Yearning - Chapter 1
The late summer sun was setting on the city as a raven haired woman stood atop a street lamp. Her big violet eyes staring in surprise at a small device she held in her hand as it continue to bleep continuously. She looked up at the sun not moments later, "It disappeared again…" she whispered.
Her device fell silent, none of it made sense to her. The creatures they tracked don't simply disappear. The real question to her was which made more sense, the tracker misreading traces or the tracked beings vanishing. Or was it yet some new breed of enemy that they haven't encountered yet? Thoughts of the past filled her head as she tried to calm herself. It too rare, it was the first and the last time it happened, it wouldn't happen to her again, right?
Her thoughts stopped when her eyes noticed a silhouette rush down the alley where her enemy was supposed to be. Her fear was conquered for the moment as her hunter instinct took over and she moved before even thinking it over for a second. She swiftly jumped roof to roof, following small particle traces left by whatever it was she tracked now.
She knelt down as her eyes spotted something she didn't expect, she now knew what she was tracking. Yet why is it here? Why so close to her target? Are they connected? Her thoughts rushed again, from seemingly innocent to worst case scenario, which would entail that her past is about to repeat. She steeled herself again, it wasn't going to be like in the past, she's stronger now. Her new target wasn't far now and it wasn't particularly quick, did it not notice her? Was it not running from her? She stood up and continued to followed traces.
The tracks lead through an impossibly complex track around the city, no one sane would walk through these nasty gutters, yet she followed it. She had to know, it was her duty after all. Something strange was happening in this city, they gave her the task to figure out what, or at least for this quarter of the city. Her rank held her back from more important duties, they gave the dead-end, unsolvable cases to lower ranks as they could handle the shame of not being able to close these cases. And as they were impossible to close the ones given them wouldn't stand a chance advancing through the ranks regardless of how capable they were. It was an old, harsh system, made by those who enjoyed staying in power, at the top.
She finally stopped, the tracks ended, but how? She was only moment away from catching the culprit. Where did they go? She looked left, then she looked right. Nothing. She checked behind, they traces were slowly vanishing into thin air. She breathed out, "Where did it go…?" frustration building up.
"Where did what go?" A voice rang out from above, at the top of street lamp, sat a boy clad in white.
Her brow furrowed as she looked up at him, "I was chasing after something dangerous, did you see it pass here? Which was did it go? It's urgent!"
His eyes widened, "Wait, you can see me?" His mouth fell agape. His shock stunned him, causing him to fall down the lamp, right in front of the woman. He quickly stood up and brushed himself off, albeit there was no dust on him, no dirt clung to him, as if even the world itself that he lived in didn't acknowledge his existence.
"Yes, why, of course I can see you…?" Something felt oddly familiar to her about this boy, have they met before? No, that would've been impossible. She would remember someone with such ridiculously bright hair. "Look kid if you haven't seen anyone run past here then say so, I really must find it, (whatever it is). I don't have time to chat" She looked around again, maybe some traces are left somewhere, maybe her eyes simply aren't picking it up cause of the light. Or so she tried to reason, there's no way her trained eyes wouldn't pick up on a trace as dense as this one. Even the least skilled hunter would pick up on this, so why can't she?
The boy looked neglected, as if something had repeated again, "Sorry miss, I didn't see anything… I wouldn't want to be in your way…"He kept mumbling apologetically under his breath, but the woman stopped listening, her thoughts was attacking her. After he mentioned didn't see she blanked him out, if she could solve this case it would completely change her life, no longer ignored and looked past, but the pride of her brigade, the first unsolvable case solved in after a century. It was too big of a prize and all the shunning she had suffered made her greed rise.
The woman jumped in a random direction without even a goodbye. The boy stood there for a moment, looking after her, "She's the first" his eyes widened, "…And probably the last…" his shoulders slumped as he turned around and followed the pavement, not really going anywhere. Since to go somewhere you'd have to have a purpose, a goal in mind. Yet the boy had no goal, no purpose, he didn't know where he really was or who he really was. He didn't possess any real knowledge apart that of the darkness that overcomes that city each night.
It was a city filled to the brim with greed, lust, gluttony… Such emotions brought to the city the worst nightmares that anyone could imagine, or couldn't, as some of them were so grim even the most stalwart would fall prey to fear. Yet the boy has been living in this world for nigh a century without knowing.
Time passed slowly. He saw them, but no one saw him. He always sat atop the light, thinking maybe somehow it would help him be noticed. His eyes wandered from person to person. Some gray haired man shouting his lungs out at his phone, the boy could only wonder what kind of life he must lead, what kind of choices he has made and what kind of home he returns to after each day. If even such a harsh man has someone to talk to, albeit loudly, why couldn't the boy find someone.
