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“Ikkaku? Ikkaku .”
Ikkaku was a man that slept like a rock. He could sleep through the sound of howling storm winds while camping in the open. He could sleep through the sound of a thunderstorm right over his head. He could even sleep through the sound of a tree crashing to the ground beside him after being split by lightning from said storm. But for some reason, that urgent whisper always managed to make it through the usually impenetrable fog of unconsciousness that surrounded Ikkaku while he slept.
He mumbled something unintelligible as he turned onto his side and lifted the covers of the futon automatically. Pulling them down and wrapping an arm securely around the warm trembling form that settled beside him, Ikkaku wondered not for the first time why Yumichika found his presence so comforting when he wasn’t even good at consoling people, and in fact religiously avoided it.
But then again, Yumichika always seemed to be an exception to his norms. And after countless decades, Ikkaku could only blame himself for letting the other man develop the childish habit of crawling into his bed after a nightmare . . .
There it was again. That quiet gasp of surprise and terror. It never failed to draw Ikkaku out of his strange raucous dreams filled with glorious epic battles. It was strange how such an utterly soft sound could break through the noisy cacophony of the wars in his dreaming head. While a nuisance, it was not nearly as annoying as the even softer sounds that always followed soon after, small shuddering gasps and harsh breaths, incessant and rhythmic. Ikkaku would try to claim sleep again, but the sounds never let him; he’d always ended up having to wait, eyes still closed for appearances’ sake, for it to cease before he could return to his dreams again.
It didn’t happen often, maybe a handful of times in a year. So Ikkaku never said anything, and pretended he didn’t hear the way Yumichika quietly sobbed himself into exhaustion after waking from a nightmare every few months. Yumichika for his part, took great pains to keep himself quiet after waking, and always rushed to wash the sleep and tears away before facing Ikkaku in the morning, eyes just a tidbit more swollen than usual, which, had Ikkaku been unawares, would have been overlooked as a regular sign of sleepiness.
Ikkaku had concluded from his behavior that Yumichika didn’t want him to know, and thus pretended he didn’t. But after nearly two decades, that wasn’t exactly easy anymore. By this point, Ikkaku would be a fool to deny that the other young man had long ago ceased being a mere traveling companion, and had become an actual friend. Ikkaku also understood what it meant to have pride and save face, but as he listened to Yumichika cough quietly as he choked on a sob, he couldn’t pretend it didn’t affect him anymore.
Yumichika was extremely strong-willed, and he had never cried for anything in Ikkaku’s presence. Yumichika became angry or annoyed mostly, and sometimes he got upset. But Yumi didn’t cry when upset, he sulked and brooded quietly like any other man. The only exception to that rule was the nights like this one, when he startled awake with a gasp, out of the grip of some nightmare. But what could be so terrifying as to make the normally unaffected young man cry like a lost child?
Dammit it all to hell if Ikkaku didn’t figure it out tonight.
His thin blanket fell away as he sat up, blinking at the light of the campfire burning beside him. They were outside tonight, foregoing an inn to conserve their funds for food. He looked over at Yumichika’s trembling form in the orange glow of the fire.
Ikkaku had never learned how to handle crying people, much less crying people he actually gave a shit about. What the hell was he supposed to do with a crying Yumichika? Because he didn’t know the answer to the situation, Ikkaku did what he normally did: got agitated. Without any sort of preamble, he reached over the few feet of distance between him and Yumichika and tapped him on the shoulder.
“ Oi . Quit that already, will you?” Ikkaku said gruffly, not knowing how else to say what he meant.
Yumichika choked in surprise, turning wide teary eyes to Ikkaku briefly before a look that Ikkaku swore was hurt passed through them and he looked down. The face that was already red from tears, further flushed with embarrassment. When he spoke, Ikkaku had never imagined Yumichika’s voice could sound so small.
“I-I’m sorry . . . I’ll just l-leave,” Yumi stuttered out hastily through a tight throat.
