Stonewalled [Closed]

Kiriko told herself she was plotting, the word had a more official ring to it than brooding, echoing like metal on metal instead of the weak whimper the later created. Plotting had become a past-time of sorts lately. She had more then enough time, and more then enough things that needed to be planned out. Strategized. Thought about. The world had turned upside down, and while it was a delightful change, it was still change. And Kiriko had a lot to put back in its place, or to find new places for, not the least of which was herself.

Herself and her new self. Two very different things. No one had commented so far, on the fact that her stare was more withering than before, or the missing sword from her side, or even the way that her reiatsu had grown so oppressive that it leaked into the entire building, pressing and cloying and so very different. Perhaps no one dared. She could see it now, the trickle of their thoughts, the tiny shift and turn as the gears moved around in their heads. Shinigami were simple people. Their reiatsu gave away what their faces never had before, and it almost felt like she was playing with sock puppets instead of commanding a force of trained men and women.

Hard to maintain perspective, to think of worth when they scurried around at her slightest twitch or eyebrow raise as if she was going to wipe them from the face of the earth just by sighing. Maybe that was why she was so alone. Maybe it was the price to pay for power. For justice. Houmaru had left her. A few others had tendered their resignations. Oh, they hadn't said it like that of course. They had written long letters, attached to even more forms, detailing exactly why the Fifth really needed them right now or the Sixth had their name on a new promotion.

But Kiriko knew it for what it was. Desertion. Disloyalty. They were like rats fleeing a sinking ship, the only problem being... SHE WASN'T SINKING. Quite the opposite really, this was more like flying. Transcending all boundaries. Becoming... more.

The pain was like a prick of faraway needles. The soft-tension that you felt when you fell into a bed of thistle, only belatedly realizing the tender hooks in your skin. Pain itself hadn't ceased to exist for Kiriko, instead it bloomed like something you could only fully realize in this new state of hers. Like a word that held only literal meaning until you finally grasped that intuitive understanding. She reveled in the sensation, the burning agony, the shattering of her very soul. The frigid touch that sought to silence her limbs and sever her nerves. This was penance. And it was so very right.

And yet... The emotional pain was harder to grasp. Fleeting and racing away right when she thought she had it in hand. If people wanted to desert, why should she care? There were more then enough recruits applying to join the Second these days. More then enough able-bodied soldiers. It wasn't personal, like it used to be. She wasn't defined by her role as Captain like that man had been. Kiriko was better than that. Better. Better. Better.

So why was she so afraid? Her breath hitching in her throat as the slow approach of her Lieutenant drew near. He could not leave like the others could. Not so easily. The two of them... they were tied together. Inexorably drawn to one another. She knew within her heart that if he was here to ask to be reassigned that she would have to destroy him first. Destroy that last imprint on her heart so that it could not taunt her from afar. Later she would find some justification, some way of twisting it to have been for his own good. She was good at that... Legitimizing.

Flicking her long strands of hair back off her shoulder, Kiriko sat back in her chair and frowned at herself. Shouldn't she embrace this type of pain too? This type of penance? It hurt all the more for being closer to her core. And thus it was clearly more deserved. And yet, the other side of her brain was working in overdrive, demanding and assessing and yelling at her that this meeting was just that – official. A report. She had sensed the furor earlier today. Sensed and known that Tokiyo could handle it.

It only made sense that he was here now to report. But after avoiding her for so long... After doing all that he could to stay out of her sight, and yet occupying a room so close by that she couldn't help but taste his reiatsu from their proximity... It was for the best. Perhaps now she could draw to a head the reason he was staying away. That would have become a problem if it had gone on much longer, and she was loathe to command Fujikagi of all people to report to her like an errant child come in for a chastisement.

Flicking her hand out, she pushed at the door and watched as it swung open from afar. Hatred thought he was so smart, having had more time to develop his powers than Severance or Penance. Well, she would show him that it didn't take time to develop into mastery. She was not going to be left behind by any man. Not again.

There, in the doorway, stood her Lieutenant, hand raised for another knock and face set into such a blank grimace that she almost laughed. Or, maybe she did laugh, Kiriko wasn't too sure as she felt her mouth stretch into a feral grin. “Oh, don't look like that, Fujikagi-san. It's not as if I'm about to eat you.” Jaunty words, joking almost, but the smallest twitch of her lips, the way her tongue pressed against her lips, and it was clear to one who she had trained in the arts of perception that it might perhaps have been something that crossed her mind. Once or twice.

Features smoothing out into stone, she waved one hand imperiously, gesturing for the man to step into her office and stand before her desk. Protocol, like always, had a soothing effect. Not just on her nerves, but on those who came before her. They could always trust that she would not break it. And so far Kiriko had held to that implicit rule. It was nice to pretend there were rules still. Sort of like playing hide and seek, she couldn't wait to see the look on their faces when she jumped out to strike instead of staying hidden.

“Come. You have something to say, so say it. I also have things to say, but that can wait for your report.” Dull, iron, void of the familiarity that might make such a phrase friendly. As much as she had changed, she still liked this game. Kiriko was pretty sure no one else did though, which was half of its charm.

WC: 1180 | GP: 23 | Total GP: 23

“Yes, of course”, he complied flatly, stepping into place in front of his Captain’s desk.

There was a time when Tokiyo had almost felt like the intimidation that cascaded off of this woman was...palatable.  Comfortable, even.  For months they had grown closer in a working relationship, in so far as Kiriko would allow them to, and he came to see the natural charm buried deep beneath the stone facade that was her exterior.  Yet still, that barrier never came down.

Not once in their time together had the two shared a genuine moment.  He had said some things to her, and she had occasionally said some things to him but to connect?  At the same time?  Merely a fleeting, incubating dream, bound by every law and protocol and every infinite flaw between them to never draw breath in reality.  A sweet and miserable prison that both of them enjoyed far too much to risk.  At least that’s what he saw.  He hoped she might have possibly, one day, some way, felt the same.

That hope died.

Standing here now the intrusive thoughts already began to pelt him; vivid recollections of Kiriko grabbing her sword and bounding over her desk, backing him up like a pig trapped in a snare, ready to gut him from stem to stern.  The burning heat of a world on fire set deep in her eyes, a genuine fury he thought reserved only for the deepest enemies of the most existential nature.  But Tokiyo had underestimated something.  He had disappointed her - and it nearly cost him his life.

