Note: Takes place from chapters 240 and on of the manga, so we're cruising into AU-Central now. There will likely be a return to the regular timeline at some point (or several times), but for the duration of Ichigo and Co.'s absence, it's alternate universe. Mostly. P.S. Tatsuki and Chizuru staged a hostile takeover, and I have no idea if I'm portraying them right. o.O
Memories and possibilities are ever more hideous than realities.
H.P. Lovecraft
Chapter 5: Place to Be
'Take care of Tatsuki.'
Ichigo was gone.
'Orihime's not here...!'
'You don't give up! I told you I don't know anything!'
It was dark, now; the sun had set long ago. The house was quieter than it had ever been.
'It's none of your business.'
'What am I to you?!'
Ikkaku and Yumichika weren't coming back. They hadn't said a word, but he knew it was true. There was an empty feeling in his gut that he never realized had been occupied by the two men, and now that they were gone, a part of him felt... hollow.
'... don't associate with me.'
'It's about time you came out, don't you think?'
The clock read 3AM. He should have been asleep, but he wasn't. Every time he closed his eyes, he found himself looking into a gaping black maw, watching over and over again as Ichigo, Sado and Ishida willingly threw themselves towards it. The way it seemed to swallow them whole, sucking his classmates down its immense throat into... what?
'Take care of Tatsuki.'
You've got to be kidding me. Even though his palms were damp with nervous sweat, he rubbed his face vigorously anyway as the memory of Ichigo's voice drifted in and out of his ears.
He was on his own this time. They all were. What was left of them was falling apart at the seams, and he wasn't sure how long they could hold themselves together.
Arisawa, he decided, would continue on as she had always done. She would be prepared – or as prepared as anyone could be, considering the nature of what they had seen. She didn't need them to take care of her. Pride and personal strength – the girl had those in spades. She would be all right. She didn't need anyone, least of all him, to take care of her.
Mizuiro... Keigo shook his head. He would withdraw, as he always did, into a cocoon of his own making. The distance would protect him, at least for a while. He'd probably come to terms with the idea that their friends were practically Ghostbusters, and had declared war on supernatural entities who – for whatever reason – had decided to kidnap Inoue (why else would they run off to fetch her back? he wondered), long before anyone else did.
As for Keigo himself...?
He'd tried to think of something – anything, really. He wanted... needed, maybe, a direct course of action. For once, he didn't want to be surprised – he wasn't willing to go with the flow, and let the world take him where it wanted. It seemed to him, in fact, that there was little choice now but to fight back, because whatever truth lurked behind all this mysterious shit had to be monumental.
He'd known that he wasn't prepared for anything. It was impossible to remain in denial after watching Ikkaku nearly kill himself fighting that Edorad monster. Impossible to stay that way, yes... but he still hadn't realized the extent of the danger it implied. It was bigger than he ever thought it'd be. Now that it was trying to destroy his life, taking away the people he cared about one by one...
Hugging his knees, Keigo surveyed the bedroom, his face pensive. When his eyes landed on an old photograph, his chest hitched.
What would happen to his parents? To his sister?
What about the baby?
Kei-chan!
A shiver raced down his spine, setting the rest of his body to trembling. The sky was too clear for rain, but thunder rumbled in the distance anyway. The brunet could see his own breath hanging in the air whenever he exhaled, but paid it little attention. He thought maybe he should, but decided that it hardly mattered now; if evil spirits actually did turn rooms to ice, it wasn't as though he'd be able to defend himself against them anyway. And for that matter, how come it didn't happen every time something paranormally weird occurred? Isn't that how it was supposed to be?
As much as he wanted to, Keigo couldn't deny the existence of the supernatural. There was no pretending that everything he had seen was a figment of his imagination, not anymore. He just wasn't entirely certain how to proceed from that point. Accepting such a bizzare truth was one thing; acknowledgment was easy enough. He could do that. But dealing with the consequences?
Evidently, they had chosen to remain behind while Ichigo went gallivanting off into the mouth of madness. This of course left Keigo in a bit of a quandary.
