In the day after I woke up from surgery I learned so much my brain felt close to bursting.
Himitsu held me for a good few minutes and I could tell that he had actually feared my death just a couple of moments ago. I felt the warmth of his friendship slowly easing away a sharp pain in my chest. What was that pain, anyways?
That's when I remembered all that had happened; the creature, the battle, and most of all, the railing skewering my flesh.
I broke away from the hug and tilted my head down to look at my chest. As to be expected, it was bandaged thick with a bit of red coloring popping up through the white bindings.
"How did I…..survive this?" I asked the boy kneeling next to me. As soon as I said those words his face went from relieved to grave.
"I don't know," was his response. But his voice sounded a bit suspicious as if there were more to it than that.
Questions flooded my mind and I wanted to ask them all in one shot.
"What was that thing and how did you kill it?" was what I had decided to go with.
"Wait….you saw that?" he asked in a voice tinged with disbelief.
"Well I saw it in the reflection of the river….and something very similar when I was a little girl. I never told anyone. I was still so small and no one would have believed that I had seen something so unreal take away the life of a woman. I mean she was on the train tracks and the train did seem to hit her. Granted that was after she had fallen…..And the little boy attached to the monster then showing up two minutes later? Impossible," I was rambling until I was suddenly cut off.
"They're called Hollows. Glad to see you're awake, by the way! I see the surgery went well. You'll have to thank our friend Momo later," a man with a green and white striped hat was telling me. His clogs clacked against the wood floor as he approached me.
"Hollo…..who are you?"
"Name's Urahara. Nice to meet you, Hanako!"
"Wait….how do you know my name?"
"Himitsu here told me all about you! And he had plenty of time to give me all the juicy details. You were out for a whole week after all!" his smile never faltered through his words. I couldn't tell if it was more comforting or unnerving.
I granted Himitsu a questioning look as if to ask if this guy was trust worthy with all of that information. Seeming to read my mind he returned me a reassuring smile.
"So, you said that the thing that caused all of the destruction in the city is called a Hollow…..what exactly is a Hollow?" My curiosity only grew as he fed me more information.
"A Hollow is the creature born from a human soul that didn't cross over to Soul Society for some reason. They eat the souls of the dead as well as the living. Each posses a supernatural ability of their own," he said this so naturally as if he were just common knowledge.
"What's Soul Society? Is that like heaven or more like hell?" I clung to his words as if my life depended on it….because who knows…..it actually might someday.
"Soul Society is simply where souls go after a person dies. This is also where Shinigami live. And before you ask a Shinigami's job is to ensure the passing of souls from the World of the Living to Soul Society, destroy Hollows, and give soul burials. A soul burial is when a Shinigami helps a human soul called a 'Plus', who is a lost human soul but not yet evil like a Hollow, make it to Soul Society."
I blinked, perhaps too rapidly, at all of this new information. It sounded like something out of a story book. Could this be the explanation to all of my questions? I guess it had to be….nothing else made sense. There was still one question I had left and as I thought about it harder, the more obvious the answer seemed.
"Himitsu…..does that mean that you're a Shinigami?"
At my question he looked down as if ashamed by something.
"I would have told you….I just didn't know how. And I figured if I ever told you, you'd be freaked out or call me insane," his reply came out apologetically.
I couldn't believe what I was hearing but knew I had to. So my best friend has been secretly living as a death god for all of these years?
"Wait a minute….to be a Shinigami don't you have to be dead?" it seemed so weird a question, asking if the brown eyes still looking at the floor beside me were actually dead.
"Well, no. You just need a soul. My living body stays here in the World of the Living while my soul is free to travel from here to Soul Society," Himitsu was making eye contact with me now. And for a moment he looked like an entirely different person. How had I not seen that something weird was going on this whole time? And…..why hadn't he trusted me?
"Oh, well okay then…..." I replied a bit more quietly than I had expected.
He looked a bit concerned again and opened his mouth as if to speak again; but in that moment I heard something that sent chills rocketing up my spine. It was a screech so loud that my body reverberating and my skull rattled. I froze in the fear of Hollows, the fear of not being able to stop imminent destruction, yet not in any fear of death. It was then that Himitsu rose to his feet and I finally realized that he was wearing the robe I saw him fighting in the day I came face to face with a Hollow.
Out of sheer instinct I grabbed his hand and looked up at him as if to say 'don't go, you'll be hurt'. He only gave my hand a quick squeeze and smiled at me.
"Don't worry, this is my job. I promise you I'll be right back as soon as I defeat the Hollow out there."
His words rung with such honest sincerity, that I had to believe them. So I let get of his hand and watched him bolt out the room. For some reason the inside of my chest tingled a bit. I blamed it on the injury and quickly moved on. Hoping I could see the battle, I pulled myself slightly up onto my elbows so I could get a better look out the window of the lightly colored room. Another twinge in my chest appeared, but this one far more painful. I decided now was not the time to be sitting up, let alone stressing out about a Hollow. So I reluctantly laid back down and instead stared at the ceiling above my head. That's when I remembered who else was in the room.
"So, Urahara, how exactly did you patch me up?" I asked the ever-smiling man.
"Oh! Well that was not so simple, dear. You see, normal surgery was not all it took. No, no. It took more than that to save you. My, were you hurt! I mean that pole went straight through you. I guess I should really be getting to the point. Basically, we had to give you some of Himitsu's power. He put half of his soul into you in order for you to keep living!"
"He…..gave me what?"
"Half of his soul. It gave you power to live on and well, there's one more detail you may want to know…."
"Well, tell me then."
"With half of his soul you also got some of his Shinigami abilities. You can separate your body and soul now and possibly even go into combat with Hollows in due time."
"I can...fight Hollows…?"
"Well not right now of course! You've been given no training. Plus you need to heal from this injury. Speaking of which, you should probably lie down and get some rest. I'll be in the other room if you need me!"
And with that, he left me alone with my head spinning in a haze of pain and total bafflement. How on earth was I supposed to fight Hollows?