11: IN THE VALE - [Hidden Situation]
"...Here we are!" Pyrrha announced eagerly, as the bullhead's door folded downwards into smooth metal steps with a hydraulic hiss.
Ichigo followed behind her, making up the back of the group that had arrived in the city of Vale that morning.
Yang stretched, before taking a deep breath of the morning Valean air with her hands on her hips. "Finally!"
"Yay! We're here!" Nora cheered, marching off the stairway with Ren in tow.
The first thing Ichigo did when touching down on the light grey cobblestones that made up the landing bays was look around. This was his second excursion to a city of Remnant, but that first time hardly counted, confused and bewildered as he was back then. This was probably the first time he'd ever gotten to explore a new dimensional realm without its inhabitants trying to kill him on sight, so he planned to make the most of it.
"So, where're we hitting up first?" Jaune asked. He'd turned up in his casual clothes, which was pretty much just his huntsman gear but without the armour. Or, rather, was his huntsman gear just his casual clothes with a bit of cheap armour slapped on? The lack of a breastplate exposed the previously-concealed, big picture of a cartoon bunny rabbit smack-dab in the middle of his hoodie.
It was early in the day, and the sun was low in the cool blue sky, with a few white doves flying lazily through the morning air and roosting on slate-tiled rooftops. He could make out a few bullheads flying over the city, so far above that they resembled distant metallic grey beads against an azure backdrop. Just as before, there were cars he didn't recognise, puttering along the streets underneath the holographic traffic lights. The buildings lining the streets were the traditional, quaint European designs he'd come to expect from the kingdom of Vale, with navy-blue roofs, palladian windows, and an interspersed mixture of bare brick and pastel-painted gothic exteriors. Plants grew behind low black metal fences, as well as the odd deciduous tree, breaking up the urbanscape with their sporadic greenery. It was a lot busier than the last time, and the cobbled paths were packed with throngs of both human and faunus going about their day. A few had stopped though, oddly enough, to stare at the leader of PJYB. She did say she was a famous cereal mascot...
Ichigo rolled his shoulders. "I don't really want anything specific other than some dust, and maybe some clothes and stuff. I'm up for anything else, but I'll be a little short on cash."
"You need clothes?" Pyrrha asked. "Is it to do with how you said you came here by accident?" The leader of PJYB was still in her full huntress attire, ever vigilant in her shining Athenian bronze armour. The dark metal caught the warm light of the low morning sun, iridescent in its gleaming polish.
"Yeah," Ichigo confirmed, "other than my uniform, the only clothes I have are still messed up from initiation. I should probably get something to fight in, honestly."
"So you're saying those aren't supposed to be ripped jeans?" Yang leaned over, gesturing to the holes at his knees. "You know, I couldn't even tell..."
They looked him up and down, from his bright reddish-orange trainers with the strange tick logo on the side, to the light grey jeans with frayed tears at the knees, to the shirt he was still wearing from his uniform, left unbuttoned with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows, exposing the white v-necked t-shirt he was wearing underneath. He scratched at his cheek under their collective gaze.
"...What? It must've gotten torn when I landed on my knees. My hoodie is beyond saving, so I'm just wearing this shirt for now. It's not so bad, is it?"
Yang grinned cheekily at him, "-Nothing, You've just got a decent dress sense for a guy. It's kinda weird to see. Way better than Jaune's sense of fashion, I gotta say." she jerked her thumb over to the other blonde, in a mock-whisper.
"Hey!" he stomped his foot at her "This is limited edition!" he tugged at his black top, accentuating the bunny logo.
"...She's not wrong..." Ichigo bluntly thought aloud. He ignored Jaune's protests as he turned back to the rest. Pyrrha, Yang, Blake, Nora and Ren were there with him. "...Anyone know their way around?"
Pyrrha chimed in first. She seemed to be the most excited one present, out of all of them, including Nora. "I know a little of my way around Vale, but not that much. I only stayed in a hotel for a few days before Beacon since I arrived early."
"Me and Ren first came to Vale ages ago!" Nora proclaimed proudly, grabbing Ren over the shoulder and leaning up against him. She, like everyone else except for Ichigo and Pyrrha, was in her huntress outfit but without any of the usual armour. "I can show you lot everywhere!"
"You... probably shouldn't be the one to lead though, Nora." Ren advised, "I've got some groceries to get. It's fine if you don't come with us, we wouldn't want to drag you guys along before you get anything yourself."
Yang raised an eyebrow at him. "...Groceries? Isn't it only the first week?"
"Pancake ingredients." Ren clarified. "We'll meet up with you lot once we get Nora her fix."
"Yes! It's been far too long since I've tasted a proper breakfast!" Nora pumped her fist in the air grandly and spun on her heels, already dragging Ren away with her over the cobblestones. "Come on, come on, let's go!"
"Hold on, how're you gonna find us afterwards?" Jaune called out as they left.
In response, Ren held up his hand and flared his aura, creating a lurid pink orb in his palm. "We'll sense each other."
He snuffed it out, and pivoted to face the same direction as Nora again, before they both departed into the busy street.
"...You could just text me instead, you know..." Ichigo muttered demurely.
Jaune stared after them. "...So is anyone else gonna up and leave?"
Yang shook her head. "Nah, I'm gonna stick with you guys. I've already stayed in Vale a bunch of times. I haven't really got anything I need, but I can still take a look, can't I?"
Pyrrha clapped her hands, much like a teacher on a school trip. "Alright then, we'll all say where we wish to visit, and we'll go there in order, together, as friends!" she scanned each of their faces, and beamed as everyone accepted her proposal without a peep. Or was she just happy that no one blinked at what she'd called them at the end? The way she spoke, it felt so sanitised, as if one was listening to a professional spokeswoman, and not a schoolgirl...
"Well alright then, I already said where I want to go. I don't mind when, though." Ichigo started.
"I'd... hum, like some dust, too? Or maybe something to help me train?" Jaune spoke up next. "Oh, and there's a couple other places, if we have time..."
She skipped over Yang, who shrugged lightly, and looked to Blake, who hadn't spoken a word yet.
"...A bookstore." she disclosed quietly. Pyrrha gave her a small nod and smiled politely.
"Thank you, Blake. We can go there first, if you'd like."
"It's fine. We can go to the dust shop first, it's on the way." she pointed down the street. They set off together, walking down the bustling pavement, as Pyrrha raised a question.
"You know where a bookshop is?"
