Long chapter this time, fellas.
Anyways, the author's notes will be… Somewhere at the bottom.
Thank you for the reviews and for reading! I hope you enjoy this 10K+-word chapter!
Sitting beside Noro within the decrypted hall that the Aogiri Tree was using to attend the orchestrated gathering being directed by her direct subordinate, Tatara, Eto watched from behind her bandage-wrapped face as Ayato brought in the infamous young man who had been implanted with Rize's kakuhou.
Eto sadistically chuckled to herself and got a kick out of seeing just how petrified with fear the young man was as Ayato practically had to shove him down the walkway past her soldiers, as she watched alongside her executives as Kaneki approached Tatara.
Smiling ear-to-ear as she watched Tatara mercilessly pierce Kaneki's stomach with his arm in order to have him reveal his single red and black left-eye, Eto found herself silently enthralled from being able to hear the young man screaming a blood-curdling cry of agony.
Even though she couldn't physically see it behind his half-mask, Eto knew just by the sound of Tatara's small chuckle that he too was enjoying seeing Kanaeki in excruciating pain. "Heh… This is the left one, huh? You certainly do have it." Tatara spoke with a slight bit of amusement in his deep-baritone voice, while taking a moment to stare deep into Kaneki's confused and terrified eyes.
"Cheh… That means it's true that Rize was killed then, huh?" Tatara mused aloud for all to hear, before jerking his arm out of Kaneki's gaping wound. Ignoring the staggering young man falling over and slamming his head against the wooden-floor boards, the Chinese ghoul turned his attention over to Ayato, who was seated down on the floor beside the rest of the executives.
"Kirishima," Tatara addressed in a neutral tone, to which got the young ghoul's attention.
"... What is it?" Ayato asked in a nonchalant tone, as he met Tatara's gaze.
"I don't need this guy; get rid of him," Tatara ordered while pointing at Kaneki the same way one would point at an object, before looking down to be met with a horrified expression plastered on the young one-eyed ghoul's face.
"I thought that even if you aren't Rize, I could use your power and keep you around… But that 'eye' is no good. Like this, I can't use you," Tatara explained in a mildly inconvenienced voice, finding himself annoyed that the young man was completely clueless.
Turning his attention over to Ayato, Tatara instructed the young ghoul by telling him, "You can make him into a soldier, or a sandbag, or whatever else; do as you like."
"I understand," Ayato replied in a slightly disgruntled voice, while silently becoming frustrated that he had to deal with the annoying coffee shop ghoul on his own free time.
Unbeknownst to him however, Yakumo Oomori, who simply was known to others as 'Jason', glared at Ayato with a sense of envy for being able to have access to what he considered a potential play thing.
Although everyone else seemed not to notice Jason's mannerism, Eto, being the perceptive person that she was, easily caught onto one of her favorite executive's shifty eyes. The thought of being able to hear the tales of what tortures Jason would be able to put Kaneki through excited her, and it was something that she'd hoped to hear about upon returning from Cochlea.
Eto looked forward to Kaneki's horrible fate that she knew awaited him there in the bowels of the Aogiri Tree's hideout. He looked so innocent, so normal… It made her want to see him suffering all that much more.
Awakening from her horrid memory to a headspliting migraine, Eto let out a low groan as she reluctantly opened her eyes. Staring up at the white ceiling of her bedroom, Eto clenched her jaw shut while seething in pain as adjusted to the brightness inside of her lit-up room. 'Am I having a hangover, or did someone hit my head...? Either would explain why I'm in my bed in the middle of the day, and why my head hurts…'
Reaching up to massage her forehead, Eto's fingers soon discovered a large-square band-aid over the center of her forehead where the pain of her headache was radiating from. Wincing to herself as she slowly peeled back the band-aid off of her forehead, Eto lowered it down to her eye level and inspected the underside of the white adhesive-patch.
'Dried blood… Oh… Oh, that's right. Haise must have accidentally hit me; how could I forget?' Eto thought somberly to herself, as the recent memories of seeing Haise having a psychotic episode began to resurface in her mind. 'What a horrible person I was back then… The thought of seeing him in any amount of agony disgusts me. I… I should make sure that he's doing okay.'
Being the candid person she was, Eto took Haise's freak out as a byproduct of his head trauma caused by an overwhelming amount of memories returning to him; memories that she couldn't help but feel responsible for. 'Hinami… Hearing her name might have caused him to act out; I can only imagine why that would be the case, though… Perhaps the children would know more about it than myself.'
Bracing herself for the intense pain that she knew she was about to feel, Eto held her breath and closed her eyes shut as she pushed herself up from the mattress before getting up from bed. Having gotten up too fast however, Eto nearly tripped on her own feet after taking three steps forward, and had to grab a hold of her desk to catch herself.
Lightheaded and feeling an ungodly amount of pain piercing through her skull, Eto was reminded of the first time she awoke from her coma, and recalled it being just as unpleasant. "Oh, how the mighty have fallen…" Eto muttered sarcastically to herself, as she continued to prop herself up by the edge of her table before gathering her bearings enough to exit her studio apartment.
Walking up-and-down the upstairs hallway to peek through the bedroom doors belonging to Haise and the rest of her surrogate children, Eto was beginning to grow anxious after realizing that no one, not even Touka or Yomo, were upstairs with her.
'This is… Beginning to become worrisome,' Eto thought to herself with an uneasy look on her face, as she began to quicken her pace during her descent downstairs into the empty dining room of the coffee shop. "Hello? Is anyone here?" She called out, while slowly walking around the sets of tables and chairs that felt hauntingly abandoned.
"Over here, Yoshimura," Yomo called back from the front entrance of the coffee shop, just beyond the empty dining area where Eto was located. Following the baritone voice of the man, Eto quickly made her way into the main lobby.
Truth be told, Eto didn't know what she was expecting, especially when she came upon the sight of Yomo standing over his dissociated and emotionless niece, who sat on the floor with her back up against the wall.
Walking up to Touka, Eto knelt down beside the despondent ghoul to speak to her. "Ms. Kirishima? Are you okay?" Eto questioned, before being met with silence. "Kirishima? Hey… Hey, you need to look at me, okay?" Eto beckoned in a concerned tone, as she reached a hand out to lift Touka's chin so that the other woman had no choice but to look at her.
Half expecting for Touka to lash out in some way or another, Eto felt a chill run down her spine and her heart drop at the sight of the manager's vacant expression; the lights were on, but nobody was home.
"... She's been like that since I found her," Yomo spoke wistfully, as he stared down to meet Eto's confused gaze. "... Can't say that I'm surprised that you're up and about, Yoshimura; you and your father have always had a knack for being there when you're needed."
"My father…? Is that so?" Eto mused back with a humorless chuckle, before looking away from Yomo to turn her attention over to Touka's empty stare. "... Why is she like this?"
Staring at her with disbelief in his eyes for a brief moment, Yomo quickly remembered that Eto hadn't been conscious when Touka dragged Haise out of the boardroom. "Ah, shit…" Yomo chuckled to himself in a stressed tone, as he raised both of his hands up to the top of his head to run his fingers through his white hair.
