The Fledgling Dragon

[Seraphina]

ooc: Repost, no grading required.....and it's gonna be a looooooooong day.





Act I: The New Guy




“S…sorry….Pardon me…”

Kiyoko Junshin could not easily count the number of people he had jostled, bumped into, or brushed against - and therefore the number of apologies he had been forced to issue - in the course of that morning. As was often the case at the end of the Academy term, every division of the Gotei Thirteen was awash with fresh recruits, as graduating students rushed to find their place as they took their first long awaited steps into the world of a Shinigami. The Fifth Division was no exception - not least due to the fact that the Captain had recently made it known that there was many seated positions free for those who were eager, and worthy, enough to try and seize them.

Junshin had little interest in such things, however. He would be content simply to make it to his assigned room in once piece, and without spilling the contents of the plywood box he carried across the floor. This was easier said than done of course, not only because the corridor was extremely crowded - forcing the young man to bob and weave his way through his the members of the Fifth Division - giving way more often than not, as virtually every member of the division was now his sempai - but because the box was simply far too highly stacked for its size.

Stuffed so full with various scrolls and books that he could only just see over the top of the pile, the box contained everything that Junshin had brought with him from the Academy. As well as various references from his instructors, the box contained letters from his family, various books he had a fondness for, a small portrait of himself and his four brothers and, of course, his assignment papers for the fifth division. Counting only the contents of the box and what he carried upon his person as his only possessions in the world, he would rather reach his room assignment without sacrificing one of his possessions to a careless foot.

Dexterously, the brown haired youth somehow managed to avoid any mishaps as he continued down the densely packed corridors of the squad barracks, his chocolate coloured eyes reading off room numbers as he continued on his way. Although the division was comprised of some two hundred and fifty garrisoned members - with unseated Shinigami occasionally rotating in and out of various divisions - the barracks was still sufficiently large that a communal sleeping area was not required. Junshin had been told that he would be sharing a room with at least one other recruit; possibly two, depending on the rate of intake for the division.

Beyond the fact that they existed, Junshin knew nothing else about the person with whom he would, for the foreseeable future, be living with. He had spent most of his young life living in a house with a large family, sharing a room with two of his brothers, and thus communal living was not unusual for him - although he had to admit that the idea of doing so with a stranger was an intimidating one. His brothers, at least, he had known all his life; were the obstacle course of a corridor to afford him time to do so, he would probably have spent more time that morning simply hoping that his assigned roommate would at least clean up after themselves.

‘Yari, yari….knowing my luck, it’ll be a big, hairy guy, who only washes his clothes start disintegrating.’

Continuing to count off room numbers, he drew to a halt as he located the one to which he had been assigned; room number G-7. A sliding panelled door that was identical to those that marched along the corridor to either side and across from it opened to grant him respite from a chaos outside as he stepped into what was, from that day forward, his new home. Sliding the door closed behind him to muffle the noise of roaming feet and chattering voices from the corridor outside, Junshin heaved a sigh of relief as he took stock of his new surroundings.

Considering the number of people that were required to be housed in the barracks, the room was impressive in size - but then, for three people to live there comfortably, it would need to be. Although the room was not designed to be a social area - the ground floor of the barracks housing a sizeable dining, lounge and recreation area - there was still enough room for three people to coexist without constantly stepping on each other’s feet. Some fifteen feet wide and perhaps twelve deep, the walls did not appear to be paper panelling as the door was, but rather solid wood - perhaps to provide some sound proofing against the adjacent rooms.

A cupboard built into the wall likely contained the bedding - in all likelihood rollout futons that would remain packed away until they were required. The room otherwise contained three individual writing desks - each furnished with a comfortable looking purple cushion upon which to sit, one against the wall opposite the door with the other two on the lateral walls to allow one to work in peace. In the approximate centre of the room was a low, square-shaped kotatsu; the heat source underneath the table, presumably not active at this time, hidden beneath the pleated folds of a cream coloured blanket that was draped over the frame beneath the table top. The room was otherwise unfurnished, but Junshin understood that Shinigami were free to buy their own décor and furnishings providing their squad commander approved.

Selecting the desk against the far wall - for it was situated in front of the room’s only window and overlooked the Division grounds outside the barracks - several acres of land, surrounded by a high stone wall. From the window, Junshin could clearly see the glistening surface of the artificial lake situated in front of the barracks, though the manicured lawn was visible beyond, and the elegant, pagoda-like building of one of the division libraries was just visible in the distance. It was a clear, well-lit day, and Junshin nodded in satisfaction to himself as he deposited his box upon the surface of the desk.

“Alright,” he murmured aloud. “Looks like it’s just me for now…”

The room contained no bathroom or shower - bathrooms, baths and shower stalls were shared across an entire floor, divided by gender, and only the rooms of seated officers had their own. There was however, Junshin discovered, ample cupboard space in the form of false panels on the interior walls. Plenty of room, certainly, for personal effects. Being the first to arrive in the room afforded Junshin certain advantages, and he quickly claimed one of these cupboards as his own, unpacking his possessions from the box and placing them neatly within. Also from the box - having been placed at its very bottom beneath the papers - he withdrew the two individual swords that made up his zanpakuto.

The twin kodachi were each some twenty inches in length from pommel to tip, and easy to carry though Junshin was not yet used to wearing the weapons openly. He rather missed the simple, uniform swords issued in the Academy, and to have his zanpakuto materialise not only as a much shorter weapon, but as two much shorter weapons had been a jarring change of pace. Truth be told, he had very little understanding of the swords in any case. He had, thus far, failed to establish any kind of ready dialogue with the weapons, experiencing the zanpakuto’s emotions as little more than an ebb and flow of reiatsu that he simply lacked the expertise to decipher.

For all that, he still placed the blades carefully upon his desk, showing due respect for the swords as he also unpacked three carved slats of black lacquered wood that would serve as a stand for the weapons when not in use.

Assembling the stand and placing his swords upon it, he set the display at a neat, orderly angle upon his desk, taking a step backwards to admire it. Nodding in satisfaction, the young Shinigami was just starting to feel at ease in his new surroundings when, behind him, the door to the room abruptly slid open a second time, catching Junshin so unprepared that the young man jumped in surprise. A blush creeping into his cheeks despite himself, he turned awkwardly to face the newcomer - who he could only assume to be his new lodging partner - cursing himself that he had not tried to rehearse a greeting to avoid stumbling over his words, only for his attempt at speech to terminate in silence as he instinctively snapped his head backwards in shock.

‘This…..this can’t be right….can it?’

Standing just within the doorway - and looking every bit as surprised as Junshin was - the newcomer was a young girl. Appearing to be approximately of ages with Junshin’s eighteen, she was youthful and fresh faced enough that, like himself, she was almost certainly a fresh Academy graduate. Arching a crimson eyebrow, the girl’s dusk coloured eyed rested briefly on her male counterpart with an obvious note of surprise, before she leaned backwards through the door to take a second look at the room number, perhaps to make sure she hadn’t made a mistake.

‘A girl…I….I hadn’t even considered that! I…I assumed they would separate the men from the women. I can’t….I can’t live with a girl! I’m not ready…I haven’t showered yet, I….oh hell, I didn’t shave this morning! Crap, crap, crap!’

The girl had, apparently, not made a mistake. Shrugging her shoulders, the girl raised a hand to brush aside a stray strand of her long crimson hair out of the way of her eyes as she turned her attention back to Junshin. Recovering from the surprise rather more quickly than he did, she stepped through the door to briefly peer around the room, taking her measure of her surroundings, before her attention turned back towards him.

‘This isn’t good….she’s hot. Why did she have to be hot!? Oh man…I’m going to sweat off three quarters of my body weight just trying to talk to her.’

“Sorry,” the girl suddenly spoke, “I should have knocked. I didn’t think there’d be anyone in here just yet.”

“N…no, not at all,” Junshin shook his head slightly, his gaze lingering on the girl’s feet, only occasionally flitting upwards to look directly at her face. “This is your room too, af….after all. At least, I assume it is. My name is Kiyoko Junshin. Pleased to meet you.”

The girl opened her mouth to reply, though she did not speak immediately, her mouth drifting closed once more as she briefly frowned - almost as though unsure how to respond. Her hesitation lasted only a moment, however, before she continued.

“Likewise, Kiyoko-san,” she offered him a brief nod - a semblance of a bow, he imagined, as the redhead appeared just as unsure how much formality was required of them as he was. “I’m Seraphina.”

Junshin was unable to keep a frown from briefly creeping its way into his brow at the unusual name. He noted not only that the girl offered no surname, but that it was a thoroughly unjapanese name - indeed it wasn’t even a Japanese word - for a clearly Japanese girl. However, he thought better of prying…or, more accurately, he lacked the nerve to pry, and instead returned the girl’s nod with what he knew was a rather awkward looking smile.

“I see you’re settling in,” Seraphina stated, gesturing towards the desk behind Junshin. “Is it just us so far?”

“Um…..yes, Seraphina-san,” Junshin nodded, instantly feeling discomfort at the reminder that he was alone with the young beauty. “I was told that we might we a third occupant of the room…it depends how the rest of the day goes.”

“Right,” Seraphina nodded. “Well, I’d best follow suit and lay claim to some territory then. With all of my….” The girl hesitated briefly, glancing down at her sword - carried in her right hand and appearing to be all she had with her save the immaculate shihakusho she wore. “…Luggage.”

Junshin spared the sword a curious glance, wondering how he had failed to notice it before. Zanpakuto usually had a tangible aura about them, and Junshin wondered for a moment if he was as ready to assume the mantle of a Shinigami as he thought he was if his roommate's weapon had evades his senses. However, as he looked at the weapon, his apprehension transformed into confusion…for even as he looked directly at the sword, he could feel absolutely nothing from it.

The sword clearly was a Zanpakuto. Far too well made and elaborately designed to be an asauchi…yet, at the same time, he felt none of the expected reiatsu or consciousness from within the sword. It felt, to him, almost as if the weapon were….

‘Dead….?’

The effect was a rather disturbing one, and he tore his gaze from the sword as the girl began to make her way further into the room, placing the sword heavily on the surface of the right-hand desk almost as though planting a flag to mark her claim to it. Unlike himself, she did not appear to have anything else to unpack.

“Seraphina-san,” he murmured thoughtfully. “Is your sword….?”

“Don’t worry about it,” Seraphian replied, her tone somewhat weary, as though she was tired of answering the same question. “Long story…Anyway, I guess there’s not much to do but sit around until we’re called downstairs. I don’t suppose you’ve heard anything about squad assignments yet?”

“N…no,” Junshin shook his head, so distracted by the girl’s downright eerie zanpakuto that he had to think, for a moment, on the answer. “Although I was told that we would be called down within the hour.”

“I see,” Seraphina nodded, folding her arms, her brow creasing in a brief, barely perceptible show of impatience. “Gah! I don’t know about you, but I’m not much for sitting around waiting…I’m going to head downstairs. At least I might catch a glimpse of what’s going on.”

“Huh?” Junshin blinked in surprise as the redhead suddenly started towards the door. “But….what about your zanpakuto?”

“Don’t need it,” the girl replied. “Who am I going to fight around here? Listen, if someone else happens by, don’t let them steal my desk. Oh, and by the way…your zanpakuto’s reiatsu is all over the place. I think it finds that display embarrassing.”

The last was added over her shoulder, Seraphina half-turning her head to look towards him; a single dusk-coloured eye visible to him, showing no hint of a joke. Taken aback, Junshin turned to peer at the weapons, squinting as he noticed for the first time - so subtle that he needed to know it was there before he could detect it - a slight vibration in the spiritual pressure of his weapons.

“Seraphina-san,” he murmured. “How did you…?”

By the time he turned to look back towards his new roommate, however, the girl was gone. Having closed the door behind her, the redhead left Junshin alone in the room once more, suddenly conscious of the apparent irritation of his own weapon that, until it had been pointed out to him, he had utterly missed.

‘Who…is she…?’


That was the day he first met Reihaii Hitomi.

That was the day that changed everything.

- - - Updated - - -


Act II: The Chain of Command




As promised, the summons for the new recruits to assemble in the common area of the barracks came just short of an hour after Junshin had settled into his room. Unlike his redhaired roommate, Junshin was content to wait patiently in his room until the time came to head downstairs - a choice that appeared to be the majority decision, as he joined a sea of slow moving recruits filing laboriously down the several flights of stairs that separated his room from the first floor of the building. Junshin made a brief effort to look around for any familiar faces, although in truth his social circle at the Academy had been so small he didn’t expect to see anyone he recognised.

Among the throng, he was fairly certain he saw a face or two that he recognised - though he wasn’t sure he could put a name to them. People he had perhaps seen wandering around the Academy at one time or another, for everyone around him would have graduated as part of the same year group as he had. However, with each of the thirteen squads only taking, in general, approximately two or three dozen new recruits each year, there was only a slight chance of him encountering anyone he knew. As such, the young man felt very much alone as he shuffled forward along with the crowd, milling into the wide common room of the central barracks.

Virtually the entire first floor of the barracks was given over to general living and lounge areas for the division members. Stepping in through the building’s enormous double doors - currently thrown open to admit the warm, pleasant breeze from outside - one entered into the central dining area. A vast arrangement of long tables with sufficient room to seat every member of the squad, if need be, and a smaller table at the head of the room for the Captain and single digit-seated officers, who’s seats were arranged in a row along one edge of the table to allow them to face their squad.

Although most of its use was seen during meal times - as much as it was rare for the entire division to be gathered together in one place at the same time given variations in shift, or long term assignments that carried them far from the Seireitei - the other primary function of the hall was an impromptu meeting place. Although the lake in front of the building did feature a sandbar which could be used for the same purpose, the collection of Shinigami awaiting the new recruits appeared to have far too much paperwork with them - strewn across the table upon which the seated officers would dine - to take outside into the wind.

As the group of new recruits spread to awkwardly fan out ahead of the officers, some seating themselves along the tables, most awkwardly standing in place, Junshin continued his search for anyone who looked familiar - feeling rather awkward as he appeared to be the only person in the room who did not move as at least a pair. In the end, his eyes focused on a flash of red out of the corner of his eye, and he noted his new roommate just ahead of the milling crowd. The girl, having arrived first, had seated herself calmly just ahead of the line of tables, her legs folded neatly beneath her body, her back rigidly straight as she waited for the officers to begin their address. The closest thing Junshin had in the room to an acquaintance, he resolved to set out towards her…although it was a decision he instantly regretted as he realised it meant not only moving closer to the young woman, but also wandering directly into the sight of the seated officers.

Hustling a few quick steps to ensure he wasn’t afforded time to change his mind, he more waddled than walked - afraid his knees would buckle if he moved at a normal gait - to plop down beside Seraphina; the redhead turning her head only slightly in his direction, but saying nothing. Sitting on his feet, his heels against his buttocks and his knees on the floor, he assumed a posture identical to the young woman, though unlike her he found himself hesitant to look directly at the division officers, who spoke to each other in hushed tones, taking no notice of the new recruit’s a few feet behind them.

“Seraphina-san,” he murmured out of the corner of his mouth, “may I ask you a question?”

“You just did,” the redhead replied, her gaze remaining straight ahead, though she tilted her head in his direction as she spoke. “But you can ask two, if you like.”

“Um….Hai,” Junshin offered a smile that was at least three parts grimace, unsure of the girl’s remark was intended as a joke or intended in all seriousness. “I was wondering…how did you tell? About my zanpakuto, you mean?”

“Just…something I picked up,” Seraphina replied, the hint of a smile creeping into her otherwise stoic expression. “From a friend. I’ve spent a long time around people with zanpakuto…give it enough time, and you start to get an ear for them. Not the same way its owner does, of course…but subtle vibrations that tell you what it’s about.”

“I…I see,” Junshin nodded, although he had to admit to feeling somewhat chagrined that he had not sensed the same until it was pointed out to him. “…But not yours?”

“Not mine, no,” Seraphina replied, her smile fading as her clipped tone suggested she wished to discuss that particular subject no further. Feeling as though her had perhaps put his foot in his mouth, Junshin was rescued from an inevitable awkward silence as the officers apparently concluded their discussions, turning to face the crowd of fresh Shinigami. One of their number, a stout, weather beaten man who had both the look and posture of a soldier, cleared his throat loudly for attention as he glanced down at a sheet of paper held in his large hands.

Giving the paper one last look over, apparently satisfied with the division of the new recruits, he nodded to himself, before lifting his gaze to address the recruits directly. His voice, like his appearance, was formal and to-the-point; very much the voice of a quintessential military officer.

“Welcome to the Fifth Division,” he stated loudly, his voice carrying easily over the crowd - for all of the former Academy students were disciplined enough to fall silent when a superior officer was speaking. “I am Fukuda Akira, Sixth Seat of this division. On behalf of our Taichou, Arryn Maine-dono, I congratulate you all upon your graduation, and wish you a long and successful career.”

The words had the note of a rehearsed speech, and Junshin imagined that the officer likely said the same to every fresh batch of recruits each year. Nevertheless, he was appreciative that a single digit seat was taking the time to address them at all; he had imagined that organising the new recruits into their squads was probably work for someone far lower down the pecking order. For her part, the young girl beside him continued to sit stock still, staring straight ahead as she appeared to hang upon the officer’s ever word.

“Our Taichou,” Fukuda continued, “has decreed that the Fifth Division will be a centre of research and learning within the Gotei Thirteen. It is your duty, in addition to those normally expected of a Shinigami, to expand your horizons, to seek out knowledge, and to help move the Soul Society forward in its unquenchable thirst for knowledge. I expect you all to give everything you have for our beloved Taichou!”

“Hai!” a general cry went up among the recruits, and Junshin found himself rushing to catch up with them a little too late. At least a full second behind the rest of those assembled, he called out his own ‘Hai’, his voice rising alone from the crowd, causing the young man to flush in embarrassment, as his lone voice briefly drew the attention of the old soldier his way.

“Here are the squad assignments,” the officer continued quickly, sparing Junshin only a fleeting glance, much to the latter’s relief. “Each of you will be assigned to a seated officer within the division based on room numbers. This officer will be your commander for as long as you remain within their squad, and you will report directly to them for duty assignments. They will be your point of contact for anything to be raised up the chain of command….I don’t want any of you kids knocking on the Taichou’s door to request leave, ask for a transfer, or complain about your bed sheets being too rough. Go to your officer, understand!?”

“Hai!” another chorus rose from among the recruits and, this time, Junshin was able to keep up with it. Apparently satisfied, Fukuda referred back to the list he still held in his hands, and began to read aloud.

“You are all assigned to floor G,” he bellowed. “Rooms one and two will be assigned to our Third Seat. Rooms three and four will be assigned to our Fourth Seat. Rooms five and six to our fifth seat…”

‘Alright, we get the picture…does he really think he needs to read out the entire thing now? It’s a kinda obvious pattern.’

The arrangements did, indeed, proceed as expected - save for the fact that some officers were assigned three rooms and one, the eight seat, was given only one. As room number seven, Junshin and himself were assigned, it seemed, to Fukuda himself, who rolled up the sheet of paper and placed it under his arm.

“As some of you may know,” he continued. “Taichou is currently restructuring the division, and therefore many seated positions are currently vacant. At this time, the only single digit officers are myself and eighth seat Sahara Hanaka-dono. Until the seated positions are filled, you will report to the second highest ranking member within your squad. Their names and office numbers will shortly be posted on the wall. These offices will be found in the building in the south east corner of the Division grounds.’

“Alright, day one, kids,” Fukuda abruptly puffed out his chest, his arms clasped behind his back as he, if only for a moment, reminded Junshin very much of a drill sergeant. “Get to work!”

The recruits were slow to respond. Those who knew to whom they were supposed to be reporting - for the most part, those assigned to an officer lower ranking than the ninth seat, began to move off towards the entrance to the barracks to head towards the office area. Others remained where they were, likely waiting for the names of their temporary commanding officers to be pinned up. Junshin himself hesitantly rose to his feet behind Seraphina - the latter springing to a vertical base almost the moment Fukuda’s speech was finished, marching directly towards the seated officer.

“Fukuda-dono,” she greeted him, snapping her heels together as she came to a stop, stooping into a reverent bow that Junshin quickly mirrored, feeling his ears burning at standing right in front of one of the Shinigami-elite. “We are room seven. Reporting for duty.”

“Ah, yes,” the officer nodded, withdrawing the list from under his arm to refer back to it. “Hmm….Reihaii Hitomi-san and Kiyoko Junshin-san, correct?”

“Hai,” Seraphina noded. “Although I would prefer ‘Seraphina’ in you please, Fukudo-dono.”

Junshin quirked an eyebrow, casting the girl a sideward glance at the exchange, not entirely sure what to make of it. Seraphina - or Hitomi - did not look in his direction, her attention focused on the officer who, with a shrug, picked up a lead pencil from the desk to apparently scrawl her preferred name onto the list.

“Very well,” he nodded. “Seraphina-san it is….although which one are you? Damn it, why do you both have girl’s names?”

“I….Junshin is not a girl’s name, Fukuda-sama,” Junshin blurted out, his cheeks reddening with embarrassment.

“If you say so, boy,” Fukuda replied simply, not looking up from his list as he took the young man’s exclamation as an answer to the question. “Sounds damn girly to me…anyway, Seraphina-san, Kiyoko-san, I wasn‘t quite ready for you to walk up quite as quickly as that, so I don‘t have an official assignment for you yet. If you wouldn‘t mind though, there are some papers that need delivering to the Twelve Division. It‘s a three hour round trip, I‘d say…should have the morning assignments in by then.”

“Understood,” the girl Junshin now knew to be called Hitomi responded with a brisk nod - the young man noting that she stood in the same rigid, straight backed manner in which she had been sitting. “We will see to it.”

“Good,” Fukuda nodded, already turning away towards his officer companions. “Office building, first floor storeroom, boxes nine-A and nine-B. Come and find me when you get back.”

“Hai,” Hitomi replied briskly, bowing on the spot before smartly turning on her heel and heading off, sparing Junshin a brief glance to make sure he followed. Instinctivly turning to do so, Junshin caught himself at the last minute before turning back to offer the officer a farewell bow before hustling to catch up with the girl - who’s great height, almost six feet, coupled with her brisk pace, forced him to almost jog to catch up with her stride.

“S….so,” he murmured, making an effort to start a conversation, despite himself, “it seems we will be working together from now on, Reihaii-s….”

“Seraphina,” the girl replied curtly, though as she turned to look in her direction, her dusk coloured eyes softened somewhat. “Sorry, Kiyoko-san…I’d just….rather you didn’t call me that. But yes, that’s the way it seems. It’s good that we have such an easy job to start out. We can take it easy and get to know each other a little.”

Arching an eyebrow, Junshin observed the young girl’s swift moving feet, her pace so quick that she may as well have been power-walking, as he wondered if she knew what it meant to ‘take it easy’.

“Sure,” he nodded, although he felt less certain than he sounded. One thing he had never been good at was talking about himself. “I’d like that.”

Matching pace with Hitomi, the two walked side by side through the open doors into the bright sun outside the barracks. Junshin had to admit that it wasn’t exactly what he had expected from military life: ferrying documents between divisions seemed the work of an administrator rather than a Shinigami. However, at least he was getting paid to do it now…living on a shoestring at the Academy had been growing tiresome. Besides, as much as his new companion seemed rather severe, she didn’t appear to be as frightening as he had feared his potential roommate might have been.

Perhaps things wouldn’t be so bad after all.

[Seraphina]

Act III: Humdrum Duties




Despite walking with Hitomi for almost an hour after leaving the grounds of the fifth division behind - each of the two carting an enormous cardboard box, stuffed with far more paperwork than they were designed to contain, forcing each of the two Shinigami to occasionally stop and raise a knee to push the box higher within their grip to stop them falling free - very little in the way of conversation had passed between them. Hitomi, it seemed, had very little to say about herself - offering only a few half murmured snippets of information, such as where she was from (West Rukongai, apparently, with little in the way of elaboration) and that she was similarly in the position of knowing nobody within the division.

Junshin would prefer she answered some of the minor curiosities raised that morning - in particular why she felt the need to go by an assumed name. The sixth seat had appeared to take it somewhat in his stride - perhaps content to let the girl’s reasons remain her own, and Junshin - curious though he was - thought better of prying. Instead, he found himself in the rare position of being the one doing most of the talking. Far from being in the habit of taking the lead in a conversation, it nevertheless seemed less awkward than walking along in silence.

Although in truth, Junshin didn’t have much of a story to tell. Unlike many children who arrived in the Soul Society alone, he had been fortunate enough to be almost immediately taken in by a merchant in the Sixth district of the South Rukongai named Kiyoko Daishin. Along with his four brothers, likewise adopted by Daishin - of whom he was the middle in ages - Junshin was likely destined for a life as a trader until his spiritual abilities had begun to manifest shortly after the onset of puberty. There was nothing in his past more dramatic than that - no stories to share of a dramatic moment when his burgeoning spiritual powers awoke, or when he was forced to call upon his zanpakuto in an hour of need.

He had attended the Academy, he had studied, he had meditated….that was, in all honesty, the extent of his career path thus far. He had, at one time, entertained a rather romanticised image of what it was like to be a Shinigami….he had honestly believed that a Shinigami was immediately thrust into exciting adventures, facing life-or-death situations almost from the moment of their admittance into the Academy, and that life beyond was similarly filled with such adventure. He had learned, rather quickly, that life at the Academy wasn’t really like that…neither, it seemed, were the duties of a Shinigami, as demonstrated by their current, thoroughly mundane assignment.

It suited him well enough, however…he rather preferred being low key.

“So….” he queried as the two traversed the wide streets of the Seireitei, navigating the maze-like twists and turns that connected one point to another once one reached the military district. Junshin could only assume that the design was intended to baffle invaders, should they ever penetrate that far into the city; it certainly wasn’t designed for convenience, as it was easy, even for residents, to take a wrong turn. “How did you end up in the Fifth Division?”

“I applied,” Hitomi replied, shrugging her slender shoulders. Junshin waited to see if the redhead was going to provide any more information than this, but she merely continued walking, her gaze directed ahead.

“…Um…I….I see,” the young man smiled awkwardly through an involuntary grimace, turning away from the girl to face the way he was going also. The redhead appeared quite disinterested in speaking, and he was in no mood to push her to do so. Although he had to admit it wasn’t shaping up to be the finest start to a working relationship; as uncomfortable as Junshin himself felt, his female counterpart seemed to be even more so.

“…..There wasn’t really any rhyme or reason to it,” Hitomi suddenly continued, rather unexpectedly, though she continued to look ahead as she spoke. “The fact that the division just seemed so…..new, I guess…sort of appealed to me. It had a new Captain, it had a new direction, it was in motion. That appealed to me. I’ve spent a lot of time in the Academy feeling like I was treading water.”

“I see,” Junshin nodded, taken slightly aback. “I wish I could say my reasons were as sophisticated as all that….I just like to read. I’ve never been very good at fighting, or kido, or….well…much of anything, really. But I do enjoy reading. It seemed the natural choice to join the fifth division. I had considered the Twelfth but, to be perfectly honest, those guys are….well….they have a creepy reputation.”

“Heh, I suppose so,” Hitomi nodded, her bow shaped lips curving into a brief, wry smile. “Personally, I’ve had my fill of fighting. I can’t pretend that I didn’t choose the fifth, also, because it felt like a more peaceful role than some of the other divisions. Maybe that’s naive of me…but it’s nice to hope for it…”

Junshin cast the girl a sideward glance, arching a curious eyebrow. Hitomi’s smile had not lasted long - replaced instead by a quiet, thoughtful expression as her words trailed off. The girl’s brief, if somewhat cryptic response left Junshin with further questions that he was fairly convinced weren’t going to be answered; a suspicion confirmed as Hitomi suddenly lifted her gaze to look ahead, inclining her head forward to direct Junshin’s attention to the fore.

“There is it,” she murmured. “Division Twelve.”

If the Fifth Division grounds resembled a sprawling, ornate Japanese estate, then the Twelfth Division’s grounds were significantly more eclectic. Although some of the buildings did, indeed, look like traditional Japanese constructions, others more closely resembled buildings that might be seen in the world of the living; towering pillars of concrete and glass, where the members of the Twelfth Division - all of whom were defacto members of the Shinigami Institute of Research and Development - conducted their clandestine projects. The greatest minds in the Soul Society - or at least those that would claim to have the greatest minds in the Soul Society - lived, worked and advanced the Soul Society’s technology within the bristling forest of buildings into which they strayed.

Making their way towards a large, central building near the heart of the complex - which identified itself as the Headquarters for the institution by way of a thick wooden plaque above its sizeable, glass double doors - there was a definite difference in the atmosphere of the Twelfth Division when compared to their new home at the Fifth; to Junshin it felt like a well oiled, corporate atmosphere - as if the division was much a place of business as it was a branch of the military.

The reception area of their headquarters even looked, to him at least, like a place of business; a wide open entry way, with laminated wood flooring and comfortable chairs arranged for visitors to sit upon, advancing upon a beachwood desk behind which sat an immaculate, attractive young Shinigami in her early twenties. The girl wore the same relaxed, painted on smile that one might have expected of a receptionist at a day-spa or an inn; Junshin was almost surprised to see that she wasn’t wearing a nametag on the breast of her shihakusho.

“Good morning,” the girl chirped as they approached. “Welcome to the Shinigami Institute of Research and Development. How many I help you?”

Exchanging a brief, uncertain glance with Hitomi, Junshin cleared his throat as he hoped that he would not be the one to have to handle the conversation. Apparently noting his hesitation, Hitomi stepped forward first to place her box upon the desk, returning the girl’s greeting with a nod.

“We’re from the Fifth Division,” she advised. “We were told you were expecting these?”

The receptionist leaned forward curiously, peering into the box as Junshin, taking Hitomi’s lead, advanced to place his own burden beside her own. The girl leafed through the first few sheets of paper in Hitomi’s box, giving a satisfied nod.

“Oh, excellent,” she chimed, her painted on smile instantly returning. “One of my sempai was chasing these up just earlier today. He’ll be glad to know they’ve arrived.”

“Um….if it’s okay to ask,” Junshin queried, “what exactly are they?”

“Certainly,” the girl replied, still smiling sweetly. “It’s a research paper we commissioned on the viability of replacing Hell Butterflies with Hell ‘Chappy’ the Rabbits. It was suggested that there would be a positive effect on morale is even the worst news was brought to you by way of bunny.”

“…..And that….took up two boxes?” Junshin replied. “You’re….joking, right?”

“Oh, no,” the reception shook her head briefly, a small crease creeping its way into her forehead as though the suggestion that she was not serious was genuinely perplexing. “Morale is a very serious matter to consider….By the way, you both look very healthy, can I interest either of you in signing up for medical experimentation?”

Junshin, despite himself, laughed nervously…before realising that the girl, once again, did not actually appear to be joking. He was rescued from further conversation as Hitomi abruptly reached out a hand for his shoulder, tugging him backwards by the cloth of his shihakusho.

“Weeeeee’ll just be going,” the redhead replied, looking just as perturbed as Junshin. “The Fifth Division extends its regards. Please feel free to call on us again.”

Being force marched towards the door, Junshin glanced over his shoulder as the reception girl shrugged nonchalantly, before turning her attention towards the paperwork they had left. Once his own feet had began to move him, however, Hitomi relinquished her grip - though Junshin noted she walked at a brisk pace that was probably kept short of running only out of politeness.

“Definitely, definitely glad I picked the Fifth,” he whispered to her.

Hitomi didn’t reply until after they had stepped back through the doors, back into the open air. Only then did the redhead breath an audible sigh, shaking her head in disbelief as she flashed Junshin a nervous smile.

“She was probably just joking,” she told him. “Hazing the new recruits, or something….I think….hopefully….maybe. Either way, let’s get the hell out of here. This place is a little too odd for my tastes.”

Junshin nodded, falling in step beside Hitomi as they made their return journey towards the division’s front gate - happy to see that he had at least managed to find some common ground with his new colleague, even if it was simply a mutual distaste for being used as scientific guinea pigs. On the return trip, Hitomi was slightly more talkative, although she still said nothing much about herself. Conversation was instead limited to the weather, current events, or critique of the newest books; of which her opinions were intelligently worded, if often scathing.

“….The sad part is, you think I’m kidding,” the girl told him at the conclusion of a thoroughly venomous synopsis of one particular book, ‘Dusk’ by Uesugi Shingen. “Shingen-kun wrote that book knowing it was garbage. He even told me so…”

Clearing her throat, the girl proceeded to speak in what Junshin could only describe as a ‘robotic’ fashion, setting her face in a passive, blank expression.

“‘Reiahii-san,’” she intoned, for some reason that Junshin couldn’t fathom holding a hand over her left eye. “‘I wish to conduct a social experiment to try and determine how bad a book can be and still be successful. It is my intention to write the worst book ever devised by a sane mind, and market it to screaming teenage girls by making it a romance story about emotionally vulnerable Bounts and a bland female lead that they can pretend is them. I will be interested to see if anyone buys it.’”

“….Did he actually say that to you?” Junshin asked, arching an eyebrow, not entirely believing that the girl had ever even met the author, let alone been made privy to his exact reasons for writing the book.

“Direct quote,” Hitomi nodded. “He knows it’s terrible….you know how authors get free copies of their published books to send to people? Well, Shingen-kun only sent copies to people he didn’t like. He called it ‘getting his own back for all the cyclops jokes’. Mind you, he did give one to Yukimura-kun….it was the first time I’d ever seen Yukimura-kun looking genuinely terrified.”

“It sounds,” Junshin murmured, “like you have a much more interesting time at the Academy than I did.”

“Heh….well…. ‘interesting’ is one word for it,” Hitomi replied, her smile suddenly returning, looking somewhat wistful. “And as much as it wasn’t easy at times….I think, sometimes, that I’d happily go back and go it over again. Well…some of it, anyway. But ah well, life goes on, doesn’t it? We’re not students now, we’re Shinigami.’

“New horizons, and all that,” she turned towards him with a half-smile, gesturing vaguely ahead. “Hell, after working for six years to get here, I’m still getting used to the fact that I’m wandering around in this shihakusho. Hasn’t really sunk in yet.”

“I know what you mean,” Junshin grinned awkwardly. “If every day is as easy as this one, then I think I’ll be happy enough…to be honest, I’m not sure I’m made for grand adventures. When you’re younger, you dream of that sort of thing….but now that I’m a little older, a desk job doesn’t actually sound so bad.”

“Stability,” Hitomi nodded in understanding. “I think I can understand that. To be honest, I’ve spent so long just trying to get to this point that I never even stopped to consider what it would be like. I think I’ve always considered my time at the Academy part of my old life….just tacked on to the life I had in the Rukongai. Becoming a Shinigami meant escaping that life…meaning I had a future, and a means of supporting myself. It was my only goal and, to be honest, now that I’m here I feel a little lost as to what I should do with this career I’ve worked so hard to get.’

“….Sorry,” a faint blush crept into the girl’s cheeks as she appeared to notice how long she had been rambling. “Went off on one a little, there.”

“No, it’s fine,” Junshin raised a hand to wave away her apology, pleased to see that the young woman, who appeared so utterly stoic that same morning, appeared to be relaxing a little more. “Anyway, we’ll be back at the barracks in a few minutes….We should probably find Fukuda-sama. Looking forward to our first actual assignment?”

“Definitely,” Hitomi nodded, turning to look ahead, where the towering wall of the division grounds was visible, peeking over the top of the row of buildings that lined the wide street upon which they walked.

“Although, knowing our luck,” she added, “he’s going to ask us to organise a filing cabinet or something…”

[Seraphina]

Act IV: Not my Nakama




“The filing or our records is a little untidy after the division’s shake up,” Fukuda Akira declared with a broad, toothy grin. “I’d like you to go and organise them.”

Standing on the opposite side of the officer’s desk, standing stiffly to attention in an effort to mimic Hitomi, Junshin couldn’t prevent his shoulders from slumping slightly. Beside him, Hitomi was significantly more restrained - though Junshin was quite certain he noticed a slight tightening in the corners of her eyes. Apparently oblivious to the response, Fuduka extended a hand to hold out a document that would, presumably, grant them access to the sealed archive rooms. Hesitantly, Junshin reached out a hand to accept the paper, regarding it with a forlorn expression.

As much as he had told Hitomi he didn’t mind routine, he’d almost have preferred another courier job. At least that would allow him to get out and about. Heaving a quiet sigh under his breath, Junshin half wondered if it was worth asking for something else when Hitomi suddenly snatched out a hand to seize the paper, folding it in half, and slipping it inside her shihakusho.

“Thank you very much,” she almost barked out, staring straight ahead. “We will see to it at once.”

Junshin winced, his shoulders unconsciously hunching as he cast his companion a sideward glance, doubting his objection would go over well now that his counterpart had so readily accepted the assignment.. Fukuda, for his part, gave an approving nod as he lowered himself back into his chair. Junshin, heaving a sigh, stooped into a slight bow before turning to leave.

“Do you think that organising filing is beneath you, Kiyoko-san?” Fukuda’s voice arrested him in place, the officer having already returned to his own paperwork, not looking up as he spoke.

“N…no, Fukuda-sama,” Junshin stammered in reply, feeling the colour training from his features. “I…I just…”

“Good,” Fukuda replied with a curt nod, perusing the document in front of him before scrawling his signature on its base. “Remember that you are soldiers….you will not always have the luxury of choosing your duties, and those duties will not always be glamorous or exciting. As unseated officers, I am afraid that the day to day upkeep of the division and its records is within your range of responsibilities. I suggest that, if you wish that to change, you apply yourself to your tasks rather than question them.”

“We understand, Fukuda-dono,” Hitomi replied in Junshin‘s place, coming to his rescue as she swooped into an apologetic bow. “Our apologies.”

The scratching of Fukuda’s pen on parchment stopped for a moment as the officer looked up at the pair. Although his tone had been clipped and to the point, he offered them an understanding smile as he placed down the pen, placing his elbows on the desk as he rested his chin across his clasped hands.

“I know that this is boring work,” he told them, “but it’s still work….and it’s where almost everyone starts out. I’m afraid that, at the bottom of the food chain, there isn’t a lot of excitement to be had in the life of a Shinigami. As fresh recruits, you’ll be doing guard duty, admin duty, courier duty…but the fastest way to prove you’re capable of handling something bigger is to do that job well.”

“…I….I understand, Fukuda-sama,” Junshin nodded, regretting that he had allowed his disappointment to so easily show. “I meant no offence.”

“Good,” Fukuda nodded, lowering his head back to his work as he apparently considered the matter closed. “Get to it, then.”

‘Wonderful….now I sound like an arrogant jerk on my first day…Not the first impression I was hoping for.’

Behind him, Hitomi slid open the door, departing without a word. Junshin followed close behind, feeling as though he were walking on eggshells the entire way, before sliding the door shut behind him as he followed his companion down the hall. Rubbing the back of his neck awkwardly, he quickened his step to draw level with Hitomi.

“Th…thanks for stepping in there,” he said, managing a smile despite his misgivings.

“Don’t worry,” Hitomi shook her head. “You said it, I was thinking it….but he’s right, we are soldiers now, and we need to do as we’re told….even if it’s pretty boring.”

“I suppose,” Junshin murmured. “Although…I feel almost like I’m back in my father’s shop, taking stock.”

“Well then,” the redhead shrugged, “think of this as….being a Shinigami with training wheels. Like Fukuda-dono said, if we do well, then maybe we’ll get a chance at some more interesting duties.”

“Somehow,” Junshin snorted, “I’m not sure that metaphor makes me feel any better. B…but you’re right. If we’re going to do this, let’s do it right! Let’s organise the hell out of that paperwork!”



And that was, in fact, how their days proceeded for their first week as Shinigami. What they had imagined at first to be a few filing cabinets in a dust storeroom somewhere had, in fact, turned out to be centuries worth of displaced files, occupying a vast library of scrolls and documents that dated almost back to the founding of the division, secreted into a large, lightless chamber in the heart of the division’s office buildings. Without any windows - for prolonged exposure to sunlight would almost certainly damage some of the older documents - the pair worked by candlelight at all hours of the day to undertake the Herculean task of reorganising the last ten years of the division’s history into some semblance of order - successive changes in the Fifth’s organisation and command having left the records something of a disjointed mess.

The chamber in which they worked was comprised almost entirely of long, endless rows of bookshelves, and the two would often work several yards apart. However, so deep within the bowels of the building, the freely shouted conversation back and forth with impunity - their voices echoing from the stone walls of the otherwise silent chamber - sharing interesting quotes or information gleaned from the documents they could only find a place for by reading them. Despite his initial discomfort around the young woman - and her obvious discomfort with him - working in such close and constant proximity they truly had no choice but to become used to each other.

Hitomi turned out, in fact, to be rather good company…even if she was a little severe and standoffish at times. She was polite and diplomatic, and kind enough to forgive his obvious lack of nerves when addressing her. However there was a hardness to the young woman - a rigid steel behind her eyes that was almost, but not quite, hidden from view. Although she never provided further insight into her life before becoming a Shinigami, he often thought back to her curious mention of having seen ‘enough’ of fighting; the dangerous glint that lurked behind the girl’s eyes always seemed, to Junshin at least, to be the cold detachment of a soldier.

Isolated from the rest of the world, it was easy to lose track of the hour of the day, and the two often set to work in the early hours before the majority of the division were awake, and only stumbled out of their dust-filled prison late in the night when most had retired. It was arduous work but, upon seeing the sheer scope of the task before them, it was the only way they stood any chance of completing it inside a month.

At night, they seldom spoke. Staggering sleepily back to their room, stretching out on their separate futons for a deep, dreamless sleep. Although on the first night or so it had felt thoroughly awkward to share a room with a stranger - especially one of the opposite gender - they had eventually become too tired to care. In this way they continued, almost uninterrupted - even eating their meals in the cold, dark chamber - until the seventh day of their service in the Gotei Thirteen, whereupon the two bleary eyed recruits staggered up from their purgatory, stepping into full sunlight for what felt like the first time in years, one quiet, Sunday afternoon.

“……Yeah….” Hitomi grumbled, rubbing her eyes as she stood upon the front porch of the division’s administration building, blinking rapidly as she waited for her eyes to adjust to the illumination. “Well….we definitely did organise the hell out of that paperwork, like you said.”

“….Yeah…” Junshin nodded groggily, raising a hand to ruffle his hair, discarding a thick cloud of dust from his follicles.

“…..Food?” Hitomi queried, her body looking rather limp as she turned her head in the direction of the distant barracks, visible on the far side of the expansive Division gardens.

“Food,” Junshin confirmed, the two immediately staggering forward, zombie like, to descend the short flight of stairs towards ground level. “We should probably tell Fukuda-sama that we finished…Although I hope he isn’t so pleased with what we did that he asks us to organise some more filing.”

“Hah!” Hitomi chuckled, shaking some dust out of her own long hair. “That’d be the perfect end to the week, wouldn’t it? ‘Good news, kids. You’ve been promoted. You’ve to go and clear out the Central Archives’.”

Although Junshin laughed, the thought send a shiver down his spine as he wondered how close to reality such a possibility was. In truth, he had found the work rather satisfying - or at least satisfying to complete - if not fulfilling. That being so, he doubted he could stand another week cooped up in a dark room with only candlelight to see by. He also had been afforded no time whatsoever to train his physical skills; a problem for a normal Shinigami, but a potential disaster for him given his thus far poor track records with his zanpakuto.

‘A week without any training at all….I suppose there’s even a chance that I’m weaker.’

For the time being, however, the young man didn’t intend to let that bother him. His stomach was growling, his body was weary, and he intended to get some food, have a wash, and sleep away the rest of the day. He could think of few better ways to round off a week of hard work as they finally reached the barracks building, stepping out of their sandals to kick the footwear into a veritable carpet of similar sandals that were neatly arranged outside the building, before stepping up onto the wooden porch.

Inside, the common room was as one might have expected things midday on a weekend. Some two score division members were currently having their afternoon meal when the duo arrived, though despite the great number of Shinigami present, the room was surprisingly quiet. The disciplined Shinigami arranged themselves in pockets of five or six, finding somewhere to sit across the length of the long tables that stretched from one end of the chamber to the other; although they did not sit in silence, they spoke to each other in hushed voices, mindful that some of their colleagues on the upper floors were likely still sleeping off a nightshift.

Throughout the day, food was available in the form of a buffet table, refilled by a dedicated kitchen staff. Junshin headed straight for the food while Hitomi, without saying a word, wandered in the direction of the large wooden box by the side of the door in which post was delivered to the barracks. Junshin didn’t intrude - since arriving at the Academy, Hitomi had not gone a day without checking the postbox, returning empty handed on each occasion. She never voiced her disappointment, but it was obvious nonetheless as, one again, she appeared to find nothing addressed to her among the letters that morning.

Turning his back before she noticed he had been watching, Junshin concentrated on filling his plate as the girl moved across the room to join him, fetching a plate of her own and wordlessly shovelling food onto it. Junshin spared her a sideward glance, noting that the air of levity she had worn on the way back from the archives had drained from the girl - replaced instead by a quiet, brooding sadness.

“….N…no news is good news, right?” he ventured, though he almost immediately regretted opening his mouth. It was hardly his business, nor was he even entirely sure what he meant by the comment. Hitomi, however, merely turned her purple gaze towards him, before shrugging her shoulders lightly.

“It’s been a busy week,” she stated, rather flatly. “I imagine everyone is still settling into their new work. Still, there are a few people I’d like to hear from…I suppose that’s a little selfish of me. I should have a little patience, I guess.”

“Ah, people from the Academy then?” Junshin nodded in realisation. “I thought it might be letters from home or something.”

“Hah!” the girl’s chuckle was short, sharp and bitter. Junshin blinked, for a moment not knowing what he had said that was so funny. “That’ll be right…..I haven’t seen from or heard from my family in seven years. I’ve no interest in hearing from them either.”

Apparently considering that explanation enough, Hitomi turned away from the buffet, carrying her filled plate towards an empty spot along the nearest table, kneeling elegantly with her back to him as she began to eat - although Junshin couldn’t help but notice her shoulders were visibly tense. Mention of her family had clearly touched some hidden nerve.

Junshin had to admit that he could not fathom the girl’s reaction. The idea of living his life without contact with his family was such a foreign concept that he found the notion utterly jarring. He had been taught, from an early age, the value of trust and support from ones relatives…he could not imagine what could possibly be done to cause such resentment; although the reason why she refused to go by her family name was, at least, thrown a little further into the light.

‘But still…seven years…that can’t be right.’

He knew that he should probably have left well enough alone, but somehow the thought of such a young girl cut off from her family bothered him. Her statement implied that she still had living family, and if so did they even know where she was? Surely someone was worried about her? It couldn’t possibly be the case that they gave as little thought to her as she did to them, could it?

“It….probably isn’t my business,” he spoke carefully, managing a smile as he moved around the table to sit opposite Hitomi. “But….you can’t mean that you haven’t really heard from your family in seven years? I mean…not even a letter?”

Hitomi froze with her fork half way between her plate and her mouth, her eyes lifting from her plate towards Junshin who realised, immediately, that he had erred. The dangerous glint, usually lurking quietly behind her eyes, all too suddenly seemed to the fore.

“…..Let’s not go there,” she uttered, her voice cold. “I don’t want to talk about it…I never want to talk about it.”

His mouth feeling suddenly dry, Junshin licked his lips nervously to try and moisten them, knowing that he was probably about to step onto a minefield. The smart thing to do would probably be to make a quick withdrawal and change the subject….However, part of him simply couldn’t bring himself to do so. Family, to his mind something utterly sacred, deserved better that to be ignored.

“I’m sorry,” he replied, his voice more than a little hoarse. Clearing his throat, he waited for Hitomi to turn her attention back to her meal, somehow feeling unable to proceed while her gaze remained on him. “B…but…seven years? Don‘t you think that your mother might be wondering where you are?”

He jumped as Hitomi’s work suddenly clattered against her plate, dropping from her fingers as the girl’s entire body seemed to stiffen. She didn’t look up this time, her face remaining lowered as she briefly raised a hand to her mouth - Junshin couldn’t be certain, but he thought he was her briefly bite down on her own finger. She didn’t speak for several seconds, almost as though taking a while to swallow her temper, before her teeth released her finger, her hand lowering as a tight fist to the surface of the table.

“….I said,” she muttered, her eyes veiled by the strands of her hair, “don’t go there. Really, just….don‘t…”

Thoroughly shaken by the girl’s response, Junshin merely stared blankly for a moment, unsure how to even begin to formulate a reply. He found himself simply stammering out an apology, though he only half heard his own words. Her shoulders hunched, her limbs stiff, her face hidden from view, the Shinigami across the table from him suddenly no longer seemed the attractive, smiling young girl he had thought he was getting to know.

He suddenly realised what he was doing amounted to prodding a cobra with a stick.

“….You’re not my Nakama,” Hitomi’s voice drifted to his ears, cutting short his stuttered apology. Her voice carried a cold, subtle edge, arresting his tongue in midflow. “We’ve never fought together, we’ve never bled together….you’re just some guy who was randomly thrown into the same room as me. Don’t think that gives you the right to butt into my life and make observations from inside your happy little bubble.’

“People like you,” she continued, every word feeling like an icicle plunging into his body, “don’t have a fucking clue what life is like in the real world. A world where there is no Seireitei, there are no cushy jobs and there’s nobody to play happy families with….Don’t you dare sit there and pass judgement on something you can’t possibly understand. That’s my world, and I don’t owe you a damn thing…you haven’t earned the right to step into it.’

“When I tell you something is off limits, it‘s off limits,” a slight upward tilt of the girl’s head rendered one of her eyes suddenly visible - an orb of purple that echoed cold, barely restrained rage. “Don‘t you ever push me like that again.”

Rising suddenly to her feet, Hitomi left her half-finished meal where it was, stalking away from the table to leave Junshin sitting stock still, frozen to the spot as he slowly exhaled a long, shuddering breath. The hushed conversations taking place elsewhere suddenly returned to his ears, and he realised for the first time how utterly consumed his senses had been by his colleague’s voice. Placing a hand to his chest, he felt his heartbeat thundering beneath his ribcage.

The transformation the girl had undergone at the mention of her family was startling; almost as though an entirely different person had suddenly bubbled to the surface. Breathing heavily as he fought to regain his composure, Junshin realised he no longer had an appetite. Any thought of food was gone from his mind.

What could possibly have happened to that girl to make her so broken?

- - - Updated - - -


Act V: The Seven Year Lie



Junshin spent much of the afternoon lingering around the lower floor of the barracks, trying to avoid heading upstairs. However, after re-reading the division notice board for what felt like the one thousandth time, he began to wonder if he was truly handling things the right way. The more he thought about it, the more he wondered why he was feeling so regretful. Had he even made an error? While it was true he had perhaps stepped into something that wasn’t his business, he had done so out of concern….why was he the one shutting himself out of his own room when it was Hitomi who had let her temper get the better of her?

As the sun was finally beginning to sink towards the pristine white skyline of the Seireitei’s elegant buildings, Junshin finally resolved to head upstairs - come what may, he couldn’t very well sit cowering in the dining room all night. Besides, if anyone should be shut out of the room, it seemed to him that it was the person that needed to cool their head that should be the one to do it. Steeling himself, he eventually threw caution to the wind and headed back towards the room he shared with the young woman just as the sky was beginning to fade into the warm orange glow of dusk.

By that time of day, the barracks was usually crowded. With the tasks of the day behind them, almost the entire daytime shift had returned to the Division grounds, while the nightshift were making ready to depart. Although there was no time, except on special circumstances or at specific meetings, that the entire division would be on the grounds simultaneously, the night shift was significantly smaller than the day, resulting in an almost collegiate atmosphere as Junshin ascended through the many floors of the barracks. On each landing, he was granted a brief few down the central corridor of each floor - each one filled with laughter, conversation, and in some cases even music as some talented division members entertained their peers with song or an instrument.

This merriment faded, somewhat, as he ascended to floor G - the floor upon which the new recruits were housed. By the end of their first week, most of the other recruits had - it seemed, formed clichés and friendships with members of their new squads, and only returned to their own floor when it was time to sleep. Junshin and Hitomi, working as they had in isolation, had never even met another member of their squad save for Fukuda himself. Although the glow of a few lamps were visible through the membrane of the sliding doors of some rooms, for the most part the corridor was dark and quiet as Junshin made his way towards room 7.

The room appeared to be as dark and soundless as those around it and, for a moment, Junshin wondered if Hitomi was even inside. However, as he slid open the door to peer within, he noted immediately that she was; whatever trepidation he had felt at encountering the young woman after their earlier confrontation appeared needless however, for she appeared to be fast asleep.

Seated upon the narrow board that served as a windowsill, just beyond the desk that Junshin had reserved for himself, Hitomi was perched somewhere precariously in slumber. With one leg dangling free - the toes of her socked feet just shy of touching the floor, with her other foot flat against the ledge to rest her cheek against her raised knee, her eyelids were closed and her breathing shallow. Propped against her shoulder, her hand gripping it tightly even in sleep, her sheathed zanpakuto slumbered beside her - the setting sun, in stark relief directly behind her, shimmering upon the highly polished black scabbard.

She looked thoroughly peaceful; serene, in fact. It was hard to form any association between the sleeping girl before him and the dark-eyed, dangerous soldier who had warned him away a few hours ago. Junshin, hesitating within the doorway, found his brief swell of anger at her earlier snapping at him fading away, heaving a sigh as he stepped into the room and slid the door closed behind him. The fact she was asleep underlined to him exactly how tired Hitomi had likely been after their near ceaseless work…perhaps it was understandable that her temper had been somewhat frayed. In repose, framed by the setting sun behind her, it was difficult to remain angry when Hitomi - if perhaps only in seeming - looked so….

….fragile.

‘Well…either way, she’ll catch a cold if she stays there all night.’

His entry into the room had failed to rouse the redhead from her sleep, and he instead made his way across the room towards her. Walking soundlessly more by reflex than intent - for he was, fresh recruit or not, a trained Shinigami - he made his way around the low wooden desk upon which his twin zanpakuto still resided - albeit no longer upon the wooden stand he had assembled for them upon Hitomi’s earlier advice - to stand beside the window.

“Seraphina-san,” he whispered, thinking it better to rouse her gently with a whisper than suddenly with a shout. As he spoke, Hitomi’s eyelids flicked slightly, through they did not open, her bow shaped lips parting to mumble out a few vague incoherencies. Junshin momentarily toyed with the idea of simply leaving her be; in a few hours the night air would almost certainly grow chilly she probably would wake up on her own before it did her some harm. However, now that he was closer to her, he noticed that Hitomi’s sleep was perhaps not as peaceful as he had at first assumed.

The faint sheen of perspiration was clearly visible upon her brow - a brow that he noted, now, was knotted in consternation. He noted also that the fist that held her zanpakuto did not merely hold the weapon, but clutched it - her fingers exerting such force that her knuckles were white from the pressure. Taking somewhat aback, Junshin allowed curiosity to get the better of him as he lowered his head closer, realising that the ramblings making their way past her lips did, in fact, contain vague words.

“Ota…san….” he heard her murmur. “…don’t….let them….mrrhmrm….no…”

His lip tightening, Junshin realised that his roommate was apparently in the throws of a nightmare - from the pallor of her features and the stress evidence in her body, he would imagine a less then pleasant one. Deciding it was best to wake her up, he threw caution to the wind as he reached out a hand towards her shoulder, resolving to softly nudge her awake.

“Seraphina-san,” he repeated. “It’s alright. You’re have a ni….”

The reaction as his hand touched her shoulder was immediately and explosive. No sooner had his fingertips brushed against the cloth of her shihakusho then he suddenly found himself crashing to the floor - spots dancing before his eyes as he struggled, for a moment, to even piece together what had happened to him. His instinct was to rise, but almost immediately a weight pressed across his torso, pinning his arms in place as something else pressed against his forehead, preventing him from lifting his head as the breath was knocked out of him.

It all happened in the space of a heartbeat, his rattled brain fading slowly back into reality as he finally pieced together his new surroundings. Lying on his back, he noted first that the weight upon his forehead with the heel of Hitomi’s left palm - her fingers gripping his hair to hold his head in place - while the weight across his chest was her body - straddling his sternum with her knees across his upper biceps, applying such pressure to his axillary artery that his limbs had already gone numb. Utterly prone, it was not the cold edge of her naked blade against his throat that stopped him from crying out an objection….it was rather the sight of the girl’s face peering down at him.

In the moments that followed him realising his predicament, he had assumed that Hitomi had thrown him to the floor as a continuation of her earlier berating…however, illuminated in an off-crimson glow by the sunlight pouring in through the adjacent window, Hitomi’s features showed none of the steel with which she had regarded him downstairs.

She was terrified.

Through eyes like saucers, she gazed down at him with an expression of absolute panic. Her shoulders rising and falling heavily as she gulped in short, shallow breaths, appearing every bit as surprised as he was at their sudden arrangement. Clearly having reacted by reflex, still halfway between dream and reality, the instant eye contact was made the girl suddenly moved from him, rising sharply to her feet and pacing quickly away, sliding her zanpakuto back into its sheath with a resounding ‘clack’ that filled the otherwise suddenly silent room.

Lying on his back for a moment, finding his own breath having quickened in alarm, Junshin found his body slow to move. Wiggling his fingers, he felt the feeling begin to trickle back into his arms as, with a grunt, he pushed himself up into a seated position, wincing as he raised a hand to his throat, his fingertip feeling a slight dampness where the edge of the girl’s sword had grazed him, breaking the surface of his skin. Had he been an enemy, he didn’t doubt that she would have cut his throat…a thought that utterly chilled him to his core.

Lowering his hand to his chest, he felt the panicked tremble of his heart, beating so quickly it felt as though it were trying to burst through his ribcage. It was the first time, he realised, that he had ever come close to being killed; he shuddered to think what might have happened if he had approached Hitomi in the dark, where she would not have been able to see his face.

For her part, Hitomi stood with her back to him - one hand holding the sheath of her sword, the other raised to her forehead. Every muscle in her body looked stiff, still coming down from flight or fight, making what looked to be a conscious effort to draw in long, deep breaths to steady herself. For some time, neither of them spoke, though it was Hitomi that broke the silence first.

“…..Sorry,” she uttered, her voice utterly filling the soundlessness, her tone genuinely regretful. “I didn’t mean….I’m sorry.”

Her movements rigid, likely realising herself how close she had come to killing him, Hitomi advanced towards one of the room’s interior walls - the western wall, besides which her bedroll was situated. Leaning her shoulders against the surface, she sank slowly down into a seated position, coming to a stop only once she had dropped into a full crouch, closing her eyes as she allowed the back of her head to recline against the wall.

“….B….bad dream?” Junshin queried. He didn’t say ‘it’s okay’…because it obviously wasn’t. But he felt more sympathy than anger, unable to shake the image of the frantic panic within the girl’s dusk coloured eyes.

“……..Worse,” Hitomi’s reply was not quick in coming, staring wordlessly at the blank wall opposite her for several seconds before doing so. “Memory.”

“I see,” Junshin nodded, raising a hand to his throat again as he awkwardly levered himself to his feet. The tingling numbness had left his arms by now, and he made his way towards the wall opposite Hitomi, where his own bedroll was located, and seated himself directly across from the girl. “Old battles?”

“Old betrayals,” Hitomi replied, her eyes still closed. “But I already told you, don’t go there.”

“Th…that’s true,” Junshin nodded, forcing his lips into an awkward smile, raising a hand to the back of his head. “I guess now I know when to quit.”

Hitomi’s eyes opened briefly, her gaze flickering towards him, before drifting up to the roof. Although he couldn’t be certain, Junshin thought he saw a slight blush creep into the girl’s cheeks as she abruptly turned her face aside.

“Sorry,” she muttered. “About before too, I mean. I get that you were trying to help….and I shouldn’t make you suffer because of my own problems. But please, just try and respect that they’re my problems, Kiyoko-san. I have my own way of dealing with them.”

“Dealing with them?” Junshin echoed, unable to keep a frown from creeping into his brow. “Is that…..really what you’re doing?”

The question clearly surprised Hitomi - in fact it surprised Junshin that he had even asked it. Her eyes turned towards him once more, though she appeared more startled than angry; if it was the first time such a question had ever been put to her, he imagined she rarely - if ever - discussed such things. In the week he had known her, she had appeared amicable and good humoured. Before that afternoon, he had never guessed how brittle that façade was….He knew that she had friends in the Academy, but perhaps such things simply weren’t discussed with them.

If her friends were even half as dangerous as she was, maybe they had pasts they didn’t care to discuss either.

“You don’t have to tell me anything,” he told her when he received no reply. “But seven years is a long time to still have nightmares….Don’t you think? I’m not going to tell you what to do, but I can’t imagine enduring things the way you are is healthy. If you don’t want to confide in me, then at least confide in someone.”

“I am not going to be anyone’s burden,” the girl shot back so quickly that Junshin drew back in surprised at seeing some of the fire return to her gaze. His own nerve died somewhat as she seemed to regain hers. “I’ve spent so much time trying to put some distance between myself and….all of that. I always thought that what scared me more than anything was going backwards. Thinking that, I thought things would become easier when I became a Shinigami. Maybe it was stupid….but I thought that would solve everything.”

“Well then,” Junshin replied, “it must be something else, then? Maybe, after seven years, now that you know you don’t need to run away anymore, you’re just looking for closure?”

“Closure?” Hitomi replied, frowning thoughtfully at the suggestion.

“Yes,” Junshin nodded, smiling in relief that he had apparently turned the young woman to a more thoughtful state. “I…I can’t possible know what happened, or how things were left, but maybe now that you’ve escaped that chapter of your life by becoming a Shinigami, you just want a way to tie it all off?”

“…….Maybe,” Hitomi offered a somewhat noncommittal reply, through her expression remained thoughtful. Shrugging, Junshin decided that it was perhaps better than nothing as he tipped sideward to lie down upon his futon - which had remained spread out across the floor for almost the entire week, neither recruit seeing much sense in folding it away each morning, so little time had they spent in their room.

“It’s just something to think about,” he told her, stifling a yawn. “In any case, I’m going to try and get some sleep now…you should try and get some more too, if you can. Maybe we’ll be given a better assignment tomorrow.”

Although he closed his eyes, Junshin did not find sleep quickly - as nonchalant as he tried to behave, the expression of abject terror that Hitomi had worn continued to plague him, and he doubted he would be afforded any more peaceful sleep than his roommate. For Hitomi herself, he remained unsure if she settled down to sleep at all; by the time he eventually did drift off, she was still seated against the wall, staring thoughtfully into space.

Remembering.

[Seraphina]

Act VI: To the Place I Once Belonged




Hitomi’s eyelids opened as she drew in a long breath of cold, blood scented air. Resisting the urge to gag, she fought down the sudden lurching in her stomach as she encountered the scent for the first time in what felt like years; it had been several months since curiosity had led her to attempt to explore her zanpakuto’s Inner World, and she had been afforded little time to become accustomed to it. However, a great deal had changed in that time; her zanpakuto’s healing was, it seemed, on the verge of completion.

As it had the first time she went there, her Inner World took the form of an endless, sun scorched battlefield. An eternal flat plain of dry, brittle earth, strewn with the bodies of the dead; victims of a colossal, nameless battle in which neither side had fared well. The stale wind that swept over the surface of the war zone whipped and snapped at the many hundreds of banners thrust into the ground periodically among the carnage - the symbol of a golden circle, inlaid with three golden leaves in, their points meeting at its centre, like the spoke of a wheel, against a white background. The last time she had come here, however, her sword had still been early in its healing process and the world felt unfinished - as though she had stepped into the canvas of a damaged painting that was still being restored.

There had been no birds circling in the sky overhead, though now their dark shapes were visible to her - fleeting shadows moving among the dark clouds, their croaking cries echoing down towards her. It was only when she turned to look behind her that the state of her zanapakuto remained obvious. Although the great river that stretched from horizon to horizon upon the southern edge of her Inner World was still present, the enormous pagoda that had once loomed beyond it was not: Instead, she was treated to a view of a reality that, for all intents and purposes, had a hole ripped into it.

Sky and earth simply seemed to end, replaced instead by a swirling, colourless nothing beyond. Without depth or texture, or indication of a beginning or an end, the world simply faded into an eternal void - the space beyond the reality created by her Zanpakuto. In previous months, this nothingness had consumed much of the world, but as her Zanpakuto continued to repair itself, more and more of its inner world was restored.

It was likely that the weapon would not remain asleep for much longer. After remaining dead and silent for six years, she had almost forgotten what it felt like to hear the sword’s thoughts within her head. She could feel its consciousness now, however - indeed she had been able to sense something from the sword in the last year. A vague, hazy semblance of awareness that reached out to her whenever she held the weapon in hand. The weapon was conscious, she didn’t doubt, somewhere within the never ending void beyond the borders of the realm it was still creating - separated from her by an eternal, unbridgeable distance of space and time.

The presence, as indistinct as it was, had been a comfort this last year; she had never imagined the loneliness one could feel when separated from a part of their own soul.

Approaching the edge of the river, she was no longer surprised as the apparently placid waters began to churn into a frothing rage, warning away her advance and barring her - as ever - from crossing to the far side. However, she had no intention of trying to cross the water today and, as she simply lowered herself into a seated position upon the bank of the river, the waters began to settle as though sensing her lack of intent.

“I don’t know if you can hear me,” she spoke out loud, absently using the butt of her sword’s sheath - for the sword’s physical form accompanied her into the inner world - to scrawl random shapes into the soil in front of her. “And even if you can hear me, I don’t know if you can understand me right now….But I need advice. I know I haven’t made a habit of looking to you for council but….for the first time in my life, I feel as if I’ve reached a point where I truly don’t know what to do.’

“Everyone I normally look to has so much to do right now,” she murmured. “Shingen-kun…Yukimura-kun….Shadrin-kun…This is a new step in their lives as much as it is for me, and I can’t burden them with my problems. You keep telling me that you are me….and I know you see more of what’s in my heart than I do.’

“So please,” it felt more than a little foolish making demands of the weapon, given their less than smooth relationship…indeed she doubted she would receive an answer. Even when it was in good health, the sword had never been prone to responding to her except at the most dire of needs. “…If you can hear me…if a part of you knows what I should do….then tell me. Please.”

The silence that followed her request was utterly deafening. Her only answer was the whistle of the wind within her ears and the occasion croaking squawk of the crows overhead; her zanpakuto either unable or unwilling to offer a reply. She found herself waiting nonetheless, her hands continuing to mechanically direct her sword to trace random shaped into the ground, waiting silently for some glimmer, some sign, from the distant fragment of her soul.

Nothing came.

Sitting upon the bank of the river for what felt like hours, Hitomi waited for an answer that she knew was never coming. As much as she hoped for one, she knew that if her Zanpakuto could speak then it would have done so long before now….even if the weapon had advice to give, it was simply unable to deliver it. Nevertheless, she remained there, denying the conclusions her own mind had drawn, seated upon the cold earth until her head began to nod slowly lower, consciousness slipping away as she drifted into slumber.




* * * * *



When Hitomi’s eyes finally drifted open once more, it was to the pale grey light of morning, illuminating the room through a single broad shaft of white that pierced the relative darkness from the window, falling upon the floor halfway between herself and Junshin - who, as far as she could tell, still slept. Hitomi found herself where she had been the previous night - reclined against the wall, still clutching her zanpakuto. Although she must have slept from early evening through to dawn, she didn’t altogether feel as though she had much of a rest…in fact, she felt as though she could happily sleep another eight hours.

However, refreshed or not, it was time for her day to begin. Moving quietly so as not to disturb her roommate, she made her way towards the cupboard built into the wall on her side of the room, retrieving from within one of the four identical black shihakusho that had been presented to her on her second day in the division, before making her way silently from the room. She had no idea what hour it was, but from the darkened silence of the floor she imagined it could not have been far past four in the morning - nobody else, it seemed, had yet to stir.

Heading to the far end of the floor, near the eastern staircase, she made her way into the woman’s washroom. Taking a moment to ensure that nobody else was present - for even if she were only guaranteed a female audience, Hitomi found herself quite unable to overcome her modesty - before discarding the clothing she had worn the previous day, having neglected to remove them before falling asleep, and stepped beneath the faucet of one of the room’s half-dozen showers.

Running water had seemed, at first, to be a curious luxury when she had first moved into the Academy and left her comparatively rustic home behind. However, she had become so accustomed to it that she wasn’t sure how she had survived without it until then. The idea of filling her own bath with coal heated water felt utterly foreign today, and she took satisfaction in the simply convenience of being able to wash herself at the turn of a dial upon the tiled wall, and be fresh and clean in the space of five minutes.

Hitomi never lingered within the shower - the thought of someone walking in on her nakedness so disquieting to her that she only remained beneath the water for as long as necessary to scrub away the previous day. Towelling herself dry with one of the large, fluffy bath towels provided, she quickly changed into her fresh shihakusho before she left the washroom, her wet hair - which she never towel dried to avoid split ends - clinging to her cheeks and forehead as she returned to the corridor.

The other recruits had yet to stir, but Hitomi noted some activity as she began to descend towards the lower level of the barracks; mostly in the form of the occasional Shinigami coming upstairs towards her descent in groups or ones or twos - Divisions members returning from their nightshift. These she made way for, offering a shallow bow as they passed that was, at least usually, returned - they were, after all, her sempai. However, despite these occasional passers by the barracks remained eerily quiet until she reached the ground floor, where there was at least slightly more activity.

The kitchen staff were already at work setting out breakfast - more so for the returning nightshift members than for the tiny number of early risers. However there was a small group of these staff - considered supernumeraries rather than actual members of the division, not a one among them having a spiritual pressure to speak of - buzzing around the only buffet table that was currently in use, stocking it with toast, warm rolls and other breakfast fare. Not having the most tremendous of appetites, Hitomi was content to make do with a roll for the time being, scooping one up in passing as she made her way as she did every morning towards the division’s post box.

With private mail delivered both at midday and overnight, there was always a chance of correspondence arriving so early in the morning. On previous days she had been disappointed, however on this occasion - as she leafed through the various letters and parcels in search of something bearing her name (she noted, as usual, that Junshin had no shortage of correspondences, but left them where they were), her heart skipped a beat as she suddenly found them. Bound together by a length of thin red ribbon; three letters address to herself.

Unable to keep a smile from her features, she immediately threw herself down at the nearest table, tearing open the first envelope to read over its contents. She had thought that the end of the their first week seemed a suitable time for her friends to get in touch, although she had - perhaps feeling slightly more lonely than they had - sent her own correspondence much earlier. The first letter she opened was from Yukimura.

Unsurprisingly, she discovered that the brash young man had yet to commit to any particular division. Freshly graduated students were usually permitted a month to tour the grounds of the various divisions - with all but the first and second squads usually admitting visitors - to decide which Captain under which to serve. Shingen, she knew, had attempted to encourage Yukimura to put his natural healing skills to good use and join the fourth division….a suggestion that Yukimura had almost found insulting. He appeared in no great rush to make a decision, however, and according to his letter had spent the last week roaming around, sleeping in one of the empty houses on what the three of them now referred to collectively a ‘Shadrin’s street’ until he made a decision.

The second letter was from Shingen, and offered a rather dry monologue about his doings since they parted ways after graduation. He had apparently headed straight for the Seventh Division - a notoriously undermanned corner of the Gotei Thirteen that he said “badly needed disciplined soldiers.” Rumours persisted that the Division had fallen upon rather dismal times under a Captain who, at least according to rumour, was a man of poor character. The division’s only officer with a reputation for competency was its Fifth Seat, and Hitomi had to admit to degree of concern for Shingen at being there. However, Shingen knew very well how to handle himself, and his letter reported no problems thus far.

The third letter was from Shadrin himself, and Hitomi - although she probably would not admit so if asked - had been anticipating his correspondence most keenly. His stint teaching at the Academy having come to an end - for he had spent the last year serving as a substitute Zanjutsu instructor upon the request of Makabe Kiyone - when they had last spoken, Shadrin had told her that he was going to enquire about joining a squad. His old position in the Second Division hadn’t appealed to him - he didn’t want to find himself shuffled back into the patrol Corps. Instead, he had his eye on the Eleventh Division - the only dedicated combat unit within the Gotei Thirteen. She had been eager to hear how he had gotten on.

Pouring over the letter, she allowed herself a smirk as Shadrin rambled on for umpteen paragraphs about how the fathers of several of his former female students were still hounding him, but took greater interest as he finally went on to report his status within his Division. She found herself hesitating, wondering if he was perhaps simply blowing smoke, when she read that he had been promoted to the post of Sixth Seat.

‘Shadrin-kun a single digit seat? That’ll never work!’

Shaking her head in disbelief, at least she could not deny that Shadrin’s strength was deserving of the position. Six years previously, he had succeeded in overpowering the Seventh Seat of the second division, Katayama Ryu, with little effort, and his abilities had certainly grown since then. Still, the Eleventh Division was known for having one of the most powerful Captains in the Gotei Thirteen, as well as the strongest Vice-Captain and Third Seat. As the Soul Society’s equivalent of a special forces unit, they consisted of some of the best warriors in the Gotei Thirteen….Shadrin was, it seemed, moving in some weighty circles, now.

As she continued to read, the morning wore on, and some other members of the division began to file their way downstairs. It was close on six o’clock when Hitomi noted Junshin himself wander into the common room, taking note of her immediately with a raised hand, before moving towards the buffet table. Hitomi returned his wave somewhat pensively, still feeling guilty about the events of the previous night. Junshin appeared quite unfazed - or at least he did not appear any more timid than he did already - as he wound his way towards her carrying a laden plate, seating himself beside her.

“Good morning, Seraphina-san,” he greeted her with a polite bow - more of a forward inclination of his upper body, once he was seated. “I see you have some post today?

“Good morning,” Hitomi nodded, her smile quickly returning as she proffered the letters. “And yes. Took them long enough, but finally got some word. That’s….something of a load off, believe me.”

“I’m glad,” Junshin replied, though he turned his attention to his food, eating delicately as Hitomi, for want of anything to say, took a bite out of her now cold roll. The fact that she had come within inches of killing him the previous evening was not lost on either of them…it probably wasn’t something that could be put aside after a single night’s sleep.

The pair sat in a somewhat awkward silence as Hitomi reread her letters, Junshin’s gaze directed towards his plate. Neither of them had much to say, and likely would have persisted in silence for the duration of their breakfast if a large, heavy hand had not suddenly descended upon both their shoulders, causing both recruits to jump in alarm.

“There you both are!” Fukuda Akira declared, smiling broadly from behind them as the two young Shinigami turned their heads to look up at him. Unlike his subordinates, the officer looked thoroughly well rested, and in entirely too good a mood for the time of morning. “I’ve been looking for you both since last night….I’ve heard good things about the work you’ve done. I haven’t had a chance to look at it myself, but I’m told the archives haven’t been in as good a state for years.”

“Th…thank you, Fukuda-sama,” Junshin replied, smiling bashfully while Hitomi, forcing her lips into a somewhat twitching smile, internally tried to will the man to get his hand off of her.

“In any case,” Fukuda continued, “stop by my office after you’ve eaten, and I’ll give you your next assignment….Maybe we’ll talk a little more about what I said last time. You both put your all into that last task, even though neither of you wanted to do it. I think…..perhaps….there’s some scope for letting you pick and choose the next one. But only if you come early, mind you. I have a lost of low grade assignments to hand out, but it’s going to be first come, first serve.”

“We will be along presently, Fukuda-dono,” Hitomi replied, unable to hide a sigh of relief as the officer finally lifted his hand from her shoulder to go on his way. Offering the two recruit’s a brief nod, the Divisions sixth seat headed towards the open front door of the common room, presumably to head towards the office building on the far side of the ground.

“Well…that’s good news, Seraphina-san,” Junshin spoke from beside her, a note of excitement making its way into his voice. “Perhaps we’ll be able to pick something more interesting than filing. Perhaps a research project, or data compilation. Maybe we’ll even get a chance to head out into the field.”

‘Into the field….’

Hitomi’s eyes narrowed thoughtfully, feeling an unconscious tremor ripple its way up her spine at the suggestion. She had rarely left the Seireitei since her arrival there seven years ago…her only long term excursions beyond the walls of the Inner City had been during her journey to the South Rukon during the War, and an extended trip on a cruise liner built by Shadrin’s father’s company three years previously. It had been so long since she had visited the Rukongai for any great length of time that the notion felt almost exotic.

She found herself wondering if, perhaps, they would get a chance to head into the West Rukon.

“Maybe,” she spoke outloud, shrugging her shoulders in an attempt to sound nonchalant. “I guess we’ll have to find out what’s on offer, first.”

“Of course,” came Junshin’s rather muted response, his enthusiasm curbed slightly by her own apparent lack of it. Her calm, however, was little more than a façade…she found herself unconsciously raising a hand to her chest, feeling her heartbeat suddenly fast and strong through her breastbone.

‘In all this time, I’ve never given any thought to the Rukongai…Why now?’

Quirking an eyebrow, she glanced a sideward glance towards Junshin, noting that the young man had significantly quickened the pace of his eating. Apparently eager to avoid being landed with another filing assignment, her colleague appeared eager to head after Fukuda sooner rather than later. Sighing, she rose abruptly to her feet as her counterpart folded a piece of cost in half to shove its entirety into his mouth.

“Alright…let’s go, then,” she nodded, quickly wolfing down the last of her own roll as Junshin, startled by her sudden movement, scrambled awkwardly to his own feet to pursue.

“Otherwise,” she added as an afterthought, only half in jest, “we might really get stuck cleaning out the Central Forty Six archives.”

- - - Updated - - -


Act VII: Stormclouds




“Well that’s…..a lot of admin work.”

For the second time, Junshin voiced what Hitomi thought, reading through the list of available assignments that she had handed to him after her own perusal. As she had half expected, the list consisted almost entirely as paperwork, with little in the way of independent thought required - recruits, it appeared, were expected to see to the organisation of more interesting work carried out by their betters.

It was a system that Hitomi understood; important jobs could hardly be trusted to unproven rookies. However, what had they been doing for the last six years at the Academy if not proving they were capable of better? They were not rookie students anymore, but Shinigami, and she was beginning to resent being treated as if she were so thoroughly wet behind the ears. However, she held her tongue…the Academy had taught her, also, that things had a habit of going quickly awry if she didn’t do what was expected of her.

“That’s correct,” Fukuda nodded from the other side of his desk, clearing his throat - looking genuinely apologetic. “I’m afraid that’s the general tone of things right now. With the division still being reordered, there’s a lot of paperwork to be done. It’s not that we don’t have other work that needs doing, we simply need to get our own houses in order before we can do it. I’m sorry, but for what it’s worth almost everyone is in the same position right now.”

“I….We, understand, Fukuda-sama,” Junshin nodded while Hitomi imagined Shadrin was probably laughing it up somewhere without a piece of parchment in sight. “We’ll choose one immediately.”

Fukudo offered a nod, returning to his own paperwork as Junshin sidled closer to Hitomi, moving a finger down the list as he apparently searched for something that looked at least slightly less boring than the rest. Hitomi was content to leave him to it - having looked over the list in detail herself, she knew that there was little difference between the assignments. At least none of them appeared to be as demanding or long term as their reorganising of the Divisional archives. Her attention instead wandered around the office, peering curiously at the remainder of the paperwork strewn across the Sixth Seat’s desk, rather lacking in organisation, as the officer clearly had more work than he could keep up with.

Rather bored, she found herself internally reading some of the documents, squinting to read the kanji upside down. Tilting her head to one side to aid her, she began to realise that the life of a seated officer was perhaps a good deal more dry than she had at first imagined.

‘Requisition order for new training equipment….Receipt for six cases of various makeup to be signed for by the Eighth Seat…budgeting reports to be referred on to the Taichou…Oh, here’s interesting, those must be the higher grade assignments.’

Separate from the remainder of the paperwork, several parchments were stacked neatly in the corner of the desk nearest Hitomi. Only the document at the top of the pile could be read, however - a request for a Fifth Division representative to investigate the reported existence of a small, sand-burrowing Hollows in the South Rukongai. It sounded like far more interesting work, however the remainder of the documents were invisible beneath the first, only the headings of some of the documents visible as they poked out of the top of the pile.

Hitomi’s eyes narrowed thoughtfully as she scanned the kanji, her entire body freezing as a certain phrase leapt out of the paper towards her, banishing everything else to the backgrounds. Near the halfway point of the bundle, Hitomi spied the phrase: ‘West Rukongai’.

“How about this one, Seraphina-san?” Junshin queried from behind her, apparently having selected a task for them. “We’d be scribing copies of of old mission reports. It might be interesting to read……those….?”

Her counterpart trailed off, following her gaze as he noted her obvious distraction. Frowning, he peered at the same document she did for several silent seconds. Hitomi was barely aware that he had stopped talking, her attention so focused on the parchment that she very nearly jumped out of her skin as Junshin suddenly reached out a hand to snatch the paper, tugging it free from the pile - to the visible astonishment of Fukuda - to wave it wildly back and forth like a flag.

“Fukuda-sama,” the youth declared. “We want this one!”

Blinking in surprise, Hitomi snapped her head towards Junshin in disbelief as Fukuda, still seated, did the same. The recruit appeared to immediately regret his show of boldness, a flush creeping into his cheeks, though he continued to wave the paper back and forth, as though doing so would somehow grant him greater courage to maintain his position.

“I’m afraid that’s not possible,” Fukuda replied, his brow knotting in confusion as he rose to his feet, reaching out a hand to try and retrieve the document. “Those assignments are intended for seated officers. I can’t authorise….”

“Fukuda-sama,” Junshin replied, raising his hand higher to lift the parchment out of the reach of the astonished sixth seat. “We….we want this one!”

Too startled to speak, Hitomi merely looked back and forth at the pair, unsure whether to come to Junshin’s aid or to agree with her commanding officer. A mission intended for seated officers was no small matter…it was likely to require greater skill or expertise than either of them had….but then, how could it be worse than anything she had faced thus far? Some of the dangers she encountered during her time at the Academy were far beyond the scope of a student…or indeed a fully fledged Shinigami.

Had Fukuda Akira ever faced the likes of Byleth or Imai Hideki? For that matter, had he ever faced the like of Hideyoshi Hashiba, who as a former fourth seat was certainly far more powerful than the sixth seat was? The fact that he was alive and breathing suggested that he hadn’t…perhaps they could handle a little more danger than they were given credit for. Besides which, she couldn’t deny that the thought of returning to the West Rukongai was a curiously intriguing one. The thought filled her with a certain buzz of curiosity - a longing that she had never known she had.

After such a long time….perhaps she really did want to see her homeland again.

Fukuda, meanwhile, fixed his defiant subordinate with an icy stare, appearing none too happy about the younger man’s obvious show of insubordination. However, rather than simply take the parchment from him - which he could certainly have done with a minimum of effort - the officer slowly sank back to his chair, raising a hand to massage his temple as the other gestured vaguely towards Junshin.

“Read it,” he instructed, prompting Hitomi to arch an eyebrow in surprise, having not expected the officer to relent.

“Read it?” Junshin queried, sounding every bit as surprised as Hitomi was. “…Oh! Read it! Oh..um…yes!”

Fumbling with the paper, Junshin adjusted the parchment in his hand to read it aloud as Hitomi moved closer, peering curiously over his shoulder to get a look at the document herself.

“Request made during Central Forty Six briefing ninety nine thousand, four hundred and sixty five,” Junshin murmured, reading from the text. “The Fifth division is requested to send manpower to the Outer Rim of West Rukon to investigate civilian reports of vigilante activity. May provide interesting data on social reordering of the Rukongai.”

Hesitating, both recruits frowned as the text simply seemed to run out there. Junshin turned the parchment over as though he expected to find more written on the back. However, there appeared to be no further information given. Apparently with no further exposition provided by the assignment itself, they turned their questioning gaze towards Fukuda, who still appeared less than enthusiastic.

“Hrrmph,” the sixth seat grunted. “That one….Alright, I suppose given the time sensitive nature of the events, we can’t exactly sit on that one for long. I did say you had some scope to pick and choose this mission….Very well, listen up.”

Instinctively, both recruits stiffened to attention, the meeting suddenly transforming from an informal issuing of an assignment to an outright mission briefing.

“Six weeks ago,” Fukuda explained, the tone of his voice instantly more authorative, speaking to the pair - for the first time - as soldiers, “reports started to float in from the outer districts of West Rukon that an apparent civilian military had started a campaign of vigilantism against the criminal gangs that operated in the area. In this six week period, this organisation has transformed districts seventy two through seventy seven into something that vaguely resembles orderly...and we know absolutely nothing about them.’

“No names, no numbers, no details of any kind,” the officer growled, sounding almost disgusted by the fact. “It’s just too far away for reliable information to reach the Inner City. The only thing that is known is that a civilian militia, which has apparently appeared from nowhere, has overthrown the criminal gangs that have been running that region almost since the Rukongai was settled. That....simply isn't possible.’

“The briefing might say that the idea is to make it a study on social upheaval in the Outer Rim, but that’s got nothing to do with it. If there is an independent faction rising up in the Rukongai that can conquer the Outer Rim in less than two months, then it can’t be allowed to remain anonymous. The central government want to keep an eye on this, and have ordered a fact finding mission and, it seems, they want the Fifth Division to handle it.”

“Isn’t that a job better suited to the Onmitsukidō?” Junshin queried, quite correctly. Hitomi, despite her own interest having been piqued, could not help but agree.

“Not at this time, no,” Fukuda shook his head. “For the time being, we are not treating this group as hostile combatants. In fact, if they’re cleaning up the Outer Rim then peaceful contact would be preferable. For now, this is a fact finding mission, nothing more, and research and investigation is our purview. The Onmitsukidō have a certain way of doing things…and if we’re going to find out anything, we need agents out in the field who have a voice and a face.’

“However,” he added, “you are to avoid direct contact, if possible. Your mission is simply to make an assessment of the situation and report back no later than five days from now. It’s up to the Central Government to decide how to proceed from there. You’re investigators, not ambassadors.”

“We understand,” Hitomi nodded briskly, feeling a surge of excitement pulsing through her as she realised that they were looking at their first truly meaty assignment - one that would take them into the West Rukongai, no less.

“Good,” Fukuda appeared satisfied, apparently taking her response for both of them. “Now…this mission isn’t expected to be dangerous on its own merits. A few civilians shouldn’t pose any danger to the two of you except in overwhelming numbers but, as I said, we’re not expecting hostilities. What will be dangerous, however, is the fact that you’re going to the Outer Rim. There is the possibility that you’ll encounter Hollows there, so be prepared.”

Hitomi nodded, noting that Junshin did the same - though only after a visible hesitation. The young man’s features had paled slightly at the suggestion; she reasoned that he had never seen a Hollow before. Hitomi herself had little concern; after some of the dangers she had faced, a normal Hollow didn’t present the terror it might have had she experienced a normal Academic career.

“Are there arrangements for transportation?” Hitomi queried, taking over the conversation as Junshin suddenly faltered.

“Nothing official,” Fukuda replied. “Transportation from the first district to the Outer Rim isn’t common. You’ll probably have to book travel one step at a time, from here to District Seventy…from there, you’ll have to decide where to go based on whatever leads you come across. You’ll be provided with funding and supplies. I’ll see to the necessary requisitions. Be ready to leave in six hours.”

“Understood,” Hitomi smartly snapped her heels together, sweeping into a bow, Junshin following a heartbeat behind. “We’ll make ready in the meantime.”

Fukuda sighed, sounding very much as though he was already regretting agreeing to allow them to undertake the assignment. However he did not change his mind, instead offering the pair a nod, waving a hand to send them from his office.

“Dismissed,” he instructed, sounding, for the first time since Hitomi had met him, like a thoroughly tired old man.

Immediately, Hitomi turned on her heel, making her way from the room as instructed. Sliding open the door, she left it open for Junshin as she stepped out into the exterior corridor. Behind her, her counterpart nervously offered another bow to their superior before scurrying after her, closing the door as she waited, silently, in the darkened corridor behind. The expression on Junshin’s face told her immediately that he was expecting reprisal, the young man turning towards her with a grimace.

“….I’m sorry,” he told her. “I probably shouldn’t have interfered, but…”

“It’s fine,” Hitomi replied, somewhat shortly. “It’s not as though I wasn’t interested in that assignment myself.”

“I see,” a look of visible relief passed over her companions features. “So you’re not angry, then?”

“No,” Hitomi shook her head. “Besides, even if I had something to be angry about, I’d be too busy wondering about this mission. Something about it just smells wrong. I’m from the Outer Rim, and Fukuda-dono is right….the people living out there don’t just up and overthrow the gangs and bandits. There’s something very wrong about all of this.”

“So we have ourselves a mystery to solve?” Junshin grinned, his eyes briefly lighting up at the prospect. Like Hitomi, he was probably just as eager to put their mundane administration work of the last few days behind them…but marching into the Outer Rim had not, she admitted, been quite what she had in mind. Junshin’s naive glee at the idea told her immediately that he had no idea whatsoever what it was like that far from the Seireitei.

The thought occurred to her, suddenly, that it would probably be best to leave him behind. Although they were both fresh recruits to the division, the disparity in both their abilities and their experience was enormous. Hitomi had been galvanised to much of the threats she could potential face as a Shinigami by facing some of the worst of them before she had been in the Academy for more than three weeks. It had been a while…but she was not a stranger to combat, or bloodshed.

Or death.

Junshin, compared to her, was little more than a child. However, for all that, he was still a Shinigami…he had still gone through the same training she had and, truth be told, many of the more advanced exercises in the final years of the Academy could in fact be punishing. Whether he was on her level or not, surely he still deserved to be thought of as a soldier…he was certainly far beyond the level she had been when two young prodigies named Uesugi Shingen and Sakon Yukimura had allowed her to be a part of their team on a day that seemed so impossibly long ago.

“I guess we do,” she smiled slightly, deciding not to voice her concerns. “In any case, we’ve got six hours to get ready…I noticed you had some post, so there’s plenty of time to send out replies. I’ve got to go and take care of a few things myself, but I’ll meet you back here before we leave. Make sure you have your zanpakuto with you.”

“R…right,” Junshin nodded, looking rather overwhelmed as Hitomi slipped, purely by reflex, back into her old role as ‘group leader’. It was a role that Shingen and Yukimura had somewhat elected for her, and it was a hard habit to break. He didn’t appear to grudge her the position, however, in fact his smile quickly returned as he appeared quite happy to be given direction. “I’ll see you then.”

“Right,” Hitomi returned the nod, before turning to make her way up the corridor at a brisk march; she couldn’t very well set out on a potentially dangerous mission without a word to those who had, in years past, accompanied her on every step she had taken. However, she would only speak to them to let them know she was going….not to beg their companionship, though she imagined they would probably drop whatever they were doing and come if she asked them; Shadrin in particular.

But not this time. Just this once, this was going to bring Shadrin back the stories of her adventures.

[Seraphina]

Act VIII: Into the West




When it was all that stood before a person and a looming deadline, Junshin realised quite quickly that six hours was not anywhere near as much time as it sounded. As Hitomi had advised, he quickly read and responded to the letters from his family - making them aware that he would be absent for the next few days - before making ready for what he expected to be a long journey. Procuring a well made, durable rucksack from the Divisional quartermaster, he packed sufficient clothing for a week or so on the road, including an additional pair of straw sandals should his current pair break, as well as parchment, ink and writing equipment in order to keep notes of what he encountered in the field.

So much care did he take, in fact, in packing his writing materials that he very nearly neglected to give any thought to food. Fortunately, he was able to secure a sizeable supply of foil wrapped trail rations - little more than dry pellets that, when wet, hydrated into a crunchy, tasteless biscuit that was nutritious if not altogether appetising. In all likelihood they would be able to find accommodation along the way, but the possibility existed of extended journeys between towns - he would rather not be caught without anything at all to eat.

His zanpakuto he elected to carry about his person. During his time at the Academy, he had fashioned a harness for the purpose - a crude contraption of leather straps that slipped over his shoulders like the straps of a rucksack, with two ‘holsters’ for his swords underneath each arm. He found the short-bladed weapons were prone to digging painfully into his hip when worn in his obi, and preferred to carry them in such a manner. The harness itself was among the possessions he had brought with him when he had first come to the barracks, and he slipped it on under his backpack, sliding home his zanpakuto so that the bronze hilts were only just visible - peeking out from his underarms through the folds of his shihakusho.

“Why do I feel like I’ve forgotten something?” he muttered to himself, scratching the pack of his head thoughtfully as he stood within the room he shared with Hitomi, frowning as he wracked his brain for anything that he may have misplaced. It was the way he often felt when setting out on a trip - the uncomfortable sensation of having left the stove on, or neglected to lock the back door. However, he was fairly confidence that he had everything he needed and, after he spared a glance through the window, he noted at the sun was beginning to climb to noon. It would shortly be time to get underway.

‘I guess I’d better head downstairs and wait for Seraphina-san…assuming she isn’t there already.’

As much as he had earlier stated he lacked the stomach for adventure, he had to admit that - now it seemed he was about to go on one - he found the concept rather exciting. He knew their journey was a far cry from being the most storied or epic of events ever to occur within the Soul Society, but it nevertheless seemed a far cry from the glorified office work he had been doing thus far. While getting ready, alone with his growing sense of anticipation, he had decided that adventures weren’t that bad after all.

Fukuda’s warning about potential danger seemed a very far off thought as he made his way downstairs - to his mind, the greatest danger he was likely to face was waking Hitomi from another nightmare. So long as he kept his distance and didn’t get under her feet, he was sure that things would be fine; Hollow sightings, even in the Outer Rim, he had heard to be very rare after all. With any luck they would be able to simply enjoy the trip, gather some information, and afford him a chance to see a few new and interesting places.

When he entered into the common room, it was very much as it had been the previous afternoon. Forty or so Shinigami were spread out among the tables, speaking quietly to each other as they ate their noontime meal. The sights and smells immediately made Junshin very conscious of the fact that he had not eaten since that morning, and it his stomach gave a brief gurgle of protest, but he put his hunger aside for the moment as he noted - beside the front door - that Hitomi was indeed present.

The moment he spotted the redhead, he raised a hand to greet her, but hesitated as he realised that she was not alone. Although Fukuda Akira stood nearby, his hands clasped behind his back, looking on impassively, the girl appeared to be in conversation with someone that Junshin had never seen before. At first, he assumed that Hitomi had merely beat him to the punch in branching out her acquaintances within the division, but as he began to make his way towards the pair, he spotted the insignia for the eleventh division on the breast of the other figure’s shihakusho.

‘The Eleventh!? Those guys are even scarier than the Twelfth…what’s he doing here?’

The man didn’t exactly look like what Junshin imagined a member of the eleventh division to be. Although he was tall and well built - utterly dwarfing the near six feet tall redhead to whom he was speaking - Junshin rather expected the man’s features to be a criss-cross of jagged scars and scruffy facial hair. He was rather surprised, therefore, that the man was clean shaved, handsome, and actually looked rather respectable. Caucasian rather than Japanese, he was blonde and blue eyed, though his expression appeared grave as he spoke to Hitomi - who’s back was turned to Junshin.

‘She did say she had a friend who was a Shinigami…I wonder if that’s him.’

Deciding to keep his distance, Junshin lingered out of earshot as the exchange continued. Whatever the man was saying, Hitomi appeared to give a somewhat curt reply, and the blonde’s mouth tightened in apparent consternation. Rather than put up an argument, however, he merely offered a nod - apparently surrendering to her, before mouthing what looked to Junshin like ‘good luck’. Junshin quirked an eyebrow as he reached out both hands, placing them on Hitomi’s slender shoulders - he was even more astonished as Hitomi briefly raised her own right hand to clutch the man’s wrist.

Junshin at first assumed she was going to throw him off, but instead she merely seemed to hold onto his wrist for a few moments, their silent exchange continuing for a few words further, before the Shinigami withdrew his arms voluntarily. No violent reaction, it seemed, for him. Turning towards Fukuda, the man offered the officer a brief nod - which Fukuda respectfully returned - before turning away to head through the door. The stranger gone, Junshin finally approached his counterpart, who did not appear to immediately notice him; instead staring into the bright white sunlight beyond the open doorway.

“…Um…Seraphina-san?” he queried, causing the redhead to jump as she finally became aware of his presence, a slight flush to her cheeks as she snapped her head in his direction. “Who was that?”

“….Are you ready to leave?” Hitomi replied after what seemed, to Junshin, to be a lengthy pause. The latter blinked in surprise at his question being so blatantly ignored, but offered a nod in comfirmation. Hitomi immediately turned towards Fukuda, who still hovered to one side. “We’re ready to leave now, Fukuda-dono.”

“Excellent,” the officer responded, raising his hand to gesture with a small, white, drawstring bag that jingled as he swung it to the fore. “You’re budgeted for transportation to and from the Outer Rim, plus food and board along the way. Although do try and be frugal, if you can…the more money you have left over when you get back, the better.”

Giving the bag a lazy underarm toss, the sixth seat lobbed it towards neither recruit in particular. Junshin, being slightly closer to the airborne coinage, snatched it up between his waiting hands, grimacing at how light it felt.

‘Will this really get us by all the way to the Outer Rim…?’

“We will be carefuly, Fukuda-dono,” Hitomi confirmed, looking significantly more confidence than Junshin. Standing with her back straight, her shoulders relaxed, and her left palm resting casually on the pommel of her zanpakuto - thrust, curve up, into her obi - she at least looked like a Shinigami. Somewhat more muted, Junshin slipped the bag of money into his shihakusho, before stooping into a brief bow.

“Alright,” Fukuda nodded. “Best of luck then….remember, make sure to report back within five days. Otherwise I’ll have to send out someone else. If it comes to that, you kids are paying for it.”

Junshin laughed nervously, though he wasn’t completely sure whether or not the officer was joking. Hitomi merely swept into a bow of her own, before turning to move briskly through the door, heading out into the sunlight to leave the barracks behind. Junshin, looking back and forth between his colleague and his commanding officer - unsure if they had actually been dismissed yet - hesitantly moved to follow.

“Kiyoko-san,” Fukuda’s voice arrested him in place, the young Shinigami turning to regard the officer over his shoulder as he suddenly called out. “Relax, son. You’ll do fine.”

“…H….Hai!” Junshin nodded, though he couldn’t say he felt very assured; excited, certainly, but still thoroughly nervous. Quickening his pace to a trot, he hurried to catch up to Hitomi outside the door, stepping out of the relatively dingy interior into the momentarily blindingly bright sun beyond. His senses immediately opened up to the sights and sounds of the Division grounds - the buzz of insects and the merry chirp of birdsong, and the warmth of the sun upon his features.

