Rating: Mature (R) for graphic violence and head games.
In This Part: The three face moments of truth.
x x x x x x
Twenty: Phantom
Renji comes awake to awareness of a blunt ache in his ribs. Rukia has rolled over in her sleep, nestled against Ichigo, with her face half buried in his shoulder. He crawls out from under the blankets, doing his best not to disturb the two. Rain patters on the roof, but the shutters let in strokes of tawny light.
It's raining, at dawn, at the brink of the world. The sun, flat and copper-tinted, breaks through the clouds. He steps out of the gatehouse into a moment of glass-bright colours, misted by the rain.
He walks up between the columns that line the bridge, trying to limber his protesting muscles. Even this up close, he can't see where the bridge ends; it melds into the sky where shapes cease to matter in the places between worlds. Rusted hooks for lanterns cling to the wide, etched railing here and there. The structure hums with enchantment so faint he strains to sense it, sunk deep into the stone. Here, the rain thins to mere moisture skimming his cheeks.
"Hey," says a voice from behind. Knuckling his eyes, Ichigo stops beside him. "Something interesting out here?"
"Looked like you two could've used some more shut-eye. Didn't wanna bother you."
"I was awake." Ichigo leans on the railing, squinting as the sun hits his face. "She's pretty beat, though. Healing seems to take a lot outta you, and she's done more'n her fair share lately."
"Yeah. We just suck at stayin' in one piece."
That elicits a husky laugh from Ichigo. "Shut up. We made it, didn't we?"
He only nods, but feels a grin touch the weary curve of his mouth. He was about to venture higher to see where the brigde cuts into the border: now, it's as well to stand here and watch the morning for a little more.
"Listen," Ichigo says, as if bracing to spit out something stupid or difficult.
"Okay."
"And shut up while you're at it." Ichigo crosses his arms over his chest. "Uh, when we get home... things are gonna go back to normal, right? As normal as they can, I mean."
"Mm-hm."
"I don't wanna think about it, but... I got a fuckload of catching up to do if I'm gonna pass high school this year."
"Didn't you have the books with ya? Some of 'em?" On a general level, Renji sympathises. Ichigo's worried about his education before, sometimes at the strangest moments during the war when most of them stopped at hoping to see tomorrow morning. Still, Ichigo has a life to return to, and it isn't in Soul Society. Suppressing the thought, he looks away.
"Yeah. Who's got time for trigonometry and the Meiji Restoration when someone's in mortal danger every five minutes?"
"Don't look at me."
"Your ass was gonna be toast, Abarai."
Renji twitches without quite knowing why. "Consider it a personal favour I'm not gonna answer that, Kurosaki."
Ichigo sighs, long and light. "Duly noted. It was one hell of a trip, anyway."
"Let's not do this again." He rests his elbows on top of the railing, throwing the youth a look. "Could do with less of the deadly peril part next time, eh?"
"Well," Ichigo lets the word drag. "It wasn't all bad. There was the bit with the haiku in the village, what was it, Persimmon Flower? That was damn near inspired. That's not a compliment, you jerkface!" He stabs an accusing finger at him when a grin tugs Renji's lip. "You got us into that mess."
Renji guffaws. "We had to get the translator workin' somehow, right? But the boat, that was all your fault."
"As if," Ichigo grumbles almost fondly. "I don't even wanna know what you were doin' out back before they turned up to throw us into it."
"I got us outta the ravine!" Renji shoves him in the shoulder, a rough, familiar gesture.
"Fine, fine." Even as his countenance sobers, Ichigo seems to get distracted by something on the horizon. "I just wanted to say. We get home, I go back... Take care of her. She's still got some remembering to do."
"Dumbass. You think I'd do anythin' else..."
"I'm not finished. I, ah, you..." Renji blinks at the expression on Ichigo's face, only half visible past his hand tugging at his hair. The fierce focus in his drawn eyebrows is offset by the uncertain curve of his mouth. "You know, I might even..."
"What?" That one word may be a mistake. He can't seem to stand silence as Ichigo gropes for words.
The moment shatters at an alarmed, muted shout from the gatehouse. Ichigo balks upright, his gaze flying first to Renji, then down the arch of the bridge. "Rukia?"
"Fuckin' hell, what—" Renji's longer legs carry him into a momentary lead, but Ichigo catches up in a few strides. They round the lowest column in lockstep, and Renji frees his sword with a savage pull.
