Chapter Fifty-Four
"We'll talk later."
That was the only word from the captains when they found out the Special Units had been fighting in Seireitei without orders. Kurosaki Taichou was one of four captains being treated by the Fourth Division captain and her circle of most talented healers, and without him no one seemed ready to deal with the outsiders.
In the meantime, they helped wherever they could.
Erina and Kitsune spent every moment with the Fourth Division, trying to help the staggeringly overworked healers keep their patients alive. Things were so desperate that the Twelfth Division came in to help, too, under strict supervision. Delicate surgery and repairing the inner workings of wounded men was, somewhat worryingly, a simple task for some of the more spirit-organics inclined among them.
Charles joined what was left of the Fifth, Seventh, and Eleventh Divisions putting together temporary structures and clearing debris. Beams of heavy wood made for strange equipment, but the rules of his release seemed to accept them after he touched them for long enough, allowing him to half or even quarter their weight through the manipulation of gravity.
Dikayumi and Herald, with Lilynette at his side, joined up with the search-and-rescue operations of the Eighth Division's Cat Guard and the last surviving members of the Stealth Force. The Second Division had apparently suffered more casualties then any other Division. The rumors claimed that, after the death of Captain Soi-fon, the lieutenant had led every loyal member of the Division that he could find in a secret raid to destroy Caro's Silenciosa, and none of them had been seen since. There was no sign of the rumored battle and no evidence, but that in and of itself, the thoroughness with which the so-called Silent Death had vanished, seemed to some a good indicator.
There was no time for rest, no time to think. Everyone had something to do, and a dozen more urgent things to do once that was done. What remained of the Fourteenth Division almost seemed to vanish in the chaos, scattered across Seireitei and too busy to even exchange notes.
Herald found Yylfordt two days after Caro's defeat and "disappearance".
He'd been following Lilynette up Sogyoku Hill, hoping she had something in her senses that were beyond his, when he spotted a lone figure sitting in the branches of one of the many leafless trees that covered half the plateau.
The former-Arrancar didn't make any acknowledgment of Herald's approach; he just sat, his arms crossed over his knee, staring blankly into the distance.
Herald motioned for Lilynette to wait, then went to sit down with a sigh against the trunk of the tree. He gave the silence a good, respectful moment before breaking it.
"You couldn't find him either, then?"
Yylfordt's response was a dull, almost lifeless, "No."
Another long moment. Then, "We will keep looking. He might have gone back to the World of the Living... or he could be in the Rukongai already, searching for Szayel."
The branch creaked as Yylfordt shifted. The blonde glanced down at Herald, then back at the horizon.
"Maybe."
Herald's voice sharpened intensely, so much that it made Lilynette sit up suddenly and flick her ears. "Trust me, Yylfordt, we're coming back until we find them. You're not the only one who has lost-"
He cut himself off and followed Yylfordt's gaze, scowling at the distant edge of the world. He could feel Yylfordt's surprise for a moment, but then it faded again.
"... Yeah," said the younger man finally, and this time it sounded like he trying, very hard, to believe it. "We'll find them."
...
Things were finally beginning to slow down again. The dead were still uncounted, the city was still in ruins, but many of the injured had been stabilized and moved to the buildings the other Shinigami had cleared and patched for them. The search teams were reorganized to go back to their own Divisions and get to work repairing their barracks, keeping only those with the keenest reiatsu-detection abilities to keep looking for survivors.
And the First Division Captain finally got back to Seireitei.
He strolled, battered and bloody, into the main camp as if it was any normal day in Seireitei, an exhausted, limping Ukitaki Taichou following close behind on one side and the silent, masked figure of Lieutenant Hachiro of the Second Division on the other. The lieutenant, for all his Stealth Force stoicism, exuded an air of supreme smugness at the importance of his current company.
None of the Fourteenth Division saw the Captain-Commander's return, but they heard about it. When Herald returned, with Yylfordt in tow, to the shallow crater where the Special Units had a few slightly-burnt mattresses, he found Dikayumi and Charles already there waiting for him.
"The captains just sent word; they want to 'talk' with us," Charles explained, expression grim. "Not right away, but once the more important stuff is sorted out. Seems we've been a little too loud and they want to know how long we've been here."
"And what we've done here," muttered Dikayumi. He sat on the edge of his 'bed', fingering the Quincy chain around his wrist. "This is it, just like last year... except this time we are the ones who knew we were helping kill a captain."
