knew they were aware of it nevertheless. He recognized the alertness of personal guards, seasoned professionals, experienced at not drawing attention to their client.

Or perhaps not a client—a leader, with a cause great enough to inspire devotion from able warriors. A truly skilled man craves a cause worthy of his skills. Katsura had a few such people in the Jouishishi. And these men on the docks were skilled—when one shifted his stance, Katsura saw the line of a concealed scabbard under his kimono. No doubt the others were similarly armed.

Katsura didn't doubt that his own blade could take theirs, and the open challenge would be more honorable; but his purpose here went deeper than honor. He slipped past all of them like water—or in the water, rather; with the raindrops pocking the choppy seas, not one of them spotted the figure swimming under the docks beneath their feet.

The trickiest part was boarding the airship. True to its name, it was hovering some four meters above the waves. The magnetic line he shot up and affixed to the hull was invisible in the rain, but Katsura had to wait, treading water, until all the guards were looking away, before he reeled himself up it.

Once he was clinging to the hull, out of sight on the sea-facing side, it was no great matter to sidle around to a hatch. Jimmying the latch with a knife, Katsura clambered inside, then took a moment to take off his swim cap and shake out his hair—seawater made for a poor conditioner—and dry himself with the towel from the plastic bag he'd towed with him. Getting found out because he caught a chill and started sneezing at an inopportune time wasn't so entertaining an experience that he wished to repeat it.

He dallied a bit too long, however; by the time he heard the boot treads coming down the narrow corridor it was too late to find a hiding space. Katsura charged instead, and brought down the hapless crewmate with a blow to the stomach before the man's eyes had finished widening in surprise.

He could bind and muzzle him, but depending on how patrols on the ship were organized, the crewman might soon be discovered. Katsura drew his katana and pressed it to the man's throat, put his other hand over his mouth and whispered in his ear, "Your choices are a quick death now, and I throw your corpse into the bay; or else I throw your living body in the bay, and you swim away and don't return, without alerting anyone. Which do you choose, one or two?"

The man hastily held up two fingers. Katsura considered for a moment, balancing expediency with mercy and trust with sense, then nodded. "Very well. If you wish to fight for a better cause, come find me. It's Katsura, of the Jouishishi," and he stripped the man of his haori jacket, then bundled him out the porthole. There was a splash as he hit the water, but no shout of alarm.

Still, there might be trouble if he failed to report in. No time to waste, then. Katsura slipped on the crewmate's haori and headed down the corridor, listening for more approaching footsteps as he mentally pictured the layout of the ship. The captain's quarters would be down that passage, at the stern—but no, that didn't matter, not as much as an open place, a chamber with a view of the city. He headed for the bow instead.

There was a guard stationed before the observatory door, an Amanto as wide as a sumo wrestler and taller, with boar tusks, no less. He would be a handful in open combat, but Katsura had no intention of challenging him, either. Instead he smoothed down the collar of his borrowed haori jacket and walked up to the alien, head down as if he were being respectful. "The boss wants you up on deck," he said. "You're breathing too loud; he wants me guarding the door instead."

The Amanto looked at him, neither recognizing his human face nor caring, then shrugged and strode away, heavy boots thumping on the corridor's metal floor. Alone in the passage, Katsura picked the lock and opened the door slowly and silently. Once inside, he locked it behind him, and tied the handles shut with wire twine. It would give them a moment of privacy, at least. Then he moved past the folding screen into the observatory.

There was only one man in the room, but he wasn't looking at the gray, rain-drenched city outside the broad windows; instead he was sitting on the floor in the corner, captivated by a small TV screen, leaning forward to watch with his elbow on one knee and his chin planted in his palm.

Katsura approached him on silent feet, katana already drawn, so that it made no sound when he put it to the man's throat. "I didn't realize you were a drama fan," he remarked. "Have you seen Summer Sonata?"

"Katsura Kotarou," said the TV watcher, tilting back his head so he could take a drag from his pipe without pressing his neck into the sword blade. "Would you care for some tea? I can have a pot brought up."

"First tell me this, Takasugi," Katsura said, not lowering his sword. "What have you done to Gintoki?"

Chapter Text

Three hours ago, Shimura Shinpachi was sure he was dead.

The Gekkon sentries might not have been Yato, but they weren't a hell of a lot slower when they attacked. Kagura sent two flying with a bash of her umbrella, head-over-tail into the table, but that left two more for Shinpachi to fend off. And yes, he had a steel sword, but the flambard wasn't anything like the Japanese katana he trained for, and he wasn't that confident of his skill with a metal blade, when you could lop your own foot off as easily as your opponent's.

But a sword was a sword, and he was a samurai. Shinpachi made sure to remember his breathing and kept his eyes on his enemies' weapons—not so difficult, with the green beamknives blazing like glowsticks at one of Otsuu's concerts. And fortunately, too, when he brought up the sword to parry, the metal blade proved a better counter than his wooden bokutou; rather than getting sliced apart, it slashed through the glowing green beam like it wasn't even there, to slam against the Gekkon's wiry bicep.

The sentry's purple uniform was of a material resilient enough to stop the blade, but it was still a bruising hit, and the Gekkon jumped back, hissing angrily. "You apes and your primitive arms!"

"I'll show you primitive," Kagura said, and rammed the lizard alien in the back of the head with the barrel of her umbrella. He collapsed on the floor with a thump as Shinpachi brandished his sword at the remaining Gekkon, who snarled and backed away, lashing tail slapping against Gintoki's desk beside him.

"Amateurs," Kagura said, grinning as she came around Shinpachi to advance on the sentry. "You're a hundred years too early to defeat us—ahh!" she yelped, as one of the Gekkon she'd left prone on the dented table suddenly pounced like a playful housecat, his teeth latching around her forearm.

"Kagura-chan!" Shinpachi yelled, swinging the sword around to chop off the sentry's tail, but he scarcely clipped the tip; the alien sprang back in time to avoid both the slash and Kagura's kick to his head. They were so fast—

And Kagura should have been faster, but when the other prone Gekkon leapt back to his feet and struck, she barely ducked the arc of his beamknife in time, dropping her umbrella. She still managed to get a punch past the knife, knocking him down again, but she stumbled as she did, nearly falling.

"Kagura-chan!" Shinpachi said again, grabbing her arm and yanking her over to his side, where they were flanked by the wall.

"Shinpachi," Kagura gasped, hunched over and grinning up at him, wild and sickly. "You should run for it—before you get bitten, too—"

"What, and miss my chance to draw all over your face?" Shinpachi said, standing between her and the circling Gekkon. "No way!"

"Idiot!" Kagura said. Gritting her teeth, she dragged herself upright, set herself back to back with Shinpachi and put up her fists. "I'm going to draw on your face again first!"

"I'm going to give you a mustache!" Shinpachi shot back.

"I'm going to give you nose hair! In permanent marker! Just as soon as we're—" and Kagura kicked out, catching the closest Gekkon on the wrist and making him drop his knife—"done with these jerks!"

Her confidence would've been convincing if she hadn't had to prop her shoulders against Shinpachi's to keep her balance. Shinpachi didn't know how she was still standing; he hadn't been able to so much as twitch his finger for an hour after he'd been bitten. The Yato constitution was formidable. But even Kagura had fallen last time...

Shinpachi tried not to let any of that show on his face, though, not giving their enemies any sign of fear as he tightened his fists around the sword's hilt and hauled it up. His arms were feeling the strain of its weight, but the Gekkon were cautious of it, keeping their distance with their eyes on the blade.

Maybe he could use that focus to his advantage. Leaving Kagura leaning against the wall, Shinpachi stepped forward and swung the sword around, a clumsy, flashy strike that made the serrated blade and its inset diamond glitter eye-catchingly. Taking another step forward, he swung it back like a pendulum. The Gekkon sentries jumped out of the path of its sweep, yellow eyes swiveling to follow the swinging sword like spectators at a ping pong match, stances braced and ready—he was giving them an obvious opening, and they were going to take it.

The third time he swept the sword around, Shinpachi was watching the closest Gekkon. The instant the sword sliced past and the sentry began to move, Shinpachi dropped to one knee, and at the same time let go of the sword with both hands, so it fell to the floor with a clatter.

Kagura yelled warning, but Shinpachi was ready and the Gekkon were not; they were already lunging forward, too late to check their charge as he reached up. The Gekkon's flat lizard faces didn't have noses, quite, but they did have nostrils, and Shinpachi hooked his fingers into those holes, heaved up and tossed two of the aliens, squawking, into the other two.

It nearly worked—one of the thrown Gekkon crashed into the one behind him, bringing them both down in a tangle of thrashing talons and tails. But the fourth sentry ducked his comrade's flying body to strike at Shinpachi like a cobra, jaws gaping to reveal a long green tongue and needle-sharp teeth, gleaming with the oily venom—

Only before Shinpachi felt those teeth sink into his skin, he was shoved to one side, his vision blocked by red—not blood, but Chinese silk. "Kagura-chan—!"

The Gekkon's jaws locked around Kagura's bare forearm. "Ow, you bastard!" Kagura cried, balling her other hand into a fist to punch the lizard off her. "That hurts!"

But her punch wasn't much more than a tap, and the lizard held on as the other sentry he'd ducked slithered forward to pounce like a scaly tiger. Kagura's knees folded under his weight, and the Gekkon's head stabbed forward, twisting down to bite her neck. With a choked snarl, Kagura rammed her chin down, catching him across the jaw; he gagged and let go, but she collapsed to the floor, arms outspread and limp, open eyes staring helplessly at the ceiling.

"Kagura-chan!" Shinpachi yelled, throwing himself at them. He barreled into the Gekkon crouched over her, knocking him back, then dove for the dropped sword, wresting it out from under Kagura's unmoving legs.

"Shin'hachi," Kagura mumbled, words stifled by her paralyzed lips, "ge' ou' of here..."

"But I haven't drawn on you yet, Kagura-chan," Shinpachi said, raising the flambard as he stood over her. The tip of the long rippling blade was wavering; he clamped his jaw tight and tried to force his shaking arms steady.

"You're brave, for thieves and kidnappers," said the Gekkon sentry who had bitten her neck, pulling himself upright. His purple uniform was accented by green stripes, complementing the beamknife glowing in his hand and the angles of his long tail describing curlicues in the air behind him. "But you've lost."

"That's not what it looks like to me," Shinpachi said. "I see three of you down, and one of us—looks like an even fight to me." True, the two Gekkon he'd thrown into each other had already gotten back to their hands and knees, hissing at Shinpachi with their talons curled around their knives. But it was something Gintoki might say, all the same.

Shinpachi wished Gintoki were here—a quarter hour ago he thought he might never want to see that stupid naturally permed head again, but right now more than anything he wanted Gintoki to wander through the door, silver hair and wooden sword and dead-fish eyes and all.

But Gintoki wasn't here, and Kagura was paralyzed, and the Gekkon were watching him with their bulging yellow eyes, horizontal pupils bisected by the green reflections of their beamknives. Shinpachi felt cold sweat trickling down his back like a slug crawling under his shirt, his palms damp as they clutched the sword hilt. "Besides," he said boldly," we're not thieves or kidnappers. We didn't do anything to you—you're the ones who broke into our home and attacked us!"

"Liar," hissed the green-striped Gekkon. "Liars are worse cowards than thieves or kidnappers, and worthy of no mercy," and he plunged forward, teeth flashing and beamknife raised.

Shinpachi parried desperately, driven back step by step until his shoulders bumped into the wall behind him. The sword was broad enough to block their blows, but heavy and slow enough that he couldn't counterattack between the Gekkon's feints. On the other hand, he hadn't been bitten yet—the sentry wasn't really trying to bite him, he realized; his head strikes were too abrupt, cut off too soon even when Shinpachi was slow to parry, not serious attacks.

Snakes sometimes expended all their venom in one bite; maybe the Gekkon were the same. In which case the only thing he had to worry about was the beamknife. The next time the Gekkon struck with his gaping jaws, Shinpachi didn't try to block. Instead he left his elbow out, in range of those needle-teeth, while he swung the sword around into the green dagger, slicing through the beamknife's hilt and nearly severing it. The green beam flickered off like a flashlight with dead batteries, and Shinpachi let the sword finish its arc, until it came to rest against the Gekkon's throat, above the protection of his collar.

"How's that for losing?" Shinpachi asked, panting for breath. The sword felt heavier than ever, even with the blade resting on the Gekkon's scaly skin, but his arms were steadier now, despite the uneven thump of his heartbeat in his ears.

The Gekkon parted his jaws enough for his green tongue to flicker out. "Finish it, then, Earthling."

"Yes," hissed another sentry behind him. "Finish him—then we'll finish both of you."

Shinpachi looked past the undulating sword blade and the Gekkon's yellow eyes, to the other Gekkon sentry—the sentry crouching over Kagura's motionless body, with his emerald beamknife held to her throat. Its light cast sickening green shadows on her face, her aware but helpless eyes.

"Don't!" Shinpachi shouted. "D-don't you dare—I'll take his head, I'll really—"

"Do it," the green-striped Gekkon said, bulbous yellow eyes swiveling toward Shinpachi's face. "Our lives are nothing but sacrifices to the imperial dynasty."

"So let's end this," the sentry over Kagura said, bringing down his knife.

"No!" Shinpachi cried, dropping the sword on the floor and raising his hands, open and empty. "I surrender, don't hurt her, just don't—"

The beamknife stopped against Kagura's throat, not quite close enough to cut the skin.

"Shin'hachi," Kagura moaned—pissed off, he thought, though her tone was hard to make out.

"You are strange thieves," the Gekkon in front of Shinpachi said. He rubbed his scaly throat with his clawed talon, where the blade had touched. "Not only loyal to one another, but you haven't killed one of us, though it seems like you could. That you could value that, while not valuing what's far more precious..."

"I told you, there's no thieves here," Shinpachi said. "Freeloaders and tax dodgers, maybe, but Gin-san would never take something precious from who it belonged to."

"Senior Sentry," said the Gekkon crouched over Kagura, "he may not be lying. Putting aside the signal, a place so cramped has few hiding places; we've searched this dirty hovel several times now, and never seen any sign of the Prince."

"The wha'?" Kagura mumbled from the floor.

"What prince?" Shinpachi asked. "Is that who we're supposed to have kidnapped? And what do you mean, 'dirty hovel'? Do you know how many times I sweep the—"

"It's true, Senior," the third Gekkon said, ducking into Gintoki's bedroom and reemerging a moment later. "There's nothing in that room but a very large dog trying to hide behind a pile of magazines."

The senior Gekkon sentry leaned close, staring Shinpachi in the eyes with the black horizontal bars of his pupils. "Do you both swear on the shell of your mother, and the shells of your grandmother and great-grandmother, that you've never had the Prince here?"

"Um?" Shinpachi said. The lizard alien hissed as the scales on his neck rippled, bristling like the tail of an angry cat. "—Okay, yes, we swear!" Shinpachi cried. "No one's ever been here but us and Gin-san—and no one kidnapped any royalty. Or anybody else."

"All right." The sentry stepped back from Shinpachi, bowing his head. "In that case, we apologize for the inconvenience." He flicked his tail decidedly, and the Gekkon beside Kagura switched off his beamknife, the green blade disappearing, and rose to his feet to go help up his final fallen comrade.

"The..." Shinpachi blinked. "So that's it...? But what about—were you doing something to Gin-san? Those times you came before...were you just looking for your prince?"

"Yes, of course." The senior sentry blinked. "Why would we do anything to this Gin of yours?"

"But then what—"

"Oh, this won't do," said a voice behind Shinpachi's, a man's voice he only vaguely recognized. "This wasn't how the confrontation was supposed to go; this won't do at all."

Shinpachi started to turn around, only to find that he couldn't move. His body was frozen, numb; not like the paralysis of the Gekkon venom, though, it was a different sort of cold, like a strange frost radiating from his gut, ice crystalizing through his belly, permeating his limbs.

Though when he looked down, he didn't see any ice, only the steel tip of a katana, slicked red and shining, emerging from the folds of his kimono.

"Ack," Shinpachi said. That wasn't good, not at all; that wasn't where a sword should be.

"SHINPACHI!"

And now somehow he seemed to be lying down, cheek against the floorboards, which wasn't where he was supposed to be, either. The sword was on the floor right before him, the diamond in its blade twinkling; if he could only reach it—

Kagura, now, was supposed to be on the floor, still paralyzed; but somehow she was in front of him, blocking his view of the sword, dragging him up. There was movement behind her, green blurs and silver blurs, but none of it clear enough to make out—his glasses must have fallen off; where were they?

Kagura hauled him over her shoulder like a bag of rice and it hurt, like someone had punched him while wearing a glove made of nails and broken glass—"O-ow, Kagura-chan, don't—" Shinpachi tried to protest, but Kagura wasn't listening, just muttering, "Have to get out of here, we can't—you can't—" as she gasped for breath; he could feel her lungs heaving with every rocking, wobbly step she took.

Then Shinpachi saw, fuzzily, a silvery arc carving toward them—a katana, and he would have blocked it if he had the sword now, but he didn't; and Kagura-chan could have blocked it if she had the strength now, but she didn't. They both were dead, and both of them shouted, more furious than frightened, at how unfair this was—

There was a howl like their ghosts were being prematurely exorcised, and a giant blurry white shape hurtled into them. Shinpachi found his face buried in thick dog fur, smothering him. Glass shattered around them—another window broken; they'd need to get more cardboard, and more tape—and then they hit the street, the alley behind the apartment.

Even cushioned by Sadaharu's bulk, the impact was hard enough that Shinpachi nearly blacked out, nearly thought that he might die, only he couldn't. Voices exclaimed above them, boots pounding on the stairs. And Kagura was flopped over Sadaharu's paws, like she sometimes liked to nap, only now she didn't wake up when Sadaharu barked and Shinpachi said her name, didn't even twitch.

Every movement hurt, but Shinpachi somehow managed to work his arm around her, hooked under her arms to hold onto her. With his other hand he grabbed Sadaharu's collar and dragged himself and Kagura up onto the inugami's back. "I've got her," he told Sadaharu, "now—"

Sadaharu barked again and took off. Each jostling bound sent a searing agony through Shinpachi's chest, but the voices and the swords were growing fainter, further behind them, he thought. He couldn't be entirely sure; without his glasses, the streets of Edo were a dizzying, incomprehensible blur. Lost his glasses, lost the sword, lost the fight. Gintoki had been right; what did he ever think he could do?

Shinpachi shut his eyes, ignoring the pain to tighten his fingers around Sadaharu's collar and his arm around Kagura's limp body—maybe he was just a kid who didn't understand anything, but damned if he was going to let anything else go.

Chapter Text

The rain wasn't getting harder, but it showed no sign of ceasing, either. Hijikata had never cared for fighting in rain; it made both footing and grip uncertain, dripped in your eyes to obscure your vision and could give you a nasty chill besides. Given the option, he practiced inside on rainy days, for all that Kondou insisted facing the weather built character. Hijikata had no interest in facing the weather; he didn't like picking fights he knew he wouldn't win.

Beside him, Okita was brandishing Kondou's sword, moving it in deliberate increments as they walked forward, testing the Kotetsu's balance. The other Shinsengumi and the remaining Gekkon all moved back, clearing them a wide battlefield.

After his first duel with the silver-haired samurai, all that time ago, Hijikata had spent days mentally analyzing Gintoki's single strike, that split second preserved in crystal-clear memory by the unrealized certainty that he was going to die. But his opponent then had been Sakata Gintoki, with his bokutou and his apathetic eyes and his unfathomable rules. The man before them now, with a silver sword to match his silver hair—Hijikata hadn't faced him before.

