CONTAGION

CHAPTER TWO

When they were children, they had played in places like this, chasing each other around the sparse trees, sitting in the branches and throwing twigs at their friends below them. Even through the reek of dried blood, the clearing still smelt of old wood and wet grass.

It was drawing towards sunset. The red light seemed to bleach out the red and brown stains across the clearing, leeching the colour from them.

Renji finished dragging the five bodies over to one side and making them decent. "Any thoughts?" he asked Rukia curtly.

Rukia paced back across the clearing towards him, eyes on the ground thoughtfully. Her robe was stained with grass and mud where she'd been kneeling down to check the tracks. "Well, first, they killed it. I'm sure of that. The strike pattern, and the dispersal-burst, are both standard in their markings --"

"Though this wasn't a standard Horror," Renji put in.

Rukia looked up at him and bristled. "Well, just assume for the moment that it did, because the alternative is that it blew up like a standard Horror and then flew away. Right?"

Renji had to admit that wasn't very appealing. "Okay. So they took it down as normal?"

Rukia nodded. "There were only two of them on their feet by that point. One must have been Rikichi. The other one was," she nodded to one of the corpses, "that woman there. She's the only one with feet small enough to have made those prints. At which point she collapsed, from where we found her, with her sword still in her hand."

"Right." Renji rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "And Rikichi didn't even try to check the bodies."

"No. Staggered straight out of the clearing, from his tracks. He must have gone directly back to the Division." Rukia frowned. "Did he make it in on his own, or did he get help from people on the way?"

"On his own, I think." Renji didn't say it, and Rukia didn't comment on it, but both of them knew how much help the Rukongai slums would have provided to a wounded shinigami on his own.

"Okay." Rukia took a couple more steps. "Now -- what exactly happened to Rikichi? You say Unohana-taichou said something about an infection? Because . . ." She hesitated. "I've seen Hollows do other weird stuff before."

"Like what?" Renji queried. He liked the idea of it being one-off abnormal Hollow weird shit. That made it one of a kind and disposable.

Rukia turned to look at the blood-smeared clearing. "Like a shinigami being possessed by a Hollow," she said distantly, "which controlled their actions while looking normal, but eventually broke out of their body and acted normally. For a Hollow. A sort of merging. Against the shinigami's will. Of course."

Renji frowned. "That actually sounds more workable with what happened than all that stuff about infection. Would Unohana-taichou have known about that?"

"I can't see that she wouldn't," Rukia answered flatly.

Well, it was as obvious as shit in summer that there was something going on here, but if Rukia didn't want to talk about it, then Renji wasn't going to push the subject. He'd trust her to tell him the important bits, and that was all that really mattered. "Okay," he said, and felt the tension go out of her. "Then we --" His nostrils flared as he felt a sudden harsh approaching reiatsu, tainted with the metaphysical stink of Hollows. "What the fuck is that?"

Rukia moved to stand beside him. "Incoming," she said, redundantly, as four creatures loomed out of the growing afternoon shadows in front of them.

They had originally been Hollows. That much was obvious. But their masks had twisted and grown in unnatural patterns, and their limbs swelled and flexed as though constantly about to split or meld with each other. One of them, the largest, held itself with an air of actual intelligence. The other three hulked and leered at the two shinigami, the gaping mouths of their masks seeming to drool.

"Shinigami fools," the presumptive leader gurgled, "you shall perish for having blundered on our work here."

Four Hollows would be, Renji flattered himself, fairly manageable. Even if they were four weird Hollows.

"Kill them!" the big Hollow declared, "Bring the heads back for our master!"

And of course only three Hollows was even easier. "Stay back, Rukia!" he called as he moved forward, sword loose in his hand. Not even necessary to call out Zabimaru for this sort of garbage. Rukia had better have the sense to stay back out of this. He could just imagine the Captain's face if he brought her back with a single scratch on her.

The three Hollows moved to surround him. One was dripping something that looked like acid onto the ground. The second had legs like a spider's. The third seemed normal enough, for a Hollow, but cast a human shadow, and for some reason that made it the worst of the three.

Behind them, the leader tilted its head in what might have been thought, and as Renji spun into motion, it hissed, "Rukia! Kuchiki Rukia! The Master will reward us well for your death!"

It bunched long wormy legs underneath itself, and sprang.

Well, all right, Rukia would have been prepared to admit that perhaps she still wasn't one hundred per cent recovered, assuming it was to someone other than her elder brother or Renji. And maybe it was best to let Renji take on these morons. It'd make him feel better -- for she could tell, she'd known him long enough to tell, how much he wanted an undisputed fight with something that deserved it, and one that he could win. And besides, if she came back with any injuries (unlikely as that was), Elder Brother was unlikely to let her go out again for the next year. At least.

But when the leading Hollow targeted on her and jumped, all bets were off.

