Careful not to disturb Kannuki, who was sleeping on top of one of his arms, Terazuma reached out in the dark for his watch with the other.

3:20. . . .

If he was still awake in half an hour, he might as well get up and get a start on the day. Get the coffee going, sneak out for a cigarette, or ten. But that would mean he wouldn't have gotten anything but a few fitful starts of sleep.

It was the silence that kept him up. After all this time, waiting and wishing he could be alone in his own head again, it was this silence that was slowly driving him mad. It was easier to stay sane in the daylight, and the noise and hustle-and-bustle of the day. Kannuki adequately filled the empty spaces, with conversation and other, hard-won distractions. But he couldn't ask her to stay up with him all night.

Do you hear me, you stupid cat? Pick up, damn you!

But no one ever answered his call. No voice but his own ever echoed around his brain.

Terazuma put the watch back with a long, silent sigh. Just half an hour. If this deafening silence would cease long enough that he could just get half an hour's rest . . .

Terazuma wasn't the only one finding it hard to sleep these days. Though in Hisoka's case, he might have welcomed insomnia to the alternative.

He still dreamed of home. The grove of cherry trees in bloom, the night of the lunar eclipse.

Only these days Muraki was absent. The threat of him was still there, some malevolent force lurking among those trees, and the tall, overgrown grasses, but it was . . . different somehow. Still the impression of silver hair and metallic eyes, still the sense that he's witnessing something he shouldn't be. Still the overwhelming impression, that makes his heart hammer in his chest, that he's prey.

He remembers the lake. Admonitions not to go there. Some woman once drowned in it, long ago, or else it was the legendary well that a serpent god had once inhabited and poisoned. It fills him with a child's terror—nameless, proof-less, but real in a way that he knows no one else will understand, it will only make the magic of the spell disappear if he tells another soul. He saw his own grave near there once—well, really it was his sister's, who died before he was born, but it bore his name, and ever since then, whenever he was near that lake he felt like he could hear her talking to him, whispering in his ear the thoughts and feelings of everyone around them that only she could hear, so loudly she left him fit to bursting with their emotions. She tags him—you're it—and goes running through the tall grasses, away from the cherry trees, lifting her bare dirty feet in her old yukata like a cat in the snow.

And he follows her. To the lake.

Or marsh, really. It's hard to tell where the water ends and the land begins. Of his sister, no trace, but he can hear the other children laughing. The kids who were sent to school with him but refused to play unless he played the monster in the middle—like they might catch some unspoken disease if they don't quarantine him in the role. They laugh at him, sing songs about him, creepy Hisoka, got a creepy secret, but slowly their singing turns to fear, and their laughing turns to shrieks, melding together until all he can hear is an overwhelming high-pitched hhissssss.

He looks down, and sees water up to his ankles. Where his reflection should be, there is nothing. The water is too dark for light to penetrate. Only the vaguest of dark shapes, switchbacking underneath the surface. There's something in that water, trying to get his attention, trying to get out.

He's under waves, breathing water, trying to get out. Screaming but no sound comes out. Beating against the surface but he just can't break through—

Hisoka woke with a jolt, remembering to breathe. Air. Just air. And suddenly he was back in his room and the dream felt like just that: a dream. No real, present threats. He turned to look at the clock, saw it was almost 4:30. Early enough he could still get some rest, if his mind could calm enough to go back to sleep.

Enough of this, he told himself as he lay there, listening to his pounding heart return to its normal rhythm. He'd been putting up with these dreams and interrupted sleep long enough. As soon as the day reached a less ungodly hour, he would head over to see Watari, before going in to work.

"Something for sleep, huh?" the scientist said as he rifled through his medicine cabinet. "Tricky things, those. With our bodies, we tend to metabolize the stuff too fast for it to have the full, desired effect. I can give you something to knock you out good, but no guarantees it'll keep you that way all night."

"That's fine." Hisoka stifled a yawn. "I can always take a second one if I wake up in the middle of the night, right?"

He missed the side-eye Watari gave him behind his glasses. But Watari covered for it with a jaunty, "This oughtta do the trick," and tossed Hisoka a small bottle of pills. Which, bleary-eyed, Hisoka nearly caught in the face. "Use as directed, then as you feel like."

I guess it's not like I can overdose. Or, if I do, like it's going to do any lasting harm. Hisoka glanced at the bottle, but his mind wasn't rested enough for label jargon. "It's not going to make me have even crazier dreams, is it?"

"I take it from the question that's what's keepin' you up?"

"You could say that. Well, one in particular. And for once it isn't about Muraki."

Watari took a seat across from him. "Wanna talk about it? I mean, only if you feel comfortable enough, of course, but sometimes it helps to get it off your chest, to have another set of eyes lookin' at it. Either that, or it just sounds so ridiculous when you say it out loud that your brain is too embarrassed to ever dream that dream again."

Being such a private person by nature, Hisoka's first thought was to refuse outright. Even Tsuzuki he hadn't wanted to hear his dreams, and in most ways he had trusted Tsuzuki more than anyone. But what can it really hurt? It's a dream. It's not real. And at least it's not a sexual one. And the idea that it might just go away on its own if he shared it was an enticing one.

So Hisoka told Watari about the overgrown field back home, and the lake, and the feeling of something lurking within it.

And something struck him in the telling. "Huh."

"Huh?" Watari echoed.

"I guess I only just remembered. . . ." It was strange. Hisoka had been dead for years; how could it only now be coming back to him? "I think . . . yeah, I'm sure I used to have this dream before. Well, something similar, anyway. It scared the crap out of me when I was a kid. But my father always said it was because of the story of Ren and the yatonokami—everyone in the village knew it. He said I must have heard it whispered among the servants too many times, and that he'd have to talk to them about filling my head with scary stories. I don't think he ever did, though. Reprimand anyone for it, I mean."