"Anything I should know?" he muttered to Okita.

Okita's gaze was fixed on the man before them. "Swords are sharp. Try not to get cut."

There was one Gekkon soldier left standing before Gintoki—punch, kick, bite, all blocked; then Gintoki's sword caught him in the stomach—the broad side of the blade, and while the soldier's armor would've stopped a cutting blow, that blunt force folded the alien in two like a greeting card. His tail twitched and then drooped as he keeled over on the wet white gravel.

Gintoki stepped over his fallen foe without another glance; he was looking forward, looking to the pair of Shinsengumi standing before him. He brought up his sword, its serrated blade sheened in purplish blood. "Get out of my way."

"We can't, Danna," Okita said, as politely as Hijikata had ever heard him speak.

"Please," Gintoki said, not polite but flat. His shaggy hair, damp with rain and sweat, hung over his eyes. "You're not who I'm here for."

"No," Hijikata said, "but the guy you want to kill, the Shinsengumi swore to protect."

"So there's no choice, then."

"Why are you here, Yorozuya? What'd the ambassador's sentries do?" Hijikata took a step forward, his katana in his hand, but lowered. "Were you attacked again? All of you, your two—Kagura and Shinpachi—what did those bastard lizards do?"

He hadn't managed to touch Sakata with his sword before, but those words cut like a honed blade—those names cut. For all that Gintoki didn't flinch, Hijikata saw how deeply they wounded in the tightening of his hands around his sword's hilt, in the bracing of his shoulders. Every answer to his question was there, every answer Hijikata hadn't wanted.

Gintoki's voice was level when he replied, though, as indifferent and uncaring as ever he'd sounded. " He's an Amanto lord, and the shogun wants you to protect him. Would it matter what he did?"

"It matters—" Hijikata started to say, but Okita cut him off.

"You know it doesn't," he said. "There's no Earth justice that can reach the Amanto, not your sword's or ours. Nothing we do to them matters; they don't care about anything that happens on this little world of ours. They might burn Edo to cinders in a temper tantrum—but they wouldn't care. Attacking them is only masochism; it can't really hurt them, only yourself. But you should know that already, you who lost the war before."

It was as cruel as he had ever heard Okita be, and maybe as kind. Gintoki didn't move or speak, and for a moment Hijikata almost had hope. "If you stop now, Yorozuya, if you walk out of here—"

"I can't," Gintoki said. "You know I can't. But you already swore to protect him, and Edo, too."

"We don't want to do this, Danna," Okita said, raising his sword, perfectly parallel with the vertical line of his back.

"I know," Gintoki said, mirroring the motion with his own blade. Cast-off raindrops glistened in an aura around its inset diamond.

"Is this your rule?" Hijikata demanded. "Is this how you keep your honor, by fighting friends—is that how your code works?"

"No." Gintoki shook his head once, shedding water. "This has got nothing to do with rules or honor or anything like that—it's just what I have to do."

"Then try," Hijikata said, and raised his own katana.

Afterwards, Gintoki knew, he was going to be very tired. After all of this was done he'd be lucky if he could move for a day; he'd have to remember to piss before he collapsed, because he wouldn't be able to get up again once he lay down.

Now, however, he existed in the pure clarity of a pitched battle, the rarified perception of adrenaline. Everything that would keep him alive was emphasized, and all other distractions diminished. Each motion of the enemies before his eyes was so clear it could have been outlined in light; while the insignificant crowd around them, the still bodies on the ground, were hardly more than shadows. Irrelevant noises were muted—the constant rattle of the rain, meaningless voices speaking meaningless words; while the most crucial sounded loudly—the crunch of a footstep on gravel behind him, the thud of his heart measuring his strength.

And everything was numb, so the chill of his wet skin didn't make him shiver and throw off his sword arm, and the aches of scratches and bruises couldn't distract him. In a battle like this, there was no pain, no matter how bad the injury. During the war he'd seen men lose limbs and not stop fighting, not even realize they'd been crippled until later. Nothing hurt when you fought like this.

Afterwards, it would hurt. But not now; not yet.

Now, even when there was a little space between him and his opponents, it wasn't the end of the fight, just a moment to breathe, to adjust his grip on the flambard's unfamiliar hilt. The perfect clarity barely waned, hardly darkened; it was like being on the battlefield again, where the pressures of danger and desperation had kept him combat-ready for hours or days. Sometimes it had felt like he'd never be able to sleep again.

He hadn't thought he'd ever miss this; he hadn't thought that he'd ever want to be here again, even if there was something beautiful about it, the brilliance of the colors, the visceral awareness of each passing second.

It was odd, how he had to strain to listen to the men standing before him, almost reading Hijikata's and Okita's lips more than hearing their words; and yet other voices were as vivid as the colors—whispers too soft to be distracting, but every word distinct. "Keep going forward, Gin-san, you're almost there." "Take them down, Gin-chan, they can't stop you!"

"For us," they reminded him, as if he'd ever forget.

It wasn't that he wanted to challenge Hijikata or Okita. For all his petty rivalries with the mayo-freak, he'd fought alongside both of them enough times that it felt incongruous to raise his sword against them now. They might be Shinsengumi, the Shogun's dogs; but they were also true samurai, with their own code and loyalties. And he knew, too, that they would be fighting alongside him this time, if they could, if their honor would allow it.

But there was no space for something as hazy and indeterminate as honor here in this absolute lucidity. In a fight like this, even victory or defeat were too nebulous; even life and death were too complex. You fought until you could not fight, or your enemy could not fight; that was how it went. You kept moving forward, until something blocked you; you fought until your way was cleared, and then you started moving again.

"For us," their voices whispered in his ears.

For a moment Gintoki thought the Shinsengumi would get out of his way when he told them to, and he wasn't sure if he wanted them to, or if he wanted more the fight they would give him, the perfect, painless clarity he would need to defeat them.

Then they raised their swords, and it was a moot point anyway. He brought up his own blade, and charged once more into battle.

In the Shimura's garden, Yamazaki blinked up through the rain at the figure standing over him—small and delicately built, but fierce-eyed, at least the one not covered by a black patch. And the sword at his throat was anything but slight. "Why are you here?" the figure demanded. "Did you come for Otae-san's life?"

"Kyuu-chan!" Otae appeared at the door, waving to them. "Don't hurt him! That's not an attacker; it's just Yamazaki-san, from the Shinsengumi. One of the non-stalking ones."

"Oh." Yamazaki's assailant—Yagyuu Kyuubei, he recognized, now that his pulse was slowing enough for him to think—withdrew the katana and stepped back to let him stand. "My apologies, Just Yamazaki-san," she said, and escorted him to the porch where Otae was waiting.

"It's just Yamazaki—I mean, Yamazaki, that's it," Yamazaki corrected, stepping gingerly. Kyuubei wasn't walking quite close enough for him to think she was looking for an excuse to stick her sword in him, but she hadn't sheathed the katana yet, either.

"Sorry about that, Yamazaki-san," Otae said, stepping aside to let him in. "After what happened to my brother today, Kyuu-chan insisted on staying over to keep watch—"

"So you know?" Yamazaki interrupted. "About what happened to Shinpachi-kun?"

"And Kagura-chan," Otae said, grave but composed, no less than he would have expected of her. Then she frowned. "But wait, how do you know about that?"

"I don't, not exactly. Just...just enough," Yamazaki said. He took a deep breath. "I'm very sorry for your loss."

Otae's frown deepened. "For my...?"

"Hey, Ane-go," someone called from down the hall. The fusuma leading to the living room slid open and a head of bright orange hair stuck out of the doorway, seeking Otae. "Are you really all out of pickles?"

Yamazaki stared. Not only did was Kagura talking through a pair of chopsticks in her mouth, but for some reason she was crawling on all fours like a baby, and one of her odango had come undone, so her red hair hung down over her ear.

On the other hand, she was pretty animated for a corpse. Yamazaki blinked hard to make sure this apparition wasn't just an exceptionally noisy trick of the light, as Kagura's head turned up toward him. "Oh, what are you doing here?"

"We should have some left," Otae said, apparently unconcerned by Kagura's appearance. "Have you checked in the kitchen, the jar behind the tabasco sauce?"

"But I was saving those, Ane-ue—and what's who doing here?" inquired another voice from the room behind Kagura.

"Eh?" Yamazaki stammered, disbelieving. He stepped forward to peer over Kagura into the living room, then stopped and gaped at the boy sitting on a futon spread by the kotatsu. "...Shinpachi-kun?"

"Ah, is that you, Yamazaki-san?" Shinpachi said. He looked as real as Kagura, though even paler than she was, and odd somehow. More than the ghostly pallor and the bandages visible under his kimono. He wasn't wearing his glasses, Yamazaki realized, when Shinpachi squinted at him across the room. It made him look even younger than he was. "Good afternoon, welcome over."

"Yes, thank you, sorry to be a bother..." Yamazaki shook his head hard, as if he could physically knock his brain back on track. "I mean—you're here! You're alive! Both of you!"

"Yeah, pretty much," Kagura confirmed, eying him skeptically from where she was sprawled on the floor.

Yamazaki looked between them, equal parts elated and confused. "Er...does your boss know you're alive?"

Chapter Text

"Do you remember what he was like?" Takasugi asked calmly, relaxed and fearless in spite of the sword at his throat. Katsura knew it wasn't because his will was doubted. But perhaps the last thing Takasugi had seen that had truly frightened him was the blade that had sliced across his eye. "Sakata Gintoki on the battlefield—do you remember how the new recruits would see him fight, and afterwards they'd ask if it were true, if he really was a demon after all?"

"You told them he was," Katsura said, which wasn't entirely accurate; they'd all said it sometimes. Sometimes they'd even believe it themselves, a little. But then, hadn't they been calling him that for years—little boys running about the schoolyard, and it had been mockery, an insult to the oddest of their number, except that Gintoki had never taken offense, just shrugged and said, "Maybe, so what?"

On the battlefield a decade later, the old insult became an accolade, a rallying cry, and Gintoki had shrugged and ignored it, same as ever.

"They'd believe it, too," Takasugi said. "Even after they'd met him, sometimes. But it was understandable, wasn't it? Seeing this," and he waved his pipe toward the television screen propped on the floor before him.

Katsura glanced down at the set cautiously, keeping most of his attention on his enemy—Takasugi was apparently unarmed, but a declawed cat still has teeth, and a rabid one could tear your throat out. The TV was muted, showing a silent swordfight in stark black-and-white—a movie, perhaps, as no text indicated a news broadcast, though the fixed camera angle was an odd cinematic choice. Though Katsura preferred romances or musical comedy to action anyway; even when the martial mechanics were broadly correct, they couldn't capture the feel of genuine combat...

Wasn't this a strange battle scene anyway, though, with two swordsmen pitted against one white-haired warrior—two swordsmen in familiar dark uniforms, and that white hair was still more familiar. But no, that made no sense; Gintoki was neither a terrorist nor a criminal to speak of, not enough of one for the Shinsengumi to bother with. Besides, Katsura knew those men, and though Gintoki wouldn't call them friends, they were close to him nevertheless. Within the scope of his sword, the only nation he'd ever fought for.

"What do you think?" Takasugi asked. "It's hi-def—I could've gotten a 3-D set, but the view's no different for me," and his fluttering fingers brushed his bandaged eye.

Was that truly Gintoki, though—silver hair and white yukata, but the speed-blurred sword on the little screen wasn't wooden. More than that, however, was the way he moved, the flood of his attacks, feint and stab, whirl and slash—capricious and uncompromising, with no rhythm but the staccato pulse of the battle itself, faster than any normal human being could move to. Even the Amanto, for all their awesome weapons and technology, had struggled to keep up with that beat.

Shiroyasha was unforgettable, then or now, as terrifying as he was inspiring. But those were not Amanto his sword was set against.

"What have you done to him, Takasugi?" Katsura demanded, clenching his hand around his katana's hilt, to steady it before the blade slipped and drew unintentional blood. "There's an antennae on this airship, transmitting something—what's in that signal? Is it some kind of mind-control? Hypnosis, brainwashing—what is it?"

Takasugi's lone eye widened in surprise. "Brainwashing, mind control—you speak like that man has a mind to be controlled."

"It's certainly dirty enough to be washed," Katsura returned. "How are you doing it?"

Takasugi angled his head to bring his pipe to his lips, over the sword blade. He exhaled a streamer of smoke, then said, singsong-serene, "There's a beast in us. In all of us, Zura, ever since that day. Howling and raging, ceaselessly screaming in anguish.

"Sakamoto fled from it, went running away across the stars, trying to escape, and still is fleeing even now. You, Zura, you locked your beast away in a cage deep inside; and when that wasn't enough, you muzzled it, bound its jaw shut with fantasies of nonviolent solutions and peaceful insurrections. Though you can still hear it whining, can't you; it's always clawing at the bars, ripping and shredding at the walls of your mind."

"Better than letting it run wild," Katsura said.

"You wouldn't know." Takasugi smiled. "But yes—I let my beast rampage as it wants; I let it devour and destroy, and maybe someday it will be tired enough to fall quietly asleep.

"But Gintoki—that bastard just put his fingers in his ears and turned his back on it. He left his beast howling in its agony and simply walked away, until he couldn't even hear it anymore, until he even forgot it was there." Takasugi skewed up his eye to meet Katsura's gaze with his own mad glare. "Was that fair, Zura? Was that right, that he could just forget it, when the rest of us must suffer?

"So Bansai wrote a song for me—a beast's howling song, a beautiful song of carnage and devastation, to be played for only Sakata Gintoki's ears. To be played so loudly that even he would hear it, so loudly that he couldn't hear anything else."

Katsura pressed the blade in under Takasugi's chin. "What did you do?"

Takasugi tilted his head back to ease the pressure off his throat. "Have you ever heard of wave-form manipulation?"

"Wave-form—like that new VR game system?" Katsura frowned. Some of his men in the Jouishishi had brought the press releases to his attention last month—after all, it was important for them to stay appraised of what new wicked devices the Amanto were inflicting upon the nation. The technology promised to be the next generation of VR, direct neural stimulation, as convincing as actually being there, so the ads declared. Katsura had planned to investigate the technology in depth when it was publicly released, to evaluate it for any dangerous influence. He was particularly concerned with the game about collecting adorable little colored motes dancing in your eyes...

He shook his head. "You should know, Takasugi, Gintoki prefers the old 8-bit games to the modern systems anyway. At least in that he's a traditionalist. Though you never appreciated the Famicon, did you—no wonder you're impressed by flashy graphics without soul. So what were those graphics? Reminders of our past inserted into Gintoki's dreams? Distractions during the day, to keep him on edge?" Katsura realized his hand was shaking, such that the wavering blade had scratched a faint white line down Takasugi's throat, too shallow even to bleed, and Takasugi didn't flinch from it. "How despicable, to assault a man in the sacred privacy of his own mind. Even a ninja would balk at such a dirty attack, I think,"

Takasugi shrugged, his loose kimono nearly slipping off his shoulder. "There's nothing clean in this world. That's the last lesson our teacher taught us, Zura; you should remember it."

"I should kill you," Katsura said. "I said I would, next time. And no one's tried to come in here—how long before they realized you were dead?"

"Do it, then. Soil your sword with my dirty blood," and Takasugi leaned forward, pushing his neck against the katana's blade.

"First stop it," Katsura said. "What you've done to Gintoki—stop it. Turn off this evil game and stop him."

Takasugi laughed, bright and genuinely amused. "Stop Shiroyasha? How? When has he ever done anything except what he wanted to do? And now—he wants this."

Katsura glanced at the screen, but the action had become too chaotic to follow, and the image was dark besides, splotchy and obscured. "Blood on the capture lens again," Takasugi said. "The rain will wash it off eventually, if you care to stay and watch."

"What did you do, Takasugi? What'd you show him—what'd you dredge up from our history, to summon Shiroyasha?"

"Not the past," Takasugi said. "The present—his present, a present for him. A couple of captured images, slightly edited, as a lead-in to Bansai's song. We'd hoped to give him a performance piece, a still life, you could say—but that didn't go as planned. No matter; he still appreciated it."

"What images—" Katsura began, then started, almost taking Takasugi's head off as he did, when the TV's speaker crackled to life.

"Shinsuke-sama?" a woman's voice spoke into the room, low and urgent. "I'm outside the auxiliary palace walls now. Should I wait, or move in for the kill? The way to the ambassador looks clear, the Shinsengumi are busy with your demon in white, but—Shinsuke-sama? Are you there?"

Katsura saw Takasugi's hand move for the panel below the speaker, reached to grasp his wrist to stop him from replying.

But his katana's blade lifted from his hostage's neck as he did, only for a second, but long enough. Takasugi jackknifed, throwing himself backwards into Katsura's chest, sending them both sprawling. Katsura kept his grip on his sword, but Takasugi twisted around like an eel to straddle him, planting his heel on Katsura's forearm to hold the sword down, while he shoved his bare elbow into Katsura's throat, under his chin.

With his other hand he reached over to tap the button on the bottom of the screen and said calmly, "Please hold a moment, Matako."

Katsura stared up at his one-time comrade, breathing shallowly so as not to gag. Takasugi's single eye glittered, savage and febrile, though his delirium wasn't any fever that medicine might cure. "So should I kill you now?" he asked. "Wash my hands with your clean blood?"

He would, Katsura thought—he'd have to. Takasugi hadn't been talking to him out of any need to be understood, or even to gloat; he'd merely been delaying, waiting to grab the upper hand and make sure Katsura couldn't disrupt whatever plan he had in motion. Shiroyasha wasn't his winning gambit but his pawn—as if Takasugi ever had anything but; as if anybody was anything to him but a means to his terrible ends.

Whatever his plan, it could not succeed; Katsura had to send warning one way or another. Before Takasugi could drive his elbow any deeper, Katsura let go of the sword and wrenched his legs to the side, rolling himself over under the other man. The maneuver twisted his arm, perhaps a sprain but he avoided dislocation, and with his knees under him he had the leverage to buck Takasugi off him and reach into his sleeve for his ace, which he threw at the TV screen.

The explosion knocked Takasugi back against the wall. Katsura was ready for it, braced with his arms over his head to block inopportune bits of television shrapnel. His ears rang from the blast, though, dizzying him and muffling the banging on the observatory door and the shouts echoing through the corridor outside.

The floor rocked as the airship began to turn, engines groaning into motion. Takasugi pulled himself shakily upright against the wall, wiping the blood leaking from the corner of his mouth with his sleeve. He had Katsura's katana in his other hand, the tip of the long blade hovering above the floor. "That wasn't my only transmitter, you know," he said. "It won't take long to restore communications, once you're taken care of."

"No?" Katsura said, "a pity," and he charged the observatory's wide window. The bomb's blast had cracked the glass; a hard kick finished the job, as Katsura ducked behind his sleeves to shield himself from the falling shards. The wind and rain gusted in, whipping their kimono about their legs and pelting the floor.

The airship wasn't so high yet, the rain-slick docks and the dark choppy sea slowly spinning below them. Katsura paused an instant to calculate trajectories, then flung himself out the shattered window.

He heard Takasugi shouting behind him, and then the rushing wind tore the voice from his ears. Katsura folded his body into an arrow, clapping his hands together as he dove headfirst toward the water, and had just time enough to wonder, My cell phone is waterproof, isn't it? before he hit the waves.

