Your Dream Won't Disappear [CLOSED/R.SOLO]

She couldn't bear to look at the headless body, eye closing and reopening to reveal the scarlet color from before hadn't been a fluke-- a change she could never take back after accepting Nazomi's aid. Extra bits of information ceased to clutter her thoughts and heart, and the roaring of the world around her slipped back into the almost natural silence that most humans would be accustomed to.

It was over at long last.
 

She hadn't expected to feel so empty.

Maybe she had grown heartless, lost too much and couldn't even grieve over the second death of the one she had loved most in that world. Maybe she... no, she cringed as a too deep breath sent a lightning bolt of pain throughout her entire body. She couldn't lay here, as pretty as it was, as peaceful and sad and fitting as the place would be for her final resting place. She had to find somewhere else to lay herself to rest, would have to have it be another time, and another place, maybe even at her own hand at this point in time, after she took care of some other unfinished business. Had to let Seiichirou and the Fujimura know that Sakuya was officially put to rest, had done so by her own hands, and the Hollow attacks at the Fujimura Shrine would no longer occur-- and the dead or dying in the village wouldn't have to worry about being devoured.

Ahh, but the heat in her chest only seemed to be stronger for the killing of her wife. A burning that nearly hurt more than the broken ribs she knew she'd suffered in the collision. Shallow breaths, small and quick, accompanied slow movements as her good arm reached up and rested against one side. A deeper breath, full of pain, came as she focused the turbulent mass within her and guided it with a flash of greenish light toward the most damaged areas. It wasn't instant, the pain intensifying before it faded into an ache that would leave her feeling as sore as one would be after a grueling work out. She wasn't better, the internal injuries were healed to an extent, to keep them from killing her at the very least, but she would at least be functional enough to make her way to some place where Asgard could carry her to safety and could rest.

A tickle of feather-light touches against her cheek and ear gave her pause, her head turning to capture the sight of the swarm surrounding her once more. ”Go away.” She ordered weakly, no bite in her voice as she struggled to push herself from the ground to a sitting position. One hand lifted, heavy as lead, and offered a perch for one to land on if it so chose. The smallest of them, a nimble thing with longer antennae than usual for its species, separated from the little cloud of jigokucho and landed delicately upon her wrist. The others followed suit, clustering about her bloodied form, some of them landing on the wounds themselves and lay still against her flesh. A tickling prickle, and several fluttered off to lose themselves in the wide sky above.

Silence as she and the small butterfly stared at one another, the wings fluttering slowly open and closed again. A ticklish tap of small feet against her battered skin and the butterfly continued a small march up from her wrist to the corner of her elbow, and upward to her shoulder. Tangled into her hair, the little feet marched themselves up until it settled in somewhere near the head wound she'd sustained early on. ”You aren't a hair ornament, you know.” Empty words, hollow and exhausted, came forward in a voice she could barely recognize as her own.

At least she wouldn't crush them when she got to her feet. ”I should go.”

A cringe, soft groan slipping free as everything in her body hurt, throbbed, and ached all at once in protest to her movement. Slow and steady, she reminded herself. Slow and steady and she could start walking away, one step at a time. Away from this place. Away from the reminder that... that she had taken someone else's life, her wife's, and that she had to just go... go somewhere to rest for a little while. Until she could figure out what she wanted to do next.

She had done what she had promised to do.

Maybe, just maybe, now she could finally just go rest in peace somewhere and allow nature to take its cour--

”First time in, what, ten, eleven years that you've managed to put me flat on my ass and you can't even have the decency to fuckin' gloat about it?” Mocking disdain so full of affection, no sting came through the way it should have.

She froze, breath caught in her throat. It couldn't-- no, it wasn't true. It was flat out impossible.
 

”Sekai?”

She'd killed her. Had completely and utterly destroyed her body beyond hope of recovery-- she'd gone for that head and had removed it entirely because it was the only way to be sure.
 

”Hey,”

Right?
 

”you listenin' to me?”

Movement, the ripples of something light and familiar brushed against the edges of her senses.
 

”I know you can hear me,”

A familiar form, of long, toned legs and shapely thighs and broad shoulders with the lean muscle of a hard working athlete easily moving beneath dusky skin. Her feet just as rough as her hands because she hated shoes and always ignored people yelling at her when she should have worn them. She knew those hands to be calloused no matter how much lotion she ever applied to try and soften them. The nails themselves kept small because long nails didn't suit her and it got in the way of--
 

”stop tunin' me out already, you're gonna piss me off.”

Of a messy ponytail tumbling with all the careless attention down the back of her neck to brush against the tops of her shoulders with the tips of strands she knew were ink-black in hue and had traced ticklish patterns across her flesh only countless times in the middle of the night.
 

”Don't make me come over there and strip you naked, I'll do it, you know.”

That same, glossy shade of black that would fall into that proud face with its high cheekbones and sooty lashes framing those same eyes that had made her decide her favorite color was blue back in middle school-- because nothing made her feel happier, warmer, safer than losing herself for hours and hours...
 

”Right here in front of the... whatever the fuck's around here besides bugs and birds, betcha there's some of those fuckers with masks around here somewhere, but I'll do you in front of 'em, swear it on my dead mom.”

The mouth that she'd kissed so often always curved into a wicked smirk that would drive even the most patient of monks into throwing their hands up and stalking off, completely vexed with the devilish woman. A flash of white teeth, the bottom left canine tooth just a little crooked because she hadn't worn her retainer after getting braces removed in middle school, that held all the laughter in the world and dared, dared, those who saw it not to join her.

She-- no, she couldn't turn around. Because she'd be there. She'd be a hallucination or the final nail in her coffin when she'd just resigned herself to living until her wounds healed or killed her on their own.
 

”I'll even make those shit eaters on both sides take notes on how to make a woman scream, God knows they could use some lessons, and probably get laid regularly 'cause holy shit, repression much?”

Even the running shorts, they would be the same black and white pair as those she'd worn when her heart, their heart, had failed upon the stairs of the Fujimura Shrine, clung to her the same way as always-- much like the bright red and black sports bra she had to have been wearing, the same one that scandalized the elderly in the neighborhood and earned her a scolding each and every time she wore them on a run.
 

