Part I
Hitsugaya sat at the edge of the precipice, legs dangling off the impossible drop. Far below, violent waves eroded the rock base, spitting foam and spray with what had to be a deafening roar that he could barely hear from such a height. He tried to imagine what it was like to be down there, with the rogue winds and the salty air and the rhythmic yet erratic beating of the dark water, and wondered if it was better than being up high. Absently, he knocked the sides of his boots together and watched as loose dirt spiralled down, and pulled his jacket closer around him against the thin morning fog, not that it would help much. He had tucked himself away from the questioning stares of the overly inquisitive general public, into a notch in the wall just below the lip of the cliff. It could barely be called a cave - it was just large enough for him to lie flat on his back if he wanted to. Instead, he leaned his shoulder against the rough rock surface on his right, listening to the hollow and distance echoes of the turbulent sea below.
The peaceful respite he had managed to obtain was short-lived, as little showerings of gravel and dirt began sprinkling down onto his knees from above. He thought better of pulling his large hood back, and leaned out of the crevice to squint upwards, only to immediately regret it. Another handful of loose gravel crumbled downwards, accompanied by a string of cusses and a pair of unsteady legs dressed in tattered trousers that made purchase on the shelf of rock next to where he sat.
'What the hell,' a voice, presumably belonging to the legs, muttered. 'I could have sworn it was easier to get here the last time.'
Hitsugaya jolted, not taking his eyes off the intruder as the stranger continued to scrabble against the rock for purchase. Moments later, the owner of the legs ducked into the small, dry space, and froze on the spot, his jaw agape in surprise. Hitsugaya supposed he had the same mildly horrorstruck and wholly taken aback expression on his own face, but hoped he did not look quite as stupefied.
The stranger could not be beyond his teens, and sported a crop of bright orange hair and a pair of dark brown eyes. He had not blinked for so long, that Hitsugaya half expected the stranger's eyes to shrivel up on the spot. As their gazes locked, Hitsugaya felt his blood run cold, as if an icy hand had gripped him at the back of his neck, cold tendrils seeping into him and overriding his entire being.
It wasn't an unfamilar sensation, yet he could never be ready for what followed. He felt himself falling - unobstructedly, endlessly, alone, for what could only be described as eternity, as the sky fell away only to reveal a bottomless chasm that was more sky. He braced himself as the descent eventually slowed, almost as if he were being pulled upwards by an alien gravity, then held his breath as the rushing air transformed into still, glassy water that engulfed his senses as the world flipped upside down - not that he had any way to tell the sky from the ground. He knew it was all never real, could still feel the solid rock against his shoulder, the rough cracks in the cliff under his sweaty palms and the salty wind on his face, and knew that when he resurfaced from the water that never existed, he would be in someone else's mind, in someone else's future, seeing through someone else's eyes. He was never ready.
The water fell away in a shimmering veil, vaporising in silvery strands and leaving him dry and disoriented -
And there was fire. Acrid smoke rose in thick, poisonous plumes as people crowded arround suffocatingly; the air was scalding and scattered with ash, and the salty sea breeze tasted bitter. He recognised the landscape of the southern district of the rocky island, with its cliffs to the west and gravel beach to the southeast, but did not recognise the voices that rose in an echoing, beating crescendo that spiralled upwards and outwards.
'There he is!' Accusatory chants reverberated across the village square, and the body he inhabited was much bigger and clumsier than he was used to. He threw a glance over his shoulder, where the sea calmly washed ashore and the almost imperceptibly thin crescent moon hung high in the sky, above the circular waves that spread through the isolated lagoon that enclosed the southern coast.
His attention was drawn back by the consuming fire and the disorderly shouts for justice and law. There was nowhere to run, his pursuers were closing in, and he realised he did not know what it was that burned so fiercely and poisonously. The air was thick with smoke and chaos that shrouded his senses, and panic began to bubble at the back of his throat as strong arms pinned his own painfully behind his back, twisted cruelly. 'We'll show you what you deserve for your blasphemy, you criminal,' a gravelly voice threatened from afar, loud as if it were near yet hollow as if it were distant.