Okita hit the gravel hard, bruising his shoulder and scraping his side through his uniform. For a dangerous second the wind was knocked out of him; then he snapped back into focus, gasping for what air he could as he rolled back up into a crouch, sword ready.

Their opponent was still meters away, though, not charging yet. He held the flambard in both hands before him like a dousing rod, and his head was cocked, as if he were listening for something. Under the dashing rain, his eyes were hidden behind soaked silver hair; no way to see where he was looking, or calculate where his next strike would fall.

If they were fighting Gintoki, Okita might have been to predict his target, might have been able to anticipate well enough to counter it, even if he couldn't equal that shocking speed. Sakata Gintoki, Okita knew, imperfectly, but well enough, the careless, carefree boss of the Yorozuya, with his amusing foibles and fascinating contradictions. Sakata Gintoki, who read Shounen Jump like he was still in junior high and could be bought off with a chocolate parfait, whose unkempt kimono and heavy-lidded eyes cloaked a core of honor and loyalty and compassion that Okita had only ever seen in one other man.

They weren't facing Gintoki now.

Beside Okita, Hijikata finally pushed himself up off the ground and back to his feet. "Lazy, Hijikata-san," Okita murmured, "lying around in the middle of a fight."

Hijikata wiped his sleeve across his mouth, smudging the blood-tinged rain dripping over his lips. "Shut up," he said, but the words stuttered a little as he panted.

Fighting alongside Hijikata was nothing new for Okita. Their skills were complementary, and they had years of experience with one another's swordsmanship; the truth was, they made an excellent combination, which Okita might have found irksome, except that Hijikata hated it. So of course Okita made a point of mentioning to Hijikata how good they were together, just to hear the vice-commander's teeth grind.

Tag-teaming a single man was different, though; fighting back-to-back against a horde of foes was one thing, but coordinating simultaneous attacks was a challenge, not anything they'd practiced before. Okita had wondered how they would do it, when they first stepped forward. Would they end up stepping on each other's toes and banging their swords together like a slapstick comedy duo? Would they have to take turns, standing in line like they were at the bank? Most importantly, if he happened to chop off one of Hijikata's arms in the heat of battle, would anyone believe him if afterwards he claimed it had been an accident?

Then Shiroyasha had charged him, and Okita stepped back and swung high, knowing Hijikata would be stabbing low, as certain of Hijikata's sword as he was of his own. Hijikata's katana might have been held in a third hand of Okita's, he was so sure of where it would be.

When he risked hooking his katana inside Shiroyasha's sword's serrated edge, he did so because he knew that Hijikata would bring his own katana down at the same time, jamming the flambard between their two blades, nearly wresting it from Shiroyasha's hands before he broke free. When Okita dodged instead of parried, retreating slow enough that the flambard's tip sliced through his sleeve and caught the skin beneath, he did so knowing that Hijikata would be striking from behind, in that brief window while Shiroyasha was focused on him.

And Okita had known, too, that Hijikata had reversed his sword, intending to dash the back of that silver-haired head with the pommel—known that Hijikata wouldn't be going for any lethal blow, any more than Okita himself was; knew that the only victory either of them would accept was the one where they all were still breathing afterwards.

It irritated Okita that he could know Hijikata that exactly, as if Hijikata's mind were overlapping with his own. What if it were contagious? Would he start obsessing over condiments? The only thing that would have softened the sting was knowing it bothered Hijikata more.

But when he spared a glance at his comrade in arms now, Okita couldn't make out Hijikata's expression through the mask of blood—he'd taken a cut near the hairline, shallow but bleeding as head wounds do. That wound pissed Okita off even more. Hijikata with blood smeared like finger paint all over his face, and he couldn't take the time to appreciate the sight—how terribly unfair.

Shiroyasha was still simply standing in the rain, sword raised, but motionless—waiting for their move? Playing with them, perhaps, like a cat with a pair of mice.

Okita didn't like being something other than the cat. He didn't like any of this.

He shifted his weight to the ball of his front foot, pressing his other knee into the ground. The last fall had twisted it badly, but the cold damp of the gravel seeping through his trousers numbed the worst of the ache. They should be taking advantage of the demon's inexplicable halt, should be taking the offensive, but strategy was hard when their lungs were clamoring for breath, louder than any thoughts.

"What's the son of a bitch doing?" Hijikata hissed.

Okita snorted at that. "What the hell is he doing any of this for?"

Hijikata beside him was still, sword unwavering and his breath restored to silence. "We know why," he said quietly.

The blood was still on Gintoki's kimono; the soaking rain wasn't enough to wash it off.

How could it have happened? How the hell could Kagura have been so clumsy, how could Shinpachi have been so irresponsible—how could they be gone?

If Okita said now, Let's bring these lizard freaks down, Hijikata would say, Bring it, and they'd turn together, align their swords with Shiroyasha's and bring justice to those who thought themselves above it, and Okita knew he would enjoy that so much more than this; it would feel so much more right than this.

Up until the Gekkon captain set off his bomb and blew the palace and half of Edo off the map. And if Shiroyashi made it through—and he probably would—the ambassador would die at the end of his flame-bladed sword, and then the Gekkon empire would come and take care of the other half of the city, and maybe the rest of the planet while they were at it.

Justice was such an empty, pathetic thing, next to power.

"It's useless," Okita said. "All of this, it's useless; it'll get him nothing, in the end."

"Aren't you a hypocrite," Hijikata said. "If Kondou-san were killed, wouldn't you be the first to swing your sword in vengeance?"

Okita glanced at him sidelong for a blink, before snapping his gaze back to Shiroyasha. "But then wouldn't you block my sword, Hijikata-san?"

"Idiot," Hijikata said, sliding his foot forward on the gravel, bracing to charge. "Who do you think would be at your back, cutting down anyone who'd try to stop you?"

He threw himself forward, and Okita was a step behind him but a step faster, so that they reached Shiroyasha simultaneously. Their swords fell diagonally, crossing in a giant slash awesome enough to have a stylish name, if they'd ever practiced such a combo before.

But Shiroyasha simply smashed his sword down, plowing through their cross—his raw strength was monstrous, almost as shocking as his unholy speed. Though perhaps he was tiring—or else he was distracted by whatever he had been listening for before; at any rate, though he spun to face them immediately, he hesitated in his counterattack.

Hijikata instantly retaliated with a flurry of short, wild strikes, his katana flickering between the raindrops as it whipped back and forth. Shiroyasha parried every hit, his flambard moving with spare, quick ease, and ended with a downward slash that could've shattered Hijikata's sword. Hijikata stepped back as he yanked his katana out of the way in time, but a serration of the rippled blade sliced across the back of his right hand, and Okita heard him grunt as his grip faltered.

But Gintoki's sword was still down. An opening—Okita stabbed forward with his triple thrust, fully extended, no strike pulled.

"Sougo!" Hijikata yelled.

Reprimanding him, Okita thought, his temper surging, that Hijikata would think he would lose control now, forget himself and go for the kill. His thrust might be lethal against a normal swordsman, but he struck now knowing that most of it would be blocked. If he could get but one strike through, wound the demon enough to slow his fearsome arm—

Too late did he realize that Hijikata's shout hadn't been a reproach but a warning—too late did he recall that Shiroyasha had seen this attack before, and what he had seen he could counter.

Adrenaline slowed time to a slideshow, so Okita saw the parry clearly, how Shiroyasha turned sideways so the first strike pierced his sleeve but not his flesh, and angled his sword diagonally to counter the second jab, crashing harmlessly against the broad of the blade. With the third, Shiroyasha brought the flambard up as he parried, so that Okita's katana skipped against the serrated edge and was nearly jerked from his hand.

Extended as he was for the strike, that wrench off-balanced Okita, and before he could find his footing again Shiroyasha had dropped low, sweeping one leg around into Okita's ankle to make him stumble. He tripped forward, caught himself with his left hand on the gravel, but his katana was in his right hand and Shiroyasha was on his left side and oh, this was going to hurt—though perhaps not for very long...

A heavy mass slammed into Okita, bowling him over onto the ground. He scrambled up, his katana's blade skating on the wet gravel, and blinked back the rain to see Hijikata standing over him, in front of Shiroyasha. Hijikata with his katana raised, but it hadn't been enough, not with his wounded hand, not to block the full force of the demon's sword.

Hijikata with his uniform jacket torn open and the white shirt underneath turning red, crimson soaking through the sopping silk, as he dropped to his knees and then curled over, like a plastic wrapper shriveling when thrown in a fire. Hijikata painted all over in his own blood and Okita couldn't enjoy it, couldn't laugh about it, couldn't breathe for the band suddenly tightening around his chest like an iron belt.

Somehow he could speak anyway. "Danna," Okita said, "you shouldn't have done that."

Because Gintoki wouldn't have wanted to do it, whatever Shiroyasha wanted. And because Okita now was fighting alone, and alone he had no chance of winning, not the way they'd been trying to win, not the way they'd wanted to win; but now he could not allow himself to lose.

Chapter Text

"So it wasn't the Gekkon who attacked you?" Yamazaki asked, trying to put it all together, but he kept coming up short.

"No, they did," Kagura corrected. "Those lizard jerks bit me—but it was the other guys who did that to Shinpachi. Though they didn't come after us, so maybe they were attacking the Gekkon, and we just got in the way."

"Yamazaki-san," Shinpachi said from where he was lying on his futon, "have you reached Hijikata-san or Kondou-san yet?"

"I'm still trying." Yamazaki checked his cell phone again and frowned. "It keeps going to voice mail." Kondou had probably let his phone's battery run out, as usual. But Hijikata always had his on, and on him—it was the one useful habit Tosshii had left him.

If the vice-commander were occupied now...

"I don't understand what's going on," Yamazaki said, scratching his head. "If the danna went to your apartment—even if everyone was gone by then, if he saw the mess and realized there'd been a fight, wouldn't he have gone looking for you guys first?"

"Yes, wouldn't he have called here?" Otae asked, coming in with another bowl of rice for Kagura—apparently improbable quantities of food were necessary to absorb the last of the venom in her system. "The office has a phone, doesn't it?"

"If Gin-san remembered to pay the bill this month, yes," Shinpachi said. "Though right now..." He gingerly sat up on the futon, one arm pressed over his bandages, and glanced at Kagura, who raised her head from her rice long enough to exchange a cryptic but definitely unhappy look with him.

"What?" Yamazaki asked.

"Gin-san's been...he hasn't been himself lately," Shinpachi said.

"...You can say that again," Yamazaki muttered.

Then regretted it as both Kagura and Shinpachi looked at him sharply. "Yamazaki-san, just what did Gin-san do?" Shinpachi asked. "Why are you here?"

"Shin-chan," Otae said, putting her hand on her little brother's shoulder, "don't get too worked up. With that injury you should be lying down." She turned to Yamazaki, smiling pleasantly. "Yamazaki-san, as I asked you before, please don't excite him."

Yamazaki couldn't decide if that smile reminded him more of Okita or a grizzly bear. He swallowed. "...Like I said, the danna came to see the Gekkon ambassador. And he was. Um. Insistent."

"Did you have to arrest Gin-chan?" Kagura asked, her mouth full. "Because he's got money stashed somewhere for us to bail him out, if you did."

"Actually I think he spent that money at last Jump Festa," Shinpachi muttered.

"They might've arrested him now," Yamazaki said. He hit Hijikata's speed dial on his phone yet again, put it to his ear to listen. "If they could..."

"Did he run away?" Kagura asked. "He's pretty fast, if he's trying not to get arrested."

"Not so much," Yamazaki said. Hijikata's voice snarled in his ear: "Leave a message or hang up, already." Voice mail again. And leaving too many messages was grounds for seppuku. He disconnected. "Last I saw him, he was trying to kill Captain Okita..."

Kagura shrugged. "Eh, that sadist probably had it coming."

But Shinpachi's eyes had gone round and huge. "Yamazaki-san...Gin-san wouldn't actually..."

"Of course he wouldn't actually," Kagura said. Then she looked at Shinpachi, swallowed and set down her rice bowl, still half-full. "Shinpachi, Gin-chan wouldn't—even if he's been—he wouldn't—"

"He had a sword," Yamazaki said. "That weird European sword, with the wavy edges and the diamond in the blade."

Shinpachi shoved off the futon to push himself to his feet. His face went bone-white and he staggered, but Kagura was already at his side, ducking under his arm to bear him up. "We've got to get over there, Yamazaki-san," Shinpachi gasped out.

"Shin-chan!" Otae said, taking his other arm. "Lie back down this instant—you can't go out in this weather, not in your condition."

"But, Ane-ue—"

"And you, too, Kagura-chan, you can barely walk in a straight line—sit down before you fall down and hurt yourself."

"Ane-go—"

"Kyuu-chan!" Otae shouted, holding onto both of them with more strength than her slender build would imply.

"Yes, Tae-chan?" Kyuubei called back from the kitchen. "I think the tamago-yaki is almost done, it's nearly the right shade of black—"

"Come in here and see Yamazaki-san out, he's causing a fuss."

"I'm very sorry," Yamazaki said, backing towards the door, "but it might help, if they—"

His cell phone trilled. Yamazaki grabbed it, but the number was unlisted. Not one of his superiors, then. "Hello, this is Yamazaki?"

The man on the other end was panting for breath; it made his voice hard to recognize, though it rang a faint bell. "The Shinsengumi inspector Yamazaki, yes?"

"That's me, what—"

"There's going to be an attempt on an ambassador's life. Someone you're supposed to be guarding, it seems. Right away, any time now."

"The Gekkon ambassador, yes, actually we know about that, he's already attacked—"

"Not Gintoki," the stranger said. "He's only a pawn, keeping you busy while another assassin is already on the estate grounds."

"On the estate? How do you know—"

"You must stop them. The assassin, and Gintoki, too—I can't reach there in time; I'm counting on you."

"Where'd you get this information?"

"That's not important, as long as you stop them.—Yes, yes, Elizabeth, I'll be done soon. I promise, I'll buy you a phone card to refill your minutes—"

"Who is this?" Yamazaki demanded. "Are you a regular informant?"

"Not an informant, it's Katsura!" the man on the other end snapped, and hung up.

Yamazaki opened his mouth, shut it again as he stared down at his phone in bafflement. "...I think I was just warned about an assassination attempt by Katsura Kotarou."

"Assassination?"

"The Gekkon ambassador—sounds like your boss is being the distraction, while someone else takes the ambassador's head." Yamazaki pocketed his phone. "I can't get through to Hijikata-san or anyone else; I've got to get over there now—"

"We've got to get over there," Shinpachi said resolutely.

"Sadaharu!" Kagura hollered, sticking her fingers in her mouth to issue a piercing whistle.

"Shin-chan," Otae said, "you can't—"

"We have to," Shinpachi said. He turned to look his sister directly in the eye, one of either the dumbest or bravest things Yamazaki had ever seen him, or any other man, do. "Ane-ue, I don't know what's going on, but it seems like Gin-san's in some kind of trouble. If I were in trouble, it wouldn't matter if Gin-san were hurt; he'd come help me anyway, you know he would. So we have to go help him."

"No." Some women would have been crying, Yamazaki thought, but Otae's eyes were dry, hard and every bit as resolute as her brother's. "Gin-san's a grown man, and he's as strong as any monster; he can take care of himself. Weren't you saying so just this morning, Shin-chan?"

"Ane-ue—"

"Kyuu-chan," Otae said flatly, "keep them here. Except for Yamazaki-san, of course."

"Yes, Tae-chan," Kyuubei said, planting herself in the doorway like a petite guardian statue.

"Ane-go," Kagura said, "don't worry." She put her hand on Otae's arm. "We'll come back, I promise. And we won't look as bad as when we showed up here earlier. But now we have to go."

The floor trembled underfoot, and Yamazaki heard a yip behind him just in time to flatten himself to the wall, clearing the way for the giant white dog that bounded into the room and bowled over Kyuubei like an inflatable bop bag. She popped right back up again, hand on her sword hilt but looking disconcerted, stymied as to how to properly challenge an enormous pointy-eared ball of white fluff.

Otae closed her eyes, exhaled. "Kyuu-chan," she said quietly, and Kyuubei nodded and stepped back as Otae slid open the doors to the porch, letting in a damp breeze. "You better come back," she said. "And with that silver-haired idiot, too."

Kagura was already helping Shinpachi astride the dog's big back; then she jumped up after him and reached a hand out to Yamazaki. "Do you like dogs, 'Zaki?"

"Well, yes," Yamazaki said, "but won't three be too heavy, and besides there's a squad car waiting outside, so we don't have to—aayii!" his argument concluded, as Kagura grabbed his wrist and hauled him onboard, and Sadaharu took off like a canine rocket, bounding out over the wall and onto the rainy streets.

Hijikata thought he must be going insane.

At first he'd thought he was dead—Gintoki's sword was coming down, and Sougo wasn't going to recover from his stumble in time, and there hadn't been time to think, only to act.

After that, hearing the voices of the dead welcoming him, it wasn't so surprising. He'd thought he might have heard something before, over the rain, but lying on the ground, staring into the blackness behind his eyelids with cold, wet gravel stopping up one ear, the whispers were clearer. "Keep going." "Please, for us."

It was weird, though; if he'd thought about it, Hijikata would have expected other voices. His mother's he doubted he'd recognize anyway. But Mitsuba...no, he wouldn't deserve that. Itou, however—if anyone came, he would have thought it would be Itou. Or any of the many other men he had cut down, looking for a second chance.

But no, it was the junior Yorozuya in his ears, Kagura and Shinpachi murmuring—accusing him, perhaps, that he hadn't been able to do a damn thing in the end, for them or for their boss. I'm sorry, Hijikata tried to tell them, I'm so damn sorry, except when he tried to speak, the mere twitch of his jaw sent agony shooting through his shoulder and chest, like they'd been electrocuted and then set on fire.

That made no sense—how the hell did a dead man feel pain? The least he could get out of being a corpse was some peace and relaxation. But no, this hurt; and it hurt even more when someone's hands rolled him over and pressed against his chest, digging his spine into the wet gravel underneath him.

"Come on, Toushi, just hang in there, you're gonna be okay—"

"K-kondou-san?" Hijikata tried to say—he choked on the words and started coughing, which hurt that much worse, but was further evidence to counter the whole being dead hypothesis.

When he forced open his eyes, Kondou's face was hanging over him, and his grin was undeniable proof. "Toushi," the commander said, "there you are," as if Hijikata had been going anywhere, what with being halfway to sliced in two.

So, alive—except apparently insane, because he could still hear the voices of the dead. "Just one more, Gin-san, just get past him, and then no one will stop you..."

"Who the hell is that?" Hijikata demanded. "What's going on?"

Kondou's smile slipped, his expression tightening into an un-Kondou-like mask. "Sougo's fighting the Yorozuya."

Over the patter of rain and those nonsensical whispers, Hijikata could hear the ringing clash of swords, the crunch of boots on gravel—"No," he protested, "he can't—" Okita was good, damn good; but his opponent was a monster. And Sougo was injured, cut and bruised and exhausted by now, and even the two of them had barely been holding their own. Hijikata sucked in his breath and shoved himself up sitting—do it fast enough and the pain was over that much quicker, and Kondou's hand on his shoulder helped.

He squinted through the slanting gray rain at the fighters—Okita versus the Shiroyasha, the sadist supreme versus the legendary white demon. It was difficult to tell one swordsman from the other, so fast were they moving, revolving around one another in a lethal orbit as their blades flashed in glittering arcs, slicing through the raindrops and crashing against one another as they struck and parried and struck again.