He shook himself from the memory with a slight shiver, looked up at Watari. "Is it weird that I might have repressed that?"

But Watari waved it off before he could get very far. "This sort of thing happens all the time. Recurring dreams we had in life—they go away, they come back. Sometimes some memory will come back two decades or more after your death, just outta the blue, and you wonder how you could have forgotten it. Or if it was even a real memory to begin with. Round here, you should just count it as a blessing if you're not reliving your own death night after night."

"That's the thing. I was. Don't get me wrong, it's a relief to be dreaming about something else for a change, but I was almost getting used to it." In a way, Hisoka almost felt guilty about that, as though he were betraying the promise of vengeance he had made to his living self by not dreaming of Muraki, and all the pain that man had caused him. Hard as it was to endure, that pain did give him purpose. "At least when I was dreaming of my death I knew what to expect."

"Mm-hm. And, just out of curiosity, when did you start noticing you were having this new—or, should I say, old dream?"

"I don't know. I guess it must have been after I tried to use Rikugou. While I was recovering here. After I stopped having flashbacks of being torched, that is."

"I suspected that might be the case," Watari said, but offered nothing more.

But Hisoka didn't see why the timing was so important. "It's still disturbing as hell—it's still keeping me up at night. Why did you ask? Do you think it makes a difference that I'm having them now?"

"Like I said," Watari flashed him a smile, "I was curious. That's all."

But why did Hisoka suddenly get the sense there was another reason Watari was shrugging this off? Normally he had some lengthy, sciency mumbo-jumbo explanation for this sort of thing. Instead, Watari was pointedly avoiding Hisoka's eyes. And Hisoka wasn't buying that smile for a second.

And there was something else. There was another slew of emotions that Hisoka felt from him but couldn't find the reason for: dread, revulsion, guilt. And pity. Hisoka's description of his dream certainly wasn't cause for any of that—at least, not in the amounts he was feeling. He had to ask about it. But he knew if he did ask outright, Watari would only avoid the subject more ardently.

"Well," Hisoka shrugged, "thanks for the pills, anyway. I'll see if they make any difference and get back to you." And he pushed himself back to his feet, making as if to leave.

"You do that, Bon. Hope it works for ya." Again: cheery voice, acting like everything was normal. But he wanted Hisoka gone. I'm making him nervous. I'm getting close to . . . something. Something he doesn't want me to see. But what?

Fortunately for Hisoka, Watari had a tendency not to push in his chairs. A rolling stool happened to be sticking out enough in his path for Hisoka to run into it without arousing too much suspicion. He hissed something about his regrown toes and doubled over, and Watari couldn't help himself. He reached out to steady Hisoka—

And suddenly Hisoka found himself staring in horror at his own burnt corpse. Or rather, not a corpse. Though it might as well have been. He could feel Watari's horror as fresh as if it were his own, and could watch his own chest rising and falling beneath the charred flesh, could hear his own strangled breaths as he fought to get something into what remained of his lungs.

Hisoka wanted to vomit. The smell was bad enough, but it was the extent of the damage that he found shocking, repulsive. Watari had told him that the Hisoka he and Tatsumi had recovered had been a fraction of himself; but it was one thing to imagine it, quite another to see the damage himself. The missing limbs, a face still mostly intact but blackened and blistered beyond his recognition . . . It was nothing to be ashamed of, yet he was ashamed. For all he had set out to make himself to be, it all came down to a hunk of meat. That's all any of them were. And it was worse than being stripped naked. At least naked he still had his humanity.

"This is the strongest thing I've got," Watari said to Tatsumi. Empathy tugged his conscience in conflicting directions, but he had to do something. He didn't want to cause Hisoka any more pain than he was already in, but a little jab of the needle might actually do some good. What were the chances he would even notice its prick in his current state? "If that doesn't knock him out—"

Hisoka didn't want to look at himself that way any longer, but something caught his eye and would not let him turn away. Or rather, caught Watari's eye. And it was Hisoka's own. The whites were almost black, the irises a more brilliant green than Hisoka had ever seen them, but facetted in a way that was not human. Even Muraki's artificial eye and Hijiri's cursed one hadn't looked like this. But he knew it was familiar. More like the eyes of the lizards he used to catch in the grass as a child. He'd seen those eyes in his dreams. . . .

And something else Watari showed him. As he prodded curiously at Hisoka's wounds, something seemed to move underneath. There was something under there—another layer, alive. As though the outer skin was just a casing, a suit waiting to be sloughed off. While the real body was covered in scales, slick with blood, soft and slippery as silk, but tough as mail—

Watari jerked out of his grasp, and the scene and all the confusion and horror that went with it vanished.

"The hell gave you . . ." He fought to catch his breath, after having to relive the memory along with Hisoka. "You can't just root around in someone's brain like that!"

Hisoka couldn't believe it. Watari was the one who was outraged? "You've been keeping this from me—you and Tatsumi, you both knew—"

"Knew what? You think either one of us has an answer for what you just saw, huh? If I did, don't you think you would have felt that, too? We didn't want to worry you with this—"

"You expect me to believe you hid the truth from me to protect me?"

"Yes! You have enough on your plate what with Tsuzuki missing without be concerned over an unknown—"

"But this does concern me, Watari, this is about me!"

"Hisoka . . ." There, again, with the sympathy. Watari's anger over being read faded, but it was the pity that slid back into its place that Hisoka couldn't take right that moment. "Bon! Wait!"

But Hisoka didn't want to wait around to hear some other excuse. They had lied to him, maybe not outright but still a lie of omission, and he couldn't stand it anymore. He had to get out of there. He had to go somewhere where he could be alone, somewhere he could think about what he had just seen.