They are ten or twelve steps from the hut. Two people, a man holding a sword, a woman with a pair of long knifes, both in travel-stained, loose clothes, stand in between. As they both jar into a halt, Renji realises Ichigo is unarmed.
The door hangs open. A sudden smash echoes from inside.
"I'll take 'em, go!" Ichigo pushes him, and Renji feels his reiatsu thicken in a rush of alacrity and awareness.
He obeys without second thought. The bridge is an anchor for the stuff of reality around them; there's next to no risk of striking an unstable patch. Shunpo throws him across the meagre distance.
The doorway leaps at him even as someone swings at him from the side. He spins and catches the swordsman's downward blow, wrenching their crossed blades to the right and lashing a kick to his knee. He has to keep his opponent moving: any opportunity to speak a spell may mean a too-quick end to this bout. Renji hears Rukia's voice stammering into a kidou chant. Hope flickers in him before her incantation is broken by a crash of wood.
He needs the man off his back. Damn Ichigo; he can put up a fight with his bare hands, but holding two skilled fighters without a weapon was too much. The man is swift and decisive: ducking Renji's kick, he flings his sword into a riposte.
There is the soft whisk of an arrow from above. Instinctively Renji snaps his head skyward, knocking the man fiercely into the doorframe as the shaft embeds itself into the ground. A funnel of humming black dots unfold into a cloud from the quivering feathers. He senses the swordsman lurching away from him.
For an instant, they look like tiny insects. They are motes of fine dust, permeating the air with a musky smell he probably shouldn't breathe in...
With a spasming noise, Ichigo crumples onto his side. He convulses once, then his head drops limp. The woman with the knives stands back as the motes swarm and disperse gently.
Renji clamps a hand on his mouth as nausea wells up, spreading tar through his limbs. His knees fold and he tries to clutch at his sword, but it tumbles from his nerveless fingers. The substance took a moment longer to affect him; Ichigo is smaller and leaner.
Swaying, he sees Rukia: another man emerges from the hut jerking her along. Her mouth is stuffed with what looks like a scarf, her arms bent back by his grip on her wrists. Her eyes widen as the man hauls her past him, shining with fear and rage.
So close, is all he can think. We were so close. What'd the bastards do, lie in wait here? His body is dull and faraway, out of joint with his all too alive mind. The paralysis seems thickest in his legs; his breath scrapes in and out, his mouth almost moulding words.
Who are they? They're good. Tian bin?
That seems the logical conclusion. The only one who could have led them here...
Soft boots stalk towards him. A gloved hand reaches to pluck the arrow from the ground, stroking the feathers to smooth away some minute imperfection.
"You stopped to play house in enemy territory, Abarai-san?" Wei lowers himself onto his haunches, his eyes on level with Renji's. "I take it you weren't the mastermind behind the break-in to the garrison."
Oh, gods.
The dark gold of the sun frames every detail. The world lies in light, yet his eyes squeeze shut to either hide or remember. His hands splay on the ground, cold dirt, withered grass, the chafed stone of the cell floor...
No. Don't break. Not now.
One by one, he took the images and shuttered them away. He tried to forget how Rukia's gentle touch seared memory into his skin, or how he'd sit staring into the fire with two parched eyes because if he blinked, one might be only a socket brimming with blood.
He never wanted to see Ichigo looking at his scarred wrists with such pity on his face.
"You did a rather poor of job covering your tracks." Wei sets a hand under his jaw. He shudders at the fingers on his throat, gripping the formless yell that rises and tamping it down.
Take your hands off me, you fucker.
"You should've killed your little helper." The pad of a finger brushes his pulse point. "That might've delayed us." The girl fell into Wei's hands. He feels numb to the realisation, as if it's either too painful or frivolous to consider.
Renji squares his jaw, feebly. It seems fitting that Wei the Tiger, who takes a great cat as his namesake, enjoys a lingering kill. His touch seems to part Renji's flesh and burrow into the places where he himself can't bear to look.
"I'm afraid I'll have to drag you back all that way." Wei turns his head up to meet his eye. He flinches, facial muscles jerking. He'd speak if the words would come right, but he won't humiliate himself by stammering.
Don't touch me, you can't hold me, leave my friends and go—
Panic, blind and awful, soaks in past every attempt to keep his head. Here he is again on his knees before this man, who so effortlessly made him afraid like he's never been. Fear is an old friend, as is the unforgiving weight of one's own mortality in battle; this is a darker, uglier kind that pries apart his resolve piece by piece.
