Sharp Wings; 鋭い翼 [Gintama]

18 | You actually never forget, but you usually refuse to remember

XVIII

Manga: Lesson 50-52

Anime: Episode 31-32

THEY decided to walk Gintoki around again.

After calling Hijikata to pick Kondou up from the Shimura household, Shizuku and the others left for town. They passed by the sweetshop that Gintoki liked so much. They went to the dango shop that they took Shizuku to when they were out explaining Edo to her, a couple of months back. They entered the club that Gintoki frequented in. They watched an Otsu concert that was happening in the concert hall. They even met up with a couple of friends of theirs, including Hasegawa and the kappa in the lake, but like earlier that day, they got absolutely nothing. They went to even more places, but the hope that Gintoki would remember anything at all was growing weaker and weaker by every passing hour.

Honestly, Shizuku was starting to lose hope.

By the end of the day, when the sun was about to sink, they slowly walked Gintoki home. Kagura, Shinpachi and Shizuku hung their heads low as they watched their feet. After gaining a bit of confidence, Shizuku tapped both of the other teens' shoulders as a sign that they shouldn't look so defeated, and this caused them to raise their heads up high once again.

"I'm sorry. You're tried everything for me." Gintoki suddenly said as they walked. "But in the end, I can't remember anything."

"Please, stop it." Shinpachi smiled. "It's so not like you."

"Yeah." Shizuku nodded while holding on to her umbrella. "Even if you're ninety percent wrong, you'll use everything that you have of that last ten percent to not apologize." She said with a smile up to the tall male.

"Take your time to remember." Kagura beamed. "We'll wait."

"Let's go home and take it easy." Shinpachi said with a smile.

"That's right." Their youngest nodded. "You might remember something if you relax at home."

"What's that?!"

The four stopped at the sound of a passerby yelling and pointing at the sky, causing them to look up, too. they all gasped at the sight of a spaceship smoking and heading directly straight down at them.

"Gin-chan!" Kagura suddenly called. "It's time for you do your thing!" she said as she shook Gintoki's arm.

"Eh?!" Gintoki exclaimed, clearly not knowing what the young girl was talking about.

"Gin-san, quickly!" Shinpachi pushed the older male towards the house that was near them and Kagura jumped up to the roof with Gintoki in tow. Shizuku gave Shinpachi a boost to get him up to the roof as well. She threw up Gintoki's bokuto and yelled at the three on the roof.

"Gin-san, you can do it!" Shizuku called. "You've always slashed your way through everything with just your bokuto! You can do it again, now! I believe in you!"

"But-," she heard Gintoki say but was immediately cut off by Kagura giving his sword to him.

Not knowing what was happening on the roof, Shizuku looked up at the sky and saw that the crashing spaceship was getting nearer and nearer to them.

"Come on, Gin-san." She prayed in her mind. "You've always been the hero. You just have to remember!" she thought in her head as she looked up at the sky.

"Please!"

Suddenly, the spaceship just went through and no explosion happened.

A thump was heard and a wooden sword fell from the roof and landed in front of Shizuku.