Disclaim: manga belongs to Tite Kubo.
+ so I think I'm just going to go with my first idea because I feel like I'm being restricted when I start putting up rules to follow... sorry. Oh and I apologize for this and the previous chapter, and perhaps the next. My mind is somewhere else these days so the spirit isn't always there. I do try my best, but at least you're warned.
Chapter 11: past 4, old friends
"Again," said the emotionless voice of Hitsugaya to the girl sitting on the grown.
"You know," she said, trying to regain her breath, "when you said to meditate this was not what I thought I was going to do."
"I said: again," he said still standing around her to see where exactly she was doing it wrong.
"I have tried for three days, don't you think we should pass to something else?" She said still trying to regain her composure with sweat dripping from her face and her arms too sore to move.
"Usually students don't have a zanpakuto when they enter the academy, and they most certainly don't know how to drive it out in one of the forms. You need to be able to let the zanpakuto back into your body, that is most definitely not supposed to be there."
"You know, you can tell that to me thousands of times, but as long as you don't tell me how in the world I'm supposed to do that, I don't see how I am supposed to just absorb metal into my body," she huffed.
"Soul and the zanpakuto is not made of metal. Your's most definitely not." He sat down again in front of her. "Try again."
She sighted as she placed her hands on the handles of her zanpakuto. Breathing and closing her eyes, she could feel the energy flow through her veins, burn the surface under her hand as if the weapon in itself didn't want what was happening. The shackles around her hands continued turning in all the ways destroying the skin under.
"She doesn't want to," she screamed after some time, letting the blades fall to the ground. Observing her wrist she could see blood starting to drip from various places. "That's it, no more torturing my wrist," she said putting down her weapon. "Captain?"
Looking around the clearing she was meet with nothing but the deep silence of the woods. Feeling she had some energy left in her feats, she stood up, placed the two circles on each side noticing there was actually two hooks, and when looking for the man.
"Captain Hitsugaya?" She screamed. When she finally found him, ice was melting away.
"Sorry," he said looking at her, placing his zanpakuto back over his shoulder. "There was a hollow near by that I needed to take care of. Something that will surely happen a lot of time during this training I'm afraid."
She didn't really know what to tell him as he stood there lost in his own thoughts. Finally: "I refuse to torture my wrist more, and I want to go home. I haven't told Yuzu where I am and I have nearly not left this place in three days," she said arms crossed.
"Fine," he said, "go get your body at Urahara's and go home. We see each other tomorrow at 8," with that he left. She didn't really think about it then but where in the world was he staying?
Running in the air was actually quite fun when you get the hang of it, not that she had but not far from. She could still feel the horrible sensation that she was going to fall at any given moment. In final it took her way more time to find the shop. Running wild in town wasn't a good idea.
Then she stopped. Everything looked so perfect and in the same time sad. The captain was sitting against the railing on the top of a hill back in his gigai as it seems, looking toward the setting sun. If it hadn't been for the strange sensation she was replaying a scene from her life, she would have left. Instead she felt drawn toward the figure. He didn't react to her presence.
"Toshiro?" She said, making the teen turn around quickly. He didn't sense her. "I can't believe it," she screamed overjoyed as everything in her mystery puzzle sat into paces. Off course she knew that way of being and those eyes, she smiled happily. The teen did not seem pleased however.
"What are you doing here Kurosaki?" He said as he looked back toward the sky. As if all the pain from training was taken out of her body she sat down effortless beside him.
"I can't believe they sent the grade school captain," she laughed at her own jock that was not well seen by the other one.
"I'm not a grade schooler, I don't even look like one," he said behind his gritted teeth, old habit of being called small.
"Anymore," she whispered. "Oh Toshiro, why didn't you say it was you?" She asked trying her best not to ruffle his hair.
"Don't call," but things made sense before he managed to finish his sentence. "You noticed that now," he said dumfound back.
"Yeah," she said trailing off as if guilty of not noticing it before. "In my defense I haven't seen you in, what now? 5 years?" She said smiling feeling this might actually not be such a bad summer. Toshiro was a good guy as long as he stopped playing pompous.
"2 actually, if you consider you saw me when you came visiting your brother and ended up in the fourth squad. What are you smiling about?" He asked looking suspicious a the girl laying with a plain mischievous grin.
"Nothing," she said. "Oh, and I didn't see you," she said absorbed by her own thoughts of how to make him act more human. He was very cold, indeed.
"You greeted me," he said flatly.
"Did I?" No she didn't, she would have remembered. "But you know you have grown so much, you don't look like a grade schooler anymore." This actually irked him and you could see it plainly on his face.
"Because you think you look anything like what you did 5 years ago," he exploded.
"No, but I'm human."
