There's quite a lot of screaming and shouting coming from Shion's division. Black, acidic clouds of smoke are billowing from the windows of the building where the main laboratory is housed, though most of the division can't do anything about it, a translucent black cube barrier having risen out of the ground all around the main laboratory to confine and keep the flames as well as any shinigami from entering or leaving.
A young woman with huge glasses and a chain hanging around her head runs up to Shion, eyes wide.
"Lieutenant!" She says. "There's-- there's at least four people unaccounted for."
"And what's your name again, young lady?" Shion asks, hands tucked into their lab coat as they continue to watch the laboratory burn.
"Niko... Niko Kuna, Lieutenant. I'm the 13th Seat."
"Ah..." Shion says, looking down at her. "Lieutenant Mashiro's younger sister."
They'd approved the leave time for her to go to her sister's funeral, that's right. The Hollowfication incident really was the gift that kept on giving.
"That's--"
"Stop dawdling, Kamiya," Seinosuke says, arms crossed. "I didn't get out of bed at this hour just to stand around in your courtyard and watch some fireworks."
"Watching fireworks together? What a lovely idea, Seinosuke. But I'm afraid I'll have to impose on your generosity at some less pressing time."
They take one hand out of their pocket and gently press it against the barrier, stepping forward as the cube begins to shrink in response to the gentle touch.
Shion walks forward, Seinosuke half a step behind him as they keep pushing the barrier endlessly inwards.
The late hour means that the only people left in the labs would have been the particularly devoted or the easily bullied, whichever Mayuri most valued that day.
So, it's no surprise that the first body they find belongs to Hiyosu, the 6th seat. He's always been a greasily unpleasant sort, wide fish eyes, a gaping mouth and an uncomfortable fondness for making female gigai.
Seinosuke kneels down next to him, checking for any lingering signs of life before shaking his head.
"It seems like he inhaled a poisonous substance..." he says, putting on a pair of gloves before he begins prodding at the corpse's distended tongue. "How strange. I can detect no such thing in the air."
Shion helpfully points to the other side of his barrier, which has only gained more and more swirls of ominous black swirls of smoke and flame as it continuously shrinks.
"Maybe it's over there?" He suggests. "Not that I'm willing to release the barrier. For the safety of the rest of my division, you understand-- I put my containment protocols in place for a reason."
"Indeed, no one can doubt your foresight in this matter," Seinosuke coldly, climbing back to his feet. "There's nothing more I can do for the dead. Let's keep going."
The next tableau they find is even more fascinating than the first, not the least because they've found their first survivor.
Young Oko Yushima, eyes wide with terror, kneels with his back to one of the few non burning walls, his unleashed shikai firmly planted in front of him as it generates a portal into a dark, timeless, and very hungry place.
Thankfully for him, that hunger is mostly working to devour the poison before it reaches him.
He stares with blank eyes as Shion carefully pushes the barrier back through to the end of the room, his imminent death reduced to nothing except a memory.
"Oko, right?" Shion says, crouching down in front of one of his newest subordinates. "Congratulations on surviving so long, and with such an inventive strategy! You really are a good fit for our division."
"I..." the young man says, face going almost as green as his hair. "I think I--"
"Our division does not accept outward transfers or resignation requests," Shion continues.
Seinosuke taps a finger on Oko's pulse, then scowls and starts tracing some kido threads through the air in a geometric pattern around his head.
"There's still some poison lingering in his system," he says. "Finally, some samples. Hold still."
Oko begins to compulsively cough up a strange, purple mist as it's drawn towards the hovering structure.
"Well?" Shion asks, fascinated. "What does it do?"
Seinosuke gives them a bitter look.
"What does it look like it does? It kills people."
"But how does it kill people, Seinosuke?"
"I am trying to--" Seinosuke breaks off from the argument as he notices pale purple mist also drifting up from Oko's skin as well as from his lungs. "A contact poison, not just an inhalant? And with a sticky, acidic component. This isn't meant for a prolonged, torturous death-- anyone below captain level would die in minutes."
"Good thing we have this barrier then," Shion says.
Seinosuke gives them a very narrow look.
"It should also be eating away at your barrier," he says. "And yet, it isn't."
