September
A busy few weeks passed for Ichigo Kurosaki, and Chad spent most of it as a bystander.
Everybody got very busy all of a sudden, questions were being asked, the police became involved, and poor Chad had been kept quietly out of the loop.
Fair enough—his only connection to the case was Ichigo, and he knew better than to bother Ichigo when he was on the warpath. If he had questions, he kept them quietly to himself, to be pondered another day. The haggard look Ichigo bore as he wandered home that first day had told him enough.
The missing persons case named Tatsuki Arisawa went on for weeks with no answers. Ichigo lost his mind, nearly hurling his desk out the window one day before he pulled it together. Orihime Inoue quietly ceased coming to classes. Keigo discovered he had dog allergies. Mizuiro wore polka-dot in public and failed to cheer anyone up. Hana-sensei smoked on the rooftop more often, but switched exclusively to cheap menthols so Chad would stop borrowing them.
The police eventually stopped calling. School reopened.
Chad spent fewer of those weeks in school than he would've preferred—the foreman needed help when their work contract hit the busiest part of the year, and the band was gearing up for a performance in a small Rock cafe in Shinjuku. Their first live audience outside Karakura, where they'd be opening for a Stones-themed cover group. Chad needed the extra cash, so he came and went, making class when he could, and life passed him by.
It went quickly.
He'd been taking a lot in stride these days, he realized one day. He'd been standing in front of the mirror, and noticed his stubble growing in thicker. He looked like his dad, the one he'd only seen in pictures. He was getting old, 'looking manlier' his Abuelo used to say while patting down his shoulders. He could feel those gnarled hands slapping him proudly. Being a man was taking shit in stride, abuelo would say. Well, Chad lived by that now, and if it felt like he was the only one these days, then Chad could understand.
Eventually, Ichigo started waiting for him after classes again, instead of running home to check on the girls. Chad greeted him and it was like the intervening time had hardly passed. It was nice to see a slice of normality return. Chad felt for the boy, but as a bystander, he had so very little to offer.
He'd done what he could the night of, of course. Nearly all of Karakura had, for all they accomplished.
It didn't take long afterwards for Ichigo to crack and spill a bit of what was going on in his head—it wasn't all about Tatsuki, surprisingly, though Ichigo turned somehow grimmer when Chad absently voiced the thought one breezy afternoon.
"I don't know," Ichigo admitted shortly, a world of frustration behind every word, "and Inoue isn't talking. Tatsuki's mom's going spare—no one knows what's happened, but Inoue was with her last. She's completely unintelligible, Dad checked in and she's, like, in shock, babbling some nonsense—" Ichigo viciously booted a loose pebble away, a troubled look in his eyes. "I just don't know, man," he repeated, watching the little speck rattle off into the distance. "I just don't know what's going on."
They'd been standing by the river that day, not far from where Orihime Inoue had been found, crouching beside an empty phone booth and sobbing uncontrollably. The grassy banks were green and unspoilt by the waning heat.
Chad had stayed silent. He wasn't really sure what to say, honestly—he'd quietly offered to help, but no one quite seemed to take him seriously. It almost hurt his feelings, but he didn't let it get him down. Tragedy was just like that. He just made sure Ichigo knew he was ready to help, and he was content to wait until Ichigo wanted to talk. Whatever was going on, it wasn't subtle.
Cue the following week, as they watched the sun go down past that same riverbank: "I've been thinking about something else," said Ichigo, after a long moment mulling things over. Chad grunted, curious.
"I think the cat can talk."
Okay. Chad hadn't expected that, he could admit, but alright.
"Okay."
"I'm serious," Ichigo insisted. "I've been thinking over that night—" what night? "—turning it over, and I swear to god I heard it speak. Or laugh. At me." Ichigo was violently red in the face.
"Okay."
"I heard it!"
"Okay," Chad repeated. "I believe you."
Ichigo shut his mouth, briefly struck dumb because, as usual, Chad meant it.