"Bring the woman." Wei switches to the local language. Renji is mortifyingly grateful when he withdraws his hand. "The boy is unnecessary."
"No," he gasps, forcing his fingers to find purchase in the earth, dragging his gaze where Ichigo slumped down. "No."
Rukia moans, keening, scuffling against her captor, beyond the edge of his sight. The man Renji fought in the doorway steps forward. He sheathes his sword and bares a knife instead. Leaning over Ichigo, he tugs his head back by a fistful of hair.
x x x x x x
Ichigo whips around, away from the woman's darting knives, and draws in a lungful of honey and rot and darkness. Something heavy and sticky encases his body; she dances back even as his eyes mist over. He itches from the inside as if something were teeming along blood vessels and nerve clusters and the marrow of his bones. Far away, someone is speaking, moving.
He doesn't feel himself hit the grass.
The spell or poison infuses him and leaves his mind stranded in the lax bounds of his body. They're in trouble, he heard a noise like an arrow flying, Rukia's inside the hut, Renji was supposed to get her... His limbs don't seem to grasp movement, strength, co-ordination. Mangled words are carried to him, in a pleasant voice that seems to speak accented Japanese.
Something is wrong. He needs to get up. He knows one way to borrow power, with Zangetsu out of his reach.
He plummets inward, passing the sky and streets of his inner world, letting them swoosh past, until all is wet grime, coiled in the furthest reach of his soul. Are you here? Answer me!
The Hollow takes a long, languorous breath, as if waking up. Your... partner's sword-spirit's in trouble, he whispers. Did you notice?
The hell? Shirayuki? Zabimaru? Ichigo pauses at a stab of uncomprehending panic at this incongruity, then forges on. Look, you can mess with me later. I need your help. Try to fuck with me and we'll both die here.
Do decide which you want me to do. It'd be my pleasure, O king.
You have time to joke around, you have time to get this—this thing off us! I need to know what's going on!
What's in it for me? The Hollow is still only a voice now, but he can hear him grinning, too wide across his face, like a gleefully sadistic wrench.
Your continued existence! I can't do this! Move, damn it!
That's it, partner, the Hollow almost purrs. See? Say what you mean and things are so much simpler. Fingers clench around his wrist, and he is pulled up as if through sand or deep water. Let's do this. You want to do this, don't you?
He can't think on everything this means now.
Yeah.
The bony hand chills his own as it draws it up and into a smooth pull from left to right. Near-liquid ice seems to rush through his head, and the darkness shrivels into glowing clarity.
x x x x x x
Rukia fights down the urge to retch against the scarf wadded in her mouth. Her hands are pinned in her captor's much larger ones.
Hu Wei found them. She isn't certain how. She is certain that unless they manage to tip the balance of this encounter, all their lives are forfeit. She forces herself to concentrate on the scene before her, Ichigo gasping and immobile on the ground, Renji on his knees as Wei studies him as if he were some exotic, dangeous animal he has trapped.
Inured to necessity, used to hardship, she finds herself revolting at the casual malice in the man. He's highly resourceful, but appears to allow a personal dimension to influence how he deals with Renji. Partly he is toying, partly there must be a... more complex interest. She has to think in cold, tactical terms, to ignore the horrible pressure on her wrist. The other two—a broad, scarred man, a graceful, stern woman—have their eyes on their leader.
The knot on the gag is at the back of her head, but it was tied in a hurry. With tongue and teeth, Rukia pushes out a little more of the sour-tasting cloth.
Wei stands back from Renji, who seems to resist the paralysis better than Ichigo, fallen to his knees, but still upright. Then Wei speaks, an implied command. "The boy is unnecessary."
She hears herself scream against the fabric, wrenching in a futile attempt to free herself.
Ichigo, get up! Get up! Not like this, no—
x x x x x x
Renji tries to push his power under the layer of paralysis, scratching and gouging without any plan. He must move, he can't move, and—
Ichigo bursts up with a rasping scream that should be beyond a human throat. The man with the knife totters backwards as the jaws of Ichigo's mask, warped enough to cover half his face, snap shut. Then he is on the man before Renji can blink. His foot slams into his stomach with merciless precision, dropping him face down. He pivots towards Renji and grabs his arm with enough force to deaden the blood flow.
