To Protect

Teeth


He could hear water. That was the first thing that Uryuu noticed when he woke, before his eyes had even opened he could hear it. It was not the sound of rain against his apartment windows as he was accustomed to hearing, but a shower which made no sense to his mind. When you lived alone that did not happen. Well it didn't normally, Inoue has stayed once or twice before but she had always been asleep when he woke up as far as he knew.

This was different though. To go along with the sound of running water his glasses were still on his face, though hopelessly crocked from how he has been sleeping. Opening his eyes he saw only a portion of the world clearly through the magnifying glass though most was blurred beyond it. One of the nose pieces of his glasses was pressing uncomfortable into the bridge of his nose, enough that he was sure it had left a mark during the evening. Parts of him felt stiff like he had been in an uncomfortable position for too long, but he was in a bed which mean he hadn't gone and fallen asleep at his table while studying again. Still laying on his side though one of his arms was asleep from his head resting on it on top of the pillow while it had been underneath, but that was not uncommon for him. His knees were more what bothered him but his legs were unevenly stretched out over the length of the bed which didn't account for them feeling like they had been bent for too long.

Then it occurred to him that the pillow case he was half looking at was not the linens he kept on his bed but an unfamiliar set instead. That had him propping himself up with his still half numb arm quickly. It was not something soft colored or girly like he had seen that one time he had been sick and Orihime had refused to let him leave. They had been a nice soft tone of peach that time and had smelled well as best he could think to put it, though lamely, feminine. These were white, clean but smelled too clean. Obviously the bed was not used often, or had even been used if that smell was as much like plastic as his mind was telling him.

A look around the room told him that the room was very likely to have seen little to no use. Beige everywhere, splashes of stark white as well and the most color was a dark brown. The color choices were an attempt at warmth in a space that rarely saw life. In other words failed frankly. The room was too spartan to have been welcoming, but whoever owned it had tried.

Sweeping a hand through his hair, ignoring the catch his fingers hit before yanking it loose, the teen tried to put together what he could remember from last night. The last of the school day flitted through his thoughts. He had had a school project on genealogy. Yes and he had gone to Ryuuken's to take a look at anything useful but had been distracted by those damned letters. Those horribly incriminating letters that he had planned to shove in his father's face and demand explanation over.

So why hadn't he?

Fuzzily he pondered that not able to recall even talking to Ryuuken, those encounters were hard to forget. He remembered being anxious after speaking with Rukia then going back to wait on his father as had turned out to be the least misleading route, he never had heard his father lie before. After that he had sat and waited in his ambush for the man to come home. It had gotten later and later but he knew his father was something of a workaholic as he always had been when he was a child so it had been no real concern. He'd done some of his school work, or all of it as that much time had passed. When he had been finished it was just time to kill. He'd read the letters more thoroughly, or most of them since concentrating had been difficult.

Some of it has been nothing but talk of work, which he didn't think he could really count as evidence against his father in the name of material worthy of accusation, but the letters hadn't been solely on such things. The things for Urahara had had nothing to do with medical work after all, they were the most damning. Some parts were oddly sentimental and some from a certain point, dated before he was born, had seemed to be seeking his father to reply. Seemed odd to think his father would keep letters from a time period where it appeared he was not on good terms with the sender. One he could accept but there were several that implied there had been no reply. Those letters had mostly asked him to explain what was going on and if Souken were responsible. What his teacher had to do with Urahara or Kurosaki was a mystery to to the teenager since the men never had come up. If teacher had known about shinigami in town he would have warned him, he was sure of that. The grandfather in Souken would have demanded him to share. His anger at shinigami had come after the man was slain so there was no cause for keeping secrets.

But after reading the few he could recall getting through it was a haze of scattered thought that circled around what to say exactly to his father. He'd gone over that quite a bit and never had come up with something to say that wouldn't likely lead to a tight lipped Ryuuken. In the end he thought the letters would speak for themselves and he could ask letting the man bury himself.

The only logical conclusion was that he had fallen asleep but if that was the case he should have been down in the living room still. Instead he was in a bedroom, in what he assumed was his father's home. There had been guest rooms they never used, this could very well have been one of them.

