A.N.- What's up everyone! It's me, DemonSlayer205, the author of Legend of the Spirit Swordsman, my first(and only for the moment) YYH fan-fic. This is my first stab at an RK fanfic, but I'm gonna try my best.

The story will revolve around Sagara Sanosuke, and his return to Japan. I'm a fan of the Sanosuke/Megumi pairing (damn you Watsuki for ignoring those two), so the majority of pairing in this story will be Sanosuke/Megumi, ok? You'll see what I mean.

Another word about this fic. I've read the manga and watched the anime. This story takes place six years after Sano leaves Japan. So, please sit back, read, and enjoy my creative genius at work. Now, on with the story.

Disclaimer: The characters of Rurouni Kenshin doesn't belong to me obviously, otherwise this fic would either be in the manga or been animated by now. No, they belong Watsuki-san.

Two of a Kind

Ch. 1- Memories of the Past

By: Ishimaru Amon

Home is the place where we are treated the best, but grumble the most.

The ocean. It stretched in out in a vastness that seemed endless, even in the eyes of those who had traveled across it's glassy surface. The waves cascaded back and forth, swaying to the calm wind as dancers to a soothing melody. The clear blue water acting as a mirror, accurately reflecting the bright full moon and the twinkling stars that loomed overhead in the sky.

On the deck of the cargo ship that floated across this vast body of water, a lone man stood leaning on the railing. His once tall, spiky brown hair, now longer and no longer sticking straight up, blowing lightly along with his bangs at the slight breeze that passed by. His rough and rugged features, once smooth and almost childlike, was now decorated with a stubby beard, signaling that he had indeed aged since his last visit to his current destination.

'Home,' he thought suddenly, a wry grin spreading across his rugged features. The word sounded so familiar, yet seemed so foreign. After all, it had been such a long time since he had been home. "Heh, it's been a little over 6 years since I left, I wonder how everyone's doing," he mumbled to himself as he continued to survey the serene scene in front of him. 'And how much everyone has changed,' he added as an afterthought.

Indeed, it had been a long time since Sagara Sanosuke had set foot on Japanese soil. And he hated it, even through all the things he had learned from his travels, all the people he had met along his journey, all the places he had been to, he learned more than anything else that indeed there was no place like home. If it had been up to him, he would have surely stayed in Japan, continuing to live life along the close group of friends he'd come to call family.

But of course, it hadn't been his choice, hardly anything in his life ever was. He didn't choose to have his mentor, his taicho, his friend, and former father figure, executed and had his head displayed publicly. He didn't choose to have his fellow comrades, who had served under that very same captain, be betrayed by the very government whom they were fighting for, and gunned down in front his own eyes. He didn't choose to grow up fighting in the streets of Tokyo, alone and unwanted because he was a member of the very group that become the first family he'd had since he left his real family in their small farming village of Shinsuu.

It seemed the only real choices that he ever really made, was to leave home to join that group, the Sekihoutai. And to become a feared gangster and fighter-for-hire Zanza, branding himself with the 'Aku' symbol, proudly proclaiming himself to be wicked, which the Meiji government had so ruthlessly stamped the Sekihoutai and all of it's members with. Even after he had made his last choice, to follow Kenshin, the ex- hitokiri battousai, he had come to be his best friend.

Even after losing to him in a tough battle, and choosing to follow him to see if he was truly different from the same traitorous government officials he'd come to loathe and despise. The same officials, who had caused him to leave his home and friends in Japan, and cast himself into exile. The grin that once plastered his face at the beginning of his musings, had long since disappeared from his face as his thoughts turned into memories that he would've liked to have buried for good.

Memories that, as much as they had made him the man he was before he left, were still after all these years painful and saddening. But Sanosuke, being who he was, had learned during his many long years of traveling, to hide his emotions from those who might seek to use them against him. For he never let his sadness overwhelm him, never let the pain he felt show.

