"The Beryl"

by: Karina Kineshi

     Shuu put his hand on the doorknob to keep it from shaking. He looked at the keychain on the keys to the jeep, a little saying that said "It's not easy being a princess, but someone has to do it." He chuckled slightly and turned the knob. "Yeah, and a princess she is." he muttered.

    "And just what do you think you are doing with my car?" He hesitated, because he didn't think Nasuti was there in the kitchen. "And where are you going? When were you planning on telling the rest of us, what if we needed the car for some dire emergency and--"

    Shuu cut her off. "I'm going to, um, the beach."

    The air hung stale in the kitchen as the great monster called bewilderment crept over Nasuti's face. Suddenly, something clicked and immediately her eyes softened. "Okay, Shuu-chan, take as long as you need." He turned to leave, keys in hand and sadness in heart. "Do you need some money in case, you get hungry?"

    Shuu turned around in weariness, "I'm not hungry." 2 hours later, he pulled over to the side of a narrow dirt road. He put the car in park and delicately fingered the roses that lay in the passenger's seat. 'White, they always were his favorite...' A new wave of nausea hit him and he put his head on the steering wheel. 'Fight it Shuu, fight....' He knew that if you waged war on yourself, you would eventually lose. 'Fight...' He was losing against his own mind. 'Stop! Stop it...' He grabbed the doorhandle and gave it a desperate tug. Miraculously, it slid open and he fell out onto the ground. Gasping because the breath was knocked out of him, he gripped the car window and hoisted himself up. He collected his thoughts and stared blankly at the roses. "Right." he muttered quietly as he reached for them. The plastic cellophane crackled with life, almost cheerily. It was terribly out of place. Shuu half-laughed and shut the door.

    *..."Shuu-chan, have you seen Shin anywhere?"

      He shook his head, "Nah, he said he had to go to the beach."

    Seiji spoke up, "Yeah, and right in the middle of dinner too!"

    Ryo turned around, rolled his eyes, and turned back to the TV. "He's a big boy Nasuti, he doesn't need another mother fretting over him."

      Nasuti scowled and resumed cutting the vegetables. "Can you keep it down over there? Some people are trying to concentrate!" Touma snapped while sitting in his favorite blue beanbag chair.

      Seiji mused while flipping over an Ace of Spades, "He's probably getting acquainted with all the hot girls there."

      "And he didn't ask me to come with him? Man!" Shuu disappointedly opened the refrigerator door.

   Nasuti looked at the rain slowly pattering on the windowsill, "I guess you're right Ryo. He turned around and smirked at her with a "I'm better than you are" look. She glared, and chopped up the celery as if it were Ryo's head...*

    Shuu crinkled the plastic more and quickened his pace. The sun was low in the sky, sunrays like fingers desperately groping for something to hold on to. The end of the trail was in sight, and the musty sea air awaited him. He sprinted until he was out in the open, a tropical palm guarding the entrance. The white sand gave way underneath his feet as he cautiously approached the water's edge. Stopping, he absentmindedly stared at the blue gem. A ghost crab skittered over his feet and vanished into the surf.

    *...The rain pounded harder against the window, but Shuu dismissed his growing concerns. Ryo was right, Shin was no baby. He continued to eat his sandwich, topped high with mayo and pickles. "Hey guys, I think you should have a look at this." Ryo stared wide-eyed at the TV.

      Touma looked up from his book, "Hey, turn it up will ya'?" Seiji stopped flipping cards and clicked the knob of the old Panoramic. "Be warned, a typhoon has been spotted off the coast of Yokohama. The advisory right now is to stay in your homes. Heavy flooding has been reported near the sandbanks of Chosu, areas under warning are..." A look of panic flickered across everyone's faces, except for Byauken who was asleep on the rug in front of Ryo.

    "You don't think..."

      Touma unconcernedly buried his nose in his book, "Even if he was, he could handle it."

      "Is there anyway to make sure?"

    Touma scratched his head thoughtfully, "Not until--" The house was plunged in darkness and the TV clicked off. He sighed in exasperation, "--until the power comes back on."

      "But what if--"

      Seiji fumbled around the kitchen for a flashlight, "Shizumaru Nasuti, we'll check first thing in the morning, but if you ask me..." A beam of light sliced through the living room, "He's getting frisky with a babe he met on the beach." Everyone welcomed the laugh, it broke the nervous tension. 'At least he tries.' Shuu thought...*

      'Oh no...' he realized with rising dread, 'It's coming back...'

