Wildly dissimilar Strangely disparate —H.D., "Scribe"
yet actuated by the same fear,
the hippopotamus and the wild-deer
hide by the same river.
yet compelled by the same hunger,
the cobra and the turtle-dove
meet in the palm-grove.
--
The war changed people.
Wounds were healed and people were brought back from the edge of death even as the total losses were still being calculated. Spring came late and the surviving shinigami slowly returned to their posts and continued with life as it had been before traitorous captains and the unspeakable horrors of a war compacted into a few months. There was the collection of heroes hailed for their acts during the war, and the honored dead remembered with mournful tears. In the end, wars aren't much more than catalysts for change. They're all the same for that much.
Everyone is weary of war. The shinigami are ready to move forward again, even if they must leave behind those still living for the sake of getting on with things. It thins the pack and allows them to keep going with life. They are still stinging with the Pyrrhic victory, and sometimes it's just better to forget again and let the fresh pains fade into older ones.
And so life goes on. Seireitei is the same as always. It is only the people who have changed.
--
His brush is dipped in ink when Izuru pauses at the sound outside his office door. He has already set aside the brush and risen from behind his desk before the knock comes. Habit alone keeps him from remaining seated when he calls to the visitor.
The door slides open, and his eighth seat is bowing in the doorway, begging his pardon and expaining his errand. Izuru nods him in and comes from behind the desk, taking the stack of reports from the man—a talented officer who has been rapidly promoted through the ranks at a breakneck pace over the last half-year—and flipping through them quickly.
After an extended silence, the shinigami clears his throat. "Lieutenant Kira," he begins, dropping his head toward the floor again. "I don't mean to rush you, but I…"
"Of course." Izuru sets the papers atop a towering stack of other reports waiting for his seal. The shinigami bids his farewell and leaves Izuru alone in the office again, staring at the small square of clear space on his desk. Sighing heavily, Izuru settles into his chair again and covers his face with his hands. On the surface of things, he feels so normal, despite the horrors he has seen, some he has committed himself. There are still stacks of paperwork waiting for him to complete, still hours of training for a bankai he fears he will never be strong enough to achieve, and still the faded semblance of a life he stopped living months before that he is expected to continue with.
Hisagi is dead, one of the final fatalities in a grueling war that took as much from the shinigami as from Aizen and his Arrancar, save the defining victory. Izuru watched the weighted darkness grow in his eyes the whole of the war, until he was nearly consumed by it. Perhaps it was mercy that he died after all, so he wouldn't have to live with the dogged shadows of war in peacetime. It doesn't help Izuru, who carries the combined weight of their darkness, only now there is no Shuuhei to cling to in the brief moments of surcease, when despair lurks close and tangible enough to touch.
With a shuddered intake of breath, Izuru brushes his palms over his eyes and reaches for his brush. His shaking fingers miss their mark and end up in ink to his first knuckle. He pulls them back and tangles his hands in his hair, hardly caring about the black streaks across his colorless cheeks and into the flaxen strands.
--
The first strike is easy to dodge. The second requires Yumichika to lift his sword and parry, but it is an effortless movement. Effortless. Just like everything else Yumichika does. His strikes come fast and hard, and the officer goes crashing to the ground within half a minute. He didn't even have to release into shikai.
Sighing curtly, Yumichika sheathes his zanpakutou and turns away. The officer will be just fine. He isn't even sure the exercise was worth the effort. Leaving the training grounds, disappointment settles heavier onto him than usual. Things just aren't the same. They can never be the same, and Yumichika is starting to wonder what the point of going on like this is. Like Sisyphus, Yumichika feels like every day he is doing the same things, only to have them reset day in and day out. It's boring and monotonous and lonely, but if it's not obvious he'll never admit it to a single soul. The world is dreary, even on the most vividly beautiful of the summer days, and Yumichika can't bring himself to care about anything he used to fret over, least of all beauty he doesn't see the point for anymore.
Ikkaku, the damn, foolhardy idiot, had to be a hero. Sometime during the war, it stopped being about the thrill of the fight and started being about a cause and, most of all, their survival. In a flash of bravado and heroics, Ikkaku was gone and Yumichika was alone. He has lived in Seireitei for decades, and suddenly it feels like a foreign land that he doesn't understand. Without Ikkaku, whom he followed to this life, it seems so… pointless.
The fights are boring, the work unbearably so, and the solitude pressing in on him like a suffocating force, even as it hollows out his chest and leaves him empty, and Yumichika goes through the motions of a life that should be shattered. Moving forward is hard, but when the alternative is to be left behind, Yumichika takes what few opportunities for reprieve he can and doesn't think to question whether or not it could harm him.
There's not much left that could hurt him more, anyway.
The call of his name—from someone from his squad—halts him long enough to fulfill their business with him and send them along their way. With another sigh—a slow, indulgent one—Yumichika leaves the Division grounds and walks aimlessly around the city wall without regard for time or who might see him. When he reaches the west gate, he sits down on the warm stone and watches the sun sink below the horizon in a flourish of brilliance beyond his reach.
--
The first time it happened was a collection of coincidences that left two near strangers drinking in the same bar. It was almost as if they were drinking alone, neither speaking, nor acknowledging one another beyond when they reached across the table to fill one another's cups. They didn't say a word then and they don't say a word now, when it's been too many times to still be written off as a coincidence.
Izuru is somber in his silence. Yumichika is nearly brooding in his own. The only movement is to take a drink, to refill a cup, or occasionally rise to refill the flask they share. It is a tradition in its own right, born from too many nights alone, longing for a companionship their friends can never quite seem to offer. They share a pain that is only the first in a series of the coincidences that has brought them to the same table night after night, week after week, until months turn to seasons and the cushion of time between them and their losses grows into a gaping chasm they are losing themselves in.
