6 Goat 1169
My armor is uncomfortably warm today. Of course, everything becomes uncomfortable in the Kanshigumi – I think it is part of their allure. We are nothing but uncomfortable combinations of ideal and reality: Law-enforcers with no authority, Samurai trying to put the Empire first with our clan colors still blazing proudly, authority figures who are outranked by almost everyone around us – it would be funny if there weren't so many people deadly serious about it…and if I were not a member.
This is our first patrol with our new squad leader, Isawa Yamizu-sama. Just what we needed: a pacifistic priest of the Kami in a group that will, in all likelihood, end up in not a small number of fights. Well, what's one more contradiction among the others? My father liked to say, "The market's never wrong, even if you don't understand it." I don't know what particular need we had for such a milksop as this one in his flaming finery, but he's the -sama for now.
And here's the funny part – we're the first squad! An Isawa, a Shinjo, a Hiruma, a Suzume, and my pleasant Yoritomo self in an unaligned police force in the capital. With no real authority, the Seppun have taken it into their heads to build a squad that is comprised of those persons who are virtually guaranteed to have no political coin to spend. It would be funny…but I repeat myself.
We finish our uneventful patrol (lucky for us – Isawa-sama seems not quite ready to face down an angry okaa-san) and return to the home of Kitsuki Atsumori, he who was "honored" with the blessing of a gang of samurai taking up every spare tatami. I suppose one does not say no to the Seppun when they ask directly. My erstwhile comrades are still slow in engaging each other in talk – we're all still individuals, not a team. My yoriki in the Mantis district were a team. Well, I suppose they still are. But father would chide me for regrets or wishing I'd made this trade instead of that. Isawa-sama seems eager to curry favor with the leadership. I can't blame him (there's precious little profit to be found in this venture as is, best to dig for gold where you can) but I've seen enough Crane-Phoenix snobbery just in my term as a clan magistrate to last a lifetime. I hardly need it here.
Still, the Dragon district is not without its small pleasures and among them is the Ikazaya, Iyashite Kudasai. The Sparrow only comes reluctantly and I think the Isawa fears the peasants will rub off on him like dirt or oil; nevertheless, we spend some small time trying to get to know one another better and move one step further away from strangers. Suzume-san is forever quiet, but we discover it's because she marshals words the way a Tsuruchi marshals arrows – her stories are amazing! We come another step away from strangers. Yoritomo's sweat, but we might even be able to see comrades from here. Then the firemen arrive.
My clan has never been renowned for its couth and refinement (and with the exception of the gorgeous Yoyonagi, I do not see this as a perception we will break away from soon), but we look like the damned Crane compared to these buffoons. They are as loud as the Crab and smell worse than the ass of a Shinjo steed. All of this I could forgive, but then they prove to be bullies to boot.
I have never tolerated bullies and I never shall. That these firemen were lording largely out of an ability to threaten others with ruin only made it worse.
I hear the grumbles and moans of the peasants around me. The firemen have been raising their "rates", the firemen are getting more aggressive, the firemen…Kuso! As much as I can't stand bullies, I don't truck much with whiners either. The thing that bullies thrive on is that weak people don't hit back. Then I overhear the bullies themselves – they're making noises about Yoshi, the district headman. Yoshi's a good guy with more sense than any four samurai put together. Anyone grumbling about Yoshi has just been added to a special list I keep beneath my pillow to give me good dreams at night.
It's my "those awaiting a celestial ass-kicking" list.
I explain the situation to my comrades and Hiruma-san and Shinjo-san are with me as soon as they see the chance to finally do something. Suzume-san is hesitant and Isawa-sama nearly flails about in indecision. Still, three of us are decisive and that is enough to get the group moving for now. Aiko's boy, Kanjiro, guides our steps in the dark until we find a place to intercept the drunkards as they stumble home. We nab one and I apply some gentle persuasion to convince him to share his innermost thoughts with us. So the firemen mean to present some manner of ultimatum to old man Yoshi, do they? While I wouldn't want to try and take on that tough old man, they're still peasants and the firemen at least have the advantage of crude weaponry on their side.
We're all a bit invigorated (well, at least I am) by actually having something to get involved in. Isawa-sama, naturally, goes to report in and curry a bit more favor. Just in case our squad actually began to understand our place in the Celestial Order, no one seems to be able to who agree just who is in charge. I suspect this is a result of a decided lack of military men in the group, but we seem to be debating if it's the Bayushi or the Doji. Their patrol seems to be primarily suited for going to parties but they've got the coin that spends in this new world, political influence. We're the pauper patrol, so we're out roughing up firemen to actually, fortunes be still, protect the damn district.
