Chapter 15 Kou Ishikawa (1/2)

[Deafening gun fire made his ears ring with an annoying buzz overwhelming his senses. He felt off balanced, but held his gun with the best control he could muster from his sweaty hands.

”Ishikawa! Run!” Kou heard Yuri's warning, which followed sounds of a ripping explosion and blinding white flashes that caused searing pain to his eyes.

”Ugh!” Kou stumbled backwards, his trigger finger accidentally letting bullet rounds into the air to drop smoking hot shells around his body.

He yelped at the burning pain he felt to his right arm from a bullet shell that had landed on his skin.

In a mad, blind panic, driven by burning pain he scrambled to his feet and sprinted with every last bit of his breath in his lungs. The sky cracked open, throwing down rain to temper his sprints, so his heavy boots sunk into the sandy terrain he was trying to escape.

White flashes and burning pain struck his eyes again. He lost complete sense and vision of where he was running. He continued to run. Blind. His body going into a state of shock and numbness.]

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”Mei!” Kou woke up from his nightmare screaming with blind terror contorting his features and his body drenched in cold sweat.

”Ishikawa-san!” A stranger's voice tried to sooth his fears with reassuring strokes to his arm and face.

The hand felt smooth, yet solid and large with long fingers that were slightly calloused to the tips. They were definitely not the hands of his mother.

”Wh-Who are you? Y-You're not my mother.” Kou gasped, still finding his voice from his breathlessness.

His hands fumbled about his darkness to form a better picture of those hands and arms connected to them.

Indistinct light moved about his darkness. He lacked taction to determine what he should be seeing. His hands continued to seek out a form he could feel and make sense of. They came into contact with the arms belonging to the man's hands he felt earlier.

They were also smooth with little hair and slender, but not like a woman's. There was taut muscly to their biceps betraying hidden strength. The smell of freshly cut material lingered about the soft sleeves of a kimono he felt. Smells of cooked vegetables, starch rice and body musk surrounded his senses.

”You're a man and I'm in your home?” Kou blurted his discovery. An image was being drawn in his mind has his fingers felt more of the man and immediate surroundings.

He gasped with surprise when the man pulled his hands forward and felt the fleshy softness of the man's cheeks, the oval outline of his jawline, round eyes, slender nasal bridge and medium-size ears free from any piercings. The man's hair was long, smooth as silk and smelt of fresh flowers.

Kou's image of him was a beautiful and effeminate man. His heart raced with confusion as to why he was lying on his bed. At least he felt the firmness of a futon mattress and woven wool blanket.

”I'm not on your bed am I?” Kou gulped nervously.

”Yes, but don't worry, I won't be sleeping in here. Please rest. I will inform your mother.”

The man's voice carried a soft almost melodic tone that held care and confidence without any quivers or undertones to suggest a hidden intention. He was a genuine kind man.

Seeing people's hidden intentions through the tones of their voices was a skill Kou had been able to immediately take advantage of with his given disadvantage.

”No. Please, don't tell my mother. If it's not too much trouble I can sleep here for now and leave when I wake again.” Kou asked, banking on the hope the man would agree.

”If that's what you want, of course.” The man responded with the same tone of voice as before.

Kou sighed with relief. He didn't want to trouble his mother more than he already did. She was having a hard enough time trying to come to terms with his blindness as a result from war injury.

A thought of Mei entered his mind.

”Instead, it wouldn't be too much trouble for call for Mei Sakamoto. She's my fiance.”

”Of course, she'd be more than happy and relieved to see you are well.” The man answered with a tighter tones to his voice, betraying excitement.

”You know Mei?” Kou frowned with worry.

His heart ached to know who this man was and how he knew Mei. He certainly wasn't a man he had met before.

A thought of Eiji Takaki's envelope flashed to this mind. Yuri had been carrying it in his pocket since his return from Pearl Harbor. He had accompanied Yuri to the house of Eiji's widow; sensed Yuri hand the letter to a man. They left shortly afterwards. The only memory of the man he had met was the soft almost melodic tones of his voice.

”You are Takaki's wife?” Kou innocently blurted and stiffen at the instant silence and sensation of shock he felt from the man.

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