Cho-Ah, I'll... Make a Man... Out of You! [PG13/Kyou, Closed]

Cho-Ah extended the sheaf of documents back to Kyousuke, who took it without hesitation, not pausing to give her a second glance despite the desperation that was plastered across her face as plain as day. He counted the sheets of paper once to be sure, then returned them to the safe. Only when he was certain the information was stored securely did he allow himself to take a deep breath and do something Kyousuke Tsukimiya had only done once or twice in his life.

In an almost unprecedented display of compassion, Kyousuke hugged the girl close, burying her face in his chest, as if to smother her sobs. There was no murderous intent in his actions, no desire to suffocate her, and yet he couldn’t help but feel that it was precisely what he was doing. He buried the feeling and stroked her hair softly, his expression indecipherable. He could almost feel her emotion welling out of her like a spring of icy water, but he remained stolid even in the face of such overwhelming grief.

‘He isn’t dead, Cho-Ah,’ he said, as if he could read her thoughts. ‘And that means he isn’t lost. Not yet.’ He weighed his options, contemplating his next move. How to best use this to his advantage? The girl was grief-stricken, but Kyousuke had seen the briefest glint of determination behind the regret in her eyes, and that was all he needed to make up his mind.

‘I’m going to make you something to eat, and then I’m going to do my very best to turn you into a survivor.’ He loosened his grasp on the girls’ shoulders and stepped back to survey the damage. She was a mess, but there it was again, the determination. The purity of will. The purpose. In the end it had been Cho-Ah’s errant brother—and not Kyousuke’s devoted one—who had given her the reason she needed to devote herself to her training. He led her into the kitchen, where he sat her down wordlessly at the counter and got to work preparing her a simple meal to get some proper energy into her system. It was bare-bones, but effective: a bowl of yesterday’s pasta reheated in the microwave with an egg yolk and copious amounts of parmesan sprinkled on top would serve very nicely. Kyousuke put the dish in front of his guest and then paused, deciding to make one for himself.

She sat mutely, staring at the food with a disinterested look on her face, and Kyousuke finished preparing his own bowl and sat down next to her. ‘Eat,’ he commanded, and nudged Cho-Ah’s bowl closer to her. She glumly picked up the fork he had provided and stabbed a few pieces onto it, taking a bite. She chewed slowly as Kyousuke watched with interest, and then she took another bite. Another followed, and within seconds she was shoveling the bowl down furiously. Satisfied, Kyousuke began eating his own bowl, and he was halfway in by the time Cho-Ah had finished.

‘Another,’ she demanded, her eyes fierce and unrelenting.

Kyousuke obliged, and by the time he had finished his own meal, Cho-Ah seemed satisfied. He rose without a word, put the plates away, and then strode out toward the garden, muttering a low ‘follow me’ as he passed her.

The lieutenant did as she was told, and Kyousuke squinted at the bright sunlight as he left the protection of the wide Annex roof and stepped out onto the neatly tended grass. It was, all things considered, a perfect day to learn how to punch things: it was warm, but not uncomfortably so, there was plenty of time until sunset, and there was an abundance of motivation for Kyousuke’s pupil.

‘Yesterday, you called Hakuda barbaric, Lieutenant Amai,’ said Kyousuke, unravelling the strip of cloth on his wrist. ‘I can imagine you meant that it was primitive or unsophisticated, but barbaric has another meaning, one that I find suits it a little better: savagely cruel. Exceedingly brutal. I can assure you, however, that there is nothing unsophisticated about it—it is a dance, the most complex dance you will ever see, where the winner lives and the loser dies. The ultimate game and the purest test. Like cooking, it is an art, and if you want my personal opinion...’ Kyousuke cocked his head to one side and gave a little half-smile. ‘It is the very definition of elegance.’

Cho-Ah looked questioningly at him, clearly not in agreement. ‘But my brother—‘

‘The traitor?’ Kyousuke interrupted her, prodding at her frayed nerves.
‘He’s not a traitor,’ she replied quietly, almost as if she was trying to reassure herself.
‘I can’t hear you.’
‘He’s not a traitor!’ she yelled, her eyes furious. ‘He told me Hakuda was barbaric!’
Kyousuke merely smirked. ‘He was wrong. And you are going to prove him wrong.’