Maybe he couldn't fight them. He certaintly didn't possess the sort of ability Ichigo seemed to. If he did, he thought he would have truly gone insane. But, he was perfectly capable of – and willing to – inform them that they were stupid and to get the hell out of his house. Baby steps, his mind chortled obnoxiously. Everyone's gotta start somewhere!
By now, a thin sheet of ice had formed on his bedroom window. Keigo narrowed his eyes, shivering a bit more when – for just a second – he thought he could see the impression of a face in the crystals. That second turned into a full minute.
The face was still there.
It was the face of a hideously ugly woman... maybe.
It was smiling at him.
"Che." He didn't want to get out of bed. The floor would be like ice on his bare feet, he thought, and he was already exhausted. "Fine, then," he muttered to the face, "You can be a creeper over there, if that's all. I'm going to sleep."
Its expression faded from a smile to one of puzzlement as Keigo swathed himself in blankets and dropped down onto his side, pressing the side of his face into the pillow. After a few minutes of continued shivering, the teen's brow drew together with annoyance. He could hear a faint rattling elsewhere in the house – belatedly noticing that his bed was vibrating. The monitor on his desk wobbled a bit. Huh, he thought, an earthquake. Soon enough it subsided, but it left behind a fluttering in his stomach. Damn it.
Sitting back up, he frowned imperiously at the window. The face stared back, evidently perplexed with him. Keigo hunched his shoulders. "It's cold in here," he told the creature. His eyebrow twitched; god, that sounded more like a whingy child than the voice of authority he was aiming for...
"Look, I don't care if you want to stare at me for the rest of the night," he added, keeping his voice low so he wouldn't disturb the rest of the household. "But in case you hadn't noticed, it's freakin' freezing in here and I can't sleep like this. Knock it off, would... you...?"
It was gone.
"Huh." Maybe he was dreaming? Or hallucinating. Didn't that happen sometimes when people didn't sleep properly? Whatever. Maybe he'd get lucky and the temperature would go back—
His cell phone chose that moment to beep, softly. Or maybe I'll get eaten tonight by a masked thing. Wonderful. Keigo stared.
You have a message! The blinking blue light seemed to say, ever so cheerfully.
The rattling started up again as Keigo snagged the phone off his bedside table with a sigh. Aftershocks, he decided, as he flopped down on his back and drew the covers over his head and scrolled through the new messages on his phone. The hell?
'Don't go into the bathroom.'
Raising an incredulous eyebrow, Keigo pursed his lips. 'Why?'
He waited for a response. And waited. He waited until he got tired of waiting. 'If it's a spider, you deal with it. I'm tired.'
'There's someone in the hallway.'
A tendril of ice made its way down his spine as he read his sister's message. He read it a second time to make sure he wasn't misinterpreting. 'Who?' he finally sent.
'No idea.' A pause, then another beep. 'Who were you talking to just now?'
Keigo thought about lying, for just a moment. He changed his mind when he heard the creak of floorboards just outside his bedroom door, though. He peeked out from under the covers briefly – and dove back in again when the shadow outside moved. 'A lady at the window.'
It was impossible, and they both knew it.
Nobody could climb that high up a wall with no hand-holds.
Eventually, Mizuho responded. Keigo bit his lip as he read.
'Remember those weird stories Bā-chan used to tell us when we were little?'
He did. 'Yeah. Why?'
'Nothing. I was just thinking. Go to sleep, Keigo.'
'Neechan?'
'What'
'Night.'
'Heh. Night, brat.'
Tucking the phone away, Keigo took a deep breath – then let it out in a long, exhaustive gust. Hiding under the covers in the dark, he could no longer see his breath in the air, but the thought did little to comfort him. He knew he would see it if he turned the light on, just as he knew that life was going to be a lot different when the sun rose.
He closed his eyes, seeing the Garganta for the hundredth time that night. But instead of looking into its depths, Keigo tried to focus on Ichigo instead. Turning away from the Garganta in his memory, the figures of his classmates became clearer; sharp contrasts to the monstrocity he hadn't been able to stop himself from gawping at. He remembered how small they had looked, then, in comparison to the creepy gate.