"The owner helped me out when I needed it. I said I'd swing by his shop sometimes." Blake replied, as she led them down the highstreet, past the black Victorian-styled lampposts and holographic signs.
As they crossed the tarmac road beneath a neon green projection of a man on a horse labelled 'GO', Ichigo noted that Vale was similar in layout to the type of cities that had grown organically over time. There weren't any straight rows of planned 'blocks' or such; instead it was a mesh of winding roads lined with relatively low terraced buildings that had steadily developed as more and more people came to call the place home, much like a mix of Karakura and Paris.
"Hey... I've been wondering, but how far is this place, anyway?" he asked, as they made their way through what felt like the eighth Boulevard so far. "Shouldn't we catch a bus, or something?"
"A bus?" Yang cocked her head. "Those stopped running like twenty years ago, bro."
"What?" Ichigo rounded on her, "Then how're you supposed to get around this place?"
"We can take the monorail, can't we?" Jaune suggested, pointing over at what Ichigo had assumed was a raised bridge until now.
It was a similar colour to the rest of the city, and looked to be conventional enough, but with neon blue detailing along its suspended track, that wound through and passed over the cityscape just below itself. He spied a sleek, white train levitate over the rail line as it passed at high speed, far quieter than any standard carriage would ever be.
So they must've replaced the bus system with that... right, futuristic technology was everywhere. He couldn't really forget it, not when it was as ubiquitous as this. He'd even brought his scroll along today, to try and use its payment feature. Ichigo had already capitulated to RWRN's immediate requests to add them all as contacts, and he decided he should probably follow through and add PJYB's members to his list as well. They'd been good friends to make, thus far.
"We won't need to, the dust store I use is close enough to walk." Blake dismissed, pressing on ahead.
"I'm glad it's nearby, then. You know, I used to go to Dust-'Till-Dawn myself, but it got robbed a few weeks back." Yang sighed, then put on a proud grin. "Ruby was there when it happened, actually. Saving the shop was what got her into Beacon early, you know, but they're still fixing the windows and stuff."
"Huh, I was wondering how she got in..." Jaune pondered thoughtfully. "Oh, we're here? Finally..."
Blake had stopped in front of a shopfront, bare brick-built with two large rectangular windows on either side of an arched door frame. A neon sign, not yet switched on, was emblazoned in the windowsills, reading Dust Right. She pushed the red-painted wooden door open, with the ring of a small bell.
The rest followed suit, and Ichigo found himself inside a space which appeared to mix traditional furnishings with advanced electronics. Carved wooden shelves lined the lime-painted walls, as well as a myriad of plinths and display stands of dust in all shades of the rainbow. As well as the stores of powder, he found that the shop also sold various books, cartridges, tools, workable crystals and all manner of related paraphernalia to the omnipresent energy propellant. The floors were well-polished wood, and the lighting was provided by halogen bars hanging from the white ceiling.
"So you two said you wanted dust, right? Any ideas for what you'll use it for?" Pyrrha quizzed as Jaune and Ichigo perused the glass cabinets along the wall, containing secure cubes labelled 'Nature's Wrath' in a bold font.
Jaune paused, and raised a hand to his chin consideringly. "Well, you know my sword, Crocea Mors?"
"Oh, You never mentioned it could channel dust too!" Pyrrha praised, "I'd like to see it!"
Jaune looked up to the ceiling imaginatively. "Channel dust? I think it can do that... maybe? I was just planning to buy some fire dust and dunk it in a bucket of the stuff when I want to." he snapped his fingers proudly, to punctuate his ingenious idea, "Boom! Instant flame sword, you know?"
Pyrrha's usual polite smile wavered. "...I'm not so sure about this, Jaune. That isn't how dust works."
"Nice idea." Ichigo snapped his fingers right back. "I might have to steal it for myself. How much is it for a whole box? You think I can just dip my sword in any type? It's pretty big though, I might have to pour it over it..."
Yang snorted, "That's how you blow your fingers off, dumbasses. Actually wait, never mind. Go ahead, I wanna see you try it."
Ichigo reached for a large sealed box of fire dust, at the back of the cabinet. "It'll be fine. Just coat your hands in aura. Nothing'll go wrong, watch."
"What the heck? Why is it so expensive?" Jaune whinged as he dragged his own green box off the shelf. "Thirty lien for a single tub? Is it always this much?"
"Thirty? It was fifteen the last time I came here..." Blake murmured, drawing Ichigo's eyes to her. She was pawing through a book on dust chemistry from a nearby stand.
"You think it's all the robberies? It wasn't just the store I told you about that's been hit lately." Yang surmised, fiddling with a blue vial in her hands. "The news said a crime wave is pushing all the prices up."
"Just from shops like this?" Ichigo inspected the box's price he held, and winced at the price of 40 lien. That's even more... The exchange rate to yen in his mind was ambiguous, and he wasn't sure whether they were using normal cash or some sort of weird futuristic cryptocurrency, but 40 lien sure felt expensive.
"Hey Jaune, wanna buy one and split it? I've still got some other stuff I wanna get."
"Sure," he agreed, "fire dust, right? We should be able to get enough to fill a bucket each. That way our plan'll work." he held up a fist, and Ichigo met it with a bump of his own.
Yang shook her head, perturbed. "You're gonna lose an arm, just warning you now."
Ichigo paid her no heed and hauled the box over to the counter, and set it down in front of a sleepy-looking young man, with light stubble and messy hair. "Will that be all?"
"Yeah. I'd like to split the price, please?" he held out his scroll to the cashier, who twisted to the holo-computer at the desk and began inscribing the details to it.
"Wait a minute... I thought you said you didn't have any money here?" Jaune prodded him in the arm, prompting Ichigo to turn around. He and Yang were standing there behind him, though Pyrrha and Blake remained in the back of the shop, facing away from the cashier.
"I don't. At least, not until the end of the week. I'm giving him the details of my account that Ozpin set up, and I'll pay it when it's delivered tomorrow morning. Tomorrow's the end of the school week, so I should get some cash by then." he took his black scroll back, and shoved it in as it contracted down his front trouser pocket. "Not as if I wanna carry that all over town. Apparently it'll blow from just a hard shake."
"Oh, you bet. I've seen it happen before." Jaune remarked, as he stepped up to the counter to pay his half, with some hard green cards.
"Dust blow up from a shake?"
"Well, a sneeze, actually." Jaune elaborated. "It's how Ruby and Weiss met on the first day. Ruby's snot blew up all of Weiss's stuff, and cratered the courtyard."
