DFS Chapter 16.
In that life, Addy had seen things.
Watched people walk through the shades that lingered on the streets, dark forms distorted by their flesh, and bone. Voices unheard, even as they begged and howled. Ripped at the mortal shells.
And then there the ones that coiled around people like Adelaide, stretched out like warm bubble gum. Over and over. Fingers clasped over their eyes.
Spirits that followed, trying to grasp hands. Catch wisps of wayward hair. Kiss cheeks.
And here there was nothing. Absolutely nothing.
Tsuru watches the steps, as she climbs towards the temples grand arch. Sachihiro at her side. A comforting figure in these dim, gray hours.
There the church had always had figures kneeling beneath the statues and sitting in the long, off white pews. Light from the crudely stained glass cutting through them. Not holes, but streaks.
And surely if there were any of the lingering dead, they would be praying here. Begging for another chance as she had.
0o0o0
Reincarnation was a strange thing, and it's not as if Tsuru is afraid of dying this time around, it's more she wants to live. Really live.
And if the cost of her survival in this mad world is another's life, she will take it.
She will make it quick.
Maybe they will wake up in a better place, where they can be happier.
Tsuru sighs, watching Kurosuki Raiga stare off in to the distance, and wants to say something. Ease the guilt that's slowly building in him, and leaving him listless. Leaving dark spots beneath his eyes.
She cannot tell him the truth though, not this man.
The betrayal would destroy him, just as it would Biwa.
"Do you ever wonder what happens to a person after they die?" she finally asks, pulling his hand into her lap. Tracing the lines that cut through it.
The man's striking eyes meet hers. "Why do you ask?"
It is the what do you see, that goes unsaid.
Tsuru lets her head tilt, as if considering the question. "Umeyu-sensai said this is our life line. But what about the others, do they really mean what people say they do?"
"Does that point in the line really mean there is an ending, or are all the lines that mark our bodies really pathways? Possibilities. Maybe I was someone else before, and in some other place and fell here," she says pointing out one of the other lines. "Instead of there."
"Maybe they are just reminders, because we forget and they grow more important the closer we get to death."
Raiga hmms, and does what she loves most about him. He considers it.
She sits in silence beside the large man.
"You could be right," he eventually acknowledges. "There are time I forget you are a child. It could be that like muscle memory, sometimes your previous intelligence remains and that is how we gain prodigies."
They continue to watch the ninja below, dropping bird seed on the unexpecting. The bag nearing empty.
"Do you think you are happier here?" the man finally asks, as Tsuru had hoped.
Her fingers twine with his. "I think so."
Her eyes stare out over the village.
"Or maybe this is where I am supposed to find happiness."