Curtain Call

By: SneakAttack29

Disclaimer: I don't own Bleach. All Rights go to their respective peoples. I'm just playing with the sandbox.

Quick Author's Note: I'm so sorry it's been over a year. Life's been a ho. I'm back stateside and working full-time which you would think would free up a bit of free time, but I'm also in...eight?...D&D games (Okay one's Starfinder and another is Cyberpunk RED, but who's counting?) and am starting a local D&D club thing in my apartment complex, provided I don't go upstairs and fly off the handle at my neighbor who is blasting music so loud it sounds like it's in my living room at 12:45am, so I do not, in fact, have as much free time to write as I would prefer. Meh. I still got this out to you! I'm also not dead, and will continue Curtain Call. I'm just slower than a granny in a school zone.

Aaaaaanyway, please don't hate me for how I left this, and enjoy!

Chapter 13: Guilt

"When I open my eyes and see the lines
that live on the life I left behind.
I feel disconnected from the place that I call home.
When I try to rewind, I can't design
a way to go back to that place and time.
I remember that moment that changed everything I know."

-I Prevail, Lifelines

There are no dreams, and that is my first clue that I fucked up.

As I muddle my way back to consciousness, through the slog of dark and empty, nothing feels right. My head feels as though it is submerged underwater, the silence filtering through in a distorted warble that makes absolutely no sense. It is analogous to my life, honestly, but that is not the point. The point is the silence, the empty, the wrong.

I fucked up.

This dark is not comforting. It is inky and frigid. The void does not bring with it peace but rather the empty promise of confusion. I do not know what to make of it. Perhaps that is what it intends, but how am I to know? I don't know anything. I am nothing and everything in one, aware and oblivious simultaneously. I exist but, in the void, nothing is real. So, what am I?

Who am I?

There should be dreams. Memories. Images. People. Things and substance, not nothing and cold. I know this. How do I know this? I don't know. But there should be something to accompany the dark. My mind revolts, though I'm unsure how.

Suddenly, there is sensation. It is not good. Teeth-grinding tension and weakness and fluttering in my chest, in my neck. My skin feels clammy. The void spins, if a void even can, bleeding into dull colors and greyscale. One specific shade, muted and terrifying, stands out to me; I try to recoil from it in lurching fear and roaring anger, but cannot.

Words emerge from that color. Comforts, platitudes. Softer than I think they ought to be. Help is coming. I'm sorry I can't do more. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry.

Hang on.

I'm sorry.

I'm so sorry.

I'm sorry, too.

But true to form, Tatsuyoru, when has sorry ever been good enough?

The void takes me again, but it isn't long before that, too, bleeds into a memory. Towering trees, air deceptively crisp with a hint of spring and flowers and all things supposedly good in the world. I know better. I hate that I know better. I shouldn't have to know better.

Memories of a knife in a hand of varying sizes through the years, crimson across my arms and under my nails, praise in an eager ear too dumb to know better—the montage is overlaid with the digging of dirt timed perfectly to recollections I wish I didn't have. Memory-Me hums a tune, so I hum a tune, unbothered by midday glare, unaffected by how utterly inescapable the dark is even when engulfed in sunlight. There is something dismal about this clearing, about this past that I call buried but is clearly not.

I can't run from this. I can't avoid these truths, reminiscing of a body in a shallow grave, thirty-one locks of hair, a purple trinket, and soul-baring complicity. The slow death of a child is never an easy thing to see. It is harder to feel, to remember, in every fiber of my muffled being. That the death is entirely metaphorical almost makes it worse. A physical death would have been kinder, I think. Merciful in a world that embodies anything but mercy.

But still, I see it all again. Every moment. Every cut, every harsh word, every favor, every dream. I see what I thought was freedom, engulfed in blistering winds, but was it really? No. It wasn't freedom. Chains by a different name and a different hold, but chains still beguile me nonetheless. I am helpless to them.

Helpless, helpless, helpless, I don't want to be. But I think that is an unavoidable truth about my nature. Or is it just nature in general? It is our nature to be helpless to our fates. It is our fate to be helpless to our natures. And by my nature, I am helpless to be just a very lost, very bitter woman to my core, aren't I?