Laying there and thinking was getting him no where so he slid his legs over the side of the bed and picked himself up. His legs protested faintly but he ignored it, it was easy enough. The sounds of water from earlier had stopped so he made his way out of the room still in his school uniform from yesterday, wrinkled and tie half crushed during sleep. Uryuu felt unkempt and dirty really. Was not habit for him to sleep in his school clothes so that he annoyed him, though not nearly as much as the fact Ryuuken of all people had seen him like this. What truly annoyed him most though was that he had not done what he had planned, though he refused to not do so now.

Out in the hall he got his bearings and paused. Despite not living here for a few years now he still knew the layout of the place well. That had not been a guestroom at all, it had been his old bedroom. Had he wandered up here half asleep on his own? It was possible but unlikely in his opinion since he was fairly sure even half asleep he'd know he was not home and want to get there than to remain here. But how else could he have gotten to bed? Ryuuken was not the type to tuck him in ever, man would have left him where he had fallen asleep.

That train of thought however was cut off when the object of his thoughts appeared. The warm damp air that followed was proof the man had been in the shower more likely than not not too long ago. Uryuu froze not sure why he was so surprised when he had sorted that out on his own already, but he couldn't honestly recall ever seeing his father in such a state of undress. Ryuuken was always in some percentage of a suit, usually a full one. So the pale back and broad shoulders were not something he was familiar with. Any smart ass remark he had been about to make was cut short fairly quickly when he saw the lines of old scars below the older man's shoulders. Thinking of Ryuuken as a quincy was strange for him but he knew he had been one now, though to think he had been injured was even more foreign a concept to him. He had seen his father's skill and somehow it had been beyond his way of thinking to imagine the man had been something but the untouchable frosty bastard he knew.

Looking out from beneath damp snowy hair the older man took in his son's state after feeling eyes on him for so long, curious why he hadn't heard some kind of sharp quip yet. The boy was just looking at him with something like shock though not as strong on his face. What was to be surprised about he hadn't a clue but he just shook his head and went on his way to go and get dressed. If his son wanted to space out in the hall for no apparent reason let him. He had enough of a headache approaching concerning him already to antagonize another.

Unable to bring himself to say anything Uryuu just watched the man's back as he went. Those scars were strange still and somehow he felt rather like an intruder. Though he may still have possessed a key to enter this place had stopped being his home a long time ago. The man that lived here he knew next to nothing about, which included those letters he had found. For all his outrage did he really possess the right to question Ryuuken when he had denounced his father and emancipated himself? The angry part of him said he had every single right to but the logical, shocked, part of him said he did not. Ryuuken was a stranger to him, always, and demanding things of strangers was both pointless and rude.

Uncertain and uneasy Uryuu ran a hand through his hair quickly before turning to go downstairs. Maybe he could regather his thoughts and anger by the time his father descended likely to go to work.

There were not many lights on but those in the kitchen. The smell of coffee in the air and the paper on the table was a sign that the other man had been up for awhile, probably an hour at the least if his morning routine was the same. A glance at the time told him it was nearly half past five and four seemed about right for the usual time his father woke to leave him alone to get ready for school alone since Souken had come into his life. There was nothing but an empty mug on the counter, used and likely to be used again before the director departed. His father always had been something of a caffeine junkie, coffee was one of the few things he ever saw him drink. Always coffee never tea. Nothing carbonated for some reason as well. Why he could recall such pointless things he didn't know.

It was still early and he could technically still be sleeping right now but mind now awake sleep wouldn't happen when there was so much on it. Ryuuken took up an annoyingly large portion of it as well.

What he really should do was leave and go home, get ready for school and pretend this had never happened. It was so early no one was likely to see him that he knew and he wouldn't even be behind schedule, as the walk to his apartment wasn't that far. But those letters persisted on his mind and demanded answers, even if he was not as entitled to them as he wanted to believe. He could always confront him later, when it was more convenient for them both really. Still he could give up a half an hour now and still manage to get to school if he didn't drag his feet about it.

“Don't you have better things to do than to be scatterbrained, Uryuu?”

