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That Nostalgic Summer Rain (Bleach/Kara no Kyoukai)

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I suspect I'm not gonna have time to write over the weekend so let's see if I can update today or tomorrow...
Adhoc vote count started by Mortifer on Aug 14, 2018 at 9:44 PM, finished with 19 posts and 19 votes.
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Update 13
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    • [X] The Abandoned Hospital

    "Here we are." Arisawa declared.

    The walk had been in silence, discounting when Arisawa had to give Fujino instructions. It had been a bit of a walk, but honestly, it only felt like it took a long time because neither of the girls had really talked during the walk.

    Fujino didn't want to be the one to bring up the topic of Arisawa's friends not telling her about the supernatural earlier. She didn't want to look like she was being rude, and if she didn't mind her own business, she might accidentally offend Arisawa. If Arisawa wanted to talk about it, she would raise the subject, wouldn't she?

    Though on the other hand, perhaps Arisawa wasn't raising the issue because she didn't want to come across as rude by bothering other people with her own problems. That was a possibility as well. If that was the case, Asagami didn't know what to do about it, but perhaps she should keep it under consideration.

    But then, now was really not the time to think about that topic. They had arrived at the abandoned hospital. There was a chance that whoever was making the fairies was, or has been, here recently. If they were here, or if there was any evidence here that would held with determining what was going on, then it was important not to miss anything by having thoughts wander to irrelevant topics.

    "Uh, Asagami?" Arisawa suddenly asked, her tone suddenly shifting into confusion. "You know how I could kinda see vague shimmers and stuff for ghosts and fairies?"

    "Yes?" Fujino asked, prompting her to continue. She was clearly going somewhere with this, and if she wasn't panicking, then it probably wasn't urgent.

    "How do I put this..." Arisawa muttered. "Is there a reason why I can suddenly see them in a lot more detail?"

    Asagami paused.

    "That is odd." Fujino mused. "Can you tell me what you're seeing?"

    "There's a ghost over in the distance." Arisawa replied. "There's a chain attached to it. It's looking at the hospital and tugging at the chain but nothings happening."

    Fujino briefly considered flicking on her clairvoyance to confirm the sight, but decided against it.

    "That's strange." Fujino noted. "I don't know enough about the topic of seeing ghosts to know if it means anything, but it is strange."

    "Yeah." Arisawa replied. "Well, at least now I'll be able to see if there's any fairies around, I suppose. This is weird, though."

    "Let's enter then, shall we?" Fujino shifted the subject. "Where is the entrance?"

    "Just walk forward until you hit the building, then turn right and walk." Arisawa advised, still sounding distracted. She was just paying attention to the ghost, wasn't she?

    Tapping her cane forward as she walked until she found the wall of the abandoned hospital, Fujino took the turn and alternated tapping her cane against the wall and the ground in front of her, ensuring the ground was clear and she found the door.

    "It's not sealed off is it, Arisawa?" Fujino asked.

    "It's fine." Arisawa replied, not sounding like she was paying attention.

    Moving onward, Fujino found the door, and pushed against it. Surprisingly, it did actually open. Fujino would have thought it would at least be locked.

    "I'm going in now Arisawa."

    "Right, right." Arisawa replied, and footsteps started coming towards Fujino.

    Fujino walked into the hospital, and immediately, the staleness in the air tempted her to walk back out. It took a moment for her lungs to adjust to the air, and she moved further inwards, giving room for Arisawa to step in.

    "So this place is meant to be magic then?" Arisawa asked. "Is there any way we would noti- Gah!"

    "Arisawa?" Fujino asked, a note of panic in her voice. "Are you okay?"

    "I'm fine." Arisawa replied. "It's just, jeez, what was that? I walked in and it felt like all of my bones shook a bit. Hurt a bit, but it was only a moment of pain. Did you feel anything like that?"

    "I didn't notice anything like that." Fujino replied truthfully, though she knew that Arisawa was lacking context on why she wouldn't. "That doesn't mean it was nothing. Perhaps it was some kind of magic thing, and it didn't effect me for the same reason the fairies can't take my memories?"

    Or she didn't feel it because her clairvoyance wasn't on so she couldn't really feel pain from anything, but for all Fujino knew she could be telling the truth. Or perhaps it really was Arisawa noticing something strange.