"Huh... no wonder they were at each other's throats like that." they turned away from the counter with their receipt pocketed and the order confirmation on their scrolls, and the group made their way outside. From the inside, the arched door was automatic, and slid open with a muted whir.
"Where to next?" Jaune prompted.
"The bookstore?" Pyrrha looked to Blake for approval, who nodded and set off immediately in the lead without a word.
"You think she'd be a bit more polite..." Jaune grumbled as he trailed her. They crossed a few streets, heading deeper into the city.
"She's been that way since we met." Yang waved off. "Probably just how she is." she excused, "Besides, she can back me up just fine in a fight, and that's what matters to me the most."
Ichigo piped in as he drew side-by-side with them, "You're right, that is where it counts, always."
Up ahead was a sideways hanging logo jutting from a dark green painted sign, with the golden lettering: TUKSON'S BOOK TRADE. Conclusively the place they were making their way to.
Blake teased the wooden door open, before swinging it inwards to reveal a wide room, with twin floor-to-ceiling dark wooden shelving units on either side, packed tight with books of all sizes and variety. A few more cases were laid out in the middle of the floorspace, themselves brimming with novels and encyclopaedias. The room was lit by a hanging metal chandelier, and a wide table stretched across the room at the back, in front of a set of double-doors, with, yet again, more piles of thick books set upon it.
It was manned by a middle-aged man, with a muscular build under his burgundy T-shirt, worn with dark grey trousers. His hair was greying, and his thick sideburns framed his hazel-eyed face. On a closer look, Ichigo picked up on the gossamer-shell of unseen reiryoku across the outside of his body. -Aura. Wouldn't have pegged him as a bookseller, at first glance...
"Welcome to Tukson's Book Trade, home to every book under the sun!" he greeted with a fanged smile. "Blake? You brought friends, eh? It's good to see that you've settled in already." His voice was gruff, but kind in its words.
Blake hesitated, before giving a curt, "Thank you", and making her way towards the stacked shelves at the ends of the room.
"Not much of a group talker, is she?" he grunted, steering back to the others, leaning over the table and hooking his clawed fingers over the front edge. His eyes lingered on Ichigo's horn, but he spoke nothing of it. "Treat her well, she's a good girl."
"We will." Pyrrha promised. "How'd you meet her?"
"I gave her a hand when she first showed up in Vale." he side-eyed the object of their conversation, whose movements had stilled at his admission, facing the shelves. She must've been listening in, because he moved on from the topic and left it at that. "So," he gestured to his wares, "what're you lookin' to buy?"
Jaune held up a hand. "You got any comics?"
"At the back." he pointed, before rounding on Ichigo, Yang and Pyrrha. "Anything else?"
"I'm good. I can wait." Yang turned down.
"Me too, probably, but I'll just take a look around." Ichigo waved him off, and began roving his eyes along the spines of the hundreds of books in the shop. Blaze of Glory, I'm in Your Walls, Violet's Garden... this was just the fiction section. It'd be a better use of time to take a gander at the reference books. As he twisted back, however, something caught the corner of his eye.
There, just outside the white-tinted window, past the T&B logo, captioned with NEW & USED BOOKS in a pale yellow-gold formal font, was a black shape. A five-pointed, obfuscated hand, he realised, was pressed up against the glass like an ink-blot. The hand, however, was no uniform, humanoid appendage. The fingers, elongated and spindly, were tipped with claws like that of an ebony nail, and the reedy, spidery digits themselves were each as long as a ruler, at least.
Ichigo froze at the sight, before his eyes swept over the members of PJYB. None of the students had reacted at all, dawdling about the bookshop, but he'd figured as much anyway. None of the pedestrians outside had noticed the thing either. It was creepy, sure, but after all he had seen, not many things could top a Segunda Etapa. He strode up to Pyrrha, who was engaged in a quiet conversation with Blake and Tukson.
"...just a photograph? I couldn't do that, I'm more than happy to pay."
"I'd have hung it on the wall for publicity, but I think I can understand if it'd be a bother. Fair enough, I understand the feeling of wanting to stay, -ahem-, tucked away." he acquiesced.
"You don't need to pay for it, Pyrrha." Blake denied, "I've got my own money." she was clasping a hardback cover, which was embellished with the crest of a hollow silver heart split into two halves.
"A photograph? How famous is your cereal?" Ichigo cut in. PJYB's team leader had her back to him, and his voice startled her.
"Wha-? oh, Ichigo." she recomposed herself. "It's... nothing. I'm just a bit well-known for a... breakfast mascot, that's all. That's all." she stressed.
"You said that twice." he pointed out blaisely.
"Haha-ha... ha, you're right. I did." she sweat.
She braced herself for an incoming question, but found none, as Ichigo was seemingly satisfied with that. He didn't ask why? She blinked her vivid green orbs. That's... unexpected. But nice.
"It's alright Pyrrha. I just want to find something else first." Blake consoled. "Do you have the second part to this?" she held up the hardback in her hands. "I've finished the first copy I bought from you last time."
"The Man with Two Souls? Nice to see you're appreciating the classics. I'll look in the back." Tukson turned about, and exited through the double-doors at the end of the room behind the wide desk.
"Two souls?" Ichigo repeated quizzically, peering over to Blake.
"An old story about a man with two souls, each fighting for control over his body." she summarised.
"Seriously?" Ichigo raised an eyebrow. That was pretty similar to what he thought he'd been experiencing for years in his inner world, but novelised, he mused.
"Why would I lie?" she crossed her arms with a puff. "It's over a hundred years old, and quite famous anyway. You must've heard of it."
"Oh, I've heard of it too." Pyrrha ratified. "I've never gotten around to reading it, though."
Ichigo fought down a smile at the dramatic irony. "Does it end with the twist that the man accepts he just has one soul, with two different halves?"
Blake gasped. "...So you did read it! Don't spoil it for me!" she slapped his arm with the book, making sure to aim the pointy corner of the hardcover at him.
"Hey! It was a guess... anyway, I only came here to just mention that I wanted to check out another store on my own." he lied. "I saw it on the way here, and I'll meet up with Ren and Nora on my own afterwards, 'cause I've already got their numbers." He spied the unsettling hand at the window, still unmoving. He would've left immediately if it did, but he had time, it appeared.
"Really?" Blake straightened up. "What shop?"
"The..." he racked his brain, picking one that he had a vague understanding of, and remembered seeing on the highstreet. "...music store?"
"Oh! I'd like to go there too!" Pyrrha clapped appeasingly.