Suspecting them of going so far as to poison the entire building... as if they would need to, when Mayuri was guaranteed to do it for them.
"Oh, it is," Shion assures his friend. "However, this barrier of mine was specifically designed to contain lab accidents. Mayuri even contributed to the design-- In fact, he specifically forced me to include an out for him. If he so much as touches the barrier with his bare hand, it will break instantly."
Seinosuke gives the barrier another, even warier look before turning back to Oko.
"You'll live," he says, disinterested now that he's extracted the poison. "Best get going."
Oko stumbles to his feet, still clutching the long polearm of his unleashed shikai.
"Careful of the corpse in the next lab over!" Shion calls as he heads out. "Don't touch that, he's definitely still poisoned."
Oko stumbles a little, giving them an even more anxious look over his shoulder, and comes to a halt.
"Uhm..." he says. "Lieutenant Kamiya..."
"You can just call me Shion."
"Lieutenant Shion..." Oko pauses, a conflicted expression on his face, but slowly he pulls what looks like... an artificial soul pill out of his pocket, holding it out towards them. "This is-- this is what the President was having me work on. I already gave him the one he asked for, this was a backup..."
"Did he give it a name?" Shion asks, immediately focused. "Not this one. The one he took."
"A name?" Oko looks baffled. "The president isn't that kind of person...is he?"
"Everyone's allowed to have some affection for their dreams," Shion says, lifting one shoulder for a shrug.
"I... if you say so, Lieutenant. I've got to get going..."
He looks like he's going to faint, though Shion can't tell if that's from the suggestion Mayuri could harbor affection for anything or due to his ongoing poisoning.
"Take care!"
"What a reliable mentor you are," Seinosuke says as Shion goes back to moving the barrier inwards.
"It's more fun than I thought it would be," Shion freely admits. "No wonder Urahara-senpai couldn't resist recruiting such fun people."
They see no more souls, living or dead, before entering into the hallowed halls of Mayuri's private lab. The only one allowed in here besides the President of SRDI is Akon, the new 3rd seat, so it's only fitting that he, too, is sprawled on the floor, body already half eaten away by the massive pool of acid that surrounds him.
Seinosuke sighs, voice full of exasperation.
"I could have saved him if he hadn't fallen into the acid," he says. "Why would he do something so foolish, Kamiya? And this is the final room where your barrier has shrunk down to, but I don't see Mayuri anywhere. What a waste of my time."
"I didn't know you liked asking the same question twice," Shion says, idly pushing the barrier forward so that the acid is forced back away from Akon's legs. "But I'll spare you the trouble of hearing the same answer twice. Right, Mayuri?"
The green liquid gurgles.
"Kamiya," it snarls in Mayuri's voice. "You did this to me."
"Hello there, President," Shion says. "How wonderful that you survived this calamitous incident completely intact."
They continue pushing the cube further and further together, until the entire inside of the now 3 foot by 3 foot barrier is nothing but a swirling morass of smoke, purple miasma, and the green, bubbly liquid.
Seinosuke raises his eyebrow at Shion.
"So he really did survive," he says. "Hello, Kurotsuchi. I am Lieutenant Yamada of the 4th Division-- are you in need of a healer?"
"I am not," Mayuri hisses. "I am, in fact, perfectly fine. My ability, Flesh Splash, will allow me to recover and reform from any damage, no matter how severe."
"See, Seinosuke," Shion says. "He's your ideal patient: already stabilized. He's saved himself completely."
"How dull," Seinosuke says, losing interest almost immediately. "So, what was the point of all that poison in the air, then? If not as a personal protective measure."
"I don't know," Shion says. "I had nothing to do with that. What was all of that poison in the air, Mayuri?"
They poke at the cube, shrinking it another inch or so.
"My new bankai breathes endless poison," Mayuri says, managing to sound unbelievably smug for a bunch of goop being slowly pushed off a corpse. "It's inevitable it would have a little...overreaction, when its first unlocking came at the same time as such. Blatant. Sabotage."
"Sabotage!" Shion says, covering his hand with his mouth. "No... I thought you hand picked your subordinates just to prevent such treachery."