At closing time, they stand, nod their farewells, and go along their opposite ways from the same bar where they are starting to become familiar faces to anyone who stops in. It doesn't matter if anyone else ever shows up. Yumichika is always there, and directly across the table from him always sits Izuru.
It's just the way it is now.
--
Yumichika is drunk when it finally comes around to the first anniversary of the single event that started this all.
Izuru hardly notices for the first hour that something is wrong, because nothing is wrong until Yumichika starts talking to him. It starts off quiet, the occasional remark about some mundane detail in the bar or another, and grows in magnitude of volume and subject matter within a quarter-hour. At the first mention of the betrayal—a subject that quickly gives way to softer talk of Ikkaku—Izuru shifts and sets aside his cup and wonders if he is the one who is so drunk as to be hallucinating this. It is as if the silence they have imposed on themselves has been breached, and Yumichika is finally reaching across the abyss.
What Izuru doesn't know is if Yumichika is reaching to save him, or to save himself, or if it doesn't matter anymore because they're either beyond help or have just started clinging together because it's the only way to keep going. The silent appointment they have kept up for months suddenly seems so much more significant than it had before, when it was a simple fact of life. Izuru edges the bottle away from Yumichika, who won't or can't stop talking, and stands up from his side of the table.
"I'll take you home, Ayasegawa-san." Yumichika's name sounds strangely foreign on his tongue, and Izuru thinks it might be because he hasn't actually used it a long time, having rarely actually spoken to the man. He reaches over and starts to haul Yumichika to his feet, but is immediately pushed away. He's had enough to drink that the world is starting to blur on the edges, just enough to make things a little more interesting, but not nearly as much as Yumichika has had, and so he manages enough coordination to grab hold of the table before losing his balance and tumbling backward.
Yumichika staggers to his feet, clutching the table himself before shaking his head. "Yumichika," he says, and Izuru doesn't recognize it as a request for a full minute.
"Yumichika," he repeats. He doesn't quite actively recall how long he has been using Yumichika's name in his head, but it must be for quite some time, because the syllables seem considerably more natural than his surname when he winds his tongue around them. He doesn't amend the name with the formality of an honorific, just wraps his arm around Yumichika's waist and starts guiding his stumbling frame toward the door and into the warm night.
The trip to the Eleventh is a long one, punctuated by several breaks of leaning against the stone walls and wishing the city had been built a bit more practically for getting drinking partners home at night. It is made harder by Yumichika's independence, and he pushes Izuru away several times and takes a few unsteady steps on his own before collapsing back into him in surrender. By the time they finally make it there, Izuru is weary and still tottering near, but not quite, drunk.
Yumichika directs him to his quarters and fumbles with the door for a few seconds before Izuru reaches out and opens it for him. "Sorry," he slurs. "I never get like… this."
There isn't an answer for a long time as Izuru helps him into the room and closes the door behind them. "I know you don't," he finally answers, and it's true. Izuru can't remember ever seeing Yumichika's composed front slip up, even for a moment, since they started this strange camaraderie all those months ago.
When Yumichika starts stripping off his uniform, Izuru turns away respectfully, not sure why he hasn't left yet. Neither of them say a word until Yumichika is dressed in his sleeping yukata and Izuru turns around again. The yukata hangs haphazardly off the other man, as if Yumichika is too drunk to notice, or he just doesn't care anymore. He is stubborn and persistent enough to try to walk to his futon on his own, but stumbles over himself again. Izuru is there and helps him to his bed. The kind of jokes he would have made with Renji or—don't think of it, don't think of it, don't think ofhim—Shuuhei seem inappropriate here, and not because Yumichika has always taken his appearance so seriously.
Tugging the blanket over top him when Yumichika is laid on the futon, Izuru stumbles clumsily to his feet and mutters a soft good night.
"Kira?" Yumichika's voice is faint, as though he's drifting between waking and the temporary freedom of sleep, but seems lucid enough.
"Yes?" Izuru turns back toward the bed with a half-raised eyebrow in surprise. Perhaps he missed covering his feet, or he needs water to dispel the hangover he'll have in the morning.
"Why do you always come?" He doesn't have to elaborate, Izuru knows what he means, but he does so anyway. "We're not… weren't…" With an annoyed huff, he starts again a third time. "We were never friends before they—before." Yumichika's tone could be accusatory, but the effect is ruined by the crack in his voice.
Izuru turns away again, and though his voice is even, his face is tight with emotion. "Because I'm lonely too," he explains, as if it's obvious enough, and slips out without another word.
--
"Third seat?" The words sound hollow in Yumichika's ears, echoing through him and shaking him to the core. The suggestion is logical, and he doesn't know why he didn't anticipate it. Everyone knew that he was only Fifth seat for the sake of appearances, quite literally, and so it was the logical next step to offer him the next highest open seat. "No," he murmurs, shaking his head and holding his hands tight to keep from their shaking. "That's Ikkaku's seat."
Captain Zaraki is a great many things, but he isn't an inherently cruel man, despite his hard exterior and rough way of handling everything in life. Everything he does is straight-forward, often abrasive and self-serving, but never outright cruel. That is another man's game, not Zaraki Kenpachi's. His face doesn't soften, but it does tighten before he steps past his Fifth seat. "I have to fill that seat, Yumichika."
The funny thing isn't even that he had wanted to be third seat, would have been third if it weren't for Ikkaku. The funny thing—the cruel, horribly ironic humor of the whole thing—is that numbers and stupid things like that don't matter to him anymore, just when it's possible for him to have that careless wish. "I don't want it." Yumichika's palms are cold and sweaty, but his mouth is so dry that the words don't seem to want to form in his mouth and it takes three chokes before they come with any strength of sound. "Give it to someone else," he tells Zaraki and falls silent.
There is a long pause where Yumichika thinks that Zaraki didn't hear him, but when he opens his mouth to repeat himself, the great man finally turns around again. "I'm promoting you anyway." He sounds as though he thinks Yumichika is being stupid, and he probably is. "You'll take a pay raise and start your new duties in a week's time. You can stay in your quart—"
"I want a transfer." Yumichika interrupts him abruptly, and feels as though he is going to be physically ill if he considers the notion of taking Ikkaku's place for a moment longer.