"Er... The music-al instrument store, I mean!" he amended on the fly. Sure, he hadn't touched the crappy guitar gathering dust in his cupboard in months, but he could call on it like this, couldn't he?
"Ah... I don't really play anything..." Pyrrha lamented. "...but Jaune has a guitar! He can go with you!" she proposed.
Ichigo waved both his hands hastily. "No no, it'll be quick. I haven't even got my own one here, so I was just gonna take a look."
Blake touched a finger to her chin pensively. "I play the flute, a little. I wouldn't mind. We can meet you there, in a bit."
"Sure, yeah! I'll just go on ahead. If you don't catch up, I'll see you at lunch, okay? Bye." Ichigo whirled backwards and entered a light jog, straight out the front door. He yanked it back and strode out, right into the lively Vale street.
Yep, he'd known it straight away.
A spirit was crouched right outside the window, pressing their strange, splayed left hand against the sun-warmed glass and peering inside the shop. Sable-dark cargo trousers, with white boots covered the man's legs, and his long, thin arms were sleeveless and exposed by a white jacket over a jet-black coat. The right arm was limp; it seemed to be missing a hand, as the wrist simply faded into nothing past itself. The snow-white jacket was clasped over the left side of his chest with three red claw marks, and the tails of the jacket hung over the back of his bent legs. He wore a bone-white mask on his brunette head, with twin pairs of slits obscuring his eyes, shaped in a downwards point, covering his eyes, nose and portion of his cheekbone. The emblem of a beast's crimson head over a triple claw slash marked his back.
"Oi. Over here." he spoke quietly, not wishing to draw the eyes of the other pedestrians traversing the pavement.
Still clocked in against the glass, the odd, presumably faunus man was engrossed enough that hadn't shifted at all, even as Ichigo stared at him.
His brow furrowed. "I said over here." Ichigo punctuated his call with a light kick, sending the masked man sprawling onto his side over the cobblestones. A few passer-bys halted in their steps at the sight of the teen's little hop-kick at nothing, on their end.
"W-what the hell?" he yelped, "You hit me? How-how can you even touch me? How're you seeing me?"
Ichigo gestured with his head to sidestreet across the road, refraining from verbally responding to someone nobody else around could see.
He crossed the road, just after a bright red convertible had passed, and the giant-handed ghost behind him staggered upright warily and followed, walking right through an oncoming teal van. The man had clearly been a spirit for some time, if he was already past the instinct to avoid traffic, Ichigo realised.
The sidepath was darker than the main street; the buildings' shadows cast over the light grey stone floor. The windows, set in bare brickwork were barred at the bottom, and there wasn't actually a way for vehicles to travel down the route. It was purely a pedestrian space, with black-painted bollards shaped like enormous waist-high pawns blocking the way for any cars. A few lines of string hung laundry, zig-zagging across the air above between two buildings on either side, and a few Victorian-styled lampposts and potted plants decorated the space. It was definitely nicer than an alleyway, since from the arched doorways embedded in the walls people presumably lived here and tidied it; but at this time of the day it was nevertheless as deserted as any alley right now. Perfect for what Ichigo was about to do, then.
He palmed his combat pass, and slipped into his spiritual guise, feeling the flare of stark bluish-white from the pentagon in his right hand and the comfortable presence of Zangetsu upon his back. He pivoted round, causing the masked ghost to jolt with a tremble in his backstep.
"What are you!? How'd you just grow that horn? Y-your eye! And that sword, too!" he pointed wildly.
"I should be asking you that question. You clearly don't feel like an Arrancar, so what's with the mask?" Ichigo crossed his arms, feeling the smooth white-lined black fabric of his shihakushō bunched against his forearms.
"Arran-what?" The man tore said mask in question off his face with his spindly fingers, exposing his wide-drawn, toxic-yellow eyes the colour of sallow. "You some type of medium, or something? I'm supposed to be dead."
"Not quite." Ichigo held up the badge still in his hand, oriented with the skull in its centre upright and prominent. "Ichigo Kurosaki. Deputy Soul Reaper."
The man reeled at the revelation, before he slunk down in disconsolation. "I can't really be surprised that you've come for me at this point. Took you long enough to show up. A deputy, huh? I guess I don't even deserve the real grim reaper, eh?"
Ichigo tutted. "Don't play me down, I'm one of the strongest ones. I just choose to go freelance, that's all."
"It's... a job to you?"
"A duty." Ichigo proffered. "I don't even get paid for it. Now can you please tell me why you were spending your afterlife just peeping in on a dusty bookshop, of all places?"
"I was bored, and figured I could haunt him." he shrugged. Ichigo stared at him blankly. "Honest! Tukson was an old friend of mine, but he went and quit on us. Truthfully, I never really believed in 'the cause' all that much either, but you don't just up and bail on your teammates who've been fighting fang and claw alongside you for years on end like that."
"The cause?" Ichigo prompted, with an incline of his dual-horned head.
The man gestured at his uniform, and at the blood-red claw marks on his left shoulder. "Hellooo?"
Ichigo frowned. "I'm not from around here. Dimensionally speaking."
"But aren't you a faunus yourself? Or do you just look like that, being a reaper...?" he trailed off. "Whatever, I am... was a member of the White Fang."
"And that is...?"
"An international force of faunus revolution. ...Or at least it's supposed to be on the tin." he explained. "I never really paid all that much attention to the pamphlets they handed out. I never really had a decent hand in life," he held up his left arm's gangly fingers, "so I just took my chance at three square meals and a place to belong. Things were alright in our squad, at least 'till Tukson split and left us a man short."
"Wait wait wait, I'm out of the loop." Ichigo interjected. "Since when is there an entire attempt at a revolution going on?"
"This your first day on Remnant? Because faunus get treated like crap in most of the human kingdoms. There's a hatred between our two species that runs thousands of years back, and we've had multiple wars over it. You get what I'm saying?" the man curled and uncurled his clawed hand.
"Oh yeah, I get it. I've seen it before, a blood war that lasted a millennium." Ichigo recounted, heterochromatic eyes pulled upwards in thought. "On my end, both sides wanted to kill the other off completely, and one almost pulled it off. The other faction came back after a thousand years for a revenge genocide, and all three races across the realms absolutely hate each other. What you're talking about is kinda understandable, really. I just fought in the last war myself."
"...What?" the faunus uttered at him in bewilderment.
"Don't worry about it. You kinda had to be there, back home." Ichigo brushed off with a nonchalant wave. "Although, Ive gotta say, if a faunus organisation is outright scheming a revolution, then how comes in Vale they live just fine with humankind? Nobody's been rude to me, and I look like one."
