After, when the fighting had stopped and the emperor was dead and none of the guards made any moves to stop her, Bashira went home. The streets were a riot of fleeing people, calling desperately for each other over the crackle of flames and the crash of broken glass, but her door was still shut tight against them. Inside, all the noise and destruction faded, muted by the comfort of walls. 

She pulled herself slowly up the stairs, still trembling and aching in all her parts, though it seemed as though her stomach had finished its protesting. The windows were closed, and her bedroom too warm, but Basira didn’t open them to let in the tumult. It would be soon enough when the guards came for her. Instead, she laid her sword on the far side of her bed and stripped out of her dueling costume to slide beneath the soft cotton cover bare.

Bashira didn’t leave her bed the next day. She didn’t let herself think of her father. She didn’t let herself think of the duel. Only lay still and wondered when the guards would come from her between fits of uneasy sleep. What would she tell them? That she had not meant to kill that stupid noble boy? What did it matter? Her father had been right. No, no. He could not be.

The second day, Bashira peeled herself from her sheets and went to bathe, scrubbing away sweat and dirt and blood. The hot water took some time to boil one kettle at a time, but it was worth it in the end. The heat soothed her sore muscles and released the tension in her shoulders. She was so tired. It had been the worst day of her life, hadn’t it? Yesterday. No. The day before yesterday. It couldn’t have been that much time yet.

Bashira went back to bed.

On the third day, Bashira woke up and reached for a bottle. There wasn’t one there. Someone—not her, certainly— had picked up the broken pottery, but the floor next to her bed was still sticky with dried wine from the day before— before everything had happened. She couldn’t sleep anymore, so she got up and pulled on a robe. The sword was still lying there like a lover, pillowed atop her sheets in languid repose. She left it and went downstairs. 

It would be so nice just not to feel, to slip away from this wreck of her life. Bashira didn’t want to think about how she had no career left, how they’d never let her duel again in this city or how difficult it would be to start over well past the age when anyone was likely to sponsor her. She didn’t want to think of the throne room, of the emperor’s death and the destruction in the streets of her home. She didn’t want to think of her father. Just for a moment. Just to relax. She had earned a chance to let go.

Bashira stepped onto the first floor, its empty, dust-tracked floors spilling out around her like an infinite, unfathomable space, so much bigger and colder than the bedroom above. There was a second room behind it for preparing food, also barren and set into the floor, the door to a cellar. Bashira heaved it open and climbed into the swallowing dark, closing her eyes as cool air caressed her barely-covered skin. It smelled like earth, like home, like the sweet notes of a summer wine, and the dim light from the open hatch above illuminated clay jugs stored neatly on simple, wooden shelves. 

The earth was cool against Bashira’s feet, and below the house, the noise from the street could no longer be heard so that silence, soft and complete, settled around her shoulders like her dark hair, clean but unbrushed after her bath. All she could see, though, was herself lying naked on the floor of her bedroom, drenched in stale wine and stinking of some lover whose name she could not remember. Or her father, sweating and filthy, staggering up from a rotting straw mat to swing at her in a thick, unknowing rage.

Were you drunk, Bashira?

Bashira threw the first shelf onto the floor, shattering glass and pottery in a cataclysm of dripping wine shards, small cuts stinging in her bare feet when the alcohol clawed them. Everything smelled stickier than cherry blossoms or dragon’s beard candy, and once started, the urge to destroy took hold of her like fighting fury sometimes did, a strange, half-delirious thrill. She tore another shelf from the wall, ran along its up-turned edges, and swept round-bellied jars pregnant with drink from their long nesting places. It was a symphony of tinkling, crashing splashes, the bouquet of a spring plum’s ripening, and then it was over, and Bashira was alone again in the mess of her rented cellar, dripping blood from thin cuts bathed in wine.

On the fourth—was it?—day, Bashira rose and left to find food, only to end up in a bar instead.

[hr]

The sun was yet to break over the horizon when Fujiko awoke. Although she did tend to be an early riser, she tended to be up with the sun other than before it. Four days had passed since the attack on the emperor, yet she still had nights filled with tossing and turning, her dreams of dread outlining her failings were broken by moments of her thoughts racing, she eventually just stopped trying to sleep. She sat up with a quiet groan, trying to not wake up her large Zauri friend snoozing across the room. Their little room was modest at best, just a couple of basic sleeping mats and a small area for cooking and eating. Although a mat on the floor may seem similar to a mat on the earth there was something nice about not being exposed to the elements every now and again. Deciding she was going nowhere by being idle she grabbed her blade and quietly stepped around Yazju.

