Chapter 11: En route from Karakura General Hospital to the Met Office

Ichigo was almost back at Key Street when his cell phone rang. He felt defeated. It was too early in the morning to be feeling so down. He had just come back from hearing the official autopsy report. Yes, there was arsenic. But both the Chief Coroner and Ukitake's man were puzzled when he had asked if they found traces of nicotine in either her stomach or liver.

"Of course not," Ryuken Ishida immediately snapped. He was uncomfortable in the presence of the two other men who seem to doubt his appointed office. Ishida was unhappy to be dragged out of bed at midnight to oversee the autopsy at the hospital. But he would be damned before he let the Twin Fish people do it alone and claim all credit. It would be a sore point on his budding political career. "If it was nicotine poisoning, it won't show up in the organs at all. It passes through the system too quickly."

"It does, however, show up on the skin, doctor," the other man chided him. "Come take a look."

Ichigo was reluctant. He felt ill to his stomach as he approached the body and Akon, Ukitake's pathologist, pulled off the sheet with something remotely akin to glee.

Hisana Kuchiki, Ichigo's mind whispered, but his imagination burned with the image.

In that cold room, on that metal table, he felt like a failure, and it was the body of Rukia Kuchiki he saw that had come to reproach him in a state of decomposition.

Ichigo wanted to bang his head against a brick wall. He hated looking at the dead at all but a point had to be made. "She's got all these abrasions and burn marks!" he exclaimed.

Reluctantly -- recoiling at the touch of cold flesh -- Ichigo turned over Hisana's arms. The same odd disfigurations were present on her wrists and near her elbow joints.

"Small burns. It's all over her legs and feet," Akon said. "Not just her arms. Care to look?"

Ichigo shook his head mutely. "I've seen enough," he said.

"Those inflamed areas are consistent with nicotine poisoning," Akon explained. "I've seen a few cases, when I did some medical missions down south where they grow lots of tobacco. The leaves get stuck on wet skin and poisons the workers. It's not something you'd expect to see on a Kuchiki."

Ryuken Ishida pursed his lips. This was outside his expertise, and it pained him that someone else had to point it out to him.

"You asked about nicotine poisoning," Akon added. "This nicotine wasn't fed to this woman. It was applied to her skin… in high amounts." He paused.

"Poisoned twice over," Ichigo muttered, as his eyes tried not to linger on Hisana's face. "This should not happen again."

After thanking them, he fled.

He was still thinking about that when the continually ringing of his phone made his head ache worse.

Whoever it was, this couldn't have come at a more inopportune time.

"Son!" Isshin's voice roared over the line. "Wherever you are, get back here."

"Not now, Dad, I'm busy," Ichigo snarled over the humdrum noise of the sidewalk. He was about to click end conversation when he heard the phone being passed to someone else on the other end.

"Kurosaki, listen to your old man," a tired voice said.

The inspector was shocked to hear Shunsui's voice. "What are you doing there?" he almost yelped in surprise.

"No time for that," Shunsui croaked. "Urgent. I can't get a hold of Ukitake or the Shihoin at this hour. There's a man on the move. Six feet tall, about 150 pounds, silvery hair and pale eyes. Evil smile. Fly at once, all is--"

Ichigo didn't hear the rest of the sentence; there was a muffled contest over the phone's receiver. The next thing he heard was his father.

"Forgive my newest patient, he's a little bit delirious right now. I stitched him up nicely and gave him something to help him sleep it off. The girl's asleep too. She's not wounded, just suffering from exhaustion and over-exposure. It might develop into pneumonia if we're not careful. People shouldn't sleep in wet clothing, especially on the beach."

His son was speechless, so he continued. "Apparently the boat they were riding was commandeered by some gnarly foreign fishermen." Isshin chuckled at that cover story. "They jumped into the damn ocean and swam for two hours before they were washed ashore. I told them they were dumb--"

"Damn it Dad," Ichigo was incensed. "I know them! Can they still talk? It's important."

Isshin scratched his head. "Health comes before crime-fighting, son," he said reasonably. "I thought you'd want live witnesses instead of dead ones, that's why Karin and I fixed them up first. Don't worry, nobody else knows they are here… our nudist neighbor was the one who found them on his pre-dawn jog. I know Kon's a freak, but he's trustworthy."

Ichigo heard more noises in the background, and then: "Oh, the girl woke up. She said that their assailant had a Rukongai accent… someone who moved to Seireitei. Then there's something about data…" Ichigo was growing more impatient as more indistinct mumblings were said out of range of the phone. "She says Ukitake should know that the data is safe; she took the precaution of making digital backups. She says it's got to be Aizen."

Aizen? Why did that name ring some distant bells in his memory? "Thanks Dad," Ichigo was about to hang up before Isshin interrupted again.

"Son, don't be a fool. I'll talk to them some more and put their valuables in the family safe." Isshin paused. "And whatever this is, don't get heroic and get yourself killed."

A long pause on his own part: Ichigo couldn't give false promises.

He hung up without replying.