Zaraki stops dead and stares down at Yumichika, who doesn't waver or take back the statement. Now that the words have been said, he doesn't think it's possible any more. He doesn't know where he'll go. He's never worked anywhere but the Eleventh Division, and while Zaraki has done things for him before, it's nothing like the debt Ikkaku had to him. He wants to stay, but he sees how clear it is that he can't.
After a long pause, "Where will you go?"
It's not an unusual question. If Yumichika had planned to blurt out the request, he might have a notion of where he might want to go. But he hadn't, and he doesn't, and he runs through the divisions in his mind. The Sixth and Thirteenth are Field divisions, and so long as he doesn't mind the odd long-term assignment, he would always have work to do. Never challenged by the low-level Hollows he would encounter, but without the stigma a kidou-based weapon would earn him in the Eleventh. But he has always been in the Eleventh, which is a war division, and the only other division with the same assignment, the only other one he could go to, is—
"The Seventh," he announces quietly. "I want a transfer to the Seventh."
Zaraki laughs, and Yumichika cringes at the sound. His request will be denied, and he will be forcibly promoted to a seat he would rather die than take. "To Komamura?" He is thankful that Zaraki doesn't point out the obvious, that he has been backed into a corner he isn't sure he wants to leave, but can't help but strike back to escape into an unknown that could be more dangerous.
"Yes," Yumichika asserts, and pretends that he means it.
--
While he is packing up his quarters, Yumichika summons and dismisses no fewer than a half-dozen hell butterflies before finally addressing one perched on his index finger and sending it to Izuru. He knows he doesn't really need to ask the man to be there, knows Izuru will be there just as he always is, but he'd rather be sure. It would be a terrible night to go without a drinking companion, not that he really cares who it is.
But as soon as he thinks it, Yumichika regrets the callous sentiment. He has had enough of pretending things he doesn't mean, and he doesn't mean to even think that he takes Izuru for granted, especially since he's kind enough to keep him company and share in his melancholy. No, Yumichika cannot even bring himself to pretend that he doesn't appreciate the company and companionship the tired lieutenant provides.
An ebony flutter of wings catches his eye and Yumichika reflexively reaches out for the butterfly. He hardly expects such a quick response from Izuru, but the familiar rise and fall of the man's voice resonates from the butterfly, even if it is distinctly tinged with confusion or worry, in quiet assurance that he will be, as he always is, waiting for Yumichika.
In silence, Yumichika meditates on the butterfly, which is flexing its wings on his finger. After a moment, he says a brief thanks and dismisses it. Turning back to his quarters, which are barely half-packed, Yumichika feels his lungs shudder with a shaky breath. He's shaking as he finishes his packing, and he doesn't stop, even when all his things are in the Seventh Division barracks and word travels like wildfire of the new third seat.
In fact, he doesn't stop shaking until he's back at the bar that night, when Izuru is sitting across from him with a curious expression as he pours the sake. He doesn't ask any questions, but it's clear he wants to, even as he settles back in his chair and peers over his cup between swallows.
Yumichika sets his own cup aside and Izuru automatically reaches over and refills it. "I asked to be transferred to the Seventh Division," he announces quietly, surprised that it is Izuru he is telling this news tofirst, and realizing that there are very few other people he could have chosen. Somehow, this is fitting. "I took the third seat there."
Izuru nods, but doesn't ask the obvious question. The question, Yumichika realizes, anyone else would have asked him. If anyone could understand the reasoning for his transfer, foolish as it is, it is Izuru. "Captain Komamura is a good man." The words are soft, but not pitying. "And the Seventh Division is honorable." It's not the same, but I understand. Izuru doesn't speak the rest, but it is implied in the gentle way he pushes the cup back toward Yumichika.
Yumichika bows his head uncharacteristically, and when he looks back up, he feels as though a weight—a small weight, but one none the less—has been lifted off of him. "Thank you," he whispers and doesn't elaborate, knowing he needn't.
--
Momo knocks gently on the frame before sliding the door open, and Izuru is already standing when she steps inside. She looks him over—the way she has taken to for the last six months—to make sure he still looks well enough. He's lost weight, but that is no surprise. It is his pallid complexion that worries her, and when she crosses the room to stand on her toes and check his temperature, he smiles very faintly.
"I'm fine, Hinamori-kun," he tells her, holding her by the wrist. "I appreciate it, though."
"Kira-kun…" She takes back her hand and looks at him more critically than before, then shakes her head. "You're drinking too much, and not sleeping enough," she finally decides, touching the stubbed ponytail he has pulled his hair into.
Izuru steps away and offers her a place to sit, which she refuses. "I work a lot," is his response, and she follows his pacing around the room for a few steps before stopping in the center, watching him with something like heartbreak in her eyes.
She has come so far from where she had fallen. Though she elected to leave the Fifth Division and transfer to the Kidou Corps, it never felt like surrender to anyone. It had been good for her then, as it is now. She keeps her shihakushou neat and well-pressed, and Tobiume is firmly lashed to her hip when she is on duty, as she is not at the moment. There is still healing to be done for her, but the war opened her eyes from Aizen's illusions more effectively than time could have. She still mourns the captain she thought she had, but she has long since accepted things as they are and moved forward with her life.
Izuru is proud of her.
The difference between them is not that he hasn't been able to move on, though he certainly has done an admirable job of going through the motions to get there. Her loss of a paternal figure who gave her purpose and passion is different than losing a lover, but it is no less potent. Still, she respects the difference and doesn't push, except to see him treat himself better. Hisagi is dead, and she knows he needs no reminder of that. Momo just wants Izuru to remember that he is still alive.