What Ichigo didn't seem to realize was that Ichigo could see ghosts. Chad was past world-shattering revelations. Talking cats seemed like a logical enough extension.
"You seem okay with all this," Ichigo muttered.
Now, hold on—that was a different concern. Chad wasn't, actually, okay with all this. He could accept that it happened, but he really didn't like it. Talking cats weren't a great sign to begin with, and that plus ghosts (who had made their existence apparent even to the spiritually blind by occasionally helping Ichigo cheat at cards) meant that he was now possibly living in a horror movie. Chad now had a bad case of the heebie-jeebies, and could probably use a beer. But Ichigo seemed more concerned than worried, and that was as good as anything for Chad.
Chad shrugged at Ichigo. "…is what it is."
Ichigo snorted in disbelief.
Late September. Chad had never had a pumpkin spice menthol before, but he was tempted to ask. Hana-sensei was cheerily puffing away at one while clicking rapidly at two shifting forms on her computer. Distant yells from the non-smoking section identified her opponent.
It smelled pretty good.
"Sensei…"
"No."
"…"
He'd have to find them on his own.
Chad turned away and stared at his own screen. Flashing colors decorated the page. Mizuiro told him it was a popular game, and he'd been pulled here occasionally to mess around, but he didn't actually have a login.
There were too many colors, Chad decided. He could barely see what the options were.
After floundering for a bit trying to make an account, he decided he wasn't really in the mood anyway, and stood up and pretended to stretch.
"Where're you going Yasutora?" Hana-sensei asked suddenly. Startled, Chad lowered his arms, turning to look at her. "We just got here." Hana-sensei waved her cigarette in a loose circle, encompassing the internet cafe. "What's up?"
The internet cafe was crowded with teenagers. Chad had never heard of a scheduled field trip to an arcade, but it counted for his attendance quota. Hana-sensei seemed quite comfortable with a beer and a cig as well.
"…aren't you having a better time than us?" Chad realized. Unlike the rest of the students, who were packed like sardines in the standard booths and sweating profusely, Hana-sensei had been greeted by name and a plate of snacks. Chad had quickly joined her in the nearly-empty smoker's section, but she refused to share.
Hana-sensei shrugged and continued to beat Yamamura's ass at Fatal Fury. It looked to be a pretty humiliating match, because he could see Keigo wandering over to Yamamura's booth with a camera held overhead.
Chad briefly wondered if he ought to try to protect Keigo from the humiliating beating he'd almost certainly receive from Yamamura.
He slowly stepped out of his chair and into the aisle, only to see Hana-sensei had held out her hand backwards.
"Stay a bit," she said, still not turning around.
Chad obediently stood as her hands flashed back to her keyboard.
"What's going on with Kurosaki?"
Ah, this question. Tricky. Probe?
"He's fine," Chad said calmly. "He's been in class, hasn't he?"
"Topped the grade," Hana-sensei confirmed. She let a thin stream of smoke escape her lips. "Oh-sensei was so proud."
Oh-sensei taught Calculus. Decent sort. He accommodated Chad's schedule with more grace than expected from a man with a mullet and a tie done up with arithmetic.
"He always said you and Kurosaki had more to show. He's been insufferable all week."
Had he? That was nice of him. Chad doubted he had the time to prove his belief true, but he could bring the man cookies or something.
"These sound like good things, Sensei."
"Chad, do you think I'm an idiot?"
"…"
No. But it wasn't her business, any more than it was Chad's business. Ichigo had a robust support structure and a loving family. He was well cared for. He needed time. The school and Hana-sensei had probably planned this trip so the students could relax a bit following Tatsuki's incident, and that was already more than enough.
If Ichigo wanted to bury himself in books to escape, that was fine by Chad.
"Ichigo is fine, Sensei."
This time she said nothing. Her eyes had never even left the screen. Chad walked past her, bowing his head politely, before striding over to where Mizuiro was chatting up a hostess.