But the truth was he didn't want to think about it. Hisoka went back to the office to see if any new assignments awaited him, but he couldn't focus.

A jump to Chijou helped for a little bit. The shopping center where Tsuzuki used to drag him on donut runs was sufficiently crowded to distract him. Usually he hated the noise of so many others' thoughts and emotions, all vying for his psyche's attention, but today he welcomed it. Even the headache that came with it, because it made it all the more difficult for Watari's memory to resurface.

But it did, eventually. Even the bustle of a crowded shopping mall couldn't keep it out forever. And he didn't know where else he could run to to escape it.

Scales, under his own skin, and reptilian eyes . . . No, Hisoka knew, not just any reptile's. Snake's eyes. The old family legend about Ren and the yatonokami—it must not have been just a story. There was more Watari wasn't telling him, but he could piece enough together from what he had felt from Watari's mind and his own hazy childhood memories to realize the legend must have had some honest-to-goodness truth to it. It made sense. Why should his own parents be so afraid of his empathy? Could their own thoughts really be so sinful as to fear what he might learn?

Or had it been something else all along? When they said I was a monster, they meant it. They were afraid—not of my ability, but of me. That cell they called a room wasn't for my protection, but for theirs. They knew exactly what I was. My own parents. How could they not know?

His heart felt like it was being squeezed inside his chest, and Hisoka was glad that the crowds around him couldn't see him. The last thing he needed was some good citizen asking if he was OK. He certainly didn't feel like he was. Who would, to find out after so many years of life, after so many years of death, that his own family, his friends, those he trusted the most, had lied to him all along about what he was?

But that still didn't answer the question: What was he?

Or, perhaps more to the point, what was inside him? Because Hisoka couldn't bear to accept for a moment that what he had seen in Watari's mind was really himself. Somehow the thought that it was some sort of foreign body, some alien parasite living inside him was easier than admitting the possibility that it was part of himself, one and the same. Tatsumi must have suspected as much, at very least. Hadn't he said something about Muraki's curse keeping something in?

Then again, Muraki had also locked up Hisoka's own memories with that curse, and his pain—things which were also an indivisible part of Hisoka. Had Muraki known about this as well? All this time Hisoka had been led to believe their meeting had been mere coincidence—or fate, as Muraki would have it, but unplanned by either of them nonetheless. Was that also a lie? Had that man sought him out, knowing what he was, from the beginning?

No, Hisoka couldn't dwell on these thoughts. That way lay madness. But the din of the crowd was getting too easy to tune out. He needed something else to distract him, and fast. But what?

For a substitute drama teacher, Terazuma was doing a terrible job. Half asleep in one of the auditorium seats, his feet up on the one in front of him, and a cup of coffee threatening at any moment to dump its contents on the floor held loosely in his hand.

Yet somehow the show went on without him. Or rehearsal, anyway. A teenage girl who looked way too serious about her role was trying to recite her lines over her male costars, who were having a much better time dueling with broom handles. The student crew was busy around the edges of the stage, occasional banging echoing from behind the curtain. And a gaggle of schoolgirls who didn't look like they served any purpose in this production whispered and giggled in the second row—probably about the sword-fighting boys.

"Hey. Terazuma."

Terazuma must have actually fallen asleep for a second, because he jumped when he heard someone speak so close to him. The coffee splashed out of its cup and onto his thighs. He yelped, and muttered a creative string of profanities.

The girls in the second row looked back at him with open mouths at the outburst. Then giggled even louder than before. Even in the dark, Hisoka could see Terazuma's cheeks and ears turning an abashed shade of deep pink.

"What's the big idea, kid," he muttered to Hisoka, "sneaking up on me like that?"

"I wasn't trying to sneak up on anyone," Hisoka said. "And anyway, aren't you supposed to be supervising this class, rather than using it as paid nap time?"

"Yeah, yeah. It isn't my fault I haven't been getting much sleep lately." The former detective grumbled, "Damn Shungei went and left me with a silence so deafening I can't even sleep through it."

Then I'm not the only one. Even if the cause of their insomnia was different, the two of them had their sleepless nights to commiserate over.

Looking smart in her private school blazer, Wakaba draped herself over the back of the chair in front of them with a world-weary sigh. "You'd think all the late-night exercise he's been getting would be knocking him out."

That made her partner sit up straight and stutter, "Hey—hey, now, hold on, Kannuki! First off, the kid does not need to know that!" (Seconded, Hisoka thought.) "And second—hey, where do you get off acting so worldly all of a sudden? 'Late-night exercise' . . . What kind of euphemisms have they been teaching you here?"

Wakaba just rolled her eyes. "Don't be such an old man, Hajime. Kids these days can speak frankly about their sex lives and it's not a big deal. Everyone's doing it. Just because you were celibate for fifteen years doesn't mean you have to turn into a prude—"

"Forced chastity, Kannuki. It was a condition. And like I told you before," he added in his sternest whisper, "I don't want the other students to think there might be anything . . . untoward going on between us. I'm supposed to be a teacher, here. A teacher! You wanna get us kicked out before we can solve this case?"

Wakaba crossed her arms over the seat back and glared. Yet somehow, despite their exchange of words, the vibe Hisoka was gleaning from them was decidedly—he might have even said almost unbearably—unprofessional. As in, Wakaba was giving some serious thought as to whether or not the lighting booth was currently in use, and whether anyone would notice if they made it unavailable for a little while. And Terazuma . . . well, not terribly originally, was thinking about school uniforms, and weighing the pros of blazers versus seifuku (apparently there were no cons with either). Not what Hisoka needed at the moment. And definitely too private to be aired in front of an empath.