He supposed if there was any day to set out on a grand adventure, this seemed to be the one to do it. Closing his eyes, he hesitated upon the doorstep as he drew in a long, deep breath. The scent of summer was in the air; freshly cut grass and flowering plants, and more distantly the scent of cookfires as the denizens of the Seretei that lived beyond the division’s walls took advantage of the warmth to have outdoor meals. It was a day where he would have been quite happy to set a casual pace, soaking up the pleasant weather, but Hitomi did not appear to be in any mood for a relaxed stroll.

The redhead was striding out ahead, her footfalls quick and purposeful, not looking back as she made her way down the gravel path that wound its way through the division grounds - linking one building to another - flanked on both sides by - in this part of the grounds - neatly trimmed grass. Sighing briefly at his companion’s hurry, Junshin quickened his pace once again to catch up with her, slowing only when he had drawn up beside the redhead - attempting to match the rapid trot of her longer legs.

“So,” he queried, “where to first?”

“We’ll head for the West Gate,” Hitomi replied. “It’s a travel hub, so there are bound to be rickshaw drivers waiting there. We should be able to book passage at least part of the way…maybe as far as District twenty. That’ll take us most of the day. If we arrive late, we’ll stop there for the night. If there are still a few hours of daylight we’ll maybe strike out on foot for the next town and camp in the wilderness at the halfway point.”

“I see,” Junshin smiled, pleased that at least one of them had an idea of what their first step should be. “Have you made this trip before, Seraphina-san?”

“….Only once,” came the girl’s reply, her gaze drifting briefly towards the ground - creating a silence filled only by the crunch of the gravel beneath their feet - before rising once more to look ahead. “He was a friend of mine, by the way.”

“Huh?” Junshin arched an eyebrow, taking aback by what seemed, to him, to be a rather random comment.

“You were curious about the Shinigami I was speaking to,” Hitomi elaborated. “He’s an old friend…he just came to see me off. Or at least that’s what he said, anyway….I’m pretty sure he was hoping I’d invite him along.”

“Oh,” Junshin shrugged. “Well….I’m sure he was just worried about you.”

“I don’t need him to be worried about me,” Hitomi shot back, sounding genuinely affronted. “I’ve spent the last six years having people worry about me…Just this once, I want to be able to do something without anyone waiting in the wings to rush in and rescue me.’

“Everything I’ve done until now,” the girl sighed, her voice taking on a slightly resigned note, “I don’t think I would have been able to do without others to keep me afloat…to buy me breathing room. I almost wonder if I’ve ever actually done anything for myself….”

“Isn’t that,” Junshin interrupted, somewhat cautiously, “what Nakama do?”

Hitomi arched an eyebrow, turning towards him curiously. Junshin instinctively winced, worrying that she might think he were prying again. However, when the girl didn’t speak, he took it as an invitation to continue.

“I’ve…never had someone close enough to call them Nakama,” he confessed. “But if I did, I’m sure I’d want to help them…even if I didn’t think they needed my help, I’d still want to be by their side. You can worry about someone without thinking of them as weak, right?”

Hitomi’s response was merely a silent, thoughtful frown. The girl’s purple gaze shifted away from him for a moment, returning once more to the path ahead, and Junshin assumed that the conversation was over. However, after several seconds, Hitomi spoke again - so suddenly that she made him jump.

“It’s a shame,” she murmured, “that you don’t have anyone you’d call your Nakama….I think that you’d make a good one. Especially for someone as thick headed as me.”

Unsure how to reply, Junshin merely regarded the girl in silence - though he felt a slight flush creep into his cheeks at the compliment. Slowly, Hitomi turned her head back towards him - regarding him with a half-smile and a slightly tilt to her head.

“What was your first name again, Kiyoko-san?” she asked.

“J…Junshin,” he replied, blinking in surprise at the sudden query.

“If it’s alright with you,” Hitomi continued. “I’d like to call you Junshin-kun. We’ve worked pretty well together up until this point….I think we can put aside some of the formality between us, right?”

“R…right,” Junshin nodded, his blush intensifying with each word. “Um…Seraphina…kun?”

“Kun?” Hitomi’s smile remained, but she arched an eyebrow at the use of the suffix. “Interesting choice.”

“Well…um…no offence,” Junshin grinned awkwardly. “You just don’t feel like a ‘chan’ to me….I mean…it’s difficult to call you ‘chan’ the night after you kicked my ass. If it’s okay, I’ll call you ‘Seraphina-kun’ instead.”

“That so?” Hitomi smirked, turning away to look ahead once more - Junshin hadn’t noticed until that moment, but she had slowed their pace significantly. The rapid forward stride had switched to a more relaxed stroll. “Don’t worry, no offence taken…you just reminded me of someone for a moment.”

Junshin frowned as Hitomi smiled fondly at the path ahead, her mind presumably dwelling on other things. Thinking it better not to ask questions, he turned his gaze ahead as well, still blushing at the girl’s sudden acknowledgement. While it was a long way from her recognising him as a Nakama, it still seemed an enormous step forward from her occasionally backhanded attitude towards him until now.

‘I’m…I’m not just a kid, Seraphina-kun! I’m a soldier, just like you. From here on, I’ll work hard and prove myself…until, one day, you’ll acknowledge me as your Nakama….’

‘I swear it!’

[Seraphina]

Act IX: The Long Road to the Rukongai




Upon the whims of the Central Government, an enormous stone wall - many hundreds of feet high - would descend to settle within a wide strench that spanned the distance between the outer edge of the Seiretei and the inner edge of the first district of the Rukongai. The wall, broken only by four gates in the extreme north, south, east and west of the Inner City, effectively prevented all transportation in and out of the Seireitei for those lacking a gate pass. Although frequently lowered, the wall was capable of being raised above ground level, where it promptly disappeared into the upper atmosphere and become lost from sight. Rumour persisted that, when not protecting the city, the wall returned to surrounding the Royal Palace; though, as the location of the Royal Palace was not widely known, this was often dismissed as fancy. The raising of the wall was usually done to fascilitate trade and quick travel at times of peace, although in truth few souls but Shinigami had much call to travel to and from the Inner City.

At this particular time, the wall was in its raised position. Simple because the wall was up, however, did not mean that the two young Shinigami could enter where and when they chose. The Rukongai was vast, its sheer enormity difficult to calculate, in order to house the many billions of souls that occupied the Soul Society at any one time. It was easy for one to become lost unless they knew the exact route and, neither one of them being familiar with the West Rukongai's inner districts, that left road.

Just like the South Rukongai, the West Rukongai had a a massive, serpentine road that ran - in theory at least - from the very foot of the west gate all the way to the far reaches of the Outer Rim. Every road within the West Rukongai was, it was said, linked directly or indirectly to that highway. For most travelers, it was the most direct and easy to follow route through the wilderness and, as a result, it would be the starting point for Hitomi and Junshin as their long trek through the Inner City saw them emerge from the majestic buildings and streets of the Seireitei into the wide open plaza that advanced towards the location of the west gate. The stone was in places cracked and uneven - having shifted over the years by the thunderous descent of the overwhelmingly heavy wall, but the open space served to cushion the vibrations for the buildings on the far side.

For some fifty feet, they progressed across the uneven paving, approaching the fifteen feet wide trench into which the wall would normally descend; beyond it, the Rukongai. Immedietly, the first district of the West Rukongai departed from the Seireitei in construction and appearance. Unlike the elegant white stone of the Inner City, most of the buildings in the West Rukon were made of wood - even the most lavish and expensive dwellings constructed almost entirely of the same raw material. The streets, also, went unpaved, with residents stepping from their porch directly into the soil - every building raised upon small stilts to elevate them some two feet from the ground to protect the wood from becoming rotten.

It was a far cry from the extremely metropolitan North Rukongai, or the Sandstone built towns of the South Rukongai. As the first region of the Rukongai to be settled, its traditions were some of the oldest and - one might argue - stubborn. New innovations were slow to take hold there, with the people and architecture firmly rooted in older, traditional methods. With the exception of the main road itself - for the merchant that lived in the West Rukon could not afford to see it degrade and thus put them on poorer footing then their north, south and eat competitors - very little in the district that had seen major change in its construction in the last several centuries.

The people of the North Rukongai were tough, independent and hard headed…it wasn’t difficult for Junshin to imagine Hitomi as one of them.

Having been afforded some time to observe the girl during their hike from the Division barracks, he noted that despite still appearing curious - perhaps even uncertain - about the exact circumstances of their mission, she moved forward without second guessing or hesitation. Once committed to a course of action the girl was clearly decisive, and Junshin was content for the time being to simply follow in her wake. She walked like a person who knew exactly where they were going, and how they were going to get there - even if such could not possibly have been the case.

By comparison, Junshin was beginning to feel slightly overwhelmed by the enormity of the task before them. That was not to say he was dreading it; quite the opposite, in fact - it would be more accurate to call him excited. The mission itself did not sound too difficult, and it was a chance to finally see something of the world….a far cry from his time spent working for his father. In the preceding week, he had begun to wonder why he had even bothered leaving the South Rukongai when his life in the military appeared to consist of the same monotony.

This, however, was a breath of fresh air. Travelling the world, meeting new people, exploring new places. And, most importantly, not as part of combat manoeuvres. It was the kind of adventure he could get on board with, but such was his anticipation he realised he was probably doing a poor show of hiding it. If his expression in any way reflected how he was feeling, he imagined that he probably looked absolutely giddy. Next to the contemplative, stoic Hitomi, he probably looked like a fool.

‘Okay Junshin….she seemed to be defrosting a little just now. Now’s your chance to get to know her a little. It’s a long road after all, and she isn’t that standoffish…just need to try and avoid stumbling into a subject that makes her angry…o…okay, here goes!’

“H…hey, Seraphina-kun,” he called out, lingering a few paces behind the redhead, who turned her head slightly upon hearing his voice, but did not look back at him. “Can I ask you something?”

“Is it about the mission?” Hitomi replied, her head turning to look ahead once more, her brisk pace towards the inner edge of the first district unabated.

“Well…..no,” Junshin replied, honestly, wincing at the girl’s rather curt response.

“Then it’ll have to wait,” the girl responded. “I’m thinking. We’ll talk once we’re properly underway.”

“Oh…r…right,” Junshin nodded, checking a sigh as he allowed his gaze to drift towards the ground. One thing that could certainly be said of the girl was that she was driven. It was also blatantly clear with of them was going to be the senior partner in their venture. Hitomi didn’t appear to hesitate, she simply assumed a leadership role; perhaps that was for the best as, left to his own devices, Junshin was fairly certain he wouldn’t know where to begin.

A ride, at least, did not look as though it was going to be difficult to find; at least not so close to the sight of the gate. As he followed after Hitomi - crossing over the threshold from where the paved streets of the Seireitei dwindled away into the well walked-soil of the Rukongai, Junshin noted that they were in fact likely to be spoiled for choice. The main road of district one was, it seemed, packed with drivers eager to ply their trade. Lined up like troops awaiting inspection, most of the rickshaws were what one would expect from one of the first districts of the Rukongai - even one as agrarian as the West Rukon. Well polished, lavish affairs, that reflected her own face back at him as Junshin paused to examine one closer.

The drivers of these vehicles were invariable tending their charges - usually applying what appeared to be an extra layer of wax to their shimmering wooden surfaces. The driver of the particular vehicle Junshin examined paid him only the briefest of glances. Like most rickshaw drivers, the man went barelegged - for a pair of hakama would quickly soak with sweat and become heavy after a long day of running - and wore a pair of loose canvas shorts that hung to the middle of his thighs. Unlike most of the others, however, he wore a kosode of fine weave that was either made of, or made very expertly to look like, silk. The driver turned away from Junshin with a derisory snort almost instantly, taking little interest in the Shinigami. Clearly, he was more used to ferrying more well to do customers than an unseated soldier.

Unlike Junshin, Hitomi did not even spare these drivers a glance as she breezed past. Although Junshin didn't doubt that their funds could cover such a journey - for a ride in a rickshaw would be that expensive - he reasoned that his companion was setting out upon a more frugal mindset. Remaining where he was, Junshin decided he would wait for her to make a selection rather than tailing her around, watching as she made her way down the line of vehicles, ignoring the clamouring calls of ‘shinigami-sama’ as she passed by a group of less fussy drivers trying to catch her attention, calling out prices.

‘I guess I’ll just park myself for the time being.’

Folding his arms, he allowed his attention to drift from Hitomi towards the remainder of his surroundings. Despite its less urbanised architecture, the first district of West Rukongai was still exceptionally affluent. The houses, he noted, despite their simply construction appeared large and spacious. Although space appeared to be on something of a premium - with only the narrows of gaps between buildings on the main street upon which he stood, all of the buildings appeared to have a modest front garden of well nurtured pot plants and flour beds, as well as spacious front porches - albeit raised up on stilts, as were all the buildings. Unlike the dry soil beneath his feet - worked bare by centuries of travellers - some of the enclosed gardens even had a grass lawn.

Overall, it didn’t seem so bad. As thoroughly different as it seemed from the South Rukongai - only slightly cooler that his own home in the inner districts, but a good deal more humid - it was a place that he could imagine living quite comfortably. A nice retirement, perhaps….although in truth he was not certain if the Gotei Thirteen had much in the way of provisioning for retirement. As they aged at a near negligible pace, he wasn’t even certain there was a retirement age for Shinigami. He had heard of some high ranking officers - usually Captains who had served their divisions for centuries - being ‘excused duty‘, their position transferred to someone else and them living, for all intents and purposes, as civilians…but this was extremely rare and members of the Gotei Thirteen they remained, with the potential to be reactivated at any time should the need arise.

Once a Shinigami, it seemed, always a Shinigami….at least that was the creed of the central government.

It was actually a rather scary thought, now Junshin took the time to entertain it. Unless he fell to illness - which was unlikely, as Shinigami bodies were not effected by most diseases - or in battle then he could potentially live for thousands of years. At only eighteen years of age, the tiniest gnat’s whisper of his possible lifespan, he had essentially entered into an eternal contract with the Gotei Thirteen for the remainder of his days, upon graduation from the Academy.

Still, it was nice to think that, some day, he might be allowed to put his duties aside and settle down to a comfortable life in the Rukongai. However, that was perhaps looking a little far ahead. The wage of an unseated officer was a modest one, and if he ever intended to own his own home - at least one larger than a hut - he would need to rise higher. Even his own father, a fairly successful merchant, had build his home on top of his place of work due to being unable to afford two properties.

‘Right! To the mission! Let’s prove what I can do!’

“Hey,” Hitomi’s voice, sounding very suddenly from behind him, caused Junshin to jump. “I’ve been trying to call you. What’re you staring at?”

Turning towards his companion, Junshin grinned bashfully as Hitomi followed the direction of his previous gaze, frowning as she apparently did not find the sight of the rustic mansions quite as fascinating. Shrugging her shoulders, the girl abruptly turned to march back up the line of rickshaws, motioning for Junshin to follow.

“Is…is there any particular rush?” Junshin queried, rushing to catch up, falling in step just behind Hitomi as she led him towards, presumably, the vehicle she had chosen.

“In a manner of speaking, yes,” Hitomi nodded. “We’ve got five days to reach the Outer Rim and find out as much as we can. Five days is barely enough time to get there by road, and I’m still trying to work out how we’ll get word back without being late…we’ll have to see if we can find a way station with some Hell Butterflies, or something. Anyway, the fewer delays we have here, the better.”

“Five days?” Junshin echoed. “That’s…I didn’t think the Rukongai was that large.”

“We can make it, just about…assuming we make as few stops as possible and sleep on a moving rickshaw,” Hitomi advised. “but it won’t leave us much time to gather information. If we don’t have enough to make a report, I’ll just send word back that we need more time…either way, so long as we at least arrive in the Outer Rim within five days, we can decide what to do from there.”

Junshin found himself somewhat taken aback by the girl’s grim estimation of their odds of beating their allotted time. To him, the idea of five days of travelling and investigation had sounded quite relaxing. It had never occurred to him that it might be more of a desperate race against the clock. It had never been properly impressed upon him, it seemed, how truly vast the Rukongai was.

“Have you picked a driver?” he queried, not sure he truly wanted to hear the answer as the line of vehicles appeared to be getting increasingly rickety.

“I have,” Hitomi replied, pointing down the line towards her choice. Squinting, Junshin tried to tell which rickshaw, specifically, she was looking at. However the answer was shortly answered as Hitomi came to a stop after marching past four more vehicles, turning to face Junshin with a satisfied smile as she gestured towards what was, it seemed, their transportation.

Once he was standing beside it, Junshin wondered how he had failed to notice the vehicle sooner. Rather than a rickshaw, the vehicle they now stood beside was a large cart made of simple, unpolished wood - probably designed to transport goods rather than people. It’s design was to the point and practical, lacking the pomp and flair of the rickshaws beside it. It seemed rather out of place among its peers, and Junshin could only conclude that the vehicle had probably originated in the Outer Districts and was going to be making a return journey anyway. Perhaps that was why Hitomi had chosen it...it certainly hadn't been due to its craftsmanship. The vehicle looked so thrown together, in fact, that it had clearly been repaired with several different kinds of wood, suggesting it hard broken down in many different places over the years.

"What a piece of junk," he groaned, catching himself too late as the words escaped his lips. Noting Hitomi's disapproving glare, he smiled nervously as the girl's own smile faded. Pursing her lips, the redhead placed her hands defiantly on her hips - apparently quite sure of her choice.

"It's still faster than walking," she advised. "The driver says this is the cart that made the Kessel run in less than twelve days."

"I'm...sorry, Seraphina-kun, but What exactly is the 'Kessel run'?" Junshin queried, wondering if perhaps his ignorance was showing again. The question, however, caused Hitomi to falter slightly. The redhead visible faltered, her gaze drifting sideward as she apparently struggled to reach for an answer.

".....I....don't know," she eventually replied. "But either way, this is the rickshaw that did it. Anyway, he's agreed to take us all the way to the Outer Rim, which is better than I'd expected."

"How much is he charging?" Junshin asked, giving the cart another doubtful look.

"....Ten thousand," Hitomi replied with a light cough.

"Ten thousand!?" Junshin shot back. "We could almost buy our own cart for that!"

"But who's gonna drive it, kid? You?" another voice suddenly drawled, interrupting Junshin's brief show of consternation, from somewhere out of sight. Trailing off, Junshin frowned as he looked over Hitomi's shoulder as a the source of the voice began to make his way around the cart. Junshin found himself suddenly blushing as he realised the driver had apparently overhead everything he had to say about the vehicle. Turning briefly towards Hitomi, wishing that the girl had offered him some kind of warning, he cleared his throat as he prepared an apology for the most thoroughly outlandish looking man he had ever seen in his life.

Some seven or eight years older than the Shinigami, the driver was, as was immediately obvious, not Japanese. Tall, lean and thoroughly Caucasian, the man didn’t dress much like the denizens of the Rukongai either. He clothes himself in a short black coat - the sleeves of which had either been removed or had simple never existed - over a long sleeve shirt that may have once been white but had since been stained a dull beige by the dust of the road. Instead of Hakama, the man wore a pair of trousers - much like those often seen on men in the North Rukongai - and a pair of black leather boots.

At his hip the man carried a short knife that ran almost the length of his thigh, though his manner was more roguish than threatening. Ruggedly handsome, regarding his two young passengers with something that was more smirk than smile, the man raised a hand in greeting, a bronze coin between his index and forefinger, apparently having been in the middle of testing its authenticity.

“Uh….no, I suppose not,” Junshin replied.

“Glad we’re in agreement,” their driver nodded, before turning his smile towards Hitomi. “District Seventy it is. Please remember to fasten your seatbelts.”

“Right,” Hitomi nodded, appearing rather unimpressed by the man’s blatant attempt at charming her. Dexterously she scrambled up the side of the cart, seating herself on the wide, flat area behind the driver’s seat that was presumably normally used for transporting goods. Junshin, hesitating only a moment, clambered up after her as he decided there was no further time for misgivings.

“So…um…what do we call you?” he queried of the driver as the latter used a small step build into the wide of his cart to climb into the driver’s seat with considerable more ease.

“Ford,” the man replied, not showing Junshin nearly as much interest as he had Hitomi, seizing up the cart’s reigns as he made himself comfortable. “And this is Chompie.”

Frowning, Junshin craned his neck to look over the man’s shoulder, thought he very nearly fell from the cart as he found himself looking at a broadly build, hairy creature attached to the far end of the reigns held in Ford’s hands. Covered in long, shaggy auburn fur, the four-legged animal appeared to be blissfully awaiting instruction, nosing through the soil beneath its hoofed feet in search of anything that could be grazed upon. Only when Ford cracked the reigns, and the animal lifted its horned head with a deep ‘moo’, did Junshin realise he was looking at a cow.

Albeit an extremely large, hairy cow. But a cow nonetheless.

“…Chompie,” he repeated to himself, relaxing his weight upon the edge of the cart as he watched the cow begin its slow, somewhat laborious movement - dragging the cart, upon its rickety wheels, out of the line of waiting rickshaws.

“You were expecting something else?” Ford queried over his shoulder, not turning as he directed the animal. “You’d best take a seat, Kid. There’s not much around here worth seeing. Trust me, I’ll get you where you’re going."

“…I sure hope so,” Junshin replied under his breath, wondering if the slowly plodding animal was likely to get them to the far side of the Rukongai inside a year, let alone in five days. However, thinking better of arguing, he slumped from the raised lip of the cart’s edge down onto the flat surface to sit opposite Hitomi - the girl having already settled down with her Zanpakuto across her lap, looking to be attempting Jinzen.

‘So much for getting to know each other…’

Sighing, and feeling as though his journey may turn out to be a very long one indeed, Junshin settled down for what he expected to be an extremely slow, slow trip.

- - - Updated - - -


Act X: Black Waters




Hitomi felt a curious sense of nostalgia at every lurch and bump in the road beneath the wagon as they began their long, westward trek. She had come by rickshaw, then - borne at the swift pace of a man running on foot rather then the lazy, rhythmic plod of the pack animal that bore them northward now. What it lacked in speed, the animal would make up for in endurance; if they were travelling a mile, then a man could transport them faster...but over the vast distance they had in mind, the cow's slow but inexhaustible pace would be the quicker route. For all the difference in speed, however, the backward journey up the road along which she arrived at the Seireitei for the first time seven years ago was nevertheless a curiously emotional moment for the young woman.

After wrestling with her own uncertainty, the flutter she felt within her stomach at the knowledge that the place she had once called home lay at the far end of her current journey told her what she had, perhaps, known all too well already. She wanted to go home. She still couldn't say she truly understood why - certainly she had no great desire to see her family and she no longer felt much attachment to the town of Jetsam where she had grown up. Perhaps some small part of her simply wished to see where she had come from, one last time, before she became 'Seraphina' and left Reihaii Hitomi behind for good.

What was she even expecting to find? Her parents? Even if she had any great desire to see them, she doubted that would be possible. Seven years was a long time, especially in the Outer Districts...a long time for people to cut their losses and move on. When Shadrin had killed the man attacking her, it would almost certainly have created trouble for Hitomi's parents, and a drunken layabout and his prostitute wife hardly had the support of the community to protect them from reprisal. If they were smart - and one thing Hitomi had to admit about her mother was that the woman had always been maliciously cunning - then they would have left Jetsam almost immediately. Even if they didn't have to run for their own safety, her mother would almost certainly have lost out on 'business' - a matter that Hitomi took a certain amount of pride in. However, it left her unsure if they would have had enough money to keep the house.

For the first time in seven years, Hitomi felt a brief pang of guilt, somewhere deep within her core. The moment she felt it she immediately replaced the sensation with revulsion, burying her regret as deep as she could. What possible reason did she have to feel guilty? She had spent her entire childhood living as a slave within her own home, and her eventual reward was a mother who tried to sell her and a father who stood by and did nothing while a stranger came to her rescue. Had they looked for her? Had they tried to contact her in the seven years since she'd left? Did they even care?

'Why should I give a damn about either of them!?'

Sighing, Hitomi’s fingers tightened around the hilt of her sword, almost daring the weapon to pass comment, though she knew that it would not do so. The sword, as ever, remained cold and passive within her grip; the barely perceptible throb of half-formed consciousness within it the only thing to mark the sword as a zanpakuto at all. No matter how distant it was, however, the vague presence within the sword was a curious comfort to her. Junshin did not seem a bad sort, but he was naive and childlike...she doubted, even if she were to explain the events of her life in detail to him that he would either fully understand or believe most of it. As harsh as she felt she had been to him the previous afternoon, she had been correct - the boy had grown up inside a comfortable bubble. He had no context with which to understand her.

His world on peace and comfort was less alien to her, at least, than her world was to him. She had enjoyed some peace these last few years, dwelling in relative contentment with her new family - her Nakama. But unlike Junshin, she, Shadrin, Yukimura and Shingen had all been touched in some way by hardship. All four them had known that the life of a soldier was one of bloodshed and that, when the day of graduation came, peace would become a temporary, transient thing between battles. Something to enjoy while it lasted, but never to become used to. There would always be the threat of Hueco Mundo; There would always be Hollows, and there would never be any way to predict when and how they would appear. Even in times of peace, a Shinigami had to live upon a permanent knife’s edge, constantly ready for the next unpredictable need to draw their swords. Even on this mission, one that was essentially one of investigation and research, they faced the very real possibility of encountering Hollows.

Junshin was not prepared….it was going to be a shock to him.

‘Damn it…it doesn’t seem so long ago I was just like him. I wonder when it all changed…?'

It was a good question…when had it all changed? Where exactly did ‘Reihaii Hitomi’ end and ‘Seraphina’ begin? Was there any particular moment in history when she had stopped being a wide eyed young girl and transformed into a soldier? Had it been during the War in South Rukon? Or perhaps it had been sooner, during her battle against Hideyoshi Habishiba during Makabe Kiyone’s brutal training? Perhaps it went back even further to the moment she had lashed out with a knife to defend herself, and for the first time felt the splash of warm blood upon her hands and heard the ragged wheeze of a dying man?

Or perhaps it all began the moment she had first met the gaze of the blue eyed Shinigami, that day in the rain….the first time she laid eyes on Shadrin Kain, that had changed her life forever. That was the day her spiritual powers had first manifested, bubbling up to the surface like froth thrown up in the wake of Shadrin’s own. Perhaps that, more than any other moment, was when Seraphina had been born.

‘Bah…maybe I’m selling him short. He’s been through the Academy, he must have fought Dummy Hollows at some point. He kinda acts like he’s got a spine made of putty, but hopefully his training will kick in when he needs it.’

The thought of training reminded Hitomi of what she had been trying to do before her lengthy spell of reminiscing, and he turned her attention once more towards her zanpakuto. Laid out across her lap, with one hand on the hilt and the other on the tip of the sheath, she made an attempt to empty her mind - as she had been taught - to slip once again into the Inner World of the weapon. As little progress as she had made in recent attempts, and as little as she was likely to make until the sword was fully healed, it couldn’t hurt to try.

The stronger she was by the time they reached the Outer Rim, the better.

‘Alright, you….Let’s talk.’




*****


The sounds of the Inner World filled her ears before she opened her eyes - signalling to her immediately that she had made it there. The shrieking caw of the circling crows overhead and the sloshing, angry churn of water. Her eyelids lifted as she opened her mouth to draw in breath - the stale, sickly stench of blood no longer causing her to gag as it once had. It disturbed her, slightly, that she was beginning to get used to it. Perhaps that was exactly why her Zanpakuto chose to present such an image to her.

She found herself standing upon the bank of the great river that sliced through the heart of her Inner World, the water already frothing and raging at her proximity - threatening any attempt to cross. The world beyond the river did not look any different than it had before - the ground and sky still faded into a colourless void as the Zanpakuto continued to repair itself. Yet, somehow, she knew the weapon's soul dwelled beyond...perhaps all she had to do to reawaken the sword was to reach it. All she had to do was cross the river.

Assuming the river would allow her to cross; it had spent the last seven years doing everything it could to prevent her from doing so. The recent halt in her contact with the sword has as much to do with frustration as it did with the weapon's current dormant state. No attempt to circumvent the river had been successful - for it seemed to extend on, eternally, in either direction. Nor should she jump it for, although she could easily make the distance and then some, each time she would simply find herself landing on the exact same bank from which she had leapt. She had concluded that she was probably meant to wait until the Zanpakuto was good and ready to allow her to cross. Hitomi, however, was not one for long waits; she preferred to try and swim.

This was, perhaps, easier said than done. The fierce current had thus far prevented her from making much in the way of progress at all. On more than one occasion she had been sucked beneath the current and blacked out, jolted sharply back into the real world choking up black water. Others she had been forced to turn back, dragging herself soaked and exhausted up the bank where she would pass out - once again waking to the real world. She wasn't certain this attempt would be any different, but she was certainly going to try.

Besides, this time, she had an idea.

The river was approximately thirty feet in width - an easy jump for a Shinigami, but a long way to swim across an angry current. She had decided, therefore, that she needed some assistance, and her zanpakuto was going to provide it. Drawing the sword smoothly - for in her Inner World the weapon’s physical form was sheathed benignly at her hip - she frowned thoughtfully at the river while balancing the sword in her hand to test it for weight before she abruptly swung the weapon to hold it reversed in her hand, reaching back over her shoulder as she suddenly hurled the weapon like a javelin, sending it soaring across the angry waters beneath.

The sword flew true, landing tip first on the far side of the river, sinking deeply into the earth like a knife carving into cheese. Grinning despite herself, Hitomi instantly reached out with her reiatsu, shaping it within the base of her palm as she extended her index and forefinger towards the erect sword on the far bank.

“Bakudo number four!” she declared, feeling the warm glow of the forming kido spiralling through the length of her arm. “Hainawa!”

Springing forward like a leaping snake, her reiatsu lashed out from her outstretched fingertips, shaping itself into a thin projectile of glowing golden light that, for all intents and purposes, took for the form of a rope. Under normal circumstances, Hitomi would allow the spell to fly towards her intended target to ensnare them, but Hitomi deftly reached out to snatch the tail end of the glowing fibre of reiatsu before it was out of reach, the length of the cord continuing to snake, unerringly, towards her zanpakuto.

With an electric hum, the far end of the rope - extending far beyond its typical length to bridge the gap between Shinigami and target - snapped around the hilt of the sword. Latching itself in place as securely as if the target were an enemy’s limbs, the energy rope wound around the sword from pommel to tsuba, Hitomi feeling a satisfying tug as the remainder of the cord attempted to follow.

“Right,” she nodded to herself, pulling backwards on the cord to make sure it was secure - the sword not budging as she did so. “Let’s hope this holds.”

Steeling herself, Hitomi gripped the rope in both hands as she took a tentative step forward, beginning to wade into the frothing water. Almost immediately, the intensity of the river’s rage increased to an absolute fury, as she had seen it do many times before. What had been an angry churn changed into a full blown torrent, the water crashing into her, attempting to knock her from her feet and drag her under as she continued forward. Spluttering as the liquid managed to fill her mouth and nose, Hitomi nevertheless kept a firm on her anchoring rope as she continued forward.

The rope could do little to keep her from being pulled under, however, when the riverbed slipped away beneath her feet as it became too deep for her to continue at a walk. Fighting against the current, she used the rope more to prevent herself from being dragged downstream with the current than to remain above the surface, only occasionally able to drag herself back up for air as she fought an exhausting battle against the water to make any progress whatsoever.

‘This time…..This time I’m going to make it!’

The water was relentless, forcing her to move at what felt like a snail’s pace. Pulling herself along by the rope at only a meter or so for every minute spent in the water, she began to wonder if the river had in fact widened just to frustrate her. The water clouded her eyes, savaging her ears, mouth and nose to try and throw her from her coarse however, despite the agonising pace of her progress, Hitomi’s heart very nearly sang as, finally, she felt her feet scrape the surface of the riverbed as the water began to swallow at the far bank.

‘I’m going to make it! I’m actually going to make it!’

A matter of a few feet lay between her and the far shore. The glowing rope to which she clung had lost some of its lustre, and Hitomi knew that the kido could not last much longer….but it would last long enough. She was exhausted, her limbs ached, her lungs burned…but, this time, she was going to make it to the far aside.

“I’ve got you!” she cried outloud, spluttering out her words through the water as her head and shoulders rose consistently above the surface, finding strength as both her feet touched the base of the river. “I’ve got you this time!”

“Hey, Seraphina-kun, are you hungry?”

Hitomi started at the voice boomed through her senses, wincing as it echoed impossibly loud within her ears. Momentarily dazed, her concentration wavered, and even as she tried to seize it again she felt the layers of her Inner World begin to peel away before her eyes….



*****


Hitomi’s eyes flared open, panic rising within her as she continued to feel momentarily disorientated. Only when she felt the sun upon her face and heard the steady groan of the cart wheels beneath her did she realise she was back in the real world. Her eyes darting rapidly length and right, her breath coming in sharp, rapid gasps as she fought to recover her faculties - for real or not, enduring the struggle across the river had been utterly draining - before her gaze settled on an object hovering just in front of her.

Held within Junshin’s outstretched hand, a dry, unappetising looking trail ration was extended towards her. The voice that had drawn her out of her Inner World, in her moment of possible triumph, had been his….and he had done so for the sake of what was essentially edible cardboard.

“Damn!” she exclaimed by reflex, scowling as she fought the urge to lash out and strike her companion’s hand away. Junshin, for his part, immediately recoiled, looking down at the ration with a somewhat hurt expression.

“Gee,” he muttered. “I didn’t think they were that bad.”

Grinding her teeth, Hitomi bit back her anger, waving away the offer of food as she stiffly removed her sword from her lap. Her entire body ached - she felt as though she had actually tried to cross the river in reality. Even if she could be afforded peace and quiet to do so, she didn’t feel in any condition to repeat the process.

“…Damn it,” she grunted, allowing herself to fall sideways to lie down on her side, folding an arm underneath her temple to cushion her head as she fixed Junshin momentarily with a glare as the young Shinigami sullenly sat back down on the far side of the wagon. Sighing, she forced as much of the bitterness out of her gaze as she could….she supposed it wasn’t exactly his fault. Still, his timing could not possibly have been worse.

“….Thanks for the offer,” she muttered, unable to keep a somewhat downtrodden note to her voice. “I just don’t have much of an appetite right now.”

“Oh….alright,” Junshin nodded, managing a vague smile despite still looking rather taken aback by her exclamation. Feeling a pang of guilt, Hitomi imagined that her companion was probably feeling rather out of his element. She, at least, had travelled fairly far and wide, and in varied company. For all she knew - and indeed it seemed likely - Junshin was about to head further away from the Seireitei than he had ever been…..and to cap it all off he was travelling with someone who wouldn’t stop snapping at him.

“What were you going to ask me earlier?” she queried, extending the question as an olive branch, rather regretful of her treatment of the young man until now. The effect was immediate, as Junshin’s expression immediately brightened.

“Oh, I was just wondering if you would help me with my jinzen,” he replied, somewhat ironically. “You just….um…struck me as being very focused and committed. I’m sure you’re really good at it. I…..well….I’m not so good, I’m afraid. I don’t think my sword respects me very much….I’ve never even been able to get into my Inner World.”

“Never?” Hitomi quirked an eyebrow, lifting her head slightly. Having called out her zanpakuto by accident, and practically stumbled into her Inner World, the struggles that many Shinigami went through to achieve the same were virtually unknown to her. She was aware that some - albeit few - Shinigami went their whole lives never even materialising their Zanpakuto…but they were rare. The idea of a Shinigami graduating from the Academy, yet being unable to at least access their Inner World at will seemed strange to her.

But then, was it any stranger then her, who had a Zanpakuto that seemed intent on drowning her?

“Never,” Junshin nodded. “I just though it might…well…help the mission a little, and….well….”

“And smooth things over a little, and stop me acting like I‘ve got ice in my veins?” Hitomi queried, one corner of her mouth rising into a wry smile. Junshin’s features immediately paled, the young man shaking his head vigorously as he opened his mouth to quickly back-pedal away from the insinuation, but Hitomi halted his objections with a grin. “Don’t worry….I keep my social circle small and, to be honest, I’m not really comfortable around new people.’

“Call it trust issues….but I suppose I’ve learned to be guarded around most people,” she continued, pressing her palm to the surface of the cart to push herself back up into a seated position. “When I first came to the Academy, it showed in how shy I was….but I think, as time goes on, I’ve just gotten grouchy. It’s not you that’s pissing me off, it’s me that’s pissing me off….don’t worry about it. I’ll try and relax at little.’

“Anyway,” she shrugged, “Jinzen?”

“Hrm?” Junshin tilted his head to one side, visible surprised. “You mean….you’ll teach me?”

“Meh,” Hitomi replied in a somewhat non-committal fashion. “To be honest, I’m not exactly an expert….I haven’t made much progress with my own zanpakuto. I can teach you the technique, but that’s about it….in terms of how to force your zanpakuto to cooperate with you, I’m afraid I haven’t really worked that out myself. My zanpakuto has helped me in the past sometimes….but usually he just does it on his own whims, rather than because I tell him to.”

“That’s good enough for me,” Junshin grinned, reaching a hand under each arm to slip his twin swords from the holsters that secured them against his body, laying the weapons flat on the wooden boards in front of him. “Please, anything you can tell me would be a help.”

“Well, lesson one,” Hitomi replied, folding her arms as she frowned thoughtfully. “I suppose we should start trying to get to your Inner World….once you’re there, your Zanpakuto will probably try and make contact. It might not be friendly contact, but it’ll be contact.’

“Just whatever you do,” she added, somewhat bitterly. “Don’t go swimming.”

[Seraphina]

Act XI: The other Half of Us



“I suppose we’d best go over the basics before we try and actually get inside your Inner World,” Hitomi murmured thoughtfully, leaning her shoulders backwards against the raised lip of the cart, sitting with her arms folded and her legs crossed beneath her. “I imagine the Academy gave you some information, but it never hurts to go over a few of the more important things.”

“Agreed,” Junshin nodded, listening intently as his gaze flickered briefly back and forth between the girl and the two short-bladed swords resting on the floor of the cart between them. “To be honest, Hashiba-sensei never taught me much…he just called me a ‘no-hoper’. One time, he sent me out of his class, telling me to ‘go practice embroidery or something else on my level’.”

“That does sound like Hashiba-sensei,” Hitomi replied with a slight smirk, remembering well how the wiry old instructor had often conducted his classes like an army drill sergeant. Believing very much in pushing his students to success, he had never been one to pull punches…if Hashiba Hideyoshi thought he could get more out of a student by making them angry, that was exactly what he’d do. “But….well, here’s what I’ve found out by doing Jinzen myself, anyway.’

“The most important thing to keep in mind,” she continued, lowering a hand to tap a finger against the cold, bronze pommels of one of the two swords, “is that if you get hurt in there, you get hurt out here. You don’t just project your consciousness into your zanpakuto, you physically manifest in its dimension, the same way it manifests in ours…Your soul exists in both places at the same time. Keep in mind that the reverse is true too, so if your zanpakuto gets damaged you won’t be able to enter your Inner World for a while.”

“H…hurt?” Junshin stammered, his eagerness giving way to sudden apprehension as he looked down at the swords as he might have a pair of poised cobras. “But…is that likely? The swords are part of me, aren’t they? They should..um…I mean…why would they hurt me?”

“Hey, hey, ease up,” Hitomi waved a hand, wincing as she realised she had perhaps begun the wrong way. “I don’t know how likely it is…that really depends on your zanapakuto. No two zanpakuto are exactly alike…Usually they represent an element of their wielders. A part of their soul that has been suppressed or cast aside. Sometimes that means they’ll reflect a person’s hidden strength…or they’re hidden gentleness….other times, it means they’ll represent everything a person tries to keep as far from the surface as possible. You won’t really know until you see it.’

“But,” she added, raised a cautioning finger, “the possibility of it attacking you is certainly there. Keep that in mind when you go in there. And even if your Zanpakuto isn’t dangerous, your Inner World might be. Don’t worry though…I’m pretty sure a zanpakuto can’t kill it’s owner.”

“K…Kill!?” Junshin exclaimed, recoiling further against the inside of the cart. “I…I’m not sure this is such a good idea anymore. What….what do you mean ‘pretty sure’?”

“Oh for crying out loud, just do it,” Hitomi grunted, reaching out a hand to grasp the young man’s wrist, tugging on his arm to place his hand down upon the hilt of one of the two swords. “You’ll be fine.”

“R….right,” Junshin nodded, his objections cowed for the moment, though still looking rather unsure as Hitomi placed her own hand on the hilt of the sword sword, frowning in concentration as she tried to focus on the dull throb of the sword’s reiatsu.

“Entering your inner world requires you to follow the thread of consciousness leaking out from your zanpakuto….but it requires either expertise or natural synergy with the sword to find it. Usually you just sort of stumble into it the first time. I‘m going to find it for you, this time…all you need to do is focus on my reiatsu for now, and I‘ll try and lead you to your zanpakuto‘s.”

“I’m not sure I understand,” Junshin replied, wearing a rather sheepish grin.

“Think of it as following a thread to find the ball of yarn at the end,” Hitomi replied, though she did not look at him as she did so, her attention focused entirely on the sword. “Your Zanpakuto’s reiatsu is, at the end of the day, just another part of your own. The moment you detect it properly you’ll gain a better understanding of the sword….I don’t pretend to understand how it all works, but suffice to say once you’ve latched into your zanpakuto’s reiatsu, it’ll pull you in all on its own. I’ll just try and guide you to it.”

Ignoring Junshin’s thoroughly confused expression, realising that any verbal explanation was probably insufficient, she concentrated on the sword instead. Her brow knotting, she allowed a trickle of her reiatsu to leave her palm, trembling across the surface of the blade in search of where the sword’s reiatsu was it its most concentrated. On her own sword it had become almost second nature, but she quickly discovered that trying to do the same on someone else’s zanpakuto was like feeling around in the dark.

She could sense the consciousness of the weapon in a remote fashion, but trying to locate the point where the physical entity of the blade ended and the spiritual form began was like scouring the ocean in search of a single, specific fish. Her reiatsu merely acted like a sonar, feeling her way until it encountered something - not for the first time, she wished Shingen was with her; he, at least, could probably have located the sword’s consciousness easily.

Gritting her teeth, she tried to put her frustrations aside. In her mind’s eye, her reiatsu floated as purple smoke through an endless, lightless black. Without any definite destination, her reiatsu merely drifted along in search of the tiny pinprick of light she knew lurked somewhere within the darkness that would mark their intended destination.



*****


“I really don’t think I understand this.”

Shadrin Kain opened one blue eye to look up at her from across her zanpakuto. For what felt like hours, the only sound in the room had been the steady, rhythmic tick-tock of Shadrin’s grandfather clock, as the more experienced Shinigami tried to guide the young girl to the spirit of her Zanpakuto. With the sheathed weapon resting on the tabletop before them, Hitomi’s hand upon the hilt and Shadrin’s upon the top of the sheath, they had been sitting in this way for most of the morning.

“It’s not really something that’s easy to explain,” Shadrin replied. “But now that your sword is talking you should at least try and establish a regular dialogue with it.”

Hitomi nodded, checking a sigh, as she closed her own eyes to try and follow the thread of Shadrin’s reiatsu. Her defeat of Hideyoshi Hashiba three days previously had apparently left both Shadrin and Makabe Kiyone more convinced than ever that Hitomi was some kind of undiscovered genius. No sooner had she recovered from her injuries from the fight than Shadrin had taken it upon himself to try and teach her to properly commune with her sword through the art of Jinzen. As a first year student, Hitomi could not expect to find such training at the Academy - it simply wouldn’t exist on the curriculum for another three to four years, when most students actually materialised their Zanpakuto.

The process, so far as Hitomi could tell, was a combination of meditation, reiatsu manipulation and sheer dumb luck. Shadrin had been meditating upon the sword for a mind numbing length of time, with her following the trail of his reiatsu every excruciatingly boring step of the way. Each time she had made contact with the sword in the past, it had been the weapon that initiated conversation; she found herself rather wishing that the sword would do so right now and at least them know where it was hiding.

“Is there any kind of method to this?” she queried, glancing at the clock as the time ticked steadily towards noon.

“Nope,” Shadrin shook his head, though he didn‘t open his eyes again, concentrating entirely on his work. “In fact I’m not sure it’s ever been done.”

“What?” Hitomi exclaimed, very nearly withdrawing her hand from the sword, but Shadrin quickly snatched out his free hand to grab her wrist, holding her in place as he continued his search. Fuming, Hitomi made a brief attempt to pull her hand free, but the older Shinigami’s grip was like steel, his hand not budging until she was forced to abandon her retreat. Heaving a sigh that, this time, she made no effort to restrain, she was left with little choice but to continue following the man’s reiatsu. “….So, basically, you don’t know if this’ll work.”

“Nope,” Shadrin confessed, grinning despite the admission. “No idea….I know I definitely won’t be able to actually talk to your Zanpakuto, or enter your Inner World with you. But, in theory at least, I don’t see any reason why I can’t find the way in for you. Sort of like…I can lead you to the door of the lady’s room, but I can’t go in with you.”

“Charming analogy,” Hitomi frowned. “But if it’s never been done before, how do you know it’s possible?”

“I don’t,” Shadrin shrugged. Hesitating for a moment as though his reiatsu encountered something of interest, but quickly moving on with a dismissive shake of his head. “Just working on a theory…The honest truth is that Jinzen rarely starts the way the textbooks say. Most Shinigami first enter their Inner World because their Zanpakuto pulls them there…once you’ve been pulled there often enough, you learn to go there on your own. What we’re doing right now is technically what the Academy teaches Jinzen as…a painstaking search for the way in.’

“It is possible to do it this way,” he confirmed, “but I’ve never heard of another more experienced Shinigami doing it for you. Call it an experiment to cut the time required….but I don’t see any reason why it shouldn’t work.”

“Alright, fine,” Hitomi relented. “I guess I’m in your hands.”

“Aaraa,” Shadrin suddenly grinned, one of his eyelids flickering open to glance up at her. “Just where I want you, then?”

“Ha. Ha. Bloody ha,” Hitomi drawled, over pronouncing each sylable as she drummed the fingertips of her free hand against the tabletop, offering Shadrin a disapproving shake of her head. His only response with another wide grin, before he went back to work. Hitomi turned her attention from him, only loosely following the trail of his reiatsu as she busied herself looking over the spines of the books on his nearby shelves, wondering if there were any present that she had yet to read.

The minutes continued to tick by in silence, Hitomi finding herself very conscious of her own breathing. With little else to think about, she shifted uncomfortably on the spot, though was unable to move much as Shadrin’s hand still rested upon her own. Peering at his hand thoughtfully, her attention wandered as she became very aware of the weight of it - the rough texture of his palm against the softer skin of her hand. His hand was warm against hers, and she quickly realised she could just about feel the steady rhythm of his pulse through it, alongside her own. However, she quickly frowned and looked away as she became aware of it a faint blush that had crept, unbidden, into her cheeks.

“Hitomi-chan!” Shadrin suddenly exclaimed, causing her to jump. The flush in her cheeks deepening as she realised she had been caught daydreaming, she snapped her attention back to Shadrin’s face as the latter smirked in a rather self-satisfied, triumphant manner.

“Found it,” he told her.






*****


“Found it,” she murmured, her lips curving into a satisfied smile as, in her mind’s eye, the purple haze of smoke that was her reiatsu coiled around a faint shimmering point of illumination within the eternal darkness. Concentrating and increasing the volume of her reiatsu, she marked the point as clearly as she could for Junshin, who leaned forward eagerly at her announcement.

“What…what should I do?” the boy stammered, though she could feel his spiritual pressure instinctively reaching out in search of her own. She gave no instruction, Junshin clearly already knowing what to do - consciously or not - as his senses focused on the now detectible tingle of her reiatsu within the sword.

‘Heh…better be careful, Shadrin-kun, or I’ll catch up to you.’

“I see it too….” Junshin murmured, Hitomi noting that the youth’s eyes had glazed over as he focused upon the spirit of his zanpakuto. She had no idea what the experience would be for him - his own Inner World was probably a far cry from her own. However, like lights on a runway, her reiatsu guided him in as his conscious mind began to slip away from his body to descend into the Zanpakuto’s world….

Suddenly, Hitomi sat bolt upright, a jolt dancing up and down her spine as she realised, through some ingrained instinct, that something was amiss. Something within her screamed a warning, her mind screaming alarm bells at something not yet touched by her conscious thought. Abruptly breaking contact with Junshin’s Zanpakuto, she rose to her feet like an uncoiling spring, every muscle in her body unconsciously poised to move as her left hand tightened around the sheath of her zanpakuto.

Junshin, abruptly cut off from his attempt to enter his Zanpakuto’s world, lurched backwards as though struck. Blinking groggily, her counterpart opened his mouth as though to ask for an explanation; however, his mouth quickly closed, the colour draining from the young man’s cheeks as he sensed the same threatening presence as Hitomi.

“What the hell….?” Hitomi growled through clenched teeth, barely able to believe what she was sensing. “We can’t even be in District Three yet….It’s far too soon.”

Sparing a sideward glance at Junshin, Hitomi noticed her counterpart was dealing with the presense with rather less steel that she was. The young man’s brow had broken into a sweat, his hands trembling as he placed them heavily upon the wooden boards before him as though to keep from tilting sideward.

“What….what is that reiatsu?” Junshin murmured, his voice filled with revulsion. “It makes me feel sick…it just feels….wrong! Twisted!”

Hitomi grimaced, but gave a nod. The description was accurate, if vague. What they were sensing was definitely spiritual pressure…but it was certainly not the spiritual pressure of a Shinigami. The only word Hitomi could think of to describe it was ‘rancid’. It was a sensation she’d felt before; one she could easily identify as she looked towards Junshin directly, deciding it was best not to sugar coat her reply.

“It’s a Hollow,” she told him.

Junshin’s only reply was one of mute horror as he stared up at her, wide eyed. Her earlier suspicion that the young man had never encountered a Hollow before was, it seemed, confirmed. It had been a long time since Hitomi herself had felt the sensation of its reiatsu. It felt like spiders crawling up and down the back of her neck.

Ford, who had until now taken no interest in what the pair were discussing, abruptly pulled on the reigns to draw the cart to a halt. Turning around in his seat, he regarded his passengers with obvious apprehension; although it was not altogether uncommon for Hollows to be encountered in the Outer Rim, their presence this close to the Seireitei was almost unheard of. She could understand the man’s concern….on any other day, he would probably be in serious danger.

On any other day, however, two Shinigami wouldn’t have been with him.

“What should we do?” Junshin queried, having lowered his voice to a whisper as though expecting speaking volume to cause the Hollow to suddenly spring from hiding. Hitomi doubted very much that would be the case - the reiatsu was emanating from several hundred yards away. “I mean…we do have a mission…should we continue or…?”

“What do you think?” Hitomi replied, turning to gaze in the direction from which the foul spiritual pressure was coming. “We’re Shinigami, and we have duties that go beyond any individual mission. A Hollow running around this close to a population centre can’t be allowed to roam a leisure….’

“We fight.”

[Seraphina]

Act XII: A Soldier’s Duty





No sooner had the words left Hitomi’s mouth than she was on the move - leaping from the moving cart almost in the same moment it had come to a full stop, taking off at dizzying speed in a full sprint, leaving Junshin sitting mutely alone in the rear of the wagon. Though still reeling from the sudden change of pace, a note of determination cut through his surprise as he quickly gathered up his zanpakuto, stuffing the weapons awkwardly back into the holsters under his arms as he placed a foot upon the raised edge of the cart, sparing a backwards glance at Ford.

“Will you wait for us?” he queried of the driver, who’s only response was to arch an eyebrow. The answer was, Junshin supposed, and obvious one; what kind of idiot would stick around with a Hollow nearby? Although he was unable to restrain a wince, Junshin offered the man a nod of understanding, before turning and leaping from the cart to pursue Hitomi. Behind him, Ford almost immediately turned to sharply snap the reigns, prompting the hairy cow pulling the cart to give a loud ‘moo’ of objection before it resumed its slow, steady plod, albeit slightly faster than before under Ford’s frantic flapping of the reigns.

For his part, Junshin put the driver out of mind, focusing instead on his companion. She wasn’t using shumpo, but he still found himself forced into an all out dash to try and catch up with her. She was certainly light on her feet, darting into the treeline beside the road, visible to Junshin only occasionally through the quickly thickening vegetation. Finding himself quickly forced to duck beneath low hanging branches or leap over tangled bushes, he kept an eye on the girl’s turned back on those few occasions she became visible, gritting his teeth as he failed to avoid the occasional twig of jagged thorn he inadvertently charged into.

“S…Seraphina-kun!” he called out, hoping to urge the girl to at least slow down. She did not do any such thing, forcing a pace that rapidly gobbled up the distance between themselves and the foul reiatsu despite having to navigate the ever thickening forest. When he received no answer, he instead focused his efforts of running….although he found himself distracted all the same, hardly able to believe that a Hollow could be found so far east within the West Rukon.

The presence of Shinigami patrols meant that, typically, the first thirty of so districts were - for all intents and purposes - Hollow free. In districts thirty to sixty, Hollows were known to appear but they were often dealt with quickly either by the Patrol Corps or, if required, direct intervention from whichever division’s jurisdiction under which its location fell. It was only beyond the sixtieth district, as one headed into the Outer Rim, that Shinigami presence began to dwindle; virtually falling away altogether at district Seventy, where the Outer Rim began. There were many locations where such a Hollow would hunt freely. Junshin could scarcely imagine what could have driven it so far east, and covering so much ground in a short time that it must have passed through dozens of districts without being spotted.

Putting such thoughts out of his mind for the time being, Junshin resolved that he would simply do his duty for now, and worry about the ‘why’s later. Although he had to admit, the thought of doing so rather daunted him. He had never faced a Hollow before; or, at least, not a real one. He had encountered and defeated scores of Dummy Hollows in his later years of the Academy, but they were little more than pale imitations - gigai made to resemble Hollows, but with little in the way of actual power. It was akin to learning to safely deal with snakes by handling a non-venomous variety. Their spiritual pressure had been disquieting…but nothing compared to what he felt now, in either its size of its ability to unsettle.

The trees continued to thicken around them as their pursuit carried them into the dingy, inner woods. The trees muffled the sounds of the outside world, though Junshin could barely hear anything regardless over his own blood pumping in his ears. Cut off by the canopy overhead, they moved now as though in perpetual shade, as Junshin realised that they were very nearly ontop of their quarry. Ahead, against the relative darkness of the forest interior, he could just barely make out what almost looked to be a dazzling wall of white light; a clearing, most likely, where the sunlight pierced the shadows of the forest. It was there, he imagined, that they would find their Hollow.

He had gained little ground on Hitomi, and she vanished into the light ahead of him. Steeling himself, realising only in that moment that his stomach felt as though it was oozing about in his feet, Junshin charged in after her, spots momentarily dancing before his eyes at the sudden change in ambient brightness as the forest yawned open around him, digging his feet against the mossy soil to skid to a halt, stopping just short of charging into the back of a now motionless Hitomi.

They had indeed, as he had suspected, reached a clearing among the trees. Though the canopy still stretched overhead from the surrounding trees, it admitted several pale shafts of bright light that permeated the clearing, creating elegant shafts of illumination that provided light enough to see by. A bubbling river - crystal clear and looking no more than ankle deep, and perhaps nine feet wide - snaked through the centre of the clearing, dividing the area neatly in half between the two young Shinigami and the thing that stood at the far end, some twenty feet distant. Frozen on the spot, his eyes bulging within his head, Junshin gazed at the creature mutely as an involuntary shudder rattled down his spine.

The entity was enormous. At least ten feet in height, with every inch of its hairless body thick with bulging slabs of veined muscle - broken only by the perfectly circular hole that pieces its body near the centre of its stomach to mark it, indisputably, as a Hollow. The creature’s muscles rippled visibly beneath its swamp-green skin as it turned to regard the two Shinigami from across the glade, two yellow eyes drinking them in from behind an ivory white mask that looked very much, to Junshin at least, like the face of a lion. The shape of its body bore only a loose similarity to the cat its mask resembled - its rear limbs looking like the muscular limbs of a feline, terminating in clawed paws. However its massive torso and powerful arms - thicker around than Junshin’s entire body - looked more like those of an ape. The creature’s arms, far longer than its legs, dangled to the ground to balance the creature upon the knuckles of its humanoid hands.

Currently, only one of those hands was earthed, however. As Junshin watched, mesmerised, he found his gaze drawn to the Hollow’s right arm - raised halfway between the ground and its open jaws - the glint of teeth visible as its real mouth hung open behind the immovable mask. The Shinigami’s eyes widened in horror as he spotted - protruding from between the fingers of the creature’s clenched fist - a thin arm dangling free, beating weakly against the creature’s thumb as its owner made a futile attempt to free themselves.

The arm was too small to be that of an adult…a child, most likely. Although Junshin had little time to analyse the situation in detail as the Hollow turned away from them in disinterest, turning its attention back towards its meal. Junshin’s breath caught as the Hollow’s hand - apparently frozen half way towards its goal by their arrival - resumed its way towards the creature’s mouth.

His mind told him to reach for his swords, but his body simply didn’t comply. Faced with such a monstrous creature and the overwhelming, choking sensation of its spiritual pressure, all he managed was a slight twitch of his fingers. His entire body felt as though it had been frozen, cold terror rooting him to the spot as he could merely watch, stricken, as the child clutched within the Hollow’s hand moved closer and closer towards death.

Hitomi had no such reluctance.

The girl’s movement was so sudden that she was already half-way to the Hollow before Junshin was even aware she had moved - only noticing at all due to the sudden spray of water thrown upwards in her wake as she darted across the shallow river, perfect clear droplets flickering in the sparse sunlight as they danced into the air, the splash hitting his ears almost in the same moment as the sound of her sword whispering free from its sheath, the redhead drawing and striking directly from the sheath as she concluded her lightning fast charge at the Hollow’s feet.

‘It’s red…’

It seemed a curious thing to focus on - Junshin squinted as he peered at the weapon drawn from the girl’s sheath - three feet of glittering red steel held within her right hand, descending to her rear after an upward forward slash that left little more than a blurred, crimson afterimage that passed directly through the Hollow’s forearm. As though acting on a time delay, a thin line of black snaked its way around the circumference of the Hollow’s arm - it’s dark blood seeping to the surface through the narrow slice, before its arm simply came away from its body.

The Hollow was even slower to react to the attack than Junshin was. Peering down at its newly created stump, as though perplexed by the sudden absence of its arm, the creature let out a hideous howl only upon examining the injury. Clutching its ravaged limb with its other hand, the Hollow reared up on its hind legs, its scream - sounding to Junshin like the haunting roar of air being forced through a tunnel - reverberated from the surrounding trees.

The arm, separated from the whole, almost immediately began to dissolve back into spirtrons. Evaporating into black smoke that dissipating almost instantly, the child that had been clutched within the entity’s fingers was suddenly in freefall, tumbling from nearly ten feet up as the hand that had held him faded from existence. Finally, Junshin’s body moved, his legs pumping furiously to carry him across the clearing to intercept the small, falling body.

Tearing across the river, he immediately threw his weight backwards to skid forward rather than sprint, wincing as every twig and small stone on the ground tore and chafed against his back and shoulders as momentum carried him beneath the child, catching the small body within his arms to break its fall. The rescued denizen of the Rukongai - who Junshin could now see was a small boy of some ten years - of the Rukongai made no noise, having lost consciousness sometime between the Shinigami’s arrival and the severing of the hand.

Sitting up, Junshin spared the child a brief glance over. His green eyes were half-open, but glazed over in his semi conscious state, partially hidden by a tangled mess of brown hair that was slicked against his forehead by the sweaty palm of the Hollow. He wore a plane grey kimono - slightly the worse for wear but looking in better condition than one would expect for the clothes of a street child - that had also survived the Hollow’s grip. However, Junshin noted with a grimace that the child’s left arm was twisted viciously out of shape, contorted sharply against the joint and obviously broken by the powerful fingers that had grasped him.

“Seraphina-kun!” he called out, lifting his gaze towards Hitomi. “The boy’s hurt, we need to get him out of here!”

Hitomi, just ahead of Junshin and with her back turned - facing the Hollow, which still reeled in agony from its lost limb - angled her head slightly to allow her to look over her shoulder out of the corner of one eye. She had not moved since the conclusion of her opening slash, the sheath of her sword still tucked into her obi with her weapon held to the rear at approximately hip height in her right hand only. Her glance was a fleeting one, her attention quickly returning to the Hollow.

“Fine,” she uttered. “Get him out of the way. I’ll handle this.”

Junshin nodded quickly, before scooping the boy up in his arms and rising to his feet, turning to move back the way they had come. However, even as he began to move he felt a sudden pang of indecision, hesitating as he looked back towards Hitomi - the girl still standing with her back to him, facing the Hollow that was by now beginning to recovery from its injury.

She didn’t look back.

Pursing his lips, Junshin resumed his task, taking off towards the far edge of the clearing. Unlike his previous breakneck speed, he moved at a pace closer to human norms - he didn’t wish to do the child any further injury by jostling him. As much as the safety of the child was important…indeed it was arguably their top priority, he couldn’t deny feeling a degree of shame as he left Hitomi to fight the Hollow on her own while he retreated to safety.

While he had stood frozen in terror she had acted. Although he had caught the child before he landed, it was Hitomi that had truly saved his life. He would never have moved at all, he knew, unless she had done so first. He had realised, long before that moment, that there was a pronounced difference between himself and Hitomi…but never before had that difference been more crushingly obvious as he continued to run, the clawing sensation of the Hollow’s spiritual pressure held at bay only by the presence of the girl who continued to fight.

‘Is this….all I’m good for…?’

Behind him, the Hollow had regained its footing and turned its rage filled gaze towards the Shinigami who had injured it. A fist the size of her torso lashed out towards Hitomi, accompanied by another inhuman roar as the Hollow sought vengeance. However, Hitomi deftly sidestepped the attack - the creature’s enormous size gave it strength, but its movements were large and telegraphed. Its fist merely thundered into the ground, splitting the surface of the soil into a spidery pattern of cracks, but missing Hitomi by a significant margin as she weaved elegantly to one side, extending her free arm to place an open palm against the Hollow’s thick, barrel chest.

“Hado thirty one,” she muttered, a brief crackle of crimson electricity sparking across the point of contact between herself and the Hollow. “Shakkako.”

An explosion of crimson light - like the explosion of a firework - an a thick fog of black, sulphur scented smoke blasted from the Hollow’s chest as the spell was fired. Striking with the force of a cannonball, the perfect sphere of crimson energy hurled the Hollow backwards a half-step before detonation. The explosion was directed into the Hollow, Hitomi unmoving by the small portion of the force that blasted back towards her, rippling her clothes and sending her long hair streaking out behind her like a whipping cape of crimson. The Hollow released a hideous shriek that was largely muffled by the sudden cacophony of noise created by the explosion of light and sound, a thick cloud of dust and debris spitting upwards around the creature as it crumbled to the ground like a broken doll.

Staggering in mid-run as the explosion left his ears ringing, Junshin drew to a halt as he turned to look back towards the battle, gazing in awe as the partially visible shape of the Hollow - a tangled mass of quivering flesh behind the veil of smoke.

‘She defeated it…? Just like that!?’

Half-turning towards the fight, Junshin was suddenly aware of how quickly he was breathing. His physical exertion thus far had been negligible by the standards of a Shinigami, but he felt drained nonetheless. His body was so charged with adrenaline that felt as though he had been running for the entire day - the inevitable climbdown from combat high would, he knew, be an exhausting experience.

“What are you doing!?” Hitomi suddenly bellowed over her shoulder at him, causing Junshin to jump, her gaze still on the collapsed figure of the Hollow. “I told you to move it!”

“B…but didn’t you just kill it?” Junshin replied, his body tensing as he half expected the Hollow to suddenly lurch back to its feet.

“It didn’t dissolve,” Hitomi replied, aiming the tip of her sword towards the creature as she began to take a few cautious steps forward. “It’s still alive….Just keep moving.”

Despite the instruction, Junshin remained where he was. Looking on in morbid fascination, he watched as Hitomi crept closer to the downed hollow as the cloud of smoke began to drift aside, revealing greater detail of the seemingly defeated monster. Squinting, Junshin took a step closer, partially turning his body to keep his torso between the Hollow and the still unconscious child, to get a better look.

The Hollow lay motionless, sprawled upon its back. Hitomi’s claims that the creature was still alive seemed immediately false, for the creature bore a gaping would upon its chest - a ragged hole, apparently punched into its body by the girl’s hado. The beast was motionless - even the yellow glow of its eyes having faded from behind its mask. It certainly looked dead. But Hitomi was right…it should have dissolved into spiritrons upon being killed. However, all the corpse - if indeed a corpse it was - appeared to be doing was spew thick black smoke from the hole in its chest and like broken upon the ground like an empty shell.

“Like an empty shell…” Junshin repeated the words aloud, frowning momentarily before his eyes flew wide in alarm. “Seraphina-kun! The smoke! That’s not from your hado, it’s…”

His warning came too late as Hitomi, perhaps coming to the same realisation, turned to raise her sword ineffectually against a blow that against which she reacted too late. The thick cloud of black smoke around her, having drifted to form a dense cloud to her left, suddenly shifted and coalesced; forming into solid matter before Junshin’s eyes as the many tiny molecules that made up the cloud compacted together to reform the entity that had birthed them.

The creature’s arm - the same left arm that Hitomi had earlier severed - was the first part of it to reform. Blasting out of the cloud upon a quickly reforming shoulder, the creature’s fist crashed directly into Hitomi’s midsection, the full follow-through of the punch thundering into the girl’s suddenly small and fragile looking frame to send her hurtling from her feet. With a strangled cry as the breath was knocked from her, Hitomi sailed from the Hollow - clear across the length of the clearing - to crash into the surrounding treeline.

“Hitomi!” Junshin cried out, the girl’s true name coming to his lips without thinking as his gaze instinctively moved to where she had disappeared to - her entry into the forest marked by a trail of shattered bark and dangling foliage. However, he was afforded little time to worry about his companion as the smoke continued to form into the body of the Hollow - even the shattered husk it had evacuated breaking away into dust to join the cloud that was now reforming the whole.

The ability had clearly consumed a great deal of reiatsu - the Hollow’s spiritual pressure was greatly diminished, but still as large - if not larger - than his own. Even if he stood a chance against it under normal circumstances, they was no way he could fight while he still carried the child in his arms. Cursing, Junshin looked from the reforming Hollow to the comatose youth, grinding his teeth as he was forced to make a quick, split second decision.

‘Seraphina-kun…I’m sorry!’

Turning on the spot, he darted into the forest, clutching the boy closer to him to try and minimise the effects of the various bumps and vibrations of his breakneck speed as he focused his energies upon retreat. It was the right decision to make - the safety of a civilian had to come first…but correct or not, it still left him feeling like a coward.

‘Damn it….damn it….DAMN IT! Why am I so damn weak!?’

Behind him, a crashing boom of splintering wood indicated that the Hollow had also entered the forest. Rather than going after Hitomi, it seemed the creature was more intent on resuming its interrupted meal. Growling out a curse, Junshin spared a glance over his shoulder, his breath catching as he observed forest behind him simply being torn apart in a dense storm of plan material and soil as the trees proved no obstacle for the Hollow’s enormous size.

Running, it seemed, was out of the question after all. As the distance between Junshin and the pursuing Hollow narrowed, his shrinking options left him with only viable alternative. Skidding to a halt, he stopped to send the young boy tumbling from his grasp in a roll - spinning along the ground to put some distance between the child and the inevitable battle as he reached for the hilts of his swords, drawing the twin kodachi even as he turned to face the onslaught of the Hollow closing fast behind, barely having time to firm up his stance before the enormous monstrosity exploded through the trees in a shower of bark and soil to descend upon him.

The harm that Hitomi had earlier inflicted upon the creature was now non-existent. Wielding both arms once more, propelled by its powerful back legs and charging upon its knuckles to remain upright, the Hollow’s yellow eyes immediately settled upon Junshin. For the second time, a sensation of cold terror seized his heart, but he was forced to bury his fear for now….there was no longer any option but to stand and fight.

Adjusting his grip on the two blades to hold them underarm - wielding the kodachi as daggers rather than swords - Junshin drew in a sharp intake of breath, firming up the muscles of his stomach and chest to receive a blow he knew he could not altogether prevent. Lacking Hitomi’s sheer speed, he made no attempt to dodge as the Hollow thundered towards him, reaching back with its left arm to deliver a punishing blow. As the first thundered towards him, Junshin swung both his zanpakuto to the fore, spearing the creature’s forearm on both sides as it careered towards him.

With a grunt of pain, he felt the enormous fist strike his chest - the entire weight of his much larger opponent piled in behind the blow, the audible snap of bone filling his ears as at least four ribs shifted beneath the blow. Unable to come to a complete stop, the Hollow forced him backwards into a skid, his heels digging into the soft earth as he maintained his footing, eventually grinding the Hollow to a complete stop.

Gasping out his held breath, Junshin’s open mouth ejected a thick stream of blood - gouged up from somewhere within his chest - across the silky green skin of the creature’s arm - held in place between his impaling blades. His swords had succeeded in slowing the incoming blow slightly…but only slightly. He still felt as though his body had been nearly snapped in half. However, running now on a combination of survival instinct and adrenaline, he forced his body to move. Tightening his grip upon the hilts of his swords, he turned the blades within the flesh of the Hollow, wrenching both weapons sharply downwards to cross them across the underside of its forearm.

Once again, it was the Hollow’s turn to howl in pain as it withdrew - issuing the same unearthly howl as it spewed thick, black blood from its now rubbery arm. Jushin’s blow had cleaved neatly through flesh, muscle and - most importantly - tendons. At the very least, he had succeeded in cutting the creature back down to one arm.

But what was he supposed to do now? Even as the Hollow withdrew, he found himself doubling over eject another stream of what was more blood than vomit. His Shinigami constitution allowed him to survive injuries - even internal injuries - that would kill a normal person…but there were upward limits even to what his body could tolerate. Even if he could survive, he wasn’t sure how effectively he could fight. Even as the thought occurred to him, he became aware of the edges of his vision dimming, numbness beginning to settle in over the top of the pain as he inched dangerously close to blacking out.

The Hollow was only momentarily compromised by its injury. Its masked features quickly turned back towards Junshin - its eyes flashing with rage. For the first time, however, Junshin noticed that its eyes - which had until now seemed to him to reflect little more than animalistic killing intent - glinted with a sudden and malignant intelligence.

Suddenly, the Hollow was on the move again. However, this time it did not move towards Junshin. To the Shinigami’s horror, it instead darted to the side, galloping upon its legs and intact arm towards where the child had come to a stop. Before Junshin’s horrified gaze, the creature stooped in mid-run, looking as though it intended simply to snatch up the child and retreat.

Junshin immediately made a move to intervene, but the attempt at motion proved to be all his body had left to give. His left knee buckling, he collapsed awkwardly to the ground, pain shrieking through his broken ribs as he attempted to drag himself forward - knowing there was no way he would be fast enough to prevent the Hollow escaping with its prey.

Even worse, however, was that the child had begun to come around. Sitting up groggily, one hand clutched to the side of his head, the boy appeared to take stock of his surroundings before his green eyes fell upon the quickly approaching Hollow. Junshin felt his heart leap into his throat at the look of stark terror that passed over the youth’s features as the monster tore towards him, willing his limbs to move unable to force them to do so. Unable to watch as the child was taken, he lowered his face to the ground, his eyes screwing tightly closed.

‘Damn it…I can’t even take one god damn punch! Damn it!…Damn it am I this useless!?’

“Hmph….and where do you think you’re going?”

Junshin snapped his head back up, disbelief chasing away his pain as he looked once more towards the Hollow. The creature’s charge had stopped, its thunderous advance cut short by the tip of Hitomi’s crimson zanpakuto - levelled. The girl stood between Hollow and child, her sword held extended in her right hand, utterly motionless, to warn the Hollow to a halt. The creature had stopped just out of range of her sword, eyeing the weapon warily, though neither moved immediately to attack.

Hitomi had not escaped the Hollow’s earlier blow unarmed; a cut to her temple wept a thick trail of blood down the left side of her face, while here uniform was scratched and torn in placed by her passage through the forest. However, she appeared otherwise none the worse for wear as, for the first time, she shifted her weight to assume an actual fighting stance. Taking hold of her sword in both hands, she held the sword at shoulder height - the blade parallel to the ground, her knees bent for quick, efficient movement.

As stunned by the girl’s sudden appearance as the Hollow was, Junshin merely stared for what was likely heartbeats, but felt to stretch on for minutes - the tiny girl facing down the enormous monster before her. She had taken the exact same blow he had…her body had to be just as damaged…yet how was she still on her feet? Not only catching up to them, but continuing to stand and fight?

‘Is she that much stronger than me...? No…her skills are more refined, but her spiritual pressure is only a little higher. She shouldn’t be able to stand right now anymore than I can. How is she doing it...?’

“Watch closely, Junshin-kun,” Hitomi suddenly spoke, causing him to jump, raising her voice to be heard across the distance that separated them. “This is the second lesson I’m going to teach you….and it’s what a Shinigami must have, above everything else!”

Like a coiled spring, Hitomi suddenly lowered her stance, her left hand sliding to the base of her zanpakuto’s hilt, her right hand remaining tight to the tsuba. A sudden ripple in the air around her marked a sharp increase in her spiritual pressure, her reiatsu flowing freely as she appeared to be preparing to pour her strength into a single attack, intending to kill the Hollow outright to prevent it making a second escape.

The Hollow seemed to come to the same realisation as Junshin, at it suddenly released another inhuman roar. Forgetting its caution of Hitomi’s weapon, the Hollow suddenly bore forward, shrieking out the same bellowing cry that Junshin knew would echo in his ears for the remainder of his days as the creature’s remaining arm lashed out towards Hitomi.

In the same instant, Hitomi darted forward, pouring her concentrated reiatsu into her blow as she advanced to meet the Hollow. Junshin winced as their colliding spiritual pressures sent a ripple of air pressure blasting out in all directions, knocking the breath from him as he was forced to turn his face aside. Soundlessly, the pair passed each other by, Hitomi’s momentum carrying her forward beyond the Hollow, landing in a crouch a mere five feet ahead of Junshin.

Behind her, the Hollow appeared to continue its course towards the child, uninterrupted. Transfixed, Junshin watched as Hitomi gracefully sheathed her sword, the blade sliding smoothly into the scabbard until it locked in place with a solid ‘click’, her dusk coloured eyes resting upon him as, with a single word, she concluded the lesson for today.

“Guts!” she declared, her expression resolute as - behind her - the Hollow collapsed to the ground as two separate halves, split vertically down its centre; almost immediately evaporating into black, odourless smoke as it disintegrated in death.

The Shinigami were victorious.

- - - Updated - - -


Act XIII: A Thorny First Meeting





“Honestly, how did you manage to get through the Academy without learning how to roll with a punch?”

Hitomi’s admonishments had barely stopped since the battle with the Hollow. Even as she had unsung her backpack to haphazardly tug out various bandages and medical equipment, she had proceeded into a lengthy sermon about a great deal that Junshin knew he should probably have understood better; things such as momentum, reiatsu fortification, and body movement that helped once better absorb a direct blow. The fact that he felt as though his chest had been struck by a cannonball while Hitomi’s injuries - it seemed - amounted to little more than a few scratches and the gash to her forehead, implied he should probably have listened.

However, he wasn’t in much of a listening mood. Thoroughly demoralised by his failure to do much of anything during the battle, he merely stared sullenly at the ground as Hitomi poked and prodded at his torso to try and determine which of his ribs were broken. He knew that her lecture was probably intended for his benefit…but all it did was underline the overwhelming difference between the two of them.

“If you’re opponent is bigger and heavier than you,” Hitomi explained, “don’t expect your body to be able to withstand the collision. You need to either put up a wall of spiritual pressure, or at least move in the direction of the blow to cushion yourself a little. Tch…now you’re all torn up. This’ll slow us down a bit.”

“I’ll heal,” Junshin murmured sullenly, wincing as the girl’s prodding fingers moved against one of his cracked ribs. It wasn’t an exaggeration - already he could feel his reiatsu threading through his body, knitting together broken flesh and bone. Although only those Shinigami with either the talent of training to do so could actually heal injuries instantly, all Shinigami could recover from injury faster - and survive more grievous harm - than a normal person. For all that however, despite having made the argument, Junshin had to admit he felt fairly terrible.

“I suppose you will,” Hitomi sighed, rising to her feet, gingerly dusting off the knees of her hakama once she was satisfied none of Junshin’s ribs were stabbing into his organs. “Still, we could be in far better shape right now. You’re injured, our ride is probably long gone, and now we’ve got take care of this kid….Speaking of which, try and tape up your ribs in the meantime. I’ll go and check on him.”

Junshin nodded, fishing through the medical supplies as Hitomi moved in the direction of the child, feeling thoroughly useless. The boy in question had neither moved nor spoken since the destruction of the Hollow, merely staring in silence at the two Shinigami with as much visible apprehension as he had regarded the Hollow with. When Hitomi finally started to move towards him, the child started, his body tensing as though being approached by a monster.

“Hey, calm down,” Hitomi raised her hands to show they were empty, though Junshin winced as her tone was utterly devoid of anything that could be described as maternal instinct. “You’re okay, now. Are you hurt anywhere?”

The child regarded her silently, offering no answer. His eyes briefly flickered back and forth between the two Shinigami, narrowing in mistrust before he made a sudden move to retreat. Much to Junshin’s surprise, the boy turned on the spot, scampering almost like an animal into the undergrowth, rapidly disappearing on all fours into the foliage.

“Crap! NononononNO!” Hitomi exclaimed, bounding after the vanishing child as she snapped out a hand to grasp at his ankle before he could complete his retreat. A string of utterly foul language followed immediately afterwards - not from Hitomi, but rather from the child, as he struggled in vain to shake off the hand that held him in place.

“Yeah, yeah, I’m an f’ing this and an f’ing that,” Hitomi muttered, paraphrasing some of the child’s language, having stooped to one knee to maintain her grip on the child’s ankle. Although she did not drag him backwards, she did prevent any more of him disappearing into the vegetation. “Sorry kid, but I can’t let you run off until I’ve had a look at you.”

“Leggo!” the child snapped, a swirl of vegetation within the forest floor preceding the emergence of his other leg, the child having apparently rolling onto his back to kick futilely at Hitomi’s hand.

“I will if you stop trying to run away,” Hitomi countered with an exasperated sigh as Junshin, distracted from his search for suitable medical supplies, peered curiously at the embattled pair.

“Leggo!” the child repeated. “You damn old lady!”

Junshin couldn’t be certain…but he was quite sure that he briefly, her eyebrow twitching as both corners of her mouth curved into a thoroughly macabre grin that Junshin found thoroughly disturbing, a crimson flush spreading over her face from neck to forehead. Immediately abandoning any attempt to let the boy come back on his own, Hitomi abruptly rose to her feet, yanking the child from the undergrowth to dangle him - upside down- by his leg. Holding the youth aloft, Junshin very nearly fell backwards in surprise as the redhead suddenly bellowed.

“Who the hell are you calling old, you little bastard!?”

“You’re old,” the child shouted back defiantly, swinging both fists as though to strike at Hitomi - though his limbs fell well short of the mark. “Pu’mee down! Fight me like a man!”

“I’m not a man!” Hitomi retorted, placing one fists on her hips as she continued to dangle the boy by his ankle. “And hey! I just saved your life you know. A little thank you wouldn’t go amiss, you little squirt!”

“I didn’t need no help!” the child exclaimed, Junshin blinking stupidly as he watched the exchange, feeling very much as though he was watching an argument between two children. “If I’d had another few seconds, I woulda ‘scaped just fine!”

“Um…Seraphina-san,” Junshin cautioned, deciding now was probably a good time to step in. Rising to his feet, he offered his companion a placating smile. “Maybe you should go a bit easier on him…He is child a child after….”

“Hey, screw you Wetpants!” the boy shouted, suddenly turning his wrath upon Junshin. “I ain’t no kid! I’m street smart!”

‘…W…Wetpants!?’

“Yeah, right, whatever,” Hitomi shrugged, lowering the child until his dangling hands were able to touch the ground, before releasing her grip on his ankle, causing the bow to flop in an untidy heap back to the ground. “Either way, you’re not running until I’ve had a look at you. Unless you want to risk running off into the forest and dying of internal bleeding…and clean up your mouth too, runt.”

“You should check his left arm, Seraphina-kun,” Junshin instructed, having taken a moment to recover from the child’s thoroughly degrading choice of nickname. “It looked to me like it was…”

He trailed off as he watched the boy push himself back up to his feet, using both hands to do it without any apparent discomfort. Frowning, he watched as Hitomi knelt in front of the boy, padding down her reluctant patient in search of injury, before turning towards him with a shake of her head.

“He seems fine,” she told him. “Guess he got lucky.”

“…R…right,” Junshin nodded, wondering how he could possibly have been mistaken. He could almost have sworn that the boy’s arm had been thoroughly ravaged within the Hollow’s grip. However, sure enough the child defiantly folded his arms - without any visible discomfort - to glare disapprovingly at Hitomi.

“My name ain’t Brat,” he declared. “It’s Dirk. You should remember it. I’m gonna be famous some day!”

“Yeah, you and everyone else kid,” Hitomi muttered, sounding as though she was speaking more to herself than to the child. Rising to her feet, she turned towards Junshin with a shrug. “Not much help for it…We can’t just leave him here. We might be able to catch up to Ford on our own, but not dragging him along. Looks like we’ll be walking for a while.”

“Hey, I ain’t no baggage,” Dirk objected, ineffectually shoving against Hitomi’s hip, failing to cause her to budge. “I told you, I’m street smart.”

“S…Seraphina-kun is right, Dirk-kun,” Junshin interrupted, leaning forward to place his hands on his knees, offering the youngster a smile. “There could be other dangers about, and its our duty to see you to safety. My name is Junshin. I promise that you‘re safe with us.”

“Pfft, yeah right,” Dirk shook his head emphatically, folding his arms again as he pointedly looked away from Junshin in disinterest. “Like I need any protection from you, Wetpants.”

‘He…called me Wetpants again….’

His smile tightening, Junshin fought to maintain his pleasant airs. Hitomi made no similar effort, scratching the back of her head with an exasperated sigh as she placed her other hand on the top of Dirk’s head, forcibly turning his face towards her as she stooped to look him in the eye.

“Fine. You’ve got a mouth on you, we get it,” she muttered. “Let’s just get this over with. You live around here, runt?”

“I told you it ain’t runt,” Dirk shot back, pulling away from her hand and raising both hands to fix his messy tangle of hair - succeeding, if anything, in making it even messier than it was. “My name’s Dirk. You should learn t’listen, old lady!”

“Well I’ll stop calling you runt if you stop calling me old lady,” Hitomi returned, placing both her hands as fists on her hips. “Anyway, just answer the question.”

“No, I ain’t from around here,” Dirk replied, apparently relenting. “My Da’ comes here t’fish. There’s good fishing this far downriver. Way better than there is back in District Seventy. I got kinda bored though…went for a wander when I ran into that thing. I was just about t’kick its ass when you two showed up.”

“Your father comes all this way to fish, Dirk-kun?” Junshin queried, ignoring the child’s bravado, not altogether certain how easy that was to believe that the story about his father was any more true. Travelling from District Seventy to the third or second district that they were in now was essentially the equivalent of travelling the length of an entire country.

“Sure, why not?” Dirk shrugged. “It’s only ‘couple of days by river.”

Junshin started, glancing towards Hitomi as the latter returned his gaze with interest. He hadn’t even considered travelling by water and, by the manner in which his companions eyes suddenly lit up, neither had she. Having been unsure how they were ever going to reach the Outer Rim in time, running into this child seemed a stroke of supremely good luck. A lift to the Outer Rim seemed the least a grateful father could provide in exchange for saving his son’s life.

“Your father,” Hitomi turned back to Dirk, her tone immediately losing much of its venom, “can you take us to him?”

“Uh…you ain’t gonna tell ‘im about my cursin’ are ya?” Dirk grimaced, taking a hesitant step backwards at the sudden suggestion.

“What?” Hitomi squinted. “No….what the hell do I care about your….never mind. But no. We just want to meet with him.”

“Well….a’right,” the boy shrugged. “Although what a pair of Shinigami would want with my Da’ I dunno. Fine, I’ll take you to ‘im. But make sure you don’t slow me down, old lady!”

Turning on his heel, Dirk took off at a spring into the forest, leaving Hitomi behind as the latter’s face turned a fascinating shape of purple. Grinding her teeth, the girl quivering in anger, Junshin winced and raised both hands to his ears as the redhead bellowed after the child at the top of her lungs.

“I told you I’M NOT OLD!”

This said, Hitomi immediately sat out after the child - although Junshin wasn’t certain whether she was actually following his lead or just intending to catch up with him to tear him apart. Heaving a sigh, he took a moment to gather up the medical supplies still scattered around the forest floor, noting that he had not been afforded any chance whatsoever to treat his injuries.

‘Ah well…at least you can’t say life with this girl isn’t exciting.’

Clutching an armful of bandages, bandaids and small boxes of painkillers and blood-thinners, Junshin put the pain of his aching ribs aside as, eager not to be left behind, he set off in pursuit of Hitomi and their new, loudmouthed guide.

[Seraphina]

Act XIV: The Fisherman of the Rukongai



It was hard going for the two Shinigami as they followed Dirk’s path through the forest. Not because the boy was in better physical condition than they were - in fact the opposite was certainly the case - but because the path he took was one intended for someone of a child’s size. More than once, the boy would scurry into what was, to the adult Shinigami, an impassable wall of thorns and foliage, forcing them to clamber around via a wider route, trying desperately to keep the boy in sight as he made little in the way of effort to wait for them.

It did not help that Hitomi, at least for her part, remained concerned about the possibility of other Hollows among the trees. Her hand resting on the hilt of her zanpakuto, she divided her attention as much to the darkness among the thick forest interior as she did on Dirk - although she did not detect anything remotely similar to the spiritual pressure of the Hollow, she remained reluctant to lower her guard.

By all rights, the Hollow should not even have been there. It was, quite possibly, the closest a Hollow had been sighted to the Seireitei for centuries, certainly for decades, with the notable exception of the attack on the Shinigami Academy. But even those Hollows had been Arrancar - infinitely more powerful and capable than the near animalistic creature they had encountered today. While Arrancar were both dangerous and organised enough to risk an attack on the Seireitei, a normal Hollow would likely have felt physical pain simply by coming so close to the nerve centre of the Shinigami. Even from so many miles away, Hitomi was still certain she could feel the vague tug of the incalculable spiritual pressure of the Captain class Shinigami still in the city.

Such a thing would have been a warning flare to a Hollow. The difference in strength between the Hollow they had fought and a Captain was the difference between a person and a fruit fly. No Hollow, even one that seemed as animalistic and unintelligent as they creature they had fought, would have approached the Seireitei….not unless another force were there to drive it onward.

What its presence merely a symptom, perhaps, of what was going on further West?

The possibility of the group they were being sent to investigate having members who were spiritually aware had occurred to her. Indeed, it seemed overwhelmingly likely given how quickly they had subdued the hardened criminal elements of the Outer Rim. However, Hollows were typically attracted to beings of higher than average spiritual pressure - she had learned that lesson well when Shadrin’s attempt to bring her back with him from Jetsam had been interrupted by a Hollow attack - but if she were to ascribe any particular behaviour to this Hollow’s actions, she would almost say that it had been fleeing.

‘What…is going on out there?’

“Hey, Dirk,” she called out, raising her voice to make sure the child heard. “If you’re from out West, perhaps you can tell us what’s going on there?”

“Huh?” Dirk’s voice echoed back to her, slightly muffled by the foliage. “Naw. Ain’t much that I get to see except fish and housework. I ain’t got much interest in much else, and adults don’t talk to kids about that sort of thing. You’d be better of askin’ Da’.”

‘Tough kid…he doesn’t even seem that phased after being attacked by a Hollow. I nearly had a breakdown the first time I saw one. I’ll give credit where credit’s due, brat, you’re a damn sight tougher than I was.’

“Seraphina-kun,” Junshin spoke up from behind her, grimacing as he picked his way through a near knee-deep tangle of brambles. “Shouldn’t we report the Hollow encounter to the Seireitei before we do anything else? Won’t that…I mean…doesn’t that change the mission dramatically?”

Hitomi glanced over her shoulder at Junshin, allowing herself a brief smile as she realised that her companion had likely come to the same conclusions she had about the Hollow’s presence. Junshin struck her as something of an academic…she could quite easily picture him as someone who had spent more time at the Academy at study rather than training. Wherever he was lacking as a warrior, he was at the very least astute in mind.

“We can’t draw any conclusions just yet,” she replied, lightly shrugging her shoulders. “Whatever first impressions we may have, we shouldn't go ahead raising the alarm over it just yet…When we get to the Outer Rim, we’ll probably be able to get a better picture of what’s going on. I don’t think there’s much point in going back just to give a report that begins and ends with ‘fought and killed a low-grade Hollow’.”

“R…right,” Junshin nodded, his gaze dropping to his feet, Hitomi immediately regretting her use of the words ‘low grade’. There was no way Junshin would have been able to defeat the Hollow had she not been there…she supposed the use of the phrase did his bruised ego little good. But be that as it may, it remained an accurate description….if there really were powerful spiritual beings running around the Outer Rim, then it was best that they erred on the side of caution and at least prepared for the possibility of hostilities.

If they were greeted aggressively then Junshin, as he was now, would be effectively useless. Although he had all the theoretical skills of a Shinigami, he didn’t have a shred of the experience required to put them together. It was only when looking at him that Hitomi realised exactly how much her various trials had prepared her for life as a Shinigami that the Academy simple never would. On paper, she and Junshin should have been equal….in reality, his abilities appeared to be behind her in every measurable quantity. If they did have to fight enemies more powerful than that Hollow in the Outer Rim…then he would almost certainly be killed.

‘With any luck, we’ll get a chance to train before we get there…Dirk said it was only a two day trip, but every little helps. Even that one fight just now might have helped him though….you never fight the same way after you’ve faced a real life or death situation like that.’

“Hey, Old Lady and Wetpants,” Dirk’s voice echoed back to her, sounding further away that it had been and immediately causing her temper to rise, “keep up, or I’ll leave ya!”

“Dirk-kun certainly is…..expressive,” Junshin observed, smiling uncertainly, perhaps in an attempt to placate her. Hitomi merely heaved a sigh, before tossing her head in the direction from which the boy’s voice had sounded, quickening her pace as she picked her way through the vegetation until the way forward cleared up slightly.

Placing her palm against a fallen tree trunk to deftly vault over it to the other side, Hitomi realised for the first time that the sound of water had once again returned to her ears. Not the bubbling trickle of the tiny spring in the clearing where they had faced the Hollow, but rather the whooshing rush of a swift flowing river. The trees were beginning to thin, and Hitomi caught sight of Dirk once more - the boy some fifteen yards ahead of them, sauntering along without a backward glance.

Beyond the boy, the soft shimmer of the sun reflecting upon the water’s surface indicated the presence of the river that now danced within her ears, and Hitomi quickened her pace to catch up with Dirk - not looking back as a sharp thump and a grunt indicated that Junshin had tripped over the log. Grimacing, but thinking Junshin’s pride was probably better spared if she simply pretended not to notice, she took off at a loping run that brought her to a stop just behind Dirk as the latter continued towards what was clearly the edge of the forest, the thinning tree line providing no further obstacles as they approached the river….and it was, indeed, quite a river.

Unlike the Great Canal Ways of the North Rukongai, the water ways of the West Rukongai were naturally occurring. Fed by an enormous lake - which was very nearly the size of a small country - near the centre of the Rukongai, many hundreds of rivers snaked their way through the West Rukon, but none larger than the one referred to - perhaps somewhat unimaginatively - as ‘The Great Blue’. Running through the entire Western region, the east Great Blue connected district one to the central lake, while the west Great Blue exited the lake to continue westward into the Outer Rim. It was the same river down which Hitomi had made part of her journey towards the Seireitei, years previously.

At its widest points some five kilometres in breadth, the river was the primary source of water for much of the West Rukongai, and virtually all of its major settlements had sprung up along its length. For, while non-spiritually aware souls had no need to either eat of drink, it was nevertheless common practice to do so. Water was also required for many facets of city life, from hygiene to manufacturing, and no settlement could grow large without its presence.

At this particular stretch of river, the opposite shore - also heavily wooded from what Hitomi could see - was only a few hundred meters wide. Separated from the tree line by a stretch of beige sand, the river was still deceptively deep only a few feet from the water’s edge, as evidenced by the several men who waded chest-deep in its cool depths only a short distance out.

Although Dirk quickened his pace to a run, Hitomi hesitated as she eyed the group - more surprised than apprehensive. When Dirk had described his father, she had envisioned a man with perhaps a small fishing boat into which they would be forced to cram for the trip West. However, what she saw instead, bobbing slightly upon the water, tethered in place by several wrist-thick ropes tied around enormous stones upon the shore, was a fully fledged barge.

The flat bottomed ship was some twenty feet in length and perhaps ten broad, though the exterior deck appeared to be both work and sleeping area for its sailors - having no cabins or additional compartments that she could see. Aside from the two masts - one in the centre and the other towards the bow, the only structure upon the deck was a square box - made, as far as Hitomi could see, from a single hollowed out piece of wood - which she assumed was where the haul would be stored to keep it out of the open air for the return journey.

All in all, it looked like quite an enterprise. Rather than being present simply to fish for his family - as Hitomi had initially expected - Dirk’s father appeared to be in the process of gathering up a large enough catch to feed an entire community. The man in the water, none of whom appeared to be any older that Hitomi herself, were in the process of deploying nets across the river for large scale catching. They appeared to be receiving instruction from an older man standing upon the deck of the ship, who Hitomi could only assume was Dirk’s father.

The man was in his late forties or early fifties, although his skin was so worn by years of exposure to the sun upon the river that he may have looked older than he was. He wore a pair of cloth breeches rolled up to his knees - soaked black to indicate that he had likely been in the water also at some point - and a sleeveless shirt thrown over his somewhat bony torso. His hair, which had once been black but was beginning to show heavy signs of grey at his temples, was heavily receding as the man burned through his middle years. With a thick, slightly hooked nose and a broad jaw - clean shaven, which was something of an oddity among men of the Outer Rim - he was far from a handsome man. There was, however, a certain air of majestic pride as he watched the men in the river dutifully and efficiently carry out his orders.

Hitomi imagined that the young men may have been his sons - for certainly they worked well and with little need for communication among themselves, looking very much as though they had been working together for many years. However they did not physically resemble him in any way. Some of the young men were, in fact, rather handsome; others sported wildly different hair, eye or skin colour from the man upon the deck. Dirk, in fact, did not truly resemble him either. Hitomi imagined that, if the group was a family, then they were likely one of the many makeshift, self-chosen families that made up the majority of cohabiting groups within the Outer Rim.

The old fisherman had not yet noticed the approach of Dirk of the Shinigami, but it was Dirk who first garnered his attention. Energetically paddling out to the boat, swimming expertly despite his young age, Dirk clambered onto the boat like a spider monkey to begin speaking to his father. Hitomi followed at a slower pace, glancing backwards to make sure that Junshin had not fallen behind altogether.

Her companion was still present, shuffling along behind her and looking slightly the worse for wear. His reiatsu had probably been afforded ample time to heal the worst of his wounds, but she imagined he was probably still in some degree of pain. Slowing to a stop altogether, she waited for him to catch up, offering what she hoped looked like a sympathetic smile.

Whatever else could be said about Junshin, he had not uttered a single word of complaint. She could respect that. As her companion came to a stop beside her, nodding his thanks at her slowing of their pace, Hitomi allowed him a moment to catch his breath, still clutching an armful of medical supplies to his chest.

“How are your ribs?” she queried, noting that she hadn’t given him much time to make use of any of the supplies she had offered.

“They’re feeling much better now,” Junshin replied, slightly flushed in the face. “I…I’ve never really been beaten up like that before. I’m surprised how quickly my body is able to bounce back.”

“Broken bones are pretty easy so long as they stay roughly where they’re meant to be,” Hitomi told him. “It’s the same with cuts and scrapes, they’ll usually heal quite rapidly. The biggest problem is if the bone breaks away from where its meant to be…or worse, if it stabs into one of your internal organs…then that would have been a different story. Broken bones set themselves, but injured organs would need the Fourth Division.”

“I guess I got lucky,” Junshin smiled, though Hitomi noticed some of the colour drain from his features at the thought. Nodding in agreement, she turned her attention back towards the boat. Dirk was still talking to his father, but the man had lifted his head to look towards the two Shinigami, eyeing them curiously as Dirk continued what Hitomi was sure would be a less than honest rendition of their encounter with the Hollow.

“Do you want some time to treat any of your other injuries?” she queried.

“No,” Junshin shook his head. “Well…nothing desperate, anyway. I’m just feeling sore now, mostly.”

“Alright,” she nodded. “Put that stuff down for now, then. Put on your best ‘protect and serve’ face for the Gotei Thirteen….This is a good chance to get not just a lift, but also information. Fukuda-dono said we were to be investigators, so let’s get to it.’

“Come on,” she instructed, starting out towards the boat, gesturing for Junshin to follow. “Let’s go and meet the locals.”

- - - Updated - - -


Act XV: The Way Forward





As the two Shinigami approached, the old man with whom Dirk was speaking raised his head towards them, placing a hand on Dirk’s shoulder to turn the young boy to face them also. Leaning slightly lower, he murmured a few last quiet words to Dirk, before waiting for Hitomi and Junshin to approach the ship. Hitomi, taking the lead, raised a hand in greeting as she came to a stop on the bank. She had spent enough time with Shadrin to know well enough that simply waltzing onto a sailor’s boat without permission was - at best - gravely offensive.

“Ahoy,” she called, thinking it best to identify herself first. “Seraphina, fifth Division of the Gotei Thirteen.”

“Kiyoko Junshin,” her companion called out from behind her, thankfully following her lead, “of the same.”

“Ahoy,” the old man returned their greeting, walking Dirk to the edge of the ship’s deck. “I am Yoshitaka Kuroda…a man whom, for whatever it may be worth, shall be raising a glass to the Gotei Thirteen for the remainder of his days. You have my deepest thanks for the rescue of my son.”

Kuroda hesitated a moment, giving Dirk a meaningful sideways glance. The boy’s response was a derisive snort, turning his head away. The old fisherman did not relent, however, applying pressure to the boy’s shoulder to force him into a compliant bow before the Shinigami, nodding in satisfaction as - if grudgingly, Dirk spoke the words that Kuroda had obviously fed to him.

“Thank you for my life,” the boy grumbled, “Shinigami-dono.”

“There,” Kuroda smiled slightly, releasing his grip on the boy’s shoulder to allow him to stand. “That wasn’t so hard, was it? Now…go help your brothers while I speak to these fine people.”