Okita was the fastest swordsman in the Shinsengumi—probably the best in all of Edo, aliens and inhuman monsters aside. And Hijikata had fought Okita countless times, had fought beside him nearly as many, but he'd never seen Okita move with that kind of power or speed. A match for the demon.

Almost a match. Okita was being forced back. It wasn't an obvious retreat, with the two of them circling each other, swords flashing like strobe lights. But it was Shiroyasha who stepped forward as Okita stepped back, and Okita's katana was parrying more than striking out.

The first squad was watching along with the rest of the Shinsengumi, standing in the rain in a wide ring around the battle. Not interfering—at this speed trying to come between the fighters was likely to get them skewered, on Okita's blade as easily as Shiroyasha's. And maybe none of them could tell how close their captain was to losing. "Kondou-san," Hijikata said.

"Yes," Kondou said, and nodded to Harada, standing behind them.

Harada had a rocket launcher, probably from Okita's personal armory. He looked about as pleased holding it as Okita would be pleased to see him holding it, and Kondou looked a fair sight unhappier than that. But Kondou knew Sougo, better than anyone, and he could see how this fight was going.

But damn it, wasn't that denying the whole point of this exercise? The Yorozuya voices were still hissing in his ears, softly accusing. "Kondou-san, we can't," Hijikata rasped out, struggling to sit further up, to get his legs under him and stand, though the damn limbs didn't want to cooperate. His fingers scrabbled in the gravel, seeking his sword—had to be around him somewhere; he'd had it when he fell, even if he'd blocked more with bone than with steel. "This isn't—we're swordsmen, not terrorists, and he—what he's fighting for—"

Kondou, looking to Harada, turned back to Hijikata, and his grave face changed, the uncharacteristic mask relaxing into familiar determination. "You're right, Toushi," he said. "It'd be disrespecting him, and them, too, to try to end it like that." He squeezed Hijikata's shoulder—Hijikata suppressed a yelp of pain—then let go as he stood up, back straight and tall.

'Disrespecting' wasn't quite the word Hijikata had been thinking, and besides, where did Kondou think he was going—"Kondou-san?" Hijikata said, realizing his miscalculation too late. Kondou was the sort of commander who wouldn't ask anything of his men that he wouldn't do himself, even if it was something he couldn't do—not that Kondou wasn't a samurai, and a powerful swordsman, but he wasn't a demon. Not to mention, oh yeah, he didn't actually have a sword right now—"Kondou-san—"

Kondou ignored him, striding toward the combatants as he hollered, "Sougo! Tag out—it's my turn!"

Okita paid him no attention. Even though it was his commander speaking, he couldn't have listened if he'd wanted to; every last iota of his awareness was focused on his opponent, on Shiroyasha and his flame-bladed sword, on a battle so furiously fast that a single misstep could cost him his head.

"Sougo!" Kondou shouted, waving his arms, "Go tend to Toushi!"

"Kondou-san—!" Hijikata hollered, before his idiot commander got another step closer and got his hand lopped off—if he were lucky, and when were they ever that lucky—and Okita's head turned fractionally toward them, finally registering his commander's presence.

It was a fraction too much; Okita's sword caught Shiroyasha's next blow at the wrong angle, taking the full force of the hit instead of deflecting it. If Okita hadn't been injured, he might have been able to withstand it; but his knee buckled under the strain, nearly dropping him to the ground, and his next attempt to parry got him smashed him aside like a rag doll before Shiroyasha's relentless ferocity.

Behind him, Hijikata heard the Shinsengumi troops gasp in shock—the bastards better have gasped even louder when he'd gone down, Hijikata thought with irritation—and Harada asked urgently, "Vice-Commander? I have a clear—"

Then Kondou stepped in the way of the shot—maybe accidentally, maybe not. Stepping before Shiroyasha's sword, though, stepping between him and Okita—that wasn't an accident. "Yorozuya," the commander said, arms uselessly raised, defenseless against the demon, "cut this out!"

Chapter Text

Inugami Express was not going to make Yamazaki's list of preferred transportation options anytime soon. On the other hand, it was one of the fastest routes through Edo's rush hour, as Sadaharu took both streets and sidewalks with a grand lack of concern for traffic regulations, and at gridlocked intersections simply leapt from car roof to car roof at Kagura's encouragement. Yamazaki just held on, and distracted himself by alternating between mentally composing letters of apology and mentally editing his notice of resignation from the Shinsengumi.

Until then, however, he had a job to do. The auxiliary palace's impressive south gate was intended for imperial use only, currently sealed off since the emperor was unlikely to be visiting Edo anytime soon. But it had a smaller side entrance for the rest of his entourage, and that was presently usable, as its lock had been jimmied. The door opened onto a covered walkway that led to the servant's quarters adjacent to the central palace; it was Yamazaki's best guess as to how the Gekkon sentries had gotten by him.

No guards stopped them as they crossed from the walkway to the palace—staying out of the driving rain, or maybe everyone was busy with the situation at the front gate. Yamazaki tried his radio, but got only static on all frequencies—jamming signal, most likely, an indispensable tool for any accomplished assassin.

In the palace's antechamber they found the third troop of the Shinsengumi idly playing cards. The men sprang up when Sadaharu burst in, fumbling for their swords, but Yamazaki jumped off the inugami's back, waving his hands reassuringly. "No, no, we're here to help. Captain Saitou, where's the Gekkon ambassador?"

"Holed up inside, as usual," Saitou said, pointing a thumb at the inharmonious steel-reinforced doors barricading off the guest quarters. "No apes allowed, they say. And I don't get why we have to be cooped up in here instead of where the action is; it's not like anyone's going to be getting through those doors any time—"

"AMBASSADOR!" With a booming clang and crunch, the steel reinforcements folded like a paper fan under the force of Kagura's kick.

"—soon," Captain Saitou finished with a gulp.

"Kagura-chan," Shinpachi reprimanded from Sadaharu's back, "you could have tried knocking first."

Behind the door, the Gekkon were gaping at the rude intrusion, tails twitching and yellow eyes bulging—not soldiers, but the gentry and servants of the diplomatic entourage. Yamazaki bobbed an automatic bow of apology, scanning their scaly heads for the ambassador's distinctive indigo eye-ridges. "I don't see him here..."

Kagura was more direct. "Where's your ambassador guy? Any of you him?"

"Is he resting in his room? Or could he have gone for a walk?" Shinpachi asked.

"Or to the bathroom?" Kagura suggested. The servants averted their yellow eyes; the gentry blushed violet throughout their scales.

"That's it—this way!" Yamazaki said, sprinting for the main privy—a luxurious and thoroughly modernized arrangement, with plenty of vents and alcoves to hide in. An ideal ambush site.

They burst through the bathroom doors to find a Gekkon bending over the long marble sink, yellow-trimmed robes and blue scales over his eyes, blinking at them. "That's him!" Yamazaki said, as the Gekkon ambassador frowned at them, his lipless mouth opening in protest.

Before he got out any exclamation, however, the stall door at the far end banged open, and a woman in a short red kimono wielding two not-so-short revolvers hurtled out. She had the guns aimed and ready and was pulling the triggers by the time the door crashed against its hinges, but Kagura and Shinpachi both were faster. Kagura dove in front of the guns, pitching her umbrella open, while Shinpachi threw himself at the ambassador, knocking him to the floor.

The first shot cleared Kagura's umbrella and shattered the mirror where the ambassador's head had been half a second before. The rest of the bullets, however, bounced off the parasol's implausibly strong silk, chipping the marble as they ricocheted but doing no harm. Kagura grinned fiercely, twirling the umbrella. "You want to take another shot, or just give up now?"

"Tch," said the blonde gunslinger, "so you're still alive. I knew Takechi-senpai shouldn't have taken that job; can't trust that lolicon to manage anything by himself."

"You're not managing any better here," Kagura snapped back.

"What is going on here?" croaked the Gekkon ambassador from where he was sprawled on the bathroom tile under Shinpachi. "What are you apes doing? I demand you rise and free me!"

"You're Kijima Matako, aren't you?" Yamazaki cried at the woman. "You're under arrest!"

"Er, I'm very sorry, Ambassador-san," Shinpachi said, trying to crawl off the lizard and getting a tail-whip across the cheek for his trouble, "it's just, you were going to get shot—"

"Okay, this is getting crowded," the Crimson Bullet said, and unloaded her pistols in a rapid-fire double volley, one at Kagura, the other at the ambassador's head.

Kagura was too quick, however; she ducked the shots aimed at her, letting them carve a bow into the wall behind her, and whirled out her umbrella to deflect the others. When she lowered the parasol, however, Kijima was nowhere in sight, and the bathroom stall door was shut.

"Hold it right there!" Kagura said, kicking down the door, but Kijima was gone. An open ventilation shaft over the toilet made it clear where to.

Kagura would have climbed right in after her, but Shinpachi objected, "Kagura-chan, don't—you couldn't fit your umbrella in there, and she still has her guns—"

"It's just bullets," Kagura argued back, but she stepped down off the toilet.

"What's going on?" Captain Saitou pushed his way through the door, shoving aside Sadaharu's furry tail. The rest of his squad filled the hall behind him, swords ready. "We heard gunfire—"

"Captain Saitou, send your men out on the grounds, and get word to Commander Kondou," Yamazaki ordered around the inugami's bulk. "Kijima Matako of the Kiheitai is here, armed and dangerous—and don't bother with the radios, they're jammed, send the messages in person—"

"We're on it!" The captain spun back around on his heel, setting off down the hall shouting orders to his squad.

The Gekkon ambassador tried to edge around Sadaharu to follow him. "Um, Ambassador-san, you should stay here, where it's safer," Shinpachi said, grabbing the Amanto lord's arm to stop him.

"Who are you people?" the ambassador demanded, yanking his arm free. "Laying a commoner's hand on my personage—knocking me to a dirty floor! You two aren't even in uniform! You—" and he gestured at Yamazaki with a skinny, scaly talon, "—you're one of those Shinsengumi people, aren't you? I demand you arrest these two—two whatever they are—"

"Us? We're the Yorozuya Gin-chan," Shinpachi said.

"We do anything," Kagura added, poking the ambassador in the chest with a far too familiar finger. "Right now that means saving your scaly tail!"

"Don't worry, sir," Yamazaki said, "their rates are pretty reasonable; you'll be able to afford them."

"So you're welcome," Kagura said, then suddenly swayed. "Whoa, dizzy," she said, and might have fallen if Sadaharu hadn't nuzzled her upright with his nose.

"That venom's not all out of your system yet, Kagura-chan," Shinpachi said. "You have to take it easy."

Kagura stuck her tongue out at him. "At least I'm not fish-belly-white—you look like a ghost!"

"I'm fine," Shinpachi said, but he was leaning heavily on the sink, and Kagura hadn't exaggerated the color of his face.

"You both should take it easy," Yamazaki said, putting his arm around Shinpachi's shoulders to help him up, and hoping as he did that he wouldn't be sent to the Shimura residence looking for the commander any time soon—he wouldn't want to face Otae after sending her brother back in this condition.

The Gekkon ambassador took the opportunity to try to duck out again, but Kagura said, "Sadaharu!" and the dog yipped, put his paws on the lizard's shoulders and swallowed the Amanto dignitary's head. The ambassador might have protested, but it was muffled by the inugami's massive jaws.

"Kagura-chan," Shinpachi reproached. "Sadaharu, stop eating the Ambassador-san."

"Mnnmm mmphmm mpph!" complained the Gekkon lord, his clawed feet scraping on the bathroom tile as he struggled to extract his head from between Sadaharu's teeth.

On the other hand, he'd never have to face Otae if he were already dead. "It is so going to be seppuku for me," Yamazaki remarked, trying to pry the dog's mouth open.

Kagura made no effort to help. "This is the guy Gin-chan was looking for, right?" she asked, entirely unrepentant.

"Good point," Shinpachi said, quitting his fruitless tugging at Sadaharu's collar. "What does Gin-san want with him, Yamazaki-san? Why'd he even come here—and where's Gin-san now? We have to find him—what you said before, about him trying to kill Okita-san—"

"Maybe not kill, exactly," Yamazaki backtracked. "I mean, Captain Okita can take care of himself. And the danna..."

"Hey, you!" Kagura wrenched the ambassador out of her dog's mouth and grabbed his collar in both fists, to shout in his face, "What'd you do to Gin-chan?"

"Gi-Gin who?" stammered the ambassador. His eyes were bulging in a manner unseemly even for a lizard, and his head was liberally coated with dog slobber, though Yamazaki supposed it could be considered lucky that it had stayed attached to his neck.

"Kagura-chan," Shinpachi said, "let's go find Gin-san and ask him ourselves—if he's still in trouble, and with Kijima-san out there—"

"Right!" Kagura said. "Come on, let's go!" and she headed out the door, dragging the Gekkon empire's honored ambassador along after her.

"Yorozuya," Kondou said, standing in front of Okita, empty-handed before Shiroyasha, "cut this out."

Shiroyasha brought his sword down like a hammer, adept and unhesitating, as if he hadn't even noticed the man beneath it had changed. Kondou, without a blade to block with, kept his arms raised and didn't even cringe.

"Kondou-san!" Hijikata yelled, surging to his feet and to hell with the pain, as Okita's mouth opened in the same shout.

Shiroyasha's sword stopped, close enough to Kondou's neck that Hijikata couldn't tell through the rain if the serrated blade were touching the skin or not.

"Yeah," Kondou said. His voice was sure, as steady as Shiroyasha's blade. "You're still a samurai, after all—you aren't going to cut down an unarmed man."

"Kondou-san," Okita said, and it was probably only exhaustion that made his voice so shaky.

"My turn, Sougo. You take a break, go make sure Toushi doesn't bleed out," Kondou said, not glancing at Okita but staring into Shiroyasha's face, like it was no great thing to meet his demon eyes. "Yorozuya—you can't fight me if I won't fight you; that's not your way. Even now. But I'm not going to let you pass, so stop this."

But Shiroyasha wasn't looking back at him. He saw them when they fought, saw every move they made, but he never looked at them, or at anything really there. And Kondou couldn't hear the voices whispering with the rain. "Bring down the stupid gorilla and get this over with, Gin-chan!" "Come on, Gin-san, you're almost there..."

"Kondou-san, he's not—"

Shiroyasha moved like a bolt of electricity, like current arcing between two points, nothing and then motion, too fast for the eye to follow. Kondou had no chance to dodge or duck or even flinch—one moment he was standing before the silver-haired man; the next he was flying through the air over his shoulder.

"That's even better a trajectory than yours, Hijikata-san," Okita turned his head back toward Hijikata to remark, about as dry as anyone could manage in the rain. "Oh, and vice-commanders shouldn't bleed so much; your uniform is quite the mess." He turned his head back and raised Kondou's sword before him as Shiroyasha continued walking forward.

"Like yours is any better," Hijikata said, concentrating to muster the reserves to stand—he had his sword; as long as he could get himself upright he could manage.

"Sougo! Toushi! I told you, this is my turn!"

Kondou, improbably, had contrived not to get his head bashed open on the gravel—had managed to catch himself, maybe been expecting it, after Hijikata's flight before; or else his skull was hard enough not to take damage, thanks to Otae's resistance training. Either way, their commander was conscious—bleeding from a scratch across the temple and with his left arm tucked against his side in a pained way, but he was standing.

"Yorozuya," he shouted, "turn back and face me! Oi! Yorozuya!"

Shiroyasha stopped. His sword was in his right hand at his side. "Don't call me that," he said. "Don't call me that anymore."

"Forget about him, Gin-chan," the voices were murmuring, just barely audible. "Don't forget why you're here, Gin-san..."

"Who the hell is that?" Hijikata muttered, giving his head a shake, as if those phantom voices were water he could dislodge from his ears.

"Hijikata-san?" Okita said.

Not ghosts—he didn't believe in ghosts, damn it. Maybe it was the blood loss? But why would his hallucinations be addressing Sakata instead of him? And why would Shiroyasha's head be cocked, just slightly, as if he were listening to them?

"We can't let you do this," Kondou was saying. "We can't let you get to the ambassador, no matter how much the bastard might deserve it—we Shinsengumi have to protect Edo, and if this guy goes down, then even we couldn't save Edo from his emperor's wrath." So Kondou had finally grasped the politics after all, Hijikata realized with some surprise. "You don't want that, Sakata; you don't want this city to burn."

"Don't listen to him, Gin-chan, just keep going forward..."

"Since when have I ever cared about Edo?" Shiroyasha said, not looking back at Kondou, still facing Hijikata and Okita. "I'm not in your Shinsengumi—since when have I ever cared about this country, or an Amanto's wrath, or anything like that?"

"Since when have you not?" Kondou roared. "I've never seen you fight for anything but Edo—for the people who live here, and what the hell else is a city, besides the people who live in it? Since when have you not cared about everyone here, everyone you know—who the hell are you, if you're not a samurai who'll do anything to protect the people he decides to protect? Except for now—you're not saving anyone now, so why are you doing this?"

Shiroyasha's head lifted slightly, his face unreadable under the wet silver bangs plastered over his forehead.

"That stupid piece of costume jewelry isn't your sword, Sakata," Kondou said. "And this—what you're doing now, this isn't what your sword is for."

But the voices were still whispering—"Ignore him, Gin-san, this government dog doesn't have anything important to say..."

"A dog can't pick up a bucket, so it will just bark and keep on barking when its house is burning down," Shiroyasha said, his even voice a parody of his usual lazy indifference. "You government dogs keep barking because there's nothing else you can do to stop me." He brought up his sword, hilt grasped in both hands as he strode forward, advancing on them.

Okita set his stance, knuckles white around his katana's hilt and his face as impassive as the demon's.

"It's not them," Hijikata gasped out, panting for breath enough to speak out loud. "It sounds like their voices, Sakata, but that's not them."

"Hijikata," Okita hissed, "I told you to stop bleeding so much—!"

But Shiroyasha stopped again, and for a second Hijikata thought those blank eyes might have met his.

"Don't listen to him, Gin-chan—"

"I don't know what happened to Shinpachi or Kagura," Hijikata said. It took everything he had left to pull his spine straight and glare into Shiroyasha's empty gaze. "And maybe they'd follow you here—hell, I bet they would if they could—but that's not them now. Those voices, that's not anything that they'd say."

"Forget about him, Gin-san, just keep going forward—"

"Hijikata-san," Okita said, with an odd note of perhaps impatience, "what the hell are you—"

From behind Shiroyasha Kondou spoke up, with the vast, sincere conviction that only he could manage, "Toushi's right, Sakata—Shinpachi-kun and the China girl wouldn't want this. Whatever happened to them, whatever the ambassador and his sentries did—the two of them, they'd never want you to do this."

"He doesn't know what he's talking about, Gin-chan; that gorilla didn't really know us—"

"He doesn't care, Gin-san, he just wants to stop you—"

There was a rushing, ringing noise in Hijikata's ears, and the edges of his vision were going dark—preludes to unconsciousness, he recognized. Strange how he could still hear their voices, though, even louder now, and clearer. He said over them, "They're right, we didn't know them like you do—so you should know, better than us, that this isn't them."

Gintoki was motionless. As difficult as his apathetic affect usually was to read, now Hijikata couldn't even see the apathy.

"They wouldn't want this," Kondou said quietly. "Maybe they wouldn't care about what would happen to Edo, and maybe they wouldn't care about us; I don't know. But I know that they wouldn't want you to do this. If you do this, if you keep down this path, using this sword, eventually you'll pay for it. That's the only place this ends; that's all vengeance is, in the end—it's only ever death. And those two, they'd never want that for you."