”Oh come on, that one works every time!”

Such lively indignation and protest...

It was impossible, wasn't it?
 

”Hey. Heyyyyyyy,”

Sakuya was dead, again, and she'd killed her with her own two hands.
 

”you're a hundred and, like, eighty nine percent fuckin' with me right now, right?”

This wasn't her. This... it couldn't be her. Not there. Not on the ground.

Her senses stretched, reached out to search for Nazomi, to whoever else could be cruel enough to cast such a realistic illusion.

”It's been, what, five? six? years since we actually got to see each other and you're seriously gonna fuckin' ignore me, little one?” Annoyance, loud and clear as a bell with that too familiar demanding tone.

Little one.

A siren's call, soul deep and poignant in its lure, and Sekai would have thrown herself headfirst into the sea a hundred million times over if there was just one chance, one small, infinitely small miracle that meant that the illusion wasn't a lie. That this wasn't-- that she hadn't lost it entirely and wasn't just hearing the voice she wanted to just one more time.
 

Slowly, the white haired mortal turned her head. Afraid.

That sharp point of a chin tilted in a too familiar manner, one brow arched in a manner she'd come to know all too well throughout their time together. Mouth twisted into something between a sulk and a frown as those same blue, blue eyes stared directly into the red of her own.

The chain dangling in the center of her chest, disappearing into an invisible void symbolizing her heart.

”Saku--” Her throat closed. Couldn't even manage to finish her name in the weak and pitiful voice that had squeaked past numb lips.

Left hand rose, the flash of silver against her ring finger glinting in the light from that heart-wrenchingly blue sky. White, white teeth peered from between her lips as they parted in greeting, entire face illuminated with the too pleased with herself grin of smug victory. ”Yo!”

Such a happy exclamation, such a happy sounding voice and--

”Owfuck, easy there little one! Not goin' anywhere, yet.” Her arms wrapped around the girl's battered form instinctively, breath driven from lungs that didn't technically need to take in air as the impact of the smaller body into her own drove them both into the ground in a tangle of limbs and long, wavy white hair. Tried not to laugh and bit her tongue for her efforts in the bone crushing grip the red faced woman had on her and the tears that fell, spotting against her flesh and slid down her shoulders and collarbone.

Her name babbled over and over and over again in varying degrees of sobbed out hysterics and laughter against her skin.

She smiled in spite of the circumstances, fell just as easily into old, familiar patterns from life as her hands swept comfortingly up and down the expanse of the girl's back. Noted the muscles beneath the layer of flesh that still covered her-- less than before, her little one had lost some of that baby fat that had made her the best kind of pillow-- and the knots within the small shoulders that shook. Little changes that had taken shape over the years she hadn't been there, the precious moments she couldn't steal back or make up for not having... the sting of missing it all, missing her, hurt a good deal more than she ever wanted to admit.

How many times had they lain there together like this?

Sakuya blinked back tears of her own, feeling the scars she didn't know on the woman's body-- she wasn't a girl anymore, had transitioned past the age of majority without her and had just started to look less like a kid and more like she was... someone maturing, coming into herself. There were wounds she had caused, knew she had caused by her own actions. Had chosen, sort of, to push her into doing what needed to be done so that they could just have a moment, the one they hadn't gotten, to say what needed to be said.

None of her visions had ever given her this scenario, had never told her this was going to be as difficult as it was.

Five, six years... and there were going to be so many, many more after this that she wouldn't get to share with her.

Her hair was still as soft, tangled as it was, as how she remembered it. Tanned fingers unwound knot after knot with patient care, waited for the girl to cry herself out before even trying to talk to her without sending her into further hysterics. Knew her too well by that point to know what wouldn't help and to push her further than she'd been already. ...and apparently she'd missed something she'd said, as a pair of eyes, red and blood shot to hell and beyond stared up at her face with a look that suggested she'd best answer promptly or face the consequences.

Shit.

”Uhh...?” Best smile she could muster.

Thunder darkened the white haired girl's expression.

Uh-oh. She knew that look.

A small fist thumped against her shoulder. And then a second.

Any moment now and she'd--

”Stupid!” Anger colored her voice, flushed her cheeks a brilliant crimson as she reached out for the dead woman.

There we go.

Sakuya's back hit the ground, vision taken over by a furious face and felt the way her hands shook with fingers clutching the black straps of her sports bra to hold her in place.

”You stupid idiot, you didn't pass on at all! You stayed and--” Teeth gritted, face threatening to crumple into tears again as she failed, again, to find the words she needed. She shook her instead, pulled her up by those same straps and shoved back down for lack of better way of communicating the sheer amount of built up frustration and pain.

Speaking of repression...

”you ate other people to survive, just to stay and--”

No, don't, do-- can't help it have to do it.

”...I ate people when I was alive too though? Mostly you once you were legal, but, y'know, detai--”

Tea kettle shriek and the shaking of her person intensified even as she started laughing at the wash of red that flooded Sekai's previously pale face.

The dark skinned woman's shoulders shook with laughter even as her head cracked against the ground, the girl curled defensively against her chest, face hidden against her shoulder and those pretty pale lashes tickling her skin. ”Speakin' of. It's been like three years now, do you need to head back to Roppongi an--”

Sakuya's head snapped back, narrowly avoided the girl's head coming up to smash into her nose.
 

Horror.

 
Red swarmed the white haired mortal's cheeks, crept down her neck and across her ears.

Sakuya's lips trembled in an effort not to smile.

Don't laugh. Don't laugh at her don't even think about--

”You were there?!”

Fuck.

The grin across her face betrayed her. ”Ten out of ten, little one, would totally watch aga--”

Sekai wailed and buried her face in her hands.

–

WC: 2582
GP: 34

They listened to the sound of the waves crashing against the cliff side, the wind stirring the yellow blossoms all around their bodies to create the perfect peaceful background noise that called back to their mountain hikes long, long ago. Half an hour, an hour... neither of them knew how long had passed since the battle had ended and their reunion had begun. Clouds were coming in from overseas; fluffy white things that slowly grew when one kept an eye on them and eased the mind, and soothed the troubled heart for just a little while.