Digging his heels into the ground, he tried - albeit futilely - to shake them off and wrestle his way out, and even though there was more strength in his arms than he knew would ever possess in reality, he only succeeded in stumbling sideways, hitting the moist pebbly ground with a pathetic smack. A foreign instinct urged him to run, to fight, anything but go down without a fight, but a heavy-soled, well-polished boot ground his cheek unforgivingly into the rock, and he finally recognised the gold trimming on the navy blue uniform of the royal police force. 'We'll see what the King has to say about you,' the officer sneered at him, then turned away to snap at some subordinates. 'Take him away.'
The iron grip that restrained him faded as his surroundings grew distant, as if a growing void enveloped him, and Hitsugaya sagged in relief as the rocky beach around him dissolved into that all-too-familiar, unsettling flipping of his insides as he continued to hurtle sickeningly downwards. It had possibly been the most traumatising and disturbing vision he had ever had, and he was of half a mind to push the young man with the outrageous hair off the cliff once he felt well enough to.
The basalt of the notch that surrounded him slowly solidified as he reconciled with reality, forcing himself to take deep, salty breaths while he waited for his senses to return. He let out a sigh, grateful that it was over, then groaned internally when the gravity of the situation dawned on him - here he was, reeling from the recoil of a vision, and about to begin fraternising with a wanted criminal.
Just great.
.
.
When Ichigo lowered himself into the narrow space in the cliff he had been spending most nights in, he nearly fell off in shock when he saw a boy sitting in his usual spot, idly swinging his legs. The boy was evidently just as surprised, and Ichigo averted his gaze a fraction too slowly, cursing when their eyes met. He braced himself for the nauseating sensation of being overwhelmed by a complete stranger's memories that would barrel into him once the world stopped spinning.
He would never get used to reliving memories he never had, welling with joy or grief or anguish or regret that wasn't his, being overcome with what he could only describe as schrodinger's deja vu. Vicious gusts of icy and hot wind assaulted him from all sides, simultaneously freezing and burning his senses, then he was falling, falling, falling - and lurched to an abrupt halt, an unfamiliar, unpleasant experience akin to walking into a glass wall and being spat out, left unceremoniously to gather his dignity, collect his wits, and assemble his thoughts. He had only experienced this once before, just two weeks ago, and wasn't sure if this was better or worse than being subject to a stranger's memories.
'God,' Ichigo gasped once his lungs found air. 'What did you do?' he demanded.
'What did I do?' the boy retorted. 'What did you do?' He looked spitting mad, albeit slightly disoriented, deep blue-green eyes glowing murderously in the shadow of the hood of the jacket he wore, mouth twisted distastefully down into an irate frown.
'Nothing!' Ichigo defended himself desperately.
'I don't think people who did "nothing" get themselves arrested and persecuted in the near future, while wanted posters of their face paper the town,' the boy accused recklessly. 'I know who you are, notorious criminal of infamy Kurosaki Ichigo, your ugly face is everywhere, even on the toilet walls,' he elaborated impressively. 'I must say those posters are unfairly flattering, and that you are horrific in the flesh.'
Hitsugaya was quite impressed with himself for not having thrown up yet.
Ichigo squinted. 'So you're a Clairvoyant,' he contemplated aloud, ignoring the completely juvenile but eloquently effective insult. 'And a novice, it seems. Could you tell me what you saw? I, er, especially the part about the arrest and persecution and...you know,' he trailed off pathetically with a weak wave of his hand.
The boy folded his arms and turned back to face the sea. 'I'm not obliged to; other people pay fortunes to Clairvoyants only to get some useless vision of them sitting around eating an unexciting breakfast.'
'I know, so I suggest an information trade, and maybe an alliance.'
'And what information could you possibly have for me? If you want something from me, perhaps I could find you a mirror, so that you may ascertain for yourself the unfortunate disaster that is your face.'
'There's a block,' Ichigo ventured, mentally berating himself for being so suicidal. 'A block on your memories,' he elaborated. 'Why is there a block?' Having said that, Ichigo quickly began consulting his mental thesaurus for a synonym for block, but came away dry.
'Lucky you, then,' the green-eyed boy drawled so dramatically he could practically hear him roll his eyes. 'You just get persecuted and arrested in what looks like a witchhunt.' He paused for half a beat, before adding with a blasé shrug, 'People never liked Seers.'
