Rurouni Kenshin: Backwards Hurled
By: Rika Wannabe
Disclaimer: I do not own Rurouni Kenshin (much as I love it), Mr. Watsuki does. Arigato, Watsuki-sama!
Chapter 1, Of How This Tale Begins
“Why are you doing this!?” The young woman’s voice cracked. She couldn’t understand why it was happening to her. What did he have against her? She didn’t even know the guy!
The young man couldn’t have been any older than she was, but he had a wild glint in his eyes that made any who saw him back away slowly and hope they hadn’t been spotted. His hair was long and dirty-blonde and a solid mass of tangles. Thin wire rim glasses sat on a crooked nose, saying it had probably been broken once.
He sneered. “You don’t even remember me, do you?”
The woman shook her head.
“Then let me clue you in: Marcus.”
Her eyes grew wide, and she struggled all the more against the ropes binding her to the pillar in the middle of the room.
“What’s the matter, Kin? Afraid?”
Kin was afraid. Terrified, in fact. But she wasn’t going to let that stand in the way of her escape.
“Now, don’t panic…!” Laughing, Marcus left the room.
When Marcus got back, he held a coils of wires and cords in his arms, and then started hooking them up to numerous outlets.
Kin watched with growing horror. It looked as if…as if he were building a bomb!
Now, like most criminals, Marcus loved to brag about his inventions and evil plots. So he turned towards the visibly shaking Kin, and smiled. The smile was filled with pure loathing.
“You’re wondering what this does. Aren’t you.” They were not questions. Marcus knew the answers before he asked. “Do you want to know?”
Kin didn’t reply, knowing that if she said no he’d be all the more likely to show her. Her plan backfired.
“That pillar you’re tied to is actually a gigantic column of crystal. It shall act as a catalyst for my testing.”
“What kind of testing…?” Her voice came out in a whisper.
“I’m playing with the fourth dimension, time. I look upon it as an enthralling game. One I’ve been planning on teaching you since the tenth grade…” Marcus turned cool eyes to hers. There was no hesitation - no sign of anything human - in them. “I am banishing you. I don’t know when to. I think it has to do with the force of will a person demonstrates. The stronger the will, the more likely you’ll be sent where you want to go.” A cruel smile lifted one side of his mouth, parting his thin lips to show teeth filthy with neglect. “In your current state of mind, your willpower will be greatly diminished. I will send you someplace I know you’ll be unhappy…like the Mesozoic Era?”
Kin was furious, and slightly doubtful of the truth behind his words. A time machine? Yeah right! But if it was true then how dare he threaten her! She’d show him. She’d play along…
Marcus flipped a switch, and walked over to place his hands on the column on either side of Kin’s head. “Say hello to your new neighbors for me,” he hissed. “It’s time FOR MY REVENGE!”
“Wanna bet? WHEREVER I’M GOING, YOU’RE GONNA COME WITH ME!”
Kin didn’t know why he came to mind…she hadn’t thought about him in years… But there he was, his sword drawn to protect -- not to kill. She admired that, even as she disagreed. If she had a sword in her hands at that very moment, she knew Marcus would be dead, and she would be free.
With a crack, Kin’s world was shattered and past and present met with clash.
The twenty-five-year-old came to briefly, to find herself in the center of a six-pointed-star shaped scorch mark, in the midst of the rubble of a once beautiful city. But then, with a gasp of pain as she tried to sit up, Kin once more passed out. She wouldn’t remember waking up in the arms of a red-haired swordsman, not at first, but she would remember the blond man who had sent her into a world where swordsmen and warriors, as if out of legend, roamed. And she would thank him, even as she swore his death…______________________________________________________________________________
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