Chapter 4: The New Day Job
Hito awoke to the soft yet steady trickling of water from the rooftop onto the windowsill and then the ground. Despite the fact that the drizzling would keep most asleep, Hito peeked open a green eye, and the sun invaded it.
"ARGH!!" The redhead screamed, leaping up from the protection of the brown pillow and covering his opened eye with one hand to keep the previously infiltrating light from getting any further into his eye. He then slammed his head back down into the pillow, only this time face first so as his eyes weren't blinded by sunlight. He stayed in the safety of the fluffy brown pillow for a while long, content not to think about…something…something that was important…that he should be concerned about…
"Hey, what the hell's going on up here?!" a deeper voice than Hito's own broke the soft silence of the red head's thoughts. The voice belonged to Kazuya Jirai, Hito's father. Hito took his head from the pillow and blinked for a second, then looked up towards the door, his heart racing as he wondered whether or not he'd actually heard his father.
"Dad?..." he asked with wide anxiety filled eyes. The door opened seconds later, and the blond older man entered with a frown. Hito's eyes lit up and he lunged from the bed and embraced his father.
"Whoa! W-what's up with you?!" his father asked, bewildered. Hito pulled away and wiped the tears that had streamed from his eyes away, hoping his father didn't see them. Mr. Jirai's face softened and he turned around. "I can understand how you'd be worried, but I'm fine and I won't be punishing you for hanging around at the construction site." The man said, a bit of an icy tone leaking into his voice.
Hito blinked curiously. The red haired boy took a few steps back and collapsed onto his bed. "Construction…?" he began. Kazuya frowned.
"Don't you remember? Ah, that blow to the head must have done it!" Kazuya stated he had twirled back around, now putting on a black blazer over his dress shirt for work. "These two guys brought you up to the door at about 2 o' clock in the morning." He began to button as Hito's eyes were drawn to the roof in thought.
'Blow to the head…two guys…I'm back in the real world…Did Hattei and Tsugemaru go?"' Hito thought to himself. He looked up to his father. "What did they look like?!" he asked, confident he knew their appearances (though it was hard for him to sift through them in his boggled mind).
Kazuya frowned in thought. "Ah, one of them was tall and had longer hair than a lot of the women I meet," Kazuya began.
Hito's mind painted a picture of Tsugemaru that was rather inaccurate, as the man had a rather curvy waist…and a previously non existent bust. He shook the mental image away as his father began anew.
"And the other one was a scraggly kid with blue hair." The older man finished his sentence as well as his preparations for work.
Hito looked up once more and his mind painted a picture of Hattei…In beggar's robes instead of his deep black cloak. The boy shook that image out of his head and looked again at his father. "But what happened that I had to be dragged back?"
"Oh, they said that you'd had a girder fall on your head." His father said simply. Hito face fell.
'The hell?! I think Hattei and Tsugemaru overestimated the human durability level!"' Hito thought with a sweat drop. Kazuya yawned and turned away again, this time to grab his briefcase.
"Either way it goes, you've got school today, so get on out there, they said you'd be fine despite the injury." Kazuya finished. He walked out of the doorway to Hito's room and as his footsteps began to get faint, Hito called out.
"Dad….Thanks…" Hito yelled after him. The footsteps paused for a moment, then they began again and after a minute or two the sound of a door opening was heard, and then it closed, leaving Hito alone, but with a smile.
School wasn't so easy to smile through. It was true that the beginning of the day went easily enough, but towards the middle of his stay in the familiar public facility something far more unexpected than anything that had happened to him yesterday; his death and rebirth included, happened.
The class was, once again, Nunari-sensei's. Hito was doing his usual thing. That is, not paying attention to the speech his English Teacher was giving and instead trying to do something pointless and/or stupid. As he tried to balance his pencil on his nose, there was a sudden very loud CLANG from the hall outside the classroom and the pencil dropped with a far softer PLIT. Nunari-sensei blinked for a moment at being interrupted then, before he could make a move towards the door to investigate there was a defiant shout of:
"THIS DAMN CONTRAPTION WON'T WORK!!!" The class blinked for a moment as well, but the stupor was broken as the voice rang out again: "FINALLY! Damn it, why can't they make things easy in this damn place?" Hito's eyes went wide with worry as Nunari-sensei placed the chalk he was lecturing with on the chalkboard's edge and stomped towards the doorway. The reason he was worried is because, despite his mind telling himself it's illogical, idiotic, and completely unfounded…The voice sounded far too familiar…
There was an abrupt silence as Nunari-sensei reached the door only to have it opened slowly and deliberately independently of his hand. The students stopped their whispering to see who it was, but Hito already knew, and dread washed over him along with millions of reasons for why the boy he had met only once before was standing in the doorway.
"Ah, are you Nunari-san?" Hattei, his attire now that of the ordinary student, his blue hair smoothed and held back in a pony tail. Nunari-sensei at first seemed to want to say no; but then his mind grasped that he was indeed Nunari-san.