Dirk’s cheeks flushed noticeable in embarrassment, not looking in the direction of the Shinigami as he sauntered away to comply. His hands in his pockets, he kicked his feet against the deck dejectedly before abruptly leaping from the side of the ship into the cool water. As before, Hitomi noted that the boy was a strong swimmer despite his small size. The children of fisherman were usually raised as much on the water as they were on land, as comfortable swimming as they were walking or running. Dirk, it seemed, was no exception.

“Well now,” Kuroda spoke, turning back to face his two guests after briefly watching Dirk’s departure, “you have my thanks, also, Seraphina-san. Kiyoko-san. Whatever else a man may value in life, if he values anything higher than his children then he is surely a fool. I owe you both a great deal.”

“We….it was just our duty, Yoshitaka-san,” Junshin offered the old man a brief bow, Hitomi noting that the young man was unable to keep a shy smile for his features at the praise…she didn’t imagine Junshin was very used to being openly praised by strangers.

‘Bloody hell, was I ever that naive? I want him to feel indebted to us. We need a lift.’

“We’re glad we arrived in time to offer our assistance, Yoshitaka-san,” Hitomi addressed the fisherman directly. “It’s probably worth mentioning that your boy remained gutsy throughout the encounter. Whatever else he might be, he certainly isn’t cowardly.”

“Hah!” Kuroda grinned, revealing surprisingly white teeth considering his state of obvious poverty. “I suppose he gave you some lip, didn’t he? That’s my Dirk…marches to the beat of his own drum, that one. Doesn’t much listen to anyone except….well…I keep hoping that he’ll learn a little temperance when he’s older. But, ah well, there’s time enough for that I suppose.’

“In any case, I hope that neither of you were injured during the battle?” the old man queried, looking back and forth between the two Shinigami.

“Nothing too severe,” Hitomi replied. “We’re a little battered and bruised, but nothing that won’t heal….our biggest concern at the moment is time. We were headed for the Outer Rim but, at the first sign of trouble, our driver left us behind. We have to get to District Seventy by the fastest route available, and…”

“Say no more,” Kuroda raised a hand, waving away whatever else she may have been about to say. “I’m certainly more than beholden enough to you that a ride into the Outer Rim is a small thing to offer. We’re going to be heading back to District Seventy within the next hour, and you’re more than welcome to come. In fact I‘m glad to see some Shinigami heading out that way…Some odd things going on out West.”

“If possible,” Hitomi ventured. “We would like some information on that, too, if you have any to give. As you can probably guess, investigating those goings on is the reason we’re heading that way.”

“Hrmm,” the fisherman frowned pensively, but assented with a nod. “I can’t say I know much….my town hasn’t seen any of the trouble yet, fortunately. But there’s plenty of time to tell you what I do know. My boys and I need to get our work squared away, but I’ll answer any questions you have once we’re finished.”

“Thank you,” Hitomi nodded, releasing a small sigh of relief. For the first time, it seemed that their rather ill fated mission was back on something that resembled a schedule. If the trip was only going to take two days, then it afforded them plenty of time to gather information after their arrival. As disastrous as it had seemed at the time, their encounter with the Hollow almost seemed fateful, now. “Permission to come aboard?”

“Aye,” Kuroda nodded. “Make yourselves at home…I’m afraid she’s not much to look at, and there aren’t any chairs, but feel free to make yourselves comfortable wherever you can. Hope you don’t mind the smell of fish.”

Hitomi checked a wince, the thought of spending the next two days surrounded by the scent of death fish suddenly seeming less than appealing. However, she nimbly leapt from shore to deck, bypassing the gangplank completely as the leap was a small one even by the standards of a normal person. Glancing up and down the deck, Hitomi noted that a collection of sleeping rolls had been bundled up towards the bow of the ship, and this was likely where Kuroda’s family bunked down for the night. Under normal circumstances she would give this area a wide berth - knowing that the bedding on such low income craft was often a haven for ticks and lice. However, both Kuroda and Dirk had seemed rather clean and well ordered - it was probably save to assume that their ship, as unimpressive as it was, would be kept in a similar state.

‘I haven’t used that much reiatsu in a long time…a short nap does sound like a good idea.’

Turning to make her way towards the front end of the ship, she glanced over her shoulder to offer Kuroda a final nod of acknowledgement. However, she hesitated as she noted that the old man’s face had taken on a rather profound change. Although she would not go so far as to call it surprise, the old fisherman’s features had taken on a note of curiosity, both his eyebrows rising upon his forehead as he regarded Hitomi close-up for the first time.

Frowning, Hitomi endured the old man’s inquisitive glance for several seconds longer than she thought were strictly appropriate. Unsure of the reason behind the stare, she finally opened her mouth to query it when Kuroda suddenly turned away, shrugging his shoulders with a wry, barely perceptible smile.

“I guess life moves in circles after all,” he murmured, the words so quiet that Hitomi only barely caught them, before Kuroda turned away to direct his attention back to his sons, shouting instructions to them as they continued their work. Hitomi peered curiously as the old man’s turned back, wondering what exactly he had meant. However, her considerations turned elsewhere as Junshin - mirroring her earlier leap to land on the opposite side of her, reached out a hand to tug on her sleeve.

“Seraphina-kun,” her companion murmured as a whisper. “May….may I speak to you.”

“Hmm?” Hitomi quirked an eyebrow, her attention drifting from the fisherman towards Junshin. “What is it?”

“I….um…I would like to ask a favour,” the young man murmured, his gaze wandering everywhere except directly towards Hitomi, clearly somewhat embarrassed. Hitomi eyed him curiously, before raising a hand to gesture in the direction she had been heading, moving towards the bow of the ship with Junshin in tow. Leaving the fishermen to their work, the two Shinigami moved to the far side of the barge, Hitomi unslinging her backpack to dump it haphazardly against the interior edge of the ship before throwing herself down beside it. Folding her legs underneath her, crossing her arms, she peered at Junshin expectantly as the latter remained standing.

“I asked you earlier if you would help me with my Jinzen,” Junshin explained, shifting uncomfortably beneath her gaze as she stooped to place the armful of medical supplies he still carried down on the deck, depositing his own backpack beside them. “I…I thank you for agreeing to that, but I think our fight with that Hollow made it clear that I need more than that.”

Hitomi didn’t reply, though she noted that Junshin’s thoughts appeared to be in line with her own. She waited as Junshin lowered himself to the deck slow, sitting somewhat awkwardly as he clearly struggled to put his thoughts into words.

“I am weak,” he stated, rather bluntly. “You were able to save me this time, but I can’t rely on that happening the next time…or the time after that. We don‘t know what we‘re going to find out there…at the very least, more Hollows. If I’m going to be anything but a burden, then I need to become strong enough that I can stand beside Seraphina-kun, rather than needing her protection.”

Hitomi didn’t reply at once, eyeing the young man curious as he continued to shift uncomfortably beneath her gaze. Much of what he had said fell in line with her own line of thinking - thought as obvious as his shortcomings were to both of them, it likely hadn’t been easy for him to admit them out loud. Training him was exactly what she had in mind, even had he not asked for it, but it was perhaps a good sign that Junshin acknowledged that he had plenty of room for improvement.

“You’re right, Junshin-kun,” she admitted. “Right now…I’m beginning to understand why Fukuda-dono only wanted to give this mission to experienced officers. We’re barely underway, but I feel like we’re already far beyond the depth that an average recruit would be capable of dealing with. As things stand, you’re not strong enough.’

“But,” she added, noting the resigned slump to Junshin’s shoulders. “I do not, and have never, thought of you as a burden, Junshin-kun. The primary difference between the two of us is experience…I was thrown into the meat grinder early on, and that’s why there’s such a difference between us. But, that being so, you managed to make it through the Academy, and you have all the tools and training you need to be strong. All you need is the experience required to use those tools properly.”

“I see,” Junshin nodded, appearing to take some small comfort from her words. “…Thank you…But, if it’s experience I require, does that mean you won’t be able to teach me?”

“Heh, well, I didn’t say that,” Hitomi replied, smiling lightly as she gave the barest shrug of her shoulders. “A lot of people say that training isn’t a substitute for experience…And while I think that’s true, experience means nothing without training. Whether we are aware of it at the time or not, every fight teaches us something…but it‘s only by training what we‘ve learned that we have any chance of putting those lessons to use in the future.’

“So, tell me,” she leaned forward slightly, placing her hands on her knees as she fixed Junshin with an appraising stare, “what did you learn in your fight with the Hollow?”

“That I shouldn’t let a Hollow punch me in the sternum,” Junshin smiled, rather bitterly, as he placed a hand to his chest. However, as Hitomi quirked an eyebrow, he sat up straighter, looking as though he was genuinely reaching for an answer. “I….I tried to shore up my reiatsu in my torso to absorb some of the impact. I think I managed at least some of it…that’s probably the only reason my ribcage wasn’t completely crushed.”

“Well, that’s something,” Hitomi nodded. “One of the biggest mistakes inexperienced Shinigami can do is to let their muscles do most of the work. While it’s important we all stay in good shape for the purposes of flexibility and to make sure our bodies can keep up with our movements, most of the work is actually done by our reiatsu. Even a Shinigami on the level of a third or fourth seat has physical strength that is as many as a hundred times that of a normal person. Even your physical strength is probably ten times a normal man….If that strength came just from their muscles, then all Shinigami would be massive He-man types. The reason we’re not is because a good deal of our physical abilities comes from reiatsu rather than actual muscle power.’

“If you’re inefficient at directing your reiatsu throughout your body,” she explained, “then not only your defence is compromised….but your speed, your strength, your stamina…every single one of your physical abilities will be stunted. You can do it…like you said, you must have gotten at least some of your reiatsu concentrated in your chest…but you’re not doing it well. If we can work on that, then you’re bound to see a massive increase in all of your fighting abilities.”

“I understand,” Junshin nodded, leaning forward eagerly as Hitomi continued her explanation. “That makes sense, actually….You said earlier that there are way of training these abilities to make them easier to use in real situations? Do you have any exercises for that?”

“….I do,” Hitomi flashed what she imagined was a thoroughly macabre grin. “If you’re quite sure you can handle it.”

“I…um….” Junshin hesitated noticeably, but Hitomi waved away his concerns as she coiled to her feet, waving away his concerns.

“Don’t worry,” she advised. “It’s nothing that’ll cause you much harm. It just not easy, and it’s draining. It’s something that Sha…well…I suppose I should call him ‘my sensei’ had me practice a lot when I was in my second year of the Academy. The best way to master reiatsu control, you see, is to start small….once you’ve learned precision, then the more large scale ways of handling your reiatsu become easier.”

Looking suddenly eager, Junshin rose to his feet also. She felt a pang of devilish glee as the young man’s expression faltered slightly as she pulled her zanpakuto from her obi - sheath and all - before his apprehension turned into a frown as she placed the weapon down altogether beside her backpack. Turning side on to Junshin, she extended an arm before her as a fist, extending her index finger only, before tilting sharply forward to allow herself to fall towards the ground.

The tip of her finger struck to hard wood of the deck - throwing up a small scuff of sawdust. The entire weight of her body behind it, one would likely have expected to her the dry snap of her finger buckling. However, though the tip of her finger whitened from the pressure, her single digit held her aloft. Straightening her legs, folding her left arm behind her back, she proceeded to lift and lower herself upon the deck on a series of rapid, one-finger push ups. Junshin, who had initially cringed in expectation of her breaking her finger, watched with mouth agape as her single digit easily supported the weight of her body.

“It’s….it’s so simple,” he stammered, perhaps having expected something more visually dramatic, such as opening tinned food using just your eyelid, or breaking stone with a head butt. Hitomi, not halting her exercise, turned her head to flash him a grin. Shadrin’s training exercises did tends towards simplicity…but it was often in simplicity that the best results were found.

“It might look easy,” she explained, “but getting enough reiatsu into just one finger to hold up your body, not to mention keeping it there, requires a great deal of control. It’s an excellent way to learn how to get your reiatsu where you need it….and not just your physical abilities will be improved by this. You’ll find yourself having an easier time with kido, too.”

“A….Alright!” Junshin nodded, his features resolute as he moved to stand beside Hitomi, facing the same way she was. Hitomi herself lowered a knee to the ground before sitting back on her haunches, watching with interest as Junshin initially seemed intent on starting the same way she had - falling forward from an upright position onto the tip of his finger.

“If I were you,” she advised, “I’d stay out in a normal push up position….just incase.”

“Oh….um….right,” Junshin nodded, some of the wind taken out of his sales as he instead lowered himself to one knee, placing his palms on the ground before stretching out his legs behind him. Hitomi remained seated, watching as, gritting his teeth, Junshin shifted his weight to support himself only upon a single arm.

‘He’s going for one arm already…Heh, well, he might not be especially strong, but he‘s a trier. There’s no way he can do it though. It took me four months of practice before I could move on from using all ten fingertips. It was a year before I could even support myself using less than three. I don’t expect him to get up to my level immediately, but this’ll get him some practice with the basics at least.’

Sure enough, Junshin experienced about the same level of success as Hitomi expected. His face reddening from strain, he made an effort to lift the heel of his hand from the deck, spreading his fingers to try and support the weight. However he was forced to almost immediately return his entire hand to the deck, releasing a long gasp for breath.

“You should start out with all ten fingers,” Hitomi advised. “It‘s better to do things gradually than to...”

“No!” Junshin fired back with such force that Hitomi withdrew in surprise. “I…I can’t keep lagging behind. I don’t have much time…If Seraphina-kun will continue to train me, then I will master this technique as quickly as possible! I promise!”

‘Heh…so he does have a little fire in him after all.’

“Alright,” she nodded. “I’ll tell you what. If you can support your body weight on one finger by the end of the night, then we’ll move on to other exercises. That’s your goal. Just don’t hurt yourself doing it, okay?”

“Hai!” Junshin nodded, gritting his teeth again as he made a second attempt to lift the heel of his hand. Hitomi watched him curiously for a moment, before shaking her head as she rose to her feet. The task she had set him was - of course - utterly impossible. Still, it was sometimes good to set a goal that was unreachable - it caused you to push yourself harder. Just so long as it wasn’t done so often that it led to frustration…but then, a little frustration was good for a warrior too.

Deciding to leave Junshin to it for a while, she relaxed against the side of the ship, retrieving her zanpakuto into her grasp to rest the weapon against her shoulder as she closed her eyes. She was still feeling the after effects of her earlier attempt at Jinzen - probably the reason why she had not instantly destroyed the Hollow they had fought. Her exhaustion had slowed her down, and she needed at least an hour or so of rest to recover the entirety of her reiatsu. As much as she had told Junshin that diligent training was necessary for a warrior to maintain their level of ability, so too was rest.

It would be a while before they were going to be underway in any case, according to Kuroda. She doubted she would sleep any longer than an hour; after which, she would question the old man somewhat and with any luck find out in more detail what was going on in the Outer Rim.

And what they would face when they got there.

[Seraphina]

Act XVI: Veiled Intentions




‘I’m dreaming…’

Hitomi knew the dream well, knowing immediately that what she was seeing was not reality. The passage of seven years had not caused the memory to fade, or the image to lose any of the potency as it danced before her minds eye. A small kernal of fear trembled somewhere within her heart as, not for the first time, she was forced to watch through unclosable eyes the day her childhood ended.

A terrified girl with flowing red hair and wide, terrified purple eyes, no older than fourteen, shrieked in terror as she struggled to pull away from the grasp of a large, filthy looking man of the Outer Rim. Pressed in on both sides by the blank, featureless walls of a narrow alley, the girl had nowhere to run as thick fingers yanked sharply upon her lilac kimono, tearing at the fabric as the man’s features - flushed red with raged - parted in a lustful grin.

Behind him, three others approached at a slower pace. They had been running, but now that one of their number had caught up with their quarry they had slowed to a walk, laughing among themselves at the girl’s pitiful struggles. Unlike the man to the fore, their faces were indistinct, their features blurry as though seen through foggy glass; seven years before, Hitomi did not remember looking directly at them. Only the man who grasped her, tearing at her clothing as he attempted to push her to the ground, she remembered with absolute crystal clarify.

“I‘m next!” one of the three men in the back shouted - words that she did not hear in every rendition of the dream, that she sometimes wondered whether or not they had truly been said or were simply a morbid creation of her mind. “You two get in line.”

A flash of light upon metal and a spray of crimson marked the moment when her life changed. The dull, wooden handled knife clutched within the girl’s tiny fast slicing cleanly across the jugular of her attacker as he continued to tug at her clothing. The strike was sheer dump luck, the girl’s eyes having been closed in the moment of her wild swing, though they flared open immediately at the splash of warm blood that splattered across her tear streaked face, the man’s hands falling away from her as - his eyes already glazed over in death - he tilted backwards like a falling tree.

It was the first time she had ever killed a man.

His companions stood frozen in horror, staring in mute shock as the girl held the blooded knife before her in both hands, survival instinct alone keeping her on her feet. Her purple eyes regarded them in terror, likely running on adrenaline alone as her extended hands visibly trembled.

“S…stay back!” she warned, though her warning did little to placate the remaining thugs, who regarded her with open rage, their carnal designs for her now mingling with murderous intent. Through her mind’s eye, Hitomi watched as the three rushed her, feeling a small measure of relief as she knew what would shortly happen. Shadrin would appear, as he had on that day…she would be rescued…

‘….Wait….where is he….?’

The three men collided with the small girl like an avalanche, overwhelming her ineffective defences with body weight alone and powering her to the ground. One of them seized her throat with a single large hand, the other grabbing her tiny fist to immobilise her knife. The third knelt upon her other arm, reaching over his shoulder before delivering a single, punishing backhand across the girl’s jaw, creating a smattering of blood across the sandy earth as her lip was immediately burst.

‘No…no! It didn’t happen this way! This isn’t how it was!’

“Hold her down!” The man who had struck her instructed, fumbling at the drawstring up his dirty, ragged hakama. “I’ll teach this bitch a lesson!”

‘No…nonoono! This can’t happen! This didn’t happen! Please….Shadrin-kun! Help me!’

The girl struggled in vain against the strength and weight of her attackers as the man fumbling with his own clothing leered down at her. Yellow teeth and breath that stank of cheap alcohol wafted into her nostrils as, all to suddenly, Hitomi realised she was no longer watching the events unfold from a distance. She was no longer a spectator within the dream, but rather looked through the eyes of her terrified younger self - felt the pressure of the fingers around her throat and wrist. Terror immediately gripped her heart, panic and revulsion in equal measure seizing her senses as the twisted alternative events continued to unfold.

“Damn it, why do you get to go first,” the man gripping her throat grumbled, their lust apparently overriding their rage at their comrade’s death. “I’ve never had a virgin before. Let me do it.”

“Because I said so,” the first snorted, roughly slapping the back of the other man’s head. “You’ll get your turn. Just hold her down while I….”

They proved to be the last words the man would ever utter as, for lack of any better way to explain it, Hitomi watched as his body simply came apart. In one instant he was leering down at her - the next, splattered as chunky red paste against the neighbouring wall. His death was so sudden, coming with so little warning, that his two companions barely had time to look up before his silent killer turned upon them. A flurry of black and red engulfed the man who throttled her, simply shredding his upper body like wheat through a combine harvester, spreading thick chunks of bloody meat across the surrounding sands before effortlessly hurling his legs - all that remained of his body - down the length of the alley.

The third man had time enough to stand, but not enough time to flee. Hitomi watched, mesmerised by her own terror, as the black presence seized him also, hoisting him briefly from the ground before - with a sickening, tearing sound - cutting short his horrified shrieks as it simply ripped him in half at the waist. The sickening scent of viscera filled her nose as some of the contents of the man’s body spilled onto Hitomi, raising her hands in a futile attempt to ward off the grotesque avalanche. Bile rose to her mouth, and she turned aside to cough out a foul tasting stream of vomit.

‘This…this isn’t Shadrin…’

“Hmph…of course it’s not.”

Her eyes widened as a voice answered her thoughts - a voice she recognised immediately, having heard it every day of her life. Breathing through her mouth to avoid the worst of the stench of gore, she turned to look upwards at her savour who, now that their rapid, impossibly swift motion had come to an end, was rendered visible to her sight.

Dusk coloured eyes stared down at her - narrow, pitiless, cold. A lithe frame, nearly six feet in height, clad in a shifting miasma of swirling black, effortlessly held one half of the separated men in each hand. Hitomi grimaced as she attempted to look directly at the warrior’s clothing - her head spinning as she realised the woman, for woman it was, appeared to be wearing a morphing wave of liquid black that broiled and rolled about her form, occasionally providing a glimpse of her porcelain skin beneath, almost as though it had not yet settled upon a final shape.

‘That’s…me….’

“Don’t be ridiculous,” the girl with the dusk coloured eyes replied - looking very much like her modern day self, save the cold emptiness of her eyes. “I’m not you either…Why would I want to be you? You’re weak.”

“It…” Hitomi spoke outloud, her mouth feeling painfully dry. “It was supposed to be Shadrin-kun who….”

“Oh, Shadrin-kun, save me! Save me!” her other self sneered back, cutting Hitomi off as she effected a thinner, shriller voice in mockery. “Don’t make me laugh! After all this time, are you still lying there waiting for your Prince Charming to save you? Fucking pathetic!”

Wincing, Hitomi made an attempt to sit up. However, she was stopped immediately as her other-self placed a foot upon her chest, forcing her back to the ground with such authority that Hitomi’s ears were split by the sound of her sternum cracking. Her lips parted in a cry of agony, the taste of blood rising into her mouth as, above her, the older version of herself merely sneered.

“Is this all that you’ve become after seven years?” she spat derisively. “Lying here, just as you did then, unable to use your own strength. Pitiful! To think that someone as insignificant as you could sit there speaking to that boy as though you had an inclining of what it meant to be strong…You’re even weaker than he is! As wretched as he may be, at least he actually wishes to realise his potential.”

Hitomi drew in short, ragged breaths, pain screaming through her body from her shattered ribcage as her other self refused to relinquish the pressure exerted by her foot. She could barely breath let alone speak, gritting her teeth to restrain another scream of agony as her duplicate suddenly leaned forward, placing more weight upon her crushing foot, resting an elbow upon her raised knee.

“You’re a puny shadow of what you could be,” her other self hissed. “A worm, crawling upon your belly, where once you soared as a God! Lurking within you is power beyond your comprehension…power enough to shake the very heavens if you only had the courage to reach for it. Pah! But there is no courage in you…instead you lie there. Puny. Weak. Nothing.”

With every movement lighting up her nerves with pain, Hitomi lifted her trembling hands to the foot upon her chest, struggling to try and push back some of the pressure upon her chest. Her other self sneered at her attempt, apparently taking some amusement from it, as Hitomi succeeded in pushing back enough on the foot to give her room to breath.

“Who…..?” she managed to gasp out, though whatever else she had intended to say was interrupted by thick bubbles of blood that burst forth from between her lips. Her other self’s mouth pulled back into a grin, her sharp canines glinting savagely, before she threw back her head to laugh, her long crimson hair spilling around her shoulders.

“Who am I?” she shot back. “What a fucking stupid question. I’m Seraphina. You are Reihaii Hitomi. I’m the one who’s name you’ve been using while you’ve been pissing around. You’re the past and, despite what you may think, the present. You’ve come no further forward since this day…you’re still the same weak, defenceless child. I, on the other hand, am the future. Or….one future, in any case.”

Hitomi couldn’t claim to understand - she was too busy trying to breath to understand. Her lack of response seemed to cut short her other self’s amusement, and the sneer faded. Instead, the doppelganger applied further pressure behind her foot - Hitomi’s lips opening to emit a long, piercing scream as another resounding crack of bone echoed from the blood soaked walls.

“You’re so terrified you can’t even see me clearly, can you?” her duplicate growled. “Hmph…but then that’s the way it’s always been, hasn’t it? Your own power frightening the life out of you so much that you’re afraid to even reach for it. Even when you fought Hideki, you barely scratched the surface of what you could one day become…and the thought of that terrifies you. The way you act when I come out to play terrifies you.’

“Everything about your own power,” she snorted, “terrifies you. You know well enough that your powers awoke at a time when you dwelt in darkness, and darkness will always follow with it. But instead of conquering that darkness, you’re rather hide from it.’

“Fine, keep that up if you really want,” the pressure from her chest was suddenly gone, Hitomi drawing in a long gasp for air as her other self removed its foot from her sternum. “But if you make me sit around much longer…then I might decide the time has come to just swallow you up instead. If you’re still this pathetic the next time we meet, that’s exactly what I’ll do.”

Clutching her chest, Hitomi rolled onto her side, curling into a foetal position as her entire body shuddered with pain. Lying in a puddle of two-inch thick blood and viscera, she felt sick, light headed, and very much as though she was going to pass out. Her duplicate glared down at her a moment longer, before turning away with a final snort of contempt.

“Even when you use my name,” the double muttered over its shoulder as she made her way down the alley at a leisurely pace, leaving Hitomi alone amongst the carnage, “you only do so because you are running. Running from this place, from this past, from yourself. Go on running, if that’s what you want. But just remember that I can catch up anytime I want to and unless you accept what is within you…you‘re not going to be ready when I do.”

Her own voice faded from her senses, the bloody scene peeling back before her eyes, as Hitomi realised - in absolute relief - that the dream was coming to an end. The sound of sloshing water touched her ears as she remembered she was still resting upon Kuroda’s boat, as her mind returned slowly to the waking world.





*****



Hitomi could not recall ever being more glad to wake from a dream in her life. She had relived that same night countless times, but on each occasion it had always followed the same script…the events exactly as they had unfolded in reality. It was the first time that her dreams had ever diverged from history, let alone in such a grizzly and dramatic fashion. She had never been one to put a great deal of stock in dreams…yet the fact that her sleep was so disturbed as she finally embarked back towards the Outer Rim could not possibly have been a coincidence.

Placing a hand to her chest, she was almost surprised not to feel pain - half expecting to find that her ribs were truly shattered in reality. However she was whole and, though her heartbeat thundered furiously beneath her fingers, the harm done to her had not carried over into the waking world. It had been a dream.

Just a dream.

Shaking off the last vestiges of sleep, she blinked groggily as she took stock of her surroundings, noting for the first time the slight undulation of the wooden surface beneath her. The ship was, it seemed, in motion. More than that, the light of day had faded into the long shadows of a crimson dusk, her intended hour of sleep having spread it seemed throughout almost the entire day. Junshin, who had been training when she had fallen asleep, was no longer present - although a quick inspection of the deck found him sprawled out on one of the sleeping mats further down the length of the ship, fast asleep.

‘Guess he tired himself out after all…he must have worked hard.’

Heaving a sigh, Hitomi recalled the words spoken by her other self within the dream…who was she, indeed, to instruct Junshin on anything. While it was true her strength exceeded his, her actual spiritual pressure was only just above him….six years ago, if briefly, she had fought against Imai Hideki at the level of a Captain. She had told herself, many times since then, that the reason she no longer held such power was because of her lack of contact with her zanpakuto; on every occasion that she had seen such a massive increase in strength, it was her zanpakuto that had bridged the gap for her. She had believed she simply lacked the expertise to tap into the vast reservoir of potential that she knew lingered within her…but the dream threw her into some doubt.

It was certainly true that accessing her power brought about a change in her…a cold arrogance that crept, unbidden, into her personality. She never felt quite like herself, or entirely in control when she had been at her strongest…perhaps the dream had been right, and it really was fear holding her back. Perhaps the river that prevented her progressing within her Inner World really was simply a product of her own terror…

Perhaps…if she simply reached out for it…

“Hey, Old Lady, whatcha thinkin’?”

Dirk’s face appeared so suddenly before her that Hitomi snapped her head backwards in alarm, wincing as the back of her skull struck the wooden surface behind her. Spots dancing before her eyes, she grimaced as she placed a hand to the back of her head, Dirk peering at her curiously as he though leaned forward from the atop the raised lip that surrounded the barge, perched just above her head and leaning forward to look at her upside down.

“I told you not to call me that!” Hitomi snapped back, her irritation at the youth’s preferred nickname driving the strange dream from the forefront of her mind. “And what are you doing watching me sleep anyway!? That’s creepy!”

“Well,” Dirk shrugged, dexterously leaping from his seat to land upon the deck, stretching briefly with a half-stiffled yawn. “I was just thinkin’ that you’re actually real pretty when you’re not openin’ your mouth. But then you talk, and you sound kinda like a brat.”

“What the h….” Hitomi blinked, momentarily stunned. “…I sound like a brat!? That’s it! C’mere!”

Unsure exactly what she intended to do, but knowing simply that she wasn’t going to let the boy’s newest remark slide, Hitomi scrambled to her feet to pursue the youth. Grinning from ear to ear, Dirk immediately took off across the deck, laughing as she sprinted after him. However, she quickly realised she wasn’t going to be able to keep up - on normal ground, she could have overtaken him easily but, even upon the gentle lap of the river, the deck of the boat felt unsteady beneath her feet and her attempt at a run turned into more of a stagger as she struggled to keep her feet under her.

“You need to get your sea legs, Old Lady!” Dirk taunted gleefully as he came to a stop at the far side of the barge, standing triumphantly with his arms folded.

“Dirk!” Kuroda’s voice suddenly called out across the ship, drawing both the child’s and Shinigami’s attention to the aft of the ship. Seated in a small circle, the older members of the crew, Kuroda included, appeared to be spending the evening playing what looked to Hitomi to be a game of dominos, drinking from shallow cups of sake, as Kuroda himself puffed grey smoke through a simply carved wooden pipe. “Behave yourself.”

“Tch….fine,” Dirk replies, somewhat dejectedly. Shooting Hitomi a final glance, the youth walked stiffly to the other end of the ship, clambering back onto the ship’s railing to watch the landscape drift by. Hitomi, looking back and forth briefly between Dirk and his father, decided to put the boy out of her mind for the time being. Besides, she had more important matters to discuss with his father. Kuroda watched her approach, likely having expected it after her earlier indication of a desire for news, and rose politely to his feet as she drew nearer, gesturing with his pipe for his sons to do the same.

“Good evening, Yoshitaka-san…gentlemen,” Hitomi nodded to the group collectively. “I apologise for sleeping so long. It was rather impolite.”

“Ach, don’t worry, Seraphina-san,” Kuroda replied, Hitomi struggling not to wince at the mention of the name that felt somehow heavier after his disconcerting dream. “You looked like you needed it. Junshin-kun was awake a while longer…seemed quite excited about something, but I advised he didn’t wake you. You both must have been pretty exhausted.”

‘Heh…‘Junshin-kun’ is it? Looks like he’s been quite diplomatic while I was out.’

“So it would seem,” Hitomi nodded. “In any case, I didn’t mean to interrupt…I was just wondering if we might talk for a bit?”

“Oh, no interruption,” Kuroda shook his head, waving for his sons to deal him out of the game as he approached Hitomi, chewing thoughtfully on his pipe. “I think it’s best if we have a word sooner or later anyway…Forgive me if I seem presumptuous, but I rather got the impression from Junshin-kun that you’re in charge?”

“Well….not officially, no,” Hitomi shook her head, falling in line beside Kuroda as the fishermen left his sons to their game, moving further down the ship to lean against the railing, one hand on his pipe to steady it. “Junshin and I are the same rank but….”

“Hrm…de-facto leader, then,” Kuroda nodded, gazing briefly out across the water - the glowing red of the setting sun dancing elegantly across the reflective surface. “He’s a nice lad…he has a good head on his shoulders, that one. But he’s very much in his shell, I think. Anyway, shouldn’t talk about him when he’s not awake to hear it. You wanted to know about what’s going on in the West, I take it?”

“Yes,” Hitomi replied, eager to finally be getting her investigation underway as she placed an elbow on top of the railing, relaxing her weight against it. “Anything you can tell me might be helpful.”

“Hrmm….well, can’t tell you much in the way of detail,” Kuroda murmured. “But…here it is, anyway. I’m afraid I don’t know as much as you might like, since District Seventy hasn’t really seen the worst of it, but the whole mess started about three months ago. Some young fella from out East wandered into District Eighty and set up camp. Anyone who looked at him the wrong way…and out there you can bet there are a lot of folks’ll that look at you the wrong way…he beat down.’

“Apparently he cleaned up the District pretty fast…has himself quite a following. Anyway, he’s been working his way east since, one district at a time. Most of the folks that say boo to him are criminals, so they’re the ones that are getting hit the worst…but I’ve heard worse is going on, too.”

“Worse?” Hitomi queried, arching an eyebrow while silently noting that the mission briefing had contained faulty information. Fukuda had told her and Junshin that the group’s activities were limited to Districts seventy two through seventy seven…he had also said that they had only been in operation for six weeks. It didn’t surprise her, however…information from that far away from the Seireitei was almost bound to have holes in it.

“Aye…” Kuroda nodded, gravely. “You have to understand….well….maybe you already do…how things work out in the Outer Rim. The further in you go, the more likely it is that the men who control everything are also the men who carry the biggest sticks. These gangs and organisations spring up, they claim a town or two, and pretty soon they control every business the town has to offer. Flotsam, where I’m from, is a little different since it’s a trading hub with ties to the inner districts, but everywhere else…the gangs are, directly or indirectly, the biggest employers in the Rukongai.”

Hitomi had been young when she had left the Outer Rim, and in truth had little appreciation for the economy of the place. She had known well enough, however, that it was a dog-eat-dog place, and Kuroda’s description sounded accurate enough. Frowning thoughtfully, she offered him a nod in invitation to continue.

“Now, at first,” Kuroda hesitated briefly to knock his pipe against the railing, “I heard about these goings on and thought ‘ah, he’s just looking to take over their businesses’. Well, that might be true, but I’ve heard that he just shuts them down. Everything from sweat shops to cotton mills to brothels just….closed. You’d think that would leave a lot of unemployed refugees wandering around the Rukongai but, if there are any, they haven’t come through Flotsam. They’re certainly going somewhere, though…I’ve had merchants wander in from further West telling me stories about entire towns standing empty, all the businesses boarded up and closed. Thousands of people just….poof. Gone.”

Hitomi frowned, this next piece of information thoroughly concerning. Turning to place both hands against the wooden rail, she grimaced she joined Kuroda in gazing out across the river, concerned that this particular piece of information had not made it into the briefing. A mission that had begun as an investigation of a likely peaceful vigilante group appeared to be rapidly becoming more sinister…they weren’t simply cleaning up crime in the Outer Rim, they were emptying it.

“A slave trade, maybe,” she wondered out loud. “Or maybe he’s trying to start his own settlement out there, free of the gangs and is gathering residents….I’d hope for the latter, but….Guh, this all just seemed to get a little complicated.”

“I’m sorry I couldn’t give you better information,” Kuroda replied with a knowing nod. “Usually, nobody goes westward of District Seventy unless they have to…most of what we hear from out that way is all disjointed and Chinese whispers. I think the only way to find out what’s really going on is probably to head out there and see for yourself.”

“Seems so,” Hitomi sighed. “….But thanks, regardless. I at least know more than I did before. It’s much appreciated. And thank you, again, for agreeing to take us with you.”

“Not at all,” Kuroda replied, smiling broadly. “It was the least I could do…In fact, I’m not sure there wasn’t a little bit of fate involved in it. This is the only boat that travels directly from District Seventy to the Inner Districts on the whole river…You might not remember, but you’ve made this trip before.”

“Hmm?” Hitomi quirked an eyebrow, turning towards the old fisherman in surprise. “Y…I’m sorry, but you can’t mean…It wasn’t your ship that I came East in, was it?”

“Well, if you came by boat, then it must have been mine,” Kuroda replied with a slight shrug. “But I’m pretty sure I remember you from back then…I’ve carried hundreds of passengers back and forth across this river, but you were the first one I saw killing a Hollow before you got onboard. Heh…you know, I suppose I technically owe you twice, since you might have saved my ship that day.”

Hitomi shook her head, silently marvelling as her life seemed to continue to waltz its way through happenstance. She remembered very little of the ship that had carried her most of the way towards the Seireitei seven years before - her mind had been on other things. She didn’t remember interacting with the crew…given what she had very nearly gone through, Shadrin had kept most people at bay. To find herself heading westward on the exact same ship now seemed somehow appropriate.

“In fact,” Kuroda continued, stroking his chin thoughtfully, “I think that was the second time you travelled on my boat…Let me see….yes, I think so. I think you took my boat out this way too. That would have been….oh, I don’t know…twenty years ago, I suppose. You won’t remember I expect, you were just a baby. Might not even have been you, but you’re the spitting image of that baby’s mother one way or another, so I assumed. She was a Shinigami too, wasn‘t she?”

“I’m afraid that there you are mistaken, Yoshitaka-san,” Hitomi replied with a shake of her head. “I was born on the Outer Rim. My mother was…well….she wasn’t a Shinigami, anyway.”

“Oh,” Kuroda replied, sounding rather disappointed as his supposed connection to the girl’s journey didn’t run quite as deeply as he’d expected. “Strange…maybe my memory just isn’t what it used to be, but you honestly do look like her. Ah well, it doesn’t much matter now. Do you have anything else you’d like to ask, Seraphina-dono?”

“No, thank you,” Hitomi shook her head. “You’ve given me more than enough already. I’ll let you get back to your game. Dirk-kun told me that it’s a two day trip?”

“Yes,” Kuroda confirmed. “That’s about the right of it. We should arrive in Flotsam about noon the day after tomorrow. We won’t be stopping anywhere along the way. Until then, rest up…my boys and I will take care of the boat.”

“Very well, thank you,” Hitomi offered a slight bow, before moving off across the ship. Having just slept for the entire afternoon, she didn’t much feel like sleep; even if she did, she couldn’t really stomach the thought of sleep in any event after her nightmare. Junshin, at least, seemed to be sleeping soundly, and she thought better of waking him to brief him on what Kuroda had said.

She would wait until the morning to catch up with her companion…for the time being, she decided, she would need to concentrate on her own training. As little stock as she put in dreams, her other self within the nightmare had certainly been correct on some points…she was nowhere near as powerful as she could be - perhaps as she should have been. Junshin was not the only one that stood to improve between now and when they arrived at the Outer Rim.

“Alright you stubborn bastard,” she muttered under her breath as she picked up her zanpakuto, which resided where she had left it upon the deck, having tumbled from her grasp at some point during her slumber. Kneeling upon the deck, she placed the weapon across her lap, closing her eyes as she made an effort to level out her breathing, seeking entry once again to her Inner World.

“Let’s talk.”

- - - Updated - - -


Act XVII: The New Generation





The boat continued its lazy journey through the waters of the Rukongai for the remainder of the evening. Hitomi remained dimly aware of her surroundings throughout her meditation; the voices of the crew coming to her as a distant drone in the back of her mind, though they did not disturb her concentration overmuch. Nevertheless, she would only manage some hour’s worth of meditation before, exactly as had occurred before, she would be forced to yank herself from her Inner World, clutching a hand to her throat as the horrific sensation of drowning seized her senses.

Her Zanpakuto was in no mood to play. The frightful river thrown up between it and herself as in traversable as ever.

Curing, she resisted the urge to hurl the weapon across the deck, instead tucking the sword into her obi as she rose to her feet. Kuroda and his sons appeared to still be playing dominos on the far side of the ship, and she decided to leave them be for the time being. Dirk was nowhere to be seen, while Junshin still slumbered among the blankets strewn about towards the bow of the ship. With only a few hours of daylight remaining, she thought it best that they continue his training - her own, certainly, did not appear to be going anywhere fast.

Advancing across the deck, she made her way towards where Junshin slumbered to nudge her companion with the tip of her foot. Lying on his stomach, hugging his blanket against his torso rather than lying under it, Junshin grunted but did not immediately stir. Sighing, Hitomi gave him a second nudge, this time causing the young man’s eyelids to flutter as he turned his gaze rather groggily to look up at her.

“Mbruh?” Junshin grunted, coming around rather slowly as Hitomi picked up the harness in which his zanpakuto were still housed - her companion apparently having unbuckled it before going to bed - before dropping it across his slowly waking body. “Ow!”

“Come on,” she told him. “Daylight’s burning, and we don’t have enough of it to waste. Let’s get on with training.”

“Oh…yeah,” Junshin nodded, using the back of his hand to stiffly a long, deep yawn, as he fumbled with his zanpakuto. Sitting up on the deck, he shrugged the harness around his upper body, clipping it in place to once again grand easy access to the hilts of his zanpakuto, before blinking groggily into space, looking as though he were still more than half asleep.

“Hey, Junshin-kun!” Hitomi snapped, placing her fists on her hips, leaning forward to look him in the eye. “Trust me, once we’re done you’ll be sleeping all night. But we’ve got to do what we can, when we can.”

“H…hai,” Junshin stiffled another yawn, but nodded. Shaking himself somewhat, the boy looked up at her with somewhat brighter eyes as he forced off the last of his grogginess. Satisfied, Hitomi straightened, placing her left palm on the pommel of her zanpakuto, tucking the thumb of her right into her obi.

“Alright,” she began, “first thing’s first…How far did you get with that training from before? Don’t worry, I didn’t really expect you to get to just one finger….that’s impossible. But hopefully you’ve gained at least a little understanding of how to focus your reiatsu?”

Junshin’s shoulders sumped slightly, and he nodded, raising his right hand to peer down at it in a fashion that was almost accusing, before he lifted his gaze back towards Hitomi. Looking rather resigned, he grunted as he pushed himself up to his feet.

“Yeah,” he nodded. “I didn’t make it to one…I got really excited when I made it to two fingers, but I’m a little glad Yoshitaka-san advised me not to wake you. When I tried for just one, I fell over. It was rather embarrassing.”

The latter half of Junshin’s statement barely registered for Hitomi, her mind immediately reeling the moment he mentioned that he had succeeded in using only two fingers for the exercise. It had taken her a full year to control her reiatsu well enough to get by on less than three fingertips…It seemed almost implausible that Junshin could have achieved the same in the space of a single afternoon.

Peering at him curiously, however, she could see no indication of a lie in the young man’s features. In fact, he seemed rather disappointed in himself. His shoulders slumped and his brow creased, it looked as though he regarded anything less than mirroring Hitomi’s single finger push-ups as a failure. He likely had no idea whatsoever that what he had achieved was borderline miraculous…even with the advantage of a full Academy education, whereas she had begun using the exercise while she was still in her first year, she would have expected it to take weeks to reach the stage he had.

‘This guy….Given how he performed against that Hollow, I would have considered it generous to call him ‘average’, but now….Now, I’m not so sure. Is he like me and just has far more reiatsu than he can access? No, that‘s not it. The volume of his reiatsu wouldn‘t effect this exercise, it‘s about control rather than strength. If anything, I‘d say he‘s more like Shingen-kun….he’s got natural born, genius level talent, and he doesn’t even know it.’

Frowning, Hitomi found herself seizing up her counterpart in an entirely different light that she would have that same morning. His spiritual pressure remained fairly weak - both Shingen and Yukimura had been stronger than him by the end of their second year - but it he could handle it that well then there was certainly room for growth. A Shinigami’s reiatsu was like a muscle - the more and harder it was worked, the more powerful it became. Although all Shinigami could become more powerful with training, their ability to handle their reiatsu would often determine how quick that growth was.

Heading into the situation they were, the faster Junshin was capable of advancing the better. Although she couldn’t be absolutely certain, if he was capable of the same rate of growth as Shingen, then she would probably be better served skipping the basics. If he had even half the natural talent Shingen did, then he would probably stumble straight over the basics of any given technique without even thinking about it. However, it was probably best to test her theory before putting it into practice.

“Uh….S…Seraphina-kun,” Junshin coughed awkwardly, shifting uncomfortably on the spot. “Why….why are you staring at me?”

“Hrm? Oh…nothing. Nevermind,” Hitomi shook her head, realising that she had been standing in silent consideration of the young man for what had likely been several long, empty seconds. “What we’re going to do now is about putting what you learned into practice. Now that you’ve got an idea of how to focus your reiatsu where you want it, I’ll show you how to apply that to combat.”

“Right!” Junshin nodded, standing straighter as Hitomi turned to head towards the edge of the boat, motioning for him to follow. She noted that, at some point during their conversation, Dirk had emerged from wherever he had been hiding. The youth was perched in a crouch on the railing that surrounded the deck, his elbows on his knees and his chin resting on his crossed forearms as he watched them curiously.

“Alright,” she stated as she came to a stop at the edge of the boat where the railing parted to give room for the gangplank to be extended when nearer land, “tell me, what do you think would happen if you were to cut this water?”

“Cut the water?” Junshin echoed, quirking an eyebrow. “Not a great deal, Seraphina-kun. A little spray, mostly. The water would just flow around the blade.”

“Like…” Hitomi replied, drawing her sword and dipping the weapon into the river, the sharp edge facing away from the boat. Flicking her wrist, she swished the weapon through the liquid to draw it out, spilling a few droplets and creating a tiny spell in the sword’s wake, but achieving nothing dramatic. “…This?”

“Well….yes,” Junshin nodded, squinting at her sideways as he apparently failed to see the direction in which her demonstration was headed. Shaking off her sword to remove a few stray droplets of water from the blade, Hitomi stepped aside, pointing a finger towards the spot in which she had been standing to invite Junshin forward.

“What I’d like you to do,” she explained, “is focus as much reiatsu as you can into the blade of your zanpakuto. Use the same method you used to force it into your fingers, only this time you’ll be channelling it through your sword. Go ahead.”

Junshin nodded uncertainly, but did as instructed. Dirk, apparently curious, walked on the balls of his feet across the railing to crouch beside Hitomi, peering over the edge of the ship as Junshin draw one of his short bladed kodachi. Crouching by the water’s edge, Junshin was able to submerge most of the blade despite its short length, drawing in a deep breath of concentration. Hitomi looked on, sensing the telltale throb in the back of her head as the young man’s reiatsu built within the sword.

‘Hmm…I doubt that’s his maximum…but probably the most he can wield right now unless he pushed himself to breaking point. I guess it’s a start.’

Around the still blade, the water’s surface broke into a small, circular ripple as the reiatsu began to vibrate within the sword in a small, barely perceptible fashion, before Jushin sharply yanked his arm skywards. The result was immediately and obviously different from when Hitomi had done the same - the tiny sword’s movements accompanied by a thunderous crash of water as a colossal swell of white froth burst forth along with it. Along the bath of the sword, a large V shaped wave rippled upwards, blasting to a full five feet - causing a started Dirk to tumble from his perch onto the deck - before is sloshed loudly back to the surface, the water continuing to churn in the throws of the sudden surge as Junshin, wide eyes, stared in disbelief.

“Holy shit!” it was Dirk that spoke first, characteristically foul mouthed, scrambling to his feet with a broad grin. “That was awesome, Wetpants! You ain’t so weak after all, are ya?”

“A…apparently not,” Junshin replied, staring at his sword in disbelief. A few droplets of water clung to the blade, sparkling crimson in the light of the setting sun as Hitomi nodded in approval. The blow certainly had power - he was at least channelling his reiatsu into the sword. However, he wasn’t doing it effectively - there was too much energy being lost to the surrounding area. As impressive as the splash had been, against a solid target the impact would have been spread across a wider area, causing less damage than it potentially could have.

“That’s nod bad,” she agreed. “But you’re still getting a lot of bleed out. You’re getting your reiatsu into the sword, but it’s not staying there. Watch…”

Sidestepping Junshin, Hitomi placed her sword back into the water - this time dropping to one knee to allow her to submerge almost the entire length of the katana. Gripping the hilt with her right hand near the tsuba, she placed her left upon the pommel to hold the weapon steady as she allowed her own spiritual pressure to trickle into the blade. Junshin leaned over her shoulder, watching the weapon curiously while Dirk returned to his seat on the railing. Hitomi inhaled as her shoulders coiled before, exhaling in the moment of striking, she swept the sword sharply upwards, transmitting the built up reiatsu directly into the water.

The effect was as different from Junshin’s display as her initial demonstration had been. Rather than a colossal swell of foam and spray, a single, perfectly straight tunnel was sliced into the water with the path of the sword. The water simply parted, the sword cleaving seamlessly through it as the slice continued to march onward from the direction of her swing - a perfectly straight funnel upon the surface of the water that extended a full teen feet, before the surface sloshed backwards to fill the void.

“Bah, that was crap,” Dirk snorted. “That was nowhere near as awesome as what Wetpants did.”

Rising to her feet, Hitomi smoothly slid her bone-dry sword back into its sheath, ignoring Dirk as she nodded in satisfaction. She had scaled back a little to avoid posing any danger to the ship, but she was sure Junshin would have gotten the point. She turned to look at him over her shoulder, one corner of her mouth rising into a smile as she noticed an expression of stricken awe on his features - unlike Dirk, he was able to properly understand what he had witnessed.

“The water,” he eventually murmured, “offered no resistance to your sword whatsoever…You cleaved through it as though you were cutting empty air.”

“Yes,” Hitomi nodded. “The way to effectively using your reiatsu isn’t to simply bludgeon an opponent with it, but to be precise. There’s no point in putting….let’s say for argument’s sake…fifty percent of your reiatsu into an attack if only fifteen percent of it is actually going to strike the target. Preventing any bleed out at all is almost impossible…but you should be aiming for at least eighty to ninety percent of what you’re using to hit what you’re aiming at.’

“I tried to use the same amount of reiatsu you did,” she elaborated, “but my strike would have caused at least six times as much damage. Your attack would have put a hole in a wall. Mine would have reduced the same wall to rubble. Your goal, from here on out, is to try and control your bleedout. If you can get even as high as fifty percent retention in your strikes, then you’ll be more than twice as effective in a fight as you are now.”

“I understand,” Junshin nodded, setting his jaw as he tightly gripped the hilt of his kodachi. “I’ll aim…I’ll aim for sixty percent!”

“That’s good,” Hitomi allowed herself a smile of approval. “This is the advanced form of what you were practicing earlier. Just like before, this is applicable to everything. Then you use reiatsu to defend yourself, to increase your speed, to hold a wound closed…if you can become more efficient, then even if your actual reiatsu isn’t any higher, you’ll still become exponentially more powerful than you are now.”

“That’s confusing…” Dirk grumbled, having watched the exchange in silence. “If you wanna become stronger, why don’tcha jus’ go lift weights or something’ like a normal person?”

“Because we’re not normal people, Dirk-kun,” Hitomi countered, turning to prod the boy’s forehead with the tip of her index finger, much to his chagrin. “We’re Shinigami.”

Dirk did not respond, angrily pushing her finger away before Hitomi moved to make way for Junshin. Immediately, her counterpart moved to the water’s edge, crouching to submerge his sword once more to try and replicate her feat. Among the many techniques Shadrin had taught her, the one she had set Junshin now was one of the most advanced….and it marked a fundamental difference between a rookie and an experienced fighter. Even a marginal improvement with greatly increase his chances of survival as they moved further West…but she was hoping for more than a marginal improvement.

‘Alright Junshin-kun…let’s see if you really do have the potential I hope you do.’

She didn’t feel any need to supervise his training. Besides which, she had her own to worry about. Unlike Junshin, bleedout wasn’t her concern. Her greatest priority was trying to gain access to the ocean of reiatsu that lurked within her, from which she was thoroughly cut off without her zanpakuto to guide her to it. Leaving Junshin to his own devices - the crash and broil of water sounding behind her to indicate his second attempt was no different from his first, she kneeled upon the deck on the far side of the ship to continue her meditations, though she doubted she would experience any great revelations on this attempt.

The sun continued it slow progression across the horizon, sinking inevitably closer towards the darkness of night as, with every passing moment, the Outer Rim drew closer. After tonight, they would have just one more day to make ready.

Kuroda’s report on events was concerning, but did not give her any greater insight as to what they were likely to face…whatever it was, she could only hope that one more day would be enough to be ready for it.

- - - Updated - - -


Act XVIII: The Storm Ahead





The line of rickety wagons trundled unsteadily across the rough terrain. The road, little more than a worn band of bare earth that was marginally flatter than the ground around it, did little to protect the wheels from the uneven, barren rock - lightly sprinkled with sand - over which the caravan advanced. District Seventy two of the West Rukongai; a rocky, mountainous area where the dry, desert landscape of the far Outer Rim faded slowly towards a more temperate environment, with the mountains acting as a barrier to prevent the further spread of the desert beyond.

Although there were several overland routes through the mountains - indeed, in some places the border between District Seventy and Seventy One was almost flat - it was not merely the transition from one district to another that this caravan was seeking. Rather, it was following a road - or at least what could loosely be called a road - towards something far more specific. It was searching for what, so far from the pristine white walls of the Seireitei, was somewhat laughably referred to as civilisation.

Although large settlements were not unheard of in the Outer Rim of the West Rukongai, they were certainly rarer than in the middle districts. Actual cities were unheard of, even the largest of townships consisting of wooden or sometimes stone buildings, sometimes surrounded by a high wooden fence that passed for a wall, tied together into communities that rarely exceeded populations of a few hundred. These small communities often functioned in near self reliance, having very little to do with their distant government, instead operating under their own systems and local laws. Each village and town was a nation unto itself, led in some cases by the wisest, but more often by the strongest.

In the bleak, harsh environment of the Outer Rim, the rule of the strong was the norm rather than the exception. Often, this came about when a town lacked the strength to fight off bandits or criminal gangs, and as a result become a haven for such types. Many bandit leaders counted several towns within their territory, collecting taxes and tributes in the manner of feudal lords. Elsewhere, the strong ruled to protect their town from such people - where individuals of exceptional strength actively defended the town to fight off raiders and bandits.

The town towards which the caravan headed was one of the latter - a mountain village by the name of Rakuseki. Relatively far off the beaten track, the narrow and often treacherous trail through the mountains left the town relatively difficult to reach, making it an unattractive target for bandits. As such, it was often considered a haven of sorts, its population large despite its isolation as never a year went by where fresh settlers would not brave their way across the mountain in the hopes of finding a peaceful life there. More than the difficult route, however, the town was protected by a name named Yagyu Jubei.

Stories of a town protected by a fearsome swordsman were not uncommon throughout the Soul Society. The concept was one that was often told and retold in various forms - often heavily romanticising the story’s protagonist as a masterless samurai with a gruff exterior, but a heart of gold. These stories far predated the appearance of Jubei within the Rukongai, and had very little grounding in reality. Local rumour had it that Jubei was a rogue Shinigami, having fled the Seireitei after committing some crime or another, or attracting the ire of his superiors. Such rogue Shinigami were invariably hunted by the Onmitsukido, but the Outer Rim was often far enough away from the Soul Society that one could effectively hide there.

Whether the rumours were true or not, even a whisper of a Shinigami living within the town was sufficient to warn away all but the boldest of would be raiders - for even the weakest Shinigami was more than a match for the strongest of normal men. In years past, local legend said that some had tried their luck against the mysterious swordsman, for succeeding in taking him down would almost certainly cement a tarrying reputation throughout most of the District. None, however, had survived the encounter.

The caravan that now wound its way through the mountains, however, was unmindful of the presence of Jubei, whether he was a Shinigami or not. The invention of those who drove the wagon was neither settling - the empty wagons bearing neither personal possessions nor goods to trade.

They had different intentions.

Alongside the wagons marched some two score men - although they wore the mismatched weapons and armour of a mercenary force, they marched with the discipline of professional soldiers. With not a man among them under the age of thirty, there were no fresh faced greenhorns among this specific group - every man counted among the caravan bore scars from past conflicts, veterans of long careers of violence. They moved with purpose, advancing grimly across the narrow and treacherous mountain path, some marching dangerously close to the sheer drop that lay on one side of the wagons with no apparent fear.

Two men alone did not march upon the ground, save those that drove the heavy oxen pulling each cart. They were also the only members of the group that showed any signs of uniformity, both of them wearing a long, high collared, sand coloured coat was very nearly a cloak and may once have been white - bound tightly around their bodies and hanging very nearly to the ground. There, however, the similarities between the two ended.

One of the pair was tall and of lankly build in his late thirties - wearing his coat open to reveal a black shinobi shozuko worn beneath. His features were partially obscured behind a layer of thickly applied white paint; though the man’s lips and the outline of his eyes were painted black to throw them into stark relief. His head was shaved completely bald, and had not been spared the same paint as his face. In fact, including his hands - just visible where the long, wide sleeves of his coat ended - every inch of exposed skin upon the man’s body bore the same deathly white paint. With his rather gaunt cheekbones and temples, he looked almost ghoulish, standing stock still despite the lurching of the wagon beneath his feet, staring blankly ahead towards the road.

The second man was far shorter than the first, sitting upon the rear edge of the front wagon, while his companion stood at its front, lazily dangling one foot over the edge as the vehicle rolled forward. The black tabi that protruded from the bottom of his coat suggested that he also wore a shozuko, but the second man wore his coat closed - clinging tightly to his torso to reveal a frame that was thin and stooped - his back crooked and hunched to suggest advanced age. The second man’s features, however, were obscured behind a rather mangy looking red scarf that was thrown about his shoulders, enveloping his features up to his cheekbones. The upper portion of his face was rendered in visible by the shade cast by an enormous circular hat - more than a yard in diameter, the sat upon the crown of his head. Rising to a slightly conical top, it resembled in some way a traditional Japanese sugegasa save for the fact that, aside from its immense size, despite being covered with dust from the long road the surface of the hat was clearly metallic rather than made of straw.

With each lurch of the cart, a soft, musical jingle drifted from the second man, originating from four silver wind chimes that hung from the frame of the hat, arranged to form the corners of an invisible square within the circular frame.

“Your racket is beginning to annoy me, Toda-dono,” the first man suddenly spoke - his voice was thin and high pitched for a man, the honorific spoken with more than a hint of sarcasm. “Why don’t you take that ridiculous hat off?”

“Hmph,” by comparison, the second man’s voice was as rough as sandpaper, sounding from deep in the back of his throat. “My music wards away evil spirits…It is needed, in places such as this, Sasaki-san.”

“So you’ve said,” the man named Sasaki grunted, turning to look over his shoulder at his counterpart, a brief flash of hatred passing over his shoulders. “But the racket still pisses me off. I’m starting to feel that itch…I wanna kill something. Why the hell did our Lord send you along? I could have handled this.”

“Your lack of restraint,” Toda responded, “has caused trouble in the past…a village full of corpses is of no use to our Lord.”

“So what are you gonna to do, Toda?” Sasaki sneered, his pink tongue briefly flashing across his lips as he gazed ahead along the road once more, the grey cloud of cookfires no visible upon the horizon - the village was close by, now. “Are you gonna leap in the way and protect them? Pfft…”

“Don’t be stupid, boy,” his frail looking counterpart snorted. “If you go against our Lord’s wishes, I’ll be killing you.”

The response from the taller man was a shrill, piercing laugh. Sasaki’s laugh was not a pleasant sound - like two pieces of metal shrieking against one another. Throwing back his head, the painted man cackled for several seconds longer than either sarcasm, or sanity, may have deemed necessary.

“Not if I get you first, old man,” he finally grinned, an eager gleam in his eye as his laughing cut off with sharp abruptness. “I’ve always wondered what the view is like from the third spot.”

“Fourth,” Toda corrected, a hint of derision creeping into his gravely tone. “Don’t forget that thing…Although I’m not even sure anymore if it’s second, or if we should just consider it first.”

“Well,” Sasaki shrugged, “it hasn’t been around for a long time…Maybe we’ve gotten lucky and its forgotten about us. Ran off and found a hole to climb into, maybe.”

“Maybe…” Toda replied, although he did not sound at all convinced. “But either way, do not delude yourself that you are capable of taking my spot. I’m closer to challenging Shimazu than you are to challenging me. You’re still too much of a whelp to compare yourself to either of us.”

“You wanna go right now, old man!?” the younger of the two snarled, turning sharply towards his counterpart, his lip curling backwards as he shifted his weight into a more aggressive posture, his right hand reaching out towards a long, thin bundle - at least as tall as he was - wrapped in dust caked white rags that, like his coat, had probably been white before the trek through the desert.

The older traveller did not respond, or indeed even turn in his companion’s direction. He continued to sit casually at the edge of the wagon, his head lazily tilted forward, the wide brim of his hat concealing his gaze. He appeared thoroughly uninterested in the Sasaki’s threats, his only movement being to sway slightly on the spot with the rough jostling of the cart beneath him.

Sasaki scowled at the man’s inaction, his gaze briefly flickering from Toda to the bundle around which his fingers had extended but not yet closed. Suddenly hesitant, as though finding Toda’s lack of concern disconcerting, the young man almost looked to be thinking better of his aggressive stance. Directing a glare towards Toda, his scowl deepened into another snarl as his concern grew into irritation at his being ignored. Abandoning his inaction, he snatched his fingers around the bound object, taking it into his grasp.

“Don’t push your luck, boy,” Toda suddenly murmured, a low growl echoing from beneath his hat that arrested Sasaki in place. For the first time, the hunched old man shifted in place, tilting his head towards to take Sasaki directly into his gaze. Although the shade cast by his hat left what little of his features that could be seen wreathed in dark shadows, the pale glint of his eyes were still evident. “I’ll kill you.”

Standing utterly still, his hand still grasping the object he had been reaching for, Sasaki appeared briefly rooted to the spot beneath the older man’s gaze. Although the other members of the caravan continued to march on, apparently unaware of the confrontation, something passed between the two that went beyond their senses; although the two remained still, a silent collision of spiritual pressure occurred between them. A confrontation who’s conclusion was obvious as, suddenly, Toda tore his gaze away from Sasaki to look beyond the younger man, his attention focused upon the quickly approaching village.

The moment their gaze was broken Sasaki faltered, collapsing to his hands and knees, the wrapped bundle that had apparently been his weapon of choice clattering to the floor of the wagon. Heaving for breath, large droplets of sweat cascading from his brow, the younger man’s composure was utterly broken in the wake of the encounter while Toda, utterly unfazed, rose to his feet.

“It appears that we’re almost there,” Toda grunted, casually wiping off his coat as he stood. “Get yourself back together. We have work to do.”

Lifting his head to direct a dagger-like glare at the older man - still heaving in deep gulps of air to try and regain his breath, Sasaki bit back whatever response he may have had in mind. His limbs shaking somewhat, he placed his feet back beneath him as he levered himself once more into a standing position - his place in the hierarchy thoroughly underlined. Although he picked up his bundle once more, he made no move to threaten Toda a second time, merely turning to follow the older man’s gaze towards the town.

“Shit…” he muttered, more to himself than to his counterpart. “Now I’m pissed off…I really, really hope I get to kill someone today...”

The line of wagons continued to trundle on towards the village, where many hundreds of people quietly carried on with their everyday lives, thoroughly unaware of the darkness that encroached upon the horizon.

[Seraphina]

Act XIX: The Harvest






“Jubei-san!”

Yagyu Jubei raised a hand to shield his eyes from the sun, squinting as the frantic cry reached his ears. Using a thumb to brush aside some of the droplets of sweat that had gathered upon his brow, effortlessly carrying an enormous log - some eighty feet in length and at least four in diameter, across a single shoulder with his other arm. The road ahead appeared blurry through the haze of heat, but he could nevertheless make out the figure that had called his name. One of the villagers, a young man of some seventeen years named Hansui, appeared to be running towards him, waving both arms frantically.

Frowning, Jubie slowed his advance along the narrow dirt road - his bare feet winding to a stop as he found himself looking beyond the young man, in the direction of the village. The sun had long since risen, and the smell of morning cook fires drifted to him in the dry, warm wind that wound its way through the mountains. There did not appear to be anything amiss, but he found himself moving suddenly at a quicker, pace, allowing the log to roll from his shoulder as the boy’s obvious distress forced him to action. Unlike his young counterpart - who’s method of running was little more than a wild flailing of his thin limbs - Jubie’s movement was the practiced spring of an athlete. The muscles of his legs - as thick around as most men’s waist, powered him up the slight incline to meet Hansui half way.

Jubei did not have the appearance of a man of the Outer Rim. While the mountain folk were often hardy, they tended to be long limbed and thin of build - the men and woman of the particular region in which Jubei lived often sporting red or brown hair and light coloured eyes. Jubei, however, was obviously of different stock; aside from his black hair and dark eyes, his physique was more robust than that of his neighbours. The tallest man in the village by a full head, he stood at some six and a half feet in height, his torso and limbs laced with powerful, lean muscles that were the result of training rather than nature.

His face was broad and flat - one might be forgiven for saying claiming that his features were severe. With a square jaw, a cleft chin, and long, tangled black hair there was a certain fierceness to his appearance. Although he was not unhandsome, he was often considered frightening upon first sight. He was, however, clean shaven and well groomed - as savage as his appearance may have looked, the old habits of the civilisation that he had left behind never having faded completely. He was a far cry indeed from the skinny, breathless youth who he reached within moments - the boy collapsing to his knees, gasping for air as he apparently reached his objective.

“Han-chin,” Jubei placed a large hand upon the boy’s shoulder to steady him. “Do not fear…you have found me. What’s wrong?”

“It…” Hansui tried to reply, but whatever else he may have wished to say was lost in an unintelligible gasp for breath. Having likely ran all the way from the village, the boy frantically waved an arm back towards the village. “Strangers…they….”

Jubei scowled, lifting his gaze towards the horizon once more. As vague as Hansui’s message was, it nevertheless conveyed as much as was required. Strangers had arrived in the village, and they had brought trouble with them. It wasn’t the first time…but it had been a long while since the last troublemakers had come to Rakuseki. Jubei had believed, perhaps foolishly, that those he had let live that day would spread a wild enough story that others would be too frightened to come near.

It seemed someone hadn’t got the message.

“Stay here, Han-chin,” he instructed, giving the youth’s shoulder a brief, reassuring squeeze. “I’ll deal with this. I’ll send someone to fetch you when it’s over.”

Immediately, he was on the move once more. His body low to the ground, his legs pumping furiously to carry him towards the town at a speed that surpassed mere human limits, he instinctively reached for the strength that he typically kept buried. Aside from the inherent dangers of flaunting his strength - for he could never be certain that he was absolutely out of sight of the Onmitsukido, he rarely had call to use it in the peaceful life he had succeeded in building for himself.

The desire to live in peace had, in fact, been his only crime.

The Central Forty Six rarely permitted Shinigami to retire - even those who stepped down from their duties were still, officially or not, members of the Gotei Thirteen. The powers of a Shinigami were formidable, and the Central Government made sure to keep those powers on a tight leash. Jubei was not a man cut out for military life…but neither was he a man suited to being perpetually monitored. He had simply faded into the Rukongai, hoping to slip beneath the notice of the Seireitei and live out the long years of his extended lifespan in both peace and freedom.

In all his wanderings, Rakuseki was the only place he had felt remote enough to settle permanently. Its community had accepted him, and asked no questions of who he was or where he had come from. They were a hospitable, unguarded people, and Jubei had taken every effort to simply become one of them. Using his powers was, on occasion, unavoidable. Aside from bandits, there were Hollows, and other naturally occurring dangers such as rockslides of predators that required the strength of a Shinigami to remedy; it would appear that today was another one of those times.

‘Looks like it’s time for us to fight again, Tsumujikaze….’

As he ran, Jubei raised a hand to his chest, his fingers closing over empty air directly ahead of his breastbone - as though grasping something tangible. The atmosphere abruptly spit with an electric crackle, a pale white light erupting from the centre of his chest as he called upon his long dormant Zanpakuto. As the sword awoke, it shaped itself within his palm - a thick bladed katana, the handle wrapped in blue silk, with a tsuba shaped like a five pronged shuriken. As the weapon materialised, so too did his shihakusho - the cloth spilling across his body from his chest, spreading to consume the peasant garb and envelope his body in black.

Yagyu Jubei, the man known as the strongest in the Outer Rim, was on the move.






Rakuseki was a settlement of modest size. Just large enough for its population of some four hundred people, its buildings were tucked neatly away behind a high wooden palisade that had protected it in the past from both aggressors and the elements. The wall, almost as old at the town itself, had stood for six generations, protecting the lives of those who lived within it boundaries.

Today, a massive chunk of that wall lay as smouldering ruins - a space large enough for twenty men to walk abreast punched into its surface to leave only blackened soil where the mighty barrier had once stood. Through this barrier, the line of wagons had advanced, the armed soldiers who accompanied them immediately setting about the task of rounding up the startled, terrified villagers. Although outnumbered ten to one, the soldiers worked quickly and efficiently, overwhelming the unarmed population with brutal efficiency, beating those who resisted and herding those who could not by the point of spears or swords towards the wagons. More than one villager attempted to raise arms against them - brandishing a pitchfork, a kitchen knife or, at best, an axe meant to cut nothing more threatening than wood. Such shows of resistance did not end in success.

Toda and Sasaki took no part in the round up. The soldiers knew their business, and moved with crisp precision - neither man needing even to give orders. They merely stood by the wagons, watching in disinterest as their troops piled the terrified, often screaming, villagers into the vehicles. It was a sight they had seen many times now, repeated all across the Outer Rim and it was one they would likely see many more times to come.

“How many do you suppose that is in total?” Sasaki queried, standing with his arms folded, the white paint upon his face cracking slightly as he scowled at the heaving carnage around him - in every direction, soldiers dragging people by the scruff of their neck towards the wagons, or delivering savage beatings to those who refused to be compliant.

“Including these people?” Toda replied. “I’m not sure….two, maybe two and a half thousand. It’s quite a number…but our Lord says we’ll need more, still.”

“You mean It says we’ll need more,” Sasaki growled, his scowl deepening. “And after It went so damn kill happy when it got free, too. How many more people does it think are left in the Outer Rim? If things keep up, we’re going to have to start looking in the lower numbered Districts. Damn monster, making us work like this…Do you think our Lord would be able to kill it?”

“Be quiet!” Toda snapped, a faint note of panic creeping into his voice, turning his head to direct a glare at the younger man from beneath the rim of his hat. “You never know when it’s listening.”

“Tch…” Sasaki turned his face aside, spitting upon the ground in response to the chastisement. “Fine….but this is boring. I thought you said there was a strong guy here. This trip better not have turned out to be a waste of time.”

“Even if it was mere rumour,” the older man shrugged, “we will at least bring back many workers.”

“I’m not interested in that,” Sasaki snarled in reply, “I was promised a fight…I’m getting twitchy. There are four hundred of them! Can I at least kill a few? Who‘s going to know?”

Toda sighed in irritation, the wind chimes that dangled from his hat jingling slightly as the old man shook his head in disbelief, almost as though having to deal with a difficult child. However, after a moment’s hesitation he gave a nod of assent.

“Fine,” he relented. “I will allow you to kill twenty. But don’t kill anyone who might be a good worker. You can kill the children, if you must kill something.”

“Hah!” Sasaki grinned, briefly licking his black lips with a starkly pink tongue, reaching to grasp one end of the wrapped bundle that he had carried with him upon the wagon - now slung across his back by way of a thick length of rope. “And suddenly I’m glad I’m travelling with you…Shimazu would never let me do that. Bleeding heart bastard. Monohoshi Zao is thirsty…I’m going to let him run wild.”

“Hmph,” Toda grunted, “not too wild…Keep your head.”

“Old bastard,” Sasaki muttered under his breath, though he was careful to make sure Toda did not hear as he wandered away from the wagons, moving through the surrounding fray without a second glance. Children were, in fact, notable for their near absence. Although a few had been captured in the initial moments of the attack and loaded into the wagon, there numbered only five or six - far too few for a town of such size. It seemed likely that most families were hiding their children indoors, and not all the buildings had yet been breached by the relatively small force.

‘Right…let’s get this show on the road.’

Moving beyond the worst of the commotion that immediately surrounded the wagons, Sasaki turned down into a quieter side street, his painted face split by a macabre grin as he allowed his fingertips to trail upon the sun-warmed stone walls that passed by to either side of him. Although he had been hoping for a battle with a strong adversary, a hunt for a few mice seemed as good a way as any to spend his time…even if he killed more than twenty, he doubted very much that Toda was going to count.

As he advanced down the alley, he allowed a trace amount of reiatsu to spill forth from his fingertips, drifting into the buildings beyond. Like the web of a spider, the invisible lattice of reiatsu spread forth to seek out any sign of life around him - the telltale vibration that would give away the tiny, frightened heartbeat of a hidden villager.

“Come out, come out, wherever you are,” he cooed, still grinning broadly - a hungry glint in his eyes as he felt a certain shudder of pleasure quicken his own heartbeat. “Come out and plaaaaaay….”

‘There!’

His reiatsu felt something - feint and indistinct through the wall. It was definitely a heartbeat - but it rattled within its owner’s chest, frantic and uneven, as though barely able to stand the stress of its own rapid beat. Not a child, but prey on the opposite end of the spectrum. The heartbeat was old….still, just because Toda had encouraged him to kill the children, didn’t mean he only had to kill children.

“Found you!” he cackled, his fingertips suddenly pushing into the stone, sweeping his arm across the surface. His fingers shredded the stone wall as though it were made of paper, gouging through the wall to lay bare the room behind it - a jagged tear in the stone, as wide as his hand, that allowed him to peer inside. Lowering his eyes to the level of the newly created opening, his smile widened as the scream of terror that arose from within - his black outlined eyes the only part of him that they would be able to see through the tear in their wall.

The inside of the building was as one would probably have expected from a peasant dwelling. It was dimly lit - with both the doors and windows having been barred by as much furniture as could be gathered from within. The front door itself was barricaded by what was likely the family’s dining room table, piled high with anything of weight that could be found - from books, to firewood - to make it difficult to move. The family had clearly not expected their wall to be suddenly punctured, and Sasaki let out a laugh that was half way between a delighted cackle and a wheeze as he beheld three terrified faces looking back at him.

Although his reiatsu had detected only one heartbeat, there were two elderly villagers in the house - both appearing to be in their late seventies. White haired, but appearing spry as most mountain folk did, they appeared in the process of piling more onto their makeshift barricade when Sasaki had interrupted them. Behind them sheltered a small boy - ten years old at most. Their grandson, perhaps. Either way, they would probably make a good start.

“Delicious!” he leered. “Simply delicious. I’m going to kill you all!”

Withdrawing from the hole, Sasaki placed his right hand across it instead. As much as he usually preferred to look at people when he killed them - there was something artistically pleasing about watching the way a corpse fell - there were still a lot of buildings to get through and he couldn’t very well break into all of them. A blast of reiatsu would be sufficient to kill everything in the building, and he would move on to the next.

Gathering his reiatsu within his palm, he tempered the heady rush of bliss that threatened to overwhelm him as the killing moment drew close. He didn’t want to destroy the building completely…most likely Toda would make trouble for him if he did anything to endanger the troops. He only wanted enough to exterminate anything that lived within its walls. Carefully measuring the precise quantity of reiatsu required, he raised his other hand to wipe away a slick of saliva that had begun to dribble from one corner of his mouth.

“Show ti…”

Something hard struck the side of his face - striking with enough force that his cheek morphed and reshaped around the shape of the blow, his head snapped sharply to one side as the left side of his vision became squint - the very shape of his eyeball compressing under the force. His reiatsu dispersing harmlessly into the air - his control of it fading in the wake of what he was quite sure now had been a kick, as he suddenly found himself sailing down the length of the alley.

Spots dancing before his eyes, he flew for several feet, the sense very nearly knocked out of him. However, with a snarl he shook himself back to his senses before righting himself in mid-air, throwing out an arm to reach side to smash his fists into the adjacent walls to stop his backward momentum even as he planted his heels firmly into the soft, sandy earth.

Beneath the force of his blow, the stone split into a spidery, mosaic pattern of cracks on both sides, his fists biting deep into the stone as he glared back up the alley towards whomever had struck him. His smile was gone - the left side of his face already swollen and misshapen - his eye weeping a trail of crimson from behind his half-closed lid, his vision on his left side reduced to almost nil.

“What the fuck!?” he snarled, grimacing in pain as the force of his own roar caused one of his teeth to fly loose, skipping across the surface of the sand, leaving tiny, bloody footprints in its wake. “Who the hell are you!?”

His attacker had landed in a crouch in the wake of the kick, his form partially sheathed behind a small cloud of sand kicked up by Sasaki’s rapid passage down the alley. However, as the warrior rose to his feet, Sasaki felt the rapid anticipation in the beat of his heart quickly return; the man before him wore the black shihakusho of a Shinigami. After being so concerned that he would have to waste his time on small prey, it looked as though the man he had come so far to kill had stumbled right into his path.

“Yagyu Jubei,” the Shinigami responded, his expression grim and his eyes glittering with sharp resolve as he extended the curved blade of his katana - held within his right hand - towards Sasaki. “Don’t bother telling me yours….‘

“You’ll be dead before I’ve had time to remember it.”

- - - Updated - - -


Act XX: Broken Blade






At Jubei’s declaration, the man with a painted face quickly broke into another broad grin. Although his left eye was quickly swelling shut, his cheek beneath it looking very much like bloody, ground beef, his right eye twinkled with mirth that likely was not entirely grounded in sanity. The man’s thin shoulders shook as he lowered his arms, the stone walls to either side trembling slightly as the labyrinth of cracks punched into their surface continued to spread.

“You’re going to kill me, eh?” he sneered. “Don’t be so full of yourself. Forget my name? Forget my name!? My name will be legend long after you’re…”

“I said…” the man’s ravings were cut short as Jubei’s shifted his stance to grip his sword in both hands, shuffling his right foot slightly further out to one side to even his posture. “…don’t bother.”

From the look on Sasaki’s face, Jubei imagined that the former had seen his movements - but the look of sudden panic that flared across his features told him that they were far faster than he had likely anticipated. Jubei bridged the distance that separated the two of them in the space of a heartbeat - one moment standing a full five yards from Sasaki, the next directly in front of him, crouched low to the ground, with the razor sharp edge of his sword aimed in a rising swing that threatened to carve the man in two from hip to shoulder.

As quick as the attack was, Sasaki was swift to reaction. However, he had little time to do much else but swung the massive bundle across his back - which Jubei could only assume was a weapon - to the fore. Without any time to even unwrap the weapon from the cloth that bound it, Sasaki grit his teeth as Jubei’s attack collided with the hasty parry. However, it was Jubei’s turn to experience surprise as his zanpakuto - which he had expected to simply cleave through whatever barrier was presented - clanged loudly against his opponent’s weapon, stopping short.

‘Impossible!….Unless that thing’s…’

For the second time, Sasaki’s pink tongue flicked across his lips, a look of maniacal bliss passing over his features as, adjusting his grip upon the bundle to place both hands on the same edge, he swept backwards against Jubei’s own strike. Immediately, Jubei was not merely pushed backwards, but thrown - lurching awkwardly backwards as his front foot lifted from the ground, skidding backwards upon his left foot only, his eyes widening in disbelief at the impossible force behind the counter-swing.

He slid backwards for a full twenty feet before he was finally forced to earth both feet, bending his knees sharply to kill his backward momentum. Skidding to a halt, he quickly raised his sword before him once more in both hands, regarding his opponent with more caution than he had after their initial meeting. His awkward skid across the surface of the sand had coughed up a thick soup of sandy smoke that swallowed up the alley, veiling the other end - and his opponent - from sight.

‘He isn’t particularly fast, but his physically strength is immense. Despite his thin limbs, in a direct contest of power he might actually be stronger than me. I’m going to have to be careful with this guy. This shouldn’t be possible…who the hell is this guy!? Where did he come from!? There’s nobody this strong in the Outer Rim!’

“I am Sasaki Kojiro,” the man’s voice hissed from behind the cloud of dust. “But don’t worry about that….you’ll be dead before you’ve had time to remember it.”

No sooner had he echoed Jubei’s own words back at him, than the painted man suddenly blasted forward - the powerful draft created by his momentum scattering the cloud of dust as his face - twisted into a lopsided sneer - rushed forward to fill Jubei’s vision. His body poised for swift movement, the former Shinigami threw himself backwards even as a flash of steel descended towards his position amid a flutter is discarded cloth.

The bindings that had wrapped around his opponent’s weapon tore free as he surged forward, revealing the enormous weapon beneath. An enormous nodachi, fully six feet in length, sporting an elegantly curved blade the terminated in rounded tsuba shaped - to Jubei’s eyes - like a grinning skull, with the blade sprouting from its crown. The hilt itself was bone white, shaped very much like a human femur and, for all its size, Sasaki wielded the weapon effortlessly in his right hand alone, bringing the blade crashing to the ground where Jubei had been standing mere moments before.

The result of the attack was immediate, and devastating. The blow struck with such force that Jubei, his dodge carrying him clear by a full five feet, still felt the tremor ripple upwards through his legs. To either side, a rumbling groan shook the stone walls - cracks spreading up from ground level to form a snaking pattern that ascended almost to the building’s peak. Dust and mortar trickled from the splintering walls as, simply from proximity to the strike, the buildings threatened to collapse.

‘If he gets a direct hit on me, it’s over…and I can’t fight him too close to the buildings, or they’ll come down. Why’d a guy this strong have to show up after all this time?’

“Who are you?” he demanded, as Sasaki yanked his sword free of the ground - the weapon having been buried in the sand by the force of its own landing. “Are you with the Onmitsukido? If so then leave these people out of it! You’re here for me!”

His opponent gave no response other than a wordless cry of what sounded like ecstasy as he charged forward once more. Hissing out a curse of his own, Jubei elected not to give him a standing target - the buildings would withstand another tremor. Instead he concentrated his reiatsu beneath his feet, bending his knees briefly before kicking skywards. Immediately he sailed into the air, propelled by the dense spiritrons gathered beneath the soles of his feet. His opponent, however, did not hesitate for a moment - immediately taking to the air in pursuit.

‘I see…he can even air walk. He doesn’t look like a Shinigami, but he certainly knows all the tricks. Let’s hope he doesn’t know any kido, or he really might destroy the entire town.’

Roaring upwards to meet Jubei, Sasaki unleashed his sword in another wild, one-armed swing. This time, however, Jubei was ready to receive the attack. Holding his sword underarm in his right hand, he braced the blade against his forearm to receive his opponent’s horizontal slash - though even with his body poised to receive the parry he was forced to grit his teeth as a shiver of pain rattled through his arm. No sooner was the attack received than he raised his right leg in a fluent roundhouse aimed for the left side of his adversary’s features.

With his left eye swollen shut, Sasaki’s field of vision was too narrow to see the blow coming. Jubei’s shin squarely collided with the side of his opponent’s head, sending the swordsman reeling in what should have been a knock out blow. A spurt of fresh blood spat forward from the man’s half-closed eyelid as he briefly turned his head aside; however, much to Jubei’s alarm the madman almost immediately renewed his attack, cackling giddily as he lurched back in the Shinigami’s direction, hacking wildly with his monstrous weapon with attacks that had little in the way of technique.

Sheer physical strength, however, left him needing very little of it; against a different opponent, Jubei would likely have parried and countered. However even as he weaved aside from one of Sasaki’s attacks - the blade whispering harmlessly by several inches one side of his head, he grit his teeth in sudden pain as the air pressure exacted by the passing blade struck him as effectively as a punch. A deafening pop sounded in his right ear - adjacent to the passing sword - only to be replaced by a muffled pulse of his own blood as his ear drum burst from the pressure.

His opponent’s strength seemed to grow with every swing of his sword - there was little chance of a second parry not resulting in injury to himself. Resolving to put some distance between himself and his opponent, Jubei kicked backwards once more - slipping through the empty air in a backward lunge until he reformed the spiritrons beneath his feet. Putting a more comfortable distance of some ten yards between himself and the swordsman, he held his sword forward in one hand, raising the other to dab at his right ear - his fingertips detecting the slick wetness of blood dribbling from within.

His opponent did not pursue this time. At the conclusion of his last swing, Sasaki remained where he was, his arm dangling to hold his weapon lazily at his side, regarding Jubei with a hungry, predatory look. A froth of blood saliva had formed at either end of the man’s mouth, and Jubei winced as he realised the man had - at some point during their struggle - begun to chew away at his lower lip. His shoulders rising and falling heavily, the muscles of the swordsman’s face visible twitched - the prospect of fighting, or more likely killing, apparently whipping him into near sexual excitement.

‘…His breathing is already getting heavy. He doesn’t pace himself….with physical strength like that, his reiatsu must be enormous, but he doesn’t conserve any of it. He puts more reiatsu into every swing than I’ve expended in this entire fight so far. If I can make him swing and miss, he’ll burn himself out and I can take him down without having to worry about that damn sword.’

With his opponent momentarily winded, Jubei spared a glance at the town beneath. His eyes narrowed into a scowl as he noticed that the soldiers have not so much as looked up at the battle. Single minded and extremely disciplined, they had continued to gather the townspeople without any show of hesitation at his presence. From his lofty vantage, he could see that most of the village had already been gathered up and bundled into the wagons - a few isolated pockets of resistance and running brawls among the buildings wouldn’t last long.

Time, it seemed, was not on his side. With their apparent disinterest in the battle, he couldn’t be sure the soldiers wouldn’t simply leave with their human cargo before it was concluded; he had no way of knowing how long it might take his opponent to run out of steam. For that matter, all it would take would be one mistake or mistimed dodge, and he would almost certainly be killed and unable to help the villagers at all. Although it presented a degree of risk to the town, his best recourse was to end things quickly and help the villagers. It would, however, require a direct attack, and that in itself was a gamble. Slow and safe, versus quick and dangerous….

“Sasaki Kojiro,” he spoke out loud, turning his gaze back towards the painted man. “You appear to be enjoying yourself….I get the feeling you don’t often get to fight men as strong as me. How about I make you a deal?”

His opponent’s eyebrow twitched briefly, a twinkle of interest sparking through the madness in his eyes, Tilting his head slightly, Sasaki’s grin spread even wider - splitting his face in two to reveal his teeth now stained with his own blood. Although he didn’t speak, Jubei at least appeared to have caught his interest.

“I don’t know what you want with the townspeople,” Jubei continued. “But I assume you’re looking for slaves…there are many in this village who have no value to you. The old, and the very young. If a good fight is what you’re after, I’ll fight you at my full power….but only if you promise me that, if you win, you will leave those people here, unharmed.”

The moment the words ‘full power’ left his lips, Jubei noticed a change in his adversary’s features. His black outlined eyes widened slightly, alight with an eager gleam as - for the first time, he hoisted his sword before him in both hands to assume the semblance of a combat stance.

“…..Alright,” the swordsman hissed through his blood flecked lips. “We have a deal. Show me how they fight in the Seireitei, and we’ll only take the ones that are useful.”

‘…Quick and dangerous it is, then.’

Drawing in a long breath to steady himself, Jubei allowed his eyes to drift closed. He didn’t expect an attack - Sasaki wanted to see what he was going to do, and there seemed little chance of a sneak attack. It had been a long time, however, since he had broken the seal of his zanpakuto….so long, in fact, that shikai no longer came easily. Focusing his reiatsu upon the blade, Jubei entered a silent communication with the weapon’s soul - the ironclad oath that existed between Shinigami and zanpakuto, as he reached out for that part of his soul that resided, long buried, within the sword.

“Undertake….

………..Tsumujikaze.”

Tendrils of white reiatsu, visible to the naked eye, spread to engulf his sword as the seal was broken. Opening his eyes once more, Jubei inhaled what felt like his first breath in ten long years - the full flow of his strength flooding forth from his sword as, within his hands, his weapon was lost from sight behind a blindingly bright glow. The shape and weight of the weapon began to change, morphing from the blue hilted katana into its true form.

A dull jingle, like the ringing of a lonely bell, briefly touched his single working ear…before Jubei’s world exploded in red.

From his left him to his right shoulder, his body split apart as though cut by a blade - the glow fading from his zanpakuto immediately as the blade - severed in half as though it were made of cardboard - spiralled into the air in the wake of the devastating attack. His eyes bulging in his head - cold numbness spreading through his body, Jubei opened his mouth to cry out in pain; but his lips merely ejected forth a thick torrent of near-black blood as he suddenly felt himself falling.

Having returned to its sealed shape, the bladeless hilt of his zanpakuto tumbled from his fingers - his limbs losing all feeling as the ground lurched up to meet him. Darkness consuming his vision, he was only dimly aware of the crunch of bone and the shattering of rock as he landed on the roof of one of the town buildings, his body smashing through the stone roof with such force that the entire structure rumbled, before collapsing on top of him.

Buried beneath the falling stone, Jubei’s pain faded as his world was swallowed by darkness.




Sasaki looked on in horror as his opponent fell, a veritable fountain of blood spilling from his broken torso, before falling like a limp doll to the town beneath. For a moment unable to comprehend what he had just seen, he watched as the Shinigami crashed into one of the many houses that were splayed out beneath them, disappearing beneath a cascade of stone and smoke. His lips twitching as he attempted to speak, he managed only a strangled gasp for air. However, his surprise turned quickly to rage, grinding his teeth as he issued forth a snarl of absolute fury, turning on the spot to roar out his anger towards the ground level.

“Bastard!” he bellowed, his voice echoing across the rooftops as, far bellow, Toda lifted his gaze to peer up at his companion from beneath the rim of his wide hat. “I didn’t ask for your help! I would have killed him!”

“Maybe that’s true,” Toda called back, shrugging his shoulders - casually holding aloft one of the four wind chimes that usually hung from his hat between his thumb and index finger. Utterly unafraid of his partner’s enraged state, he casually lifted the chime back to his hat, clipping it in place. “But he was stronger than I thought he’d be…at least third seat level. Odds are that you would have killed each other.”

With another snarl, sounding more animal than man, Sasaki tore back to ground level in a blast of shyumpo that saw him reappear, almost instantly, before his counterpart. Still grinding his teeth, his sword arm tensed as his shoulders visible shook with rage. Toda - seated casually upon a low stone wall that surrounded a small well near the town centre, only a short distance from the wagons - barely spared his younger companion a glance as he rose to his feet.

“You’re bleeding all over yourself,” he murmured, using a dingle hand to draw low the edge of his hat, as though to hide the bloodies Sasaki from his sight. “Clean yourself up….fighting like an animal. You’re a damn disgrace.”

“I came all this way to fight him,” Sasaki growled, his every word sending a spray of blood filled spittle spraying across the sand. “I finally got to fight someone strong, and you…..you old bastard. I’ll…”

“You’ll what?” Toda replied nonchalantly, turning away from Sasaki altogether to make his way back towards the wagons. Sasaki glared daggers at his back, but said nothing more - turning his face aside to glare in mute frustration at the ground. The difference in strength between the two of them was vast; there was nothing he could do.

“I’ll go find someone else to kill,” he finally muttered, shouldering his enormous sword as he turned his attention towards the town. “He never showed me his full power…so I guess there’s no deal after all. I‘ve got some unfinished business at a house back there.”

Scowling, the warrior turned to stalk back into the town - his every movement stiff and agitated. Toda, his hands clasped behind his back, turned briefly to look over his shoulder as his counterpart left. He almost felt sorry for whomever the maddened swordsman selected as his prey.

“Have fun,” he snorted, before continuing on towards the wagons to oversee the harvest.

- - - Updated - - -


Act XXI: Homecoming






The port of Flotsam did not look any different, to Hitomi’s eyes, than it had seven years previously. Still the central hub of trade between the Outer Rim and the more civilised districts to the East, it was perhaps slightly larger than it had been when she had passed through last. On both sides of the river, the multi-tiered town of Flotsam scaled upwards upon an enormous wooden scaffold - it’s furthest edges essentially blending into the forest that surrounded the town on both sides. Many hundreds of shanty huts and buildings or varying states of repair and architectural expertise bristled upon the scaffold, a population of several thousand living out their lives upon the artificial plateaus that marched along this section of the river.

Only a few dozen meters separated the south and north back of the river where the town stood, the distance spanned by four rope bridges that connected the towering scaffolds on both sides of the water to link the two halves of the town together. Like any typical fishing village, it was alive with activity - although the highest tiers of the scaffold were too far away to make out fine detail, the small shapes of people could be seen ascending the narrow staircases that snaked through way between the buildings, while the docks themselves frothed with activity.

As Kuroda’s ship navigated its way through the narrow river, Hitomi stood upon the bow. Her arms folded, she watched with interest as the people around her were about their daily lives - if the commotion further west was bothering them, then it certainly was not obvious. The fisherman - as most of the towns people visible on the docks were, simply went about their business as they likely did on any other day; making their way down to the veritable carpet of small canoes and fishing boats that resides in the shallows, or carrying nets laden with fresh catches in the opposite direction. On the surface, at least, it was a scene taken directly out of her memory of the last time she had seen the town.

However, the longer she watched, the more she became aware of a certain tension in the air. Although the townsfolk went about their daily lives - for indeed they had little choice but to do so in order to sustain their town - there was nevertheless a definite cloud of apprehension that hung over them. Hitomi noticed that, despite the sheer number of people, the docks were unusually quiet. Although the toing and froing of so many bodies still created a great clamour, and there was a general drone of conversation, these conversations were muted and brief. Nobody called out across the dock upon seeing a familiar face, or laughed upon hearing a crude sailor’s joke (of which Shadrin had told her there were many). The longer she observed the town drifting by, the more disquieting the sight became, and she decided to turn her attention elsewhere as the vessel continued through the dock towards a destination that Kuroda had not made clear.

Seeking a distraction from the somewhat depressing atmosphere of the town, she turned her attention to the boat upon which she stood, casting a sideward glance at Junshin. Her counterpart, unlike herself, had no frame of reference for what the port town should have looked like - to him, the sight of the rustic buildings and swaying rope bridges likely appeared wondrous and charming compared to the stone buildings and paved streets of the Seireitei. He stared in open awe at the town as it drifted by, thoroughly taken in by the hustle and bustle of civilian live that was simply not evident in the military city.

His back to her, Junshin stood with his hands on the boat’s railing, gazing out eagerly at the town. However, he soon turned to regard her with an eager grin, clearly wanting nothing more than to explore the rich tapestry of sights and sounds that lay beyond the port. Hitomi allowed herself a small smile, her unease settling slightly at the sight of Junshin’s apparent enthusiasm, though she affected an expression of mock severity, placing her hands on her hips.

“Don’t get too excited,” she cautioned. “Just remember that this isn’t a holiday. We’ve got work to do.”

“I understand, Seraphina-kun,” Junshin nodded, though Hitomi noticed that the exited grin did not leave his features as he turned back to look towards the port. During their two day voyage, Junshin had probably explored his abilities more thoroughly than he had in the six years he had been at the Academy - his confidence had grown in leaps and bounds as, Hitomi suspected, he began to realise that he was not such a weakling after all.

He still wasn’t a soldier, though. Nor, she fancied, did he fully appreciate the potential danger they were walking into. Their encounter with the Hollow had been a educational one, but their rapid recovery from the ordeal had done little to prepare Junshin for the reality of facing life or death situation. With any luck her fears would be allayed, and they would discover that whatever awaited them in the Outer Rim did turn out to be nothing more than an overzealous group of vigilantes.

With any luck.

Kuroda and his family had been working at a frantic pace from the moment the town came into sight. With a pair of eyes stationed at either edge of the boat to keep an eye out for potential collisions, and Kuroda himself at the bow barking orders while the remaining crewmen - save Dirk - steered the vessel through the narrowing river with an enormous rudder strapped to the rear of the ship. Dirk made himself usual by darting back and forth across the ship, relaying orders and information among the crew as the noise of the harbour made it difficult for voices to carry the length of the deck.

As much as she found herself feeling rather awkward at standing around doing nothing, Hitomi thought it best to leave them to their tasks. Lacking either training or experience in nautical matters, she would likely simply get in their way, and leave them looking over her shoulder to make sure she was doing her job correctly. Left alone, the family moved as a crisp, well oiled unit that had clearly navigated the waterway countless times before. Attempting to simply stay out of their way, Hitomi moved to stand beside Junshin at the ship’s rail, leaning backwards against the wood, her brow knotted thoughtfully.

It was a strange sensation, finally begin back in the Outer Rim. An odd sense of comforting familiarity that had been missing while she had lived the last seven years of her life in the Seireitei. She had only been fourteen years old when she had left, but a part of her couldn’t help but consider the Rukongai as home; a part of her that she hadn’t even realised existed until she found herself drifting along the surface of the river.

As much as she admonished Junshin to keep his mind on their mission, she knew that hers was no more on it than his. With nothing else to do over the last two days but train, she had spent a great deal of time alone with her thoughts…and she had thought a great deal about what she now considered a homecoming. Despite the passage of time, she couldn’t help but feel a sense of peace the closer she came to the land she had grown up in.

“Junshin-kun,” she murmured suddenly, “I’ve been thinking…well…maybe ‘over thinking’ is the better word. I think….I want you to know that you were right, that night in the barracks.”

Junshin turned to regard her with a quirked eyebrow, his smile fading to be replaced by a somewhat perplexed impression. Hitomi didn’t look towards him, shifting uncomfortably as she felt suddenly awkward at dredging up one of their less pleasant conversations.

“Seven years was too long,” she admitted. “I think I understand that, now. I didn’t even realise it until I found myself heading back this way…but I wanted to come home. Even if it’s just to see what things are like out here now. I’ve come a long way, but as much as I don’t regret leaving it’s not as though becoming a Shinigami was an easy path to take.’

“I’ve had to endure a lot of hardships,” her lips tightened grimly, “I’ve had to watch people I care about get hurt…and I’ve killed a lot of people along the way. I suppose part of me wonders if any of it really was easier than what my life would have been like if I hadn’t gone with Shadrin-kun that day. If I’d just said ‘thanks for saving my life. See ya’. I don’t think for a moment that it would be better….but I just…I don’t know. I think I’ve got this little part of me that needs to see things out here for myself, or it’ll never shut up.”

Falling silent, Hitomi unconsciously wrapped her arms around herself, staring at the deck before her feet. As much as she knew it to be true, it was still uncomfortable to admit she had any desire to see her old home. But it was there regardless, and she couldn’t continue to ignore it. It made her feel guilty to have such a wish; after everything that Shadrin had done for her, and the friendship she had received from Yukimura and Shingen, even the implication that she could second guess the life she had left since leaving Jetsam left a bitter taste in her mouth.

“….I’ve often wondered the same,” Junshin suddenly spoke up beside her, causing her to jump as for the first time she turned her dusk coloured gaze in his direction. The other Shinigami’s smile had returned, though his own gaze had turned once more to the town, watching wistfully as its occupants drifted by. “I don’t think a day’s gone by since I started at the Academy where I haven’t thought ‘I’m not cut out for this. I wonder if it wouldn’t be better if I’d stayed a merchant’.’

“Even after I graduated, I didn’t think I really belonged. I’ve spent a long time thinking that I might have made a mistake, and thinking the better path would have been to stay at home, but….but now, I’m not so sure that’s true.”

“I wasn’t half as strong as I am now when I first met you, Seraphina-kun,” he continued, his eyes briefly flickering down to his hands, clasped lightly over the wooden barricade “Although I know that I’ve still got a long way to go, I feel for the first time like I actually belong in this uniform. I’m not just some guy who stumbled into this career….I feel like I am a Shinigami. That I earned the right to be called one. It was Seraphina-kun that helped me belong. That alone makes me think that, surely, you belong here too.’

