A/N: Sorry for the late update! Since we're in the penultimate stages of wrapping up things at work for the holidays, things had been a little hectic lately. But nevermind that! I am back (rather, I was never gone!). We have only two more chapters to go, so that's fun!
Azza, if you're still reading: Ichigo's inmate number from Chapter 1 is 1503 for two reasons: a) '15th' July is Ichigo's birthday and '03rd' September is Orihime's birthday, as one reviewer correctly pointed out. b) 15th March is also my birthday! I didn't expect any of you to know that lol, but just putting it out there.
Also, I'm not sure but Byakuya might be slightly OOC in this chapter. It was said in Bleach that he was hot-tempered in his youth, but, yeah. Hope everyone is staying safe this holiday season. Will be back to regularly scheduled updating from here on!
Driving up to the high arches of Seireitei had proved to be rather difficult that morning. Orihime noted with apprehension that most main roads leading to and from the penitentiary had all been cordoned off. If that hadn't confirmed her suspicions enough, there were guards stationed every two miles within each other, and nearly all of them required her to show her I.D or prop open her trunk. Radios buzzed, and heavily-armed personnel seemed to be swarming in and out of the region like flies.
By the time she approached the seventh check point, she was feeling rather tired.
Her window slid down, opening up to yet another guard.
"I.D?" he asked, narrowing his eyebrows to examine the already opened wallet that she showed him. He noted down her details with a satisfying click, then gestured at the back for her to open the trunk. Mechanically, she flipped her key to one side and heard the steady hiss of her car as it did. The guard left her window to go examine the back.
The most he'd find there were old collections of manga she'd been meaning to clean out. A spare tire. An umbrella and her rain boots. Certainly not three escaped inmates that she'd locked in her car and taken for a jaunt to the very place they'd meant to escape from.
But protocol was protocol and Orihime understood it quite well. Even if she had broken a few. A line of guilt slithered down the bob of her throat.
Orihime was a good person. She and Ichigo were good people and they had done a bad thing. And bad things led to other things, no matter how rose-tainted one tried to paint it. There was no absolution for this kind of guilt; it was just something that you decided to weigh on your shoulders if it was worth it. And Ichigo was worth it. He was a good man – an innocent man – who had a lot riding on his shoulders. The last thing she wanted to do was be the strings that held him back.
The guard rapped on her window with his knuckles, snapping her out of it. When she turned, he gave an apologetic smile.
"Sorry about that, uh," he glanced at her I.D again, "Dr. Inoue. I'm sure they'll brief you once you're up there but we had four cons break out last night, so everyone's kind of on the edge." Four cons?Orihime frowned. He watched her pale face and gave her a reassuring smile. "Not to worry, we have police scanning the entire district with helicopters. JSDF loaned out a bunch of men to do door-to-doors and scent-tracking, so there's a good chance we'll be onto those bastards by sundown."
Orihime bit her lip. She knew this man was just trying to make her feel better, but there was nothing remotely comforting about any of the things he just said. She smiled nonetheless, not wanting to hold his time up. "Thank you, guard-san," she cheered. "I'll be on my way then."
As she began pulling away and arriving at the heart of the prison, she noticed media vans, cameras and an entire entourage of reporters crowding by the gates. Even as she drove into parking, she could hear the throng of press shouting questions and doing their extensive reportage rather noisily. At this rate, Orihime suspected the entire city would know by noon. Maybe even the neighbouring districts. In her pocket was her phone, with three missed calls from Tatsuki, confirming as much.
She pulled the keys from ignition and stepped out into the thick air. It had drizzled early that morning, but nothing could keep the enthusiasm of spectators at bay. Out of the corner of her eye, she spotted Iba instructing the other guards on crowd management. When his gaze caught hers, he nodded in greeting.
"Mornin', doc," he greeted as she jogged up to him. "Hell of a night. You hear what happened?"
"I – yes, I caught bits and pieces of it," she said, gnawing her lip in worry as the crowd around them grew. Thankfully, Iba kept one hand on her elbow and guided her through until they entered the grounds together. As they approached the high towers, she spotted other staff and personnel standing around in clusters with solemn looks on their faces. It was a fate worse than death, the verdict that convicts had escaped from a prison. She caught snippets of conversation from the police and other guards who were speaking into their phones – snippets of 'possibly armed and dangerous.'
She frowned, her heart hitching in a sort of dull pain. While she personally knew three of the supposed convicts – and found them reasonably harmless – she realized the public perception was far different. And that their tensions were high for very different reasons from hers.
Once she noticed the bright flash of Renji's hair ahead of her, however, her stomach dropped. The crease of his brows puckered around a darkened, purple bruise. Slings of white bandages were tightly wound from his torso to his chest, tapering off at his right arm. When he regarded her, his face was hard set and somber. There was something in his eyes that she was sure, had she not been so worried, she could have deciphered.