"Anyway, Hisoka," Wakaba turned to him, "what can we do for you? Come to see how the show is getting on?"

"The show?" She said it like the pair of them had been a part of it from the beginning. "Aren't you two supposed to be investigating a case?"

"Oh, we are. But it's more convincing if we take an active part, don't you think? When in Rome and all that."

She was actually enjoying it. And, despite his lack of sleep, Hisoka would have wagered that Terazuma was too. Though of course he would never admit it.

"It's a musical mash-up of Phantom of the Opera and Doujouji," Wakaba explained, though she gave no clue as to how Broadway rock opera and Noh theater were supposed to mash up, exactly. "The students adapted the music and lyrics themselves. Can't say they're not dedicated to their art."

"Thing is, though," Terazuma said through a yawn, "so is the poltergeist. We've been having a hell of a time keeping the bell from falling on some unfortunate student every time they rehearse the end of the first act with it."

"Which is where I come in!" Wakaba beamed. "The kids have no idea their Second Miko is an actual miko!"

"That's one way to keep a low profile," said Hisoka.

Said Terazuma, "Yeah, but if another Kristine-hime gets herself almost crushed by that damn bell, you might find yourself playing the lead. Of all the plays to put on in a school with a poltergeist on the loose, it had to be not one but two about giant cursed things that fall from the ceiling. . . ."

"Like I said," (apparently this wasn't a new conversation), "it can't be a coincidence that the understudy to the understudy of Kristine-hime now seems to be the only one able and willing to play that part. The poltergeist must be connected to her in some way. I mean, look at her," Wakaba said with a glance over her shoulder. She must have meant the girl reciting her lines—who was starting to get rather visibly peeved with the boys stealing her spotlight. "Talk about life imitating art. She's been so serious about this whole production, it's kind of scary. I don't think she'd let flying props keep her from playing the lead."

"Even if they're flying at her head?"

Of course, there was a reason Hisoka had come to see his colleagues, but now that he saw that they had completely immersed themselves in their covers—not unlike someone I know used to do—he felt a little guilty pulling them away from the case. "I have a favor to ask you guys—if you think you can spare the time."

"Sure, Hisoka," said Wakaba. "What do you need?"

He took a breath, steeled himself. Perhaps it was asking too much, but it was important . . . "I need you to get me into Gensoukai."

"Absolutely not!"

To his surprise, the outburst came from Wakaba. Who quickly lowered her voice when she saw the gaggle of girls glaring at her. Hisoka didn't need empathy to detect jealousy in their glances, though Terazuma seemed oblivious that he was the reason for it.

Wakaba lowered her voice. But her words were no less sincere, and adamant. "I'm sorry, Hisoka, but I can't. You were busy recovering, so I'll give you a pass for not knowing what went down in the last month. But Todoroki managed to convince someone higher up the ladder in Judgment that opening gateways into Gensoukai was opening Enma-cho up to too much danger at this 'delicate' time."

In other words, they couldn't risk Hisoka bringing back any more powerful shiki he couldn't control.

"For now, and the foreseeable future, it's forbidden. At least, without getting the proper clearance and permission first it is, and I'll let you guess which department seems the be the only one still able to get it."

"And if someone were to go in without obeying the protocol—what, are we talking grounds for termination, here?" Hisoka asked. But Wakaba either didn't have the answer, or didn't want to give him any more hope.

"I'm not going to do it, and that's final. I'm in enough hot water as it is for sneaking you in the last time. And you remember what become of that trip."

How could anyone forget? "But that's exactly why I need to go back! Yes, I messed things up with Rikugou. All the more reason I need to know what went wrong. I need to fix it—"

"Why? So you can fuck it all up again? Er, pardon my French." Terazuma glanced around him, just to make sure no fragile teenage ears had been listening in. "But it's time someone told it to you plain. Take it from someone who knows a thing or two about bad habits, kid. This obsession with Gensoukai ain't healthy, and sending you back there is only gonna enable it further. Better to quit it cold turkey. You don't need a shiki to fight your battles for you anyway. You're better than that."

"Look. Hisoka." Wakaba sighed. "You know I want to help, I really do, but I'm not going to stick my neck out again for what, for all we know, might be a fool's errand. After what you've just been through, you could get yourself killed for good over there. At least the last time there was a possibility you might find some clue as to where Tsuzuki was in Gensoukai. But now we know where he is. And that's more than I can say for whatever you might try to bring back with you."

"Alright. You've made your point. Sorry I bothered you."

Face burning, Hisoka got up and headed with haste for the exit. He didn't need them telling him what he already knew. Did they think he was an idiot—that he couldn't see his own fault in everything that had happened? But that was why he needed this—why he needed their support. Wakaba and Terazuma were the last people he expected a lecture on red tape or unhealthy obsessions from.

He heard Wakaba running up behind him, and shook off her hand when she tried to grab his arm. He wanted to keep going, to just ignore anything she had to say, but her "Would you just listen to me for a second?" wavered with emotion, and he couldn't do that to her. He couldn't be so cruel.

"You know I know how you feel, don't you?" He started to say that no, she really didn't, but she cut him off. "It's true, none of us were nearly as close to Tsuzuki as you were, but that doesn't mean we don't have people we care about just as much. I don't know what I'd do if something so awful happened to Hajime. Well, probably something desperate like what you're trying to do now."

Hisoka looked down at his feet. His upbringing told him she deserved his apology, but he couldn't make himself give it.

But she was wrong about one thing. "You think this is about Tsuzuki."

