Soul Spark

21 - Mobile Interception, p2

The train, reaching the height of its acceleration, streamed through the mountainous terrain, not too far from its destination. The many sides of the conflict were about to converge all in one city. But before that...

“Hiroshi.” Ichigo tried a calm approach at first.

“I’ve had it with you!” Hiroshi yelled. His heart beat faster, injecting his body with more soul prowess, enough to leak out of his hands and shape itself into a pair of sables. He took a step back, raising the blades and bracing for impact.

“Hey, it’s okay.” Ichigo tried to comfort him. “Everything’s alright. Please, let’s not-”

“I’m not coming back with you, I already decided on what I’m gonna do! Now get lost!” Hiroshi yelled, almost instinctively launching soul prowess out of one of his blades. Ichigo absorbed the attack, it hurt surprisingly a lot. Jian raised her arm to take aim, but Ichigo signaled her to not do so.

“I understand. I understand that you might be frustrated right now...” Ichigo said.

“The train’s going even faster it looks like...it’s clearly not a safe speed for a terrain like this.” Ichigo thought, carefully and slowly getting closer. Hiroshi felt Ichigo approach him and took another pair of steps back, almost overstepping and falling down.

“I have to somehow pacify him and get out of here...or at least stay here until Sakuto arrives.”

“But it looks like he wants to put up a fight.”

Ichigo took a deep breath.

“Hiroshi, I do not want to use force against you.” Ichigo said. “I want you to talk to me, and I want you to tell me why exactly it is that you’re doing all of this.”

But Hiroshi didn’t want to engage in conversation. He threw two more slashes, this time, Ichigo leapt and dodged them. He started walking Hiroshi down, and just as Hiroshi felt a surge of fear, more soul prowess entered his body.

In a surprising turn of events, he rushed to Ichigo. He tried to swing one of the sables at him, but failed to properly deliver the strike. Ichigo avoided by simply taking a step back. He tried to grab Hiroshi by his clothes, but Hiroshi swung again, this time, scarring Ichigo’s chest. Ichigo kept pushing forwards.

“Hiroshi, we both know that you need to stay with us.” He explained. “There is no telling what your father will-”

Hiroshi struck again. His sables, this time, melted into a longer, more flexible essence, and they struck Ichigo. Not him directly, but the wagon that he was standing on - quick enough to almost catch Ichigo off balance.

Ichigo sighed in disappointment. He activated his invisibility. Now that he was presumably performing a flanking maneuver, Hiroshi was face to face with Jian.

Jian shot instantly. Not at him, but at the wagon beneath him, tearing a hole in it and causing Hiroshi to fall down. Ichigo peeked out of his invisibility down there, grabbing a hold of Hiroshi and trying to somehow put him to sleep. The only option that came to his mind was choking him unconscious, but it was difficult to do even that.

The soul prowess surrounding his body and reinforcing his weapons escaped its confines, emerging as small, sharp tentacle-like formations that attacked Ichigo instantly. Ichigo, surprised, let go of Hiroshi, and Hiroshi, jumping up on top of the wagon again, escaped his grasp.

“Damn it, he’s managed to awaken a soul expression...”

“And how the hell am I supposed to deal with that without harming him?” Ichigo thought to himself, annoyed.

While Ichigo was faced with an almost unsolvable task, Dietrich had to face the rest of the Heisei’s relentless fighters. More specifically, the two most exotic members of the squad. All he had to himself were sets of weapons and grenades, and a small bag that he grabbed from one of the more hidden compartments on the train.

“Kouhai, how much more left? Like, three wagons, right?” Yuuka said, leaving the wagon that has been reduced to a complete and utter bloodbath. Her fists and most of her face were covered in blood, and Zawadski, walking alongside her, looked like nothing was wrong with neither the scenery nor her.

“Dunno. Maybe he comes up to us-”

Dietrich entered the wagon, raising his arms.

“I am responsible for the train. I surrender and ask to negotiate.” Dietrich exclaimed. However, his expression conveyed confident concentration.

“Right about now...” Zawadski finished his sentence. “You’re...responsible?”

“I am the supreme commander of humanity’s resistance against the calamity known as Kaito Kamiki.” Dietrich explained. “I am the one who has collaborated with Hiroshi Kamiki in order to carry out this plan.”

“Right, a...plan?” Zawadski asked. “So the other guy from back then died...no surprise, to be honest.”

“And what plan is it?” Yuuka asked in a much more commanding tone than usual.

“A plan to reach the destination of this train ride and to guarantee that the situation regarding the world is resolved.” Dietrich said, slowly reaching towards his belt buckle. Zawadski, keeping a keen eye on him, tried to deduce his next actions.

“Too much ambiguity.” Zawadski said. “What exactly are you planning to do? Where’s Hiroshi?”

“I do not know who that person is.” Dietrich said. He slowly removed a type of grenade from his belt buckle.

“Alright, I guess we’ll just beat the info out of him.” Zawadski said. But he decided to stay quiet instead.