“I think you should definitely look for your own answer,” he confirmed with a nod, turning his smile towards her. “You shouldn’t go forward with regrets….but, if it puts your mind at all at ease, I believe that you’ll find you made the right choice. Just be being around, I think you‘ve made me stronger. I doubt I‘m the only one.”

Hitomi merely stared mutely at her counterpart for a moment, though she felt a warm flush creep into her cheeks before sharply snapping her face aside. Pushing away from the banister, one hand reaching up to rub an imaginary crick in her neck as her other swatted out to deliver a light punch to Junshin’s shoulder.

“Yes…well…” she coughed. “You’ve worked hard these last couple of days. That’s why you’re stronger. Besides…uh….say, are we actually stopping or not?”

Taking aback by the sudden question, Junshin turned his attention back to the land. Hitomi had noted that, despite passing through the town, the vessel did not appear to be slowing its progress. She had assumed the boat would dock somewhere along the port; however, it looked as though Kuroda was simply heading through the town altogether, the buildings beginning to thin in number as they reached the very outskirts of habitation - the town eventually being replaced altogether by trees.

The river quickly began to widen once more, thick green forest filling the banks to either side as Hitomi began to wonder if they were headed for the next town rather than Flotsam itself, when their apparent destination suddenly became clear. As the vessel continued forward, a final building suddenly came into view around the treeline - separated from the remainder of the town by some hundred yards of woodland.

The building was by far the largest they had seen as part of the town - separate from the scaffold structure, and thus able to be built and extended at the leisure of its occupants without thought to weight of encroachment upon neighbours. The main body of the house was made from what appeared to be the remains of a large grain silo, though a number of extensions had been built onto this original framework to add additional rooms. Windows - framed by pale blue curtains - had been carved into the wooden structure to mark each room, with those on the bottom floor sporting well tended window-boxes filled with flowing plants and bloomed lavishly in the warm weather of the Outer Rukongai.

The craftsmanship behind the house was not as professional as one might have seen in the wooden dwellings they had observed in the Inner Districts, but it appeared sturdy nonetheless. In fact, aside from the circular shape of the building’s centre created by the grain silo, it looked very much like an a-typical country cottage. A wooden decking with an overhanging porch extended beyond the front door to provide shade for its occupants to sit on lazy evenings, while the curtains fluttered slightly in the welcome, cool breeze that was swept along the surface of the river.

It was, in fact, a good deal more homely that Hitomi had expected. Flotsam itself, as a major trade hub, was a far cry from being considered a slum - even its average citizens lived in relative comfort by Outer Rim standards - but Hitomi was nevertheless impressed by the home that Kuroda had likely built himself upon the frontier of society. A small dock had also been constructed upon the bank of the river to provide a berth for his ship, and it was at this dock that the rest of Kuroda’s family appeared to be waiting.

Unlike the occupants of the boat, Hitomi noted that those who had apparently been left behind were all female. They were five in number - two of them looking to be of near ages with Hitomi herself, while the other three were closer to twelve or thirteen; Dirk remained, it seemed the youngest member of the family. As with their male counterparts, Hitomi noted that none of the five in any way resembled either Kuroda or, in fact, each other. As she had suspected, it seemed likely that Kuroda had simply taken in his various children from the streets. It was not an uncommon practice in the Outer Rim, with ‘families’ forming sometimes for mutual protection, and sometimes out of simple compassion; with all she had seen of Kuroda, she suspected the latter to be the case in this instance.

“Ahoi there,” Kuroda called out to the party at the dock, raising a hand in greeting as the group enthusiastically waved their own arms in jubilant greeting. “My my…out in force to welcome us back, are we?”

Hitomi watched as Kuroda tossed a rope to the shore, which was promptly seized up by the two oldest girls to help pull the boat into place. As the boat drew closer Dirk - with his hands in the pockets of his hakama, lazily kicking the length of wood across the deck - knocked the gangplank roughly into position to bridge the gap between vessel and dry land. At a gesture from Kuroda, Hitomi made her way across the deck with Junshin in toe as the old sailor grasped Dirk by the collar - arresting the youth in his efforts to charge off the ship first.

“Shinigami-dono,” Kuroda gestured grandly towards the shore, “as my guests, please be the first to disembark and make yourselves comfortable. It’s been a long trip, and I’m sure you’d both like to rest up on an actual chair. Welcome, both of you, to my home. The townsfolk like to call it ’Kuroda’s Landing’. As you’re probably aware, this is the town of Flotsam.’

“Welcome to the official starting point of the Outer Rim.”

[Seraphina]

Act XXII: Eyes of Rosy Hue






Although the Seireite experienced weather that was typically warm throughout spring through to autumn – becoming only truly cold in the winter, when snow was not uncommon – the weather of the Rukongai varied dramatically. With a landmass larger than most continents in the World of the Living, the Rukongai saw many different topographical landscapes from thick jungle or arctic tundra. In general, the North Rukongai featured more temperate climbs with the south more arid. The West Rukongai was, although drier than the north, not nearly as arid as the south. The mean temperature, however, was well above thirty degrees on the cusp of the Outer Rim; beyond which the temperature would soar even higher.

Although spiritual bodies were often not affected by extremes of heat in the same manner as a physical body, that was not to say that neither Shinigami was effected. Hitomi, believe of a relatively pale complexion, could almost feel the warmth of the sun pounding down on the back of her neck. It would probably be best to get indoors as soon as possible. Even if they were bound to spend the next few days touring the Outer Rim under the very same sun, she at least intended to plan out their investigation in some degree of comfort.

Offering Kuroda a nod of acknowledgement, Hitomi stepped forward onto the ready gangplank that Dirk had prepared to step from the boat onto the shore. She hesitated only slightly as she noticed the look of eager curiosity with which the party on the shore peered at her approach. Most likely none of the children would have ever seen a Shinigami, and no sooner had she set foot upon dry land than they surged forward to poke and prod at her; perhaps to make sure she was truly what she appeared to be.

Several pairs of tiny hands tugged at the cloth of her shihakusho and fingered the sheath of her zanpakuto – though she kept her hand upon the pommel to prevent any of them from actually drawing the sword. Grimacing at the sudden interest, for she was far from accustomed to being accosted in such a manner, the Shinigami pressed through the wrong as delicately as she could, raising her free hand to shoulder height to avoid accidentally bumping the heads of any of the waiste high children. They made no attempt to bar her passage, immediately turning their investigation towards Junshin the moment Hitomi had moved on.

Junshin appeared slightly more accommodating that Hitomi had felt, smiling warmly at the children as they gave him identical treatment. He would likely have waited for them to satisfy their curiosity before moving on had Dirk, bounding sure footedly down the gangplank, not delivered a rough kick to his backside.

“Come on!” the youth grunted. “Keep it moving, Wetpants!”

Losing some of his thunder at Dirk’s continued use of the nickname, Junshin wilted slightly as some of the children giggled. One of the older girls addressed Dirk with a disapproving frown, but the youth quickly shouldered his way through the crowd before he could receive any admonishment. Catching up to Hitomi, he darted quickly around her also to make his way towards the house. However, after overtaking her, the boy turned to glance backwards over his shoulders before doubling back, reaching out a hand to Hitomi’s sleeve to make an attempt to pull her along behind him.

“Hey!” Hitomi resisted the urge to shake him off, allowing herself to be led across the expanse of grassy lawn that led towards the building. “What’s the rush?”

“Da’ says that th’sun gives ya wrinkles,” Dirk replied, nodding matter of factly. “Ya don’t have any wrinkles, but n’Old Lady like should be careful.”

A curiously therapeutic image of Dirk being buried in a smouldering crater danced through Hitomi’s head, but she satisfied herself by offering the child a taut smile as she withdrew her arm from his grasp. Dirk glanced back to look over his shoulder at her, but shrugged when he noted she appeared to be following regardless. As much as the youth’s chosen nicknames seemed likely to persist, at least his actions appeared to be – if only slightly – dictated by a sense of concern.

“You seem to have a large family,” she murmured, attempting to make conversation as she followed the boy towards the house, casting a backward glance towards Junshin, who appeared no closer to disentangling himself from the crowd of children. “Is this everyone?”

“Naw,” Dirk replied with a small shake of his head. “Hisayo-Ue-san isn’t here.”

Hitomi quirked an eyebrow at the unexpected use of an honorific – let alone such an old fashioned one – from Dirk. The honorific ‘Ue’, literally meaning ‘above’, was one she had heard of but never actually heard anyone say out loud. She peered curiously at the back of the boy’s head as he continued towards the house, wondering what kind of a person it would take to squeeze from respect out of the boy.

“Hisayo-san is your….Mother?” she queried, although she imagined Dirk would probably know that Kuroda – and his wife, assuming he had one – were not his natural parents.

“Naw. She’s our…” Dirk paused for a moment, as though unsure of exactly how to reply. After a momentary pauses, he shrugged gave a satisfied not to himself before issuing his reply. “She looks after us. She ain’t been here long, but she takes care of th’town.”

“I see,” Hitomi nodded, although in truth she wasn’t entirely sure that she did. Knowing what she did of Dirk, this could mean anything from some kind of local law enforcement to the leader of the local protection racket; she somehow doubted that Dirk would be able to tell the difference between the two. Besides which, she couldn’t claim to have that much interest. She had merely intended to make some conversation with the boy and, with any luck, distract him from further referring to her as ‘old’.

Hitomi had to admit that she felt at least slightly guilty retreating into the shade of the house while, behind her, Kuroda and his family worked to offload their fishy cargo from the boat. However, experience told her that those who dwelt on the Outer Rim tended towards self-sufficiency. They often took their independence from the distant Seireite, and their ability to live on the crust of civilisation as a badge of honour, and she was quite certain that Kuroda would prefer not to receive help from a Shinigami, regardless of how hospitable he may have been.

As Junshin finally caught up with her, having managed to disengage himself from the greeting party, he slowed down to match her pace. Together, the pair kept a half step behind Dirk as the latter finally disappeared into the house’s interior. Upon the doorstep, Junshin raised a hand to momentarily bar Hitomi’s way, addressing her in hushed tones.

“Seraphina-kun,” he whispered, “we shouldn’t impose on these people if we can avoid it. Those children found us fascinating…Shinigami can’t be very common out here. We can’t have sailed through that town without attracting at least some attention, and if there is a danger….”

“Yeah,” Hitomi nodded in agreement. “I don’t want to drag anyone into our problems either. Mind you, we still don’t know that there actually is any chance of hostilities out here. For now, we’ll consider this place forward base…but I agree, we won’t stay here longer than an hour or so, while we plan our next move. There’s bound to be a Shinigami waystation around where we can bunker down if we’re going to be in this area for a long time.”

“Alright,” Junshin replied. “At the very least we can try and get our bearings from here, I suppose. Yoshitaka-san is bound to know the lay of the land a little.”

Having reached something of a consensus, the two Shinigami headed through the open doorway. Hitomi immediately hesitated upon the threshold, blinking rapidly as her eyes took a moment to adjust to the sudden relative darkness. Although sunlight still bathed the entry room in a generous glow from the many windows carved into the side of the building, a definite shape in the intensity of the light was present as one stepped inside.

The doorway opened up immediately into a small porch upon which Dirk had kicked off his sandals – Hitomi taking the hint and doing the same – before a small raised lip stepped onto a hardwood floor that led down a narrow corridor that seemed to cut through the direct centre of the building. Four doorways, each of them little more than empty arches with a net curtain across each to afford a degree of privacy, branched off at even intervals into the corridor terminated in a ladder against the back wall of the house that ascended, presumably, to the upper floors.

As perhaps was to be expected given the less than affluent area in which the family lived, there was little in the way of furniture and what there was appeared to be handmade. Crafted with the same skilled but unpolished technique as the house itself, a stout table by the front door appeared to be where the family kept various letters and other documents, while a child’s hobby horse law in the centre of the hallways – presumably discarded when the children realised their father was returning.

Dirk had not waited for the Shinigami to catch up; instead immediately striking out ahead to the last door on the left hand side. With little else to do but follow him, Hitomi set off for the same doorway. Although it was still warm inside, in the absence of direct sunlight the air was pleasantly cool when compared to the near stifling heat of the exterior, and Hitomi found herself feeling increasingly refreshed as she made her way down the corridor to turn into what was, as it turned out, the kitchen of the house.

A log fire set into the far wall – surrounded by stone to provide a safe distance between it and the wood – played host to a bubbling stone pot that, from the smell, contained some kind of vegetable soup. As she arrived, Dirk was in the process of poking at the same pot with a wooden spoon. Unlike the two Shinigami, the youth could not possibly have been experiencing hunger; Hitomi, however, felt a brief gurgle in the pit of her stomach as the smell that she hoped was not audible. Perhaps the only disadvantage that spiritually aware beings experienced over their more unassuming counterparts was the requirement of food.

In the middle of the room, there was a large table with enough space for the entire family to be seated around – and a number of cushions strewn across the floor for this purpose - while a number of smaller surfaces were tucked against the wall – presumably for foot preparation – with neatly packed wooden plates and eating utensils ready for distribution.

Although she hadn’t been specifically invited to do so, the right to sit down had been implied by Kuroda’s earlier invitation to make themselves comfortable, and Hitomi lowered herself onto one of the cushions that surrounded the table, setting her zanpakuto down beside her. Kneeling with her legs folded beneath her body, her heels against her buttocks, she placed her hands neatly in her lap as Junshin sat down beside her, though her still appeared somewhat uneasy at the prospect of remaining there for long.

“Well…the first thing we should probably do is report in,” she began. “We still don’t really have much to report, but we can at least let the Soul Society know that we’ve arrived. I doubt we’ll find much useful information this far East, but there might be some merchants or someone we can question who’s maybe come from further West before we head that way.”

“Sounds good,” Junshin nodded, venturing nothing further. Hitomi frowned slightly, having hoped her companion would have a little more to contribute. Although, if she was forced to do so, she couldn’t help but admit that she had done the majority of the decision making thus far…perhaps she had gone some way towards making Junshin feel as though he were simply along for the ride.

“Any further thoughts on what we learned from Yoshitaka-san?” she queried, having relayed what the fisherman had told her on their first night to Junshin. Then, as now, Junshin had little to say; having merely frowned and nodded with a thoughtful grunt.

“I think I agree with you,” he responded. “The only purpose I can really imagine anyone gathering people up like that would be a slave racket…Although I really hope that isn’t the case. I’ve been trying to think of anything else it could possibly be, but so far I’m drawing a blank.”

“On the Outer Rim of the South Rukon,” Hitomi shrugged, “there’s a man named Uesugi who’s built a settlement, and invited people from the surrounds to come and settle there…a semblance of civilisation among the wasteland. We can’t say for certain that these ghost towns have been emptied by force…but you’d think, if otherwise was the case, not everyone would have been willing to leave.”

Junshin did not reply at once, instead turning curiously towards Dirk – the latter in the process of carefully licking the spoon he had earlier dunked into the soup, taking little interest in the two Shinigami. Noting Junshin’s gaze, however, the youth immediately scowled as he turned his body away from the young Shinigami to protectively shield the spoon, as though expecting Junshin to lunge for the food covered utensil.

“Dirk-kun,” Junshin ventured. “I know that you have been away from home for a few days, but are there many refugees in town? Anyone who has maybe come in from further West who might have a good idea of what’s going on that way?”

Dirk squinted, his eyes rolling upwards in his head as she apparently attempted to think of a reply. Taking his time, he gave the spoon in his hand another thorough licking, before pointing it towards Junshin as he apparently drew a blank save for a single name.

“There’s only really Hisayo-Ue-san,” he replied. “She’s from out West…I think. She hasn’t really said so, but she didn’t come into town from th’river. She walked in on th’road.”

“You said outside that she hadn’t been here long,” Hitomi nodded. “I suppose she could be a refugee…Could you tell us a little more about her? Who she is, what she does here?”

“I told ya,” Dirk shrugged, turning his attention back to his spoon, “she takes care of th’town. She lives here with us.”

“I believe Hitomi-kun would like you to be more specific, Dirk-kun,” Junshin attempted to phrase the question as diplomatically as possible, given his earlier lack of success in getting much out of the child save for insults. Dirk looked, if only for a moment, to consider the request. However, his expression quickly shifted into an impish grin as she stabbed a finger towards Hitomi’s sheathed zanpakuto.

“I’ll tell ya if you let me….”

“No,” Hitomi quickly shot down whatever zanpakuto orientated request the youth was about to make, to his visible disappointment.

“Aww, come on!” he protested. “I only wanna hold it for a bit!”

“I know,” Hitomi replied curtly. “That’s why I’m saying no.”

“Come oooon,” Dirk continued to argue, wildly waving his spoon in the air. “Don’t be like that, Old Lady! I know how t’handle a blade. I told ya, I’m street smart!”

“Yeah, right,” Hitomi sighed, doubting that Dirk could even lift the heavy sword let alone wield it safely once out of its sheath. Waving a hand dismissively at the youth, she turned back to face Junshin to continue their discussion. Assuming Dirk was correct about this Hisayo individual, then searching for her seemed as good a starting point as any.

With her back turned, Hitomi did not notice as the boy reached into his sleeve, tugging free a small leather-wrapped bundle that he apparently been tied to his small arm. Looking rather pleased with himself, Dirk tapped the leather package to spill the contents into his palm before reaching out to tug at Hitomi’s sleeve. With a sigh, she turned back to face the boy – and her heart very nearly stopped.

In his hand, Dirk clutched a tiny kitchen knife – the edge dull from use gutting fish – the handle simple, hand crafted and unadorned sent an involuntary shiver up and down her spine - the improvised weapon a near mirror image to the very same that had haunted her dreams for the last seven years, clutched in her own small, blood stained, trembling hands. Her alarm turned quickly to terror as, involuntarily, she recoiled from the unassuming blade with such force that her rising knee crashed into the underside of the table.

Had her leg possessed only the strength of a normal person, then in all likelihood she would have done more harm to herself than the furniture. As it was, the impact had enough force behind it to flip the table completely – sending it crashing face down to the floor with a dramatic clatter that echoed deafeningly throughout the house.

Her state of alarm was only momentary – a reflex action as she suddenly found herself to face to face with a disturbing reminder of a moment she wished, more than anything, to forget. No sooner had she risen that she returned to her senses, flushing brightly from embarrassment as she looked back and forth between Junshin – visibly taken aback – and Dirk, who appeared to find her sudden frantic movement terrifying. For several long seconds, the three stared mutely at once another before Junshin at last broke the silence.

“Seraphina-kun,” he murmured cautiously. “Your sword…”

Regarding him curiously for a moment, Hitomi glanced down at her hands, starting as she realised that she had snatched up her zanpakuto while rising. With her left hand grasping the sheath, her right had closed around the hilt, apparently without thinking, and she quickly snatched her fingers from the weapon’s handle. Doing so came slightly too late for Dirk, it seemed, who immediately recoiled back towards the far wall of the room.

“S…sorry,” Hitomi stammered, maintaining only the most tenuous grip on her composure. “I just…You caught me little off…”

Her attempt at placation came a little too late for Dirk who, clearly terrified, immediately moved to flee the room. Darting between the two Shinigami, he darted for the doorway as Hitomi uttered an inward curse, imagining that their welcome in Kuroda’s home was about to come to a swift end. She couldn’t certainly have stopped Dirk leaving and attempt to calm the boy – but somehow, she doubted that would do much to repair the damage.

Dirk’s travels, however, did not extend beyond the doorway. His charge came to an abrupt halt as he apparently collided with someone heading in. Appearing soundlessly within the doorway, the newcomer drew Dirk to an abrupt halt, placing a hand upon each of his shoulders to stop short the potential collision.

“Oh my….” a voice that rang in Hitomi’s ears like the clear, perfect ringing of a bell was laced with a slight hint of admonishment as slender, delicate fingers deftly plucked the knife from Dirk’s trembling hands. “Naoko-kun, you know better than to run with knives, no?”

Looking beyond Dirk, Hitomi peered at the newcomer directly, founding herself peering into a pair of brown eyes – shining so brightly that they leaned closer to maroon – and a beautiful, heart shaped face belonging to a raven haired girl who appeared to be only a year or so older than Hitomi herself.

And she was beautiful….so much so that Hitomi found herself feeling awkward just standing in the same room as her. Her black hair, which shone luxuriously in the sun that streamed in through the window, perfectly cascaded down her back in the exact way Hitomi often wished hers would. Her slender frame was clad in a white dress – who’s low neckline somehow looked elegant rather than vulgar - that was in sharp contrast to the kimono she had seen all of Kuroda’s family wearing until this point. It would not, in fact, have been out of place had she seen it being worn in the Seireite itself; Bound at the front with navy-blue string to contain her ample bosom, the dress appeared to be professionally made rather than the same makeshift crafting that was thus far typical of the Outer Rim.

In one hand, the girl carried a wicker basket containing a strong smelling collection of wrapped bundles and sachets made of leaves that – from the curious, sterile quality to the scent – contained medicinal herbs and ointments rather than food. This, she set down on the surface closest to the door, her eyes moving between the shinigami as Dirk, immediately calmed by her presence, tightly gripped the long skirts of her dress. Hitomi could not help but feel more than a little uncomfortable beneath the girl’s crimson gaze, left with the definite impression that she was being seized up by someone infinitely her superior – as though she had been caught daydreaming in class by Makabe Kiyone. However, the discomfort lasted only a moment before the young woman offered the pair of Shinigami a curtsey rather than the expected boy, smiling in a thoroughly disarming fashion.

“Good morning, Shinigami-dono,” she addressed them collectively, the gentle curvature of her bow-shaped lips utterly charming. “I am Sato Hisayo…please be at ease. I was told that we have we have guests, and Shinigami no less. What a rare happening, no?”

‘Damn….Don’t you wish you were here right now, Shadrin-kun?’

Momentarily dumbfounded by the sheer radiance of the newcomer, Seraphina found herself grasping the wide leggings of her hakama and mimicking the curtsey without thinking, managing a noise that she was pretty sure amounted to something along the lines of ‘ug’, but failed to articulate herself in any clearer a fashion. Hitomi was no fool – she was aware that she had grown into an attractive young woman – but next to the striking newcomer she felt utterly ponderous by comparison.

Junshin, looking back and forth between the two women curiously, rose awkwardly to his feet. Unlike Hitomi, he was successful in managing a bow before opening his mouth to speak. However, as he stood the girl turned her maroon gaze towards him and almost immediately he blushed and abandoned whatever he had been about to say. When no longer under the girl’s direct gaze, Hitomi felt almost as though she had been released from a stupor. Finding her voice at last, she was able to speak.

“S…Sato-san,” she began, momentarily surprised that such a thoroughly remarkable looking individual would have such a plain family name, “I am Seraphina. This is Kiyoko Junshin.”

As Hitomi spoke, Hisayo calmly led Dirk back into the room. Seating the child on one of the stools, she made no mention of the upturned table, merely stooping – her every movement poised and graceful - to right the furniture. Awkwardly, Hitomi and Junshin moved to assist her in doing so.

“We...uh…” Hitomi continued as they levered the table back into position. “We…sorry about the mess…we’re here to investigate…”

“Oh, I know why you’re here,” Hisayo responded, still wearing a gentle smile as she turned her back on the table the moment it was back in position, briefly examining the pot upon the fireplace. “You’ve come to ask about the disappearances, no?”

“We didn’t really know that there were disappearances until Yoshitaka-san told us so,” Junshin replied, though he continued to blush brightly, staring at the floor as he struggled to bring himself to look directly at the beauty. “We were hoping that you could…”

“Could tell you what’s going on?” the girl replied with a wry smile, her gaze – if only for a moment – appearing to go out of focus as though dwelling elsewhere. “I imagined so…I heard about you in town. Two Shinigami cannot pass through a town like Flotsam without creating quite a stir. I thought it best that you speak to me.”

“Then…you can give us some information?” Hitomi ventured, rather hopeful.

“Perhaps not directly,” Hisayo replied. “In fact, I have something I wish to show you…Perhaps it will mean nothing. It is merely a suspicion…but one that perhaps demands your attention.”

Hitomi quirked an eyebrow, sharing a silent glance with Junshin, who appeared similarly perplexed. Opening her mouth to speak, Hitomi was cut off as Hisayo simply raised a hand, apparently wishing no questions, as she turned to leave the room. Surprised at her sudden departure, Hitomi blinked in surprise as she rose awkwardly to her feet, wondering if they were intended to follow.

“….You’re not gonna like it,” Dirk muttered, causing the Shinigami to jump in surprise as the youth, who had been utterly silent since Hisayo’s arrival, suddenly spoke.

“Like what. Dirk-kun?” it was Junshin who asked, Hitomi merely frowning in concern as the boy, with an involuntary wince, places a hand across his chest.

“I ain’t really good at explainin’ it,” he replied. “You’d best follow Hisayo-Ue-san an’ see for yourself. Jus’ try not t’puke.”

Feeling a growing sense of unease at Dirk’s rather evasive response, Hitomi turned her attention back to Junshin. The latter frowned in concern, though he appeared no more able to offer an explanation than she could. However, it seemed the only way they were likely to find any answers was to follow after Hisayo. With a silent not of confirmation, Hitomi followed the young woman through the doorway, Junshin quietly setting off in tow.

[Seraphina]

Act XXIII: The Sleeping Darkness






Hisayo offered little in the way of explanation as she led the two Shinigami from the house, moving around the building to head westward into the treeline. She did not look back to see that the pair followed, instead moving unerringly through the trees in a direct line that was slightly west-north-west of the town of Flotsam. If it was her intention to lead them to the road, however, she was most certainly going the wrong way, heading instead into the ever thickening forest as the trees grew denser around them.

Hitomi, guided more by curiosity than anything else, followed in the young woman’s wake. However, it quickly became hard going; the vegetation grew thickly, and the undergrowth quickly became a tangled mess. Although she was able to keep Hisayo in sight, the latter was often visible as little more than a wisp of white glimpsed between the boughs of the trees ahead, giving the Shinigami little more than an indication of which way to head – if the tangled foliage was in any way slowing the Rukongai native, it was not immediately obvious.

“Sato-san,” she called out, her voice, even to her own ears, sounding strangely muffled by the closed in trees, “what exactly is it you’re intending to show us?”

“Did you know,” the woman’s voice echoed back through the trees, “that the Ancient Soul Society occupied far more of the Rukongai than it currently does? This is well known, no? The Seireitei, although it has always been the heart of civilisation, has not always been its extent. There was once a great city that extended throughout much of the Rukongai…though it is visible now only as sparse ruins, that can be found only by those who seek to look.”

Hitomi quirked an eyebrow, glancing backwards towards Junshin, who could offer only an equally perplexed shrug. What Hisayo said was perhaps debatable; the Soul Society certainly was older than any known written records. Exactly how the Soul Society game to be and exactly how long it had existed for where questions long lost to antiquity. However, the existence of apparently ancient structures throughout the Rukongai couldn’t be denied. To some scholars, they were evidence of exactly what Hisayo suggested; to most, and indeed as seemed the most likely explanation, they were simply the ruins of independent outposts and settlements. Had the Seireite ever truly been so vast as to cover the entire Soul Society, it was likely that more of it would be present. Very little, after all, could so completely eradicate ruins of that scale.

“By nature, I am inquisitive,” Hisayo continued – no longer visible to the Shinigami, the pair were forced to try and use her voice to navigate their way forward. “Before I settled in Flotsam, I have spent a great deal of time exploring the Outer Rim in search of signs of…if you’ll forgive me for coining a phrase, no?…the ‘Elder Civilisation’. In recent weeks, I have discovered something most interesting.”

Wincing as she was forced to use her hands to push aside a veritable wall of tree branches and jagged, brittle twigs, Hitomi continued to plunge through the forest in pursuit of the now utterly invisible young woman. However, by the sound of her voice, she surmised that Hisayo had come to a stop and, although they still could not see her through the gloomy forest interior, Hitomi felt that they were gaining ground on their would-be guide.

“…Is it just me, or is it very quiet here?” Junshin muttered from behind her, interrupting Hitomi’s efforts to thrash through the undergrowth.

“What?” Hitomi grunted in reply, pausing to look back at her companion before shrugging. “I guess so…we must be pretty far from the town by now…I wouldn’t expect to hear much through all these trees, anyway.”

“No, I don’t mean the town,” Junshin replied, shaking his head. Tilting his head, he narrowed his eyes slightly in concentration as Hitomi, also, noticed that – now that she was no longer trying to tear her way through the vegetation – the absolute stillness of the surrounding forest. “No birds….no bugs…there’s no sound whatsoever except for us.”

“That’s a little…” Hitomi began, finding the sudden silence more than a little disconcerting. “…odd.”

“It’s certainly not normal,” Junshin agreed, wetting his lips nervously. “It….it feels a little like when we encountered that Hollow.”

Hitomi nodded, although – as much as the silence was certainly eerie – she couldn’t detect anything that even vaguely resembled the reiatsu of a Hollow. However, although the Soul Society did not possess the same abundance and variety of animal life as the world of the living, it should still have been there. She should have been able to hear birds and beasts nearby, and the fact that she didn’t suddenly made her curious as to exactly what Hisayo was leading them towards.

“…Sato-san?” she called over her shoulder into the forest. “What did you say you found?”

No answer was forthcoming, and the continued silence did little to put Hitomi’s mind at ease. Chewing her lower lip, Hitomi began to wonder exactly how good an idea it was continuing forward. However, curiosity once again got the better of her as she edged her way into the undergrowth ahead, batting aside a dangling vine to make her way forward. She managed all of two steps before the ground suddenly fell away beneath her.

‘Shit!’

She vaguely heard Junshin call out her name, but his voice was almost completely lost behind the masking sound of crashing vegetation. The thick, dangling foliage had concealed a steep slope, Hitomi finding herself plunging along the incline at a full sprint with little control of her momentum. Fortunately, there did not appear to be much in the way of obstacles between her and level ground, though her feet churned up a veritable avalanche of loose soil and small stones that she rode like a wave, flailing her arms desperately in an attempt to stay upright.

As she reached the base of the slope, her luck ran out as her foot finally snagged on something – probably a tree root. Tumbling forward, the breath was knocked from her as she landed in an awkward heap at the foot of the slope, grimacing as the scent and taste of dirt filled her nostrils. The forest floor was mercifully covered with a layer of spongy moss, cushioning her landing somewhat as she gingerly sat back on her haunches, wiping her hands on the front of her shihakusho as she took stock of her new surroundings.

At the base of the slope, the forest simply seemed to be growing thicker and darker. The canopy clung so thickly overhead that she could almost believe it was night – only the barest glow of white light through the overhanging branches served to dispel the illusion, creating thin bars of clearly defined white light that periodically pierced the murky gloom.

“Seraphina-kun!” Junshin’s voice echoed from behind her, and she turned to look back up the slope, realising only then how far she had come. The slope extended into darkness behind her – a vertical distance of at least fifty feet. She found herself suddenly glad that she had encountered a slope rather than a sheer drop; even a Shinigami would not have been completely unharmed by such a fall if caught unprepared.

“I’m fine,” she called back, raising a hand to either side of her mouth to help project her voice. “Be careful. There’s a steep slope just head of you.”

“Alright,” Junshin’s voice replied, followed soon after by the sound of a man sized object breaking through the forest, “I’ll try and find another way down.”

“Just watch your footing,” Hitomi cautioned as she rose to her feet, glancing briefly down at her palms to make sure she hadn’t skinned them. “Visibility is crap out here.”

Her hands seemed undamaged – more dirty than anything else – and Hitomi grimaced as she imagined how filthy her shihakusho was likely to be. However, she had other things to worry about – not least of which how they were going to find their way back to the town now that they seemed to have lost Hisayo. Squinting into the darkness, she hoped to catch a glimpse of the young woman’s white dress among the surrounding browns and dark greens. However, there was no visible sign of her; either she had gone too far ahead, or falling down the slope had led Hitomi along a different route.

“Damn it,” she muttered aloud, shaking her head at their sudden misfortune. Cursing herself for wandering blindly into the forest on the apparent whim of a total stranger, she lifted her gaze back to the ridge behind her, wondering if there might be a way to climb back up. She was reminded, rather bitterly, of the time she had awoken outside Jetsam to find herself at the foot of a similar slope when she had collapsed after her zanpakuto first began to awake.

‘Didn’t warn me that time either, did you?’

Giving the weapon a somewhat rueful pat, she could see nowhere obvious to get a decent hand or foothold for the upward journey; besides which, she couldn’t risk being further separated from Junshin. Deciding to remain where she was until he arrived – for if he could find an easier way down then that same route may serve as an easier way up also – she decided to take better stock of her surroundings.

“Keep an eye out for Sato-san, too,” she called, lifting her voice loud enough that she hoped Junshin would hear. No reply came from the darkness however – perhaps Junshin had travelled out of earshot. Well and truly alone, it seemed, Hitomi heaved a frustrated sigh as she took a step further into the trees.

Immediately, the breath tore itself from her lungs, her knees buckling as she felt as though the weight of an ocean suddenly crashed down upon her head. Falling to her knees, she grit her teeth to hold in a cry of pain, her fingers involuntarily curling into fists – gouging out deep tracts into the soft earth. It was a sensation she recognised – she had felt it six years previously, in the Southern Deserts of the Rukongai.

Spiritual pressure. Vast. Incomprehensibly vast. It crashed down without mercy upon her unprepared body, ravaging her so mercilessly that it took her several seconds to even think to bring her own spiritual pressure to the fore in an attempt to shield herself. Her own reiatsu served to muffle the effects, allowing her to gasp air into her breathless lungs, but it could not deaden the clawing, choking sensation completely. Unable to rise, or for that matter even move, her arms trembled from the effort to keeping her torso from being pressed down into the ground.

‘Wha……what the hell is this!?’

Her stomach tightened into a painful knot, it was an effort even to keep her eyes open. Feeling her consciousness slowly begin to ebb away, Hitomi felt a sense of panic begin to rise within her as the very real possibility occurred to her that the spiritual pressure she was feeling could very well be enough to kill her. It utterly dwarfed the spiritual pressure of Imai Hideki, reducing his Captain level reiatsu to a flickering candle beside a forest fire. However, all too suddenly, she found herself yanked backwards – a sharp tug upon her obi drawing her away from the source of the punishing reiatsu back towards the slope.

Gasping for air, she felt a sense of overwhelming relief as she realised she was once again able to draw air into her lungs. Falling onto her back as she was as much dragged as hurled from the source of the spiritual pressure, she lay motionless upon the mossy forest floor, clutching her chest in pain as she found herself momentarily able to hear nothing but the rapid beat of her own heart, spots dancing wildly before her eyes.

“J…Junshin-kun?” she gasped out, blinking rapidly in an attempt to restore her sight, though the attempt to speak brought a flood of pile to her throat. Gagging, she turned her face aside to cough out thick globules of vomit and phlegm across the moss, her disorientation being quickly replaced by a sense of overwhelming nausea.

“I’m afraid not,” it was Hisayo’s voice that responded, a pair of gentle hands taking hold of her shoulders, steadying Hitomi as she continued to gag into the undergrowth. “My apologies….I lost sight of you among the trees. It is fortunate that I found you again when I did, no?”

“Jrrnsh…” Hitomi attempted to speak, managing only a gargled splutter. Coughing to clear her throat of the gunk clogging it up, she was finally able to raise her voice. “Junshin! Don’t come down here!”

“I will find him,” Hisayo soothed, aiding Hitomi in turning onto her back once more – the young Shinigami still struggled to draw in breath, still dizzy from her experience. She still wasn’t entirely sure what it was she had experienced. “Please take a moment to recover, Seraphina-dono. You hardly seem in a condition to move, no?”

Hisayo rose elegantly to her feet, brushing down the long skirt of her dress before stepping around Hitomi to head northward – the last direction in which Hitomi had heard Junshin’s voice. Hitomi tried to call out to her, every fibre of her being demanding an explanation for the source of the crushing spiritual pressure. It had been utterly unlike the pressure she had felt from Hideki. It was not only the size that was different….everything about the reiatsu had felt utterly alien. It was defiantly not the reiatsu of a Shinigami.

It had felt more like a Hollow.

However, she couldn’t see how that was possible. Even the Arrancar she had fought in the South had possessed strength that was insignificant when measured against what she had just felt. In terms of strength, there was simply no comparison whatsoever between the two. Besides which, she had never heard of a Hollow that possessed strength on the level of a Captain.

‘No…if anything…it was higher. Much, much higher.’

“Seraphina-kun!” Junshin’s voice touched her ears, and Hitomi found herself able to lift her head to follow the sound. Some the strength was beginning to return to her body, and she pushed herself up on her elbows as her companion materialised from the darkness of the treeline, Hisayo following a half step behind. The other Shinigami sprinted across the short distance between them, making as though to help her stand. However, Hitomi waved him away, finding that she was now able to get her feet beneath her as she levered herself – in painstakingly – back to her feet.

“Are you feeling better, Seraphina-dono?” Hisayo queried, idly fingering a small red gem set into a wide bangle hanging from her wrist. “I didn’t expect quite so profound an effect. But you are well, no?”

“What happened?” Junshin queried as Hitomi grunted out a reply – still not finding it easy to talk – the former peering out among the trees in search of whatever had caused Hitomi was apparent harm. “I don’t see anything….”

“Don’t go any further out than this,” Hitomi growled through clenched teeth, placing a hand to her stomach in an attempt to rub out the tight knot. “There’s….something….I don’t know….Sako-san, what the hell is that!?”

“Wh…what’s going on?” Junshin stammered, looking back and forth between the two women. “Could someone fill me in? Anyone? Please?”

“I must be honest,” Hisayo replied, the young woman clasping her hands behind her back, turning her maroon gaze out into the forest. “I’m not entirely sure what it is….I had intended to show it to you directly, but it seems this is as close as we can get. For lack of a better term it’s a...well….pit.”

“A pit?” Hitomi echoed, a sudden horrifying image of a cave dwelling, all powerful Hollow living bellow the Rukongai springing to mind.

“More a hole, really,” Hisayo quickly corrected, holding up one of her slender arms, “it is wide enough to perhaps accommodate my arm. Hardly a chasm, no? It is some fifteen yards further into the forest, surrounded by a ring of man-sized stones some fifteen teen feet in diameter. The stones are marked with kanji…but I have been unable to read it.”

“You can’t read kanji?” Junshin queried, arching an eyebrow. “That’s odd…you speak Japanese so fluently, I assumed….do you have any sketches? Maybe we could…”

“Allow me to clarify, Kiyoko-dono,” Hisayo interrupted, her lips curving into a patient smile. “I cannot read this kanji. The symbols use a script that I suspect is no longer in use, and indeed has not been in use, for some time. It is very old, no? I am something of a purveyor of antiquity, and have seen similar writing on other ruins credited to the Elder Civilisation. In fact, I have even located other sites like this one.”

“Do they all feel like…” Hitomi began, though she was forced to pause to clear her throat, almost unsure how to put the sensation into words. “…that?”

Hisayo did not immediately reply, gazing thoughtfully into the trees for several long seconds. For a moment, Hitomi wasn’t certain that the young woman was going to reply at all. However, she finally shrugged, turning her maroon eyes back towards the Shinigami.

“If you will forgive me,” she responded, “I am going to present a theory….When I have found these similar sites in the past, they did not appear abnormal, aside from the fact that they may date back to the Elder times. However, in recent months, I have noticed the absence of animal activity around them….that is unusual, no? In addition, I became aware of the stifling sensation…what you call ‘spiritual pressure’ only recently. It is not something I can detect myself…but I suspect it has also only recently been present.”

“Wait,” Hitomi interjected, raising a hand. “How did you become aware of it to begin w….”

“Dirk,” it was Junshin who replied, the other Shinigami’s mouth twisting in distaste. “Damn it…I’m an idiot. I overlooked it completely…”

“Dirk!?” Hitomi blinked, taken thoroughly aback. “That brat?”

“Yeah,” Junshin nodded. “I’d forgotten….in fact I thought I was imagining it at the time. When we were fighting that Hollow, I felt sure that his arm was broken. When I saw him moving about just a few minutes later, I thought I was wrong, but….”

“Naoko-kun is like you,” Hisayo explained, a hint of amusement behind her smile. “He is not fully in control, but there is no doubt he possessed the beginnings of spiritual powers. For now they are simply stirrings….he is able to heal himself quickly, as you have seen, no? But it was he who first felt this presence here. Your senses are perhaps sharper…it did not affect him so dramatically.”

“What presence? What’s going on?” Junshin demanded, for the fist time sounding more than a little impatient as he continued to be left out of the loop.

“As I was explaining,” Hisayo continued, “I believe that these holes are vents, of a sort. Those I have discovered appear to be arranged in a semi-circle….a vast semi-circle that spreads across much of the Outer Rim. I suspect that there is in fact an entire circle of them, surrounding a central point from which this pressure is emanating, each dispelling a part of the whole.”

“A part!?” Hitomi spluttered, suddenly feeling her knees becoming weak once more. “Are you telling me that was only a part!? That…that’s impossible!”

“A part of the overspill, to be more accurate,” Hisayo shrugged. “Whatever part of the whole that its container cannot accommodate? But I venture only a theory…not even that, more of a guess, no? However, the reason I show you is because the change has coincided, almost exactly, with the troubles that have begun along the Outer Rim.”

Hitomi found her objections brought to a sudden halt, her eyes narrowing thoughtfully at this new information. She wasn’t sure she could see how the two could be connected, but it certainly did seem a strange coincidence….potentially a terrifying coincidence, if the reiatsu she felt turned out to originate from some kind of entity. Spiritual pressure didn’t have to come from a living thing…it could come from kido, or a barrier, or even some forms of technology. However, none of the possible conclusions seemed at all preferable to the others.

“Well….” She eventually murmured. “One way or another, we’d best report this. It may not be connected…and I truly hope it isn’t. But, somehow…..guh….somehow I know I’m not going to be that lucky.’

“Shit like this seems to happen to me a lot.”

[Seraphina]

Act XXIV: Striking Out





Junshin squinted across the open, grassy plain, raising a hand to shield his eyes from the sunlight that bathed the landscape in a warm, golden glow. The action forced him to note that his hair was starting to become rather longer than he would usually have liked. Under normal circumstances, the strands of his bangs hung to just within sight of his eyes; however, they now came close to hanging over them altogether. His two days on the road had also left him with a thin layer of fuzz that had begun to develop on his chin, but this he had at least managed to see to after borrowing a razor from Kuroda. Junshin did not usually care much for his appearance – despite the insistence of some throughout his academy days that he was ‘pretty’ – but neither did he particularly want to look slovenly.

‘I guess that’s what happens when you wander miles from civilisation….Maybe I should ask Hisayo-dono to cut it for me. I don’t know why, but I think she’d be good at that sort of thing.’

A small cough drew his attention back to what he was supposed to be doing, drawing him out of his hair-related deliberations to bring his attention once more to the small figure squatted in front of him. Seated in the shade cast by the high walls of Kuroda’s house, his hands on his knees, Junshin affected an awkward smile towards Dirk – seated across from him – as the latter regarded the Shinigami with a look that quite thoroughly stated ‘I don’t want to be here’. Aside from the pair, some other members of Kuroda’s family were also present; by the river, two of the fisherman’s teenage daughters were in the process of cleaning a large pile of fish.

“I don’t get why you’re doin’ this,” the boy muttered. “You’re kinda shit. I want th’Old Lady to do it.”

“Seraphina-kun isn’t here,” Junshin sighed rather wearily – he too felt that Hitomi would probably be better suited to the task also. Though he kept his tone polite, he had to admit that his own patience for the boy was beginning to wear somewhat thin – although that might also have been his own feelings of inadequacy. He hardly felt that he was the suitable sort to teach anything to anybody. “And she’s twenty one…you should stop calling her that, or you’ll just keep making her angry. Anyway, I’m afraid you’ll have to make do with me, Naoko-kun.”

“Hey!” Dirk exclaimed, thrusting a finger in Junshin’s direction, causing the Shingami to tilt slightly backwards in his seated position to prevent the offending digit from striking him. “Don’t call me that! It’s Dirk, right!? Not even my Da’ calls me that anymore!”

“Well….it’s your real name, isn’t it?” Junshin attempted another diplomatic smile. “Besides, Hisayo-dono calls you it.”

“Yeah, well…she’s different,” Dirk stated simply, a slight flush creeping into his cheeks at the mere mention of the young woman, who Junshin couldn’t deny possessed truly ethereal beauty. Junshin heaved another sigh, rather wishing that Hisayo was still at the house; she, at least, seemed to be a rather calming influence on the rebellious child. Lifting his gaze towards the small dirt path that ran along the river – invisible from the water itself – leading back to town, he wondered exactly how long the two women were going to be gone for.

After their return to the house, Hitomi had set off immediately to send their first report back to the Seireitei. Hisayo, knowing of a Shinigami way-station situated some two miles outside of the town, had gone too to show her the way. Junshin had been very much in favour of exploring the town, but Hisayo had insisted that neither Shinigami enter Flotsam again until they found clothing to replace their shihakusho – this far out, Shinigami were not universally welcome, even in a town that saw as much through fare as Flotsam.

And so instead he was left to babysit Dirk and, now that no effort was made to conceal the existence of his spiritual awareness – although it was more a lie of omission than an outright deception – Hisayo had asked that the Shinigami take some time to tutor him. They had since learned that Dirk’s awakening powers had led to a certain amount of havoc in the homestead; objects suddenly bursting into flames, a blast of scorchingly warm air blasting its way down the house’s central corridor and, on one occasion, and entire day’s catch of fish cooking themselves on the boat after Dirk stood close by for no longer than two minutes. Kuroda did not intend for his son to attend the Academy – in fact Dirk had no wish to do so himself – but it was certainly true that at least some greater control of his abilities was needed and Kuroda had requested as much of Junshin while they waited for Hitomi’s return.

Junshin’s smile tightened as he recalled, quite vividly, similar events in his own home. Kuroda’s wish may, in the long run, turn out to be irrelevant. Whatever he could reach the child in a few hours would not suitably prepare him to control his powers; especially not when they matured. Sooner or later, all spiritually aware souls required long term professional tuition….it was almost impossible for any but the most naturally gifted geniuses to teach themselves. In the absence of anyone else to train him, it was likely that sooner or later Dirk would have to attend the Academy simply to avoid inadvertently killing everyone around him.

“Hey, whatcha lookin’ like that for?” Dirk’s voice brought him back, once more, to reality. Blinking stupidly, Junshin turned back towards his small charge, who had leaned forward to squint at his face. “I know what you’re doin’! You’re pissed off that the Old Lady gets to go with Hisayo-Eu-san an’ you don’t!”

“Wha?” Junshin stammered, feeling a warm flush creep into his own cheeks. “I….I was thinking nothing of the sort!”

“Yeah you were!” Dirk grinned, apparently quite convinced he had reached the correct conclusion. Folding his arms, he directed a look towards Junshin that was entirerly too knowing for a boy of his age. “Wetpants is a pervert.”

“I am not a pervert!” Junshin shouted, rather more loudly than he had intended. Realising his mistake the moment the words were out of his mouth, he turned to look in morbid horror towards the two young woman still working by the river, very nearly choking when he saw that they had both looked up from their work after overhearing his exclamation. “….Look, let’s just…uh….let’s just get on with this, shall we?”

“Are you gonna teach me t’get one of these swords?” Dirk queried, a brief flash of eagerness breaking through his boredom as the thought suddenly occurred to him, pointing towards the pair of kodachi – Junshin’s zanpakuto – that rested on the ground between them.

“No,” Junshin replied, immediately banishing the boy’s grin. “Calling out your zanpakuto spontaneously is very rare…only the most talented and powerful Shinigami are able to do that. Every Shinigami has a zanpakuto spirit from the moment they’re born, including you, but most Shinigami have to go through years of meditation before they can force that spirit to materialise in our world as a sword.”

“Did you call yours out spontanawhatsit?” Dirk muttered, sounding rather crestfallen upon learning that he would not shortly be swishing around a zanpakuto of his very own.

“No,” Junshin confessed. “I acquired mine in the Academy, around the same time that a lot of other students did.”

“Then you suck!” Dirk protested, pouting as he turned his face away in disinterest. “If I’m gonna be an awesome Shinigami, then I need to be trained by someone awesome!”

“I thought you didn’t want to be a Shinigami,” Junshin countered, raising a hand to nurse his temples as he began to feel the dull throb of a headache developing.

“I didn’t say that,” Dirk shrugged. “I just don’t wanna be you.”

‘Damn this little punk!’

Despite his repeated warnings to Hitomi to keep her cool, Junshin felt his own patience begin to fray. He was beginning to think that the boy may very well have been unteachable. Wondering how such a venomous little reptile had been raised by a kind an unassuming man like Kuroda, Junshin threw up his hands as he decided that, in this situation, retreat was perhaps the best option.

“Okay, fine!” he snapped. “But don’t come crying to me when you set yourself on fire, or….”

His words cut off sharply as he reached out a hand to retrieve his zanpakuto, his fingers closing over the hilt of one of the twin swords as, almost immediately, everything faded to white….





*****



‘It’s warm…..’

Junshin’s eyelids felt heavy, momentarily resisting his attempts to open them as he felt a comfortably familiar warmth upon his face. It was a dry heat – not an altogether pleasant sensation, but comforting nonetheless due to it being a climate he was familiar with. He knew, even before he opened his eyes, that he would be looking at the blue, cloudless sky of South Rukongai, even as he realised that he lay flat on his back upon a bed of coarse sand.

The overhead sun was blindingly bright, though it was indeed the perfect blue of the sky that greeted him – shaded slightly by the flowing branches of overhanging palms. Pushing himself up onto his elbows, he was afforded a better view of his surroundings. It was, indeed, the South Rukongai. Stretching before him lay endless desert, the distant horizon rippling and distorted beneath the heat of the sun. The endless, rolling dunes seemed familiar, and he was quite sure that he recognised the region and, as he turned to look over his shoulder, his suspicions were confirmed.

Behind him lay one of the few patches of green within the southern desert – one of the oasis that were dotted throughout the sands, nourishing the otherwise parched landscape. This particular oasis was one known to him – little more than a pond some fifteen feet by ten, surrounded by a slight scrub of grass and four looming palm trees that, at certain times of the year, bore dates. It was one of the common waystops his family would make when his father’s trade required him to travel from District One, lying somewhere on the border between districts two and three.

Junshin knew, of course, that he was not actually there – not unless the last few years of his life had been a thoroughly realistic dream. He had not been to this part of the desert since he has twelve years old, before his admission into the Academy; this, he imagined, had to be his Inner World…in fact, he could think of no other possible explanation.

“H…hello?” he called out as he pushed himself to his feet, suddenly remembering Hitomi’s cautionary tale of zanpakuto possibly attacking their owners. However, there was no reply – the oasis silent save for the gentle slosh of water. Shrugging, Junshin made his way down the slight slope that descended towards the shallow bowl in which the oasis was formed, grateful to pass from the scorching hot sand onto the cool, spongy grass. On the dunes, what grass there was tended to be razor short – capable of cutting a careless walker’s foot – but near the oasis it was much the same as any other grass, and Junshin crouched by the side of the water, continuing to watch for signs of movement.

Despite Hitomi’s warning, however, he didn’t feel threatened. The spot was comfortingly familiar and, his own nerves aside, he felt no threat from it. Owing to his need to eat and drink, the desert perhaps presented more danger to him as a spiritually aware being that it would a normal soul, but he had learned to cope expertly with its many hazards while growing up. To him, this merely felt like returning home.

Cupping his hands, he reached down to the surface of the water, gathering some of the cool liquid within his hands. Raising it to his lips, he gulped a mouthful to see how realistic it tasted. The water was slightly bitter from the various minerals that permeated the rock beneath it, but it was a taste he was used to – indeed, having been used to drinking it through a throat that was badly parched, there were times when it had felt like the sweetest taste in the world. It was exactly as he remembered it.

Opening his hands, he allowed much of what he had gathered to tumble back to the oasis, the surface of the water rupturing into a swirling pattern of ripples that spread out from his position. Unconsciously, his eyes followed the path of the every expending ripples as they made their way towards the far bank….and very nearly jumped out of his skin as his eyes met a shimmering reflection within the water that was more certainly not his own.

His body instinctively tensing, Junshin snapped his gaze upwards to the far bank – a mere fifteen feet away – as he realised he was not alone. On the opposite side of the water another figure had crouched to drink from the oasis – a single hand liberally scooping up the life giving liquid as a pair of dark, almost shaped eyes took stock of Junshin almost the same moment he noticed their owner. The individual who shared the oasis with him appeared as surprised to see the Shinigami as Junshin was to see him, and for a moment they exchanged a mute stare of mutual shock.

The man – for the figure was a man - was quite unlike anything Junshin had ever seen. Unlike Junshin, who still wore his shihakusho, the man was garbed for desert travel. From shoulder to ankle he wore a long beige coat, hanging rather loosely around his body, with wide sleeves that, should the need arise, Junshin imagined the traveller could fold over his entire arms. Beneath the coat, or at least as far as Junshin could see, the man wore simple cloth clothes over what looked to be a leanly muscular frame – Junshin noted that all of his clothes appeared to be spun from white silk – yellowed to beige by the desert.

The man’s head was wrapped in similar cloth to protect him from the sun’s glare, forming a turban like weave of cloth that wound its way from the town of his head, over the lower half of his face and, eventually, around his neck and shoulders like a heavy scarf. Only his eyes, a dark brown – almost black – were visible, regarding Junshin from across the water.

The man took no action that was obviously hostile, the surprise in his eyes changing to curiosity as he continued to observe the Shinigami. As Junshin watched, the man lifted a hand that was heavily darkened by years of exposure to the sun to tug down the cloth that concealed much of his face, revealing darkly handsome – albeit sharp and somewhat angular – features. The man had high cheekbones and a strong jaw, framed by a black beard that was styled to a sharp point that extended a full two inches past his chin. Despite the grime of the desert, he appeared to be well groomed, his face clean and his beard meticulously groomed. After overcoming his initial surprise, Junshin also became aware of a pleasant, spicy odour emanating from the man that may have been some kind of deodorant.

For several seconds longer, the two stared at each other in silence. However, it was the stranger who broke that silence first. His full lips creasing into a smile, the man raised his brown hand again, pressing her fingertips first to his lips, then to his forehead, before sweeping his arm in a gesture towards Junshin that the Shinigami assumed to be a greeting.

“As-salāmu ʿalaykum,” the desert wanderer murmured in a voice that was deep and gravely. “So, you have finally come.”

Still struck mute by his surprise, Junshin opened his mouth in an attempt to reply, his right arm moving mechanically in a poor imitation of the man’s greeting gesture. As it slowly began to dawn on him exactly who, or what, this strange man was, the latter seemed to take his shock with a hint of amusement. His smile deepened for the briefest instant before he assumed a more stoic expression, bringing his arm up once more – this time to cross his forearm across his chest, his palm over his heart, as he lowered his head into a bow.

“My Master,” Junshin’s zanpakuto intoned reverently, his eyes drifting closed as he exhaled a long, low sigh – as though he felt as much relief at the meeting as Junshin did. However, no sooner had the words left the man’s mouth than Junshin felt a curious sensation of being pulled. Although he knew he was not moving, he was overcome by the unnerving feeling of tipping sideways, his eyes drifting closed as the bright light of the oasis faded away, and he felt himself falling into darkness….





*****



Junshin awoke with a start, his eyelids flaring open as he instinctively threw out a hand before him as he was overcome with the sensation that he was about to strike the ground. For the second time, however, he found himself staring up at the sky – though this time it was a sky darkening into the purple-twinged blue of twilight. His own heartbeat thundering in his ears, he realised that he was gulping in air, almost as though he had just run a marathon. However, as his breathing began to settle, the sounds of the world around him began to return – although the evening was filled almost entirely by the rhythmic chirp of crickets.

“Welcome back,” a voice behind him drew Junshin’s attention to the rear, and he sat up to better look over his shoulder, finding that he was not alone upon the grass. Realising that he still lay upon the ground beside Kuroda’s house, he found himself looking up at Hitomi – the young redhead seated upon the windowsill almost directly above his head, her bare feet dangling listlessly just shy of the ground. Cupped in her lap, the redhead clutched a steaming cup of what, from the smell – was some kind of soup. Although she had likely been in the process of drinking it, she leaned forward to hand the cup to Junshin, who accepted it with a somewhat shaken nod.

Hitomi was no longer wearing her shihakusho – Junshin noted. Apparently acting on Hisayo’s earlier advise, the young woman had substituted her uniform for the same shapeless brown kosode and knee-length breeches that appeared to be the norm for the fishing village. Her long crimson hair and pale skin meant it was unlikely anyone would mistake her for a native, but at least she stood out less obviously than she would dressed as a Shinigami. Junshin, as he raised the soup to his lips gratefully, imagined he would be required to change also.

“How long w…” he paused as the scent of the soup suddenly made him realise exactly how hungry he was. His stomach growled loudly at the suggestion of any further delays, and he quickly gulped down a mouthful of the thick liquid. The taste of meat – possibly pork – potatoes and carrots filled his senses as he swallowed the broth, gulping down half the cup before he felt satisfied. Wiping his lips with the back of his hand, he sighed in satisfaction as he lowered the mug. “How long was I out for….? It only felt like four or five minutes.”

“Seven hours, give or take,” Hitomi replied, lifting her purple eyes to peer at the darkening sky. Noting Junshin’s immediate alarm, the other Shinigami shook her head with a wry smile. “Don’t worry, it’s happens sometimes. The first time a Shinigami accesses their inner world it can overwhelm the senses. Your mind takes in too much at once, and it warps your perceptions…especially of time. It doesn’t happen to everyone, but it’s nothing to worry about. The good news is it only ever happens on the first time.”

“Right…” Junshin nodded, feeling rather overwhelmed that he had been unconscious for so long. “…Wait, how did you know I was in my inner world?”

“Well,” Hitomi shrugged with an impish grin, “it was either that, or you were napping on the job. Which would you prefer I assumed?”

“Good point,” Junshin smiled nervously, not entirely sure what the young woman would do to him if she thought he had been slacking all afternoon. “What time is it?”

“It’s not that late yet,” Hitomi replied. “Maybe eight o’clock. Once you’ve changed, we’ll head into town and try and gather some information….I don’t honestly know if anyone in town will know much of anything, but it can’t hurt to at least check before we move deeper into the Rukongai.”

“R…right,” Junshin nodded, quite content to let Hitomi take direction once more. He was still reeling from his first encounter with his zanpakuto….for he couldn’t imagine that else the mysterious desert dweller could have been. He had looked, to Junshin, like a member of one of the wandering tribes of the South Rukongai; he had been imparted with a healthy dose of respect for the hardly, pragmatic men of the desert from his father…perhaps that was why his zanpakuto had taken the shape of one.

A sudden flicker of movement out of the corner of his eye drew Junshin’s attention, and he turned his head towards the source. He found himself looking a the small figure of Dirk, peering around the edge of the house in the direction of the two Shinigami. Junshin winced as he imagined his sudden collapse had likely started the youth, and raised a hand in greeting.

“Hey there, Dirk-kun,” he smiled. “I’m alright now.”

The boy started slightly at the unexpected greeting, but quickly turned up his nose, marching defiantly around the corner to stand with his feet shoulder distance apart, firmly crossing his arms across his chest. Puffing himself up like a peacock, the youth fixed Junshin with a thoroughly defiant glare.

“I don’t care about you, Wetpants,” he thundered, a note of genuine offence in his voice that made Junshin wince. Hitomi, meanwhile, greeting the boy’s appearance with open glee. Her impish grin quickly returning, she hopped from the window sill to stand beside Junshin, raising both hands overhead as she cried out in as thin and girlish a voice as was perhaps humanly possible.

“Wraah! Junshin-san! Don’t die!” she cried jubilantly, causing Dirk’s eyes to bulge in his head. “I’m sorry I called you Wetpants! I won’t do it again! I’m sorry, Junshin-san!”

Looking back and forth between the fuming boy and Hitomi – who appeared so pleased with herself that she was actually cackling – Junshin raised a hand to his mouth to hold in a snort of laughter as Dirk, his entire body quivering with offense, pointed accusingly at the redhead.

“I never said that!” the boy shrieked. “I totally didn’t say that!”

“Junshin-san, please wake up and teach me! Teach me!” Hitomi continued, advancing towards Dirk who, his face flushing bright scarlet, was already in the process of retreating away from the house. Hitomi was not about to let him get away quite as easily as that, however, and set off in pursuit. Hounding her quarry around the corner, Hitomi continued to recite what was perhaps a slightly modified version of Dirk’s words back at him, coming to a stop only as she reached the corner herself. Skidding to a halt, she watched as Dirk made a tactical retreat down the dirt path towards the town, likely hoping to lose the Shinigami among the buildings.

“Damn, that felt good,” Hitomi flashed Junshin a toothy grin as she made her way back towards him, nodding to herself in satisfaction as Junshin briefly wondered whether she actually was twenty one, or if he had perhaps exaggerated her age by some ten years. Still, after being referred to as ‘old lady’ for the better part of three days, he supposed she could be forgiven a little revenge. Draining the last of the soup, he looked around for somewhere to deposit the ceramic cup as Hitomi stooped to retrieve her zanpakuto from where it had apparently been lying in the grass underneath the window. Like her clothing, her zanpakuto was glad in a similar disguise – bound in a long canvas case that Junshin had occasionally seen been used to carry dismantled fishing rods.

“Get inside and change,” she instructed. “Kuroda-san looked out some clothes that might fit you. We’ll head into town as soon as you’re ready….and then….well, we shall see what we shall see.”

Frowning the redhead turned in the direction of the town, pursing her lips briefly. Junshin had not been exposed to the same reiatsu that, according to Hisayo, had been bubbling up from beneath the surface of the Rukongai. However, going be Hitomi’s description, it had been an utterly terrifying power…they could hope, for the time being, that it was not connected with their investigation.





*****



The dirt path transferred quickly from soft grass into a sandy bank that followed the river from Kuroda’s landing back towards Flotsam, swallowing the path beneath the sand to leave only a beaten, flattened section to show where the road generally lay. However, once he was walking on it, Junshin realised that the shore was not sand at all, but shavings; dark and coarse, it consisted more of shattered sea shells and chaff kicked up from the base of the river and wished in by the lapping tide; for the river was so vast Junshin had no trouble imagining it possessed both a high and low tide. Currently, the water lapped lazily back and forth against the shore, providing ample space for the two Shinigami to crunch their way across what passed for a beach.

The clothing that Kuroda had supplied for him did not vary much from that of Hitomi; although while her kosode and breeches were greenish-blue in colour, his were a simple brown. It was only after changing into the rather ragged clothes that he realised quite how well made and comfortable his shihakusho was, for the far coarser fabric of his new clothing chaffing slightly against his skin. That being so, it had been easy to conceal with zanpakuto under the folds of the baggy kosode, wearing the harness in which he usually carried the weapons underneath his clothing rather than above as he normally would.

Despite the sun having all but set, the night air was warm. A cooling breeze swept along the surface of the river to occasionally dispel the heat, however, keeping the mean temperature rather comfortable for the two. In fact, it was rather a pleasant evening and, were they not on the trail of potential slavers, Junshin could almost have been convinced they were on a holiday. Hitomi even almost seemed to believe it, a slight spring in the young redhead’s steps as she crunched her way across the beach, the case containing her zanpakuto draped casually across her right shoulder.

“You appear quite at ease, Seraphina-kun,” Junshin remarked, allowing himself a smile as it occurred to him he had never seen the young woman looking more – for lack of a better term – jaunty.

“I’m just glad to be underway. I’ve never been much good at waiting around,” Hitomi replied, a slight smile touching the corners of her own lips. She didn’t look in Junshin’s direction as she replied, instead lifting her gaze skywards to look up at the twinkling pinpricks of light overhead. “And also…it somehow feels good to be back underneath the stars I grew up with.”

Junshin nodded, recalling the same sense of comfortable familiarity he had felt upon seeing the dunes of his homeland when he had accidentally plunged into his inner world. Even after many years, a person rarely lost their attachment to places they once knew well. As much as Junshin was quite certain he had much more pleasant memories of his childhood home, nostalgia was a difficult sensation to shake off. However, he had decided not to pry into Hitomi’s old life anymore – even though she had herself had brought it up on the boat. He had pushed her before, and it had come close to scuppering their fledgling friendship. He was not about to risk the same now that Hitomi, as much as she could be thoroughly standoffish, was starting to feel like a comrade to him.

“What will we do when we get into town?” he queried as the sand began to grow sparser, blade of grass showing through the surface as they began to return to the greener wilderness surrounding the town. “I don’t suppose we’re going to just wander up and start a conversation about the troubles with someone?”

“No,” Hitomi shook her head. “You and I are a brother and sister, traveling in from further East. Our parents are dead, and home doesn’t feel like home anymore. Fortunately, we’ve got a sense of adventure, and want to settle on the frontier. If we do get into a conversation, that’s our story….and we can use that reason to ask about what life is like further West, and what kind of news has come out of that way. If anyone’s heard anything we haven’t, good. If not, we’ll move on.”

“I…uh…I see,” Junshin squinted, wondering exactly how much thought the redhead had put into this sudden cover story. “Why the deception?”

“Hisayo-san warned me that people might not talk to a Shinigami here,” Hitomi advised, the young woman’s name being invoked, Junshin noticed, with increasing regularity. It seemed almost as though, since meeting her, that the raven haired beauty was quickly becoming their Outer Rim gospel. “Besides, if this group is hostile, then we can’t risk that they have people out here…this is the only route anyone’s likely to take in or out of the Outer Rim, and they might be on watch here for Shinigami coming by to interfere with whatever it is they’re up to.”

“Now you’re talking like you should have joined the Second Division,” Junshin smirked, following a half step behind Hitomi as their route began to slope upwards into a gentle gradient. By now, the sounds of chirping insects and birdsong from the surrounding forest was also broken by the sounds of the town itself. Despite the late hour, the denizens of Flotsam appeared to be out in source – bright lights twinkling through the trees, and the sound of music and voices reaching the ears of the Shinigami.

“Better alive and paranoid than dead and complacent,” Hitomi countered with a shrug. She was perhaps being a little melodramatic, but Junshin could see her point. They were, after all, going into an utterly unknown situation. While it was true they had been seen from the boats, civilians often didn’t see Shinigami: they only saw the uniforms. Dressed in civilian clothing, they could perhaps pass for normal people…however, the instant they ran into anyone who was even remotely spiritually aware, any deception would immediately be impossible. Even as the thought occurred to him, Junshin cast out his senses towards the town, frowning as he came to a stop beside Hitomi – who had halted at the top of the slope, with only flatland lying between themselves and the towering wooden structure of Flotsam.

“Feel anything?” he asked, but Hitomi immediately shook her head. Similarly, Junshin couldn’t detect anything that felt like spiritual pressure from the settlement. That didn’t, however, mean that there was none there; it was entirely possible that spiritually aware being did occupy the town, but were simply supressing their spiritual pressure. If that did turn out to be the case, then the only way to identify them would be through close proximity…although doing so would expose the Shinigami, also.

“I don’t expect trouble out here,” Hitomi shrugged. “Hell, maybe we’ll get lucky and they’ll be no trouble to speak of, and we’ll find out this whole thing has been a false alarm, and there’s a collection of tree-huggers out there in the Outer Rim somewhere building themselves a commune.”

“Maybe,” Junshin muttered. Despite being the one to say it, Hitomi sounded even less convinced of the possibility than he was. “Either way, let’s get going.”

“Yeah,” Hitomi nodded, starting out towards the distant town at a brisk trot, the bounce gone from her step as the possibility that they were heading into danger was once again brought to the fore. Junshin quickened his pace slightly to draw level with her, the pair walking side by side towards Flotsam, and whatever waited within.

[Seraphina]

Act XXV: The Wayward Child




Dirk kicked his feet back and forth as he sat upon the low wooden wall to the rear of ‘The Blue Cheese’; located on the edge of the docks, it was one of the primary watering holes for the town’s fishermen on their way home after a long day of hauling nets and cleaning fish. Kuroda, living far from the town, was not a common fixture at the inn – Dirk, however, had made his presence known often enough that he was well known to the staff, and could usually rely on coasting a free apple or a small glass of goat’s milk when the nights were quiet.

Today was one such night, and he crunched loudly upon said apple, the tips of his toes scuffing against the boardwalk beneath him as he continued to silently fume in embarrassment over his last encounter with the Shinigami. He considered himself many things, but a crier was definitely not one of them; if he had shown concern for Junshin, then he was quite convinced it had been in a thoroughly manly way, and Hitomi had misrepresented him.

It did occur to him that he had perhaps deserved it – he had certainly not done a great deal to be polite or to help the two Shinigami warm up to him since their first meeting. Being tough and abrasive, however, was the way of the Outer Rim…it was the only way a child could survive alone on the streets. He had been a member of Kuroda’s household for scarcely a year – until then, he had been forced to make his way alone.

He had grown up further west, in district seventy eight – surely one of the most brutal hellholes that had ever existed. It was a place of lawlessness, where theft and murder were every day occurrences, and a child living alone had no chance whatsoever of survival. He had survived by doing what many children of the Outer Rim do – forming a gang, and stealing to survive. Such an unforgiving place, however, showed little mercy on those children caught during their thievery. One after another, Dirk had seen his friends dwindle away as they were caught and killed. Some were beaten to death by angry store owners – others savaged by guard dogs. One he had seen thrown into the river by a mob, weighed down with stones. When he eventually found himself the only survivor, he had been left with little in the way of options but to try and find a better life further west.

Stowing away in the back of merchant’s wagon, he had eventually found his way to Flotsam – although he had come by a long and varied road, often only just managing to avoid discovery, or fleeing towns with a murderous crowd behind him when he was forced to steal – the actual need to eat, curiously absent from those around him, had never seemed strange to him. Perhaps, if those who he had stolen from understood the bitter knaw of hunger – if they were capable of feeling the painful growl of an empty stomach – they would have understood.

But they didn’t understand. Nobody had, until Kuroda.

He had happened upon Kuroda’s landing by accident; following the river on foot under the assumption that it would eventually lead to a town. He happened upon Kuroda’s family in the process of offloading the boat by the river, and had managed to steal away a fish without being seen. It was an easy meal, and they appeared to have plenty – it was the first time in his life that he had come back more than once to steal from the same location. For three nights in total he would steal back to the Landing to make off with a fish or some other morsel, but it was on his fourth attempt that he was eventually caught.

Rather than the expected beating – the same beating he would have received virtually anywhere else in the Rukongai, Kuroda had taken him into his care. He was cleaned and fed, and slept in the bed for the first time in his life; one of many children who had happened upon Kuroda in a not dissimilar fashion. The old man asked for nothing in return save that they work for what they eat as a member of his extended family – be it in the house or on the river. It was an honest, straight forward arrangement that had seemed utterly foreign to Dirk after a life of thievery.

Still, he had never been able to shake off the tough, reticent attitude to life that had served him well in a world where virtually everyone wanted to kill him. Although Hisayo, who had arrived at the household only some four months after him, had been something of a calming influence – for the woman’s gentle firmness had quickly enraptured the entire household and established her firmly as a force of authority – he still couldn’t shake away his old habits completely…offensive nicknames for the Shinigami included.

Sighing, he continued to chomp away on his apple, scowling as continued to dwell on his last humiliation at the hands of Hitomi. He supposed Hisayo would point out that he deserved it, and probably force him to apologise for his behaviour up until then…he couldn’t deny that she was probably right. Still, it wouldn’t change the fact that it would be a bitter pill to swallow.

Suddenly he stiffened, a slight tingling in the back of his head – like an itch that he couldn’t quite locate – telling him that someone was coming. It was a sensation that he had been feeling almost constantly in the presence of the Shinigami; an indication, he imagined, of the growing powers that Hisayo continually told him he had. He could sense their presence in the same way he could hear a noise – similarly able to gauge direction and distance – as though another sense had been thrown onto of the ones he already had. This particular sense was telling him that two individuals, both bristling with reiatsu, were making their way down the street in his direction.

Still feeling rather bitter, Dirk wasn’t particularly eager for an encounter with the Shinigami at this time. Immediately he rolled backwards upon the wall, slipping behind it to place the low wooden barrier between himself and the street. Crouching on the boardwalk, he lifted himself just high enough to allow his eyes to poke over the top of the wall, content to wait for the two Shinigami to pass; for, sure enough, two dark figures were now visible making their way up the streets, towards the dock area.

Junshin frowned as he realised immediately that neither of the two could possibly be the Shinigami. Wondering if he had perhaps made a mistake, he probed cautiously with his newfound senses, and confirmed that both individuals definitely possessed reiatsu. However, they were thoroughly different from the Shinigami that Dirk had left back at the house. Aside from the obvious physical differences, their reiatsu itself was different. It felt sharper and less refined, a wilder variant of the more controlled spiritual pressure of the two Shinigami.

Both of the newcomers were men – one standing some five and a half feet, the other significantly taller at just over six feet. The shorter of the two was, even by Dirk’s standards, extremely slovenly. With a pot belly and flabby arms, his poor physical shape was clearly visible even beneath the long beige trenchcoat he wore. His round head was topped by a head of greasy brown hair, while his features looked almost pinched, as though his face was too small for his head. With a small mouth and dark, beady eyes, he looked almost to Dirk a man whose mother had an affair with a rodent.

By comparison, the other man was leaner in build and in a considerately better state of grooming, though he wore the same beige trench coat over what looked in the darkness to be black cloth. His skin was bronzed from the sun, and his black hair was styled into a topknot. A well-trimmed goatee surrounded his mouth, and he walked with a certain dignity that reminded Dirk of the self-appointed lawmen he would often encounter further west….the man’s narrow, pitiless eyes were enough to force Dirk to duck back behind the wall – somehow, he knew he didn’t want either of the two to spot him.

As the pair drew nearer, Dirk could hear their voices. They spoke to each other in a quiet, clipped manner, using a dialect that Dirk did not understand. It certainly wasn’t Japanese, or indeed any language Dirk had ever heard spoken in West Rukongai before. Had he been more of the world, the youth would perhaps have been able to tell that the pair were speaking English – a tongue seldom spoken so far out in the Western Rukon.

The pair appeared to be in a hurry, and were paying little attention to their surroundings as they advanced down the street. Dirk was quite content to let them pass, finding both men to be rather unpleasant. However, in the same moment they passed by his wall, one of the men – the shorter of the two – spoke a word that Dirk was able to recognise through the otherwise foreign garble.

‘Shinigami’.

Squinting, Dirk peered back over the top of the wall as the pair continued on, wondering if he had heard correctly. He was quite certain that this was the word he had heard – at least, either that or there was a word in the language spoken by the two that sounded very much like Shinigami. Either way, his curiosity was peaked. Cautiously, he crept along behind the wall, staying level with the two as they continued on their way further down the block. Keeping the pair in sight as best he could, he watched they abruptly turned down a side alley between some of the stone buildings along the boardwalk – for near the water’s edge, most of the buildings were made of hardier materials that wood – rather than down to the dock itself as Dirk had expected.

Moving out from behind the wall, Dirk kept to the relative darkness as best he could, darting to press his body flush against the stone wall and peer around the corner around which the pair had vanished. The two were still visible, some nine yards further down the narrow passage between the buildings, where they had come to a stop beside a door into one of the houses. The larger of the two raised a hand to bang a fist against the door, the smaller of the two glancing cautiously up and down the alley, forcing Dirk to retreat around the corner once more as the door creaked open.

“Where’s Shimazu-sama?” someone spoke from inside, this time speaking Japanese. A second voice – sounding like the taller of the two coat-wearing men – replied in the same.

“He sent us ahead when your report reached us,” the bearded man replied gruffly. “He is not far behind…he wished to confirm that you report was accurate.”

“It is, Kashigi-sama,” the voice within the doorway replied. “We saw them arrive this morning. Wearing black and carrying zanpakuto. There’s no doubt whatsoever that they w….”

The remainder of the conversation terminated with the sound of the closing door, and Dirk chances a glance back down the alley to discover the speakers had retreated indoors. There no longer seemed any doubt that the group was talking about the Shinigami, and the youth felt a grin come to his features.

‘Alright! Let’s see the Old Lady make fun of me once I tell them about this! ‘Dirk-sama, hero of the hour!’…hey, that actually sounds kinda awesome. Alright, let’s see what I can find out’.

Owing to his former career – if it could be called that – Dirk was nothing if not adept at climbing. In fact, his efforts to perpetuate the nickname of ‘Dirk’ around Flotsam was largely due to his attempts to dispel the nickname of ‘monkey’ often given to him by the townsfolk. Taking a moment to peer up at the roof of the dwelling against which he stood, the child placed the sole of one foot against the seemingly sheer wall, propelling himself upwards with cat-like ease, his fingers seeking out minor dips and handholds that would have been invisible to the inexperienced eye.

The rooftops of the white stone buildings were made of red slate, and Junshin navigated this as easily as he would have solid ground. Weighing at most some eighty pounds, he soundlessly picked his way over the uneven surface without disturbing the slates, crouching on the edge of the building as he drew level with the doorway through which the mysterious group had retreated. A dexterous leap carried him across the street onto the same building. However, Dirk quickly realised he had rather undershot the jump, landing slightly closer to the edge than he had intended. Checking a curse, his breath caught as he heel struck one of the slats closest to the roof’s edge, sending it tumbling to the street beneath.

The ceramic tile broke with a crash upon striking the ground, immediately disturbing a dog in the nearby streets with began to bark furiously. Holding his breath, Dirk tensed himself to run as he waited for any sound of activity inside the house. However, he exhaled a long sigh of relief as no commotion followed; if he had been heard, the noise was likely dismissed as a cat.

‘That’s me! Dirk-sama! Cat burglar extraordinaire….or something.’

Turning his attention back towards the building, Dirk scanned the rooftop for any sign of a chimney or other opening through which he could listen to the conversation within. The building had no upper floor, so a window was out of the question. However, as he navigated his way further up the rooftop, he spied what he was looking for – a rectangular opening near the centre of the roof, coverage with a mesh grate, that he could only imagine led to a fireplace within.

“Jackpot,” he whispered to himself, his sense of excitement rising as he briefly pictured Hitomi hugging him against her ample bosom upon learning of his daring adventure. As much as she was much older than him, and more than a little scary, it was a thought that appeared to his youthful curiosity. Grinning from ear to ear, he began to scramble up towards the opening before a sudden tingling up and down the back of his neck made him feel, with a sudden sense of dread, that he should turn around.

Looking over his shoulder, Dirk felt as though the blood had frozen in his veins. His entire body going stiff, he found himself looking directly at a broad, black figure standing upon the edge of the rooftop behind him – the same short, mole featured man that had been one of the pair he had followed to the house. Dirk’s eyes, bulging in alarm, met the dark, beady pits of the adult’s. He couldn’t say how long the man had been there…but he found it alarming that he had not heard a sound from the far larger individual climbing onto the roof.

“Oh?” the fat man tilted his head to one side, his lips parting in a smile that revealed yellowed, broken teeth. “You noticed me, did you? That’s odd…I know I didn’t make a sound. I wonder…..are you with the Shinigami?”

‘Fuck!...fuckfuckfuckfuck!’

All thoughts of heroics fleeing from his mind, Dirk knew immediately that he had to run. Merely making eye contact filled him with a sense of absolute dread that he had felt on only one other occasion in his entire life: when he had come face to face with the Hollow those few nights previously. The man regarded him not with the contempt he was used to as a street urchin; rather it was something more tangible – a sharp, edged aura of killing intent.

He immediately turned to run, intended to leap down to the next rooftop to try and make an escape. However, he was immediately arrested in place as the air around him seemed to thicken like soup. His limbs felt heavy, his lungs struggling to draw in breath as the mole-faced man’s spiritual pressure was suddenly unleashed upon him. The boy suddenly found himself unable to stand, let alone run, falling to his knees as the world around him faded to black.



A cold splash of water upon his face brought Dirk back to consciousness, drawing in a sharp gasp for breath at the sudden chill. Shaking himself out of his stupor, he was momentarily unaware of where exactly he was. Soaked and shivering, he spat out a mouthful of what tasted like river-water, realising he was lying upon a cold, stone floor. Raising a hand to wipe away the heavy droplets that had gathered in his eyebrows, he realised that he was not only. A total of six individuals other than himself occupied the room, through only three of them were paying him any attention.

The room was dark – lit only by the fireplace that Dirk had earlier speculated upon, around which three of the individuals sat on three legged stools – the only furniture that Dirk could see from where he lay. The other three – the two men in the long coats, and a third wearing the routine peasant garb of the townsfolk, with an ugly, hook shaped scare crossing over the left side of his mouth, peered down at Dirk curiously. It was the scar-faced man who held the dripping bucket, and has presumably doused Dirk to wake him up.

“….He’s too young to be a Shinigami,” the tall, bearded man, earlier referred to as Kashigi, muttered. He stood in the middle of the trio, glaring down at Dirk with his hands clasped behind his back. “He’s probably just a thief.”

“He was affected by my spiritual pressure,” the mole-faced man snorted, gesturing a thick-fingered hand towards the child. “He’s got reiatsu of his own…maybe he’s a student?”

“Maybe,” Kashigi nodded. “Or he might just be an anomaly. If he is a student, then he’s the youngest I’ve ever seen…besides, they wouldn’t send a student out here. Get rid of him. Dump the body somewhere it won’t be found.”

Turning away in disinterest, the man who appeared to be the leader of the group headed towards the fireplace. At his instruction, the rodent faced man grinned broadly as Dirk immediately retreated against the far wall, his eyes bulging in terror. The shorter man waited until his apparent superior had withdrawn to the far side of the room – so far as Dirk could tell the only room in the house – before advancing forward with his hands held up before him.

“Don’t worry, boy,” he sneered, rolling up the sleeves of his jacket. “I’ll make this quick, since you’re just a kid.”

“Wait, Yabu-sama,” the scar-faced man suddenly spoke up. Having been leaning against the wall, watching the proceedings curiously, he suddenly pushed him upwards to stand straight. His interruption drew a sideyard glance from the rodent-faced man, a vein visibly bulging in the latter’s forehead in apparent irritation at the interruption. The scarred man, realising that he had perhaps erred, quickly dropped to his knees, placing his palms on the floor as he lowered himself into a reverent bow. “Forgive me, Yabu-sama, but I recognise this boy!”

“Oh?” the man named Yabu sneered. “I didn’t think you’d been here long enough to become familiar with the locals….I assume nobody will miss him if I squash him?”

Dirk, pressing himself closer to the wall, searched frantically for anything that looked like a means of escape. However, there was no clear route to the door – not without passing within arms reach of the man who clearly intended to kill him. His knees beginning to tremble, he sank slowly down the wall, the colour draining from his features as he tightly shut his eyes, hoping to open them to find that his capture was nothing more than an uncomfortable dream.

“He was on the boat, Yabu-sama,” the scarred man reported. “With the Shinigami. I am most certain of it….it is likely than the boy knows their location.”

Dirk’s heart stopped, his eyes opening as he noted a lengthy pause following the man’s declaration. On the far side of the room, the man named Kashigi had taken an interest in the proceedings once more, returning to push aside the thoroughly disappointing looking Yabu to peer curiously down at Dirk.

“You’re sure?” he queried, prompting the scar-faced man to bow even deeper, his forehead very nearly touching the floor.

“I am certain, Kashigi-sama,” he replied.

“I see….” The man naked Kashigi nodded, raising a hand to absently stroke the shiny black hair of his beard. “What’s your name, boy?”

Dirk didn’t reply, managing to do little more than issue forth a whimper that passed over his trembling lips. He was left with the definite impression that his identification had not prevented his death, but rather delayed it; more concerned was he, however, of the sudden interest in where he could potentially lead them. The last place he had known the Shinigami to be had been his home…and he had no intention of leading these men to his family.

His lack of a reply seemed to be a point of some irritation to the apparent leader of the group, and his brow creased in irritation. However, he regained his composure almost instantly, kneeling down to bring himself level with the cowering child. Feeling very much as though he were face to face with a hissing cobra, Dirk wished more than anything that he could withdraw further into the wall.

“I don’t suppose there’s any chance,” Kashigi queried, “that you will tell me where to find them? If you do, then I give you my word that we’ll let you live.”

“Likemhm…” Dirk murmured, his words once again lost behind a whimper. The answer he wanted to give was not forthcoming and, once again, Kashigi scowled in irritation. Inching forward on the balls of his feet, the man spread his hands as though to show they were empty.

“It’s a good deal, isn’t it?” he continued. “All I ask is that you point out a pair of Shinigami to me. You’re a local, aren’t you? What could those Shinigami mean to you? It isn’t worth your life, is it?”

‘Maybe not…but my dah’….my brothers….my sisters….everyone else…’

Biting down on his lower lip, the sharp pain brought a surge of defiance rising up within the boy as, finally, he was able to find words. As he drew in breath to speak, Kashigi leaned forward eagerly to listen – however the man quickly withdrew in surprise as Dirk thrust himself away from the wall, swinging a tiny fist at his captor’s bearded features that fell well short of its mark.

“Like hell I’d believe your word!” he shouted, his tiny body quivering as his terror was replaced by defiant anger. “I don’t care what y’do! Y’might as well jus’ kill me, cause I ain’t tellin’ you nothin’! Sod off an’ die, ya carpet-faced bastard!”

Kashigi’s initial reaction was to simply stare in mute shock at Dirk’s outburst. However, as the boy attempted to force whatever reiatsu he had to the fore – intending to fight for his life if necessary – the man’s surprise turned quickly into rage. Gritting his teeth, Kashigi immediately lashed out with his own reiatsu, shattering Dirk’s meagre imitation and blasting the youth back to the floor with the sheer weight of his spiritual pressure. Pushed down on his stomach, Dirk tried to open his mouth to scream as he heard, and felt, at least one bone crack inside him. However, all he succeeded in doing was coughing a few droplets of dark blood across the stone floor. Yabu, watching the proceedings, immediately burst into a cackle like laugh.

“The little carpet mite has some spine,” the fatter man sneered. “I think he’s serious….I don’t think we’ll get more than that out of him. Lemmie kill him.”

“Tch…fine,” Kashigi growled, though he had not yet relented with his own spiritual pressure – continuing to punish Dirk with the weight of his reiatsu in the same way a man might grind his heel after standing on an insect. “You can have your fun with him. If he talks fine, if not….make damn sure he suffers for it.”

‘I’m…I’m gonna die...Damn it…I couldn’t even fight them….’

Closing his eyes, Dirk felt bitter, salty tears begin to trickle from beneath his closed eyelids as the pressure exerted by Kashigi began to lesson – making way for Yabu to resume whatever diabolical plans he had In mind. There no longer seemed to be much Dirk could do, neither escape or survival seemed at all likely. He took some solace, at least, in that he hadn’t betrayed the location of his family….he owed Kuroda far too much for that.

‘Old Lady…..You….you better find these guys for me. And….and you’d better kick their asses!’

It felt odd, at the end, that he should think of Hitomi. He supposed there were worse things to think of in his final moments, as much as they hadn’t exactly had the smoothest of relationships. However, he somehow felt that – if anyone had what it took to avenge him, it would going to her…it certainly beat relying on Wetpants, or whatever the other one’s name was. Although pain wracked his body – he was quite sure that Kashigi’s spiritual pressure had broken something inside him – the boy managed what he imagined would be his final smile.

It was funny…in his last moments, he felt almost as though he could feel Hitomi’s presence there with him.

A sudden deafening crash tore through his senses – like an explosion sounding inside his head – as the world around him seemed to be suddenly swallowed up by white noise. His ears rang, the eruption of sound enough to daze him even more than Kashigi’s reiatsu as he became dimly aware of a sensation of rising. Pressure around his waist secured him in place as he lifted rapidly from floor level, his vision blurred as his head continued to real from what he could only liken to a dynamite explosion, his nostrils filled with the powdery scent of shattered stone.

His rapid ascension terminated suddenly, his vision gradually coming into focus us the cool air upon his features was sufficient to partially rouse him from his dazed state; as much as he knew, having been indoors, he shouldn’t have been feeling the air at all. Nevertheless, the night air hung cool and soothing around him as he came back to his senses, blinking rapidly to bring his eyes back into focus as he found himself staring down at the building in which he had been in moments before – looking upon it from the vantage point of the neighbouring roof.

The building, however, could no longer be described as such. The building appeared to have been sliced down the middle from roof to foundations, the roof and walls almost entirely caving in under the force of a single, monumental strike that Dirk, for a moment, could only assume had been a meteor. However, the reiatsu that hung thickly in the air told him otherwise, as did the limb that held him underarm, apparently having plucked him from the devastation.

Turning his head to look over his shoulder, Dirk was unable to see the face of his savour – he could see only a slender torso wreathed in a cascade of crimson hair. Held under the individuals left arm, the right held at the ready a long, curved blade of shimmering red – a zanpakuto who’s fangs he had seen bared once before.

“Are you alright,” a voice that he had never been more glad to hear asked – the cold hardness of rage hidden just behind her words. “Dirk-kun?”


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LgAG3Ex1XWA

“O…Old Lady…?” he murmured, still able to taste his own blood upon his lips, though he managed a smile nonetheless. “What took y’so long?”

“We were sight seeing,” a second voice, this one that of Junshin, replied from the other side of Dirk. Turning his head, the boy found the other Shinigami crouched on the edge of the roof top, his attention focused on the smouldering ruins of the building. “I don’t remember reading about a ‘nest of child abducting scum’ on the tourist pamphlet though.”

“Wetpants,” Dirk wheezed, finding it rather difficult to breath – though he could already feel his reiatsu flowing through his body to tend to his wounds. “You’re pretty bad at the comedy. Y’should leave it to th’professionals.”

Junshin didn’t reply; he merely smiled lightly as he kept his attention to the fore. Frowning, Dirk turned to peer in the same direction, and realised that he was not the only one to have made it out of the building alive. On the opposite side of the shattered house – perched on the rooftop on the far side of the smoking rubble – were the two coat wearing men that had tormented him within. Although they appeared to have escaped being crushed by the collapsing building, it seemed they were the only ones among the goons that had succeeded in doing so.

“Careful with those guys,” he cautioned. “They’re both real strong.”

“Don’t worry, Dirk-kun,” Hitomi replied, kneeling to set Dirk down upon the rooftop. Content to simply lie where he was left, Dirk doubted he had much strength to move in any case. He couldn’t recall his body ever suffering such extensive damage – it would be some time before he was able to move around on his own. He was, however, able to push himself up onto his elbows; affording himself a view of what was almost certainly going to turn into a fight.

“So are we.”

[Seraphina]

Act XXVI: Rooftop Battle





“So,” Junshin muttered, “I suppose all thoughts to a friendly first encounter just went out the window.”

Hitomi cast her companion a brief sideward glance, only looking away from their opponents for a moment. She said nothing, however, and Junshin took the silent hint: focusing his attention once more open the two men who stood opposite them. Heaving a heavy sigh, he reasoned that some part of him had known – even when they first received the assignment – this was almost certainly how their mission was going to proceed. He had entertained hopes that the group they were searching for would turn out to be well meaning vigilantes, but it had always been the vaguest of hopes. Truth was a rather bitter pill to swallow, but Junshin didn’t find it an altogether surprising one.

Peering across the rooftops at the two men, Junshin’s eyes narrowed as he silently appraised them – they both wore identical clothing: a long beige trench coat over what looked like a black shinobi shozuko. A uniform of some sort, possibly. Neither of the two carried any visible weapons, but the coats had a great deal of room for concealing one. It was their reiatsu, however, that he took the greatest interest in. It was not unlike that of a Shinigami, but felt somehow less refined; It was like the comparison between shaped and unshaped stone. He imagined that they possessed the abilities of a Shinigami, but had received more rustic training in their use than the rigid, disciplined curriculum of the Shinigami Academy. However, what he was truly interested in was the relative size of each man’s reiatsu.

Both men were taking care to keep their spiritual pressure supressed – likely intending to do so until the last moment – and Hitomi and Junshin had elected to do the same. The fact that they were able to handle their reiatsu at all without Academy training meant that these men were almost certainly combat veterans – learning through doing. The brief taste of both men’s spiritual pressure, detected from across the town during in those instants when it had been raised to cow Dirk, told him that both men were on the level of single digit seats; if he had to guess, Junshin would have put them both around the level of a fifth seat.

‘We’re really out of our depth here…I never imagined they’d be this strong…’

Across from them, the man with the beard suddenly spoke. Having been grinding his teeth in frustration at the continued silence, he apparently saw fit to open communications, shouting across the wrecked building as, all around them, the panicked cries of alarmed dogs echoed from among the streets. Hitomi’s opening attack had all but severed the building in half, creating a thunderous explosion that had echoed across the entire town – it was doubtful their battlefield would remain private for long.

“I am Kashigi Masamura,” the declared. “Fifth Finger of Kuroken! We’re glad you could join us, Shinigami-san. You’ve saved us the trouble of looking for you.”

Junshin allowed Hitomi to take the lead, and left the reply to her. However, Hitomi didn’t reply, her purple eyes flickering back and forth between the two; like Junshin she was likely also trying to get an exact picture of how powerful their two opponents were. While the taller of the two postured, his shorter companion stood slightly behind him, grinning. They still maintained a careful hold on their spiritual pressure, not showing their hand just yet. However, merely by speaking they had already surrendered more information than the Shinigami had known mere moments before. ‘Kuroken’, Junshin imagined, was the name of their organisation….or perhaps a specific branch of it. ‘Ken’…fist….fifth finger….a rank, perhaps? In the cutthroat bands that often roamed the Outer Rim, rank often equated directly to strength. If this man was the fifth ranked member of his organisation, that likely meant that there were at least four others who were even stronger than him.

Hesitantly, he cast another glance towards Hitomi, wondering if the redhead had given any thought to an exist strategy. As raw recruits, they were at a significant disadvantage - both men were about as strong as the very officer who had given them their assignment to begin with. They were far above the level of a fresh Academy graduate, even before the fact that there could be others, even more powerful, lurking nearby.

“Which of you,” Hitomi suddenly murmured, interrupting Kashigi as he opened his mouth to speak again, “is stronger?”

The question caught both Junshin and the two thugs off guard, and they did not reply at once. The rat-faced man’s smile faltered while Kashigi blinked mutely, as though surprised that his introduction had not been returned. Junshin looked frantically back and forth between his companion and the two men, wondering what she could possibly be thinking by provoking them. Hitomi herself kept her eyes on their two opponents, waiting patiently for an answer.

“I’ve given you my name, Shinigami,” Kashigi growled, looking genuinely offended by Hitomi’s lack of introduction. From the manner in which the shorter man allowed the other to take the lead, Junshin would imagine that the taller of the two was the stronger. “Before you die, you should show some cour….”

His sentence ended in a muffled ‘omph’ as he was forced to tilt his upper body sharply backwards, his knees bending to a near ninety degree angle as he was forced to reach a palm backwards to brace himself around the ground, the blade of Hitomi’s sword flashing through the space that his torso, mere moments before, had occupied. Junshin was as surprised by Hitomi’s sudden charge as the two thugs were, the redhead bridging the gap between the Shinigami and their opponent’s at blinding speed.

‘Fast…..was she….was she always that fast!?’

Kashigi was only caught off guard for a moment, grunting in exertion as he turned his backward lurch into an bicycle kick – his right leg leaving the ground altogether to arc upwards towards Hitomi as his shoulders descended towards the slated roof. Hitomi quickly angled her sword to receive the kick, the ball of her selected opponent’s foot striking the pommel of her zanpakuto before, still in mid leap, she sharply thrust the tip of the weapon downwards towards the centre of Kashigi’s skull.

Pivoting on his earthed palm, Kashigi spun into a cartwheel that saw him clear of the blade – Hitomi’s weapon thunking into the roof with enough force that a shower of fragmented ceiling tiles was coughed skyward by the impact. The two separated for only a moment, Hitomi charging into Kashigi once again the very instant her own feet touched the roof, both combatants tumbling out of sight into the street below.

“Seraphina-kun!” Junshin shouted, overcoming his initial shock after Hitomi’s opening blitzkrieg. As utterly insane as it seemed for them to engage such high level opponents, the fury of her assault had certainly caught her opponent on the back foot – perhaps that was their best, if not only, option to win this battle. However, his advance to try and go to Hitomi’s aid was halted as the other man suddenly moved to stand in the near centre of the opposite rooftop, still grinning widely as he extended his left arm to bar Junshin’s way.

“Where do you think you’re going, boy?” he sneered, his right hand reaching beneath his coat, snaking behind his back. “Looks like you and I are going to play a while.”

Junshin tensed, shifting his weight into a more ready stance as he spread his feet to shoulder distance apart. Reaching one of his hands underneath his kosode to grasp the hilt of one of his kodachi, he risked a glance towards Dirk – the boy continued to lie on his stomach where Hitomi had placed him, looking more dazed than anything else. Junshin grit his teeth in frustration….he had little chance of winning, but he couldn’t run away either incase his opponent went after Dirk instead.

‘Damn it….’

“Yabu Hanzo,” the fat man sneered, introducing himself as he tugged on whatever was concealed behind his back, “of Kuroken….although I think killing a pair of Shinigami might move me and Kashiga-san up the world, don’t you? Hell, I might even be named a Finger. Fifth Finger Yabu Hanzo….doesn’t sound so bad, does it?”

From beneath his coat, the man withdrew what Junshin at first thought to be a short stick – some twelve inches in length. However, with a flick of his wrist, Yabu extended a curved, single edged blade that ran alongside the wooden handle – swinging upon a hinge in the same manner as a razor to reveal that the weapon was actually a kama. The jingle of metal accompanied the weapon’s every movement as Junshin realised that the a thick metal chain dangled from the base of the kama’s handle, anchored somewhere beneath its weilder’s back.

“…..Kiyoko Junshin,” he muttered in reply, although he didn’t altogether feel that this man was worth the last courtesy. “Fifth Division.”

“What? No seat?” Yabu’s lip curled in distain. With a clattering jangle, he allowed the kama to tumble from his fingers, feeding the chain between his index and middle finger until he ran out of slack, the weapon dangling just shy of the roof. Junshin couldn’t say exactly how long the chain was, but it seemed to simply continue to extend from behind the man’s back as and when he required more length. “Bullshit. Trust the Soul Society to send a couple of small fry. I’ve never killed a Shinigami before….I was hoping my first would be at least a single digit.”

‘Damn it…I don’t have time for banter. This guy’s out of my league! I need to get to Seraphina-kun…maybe together we might manage to take out one of them if we get lucky. If we can do at least that, the other might think twice…’

Yabu’s opening attack came without further warning, forcing Junshin to shelf all other thoughts save for staying alive. Having begin to spin the chain-bound kama in a slow, lazy circle, the rat-faced man suddenly lashed out with the weapon, hurling it with unerring accuracy towards Junshin’s position. The attack was slower than the Shinigami had expected – perhaps his opponent was simply toying with him – but either way he couldn’t afford to let it hit him. Throwing himself to one side, he moved sideways – away from Dirk – in the hope his opponent would stick with him and forget the child was there.

