A/N: Ok, sorry for the extremely long wait but grad school kind of took over my entire life for a little while. I promise you won't have to wait nearly so long for the next update. A word on reviews, it is very difficult to offend or annoy me. It pretty much never happens. So be honest and open with any reviews, I'm open to suggestions or constructive criticism.
This is my longest chapter yet, I hope you enjoy it.
Chapter 7
6 Days Before Captain's Exam-Division 3
Kinji was at his desk and trying to make sense of the nonsensical. The attack on his Division that ended with the death of his 5th seat had no witnesses. There was nothing on the body to indicate who had killed him. Kinji had been hopeful that the unique wounds would at least provide some hint as to who was responsible. There was no kido that conjured corrosive liquid, so the ability had to come from a zanpakuto. But after checking Division 12's database he hadn't found a zanpakuto with that ability. So whoever it was had a zanpakuto, but wasn't part of the Gotei 13. That meant it was either a noble or an assassin from the underworld. Neither idea made him happy. What made no sense was the target. Kurata was a nobody as far as the noble families were concerned. And if the killer was an assassin, he wouldn't kill someone unless it was to get at his target. Kinji knew how such killers operated because he had been trained as one.
None of it made any sense. And why then? Was it a coincidence that he had been killed the same night as the summit? There was no gain that he could see. Was it to send a message to him? That he wasn't untouchable? Was it about him at all? The questions buzzed around in his mind like angry bees. Whenever he grabbed one, the pain of guilt stung him. Kurata had been a good guy. He was quiet, kept to himself, didn't complain when someone asked something of him. He shouldn't have died. He didn't have any family, but that cold comfort was the only one he had at that moment. He flipped through the complete report that Sui-Feng had provided him at his request. He stopped at the photo of a shard of white stone that had been found in the body. It was part of a knife that had been fashioned of sekkiseki stone. Being stabbed with something like that would rob an unranked soul reaper of their power. To anyone of substantial power it would hinder their abilities. Kido would be nigh impossible. To a Captain, or someone of comparable level, it would be a nuisance and nothing more. If the killer tried the same thing with him, Kinji would tear him into tiny little pieces.
He took a look outside on that beautifully sunny day. He was only a few hours away from a check-up Isane insisted he have. He wasn't sure why she suddenly decided to take an interest in his health. But he would welcome any opportunity to see her. She hadn't spoken to him since the summit three weeks prior.
It was less than a week before the exam. He knew how it would go. He shows his bankai to the Head-Captain and two others, he gets a nice white coat. But the closer it got the more nervous he felt. What had formerly been a twinge in the back of his mind was now a nervous tremor in his hands when he lost focus. He could feel that something was wrong, the instinct was bone deep. It left him in a nigh perpetual bad mood. It was so obvious that even Miko, who ususally cared little for his mood, hadn't spoken to him in two weeks. The only thing that could brighten up his day was Lin. They had gone on half a dozen dates since she had met his family. He found life more enjoyable when she was there. But she was away to Division 2 for the day, Sui-Feng apparently needed her for something. He shook his head to clear away the intruding thoughts. Lin wasn't there, and dwelling on her absence wouldn't do any good.
He stood up from his desk, restlessness finally overpowering his need to figure things out. He needed to talk a walk. He had thought to the end of his wits and now he needed to do something, anything. Though he had not reached his answer he still felt the need to act. So he slid the plain door of his office open and started walking to his Division's training grounds. He took in his surroundings with an absent minded attention. He looked at the trees, the buildings, his subordinates. He decided to go to the kido range and blow off a little steam. A little quality time with the interactive targets would help him clear his head. He didn't want to walk into a meeting with his sister frustrated and primed for violence.
He saw a couple of the unranked members of his squad there. Probably the ambitious ones looking to become seated officers. To his mild surprise he saw Aoki there as well, using a binding spell to entangle one of the manikins wielding a wooden sword. For a moment he thought about leaving them to it, but after watching one of his subordinates let a destructive spell unravel in her hands and set her sleeve on fire. When he got closer he recognized her. She had been one of those just recently added to Division 3 as part of the recent expansion. He was fuzzy on her name but he remembered her attitude. She had picked several fights in the last month, was often seen using Division equipment after sundown, and had insulted him on their first meeting. Everyone else was standing a good distance from her and out of her line of sight. Likely to avoid any stray spells.
"Aoki!" He called to the 10th seat. Aoki turned around and waved to his superior. Kinji flash stepped to close the distance so he wouldn't have to shout. "How is this training session going?"
"Training session, sir?" he asked. Kinji had assumed, wrongly, that his officer was here helping his fellow Division members.
"Nevermind. What is her name? I'm having trouble remembering." Kinji asked, pointing to the woman with whisps of smoke still rising from one of her sleeves.
