Corie=27
Kaneki=22
Corie slowly came down the stairs of :re early in the morning before the café opened, still needing to lean against the wall for support.
"Hey, how are you feeling?" Touka asked the woman.
With a little difficulty, Corie slowly eased herself into one of the chairs in front of the counter. "Like I've fought fifty investigators by myself. Everything hurts. But it sure is better waking up here than in Cochlea."
Touka put a mug and a plate on the counter. "Here. I made some coffee and grabbed some meat from the fridge down below. That should help you get your energy back."
"I just want to be able to use my kagune. I never knew how stifling it could be to not be able to use it at all." Corie slowly began digging into her meal and sighed happily. It tasted infinitely better than the slop served in Cochlea. "Mm…it's been months since I've been able to drink your coffee. You're better at this than I am."
"Um…so, Corie, there's probably something you should know."
Corie grimaced. "The last time you said that, you told me that Kaneki had lost all his memories. What is it this time?"
Before Touka could answer, a familiar purple-haired ghoul walked into the café. "Ah, mon ange, how it wounds me to see you so weak!"
"Tsukiyama?!" Corie exclaimed. "What are you doing…out of bed?"
"Well, Miss Kirishima came to see me and told me about how you had been captured by those terrible Doves. So naturally, I offered my assistance to help get you away from them."
Corie raised a suspicious eyebrow.
"She may have also told me that my sweet Kaneki is still alive."
"There it is. Well, it's nice to be an afterthought."
"You could've just told me he was still alive, Miss Masataka, instead of wasting your words trying to get me to leave my room."
"Well, I was trying to help you get a grip first, and then I planned on telling you. I had to make sure you wouldn't immediately go and try to eat him again."
"Have I not already proven that I am a changed man? Honestly, what more must I do to show you that I am not who I was before?"
"Go take a long walk off a short cliff."
Tsukiyama smirked. "Feisty as ever, I see. Even after being in that awful ghoul prison. So is it true that my sweet Kaneki has lost all of his beautiful memories of moi?"
"Yes, but all of his memories came back last night just before he helped me escape. I guess that means he remembers you too."
"Oh, you sound frustrated, dear. Did you perhaps not want him to remember me?"
"Bite me."
"If you insist."
"Enough," Touka interjected. She turned to Corie. "Look, we had no idea how we were going to break you out and we needed all the help we could get. I knew that if Tsukiyama knew that Kaneki was alive, he would help us."
Hearing that Touka had worked so hard to help her upon learning she was in trouble, Corie felt a lump in her throat. How long had it been since someone had gone to such lengths to help her? How long had it been since she'd let someone help her?
Touka leaned forward onto the counter. "What's the plan now?"
"I have no idea," Corie answered as she took another sip of the wonderfully brewed coffee. "I kind of didn't have anything worked out beyond Kaneki getting his memories back."
"Where is he now?"
"The guards who were taking me to my execution were killed, which I'm pretty sure Irimi and Koma were responsible for. Because of that, no one at the CCG knows he remembers everything, so we decided that for the time being, he would pretend to be Sasaki and find out information that he can get back to us."
"What kind of information?"
"Our main focus right now is finding out what happened to Dr. Kanou. Ever since we stormed his hideout two years ago, I haven't heard anything about him, and I want to know if he's making more half-ghouls like he did with Kaneki. I…I was so focused on protecting Kaneki from ghouls that may want to harm him that I forgot there are humans out there that are harming other people too."
Touka sighed. "Then we'll have to wait until Kaneki gets back in contact with you before we decide to do anything."
"I need to go the training area and see if I can get my kagune out."
"You're not doing anything until you take it easy for at least a week. You look awful."
"I'll be fine. I have to try."
"No. You have been through a lot, Corie. You're not going down there until you heal, and don't test me because I will stop you. And in your current condition, you're gonna be pretty easy to take down."
Though frustrated, Corie couldn't help but smile. She had thought she would never get to hear Touka nag her again.
For the next week, Corie stayed at :re and did her best to get some rest and take it easy. The problem was that whenever she tried to sleep, she was plagued with endless nightmares about her torturous imprisonment in Cochlea. She would wake up in a panic and it took several moments for her to remember that she was not prisoner and she wasn't going to die at Jiro's hands.
She wondered if Sasaki had ever had nightmares. With a sinking feeling, she realized that now that Kaneki's memories had returned, all of his nightmares, particularly the ones about Yamori torturing him, probably would too.
Maybe it really would've been better if she had just stayed out of the way and left him alone…
Well, it was too late to turn back or start having regrets now.
Once she had gotten her strength back, she put on a dark hoodie and tossed the hood up to hide her face since she was a wanted ghoul now and she was sure the CCG made sure everyone in Japan knew what she looked like.