He tried, oh how he tried. The first years were rough on him, yet he was steadfast, followed each person on the street, asking, pleading and begging them to speak up, to notice. It was not a fair world he lived in. What cruel fate turned him invisible to others?
Night came as any other, yet it was quiet this time around. "Was that really the last one?" His sorrowful eyes turned to the moon, it was full this night, bright white, adorning the night's sky. He had always enjoyed the moon, somehow it soothed him. As if all the weight had been lifted from him and he could fly with just a thought. "Who was she looking for…?" He looked down at his crossed legs, "Was it him she wanted to find?" He turned left for no particular reason, "…Wasn't anything special in him." He spat, yet nothing hit the ground. "He could barely even speak…" His eyes were met by a familiar silhouette stood atop a roof.
It was a man clad in black, same as the raven haired woman. "They always wear the same things. Just who are they?" He tilted his head, "Always with such serious expressions, missions this, objective that, my orders are this… It's like they don't even want to act human, but why?"
He stared at the man, not knowing for how long, it didn't really matter to him. Time might as well not exist for him. He could had studied the man for years now, he knew he seemingly didn't age, just like himself, not that he could see himself, but he assume as he didn't seem to get taller, no matter how old the people walking through the street were getting. He knew that the man and he were the same, yet he wore white and the man black, was that the boundary? Was that all that was keeping him from connecting with another person? But how would he gain the black clothes this man wore? There was no shop that was selling clothes to invisible people, as silly as it sounded, it was the only explanation. But the man wasn't invisible to him, and the boy wasn't invisible to the man, just that the man chose to ignore the boy. It angered him, but it also calmed him. There were still people who could see him, he wasn't all alone.
The morning sun steadily rose as the boy continue to stare, deep in thought, it gave him comfort in the now lonely nights, no nightmares showed that night, to the relief of the people clad in black. The woman with raven hair appeared next to the man and exchanged words, they were too far for the boy to hear, but he was also too preoccupied remembering his own name. The man reached out his arm and a door appeared seemingly out of thin air and opened. He stepped forward with a small smile and a sigh of relief, he was going home.
The woman seemed exhausted, yet dead serious, her mind set on completing her duty. Her head felt heavy and her body too. She had been running for half the night trying to catch up to the trace, yet she never found even the tiniest particles anywhere in the area. She was promptly summoned by the leadership and congratulated on finding traces. To all it was clear that she was ridiculed. All the effort for naught, again. And now she got guard duty for the same quarter of the city, some sick joke, she thought as she grinned in disgust.
"That's some nasty expression you got there miss." The boy stood on a roof not far from the street light she stood on, his expression was almost alike to a perky puppy.
"It's been a long night." She sighed as his voice gave her a small shock, not really expecting to see someone who could see her in return.
"How come it's you standing here today? Usually it's the tall man and the thin man..." He brushed off what she said, not really interested as his night was long, painfully so.
"Not really any of your concern, is it?" She shot him a sharp eye, her tongue clicked.
"Considering you're the first new face I've seen in," he stared off, "I'd like to know…" He looked down, he didn't count the days he's been alone, but that stopped bothering him long ago.
She tilted her head, "Seen in? How long have you been here?" Her stern look changed to a worried one.
"I've been here since I know." He looked up nodding, as if confirming it with himself.
She eyed him carefully, his white garb still was speckle free. As if he came to yesterday, yet he speaks of seeing the two guard brothers as if he'd been around for decades. No one who's from yesterday would've noticed the guard brothers standing their post. They tend to cry their eyes out at no one noticing their form, or they simply accept their fate and wait where they first appear. He was different, his face conveyed no fear of the unknown or grief for the past. Just who is this boy?
"Hello, miss?" He waved his hand in front of her face, "Something wrong?"
"Huh, what? No?" She lightly shakes her head.
"You've been quiet for quite some time, look even the sun in up up." He pointed towards the sun jokingly, it had barely moved.
Ignoring his remark she quickly pulled out her device and dialed some unknown combination of numbers, "R. Help Center speaking, I'm listening to your request." A voice rang out of the device.
"Yes, this is Kuchiki Rukia-", she was promptly cut off.
Laughter shot out of the device, "The same one that reported a disappearing hollow and then chased it throughout the night?!" The wheezing and giggling of several men died not minutes after.
"Yes the same one…" She spoke through gritted teeth, "I've got a question for the Death Accounting Office…" The boy froze.
Death. Death? Death! Something had snapped inside his mind. His memories now made sense. It all fell into place now. Why he wasn't seen, why he wasn't heard, why he wasn't felt. He was never really there for those people. They passed through him not cause they chose to banish him from their thought, not because they were heartless or cruel, it was simply the way things were. His existence ended long ago.