As he approached, the hostess squeaked, startled, and tottered off after waving at Mizuiro. A brief flash of bemusement crossed his face before it smoothed into resignation as he turned and saw Chad approaching.
"Chaaaaaaaad," he whined childishly. "She was nice! You coulda waited!"
That stung a little. It wasn't his fault.
"You look scary!"
That was uncalled for.
Chad reached down and deliberately ruffled Mizuiro's neat locks. The boy yelped in genuine distress; Chad knew Mizuiro kept his hair deliberately neat, because he claimed it made older ladies happy. Made him 'cute', but not 'childish'. He kept babbling about things like that whenever they went to the mall. It gave Chad a headache.
Puppies were cute. Mizuiro was a menace.
"Don't bother with him, Chad," a calm voice said. Chad looked to the left and spotted Ichigo tipping his chair back onto its rear legs, headset dangling half-off his head. His brown eyes drifted to Mizuiro. "You make me sick," he informed the younger boy, who'd pulled out a glittering makeup mirror very clearly not his own.
"Don't hate the players, Ichigo," he said in his irritatingly childish voice. "Hate the game. My game, specifically. Not yours. You don't have any."
"I don't want any."
"Liar," Mizuiro sang. "I saw you follow that nice hostess's—"
"Anyway," Ichigo hissed, "I'm heading out." He kicked his chair back, tossed the other boy a box of leftover pocky, which Mizuiro cheerily accepted. "Comin' Chad?"
Chad nodded.
"Bored?" Mizuiro asked, with a mouthful of cracker.
"Tired."
"Spent all night by the riverbank, did you?"
Ichigo froze. "How—"
"I was on the lower bank," Mizuiro grinned. "Don't ask why."
Chad knew why, having rescued a puppy from the river and left him with a homeless man under the bridge. They'd been playing happily together, when Chad had checked in yesterday. Chad had seen Ichigo on the top bank as well, in passing, but he didn't feel the urge to bring it up.
Mizuiro must've followed Ichigo and discovered the puppy. Chad wasn't sure why the puppy had eventually taken higher priority in Mizuiro's mind. The boy was strange like that.
Ichigo rubbed the back of his neck; he was quite red. "I was just—"
A scuffle interrupted them. Yamamura yelled and started throwing pretzels across the room while Hana-sensei yelled insults about his wrists across the room. Half the crowd gathered around his computer started wobbling as Yamamura accidentally shoved his chair back and knocked it into them, and the rapid clutch-grab-pull of people trying to regain their balance started a small war of violence. People started to stand and stare. A keyboard went flying.
"—whatever," Ichigo muttered.
Mizuiro laughed, and the three stood aside as the staff of the cafe came running to break it up. One-by-one, students were escorted out with stern warnings, until Hana-sensei slumped out after them, the mandatory chaperone.
In the sudden silence after the crowd cleared out, one of the staff started towards them, met Ichigo's eyes and Chad's pecs (he looked no higher, to Chad's quiet dismay), and turned away.
"Well shit," said the smallest boy. "Guess this section opened up. Chad, did you figure out how to make an account?"
"No."
"Man, I really—"
"Come on Ichigo," Mizuiro said softly. "One more game. With us. Like old times."
Ichigo looked tempted, but hesitant. Chad could understand. He clapped Ichigo roughly on the shoulder, and when Ichigo looked back at him, startled, Chad nodded. "One game." And shot him a thumbs up.
Ichigo rolled his eyes and relaxed.
"One game," he said, trudging to a computer. "But I'm just saying, it's been a while." He turned to look at Mizuiro, who stood encouragingly at his shoulder. "I'm probably not gonna be…"
Suddenly, Ichigo's screen started to flash with pings. Mizuiro snickered at Ichigo's expression, as Chad leaned in to read the incoming messages.
[Daddy_Asano]: Wash yourself! Big Daddy's here!
Daddy_Asano has challenged you to a match!