Even before he left, he kept his feelings and frustrations tightly locked away inside himself, only letting it come out during one of the few times when fought insanely strong opponents. But in his travels, he had come to learn quickly that emotions were things that were best kept to ones own self. It didn't belong in a heated battle, or in moments where his life was in danger.

He had discovered, that letting out a person's feelings and thoughts, fears and frustrations, could only be done around family or close friends, people who loved him. But those people hadn't been around for 6 long years, and he was left with no choice but to bottle them up, letting bits and pieces of them out during the times when he trained. But then, a question came crashing down on him, barreling into him like the speeding locomotives that he hated to ride on.

'Why didn't I ever share with any of them what I kept hidden for so many years back then?' He had so many answers to that question. Answers that he now understood to be nothing but mere excuses for such secrecy. 'They all had they're own problems to deal with,' was the first one he could offer. And in reality, it was really the only one that had any credibility to it, the only one that stand on it's own. Because in reality, it was the truth, the whole utter truth.

Especially in Kenshin's case, having to deal with many of the ghost's from his battle scarred past. Sanosuke always thought that that was why they were as close as he and his friend were. Indeed the rurouni was the only one who understood Sano's history, because his was so similar. The only one who understood the street fighter's feelings, even when he hardly never expressed them, because he at times felt those same feelings.

Sanosuke always knew that was what drew their little ragtag group together, was the fact that almost each of them in some way, had shadowed pasts that at times seemed to haunt them. Kaoru, the young woman he considered a sister, growing up and taking on the responsibility of maintaining her father's sword style and dojo, Kamiya Kasshin Ryu dojo.

Kenshin, his best friend whose past seemed to follow him wherever he went, dealing with madmen like Makoto Shishio, his successor. And Yukishiro Enishi, his ex-wife's younger brother, who blamed the rurouni for the death of his sister Tomoe, the only family he ever had. Even Yahiko, the little boy who reminded Sano so much of himself, growing up alone on the streets of Tokyo a pickpocket, and joining the dojo in order to become strong enough to uphold his family's proud samurai heritage.

And especially the kitsune-onna, the sly female doctor who had captured his heart without even ever noticing it. 'Why didn't I ever tell her what I felt?' he thought once again as his gaze continued to linger on the image in front of him, not even noticing the land slowly appearing in the distance. Once again, he had plenty of excuses to toss at that question, all of which seemed fairly reasonable given his circumstances at the time.

After all, she was a beautiful, intelligent, talented young woman who could have any man she wanted should she have chosen to. She was polite, well-mannered, and refined, indeed she was all in a class of her own. And he, he was a lazy, broke, mooching ex-gangster who knew nothing but how to gamble away what little money he had, drink himself into a sake induced oblivion, and get into fights with anyone who were either sadistic or strong enough to challenge him.

She was a lady, and he was a brute, there was no way the two of them could ever be, at least it seemed that way in her eyes. She would always flirt with Kenshin, draping herself over him at any chance she got, seemingly just to piss Jou-chan off. How he longed for such lavish attention from the kitsune, often times so much he would consider coming right out and telling her.

But everytime he thought he about it, she would shoot him with some witty comment about his manners and/or habits, causing him to respond in kind with equal fervor. And their verbal sparring matches would begin again, seemingly causing her to distance herself away from more and more. 'Not to mention the fact that she left,' he thought to himself.

His thoughts fluttered back to the night before she left the Kenshin-gumi in Tokyo, in order to head back to her hometown of Aizu. Ironically, the same day he was also forced run from the police, causing him to leave Japan to avoid arrest for beating the crap out of one of the aforementioned crooked politicians. His discussion with Kenshin that evening causing him to reveal, for the first time to anyone, his feelings for sly and sensual kitsune.