Fujiko journeyed a good hour or so out of the city to a nearby meadow. There was something freeing about being outside of the cluster of buildings, especially after the death of their emperor the air was suffocating. Thousands of people were holding their breath to see what would happen next, and it was Fujiko’s weapons that had allowed it to come to this. She took a shaky breath before pulling out Otto Boyuja and swinging at the air, coming up with other ways she could have approached the prior night. Maybe if she had slashed like this, she would have left more room to move swifter, or perhaps if she ran like this, she would have made it to the attacker. Fruitless thinking that had been crossing her mind for days. She did not seem to come to a conclusion on what would work, and worse still, even if she did, she was too late, it was all in vain, she had already failed. Fujiko hated failing.

[color=limegreen]”The hell was I meant to do?!”[/color] she screamed in frustration, throwing her weapon at the ground before dropping to her knees. She wasn’t sure who she was yelling at, whether it be Kizunatsu, herself, or her katana and the remains of her husband within. Her eyes flutter to her katana, the blade having stuck itself in the soft dirt when she threw it down, leaving the hilt hanging in the air. [color=limegreen]”What would have you done?”[/color] she asked gently with a sigh. Nothing came back, as she very much expected, the dead are no better at conversation than steel. Fujiko needed a drink, and a good one at that. She released herself from the tranquility of the meadow and returned to the city, where a solemn feeling lingered in the air more than ever, as if more people knew of their emperor's early demise. Fujiko had noticed a small Izakaya when she had arrived at the city only days ago. It looked like a small dingy place, but they seemed to serve drink at the best prices and be less likely to cut one off early. She went inside and took a seat by the bar. 

There was a folk woman beside her, already nursing rice beer, her dark hair pulled back from a pointed face, one cheek slashed badly, the cut new and scabbed over. The forearms of her green robes were sooty where she had rested them on a part of the counter kissed by the fires that had ravaged the city only a few days ago, and a two-handed sword hung from her belt. There were a few such scorch marks around them, but it seemed that whoever had been defending the Izakaya had done a decent job at putting them out before they spread. Minutes passed without her seeming to notice Fujiko, but when she did, it was with the half-suppressed start of recognition. “You,” she said. “You were there.” 

Although there was only a chair between Fujiko and the stranger, she didn't at all mind the silence between them. Honestly, she barely noticed the fierce folk's presence. She ordered a rice beer for herself also and was only a sip or two in when the woman started a conversation, reminding her of her presence on that wretched day. Fujiko turned her head to get a better look at the woman, she didn't recognize her from the attacks. Although, she doubted she would have recognized the head guards let alone anyone else in the crowd, all of which had become blurred faces despite her zauri friend. The woman's scars paid testiment to a recent battle, likely the same one Fujiko was in, she had figured. [color=limegreen]"Unfortunately,"[/color] was the response she settled on before taking a swig of her rice beer. [color=limegreen]"Yourself?"[/color]

Bewilderingly, the woman looked away as though taken aback. “It was real…” It was a ridiculous thing to say, given the destruction that still tainted the city, but perhaps she meant the throne room. The Emperor’s death. The horrible, unstoppable masked man who did it. The woman raised her cup. “Well, here’s to surviving that shit bath.”

[color=limegreen]"Unfortunately it was,"[/color] the Honfokun mused. Admitting the event had happened brought back a flood of memories, the stench of mass death, the blanket of silent horror as the emperor was impaled by Wakuno's sword. Fujiko was already raising the glass to her lips when the folk woman raised a toast. Fujiko raised her glass in reply [color=limegreen]"To, somehow, not being dead,"[/color] she responds before taking a swig of her rice beer. [color=limegreen]"Looks like you got a good battle, how does the other guy look?"[/color] she asks, nodding to her fellow drinker's cheek.

The woman frowned, touching her face where the scabbed cut crossed her skin. “That wasn’t the battle, but the aftermath,” she said dryly. “I’d say everyone I fought was dead, but there were so fucking many of them, who knows. Dressed in rags and appearing like a swarm of locusts… What do you think will happen now that the emperor is dead?”

[color=limegreen]"Ha, sounds no different from my experience,"[/color] Fujiko replied dryly. She took a few moments and a few sips of rice wine to think through her answer to the question. [color=limegreen]"I suppose there will always be someone to step up. I guess it comes down to whether the emperor had an heir or if someone battles their way to power."[/color]

“Who fucking says the emperor is dead?” Too late, the women looked up to notice that they were not entirely alone. A large man—a laborer by the size and strength of his hands— had been standing nearby, waiting on drinks for his table. He turned to the companions waiting on him. “Did you hear that? These say the emperor is dead!”