He tried not to look behind him as the kama collided with the roof where he had stood mere moments before. The blade of the weapon sliced into the rooftop, but it was more the forward momentum of the weapon that caused the damage. Gouging up the surface layer of slates, the kama blasted apart the ceramic tiles as though they were paper, a cacophony of noise rending the night air apart as the shattering tiles combined with the sharp jingle of the chain; Yabu yanked the weapon expertly back into his hand for a second attack.

Sticking to the rooftops, Junshin set off in a sprint, drawing one of his own kodachi as he was forced to throw himself into a spin, very nearly falling onto his back as he desperately batted aside his opponent’s second attack – the vibrations from the impact shuddering their way up and down the length of his arm. The attacks were lacking in speed, but they certainly didn’t want for power. He could only imagine what the assault would be like when his opponent began to fight seriously.

Regaining his balance as Yabu dragged the weapon back into his grasp, Junshin drew in a sharp breath as his attacker suddenly bounded into the air. The leap was fuelled by reiatsu, sending the man rocketing skyward for at least fifteen vertical feet as he snatched the kama back into his hand. Junshin, doubting he stood much chance of blocking another attack like the last, elected to dodge once more as – from above – Yabu hurled his kama for a third time.

On this occasion, gravity served to help the weapon along, and it crashed down upon Junshin’s position more quickly than those before it. Throwing himself into a backward leap, Junshin winced as the weapon did not merely strike the roof, but punched straight through it into the building beneath. The longer the fight went on, the more likely there was to be collateral damage among the townsfolk. However, he could see no means of defeating his opponent when he was barely even able to keep up with the man’s lazy opening offensive.

Lifting his gaze back towards his opponent, who had began his decent back towards ground level, Junshin started as his eyes met those of his rodent-featured opponent. His eyes widening in surprise, Junshin saw an expression he had not expected. He had anticipated an expression of contemptuous amusement upon his opponent’s features; however, if anything, the man looked frustrated.

‘Is he….actually trying’

Junshin’s heart skipped a beat as, for the first time, he became aware of the tingling sensation of his opponent’s spiritual pressure tickling his senses. He had been so intend on dodging the attacks that he had not even been aware of Yabu’s reiatsu springing to the fore, nor of his own rising reflexively to meet it. He had assumed, owing simply to the fact that he had been able to dodge them, that his adversary was playing around…but the spiritual pressure he currently felt from his opponent was as high as the maximum Junshin had expected.

Yabu’s attacks weren’t slow…Junshin’s reaction time was simply extraordinarily fast.

‘This can’t be right…by all rights, he should be able to take me out anytime he wants to. Just two days ago I couldn’t even take on a low-grade hollow! What the hell is going on!?’

As the kama began to withdraw from the roof, Junshin quickly lanced out an arm – thrusting the blade of his kodachi through the links in the chain to arrest the weapon in place. Spinning his arm in a circle, he wrapped the chain around his entire forearm to give himself sufficient leverage before, with a roar, he yanked as hard as he could upon the length of metal – drawing Yabu towards him for the first time. A surge of adrenaline pumped through his veins, fear and frustrating melting away as he began to realise that victory was not so far out of the question as he had fought.

He couldn’t imagine how or why his strength had increased so greatly over the mere two days training he had received from Hitomi, but now that both he hand Yabu were using their reiatsu to its fullest, he would have placed them both on approximately even footing. Hitomi had told him that reducing his bleedout would increase all of his physical abilities exponentially. But perhaps, even then, the training was only part of it….perhaps the sudden and unexpected contact with his zanpakuto had unleashed something within him? Broken a barrier of strength that he alone had been unable to breach?

Whatever the case, of one thing he was most definitely certain: He could win.

Yabu’s expression changed from one of frustration to alarm as he was suddenly yanked towards Junshin by his own chains. Flattening his feet, the man attempted to create a wedge of dense spiritrons beneath him to try and stop his downward momentum – in the same manner as would be used to airwalk – but the attempt came too late as Junshin pulled his opponent into a freefall, reaching back with his free hand – concentrating his reiatsu upon his fist.

As Yabu descended towards him, Junshin uncoiled his arm like a tense spring, his fist crunching into the very centre of Yabu’s features as the latter – perhaps being inefficient at close range – made no adequate defence from the blow. In a shower of blood and yellowed teeth, Yabu’s trajectory changed from the vertical to the horizontal as the force of Junshin’s blow sent him skimming across the rooftop. The Shinigami himself winced at the impact – some of the blood was his own, his knuckles splitting from the sheer force with which he struck his adversary.

Yabu remained airborne for several seconds, the kama tearing its way free from the roof and snaking after him until he finally reached back onto the rooftop from which he had initially leapt, crunching through the surface to be buried among the resulting cascade of tiles. Junshin, shaking off his hand, couldn’t help but grin in satisfaction as he succeeded in striking the first decisive blow of the fight. However, some of the wind was robbed from his sails as, coughing and spluttering, his opponent set about extracting himself from the rubble.

As ugly as Yabu had been before the punch, he was positively grotesque now. The cartilage of his nose had been essentially crushed, flattened against his face as a fleshy bound of blood soaked mush. Blood trickled thickly from his mouth and, as the thug lurched unsteadily up to a seated position, he coughed out three more teeth that skipped down the slight slope of the rooftop to fall into the alley beneath. If the disfigurement was enough to make the fighter think twice, however, it certainly wasn’t evident. Staggering to his feet, he pulled the kama back into his waiting hand, glaring across the breadth of the street at Junshin.

“Don’t get cocky,” he roared, his words more than a little slurred due to his sudden lack of teeth. “You little shit! I’ll kill you!”

Junshin’s heart pounded, still hardly able to believe that he had been able to strike that hard. By all rights, he shouldn’t have been able to keep up with his opponent, but now he had him on the back foot. However, he knew that Yabu would approach more cautiously from here – he probably wouldn’t catch him off guard quite as easily the next time.

Now that he had both feet under him once more, Yabu regained some of his previous poise. Feeding the chain through his left hand, he used his right to spin the weapon as before – though this time the circle was much swifter than before, the weapon quickly rendered invisible in a buzz-saw like whirl of flashing metal. Junshin readied himself, reaching into his kosode to withdraw his other kodachi. Now armed in both hands, he waited for the attack he knew was coming.

“Bring it on,” he shouted, attempting to mimic the bravado expected of a Shinigami. “I’m ready!”

[Seraphina]

Act XXVII: Beyond the River






Hitomi and Kashigi spiralled through the air, the man’s hands around her wrists, desperately trying to keep the edge of her blade from his throat. From across the crimson metal, their faces were only inches apart as the tumbled – dark brown eyes locked upon dusky purple, the deadlock lasting for mere heartbeats as the ground rushed up to meet them. Hitomi allowed herself a slight smile of satisfaction at the expression of surprised affront upon her opponent’s features – it was an offence she didn’t intent to apologise for.

She paid little mind to Junshin’s own predicament. Her counterpart had become far stronger than he gave himself credit for – she doubted he even realised exactly how powerful he had become over the last few days. He had approached the simple training exercises she presented to him with such determination that a dramatic increase in power had been inevitable. By this point, his level of bleedout was effectively zero – in terms of handling his spiritual pressure, he might actually have overtaken Shingen. She had no doubt that he had all the tools he needed to defeat his opponent…it was her own that she had to concern herself.

As they reached the ground, the two combatants split apart, pushing away from each other as they both arced into identical horizontal spins that saw them land gracefully upon the balls of their feet. A fine ring of wispy dust was kicked up around their landing side in the narrow street as neither fighter paused for long, darting towards each other at ground level. Hitomi held her sword in both hands at hip level, the blade parallel to the ground as she unleashed an elegant swing towards her opponent who – as far as she could tell – rushed towards her unarmed.

However, as Kashigi realised his left arm to intercept the blow, Hitomi realised immediately that he was not as defenceless as he first appeared. As her blade struck his forearm, the report of metal on metal sang through the alley, Hitomi’s sword stopped dead upon the man’s sleeve. Gritting her teeth, Hitomi bobbed her head aside as Kashigi replied with what she thought at first was a punch but, as the man angled his arm into the blow, she realised was in fact a short ranged elbow.

The attack should have gone wide. However, as Kashigi torqued his arm, the sound of rending cloth was Hitomi’s only warning as a three inch long, talon-like blade sliced free at Kashigi’s elbow, sprouting from beneath the cloth of his sleeve, moving in a path directly towards her right eye. Almost too late, Hitomi dropped into a crouch, placing her left palm upon the ground to steady herself as the hidden blade arced by over her head. Pushing off from her earthed palm, she hurled herself into a midair corkscrew that saw her sword once again arc towards her opponent.

For the second time, however, a metallic clang indicated her failure to injure him - this time sparks flying from the collusion as her blow was sufficient to tear the sleeve from his lower arm. Rebounding from the impact, Hitomi landed in a crouched skid, placing a knee to the ground to kill her momentum as she slid a full ten feet backwards down the alley.

Scowling, she remained in her crouch as she took stock of her opponent, and the reason for her continued frustration. As Kashigi reached up to tear away the remainder of his shredded sleeve, Hitomi noted the man’s arms – from wrist to elbow – were encased in polished, silvery metal. The gauntlets possessed no rivets or visible joints, appearing to be made of a single piece of metal that flowed and rippled along with the muscles underneath, almost as though it were a part of his body rather than armour.

‘Whatever the hell it is, it’s not normal metal….normal metal wouldn’t have stopped a zanpakuto. It’s got to be something else….’

Even in the darkness, Hitomi could see the defence was not the armour’s only function. The spike upon his elbow was still visible and, as Hitomi watched, the metal around his wrist seemed to shift and move – almost as though it were liquid – elongating and thinning to form a long, dagger-like spike that extended over the top of his palm, past his knuckles.

“…Nice toy,” she grunted, risingly slowly to her feet as she regarded the man with a greater degree of caution. Once more she secured a grip on her sword with both hands, wondering the exact extent of the usual weapon’s shape changing abilities. She imagined that if Kashigi could strike her from where he stood then he would probably have tried already…but it couldn’t hurt to be too careful. “I don’t suppose you’d mind telling me what the hell is it?”

“This?” Kashigi sneered, raising his bare arm to allow Hitomi a better look in the dim light. Clearly, he felt as though he was back in control of the fight, his anger slipping away as he regained his composure. “Child, haven’t you ever seen a zanpakuto before?”

Hitomi started, though she managed to keep her surprise from showing. Her eyes flickered briefly down to her own sword, though she did not keep her gaze from her adversary for long. As much as she attempted to mask her reaction, Kashigi’s sneer widened nonetheless.

“….Zanpakuto are swords,” she replied, her eyes focused upon Kashigi’s features, searching for any indication that the man was bluffing.

“Only when they’re sealed,” her adversary replied with a casual shrug. “This is my shikai.”

‘What the hell!?’

“Bullshit!” Hitomi snapped through clenched teeth. “I didn’t see you release your seal….don’t even try and tell me you walked into town like that. Breaking the seal on a zanpakuto requires massive reiatsu…there’s no way you could do it without me noticing.”

“My zanpakuto,” came Kashigi’s drawled reply. “Can’t be sealed. All members of Kuroken carry similar swords….their seals were forcibly removed, and can never be put back in place. Our swords have been touched by a power utterly beyond your imagination…We don’t even need to use our own reiatsu to maintain shikai.”

Hitomi couldn’t be certain whether or not the man was babbling – what he was saying certainly shouldn’t have been possible. Although it was possible for a zanpakuto’s seal to be forcibly broken, allowing the weilder to use shikai without calling – or even knowing – the sword’s name. However, it required the Shinigami wielding it to have massive spiritual pressure, on the level of a Captain…this man, as strong as he was, did not have strength on that level.

However, Hitomi found herself suddenly reminded of the massive, incomprehensible power she had encountered earlier that day, bubbling up from beneath the surface of the Rukongai. She couldn’t see how anyone could use a third party to break the seal of their zanpakuto…however, at least part of what Kashigi said may have fit. She couldn’t say she altogether believed it….but she also couldn’t say what power on such a ridiculous scale could potentially be capable of.

“…Are you frightened, girl?” Kashigi chuckled, extending his arm – lethal blade an all – to point towards the redhead. “Don’t worry….I’ll take away your fear, child. In mere moments, pain and fear will be but a thing of the past….I almost envy you the endless sleep of oblivion.”

Suddenly, he was on the move. Her opponent did not approach Hitomi directly, instead leaping onto the nearby wall. Such was the speed of his advance that he was able to run across the sheer surface, his body almost horizontal, as he closed the distance between himself and Hitomi in the blink of an eye. Hitomi was ready for him, however, swinging her blade to meet the downward angle of what Kashigi had intended to be a killing thrust, using the recoil to vault away from him – her feet striking the opposite wall.

Like two swift moving blurs – one of silver, the other of crimson – the two rebounded back and forth from the close walls of the alley, a ring of clashing metal and a shower of sparks accompanying their every collision as their battle progressed between the buildings. Their feet did not touch the ground, bounding from one wall to the other, striking at each other with each mid-air pass until they finally reached the end of the narrow alley, breaking out into the main street beyond. Both warriors landed on the balls of their feet, their momentum such that neither way able to prevent themselves from staggering.

However, no sooner had they regained their balance than they advanced once more. Hitomi winced as Kashigi’s entire forearm shifted into the shape a jagged axe-head, swinging his limb in a chopping motion that she intercepted upon the shoulder of her blade. The cobbled paving stones of the main road splintered around her feet beneath the weight of the strike, but her knees refused to buckle as she sharply pushed the blow to one side, throwing her body into a spin that saw her right leg lash out in a fluent wheel kick aimed for the side of Kashigi’s head.

To her horror, Hitomi watched as the metal that engulfed Kashigi’s lower arm shifted once more – slithering up the length of his arm to instead engulf his shoulder and neck. The metal was quicker than Hitomi’s limb, enveloping an entire half of Kashigi’s head, causing the Shinigami to cry out in pain as her shin met nothing but solid metal. Kashigi did not waste the momentary opening, grasping out with his now bare right arm to snatch his fingers around Hitomi’s throat, using his superior size and weight to drive her to the ground.

With Hitomi momentarily pinned, Kashigi raised his left arm. His remaining sleeve split apart as, beneath it, a second blob of silvery liquid metal revealed itself. Like the first, it shaped itself into a thin spike that spouted forth over the knuckles of his left hand, his arm reaching back to deliver what would almost certainly be a killing blow to the prone Shinigami. However, the other half of his weapon had not yet descended to cover his right arm, leaving the limb exposed as Hitomi, with a desperate cry, raised her knee sharply against the elbow of the arm that pinned her in place, bending the limb against the joint with an audible snap of bone.

This time it was Kashigi’s turn to cry out in pain, agony forcing him to abandon his attack as he withdrew, instinctively nursing his rubbery arm as Hitomi scrambled back to her feet. Putting some distance between herself as Kashigi, she raised a hand to her throat – using the other to hold her sword to the fore – wincing as she imagined she would be wearing some bruises for a while.

Kashigi did not take long to recover. Although his breath heaved within his lungs, clearly still in the throws of pain from his shattered limb, his smirk returned – albeit in a strained fashion – as the liquid metal that had still engulfed the right side of his head slid back down over his arm. Hitomi smiled bitterly as she noticed that, once enveloped once more by the metal, his right arm began to move as normal. Broken or not, it was as though the liquid silver supported the muscle where the bone could not; breaking the limb had been a wasted gesture.

Still….she couldn’t pretend it hadn’t been satisfying.

“Y…you’re really something,” Kashigi breathed, his voice somewhat strained by pain, taking advantage of the momentarily lull in their duel to catch his breath. “No wonder you asked which of us was stronger….Yabu would have been boring for you. You would have killed him in seconds. Someone as strong as you….you must live for battle.”

“Sorry to disappoint you,” Hitomi replied, allowing herself a smirk of her own, “but I didn’t pick you because I thought you’d be a challenge….I picked you because I wanted Junshin-kun to fight the weaker of the two of you. He’s strong, but he’s never been in a real fight before…I thought it best not to throw him in at the deep end.”

Kashigi’s lip curled, and he turned his face aside to spit into the side of the road. Despite the lull in the action, he was not quick to recover his breath. Hitomi had not yet begun to exert herself – as even as their fight had looked up until that point, Kashigi was fighting past his limit in order to keep up with her. It was obvious which of them had the advantage. It was a repeat, on a smaller scale, of her battle with Imai Hideki.

“I guess,” she murmured, moving both hands to the hilt of her sword. “That having a fake shikai doesn’t help you much. If the other members of your organisation are anything like you, then I doubt you’re going to cause me much trouble.”

She had expected, and indeed hoped, that her jibe would enrage her opponent into attacking. Even if she had more steam than he did, whatever difference in strength existed between them was negligible. Her victory was far from certain…and, even then, depending on how much Kashigi had left, their battle could still drag on for some time. She could still sense Junshin and his opponent fighting some hundred yards away – although his fight appeared to be a similar stalemate. The expected rage, and thus negligence, did not materialise from her opponent however. Instead, much to her surprise, Kashigi instead grinned – even going so far as to wheeze out a laugh.

“Stupid brat,” he chuckled. “You don’t know anything. There are five members of Kuroken who hold the title of ‘Finger’….and each finger travels with an adjutant to take over their duties should they be killed. Not only are the other Fingers more powerful than me, but so are each of their adjutants. Out of all the members of Kuroken, you and your friend are currently struggling to defeat the two weakest. I don’t mind admitting it…it’s simple fact….every single one of them is much, much stronger than me.”

Hitomi grimaced, having half expected such to be the case. She had entertained a small hope that she had guessed incorrectly – Kashigi’s power alone was close to that of a fourth seat, and the thought of other members of his organisation being even more powerful had seemed unlikely. She felt a sudden chill run up her spine as she couldn’t help but wonder if their weakest member was as strong as a fourth seat…..then how powerful would their strongest be?

“Heh…that’s got you worried,” Kashigi observed. Having recovered somewhat from his broken arm, the warrior shifted into a combat stance. This time, he used both his arms to forge weapons – one taking the form of three pronged fork, perhaps intended to catch her sword, while his right arm resumed the shape of the axe-head it had earlier taken. “Your fear….it has a sweet aroma. A woman’s fear always smells sweeter than a man’s, don’t you think? Would it sweeten the aroma, I wonder, if I were to tell you that there is another member of Kuroken on his way here as we speak?’

“His rank,” a macabre grin very nearly split Kashigi’s face in two, “is third. And his adjutant will be with him.”

Hitomi felt the colour drain from her features, Kashigi’s words hitting her like a cannon ball. As much as she believed she and Junshin could possibly defeat their current opponents, the thought of facing not one but two new opponents, both more powerful than Kashigi himself, was an insurmountable one. Gritting her teeth, she drew in a long, steadying breath.

“In that case, I’m sorry,” she stated, “but I can’t afford to dally around anymore. I’m going to fight seriously, now.”

Kashigi’s smile faltered, his eyebrow rising upon his forehead as though wondering if he had heard Hitomi correctly. He watched, wordlessly, as Hitomi sheathed her sword – slipping the weapon smoothly back into its scabbard, and thrusting the weapon back into her obi. To the warrior, it perhaps looked more like Hitomi was giving up than anything else, though his second eyebrow lifted to join his first as the Shinigami relaxed her shoulders, allowing her arms to hang limply by her side.

“…….What?” Kashigi finally grunted, looking on curiously as Hitomi remained perfectly still. “….Perhaps I misheard you. It almost sounded as though you were claiming you’ve been holding back.”

“You know,” Hitomi uttered in reply, her eyes drifting closed as she began to regulate the steady rhythm of her breathing, flexing her fingers at her side, “in my Inner World, there’s a river….I’ve never been able to cross it, and for a long time I just thought it was there to piss me off. A way for my Zanpakuto to stop me getting too close.’

“I’ve been trying to cross it for some time,” she continued as Kashigi looked on curiously – the latter apparently unaware of the slow build up of air pressure around Hitomi, kicking up the surface layer of dirt beneath her into a thin, barely visible cloud. “I can’t swim across….can’t jump across….so I kept trying to think of new techniques that might help. I have to admit, I rather stumbled into this one. I’ve actually been using it now and then without even knowing it, but I finally learned how to do it at will. I can’t control it too well though, which is why I’d rather not use it….but if there are more like you on the way, then I guess there’s no choice.’

“Get ready, Kashigi Masamura. I’ll only allow you to see this for an instant,” she uttered, her eyes opening once again as her slowly pent up reiatsu suddenly exploded to the surface, Kashigi’s own eyes widening in alarm at the sudden massive increase in the girl’s spiritual pressure. “I call it Shunko.”


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TJzxpmOogqg

As though naming the technique suddenly gave it form, the storm of spiritual pressure that churned around the young woman suddenly took shape. The entirety of her reiatsu shuddered into her limbs, a visible stream of purple, steam like smoke beginning to whisper from her motionless form. The force proved too much for her body to contain, the excess reiatsu tearing free from her body in the form of a tornado like gale that ascended upwards in a near straight line, whipping the length of her crimson hair free of its usual ponytail to flutter wildly around her. With a rending tear, her clothing also felt the effects of the upheaval of reiatsu, the back and shoulders of her baggy kosode simply disintegrating like wet paper, tumbling free to reveal her sleeveless white shitage beneath.

The rising spiritual pressure thundered around her like a tornado, taking its toll upon the paving stones themselves. Save for a perfectly clear circle beneath her feet, the stone surface cracked, and ultimately shattered, fragments of stone hurled upwards as to be sucked up by the swirling melee of reiatsu. Before Kashigi’s horrified gave, the misty smoke that engulfed the Shinigami suddenly erupted into flame – a sheath of purple flame that silhouetted the young woman’s form from head to toe. Hitomi looked on impassively, her eyes devoid of sympathy as her opponent squinted, raising a hand to shield his face from the wash of blistering heat that she knew poured forth from her.

“Farewell,” the word left her lips as a half-uttered whisper, Kashigi’s eyes flaring open in stunned alarm as he realised she spoke not from in front, but from behind him. Even as he came to this realisation, it was already too late – Hitomi had already killed him, his mind and body just hadn’t caught up with her yet.

A massive hole was carved into his torso – a semi-circular gap that stretched from his left armpit to left hip, cutting as deep into his body as his sternum. By the time he realised Hitomi had moved, more than half of the man’s torso was already gone. The bloodless wound was already clauterised – as though sealed shut the instant it was inflicted – but it would not be blood loss that killed him. Minus one lung, his stomach, heart, liver and intestines cleaved cleanly in half down their centre, Kashigi’s eyes rolled lifelessly backwards in his head as he fell to his knees before tilting limply forward to crash to the ground.

Hitomi did not look back. Her attention was already on other things as the hissing purple aura that danced around her body faded once more into smoke – before dying altogether. Turning her gaze in the direction in which she believed Junshin still to be fighting, she immediately set off to join him; however, she managed only a step before a sudden stab of pain forced her to hesitate.

‘Damn it….I still can’t control it outside of my Inner World….I nearly ripped my body apart there. I need to avoid using that in combat until I’ve had a chance to practice it.’

Drawing in a long breath, she fought down the pain that twinged its way up and down her nerves, taking a moment to compose herself. Pain or not, she didn’t have time to stand around – if Kashigi had been telling the truth, then they had to get out of Flotsam as quickly as possible.

“Alright Junshin-kun,” she spoke allowed, forcing her body into a sprint as she left Kashigi’s corpse behind without a backward glance. “I’m coming!”

[Seraphina]

Act XXVIII: Where a Heart has no Place





A rhythmic clack of sandaled feet against ceramic tiles echoed briefly over the rooftops as Junshin and Yabu closed upon one another. Holding one of his kodachi underarm, Junshin hissed out a sharp breath between clenched teeth as he thrust his other weapon – held in his left hand – towards the centre of his opponent’s torso. Yabu, despite his relative bulk, moved with surprising deftness, one foot leaving the ground as he pivoted sharply to one side of the blow, sweeping the dangling chain from the base of his kama into Junshin’s arm.

With a clear jingle, the chain snagged itself around Junshin’s blade, anchoring the weapon in place as, with a triumphant leer, Yabu brought the kama down – blade first, towards the crown of Junshin’s head. The Shinigami quickly brought his other weapon to the fore, bracing the blade against his forearm to bat away the descending kama. However, no sooner had the blow been dealt with than Yabu launched himself skywards once more, his ankles together, his legs bent, aiming both knees towards the centre of Junshin’s chest.

The impact knocked the breath from Junshin, a cry of pain ripping itself from his throat as a strangled gasp. Thrown into his back, he winced as he slid across the surface of the rooftop, the tiles – jagged and broken from their exchange thus far – cutting painfully into his flesh. He quickly rolled to his feet, moving aside just in time as Yabu landed emphatically – all his weight upon his leading foot, crunching through the space that Junshin’s head had momentarily occupied.

Neither hakudo nor Zanjustu had ever been Junshin’s strongpoints. While his spiritual pressure had increased dramatically over the last few days, his actual skill remained mediocre. This placed him at a severe disadvantage against an aggressive, more experienced opponent. However, as much as everything about the fight told him that he should have been getting absolutely pummelled, Junshin was keeping up. As surprising as this was to Junshin, it was even more so to Yabu; the man’s features had shifted through various stages of alarm and rage as he clearly believed that an unseated Shinigami should not have been giving him an easy fight.

Nevertheless, none of his attacks that should have been lethal ever seemed to connect. A bloody rip into the left shoulder of Junshin’s shihakusho left a trail of sticky blood dribbling down the length of his arm, while a shallow cut across his right cheek was already beginning to sting and close under the power of his reiatsu. Yabu, meanwhile, had suffered an injury that left the entire thigh of his right leg soaked in blood – the black cloth of his shozuko slick against his chubby leg. Junshin imagined it had been some time since the man had been in a fight that had drawn out quite so long – the fingers that directed the chain were swollen and bleeding from the continued friction. However, it did nothing to slow his attack as Junshin, rolling dexterously to a standing position, crossed his two blades over each other to sweep both swords forward in a scissor-like motion towards his adversary’s throat, only to find himself once again blocked by the shaft of Yabu’s kama.

With a sharp upward thrust of his arm and the shriek of metal on metal, Yabu pushed all three weapons upwards and outward. His arms thrown side, Junshin uttered an internal curse as he realised his torso was open to attack. Yabu wasted little time, immedietly surging forward to deliver an underarm punch directly into Junshin’s solar plexus. The blow crushed into Junshin’s body, bringing the taste of blood to his mouth as his legs shook – coming close to buckling. Yabu’s lips curved briefly into a sneer of satisfaction…before his eyes widened in alarm when Junshin, with a bellowing roar, snatched out a hand towards the whirling chain – snatching it into his fist alongside his kodachi.

With little in the way of grace, using entirely raw power, Junshin heaved upon the chain – the muscles of his arms burning as he cracked the heavy metal as if it was a whip; the force rippled down the chain like a tidal wave, reaching Yabu with enough momentum to send the man lurching skyward. No sooner was his opponent airborne than Junshin seized the chain in both hands, grunting in exertion as he heaved his hapless opponent up and over his head before jerking sharply upon the chains to bring the man crashing back to the roof with what – to a normal person – should have been terminal velocity.

The roof very nearly buckled beneath the impact, the entire building groaning in protest as Yabu was planted – face first – into the tiles. The surrounding rooftop caved in around him, punching the warrior into a miniature crater as Junshin’s legs finally gave way. Taking a few awkward, staggered steps backwards, the Shinigami finally collapsed onto his back. Every part of his body screamed out in pain, fatigue the likes of which he had never experienced burning like a furnace within his muscles. Was this, he wondered, what battle felt like?

His adversary was in no better condition. Extracting himself from the tiles, Yabu groaned in pain as he rolled onto his back. The entire front of the man’s body was a cross-cross of jagged cuts, oozing crimson liquid as his lips moving wordlessly – muttering to himself in what Junshin could just about hear as his adversary ordering himself not to pass out. The two had battled now for almost ten minutes without pause, every breath searing their lungs as, for a moment, neither man was able to do much more than try and catch his breath.

“Ridiculous,” Yabu finally snorted, the word bringing dark bubbles of blood to his lips that he quickly turned to spit from his mouth. “You……you shouldn’t be this strong….”

“Y…..you’re…..telling me,” Junshins grasped out between breaths, wanting to laugh but imaging the effort would cause him agony. “I’ve only been training a short time….I d…didn’t think it was possible to becoming this much stronger in only t…two days…”

Taking the chance presented to him, Junshin reached out in search of Hitomi. He knew that she could handle herself well, but whatever increment her own strength had grown by during their journey, she had kept it to herself. Yabu was far stronger than either of them had been when they had set out; he couldn’t help but feel concerned if Hitomi was fighting an even stronger opponent. He breathed a sigh of relief, however, when he realised he could still sense her reiatsu – alone, and heading quickly in their direction.

“Looks like…” he paused, swallowing with a grimace as the taste of bile filled his mouth. “..Looks like Seraphina-kun defeated your boss.”

“What!?” Yabu started, lifting his head with an obvious effort as he apparently also reached out in search of his own companion’s reiatsu. Junshin allowed himself a smile of satisfaction as he felt a tremble in the man’s spiritual pressure; for the first time since the fight had began, Yabu was experiencing the same fear he had inflicted upon Dirk. “That’s….not possible…..”

“That’s what you said about me,” Junshin replied, gritting his teeth, pressing the back of his hand against his ribs as he made an effort to push himself to his feet. Although his muscles responded only grudgingly, he was able to complete the slow process of rising to stand once again. The frustrated grunts and half-uttered curses from behind him indicating that Yabu – despite his best efforts – was unable to do the same.

“It looks like you lose,” Junshin wheezed, still finding it hard to breath, but nevertheless feeling a sense of elation as he slipped his kodachi – his hands shaking slightly – back beneath his kosode. Yabu abandoned his efforts to stand, tilting his had upwards to peer at Junshin’s turned back; when the man next spoke, Junshin didn’t need to turn to know that he wore a sneer.

“You’re not going to kill me?” Yabu asked, cold confidence suddenly having returned to his tone.

“….No,” Junshin shook his head, his shoulders stiffening. “I might have killed you during the fight, if I’d had the chance. but I won’t do it now that you’re helpless. You’re defeated…killing you now would be straight up murder.”

Junshin flinched as Yabu’s reply to his mercy was to burst into laughter. As much as doing so probably caused the warrior a great deal of pain, his mirth appeared to be beyond his control. Even as he continued to pump blood from his many wounds, he issued forth a thin, shrill approximation of laughter that sounded – to Junshin – like a poorly tuned violin. Ignoring his defeated opponent, Junshin instead peered into the night in search of Dirk. They had travelled some way across the rooftop, but he could still just about see the child within the darkness, exactly where Hitomi had left him.

“Don’t expect me to thank you,” Yabu finally spoke once his laughter had died, his voice trained from the additional damage his cackling had no doubt inflicted on his body. “You’re a fool, boy….Do you think a single member of Kuroken will show you mercy? You’re in the Outer Rim, boy! Mercy has no place here….the weak have no place here.’

“Do you know why we can’t feel Kashigi’s reiatsu?” the man continued to rave. “It’s because your friend must have killed him. At least one of you knows how things work out here. But I take back what I said about you. You’re not strong…if you don’t even have what it takes to kill, then you don’t belong here. The Outer Rim will swallow someone like you whole.”

A dull scraping sound forced Junshin to look over his shoulder, his eyes widening in disbelief as he observed his opponent struggling to lift his shattered body back to a standing position. The blade of the kama scraped loudly against the tiles, dangling from Yabu’s limp right arm – his fist clutching the chain in a death grip. What truly drew Junshin’s attention, however, was that the man’s trench coat had become entangled with the chain, causing the hemline of the clothing to be pulled high enough that Junshin could finally see what held the chain in place. He had expected to see some kind of contraption attached to the back of Yabu’s clothing. However, the Shinigami felt his stomach lurch as he observed his opponent yank upon the chain – drawing out more and more links of metal through a red, festering hole in the small of his back. The chain seemed to extend from within the man’s body, being yanked through the gangrenous hole as he turned to look over his shoulder at Junshin – flashing a bloody, toothless grin.

“What th…..what the hell has been done to you!?” Junshin stammered, barely above to believe was he was seeing as – his legs unsteady – Yabu lurched around on the spot to face him.

“I’m one of the lucky ones,” Yabu replied, his shoulders heaving with every breath. “We have all sacrificed something...Some of us sacrificed our sanity, others our flesh. A few of us even sacrificed our lives. It told us that it was the only way to break the seal.”

“What are you babbling about?” Junshin took an involuntary step backwards – now that he was aware of the wound’s existence, he also realised he could smell it; a rancid decaying stench that he had, until that moment, ignored. “What seal!?”

“On our zanpakuto,” Yabu wheezed, shaking his fist to jingle the chain for emphasis. “With Its help, we sacrifice something else in exchange for the reiatsu normally required for shikai….Kashigi and I both chose to sacrifice our physical bodies. In exchange for a permanent state of forced shikai, neither one of us can ever separate ourselves form our swords.”

Junshin’s nose wrinkled in distaste, his eyes drifting half closed as he attempted to think of something other than the gaping, disturbing wound. As much as he understood only snatched of what Yabu was saying – and he wasn’t sure what he did understand was even possible, he could understand that a wound the likes of which Yabu bore was not one that could simply be ignored. Junshin could not imagine that the exchange he had made in pursuit of power caused Yabu anything but constant agony. Despite what the man had tried to do to Dirk, Junshin could not help but allow a shred of pity to creep into his heart.

“Can it be undone?” he murmured, a question that elicited a derisive snort from her adversary.

“Feeling sympathy for an enemy?” the warrior grunted. “You are a fool. I told you that you’re too soft to be in the Outer Rim…someone like you, against Kuroken? Pathetic….that girl might as well be out here fighting alone. If you had any worth, then you would have killed me the instant you had the chance.’

“Because I,” he snarled, his left hand taking hold of the chain to yank it through his cupped right hand, drawing the kama back into his waiting grasp, “am going to kill you. If your attacks lack killing intent, then there’s no way you can possibly defeat me. Before you get involved in a fight, you should make sure you’re determined to end it! We’re both soldiers….soldiers exist to kill each other. If you can’t even accept that, then you shouldn’t have taken up that sword.”

Taken aback as his opponent suddenly rearmed himself, Junshin reached for his own weapons once more as Yabu’s toothless mouth parted in a sneer – his lips frothing with blood filled spittle. Panicking as he realised how unprepared he was for the fight to resume, he adjusted his footing for quick movement – intending to dodge Yabu’s attack rather than parry it. Yabu’s body was on the point of collapse; he no longer presented a significant danger provided Junshin kept his head.

However, the attack never came. Both combatants hesitated as a large spiritual pressure loomed up from street level beside them; Junshin had almost forgotten Hitomi’s approach until the redhead leapt up onto the roof to join them. Landing in a crouch, the other Shinigami’s leap from street to roof saw her find her footing half way between the two, her purple iris moving briefly back and forth between Junshin and Yabu. For a moment, Junshin found himself just as threatened by the young woman’s sudden appearance as Yabu was – she hardly seemed recognisable.

‘She isn’t wounded at all…but what happened to her clothes? And that spiritual pressure…has she been hiding it until now? But she only did Jinzen on the boat. Did she become this much stronger just by trying to contact her zanpakuto?’

“Junshin-kun,” Hitomi murmured, rising to her feet, raising one forearm against her chest to modestly conceal the neckline of her shitage; utterly ignoring Yabu as the latter took a hesitant step backwards – far less eager to fight both Shinigami together than he had been to fight Junshin alone. “We have to move. What’s taking so long, this guy is a wr….”

The redhead paused as she spared Junshin’s opponent a brief glance, arcing an eyebrow as she noticed the plethora of wounds the man bore. Much of his skin was broken and shredded from his impact with the roof – his face and clothes a slick mess of blood, while his lips produced a constant stream of blood coloured forth that dribbled down his chin. It was obvious that it was taking a great deal of willpower simply for the man to remain on his feet.

“…..Holy shit,” she marvelled. “What the hell did you do to him?”

“It….it wasn’t exactly deliberate,” Junshin stammered, wincing as he wondered if Hitomi believed he had intentionally sliced up his adversary like a deranged killed from a bad horror novel. “…Wait….why do we have to move?”

“These guys aren’t alone,” Hitomi advised. “Hurry up and kill this guy. If we had time, I’d like to take him alive and interrogate him….but he’d give away our position the first chance he got. Better to kill him. I’ll get Dirk. We’ll drop him off at his home, but then we have to put as much distance between ourselves and this town as possible.”

“R..right,” Junshin nodded, drawing one of his kodachi, though he felt himself immediately shaken by Hitomi’s casual instruction to kill Yabu. As despicable as the man was, killing him now still felt – to Junshin – like killing him while he was defenceless. If he did attack now, Yabu would have no way whatsoever of stopping him.

Hitomi had already turned her attention towards Dirk – visible some hundred meters away across the roof as a dark shape against the skyline. Rushing past him towards the boy, his companion did not give a backward glance, clearly expecting Junshin to take care of their surviving adversary. With only an empty expanse of rooftop between himself and Yabu, there was no obstacle to stop him.

‘She’s trusting me to take care of a job…Seraphina-kun is actually acknowledging me as a soldier. This is your chance to show her that I can be relied upon. Didn’t I want that? Didn’t I set out wanting to make her acknowledge me as her Nakama?’

Across from him, Yabu had made no move to attack. Instead he was slowly beginning to edge away – his attention initially focused on Hitomi but turning back towards Junshin when the former began to move off. The moment he faced off against Junshin alone, the warrior’s lips curved into a crooked smile.

‘He doesn’t think I’ll do it…He thinks he’s got me figured out. The bastard! After he tried to murder Dirk, and goodness knows what these bastards are doing to all the people they’ve kidnapped. He deserves to die! It’d be justice! It’d be….be…..’

“No,” he spoke aloud, lowering his kodachi to his side, his shoulders slumping. “I….I won’t kill him. Not like this.”

Yabu’s grin widened as, behind Junshin, Hitomi screeched to a halt. Turning to look back in disbelief, Junshin winced as he felt her gaze fall upon him. When she spoke, her felt her displeasure thrust into him like a dagger.

“What the hell are you talking about?” she exclaimed. “We don’t have time for this. There are others like him…stronger ones…on the way right now. We have to get out of here, and we can’t leave behind someone who can tell them where we fled to!”

“I…I know that,” Junshin replied, shutting his eyes tightly, afraid to turn – not wanting to see the expression he imagined Hitomi would be wearing. “I just….can’t kill him. Not like this. He’s defeated and the fight is over…I can’t kill a man when he’s this broken.”

“Fine,” Hitomi muttered, a note of exasperation in her voice as she doubled back, Yabu’s smirk instantly vanishing as the redhead made to pass Junshin by. “I’ll kill him. You get Dirk.”

“No,” Junshin stated emphatically, raising an arm to bar her way, causing the startled young woman to snatch her head backwards to avoid striking his limb. “I’ve decided to spare him…you can’t just go and kill him like my decision means nothing. I’m sorry, I….I just don’t think it’s right to kill him like this.”

Out of the corner of his eye, he could just make out Hitomi’s features – she regarded him with an expression of wide eyed disbelief. However, her expression quickly changed to a scowl as she swept a hand to sharply knock his arm aside – her other hand reaching around Junshin to grasp the front of his kosode. Junshin flinched as she yanked him sharply around to face her, though he still couldn’t bring himself to look her in the eye.

“You need to wake up,” she growled. “We’re on a battlefield, and these guys are the enemy. Do you think for a second they’d show mercy to you if our roles were reversed? Damn it, I can’t keep babysitting you! I can’t keep holding your hand and teaching you things that you should already know as a Shinigami! We’re soldiers….and you need to man up and realise that killing is part of what we do.”

For the first time, Junshin felt his own temper flaring. Reaching up a hand, he snatched Hitomi’s wrist, the girl’s scowl morphing once again into surprise as he yanked her hand from his clothing, his other hand reaching out to grasp the front of her own clothing. He realised immediately that it was perhaps not the wisest course of action – he felt quite certain he saw a momentary hint of panicked fear behind the girl’s eyes as he grasped the front of her shitage into his fist to yank her closer.

“Bullshit!” he bellowed, speaking with conviction that he didn’t know he had. “I didn’t become a Shinigami to kill people….I became a Shinigami to save people! To protect this world, and the world of the living! That’s our purpose. Maybe along the way I’ll have to kill someone…but if I do, I’ll do it in combat. Killing this guy would be a glorified execution. Killing people isn’t what we do, it’s what they do….and somewhere along the way, I think it turned into what you do.”

Junshin knew he was going too far. A small voice in the back of his head told him that Hitomi was right – that circumstances demanded a more ruthless attitude than the one he was prepared to extend to his opponents. However, as much as he knew that….it wasn’t who he was. He had never killed anyone in his life and, unlike Hitomi, he was not so quick to regard killing his adversary as necessary for victory. Hitomi meanwhile, although she had initially stared at him in alarm, narrowed her eyes in sudden ferocious anger.

“Get your hands off me,” she murmured, her voice dangerously edged. “Before I….”

“Before you what?” Junshin shouted, surprising himself as much as he did Hitomi. “Kill me? Is that just how we’re supposed to solve our problems now?”

“No,” Hitomi snapped back, after recovering from her initial surprise as Junshin’s ferocious reply. As the exchange continued, their voices grew louder – causing more of a stir in the surrounding town that their respect battles had. The sound of angry dogs barking in nearby streets was now clearly audible, while in some places the lights of houses could be seen twinkling to life as their occupants were roused by the commotion. “But I’ll sure as hell kick your ass! I can’t believe I thought you might actually have potential. You’re nothing but a damn child! I’ve been through things you wouldn’t believe. You’re just a damn rookie who doesn’t have a clue what he’s….”

“Stop acting like you’re some sort of tragic heroine,” Junshin snapped back, cutting her off. “You’ve been through hardships, fine. Maybe the world isn’t as bright a place as I think…but I know it can’t be as dark a place as you think! If you think the world is so god damn dark, and full of death, then why the hell are you letting it drag you down with it instead of trying to make it better!? ‘The world is ruthless and cruel, so I should be the same’? Is that your answer? And because I have a different answer it means I’m useless and lack potential?”

Junshin drew in a long breath at the termination of his last sentence, his shoulders heaving as he realised he had come close to shouting himself hoarse. It was only once the words were spoken that he realised he had been thinking them – he perhaps had been thinking them for some time. Ever since setting out, he had wanted Hitomi to acknowledge him – to help him feel like a Shinigami. However, every step of the way he had simply been following in her wake as she dictated the journey. Hitomi didn’t see him as an equal – even her training had probably only been given because she wanted to make him less of a burden. Not once had his opinion been sought on any course of action they had taken…she had simply assumed that her way was the correct one. On this matter, however, he would put his foot down.

His fight with Yabu had proven to him that he wasn’t just some weakling along for the ride….from here on out, he wouldn’t be just a passenger.

“We’re supposed to be comrades,” he murmured, lowering his voice. His anger was spent – the pent up emotions he had never realised were building up within him expelled, he proceeded in a more gentle tone. The sudden change robbed some of the rage from Hitomi’s features, her bow-shaped lips parting as though to issue a reply that she quickly bit back. “I just….I just want you to give a damn what I think. I want to believe that, if not in strength, we’re at least equals as Shinigami. This isn’t just your mission. It’s ours.”

Hitomi didn’t reply, regarding him silently for several long seconds. She certainly wasn’t happy – and Junshin imagined that she was internally fuming. However, she closed her eyes – her scowl softening as she heaved a long sigh before abruptly raising an arm to point towards Yabu. The latter, who had been watching the exchange in silence – perhaps hoping the Shinigami would forget he was there if he was still and silent enough – jumped as she suddenly aimed her digit in his direction.

“Get lost,” Hitomi grunted without looking directly at him. “Never come before me again.”

The fat man raised an arm to wipe away the froth from the corner of his mouth, slobbering over the back of his hand before his face was split by a fresh grin – apparently finding the entire scenario thoroughly amusing. Junshin sighed and relief, offering Hitomi a weary nod.

“Thank you,” he uttered.

“Whatever,” Hitomi grunted in reply, still appearing far from happy at the outcome. “But we have to get moving, right now. We’ve wasted enough time. For all we know….”

“Too late,” Yabu cooed, both Shinigami turning towards the man in alarm as he suddenly spoke. The thug’s grin had not faded, but he was no longer looking at the Shinigami – his gaze was rather directed between them, looking at something that lay beyond. His warning – or perhaps it would be more accurate to call it a threat – came only seconds before both Shinigami became aware of another presence upon the rooftop; this one in the form of a crushing tidal wave of spiritual pressure.

Junshin felt his knees very nearly buckle, staggering awkwardly in a lurching sideways step as he felt as though he had been punched inside his head. His vision blurring as every organ in his body felt as though it was being suddenly compressed, his lungs and throat constricting as he struggled to draw in breath. The sensation was impossible to describe – as though someone had placed an enormous boulder across his shoulders, the very density of the spiritrons within the air twisting and trembling in the vortex of raw power that swept forth from behind them.

Hitomi fared better. Although the colour drained visibly from her features, the girl was able to turn to face the new threat – though her movements were stiff and exaggerated, her limbs moving as though having to be dragged through quicksand rather than empty air. Whatever she saw brought another scowl to her features as, ahead of him, Yabu took several quick backward steps to avoid being caught within the swelling spiritual pressure himself.

“S…Seraphina-kun…” Junshin managed through to clenched teeth, watching as enormous droplets of sweat cascaded from his forehead to plummet to the rooftop beneath his feet. “What….what is it…?”

“Exactly what I was afraid of,” Hitomi replied – her voice also taut, as though struggling to draw breath into her lungs. “See if you can turn around….very slowly.”

Gritting his teeth, doubting that his muscles were in any fit state to cooperate, Junshin made an attempt to comply. Craning his neck – his feet utterly rooted to the spot, preventing him from turning – he was able to look over his shoulder at the source of the overwhelming reiatsu. Through the darkness, perched upon the rooftops further down the street, he could vaguely see two figures. They were both some distance away – at least five hundred meters, visible only as silhouettes against the dark blue night sky.

One of the two looked to be roughly the same size as Junshin himself – the other, however, stood significantly taller. The larger of the two was at least seven feet tall, the figure’s broad shadow at least three feet across as the shoulders. vThey appeared to simply be watching, likely having only just arrived – it was likely that the pair, whoever they were, were still in the process of taking stock of the situation.

“There’s so much spiritual pressure coming from them that it’s hard to tell one from the other,” Hitomi murmured, the corners of her mouth rising into a mirthless smile. “But one of them is roughly on the level of a Vice-Captain…”

‘No way….’

Junshin had never met one of the commanding officers of the Gotei Thirteen – the Captains and Vice Captains, who commanded the military wing of the Soul Society. No more than thirteen of each existed at any one time - when the Gotei Thirteen was at full stength - and stories about their strength was one part fact and three parts legend. Junshin had no way of knowing whether or not Hitomi’s estimate was accurate, having no frame of reference…but he could say, without doubt, that the reiatsu he currently felt was more powerful than himself, Yabu and Kashigi combined.

“And the other?” he queried, almost not wanting to hear an answer. Hitomi, equally, hesitated before providing it. The young woman swallowed hard, her gaze flickering briefly from the two figures back to Junshin – the latter feeling a note of panic take root within him as he saw absolute terror reflected in the young woman’s eyes.

“…..We’d better run,” she simply replied. “We have absolutely no chance of victory here.”

- - - Updated - - -


Act XXIX: Lifting the Veil




‘This shouldn’t be possible….’

Six years ago, when Hitomi had fought Imai Hideki, a part of her had thought it odd that a Captain level adversary could simply ‘appear’, without the Central Government being aware of his existence. Only a handful of Shinigami from each generation ever reached the level of a single digit seat, let alone the elite members that ranked among their most powerful; the third seats and, beyond them, the Vice-Captains and Captains. The Rukongai was so incredibly vast that it was possible for anomalies to exist without discovery…but, at best, she would expect such rogue souls – even the most powerful of them – to max out at the level of Kashigi.

Generally speaking, a soul’s maximum potential was set at birth. Some souls were capable of becoming exceptionally strong, others just barely scraping the power of an average Shinigami. Regardless of how hard a Soul trained, or what techniques they mastered, it was impossible for a Soul to go beyond its limit….and the number of Souls born with Vice-Captain or Captain level potential was dwindling small. The only way so many powerful souls could have been gathered together into a single group is if they had intentionally been sought out.

Someone must had scowered the length and breadth of the Rukongai in search of those few freaks of nature – the tiny number of absurdly powerful people who, by all rights, should not have existed outside the Gotei Thirteen. Such a task must have been monumental; what kind of rescources would have been required to fund such a search, let alone produce the manpower to carry it out?

‘Just what the hell is Kuroken…Damnit, I wish we could take a prisoner. All this encounter has done is give us more question. But right now we need to get out of here….If we can get out of here.’

“Can you move?” she asked of Junshin, noting that her companion had been more profoundly effected by their new adversary’s spiritual pressure than she had been. His spiritual pressure was only about two thirds the size of her own – yet even she doubted she would be able to move in a hurry.

“Maybe,” came his rather strained reply. “If I can get out of the range of their reiatsu, then….but what about Dirk?”

“Maybe we can get them to chase us,” Hitomi murmured, grinding her teeth as she glanced in the direction of the boy; the youth lay on an almost direct line between the Shinigami and the two distant figures. “It’s us they’re here f….”

“Oh, don’t think you can just run off,” Yabu crooned from behind them, causing Hitomi to flinch. “If you run, then I’ll kill that boy…Shimazu-sama might be cross if I make him chase you.”

‘Damn it. I knew we should have killed that guy….’

“You bastard!” Junshin snarled through clenched teeth. “I spared your life! Don’t you have any sense of….”

“No,” the man replied. Even without turning, Hitomi could tell that the man wore a sneer. “Maybe you’ll learn one day, Boy, that the only thing that matters in a fight is who lives and who dies. In a life or death struggle, victory justifies any means. Honour is for the heroes in story books…and I’d rather be a living bastard than a dead hero.”

“Junshin,” Hitomi muttered, attempting to regain her companion’s attention. “Ignore him…he can’t do anything right now, in any case. If he takes more than a couple of steps forward, this spiritual pressure will probably break every bone in his body. Those two haven’t moved yet….they might still be trying to decide what’s going on. I’ll try and draw their attention away…you see if you can get to Dirk.”

“….Alright,” Junshin nodded, turning his head to look at her directly. The young man’s expression showed concern, but he didn’t voice it. “How much time can you give me?”

“I’ll probably only be able to outrun them for a few seconds,” Hitomi replied. “Then I’ll have to try and lose them…If they catch up to me, I’m dead.”

“Understood,” Junshin replied, though Hitomi couldn’t say he sounded altogether happy with the idea. However, it remained the only option she could think of. The two men – for form the shape of their silhouettes she imagined the pair were men – were still almost five hundred meters away. If she moved sideways, she could possibly give herself a few more seconds.

“Okay,” she murmured, reaching towards the hilt of her sword, easing the weapon slowly from its sheath – she doubted the weapon would be much help to her, but at least drawing the sword might make her look the more obvious threat to the pair. “I’m going to move on three. One….two…”

A dull ‘whump’ of rushing air was the only sound that proceeded the enormous, heavy hand that suddenly thudded into the pommel of her sword. A palm larger than Hitomi’s head pressed down upon the hilt, preventing Hitomi from drawing it further than an inch from the scabbard. Her entire body freezing on the spot, Hitomi’s heart felt very much as though it had stopped altogether, her gaze still fixed ahead as she realised that one of the two figures – both of whom she had not taken her eyes from for a moment – was no longer there.

‘That….that was five hundred meters….That’s….they can’t be that fast! There’s no way!’

A tremble of fear shuddered through her body – a cold shiver of terror crashing through her determination as her gaze dropped to the massive arm that held her weapon in place. Feeling a cold sweat glistening upon her forehead, her disbelieving eyes followed the hand into an arm that was thick around as her torso into a broad, muscular shoulder that loomed over Hitomi – seven feet from the rooftop upon which they both stood.

The man was not simply colossal, but slightly misshapen. His arms were slightly longer than they should have been when compared to the proportions of his body, while his shoulders rose higher than the norm – the muscles essentially merging into those of his thick neck to render the latter almost invisible; his head simply seeming to sit between his enormous, three foot wide shoulders. Like Kashigi and Yabu, the man wore a black shozoko, stretched taut across the thick slabs of muscle that encased much of his body, but he lacked the beige trench coat – most likely because it was unlikely such a garment could have been found to fit him.

This man was entirely bald, with wide, flat features that were somehow reminiscent of a bulldog. Despite all appearances, the brown eyes that peered down at Hitomi were bright and clear, regarding her with a keen, appraising intelligence as Hitomi remained utterly frozen before him. She was dimly aware that the crushing spiritual pressure had lessened somewhat – perhaps to avoid inflicting injury on Yabu, who remained close by. However, making eye contact alone was sufficient to hold Hitomi on the spot; the man’s sheer presence was utterly overwhelming. Beside her, she was dimly aware of Junshin collapsing onto his hands and knees, the proximity finally proving too much for him.

“You should not draw your sword, Little Girl,” the enormous man rumbled, his voice echoing from deep within his chest, “unless you intend to use it.”

‘This….this guy’s the real deal…Compared to him, I’m like a baby! There’s no way….there’s no way I can fight this guy! I’m gonna die! We’re both gonna fucking die!’

Hitomi’s entire body trembled, thick droplets of sweat cascading down her features as the seed of terror continued to grow within her. She no longer had anywhere to run, anywhere to hide….even if she could force herself to move, the giant’s speed was absurd. The only way he could have moved to quickly was if he had used shunpo….and Hitomi had been utterly unable to duplicate that technique since her battle with Hideki.

“Are you alright, Yabu-san? Where is Kashigi-san?” the large man queried, breaking eye contact to look in the direction of the thoroughly beaten thug behind her. As the man’s gaze left her, Hitomi instantly slumped to her knees, her legs giving way as she was able to do little more than stare blankly ahead. She could feel a warm wetness on the corner of her mouth, and realised that she had bitten down – hard – upen her lip, enough to draw blood. She somehow knew that she would never rise to her feet again…she could no longer move.

“I am fine, Kejii-sama,” Yabu drawled in reply, sounding rather pleased with himself. “But I am afraid Kashigi-san is dead….This girl killed him.”

“Hmph…that damnable cretin,” Hitomi jumped as a third voice joined the conversation. “He was far too proud of that new zanpakuto of his…I always told him to keep up the training on his basics.”

Although she could no longer raise her head, Hitomi was able to swivel her eyes within their sockets to look up as she realised the second of the two new arrivals had advanced across the rooftops to join them. Although the man had almost certainly used shunpo to reach them so quickly, she did not detect and reiatsu from him…however, she was quite certain that the vast majority of the spiritual pressure she had felt before had been from him, rather than his larger companion.

‘He’s supressing his reiatsu down to almost nothing….his bleedout is practically nil. Damn it…both of these guys are ridiculously strong!’

The second of the two men was significantly smaller than the first - although he still stood at some six feet in height. Like those members of Kuroken she had encountered thus far, he wore the typical beige trench coat over his shozuko; although unlike the others, he simply walked with the garment drapped across his shoulders like a cloak, the sleeves dangling empty by his sides. Beneath the sable cloth of his shozuko, obvious even under the long coat that hung from his shoulders, he was well built and powerful. His muscular frame seemed somewhat at odds with his face, for the man was clearly of advanced years.

The man’s silver hair was clipped short, while his wrinkled, weather beaten face - his skin baked to a crisp brown by years of exposure to the blistering Rukongai sun - glared down stoically at Hitomi through a single piercing blue eye, the other concealed behind an eye patch that appeared to be made from a scrap of black iron, secured around his head by a thin leather strap. He was clean shaven, with a slightly hooked nose and features that had sunken slightly with age, he nevertheless stood straight backed and motionless upon the rooftop, showing no indication of the age that his features betrayed.

As he peered at Hitomi, the man’s right arm slipped out from within the coat, raising a burning cigar to his mouth. Clenching the cigar between his teeth, the man inhaled and exhaled a brief puff of grey smoke. His voice was hoarse and gravely – a combination perhaps of both age and his smoking habit – as he frowned at the two Shinigami.

“They’re just kids,” he remarked, speaking through one corner of his mouth, clenching the other side of his mouth around the cigar to hold it in place. “I thought they’d be older….”

“Do not let their age fool you, Shimazu-sama,” Yabu leapt to point out, his voice taking on a simpering, toadying undertone. “They are both most dangerous….You should kill them, at once.”

“Do not give Shimazu-sama orders,” the enormous man growled, his eyes narrowing upon Yabu, who remained outside of Hitomi’s line of sight. “You should instead be begging for your life! You have caused chaos in this town, you have risked exposing us, and you have allowed a the Fifth Finger to be killed. You are a disgrace!”

“Enough, Keiji-san,” the man called Shimazu grunted, immedietly curbing the giant’s rage. “He’s unfortunately right….we do have to kill them.”

“D….Dirk…” Junshin suddenly croaked out, having been pushed down onto his hands and knees by the combined reitsu of the two men, he struggled to lift his head, his eyes screwed tightly shut as the word obviously caused him pain. “Don’t…..please….don’t kill….”

“Hrm?” The older man grunted, reaching up a hand once more to briefly remove his cigar from his mouth, flicking it to remove the excess ash from the tip, before placing it back between his teeth. “What is is, boy? I’ll allow you some last words.”

Hitomi glanced beyond the two men into the darkness across the rooftop. Although she could no longer see Dirk, she had no doubt he was still here…and no doubt Yabu remembered also. Something about two new pair seemed different from Kashigi and Yabu; it was perhaps a gamble, but one that she had no choice but to desperately make.

“There….there is a child behind you,” she murmured, having to draw in a deep gulp of air to find her voice between words. Junshin himself had already slumped face first to the tiles, apparently having used all his strength to speak those few words. “He has nothing to do with any of this….Please….spare him.”

“Oh?” Shimazu arched an eyebrow, glancing over his shoulder into the darkness. The old man hesitated a moment, likely noticing Dirk for the first time. Hitomi held her breath, wondering if she had perhaps doomed the boy now that she had drawn attention to him. “Yabu-san, who is he?”

“Just some local brat,” Yabu replied. “I was going to get back to him once these two were dealt with.”

“Is that so?” Shimazu muttered, turning back to face Hitomi. The man continued to chew his cigar thoughtfully, his single blue eye fixed upon the young woman in silent consideration. “Very well…we will leave him be. I give you my word on that.”

“B…but Shimazu-sama,” Yabu protested. “My…my injuries! Kashigi-san’s death! I demand satisfaction!”

“Be quiet, you wretch,” it was the giant – Keiji – who rumbled out a reply. “We are not Toda and Sasaki…Killing children? Tch…You have no pride.”

Yabu appeared suitably cowed, for he did not issue a reply. Despite knowing nothing about the two newcomers, Hitomi felt a small measure of relief as she found herself believing them; the giant’s disgust at the notion of killing Dirk was obvious, while the older man did not have the look of a person prone to mincing words. It may not have saved either herself or Junshin….but at least she may yet have saved Dirk.

“….Thank you,” she murmured, lowering her head as she began to feel the last of her strength ebb away. Her reiatsu had been waging a near constant battle to keep her body from total collapse, rendering her in the same position as Junshin. However, she was very nearly spent; the end was coming one way or another, whether her adversaries cut her down or not. As though in echo of her thoughts, Keiji slowly reached behind his back, grasping something previously hidden from Hitomi’s sight.

With a dry, slithering sound against its leather sheath, the giant drew forth a long, straight bladed ninja-to. Although little more than a short-sword in the hands of the giant, the weapon was still at least as large as Hitomi’s zanpakuto. Holding the weapon underarm, he cast a backward glance as Shimazu, who simply gave a brisk nod.

“I am Keiji Maeda,” the giant murmured, raising his weapon overhead in a single enormous hand as Hitomi realised that he was delivering the last courtesy. “Take my name with you into the next life.”

Hitomi felt her vision begin to dim – she doubted the sword would be needed to finish her off at this stage. Knowing that Dirk would survive was only a small comfort. She wasn’t ready to die yet…she still felt as though she had left a great deal unfinished. She still had a mission to complete….she still had stories of her adventures to tell Yukimura and Shingen….and Shadrin…

‘I’m sorry, Shadrin-kun…I wanted…I really wanted you to see more of me in my shihakusho.'

She felt the sword descending – a soft swish of parting air heralding her execution as the blade sliced down towards her lowered head. Her eyes closed tightly, she was nevertheless unable to prevent a single tear of frustration budding within the corner of her eye, rolling its way down her cheek.

“Do not cry, Seraphina-dono. You are a little old for it, no?”


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oQVHn1zipC8

Hitomi’s eyes flashed open, drawing in a deep gulp of air as the crushing sensation of Keiji’s spiritual pressure was suddenly lifted from her. As though a wall had been thrown up between herself and the mountainous warrior, she suddenly found herself able to lift her head – her muscles aching but cooperating as she looked up to discover the reason why she was not dead.

A rippling wave of white cloth momentarily shrouded her vision, preventing Hitomi from immediately recognising what she was seeing. However, as the cloth settled – having been whipped into a fury by the rapid movement of its wearer – Hitomi realised the cloth was a long white dress. More remarkably, she realised it was one she recognised as she lifted her head higher, squinting as she wondered for a moment if she was hallucinating. That seemed, indeed, to be the only plausible explanation for who their rescuer was.

“Sato….Hisayo….?” she murmured, blinking as she beheld the tiny, fragile looking woman standing between her and the sword wielding giant.

She was turned side on to Hitomi – though her head was turned towards Keiji. Her black hair rippled lightly in the wind, shimmering in the starlight as – with a single, slender arm – she had apparently reached up to snatch the giant’s weapon in mid descent. Catching the edge of the sword upon her open palm, the young woman held the blade motionless in her grip, permitting it to neither advance of retreat as Keiji – his eyes bulging in his head, appeared just as surprised to see her as Hitomi was.

Beneath her other arm, Hisayo carried a rather limp looking Dirk; the boy had likely passed out the moment he fell within the radius of the two enormous spiritual pressures of Keiji and Shimazu, but the rise and fall of his shoulders indicated that he was at least alive. However, Hitomi still found herself struggling to piece together exactly what she was seeing as the tiny woman – weighing one hundred pounds at most – casually pushed back upon the blade held within her hands, throwing the colossal Keiji in an awkward backwards stagger.

“Hisayo-san,” Hitomi whispered, finding her throat too dry to speak at any louder a volume. “How did….what are….?”

“Hush, Seraphina-dono,” the girl replied over her shoulder, not turning towards the Shinigami. “I will explain later.”

“So,” it was Shimazu who spoke, drawing Hitomi attention towards the man. Unlike Keiji, he did not wear his surprised so openly. However, Hitomi noted that the soldier’s weight have shifted slightly to assume a more ready stance. “This is where you’ve been hiding? Tachibana-sama has been looking for you, you know.”

“I wasn’t hiding,” Hisayo replied with a shrug, her voice actually carrying a note of levity. “I was merely exercising my hobby. There are many interesting ruins in this locality. You can forgive my curiosity, no?”

“I see,” Shizuma muttered around his cigar, his single eye not leaving Hisayo for a moment. “…That doesn’t explain why you’re standing between us and these Shinigami.”

Hitomi’s head was beginning to throb, head gaze snapping back and forth between the conversing pair. Was Hisayo one of them? They certainly knew each other…but if so, why had she rescued them? And more than that, how in the hell had she concealed the fact that she was so immensely powerful? Hitomi felt a cold shudder run up and down her spine as she turned her gaze towards Keiji – the man regarding Hisayo with a look of undisguised terror.

‘He’s afraid…..Afraid for his life. Someone that monstrously strong…?’

“These children are of interest to me,” Hisayo replied. “They’re both very pretty, no? I may take them home with me when this business is concluded….They can be my new pets.”

Shimazu’s nose wrinkled in distaste, his eye flickering – if only briefly – from Hisayo to Hitomi. Although the Shinigami could not be certain, she thought she saw a flash of something unexpected within the pale blue eye of the soldier: pity.

“And if I do not accept this explanation?” he murmured, pursing his lips to spit out the almost entirerly spent cigar – which all but disintegrated as it skipped across the surface of the roof.

“Ah,” Hisayo replied – though she remained facing away from Hitomi, the note in her voice suggested that the young woman was smiling. “In that scenario, then things will become most…..uncivil.”

Shimazu’s eyebrow lifted slightly higher upon his forehead, but he gave no immediate response. The leader of the trio appeared to silently weight his options – perhaps trying to decide whether or not he could believe a word Hisayo was saying, or perhaps seizing her up for a fight. Either way, the silence stretched from second into what was nearly a full minutes before, at last, it was the old man’s enormous subordinate that broke the stalemate.

“Orders, Shimazu-sama?” Keiji murmured. Although he was still visibly terrified of the young woman, he appeared ready to fight if his commander ordered it. Shimazu, for his part, regarded Hisayo a moment longer, before shaking his head.

“I suppose we have no choice,” he grunted. “We will retire for now. Our orders were to verify the presence of Shinigami in the Rukongai. We’ve done that. If you intend to take responsibility for them, then….I do not have the authority to argue.”

“I am glad we have an agreement,” Hisayo replied, turning away from the pair without another glance. Behind her, Shimazu lifted a hand to gesture for Keiji and Yabu to follow, before turning away himself. In a sudden flash of shyumpo, both Shizuma and Keiji disappeared, leaving Yabo to hop down to street level to limp after them at a much slower pace – casting a final, venomous glance at the two Shinigami.

Kneeling before Hitomi, Hisayo offered a gentle smile of reassurance as she looked over the girl’s wounds, clicking her tongue quietly in disapproval. Hitomi, still reeling from what she had just witnessed, took a moment to piece her thoughts together.

“H…Hisayo-san!" she suddenly exclaimed upon finding her voice. “What just happened!? You made those guys retreat…Just….just who are you!?”

“Hush,” Hisayo repeated, raising her free hand against Hitomi’s forehead, palm first. The girl’s palm felt impossibly cool against Hitomi’s skin – which she realised for the first time was feverishly hot. “That technique you used has done a great deal of damage to your body….I’m amazed you’re holding together as well as you are. Moving will be painful for you.’

“It is probably best,” the young woman tilted her head slightly to one side, smiling in perfect, innocent sweetness. “If you slept for now.”

Hitomi immediately opened her mouth to object. However, it was an objection that would never be given voice. Hisayo abruptly dropped her palm across Hitomi’s eyes, plunging her world into immediate darkness and, before Hitomi was even aware what had been done to her, causing the Shinigami to slip almost instantly into warm, comforting oblivion.

[Seraphina]

Act XXX: The Tangled Web We Weave




Hitomi awoke to a pounding headache; the pain such that she almost immediately wished she was still unconscious. Her senses swirling through a colourful blur of sight and noise, it took several seconds for her to piece together her fractured surroundings into some semblance of order. She realised immediately that she was not still on the rooftop; rather she lay on her back on something warm and soft. A mattress, she imagined. Above her, the shapeless blur was beginning to gain shape and definition as she realised she lay beneath a wooden roof, the dim, adulating lighting indicating flame rather than natural light.

Gritting her teeth – her body aching from head to toe – she forced herself into a seated position. The blanket that had been slung across her fell away, and she noted that someone had changed her clothes. She appeared to be clad in a long gown similar to the dress worn by Hisayo; white with red lace along the hemline. The neckline was rather lower than she would normally have worn, but her torso was heavily bandaged beneath the garment. In fact, as she examined herself more closely, she saw that her arms had received similar treatment – her bicep and forearms separately bound in similar bandages.

“That technique of yours is very dangerous,” the sudden sound of a voice caused Hitomi to jump, having been so absorbed in her self-diagnosis that she had been unaware of another occupant in the room. “You might have the power required to use it….but your body isn’t used to the strain. I would not make use of it….at least until you’ve learned to handle it, no?”

Sato Hisayo was virtually invisible on the far side of the room. In the dimly candle light – for the only source of light was a gently waving flame upon a low nightstand beside Hitomi’s bed – Hitomi quickly understood why she had failed to notice the girl’s presence. Hisayo had apparently discarded the white dress she had worn until now and was in the finishing stages of garbing herself in a black shozoko similar to those worn by the members of Kuroken. The young woman was in the process of sweeping her hair out of the clothing’s neck to let it hang free – have apparently only just tugged on the black, sleeveless tunic as Hitomi was waking.

“The thought had occurred to me,” Hitomi replied, her gaze flickering to the foot of the bed, where her zanpakuto had been laid atop the sheets. She resisted the urge to reach for the weapon; although she had every reason not to trust Hisayo, at the very least she appeared to have treated Hitomi’s injuries…it would make little sense to do so if she intended her harm. “Where’s Junshin-kun?”

Tugging a pair of cloth gauntlet’s that covered her hands and forearms – her fingers left bare to poke through the cloth, Hisayo did not give an immediate answer. However, just as Hitomi was on the point of demanding a response, the raven haired woman turned towards the doorway to the dimly lit room, sweeping back the thick curtain that lay across the opening. Looking rather sheepish, Junshin made his way cautiously inside, plucking awkwardly at the bandages that were wrapped around his own hands.

“H….hey, Seraphina-kun,” he murmured, his eyes on the floor. “I’m glad you’re okay.”

Hitomi exhaled in relief to see that her companion looked none the worse for wear. He did, however, look rather more sheepish than he had on the rooftop. The fiery temper he had discovered appeared to have retreated; likely he realised that the delay he had created with his objection to killing Yabu had very nearly cost them their lives. Hitomi, however, was in no mood to admonish him. Instead, she turned her attention immediately back to Hisayo.

“I believe,” she murmured, “you have some explaining to do.”

“Is that so?” Hisayo replied, having immediately returned to preparing her clothing, tightening the black thread that held her gauntlets in place. “What would you have me say? That I have deceived you? That’s certainly true…but I make no apologies for it. This is not exactly how I intended things to be…but what’s done is done.”

“And…um….what exactly is done?” Junshin queried, looking back and forth between the two women uncertainly.

“What is done, Kiyoko-dono, is that you and your companion have encountered Kuroken and very nearly gotten yourselves killed,” Hisayo sighed, a note of exasperation evident in her voice. “You have also forced me to show my hand to them….keeping you alive will leave me with difficult questions to answer. I had hoped the pair of you would be able to leave Flotsam without causing trouble. But trouble seems to flock to you, no?”

“I’m not sure I follow,” Hitomi confessed, throwing back the blanket to swing her legs to the floor. Placing her bare feet against the wooden floorboards, she made an attempt to rise. However, the strength to do so did not come immediately, as she was forced to simply perch on the edge of the bed. “You had best begin by telling us exactly who you are, and what your relationship is to these people.”

“I would imagine that is obvious no?” Hisayo replied nonchalantly. “I am a member of Kuroken….I suppose former member might be more accurate, even though I have yet to make my former employers aware of my resignation. I was once the adjutant to the man who held the rank of Second Finger….although now that he’s been sent out here, I suppose he’s promoted himself to First Finger, now that there’s nobody here to keep an eye on him.”

“And you didn’t tell us this because…?” Hitomi queried, eyeing the woman carefully. Hisayo’s response was so flippant that Hitomi could not help but believe it to be true – potentially the first truth that the woman had spoken since their meeting. Her strength was certainly enormous – the woman was powerful enough to force Shimazu to withdraw…she wouldn’t have been out of place in a group like Kuroken.

“Because you weren’t who I was waiting for,” the woman replied with a shrug. “I’d been waiting for a Shinigami presence to arrive…that’s why I came here. I knew the Seireitei would send some kind of investigation eventually….I just didn’t think they would be foolish enough to send two children. Kiyoko-dono tells me that the two of you are fresh recruits, no?”

Hitomi winced, casting a warning glance at Junshin. She saw no reason to surrender any information about themselves whatsoever until she gave them better reason to trust them. Patching up their wounds, as much as it may have indicated she didn’t mean them immediate harm, did not quality.

“I had hoped,” Hisayo continued, “that by showing you the vent, you would realise you were out of your depth and send for reinforcements. I had hoped for a seated officer perhaps…someone I could use, no?”

“Use for what?” Hitomi growled, not liking the sound of the phrase at all. It was with a sense of bitter irony that she recalled the mission had been intended for Shinigami of higher rank that Junshin and herself….had they not pushed for the assignment, then it was likely more powerful Shinigami would have been sent instead.

“What else?” Hisayo responded. “To kill the other members of Kuroken. What did you think I meant?”

Hitomi blinked in surprise, not having quite expected this response. However, it would have been an exaggeration to call it a shock….from what she had seen, the group did not seem entirely cohesive. If it was simply an alliance of powerful individuals, drawn from all corners of the Rukongai, then their personalities and goals would almost certainly be different. An internal conflict within the group did not seem out of the question.

“But….aren’t they your allies?” Junshin asked – her counterpart rather more incredulous than Hitomi. “Why would you help us kill your friends? Aren’t they Nakama to you?”

“Hmph…of course not,” Hisayo replied. “They are barely allies to each other. What keeps them in line is a desire for power…or a sense of misguided duty…I have simply decided that the requirements to achieve that power are a higher price than I am willing to pay. You saw Yabu’s weapon, and the price he paid, no?”

Junshin grimaced, turning away from the young woman as Hitomi finally found the strength to stand. With a grunt, she levered herself to her feet in an unsteady fashion. Her legs trembled slightly, but she was able to remain upright regardless.

“Start at the beginning,” Hitomi demanded. “Tell us everything there is to know about Kuroken.”

“Very well, but you may prefer to sit,” Hisayo replied. “It’s a rather complicated story.”

Hitomi hesitated a moment, feeling rather awkward sitting down after making such an effort to stand. However, with a grudging nod she lowered herself back to sit on the edge of the bed, waving for Junshin to do the same. As the two Shinigami sat, Hisayo leant backwards against the wall, crossing her arms.

“Kuroken,” she began, “is the strongest squad in the private army of Tachibana Motonari. It is a name you might have heard before…if either of you were from the Eastern Rukongai, then I guarantee you would have. Motonari-sama is the current head of the Tachibana house, one of the two ruling families of the East Rukongai. His lands are utterly vast – almost a full third of the East Rukongai is his property. With such wealth he is, arguably, the most powerful independent party in the Soul Society.”

Hitomi had heard of the Tachibana house during her education on the Soul Society – ingesting the name as he had so much other information during the year long period that Shadrin had tried to prepare her for life in the Seireitei after taking her from the Outer Rim. However, she couldn’t help but feel as though something else about the name tugged at her memory.

“Motonari is what is sometimes called a ‘free power’,” Hisayo continued. “A licensed and documented spiritually aware being, allowed free reign within the Rukongai outside of the jurisdiction of the Gotei Thirteen. He boasts strength that is comparable to one of your Captains….I regret to inform you that this is the man, even if he is not here in person, who commands your enemy. He is a man obsessed with the acquisition of power….and I fear that his search for strength may have delved too deep.’

“Eighteen years ago…I do not know how, or why….he made contact with something,” Hisayo frowned briefly, as though unsure how to properly articulate what she intended to impart. “An entity of some sort…a living relic from the Elder World, lying dormant for untold millennia. He claimed it came to him in his dreams, offering him promises of greater strength than he could imagine in exchange for his help. Help that we was only too glad to give.’

“Through his dreams, the entity told Motonari-sama that it’s physical form lay buried far beneath the Central Fort Six chambers at the heart of the Seireitei. He immediately left his estate in the care of his sons and departed to try and free this creature. He did not speak of how he did it, but he somehow opened a door on this side for a powerful minion of the creature to some to the Soul Society. His attempt failed when he was defeated in the deserts of South Rukongai six years ago by the Shinigami….although they never found out what his actual intention had been.”

Hitomi felt her blood run cold, the breath catching in her lungs as she realised, all too suddenly, the events to which Hisayo was referring. All too suddenly, her memory returned to a moment in time six years previously, when Imai Hideki had offered his true name to her during the throes of battle.




*****



“…..Reihaii-san,” Hideki finally murmured, his words permeated by laboured gasps for air. “Your name was…Hitomi?”

“….Reihaii Hitomi,” Seraphina confirmed, not lowering her guard.

“Hitomi….” Hideki murmured in return, as though silently considering the word. “….Named for the colour of your eyes, perhaps? It is fitting….those eyes serve you very well indeed. Never before have I met an opponent so capable of observing and adapting in the middle of combat. Those eyes of yours…they see possibilities that I admit I would never even have considered.”

Hitomi kept her weapon raised throughout Hideki’s sudden praise. The man’s gaze appeared more thoughtful than anything else - he did not appear as though he were merely trying to force her attention from the battle - but she was not willing to place anything outside the scope of a man who could so brutally betray those who have lived and worked beside for a decade.

“My name is Motonari,” he suddenly spoke again, though he gave no indication if what he offered was his first or surname, or if indeed Hitomi could trust it to be any more real than the assumed name of Imai Hideki.




*****



“Shit!” she found herself exclaiming. “Shit! I don’t believe it!”

Her sudden exclamation drew surprise from both Junshin and Hisayo. The raven haired woman stopped speaking abruptly, snapping her head in Hitomi’s direction with a quirked eyebrow as the Shinigami fought down the urge to be sick. After six years of wondering, the actions of the man named Imai Hideki finally began to make a degree of sense. The source of the funding that had seen the Katsu house rise to prominence…the mysterious, seemingly limitless resources that had been funnelled behind the scenes to remove Shingen’s father from office, to manipulate the Central Government itself….and the eventual goal of Hideki himself in replacing Katsu upon killing him. It was not position he was after…it had merely been access to the Central Forty Six chambers.

“Seraphina-kun?” Junshin queried, looking upon her with concern. “Um….are you alright?”

“I don’t believe it….” Hitomi repeated, resting her elbows on her knees as she lifted her hands to nurse her temples. “After six years, the same things are still following me around.”

Hisayo continued to eye the girl curiously for a moment. However, as though coming to a sudden realisation, the young woman’s eyes flared open wide. Abruptly marching across the length of the room she snatched out a hand to roughly grasp Hitomi’s chin. Forcing Hitomi to lift her head to look at her directly, the Shinigami made an effort to withdraw. However, Hisayo’s terrifying strength held her easily in place, the woman’s eyes examining her carefully, as though only truly looking at her for the first time.

“…..It couldn’t be…” Hisayo murmured. “….What’s your name, girl?”

“I told you already,” Hitomi objected, still trying without success to pull herself away. “It’s Se….”

“Don’t fuck with me,” Hisayo growled, her eyes narrowing to immediately arrest Hitomi in place. The young Shinigami stopped her struggling, feeling as though the woman’s depthless eyes were simply swallowing her up….it was the same overwhelming sensation she had felt upon their first encounter, but this time there was no innocence within the girl’s eyes. They burned with cold authority – looking to Hitomi suddenly more red than maroon – and demanded an immediate answer.

“….R…Reihaii…” she found herself stammering. “Reihaii Hitomi.”

A hint of surprise played across Hisayo’s features; the name clearly meant something to her. If she had been in Imai’s…or perhaps Hitomi should start thinking of him as Tachibana’s….confidence, then it was likely the full story of what had occurred in the South Rukongai had been relayed to her at some point. She would know, more likely than not, the name of the Shinigami who had defeated her master.

“…..I see,” was her only response as she suddenly released her hold on Hitomi, taking a step backwards to look down at the girl in a moment of further appraisal. However, she quickly returned to the spot upon which she had previously been standing. Junshin, not understanding the reason for the sudden exchange, shifted uncomfortably as he was caught between the gazes of the two women.

“Although the Shinigami did not know his intentions,” Hisayo continued, “the Central Government did. They used forbidden kido to transport the creature’s prison away from the Seireitei. Although we did not know it at the time, they location they selected was the wasteland far beyond the outer edge of the West Rukongai….Motonari-sama has been searching for it for the last six years. He mobilised the entire Kuroken save himself and his adjutant – the Arrancar servant of the creature that he brought into this world, which remains with him still.’

“A year ago,” she murmured, “his son, my master, Aoshi Tachibana-sama, the Second Finger, found it. When the Central Government teleported the prison, they also transported the venting system that went with it….the vent you saw is one of ten, designed to disperse the prisoner’s reiatsu and make it harder to discover, as well as preventing it from gaining strength and escaping. Once enough of them had been found, however, they allowed him to guess the approximate location of the prison based on their layout. A minor oversight from the Central Government.”

“So…..wait,” it was Junshin that spoke. “Are you telling me that this….whatever it is….is free!?”

“No,” Hisayo shook her head. “The prison…although I suppose it might be more accurate to call it a tomb…is built entirely from seki-seki rock, and buried more than a kilometre beneath the sand. It was built in the Elder Times to contain this creature, using techniques that are long since lost to us. Although it is possible to enter it from the surface, the seal within proved impossible to break. The creature is conscious within, however…but it speaks only to Aoshi-sama. It has essentially taken up the position of Second Finger, while he has promoted himself to First, believing that the entity will help him assume his father’s place if he frees it. Under its orders, he had been gathering slave labour to excavate the tomb for months, now.”

“That explains the ghost towns,” Hitomi murmured grimly. “Looks like we were right….they were after slave labour. Although damn it, why can’t they be mining gold or diamonds like normal people….They need to be trying to dig up some kind of evil god.”

“But….why?” Junshin shook his head. “Why unearth this prison if the seal can’t be broken?”

“He hasn’t told us,” Hisayo replied. “Maybe he believes the creature may be able to free itself…or perhaps give him the means to free it…once the ruins are completely excavated. All he has told us is that, within the very heart of the tomb, the creature is sealed behind thirteen different instances of the ninety ninth level of Bakudo, the Bankin. That’s what’s holding it in place, along with a forbidden temporal kido that prevents the bakudo from dissolving. The dying acts of those who succeeded in sealing it.”

Hitomi found her head spinning at the thought of such ridiculous power. Suddenly, the reiatsu pouring through the vents seemed not so impossible as she had thought. However, even as she reflected upon the enormity of such a spell, the number of times the spell had been cast suddenly seemed significant.

“You said…..thirteen?” she murmured thoughtfully, turning her dusk coloured gaze in Hisayo’s direction.

“That’s right,” Hisayo nodded. “Perhaps now you understand why I have gone against the orders of my master…power such as that simply cannot be allowed to walk free with impunity. Eons ago, whatever is sealed inside that tomb fought against all Thirteen Captains of the Gotei Thirteen of its time….none of them survived the battle.’

“Just finding a way to seal it away cost them all their lives.”

[Seraphina]

Act XXXI: The Road to Beyond




Junshin watched as the Hell Butterfly arced gracefully into the blue, cloudless sky. Raising a hand to shield his eyes from the blindingly bright morning sun, he smiled tightly as the spectral insect fluttered into the east, making the long journey back towards the Seireitei to carry news of what he and Hitomi had encountered. It was only their second report in as many days, but he imagined their superiors would find it of rather more interest than the first.

For Junshin’s part, he wasn’t even certain how much of it he believed. The entire thing made his head spin; first, he finds himself unable to turn around without bumping into some monstrously powerful enemy or another, then he discovers that Hisayo is not only one of them, but among the most powerful. Then he find out that the group is trying to awake some kind of diabolical creature beyond mortal comprehension, and that his traveling companion – who he had taken to only be slightly above his own level – once defeated a Captain level lunatic when she had only been in the Academy for two weeks.

Without context, the whole thing sounded insane. He had felt almost embarrassed reciting the story to the Hell Butterfly – as much as the insect had merely sat upon his palm throughout, flicking its antennae impassively. To the tiny creature, it was simply another message – of no greater or lesser import than any other it had ever carried. But it would carry word to the Soul Society quickly, and repeat what it had been told word for word; that was the very reason why Hell Butterflies were still so readily is use despite the Twelve Division having long ago developed means of long range, wireless communication; such devices were expensive, and usually only available with requisition orders. For most Shinigami, Hell Butterflies were usually fine.

Leaning forward upon the wooden railing that surrounded the way station – little more than a tall wooden tower, some thirty feet in height, in which Hell Butterflies were nested throughout the year. Crossing his arms, he rested his chin upon his forearms for a few moments – enjoying the quiet that he somehow imaged was simply coming before the storm. He couldn’t help but feel that he was very much in over his head – involved in events that were far larger than he was. It was not the first time he found himself wishing that he had not been so insistent when he had snatched this assignment out of the pile. He really hadn’t known what he was getting himself into.

‘That’s enough Junshin! Maybe you don’t want to be here, but you are here. Sure, it would be nice for a Captain to drop out of the sky and save us, but that’s not going to happen….at least not for several days. Until then, we’ll just have to make do.’

Their own journey through the Outer Rim had been only two days long by virtue of fluke. The Hell Butterfly would almost certainly take a similar length of time to reach the Seireitei – for even a spectral insect could not travel the full way without rest – and from there Junshin could only guess how long it would take a suitable response to be deployed. They report would have to work its way up the chain of command, approvals would have to be sought, and bureaucracy would have to be dealt with. It would not be so simply a matter as the two unranked Shinigami who had wandered off the same day they had received their mission. Still, he trusted that help would be on the way dooner or later; it was as Hisayo’s instance, however, that they not wait for it.

Time, it seemed, was not on their side.



*****



“But I don’t understand,” Hitomi shook her head. “That Shimazu guy even said that he had come there to investigate reports of Shinigami.”

“That is perhaps why he diverted to town,” Hisayo replied, his eyes narrowing thoughtfully – little more than thin sliveres of red illuminated by the flickering candle light. “But he could only have arrived so quickly if he had already been in the locality. The Rukongai is vast, no? I would guess….no….in fact I am certain…that he was coming here to collapse the vents.”

“Huh?” Junshin blinked, sitting up slightly straighter, having been feeling like something of a third wheel in the conversation thus far. “The thing you showed us the other day?”

“Yes,” Hisayo nodded. “Aoshi-sama had always made it known that, when the excavation was nearing completion, the vents would be collapsed in order to funnel spiritual pressure back towards Pinnacle….that’s what he’s named the prison. I can only assume there are failsafe’s in place…perhaps uncovering the ruins completely will allow him to disable them. That’s a guess though….as I said, he told us little of the reasons behind his actions.”

“I see,” Hitomi murmured. “But collapsing that thing….even just getting near it….is Shimazu that powerful?”

“Yes,” Hisayo replied. “Although it will cause him immense pain to do so, he can approach the vent, and will be able to collapse it. If Aoshi-sama has Shimazu on the move, then it is likely his plans are in the final stages. I’m afraid we can no longer afford to sit and wait for your backup to arrive. We will have to put our own plans into motion now.”

“I wasn’t aware,” Junshin grumbled, somewhat bitterly, at the thought of having to go into battle alone against such ridiculously strong opponents, “that we had any plans.”

“Ah, but I do,” Hisayo smiled slightly – little more than an upward curve to one corner of her perfect, bow shaped lips. “Both of you are young…you graduated from the Academy only a short time ago, no? However, that being so, you still managed to fight and quite handily defeat, with only a minimum of experience, two members of Kuroken.’

“In addition,” she raised a slender hand to point a finger towards Hitomi, “do not try to deny, girl, that you are the child that fought Motonari-sama to a draw six years ago. I am not sure where all of that power went, but it was most certainly your name he gave….my memory is not so dulled that I would quickly forget hearing the name 'Reihaii'.”

Junshin frowned, believing that the woman must have been mistaken. However, as he turned to look back towards Hitomi, he drew back in surprise at the tight, mirthless smile the redhead wore. Resting her elbows on her knees – clearly rather unused to wearing long dressed, given her posture – the young woman wrung her hands briefly, before giving a slight nod.

“Yeah,” she admitted. “That was me….but things were different then. I only managed that with the help of my zanpakuto, and he nearly destroyed himself making me that powerful. It’s six years on, and he hasn’t said a word to me since that day. Things are….things aren’t the same, now.”

“Be that as it may,” Hisayo shrugged, “the power used was still your own….you still have that strength within you somewhere. You showed a small part of it with the technique you used to defeat Kashigi….we may need your zanpakuto to hold your body together during it, but we’ll perhaps address that later. If you have the strength to fight evenly with Motonari-sama as he was six years ago, then you might….might have a chance against Aoshi-sama.”

“Wait,” Junshin interrupted. “Might be!? I thought you said that Motonari guy was on the level of a Captain? Are you saying his son is even stronger?”

“Stronger than Motanari-sama was when your friend fought him, yes,” Hisayo briefly turned her gaze towards Junshin – her visible irritation at being interrupted causing him to flinch. “Motanari-sama has become far stronger since that day, though….it is fortunate that he is not here. As it is, we are afforded a chance. Junshin-dono, you have demonstrated a truly frightening rate of growth….Reihaii-dono, you have the potential to tap into immense power if you can but learn how to reach for it consistently. If we move quickly, and if I teach you along the way, then it is possible that we will be a force capable of facing Kuroken by the time we arrive at Pinnacle.”

The two Shinigami exchanged a brief silent glance. It seemed unlikely to either of them that they could become that much stronger in such a short time, even with Hisayo’s guidance. However, it didn’t seem as though there was much choice in the matter. If their opponent’s plan was nearly completed, then the young woman was right and they couldn’t very well sit around. Somewhat reluctantly, Junshin offered Hitomi a nod of agreement. He was on board if she was.

“Alright,” Hitomi murmured, turning her eyes towards Hisayo. “We agree.”

“Excellent,” Hisayo smiled – a not altogether pleasant smile, Junshin noted. “There is one more thing I should mention….in addition to Aoshi-sama himself, there is another extremely dangerous member of Kuroken of whom you must be aware. Shimazu’s strength is approximately equal to my own, or perhaps only a little behind….but there is another member, Toda, who has been striving for years to overtake Shimazu. Of all the members of Kuroken, he made perhaps the most costly bargain in exchange for his strength….it is entirely possible that, despite being the Fourth Finger, he has actually surpassed both Shimazu and me by now.’

“In other words,” she grinned, appearing to take rather too much amusement in the announcement. “It’s not enough that you both become stronger. To fight evenly with the top three members of Kuroken, you’re both going to have to become even stronger than me.”




*****



“Hey, Junshin-kun,” Hitomi’s voice called out from bellow, snapping him out of his reverie. “Come on, we don’t have all day!”

“R…right,” Junshin stammered, forgoing the ladder he had used to ascend the tower to instead simply vault over the side. Bracing his reitsu into his legs and spine, he plummeted the full thirty feet to the ground, wincing despite himself as he still could not quite become used to the reality that such a fall would not smear him across the ground. However, he handed safely – albeit forced to place a palm against the ground to keep from tipping over – to join Hitomi, Hisayo and Dirk on ground level.

The boy had been all but attached to Hitomi since recovering from his own injuries, tailing the redhead around and referring to her as “Onee-san”. ‘Old Lady’, it seemed, was no longer the order of the day. He had been permitted by Hisayo – rather against the objections of the Shinigami – to accompany them as far as the way station to see them off. Their farewell from the Kuroda household has been a rather dramatic affair; the fisherman openly shedding salty tears at Hisayo’s departure. Although she had only been a part of their household for a short time, it was obvious that the young woman had quickly established herself as the ‘big sister’ of the family. It was difficult to imagine, knowing this, that she was in fact a steel hearted killer.

That being so, as Junshin joined them, Hisayo reached out a hand to place her palm on Dirk’s head. The youth stared sullenly at the ground, still gripping a small fist onto the fabric of Hitomi’s skirt. The latter had not changed out of the long sundress earlier offered by Hisayo – having no other fresh clothes to give her. However, she had added the addition of a pair of sturdy, calf-high walking boots for the long road that no doubt lay ahead of them.

“This is where we part ways, Naoko-kun,” she told him. “Go back to the house….all being well, I’ll return in a few days.”

“You promise?” Dirk queried, eyeing the woman with a note of suspicion. “You also promised Da’ that y’wouldn’t wear that uniform no more.”

“I promise,” Hisayo offered the boy a smile. “In the meantime, you take care of your sisters.”

“….Yeah,” Dirk nodded, looking melancholy, but convinced. Hisayo withdrew her hand, moving a few steps further down the road to make her desire to leave clear to the Shinigami. However, she only advanced a few meters before stopping, waiting for them to make their own goodbyes also.

“Well,” Hitomi shrugged. “See ya, Dirk-kun. Don’t get into too much trouble….and hey, try not to call any more young and attractive women ‘old lady’ from now on.”

“I still think you’re old,” Dirk grunted, quickly withdrawing his hand as he folded his arms across his chest, turning his face away defiantly. “But you an’ Wetpants are alright….I guess you’re kinda Streetsmart, too.”

‘Why am I still Wetpants….?’

“Yeah, well, I think you’re still a brat,” Hitomi countered, placing her hands on her hips. “But seriously, you take care of yourself and your family, right? You’re going to be a man one day…Last night, I think you might actually have started to act like one.”

“Really?” Dirk quirked an eyebrow, turning back to look towards Hitomi. The youth looked more than a little as though he expected the compliment to be quickly withdrawn and exchanged for a jibe. However, Hitomi merely offered him a nod, prompting the boy to break into a wide grin. “Well….y’know….that’s me. I’m Dirk-sama. I’m streetsmart, a man among men n’stuff.”

“Heh,” Hitomi smirked. “Well Dirk-sama, I’d better get going. I’ll see you around.”

Turning to follow Hisayo, Hitomi waved a hand over her shoulder in farewell. Junshin, for his part, watched the two women leave before exchanging an uncomfortably long, silent glance with Dirk. Shifting awkwardly from foot to foot, Junshin wasn’t entirely sure what to say….although he rather hoped that the boy would at least use his name for once. He had, after all, helped Hitomi in saving the youth’s life.

“See you, Dirk-kun,” he offered with a half smile.

“See ya, Wetpants,” Dirk grinned with a wave. “Take care of Onee-san. Oh, and keep your hands to yourself. That shit’s gonna be mine when I’m older.”

‘…..Okay….I’m just going to just pretend I didn’t hear that.’

Feeling at least slightly horrified by the parting words that Dirk had elected to leave him with, Junshin thought better of trying to decide whether or not the boy was making one last attempt to mess with his head. Instead, he set off at a jog after the two women – who had begun to make their way up the road at a steady trot. Once he drew level with them, he cast a backward glance down the road – Dirk had remained where he was, apparently content to watch them go until they were out of sight.

“Are you really going back?” he murmured to Hisayo, who stared resolutely forward.

“….No,” the young woman shook her head. “I can’t go back. What I’m about to do is going to make me an enemy to the Tachibana house. There’s nowhere in the Soul Society I’ll be safe….and nobody who will be safe with me…so long as Tachibana exists.”

“Yeah,” Junshin nodded, his shoulders heaving in a brief sigh. “I sort of figured that…”

“You should maybe have told him,” Hitomi ventured, casting her own backward glance towards Dirk – the boy frantically waving when he saw that she had done so. “He strikes me as the sort who’ll wait….I think he might just spend the rest of his days watching this road to see if you’ll come back.”

“He’s also the sort,” Hisayo countered, “who would follow us if he thought, for a moment, that we weren’t coming back. Trust me, it’s better this way….He’ll understand, in time. Maybe, one day, I’ll make my way back here…but I doubt that will be anytime soon.”

A rather long, awkward silence existed between the trio. Both Shinigami occasionally looked back at Dirk, the latter remaining where they had left him. The youth dwindled upon the horizon as they continued down the road, though he continued to wave both arms each time they looked back. It was only when the road made a sudden incline – dropping into a slope that would cause the boy to drop out of sight - that Hisayo at last hesitated.

Both Shinigami stopped, expecting the young woman to turn. She remained still for a moment, her gaze upon the worn, gravel path beneath her feet. However, her hesitation was brief as she finally began moving again, making her way down the incline that would carry her out of sight of Dirk.

She did not look back.

- - - Updated - - -


Act XXXII: Beneath the Crimson Gaze





“It’s about time we discussed your training.”

Hitomi looked up as Hisayo spoke, pausing in the act of splashing cold water from her cupped hands into her face. The trio had been walking for several hours since leaving Flotsam – Hisayo almost immediately taking them off road and into the wilderness. After scrambling through miles of dense woodland, the Shinigami had been more than grateful for a rest when their path had eventually led them to a small, bubbling brook that cut through the trees, presumably to join up with the vast river that was now many miles from their position.

Despite the fatigue that both Junshin and Hitomi felt after the long trek through temperatures that were by now climbing as high as forty degrees, Hisayo had almost immediately moved on to ‘scout around’. She had made it plain that the rest would not be a long one, but had been gone for nigh on twenty minutes when she at least reappeared. So deep into the forest, visibility was reduced to a gloomy haze only a few feet beyond the surrounding trees and the woman – still clad in her black shozoko, all but materialised from the darkness; her words coming so suddenly that the Shinigami had startled.

“Training?” Junshin echoed from where he had been lying on his back – taking advantage of a soft bed of moss that carpeted a series of large boulders about the point from which the brook spat up from beneath the ground. “There doesn’t seem to be much room for that here.”

“You will quickly find, Kiyoko-dono,” Hisayo replied with a shrug, leaping from ground level to stand upon the same boulders as Junshin, ushering him from his perch with a tap of her foot to his retreating backside, “that training can be done anywhere, at any time. It is my intention, in fact, to have both of you training on as close to a constant basis as possible. You must both become far stronger, no?”

As Junshin landed in something of a sprawl beside her, Hitomi rose to her feet, watching curiously as the older woman sat on the edge of the rock, folding her arms and gazing down thoughtfully at the two Shinigami. Not for the first time, Hitomi felt more than a little like she was being silently weighed up, before the girl’s maroon eyes shifted to Junshin.

“I want both of you to raise your spiritual pressure as high as it can go,” Hisayo stated. “Once you have reached your maximum, I want you to hold it at that level. I have to see what I’m dealing with, no?”

Hitomi exchanged a momentary glance with Junshin, both Shinigami immediately feeling uncertain. Hitomi had occasionally been forced to push her reiatsu to its limits, but those occasions had been few and far between; truth be told, she wasn’t even entirely sure how high it was. Although she was capable of briefly breaking her limits by using shunko, she was not completely sure where those limits lay. As a rule, Shinigami did not fight at their maximum strength unless they were forced to do so in order to keep up with a more powerful opponent. Combat between spiritual beings of similar strength could often be a battle of staying power, and the trick was usually determining exactly how much reiatsu you needed to expend during the fight, and using only that much.

Nevertheless, with a shrug, she allowed her eyes to drift closed in order to better concentrate, levelling out her breathing as she began to allow the churning reiatsu within her to bubble slowly to the surface. Almost immediately, the surface layer of dead leaves and loose foliage around the two Shinigami began to shift; the density of the air twisting as their respective spiritual pressures began to climb higher. Hitomi was dimly aware of Junshin’s rising beside her, but it was muffled somewhat by her own – not only did her rise faster, but she noted also it rose higher. As Junshin maxed out, Hitomi’s spiritual pressure continued to rise until finally levelling off.

