The Two Currents of Time T.M. Doshisha International Jr/Sr High School, Kyoto, Japan

The Two Currents Of Time In eighteen fifty-three, one American man called Perry brought his fleet of ships to Japan to open its ports to the foreign countries. The Shogun and his men had never seen such ships, and they were afraid of what they might do to the country. So they concluded every treaty they were shown in front of them even though the treaties were unfair to the Japanese (No tax for the foreigners when trading, and criminals who were foreigners were judged by the law of their countries, and were often given a lighter punishment than a Japanese would do, and so on.) The situation of the country gradually went into the samurais' ears (Samurai were ranked highest in the Japanese class system in the Edo period.) The samurais heard how the men at the top of the country were being pets for the foreign countries, how they were listening to whatever they said. The people who felt ashamed of the state of this country fought for one of two reasons. To support the Shogun, or to defeat the foreign countries and the Shogun (and his men) to make a new country. There is tension between the two, and there are fights between these two sides all over the country, and this friction between them is changing the country dramatically. The year is eighteen sixty-four, and Japan is changing dramatically. The Tokugawa family has been ruling for two hundred years. They have not changed the way they have ruled since the first Shogun (The man in charge of the country. The man at the highest rank.) Japan has only been trading with Netherlands, and not with any other country like America, England, Spain, the advanced nations. It is because the Shogun and his men are afraid that they might be attacked by them. It is dark, and the light of the moon is peeking through the clouds. It rained yesterday, and the ground is damp and slippery. Tsugumichi is running further and further into the woods as droplets from the trees fall on to his face and mix with his sweat. After running for a few minutes, he finds a light growing bigger and bigger as he runs closer and closer, the light from the hut where he promised to meet his comrades. He slowly opens the Fusuma (Japanese door) to see the flash of two swords in light. The swords are held by two men ready to attack, but when they see the face of Tsugumichi, they release a sigh of relief. They put away their swords. "Are you not late Tsugumichi?" says a man with no third and little finger of his left hand. It was slashed when he was running away from the Shinsengumi. (A group of samurai who had come together to support the Shogun. They search around the town to seek for any samurai who are thinking of going against the Shogun. They have full back up from the shogun, and this makes them misunderstand that just killing samurai is good for the country. As a result, many of those who are thinking deeply about the future of the country are killed everyday.) His name is Yataro. They have been friends since they were children. "The Shinsengumi did not make it easy for me to come here." answered Tsugumichi, as his face glows by the candlelight." "So is it the day for us to start our work?" said Izou. A man with brownish eyes, on a round face that makes him have a slightly childish look. As Tsugumichi slowly nods, "The time has come for us to change the color of this country. Although we have been finding a way to live each day, the men that are governing the country have been fed more than enough to this day. They are not hungry to change this country for they are satisfied in the rich living that they have now. How can men of this kind think about the country? Die for the country? We are the ones who have the true spirit in changing this current!" They strongly shake hands and promise to meet each other again, and they all leave the hut in different directions as the moon watches their going. Tsugumichi reaches Nagasaki, one of the few places where trade is occurring. Many kinds of pottery, perfume and accessories are distributed, and the city has a mixture of an Eastern and a Western look. Everything is a new encounter for him. After a short walk, he eventually finds a place to stay. The buildings surrounding it have glass windows, pots, and dolls, but Tsugumichi's inn has none of those aspects. Tsugumichi looks up at the building. The timber is dark with age, but it seems to shine with a luster of its own. Also, the deepness in color represents how 'long' it has been working for. The look of this place is made different intentionally for those who are eager to change the country like Tsugumichi. Samurais gather here because the owner of this building is a dealer of weapons who supports men like them. Tsugumichi has already sent a letter to the owner, Matakichi, to help him gather men who are seeking to change the country. "Matakichi, I have arrived." Shouts Tsugumichi. "Oh, they have been waiting for you." answers a little man with a bent back. Matakichi looks up at Tsugumichi with a grin on his face. "When I told them about how you studied strategies, they gathered like ants around sugar." He adds, as his yellow teeth shine by the ray of light. Matakichi shows the way to where the men are. Matakichi opens the Fusuma and Tsugumichi is welcomed with a huge roar from the men in the room. There are about a hundred in the room, and Tsugumichi immediately introduces himself to the sea of men, and continues speaking with his plan on changing the country. As his sharp eyes look deeply into each pair of eyes in the crowd, he lightens the men's souls as if his eyes are flames of candles, and one burning ambition to change the country grows in each one of them. The men in the room nod to his plan, and they bond as one. During that time, Izou has opened a restaurant in Edo (The place where the shogun lives.) to