Snapping back to the moment, his jaw tightened and clenched as he expelled whatever imagery he could before lifting his eyes to meet hers.  Bending over slightly, he placed a thick, manilla folder on her desk and then stood upright once more before delivery his summary.

“Naturally, you’ll be quite interested in this incident.  As you know I lead the response team and called for the Task Force to New York City”, he cleared his throat, coughing once with a deliberate succinctness.

“The Statue of Liberty was...obliterated.  Hulking wreck of twisted metal, clearly performed by some sort of spiritualist.  Given the ambient levels of energy in the surroundings and the magnitude of the damage done my first instinct turns the Espada.”

“The energy burns,” he switched his tone to one of bemused thought, “Didn’t follow any of the documented patterns for any known Espada’s Cero.  Combined with the rather curt nature of the attack, I am left to suspect that this was the work of the King himself, Tova Diablo.  Of course, this cannot really be proven beyond doubt, but it’s the best the evidence can do for us.”

He inched ever so slightly closer to her desk and folded his hands neatly in front of him.  “With that in mind, Captain, it presents an extremely uncomfortable scenario wherein the Arrancar have resort to an unusually subtle method of attack for an unknown purpose.  There was no other devastation, save for a very bizarre...shadow of some sort in line of sight several miles away.  The who, we have a theory for.  But the how and the why are entirely a mystery.”

He paused for a few moments to allow her to absorb these details before he put a ribbon on his summary.  “We were able to successfully administer amnesiacs to the greater area.  It took days to finish recreating and replicating pre-incident conditions but it went off mostly well.  There were millions of people within viewing distance.  Millions.  At any rate, there were no doubt some leaks that made it social media or various internet outlets but we’ve produced a trailer for a motion picture that should be able to dispel most of the leaked information as a marketing scheme.”

“Capitalism, right?”

He took the liberty of smoothing over his own joke and elected not to laugh at himself.  Hopefully Kiriko would choose to do the same.

Word count // 663 = 13 || 26

A truly infinite number of phrases and words could have come from his Captain’s mouth after he finished his report.  In his most deeply considered estimates, he expected she would quietly thank him for submitting the report while drilling holes into his soul with those signature eyes, and dismissing him without another word, torturing him endlessly with the Sword of Damocles never dropping on his exposed next.  The less rational part of his brain feared that she would quiet him while he gave the report, pull her blade out, and finish what she attempted to start last time.

Speaking of which, where was her sword?

His cortex covered all sort and number of possibilities.  Should could have hrown him in the Maggot’s Nest, or delivered a heartfelt, desperate apology.  Or really anything between.  But instead of any one of the extreme possibilities that his emotions pulled him towards believing in, how could he have ever expected that she would be...happy to see him?  

Sincere praise wasn’t a particularly good fit for his Captain.  Or maybe it just wasn’t a good fit for him?  His eye almost twitched out of surprise and confusion as she revealed that her focus was not, in fact, on imaging what he smelled like when burned alive, but on...the work he did?

Tokiyo almost missed her transition completely, as Kiriko eluded to a tradition she wished him to partake in.  A curt change in gears for him, but laid in front of him as if she were on the subject the entire time.

Kiriko’s eyes could sometimes seem lifeless.  Empty.  Deeply unsettling in a way that couldn’t be explained to anyone who had not directly stared down death and known fear.  She had a remarkable talent to purge any and all emotion from her own visage, while she stripped your own defense mechanisms away.  Regardless of your height compared to hers, it always felt like she was looking down at you and she wasn’t happy with whatever you had to say.  Tokiyo thought of it as a talent but...the more her got to know her?  He feared it as a curse.  It was an impossible barrier that he quickly came to view as something that made her, well, larger than life.

Maybe that’s why this is so unsettling.  She isn’t supposed to be this human.

Certainly, the two of them had grown professionally close during his time with the Nibantai.  And as far as anyone had the authority to say, they were even modestly close personally.  They took lunches together often, they had regular meetings, they talked over training, they reviewed files, they had late night dinners when their work kept them up.  They were, well, almost friends.  That is, until he apparently threw that away.

It wasn’t an act of defiance - it was selfish.  Could have been where he went wrong.  They were supposed to be kindred spirits in their sequestered lifestyle, devoid of ‘social circles’ and Seireitei politics.  They both understood that it wasn’t about either of them.  They both saw the big picture about the importance of their job.  They were a team.  Until a piece of parchment got nailed to an announcement board and Tokiyo Fujikagi, Lieutenant of the Second, challenged Junko Aizawa, Captain of the Sanbantai.

Maybe she would have forgiven him without much hassle had he won.  They could have sat down together over a late night dinner, had a cup of sake and talked about how Junko ‘just didn’t get it’ and the poor Third Division was so lost and needed to be turned around.  They could have shared philosophy about where to take his new Division and who on the roster could be tapped for mutual benefit.  They could have had so much until this old, bald geezer went and lost to a greasy haired Lieutenant who no one saw coming.

To risk what he had built and not capitalize on the opportunity...was something Kiriko could only view as weakness.  And it was such an egregious affront to her sensibility that she was willing to make him die for that sin, yet here she was…praising him and asking him to participate in some sort of tradition?

Seppuku is ‘traditional’ too.  He was hesitant to say yes.

“C-Certainly, Captain”  He cleared his throat and quickly put the stutter behind him.  “It would be an honor to observe this tradition alongside you.”

He stopped short of a more thorough affirmation, his mind was still reeling.  And did she actually say that Tova Diablo was dead?  A piece of intelligence to discuss after tea.

Somewhere between the two of them, their job, their mutual respect, and their working relationship, lay truth and lay secrets.  One was giving way to the other, and very much couldn’t make sense of which anymore.

Word count // 806 = 16 || 42

She wanted to giggle but that was such a plebeian response. The look on his face though! Fujikagi's reiatsu tickled her own as it squirmed and cringed each time she exhaled, the blend of terror and hope a casual confluence that she swished around in her mouth before another smile carved its way across her stone features. “You haven't listened to me, Fujikagi-san. I already told you.” Her words were dull, stone striking stone, expectant, and yet there was a lilt created by the curving of her lips as Kiriko smiled into her next sentence, “I won't eat you, so stop flinching as if I have called you to your gallows.”