"Er- yes. Are you a new student?" the fat teacher asked in his rather annoyingly high voice. Hattei nodded vigorously and shoved a pink slip under the teacher's nose before appraising the class the same as they were appraising him. "Ah, I see. Well that's in order…." The teacher had glanced at the pink slip and, with a flick of the wrist, had put it in his suit. He then looked at Hattei. "Well then, you may take a seat anywhere free, and please refrain from using all Japanese. It says here-" he patted his breast pocket where he'd placed the slip. "You're on the same level as these students so don't expect special treatment!"
With a nod, Hattei slid the door close and began to move towards the desks in the center of the room. Specifically he moved towards an empty desk to the left of Hito. Hito just stared blankly at the Judge of Eternity as he moved through the room until he came to the seat beside him. Then, very suddenly, he stood up, grasped Hattei by the elbow, and with the words: "Please excuse us," dragged the blue haired boy from the room.
Hito didn't test his luck too much; he remained only a few feet away from Nunari-sensei's class, but he didn't hear sounds of pursuit, so, with obvious annoyance, he released Hattei and folded his arms with a glare. "What the hell are you doing here?!" the red head asked. Hattei cocked his head to the side.
"I gotta ask, why the hell does it matter to you if I'm here or not?" Hattei's voice was even, but his face had broken into a smile which seemed to annoy Hito even more.
"Because, you told my dad a girder fell on my head!" Hito remarked. Hattei looked up thoughtfully, apparently trying to remember, and then he snapped his fingers.
"Oh yeah, sorry about that, I wasn't sure how strong humans are exactly!" he said, continuing to smile as though it was a big joke. Hito twitched more and more as he looked at the blue haired boy, but he didn't say anything else. Instead, he turned around, threw his hands up in exasperation, and began to stalk back towards the classroom. Hattei frowned, then sighed and yelled to his retreating back: "You're a Judge of Eternity," he said simply. Hito stopped, still facing away from Hattei.
Slowly, but surely, he turned around with his green eyes twice as big as before, measuring Hattei's face and trying to determine by that whether or not it was a joke. Hattei was no longer smiling. In fact, as Hito looked at him, he could swear the blue haired boys eyes held a bit of sadness in their depths. The red haired boy blinked, shook himself like a dog trying to rid its fur of water, then spoke- slowly and deliberately- while keeping eye contact. "You're seriously crazy," he retorted.
Hattei frowned. "You don't think I'd show up here just to annoy you? Or take back a story on why you were knocked out when we took you home? Or get into the English class when I have no express reason for wanting to learn any more of that language?" Hito already knew the answer. The only logical answer for Hattei's return was the one that he'd first supplied; from the little he knew of the Court of Eternity, it seemed like they tried to refrain from getting involved in the daily lives of humans as much as possible. Which meant that he wasn't-he couldn't be human….Not anymore.
"That's what the trial was." Hito murmured faintly. Hattei nodded.
"Tsugemaru should've told you, but I get the feeling….Well, it's not important. All that matters now is that you know. I've been assigned along with you to Tsugemaru's division," Hattei continued, he sounded annoyed upon saying he was in Tsugemaru's division, and some part of Hito was laughing at how Hattei had ended up with probably the division he liked least, though this assessment was based solely on seeing him interact with Tsugemaru the night before. "and you've been assigned along with him. We're a part of a 'Specialized" team." The blue haired boy finished.
Hito was silent for a bit longer, then, without warning, he ran forward until he was only a foot away from Hattei, and then brought up his right hand, which had curled into a fist, and swung it across the boy's unsuspecting cheek. Hattei stumbled back as Hito unclenched and shook tingle from his fingers. "That's for hitting me yesterday….And for being a jerk." The red haired boy remarked. Hattei had a hand on his cheek, but otherwise didn't seem to be fazed, something Hito, though he would never admit it, admired.
"Nice punch….Why didn't you do that yesterday though?" Hattei queried. Hito frowned.
"I wasn't equal with you yesterday…Now we're in the same groove." Hito finished. Hattei nodded as a DING DONG sound filtered through the school hallways. Hito looked up, and then looked around the hallway as though just realizing where he was. "Well, I guess I'll see you-" he was cut off by Hattei.
"Not likely; Tsugemaru managed to rig up a schedule for me that matched yours. We got all the same classes." Hattei said; again, annoyance was evident in his voice. Hito raised an eyebrow, then sighed and nodded.
"I think that works out pretty well…You have to tell me how to do….Whatever it is you guys do," he said. Hattei shrugged, reached into his pocket to pull out what Hito recognized as a rolled up schedule slip, and began to walk away to navigate the next class he and Hito had. Hito frowned as he realized Hattei was going the wrong way. 'Oh well, his problem"' and with an evil smirk, the red haired newly appointed Judge of Eternity stalked off in the right direction of the class.
