𝐒𝐓𝐑𝐈𝐕𝐄 | 𝐁𝐥𝐞𝐚𝐜𝐡 [MINOR EDITING]

³⁶ ɪɴ ᴛʀᴜᴛʜ

ʙᴀᴄᴋ sᴛᴏʀʏ ᴛɪᴍᴇ!

I don't know what to say. I'd planned to go searching for him, to reunite with my father once my assignment ended, to hurry and finish my task of returning the well-over two-hundred souls to the Soul Society to fix things and then spend the rest of my allotted time with this man. But now that he stands here before me, mere minutes after my arrival, I am at a loss for words.

I splutter and stammer on each attempt to form a sentence. I shake my head, trying to start over. But my father speaks first.

"Abaron." My heart stops, my body rigid. Hearing him say my name... it's as if I never died in the first place. "I knew you'd come, sooner or later."

"Y-You did?" I pant. I'd been holding my breath.

"Of course," he says, his hands now shoved deep into the sleeves of his oversized robe. "Your mother... she always planned things a few steps ahead of everyone. I assume that there is her Zanpakutõ?"

I clutch Bõkyaku's hilt in both hands.

"Y-Yes," I say. "I inherited it from her after she was executed."

"I know. She told me her plans, long before you and your sister were even born."

I raise an eyebrow of concern.

"You mean to say that she wanted to kill me before I'd even been a forethought?" I say, my voice becoming more and more grave as the reality thoroughly sinks in. It could also be the burning sensation from my wound.

"As terrible as it sounds, yes, this is the case. She'd wanted a successor. After over eight hundred years of being a Soul Reaper, she wanted an out." He stops speaking suddenly, and gestures to the open space around him. "But how about we take this conversation back to the manor?" he suggests. "It's gotten a bit... chilly out here."

My father gracefully glides across his platform of reishi, not even moving a single foot in the process. With a glance up at the hapless Shuren, I clutch my bleeding shoulder and jog after him.

-

The silence between me, my father and Shuren is near unbearable. There's a tightness in my throat that just refuses to relent and it's exhausting. My father was right; it is cold out. But I'm flushed all over so the cold doesn't touch me. It barely manages to provide a relief from my frustrations.