"That is a lame excuse. If not for the face, I said my name," he found his usual blank expression and looked toward the horizon that was graying fast.
"Well I didn't really connect the dots so," she trailed off watching the sky turn more and more like her inner world. Strangely that gave her peace. They sat there in silence before he broke the silence.
"What are you doing here Kurosaki?" He sounded bored.
"I saw you and I felt so happy that I finally got this puzzle together. I mean, your personality sure changed a bit. Oh wait, are you like that with all your squad? Poor them," she could see the irking sensation that he wanted to scream at her. Impressing, he kept it inn.
"I asked what are you doing here? Right now?"
"I am sitting beside my apparently very cold teacher, that actually was a kind of friend some years back now, that I have seriously not seen for 5 years and watching the stars. Happy? And what exactly are you doing?" She asked, but she noticed he wasn't really listening as his eyes were empty. Right, this was an old man, she forgot that part.
"Toshiro? Oi Tosh, you okay?" He did react to being called impolitely as he said.
"It's captain Hitsugaya." Yeah, she could hear the autopilot working in his head.
"Hitsugaya, Toshiro, same person anyway. What about Toshiro sensei? Anyway, what is on your mind?" He didn't seem to hear her as he stood up and left.
"8 o'clock," he said over his shoulder, "don't be late."
"Good night to you too," she screamed after him. Well maybe he hadn't changed that much over the years. Still living in his own thoughts. She still didn't get why he didn't just tell her they had met before.
"He did say his name," said a sweet voice in the back of her head, as she decided to stay just a little while longer looking at the sky laying down in the soft grass. It wasn't as if anyone could actually see her anyway.
Oh, you're still here, she said feeling as if she was back in her own world again.
"I'm always here child." The little laugh that followed announced the next sentence. "So are you still angry at the shinigami?"
Toshiro? No. I think it was a very wise choice to send him. Seems like he need some help to get of his horse.
"And you intend to do that?" She said amused.
Depends if he intend to play pompous or not. I made him play soccer. What could possibly changed him so drastically in simply five years.
"People change a lot over the years child. He may be a soul, but they experience the notion of time the same way, especially in the beginning."
Well you know a great lot of things, she fumed. Speaking of which, why don't I manage to make the weapons disappear?
"You want them to?" She asked startled.
No, she thought, but pompous teen wants me to.
"I have no interest in your new friend, but I do have an interest to what you are doing to your poor wrist."
The shackles are burning me every time I try to absorb them into my body. Sorry, soul.
"Why does he want to make your weapon disappear anyway?" Concern tingling her voice. By now, Karin was actually in her inner world laying on the surface of the melted silver.
"He says something about them not being normal. Apparently I'm supposed to put the soul of the zanpakuto in another type of zanpakuto and not draw it right from my body."
"Is that it," whispered the other one, sadness was clouding her voice. Looking at her, Karin couldn't see her face anymore.
"Why are you fading?" She panicked.
"I thought you needed the weapon as fast as possible so I made sure you could use me without the soul reaper training, but I suppose I'm not needed for the moment." The doll slowly stood up, leaving a carpet of treads and pearls after her.
"Wait where are you going?" Screamed Karin as she felt her feats stuck to the floor.
"You need to find me the right way, sweetie. Take care until then," and with that, the doll faded into the dark sky. Panic took over. She was able to move again, but running wasn't helping. The place just continued on forever in all directions.
She woke up with a startle as she felt the presence of a hollow. But by the time she actually was on her feats, the energy was gone. Looking closer, the sky was burning up by the morning sun. That's it, she thought, before leaving for the usual training ground.
She found him in the clearing meditating or whatever. He didn't have the time to react before she pinned him to the tree behind.
"This is all your fault," she screamed right up in his face holding his cloth tight in her slowly whitening grip. "If you hadn't said that, she wouldn't have left, you little, you bastard," she shakes him back toward the tree many times, but he didn't stop her.
"Wha," but he never managed asking before she was as his throat again.
"You said I needed to make the weapons disappear, well guess what? Now she is gone and I'm all alone. All alone. Do you get that?" She could feel the humidity in her eyes. She pushed him against the trunk.
"Bastard, don't follow me," she screamed over her shoulder as she felt the tears coming. She was not going to cry, she said to herself making them disappear with the back of her hand. Not because of something so stupid.
She had lost a mother, a brother and now apparently the only person after her mother she could actually talk to without feeling she needed to hide behind a mask. And slowly, if she thought about it, she was losing her twin. So she did the only thing that made her forget the world: she ran. She didn't know how long nor where, she only felt the pleasant feeling of physical pain very welcomed over the pain she was feeling in her stomach. Or was it the heart that ached.