"There's no level of security that could prevent the true poison..." Mayuri says, voice dark. "You, Kamiya. You are the poison within this division. You activated the cut on my hand and throat when I was in the midst of the most delicate part of my bankai modification process, interrupting me and causing a massive explosion... but you failed. My bankai activation was successful! Now that I am qualified to become your captain... you will regret this!"
Seinosuke looks between Shion and Mayuri, and rapidly gets back to his feet.
"I'm done with my investigation," he announces. "When last I saw Shion Kamiya and Mayuri Kurotsuchi, they were both alive and well, and then I went back to bed. Good night."
"Good night, Seinosuke," Shion says, waving to him. "Don't let the bed bugs bite."
He does not favor them with a farewell on his way out.
"It must have been him who betrayed me..." Mayuri muses, as Shion begins to kneel down and rummage through Akon's ravaged corpse. "You needed someone to be your eyes and ears on me, so you'd know the right moment to strike. A pity your limited understanding of my talent meant you could not anticipate my survival."
"Why would I need anyone to betray you, President?" Shion says, voice light. "I want nothing more than to see Division 12 thrive and prosper."
Their fingers seize around the artificial soul container.
"Even now you do not let your true colors shine," Mayuri mocks them. "You cower and bow before your superiors, trying to appease those you cannot over power. Tell me-- now that I am more powerful than you, will you bend from one face to the next, acting as if you'd always been a confidante, a trusted subordinate?"
"Ah..." Shion says, holding the artificial soul up to the light, so that Mayuri can see it. "What is... this?"
Their only regret is that like this, they cannot see Mayuri's face.
"Do not touch that," Mayuri says sharply, making waves within the cube as he begins to try and break it in earnest.
It's only a small, white pill when you look at it.
"The Nemuri Project, wasn't it?" Shion says. "That was where you thought the key to your bankai would lie. Only by creating true artificial life would your zanpakuto spirit acknowledge you as its true master. But look...."
Shion holds the pill between their fingers, and crumbles it into dust.
"It's gone."
Silence.
"I'll make another one," Mayuri says, finally. "I'll make another nine. You understand nothing, Shion Kamiya! As long as I'm alive, I'll create more and more! I will assemble the perfect being!"
Shion places the hand they'd just used to break the artificial soul on top of the cube, and once more begins to press down, the size decreasing until it's barely a single foot in every direction, the liquid pushed up against all of its walls.
"You know, President," he says, smile once more twitching at the edges of his mouth. "Have you ever seen my shikai?"
"I don't have time for your games, Kamiya," Mayuri says. "Let me out this instant, or you'll face the consequences."
Shion continues to shrink their barrier, until it becomes nothing but a whirling mass of acid that they can pick up with one hand.
"Yes... that's right. I've never shown it to you. My apologies for the oversight. You see...to me, having a weapon that reflects my self is a deeply personal matter, and I really do hate baring my soul in public. But there is one exception, really."
Shion draws their short blade from their waist and slowly unsheathes it. Then, they plunge it directly into the liquid.
"You can't kill me!" Mayuri snarls. "I'm invulnerable in this form!"
"Because, me and my sword have the same rotten hobby," Shion says.
The tassel of their sword turns from white to black as the purest expression of joy on Shion's face coincides with Mayuri's gurgling scream.
"Rejoice in Suffering, Ryuketsu!"
The world in front of them fades away, replaced with the familiarity of their inner world. A common household, though not one that Shion has ever seen in his memories, And, sitting at the dining table, hands laced behind her head and feet kicked up next to her empty sake cup, Ryuketsu stares at him, black eyes languid and cold.
"If it isn't Shion," Ryuketsu drawls, crimson hair falling down her back as she drops her hand to rest on the butcher's knife that hangs at her waist, the white wrappings around her upper body blending into the proud white of her overcoat and hakama. "I'd thought you'd forgotten all about this old place, now that you had your fancy new job."
Shion takes a step forward, only to be met with that single sensation that truly brings them back to their youth.
The squelch of blood.
Every inch of this house that they can see, every inch of it they've ever been able to see, is ankle deep in it. It soaks into their white socks, their sandals, the white hem of their lab coat... everything returning to how it always looks within this world.
"How could I forget this place?" Shion says. "This is my home."
