Title: Within the Truth of Dying
Disclaimer: Hi. I don't own BLEACH or any of the characters in it. All that belongs to the troll- Kubo.
A/N: If you're looking at this, congrats. You're looking at my first angsty fic. My friend passed away, and I kinda took my sadness out on my favorite character.
note1: Drea, I love you so much.
note2: RIP Kyle, I'mma miss you bro~
note 3: Enjoy~! (It gets better in the end, I swear)
"Death is the last enemy: once we've got past that I think everything will be alright."
~Alice Thomas Ellis
Dying was easy. Simple even. It's living that sucks. The overall feeling of going on day after day with the same damn feeling of uncertainty, it was well…. Uncertain.
Hiyori was beginning to lose feeling any feeling that she had in her body… well what was left of it. She knew she was gravely injured. Hell, she was chopped in half. If that wasn't gravely injured, she didn't know what the fuck was.
She hated this feeling though. She couldn't feel anything, almost as if she was floating, but she knew she wasn't. Weird white orbs restrained her vision. All of that while feeling your body lying in a pool of your own blood just wasn't really that great of an experience.
"Hiyori!" A distorted, but easily recognized voice called.
Shinji.
Was the only coherent word she could think of.
"W-what're ya doin," She coughed up some blood, "Dumbass?" She could feel her heart beating faster, which was not good by any stretch of the imagination. Hiyori knew that Shinji needed to be fighting. The others needed him. He couldn'tleave them.
Hiyori watched as Shinji's desperate face looked her body up and down, searching for something to do. Anything. He finally settled on her hand. The blood covered hand that she had used to realize that she was, in fact, missing half of her body.
"Yer' gonna be okay." He muttered, she knew he meant for it to come out definitive, but it barely came out as a whisper.
"Liar." She chuckled before sputtering trace amounts of blood. Shinji didn't say anything, just gently squeezed her hand.
"Ya know. Ya can't leave me. Not yet. Orihime-chan will come an' fix ya' right up." He said, she could hear….
Were those tears in his voice? Hiyori was sure it was just her. After all these years, she had never
seen Shinji shed a single tear out of sadness. Ever.
"Yer a h-horrible liar, baldy." She replied. Suddenly, instead of the white orbs floating she had noticed previously in her vision, she was beginning to see black.
Hiyori began to panic. She couldn't die. She couldn't. She had to keep fighting. Fighting was the only thing she was good at. She was the onlyone who could fight this.
Why? Because fighting was what she did.
"No. Hiyori. Ya' can't leave me." Shinji's voice cracked before he looked up for a moment.
"Someone! Help!" Shinji screamed out, his voice thick with desperation for anyone, really. Hiyori just laid there and silently wished that someone would hear him. She knew that there was battle going on, but maybe. Just maybe someone had heard him.
"Course I ain't. Someone's gotta keep ya' on yer' toes. And quit yer' bitchin'. People got more important things ta' do then heal me." She knew she was long gone, she could feel it.
There wasn't any pain, nothing at all. She could even feel her other half, which was more than odd all things considered. But she didn't care. Hiyori could hear the pain in Shinji's voice and she wanted to make it stop.
"Please don't leave me." He choked out, his other hand cupping her face.
"Don't." Tears began to fill her eyes. She couldn't bear to hear such intense pain in his voice. She was used to him being in pain though, after all the abuse she had put him through. It was all her demented way of showing how much she really cared. It was sick and twisted, sure. But she still cared for the blond man.
To top it all off, she was crying. She was crying in front of the man she cared about, for no reason whatsoever.
"Why the fuck'm I cryin?" She asked no one in particular, frustrated with herself. She coughed again and her whole body shook with the power of it could feel a small stream of blood fall down the corner of her mouth as a result to all her coughing. This is not good, she thought to herself. Blood coming out of ones mouth, was never a good sign.
"Cause ya can." The blond replied to her rhetorical question.
Hiyori told herself that she didn't really see him in that much pain, he had to have been backlit or something. She didn't really see a tear fall down his face and hit her hand. No, that had to have been an illusion. She told herself that, because if he really had been, it would have only caused more pain for everyone. She wanted to tell him that he was being an idiot and he needed to stop being a girl and stop crying. But Hiyori couldn't find the words.
"Hey, Hiyori?" Shinji suddenly whispered.
The blackness began to overtake her. No! No. I ain't ready. I can't leave. Not yet, she screamed at herself. She wasn't going to let herself die. Her eyelids became heavy and the need to take a nap was becoming seemingly present. Hiyori didn't like it one bit. Sleep was for the weak.
"S-Shinji." She cried. She was getting cold where she was once warm. She was surprisingly comfortable, though in a situation where nothing should be comfortable. She could feelher body giving up on her, shutting down. She couldn't feel anything anymore. The hand that Shinji had on her face, the other which was clutching her own, felt foreign.
"I need ta' tell ya' somethin'." He whispered in an even lower tone. He knows. He's knows I'm dyin', she thought to herself.
Stay awake you dumb bitch. STAY AWAKE.
She continued fighting, even if all her body wanted is some sleep. It almost lulled her into a sense of relaxation, practically coaxing her into the deep recuperative state. She however, wanted, more than anything to stay awake.