"Kyoko? I wouldn't go there." Aoki said sourly. "I tried helping her out and she nearly took my arm off."
"Kyoko. Right." Kinji ignored Aoki's warning. He had a tendency to overreact about little things. He was five feet away when he tried to catch her attention. "Kyo-" her spell exploded. Kinji wiped the soot from his eyes and blinked a few times. "Kyoko?" She had been knocked out cold.
"I did warn you. She can't do kido. But twice a weeks she comes out here and blows herself up. No talent at all." Aoki said with some exasperation. Kinji lifted his hand and mumbled "Sokatsui". A small blast of blue fire, the same blast Kyoko had been trying to conjure. It struck the target and left some deep scorch marks but didn't destroy it. "You have any experience in healing kido?" he asked Aoki. The confused soul reaper started to ask a question then put his hands over the fallen woman. Green light poured from his hands.
"All I can do is reiatsu replenishment. If she needs anything more we'll have to take her to a real medic." Kinji slapped him on the back.
"You're a man of many talents. Too bad relationships aren't one of them."
"That was a cheap shot." Aoki complained.
"You dated my sister. I'm entitled to take a shot at you once in a while."
"It wasn't my fault. She has a crush on Captain Abarai." Kinji has to restrain himself from grabbing Aoki by the robe and beating more information out of him.
"You're joking."
"No. Captain Abarai. Don't ask me why, but he does spend a lot of time in the hospital so that would be the how. And as for when, apparently for a long time. He walked by our table and she just lit up." Aoki's hands were shaking.
"Easy." Kinji cautioned. "It'll be alright. Plenty of fish in the sea and other comforting platitudes." The lack of enthusiasm in his superior's voice told Aoki that his superior was completely fixated on the idea of Isane crushing on Captain Abarai. To be fair, he had reacted just as poorly to the revelation. But his superior's obsession with his family still concerned him. It was the one thing that would commandeer his attention regardless of what was going on. Aoki was convinced that if he was bleeding out on the ground and Isane subbed her toe, Kinji would see to Isane first and him second. It bordered on the psychotic.
"You sound so convincing." Aoki settled for a sarcastic jab at his superior. "I don't really care about the other million fish. I just wanted one. Was I asking for too much out of life?"
"When the fish is a Kotetsu, asking for anything is too much." When Aoki looked at him Kinji stood and started walking away. Kyoko's eyes flickered open
"Cryptic, yet unhelpful. Thank you so much for your invaluable advice!" Aoki yelled to his future Captain as he walked away. Aoki helped the woman to her feet when she regained consciousness. Then he put a binding spell on her when she started chanting another destructive spell. Kinji made his way toward Division 4. The small forest of well tended trees made for pleasant scenery on his walk. He hadn't seen his sister since the summit and he had a sudden impulse to have a long conversation with her. He'd met Captain Abarai on several occasions, once when the moron had been brought into Division 4 suffering from what the nurses had described as "severe hypothermia". Apparently some drunken jackassery had caused Captain Hitsugaya to encase him up to his neck in ice. He's also heard rumors of other, even less intelligent, stunts by the red-haired man. But he'd also heard about the man's constant acts of valor in the line of duty. His fight with Byakuya, his stand against Aizen, his assault on Hueco Mundo. He had many friends among several Divisions, he was admired by many young soul reapers, and he had proven he would die for those he cared for. If the worst thing you could say about a man is that he was an idiot, you didn't have much to complain about.
"But Isane would never make a move for him." Kinji said aloud to himself. "How should I play this? Should I set them up? Should I confront one of them? Both of them?" Kinji started massaging his temples to stave off a headache. "What the hell is wrong with me? Scheming to manipulate people's lives never used to be this hard." Pain flared in his head just before he was able to recall an instance of his childhood machinations. The pain was intense, a mind-shattering flash of agony that jolted him from his recollections and nearly brought him to his knees. Something was very wrong with him. His heart thudded hard in his chest and his stomach squirmed as he considered the ramifications. He wasn't completely dense, he'd realized that the headaches happened only when he tried to recall certain memories. But that last one was bad enough to make him wonder, was this strange condition getting worse. "Miko!" Kinji practically yelled. He placed a hand on his zanpakuto and demanded an answer to his summons.
Yes, my host?
What the hell did you do to me? Anger so pure and hot flooded Kinji's soul that the temple Miko was residing in became sweltering. Miko considered another adjustment to remove this memory but decided against it. Kinji had become unstable, much like her previous host. He had lasted longer and been more resistant to deterioration, but Kinji was slowly breaking down. She had noticed the changes in the world around her. The waves had ceased and the air had become stale. Even the trees had begun to wither and die. She had pushed too far, taken too much of his identity. Miko had believed Kinji to be the one, the perfect host for her. He had the right blood, he was possessed of the ruthlessness she liked in hosts, and he had the potential required for one to surpass their natural limits. This was the critical moment, in order for Kinji to surpass his limits he would have to survive the madness that would try to drown him.
