𝐈𝐍 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐄𝐍𝐃 | 𝐁𝐥𝐞𝐚𝐜𝐡 [Discontinued]

↠ 5 ↞

She hummed quietly under her breath as she made her way towards her daughter's room, ready to check on her before heading to bed herself with her husband. She paused when she saw that the door was cracked open. She could have sworn that she had closed the door earlier and that no one had gone into the room.

She slowly approached the door, ready for a threat to be on the other side. She reached a hand out and lightly pushed the door open a little. She peeked inside and froze at the side of a man with long blond hair sitting in the rocking chair, eyes locked onto her daughter's form.

Despite her better judgment, she pushed the door open all the way. His eyes left the little girl's form and locked onto the woman's. He betrayed no emotion as she brought a fist up to her chest.

"Are you here to hurt her?" she asked quietly. She didn't want her daughter to wake up or alert her husband of the intruder.

He shook his head. "Never," he answered just as quietly.

She stared at him for a moment longer before nodding and leaving the room, leaving the stranger and her daughter alone.

"I would never dream of harming her," he whispered softly.

- - - - - - - - - -

20 YEARS LATER

"So, let me get this straight," Arisawa Tatsuki, a friend of Sayuri's, said. "You've been seeing spirits and these...Hollow...things for as long as you can remember-"

An arm slammed Tatsuki into the wall, Orihime calling out her name in fear.

"-one of them attacked Orihime and I last night-"

Sayuri appeared and blocked the Hollow from grabbing Orihime.

"-which happened to be Orihime's deceased brother-"

Part of the Hollow's mask fell off to reveal the face of Sora Inoue.

"-and you were given Shinigami powers by Kuchiki-san-"

Sayuri, with tears in the corners of her eyes, brought the blade of her Zanpakutō down through Sora's face.

"-which helped you send him to this Soul Society?"

"Pretty much," Sayuri said, a sweatdrop resting on her temple at Tatsuki's unwavering gaze.

Both girls and Orihime were sitting at a picnic table on the university grounds. They had just gotten out of class when Tatsuki cornered Sayuri and demanded that she explain what had happened the previous night.

"Why didn't you tell us this?" Tatsuki finally sighed.

Sayuri smiled softly. "I didn't want to drag you into my mess. It gets dangerous and I didn't want to risk your safety, and Orihime's."

"Don't do it again, okay?" Tatsuki said. "I want to be kept in the loop."

Sayuri hesitated before nodding. "Okay."

"How's Rukia-chan doing?" Orihime asked with a kind smile.

Sayuri snorted. "She's...adjusting," she said. "She finds university and other aspects of human life to be odd, but other than that, there's been no issues. Fingers crossed, though."

She froze as a large wave of Reiatsu rushed over her. Doors slamming open drew her attention to see Rukia rushing over to her. "Got to go," she managed to say before Rukia grabbed her arm and began to drag her away.

- - - - - - - - - -

One more slash of her Zanpakutō and the Hollow was cleansed and gone. Sayuri exhaled and wiped some sweat off her forehead. She turned to look at Rukia, who was staring at her phone with creased brows.