"... Is it really that bad?" Eto inquired, as she felt dread coursing through her veins.
"Yeah… Yeah, it kind of is," Yomo muttered back with a mild grimmance on his face, before letting out a slowly-exhaled breath. "... As you may or may not remember, Touka came into the room after hearing all the commotion, and well… That's when Haise struck you in the forehead… God, I wish you were there to de-escalate things before everything went to shit."
Still feeling the aftermath of when Haise cracked her skull, Eto fully was aware of everything up until that point, but was now becoming visibly angry at how much Yomo was actively avoiding telling her what had happened. "... What did you all do, Yomo? Where did everyone else go? Where's Sasaki?"
Haise honestly had no idea where he was, nor did he know where he was heading. Aimlessly walking the cold streets of Tokyo, the sky above grew cloudier by the passing minute, and without any concept of time, the sky above Haise had become engulfed in grey.
Wearing nothing but a black-sweater and some slacks, Haise was beginning to feel his body shivering. The air grew colder and snow began to fall from the heavens. Coming more to his senses now that he had something to distract himself from his own inner thoughts, it soon dawned on Haise that he hadn't even been paying attention to his surroundings during his entire journey through Tokyo.
Surrounded by passing people who were walking around him as he stood still in the middle of the sidewalk, Haise's grey eyes scanned the area around him to take note of the tall office buildings that ranged from private travel agencies to corporate industries. A cracking above caused by a nearby pair of jet engines taking off made the young man realize just how close he was to what he assumed to be an airport.
Feeling a tugging sensation from below his belt, Haise lowered his gaze to be greeted with the small-child version of Hinami looking up at him with her optimistic smile. "Onii-Chan! Look up there! Remember that?" The phantom asked curiously in an excited voice, before pointing up at the large stadium monitor that was mounted onto the tallest skyscraper for all below to see.
Feeling the cold snow dropping down on his shoulders and onto the top of his head, Haise could see his breath escaping through his parted lips as he let out a defeated sigh before craning his neck up to look up at where Hinami was pointing.
"The 20th Ward is under a large-scale warning net. Presently, it has become a restricted area." Haise heard within the recesses of his head, as he stared up at the news announcement that had aired over two years ago being played on the stadium television above.
"The target is a coffee shop located within the 20th Ward. The probability of it being a den for ghouls is…" The haunting voice of the news announcer said, before fading away the moment Haise reached up to tap the left side of his head like one would do with a faulty piece of technology.
Thinking that he had found an easy fix to stop his future hallucinations, Haise's hopeful assumptions were crushed the moment he looked down to see that Hinami's phantom still stood present by his side.
"Oh, Onii-Chan… I'm the one memory you can't forget; even if you tried~!" Hinami's phantom stated with a bit of youthful spunk in her voice, before suddenly turning her attention to the rumbling noise that was being emitted from his stomach.
"Onii-Chan, I think you're hungry! Since your best friend Hide isn't around anymore, I suppose that means you're going to have to use Onee-Chan's parting gift to get yourself something to eat," the manifestation of Haise's guilt mused in a taunting way, before bringing her fingers up to her chin to convey that she was thinking of a solution.
Too hungry and disoriented to argue with himself, Haise merely stood patiently with an emotionally drained look on his face, as he looked down at where he could see Hinami standing. "... Any suggestions?" Haise spoke aloud, without caring anymore about which passing pedestrian heard him.
"Well, Onii-Chan… There's one place not too far from here that's similar to how Anteiku used to be… Come, I'll show you!" Hinami said with an adventurous look in her warm amber eyes, before ushering Haise to follow behind her.
Whether or not he was insane was debatable, but Haise at least was still fully able to comprehend fully well that Hinami was just his own subconscious trying to lead him, and not her own separate entity.
With that being said, Haise still wasn't very confident that Hinami's phantom would actually lead him anywhere important. Without any first-hand memory of where he was at, other than remembering that it was the area where he first was made aware of CCG's raid on Anteiku, Haise really didn't know where else to turn.
So, without even realizing that he had gathered the attention of a squad of patrolling investigators who were shadowing him from afar, Haise awkwardly followed behind the apparition of Hinami with one hand pressed up against his empty stomach. Hearing the crunching of snow underneath his loafers, Haise could only hope that wherever Hinami was leading him was close, because the possibility of him getting hypothermia was becoming more probable by the passing second.
Pushing through the crowds of people with his free hand, Chuu Hachikawa made sure that he and his squad never lost sight of the wandering one-eyed ghoul who was oblivious to their presence. Without any cheeks or lips, Hachikawa was trapped in a perpetual grin that was hidden behind the tall collar of his trenchcoat. However this time, the investigator's skeletal smile was a true reflection of his joy for finding the one-eyed ghoul.
Ayumu Hogi's blue eyes peered through her long-blonde bangs at who she knew to be unmistakably the very same ghoul who had supposedly died alongside the One Eyed Owl. "Boss, I don't understand what's going on… Isn't he supposed to be-"
"-Dead?" Hachikawa interrupted, while finishing his squad deputy's sentence for her. "Why, yes; young Sasaki was reported as being killed in action six months ago; if my memory serves me right, that is." The man mused in his deep and ghastly voice, while taking a moment to push his glasses up the bridge of his nose. "I suppose that can be said for a lot of people nowadays, unfortunately… Thankfully, it appears as though we've been given a chance to rectify that."
While Ayumu couldn't say that she wasn't surprised to hear her squad leader talking so casually about eagerly murdering a ghoul, a part of her still felt conflicted about what they were doing. "But… Didn't he used to be a ghoul investigator himself? What if he's still on our side? We really could use all the help we can get..."
Scoffing at the nativity behind Ayumu's words, Hachikawa shook his head at his deputy leader as he watched Haise awkwardly open a black door leading into a medium-sized sleek-modern building that looked to Hacikawa to be a club or a bar. Shifting his gaze up from where he last saw Haise, Hachikawa silently read the bright neon letters that read 'ORCA' in English.
"... I'm not expecting for you to understand, Ayumu, but I've seen what 'Eyepatch' is fully capable of," Hachikawa spoke with malice in his words, as he vidily could still recall Kaneki showing up during the Anteiku raid, just in time before he could get vengeance on the 'Black Dober'. "... No, Ayumu; Sasaki isn't worth saving; it's better that we put him down like the sick puppy he is."
Entering the upstairs portion of the establishment, Haise felt the reminiscent memories that he had of the elegant and cozy bar around beginning to resurface in his mind, as he began to recall himself being there the last time with Tsukiyama and Banjou.
'Ah… That's when we were looking for Madame A. That's back when we were looking for Dr. Kanou… Back when Rize Kamishiro was still relevant in my life,' Haise mused nostalgically to himself, while finding himself smiling despite the fact that his life back then wasn't exactly cushy.
But then again, his life was never easy.
'Speaking of the back then… Looks like these guys still kind of remember me,' Haise thought anxiously to himself, after reaching the top step of the staircase leading into the bar room itself. Holding onto the smooth-iron railings, Haise smiled nervously at Orca's bar staff, all of whom stopped what they had been doing in order to stare at him with shocked expressions on their faces.