"Wha—" Renji can only stare into the darkness of his eyes. Hands on his shoulders, Ichigo returns his gaze; he struggles past the clashing horror and intimacy of the gesture.
Then the sable-smooth power of the Hollow licks over his own: it's like someone sliding a knife between fruit and peel and yanking off the skin in a single movement. The paralysis falls away in one graceful slide. Renji staggers with the raw lightness of his body, with his muscles responding as they should. Ichigo stumbles, bracing himself on a knee.
The mask shatters; a pulse of power wracks the air. Renji reaches out with a gasp, but Ichigo's sleeve shuffs through his fingers as the youth collapses.
x x x x x x
Ichigo surges up with the red-streaked oval of a Hollow mask gleaming on his face. His power cracks against Rukia, flaring as he drops his would-be killer with a kick she can barely see.Buffeted by the dark charge of his reiatsu, Wei and the woman stumble backwards.
That is him, Rukia comprehends. He's in control now.
That returns her purpose. T he gag blocks the sound of her voice, but she might be able to form the syllables. Her captor's grip has slackened with momentary shock. With desperate force, tugging together as much of her power as possible, she summons the strongest binding she can do with her hands seized.
"Way of binding—nine—Geki!" The spell wraps around the man in a beat of scarlet energy. He reels back, but the kidou freezes his grip on her, and she topples after him. Frantically wresting away, she sees Renji whirl away from Ichigo, now prone on the ground.
That is all she needs to know. Renji is free, Ichigo's aura blank with unconsciousness. She'll worry about him later. Renji wheels towards Wei, Zabimaru back in his hand, so she tears the gag off and commences a chant. As if brought out of a daze, the woman flips her knives and advances on her. The binding Rukia fired at her captor was weak; this one must finish the task.
One blade swishes towards her, nearly throwing off her concentration as she ducks, the edge passing the crown of her head. The woman slams the back of her studded glove into Rukia's jaw. Glints of light swim in her vision. Thrusting both hands forward, she calls out the final syllables of the first spell. The shining bars converge at her assailant's chest in a tremor of energy, clinching her in the middle of a blow.
"Rikujoukourou!" Rukia snaps out again. The second binding in the double incantation pours into shafts of light from her outflung palms.
x x x x x x
Ichigo moved, and Renji could only respond on trust and instinct. The mask breaking tells him there will be no further help from the youth, but his hand closes on Zabimaru's hilt and his eyes find Wei, gaping, an arrow nocked on the string of his bow. The traces of astonishment on his face suffuse Renji with satisfaction.
Got you, bastard. That should be somethin' even you don't see every day. If he can help it, it'll be the last thing Wei ever sees. He shunts away the sounds of Rukia's scuffle behind him. She'll manage. This is the only strike that will matter.
"Howl—"
The release blazes up and dies in his hand. An immovable grip closes around his power and strangles. Zabimaru roars in dismay and outrage, thrashing against the restraint. The sword feels a mere lump of steel, inert, common.
His shikai is smothered.
He's done this! He's tainted us! Zabimaru rails, the voices of the nue mingling into disturbing echoes.
Wei springs into motion, his bow discarded as he swerves round Renji with a fluid flash-step. His confusion vanishes in the way of grim intent. He dives after Wei, sword leading—released or not, it will cut—his mind racing to keep up with the cascade of things happening much too quickly.
Pivoting, Wei blocks his gliding strike with a harsh clang of steel, slinking back even as he angles their joined blades steeply to the side. There's no sword in his hand, only a long, smooth-edged knife. Renji allows his grip to loosen and flex to free his weapon–never leave a blade locked with your enemy's, then spins to stay on Wei's left best as he can. Never leaving shunpo, they whirl around each other: Wei is sharp and strong, never hesitating despite his clear disadvantage in reach.
"What did you do to my sword?"
"Oh, after my trade secrets now, are you?" Wei stabs towards Renji's shoulder, deftly shifting into a slash that splits the skin of his arm as he is an eyeblink too slow in parrying. It's more like a fast-beating, graceful practice spar; they may well be equal or nearly so in power, but Renji's exhaustion hampers him, and Wei keeps him at bay with too little effort.
"Whatever," he throws back. "Won't matter when I cut you in—" He feints to the right, then tips the angle of the sword and slams it down along Wei's blade, wrenching the knife from his grip. Now!