Unlike with shunko, there was no dramatic flash of light or flame – merely a breath of brisk wind that ruffled the Shinigami’s clothes as the pressure increased, only settling when they had reached their respective maximums. Allowing her eyes to open, Hitomi immediately grimaced; maintaining her reiatsu at such a level as like tensing a muscle, and she doubted she would be able to hold it at exactly such a stage for more than a few minutes, at best.

“I see….” Hisayo murmured, observing the two carefully. “That is about what I expected…Although I can only guess at your potential maximum, the amount of reiatsu you can actively wield at this time is about that of a fifth and fourth seat, respectively. It is rather surprising that you have both come so far in so short a time, no? I would not have believed you were fresh graduates were you not so young.”

Hitomi noted Junshin’s cheeks flush slightly at the compliment, though she found herself more stunned than pleased. As much as their fight with Kashigi and Yabu would seem to have made the Hisayo’s statement self-evident, she still found herself scarcely able to believe hearing it being said aloud.

‘I’m on the level of a fourth seat…? Hashiba-sensei was a fourth seat. Hell, Shadrin-kun said in his letter that he was a fourth seat. There’s….surely there’s no way that I’m as strong as Shadrin-kun?’

The fact that, for a brief moment in history, she had utterly eclipsed Shadrin did little to dispel her surprise. She had always accepted that she reached such lofty heights only because her zanpakuto had allowed her to….now, however, her zanpakuto remained dead and silent by her side. It was playing no part in the strength she brought to the surface now…What she felt now was, apparently, her own base strength.

It did seem absurd; as Hisayo noted, the pair had only graduated from the Academy a little over a week ago. Hitomi’s strength had perhaps been above average, but it had certainly fallen far short of what would even have been expected of a single-digit seat. Had simple jinzen really increased her abilities that far? Or perhaps she had always been this powerful, and it was simply spending so long in a state of near physical dormancy that had led her ability to wield her strength to atrophy.

“Now then,” Hisayo was speaking once more, drawing Hitomi’s attention back to reality as the redhead was forced to throw aside whatever doubts she may still have held, “from now on, I want both of you to maintain your reiatsu at this level. Whether we are walking, eating, or resting…the only times I wish to see your spiritual pressure fall beneath this point is when you have used up all of your reiatsu. Until that happens, although we will make camp at nightfall, you will not sleep.”

“What!?” Hitomi exclaimed. “Are you kidding? Just holding it like this while we’re standing still is difficult enough! Just what kind of state do you want us to be in when we finally run into these guys!?”

“I….I agree with Seraphina-kun,” Junshin nodded. “Just holding myself as this level right now is making me feel light headed.”

Hisayo’s eyes narrowed, and Hitomi immediately felt her stomach lurch – as though some primal part of her recognised that she had perhaps simply prodded a predator with a stick. The raven haired young woman remained perfectly still, her arms still folded, before she abruptly shook her head with a sigh.

“Pathetic,” she muttered. “Neither of you are cut out for this. Go home.”

Hitomi started, Hisayo’s tone clipped and dismissive. Once again struck dumb by surprise, she watched as Hisayo rose to her feet, wiping off some stray clumps of moss from the back of her legs, before apparently turning to depart. She seemed perfectly content to simply leave the Shinigami where they were. A note of panic flared within Hitomi as she realised, without a doubt, that they would stand no chance of finding the woman again if they lost sight of her among the trees.

“Wait!” she called out, reaching out a hand as though to snatch for Hisayo’s shoulder – though the woman was far out of her reach. Her voice, however, was sufficient to cause the black-clad woman to hesitate; though Hitomi suddenly found herself almost wishing she had remained silent as Hisayo turned back towards her – looking backwards over her shoulder at such an angle that only a single near-crimson eye was visible. Hisayo’s gaze was cold, uncompromising, and utterly bereft of sympathy.

“You both make me sick,” she murmured, her upper lip curling slightly in the semblance of a growl – prominently displaying her sharp, pristine-white canines. “You might be strong, but you’re still little more than stupid children. Let me make it clear that I don’t need you…I need what I might be able to turn the pair of you into.’

“If the two of you are content to remain at the level you are, then you’re nothing more than baggage that will slow me down, and distract me when I’m trying to fight. I’m not going to mollycoddle you, and I’m not going to set a pace you’re comfortable with….I’m going to push both of you to breaking point, because there’s no other way you’re going to be ready in time.”

Turning on the spot to face them once more, Hisayo’s expression was one of visible contempt. It was not difficult at all to imagine her as a member of Kuroken; her pitiless eyes glared down upon the two young Shinigami, offering none of the warmth she had once so expertly displayed.

“If you wish to have use,” she continued, “then you must be prepared to do absolutely anything I demand of you. You will not be able to find your way to Pinnacle without me, and you would not survive even if you somehow did. You are in no position to negotiate the terms of my cooperation.”

Hitomi bit back a reply, knowing that Hisayo was correct. As much as their strength had grown tremendously in the short time since leaving the Seireitei, there were still severally outclassed by the forces arrayed against them. Leaping through whatever hoops Hisayo demanded was simply necessary if they were going to have any chance whatsoever of being powerful enough when the time came.

“…Right,” she finally nodded, though maintaining her reiatsu at such heights was already beginning to give her a headache.

“Yeah….” Junshin’s reply came only a half step behind her own. “….Sorry.”

“Well then,” Hisayo’s demeanour shifted immediately – her scowl transforming into a glowing smile. “Now that’s settled, allow me to explain. In terms of actual techniques, there is little I can actually do to teach you….I have no formal training as a Shinigami. Feral powers like me do not learn, we simply…‘do’. Unlike the rigid drills of the Academy, where you will learn to handle your powers in a specific way, we use the flow of our reiatsu to achieved results however we can. Two different self-taught spiritually aware beings might both be able to air-walk, for example, but they won’t both do it in exactly the same way.’

“In terms of how to handle your reiatsu,” she shrugged, “I’m quite certain that both of you have had a far better education than I have….So I’m not going to teach you fighting techniques. What I am going to teach you, however, is how to rapidly increase your reiatsu. You may have heard it said in the past that reiatsu is like a muscle…the more it is exercised, the larger it becomes, no? That is why, for as long as you are physically able to do so, you are both going to be exercising your reiatsu constantly by forcing yourself to remain at your maximum. Doing so will dramatically increase your maximum as a result…provided you’re able to maintain if for the long haul.”

“I’ve never heard of this method before,” Junshin frowned. “If it works, why isn’t it taught at the Academy?”

“I’ve heard of it,” Hitomi interjected. “Or at least something similar. Shadrin-kun…that is….a friend of mine trained someone by having him repeatedly raise his spiritual pressure to his maximum several times in quick succession, until he all but collapsed from exhaustion. It….did have good results. Shingen-kun came out of that training many times stronger than he had been.”

“That is a similar idea, true,” Hisayo nodded, one corner of her mouth rising into a curious smile. “This Shadrin fellow must be very intuitive, no? It is not a training method that is in frequent use for a number of reasons…The first, and most obvious, is that it poses a risk to the individual using it. Results are greatly reduced unless you use all of your reiatsu, and in addition to possible sleep deprivation and physical exhaustion, you run the risk of causing damage to your muscle tissue...if your body is not able to handle it, then you will probably inflict permanant injury. Your body isn’t meant to remain at this level for long periods of time. Although traditional training methods are slower, they don’t carry the same risks. Nobody would do what we’re doing unless they were absolutely desperate.”

“Wait….you’re telling us that we risk crippling ourselves here?” Hitomi resisted the urge to immediately let her spiritual pressure shrink back to resting levels. “What good does that do us when we finally get into a fight and both of our bodies are wrecked?”

“No more or less good than it would do you walking into a fight with anything less than that equal power to the opponents you’ll be facing,” Hisayo sighed, her air of exasperation quickly returning. “As I said, I am not offering you an easy way. I am offering you a gamble…a gamble that, if it pays off, might just have you strong enough by the time we get where we’re going. Whether it does or not depends partly on luck, and partly on just how much potential the two of you have.”

“Alright, understood,” it was Junshin that replied, puffing out his chest slightly. “I….I want to become stronger.”

“Clever boy,” Hisayo addressed Junshiin with a smile, before shifting her gaze back to Hitomi. The redhead immediately looked aside, finding it increasingly uncomfortable to meet the woman’s gaze. “May I assume that we are all in agreement?”

“Fine,” Hitomi murmured. “As you say…we have little in the way of choice.”

“Choice is a rare luxury,” Hisayo replied, turning abruptly on the spot to leap down from the rock upon which she had been standing – landing on the opposite side of the brook. “Those who think they have it seldom do….those who do have it usually don’t realise until they’ve made the wrong one.”

‘…Damn, this woman is creepy.'

Sighing, Hitomi began to make her way after the woman – before very nearly jumping out of her skin as the air was split by a thunderous crack. Her hand instanctivly moving to the hilt of her sword, the redhead spun her gaze in the direction of the sound, her eardrums still ringing as she tried to decipher exactly what the noise had been. The question, however, was answered the moment she looked in her companion’s direction.

Looking, if anything, even more surprised than Hitomi, Junshin stood stricken on the spot with his right leg buried up to his knee in the soft earth. His foot, Hitomi imagined, had smashed through the surface level of soil to fracture the stone beneath, the momentum behind the footfall such that he had likely been afforded little time to prevent himself sinking so deep. His eyes wide in near panic, the young man flailed widly with his arms to keep his balance before, with a loud ‘pop’ sound, and a shower of tiny flakes of soil and rock being flung skyward in the process, he succeeded in extracting his now thoroughly mucky leg.

“I…I just…” he stammed, staring fixedly at the hole still left within the ground. “I just took a step and..it…”

“Oh, I forgot to mention,” Hisayo’s voice drifted back towards the pair, this time flavoured with a hint of amusement. “The other reason this method isn’t used is because it’s rather dangerous for your surroundings, and for anyone around you. Just remember that your physical strength is at its current absolute maximum, and try not to break anything. Oh, and don’t try and jump anywhere either…you’ll probably go flying through the canopy.”

“Thanks for the warning,” Hitomi muttered back, doubting that the other woman would hear her. Junshin making a futile attempt to wipe away the layer of soil that now caked his leg, took a more ginger step forward. With considerable effort, he was able to avoid shattering the ground on his second attempt, slowly walking with more confidence as he followed after Hisayo.

‘Well…let’s see if the forest survives the trip then.’

Putting as much effort into holding steady her reiatsu as she did in keeping pace with her companions, Hitomi quickly moved to catch up as they left the brook behind; Hisayo continuing to lead them Westward towards the heartlands of their enemy.

[Seraphina]

Act XXXIII: Those Left Behind



“Shadrin, do you wish to continue?”

Shadrin Kain started, his blue eyes snapping back to the Go-board set out before him with an expression that made it evident he had all but forgotten the game’s presence. So fixedly had he been staring westward, his gaze directed out across the vast expanse of the Kain estate, that he was not even certain how long he had been doing so. Seated upon a foldable stool with a seat formed by a sheet of white canvas, stretched taut by the x-shaped struts that formed the chair’s legs, he shifted to direct his attention more thoroughly back to the game, offering an apologetic smile to the man who sat on the far side of the board.

Sanguine Kain regarded his son carefully, cooling himself with the rapid flap of a paper fan held in his left hand, as the latter picked out one of his game tiles and, barely glancing at the board, set it down to immediately blockade what Sanguine had believed to be a subtle expansion into a hitherto unoccupied section of the board. Frowning in a moment of frustration at seeing his offensive so effortlessly blocked, Sanguine lifted his own eyes from the board to offer congratulations to his son, only to find that Shadrin had once again turned to gaze out across the grounds, his attention once more turned to the West.

The veranda upon which they were seated was on the ground floor of Sanguine’s home, commanding an excellent view of the expansive gardens that marched from the back of his house into what seemed - at least to one who had not explored the grounds to determine their true dimensions - into infinity beyond. Some half-mile of lawn, and carefully tended trees, flowerbeds and rockeries made up the rear of the Kain estate, but it was not the garden itself that distracted Shadrin. For several days now, his mind had never truly been on whatever he was supposed to be doing; or, as was often the case, what he wasn’t supposed to be doing, but was doing anyway. Today, however, that sensation was felt more keenly that ever, and he could not avoid the sensation of being inexplicably drawn towards the western horizon.

“Are you alright, my Son?”

‘I know it’s not possible….but I could almost swear I felt her spiritual pressure just now…’

“Shadrin?”

“Huh?” Shadrin started again, drawn for the second time out of his considerations as he finally became aware of his father having spoken. Tearing his gaze from his distant concerns, he attempted to appear nonchalant as he folded his arms across his chest, nodding back to the game board.

“Apologies, father,” he murmured. “Let’s continue.”

His father did not, however, continue with the game. Rather, he turned his own head to peer Westward, almost as though he too could feel the faint - perhaps imaginary - tug of familiar reiatsu that seemed to reach out across the expanse. The constant flapping of Sanguine’s fan did not, for a moment, slow - the older man’s wrist almost seeming to be running on its own motor as it tirelessly continued to wave the paper instrument. Shadrin immediately found himself shifting uncomfortably on the spot, knowing very well that some very direct questions were likely about to come his way.

“You have friends out on a mission, I assume?” Sanguine eventually asked, his voice little more than a quiet murmur. His tone was sympathetic rather than exasperated - as perhaps may have been justified given Shadrin’s near constant distractions.

“Aaraa,” Shadrin shrugged. “It’s nothing to worry about…I have lots of friends out on missions right now.”

“And yet you only appear to be concerned for this one?” Sanguine arched an eyebrow, raising his right hand to point to the west, turning his head to cast his son a sideward glance. “Is it someone I know?”

“Someone you know of,” Shadrin replied, rather reluctantly, hunching his shoulders in an immediate effort to disappear. He didn’t especially want to name Hitomi directly - especially as his father routinely asked thoroughly uncomfortable questions whenever he mentioned any girl’s name; mostly along the lines of ‘when are you going to settle down?’ or ‘Am I going to be a grandfather?’.

“Ah, the Reihaii girl,” Sanguine nodded, causing Shadrin to immediately choke as the older man simply nodded matter-of-factly, as though Hitomi had been the only possible name implied by Shadrin’s evasive response. “You are concerned for her safety?”

“Aaraa….” Shadrin waved a hand, knowing that his words would likely sound forced even before they left his mouth. “I’m just worried about the kid they sent out with her. I got a brief look at him before they headed off…honestly, he looked like he didn’t even know what a sword looked like. She’s probably going to drag him around the Rukongai, get him into all sorts of trouble, and make the guy’s life misery the whole time.”

“Oh, so you’re worried about this other fellow, then?” Sanguine replied with a wry smile. “Not your friend at all?”

“Exactly,” Shadrin nodded emphatically, now trying to convince himself as much as Sanguine. “She’ll be fine….she’s always fine. No matter what gets thrown at her.”

“But…?” his father prompted, turning in his stool to face his son once more, folding his own arms while regarding Shadrin expectantly.

“But?” Shadrin echoed, before quickly shaking his head. “There’s no ‘but’. That’s it. She’ll be fine. I didn’t imply a but. This is a but free zone.”

“But,” Sanguine apparently elected to continue the sentence regardless, “you wish you were there to protect her, regardless, as you did in the South Rukongai?”

Shadrin didn’t respond, imaging there was very little need to. Sullenly, he began pushing around the unused Go-tiles arrayed before him with his index finger, unsure exactly what to say. There was a part of him, a rather large part of him, that wished he had simply followed after Hitomi and her young companion when they had left the Fifth Division barracks. She wouldn’t have thanked him for it, but it would at least have helped put his mind at ease. Although he knew that he could not possibly be feeling her reiatsu from so far away, he nevertheless felt - in some distant fashion - that she could use the help.

But that was likely his imagination running away from him.



*****


“You should let me come along.”

“No,” the redhead stated emphatically, a sudden fiery defiance visible in her dusk coloured eyes. “I don’t need you looking over my shoulder on this one. I’ll be fine.”

Shadrin pursed his lips, sparing a rather uncomfortably sideward glance as the sixth seat of Hitomi’s division, Fukuda Akira, who was very poignantly not looking in their direction throughout the exchange. Hitomi’s superior seemed content to let them conclude their business, but Shadrin was nonetheless conscious of the fact that the man could still hear every word they were saying. Biting back his initial reply, he instead offered a more measured response.

“Sera-chan,” he murmured, only having just become used to the assumed name she now preferred to go by, “I can’t just…..Look, you’ll make me worry if you go off alone. Just this once, put my mind at ease, kay?”

“And what about the next time?” Hitomi’s reply was clipped and curt, and Shadrin found himself unconsciously wincing. “And the time after that? Or after that? Shadrin-kun, I’m a Shinigami now…I’m not the little girl that you need to look out for anymore. And even if I am, I’m never going to stop being that little girl unless I start doing things for myself. Sooner or later, I’m going to have to go out there alone, and this is as good a time to do it as any.”

“But to the Outer Rim!?” Shadrin shot back, though he immediately realised that he had raised his voice slightly higher than he had intended, immediately dropping it back to more hushed levels. “Sera-chan, this isn’t about what you can or can’t do. There are….going to be a lot of bad memories out there for you.”

Hesitantly, somewhat wary of possible reprisal, Shadrin reached out to place one of his large hands on each of the girl’s small shoulders. It was seven years since the first time he had reached out in comfort to her - he could still vividly remember how small and delicate she had felt then. Even now, after so much time, he could not shake off the sensation that he was holding a glass ornament - beautiful and elegant...but fragile, in danger of being shattered by the slightest mishandle.

“I just…want to be there for you if things start catching up,” he uttered in a low whisper, intended for her ears alone.

Rather than throw him off, the girl instead reached up her own hand to seize his right wrist. Her fingers closed around his hand, giving a brief squeeze, and Shadrin felt himself immediately hesitate. Although intended to return the gesture of comfort, the grip of her slender fingers was powerful - her physical strength almost equal to his own, despite the enormous difference in size. Taken slightly aback, by remained still, offering no further objections as Hitomi - her face having turned to the ground the moment the Outer Rim was mentioned - slowly lifted her eyes to meet his own.

“I know,” she replied. “Thank you….but I think this is something I need to face on my own. I’ll be fine…really.”

“…Alright,” Shadrin relented with a brief nod, though he still couldn’t help feel that it was at least slightly against his better judgement. “Just…promise me that you won’t start mistaking relying on others as the same thing as weakness. Your Nakama all depend on you…don’t forget that you can always depend on us, too. In any case, good luck.”




*****


“Do you trust this girl?” Sanguine suddenly asked, the question seeming curiously out of place as Shadrin frowned, lifting his eyes back to his father. Sanguine was no longer looking in Shadrin’s direction, instead frowning down at the game board as he quietly considered his next move.

“With my life,” Shadrin replied immediately, requiring little consideration of the question. Although he did not look up, Sanguine allowed himself a brief smile and a satisfied nod.

“If you trust her with your life,” he returned, “then try and trust her with her own, too. If she needs you, truly needs you, then I’m sure she’ll find a way to tell you.”

Shadrin nodded, heaving a brief sigh. He knew his father to be correct, but it didn’t make it any easier to sit at home while Hitomi was on a mission in one of the most dangerous part of the Rukongai. However, sit he would; he would simply have to trust that Hitomi knew her business well enough that she would send word if backup was required. With a concerted effort, he forced himself to turn his mind back to the game…

…only to find that Sanguine had just placed a tile that essentially cut the board in half, leading to domination of the game and a near certain victory.

“What the hell!?” he exclaimed. “When did that happen!?”

“You should have Uesugi-san come round and play me, boy,” Sanguine grinned from the far side of the board. “You’re still a long way off from challenging me.”

“Hey, I was pouring my heart out here,” Shadrin protested, his lip curling into a noticeable pout as his father toothily grinned back at him in poorly restrained glee. “You play dirty, Old Man.”

“I play to win, boy,” Sanguine smirked, finally snapping his fan closed to point it across the board at Shadrin. “Come, we’ll play again! This time, I’ll distract you with pictures of large breasted redheads.”

Shadrin’s eyebrow twitched in irritation, thoughts of what may or may not have been occurring in the west momentarily banished from his mind. Sanguine continued to regard him with a challenging smirk, tapping his closed fan against his elbow.

“Alright,” he growled. “Reset the board old man. I’ll distract you by describing in graphic detail what a naked woman actually looks like, given you haven’t seen one in about twenty years.”

The two continued to enchange barbed jibes, taunting everything from the other’s masculinity to haircut. To the various servants of the Kain household, the sound of raised voices was taken as a blessing - the tension that had immersed Shadrin’s visit easing away to be replaced by their more usual weekly duel as, with a game of Go placed between them, Sanguine and Shadrin Kain demonstrated how thoroughly alike father and son truly were.

[Seraphina]

Act XXXIV: Kuroken






The road extended for what seemed like a blank eternity in both directions, marching into an infinite journey both east and west. In one direction, the wooded greenland that led, in time, away from the Outer Rim and into more civilised lands. In the other, the gradual fade from vegetation into desolation; the parched and rugged landscape of the deeper Outer Rim. It was a road that was travelled by few - the denizens of the Outer Rim unable to afford travel, and merchants usually only braving an annual trip into the deeper districts.

Today, in fact, the road was playing host to more travel than it likely did inside the average week. A line of wagons, their trundling journey sparking up a cloud of dust from the unkempt road that drifted into the pale blue sky overhead - visible for miles around - progressed steady eastward at a pace as swift as their rickety frames and heavy load would allow. Despite the intense, baking heat from the merciless sun overhead, the armoured men that marched alongside and between the wagons in disciplined ranks moved at a tireless jog to remain level with the vehicles. For all their vast number, there was not a man among them who’s constitution was not fortified, if only slightly, by a degree of reiatsu.

Only two of the men, however, were of any true substance by the standards a Shinigami would set. Sasaki Kojiro and Toda sat on opposite sides of the caravan’s foremost wagon, their backs turned to one another, and with absolutely nothing to be said between them. Save for the trundle of the wagons and the pounding of the marching feet to either side, the silence between the two men was broken only by the melodic jingling of the wind chimes that hung from Toda’s wide brimmed hat. The two had hardly spoken since leaving Rakuseki; although with half his face still swollen from his encounter with Yagyu Jubei, it was likely that Sasaki was not altogether eager to speak. Taking small comfort in the few meagre kills he had managed to accumulate before leaving the village, the fact that he had not been afforded a chance to kill the man that had maimed him left a thoroughly bitter taste in his mouth.

Toda, for his part, was simply disinterested in conversation in general. Crouching within the wagon, the old man looked more like a misshapen mass cloth than a human being, his spindly frame rendered almost invisible beneath the large coat slung about his person. His only action, for much of the trip, was to occasionally rattle out a hacking cough from behind the thick scarf wrapped around his nose and mouth. Whenever the cough sounded, Sasaki briefly glanced back at his counterpart, perhaps in search of any indication that his superior was weakening or had lowered his guard; each time, however, he turned away disappointed; Toda as aware of Sasaki’s potential for treachery as Sasaki was of the difference in power between them. Whatever gains he could make by striking down his superior were not worth the risk of attacking the old man while he remained capable of reprisal.

The caravan continued on its way, the landscape to either side appearing very much the same for each bland mile. The same rugged, sun-yellowed landscape, half way between the forests behind and the deserts beyond. Scorched golden grass and brittle, leafless trees stabbed skywards from the dry earth in places, though there was nothing that could be referred to as a forest. The land was more rocky than sandy, however, and it would be some time before water became truly scarce and civilisation peeled away completely. Settlements, far from the road in an attempt to stay out of sight of bandits, still dotted the district; these, however, were safe for the present. Sasaki and Toda would have to deposit their current load before they could acquire anything else.

True to Toda’s estimate, Rakuseki had yielded two hundred and forty six prisoners - fresh workers for the excavation of Pinnacle in the distant west. Although they had been initially noisy, they had by now succumbed to depression and hopelessness - packed shoulder-to-shoulder within the wagons, with little room to move or sit, exhaustion would have forced them to quiet down if fear had not. Forced to sleep standing up, propped up by their neighbours, none of the villagers had gained much in the way of rest since being taken from their home. If their captors cared much for the wellbeing of the workers, it did not show; indeed, their deaths were likely inevitable anyway. Once the excavation was complete, it seemed unlikely that Tachibana Aoshi would much care what happened to the thousands of workers left stranded beyond the Outer Rim.

As the caravan continued its journey, two figures became visible by the roadside ahead - two dark shapes against the dusty skyline, standing motionless as the line of wagons slowly bridges the gap between them. Although little more than shapeless blurs initially, the two gradually took shape as the distance lessened, forming into two human bodies - one the size of an average man, the other significantly taller and wider across his massive shoulders; Shimazu Tadatsune and Keiji Maeda, the third finger and his adjutant respectively, waited patiently for the arrival of the caravan.

Rendered almost invisible beside their monstrous presence, it was only when the caravan had almost drawn level with the pair that a third figure - seated moodily by the roadside - became evident: that of Yabu Hanzo. The squat, mole-faced man looked utterly pathetic beside his peers - almost his entire body wrapped tightly in bandages that were, just barely, holding his flesh together after his near fatal encounter with Junshin. Of the three, he was the first to clamber aboard the lead caravan as it rolled by - not stopping to accommodate the newcomers. Shimazu and Keiji were only just behind him, seating themselves near the front of the cart, side by side, to keep all of the others within their line of site.

Trust was in short supply within Kuroken.

“What’s that worm doing on his own?” it was Sasaki that spoke first, only just turning his head to peer at Yabu over his shoulder, his lips face split by a sudden sneer. “Did Kashigi-chan go and get himself killed?”

Yabu scowled, but did not reply. Even were he fit for battle, he was by far the weakest member of the group - Sasaki’s contempt he could deal with better than the man’s temper. Keeping his eyes downcast, the junior member of Kuroken - now the fifth finger in all but name - allowed Shimazu to answer for him.

“Kashigi-san is dead,” the old man growled, his right hand slipping from beneath the trechcoat draped across his shoulders to briefly remove the half-burned out cigar that had, until that moment, been clenched between his teeth. “He was killed by a Shinigami.”

“Oh?” it was Toda that spoke, lifting his head in sudden interest, to the merry jingle his wind-chimes. “So the Seireiteii has finally made its move…Tachibana-sama did say that this would be inevitable, though they are considerably ahead of schedule.”

“Tch…screw the schedule,” Sasaki spat, finally turning to face the inside of the cart - his left eye still swollen shut, his upper eyelid black and puffed up to the size of a plum, visible even through his re-applied white facepaint. “You two bastards got to fight Shinigami while I had to make do with small fry? That pisses me off…”

Keiji scowled darkly at the painted man’s blatant disrespect, and opened his mouth to bark out a harsh reply. However, Shimazu raised a weathered hand to his subordinate’s shoulder, silencing the giant before he could launch his barbed response. Shifting uncomfortable in an attempt to swallow down his anger, the largest man in the group said nothing.

“Well,” Toda observed, his tone suggesting that - beneath the scarf - he wore a smirk, “don’t you have your adjutant suitably tamed. I don’t suppose you’d be willing to teach me that trick?”

Sasaki, who had been sneering triumphantly at the cowed Keiji, immediately snapped his gaze towards Toda’s turned back. His good eye flaring wide, the grinding of the white-faced man’s teeth was audible as his hands twitched - if only slightly - in the direction of the cloth-bound weapon strapped across his back. However, he resisted the urge to draw, merely glaring impotently at his superior as the cart continued to lurch forward.

Shimazu, his own single eye moving back and forth between the two, briefly placed his cigar back between his teeth. From the other side of his mouth, he ejected a thick puff of grey smoke that plumed skyward, before appearing to satisfy himself that there was not going to be a confrontation between the two.

“The Shinigami are no longer our concern,” he explained. “There were only two of them…children, at that. The Gotei Thirteen are clearly not yet aware of the full scale of what is going on our here. The only reason they would have sent two greenhorns would be if it was a fact-finding mission, not an offensive.”

“If Kashigi allowed himself to be killed by rookies,” Toda snorted, “then he was clearly even weaker than I had thought. He was never truly one of us….even Sasaki has three times his spiritual pressure.”

Yabu, himself being lower in strength that Kashigi, could only glower as Toda voiced his derision. As with Sasaki, however, he knew better than to open his mouth to argue. The other members of Kuroken, meanwhile, made no argument simply because Toda was correct - the difference in strength between the Fifth and Fourth finger had always been vast, even before the discovery of Pinnacle; a gap that had increased severely since then. The impact of Kashigi’s demise upon the fighting power of Kuroken was a negligible one; he was, and always had been, replaceable.

“I take it they’re dead? Your little Shinigami, that is,” Sasaki suddenly asked, his gaze slipping back to Shimazu. The latter did not immediately respond, taking his time in reaching up to remove his cigar from his mouth, knocking off the excess ash as a fine black powder against the side of the cart, before replacing it between his teeth.

“I doubt,” he eventually replied, “we will be seeing them again.”

Keiji, still sitting silently by Shimazu’s side, cast his master a brief sideward glance at the response, but said nothing. The vagueness of the answer was not lost on the large man, and he knew well enough that it represented an unspoken instruction to report nothing of what had occurred - Shimazu would, no doubt, inform Tachibana Aoshi first. The actions of one of their members - if indeed she still was a member - were best kept for their Lord’s ears alone, for now.

“What a wonderfully evasive answer,” Toda observed, for the first time turning to look over his shoulder at Shimazu directly, raising a hand to steady his wide-brimmed hat. “Are we to assume, then, that you did not actually kill them? Is the mighty General Shimazu losing his resolve?”

Shimazu immediately stiffened, his cobalt eye fixing Toda as he reached up once more to remove his cigar from his mouth. This time, he did not replace it, holding the burning stub between his index and middle finger as he fixedly regarded the other man. Though the cart continued to jostle along the road, Toda’s wind chimes dancing with the vibrations, the group of men within the cart otherwise descended into immediate silence; even Sasaki, who had initially worn a broad, yellow-toothed grin ad Toda’s remark, silently inched away from the pair at the sudden, silent exchange.

“….An time you wish to test my resolve,” Shimazu finally uttered, more growling the words than speaking them, “feel free to do so.”

It was not often that Toda challenged Shimazu directly. The last time had occurred immediately after their augmentation at Pinnacle, and only direct physical intervention by Tachibana himself had prevented a battle from erupting. Here, however, their Lord was many miles away; it was conceivable that Toda’s long held belief of superiority would be put to the test. For that moment, however, the two simply weighed each other in silence - neither taking immediate action. The exchange of power between the two men was tangible, each gauging the other as it became clear neither of them was going to be the first to break their gaze.

Yabu, his face painted in an expression of absolute terror, watched in dismay as the two warriors measured one another. Pushing himself backwards in his seat - as though the few extra inches would spare him from being engulfed in the potentially explosive confrontation, he joined Sasaki in attempted to search for an escape route. It was Keiji alone who, despite obvious apprehension, remained steadfastly beside his master.

It was the giant, perhaps due to being the least distracted member of the group, who realised first that they were not alone.

A sudden shudder passed through Keiji’s spine as he became aware of a the sudden unpleasant sensation of being watched. His massive shoulders hunching, he grit his teeth as his stomach recoiled in revulsion as the sensation - he would liken it to tiny insects burrowing into the back of his head. He did not turn, knowing that he would not see the observer; this gaze came from many miles away.

The other members of Kuroken were not far behind the giant. Shimazu and Toda both grimaced, finally breaking their glare at one another to flinch aside. Toda raised a hand to tug his hat lower - hiding his reaction - while Shimazu’s lip curled in distaste. Half-way to raising his cigar back to his lips, the old man hesitated for a moment before, with a grunt, tossing the stub over the side of the cart.

“…..It’s watching,” Keiji murmured, having unconscious raised a hand to grasp at the collar of his shozoko, loosening the cloth as though struggling to breath.

“It wants us to know It’s watching,” it was Toda that responded, his tone bitter. “It seems, Shimazu Tadatsune, that we will need to have this conversation another time.”

“….Another time,” Shimazu agreed, scowling at the floor beneath his feet, waiting for the sensation of being observed to pass. It was a reminder, for the whole group, that nothing they said or did was truly between themselves. No word or action that passed between them could ever be concealed. The reminder was sufficient to end the infighting for the moment, however.

As much as they hated each other, they hated It far more.

“How long before we pass beyond the Outer Rim?” Shimazu finally asked of no one in particular, his gaze still directed at the floor of the wagon.

“Should be about three days,” it was Sasaki that answered, casting an uncertain glance at Toda before doing so - however the latter had turned back to face the landscape that marched by the side of the wagon, appearing to take no further interest in his counterparts. “We’ll be at Pinnacle in four.”

“Four days…” Shimazu nodded. “Projected completion of the excavation was six…these new workers might cut it down to five. I collapsed the last of the vents today…I suppose that means we‘re nearly finished.”

“So we only need endure for five more days?” Yabu breathed an audible sigh of relief, sitting up straight for the first time since Shimazu and Toda had begun butting heads. “Then it’ll be over?”

“….Yes,” Shimazu nodded, his single eye narrowing thoughtfully. “I imagine it will be.”

Sasaki, having relaxed visibly upon feeling an absence of their benefactor’s gaze upon them, had sprawled out upon his side of the wagon, his arms casually draped over the sides to dangle a few feet shy of the ground passing beneath them. Shimazu’s remark prompted him to turn his head briefly towards Shimazu, arching an eyebrow - though he said nothing.

The members of Kuroken continued in silence - they would not speak to each other again unless absolutely necessary. All that needed said had been said; the final stage of Tachibana Aoshi’s plan was moving towards fruition

The five day countdown had begun.

- - - Updated - - -


Act XXXV: The Broken


Day 1: 10:23am





‘Am I…alive…?’

Yagyu Jubei’s eyelids parted to admit a sliver of dim light, his word immediately swallowed up by such searing pain that he truly wished he had simply remained unconscious. His body felt as though his every bone had been ground into a fine powder, agony demanding that he immediately return to the sweet oblivion of unconsciousness. It was a request that the Shinigami did not entertain, his eyes half open as he attempted to piece together the shattered images dancing through his mind.

For several long minutes, he remained unaware of where he was or what had happened to him. His mind was a jumble, with one thought difficult to connect to the next until, gradually, the last events recorded within his conscious mind began to play out within his mind’s eye. His battle against a man with a painted face, the terrified screams of the villagers being rounder up like cattle…and the single metallic ring that had, or so he believed at the time, been the herald of his demise. After that sound, there was nothing more - his memories fading into a muffled void of darkness that, only now, he was able to scrape his way free of.

As he became more away of the waking world, he realised that he was lying within the remains of what may have once been one of the many stone buildings that had made up the village of Rakuseki. The domed building had not, it seemed, survived the onslaught of the mysterious attackers, however. Most of the roof had caved in, revealing a cloudless blue sky overhead that poured sunlight into the burned out hovel - the interior of the building little more than a misshapen mess of blackened wood. Only a narrow stretch of overhanging stone, slightly wider and longer than Jubei himself, remained to offer him shade from the potentially punishing sun’s rays; the ruin around him had long since stopped smoking. Whatever he had missed after falling unconscious, it was long over.

A glance down at himself immediately revealed the extent of his injuries, and explained the pain that continued to claw its way across his nerves. Someone had removed his tunic - his shihakusho having likely faded along with his zanpakuto when he lost consciousness - and made an effort to dress his wounds, the savage slice that had been carved into his torso tightly bound beneath bandages that - from the lack of blood seeping through - had likely been changed at least once. His right arm, meanwhile, had been folded into a sling across his stomach; badly mangled and likely useless. An attempt to move his fingertips brought a hiss of agony to his teeth and Jubei abandoned any further though of using the arm for now. It seemed likely his swordarm was utterly spent. He would have to make do with his left.

As to why he was alive, he could not in that moment answer. Although someone had clearly made an effort to care for his injuries, he was along within the shattered building. Closing his eyes, he attempted to listen for any potential signs of his rescuer; however, the only sound that touched his senses immediately was the sharp cry of crows - a foul taste immediately leapt to the back of his throat as he imagined what they may have been feeding on. He recalled, before his defeat, that the man named Sasaki Kojiro had promised to spare the old people and children of the village only if he fought him at full strength.

It seemed likely that the invader had not considered the bargain kept.

‘…Damn it…..I failed them….’

Closing his eyes tightly, Jubei ground his teeth more to fight down his rage than pain. Pain he could deal with - he had survived enough brushes with death that he had come, almost, to regard pain as a way of life. The anger, however, he could not so easily put aside. Behind his closed eyes, the leering face of Sasaki Kojiro cackled, taunting him even as he cursed his own failure. How many people had been killed, owing to his weakness?

The dry scraping of his shoulders against the stone floor was, for a moment, the best he was able to do as he attempted to rise. Holding his breath, he pursed his lips to hold in a cry of pain as he felt something give beneath his bandages, a warm patch of red bubbling through the white wrappings across his sternum. Ignoring the pain, he fought to stand once again - the very least he could do was bury the dead before the crows had them. Feeling as though a thousand red hit knives were plunging their way into his chest, he was finally able to lever himself into a seated position more by an act of sheer will than anything else. However, this proved to be all the strength he was able to muster for that moment, heaving in deep gulps for breath as he struggled merely to prevent himself from collapsing back to the floor.

Reaching up a trembling hand, he pushed back some of the long black hair that had tumbled down across his features, his forehead slick with perspiration as he roughly shoved the strands out of his vision. Silently telling himself that he was already half way there, he clenched his teeth again as, his limbs shaking from the effort, he urged his legs to bend - placing his feet underneath him. It would be standing, ultimately, that required the greatest effort; blood now dribbling down his stomach from beneath his bandages, the warrior was finally able to muster the strength to straighten his legs, pushing himself up with his one good arm to rise to a vertical base.

OnCe standing, he discovered, things proved easier. Though the pain of his exertion left him light headed, his stiff legs were quite content to remain upright as he took a single, half-staggered step out of the shade and into the direct sunlight. The sudden change in temperature was immediately noticeable, the scorching rays licking at the bare skin of his arms and shoulders immediately. With much of his reiatsu invested in holding his body together, there was little to rebalance his metabolism for the extreme temperature; the usual, boulder like constitution of a Shinigami would not be offering its usual protection.

He imagined he would have time, however, to complete his grizzly task.

His every footstep causing a jolt of pain to shoot up his ravaged arm - dangling lifelessly within the sling - he picked his way through the destroyed homestead in search of a safe way out into the streets. Although much of the collapsed roof and walls lay strewn across the burnt out shell, there was enough clear space for Jubei to gingerly make his way out of the ruin; doubting very much that, if he was to trip over, he would find the strength to get back up on his own.

The rest of the village did not appear to be in any better a state than the building in which he had woken. Not content with emptying it of inhabitants, the invaders had clearly unleashed a truly unnecessary level of destruction upon the now vacant homes - perhaps simply to kill anyone they had missed, or perhaps Sasaki Kojiro had simply been venting his frustrations upon losing the chance for battle. Nevertheless, Rakuseki was finished - the one time mountain haven little more than a graveyard.

Winding his way between the torn buildings, he noted that a few had been spared the invader’s rampage - though he could hear no sounds of life from within them. Others were in the same state as the building from which he had emerged while others were all but flattered - the brittle remnants of their walls flaking and crumbling simply from the vibrations of his passing footsteps. If destroying the village had been their goal, then the invaders had certainly succeeded. Rakuseki would never be lived in again.

‘I can’t let those bastards get away with this…I’ll hunt them…I’ll hunt them no matter how far I….’

A sudden cough brought the bitter, metallic taste of blood into his mouth, and Jubei realised - as he had most likely known already - that he was overexerting himself far beyond what his body was yet able to accommodate. Something inside him - a broken rib, or perhaps a shattered section of his sternum - was stabbing painfully into his lungs. For all that, he found himself hardly caring for his own injuries; determined, even as his legs buckled beneath him, that he would drag himself after the attacks with his single good hand if he had to.

The bare, rocky earth lunged up to meet him as he tipped forward, Jubei’s eyes reflexively closing as though doing so would protect him from the fall. Though he attempted to raise his left hand to try and cushion his landing, his arm hung from his shoulder as the mangled right. Steeling himself for what was certain to be an agonising landing, the Shinigami’s expected grunt of pain transformed into one of surprise as, rather than the ground, he instead collided with an outstretched, steadying arm.

“Patience, Shinigami-san,” a soft, feminine voice murmured in his ear. “It wouldn’t do for your body to break so soon after I’ve put it together, no?”

Sagging against the supporting limb, Jubei’s head sunk until his chin rested against his chest, no longer having the strength required to lift his head. Able to look only at the ground beneath his feet, he noted that his buckled knees were no longer supporting any of his considerable weight. The single arm of the women that held him aloFt was, apparently, accomplishing the feat alone.

His weight shifted outside of his control as the woman hefted him within her grasp, slinging one of his arms over her shoulder to better support him as her other hand clutched him around the waist. She felt small and frail against his much larger body, yet shifted him back in the direction he had come without so much as a grunt of exertion.

“W…wait…” he managed to bring words to his lips, though they brought with them several dark red bubbled of blood that popped upon contact with the air, splattering a grizzly pattern of droplets upon his chest. “I need…I need to bury them…”

The woman hesitated for a moment at his words, before shifting her stance once again. Turning him to face the way he had been going, she released her grip on the arm slung across the back of her neck to place her fingertips under his chin, lifting his head to allow him to look forward. Squinting into the sunlight - the view between the buildings distorted and hazy from the rapidly climbing air temperature, Jubei was momentarily unsure what he was supposed to be looking at.

Within a few moments, he realised that the blur in the distance - some hundred meters from where he stood - was moving. Blinking rapidly to try and stave off the river of perspiration that was dribbling into his eyelashes, he watched as the haze formed into two figures. As he watched one of the two - to Jubei’s blurry vision looking like little more than a vaguely humanoid shape with what appeared to be a red cape, or perhaps extremely long red hair - was in the process of hefting a child sized bundle from the ground into their arms and, as he watched, bore it to somewhere out of sight.

“It’s being taken care of,” the woman who held him upright explained. “They will be treated with respect, I assure you. But you can do nothing for them if you die, no?”

Jubie closed his eyes, a long breath escaping his lungs as he felt some of the tension leave his aching body. Knowing that, at least, the dead would not be left in the open air to feed the crows was a small measure of comfort. However, it did nothing to sate his desire to claim vengeance; the woman, however, was correct. That, it seemed, would have to come once his body was healed.

“Thank you,” he croaked through his bloody lips as he was again hefted around to move in reverse, being more carried than walking as he made the return trip back to the sheltered spot in which he had awoken. “But…who are you?”

“My name is Sato Hisayo,” the woman replied, her voice still free of strain as she hefted Jubei on his way. “My companions are Seraphina and Kiyoko Junshin. They are Shinigami, like you…but your questions can wait for the time being. Rest for now, and I will return to mending your body. When you are in better shape, I will explain all.’

“Suffice to say for now,” she added, almost as though as an afterthought. “We share the same enemy…and it is well that we found you here, for a union of our strength may be in order.”

Using what remained of his strength, Jubei made an attempt to turn his head to get a look at the young woman - for, from her voice, he was quite certain she was young - that was in the process of saving his life. The effort, however, proved to suck away whatever energy he had left in him as, catching only the briefest side-on glimpse of a beautiful porcelain face and a silky river of black hair, his eyes drifted closed once more.

Unconscious but alive, the swordsman collapsed into blissful, painless oblivion.





Day 1: 10:37am

[Seraphina]

Act XXXVI: The Meaning of Failure




Day 1: 11:42am





Hitomi had seen a great deal in her life that had left an indelible mark upon her. Sights that had hardened her, or so she had believed, to much of the grim realities that a soldier could potentially face along the road. She had seen death, she had dealt death, she had come close to falling to death herself. Perhaps, in arrogance, she had believed that she had seen enough to remain unphased by the potential horrors that could be unleashed before her eyes.

She had been wrong.

For a long time after discovering the village, she had been unable to do anything. The first glimpse of the tiny, immobile bodies lying among the debris had left her retching upon the ground, her fingers tightening into fists with such ferocity that her fingernails had cut painfully into the palms of her hands. Neither she nor Junshin had seen anything that had prepared them for the sight of dead children; only Hisayo, her expression grim, had gone unaffected.

Allowing the two Shinigami time to collect themselves, the raven haired woman had been more interested in the trail of fading spiritual pressure that had led them to the village in the first place. Disappearing alone into the ruins, she had returns some half an hour later bearing the shredded remains of the man who, currently, she was tending to in the broken remains of one of the few buildings that still had anything that passed for a roof. Her return had roused the Shinigami, and they had moved to carry out her instructions to begin a burial detail in a rigid, mechanical fashion.

Hitomi tried not to think about what she was doing, repeatedly telling herself that the cold, limp bodies - young and old - that she carried to lay gently within the stone lined graves she and Junshin had dug were merely sleeping. There were twenty of them in all, though Hitomi imagined that a few others could possibly lie buried beneath the rubble. Time did not permit them a lengthy search; it would take days to scour the ruins. The least she could see to, however, was that those discarded in the street were properly seen to. It was a grim, heart wrenching task - the faceless casualties of war who’s names she would never know, who’s stories she would never hear, eternally silenced in an act of wanton violence that she could not possibly see a sense to.

She found herself recalling the many inhabitants of Solace, and wondered if she was perhaps looking at an echo of Tachibana Motonari’s intended genocide there. The fact she had been able to prevent that massacre six years ago was no comfort now. It did not breath life into the departed, nor close the sightless, glazed eyes that stared forth from faces perpetually frozen in horror. For now, she simply continued to work, knowing that she would only be able to so for as long as she remained numb to the anger and grief that would, eventually, catch up with her.

As she returned to the town proper after laying her last charge to rest, she hesitated midstep as she noted that her companion had stopped working. Squatting upon the ground, his head between his knees, Junshin appeared to have finally seen enough. As she watched, the young man peered down at his hands - his palms and fingers caked in a thin layer of crusty, half dried blood. An unintelligible sound, half way between a whimper and a gurgle, tore itself from the boy’s throat as he pressed his hands to the stone earth, scrubbing them back and forth against the rough surface as though to rid them of the stains. Hitomi, resisting the urge to look down at her own hands - knowing that they would be similarly marked - made her way towards her counterpart, reaching out to touch her fingertips lightly to his shoulder.

“It won’t come off….” Junshin murmured without turning, sounding more as though he was talking to himself than to her. Hitomi’s gaze flickered briefly from Junshin to the motionless form that still lay in front of him. An old man, some seventy years of age - his skull almost entirely caved in on one side - had finally been enough to push Junshin over the edge. “It won’t come off…won’t come off…won’t come off…come off…come off….damn it, come off!”

Her purple eyes turning back towards Junshin and his frantic scraping, Hitomi winced as she realised his hands were now leaving two slick tracks in the stone - slick lines of red where his own skin had been broken by his panicked actions. His shoulders shaking, Junshin barely even seemed to notice, if anything redoubling his efforts against the stone; oblivious to the pain as the heels of both his hands were shredded against the surface.

Hitomi, looking on as though in a trance, finally reacted as she stooped behind her squad mate, reaching over is shoulder to snatch a hand around his left wrist, the other gripping his right elbow to arrest the motions of his arms. The sudden contact seemed enough to break Junshin from his mortified daze, and his body rattled with a sharp, half-gasped intake of breath as he became aware of what he had been doing. Hitomi held him in place a moment longer until, satisfied that he would not continue, she released her grip.

Still trembling, Junshin stared down at his hands - now slick with his own blood - though his expression was passive. If the jagged gashes carved into his palms caused him pain, he made a better show of coping with it that she would have expected of him just a few days previously. With a long, ragged sigh of her own, Hitomi turned to seat herself upon the ground behind him, back to back with the other Shinigami as she, too, took a moment to collect herself.

No words passed between them for a long time. His back pressed against her own, Hitomi could feel Junshin’s lungs expanding and contracting with every deep, weighty breath. He was calmer now, but the seething aura of his spiritual pressure was as unsettled as she had ever sensed it. It was almost painful to see the young man so disquieted…she recalled, somewhat bitterly, that upon setting out on their journey she had thought Junshin would be struck hard by whatever they encountered on the Outer Rim. The hardships, the poverty, the violence…she had not believed him capable of dealing with it. She had not at that time, however, predicted anything as horrific as what they now found themselves embroiled in.

“I’m sorry….” she found herself uttering, her head tilting upwards as she gazed into the clear, cloudless blue sky above. “For everything you’ve been through until now….I’m sorry.”

Junshin didn’t reply, merely shifting his posture. Having remained squatted upon the ground, the youth adjusted his footing to sit upon the ground - reclining his weight against Hitomi as she did against him. Propping each other up, the two rested among the rubble. It was only a temporary reprieve - their task remained unfinished, but a few moment’s rest to steel themselves was, to Hitomi at least, a calming oasis among the carnage.

“You have nothing to apologise for, Seraphina-kun,” Junshin eventually replied. “You didn’t cause this.”

“Maybe not,” Hitomi nodded, her eyelids sinking to half-shield her eyes as she heaved a long sigh. “But the only reason you’re here is because you went along with me. You would never have picked this assignment if I hadn’t taken interest in it…It’s because of me that you’re out here. That you’re having to go through all of this….’

“…I’m sorry…” she repeated, her eyes closing tightly, a tremble entering into her voice as she felt her own will strain against the sheer scope of what lay around them. She could never have imagined that this is what they would find themselves arrayed against when they had set out - a host of powerful enemies, a slumbering evil beneath the sands of the Rukongai, and atrocities the likes of which their young minds were not prepared for. The sense of giddy excitement she remembered feeling upon setting out was now almost enough to make her feel sick.

Her fingers tightening around the hilt of her zanpakuto, sheathed at her side, the cold metal of the weapon offered no comfort. The sword still gave no outward sign of life, offering no guiding words or thoughts to help see her through. Now, more than ever, she found herself wishing that the weapon would reach out to her; even if it could not help, mere words would be a comfort.

‘Why…won‘t you speak to me…?’




“I’m not.”

Junshin’s statement jolted Hitomi sharply from her despair, her eyes opening once more as she turned to look over her shoulder at her companion. Though she could see little more than his shoulder and one side of his face, she noted that the unsteady, halting rhythm of Junshin’s breath had evened out somewhat; his reiatsu, though still unsettled, had calmed considerably also. He did not continued immediately though, appearing to simply stare ahead as though in silent, internal contemplation.

“I’m glad that’s it’s you and me out here,” he finally continued. “If it was anyone else….I don’t know what they’d do after seeing all of this. Maybe they’d go insane…maybe they’d give up…maybe they’d go on, but just leave these people lying here. But because it’s us…because it’s me and Seraphina-kun…I know exactly what we’re doing to do.”

Hitomi very nearly tipped backwards as Junshin moved - clambering to his feet, the youth wiped his blood hands on the front of his tunic, before reaching out to scoop up the body of the old man. Turning towards Hitomi to make his way back towards the gravesite, she saw his face for the first time - his jaw clenched, his expression one of grim resolve.

“We’re going to do the right thing, here,” he stated emphatically, seeming to draw strength from gaining direction. “And then we’re going to get stronger…we’re going to get much stronger. We’re going to get strong enough that, when we meet the ones who did this, we’re going to make sure they never do it again.’

“The stakes are higher than we first thought,” he continued, “but all that means is that we have to try harder. I’m not going to give up, and I’m not going to run away. What’s happened here can never be allowed to happen again…I won’t allow it to happen again.”

Keeping herself upright by propping the palms of her hands against the ground, Hitomi could only blink in mute surprise at the sudden transformation in her companion. Appearing resolute, Junshin swept past her to continue about his work, gently bearing the body to its final resting place as Hitomi, shaking off her stupor, quickly scrambled to her feet to follow suit.

‘He’s becoming really strong….far stronger than I give him credit for.’

Watching after Junshin for a few moments, Hitomi drew in a steadying breath - drawing a degree of comfort from Junshin’s sudden determination. Wiping her own hands on the front of her sundress - the garment given to her by Hisayo having become caked in dirt and grime for their journey across the Rukongai anyway - she used her slightly cleaner hands to brush back some of her hair which had, during her work, tumbled across her eyes. The sun was merciless, leaving tiny pinpricks of heat upon her exposed skin, but she found herself strangely refreshed as she, too, resumed their assigned task. If the past offered no comfort to the present, then she would instead look to the future. Junshin was correct; they could at least take some solace in attempting to prevent a repeat of what had occurred in this village.

Whether to protect other innocents, or to avenge those already fallen, Kuroken could not be allowed to continue. She had no idea how much stronger she could become by the time the final encounter came…she knew only that she no longer felt any hesitation in moving towards it.






*****


It took some three hours to bury the remainder of the villagers, ensuring that they were deep enough in the ground that carrion could not simply dig them back up. Doing so left Hitomi still feeling physically sick, but there was a certain satisfaction in knowing that, at least, they could perform that final courtesy to the nameless civilians.

It made her wonder how many of the people she had killed had simply been left to rot beneath the sun.

With an effort, she kept such thoughts from her mind as, exhausted, she and Junshin staggered back to where Hisayo was likely occupying herself with the mysterious man she had plucked from the rubble. Although she had initially been overseeing their efforts, she had vanished upon spotting her patient stagger away from the building in which they had housed him, and had not returned since. Hitomi had been aware, if dimly, of the near constant itch of the woman’s spiritual pressure in the back of her head since that moment. She had likely been working upon the man’s injuries ceaselessly since then.

The sun having long since begun its descent from its peak, there were nevertheless many hours of daylight left as the pair advanced upon the building. The shadows of the ravaged buildings were, however, beginning to lengthen. Marching alternatively from heat to shade, Hitomi thought it a wonder that neither herself nor Junshin found themselves scorched and sunburnt. She imagined that their reiatsu - which, true to Hisayo’s instructions that had not allowed to waver from their maximum - provided a cushion of some sort from the worst of the damage.

The simple act of maintaining her maximum level of reiatsu had, at least, became easier. She no longer had to consciously direct her reiatsu to that point, simply allowing it to fall into place with the same reflexive ease that she would place one foot in front of the other to walk. Junshin, also, appeared to be becoming more used to the strain upon his body - at the very least he no longer accidentally crushed anything he came in contact with. Although maintaining such high expenditure of their reiatsu left even the most simple task a draining one, they were nevertheless learning, if slowly, to properly exercise the upper limits of their powers.

As the made their way through the broken remnants of the buildings wall - the tiny fragment of roof now casting a long and wide enough shadow that much of the interior was cast into shade - the two Shinigami flopped wordlessly into seated position. Her head rolling back on her shoulders, Hitomi reclined until her shoulders touched the scorched stone floor, resisting the urge to simply fall asleep there and then.

Hisayo did not look up as the two returned, her attention focused entirely on the muscular warrior in her care. Having reapplied his bandages, she was in the process of testing his right arm - having removed it from the sling to bend the man’s elbow back and forth. The limb was in poor shape, the muscle and bone having likely been crushed. When they had found him, the bulging lump of his bicep had been in entirely the wrong place, having been cut free from its tendon to bunch up near his shoulder. This, it seemed, Hisayo had reattached - the man’s entire body a virtual lattice of threaded reiatsu that held his flesh together where his own muscles and bone could not. Even with Hisayo’s expert talents, however, it was unlikely he would see full use of the arm again for years.

The man himself was reclined against the wall, his eyes closed. Hitomi could not at once tell if he were awake or not. It was Junshin, however, that first broke the silence - the moment the young man spoke, Hisayo’s patient opening his eyes to look back and forth among his assembled rescuers.

“How is he?” Junshin queried, sitting with his elbows rested on his raised knees, his dark hair clinging to his features due to perspiration.

“He will live,” came Hisayo’s reply, apparently satisfied enough with the progress of the man’s arm that she returned it to the sling - the range of motion sufficient to cause her patient to grunt in pain. “Although in worse condition that he would have been had he simply stayed put when he woke up.”

The man grimaced at her words, though he offered a nod of thanks as she settled his limb within the sling. As Hisayo withdrew to rise to her feet, he finally raised his voice to address the three of them.

“Apologies…I was not thinking straight. But I thank you. All of you,” his voice was deep and husky, his accent most certainly not that was west Rukongai. “For my life…and for what you did for the villagers. It was a task that should have been mine…I am indebted to you all.”

Neither Shinigami replied immediately, waiting for Hisayo - for all intents and purposes the group’s leader - to take the initiative. When the raven haired women said nothing, her intention instead turning to a cloth sack that had been deposited in the centre of the room, Hitomi took the initiative instead. Levering herself back into a seated position, she offered the man a brief bow.

“You don’t need to thank us,” she replied. “We are Shinigami…there was no other action we could possibly have taken.”

“Then the Shinigami have changed,” the man responded, though his lips curved into a barest of smiles. “At least from when I knew them. Or perhaps the two of you are simply young enough that the Central Government has yet to get its claws into you….Either way, I believe that I do owe you. I am Yagyu Jubei, and whatever aid I can offer, I am at your service.”

“Aid?” Junshin queried, sitting up slightly straighter. “Then you know what we’re about?”

“Indeed,” Jubei replied. “Sato-dono has informed me of your intentions. I know that you are Seraphina-dono and Kiyoko-dono, from the Fifth Division of the Gotei Thirteen. Sato-dono tells me that you are enemies of the men who destroyed my village….It is my intention to help you.”

Hitomi glanced between Jubei and Hisayo, the latter finally fishing some items from the sack. The woman apparently thought nothing of sharing details of their mission with others…or at least not with this particular man. She could not immediately see, however, how Jubei’s help was likely to benefit them - the fact that they had found him at all was owing to the fact that he did have some spiritual pressure; however, if they were going to take him with us, they would need to wait for his injuries to heal.

Time was a luxury in short supply.

“Having doubts, Seraphina-dono,” Hisayo murmured without looking up, busying herself filling up armfulls of what appeared to be bread and meat. “If you have something to say, you need only say it, no?”

Hitomi started, tearing her gaze away from Hisayo almost immediately. The woman’s uncanny ability to simply ’tell’ whatever she was thinking continued to be a disturbing one. She gave no reply as Hisayo hap hardly tossed a chunk of bread towards Junshin, the latter deftly catching the offered food, though he did not immediately begin to eat. Hitomi, similarly, was thrown a loaf of her own - the mere act of handling food enough to cause her stomach to gurgle loudly, reminding her of just how hungry she was.

“Is…um…is this okay?” Junshin queried, grimacing as he looked down at the bread - Hisayo hardly needing to explain that the food had been looted from the surrounding houses. Hitomi could not deny similar misgivings, feeling very much as though she were stealing from the very people she had just buried.

“There was plenty of food within the village,” Hisayo stated flatly. “We’ll eat this for now, and save our rations for the desert. They’ll keep for longer, so there’s no sense wasting them now. I doubt it could be claimed that they need it more than we do.’

“I trust,” she added, glancing over her shoulder at Jubei, who looked on impassively, “that you have no objections?”

“None,” the man shook his head. “If it is your intention to avenge those who have fallen, and rescue those who did not, then some food is the very least that could be offered.”

“Just so, then,” Hisayo affirmed with a nod, rising to her feet to march back to Jubei, thrusting what appeared to be a cooked - if thoroughly cold - bundle of wrapped meat into his hands. “You should eat too…You need to get your strength back more than they do, no?”

Jubei accepted the offering, nodding a brief thanks, though he did not appear to have much of an appetite - Hitomi thought it understandable, considering how many people he had known were now dead. Initially he merely nibbled upon the meat; however, as Hisayo continued to loom over him with a disapproving glare, he eventually began to eat in earnest, simply forcing down the food that his appetite could not.

Hitomi, remembering her own hunger, began to tear off chunks of bread to shovel into her own mouth with an eagerness that almost surprised her. Denied sleep or much in the way of rest while she and Junshin continued to burn through their reiatsu in accordance with Hisayo’s exercise, food was a poor substitute for a good night’s sleep…but it was a substitute, and she was content to allow it to serve that purpose. Imagining that she could quite happily tear through five or six similar loaves, the three Shinigami were silent as they ate. Hisayo alone went empty handed, pacing the length of the wrecked home with her hands clasped behind her back, waiting for her charges to finish their meal.

“We will not remain here for long,” she finally stated, her gaze directed through the shattered wall across the empty, silent village. “We must gain as much ground as we can before nightfall. The enemy is tireless, and they will almost certainly teach the far side of the Outer Rim before we do. There, they will be forced to take a marked path through the desert, however, to avoid becoming lost. I, meanwhile, know the exact location of Pinnacle, and can guide us there in a straight line.’

“We will buy ourselves some time,” she stated, “but at best we will still arrive only just after them. We will arrive at Pinnacle within four days. In that time we will either be prepared….or we will be dead.”

‘Paints a very lively picture, doesn’t she?’

Hitomi spared a glance in the direction of Jubei, the latter still gulping down the food offered by Hisayo. She doubted very much that he would be in any fit state to travel anytime in the near future. However, Hisayo’s earlier words to herself and Junshin were, most likely, applied to him also.

“I’m not going to mollycoddle you, and I’m not going to set a pace you’re comfortable with….I’m going to push both of you to breaking point, because there’s no other way you’re going to be ready in time.”

“Yagyu-san,” Hisayo continued, without turning towards her patient. “I am afraid that I must ask you to risk your life and travel before you are fully healed. The injuries you have suffered were inflicted by a reiatsu I recognise…the fact that you are alive at all suggests to me that you yourself must be incredibly strong. We cannot delay, but you are a resource that I cannot simply discard. The odds are, I must admit, not in our favour and even one more sword arm capable of fighting evenly with a member of Kuroken may be enough to tip the balance.”

“…I understand,” Jubei replied, pausing for a moment in his eating, though he did not look up. “The moment you saved my life, Sato Hisayo-dono, you became my Captain. I shall do my utmost to survive whatever road you choose.”

Hitomi saw, or thought she saw, a brief smile play across Hisayo’s bow shaped lips. However, it was gone in an instant as she sharply turned on her heel to address the trio. Stretching to her full height, she regarded her tired troops for a moment - Hitomi feeling the same, uncomfortable sensation of being silently appraised that she still could not become accustomed to.

“Then for now eat, and regain your strength,” Hisayo advised. “We leave in one hour.”



Day 1: 03:06pm

- - - Updated - - -


Act XXXVII: The Voice of Experience



Day 1: 04:02pm



It was just short of an hour later that Hisayo, having vanished once more into the ruins upon the declaration of her selected deadline, finally returned to them. Advising that she had determined the route that their quarry had taken both to arrive and to leave, she simply ordered that the three Shinigami rise and get underway. Her instruction brooked no argument and, somewhat wearily, Junshin moved to comply. His limbs, however, felt heavy - his body not immediately responsive until, with a groan of effort, he was finally able to rise.

The brief rest may have done his energy levels some good, but it had done little for his body. All that had been provided was time for his muscles to cramp up, and the adrenaline of exercise to fade away, leaving in its wake throbbing aches that danced a merry jig across his entire person. Hisayo was unsympathetic, however, merely setting out at a brisk pace with little attempt to wait for the three Shinigami to catch up. Hitomi was the first to set off after her, casting a concerned backward glance as Jubei as the latter lurched to his feet with the aid of the nearby wall, before turning to pursue Hisayo through the rubble.

Junshin hesitated only a moment longer, watching as the newcomer to the group grit his teeth in what was obviously a moment of pain, before managing to force his body into a forward march. Some colour had returned to his features - both Hisayo’s ministrations and the man’s own returning reiatsu having taken him through the worst of his injuries - but Junshin doubted he was quite well enough to travel.

“Are you alright, Yagyu-san?” he queried, falling in step beside the older man as he made his way from the building - stepping into the warm glare of the sun that, even in late afternoon, was still mercilessly hot.

“I will be fine, Kiyoko-dono,” Jubei nodded, managing a half smile. “I doubt I could fight right now…but I can at least march. Besides, Sato-dono is correct…we cannot afford to delay so long as the distance between ourselves and the enemy grows. I will be ready, when the time comes.”

“Mhmm,” Junshin nodded, rather non-committaly, wondering exactly how much about the enemy that Hisayo had actually told the man. He found it difficult to imagine that she had divulged the full details of the potential cataclysm the group intended to unleash, simply because - had Hitomi not relayed the sheer scope of the reiatsu felt from the vent to him - Junshin was quite sure he would not have believed it himself.

“I’m sorry if it’s rude of me to ask outright,” he eventually continued, giving Jubei a brief sideward glance, “but you’re a Shinigami, are you not?”

Jubei did not answer, rather his own dark eyes merely turned towards Junshin, prompting the younger of the two to quickly snap his gaze away. There was a certain apprehension in Jubei’s gaze that answered the question as clearly as any words could. Rogue Shinigami were invariably hunted by the Onmitsukido, and Junshin doubted that this man was in the middle of the Rukongai with official approval.

“It’s…it’s not really my business,” he elaborated. “I was just curious…Now that your reiatsu is coming back, I just realised it felt more like Seraphina-kun’s and mine than it did Sato-san’s. All the spiritually aware beings I’ve met who were self taught feel a little more…..rugged, than we do. You don’t have to answer if you don’t want to. But, either way, you don’t have to worry that I’ll tell anyone you’re out here.”

Falling silent, Junshin continued to advance - keeping his gaze upon the turned backs to Hisayo and Hitomi ahead of them. As he watched, Hitomi suddenly quickened her pace; vaulting dexterously over some low-lying rubble to catch up with the other woman. Although they were too far head for Junshin to clearly hear what was said, he imagined they were discussing the road ahead…of greater interest to him was the fact that Hitomi appeared to still have full motility, even as Junshin could feel entire sections of his body seizing up.

“You look like you’re having trouble,” Jubei suddenly spoke, causing Junshin to jump in surprise. The other man had not turned towards him, his own gaze directed at the ground beneath his feet as he carefully picked his way through the scattered debris. “You’re using your own muscles too much, Kiyoko-dono…you should let your reiatsu carry some of the load.”

“Heh…” Junshin smiled rather bitterly, shaking off his hands to fight off the numbness he could feel settling in. “Seraphina-kun once told me the same thing…I’m just not really sure how to do it. She taught me how to move my spiritual pressure around, and fortify my body with it…but I can only really do it for seconds at a time. I wouldn’t even know where to begin letting it take over completely from my muscles.”

“Truly?” Jubei quirked an eyebrow, turning his head to look at Junshin directly once more. “I find it odd that you would not have picked that up by now….what seat are you, Kiyoko-dono?”

“Oh, I’m not,” Junshin waved a hand, shaking his head. “Seraphina-kun and I graduated from the Academy about a week and a half ago. We only just joined our squad, so neither one of us has a seat yet.”

Junshin continued on at the same weary pace, his feet plodding onwards as he sidestepped the worst of the fallen stone. As they made their way towards the village outskirts, the broken remains of the buildings was joined by large chunks of wood from the devastated outer wall - hurled among the buildings by the colossal explosion that had burst in from the outside. The young Shinigami had taken several steps before he realised that he was alone and, stopping, turned to look back of his shoulder to find that Jubei had stopped several paces behind him.

To say that the older man looked surprised would have been something of an understatement. His eyes bulging within his head, Jubei blankly stared at Junshin for several long, silent seconds. Junshin, quickly becoming uncomfortably beneath the man’s astonished gaze, shifted uncomfortably - feeling a measure of relief as Jubei eventually turned his eyes towards Hitomi who, along with Hisayo, was currently passing through the gaping hole in the outer wall.

“You mean to tell me,” Jubei finally murmured, resuming his pace to draw level with Junshin, “that the two of you are mere recruits?”

Junshin checked a flinch at the use of the word ‘mere’, but silently nodded. He was quickly becoming used to being considered out of his depth, despite his earlier words to Hitomi. There was little doubt that two recruits should not, by any stretch of the imagination, have been on the mission they were on. That being so, they were on it…his low rank would have to simply be put aside for the moment.

“Hah….” Jubei let out what sounded halfway between a chuckle and a bitter grunt as the two resumed their march. “I see….Sato-dono is cunning indeed. So, it isn’t my sword arm at all that she wants…”

“I’m…not sure I follow,” Junshin ventured, his brow furrowing as he looked from Jubei back in the direction Hisayo had taken - though the two women had now passed through the hole in the gate and, until Junshin and Jubei did the same, remained out of sight.

“If Sato-dono is a wilder,” Jubei replied, “then there is likely only so much that she can teach you…I had assumed that you were a seated officer, going by your spiritual pressure. At my strongest, I’m still well above you…but I graduated from the Academy more than a century ago. If what I am feeling now represents your rate of growth after only a few days, then I believe Sato-dono intends for me to help you along. I suppose it’s possible that you might even become stronger than me.’

“I wonder now,” he murmured, his own gaze following Junshin’s to peer through the gap in the wall, “if you’re coming here was any accident at all. My reputation on the Outer Rim is well known…and it would be no great guess to conclude that I was a Shinigami. Perhaps she came here specifically to seek me out.”

Junshin did not reply, his gaze dropping to his feet as he found himself silently considering Sato Hisayo himself. The woman had made no mention whatsoever to Jubei until she had plucked him from the rubble, though it was true that the mountain road they had taken to reach the ruined village seemed, to him at least, to be quite a lengthy detour. The wheels that turned within Hisayo’s mind, however, remained unknown to him…whatever thoughts and plans swirled behind her maroon eyes, she certainly had not shared them with him.

“If you can offer me any of your knowledge,” Junshin eventually responded, “I would appreciate it greatly…but you keep talking about training me. What about Seraphina-kun?”

“No,” Jubei immediately shook his head, his lip curving into a bitter, mirthless smile. “I am afraid that I cannot teach her anything.”

Junshin frowned, though he did not immediately ask why. Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed Jubei’s hand drop to his side - his fingers clenching around the spot where, had he carried one, a zanpakuto’s hilt would have resided. The man’s fingers closed around empty air, however, grasping at nothingness as he continued to stare at the point in which they had last seen Hitomi; if anything, his eyes carrying a heavy note of sympathy.

“What you lack is experience,” Jubei finally continued. “I can provide that….what she lacks is something infinitely more difficult to acquire, and something that cannot be given by another. Her reiatsu is disconnected…as though she is using only the tip of a sword and ignoring, or perhaps simply unable to see, the entire length of the blade. There is only one person capable of training her….and it is not someone that she will find by looking outward.”

“You’re very perceptive,” Junshin nodded, his shoulders rising and falling in a brief sigh. “You’re talking about her Zanpakuto? Ever since the day I met her, that sword has just seemed…..dead. I’ve only just started to communicate with mine, and I’ve become much stronger since I did. But Seraphina-kun….I don’t think she feels anything from her Zanpakuto.”

“Perhaps it will come in time,” Jubei shrugged, “but either way, I cannot help her. In any case, the exercise you are both undertaking will likely increase your spiritual pressure, but you are going to need more than that. If you will forgive me for saying so, Kiyoko-dono, you’re knowledge of the Shinigami arts is lacking. You may have the reiatsu of a fifth seat, but you cannot possible have acquired the skills that would be required to fight on the level of one. If you still don‘t know how to let your reiatsu take over your body‘s movements, then in practical terms you would in all likelihood be unable to defeat a seventh or eighth seat as you are now.”

If Jubei intended to pose the statement as a talking down, it had entirely the opposite effect on Junshin. His head spun with the numbers that Jubei simply churned out, barely able to entertain how preposterous the notion was. There was no conceivable way, in his mind, that he could be anywhere near such a level of ability. Although Hisayo had already advised him of the volume of his spiritual pressure, he had never truly considered the implications - the thought of him being able to stand toe-to-toe with any seated officer, let alone a single digit, would have been absurd to him only a few days previously.

He had always been told that the difference in strength between a single-digit and another Shinigami was difficult to express in words. The sheer scope of power that the Shinigami elite were capable of exercising was almost impossible for the average fighter to imagine - it was like a child trying to understand the physical strength of an adult. Although still so far beneath the strength of a third seat that they were dwarfed into insignificance, even a ninth seat should have been, in theory, exponentially more powerful than any of his subordinates. Somehow, however, Junshin found himself believing it.

Certainly, his fight against the Hollow on their first day out seemed a long time ago, now. He knew even without being told that, were he to face the exact same opponent today, he would have utterly dismantled the creature. He could feel that he had grown stronger…every fibre of his being told him that he was a thoroughly different warrior than he had been when he set out.

Or perhaps it was more accurate to say that he had not truly been a warrior then…he had simply become one somewhere along the road.

“Seraphina-kun has taught me a great deal,” he finally murmured. “I doubt that I will ever be able to truly repay her for the strength she has given me until now….But you’re right, Yagyu-san. She has her own training to worry about now, and I can’t keep slowing her down so she can check up on me. If you are willing to teach me, then I promise that I will be willing to learn.”

“That is well,” Jubei nodded, wearing the first genuine smile that Junshin believed he had seen from the man. “But you had best be prepared…if you believe that Sato-san’s exercise is punishing, then you had best steel yourself for some real training.”

Smiling weakly, feeling suddenly uncertain as to how good an idea this was, Junshin nevertheless continued alongside the larger man as they finally passed through the gate. Ahead of them, the road dipped into a slope that wound its way steeply down through the mountains - Hitomi and Hisayo visible ahead of them, moving at a brisk pace. As he watched, Hitomi looked back over her shoulder, hesitating when she noted that they were both in view again.

“Junshin-kun,” she shouted, raising a hand to either side of her mouth to project her voice across the distance that separated them - a matter now of some hundred meters. “Do you want me to wait for you?”

“No,” Junshin shouted back, raising his own hands to amplify his reply. Their words echoed across the steep rocky slopes to either side of the trail, carrying effortlessly across the distance. “You keep going. I’ll catch up!”

Hitomi seemed hesitant, but as Hisayo reached out to flick the back of her hand against the girl’s arm - a rare show of impatience from the woman - the redhead merely offered a final wave before turning to follow their raven-haired guide down the track. Junshin, beginning the descent down the slope himself, watched the two continue steadily away.

‘I swear I’ll catch up…I won’t be the one that slows you down, Seraphina-kun.’

“Let’s go, Yagyu-sensei,” he affirmed, before taking off at a brisk trot down the road, the slope lending him speed as, Jubei keeping pace beside him, he set off after his companion.




Day 1: 04:16pm

[Seraphina]

Act XXXVIII: Going Back to Where it All Began



Day 1: 09:11pm



Hitomi could not recall ever walking for so long in her entire life. The shin-high walking boots that she had borrowed from the Kuroda household could only protect her so much from the jarring impact of the stone beneath her feet until, eventually, every footfall rattled up the length of her legs to leave her throbbing at merely the thought of continuing further. The mountain trail seemed to go on forever, winding in a perpetual angle of descent that was surrounded, at most points, by a steep rise on both sides. With little to allow her to gauge altitude, Hitomi could do little more than wander in Hisayo’s wake - falling slightly behind the other woman as the latter continued to stride on with no sign of fatigue - in the hopes that their journey would eventually reach a conclusion.

As the afternoon lengthened into evening, Hisayo had allowed the group a brief fifteen minutes of respite - largely, Hitomi imagined, to give Junshin and Jubei time to catch up. However, even as the sun continued to sink beneath the horizon, the high rocks to either side enveloping their path in deepening shade, it would not be until they ground beneath their feet finally began to level out that Hitomi felt a measure of relief. Their descent, at least, was over.

Almost immediately after returning to level ground, the narrow road yawned wider into open ground - the rising slope of the mountain slipping away to reveal an eternity of flatland beyond its reaches; the rocky skin of the Rukongai broken only by the occasional, lonely looking tree that sprang, naked of leaves, from its surface. Having left the greenery of the inner districts well and truly behind, they found themselves looking out upon the landscape that most people envisioned when thinking of the Outer Rim.

It was the land in which Hitomi had been born.

Barren and inhospitable, the bare rock served as the transition from forest to the wasteland beyond. Although it did still rain in this part of the Rukongai, and indeed could do so frequently, the dry, scorching winds that swept in from the deserts beyond the Outer Rim quickly dried whatever precipitation was left after such storms. As a result, what little vegetation existed there was often parched and scorched by the sun. Brittle patches of yellow grass and dry, leafless trees - only the cacti were truly at home, with entire copses of the jagged plant flourishing across the flatlands.

The air itself felt drier, though it was not a true desert yet. The warmth had not left the air, even as the sun finally disappeared from view beneath the distant skyline. It remained oppressively hot, even in the absence of daylight; exactly as Hitomi remembered it.

“I think….” she found herself murmuring, speaking more to herself than to her companions, “I know where we are.”

Junshin, panting heavily for breath, stumbling along a few feet behind her. Having come to a stop as the last of the mountain range flattened out, Hitomi was afforded a near unobstructed view of all that lay to the west of them. Seven year old memories stirred within her, dark shapes upon the horizon - breaking the uniformity of the otherwise level plane - tugged loosely upon her mind. She knew she had never stood upon the spot she now occupied, but she could not deny the familiarity of much of what lay about her.

“Can we rest now?” Junshin panted, placing his hands on his knees as he regarded Hisayo. Unlike the two young Shinigami, both Hisayo and Jubei did not appear to be suffering the worst effects of the journey. Even Jubei, despite his injuries, in fact seemed stronger now than he had when he started; having been afforded enough time for much of his reiatsu to return, the warrior looked ready to march many more miles if required.

“No, we shouldn’t rest here,” Hitomi interjected before Hisayo could reply, turning over her shoulder to offer Junshin an apologetic glance. “We might be okay now, but if the wind picks up we don’t want to be caught in the open. There isn’t much shelter out there…We should keep moving. There’s a town…at least….I think there’s a town not far. That way.”

Raising a hand, she pointed unerringly towards one of the dark blobs against the night sky - a dark shape that blotted out the twinkling stars painted across the horizon. She noted, only after extending it, that her hand trembled upon doing so. Immediately, she snapped her arm back to her side, her eyes moving uncertainly in Hisayo’s direction for approval.

“Seraphina-dono is correct,” Jubei spoke up when Hisayo, rather than respond, merely regarded the young girl with a silent, curious gaze. “Do not let the clear skies fool you…a storm can form within minutes in this part of the world. We should find shelter, and quickly. I believe I know the town of which you speak, Seraphina-dono. It is only some two miles away.”

“Two miles?” it was Junshin that spoke, licking his lips to moisten them before nodding. “I think…I think I can manage another two miles.”

Hisayo, the only member of the group who had yet to venture an opinion, turned her maroon gaze in the direction Hitomi had indicated. If they moved in a straight line, they could cover two miles inside half an hour, even exhausted as they were. However, the woman appeared thoughtful, her attention eventually slipping back to Hitomi - her gaze causing the latter to shift uncomfortably.

“I see,” she eventually murmured, simply giving a nod. “Very well….we shall go that way, then. I assume you know this town also, Seraphina-dono?”

“Y….yes,” Hitomi nodded, casting a glance over her shoulder at the shapeless rise upon the horizon. “I know it well….’

“It’s called Jetsam.”




*****


Some part of Hitomi knew that this was the true reason why she had set out from the Seireiteii to begin with. Whatever notions of duty, or desire to break the cycle of admin duty in which she and Junshin had been trapped, was little more than pretence. Her journey had, as Junshin had put so distinctly on the day they had set out, one in search of closure.

Every step she had taken in the last seven years had been an effort to put as much distance as she could between herself and the life she had left behind. Every battle, every hardship, every wound suffered, she had endured - at least in part - because she believed she would emerge on the far side being able to finally say she had escaped from the events of the day she had fled her home. To become a Shinigami; to make enough of her life that she knew she would never, ever have to go back.

And yet here she was, returning to where it had all began.

Her feet felt heavy as she marched across the flatlands towards her old home, still unclear as to what it was she expected to find there. Perhaps she simply wished, or even needed, to take a final look before she could move on. Perhaps she hoped to show her home town what she had become. Perhaps she hoped her parents would be there…though she doubted that. Her desire to see them now was no stronger than it had been at any time in the last seven years. In that time, her anger had never cooled…

She doubted it ever would.



The march was not a long one - not compared to their trek through the mountains - but she could feel Junshin’s eyes upon her back every step of the way. Their exchange in the Academy common room, now seeming so long ago, burned as though fresh in her mind; if Junshin did not know exactly where they were going, then she at least imagined he had a few ideas. She resisted the urge to look back, however, attempting to keep her pace measured and casual as the blob upon the horizon gradually gained definition as they drew closer.

Set upon a hill that rose starkly from the surrounding plains, the single-street long town of Jetsam overlooked one of the few green forests in District 74 of the Western Rukongai. The steep rise provided a degree of shelter from the savage winds that would often sweep in from further West, allowing the rugged patch of vegetation to spring up from the otherwise parched earth. It was in the shade of those trees that Hitomi had, for the second time, encountered the Shinigami that had changed the course of her life, but it was not where she allowed her feet to lead her. Her companions wordlessly falling in step - content it seemed to let her guide them - she made her way around the rise to the more gentle, northern slope. There, the quartet rejoined the main road that cut its way through the Rukongai, its main branch continuing westward in the direction they would eventually take while another, narrower dirt track ascended the slope towards the tiny collection of buildings.

“You’re sure this is a town?” Junshin queried. “I don’t see any lights.”

“Quiet,” Hisayo’s voice was sufficient to immediately silence Junshin, cutting off any further questions as the woman came to a sudden halt. Reaching out an arm, she blocked the path of Junshin and Jubei, the latter two having been travelling directly behind her. Hitomi, her attention focused entirely on the path ahead, did not even notice as her companions fell behind.

“Why do we stop, Sato-dono?” Hitomi was dimly aware of Jubei’s voice rising to ask the question, thought she found herself no longer paying attention. With every inch of the slope she scaled, she could feel her heartbeat accelerating in her chest - her blood pumping in her ears, drowning out all other sound.

“Give her a head start….” was Hisayo’s simply reply as, finally, the road beneath Hitomi’s feet levelled out once more, leaving the others behind as she made way - at last - into the town of Jetsam.

The buildings appeared exactly as she remembered them - simple, wooden structures, not a single one among them more than two stories in height. Marching by to either side on what was, more or less, a straight line, Hitomi found herself feeling light headed as she half walked, half staggered down the street that, for the first fourteen years of her life, had been the entirety of her world.

Every rise and dip of the well-walked street….every gnarled and grizzled board within the walls of the buildings….every alley…every rooftop…every porch…it all seemed exactly as she had left it. Even in the darkness, she felt as though she could clearly see the most minute of details - paring the indistinct shapes with her memory to form a complete picture, navigating her way as easily as if she were doing so in full daylight.

‘Wait….why is it so dark….?’

The very moment the thought occurred to her, Hitomi stopped dead. The steady beat of her heartbeat tremored to a higher pace, her breath seizing in her lungs as she noticed for the first time what Junshin had already voiced. The row of buildings ahead marched darkly on to either side - every doorway and window cast into pitch blackness. Cut off from the illumination of the overhead stars, the interiors of the buildings appeared even blacker than the night outside - windowa yawning open to admit nothing but empty, lifeless shells.

Before she was even aware that she had set herself back in motion, Hitomi was running. Her tired aching limbs screaming for her to stop, but finding herself unable to slow down as she careered down the street. Her footfalls kicked up a thin cloud of chalky dust, the stone there well worn by the passing of my thousands of feet over the years - lightless buildings passing by as a blur to either side until she located the one for which she searched.

Skidding to a halt, she drew the first breath she had been aware of since realisation had struck her - the air rattling in her lungs as she gazed, wide eyes, at the building that had once been her home. In her memory, a six-foot fence had surrounded the building to afford a degree of privacy. Upon her escape seven years previously, she had caused a section of the fence to collapse when she had thrown herself from the house’s slated roof - at some point in the interceding years, the entire fence had been removed, affording a clear view into the long since overgrown garden that, at one time, she herself had carefully maintained.

In two bounds, she traversed the narrow stone path that led to the front door, not even thinking to remove her boots as her feet thudded onto the wooden porch. Yanking open the building’s front door, she passed without thinking into the blackness beyond, immediately robbed of her sight as her eyes failed to adjust to the sudden lack of illumination.

“Otasan!” she heard her voice break as the word left her lips, echoing into the empty darkness and receiving only silence as a reply. Without thinking, instinct taking over from conscious thought, she raised her right hand as a half-fist, focusing a trickle of reiatsu into her palm that, with an electric hum, spat to life as a warm glow of dim, purple light.

In the dingy illumination cast by her gathered reiatsu, the details of the room became clearer to her wide eyes. She took in the low, square table directly in front of the door, surrounded by moth-eaten cushions that had served as a substitute for chairs. Her father’s futon, the covers bunched up as though recently slept in, was arranged in the far corner. The central corridor - largely cloaked in shadows as her dim light refused to reach so far - stretched into the remainder of the house before her.

Almost immediately, Hitomi was in motion once more. Charging down the hallway, her booted feet clunking heavily against the wooden floor, she advanced upon the wood panelled door at the far end of the corridor; the door that should have led into her mother’s room. Once, there had been no other place in the world that had terrified Hitomi more than the room that lay beyond the very door that she reached for. However, today, she did not hesitate as she threw the door open, leaning through the doorway to direct her panicked gaze at what lay beyond.

She stopped dead, her frantic movements finally arrested as she found herself staring at something quite unexpected. In the partial darkness, she had expected to see her mother’s things - the two person futon in which her father never slept, the rich red carpet, her mahogany dresser and desk…and yet, there was none of that. The light cast from her raised fist instead played across what appeared to look like a utility room; shelves stocked with cans of paint and wood varnish, mops and shovels, sand paper and brushes. Much of what she would have expected to find, in fact, in her own room.

The transformation was so extreme that, for a moment, Hitomi’s mind simply reeled as she stood within the doorway, her knees feeling weak as she wondered for the first time if she was actually in the right house. Her hesitation was momentary, however, simply sliding the door closed as she turned instead to the one immediately to its left - her own room.

“Otasan?” she called again, though she did not expect a reply…nor, for that matter, was she even sure why she would seek the man out, even if she had. The sliding paper door, lacking the quality wooden finish of the one that marked what had once been her mother’s room, offered no response and, her hand trembling, she reached out to slide it open.

When she had last seen her room, at had been in a state that could politely be described as ‘poor repair’. Her awakening spiritual powers had caused a massive, circular hole to be burned into the roof - opening her room to the night sky - while, during her escape, she had punched holes in the paper of the exterior wall while using it to climb to safety through that same hole. It was only after she had opened it that she recalled the door, also, had been ripped through by one of the men pursuing her.

She had more than half-expected to find her room exactly as it had been…however, it had undergone a similar transformation to her mother’s dwelling next door. Her futon was still present - the sheet neatly made and spread utterly flat, looking unslept in, but still regularly washed and changed. Her wall and roof had, at some point, been repaired - the illumination cast by her makeshift light revealing unbroken wood panelling overhead where she would have expected to see the hole. The largest change, however, was in the furnishings.

She was only slightly surprised to see that the various tools she had used to maintain the house were no longer present, having seen them herself in the next room. The shelves had been taken down, and the floor swept clean. Instead, a large wooden wardrobe graced the interior wall of her room - something she had certainly not owned when she had been living within the house.

Her entire body feeling numb, Hitomi felt herself curiously drawn to the alien object within what was, otherwise, her room. Holding her hand higher to cast a wider range of light, she took a closer look at the furnishing. It was of simple, hardy construction - the same handcrafted design that she would have expected to see on the Outer Rim. Some degree of skill had gone into its making, however, with a panelled design upon the twin doors that was, perhaps, designed to better match the construction of the room.

Taking hold of one of the bronze handles with her free hand, Hitomi tugged the wardrobe open, revealing a number of dark shapes hanging within. Cautiously, she opened the second door also to afford herself a better look, realising that she was looking at a number of carefully hung kimonos. Trailing her fingers across each in turn, she noted that the size gradually increased as she made her way down the line, seven kimonos in all, for girls of varying ages.



*****


“Do you have any money left?” he asked, his mouth still full, and Hitomi winced inwardly. It was a question she had half expected, but had hoped wouldn’t be asked, and immediately tried to steer the conversation away from drink.

“A little…but Okasama was forbidden me from leaving the house today.”

“Gimmie some,” he father replied immediately, pausing for the first time to properly chew his mouthful as Hitomi’s heart sank…another day with her father heading out to drink it seemed, and with the sun barely in the sky. “What size of kimono do you wear again?”

Hitomi blinked, for a moment unsure if her mind had processed the question correctly. She looked back up at her father, who’s attention was still very much on his roll, blinking in surprise.

“…Size?” she murmured, her brow knotted together.

“I think I remember your kimono being ripped last night, right?” Toda replied, finally finishing his mouthful. “You can’t leave the house, so I’ll go get you a new one….you can’t go on one set of clothes.”

Hitomi felt her lip trembling as she quickly dropped her gaze back to her plate, hoping her father hadn’t seen her reaction. She raised a hand, dabbing the corners of her eyes as she pretended to attend an itch, before looking back up with a smile - the first genuinely happy smile that she had worn for many years.

“Thank you,” she whispered, somewhat hoarsely, “Otasan.”



*****


Hitomi’s fingers clutched tightly within the cloth of the last kimono in line - appearing small for a girl of her height, but likely intended for one of her years. The last conversation she had ever had with her father playing out within her mind as, her shoulders trembling, the sight of the unworn garments blurred with tears before her eyes.

She could not say for certain what the clothes represented. Perhaps they existed merely to ease a guilty conscious, or perhaps they were simply a means of marking the passing birthdays of a lost daughter. Perhaps they were a prayer for forgiveness…or perhaps they simply represented a man’s hope that his child would, one day, return home.

Whatever the reason…they were a gift that had waited seven years for her to claim them.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YB_bjgFdx20

She didn’t hear the first sob, but she felt it. Her entire body shook as it escaped, wracking her slender frame as it proved to be merely the first of many. Her eyes closing tightly in a vain attempt to stop the flow of tears, Reihaii Hitomi wept as she sank slowly to her knees. After seven years of nursing her anger, she felt her rage slowly dissipate as she held the cloth of the kimono over her face, he lilac material quickly becoming wet with her tears.

“You‘ve been alone all this time, Otasan,” she murmured, though she knew that no other ears would hear her. “I won’t forget…I’ll never forget…but maybe, just maybe I can…”

Her final words were swallowed once more in a hacking sob, her fingers curling into a fist within the cloth. For some time, she remained where she sat - for many years or her life having longed to escape from that house…now unwilling to leave it behind. The thought never occurred to her that her father would have abandoned such a carefully preserved memory.

The empty, lifeless down was simply a symptom of what now stretched its shadow over all of the outer rim. Her father, like so many others, snatched from their homes just as Jubei’s village had been. Just as countless settlements across the Outer Rim had doubtless been. She wondered how many people had been taken…how many innocent lives had been dragged off into the desolation beyond the Outer Rim for the sake of one man’s demented ambition?

Hitomi doubted she could even guess at the number. Hundreds? Perhaps thousands? More important to the Shinigami, in that moment, was how many people there still were to take.

“….Not one more….” she uttered into the darkness.

Forcing her aching legs to comply, Hitomi thrust herself unsteadily to her feet - her stiff muscles complying with her demands despite their throbbing objections. Though her knees initially trembled, she forced them to be still with what she was sure was an act more of will than of muscular control. Maintaining her grip on the kimono for a moment longer, she finally allowed the cloth to fall free - settling once more within the wardrobe.

“I won’t allow them to take anyone else,” she vowed beneath her breath. “Not one more man, woman or child. I’ll do whatever I have to…I’ll defeat anyone who gets in my way…I’ll take back everyone they’ve taken and I’ll bring them home….Even if it’s someone that hurt me..’

“I’m done…” she murmured, finally closing over the doors of the wardrobe, casting the waiting clothing once more into darkness, “…with running.”






Day 1: 09:46pm

- - - Updated - - -


Act XXXIX: Come So Far



Day 1: 10:11pm




When Hitomi finally emerged from the house, she noted that her companions had apparently made their way into the town in her absence. Further up the street, before the abandoned shell that had once been the town inn, a flickering glow of orange flame was visible where they had started a fire. The undulating light was sufficient to overwhelm the surrounding starlight, making the world beyond the firelight seem somehow darker, as Hitomi made her way to join the remainder of the group.

The trek along the length of the street was as disquieting one. Leaving the house behind, she walked in her own footsteps as she followed the road in the same direction that she had taken when fleeing for her life on the day she left Jetsam. The silent, empty streets peered back at her unsympathetically as she recalled the panicked child that had charged down the street, turning into a narrow alley only a few yards ahead of her, where the course of her life would have been set - where her young hands would be become stained with blood for the first time.

As she passed the alley, she found herself coming to an abrupt stop. Her body tensing, she felt a sudden cold shiver snake its way up and down her spine as she briefly found herself unable to look in its direction. She had seen the alley countless times in her sleep, the events within played back over and over before the lidless eyes of her dreams. It was at the same time when her life had been at its darkest, and yet it was also the place where - for the first time - a ray of light had broken through the fog. The day that Shadrin had stepped into her life was the single most important thing that had ever happened to her…it was unfortunate that his arrival was surrounded by such grim memory.

She knew, at least in some fashion, that some part of her had never left that alley. The parting of a man’s jugular and the warm splash of his blood across her face had haunted her since that day. So pivotal a moment in her life did it seem that she sometimes felt it had taken on a near mythological quantity - coloured by her nightmares into something that hardly seemed part of reality at all. She knew, though she had no urge to return there, that those nightmares would never leave her so long as it remained so.

She had come to Flotsam, knowingly or not, to close the door on her past. She could never do so when her reality remained clouded by the perceptions of a child.

“I’m done with running…” she murmured under her breath, echoing her early words to herself in an attempt to summon up resolve. “I’m done with running….I’m done with running….done running….”

Grinding her teeth, she made an attempt to will her head to turn. However, her muscles felt suddenly seized up. Unable, or perhaps more likely unwilling, to look towards the alley. She did not know what she expected to see - she doubted she would see anything. She entertained no notions that the man she had killed, or those Shadrin had killed while rescuing her - would still lie strewn among the dust seven years after the fact. However, she could not shake off the image of blood stained walls and wet sand…or the air being parted by the last gurgling breath of a dying man.

She was already moving again before she was aware of it. Her feet moving at a brisk pace to put the alley behind her. There remained some things for which she simply was not yet ready…that corner of her past remained one of them. Content to let her feet lead her, she continued on her way towards the fire, noting as she drew closer that only one other member of the group was present.

Sato Hisayo crouched alone beside the flame, prodding at the burning wood - which Hitomi imagined had simply been torn from the surrounding buildings - to further stoke it to life. There had been no effort to unpack bedrolls or other camping equipment, as the inn would likely have all the furnishing they would need for a night’s rest. It was only as Hitomi finally flopped down on the opposite side of the fire from the other woman that she realised how utterly exhausted she was.

The two did not exchange words, Hisayo not asking where Hitomi had been and Hitomi not eager to volunteer the information. The silence that passed between them was filled only by the dry crackle of the flame, the wood burning generously to bathe the two in its warm glow. Hisayo, still wearing her black shozoko, was almost invisible in the relative darkness - the light of the flame merely illuminating her face, and giving a hint of depth to her sable hair and clothing. Despite having shed the pretence with which she had carried herself in Flotsam, the woman was still eerily beautiful.

She did not look like a warrior…but then, Hitomi imagined she did not look much like one either. She found herself wondering exactly what path Hisayo’s life had taken to lead her to working with Kuroken. Had she been a noblewoman, born into the service of the Tachibana house? Was she a commoner who had joined his house and simply risen through the ranks due to the powers her birth had granted her? Or was she, like Hitomi herself, simply a girl that had been swept along by the tide of events far larger than she was, left with no choice but to run to catch up.

She didn’t ask….she doubted Hisayo would answer.

“Sato-san,” she murmured instead, breaking the length silence between the two, “tell me about Tachibana.”

“Which one,” Hisayo responded, not looking up from the flames. The reply caused Hitomi to hesitate, as she found herself unsure of which one she actually wanted to know about. She imagined that Tachibana Aoshi, as the more immediate thread, would make more sense….however, at least part of her wanted to know more about Tachibana Motonari, the man who had called himself Imai Hideki. Somehow, she had to believe that it was he, not his son, who would be the eventual enemy they would face.

“Either. Both,” she eventually replied, sitting backwards to relax her weight onto her arms, placing her palms against the ground to hold herself steady. “You worked for the family…you must know something about them that would be useful. I already know a little about Tachibana Motonari….his actions during the War in the South Rukon said a lot about him. But I don’t know anything about his son, except what you’ve told me.”

“That’s because there isn’t much to tell you,” Hisayo murmured, lightly shrugging her shoulders. “Tachibana Aoshi is an ambitious man, but he is attempting to assume a station that is beyond his talents. He does not have his father’s intellect, but Aoshi does have his lust for power and position…He is not so foolish that he believes he could supplant Motonari directly, so he has capitalised on the opportunity granted to him here.’

“The creature imprisoned within Pinnacle,” she continued, raising her hands briefly to the flame to warm her digits, “has given him a chance to rise above his father. What he cannot do himself, it will do for him. He is a man of grand ambition but poor vision….it is likely that he does not even fully understand the horror he could potentially unleash upon the world.”

“You make him sound like some kind of buffoon,” Hitomi observed, quirking an eyebrow. The statement brought a brief smirk to Hisayo’s lips - the latter apparently finding some amusement in it - though her expression almost immediately returned to its usual, unreadable neutrality.

“Make no mistake,” Hisayo corrected, “Tachibana Aoshi represents a significant physical threat to you, me and anyone in the Outer Rim. As I have already told you, his might is sufficient to be compared to one of your Captains and not a single one among the four of us would be capable of matching him as we currently are. However, he spends much of his time meditating within Pinnacle, communicating with his new benefactor. It is my hope that we may be able to undo his plans, defeat Kuroken, and reseal the prison without ever having to confront him.”

“I see…” Hitomi nodded, frowning thoughtfully into the dancing flame as she held out her own hands - feeling her fingers begin to numb slightly as the night air finally began to cool - even the warmth of the outer rim eventually fading late into the night. “And if we do have to fight him?”

“Then,” Hisayo’s reply came along with a lopsided, mirthless smirk, “he will kill us all.”

Hitomi pursed her lips, Hisayo’s grimly honest response not coming as any great surprise. The woman had already stated, in no uncertain terms, that Aoshi was more powerful than Motonari had been when she had fought the latter six years previously. She had, at best, scraped out a victory against Motonari based purely on the absurd level of strength granted to her by her zanpakuto…against an even more powerful adversary, even if her zanpakuto decided to suddenly cooperate, she doubted the same trick would work again; she simply wouldn’t be able to make herself strong enough. Hisayo, it seemed, was correct…even if they became stronger by the time they reached Pinnacle, they could never become so strong that they could defeat a Captain level opponent.