Amongst the staff, a ghoul with dark hair and a blemish on his nose approached Haise cautiously. "K… Kaneki?!" The ghoul dressed in a business-casual fashion asked in a shocked tone, as he approached Haise the same way one would react if they were approaching a ghost. "Kaneki… It's… It's Gil; d-do you remember me?"
"Not particularly, no… I do remember one of you being very… 'Vocal' on what your opinion was about me though," Haise admitted with a small chuckle, before needing to take a moment to think long and hard about the last time he'd been there. "Ah, I remember now! You were upset at me because I mentioned the possibility of Matasaka Kamishiro collaborating with the Aogiri Tree."
Surprised that Haise still was able to somewhat recall their one-time interaction with one another, Gil had to admit that he himself had forgotten why Kaneki had poked his head into his master's bar years ago. "... That was during the time that you lied about not being involved in that incident with the ghoul restaurant, I think?" Gil commented aloud with an unsure look on his face.
"Yes… Yes, I think I actually did lie to you and your associates about that; I hope none of you still harbor that against me," Haise said apologetically, to which Gil simply shrugged at in response.
"Nah, we all sort of forgot about that shit happening… What the hell has it been man, like… Three years since you've shown your mug around here?" Gil inquired with a smug smirk on his face, before stepping forward to place his hand on Haise's shoulder. "Digging the new hairstyle by the way…! Feelin' hungry? Thirsty? You look like you could use a drink, my friend!"
While Haise never considered himself much of a drinker, on account that obtaining blood-wine had been a rare luxury that had seemingly always evaded his grasp during the time he actually did turn twenty-years old, if there ever had been a time for him to take up drinking, it would have been right there and then.
"Actually… I wouldn't mind having a glass of wine right about now," Haise admitted with a laugh following suit, as he rubbed the back of his head while being led toward the modern-esque island bar counter.
"Ah...! It's been one of 'those' days, eh?" Gil mused in a sense of friendly banter, as he helped Haise take a seat at one of the bar stools. "I've had too many of 'those' sorts of days to count, my friend; too many…! Anyways, how about you look over a menu before deciding what you want?"
"Menu? Isn't this place a bar made for… You know, 'ghouls'?" Haise inquired in a wary and cautious voice, before remembering that he was the only actual 'customer' in Orca amongst a staff of ghouls.
Letting out a bit of a pretentious chuckle, Gil found Haise's nativity to be amusing. "Heh, not much of a ghoul bar-hopper, are ya? Here, let me briefly guide ya' around our fine-selections," Gil said in a self-pompous voice, before standing behind Haise to place his finger down on the large laminated menu.
"First, you got your appetizers; obviously most of the items here aren't for ghouls, but there are some options that-"
"-I want that," Haise interrupted calmly, much to Gil's annoyance, as he pushed the ghoul's finger away to point over to one of the many pictures of food items that had gotten his attention the most.
Thinking at first that Haise was trying to mess him, Gil impatiently waited for an 'I gotcha' moment from the one-eyed ghoul, but eventually the man got tired of waiting for the punchline that never came and decided to just take the 'bait'. "... Alright, I'll bite. You do realize that you're pointing at a cheeseburger, right? Granted, it's extremely popular with our human customers during date nights and what not, but li- You're fucking with me, right?!"
"... Hear me out," Haise said in an ambitious voice, as he sat the menu down so that he could turn himself around to face the flabbergasted ghoul. "Okay, so to make a long-story, I woke up from a coma today, and I couldn't taste anything a ghoul normally would enjoy; such as coffee or even raw meat."
"Bullshit... Go on," Gil muttered with his arms crossed over his chest, while arching an eyebrow at Haise while silently regretting letting the mangy one-eyed ghoul into his bar. 'God Shachi, if only you were here to hear this shit.'
"Anyway, before I could eat it, I did catch a whiff of some ground-meat that smelled really delicious…! I can already feel my mouth watering from just thinking about it!" Haise mused with a wide smile, while drooling as he fantasized about how good that patty of meat would have been in between two buns, a slice of cheese and some traditional American fixings on it.
Pinching the bridge of his nose, Gil closed his eyes and quietly muttered to himself about how crazy Haise was for getting so worked up over a hamburger, as he played around with the idea of fulfilling the one-eyed ghoul's odd fantasy. "So... You want cooked human meat, but in a sandwich?"
"It sounds rather inhumane if you put it like that, but… Yes, that sounds like something I'd kill for right about now!" Haise said in an excited voice, before quickly correcting himself by saying, "Y-You know…? Metaphorically speaking..."
"… Yeah, sure buddy," Wanting his conversation to end with Haise but also wanting to make a sale, Gil found himself finally ready to fulfill Haise's request, but there was only one important question that he had left to ask. "... You got money to pay for this, right?"
"Yes sir," Haise answered politely, before taking out the large wad of Yen that Touka had given him. While he slipped out a large bill, Gil couldn't help but find himself impressed with the amount of money that Haise had on his person. "Is this enough?"
Taking the two one-thousand Yen notes from Haise's outstretched hand, Gil continued to stare in absolute confusion at the other man while mentally trying to comprehend why a ghoul would willingly waste money on human food outside of the purpose of trying to blend in with humans.
"... One double-decker 'Juicy Lucy' cheeseburger with the fixings, coming right up pal," Gil said without a hint of joy in his voice, before taking the menu away to begin going in the back of his bar's kitchen to grill the burger himself in order to save himself from having to explain it to his workers.
Excited that he was finally going to be able eat what he wanted that day, Haise quickly pulled out a few more large bills before waving it at Gil to get his attention. "Wait, I still want that glass of wine, please!"
Irritated by how much of a needy customer Haise was, Gil took a moment to glare at him before simply reaching over to grab a random bottle off of his bar's shelf before placing it on the table where the one-eyed ghoul was sitting.
Reaching underneath the bar counter, Gil quickly retrieved a corkscrew before passive-aggressively popping the top of the bottle of blood wine. "Here, just take it," Gil said in a flat voice, before sliding the bottle to Haise before ripping the money out of the strange ghoul's hand. "Fuckin' aye…"
Grabbing the glass bottle by its neck, Haise waited for Gil to disappear into the kitchen door just behind where the bartender would stand before leaning over to take a whiff. Taken aback by just how strong the wine was, Haise felt the pungent fumes burn his nostrils before needing to lean away to breathe.
Swallowing back the lump in his throat, Haise had accidentally caught himself staring at the phantom of Hinami, who sat down at the bar stool to his left. "It hasn't even been a day yet, and you've already turned to alcohol… Do you honestly believe that's a smart idea, Onii-Chan? Do you think I'm going to leave you alone just because you'll be intoxicated?"
Staring defiantly at his mind's mocking manifestation of his own guilty conscience, Haise found himself smirking smugly at Hinami before picking up the bottle with one hand. "Only one way to find out, huh?" Haise mused carelessly at the disapproving phantom beside him, before raising the bottle of wine up in the air.