Truly, human beings were weak. If she hadn't already understood why Fujikagi was so important, why he was hers, she might have tossed him away right then and there. This terrified little worm was not very interesting. But the glint in his eyes, the careful surety, the way he worked so hard to cover up his fear – ahh, that was the talent that had drawn her to him in the very beginning. This was a man who knew how to fake it until he made it, and she would be a hypocrite to fault him for that. Today was a day for remembrance. She might want to rip out Tsukimiya-taichou's throat but there were things to give her respects to. And for everything else that man had done, he had never called her out on her own ploys and afflictions. She could do the same. Only unlike Tsukimiya-taichou, she wouldn't waltz off into the sunset and leave Fujikagi on his own.

No, unlike those craven fools, Kiriko would never leave her Lieutenant.

Kiriko followed his gaze, reading into each tiny shift and tremor. Oh what a story the human canvas could tell! It wouldn't do to become too emotional though. Oddly it was easier now to feel. To submerge herself into the depths of emotion now that there was no threat of currents sweeping her away. Before she had always had to be careful, to hide and to flee from a heart that was stronger than her mind. It was completely different now. Kiriko finally understood that there was a certain type of pain that could only come from the heart, an exquisite amber anguish. If she truly wanted to repent, and she did, she really did, then it was emotions that would give her the truest of penance.

“It is not really a tradition as I would describe the word,” she explained dryly, pushing up out of her chair and snapping the folders shut on her desk. Sliding papers to the right, arranging one last corner into perfect placement, she straightened and stepped towards the door. Ghosting diagonally beside Fujikagi, Kiriko turned her chin to glance sidelong at him as she walked, attempting to be inclusive even as she forced her body to be controlled leaving a wake that never so much as fluttered too close to her Lieutenant.

“I think of traditions as deriving themselves from our shared culture. Tsukimiya-taichou was different though. I often believed that he was tainted somehow by his human life. Perhaps he remember more than he should have. But it left its mark, indelible as it was, and he taught me a thing or two about the culinary arts. Please forgive me if I put my own spin on his tradition,” her voice was soft and droning as Kiriko paced down the hall, making a left and then a right until she stepped into the shared kitchen. A room she had not spent much time in lately. Or much at all honestly, since Tsukimiya-taichou had abandoned her.

The room had always held his ghost. Circumspect eyes around every corner, the crease of a frown inside each cupboard. Besides, she hadn't had much time to eat back then. Stupidity was at the root of all weaknesses. Today Kiriko realized that she felt no fear entering this room. After all, what threat did Tsukimiya-taichou's ghost hold for her? He could no more affect her by his disappointment than she could disembowel his spirit, not that she wasn't certain her endeavor would be more effective than his.

The man had taught her somewhat about his style of cuisine. She had never enjoyed it. The harsh tastes and the heavy foods. But it was almost a ritual, this creation of pasta and tomato and spice. What would it be like to share that flavor with another soul? Maybe it would have the same effect it had had on a young Chinda Kiriko. Maybe that was why she was indulging in this weakness. Whatever it was, she set about preparing the food mechanically as she followed the recipe from visual memory.

“I believe he said it was Italian. They are known for their pasta, as you probably know. I have never spent much time in the human world, but I think I would like to visit Italy. To compare.” Busying herself with her work, she let the silence stretch. For once in her life it was not painful or intentional stiffling sensation. It almost felt warm. Familiar. She could remember so clearly why it was that she had fallen in love with Tsukimiya-taichou. He was her idol back then. Perfection in the shape of a Shinigami. She'd been a fool, but his strategy for roping her into his life had succeeded. He had always understood people better than her.

It couldn't hurt to turn the tables. To see what she could entice. Her adoration for Tsukimiya-taichou had been too much, she understood that now. She was glad that he had never tried to shift their dynamic into romance as so many other Captain's did with female co-workers because there was too much fanaticism for there to have ever been that type of love inside her heart. He had been what she had needed him to be though, and on some level she knew that she did not want to be that same figure for Tokiyo. An icon can give you strength, devotion, fever, but it can never give you happiness.

She was no fool. Not anymore. And Fujikagi needed more than a figure head as his leader. Stirring the pasta, she let her thoughts float out with the burbling of the tomatoes. This time things would be different. This time she was in control.  

WC: 1067 | GP: 21 | Total GP: 63

Kiriko had a habit of just sort of, bolting off down one hallway or another, her little feet pattering on the tatami mats as she effortlessly glided between sharp corners and short bends.  She liked to do that and start to brief him about things, her head turned incorrigibly forward in a way that made her tightly controlled voice project only forward; she forced you to keep up with her and focus only on what she was saying so you would have no clue about where she was taking you.

It was one of his favorite tactics in her arsenal and it worked every time, even on him.

In the best of cases you stayed closely behind her, drifting just behind her shoulder and catching her words.  You could hear the content and measure the delivery but you were *hopelessly* oblivious as to where she was leading you.  The walls blurred together, one wall panel bleeding endlessly into the next, and before you knew it she had you at a disadvantage you had no idea you were heading for.  The most troubling part was there wasn’t a damn thing you could do about it.

The alternative?  The ‘worst case’ scenario?  You could barely hear her, catching only various and intermittent phrases as they bounced off the walls around you as you neared turns in the hallway.  And you tried to follow the layout in your head and she took you about but the problem was she knew exactly where she wanted to go and you?  You were just a tag along.  Always playing catch up.  So you sacrificed and semblance of knowledge about her briefing for a fleeting glimpse into your location that you were still likely to get wrong.  And for what?  Only to arrive at your spot, still not really know where it is, and then have no idea why to boot along with an offended Captain.

An interesting array of choices.  Tokiyo preferred the former.  Call it a calculated risk.

The Lieutenant was both shocked and nonplussed to ultimately arrive in the smaller of the shared kitchens.  It was a private, mostly officers corner of the Mess Hall.

“Italian, Captain?”, as she reached for tomatoes, pasta, basic, and a few other fresh ingredients.  It was exceedingly rare for them to share a meal in fact...he might not even be able to recall a time they directly did, at least in this kitchen.  Maybe bowls of rice over briefings but that hardly constitutes a ‘meal’ experience, especially when the Captain so clearly knew what it was to construct one.

“I must say I am surprised.  The frill and color of Italian cooking isn’t a card I would expect you to know how to play.  You’ve always struck me as a more measured woman than I would consider invested in culinary arts.”  He cracked a smile as she brought the tomatoes to a simmer.  “Pun intended.”