    Though, that said, Arisawa seemed to be in a better mood than she had been before they walked to the hospital. Had the extra time and distraction given her time to take her mind off of it, or was she just putting on more of an act now to hide it?

    Hopefully the first.

    Walking forward a bit more, Fujino kept checking the path in front of her. "Arisawa, are there any signs with directions around this place?"

    "I don't see any." Arisawa replied. "And this is kind of a big building. Where should we look?"

    "How big is the building, again?" Fujino asked. "I'm not sure if it was ever mentioned."

    "It's pretty big." Arisawa confirmed. "Several floors and wings. It might take a while to search everything. Especially since I doubt there's any working elevators here..."

    Perhaps it would be wise to use her clairvoyance, then. It would only take a moment to look through the entire building.

    Taking a breath, Fujino closed her unseeing eyes, and opened her figurative third eye. Her vision activated and expanded, and for a fraction of a second, she felt a jolt of pain rattle down her bones. She savoured it for a moment, before looking around.

    Momentarily, she looked around to ensure there were no Hollows nearby. None were in or around the building, and so Fujino focused her gaze to the building itself. Scanning through it, she looked through the empty floors and rooms. Nothing, for so long, but darkness. Some cobwebs and insects. Parts of the building near the roof looked damaged for some reason, but apart from that, the upper floors were empty.

    Eventually, she saw something off, and upon focusing on it, Fujino confirmed her suspicions. A room filled with paper and tools and all sorts of other equipment. She didn't get a good look at the room, but once she knew it was there, she just needed to see the path.

    "I know where it is." Fujjino declared, deactivating her clairvoyance. "First floor, near the back of the building."

    "Psychic powers are really useful, huh." Arisawa noted. "Well, let's go."

    The two of them walked through the building for some time, with a few detours when they took turns into dead ends and needed to backtrack, but had been able to find it eventually.

    Pausing momentarily by the door, Fujino considered what she should do once she entered the room.

    There wasn't anyone in there, but with the amount of stuff left in the room, it would be a necessity to look at what was actually in there. And with that in mind, it might be important that Fujino actually used her clairvoyance, so she could read what was on the paper and see what everything was.

    And if she was going to be in that mindset, then it would be in her best interest to keep Arisawa out of the room.

    "Arisawa?" Fujino asked. "I may need to use my abilities to examine the evidence in the room, and Urahara had mentioned it attracts Hollows. Would you mind watching the halls so you can call out if I don't feel them coming?"

    "Huh? Oh, yeah, I could do that." Arisawa replied. "Will you be able to find anything just with your abilities?"

    "I'll let you know if I need you." Asagami answered, as she stepped into the room.

    The door shut behind her, and taking another breath, Fujino activated her ESP once again.

    Looking through the room, Asagami searched for anything that could be relevant. Nearly immediately, she noticed something. By the back of the room, with some distance away from everything else, was a collection of jars against the wall. Each was labelled with a name, and bar one, they had a fairy stored inside, bouncing away from the glass.

    That would confirm it, then. Whoever was making the fairies had set up base here, and she could find some clue as to who it was here.

    Taking a moment to focus on the names, Fujino read them internally.

    Three names in, and it occurred to her that the names on the jars were familiar. In fact, weren't they the same names as people in Keita's gang? The ones who had-

    Repeat the phrase enough, and it becomes a curse.

    "Bend."

    The jars shattered as Fujino's power bent around them, shattering the glass and crushing the fairies within. She noted, momentarily, that they seemed more solid then the other's she had seen before, but they died all the same. Fujino smiled softly as her power tore apart the various fairies, and that simple joy was enough that she didn't even linger on how the amount of jars was exactly equal to the number of people she had killed.

    "Asagami?" Arisawa called from outside. "What was that?"

    Ah. Shattering glass was loud, wasn't it?

    "There were some fairies in jars in here." Fujino replied. "I was dealing with them."

    "Got it." Arisawa replied. "Did you get them all?"

    "I did." Fujino confirmed. "Is it still all clear outside?"

    "It is." Arisawa nodded slightly outside the room as she spoke, and Fujino let out a breath.

    Still, this had to have confirmed it. There was the memory-consuming fairies in jars with the names and number identical to the murders Fujino had committed. Did the one who had made the fairies know about Fujino in advance? Did they know she would come after them? Or, given that they had been in Reien Academy, was it simply that they had gathered information on Fujino and kept it on hand just in case?