"Abarai-san," Orihime gasped, immediately rushing to his side to examine the very hasty-looking fresh stitch on his finger where the skin had split. "Who–what happened?"
"There's a 'you should've seen the other guy' joke in there somewhere, I'm sure," Iba said, grinning with a livid, humorless smile. "I'm sure we'll get around to crackin' it once we catch those sorry sons-a-bitches." He clapped Renji on the shoulder. "And we will catch them."
Renji, however, heaved a deep sigh, still looking at Orihime. He shook his head, then jerked his head towards her office window from where they were standing. "Clinic's a mess," he said shortly. "But the warden wants to see you first, so we should get that sorted."
Orihime nodded, feeling a throb of fear in her chest.
You knew this would happen, she told herself as her ears buzzed with anxiety.
"Come on," Renji said, beckoning her to follow him into the penitentiary. As they walked, there was a grave, heavy silence between them. While Renji was still standing tall, still going about his job, his shoulders were sagged in a defeated slump.
"Abarai-san–" Orihime started, then stopped. What comfort could she provide? What help would she even be? And his family...She squeezed her eyes shut, voice growing soft to the point of a whisper. "Who was it?"
Renji turned over his shoulder, looking her dead in the eyes with that look again. "Kurosaki," he replied roughly, before turning on his heel and continuing up the corridor.
Orihime almost stopped dead in her tracks, her heart racing to her throat with a gush of bile. There were questions – too many, in fact – but they were already well past administration and coming up on the warden's office. The door was closed, and Renji looked like he was going to raise his fist to knock on it, but he stopped halfway, shoulders tight.
"Abarai-san?"
He turned on his heel and put one large hand on her shoulder, the weight of it forcing her to look up.
"Listen to me, doc," he said quietly, eyes darting up and down at the many people that were hurrying around before landing on the door. "The man in there, he's my brother-in-law, sure. But he's also got the reputation of being the most tough-on-crime warden in decades." He ushered her around a corner when a couple of guards passed him by, giving them a vacant nod as they greeted him. When they retreated, he turned back to her. "We haven't had a single escape attempt in fifty years. Way things are going, there's going to be a lot of downsizing. Good men will lose their jobs. Things are going to get ugly real fast. People are going to start talking to save their asses and the warden's going to take every lead seriously until we catch these guys."
Orihime's chest tightened with guilt, feeling the tremble in her own voice when she murmured, "Why–what are you saying?"
His eyes studied hers carefully. "If there's anything, anything at all you want to tell me before we go in there," he said slowly, "now would be a good time to do it. Before you go see Kuchiki Byakuya."
For a moment, Orihime wondered if he knew. If he'd sat up in bed one night after he'd put his baby daughter to bed and cursed his kind heart for inviting a traitor to his home. She took a shaky breath, wondering if she was the type of woman to go scurrying into shelter when shit hit the fan. She might have been, once. Maybe she still was, somewhere deep within.
But not today.
"I have nothing to hide, Abarai-san," she replied finally, staring Renji dead in his eyes.
The way he looked at her, she might as well have been a dead woman where she stood.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Kuchiki Byakuya's office was irrefutably dark, the only light seeping in through pale curtains at the north of his chair. The man himself was seated, his figure casting a long shadow ahead of him. It was quiet – eerily so – and the way his hands were locked over each other on the table, Orihime suspected he was an indomitable man.
Renji closed the door behind them, before stationing himself over at the far corner of the room. Orihime's knees felt like jelly, standing in the middle of the room rather uncomfortably with no course of action.
"Dr. Inoue, please," Byakuya waved his hand ahead of him, beckoning her to take a seat.
"Thank you," she replied quietly, settling down on the frankly uncomfortable chair.
"I am sure you can appreciate the gravity of the situation." Byakuya intoned, cutting right to the matter as he stared at her. "If your policy in answering my questions is utter honesty, there should be no need to fear an inquisition or a visit down to the courthouse. As of now, all our inquiries stand on conjecture." He tapped a tiny, black box on the table with one, long index finger. "You will be recorded. Do you consent?"
He stated the words plainly, but something about his monotonous demeanor made it sound like a threat. Nonetheless, Orihime straightened in her chair. "Yes," she replied, watching him click the recorder on with a whir. "I intend to cooperate with the investigation in whatever way you would need me to, sir."
"Very well," Byakuya replied, staring down at a clipboard of papers in front of him. He confirmed her background details mechanically – name, age, education, where she worked prior. It was all pretty standard procedure, but Orihime couldn't temper the gnawing in her gut when he set aside the clipboard to regard her attentively.