He stretched the fabric over his eyes and tied it in place at the back of his head, and passed his hand in front of his face a few times as if trying to see it. Satisfied with the complete darkness, he shook off the feeling that he must look like some cruel mockery of Mitsutaka, and instead cleared his throat.

‘There is a gap in skill at play here, Lieutenant Amai, and several decades’ worth of instinct that is quite difficult for me to simply ignore, so for our sessions I have seen fit to give myself a handicap.’ He gestured at the blindfold, and continued. ‘I can’t see anything at the moment, and unfortunately my sixth sense isn’t quite as honed as Mitsutaka’s, so I find myself at a bit of a disadvantage. You will find my responses slow and inaccurate, but as you improve, so will I. This is a win/win situation. The best way to learn, after all, is by doing, so I’m going to ask you to hit me.’

He paused.

‘If you’re not too upset about your brother being a traitor, that is.’

That was all it seemed to take, because he heard Cho-Ah snarl in anger and then a dull pain spread across his cheek where she had punched him. It was a punch, not a slap as he had been expecting—clearly family was a sensitive issue with the nobility. Somewhere deep within him, something threatened to bubble up and spill over, but he fought it, silently reminding himself that she wasn’t a threat. Another blow, but this time Kyousuke could almost feel it in the instant before it hit, a subtle shift in the atmosphere, a strange feeling almost like the hairs on the back of his neck standing up.

The exchange of thinly-veiled insults and the soft thud of a fist on exposed skin continued for a while, until Cho-Ah paused, her rage seemingly having run out of steam.

‘What the hell are you made of?’ she asked almost accusatorily, massaging her raw knuckles as Kyousuke rubbed his cheek.
Of suppressed rage, he wanted to answer. Of vice and of deceit. ‘Same stuff you are, Lieutenant Amai. In more ways than one.’

Kyousuke hadn’t forgotten about the real reason she was here, after all. ‘Can’t make an omelette without breaking some eggs. Hakuda makes you feel it. There’s no barrier between the battered and the batterer; you earn every bit of your victory. A small sacrifice, if you will, for the greater good—yours.’

He was still blindfolded, but just before Cho-Ah had given up, he was beginning to feel more than just a tingling in his spine whenever she was about to strike. He was doing his very best to see without his eyes and though he wanted little more than to tear off the blindfold, he resisted the urge. Kyousuke was a firm proponent of empiricism—the best way to learn is by doing. He wasn’t going to quit this early.

Still, the nagging feeling of envy nipped at the edges of his consciousness as he thought of how Mitsutaka had described it to him on occasion, and how easily it seemed to come to Kyousuke’s younger brother. It was fortunate, in every sense of the word, that Mitsutaka had retained at least some form of vision with his eyes melted out of their sockets.

It was the psychological issues that—worried?—Kyousuke.

‘Keep going,’ he said, settling his shoulders and pushing Mitsutaka from his mind. ‘I think I’m getting the hang of this. And so are you,’ he added hastily.
‘Is there even any point to me hitting you, Tsukimiya?’
‘Yes. You’re learning what it feels like to take a man’s life one hit at a time.’

They had been at it for hours by the time Cho-Ah finally collapsed in exhaustion, and Kyousuke’s cheeks had swelled noticeably. His arms had finally managed to shoulder some of the burden, however, as he had gradually been able to anticipate when and where the blows were coming from—though he was consistently too late to do anything about it. In order to keep things difficult, he had ordered Cho-Ah to practice kicking, too, and that had increased the difficulty of the exercise threefold. His pupil was making progress; she was becoming less and less afraid of hitting him, and that meant that she was opening up to the idea.