"Vale's a whole lot nicer for faunus than other places like Atlas or Mistral." he elaborated. "Plus you're pretending to be a huntsman, from what it looks like. I don't know why an agent of death needs to do something like that, but nobody's gonna mess with a huntsman, even if they are a faunus. I mean, I got killed by one, actually, in shootout." the spirit divulged.
Ichigo stalled, taken aback slightly at the ghost's careless tone, and leaned back on a bollard. "A shootout? I guess you wouldn't expect a revolutionary group to be peaceful... but you're still making the White Fang sound like a gang."
"Yeah, I hear you. In a ways it was... not as if the Vale branch has had much to do lately, but right when I died we'd just gotten sudden orders to steal an entire shipping container's worth of dust. That was something way out of our depth, for us, and no wonder we took casualties. Me being one of them." he held up his single hand, flexing its dark, wiry digits. "An aye-aye's fingers ain't exactly the best with a handgun."
"Your other hand... where is it? I can tell its not something you lost in life." Ichigo's mismatched eyes swivelled to the afflicted limb.
The man winced, bringing his vanished right wrist up to bare. "It's disappearing. I think- I think I'm moving on. My right hand, even though it's not there, actually feels better than the rest of me. It's travelling up my arm, but it's a slow process. It's taking too long, and I've had plenty of time to think. I would've probably survived if Tukson had been there to back us up, so I wanted to go and do a little, you know poltergeist-ing. He owes me that much."
A cloud passed across the sun, blotting it out a margin and engulfing the already-darker sidestreet in even deeper shadows.
"You really shouldn't try any of that stuff. I don't think you can go hollow, but... it wouldn't be right, to pass on full of envy." Ichigo adorned a stern, admonishing scowl. "I get that someone up and left on you, but you just sound jealous that he found a way out of that life, and you never did. Don't spend your last moments on Earth full of regret, coveting someone else's life, because you'll regret that even more. I can understand being mad that someone else is just choosing not to fight, but that was his choice, not yours. You have to let go."
"Alright, alright!" he exclaimed, holding his lengthy hand up placatingly. "Geez, do you have to lecture me? And it's about this, of all things? Do you even know the kind of life I've lead? Trust me, there's way worse to be mad at me for."
"Well pardon me for caring. It was for your own good, you damn gangster." Ichigo chided, turning his head up at the man. "Moving on the right place is more about mindset, than anything else. I was trying to help you out, idiot."
The man shuddered, his face paling. "The right place? Can you send me there? I want to move on. I've been stuck like this for months, and I know I'm already passing on, but I really can't bear how godsdamn long it's taking. Not to mention, I'd rather be sure I'm moving up, and not down."
"Down?" Ichigo repeated. "Getting sent to hell is pretty hard, but you did say you're-"
"-A criminal? Yeah, I'm not denying it. Even before the 'Fang, I was a pickpocket. My hands were great at that. But you know, I never killed anyone. Not for lack of trying, mind you, but it's gotta count for something, right?" he looked on hopefully with his acrid-yellow eyes.
"You'll be fine." Ichigo reassured. "You sound pretty scummy, but I know guys who've done way worse and still didn't go to hell."
"...Really? Then what're you waiting for?" the man spread his arms wide, acceptingly. "Send me on! I want a free pass to heaven!" his lips wobbled, and his stance rocked, but he remained standing, ready to receive his fate. He closed his eyes, and tilted his head upwards, exposing his neck.
Ichigo stood there, hand on his chin contemplatively as he mulled whether he should go through with it in his mind. The man clearly wanted it; but that was only half of the equation.
Back at the cliffs of Patch, he'd told Mrs Rose that he wouldn't try a Konsō because he wasn't sure where the soul would end up. But that, had been back when he was under the impression that Remnant was just the Western Soul Society. Now, with his new awareness, did he dare to try it? It was unlikely to send the spirit across dimensions, all the way to the Soul Society, and the soul was already partially passing away...
The mechanics of it supported the decision. A Soul Burial acted as a spiritual catalyst, pushing the target soul of the ritual in whichever direction they were already inclined. In nigh every case, this was towards the Soul Society, because any souls bound for Hell were destined to turn hollow upon death, from their dispositions in their sinful lifetimes. This man was a plus soul, who was already moving on, and asking for it. All he needed was a little push, and he'd be on his way. An instinctual feeling of it being right cemented the choice in Ichigo's mind.
His hand snaked up, just as the cloud above finally began to pass the sun. The light crept down the street, catching the pure-white cloth of Zangetsu's sealed state as Ichigo's fullbring-marked hand gripped his handle. He drew the body-length blade,holding it above his head as he spun it quickly in his palm to hold it in an inverted grip. The cloth, this time, stayed on, wrapped tightly around the sword's keen edge with no soul metal to be seen. "Alright. Just... relax."
The man breathed out, just as Ichigo did, and he reached forwards to tap the covered pommel of his zanpakutō against his forehead. A low, slow wind whipped up around the two, just as the sun above was completely uncovered from behind the dense cloud. Unlike the usual kanji stamp, there was no blue glow or flash; instead, the daylight shone down upon a golden halo that appeared above the man's head, as his body began to rapidly fade away.
"Hey-hey, wait!" Ichigo gaped, thrown off as he was at the angelic sight.
The man's vibrant-yellow eyes opened, looking over his evanescing body, he rubbed at his orbs, damp with euphoric peace. "I... I know where I'm going now. It's a... better place. Thank you." His legs had long since disappeared, and his torso followed, as his very presence on the fabric of existence itself bled away from this reality entirely. "Thank you."
With that heartfelt articulation of all the gratitude his fleeting soul could muster, the man was gone.
The sun's angle was higher in the sky as of now, at such a height that its beams could reach into the sidestreet proper, and flood it with its golden light. Ichigo stood there, basking in its warmth as he chewed on and comprehended the mind-bending implications of what he'd just borne witness to. His contrasting gaze remained locked on the place where the ghost of the faunus had once stood, Zangetsu's hilt clenched in his hand.
Heaven... here... it's real?
Or at least, something very similar to it.
A spark of jealousy fizzled into his psyche, before he quashed it. That would've been far too hypocritical of himself, given what he'd told the man not that much earlier. He'd sometimes entertained the idea of everything just being perfect after one died in his mind, on several occasions in the past, but he'd long since accepted that a 'perfect place' didn't truly exist, living or dead. Aiming for the best it could be, was what mattered then. But here, on Remnant... the perfect rest seemingly existed by default...