Momo allows the silence to settle between them for only a moment before finally taking a seat on the couch, waving him to sit with her. When Izuru complies, she curls her knees to her chest and wraps her arms around them, smiling at him. "When did you talk to Abarai-kun last?"
"A week and a half ago, I think," Izuru responds after a few seconds' pause to think. "He's been terribly busy."
"Mm," she agrees, and gives his shoulder a shove. At his confused and slightly alarmed look, she laughs and does it again. "His birthday is in a few days… I'm sure he doesn't expect anything, and since he's been so busy with his promotion…"
Izuru's face softens immediately. Momo is terrible at asking for anything directly, but he nudges her back and his smile becomes more genuine than it has been in some time. Momo's visits always leave him feeling a little better, but he worries that they are draining for her. She has quite enough to be worrying about without the underlying current of misery that seems to stay with him, no matter what. "We'll do something for him together, alright?"
She laughs and nods, unfurling and pulling him to his feet with her. "Let's go now. Abarai-kun never gets any visitors these days, except for Kuchiki-san, and she doesn't really have a choice, does she?" There is a brief flash of doubt in Momo's eyes, as if she has been trying to avoid mentioning the romances of other people for Izuru's sake, but it disappears under a mask of cheer almost immediately. "What do you think?" she adds quickly, trying to smooth over her perceived faux pas by moving on.
He checks the time quickly and nods. There is time to visit Renji and still make it in time for the daily tradition he can't bring himself to miss. For that time, for those few hours with Yumichika, he can remember freely and keep vigil for the person he misses more than anything. It occurs to Izuru that it may not be a healthy tradition, but whether it is or not doesn't matter to him.
Though Momo leads the way out of the office, they walk side by side through the streets toward the Fifth Division, ducking through the side streets and shortcuts they created when the two of them used to be members of Renji's division. Izuru's laugh is brittle, but genuine. Momo's is full of life and never once betrays the shadows that dart over their hearts. When they arrive, Renji is hardly visible from behind the stacks of paperwork on his desk, but he looks up at them in surprise and raises an eyebrow at their appearances. Momo brushes some dust off her usually immaculate uniform and Izuru picks a spider out of his hair.
"What the fuck have you two been doing?" Renji asks, but there is the glitter in his eyes that promises the barking laugh that follows. He comes out from behind his paperwork fortress and knocks a cobweb off Izuru's kosode with a grin. "You look like you've been digging around in a tunnel somewhere."
Momo exchanges a look with Izuru, and shrugs innocently. "Something like that," Izuru answers for her, and Renji laughs helplessly, dusting them off with heavy pounds of his hands on their shoulders that send them stumbling off-balance.
It's not much of anything, just the laughter of old friends, but it's enough. They'll be fine in the end, all of them, no matter what.
--
The training grounds are always deserted in the early morning, and it is for that reason that Yumichika wanders the wall at sunrise, when the rest of Seireitei is still waking and beginning its day. Sometimes he trains, and sometimes he releases into his true shikai when no one is looking, and sometimes he just walks. The job at the Seventh Division is easier than he had expected for the Third Seat. Komamura and Iba are an effective team, and the only paperwork that falls to him is the kind that is supposed to, rather than when he worked in the Eleventh Division, where most of the paperwork fell to the seats below the captain and lieutenant. It is a safe seat in a safe division, where no inconvenient associations stop him from taking the seat.
There is nothing holding him back from using his shikai at will except continued pride and habit. His zanpakutou lectures him on his foolishness. He spends these mornings trying to talk himself into just letting go of his insecurities about the whole thing. It doesn't matter any more.
He is just walking today, following the wall around Seireitei until it will be time for him to go on duty, when he passes the Third Division. He has never given it much thought, that this is where Izuru returns every night after they finish their routine drinking, but now that he is looking at the complex of buildings and wonders if there is a remaining stigma on the place from Ichimaru's betrayal. It feels no different than any other Division, until he realizes that he can pick out Izuru's reiatsu from the constant hum of the other members of his division. His reiatsu sense isn't particularly strong, and it occurs to him that either Izuru is excellent at masking his reiatsu, or he is doing something that causes him to set himself apart from the hum of hundreds of other Third Divisioners.
Yumichika continues his walk, and stops again when he passes the training grounds. Now he understands, when he looks down at the area and sees a single figure in black moving through an endless string of movements, the gleam of his sword catching on the early morning light as the sun peeks over the wall behind Yumichika. Without pausing to think about what he's doing, Yumichika leaps from the wall and strides toward Izuru, who whirls around, hands tight around his zanpakutou and a thin trickle of sweat sliding down the bulge in his throat.
"Ayase—Yumichika." He corrects himself quickly, lowering the blade and wiping away some of the sweat. "You caught me at the end of my morning warm up."
Nodding silently, Yumichika wants to tell him that there's no way he can believe that this is just a warm up, the way Izuru is sweating and the way his reiatsu flared so dramatically above the others nearby. Instead, he manages to look as though he belongs on the Third Division grounds and pretends to have some of his old confidence back. It doesn't help him feel any more confident. It only makes him feel like a failed weakling, putting up a flimsy shield to hold off the world. He drops the act quickly and follows Izuru to the nearest building. When Izuru picks up the sheath for his zanpakutou and sheaths it, Yumichika sits against the nearest support post, leaning his head against the cool wood and closing his eyes.
There is a series of noises to his right, but it on his left that Izuru finally sits down, on the other side of the post he's leaning on. He opens his eyes to see that Izuru has pushed off his kosode to leave the white undershirt exposed and is holding Wabisuke to his chest, eyes shut and head leaning against the post in an exact mirror of Yumichika's pose. His hair, unbound and unruly on his shoulders, falls into his face, and Yumichika reaches over inexplicably to push the lock of hair that seems to grow over his face out of the way. It slumps back into place, and Yumichika tries again.
This time, Izuru opens a single eye in curiousity, but he doesn't say anything. It is Yumichika who breaks the silence again, and this is becoming a habit now more than it ever was a compulsion before things changed.
