There was exactly one place he dwelled at on a daily basis and refused to leave willingly—Subaru's "new" apartment (Seishirou's old apartment),

There was no in between. Although these were his options ever since the last scrap of his heart had withered like a flower at the start of autumn, he still felt as though he didn't belong. The now familiar living quarters was dreadfully foreign. Subaru always relearned everything he had known on autopilot.

Stepping over the threshold of his predecessor's apartment was a hollow adventure each time. It wasn't the oddity of the high-rise apartment itself considering his old apartment had been nearly identical in design and size. He spent a majority of time he wasn't obligated to work and relieve his thoughts of self-doubt and sadness in the spacious bedroom. Seishirou had lived here and slept here and it was decent enough for Subaru to cling to.

The apartment was lifeless without warmth. At least his memories and fantasies colored it just a little bit.

There was exactly one place Subaru hated dwelling at and went to with his teeth clamped firmly shut—the sacred cherry blossom tree at Ueno Park.

The tree was the symbol of what he had become.

It was inevitable that he had to visit, but he did so sparingly. He didn't visit out of true inner happiness. Subaru did for simple recollection. The sprawling tree branches, endless shower of cherry blossoms pelting his face, and howl of ghostly wind reminded him of an unrelenting past that could have morphed into something different if fate had been kinder.

He had been nine then, young and impressionable.

For that reason, he had not been drawn to the tree after he had found out about its true nature. Subaru was and wasn't attracted to its deadly beauty, and he had Seishirou to thank for the self-composure. He could not allow the tree to ensnare him even if he had adopted those principles as his lifestyle.

The cherry blossom tree collected souls. Such was the fact of life and had been since ancient times. For that reason, the cherry blossom tree was sacred.

There may be souls, but none of them were his business. They weren't souls he personally knew enough to bother in their current eternal state.

He was currently working out his own system for cleansing as the Sakurazukamori. Technically he had been "working" in this line for five years, but he must craft the Sakurazukamori art to perfection, fall into Seishirou's fading footsteps naturally.

So far, it had not been enough. Never would be.

That bodily mechanical, repetitiveness would last him for the remainder of his life. That was what he had left. The only soul he should worry about in such legacy. All Subaru had to do was hone that instinct.

Subaru only needed that much to survive.

Come here more often.

He stared at the tree, green eyes transfixed, not in the least bit moved to do as it instructed him. Subaru didn't even make a gesture to respond. He never did. It was a feeling rather than a coherent thought the tree signaled to him. He had no patience for it.

That's what the tree was: melancholy, nostalgia, and a place far away in time severed from the present.

Cherry blossoms swirled and brushed at his cheek in welcome. Silently, he closed his eyes and focused. Subaru didn't bother to acknowledge their pleas.

Rarely did he touch the tree. Touching was a formality. Although he imagined his predecessor may have done as such for propriety, he did not have the same will to feign kindness. Its innate power was usually drawn to him regardless.

The connection was not for him, as always. It was for what he brought. For the object (it was easier to think of it as an object, not a soul, though it hurt to think it was an object because he knew better, but Seishirou would have done it) to be sealed inside.

The cherry blossom tree's branch swung down and gripped at the shimmering white soul at Subaru's side. The soul did not budge or fight as the branch pulled it close and engulfed it within the confines of its trunk, having accepted its inevitable passing.

Either they fought or give in. There was no in between. Subaru was grateful for the latter.

Every soul extinguished by the Sakurazukamori was fated to be bound to this tree forever, after all.

Turning on his heel, the tree started to blur. The night sky and cherry blossom shifted and rustled restlessly under the dissipation of the illusion.

—wait—

The cherry blossoms rushed past him. Subaru's body seized up, and he finally glanced upwards.

The illusion held for a few moments longer. The pounding of the wind in his ears was all he heard before the neon light on the Tokyo street corner blinded Subaru out of his wandering thoughts.

It was nothing new to him. For years, he had heard their voices echoing and whispering in his conscious. He replayed them often. The black rolls of a ripped out VHS tape may as well have trailed at his feet with the rate he went about indulging fantasy.

He had gone for so long without hearing either of their voices, but they were as fresh as the year of the bet in his memory. It may as well have been an eternity that the year had lasted for him, including the stains of sheer spite and happiness which had plagued his yearning of it in the year of destiny.

No matter where he went, he always heard them.

Reality was a trick of the mind.

The wind was deceiving in its own right.