Starting against his will Uryuu turned to look at his father now fully dressed in one of his usual suits. Today it was a medium shade of gray that made his hair look whiter, a white collar shirt and a cerulean tie with a faint metallic sheen. The silver cross tie pin was what gave the teenager the most pause though. His father claimed to no longer be a quincy or more directly to have no interest in it, but there were subtle signs that he hadn't paid so much time to before.

“Taken to staring as well I see. How unbecoming.” Ryuuken muttered and went for his mug on the counter for one more full cup of coffee before work while he planned to finish the paper if he was particularly lucky. More likely he was sure he'd be subjected to his son's accusations or some such foolishness.

For a long beat though while he poured his coffee it was silent. Perhaps his luck would hold out by some miracle.

“Why the cross?” Not the question the doctor expected.

“Why not.” Shrugging his shoulders he was just as fine paying no mind to the details like that that were really little more than habit now.

“You hate the quincy though. Why?” Appeared the boy wasn't going to let the matter go until he was satisfied.

“A zebra has stripes, a leopard has spots and quincy have crosses. It's that simple.” And it really was. While he was hardly what anyone would now consider a devout quincy he was still a quincy, it was in his blood and body without his choosing. Souken had seen to that very well and despite himself he still didn't bother to rid himself of the small signs of what he was. Maybe he wanted to be reminded of the past, maybe he needed to remember for his son's sake. Maybe it was just something he was best not thinking about, frankly he was leaning toward that.

“Why do you hate being a quincy so much?” It was something Uryuu wanted to understand because it wasn't something that never quite made sense to him. Yes the man had said it was of no profit to him and that was true but was that just cause to loathe a part of who he was? Then again somehow it didn't seem like his father to need a reason.

And here was a conversation he never imagined to have nor did he wish to have with his son of all people. He'd told his friends, or associates as he called them on certain days, and that had been humiliating enough.

“Not everyone's training was like yours.” Simple truth and close enough without revealing too much. A good answer the elder of the pair thought, though intentionally vague.

Uryuu didn't appear to think it was enough but it had given him pause. In that pause the teen was contemplating that statement, not entirely sure what it was supposed to mean. What did Ryuuken really know about his training? He never had thought the man knew anything about it, he had left him to Souken which has been just fine. Had his father really been paying mind to his lessons in their inherited history? That was enough to surprise him alone. Other than that it did remind him that the other Ishida also happened to possess the same skills, or more if he was honest with himself. Ryuuken had to be taught by someone as if he recalled right it had been implied his grandfather had been the one to do so. Had they both really been treated so differently and that had amounted to their very different views on the same man? It was plausible.

“What...do you mean by that?” A note of uncertainty in his voice held and just a hint of mistrust.

Sipping at his coffee, black the way he liked it, he just took the mistrust in stride. Really he shouldn't be accustomed to his own son not trusting him by now, it had been that way for years. Still it irked him in a way that the teenager could stand opposite him and listen but still doubt everything that came out of his mouth. “I meant what I said.”

“That's hardly an answer.” That mistrust was shifting to annoyance.

“I wasn't aware you had planned to listen to the whole story.” Getting defensive wasn't the best choice but it hadn't quite been a choice on his part. Why they had to rub each other the wrong way every time they spoke now he honestly wondered. Ryuuken wished he could make sense of it but he could not, so correcting it really was an impossibility.

Gritting his teeth faintly Uryuu reminded himself he wanted answers and snapping at his father wouldn't get him them. Least of all get them any more quickly than this annoying game that seemed to have started between them.

Another beat of silence and Ryuuken took another sip from his mug, musing over just what to say and perhaps collecting his temper more neatly before it got the best of him. Quincy talk always wound him up, even now. How much detail he wanted to put in was still up to debate. Somehow he didn't think dragging Souken through the mud would do him any good, true or not, nor would it be the honorable road to take. “You enjoyed it, you weren't trained to be a soldier.” Again it was a bare minimum of an answer.

“A soldier?”

“Yes. Souken wasn't teaching you how to kill, he was teaching you how to protect.” The theme to their tutoring had certainly been opposed.

The silence to that didn't come as a shock. After all Uryuu had seen the old, wrinkled and kind-faced version of his father. He hadn't seen the sharp eyed and tongued Souken who enforced things with force, demanded obedience. Which in truth eliminated an explanation for some of Ryuuken's own traits. Some of it had been learned, not all of it was his own attempt to distance others.