”Why did you stay?” Her question was soft, murmured to the woman she lay beside, fingers tightly entwined with the taller woman's own as she kept her eyes on the puffs of clouds above. Looking at her hurt, hurt far too much to do for longer than a few stolen seconds at a time. Touching her, holding her, lying beside her the way they had once done so long ago hurt more, knowing that it was so fleeting, that it could be nothing more than a final dream brought by Death.

Silence.

Sakuya's brow furrowed in the same way it always did when she was uneasy about talking about something. It'd been an expression she'd gotten very familiar with after many years at the older woman's side, particularly when trying to talk to her about how she felt, what she worried about, or anything that seemed to be bothering her. A tightening of the left corner of her mouth and a narrowing of her favorite pair of eyes in the whole world suggested that this was definitely one of those 'I'd rather cut my tongue out and staple it to my forehead' type of conversations.

She tightened her grip on her wife's hand, tried to be patient for her the way she had always been. Rushing her never did anyone any good, and it'd always gotten them into so many fights that they'd both been in tears by the end of it.

”For you. Because I had to.” She finally answered, reluctance in the two words and the way she stared intently at the clouds above a message that there was more to the cryptic answer than she was really wanting to get into.

”You had to?” Sekai frowned, didn't understand why she had to when she could have just... moved on. The way she should have, and had expected someone with Sakuya's usual carefree and to the point personality. ”That doesn't make sense, you always told me that nothing would keep you from moving on, and you'd always threaten to exorcise me yourself if I died before you...”

She stopped.

Eyed her wife with narrowed eyes. ”...Sakuya, are you special?”

That got the woman's attention; blue eyes locking into the red of her own as a cheeky smile flashed across her face. ”My wife always told me I was, d'you think she's wrong?” Playful question as she lifted their linked fingers together to press a kiss against them, waggling her eyebrows all the while.

Sekai scowled, reached out, and pinched her arm in retaliation. ”I'm serious! Are you special?”

”We talkin' short bus special or... what? Be a little more clear, little one.”

”You know what I'm talking about, you're just being a jerk about it because you don't want to answer me!” Indignant voice with a touch of hurt beneath it.

Sakuya's free hand reached up and ran her fingers through the black locks of her own hair with a sigh. ”I-- yeah. If that's what you wanna call it.” The same uncomfortable expression came back, turned into a grimace as she avoided looking at the woman beside her. ”No, in case you're wonderin', I can't actually do exorcisms, not that I know of anyway, and I never... really decided to go lookin' into it all that much. Wasn't a big deal to me.”

”How strong were your abilities?” This wasn't surprising, it wasn't. ...maybe a little. But it made a startling amount of sense all of a sudden and she needed to see just how far down the rabbit hole that she'd been and not even realized it.

”Little one--” Sakuya began.

Sekai cut her off immediately. ”How strong?”

Discomfort turned into a black scowl. ”Seriously? You wanna talk about that instead of, y'know, literally anything else?”

She could feel the weight of Sekai's stare on her and growled something under her breath. Damn girl was stubborn as hell when she had a bug up her ass and the events of the last few years certainly hadn't done anything to change that. ”I dunno, alright? Weaker 'n your ass, how you didn't mop the floor with me earlier is something you're gonna answer for, but I could do enough with it to make my life a little easier.”

She lifted a hand before the next round of questions could come flying at her like one of those fucking earth spears the little wretch was apparently so fond of. ”I don't know what all I could do, for one, I mentioned that already. I know some of it might've been water or ice related, and I could regulate my own body temperature pretty damn easily and not worry about hypothermia in the winter. But the big one was, well,” she wiggled one hand in a side to side manner. ”visions? I guess you could call it. They didn't make a hell of a lot of sense, just a snippet of something, a flash of a scene like I was running past somethin' real quick. Most of 'em I didn't remember.”

That stare still held and Sakuya swore again. ”Look. I didn't see shit like you can now, and if I'd known you had any talent, I'da started workin' with you, together, until we figured out just what happened and what we could do about it.”

”Did you foresee your death and not tell me?” She was too calm to be asking that question, surprised herself by asking it as steadily as she did.

Sakuya looked startled, shook her head vehemently in response. ”The fuck kinda question is that? Hell no, I didn't know!”

Sekai swallowed hard, tried to keep her heart from thundering out of her chest. ”Then why did you stay for me? Why did you have to stay instead of going on to the afterlife?”

Sakuya's hand tightened suddenly against her own, hard enough to hurt as the blue eyed woman stared hard off into the distance with a clenched jaw. Upset, clearly so by the way she held herself sort of half-hunched over and tensed, ready to launch herself forward to her feet and bolt off like a bullet from a gun.

”Saku... I can--”

”No. You can't.” She snapped sharply, not loosening her grip in the slightest as she fought to give her the truth, one that would hurt her more than she had been already, and resisting the urge to just lie, or mislead her, and tell her something that would make her happy and upset anyways. There wasn't a way to win this, she knew, but the need, the want to just be able to protect her from one goddamn thing that would hurt her was so fucking strong.

”You can't, little one, because you already blame yourself.” Danced around the subject, knew that Sekai had done just that, and would always do that to the detriment of herself and those around her. Accept the blame where she shouldn't, carry the burden of responsibility for others' misgivings, mistakes, and errors just because she couldn't fucking stop seeing herself as the enemy. ”Fuck, I don't even want to talk about this, I don't, and it's not going to help you. I don't want our time spent together to be this, not like this, not why I didn't just go throw myself on those pajama wearing assholes' swords and be done with it all.”

...speaking of which.

Her eyes narrowed, she slid a cat eyed glance in Sekai's direction. ” By the way, when I get to that place? I'm gonna slap the ever loving shit out of that ginger bastard, mark my words. I will hold that memory so fuckin' hard even the best medical professionals in the world won't be able to get rid of my hate boner for that guy.”

”Don't. I ended things and there's nothing left to do anything about.” Sekai countered immediately with a firm shake of her head and a tight swallow of the lump in her throat. She didn't want to talk about that any more than Sakuya wanted to about her reasons for staying.