    "Stop!" The thoughts tumbled out like a burst dam from being held back for so long.

    *..."What do you mean?" Nasuti demanded, her frightened eyes scanning the four guys sitting apprehensively at the table. "Why yes, of course...We'll be right there!" Slamming down the phone on its receiver, she was on the edge of hysterics. "Shin's boat never came back last night."

      Seiji bolted upright from his chair and went over to Nasuti. He put his hands on her shoulders and gave her a little shake, "What else did they say?"

    She collapsed sobbing into his arms, "They're deploying a search and rescue team, in case..." She didn't have to finish.

    Shuu got up and yanked his coat off the coat hangar, "Let's roll."

    Touma glanced at the battering rain, "They can't start the rescue until the storm passes, which I believe won't be until morning."...*

    Shuu grasped his head in his hands, trying to block out the memories. But they kept on spilling out like a plastic bag full of water that just got stabbed with a pin. He was fighting a battle against himself, and he knew that he would eventually break, but Shuu was a fighter, and he would go down fighting.

    *..."It's not there." Touma pointed at the empty wharf where Shin's boat should have been.

    "Thanks for the update Dr. Obvious!" Ryo snapped.

      "Nasuti Koji." A formal looking man in floodpants, an orange vest, and wraparound sunglasses advanced her and shook her hand. "Who are these people?"

    His mirrored glasses scanned the odd looking bunch.

    "My brothers." She said pointedly, not in the mood to explain.

    "All of them?" Whatever emotion the guy had was hidden behind his robot like spectacles.

    "Listen Mr..." She bent closer to examine his name tag. "...Baltes, I don't know what you are trying to get out of me, but I am operating on about four hours of sleep and no cups of coffee. One of my brothers is out God knows where, and the last thing I need is interrogation from someone who doesn't even know me."

      The man stepped back in alarm but composed himself, "Sorry Miss Koji. Please follow me."

    Ryo pushed himself beside Nasuti as they were walking, "What was THAT all about?"

    She gave a small grin, "It's the only way to get anything done around here."

    Mr. Baltes led them to a small yacht with four smaller boats hanging over the edge. "We are short staffed for the weekend, this isn't typhoon season. We are going to be needing your help. Do any of you know how to use this equipment?"

      "Yes, Shin taught us."... *

Shuu tried vainly to blot them by kicking at the water, but that merely sprayed more foam into his face. The setting sun left angry reds on the sea, turning it into a raging bull. Wind was starting to pick up, the waves were starting to crash, but he stood his ground. They went to halfway up his thighs, but the horrific past played in his mind like a broken tape recorder, fixating him to where he stood.

    *..."This is where we lost radio contact with your brother." Mr. Baltes pointed at a topographical map with a pencil. "You." He pointed at Ryo. "Take this corner of the grid. I'll drop you off at your appointed area and I'll come back in two hours. That should be more than enough time to check things out. You all know how to work motorboats right?" They nodded their heads mechanically, as if this was a dream gone awry. Mr. Baltes sensed their numbness and whispered, "Miss Koji, may I speak with you for a minute?"

    She defiantly crossed her arms, "Whatever you have to say to me can be said to my brothers as well." Mr. Baltes took off his glasses and looked at her pleadingly. She saw the years of fatigue and listlessness in those eyes and thought otherwise. "Excuse me guys."

      He guided her to a corner, "I'm not going to lie to you, this was a tropical storm with the magnitude of 6, it is highly unlikely we will find his boat intact. It took a while for those words to digest, but it finally sunk in.

    "You mean--"

    "--yes." He continued, "There's about a three hundred to one chance we will find him alive."

    Nasuti inhaled sharply and let it out as slowly as she could. "Then there's still a chance. You don't know Shin like we do."...*

    "Stop, please stop..." Shuu was growing weary, but the memories showed no signs of letting up. Twilight was beginning to break, dotting the sky with hundreds of tiny pinpricks. A single tear glistened down his face and lingered before becoming one with the sea.

      *..Shuu put on his scuba gear and after checking the air pressure gauge, dropped over the side of a small white boat. He popped up above the water to get a the net that was still inside the boat. Uttering an "Oh God, please say I don't have to use it," he put the net on his back and ducked under the water.