"You're only hurting yourself, Onii-Chan; like you always do," Hinami's phantom warned, as she watched with a poker face as Haise brought the wine bottle closer down toward his mouth.
"... Cheers," Haise said sarcastically in spite of himself, before wrapping his lips around the opening of the glass bottle to begin chugging down the fermented blood.
Fueled by absolute rage after being told by Yomo that he and his niece had exiled Haise with nothing more than some spending money and the clothes during the day that a snowstorm was supposed to be coming to Tokyo, Eto was practically shoving anyone who got in her way onto the snow-covered pavement as she sprinted towards where Saiko and Shirazu were supposed to be waiting for her.
Standing outside of a famous corporate 'reserve roastery' that was located in the 8th Ward, Saiko and Shirazu stood underneath the light being casted from within the three-story coffee shop, while being dressed from head-to-toe in thick layers of clothing.
While they were both still upset about what Haise had said, the two quinxes eventually came to their senses and had begun to seek out their old squad leader after Saiko and Shirazu put Eto to bed after she was knocked out.
"Goddamnit… I can't believe I broke the nose of some guy who was tripping balls," Shirazu said self-critically to himself with a large amount of frustration dwelling within his head. "I mean... Saiko, how much of what he said was actually true, and how much of it was just shit was just him 'thinking' it was real?"
"Saiko… Saiko shouldn't have snapped at Maman either, ShiraShira," Saiko said in an emotionally-drained voice, after having cried through her body's reserved allotment of tears. "Six months… He's been recovering from head trauma for six months… How selfish we were to assume that he'd be fine," Saiko muttered bitterly at herself through gritted teeth, before taking a sip of cappuccino from her styrofoam cup.
"Yeah… Yeah, I really feel like shit right now," Shirazu admitted angrily, before getting to the point that he had to throw his coffee away because he was too angry to drink it without wanting to needlessly throw it on the ground.
"Same," Saiko replied back in a flat voice, before looking around her at all the garland and strung-up lights decorating the area around where they stood. "... And on top of that, the manager just HAD to throw Maman out on his ass during Christmas time… How terrible is that?"
"Terrible… Absolutely-fuckin'-terrible," Shirazu said with a saddened chuckle that lacked any aspect of humor behind it. Without a cup of piping hot coffee to keep his gloved hands warm from the bone-chilling temperatures caused by the same weather phenomenon that was blocking most of the sunlight above, Shirazu shoved his hands deep into his fur-coat's pockets.
Taking a sip from her cup, Saiko absent mindedly used her free hand to extend it outward past the building's protective brick-oning to expose her arm out to the snowfall. Grimacing quietly at just how fast her sleeve was getting coated in white frozen ice-particles, Saiko shook her arm free of snow before retracting it back where her arm would be safe.
"... Do you think Mutsuki's having better luck than us right now? We've been searching for him for about four hours now; you'd think we'd at least spot someone with a haircut like Maman's?" Saiko mused with a worried tone in her voice. "... Do you think Mutsuki's going to come back if he does find Maman?"
Surprised at how their conversation had shifted from trying to find Haise to Mutsuki flat out abandoning them, Shirazu opened his mouth to immediately reject the idea, but the more he thought about how Mutsuki had been behaving in the boardroom, the more Shirazu began to wonder himself.
"... With everything we've been through together, I'd love to give Mutsuki the benefit of the doubt, but… But shit, he's been acting possessive of Sassan lately, now that I think about it," Shirazu mused with a bit of reluctance in his voice. "I mean… I'd hate to say, but honest to God? I worry about Mutsuki a lot."
"... You too?" Saiko asked back with a bit of her own hesitation in her voice, as she turned her head up to stare at Shirazu. "... Saiko was beginning to think that she was the only one who noticed it… The way he stares at Saiko is scary; especially when he thinks she's not watching him… It's like he wants to hurt Saiko, ShiraShira."
"I… I don't know what's up with him," Shirazu finally said with a hint of defeat in his voice, after realizing that he honestly couldn't make an argument to justify Mutsuki's recent behavior. "... Yeah, Mutsuki is sort of messed up in the head, but then again, I think it's obvious that none of us have been right in the head lately either." Shirazu said with a self-aware grunt, before raising his hands out his pockets to talk with his hands.
"We've all been dealing with our problems while trying to pretend that everything's kosher; Haise's ramblings were just a catalyst for all of our repressed feelings n' shit," Shirazu said aloud frantically, before pointing to himself.
"Everytime I'm not with either you or Mutsuki, I get reminded of my little sister being alone in that hospital bed, while I can't do a goddamn thing about it except cry and feel sorry for myself when I'm alone!" Shirazu began to rant more so to himself than Saiko, as he became suddenly face-to-face with his own insecurities.
"It KILLS me on the inside knowing that I can't visit her anymore, because that hospital belongs to CCG! I… I-I don't even know if they have her on life support anymore…!" Shirazu stuttered out with fresh tears beginning to blur his vision, as he finally revealed aloud to himself and Saiko of his inner demons.
"I… I know Urie told us to stay low, but… Saiko, you don't know how many times I've stayed up at night and thought about going to that hospital and just saying 'fuck it', so I can fight my way through all those investigatiors, just so I can know if Haru's even still there." Shirazu chuckled out in a heartbroken voice, as he raised his head up to try and fight back his tears. "I… I know it's stupid, and suicidal, b-but..."
Watching with an aching feeling tearing away at her heart, Saiko stared at Shirazu visibly losing control of his emotions once again. "ShiraShira! Y-You're not making sense right now, it's… It's the stress talking; you're not thinking clearly is-"
"-No Saiko; for the first time in six months, I'm thinkin' crystal-fuckin' clear right now," Shirazu interrupted in a frustrated tone, as he stared with back at the other quinx with a solemn look in his watery eyes. "... Do you know what I was going to do on Christmas morning, Saiko? I'll tell you what I was going to do: I was going to finally do it; I was going to man up and go see Haru, and kill any son-of-a-bitch who got in my way."
Horrified at how serious and dedicated Shirazu sounded with his proposed self-destructive plans to see his little sister, Saiko found it traumatizing the way he looked at her with such conviction in his voice. "You… You wouldn't make it, ShiraShira… T-There's too many people stationed there."
"... I know," Shirazu said with a saddened smile on his face, before backing away from Saiko to wipe his eyes on his sleeve. Taking a moment to collect himself and put himself back into the right headspace, Shirazu hopped up-and-down like an athlete would do to hype themselves up before a performance. "... What about you, Saiko? What's going on in that round belly of yours?"
Upon being called out for her sudden weight gain, Saiko froze up with a gaped mouth before trying to laugh it off. "... T-Trying to insult, are you? Seems inappropriate right now, wouldn't you think?" Saiko said uneasily with a nervous look in her eye, before turning around so that she wasn't having to look at Shirazu's knowing stare.
"... Who said I was trying to insult you?" Shirazu argued back in a humorless voice, as he and Saiko stood while the cold winter air brushed unforgivingly against their exposed skin.