I stripped you of unnecessary burdens. Those moments of your life that would have made you too weak to survive what comes next. Kinji was thrown momentarily into shock. Because he had known her for so long he knew exactly what she meant. She had taken memories, elements of his personality. She had manipulated him by literally molding him into what she wanted. He wasn't surprised that she had done it, but he could hardly believe the scope of what she'd done. She had not only taken away his real zanpakuto, she had lopped off any part of his mind that she deemed weak or counterproductive. He wasn't himself, or at least only a shadow of what he should be.
You poisonous demon! His hatred of her shook the timbers of the temple in his mind. He was about to enter his mind to confront her in the most violent way possible. But the death match he had put off for so long wasn't to be. Even as his mind began to slip away from the real world it was dragged back from the sensation of a blade slicing through the skin on the back of his neck. Kinji reacted on pure instinct and rolled forward. It saved his life. He spun to face his attacker the moment he was back to his feet. He was forced to draw his sword and block the next incoming slash from his masked assailant. When he felt the strength behind the slash he almost laughed. With one arm he repelled the attack and sent his attacker tumbling back ten feet. If the power of that attack was representative of his true strength then Kinji had very little to worry about. He would peg the man as a strong 4th seat in terms of physical brawn. But he couldn't sense the man's reiatsu through the black clothes he was wearing.
"Who are you?" Kinji asked. He kept on his guard and flared his reiatsu high enough to make movement difficult on his opponent. And hopefully someone would notice the spike and help him capture the would-be assassin. Whoever this was he wanted to take them alive so Sui-Feng could interrogate him.
The ninja wannabe pressed his attack instead of answering Kinji's question. The noble easily parried the attacks. As a swordsman the assassin was more skilled than he was by far, but the sheer difference in both speed and strength made his advantage negligible. Takeshi grinned from behind his cloth mask. He had finally managed to catch the soul reaper off guard in an isolated area. It had take n him weeks of stalking and he'd been forced to kill a witness, but Kinji had finally been out in the open and far away from help. He'd first hoped to kill the man in his sleep but the kido barriers around his sleeping quarters were too strong for him to break without waking the entire 3rd Division. Then he had hoped to catch him unguarded after the came back from the summit, but he was stopped by Kurata. But after so much waiting the time was here. And all he had to do was keep him occupied and everything else would fall into place.
"Flow, Mizu o korosu." The blade of Takeshi's zanpakuto was coated in a sickly green fluid. The smell hit Kinji's nose almost immediately. Takeshi saw Kinji's expression darken.
"You were the one who did it." his voice was completely flat, void of all emotion. "You killed Kurata. Mind telling me why before I strangle you with your intestines?" Takeshi said nothing. He just stood there waiting for Kinji to make the first move. The longer his opponent delayed the better it would be for his chance of success. Instead he readied his sword for his next attack routine. Kinji's reiatsu flared to new heights and placing a severe burden on Takeshi. If he hadn't been wearing a special cloak provided by his employers the pressure would have rendered him incapable of fighting. Kinji had the strength of a Captain and being the sole focus of his murderous intent was enough to buckle the knees of anyone with less reiatsu than a Lieutenant. "Not the talking type." Kinji commented coldly. "Then I guess there's nothing left to do but crush you under my heel." Kinji held his zanpakuto above his head. Even though he hated Miko he was not above making use of her power for ends greater than himself. Avenging a comrade, even one he barely knew, was such an end. This man who had killed his subordinate would know fear before he died. He would know just how powerless he was before the man he had attacked. Kinji ignored the sensation of blood dripping down his back from the cut on his neck and focused on bringing forth the pinnacle of his power. He visualized his bankai and began to speak the word. Then pain flared in his head and he nearly dropped his sword. His anger, purposely kept at a low simmer so he wouldn't make mistakes flared into a full bonfire. He knew instantly what had happened. Miko had removed the memory of his bankai, and without that memory he would not be able to call on his most potent ability. He cursed her again for her treachery.
Takeshi saw the moment of weakness but hesitated briefly. He had barely scratched Kinji and there had been no poison on his blade. What could possibly have happened to bring his target to drop his guard. The hesitation lasted only as long is it took Takeshi to remember that the difference in power made feinting a useless tactic on Kinji's part. So he attacked with as much skill and brute strength as he could. Kinji caught the sidelong slash on his left side with his zanpakuto. The sudden impact jolted him back to the battle at hand. Unfortunately, the sudden stop of Takeshi's sword caused droplets of acid to be splashed onto Kinji's torso. The green drops ate through his clothes and burned at his skin. For someone less experienced, or someone with no knowledge of Takeshi's abilities, the unexpected pain would have caused them to make a mistake or drop their guard. But Kinji ignored the pain and grabbed for the assassin with his empty right hand. He leaped back from the attempted grapple and flung more droplets at Kinji to keep him from pursuing.