“Yuuka, the guy has smoke grenades, and he’s waiting to toss them around.” Zawadski said. “He’s waiting for the right moment, he did it once I finished my sentence.I’m betting he’s got other types of armaments as well.”

Dietrich was visibly taken aback that his hand was read.

“And also, he’s got a flashbang in there. It wasn’t exactly the best thing to experience, so let’s make sure he doesn’t throw that shit again.” Zawadski said, taking a step forward.

They heard thudding noises from above.

Hiroshi was trying to fight off Jian, who, with elegance and little to no effort, was avoiding his attacks. Thankfully, despite having a potentially rather powerful soul expression, he was never a fighter. His inexperience and lack of combat awareness and technique made him a punching bag with an extra few gut checks.

Between some such maneuvers, Jian struck Hiroshi with a sweep and dropped him. Hiroshi tried to climb back up, but ultimately, Ichigo, flanking him, grabbed him.

“Let go! Let me go!” Hiroshi pleaded.

“Alright. All that’s left is to get him outta here.” Ichigo said. He tapped on his earpiece. “Sakuto, it’s us. We got-”

“OUCH!” Ichigo yelled in surprise, as Hiroshi, in a wake of desperation, bit his arm and ripped a rather large chunk of flesh from it. He instinctively let go of Hiroshi and pushed him away, accidentally dropping him off the wagon...

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“Fuck!” Ichigo yelled, quickly leaning over. “Hiroshi!” He called for the boy who was destined to roll down a rather large hill. However, his wings had saved him.

Hiroshi flew up into the sky.

“No, wait...the train, I need to be on...”

However, unlike last time, his wings felt much more potent. He could fly and maneuver not only faster, but also more flexibly, executing more difficult flight patterns. Though, he wouldn’t be able to maintain flying for a prolonged amount of time...at least he wasn’t being chased anymore. On the feet, that is.

“Ichigo, this is bad.” Jian said, taking aim at Hiroshi. Shooting wouldn’t change much, it would just kill the boy.

“Only one way I can think of handling this.” Ichigo said.

“Do you mean-”

“It’s fine. At this point, we don’t have to worry about being detected anymore.” Ichigo said. “We’ll immediately take off and work towards reuniting with Sakuto.”

He took a deep breath to focus. The next moment, his presence flared up. Despite trying his hardest to contain it, it was still very, very strong. The hollow sunlight still dominated the sky, but from Ichigo himself, faint, golden light began to emanate.

“ ✦ Divine Acclamation. ✦ ”

“ ✦ Spectral Requiem. ✦ ” For more chapters visıt N0veI.Fiɾe.net

Hiroshi was shocked.

“No way...he...”

“This is...”

The dimming effect started to slowly whither his soul away, he was too scared and even confused at the moment to protect himself properly. He slowly started losing altitude, while Ichigo, with his wings, soared into the sky.

“Holy shit, Ichigo’s going all out?” Zawadski wondered, looking at the ceiling, sensing his comrade’s presence in the sky. “There’s no way catching the kid is this complicated...”

“You don’t say, Kouhai.” Yuuka thought out loud. “If the kid is important enough for Kaito to do this, well...”

They looked in front of them to see that Dietrich was gone.

The commander went back to the control room, where he immediately started typing in commands into the terminal at almost lightning speed. Seconds later, a small alarm went off in the room. The harder he worked, the more the software opened up its way towards its last resort.

Yuuka and Zawadski rushed in after him, entering the room. Katya quickly grabbed him as the latter was desperately on the terminal, punching him away, breaking half of his ribs in the process.

“Now now, running away is no way to behave ~_~ ” Yuuka said. “Commanders don’t do that.”

“You’re correct.” Dietrich said, watching the soulfuls. For a moment, he looked through the hole in the roof. He saw Hiroshi flying. It filled him without enough information and hope to finalize his decision. “But I am not behaving the way you think I am.”

He reached for his handgun and pointed it at Yuuka.

“Gunfire against soulfuls...amazing.” Zawadski said. “You know, if you want to work with us towards actually stopping Kaito, pointing this thing at us isn’t exactly the best course of action. Yuuka, you deal with this. I’ll go check up on whatever the hell Ichigo is doing.”

Just as Zawadski went up, Jian came down.

“Yuuka, situation report.” She said. “Who is this?”

“You have some type of future sight, don’t you?” Dietrich asked. “One of you, you and your damn powers...”

“He’s the new leader of the soulless.” Yuuka said, disappointed.

“State your intentions with this operation at this instant.” Jian said, taking aim at his head.

“The kid said that he can figure out a way to stop all of this. And I chose to believe him.” Dietrich said, blood leaking out of his body courtesy of Yuuka’s strike. “I’ll believe the kid who wants to talk to his father and fix everything over hounds like you...”

“You’ve killed all of my men, you bloodlusted hounds...” Dietrich said, subtly smiling. “You are not a solution to this problem, you are its cause. You, and all the soulfuls like you.”