She traversed to the underground tunnel where she used to train with Kaneki. It was empty and she had no idea when it had last been used. She had missed this place. Things were always simpler down here. In this space, all that matter was training and getting stronger. Nothing outside of this room existed and one could forget about all of the trouble happening above.
Corie removed her sweatshirt and tossed it aside. Then she took several deep breaths and focused all her energy into releasing her kagune.
"Come on," she pleaded of the additional organ. "Please come out! Please!"
She tried and tried over and over until her muscles screamed for her to stop. Nothing exited from her back and she could not make any of her tentacles form.
Before being taken to Cochlea, it had been difficult to release her kagune, but it always eventually came.
This time, there was absolutely nothing.
Corie sank to the ground in tears.
She suddenly felt two arms slide around her to pull her close.
"How…how did you know I was here?" she choked out.
"Sibling intuition," Kaneki replied. "What happened?"
"I can't…I can't get my kagune out. After giving myself RC suppressants for the last year and then everything that was pumped into me in Cochlea…it was too much. No matter how hard I try, it just won't come out."
"Corie, you don't need your kagune to fight."
"Yes, I do. My kagune was what made me such a good fighter. It's why the CCG rated Lightning SS."
"I saw you training my squad. You defeated all of them multiple times and that was you holding back so as to appear human to them. You can't tell me that in all the places you've been, you never worked on your hand-to-hand combat."
"Kagunes are how we survive. It doesn't matter how good I am at combat. I can't fight other ghouls when I don't have mine."
Kaneki sighed. He didn't like it, but she had a point. After he had first become a ghoul, he had tried to go without using his kagune and quickly learned that he would get slaughtered if he didn't learn how to use it and control it.
"How about we spar in a few days when I get some time off?" he asked. "And this time, we can really spar without both of us pretending to be someone else."
Corie smiled through her tears. "That sounds like exactly what I need."
"Good."
She didn't tell him about the nightmares or her doubts about her actions regarding him getting his memories back. She wasn't sure she wanted to know what his response would be.
"Have you learned anything since we last saw each other?" she asked.
"Just that those two investigators were killed by two invading ghouls who managed to break into Cochlea. Interestingly enough, they didn't break anyone out. They just slipped in, killed them, and left."
"Touka told me Irimi and Koma broke in that night to try to find me so they could prepare to break me out. They must've killed the two investigators so that no one knew you had gotten your memories back. It would've been pretty bad for you if everyone found out while you were still in Cochlea."
"Yeah, you're probably right. I'll keep looking for information on Dr. Kanou and the other One-Eyed Owl. Can you meet here next week?"
"Yeah. You do realize you're going to have to talk to Touka eventually, right?"
Kaneki grimaced. "I know."
"I know she's intimidating, but she deserves to see you."
"It's not that I don't want to see her. It's just…I don't know, I can't explain it."
"You've always wanted to protect her from your world, and I get that. But…shutting her out and pushing her away isn't going to do either of you any good. She's tougher than you give her credit for. I think you need to give her a chance."
Kaneki sighed. "Yeah, you're right. How about…we spar down here for a while, and then…we'll go to :re together."
"Sounds good. You know…there's another person you need to see."
"Who?"
"Hide."
Kaneki's heart skipped a few beats. "He's…he's still alive?"
"Yeah. I don't know where he is now, but he came to see me a little while ago asking about how you were doing. It was nice to catch up. He really misses you."
Kaneki didn't know what to say. He could barely remember the last time he'd seen his best friend, but what he did know was that it hadn't been a great meeting. He remembered feeling tired and weak and too many thoughts invading him all at once.
And then Hide showed up. And then…
He didn't want to remember after that.
"Well, for now, just rest up," he finally said. "Maybe your body just needs to heal for a while and get rid of all that RC suppressant on its own."
"Maybe. But I think I have to face the possibility that my kagune is gone for good. I knew the risks. This is my burden to bear."
That certainly didn't stop Kaneki from feeling guilty that he was ultimately the reason she couldn't get her kagune out anymore.
When she and Kaneki met below in the tunnel, the two of them engaged in hand-to-hand combat for a little over two hours. It was not so much for training purposes but more to relieve themselves of all their anger and anxieties and forget about everything happening above them for a little while. For this reason, there was absolutely no mention of the CCG, Kanou, or Eto for the duration of their fight.
Unfortunately, they couldn't stay down in the tunnel forever.
The both of them slowly returned to the world above, careful to keep both of their faces hidden, and walked back to :re.
"Welcome to…"
Touka's voice faltered when she saw who had stepped into the café.
"Uh, hey, Touka," Kaneki said sheepishly.
The young woman marched over to him and slammed his head onto the counter.
Corie shook her head. It appeared that some things would never change.
"Well, I feel better now," Touka said.
Kaneki picked himself up off the floor.
She gave him a warm smile. "Welcome back, Ken."
Was it possible for Touka to have become even more beautiful than when he had last seen her a few weeks ago? It just didn't seem possible for one person to be so incredibly pretty.