My own fault, an echoing, disjointed end, and who do I have to blame but myself?

The transition isn't smooth, but it isn't jarring either. It just happens. One second, I'm in an abyss of memory. The next I am awake, peering at a plain ceiling with blank eyes that are neither feeling nor unfeeling.

It's like a split second of limbo, and I'd find it funny if I didn't feel so much like shit underneath it all.

An uttering of my name accompanied by turquoise eyes popping into view is enough to blink and break the spell. "Kozaki?" It's better to hear than Yoshiko, but all my names hurt. Or maybe that's just the headache. "I think she's awake."

"Yeah," I try to mumble, but it comes out more of a screeching croak than an actual word. I wince, both at the sound and at the way its reverberations in my skull cause the throbbing behind my eyes to intensify.

"Is she? Thank the gods," chimes a familiar voice as doe brown eyes are suddenly joining the turquoise. I absently think that gods have no hand in any of this. "I will get a nurse. Do not strain yourself! You are worse than my four-year-old, I swear!"

"Thanks, Haruka," I try to say in response to her fretting, but it again hurts halfway through. How are you here? I also want to ask, but the woman darting out of view and presumably out of the room combined with a deceptively gentle hand being placed on my shoulder by my captain makes me rethink the prospect.

Instead, I blink slowly at blue-green. Thankfully, Hitsugaya has no issues reading all of the questions I want to ask but can't.

"You're in Division 4. Someone found you unconscious in your office three days ago. No idea who it was, they were gone by the time I got there. You stopped breathing on your own for a while." His voice as he lists everything is monotone, but I know that is deceptive. His eyes are frozen, but they speak volumes. I blink again because he is furious. "Did you just not know you're allergic to that damn tea, or did you fucking forget to say anything about it?"

Allergic?

"I'm what?" It's hoarse, but I get the question out.

He clicks his tongue, the irritation not abating but meeting a brick wall in the form of my ignorance and no longer having a suitable target. "Didn't know, then. Well, allergic isn't the technical term, but close enough. The nurse could explain it better. Taking it so frequently caused your blood pressure to drop. Your heart nearly gave out, and then you wouldn't breathe. They tell you about those side effects when they give it to you for a reason, Kozaki."

I don't think I've ever seen him this angry. His brow is furrowed, eyes harsh, mouth in the thinnest line and back rigid. Usually, he is silent reprimands, maybe a well-placed word here and there to get his point across. This is a veritable rampage for him. I'm not awake enough to deal with it.

"I just…" My throat burns, but I know I need to get the words out. Keeping eye contact hurts, but I know I need my gaze to convey all the syllables I can't speak. "D-didn't want to dream."

The ice doesn't melt—he is the ice-wielder, after all—but it does turn less harsh. I feel the tentative hand I'd forgotten about on my shoulder press a little more in what I take to be apology. "I know. Don't do it again." Guilt creeps up, and I do look away this time.

Whispering also hurts, I find, but not quite as bad. "I-I apologize for th—"

"Don't," Hitsugaya interrupts in a firm voice brokering no room for argument. The hand at my shoulder moves to cradle my face, bring my eyes back to his instead of letting me stew in my own cowardice. Even if I had the strength to reject the motion, I would let it happen. It speaks of comfort following a nightmare. Not only is it apt, but it is welcome. Fūmittsu's muted whistle of approval at this small step echoes in the back of my mind, clear if strained so I know she must be close by unlike the last time I woke in the hospital. Probably my captain's doing. "You matter, Kozaki."

There isn't a chance for me to retaliate because Haruka returns, bustling in with a nurse all storm and fury. Hitsugaya quickly retracts himself from my side to make room for the medic, but his eyes don't leave mine for another beat, trying to impress upon me the seriousness of his words. Instinct tells me not to believe him. I do not matter, not in the grand scheme of things. I am unimportant. A nobody. A brat from Rukongai with blood under her fingernails.

But I also can't doubt the sincerity. It is in everything he says, everything he does, every nonverbal quirk of a brow he sends my way. I've said it before that I don't know when I became so able to read my captain, but I'm glad I did.

