guardian | gintoki x reader

c h a p t e r t w o

        She could recall the cries of her own voice echoing through the night as her tears dripped down her dry cheeks.  She remembered watching painfully, along with her comrade, as their savior was being taken away from them by force.  The memory of their teacher telling them to promise to take care of the others was going to stay burned into her mind.
        The only thing is that she couldn't keep it.
        But what corrupted her the most was watching her dear friend, Shinsuke Takasugi, on a hospital bed.  She new that this day was going to come.  The day when hell would break loose for the two.  Did she regret joining him?  She didn't know.  But she still felt bad for abandoning her family a long time ago.  Kabukicho, Shinsengumi, Yoshiwara, and of course the Yorozuya.  She had so much that she left behind and it pained her every time she thought about it.  But she had to.  She had to join the Kiheitai.  Only because she knew she had to stay by his side.  She wanted to be the one to heal that broken heart of his—the one he shielded from everyone else.
        [Name] knew that Gintoki himself was hurting inside.  But she trusted Kabukicho to fill up the hole in his heart.  He had everyone—but not Shinsuke.  He was a troublesome lonely boy in her eyes. 
        When he told her, "You hate the world as much as me.  You hate of how this so called God takes away everything we love...and by everything; I mean Shouyou-sensei."  She couldn't agree more to it.  The moment Yoshida Shouyou was taken from them, she couldn't stop crying that night.  Everything inside her changed the next day.  The more her comrades were taken away she couldn't shed a single tear.  But when the day of when Sakamoto, Kotaro, Gintoki and Shinsuke were separating, she wanted to reach out to them all and tell them, "Please don't leave me." 
        She could hear her own heart cracking faster by the second as their backs were facing her from a very far distance.  Getting smaller and smaller.  They were all different inside now and she could tell.  All she wanted to do was go back to the good old days when they laughed together, cried together, ate together, smiled together, and being idiots together.  She wanted them back. 
        She wanted herself back.
        But y'know, you can't bring something back from the dead.

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        "You really think...that after all this time—that it's okay to finally show your disgusting face?!"  The vermilion haired girl had yelled with a clench of her fists.  [Name] rubbed her cheek where Kagura had punched her and spat out her own blood that pooled from the inside of her mouth.  "You really think that everything will be okay once you've finally showed yourself to us?!  To go behind our backs and become one of the bad guys?!  You really think that everything will be okay after what you did to Gin-chan?!"  [Name] looked up with dead eyes and didn't say a word.  She didn't blame the little girl to be pissed at her.  But she hated herself more than anyone.  She got off the ground and held her sword in her hand, opening her mouth to say something but quickly closed it shut.
        "I won't forgive you for this!"  Kagura cried.  [Name] had noticed the crack in her voice which caused her to instantly feel remorse.  "It's okay."
        "It's okay?!"  She repeated.  "How is any of this okay?  Why didn't you tell us where you were?  Why did you leave without a note—why did you leave carrying your agony by yourself?!  Why do you keep doing this to yourself, [Name]-chan?"  She asked with sorrow in her voice.
        "I thought—I thought that we were a family."
        Family you say?  The word felt so foreign—almost nostalgic to her.  She couldn't understand what it meant.  She couldn't remember.  A part of her wanted to.  She wanted to feel it again.  To grasp it.
        Yet no matter how many times she tried to get pass the gatekeeper at her door, she couldn't face it.  She couldn't open it.  So she walked away from that door and left it alone with the gatekeeper; the gatekeeper she couldn't see the face of and probably never will.  She felt a bit anxious of guessing who it could possibly be and why.

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Families are the compass that guides us.  They are the inspiration to reach great heights, and our comfort when we occasionally falter.  They don't have to be by blood, they have to be the closest to you.  They are the most precious thing in life; they are everything.