I couldn't care less what Isawa-sama's meeting with the aspiring authorities meted out, but the next day we're out and working. Isawa-sama's political finesse (not a lot but "not a lot" beats the rest of us by a couple of boat lengths) gets him some time with a Kitsuki district magistrate. That meeting doesn't get us much more than an ever-so-polite Dragon "go mind your own damn business and stop pretending to be magistrates." My own meeting with the potter, Hayao, helps to confirm what we already suspected – that the firemen want to jack up their rates and that the locals are angry enough about it to tell them where they can stuff their rates. This is just the sort of matter I hate but it's a magistrate's lot: you never see these problems until they're about to explode with some poor bastard getting his head broken. In a fight between peasants and firemen, I see a lot of broken peasant heads. Time to go talk to Yoshi.
Well, this proves to be my turn to be unproductive. Yoshi doesn't want broken heads either, but the demands of the firemen have crossed from being impoverishing to ruinous. There's just not enough coin to make them happy and they are not taking no for an answer. Adding to the problem is Yoshi's hotheaded boy, Hokichi, who helps Yoshi run the inn, Kiri no Kioku. Hokichi is just spoiling for a fight and I can understand the man's pride but he wants to go fist first at a gang that's going to come armed. We leave Yoshi's house with the knowledge that this is going to go to Jigoku in a hurry. So what does Isawa-sama want to do?
A great big steaming pile of nothing.
I really ought to be used to this by now. The damn uppity clans with their damn uppity ways not caring who or what gets broken, especially if it's just peasants wailing on peasants. After all, they're barely even people, right? He stares at me with this uncomprehending gaze as I try to make him, for a flicker of a moment, see the road to ruin for the people he is supposed to be protecting. In the end, I don't even know if I got through to him – he still prattles on about how Doji-sama wanted to us to inquire and report but not, you know, actually do anything. The Scorpion or the Crane would squabble over what to do next and probably leave use either doing nothing or disobeying orders – neither of which is acceptable.
We know that the firemen will be roaming after sundown for lights-out so we set up an after-dark patrol. That patrol is like a fire: a spark that leads to a conflagration. The spark is a poor old obaa-san whose husband is ill. The firemen hassle her once and then come back to give her the once over again. At this point, I've had enough. Like every bully since the first one, the firemen are not ready for a fair fight. They go scuttling away, muttering the eternal bully retreat song of "We'll be back." I'm just beginning to feel like we might be getting somewhere when the gong starts sounding.
The fire gong.
Ok, I probably ought to wait for Isawa-sama to actually make the decision, but one does not wait for a fire. We're off like a shot. The scene is as bad as one could possibly make it: a building burning out of control, the firemen standing to one side, and the locals standing to the other. They're ready to kill each other and, judging by their conspicuous absence, the samurai are ready to let them. Just when it looks like hell is about to erupt up and down the street, Isawa-sama makes me take back all the nasty thoughts I've been having about him.
I've seen a few of the Yoritomo shugenja weave minor prayers and I've read stories along with everyone else but what Isawa-sama does next is one of those things you hear about but never really see. His voice, which has nearly quavered with indecision, is, at once, enough to command a raging fire. Suddenly, I see why people fear the Phoenix and the Isawa, in particular. Yamizu-sama destroys the fire, seemingly by the sheer force of his will. At the same time he's plunged everyone into darkness and the fighting is stalled by confusion. Unfortunately, it's the sort of confusion that could easily turn into a disaster only slightly less horrendous than the fire. But there's Isawa-sama again. His voice echoes up one side of the street and down the other and, in no time at all, a miniature sun is blazing in the sky. Now we can see the enemy. He's turned this from a disaster into a fight…and I know what to do in a fight.
We dive in on the side of the peasants and I start setting some small order to the mob. My yoriki and I trained daily on squad combat, but these people are crafters, not warriors. Still, the firemen are only marginally better than the peasants and our patrol more than makes up the difference. Just like that, for a moment, we are a team and we are better than a gang of bullies. The fight is over as soon as it begins – it just takes the thugs a little bit to realize it.
Even as they draw back, I can see it in their eyes: they're just going to slink away and wait…wait for a time when the big, bad samurai can't get them and they can handle the peasants with a free hand. There's only one way to deal with those sorts of opportunists and that's to put fear in them. I call out the ringleader, an ugly piece of work named Hideo. He rumbles forward, licked but, thus far, unbowed. So I bow him.
My kick is neither honorable nor particularly gentle and I'm pretty sure I busted his manhood with the iron of my shin guard. He goes down like a gasping tuna and I introduce him to how we keep order in the Mantis district – one harsh kick at a time. Isawa-sama calls me off and I let him: the shugenja has earned some of his authority tonight and the thought that I might be a little unhinged and need leashing will help make the bastards more hesitant to cross us in the future.
We go back to the house. It's a little victory but, Jigoku's spit, we're a little group.
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