"Do you ever think of him?" He asks, meaning Ichimaru, but realizing quickly that Izuru will think he's talking about Hisagi. "Ichimaru, I mean." He knows Izuru thinks about Hisagi, probably as often as Yumichika thinks of Ikkaku. Yumichika waves around the training grounds to imply the whole of the division, echoing his thoughts from before. "When you're here. Does it feel…"
"Like him?" Izuru supplements, and then shakes his head. "Not anymore. I wondered about that after… during the war, but…" He lifts a small flask of tea and, after offering it to Yumichika, lifts it to take a drink, but pauses. "I don't know Ichimaru ever left enough of an impact on the division," he explains quietly. "It was a different environment before the war, but… He's gone now. The Third Division isn't." Izuru smiles bitterly. When the flask is near empty, Izuru shrugs his kosode back on and straightens it, but it hangs open anyway. "Neither am I."
Yumichika watches him carefully and it occurs to him that Izuru could easily be lying to him, but he doesn't seem like the kind to lie. He doesn't think Izuru has anything to lose, anyway, by pretending that he's strong over something like that. "People talk, you know." He isn't even sure why he's talking about Ichimaru, of all people, or even telling Izuru about the wild stories he heard—even took for at least half-truths—about the Third Division's former captain and its current acting captain. "About the two of you and… all that time."
Izuru's face is unreadable for a moment, but he drops the frigid mask and sighs, pulling a knee to his chest. "I know," he finally says, and his tone is more resigned than anything else. That alone tells Yumichika more truth than if Izuru had denied it.
"They aren't true." It isn't a question, but an affirmation. Yumichika feels a faint pang of shame for even bringing it up.
"They aren't true," Izuru confirms, and Yumichika feels worse, because he sounds weary, as though he has had this conversation more times than he cares to. After an awkward pause, just when Yumichika starts to apologize, Izuru sets Wabisuke to the side and leans against the post again. "Shuuhei asked me that, too."
Yumichika pulls away from his side of the post and stares at Izuru in surprise. He has never heard Izuru talk about the time he spent with Shuuhei, however stunted it was by the war. "Hisagi did?"
"After Ichimaru requested my transfer to the Third to be the lieutenant here." Izuru doesn't look uncomfortable, but he closes his eyes in the memory. "When he heard him use my given name, instead of Kira," he opens an eye. "I can't blame him for it. It's as you said: people talk."
It takes Yumichika a moment to catch on to what he means, but when he does, he relaxes and nods. He wishes Izuru could be a bit more straightforward in his forgiveness, but it occurs to him that it's probably easier for the man to give an apology than receive the awkward one Yumichika can't quite form properly.
Izuru is relaxing too, and they sit in silence for a few, peaceful minutes, until Yumichika feels his reiatsu drop into a pleasant, subtle coil that fills the area around him, pressing but not insistent against his own. It is a comfortable silence, without the call of duties awaiting them or the ever-present mourning that usually binds them together. For a few, brief moments, they are almost whole in their shared exile from the world; alone, save for one another and the slow mesh of reiatsu as they breathe in the early morning sun.
"Abarai-kun is celebrating his birthday tomorrow night," Izuru begins abruptly, and Yumichika almost jumps in surprise. "I'm sure he would be glad to see you there." Izuru picks up Wabisuke and stands.
Yumichika nods numbly, surprised both at the quiet man's initiative and the invitation itself, as he pulls himself to his feet. Before he can speak, to confirm that he'll be there, Izuru turns to him.
"I would be glad to see you there, too," he adds awkwardly, then dips his head in farewell and starts down the hallway.
--
The table seems crowded, even though it's much larger than usual and there is plenty of space for everyone. Rangiku sits next to Yumichika, her arm twined with his and punctuating her drinking with a loud laugh or well-placed remark intended to give gentle, not cutting, teasing to her latest victim. Renji is red around the ears, while Rukia has slouched so far in her chair that it seems she might fall out at any time. Izuru is on Renji's right, but is turned to Momo, who is animatedly miming something next to him, while Tetsuzaemon laughs raucously from Yumichika's left.
He doesn't mean to stare ahead at Izuru, but it seems the only way to dispel the claustrophobia he never expected to feel. He likes people. He likes these people, but they all seem like a harsh reminder of who isn't with them; more so when Renji lifts his cup to the empty chairs at either end. Yumichika swallows hard and thinks that there isn't just empty space in those chairs, but a cold vacuum set on tugging at him until there is nothing left to strip him of and he falls in himself. He looks back across the table, catches Izuru doing the same and knows the sentiment isn't one he endures alone. That, more than the warm brush of Rangiku's breast against his arm or the periodic nudge from Tetsuzaemon, is real enough to pull Yumichika back from the edge of the abyss.
Finally, he lifts his cup and drinks belatedly, watching Izuru as he goes through the same motion; watching Yumichika watch him. The ghost of a smile crosses his face, and it doesn't feel like a betrayal for once. Yumichika gives into the feeling, however subdued it may be, and takes a second drink. For tonight, it can be a celebration instead of a memorial. As he relaxes with his friends, the tightness in his shoulders loosens. He is smiling more, laughing more, and reminding himself that his uncharacteristic melancholy is likely the last thing Ikkaku would want for him.
Across the table, Izuru lifts his head and their eyes meet with mutual understanding. Yumichika returns his smile and finds that he means it.
--
It's almost back to the way it usually is, after everyone but Renji and Rukia have left. Izuru still sits across from Yumichika, far more drunk than he should be, but not so much that he can't keep control of himself or get home. It will just be an interesting trek back to the Third Division. Yumichika is probably as drunk as he is, but they aren't saying much, just listening to the banter of their friends, now that Rukia has moved to replace where Rangiku was sitting.
