The paperwork says the soul is persistent.
Not hostile. Not malignant. Just—persistent, a word the system uses when it does not know how else to classify refusal.
Jesse reads the report twice, then a third time, lips pressing together.
SOUL DESYNCHRONIZATION — NON-TERMINAL
BODY STATUS: CRITICAL
RECOMMENDATION: OBSERVE. DO NOT FORCE.
The file is flagged non-terminal, which means the soul is still legally bound to a living body and therefore outside retrieval jurisdiction.
“That’s new,” he says.
Across the desk, Kōchi does not look up.
“It isn’t,” he replies mildly. “It’s just rare.”
Jesse squints at him. “You say that like you’ve seen it before.”
“I have,” Kōchi says. He closes the file, careful, precise. “It doesn’t end the way people expect.”
The Summons Division does not resemble hell.
That is its first cruelty.
The halls are bright, the ceilings high, windows opening onto an eternal spring that never progresses beyond gentle bloom. Cherry blossoms drift past glass that never opens, time marked only by the clocks mounted at regular intervals along the walls. Every sector runs on schedules. Every death has a place in line.
Shinigami are not angels.
They are selected.
Souls with ties too deep to sever cleanly, regrets that anchor them between worlds. The system refines them, assigns them colors, binds them to rules meant to prevent longing from becoming corruption.
No one works alone.
Partnerships are mandatory. Supervision constant. Deviations documented.
Jesse is still getting used to that part.
Freshly dead does not mean unmarked. It only means the marks are new.
He wears Red easily—too easily, according to Shintaro, who watches him the way scientists watch volatile compounds. Red means action, disruption, emotional proximity. It also means restraint must be learned, not assumed.
Kōchi is Yellow.
Yellow looks harmless on paper.
Stabilization. Mediation. Endurance.
Yellow Shinigami are the ones assigned to cases that linger. To souls that do not escalate but do not release, and to situations the system prefers to outlast rather than resolve.
Kōchi has been Yellow for longer than Jesse has been dead.
It shows.
The building waits. That is the first thing Jesse notices when they step inside.
Not abandoned—paused. Dust coats the floor in a thin, careful layer, undisturbed by footprints. Chandeliers hang intact, crystals dulled but unbroken. At the far end of the room, a gramophone turns slowly, needle resting against a worn record.
A waltz plays. Soft. Unfinished.
The soul stands at the center of the floor.
They look whole at first glance. Solid. Present. Only when Jesse lets himself feel does he sense the strain—the thread pulled too thin between soul and body, stretched by stubborn insistence.
The man’s posture gives him away before anything else does. Upright to the point of defiance. Weight balanced precisely over the balls of his feet, as though still listening for a cue only he can hear. Even standing still, he holds himself like someone trained never to waste movement.
“You’re early,” the soul says.
Jesse blinks. “We are?”
“You’re not supposed to come yet.” A faint smile curves his mouth—professional, practiced. “But you always do.”
Kōchi steps forward, hands visible, posture unthreatening.
“We’re not here to take you,” he says gently.
The soul laughs. It’s not unkind. “That’s what you said last time.”
Jesse stiffens. “Last—?”
Kōchi shakes his head slightly, a quiet signal. Later.
The music skips.
The soul presses a hand to his chest, breath hitching—not pain, exactly, but effort. The movement is unconscious, muscle memory asserting itself even as the body protests.
“The body’s tired,” Jesse says before he can stop himself.
The soul’s gaze snaps to him, sharp and offended. “It’s not finished.”
“I know,” Kōchi says. “Neither are you.”
Silence settles, thick and waiting.
Then Kōchi extends his hand.
“May I?”
The soul hesitates. His fingers tremble—not fear. Strain. The kind that comes from pushing past limits long after the body has started to keep count.
“If I stop,” he whispers, voice barely carrying over the music, “I don’t think I’ll start again.”
Kōchi meets his eyes. “You won’t stop,” he says. “Not yet.”
The soul exhales, something tight loosening just enough to allow movement.
He takes Kōchi’s hand.
They dance.
The steps are small and careful, barely moving across the floor, but the precision is unmistakable. Even restrained, even half-held together by will alone, the soul moves like someone who has spent a lifetime translating feeling into motion. Kōchi adjusts without thinking, matching breath to breath, letting him lean when he needs to, never leading so much as listening.
Jesse watches from the edge, chest tight, as the strain eases—not gone, but shared.
“I died here,” the soul says quietly, eyes unfocused. “Once.”
Jesse’s breath catches.
“They brought me back,” the soul continues. “Said it was a miracle. Said it wouldn’t last.” A soft, rueful huff of laughter. “So I stayed. I thought… if the music didn’t end, neither would I.”
The waltz falters.
“You don’t have to decide tonight,” Kōchi says.
The soul smiles, tired and knowing. “You always say that.”
The needle lifts.
The music ends.
The soul remains standing long after the music stops.
He doesn’t sit. Doesn’t sag.
Waiting, still.
“…He’s late,” Sugiki says eventually, eyes fixed on the empty doorway. “He always is.”
Jesse’s chest tightens.
Kōchi doesn’t speak right away.
“Did he come through here?” Sugiki asks. The question is careful. Controlled. “After me.”
Jesse inhales sharply—instinct screaming to answer, to fix, to say something definitive.