Herald snorted. "Oh, please. We didn't kill her, the lieutenant did. Talking like that will only make trouble no one needs." He scratched the back of his neck, thinking, then declared, "Listen, when the time comes I'll go see what the captains want, and if they have a complaint with one of you they can go through me. But let's not worry about that just yet. " He glanced around. "Where are Erina and Kitsune?"
"Still helping the Fourth."
"Probably a good idea... show we're on the right side," Herald muttered, almost to himself. Then he shook his head as if to clear away unwanted thoughts. "We're just being paranoid; there is no way the captains will want to stir up more trouble after everything with Caro."
Charles let out a huff of breath. "We? Speak for yourself; there is no reason to be worried. Last time, we were unknown intruders wielding Hollow powers who appeared during Aizen's break-out, we couldn't have timed it to be more suspicious. This time, we're allies. We've got our own Division now. How about we try and trust Seireitei a little?" He straightened, resting one hand casually on the hilt of his Zanpakuto. "Come on, Dikayumi, I have some things I want to investigate while we have some down time, and I might need your superior Quincy senses."
He caught Herald's eye and the latter gave him a reluctant nod of agreement. Keeping their young friend's mind off the captains' eventual summons with some random quest was better then letting him sit here and worry about it.
"Don't go too far," Herald warned anyway. "I don't want any more friends getting lost."
...
Dikayumi's presence really wasn't what Charles needed; as good as Quincy were in pinpointing reiatsu, it was already too late for that to be enough. If Edward had eluded discovery this long, they would need something beyond what was commonly available.
"Let me know if you sense any trace of Edward, or Ryohime and Vance," he told Dikayumi anyway. "For all we know, they might be anywhere, but Herald said they disappeared into a Senkaimon. This is our best starting point."
He, meanwhile, searched for someone else. Through Nnoitra's eyes and the reports of his teammates, he had seen what the Second Division lieutenant was capable of, and now there were rumors that he was back in Seireitei. It was time to find Hachiro Fukutaichou.
Most of the remaining Shinigami had congregated into a few different camps around the least damaged areas of the city, so finding people outside those camps was not difficult. Charles was relieved to sense a faint, familiar reiatsu nearby after several minutes of searching, alone and isolated in one of the many totally-decimated areas.
The lieutenant was crouched next to a huge rift in the ground, so deep that the bottom was obscured by darkness. He looked up when Charles and Dikayumi got close, and Charles noticed with some surprise that the black mask the Stealth Force always seemed to wear had been pulled down to hang around his neck. His lips were pressed together in intense concentration, and his eyes gleamed with fierce displeasure at the interruption of their approach.
"What are you doing here?"
"Looking for you," Charles replied easily, though he didn't blame Dikayumi for slowing and stopping before quite reaching the lieutenant. "We need your help to find some people."
Omaeda Hachiro raised a hand and impatiently tugged his cloth mask back up over his chin. "I'm finding a lot of people," he replied coldly. "Enemies, friends, allies... what makes these people more important?"
Charles shrugged, wishing he had a better answer. "They've vanished, not died. You're the only one who might be able to find them."
For a moment, Lieutenant Hachiro didn't reply. Then, he moved so suddenly Charles half-expected an attack; he flashed up next to Charles and glanced sidelong at him with a strange look in his eyes.
"I will need a starting point. A place with a strong memory of the reiatsu."
I forgot about that. Erina would know, but Charles hadn't thought to ask her about where, exactly, she had seen Edward last. Then an idea hit him, and he grimaced.
"I know of a trail that can lead us to one starting point."
Erina had been with Edward before getting knocked out. Steve had gone off to interrupt his brother's fight... had died there... but before that, he had been only a few blocks away from Charles' fight with the tornado-reaper captain. And that place, Charles could find.
It hadn't occurred to Charles to ask what had become of the Second General; if anyone knew if Steve had finished his fight before going to help Edward or if he had abandoned it, but suddenly it was all he could think about. The damage here was definitely not caused by Steve.
The three of them stood on the edge of a wide, shallow crater of burned ground; not ash, but rock that had been heated to melting-point and twisted into thick, circular patterns like some bizarre lava flow. In the center of the almost-perfect circle lay a blackened blade, no hilt or guard, and two small, uneven protrusions of rock where the molten stone had hit something and tried to flow around it.
"Hmm."
The lieutenant drew his little knife-Zanpakuto and released it, then knelt and touched the blade to the ground. Charles eyed the burnt blade, wondering if there would be any way to find out whose it actually was, but said nothing. He didn't want to risk annoying the best tracker in Seireitei.