She was caught off guard by the hand that tilted her chin up, the way her ocean blue eyes stared deep into her own as if looking deeper than most were capable of. ”...you're not done, trust me on that one. That's why I'mma slap 'im first.” Her tone was completely serious and lacking any of the humor she'd had before when stating her intention.

”Please don't.” Her plea was rough, eyes blinking back tears as she tried, and failed, to shake her head.

Her forehead knocked against Sekai's own, tanned skin against fairer, but bloodied, flesh. ”...it was because of what you did that winter. I was there and I'd thought... well, I thought you were going to go scatter my ashes like I'd wanted you to rather than keep 'em around.”

Sekai frowned, trying to recall which winter she was talking about. ”Wh-what are you--”

”Sekai; I was there when you tried to drown yourself in the river.”

This close, she couldn't miss the panic, the fear, the shame and everything else that flitted into the younger woman's eyes as the news sank in and struck home. Tightened her grip to keep her from pulling away and slid her hand away from her chin, behind her cheek and around to cradle the back of her head to keep her there, close, closer than they had been in far too long.

Closer than they were ever get to be again, after all was said and done.

”I panicked. I didn't know what to do; move on and hopefully see you there, or wait and beat you senseless and help you move on if you'd managed to succeed. Or try and influence someone, anyone to come pull you out before you managed to do any real harm to yourself.” Her confession came out in a tumble of words, rapidly spoken as if the faster she talked, the more distance she could put between the way it had made her feel and the way that the news was going to hurt her beloved all the more for knowing it. ”So... I waited, I watched, and yelled at you the entire time, followed you down the damn thing until you were tossed up on shore. I watched--”

”Stop it.” Sekai broke the woman's speech, tried, failed, to pull away again. ”You don't need to--” She knew now. She remembered that night all too clearly, the way the bite of the water had felt against her skin, how it burned and settled into her bones for days afterward, weeks after she'd come down with pneumonia as a result of her weakened immune system.

”I stayed in case you were successful, in case you made another attempt-- and I was right to. You did make another attempt in the Shrine.” She drove it further, pushed back against the girl's attempt to deny it, to try and reject the reality that both of them knew to be the all too painful truth.

She reached out, pinched the girl's cheek between her fingers, and pulled hard enough to elicit a startled squawk of protest. "And just what part of that sounded even remotely like somethin' I'd approve of?"

Sekai smacked her hand away, winced as she rubbed her much abused cheek and glowered somewhere to the right of the black haired spirit beside her. "I never said I was looking for anyone's approval." She muttered in reply.

Another pinch.

"Ow! Stop that!"

"Then quit being a little chicken and live out the rest of your days properly, you idiot." Sakuya retorted, going in for a shot at the girl's side.

Sekai caught her wrist with one hand, twisted away from the quick as a flash retaliation from the other and seized it in turn. "And what if I don't want to? What if I've had it with this life?" She challenged, tried not to let the hurt in her voice slip free.

Their gazes locked, challenged one another as neither prepared to back down.

"Why're you alive then if you've had it?" She fired back. "Too scared to do it yourself? Afraid of the consequence? Afraid you'll change your mi-"

”I didn'--”

”You did, and you apparently tried it again, and again, and again in different ways, didn't you? You tried to find a way to die without actually doing it with your own two hands in hopes that'd make it easier for you and I to b--” She was cut off, again, this time by her back hitting the ground as the girl utilized her strength to shove her a little more violently than was necessary away from her.

”Stop it!” Sekai backed away, turned her back on the woman looking positively livid on the ground, and covered her hands with her ears. She didn't want to hear it. Didn't want to hear any more of that. Of just how many moments hadn't been the private expressions of grief she thought she'd had. Of how many moments she'd thought she had been alone and could speak or act freely without anyone's judgment but her own.

Blue eyes flashed with temper as she threw out the last bit, frustrated and tired of keeping in the pain that had eventually consumed her on more level than one. ”Goddamn it, Sekai, you broke our fuckin' promise and you expected me to just be okay with that and move on like you never fuckin' mattered?” Shoved herself off the ground and stomped toward the girl with her hands pressed over her ears. Grabbed her wrists and wrenched them off her fool head. ”I had to stay because of you, you idiot; you never would have thrown off that asshole Arrancar's influence and he would have killed you the way you wanted that dumbass sibling thing of his to.”
 
She waved a hand, knowing already what Sekai was going to say before she could even say it. Knew her well enough to know the girl's excuses and protests before they formed on her lips-- she'd say it was because she was alive or some bullshit like that. And she heard the words 'because of' before she cut her off.
"Bullshit, you didn't even know I was--" She stopped herself mid-sentence. Considered little pieces of information she'd accumulated from two sources and put a hazy picture together. If she knew about the anomaly and how it was connected, somehow to that green haired fucker who’d gotten her into this mess to begin with... might not be such a stretch.

Well, shit. "...maybe you did on some level, fuck." There went that argument out the window. She twisted, broke the girl's hold on one wrist as she swiped her bangs out of her eyes, mused that the long locks hadn’t grown a single centimeter since her death as she held a tendril out to study for a moment. Delayed what she was going to say until she could figure out just what it was she needed, or should be.

Come on, stupid gut intuition thing, the time to kick in would be right now if ever.

...nothin’.

Well, fuck. Alright then.

New angle time.

Navy blue eyes slid toward the pale faced woman before her. "You gonna off yourself once I'm gone?" Stern as she could make her tone without losing its seemingly casual edge.

She didn’t care for that much and scowled in response. "Can you not word it that way? It sounds so--"

"Real? Honest? Stupid?" She offered a host of words that accurately described what she felt the question was best suited to be. Real, because this wasn’t some bullshit dream anymore-- not that Sekai had ever responded properly to any of the times she’d tried fucking with her in the dreams. ...well, not in that sense, the other one, however…

Anyway, honest because she had to be blunt with the stubborn girl sometimes to get an actual answer out of her, and not the bullshit platitudes that traditional Japanese society still liked to reside under. That mask face and true face bullshit was irritating as hell.