"Your home," Ryuketsu repeats, uncrossing her legs and resettling her feet on the blood soaked floor as she leans forward, one hand going under her chin. "Your home, Shion?"
The butcher's blade is in her hands in a single moment, and it ricochets in the air to thunk into the wall next to Shion's head.
"Vultures," Ryuketsu says, hand slamming down. "Circling around, peering through my windows. Pigeons. Shitting on my roof. Spiders, winding their webs where they think I can't see them. Feral strays clawing at my door. Filth, everywhere."
"And yet you seem unstained," Shion says. And he is right: where the blood soaks into Shion's own hem, it parts wherever Ryuketsu steps, her pants remaining white even in a sea of red.
"Heh," Ryuketsu scoffs, but she seems amused, the blade disappearing from behind Shion and reappearing back on her waist. "Well then. Have a seat, have a seat. No one's going to be saying I was a bad host, now are they?"
"No one would ever say that to you, Ryuketsu." Shion pulls out a seat, the motion of moving the chair back and forth enough to splash more blood onto their lab coat.
Ryuketsu snorts.
"'Cause you'd kill 'em for it," she says easily. "Hah... well, you used to. Still willing to do something like that for me, Shion?"
"I thought you disliked it when I did that," Shion says. "You said I cut everything too short."
"Did I say that?" Ryuketsu laughs, low and throaty. "That's what's wrong with you, ya know. You take everything so seriously. Can't a girl have a little fun?"
Shion feels the cold liquid slowly rise around them, blood slowly creeping up their legs as a little more of the room is lost to the crimson tide.
"You can have as much fun as you want," Shion says. "Didn't I promise you that?"
The languid look in Ryuketsu's eyes finally turns to ice.
"And what are your promises worth, Shion Kamiya? The same worth as this abandoned house. The same worth as this empty bottle!"
She hurls the sake bottle at his head, only for Shion to catch it.
"But I don't mind," Ryuketsu says, slumping down to rest her chin in one hand as the other traces an indifferent pattern in the grain of the table. "I've been entertaining myself while you were gone, after all."
"That's wonderful," Shion says, smiling at her. "I was worried about you."
"Worried?" Ryuketsu repeats, looking up at him. "About little old me? That's a riot."
Slowly, she stands up, wading through the knee deep blood to sit down on the table just to the left of Shion, red hair sliding down the side of her face as she tilts her head to stare down at them.
This close, Shion can see what precious distance had hidden. A cobweb of cracks on Ryuketu's neck, echoed in the cracks on the hilt of her blade.
Shion goes still.
"I'll kill him."
"Aw, Shion."
Ryuketsu threads her hands through their own coral hair, bringing his face closer to her own, her voice a whisper in his ear.
"Gonna kill yourself for me, now?"
Shion freezes.
"It's that bad habit of yours that got you," Ryuketsu muses. "You've always been like this. Yearning for the misery that people only feel after failing to grasp their dreams, falling short just before their end. You're immortal, so what does it matter to take 30 years? 50 years? A hundred years? That will just make their suffering all the sweeter."
She shoves Shion back with such force that the chair tips over, dumping them into the red ocean.
"But I'm not that patient," she says, watching them climb back to their feet, blood now dripping from their coat, their hands, the tips of their hair. "I told you my name. I told you what I'm meant for. And have you ever used the full extent of my abilities? No. Not once in our years together. What's the use of having a wielder like you?"
"The lack of trust truly cuts to the bone," Shion says, slowly wringing some of the blood out of their hair as they walk back to the place where Ryuketsu had originally been seated, picking up her empty sake cup and bringing it back to where he'd left the bottle. "Didn't I wait so long because I wanted to give you a proper present? To celebrate?"
From the empty bottle, green, acidic ooze pours down into Ryuketsu's cup.
Ryuketsu laughs.
"Waiting on me to complain, were you," she says. "Tell me, Shion. What's that going to taste like? It looks disgusting."
"Even now, he thinks he won't die," Shion says. "I crushed his dream in front of him, but as long as he's alive, he can simply recreate it again, newer and better. As long as he has his bankai, he can take the seat of captain, and mold the 12th Division into exactly the place he wants to be. Everything good in the world is within his grasp."
Ryuketsu picks up the cup.