"…So there's absolutely no way they would've missed a soul existing in the city?" Her annoyance was reaching peaks she never knew existed.
The laughter boomed again, "Of course there's no way, do you know who we are? Do you know what our job is?" The cackling from the other side was no subsiding, "Oh man you're just full of jokes today aren't you Rukia?" The man on the other side let off a few coughs, catching his breath he continued, "Anything else we can help you with miss?" He scoffed.
"No that would be all, thank you!" She slammed shut the device and threw it as far as the eye could see, "Now I've even become a laughing stock for the information brigade… Amazing…" She threw her arms up in defeat.
The boy simply stood there, stunned by these unraveling news, unable to move, unable to utter a single word, let alone sentence. "I'm sorry that I'm the bringer of grim news." Her eyes melancholic and he tone as sweet as nectar, it was always heartbreaking to be the one to convey the bad news, yet her heart never hurt as badly as today. Just how many lonely years has this boy been alone? How many days must he have cried and wallowed? Just how did he survive this town?
The city was known to be a common cesspit of hollows, the worst kind; sadistic, hateful, vile creatures. Evil in its purest form. Born from emotions kept unchecked, born from yearning for what couldn't be and what wasn't meant to be. Those creatures rose in the night, hunting for souls that haven't been sent off yet. Those that survived even a week in this city were deemed miracles as the first few days are the hardest for souls to cope with their existence. And as the wallow and shriek out of sadness and fear, they are found… Toyed with, as a child would with a doll, taking apart limb after limb, reveling in the screams of pain and agony until finally giving them what they've been begging for; death. This being the ultimate and final existence of the soul as it gets shattered by the hollows. Into thousands, millions of pieces, never to be put back together, yet living on through everyday things that the pieces attach themselves to.
Just how did he survive? Was a thought that she couldn't figure out no matter how hard she tried. Yet he knew now, he was no longer in the dark. She broke the wall that kept that side hidden from him. But it gladdened him not, it disgusted him. It was strong, it kept him alive, yet at what cost? He could feel his soul already being torn. Maybe he did deserve solitude, maybe the reason he was never found was that deep inside he was content?
"Boy?" The woman knelt in front of him as he gripped his knees, he was sitting down for a while, unresponsive and numb. Until something changed, as if he'd come to terms. With what, she'd never know. She tried again, "Boy?" lightly touching his hand.
It was warm, warmth he hadn't felt since he was alive. It was welcome feeling, made him remember all the faces he used to see daily, smile and laugh with, now gone. His cold eyes looked up slowly, "Yes?" his voice sounded older, distant, no longer boyish or innocent. A voice of a man who has seen things better kept hidden, a voice of regret and misery.
She eyed him carefully, as his tone change so had his appearance, he change from boy of 15 to now a man of 19 or older. It seemed strange to her, and she will check up on it with the idiots in information, that is when she finds the device she threw in some direction. "Can you stand?" She stood and offered him a hand, which he gladly took, yet he avoided her eyes as if he was ashamed of something.
"Now let me explain something to you…" She explained who she was, what her role was and who he was, and what was to be done to him. Yet to her surprise, he wasn't shocked or even remotely interested in what she was saying, he was simply looking at her, his thoughts unknown to her. She tilted her head, "…Are you listening?"
His eyes glance at the setting sun to his left, "It feels like I've heard all of this before… I'm not even sure why. I have all these memories inside my head, I'm not sure which ones are definitely mine…" His amber eyes turned and looked into hers, "Does any of this make sense?"
Her brow furrowed as she thought for a moment, it did seem strange that he mentions other memories, but surely he must be confusing his memories from different years of his life as different ones. Can't be anything else, there's never been any speak of souls gaining memories of others… "Yes, this happens often with others too…" she did her best to lie, "Don't fret, it's all fall into place when I send you to Soul Society. There you will be seen and heard by others, it is a warm and welcoming place. Filled with thousands and thousands. You will not be alone there." She gave him a reassuring smile before grabbing the hilt of her blade, which made him tense up.
"Don't be afraid, I won't cut you." She gracefully unsheathed her blade, "would you mind kneeling for a moment?" She asked, slightly embarrassed of her smaller stature. Her obliged without a second notion or word. She continued, placing her swords hilt on top of his forehead, closed her eyes and whispered a few words.
"May you be in peace…" She spoke softly.
Her eyes opened and were met with amber looking back, he gave her a sorrowful smile, "…Ichigo." He told her before vanishing abruptly.
"Ichigo." She let out a sigh of relief, "May you never be alone again."
A/N: Just felt like writing this, maybe I'll continue. Thanks for reading.