"Dr. Inoue," he started, eyes scanning her coolly, "Are you aware that the four inmates: Yasutora Sado, Ishida Uryu, Kurosaki Ichigo–"
– Orihime tried not to straighten curiously –
"– and Hirako Shinji, are the names of the four convicts that escaped Seireitei State Penitentiary late last night?"
"I- I saw the news, yes sir," she said softly, fighting the urge to dig her nails into her palms. Shinji, too? she wondered, thinking of the man who had once declared his proposition to escape.
"What was the nature of your relationship with the escaped fugitives?"
Orihime bit her lip to hold down a gasp, not expecting him to get straight into the crux of things. But as Renji had said, Kuchiki Byakuya was all business.
She took her time, weighing each word with deliberation as her eyes drifted to the recorder. "I knew them in passing. Some of them were my patients."
Byakuya peered down at his papers. "I see." He leaned forward. "It is my understanding that on your first night in Seireitei, you were the attending doctor to Kurosaki Ichigo, yes?"
Orihime felt her fist curl tightly around her purse, blood rushing to her ears as she attempted to keep calm. "That's right. He came in with a broken rib, which was the primary reason we admitted him, spare a couple of bruises."
"Were you well-acquainted with the escapee at the time?"
"No, sir. I had never met him before," she replied promptly.
Without any hesitation, almost hawk-like, he asked, "What about after? How would you describe your relationship with the fugitive during his incarceration here?"
Orihime swallowed. "Kurosaki-san?"
Byakuya said nothing. She assumed that was her cue to continue, much to her dismay.
"We-ell, he came in a few times for his check-ups and he was the inmate assigned to prison industry at the infirmary, so we talked sometimes," she explained, fidgeting with her fingers.
We had sex, right on one of the infirmary beds, she thought, with no one but Ukitake-san and God as conscious and unconscious witnesses.
Her face flooded with such terrible heat she nearly missed the next question.
"Correct me if I'm wrong, doctor,"– he didn't seem to believe he was – "but it says in my report that on the night of the riot, he was present in the infirmary with you for an entirety of...six hours. Correct?"
"I – yes," she whispered. Behind her, she heard a rustle of movement as Renji shuffled his feet.
"Yet, there seems to be forty-five minutes of your time that was unaccounted for. Where were you during that time, Dr. Inoue?" He pinned her down with a gaze that was far too stoic to be considered curious.
"Erm, as I mentioned in my report, I was tending to Zaraki-san," she explained. "Then I headed straight back to the infirmary."
"I see. Was this before or after Kurosaki Ichigo arrived at the infirmary?"
"Before."
There was a beat of silence. Orihime wondered if it was such a good idea to have eaten breakfast before she turned into work today.
Byakuya propped one hand under his chin, like Orihime was his sole focus of attention. "Now, what I'm having trouble understanding, Dr. Inoue, is why you would return to the clinic if your shift had ended three hours prior. Surely there was nothing holding you back from heading home?"
Her brain tried to tear apart and piece back together what he was trying to insinuate rapidly, as her mouth began to reply to his question, "Ukitake-san was all alone, so I wanted to stay with him until a guard arrived."
"And what of Kurosaki Ichigo? Were you reluctant to leave him alone as well?"
Orihime opened her mouth, then paused. "I don't know how to answer that question." It seemed rhetorical.
Byakuya's eyes met Renji's briefly, behind her shoulder. Then, they flickered back to her. "Were you aware, Dr. Inoue, that the route the fugitives took last night was a tunnel through your office?"
"I am breaking out...and it's right through your office."
"I wasn't," she lied, the taste of it sour on her tongue.
"It seems awfully convenient that you've been sitting on the exact same passage that four escaped convicts – one of whom spent hours here in your company – used, and you had not the lick of an idea it was even there," Byakuya suggested.
Behind her, Renji cleared his throat loudly. When both Orihime and Byakuya turned to him, he simply stared at his feet.
"Sorry," he mumbled. "Bad throat."
Orihime turned back, then spoke at a rate a lot slower than her heart was, "I'm sorry, sir, but from what I've heard, administration wasn't aware of it either, so I'm not sure how I could have discerned something like that when I spent most of my time working with my patients."
Smart ass, Ichigo would have teased.
Something akin to irritation flashed in Byakuya's eyes at her answer. "I see," he said stonily, " I think we've wasted sufficient time beating around the bush here, Dr. Inoue, so let's get to the facts. The fact is that my men found traces of blood matching Kurosaki Ichigo's all over your clinic floors. Evidenced right from his assault, we think, on my adjutant there."
Orihime's purse suddenly fell to the floor, but the 'thud' sounded distant to her own ears.