How long would it take to see them again?

Would they talk to him in the afterlife?

Should he seek them out considering his role?

Had that voice really been the same?

It had only been a few syllables, but he knew whose voice he had heard crescendo the rush of wind.

He could not allow himself to fall. These days, he wasn't that person. Nothing fazed him. He could live without memories plaguing his waking moments.

So why did the curtain of cherry blossoms, no matter which direction he looked, call out to him in a way he had not been swayed by since his innocent youth?

None of the words were ever coherent sentences. Every word that Subaru overheard while he visited the tree was always a fragmented phrase.

—I don't want you—

Many times they stood in front of him with their hands stretched out as he approached them in the dark, eyes bugged out, faces drained of color.

—you shouldn't be—

Many things and people shouldn't be allowed in the world, but they existed nonetheless. That was life.

—listen—

Ages ago he had listened. They had run away in the time he had processed what they said, and he had chased after them. It hadn't been pretty or beneficial to his overall performance. He didn't bother now.

—stay with us—

Seishirou's apartment was waiting. The coffee maker had broken due to old age. He should replace it soon, but where had Seishirou bought the first?

As soon as he was home he placed a hand on top of the coffee maker. He nodded and caressed it with his palm. Yes, he should search the store for a white one just like this. He had kept everything up to date that way for years, as objects naturally gave out.

At the store, he skimmed the shelves. Several silver coffee makers lined the rows. There were even gold ones. The white ones, however, didn't look the same on the box as the one at home. Dissatisfied, he frowned, walking out and leaving the shop.

The next store was the same. The shop after that wasn't any better, but there was one close to it. But the coffee maker still wasn't good enough for him.

This hadn't happened to him in the past. But it had to be perfect now. Hokuto would have wanted the nicest one, and Seishirou wouldn't have bought junk, so he had to keep the tradition between them.

Why did it matter so much?

How did those voices echo in his head?

It had always driven him over the edge, but he had to be closer to them. Recently, he had to be far, far closer than he had ever been, and he didn't know how to be. Whose voices were those, exactly?

It had to be the same. Dare he think, identical…

Objects were the things he should pay attention to: the painstaking upkeep of Seishirou's apartment, the people he had to kill, and the Tokyo before his eyes.

Not hold onto inanimate voices.

Definitely not notice that wretched tree.

Days passed. His long hunt for the coffee maker continued, and he still couldn't find the right one.

At one point he had found the right brand. The design resembled his without any differences, but he had passed on that one. He wandered elsewhere from shop after shop. Searching and searching.

Later, he went back and bought the coffee maker he had first believed to be the one, but he felt hollow on the way home. The box was more of a weight than something he anticipated opening up for himself.

—I hurt you, and I know—

He didn't know why.

After opening it, he placed the coffee maker on the table. He stared at his reflection in the polished metal. It sat quietly, inviting him to put it to use.

Yes, he was positive Seishirou would have liked this.

Something was missing, however.

Subaru glanced at the old coffee maker in the corner of the kitchen. It didn't stare back. The surface was chipped in places and too faded to shine properly.

His heart constricted, and the rumbling vibration of noise in his head was clearer than ever. He could hear Seishirou's voice asking him twenty years ago if he could put a big spoonful of sugar in from the coffee that had come from that coffee maker.

—you're working too hard, like always—

The voice was fresh. It was teasing him. The voice was too raw to have been from two decades ago.

Sighing, he boxed the new coffee maker. He placed the receipt on top and tossed the whole thing near the door away from his sight. He would return it in the morning and then drop the entire subject.

But it was the right decision. He didn't need a different one, anyway. He preferred tea.

Finally at ease, he looked out into the blazing orange sunset outside the window. He blinked, the vision of the tall tree coming to mind, something washing over him that was powerful and harsh.

It was twilight, and the death that accompanied it wouldn't be too far away from him at this rate.

You're so hardheaded! What can I do with you?

Those voices he had never listened to, not once.

But the thoughts had squirmed into his brain either way.

I never told you my feelings.

He had heard the voices therein his hidden world.

The search had ended.

The ethereal light enclosed him under the tree's branches. The source of the tree's life pulsated, surprised by his brashness although not upset.

He had never taken this step before. This was new to him, but he had rest of his years to stand here if he must. He put foot in front of the other, and then the next one followed, and soon he was next to it.