Common sense cut in just as she was halfway through drawing her blade. This Hollow knew too much. They needed it alive to question it. She converted the movement into a turn, bringing her empty palm up towards the Hollow, and called up the Way of Binding in a shout that made the leaves on the trees around them shiver in resonance. The Hollow came to a shrieking stop in mid-air, hanging there as the spell coiled around it, gross and dripping.

Except. That it. Was. Heavier. Than it. Should. Be.

Renji was dealing with the three others nice and smoothly, he'd already taken down the first and it was shattering into powder as he finished a slashing hammerblow through its mask, and she had to be able to deal with this one herself, or he'd never trust her again on her own. Or she'd never trust herself again on her own.

It was heavy. It was looking at her, those dark empty holes in the mask focusing directly on her, and it slobbered threats from its loose-lipped mouth.

She'd felt this way once before, when Ichigo had broken free from the binding spell.

It flexed inside the bonds.

Rukia was not the sort of person who swore, even before the Kuchiki adoption, but she could currently think of all sorts of words that she wasn't going to say aloud. Fine. It was stronger than expected, she was still not fully herself, and allowing it to enter into a full contest of wills that might result in breaking the spell would incapacitate her if it managed to break free.

Renji's blade carved through the second Hollow's mask, and it dissolved with a thin shriek that carried through the air like serrated knives.

Decisions, decisions.

With a gesture she let the spell dissolve, and the Hollow fell to the ground with a rippling squelch.

Renji whirled, his blade glinting in the afternoon light, and cut through the third Hollow's leg before slicing its mask into two perfect halves that fell to dust.

"Kuchiki Rukia," the lead Hollow hissed, "you're dead." It sprang at her.

In that moment of perfect clarity, when the Hollow hung in the air like a nightmare, when Renji was opening his mouth to shout something stupid, she called, "Dance, Shirayuki," and released her blade.

Shirayuki sang in joy and purity and sweet frozen lucidity, slicing through the air so fast that it parted the breeze and shattered the sunlight into a thousand reflections, and its white edge carved through the Hollow's reaching mandibles as if it was cutting through water. The force of the blow tossed the Hollow back into one of the ancient trees, and it paused for a moment to gather itself, tentacles thrashing and squirming in the leafmould.

"Going to kill you!" it squealed. "Going to kill you and eat you and make it hurt!"

"Like hell you are," Renji said flatly. He moved to stand between the Hollow and Rukia. "Get up. Get up and face me. I'm your opponent. You want her, Hollow, you go through me."

Her zanpakutou was still light in her hand, still eager to swing and cut and slay, but Rukia lowered the blade, taking a step back. She thought she could probably take the thing, but -- she still wasn't entirely sure.

Besides, Renji was already going to have enough to yell at her about. She'd let him dispose of this one.

"A pleasure," the Hollow gurgled, and leaned forward to swipe at him with a long clawed arm. It creaked as it moved, and frozen chunks of its body crumbled away from where Rukia had wounded it.

Renji dodged it easily. "Slow," he taunted it, "you're a slow son of a bitch, aren't y--" He had to dodge faster this time, as it brought another limb round in a hammerblow that would have buried him to the waist in the mud if it had connected.

Okay. This bastard was faster and tougher than the other three put together. He couldn't shift his ground too much or the Hollow would have a clear line of attack at Rukia (and he was going to have WORDS with her after this about pulling kidou and her sword, she knew she wasn't supposed to get involved) and that couldn't be allowed. Time to kick things up a notch.

"Howl, Zabimaru!" he commanded, and felt the habitual swell of weight and length in his sword as it grew longer. The wind hissed against its fangs, and he could hear it crooning at the back of his mind, hissing for blood. He brought his arm round in a smooth swing, letting the blade lengthen and curl to bite into the Hollow.

The creature screamed in pain, flung back by the force of the blow, then pressed into the mud as Zabimaru's teeth raked across it. "Shinigami scum! You are doomed! Doomed!"

"Yeah, yeah," Renji commented. "Now why don't you tell me who sent you here . . ." He was forced to break off as the Hollow rose into the air and oozed towards him, thrashing it back with Zabimaru as it howled and writhed. "Look, shitbag, it's not like I want to talk to you, so the sooner you tell us what's going on, the sooner I can kill you and we both get this over with . . ."

The Hollow's mouth worked and shifted in its mask. "What's going on?" Its skin began to bubble unpleasantly, and new eyes started to form in its flesh as its tentacles coiled outwards. "The truth is that a new age has come! We shall arise! We shall swarm the gates of Soul Society! We shall consume all! We shall . . ."

"Renji!" Rukia screamed from behind him. "Take it down! Now!"