'Look,' Ichigo tried to reason, 'memories don't get sealed away by themselves. Magicians place blocks, and since you're a Clairvoyant I highly doubt that Magician was you. Doesn't it bother you, that you don't know how much of you is a secret from yourself? That who you are now could be a stranger to who you really are? That someone has tampered with your mind and could do it again whenever they wanted to?'
Hitsugaya pulled his knees up to his chest and rested his chin on them, closing his eyes against the cool breeze, and took a deep breath before replying. 'That sounds like the logic of the desperate. What does it matter, if I am not the person I would otherwise be? How can I be less of myself than I am?'
'And that,' Ichigo rebutted, 'sounds like the logic of the even-more-desperate. Look, we're really both in the same boat. If you help me change my future, I'll help you find your past. Do we, or do we not, have a deal?'
Ichigo watched as the late afternoon sun silhouetted the boy's face and after a moment of hesitation, even as his expression remained frigid and emotionless, he held out his right hand, which was small and bony and dirty from clambering around the rock face. 'Deal,' he agreed. 'The name's Hitsugaya.'
Ichigo took the proffered hand and shook it firmly. 'Right. I'm Kurosaki Ichigo. I'm not really as hideous as you say, am I?'
Hitsugaya shrugged.
.
.
Hitsugaya was admittedly perturbed by Kurosaki's claim about his memories and his insinuations about his identity. He knew he was distracted as he treaded the familiar uphill path home that wound around the various rocky faces of the island, the unceasing rushing of the fierce ocean echoing further and further below as he ascended sure-footedly as only a local could - but his mind was far off, slipping down the unfamiliar downhill slope of what-ifs and groundless theories, the unceasing rushing of self-doubt echoing louder and louder in his ears as he descended deeper and deeper into thought, fumbling for pieces of himself he could be sure of.
There was nothing.
When he arrived at the thatched house he had come to call home, instead of jerking the door open, he wound around to the back and stepped up onto a sun-faded window sill, hefting himself up onto the roof, scraping his knee on the ledge on his way up. The house was just far enough from the edge that the frothing waves below were hidden beneath the lip of the rock, leaving him with a panoramic view of the calm ocean painted with a gleaming golden path that led to the half-gone sun.
He was barely surprised when footsteps followed him around the cottage, and didn't bat an eyelid when Hinamori called up at him, 'Granny's going to freak out if she finds out you're on the roof again!'
Hitsugaya ignored her, squinting into the horizon and hoping she would go away. She was a year older than he was, and was the boisterous granddaughter of the old lady who had taken him under her wing - he had always assumed that he was too young at the time to remember his adoption, but now he couldn't be sure if it wasn't because a Magician had purposefully altered his memories. He only knew that Granny had once told him she'd found him at the edge of the woods.
He felt the surface of the roof shift slightly, and looked back to see Hinamori with one elbow on the edge of the roof, struggling to pull herself up from the sill below. Between efforts to swing her leg up and vicious glares in his direction, she berated him incessantly. 'You can't keep ignoring me and brood forever on the roof, because one day the wind will toss you off into the sea, and if you were a little more gentlemanly and less like a half-eroded stone block you would help me up, and you would probably also have a girlfriend by now,' she ran off at the mouth as she always did. Sometimes, it seemed she would never run out of words. Even though her mouth was moving like a bullet train, none of its energy appeared to be of any substantial use in climbing onto roofs.
Upon realising that Hinamori wasn't going to turn around and leave anytime soon, Hitsugaya leaned forward and held out one hand with a sigh of resignation. The brown-haired girl grabbed it and finally swung herself up and she sat, dishevelled, brushing dirt and dust from her skirt.
'For the sake of the general public and your dignity I certainly hope you're wearing some decent underwear today,' Hitsugaya said tonelessly, obviously indifferent towards both the general public and Hinamori's dignity.
'Rude,' Hinamori huffed.
They fell into silence, each not looking at the other, as the streaks of colour in the sky slowly faded into the greyish blue of dusk. Eventually, Hinamori turned and demanded with a scowl, 'I know something's bothering you, so spit it out.' Her hair flew messily aross her face in the chilly evening wind, and she wiped a strand from her mouth. 'Or I will personally push you down, and then you will have a broken skull to bother you too' she said as she gestured wildly towards the ground.