He approached the island in the middle of the kitchen, taking the face of the block just to her side; plenty clear of any practical interference but well within a closer space.  For conversation.  For this tradition.

“I’ve been to Italy a few times over my assignments and I was always shocked by the unifying nature of such a simple thing.  Pasta is...astounding, for lack of a better word.  Such a simple thing, to take flour and water and salt an an egg yolk and…” he waved his hand, as if trying to swat away the words he didn’t want to use.  “...make it into so much.”

“So many shapes, and sizes, and uses.  Infinite combinations.  Me?  I primarily carried out my assignments in the north.  Trento, Genoai, Turino.  They like cream sauces in the North, with lots of garlic and meats.  Oh my yes, the lamb!  That’s what I enjoyed there.”

“I could certainly be mistaken, but the tomato sauce here suggests something from Southern Italy.  I wouldn’t really know, I just eat the stuff.” He shrugged his shoulders and let loose the lightest of laughs.  It was a natural reaction, but one he was conscious of overstating any enthusiasm.  This was still a bit awkward but forcing the exchange was lifting his mood, and he hoped it was lifting hers as well.  He wasn’t out of the woods yet.

“I absolutely recommend a visit”, he placed his palms flat on the counter as he watched her cook.  “Is there anything I can do to offer help?”

Word count // 755 = 15 || 57

Conversation flowed over her as she chopped and stirred and added a touch more heat to the burner. A conversation she had never bothered to have before. Kiriko stifled the pangs of regret that rose up, like clouds of white trying to smother her breath and erase her composure. How had it gotten to be this way? That she only ever talked to Fujikagi when it involved business? It seemed her time as a Lietenant had been the exact opposite. Tsukimiya-taichou had rarely discussed what he wanted from her, or her work, and instead had left her with frustrating conversations about food, nature, and people. She remembered the anger she had felt back then, at herself and at the world, when trying to piece together an order out of a jumble of archaic sayings and a question about art.

Kyousuke had been like that though. More concerned with the person than the statistic. And yet... He had never failed to achieve his goals with the Second. Somehow she had lost that awareness, thinking instead to do what he had not, to give structure and order where it was needed. When had she lost the human touch that had been his legacy? Even if, at times, she knew it to be an act. Probably all the time really, given his history. Hadn't she learned with Takasugi-san the importance of at least pretending to be human?

Her hands moved quickly, her mind spinning even as her body followed a scripted act that she had never partaken in before. Eyes tracing the phantom hands, a remembered body, Kiriko lost herself in the moment. Before it had always seemed to take so long, the preparation of this meal, and yet today it went by as if in a whirlwind. One minute Fujikagi was regaling her with his past missions, and the next she was checking the pasta to see if it was al-dente and scooping it into two pairs of bowls. Laying fat noodles with a generous portion of the spicy sauce, she handed the bowl to Fujikagi and grabbed the tea kettle off the other burner. The warmth of the dish stayed in her palms, a lingering sensation that increased her melancholic vigor.

“I see, maybe one day I will have to go and see for myself. Italy...”

Their eyes met, and Kiriko paused, staring at the lines on her Lieutenant's face. Staring at the features that made up the man that she so often missed in favor a vision of the whole. Words bubbled up but she swallowed instead, too uncomfortable with herself to voice them. Words that would have spoken of an older time, a younger time. Back when she was full of fear and yet full of delight as well. Kiriko had forgotten that there were even good times back then... during the reign of her weaknesses. She wanted to say... to whisper... to divulge...

Don't do anything Fujikagi-san, just be here. With me.

Instead, what came out, was a wry smile and a pointed shoulder towards the door that led from the Command Annex and into the gardens outside. “Would you grab some tea cups, please? I know that tea does not often go with foreign dishes, but I find myself unable to set it aside. Tsukimiya-taichou always had barley tea, but...” she trailed off, her words bitten in half, and Kiriko turned away rather than face her own Lieutenant and the past that was staring back at her. Tsukimiya-taichou had always been better at this then she was. That was why she had never really wanted to become Captain. Why she had been content to remain as the man's second in command.

Foolish really, to set aside her ambitions for a man. A man with weaknesses of his own. Aneue would have laughed at her now, deriding and pointing out just how gullible she used to be. And in the end he had left her. Disappearing into thin air. Just like everyone else in her life. That was why she had cut away Aneue. Destroying Hahaue. Kiriko wouldn't let anyone else leave her again. She was the stronger person now, the smarter, and she would destroy everyone before they had the chance to hurt her one more time. She would destroy the whole world if she had to.

Balancing her own bowl of pasta in one hand and the tea kettle in the other, she pushed open the sliding door and stepped onto the engawa that wrapped around this side of the Command Annex. A woebegone table still stood, tucked away in the lee of the building, several sets of western chairs crowded around it. Kiriko wrinkled her nose at the sight of the untraditional set-up. She had always hated Kyousuke's break from ceremony. But it was a day of remembrance, so even this seemed fitting.

Laying her burdens atop the table, she pushed away the extra chairs and brushed a few errant leaves away. Gesturing grandly towards the other side of the table, Kiriko settled herself into her own chair and arranged her utensiles beside the food. “Arrabiatta,” she murmured, her voice husky and laden with its own connotations. “That is what Kyousuke called it. Be careful, it is spicier than you might be used to.”

They had never spoken of Tsukimiya-taichou before. They had never spoken of anything in the past before unless it pertained to an on-going mission. Somehow it didn't feel as if she was disturbing the dead like she had always imagined it would. Instead there was an oddly cleansing gust of air, a purge, each time she broke that silence and spoke his name.

Tsukimiya-taichou. Kyousuke. Maybe... Maybe she really had been a fool, but it had been a wonderful run nonetheless.  

WC: 960 | GP: 19 |  Total GP: 82

He nodded to her, slowly, almost delicately, as she asked him to retrieve the tea cups.  The Lieutenant knew just where they were - second cupboard from the left, on the right side of the sink - and as he swung open the cupboard he felt himself freeze, his hand mere inches from a pair of cups for their dinner.

What in name of all common sense was he doing?

Tokiyo knew better than this.  He had studied too closely with this very woman, lived too cautiously in his field work, paid too much attention the dynamics of any meeting he ever entered to let himself be disarmed so quickly yet...here he was.  He couldn’t help himself.