And stupid because Sekai had a full damn life ahead of her and there was no way on God’s green Earth she was just going to stand by and let the worst ending come out of it a--

"Crude." She glared half-heartedly at the poker faced woman before her. "You aren't supposed to joke about things like that."

A quirk upward of dark brows. "Who says I'm joking?"

"You certainly sound like you're having fun." She retorted, an ugly flush of heat burning beneath her cheeks.

Temper flashed, lightning quick, across her face. "Oh yeah, time of my undead fuckin' life right now. Nothin' more fun than listenin' to my wife talk about her plans for killin' herself once I'm gone, no ma'am."

Stung, her hands shook as she tried to deny the accusation. I never said I was going to do that!"

"You didn't have to." Sakuya's words cut deeper than any keen blade could have, and she felt her eyes sting and face heat all the more in response.

”Little--” Sakuya began, reached out her hand to touch the girl’s hunched shoulder with strong, calloused fingertips.

Her hand was knocked away a moment later, a dull, stinging rejection she hadn’t anticipated.

”Do you know what it’s like to come back and find nothing but silence?” Her voice came too softly for the biting steel beneath the words. ”To have to come to the place you made, the home that you and the one who made you into everything you were, the happiest, safest place you could ever be-- and have to live among the echos of what would never be again?”

Her hand dropped back to her side, curled into a fist. ”Do you know what it’s like to realize that you have nothing, no one left? Your friends are gone, your family doesn’t exist anymore, and those who were never key players in your lives, who came during trials only to offer thin words of pity and shallow promises, all fade away when you don’t magically snap out of your grief?”

The world became a grey-green and yellow and brown blur. ”Do you know what it’s like to sit at an empty table, to look around the home you’d made and realize that no matter how long you wait, no matter how good you may be, no matter how many times you beg and plead and cry and scream, that you will never again hear one more ‘good morning’, never again hear one more ‘I love you’ or ‘I’m home’ or share a meal together because that person isn’t here anymore and she never will be again!”

”Do you know what it feels like to live in a nightmare you will never wake up from-- reminded by everything, everyone you see, that you are the heroine in the next fashionable tragedy of moment? That you notice and endure all of those pitying glances, hushed whispers, and shaking heads that follow when they think you don’t see them?” Eyes on fire, she didn’t dare close them, didn’t dare release what threatened to spill.

She was so tired of crying.

So very, very tired.

”I’m not strong like you, I’ve never been like you, and I tried to be. You died. You died without pain; just collapsed on the shrine steps like it was the most casual thing in the world-- and just like that, you were gone.” Bitterness, heavy and thick in each word. Began to open her mouth to say more, to hurl more of what her wife and her carefree, “that’s life so suck it up and deal with it” attitude didn’t get at her.

To find that, for the second time in less than a week, someone’s hand came down across her cheek hard enough to sting, to snap her head to one side and send the taste of copper-sweet blood back into her mouth.

--
WC: 3781
GP: 50

Six years later and the memory was as fresh as if it had happened only hours ago.

Sudden weakness accompanying a sharp, violent rip up her left side. Her legs going out from under her just as she’d stepped down on the corner of one stair. The dull, fading impact of her body suddenly striking the uneven stone steps, flash of plain when a rib had snapped from impact, red and black stars in her vision when her head had stricken the stone ground, how she’d tumbled down like some stupid ragdoll to lay against one of the three landings. The numerous bruises she knew would pop up from the hellish fall down. The ache and burn within her chest as her throat closed up, her heart thriving its way faster, faster, faster, faster-- and then there was nothing.

Red explosions in her vision, the screaming she couldn’t hear anywhere but in her head with a voice that didn’t fucking work.

Everything went to black and she was nothing.

Her death had taken roughly a minute and a half from start to finish-- and she had felt every. last. fucking. second.

”Don’t tell me I don’t know what I do and don’t understand.” Her voice was low, harsh and ugly. Her hand shook, shook and stung from the impact against her wife’s cheek. She’d never lain a hand on her in violence, never even considered it after the way she’d seen and heard of the way she’d grown up-- the times in the dojo hadn’t counted; training was training and that was always the risk of any martial art.

Scarlet eyes slid up to meet the navy blue of her own.

Banked fury, unshed tears.

The sorrow and regret that bound them together even now.

Chains that bound her were coming undone, she could see the way the girl prepared to hand herself over, willingly to the madness threatening to devour her from the inside out. A fox chewing at her own leg to free itself from a trap that would surely kill her in time. If she died, by her own hand, at the hand of another’s, or because of the wounds she’d healed just enough to keep from bleeding out on the spot, she wouldn’t last more than an hour before she Hollowified.

And that was if she died-- and didn’t turn into something worse than the pain driven monsters who fed on the flesh and soul of others to survive.

Something cool slid down her spine, soft scales and the impression of two red, red eyes that had no place in the shadows of the unseen crawling along her flesh and--

Sakuya slapped her again.

”Don’t. Don’t you dare use that thing he gave you on me.” Fury gave her eyes an otherworldly glow, the chain hanging from her chest clinking against itself as the pain of self-eating began with greater fervor than before. ”You’re better than that; you’re--”

”Not the monster Nazomi-san is?” Sekai threw back. ”I will be worse than he is-- was forced to be, and you and I both know just how he likes to play.” Pressure building behind her eyes, head throbbed in time with the rapid beat of her heart.

Liar.

”Fuck. off.” She hissed, shuddered at the silky sweet voice that came, cruel and mocking, in the back of her head. Anger her own and not made her tremble, hands coming up to rake through her hair. Wanted to get up, run. Run away. Go deep into the mountain somewhere, live in the heart of it until an earthquake strong enough to collapse whatever chamber she would carve out for herself would crush her into something unrecognizable.

”Not until we work this shit out; I ain’t leavin’ it like this.” Her wife snapped, preparing to shackle her again if she showed even the slightest sign of running off.

”I wasn’t even talking to you!” Sekai shot back.

The two women glared at one another.

Sakuya’s expression softened, barely, at the hostile defenses building themselves in her former lover’s eyes. ”Yourself?”