make money, and to gather information about the Shogun's daily routine, the information needed to assassinate him. Somewhere in Japan, Yataro is searching for men who are just waiting for the chance to change the country's worst state. Yataro tells them where Tsugumichi is, and how he is able to know the future by reading the history carefully, enabling him to succeed in his plan. Men are dearly interested in what kind of man he is, and little by little the number of men working for Tsugumichi is growing. All is going well. So they think. Yataro is on his way to his next destination. Walking on a rough road he sees the Shinsengumi looking around for men seeking to attack the Shogun. They are slowly walking towards him getting closer and closer. He quickly searches for somewhere to hide. He notices a house, and he immediately runs inside. "Let me stay until they disappear. I will do no harm. Just bring me some tea if you please." Says Yataro to a thin and pale woman who looks frightened. It is because Yataro is holding his sword ready to attack. "Ye...yes." she replies as she hands him the cup of tea. He drinks the tea with a trembling hand. He drinks it slowly trying to calm himself down. He has seen one of his comrades slashed and killed, and he cannot erase this scene from his mind. Eventually, the Shinsengumi passes and Yataro decides to leave the house. He walks outside to return to his course, but suddenly his legs are going numb and refuse the signal from his brain to walk. His legs are walking in zigzags, and his body sways right to left. His field of vision starts to blur. He feels as if the world is circling faster and faster. When he realizes what he had drunk just before, he turns around to see the house. The woman is looking eagerly to what would happen next from the shadow of the wall of the house. She has been given money to kill anyone who comes to hide from the Shinsengumi. "I will not fall to my knees! I am the man who is going to change time! I will not fall!" Shouts Yataro as his body does the opposite, his body falls to the ground, and his left hand with no third or little finger grabs the mud on the ground with resentment and pity. Izou is now in Nagasaki. He has heard the news of Yataro, and has come to meet Tsugumichi. He enters the old building and calls for Tsugumichi. Tsugumichi runs to him with bloodshot eyes. It looks as though he has heard the news as well. Izou has come to call for revenge. "We can not go on like this. We must take revenge for Yataro. We must kill one of the Shinsengumi as well to at least make it even!" "I know how you feel, but we must carry on with our plan. Yataro would be thinking the same thing from high above the clouds." Tsugumichi replies as he bites his lower lip with a bitter feeling of helplessness. This shocks Izou and his body starts to shake with anger. "Why? Why are you talking like this? I was hoping for you to think the same. I was hoping that you would come with me to kill the members of the Shinsengumi and to banish them from this earth! Shame on you..." His eyes overflow with tears, and he calls for men who will come with him to take revenge. A few minutes later, some men gather around Izou to take revenge. They take with them the weapons prepared. Guns, arrows, and spears. Izou walks out of the building with 'his' men behind him. As he thought, the members of the Shinsengumi are lurking around in search of men working against the Shogun. Izou runs with his sword held high above his head, and slides in front of one of them and slashes down with his sword from his enemy's left shoulder to his right chest, and the body spreads the blood into the air like a water-fountain. Izou's men follow and the four or five men that were in front of them are killed instantly. The dead bodies look as if they are floating in blood. However, this was not the end. They soon realize that more men of the Shinsengumi have surrounded them. They are all professionals in combat, and the number of men is ten or twenty more than Izou's force. The fight starts as the sound of colliding swords fills the air, and Izou's force becomes smaller and smaller. Suddenly, he hears a voice he had heard before, it is Tsugumichi's. Tsugumichi is running towards the men surrounding Izou as he holds his spear with his right hand behind his back with his men following him. He quickly stabs the side of the body of the man fighting with Izou. This reinforcement had seemed to be helpful at that time, but he sees that it is useless. It is as if they are dripping water on dry sand, they kill one but another enemy comes immediately from behind the killed enemy. "Tsugumichi, I am thankful for your support, but it looks as though you were right. I do not have the strength to keep going..." says Izou, holding the wound on his chest tiredly. "What are you saying?! We can go through this and we are going to change this country!" As he replies, he sees Izou stabbed from the front, back, and both sides. During this unguarded moment Tsugumichi is slashed from behind. One knee falls to the ground, but he is still willing to fight. However, his field of vision slowly begins to fade, and he makes an end to his life and to his dream, because he would rather kill himself than be killed by the enemy and he cuts his stomach by himself. His men see the end of their leader, and they start to run away, but they are all slaughtered. As they lie on the ground, the sun looks down on them, and starts to dry up the blood from the ground. After their bodies are buried, will anyone remember what they have gone through in trying to change the country?

Child Research Net would like to thank the Doshisha International Junior/Senior High School and Toshiaki Matsunami, student and author, for permitting reproduction of this article on the CRN web site.

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