Flashback

Outside one of the few rooms of the Kamiya Kasshin Ryu dojo, two figures sat out on the dojo's engawa, staring into the night sky at the stars hanging up in the sky. One figure lay against one of the posts, a fishbone clicking in between his teeth, his white outfit standing out in the darkness of night. The other, sitting beside him on another post, his sakabatou propped up against his shoulder, his long red hair hanging from the top of his head past his shoulders.

"Oi, Kenshin, you mind if I ask you something?" the man in white asked, breaking the silence that surrounded them.

"Not at all Sano, what's on your mind?" Kenshin answered back, his not tearing their gaze from the night sky.

"What do ya think about the kitsune?" he asked, glancing over at friend with one eye, the double meaning cleverly hidden in the younger man's question.

Kenshin, being the intuitive swordsman he was, saw right through his best friends muse. He wasted no time in dissecting the question, in order to get through to the heart of the matter. Casting a sidelong glance at his friend, reply was straight to the point.

"Do you mean of Megumi-dono's imminent departure, or of her as a woman?"

"Che, can't sneak anything past you can I?"

"I guess you can't. You should know by now Sano, that you don't have to try to either, de gozaru," Kenshin responded, his trademark rurouni smile plastered on his face as a sign of assurance.

Sano just eyed his friend carefully, then let his eyes dart around them, ears perked up listening for the slightest sounds of eavesdroppers who might want have chosen to hone in on the private conversation between the swordsman and street fighter, before choosing to continue.

Realizing that no one was hiding in the darkness awaiting his response, he chose to clarify the matter.

"Both I guess," Sano responded.

Kenshin gave him a look, that seemed to urge him to continue.

"I mean, I understand why she would want to go back home, and restart her family's medical practice, and it's actually one of the things I admire about her."

"I understand what you mean Sano, Kaoru-dono has a strength just like hers. It makes them more similar than either of them would care to admit."

"Yeah, I see what ya mean, Kenshin. Jou-chan running a dojo like this all by herself, even though she's only got a couple of students, one that's all the way in Germany right now. And the kitsune-onna, goin off to a town she hasn't been back to in years, hopin to find family that might not exist anymore."

"Kaoru-dono will have more students soon, now that hopefully there will be no more attacks on the dojo or on sessha's life. And Megumi-dono's family might still be alive, so as long as there is hope, the possibilties will always exist."

"Che, I guess somethin like that's only for people who have somethin to hope for, as for me, there's no hope or possibility."

Kenshin suspicions were finally confirmed, as his expression seemed to show was evident. The rurouni had always suspected that there something between the two bickering friends, even though they were very careful to hide it. The way they argued seemed like that of a couple many years married, the pet names they chose to call each other relentlessly, rather than addressing each other formerly, skillfully making them seem like nothing more than insults.

He smiled despite himself, choosing to finally respond to his friend whom he had notice was now gazing at the stars with intensity.

"Do you mean for Megumi-dono?"

"Heh, you must be slippin Kenshin, of course I mean for the kitsune."

"Well, Sano, there's always a possibility, because hope is for everyone, de gozaru. Have you not tried telling Megumi-dono?" the rurouni asked, his face now inquisitive.

"Are ya kiddin Kenshin, look at her and look at me, she'd laugh right in my face," he replied, his eyes seemingly transfixed on the stars, a visualization of Megumi's face smiling at him as if a spell casted by the heavenly trinkets themselves.

"I've never heard you sound so defeated Sano, you haven't even told her how you feel, and yet you believe she will automatically shun you."

"I'm not bein defeated Kenshin, I'm just a realist, and believe it or not, I do know what battles are worth fightin and which aren't."

Kaoru, who was in her room not to far away, let out a small gasp as her eyes widened at the news she'd just overheard. She'd never thought she would hear Sagara Sanosuke, the rooster himself, revealing any inclinations of affection for the flirtatious doctor. She continued to listen silently, seemingly unknown to both warriors on her dojo's porch.

"Sessha doesn't think so Sano."

Sano quirked an eyebrow at his friend, silently asking him to clarify his response.