"Just keep walking, Gin-san—"

"No," Shiroyasha said quietly. He put his foot forward, and then the next—a strange motion, as measuredly level as a machine. "They don't want anything now. Or at least they shouldn't, should they."

"Just ignore them, Gin-chan—"

The diamond set in the flambard's serrated blade glittered as he raised the sword, haloed by the sprinkling rain. "Though maybe they do anyway," Shiroyasha said. "Maybe what they want—"

His walk turned into a lunge so smoothly that Hijikata scarcely registered it, that the measured approach was suddenly an attack, the demon bearing down on them. Okita's reflexes were as fast as ever, though; he was there before Hijikata, sword ready.

"That's right, Gin-san—"

"You can do it, Gin-chan—"

"—is for you—"

Shiroyasha didn't hesitate or change his course; he swung his sword up to engage Okita's, while at the same time shifting his weight to sweep one foot around in a roundhouse kick that cracked across Okita's injured knee and brought him down. Then Shiroyasha was on Hijikata, and Hijikata dragged up his katana. His arms were trembling, and his vision had narrowed to a tunnel, blackness closing around the silver samurai's glittering silver blade. The buzzing in his ears was like a hornet's nest.

"For us, Gin-san—"

"For us, Gin-chan—"

"—to SHUT UP!" Shiroyasha cried, and brought his sword crashing down against Hijikata's, close to the hilt, jarring his arms up through his shoulders. Searing pain flashed through Hijikata's chest at the impact, and he stumbled back, blinking furiously, fighting to dispel the hornets and the blackness, trying to find his balance on the wet gravel and brace himself for the next attack.

Except there wasn't one. Shiroyasha only stood there, mere paces away, holding the sword in both hands. The falling rain spattered on the blade, tiny pings as each droplet hit the steel and the diamond.

The fractured diamond, Hijikata saw, white cracks splintering the crystal, clouding its clear planes like mist.

The voices were gone, he realized a second later, as abruptly silent as if a plug had been pulled.

Shiroyasha lowered the sword, slowly. Inhaled—Hijikata could see his shoulders rise—and looked around himself, to his left and to his right, as if he were expecting to see something there besides the rain.

"Ah," he said at last. "I guess you had a point."

His fingers opened, so the sword dropped from them, chiming dully as its blade skipped once on the gravel before coming to rest. Gintoki exhaled and tipped back his head, tilting his face up to the clouds, shutting his eyes against the rain. The water ran in rivulets down his cheeks, pink-tinged—he'd taken a few cuts after all.

Hijikata exhaled, too, and let himself drop to his knees—it hurt like hell, but when he lowered his head and breathed deeply the annoying buzzing subsided a bit.

Gravel crunched like breaking eggshells under the boots of many men. Hijikata looked around to see the Shinsengumi troops cautiously closing in, led by Harada. He'd exchanged the rocket launcher for a pair of handcuffs, his katana ready in his other hand. "Vice-commander, we can take him into custody—"

"No!" Kondou shouted, and Okita limped forward with Kondou's katana drawn and a gleam in his eye bright enough that the men immediately fell back.

"You might as well," Gintoki said, not opening his eyes, but he held out his empty hands, palms up, wrists together.

"Eh, why bother," Kondou said, coming up beside him. "You'd just get off with a temporary insanity plea anyway. We'd all vouch for it, right, Toushi, Sougo?"

"Temporary," Gintoki said, with a catch that in another universe might have passed for a laugh.

"Yoro—Sakata," Kondou said, his own voice catching. Hijikata could see how much his commander wanted to reach out, wanted to ask him what had really happened, wanted to vow that they would get justice somehow. Wanted if nothing else to put his hand on Gintoki's shoulder and remind him that he was not alone.

Hijikata knew how much it cost Kondou to refrain, but he did—it was something Kondou understood, for everything else that passed him by, how there were things that no one, no matter how powerful or perceptive or passionate, could put right.

Chapter Text

Captain Saitou had already mobilized the other available squads; the auxiliary palace grounds were flooded with Shinsengumi searching, from up on the rooftops to down under the porches. Against the promenade's pale gravel, the men were dark silhouettes, outlined on occasion by the beam of a passing flashlight—the rain was lessening to a drizzling mist, but behind the clouds the sun was setting, dimming the sky and sinking the mist into obscure shadows.

Yamazaki would have hurried ahead, but he was helping Shinpachi along, the boy leaning against him but still defiantly on his own two feet. Yamazaki peered at each shadowy figure they passed, but didn't spot Commander Kondou's spiky hair, and the dripping rain would smother any smoke signals from Vice-Commander Hijikata's cigarettes. He didn't see the Yorozuya danna, either, though his silver hair should show up through the twilight—maybe they'd arrested Gintoki, taken him away?

Behind Yamazaki and Shinpachi, the Gekkon ambassador was screeching nonstop as he struggled to free himself from the tight grip Kagura had on his collar. "Unhand me! Shinsengumi, I demand to see your commander at once; you'll pay for this indignity!" he hollered as she dragged him along, flanked by Sadaharu.

"Yamazaki-san," Shinpachi said, short of breath and ignoring the racket behind them, "about Gin-san—"

"Don't worry, Shinpachi-kun, it'll be fine." They were nearly to the main gate. "As soon as the danna sees you guys—I hope, anyway—"

As they passed the gatehouse on the corner, the Gekkon legion captain in his green-striped uniform came around the bend, leading a troop of his men, all ragged and rather the worse for wear—uniforms ripped and most were limping, and a few were missing various lengths of tail. "Captain Eublepharin," shrieked the ambassador upon spotting them, "seize these ruffians!"

"Lord Ambassador?" the captain cried. "Where are the sentries—why aren't they stopping this outrage? Get your dirty hands off our lord, apes! Soldiers, to me!"

"Kagura-chan," Shinpachi said urgently as he and Yamazaki were backed up against the gatehouse's plaster wall, gulping as he peered around at the Amanto surrounding them. Though their laser pistols might have been broken, their talons and teeth were quite intact. "Maybe you could let him go..."

Kagura opened her fist, releasing the ambassador. "We were just trying to keep him safe," she said, folding her arms and glaring back at the legion troops.

"'Safe'!" the ambassador huffed, attempting to straighten his robes, disarrayed from the dragging and now soggy with rain. "I've never received such treatment—"

"It's true, sir," Yamazaki said, leaving Shinpachi leaning against the wall to stand before him, hand on his sword's hilt. Protecting the ambassador was important, obviously, but that would be that much easier if he could keep the Yorozuya intact. "And we're sorry for the treatment, but if you'd just—"

"We didn't—we didn't mean the ambassador-san any harm!" Shinpachi gasped, shying back from the claws reaching around Yamazaki. "There's an assassin—we were protecting him, honest! We swear it on, um—on the shells of our mothers and fathers and grandparents...or however that went—"

"You swear it on the shells of all your mothers?" the Gekkon captain said, asynchronously blinking his yellow eyes. He turned to the ambassador. "My lord, do you deny their oath?"

"Well," the ambassador said crankily, "they could've been more courteous in their 'protection'."

"But they're only crude apes, after all, sir," the captain said. He brought down his arm in a decisive gesture, and his troops obediently lowered their own talons and closed their sharp-toothed jaws. "And if there's an assassin, perhaps we ought to be hunting them—"

"Oi, what's going on here?"

Yamazaki felt a stab of unexpected relief, like realizing a presumed bloodstain was in fact only strawberry jam. "Commander Kondou!"

"Yamazaki?"

Yamazaki shouldered through the gathered Gekkon to meet his commander coming up the path. "What are you doing back?" Kondou demanded. "And what's this about an assassin on the grounds? Oh, hey, Ambassador."

"It's okay, Kondou-san, it's just a little misunderstanding," Yamazaki said. "—Okay, a big one. And not the assassin; Kijima Matako's really here—"

Behind him, Sadaharu yapped as if in confirmation. "Is that the Yorozuya's—" Kondou started to ask. Then he stopped, put his hand on Yamazaki's shoulder to push him out of the way. The Gekkon troops were dispersing to join the Shinsengumi's hunt, leaving Kondou staring at Sadaharu now revealed behind them—no, staring at the two kids standing beside their dog.

"Right, yes," Yamazaki said, "that's part of the misunderstanding; turns out they made it after all—"

"Shinpachi-kun? Kagura-chan? You—you're—" Kondou swallowed hard, and for a humiliating second Yamazaki thought his commander was going to start bawling right there in the rain—but instead Kondou drew himself up straight, a rare gravity settling over his features, squaring the line of his jaw. He stepped back past the gatehouse wall, called into the foggy gloom, "Get over here! Hurry up!"

"Just so you know, Hijikata-san's not going to be any help with an assassin," Okita's voice called back.

"Like you'd be much better, with that leg," Hijikata said, but it was a breathless, feeble shade of his usual snarl.

"Hijikata-san?" Yamazaki asked, looking down the promenade toward the plodding shadow which approached, a bizarre hunchbacked beast treading unevenly on the gravel.

The timed grounds lights finally came on, the electric-wired lanterns hung from the eaves glowing to life through the evening's growing darkness, turning the rain into a cloud of golden glitter. Yamazaki squinted through that scattered illumination, and the beast resolved into Hijikata, leaning heavily on Okita—or else Okita was leaning on him; the captain was hobbling on one leg, but Hijikata was stumbling more than walking at all, his uniform torn and bloody.

"Hijikata-san—!" Yamazaki said in alarm and started over to them, only to hesitate.

In the shadows behind them, the lantern light picked out another shape, a pallid figure, like a white ghost through the mist. Pale cloth, pale head—Gintoki's shoulders were bowed, soaked yukata draped and clinging to their slumped curve, and his head was hanging down, his eyes hidden beneath his dripping silver hair. He wasn't limping, but every step he took seemed uncertain, lurching, as if once he lifted his boot he didn't have the strength left to place a step, but simply let it drop. Not injury so much as exhaustion: a man still walking only because he was too weary to think to stop.

He didn't have the sword, Yamazaki observed, no crystal facets or scalloped blade glittering in the light; he looked too tired to bear it anyway.

"Danna," Yamazaki began, and behind him Kondou started to say, "Yorozuya," but they were both drowned out by a loud bark.

Yipping excitedly, Sadaharu bounded forward, nearly knocking over Hijikata and Okita, and Gintoki had barely managed to lift his head when the giant dog plowed into him, flattening him to the ground and then standing over him, tongue hanging out and tail wagging.

Gintoki pushed himself up off the gravel, slowly and with the careful step-by-step motion of someone whose whole body hurt, first sitting up, then levering himself to his knees. "Hey," he said, softly enough that Yamazaki could only just hear him through the fizzing of the rain, "so you made it after all," and he dropped one hand to the dog's head, scratched behind his ears.

"Gin-chan?" Kagura said, and "Gin-san?" Shinpachi said, both of them coming forward beside Yamazaki.

Gintoki's hand paused on Sadaharu's head, his entire body gone rigid but for one shudder that ran through his shoulders. His head was still down, face in shadow.

"Eh?" Hijikata said, gaping at the pair of them.

"Oh," Okita replied, his eyes just as wide.

"But I broke it," Gintoki said. "I broke it, didn't I; I broke it and they went away, because that's what they would have wanted, even if I didn't...so I broke it, and they were gone—"

"Gin-chan?" Kagura said again, taking a step toward him.

Gintoki shook his head, once, a sharp, almost irritated turn. "I already broke the damn sword—"

"Yorozuya," Kondou said, unusually soft but unshakable as ever, "it's not the sword this time."

Gintoki turned his head once more in denial. "They were—I saw them; they were—"

"Whatever you saw before, that could have been the damn sword," Hijikata said. "This isn't. ...Maybe? Shit, I don't know..."

"Oh, you're a great help, Hijikata-san," Okita murmured.

"Gin-san?" Shinpachi was paler than ever and his voice was more unsteady than his boss's. "What—what did you see? Why'd you come here, why'd you—"

"Hey, did you kick the super sadist's ass, Gin-chan?" Kagura interrupted. "You shouldn't have—it was my turn, I called dibs, and now I'll have to wait until he's healed up—"

"Kagura-chan," Shinpachi hissed, elbowing her, "now's not the time for that, and anyway you can't go calling dibs on government officers—"

"What about on diplomatic guys? Because I've totally got dibs on those sentry jerks, too—though we got the ambassador here for you, if you want him—

"Diplomatic envoys are even worse!"

"Gin-chan, Shinpachi's too boring even for a straight man—"

"Gin-san, Kagura-chan is going to get us all arrested—"

In the light-drenched mist and shadows, Yamazaki didn't quite see the Yorozuya danna move, or even see for sure that it was he who reached up, and not the other two who fell forward instead. But somehow instead of standing before him they were kneeling with him on the gravel, their arms around him and his around their shoulders, pulling them as close as he could, and all their heads together, the crown of Gintoki's head resting atop Kagura's and Shinpachi's, and the rain running down over their hair to mingle silver strands with red and black.

"Gin-chan," Kagura said after a moment, muffled, "Gin-chan, you're shaking—"

"We're all soaking wet," Shinpachi said, "we should get inside and dry off before we catch cold—" He punctuated this sense with a sneeze and a whimper of pain.

"Shinpachi!" Kagura said, pulling away hurriedly. "Gin-chan, he got hurt—"

"I-I'm okay," Shinpachi said, but his teeth were chattering, and when he tried to stand up his legs folded under him.

Gintoki caught him. "What did you do?" he said, pushing aside Shinpachi's sopping uwagi to check out the damp bandages underneath. "Leaving your glasses lying around to get stepped on, and this, too? How careless can you be?"

"M-my glasses?"

"Ah—that is—who said anything about glasses?" Gintoki said, scooping Shinpachi up as if he were no heavier than an infant.

"Yorozuya, the barracks are over there," Kondou said, pointing to the wooden building on the opposite side of the walk. "All the squads are deployed, so there's plenty of spare towels and futons."

Gintoki nodded. "We'll owe you, Gorilla."

"You can pay me back now," Kondou said, "take Toushi with you, before he passes out in a puddle."

"I'm not going to—hey!" Hijikata objected, as Kagura went and picked him up, as easily as Gintoki carried his charge, for all that she had to bundle the vice-commander into a long-limbed, ungainly ball to manage it. "Put me down! Kondou-san—!"

"Good," Kondou said, watching them head for the barracks with a smile wide enough to sprain his jaw. "Good work, Yamazaki."

"Ah—um—yes, sir." Yamazaki coughed to clear his throat of the lump that had mysteriously collected there. "Thank you. Though really, the Yorozuya are the ones who actually stopped the assassin—"

"The assassin who may still be here," the Gekkon ambassador broke in to say. Yamazaki had quite forgotten he was there. "And how are you apes faring with that? No sign of that would-be killer, as we stand out here in the wet and the dark—"

"Don't worry, Ambassador," Okita said, "if she happens to shoot you now, we're sure to be able to locate her by the gunpowder flare. If you'd just step farther into the light to make a better target..."

"Sougo," Kondou sighed.

"Hello?" a voice called from the twilight behind them, a light tenor or alto. "Is it all right if I come in? Your gate appears to be broken."

It didn't sound like Matako, but Yamazaki still fumbled for his sword. It wasn't often that he regretted missing the regular Shinsengumi training sessions, but with an assassin about and Okita hurt and Kondou somehow sword-less and an Amanto dignitary to protect, he wondered if he shouldn't have skipped a badminton practice or two.

"Captain Eublepharin!" the ambassador screeched. "Come back, shield me!"

"Ah, this isn't your captain, is it?" said the approaching figure—two figures, it turned out, the shorter one shoving along a swearing, struggling woman.

Blonde hair, red kimono—"Kijima Matako!" Yamazaki exclaimed.

"Is that what she looks like?" Kondou said, squinting at her through the mist. "I didn't know she had such big—er—guns."

The smaller figure, holding Kijima in a strong arm-lock, had black hair to match her black eye-patch. "Kyuubei-san?" Yamazaki said.

"Tae-chan asked me to follow," Kyuubei explained. "And since there was a squad car outside the dojo, I asked them to take me, but with traffic being what it is, we only just arrived. As we pulled up, I saw this person coming over the wall, and it occurred to me she might be related to the assassination attempt you mentioned. So I apprehended her. She had a couple of revolvers," she added in an off-hand way, "they're in my coat pocket."

"You'll all pay for this," Kijima snarled, twisting as she tried to free herself from Kyuubei's adept hold. "When Shinsuke-sama finds out you have me—"

"Shinsuke?" Okita asked. "That would be Takasugi Shinsuke?"

"Takasugi's back in Edo?" said Kondou. "So he's the one behind this...isn't he tired of raising chaos by now?"

"I doubt it, Commander," Yamazaki said, "it's kind of his thing, you know..."

"Takasugi? Precisely who is this Takasugi?" the Gekkon ambassador demanded.

"You've heard of him, Ambassador?" Kondou asked.

The ambassador puffed up the pouch in his neck, making the scales prickle like thorns. "The Imperial Sentries may have mentioned that name. Or something like it; it's not like I can be bothered to keep track of ape appellations."

Kijima smirked. "I doubt any of your sentries are going to forget his name now."

"So it was the Kiheitai who attacked the sentries, and the Yorozuya?" Yamazaki said.

Okita stepped forward as Kondou frowned. "The Yorozuya...?"

"The, um, misunderstanding," Yamazaki said. "Kagura-chan and Shinpachi-kun and the sentries were all attacked. The Yorozuya didn't see who it was—they were struck from behind when they were vulnerable, only just escaped with their lives..."

"So she's an associate of the ones who hurt them?" Kyuubei asked, single eye narrowing, and Kijima yelped as the grip on her arm twisted tighter.

"Is that what got the danna so worked up?" Okita said, with a certain nonchalant calm that made the hairs on the back of Yamazaki's neck stand on end. "What exactly did your boss do, Crimson Mullet?"

"That's Crimson Bullet," Kijima said, turning up her nose, "and I'm not talking to you government dogs—do your worst."

Okita smiled. It was the smile of someone getting an unexpected gift at the end of a very bad day, and Yamazaki shuddered as the first captain leaned in toward the would-be assassin to say, "I thought you'd never ask."

Whatever Kondou might have fretted about, or whatever malicious rumors Okita might have spread after the fact, Hijikata did not in fact pass out, in a puddle or after reaching the barracks. Things merely got a little vague for a time, a patch of intellectual fuzziness where he was focused on not moaning in pain, and missed a few minor shifts in physical and environmental conditions.

Such as how he ended up lying on a futon, his wet uniform removed and his wounds bandaged up. Hijikata blinked at the shadowy ceiling overhead, making a face at the bitter taste on his tongue—some noxious medicinal potion or other, but the pain was more distant than it had been. Even if the drug made his head spin a bit when he sat up, carefully, and looked about himself. The room was dark, but in the dim glow coming under the doors he could make out the tatami floor, the semi-familiar paintings on the fusuma doors. The barracks, not at Shinsengumi headquarters, but on the palace grounds.

This room was smaller than the main dorm, though, the tatami floor only big enough to accommodate four futon sets. The two opposite his were occupied: lumpy silhouettes under the blankets, and the soft susurration of sleeping breaths. And sitting between them was a figure—dark clothes, wrapped in shadow, but the faint illumination picked out a pale phantom tangle of white hair and the gleam of open eyes.

"Shit," Hijikata swore, heartbeat pounding as he groped in the dark for his katana.

