A/N: I have made a terrible mistake for I have no idea where I am going with this. I want it to stay along the lines of canon as Bleach chapters are published, meaning I have to wait like a week or two before updating. . . I'm trying.
Spoilers for Chapters 591 - 594.
Thanks for everyone's reviews, I'm sorry I'm so disappointing. You all mean so much to me!
For The Sake Of Seireitei
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- - Giselle touches his face as she bleeds on him and he, exhausted, gulps and feels himself being tugged under, his reiatsu crumbling, the clinging remnants of his life dispersing into the metallic liquid splattering across his skin.
The last thing he remembers is the aching throb of the fingerprints on his chest, a flicker of worry in scarcely recalling Matsumoto's situation, and an isolated memory (or is it a reality . . . ?) of someone kissing the tip of his nose.
And just like that, he can't quite recollect her face, her name, or why he is obediently dressing himself in white.
The one piece he can hear in the murky depths of imprisonment is:
"After all . . . it's all for the sake of Seireitei . . ." - -
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Karin grins at him and plants her lips on the tip of his cold nose and Toushirou scowls, sighing and letting her do as she pleases.
He follows her around, holds secret discussions with her during classes. In third period, there is an empty seat after the kid moved to Europe with her family, so the Shinigami likes to occupy that spot and call it his own.
When he can escape Soul Society, grab a position down in the human world and leave Rangiku-san in charge for a little while, he fancies neglecting his job ever so slightly to spend time with the dark-haired girl with grey eyes and a sharp tone. She scribbles messages on the top margin of her notebook to communicate with him, even risks whispering sometimes when the students around them aren't paying attention. After all, the boyish teenage girl chatting idly with a "ghost"? It sounds ridiculous and Karin doesn't quite enjoy the idea of living in an asylum, so she tries to be discrete.
Toushirou speaks pretty loud since no one but her can hear him, entertaining her because school is boring as hell. His monotone, dull speeches tend to catch her off guard because suddenly something will be hilarious and she can't react considering the teacher would give her detention.
There is a time, however, when they hold a fairly sincere and thoughtful conversation.
"I have a question," Karin mutters out of the corner of her mouth while pretending to read a book. "You're dead, right?"
Toushirou frowns at her, unamused, and replies, "Yes."
"Then why do people like you still fear dying?" she ventures, facial expression neutral but stealing a peek at his legs propped on the desk in boredom, arms folded, chin angled downward. She wishes to know on account of the spirits she sees around town often fretting over this inevitable event.
The boy ponders that a second and chooses his response carefully, explaining plainly. "Well, this is the afterlife for me. You could say it's the in-between. If I were to die again, though, then I'd be nothing. I'll stay like this for many centuries to come so long as I'm not killed again." He turns to look at her. "I suppose others fear a second death because they will no longer exist when that happens."
"That's . . . depressing."
"Very."
Karin knits her brow. ". . . Are you scared? Of dying again?"
Toushirou smirks sourly. "Who isn't?"
She ducks behind the book when Sensei peers up and grinds her teeth, scolding herself for falling in love with someone who had already died once, when she still had two more times to go.
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It only becomes more and more unnerving as time stretches on.
She goes home that day, walking oh so slowly to keep her balance, to keep her legs going straight forward. She does this because she is scared.
Scared that she'll lose control of her own body.
Karin couldn't describe it even if she wanted to, so she shuts her mouth for the rest of the day, staring at her shoes in vigilant, unfocused determination to make it to her house without falling over. The sky is drab with overcast and she distractedly pulls her coat closer around her figure, knocking her book bag with her hand in the process. She blinks slowly down at the scattered papers littering the sidewalk now, dragging in a dry breath of air, lungs heaving in effort, and gradually kneels down onto the cement and begins to pick up her homework documents, one by one with delayed motions.
And she doesn't exactly know how, but Karin recoups her belongings and makes it to the Clinic, manages a soft No thank you to Yuzu when she offers snacks, and gets up the stairs to her bedroom, collapsing on her mattress unsteadily, drawing her knees to her chin and hugging herself in failed comfort, gazing at the closed door as if waiting for him to come home like he promised, to step in and shrug nonchalantly, to . . . to . . .