Hachiro closed his eyes and let the data flow through him.
A great mind, no sense of guilt or restraint, a complete lack of empathy... sociopath. Shinigami.
A familiar description, but an unfamiliar reiatsu. From what the Fourteens had said, he could guess who Seishinkari was reading there.
Another great mind, but less controlled and untapped. Young, eager, arrogant, a damaged but intact sense of right and wrong. Human with intense traces of Hollow.
Ah, there it was. And he could see where the trail ran off to.
But...
Suppressed, barely functioning emotions, but a ingrained sense of extreme fear and blood-lust... psychological and/or physical trauma? An unextraordinary mind, a weak will, both at odds with obvious power. Hollow... no, Shinigami. Barely.
He opened his eyes and searched the ground with his gaze, locking onto, analyzing, then moving on from any abnormality. It took almost a minute for the Fourteen to finally get curious enough to speak up.
"Have you found Steve's trail?"
"His, one I assume to be former-captain Kurotsuchi Mayuri's, and another... the reiatsu of the man who killed Kurotsuchi."
Charles hesitated.
"Do you know who it is?" he asked finally, a slight frown creasing his brow. The lieutenant looked troubled, and that did not bode well.
"It isn't one of ours. Whoever it is," Lieutenant Hachiro added, standing, "he left this battle alive and strong." He hesitated, glaring out towards the distant walls. "I don't like it; there is something very dangerous about this reiatsu that I cannot pin down."
A memory intruded into Charles' thoughts without his permission, an image and an idea. Instinct... Nnoitra's instinct, though the Hollow part of Charles had no reason to fight for control over it. He simply shoved his opinion into Charles' head and left it there, chuckling to himself and making his host grit his teeth against the insidious inner-sound.
"Can... do you know where this man went?" Charles asked after a futile attempt to shake the notion. Lieutenant Hachiro looked at him with narrowed eyes, then nodded.
"His path seems quite straight, actually... as if he knew where he was going. Do you know who this person is?"
"I have a guess, but nothing more." We have to look for Edward... Yylfordt needs him, and he will need us. But he couldn't shake Nnoitra's instinct. With an angry sigh, he gave in. "With your permission, Lieutenant, I'd like to try and find him while you follow our allies' trails. We need to find Edward and the rest, but Dikayumi can help you with that." He glanced at Dikayumi as he spoke and, while the Quincy did not look happy at being volunteered, there was a resolute set to his expression. Go ahead, he seemed to say.
The lieutenant considered, then pointed out towards Rukongai. "That direction. If he changes course, I can't sense it; for as far as Seishinkari can read, he goes straight towards the walls."
Charles nodded. "Thanks. I'll be back as soon as I can," he added to Dikayumi, then whirled and flashed off towards that distant point in the Rukongai. He had a feeling his target would not veer off track. Nnoitra knew where he would be.
...
Soul Society thanks you.
Akama Kagemaru stared at the lines, his gaze fixed and unblinking, but he no longer read them. The names listed, the familiar and the unfamiliar, were carved into his memory as surely as they were into the simple black stone... Kurosaki, Starrk, Gingerback, Cifer...
At the bottom of a crater, wide as a valley with fading edges as time wore away at the earth, they had this tiny, insignificant monument; but not a monument, or even a marker, for Aizen - it was for the people who had killed him. Soul Society... thanked them for killing Aizen.
Dirt slithered down the slope behind him. He did not look up. He had only felt that reiatsu once, but he did recognize it. The boy with the invaders. The ones who had destroyed his prison-home. They had tried to bury him with it.
I don't blame them. I would have done the same if they had been Caro's and I had been free...
"I thought we would find you here. Though... I'm not sure how you knew where it was..."
Kagemaru drew in a long, deep breath, then straightened, sitting back on his heels. His dark gaze slid sideways to meet that of the Fourteenth Division boy.
"The Muerte were good at spying," he replied dryly. "Something as important as the death of Caro's biggest threat... it was important intelligence."
The boy - what was his name? - crouched on the ground nearby, not too close, but close enough to talk comfortably. Kagemaru almost smiled at his caution.
"I'm not going to attack you, kid. Caro cannot control me anymore"
"Maybe not, but I have these memories of the old days... I know you were loyal to Aizen. Considering where we are now, I think being concerned is warranted."