That was... nice. In a world as dangerous as this, where they trained the youth en masse to defend against soulless monsters, the existence of something like heaven awaiting them was a comforting grace.
Before Ichigo could ruminate on it further, he felt something brush against his shihakushō.
His hand shot out behind himself immediately, whirling around to meet the face that owned the wrist he had instinctively grasped onto. His grip was unconsciously tight enough, even his sealed state, that it pressed through the aura he could sense in the forearm that was... invisible?
『Aw, crap. Strong grip you've got there.』
A voice, high, feminine and garishly cheery, false in its inflection even across the psychic medium of reiatsu.
The air in front of Ichigo's clamping grapple broke with the tinkling of shattering ethereal glass. The veil of invisibility was lifted, revealing a girl even more colourful than the quartet of psychotic harlots he'd fended off from a downed Kenpachi.
Her most defining feature was her head. Round eyes that seemed to flicker between chocolate brown, milky white and a pale, sweet pink with every blink, never matching one another in their cycles, were set in a pale face that put on a self-assured half-smirk. Her expression was framed with two-thirds-pink, one third-brown locks of long wavy hair, brushed into a parting where the brown hair flowed from just over the left side of her crown. Below her head, she hung a set of loose brown beaded necklaces around her neckline, right where the wide crop of her broad snow-white tailcoat opened up. The folded-down collar exposed its pink lining, as did the cuffs which showed off her black gloves. It was fastened with a single pink button, and whilst the tails fell behind her, the front ended in a brown short corset over her stomach, which fed into her brown fabric trousers, which themselves fed into shin-high white spat-styled leather boots, closed tight with too many black circular buttons lined up vertically to count.
Her left hand wriggled in Ichigo's grasp, and his human-hollow eyes traced down to where she'd been reaching. "Were you just trying to pickpocket me?"
She gave an innocent-surfaced smile, which Ichigo met with a sardonic one of his own. In an instant, her right arm, seemingly empty, swung forward-
Only to be blocked with the cloth-sheathed handle of Zangetsu, raised in a speeding blur to block the unseen blow. The air over her arm and against the fabric-sheathed blade shattered, revealing an elaborately-decorated closed parasol. Pink at the tip, white was its base colour, with a swirling pattern of pink loops lining its middle, then jam-red swirls on sand-brown at the edges. Her shifting eyes widened at the impact.
"What?" Ichigo scoffed. "Obviously if you're gonna swing your hand like that, there'll be something in it." his gaze drifted to the pink tip of her disguised weapon where he spied a hollow hole within it. He tilted it away from himself, up towards the blue sky.
"...This won't blow up, will it? I can tell it'll be a gun at least, like pretty much everything else on this whack-ass planet."
She pouted, and tugged back on her umbrella.
『Hush? Not a gun...』
She centred the point on the gap between Ichigo's feet, and with a trigger a lengthy blade popped out of the hollow point. Like a two-foot-long needle, the sharp edge shot forwards, and the girl whipped it up, intending to force him back... only for her opponent to hop up and land with his sandled feet heavily on the blunt edge of the spear-umbrella. -Hush, she called it? It veered straight down, pushed by both their strength to spear itself right into the stone, wedged in there by Ichigo's continuous balance on the blade-shaft.
She gasped, before letting go and somersaulting backwards, bounding over a black-painted bollard and balancing on it with a single foot. Ichigo too remained standing on top of her blade, even as he set the door-sized sheathed Zangetsu upon his shoulder.
"If you were expecting to catch me off guard with a blade, then why'd you go and say that your umbrella wasn't a gun?" Ichigo scolded. He could see what she'd attempted; if he'd thought it was a gun, then her aim at his feet would've forced him to get close, but in reality that was exactly where she could've dragged her pike up from between his legs... nasty, but effective. "Shame you're such a chatterbox."
She gawked dumbly at him, before gesturing towards her wordless mouth expectantly.
"Not that... You know what I mean... that thing? Where you speak through your aura?" he tapped at his temple, just under his horns.
『You can... hear me too?』 she started. 『You'd be the third I've ever met... maybe it has something to do with how you're...?』she looped her finger round her ear.
"Crazy? What're you talking about?" What could've made her... oh.
She must've seen him talking to the White Fang member's spirit- or thin air, from her perspective. "...You're one to talk. Why're you dressed like a walking milkshake? The only thing missing is the clown makeup, you half-off mime!" he jabbed with a pointed index. She really was small, just about less than a metre-and-a-half, even when she was in high boots, too.
Instead of deigning a mental response, the girl- no, the woman- grimaced and whipped her hands forward, tossing three needle-shaped stiletto throwing knives forwards, right at Ichigo's unguarded side. His hand flickered into motion, catching the first one at his ribs, snatching the next aimed at his forehead, and flicking away the last aimed at the left of his chest.
"Seriously? Are you really going lethal just because I caught you trying to steal from me?" he inspected a knife in his hand, before dropping it and checking back towards where the petite lady had been, only to find nobody there on top of the dark post.
Ichigo stepped off of the stuck parasol, only to hear it move as soon as he was a few paces away.
His arm snapped back, snaring at the space above the moving object, causing it to shatter away, revealing nothing but the umbrella. His mismatched eyes narrowed, and he thrust Zangetsu's hilt forth to break the layered space around the false parasol once more, exposing nothing, not even the weapon in the space it once occupied. An illusion of an illusion breaking? Not bad... Nothing Kyōka Suigetsu-tier, but she was obviously well-experienced and skilled in its implementation nonetheless.
『Don't be a baby... you still have your aura.』A voice entered his mind. Speaking through reiatsu like this, he couldn't pinpoint the direction of her inaudible voice. There was still another option, though...
He closed his eyes, and thought back to just before he'd first awakened his fullbring, in Xcution. His eyes had been sliced clean through and yet, he could still see... a blue, glowing figure, just like that.
It was notably shorter, and more feminine than Ginjō's build, but that was what he'd expected. A short, silent flash-step there, and-
A hand caught onto her shoulder, as she made to escape from the mentally ill huntsman who'd been talking to an empty street for a the last ten minutes. The physical illusion, the cloak of invisibility she had woven broke away like the chrysalis of an ice-cream coloured butterfly, and she revolved on the spot to swing Hush at full-tilt at the young faunus's horned cranium. He wouldn't be losing much from there, after all. He blocked it with a right forearm, having already replaced his massive sword to his back, and he jabbed his left arm forward like a piston, the open-palmed shove sending her rolling across the cobblestones.