Renji had already been poised for action. Getting the thing to talk was all very well, but standing round while it mutated into even weirder shit was not on his agenda. At her words, he leapt, rising above the creature, and swung Zabimaru over and down, letting gravity and acceleration add their force to his own strength and to the howling blade's lust for killing. The blade cleaved through the Hollow's mask mid-rant, splitting it apart, ripping through it from forehead to chin and parting the babbling mouth in two, coming down through the oozing flesh and embedding itself in the ground before Renji drew it back to his hand as he landed.

He stood there for a moment, looking at the creature dissolve, and said out loud, "Think if we stay here some more will come back?"

"I'm not sure they're that stupid," Rukia answered sharply. "Even ones like that."

Renji turned round, anger mounting in him now that the danger was over, boiling in him like hot wine. "And you. What the hell -- what the hell -- do you think you were doing, getting involved in . . ."

Rukia cut him off, stepping up to him and jabbing a bony finger into his ribs. "And you. You're just as bad as he was. The two of you just charge in without even thinking of the consequences, and of course you take them on, without even considering the other person."

"I was thinking of you!" he yelled at her, refusing even to consider her references to "him". The idea, the very idea that he was in some way comparable to that carrot-topped moron . . . "You go deliberately putting yourself in danger like that --"

She put her hands on her hips and looked up at him, face oddly neutral. "I thought we were a team."

We. The word made him hesitate, and he swallowed his next words, trying to think what to say.We. Team. Well, yes, of course, that was the case, and he knew he could depend on her, and . . . "I . . . shit, Rukia, of course we are, but . . ." He shuffled his feet, trying to think of a direction to back out in that wasn't obviously backing away. "You're still recovering from the whole thing with that whatsit," he offered hopefully. "Of course if you were back in form that'd be different."

Rukia flourished Shirayuki rather too obviously before putting it away. "I let you finish that creature off," she said sweetly. "It's not as if I'm doubting your abilities. Vice-Captain."

"Oh, don't give me that shit!" He slapped her across the back of her head, more comfortable with the familiar pattern of insults. "Come on. Let's get back. We can check in at Fourth Division and tell them to pick up the others, and find out about Rikichi before reporting to the Captain."

"We could split the duties," Rukia suggested helpfully. "I'll tell my honoured elder brother what we discovered, while you check out Fourth Division."

Renji thought about that. Let Rukia tell the Captain about this little skirmish, rather than having to break it to him that his sister had got herself into a fight, and she'd be sure to play it down for her own sake anyhow, and also that way he could make a private suggestion to Kuchiki-taichou later that she go back to Thirteenth Division where Ukitake-taichou would probably sit on her if she even considered going near any Hollows . . . "Good idea," he said cheerfully. "Not bad at all."

Rukia was whistling as they headed back towards town. Renji had a nasty feeling he'd been outmaneuvered somewhere, but wasn't quite sure where yet. Oh well.

He'd probably find out soon.

Fourth Division was busy. Swordless shinigami were running in all directions, occasionally pushing trolleys or carrying stacks of notes. Renji stepped back into an alcove to avoid one particularly heavily loaded trolley while he waited for an audience with Unohana-taichou, and found himself sharing it with his fellow vice-captain, Kira Izuru.

"Well," he said.

"Um," Kira answered, and shuffled his feet, gaze somewhere between Renji's torso and navel. "Hello, Abarai-fukutaichou."

"Oi." Renji grabbed his shoulder and shook him. "What do you think you're playing at, huh? What happened to, "Hello, Renji?""

Kira kept his eyes lowered. "Abarai-san, after everything that's happened . . ."

"Oh, shut it." Renji kept a grip on his old friend's shoulder. "Look, we all got screwed over, didn't we? You think I'm blaming you? Forget it." He felt Kira's muscles tighten under his hand. "Them upstairs cleared you, didn't they? You're managing your Division, aren't you? It wasn't your fault. We all jump when our Captains tell us."

"You didn't," Kira mumbled. He still wouldn't look up. "You tried to save Kuchiki Rukia. You faced down your own Captain . . ."

Renji could still feel the ache from the wounds that Kuchiki-taichou had given him. "Yeah. Well. We all do stupid shit at times. Look, it's where you are now that counts. You're here." He paused for thought. "What are you doing here, anyhow?"

Kira seemed relieved by a question he could answer. "Checking up on some of my Division. They ran into some strange Hollows while out patrolling. And, well. I came to see Hinamori-fukutaichou."

"Oh," Renji said. "Is Momo any better?"

"She's conscious. She's walking. And talking."

"Well, that's --"

"She doesn't want to talk to me," Kira said flatly.