Subaru's breath went uneven. He could hear them without doing this, but many of those times he had awoken the souls inside with another addition to their ranks. It needed to be physical, and him taking the initiative. This time, he would see for himself, without another sacrifice to this tree for that end.

Subaru pressed his back to the tree a hand to the tree trunk. The worn, rough wood scratched against the sensitive palms of his hand, the tree's ancient power connecting him to its vital life source

"SUBARU!"

Immediately, Hokuto's high-pitched voice screeched through his skull. He clutched the bark, speechless. He could not comprehend the meaning of his name.

The bridge between life and death was a rocking boat that threatened to tip if he embraced her too quickly. But of course he had no choice. What was in life didn't always translate to death, but the ties connecting each were not severed each time.

"Hokuto-chan?"

It wasn't until he spoke that he realized his throat was parched, and his normally soft tone cracked. He swallowed, awestruck. He hadn't dared put her name back into existence around him. She should have moved on from this world to the afterlife.

She laughed, although he could hear the underlying apprehension and regret there, an uncertainty that seemed to understand the position she was in.

"Of course it's me! I've been talking to you for a while now, but you never heard me. Did you?"

He blinked. His heartbeat began to normalize again. The realization that he was dreaming this melted away. Now, it was becoming apparent that she indeed was inside the tree. Her voice had a faraway quality, but he still heard her voice crystal clear.

He didn't reply. His vision blurred.

She huffed. "Honestly, I've been waiting a while for you. I know it's been…" She trailed off momentarily. "It's been… difficult for us. But—hey, Subaru?"

Subaru started shaking. His legs collapsed under him, and he fell to his knees, leaning against the tree. He counted to ten, trying to hold back the flood.

"Subaru?" Sensing that he had moved, she sounded more concerned than previously. "What's wrong?"

Ice may as well have encased him and held him firm; the turmoil of emotions plunged into him like icicles. This time he couldn't get himself to speak at all. He hung his head and stared at his lap. The cherry blossoms at his knees gleefully attached to his fanned out trenchcoat and clung on to him. Their unbridled warmth startled his sensitive body.

Transparent tears covered the cherry blossoms. The tears pelted them, and they kept falling and falling.

He had forgotten the blossoming, foreign emotion welling up within him. It a sweet release that spread throughout his body. It was lucid, intoxicating.

The dead never returned. He had fought for peace for the dead for years. It wasn't natural to be here.

Right then that thought was not entertained.

What was the emotion he felt called again?

At some point he must have lost his train on reality, because when he opened his eyes, the time eluded him. He didn't have the will to look at his watch.

He didn't have the desire to leave.

Subaru still ignored the cherry blossom tree itself. Regardless, the tree was content with his change in heart, and lessened its persistence to have him engage with her face-to-face. In fact, he vaguely wondered if her end goal all along had been meeting his sister and predecessor in the first place.

Perhaps it was giving it too much credit for such a tricky tree with so much history and ambiguity.

Well, the guessing games were pointless.

"How have you been?" she asked him. "I can't see you, you know, so you better not be pale and thin."

It was typical relaxing conversation fodder. Just like how she used to ask him what he had done at school the days he had gone to high school.

Subaru drew his knees up to his chest. The entire bit of this actuality was highly uncanny for him to digest..

"I…"

They caught-up on practically everything from clothing, current set of friends, and his schedule. They scratched the surface of his job, but they avoided it at first, not even jesting about it.

"And it's been good to see you, you know," she told him sincerely for about the one hundredth time.

She didn't realize how understated that was for him.

He might as well have been floating on a cloud in his own sheer bliss, but his mind was still cloudy.

She was hesitant. She was holding back on telling him something. At first he hadn't noticed it, but now it was too ingrained within her mannerisms to ignore. He had learned over the years how to detect a liar. During her life Subaru had never thought of her as such, but the waver in her voice definitely signaled that she had something that she was tip-toeing around for the perfect moment to tell him.

"Hoku—"

"And I have something else to tell you, Subaru."

She hurriedly whispered it to get the first word in, as though she walked on a flat wire. She never needed the full question to sense it coming but it put him on edge. He stiffened. Quizzically, he frowned.

"Sei-chan is here," she told him, knowing there was no easy method to confess this. "He's in the tree."

Subaru's hand slackened on his wrinkled shirt. His chest tightened. He hiccupped a small, quiet gasp.

Hokuto didn't pause. "Sei-chan."

A crackle rattled through the tree's core.

"Sei-chan, I'm not telling you again!"

No reply accompanied her pleas.