"That, was for trying to rob me." Ichigo straightened up, his hand still open as he looked down at her. "And then for throwing knives too, even if you claim you didn't really expect to stab me."
The lady wiped a droplet of blood from the corner of her mouth, as she laid out on the floor. It seemed that, even through reiatsu, she kept the talking to a minimum. Watching Ichigo cautiously, she staggered to her feet, brushing herself off when he didn't make any moves.
"What?" he stated flatly. "I got you back for that. We won't fight, unless you want to keep going." he grinned. "I'm pretty sure I won, anyway."
Her expression was of of bafflement, before she seemingly decided not to look a gift horse in the mouth, and relaxed a touch, donning her plastered half-smile once again.
A toothy leer broke across Ichigo's face. "That being said, you did just try shaking me down, so it's only fair if I get-"
A vibration in his pocket cut off his demand, and he tugged out his scroll to answer his first call. It was from Nora of all people, funnily enough. "-Hello?"
#"~Hi Ichigo!"# her blaring voice was enough that he pulled his black scroll away from his ear, checking if- nope, it wasn't even on speaker. She was just that loud.
"Hey. I thought you guys said that Ren was gonna just get us to sense his aura?"
#"He's been trying! I think the others are on the way, actually! But um, he can't actually sense you, like, at all. He's been pulsing his own, but you haven't shown up yet either. He'll get a little depressed if he thinks his aura wasn't strong enough to get your attention, so I'm making this super-secret call, just in case. For Renny's sake, you know. He thought he was so cool when he did that thing in his hands..."#
"Er, right, sorry. I... was caught up in something, just now. Where should I meet you?"
#"We're getting lunch at a kebab shop! It's really cheap! You wanna get something?"#
"Ah well... I don't really have any cash on hand at the minute. I'm good."
#"~Yeah, one of those please. He said he'll be here in five minutes. -Sorry, Ichi, I didn't catch that. You like chicken, right? Everybody in the world likes chicken."#
"Did you just order for me!? Cancel it! I said I don't have any money yet!"
#"Sorry, we're passing through a tunnel. Follow the flare, it'll be hard to miss. See you soon!"#
"A tunnel? You're already there! I just heard you order! ...And what flare?-"
Ichigo's question was cut off by a high whistle that burst into a crackling pop, echoing across the city. His head twitched upwards, to find a blazing spark of crimson dust suspended in the Valean sky. ...Ah, that flare. He glared at his scroll, only to find that she'd already hung up. Setting off a flare-gun in public? That had to be illegal, right? Nothing else to it, then.
"...So, as I was saying, I'm suddenly in the mood for lunch- ah." He glanced back up towards where the pink-white clad lady had once been standing, only to find that the young woman was there no longer, not even a trace of her presence remaining. Figures.
Oh well, he wasn't all that bothered to chase her, anyway.
He reached for his combat pass, flashing back into his corporeal form, and marched from the sidestreet in the direction of the flare.
"You're taking way too long to eat that. Seriously." Yang poked at Jaune's shoulder from the back, jolting him as he brought a forkful to his mouth ever so carefully.
They were standing outside of a huntsmen's clothing outlet, with the rest of PJYB. Lunch wasn't meant to be on the go, but Jaune was the only one still eating since an hour ago, so they'd just told him to take it along.
The building was glass-fronted, with both male and female outfits on display in the lit-up windows, each of them as colourful and unique as any proper huntsman worth their salt would dress. The interior was modern-styled, all white panelling and glass stands. Jaune was seated on a bench just outside the doors, under a young tree as he ate, the other two standing on the cobbled path. A few white pigeons, native to Sanus, strut about the carless road, flanked by pedestrians.
"I've gotta be careful! I can't stain this, it's one of a kind!" he griped.
"Jaune, it's black." Yang pointed out boredly. "Besides, isn't Pyrrha sponsored by them, anyway? You can just ask her to hook you up with an infinite supply."
"It's not the same!" he denied, the gleaming his azure eyes resolute. "I earned this. It's mine."
"You better be just as dedicated to training, I swear..." she scowled, "...although, I think I just realised, about Pyrrha... she's absolutely loaded, isn't she?"
"What makes you say that? The fact that she's trying to pay for Ichigo's clothes right now, or the fact that she's already bought that expensive guitar for him on a whim when we found he'd already left the shop, just because she guessed that was 'what a friend would do?'" Blake observed, making air quotes with her fingers. "She didn't even know if he plays that instrument, she just guessed which one it was."
Ichigo was still inside the shop, half-heartedly refusing Pyrrha's offer at every turn in front of the counter. It was a losing battle, more out of politeness than anything else. With them were Nora and Ren, perusing the rest of the store's goods, which went beyond just general hunts-wear.
"Don't act so detached, Blake... you're still holding that bag with the set of books and a brand-new handcrafted flute yourself." Yang jibed.
Blake's rich yellow eyes flicked down to the white bag in her hand, tied with a pink ribbon. "T-that's a... late birthday present. From a friend."
"Riiiiggght" Yang waggled her eyebrows at her.
"You're not really one to chat here, Yang." Jaune shifted over, nudging at the set of colourful branded bags on the black-painted metal bench.
"Geh!" she flinched, "Uhm, right, we should really get her to stop..."
"You're right. We should tell her she doesn't need to go this far." Jaune piped in, shuffling the brand-new game console behind himself, out of sight and mind. "I think she's just trying to make sure we all like her. It's kinda sad." Jaune appealed. "I feel bad about it, even if she does get a discount wherever she goes..."
"I think she just doesn't know how to treat us. We'll try not to mooch off of her from now on." Yang promised, before tacking on "-If we don't need to."
Blake and Jaune both stared at her. "What? We might need her money when we're running low on dust, and stuff. It's to protect our lives! You know how prices are right now; -we literally saw it today! I'm just being practical." she refuted, fists on her hips.
Jaune sighed. "That... makes sense, actually. We'll talk to her about this later."
The glass doors slid open automatically, as Ichigo stepped outside with Pyrrha, Ren and Nora in tow, and several sets of clothes and other necessities for his life in Beacon in hand, held in heavy opaque bags. "I would say I'll pay you back, but I don't think I'd be able to afford all this, even when I do get paid tomorrow..."
Pyrrha smiled bashfully. "It's fine. A leader takes care of the other students, after all, even if you are older."