"Relax," Shiroyasha said. "I'm not going to try anything."

That lazy drawl wasn't any demon's. Sakata Gintoki. Right. Hijikata forced himself to breathe slower, evenly around the throbbing ache that tightened like claws around his chest, under the pressure of the bandages. He looked at the snoozing lumps on the futons, one on either side of Gintoki, and him with barely enough space to squeeze between them. "That's your two, then?"

"Yeah," Gintoki said.

"And they're okay?"

"According to you guys' doctor, yeah."

"Good," Hijikata said. Hissing a little, like a teakettle releasing pain instead of steam, he slowly bent his legs so he was sitting more comfortably, leaning forward with his crossed arms resting on his knees.

"The doc said you'll be okay, too," Gintoki said.

"The medic was here?" That did explain the medicinal aftertaste. "So he's the one who bandaged me, then."

"What, you thought I'd stripped you down and wrapped you up?"

"No, of course I didn't."

"Ah, is that disappointment? Did you secretly want me peeling your wet clothes from your naked skin, Hijikata-kun?"

"No, you perverted degenerate!" Hijikata patted his bandaged side, but the Shinsengumi medical officer had neglected to tuck any cigarettes where his pocket usually would be. He sighed and settled for grinding his teeth instead. "But hell, it's the least you could've done, after slicing me up to begin with."

He meant it to cut, but Gintoki didn't parry, or throw it back; his eyes were still open in the darkness, but he stayed quiet.

"It was a lucky hit, you know," Hijikata said. "Total fluke."

Gintoki's head came up, the ghost of his silver hair moving through the shadows. "I must be having a hell of a lucky day, then," he remarked, "to get that many flukes off on you."

"Asshole," Hijikata said. "You should be prostrate, thanking us for not taking your head."

"You really believe you could have?" Gintoki said.

"We had every damn legal right to." Silver hair, silver blade, the driving rain and the demon's terrifying speed...Hijikata ground his teeth harder. "...No."

"You could've tried harder, though." Sakata's tone was the same old indifferent inflection; impossible to tell whether he was thoughtful or angry or accusing.

"You could've tried harder, too," Hijikata said. He could have been eviscerated; his belly could've been sliced open like a gutted fish's. Okita, and Kondou, too, without any sword.

Hell, of the Gekkon legion soldiers Hijikata had watched him take down, most had been spared lethal wounds. They'd lost tails, but no heads.

Not mercy, Hijikata didn't think. Maybe it had only been force of habit, years of passive indolence tempering Sakata's sword. Or more likely a routine from longer ago than that—on the battlefield, surrounded, going for trophy kills could get your life taken instead. You took your enemies down fast and hard, however you could, and you kept going forward.

But he hadn't struck Kondou down, as easy as it would have been; Shiroyasha for all his fury had stayed his blade.

Hijikata was never going to understand this silver-haired son of a bitch of a samurai, as long as he lived.

He didn't notice the footsteps outside the room until the fusuma was pushed aside, letting in the light from the hall. After the near darkness the fluorescents' white glow was momentarily blinding, and Hijikata squinted to make out the figure standing there.

"Oh, you're up, Hijikata-san," Okita said, leaning against the doorway, a crutch tucked under his other shoulder. "I thought you'd be sleeping straight through 'til morning, like a sloth does."

"You're calling me a sloth?"

"Danna," Okita said, ignoring him as he turned to Gintoki, "there's a squad car waiting to take all of you back to your apartment, if you like."

"Ah," Gintoki said, staying sitting against the wall. He wasn't wearing his usual sloppy yukata, only the black under-outfit, dry now but wrinkled from the rain. The dark clothes made him look pale, washed-out face under his washed-out hair.

"Or you can stay here for the night, Kondou-san says," Okita added. "Since Vice-Commander Sloth here is going to be taking up his room anyway."

So this was Kondou's room, Hijikata realized. Quarters were tight in the auxiliary palace barracks, and there was no dedicated infirmary. This room was private, though; there wouldn't be squads parading by to observe his present indisposition. Hijikata spared a second of silent gratitude for his commander's thoughtfulness, before snapping irritably, "Since when are you his errand boy anyway, Sougo?"

"Since everyone else has gone Gekkon-hunting," Okita said. "Kijima Matako confessed—well, not to everything, she wouldn't say where Takasugi was; but she spilled about the sentries."

"Kijima Matako?" Hijikata said, frowning.

"Takasugi?" Gintoki said, and Hijikata's attention snapped back to him, because that tone was a little too low and focused.

The lump burrowed in the futon on Gintoki's left suddenly moved, sitting up with a yawn as she brushed red hair out of her face. "What's that, what's going on? Gin-chan?"

"Kijima Matako was the assassin sent after the ambassador. Takasugi Shinsuke is the one who sent her," Okita explained. "Maybe the one who sent this, too," and from behind his back he pulled out the flambard, unsheathed. The light gleamed off its blade's serrations and the diamond's fractured facets.

Hijikata, glancing at Gintoki, saw him freeze, motionless for a fraction of second; then Sakata shrugged easily, stretching as he said, "A cheap gift like that, yeah, could be that bastard's style."

Kagura's eyes widened. "Don't use that sword!" she said. "You should get rid of it, it's cursed—" Then she blinked at Okita and sat back down. "Never mind, a ghost would probably be more scared of you anyway."

"The curse is broken," Okita said. "So to speak—it looks like there was some kind of circuitry worked into the blade, but you wrecked it, Danna."

"Never did have much luck with electronics," Gintoki said. "So where's Takasugi?"

"Leaving Edo, most likely," Okita said, setting the sword down on the shelf by the door. "If he's not already gone—that, Kijima wouldn't talk about. But after a little encouragement," and he said it casually enough that likely only Hijikata understood how she had been talked into talking, "she mentioned where the Kiheitai were holding the Gekkon Imperial Sentries they'd kidnapped. The sentries who made fools of you, China," he added helpfully.

Kagura stuck her tongue out at him. "I'd love to see you get bitten by one of those jerks," she said. "I could put you into all kinds of positions. And take pictures."

Okita blinked. "Why, China, I had no idea you felt that way about me. I'd be flattered, if you were a real girl instead of a savage."

"Maybe I would feel that way, if you were a real human being instead of a monster sadist."

Gintoki cuffed Kagura upside the head, so lightly he hardly mussed her hair. "Flirt later," he said. "The Kiheitai—they managed to capture the sentries?"

"While they were distracted, yeah, at your apartment—"

"So they're the cowardly bastards who attacked us," Kagura said, jumping to her feet. "The ones who stabbed Shinpachi from behind—we should go kick their asses—!"

Sakata's face was set, but Hijikata couldn't tell if it was with agreement or argument. Before Gintoki could say one way or another, Okita said, "You're too late; that's what Kondou-san's doing now."

"Kondou-san went to face them alone?" Hijikata demanded, looking around for his katana and ignoring how the motion twinged his wounds. "You let him go without you?"

"Kondou-san, along with Yamazaki, and the third, fourth, fifth, and eighth squads," Okita said. "Plus some of the Gekkon legion troops who wanted in on the action. It should be enough. Besides," and the corners of Okita's mouth turned slightly down, a livid scowl by his standards, "I don't actually have a sword to back him up with right now, and Kondou-san wanted his back."

"Ah," Gintoki said. "Erm. About that..."

Okita turned to him, bland smile restored. "Don't worry about it, Danna. I'll just take it out of whatever fees we owe you—a year's worth of favors should about cover it, I think."

"...Shit," Gintoki said, dropping his head between his knees and putting his arms over it.

"Gin-chan?" Kagura asked, frowning.

"Never mind, Kagura-chan," Gintoki said, muffled by his arms. "I'll work it out with the sadist later."

"If the Shinsengumi are there now, then we should get over there quick," Kagura said, poking his shoulder. "We can kick their asses a little, before they get arrested or sliced up—

Gintoki looked up at her, then looked over to his right, where the lump under the second futon had yet to stir—the four-eyed kid must be pretty bad off, to be sleeping through their ruckus. Or else he was used to it, more likely.

"Nah," Gintoki said, shaking his head as he settled back against the wall. "Forget it—it's late, and anyway it's still raining and my hair's already drying curly; it doesn't need another soaking."

Truthfully his hair didn't look any worse a disaster than usual, but Hijikata opted not to point this out. Kondou would appreciate an operation without their interference.

"But, Gin-chan, those stupid wannabe—"

"And I'm tired," Gintoki said, not whining but quietly.

Hijikata wouldn't have thought the girl would have even heard him, what with how she was carrying on, but at that mutter Kagura looked at Sakata, then shut her mouth and sat down on her futon again. "Yeah," she said, "so am I. We could go home..."

"Why bother, when we can impose on their hospitality? We won't have to change these futons. And there'll be breakfast tomorrow, too."

Kagura brightened. "Really?"

"Breakfast for the Shinsengumi," Hijikata said. "This isn't an inn."

"Government worker breakfast, paid for with our tax dollars," Gintoki returned.

"Like you've ever paid any taxes...!"

"I better get back to guarding the ambassador," Okita said. "My squad and your dog is keeping him safe here in the barracks, but he's getting impatient, and Kondou-san will be disappointed in me if I let him slip the leash. So to speak."

"The leash," Hijikata said, frowning. "Sougo, you didn't put a collar on him, did you?"

"Good night, Danna, Hijikata-san. I hope your dreams are terrible, China."

"Sougo! About the ambassador—hey, come back here—don't leave me with—Sougo!!"

But Okita had already closed the fusuma doors, returning them to darkness.

"Damn sadist," Hijikata growled, grating his teeth. He'd wanted to ask Okita for a pack of cigarettes, too. Although the likelihood was high that he'd lace them with gunpowder again, given the opportunity, so probably Hijikata was better off not asking.

"Gin-chan, I'm hungry now," Kagura whined. "Could we get breakfast early?"

On the other hand, a smoke right now would be worth the risk.

"They've probably got a kitchen," Gintoki told her. "Go raid that. And bring back Pocky, if they've got any."

"Okay!" The girl jumped up and flung aside the door, nearly throwing it off its tracks in her enthusiasm.

"Kagura," Gintoki said—not scolding her, though; not anything that Hijikata could read.

By the way she paused in the doorway, looking back at her boss, Kagura couldn't figure it out either. "Gin-chan?"

"...Nothing," Gintoki said. "Pocky, remember. Or dipped cookies. Chocolate or strawberry."

"Aye, aye," Kagura said, sloppily saluting, and pounded off. It was amazing how the tattoo of her bare feet on the tatami might be mistaken for a charging elephant's.

"The kitchen's in the other direction," Hijikata remarked.

"She's got a nose; she'll find it eventually," Gintoki said. "Or someone's snack-stash, whichever. Either way it's better if she's fed, trust me."

"You could go back to your place and let her wreak havoc on your own groceries, you freeloading bastard."

Kagura hadn't closed the door all the way, and the sliver of light falling through the crack was enough for Hijikata to see Gintoki go still again, motionless but for the slight rise and fall of his shoulders as he breathed.

Hijikata sighed, hissing through his clenched teeth. "You can't stay here forever, Yorozuya; you'll have to go home sometime."

Gintoki slumped back against the wall, made a vague shadowy gesture with one hand. "Eh, the place is a mess, worse than usual. Broken window and lizard blood and whatnot. And Shinpachi's not going to be up for cleaning for a while, and it's not as if Kagura can be trusted with a mop."

"You could clean it up yourself."

"Why would I have employees, if I enjoyed doing chores myself?"

For all Sakata's many careless, reckless, aggravating deficiencies, he wasn't usually a coward. Hijikata looked at him through the dimness, the dark shadow of his clothing and the pale smudge of his face and hair. "What'd you see?" he asked. "That sword," and he nodded toward the shelf where Okita had placed the flambard, "what'd it make you see?"

"Nothing," Gintoki said. His laidback tone was so very close to his normal casual unconcern that Hijikata couldn't quite be sure that it wasn't genuine. "Nothing real, so what does it matter?"

"It sounded real, though," Hijikata said. His chest was throbbing, a distant burning ache—the painkillers must be wearing off. Carefully he stretched out his legs and lay back down on the futon. "I heard it—heard their voices. It sure as hell sounded like them, even though it wasn't. If the visuals were as convincing as the audio, if they looked as real—"

"They did," Gintoki said. "They looked real, but they weren't, and it's not like I haven't seen worse things. Far worse things, that were totally real. Same as you have."

"Just because you know a nightmare's not real, doesn't make it suck any less," Hijikata said slowly.

It wasn't anything he would have said if it had been bright enough to see Sakata's face; and probably not if he hadn't been lying down and hurting and under the influence of painkillers, either. And he would have thought Gintoki would throw it back in his face, ask him if the big bad Shinsengumi had big bad scary dreams, and did he go crying to Kondou's bed when he did. He was expecting it, but maybe it wasn't worth it when his face couldn't be seen, either, because Gintoki said nothing, not for a while.

When at last he did speak, his voice was quiet, so pensive as to be another man's. "The worst nightmares are the ones which aren't real, sometimes. The real memories, they fade eventually—every day you live is one day further away from what happened. The fake ones, though, you can't get away from them; all you can do is remind yourself every day that they didn't happen."

Then his voice shifted into a louder, more familiar tone. "Isn't that right, Shinpachi?"

"Ah," yelped the lump in the futon next to Gintoki. "I mean, um—what? Did you say something, Gin-san? I was so sound asleep..."

"Seriously, Patsuan, we have to work on your lying. Also your breathing, if you're going to eavesdrop by pretending to sleep."

"I wasn't," Shinpachi mumbled, "that is, I didn't—I was just..."

"You should be asleep for real," Gintoki said. "The doc said you need plenty of rest to recover. And until you're recovered you can't clean the apartment, and what are we going to do then?"

"Do it yourself! Even if I'm your employee—which usually would mean you'd pay me, so I don't know if it counts anyway—since when am I the maid?"

"Huh, I wonder if the baba would loan Tama out..."

"Oi, some of us are trying to sleep here," Hijikata said. "Keep it down, already."

"Why not have the sadist perforate your eardrums—then you'll always have silence to sleep," Gintoki advised.

"Sorry, Hijikata-san," Shinpachi said, with more manners than both of his Yorozuya comrades put together and squared.

Though he was the one to break the peace a minute later, whispering, "Gin-san, aren't you going to lie down? There's another futon by Hijikata-san..."

"I'm waiting until Kagura gets back, " Gintoki murmured back. "She'll just wake us all up anyway, finding her way to her futon."

"Okay...as long as you do sleep, Gin-san. You need it, too."

"Yeah," Gintoki agreed, as if it wasn't ridiculous to be mother-henned by a boy a good ten years his junior.

"Gin-san," Shinpachi said, so softly that Hijikata only barely heard him, "if you...Kagura-chan and I, we'll remind you. Every day, whenever you need us to. We'll keep reminding you."

"Yeah," Gintoki said, "I know," and he didn't sound embarrassed by that, either, or annoyed. Or grateful, even. Content, maybe.

The thunderous thump of heels on the floor outside heralded Kagura's return. True to Gintoki's dire prediction she slammed aside the door to let light flood the room, and managed to step on all of them to boot, on her way to her futon. Then she and Gintoki had to divide her spoils—she'd found the troops' snack trove after all, but as most of the sweets were illicit and grounds for seppuku anyway, no one was going to make a fuss, and Hijikata let himself be bought off with a packet of dark chocolate Pocky (it was Men's, after all.) It wasn't a cigarette but it was something he could bite down on, at least.

By the time Kagura crawled back into her futon and finally closed her eyes and mouth, Shinpachi was already sacked out, figuratively dead to the world and unable to protest when Gintoki settled back in his spot between their futons, rather than lying down and going to sleep as he'd agreed to.

Hijikata might have said something—it was true, that in the light Gintoki's face looked drawn and tired, and hell, even a demon would need to rest his body after the paces he'd put it through today. But he wasn't the man's damn mother-hen or nursemaid or anything else. And it wasn't as if Sakata was likely to listen to him anyway.

More likely, Gintoki would just be contrary and say he was more comfortable where he was, crowded up awkwardly against the wall, with Kagura and Shinpachi snoring on either side of him, noisy and drooling.

No, there was no way Hijikata was ever going to understand this guy.

But at least he was going to get more chances to try.

Chapter Text

Gintoki jerked awake with a start and without warning, as if someone had set off an alarm clock inside his head. In the muted predawn dimness it took him a second to place the ceiling overhead, higher than his own, worn rafters stained dark with age—the rafters of the Shimura's living room, same as he'd been waking to every morning for the last week.

If he'd been dreaming he couldn't remember about what, but the blood in his ears was ringing like a siren. He rolled his head to the left, saw Kagura on the futon adjacent, flopped on her stomach with her face buried in her pillow—Otae disapproved of Kagura sleeping in the futon closet, but the house wasn't so big that everyone could have their own rooms. Probably her snuffling had woken him, or else a wayward kick; sleeping next to Kagura was akin to taking a nap in a prize-fighting ring.

But then he looked to his right and saw no other futon, just bare tatami, and for a second that damn mental alarm was clamoring so loud it was deafening.

Gintoki was halfway to standing before he remembered, shook his head in exasperation and lay back down again. The living room was closer to the kitchen and bathroom, and the doctor had advised as little walking as possible, so Shinpachi had been sleeping here with them for the week; but last night he'd finally felt well enough to return to his bedroom. Leaving space for Gintoki to lay down his futon out of range of Kagura's dream skirmishes—more room, less noise; he ought to have slept better than ever.

But here he was, wide awake and it not even sunrise. And not for the first time this week, either. Takasugi's accursed flambard was no longer screwing with his brainwaves, so maybe it was that the Shimura house's tatami was inferior to that of the Yorozuya apartment. Or maybe their guest futons were lumpier than his own. Or hell, maybe they were that much better, and his back just wasn't used to the comfort.

Either way, this early rising better not be becoming a habit. Such responsible behavior was completely out of character—if he got used to getting up early, then what was stopping him from getting a regular job, and once he had a salary he could look for a house, and a mortgage, already had the dog...and seriously, what kind of life was that for someone like him?

The hazy sky outside the window showed only the merest hint of pink, and the house was quiet, even Kagura's snores muffled by her pillow; but Gintoki's eyes wouldn't stay shut. No matter how long he stared at the ceiling his eyelids refused to get heavy.

And it was irritating, to roll over and see that empty space on the tatami.

Finally he got up and went to the toilet, and he must have been sleepy after all, because he wandered the wrong way down the hall on the way back and ended up by Shinpachi's bedroom. When he turned around, his elbow clumsily bumped the fusuma, rattling in its frame, and he would have opened the door to apologize to Shinpachi for waking him, if he hadn't heard footsteps behind him.

"Gin-san?" Otae whispered, and Gintoki winced, expecting a pounding for disrupting her little brother's medically mandated rest. But Otae just said softly, "I think Shin-chan's still asleep."

Of course, she'd have to delay punishment until a time and place that wouldn't disturb Shinpachi. Gintoki thought fast, calculating his position relative to his clothes and the front door, and said, "Right—I'm going out. Got an, um, errand."

It was dim enough in the hall that he couldn't make out Otae's expression. "At your apartment?" she asked.

"Yeah, sure," Gintoki said—she'd been dropping pointed hints for the past couple of days about him and Kagura getting back there; now seemed like an excellent time to acquiesce.

"All right," Otae said, "I'll let them know when they get up," and Gintoki hastily agreed and made his lucky escape.