The two of them stood there in silence for what seemed like an hour before Saiko finally spoke up in a serious and mature tone; one that was very much unlike the voice she usually used to speak.
"I… I might have… Might have developed a… A codependency on food," the young woman said reluctantly with shame in her words, as she looked down to see how much larger she had gotten; the extra layers of clothing and the parka she had on didn't help her self-confidence in the least bit.
"... You have to understand ShiraShira, my only real comfort for the last six months has been a combination of eating, and playing video games. Taking care of Maman has been… Difficult, and well… Since we're being honest here," Saiko said with a frown on her face, before swallowing back the lump in her throat to clear the way for what she was about to say next.
"... Taking care of Maman around the clock, working full time as a waitress… I've been having so many responsibilities that I've been having to juggle these past six months… I haven't had time to play games like I used to," Saiko admitted, before adding on with, "since I couldn't have that comfort in my life, I… I started to rely heavily on the one thing I did have time for: food."
Nodding his head while empathizing with Saiko, Shirazu made sure to listen and wait until she was done before asking, "Why didn't you ask for help, Saiko? I'm sorry that I… I just assumed that you didn't mind taking care of Sassan… I should have known better."
"It's… It's fine, ShiraShira," Saiko replied back with a small shrug, while letting out a sadden sigh. "I had a feeling that you were… Going through something, it's just that I didn't know what that 'something' was… Saying that makes me realize that we all could have done more to check in with each other; shame on us."
"Yeah… Yeah, amen to that," Shirazu said with a half-hearted laugh, before shaking his head at how disappointed he was with himself for his own lack of effort. "What about Mutsuki? He's always been hanging around Sassan. I know that he wouldn't have minded lending you a hand."
What amount of comfort Saiko had in her fragile smile quickly vanished upon hearing the idea of Mutsuki looking after Haise. Instead, Saiko felt a frown make its way across her lips as she felt the color from her face drain in the matter of seconds. Feeling herself freeze up, Saiko stared blankly ahead as repressed memories of what she saw in the past came flooding back into her head.
Noticing Saiko's strange behavior, Shirazu stared down at her with a worried look in his eyes before reaching out towards her shoulder. "Saiko…? Hey, hey, come on now; stay with me," Shirazu said, before finally grabbing onto Saiko's shoulder.
The moment she felt something grabbing a hold of her, Saiko jolted up before instinctively shoving Shirazu's hand off of her shoulder. Realizing what she had done, Saiko let out a shallow breath before quickly muttering, "S-Sorry ShiraShira… I didn't mean to do that."
After the stunt he had pulled earlier, Shirazu had learned his lesson about taking the actions of others seriously at face value. Shrugging his shoulders and smiling patiently at Saiko, Shirazu brushed off what she had done to him before saying, "Don't worry about it… We don't have to talk about it if you don't want to right now."
Nodding her head weakly, Saiko let out an elongated breath before replying with, "Thank you, ShiraShira… Saiko will tell you about it later, just… Just not right now, please." Thankfully for Saiko, the sight of Eto running toward from down the street was enough of a distraction for her to focus away from her unpleasant memories. "ShiraShira, look; it's my other Maman!"
Being just as happy as Saiko was to finally have a reason to switch subjects, even if it wasn't for a pleasant reason either, Shirazu's excitement to begin their search for Haise quickly faded away into fear the moment he could see how visibly pissed off Eto was. "Welp… This is gonna suck."
"'RIP'," Saiko said sarcastically in agreement with Shirazu's comment, as they both prepared themselves for the barrating and yelling they were about to receive from their very angry mother.
Being the novice drinker that he was, Haise managed to get more than half-way down the bottle before finding himself slumped over the bar counter with the glass bottle still in his hand. Staring blankly over toward his left side where he had last seen the manifestation of his inner demons, Haise took solace in knowing that he had finally discovered a temporary fix for his hallucination; even if it wasn't a very good one.
As expected, before the alcohol had fully entered his system, Haise had been extremely talkative with the bartender that Gil sent out so he didn't have to talk to the one-eyed ghoul himself. When Haise was buzzed enough to be a fun and somewhat cognitive drunk, he and the bartender discussed ghoul society and the rules that the bartender wanted Haise to remember.
According to the bartender, ghouls had two choices for living their lives: either living in isolation as hermits, or to integrate with human society. The way the bartender described it, Haise would be needing to live life with the same careful planning and caution one would need when walking a tightrope.
However, there wasn't much weight left of the ghoul's 'tight-rope' philosophy after the bartender watched Haise sinking his teeth into the gourmet cheeseburger. Having expected for the one-eyed ghoul to begin immediately gagging, the bartender cautiously lowered the trash bag he had in his hand as he watched with a fascinated look in his eye as Haise ate the large cheeseburger was the best thing he'd ever had in his life.
Amazed at the phenomena he had witnessed, the possibility of Haise being the only other ghoul aside from the rumored ex-Aogiri Tree leader capable of eating human food without any upfront negative effects astounded the bartender, so he the told Haise to stay seated so he could go into the kitchen to bring him something else to try.
Being too drunk to care that he was essentially going to be used as a guinea-pig for Orca's experiment, Haise remembered raising his bottle toward the bartender before drinking himself further into a drunken stopper.
Time had passed since then, and between him passing out and awakening from time-to-time to hear what sounded like pots-and-pans clattering and glass shattering, Haise was far too inebriated to bother looking into what had been causing the commotion.
To his defense, Haise did consider getting up at least three times, but ended up just absent-mindfully choosing to take a swig of alcohol and lay back down on the table while listening to the chill beats of what he assumed was a mix between soft-jazz and lofi playing from the overhead speakers.
Haise's blissful ignorance came crashing down about the moment when Hachikawa walked through the kitchen door and around the counter before bashing him off of his stool using his quinque, 'Kaijri'.
"You're making this too easy for me, Sasaki," Hachikawa said in a deep voice, as he nonchalantly walked over to where Haise had been sitting to stare down at the messy white plate and spilt alcohol on the table, before turning his attention toward the floor to take note of the near-empty bottle of wine that the one-eyed ghoul was still holding onto.
"W-What are you selling? I don't want it..." Haise groaned out in a disoriented voice, as the room around him seemed to spin around him. "Goooooo away, I don't wanna sign your petition..." Haise slurred out in a bothered voice, before getting immediately kicked in the ribs.
Although Hachikawa wasn't able to break Haise's ribs or even bruise his skin, his kick had been enough to upset the young man's stomach. Feeling his cheeseburger and wine coming back up the way it entered, Haise's eyes widened in sheer panic as he rolled over on his side just in time to vomit onto the floor.
"Look at you… Such a fall from grace! You used to be Arima's star-pupil; many even considered you to be his legacy… How wrong they were," Hachikawa mused with a look of superiority in his eyes, as he walked around Haise in a circle with his quinque aimed at the back of the heaving ghoul's head.
"I've always seen you for the pathetic piece of shit that you are. Although I have to admit, I am surprised to see you here rather than inside that casket of yours… Then again, I don't recall CCG being able to find most of your body, so… I suppose the only question I have left is what of the One-Eyed Owl? Is she still alive as well?"