Weeks ago she’d leapt over her desk at him in a rage with a blade poised to pierce his heart!  No need to specify if it would have been literal or if it would have been figurative, the answer was the same.

Was he feeling sorry for himself?  Was he feeling sorry for her?  Or was it contrition over the disappointment he had made her feel?  Why did it even matter, and especially why did it matter right *now*?

The Japanese tea cups seemed out of place, he thought to himself as he snapped back to the moment.  His Captain’s soft, footsteps trailed off outside of the kitchen and onto the engawa she took his silent reverie with her.  Simple, classic, white porcelain, handled tea cups would do just fine and feel more in keeping with their Italian meal.  He wrapped him index finger between the handle of two cups, scooping them together, clinking their finished off of one another, and pulled them from the cupboard and down to his side.  Grabbing the second bowl, his bowl, from the countertop he followed after Kiriko to make up the ground.

She took her place, and he took his.  Fork on the left, spoon on the right.  He reached a hand across the table and slide a tea cup before Kiriko, twisting it sideways so the handle jetted off to her right, away from the bowl, and he subconsciously nodded in affirmation to himself.

There was a very odd tension between the two of them that he could not quite wrap his fingers around, likely born from having considerably different expectations with what was at play.  Tokiyo could only speak for himself, or at least think it.  This frequent talk of Kyousuke had him rolling about in his own head, punch drunk from his Captain’s unclear motivations.

“She speaks of him as if he were a ghost”, his Spirit chimed in, coalescing in a brief projection that walked behind Kiriko, slowly, deliberately.

“That’s all the past can ever be.  Or rather should be.  And it’s up to her if she wants to let him haunt her, but I’m having none of it.”

“You say that, but isn’t all this tension you’re feeling right now kind of the same thing?"

As usual, she cut right to him.  Whether or not she was right, he had stopped dead in his tracks to think about it, which was a far more useful tool than any answer key.

“I would say yes, but we’re talking about people in the here and now.  Being conscious of the past is not the same as clinging to vacant memories of how things were.  She had murder in her eyes just the other week; this isn't some vapid, childhood fantasy.”

“Tisk, tisk.”, she wagged her finger at him before fading back into...where it was Zanpakuto truly go.

He positioned his own cup at his side and lifted the tea kettle carefully, pouring them each a modest cup.  Lifting his fork with his left hand, he raised his eyes to meet her just as the silence began to outgrow the pot it had been planted in.  “I don’t think I’ve ever had Arrabiata before!”, he injected in a deliberately positive manner.  Of course, he wouldn't try any until she had her chance to dig in, but he part of him was eagerly awaiting this first bite...eagerly awaiting partaking in this ‘tradition’, to whatever end she truly needed him for it.

“Did Tsukimiya-Taichou participate in this with his predecessor as well?  This is the sort of tradition I *like*!  No blood sports like the Fifth, or fake black-bagging people in the middle of the night like the Sixth…”

The joke was admittedly dry, but it was only a partial joke.  He had heard ‘stories’.

But the story here was all that mattered to him at the moment.  And most important to the telling of that story, was whether or not Kiriko was here to integrate Tokiyo into her own telling, or if she was trying to relieve something from her past, one of those ghosts, that no one could ever recapture for her.

The feeling in the pit of his stomach suggested it was a question he might not want to ask.

Word count // 832 = 16 || 16 (Reset by claim)

Reaching for her tea cup, Kiriko admired the smooth blank porcelain, letting the tips of her fingers brush the perfectly curved edges. Japanese pottery work was always the best, but she had never had the heart to remove all of Tsukimiya-taichou’s foreign objects from what was now her kitchen. The utensils stayed, just as the packaged food items and the utilitarian but modern appliances remained in their places. Grave markers for something she didn’t wish to recall. For a past that she was trying to forget, even as it clung to her like the steam rising from her tea cup.

There was nothing inherently wrong with the foreign objects. Kiriko could appreciate their speed and efficiency, so very like the man who had brought them into the Command Annex. She could appreciate their lack of adornment, these tea cups reflecting nothing back but white paint and gleaming glaze. She could even appreciate the story behind all these things, the history they had for Tsukimiya-taichou before they had even come into her life or her kitchen.

And yet they had always felt out of place. Foreign. An obtrusion. Just another reminder that Tsukimiya-taichou was not like her. She knew how easy it was to let go of his superiority, after all the man had been her Captain, he was expected to be better than her in all things. But that exotic and misplaced sense had never left the two of them. Like a tea cup twisted in the wrong direction, a jarring blaze of red in a sea of blues, the discordant note had echoed again and again each time Kiriko looked at these objects. Looked at her Captain. Looked and saw that he was not of her world, and that she could never really understand.

Even when he had shared his life with him, creating what he thought to be a parting gift of Hahaue, even in that melding of memories, she was forever locked out from the truth. From the emotion and the passion and the reality. For Kyousuke was a lot like these tea cups, perfect and efficient, but reflecting nothing back. He had always taken, and she had been content to ignore the signs, to believe that she was receiving in return. The truth had felt much like shattering. The pain in her heart hadn’t dispersed with the days or months that had gone by. It hadn’t even left with the removal of that offending organ, still she could feel it, the cold chill of despair.

Kiriko had been content with being Tsukimiya-taichou’s Lieutenant. Maybe that had been the only real happiness that she had ever experienced. And he had crushed it so casually. Leaving without a word, without even explaining or telling her that he was going. Did he expect her to wait again? Like last time? Pining after a man that was more dream than reality? No, better to dismantle the dream, to move on and see what was left. But Kiriko knew what wasn’t left, what she had lost that very morning she had awoken to see the Captain’s haori laying on her bed and the Command Annex empty. The morning she had heard of Tsukimiya-taichou’s promotion to Captain Commander and then swift departure. The morning she had learned that he had left, again, of his own free will this time. Leaving her to pick up the pieces . Leaving her to shatter quietly and slowly. It was his fault that she was where she was today. His and hers, and somehow she didn’t so much as blame him as she did wish for something different.