Kyousuke untied the blindfold, shielding his eyes from the setting sun, and looked down at Cho-Ah, who was panting hard, her knuckles and shins scuffed and tender. ‘I hope won’t have to provoke you into action the next time, Lieutenant Amai.’ He reached down to help her to her feet, and she grumbled something under her breath.
‘Now, go home and rest. We’ll pick up where we left off the next time.’

---

Kyousuke had originally only planned to meet with Cho-Ah once or twice every week, and yet the diminutive lieutenant of the Fourth Division insisted on showing up every day right after breakfast and staying until just before dinner. They spent hours in the garden, and as Cho-Ah’s strikes grew more reliable, so too did Kyousuke’s second sight. He had expected depriving himself of his eyesight would have produced results, but not quite as fast as this, and in much the same vein, Cho-Ah was proving to be a very fast learner. Her problem lay elsewhere—her build was not particularly conducive to this kind of physical strain. On the third day, she asked Kyousuke why he wasn’t teaching her how to punch.

Kyousuke halted at the question, scratching at his chin. He could feel her skepticism in the air, layered like a light perfume that he could almost see and hear as well as he could smell.
‘Because of instinct, Lieutenant. I’ve learned countless ways of hurting men and women with my bare hands, and the best from each are always the ones rooted in basic instinct the most. I can’t expect to impart the entirety of my wisdom onto you in the short timetable we’ve been given, so I’ve chosen to focus on the most important part. There are merits to knowing the intricacies of each school, but when you’re fighting for your life it becomes a strain to adhere to all their rules. For the unseasoned fighter, instinct always takes over. You are an unseasoned fighter, so I have chosen to hone your instincts and bring out the strongest ones.’
If he concentrated very hard, it was almost as though Kyousuke could make out her suspicious expression.
He tried to elaborate. ‘When you’re in a life-or-death situation, you have two basic responses. Fight, or flight. The latter should always take priority over the former, because it is the safer option. Especially in your case—you have no reason to kill anyone.’
Cho-Ah opened her mouth to protest, but Kyousuke heard the intake of breath, felt the surge of indignation in the air around him.
‘You have no reason to kill anyone, Cho-Ah. You aren’t a soldier, and you aren’t an assassin. Your job is to think, not to kill.’
She had no response.
‘What am I teaching you here is self-defense and control. If, during the course of your self-defense, you should happen to kill your opponent, so be it, but you are not a killer. I am giving you a means to an end, and that end is to keep you safe from your foes, whether they be external... Or internal.’
‘And instinct will help me with that?’
‘It helped me.’
‘And what’s your guarantee that your method will help me with my—’ she hesitated. ‘Acquaintance?’
‘Guarantee? I can’t give you one. I can only speak from personal experience. Putting it at its mildest, what you have is a very rare condition, with very few ways of dealing with it. You don’t want to end up like Kasumi Suzumei or Hikari Miyazaki, do you? Or Artix von Creg?’
‘They ended up the way they did because—’
‘Because they lacked control. Conquering your instinct and using it as a tool is the purest form of control; it is the equivalent of taming your inner animal. With the help of your inner animal, you can tame your inner demon.’
‘Have you tamed your inner animal?’
Kyousuke laughed. ‘I am the inner animal. I tore my demon to shreds, proving that I was the one in charge. You will do the same, in time. Enough talk. Begin.’

Cho-Ah lunged, and Kyousuke felt her approach, but didn’t feel her fast enough—her fist collided with his jaw and bounced off almost harmlessly. It was sore after several days of punishment, but Kyousuke was no stranger to pain. Remarkably, Kiriko had not mentioned it or asked about it during dinner last night.

She lunged again, her fist rushing through the air at his chest, and this time, Kyousuke thought he could feel everything: the minute changes in air pressure, Cho-Ah’s violent intent, the almost imperceptible ebb and flow of her spiritual pressure as she exerted herself, and for a fleeting moment he could almost see through the pink blindfold, see her punch, see her face. He felt a surge of something—fear? Exultation? Excitement?—from his pupil as his own hand shot up and caught her small hand in his at the very last second. A satisfied smile spread slowly across Kyousuke’s face, and he let go of her fist and nodded to her. It felt as though he had made a breakthrough, and for the next couple of strikes from Cho-Ah, he kept searching for that same elusive sensation and how to recreate it. He was learning.