Spitting out the last remnants of his meal onto the floor, Haise quickly remembered Mutsuki's advice from earlier, and tried his best to summon his kagune. Unfortunately, for some reason that Haise couldn't wrap his head around at that very moment, the one-eyed ghoul was unable to unleash his kagune to defend himself.
In his drunken state, the only thing left to do in Haise's mind was to look up at Hachikawa and stare him in his eyes before saying, "... Looking for the One-Eyed Owl, huh? I only saw HALF of her, but she was a real HOOT!"
Without receiving the answer he wanted in the limited time frame that his patience allowed for Haise to speak, Hachikawa lowered the drill-like quinque to take aim at the ghoul's wrist before firing practically from a point-blank distance.
"-AHH, FUCK!" Haise screamed out in agony, before falling down in his own pool of vomit. On his back, Haise raised his right forearm up and was greeted with the grizzly sight of there being a bloodied stump at his wrist where his hand used to be connected to.
Seething through his pain, Haise looked over to his side to see his severed hand laying in a small pool of blood beside a glowing-orange quinque-metal projectile that was responsible for his loss of his limb. Tucking his mangled arm into his chest, Haise tried reaching over to grab his hand with the intention of reattaching it to his wrist.
Another shot from Hachikawa's quinque rang out in the enclosed area, and what followed suit was more screaming from Haise's part. With the one-eyed ghoul missing both of his hands, Hachikawa watched Haise squirming in agony on the ground, while reveling in the young man's misery as Ayumu and two other armed investigators came into the bar after finishing up their slaughter in Orca's kitchen.
"Boss, the staff were all ghouls; their bodies are ready for pick up," Ayumu announced to her squad leader, as she walked past the bar counter to get a look at one of CCG's most previously aspiring investigators. She wouldn't admit it in front of Hachikawa, but she hated seeing Haise in the pathetic state he was in.
While Hachikawa wasn't able to take pride in what he considered to be an easily achieved victory against Haise, the investigator was still content with how smooth their last-minute raid had been on Orca. Towering over Haise, Hachikawa kept his quinque aimed at where he last saw the one-eyed ghoul curled up on the floor before momentarily raising his head up to address his squad.
Unfortunately for the associate special class investigator, he had claimed his preemptive victory far sooner than he should have. Having underestimated how fast a still-intoxicated ghoul could move, by the time that the Hachikawa realized that Haise had reattached both of his hands and had already gotten up, it was already too late for him.
Grappling the arm that Hachikawa was using to hold onto to his quinque, Haise used his free hand to smash the bottom of his wine-bottle down onto Hachikawa's nose. With shattered pieces of glass getting stuck in his eyes and nose, Hachikawa let out a painful groan as he fell backwards from the blow before landing hard on the ground.
"Bottom's up," Haise taunted in a spiteful and sarcastic voice, before spitting a wad of saliva while narrowly avoiding being attacked by an ambitious investigator who thought he would be able to land a strike on the one-eyed ghoul with his unaspring quinque.
"How dare you! I'm going to kill you!" the man screamed hatefully at Haise, while relentlessly swinging his mace-like quinque at the ghoul.
Not wanting to kill a man for merely doing his job, Haise was able to master the ways of the drunken-arts within his inebriated state. Executing his dodges in a way that would have been described as 'flowing and smooth like water', Haise eventually saw his opportunity to make his counterattack upon seeing the enraged investigator stumbling out of proper form after his last attack.
Grabbing the leg of the stool he once had the pleasure of putting his ass on, Haise raised the piece of furniture up above his head before slurring out, "Ttt-take ah' seat."
Confused as to what the apparently drunken and crazed ghoul was doing, the once enraged investigator managed to utter out "W-Wh-" before Haise broke the wooden stool onto the top of his head. Concussed and bleeding profusely from the large gaping wound on the top of his head that was ridden with splinters, the investigator was knocked out.
Confused more so than she was afraid for her own life, Ayumu stood there with a baffled expression hidden behind her blonde hair as she watched her other subordinate reach into his trench coat to pull out a pistol.
While Haise wasn't agile enough in his drunken state to pull off something as flashy as using his white-ceramnic plate to disarm his attacker, he was however still smart enough to simply grab Hachikawa from the ground to use as his next makeshift weapon.
"THERE IS NO PUN," Haise yelled out in an excited and slightly manic voice, before throwing Hachikawa at the investigator like one would do with a javelin.
With his injured squad leader landing on top of him, the last investigator in Hachkiawa's squad fell onto the floor from the sheer weight of the muscular man on top of him; all the while dropping his pistol onto the floor for Haise to clumsily steal.
Picking up the firearm, Haise took aim and fired two shots with the intention of destroying the man's quinque that he hadn't activated yet. Unfortunately for the investigator, Haise's aim wasn't the greatest at the moment, and he ended up accidentally firing two shots into the man's upper thigh.
"Oh! Erm…! S-Sorry about that," Haise mumbled apologetically at the screaming investigator, who soon ended up seizing up and going into shock from the sheer amount of pain he was experiencing.
While Haise seemed distracted with trying to slur out an explanation for his misfire to the unconscious man, Ayumu quietly tried stepping forward with the intent to use her sword-like quinque on the ghoul while he wasn't looking.
"... Hands up, and drop your weapon," Haise suddenly said in an authoritative tone, as he took a step back before raising his newly acquired handgun up towards Ayumu, who stopped dead in her tracks. "Nice and slow… Don't make me do anything that I don't want to."
Clenching her jaw and unable to find the courage to speak, Ayumu reluctantly complied with Haise's orders by slowly kneeling down to drop her most recently acquired quinque down on the floor, before standing back up with her hands raised in the air.
"Kick it over," Haise commanded the young blonde girl, to which she followed without question. With his firearm still aimed at her center of mass, Haise kept his eyes on Ayumu as he knelt down to pick up the handle of the guardless sword. "... Yukimura used to be my quinque; it was a gift I got from Arima," Haise mused with a thoughtful look in his drunken eyes, as he struggled to grasp the slim handle of the quinque on the first few tries. "... Son-of-a-cuss-word! Was this thing always this slippery?!"
With the handle of Yukimura repeatedly dropping out of his palm, Haise grew irritated with his own lack of hand coordination, and momentarily placed the loaded firearm onto the bar counter beside him. With his other hand free, Haise was able to properly grab a hold of Yukimura's long handle before standing back up.
Having somewhat expected for Ayumu to have made a move by either running away or trying to land a surprise blow on him, Haise was actually surprised to see that the young woman was still standing where he'd last seen her. Standing as still as her buckling knees would allow her to, Ayumu kept her trembling hands raised up above her head as she began to breathe shallow and quick breaths.
"Please… Please don't kill us," Ayumu spoke out in a quiet and withdrawn voice, as she begged for her life and the lives of her squadmates. While she wasn't one to normally speak in general, Ayumu's courage stemmed from wanting to rescue Hachikawa, who she saw as a fatherly figure.