A flinch.

Sekai shook her head.

”Who, then? Who needs to fuck off?” Pressed the issue further. Didn’t get any closer, not with the girl looking a lot like she had when she’d been, oh hell, what, twelve? thirteen? when she and Jadyn’s parents had passed. That same, almost feral look in her eyes when everything hurt too much to endure for much longer.

There was no use getting into it now, and she didn't even know how to begin telling her wife she had someone she didn't recognize talking to her at random intervals that no one else could hear. ”It doesn’t matter.” She denied.

”It does if that voice is on the side that keeps you from killing yourse-” Sakuya shot back, ready and willing to drag the argument into the ground until she came out the victor.

”Will you just get off that subject already?!” Sekai snapped, cut her wife off once again as that same topic came circling back around.

Quicker response, she was never one to be for a loss of words for long. ”Sure; right as soon as you fuckin’ tell me you’re not gonna do it again and why you’re even still considering it in the first fuckin’ place.”

Temper boiled over. ”What else was I supposed to do back then?!” Sekai snapped back, glaring with a face full of the same damned tears she never seemed to run out of cutting clean swaths through the drying blood. ”What am I supposed to do now, even? You were everything to me, Saku, everything!” Pale lashes clumped together with tears she dashed angrily away. ”You were there, you were my light, my strength, and then one morning-- you're not there anymore. You're dead and cold on the steps of the shrine, there's nothing in your eyes and I-- I was alone.”

She slapped Sakuya's outstretched hand away from her again, holding herself for comfort instead as if it would keep her from falling apart at the seams. ”You were gone, Seiichiro-- the others, they were in danger with the rest of the family. I did what you would have done and went for the kill on a monster I didn’t even understand wasn’t even the true threat knowing I would die and we’d be together!” Pain that took root, festered deep, and rose with the resentment she’d carried for those who judged without truly knowing and understanding the path she had been forced down.

She hadn't done it solely just to get herself killed; it just would have been a nice side effect. A way to be of use to someone for more than just five seconds before the uselessness of her existence popped back up to mock her relentlessly in a voice that wasn't quite her mother's, but wasn't far off either.

"And then, when that failed, when I failed to die a second time in less than twelve hours, when I believed you gone, well and truly moved on and started to move forward again-- suddenly you weren’t gone anymore! You’d never been gone in the first place, and everyone was telling me it was my fault, and every move I made was influenced, all the little doubts I had magnified that might have made me go somewhere different, I chose to ignore because I didn’t believe I deserved any of it! I had to stay, I couldn’t do it because you were here!" Sekai exploded, one arm sweeping out in a violent manner to gesture to the world around them.

Something tore with a heated slash along her back and side, the trickling burn of recently scabbed wounds reopening from the motion. Dared Sakuya to deny her, to tell her she was stupid just like every other person did-- and felt her face crumple, unable to sustain the heat of anger for any longer than she had.

"...I just don't-- why? Why are you just-- why are you here now?" The final word was lost in a wail, childish and immature, but filled with the pain she'd held since her wife had died.

Ahh hell. Sakuya cringed at the keening wail that rose. "Little one," she began, watched the tears slip down her cheeks and the way her hands moved to automatically wipe them away as if they burned. ”don’t dodge the subject. Crude or not, are you going to kill yourself when I’m gone?”

Sekai’s entire body tensed, wouldn’t move her hands away from her face, wouldn’t look at her.

She didn’t say ‘no’-- she didn’t say anything at all.

And that was worse than if she had answered to begin with.

--
WC: 1569
GP: 20

She hadn’t anticipated really, truly falling in love with someone eight years her junior. This was her wife, the woman she had reluctantly shared her heart and soul with, and had loved more than she had possibly fathomed loving another person aside from herself. Physically too, of course, but it was the emotional side that had taken her by surprise. Caring for someone, being looked after and cared for-- protected in return… it wasn’t something she’d been used to. Sure, she and Jadyn had gone their rounds as twins, had fought for one another when the other had some shit go down because it was their code-- but it was different when it was someone else. Someone unrelated to you.

It was different when it was some tiny snip of a brunette throwing herself in front of you, arms spread open like she could make herself bigger, and telling that crazy ex-boyfriend to quite literally fuck off and do something better with his life than hang on to the past that would never come to be. Different when she’d had to whip the guy’s ass for actually daring to hit her in response and Sekai had jumped in to pull the two of them apart and drag her away babbling that he wasn’t worth it and they had to get out of there before the police would show up.

Different when they’d ducked into a bathroom and Sekai had pulled herself on top of the counter to sit and carefully daub away the blood that’d fallen from a split lip and a cut above her eye. Had burst into tears and apologized even with the corner of her mouth cut open the way it’d been. It was different, and she didn’t know why that one moment had just sealed the idea in her mind that this girl, this woman in front of her, was the one she wanted to keep around at her side for the rest of her life.

As pathetically short as that had been.

But this wasn’t the roof of the hospital, and she wasn’t just some curious bystander answering the call of intuition.

This was her wife, even though they’d hit the ‘death do they part’ thing a fuck of a lot sooner than any of ‘em had ever dreamed. Life wasn't fair, and she was beginning to think a sudden parting rather than a prolonged goodbye really had been the better option.

”Why?” She didn’t mean for the question to get flung out in such an angry, demanding way. Didn’t mean to use a tone so sharp with her voice more on the shrill side than she wanted to admit to use on the woman she had loved for years in life and even more after it. She didn’t mean to look scared, to look desperate and like this was her one last chance at actively trying to change her mind the way she had done so long ago.

Sekai didn’t answer.

”Goddamn it, little one, you owe me that much at least! Why?” The temptation to reach out and shake her was enough to make her fingers ache, flexing as if they could already fit around her arms and squeeze. ”Why don’t you want to live? What is it about death that you find so fucking appealing, that’s so goddamn wrong with this life that you don’t want to even give it a good goddamn fucking try anym--”

”Shut up!” Heart-wrenchingly loud in the wide open space, Sekai’s too shrill voice cut through the middle of Sakuya’s rant.