"Well, isn't it? Hisoka . . . I know it's hard to accept, but you've hardly even said his name since you came back to us. I can see this has taken a toll on you, and I don't want to belittle what you're going through in any way. But don't you think you have to keep going? For his memory, if nothing else. It's okay to let yourself mourn. I know . . ." She blushed. "I know he was more than just a partner to you."

"Mourn?" Hisoka met her eyes, taken aback by that single word. More than her thinking his relationship to Tsuzuki was somehow analogous to hers and Terazuma's. Was that what they all really thought was wrong with him? Was that what they'd all done while Hisoka was healing—mourned Tsuzuki's loss, and gotten over him? Accepted a reality without him? Moved on? There's nothing to mourn. Tsuzuki's not gone forever. We're going to get him back. How can they all just give up on him like this?

A crash on the stage made Wakaba forget whatever she had been about to say next. There were gasps from the shocked students. Exhausted or not, Terazuma was onstage in a few leaps to help. And in the center of the commotion, a huge serpent with a huge head of flowing hair writhed and flopped about the ruined set. Hisoka's heart hammered before he realized it was only a very large puppet. And it writhed not with a life of its own, but from the kicking and fighting of one of the puppeteers trapped inside it. It was her screams that filled the auditorium. Watching on the sidelines, the girl playing the lead was frozen in shock.

"Oh no, not again," Wakaba said as she raced off to help. For which Hisoka was rather glad, as it gave him an excuse to leave without saying goodbye.

Now he remembered. There was a reason he had gotten a feeling of sinking dread in his gut when Wakaba said the drama club was staging a version of Doujouji. The protagonist from the first act went mad with lust and revenge and turned herself into a giant serpentine dragon.

Snakes, he cursed as he turned to leave, feeling his skin crawl. It seemed like everywhere he looked, the universe was trying to tell him the same thing. He just wished it would try telling him in plain Japanese.

Natsume was jogging in the park when Hisoka tracked him down. In a zip-up Day-Glo jacket, a baseball cap turned backwards on his head, modern earbuds attached to a Walkman that looked like it belonged in a museum, and glasses tucked safely away (they fogged up too much when he ran), it was much easier to see him as the college student he had been when he died.

Ever-present K was still nearby, albeit hunting for lizards in the bushes, though Hisoka suspected she was never quite out of earshot.

"You know that favor you owe me?" Hisoka said when Natsume pulled out an earbud. "I want to call it in."

"Already? You sure you don't want to save it for something big?"

"This is something big. I need your help getting into Gensoukai."

Natsume stopped his jog entirely. Though he was still breathing hard, an eerie sobriety came over him with the mention of that place. He stopped the cassette in his Walkman, and the glasses came back out. A moment later, so did K.

Still he had the gall to pretend he didn't know what Hisoka was talking about. "What makes you think I can help you with that? Last I checked, I'm not a Shinto priest."

"No, but your partner here can hack into just about anything. And Gensoukai is a digital world. I'm betting K would have no problem opening up a portal. Unless Gensoukai's firewalls are that much tougher to crack than Mother's."

And there was the magic word. Natsume gestured for Hisoka to follow him, looking around to ensure that no one was watching them. It must have taken all his self-restraint not to grab Hisoka and throw him into the bushes to keep him quiet.

"Let's suppose K can do what you're asking," he said in a low voice once he was sure they were alone. "Why do you want to get into Gensoukai so badly?"

Hisoka tried to explain it, how he was desperate to learn what had happened to Rikugou since that night at Sakuraiji's house, to say nothing of how he had survived. He even mentioned something about looking into why Terazuma's communication with his own shiki had ceased, hoping it would make his motives look a little less selfish than they truly were.

He made no mention of the dream of snakes, however, or the scales Watari had seen on Hisoka's body. It's none of his business anyway. It's a personal matter. But even Hisoka had to admit there was more to it than that. If Natsume knew about the scales, would he think that was the question Hisoka really sought answers to, and would he agree to help at all? Or go running to Tatsumi or the chief at the first opportunity? Either way, if there was any chance revealing that part could stop Hisoka from reuniting with Rikugou, he had to keep the secret clutched tight to his chest. At least until he had some answers to share himself.

Natsume listened patiently to his reasons, nodding occasionally and not interrupting or suspecting anything was being left out until the end. At which point he said, "I understand all that, but I have to say I don't think it's a good idea. Too dangerous."

"Because Judgment has put a moratorium on trips to Gensoukai?"

"That," Natsume said with a roll of the eyes, "and I've probably used up the other departments' good will toward me with enough supernatural shit of late. But more to the point, I think what you've got there is a pretty poorly thought-out plan. You have no idea what's happened to your shiki since he—literally—blew up in your face, or what kind of enemies he's made for himself back home. Let alone if he will even tolerate the sight of you anymore, and not try to end you immediately. Yet you expect me to just let you go in there alone. With, what, a packed lunch and a 'See you when you get home, honey'?"

When he put it that way, Hisoka did feel a bit foolish. But it was going to work. It had to.

K got her human's attention with a curt little meow. When Natsume turned to her, she blinked and twitched her ear and tail in Natsume's direction, the meaning of which was completely lost on Hisoka.

"No," Natsume said to her at the end of it. "I don't think having a traveling companion is going to solve the gaping holes in this plan. It's still a terrible plan."

Christ, it was creepy when they understood each other like that. "What's she saying?" Hisoka couldn't believe he was actually asking that. "She think you should come with me?"

"God no!" Natsume laughed. "That's a worse idea than you going in alone! Not to mention, impossible."

"You're right," Hisoka said after giving it some thought. "We'd be found out right away if we both went. And, as my partner, you'd be implicated by association."

"Well, I'll be implicated no matter what if I agree to this, won't I? No, I mean it's physically impossible," Natsume said. "I'm not allowed to enter Gensoukai. Look, it's a long story, and I don't want to get into it now—"

"It's because of your possession, isn't it?"

