Redemption (Chapter 3)
Dimitri stood in the open air patio watching his senshi go through form 8 of Iaido. He was silent waiting for Akuma to speak. Eventually he did.
“So you are still having the dreams?”
“Yes, but they are getting worse. I’m not sure what do anymore. Nothing helps to keep them away. I feel that I can never make peace with myself with these dreams.”
“It is no small wonder that you keep having these dreams. Your coming here and telling me this is no suprise.”
Dimitri was suprised by this annoucement.
“How can you say that? What does it mean then?”
“You have not made peace with your past. You have pushed it away rather than accept it. It is a part of you, it is in you no matter what else you choose to do in this life. The fact that you’ve handled things like you have makes these dreams perfectly normal.”
“I don’t want that past anymore. I am not that person anymore. I would rather it never have existed. Hiroshi understood that.”
Akuma looked down for a moment, a gesture of reverence for his dead friend and Dimitri’s first teacher.
“As I do. But he would have agreed with me as well. A man does what he does and cannot go back and change it. He must accept the things he does and the things that come with it. He cannot pretend it was someone else that did those things.”
“I cannot accept that right now. Maybe in time, but I cannot do that now.”
“Then until that time the dreams will continue.”
“You cannot offer any other advice to help me with these dreams?”
“I have offered you the only advice that will help you. I can offer you nothing further than a cup of mugi cha. Now come, the tea will do you good.”
Akuma turned to go inside. Then with lightning quickness he turned and threw half a dozen throwing blades at Dimitri. Dimitri moved just as quick, catching each of the blades in perfect timing…until the last one, pulling it out of the air a second late, getting a light cut across his arm.
“You are almost as quick as you were. The fact that you are able to still do such things show you are still that person, you must accept it to move on. But your denying of this will only hurt you…physically as well as spiritually.”
Akuma then turned and went inside. Dimitri looked at his arm for a few seconds before walking toward the house as well. He turned around right before the step and the blades flew from his hands like bullets. They hit the bullseye of the target wall in a soft star pattern. His rage abated for the moment, he went inside.
Damien