Hitsugaya hesitated. It was a question he should have asked a lifetime ago, and yet it had never occurred to him even once. If there was a time to hit himself hard, it was probably now. '...What do you remember about when your grandmother brought me in?' Careful not to make eye contact, he kept his gaze firmly on the blinding red sun.
He listened to Hinamori exhale slowly, which slowly turned into a sigh. 'I think I was five, but I don't really remember. Maybe you could try asking Granny?'
He shook his head, and asked, 'But do you remember other things from that time?'
'Sure,' Hitsugaya could practically hear the smile that lit up her face together with the lightened tone of her voice. 'I used to follow Granny everywhere - she would take me down to the edge of the woods to pick berries, then we would hike to the southern lagoon to eat lunch by the water.' Hinamori sighed, distant and dreamy. 'Maybe you don't remember? You've been along too, and I think you were a terrible berry-picker. And there was the time Granny bought a watermelon from the market - we fought so hard over the last slice. You were such a cute kid, it's too bad you became such a grump,' she joked, elbowing him in the side.
It was strange, that Hinamori had such clear memories of simple moments, yet could not remember how, or when they had met - it was equally strange, that he remembered little of the incidents she recalled with obvious ease. The sun was setting in a gentle angle - only a small sliver of it was left now, although the sky remained bright enough to see the shadows of faraway ships against the horizon - reminding him that autumn would be declining into winter in just over a month, and that ten years would have passed since his supposed adoption. Would anyone remember the truth of his identity, and if they did, how could he trust them if he couldn't trust even his own memory?
Someone has tampered with your mind and could do it again whenever they wanted to.
The words spoken to him earlier that day haunted him like a persisting headache, echoing hollowly in his mind, driving him to madness. He knew a skilled Magician could alter, or even completely destroy memories with a mere touch to the head.
How could he tell truth from fabrication if memories were so fragile, so easily deformed and twisted into lies?
Did it even matter?
Of course it matters, he tried to convince himself, with little effect. How could he find the truth if he didn't know what it looked like?
He hadn't realised he was clutching his head in what must have been a despairing manner until he felt a hand pry his sweaty fingers away from his hair. The light touch seemed to make him feel even more nauseous than he already was, and for a moment he couldn't quite remember what had been plaguing his mind.
'Are you sick?' Hinamori asked softly.
Hitsugaya took a deep breath of salty, humid air and glanced around. The ocean was quickly turning a deep black while the last traces of blue pulled away from the sky into the horizon, leaving a scattering of stars in its wake. He vaguely wondered how much time had passed, and if the dizzying combination of confusion and frustration counted as "sick".
'No, I'm fine,' he mumbled as he batted her hand away. 'We should get back before Granny gets worried.'
Hinamori snorted. 'She's probably heard the roof creaking and shaking.'
'Then she must be freaking out,' Hitsugaya threw her previous argument back at her, just as he jumped off the roof, crouching neatly into a three-point landing on the grass below while Hinamori yelled at him about recklessness and broken legs and skulls from the roof, and he couldn't help but marvel at how trivial everything they were bickering about was when he measured it up against the situation he had gotten himself embroiled in.
If he wanted to, he could preserve this state of calm his life had settled into - he could abandon the notion of truth for comfort, continue meandering down this path of least resistance.
He wasn't sure if it was what he wanted.
.
.
To say Ichigo was bothered by the day's encounters would have been an understatement. He had since retreated to the comforting solitude offered by the woods in the northern parts of the islands, another one of his several hideouts since a price had been placed on his arrest. Spending two whole weeks on the run meant either the royal guard was not really doing a great job, or he was unexpectedly good at avoiding them. He had, at one point in time, considered leaving Cair entirely, but just leaving his family without a single word had ripped his insides into pieces. He didn't want to think about leaving the only land he was familiar with for another harsh foreign land.
It had all started with a bad decision two weeks ago by the foot of the old lighthouse, which rapidly escalated into a terrible misunderstanding. He had known all his life the way Seers were prejudiced against simply for their ability - to experience another's memories, which amounted to a severe degree of invasion of privacy, where there was no way to protect oneself. He could imagine why people were so quick to judge his character from his identity, but it wasn't as if he had a choice in whether or not he wanted to play audience to complete strangers' memories - it was just as unpleasant an experience for both parties, and he was sick and tired of constantly taking in the antipathy of society while they practically worshipped Clairvoyants for the exact same talent.