She ran the entire day around the entire town sometimes. By the time she was on the third round, she was pretty comfortable running ten meter over ground or more. The feeling of the air was more present here anyway and made it easier to be cut away from the rest of the world.
She didn't know when or how she ended on the hill from this morning, but when she did, she was drenched. A rapid reminder to her pathetic display in soul society. She felt the air beside her change as the young captain sat down beside her. She could see him from the corner of her eyes, but he didn't seem to bother her, so she let him stay.
"You should eat something," he said after a strange kind of comfortable silence between them. She actually managed to sit up and take the sandwich he offered her.
"Thanks," she said between the bits. The sun was setting again in the distance. She couldn't say the sunset wasn't beautiful, but she preferred the night sky.
"I'm sorry," she mustered finally. She didn't feel that guilty for hitting his head so many times, but he did go through the effort of getting her food. She didn't think he heard her in the beginning. When she saw the small smirk in the corner of his mouth, she knew he had. Or what you could call a smirk as his mouth barely moved. She couldn't resist it and ruffled his hair.
"Hey," he screamed not expecting that at all. She just laughed at his face.
"Chill, Toshiro, it's just your hair," she smiled at his sour expression.
"It's Hitsuga..."
"Yeah, yeah, Toshiro-sensei, happy?" He still had a scroll but he seemed to settle for that in the meantime. They sat there a while longer before he spoke again.
"We will start your training properly tomorrow. Get some sleep and actually go home this time." True, she had fallen asleep in the park.
"Say, Toshiro-sensei," she said underlining the sensei, "where do you stay anyway?"
"Somewhere," he replied before leaving slowly like the day before. Somehow, she waited for a comment from the occupant in her inner world before remembering she was gone.
She made her way to Urahara to retrieve her body that was miraculously actually healed, this time walking on the ground. It was strange to walk around without the masses on the side of her hip. She got a hit by Jinta as he bugged her saying that even if she was a soul reaper he could beat her anytime. She barely registered as her mind was far gone. She just walked home in her body. It felt strange to be back in a human body again. Feeling like she actually had a weight.
The light was still on in her home when she arrived. Preparing to be hit by her father when she entered, she found it surprisingly silent. Of course, Yuzu was gone by now, another one gone. She found her father in the kitchen waiting for her with take away. Good thing they had Yuzu or they would have starved.
"How are you?" He asked in that serious tone of his, a voice that actually frighten her from time to time because that reminded her that there was a lot of things she didn't know about him.
"Fine, I suppose," she said sitting down in front of him. Taking one of the take out boxes she understood just how hungry she really was.
"How is training going?" she shouldn't be surprised, really she shouldn't.
"Horrible," she said suddenly not really realizing what slipped her mouth. "I mean, it could go better."
"I'm sorry," he said looking straight at her. "I never wanted to burden you or your sister with this."
"It's okay," she said taking the last food down. "No need to apologize. At least now I can learn how to protect Yuzu probably." She smiled but her heart wasn't in it, before leaving.
She hadn't felt this alone in years. She had lost a friend that apparently knew her from inside out. Her sister didn't even bother asking her about spirits. This made her wonder what exactly her sisters zanpakuto would look like. The silence promise she would soon see her twin again made her fall into a dreamless sleep.
She met up in her body the next day, her look far away from reality. So far gone she missed the captain hitting her with something that made her watch her body fall limp to the ground.
"It's to split your body from your soul," he explained. Sitting down, he gestured her to do the same. "As I said yesterday we will start your proper training. When souls start at the academy they are given a nameless zanpakuto that is called asauchi. This is the proper way of archiving a zanpakuto that is stable and belongs only to you."
Taking something off his back, he handed her a katana with a red hilt and black shelter. She watched in aw the long sharp blade and the hilt wrapped in a beautiful red fabric as she drew it out.
"Your brother said you would like that one."
"Ichi-nii," she asked finally managing to take her eyes away from the katana.
"Indeed. This is yours know. For all your time as a soul reaper, this is yours and only yours. One doesn't switch zanpakuto with anyone else." She nodded at his ice like glare that inspired her more than annoy her now. She felt better.
"So this is how I'm going to get the doll back?" She asked. Being a man of few words he only nodded.
"We are going to meditate. Try to connect with this katana and see if you can somehow transfer some of your energy in it. But most of all try to go back to your inner world."
They did that for the next week and slowly a pattern started to form. She was always there at 9 o'clock as she argued she needed more time to sleep. He would split her soul from the body before sitting down and meditate. When she was annoyed beyond compare, he would allow her to run, understanding fast that was the only way she actually followed what he was telling her. After, he would try to tell her about the life and roll of soul reapers. By the end of the day they would sit against the railing looking at the sky.