He needn't have bothered. Kinji was reeling from the loss of his bankai and his was shaking with barely contained rage.
If you do not focus on this fight you will not survive. Miko's voice pierced the haze of emotion and helped Kinji regain a semblance of control. He was still nearly mad with anger, but now he could determine a path to resolving his anger. The target in front of him was a start. He could deal with Miko when he was safe in his office. He took a deep breath and let it out slowly. His enemy was skilled but weak. He didn't need to close into sword range to finish him when a blast of kido would do just the same. "Bakudo 61: Rikujokoro." Six rods of light slammed into Takeshi and rendered him completely immobile. The assassin was stunned. He knew Kinji was a powerful kido practitioner, but he hadn't known that this particular spell was in Kinji's repetroire. If he had then he would have taken certain precautions. He couldn't move and the look on his target's face promised an uncomfortably slow death.
"Is there anything you want to say before I get started?" Kinji asked. There was a distinct lack of emotion on his face the sign that he was prepared to do things that normal people had no stomach for. Takeshi had seen that look during his career in the Gotei 13. Usually it was on the face of an interrogator before the screaming started. He tried to move his arms and failed. Drops of acid fell from his sword onto the binding kido. Kinji was too angry to notice, but the fluid was slowly eating through the binding. Takeshi knew what he had to do. He needed to stall for time and wait for the spell to weaken. It hadn't been long enough for his surprise to be ready either.
"This wasn't a personal thing. I was paid to kill you." He said the words as slowly as he could, trying to make it sound calming. He knew it would have the opposite effect, but Kinji wouldn't kill him until he was sure he didn't have anything left to give.
"Who paid you?" the change of pace derailed the singular mindset that had dominated Kinji's mind since the fight had started. Now he was actually thinking. Something good might come out of all this after all. This was the payoff to Yamamoto's plan.
"Some nobles with a lot of money and more than a little pull inside the Gotei 13. There were three of them, at least, I met with three people who felt it necessary to hide their faces." Takeshi could feel some small degree of movement return to him as his acid broke down the spell. Another minute and he would be able to break the kido with one swing of his zanpakuto.
"You don't have any names or descriptions?"
"No. But there are plenty of things I can tell you. The money they gave me, it's enough for me to retire on. Agree to let me go, I'll tell you everything I can, including names of soul reapers who are either loyal to these nobles or are on the payroll." The list was only two people long but Kinji didn't need to know that. Besides, he had no intention of giving the soul reaper anything useful.
"You spoke with them, right? Give me the conversation word for word." Kinji's left hand twitched in an angry spasm, a sign that his desire to kill Takeshi hadn't actually subsided. So the assassin decided to do just that. His employers wouldn't be happy, but they hadn't given him anything that would give someone their identity. And if they had then it was their fault. He saw Kinji's expression change when he got to what the old man said.
"The woman, if you had to describe her voice in a single word, what would it be?"
"Musical." And bingo. Kinji could safely assume the identity of two of the three conspirators. The old man was almost certainly Eiji Tenshin and the woman was Reiko Tenshin. The third person was still a complete mystery, but it was a hell of a lot more than he'd had a couple months ago. But with the satisfaction of his mission paying off came a bitterness. Without this man's testimony Yamamoto would have no possible way to move against the Tenshin. For the Gotei 13 to take any action against one of the four Houses they needed concrete proof of treason against the Soul King or the Royal Family. Now, the word of some hired killer wouldn't be enough to arrest anyone, but it was enough for Central 46 to authorize an actual investigation. So, in short, if he wanted to bring down the Tenshin, this man would have to stay alive. The thought disgusted him. And his anger wasn't abating in the least. But there were rules he had dedicated his life to, and he wasn't going to break them for the sake of personal satisfaction.
"Congratulations. I'm not going to be killing you today." Kinji held out a hand and prepared to cast a more permanent binding. Then he took note of the way the assassin's eyes crinkled at the corners. Almost as if he was smiling behind his mask. There was a sharp pain in right shoulder and a sudden sense of vertigo.
"Chains reforged and wheels unbroken. Scattered colors returned to white." Kinji looked over his injured shoulder and saw a man with red hair standing behind him chanting the words to a spell. He tried to flash step and take the man's head off, but his reiatsu was stuttering and inconstant so he ended up half a dozen paces behind this new attacker without ever touching him. "-divide the sky in five. Bakudo number 85, Gentei Reiin!" Kinji felt the burning sensation on his chest when the tattoo seal appeared and reduced his power to 20% of his normal capacity. He staggered under the sudden loss of power. He heard his binding break and release the masked assassin.