Hitsugaya had said there would be a witchhunt. The thought itself was unsettling, but not knowing how far into the future, or what events led to its occurrence, was far worse. He needed to know more, couldn't live his life on the run much longer - he missed his family, and refused to be considered a criminal merely by existing. He needed to do something, change something, to save himself from falling victim to the criminalising and demonising bigotry of society that condemned his existence to something inferior - something undeserving of even the freedom to live a normal life.
I didn't even do anything wrong, Ichigo reiterated to himself. Being a Seer was not, in itself, a punishable crime, but he was definitely the small town's most wanted man for having looked the King in the eyes with the Sight. If I were just a normal person, he griped, none of this would have mattered. So what if I saw the King? Everyone sees the King in pictures.
But he wasn't a normal person, and he couldn't do anything about that, so he would have to change something else instead.
The only way, he reasoned, was to change the future - and the Clairvoyant boy was his best bet.
.
.
The next day, Hitsugaya slipped out of the house while Hinamori was still half-asleep, bidding a quick good-bye to their grandmother. He was dressed as if he were going to school – jeans tucked into his boots and a pullover to hide his dismal regard for dress sense from the world – and grabbed his book bag on his way out.
He trekked downhill towards the paved roads of the town, shrugging off the piercing glances at his bright white hair, ignoring the judgmental suspicion as he passed right by the district school, and headed coolly northward. If he looked like he knew where he was going, nobody would question him. So he walked confidently forward, fixing his gaze on the distant sea, which was glittering in the sun's brightening light. There were banners all over the town, pieces of paper calling for the people to rise for equality – calling for a revolution of the Seers. Many were damaged, many were torn, as if even putting them up had cost an effort. He wondered how long a society could balance on this precipice of pent-up unrest. After a lingering glance at one yellow poster with a cheesy slogan, he turned his back and left.
The woods were over an hour's walk from the city square – and even further from his home. By then, the sun was high in the sky and lessons at his school would be well under way. The woods cast a dark shadow over the ground, and the undergrowth was shrouded in a dank atmosphere. He stepped onto the flattened earthy path tread by most visitors to the woods and looked around. It didn't take long to find what he was searching for, for a flash of bright orange quickly caught his eye. It was a miracle the idiot hadn't been arrested yet, given his far-below-par camouflage efforts. He could at least wear something with a hood.
'Ditching school to meet an older boy you met under dubious circumstances,' Ichigo greeted jokingly with feigned condescension. 'Whatever will your parents think?'
Hitsugaya snorted. 'I'd throw myself off the cliffs before you can wrestle my corpse into your bed. Did anyone ever tell you that your sense of humour is dreadfully distasteful?' He continued walking, kicking up sticks and dried leaves, and leaving the hotheaded teenager in the shrubbery.
'So,' Ichigo jogged a few paces to catch up, 'Why the clandestine convention today?'
'I'm taking our shady deal very seriously, so you are going to tell me everything you know. In exchange, I'm going to see your future again, and- and see what I can tell from it.' He stumbled uncharacteristically over his words.
'Um, wow,' Ichigo said quite lamely.
A fifteen-minute walk led them to a large fallen tree. Its astounding girth made a wide platform larger than a dinner table. Sunlight filtered faintly through the foliage, warming the chilly ground from the cold night. Hitsugaya clambered up the rough surface of the bark, dusting his hands off when he reached the top, and Ichigo followed suit. The sounds of leaves rustling in the wind and birds voices effectively blocked out the noise of the ever-raging sea that washed over the rest of the island, leaving a simple and comforting quiet.
Once they had both settled into natural seats created by the few remaining branches of the tree, Ichigo began fidgeting restlessly while Hitsugaya eyed him with apprehension from a healthy distance away.
'I, er, have not told you of the circumstances of my wantedness, have I?' Ichigo said at a long last. He was absently peeling bark off the tree. 'It may or may not be important, I think.'
Hitsugaya waved a hand nonchalently, gesturing for him to continue.
'Well, um, how should I say this- I mean- Uh…Did you know? That the King has a block on his memories just like you do?' He blurted out.
In the passing momentary silence, Hitsugaya instantly realised the legal implications of that one nugget of information Ichigo had gleaned from the King, and buried his face in his palms. 'Oh my god, you are even stupider than I first thought.'