There is a lull in the bickering, and Renji nudges Izuru with a grin. "We should head back soon." It's been a good birthday—far better than the one from the year previous—but Renji wonders if the best part isn't the peace and quiet, or how far he's come in a year, but that both Izuru and Yumichika seem more alive than they have in months. Yumichika has lapsed into the quiet, but there is still the faint curve of a reminiscent smile on his face, as if he is remembering halcyon days and putting aside the cold reality of the present. Izuru has a similar expression, but there is something inherently more hopeful about him. Renji knows better than to think Izuru isn't strong enough to bounce back, but he—both he and Yumichika, really—took a hard hit. For a long time, it looked like they may never come back to themselves. Seeing a flash of the people they were before is the best present Renji could have asked for.
Izuru nods absently, his response delayed, but he starts to push himself up from the table. Renji stands next to him, and Rukia helps him pull Yumichika to his feet. On impulse, or out of habit, Izuru reaches for him and slings his arm over his shoulder, and they keep one another upright.
"Good night, Abarai-kun," Izuru smiles a real smile, and Renji softens around the edges, until Rukia gives him a sharp prod in the ribs and a sharper jab about being drunk and slow, and the bickering resumes, quieting to silence as they disappear down the streets.
"They sure fight a lot for being in love," Yumichika comments as they reach the door and stumble out onto the street themselves.
Izuru smiles again and watches the empty street left where Renji and Rukia had been arguing just a few moments before. "You'd think they'd enjoy it more," he laughs faintly, meaning it as a joke, but there is an underlying wistful tone that Yumichika can't miss any more than the press of Izuru's weight against him.
"They wouldn't take it for granted," he supplements, pushing his weight back to steady himself as he sways. It would do neither of them any good if his knees buckled and they went tumbling to the ground. "I wouldn't."
Izuru pauses and looks at Yumichika, who either is too drunk to understand what he's implying, or he does understand and it just doesn't bother him as much. Finally, he looks back down and keeps walking with him. "I wouldn't, either," he says quietly, but the smile returns inexplicably when he thinks that Yumichika spent plenty of time bickering with Ikkaku. It was just their way, the same way it is for Renji and Rukia. It's been a good night. It feels nice to reminisce.
Yumichika straightens and nudges Izuru on purpose this time, stopping and catching him before he falls forward at the sudden change of pace. When he turns toward him, Yumichika cocks his head and stares at him for a long moment in the lamp light. He doesn't know why, and it could easily be because of the gratuitous amount of alcohol running through his veins, but the way the light catches Izuru's blond hair gives him a sort of halo and Yumichika hums in appreciation.
"Yumichika, what are you—" Izuru begins, but is immediately cut off by a surprisingly firm hand on his shoulder, pushing him against the stone wall surrounding the Tenth Division. Before he has the chance to open his mouth and say anything else, Izuru stops himself and blinks as Yumichika stares at him unabashedly. A finger reaches out and strokes his right cheek, and Izuru is suddenly all too aware of how little space is between them, not that there was ever much before.
The first kiss is fumbled, set delicately on the corner of Izuru's mouth when Yumichika loses his balance for a half-instant and steadies himself by grabbing Izuru's arm, which is already lifting to catch him. In the same instant, Izuru stumbles and falls back against the wall, senses dulling except where Yumichika is. It's all so awkward. More so than Yumichika would like, and he is surprised to realize that he actually cares about that much when he rights himself and tries again.
This time, his lips fall firmly against Izuru's and there is only a second of hesitation before Izuru's hand slides up the arm it is gripping to cup his cheek. The flutter of Izuru's pale eyelashes captivates Yumichika until he manages to convince himself to close his eyes as Izuru has done. The kiss isn't like anything he's shared with anyone else. Izuru is shy and yielding where Yumichika is quick and clever and it takes a few seconds of a delicate hesitancy before Yumichika slows and Izuru adjusts and the kiss loses its reserve. It could be the alcohol that emboldens Izuru, but his other hand is firm against the back of Yumichika's neck when he nudges forward and Yumichika yields to him, clever and swift once more as he tangles his tongue around Izuru's patient one and his hand around the front of his kosode.
There is a certain thrill in this not knowing what either will do next. Yumichika almost instinctively expects the intensity of Ikkaku's kiss, while Izuru expects Shuuhei's teasing coax, but neither comes and they press forward to discover just what will. A cool hand pushes the lock of hair over Izuru's left eye out of the way, but instead of holding it there, Yumichika twists it around long fingers and there is a break in the kiss as Izuru gasps. Without missing a beat, Yumichika takes back the kiss, pressing Izuru into the wall and taking advantage of the lull in his attention to seize control and Izuru succumbs easily to him.
Slowly, Yumichika slackens his grip on both Izuru's hair and kosode, Izuru pulling away until they stand, forehead to forehead, and gasp for air. Neither speaks for a long moment, breathing and disentangling from one another. Izuru leans against the wall and Yumichika resumes his place leaning on him for balance, lightheaded and regaining control over his breathing.
"You're nothing like him." His voice is hoarse and the words seem like they should sting, but Izuru only nods, closing his eyes again.
"And you're not at all like he was."
"That's…" Yumichika shakes his head and takes a deep breath. "That's alright. I…" He trails off, uncertain how to keep going.
"Don't want to be, anyway," Izuru finishes for him, looping his arm around his waist and stepping away from the wall.
"Exactly," Yumichika agrees, and they head on toward the Seventh Division.
--
"You're humming." The door slides open and Rangiku's voice drifts over toward Yumichika before he has the chance to look up to see who knocked a single second before.
He hadn't even realized that he had been humming until Rangiku said something, but Yumichika shrugs. There's no need to hide something he isn't exactly ashamed of. He's fully sober and in good spirits, and it shows. "I'm humming," he confirms, tucking his hair out of his way and lifting his brush to make a few quick notes on the report he's been given.
