What do you want?
To know my enemy.
I've seen what you do to your enemies.
Warriors in your country do not kill?
They don't cut the heads off defeated, kneeling men.
General Hasegawa asked me to help him end his life. A samurai cannot stand the shame of defeat. I was honored to cut off his head.
And who was your general?
Don't you have a rebellion to lead?
People in your country do not like conversation?
He was a lieutenant colonel. His name was Custer.
I know this name. He killed many warriors.
Oh, yes. Many warriors.
So he was a good general.
No. He wasn't a good general. He was arrogant and foolhardy. And he got massacred because he took a single battalion against two thousand angry Indians.
Two thousand Indians? How many men for Custer?
Two hundred and eleven.
I like this General Custer.
He was a murderer who fell in love with his own legend. And his troopers died for it.
I think this is a very good death.
Well, maybe you can have one just like it someday.
You have nightmares?
Every soldier has nightmares.
Only one who is ashamed of what he has done.
You have no idea what I've done.
You have seen many things.
I have.
Yet you do not fear death, but sometimes you wish for it. Is this not so?
Yes!
I also. It happens to men who have seen what we have seen. But then I come to this place of my ancestors, and I remember. Like these blossoms, we are all dying. To know life in every breath, every cup of tea, every life we take. The way of the warrior....
Who sent those men to kill you? Was it the Emperor? Omura?
If the Emperor wishes my death, he has but to ask.
So it was Omura.
You believe a man can change his destiny?
I think a man does what he can, until his destiny is revealed.
What happened to the warriors at Thermopylae?
Nathan Algren [smiling]: Dead to the last man.
The Emperor could not hear my words. His army will come. For nine hundred years, my ancestors have protected our people. Now... I have failed them.
So you will take your own life? In shame? Shame for a life of service? Discipline? Compassion?
The way of the Samurai is not necessary anymore.
Necessary? What could be more necessary?
I will die by the sword. My own, or my enemy's.
Then let it be your enemy's.