'No no nooo,' Ichigo protested. 'It was a total accident, I assure you. I'm not completely daft.
'Uh-huh.'
'Anyway, the important part is, both you and the King have had your memories altered at most just a couple of years apart, and our silly little island doesn't have a local Magician skilled enough for such powerful and long-lasting blocks.'
Hitsugaya kneaded his temples slowly, as if he were still recovering from the previous punch of idiocy. 'When was this "couple of years apart" that you speak of?' he asked.
Ichigo shrugged. 'Ten, twelve years ago? Maybe a little more.'
This was distressing news, thought Hitsugaya. Either a Magician had travelled from another city and gone on a mass memory-wiping spree – there was a very real, oddly terrifying possibility that he and the King were not the only two affected – or someone within his circle of immediate acquaintances was a lesser Magician and had been constantly working him through the years. But that made even less sense, because anyone he knew well enough to meet every year or so didn't know the King well enough to meet him often enough to sustain a block for over ten years. Unless, of course, said lesser Magician erased his or her own existence from his previous memory as well…
Ichigo was vaguely concerned over the constipated expression that had twisted Hitsugaya's eyebrows together. Had he said something wrong (again)? He was about to ask if the younger boy was okay, but stopped with his mouth half-open because Hitsugaya spoke first.
'Okay, thank you, that helped.' Hitsugaya ran both hands through his hair, smoothing it backwards as he took a deep breath of clean forest air. Ichigo nearly laughed when the crop of white hair flopped back up into its usual disarray. Consternation was written all over his expression.
'Are you sure I helped? You look like you've eaten a fork.'
'Heaven knows how you know what that looks like,' Hitsugaya muttered under his breath. 'My turn,' he said out loud, as he forced his expression to relax. 'Come over here.'
Ichigo scooted over, and though he could tell from the closed eyes and deep breaths that the Clairvoyant boy was not quite as ready as he pretended to be, he complied anyway.
'Okay,' Hitsugaya breathed, more for his own benefit than for anyone else's. He pressed his fingers lightly to either side of his temple, thumbs resting at the tips of his jawbone just under his ears. He wondered if Ichigo would actually see his memories this time, or if he would run into another block.
Think. Remember the last vision.
The suffocating fire was all he could conjure up, and he could feel his breaths quicken and his heart rate surge at the mere thought.
Think – what else was there?
The calm ocean. The southern beach. The thin crescent moon. Bits and pieces of the vision from the previous day came together slowly, like smoke coalescing. Last night had been a half moon, so the future he had seen was most likely in a weeks time – he had yet to see anything beyond a month away, so he was willing to bet on this.
Concentrate. One week from now. The moon. The ocean. The fire.
He grimaced.
'Okay,' he said again, not that it made him feel any more okay, and opened his eyes. After a moment's hesitation, he lifted his gaze and looked dead straight into Ichigo's warm brown eyes.
Take me to the future.
And he fell through time once more – only this time, he was prepared.
.
When the rushing in his ears finally stopped, Hitsugaya opened his eyes, fully aware that he would be in a vision – in Ichigo's future. He was in a back alley, probably near the market district, judging by the closely packed wooden buildings lined up neatly on a stone-paved floor. Many had wooden stools and buckets stacked up by the back entrance steps. He could sense the buzz of civilisation on the other side of this row of shophouses he was hiding behind, and was relieved that this time, the vision was a peaceful one.
He still wasn't used to walking – or anything, really – as a long, lanky thing. It was a strange sensation, as Ichigo's body moved according to its own intentions, and he had to take care of the finer movements as he was now the presiding consciousness. It was very strange. He supposed that ultimately, Ichigo (of the future) was in charge of the situation, and all he could do was ride along. So when Ichigo turned and headed down the alley, Hitsugaya groaned.
Time to learn how to walk like you're tall, he thought. Then, The ground is disturbingly far away.
He walked – stumbled and lurched, more like – towards the alley's exit, scaring the wits out of a dirty grey cat in the process. He was pleased to notice that the bumbling orange-haired idiot had since taken to wearing a hoodie, and was even more pleased when he looked up to the sky and found a pale, almost imperceptibly slim crescent moon suspended in the pearlescent early evening sky.