The look Natsume shot him was not one Hisoka was a stranger to these days. It was a peculiar melange of betrayal and shame, violation and indignant pride—the knowledge that someone you thought you trusted had gone over your head—or even into your head—to learn your secret. Hisoka knew something about Natsume that Natsume didn't want him to, and Natsume blamed him for the infraction of his privacy. Not exactly how Hisoka had wanted this conversation to go. Not when he desperately needed the other's cooperation.

"I may have convinced Tatsumi to tell me why your partnership with Tsuzuki ended," Hisoka said. "However you feel about it, Natsume, I deserved to know what kind of a person I was paired up with. Just like you had every right to know about the circumstances of my death. It's not something I like sharing either, but if that's what it takes to earn your trust—"

"Then you know about the seals."

Natsume pushed down one sock to expose his ankle. At first, Hisoka saw nothing but bare skin; but as he watched, a banded pattern began to materialize, like the pale violet outline of veins beneath the skin, only glowing, and deliberate. Like shackles. They appeared around his wrists as well, along with a glowing character from the old script meaning "closed" in the center of his forehead.

"This is why I can't go with you into Gensoukai," he said. "I don't know if I'd even survive the trip with these things on, or if crossing over the threshold of that world would rip apart my atoms like some sort of giant bug zapper." As if he could feel it itching under his skin, Natsume scratched at the sigil on his forehead and pulled his cap down over it. Seconds later, it and the bands around his wrists slowly faded into invisibility again. "I was told that if I somehow did survive the crossing, I'd have shiki on me before I even knew which way was up, trying to either eradicate, possess, or eat me. Which I know sounds like the worst slumber party game ever, but if shiki are anything like demons, I don't doubt it's true. Either way, I'd rather not try."

Hisoka shrugged. "Then I'll go alone. It's no trouble to me."

But Natsume was exchanging meaningful glances with K again, and he knew that wasn't the end of the story. "K says she wants you to take her with you. As a chaperone of sorts. And I believe she knows what she's talking about. She has contacts there who could protect you."

"Then why do I get the strong feeling that you don't like the idea?"

"Don't get me wrong. K's competence, I don't doubt for a second. She knows her stuff, and even if she doesn't look like much, she can hold her own in a fight. She's the one who put these seals on me. It's her job to make sure I'm never susceptible to demonic possession again.

"Tatsumi didn't tell you that part, did he?" Natsume said to Hisoka's unsettled expression. "K isn't just my partner. She's also my minder, my watchdog. Er, watchcat. (Sorry, K, it's just a figure of speech, no offense intended.) She's sworn not to let me out of range of communication. And that's why the prospect of sending her to a whole 'nother plane of reality with you doesn't exactly sit well with me. If she's in Gensoukai with you, who's keeping an eye on me out here? Not to mention, if she's your ticket in in the first place, who's gonna pull you two back out?"

"She's also your ticket into Mother's systems. If K's in there with me, that more or less puts your project on standby."

"True, true," Natsume said half to himself. "Yet another reason I'm not fond of this plan. . . ." But unless Natsume planned on Muraki dying while Hisoka was in the Imaginary World—or unless he planned on getting into some other form of trouble, Hisoka didn't see how it affected his partner that much.

"So, does that mean you two are going to help me? Or should I tell Tatsumi about our little conversation from earlier?"

Natsume let out a long-suffering sigh as he rubbed the back of his neck. "Give us the day to talk it over. Okay?" But Hisoka could sense that, for the most part, he had already capitulated. "And meet me tonight after business hours at my cubicle in Billing. One way or another, I'll have an answer for you then."

The overhead fluorescents were shut off when Hisoka reached Billing that night, only the glow of computer monitor screensavers to cast the place in an eerie, faerie-world-like air.

The bar of light on the carpet from Natsume's desk lamp guided his way. There, Hisoka found his partner occupied with a game of solitaire. He swiveled in his chair when he sensed Hisoka's presence. "I hope you packed a change of clothes."

"Does this mean you agree to do it?"

Natsume shrugged. "The two of us discussed it at length, but ultimately, it wasn't up to me. K wouldn't let me say no."

As if to confirm that, K slow-blinked up at Hisoka.

"And you always do what K tells you?" Should I be suspicious? If K wants this, what does she hope to get out of it? Probably not something as simple as fatty tuna.

Natsume laughed. "Kid, I have to do what K tells me to! She's my minder, remember?" He switched off his light as he shot to his feet, grabbing his blazer off the back of his chair. "Shall we?"

After the labyrinth of cubicles and massive copy machines, the duo led Hisoka to another floor, where they passed through immense halls of old servers. The whole place smelled of warm electronics; their ears were filled with the ambient hum of so many digital minds busy processing. It was hard to believe that Gensoukai itself, or at least parts of it, might have been housed on some of the very servers they walked past. Its code had to be stored somewhere, though when Hisoka visited the place it felt as large as an entire planet. Stranger things existed in the world, he supposed. Like whole planes of reality encapsulated in books. In light of that, a universe inside a computer wasn't so outlandish.

Hisoka wasn't sure where he was expecting to end up. Maybe in a massive laboratory with a star gate or other sort of magical portal mounted in it, or at very least a supercollider. But when they arrived and Natsume switched on the lights, what greeted Hisoka's eyes in the center of the small room was a device roughly the size and shape of a shoebox with a mass of tubes and wires snaking out of one end of it. A device he remembered very clearly from a previous case with Natsume as a resurrected one of Watari's old rejected inventions, affectionately dubbed Xul.

"You can't be serious."