    He felt like he was suspended in jelly, his long legs tediously propelling him deeper and deeper. No schools of fish, no sea life, no movement. The only activity was the occasional burst of bubbles from his airtank. Fighting the urge to go back, he paddled faster, 'The sooner I get in, the sooner I get out.'

    He finally reached the bottom, but it was too dark to see anything. Shuu reached for the flashlight on his side and switched it on. It didn't do much good, the beam reached out to only ten feet. He checked the depth and the time.

    172 feet, 10:30 a.m. It was only a couple of hours until the sun would be directly overhead, giving just a little more light to work with. The pressure at that depth was tremendous and it was getting difficult to breathe. He aimed his flashlight at the ground. It wasn't sand, but it wasn't mud either, more like a mixture between the two. 'Silt, Shin told me about this stuff.' It can cause a slide if disturbed.

    Shuu swam faster, but the limited range of the flashlight made it very difficult to see at all. The time was nearing 11:30, only one hour to do little of anything. Little chinks of light filtering down turned the water from midnight black to a lighter shade of gray. Up ahead, the sand seemed to part into two different colors, brown and black. A large, ghostly figure protruded out of the grayness. 'It can't be...'

    He paddled closer for a better look and with one gloved hand picked up some of the mysterious sand. It slid right off his fingers like...'Oil.' A light flashed by his eye, near the direction of the white figure. 'What?' ...*

"No I refuse!! This has gone far enough! "Shuu was writhing in agony on the beach, the roses half submerged by his feet.

    *...He treaded water to examine the object, which was beginning to take the form of a small boat. "No!!" Shuu screamed, dropping his mouthpiece in the process. Quickly retrieving it, he studied the boat. He rationalized, 'What are the chances it is Shin's boat? After all, this area gets a lot of storms...' He sped over to the other side of the hulking figure, already covered with a thin film of algae. Bleached white planks were strewn about the ocean floor, partially buried in the oily mud. The boat itself was wedged upright in a crevice, but other than the planks, no other damage was sustained. The topgallant spar even remained in place, a flag still waving in the current.

    There was only one way Shuu knew how to confirm whose boat this was, because he had never before seen Shin's boat. But Shin did speak lovingly of his "Beryl-sama", how his father willed the yacht to him shortly before he was killed in battle, how the word beryl means sea-green, and how his favorite moments in the world were spent on that boat looking at the stars. The hull was partly submerged in black silt, but the name was covered with algae. He began brushing it off hesitantly, fearing to take off the paint along with it. He uncovered a "B", and his heart fluttered. 'Well, there are a lot of boats out there with a B name, like "Britannia" or "Bostonian".' But something told him otherwise. Without thinking, he saw his hand move with a force all its own and wipe off the reveal the last letters. Words don't lie, and Shuu felt a familiar tightening of his chest, like being trapped in a vice. He floated away from what was the Beryl, the pride of the ocean.

    He wasn't prepared to deal with this, so he did the only thing he was trained to do, run. In reality, his boisterous personality hid a weakness, sometimes he can't handle what he swallows. He thought of all the times he was first to battle, always portrayed as the heroic one. But he wasn't that heroic at all, he wanted a cover for that, and the cover was to run, and don't look back. Shuu crashed through the underwater forest, dodging past black sand, wooden planks, and reality. His legs screamed in distress, the lactic acid was eating away at his sore muscles. If Shin's boat was there, Shin would be close by. He remembered the old adage, "The captain always goes down with his ship." His mask fogged up, 'That's a bunch of shit!' And strong swimmer that Shin was, there was no way he'd make it to land this far out in a typhoon.

      Something white among all the black caught his eye. It was a small corner of netting, probably left behind by a careless fisherman. 'As if we don't crap up the oceans enough...' He stroked over and picked it up, but it wasn't just a corner of a net, it was all four hundred yards of it. He wiped the fog from his mask and saw what he was missing. A poaching net was strung between two jutting rocks, trapping all the fish that passed by. Hundreds upon thousands of them lay feebly wriggling, trying futily to hold onto what remained of their life. And it wasn't just the fish that were affected, two dolphins and 3 manta rays were gradually dying. Horrified, Shuu floated up to get a full range look. Three such nets were strung up, and all had enormous casualties. But one had fallen, crumpled in a heap. 'No animal could have possibly torn down a four hundred yard net.' So he paddled over to where it lay in a mass. His flippers uncovered a small, red object buried in the sand, but Shuu was too preoccupied to notice. It was an army knife he had gotten Shin for his 24th birthday.