The errand wasn't an entirely bogus excuse, though he'd planned to go later in the day. Walking Edo's quiet morning streets, sober and purposeful, felt far too much like the routine of a proper, upstanding citizen. Though there was something special about the atmosphere of the just waking city, a peace he was rarely in the condition to appreciate when observing it from the other end of the night. The air was crisp, not cold but snappy, and the quality of light from the sun still hidden below the rooftops softened everything, made the rough potholed streets look smooth and the rough faces of passersby look peaceful.

Those gentle shadows even lent a touch of ephemeral ambiance to the bar district's back alleys. Gintoki took a deep, bracing breath of the last of the city's nightlife, then immediately regretted it, as it was painful to cough while holding one's nose. But at least it dispelled that lingering aftertaste of responsibility.

Katsura was in the alley behind the club he had been calling in front of the week before. The Jouishishi's noble leader was wearing an old stained jumpsuit, his hair tied up under an even dirtier baseball cap. He was too busy to notice Gintoki's approach, occupied with dragging a cart stacked with flattened boxes through the gap between a dumpster and two trashcans. A narrow gap; the barrow got stuck, forcing Katsura to grunt and heave and wiggle at the handlebar in a vain attempt to turn the wedged tires.

Gintoki observed the epic contest of samurai versus trash cart for a minute, then kicked aside one of the garbage cans, freeing the wheel.

"Good work, Elizabeth," Katsura said, pulling his cart the rest of the way into the alley.

"Not Elizabeth, it's Gin-san," Gintoki said, then winced at the phrasing. Speaking of bad habits...

"Oh, Gintoki," Katsura said, turning around. "What are you doing here?"

"What are you doing here?" Gintoki returned. "I know you swore to clean up this nation, but trash collection's literal even for you."

"Not trash collection, it's recycling," Katsura said with dignity, sidling back around the cart to start fishing cardboard out of the dumpster.

"Weren't you working as a caller?"

"I can't risk an occupation that places me so visibly in the public's eye," Katsura said. "Also I may have gotten fired for walking out early to buy cake."

"You really should watch that sweet-tooth," Gintoki advised.

"And at least I'm earning my living," Katsura said. "I've gone by your offices, but no one's been in." He tossed a couple of crushed chips boxes on top of the cart, then let the dumpster lid drop to look at Gintoki over it. "You're looking rather improved, anyway."

"Getting my beauty sleep," Gintoki said. "Even if it's not helping my hair any." He set a boot on the cart to keep Katsura from rolling it away as he took a thick envelope out from under his yukata. "That idiot Sakamoto sent me something. Said that you'd been asking him about it, and thought that I might be interested, too." Pulling the top pamphlet out of the packet, he read aloud, "'Don't miss this exciting venture opportunity! Be first in line to capitalize on wave-form manipulation, the total immersion entertainment fad of the future.'"

Gintoki shook his head. "If you're investing in brain-waves of the future, Zura, what are you doing working as a garbage man?"

"Recycling. And the Jouishishi doesn't invest in Amanto-backed enterprises," Katsura said.

"But Sakamoto's considering it. Along with—oh look, here on the investor list—Kawakami Bansai." Gintoki tossed the envelope down on the cart between them. "So when did Sakamoto pass on this hot tip?"

"I asked him about it a few days ago."

"Did you know about it before that?" Gintoki could hear his pulse in his ear, a throbbing thump as loud as his own voice. "When I talked to you last week—did you know this VR crap was getting beamed into my head?"

"No!" Though when Katsura glanced at Gintoki, his eyes slid right off again, as if Gintoki's gaze was slick like oil. Katsura had never had much skill at direct duplicity, ironic for the man who was Edo's most wanted. "I had no idea what was wrong with you."

"But you knew who was behind it."

"I didn't know...guessed, perhaps, and there were rumors, but...." Katsura looked affronted, but that was how he tended to look when he was ashamed; he was as fully capable of being righteously displeased with himself as with anybody else.

It was overkill at the moment, however, because Gintoki was already plenty righteously displeased for the both of them. He forced his tone to stay casual, though, as he said, "I've heard some rumors myself. Such as about Kijima Matako's escape—someone sprung her, or maybe she broke out of jail on her own, the inquiry's still open. Though all the other loyal men of the Kiheitai that the Shinsengumi captured in their last raid, they've been left to rot in federal custody.

"Which might be because on the day of that raid—the same day someone tried to assassinate a big-shot Amanto ambassador, by the way—there happened to be an explosion aboard a particular airship. Blew the Kiheitai's cover on the docks, literally, and forced them to relocate in a hurry—back to outer space, so I've heard. Which was why the men holding the Gekkon sentries hostages didn't have back-up when the Shinsengumi came for them. Now, who might've set off that explosion is still under investigation, but..."

Katsura sighed. "Yes, it was my bomb. Are you going to make a citizen's arrest?"

"Arrest you?" Gintoki said. "Hell, Kondou would probably give you a medal, if it wouldn't look weird for the Shinsengumi to be awarding known terrorists for their terrorism. No, I'm not going to arrest you." So saying, Gintoki balled up his fist and slammed it square into Katsura's jaw.

If Katsura had been expecting it, he could have easily blocked in time; but Gintoki had been keeping his voice even for a reason, and the punch connected satisfactorily, sending Katsura tumbling over his cart and sliding into the trashcans behind it.

The crashing clatter as they toppled over was almost as painful as the bruising his knuckles took. "Ow." Gintoki winced, flexing his fingers with a grimace. He should've just used the bokutou. "What's your jaw made of, adamantium? What kind of mutant freak are you?"

"I'm sorry my patriot's skeleton is too strong for your lazy fist," Katsura said, not sounding sorry at all as he prodded his battered chin, glaring up at Gintoki. "What was that for?"

"For going Takasugi-hunting and not inviting me along."

"Since when have you cared whether I invite you to Jouishishi business?"

"When it's not Jouishishi business," Gintoki said. He didn't need to bother keeping his voice cool anymore, which was fortunate because he wasn't sure he could've managed it. "Takasugi might be giving your nationalists a bad rap, but it was my head he was screwing with. So my right to knock around his head in payback—right off his shoulders, maybe. If you'd told me then, if we'd gone after him together that day, then everything else—his whole damn plan might've fallen apart before it even got started."

"Maybe," Katsura said, still looking up at him, but less outraged, more thoughtful. "Or it might have been worse. You told me so yourself that day, that you were in no condition to fight."

"No, I said I couldn't protect anyone. Not that I couldn't fight." Gintoki would've laughed except that he knew it would come out wrong; he smiled instead, and that was bad enough by the way Katsura blinked. "Fighting, I could've handled. Ask the Shinsengumi, next time they arrest you, how well I could handle it."

"I saw," Katsura said. He picked himself up off the alley's pavement and brushed at the bits of trash stuck to his jumpsuit—ineffectively, not that anyone would notice, with all the grime already stuck to it. "A little of it, anyway—Takasugi was observing you. He'd planted some kind of lens on you, a crystal-oscillation radar holographic array, was Sakamoto's best guess. Possibly part of the wave-form receiver, though Sakamoto wasn't sure how you could've had something that big on you and not noticed it."

"As if that idiot's likely to notice anything smaller than a mid-sized moon, on a good day," Gintoki muttered, gladder than ever that he'd smashed the stupid sword's stupid, VR-spinning, spying diamond eye.

Kagura had actually gotten down on her knees to apologize for keeping the flambard—that wasn't a Yato custom; either she'd learned it from Shinpachi or she'd been watching the NHK historical dramas again—so Gintoki had had to forgive her, with only a little grudging testiness. (He hadn't mentioned that said testiness was the most anger he could muster and was all for show anyway. It was going to be a while yet before he'd actually be able to get genuinely cross with Kagura or Shinpachi, but Gintoki wasn't about to let them catch on to that. Shinpachi wouldn't take advantage—or much, anyway—but Kagura had no such scruples.)

It wasn't her fault anyway. They'd all been played, set up from the start. He'd gone by the old woman's garden yesterday, only to find the manor was actually a rental, contracted out weekly for parties and conferences, and no sword-collecting samurai family had lived there for a good twenty years. The company had been unwilling to divulge their client list for the previous month—not that it mattered anyway, when he already knew where the trail would lead.

The sword would've only been plan A anyway; if they'd thrown it away, Takasugi would've gone on to plan B or C or pi-R-squared.

"Gintoki," Katsura said, "what Takasugi and Kawakami did, using wave-form manipulation like that on you—it was only because they knew you well enough to calibrate their system to your brain patterns. It must have taken weeks to establish a clear connection, and even then it was only effective because they calculated the precise auditory and visual stimuli to trigger overwhelming psycho-emotive response."

"Sakamoto told you all that?" Gintoki asked skeptically.

"Mutsu-dono may have offered some of the specifics. If by 'some' one means 'most'. The point is, Takasugi knows you, well enough to know what buttons to push to make you react."

Katsura hadn't asked him what those buttons had been. Gintoki didn't expect him to; Katsura knew him well enough to guess. Better than that bastard Takasugi, even. "Are you trying to tell me what I did wasn't my fault?"

"No," Katsura said, far too profound for a man with soy sauce stains down his jumpsuit's front and a wad of gum stuck to his sleeve. "I'm telling you there was...an inevitability to what you did. We are who we are. Takasugi could provoke me just as well. And perhaps we could do the same to him, if we chose. But even so, we can't change who we are—and in the end it didn't succeed, did it? The Gekkon ambassador is still alive; the Shinsengumi, too, so I've heard. You stopped yourself."

"I stopped," Gintoki said. "I was stopped." He paused, speculating; this was only a guess on his part, but a reasonably educated one. "It was close, but there was a moment near the end when the ghosts...when Takasugi's signal cut off. I stopped hearing or seeing anything. And then it came back, louder than ever, but..."

"I'm sorry," Katsura said. "If I'd brought a larger bomb, I might've been able to take down his ship and cancel the signal entirely; but Takasugi had another transmitter, and he must have been able to get it online quickly enough to make no difference."

"It made a difference," Gintoki said. "It gave me a moment to think, take a look at what the hell I was doing. Maybe not enough by itself, but..." He eyed Katsura. "Besides, the last thing Edo needs is you with a bigger bang, Zura."

"All the same," and Katsura bowed his head, obstinately serious as only he could be, "I'm sorry I wasn't able to do more, Gintoki."

"You did too damn much." Katsura, and the damn Shinsengumi, too. Mayora and the super-sadist, not to mention their gorilla of a commander—if they'd had any idea how close... No, they had known; unbelievable morons though they might be, they were good enough swordsmen to have understood what they were up against. And yet they'd still not stepped down.

Lunatics and fools, every one of them. Kagura and Shinpachi were too young to know better, but the rest of them...what'd he ever do, to deserve being surrounded by such blockheads? "Next time you go after that bastard Takasugi, Zura, you sure as hell better bring me along with you. Or else it won't be your face I'll be punching."

Katsura folded his arms. "Just so you know, you'll find the rest of me as hard as my chin."

Gintoki made a face. "Did not need to hear that. But I'm serious, Zura. You're good, but Takasugi—that bastard cheats. As this just proved. And if he ever finally got one over on you...you better not give him a chance. I've had enough vengeance-taking to last me a while; it's way too much work."

"Yes," Katsura agreed, to his surprise. "It is. So you'll forgive me, Gintoki, if I can't promise you anything. Because I, too, have better things to do than to be avenging you after the fact."

Idiots, all of them. But what was he supposed to do about it?

Gintoki sighed, then went on, "There's something else—this wave-form manip stuff. It's supposed to be tuned to a single person's brainwaves, personalized, right? Takasugi had to calibrate his transmitter to me specifically."

"As I understand it, yes."

"When you were talking with Sakamoto, did he mention anything about how those wave-form signals might get crossed? So another person might pick them up, start hearing the same voices or whatever?"

"Hmm." Katsura considered. "I suppose, if the other person had a very similar cognitive structure—if their brain were enough like the target's, they might be on almost the same wavelength, so to speak..."

And Takasugi would have upped the transmission power of his signal after Katsura's bomb, impatient to re-establish the connection before his plan fell apart—set it broadcasting loud enough that any son of a bitch with a blade and a bad attitude could hear it. Gintoki shook his head. "Thought it might be something like that. Just so you know, Zura, that thing about similar cognitive structures, if you ever mention it to anyone—especially the Shinsengumi—anywhere, ever, I will have to kill you."

"I understand." Katsura blinked. "No, wait, I don't—"

"Never mind," Gintoki said. "You can get back to your trash. See you, Zura."

"Not Zura, it's Katsura. And not trash, it's recycling. And not see you—Gintoki. Wait."

Gintoki stopped halfway down the alley. "Yeah?"

"Do you hear something?" Katsura asked.

Gintoki cocked his head, listening. Morning rush hour hadn't started yet, and the last late night partiers had passed out or stumbled home by now. And there were no sirens announcing Katsura's next imminent arrest. "No, the city's pretty quiet this early. I don't hear anything. Must be your imagination."

"Good," Katsura said, and for some bizarre Zura-exclusive reason he was smiling. "All's as it should be, then."

After leaving Katsura to his excessively exact city clean-up, Gintoki took a stroll through the slowly waking Kabuki-chou. At a convenience store he picked up onigiri and the latest issue of Jump, vaguely feeling that he might be sleepy enough for a siesta in a couple of hours. That would be lazily in character...

He stopped when he realized what street his feet had taken him to. He'd walked this sidewalk countless times, but all he could think of now was the last time. The rainclouds overhead, the last bite of sakura soft-serve melting on his tongue—the sky today was more blue than gray, the clouds from last night's showers scattering and the afternoon's yet to gather. But still...

It's your own home, idiot, Gintoki told himself. His own home where nothing actually happened, nothing that couldn't be fixed with a mop and a broom and a few panes of window glass. There was nothing stopping him from walking down the street and back to his apartment and reading Jump in the sun on his own couch.

Of course nothing was stopping him from continuing along the main road until he came to a pachinko parlor or a bar or a parfait shop, either...

There was a little inner voice in his head that sounded an awful lot like Katsura, or maybe Kagura. Are you a man or a mouse?

Do you seriously want me to answer that? Gintoki asked it back, irritated. But he turned down the street.

Otose was standing in the doorway of the snack bar, smoking a cigarette. Normally Gintoki would have tried to sneak around her unseen (he suspected that rent had been due last week, though he wasn't sure, and couldn't remember how many months it was behind anyway) but today he opted to greet her. It was only polite, after all; if he were going to be getting up at a reasonable time he might as well play the responsible guy otherwise. And it had nothing to do with putting off climbing the stairs up to his apartment, no matter what the annoying little voice in his head might insinuate. "Good morning, baba."

Otose raised an eyebrow at him. "Ah, and here I was just wondering if I ought to rent out the rooms to someone else. Preferably someone who will actually pay their rent."

"I've got it, I'll get it to you today," Gintoki lied.

The old woman studied him through the trailing smoke of her cigarette. "So you are coming back."

Gintoki wondered how much she had heard. Most of it, he imagined; Kabuki-chou's Empress might be retired, but her eyes and ears were still sharp, and she had them more places than not. "Yeah," he said. "Looks like."

Otose looked at him a moment longer, then smiled slightly. "You're looking better."

He seemed to be getting that a lot. "Are you saying I don't always look good? Your old eyes just can't appreciate a modern man's handsomeness."

Otose snorted with a warning shake of her head. "Don't try too hard yet. You might lose it."

"I'm all right now," Gintoki said. He could have told her that it was over, could have told her it would never happen again; but she'd lived far too long to fall for a bad man's promises.

But long enough, too, that she could recognize honesty. "Glad to hear it," Otose said. "So you'll be getting the rent to me this afternoon, then?"

"Today, yeah, yeah," Gintoki said. "Send Tama up for it—hey, speaking of that, any chance you could lend her out for a bit? Our place got a little, uh, untidy. When we were attacked. Completely unprovoked, by the way."

"And why should I give up my staff's services?"

"I can't accept clients in a messy office, can I? What kind of professionalism would that be? And without clients there'll be no money to pay that rent. And Shinpachi's not up for cleaning yet—he was wounded in that attack, you know, terrible thing..."

"Huh," Otose remarked. "He looked well enough earlier."

"...Earlier?"

"When he and Kagura came over. Perhaps half an hour ago—they're up there now." Otose frowned at him. "You didn't know? I'd assumed you'd been there already, getting ready for your clients."

"We don't have any clients."

"What about the Amanto who just dropped in? They turned up not fifteen minutes ago, went straight up when they heard the Yorozuya were in. It was the third or fourth time they've come by here, looking for you—four of them in fancy purple uniforms, from that lizard clan who've been on the news—"

They'd returned—the damn Gekkon sentries, invading his home again, and it wasn't any VR hallucination this time. And Kagura and Shinpachi were up there—

Gintoki took the stairs three at a time, slammed aside his door and charged down the hall with his bokutou drawn, yelling, "You scaly assholes, you should know better by now than to try me—if you've done a damn thing to them, I'll—"

He flung open the door, and there in the Yorozuya office were the lizards in their purple uniforms, all four of them—

Sitting peacefully, two to a couch, with their tails curled uncomfortably under them, while Kagura perched on the corner of his desk, and Shinpachi served everyone tea.

All six heads turned toward Gintoki's unexpected intrusion. "You'll what, Gin-chan?" Kagura asked interestedly, drumming her heels against the desk's paneling.

"Gin-san," Shinpachi whispered, raising a hand from the teapot to gesture at Gintoki furiously behind his back, while hissing through clenched teeth behind his polite smile, "these are our clients; put away the bokutou!"

"Our...what, now?"

"It hasn't been that long since we worked, Gin-san," Shinpachi muttered, then turned back to the Gekkon. "So, as we were telling you, this is our boss. He has the final say whether we'll take your case, but it shouldn't be a problem."

"Shouldn't be a...?" Gintoki echoed, disbelieving. Shinpachi grabbed the end of his bokutou and forced it down, still smiling with painfully rigid courtesy at the Gekkon sentries.

The sentries looked at Gintoki, then as one set down their teacups and stood up from the couches. Gintoki rocked back on his heels to set his stance, not raising the bokutou but not tucking it away, either—none of the sentries had their beamknives out, but he knew how fast they could move.

The closest Gekkon's uniform was decorated with green stripes over the purple. "Shiroyasha," this one began.

"It's Gin-san," Gintoki said. "Or Gin-sama, to you lot."

"Gin-sama," the Gekkon sentry continued willingly. "We apologize for our previous intrusions into your domicile; we were acting in good faith but on bad information. We didn't mean you any offense," and he bowed his head politely. The other sentries mimicked his gesture.

"What if I want to take offense anyway?" Gintoki inquired, fingers playing over his bokutou's hilt like a flautist performing a solo.

"That's not fair," Kagura pouted. "Shinpachi wouldn't let me clock any of 'em. And they never even bit you."

"Excuse us a moment," Shinpachi told the sentries. "Gin-san," and he yanked Gintoki over to the corner to whisper to him urgently, "whatever happened before, right now these are our honored customers who have come all the way here to ask for our help—come here from a very powerful and very, very wealthy empire—"

"Ah," Gintoki said. "Right, of course." His professional smile felt on the rusty side, but he gave it his best as he straightened up and waved at the lizards. "Please, take a seat, gentlemen, and tell us what the trouble is. I'm sure we can handle it, whatever it is."

"So we were told," the senior sentry said. He sat down again, his comrades following suit with the same coordinated synchronicity with which they fought. "When we explained the situation to the Shinsengumi, Captain Okita assured us that you would be able and pleased to help us."