At the tone of his voice—skeptical would have been putting it lightly—Natsume looked back at Hisoka, and told him, "Not to worry, I think K and I just about have all the bugs worked out of it—"

"Just about?" Hisoka said, having serious second thoughts about even stepping foot inside the same room as the device. "Last time we used that thing, it burnt the creature we tried to put in it to a crisp!"

"Actually, if our suspicions are correct," by which he apparently meant his and K's, "the problem arose when we tried to retrieve the shoggoth from the dimension it had been stored in. You see, pocket dimensions are notoriously unstable . . ."

But a look at Hisoka's face told Natsume that, to his partner, the particulars weren't nearly as important as the end result.

"Never mind the details," he tried instead, clearing his throat and trying to put a nonchalant spin on things, while K hopped on a nearby laptop that was hooked up to the box. "Because we're not going to be using Xul to create a new dimension. We're just dialing into one that already exists, which is gonna be a whole lot easier. Xul's going to open a nice little Einstein-Rosen bridge for you two to simply walk across. . . ."

Somehow seeing a cat inputting the proper values on the computer did not exactly put Hisoka at ease. But he didn't see that he had much choice. If he wanted to get into Gensoukai, this seemed to be the only option currently available to him. Other than putting in a formal request, but he sincerely doubted Todoroki would grant it, and not heap some disciplinary measure on him just for trying. Better to beg forgiveness later than ask permission, since asking permission was likely to get him no closer to his goals, and might even set him further back.

"I hope you got all the slime monster out of it first," Hisoka grumbled, not bothering to hide his worry as the machine hummed to life and the doors in the top snapped open.

"Don't be silly," Natsume chuckled. "It's perfectly safe—as long as you're not standing too close to this thing when the antimatter is activated. Speaking of which, you might want to back up about three meters. Er, a little more. This baby sure packs a punch."

Hisoka had just opened his mouth to ask if he was sufficiently out of the way yet when the box began to rattle violently in place. While the overhead lights dimmed from the sudden flux of power to Xul, they flared in the machine's interior, and Hisoka jumped back when a sound like the crack of a whip split the air. He felt a sharp tug as Xul sucked the air of their room in toward itself, and braced himself as he would against a windstorm.

"Wait for it," Natsume said, watching the computer screen, the glow of which reflected wickedly on his lenses. "We should achieve stabilization in three, two, one. . . ."

Once he stopped feeling like he would be sucked in at any second, Hisoka inched closer to the device. He craned his neck to try to see inside, and was amazed. Warped as if through a fish-eye lens, or on the surface of a crystal ball, was a bright blue sky streaked with thin clouds, and brilliantly green trees—a landscape more vibrant than real life, like only a dream or the Imaginary World could possess. And since Hisoka was fairly certain he wasn't dreaming all this: "That's it. That's Gensoukai."

Natsume let out a deep breath. "Certainly seems that way. Boy, I wasn't sure for a second there. I mean, it all made perfect sense on paper—"

"You mean to tell me you've never actually tried this before? And I suppose you expect me to just trust you that it's safe and take a flying leap into that thing!"

"That's the plan." Natsume blinked up at him. "But don't take my word for it. If K says it's safe, you don't have anything to worry about."

Right, Hisoka thought, put my trust in a house cat. But when he looked over at the laptop for a second opinion, K was nowhere to be seen.

Hisoka was completely unprepared for it when she jumped up on the back of his neck. Small though she was, she had a way of using her momentum and her claws to throw him off balance just enough to let gravity finish the job. Even if Hisoka had tried to catch himself, he was already too close to the device and the open wormhole inside for it to do him any good. Xul sucked him down into itself, and all Hisoka had time to see before Meifu disappeared from view was Natsume waving goodbye.

It was like being pulled along by a strong tide. Only instead of being surrounded by dark water, it was a warm light that had hold of Hisoka and was dragging him where it wanted. He raised his arms to shield his eyes, and felt wind surround and ruffle him. A different air than what had been trapped underground with them among the humming servers: fresh, scented of moisture, and of exotic plants and flowers that he could not even begin to name.

He opened his eyes, and found himself floating in a cloud-streaked sky. Below him, jagged rocks stretched like the petrified fingers of some ancient giant towards the sky, and densely-packed forest filled in the valleys in between. He didn't recognize the landscape, didn't see any buildings or other signs of civilization anywhere around. When Natsume had said K knew of a back door into Gensoukai, Hisoka had assumed that meant somewhere within a day's walk of the Capital, if not in the city itself.

But she seemed to know where she was going, or at least not be daunted by their surroundings. Ears back and a look of concentration on her face, K paddled through the air towards the ground. So Hisoka thought he had better follow suit, if he didn't want to be left behind. There was a small clearing a little ways ahead of them, and they aimed for that.

When they were on solid ground again, Hisoka felt even more lost than before. Huge trees surrounded them on all sides, each one looking very much like the last and hung with moss that waved delicately on the slightest breeze like a woman's hair. "I hope this place looks more familiar to you than it does to me," he mumbled to K, but didn't know what good it would do. He was stuck here, with only a cat for company.

A cat he was talking to like a person. It felt weird. Embarrassing even. But, Hisoka had to remind himself, just because he couldn't understand K didn't mean that she didn't understand everything he said to her. He would have to get used to thinking of her as another human, he supposed.

And it seemed she had already started thinking of him as another cat. She took off into the forest without another look back, apparently expecting Hisoka to have picked up on some non-verbal cat cue to follow.

"Wait!" Hisoka called out. "Damn cat. . . ."

He pushed through ferns that came up to his knees as he struggled along in the direction he'd seen K go, and after a few minutes of this, found her resting on a log, just waiting for him to catch up. An expression on her face as if to say "This is going to take longer than I thought." Hisoka could have sworn the impatient switch of her tail was meant as some sort of insult.