The same fatherly figure who immediately stood up before shoving her into Haise so that he would instinctively have to catch her. "I'm sorry…" Hachikawa spoke out in a ghastly and remorseful voice, before using his limited vision to fire a barrage of quinque-metal that pierced through Ayumu's body and into Haise's torso.
Hearing the groans of agony coming from Haise mixed in with the tearful whimpers of pain coming from Ayumu, Hachikawa lowered his quinque as he stood there with his glass-ridden eyes staring down painfully at the two youthful adults who laid down in a pool of their combined blood.
Feeling it slowly becoming harder-and-harder to breathe, Hachikawa attempted to take a step closer to try and put Ayumu out of her misery before taking his time with Haise. However, the moment Hachikawa raised his other foot in preparation to make the next step forward, the grizzled old man collapsed onto the floor.
Clenching at his aching chest, it didn't take long for Hachikawa to realize that before Haise fell to the floor, the one-eyed ghoul had managed to throw Yukimura at him. Whether or not Haise had been aiming at his heart was unbeknownst to Hachikawa, but either way the ghoul investigator knew that he had only a matter of moments left before he would succumb to his injuries.
"Ayumu… Forgive me," Hachikawa groaned out in a barely audible voice, as he lay dying in a pool of his own blood, surrounded in the carnage that he had created in his path to end the life of someone who didn't even remember his name.
Due to Haise's body being durable and gifted with an impeccable regenerative ability, the moment he managed to carefully get Ayumu off of him, he had no problems sliding out the orange-bits of quinque-metal from his chest. Spitting up a wad of blood that he had coughed up from his lungs, Haise within his disoriented state managed to push himself up from the ground before gathering his bearings.
Stumbling his way over to Ayumu, Haise stared down with an empathic and sadden gaze as he watched the young girl curled up on the floor. "H-Help me…" Ayumu whimpered out weakly, as she shook violently from the agonizing pain she felt.
Surprised that she was still able to talk, much less breathe, Haise quickly knelt down beside the young investigator to get a better look at her injuries. Carefully trying his best to not hurt her, Haise moved the arm she was using to cover the right side of her abdomen to reveal that her injuries weren't as fatal as he had thought them to be.
'... I guess that guy must have known what he was doing; I don't think he hit any of her vital organs,' Haise thought with uncertainty, as he motioned for Ayumu to cover her gaping wounds with her arm once more. 'That doesn't make what he did justifiable though… Damn it, I wish I remembered how to do first aid!'
"Stay still, and try not to move; I'm going to call for an ambulance… Erm… What's, uh… What's the number to the emergency hotline again?" Haise asked with an embarrassed and panicked look in his eyes, while Ayumu fought past the pain of her injuries to begin assisting the confused man in order to save herself and her two unconscious squad members.
After having gotten the address from Ayumu and finishing up his call to the emergency hotline, Haise made sure to take what he needed amongst the fallen around him before heading off into the night. Tossing off his soiled turtleneck sweater, Haise went over to the investigator who he had knocked out with a bar stool to get changed into a standard CCG trench coat and black dress shirt.
Reunited with Yukimura after pulling the quinque out from Hachiakwa's chest, Haise made sure to rifle through the belongings of the last investigator who went into shock to retrieve ammunition for the pistol. Putting his old quinque back into its case, Haise stuck the pistol and his looted magazines into the inner pockets of his new trench coat, before making his way to the bathroom to clean the blood off of himself to avoid suspicion.
Already being able to hear the sirens of what he presumed to be the ambulance, Haise decided to avoid taking the front entrance of the bar as his escape route. Instead, Haise made his way past the mutilated bodies of the staff that littered the blood-stained kitchen; making sure not to step on Gil's decapitated body on his way to the fire escape ladder that the investigators had used to get inside the ghoul-owned bar.
Still feeling the effects of the alcohol clouding his judgement and senses, Haise accidently lost his footing midway down the ladder and ended up slipping off before falling down two stories onto the snow-pavement in between the alley. Landing on his back, Haise felt the air forcibly escaping his lungs as heavy snow falling from above began to already cover his entire body.
Wheezing for air, Haise pushed past his dizzy vision as lifted himself up from the ice-covered ground before immediately slipping again and falling face-first into a pile of dirty snow. Frustrated and still shaking from the stress of having to fight for his life, Haise's stress levels were through the roof.
So when he heard the sound of snow crunching in the recognizable rhythm of footsteps approaching him from behind, Haise's adrenaline fueled mind immediately had him once again feeling the effects of 'fight or flight'. Rolling over on his back, Haise immediately withdrew his pistol from his trench coat before taking aim at the two silhouettes that came to a halt the moment they saw the firearm.
Trembling with his eyes widened and his hand shaking, Haise kept his pistol aimed towards the two figures who were obscured by the falling snow and shadows of the alley, as he used his encased quinque to push himself up to his feet. With the screeching sirens coming to a halt, the lights of the ambulance parked out in the front of the bar were then able to illuminate his surroundings enough for Haise to finally recognize the two young men standing before him
"M-Mutsuki?! W… What are you doing with... ?! Erm..." Haise asked in a shaken up and confused voice, before suddenly squinting with uncertainty as he stared at the taller man who donned an olive-green trench coat and pair of eyeglasses. "... Your name's Nishido, right? I'm sorry, it's just… It's kind of hard to remember everyone's name."
"... Yeah buddy, that's my name alright," Nishiki replied back with a small chuckle at the end of his sentence, before slowly extending his hand out to lower Haise's gun out of his face. "... You can, ya know… Put that thing away now; I'm not here to fight ya' like last time."
"... Last time?" Haise asked with an inquisitive look on his face, as he smiled nervously while putting his stolen pistol back into his trench coat that he also took by illegal means.
Nodding at Haise, Mutsuki smiled happily as he still remembered the day he and the rest of his squad first fought Nishiki, who had gone by the alias 'Serpent'. "That's right Sensei! Do you remember doing this?" Mutsuki asked, before demonstrating what he was referring to by standing with his arm outstretched to block Nishiki, before dramatically reciting, "'Stand back. Investigator Mutsuki, that's an order.'"
Despite his current stressed state, hearing Mutsuki imitating him in his voice made Haise let out a laugh of genine amusement, which destressified him quite a bit. "Oh yeah, that! I remember now… Excuse me, Mutsuki." Haise said in a deepened voice, before stepping forward to punch Nishiki straight in his gut.
While Haise purposefully didn't hit hard enough to pierce through Nishiki's skin, the blow he received from the one-eyed ghoul knocked the wind out of him. Falling on one knee while pressing his hand against the spot where he had been sucker-punched, Nishiki gasped for air before looking up at Haise with an angered and bewildered look in his eyes.
"Guhhh…! W-What the hell, Kaneki...?!" Nishiki wheezed out in between breaths, while looking up at the somewhat bothered look on Haise's face. "Are you out of your goddamn mi-... Nevermind… Why did you e-even do that…?!"