"I have seen the way you two act around each other, and this one doesn't think it is a hate/hate relationship, so much as one of comfort, de gozaru,"

Silence surrounded them once again as the two began to mull over the conversation that had just taken place between them. Sano let out an exasperated sigh as he stood to his feet, apparently preparing to leave the dojo for the evening.

"Still Kenshin, even if it appears that way, I can't risk telling her such things hoping that she might somehow feel the same way. Cause if she didn't, I'd be hurt, and it'd probably ruin whatever little friendship the two of us have. Besides, she seems to like a hell of a lot more than me, not to mention that I don't really have a damn thing to offer her. It's better for me to just watch her from a far, like I've been doin for a while now." the taller man replied.

Kenshin smiled both outward and inwardly at Sanosuke's confession, indicating another suspicion confirmed. After all, it wasn't hard not to notice the lustful glares and the indecent comments made about the lovely lady doctor on the streets of Tokyo.

"So it's true then Sano, you've been secretly watching over Megumi-dono for a while now haven't you?"

"What do you think Kenshin."

"Sessha thinks you think to little of yourself Sano. If she feels the same about you, then it probably won't matter what you have or don't have."

"That's a very big if Kenshin, and it wouldn't change the fact that it's what she deserves."

"Don't you think that is something Megumi-dono should decide for herself, de gozaru?"

'Chikusho, Kenshin.' the ex-gangster cursed inwardly. Kenshin's intuitive mind never ceased to amaze him, the rurouni was seemingly able to find a silver lining in any grey cloud. Able to make the best out of any given situation. 'Much like Jou-chan,' he thought amusingly.

"Heh, maybe," Sano replied simply, stuffing his hands in his pockets, as began to make his way towards the gate.

"Leaving for the night Sano?" the rurouni questioned, also rising to his feet to retire for the evening.

"Yeah, I wanna make sure I'm up early enough to see the kitsune off," the young man replied pausing at the gate, before turning his head back to Kenshin.

"Just make sure you keep this conversation to yourself, got it!"

"No problem Sano, I will allow you to decide when to tell Megumi-dono."

"Thanks Kenshin. You too, Jou-chan," he called out before leaving.

"Alright Sanosuke, good night!" she replied from inside her room.

"Goodnight," he replied while grinning at his friend, who also had a grin on his face, showing he too knew Kaoru was listening. Sanosuke gave his friend a pat on the back before stepping out of the dojo and starting down the street to his run down apartment.

End Flashback

"Land!" a voice cried out in a foreign language. The voice snapped Sanosuke out of his thoughts as he discovered himself staring at the very place he had left all those years ago. Within minutes, the boat soon slowed and then came to a halt as the anchor was dropped and the ropes were tied securely onto the wooden dock. A ramp was then placed up against the boat, as the passengers began making their way off the vessel.

Sanosuke made his way in long strides down the ramp, his cloak which had long since replaced his characteristic white gi, rippling as a gust of wind blew once again. He stopped as soon as he had made his down the dock and onto Japanese soil for the first time in 6 years, and breathed deeply with his eyes closed.

Opening them once again, as he exhaled slowly, only a single thought had crossed his mind, one that seemed refreshing and inviting to him.

"I'm home," he muttered to himself, a grin placed right back onto his face.

To Be Continued...

Translations-

kitsune-fox

dono-honorific term kenshin uses for most females in RK

Che, Chikusho-cuss words Sano frequently uses

onna-lady, woman

gi- loose floppy shirt worn usually by men

engawa- like a front porch

Jou-chan- Sano's nickname for Kaoru, roughly translated as missie

Sessha- unworthy one, Kenshin's name for himself

Sakabatou- Kenshin's reversed blade sword

hitokiri battousai- Kenshin's nickname during the bakumatsu

Zanza- Sano's nickname as a gangster and fighter-for-hire

Sekihoutai- name of the military militia group that Sanosuke was a part of during the bakumatsu

taicho- captain, leader