Akamatsu smiled the satisfied smile of a scientist getting good results. He'd had reservations about this strategy, even after the test run was done on Kurata. But with a piece of sekiseki stone to lower Kinji's resistance to his binding, everything had gone smoothly. Even if Kinji removed the stone the Gentei Reiin would remain until someone from Division 12 removed it. Now that the seal was on him and Takeshi was free, they would be more than capable of retrieving the artifact.
"Two on one? And a seal on the majority of my power. At least the Tenshin aren't insulting me by aiming low." Kinji commented. He pulled the shard of sekiseki stone from his shoulder. The seal remained but the nausea and vertigo disappeared. Neither of the men responded. Instead, the one who had cast the seal drew his sword and released it.
"Grind, Boseki Kinzoku." Small serrated metal disks appeared on both sides of his katana and began spinning at a blurring speed. The two assassins readied themselves to strike. Kinji stood straight and slipped out of the top of his shihakusho and revealed his scarred chest and back. The sight of those scars gave his potential killers pause. Kinji was a survivor the likes of which most people had never seen. He had pitted his life against more than a hundred opponents in single combat, many of them were stronger than him, and he had the scars to prove it. Takeshi and Akamatsu wondered, just for the barest moment, if he would somehow manage to walk away from their custom-built deathtrap.
"Before you really try to kill me, I'm giving you fair warning. If I'm the one left standing when this fight ends, I'll be handing you over to Sui-Feng for interrogation. After killing my subordinate then coming after me, a quick death isn't in the cards for either of you."
The Division 4 hospital was unusually quiet that day. Isane was using the extra time to restock some of their more mundane supplies like bandaged and suture thread. Unfortunately for her the menial task gave her mind time to wander back to the story her mother had told several weeks ago. And what she had asked of her children.
"The night your father, Yukimura, died, he was about to perform a ritual that would have killed hundreds of unranked soul reapers. That was what I told everyone about that night, and it is part of the truth. But the reason he attempted it was because of the spirit possessing him. He had uncovered an artifact, a mirror, left behind after the Soul King moved to a higher plane of existence some 2500 years ago. It joined with your father 200 years ago and from then on his actions became increasingly erratic. He began losing memories and his entire personality became more aggressive, more ambitious. Then, when he tried to sacrifice most of the Gotei 13, Kinji used the power of his zanpakuto to get close and stabbed his father in the heart. Before he died, the mirror separated from Yukimura and tried to bond with Kinji. When it attached itself to your brother he tried to run himself through with his zanpakuto, hoping to either destroy the cursed thing or render it inert. Instead, it bonded with his zanpakuto and your brother lost pieces of his memory. I assumed that was the worst that had happened and the threat was contained. But it seems what happened to Yukimura has been happening to Kinji, just more slowly. At some point he will also attempt transcendence, the mirror won't give him a choice. Before that happens we need to find a way to remove the artifact and contain it. For nearly a century I've scoured our records and consulted with kido experts. Isane, I want you to talk with your Captain about this. Kiyone, keep an eye on your brother. Jiro, reach out to the other three families. The Shihouin in particular might have some information on such a powerful artifact. I expect one of you to have a possible solution in one month. If you don't, we may have to kill your brother.
That possibility turned Isane's stomach every time she remembered it. She had talked with Captain Unohana several times since then. Her Captain was the most knowledgeable and skilled medic in the Seireitei, but she had no idea how to extract the artifact. There was a chance that sealing the possessed zanpakuto would save her brother but there was no guarantee. As much as she hated the idea, she was planning on going to Captain Kurotsuchi to discuss the matter. She would withhold which member of her family was the subject, but she would have to tell him everything else. She had contacted the 12th Division earlier that day and spoken with their 5th seat, Akamatsu Okubo, and secured a meeting time early in the next week. She'd wanted it to be sooner but the man had assured her it would be six days before his Captain would have time.
But before she did anything that drastic she wanted to bring Kinji in for a full examination. Until she was absolutely sure there was nothing she or her Captain could do, she wouldn't go to Division 12. She checked the clock. Kinji was running a little late.
That was another thing that had changed. When he was younger he was always early. Now it seemed he was consistently late. Not by a lot, but the change was clear. She could hardly blame him for that though. He was doing the work of the two highest officers of the 3rd Division by himself. It was understandable that he was having schedule trouble. But since she didn't have anything better to do at the moment, she decided to walk out to meet Kinji. There was only one path between Division 3 and Division 4, so she assumed he would be on it. Out of habit she picked up an emergency medical kit, more compact than the bags her subordinates wore, and stepped out onto the path.
The moment she stepped into the small forest between the two Division grounds she wondered why she couldn't feel her brother's reiatsu. He never really made an effort to hide it unless he was on a mission. She pulled out her dinreishikki and tried to call him. His communicator wasn't able to be reached. These things worried her, but it wasn't until she walked face first into a powerful barrier spell that she began to panic.