The knife tumbles to the ground, but Wei no longer stands there. Renji swears aloud as he hurtles after the man again. Shunpo over short distances can be disorienting, the flood of sensory input coming hard and fast. Movement flashes past him, and he pushes himself into quicker flash-step; then, in the second that he perceives Wei again, the man raises his voice into a shout. "Stop!"
Renji hears a high gasp, stunned or frightened, perhaps his own. The ground seems to crumble from underneath him.
"Don't move, little outlaw," Wei says evenly. "That goes for you as well, Abarai-san."
A red droplet oozes down Rukia's throat under a slim knife in Wei's hand.
She stands unmoving before the much taller man, her hands wound behind her back. Ichigo lies not far away, his breath sawing in and out. The man Ichigo kicked hasn't got up. Wei's two remaining helpers are frozen by binding kidou, yet the observation rings empty in his mind.
"You son of a bitch." Renji nearly chokes on the murderous fury that throbs through him. "What the hell is this?"
"My parentage is irrelevant here, Abarai-san. You didn't think I'd let you run after that escapade at the garrison?"
"Don't you dare pull her into this." His voice cracks. "Don't you dare, you fucker, she's done nothin'."
"Drop your weapon. You can't summon its power, but I'd rest easier if it was further away." Wei moves the hand grasping Rukia's; she jerks, tight and involuntary, and a sickening noise escapes through her clenched teeth.
Zabimaru rings on the ground as Renji lets go. No choice there.
"It's me you want," he mutters. "Let them go."
"And lose the bounty on your little outlaw? That was clever, using her to get in. Half the mercenaries on Tiangen would've sold their mothers to collect that prize."
"The other half don't know their mothers, or they'd follow suit," Renji snaps. Rukia radiates defiance in spite of her hurt and humiliation, her face angled to the side and towards Ichigo.
Keep him talkin'. He likes the sound of his own voice. Give Zabimaru... time. Yeah.
He casts out a terse thought. Calm down. You gotta think. There's a way.
The nue doesn't answer. Renji has to trust that he's listening.
"I wonder if I could get something for your young protegé, too," Wei says. "Is he some sort of a hybrid? His power was like a tian bin until the... transformation."
"Curious?" Renji sneers. "A minute ago you were gonna kill him. Would've been a terrible waste, dont'cha think?"
"One doesn't store tainted meat." Wei's face hardens. Renji knows he is toeing a tightrope here, one that may come loose at any moment.
"Tainted? Watch what you say. He tore through your fancy-ass binding like paper."
"It seems he also exhausted himself doing so." Wei jabs with the knife: the bead of blood becomes a thin, glistening line. Rukia gasps, her eyes unblinking, and the need to meet her gaze is nearly insurmountable. Renji's hands clench as he keeps his entire focus on Wei.
"All right," hesnarls, yet it sounds too much like a plea. "Let's cut the horseshit. What do you want?"
x x x x x x
You saved him, and now he can't fight. Tell me again, partner, how the hell did you end up holding the reins?
Ichigo's heart should hammer loud enough to drown out the Hollow. No such luck.
If you don't get it, then you'll never understand. Shut your trap.
Oh, I do get it, the Hollow hums somewhere in the space that is neither physical reality nor his inner world. I know what you were saying, king, before you were so rudely interrupted.
Funny that, he rejoins. Since I don't even know.
Through the mire of utter exhaustion, a fleeting idea nudges him that this isn't what he should be doing. Arguing with the Hollow is a useless pastime; he only understands the law of the strongest. Why is he still here? He should be standing up, fighting, seeing that Rukia and Renji are...
The Hollow is partly right; he might not know the words to express what he wanted to say on the bridge, but he knows their meaning, deeper inside than words can even go.
Really, partner? Then I guess you can manage this one without my help? Think he can manage without the help of his chattering monkey?
That sends a quiver of alarm resonating through him. Something's happened to Zabimaru. What the hell are you saying?
I said he was in a tight spot, the Hollow drawls. The old man could've told you, but he's still worn out from last time. Took a lot out of him, pulling your ass out of the fire...
Okay. Then, you help me.
For an agonising moment, glacial silence is his only answer, cold whistling through the space between.
Then Ichigo drags his eyes open and strains to see in the dulled glare of the sun.
Through the slim blades of grass, so far on the rim of his sight she blurs into mere shape and colour, Rukia is staring straight at him. Sunlight is reflected off something a small ways ahead of him, almost within his reach.