“Like any trash rabble could get to our emperor! Load of snivelling scared bullshit.”

They were just drunk. Men and women who worked hard and then spent that money on a little escapism at the end of their week before dragging themselves back to their jobs after a too-short day of rest. The sort of people who believed in their leaders and hoped for a brighter future for their children when they could have no hope of anything better for themselves. There was absolutely no reason to fight them if it could at all be avoided.

But the woman with the long sword stood up and turned to face him. She was every bit as tall as he was, and she pressed threateningly into his space. “The emperor is dead. We saw him die to a man in a demon mask, and if you can’t admit it, then you’re coward scum brothel frequenter whose mother ought to have given birth to an empty pigskin instead. Fuck your ancestors to the eighteenth generation!”

Well. That was one way to get a fight if you wanted one.

The man swung, and Fujiko’s unfortunate drinking companion dodged—surprisingly light on her feet for someone that must be inebriated. She landed a blow to the underside of his chin that sent the man stumbling back into another table, and from there all was chaos. Lubricated men and women from all across the Izakaya stood up, some to head to the doors, but most to lend their fists and cups and tables to the tumult.

Fujiko didn't come to the Izukaya to fight, far from it, she came to forget that very thing. She could have easily ignored the drunkards, spewing ignorant arguments of the emperor’s non-death. She very much considered doing so. Even when her new acquaintance shouted back, Fujiko had no intention of playing a role, then the folk woman had to insult someone. Soon the whole bar seemed to turn on Bashira. Fujiko groaned as the men and women surrounded the pair. She was going to be in the midst of the battle whether she lent a hand or not. [color=limegreen]"Fine!"[/color] she groaned, grabbing her cup and clobbering a middle-age folk man in the chin with it, precious drops of rice wine spilling out of the cup. 

The folk man stumbled back a few steps in shock, running a hand down his chin, a dark bruise forming where he was hit. He ran at Fujiko. Unfortunately for Fujiko was not as dexterous as her drinking companion when she was sober, luckily she could still withstand a good attack. Her recently instituted brawling partner slammed her against the bar, and without missing a beat, Fujiko returned the favor by punching him in the cheek.

Fujiko turned her attention to the rest of the crowd, most of their attention was on Bashira, although there did seem to be a few sizing up the Honfo. Her eyes glanced at her drinking buddy turned brawl partner. She seemed to play this scene like a dance with poise and grace beyond what Fujiko could do in this setting, she must have done this before. [color=limegreen]"I take it this is not your first?"[/color] she called out to the folk woman as she shoved away another attacker.

The woman just laughed, and then they were too absorbed in the melee to speak. Fujiko lost sight of her for a time, blocked by a tall folk man wielding a clay bottle like a short club. He swung it artlessly in front of himself and lost his balance when Fujiko took hold of his arm and pulled him forward into the bar, his head connecting with a thick clunk. Her drinking partner was kicking over a table into the legs of two opponents, bottles and cups crashing into the floor. Everything smelled of sour beer and sweating people. It seemed to last forever.

And then the woman’s growl spilled over the riot in a stream of colorful insults. A guard had her, his comrades laying about the fighting people with clubs and fists and the butts of their spears, and though she wrenched herself forward, she couldn’t seem to get away. The fighting just died, all of the squirming bodies falling still like an anthill treated with poison, and in the silence, a roughly-dressed man pointed. Fujiko thought it was one of the first group her drinking companion had insulted. “That’s the other one. The Honfokun.”

Fujiko was so engulfed in battle she hadn’t noticed her companion being captured at first. It wasn’t until silence fell and someone had mentioned her that she turned to see Bashira held in place. Fujiko growled and run at the man only to be pulled back by the arms before she could. She whipped her head around to see the gruff face in a guard's uniform. [color=limegreen]”Unhand me right now!”[/color] she screeched, attempting to writhe her arms out of the folk’s large hands but it was fruitless. Once again she had failed. She gave a defeated sigh, lowering her head. [color=limegreen]”Fine, what do you want from us? Coin? I have coin,”[/color]

“We do not want your coin,” her captor responded. He gave no other clarification but began pulling her toward the door. Part of Fujiko was intrigued, there was little a lower rank guardsmen would do for coin, and there was no reason to send higher ranks to break up a bar brawl. At least for now, she would follow his instructions. Worst come, she had a lifeline in her Zauri friend, or perhaps her father would take pity on her and call for her release.