[Daddy_Asano]: Wash yourself! Big Daddy's here!
Daddy_Asano has challenged you to a match!
[Daddy_Asano]: Wash yourself! Big Daddy's here!
Daddy_Asano has challenged you to a match!
[Daddy_Asano]: Wash yourself! Big Daddy's here!
Daddy_Asano has challenged you to a match!
"Just like old times," said Chad.
"Mizuiro, where the fuck is Keigo. I'm gonna kill him."
It was nearly October, and the air had grown distinctly chilly. There was a unique draft to derelict buildings in this season, Chad felt. As though the darkness outside pressed closer to the windows here.
"You're a poet, Chad. A poet," Mizuiro sang, kicking his feet up on the store counter. "So how come your band only sings about parties and stuff?"
Chad paused while pulling up the plastic sheeting that covered the ground, allowing the dust and scrap to slide down to the crease. "…I don't write the lyrics," he said, not looking at Mizuiro. There was a good deal of detritus, and the occasional fine metal spur that warranted caution.
He left Mizuiro chuckling to himself by the backroom entrance as he made his way back to the front of the store, where Ichigo was standing on a few boxes, and hammering sheets of plastic over the yawning gaps in the walls.
Chad slowly took in the full measure of the patch job, as he came to a stop behind the shorter man. "It might hold," he finally allowed, "but that's only allowing for a normal volume of rainfall. Monsoon season will test the integrity."
Ichigo released the corner of a plastic sheet and sat back on his heels, dabbing at his forehead with a cuff. "I mean, most of this is just stuff to make sure dew doesn't drip in. The primary structure is actually nearly intact—this place is pretty damn sturdy."
He tossed a screwdriver at the bin beside him, letting it rattle against an assortment of similar, but slightly different screwdrivers. Chad winced at the noise, and paused to regather his thoughts, as Ichigo moodily prodded at his vinyl assembly. "Really, all I've done is patch the holes. It should prevent more rot from setting in." And that's as far as I'm willing to take it went unsaid. Chad nodded, and passed a critical eye over their repairs once more. It wasn't perfect, but it was honestly quite thorough for a charitable whim. Chad would simply have to live with the twinge to his conscience telling him they could've done better—with what money? he rebutted in his mind, and the thought went silent once more.
Ichigo looked moody again. It was obvious to Chad that he'd mostly been doing this to get his mind off of Tatsuki.
"I stopped by the pawnshop you mentioned." Chad said, carefully stepping around an overturned umbrella to crouch beside Ichigo. "Thanks for introducing me. He had some tips for maintaining metal."
"No problem. Estimate for the register?"
"Not sure," Chad replied. "Lots of specialty pieces."
Ichigo grunted. "Makes sense. It's old as hell."
Chad nodded slowly. "Are you sure about paying for it?"
"Not really," Ichigo said shortly.
Chad nodded. Even whims needed to be grounded. That was a small relief, actually; he was worried that Ichigo had gotten too invested in this.
Chad walked slowly, lost in his thoughts as he often was lately. The moon had vanished behind thick clouds and light from occupied homes spilled onto the street. It was trash day, and where piles of garbage had been discarded, the odd homeless man could be seen resting upon them, clutching tightly to a bag of garbage, warm and swollen with rotting refuse. There was no traffic on either side of the road, but in the far between of tall lampposts, other men had made a shantytown of tents and boxes in a long smear down the pavement. Some had draped their surfaces with additional cloth or tarpaulin to weather the drop in temperature Tokyo had seen over the past week. On a dusty car a small child sat beside an older girl, both playing with the wipers. The low murmur accompanied him for a little bit, but after a hundred feet, there was only silence. Chad found himself checking over his shoulder more than once, to see if he really had passed through so much life.