“What about his father?” Hitomi murmured, her memory briefly coughing up an image of the man in question; the stoic, broad shouldered man, with a meticulously groomed beard, slightly hook nose and, as she recalled, eyes that had very much reminded her of a great, predatory bird.

“Most of what I can tell you,” Hisayo shrugged, “you already know. Unlike his son, Tachibana Motonari is a military and domestic genius. The wealth and prestige of the Tachibana house is owed, almost entirely, to his influence. It would be no exaggeration to name him the most powerful man in the Eastern Rukongai…perhaps even in all of the Rukongai itself.’

“His physical abilities have grown since you fought him,” she added. “After you defeated him, he fled to Hueco Mundo with his new allies…I have no idea what was done to him, or what training he underwent but when he returned he was…changed. Even if, by some miracle, we were able to defeat Aoshi…we would stand no chance whatsoever against his father. That is one mountain that we are not destined to scale.”

Hitomi grimaced, the warmth leaving her body as she tried to entertain the concept of Tachibana Motonari being even more powerful than when she had fought him. It was difficult for her to even imagine such absurd levels of strength. She was aware that not all Captains were equal, with some being vastly more powerful than others, but for someone of her level to compare them was virtually impossible; it was as fruitless as looking at two stars, and trying to determine which of them was further away.

“Do you have any idea what he’s doing now?” she queried.

“Motonari?” Hisayo arched an eyebrow. “No…We were sent from his province some years ago, and have not been in communication since. If he has become aware of Aoshi’s plans to subvert him, than he may be fortifying his power base at home. If he is not, then I have no doubt he is attempting to further expand his territory. Much can change in the time we have been gone, however. The fact that we have not reported back yet should not be a cause for concern for him. Our mission to explore beyond the Outer Rim was scheduled to last four years.”

“Well…just so long as he doesn’t come charging out here,” Hitomi stated with a sigh, before suddenly pushing herself to her feet. “In any case, I had best find somewhere quiet to rest.”

“You should get some sleep,” Hisayo advised her, immediately returning to poking the fire. “You haven’t burned through all of your reiatsu yet, but…I’ll allow it, for tonight.”

“Really?” Hitomi couldn’t help but feel a pang of relief at Hisayo’s statement, the idea of having to remain awake until literally being overcome by exhaustion having been a thoroughly unattractive one. However, her relief came along with a certain degree of guilt as she wondered if Junshin had been afforded to the same relaxation.

“He won’t be far behind,” Hisayo stated, almost as though sensing Hitomi’s hesitation. “Kiyoko-dono and Yagyu-dono are inside, practicing jinzen. Kiyoko has another hour in him, at most, before he burns up what he’s got left. You can sleep without a guilty conscious.”

“That….that’s good, then,” Hitomi exhaled, nodding as she set off towards the inn. Hisayo did not look after her, simply continuing to regard the fire from which she had barely looked up for the entirety of their conversation. However, shortly before Hitomi crossed over the threshold of the darkened doorway, Hisayo’s voice arrested her in place once more.

“Seraphina-dono,” the woman called. “You should wash your face.”

Blinking, Hitomi turned to regard Hisayo’s turned back with a raised eyebrow. Instinctively, she lifted a hand to her features, unsure exactly what the woman was referring to. The question was answered almost instantly, however, as her fingertips dabbed at the skin around her eyes - wet and puffy from her earlier tears. The redhead immediately found herself blushing, having not been aware her crying had been quite so obvious.

“Thanks…” she nodded. “…Goodnight, Sato-san.”

Bobbing her head and shoulders in a brief bow, the woman acknowledging her farewell with a casual wave of her hand over one shoulder, Hitomi turned to depart into the inn. For the first night in seven years, she would sleep in the town of Jetsam….were it not for sheer exhaustion, Hitomi imagined that it would not have been the most restful night of her life.

However, the dark shadows in her memories did not creep quite so vividly as they once had; lessened, if only to a certain degree, by the faint echoes of a father’s regret.





Day 1: 10:32pm

[Seraphina]

Act XL: We are Nakama



Day 2: 03:12am




Fukuda Akira nursed his throbbing temples between his index fingers; attempting to massage out the headache that had been building, slowly but surely, over the last several hours. Since the Hell Butterfly bearing the report of Kiyoko Junshin had arrived back at the Seireiteii, his day had taken a decidedly poor turn. Having begun as another routine cycle of bringing some semblance of order to a division that still suffered from large gaps within its hierarchy - as the second highest ranking officer, saddled with all the responsibilities of a Vice Captain in addition to his own - the Sixth Seat could not possibly have prepared himself for the tale that his subordinates had brought to him.

The report had arrived in his office more than three hours previously and, although he had not fully understood a great deal of what was mentioned, he had immediately dispatched a copy to his sole superior. He did not doubt, however, that the final decision as to how to proceed would rest with him. As members of his squad, on a mission upon which he had dispatched them, it would be Akira’s responsibility to see the situation through to its conclusion.

The outlandish tales of monsters beneath the Rukongai, and of high level spiritual beings, however, left him feeling rather out of his depth. Although all Shinigami were trained for combat, the fifth Division - despite boasting one of the most powerful Captains among the thirteen squads - was not comprised of combat specialists. The vocation of the fifth was research and investigation and, although Fukuda’s personal strength may have approximated the power of the sixth seats of most other divisions, he was one of only two single digit seats currently at the division’s disposal.

Lowering his hands to his desk, Fukuda allowed his head to roll backwards upon his shoulder until it struck the high back of his office chair - the padded cushioning fitted to the chair seat and backrest only slightly deadening the impact. It was only a short time ago that he had allowed those two young recruits to walk out of that very office, assignment in hand, and he still was unsure whether or not it had been a good idea to send them.

On the one hand, his subordinates were clearly out of their depth. On the other, he found himself dreading to even imagine what could potentially have unfolded had the Soul Society remained unaware of what was occurring along its borders. As much as he had trouble believing that many aspects of what Junshin had reported could possibly be true, it could not be ignored. Even if many of the facts were exaggerated, there mere possibility that the prestigious and powerful Tachibana house was party to some kind of conspiracy to the detriment of the Seireiteii could not go unexplored.

‘We have to send support…there’s no doubt of that. I just don’t have anyone to send.’

The silence within his office felt oppressive. Fukuda, not for the first time since the Captain had announces her reorganising of the division, wishing that he had been afforded more support that a single ditzy Eighth Seat, who’s career rode a great deal more on charm than it did on talent. Still, he could not complain overmuch…there was no way an event such as this could have been predicted.

Exhaling a low, half growled breath of frustration, Fukuda fumbled among the spread of papers that had carpeted his desk, seemingly without end, for the last several weeks. Somewhere among them, he knew, he would find a detailed personnel list of the entire division. However, he doubted he would find anything there to help him. If the threaT was as grave as Junshin claimed, then even the calibre of officer he had initially intended to send would be insufficient. The only person he could think of, in the entire division, that would be worth sending would be himself…but he was in no position to leave.

‘Damn it, if I just had one more single digit! I suppose I could request help from another division, but the requisition wouldn’t carry any weight unless the Captain Commander signed off on it, and that could take weeks. The only way to get someone dispatched immediately would be if they volunteered without the need for signed orders, and who the hell is going to agree to run off to the Outer Rim based on what sounds like the plot of a monster story….’

Fukuda’s hands froze mid-rummage, his brow knotting together as his thoughts were immediately halted in mid-flow. Abandoning his search through his paperwork, the Sixth Seat once more slumped into his chair as he felt, not for the first time in his life, like a man who was beginning to show his age.

“Akira,” he grumbled to himself with a slow shake of his head, “you’re an idiot. I can‘t believe it took you three hours to think of that.”





*****



For the next hour, the sky above the slumbering Inner City was alive with the dark, fluttering shapes of Hell Butterflies. Flitting in and out of the pale white illumination of street lamps, the black-winged insects danced over the majestic rooftops carrying messages to every corner of the inner city. Every Hell Butterfly within the Fifth Division’s roost deployed to carry a single message to a single recipient. Fukuda Akira, having no idea where to find his intended target, simply scattered the resources at his disposal far and wide in the hope that, somehow, one of them would find the man he sought, or someone that would know him.

Fukuda would have liked to claim that doing so put his mind at ease, though he struggled to get the situation out of his mind. Although he knew that it could take hours, perhaps even all night, for his message to find its way through the vast, country sized Seireiteii - or for that matter for it to be answered - he did not return to bed. Returning to his office instead, he waited there pensively for word to arrive back. Anticipating that a long night lay ahead of him, he summoned one of the division’s nightshift staff for a mug of herbal tea to calm himself. The longer the delay, he knew, the more anxious he was likely to become - if harm were to come to the two young recruits, then it would come because he had foolishly sent them into danger.

As an officer within a military organisation, Fukuda knew that danger was a part - if not the greater part - of a Shinigami’s duties. He had lost officers on assignment before, if rarely…yet he could not help but feel that this occasion was different. This time, the Shinigami in question were relative children, and more importantly had been dispatched against his better judgement. He knew sleep would not come, so there seemed little point in seeking it. Fully prepared to wait for however long it took for a response to arrive, the Sixth Seat settled for what he expected to be many empty hours until the dawn.

It took twenty minutes.

The sudden knock upon his door caused Fukuda to jump, coming far sooner than he had anticipated. Initially startled, he found himself repressing a groan as he thought it more likely that some fresh matter had arisen to demand his attention, whatever small part of him may have wished his message had been responded to. It was therefore with some surprise that he received the report from the young, fresh faced young member of the nightshift that had disturbed his vigil.

“Fukuda-sama,” the youth advised, crouched reverently within the doorway after Fukuda’s instruction to enter. “Some men have arrived in the courtyard. They are asked for you.”

“Men?” Fukuda arched an eyebrow, rising from his seat while making an effort to smooth down his shihakusho. “There’s more than one of them?”

“Three of them, Fukuda-sama,” his subordinate replied. “Shall I send them away?”

“No,” Fukuda shook his head, making his way around the desk to head for the door to his office, the young Shinigami immediately shuffling sideways on the balls of his feet to make way. “I shall meet with them. You said they are in the courtyard?”

“Yes,” the youth replied with a nod. “They did not wish to wait inside. If I may say, Fukuda-sama, they appeared quite….agitated.”

‘Agitated…? And there are three of them? I hope this isn’t something else….oh, please, let it not be something else.’

“Very well, return to your duties,” Fukuda instructed as he stepped past the youth, making his way down the corridor beyond his office at a brisk trot. Outside his office, the building was almost entirely cast into shadows; although the flickering light of a small number of lamps, lit sporadically along the corridor, provided a degree of light, almost all of the offices were currently vacant. With almost the entire division asleep, only the night shift staff busied themselves at this hour - with most of them confined to the central research building on the far side of the Division grounds. As such, there was a certain eerie silence that hung in the air as Fukuda navigated his way through the building towards the exist that would take him into the main courtyard.

It was oweing largely to this quiet, he imagined, that he was able to do distinctly hear the voices of those who waited for him up ahead. Floating through the open frames within the walls that served as windows, though their owners were not visible from the particular corridor Fukuda occupied, he could quite clearly hear the exchange taking place in the courtyard bellow.

Although he had been advised that there were three men waiting for him, he could hear only two voices. The pair were in the process of batting various insults back and forth, one in particular taking little care with the volume of his voice, with the third presumably remaining silent. Fukuda winced as he wondered if the argument was audible from the barracks and, if so, how many of his squad mates were likely to be disturbed by it.

The one small matter for which he could be thankful, however, was that the argument confirmed what he had hoped. The group was certainly there to respond to his summons. As he made his way down a brief flight of stairs that brought him into the main entry-hall of the office building, Fukuda further hurried his steps to advance towards the main door - flung open to admit the cool night breeze.

‘I see…so they must be her friends. He must have brought them here with him.’

“Hey, you could at least show some emotion, ya damn Cyclops. Sera-kun is in trouble, you know?”

“I am aware of that. I am just not panicking. Do not mistake that for not caring.”

“Tch…I guess being in a squad didn’t stop you being a damn robot.”

Stepping through the doorway, Fukuda blinked rapidly as the dim orange flow of the partial lighting within was replaced by a pale blue illumination of unbroken starlight beyond. The night was, in fact, brighter than the building’s interior. Standing upon the threshold of the building, Fukuda took a moment for his senses to adjust to the sudden change, his gaze falling upon the group that awaited him.

The two arguing voices, it seemed, belonged to a pair of youths that did not look any older than the pair he had sent to the Outer Rim in the first place. One - a large, tattooed young man with spiked blonde hair that was quite obviously a different colour from his black eyebrows - was in the process of waving an angry fist at the other. The second of the two, visibly more restrained than his counterpart, stood with his arms calmly folded across his chest, side-on to Fukuda with his long pony tail rippling languidly in the night breeze.

Although both the young men wore a shihakusho - the more brazen of the two having apparently torn off the sleeves off of his to better display his tattoos - Fukuda immediately felt a moment of hesitation as he wondered if he was about to send more children off to face danger. His fears were allayed somewhat, however, by the presence of the third member of the trio.

Further away from the building entrance than his companions, the last member of the group stood with his back to Fukuda; his gaze directed eastward. The same breeze that lapped at the pony tail of the second youth caused the third man’s long blue coat to ripple serenely behind him, the cloth swaying and dancing upon the breeze to the toing and froing of the wind.

“Kain-dono,” Fukuda raised his voice, interruption the arguing pair who immediately turned curiously in his direction. The man to whom Fukuda spoke did not turn, though the officer knew he could not possibly have failed to hear him.

“It’s good that you arrived so quickly,” he continued, making his way down the short flight of wooden stairs that descended to the wide, stone patio upon which the men stood. “Had I known you would have been so prompt, I would have given more precise instructions to my subordinates. Please, come inside and I‘ll brief you on….”

“Fukuda-dono,” Shadrin Kain still did not turn as he replied, his attention focused, unshakably, upon the western horizon. “the specifics don’t matter to us…feel free to give us the short version, so we can get underway.”


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LgAG3Ex1XWA

Taken aback by the curt response, Fukuda frowned as his gaze flickered from Shadrin’s turned back to the previously warring youths. Their quarrel, it seemed, had been instantly forgotten; rallying together the moment Fukuda had appeared, they regarded him in resolved, if impatient, silence.

“I….think it’s best that I at least tell you what you’ll be up against,” he responded cautiously, unsure exactly what to make of the three.

“We don’t care,” came Shadrin’s reply, finally turning on the spot to look at Fukuda directly. Framed against the enormous, milky white sphere of the moon - almost directly behind him - the warrior settled his cobalt gaze upon Fukuda with an expression that spoke the same uncompromising determination as his companions. “A lengthy briefing will just slow us down…that’s a pain in the ass. Sera-chan is our Nakama…Whatever the danger is, we’re going anyway. I don’t see that it makes any difference.’

“The only thing we need you to do,” he uttered, “is tell us where to find her...Even if we have to walk into hell itself…‘

“…That wouldn‘t stop us...”




Day 2: 03:44am

- - - Updated - - -


Act XLI: Inner Stirrings



Day 2: 5:43am




‘I can hear the trees….’

Junshin couldn’t help but allow a slight smile to touch his lips as the faint whisper of leaves, rustling in a soft breeze, murmured into his ears. The warmth of the overhead sun, muffled by the cooling shade in which he lay, was pleasantly reminiscent of his homeland. It was a comforting reminder of the world he had once known; a distant cry from the bleak, featureless land in which he knew his physical body now resided.

He knew, even without opening his eyes, that he was within his Inner World. Although it was only the second time he had succeeded in entering it, it no longer felt as jarring as it had on the first occasion. Rather, he felt more as though he found himself in a comfortable, familiar place. It was a sensation that went beyond the simple fact that it resembled his homeland - indeed an actual, physical place from his homeland. Rather, he felt as though an old friend were welcoming him in.

Opening his eyes, he squinted into the momentarily blinding brightness. The blue, cloudless sky overhead was partially obscured by the dancing, overhanging canopy of one of the palm trees that surrounded his inner oasis, but the sun remained bright nonetheless. Blinking rapidly as his eyes slowly adjusted, he sat up to take better stock of his surroundings - finding himself, as he had expected, surrounded by the endless, majestic dunes that so closely resembled the Southern Rukongai.

All was much as it had been on his first visit. The glistening surface of the oasis reflected the sky as a perfect mirror of shimmering blue, clean and inviting beneath the warm sun. This time, however, he was able to immediately lay eyes upon the sole other visitor to the oasis. Seated with his back turned to Junshin, by the bank of the water some three yards distant, the desert wanderer whom the Shinigami supposed to be his Zanpakuto spirit appeared to be in quiet, serene contemplation of the water.

As Junshin stirred, the spirit briefly turned to look over his shoulder. The off-white cloth of his turban partially obscured his features but, as the pair noticed one another, the spirit reached up to tug low the cloth that covered his mouth and jaw. The same sun-darkened face that Junshin had seen on his first visit, with its high cheekbones, slightly almond shaped eyes and shining, well manicured point of a beard regarded him with a smile.

“As-salamu ‘alaykum,” the man stated, repeating the greeting he had offered on their last meeting. “welcome once again, my Master.”

Initially, Junshin was simply too taken aback to reply. His last encounter with the zanpakuto had ended almost as abruptly as it had begun and there had been little chance for anything in the way of dialogue. Half expecting to find himself lurching back to wakefulness, Junshin was as surprised by the fact that he remained in the world as he was by the fact his zanpakuto was present and speaking to him.

“I…uh….h….hello,” he stammered, wincing as soon as the words left his mouth.

‘Geez, Junshin, how weak did that sound?’

Rather than taking offence at his lacklustre greeting, the spirit seemed to take a measure of amusement from it. Behind the beard, the man’s smile widened as he turned away once more to face the sparkling oasis. As Junshin watched, the spirit lifted a small, shallow bowl - presumably filled from the oasis - to drink. Taking his time, the spirit sipped the cool liquid at his leisure, heaving a deep, satisfied breath as he finally lowered the bowl from his lips.

Sitting up on his elbows, Junshin felt suddenly awkward as the spirit remained with his back turned. Feeling very much as though he was supposed to say or do something else, the Shinigami pushed himself to his feet, briefly dusting himself down as he noticed - for the first time - that he was once again wearing the black shihakusho of a Shinigami. The clothes given to him by Kuroda did not, it appeared, follow him into his Inner World.

“I…uh…” he began, taking a hesitant step towards his zanpakuto, thinking that at the very least it would be polite to introduce himself. “…My name is Kiyoko Junshin.”

“I know your name, Master,” once again, there was a hint of amusement in the Zanpakuto’s voice as he turned his head slightly towards Junshin a second time. Raising a hand, the spirit gestured to the ground beside where he sat. “Please, sit with me. I imagine you have many questions….I know a great deal about you, Master. In fact, it is no great exaggeration to say that I know more about you than you know yourself. I do not think, however, you know much about me.”

“That’s certainly true,” Junshin grimaced, absently raising a hand to place his fingertips against the bronze hilt of one of his two zanpakuto. It felt somehow odd that the weapons - at least in their sword form - still existed with him inside his inner world. However, he decided it was likely best not to over think the matter. Instead, he made his way to the side of the spirit and, if a little awkwardly, lowered himself to sit beside him by the water’s edge.

“I’m sorry if it’s rude to ask,” the Shinigami murmured, licking his lips to wet them slightly as he realised his mouth was suddenly painfully dry, “but could you tell me your name?”

The spirit’s smile did not survive the question. The man’s dark eyes fell back to the empty bowl before him, a hint of a sigh within the rise and fall of his shoulders, before he shook his head.

“I regret that I cannot,” he replied. “I cannot tell you my name anymore than you can be told the content of your heart of the thoughts in your mind. I am you, and you are me….my name is written upon your soul and, if you have to ask, then you are unable to hear it. When you hear it, you shall have no need to ask.”

Junshin frowned, although he at least partially understood the spirit’s words. He had learned, as had all Shinigami, of the relationship between a zanpakuto and its master. The weapon was merely an extension of its wielder’s soul, a part of themselves cut off from the whole and given its own form. He should, he knew, have known the sword’s name as readily as his own - he was simply not consciously aware of it. He had heard that not all Shinigami acquired the names of their swords in the same way but, in general, it was less a matter of physical prowess than it was of connection and understanding of the zanpakuto.

“Sorry,” he finally stated, “I’m not really sure what I’m supposed to ask…what I want to ask. I didn’t really expect to find myself here.”

“By ‘here’, do you mean this place?” the spirit replied, raising both his hands to gesture to their surroundings. “Or do you mean where you are in actuality? You have a question to ask, whether you know it or not. It is a question you have been silently asking yourself…asking me…for some time now. I believe you are hoping that I have an answer.”

The response, once again, caught Junshin rather off guard. Lifting his eyebrows, he peered at the spirit curiously as he found himself unable to call whatever question the spirit had in mind to his lips. However, even as he began to doubt the truth of what had been said, he realised that he did in fact have something that he had wondered about. It was a question that had been lurking in the back of his mind, in some fashion or another, for much of the past six years, let alone since the start of his journey.

Since he had begun travelling with Hitomi, he had thought he was coming closer to an answer. Sometimes, he felt as though he might even have answered the question himself. However, in truth, he knew that is was an answer that still lay out of reach. Whatever resolve he believed he had coughed up over the last few days may have glossed over his indecision, but it had not removed it. It had delayed the question…it had not answered it.

“….Am I meant to be a Shinigami?” he asked aloud, sighing out the words as he took his gaze from his zanpakuto, directing it out across the water.

“Are you thinking aloud,” the zanpakuto queried, following Junshin’s gaze to regard the oasis, “or are you asking the question, my Master?”

“I don’t know,” Junshin shook his head. “It’s something that I’ve been back and forth on so much since I left home all those years ago that I’m not even sure there is an answer anymore. I want to move forward, but….every step I take seems to throw up some fresh horror about the world I’m about to step into that I hadn’t even considered.’

“In that ruin yesterday….there were children,” he murmured, pursing his lips. “I’d…never seen a dead person before. I know that Seraphina-kun killed that Kashigi guy back in Flotsam, but I didn’t see it. It wasn’t something I was prepared for…I don’t think I’ll ever be prepared for something like that. I know that I never want to see anything like that town again.”

The pair were silent for what seemed, to Junshin at least, to be a thoroughly long time. Content to simply gaze out across the water, the Shinigami had no great urge to say anything further. He had not left home altogether wanting to be a Shinigami…his spiritual powers had simply awakened, and it had been a fate decided for him. However, he had made every effort to try and embrace his new vocation. Academy life had not been so bad…he had certainly taken well to study and academics. Even upon graduation, things had not seemed so bad.

However, every step he took further away from the Seireiteii exposed him to parts of being a Shinigami he had not considered. The Hollow in District Three, his life-or-death struggle against Yabu, the lifeless eyes of the slain villagers in Jubei’s hometown…violence, he had known, was part of a Shinigami’s life. He simply had not known how visceral that violence would seem up close. He could not deny that he had second guessed himself, more than once; Hitomi had become something of an anchor for him - she was encouraging to him, if a little backhanded at times.

However, he and Hitomi were part of different worlds. She had said as much that night, now so long ago, in the fifth division barracks. She had been a part of this world of blood and death for so long that she could calmly walk within it - or at least she gave the impression that she did. For Junshin, all that lay around him was foreign. Perhaps it was his upbringing, or perhaps it was simply some weakness inside him…but he could not so easily make himself a part of that world.

He was quite certain that he did not want to do so, either.

“Why do you suppose,” his zanpakuto’s voice drew Junshin out of his contemplations with a jolt, “your Inner World takes this form?”

Frowning, Junshin cast the spirit a sideward glance, though the latter continued to gaze out placidly across the oasis. Regarding the water once more, Junshin could do little more than shrug.

“I…suppose because it’s familiar to me,” he replied. “I came to this place with my father and brothers many times on our way through the desert.”

“But why here?” the zanpakuto replied. “Why not your home town? Why not your childhood bedroom? Why not an Academy classroom? This cannot be the only place in the world to which you attach a sense of familiarity….Do not forget that the place is a reflection of yourself, just as I am.’

“I believe,” the spirit continued, “that your Inner World is an oasis because you, whether you realise it or not, are also an oasis. This place is a source of life and comfort, surrounded entirely by death. Here travellers find respite, just as you once did, though all around them is savage and uncaring. As it is with this place, so it is with you.”

Perplexed, Junshin made an attempt to digest what his zanpakuto was saying; he understood the words, and indeed understood the metaphor - as much as he wasn’t completely sure he would have attached the same interpretation.

“I’m not sure that answers my question,” he murmured, managing to keep disappointment from his tone.

“Yes, it does,” his zanpakuto replied, the man’s features curving once more into a smile. “It is simply an answer that, like my name, you are not yet able to hear. You will understand, in time.”

“Maybe,” Junshin responded, shaking his head. “But I think I’d prefer if things were a little cl…”

He cut off, abruptly, at the sensation of a large hand falling upon his shoulder.





*****



Jolted sharply back into the waking world, Junshin’s eyes flared open as he instinctively raised an arm to grasp at the hand that had settled upon his person. A wrist as thick around as Junshin’s own bicep was immediately resistant to his attempt to remove it, though Junshin quickly realised that the hand upon his shoulder was not intended as an attack.

The broad face of Yagyu Jubei peered down at him through the partial darkness, the man’s eyes searching his face appraisingly as though trying to decide how awake he actually was. Apparently satisfied, the older Shinigami rose to his feet - having been kneeling by the side of the narrow cot upon which Junshin had been sleeping - to turn back towards the door.

“Sato-dono wants us to start moving,” he stated simply. “I have prepared some breakfast downstairs. Please be quick, Kiyoko-dono.”

“I…uh…yes, Sensei,” Junshin replied, still feeling somewhat bleary-eyed as he wondered just how much sleep he had actually been afforded. A single window - little more than a rectangular hole in the wall - cast the virtually featureless room into pale daylight. A clear bar of white light streamed through the portal to the outside world, falling upon a bare, hardwood floor that Junshin fancied had not been cleaned for several months; save for the cot - little more than an uncomfortable, moth eaten mattress resting upon a rickety wooden frame - what passed for accommodations in the outer room was otherwise devoid of furnishings.

Junshin was quite certain he had seen a chamber pot underneath the bed when he had stumbled into the room the previous night. However, he was certain he had no wish to investigate further. The room was in such a poor state of upkeep that he fancied the chamber pot would be a source of untold horrors. The bed, such as it was, had not allowed for the most restful of sleeps and, as he tried to move, Junshin realised that every muscle in his body it seemed was still throbbing from the previous night.

‘Alright….best get moving. I suppose I’ll loosen up after I’ve walked around a bit.’

More rolling than stepping off of the cot, seizing up his zanpakuto from where they had been lying beside him as he went, Junshin felt the floorboards creak beneath his weight as he rose to stand - more a matter of shoddy construction than any excess weight on his part, he fancied. Rubbing the back of his neck with a painful groan, he stumbled after Jubei as the latter turned into the narrow corridor outside his room.

“If you please,” the large man called over his shoulder, “please wake Seraphina-dono. It would not be prudent for a stranger to enter a young lady’s room.”

“Uaaaaarwwwaaah?” Junshin very nearly felt his heart stop, his feet freezing midstep as Jubei’s request reached him. A brief surge of panic gripped the young man as he remembered the last time he had roused Hitomi from sleep. However, before he could object, the older Shinigami had already descended out of sight down the flight of stairs that departed to the lower level of the inn.

‘Aw crap…’

Feeling very much as though the hour of his doom was at hand, Junshin took a moment to thrust his zanpakuto back into their harness, before grudgingly heading further up the corridor to the room that he believed Hitomi had appropriated the previous night. The young woman had retired shortly before Junshin, though he had been only dimly aware of her passage past his own room - so absorbed had he been in Jubei’s attempts to properly teach him Jinzen - attempts that, oddly enough, had met with more success while he was asleep than they had while he was awake.

‘Hopefully she’s already awake…’

As he came to a stop by Hitomi’s door, Junshin cleared his throat before raising a hand to rap his knuckles against the somewhat gnarled wood. His heart sank into his feet when doing so elicited no response from within and, gritting his teeth, he lowered his hand to the door handle instead, prizing the door open.

“Um…Seraphina-ku-woa!” his intended greeting ended in a sharp cry as a slender hand shot through the narrow gap between door and wall, seizing his wrist to yank him inside. Before he could draw in breath for another cry of alarm, the girl’s other hand shot up to cover his mouth as he stumbled into her room. Having positioned herself behind him, Junshin felt Hitomi press herself between his shoulder blades, putting herself out of the way of his free, flailing arm. Instinctively, Junshin attempted to struggle free - thinking that Hitomi was attacking him again. However, as he did not immediately find himself becoming acquainted with the floor, he realised that her grip was apparently intended only to silence him.

The moment he stopped struggling, Hitomi’s hand abandoned his mouth, the girl slipping soundlessly away from him across the length of the room. Fully dressed and apparently ready for travel, Hitomi gave no explanation for her actions as she advanced upon her room’s window, leaving Junshin standing within the doorway.

“….Okay, seriously, what the he….” Junshin’s intended reprimand was cut short as the girl turned her dusk coloured eyes towards him with a gaze that demanded immediately silence.

“What’s going on?” he lowered his voice to a whisper, moving to join Hitomi by the window as the latter, finally giving some explanation for her actions, raised a hand to beckon him over. As Junshin drew up beside the redhead, he craned his neck to peer over her shoulder, attempting to see what it was outside that demanded stealth.

Outside, Junshin could see that the sun was not quite as bright as it had appeared to Junshin is in his darkened room. There remained a certain grey quality to the dawn, and Junshin would not have placed it far past six in the morning. The town, however, looked more alive or vibrant in daylight than it did during the night. Every building appeared to be constructed of the same half-rotted wood and corroded sheets of metal as the inn in which they now resided. Everything - save for Hisayo, seated outside beside the remains of their campfire from the previous night - was as lifeless as he remembered it.

“What am I supposed to be looking at?” Junshin queried, his gaze flickering towards Hitomi as he wondered if he had perhaps simply caught the young woman waking up from a dream in which she was, at least partially, still trapped.

“She hasn’t moved,” Hitomi hissed in reply.

“Huh?” Junshin frowned, his attention returning to Hisayo. “Sato-san? What do you mean?”

“I mean that she hasn’t moved,” Hitomi repeated, gesturing a hand in the woman’s direction. “Forget about sleeping…she hasn’t so much as moved an inch from where I left her last night. She’s just been…sitting there. For hours.”

“Oh…” Junshin quirked an eyebrow. “Well….maybe she came in while you were asleep?”

“I didn’t sleep much,” Hitomi’s reply was little more than a mutter. “Not in this town….trust me, she hasn’t moved from that spot all night. She didn‘t eat, she didn‘t sleep…she didn‘t so much as scratch an itch.”

“So what?” Junshin shrugged, not altogether sharing Hitomi’s apparent sense of urgency at the news. “Sato-san is extremely disciplined.”

“So what?” Hitomi hissed his own words back at him. “It’s…..it’s creepy!”

Taken aback, Junshin frowned at his companion, as he began to wonder if their surroundings were beginning to get to her. Although she had not stated outright, he had at least an inkling as to what the town meant to her…although now hardly seemed the best time to challenge her on it. Thinking it best to wait until she was more relaxed, Junshin took a step away from the window.

“I’m sure it’s not worth worrying about,” he shrugged. “She was probably doing Jinzen. If she’s like Yabu and Kashigi, then her zanpakuto might not be obvious, but she’ll probably have one. Anyway, we’re leaving soon. Yagyu-sensei said he had made some breakfast. Come on downstairs as soon as you’re ready.”

Hitomi didn’t reply at once, continuing to peer through the window as Junshin backed off towards the door. Hesitating within the threshold, he watched with growing concern as Hitomi continued to look out at the town. However, after several long seconds of silence, the girl turned to regard him once more, heaving a sigh.

“Yeah,” she nodded. “Let’s….let’s get out of this place.”

‘Wow…I’ve never seen her this rattled before…What the hell happened to her to make her leave this town?’

“Right,” Junshin affected a smile despite his concerns, offering the girl a nod. “I’ll see you downstairs then.”

“….Yeah…” Hitomi replied, though her attention almost immediately drifted back to the window. Junshin, unsure if her gaze lingered upon the empty buildings, or Hisayo, thought it best not to ask. Hesitating only a moment longer, he took another backward step to carry him outside the room, closing the door behind him.






Day 2: 6:14am

[Seraphina]

Act XLII: Last Stop


Day 2: 6:24am




Hitomi still felt groggy as she stepped through the inn doorway into the quickly brightening dawn, the scant hours of sleep she had been afforded more delaying the onset of exhaustion than ridding her of it completely. The ‘breakfast’ Jubei had prepared had turned out to be little more than carefully portioned trail rations, but she had wolfed them down nonetheless. What the dry biscuits lacked in taste, they made up for in energy - energy capable, if only just, of serving as a substitute for sleep.

She didn’t grudge the early rise, however. As much as she was quite certain she could do with further sleep, she was also certain she wouldn’t find it. While Jetsam did not hold quite the same horror for her as she had anticipated, Hitomi could still not bring herself to be comfortable in the town. Too many dark memories lurked there and she considered herself fortunate that, though she was certain that she had dreamt, she could not remember what thoughts had tumbled through her sleeping mind.

“What are you two doing?” Hisayo’s voice snapped through the grey dawn almost the moment she had stepped through the doorway. “Where is your reiatsu?”

Hitomi instinctively flinched at the snapped admonishment, her attention turning from the empty town to the raven haired women who - as she had already observed - was seated exactly as and where she had been when Hitomi had spoken to her the previous night. If Hisayo was at all fatigued by the lack of sleep, it certainly did not show - rather, she directed a clear and disapproving glare at Hitomi and Junshin, who stood directly behind the redhead.

“Yeah…” Hitomi acknowledged, closing her eyes briefly to concentrate as she allowed her spiritual pressure to shudder once again towards its maximum. It came at least a little easier than it had the previous day, her reiatsu flaring to life with considerably less effort - like a machine that had been freshly oiled. However, if it rose any higher than it had yesterday, she was not immediately aware of it. Once at her peak, she allowed her reiatsu to level off, noting the tickling sensation in the back of her head that indicated Junshin was doing the same.

“That’s better,” Hisayo nodded in approval, rising from her crouched position - using the palms of her hands to smooth out the legs of her shozoko. “From here, we strike out west in more or less a straight line. I probably don’t have to tell you that civilisation is scarce out here. The odds are we won’t pass through another town. That means a night or two roughing it….I am sure that you two will not mind, no?”

“We’ll be fine,” Hitomi nodded, her own gaze drifting to the western horizon. Despite having lived in Jetsam for many years, she knew very little of what lay beyond it. Her world had been a small one, and the land deeper into the Outer Rim was often shrouded in as much mystery as the Seireiteii itself. What she knew, she knew largely from rumour…no merchant, in her memory, had ever gone further west than Jetsam and, although a traveller on hard times would occasionally be forced to escape debt or danger, she had not once seen anyone come back the opposite way.

Nobody in her home had ever talked about the final bastion between the Soul Society and the desolation beyond. The only person she had ever heard speak of District Eighty at all was Yukimura…and was a description that had warranted no further questions.





*****



“District Eighty?” Hitomi echoed, regarding Yukimura with sudden interest. Although she knew nothing of the eightieth district of East Rukongai, the final district of West Rukongai, Zaraki, was a place almost as mythical as the Court of Pure Souls itself. She had heard that civilisation simply did not exist there, and that its inhabitants who lacked strength would have no hope of surviving. Although her own district had been known for lawlessness, Zaraki had no law to speak of, filled with marauding bands of cutthroats and bandits.

She had even heard that Hollows would occasionally wander into the Soul Society from the vast expanse that lay beyond the Outer Rim; incursions into the outer districts of the Rukongai were, in fact, more common than incursions into the human world due to the lack of any Shinigami presence there.

It was a land of demons.

If the final district of the East Rukon was anything like that of the West, then she found herself rather surprised at how centred Yukimura appeared to be. As much as he was brash and foul mouthed, he didn’t appear to be on the verge of launching a campaign of murder and rape upon his fellow students. Perhaps the stories were simply exaggerated.

“……You sound surprised,” Yukimura murmured, almost as though he had read her thoughts, causing Hitomi to jump.

“Huh?” she blinked. “Oh…sorry….I didn’t mean…”

“It’s alright,” Yukimura replied, his eyes straight ahead as he continued to march after Shingen. “A lot of people act that way when they meet me….they think ‘how could such a nice and handsome fella come out of that hellhole?’. A lot of them think either I’m lying, or that they’ve been fed lies about what it’s really like out there, and that District Eighty must be full of normal guys like me.”

Turning briefly towards her, Yukimura eyed her carefully - perhaps trying to gauge her reaction. His guess has been accurate - alarmingly so, in fact. Hitomi couldn’t deny that was precisely what she had been thinking. His next words, however, sent a tangible chill up and down her spine.

“Everything you’ve ever heard about District Eighty,” he told her, “is absolutely true. You don’t need to be dragged through any oversized gate to wind up in hell.”

Yukimura turned away once more, walking on silently. Hitomi looked away, her eyes cast down at her feet as she tried to keep herself from imagining the life Yukimura must had led to bring him to the Academy. The life she had fled in the Rukongai suddenly seemed laughable…she imagined she wasn’t the only one who had something to run away from.





*****



Shaking herself as she felt a sudden chill dance up and down her spine, Hitomi was rather pleased to hear they would not encounter any towns along their route. Any environment that could force such a tone into Yukimura - a man who seemed to be perpetually wrapped within good humour - was one that she would rather slip through as quietly and cleanly as possible.

“Sato-san,” Junshin asked from behind her, Hitomi sidestepping to allow him a clear line of site to their guide, “what do you think we should expect when we go beyond the Outer Rim?”

Hisayo did not reply, thought it did not appear as though she was ignoring the question. Her expression was thoughtful as she gazed along their intended course, her arms folded in rigid, unmoving contemplation. Behind the two young Shinigami, Jubei appeared from the interior of the building - quietly closing the inn door behind him for what could, very easily, have been the last time it would ever be moved.

“If we’re lucky,” Hisayo finally responded, not taking her maroon eyes from the horizon, “we’ll find nothing at all between us and Pinnacle. It is not a place known to be active, no?”

“And if we’re unlucky?” Hitomi answered for Junshin, voicing the question that she was quite certain would be on her companion’s mind. This time, however, Hisayo had no answer to give; though she continued to gaze into the distance for a few silent moments longer, she abruptly dropped her arms to her side, and began to move off.

Her silence was not encouraging.

“Kiyoko-dono, Seraphina-dono,” Jubei intoned, the large man clearly attempting to fill the void as quickly as possible, “come…let us move on. There is still a long road ahead.”

Moving past the younger Shinigami, Jubei set out after Hisayo. The black haired woman was already setting a brisk pace, marching back down the way they had come the previous night: through the town’s only street in the direction of the slop back to the main road. They were, it seemed, set to leave Jetsam behind. For her part, Hitomi initially set off after the pair at a similar pace; however, she quickly found her trot slowing as she took a final look about her.

The last time she had left Jetsam behind her, she had been riding atop a wooden cart, seated between Shadrin Kain and Ranmaru Yoshimitsu - the survivors of the three man Shinigami team that had been hunting Hollows near Jetsam when her spiritual powers awoke. She recalled, albeit in a somewhat distant fashion, the town had looked so different when seated atop that cart. Having lived her entire life at the bottom of the barrel, it had been somehow liberating to see the town from on-high…the buildings seemed that little bit smaller, the horizon beyond bright and suddenly obtainable.

In the seven years since that day, she had seen a great deal of the world that lay beyond the tiny town that had once been her whole existence. She had seen the green pastures of the Inner Districts. The colossal white towers of the Seireiteii. The endless, rolling forests of the Academy grounds. The shimmering, eternal canals of the North Rukongai, and the sparkling white Tundra that lay beyond them. She had seen the sandstone towns of the South Rukongai, and the majestic, golden dunes of its southern reaches. She had seen peace and she had seen war. She had met people who had become her friends and others who had become her enemies.

And every step of the way, the memory of Jetsam had hounded her. The thought of what may have been…the musings upon what might be happening in her absence. The unanswered questions of what her life may have been like had a different path been followed.

In the night, the town had held a degree of fear for her. The buildings, wreathed in shadow, had appeared to loom tall and dark. However now, as the sun climbed over the rooftops, casting the town into illumination, she saw more clearly what lay about her. A woman of twenty one saw the world in a different light from a girl of fourteen.

From atop her cart, as a child, she had thought the town looked small. She could almost have laughed at that perception as she looked upon it now. Set against the wider world she had now seen, the town was tiny. Barely a grain of sand against the vastness of the Rukongai. In the darkness, it had appeared to be the haunted remains of the town that had been the source of much of the pain in her life….in the daylight, it was simply the shell of something that had once been.

There were not ghosts in Jetsam. She needn’t have feared what she may have left behind, for there was nothing there to begin with. The only matter of concern for her, the whereabouts of Reihaii Toda, was no longer a matter in which the town need be involved. She would find the answer to that question further West; She could leave Jetsam behind.

Perhaps, this time, she would leave it for good.

“Seraphina-kun?” Junshin’s voice, by her side, drew the redhead’s attention. Realising that she had been standing motionless for some time, she offered her companion an apologetic nod, before her feet began to move once again.

“Sorry…” she murmured. “I was just thinking.”

As she began to move again, Junshin fell in step beside her. The two continued in silence, Hisayo and Jubei both further ahead - close enough to keep in sight, though well out of earshot. The two young Shinigami simply trotted along after them, the empty, lifeless buildings marching by to either side.

“This is your home, isn’t it?” Junshin queried, a note of hesitation in his voice as he clearly remained unsure whether or not he should have asked the question. Hitomi allowed herself a brief smile, casting him a sideward glance - she knew that she not exactly been forgiving of questions into her past previously.

“Yeah,” she nodded. “Well….no. It was where I lived, but I don’t think I ever really thought of it as home. It was….more like a cage. I didn’t find home until I left it behind, and travelled to the Seireiteii. Shadrin-kun…Yukimura-kun…Shingen-kun…Makabe-sensie…Hashiba-sensei…Ranmaru-san…and now you, Junshin-kun. Everyone who has ever helped me feel as though I belonged…that‘s what made it home for me.’

“Here,” she shrugged, her gaze on the ground beneath her feet. “I didn’t have that. I wouldn’t even say I lived here…it’s just where I existed.”

Junshin merely offered a wordless nod, remaining level with her as they continued their steady march. She could almost hear the questions turning within his head; but, this time, he did not ask them. Enough had passed between them, she imagined, that he no longer felt the compulsion to push her for answers. In time, perhaps, she would tell him about Reihaii Hitomi; for now, however, she intended to remain Seraphina.

“Did you find what you were looking for?” he finally queried, apparently satisfying himself with a single question instead of the many he likely wanted to ask. It was also one that Hitomi could not immediately answer, frowning thoughtfully at the ground as she considered her response.

“You mean,” she murmured, “did coming her bring me closure?”

“Mhmm,” Junshin nodded, turning his head to look at her directly. “That is why you set out to begin with, wasn’t it? To close this particular chapter of your life?”

“Maybe,” she sighed, raising a hand to gesture to the empty buildings. “But…it looks as though that chapter has been closed in my absence. Jetsam is dead…whatever remained here for me is gone. The end of the town is as good an ending to the pain it caused me as any I can think of.”

“I sense a ‘but’,” Junshin prompted when she did not continue, arching an eyebrow. However, Hitomi’s reply was not immediate, her attention drifting from her companion’s words as she realised where their feet were leading them. On their left, her old house marched steadily closer and on the right, she knew, the narrow alley that had birthed almost every nightmare she had endured for the last seven years. Her dusk coloured eyes lingered upon the house, viewing it in full daylight for what she expected to be the last time. However, she found that she felt nothing…absent of its occupants, the home no longer held any meaning for her.

It was to her right, however, that she was still hesitant to cast her gaze. Returning her eyes to the ground, she resisted the urge to quicken her pace, knowing that it would prompt further concern from her companion. Out of the corner of her eye, the plain grey wood of the building beside her continued to wander by, the alley only a few meters ahead.

‘You know you have to look….This is the last chance you’ll ever get. If you don’t look, you’ll never be able to move on completely.’

Gritting her teeth, her hands clenching into fists by her side, Hitomi was barely aware that the depth and volume of her breath had increased. Junshin, perplexed, looked on in silence as Hitomi’s every muscle tensed - her head already rebelling against the command to turn.



*****



The four men pursuing her appeared in no mood to give up the chase however, screaming obscenities as they changed direction to match. Her heart pounding, Hitomi moved between the wooden walls of the two buildings, open countryside visible beyond, as she continued to press on towards possible safety.

Then, all too suddenly, one of them was on her. A powerful hand reached over her shoulder, grasping the front of her kimono and yanking her sharply around to face him. Her terrified eyes were forced to turn to gaze up into the enraged features of the same man who had earlier injured, blood oozing from his hand across the breast of her clothing.

“Little bitch!” he snarled, as she tried to withdraw…but the movement succeeded only in eliciting the sound of tearing cloth. She struggled desperately to free herself, but her movements only seemed to enrage her captor more as, behind him, his trio of companions finally caught up. The group shouted and jeered, encouraging him as he actively began trying to tear open her clothing, her lips curling backwards in a feral snarl.

Hitomi still held the knife in her hand….

In the years that followed, she would often wonder to herself what she had intended to do that day. If she had swung the weapon out of reflex, or instinct. If she had intended to frighten or maim her attacker. She could never remember…the event seemed to pass by as a blur on every occasion she would try to recall it…she remembered only the brief, soft resistance of the man’s throat against the edge of the knife, and the warm splatter of arterial spray as his neck opened up before her.

His blood arced skywards like a fountain, the seemingly blunt knife cleaving from one end of his neck to the other. The hand that had been attempting to tear open her clothes open fell limply away, the towering man tilting stiffly backwards like a falling tree before crashing to the ground with a final gurgling breath.

The man’s three companions stared on in mute silence, their jeers stopped in an instant as Hitomi, her face, hands and arms drenched in the man’s blood, stared down at the still-twitching corpse lying on the ground before her.




*****



‘You have to look...just…turn…turn your head.’



“S….stay back,” she warned, raising the knife before her in both bloodied hands once more, as the group glared at her in open, murderous rage.


She could feel the fingernails of her right hand digging painfully into her palm, her left fist having settled on the hilt of her zanpakuto - sheathed at her hip - gripping it so tightly that her knuckles were white from the pressure. The teeth of her upper jaw clamped down tightly upon her lower lip. She could not yet taste the metallic bitterness of blood in her mouth, though she knew she was coming close to breaking the skin. Her heartbeat thundering loudly in her ears, she realised that the wall to her right was no longer present.



“...Get the bitch,” one of the men finally snarled, his features contorting in anger as the group surged towards her as one.


‘You can do it Hitomi…it’s now or never. Please…don’t let it be never. You can’t go on living like this.’

The ally was narrow…the men who had attacked her had been unable to do so by moving abreast. The window of opportunity was narrow but, to Hitomi, time seemed to have slowed almost to a crawl. She could see, out of the strained corner of her right eye, the light streaming between the two buildings. However, despite her urgings, her head simply would not turn.

‘Look! Damn it, look!’





“Aaaraa….’

“……I think you boys might just want to rethink this….”





“What are you doing, girl!? Look while you can!”


Hitomi abruptly snapped her head to, her eyes flaring wide as though her own body was shocked by the sudden compliance. She could feel warm wetness streaming from her eyes, cascading down her cheeks she forced them to remain open against the comparative brightness of the sunlight that shone forth from the far end of the narrow gap between the two buildings.

She beheld little more than an empty stretch of barren earth, indistinguishable from any other ally in the town, separating two stretches of half-rotten, sun dried wall. The blood and bodies of the past were long gone, as was any sign they had ever existed.

The glance was fleeting, her pace such that the ally flashed by in a mere heartbeat. No sooner was it gone than time suddenly seemed to catch up with her. Hitomi’s knees came close to buckling as her forward step turned into a stumble, catching herself from falling only because she lurched to an abrupt halt. She was not even aware she had stopped at first, very nearly doubled over with her right hand on her knee to support herself, her left still clamped tightly upon her zanpakuto.

‘I…I looked…..I did it…..’

She could dimly hear Junshin by her side - her companion placing a hand upon her shoulder in an attempt to shake her out of her stupor. She was only aware of him speaking, however - she could not distinguish the words. Her own heartbeat continued to fill her ears, her body trembling as she came down from the rush of adrenaline she hadn’t even realised had been pumping through her system.

‘I did it….’

As the desperation fled her system, she realised that it was being replaced with a certain heady giddiness. Although her head was still spinning, she found herself unable to keep a smile from her face as she suddenly stoop up straight. Junshin, who had been stooped to get a better look at her, withdraw sharply in alarm as she reached out with both hands to grasp the front of his tunic.

“I did it!” she told him, still unable to remove the smile from her features, knowing in the back of her mind that he was likely to think she had gone insane. “I did it…and there was nothing there! Do you have any idea what it’s like to be trapped in a place for seven years, and then just…just to….it….”

Her words trailed off as she realised she was babbling - and that Junshin was looking increasingly alarmed. Ahead of them, Hisayo and Jubei had come to a stop, looking back to see what the cause of the commotion was. They did not double back, but Junshin, smiling tightly, raised his hands to Hitomi’s wrists in an attempt to prize her from him.

“Um…that…that’s good?” he stated hesitantly, using both hands to unlatch one of her fingers at a time from the front of his clothing. “I’m not sure I really get it, but…”

“….Yeah…sorry…” Hitomi nodded, forcing herself back to reality as she voluntarily released her grip, her right hand dropping to her side, placing her left palm on the pommel of her sword. “I suppose that didn’t make much sense, but….I….I think I might just have taken a step closer to that closure we talked about.”

“Really?” Junshin blinked, smoothing out the front of his clothing. “Um…just like that?”

“Just like that,” Hitomi grinned, nodding her head. “Maybe…maybe just looking at things in daylight was all I needed to leave this place behind.”

“R…right,” Junshin nodded, frowning as he looked back along the way they had come, clearly trying to determine what exactly had changed over the course of the few dozen yards they had travelled. “So…does that mean you’re ready to close off that chapter after all?”

“Almost,” Hitomi shook her head, her smile fading as she turned to continue on her way. Momentarily surprised at her sudden return to their march, Junshin took a few hurried steps to draw level with her. “There’s one more loose end that I need to tie up….one more thing I have to do before I’ll be able to consider my past well and truly settled.”

“I don’t suppose you’d be willing to tell me what that is?” Junshin queried, both his eyebrows rising upon his forehead as he was still forced to job to keep up with Hitomi’s frenetic pace, any semblance of hesitation gone from her movements.

“There’s….someone that‘s been waiting for me,” she replied, her eyes narrowing as she turned towards the western skyline. “But I have a feeling that I’ll see them soon.”

Seeing that the two young Shinigami were catching up once more, Hisayo and Jubei turned to continue on their way. Filled with fresh determination, Hitomi hurried after him. So concerned was she, however, with the path that lay ahead that she never paused to consider the stern, commanding voice that had finally forced her to turn her head.

Nor the silent stirring of life within the sword by her side.



Day 2: 6:38am

[Seraphina]

Act XLIII: Leap of Faith



Day 2: 11:26am




True to Hisayo’s intentions, the group continued westward at the same brisk, unforgiving pace for many hours. The flatlands of District Seventy Four allowed them to progress at an easy pace, for the cracked and brittle soil beneath their feet was infinitely more forgiving then the unrelenting stone of the mountain paths through which they had trudged the previous day. Indeed, the knowledge that they were setting out upon what would be the last leg of their journey put the group into the closest thing they had seen to high spirits since their adventure had began.

At first, they progressed as they had upon leaving Jetsam; Hisayo in the lead, with Jubei a few meters behind, and Junshin and Hitomi side by side a further few meters behind him. As the hours trickled by, however, their formation fractured slightly as each assumed a pace with which they were comfortable. Jubei slowed to lessen the distance between himself and Junshin - the latter eagerly revealing to his new mentor the details of his encounter with his zanpakuto - while Hitomi pulled ahead to wander a short distance behind Hisayo, who remained in the lead.

As the sun continued to march progressively higher in the sky, so too did the temperature climb. The further west they travelled, the further removed they became from the more manageable heat of Hitomi’s homeland. As the flatlands began to peel away, giving way to more uneven, undulating terrain, Hitomi began to see the first signs of the desert that was to come - in places, clouds of sand billowed across the surface level of the parched earth, carried westward by the wind and impacting against the rising hills that were, it seemed, the one buffer between the flatlands as the wasteland beyond. Although they had, until that time, remained upon the road, it was becoming a more difficult path to follow.

Even as of District Seventy Four, the road had become little more than a dirt track. The passage of many moving feet had formed it, rather than any attempt at actual construction. However, the further they travelled, the fewer feet had come before them. Although the path was still distinguishable from the surrounding, barely touched terrain, it was a difference that was less pronounced than it had been. Where before their path had been essentially pounded flat, the road was now barely more traversable than the landscape around it, and the going became harder as the sun climbed towards noon.

It was only then that Hisayo, having been marching steadily forward at the same unrelenting pace for more than four hours, suddenly drew to a halt. The sudden change came as she had reached the crest of a shallow slope along their road - the hill presumably descending on the other side - raising a hand to shield her eyes from the sun as she took stock of what lay ahead. Hitomi, wandering not far behind, scrambled up the slope to join their guide, her breath by now rapid and shallow as fatigue had long since began to set in.

Ahead of them, the desert appeared to begin in earnest. Although the road ahead was distorted behind a miasmic ripple of warm air, she nevertheless beheld the ocean of golden sands that marked the final border of the Outer Rim. The slope was considerably steeper on the opposite side, descending for some fifty feet to place the land significantly lower beneath sea level than that which they had been traversing. Almost immediately, parched stone and soil gave way to an ocean of golden sands - the sun reflecting upon the surface so brightly that, initially, it was almost painful to look at.

Although Hitomi had walked the deserts of the South Rukongai, she had never progressed further than the shallow end of the Southern Outer Rim. There, the desert had been strangely majestic, the sands a gentle rise and fall of dunes that had still played host to sporadic vegetation and homesteads. Not so here, however. Here, the desert simply appeared to be a barren sea of silky gold, the dunes shaped by a harsh wind into towering mountains, their wave-like peaks engulfed in a swirling melee of sand carried upon the harsh winds, flowing so thickly it looked almost like liquid. Here, the reach of the Soul Society saw its end, as the last vestiges of civilisation fell away.

Here, the road ended.

Having walked upon the road for so long, having seen it wind its steady course from the gates of the Seireiteii through its serpentine path through the Rukongai, it was almost jarring for Hitomi to see it come to such an abrupt close. Its ending, however, was unceremonious - the dirt trail simply petered out at the crest of the hill, without any marker of fanfare to mark its termination. It was not that the road ahead had been swallowed by the desert; there never had been a road beyond this point at all. The sole reason the road continued to exist was due to the passage of travellers over time…it seemed that, for many travellers, their journey had been abandoned upon the spot they now found themselves.

“District Seventy Nine,” Hisayo murmured over her shoulder in explanation, raising a hand to gesture at the wasteland ahead of them. “From here…you’ll find little to call civilisation. There aren’t many towns out here. Those that do exist are hidden to try and keep out of the way of bandits, slavers and Hollows. They exist, but the odds are you won’t see them…it’s more likely that we’ll see what they’re hiding from, no?”

Behind the two women Jubei and Junshin also mounted the slope. Like Hitomi, the long journey through the intense heat had also begun to take its toll on the two men. Even Hisayo, who had seemed utterly unflappable for the duration of their journey, was forced to wipe a hand across her eyes to stave off the perspiration that dripped from her forehead. The day was likely to only continue to become hotter.

“We should perhaps find somewhere to rest,” Jubei advised, standing with his thumbs tucked into his obi, his shoulders rising and falling with each breath. “The day is about to reach its hottest….we cannot travel through noon in this heat. I would suggest we stop for an hour or two somewhere shaded.”

Hitomi winced at the suggestion; while she couldn’t held but agree, she couldn’t see anything from their vantage point that could pass for shade. The sun was almost directly overhead, affording few places for shade to linger. If there were any sheltered spots along their intended route, they did not make themselves obvious.

“No,” Hisayo replied with a simple shake of her head. “That would not be prudent.”

Jubei quirked an eyebrow, but offered not objection as Hisayo lowered the hand that was shielding her eyes. She did not immediately set out, however, pursing her lips before deciding, apparently, to offer some explanation for her decision.

“Hueco Mundo is cold and inhospitable,” she advised. “It is a land of perpetual night and it is where Hollows are most at home. Hollows exist in this place because it is far from the Seireiteii, not because they enjoy the environment. At nightfall, the temperature will drop and darkness will set in. We won’t be able to see a hand in front of our faces unless we make some light of our own.’

“So long as the sun is in the sky, we don’t have to worry about Hollows…it would take something monumental to drive them into the open. The moment night falls, however, they will become active….we absolutely cannot be caught in the open when that happens. There are some secure places within the desert, but we must reach them before evening. If we delay now, and risk being abroad when the sun sinks, then it is unlikely we will reach Pinnacle without casualties.”

“From Hollows?” it was Junshin that spoke, making a vain attempt to tug the short sleeves of his tunic lower to try and cover his forearms from the scorching sun. “I wouldn’t think that Hollows would cause any problem to you and Yagyu-sensei, Sato-san.”

“It seems you don’t understand,” Hisayo replied, turning her maroon gaze towards Junshin - her bow shaped lips curving into the hint of a smile; not at all a pleasant one. “There are more Hollows in this part of the Outer Rim than there are people…and their numbers have been growing since Pinnacle was discovered. Every day, hundreds more have come from Hueco Mundo as though drawn here by whatever is stirring within that prison. Buried beneath these sands are not dozens, or hundreds, but tens of thousands of Hollows.’

“It is likely that I will be able to make this journey unscathed,” she continued, “perhaps Yagyu-dono would also survive. The two of you, however, will be like a beacon to them. They have become so desperate for food that Kuroken received reports that they had begun eating each other…two young, sumptuous Shinigami wandering through their territory will draw every Hollow for miles around. You are little more than a walking buffet, no? Yaygu-dono and I would not be able to protect you from the numbers that we will see.”

Hitomi found herself briefly entertaining the thought of the sky darkening with Hollows as they swarmed up from beneath the sands, and quickly shook the image out of her head. She found it hard to believe that so many Hollows could have entered the Rukongai without being detected but, equally, she had begun to think it unwise to second guess their guide. Hisayo was the only one among the quartet who had walked this route before…although, from her description, the far edge of the Outer Rim was an even more horrific place than she had heard.

‘How could people live out here if the only thing it takes to kill you is the onset of night…?’

“I assume there are no objections to continuing?” Hisayo queried, one corner of her lips rising into a smile of vague amusement. Receiving no immediate argument to the contrary, she apparently considered the matter settled and turned to continue on her way. Without hesitation, the young woman leapt from the edge of the veritable cliff upon which they stood, bypassing the almost sheer slope ahead of them in a freefall that saw her hurtle towards the desert floor beneath them.

“It seems our course of action is decided, then.” Jubei shrugged. “Well…let us get on with it then, shall we?”

Marching past Hitomi, the older Shinigami quickly threw himself after Hisayo. Neither of the two appeared to take any great heed of the fifty foot drop that lay between them and the sandy earth, and Hitomi found herself holding her breath as she peered over the edge to watch them plummet to ground level. Although some distant part of her mind told her that such a drop would not be sufficient to harm any reasonably powerful Shinigami, it was a fact to which she was still becoming accustomed.

Like herself, Junshin scrambled to the edge of the cliff to watch in obvious horror as the two senior members of the group vanished from sight. The pair dwindled into the distance beneath them, the wind that rasped across the surface scattering against the steep slope to create a chalky cloud of drifting sand that hung within the air like soup. Although she fell first, Hisayo fell significantly slower than her much heavier counterpart, and they both disappeared into the cloud at almost the same moment. Reduced to little more than dark blurs, the pair nevertheless appeared to come to a stop, the tug of their spiritual pressure uninterrupted by hurt or unconsciousness.

“Um…Are we…meant to do that too?” Junshin queried, looking back and forth between the distant ground and Hitomi.

“I….I‘m not sure,” Hitomi replied honestly. “I suppose the two of them are fine with a fall like that. But they‘re both far more powerful than us. I suppose we might have enough reiatsu to see us through...uh…I think, anyway.”

The two youths continued to hesitate upon the threshold, peering down into the chalky cloud of drifting grit. Pursing her lips, Hitomi repeated internally to herself that she would survive the fall - that her reiatsu had reached a level that it would be capable of cushioning her - but it was easier to think than it was to convince herself to take the plunge. So absorbed was she in her attempt to shake off her doubts that she very nearly jumped out of her skin when Junshin’s hand suddenly closed over her wrist, his grip firm as she turned her started eyes towards him once again.

“Seraphina-kun,” her companion’s voice did not contain any more certainty than her own. However, the chocolate coloured eyes that met her dusky purple had steeled over somewhat in determination. “We have to start trusting ourselves. It’s too late for us to still have doubts. When we step beyond that ledge, somehow it feels like we’ll be at the point of no return…we can’t keep going forward unless we learn to believe in our strength.”

Two or three days ago, Hitomi would likely have torn her arm from his grasp in horrified reflex. But then, two or three days ago, she doubted Junshin would have had the nerve to touch her. The steel in his eyes was sufficient to fight off her instinctive aversion towards physical contact, and she found herself hesitating beneath his gaze; she knew him to be right. They were long past the point where they could entertain doubts.

“You’re right,” she nodded, turning to face the ledge once more, her wrist still within Junshin’s grip. “Let’s go then, Junshin-kun. No more doubting.”

“No more doubting,” Junshin affirmed with a nod. Each of the pair drew in a long breath to steel themselves before, throwing off the last vestiges of caution, they took a brief running start to the edge of the cliff and leapt into the abyss.

Hitomi felt the air rush around her, making it difficult to breath as they fell towards the swirling dust cloud beneath them. It took startlingly little time for them to make the drop - fifty feet passing in what, to Hitomi at least, felt like the blink of an eye. Their raised spiritual pressure, if anything, served to dramatically increase their mass - sending them rocketing towards terminal velocity at dizzying speed. The air rushing past at such a pace that it felt impossible to breath, Hitomi instinctively closed her eyes as the dark shape of the quickly approaching ground loomed up to meet them from beneath the layer of swirling sand.

Still half expecting her landing to be greeted with a dry crunch of her legs shattering, Hitomi was almost surprised when instead her ears echoed with a dull ‘whumph’. Landing in what was virtually a standing position with only the barest bent to her knees, her feet did not so much sink into the sand as punch into it, the impact blasting a shallow crater several inches deep into the surface. It was an impact, however, that she herself barely felt - feeling very much as though she had done nothing more than leap from a footstool. Despite the success, she remained frozen in place for several seconds as, beside her, Junshin appeared to be similarly convinced that they should have been splattered across the desert.

“You two really are a handful,” Hisayo’s voice, tingling ever so slightly with amusement, drew Hitomi’s attention to the fore. Hesitantly lifting her gaze from the ground, she found Hisayo and Jubei waiting a few yards ahead, looking back at their younger counterparts expectantly. While Hisayo regarded her with the smallest trace of a smile, Jubei - upon noting their reaction to the landing - raised a hand to slap his palm against his forehead.

“I keep forgetting,” he grunted, “that you two are fresh graduates. I thought you would take a fall like that in your stride.”

“It…seems we did, Yagyu-sensei,” Junshin smiled nervously, finally releasing his hold on Hitomi’s wrist as he extracted himself from the shallow crater he had also succeeded in punching into the desert surface. “It looks like we still have a lot of exploring to do before we really understand the limits of what our new abilities are.”

“Just don‘t let it go to your head,” Hisayo stated turning to continue on her way. “High level Shinigami are powerful not just because of their spiritual pressure, but because their bodies are extremely robust from long exposure to that pressure. Right now, the two of you only have one half of what you need. If you tried to fight with that level of reiatsu, you would probably tear your bodies apart. It’ll still take a few days before your bodies have become fortified enough to use your abilities in any practical sense. You are still a long way from being indestructible, no?”

Hisayo’s words rather took the wind out of Junshin’s sails, and Hitomi noticed her counterpart’s shoulders sag somewhat at the lack of encouragement. However, he quickly began to move off after the woman, hesitating only to look back over his shoulder when he noted that Hitomi herself had not moved. For her part, the redhead had turned her attention back to the cliff from which they had leapt - the distant upper edge obscured by the drifting dust cloud that continued to swirl around and above them.

“Yagyu-san,” she suddenly murmured, turning her attention back to the fore, “would you teach us to air-walk?”

The question visibly caught the older Shinigami by surprise, one eye rising upon his brow as, up ahead, Hisayo paused to cast a backward glance. Folding her arms, the young woman did not interject - perhaps a silent confirmation that, as Jubei had earlier guessed, she considered the Shinigami better suited to teach them actual techniques.

“I…suppose so,” Jubei eventually nodded. “It’s not actually that hard to do, so I could probably at least give you the basics.”

“Thank you,” Hitomi nodded, exhaling in relief. “It just seems that our strength is running so far ahead of our skills….there are a lot of bread-and-butter techniques that we still don’t even know. We should probably have them down by the time we arrive where we’re going.”

“Fine, but later,” Hisayo interjected, her voice - as usual - inviting no argument. “When we find somewhere safe to rest, you can undertake whatever lessons you please.”

Once again striking out into the desert, Hisayo did not turn to make sure she was followed. As ever, the three Shinigami were left to follow in her wake as the group struck out into the penultimate district of the Outer Rim.






Day 2: 11:49am

[Seraphina]

Act XLIV: The End of the Rukongai




Day 2: 4:46pm





Hisayo pushed the group hard throughout the day. Even as both the sun and the temperature climbed, the woman made no attempt whatsoever to slow her pace. Rather, she seemed driven to see them cover as much ground as possible, ploughing through the desert sands as though their lives depended on how far they could travel within the day; according to her earlier warnings, it may very well have been.

The company spoke little as they marched; the trek through the intense, burning heat leaving little energy or breath for conversation. Walking in single file with Hisayo at the fore, Jubei behind, followed by Hitomi and then finally Junshin, the three Shinigami walked in their guide’s footprints as she navigated across the dunes that - to Junshin’s eyes - looked identical. In the disorientation caused by the wind and the heat, Junshin had trouble determining which direction they were even heading. Hisayo, however, appeared to have no such confusion. She either knew exactly where she was going, or she was making a good show of pretending to.

Having grown up in a desert environment, Junshin had thought himself prepared for the long hike. However, there was little he could use to compare the sands of the Southern Rukongai to the wasteland into which they now stumbled. Set against the aggressive, searing heat and the blinding sun, the dunes of his homeland seemed utterly gentle. If he had been in any way acclimated in his youth, he certainly did not feel it now. The water Jubei handed to him felt utterly luxurious, his lips parched and cracked after only a few hours beneath the sun. The thought that anyone could live in such extreme conditions was a daunting one…it was a life that he would rather not have considered.

The march continued unabated for nigh on five hours - a punishing journey that would have left Junshin exhausted under normal circumstances, let alone within the unforgiving environment around them. It was only as the shadows were beginning to lengthen into evening that Hisayo finally called over her shoulder that they would soon be stopping and Junshin felt his spirits rise at the mere notion of rest. As tiring as their trek through the mountains had been, he could gladly have endured it twice over when compared to Hisayo’s current choice of route.

‘And to think….we can all look forward to this same thing on the way back.’

The realisation brought a sudden, giddy laugh to his lips, and he quickly raised a hand to slap himself to keep his senses. Dehydration he knew could cause the mind to waver, but so too could despair - that much, at least, he had learned in his lightweight desert to the far south. There would be plenty of time to worry about the return journey when the time came to make it. For now, he had to force himself to remain focused on what lay ahead.

That path was currently winding its way down the steep edge of one of the countless dunes they had scrambled over on their way across the desert. More than one losing their footing, the smallest stumble from the group saw them slip and slide down the slope as the surface layer of sand flowed like a river - threatening to swallow them at the slightest misstep as Hisayo - as unerring as ever - raised her hand to point out their destination. As Junshin squinted against the sunlight - the rays somehow seeming even more piercing as the sun crept lower towards the horizon - he marvelled at first that the woman had been able to see it at all.

At the base of the dune ahead - rendered all but invisible beneath the sand that had begun to pile up at its entrance, there appeared to be an opening. So small that it would certainly have defied detection had Hisayo not pointed it out to them, Junshin imagined that the gap was little more than three feet wide. Tunnelling into the dune, it appeared that there was a stone structure - perhaps a cave complex of some kind - directly beneath the dune. It was here, it seemed, that Hisayo intended to shelter.

“I certainly hope it widens out inside,” Hitomi called out, forced to raise her voice against the wind that had continued to pick up with every forward step into the desert. As bad as Junshin felt, he thought Hitomi to look significantly worse. Her long hair appeared to be a magnet for sand and grit, the once silky stands becoming thick with grime after their long hike and badly in need of a wash. There was no way that she was not aware of her filthy appearance, and the redhead looked both miserable and irritable as the group came to a stop beside the hole.

“It does,” Hisayo nodded, stopping to sweep away the barrier of sand that had partially obscured the opening. “I would not ask you to squeeze into a hole to rest, no? There is a cavern inside, with room enough for all of us.”

“No time like the present, I suppose?” Junshin managed a smile despite feeling rather ill at ease at having to squeeze through the narrow hole to reach their place of rest.

“There’s still an hour or two of daylight,” Jubei observed, glancing towards the horizon. “Did you not wish to press on, Sato-dono?”

‘Oh god, no. Please. No pressing on for today.’

“Not now,” Hisayo shook her head, much to Junshin’s relief. “We will not find another place like this for miles. We’ve never get there before dark….either way, this will be our last rest stop in the Outer Rim…tomorrow, we’ll cross the border into the lands beyond. From there, it’s a straight shot to pinnacle.”

Peering into the hole over Hisayo’s shoulder, Junshin could see only darkness within. However, their guide did not hesitate as she quickly crawled inside. Slight of build enough that she was able to crawl forward on her hands and knees, the woman vanished into the darkness ahead. It was only after she was gone that Junshin recalled, with a sudden pang of dread, her earlier warning about Hollows lurking beneath the ground.

“Would you prefer if I go next?” Jubei queried, eyeing the two younger Shinigami uncertainly.

“No, it’s alright Yagyu-san,” it was Hitomi that answered. “You’ll have enough to worry about getting through without keeping an eye out for anything ahead of you….I’ll go next, and call back if anything goes wrong.”

Junshin nodded, noting that the man’s broad build would certainly give him the most trouble navigating the passage; in fact, Junshin himself would probably encounter difficulty. Hitomi, although taller and longer limbed than Hisayo, was still able to simply wriggle inside and crawl forward. Watching as she vanished into the shadows, Junshin gave her a few seconds lead before following her inside.

‘Damn…it’s like being in a coffin.’

A clawing, oppressive sensation of claustrophobia almost instantly closed in around him as Junshin realised he would not have sufficient room to crawl as the two woman had done. Rather than his hands, he was forced to push forward on his elbows, able to see nothing whatsoever that lay ahead save for darkness. In the pitch black, he made slow progress as, ahead, he could hear the laboured grunts and mutterings of Hitomi, and behind similar exertions from Jubei - by the sound of the dull rasp of cloth against stone, the latter flush with the walls of the passage.

The journey was not enormous in distance - Junshin imagined he travelled no more than fifteen to twenty feet - but it was laborious nonetheless. His muscles were stiff and aching from the long march, and more than once he had the terrifying thought of his body seizing up within the narrow confines and leaving him stuck there. Fortunately, the tunnel widened slightly as it went, until Junshin was eventually able to see - beyond the struggling silhouette of Hitomi - a flicker of red light.

‘Looks like Sato-san lit a fire.’

As Hitomi finally crawled free of the passage head of him, she reached back to offer a hand in helping Junshin pull himself the last few feet. The passage terminated as a narrow hole at ground level in what, true to Hisayo’s description, proved to be a large stone cavern - so enormous, in fact, that the walls and roof were rendered invisible within the darkness beyond the crackling fire that Hisayo had lit several yards away. The dark shape of the black-clad woman was just visible within the light, crouched by the fire and watching her chargeS stumble inside.

“Watch your footing,” she instructed. “It‘s a little damp. We wouldn‘t want you to break your necks, no?”

“Damp? There‘s water?” Junshin latched onto the word like a rope thrown to a drowning man, gripping Hitomi’s hand as she aided him in lurching to his feet. “How is that possible?”

Hisayo’s reply was interrupted as, grunting with exertion, Jubei emerged from the hole directly behind Junshin. The largest member of the group, he had apparently elected to crawl through on his back - bracing his hands against the roof of the passage and moving forward more with his shoulders than anything else. As he struggled free, both Hitomi and Junshin helped him squeeze from the narrow confines as Hisayo rose to her feet, reaching for the edge of the fire to withdraw part of what she had set alight.

Shaking off the smouldering object to dispel the flames that had - just barely - begun to consume it, she tossed the object towards the Shinigami. The object struck the ground, though the impact was not a heavy one, skidding across the stone to come to a halt at the feet of the trio. It was Hitomi who stooped to retrieve it, feeling briefly within the partial darkness until her hand settled upon what Hisayo had thrown, raising it for easier viewing.

“What is it?” Junshin squinted, barely able to perceive much in the way of detail in his companions beyond a dark outline and the definition of shape, standing as they were beyond the firelight, let alone what Hitomi held in her hands.

“It’s a book,” she answered, the sound of ruffling paper following as Hitomi flipped through the pages. “Or at least what’s left of it…the pages feel brittle. I don’t know long it’s been down here, but I almost feel like it’s going to fall apart.”

“Can you read it, Seraphina-dono?” Jubei queried, dabbing at the back of his head, presumably to find out if he had grazed himself on his way through the tunnel.

“Not in this light,” Hitomi replied. “Well…or lack thereof. Let me took a look closer to….”

“Oh, you won’t be able to read it,” Hisayo replied, having reseated herself at the fireplace. “I am certain there are only a tiny, tiny few within the Soul Society who could read that text. Certainly, there is nobody still around who was of its time.”

Hisayo’s statement ended any further speculation from the Shinigami, as they turned their gaze towards the woman. Although Junshin was not certain what explanation the book gave of the presence of water, he nevertheless found it curious that such a thing would be found in a cave. Frowning, he turned his gaze towards the cavernous darkness above him, pursing his lips in frustration as he remained unable to determine any fine detail.

“Do you recall,” Hisayo continued, aiming her hands towards the fire, palms open to warm herself, “when I spoke to you of the Elder Civilisation?”

“Yes,” Junshin nodded, picking his way through the darkness to join Hisayo by the fire - noting for the first time that the kindling she had used appeared to be similar books and scattered papers. “You…I believe you said that the Soul Society that we know was built over something older?”

“Something far older,” Hisayo nodded, wearing a slight smile at Junshin’s recollection. “You may also recall that I stated I could not read the text surrounding the vents in the Rukongai…the writings here are not as old, but they are not far from it. Fortunately, there are enough elements of the kanji that are similar to our own that an approximate translation is possible.”

“You’ve been here before then?” Hitomi murmured, moving to join Junshin by the fire, sinking into a seated position as she looked over the book in better lighting - little more than a brown mass of flaky paper, the writing upon its pages barely legible. “When you came this way with the members of Kuroken?”

“You are correct on one count,” Hisayo replied. “I did come this way, but not with Kuroken. While Tachibana has been busying himself unearthing Pinnacle, I have been exploring much of what was bypassed on our way through the desert. This place, and a few others like it, I discovered by accident. I spent some months here, reading whatever writings had survived through the ages….This was long before I found my way to Flotsam, of course, and to you.”

As Jubei joined the group at the fire to complete the quartet, Junshin found himself peering into the darkness. Although the crackle of the burning paper filled much of his senses, he felt almost certain that he could hear - though it sounded distant - the quiet, rhythmic drop of water.

“But where is here, exactly?” he queried.

“What you are now standing in,” Hisayo responded, “is one of the few surviving remnants of the Elder Civilisation. After its destruction, their great city was swallowed by what would become the Rukongai…only the Seireiteii surviving the devastation more or less as we know it today. Very few ruins are as intact as this one, though….this is not actually a cave. It’s a building.”

“I find that hard to believe, Sata-dono,” Jubei frowned, having been looking more and more incredulous with every passing word since the mention of the ‘elder civilisation’. “The Shinigami only came to this region some two or three thousand years ago, and there has never been any construction.”

“It is only hard to believe,” Hisayo shot back, “if you believe that the current Shinigami civilisation is the first Shinigami civilisation. Shinigami and Hollows have both existed for as long as humankind has existed, but it was Shinigami who created ‘civilisation’ first, in this realm. The Elder Civilisation reached its peak before humans had even developed agriculture. It is more than twenty thousand years since its destruction…This building is a remnant of that age.’

“What you just crawled through,” she explained, pointing into the darkness in the direction of the shaft, “was, at one time, a chimney. Over the eons the building has sunk into the sands, and now lies on its side.”

Junshin continued to frown into the darkness. With no visibility to speak of, he had no way of discounting Hisayo’s words. If the stone beneath his feet had ever been shaped by masonry, time has erased any trace of it. It would very easily have been that he was standing within the remains of a building, so ravaged by the passage of the ages that it no longer retained its finish…but then, it could also just as easily have been a large cave.

But then…that wouldn’t have explained the books.

“You said that the books weren’t as old as the Elder Civilisation?” Hitomi queried, eyeing the other woman carefully. Her tone suggested scepticism, but she was not quite as blatant about is as Jubei. “What exactly are they doing here, then?”

“I imagine that they were written some time after the apocalypse that destroyed their nation,” Hisayo replied with a shrug, still warming her hands against the fire. “Generations afterwards, most likely. It would have taken centuries for the wasteland created by the fall to swallow up the city completely. I believe this building was repurposed to stockpile water. I am not entirely sure how it works…but it appears to gather water during the rainy season for miles an miles around. It still works, hence the dampness with I earlier warned you of. For some time, I imagine that people still lived within these ruins…much of what I have been able to glean from their writing, in fact, describes the fall of their civilisation as happening long ago.”

“So it makes mention of this ‘apocalypse’ you keep mentioning?” Junshin noted, turning his attention back to the campfire. “If this civilisation was so enormous, what could have brought it down?”

Hisayo did not reply immediately, withdrawing her hands as she sat back on her haunches. Crossing her legs beneath her, she rested her hands on her knees as - for several long seconds - she merely stared into the rippling flames. Jubei, who had been eyeing the woman uncertainly, apparently decided to answer instead.

“There have always been stories,” he explained to the two younger Shinigami, “of what came before recorded time. We do know that the Seireiteii predates written records, but we know very little about the Shinigami who lived there….at least, if anything is known, it has never been made public by the Central Government. There has always been the question as to why there are no other cities than the Seireiteii built within the Rukongai and…”

He hesitated for a moment before continuing, casting a sideward glance at the still silent Hisayo.

“There has always been a school of thought that, by all rights, those other cities should be there, and the very fact that they are not is evidence of some kind of ancient disaster that laid waste to them. It’s more mythology than history, though…no offence intended, Sato-dono.”

“Mythology,” Hisayo suddenly murmured in reply, “is merely what history is called when people forget it. Whether the Elder Civilisation existed or not, someone wrote these books millennia ago, no? And they certainly believed it existed.”

“What do they say?” Hitomi queried, her eyes glazing over slightly as she took gazed into the fire, watching the faded remains of the pages curl and burn - sacrificing history to provide them a source of survival.

“You must understand,” Hisayo replied, her brow creasing in a moment of irritation, “that there is very little left that was legible…and even less of it was possible to translate. I did not glean the entire story, merely details…it is thanks, at least in part, to recent events that I am able to fill in many of the blanks.’

“Eons ago,” she continued, “at the founding of the Elder Civilisation, the Shinigami succeeded in driving the Hollows from the world of the living into Hueco Mundo. There, the most powerful Hollows vied for leadership over their shattered race. Not enough information survived…or perhaps those who wrote the text simply did not know…how this war was fought, or who eventually won. All that is known is that when the civil war ended some twenty thousand years ago, Hollows made the first known incursions into the Soul Society, in a campaign that cumulated in an attack carried out by a single Hollow that all but destroyed the Elder Civilisation before it was defeated at tremendous cost.’

“That Hollow,” she uttered, “I believe to be the creature sealed within Pinnacle.”

An uneasy silence settled over the group as Hisayo stopped speaking. Junshin, having been standing, sank to crouch by the fire as the weight of Hisayo’s implications began to slowly settle upon him. Although he had known already that the horror that Kuroken wanted to unleash was a formidable creature - the very method of its capture attesting to that - the sudden knowledge that it had wiped out an entire civilisation before its defeat left a gnawing, hollow sensation in his chest.

The stakes, it seemed, continued to climb higher…the creature that lay at the end of their journey was escalating from a monster to a living cataclysm. Placing his hand to his throat, Junshin grit his teeth as he found himself briefly feeling sick. However, he shook the sensation off as quickly as it started; all they had to do with defeat Kuroken, and the creature’s return would be halted.

A tall order…but at least an easier challenge to focus on.

“…..This thing,” Hitomi was the first to speak, shattering the silence that Hisayo had imposed upon the group, “does it have a name? Perhaps it doesn’t make any difference, but….I think I’d like to put a name to what we’re up against.”

“Yes,” Hisayo nodded, lifting her maroon gaze to encompass all three of the Shinigami. “in fact, it had several….each different text appeared to use a different term to describe the creature. A few I was able to translate read as ‘The Mother-Hollow’… ’The Three Crowned Empress’…‘The Seducer’…one term that I saw crop up several times was ‘She of the Porcelain Mask’. Only one term I found utterly defied translation,” she continued. “I am not certain, but I believe it to be a proper noun. It was, in all likelihood, the creature’s actual name.’

“They named it Isharie.”







Day 2: 5:23pm

- - - Updated - - -


Act XLV: In the Dead of Night


Day 3: 3:02am



Hitomi felt herself jolt awake, her head having sunk so low that her chin had nestled against her chest, leaving her with a painful crick in her neck that immediately caused her to wince. She had not even been aware of falling asleep, her last recollection being of sitting in front of her zanpakuto alongside Junshin; the pair attempting to spend the long night in Jinzen meditation. It was a plan that, it seemed, had not lasted long. Still in her seated position, her legs crossed, she appeared to have simply drifted off in the middle of the attempt.

‘I guess we burned ourselves out crossing the desert…’

Frowning, Hitomi instinctively reached for her reiatsu, but it was sluggish in responding. She still felt utterly drained, and doubted that her proverbial batteries were fully charged just yet. However long she had slept, she imagined it had only been some two or three hours at most. For some hours the previous night, Jubei had made a largely unsuccessful attempt to teach the two young Shinigami to air walk - Hitomi, once again, discovering that she simply had too much reiatsu for her own good.

She had been painfully reminded of her attempts at shunpo in the academy, a skill she had still not perfected, when her first attempt to follow Jubei’s instructions - altering the density of spiritrons beneath her feet to create a ‘platform’ upon which to stand - had seen her pack so many spiritrons around her feet that she had broken the big toe of her left foot from the resulting pressure. It was only after some three hours of repeated attempts that she was eventually able to bring herself to hover a few inches above the ground - albeit on rather unsteady footing as her ‘platform’ of spiritrons proved to be more of a ‘swamp’ of it.

Junshin had fared rather better than herself. Although he had not succeeded at once, he had managed to reach the point of rising a full free feet from the ground, and was able to take several steps - moving his invisible platform with him for several feet before it was lost. Hitomi’s suspicion that the young man’s hidden talents potentially rivalled those of Shingen appeared to be further confirmed, thought she had to admit that her own failure took some of the satisfaction out of Junshins’ accomplishment.

She could not be certain, but she felt it had perhaps been ten o’clock when they had settled down for Jinzen. In the hours that had passed - most of them likely having been spent in sleep - Hisayo’s fire had dimmed somewhat, though fresh kindling had been added to stop it from dying altogether. From the deep breathing around her, she surmised that Jubei and Junshin had similarly succumbed to their exhaustion. Hisayo, meanwhile, was just visible on the edge of the firelight. With her back turned to Hitomi, she was seated in a similar fashion to Hitomi - her legs crossed, her head dropping slightly and her arms, so far as Hitomi could tell when viewing her from behind, folded across her chest.

Uncertain of whether or not the other woman was asleep, Hitomi decided it best not to disturb her. It would, in fact, have been some comfort to know that the mysterious woman did sleep. However, as Hitomi became more aware of her surroundings, she found something else reaching her senses; a dull scratching sound that, when focused upon, grew within her ears to drown out the slumbering breath of her companions. It was a difficult sound to describe - like metal scratching against stone, varying in pace from a leisurely scrape to a frantic scramble, echoing from all around her.

Squinting, Hitomi lifted her gaze to peer into the darkness, but found herself unable to see anything that lay beyond. Were she sleeping in a forest, she would not had found the sounds unsettling, for nightly noises were not so uncommon in the wilderness. In a desert, however, she would not have expected them…let alone inside a cave.

And she was quite certain the sounds were from inside. As much as she would have preferred to think that the scratches were vibrating down from somewhere on the other side of the thick rock faces that surrounded them on all sides, she doubted she would hear them so clearly if they were.

‘Something’s in here….’

Moving slowly, instinctively avoiding any sudden movements, Hitomi leaned forward to reach out for her zanpakuto - the naked blade still resting on the ground in front of her. However, she had barely moved an inch before another sound touched her ears - this one far closer and immediately recognisable.

“Do not worry,” Hisayo’s voice whispered through the darkness. “They will not approach.”

Hitomi jumped, startled by the other woman’s sudden words, having rather convinced herself that her companion was asleep. Turning her gaze back towards Hisayo, Hitomi found that she now fell under the scrutiny of a single maroon eye, the older woman having turned to regard the Shinigami over her shoulder.

“They w…” Hitomi began, catching herself short of simply echoing Hisayo’s words back at her. “Are they…? I mean, even in here, are we surrounded by….?”

Rather than answer with words, Hisayo turned on the spot to face Hitomi, using her hands to turn herself while remaining seated, before reaching into the fire to withdraw a half-burned book from the flames. Exactly as she had done earlier to illustrate the kindling to Junshin, Hisayo casually tossed the burning paper into the darkness beyond the firelight, carrying a brief trail of illumination with it.

The book struck the ground some distance away, sparking violently as it did so before being extinguished almost immediately. However, the brief illumination was enough to give Hitomi a glimpse of what lay beyond the firelight. Her breath caught, her heart very nearly stopping to beat as the dim light of the quickly dying flame dances across movement within the darkness. Many writing, seething bodies, slithering over one another in a desperate competition for space. They were packed so tightly that they utterly filled the spot illuminated by the flame, crawling over one-another as the ground provided too little space for them all to stand.

When the book landed, it had struck the ground almost directly beside the face of one of the creatures - squat low to the ground, its chin resting upon the stone as it gazed - to Hitomi’s eyes at least - directly at her. A bone white mask shaped like a skull, four times larger than Hitomi’s own head, with by a pair of yellow eyes that reflected the quickly dying flames stared back at Hitomi from across a distance of only some fifteen yards. The sight was a fleeting one, the light snuffing out almost as soon as it was born. However, from the scraping that echoed from every direction, Hitomi imagined that it was a sight that would be duplicated wherever she looked, had there been light to see it.

“They’re Hollows,” Hisayo explained, somewhat needlessly. “I’m not certain how many…a hundred, perhaps.”

A shudder rippled its way up and down Hitomi’s spine as the redhead wondered exactly how long she had been sleeping peacefully with a small army of Hollows lurking within striking distance. It almost failed to occur to her to even wonder why they had not yet attacked. However, even as she opened her mouth to ask, Hisayo had clearly already anticipated the question.

“So long as there‘s still light here,” Hisayo advised, raising a hand to wave vaguely into the darkness. “we’re quite safe. They won’t step within the firelight so long as I’m both awake and able to see them. However, I would advise that you do not stray beyond the firelight for any reason. In this limited space, and with light to see by, I can keep you safe. Safer, at least, than I could on the surface. However, I cannot protect you if I cannot see you, no?”

Hitomi squinted into the darkness, the Hollows rendered invisible by the shadows beyond the flickering light of their small fire. She found herself suddenly wondering if the Hollows had been there from the very beginning - if, from the moment they had stepped into the cavern, they had been sized up by the legion of hungry creatures. The only thing that had kept them inactive on the surface had been daylight…in the darkness bellow ground, however, there would have been nothing to force them into inactivity throughout the preceding hours.

“I don’t understand, Sato-san,” she whispered, keeping her voice low as though speaking at a normal volume would provoke the creatures. “They’re right there…they could attack us anytime they wanted to. Why would you being here stop them?”

“Because Hollows have a very long memory,” although Hisayo’s features were partially concealed by the darkness, the fire only illuminating so much, Hitomi though she saw the other woman’s lips curve into a thoroughly macabre grin, “and even if they do not remember this face, they remember my reiatsu very well.”

Hitomi nodded mutely, recalling that Hisayo mentioned having spent time within the subterranean caverns prior to heading for Flotsam. She shuddered to think what the first encounter between the woman and the Hollows would have been like, imagining a sea of swarming bodies enveloping Hisayo the moment she set foot within the darkness; in any event, it was evidently an encounter that Hisayo had won. Whatever she had done to them, it was sufficient for the surviving Hollows, it seemed, to give her a wide berth.

“You should try to sleep,” Hisayo continued, her gaze still lingering on Hitomi, making the younger woman shift uncomfortably on the spot. “Your own reiatsu is a long way from being fully recharged.”

“Maybe, but…” Hitomi replied, cutting off with a grimace as she merely shook her head. She doubted that sleep would come easily, knowing that lurked just beyond the light. Instead, she sank into a seated position on the far side of the fire from Hisayo, still gripping her zanpakuto. Hisayo’s belief that the Hollows would not attack appeared to be self evident…but she did not like the idea of trusting that one or more of the creatures would not decide to try their luck.

“What about you, Sato-san?” she queried. “I don’t remember seeing you sleep since…um…well, at all, really.”

Hisayo’s eyebrow briefly lifted at the remark, her maroon gaze continuing to linger on Hitomi for a moment longer before finally dropping to the fire - much to the younger woman’s relief. Hisayo’s reply was not immediate in coming, though she finally heaved a brief sigh before nodding.

“I‘ve have trouble sleeping,” she replied. “Since the first time I travelled to Pinnacle…sleep doesn‘t come easily. When you experience a moment in which you‘re quite certain your eyes will never open again…it‘s not always easy to close them.”

“Oh…” Hitomi murmured. “I see.”

“I doubt that very much,” Hisayo responded with a wry smile, shaking her head ever so slightly. “I have no doubt that you have faced death before…You are not like Kiyoko-san. He is naive and his hands are unstained. You….I believe you have more in common with me than you do with him. You and I are soldiers, hardened by what we’ve seen and by what we’ve done. You’re young…it hasn’t really taken its toll yet…but the signs are there. You have faced the possibility of death more than once, no?’

“But….this was different,” the young woman’s eyelids drifted half closed as she continued to stare into the fire, her half-smile fading into an expression that was unreadable. “There is a difference between thinking you might die, and knowing that you will die. To feel cold, hard terror take root within the pit of your stomach…to find yourself face to face with something that is so utterly beyond your comprehension, its very existence is nearly enough to shatter your mind. To know that your life is about to end, and that there is nothing…absolutely nothing…that you can do to prevent it.”

Hisayo fell silent, the absence of her voice filling the sudden soundless void within the chamber. Even the distant Hollows had fallen silent, the scratching noises of their bodies creeping against the stone drifting into nothingness as the young woman finally rattled out a long, low breath. Although Hitomi could not be certain, she believed she saw - if only for a moment - a flash of anger in the young woman’s otherwise empty eyes.

“But be that as it may,” she eventually uttered, “I did not die. At least I don’t think I did. Sometimes….I’m not sure.”

Hitomi frowned, watching the other woman curiously as the latter continued to simply stare into the fire. She couldn’t help but wonder exactly what had been done to the members of Kuroken to make them what they were. She recalled the manner in which Kashigi and Yabu had appeared to have ‘traded’ parts of their body for their zanpakuto. Hisayo had also spoken of ‘sacrifices’ that her former allies had made to gain their tremendous power.

She wondered - though she thought better of asking out loud - what sacrifice Hisayo had made for her own strength.

A sudden scramble of shifting stone drew Hitomi’s attention sharply away from Hisayo and back to the surrounding darkness. In the dim light, she could still vaguely see the shifting, darting movements of the Hollows - at least now that she knew what to look for. The previously seething movement of the Hollows had intensified, though now the empty cavern was filled with another sound - a dry, snapping crunch; it seemed that the Hollows, becoming frustrated, had started to eat one of their own.

Turning away in disgust, Hitomi raised a hand to her mouth as she fought down the urge to vomit. When she turned back to face Hisayo, she discovered that the woman was no longer facing her. Having turned back to look away from the fire, the woman’s back was to Hitomi once more.

“You should go back to sleep,” she instructed over her shoulder. “If you are tired, then you will simply slow us down, no?”

Taken aback by the somewhat abrupt conclusion to their conversation, Hitomi merely nodded mutely at the back of Hisayo’s head, before settling down where she lay. Despite being close to the fire, the stone floor felt icy cold, and the girl curled herself into a ball in a futile effort to stay warm. Closing her eyes, she made an attempt to return to slumber - though her ears still echoed with the dry crunch of snapping bone, sounding from the darkness.

Serenaded by the grizzly lullaby, Hitomi was not even aware of how long she lay awake until slumber finally took her.





Day 3: 3:22am

[Seraphina]

Act XLVI: Changing Me to Change You



Day 3: 7:15am



As much as it surprised him, Junshin awoke to find himself relatively refreshed despite having found nothing more comfortable to sleep on than a dry section of rock near the fireplace. It was a testament, perhaps, to just how exhausted he had been after the previous night. After achieving what could perhaps, in the loosest possible sense, be called ‘air-walking’, he had all but collapsed into sleep. His attempt to reopen communications with his sword ending as quickly as they had begun.

As sleep left him, he felt certain he could recall the fading images of a dream - glistening water beneath the bright desert sun, and the cool refreshing taste on his lips…however, the bulk of whatever he had dreamt was gone, and whatever remained was fading with equal speed as he sat upright, grimacing as he reached up a hand to nurse a crick in his neck; perhaps his sleep had not been so restful after all. The fire was still burning, and in the otherwise lightless cavern it was difficult to say exactly what time of day it was. However, Junshin imagined he had slept for at least a few hours - it would, in all likelihood, be past dawn in the world above.

Of his companions, Junshin could just about make out the dark shape of Hisayo on the far side of the campfire - her back turned, and utterly motionless. Jubei was exactly where Junshin remembered him being the previous night, reclined on his back with his arms folded behind his head, just on the edge of the firelight. Hitomi, meanwhile, was spread out closer to the fire, only two feet to one side of Junshin, lying on her side with her head resting on her clasped hands. Neither of them had woken yet - Junshin, it seemed, was the early riser of that particular day.

“Are you rested, Kiyoko-dono?”

Junshin jumped at Hisayo suddenly spoke, her voice filling the otherwise silent chamber. She spoke without turning, though Junshin squinted into the dim firelight as he saw her posture change - the woman’s dark outline rising into a standing position as she somehow realised that one of her charges had begun to stir.

“I…yes, thank you,” Junshin nodded. “Better than I thought I would, at any rate. Did you sleep well, Sato-san?”

“Wake the others,” Hisayo replied, simply ignoring the question, “I let you sleep longer than I had intended…we’re making good time, but we have to move out or we’ll lose whatever we’ve gained. This is our last stop. Today we move through Districts Seventy Nine and Eighty, and head beyond the Outer Rim. We do not have time to waste, no?”

Junshin allowed himself a wry smile, no longer altogether surprised at Hisayo’s business like response. Nodding, although with her back turned he knew that Hisayo had no way of seeing him do so, he placed his palms against the ground to slide himself closer to Hitomi, reaching out a hand to shake her away. He imagined, or at least hoped, that it would not produce a repeat of their night at the barracks. At least, this time, the girl did not look as though she were in the middle of a nightmare.

As his hand settled on her shoulder, Junshin gave the girl the briefest of shakes. She stirred briefly, muttering incoherently as she shrugged off the remainder of her own sleep. When one shake proved insufficient, Junshin applied a second - this time causing one of Hitomi’s eyes to open half way, still glazed over as she continued to fail to wake up.

“I don’t wanna eat it,” she grumbled, clearly stuck half way between reality and whatever she had been dreaming about. “It’s horrible…you eat it.”

“What?” Junshin blinked. “I don’t have….never mind. It’s time to get up, Seraphina-kun.”

“You get up,” Hitomi grumbled, rolling onto her back and raising both hands to rub her eyes. As uncooperative as she seemed, Junshin imagined she would come around on her own, and turned his attention to Jubei. The latter was considerably easier to wake, his eyes flickering open and appearing to be immediately alert the very instant Junshin touched the man’s muscular shoulder. Hitomi, meanwhile, had sat up. Although she still grumbled in protest, the redhead appeared to be coming around by the time Junshin had gathered up his twin zanpakuto and slid them into their harness.

“I assume, Sato-dono, that we will not be delaying for breakfast?” Jubei queried to Hisayo, who had made her way to the narrow tunnel through which they had entered the sunken building, peering through it for any signs of activity outside.

“No,” Hisayo replied over her shoulder. “A few trail rations will have to do….I refilled the canteens while everyone was asleep, but we can’t waste anymore daylight. It is a straight shot from here to Pinnacle and, if we are lucky, we may even beat Kuroken there.”

“Yeah….” Hitomi murmured groggily from the floor, looking rather more wakeful and making an attempt to smooth out the left side of her hair - bunched up and crinkly from having been slept on. “I’d rather get there first too, if we can. Maybe we can do something to screw up their excavation before they get there.”

“Don not forget,” Hisayo cautioned, “Tachibana Aoshi will be there. Provided he remains inside Pinnacle, the seki-seki rock will prevent him from detecting us….if he is not, then the members of Kuroken being present will be neither here nor there, no?”

Junshin peered at the woman’s turned back, wondering what exactly she intended them to do if their opponent was that powerful. The possibility of their success rested, it seemed, on a gamble…and, thus far, they had not had the best of luck on their journey. Still, knowing that the final leg of their trip was upon them was an encouraging thought, and Junshin made his way across the chamber to join Hisayo as she finally withdrew her head from the hole, gesturing to the outside world.