"All sixteen hospitals in this district have been given the photographs and records of the escapees; if he's cunning enough to avoid medical treatment and subsequent capture, chances are, he will die from the blood loss."
Her throat was so dry, brain buzzing with an intensity capable of a migraine. Was Ichigo hurt?
"You could save him, doctor," Byakuya said, watching her keenly. "The sooner we find him, the sooner he will be brought back. I care not for vagabonds with no respect for the law, but legally, we are obliged to provide him medical treatment until the end of his sentence." He leaned forward. "I think you catch my meaning quite well when I say our hands are the only hands equipped to rescue a man living off of blood loss and prison nutrition in his system right now."
Orihime couldn't breathe, the raw ache of her nails digging into the skin of her palms fierce enough to bleed. She couldn't tell behind the man's darkened gaze if he was bluffing or not. She couldn't drive around Tokyo looking for him herself because she didn't know where he was. She couldn't turn over her shoulder and ask Renji how hard he had fought back.
"There's a 'you should've seen the other guy' joke in there somewhere, I'm sure."
Faintly, Orihime wondered if her pulse could speed enough to bring on a heart attack. The symptoms were all there, slow crawling their way up her system. She had to save his life. She had to preserve his secret. She had to – she didn't know. She couldn't tell up from down anymore and Ichigo was out there somewhere, possibly hurt.
"You could save him, doctor."
"I...I don't," she stuttered, feeling lightheaded.
Ichigo, she thought urgently, what would you do if it was me?
Would he drag her back, or set her free? Would he rush to save her, or would he trust her enough to make her own fate? She found herself thinking back to the night they met. How he went from outright dismissive of her abilities, to the faith he placed in her to save Ishida Uryu's life. How he trusted her enough to tell her his past, to confide in her his hope for his future. Their future.
She took a deep breath. Maybe Ichigo would have done the same, maybe he would have done differently. But she knew what she had to do.
"I'm sorry, sir," she said calmly, raising her eyes to meet Byakuya's in a determined stare. "But I have no idea where they are...or what they're planning to do next."
Byakuya's fist turned white where it was curled around the clipboard head. "I see," he seethed, standing up. "So among all the sweet nothings whispered within my walls, there was not a single word? Not one sordid confession–"
"Sir!" Renji interrupted in yell, stepping forward from where he stood like he was trying to block a hit. "That's an outrageous accusation!"
"Then tell me, Abarai, how the devil four cons slipped under these confines with none but God as their witness!" He slammed his hand on the desk For a man who was stoic as they came, Byakuya's eyes were wide-blown with rage. Orihime shrunk into herself, staring hesitantly up at Renji.
For a while, none spoke. The entire conversation hung on a tightrope, Renji being the one that held the force that would ultimately push them off. Orihime's pulse had heightened so loud, she could feel it throb in her throat.
"I'm sorry, doc," Renji said finally, offering her a hand. "You'll have to excuse the warden. I think we're done here."
Orihime stared between Byakuya and Renji, but the former had already clicked off the recorder and turned to regard the wall dismissively. Renji sighed, nudging her shoulder with his hand.
Orihime stood up wordlessly, picked up her bag, and joined him.
They didn't stop until they were well out the door, well past the corridor that housed the administrative office. When they halted, Orihime bit her lip with uncertainty.
"God, I'm sorry, Dr. Inoue," Renji muttered, running a hand through his face. "He's just...he's not himself at the moment. This has never happened under his jurisdiction before and it, uh, reflects poorly on his lineage, considering he inherited the job from his father and grandfather before him." He finally met her gaze. "It was wrong of him to say those things, though. You didn't deserve that."
Orihime nodded shakily, hands still trembling from Byakuya's outrage. "It's alright, Abarai-san," she said softly. "Thank you for standing up for me back there." She felt an ache at the back of her throat, the first bellwether of tears. "And I'm so sorry you got hurt. If you ever need me to take a look–"
Renji raised his hand, cutting her off. His eyes, however, were not unkind. "Look, I'm an outsider, I get it," he said, watching the up and down bob of her throat. "But whatever it was, I hope it was worth it." He gestured around him. "Worth all this."
Orihime sighed.
He is, she thought, but did not say.
For a while, neither of them said anything. Orihime mumbled something about checking up on her patients, and Renji nodded absently.
While she began to leave however, Renji called out to her.
"Yes, Abarai-san?" she asked, turning over her shoulder to regard him.
In the spaces between them, it almost seemed like Renji was going to ask her something – maybe even hazard a guess that wouldn't entirely be inaccurate. But he stopped halfway, shaking his head.
Orihime took that as her cue to flee, not stopping once until she reached the confines of the infirmary.
And once she bolted to the bathroom and locked the door resolutely shut behind her, she threw up.