The rest of the school day passed almost without incident. Almost because during their final class, a class in which an anticipated field trip to the Kanazawa Aquarium was involved, Hattei, who had mysteriously disappeared before the class, arrived and introduced himself as usual with the exception of having a signed form which would allow him to go to the Aquarium. This baffled the already scatterbrained teacher, Iroku-san, but she permitted him to go with the rest of her Environmental Science class to the Aquarium.
"How the heck did you get a signed form so quick?!" Hito asked as they boarded one of the busses.
"Simple: When I went back to the Court I had Tsugemaru sign it," Hattei stated, then, at the sight of Hito's wide eyes, he added, "he's my legal guardian as far as this school is concerned, but he's just my superior in the court otherwise." Hito's wide eyes became normal sized again as he sidled into a seat. Hattei sat down right next to the red haired boy, much to his annoyance, but he didn't try and maneuver out of the seat.
After everyone had gotten settled, however, and the bus started to wheedle along the roads of Kanazawa, Hito made a motion to stand up. Hattei turned to him and shook his head. Hito frowned, but obeyed, staying put as Hattei then opened his backpack (they would be returning to the school after the normal release, so they'd been allowed to grab them) and pulled out an oddly adorned CD player. Oddly adorned because it had a skull and crossbones on it's face.
"Er, what the heck is that f-" Hito began, but was cut off as Hattei reached up with inhuman speed, and snapped the headphones onto his head. Hito reached up, about to remove them, when suddenly he heard, not music, but a familiar voice emanating from them.
"Raine Tsugemaru, Supreme Judge of 9th division of Court of Eternity, assigning Unseated Judges of Eternity to eliminate one: Rank 'I', F-level exposure threat Hollow; Black Soul count at 59 . Judges assigned shall be two: Hitonari Jirai and Hattei Ayanami. Located in Sector 12 of Kanazawa City. End Transmission." Hito's eyes had gone wider and wider as he listened, and by the end of the Transmission all he could do was mouth wordlessly at Hattei.
"Hope you're ready for a bit of Hollow Hunting," Hattei said.
"I-you-I CAN'T FIGHT THOSE THINGS!!!!!" Hito yelled. Luckily for him, his outburst went unnoticed by the majority of the students as they all clapped and yelled upon hitting a bump in the road and bounced up. "Are you two crazy?!" the red haired boy asked. Hattei sighed.
"You can, and you WILL fight the Hollows. Don't worry; this one should be fairly straightforward. It's somewhere in the Aquarium, we already kno-" Hattei was cut off as Hito grasped him by the collar.
"The hell?! One of those…things is in the Aquarium…around living people?!" the red head's eyes had gone wide again. Hattei sighed and pushed Hito away. Hito was about to grasp him again, but the bus took a sharp swerve that threw him off balance as Hattei spoke up again.
"Despite popular belief, they're usually in areas populated by people." Hattei retorted sarcastically. "But don't worry; it's likely not going to do anything to show its presence until it finds a good and strong person…Spiritually, anyway. After that happens…" Hattei shrugged. Hito's eyes weren't the only thing wide now; his mouth was gaping in shock at the boy beside him.
"You're talking about death like it's an inconvenience, or a bad day! Do you know how horrible it is to DIE?!" Hito asked loudly. Hattei just looked at the boy for a moment, nothing on his face moving from a stony and almost cold expression. Hito was about to force him into speech with a blow, but then it dawned on him what he just said, and he looked away, ashamed.
"Don't be stupid." Hattei said simply. Hito looked up at Hattei again, noticeably calmer and sighed.
"Alright. But why am I needed for this? I've never fought one before!" the red haired boy asked. Hattei frowned.
"You can't just be dead weight. Like Tsugemaru said last night, you'll only be accepting death more if you choose to undertake the trial. You passed, so now you've got to embrace the life of…well, being in the after life." The boy explained. Hito hung his head.
"I'm not getting out of this am I?" He asked. Hattei smirked.
"Not a chance. Say hello to your new Day Job," the boy remarked. The bus sidled into the museum parking lot as Hito let out a very audible sigh. This, in no way, expressed the horrible fear brooding inside him…
To Be Continued…
Next Time: Talk about complicated! My life went from being…well, my life to my death! Okay, so that's pretty obvious, but what's not obvious is how I'm supposed to fight the same kind of thing that nearly chomped me in half a night ago! I'm all for saving the people, but I'm just not the kind of person who can leap into battle against a huge shark toothed thing coming right at me! Hattei, if you save me, I swear I'll do your homework for the rest of the year! Next time on Bleach: Court of Eternity: Go Fish.This one's going to be a whooper!
A/N: Whew! Well, if you've stuck with it so far, next chapter's the first real fight with full Shiki goodness! As always, review if you've been reading, until next time!