“You lack a lot of knowledge if those are your opinions.” Jian said. “Stop the train.”

“And let me guess, even if the kid somehow fixes everything...you’ve just proven to me that it won’t matter.” He said, staring particularly hard at Yuuka who was smiling with blood all over her uniform.

“At least I’ll get to prove a point.”

Instead of firing the weapon, he leaned forward a little and tossed it towards the terminal. The throw managed to hit exactly the keys that needed to be pressed in order to finalize what he’d been aiming to set up all this time - the train’s self-destruction sequence.

Sirens began whaling.

“What did you do?!” Jian asked.

“Captain, this...” Yuuka got worried, rushing over to the terminal. “It’s impossible to stop.”

“You’ll never get to that boy.” Dietrich smirked. “He’s the only faith I have left in you soulfuls, he’s the only hope in a sea of madness...”

Jian shot him in the head and killed him. But at that point, it didn’t matter anymore what happened to him.

In an almost spectacular explosion, the train’s front section was completely destroyed. Parts of it were knocked off the mountain, including the wagons where the Heisei’s fighters were. The rest of the wagons came to a crashing stop, and the explosion’s power caused large rocks to tumble their way down the mountain terrain near them - destroying the train’s remnants even further.

The two soulfuls unaffected were Hiroshi and Ichigo. And Ichigo, seeing the explosion, quickly turned his attention towards it.

“No!” He yelled, trying to make out whether or not he could see any of his comrades scattered around.

He had been trying to catch Hiroshi all this time, with Hiroshi consistently trying to outmaneuver him and attack him. He landed an attack this time, a rather hard swing of despair on Ichigo’s face, which did rock him a little. Ichigo, infuriated by the situation and focused on something much more important to him, fought back - swinging his hand, hitting Hiroshi’s forearm and snapping it in half.

He immediately tried to go towards the wrecks, but received a message through his earpiece.

“Ichigo, we’re fine! Go after the kid!”

Ichigo watched Hiroshi whimper in pain from the arm break. He held it, and the soul prowess started to slowly mend it. Noticing Ichigo’s determined gaze, quickly tried to turn around and fly away. But Ichigo, quickly charging towards him through the air, managed to grab a hold of him.

“What the hell is your problem?” Ichigo asked him. “Don’t you know the lengths we went through just to make sure your dad doesn’t get to you?”

“Let...go...” Hiroshi said, starting to lose breath.

“Hiroshi...?” Ichigo asked, seeing the kid struggling to breathe and in pain.

“What the fuck...no, is he...?”

“Shit, my acclamation! Does he not know about soul dimming?!”

“Hiroshi, listen to me carefully.” Ichigo said. “Reinforce your soul with soul prowess. Do it now, or it’ll get even worse. Do you understand what it-”

“My chest hurts...” Hiroshi said, his breathing getting more and more chaotic. “It...feels like it’s gonna explode...”

A second later, Hiroshi lost consciousness.

“Chest pain...and...no...what the fuck?” Ichigo questioned the predicament. “Is he having a heart attack? Did this...”

“Okay, calm down...”

He held onto the now limp Hiroshi, preventing him from falling. He brought his hand to his throat.

“No, he still has a pulse.”

His chest shined. A rapid stream of soul prowess enhanced his broken hand, not only healing it fully but also enhancing it. It was enhanced to the point where it started growing externally, acquiring sharp claws and a larger size.

It grabbed Ichigo by his neck. Ichigo let go of Hiroshi, surprised to see that Hiroshi’s wings were functioning again. He tried to fight off the hand, but the shocking strength, and the bright, pulsating nature of the black-and-white hand acted too fast. It crushed his neck and threw him towards the rest of the wreck site. Ichigo lost one of his wings.

Crashing on the ground, he was still in disbelief.

Hiroshi came to his senses. The enhancement on his arm disappeared, the soul prowess traveling to his back to form a pair of especially powerful wings that propelled him towards his destination. He didn’t feel tired from flying anymore, he didn’t even feel his heartbeat properly. He just looked at the wreck, and he chose to leave it behind and head to Rome directly.

“Fuck...Ichigo?” Zawadski asked, getting up. “Your...”

“Something’s wrong with the kid.” Ichigo said. “He...technically killed me. I’m thinking it was an awakening, but...something’s seriously wrong.”

“I’m starting to understand why he, out of all people, would be Kaito’s point of interest...”

He tapped on his earpiece.

“Bad news, train got derailed. He...fucking, I don’t know. He awakened and escaped.”

“Where is he?”

“Flying to Rome with a new pair of wings he got.” Ichigo said, disappointed. “I have my acclamation active. We’ll get there.”

“Good. We’re almost there too.” Sakuto replied.

Ichigo grabbed his comrades and flew towards the city’s direction. All the parties involved in the conflict to decide the world’s fate were destined to meet each other. And that included the white crow himself...