“Alright,” she nodded. “You go first, Kiyoko-dono. I will wait until last….then, we will continue west, to whatever we find there.”

Nodding, Junshin dropped to his hands and knees and, for the second time, made the uncomfortable and claustrophobic journey through the narrow tunnel; made slightly less oppressive on this occasion by the presence of bright white daylight on the far end. Inching forward on his elbows, he was more aware of the upward inline than he had been of the descent, the trip slightly harder going on the way out than it had been on the way in. However, it nevertheless seemed to end more quickly as Junshin found himself crawling free to emerge once again into sunlight….and immediately encountering the painful, searing heat of the desert sun overhead.

‘Damn it…should have stayed underground.’

Rising to his feet, Junshin strode up the side of the dune beneath which they had slept, using his hands as much as his feet when the soft surface of the sand threatened to slip out from under him, to get a better look at their surroundings. The desert, however, looked exactly as it had the day before - blank, featureless and eternal. The ocean of dunes simply spread out into infinity, leaving - to Junshin’s eyes at least - no indication of the way ahead.

Behind him, Hitomi was the next to emerge from the hole. Dusting herself off, the girl peered up at him briefly before scrambling up the dune to join him. With not a breath of wind, the air felt hot and stifling within his lungs…Junshin was, once again, reminded just how far removed this wasteland was from the comparatively benign sands of his homeland.

“So, what was it you were eating?” he queried to Hitomi as she drew up beside him, drawing an arched eyebrow from the young girl. “In your dream, I mean. You said something about not wanting to eat such-and-such?”

“Oh…” Hitomi replied, shaking her head as she turned away, directing her gaze westward. “I don’t remember….didn’t sleep too well. I’m not sure what I dreamt about.”

“Heh, fair enough,” Junshin smiled mirthlessly, following her gaze. “Still….there ware worse things to dream about that food. Do you remember the buffet table back home? What I wouldn’t give to find myself in front of that right now.”

“It was only a few days ago….but yeah, it feels a lot longer,” Hitomi nodded, her shoulders rising and falling in a weary smile. “It almost feels like we’ve been out here for months….But it’s a bit late in the game for regrets, isn’t it?”

“Oh, no regrets,” Junshin replied, turning to face her once again. “Well….maybe one. Well, perhaps not a regret so much as a question that‘s buzzing around in my head”

Arching a crimson eyebrow, Hitomi cast him a sideward glance. Junshin met her gaze readily, no longer shying away from his companion as he once had. He was still quite certain he didn’t completely understand her, and he knew for a fact that she did not yet completely understand him. However, he did at least feel a greater rapport with Hitomi than he had only a few nights previously. It was only a little over two weeks since the door to his quarters in divisional barracks had open to admit the remarkable young Shinigami into his life, and he could not have imagined the circumstances into which they would find themselves thrown.

Whatever else could be said of their relationship, of one thing Junshin was certain; he no longer felt like the junior partner, riding along on her coat tails.

“I just wonder, now that we’re in what’s probably the final stretch of this little adventure,” he eventually continued, turning away from her gaze as he felt a slight flush creeping into his cheeks, “if you’ve started to think of me as Nakama yet.”

It was a question he would not have dared to ask only a short while ago, and Junshin couldn’t help but smile inwardly as it brought a flash if crimson to Hitomi’s own cheeks. The girl quickly turned away, clearing her throat loudly.

“Heh…” she finally grunted, managing a grin of her own. “You know, you’ve changed.”

“For the better, I hope,” Junshin replied, turning to look back over his shoulder as the irritated grunts of Jubei announced the older man’s emergence from the cave.

“Much better,” Hitomi responded, folding her arms as she offered a brief, emphatic nod. “You know, I think….I think that part of the reason I was so thorny towards you at first was just because of how much you reminded me of me.’

“When I first came to the Academy I was….just this timid little thing,” although the girl’s smile did not fade, her gaze dropped from the horizon to the ground beneath her feet. “I had no confidence in myself…I felt that the impossible was being asked of me…I guess we have that in common. I honestly think I would have continued that way too if it hadn’t been for two people who woke me up from that. They helped me find my voice, they helped me grow, they helped me become the person I am. That‘s why I came to think of them as my Nakama.”

“In that case,” Junshin murmured, “I guess we have two things in common, then.”

Hitomi’s eyes flickered in his direction, though quickly returned to the ground. One corner of her mouth rising into a somewhat reluctant smile, she briefly shrugged her shoulders before turning her own attention behind them, watching as Hisayo finally exited the underground complex as well.

“Maybe we’ve both changed along the way,” her voice was low as she spoke, intended for Junshin’s ears only. “Maybe you needed me to help you find your voice….and I needed you to help me realise my voice doesn’t need to be so loud that it drowns out who I really am. Beneath all of this…beneath Seraphina….Reihaii Hitomi is still there. Maybe I don’t need to be a soldier all the time.’

“Either way,” she nodded again, tossing her head westward, “let’s get this show on the road….the curtain’s rising for the last act, and if we don’t hurry we might end up missing it.”

“Yeah,” Junshin nodded, squinting into the blinding brightness of the distant horizon, as though expecting to be able to see their final destination looming towards them. “Let’s go save the world, n’stuff.”

“Indeed,” it was Hisayo who spoke, scaling the dune with Jubei in tow, striding between the two Shinigami to hesitate only briefly upon the crest of the dune. Like the two Shinigami, she gazed westward, as though she could see what lay ahead, before finally continuing her descent down the dune’s opposite slope.

“Next stop,” she uttered, “Pinnacle. And whatever end awaits there.”

As Jubei drew up beside the pair, he stopped briefly to place a heavy hand on each of their shoulders. Offering them each a nod of encouragement, the veteran Shinigami set out after Hisayo. The latter appeared to be setting the same unrelenting, brisk pace that she had the previous day. Their final march was, it seemed, going to be a punishing one. With a district and a half to cross, and some unknown distance between themselves and their final destination, it was unlikely she intended to stop before nightfall.

Neither Hitomi nor Junshin followed immediately, both of them silently considering the possibility that this journey could very easily be the last ones they would ever make. Ahead of them, beyond the desert, lay uncertainty….their success, indeed their very survival, rested entirely on how much their strength had increased during the course of their journey. Whether it would be enough or not, they had no way of testing until the time came.

Junshin knew he was stronger…astronomically powerful compared to the level he had been on the day he set out from the Seireiteii. As powerful as he was, he knew that Hitomi remained further ahead….but he was extremely hesitant to measure either her or himself against the likes of Hisayo or Jubei. There was still a barrier that existed between himself and ascending to the next tier of strength that he would almost certainly require.

He needed to learn his sword’s name….and he needed to do it before they reached their destination. Unconsciously lifting his right hand, he placed his fingertips upon the bronze pommel of the sword beneath his left arm - just visible as it protruded from, its harness. There was a definite change in the weapon; in the last few days it had felt more alive than it had in the years since its formation. There was a definite consciousness within the two swords, as eager to reach out to him as he was to seize it.

‘Written on my soul, huh?’

Shaking his head, Junshin finally set out after the two senior members of the party, Hitomi staying in step beside him. He would just have to hope that, when he finally had the need to reach for it, the name would come to him. If he could achieve shikai, then perhaps he would have a chance of making a difference in the coming battle.

He had come too far to go back to being a burden.



Day 3: 7:26am

- - - Updated - - -


Act XLVII: Isharie the Seducer


Day 3: 2:23pm



To a spiritually aware being, the existence of the chamber would have appeared to be an impossibility. A contradiction so enormous that any attempt to rationalise it threatened to shatter the mind. The colossal pillar of swirling black - the most powerful spell in the bakudo school of kido, the Bankin - towering invisibly into the darkness that loomed oppressively overhead should have radiated monumental, bone crushing spiritual pressure. However, through the complex web of seals weaved around the monolith, trapping it with barriers both physical and temporal, only the barest sliver of reiatsu was able to escape into the physical world. A tiny crack in the dam, through which the barest trickle of the ocean beyond it wept.

The sheer power of such a barrier was astronomical. The fact that every drop of reiatsu invested in its makeup was turned inward, forced to expend virtually the entirety of its being to such an extent that there was simply no excess left to detect was a horrifying testament to what lay within. That he could look upon it at all without losing his mind was, to Tachibana Aoshi, all the proof that was required of his right to dominate it. He had long since set his mind towards that goal, devoting every hour of his day to trying to break through the seal and sample the bounty within.

The Entity could not influence him. His mind was strong.

Like a chisel to stone, his entire existence was consumed by the need to drive his reiatsu time and time again at the tiny chink in the armour of the seal, though he never seemed to make any significant headway, widening the gap in the barrier’s armour by only the tiniest amount as the months rolled by. At first his attempts have been out of simply curiosity - a suggestion that had come to him through his dreams. He knew that the Entity had implanted the notion, but he cared not - his mind was still his own.

He thought very little of the fact that, as the crack grew, so too did the compulsion to widen in. Occasionally he found himself wondering how long it had been since he had slept or eaten, but the questions always seemed to slip from his mind the moment they entered it. He could no longer remember how much time he had spent in silent meditation before the prison. Behind the kilometre thick walls of sekiseki rock, the passage of time in the outside world seemed somehow muted. Events beyond the chamber seemed less pressing than they once had. He felt that, once, he had cared a great deal more about other tasks; cracking through the prison had been a goal but not a priority.

Aoshi did not often find himself wondering what event or circumstances had caused him to change his priorities. But he was certain the reasons had been good ones. His mind was, after all, still his own. He knew that the Entity whispered to him, that it attempted to fill his thoughts with its desires and sway his purpose. But its urgings he dismissed with the contempt they deserved.

The Entity could not influence him. His mind was strong.

A sudden tremble shuddered through the reiatsu that bled from the crack in the seal as, reaching through the walls of the prison where he could not, the Entity sensed the approach of his subordinates. Kuroken was drawing nearer - the Entity would not have disturbed him unless they were less than a day’s travel away. The event very nearly passed Aoshi by, however. He simply continued to stare forward, his eyes glazed over, numbly hurling his reiatsu against the prison until the notion finally wormed its way into his mind to contact his subordinates. His own notion - he was sure of it.

Urged on by a half whispered voice that hissed to him from within his mind, Aoshi rose to his feet. Despite his days of inactivity, his body was still firm and powerful - for as much reiatsu as he hurled at the prison, the Entity allowed more to flow into him. If anything, he had become more powerful during his exposure to the seal than he had ever been before it - the Entity supplying him with a constant, inexhaustible source of energy to hurl back at the breach. It had bothered him at first that much of his own reiatsu had been suppressed and replaced with the entity’s own…but now, he could scarcely recall why it had concerned him. What did he had to fear, after all, from the caged monster?

The Entity could not influence him. His mind was strong.

As he stepped closer to the monolith, Aoshi found himself momentarily transfixed by the reflection he encountered within its glassy surface - rendered visibly by the pale, green glow that emanated from the base of the towering prison. He recognised the face as his own, but it was not quite the face he remembered. He remembered himself as a man in the prime of his youth, his skin bronzed and tanned, his head crowned with a mane of black hair and his piercing blue eyes challenging the world. It was a face with which he had often competed with his brother, charming the local girls and infuriating the husbands within his father’s court.

The face that looked back at him was not, however, his own….or at least, it was not as he thought it should have been. Although he still stood at his impressive height of six feet and three inches, his leanly muscular build evident even beneath the black shozoku and long brown dustcoat that was the hallmark of Kuroken, his face had undergone a myriad of changes since last he saw it.

Heavy, dark rings hung low under his eyes as the lack of sleep clearly took its toll upon his body - though he did not feel physically tired. His skin looked pale and clammy, a thin film of perspiration dribbling from his now hairless head as, at some point or another, his hair had apparently been shed. In his forehead and neck, he could clearly see blue veins bulging beneath his skin - though his alarm upon seeing his appearance faded almost instantly, replaced instead by a serene calm as he realised it was simply temporary…a reaction to his body fighting off the Entity’s influence. Once he had dominated its power, he could reshape his body however he wished.

The Entity could not influence him. His mind was strong.

The fingernail of his right index finger had already bitten into the skin of his left forearm, cutting so deep that it broke the skin, before he was even aware of having moved. Blinking groggily, Aoshi glanced down to watch his own finger carve into his skin, his mind deadened to the pain as an intricate pattern of sigils and ruins was cut into his flesh. It never occurred to him to stop - somehow, he was quite certain it was important for him to continue the process.

“Bakudo number seventy seven,” he murmured, raising his left hand - his forearm oozing a thick trail of crimson from the jagged cuts carved into his flesh - to press his palm to the glassy surface of the monolith, “Tenteikūra.”

He immediately felt his consciousness slipping away - the spell carrying his mind from his body and into the vast currents of the Entity’s churning reiatsu. Alone, his kido could not possibly have penetrated the barrier but, piggybacking upon the overwhelming power contained within the prison, Aoshi’s mind was able to seek out its objective as, still many miles distant, the members of Kuroken became aware of him.

“Report,” he uttered, his lip curling as he realised how dry his throat felt.


“We have just left the Outer Rim, Tachibana-sama. We will arrive at Pinnacle in about fourteen hours.”

The voice that replied belonged to Toda. Hearing the man’s voice made Aoshi’s skin crawl - he could almost feel the corruption of the Entity radiating from the man, his entire body wracked with the changes that had been forced upon it during his exchange with the creature. He had been unable to resist….not like Aoshi…not like him.


“There is another matter, Tachibana-sama. Kashigi is dead.”

The second voice belonged to Shimazu, and despite taking more comfort in it than the voice of Toda, Aoshi still found himself momentarily scowling. How could one of his subordinates have been killed without him being made away of it. The Entity constantly monitored all the members of Kuroken, and made no secret of that fact. There was certainly no way it could have been unaware of Kashigi’s death, and the only reason he could not have been made aware of it is if the Entity had deliberately withheld such information…

Like a leaf carried by the current of a stream, Aoshi found his thoughts suddenly tumbling from his head. Squinting, he stared mutely at his own reflection for a moment, trying to remember what he had been thinking about. Had he been angry about something….? If he had forgotten so quickly, it could not have been that important.

“Very well,” he instructed his subordinates. “Continue on to Pinnacle. Put the slaves to work as soon as you arrive.”


“Tachibana-sama, perhaps you did not receive my last message. Kashigi is dead. He was killed by a Shiniga…”

“Those are my instructions,” Aoshi snapped in reply. “Carry them out.”

Removing his hand from the surface of the barrier, Aoshi only then felt the sudden agony that had been surging through his arm since he had carved the runes into his own flesh. Hissing through clenched teeth, he staggered drunkenly backwards as a brief, all too fleeting moment of lucidity pierced through the fog that otherwise enveloped his mind.

‘Wait….what did he say about Kashigi…? That the hell am I doing! Why am I sitting here instead of studying this thing and find out what it….’

The notion that whatever objections he had were not important swept over him once again, and Aoshi found his lips curving into a placid smile as he sank back into a seated position in front of the monolith. The pain in his arm subsided, even as the blood that flowed freely from his wound pooled on the floor beneath him, Aoshi calmly returned to hurling his reiatsu against the breach into the prison. What did he have to object to, after all? Whatever he did, he did with his own mind, and he was quite convinced his reasoning was sound.

After all, the Entity could not influence him. His mind was strong.




Day 3: 2:34pm

[Seraphina]

Act XLVIII: Dissent


Day 3: 2:34pm



Shimazu Tadatsune was not a man prone to acting without due thought. The long years of his life had been spent learning control and restraint, to take action only when the consequences of that action had been carefully considered and all contingencies accounted for. It was a code by which he lived in both military matters and life in general, and it was a trait that he considered a virtue. Acting without thinking was the way of the young and the reckless. Those with experience had no excuse for doing so.

As a result, Shimazu found himself hesitant to speak as Tachibana Aoshi’s voice faded from the minds of the Kuroken members, still seated within the cart that lurched inevitably onwards through the blank, sandy desolation of their surroundings; that part of the Soul Society that - upon its discovery - Tachibana had dubbed ‘the wastes’. Here, an end came even to the sporadic settlements of the Outer Rim; an eternity of flat, featureless sand and stone, beaten flat by an eternal wind that pummelled even the dunes down to the barest rises upon the otherwise level terrain; a constant cloud of scraping, itchy sand blasting across the landscape to irritate the throat and the eyes, while blinding the sky overhead in a beige fog. It was not surprising that it was here the Pinnacle had been hidden - surviving in such a place was nigh on impossible. With no landmarks and no means of navigation, anyone who did not know exactly which direction in which to head would inevitably wander until death.

It was not a place that brought comfort. Leaving the Wastes to undertake his mission to collapse the vents through which the excess of the Entity’s spiritual pressure was released had felt, at the time, like a blessing. Even the sun scorched desert of the outer rim had seemed like paradise compared to the alien landscape in which he had been forced to exist during the initial excavation of Pinnacle. However, his journey had not been without a growing sense of unease…unease that had grown upon seeing the droves of prisoners being carted back to Pinnacle by Sasaki and Toda, and further still upon the contact from his master.

His concerns had reached a point, he felt, where he could no longer keep them silent. In all likelihood, whatever was going to happen at Pinnacle was going to happen within the next day or two, and if he did not speak now it was likely he would not get a chance.

“We must speak,” he murmured, his voice low - he did not know if whispering made any difference to the Entity’s ability to monitor what passed between them, but he knew of no way to altogether prevent it. “And…we must speak carefully.”

As he spoke up, the other members of Kuroken stirred. Toda, who had been reclining against the interior edge of the raised wooden barricade that surrounded the wagon - lifted his head just enough to cause a light jingle from the wind chimes that swung from the edge of his hat. Sasaki, who had been busy scraping a wetstone across the length of his colossal sword’s blade, hesitated upon hearing Shimazu’s swords, but did not look in the older man’s direction.

It was only Yabu who did not stir - the rodent-like man spread-eagled on the narrow bench at the cart’s rear upon which he had slept for much of their journey. Shimazu, however, paid him no mind - the man was so insignificant that his support would not be mandatory. He was content enough to have the attention of Toda, Sasaki and Keiji - the latter having immediately snapped to attention upon hearing Shimazu’s voice.

“Speaking is dangerous, Shimazu-san,” it was Toda who spoke, his voice echoing with a faintly tinny quality as it vibrated against the brim of his hat - his head almost entirely buried in cloth as the old man reclined into a crouch on the wagon’s floor. “You never know who might be listening….Or, then again, maybe you know exactly who might be listening.”

“I know…” Shimazu nodded. “But this cannot wait…it must not wait. You must all realise what it is I am going to speak of. Don’t try to tell me that you have not had the same concerns.”

The silence he received in response answered the question readily enough for the veteran soldier. None of them spoke, Shimazu’s meaning clear to everyone present. In the months since Pinnacle’s discovery, there was not a single one among them who had not wondered whether it was Tachibana from whom they still took orders.

For Shimazu, the difference that had come over his young master had been so sudden, and so dramatic, that the difference had seemed jarring. Aoshi had always been consumed with the same lust for power and advancement as his father - a man with little patience for incompetence or compromise. However he had always seemed, to Shimazu at least, to lack his father’s cruelty. Shimazu remembered a bright young man setting out eager to prove himself worthy of his father’s trust, and he had watched that same young man begin to plan a coup, and order his subordinates to round up slaves to further that ambition…all since discovering that damned prison.

In the hierarchy of the Easter Rukongai, the Shimazu clan had been a subordinate clan of the Tachibanas for as long as the history of both houses existed, a parallel to the Chiharu clan of Tachibana's rivals, the Imagawa house. Shimazu’s family had served Aoshi’s for a period that spanned into millennia. Successive generations of Shimazus had found their place at the head of Tachibana armies, or in a place of high esteem within their master’s courts. It had not been a roll in which Shimazu Tadatsune himself had always been comfortable - not since the day Tachibana Motonori had begun to respond to the murmured whispers that came to him in his dreams - but it was one he could not possibly betray.

For as long as his orders came from a Tachibana, he could carry them out. It was not his place to agree or disagree with Aoshi’s instructions - whether he felt sympathy for the slaves, or remorse for those that did not survive the horrific working conditions at Pinnacle should not have entered into his decision to obey. Somehow, he could force himself to stomach it.

However, he was no longer convinced that it was a Tachibana giving the orders.

“I will serve the house of Tachibana until I die,” he spoke up again when the others continued to remain silent. “I will not serve another…nor will I be a puppet to another. If….what we fear turns out to be true, may I count on your support?”

“To do what?” it was Sasaki who replied, his hand still frozen in the middle of scraping the wet stone over his sword. There was, however, a hint of a sneer behind the man’s voice; he knew that Shimazu could not answer directly - indeed he seemed to take amusement in it. The need to carefully garb their words in pretence was once that Sasaki was the least likely of the four to observe. Holding the chain of command in contempt, he made no secret of his derision towards Toda or, for that matter, Tachibana himself.

However, he still knew better than to speak out against their silent, ever vigilant watcher.

“You know very well,” Keiji suddenly growled - the behemoth having remained utterly silent until Sasaki’s blatant provocation, “of what Shimazu-sama is speaking.”

Shimazu may, ordinarily, have allowed himself the barest of smiles at his subordinate’s words. Keiji, he did not doubt, would support him regardless; he had never been given cause to doubt his adjutant’s loyalty. However, Keiji’s support alone would be insufficient - his power was inferior to that of both Toda and Sasaki. If the worst came to worst, it would require the united strength of Kuroken.

Even that damnable woman, wherever she was now.

Whatever comfort his subordinate’s support offered to Shimazu faded almost immediately as Hisayo sprang to mind, and he found himself scowling at the memory of their encounter in Flotsam. As Tachibana Aoshi’s adjutant, Sato Hisayo had rarely operated alongside the other members of Kuroken. Shimazu would be lying if he were to claim to know her well…what he did know of her was largely reputation. In the court of the Tachibana clan, Sato Hisayo was known both for her great beauty and her predisposition towards violence. Cold, uncompromising and reputedly without compassion, she served primarily as an unspoken warning against the enemies of the Tachibana house. Although not his equal in power, the enemies of Tachibana feared the 'White Lady' far more than they feared her master.

Everything from the way she had stood to the look in her eyes to the tone of her voice told Shimazu that, if there had been a fight that night in Flotsam, she would have fought to the death. Despite her claims, he did not believe for a moment that she would be willing to risk such a battle for the sake of making two young Shinigami her sport. Sato Hisayo was up to something, and her lack of contact with the rest of Kuroken left him in little doubt that it was something she did not wish Tachibana to know.

If so, then Shimazu found himself wondering if the young woman had, somehow, found a way to elude the sight of the Entity….

‘Damn it…you’re getting old, Tadatsune. In the old days, you wouldn’t have let her go anywhere without being clear about her intentions. Now you don’t have any idea whether she’s friend or foe. And, unless I’m a fool, those two Shinigami are probably not only alive, but wondering the exact same thing about her.’

Shimazu was abruptly snapped back to the conversation as he realised that Sasaki was talking again. Having finally turned to face Shimazu and Keiji on their end of the wagon, the man’s painted features had split into a wide, leering grin.

“It sounds to me almost like you’re talking about sedition,” he grinned. “My, what would Tachibana-sama say if he were to find out that….”

Sasaki cut off abruptly as Shimazu’s had suddenly slipped out from beneath his coat - the garment still draped around his shoulders like a cloak. The old soldier’s palm closed over the iron eye patch secured over his right eye - his left glaring at Sasaki in a silent, unspoken warning. His fingertips closed over the edge’s of the eye patch, though stopped short of moving it to one side; Sasaki had already stopped talking.

“I said,” Shimazu growled, slowly lowering his hand - the threat of whatever was concealed underneath clearly no longer required, “that I will serve the House of Tachibana until the day I die. I will slay, without hesitation, anyone who betrays our Master. I will follow any order, if that order comes from Tachibana-sama.’

“Now, that being said,” he continued, his arm drifting beneath the cloak once more. Sasaki’s grin was gone, replaced by a frustrated scowl as he merely glowered at the Third Finger. Whatever insubordination he had planned, he clearly thought better of it now. “May I count on your support, should the worst prove to be true? Let me make it clear that should you make yourself my enemy that if I defeat you I will show you no mercy.”

As he spoke, he slid his single eye from Sasaki towards Toda - the latter having remained silent. At his last sentence, however, Toda’s head suddenly lifted. The wind chimes that clung to the wide brim of the hat jingled out of brief rattle of vaguely musical notes as - although his face was virtually invisible beneath the shadows cast by the wide metal circle - Shimazu felt certain that Toda smirked.

“….If,” Toda replied, his eyes glinting mockingly from within the darkness, before he lowered his head once more.




Day 3: 2:44pm

[Seraphina]

Act XLIX: Yesterday's Scarecrows


Say 3: 6:12pm



“What…is that?”

Hitomi squinted into the sunlight, beads of water dribbling down her face from the damp cloth draped over her head - her tunic having been repurposed into a waterlogged turban, leaving her only in her breeches and shitage. Raising a hand to wipe away the largest of the droplets that clung to her eyebrows, the young Shinigami made an attempt to better discern what exactly she was looking at. At first, it had seemed to Hitomi that the otherwise flat, barren landscape beyond the Outer Rim was broken by distant rock formations that loomed out of the perpetual dust storm some mile ahead of them. However, as each step drew them nearer, it became clear that what she was looking at was something quite different.

Directly behind her, the wet sleeves of his own tunic dangling at either side of his head with every unsteady step, Junshin came to a stop as he lifted his own head to follow Hitomi’s gaze. He and Jubei - who walked some five meters to Hitomi’s left - had also stripped off their own tunics, soaking the cloth from the canteen and draping them over their heads in the hope of cooling themselves off. As Shinigami, they did not have to concern themselves too readily with sunburn or sunstroke - the heat, however, nevertheless remained oppressive.

“What’s what?” Junshin queried, his shoulders sagging somewhat, his torso shiny with perspiration as he too peered into the distance. Hitomi had no need to answer, however, as her companion clearly caught sight of what she was referred to. Although the constantly billowing cloud of sand and dust reduced visibility to only a little over a mile ahead of them - despite the relatively flat terrain - it was still clear that something lay up ahead.

They appeared, to Hitomi at least, to be approximately man sized and that their path would carry the group directly to whatever it was they were. Although still little more than dark shapes, glimpsed indistinctly through the dusty smog, she could tell now that they were certainly not rocks. To her eyes, they appeared to be ‘T’ shaped, and were she seeing them in any other location in the world she would probably have immediately assumed they were artificial.

Who, however, would build anything out here?

Had she been asked in advance what she believed existed beyond the Outer Rim, Hitomi would have immediately replied: ‘nothing’. As it happened, this was not far beyond the truth. As they had drawn near the end of District Eighty, the sand had largely given way to stone, the dunes fading into flatland and the desert into something even more desolate. What lay around her could not truly be called a landscape…it was the bones of one. A dry, lifeless, featureless eternity of nothing that - so cut off from the rest of the world that even the sky was rendered invisible beneath the swirling clouds created by the sand filled wind - Hitomi felt as though she had stepped into another world.

At first, questions had tumbled through her mind about the nature of what she was seeing. How far did the wasteland go? Was there even an end to it? If there was an end, what did it turn into at its conclusion? Had it ever been anything else? They were questions that she doubted she would ever answer, or that anyone would ever answer, and had simply forced them out of her mind. Living in a continent sized kingdom that provided an afterlife for every soul that travelled from the World of the Living, it was easier to imagine that the Soul Society was all that existed within its dimension. Certainly, even if the land beyond the Outer Rim continued for eternity, Hitomi doubted there was anything else out there.

But what, then, was she looking at?

“Those,” it was Hisayo who suddenly spoke up, causing Hitomi to jump as the raven haired woman suddenly drew up beside her, “are meant to be a warning.”

The rather brief response appeared to be all that Hisayo intended to give as the woman immediately pulled ahead of the group, marching forward with the same dauntless determination with which she had guided them from Flotsam. Even Hisayo, however, was clearly feeling the effects of the heat. She had loosened the lie of her shozoku around her torso, opening the neckline slightly further to give her milky white skin room to breath. She did not, however, go so far as to drape her head in wet cloth - though she did occasionally raise a hand to wipe the gathering perspiration from her brow.

“A warning, Sato-dono?” Jubei intoned from his position at the group’s flank, using the dangling cloth of his own repurposed tunic to dab at the sweat dribbling down his thick neck. “For whom? Or perhaps I should ask from whom?”

“Either would likely be a valid question,” Hisayo replied over her shoulder. “I believe they came long after Pinnacle was built, but before it was moved here from the Seireiteii. I suspect, though I cannot be sure, that Pinnacle’s current location is actually where it was originally created…at some point during the eons that followed, it was moved to the chambers beneath the Central Forty Six headquarters. They didn’t move it here at random after Tachibana Motonari‘s attempted coup, they were returning it to where they found it.’

“Those things,” she raised a slender arm to point towards the distant objects, “where likely erected by people who stumbled on it the first time it was here…perhaps people who explored this far out when it was more hospitable, early enough that they still had an understanding of what they had found. Twenty thousand years is a long time. Tachibana Aoshi could not have been the first to explore out here, no?”

As the three Shinigami hurried to match pace with Hisayo, the distant objects began to march steadily closer. Slowly, some details of what they were seeing began to become more clear - thought Hitomi could still not immediately tell what they were. The ‘T’ shapes she had seen appeared to be made of stone, some eight feet in height - a dull throb in the back of her head as her reiatsu reacted to their proximity told her that it was likely seki-seki rock. It made a degree of sense - normal stone could not possibly have retained its shape after so long.

“So you’re saying that someone made these because they knew what was buried out here?” Junshin queried to Hisayo’s turned back, his gaze moving slowly from their guide to the looming objects. “But if so, what do they represent?”

“You’ll see when you’re closer,” Hisayo replied simply, speaking no further on the matter as the group continued their long march. “You may be pleased to know that, once we are past them, Pinnacle will only be a few hours away.”

Hitomi couldn’t deny that this information was more than welcome. They had been marching virtually without pause for somewhere close to eleven hours. Under normal circumstances it could be considered an exhausting distance to travel, even for Shinigami. However, between the heat and being forced to maintain her spiritual pressure at its maximum, Hitomi felt as though her body was on the verge of collapse. She hoped, very much, that Hisayo’s assurances that they would beat Kuroken to their goal proved to be correct…she would need whatever rest could be managed before engaging them.

However, that still left ‘a few hours’ of marching ahead of her, and Hitomi was forced to fight down a weary sigh as she wondered if her body would hold together for that long. She doubted Junshin was in much better condition; possibly worse. However, her counterpart had not uttered a word of complaint since setting out. He was, it seemed, as eager to see their journey through to its conclusion as she was.

As the mile between them and the stone structures dwindled, Hitomi was finally able to see what they were. The structures were not simply standing stone, but rather carved - each one of the seven shaped in such a way that a figure, their arms spread wide to accommodate the ‘T’ shape was fixed permanently upon the stone surface. Time and the elements had worn away much of the fine detail, so that little more than the humanoid shapes remained, rendering the identities of those carved invisible beneath the touch of the eternity that has passed since their creation.

As the group finally drew to the foot of the structures - arranged in a straight line across the even ground - Hisayo finally came to a stop. Almost immediately, Hitomi found her legs giving way as she took the opportunity to collapse into a seated position, heaving for breath as, beside her, Junshin did the same. Any chance to rest was a welcome one, and the two youngest members of the party caught their breath as Jubei, slightly more restrained, levered himself into a crouch upon the ground.

“I’m still not really sure what I’m looking at,” Junshin murmured as he caught his breath, raising a hand to point at the nearest effigy. “You said they’re meant to be a warning….but there are seven of them. Who are they supposed to be?”

“They’re the Apocrypha,” Hisayo replied over her shoulder, not turning towards her charges a she spoke, instead gazing up at the carving directly in front of her - directly in the centre of the group. “Those who are hidden away.’


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wFe4CTCkb3U

“It is difficult for you to understand in this era,” she continued, heaving a brief sigh, “but, twenty thousand years ago, you would have recognised the name of each and every one of them. In your world, stories about Hollows and Arrancar are used to frighten children….in their day, stories about them were used to frighten an entire nation. The mere thought of any given one of them would have been enough to horrify even the strongest Shinigami…They were the Throne Bearers of the Seducer, those followers who survived the Purge because their mistress sealed them away.”

Hitomi squinted, turning her own gaze up the featureless, humanoid shapes that had once, she imagined, been detailed carvings of the monsters of a bygone era. It was curious to think of the Soul Society living in terror of individual Hollows…there was no such nightmarish individuals in the modern Soul Society she knew. The Soul Society knew of the existence of Arrancar - her encounter with one in the Southern deserts, and the attack on the Shinigami Academy six years ago let little doubt as to their existence. However, if any Arrancar existed that were so famous their names along could inspire terror, she had certainly not heard of them.

“What exactly is this ‘Purge’?” she found herself murmuring, her gaze lingering on one of the shapes to the left of the central figure - which, along with one of the others, she felt certain was vaguely feminine when compared to its peers.

“Ah, if I could tell you in detail I would,” Hisayo finally have turned to look over her shoulder at Hitomi, her lips curving into a wry smile. “But that is something, I’m afraid, that is largely lost to antiquity. There are some surviving writings that refer to it, but they’re rather…vague. As far as I’ve been able to determine, after Isharie’s defeat, there was a civil war in Hueco Mundo during which most of her followers were killed. Common mythology states that Isharie was aware of this risk before she launched her attack on the Soul Society, and somehow hid her most trusted subordinates away, intending to retrieve them when she was able.”

“Hidden for twenty thousand years?” Jubei murmured, his own gaze rather sceptical as he examined the figures. “Would they even still be alive?”

“Isharie is,” Hisayo shot back, her smile taking on a rather macabre quality, before she directed her gaze back at the seven carvings. “We know that one of them, at least, is still alive. It is possible that, as the seal of Isharie’s prison weakens, her servants are beginning to stir…I believe you’ve met her already, Seraphina-dono.”

“Me?” Hitomi blinked in surprise, taken aback by the announcement. “What are you tal….”

“In ascending order of power,” Hisayo cut her off abruptly, folding her arms as she continued to gaze up at the carvings, “they are Byleth the Deceiver, Morax the Despoiler, Samyaza the Betrayer, Baal the Devourer, Leraje the Corruptor, Tamiel the Fallen and Asmodeus the Conqueror. Remember them….because they are names that, millennia before you were born, made the heavens themselves tremble.”

A lengthy silence followed Hisayo’s words, the air itself almost seeming to fall still. As though the wind hesitated upon hearing names not uttered for eons. Hitomi found herself thoroughly aware of the soundless void into which they were all too suddenly plunged. Even her laboured breath, still struggling to pull air into her lungs, was stilled. Though perhaps this was simply due to the fact that she recognised one of the names Hisayo had spoken.

She remembered very well the creature that had maimed Shingen and Yukimura at Solace, and come dangerously close to killing Shadrin. At the time, before she had fought Tachibana Motonari himself - or, as he had been guised then, Imai Hideki - the creature has possessed the highest spiritual pressure she had ever felt from any individual…a feat that, until now, only Motonari and the crushing pressure from the vent near Flotsam had surpassed. Even the might of the members of Kuroken felt somehow muted when measured against her memory of that creature.

And yet, if Hisayo was to be believed, Byleth had been the weakest of them…

“…This gets better and better,” Junshin grumbled, shaking his head. “I’m almost starting to feel like you’re enjoying giving us progressively more to worry about the closer we get to where we’re going, Sato-san.”

“Would you prefer,” Hisayo replied, “if I had simply told you all immediately? That if Isharie is unleashed, we will see not one monster released upon the Soul Society, but eight of them…and that this is assuming the Seducer is not able to press the most powerful Arrancar of today into her service? There are creatures in Hueco Mundo, right now, who have power that you cannot fathom…power that is either at or beyond the level of a Captain. I believe that allowing you to become used to one fact at a time is more merciful that dropping everything on you at once, no?’

“In any case,” she shrugged, abruptly starting to move ahead, passing between the carvings to continue on their westerly path, “if we succeed, it is all meaningless. If we can reseal Pinnacle, then no more of the Seducer’s followers will awaken, and their names will remain in their forgotten corner of history, no?”

Hitomi exchanged a wordless glance with Junshin as the latter merely shook his head. Grunting in exertion, the young man placed his palms to the ground as she pushed himself to his feet - shifting his weight back onto his aching limbs to continue their gruelling march. As he began to move on after Hisayo, Hitomi found her gaze lingering upon the seven carvings, unable to shake the rather disturbing question from her mind that if one could have arisen again by now…what was stopping the others from doing the same?

“Seraphina-dono?” Jubei’s large hand settling upon her shoulder caused Hitomi to jump for the second time, and she pushed herself back to an upright position without answering. Apparently satisfied that she was ready to follow, Jubei turned to follow Junshin and Hisayo. Wincing at the ache that was slowly but surely creeping into her stiffening legs, Hitomi spared the carvings a final glance, before falling into step behind Jubei.

If Hisayo was correct, then Pinnacle was only a few hours ahead of them. Hitomi knew for certain that Hisayo’s exercise was causing both Junshin’s and her own spiritual pressure to increase…though she would have been hesitant to say by how much. It seemed likely that, very soon, they would be realising whether or not it was enough.

And whether or not history’s ghosts would suddenly become today’s reality.





Day 3: 6:42pm

[Seraphina]

Act L: Pinnacle


Day 3: 11:15pm



Hitomi’s body had long since become numb, no longer feeling the red hot needles of pain that had torn along the muscles in her shin with each footfall. Bellow the waist, she was aware of her body moving, but it was the curious sensation of walking on air - she knew that the ground was there, but she had not felt it for hours. In the fifteen and a half hours since they had left the underground cave that had been their last resting spot, Hitomi could not even hazard a guess as to how much ground they had covered.

In the proceeding week she and Junshin had made a journey that spanned the entire length of the Western Rukongai, and into the infinite wasteland beyond. She couldn’t help but wonder how often such a trip had been made before - she didn’t find it hard to imagine that they were in some rather exclusive company. With thousands of miles between herself and her distant home within the Seireiteii, the journey itself should almost have felt like an achievement.

Yet Hitomi felt little joy when Hisayo finally informed them that the journey was over; merely a sense of relief.

Their march had continued unabated as the sky darkened into night. Hisayo still cut unerringly westward as the sun sank below the horizon and the warmth left the air. As hot as the wasteland had been during the day, it was utterly frigid at night, though the absence of the sun afforded the Shinigami the first real glimpse of their goal - a faint, green-black glow upon the distant skyline, piecing through the midnight blue of the darkening sky to indicate that something, indeed something very large, lay ahead.

The sight had been enough to reinvigorate the Shinigami, and they had continued on with a sense of purpose upon first seeing it. However, as the hours ticked by and the glow seemed to come no nearer, their march had eventually slowed to a weary trudge as fatigue at last caught up with them. The strain of holding their reiatsu at its maximum had left both Hitomi and Junshin very nearly at their breaking point, but with no chance to stop and rest - and indeed nowhere they could have done so - they were forced to merely continue on after Hisayo as their senses numbed to the world around them.

“We’re here. Rest now.”

Hisayo’s words had seemed, to Hitomi, to be the sweetest she had ever heard. By the time they were spoken, her world consisted of a dark, hazy blur. Taking no time to take stock of where she was, the redhead found herself simply tipping forward onto the ground, falling flat on her stomach and closing her eyes as she was dimly aware of Junshin doing the same beside her. Side by side, the two young Shinigami allowed sleep to finally catch up with them for whatever time Hisayo would allow.

Whatever greeted them when they woke up could, for the time being, wait.




However needed their rest had been, Hitomi found herself blinking slowly awake after what was likely only a little over three hours. With her entire body aching, she found herself immediately hacking out a dry, painful cough - tasting the sandy grit from the ground within her mouth as she pushed herself up from her impromptu bed. The pain in her limbs throbbed furiously, but at least it was an indication that she still had the use of them. Perhaps that would be sufficient.

“…No sense waiting…we should make our move now, while the coast is clear.”

Jubei’s voice drilled its way into her groggy head as Hitomi slowly sat back on her haunches, her mind still half asleep as she peered through the relative darkness - illuminated only by the same faintly green light that had once merely lit up the horizon, but now bathed the entire surrounding area in a strange display of exaggerated shadows. Cast into curious relief by the light, Hitomi found herself looking at a world coloured entirely in green and black as she spied the huddled outline of Hisayo and Jubei in the darkness ahead of her.

The pair appeared to be crouched on the edge of a ridge or cliff - the first indication Hitomi had seen of any break in the flatlands whatsoever. It was from beyond the ridge, it seemed, that the green glow emanated, and it was here that the two older members of the party directed their attention. Junshin, for his part, still lay sleeping on his stomach beside where Hitomi had been lying. Thinking better of disturbing him, Hitomi edged forward on the balls of her feet to approach the conversing pair.

“I am concerned,” Hisayo responded to Jubei’s statement, “that they could turn up while we were trying to reseal the prison…we have no idea how far behind they are, no? Besides, if you intend to free those workers, where would you take them? That many people moving through the desert would be easily tracked. There is also the matter of getting them through District Eighty, at night. Your rescue attempt will be a slow process, and Kuroken must be dealt with before you proceed.”

“Then what do you propose, Sato-dono?” Although she could not clearly see his features, Jubei’s tone immediately made it clear to Hitomi that he was not in the slightest bit pleased with the idea of further delays.

“When Kuroken arrive,” Hisayo explained, “they will be weary from their journey and seek somewhere to rest. There is no unity among its members, and they will not stay together. They will no doubt…”

Hisayo cut off as Hitomi approached, turning over her shoulder to regard the younger woman in apparent surprise. Even in the otherwise green glaze that covered everything else touched by the light, the single eye visible on the illuminated half of Hisayo’s face - the other shrouded by the darkness of night - still seemed to hold its unsettling maroon, Hitomi hesitating beneath the woman’s sudden gaze.

“I did not expect you to be awake so soon, Seraphina-dono,” Hisayo murmured. “Are you rested?”

“As rested as I’m likely to be,” Hitomi replied, managing an uncomfortable smile despite - or perhaps because of - the woman’s unflinching stare. “I’m not sure I could get back to sleep now, in any case. I think I’d rather just see what we’re up against.”

“Has your reiatsu restored itself, Seraphina-dono?” Jubei queried, lifting an eyebrow as he regarded the young woman with a rather less demanding gaze that Hisayo. Hitomi winced at the question, glancing down at herself as though somehow expecting to find the answer written somewhere on her person, before simply shrugging.

“I don’t think I could fight right at this moment,” she replied, “but I don’t feel like I’m about to collapse…I’ll be ready when the time comes.”

“I sincerely hope so,” Hisayo muttered, finally turning her attention away from Hitomi - much to the latter’s relief - to gaze back over the ridge upon which she and Jubei crouched. For a moment, the woman was silent as she examined whatever lay out of Hitomi’s field of vision, before she raised a hand to curve her fingers in a series of brief, beckoning gestures. “You may as well look upon it now, then. I…cannot prepare you for it. But better you see it for the first time now that when we need you to fight.”

“Sato-san….” Jubei’s voice carried a hint of objection that immediately put Hitomi on edge. The large man had turned back towards Hisayo, his mouth half open to continue, though the woman simply gazed back at him a flat, uncompromising fashion that brooked no argument.

“Come…but do not look directly at the tower,” Hisayo repeated her invitation, her eyes settling on Hitomi once more as the redhead hesitantly inched forward. Staying low, not certain how visible they would be on the ridge to whatever lay beneath them, Hitomi made her way forward to slip between Jubei and Hisayo. Leaning forward, she caught her first glimpse of the goal towards which they had been heading - the stronghold of the enemy.

What Hitomi had at first thought to be a cliff edge upon which they were perched appeared instead to be the upper crust of a vast - incomprehensibly vast - pit. The stone of the wasteland beyond the outer rim had been gouged into an enormous hollow, cutting into the ground at a near vertical angle to create what was for all intents and purposes an artificial canyon. So enormous that it defied her attempts to measure its width, the far wall of the excavation site was hidden in the swirling, dancing shadows that were spun within the off-green glow of the slowly unearthed structure.

When Hisayo had described Pinnacle as a prison, Hitomi had expected a locked tower, or perhaps a walled off complex; what she found herself looking at instead appeared to her eyes more like an enormous, black-stoned pyramid. The structure was nothing short of enormous, its smooth sides rising from the darkness of depths so far away the light failed to penetrate it. A vast hive of gangplanks and walkways had been erected around the structure, but they were reduced to the size of matchsticks - the tiny figures of people moving along their surface looking very much like ants swarming over a boulder. At least five kilometres across, the pyramid itself was still several hundred meters bellow Hitomi’s position; flattened at the peak as the pyramid merged into a rectangular, tower like structure that stabbed skywards.

Unlike the pyramid, the tower was not made of seki-seki rock. Despite Hisayo’s warnings, Hitomi found her gaze drawn to it - her eyes moving over the enormous chains - each link the size of a small house - that extended from the steep walls of the excavation site to merge with the structure - sinking into its green-black surface as though it were liquid, tethering it in place. Six chains in all, their combined weight no doubt in the many thousands of tons, anchored the tower to the walls of the cavernous opening, time having worn the metal to a rough, rusty, orange finish - obvious even in the green light cast by the tower that bathed both the chains and all else within the unnatural valley.

As Hitomi’s gaze moved from the chains to the tower itself, she felt an unmistakeable shudder run across the length of her spine - the perfectly flat, glassy surface of the facing side of the tower casting a perfect reflection of all that lay around it - the tiny flickers of the torches far bellow it dancing in its surface like stars on a pond. To Hitomi, it almost felt as though the tower was drawing her in…enticing her…pleading with her to leap from the edge and dive into its cool, liquid embrace…

Two hands clamping down upon each of Hitomi’s arms and arrested her in place - Hisayo’s fist closing over her left arm while Jubei grasped her right - before the young Shinigami was even aware she had risen to her feet. Blinking rapidly as though breaking free of a stupor, Hitomi took a moment to register what was happening; looking down at herself, she found that she was now standing upon the very edge of the ridge, one foot extended to take a step that would have seen her plunging into the endless darkness beneath.

“What…what the hell!?” she exclaimed, reflexively pulling back from the edge even as Hisayo and Jubei forcibly yanked her back to a seated position. Wincing as she struck the ground tailbone first, Hitomi’s discomfort was minor compared to her bewilderment. She could not recall making any conscious decision to move - the grim expressions on the faces of both Hisayo and Jubei, however, appeared far less surprised by her actions.

“Do not feel ashamed, Seraphina-dono,” Jubei murmured, his shoulders heaving a brief sigh. “The same thing happened to me. Sato-dono was forced to pull me back, also.”

Looking from one to the other, Hitomi merely continued to stare stupidly for a moment, before abruptly shaking herself off as another chill wound its way up her spine. Without the tower in sight, her mind slowly began to piece together whatever she had just been exposed to…although she was not certain, she felt as though she had heard voices, whispering for her to join them.

“As the seal weakens, so too will its hold over the Seducer,” Hisayo explained, her eyes narrowing as she cast a glance over her shoulder towards the edge of the chasm. “It’s worse now than it was when I was last here…far worse…any spiritually aware being that looks upon that prison is likely to be touched by her influence. Her hold is easily broken if you are aware of its attempts…at least for now…but it is insidious. The longer we remain here, the more likely we will be influenced without even being aware of it.”

“Y…you mean she can control our thoughts?” Hitomi stammered, her mind still partially reeling as she raised her hands to rub her temples, feeling very much as though she had been somehow punched from the inside of her head.

“Not exactly,” Hisayo replied, shaking her head. “I believe she may have the power of suggestion over individuals who fail to guard their mind against her. We must all be mindful of each others actions…we should certainly stay together. If any of us begin to act in an unusual fashion, it would be best to make it known, no?”

“Right…” Hitomi nodded, slowly levering her feet underneath her to return to a crouched position. Although still thoroughly rattled, she was glad - at least - that she was no longer hearing whispered voices in her head. Their conversation, meanwhile, had apparently been sufficient to rouse Junshin from sleep, the latter grumbling as he stirred, pushing himself up on his palms to look around.

“Whasgoinon?” he grumbled, blinking groggily at his three companions. Although her companion’s features were partly distorted by the exaggerated shadows cast the shimmering green glow, Hitomi nevertheless found herself involuntarily wincing as she turned to look at him over her shoulder. Their long march, and limited rest, had been less than kind to the young Shimigami - heavy bags had gathered under his eyes, while, even considering the light, his features looked unhealthily pale.

‘He’s lost weight, too….I expect I probably look much the same. Or worse. I can see why this training method isn’t used in the Academy. Another day or two of this would probably kill us.’

“Kyoko-dono,” Hisayo raised a hand to beckon him forward, “if you’re awake, we may as well discuss our next move. I do know now how much time we will have.”

Shaking himself awake, Junshin nodded as the rest of his body struggled to join him in the world of the waking. Clearly stiff-limbed and needing far more sleep than he had been afforded, the young man pushed himself up on his hands and knees to crawl the short distance to come to a stop beside Hitomi, grimacing as he sat back on his haunches, rubbing the crook of his neck in what was likely a vain effort to unstiffen his muscles.

“When Kuroken arrive,” Hisayo explained, “they will likely move their prisoners down into the pit. They use the chains as bridges…they are large enough for many people to walk abreast on, no? There will be many prisoners, however, and they will spread out. It is during their descent that they will be vulnerable. I suggest that we single out Toda…he is the most powerful next to Shimazu, and he will care nothing for collateral damage. If we attack him as one, we may kill him before the others can respond, and give ourselves a fighting chance, no?”

“…Collateral damage…” Jubei echoed, scowling briefly. “I suppose…there will be no way to avoid that?”

“No,” Hisayo replied simply. “In addition to Kuroken, Tachibana’s force consists of several hundred normal soldiers…many of them are spiritually aware, but not to an extent that they need concern us. Killing them all, however, will take time. Whichever way we proceed, we are in for a pitched and bloody battle, and no matter how careful we are some of the workers will be killed in the crossfire. There is no way to prevent that.’

“The best we can do,” she included all of them in a sweeping glance, “is save those we can. Most of the workers will not be active at this time…it will be difficult for Tachibana’s troops to monitor them in the darkness. If we attack in darkness, there will at least be fewer workers around.”

Hitomi pursed her lips, but nodded - wondering very much if her father was among those who would be working the excavation that night…or, for that matter, if he was still alive. Working through the day, in such oppressive heat, she imagined that the mortality rate among the workers would be horrific. She shuddered to think how many people would have died already in the months before their arrival….how many would be in too poor a condition to survive the journey back to civilisation, even after being rescued…

For many, even if the Shinigami were victorious, there would be no happy ending.

“Yagyu-sensei,” Junshin murmured hesitantly, his gaze turning towards Jubei. “If we do this, then it will be the people from your village that will be in the middle of it. Shouldn’t we try and…”

“No,” Jubei interjected, shaking his head. “Thank you, Kiyoko-dono…but Sato-dono is correct. It would be naive to think we could defeat such men without some of the prisoners being killed. We must simply do our best…I simply hope that my best is good enough for my conscience….”

“Either some of them die attempting a rescue, or they all die when they are no longer useful,” Hisayo snapped, her patience clearly thinning. “When the time comes, do not hesitate…our chances of success are thin enough without misgivings.”

Hisayo immediately turned away, directing her gaze over the edge of the chasm once more - effectively ending any debate on the matter. A silence immediately descended over the group as the three Shinigami exchanged brief, uncomfortable glances. They each knew that Hisayo was right…certainly, for her part, Hitomi could not think of any feasible way to both fight Kuroken and rescue every single one of the workers. However, that didn’t make the thought of piling up more bodies of innocent people any less unsavoury.

“You two should get some sleep while you can,” Jubei finally instructed. “We have no way of knowing how long we’ll be waiting, so we should take whatever rest we can.”

“Alright,” Hitomi nodded, exhaling the breath she hadn’t realised she was holding. Not even moving from the spot in which she was seated, she simply found herself tilting backward to flop onto her back, her body suddenly reminding itself just how fatigued she was. Junshin, after a moment’s hesitation, did the same. Rolling onto his side, the other Shinigami clasped his hands beneath his head to afford himself some cushioning, his back turned to Hitomi.

Turning her head, Hitomi found herself regarding Junshin’s back for a silent, thoughtful moment. It was quite likely that, the next time they woke up, it would be only minutes before they would enter into what was likely to be the fight of their lives. She remained unconvinced that they were ready…but there was no longer any time to make themselves so.

There was a chance - rather a good chance - that one or both of them would die. Even if they were successful, they still faced lethal adversaries that would not walk quietly into defeat. It was a fight that was never meant to be theirs, yet they had somehow stumbled into putting their lives on the line in it regardless; all because Junshin had chosen an assignment that he had believed would cheer her up.

Smiling rather bitterly, she managed to restrain a chuckle as the irony of the situation suddenly seemed almost humorous. As much as she still felt responsible for Junshin’s misfortune, it was a fight that would have come to their doorstep sooner or later in any case. If Kuroken were successful and the imprisoned Arrancar was freed, then what would that have meant for the Soul Society?

Perhaps someone else would have been sent instead of them…perhaps two entirely different Shinigami would have eventually found themselves huddled within the green glow of Pinnacle, waiting for their enemy to arrive. Perhaps, they too, would have considered themselves unfortunate…

But they weren’t there. Hitomi and Junshin were. As much as she cursed her own lack of preparedness, she nevertheless found herself taking a measure of solace in knowing that she would at least be involved in the battle that would ultimately determine her fate, rather than its result being decided by some stranger while she was miles away filing paperwork in the fifth division barracks. In some strange way, she found herself glad to be there.

“Junshin-kun?” she murmured into the darkness. There was no immediately reply, though the latter stirred slightly upon hearing his name. The pitch of Junshin’s breathing shifted slightly, though he did not respond. Biting her lip, Hitomi felt a blush creep into her cheeks as she inwardly chided herself for disturbing him; they both needed their sleep.

“Mrhm?” Junshin finally grunted, although in truth he sounded more than half asleep.

“I…” Hitomi began, thought she trailed off, wondering exactly how likely Junshin was to actually comprehend whatever was said to him. Her blush deepening, she reasoned that it would at least be easier to say to him when he was only half awake. “I just…whatever happens, I want you to know that the answer is yes. To….to the question you asked me before, I mean.”

“Mrhm?” Junshin grunted again, lifting his head briefly to scratch an itch behind his ear, before he lazily flopped back to the ground.

“You asked me if I’d started to think of you as Nakama,” Hitomi replied, shifting on the spot uncomfortably. “Well….I just want you to know that the answer is yes, I have. No matter what happens from here, you‘re one of my Nakama, Kiyoko Junshin.”

Imaging that her face was probably glowing in the dark, Hitomi kept her gaze directed overhead, realising that she was scowling defiantly at having to say such a thing outloud. At least with Shingen and Yukimura the transition from friendship to Nakama had been an easy, unspoken one. Far less embarrassing than confessing it outright. Junshin’s silence, however, made Hitomi briefly wonder if her counterpart had fallen asleep - however, a sudden yawn from Junshin broke the silence, as he nuzzled his cheek into his clasped hands.

“That’s nice,” he grumbled halfway through the yawn. “G’night, Sera-kun.”

His words faded into a snore as Junshin’s breathing once again evened out, Hitomi lifting her head from the ground to stare at him mutely in surprise at the extremely lacklustre response. However, after several seconds of watching his torso expand and contract with the pace of his breath, Hitomi found herself unable to keep an amused smile from her lips as she allowed her head to sink back to the ground.

‘Heh…jerk…you could at least be awake for things like that. Falling asleep when I’m saying something important…that’s the sort of things Shadrin-kun would d…’

Her smile faded abruptly as Shadrin leapt to memory, having been rather unprepared for him to be there. The thought was a sharp, painful one….far more stinging than the possibility of death. She found herself wondering what Shadrin would do if she never came home…how long he would take to stop believing she was still alive….whether or not he would blame himself for not forcing his way into her expedition.

She wished, more than anything, that she could tell him it wasn’t his fault…

Her eyelids feeling suddenly heavy, Hitomi allowed them to drift closed. The sky overhead, concealed beneath the ever present cloud of swirling dust, was sheathed in black as Hitomi allowed sleep to wash over her; knowing that, when she woke up - whatever happened - the course of history would be set.





Day 4: 2:56am

[Seraphina]

Act LI: The Weak Link


Day 4: 4:12am



Hitomi heard the approach of the wagons before her mind was fully awake. Her mind briefly interpreted the sound as part of her dreams - a half formed image of herself pulling at the reigns of an out of control wagon, attempting in vain to pull the panicked horses to a stop, slipped in and out of her mind within the few seconds it took her to come around. She hadn’t slept enough…she felt as tired now as she had been the last time she closed her eyes…but she knew that it would have to do.

The time had come, it seemed, to see how far they’d come since leaving Flotsam.

As she began to sit up, Hitomi was immediately set upon by a large, powerful hand - pressing into her shoulder to force her flat on her back once more. She instinctively reached out to grasp the wrist of the offending limb, even as her other hand reached for the hilt of her zanpakuto, but she hesitated as she found herself looking up at Jubei - the latter on his hands and knees, pressed so low to the ground that his chest was only a few inches above the cracked soil. Taking the hint, Hitomi offered a silent nod as she rolled over onto her stomach, remaining similarly low to the ground as she crawled rather than sitting up, making her way past Jubei as the man moved to rouse Junshin.

Hisayo was to be found once more on the lip of the chasm, though like Jubei she had flattened her body against the ground, peering cautiously across the chasm rather than into it - with the ground almost completely flat, the object of her attention was easy to spot even before Hitomi drew level with her. On the southern edge of the chasm, many hundreds of meters from their position, it seemed that Kuroken had arrived. Indeed, lit by the dancing illumination of many hundreds of torches, their procession could hardly have been missed.

The caravan appeared to consist of several wagons, each rumbling to a stop several yards away from the edge of the chasm. A great clamour of sound and movement surrounded the vehicles - both the horses and many clanking, armoured men darting to and fro to prepare what Hitomi imagined to be upwards of two hundred prisoners - clearly visible within large, cage like structures built into most of the wagon carriages - for transportation. These were, most likely, the townspeople of Rousaki; although Hitomi had not expected there to be quite so many of them.

“How in the hell can we fight these guys with that many people around?” she muttered under her breath, casting a sideward glance at Hisayo. There appeared to be in the region of forty soldiers accompanying the wagon - the metal of their armour glinting fiercely in the torchlight, but Hitomi paid them little attention. It was the monstrous spiritual pressure of the members of Kuroken - easily detectable even in their rested state - upon which she focused.

“No hesitations,” Hisayo reminded her, her maroon gaze not drifting from the wagons. “We will only have one chance at this…it cannot be a half hearted one.”

“R…right,” Hitomi nodded, briefly turning to look over her shoulder as Junshin and Jubei moved up to join them - both men taking up a position on Hitomi’s right, with Hisayo upon her left. Grimly, the four watched in silence as the wagons were unloaded. The long journey through the desert had made the prisoners within exhausted and timid - although the shouted instructions of their captors echoed across the night air, not a single one of them made a sound of protest as they were yanked from their cages and formed into lines of four, herded into a marching column.

“That’s some insane reiatsu,” Junshin grunted - visibly wincing as his senses encountered the near solid wall of spiritual pressure that spilled forth from the wagon. “Are there really only five of them? It feels like there should be hundreds.”

“Your spiritual pressure is not far behind them, now,” Jubei whispered encouragingly. “You will notice when we raise it to fight…have courage, Kiyoko-dono, Seraphina-dono.”

‘Courage, eh? Well…no time for regrets now.’

It was with a certain surprise that Hitomi realised, in that moment, that she wasn’t actually panicking. As much as she felt a fair degree of nervousness about whatever was to come, she realised that she was approaching the upcoming battle with a level of serene calm that she had not anticipated. It was not the first time, after all, that she had stared the possibility - indeed the likelihood - of death in the face. After all of the various dangers and trials she had braved throughout her young life, perhaps she was slowly becoming inoculated to the stress of finding herself in danger.

It occurred to her that, as much as Jubei and Hisayo were both far more powerful than her, there was every chance that Hitomi had seen more actual combat than either of them. As much as she continued to think of herself as a ‘rookie’ and a ‘fresh graduate’, there was a great deal that Hitomi had said and done that many seated officers had not. Perhaps that experience would be enough to see her though.

However, the same could not likely be said for Junshin, or the quiet, muted souls that were pushed into line by their unkind captors. The people of the Outer Rim were a hardy, resilient folk…but their knack for survival extended to the harsh conditions of the weather, and the barren, untameable landscape. Theirs was a world of harsh realities…but it was not one where people were herded up like cattle, and torn from their homes. They had never been prepared for such a reality, and she doubted many of them were prepared to die in exchange for their freedom. Nevertheless, it was likely a price at least a few of them would be asked to pay.

“Some luck…finally,” Hisayo’s voice hissed through the darkness, the woman extending an arm to stab a finger towards the front of the line. “Look…there’s our mark.”

Squinting, Hitomi narrowed her eyes in an attempt to better focus on the group. Despite the light of the torches, it remained difficult to tell one member of the caravan apart from another. She wondered, in fact, how Hisayo was capable of distinguishing between them. However, now that her attention was drawn to him, Hitomi noticed that a single figure appeared to be breaking away from the group, heading in the direction of the enormous chain that dangled down into the chasm. Detail was difficult to discern at such range, but Hitomi felt certain the man - for she was sure it was a man - wore the long flapping coat of a member of Kuroken, and appeared to be carrying a metal shield above his head….

‘No, it’s not a shield…it’s a hat.’

The man’s posture was stooped, and he moved as though of advanced years. He did not stride away from the procession, but rather hobbled away. As Hitomi watched, a second figure briefly broke away also - sheer size immediately identifying the second figure as the man named Keiji that she and Junshin had encountered in Flotsam. The larger man shouted something at the first - perhaps trying to call him back to the group to help sort out the prisoners - but the man that Hisayo had singled out dismissed him with a careless wave of his hand, continuing on his way.

“He’s heading off alone,” Hisayo continued. “He always did think he was too good to get his hands dirty…we couldn’t have asked for this. Keep your eyes on him. When I say to go, hit him with everything you’ve got. The four of us together have far more power than he does alone…he won’t survive a combined assault.”

“That’s the man who cut me down…” Jubei growled, his broad shoulders visibly tense as he scowled at the shuffling figure. “I regret that I didn’t get a chance to see his attack, though….whatever his ability is, it’s fast and deadly. Don’t give him a chance to use it.”

“I’m ready,” Junshin nodded, reaching underarm to slip one of his zanpakuto from its sheath. “I think…I’m more comfortable doing this, now that he’s away from those people. Maybe we’ll get them out of this alive after all.”

“Don’t get your hopes up,” Hisayo muttered with a low shape of her head, pushing herself up slightly on her palms as she shifted her weight to move quickly when the time came. “But you’re right….things might just be looking up for us at last…”

Hitomi merely nodded, licking her lips to wet them as she found her mouth suddenly feeling uncomfortably dry. Adjusting her weight onto her left hand, she lifted her right from the ground to grasp the hilt of her zanpakuto, slithering the weapon from its sheath as her purple eyes remained locked upon the slow moving member of Kuroken who had - by now - mounted the chain that would carry him down towards Pinnacle. The sheer overwhelming weight of the metal ensured that the addition of a single man was not enough to cause it to swing, the colossal structure dangling motionless between rock and tower as the man named Toda began his descent.

At the wagon, the other members of Kuroken, and their two score guards, appeared to be continuing without their comrade. Even as Toda moved further and further away, the caravan made no move to follow; with over two hundred people to organise, it would probably be at least ten or fifteen minutes before they would be prepared to move. Toda, meanwhile, continued his lonely march.

‘Toda…he’s got the same name as my father. That….actually makes me feel a little sick.’

Holding her breath, Hitomi moved her sword arm beneath her to hold the weapon out to one side - the edge well clear of her torso as she prepared to spring forward at Hisayo’s command. She didn’t intend to use the weapon, however…better to use kido, and strike him at a distance. She imagined she had more than enough reiatsu to use a hado in the fifties or sixties by now…it would be best to attack from a distance, rather than taking the extra time to close in.

The arrival of the caravan appeared to be causing a stir in the workforce that was currently spread throughout the excavation. Although they could likely not clearly see what was going on at ground level, those within the chasm must still have realised that new arrivals were on their way - they had likely seen the same many times before. The tiny figures of people briefly paused in their work, peering skywards from far below Hitomi as they waited for more innocents to join their workforce.

Briefly, the young Shinigami allowed her gaze to drift towards those she intended to save. Among the few patches of colour granted by the flickering torches, Hitomi could just about see them - dirty figures wearing the tattered remnants of whatever clothes they had worn at the time of their abduction. Grubby, hopeless faces peering skywards to watch their ranks swell with hapless newcomers. They had no way of knowing that their plight was, hopefully, going to come to an end…

All Hitomi needed to do was win.

‘We will win, damn it. We’ll put an end to this, right here. We’ll make sure they never take another. Not one m….’

Perhaps it was merely coincidence….perhaps it was a quirk of fate…perhaps it was the will of whatever strange circumstances had led her down the winding, often violent road of her life. Whatever the cause, Hitomi’s heart all but stopped as she spied a head of red hair among the dirty onlookers.

All other sights and sounds seemed to immediately slip from reality, Hitomi’s eyed widening even as her world dwindled. Visible within the dancing flames of a nearby torchlight, directly within her line of sight upon the labyrinthine walkways that encircled the tower of Pinnacle, was Reihaii Toda.

It was a face she had not seen in seven years, and yet it was one that was immediately familiar. Memory filled in the blanks that distance created. The crop of red hair - longer and more dishevelled than she remembered - the scruff of facial hair that his time in the pit had seen thicken into a full beard….the man’s build was different, years of abuse from drink and sleeping rough seemingly having faded away, flap replaced by firm muscle as he more closely resembled the powerful metalworker that she vaguely recalled from her infancy. But the changes were not enough that she could possibly be mistaken…there was no doubt that the man was her father.

“Alright…” Hisayo’s voice seemed distant and muffled - Hitomi barely heard her. “He’s far enough away….we move on three.”

Hitomi’s attention was no longer on the member of Kuroken whom they intended to ambush, however. She continued to watch, mesmerised, as the grubby faced turned back to their work. A few, however, kept their gazes skyward - her father among them. Perhaps they were watching for acquaintances or loved ones to be led down the chain…perhaps they simply wanted to show their captors that they were not completely broken.

Whatever the cause, the response was immediate and brutal. Armoured figures like those that manned the wagon also wandered among the prisoners. Armed with wrist-thick clubs of what appeared to be studded wood, they were quick to set upon any who did not quickly return to work. Without instruction or warning, they simply descended upon those too slow to pick up their duties. As Hitomi looked on, one such soldier approached her father. Cautious of the man’s size, the soldier did not strike her father’s arms or legs - as the blows to the other prisoners were given - but instead struck his weapon with a full arm swing into the back of Reihaii Toda’s head.

As her father dropped to his knees, his features contorting in pain, the blow was immediately followed by a second. Apparently intent on making an example of any who showed even a modicum of defiance, all along the line of prisoners, those who had drawn the attention of their overseers were beaten to the ground - attempting to cover their heads as best they could from the savage hail of blows.

Hitomi didn’t think, she simply moved. Leaping to her feet, she had already leapt over the chasms’ edge and formed a thick layer of solid spiritrons beneath her feet before she even had time to wonder how she had done it. As it had so many times before, rage proved to dredge up the abilities that so often lay hidden within her, air-walking suddenly coming as naturally as breathing. There was little time to find wonder in the achievement, however, Hitomi barely even noticing the feat as she prepared to spring forward - her breath leaving her throat as a low growl of fury.

A powerful grip upon her ankle arrested her in place, Hitomi rounding with a snarl upon Hisayo as the latter made a futile effort to pull her back. Hitomi’s reiatsu had begun to rise the moment she moved, rising quickly towards its maximum as Hisayo - for the first time since Hitomi had met her - showed visible strain upon her features.

“What the hell are you doing!?” Hisayo hissed, her maroon eyes flashing desperately back and forth between Hitomi and their intended target - continuing along the chain, for the moment at least, oblivious to their presence. “Get back here! You’ll ruin everything!”

“That’s my father!” Hitomi all but shouted back, blind, white hot anger dispelling any semblance of caution as she pulled upon the hand that held her ankle. However, Hisayo’s own spiritual pressure had climbed to match her own - as she pulled, the woman’s limb did not budge. “They’ll kill him!”

Directly behind Hisayo, clearly visible in the eerie green light cast by the tower, Junshin and Jubei had both also risen to their feet. Both men looked uncertain, staring in mute shock at Hitomi’s sudden charge - Jubei uncertainly looking towards Hisayo for direction, while Junshin turned his own gaze into the chasm, noticing the savage beatings taking place below for the first time.

“You fool….” Hisayo snarled through clenched teeth, her fingers squeezing down upon Hitomi’s ankle with what, for a normal person, would almost certainly have been bone crushing force. “I told you when we set out…I told you that I wasn’t offering you an easy way, or a right way, or a way that was going to save everyone. I was offering you the only way!’

“Our priority it to defeat Kuroken and reseal Pinnacle,” Hisayo suddenly yanked with her arm, this time succeeding in dragging Hitomi several inches backwards through the air. “That is what matters! That is what we’re here for! Anyone we save is just a bonus…If you do this, if you screw this up, if you ruin this chance we have…this one chance…then I will not help you! If you charge in there like an idiot, I am going to disappear. You’ll die, and you’ll die for nothing!”

Hisayo’s words were like a cold slap to Hitomi’s frothing rage. Blinded for a moment to all else in the world but her father and the woman that was stopping her from going to him, Hitomi slowly found herself returning to reality. The world around her faded back to existence, the sound of the wind whistling through the links of the enormous chains, and the dull throb of the reiatsu that emanated from the members of Kuroken. They had not yet raised their spiritual pressure….they hadn’t noticed her yet…

There was still time to stick to the plan…

As sense began to trickle through her anger, Hitomi turned to look back in the direction of her father. Still hovering in mid-air, the reiatsu she had invoked to allow her to air walk holding true even as she came to her senses, Hitomi’s lungs caught in her breath as she realised that many of the prisoners selected for beatings were no longer moving. Expendable…disposable…the guards took little care as to whether or not their charges survived. Her father, meanwhile, had curled into a ball, his thick arms around his head to try and save himself from the worst of it as the blows continued to rain down without sign of stopping.

She had to focus on the greater goal. A part of her knew that…their objective was clear, and it was likely that they wouldn’t get another chance to see their task through. How could she risk it for a man who had betrayed her? Who had failed to protect her when she had needed him most? How could she possibly throw everything that she had been training for away to save a single man?


‘Because...he’s my father.’

“….Shunko!”

Hisayo snatched her hand back with blinding speed as the air around Hitomi’s levitating form briefly rippled with suddenly rising heat. It was the only split-second warning before the young woman was suddenly enveloped in a shimmering cloak of purple light. The same technique she had used to kill Kashigi flaring to life as, one again, Hitomi found herself tearing towards Pinnacle. She knew immediately that her reiatsu could not longer be concealed…such a massive spike would not be ignored. But it hardly seemed to matter in that moment.

She would not stand by and watch someone kill her father.

The distance between herself and the scaffolding shrunk in an instant. Such was her speed that she passed over the many hundreds of meters in the space of scant heartbeats. To those perched upon the walkways, her approach must have looked like the landing of a burning, purple meteor….which it may very well have been for the man who received the brunt of her advance.

The soldier who was beating her father likely never knew what hit him. His arm was still raised to deliver a further blow when Hitomi struck - her Shinigami body striking his mere-human one…It was like throwing a brick at a tomato. Her momentum was such that she did not merely strike the man - rather passing through him as his body simply came apart, painting the surrounding wood and the wall of the tower in a spray of red paste as his arm - the only part of his body to survive intact - fell to the ground with a wet smack.

As her feet struck the wooden walkway, Hitomi landed in a crouch - her face and torso covered with the blood of the man she had killed. Rising immediately to her feet, she spared her father the barest of glances. Uncovering his head, Reihaii Toda looked up at his daughter for the first time in seven years, his blue eyes widening in a curious mixture of amazement and - quite likely - terror.

For the briefest of moments they made eye contact, father and daughter reunited at last.

The meeting was a fleeting one, Hitomi immediately rounding as the metallic clank of armoured bodies approaching drew her attention elsewhere. The flaring glow that surrounded her faded as she allowed her shunko to dissipate; it would be too dangerous to use it with so many prisoners around her. This reduction, in power, however, did little to save the two men who had been charging her from behind.

The men who served Kuroken wore the mismatched armour of a mercenary company, though Hitomi had little doubt that they were soldiers from Tachibana’s house. Tachibana Motonari had disguised his own soldiers as mercenaries during the war in the south to cloak his involvement, and it hardly seemed surprising to Hitomi to see the man’s son attempting the same trick. However, it was not the soldiers she needed to be concerned with…it was the members of Kuroken; that, at least, had not changed.

Turning away from the two charging men, Hitomi dismissively swatted a hand in their direction - a blast of undiluted reiatsu lashing out from her extended limb to strike the approaching men even as the Shinigami turned her gaze elsewhere. The iron breastplate of the leading soldier crumpled like paper as he was struck by the invisible force, his chest caving in as he was hurled from his feet - striking the man behind with lethal force that saw both of them crumple lifelessly to the floor of the walkway.

As Hitomi directed her attention back to the chain, Hitomi utterly a violent curse as she realised that the Kuroken member was no longer there.

‘Shit…where the hell did he…’

“Reihaii-sama!” Toda’s voice - that of her father, interrupted Hitomi’s search as the large man suddenly lunged to grasp her hand. Her eyes widening in surprise, she turned her attention back to her father as he lifted himself up onto his knees - blood trickling freely from an open gash in his head that he made no effort to treat.

“I’m sorry, Reihaii-sama,” he continued, pressing the back of her hand against his forehead. “I knew you were alive…I knew it! But I’m sorry! I’m so…so sorry…I failed the trust you put in me! Your child….she’s gone. She ran….I failed to protect her and she ran!”

Numbly, Hitomi stared mutely as Toda began to weep - his broad shoulders shaking in grief as she felt his tears cascade against her hand. Her heart sank as she wondered if the man she had come so far to save had already lost his mind.

‘What….on earth is he babbling about?’

“Otasan…” she murmured, interrupting the man’s sobs. “What…what are you talking about?”

Toda’s head immediately snapped back up to look at her directly. Her father’s eyes - red from his tears - showed at first confusion….and then widened in sudden recognition. His grip upon her hand was suddenly relinquished, the man falling backwards upon his haunches as he stared up at her.

“…H…..Hitomi,” it was an observation rather than a question, her father’s eyes bulging within his head as Hitomi continued to stare down at him.

‘…He didn’t recognise me…he didn’t realise who I was until just now…’

Wordlessly, Reihaii Toda’s mouth moved in an attempt to force out words that refused to come. Hitomi found her own breath halting within her lungs; fresh questions pouring into her mind that she knew she had no time to ask. As she looked upon her father’s stunned features, however, one question immediately leapt to the fore.

‘Who the hell did he think I was….?’

A sudden, almost musical ring, filtered its way into Hitomi’s ears. It was a sound not unlike the ringing of a silver diner bell…or the toll of a wind chime…and it was the only warning she had before her senses were overtaken by blinding agony.

From kidney to shoulder, a tremendous slice opened across her back - a fountain of blood immediately spewing skywards as Hitomi’s feet left to the ground. She knew she hadn’t been struck by a sword…it was something else…her entire body shaking as the vibrations of whatever had struck her shuddered through her limbs. The pain was unbearable, the slice so deep that it had carved her shoulder blade in half, Her entire body going limb as she was throwing in the direction of the blow. Her ears ringing, she was dimly aware of her father forced to dive aside to avoid being struck by her flying body.

Her eyes rolling backwards in her head, her world had already faded to black by the time she hit the floor.



Day 4: 4:29am

[Seraphina]

Act LII: Darkest Hour, Brightest Light


Day 4: 4:29am



To Junshin, the sequence of events that unfolded before him were like something out of a nightmare. He found himself hoping - as little hope as there was - that the disaster he was witnessing was simply a dream brought on by his troubled sleep. Everything that could go wrong, it seemed, did go wrong…Hisayo’s plan falling to pieces in spectacular fashion as Hitomi tore away from the group.

“Seraphina-kun!” he bellowed after her, reaching out too late to make his own grab for the retreating young woman. As she dwindled into the distance, Junshin quickly attempted to give chase, attempting to form a platform of reiatsu beneath his feet to support his weight as he hurled himself after the redhead…and almost immediately found himself plummeting into a freefall.

‘Shit!’

In a controlled environment, when he had time to concentrate, Jubei’s instruction had seemed easy to follow…he had even achieved air-walking for a few minutes during practice. However, that seemed a far cry from now; in quickly growing panic, his reiatsu slipped away from him the second he reached for it, and he snatched desperately at the empty air as he felt himself plunging into oblivion.

Jubei’s muscular arm, snatching a hand around his wrist just before he dropped out of reach, narrowly saved the young Shinigami from his fate. Flat on his stomach with much of his upper body dangling precariously over the ledge, the older Shinigami grunted in exertion as he sharply pulled Junshin back up towards the ledge, Junshin flailing out his legs to try and get a foothold on the almost sheer rock face in an attempt to aid his rescuer.

“Seraphina-kun!” he shouted again, looking over his shoulder to try and get a look at Hitomi’s progress. She had already reached the tower - effortlessly dispatching two soldiers before, by the looks of it, conversing with a large, red haired man who remained on his knees.

‘Is that…her father…?’

“Yagyu-sensei,” he called, turning his attention back to Jubei as the latter pulled him close enough that Junshin was able to reach up to grasp the edge of the cliff, the larger man helping him climb back up to solid ground. “We have to get over there! Seraphina-kun needs our help!’

“Sato-san, can you…” he trailed off as he turned his head towards where he expected the raven haired woman to be standing - only darkness greeted him. His panic continuing to rise into his throat, Junshin’s own heartbeat thundered in his ears as he desperately swept his gaze across the ledge on which they perched.

He and Jubei were alone….Hisayo was gone.

‘No…no, no, no, no, no! How the hell did things get this fucked up!?’

“Run, Kiyoko-dono,” Jubei muttered, the man’s steady presence some small comfort as he rose to his feet. “Our plan has failed….we need to get out of here. I’ll retrieve Seraphina-dono, and we’ll make a break for it. We’ll have to come up with something else.”

Junshin found himself nodding before Jubei’s words had even sunk in. Looking down at the zanpakuto still clutched within his right hand, he realised that his fingers were gripping around the hilt so tightly that his palms had begun to bleed. He had thought, after his battle with Yabu, that things had changed since the battle with the Hollow….he had been feeling so much stronger…so much more confident…

And yet, for the second time, he was being instructed to run away.

’No…damn it, get a hold of yourself! Sato-san or no Sato-san, we’re not going to get another chance at this. Pull yourself together, you damned idiot! Act like a man!’

“No,” he stated, attempting to keep his voice level as he pushed himself back to his feet. Drawing in a long, steadying breath, he reached up with his empty left hand to draw his other zanpakuto. “Take me over there with you, Yagyu-sensei.”

“Don’t be an idiot!” Jubei growled, turning away to take a step towards the edge of the cliff. “Without Sato-dono, we don’t have a chance. We’re going to have to wait for another chance to…”

“There isn’t going to be another chance!” Junshin interjected, halting Jubei in mid-step. “We’re all we’ve got…and I’m not running while Seraphina-kun is still out there. We’ll move in to support her, you and I. If we watch each other’s backs then maybe we can…”

A sudden explosion of reiatsu - enormous, blinding, horrifying - left spots dancing before Junshin’s eyes as the world seemed to lurch around him. Without his own reiatsu raised to defend himself, it felt as though a vice had been squeezed around his lungs. His disorientation was brief, however, replaced by alarm as he realised there was no way that the sudden eruption had been caused by Hitomi.

Darting past Jubei, Junshin slid to a halt at the very edge of the chasm, his eyes frantically returning to where he had last seen Hitomi. His heart all but stopped as he saw the effects of the attack that struck her - the girl’s body flying through the air like a broken doll, her reiatsu - which only moments before had been singing within his senses - fading away to nothing.

‘…N….No…..’

His knees finally buckled, Junshin collapsing to his knees as Hitomi struck the wooden floorboards of the walkway. The girl lay motionless, blood spitting from her wound to cause a quickly growing pool or crimson beneath her. She did not stir…nor did her spiritual pressure…

‘…dead….’

His eyes like saucers, Junshin could feel a tremble tearing its way through his entire body. His spiritual pressure shuddering to its maximum, he didn’t hear himself cry out…but he knew he did. A howl of rage that tore itself from his lungs as his gaze moved from Hitomi’s motionless form to the figure that hovered in mid-air above her position; half way between Junshin and the tower.

His long coat flapping in the wind, the cloth snapping violently in a gale that failed to dislodge the hat from the top of his head, the member of Kuroken that - only minutes before - they had been waiting to ambush, was in the process of calmly reattaching one of the four dangling wind-chimes attached to his hat. Standing upon the empty air, his back was to Junshin…though at the sound of the latter’s howl of rage, the man slowly turned to look back over his shoulder.

Even from so far a distance, Junshin felt Hitomi’s killer’s eyes fall upon him.

“Damn it!” Jubei growled, throwing all other plans to the wind as he reached out a hand to grasp Junshin by the scruff of the neck. His attempt to pull the younger man to his feet initially failed however; Junshin was not intentionally resistant, his limbs simply refused to move. Hissing out a curse, Jubei instead stooped to wrap one of his muscular arms around Junshin’s torso, resorting instead to body carrying the younger man away as he took off at a full sprint away from the chasm; the two Shinigami disappearing in a blur of shunpo that saw them blast across the flat surface of the wasteland at blistering speed.

To Junshin, realisation that they were retreating was slow in coming. Dangling within Jubei’s grasp, he merely numbly watched the ground beneath them blaze past as a swift moving blur, wreathed in darkness. He could feel the enormous reiatsu of their adversaries surging after them, through the further they moved from Pinnacle the more difficult it became to keep track as they were drowned out by the tower‘s own output - fading into what was perhaps the reiatsu equivalent of background noise. Jubei did not withdraw in a straight line; quickly changing direction as he used the darkness to conceal their escape.

And escaping they were…Junshin finally wracking out a half choked sob of agony as he realised they were leaving; saving their own skins while leaving Hitomi’s body behind.

“Save your grief, Kiyoko-dono,” Jubei’s voice came to him through the air that shrieked through his ears - the speed at which they travelled making little allowance for speaking. “So long as you’re alive….there’s always revenge.”

His twin zanpakuto still clutched within his hands, Junshin tightened his grip upon the weapons - his own blood seeping between his fingers upon both fists as Jubei continued to carry him away from danger. He had come so far…he had grown so much stronger…and yet, in the end, he still didn’t have the talent to go to Hitomi when she’d needed him the most.

‘The one time….the one time she needed me to protect her…I failed.’

The sting of years forced Junshin to close his eyes, his entire body aching as the days of exhaustion and stress finally caught up with him; combining with this newest calamity to claim him into oblivion. Even as he felt himself fading away, he knew it wasn’t a dream…no matter how much he wished for it, dreams didn’t hurt this much.

“Damn it…” he uttered, as he felt himself drifting away; dimly aware, in the fading moments of his consciousness, of the silent tug from his zanpakuto that pulled him in.



*****


Junshin was not surprised to find his eyes opening to the sight of overhanging palm branches. The gentle, is dry, heat of the deserts of the Southern Rukongai massaging away - at least in part - the panic and grief that continued to tumble through his soul. The sensation was starting to becoming a familiar one, though even the calming influence of his Inner World could not completely shield him from his grief. Whatever comfort it offered, it did not change the fact that the friend who had helped him find it was dead.

Having been lying on his back, Junshin sat up to rest his elbows on his knees, his gaze on the ground as he struggled to bring himself to look upon the oasis that he knew awaited him. He did not relish another encounter with his zanpakuto at this time…he already felt like enough of a failure, without being reminded of it by the weapon he had so persistently failed to master. Even now, he felt he was no closer to its name that he had been the day he first stumbled into its world.

However, it hardly seemed important to him now.

“….You are troubled, my Master.”

As ever, his zanpakuto’s voice was polite and respectful. However, there was a difference to the spirit’s voice…a slight change in tone that Junshin likely would not have detected had he not known it was be echoed in his own as well. The zanpakuto was a part of him, that much he knew…and it shared his grief.

Finally lifting his gaze to look upon the spirit, Junshin found his zanpakuto spirit as he had left him - seated upon the edge of the cool, pristine oasis. His back was to Junshin, though his shoulders sagged somewhat - he did not strike quite the same calm, collected figure that Junshin had encountered on his previous visit.

“My friend is dead,” Junshin shot back, though his words escaped his lips as little more than a croak, his throat feeling painfully cry. His sentence transformed into a spluttering cough as the spirit briefly turned to look over his shoulder - his bronze, majestic features grim. As Junshin made was likely a vain effort to clear his throat, the spirit shifted his position; turning on the spot to kneel facing Junshin directly, his back to the oasis.

“But you are not,” the spirit replied once he was resettled. “So long as you are alive, my Master, there is always…”

“Revenge, yes, I know,” Junshin snapped, abruptly rising to his feet as he swung his foot into the sand - kicking a flurry of the golden grains into the air in a futile attempt to vent his frustrations. “Yagyu-sensei said the same thing…It just….it doesn’t make things any easier…”

The spirit lifted an eyebrow and, for a brief moment, Junshin felt certain the corners of his mouth were touched by a fleeting, bitter smile.

“Actually,” his zanpakuto replied, “I was going to say ‘justice’.”

The response caught Junshin momentarily by surprise. However, his surprise quickly changed to anger as he found himself storming towards the kneeling spirit. Snatching out a hand, he seized the front of the collar of the man’s turban, his fingers closing around the beige tunic underneath, forcibly yanking the zanpakuto up to stand level with him.

“Seraphina-kun couldn’t have been much older than twenty,” he snarled, only narrowly resisting the urge to shake the spirit - the latter making no attempt to break free, merely regarding Junshin flatly. “Where the hell is the justice in her dying like that!? And all of those people…and those children back in that town…I’m finding ‘justice’ to be in short supply since I came to this part of the world!”

Gritting his teeth, Junshin almost wished that his zanpakuto would throw him off, or shout back, or do anything other than stare back at him. He had no idea what he was supposed to do…what he was supposed to say…to see Hitomi cut down so suddenly and unexpectedly had shattered his world; everything that had seemed to clear cut was now suddenly turned on its head.

And even Hisayo, who had until then been their beacon through the darkness, had simply vanished. That, too, was a stinging blow….though, for some reason, he wasn’t altogether surprised. Hisayo had never made any secret of the fact that she was using them all as a means to an end; to see Kuroken defeated and Pinnacle sealed. When they had broken away from her plan and become a liability, it made a certain amount of sense that she had discarded them.

But that didn’t mean he was going to forgive her…her, or any of them.

“Tell me your name,” he growled, his eyes snapping into those of his zanpakuto. “I don’t want to hear any riddles. Just…just tell me your damn name! Seraphina-kun died and I….I couldn’t do anything. I’m weak! I’m still just too damn weak!’

“Please…” he continued at a near whisper, tightly closing his eyes to hold back the bitter tears of frustration that he knew threatened to come. “Just…just tell me your name. If I only had your power, then I could…”

“Kill them all?” his zanpakuto finished his sentence for him, the spirit’s expression still utterly impassive.

Junshin started, his eyes opening again as his gaze met that of the spirit once more. He recalled, all too bitterly, the words Yabu had spoken to him upon the rooftop in Flotsam…and the shouted exchange between himself and Hitomi that had followed it.

“…I…didn’t become a Shinigami to kill people,” he found himself murmuring out loud, echoing his own words from that night. “I became a Shinigami to save people.”

His zanpakuto smiled briefly at his words, nodding in apparent satisfaction as Junshin slowly relinquished his grip upon the spirit’s collar. His arms dropping to his sides, Junshin exhaled a heavy sigh, shaking his head.

“That just seems like empty rhetoric now,” he muttered. “Yabu was right…no member of Kuroken will show us mercy. That way of thinking. That….that weakness….can’t serve me in this fight.”

“Do you think killing without hesitation is what makes someone strong, my Master?” the spirit asked, reaching out to settle a hand on each of Junshin’s elbows. “It is not…the measure of a man is not in how willing he is to kill. It’s in how willing he is to stand by his principles when they are threatened.’

“You are a man of principles, Kiyoko Junshin,” the spirit whispered. “If you are to wield my power…then wield it for the reasons that you believe to be right. If you use me to kill, then do so for the right reasons…wield me for justice, and to protect the weak. Do not make me a tool for vengeance.’

“You are an oasis. Though surrounded by death, your purpose is to preserve life…not to destroy it.”

Junshin could not bring himself to lift his gaze and look the spirit in the eye. His grief and rage was still too close to the surface to simply throw aside his desire for vengeance. The line between justice and vengeance seemed, to him at least, to be a very fine one indeed.

“I still don’t understand,” he responded, shaking his head.

“You will,” the spirit encouraged, releasing his grip upon Junshin’s arms. “I think…you’re very close, now, to being able to hear my name.”

Despite himself, Junshin made an attempt to life his gaze - though he realised that what lay before his eyes as no longer his inner world….



*****


Sky….

At least, Junshin imagined he would be looking at sky were it not for the perpetual, swirling dust storm that lurched far overhead, drowning out whatever lay beyond. However, despite the thick layer of dust, the land about him was far lighter than it had been - sunlight penetrating the cloud to cast the world into an off-orange glow. Darkness had long since passed, though Junshin could not even begin to hazard the time. Several hours, at least, had surely passed since they left Pinnacle behind - though he had no way of knowing how far they had travelled.

His entire body felt stiff - he had likely been lying upon the ground for some time. The unforgiving, dry ground had not been kind to his spine and neck, and he grimaced as he made his first effort to move. His midrift, in particular, felt badly bruised from where Jubei had gripped him during their flight…

‘Yagyu-sensei!’

Cursing his own foggy head, Junshin wondered how he could possibly have failed to wonder after the other Shinigami’s condition before that moment. Sitting up on his elbows, Junshin blinked groggily as he looked around him, trying to gather his senses as his eyes - having spent so long in darkness, momentarily failed to adjust to the comparative brightness of his new surroundings.

Shapes slowly began to form within his vision - little more than hazy blobs that, initially, lacked definition. However, as he looked to his left, Junshin realised that three of those blobs in particular appeared to have more definition than the others. Squinting into the light, Junshin’s throbbing head continued to struggle to piece together what he was seeing, before he realised that one of the shapes - lying flat on his back in a manner similar to Junshin - was Jubei.

Recognisable only because of the colour of his hair and clothing, Jubei was the only one of the shapes immediately identified. The other two, however, remained alien to him. As Junshin’s scrambled vision tried to account for their presense, the only conclusion he could draw was that two people were beside Jubei - one standing, the other crouching beside the warrior and emanating what Junshin was quite certain to be reiatsu.

‘Kuroken!’

Desperation cut through his disorientation as Junshin immediately snatched his right hand underneath his left arm in search of the hilt of his zanpakuto - cursing when he realised the holster was empty. Without a weapon in hand, he instead made an effort to sit up - resolved to hurl himself against the individuals that he could only perceive to be attackers.

A hand suddenly thrust against his shoulder - large, strong, and effortlessly pushing him back to the ground. In a state of panic, Junshin surmised that a third attacker had been present out of his line of sight. His attempts to push back against the restraining arm proved futile, however - the owner of the arm far stronger than he was.

As he continued to try and force the arm from him, Junshin’s vision finally began to adjust for the illumination. His panicked mind should, perhaps, have realised that the ‘attacker’ was doing nothing more than holding him down. However, it was only as the hazy image above his head became clearer that Junshin’s struggles ceased; alarm fading first to recognition….and then to surprise.

“Y…you,” he stammered, his chocolate coloured eyes meeting the cobalt blue that peered down at him. “Wh…what are….how did….when….?”


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vhCQ6jQIgeQ

“Aaaraa…'

“Nevermind that,” the owner of the arm's tone was gentle, yet firmly demanding. “We’re here…that’s all that matters. You’re safe…and that big guy is safe too. Yukimura-kun will have him up and about soon. So no questions for now…the only thing I want to hear from you now is the answer to two questions we‘ve come a long, long way to ask.’

“Where is Hitomi,” he murmured, holding up his free hand to extend a single finger, a second soon joining it as he spoke his second question, “and who’s ass do I need to kick to get to her?”




Day 4: 10:41am

- - - Updated - - -


Act LIII: Without Doubt


Day 4: 11:06am



Junshin had told the tale of everything that had transpired since their arrival in Flotsam as a rushed jumble of words, his sentences tripping over each other as they flowed from his mouth - sounding, he realised, very much like the story of a madman. The silent, appraising stare of Shadrin Kain did not make it any easier; the powerfully built Shinigami sitting with his arms folded, his eyes narrowed as he appeared to carefully examine every syllable that left Junshin’s lips.

Throughout the tale, the other two men - both young Shinigami approximately the same age as Junshin himself - continued to tend to Jubei. The latter had apparently reopened his wounds by overusing his shunpo to get them away from Pinnacle. One of the two young men - a fierce looking, tattooed Shinigami who looked far more warrior than healer - was in the process of using reiatsu to close the man’s injuries. They both, however, were clearly paying as much attention to Junshin’s story as Shadrin was.

As his tale reached Pinnacle, and the events there, Junshin had expected Hitomi’s companions to react violently. He expected them to rage, or shout, or cry out. However, as he reported the injury suffered by Hitomi at the hands of the Kuroken member named Yabu, the only reaction from any of the three was a brief pause in the flow of reiatsu between Jubei and the man healing him. Shadrin’s expression did not change save, perhaps, for a crease that crept its way into his brow.

As Junshin concluded his tale - by now sitting up on his own, directly opposite Shadrin - he waited for the man to ask questions. He expected demands of clarification, or perhaps accusations that he had allowed Hitomi to die. However, no such things came; Shadrin, merely peering thoughtfully into space for several silent seconds, simply rose to his feet and turned towards his two companions.

“Yukimura-kun,” his voice was perfectly flat, a definite air of restraint to his tone - the previous gentleness having completely left his voice. “Are you about finished?”

“Yeah…” the name named Yukimura nodded without looking up from his work. “He’s not really in any shape to fight. Whoever healed his wounds the first time had a….weird…way of doing it. It wasn’t like any Shinigami healing I’ve seen. He’ll be able to get up and move around, but he’s not going to be in much shape to fight.”

“Right,” Shadrin nodded, turning immediately towards the other man - a handsome, lean young man, who had watched on wordlessly since Junshin had woken. “Shingen-kun, what direction did you say that weird spiritual pressure was in?”

“That way,” the black haired young man replied, raising a hand to jab a thumb over his shoulder - to the north west. “I am afraid I cannot tell you the exact distance…but it is certainly what we are seeking. The reiatsu is alien to me. I have never felt anything else like it in the Rukongai.”

‘He can sense it? From….from that far away….?’

“Alright,” Shadrin nodded. “Head that way and take a look. Double time it. Yukimura-kun and I won’t be far behind.”

“Yes, Sir,” Shingen nodded, immediately turning on the spot, presumably to head in the direction he had indicated. None of the three moved with any hesitation, Shadrin moving away from Junshin to stand over Yukimura - apparently waiting for the other to finish working.

“W…wait!” Junshin found himself speaking outloud, rising from his crouch onto one knee. “I don’t…what….what the hell is wrong with you guys? Didn’t you hear me!? I said Seraphina-kun was killed! Didn’t you understand that!? Do you even care!?”

His outburst was sufficient to draw the attention of all three men back to him. None of them responded, which served only to further fuel Junshin’s anger as he wondered how he could possibly be the only one effected by Hitomi’s demise. These were the Nakama she had spoken so much about? These were the people who had had such a profound effect on her life?

He wanted them to be angry. He didn’t care whether it was at Kuroken, or at Jubei, or Hisayo, or even at him. He simply knew that their failure to show even a hint of grief filled him with such blinding rage that he was on his feet and lunging for Shadrin before he even knew what he was doing. Grasping the lapel of the far larger man’s long blue trench coat, Junshin’s throat released a sound that was half way between a growl and a sob.

“You guys…” he shouted - so loudly that his voice cracked. “You guys meant something to her! She talked about you…all of you…all the time! She talked as though you were the only people in her life that she ever trusted! Why aren’t you angry!? Why aren’t you crying!? What the hell is the matter with you….Seraphina-kun is dead and you don’t even care!?”

Although he tried to shake the larger man, he failed to cause Shadrin to budge. The latter’s blue eyes merely gazed down at him with an expression that showed neither surprise nor anger at his sudden outburst. His own vision blurring with further tears, Junshin grit his teeth as he scowled up at Shadrin, wishing, willing him to show some kind of emotion. However, he was quickly forced to close his eyes as his body was wracked by another sob, his shoulders shaking as he lowered his head.

‘Why….why am I the only one that cares….?’

Slowly, Shadrin finally responded by lifting both arms to place a hand on Junshin’s shoulders. The younger man’s instinctive reaction was to try and throw him off, but he found he simply lacked the will to do it. Everything simply seemed to be falling apart, the mission he had undertaken still seemed set for failure,

“Tell me, boy,” Shadrin murmured, some of the same gentle tones as before having returned to his voice, “in the time you’ve been travelling with her…what has Hitomi come to mean to you?”

Junshin forced his eyes to open, looking back up at Shadrin was the question caught him rather off guard. Shadrin’s expression had not changed - though he thought, perhaps, there was a hint of sympathy in the larger man’s eyes. There was a warmth to the man - something that Junshin could not help but feel even through is grief and rage….it was a far cry from the cold, objective leaderships of Hisayo.

“She’s my Nakama,” he replied without hesitation, his gaze locked defiantly onto Shadrin’s, almost as thought challenging the man to claim otherwise.

“In that case,” Shadrin responded, “why the hell are you giving up on her so soon?”

Junshin was, for the second time, struck with surprise at the question. Blinking up mutely at Shadrin, he found himself unable to immediately form a reply - very nearly jumping out of his skin when Yukimura, having apparently risen to his feet during Junshin’s exchange with Shadrin - suddenly burst into laughter.

“Hey, Wetpants,” Yukimura grinned, shrugging his shoulders. “I don’t know which Sera-kun you’ve been travelling with, but the one we know wouldn’t up and die like that.”