“He wouldn't-”

“No the man you knew wouldn't but people change.” How he knew that all too well. Ryuuken had seen it in himself, in his father and in his son. Not to mention his friends as well. Then entire world had gone along too, not stopping to wait for him to realign himself. Things did not stop just because someone strayed, they continued on without care or concern. “Of course you never considered such a possibility that people are subject to being something different than you knew.”

The words stung faintly and Uryuu felt a faint sense of disappointment in himself to have admittedly over looked something so basic in way of explanation. People did change. Yet he could not picture Souken as anything but the preacher of tolerance and a patient man. Nothing else fit with the image of the man that he knew.

Quiet again Ryuuken was working to finish his coffee quickly now. The atmosphere between them was getting to be something too stifling to tolerate. Work was a good excuse to leave and he planned to make use of it despite the voice whispering to him that it was a cowardly way out of the situation. The coffee wasn't as hot any longer so it was not uncomfortable to drink it so quickly, just short of gulps really. The coffee was making him a bit hot under the collar to be drunk so quickly but the bit of discomfort was worth it to get them away from one another before they started screaming. Last way he wanted to start his morning was one of those fights with his son that left him on edge for the better part of a week. While it helped to repel those unwanted pests at work, it make things difficult and uncomfortable for himself as well as others. Namely it got in the way of business and that was all he did now so it was problematic.

Uryuu was lost in his own head really. Even the vexation to have been cut off while speaking earlier wasn't pressing on his awareness. Instead his head a mix of thoughts of Souken and Ryuuken. They had always been two very opposing presences in his mind. Souken had been patient and tolerant, loving. Ryuuken had been distant, awkward and strangely protective. His father had also always hated his grandfather. As a boy that had upset him, it did to a far lesser degree now but he was estranged from his father. Of course he had always blamed his father for strained relationship between all the Ishida men but it was possible that it wasn't true. He had been young when he had decided that must have been the truth. Very possible his understanding had been tainted with his love for his teacher and his hate for his father. What just made it stranger was that the older man had always defended Ryuuken. What had he used to say to him? Something about understanding his father's heart. Then he had just brushed if off with the outrageous claim that Ryuuken was even possession of such a thing.

Coffee done the empty mug was set into the sink and the director was on his way to getting ready to leave. What Uryuu would do with himself wasn't really his concern anymore or so he continued to tell himself. When the boy got himself into trouble it was more difficult to remember that.

Ryuuken didn't expect on his way away from the sink to leave for his son to grab his arm but he did. Surprise more than force was what stopped the doctor in his tracks. Wearing an uncertain expression he glanced at the boy to see he appeared just as scatter as he had before. A quick glance down also said that grip on his arm hadn't loosened even when he had halted. The boy didn't appear inclined to be letting him go so easily.

“What did he do to make you hate him so much?”

“What did I do to make you have me so much?” The question volleyed back was enough to make the teenager reel back just a bit.

The effect was only temporary however, soon enough those eyes narrowed on him with the same signs of resentment he was so accustomed to by now. The predictability of it was almost soothing in this strange association that had held over them. The quiet wouldn't be back but that was the price and he could accept it just bracing for his son's fuse to burn to the end. If he had wanted to avoid a fight it was no doubt the wrong thing to have said, but the boy was just as sore about speaking of their dysfunctional relationship, and that was putting it all too kindly, as he was about his own with his father, which was only worse in his opinion.

Despite his son's initial reaction he hadn't released his arm and it only tightened. Not the response he would have anticipated.

“You know what you did.” Uryuu was using his focus on trying to reign in his temper though the success of that would in part rely on what his father said in response. Those details had been hashed about before, on more than a single occasion.

“I do.” Though they were both referring to slightly different things now. Ryuuken knew the whole truth and his son was only aware of a certain extent of his actions that had led him to being the solitary man that he was. “You do not.”

Scoffing to that, in a very typical teenage way, the younger man rolled his eyes. “Then enlighten me, Ryuuken.”

Eyes narrowing slightly to have his son speak down to him in such a way he didn't think that much of it when he stepped further into the boy's personal space. Jaw clenched tightly the taller of the pair stood to hold his ground. “Not nearly as much as you imagine boy.”