Get me there, the Hollow whispers.
x x x x x x
"What do I want?" Wei repeats. "To be blunt, I want you, Abarai Renji, or whatever your name is. You never did answer my questions. It would've been downright unseemly to let you run home with all that intelligence on us."
"Wha—you thought we were spyin' on you lot?"
"Don't insult me." Wei grits his teeth; Renji may not be the only one whose composure is crumbling. "You're a member of a foreign military, sent here in secret. Need I continue? I will kill. I will lie, and extort, and interrogate in the name of my oath. Should I assume you'd do anything less?"
Renji understands something, and the realisation drenches him in ice. This man is a fine soldier, loyal, steadfast, disciplined.
"I came to get her," he says with shattering honesty. "We don't care. I got orders to do one thing, and that's to bring her home."
This man imprisoned and tortured him, fabricated a dozen gruesome fates to whisper at him in the darkness to break his resistance. If he moves an inch now, gives any suggestion to Wei that he is a threat, the knife will slit Rukia's throat.
"How very altruistic of you." Wei gives a low, incredulous noise. "Unacceptable. She'll answer for her crimes, and so will you. The boy is too much trouble to keep alive."
Muscles bunch along his back and shoulders, his body so tight with vain intent that it nearly makes him light-headed. Rukia is slipping beyond his reach, balanced on the edge of the blade on her skin.
This man will hunt him beyond the ends of the earth because he is a threat, and because he didn't break under his hands. As if from a great distance, he knows he's stepped into a deadlock he has no hope of cracking unless at the cost of lives dearer to him than his own.
He took that step himself, on a wild hope, a desire that is now his undoing.
x x x x x x
Every shift of air in her throat seems to press her windpipe fractionally closer to the knife. Wei has a grip on her hands that will alert him the second she moves them into a kidou mudra. Watching Ichigo consumes her; she can't even twitch before he grasps the sword half-hidden in the grass beside him. He moves in arduous, near-silent jerks, one at a time. Renji retorts to every one of Wei's taunts, only his face is pale and hollow, despair winning ground with each passing moment.
She has no strength left to lend either of them, but there is one more thing she can do.
Ichigo reaches Zabimaru's hilt and pulls himself up halfway. His knuckles whiten around the handle.
Rukia pounds her heel into Wei's knee viciously and precisely. He buckles with a curse—and steel whispers across her throat in a deep, clean slice. Her next exhalation gurgles, although she feels no pain, only the blood soaking her collar.
She knew she might take the cut. The blade was pressed too close. Clasping a hand on her neck, she tries to think, reason, remember, cohere her will into a healing spell in spite of the wetness welling through her fingers.
How quickly does a neck vein bleed? Renji yells her name over the rush of her breath like a broken drum. Her reiatsu floats in a light, hazy swirl as if she weighed nothing.
Focus, mumbles something through the soft, cloudy sheen that blossoms in her mind. It doesn't hurt. She should move away from the man who was restraining her. She can't seem to catch her breath...
x x x x x x
All he can see is the crimson flowing down her throat. Wei hobbles back on a pure reflex of pain; Renji hardly notices, as he teeters forward, hand flung out as she crashes down, vainly seizing at her own neck. "Rukia, Rukia—"
"Renji! Here!" Ichigo barks from the side. He thinks he must be going mad, the words meaningless, inconceivable, all this a dream or a hallucination. "Look at me!"
Another voice overwhelms the cacophony of his own thoughts, strong and sharp. Renji! Zabimaru bellows in a tone that suffers no disobedience. Control yourself! This is our fight. We haven't lost yet. Look at him!
He looks.
The effort seeming to shake him to the bone, Ichigo, leaning up on one trembling arm, lifts Zabimaru. "Do it!"
Straining for a steady throw, Ichigo slings Renji's own sword hilt-first at him. He has no chance to question or second-guess—the hilt slams into his palm, his fingers close around the leather-wound grip, and hesitation drains from him. Rukia slumps on the ground on all fours; with willpower he can't question right now, he ignores the damp hiss of her breath.
Everything else blurs away but the clean goal before him as he advances three steps and plunges the blade into Wei's chest. With a rasp, the man falls forward, impaled above the heart. Renji takes the weight of him and pushes himself upright, his mind narrowed to this one purpose. Wei opens pain-clouded eyes at him.
Renji pulls the sword free. He's grown used to the two-edged blade; the heft and reach are solid and agreeable.