"You didn't tell him, Shion?" She says, mouth curving up. "How cruel."
"Wouldn't it be better for him to die in ignorance, despairing at not knowing the cause?" Shion says.
"Wouldn't it be better for him to die screaming from his own folly?" Ryuketsu says.
Shion concedes the point.
He leans forward, his inner world overlapping with the outer world as he directs his whisper towards the still screaming Mayuri.
"Let me explain the power of my shikai, peer to peer. Or, have we ever been peers? Shinigami to shinigami, then. As it's passive ability, my blade cuts the air, leaving countless traps behind it. You remember this, yes? The slash on your wrist."
Shion shoves the cleaver deeper.
"The slash on your throat."
Inside their inner world, Ryuketsu lifts up the sake cup in a toast.
"The cuts can amount to any number, but any number past two would have just been for my own amusement, President," Shion says, and finally their cruel smile matches Ryuketsu's own. "For the third strike, delivered while I hold the blade in my own hand..."
Ryuketsu downs her cup, and Mayuri's scream goes silent.
Slowly, Shion pulls the butcher's blade back out of the black cube.
"My sword has grown used to the taste of your blood," Shion says. "Now, only your screams are enough for her to be satisfied."
A single drop of blood falls from the clean surface of the blade as Shion sheathes it.
"I'm back, Ryuketsu," he says.
Her laughter accompanies them all the way home.
They were never so much as censured for having the third, fourth, and sixth seat of their division die under their watch. Within a division, the only one with that power is the captain or the lieutenant-- and Shion is the only authority his division has.
If they wanted justice, they would never get it.
But, sadly, most of the division doesn't seem to have cared very much at all, except in the sense that working for the 12th division has now gotten safer, and practically everyone has gotten a promotion.
Shion sighs a little, bored as they poke at their newest project. Theoretically, attaching a kido spell to a piece of equipment is pretty easy, but that's only for weak spells. The last earring they tried to stick a higher ranked kido in exploded and took a lot of the room with it. It's an issue of reiatsu containment... but making it so the spell drains the reiatsu from the shinigami in the moment rather than storing it in advance completely defeats the point.
Ugh.
No Urahara to bother, no Hiyori to tease, no Mayuri to sabotage...
These days...it's so quiet in the lab.
Not for long, though. Shion's head snaps up as their seals around the compound alert them to a very distinctive presence heading in their direction.
"Lieutenant Shion?"
If it isn't little Niko Kuna. The 13th seat.
Shion looks up from their seat on the floor.
"Yes, Niko?" Shion says. "Do you need some assistance in the lab?"
Since they are, after all, now also the president of the SRDI.
"No, Lieutenant! I wouldn't bother you over something like that!" The girl seems a little anxious. "It's just-- Someone's come to visit you."
An old memory stirs.
"No one ever comes to visit me," Shion says, voice dry.
"And yet..." Ukitake's soft voice comes from behind Niko as he makes his way into the room, his long sleeved captain's haori overing his emancipated frame. "Here I am."
Shion immediately rises to their feet, brushing dust off their lab coat and offering a deep bow.
"What an honor," they say, looking around their lab for a chair to offer the captain and coming off short. There's nothing but an assortment of tables cluttered with half finished projects and chalk marking and deep grooves all over the floor. This just won't do. "This really.. Isn't a place for hosting such meritorious visitors. I'll show you to the front porch--"
"No need to hustle around on my account," Ukitake says, gently smiling at them. "I'm not that fragile, after all."
"Of course," Shion says. "Niko.. how about you go and find some tea to offer the captain? Do not take it from any of the labs."
Niko nods nervously, and practically runs out of there. She might have to go to another division to find some not from the labs, but they'd really hate to accidentally poison someone in the name of hospitality. Sacrifices must be made.
Now Shion almost wishes they'd left the tatami mats down, instead of taking them all up so they could get more floor space to draw on.
Ah, well.
They conjure a barrier for Ukitake to sit on, and then do the same for themselves, settling down to listen to whatever the good captain has to say.
"You are too kind," Ukitake says. "First of all, I would like to express my deepest sympathy-- it is not easy losing any member of your division, and you have faced quite a number of losses in such a short time."
Shion nods seriously.