Not one to back down himself Uryuu didn't give ground either, standing at his full height despite his wrinkled clothes and untidy hair. The effect would have been comical as he tried to stare his father back down had it not been so horribly serious. Back stiff and straight and trying to match the elder Ishida's height and falling short he kept his chin tilted up to glare evenly at the pair of eyes such a similar shade to his own.

“I did not imagine all that.”

“Assumed may be a better term if you must be so particular.”

“Nothing to assume about you being the bastard that you are.” His voice was beginning to rise now. His hands weren't clenched just yet though he was still gripping at his father's arm, probably more firmly than was comfortable.

“Don't flatter yourself to think you know anything about me.” Ryuuken could feel his own fuse burning down, though unlike his son his anger ran cold not hot.

The part of him that was trying to ward off the worse fight was trying to intimidate the boy. Stepping closer to the boy, until his chest nearly bumped against the thinner frame he held himself tall. Uryuu was still shorter than he but not by the margin that there once was. For now it was enough that the boy had to look up at him, it served the purpose of making it known he was older, more experienced of them.

“I know enough.” With how seldom he saw Ryuuken for more than a few minutes, or even an hour's time in his younger days taught him little to nothing about him. It had been enough to show him that the man obviously did not consider his family a priority and he was horribly involved with his work, to a degree that had ruined any image of a happy family that could have been. Only because he had lost his own powers had he learned that his father possessed any.

Snorting, whether in amusement or some state of annoyance, the older man just reached to remove the grip from his arm to free himself. Instead of finding the finger accommodating to his attempt they resisted, fingers curling around the arm of his suit jacket refusing to be moved easily.

“You know nothing and as always seem more than inclined to give yourself more credit than you are due.” Ryuuken knew his tolerance had about run out. Uryuu was good at getting under his skin, mostly because he was his own flesh and blood. If he hadn't loved the boy he wouldn't have been able to invoke much of anything in it, like the vast majority of others. “Let go. Now.” Words clipped and promising consequences if disobeyed the doctor tried to remove the hold again.

For the sake of sheer stubbornness and merely to oppose his father the boy didn't let go. Eyes narrowing back at his father he locked himself in place to demonstrate he would not be ordered around.

Enough was enough. With a deceptive show of strength Ryuuken forced the boy's back against the counter. He did not force him to bend backwards very far as he was not trying to harm him, but he did make the teenager concede ground to him. Lines of muscle tense from both his posture of the other and from the less than amiable exchange he held himself above Uryuu. Ryuuken held him down with a grip just as firm as the one on his arm he didn't relent even when blue eyes widened up at him in surprise. His son hadn't expected an aggressive display, though really it lacked something in the name of violence. Instead the display was more meant to assert his position, his dominance.

It was, however, Ryuuken's turn to be caught off guard when his other arm was just gripped and Uryuu straightened himself up again to awkwardly meet his father in a show of resistance. Foreheads almost resting together it was hard to miss the scathing look the younger man was giving him. Also difficult to miss that he could feel the uneven movement of his chest against his own, or the faint pants of air against his face that accompanied each breath.

For a long moment they remained like that, standing awkwardly and uncomfortably there glaring at one another. There were no words just uneven breathing a sign of their agitation. It was only when the sound of someone clearing their throat reached them that they parted as if they suddenly realized each point of contact burned.

Springing away from one another Ryuuken stepped away from his son and turned to regard the newly arrived third party and gave him a dark look. Kisuke was standing in the door and leaning against the frame as if he were not the one intruding. Under the shadow of that forsaken hat was a curious, questioning look but for the moment he was silent.

Uryuu picked himself up from the counter, though he had been mostly holding himself up off of it and straightened, not wasting time in heading for the door in a hurry. He only doubled back to get his bag before he was making a very hasty retreat.

The teenager felt horribly strange, almost ashamed of himself to have been caught as he was with his father though nothing seemed logical about that. If he has been thinking clearly, which he was most certainly not, he would have rounded on his father with the proof of his association with shinigami there and demanded answers. Instead he was already moving at a very speedy walk down the street and toward his apartment.

Meanwhile the remaining quincy was still stuck with one nosy exile in his kitchen.