"Said I'd fuckin' kill you," he declares low.
Severing the head is the only way to permanently slay a shinigami. He's kept the sword sharp and oiled, but it takes more than one blow: blood pools, viscous and abundant, beneath the body by the time he is done.
"That's Vice-Captain Abarai Renji, Sixth Division of the Gotei," he mutters the formal combatant's salute, raking the back of his hand over his face. "Makin' sure you'll never touch anyone I love again."
He's dead.
"Renji?"
Reality squeezes through the red-tinged funnel of his anger, and his heart seems to crawl into his throat. Rukia. He falters at the shame that all but overwhelms him, washing away the rage and resolve and incipient relief.
A hand settles on his arm, turning him around as he follows the tug, and then he has to blink away a sting in his eyes as she glowers up at him with hard indigo eyes. Her face and neck are smeared with blood, but she is whole, alive, breathing in an even rhythm.
Rukia is safe. That was all Wei could ever make him doubt, and nothing else should matter. Why then was she lost in his need for revenge, shadowed by the pain he was put through?
He's dead, his mind echoes, inclement.
"There's something strange about Ichigo's reiatsu. He isn't hurt, but I can't wake him."
"He's dead," he tells her.
"Don't be a fool! Are you listening?" Her ungloved hands are a livid scarlet, blood rubbed into the skin, as she raises them to take hold of his face. "Renji. Ichigo isn't responding, and I don't know what to do."
"Yeah, okay." His training seems to slowly build the correct course of action. The battle is over, now disable or dispatch the last of the enemy, take care of your own, report back. "We gotta do somethin' about the others, too." They took down Wei's retainers, but none of them should have fatal injuries.
"That is a little better." As if only now realising the state of her hands, she begins scrubbing them with her scarf.
"Right." He finds a brusque tone, pushing back everything nonessential. "And the... the body. Don't think many people are gonna be sorry to hear he's dead."
"It's a capital offence to murder an officer," she mumbles, as if that occurred to her only now.
"I know!" He gestures impatiently. "He was a fanatic, Rukia. You remember how scared that girl—Mei—was of him?"
"Yes, I do."
"Somethin' tells me they might not look too hard if he doesn't come back to Phoenix Gate. I gather her father's the commander there. The others aren't in uniform, so maybe they're his own people."
"That's a great deal of guessing, but we can't stay here. Ichigo needs help I can't give."
Worry about what is real. Save those that you can. Renji ducks into the gatehouse to grab his bag, fumbling it open as he re-emerges. "Almost forgot about it, but..." He holds up the memory modifier, stuffed deep enough in the inner pocket that it went unnoticed when the spirit phone was taken.
"What's that?" Rukia's frown deepens as he explains. "We alter their memories? Are you sure that will work?"
"If you don't wanna test it—"
"No. That's... I do not like the thought of killing them."
He isn't even certain if he agrees, but simply nods. They stun the three and bind them hand and foot. Renji flashes the modifier at each one and doesn't voice the thought that left here, they are demon bait in any case. Thatisn't his concern.
Last of all, he lays Wei's body and head on a blanket and bundles them up into the makeshift shroud. Rukia watches him work. "What will you do with him?"
"We bury the dead in the sea." He shoulders the bundle. "The sea's right there." He walks up, then turns to climb the railing of the bridge. The top is broad enough to crouch on. He goes on one knee and she kneels next to him, so his greater bulk shields her from the whipping wind. The waves far below carry froth on their backs.
"You think he deserves a burial?"
"No." Renji pushes the blood-stained bundle towards the edge. "But I'm not like him, and he's gotta know that."
He can never remember what the older captains say at these times. Back in Rukongai, you were lucky to have someone care for your body after death. "So... I'm just gonna give you to the sea, then. Feels like too good a fate, but I figure it'll know what to do with you better'n me."
The body slides off the railing and is lost in the churning waters. Rukia holds onto his shoulder, for his support and hers. Covering her hand with his own, he tries to exhale the heaviness inside him. Somehow, it seems a poor atonement.
"Let's go," he says then.
The gate is permanent; all they have to worry about is the time limit. Sliding Zabimaru into his sash is unfamiliar after carrying him over his shoulder for so long. Carefully, he hoists Ichigo up and over his shoulders, so his back bears his weight. Rukia returns from the gatehouse, bearing both Shirayuki and Zangetsu.