But he remembered their posture, too. He remembered that, despite the daunting chasm waiting for them, not one of them flinched. And he remembered with a striking clarity how they had all leapt into it without looking back, without – he realized – a second thought.
And maybe that was just it. Maybe, that's all it was, in the end. Keigo opened his eyes, just a bit. He shivered, still cold... but unless he was grossly mistaken, the temperature seemed to be going up. I wonder...
He didn't want to fall asleep, but he did. A bizarre sense of comfort stole over him, wrapped up in his blankets with his cell phone held tightly to his chest. He didn't notice how the shadows on his walls stretched obscenely, or when the curtains over his window drew closed on their own.
Maybe, he thought as he drifted off, Maybe that's... all...
Something was wrong with Asano, and Tatsuki was determined to find out what.
She wasn't alone, either. Chizuru had also taken notice of their classmate's sudden departure from the norm; how Asano had gone from a hyperactive goof with elements of perversion, to little more than a subdued husk of himself. Kojima had been utterly useless in this matter, as he'd made himself mostly unavailable – and when he was around, all the short teen could do was shrug.
It aggravated Tatsuki more than she cared to admit. Aren't you his best friend? she'd thought at Kojima's retreating back. Don't you even care?
Ever since Orihime had vanished – quickly followed by Ichigo, Sado, and Ishida – Tatsuki kept finding herself thinking about Asano. Well, she amended quickly, not just him. After what she had seen, what they had all seen, she had turned her attention to dozens of people: Tatsuki found herself carefully assessing the rest of her classmates, as well as her teachers and parents, even strangers on the street. At first, she'd had no idea what she was looking for, or why.
Not until Chizuru had cornered her in the girl's change room after gym and told her that something was wrong with Asano. Her lips had been thin, voice low and serious, brow drawn with the same familiar determination Tatsuki recognized from the lesbian's Hime-hunting. The red-head's glasses had flashed almost dangerously at her before she could even open her mouth to protest, however.
"Just watch him," Chizuru insisted. "You'll see."
Grudgingly, Tatsuki had done it; she watched Asano. She knew that she wasn't exactly being subtle about it, but neither was Chizuru. That was the only reason she decided to discard any feelings of embarrassment whenever the other girls smirked at her, or she caught them gossipping. If the lesbian was willing to be accused of ogling a boy (whether or not that's what they were doing was irrelevant), Tatsuki thought it wasn't worth the effort of getting angry over it.
It wasn't as if she liked him like that, even though he did sometimes make her blush. But she always punched him for it, so it evened out.
After several days of staring daggers into Asano's back, she supposed that the red-head deserved more credit than she received, because lo and behold – their classmate finally dropped his guard. And Tatsuki saw what Chizuru meant, even if it was the sort of thing nobody else would have picked up on. Then again, 'dropping his guard' wasn't an accurate description of it. It was more like seeing what had already been there the entire time, except that Tatsuki had taken off a pair of blinders she didn't know she'd been wearing.
He wasn't as energetic as he usually was, for one thing. Tatsuki couldn't remember the last time he'd purposely held still, or remained quiet, for any length of time – for any reason. He was always doing something; his mouth was always moving, or he was tapping his fingers or feet to a song only he knew, or passing notes to his friends, or trying to get their attention when he should have been paying attention to the teacher. Asano had always given her the impression that he was bursting with life. But now his eyes were dull, and his smiles were terribly fake.
Seeing him like that made her feel just a little bit sick.
The first thing that caught her attention was the air of nervous anxiety surrounding him, and his propensity to hesitate. He would stop suddenly, body rigid, before seeming to deflate. Sometimes it was too fast to catch; other times, his reluctance to complete a task was practically scribbled in marker across his face. Understandably, he exhibited the same hesitation any time he had to use the bathroom, but at least there was an explanation for that. Tatsuki was fully aware of his distaste for education, so watching him hesitate on the threshold of school grounds, as if he was afraid to leave, sparked a flame of worry in her chest.