A different outcome. As weak as it was to even entertain such thoughts. The past would never change. Only the future. That was why she was doing this. That was why she had cultivated the fear in Fujikagi’s eyes. Why she had attacked him. Trying to tear him down and break him. Trying to cut out the parts of him that weren’t acceptable to her anymore. She wouldn’t allow him to become something she would leave behind. That was her promise to Tokiyo. To Kyousuke. She wouldn’t be like her Captain, she would never find a reason to leave her Lieutenant. Never.

Curling her fingers around the handle, she lifted the tea to her lips and took a small sip, relishing in the sensation of fire spreading across her tongue. This was real. This pain wasn’t a dream. She could trust in that. Trust in the rightness of her own suffering. Of her own penance. Happiness was nothing but a memory now anyway, a weakness she couldn’t indulge in. Tsukimiya-taichou was gone, and so was her innocence. That was fine, that was good, and it left her in this newer, stronger, state. She was no longer Chinda Kiriko, she was Penance. And things would be better. One day.

She rolled the tea over her tongue, allowing the heat to seep and burn until there was no more sensation before she swallowed. Setting her cup down, Kiriko watched as Fujikagi held to a protocol she had tried to show him was no longer needed and the reflection of the past was almost too much for her to bear. So instead of commenting, Kiriko picked up her fork and stabbed a piece of noodle, wondering at the violence of these western utensils when compared to chop sticks. Placing it delicately in her mouth, she closed her eyes for a second, probing the taste and the sauce for some forgotten quality.

It was different. Some part of her felt upset at that revelation, as if the chain of events had been broken. Another part though settled down, content with the realization that this was the way of traditions. Changing quietly and slowly with each new permutation. She could no more be a copy of Tsukimiya-taichou than she could actually want to be, and that was alright.

Listening to Fujikagi’s attempt at levity, Kiriko smiled, a hapless expression that was almost cheery despite her faraway gaze. “Oh, you never heard about Tsukimiya-taichou’s ascension to Captain of the Second, did you? It wasn’t widely talked about back then even, there were enough issues going on that no one wanted to slander their new Captain, not when Gilgamesh himself was involved in the succession.” She tried to bring her mind back to those early days, to the hope and the expectation that had filled the air when Tsukimiya had mysteriously appeared in the Second’s Command Annex. No one had known where he was from, not many at least, for the knowledge of Maggot’s Nest and her inhabitants were a secret to even many members of the Nibantai.

“Before Tsukimiya-taichou we had a man named Noaruji,” she left off the honorific in what was not a very becoming slight towards the Shinigami who had left the Second to languish, “He abandoned his post and was never involved with Tsukimiya-taichou becoming Captain. None of us were involved. Tsukimiya-taichou, at the time, was imprisoned in the Maggot’s Nest for working with the enemy, and for leaving Soul Society. Gilgamesh released him and gave him the position of Captain. Tsukimiya-taichou chose me as his Lieutenant, though at the time I wasn’t even a seated officer. After that… well, he made good on whatever he had promised to Gilgamesh and it was around that time that he became known as the Sword Breaker.” She couldn’t keep the warmth from her voice, a mix of pride and recollection. For too long Tsukimiya-taichou’s accomplishments had been her own, a flag waved to show the rest of Seireitei just how much the Second had improved. How they had eclipsed the other divisions under Tsukimiya-taichou’s leadership. How they had finally come into their own. She still remembered that pride, the flush of arrogance and expectation. He had given the Second a reason to stand tall. For whatever else he had done, she was grateful for that.

“So, to answer your question, no. This tradition does not stem from before Tsukimiya-taichou’s time. He started it with me,” though she couldn’t be sure he had never shared the same dish with any other. That he had never leaned across that countertop and reached into another’s soul the way he did hers. She knew in her heart that he had, for why would you keep such a power to yourself when you could enthrall the masses? And yet, she clung to the lack of knowledge, to the belief that she had somehow been special. Special enough to keep him at her side, though never good enough for him to remain there.

He gripped the fork between the fingers of his right hand and slid the bowl closer to the edge of the table, just under where his chin would be at a slight stretch.  A tactical dance of logistics and hunger, balancing the want of the stomach with the practical capacity of a utensil to deliver a most-

“Shut the fuck up and eat”

“I wasn’t even saying anything-”

“Just eat.  She’s digging in and nothing about this is your proper protocol.  Just...open your talk-hole and put food there, instead of barfing up words.”

A modest heap of noodles, sauce, and sliced tomato crossed the space.  There was a sweet, spiciness to the dish, between the bright, fresh tomatoes and the healthy portion of red chili flakes his Captain had included!  A savory taste of garlic and a lively splash of basil made for something that mimicked their situation rather appropriately; this was good, but none of it really fit.

Might even go so far as to call it wrong.

Italian food, English teacups, Western style chairs and table, and so on.  A dour man, Lieutenant of the Second, making jokes about black-bagging people with an equally dour woman, the Captain of the Second, talking fondly about a retired killer.  Kind of surreal.  The Arrabbiata encouraged him to forget about the circumstance and focus on the company.  On her story.  On whatever insights her relationship with this ghost in her life, this Tsukimiya-taichou, could offer him.

“Yes, I’d heard of that Noaruji fellow.  Turned up again the other month...taken in by Soutaichou for dereliction.” He managed to bumble out through a half-mouth of noodles and sauce.

“You know, there’s a Chinese proverb that comes to mind.  ‘Better to live as a dog in an era of peace, than a man in times of war’.  Tsukimiya-taichou certainly had an interesting go of things in his time of war.”  He stabbed another fork full of noodles and looked up, speculatively, at Kiriko.

“Seems like he came out of things pretty well, all things considered.”  A genuine judgment, made as a nod to the past.  Understated if nothing else.  

However he continued with a sagging, sigh.  “I guess it’s a full story I’ll never know.  All that experience just...retired out in the Rukongai.  I guess I had heard his first life ended in a great Mortal war, as well?  I salute him for finding his peace out of all of that.”

Scooping more pasta into his mouth, he reached out and followed up with a swig of the piping hot tea - just how he liked it.

“I hope you’ll be sticking around for a good long while yet, especially if you’ve any more dishes like this up your sleeves.”

He almost said it...his mind had dared to think it and he immediately felt sorrow that the mere notion would creep past his frontal lobe.  Thankfully, his mouth remained busy and under his control.  For now, it remained unsaid.

If you’re so fond of him, why didn’t you follow him?

