• "Damn, my skin is sticking to my skin, it's so hot!"

    Truly, the air was so humid that summer night that it was impossible to be comfortable, as the samurai observed. His armor long since shed, he wore his yukata loose, a fan in hand as he attempted to cool himself. Magoichi had discovered several things that night; one, he was cooler with his hair down, and two, he looked stupid with his ribbon wrapped around his wrist like a bracelet, but there wasn't anyone around to say anything to him about it.

    He lay on his back on the wooden floors of the inn he had somehow come across in the middle of what was seemingly nowhere. Moths were drawn to a lantern, covered in a paper shell and casting a red-orange glow across the floorboards and across Magoichi, not that he minded too much. It was better than the sun, at any rate.

    There was no sun to be found, however, nor even a moon. The sky was filled with heavy clouds, dark and ominous, that threatened rain which never seemed to come. It was always like this; heavy and humid with no end in sight.

    And yet... the rain finally broke free from its prison of cloud, falling upon the earth in a steady staccato within seconds. The humidity lifted and was replaced with the cool, fresh scent of damp earth and wood, along with the clean scent of the rain itself.

    Everything was more stunning during a storm, Magoichi thought, feeling the floorboards vibrate beneath his back with a clap of thunder. The sakura tree in the courtyard, perfectly visible through the wide open shoji doors, was being tossed around in the wind, petals flying from its branches prematurely and landing to the earth in puddles. One landed at his side, and he glanced up at the tree from which it came. "It's like being born early, I guess," He said, taking the petal into his hand on impulse and setting it near the candle to dry. Turning back to look at the tree, however, he saw something else, of far greater interest.

    Standing near the open gate was a figure, covered in straw mats stained red with dried blood. The posture of the person was shaky, as if they were unable to stand on their own. Slipping on his sandals and grabbing his musket, Magoichi stepped outside to check upon the person. It seemed to be just in time, too, as the person fell forward into Magoichi's arms.

    It took him no less than a second with his strong arm across their chest to realize two more things; one, that the blood on the mats had probably come from them and the wound in their stomach, and two, that the person was not just a person. She was a woman.

    Magoichi took her inside immediately, shoving more impulses to the back of his head, and set her down on the floors. "I'll roll the futon out for you in a minute," He murmured to her, throwing aside the straw mats and pushing masses of dark hair away so that he could see her face.

    The woman was pale, and losing more blood very quickly. It looked to Magoichi as if the wound had healed, but was then reopened, probably by long, forced travel. Grabbing sets of bandages from his bag, as well as some medicines he had acquired on his travels, he began to untie the hakama from around her waist. The ties were tight, and no wonder; they were way too big for her petite frame. After being untied, it was easy to slip the hakama down enough for him to begin untying the pale blue yukata that she wore underneath, which had a telltale red stain around the abdominal area.

    Magoichi worked quickly, first stopping the bleeding, then applying the medicine, and finally bandaging her abdomen, wrapping it several times until, finally, the edge of the bandages reached the bottom of where she had bound her breasts to, with similar, albeit loose, bandaging. Deciding not to worry much about that, he examined his work, nodding when he had given himself a passing grade. "Wait a moment," He muttered to the unconscious girl, unrolling the two futons that were in the corner for storage and laying them out beside each other.

    "Fever..." Magoichi muttered under his breath as he drew his fingertips across her forehead. "Prob'ly from infection... hope I got it all out." Gingerly, he picked the woman up, setting her down upon one of the two futons. After making sure she wasn't laying on any part of her hair, he changed into another yukata, and laid in the other one. "She's not conscious enough to take any medicine for that, either. s**t."

    Drawing her closer to his chest, he felt the tiniest flutter of a pulse from her wrist, and he was relieved, at least, that he wasn't wasting his medical supplies on a corpse. "You'll be alright, now." He murmured, glancing over at the now-closed shoji, which was illuminated every so often with a flash of lightning. Pushing his tired eyes to look where the sopping wet mats had been laid, he saw the light of the candle reflecting off of what appeared to be the lacquered hilt of a blade. That was the last thing that he saw, however, before his tiredness consumed him entirely, and he fell into a deep sleep.

    When he awoke the next morning, he found the still-slumbering woman curled against his chest, the color in her cheeks back and her pulse once again strong and normal. Smiling upon realizing that, Magoichi sat up and gently drew the covers over her, while he dressed back into his armor. He went to tug the ribbon from his wrist and stopped halfway to reaching up for his hair. He glanced over at the girl, whose long hair was in so many directions he got dizzy just thinking about it. Stepping over quietly, so as not to wake her, he pulled the lower part of her hair back into the ribbon, tying it tightly. "Time to go, Sleepin' Beauty," Magoichi said, taking her sword and tucking it into her arms before picking her up and leaving the inn room.

    "Nn... where am I...?" Magoichi's gaze shot down to the woman, who drew her hand to her head as if in attempts to ease a headache. "Who are you?" Opening her chocolate-brown eyes, she looked up at him confusedly. From the sound of her voice, she wasn't even really a woman yet, probably only thirteen, fourteen at the most. "Name's Saika Magoichi," He told her, rather proudly. "And I pretty much saved your life last night. So don't go killin' me, okay?" Magoichi nodded to her blade.

    She nodded to him, looking as if she were still very tired. "I'm Ikusawa Ramiko..." She yawned. Magoichi nodded. "Got it, Rami." He grinned, watching her press her head to his armored chest and drift back off into a light slumber. Apparently, she didn't mind the nickname.

    Maybe the air last night was filled with more than humidity. Magoichi thought that there must have been a little magic in it, too.