A small voice in the back of her brain whispered at her to sleep. Sleep, just rest your eyes. Don't worry.
No. She told the voice. She couldn't bring herself to keep her eyes closed. Not yet.
"I-I can't see, Shinji." She sputtered and coughed again. More blood escaping her mouth.
"Stop talkin', alright?" He brushed some of her blonde hair out of her eyes. The sun was shining on her face, she could feel its warmth on her skin. Her vision flickered back and forth. Sometimes she got whole vision, only for it to switch back into simple splotches of light.
She brought her head to nod in agreement, but even that sent pain shooting down her body.
"Now, I need ya' ta' listen ta' me real good." She could feel his breath near her ear. She braced herself for his words.
"I know this is selfish of me, Hiyori. But I need you to keep fighting. I need…. I need you. I need you to kick my ass whenever I'm being a dumbass. I need you help me make mildly decent choices, whether you know it or not. I need you to call me a baldy and smack me with your sandal. I need you to help keep Mashiro at bay. I need you to just stay with me. I need you….because I loveyou." He whispered in her ear.
Just as the blackness overcame her, she heard the words, "I love you."
"Shinji..." She managed. She tried, she really did, but in the end, the blackness overcame her.
She saw only blackness, until she saw the tiniest flicker of light... it was small at first, but it eventually grew. It eventually became larger, expanding until there was only light in front of her. She didn't feel the need to cover her eyes though, the light was warm and welcoming, while the darkness behind her was cold, and well…. Fucking dark. But it had Shinji's voice, his last words echoing in her brain.
"I love you."
Hiyori fought. She turned around and ran into the blackness, regardless of the consequences.
She couldn't leave, she couldn't let herself just give up like some sort of wuss. Hiyori was, after all, a fighter and she sure as hell wasn't going to stop now. The fight was hard, and she could feel everything.But she kept thinking that Shinji was waiting, she couldn't let him down. Not now. Not ever.
Hiyori refused to give up.
Until she blacked out.
She could still feel everything. A tug there, a sharp stabbing there. She couldn't help but feel lost. She was disoriented. Distorted voices filled her ears. The blonde tried to make them out, but she couldn't. Everything sounded like gibberish, or like she was hearing things backwards.
Hiyori tried to piece things together in her brain, however hard the feat would seem to be. She was awake, but she wasn't. It was like she was trapped in her own brain, and she wanted out.
Finally, warmth came. She began to get feeling in her limbs again. She was comfortable, the pain was still there, but it wasn't as stabbing and blatant as it was before. It was bearable.
She could sleep peacefully, right before she fell asleep though, she could see the faint orange glow permeate her vision.
Fuckin' big-tits, she thought to herself before she let herself get some much needed rest.
Hiyori woke up god knows how long later. Her eyes practically needing to be pulled apart. There was something in her hand though. She released whatever foreign object in her hand only to find that the mass remained. When she finally managed to pry apart her eyes and she blinked away the massive amounts of sleep. She focused on her hand only to be greeted by a rather massive hand belonging to none other than Shinji. She rolled her eyes at the man and tried to yank her hand out from under his.
Now, the reason why this was so difficult was because the man was passed out in a very uncomfortable looking chair next to her.
"Shinji." Her voice croaked, she coughed a few times. God, how long had it been since she had…. Her memory searched back to when she passed out while being healed.
Shinji stirred in the seat next to her bed. That was the next thing she noticed, she was hooked up to a monitor, but she was in her own bed, at home.
She was home.
"Hmmm?" Shinji grumbled in his sleep.
"Wake up you oaf!" She exclaimed, her voice still hoarse. His eyes fluttered open before he jumped up to face the blonde.
"Hiyori!" He exclaimed while practically tackling her.
"Oof!" she protested, "Get offa' meee!" She continued. Shinji froze as soon as he realized his what he had just done, and immediately began untangling himself from Hiyori.
"Yer awake." The blond stated.
Rolling her eyes, Hiyori simply replied, "No shit, Sherlock. Thanks."
"I thought ya died."
"Well… I ain't dead yet." Her eyes narrowed slightly, unsure whether or not to take offense in the statement.
He shot her a toothy grin. Typical Shinji. "I'm glad."
Hiyori narrowed her eyes at him. Part of her wished that she had forgotten what he whispered in her ear as she died. But she couldn't. It was those words that brought her back, she doubted if she would ever forget those words.
"Hey Shinji." She said, motioning for him to come closer. He shot her a cautious look but did as she told and moved closer.
"Wanna know a secret?" She asked a mischievous smile on her face. Shinji, looking legitimately frightened inched closer to her.
"I guess…" He said. He was so close to Hiyori that she could feel his body heat. His face hovered above hers.
"Ya' know… I remember what you said." She said before she reached up and punched him in the face. His face making a audible, and rather satisfying crack.
"Yer a fuckin' idiot."
And in that moment, Hiyori realized those words, in her brain at least. Translated into, "I love you too."
A/N: Thanks for reading through my depression.
As always, reviews are appreciated and loved dearly.
Take care my lovelies~
~Allie