Word count // 510 = 10 || 10 (Reset by claim)

She tried not to notice, tried to stay submerged in the past now that enough time had passed for her to look back and see more than a collection of broken edges. It was a gift, to be able to reconsider her preconceived notions about betrayal. Painful though it was to jostle the shards of abandonment she had so carefully collected and interned within her own chest, it would have hurt more to let them sit there in their meticulous little boxes. She hadn't the chance to ever look back with such fondness, hadn't the situation or the right people around her. Somehow Fujikagi was reminding Kiriko of more things that she had tried to hide from herself, more and more and more until it was almost a faint reliving instead of a black and white memory.

So try as she might to remain in that place, to sit and steep in the freedom and new found ability to appreciate what had come before, Kiriko still couldn't help but read the subtext. The two of them had come here today for something in particular, and it had never been her intent to release the lock on her closet full of skeletons. No – she had wanted something different, something cleansing of an entirely separate nature. She had wanted the chance to level with the man she had placed at her back. The chance to speak with him one on one, person to person, instead of their usual dance of protocol. She had wanted to see the human behind the flaws and the strengths that she so often took advantage of. Took for granted. And she had wanted to give him the same opportunity, to see his Captain as Chinda Kiriko instead of Captain of the Nibantai. Because she knew what awe did to a working relationship, and she knew that she wanted something different for the two of them than she had had with Tsukimiya-taichou.

And with that knowledge Kiriko couldn't help but see what lay between them. A door opening into her silence as Fujikagi's words pushed it ever wider until there was nothing for her to do but to step right through the gap.

Something about this was ironic. She had come here wanting to show her Lieutenant a side of herself that she had never shown anyone, and yet she was still too terrified to do just that even when the situation fell into place as if she had planned the entire conversation thus far. Lips curving upward in an expression of self deprecation she surged forward as if eager to cause herself this newest lance of pain.

“You look as if you have a question, Fukikagi-san. I think I know though what you want to ask.” It was there, in the twist of his brow and the slant of his eyes, in the way he had weighed her own stories and returned back carefully worded nothings. It was there even more in his reiatsu, in the shadows and the curves of his aura that clung so tightly to his body as if he was afraid to let her see what lurked in his questioning mind.

Was he afraid of her answer? Or what she would do if she knew that he wondered about such things? She expected perfection, certainly, but she had never begrudged an honest curiosity – if it was just that, honest. Or at least, Kiriko hoped she had never given that impression, for as exacting as she was on her men she had always wished for them to believe in her. To trust her, as they had to when they entrusted her with their lives and their dreams.

“Tsukimiya-taichou was a great man. He was the best of Captains. He took us out of our darkest hour and into the height of our success. And then he left. So you find yourself wondering, if all that was true, if he really was all that you say he was, why are you still here, right Fujikagi-san?”

She leaned forward, elbows on the table and eyes alight with a fierce sort of internal flagellation. “It could be that he left me here, that he didn't tell me he was leaving. That seems to fit in with the stories of Tsukimiya-taichou, the legends. Never was he one to give forewarning of his actions, if you wanted to keep up you had to guess and risk it all. We never did manage to guess what he was going to do most of the time, and that day was no exception.”

“Or it could be that it was my duty to stay. That he entrusted me with the task. That he had picked me out of everyone else to become his Lieutenant, that he set me aside and trained me and told me that one day I would take his place. It could be that he left me his dream, and so I decided to carry it out in his honor. That, I think, is in keeping with the stories about myself. The dutiful soldier. I was a very good Lieutenant after all, one of the best, some say.”

There was something in her voice, something she couldn't hold back from the cold almost casual words. Later, after this conversion, Kiriko would look back and recognize it as disgust. “The truth is simpler though. He was done with his war. He had had enough. He solved his great crimes and repented to his satisfaction. So he set aside his sword and went into retirement. Tsukimiya Kyousuke died that day, and he let himself do it. He willingly set fire to all that he had been because he was finally at peace.”

“So you wonder, why didn't I follow him? I was at his side the whole time, right? I had told him, at the beginning and at the end, that I would follow him anywhere. And I did, for we walked through Hell together. I told him that I would be there when he became Captain Commander. That I would be there on the day that we walked out of Hell together. But things don't always go as planned, and when he walked out, I stayed behind.”

“Because I'm not yet ready to set aside my sword. I'm not yet ready for peace or retirement. He gave up on the dream, he found what satisfied him, but I will not be satisfied until I reach what I am fighting for. So I chose to stay because there was never any other answer.”

“How could I follow him when I still had things to do?”

WC: 1104 | GP: 22 | Total GP: 132

“That’s….quite the story, Captain.”

His fork hung there between his fingers.  It would have been held up by the electric tension in the air around him if his hand had not been there already.

“Tell me, Chinda-san, are you familiar with the Biblical works and the idea of ‘The Sins of the Father’?”

He let go of the fork and it clanked unceremoniously on the ceramic lip of the bowl, bounding against the diningware once or twice before the noisy, metal thing settled into place as he leaned back in his chair.  She seemed bound and determined to make a genuine connection here, despite his efforts to keep a distance; to keep the space where their last encountered demanded there be.  Just who was this woman?  For the first time in their years together, Tokiyo actually stood a real, human chance of finding out what made her tick.

And that idea frightened him.  Immensely.

Have you ever been in a truly terrifying situation?  Not just scary, but -truly- terrifying?  Where every neuron in your head knew that you were about to die if you didn’t take one step to the left, or speed up just a little bit?  That instinct failed Tokiyo in that moment, and he resigned himself to the his place in the path of the oncoming train: Kiriko.  He would ask, and either she would run him over or...she wouldn’t?  He wouldn’t be getting out of the way.

“Don’t you think the way you speak about him, and yourself, sums that up rather roundly?  I mean...truly, I do wonder why you didn’t follow him, but that’s not the question I would ask.  I would ask why that single-minded vision for your peace kept you from following him, just like it kept your former Captain from staying around to pick up after himself.  For you.”

The intensity in her eyes did nothing to ease his comfort but it, at the least, was not ferocity.  Passion?  That might be the right word for it.  But passion for what?  For him?  For her vision?  For Kyousuke?

His lips smacked together once, absent mindedly.  He reached for the last of the tea in his cup, poured himself a very hasty half-cup, and downed it quickly.  It burned.  He didn’t care.  The floodgates were open.