Chad suddenly felt the chill. The night breeze curled under his thin turtleneck, and he cursed his lack of forethought. The street was wide and people passed by in much the same post as him; hands under arms, neck hunched, and eyes focused downward. Of course, for Chad, downward often meant the top of peoples heads. In the daytime, it was fairly disgusting, but in the night he could only see by streetlight, flashes of moonlight, and the odd car passing by. The finer details were blessedly absent.
Even still, Orihime Inoue's head stood out in much the same way as Ichigo's, both vibrant and unmistakable. They appeared like a sudden riot of color under his sightline; startling, every time. She appeared close behind after a cyclo, while the wheels of the bike rattled up onto the curb and wobbled past him on the thin bit of cracked concrete he could squeeze himself out of the way for. He noticed immediately that she was running with some urgency, and she passed him without comment.
This was rare for Orihime Inoue. Chad knew her as an irrepressibly friendly girl, the type who he'd only ever frightened once and never again. It was another way she reminded him of Ichigo, and while she wore her kindness on her sleeve, he liked how she would always stop by his desk to say hello.
She didn't even see him this time, and that was very strange indeed. Nobody didn't see Chad. This was new for him. He briefly savored it, before he remembered that it was probably a bad sign.
His head turned to follow her as she continued running down the street. He'd missed her expression, unfortunately, and briefly considered following her.
—
A dark shadow followed the young lady down the alley. The shiver down her spine was only half-conscious, but the sound of a heavy tread behind her made her slow, heart pounding, before she whirled around, pupils dilated to pinpricks and a scream already tearing out of her throat—!
—
Chad held his head in misery. It was all in his imagination, of course, but he didn't think his heart could take it if Inoue actually screamed after seeing him. He'd already been arrested twice this month on suspicion of being too tall and muscular to not be trouble, and Detective Kadokawa could only bail him out so often. He might actually cry this time, and then his reputation would really be in the gutter.
He moped a bit before he pulled himself together and went after her, knowing that he'd never forgive himself for not helping even the friend of a friend of a friend, even if she screamed and made him feel bad. But Orihime Inoue was apparently much faster than she seemed, because he quickly realized she'd vanished.
The alley she'd gone down was damp, and filled with only the noise of ambient moisture. He checked the corners, just in case, but no berry-bush made itself visible, and he turned back after a few more minutes of fruitless waiting.
Chad had a bad feeling again. He quickly dialed Ichigo. It took a few minutes for him to pick up.
"Dude, it's four in the morning."
Ichigo sounded tired, so Chad kept his explanation brief.
"I'll be there," came the immediate response, and the hold tone rang out. The line hung for a second as Chad thought about what had just happened while staring at his phone.
Could he have done more?
Not without information he didn't possess, he concluded. Chad shifted his phone to his other shoulder, wedging it against his ear, and pulled out his pocketbook to mark another good deed for the day, before hunkering down and waiting for Ichigo.
Ichigo's steps echoed through the house as he ran down the stairs, briefly heedless to the noise. His mind had too many thoughts going through it; he couldn't focus on anything, so he let his feet carry him out the door and down the street in a way he hadn't since elementary school, when Tatsuki had been something close to a fixture in his life as an on-off rival and occasionally a best friend.
He'd been out the door before he could even consciously think about why, cellphone pressed to the side of his head as he'd kept up a running stream of chatter with Chad.
He didn't like that Orihime Inoue was wandering around in the dark. He didn't like the parallels. He didn't want to think back to last month, when he'd called Tatsuki's mom and first got a hint that things were wrong.
Mrs. Arisawa had sounded tired, more tired than he remembered, but she still greeted him the same way—Ichi-kun how are you—and asked about his day and whether he'd seen Tatsuki around. He hadn't. No one had, it seemed. No one at all. Tatsuki's mother had tried to sound like she wasn't worried by that. Ichigo had reassured her that things would be alright—and closed the line before mentally flagellating himself for doing what his father had beaten into his head since he'd been old enough to help in the clinic, to never do; make a promise of safety he couldn't keep.