The medic is quick to sit me up, running kaido over my limbs, odd contraptions to measure vitals, and questions about any vertigo. It is nothing invasive, so with my permission Haruka and Hitsugaya are allowed to linger somewhat awkwardly to the side while the nameless woman does her job. I learn my throat is in shreds because of how they had to keep me breathing—essentially forcing a tube down my throat and into my airway to keep air flowing. Two and a half days of that was long enough for my breathing to stabilize, and after two false starts and one partially collapsed lung, I started breathing on my own again only around twelve hours ago.

But Hitsugaya wasn't exaggerating—I am lucky to be alive, apparently.

Well, dead. Alive? Dead? Breathing. Afterlife is weird.

"You're breathing as well as to be expected," the nurse sighs, checking off things on a clipboard. She introduced herself, but I do not remember her name. The fiery red hair is marker enough, honestly. "Blood pressure still a little low, but that'll go up in a day or two. No confusion, vertigo seems steady but we'll get you up in a few hours to see how your mobility is. Now, how is your communication with your zanpakuto?"

I freeze. It's a standard question, one I've lied about before. Discordance between a Shinigami and their zanpakuto usually spells some deeper, underlying trouble. The one time I admitted to it, I was forced into what passes for therapy sessions. They made things worse.

But I feel two pairs of eyes boring into the side of my head, two pairs of eyes that will know if I lie.

Dammit.

"I…can't h-hear her very well," I admit, barely a mumble and I'm amazed the nurse catches it. She doesn't lower the clipboard or even make eye contact, pursing her lips and humming as she checks something off, writes a note in the margin. I don't want to know what that note says.

A few more formalities later, and she leaves me to the scrutiny of my captain and friend with only a reminder to rest. I try not to look at them, but it is difficult when I can feel their judgement clear as day.

"You can't hear your zanpakuto?" Hitsugaya finally asks after letting the terse silence settle into my bones for a poignant moment.

I wince. "N-no. Well, a l-little. Difficult aft-ter n-nightmares."

Haruka blinks and her eyes dart between the two of us, clearly not comprehending the significance. It's just as well, I don't think I want her to know. It just gives her something else to nag me about. Hitsugaya, though, just gains a look of reluctant understanding. My words, both spoken and unsaid, succinctly explain why I continued to take the tea when I knew I was reacting poorly to it. My caution is not lauded, but it is understood by someone in this moment.

"Kozaki-chan," Haruka starts softly, as if afraid of treading on a conversation where she doesn't belong. "You know that we are here for you if you need to talk. About the nightmares, your zanpakuto, anything. And if you do not wish to speak with us, there are other options." She is gently indicating the counseling I believe everyone who knew me after the incident five years ago is fairly aware that I hold a remarkable amount of distaste for.

There's a long, pregnant pause that feels like it swells for an eternity. I look away from both my friend and my captain. Friends? Plural? That line became blurred a long time ago, and I am just now realizing it.

"Yeah. I know."

I do know. But I think they both know I'm not going to speak to anyone, them or otherwise, by my countenance. I can't help it.

After all, how do I bring up the fact that the nightmares aren't at all related to what they think? How do I bring up the fact that the last thing I remember seeing before truly falling unconscious is Tatsuyoru's eyes?

Two days later finds me physically stronger, if no less confused. The confusion, however, is another matter entirely. It is not something Division 4 can fix with kaido and some herby tea. Regardless, I do feel better, and with Fūmittsu beginning to whistle again in the back of my mind, I am moved to a room intended for less severe patients soon after waking. It is enough that I am allowed more visitors than my emergency contacts of captain, lieutenant, and Haruka, and the latter is quick to bring Eiji down to see me. I apparently worried the boy even though he thankfully wasn't with me when I collapsed. It appears that my deteriorating condition in the days leading up to my hospital stay was more apparent to his watchful eyes than any of us adults were aware of.