As an expert in kido she was able to tell by that one touch how powerful it was. But the reiatsu wasn't homogeneous, the barrier felt like it had been raised by a dozen or more individuals. She drew her zanpakuto and pressed the tip against the barrier. When the Gotei 13 created barriers like this they included a feature that allowed certain soul reapers to pass through so long as they had the proper key. The keys in question were the unique composition of their zanpakuto. But the moment her sword touched the barrier it was violently rejected. Isane's panic picked up a notch. As the Lieutenant of the Medical Division she had total access to all areas not forbidden by Central 46, which was more than most of the Captains. Then her training took over and she drew out a small disk-shaped ink well. She used the ink to draw curving lines on her arms and a character on each hand. "Black and white net. Twenty-two bridges, sixty-six crowns and belts. Footprints, distant thunder, sharp peak, engulfing land, hidden in the night, sea of clouds, blue line." A square of blue light appeared in the air in front of her. She placed both palms on it and finished the spell. "Form a circle and fly though the heavens. Bakudo 77: Tenteikura!" Lines of connection formed between Isane and every Captain and Lieutenant in the Seireitei. "Isane Kotetsu of Division 4 requesting immediate assistance. Unidentified barrier found half a kilometer south of Division 4. I repeat, unidentified barrier found half a kilometer south of Division 4. Requesting immediate assistance." Now she had to wait. Trying to break through a powerful barrier wasn't a good idea, with something that was prepared in advance there was a chance it had additional qualities. If she attacked it she might suffer unpleasant consequences.
Two Captains immediately began making their way to the reported site upon hearing the alert. After Aizen's betrayal it became law that any anomalous happenings be immediately reported to higher ranking officers. And a powerful barrier created without prior notification was the kind of thing that put people on edge. It meant that something was happening that someone powerful didn't want the Gotei 13 to know about. Sui-Feng, already on edge from having an unsolved murder on her desk, took off at speed. She barely notified her subordinates that she would be heading out. Renji Abarai, who had been doing paperwork in his office in Division 5, welcomed any excuse to get up and run. He was almost grateful to whatever idiot decided breaking the law was a good idea. The other Captains were farther away but would have responded despite the time it would have taken them to arrive. When they felt Renji and Sui-Feng begin to move they stopped. All of them, except for Kenpachi Zaraki. He coukdn't sense anything so he and Lieutenant Kusajishi too off toward what they assumed was Division 4. It was actually Division 8 but they wouldn't figure that out until they arrived there 20 minutes later.
Despite being much closer, Renji arrived at Isane's location after Sui-Feng. "What's going on?" Renji asked without any formalities.
"Ren- Captain Abarai." Isane misspoke. After Renji being a Lieutenant alongside her for years she hadn't gotten used to addressing him as a Captain yet.
"Knock it off with that. Just call me Renji, having you call me Captain just sounds wrong." Renji replied. "Now what's going on?"
"I thought it would be perfectly obvious to a Captain." Sui-Feng said. "But since you're just a baby Captain I'll explain in small words." she was in a foul mood already, but when she heard Renji act so dismissively about his rank she needed to vent her frustration. Renji, despite being a Captain, was scared of Sui-Feng. Some might call him a coward, but anyone who knew anything would just say he had good judgment. So when she insulted him he held his tongue when his first instinct would be to pick a fight. "This barrier is not supposed to be here. We're going to break it down and arrest anyone inside it." Sui-Feng took off her haori and took her fighting stance.
"Be careful. I think my brother might be trapped in there." Isane said with a suppressed urgency.
"Good, I wouldn't mind knocking him around a little after he stole one of my best officers." She whispered the words to a kido known only to the Shihouin and Feng families. It was a spell designed to make the energy forming a barrier lose its coherence and fall apart. But in order to do that she would have to make a crack to allow her spell to sink in. When her punch struck the barrier she was violently repelled.
"Tough barrier." Renji commented.
"Not for long." Sui-Feng promised. "Shunko!"
Kinji traded another spattering of acid droplet on his chest and left shoulder for a bone crushing strike to Takeshi's lower ribs. The masked man was thrown straight backwards until he impacted a tree branch with the back of his head and flipped head over heels. Then Kinji stopped Akamatsu's overhand slash with the flat surface of his mirror. Sparks showered as the high-speed discs met a substance they couldn't cut. "Hado 11: Tsuzuri Raiden." Electricity transferred from the blade to the mirror and wracked Kinji's body with spasms. When Kinji's shield didn't budge, Akamatsu followed up with a brutal kick to the gut. Kinji rolled away from his attacker and interposed the mirror between them once he was able to rise to his knees. He wanted to respond with a blast of kido but with his power limited it would simply be a waste of energy.