It was difficult to know what to say to that. But Renji couldn't just let it drop. Running into Kira like this had reminded him of the Academy days -- and remembering Momo then, and comparing her to how she'd been for the last few years, hell, why hadn't someone noticed something sooner . . . "She'll get over it," he said with more confidence than he strictly felt, trying not to think about her determination or her ability to hold a grudge. "What she needs is something to be organising --"

"Hitsugaya-taichou is still in charge of her Division," Kira said with a total blankness to his voice. "I understand that he is prepared to partially release it to her when it is felt that she is in a proper state to resume her duties."

Renji spat. "Fucking fine. Anything else they want her to do? Any more grovelling because she believed the Captain they gave her to?"

Kira didn't answer.

"Sod it." He kicked at the wall. "Look, I'll have a word with her later. Okay? We'll get her through it."

"We will," Kira said with a little more determination. His hand drifted to the handle of his sword. "She'll be fine."

"And -- ah." His eyes narrowed as he caught sight of a familiar bald head and pair of broad shoulders at the end of the corridor. "Look, I'll catch you later. Seen someone I need to talk to. Take care, right?"

"You too." Kira smiled wanly. "Don't get your Captain too angry with you."

"Who, me?" Renji snapped his fingers. "Me and the Captain, we're like that. Except when we're not."

He grinned, and ducked out of the alcove, catching up with the figure he was pursuing. "Oi," he said, and punched Ikkaku in the shoulder playfully.

"Oi yourself," Ikkaku retorted, and slapped him round the back of the head. This let Renji get a grip on him, of course, and they tussled, stumbling into the nearby room, with Renji cursing Ikkaku's slippery baldness while trying to get him in a headlock, and Ikkaku knotting one hand in Renji's ponytail and getting a grip on his neck with the other, and it would have gotten much more serious if they hadn't been interrupted by frantic coughing from over by the door.

Renji nudged Ikkaku with his elbow until the 11th Division man loosened his hold on Renji's ponytail, then tilted his head till he could see who was there. "Oh," he said with a certain lack of enthusiasm. It was that guy who'd helped out earlier, whatshisname Hanatarou. "Hey. Things going okay?"

Hanatarou folded his hands behind his back and visibly braced himself. "Unohana-taichou and Isane-fukutaichou are very busy at the moment, Abarai-fukutaichou, 3rd Seat Madarame, and I was instructed to give you the report on the current situation."

Renji let go of Ikkaku's head. Ikkaku let go of Renji's hair. "Well," Ikkaku said, resettling his sleeves, "what's the word?"

Hanatarou coughed. "Er, your twelve squad members will be out of here as soon as Unohana-taichou has completed tests on them, but because of the current injuries from other Divisions and the fact that they seem to be in perfect health otherwise this is not a priority, and therefore --"

"Hurry it up," Ikkaku growled.

Hanatarou speeded up. "-- and therefore they are currently being housed in the convalescent ward and issued with alcohol from the emergency stock to keep them from bringing the place down round our ears, please issue due condolences and apologies to Zaraki-taichou and inform him that we will get them off our hands as soon as possible and be glad to do so -- that is, we will be glad to certify them fit for duty at the earliest possible convenience."

Ikkaku snorted. "What's all this shit about disease anyhow? So we've got weird Hollows. Fine. We just kick their butts twice as hard."

Hanatarou took a deep breath. "With all due respect, 3rd Seat Madarame -- you know fighting. We know healing. If Unohana-taichou says there's a disease, I'm not going to argue with her."

"He's got a point," Renji put in hastily. "But, hey -- just how many of your people have been getting mixed up in this sort of fight?"

Ikkaku shrugged. "We've had several run-ins with weird shit on the wide patrols. Lost a few men. Then the Captain got orders that anyone who was involved in a fight with the weird Hollows was to come in for a checkup. He . . . wasn't happy."

Renji smirked nostalgically. "I'm sure."

Hanatarou backed away quietly, sidling down the corridor. "I'll just go and check with the Vice-Captain . . ." his voice trailed away.

Renji jerked a thumb after him. "He's not too bad. Better than some of them."

"Eh." Ikkaku smirked. "I liked that mortal one. You know," he brought his hands up to his chest, "the one with the big --"

"Excuse me." Both men looked round, then down, to see a small elderly woman with a Fourth Division badge standing behind them. "You. Young gentlemen. You are talking much too loud. You should take this outside."

Ikkaku gave her a friendly pat on the head. "Don't worry, auntie, we'll be out before you know it. Now like I was saying -- ow!"

They tumbled down the steps outside the Fourth Division compound, both clutching ears that had been nearly pierced by the old woman's long-nailed grip on them.

"And don't come back!" she called from above them, shaking a wrinkled fist. "Kids these days . . ."

Renji and Ikkaku looked at each other.

It was against the dignity of a seated Division member, let alone a vice-captain, to react to being thrown out like that. Therefore it couldn't happen. Therefore it hadn't happened. With a nod to communicate their understanding of this definite fact, they turned to head for their separate headquarters.