Work Text:
He still remembered vividly when the morbid masquerade began.
The first butterfly had fallen one frigid night of spring. Then, on a particularly hot summer's day, the new one emerged in her wake.
Kanzaburou had just announced to 19-year-old Giyuu that the Master had called for an emergency hashira meeting. He felt his stomach turn into a hollow pit. These types of meetings were often one of two things: someone had to be replaced, or a replacement had been found. Neither was good news to Giyuu.
It's been two years since the last pillar had been killed. He fervently hoped they were not being summoned to be told that another vacancy has opened...
He arrived early at the meeting place, and since he wanted as much as possible to steer clear of the other hashiras, he decided to wait in the garden. He'd figured after a while that people stopped bothering you if you mostly kept quiet. Unless they were someone like the older Kochou sister. He could still remember how she'd try to involve him in conversations that he deliberately opted out of. But he never knew how to properly receive her invitations, and he ended up appearing dismissive, much to Shinazugawa's vexation.
She was a kind person... how unfortunate...
It was then that he caught the trail of what looked like her haori at the periphery of his vision. The flowy white garment disappeared behind the shoji walls of the meeting hall. His eyes widened. It's been a while since he'd seen the unique butterfly pattern that the Flower Hashira wore. But he could be wrong. After all, the glare of the bright sun could play tricks on one's eyes. Not to mention, the scorching heat. It was probably getting to his head.
He decided to finally take refuge in the meeting hall to escape from the sun. But also, he wanted to satisfy his curiosity if he truly saw what he thought he saw.
When he entered the hall, there were already cushions arranged on the floor, but there wasn't anyone seated yet. There were two seats in front, for Oyakata-sama and his wife, and one, two... five for the hashira.
There hasn't been a fifth one in a while...
Giyuu sighed and whispered regretfully, "I see we've found someone to fill your post..." Then he kneeled next to where his fallen comrade used to sit. "Thank you for all you'd done," he murmured.
"Ara~" Giyuu froze despite the sweltering heat, and his heart dropped when he heard the familiar lilt of the voice that always addressed him kindly.
He looked up and his face paled, the ghost of the haori the woman used to wear hanging before him, until the figure stooped down closer to him and he realized that it was not immaterial, and that someone was, in fact, wearing it.
"I didn't know you two were close," the voice continued, but it was not from the person he had expected.
"K-kochou-imouto?"
"Yes, Tomioka-san. It's me. Did I startle you?"
"Why are you..."
"There is a meeting, is there not?"
It took Giyuu a second to put two and two together. Then his heart sank. "You're a pillar now too?"
"I am," Shinobu answered in a perfectly modulated, sweet voice again, which he had never heard from her before. It was true that they did not get a lot of chances to talk in the past, but he remembered how her bold and rash way of speaking contrasted her sister's meek and gentle tone.
"I see..." Giyuu looked away, not really knowing what to say.
"Hmm..." He heard her hum, and he could just picture the smile that brightened Kanae's face whenever she made such a sound. "Most people congratulate me... But here you are almost looking sorry for me. You're an interesting one, Tomioka-san."
Giyuu's eyes darted back to her. "No, that's not it! I just don't think..." he trailed off. He had so many thoughts about the new assignment, about the unusual way she was acting, and about how she had clothed herself in her own grief like he did, that he just couldn't find the words to say. After all, he was not one trained in the art of sugarcoating, and neither of them might like any word that he'd manage to pull out. But then, a hint of sadness softened his often stone-cold expression, and he was able to ask her the one thing he could muster, "Kochou, are you sure you want this?"
Her eyebrows twitched. For a split second, the sharp edges of a glare penetrated her mask of a perfect smile before she was able to cover it up again.
"Ara ara~ that's an interesting question, Tomioka-san..." Her voice remained sweet, but it had a hollowness to it; it made his blood freeze in his veins. "Want, hm? Well, everyone says it's an honor... How about you, Tomioka-san? Is this something you had wanted?"
Giyuu only looked down as his mind summoned the image of an old friend's smile--the price he had to pay for this 'honor.'
"Hm. I suppose I 'want' to be here as much as you do!" She giggled, and it did not make him feel better.
"Kochou..." For a moment, it had become a blur to Giyuu which one he was referring to.
"Ah, I think the rest are approaching. I should go ahead and take my seat. If you'll excuse me," the younger Kochou bowed briefly, and with the semblance of an innocent smile, she tipped her head to the side and said, "I hope we get along, hm?"
Giyuu swallowed a lump forming in his throat, but he found that his mouth had dried. It was something the elder Kochou would say; it was something she often did say. And yet, hearing it again now, it felt like a mere echo, with the true source of the words long gone.
As the younger Kochou walked away, he saw how even the cadence of her steps had lost its roughness, replaced by the fluid and graceful gait that was her sisters. And, perhaps as another cruel trick of the summer sun's glare, the shadow she cast on the ground looked to him like the silhouette of the fallen butterfly.
For years henceforth, the younger Kochou would scream in the deafening loudness of her actions that they had buried the wrong sister that spring day, as she'd keep throwing herself into Kanae's grave to keep her shadow alive.