“Why would you walk through hell for someone, and then stop at the exit?  What terrible burden do you carry on your back that he convinced you to carry?  I’m sure you’d say he had nothing to do with the choice, that it was all you and this is the way you want things to be because he is who he is and you are who you are but we both know that’d be little more than a convenient non-answer for what has been a convenient non-question.”

“Somewhere, Kiriko, you chose to accept the sins of the father.  Despite everything you went through with him, and everything you put yourself through.  And I want to know.  Why?”

Word count // 503 = 10 || 20

She carried with her a spark. The flicker of baleful warmth at all times cocooned inside the cavity where her heart had been. The thimbleful of flames that never ceased to lick and sear and burn away at her. When it became appropriate, that spark grew and surged, a fury of hell fire, but even at full rest the flame glittered and hissed within her. The burden of her sins. It was what she had chose for herself, a weight she had picked out of all the other options to wrap around herself. This was her penance, and she would not regret the flames.

She could never regret the pain because it was what was owed. And Kiriko had her own brand of honor, murky and shadowed though it might be. She did not turn her back on a debt. On a price.

Fujikagi could never understand, and she tried to reign in her immediate response, the crush of sudden fear and panic as he brushed too close to the heart of the matter. She hadn't been prepared. No one had read her that well since Tsukimiya-taichou... no one had tried. And damn if she hadn't forgotten the feeling of dread, the white hot blindness like a vice around her lungs and eyes. She wanted to lash out, to burn him like he had burned her, to throw vitriol around until Fujikagi slunk away. Until he learned not to push her into this place, this corner that she had tried to ignore existed.

But Kiriko had control. She was temperance, even when it galled her to be so disciplined. She was a soldier and she would not destroy that which her current mission had aimed to build. Some small cynical part of her mind wondered at that, wondered if this was Fujikagi's subconscious attempt at pushing her away too? She had seen it, the stab of fear, of blank terror when she pulled him close with her own honesty. Was he also afraid of commitment, of understanding what it was that lurked beneath the title and the protocol of their relationship?

Reimagining this as a child's fumbling redirections instead of a true betrayal, Kiriko could only shake her head at the man. Ice in her veins battled with the flames, and even as she calmed her knee-jerk rage she couldn't help but shiver under her Lieutenant's intense regard. He knew things. Knew things he shouldn't. Knew things he couldn't. But wasn't that what she had been trying to do here today? Only... Only Kiriko didn't want to see the results, she didn't want to respond to his questions. She didn't want to see what he saw, because it was too close to a truth that she could never accept.

It would only weaken her. Only take away the very power that allowed her to exist now as she did, that allowed her to transcend all of the weaknesses of the past. So she could not look him in the eye and agree, but she could respond. Her mind already full of a multitude of words and feelings, all of them tinged with both honesty and falsehood.

“You are mistaken, Fujikagi-san. It's not that simple, if only it was. Tsukimiya-taichou had a dream, yes. He taught it to me, in the same way as he taught me how to be a leader, how to be Nibantai.” Her hands clenched, fingers twisting before she placed them on the table, cold and flat and open.

“But it was always his dream. I supported it, I believed in it, I did my duty because he was my Captain. And when he left, you are right, there was part of it that was my dream as well. That kept me here. But it is not the same, it had never really been the same. Tsukimiya-taichou planted the seeds, and perhaps I have him to blame for that, but I had always known what I wanted to do. What needed to be done. He merely burnished the dirt away until I could see for myself what that was.”

It felt odd to be defending her Captain, the old fervor of faith mixed with obsession rising up like a red tide. But she was not that same little girl, not that same child who needed a leader, and she saw Tsukimiya-taichou's flaws just as easily as she saw his perfections. Just as she saw the same in her own reflection.

“I inherited the world from Tsukimiya-taichou, but not that. Not everything. This dream, it is one that he would never have agreed with, I know that. I know what he would have told me, what he would have said. But a man who has given up the fight has no right to say a word to me.”

She looked up, eyes full of a deep stillness, a moment frozen in time. “It is not the same as being judged for the sins of the father, Fujikagi-san. I am not Tsukimiya-taichou, and he was never me.”

She could have stopped there. Should have stopped there. Something kept her mouth moving though, some ungodly desire to make things even between herself and her Lieutenant. “But that's not what you're really saying, Fujikagi-san. Not what you're really asking. You want to know about the past, my past. You talk of this burden, this sin, as if it was not my own choice. As if I do not want it.”

She looked down, away, at her hands, the long blocky fingers that were covered in so much blood. The hands that had brought the whole world down on her. A wry smile flitted across her face, a twisting sneer at her own reticence. Oh how the low have fallen when she couldn't even utter her litany of sins to the very one who was supposed to be her shadow, her second. She had no right to shame. No right to subterfuge. She had lost that right the day she committed such atrocities. And this was just another sort of pain and like any other it needed to be embraced.

“But I do want it,” her voice was soft, feather-light yet filled with caverns of intensity.

“You deserve to know, to understand, for just as I supported Tsukimiya-taichou's dream you too support my own. It is not a long story. There is nothing much to it really. I made mistakes, as we all make mistakes. But mine were dark enough and deep enough that I must justify them, and while I can never wipe away the past, the crimes, I can make use of my mistakes. So I will be what no one else can be. I will do what no one else can do. I have already created a place in Hell for myself, that is undeniable, there is no reason to waste that opportunity. That opening. This sin as you call it, it is in truth freedom. I have already crossed the line, and now I will do whatever it takes to ensure that the next generation never needs to commit the same mistakes. To wander into sin, unwittingly or otherwise.”

“And that is why the Second exists. To shoulder this burden that would blacken the best of the other divisions. To do what needs to be done for that future. We damn ourselves in the doing, but what a glorious future we can ensure.”

“I accept this as truth because it is useful. With our sacrifice we can do great things, and good must come out of this world if any of this is supposed to have meant something.” So yes, it was choice, the best of choices. Kiriko understood, even if Fujikagi couldn't, that sometimes the world was very simple. Very black and white. And this was one of those times, when her pain was for the greater good. For a purpose. And so long as there was purpose behind her suffering, so long as she could justify her life within that pain, it was easy. Simple. Straightforward.

She would burn away her very soul if it meant being powerful enough to save the future. A future where there would never be another Penance. Another Hatred. Another Severance. A future without sin. 

WC: 1374 | GP: 27 | Total GP: 159