In the beginning he would try to move away from her to be in his own thoughts but gave up as he never got to relax with her intruding on his privacy more than not. As for eating, she made sure to bring food for the day in the morning, or she went buying something during the running period. She forgot the doll was no longer there for most of the time, only reminded when Toshiro told about the reasons one needed to learn ones zanpakuto's name.
When Sunday came, she nearly ran to the field. Of course her friends were annoyed she didn't have time to spend with them and her teammates even more as they pushed her to come to the training ground. She admitted being jealous in the beginning as they could do what they wanted, but using her summer training was really not bad.
"Morning Toshiro." She had dropped the sensei after two days and he had given up on correcting her. She was proud of that. But the clearing was empty. Looking at her clock it was already passed 9 and he was always there before her. Trying the strange method she learn to find spiritual energy, she couldn't find the red thread that would tell her where he was.
She cursed the fact none had bothered giving her a way to turn into a soul at will. True, she had the katana as she could decide if she wanted it in the physical world or not, but that wasn't what would help her defeat a hollow.
Honestly there was only one place she could think he was. Finding him sitting on the grass on the other side of the railing she swear she could see worry in his eyes. At least he was in his gigai so she wouldn't look like she is talking to herself.
"It's 9:30 captain, you're late," she let the tone stay playfully until he looked way to lost to even be present in his body. Maybe this was the replacer?
"Kurosaki," he whispered as if not certain she was there.
"Yeah, Toshiro what is it?" She said worried. Even if she didn't know him that well he was pleasant to be around, when he didn't act like a person ten times his own age. She really did consider him her friend even if she knew it would take years before he would ever think that.
"Nothing," he answered turning his eyes back to the sky. "No classes today. It's Sunday."
"Okay, so I can bother you the entire day then." She was waiting for a reaction, something that would tell her he was still there, but none came. To be honest she knew Sunday had absolutely nothing to do with this, as last Sunday she still remember long hours trying her best to enter her inner world. "What's her name?" She blurred out.
"What?" He asked shocked. He looked back at her as if some life was back in his eyes.
"Your girlfriend," she emphasized. "You know, the one that had been bothering you for the past weeks."
"I don't have a girlfriend," he breathed out.
"Okay maybe you don't, but don't tell me there isn't a girl involved in your distant behavior. I spend most of my time around boys and I know that look. It's the 'I miss her so much', or 'I wish she notice me'. So, what's her name?" She said right up in his face to make him react. It could also be the 'I'm extremely worried that something wronged happened to someone' but she wanted to see ice sculpture react to her comment.
"It's none of your business," he managed to say in an angry, annoyed voice as he pushed her away.
"Well you kind of made it when I'm the reason you can't be with your beloved right now." Beloved and girlfriend actually made him react. He gave her a dark glare as she felt happy to notice it didn't do her a damn thing anymore.
"You know, I get you want to believe you don't have feelings but more you suppress it, the more it's going to hit you back. Hey I've been doing that, a lot. Still do. But you must be at least twice my age. Think about the consequences when all those feelings come bubbling up. So what about you learn to open up a little and tell me her name?"
"You're not good at hiding your feeling, and you don't seem to open up much anyway," he said flatly. "Must be a girl thing," he muttered soon afterward, she wasn't sure what exactly he meant with that though.
"Maybe girls can actually admit they have a heart. And what better to share with someone that have it the same way? Hey, it's just a name, and I can keep a secret." He seem to be valuing the pro and cons before answering her.
"Hinamori," he said as if afraid of even admitting it to himself. "She's my big sister, somehow."
"Do I need to think of incest or souls being very different from humans?"
"It's not like that I said. It's hard to find your real family when you arrive at soul society so you usually find a family you call your own. And I know when the feelings are bubbling over. I have once let my emotion get in the way, so no, feelings aren't good to have as a soldier."
"Toshiro, you know you can talk to me, right? I mean, if you want some tips on how to seduce her, I'm the last to ask, but I can help with the rest."
"Thanks, Kurosaki." He rose to leave as she followed suite.
"Karin. Seriously I don't take that polite stuff well. But I know perfectly what you need." He actually waited for her to continue. "You need to chill and join a soccer game. Come on, the guys are training today. And I promise, we are so much better at playing than five years ago." He didn't fight back when she dragged him toward the field. Good start.
Thanks for reading :) And hope you had/have a nice vacation :)
Finally back to my computer and to the righting.
Thank you for the reviews, it always make the voyage more comfortable and enjoyable to know you guys like it :D And I really appreciate your point of view of the story :)
Well until next time, and again I apologize if the persons are a bit strange... I really am trying my best to learn the different characteristic of each person in the manga, but sometimes I seem to shoot in blind... sorry...