Maybe she was just that much more beautiful because he now remembered exactly who she was to him.
"Did I hear that Kaneki was back?!" Tsukiyama quickly but somehow still gracefully came out from the back of the café. "So it's true! You really are alive! Incroyable! It cannot be!"
"Yeah, yeah, it's wonderful that you're still a perverted freak," Corie said with a wave of her hand. "We have more pressing matters to deal with."
Kaneki, Corie, Touka, Yomo, Irimi, Koma, and (to everyone's disdain) Tsukiyama gathered in the back of the shop to discuss their next move now that Kaneki was Kaneki again.
"I have a lead about Dr. Kanou," Kaneki explained. "After we stormed his hideout two years ago, the CCG completely cleared it out. However, I managed to track down a building the CCG used several years ago for secret experimental work. When it was revealed the investigators and scientists were involved in questionably ethical experiments, it was shut down and has been out of use ever since. What's interesting is that Dr. Kanou's name appeared on the list of scientists who were part of the team conducting the experiments. It's possible that he's using that building now."
"Wouldn't the CCG have already explored the place?" Corie asked.
"That's the thing. They raided it several years ago and found nothing. I guess after that, they just forgot it existed."
"It's a long shot, but it's all we've got. We should check it out as soon as possible. Maybe we can find something on my cousin while we're there."
"Touka—"
"Don't," she quickly cut him off. "Don't even think about leaving me out of this. If you so much as attempt to leave me out of anything from now on, I'll kill you in your sleep."
Everyone knew that was a total lie, but Kaneki got the message quite clearly.
"We'll need to infiltrate as quietly as possible. The CCG cannot know about any of this."
"Just tell us what to do, Kaneki," Irimi said. "We follow your lead."
"Hey, Uta," Corie smiled as she stepped inside the mask shop.
Uta swiveled around on his chair to look at her. "Good to see you up and alive, Cor. I heard you got pretty close there."
"Yeah…" She stepped closer to him and ran her hand over his head. "Your hair's gotten so long."
"I decided to grow it out."
"I like it like this."
Uta swiveled his chair back to the desk and continued working on his current mask. "What can I do for you?"
"I want to ask a favor."
"I already started making you a new mask. Figured after you were outed as Lightning, you were going to need a new one. Too bad because that one suited you best."
"No, that wasn't it, but thanks."
"What is it this time?"
"I…I can't access my kagune anymore."
Uta paused and brought his hands down from the mask. "I warned you that was a possibility when I gave that stuff to you."
"Yeah, I know. It's not that I didn't listen, I just didn't have any other choice. Everyone says that if I give it time, it'll come back, but…when I try to release it, I don't feel anything at all. None of my muscles respond the way they used to."
"Well, you can only suppress it so much before it stays that way."
"Without it, I don't have any way to defend myself, much less protect the people I care about. I have nothing."
"I wouldn't say nothing. You've always been a pretty good fighter even without it."
"So I've heard. It doesn't change the fact that up against the people we face, I'm dead without it. I need something. Anything at all to replace it."
Uta raised an eyebrow when he guessed where this was going.
"I want you to teach me how to change my appearance. In all the places I've been, I've never met anyone who can do what you can."
Uta put down his tools and turned to face her. "There's a reason for that. Only ghouls who have a certain genetic makeup can do it, and even the ghouls who have it can't do it because it's insanely difficult to learn."
"I know something about learning difficult techniques."
"Fair enough. I'll teach you, but I can't be sure you'll actually be able to do it."
"We won't know until we try."
"Follow me."
He stood up from his chair and walked into one of the back rooms. Corie slowly followed him inside where there were two large shelves full of materials needed for the masks he made. Two chairs facing each other sat directly in between them.
Uta sat in one of them. "Take a seat."
Corie sat down across from him.
"Rule #1 is that you can't mimic anyone of the opposite sex so you're stuck imitating women."
"Okay."
"Close your eyes. Picture someone's face. Someone you know pretty well. Picture every single detail about that face, right down to the tiniest freckle. Now relax. Feel every blood cell inside you, everything that makes you a ghoul. Focus on all of those cells, and let them do what is necessary to complete your transformation."
Corie followed all of his instructions to the best of her ability, but after five minutes of concentration, she had nothing to show for it.
"All right, let me do something simpler. Relax, and focus on that one person's voice. Remember how she speaks, how she says each word, the type of lilt she has, and anything else completely unique to her. Let your vocal cords relax and fix themselves as they see fit. Now say something."
"Um…hey, how's it going?"
No luck. All that came out was Corie's own voice.
Uta stood up from his chair. "Work on it yourself. If you can change your appearance or even your voice the slightest bit, come back and see me."
Corie sighed as he left to return to his work. It was a stretch and she knew it, but losing her kagune was a huge blow to her and she needed something to replace it. She needed to feel in control again. This was all she had left.