"Okita-kun did, now," Gintoki said, smiling resolutely over a burgeoning of a sense of dread as powerful as the one he'd had running up here, if entirely different in nature. But he did owe the Shinsengumi... "So what is this situation?"

The Gekkon sentry leaned forward, lowering his voice as well as translucent membranous eyelids over his bulging yellow eyes. "First understand, this is a matter of imperial security," he said. "If any of this information should be publically disseminated, we'll know the source, and we will take action."

"Ooh?" Kagura hopped off the desk to lean in close, her eyes wide with interest. "So it's classified? Top-secret spy action?"

"Your security's safe with us," Gintoki assured. Governments were willing to pay big to make sure their secret-keepers stayed bought. "We're utterly, one-hundred-percent discreet."

"So the Shinsengumi claimed," the Gekkon said. "Very well. The fifth Prince of the Gaiko dynasty, youngest son of the Emperor, first among all the Imperial Treasures, is missing. He was abducted—stolen from his cradle some months ago, when the Imperial flagship was raided by pirates. After much searching, the Imperial Sentries finally found a trail leading to this planet, and this city's spaceport; but since our arrival we've been unable to locate the Prince."

"Is that why the diplomatic entourage really came here?" Gintoki asked. "So you can find this lost prince of yours?"

"Of course." The sentry's throat scales raised and lowered in surprise. "Why else would the Gekkon empire bother with this silly little rock?"

"Aw, but it's such a cute little rock," Kagura said.

"Kagura-chan, that's our planet you're talking about," Shinpachi sighed, then straightened up. "But, the prince—weren't you saying something like that when you attacked me and Kagura-chan last week? That we were the kidnappers...?"

"That's why you kept breaking in here?" Gintoki demanded. "Looking for your prince? Why'd you think we had him? We've got nothing to do with any pirates."

"Yes, so we deduced; however..." One of the sentry's eyelids flickered open and shut with his embarrassment. "A tracking device was embedded in the Prince's shell. It should have been emitting a subspace signal all along, but it must have been damaged; until we reached Earth we received no trace of it. Once here, we detected what appeared to be the signal coming from your resident intermittently. Given that we never found any sign of the Prince here, however, the transmission must have somehow been faked."

"Yeah," Gintoki said grimly. That explained it—something else he owed Takasugi for. Quite a gift, that sword of his; it did damn near everything but slice bread. "Don't worry, though, that transmitter's broken now. You won't get any more false signals from it." Though if Takasugi had gotten the original tracking device from the Harusame pirates, he might be able to mimic it again. But maybe they could use that to find the prince, reverse engineer it or something. If Takasugi had their prince with him, as another contingency plan to bring the Gekkon's wrath down on Edo...

"What'd you mean, 'shell'?" Kagura asked. "Like you said the prince's tracking whatsit was embedded in—like a turtle shell?"

"Like an eggshell," the sentry said. "The fifth Prince is the Emperor's youngest; he's not yet hatched."

"...Hatched," Shinpachi repeated. Behind his glasses his eyes had gone quite round. "Er, Senior Sentry-san, how big would the prince's egg be?"

"About so," the Gekkon said, gesturing a spherical shape with his talons around twice the diameter of his head.

"A white egg?" Shinpachi asked. "A big, white egg..."

"Mmm, I'm hungry," Kagura said.

"A big, white egg, with a prince inside...a baby prince," Gintoki said, and smiled. They should be grateful to Okita for passing this one on to them after all. "So, gentlemen—exactly how much would finding this egg be worth to you?"

Chapter Text

"What—what are you doing to My Baby!" Mr. Nakajima cried. His immaculate wife clutched at the sleeve of his immaculate suit, both of them staring in dismay at the aliens invading their home. Shinpachi had his arms outstretched before the couple, barring their way as he begged them not to start yet another intergalactic incident. Gintoki and Kagura just stood back and watched.

Oblivious to the humans, the Gekkon surrounded the giant white egg sitting in its place of honor on the Nakajima's kotatsu. The senior sentry tapped ever so gently on the shell with one talon while one of his subordinates scanned it with some kind of alien device or another. The Amanto conferred for a moment in spirant whispers; then as one they took a step back and dropped to their knees before the egg, claws respectfully curled in and tails flat against the floor.

After a moment the senior sentry turned his head back toward them, still kneeling. "You have found his imperial honor the fifth Prince," he told the three Yorozuya. "The Gekkon Empire thanks you."

"Prince?" Mrs. Nakajima asked hesitantly.

"Seems that this particular chicken's à la king," Gintoki said. "Your egg's actually stolen—or kidnapped, rather—royalty. These guys' prince."

"You mean—My Baby's a boy?" Mrs. Nakajima said, oblivious. "Dear, we're having a boy!" Her husband beamed.

"Where exactly did you, um, obtain My Baby, Nakajima-san?" Shinpachi asked.

Mr. Nakajima put his arm around his wife's shoulders. "We wanted a child so badly, my wife and I," he said. "For so long we hoped and prayed. And then one morning a couple of months ago, we got a delivery, a box left on our doorstep—it was supposed to be a turkey fryer, but instead we found that the stork had brought us My Baby!"

"The stork," Gintoki repeated.

"You know, the stork that brings the babies to loving husbands and wives. We hadn't realized they came in eggs, though I suppose if it's a stork..."

"Makes sense," Kagura agreed, nodding.

"Um, Kagura-chan, that's not how humans—" Shinpachi started to say, only to have Gintoki step hard on his foot. "Ow, Gin-san, why—"

"Do you want to explain to Kagura where babies come from?" Gintoki hissed in his ear.

Shinpachi gulped and hastily changed the subject. "But if it wasn't the stork, then who did deliver the prince? And why here?" He glanced at the cowering Nakajimas. "They don't really seem like the pirate type..."

"I got a guess," Gintoki said. "If you wanted to smuggle something—something that wouldn't turn up in any standard package scans, because it's not anything actually illegal—and you couldn't move it yourself because you were being watched or whatever, but you needed to get it out fast, before you were caught..."

"You could use a shipping service," Shinpachi said.

"And if there were two boxes, around the same size and weight—and Nakajima is a pretty common name; how many of them did we census in this neighborhood?"

"So there are a bunch of kidnappers somewhere around here with a turkey fryer..."

"Rather than the ransom jackpot they were expecting. And they'd removed the tracker from the egg, so they'd have no way of finding it themselves."

"If it's as you say," the senior sentry said, rising to his feet, though with his tail still politely lowered, "then these humans are innocent." He turned to the Nakajimas. "The Prince is in excellent health. He has been well-treated in this house; the Gekkon empire will reward you for your benevolence."

"Reward us?" Mr. Nakajima said. "You're going to pay us for My Baby? You can't—you can't buy our child!"

"Um, Nakajima-san, it's not technically your child," Shinpachi said.

"Technically it's not anyone's child yet," Gintoki said. "Right now it's just a first-stage soufflé..."

"Gin-san!"

"No, you can't take My Baby!" Mrs. Nakajima sobbed, ducking around the Amanto to fling her body over the egg in a rustle of silk kimono.

The Gekkon observed this display with much twitching of tails and asynchronous eyelid blinking. "To touch the Prince so cavalierly—!" one of them hissed.

"Relax," Gintoki told them, "she's just keeping it warm. You said so yourself, they've been treating him right."

"If she wants a few more moments to appreciate the Prince's royal presence, it can be allowed," the Gekkon senior sentry declared. "Once the imperial carrier arrives, she'll have to be moved regardless."

Mr. Nakajima folded his arms resolutely. "I'm going to have to ask you to leave; you're upsetting my wife and child. If you don't go, I'll have to call the police."

"Nakajima-san," Shinpachi said, "I'm afraid the police are going to want to return the egg to the Gekkon."

"Sorry," Gintoki said, "but you know, can't make an omelet without breaking a few eggs...kidding!" he hastily added, as four pairs of yellow lizard eyes swiveled around towards him at alarming angles. "Sorry, didn't know I had to walk on eggshells here..."

"If I can't call the police," Mr. Nakajima cried, "then I'll call—I'll call the Jouishishi! They'll stop Amanto from interfering with human lives—"

"Yeah, and their leader's got a thing for ugly ducklings," Gintoki said, "but I can't let you do that. The Gekkon are too much trouble for them to mess with. And this is their emperor's son..."

The Nakajimas' reply was drowned out by the roar of a fusion hover-drive outside. "The carrier has arrived," the senior sentry announced, quite unnecessarily as it was unlikely anyone within a kilometer had missed it. The Gekkon imperial carrier, rather than do anything practical like land at the spaceport and send a car over, instead came down smack in the middle of the city block, illegally parking itself in the air outside the Nakajimas' apartment.

Gintoki peered out the window at the ship, massive and bristling with the latest Amanto armament, and whistled. "Well, if you're going to put all your eggs in one basket, it might as well be that one."

The ship extended a telescoping walkway over to the apartment's balcony, which a dozen new Gekkon came down, all dressed in pristine white that matched the egg's immaculate shell. They brought with them a pod draped in ivory satin and floating feather-light on anti-grav repulsors, each unit pricey enough to buy the entire apartment block. This cradle the white-dressed Gekkon carefully placed the egg in, four of them lifting it up and settling it into the lushly padded pod as if it were the world's most delicate bowling ball.

"M-my Baby," sniffled Mrs. Nakajima, dabbing her eyes with the tissue Shinpachi had guiltily handed to her. Her husband put his arm around her again, his own eyes teary.

Gintoki sighed. "At least you know your baby'll be cared for, right? He'll be with his people, and they'll treat him like a, er, prince. Could any parent ask for more?"

"But, Gin-chan," Kagura said, staring at the couple, "this isn't right..."

"Humans having an egg for a baby? No, it isn't—"

"No." Kagura shook her head. "Even if you don't usually have babies like that—they are, aren't they? These two, they took it in like it was their kid. They've been caring for it, waiting for it to hatch, keeping it warm, loving it—even if they weren't supposed to, they did anyway. Even if it wasn't really theirs, they love it. Who you love—it doesn't matter if you're not related, does it? You can still be family anyway. And it isn't right, to take a baby away from its family."

"Kagura-chan..." Shinpachi murmured, but didn't contradict her.

Gintoki looked at him and Kagura, then looked at the tearful Nakajimas. Then he looked at the Gekkon gathered around their precious egg-bound prince, sighed again, and stepped forward. "Yo, boss sentry. Don't any of you go anywhere yet; there's still some details to work out."

"The reward, of course." The senior sentry nodded. "You'll be compensated fairly—I was told your rates are hourly, yes? And the journey here took," he checked his watch, "nearly half an hour."

"Yeah," Gintoki said, gritting his teeth as he mentally cursed himself—they could've drawn out the search a little, a day or two at least—"besides that—look, I don't much about your race, but when you're in the egg, how much are you affected by what happens outside your shell? On Earth, baby sea turtles change sex in the egg depending on how hot their nest is, and baby birds hatch out already knowing their parents' chirps—"

"See, Gin-chan wasn't sleeping through that nature documentary after all," Kagura whispered to Shinpachi. "I told you he's not really too old to learn anything new."

"What are you saying?" the Gekkon sentry asked.

"This egg's been here for two months," Gintoki said, "sitting here in this apartment, getting kept warm by these two humans, getting talked to by human voices and touched by human hands. It must've been a shock for it, getting stolen—kidnapped—eggnapped?—and then bounced around half the galaxy. And taking it away now, moving it yet again—what if the prince inside that shell has gotten used to this place, used to these parents? If all these changes are too much for him, maybe he'll just decide never to hatch at all..."

The sentry's tail lashed, his neck puffing up like he had a balloon stuck in his throat, scales bristling. "That's ridiculous—" he began, but one of the Gekkon in white who had accompanied the egg pod leaned over to hiss in his ear, or where an ear would be if the aliens had any.

The alien was speaking in their sibilant tongue, so Gintoki had no idea what she was saying, but he understood it when the sentry's expanded neck pouch deflated back to normal size. "You may have a point," the Gekkon acknowledged grudgingly.

"Great, so then you can leave the prince here to hatch—"

"Therefore," the senior sentry spoke over him, "to preserve elements of the Prince's present environment, we will take these two humans with him, so they may warm him and talk to him as they have been doing."

"Wait, that's not—"

"All right," Mrs. Nakajima said. "Can you give us a couple of hours to pack, or do we have to leave with you right away?"

"You can pack if you wish," the Gekkon sentry said magnanimously. "Though," and he glanced around the apartment, "I see nothing here that the empire could not provide for you, and at far higher quality."

"Er, so you're willing to go with them?" Gintoki asked.

"For My Baby?" Mr. Nakajima and his wife were both beaming, tears gone. "Of course we'll go!"

The Yorozuya stuck around through the brief packing and last-minute phone calls, mostly in interest of keeping the Gekkon from skipping out on their compensation, while Gintoki tried to come up with a reasonable way to write up a bill for a million yen an hour. Maybe if they claimed that was their standard going rate for imperial service...a million yen was pocket change to an empire anyway...

When the Nakajimas were ready to go—undoubtedly to the relief of the other residents of their block, who must have been sick of having an Amanto ship hovering over the street so low as to impede headroom—the Gekkon boarded their carrier, first the egg-keepers in white, then the sentries. The senior sentry stayed back, waiting to escort the Nakajimas.

Then there was only the awkwardness of asking for pay—it would be transferred within the day, the sentry promised—and the even greater awkwardness of bidding farewell to people they barely knew. "So, yeah, good luck out there in the universe," Gintoki said, then grabbed Mr. Nakajima's arm and pulled the man aside for a moment. "Psst, by the way, take these with you," and he discreetly passed over a few full-color magazines. "They'll give you some, um, ideas, for how to get a baby without a stork or an egg."

After Mr. Nakajima had thanked Gintoki for the farewell present and proceeded up the ramp into the ship with his wife, Shinpachi hissed, "Gin-san, did you just happen to have all those—those magazines—on you?!"

"No—I couldn't give him all of them; then what would be left for me?"

"Goodbye!" Kagura called, waving at the ship as it retracted its walkway and rose up over the street, cyclone winds gusting from its hover-drive and knocking over bicycles on the sidewalk. "Have fun raising your lizard! Don't let it bite anyone!"

"Words of wisdom for any parent," Gintoki muttered, but he waved at the carrier, too, feeling a great sense of relaxation, like the ship was bearing a weight up off his shoulders, along with the royal egg.

Some of that was naturally the gratification of knowing that when he checked his bank account the next morning there should be more zeroes than he was used to seeing there. But some of it—most of it—was knowing that the whole affair was over, that the last month was completely passed and done. The best thing about chronological time was that it meant some moments would never be happening again.

When Shinpachi said, "So we should be getting back to the apartment; it's only early afternoon, maybe we'll get a new client," Gintoki didn't feel even a twinge of apprehension or hesitation.

It helped knowing the office was already in a condition to welcome customers. "You guys did quite a job cleaning up the place," he remarked as they started walking back. "I didn't even notice the crack in the table."

"Oh, that's a new table," Shinpachi said. "Tama-san brought it up for us, after she finished the rest of the cleaning—Otose-san said that since most of the furnishings were hers anyway, she'd just add the replacement to our rent."

"That baba." Gintoki shook his head. Otose always had to have the upper hand, always had to make sure he owed her more than he could ever pay back.

She ought to know better, at her age. That was what came of never having kids or grandchildren to indulge, that you ended up spoiling pathetic undeserving strays instead.

"Do you think they'll be all right out there, Gin-chan?" Kagura asked, parasol tipped back as she walked so she could look up at the clear sky. "That husband and wife, with the Gekkon."

"Mama and Papa, you mean." Gintoki shrugged. "Yeah, they'll be okay. Humans are adaptable; we can make a home for ourselves wherever we go. And they already have a family started, so that's fine. It won't be bad for Earth, either, having a Gekkon prince who grows up thinking of Earthlings as parents."

Shinpachi pushed up his glasses. "Is that why you were okay with them going? Because it gets us in good with the Gekkon?"

"No," Gintoki said. "I just wanted to make sure a mom and dad didn't lose their kid."

"You'd have fought them, if they hadn't wanted to go," Shinpachi said. "The Gekkon—you'd have fought them for the egg. Even if it would cause an intergalactic incident."

"Yeah, and it would've been fun, too," Kagura said, swinging her umbrella like a baseball bat. "I never did pay them back for all that biting."

"Gin-san," Shinpachi said, speaking too quietly for outdoors, almost as if he didn't want to be heard over the traffic, "before—last week, when you went to fight the Gekkon. I know some of it was in your head, that the sword was hypnotizing you, or whatever; you weren't really thinking straight. But when you thought we were... When you went to—to attack the ambassador—you knew what you were doing, didn't you. You knew what could happen, what kind of trouble it would cause."

A few paces ahead, Kagura's skipping slowed to a walk; she wasn't looking back, but she was near enough to be listening.

They were young, so much younger than Otose, or even him; they hadn't seen enough to know a lie from a truth, not always, not yet.

But then, even the most persuasive lie won't be convincing, not when the one asking the question already knows the answer. Gintoki exhaled. "Yeah," he said. "I knew."

Shinpachi stopped, right there in the middle of the sidewalk, planted like he was a tree rooted against a hurricane. "We wouldn't want that," he said. "Kagura-chan and I—we'd never want you to do anything like that."

"I know," Gintoki said, and he knew, too, that what came next would be a request, a promise that he wouldn't do it, not again, no matter what happened.

He looked up at the sky—pointlessly pure blue, even though they were supposed to be into the rainy season by now. Inspiration struck even if the clouds failed him, however. "Did you guys have time to take Sadaharu for a walk before the Gekkon dropped by?"

"No!" Kagura said, suddenly anxious. "And he must be lonely, too—especially after he's been stuck at Shinpachi's house all this time—"

"What do you mean, stuck at my—"

"I hate to see what he's done to Tama's nice cleaning job by now," Gintoki said, shaking his head.

"We have to get back and take him for a nice long walk!"

"Okay," Gintoki said, "but we're going to lay down some ground rules first."

Kagura, poised to sprint all the way home, paused. "Ground rules?"

Gintoki nodded and raised one finger. "Firstly, no letting go of the leash. And if the mutt gets off anyway, then whatever private property he wanders onto—into a garden, into someone's living room, whatever—we wait outside for him to come back."

"No trespassing is reasonable," said Shinpachi. "Also how about, no accepting rewards for things we didn't really help with?"

"Probably smart," Gintoki reluctantly agreed. "And while we're at it, no sakura soft-serve out of season."

"...Gin-san?"

"Aww," Kagura said. "Then I say—no dying. Nobody, ever."

"I think that's always a rule, Kagura-chan," Shinpachi murmured.

Kagura picked her nose and flicked it away defiantly. "Fine, okay, then how about—no new swords!"

"Right," Shinpachi said, nodding, "no picking up any strange flambards or katana or zanbatou or foils or cutlasses or anything else. No matter who's offering them or how big the jewels stuck in them are or how many millions of yen they might be worth. Agreed?"

"Agreed," Kagura said, twirling her sword-free parasol.

"Agreed, Gin-san?" Shinpachi said severely.

Gintoki looked at Shinpachi walking at his left with his arms stubbornly folded, then at Kagura skipping cheerfully at his right, both of them moving and breathing and alive, too loud and colorful and there to be anything but real.

"Yeah," Gintoki said, tapping the wooden hilt of his bokutou. "This is enough for me."