. . . to stop hurting people.
So her afternoon is an entanglement of anguished, angry shrieks of two men being slaughtered, of an oily, drawling voice threatening a walking corpse, and strange, unnatural twists of muscles and bends of joints even though she isn't moving. The words are far away, incoherent, like they're buzzing memories from a dream she had many years ago, like déjà vu. The only thing she understands for an entire hour straight is him straining to roar "Daiguren Hyourinmaru!" and it's painful to hear because her own throat rasps along with his and the dead aren't supposed to tell.
By the time Karin finally grasps another reoccurring sentence properly, it's too late, and he's hitting the ground.
"After all . . . it's all for the sake of Seireitei . . ."
Karin sort of zones out, blanks, buries her face in her arms and rests her head on her curled up thighs, counting each exhale, each inhale. It's stopping her from panicking, stopping her from giving up.
A part of her wants to rid herself of the marks, of their connection on her shoulder, erase them, destroy them, be done with this stupidity and cross her fingers and convince herself that none of this ever happened and that Toushirou will be okay. And then the rest of Karin wants to punish herself, restrains herself from rubbing the flesh off of the five prints, endures. It's an endless war inside of herself.
It's all so distant, so remote, so muted and faint and unreal.
She is so goddamned fixated on monitoring her limbs and mind and emotions that the person sitting beside her causes her to inaudibly cry out in surprise. This sensation is screwing with Karin's intellect and she looks dazedly at her father as he leans next to her and wraps an arm around her, pulling her close and massaging her back with repetitive circles. Isshin smiles sadly, like he knows, knows everything, and patiently embraces his daughter, a certain sorrow deep in his own eyes.
He tells her that he's thinking of going out, asks her if she'd like him to pick up anything. He hasn't decided yet, if he'll go anywhere, but he's sincerely contemplating stepping out for a while.
Karin says no. It's croaky and dying and weary, but it is comprehensible and that's good enough.
Isshin mentions how Yuzu will be making supper in a couple of hours, wants to know if Karin has a craving for anything special. This time, she can only shake her head.
"You seem to have made a mistake," Isshin murmurs gently, and it's so out of character to hear him talk seriously. "We all do, you know."
Karin wonders if he means the seal on her shoulder and shudders.
Her dad cranes his neck to kiss her cheek and she can't retort properly so she allows him to, watching as he adds evenly, "He'll be alright. Don't worry."
Just outside the door, Yuzu slides to the wooden floor, back against the wall, stifling a worried whimper.
Karin lets herself cry.
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Daiguren Hyournmaru.
It continues to replay like a broken record; the syllables are strangled, full of distress, like it hurts to say them, yet so thickly coated in malice that it makes Karin want to tear up again and again and again.
After all . . . it's all for the sake of Seireitei . . .
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Karin's spine arches strangely when something stabs into her neck, something that feels suspiciously like a needle, and Isshin's arm grips her tighter as a low whine slips off her tongue.
It is when she starts to scream that her father shatters, clenches his jaw with a flash of horrified responsibility that only a parent can possess, and unzips her coat, pulling the fabric away from her shoulder as if he knew where the connection laid all along, wiping his palm down her pale, clammy skin.
Karin recovers, voice having cracked and now very full of gravel, shifting to see that her sister has joined them, embracing her protectively as well.
Isshin gives her one last squeeze and gets to his feet tensely, closing the door behind him with a tiny creak, leaving Yuzu to comfort her.
Dreadfully and desolately, she twists her sore, sore neck to stare at her exposed shoulder. Toushirou's markings are erased; only faded freckles remain. She can't sense him anymore, as if it never even happened at all, and she sinks into her sibling's warm constraint, no longer quivering - only feeling oddly detached and insecure.
Downstairs, they can hear Isshin beginning to make an early dinner. Karin vaguely wonders if he's still pondering whether or not to run that errand of his.
Yuzu whispers her name (a desperate plea to know if she is okay) and she can't bring herself to answer; simply presses closer, letting down her many, many barriers.
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- - Toushirou is still screaming.
- - He is so, so, so very alone. . .