"I don't think we'll need any of our other things."
"Just leave everythin' you won't miss." She may have some personal mementoes, but their equipment will only burden them. "Over this bridge's Soul Society. Either we're stuck in the border or we get to home ground."
"It'd be a sorry end to this journey. You said this crossing depends on intent. We don't have much, but we must give it what we do have."
He gathers himself. "We aren't stoppin' before home, then."
"No."
They dash forward together.
x x x x x x
They plunge through the gate almost abreast. The world lodges into place: a field bathed in an amber sundown, the rich smell of earth after rain, a scratch of crisp wind.
Rukia veers around to help ease Ichigo down into the grass, and Renji bows forward, hands on his legs. She is panting, too, supporting Ichigo's head against her shoulder. Behind them, the hum of the gate stops as the connection cuts off. The gate is under constant watch: even now, somewhere wheels will push into motion to send word ahead that Vice-Captain Abarai and Kurosaki Ichigo have returned, but for now, all he can think of is drawing the next breath.
The sound of people shouting makes Renji finally push through his exhaustion. The gate frame stands on a hilltop, with plenty of open space around it. Someone is going to come up, and they'll be looking at him for a report. What is more, Ichigo needed to be at the Fourth several moments ago.
Footfalls swish through the grass. Renji turns to see, and bows at the man now standing next to them. "Captain."
"Renji." Captain Kuchiki acknowledges him. "A medical squad is on its way."
"Thank you, sir," he says and has never meant it more.
Hurriedly, he kneels next to Rukia and slides an arm around Ichigo. "Here, lemme take him."
"But..."
"Rukia. It's okay." He nods towards the captain. "Go."
Her eyes widen slowly as if in a dream. Captain Kuchiki stands still, his shadow stretched behind him on the hill. Renji would turn away, but he needs to support Ichigo; Rukia's hands have fallen slack in her lap. Clambering onto her feet, she brushes at her clothes as if to dispel the grime and wear on them.
"Rukia." The captain's voice scrapes where it should be smooth and calm.
She's biting the inside of her cheek, Renji can tell. He wonders if the captain notices such nuances in her. What does she remember of him? He tenses in spite of himself. I should've talked to her.
He has never seen Captain Kuchiki hesitate. Now he does, and his fingers curl towards Rukia's shoulder before his hand falls. Renji holds his peace; Captain Kuchiki is looking at her, not him. He's acutely aware he never could report to his captain they'd found her. He knows nothing of what she's been through.
The moment is broken by a squad of the Fourth hastening up the hill. Two shinigami come carrying a stretcher; they set it on the ground and make to lift Ichigo onto it.
"Vice-Captain Abarai?" One of them, a grave-faced woman, bows towards Renji. He's gripping Ichigo's shoulder so hard his arm shakes.
"Oh, sorry." He blinks. "He's not physically hurt, but he needs Captain Unohana. Soon as possible."
"If you'll let us..." She gestures at the stretcher.
"I should go with you." There are too many people around and too many things he needs to do. "I..."
"You are dismissed." Captain Kuchiki sobers him like nothing else could. "I will have your report later."
"Yes, sir," Renji says, hoarse. Past the captain, he looks at Rukia and tries to infuse the glance with reassurance. "I'll be back soon as I can," he adds, that all to her.
Then he settles Ichigo on the stretcher with the woman's help and hurries off along the medical squad.
x x x x x x
The even-voiced, black-haired man watches her across a small distance. Two steps forward and she could touch him.
This must be her brother, she thinks with curious coolness, clad in the mantle of a captain. He's tall and still; she knows the chiselled lines of his face. The strange thing is that he's looking straight at her, from the caked blood on her face to her muddy boots.
She hears Renji's goodbye and wishes so much she could return it. He'll see Ichigo will be cared for, so she shouldn't worry.
Her brother never turns away. The situation is surreal. She wishes this were the twilight of his study, where she could count the tatami and bow at the proper distance.
"Honoured brother." She unslings the swords strapped across her body. They fall with a clatter as her fingers slip. She folds into a full reverence, palms to the ground and angled inward, her brow touching them. "I am sorry to have given you such cause for concern. I offer my humble apologies."
Grass whispers as he steps back.
x x x x x x
Thanks to Kari for Renji meta that persuaded my brain back to this chapter, and to my brave 'Pea for talking this one through with me.
Consider my ideas of Soul Society funerary rites artistic licence.