The uprising propaganda seemed to paper public spaces, even this back alley, with a renewed ferocity, and he couldn't suppress the itch to tear some of those posters down.
As he neared the market square – he was getting better at this walking-like-a-normal-tall-person thing – he could smell smoke and see ash floating in the breeze, obscuring parts of the sky into a flat grey. Hitsugaya allowed himself a little mental fistpump, and continued taking in his surroundings as best as he could.
He could now hear the bustle of people going about their business at the market, buying and selling and haggling and bartering. He sauntered past a noticeboard – only tall people could saunter and not look completely hilarious, so he'd better savour the moment, he thought – and immediately stopped short, doing a double take, because unfortunately the future Ichigo walked right past.
It was the wanted poster he was all too familiar with, plastered with an artist's impression of the orange-headed teenager and the reward for his capture. However, it wasn't this that caught his eye, but another, newer bulletin. Another wanted poster was tacked up, this time with both a picture and a name. Ichimaru Gin, he thought. Who the hell was that? What did he do? This one sure wasn't up this morning when he passed by the market – it had to be new.
Hitsugaya filed away that piece of information, and settled back down. He was beginning to get a hang of this Clairvoyance thing too, he decided, and looked around furtively as Ichigo skirted the edge of the market, carefully avoiding people.
He was headed for the southern beach, Hitsugaya realised.
Nononono. Don't-
The smell of the acrid fire was burning his senses and his collectedness. He still hadn't figured out where it was burning – was it the town square? It was nearby. Maybe that Ichimaru guy set the fire.
Don't confuse facts and speculation, a tiny voice at the back of his head warned him.
Ichigo had, by now, exited the market uneventfully, and was making his way towards a long flight of stairs cut into the stone of the cliff leading down to the shore. In a last desperate effort, Hitsugaya swivelled around and looked at the market square, where two men were putting up a sign by the newsstand. A small crowd had gathered, abuzz with muted commotion, but for once he could see over most people's heads. The sign was a deep blue, written with gold words – the Kingdom's royal colour, he realised.
Cair celebrates the anointing of her Crown Prince
Hitsugaya choked.
We have a Crown Prince?
The sudden distraction had disrupted his concentration, he realised with dismay. He was losing his grip on the vision, and felt gravity slipping upwards as his own time began to claim him back. The market and the cliffs began fading while his ears filled with rushing water, and he had no choice but to let it take him back to the present.
.
Hitsugaya resurfaced to find himself leaning heavily against a tree branch, crouched in the space at the fork of the branch and the trunk of the fallen tree. Someone was holding him at the elbows and periodically shaking him.
'Hello? Earth to Toshiro? Anyone in?'
He groaned, the dizziness and nausea of returning from a vision still clinging strongly to him.
'What terrible things did you see?' He heard Ichigo ask, though the world hadn't stopped spinning enough for him to see anything yet.
'Let me go,' he mumbled, and pulled his arms away from the noisy teenager. 'And don't call me that,' he added.
To his credit, Ichigo did let him go while he recovered his wits, though he didn't stop yapping throughout.
'What? What? Are you sure you don't need any help? Is this really normal? Are you sure you're okay? Hello? Toshiro?'
As soon as he felt better, Hitsugaya was going to punch him. Twice. In fact, he was already feeling quite up to hitting someone.
'Well?' Ichigo asked, having noticed that Hitsugaya had regained lucidity and was starting to wind up a punch.
He didn't know where to start, but had to say something, so he dropped his fist. 'There's a Crown Prince,' he blurted.
Ichigo stopped short, then bounced back. 'There what? No- there can't be. There isn't one.'
Hitsugaya chuckled weakly. 'I'm telling you there is one in a week's time.'
'The Queen's not pregnant,' Ichigo pointed out.
This observation calmed Hitsugaya down sufficiently for him to relay everything he had learnt to Ichigo, which was a very tiring conversation riddled with questions that either he couldn't answer (Who's Ichimaru Gin? Have you heard of him before?) or were absolutely preposterous (What about the dirty grey cat? Was the moon waxing or waning? Are you sure?).
'There you go. I would watch the news really closely for this Ichimaru character. Also the Crown Prince, maybe,' Hitsugaya finished.
Ichigo looked thoughtful. 'Maybe they're celebrating the conception of the Crown Prince, because they can't wait for him to be born to celebrate.'