"And what is this, now?" I ask my godson quietly as he leans against me in my sterile bed, inked paper proudly in hand with a matching, crooked grin on his face I'm fairly certain he picked up from Hitsugaya. My tiny (although private) room is crowded this evening, my captain having stopped by to fill me in on what my medical leave is going to look like, Lieutenant Matsumoto insisting on tagging along. This happened to coincided with Haruka and Eiji's visit, and I am once again faced with the sheer power of the little boy's puppy dog eyes when he turned them on the two Shinigami thirty minutes ago, pleading that they stay "just for a few more minutes" as they are obviously his "next favoritest people in the world!" Matsumoto visibly caved in moments, and while my captain put up a stoic façade, I can tell in the way he crossed his arms and scrutinized Eiji to within an inch of the boy's life that he never intended for a quick visit the second he sensed he and Haruka were already here.

I am alarmed and oddly proud to think that given enough years and training, Eiji could make a frighteningly efficient Onmitsukidō officer.

Said terrifying force of innocent persuasion is almost gentle at pointing to splotches of green and red on the paper he'd handed me. My name—or nickname, in this case, as it says oba-chan—in clumsy hiragana in the top left corner tell me clearly what the paper is meant to be, but he's too enthusiastic to explain his gift, and who am I to argue with the sparkle in his eyes? "Mama and I found some frogs in our backyard! I decided to paint them because I couldn't show you in person since you're sick. But maybe since they're so cool seeing a picture would make you feel better!"

Okay, so I thought they were vegetables and not frogs. Letting him explain was probably a smart idea. I catch Hitsugaya's eye when I glance up to blink away the surprise, and he looks amused. He's clearly already seen the artwork in question, and his face is all but saying you too, huh?

Cheeky bastard.

"That's lovely, Monkey," I murmur. The smile I give him is nothing short of genuine as I press a small kiss to the crown of his head. "Thank you! You know what? I have just the place for this once I'm given the okay to go home." A conspiratorial wink has him beaming widely, likely remembering our conversation in my tiny quarters what feels like an eternity ago.

From to the right of my bed, Lieutenant Matsumoto hums. "Which shouldn't be too much longer! And then you'll be able to come back to work shortly after. Thankfully, I think Taichō has been losing his mind!"

Once again, if I didn't absolutely know better, I'd say Hitsugaya appears flustered as he scoffs. "If both you and Akiyama would do your jobs, we wouldn't be so far behind!" Matsumoto pouts, shifting to stage whisper to me.

"Well I think he misses you and just doesn't want to admit it."

I roll my eyes and don't catch whatever look the captain sends the blonde that ends up actually shutting her up for once. It must be funny as it gets Eiji to giggle, and Matsumoto's pout is a bit more defined when I look back at her and shake my head in bemusement.

"Honestly, y-you could bring me work t-to do he-here," I say. "I wouldn't mind."

It is Haruka who laughs this time, surprisingly, though it is as dainty as everything else she does. "No, you are meant to be resting. If they tried, they would have me to deal with."

Both Hitsugaya and Matsumoto look vaguely chastised, and I nod sagely, my lack of work to do while trapped in the expansive boredom that is an extended hospital stay succinctly explained by those two sentences. Haruka can be absolutely terrifying when she wants to be.

My captain starts in on what I'm imagining is a familiar argument, "I still think that—"

Knock, knock, knock!

A pause reverberates.

I have no idea how three raps on a shoji frame can sound so intimidating, but they cut through whatever Hitsugaya was going to say like a hot knife through butter. It's almost jarring, a reminder of the outside world in a way that I don't think any of us conversing were quite ready for, for some reason. Or maybe that's just me and I'm still loopy from the medications.

Hitsugaya quirks a brow at me, and I nod in consent as my throat is still a bit too raw to do much more than mutter. "Enter!" When the door clacks aside on its track, I don't know what or who I am expecting. Perhaps Akiyama come to badger me now that I am allowed more visitors, maybe Captain Hirako come to ruffle my hair in that almost parental way of his and call me "Kozaki-kun" like he's fondly known me all my life, or possibly one of my nurses come to tell me something she forgot.

I am not expecting Shikimoto Nozomi.