Subaru traced the back of his hands where his marks no longer were, every part of him cold with anticipation. The adrenaline rush was for naught.

Why wasn't he speaking?

Why would he speak after his final words?

Regularly, he started to visit more than once a day.

As if to oppose fate, Subaru never once initiated conversation with his predecessor. In a way, he didn't need to. Each second that he spent there Subaru's inkling of his presence grew stronger.

It would take time to outwardly get there.

He talked to Hokuto despite the twinges of disbelief. He still grappled with the intricacies of the act itself.

No matter when he was there, he felt his presence. It was one of the stronger souls within the tree; his aura emitted the ruthless energy Subaru had known. But there was also expected fondness and charity Subaru likewise swore that he was hallucinating.

Seishirou had always been that way, though. He had been polite, considerate, and hostile appropriately. Should he feel excited for his attention, or reluctantly dismissive that he had a hollow victory?

Was that what it was? It was as if eyes were on him.

At the end of the day, he kept rounding back to what he knew to be the truth. He felt it, and it was surreal. He couldn't stop the beaten, insecure feelings from bubbling up within the crevice of his heart's core…

Then, those final words repeated in his ears, and he did not have any lasting regrets on that front.

Subaru fell asleep on the tree roots again. It wasn't a particularly special day, and there was not much to say, but he had wanted to be here In Ueno Park. Existing. Being close to the souls of the people he cared about most in the world was his livelihood.

There was no greater pleasure for him.

Blurrily, he opened his eyes and rubbed at them. He pulled his knees to his chest and ducked his head, trying to fend off his cold hands and feet. That was what he deserved wearing thin pants and a shirt.

Barely awake, he brushed his hair away from his eyes. Of course he slept better here than at home even though his back would blame him for this.

So he was deep down amused at his odd timing.

"Is it cold?" Seishirou asked. The question sounded acquiescent and even somewhat rhetorical. His voice rumbled out of the tree like a gale wind.

The water under the bridge had been colder.

Subaru shrugged. His heart thumped, and his face froze, but he kept stoic. This was an abnormality, but he would burden this sin. "I'll bring a blanket next time," he admitted calmly, shivering, deadpan.

Silence. Subaru waited, but he didn't make another comment, and the battle for who would speak first weighed in. But Subaru wasn't playing that game.

"I'm angry at you," Subaru hissed. The hostility burned from all the years without him, with him suddenly there, and for no reason at all.

"I know," Seishirou told him instantly.

Subaru grit his teeth. "I hate you."

"As you should," Seishirou agreed matter-of-factly. He was not complacent. "I expect nothing less."

Subaru balled up his fists and shook his head. Always, he agreed with him—they were on a wavelength that was too difficult to sever. He needed something which would rock the boat.

"Most of all, I want to punch you in your smug face." The fiery passion and fierceness in the threat would without a doubt chill any man down to his bones.

Seishirou hummed to himself thoughtfully. There was teasing angle to the sound despite the course the conversation was forming. He chuckled a little. "That's quite feisty of you," he remarked. "Isn't that a bit too violent for my gentle Subaru-kun to do?"

And for a moment he really did want to punch him until his head spun off his shoulders, because he was the reason he was here and steeped in lies and truths. Subaru had cast away his Sumeragi title to become the esteemed Sakurazukamori. Now, he sat in a giant field of beautiful cherry blossoms that had greedily engorged themselves on fresh blood.

In the end, he didn't care. He didn't know why it had ended up like this. He had a million questions in his soul left, but he didn't have any resolve to focus on them. Hearing him talk to him again was enough to make Subaru desperately crave throwing out his beating heart to him. He didn't need anything else and he never would. He was in it for the long haul.

Subaru twisted around in place. Eyes narrowed, his eyes sizzled like leaves within the shimmering sun at the spot he imagined Seishirou's soul to be within the tree's buried depths. His expression softened faster than the cherry blossoms could hit the ground behind him. Both of his arms enveloped the massive tree, and he pressed his lips to the bark. His arms didn't halfway fit around it and it was comforting. He closed his eyes and willed away the tear that hoped to fall. The tear fell anyway and hit the tree root.

He didn't know how this would pan out. For all intents and purposes, he wasn't invincible. But there was one thing he could do that he hadn't been able to since he had had lost his sister as a teenager. He would live if he had them both holding him up.

"No." Subaru contentedly rested his head against the tree's wide trunk. "Not if it's for only you."