He'd fought on par with the two of them by relying on superior speed and his hakuda skills. Both of his enemies were injured. Takeshi had broken ribs and an arm that was little more than bone splinters inside a tube of muscle. Akamatsi had taken a shallow cut across his chest from before Kinji had released his shikai, Miko had at least left him that. But Kinji's injuries had stacked up much faster. Apart from the most recent burns from his electrocution, he had six minor gashes on his arms and chest, one deep stab wound in his right thigh and dozens of small pock marks on his face and arms from the acid. And he was slowing down. The pain and blood loss had begun taking their toll. But being at a disadvantage was par for the course in this fight. Kinji still believed he could take the two of them and he had a plan to do just that. Takeshi was nearly done for the fight, and Akamatsu was a fairly inexperienced fighter. He had no attack routines and he had to consider each move before he made it. That hesitation would give Kinji a window in which to use his finishing move, the only hakuda technique he had created himself. It was a strike meant for one on one combat because it would leave him defenseless to an attack from behind. But if he timed it right then he would be fighting one on one.
Akamatsu closed the distance and hammered his spinning blades against the mirror. Following his partner's lead, Takeshi made a thrust at Kinji's back while he was still down on his knees. Kinji heard him coming and swung his left arm out behind him. It knocked the acid coated zanpakuto high and right toward the right arm of the man keeping him pinned down. But Kinji didn't stop there, he ignored the acid eating the skin on his forearm and made a grab for Takeshi's face. The assassin was fast enough to dodge but the reaching hand caught hold of his mask and ripped it away. The two attackers disengaged. Akamatsu had to switch his sword to his off hand because Takeshi's blade had sliced deep enough to make him cautious about using his right hand in battle. The pain that would normally accomany such an injury wasn't there. Akamatsu had disabled his ability to feel pain in anticipation of this fight. It allowed him to push himself harder than he normally could. But the downside of that perk was an inability to gauge the seriousness of his injuries.
"This is embarrassing. It's two on one fifth and I'm still standing." Kinji used the stolen fabric to wipe the acid from his skin and tossed it aside. His pain tolerance was just about out. The constant burning from the acid was driving him nuts. But he kept up the facade.
Akamatsu was embarrassed as well. The fight should have been over already and he knew they were pressing their luck. A barrier as big as the one he set up was bound to be noticed eventually. The fact that it had enough power to withstand a decent strength attack from a Captain might buy them a minute after it was discovered. He felt a pulse as someone struck the barrier. They were almost out of time. "We need to finish him now."
"You were the one who said not to completely destroy the body."
"That rule still applies. But if he loses a limb I don't particularly care anymore." With that Takeshi swept his sword in a wide arc at his target. A small wave of acid appeared and tried to engulf the wounded 3rd seat. Kinji was fast enough to avoid it but Akamatsu was waiting for him when he stumbled on his injured leg. The spinning blades gashed his other leg, effectively hobbling him. But Kinji responded with a strike to Akamatsu's face. The eye gouge did precisely what it was designed to do and Akamatsu stumbled back. Even though he couldn't feel pain he could still panic at the loss of a major organ. Kinji managed to stand on his own feet, but that was all his wounds would allow. He would have to take them both on while standing still. Then the barrier shattered. Kinji hadn't even realized it was there, but he was suddenly able to feel several familiar energy signatures. He smiled like a shark. Everyone he could sense was an ally he trusted to stand with him against these two. Sui-Feng, Renji, Isane, and Lin. Any one of them would be able to put down these traitors.
"Tough luck. I wi-" an impact between his shoulders cut him off before he could finish declaring victory. The impact confused him. He could see both of the guys trying to kill him, but something had hit him from behind. Then he felt a sharp ache in the center of his chest. When he looked down he saw a silvery katana blade covered in blood coming out of his sternum. It took him a three count but it finally occurred to him that someone had stabbed him in the back. He looked behind him and he met the green eyes that had become so familiar to him.
"If you two are done being incompetent we need to leave. Now!"
"Just a moment. We need to wait for the mirror to separate from him." Akamatsu said, still holding one hand over his ruined eye.
"And when does that happen?" Lin asked. Kinji dropped to his knees as the new injury sent him into shock.
"When he is close to death."
"Lin?" Kinji asked. His mind could grasp the idea that a subordinate had betrayed him. It hadn't even been the first time that had happened. But he couldn't quite believe that the woman he loved, that seemed clear to him in that moment, had literally stabbed him in the back.
"Oh shut up." Lin twisted the blade and yanked it back out. "Just hurry up and die." Kinji heard the callousness in her voice but couldn't reconcile it with the woman he had come to know. Was it all an act? Or was her involvement here and act? He hoped beyond hope that the second one was true. But in the darker corners of his mind he was already wondering if he could kill her before he blacked out. He wasn't given time to even try. In the blink of an eye the scenery changed. He was on the wooden floor of a ruined temple. He pushed himself off the floor and to his feet.