He got up quickly, and slipping on his geta, made to move into the small woods around them. Ikkaku realized his brash words had been a mistake, and instead of getting the answers he wanted, his social ineptitude had made Yumichika shut him out.
“Tsk, damn. Yumichika, wait up,” He got up and followed barefoot, his longer stride quickly catching up.
“L-Leave me alone,” Yumichika answered miserably, hurrying his steps, but Ikkaku managed to grab a hold of his kimono sleeve anyway.
Yumi turned then to brush him off, but doing so put the campfire which until then had been blocked from view by Ikkaku’s body, directly back into his line of sight. Ikkaku watched in horrified fascination as Yumichika’s eyes widened impossibly, seeing something not of the here or the now, and he let loose a scream so chilling it gave Ikkaku gooseflesh.
Yumichika turned away from the fire then, making to flee into the woods. Ikkaku would be damned if he was going to let an incoherent Yumichika run around a dark forest because of some unknown terror only his mind could see. He grabbed the frantic man by the waist, effectively stopping him from going anywhere despite his struggles; but that didn’t stop the harsh sobs and desperate gasps he was emitting from coming at a faster and faster rate until he was hardly breathing anymore. Ikkaku turned Yumi around to face him and saw even in the dim light of the fire that his face was going blue.
“Oi! Yumichika!” Ikkaku shook him a little, trying to get Yumi to look at him, “Oi! Breathe , dammit!”
But Yumichika only turned bluer now that he was in the firelight and it suddenly dawned on Ikkaku that it was because he could still see the fire. He dragged Yumi a few feet away and pulled them behind a wide tree. Yumichika was going limp.
“Fuck!” Ikkaku shook harder this time, commanding in a harsh tone as he lifted the other’s chin up to meet terrified eyes, “Yumi! BREATHE !”
Yumichika gasped and coughed, and would have crumpled to the floor in a boneless heap if Ikkaku hadn’t caught him. He sat them down carefully on the ground, resting his back against the tree trunk, legs splayed. Yumichika was kneeling in front of him trembling, and taking deep shuddering breaths. Ikkaku could see silent tears dripping off his chin to fall onto the dirt below.
“C’mon . . . You still ain’t done?” he complained uneasily, and winced when Yumichika’s only response was a laugh that sounded horribly like a sob as he bowed his head lower and hid his face within his sleeve covered hands.
Dammit, that wasn’t what Ikkaku had meant either . Ignoring the biting sense of guilt suddenly blooming in his chest, he racked his brain trying to remember how it was you were supposed to comfort people. He suddenly remembered seeing an old woman embrace a crying child a few weeks ago in the market.
He moved forward with a sigh and awkwardly encircled his arms around Yumichika, drawing him close. Yumi froze and tensed at the move, and for a minute Ikkaku thought Yumichika was going to deck him. Instead, he was a little bewildered when Yumi melted into the embrace. Burying his face in the crook of Ikkaku’s neck, Yumi did not turn into a sobbing mess as the child he had seen, but still shuddered with mostly silent tears. Ikkaku made no other move. He didn’t rub Yumi’s back, or smooth his hair, he simply lay back against the tree and held him tightly, waiting a small eternity before he pushed his friend back with a large gentle hand on his head.
“Seriously, enough a that,” Ikkaku’s tone was still a little too gruff, but his thumbs were gently wiping the dampness from Yumichika’s face.
He stood, and gave a hand up to Yumichika, not really letting go of it as he led the other man back to their camp. The fire elicited another shudder, but nothing more serious. Ikkaku let go of his hand to push their sleeping mats together, and sat down; Yumichika followed suit in a drowsy stupor. He was shivering, so Ikkaku threw a blanket over his shoulders. Together they sat in silence and stared at the fire. Ikkaku wouldn’t ask a thing; but if Yumichika wanted to volunteer information, he’d gladly listen. Sure enough, after a few minutes he broke the silence, voice scratchy from a throat that hadn’t quite shaken off the tears yet.