His feet turned themselves westward as he shifted the phone to a more comfortable position.
He knew where Inoue was going. Or he thought he did, but tonight that felt like enough. It was a still night, like the sky was holding its breath. Still and unpleasantly muggy. It kept thoughts spinning in his head all night; he'd known where to look as soon as Chad called.
Chad always liked to walk by the homeless after gigs, and see about buying them drinks sometimes. But people avoided those streets for a reason, and it took someone as tough as Chad to walk by that many desperate people without fearing a thin blade to the kidneys, no matter how uncharitable the thought.
Well, his freaky night-owl trick had finally paid off, and Ichigo would have to apologize for all the times he'd told Chad it would eventually cause hair loss. Maybe it still would, but Ichigo wouldn't rag on about it. Not like Tatsuki would.
And she would.
Once upon a time, Tatsuki had run away from home. They'd been in middle school, and she'd left with Inoue one day after school and never shown up at her home. Her parents had gone spare, all but breaking down his door to check for traces.
Before they could do something drastic, the girls had shown back up, smelling like sewage and Inoue missing half an inch of hair. Ichigo had never heard the explanation given, but he'd asked Tatsuki later, and she told him with great solemnity that they'd camped under Onose Bridge, and if he ever told anyone she'd rip off his winky and feed it to Maron-chan, the class parakeet. Only three people knew that secret place, and he'd been wise enough all these years to pretend he didn't.
Chad said he'd seen Inoue alone while walking down 3rd. If Inoue had crossed Chad's meandering path that late at night, then something was definitely up. Given her heading, she would be moving in the right direction.
His gut was screaming that Inoue wouldn't be out there unless something happened, after spending a month withering away in a dark apartment.
Not unless she had news of Tatsuki.
The girls were inseparable, practically joined at the hip. The number of times Tatsuki came to class wearing Inoue's castoffs numbered higher than her own damn clothes. Inoue wouldn't ditch her. She'd know. She'd know where to look for Tatsuki if something happened.
Ichigo's feet knew too, and they carried him down a mazelike path deep into the city, hanging a left when right would've carried him to Tatsuki's doorstep. The streets eventually grew thin and dark, the weak sunlight clouded over and hidden behind tall buildings in the distance. Two heartstopping girls crossed his path, jabbering in rapid Korean and playing with ribbons. A man sat on a dumpster and tried to spit on him as he passed. A man screamed allez-vous! as he ran past, and faint gurgles echoed against the walls for a full two blocks after. His vision broadened to fisheye, and he felt as though he could see everywhere at once.
Orihime Inoue was under the bridge when he arrived, phone ready in hand. He could see her, in the distance, even from over a hundred meters away. The Bridge had been constructed for a railway, with a scrapyard in-between. On nights with even a light breeze, the scrap shifted and tumbled, clashing with a god-awful scraping that drove thought and sound away.
Thus, she didn't notice as he approached, the atmosphere dominated by the ringing din, as he came up towards where he could see the small figure sit. The night was warm, and what insects and people lived here had been long driven away. The road was flat and so was the dirt that Inoue sat in motionlessly, something pale clutched in her hand.
It looked like a hand. Something twisted in Ichigo's gut, and he'd begun sprinting again. His phone fell to the earth behind him, forgotten.
Tatsuki Arisawa lay in the dirt, covered in dust and ash and layers of stinking filth so dense he could barely make her features out, save the blood oozing from a puncture in her side in a thick sludge. Her eyes were glassy and her legs were twisted under her body. Orihime Inoue sat behind her, frozen, a terrible blankness in her eyes and lip split clean in two where her incisor had cleaved through it and even now continued to work its way down.
Tatsuki coughed a fine mist and blood sprayed onto Ichigo's sweats.
"Oh hell," said Ichigo, fingers dancing through his hair and mind so clear it hurt. Behind him, thumping footsteps echoed as Chad quickly caught up. "Oh what the hell."
Orihime Inoue started screaming.