It was like the sun behind cloud cover—there were sudden moments of crystalline clarity that seemed to poke through the fog, and Kyousuke capitalized on them as best he could, and in time they became more and more common. Here, a blocked punch, there a deflected kick. It was coming to him, and with his own improvement, Cho-Ah’s quickly followed as she was forced to adapt to Kyousuke no longer simply standing there taking her punishment.

As the evening approached, neither Cho-Ah nor Kyousuke showed any sign of tiring, and very soon it was Kyousuke, not Cho-Ah, who had the advantage—her own visibility was fading in the diminishing light, whereas Kyousuke suffered no such handicap. He was managing to deflect the vast majority of blows by now, and once in a while he was even able to land a cheeky open-handed slap to Cho-Ah in return, light at first and growing steadily more forceful. She had grown accustomed to hitting someone, and now she needed to grow accustomed to being hit.

Finally, the girl could take no more of it and threw up her hands as if giving up. What surprised Kyousuke the most wasn’t the fact that she decided to call it a night, but rather that he felt almost as if he could see her give up, as if a hazy outline of her had been drawn directly on his mind. The very limited range of his second sight seemed to be expanding.

He tore off the blindfold and blinked at the darkness, surprised by just how dark it was. No wonder it had been so easy for him to land hits, Cho-Ah was no doubt having trouble seeing her own hands in front of her face.

‘Enough for today, I agree,’ he said softly, gazing at the warm light filtering out of the open door to his office. He wondered if Kiriko was home yet.

Cho-Ah took her leave and disappeared, and Kyousuke trudged out of the evening—no, this was definitely what he would call night—chill.

Cho-Ah did not come see him the next day, and for a brief moment he wondered if she had given up, but quickly pushed the thought from his mind. He doubted Cho-Ah would ever give up, it was far more likely she was taking a short break in order to recuperate from the light battering she had received last night. Kyousuke had nothing planned for the day, so he put the blindfold on and wandered around the Second Division compound at a leisurely pace, attracting more than a few odd glances. Still, nobody dared make any comments, and Kyousuke found that he could navigate the hallways and corridors fairly well using a combination of the atmospheric spiritual pressure and his own as a form of supernatural sonar. Open spaces gave him a bit of a problem, as did people who were moving about, but the rumor very quickly spread that the Captain was up to something and people were quick to steer clear. If he was to be perfectly honest—a rare enough occurrence in and of itself—Kyousuke would have preferred if they didn’t edge away from him as he approached; they were good practice and practice, after all, made perfect.

This continued throughout the day, and his situational awareness was constantly improving: mixed in with the general mood, he gained a sense of physicality that exceeded regular sight—Kyousuke’s perception of his surroundings seemed to stretch further than just the room he was in, and within each room, he seemed to be able to sense how many people resided within. In some cases, he could even make out who they were and what they were doing. Some rooms, however, seemed like solid blocks haphazardly strewn throughout the compound, and Kyousuke quickly realized they were the ones lined with sekkiseki. He was thankful on some level for that; there were things that went on in the Second Division that prying eyes would do best never to see.

It was just after lunch and Kyousuke had decided to skip the meal given his preoccupation, and in the hours since he had woken, he had been able to make a full circuit of the most easily accessible places of the compound. The familiarity of it all dampened the effect, so he turned toward the front gate and marched out, striding down the grand staircase through the woodland that led down from the little plateau the Second called its home, looking as though he hadn’t a care in the world. The pink blindfold was still securely in place, but the steps posed little problem.