"I really didn't need all this, though." He hefted up the bags, then nodded towards the wrapped electric guitar, laid in its hardcase bag. "That, neither. Seriously, I have no idea what to do with half of this stuff." The worst part was that, now he'd feel guilty if he didn't play that thing at all, so he couldn't just dunk it in his closet and forget about it, like with his other one...
"Well, it's to help you settle in! You said you're still trying to find a way home, so all this will help make Beacon more comfortable until you can go back!" Pyrrha asserted.
"Beacon? I don't think... never mind." Ichigo turned to the rest. "Where're we going next?"
- –—{}—– -
The sun was low in the sky now, as the group made their way to the landing pads.
The pull of an encroaching dusk bled purple across the rim of the orange star-speckled heavens, embalming the city in twilight. The white doves were fluttering to rooftops to roost, and the roads and pavement were far sparser with people than a few hours prior.
Arriving at the landing bay, in the designated 'Beacon pad' marked with its emblem, the sideways door of a bullhead opened up at the sight of the approaching huntsmen. A quick flash of their scrolls to clock in, and they were on their way through the air, returning to the academy.
"Today was..." Nora yawned, "-great! We got everything, didn't we, Ren?"
He leaned over the bag, fishing through the items within and matching it up with a small notepad. "I think so. I made sure to cross everything off..."
"I'm good with my haul." Yang murmured tiredly, reclining in her seat with her own nest of bagged goods. A pointed look from Jaune reminded her. "Oh, right. Pyrrha?"
"We need to talk." Jaune forwarded, speaking loudly enough that Blake looked up from the book she had buried her nose in.
"...Yes?" her voice wavered, almost fearful in its flavour, and she swallowed, fidgeting in place.
"Oh, um, we're not unhappy, if that's what you're worried about." Jaune established swiftly. "It's just that you seem to be paying for all our stuff, and while it's very nice, you don't need to do any of that."
She blinked, "But-"
"It's true. You don't need to buy our friendship, Pyrrha." Blake set the book down, closed at her side. A sly finger remained inside, holding her place.
"But what about loyalty? What if she's trying bribes to prevent a coup for her leadership?" Nora interjected, leaning into the middle from her seat.
Pyrrha recoiled, "No, no, I would never-"
"Let's... not talk about that." Ichigo dismissed with a stiff smile.
"...Right? That'd be ridiculous." Yang concurred, unawares as Ren sat straighter in his seat.
"We trust you. You're the strongest one of us, anyway, so of course it makes sense it'd be you leading us." Jaune continued candidly. "You don't need to do anything to convince us. We're your friends, aren't we?"
Yang nodded, then Blake followed.
"Ah... then thank you for that." she acknowledged tenderly, with a delighted glow. Looks like that really did mean a lot to her.
- –—{}—– -
Ichigo drowned out the subsequent conversations after that, leaning back in his soft chair and daydreaming away. When the bullhead touched down, he returned to lucidity with it. The doors opened, and with a thanks to the pilot and co., they stepped out onto the landing bays. They were large, circular metal platforms, with a white marked target for the bullhead to probably detect as it descended.
A white-tiled pathway lead from the platforms directly to Beacon, and they continued down it, past streetlamps, branching paths and trees, chatting idly, until Ichigo clocked something- someone in the distance.
It was Amber, her eyes brimming with tears and her phantasmal body racked with shivers; -she looked absolutely distraught, alone, sat against a white alabaster pillar under a walkway. The night was drawing in, and the lamps switched on as he saw her, illuminating her languishing form against the pale stonework.
Ichigo was spurred into action without delay. "Oi, Jaune?"
"Yeah?" he eyeballed the other teen's suddenly-tense countenance oddly, waiting for an elaboration on Ichigo's part.
"Here's my keycard to my room." He drew the mirrored card from his pocket, handing it to the other boy, "My scroll works too, so I'll be fine. Can you just dump all of my stuff on my bed? You don't need to unpack it, I'll take care of all that." He handed the bags over to him, and set off at a brisk pace down a side path.
"Wait, where're you going?" Yang hollered after him.
"I just remembered something I've got to do!" he called over his shoulder. Once he was a ways away, he flashed into the form of a shinigami with his combat pass, and swiftly shunpo'd across the castle grounds over grass and stone alike.
He landed behind the disconsolate girl, crouching down to her level on a knee with a severe frown.
"Amber? What's happened?"
"Ichigo? You're here? Oh... thank gods... I couldn't find you all day!" she cried, "It's... my body... I saw it..." she grieved for herself. "It's... beyond saving..."
NEXT: 12 - CHAIN[GE] OF FATE - [Nothing Anymore]
Author's notes:
I've got my coursework due very soon, I've been quite busy and I'll be slowing down a bit (as you've probably already noticed). I know 99% of the time you see something like this they'll never update again, but I assure you all I will NOT do that.¹ You won't see 'Last updated 5 years ago', or anything, things'll just slip between weekly updates like I managed for like the first ten weeks straight, and slightly more spread out. On the other hand, once I get it out of the way I'll have an entire holiday before starting University to write.
Sidestreet basis:
[64DOTmediaDOTtumblrDOTcom/d28f4837a5a8435399269fd0401519ff/tumblr_mradsodpfq1qgseqbo1_1280DOTpng]
Next chapter will be pure PLOT, but this one was more relaxed, but with a few introductions and some more exposition. Heaven exists on Remnant, because... why not? They'd have to have an afterlife of their own, after all, but I envision this one to be completely automatic, set up by the brother gods, so no shinigami required. (He won't be going there). This means Ichigo'll start going around cleansing lingering spirits on the regular, letting me move him around Vale. Speaking of Remnant, he doesn't actually know how bad things are for humanity in general yet, which is important to point out.
About the characters this chapter, I imagine Pyrrha would act as pleasingly as possible as a leader at first, which includes paying for all her teammates' stuff. Blake knows Tukson, because where else would a WF fugitive get a collection of books by EP 1? Neo shows up, since I imagine she just wanders Vale regularly. She won't 'talk' often, this time was just to establish that because I thought it was a cool idea.
Also, I stumbled across this; Ichigo actually has a guitar in his room in a few episodes:
[pbsDOTtwimgDOTcom/media/FXQRPEiXEAAaPUC?format=jpg&name=large]
It gave me an idea for some /comfy/ later scenes, before SHTF. Thanks for the advice on the timeskip, I'm more confident in giving him a reason to wait it out now.
Thanks everybody for 680 favourites and 953 follows!
[1] - Genre-defining, slow-burn peer-reviewed source: trust me