Rangiku crosses the room and perches herself on the edge of his desk, staring down at him expectantly with a lifted brow. "Well?" Yumichika's good mood is an excellent indication that it might be safe for Rangiku to tease him a bit.
"Well, what?" Yumichika looks up and flashes a brief smile before turning back to his work.
"Don't well, what me!" Rangiku cries in indignation, neatly plucking the brush from his hand. "You haven't looked anything less than miserable in months, and you're in your office humming and smiling at me like you should be." She shakes the brush at him before Yumichika catches her hand and takes back the brush.
"You're going to get ink all over me," he tells her shortly, and sets the brush back on his desk, crossing his arms over his chest. "Maybe I just can't stay unhappy forever."
With a huff, Rangiku shoves at him in his chair. "That's not what I meant, anyway." She crosses her arms and smiles at him. "I mean that I want to know what happened. And before you tell me about wrinkles and how pretty you are, consider that you're very lucky that it was me wandering around the division last night and not my captain."
Yumichika shrugs and pulls another report toward him. He hadn't really thought much about wrinkles in what felt like ages, but he'd taken time that morning to get ready, breathing deeply and ready to face the world as himself and not the shell he had been for show. "I don't kiss and tell," he quips briefly and starts comparing the report he had been working on before to the one in front of him.
"So that is what it was." The look in Rangiku's eyes looks suspiciously like triumph, and she grins when Yumichika shoots her a cool look that tells her quite clearly that he is not inclined to expound on his original statement. "Well," she begins, swinging her foot back and forth like a pendulum. "You could have been trying to attack the charming, blond lieutenant who was in your company."
The look Yumichika shoots her now is as icy as ever. "Hardly," he protests with dignity. "What were you doing just wandering around the division, anyway?"
Rangiku slides off the desk and dusts off her sleeve delicately. "Don't change the subject, Yumichika." She looks down at him, then lays her hand on his shoulder and squeezes gently. She could tell him to be careful, but she knows better than to think that Izuru is the manipulative kind. She could warn him to be careful with Izuru, but she doesn't think it's very likely that either of them might play the games that lovers play to hurt one another. They've suffered loss and loneliness for too long to do that. If anyone could be careful enough with either of them for her, it would be the other.
"I'm glad," she finally tells him and turns toward the door, stretching her arms over her head. "I suppose I should get back to Captain and that work he wants me to do…" She grins over her shoulder and blows a kiss of farewell before leaving Yumichika to stare at the empty room. It's just like her to blow through like a whirlwind and leave just as quickly.
Instead of dwelling on Rangiku's peculiarities, Yumichika looks back down at his reports, not quite able to focus on the figures he's supposed to be working with. Indeed, it's hard to focus on anything but moonlit, blond hair and the heady breathlessness of the night before. Rubbing his temple and shaking his head, Yumichika takes a deep breath and picks up his brush.
Before long, he's humming again.
--
What is disorienting about that night, or any of the nights that follow, is not that Yumichika is drinking alone, but that he feels like himself, even as he feels the empty space across the table like a void within himself. He orders his sake with the same regularity, drinks at the same pace, but he doesn't feel weighted anymore. Things have changed. He has changed, even as he's returning to himself. The world is brighter and more beautiful. The late summer flowers blooming around Seireitei catch Yumichika's attention, and he quietly appreciates them with a contented smile. The world has been dark to him for so long, with a single companion to fumble in the dark with. If it was all Izuru could do to deliver him to the other side of that, then Yumichika has enough grace to understand that much without faulting him. He feels the loss acutely, but it is nothing he can't work through and beyond, if he needs to.
The door opens and Yumichika looks up automatically, unable to quash the expectant hope that it will be Izuru, but fully expecting it to be someone else. It is, and he looks back down. It's fine. He keeps telling himself that it's fine, and that it really is good for them to both be to the point where they can move on, even if it's not with the other.
He just doesn't want it to be this way, and so he takes a drink and breathes and lives.
It's not so hard to do that anymore.
--
Izuru would like to leave his decision to stop going to drink with Yumichika as the sort of thing that he just does and doesn't think twice about, but it's not that easy. Every moment that ticks by on the office clock past when he should have been there as he always is seems like an eternity of waiting he hates enduring, even after he has done this for the last week. Passing the time with reports grows dull quickly, until Izuru finally straightens his desk and leaves the office. Once the door is locked, he leans his forehead to the wood and breathes slowly. Breaking habits is difficult and breaking this one is painful, even if he knows it's best for the both of them. If anything, he's ready to start living his life again, and if he continues to commiserate with Yumichika over the past, he fears that neither of them will ever move into the future. And so it is a clean break from the habit that keeps them rooted in their pain that they need, even if it means cutting off a relationship they have fostered in their silent companionship for all these months.
And then there is the matter of dealing with the unexpected, though not altogether unwelcome, complication that has arisen. Neither of them had been quite drunk enough the night of Renji's birthday to justify things with intoxication, but Izuru is not the least bit inclined to make excuses for something that had happened as a natural progression. It had been a positive step forward for both of them, and to go back to the way things had been before would seem like both a step back and a trivialization of that moment of honest emotion. Now that Izuru has lived a time where he isn't in mourning, he knows that he doesn't want to go back to that.
Or maybe he's just afraid. It's been long enough that he could move on, that he wants to, but perhaps not long enough to have given enough of himself to the memory of something he may well never have again. He wants to try, and he's too afraid to. In the middle of the warring sides of himself, Izuru does nothing. That alone may be enough to make the decision on its own, and he is willing to let that happen. No risk, no pain, but also no chance to get ahead. In his own way, Izuru is trapped in his mourning, even in his attempts to escape it.