She'd even caught him rummaging through his desk a few times, his face pinched with an emotion she couldn't quite identify. He'd had a bag, which he was shoveling a number of items into; keeping her distance, Tatsuki observed from around a corner as he tied the bag tightly and flung it almost violently into the trash. "It never freakin' ends," he'd muttered, oblivious to her presence as he stormed away.
Determined as she might have been, Tatsuki was not willing to dig through garbage for answers.
She'd rather beat them out of him, to be honest. She might have, if Chizuru hadn't insisted they treat the matter with some measure of decorum. Decorum? Tatsuki thought with white knuckles and a disgruntled sigh, Decorum didn't help Orihime. I'm sick of this. Why are all my friends so stupid that they have to hide things?
"Ch'," she muttered, as she watched Asano pause in the middle of school grounds, his eyes on Kojima's back as the other boy steadfastly marched away. "Idiots."
Chizuru hummed thoughtfully. "It's not just a falling out, is it?" she asked, adjusting her glasses. They flashed imperiously.
Tatsuki thought back to the night they had followed Ichigo. She could still almost hear the roar of the Garganta as it slammed shut, and the echo of Ichigo's words. How Kojima had withdrawn from them when the three left that weird sandal-clad man's shop, his face closed; and how Asano's face had become ashen, refusing to look either of them in the eye. Her eyes narrowed.
"No," she said after a moment. "I don't think it's that at all."
Filing that cryptic comment away for another time – although it burned her to do so – Chizuru huffed her frustration. "I hate to say it, but we need to do something," she declared. Tatsuki shot her a look, but the other girl just shook her head. "I know, I know. Keigo's an idiot, but doesn't it bother you?" She waved her hand in a broad gesture towards the brunet. Her voice softened a little. "What if something's really wrong?"
"Since when did you care so much?" Tatsuki asked her bluntly. Her words weren't meant to be cruel, and she felt a little guilty at the implications when Chizuru's offended frown appeared, but she was genuinely surprised. Asano wasn't known for having a good reputation among women, romantic or otherwise.
"Since he was the first one to know I was gay," the red-head said sharply, "And he never made fun of me for it." Her glasses flashed as Tatsuki opened her mouth to respond. "When we were eleven, we went to the same summer camp. Neither of us were very welcome there." Chizuru pressed her lips together, as if daring the other girl to say something.
She needn't have worried, though; after a moment of processing the new information, Tatsuki thought she understood. Kind of. It would explain why Chizuru occasionally addressed the brunet by his given name, anyway. "Sorry," she apologized. "I didn't know the two of you had... history."
The lesbian snorted. "If that's what you want to call it. We're not that close." Her eyes fell on Asano again, and her irritation subsided. "He's not a bad guy, you know. He cares about people a lot. More than what they deserve, sometimes." When she focused on Tatsuki again, there was a hard glint in her eye that caught the girl off guard. "How is it fair to him?"
"How is what fair?"
A sigh. "In case you hadn't noticed – and I know you did, the whole school does now, so don't bother denying it – more than half of your rooftop social group is away," she explained, ticking off names with her fingers. "Kurosaki, Yasutora, Ishida, Hime-chan, Kuchiki-san... the only ones left are you and Kojima." Ignoring the closed expression on her companion's face (She doesn't know about the swords and kimonos and monsters, Tatsuki reminded herself), Chizuru leaned in to make her point. "Keigo doesn't hang out with anyone else. You're usually with me and the girls. And now Kojima is brushing him off."
Guilt roiled in her stomach. "So he's alone," she surmised.
"Exactly." The red-head nodded, folding her arms. "It's clear as day that something's up. It might even be serious." She paused. "Even if it's not... nobody should have to face the world alone."
As Tatsuki stared at her, she couldn't help but feel... well, in a weird way, she felt better. As if her heart was lighter, somehow, because someone had just hit the proverbial nail on the head. That's it, isn't it? She thought, eyes widening a little bit. That's what's been bothering me. It's not just that Orihime's gone, or that Ichigo's been keeping secrets, or that I'm stuck here waiting in the dark. I can hardly believe it, but Chizuru's right.