At first, Kyousuke thought there had been an incident, because ahead of him, Seireitei seemed to be on fire with the spiritual signatures of Shinigami, but as he got closer, it dawned on him that there was no commotion, no chaos. Back in the compound, his subordinates moved around quietly, stealthily, their spiritual pressures suppressed out of habit—an occupational hazard, really. People always made a point of mentioning it to Kyousuke, how people were so difficult to read in the Second, and it was only natural the same phenomenon would stretch to the unseen and unspoken communication. Out here, on the bustling streets of the white city, people weren’t nearly as reserved. Their thoughts and feelings shone out like miniature suns and Kyousuke basked in their light, drinking in the sensation of being able to sense them all so sharply. It simultaneously pleased and bothered him; on the one hand he felt a distinct pride at the fact that the soldiers under his command were so dedicated to their cause, and on the other he now knew that Cho-Ah was holding back. Hakuda was honest—or was supposed to be, but somehow Kyousuke managed to twist even that to his own ends—and yet she was not being forthright. Perhaps she was unaware of it herself?

He made a mental note to mention it to her when he saw her next, but for now, he was going to venture out into Seireitei and bask in the sensations his heightened perception afforded him.

---

‘You’re closing yourself off to me, Lieutenant Amai.’

The Fourth’s lieutenant had finally chosen more suitable attire for strenuous physical activity, and Kyousuke noted with satisfaction that her hakama reached all the way down to her ankles today. It hadn’t been a major concern until now given his blindfold, but he had noticed while out and about in Seireitei the day before that the hazy wisps that represented people in his mind’s eye were beginning to sharpen. He had almost been able to make out faces. Even now, without the blindfold, he could sense it was Cho-Ah in front of him simply by the fact that her aura was familiar, and he imagined that once he tied the strip of cloth across his eyes her face would come into sharp focus.

If she stopped trying to hide whatever it was that was bothering her, that is.

‘I’m not—’ she looked flustered, and stopped herself mid-sentence. She looked hesitant, and then, as if she couldn’t hold it in any longer, it came tumbling out. ‘I can’t— I can’t see Captain Karahashi anymore.’

Kyousuke blinked.

‘So?’

She sputtered. ‘Well, that means that this is the last time I’ll be visiting.’

‘Why?’

The girl seemed at a loss for words, and her mouth opened and closed a few times before she finally managed to piece together something resembling a sentence. ‘Because you’re his— and I’m— It would be...’

‘Cho-Ah, I have every intention of finishing what we started. Your relationship with Mitsutaka is none of my business and none of my concern. Our connection runs deeper than that. We share a common plight, you and I. My helping you is a display of my own selfishness, nothing more.’

The noblewoman gaped at him in silence for a few moments, and then bowed deeply. ‘Thank you, Captain Tsukimiya. Thank you very much.’

Kyousuke didn’t have the heart to say that the only alternative was to kill her.

Instead, he waved a hand dismissively at her. ‘Don’t worry about it. This way, we all benefit. You take control, and neither my siblings nor I are executed for committing a taboo.’ His smile was easy, disarming, and calculated down to the smallest detail. Cho-Ah Amai was not going to jeopardize his plans, not at this stage. ‘Anyway, let’s begin. And this time, don’t be quite so introverted. Try simply letting go.’

She readied her stance, and Kyousuke let her reiatsu flow over him. It felt like he was being suffocated in countless strands of hair in a breeze, strands that threatened to wrap around him and restrict his movements, and there, in the very midst of it all, he could sense something he knew nobody else in Seireitei barring Mitsutaka or Lessa would be able to sense: that sickly-sweet tinge of corruption masked in the subtlest of ways. He very nearly lost himself in her aura, studying the intricacies of her hopes, fears, and conflicting emotions, and then he opened his own valve. Cho-Ah’s reiatsu was drowned out by the rush of his own, and the strands seemed to recede back into her in the face of the new tide that spilled out of Kyousuke. Someone had once described his reiatsu as staring into a complete void; a bottomless, edgeless pit. It wasn’t Kannaduki that spilled out of him, just as it wasn’t Hazuki—it was all Kyousuke and the emptiness he almost seemed to embody. He saw Cho-Ah go pale, and relaxed, some part of him wondering how far away the surge had been felt. There were times—rare times, but they happened now and again—when Kyousuke could feel Mitsutaka from halfway across Seireitei. Kyousuke couldn’t match his sheer output, but there was something particularly chilling about how empty Kyousuke’s spiritual pressure seemed.