'I'd like to see you try anointing an embryo.'
'Very funny, smarty-pants.'
Hitsugaya punched Ichigo in the shoulder.
'On a more serious note,' Ichigo said as he rubbed his shoulder, 'What are you going to do now? I mean knowledge is power and all, but there isn't anything we can do with this grand nearly-nothing that we know.'
Hitsugaya shrugged curtly. 'Go home, bide my time. Sleep on it. I don't know. Either we find out, or next week much will be explained.'
Having finished his frustratingly rational yet cryptic spiel, Hitsugaya slid off his perch and traipsed out of the forest, book bag swinging behind him. If he hurried back, perhaps he could slip home before Hinamori gabbed away to her grandmother about how he hadn't shown up in school.
.
.
Unfortunately for the fourteen-year-old Clairvoyant, he never got anywhere near home.
Instead, he had been apprehended and waylaid by Hinamori on his way, and as a result was the begrudging audience to her incorrigible loquaciousness.
This time, she was gushing about something he had yet to comprehend.
'There's a famous Magician coming to town!' she sang into his ears.
Hitsugaya was not thrilled. 'You mean the kind of Magician that can destroy your memories and probably half your IQ with a single touch? The kind that can set you on fire just by looking at you? That kind of Magician?' he demanded cynically. 'How is that a good thing?'
Hinamori pouted petulantly. 'There are plenty of good Magicians,' she argued. 'I've read sooo much about Sir Aizen – did you know he's the best Magician in the land? Not only is he powerful, he's smart, rich, kind – everything. And he's of noble descent. I heard that he was unofficially appointed the heir to the throne of Cair if the King and Queen don't get busy soon.' She sighed dreamily. 'Is there a reason why you're being so antagonistic and everything?' She shot him a stern glare, all the while taking immense strides down the path as if she were in a massive hurry.
Hitsugaya ignored her question with a roll of the eyes, deftly avoiding it with a question of his own. 'Is there a reason why we're walking like we're running from a glacier?' he asked, because keeping up with Hinamori and her long legs (relatively) when she was power walking meant he was forced to jog, although at that awkward speed they could outrun nothing but a sliding glacier.
'They should be arriving any moment now,' she said. 'At the harbour.'
'You're going to meet him?' Hitsugaya asked in disbelief. 'Wait, who's "they"?'
'Sir Aizen and his apprentice!' Hinamori exclaimed with an excited wave of her arms, as if he were a total idiot. 'It's been like, ten years since they last came, but before that they used to come much more often – several times a year, apparently? Maybe you don't remember, but I've seen them once, and a huge crowd gathers at the harbour to welcome them! They're both handsome too, or so I've heard.'
'I'm sure they are,' he drawled.
'And don't you dare do anything dumb, because this is the closest thing I'm probably ever going to get to a celebrity encounter, got it?'
Hitsugaya vaguely registered making some kind of noncommittal noise, but the gears in his head were turning so fast he was sure his ears were steaming.
There's a block on your memories.
Magicians place blocks.
Our silly little island doesn't have a local Magician skilled enough for such powerful and long-lasting blocks.
Did you know he's the best Magician in the land?
Ten, twelve years ago? Maybe a little more.
It's been like, ten years since they last came.
Oh, god. It couldn't be.
'Hinamori,' she turned at his voice, but didn't stop trucking down the rough path at top walking speed. 'Who's the apprentice?'
'Oh, the apprentice?' Hinamori was bewildered for a moment. Obviously her celebrity crush was only for Aizen. 'Um, I think his name's Ichi-something or the other, but that's unimportant. He's nothing compared to Sir Aizen. Why?'
Hitsugaya stopped dead in his tracks. In her surprise, Hinamori stopped several paces ahead.
He was gripping the strap of his book bag so tightly his knuckles whitened.
'Ichimaru Gin,' he whispered. His voice was low and hoarse, as if he were parched. He was surprised Hinamori even heard him.
'Oh, yeah! That's the one!' Hinamori said blithely, before her smile settled into a suspicious frown. 'How did you know that?'
Wordlessly, Hitsugaya grabbed her wrist and began sprinting for the harbour.
A/N: Okay, I know that was probably confusing. I'm so sorry! I hope it makes at least a little sense...?