It's like looking at the sun, she decided, as an exasperated smile crept across her face at Chizuru's confident demeanor. It hurts, and for a while you can't see everything around you, but... that doesn't mean it's not there. Right?
'Take care of Tatsuki.'
Ch'. Someone should have mentioned that road goes both ways. What an idiot.
"Got any ideas?" she demanded, finally. Chizuru shook her head ("Not yet") and Tatsuki huffed. Having finally settled the matter in her mind, Tatsuki knew that now was the time for action. There was little choice for her but to push aside her own feelings of abandonment; what would they do except drag her down, anyway? Understanding her feelings didn't mean she could escape them, either. Her only options were to do something productive with them, or wallow.
Arisawa Tatsuki absolutely refused to wallow in her own angst. Fuck that. She would deal with that shit when Ichigo got back, and Orihime was home where she belonged. (And maybe then, she wouldn't feel the urge to punch his lights out. Maybe.)
And maybe by then, she'd be strong enough.
For now... her narrowed eyes fixated on Asano's back. The people that had been left behind were struggling. She couldn't help anyone who didn't want to be helped, of course – going after Kojima was out of the question. Besides, he seemed perfectly capable of handling himself, and he was doing a fair job of making it clear he wasn't interested in Asano's plight. And if Asano was in serious trouble... which he seemed to be, if her gut feeling was right...
How could she live with herself if she knowingly let a friend down? How could she turn someone away when they needed help?
...not that Asano had asked for her help, of course. Now that she had identified the signs, she felt that he didn't need to say it to make it any less true. It was doubtful that she could solve it for him, but that wasn't the point; that dumbass needed to know that there were people he could still turn to, if he ever needed it. And that she was one of them. That was a trait she had carried with her her entire life, and she wasn't about to drop it simply because she was hurt and somewhat depressed.
"It better not be something retarded," she told Chizuru, "Or I'll have to kick his ass. And yours."
"I wouldn't have it any other way!" her friend replied cheerfully, and Tatsuki might have punched her if she hadn't chosen to stop leering. "Now, come on; if we're going to be busybodies, we better get busy!"
A semi-wicked smirk made its way across Tatsuki's face. To Chizuru's delight, she began to eye Asano the same way she did potential challengers in the dojo. "Whatever you say, Chizuru."
"Excellent. Oi, Asano!"
Asano turned to them almost immediately, his face a mask of confusion, and Tatsuki couldn't help but notice the smallest spark of relief light up in his eyes when he saw them. He still wouldn't look her in the face – and why not? he always did before, what's so different now? is there something on my face I don't know about? – but she still knew. For whatever reason, the brunet was glad to be detained.
And, as he made his way over to them, the tiniest spring came back into his step. Chizuru's greeting was returned in full; even if it wasn't as outwardly enthusiastic as they had unconciously come to expect from him, it came with a sincerity both girls sometimes forgot their classmate had – buried beneath his persona of weird and perversion as it was. It occurred to Tatsuki that sometimes, the best place to hide was in plain sight. Son of a bitch...
Chasing off bad guys was probably going to be a lot easier than chasing the bags out from under the taller boy's eyes, Tatsuki realized, watching them.
Ah, well. She hadn't yet turned down a challenge. Why start now?
So she drove her knuckles into his good shoulder with a smirk, eliciting a yelp out of him. He rubbed the spot with a pout. "Arcade?" she issued the challenge haughtily, one eyebrow raised; drawing on past experience, taunting him seemed like the best option right then. "You'll never beat my score, Asano." C'mon, c'mon...
The teen rose to his full height, looking her in the eye for a moment, and Tatsuki grinned. Aha. There you are. "Oh, yeah? We'll see about that, Arisawa."
TBC...
I am so slow. But then again, I wrote like three extra chapters between my last update and now... editing and revisions and fixing junk sucks. Also I keep getting distracted by compiling a soundtrack, because apparently I think I need one for this fic. Plus I'm lazy and hate editing. xD