Yellow blossoms slowly settled to the ground, lazily drifting on the ocean breeze from the impact of the white haired spiritualist’s fist slamming into the ground sending them high into the air. Her shoulders hunched up about her ears, head lowered as if she had sustained a wound that was killing her from the inside out.

What Nazomi had done should have fixed her; should have fixed the urge to die. She didn’t have that person influencing her anymore. No one left trying to drive her to her own ruin beyond recognition just so that she could have form once again, a body that wouldn’t reject her and a perfect platform in which to launch her plans further.

She didn’t hate her; not in the way Nazomi had felt so very vehemently towards the lost souls who had manipulated the both of them down paths they otherwise may never have traveled. She understood, to a degree, and even empathized with the woman and man’s aspirations..She knew the unfairness of a loved one taken too soon, of the perfect, fairytale lives they were supposed to live out and live through together as a family being cut before it could even begin.

Had the circumstances been different, Sekai might have even agreed to just hand her physical form over and just… have her soul expelled to be purified, or left for Hollow consumption. Or absorbed all together so that the person who sat there in the field of scattered yellow flowers and sea grass was nothing more than a memory to be forgotten.

And yet, here they were, and here her feelings still remained relatively unchanged in regards to her own fate.

Sure, the all encompassing need, the way the world seemed to loom so scarily big and intimidating and too much of everything awful for her to bear its weight was gone. But the world had not brightened and become less unbearable by the removal of her extra burden. It hadn’t taken the filters of grey over a world supposedly so colorful and bright away.

Getting rid of one problem did nothing to erase the burden, the pain, that came with surviving what her influence had wrought-- and what unforeseen consequences lie ahead of her.

That pressure came back, full force and crushing as she dropped to the ground, legs refusing to hold her up any more.

"Why? Why not die if it meant I would be able to find or catch up with you?" She sobbed. ”Why not just stop all of this? All the pretending I’m okay, the smiles and having to force myself every single step of the way-- why not stop it for good this time? Why should I have to keep going, why should I have to just because you want me to when you won’t even remember me once you’re gone?” This was a pain she had tried to carry with the dignity expected of someone of her upbringing, in a way that wouldn't bring shame to those around her-- and she was falling apart all the same.

Why couldn’t she just hold it together like everyone else?

What made her so much weaker, so much less than the rest of humanity who did, and those who didn’t, have to deal with the amount of suffering she had seen and endured in twenty six years and more?

Why…?

Why couldn’t be strong enough to carry on, to build a future with her own two hands instead of holding someone else’s as they walked along life’s road together?

Sakuya dropped down to her knees in front of her, held Sekai’s wrists as firmly as ever and shook her a little out of lack of knowing anything better to do to grab her attention. Wanted to just grab her, hold her close and never let go. Let the fates be damned, fuck the future; the two of them could become monsters or go to Hell or wherever the fuck the afterlife might have been just to stop her tears for just a little while… but she couldn’t.

She couldn’t do that.

Not with what was at stake, what those flashes of broken, splintered futures had shown her was necessary. ”Fuck if I know, but it wasn't that. Go find someone new, damn it. You weren't even of actual majority yet when I went; you coulda gone out and found someone who'd treat you just as well, if not better.” She tried to lecture her, half-hearted and angry as it was.

”I didn't want anybody else, I wanted you! You're the one I love, you're the one I wa--” A sob cut her off mid-word, Sakuya shaking her head all the while.

The next four words hurt more than anything else she could have fathomed, even hearing that her wife had collapsed, that she had died hurt less than this somehow.

”I'm dead, little one.” Her own voice was rough with unshed tears, unexpressed grief in return. ”I'm dead, and there's nothing anyone can do about that.”

Sekai shook her head, wordless sobs, protests as her head bowed until her chin nearly touched her chest. She wasn't! She wasn't dead right now, she was here, with her. She could touch her, had been touching her, lying next to her-- everything she had wanted she could do right here, right now.

They were together again, reunited after six, no, seven years apart-- and they would never see one another again after these precious last moments were over.

Hot tears spilled down cool cheeks, the black haired woman ground her teeth together and berated herself for her own weakness, for her own inability to keep it together and remain calm and collected even in the face of-- of this. She’d known Sekai had been a little weak, had her softer than should be spots and had trouble motivating herself to go full on Miss Independent the way she and Jadyn always had been-- but this… this wasn’t the way she had seen the girl she’d fallen in love with. This wasn't the way she'd planned this whole damned reunion of theirs to go. She'd planned a goddamn happy reunion, a good-bye that would bring peace to her heart and would allow her to move on with life while still remembering her fondly.

”Damn it, Sekai,” Strangled words from between clenched teeth making it difficult to discern if it were a plea or some sort of... some sort of exasperated something to say to fill the void of silence stretching so heavy between them.

Couldn't finish whatever it was she'd been about to say, had wanted so badly to say to her.

Couldn’t handle it if she were the reason Sekai were to break completely and become something worse than what had plagued her sleep for so many months.

”Just-- damn it.” Her shoulders shook, Sakuya weeping silently in direct contrast to the noisy sobs coming from the little wretch who'd stolen her heart with a pair of big brown eyes up on a hospital roof.

--
WC: 1858
GP: 24

They wept together.

Bitter and resentful of their respective fates.

Of the parting that would be soon to follow.

”So, what happens now?” Her voice was still on the husky side, clearing her throat hadn't done a whole lot of good-- and neither had the bloodstained, torn to pieces handkerchief Sekai had offered her to use. It'd been such a characteristic move on the white haired woman's end that they'd both frozen and started laughing about it. What a pathetic move it had been on Sekai's end, but the offer had been so thoughtful, so... so her that neither one of them could do anything other than just giggle until the laughter broke free into loud, nearly hysterical guffaws that were so unladylike that she was almost proud of the gentle raised woman beside her.

Laughed until it hurt too much to move; and laughed until they were holding one another and crying all over again for the knowledge that the little offering was just one thing more on the list of 'last times' they had left together. Now, the two of them sat beside one another once more. Sekai trying to find some undamaged, unbloodied part of her clothing in which to cut away and use as a spare handkerchief in a tight spot as the question was thrown at her while Sakuya rested with her arms slung casually overtop knees tucked up against her chest.