“It feels so real doesn’t it?” Yumi asked in a near whisper.
“Yea,” Ikkaku agreed. With that, Yumichika confirmed what Ikkaku had guessed might be the problem.
Dreams, like his of glorious battles, or Yumichika’s nightmares, were remnants . The impressions of a soul’s last moments before dying. They were the only memories of the previous life a soul could retain, and only if their death had been violently bloody or unbearably anguished. Ikkaku’s had been the first; he guessed Yumichika’s had been the second. Regardless, when the images floated out of a soul’s subconscious as dreams, they could be frighteningly real. Ikkaku always woke up grinning with bloodlust, but Yumichika always awoke gasping in terror.
“So . . .” Ikkaku ventured after some silence, “What happened to you?”
Yumichika already knew how Ikkaku had died, as a warrior, proudly fighting to the death. Ikkaku had revealed it one morning after he’d been particularly violent to a pack of thieves that had tried to make off with their money. He had dreamt of his final battle during the night, and had still been filled with the bloodlust from it. It had been an honorable death that he had had no qualms bragging about.
Now, he was filled with as much dread as curiosity to know what miserable fate had befallen his friend, if his nightmares were anything to go by. He prepared himself to hear something most unpleasant. Yumichika stalled for a long while before finally revealing it all.
“There was a plague. It was terrible . . . and highly contagious. When I got sick, I was isolated for a few days, but I wasn’t getting better . . . I smelled the smoke first, then everything started to burn . . . .” His voice was small and halting, trembling slightly, “It was so hot . . . I thought I would melt. It was so, so hot . . . I-It hurt so much . . . I just wanted to die already but . . . I just k-kept burning . I tried to get out but . . . the door was locked . . . from the outside . . . It was so terribly hot... ”
Yumichika’s voice died out, and he sat biting his lower lip to keep it from trembling as he wrung the corner of the blanket in between his hands. Ikkaku had seen and heard his fair share of horrible deaths, but thinking about being burned alive by his own family made his stomach turn just slightly.
An ordinary soul would have long gone mad, having to relive such terrible final moments through their dreams for countless years. It would weigh on their minds, haunting them, turning them recluse and hostile. A betrayal like that would break a common soul and keep them from trusting ever again. Who could you put your faith in, when your own family had stabbed you in the back?
Yumichika, Ikkaku had long figured out, was no ordinary soul, but the new insight only served to raise his opinion of the other even higher. Deep somewhere in a place he wouldn’t yet consciously acknowledge, it floored him how much trust Yumichika was able to place in him despite such a betrayal; and he made a personal vow to do his damnedest to keep hold of it. But Ikkaku didn’t say any of that, and the only condolence he offered for what he’d heard was a long tension releasing sigh.
“We should get some sleep. We’re heading out for the next district ‘morrow,” he finally said.
They both stretched out on their mats once more. But Ikkaku couldn’t sleep, not with Yumichika hiccupping regularly and still occasionally sniffling like that. Finally, it became more than he could stand and in his drowsy state he moved almost unconsciously, doing something he’d never have done with a clear mind. He turned and pulled Yumichika’s smaller form against him, draping an arm over the other’s waist.
“ Hush ,” he murmured into the dark hair beneath his chin.
If only from shock Yumichika did, and they both soon drifted into a dreamless sleep . . .
Yumichika later told him that he had never before been able to get back to sleep after a nightmare, until he’d slept beside Ikkaku. That was the only reason, Ikkaku insisted to himself as his friend shifted closer to him, that to this day he still allowed Yumichika to sneak into his academy dorm, and crawl into his futon. It was the only reason he tightened his arm around the smaller sniffling form beside him and drew him closer. And the only reason, he ever bothered to murmur as he’d murmured every time since that first night.
“ Hush .”
But Ikkaku didn’t have a reason for pressing his lips to the crown of Yumichika’s head before tucking it under his chin.