Leaving the office, Izuru swallows and looks up at the moon. It's late, and he feels a pang of doubt that he rationalizes away quickly. He doesn't return to his quarters, and he doesn't go to where part of him feels like he should be, but just steps out onto the street and walks. He has distracted himself with everything from drinking to training to work over the months, and nothing has really helped him. Walking, losing himself within his own mind, is therapeutic in ways that nothing else has been. Izuru is frank with himself, trying to sort through his motivations and fears and vices. It is in his wandering that he finally finds himself at the wall of the city, looking out across the open countryside and wondering if what he's so afraid of is a new unknown. There is comfort in the melancholy, in the knowing that there is always someone he can come to and mourn with, and it is something he could easily lose himself in again. And yet… yet, he knows it's unhealthy and it's time.
He's just afraid to take the next logical step; the one following what he and Yumichika took at a leap a week before.
Turning back tow ard the city, Izuru is surprised to see Renji standing against a nearby building, watching him with arms crossed as if he has been there the entire time. It occurs to Izuru that it's very likely that he has, and he walks toward him. "Abarai-kun…"
"You're really an idiot, you know that?" Renji pushes away from the wall and cuffs him over the head when he's within arm's reach.
"How did you—" Izuru begins, but the words fall short, just in time for Renji to cut him off.
"Rangiku-san told me," Renji explains, his tone less abrasive and more concerned now. "And I know you, stupid. You don't break habit without a reason, and this is a really fucking stupid reason."
"I had to stop going eventually," Izuru tells him and they start back toward the Divisions at a slow pace. "I couldn't go and mourn every night forever."
"No one was asking you to." Renji smacks him again and rolls his eyes. "Do something good for you for once, Kira. You don't think this is good for you? And," Renji raises a hand to stop him before he can protest with something equally as stupid as what he's doing to both Yumichika and himself. "I'm not talking about the going off and being all miserable and shit."
Izuru doesn't say a word for a long time, not until they're passing by the Eighth Division and he slows to a stop. "Abarai-kun?"
"Ah?" Renji turns and raises an eyebrow at him, crossing his arms over his chest and looking at his old friend.
"You really think it's good for me, then?" Izuru doesn't bother prefacing the question with any explanation, even though it's been a quarter hour since either of them last spoke.
A barking laugh is Renji's answer, followed by a heavy clap of his hand on Izuru's shoulder. "I wouldn't say it if I didn't mean it, dumbass."
There is another pause, but this one only lasts a few seconds before Izuru looks up, eyebrows knit together. "How do you…" He trails off, and tries to restart.
With yet another eyeroll, Renji cuts him off again. "What I don't know, Kira, is what the fuck you're still doing with me, talking about this. I think you've already made your choice, and now you're just waffling about it."
With a shaky sigh, Izuru nods and stares back at the ground, gathering himself. Renji is right, and of course he is. If anyone knows Izuru, it's the man who's stuck with him for nearly half a century as his oldest and best friend.
"Just go, Kira," Renji nudges him and starts walking back toward his Division alone.
A few minutes later, having taken a few deep breaths and that proverbial step forward, Izuru starts walking again.
--
The knock on the doorframe surprises Yumichika, but he composes himself and slides open the door. He has spent all this time waiting for Izuru to come to their regular bar, but he doesn't expect him to come to his quarters, hours after the time they would have normally met. He steps aside immediately, when it's clear Izuru wants to talk to him, sliding the door shut and feeling distinctly unnerved by the unusual pounding in his chest as Izuru faces the far wall. "Kira…" His voice is surprisingly soft for being so tight with emotion.
"Izuru." This time, it is Yumichika who doesn't recognize what he means, until Izuru turns back to face him. "Please," Izuru says, and it isn't so much a plea as a request.
There is a long history of things that Yumichika knows have happened that make Izuru prefer his surname, even among the closest of his friends, and none of them have a thing to do with formalities or social protocol. The gravity isn't lost on him, but he chooses not to dwell on it, because Izuru clearly isn't.
"I should have said something," Izuru begins.
"You don't have to apologize," Yumichika tells him at the same time.
Silence hums in their ears for a few more beats, until Izuru takes a shaky breath and Yumichika stops himself from biting his lip.
Finally, "I'm really not upset." Yumichika means it whole-heartedly, but he hates the crack in his voice. This has been about Ikkaku and Shuuhei for so long with them that now, without that central factor they have relied on for so long, it feels almost as if they're starting anew as strangers. But they aren't strangers. They've been in this together for so long, and even though Izuru is a wholly different person than Ikkaku ever was, and he knows he is not and never will be anything like Shuuhei, this is something he wants almost because it's different. Almost, but not quite at all. The change is good. Wanting to move forward is good. Wanting to do so with Izuru is the unknown variable.
"I don't regret it." Izuru's words are soft and shy, but his jaw is set and he hasn't lowered his eyes to the floor in discomfort. "And I…"
"Want to keep going," Yumichika continues the sentence, but stays rooted in place, letting the pause grow between them again.
"With you," they finish together, Izuru's voice shaking, but sure; Yumichika's quiet and fearful of rejection.
Izuru takes the hesitant step to close the abyss between them, toward Yumichika and something unknown and different. "I'm afraid," he confesses.
"I think that's normal." Yumichika feels as though his chest is constricted, but he swallows back pride and fear and they meet halfway. "I'm nothing short of insufferable," he breathes, and their hands brush.
"I'm patient," Izuru assures him, and their foreheads bump, then rest against one another. He closes his eyes and breathes. "Though, I'm not very good at change, or leaps of faith, or spontaneity."
"I have enough of that for two people," Yumichika laughs, and it is a soft, fragile thing that has room to grow and strengthen with patience and time. They have both. It was alright before that Izuru is nothing like Ikkaku, and that hasn't changed, even now that he's demonstrated. his reserve and fear. "We'll make it, won't we?" It is half reassurance and half question, and not even Yumichika is sure which he means more.
Nodding against him, Izuru opens his eyes. "We've made it this far," he points out with a smile that loses none of its sincerity for being faint.
"We've come this far," Yumichika concedes and twines his fingers in Izuru's.
It isn't that there isn't a long way for them to go. It's just that it doesn't seem so far.