‘Are you ready to begin?’ Cho-Ah was breathing heavily as Kyousuke tied the blindfold around his head once more, but she nodded resolutely.

‘Then impress me.’

Cho-Ah was a more apt pupil than Kyousuke had given her credit for previously, and while her physical strength left a great deal to be desired, her skill was sharpening—even after less than a week it was evident that she was adapting and learning from her mistakes, picking up tricks of Kyousuke’s and applying them in situations where he would have.

Now, however, Kyousuke was not quite the same punching bag he had been a few days ago. He could practically see Cho-Ah through the blindfold—more than that, he could feel her intent, feel the minute eddies in the spiritually charged air as she moved through it, he could almost predict her movements before she made them. Was this what Mitsutaka saw in every waking moment? Intent? Purpose? Another world beyond the physical? Eyesight be damned, with something as potent as this it almost felt as though the naked eye would be a hindrance. His own handicap was lessening by the minute, and yet Cho-Ah managed to keep up, because as Kyousuke became more responsive, he was inadvertently teaching her more and more. They were both improving at breakneck speeds, and somehow the pace kept increasing.

It had reached the point where the strain of trying to use an almost entirely new sense had fallen behind the strain of trying not to break Cho-Ah’s neck in response to her attacks, and thanks to that—the carefully measured, precisely calculated responses to her mounting aggression that forced him to be careful—they were keeping an even pace.

Still, both of them looked as though they had been through a meat grinder: Kyousuke’s face and arms were bruised from being struck over and over again, just as Cho-Ah hadn’t been able to avoid some light bruising of her own. Still they continued, late into the night and then again the next day, and the day after, and the day after that. They were both getting better, and eventually Kyousuke removed the blindfold, deciding that he not only wanted to test Cho-Ah properly, but he wanted to attempt blending his newly honed sense with the others.

It was jarring, at first—it felt almost as though the spiritual was superimposed on top of the physical. With concentration, however, it faded into the background, becoming something closer to an embellishment, a guide, a complement.

Technically, she had become good—better than Kyousuke could have hoped, but the matter of her lacking power remained. Her movements were solid, an excellent framework to build upon in the future, but she was missing strength behind her blows. Kyousuke thought of Kiriko, of how frail she must seem to the casual observer, and something struck him. She had been looking into alternate methods of combat—discreetly, of course, but Kyousuke kept a deceptively close eye on the dark-eyed girl who shared his home.

He suddenly raised his hand to signal a pause. ‘Lieutenant Amai, how is your Kidō?’

She looked confused for a moment. ‘I thought you said Kidō wouldn’t help?’
Kyousuke stood up straight and crossed his arms, deep in thought. ‘It won’t. But I’ve taught you enough to get by from a purely technical standpoint. You’re a frail girl, though—fast, but you’re simply not built for combat.’
A dismayed expression crept onto her face. ‘Are you giving up on me?’
Kyousuke shook his head. ‘No. I’m saying that if you want to get better now, you run the risk of getting seriously injured if you keep sparring with me like this. There’s a reason I don’t practice with Kiriko. I’m also trying to say that there may—may—be another avenue of inquiry which you may find rewarding.’

Kyousuke could feel the hesitancy and apprehension ooze from Cho-Ah like an oil spill, but he put on a reassuring smile. ‘I think, Lieutenant Amai, that you may be wise to schedule a meeting with my own lieutenant. Explain your predicament to her. Ask her for guidance and aid.’
‘What about you? Can’t you help?’
He could only laugh. ‘Unfortunately, you and I are very different in a lot of ways, and this is one of them. Speak with her. I think you’ll find you have a lot in common.’

He took a deep breath and stretched his arms above his head, as if he had just woken up from a long night’s sleep. As he did, he let his mind wander outwards, finding that his senses seemed to stretch so much further now, with so much more clarity. He was looking for something—someone—but after a few moments of futile search, he gave up.

‘Come on. Let’s have something to eat before we start to stink.’


°4,953

cho ;_;