He glared back. "Just get us to a shelter before nightfall and I promise I will buy you fatty tuna on our next case."

K made an effort to stay close after that, looking back over her shoulder every so often to make sure Hisoka was still behind her.

Not that she couldn't hear him. Dodging protruding roots and kicking his way through densely-packed ferns wore Hisoka out faster than usual, and on top of that the forest seemed to get more humid the farther in they went. He was glad K's white and orange patches made her easy to see in the undergrowth, but who knew what else in the forest had noticed their conspicuous progress. The canopy was alive with the queer calls of unknown birds and insects, and Hisoka half expected exotic, lower-level shikigami to pop out and challenge them at every turn. This was the Imaginary World; he would not have been too surprised if there were dinosaurs lurking in these forests, too.

They might have only been there ten or fifteen minutes when Hisoka heard the first peal of thunder. Great, he thought, it would be just their luck if a rainstorm were on the way.

To make matters worse, upon hearing it K immediately chirruped and bounded off, leaving a stranded Hisoka to try and guess where she might have gone.

He caught up to her again in another small clearing. Not exactly where he wanted to be in a storm. But a glance up at the sky showed no dark rain clouds in sight. Yet, still, the thunder boomed, rolling closer—

Foliage rustled and branches snapped somewhere in the trees ahead of them. It couldn't be thunder after all. Lightning didn't cause that kind of destruction. And the rumbling in the earth was the distinctive sound of feet. Very large feet. Shit, there are dinosaurs. If I'm going to be trampled by a brontosaurus—

Something massive and gray broke through the trees and the moss, and Hisoka couldn't help his shout as he leapt out of the way. It was as big as an elephant, and snorting a gale of hot air as it skidded to a halt.

But when the dust cleared, he saw with some surprise that it was in fact a huge iron-gray horse that had burst into the clearing, tossing a long pale mane and prancing around K.

Whose tail was straight up as she mewed and blinked at the horse, headbutting and arching into its snout.

Hisoka had seen her do this with Natsume enough to understand that this was K's way of showing affection, so that put him at a bit more ease. At very least, K knew this beast and it didn't seem to plan on killing her. "K, what's going on?"

"Oh-ho, and what's this?" a voice came out of the horse like a whiny mixed with a laugh as it turned its head towards him. "You must be Hisoka! Mistress K's said good things about you."

K, saying good things about him? Hisoka couldn't help a snort. "When?"

"Just now," said the horse, as though that should have been obvious. "And it is an honor to finally meet you, young man. Naturally, your reputation in this land precedes you, and not all of it good, it gives me no pleasure to say. But if Mistress K vouches for your character, then I am inclined to believe the rumors have been quite blown out of proportion."

Was that supposed to be a compliment or an insult? While Hisoka fumbled for a proper response, the horse let out another horsey laugh. "But I do apologize! I know who you are, young human, but clearly you have no idea who I am." It bowed its head toward the ground, and bent its front legs. Was Hisoka imagining things, or was that meant to be a curtsey? "I am Mistress K's guardian, Senrima."

"The Thousand-Li Horse?" Now they were getting somewhere! If the legends were true, it didn't really matter how far they were from civilization. "Can you really cover a thousand li in a single day?"

The horse snorted, pawing the ground, as though itching to go already. "Can I! That sounds like a challenge if I've ever heard one. I look forward to making a believer out of you, human."

And Hisoka didn't doubt it would. Senrima was a magnificent creature to behold, not just for its size alone, but for its waterfall of a mane and tail that sparkled like flames reflected in steel when the light hit them right, and clouds of steam billowing around its metal hooves and muscular legs. It had to be a shiki of immense power. Hisoka didn't need his empathy to sense that; the horse encapsulated it in every outward aspect of its form. How a mere house cat could have won such a guardian was a story he was sure to get out of the horse before this trip was over.

"But it still takes time to get anywhere. And if we're going to find some shelter in this jungle before our bedtimes, as Mistress K insists you are keen to do, I suggest we go now. Climb aboard, if you please."

Well, Hisoka wasn't about to argue with a god, let alone one that made such excellent sense. Though it was all he could do to hold on to its mane for dear life when Senrima bounded back into the sky like a shot. Sitting secure in his lap, K seemed to have none of his trouble, but rather appeared perfectly at home, riding barebacked on what amounted to an open-air jet plane.

Author's note: First, any wonky switch-ups in tense or italics is entirely intentional. Apologies if it is difficult to read.

Regarding the high school musical: Kristine-hime is a reference to the heroine of Phantom, Christine, but also to Kiyohime from the noh play Doujouji whose role actually bears more resemblance to the Phantom. After he rejects her, Kiyohime turns into a giant fiery serpent and attacks the handsome young priest she's obsessed with, who takes refuge inside a temple bell, which she uses to cook him to death. This is all told in a flashback by the abbot who is trying to exorcise Kiyohime's now-demonic spirit from the bell (the parallel of the chandelier in Phantom in this instance). How one goes about mashing those two stories up—let's just pretend these high school drama club students had a vision.

The Xul episode referenced comes at the beginning of the previous part of this series, Gone to Earth, for those who read that story a long, long time ago (and yes, "Xul" is essentially a containment unit from Ghostbusters).

Senrima, or the Thousand-Li (sometimes translated as "league" or "mile") Horse, is an established mythical creature often compared to Pegasus and said to be too fast and elegant for any mortal man to mount (so why not a cat, am I right?). Chollima (Korean) and Qianlima (Chinese) might be more recognizable names to mythology buffs. In this version, I'm keeping the flying ability but making wings optional, just cos not everything in Gensoukai has to have wings to fly.