"It means a lot to me that you came all this way to check in on me," they say. "While I can't say I was very close to many of the people in my division, their loss is a loss for the Seireitei, and I often find myself missing their presence."
"How reassuring," Ukitake says, tucking his hands into his sleeves. "That actually brings me to the very thing I'd come to talk about."
"I am...all ears," Shion says. They're not...worried, exactly. Concerned. Intrigued.
"As you may know, my lieutenant actually got married last year," Ukikate says.
Shion is shocked when he doesn't start pulling out pictures and showing them off to them on the spot.
"I did hear about that," Shion says. Didn't they say they needed to get a fan? They need something to do with their hands at times like these. "Kaien married your 3rd seat, right? Miyako. Congratulations to the happy couple."
"It was such a wonderful ceremony," Ukitake says, the sincerity of his tone putting even Shion's most earnest attempts at humility to shame with ease. "But, I've recently been facing a bit of a dilemma. You see, Miyako is such a talented individual. She's brilliant, devoted, powerful... lieutenant level, in fact."
"Wow..." Shion says, lacing their hands together. "That's quite impressive, coming from you. It's a good thing that there are three open lieutenant slots right now, then. In fact, Captain Kyoroku is one of the people with an opening... right? Surely he'd take your recommendation."
A shadow crosses Ukitake's face.
"Lisa was...one of Shunsui's closest companions for more than half a century," Ukitake says. "He hides it well, but the grief is still fresh in his heart for the past decade, and I suspect many more decades to come. No...I couldn't do that to him."
"I didn't think," Shion says, backtracking quickly. "Of course I shouldn't take the captain's posturing to heart. But then-- Is there something wrong with Kaname? He also remains without a lieutenant, due to the circumstances in which he was promoted..."
"It's good that you are on friendly terms with him," Ukitake says. "I worry about him, unable to rely on his captain for advice or his juniors for aid."
But still, he shakes his head firmly.
"Aizen, too, remains without a lieutenant. However, the main issue is Miyako, herself, doesn't want to be promoted," he says. "Very like her husband, sadly."
"That is truly unfortunate," Shion agrees, more confused than ever at where Ukitake is going with this, and what it has to do with him. "So, how can I help you..?"
"It bothers me to speak so numerically of the dead," Ukitake says, voice delicate, "But I notice that you are, indeed, without a 3rd seat."
Shion pauses.
"I...am," they say. "He died from injuries sustained while attempting to unlock bankai...truly a tragic passing."
"The path to captaincy is ever one of hidden dangers," Ukitake agrees.
He takes a sip from the tea that Niko had finally arrived with.
"But I have full confidence you will maneuver around those dangers soon enough," he says. "And then, wouldn't it be natural for your 3rd seat to step up? Especially with such support from her captain."
Shion takes his own sip of the tea. Bland, but not offensive. Probably taken from Ukitake's own division, since they are right next door to one another.
"You have an unexpected amount of faith in me," Shion admits. "Are you sure you want to take this gamble? As I told the captain commander himself, I don't see bankai happening in any of the next coming decades."
"A bankai is only one way of measuring power," Ukitake says, eyes clear and unworried. "Do not reverse cause and effect, Lieutenant. A captain's power is not their bankai: the bankai is merely a symbol of the captain's power."
"How reassuring," Shion says, not reassured. "But if this is your choice, so be it. The 12th Division does not reject anyone, nor does it allow anyone to leave, unless they are lieutenant and above. I can only promise that whether she comes to think of this place as her home, or merely a stop on her journey: the only place she can go is up."
Ukitake sets the cup down on the barrier gently, and rises to his feet.
"You already speak like a captain," he says. "And... I will say one last thing before I leave."
"Yes, Captain Ukitake? I am always eager to hear your wisdom."
"The Soul Society has come from a dark place. And still, its past molds the present in its image. But Shion.. You are done cleaning house, yes?"
Shion smiles back at Ukitake.
"I'm satisfied with my division," he says. "Do not worry, captain... I will treat Miyako with the greatest care I am capable of."
a/n: lol
Ryuketsu: 'Bloodshed'
![Indelible Stains [Bleach SI/OC]](/data/threadmark-index-icons/l/62/62919.jpg?1651916530){kind=icon}