    It was worry, that someone else could have found out about Fujino's history so easily. What exactly had happened, though? Had the fairies eaten the memories of whatever ghosts her victims left behind?

    Perhaps she was lingering on that for too long. Asagami needed to find out anything she could about the current scenario.

    Refocusing her gaze, Asagami looked towards the various papers in the room, scattered across the ground. She noticed a textbook from Reien, and what looked like a map, which had circled Karakura Town on it. There was another book near it that had been left open, and the writing inside it was strange. For some reason, it looked as if several different languages had been used in the writing. German, English, Russian, Arabic, and Japanese words had been written, all in the same page. Was this some kind of code, to keep information hidden?

    The Japanese phrasing mentioned Karakura Town, and Fujino took a moment to focus in on the kanji more. If she was reading it properly, and the sentences before and after it didn't change the context, it seemed to refer to Karakura town as being spiritual land, in which the barrier between life and death was fragile.

    Moving over towards the page and flipping to another page with her cane, Asagami kept reading. The page was covered in languages that Asagami couldn't recognise, but after flicking through a few pages, she found a page with other various languages, with another person's handwriting making notes of translation.

    It was disjointed, and several points hadn't been translated, but Fujino saw some wording. Communion with dead spirits, binding the dead, necromancy. So, whoever it was wanted to talk to somebody who had died? But then, how did Misaya play into this?

    An idea came over Asagami, as she shifted her psychic gaze towards the Reien textbook. Trying to look within the pages was pointless, as there was no light within the pages, but upon walking over towards it and using her cane to shift the page, she found the name on the inside of the cover.

    Tachibana Kaori. The name of Ouji's friend, the girl who had died months ago. When Misaya had disappeared, someone had noticed Tachibana's old things disappear as well. Looking around near the textbook, Fujino saw a hairbrush, a scrap of cloth that resembled the sleeve of her uniform, and a necklace. Were all of these also Tachibana's things?

    It didn't matter. There was one item here which Fujino knew belonged to Tachibana. And with that in mind, it was easy to put together a guess of what happened.

    Was this Misaya's doing? Was she the one who had created the fairies, after all? Had she come to Karakura seeking some way to talk to her lost friend?

    But then, if that was the case, that raised further questions. Why was that book written in so many different languages, in a different handwriting? Why had Misaya disappeared the day the teacher had died, if the evidence implied she was here to find the ghost of a girl who had died months ago? If she was the one who had made the fairies, when had she learnt?

    There was a lot of questions Asagami didn't have the answer to yet, and this room may have some answers to that question. All she had to do was decide where she had to look first.

    Misaya clearly intended to return to this place. She had left too much behind to simply abandon this place, given how much evidence she had left behind. And if she wasn't here, she could be back at any moment. Fujino wouldn't have the chance to examine the room if Misaya arrived, so for now, she had to prioritise. What would give the most information?

    [X] Look through the coded and translated book. Even if most of it was incomprehensible, some of it could be important.
    [X] Look closely at the map. Perhaps other important locations would be marked, which may prove useful.
     
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    • [X] Look closely at the map. Perhaps other important locations would be marked, which may prove useful.

    We can photocopy the book.
     
    [X] Look closely at the map. Perhaps other important locations would be marked, which may prove useful.
     
    [X] Look through the coded and translated book. Even if most of it was incomprehensible, some of it could be important.
     
    [X] Look closely at the map. Perhaps other important locations would be marked, which may prove useful.
     
    [X] Look closely at the map. Perhaps other important locations would be marked, which may prove useful.
    Even if the book has info we wouldn't be able to pick out what is or isn't important. Maps on the other hand provide information about locations where our suspect might be.
     
    [X] Look closely at the map. Perhaps other important locations would be marked, which may prove useful.
     
    [X] Look closely at the map. Perhaps other important locations would be marked, which may prove useful.

    I feel the book will give some context, but it is better to know where to look for more information if we aren't taking anything with us.
    I am assuming that Arisawa does not have anything she can use to copy things down.
     
    [X] Look closely at the map. Perhaps other important locations would be marked, which may prove useful.

    Sounds good , let's do it.
     
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