"Kinji. You were so close. A few more days and you could have been a god. But fate seems to have intervened once again. Just like it did with your father." Miko was standing behind him at the entrance to the half-collapsed temple.
"What are you talking about? What happened here?"
"You're dying. I was hoping you'd be the one, the vessel I could fill with divinity. But despite my best efforts to keep you from the greater dangers of life you were cut down." Miko bowed to Kinji once then turned to leave. "Goodbye, I enjoyed our time together." Miko turned to leave. Kinji flash stepped in front of her, blocking her exit.
"Give it back." He growled. Even if he was dying, he wanted to die whole. "Give back my real zanpakuto!"
"Its already part of me. You won't be needing it." Kinji had reached the breaking point. He had been ambushed just as he managed to make his life worth living again. He had been betrayed in the most cruel fashion by someone he loved and trusted. And now he was being told that he would die before ever getting back that piece of himself he had been forced to live without. No, if he was going to die then he would do everyone a favor and kill the thing that had begun this disaster all those years ago. He reached for all the power he had left and used the technique he had been about to attempt on his killers. Sabeji Migite.
He focused his energy into his right hand and lunged forward. His technique wasn't flashy or complex. It was a simple, efficient, and brutal attack designed to kill an enemy. After wielding so many zanpakuto he had come to a point of realization. You didn't need to poison or freeze or burn your enemy to kill them. All you needed to do was breach their defenses for a moment and destroy some important part of their body. You didn't need to summon up huge amounts of power, or dazzle your opponent with your speed. All you had to do, was get close, and rip the heart from their chest. That's what the move was, concentrating all your strength and speed into one swift motion that ignored the possibility of a counterattack, that risked the user's life to kill the enemy.
He couldn't see her eyes behind the cloth but from the way her face twisted he could tell that she realized she wouldn't have time to dodge. Instead, she lifted the mirror the few inches she needed to block her heart. Kinji watched it all happen in slow motion, his mind speeding up to capture every instant of his last act, but his body's actions were already predetermined. He knew he needed to shift his target to her throat to avoid the mirror but he couldn't make his body respond. All he could do was watch as his hand would impact the metal and break. His last act would end in failure, the grim punctuation to a life full of disappointments.
His hand slipped into the metal as if it were water. When the strike ended his arm was in up to the elbow. He felt something rough under the palm of his hand. Acting on a hope that he didn't even let crystallize fully, he grabbed onto it and pulled. It was hard. It felt like the mirror had turned to metal once again and he was trying to pull something out of a block of solid steel. But he pulled with every last speck of will he had. He literally had nothing left to lose. He dimly heard Miko screaming at him but he didn't care. She had both hands on the mirror and was pulling on it just as hard as he was. After a few moments of straining Kinji heard a scream of twisting metal and he pulled the object free.
"You bastard! Give that ba-" Miko's demand was overpowered by the roar of the blue fire that sprang up between them.
"Not this time." Another voice answered her. Kinji looked down to the familiar sword in his hand. The voice had come from his zanpakuto, his real zanpakuto. He gripped the hilt of his sword tightly. He had it back. After so long he had it back. But what he saw when he looked at Miko was enough to temper that long awaited joy. The blue fire that had come from his sword had burned away the strip of white cloth that had covered her eyes. There were no eyes. Two gaping holes stared back at him, not empty but filled with some terrible darkness beyond his understanding. He looked at her and suddenly realized just what he had been dealing with. Miko was just a front, a pleasant face for something old and powerful beyond words. Host had been more than just a way for the spirit to annoy him, it was a truth that meant far more than he had realized. If Lin hadn't mortally wounded him, that terrifying thing that had hidden behind Miko would have devoured him and replaced him with something else. Something other and alien.
Then it was gone. All traces of Miko disappeared behind the wall of flames. The blue fire died out and revealed the collapsed temple. The wood was quickly rotting away to nothing. He saw the forest to his left. It was filled with withered husks and dried brown leaves. The ocean to his left was flat and still, and clogged with rotting seaweed. Everything around him was rotting and dying. He tried getting back to his feet but his legs wouldn't move.
He felt so heavy. Without thinking about what it meant he laid his head back and let his heavy eyelids close. But he felt contentment deep in his heart. He had it back. He was Kinji Kotetsu for the first time in a century. A memory of his childhood flickered dimly in his mind. His little sisters were chasing him around the garden in the middle of their house. He heard their laughter like a dim echo and he nearly wept. Then he forced his eyes back open. Isane, Kiyone. His grip on his sword redoubled and he forced his eyes to open. The bloody red sky above him had cracked open revealing a deep darkness beyond it. He wasn't going to just drift off into death. Isane was close, he remembered that much. She had been very close when Lin had stabbed him. If he hadn't died yet, she would find a way to save him.