"First of all Nishido, my name's not 'Ken Kaneki' anymore; it's 'Haise Sasaki'… I'm getting kind of annoyed with people not getting that right," Haise said foremost, before moving onto his explanation, "And secondly…You totally deserve that after everything you put my squad and I through."
Muttering to himself while trying to process what Haise was referring to, Nishiki felt his eyes widen and his jaw drop the moment it dawned on him where the one-eyed ghoul's sudden outburst stemmed from. "Are you f-fucking joking?! That was, like, TWO years ago; how are you STILL mad about that?!"
"... Because I just now remembered how upset I was at you for hurting my squad… Buuuuut now that I got that out of my system, all is forgiven," Haise said with a half-hearted chuckle, before extending his hand down for Nishiki to grab hold of.
Shaking his head after having witnessed the minimum extent of Haise's odd behavior for himself, Nishiki grabbed a hold of the young man's hand before getting helped back up to his feet. "You're so goddamn lucky that I'm not in the mood to kick your ass right now..." While Mutsuki wasn't at all amused by what Nishiki had to say, the young quinx held back his tongue after seeing the ghoul's angered frown slowly dissolve into an amused smirk.
"... It's good to you again, Kane-, I mean… 'Sasaki'," Nishiki said after having to awkwardly correct himself. "... Jeez, I'm going to have to work on that; calling you by that name leaves a weird taste in my mouth." Nishiki said half-jokingly, while rolling his tongue in his mouth in an over exaggerated way.
With the two other men having been distracted with their reunion, Mutsuki was the only one who was still wary of the EMTs scourging up in the upstairs bar located in the building above them. "I'd hate to ruin the moment, Sensei, but we really shouldn't be out here right now- Have you been drinking?" Mutuski asked after suddenly getting a whiff of Haise's alcohol-scented breath.
"... Shouldn't I be the one asking the questions here?" Haise asked with a guilty and nervous look in his eyes, after slowly taking a step back to avoid Mutuski trying to interrogate him. "Like for starters… What's going on here?! Were you two following me?!"
Opening his mouth to answer the first of many questions that he predicted his friend to have, Nishiki was suddenly interrupted by the sounds of new sirens echoing closer towards their location; the same variation of sirens that CCG used as a way to distinguish themselves from other government agencies.
"I'd love to play twenty-questions with you Sasaki, buuuut… I think that's our cue to get the hell out of dodge," Nishiki said sarcastically with a stressed look in his eyes, before beginning to flee from the vicinity by taking the path down the alley. "Come on, let's go!"
Feeling frustrated that his questions weren't answered yet, Haise opened his mouth in protest, but was quickly silenced after suddenly feeling Mutsuki's tender lips pressed up against his. "Mmmph?!" Haise muttered out in confusion, as he felt his heart beginning to flutter and his eyes widened at the sheer amount of shock that he felt in that very moment.
Holding onto Haise by wrapping his arms around his back, Mutsuki's eyes were closed as he took advantage of their brief moment alone together to bask in his mentor's presence. Making sure to slide his tongue into his baffled ex-squad leader's mouth, Mutsuki enjoyed the alcoholic-taste of Haise's saliva as he licked the inside of the other man's cheek.
Feeling himself getting aroused while experiencing the thrill of running from the law, Mutsuki reluctantly broke away from the kiss before reaching down to grab Haise's free hand. "Come on Sensei! We're going to the 8th Ward's docks; you and I have a ship to catch!" Mutsuki said in an excited voice, before beginning to sprint forward with Haise barely able to keep up in his drunken state as a million thoughts raced through his mind.
'Ship? What ship?'
'Why did you kiss me like that?'
'Why were you two following me?'
'Did anyone else come looking for me?'
'Is Yoshimura okay?'
'What the hell is going on here?!'
'Oh God, why are we running so fast?! I'm going to throw up again!'
Were a few examples of the many things going through Haise's head, as they fled into the snow-ridden streets on that not-so-silent night, and towards the breaching waves and coastal breezes of the 8th Ward's docks. However, one very important question remained in Haise's head; one that was so important, that it was the only thing he could think of during their entire escape.
'FOR THE LOVE OF GOD; WHY DIDN'T I USE THE RESTROOM WHEN I HAD THE CHANCE?!'
Thank you for reading this long chapter! I usually try to keep it around 5K words, but I guess I had a lot to write this time lol.
Now to address some reviews I got.
Also, a lot of you are kind of horny; I love reading those lemon-esque scenarios you guys write down. Never change.
Thank you for reviewing L; and yes, Hinami's going to be Haise's only chance to get into Touka's pants at this point. And I too love Spongebob.
Saitama, thank you for reviewing! I agree, Haise probably shouldn't have kept his hallucination to himself. But don't worry, everyone to some extent or another (sans Touka) realized that they themselves overreacted to Haise.
Root A, thank you for reviewing! Eto back then enjoyed the suffering of others, especially Kaneki. So yes, it's something that haunts her still. Hence why we got to see a fraction of Eto when she's angry. The next chapter will reveal more of Eto being pissed off.
Thank you for reviewing Carla! I've mentioned before that I don't watch the anime but I do love the soundtrack from Tokyo Ghoul :re and from the original two seasons of the anime as well!
Haise thankfully won't be homeless for long. While I personally think Haise x Hinami would be a very interesting thing to read, I can't see Haise lusting after her. Hinami shipped him and Touka together from what I can remember, but yeah I can see her having a crush on him. Especially now that Ayato is dead AF.
Good point by the way lol, Touka was fine with Rize killing Kaneki a while ago, huh? Shame on her indeed.
Thank you Reviewbruh for the review! But uh, Haise's only been awake for one day; kind of hard to believe with how many chapters I wrote, but yeah lol. And you were right, those WEREN'T the words of a sane man at all. Ayato was an asshole to Kaneki, so it definitely was Touka's fault for how she reacted. This isn't based on Root A, but the original manga itself; so yeah, Haise's definitely not a fan of Ayato. I wouldn't call :re's staff morons, but they defiantly overreacted and used Haise to self-project their own demons onto. And don't worry, Tsukiyama and Nishiki have their eyes set on a bigger fish than just revenge.
Tsukiyama wants Haise for an entirely different reason other than just trying to take a bite out of his fine ass. Kanae is still alive, so is Matsumae. Also, no way Haise has that kind of good luck. He's got that 'Struggler' luck, where he barely gets out of scrapes just to get into more trouble.
Haise would probably get Eto an iPod Touch, but she's also dyslexic. If anything, he'd get her an iPad so she'd have an easier time using it with some accessibility aids. Also, Haise being a simp for Eto breathes life into me.
Mr. Merlin's words are true; Haise is really messed up.
If Eto didn't get knocked out, she'd probably stop Touka and everyone else from reacting the way they did. Except Mutsuki; say what you want about him, at least he's the one person other than Eto who doesn't judge Haise.
Haise plans on rescuing Hinami by himself, or at least while only getting indirect help from others. Hint: Kurona equals the edgy Hinami.
Eto wasn't even mad at Haise; he's the apple of her eye.
Anyways, thank you for reviewing and reading! I hope you all have a wonderful day!