The Onmitsukidō is as stony-faced and plain as I remember her being what has to be nearly two weeks ago now when she took Haruka and Eiji in for questioning, though there's a hard edge to her green eyes I don't quite like. It almost seems like resignation mixed with regret and disbelief by not so many words or weights. Eiji recognizes her by the way he curls into my shoulder, and I do not miss how my captain straightens in a way that is dangerous, Matsumoto following cue rather quickly to slide surreptitiously closer to a startled Haruka.

"…Shikimoto-san," I say in the loudest rasp I can manage, puzzled as I am fairly certain this woman does not hold any inkling of fondness for me and thus cannot fathom why she would be standing here unless it is not good. I clutch Eiji to me a bit tighter.

Shikimoto bows a polite greeting. "Kozaki-san. Tatsuyoru-san, Captain, Lieutenant—good evening."

Hitsugaya gives her a look. "Shikimoto-san. This is a surprise. May I ask why you're here?"

Dull jade levels each and every occupant of the room with a stare that reveals absolutely nothing and unnerves with absolutely everything. "Unfortunately, I'm not here for a social call." The woman seems steeled enough, but she still pauses to suck in a breath as if preparing herself for the next words she's to say.

I should have done the same.

"I am hereby placing Kozaki-san under arrest."

A lot of things happen after Shikimoto says the word "arrest" in conjunction with me. A cacophony of interrogatives burst forth from the other adults, Eiji clings even tighter to me if it's at all possible, and me? My heart sinks. I'm pale anyway, but I can almost feel the blood creep down, down, down and away from my face. If I wasn't already reclined, I'd probably be on the floor and not from shock. Some part of me always saw this coming. No, it is dread.

"Says who?" My captain's voice cuts demandingly through the small din as he takes a step away from the wall he had been leaning against to my left and stares down the Division 2 member with as much restrained fury as I think I've ever seen. The room probably drops a few degrees, though that could just be my own adrenaline. The hand gripping my godson to me begins to shake. "And on what charges?"

Shikimoto grits through her teeth. "Central 46. Murder. Conspiracy to commit murder. Attempted murder." All of my breath leaves me.

I can't question any of this. I know what it is. And I couldn't speak if I wanted to.

"Kozaki-chan was cleared of all suspicion following the incident five years ago, Central confirmed that!" Matsumoto says, uncharacteristically serious. A trembling hand reaches for a pendant I know I won't find, a trinket that I can't forget.

It's not about what happened five years ago. It never has been. I feel tears well up and instinctively curl my hands into fists, causing Eiji to glance up at me with wide, fearful purple eyes. Purple, so much purple.

So much blood.

"Oba-chan…?" he whimpers. I don't answer. I can't answer.

"She was cleared for those," Shikimoto says with a shake of her head. "These are different. Over fifty years ago, in Rukongai." They wait for me to speak, to defend myself. But I can't.

Hitsugaya gives me a lingering glance that is as worried as I think he can openly express, but I barely even register it. "These? Plural? How many counts?"

I don't need her to say it. She does anyway. I am full-on trembling now as Shikimoto finally steps fully into the room instead of lingering in the doorway, revealing her small team assembled behind her. Assembled in case I decided to run, to fight. Laughable in my state, though considering the captain and lieutenant positioned defensively on either side of me, perhaps it is a warranted decision.

"Kozaki Yoshiko." The trembling increases. "I am placing you under arrest for a total of thirty-one counts of murder, attempted murder, and conspiracy to commit murder in the seventy-third Rukongai district." The tears spill, blurring everything, but I still don't see it.

All I see is red.

"Nothing is more wretched than the mind of a man conscious of guilt."

-Plautus

Final Words: ...SURPRISE!

I regret nothing.

Also, to note, I've decided I am going to keep Curtain Call as one work, just notate different parts or acts. The prologue and first 12 chapters are obviously Part 1. Part 2, Memento Mori, will span the next however many chapters and will out of necessity (i.e. the narrator being...y'know, incarcerated) be switching POVs. It'll probably be mostly 3rd person by my guess. Hopefully that won't be too out of place since this has strictly been 1st up until now, but I didn't actually plan to this point until I was several chapters into the 1st person, sooooo. Yay?

Anyway, I hope you enjoyed! R&R, and I'll see ya next time (hopefully not over a year from now)!

~Sneak