    If a sea had such a thing as a feeling, it felt like unfathomable sadness. A small killer whale lay trapped under the mesh, its eyes lifeless and glazed. Beside it, was the body of his best friend in the whole world, Mouri Shin...*

    "Why Shin-chan, why?" Shuu lay crouched in the water, tears trickling down his cheeks and landing with a small splash. He recalled his forlornness when he saw his "big brother" tangled in the net, trying to get his beloved Suiki out. Shin's hair was softly wavering, his calm face looking as if in a deep sleep. Shin appeared to be standing in the water, only his neck was thrust back like that of a dying crane. One of his arms was sticking out parallel to the ground, because a rope was wrapped around it and tied to the jutting rock. His legs were so hopelessly meshed there was no chance of him cutting it out and getting to the surface in time. But he looked so peaceful, despite what those last moments must have been like, knowing you are going to die. Gradually feeling your lungs fill up with water, and seeing your life dance before your eyes.

    Shuu didn't remember much except being pulled aboard the boat, upon which he promptly blacked out. "Shin-chan, why did you have to die?" Shuu despairingly pounded at the sea, but it just yielded and gushed saltwater. He knew why Shin had gone down there, to free his orca and make the sea a safer place for his friends. But if orca couldn't win against mankind, neither could just one man.

    "May our beloved Mouri Shin remain at eternal rest..." It seemed fitting that his funeral would take place on a beach, now he would forever be close to what he loved when he was alive. Even the sea seemed come out to pay their last respects, dolphins and sharks alike set aside their differences to say farewell. Shuu remembered seeing Nasuti's tear stained face, and Seiji's downcast eyes. He knew Seiji felt terrible after cracking all those girl jokes earlier, as if he was totally unaffected by the situation. The Ronins have never dealt with a non-Dynasty related loss, especially not from one of their patriarchs.

      "He was like a father to me, the one I never had." Ryo broke down on Nasuti's shoulder, unable to contain it any longer. Shuu had to show courage, after all he was the warrior of strength, but he just wanted a shoulder to cry on too. Even Seiji teared up during the prayers, a small river that indistinctly slipped down from one closed eye. Touma wrote a poem in memory of his friend and read, "God's Garden."

"God looked around His garden, and found an empty space.

He then looked down upon this earth and saw your tired face.

He put his arms around you, and lifted you to rest,

God's garden must be beautiful, He only takes the best..."

    Touma choked up, but continued reading after he wiped away a tear with the back of his hand.

"He knew that you were suffering, He knew you were in pain.

He knew you might never get well upon this earth again.

He saw the road was getting rough, and hills were hard to climb,

So He closed your weary eyelids, and whispered, "Peace be Thine."

It broke our hearts to lose you, but you never went alone,

For part of us went with you, the day God called you home."

    The bishop climbed to the top of a pulpit and scattered Shin's ashes to sea, the gray flecks dancing on the wind. A mother cried out in anguish, "Cursed be the day a mother outlives her children!" She collapsed sobbing into another younger woman's arms. The elder woman composed herself and walked over to where they stood. "You wrote that poem just for my Shin? It was beautiful..."

    The younger woman held out her hand, "Hi, I'm Sayoko-aneki, Shin's...elder sister. -Aneki is only something you add when the brother is still alive, when he passes away it becomes -boushi. Sayoko immediately realized this after she said it, but instead of fixing it she hung her head. "I still keep thinking he's alive." She lifted her face to the sky, resembling Shin in the water, "Annon, kyoudai, annon." Peace, little brother, peace.

    Shuu wasn't prone to sudden outbursts, but a part of him wondered why he was trying to forget his friend. It was like the epiphany that nobody is perfect, he realized nobody really dies if there are remembered. "I swear I will never forget, Shin-sama, never." He bent over, picked up the roses at his feet, and gave them a little shake. The moon rippled the water, reflecting slivers of light back at the sand. "Never..." as he threw the roses out as far as he could over the roaring ocean. He heard a distinct splash, and the moonlight on the water broke like a mirror but then just as quickly put itself back together again. He felt a hard knot at the back of his throat, and swallowed to try to get rid of it. Shuu turned his back to the sea, fearing what Shin would think if he saw him like this. Instead, a caressing zephyr ruffled his hair and cooled the back of his neck. The salt water on his arms crystallized and made intricate patterns up to his elbows. He smiled and started down the path to the car, the sea silently lapping at the sand.