Kagemaru glanced at the marker, then let out his breath in a silent, grim chuckle. "I'm not going to lie, kid... there was a time when I would have seen these words and sworn revenge on every single one of you who helped to kill my master."
"...But?"
He put his hand on the marker for a moment, tracing the words 'thanks you' with his thumb, then rose.
"I'm done with blind loyalty, at least for a while. Caro has soured the concept for me. Aizen may have saved me a long time ago, but he's gone now and I'm still alive... there has to be some kind of life for me that doesn't involve going to war with the entire Soul Society over a dead man."
He took a breath and turned away. "You can let them know, by the way, that Caro is gone. I don't know how you did it, but you defanged the cobra... he could barely stand when I found him."
The kid looked up at him sharply. "We couldn't figure out where he went... did you kill him, then?"
Kagemaru shrugged. "Why would I? He might as well have been a Plus... next-to-powerless. From what I could sense, every trace of Hollow power he used to wield was gone."
"That... is what the reports suggest happened. So you decided he wasn't a threat anymore?"
"Even Pluses can be a threat, especially when they are schemers," insisted Kagemaru, but then shook his head. "I didn't kill him because every decision he made, the decisions to enslave me and send my friends to their deaths and burn down Soul Society, they were all made by a Hollow. Hollows corrupt every thought they touch." He turned away so the kid could not see his smile. "But he won't be making trouble for your friends anymore. He wanted to leave, so I helped him."
The other seemed to sense the shift in mood. His next words were low, suspicious. "What did you do?"
"Only what he asked," Kagemaru replied, forcing his smile away. "Eventually. I opened a Senkaimon for him."
He did not elaborate. The boy did not try to make him.
"So... what now?" The young voice was hesitant, but hopeful. "Seireitei is very short-staffed right now... I imagine they'd be understanding if you wanted to come back."
Kagemaru could barely suppress a shudder as the chill of disgust crawled across his skin. "Go back?" he asked tightly, through gritted teeth. "Back to the Division that abandoned me to the whims of an evil maniac? Back to the society that looked the other way, knowing full well what Kurotsuchi was doing? Never." He looked over his shoulder at the young man. "I may not agree with Caro, but I was ready to follow Aizen into the underworld to change Soul Society. You are on the wrong side, kid. There isn't a right side, but Seireitei is the wrong one."
He began to walk away, but the boy - Charles, that was what he had called himself - called out,
"Akama-san... if you can't figure out where else to go, find us in the World of the Living. The Fourteenth Division was made for those who couldn't fit in with normal Shinigami."
Fourteenth Division... the 'Special Units'. Hah.
Kagemaru raised his hand, acknowledging the offer. Then he vanished.
...
Lieutenant Hachiro scowled, his eyes closed tightly in concentration. Dikayumi shifted, uncomfortable, from foot to foot while he waited, his attention morbidly captured by the destruction around them.
Seireitei had suffered a lot: raging fires, flash freezing, earthquakes, ceroes, explosions, and every kind of kido imaginable. And yet this was a unique, almost incomprehensible new kind of obliteration.
He had seen the pictures of storms rising out of volcanoes, eruptions capped and intertwined with lightning, and he had never quite fully believed them. The internet was a pathological liar, after all, and it just looked so insane. And yet those images were all that came to mind as he looked down the broad, blackened, ravaged strip of city that lay before him.
This is where the fight that had killed Steve started. This is where, to the best of their knowledge, Edward had been last seen.
I don't think we need the tracker... I think we know exactly where Edward went...
Erina hadn't told them about this. He couldn't help but wonder why.
"The reiatsu here is so tangled I can barely sort them out," muttered the lieutenant finally. "They keep changing and mixing, but I don't need to untangle them to follow that." He rose, still frowning intensely. "The only question is who that is, because the reiatsu following that rampage is not any of the reiatsus that came into this area."
Dikayumi winced. "So... it could be Edward, but..."
"If the person who did that is the person you are looking for, I don't think you want to find him." The lieutenant looked at Dikayumi and, despite the cloth obscuring most of his face, a hint of sympathy did appear in his black eyes. "The reiatsu isn't remotely human anymore, Quincy. Whatever left here... it was a Hollow."
They followed it to the end of the destruction, and then the lieutenant sheathed his Zanpakuto. The trail simply vanished. There was no need even to discuss it; they both knew how their target had left Soul Society.
"When things are more settled, I'll try to help you find the other two," Lieutenant Hachiro promised, and then he left. Dikayumi, alone, walked back to the Fourteenth Division's meeting place. Slowly.