Sekai tensed at the question, shook her head in response, and kept searching. ”I don't know.”

A frown, eyes narrowed at her as she wiped away the evidence of her own little hissy fit with the pads of her thumbs. ”Should go see some friends. Don't be alone for a while.” Glanced away from the evidence to the blue sky above.

”That would put the girls in danger. I can't do that.” Sekai rejected the notion outright with a wave of her hand. ”The Fujimura as well; even though Seiichiro has the sight and some minor power too... just, no. They've been through too much because of me as it is.”

Brow furrowed further. She could cheerfully damn her logical side into Hell and replace it with just a little fucking selfishness once in a while. Her family, irritatingly passive as they had a penchant for being, would still support her in their own way and help if they could-- even if it was just allowing her to be among people who did genuinely care for her. ”What about your not-as-weak-sauce friends?”

Loved the Sparkle Sisters, but even she’d probably end up feeding them to a black robe or asshole with a mask if she had to spend too much time in their company. Especially those two bitches who couldn’t decide whether or not they wanted to try inviting a certain little someone in for a menage a trois or just make a play for her on their own.

Lord, how she did not miss dealing with that load of fuckery.

Sekai didn't look at her. ”Like who?”

”Whatshisass... the idiot blind guy?” She offered helpfully, frowned as she tried to sort through the haze of bestial memories tucked in the back of her mind for another example. Fucking stupid animalistic memory. She could smell them, but fuck if she could even tell the girl in front of her what she thought they might have looked like in great detail. ”Or, uhh, shit. What about the guy you helped at the shrine? He could be helpful, so could the dork with the baseball cap, or--”

Her body language stiffened almost instantly.

Takua is not a friend.” Sekai bit out, a little too sharply to disguise the hurt and anger that flashed across her face.

Dark brows shot upward in surprise. Well now, wasn’t this an interesting tidbit?

"Since when?" This was news to her, after all. She’d remembered attacking her, smelling those black robed fucks and had intended to make them pay for trying to pull some sort of bullshit-- and had gotten a mouthful of blood that had been her beloved’s-- and that had been all shades of unacceptable, and she’d run off before the temptation to chew and devour had gotten too strong.

Her mouth did the cute but irritating little pouty thing that usually invited her to get kissed as her expression went from irritated to some cross between sullen and trying to act like she didn't care. "Since he decided to use both of us to try and further some stupid plot of his to die."

Dark brows disappeared beneath the fall of her bangs as Sakuya stared at the white haired woman studiously not looking at her. She opened her mouth to argue, paused as she went over what little she knew of the Arrancar and reviewed the conversation they'd had. So that was where the little tidbit had lead to…

Well, shit. Good job there, oh Loremaster Master Loreman.

Which would mean something else would be happening in the future to make that... wait. Well, that, uhh… wasn’t good. She didn’t figure Sekai for the old lock and key dungeon prisoner type, but, well… they’d had some fun during their experimentation days to learn what the younger woman had liked and maybe she’d discovered something a little more than what either of them had tried.

"...don't suppose you've got 'im held prisoner somewhere, do ya?" Phrased the question carefully in a mildly teasing tone.

She was given a glare for her efforts. Hands came up in her own defense as she chuckled and shook her head. "Okay, okay, just askin'." Poor dumb bastard had some unhappy, and unwelcome, surprises headed his way apparently. Probably for the better he couldn’t get a heads up, if that little flash of something had been correct.

But, in that regard; her little one had some problems headed her way too-- but that would come later than she would ever know, and sooner than she’d think.

She kinda wished she could tag along just to watch and laugh, and comfort her when things went to shit all over again-- and they would go to shit. "What about the others?" She persisted, relentlessly needling the irritated woman in front of her much like she always had.

"There aren't any." Flat tone, leaving no room for debate.

Frown intensified. "Burned all your bridges so you wouldn't feel guilty when you finally succeeded in offing yourself?" She asked, still deceptively conversational in tone.

A flinch-- she'd hit the bullseye dead on.

Well, goddamn it, Sek--

Paused, thoughtful consideration. ”Was it you alone who burned ‘em?”

”Why are you asking me all these questions?” Sekai countered with one of her own, feeling a little put out by all the ‘what’s this, but what’s this, and what abouts’ that she’d already considered and discarded for reasons of her own.

She considered the best course of action and discarded it. Why the hell not just be true to herself, as always? Leaning heavily against the smaller woman, Sakuya took her back to the ground and sprawled across the grass and flowers half on top of her with one leg thrown over both of hers. Propped up on her elbow, she studied the woman’s cross expression beneath her and smiled slightly.

”Because I love you.”

Red eyes welled up with tears all over again and Sakuya laughed quietly under her breath, leaned down and kissed her. ”Still the biggest crybaby in Japan, little one.” Affection, warm and true, filled her voice alongside the love she felt for the younger girl. Free hand reached out and touched her cheek, smoothed away some of the white strands sticking to her tear streaked cheeks, and let her fingertips linger against the scars she’d inflicted.

”I didn’t mean to do this.” Hand drifted down until it brushed against her throat. ”Or this.”

Sekai’s hand reached up and caught Sakuya’s own, lifted it back up and cradled her cheek against it. ”I know.” Simply put, simply spoken-- and she did know. She knew what happened when one became a Hollow, had lived the experience more vividly than anyone would ever know unless she chose to share the memory-- or they became a Hollow themselves.

Sakuya’s face twisted into a grimace as the chain devoured a link.

Her forehead knocked against Sekai’s own as she bent her head to rest and catch her breath. Uncomfortable silence, knowing that time was running short, running out even as they danced around the inevitable.

This wasn’t the way she wanted this to go, hadn’t been the closure she had wanted-- and there hadn’t even been any kind of closure whatsoever. At least, none she could see. Sekai wasn’t better. She wasn’t against ending her own life. She wasn’t even--

She wasn’t…

Three links left, she noticed as she glanced down at the chain hanging between her breasts.

She’d started with eight.

--
WC: 1575
GP: 21