Kōchi lifts a hand, subtle. A reminder of rules Jesse doesn’t fully know yet.
But he doesn’t stop him completely.
Kōchi meets Sugiki’s gaze.
“There are some paths,” he says slowly, “that don’t cross again.”
Sugiki’s fingers curl.
“…So he didn’t wait,” Sugiki says.
Kōchi doesn’t say yes.
He doesn’t say no.
“He wasn’t meant to,” Kōchi says instead.
The words land like a controlled fall—not a push, not a lie.
Sugiki closes his eyes.
For a moment, Jesse thinks he’s going to break.
Instead, Sugiki exhales — long, shaking, exhausted.
“…That figures,” he murmurs. “He was always like that. Moving ahead. Dragging me with him.”
A beat.
“We promised,” Sugiki says quietly. “Ten dances. Together. We were going to win.”
Jesse swallows. “You still danced.”
Sugiki smiles faintly, and it’s devastating.
“Yes,” he says. “I did.”
The ballroom feels different now.
Not empty.
Finished.
Sugiki straightens—posture settling into something no longer braced against waiting.
“…Then I suppose,” he says, voice steady but thin, “I shouldn’t keep him waiting either.”
Nothing opens.
Not yet.
But the thread loosens.
Just a little.
Jesse feels it then—the boundary holding firm. The soul is still anchored, thread taut but intact, bound to a body that has not yet finished failing.
“…So that’s it,” Jesse murmurs. “We don’t—”
“We don’t,” Kōchi says gently.
The soul exhales, a sound caught halfway between relief and disappointment.
“Figures,” they say, with a small, tired smile. “Still not time.”
Kōchi inclines his head. “No.”
A pause.
“…Will you come back?” the soul asks.
“If you’re still here,” Kōchi replies.
They leave the building exactly as they found it.
Unclaimed.
Jesse doesn’t realize it right away.
At first, it’s just irritation—the way the soul snaps when he mentions the body, the way they bristle at the idea of rest like it’s an accusation. Jesse recognizes the posture before the thought forms: shoulders squared, spine locked, breath shallow but controlled.
Holding together by force of will.
He’s seen it before.
He’s worn it.
When the dance ends and the gramophone goes quiet, the soul sways, catching themselves on instinct alone. Jesse moves without thinking, a half-step forward—
—and stops.
Because the soul doesn’t fall.
They refuse to.
“I’m still here,” the soul says, as if daring the room to contradict them.
Jesse’s throat tightens.
Yeah, he thinks. I know.
Later, outside the ballroom, when the air finally feels less heavy, Jesse leans against the wall and exhales harder than necessary. Kōchi pretends not to notice.
“That thread,” Jesse says after a while. “You felt it too, right?”
Kōchi nods. “Yes.”
“They’re not staying because they don’t know they’re dying,” Jesse continues. “They know. They just… don’t accept it.”
Kōchi looks at him then. Not sharply. Carefully.
“Is that what you think?” he asks.
Jesse laughs, short and humorless. “It’s what I know.”
The words hang there, heavier than intended.
Jesse rubs at his wrist, thumb pressing into skin that remembers restraints that no longer exist. The soul’s stubborn outline flashes in his mind again—the way they stood too straight, the way they kept moving even when stillness would have been easier.
“They’re waiting for something,” Jesse says quietly. “Not a cure. Not a miracle. Just—proof they didn’t endure all this for nothing.”
Kōchi doesn’t interrupt.
Jesse swallows. “That if they let go now, everything before it… meant nothing.”
There it is.
Recognition, sharp and undeniable.
Kōchi’s voice is soft when he speaks. “And what would make it mean something?”
Jesse doesn’t answer right away.
Because the truth is ugly in its simplicity.
“…Someone staying,” he says at last. “Someone seeing it. Someone not turning it into a lesson, or a statistic.”
Kōchi nods once.
“That’s why I danced,” he says.
Jesse squeezes his eyes shut, breath hitching once before he can stop it.
“Yeah,” he murmurs. “Figures.”
They stand there in silence, the city breathing around them.
“You know,” Jesse says eventually, forcing lightness into his voice, “if I’d met you earlier, I might’ve made better decisions.”
Kōchi smiles faintly. “You survived. Those were the decisions you had.”
Jesse lets out a shaky laugh. “God, I hate that you’re right.”
He straightens, shoulders settling—not rigid anymore, just tired.
“When we come back,” he says, not if, “and they’re still there… don’t send me away.”
Kōchi meets his gaze. Steady. Present.
“I won’t,” he says.
Jesse nods.
Because for the first time since recognizing himself in someone else’s refusal to disappear, he understands something terrifying and gentle all at once:
Staying isn’t the same as refusing to die.
Sometimes—it’s how you decide to live.
As they walk back toward the gate, Jesse breaks the silence.
“Hey,” he says. “Next time Ninomiya sends us something like that?”
Kōchi glances at him. “Yes?”
Jesse hesitates, then shrugs. “Don’t go alone.”
Kōchi blinks. It’s small. Almost imperceptible.
“I wasn’t planning to,” he says.
Jesse exhales, relieved in a way he doesn’t fully understand yet.
“Good,” he replies. “Because… yeah.”
They don’t elaborate.
They don’t need to.
Behind them, in a ballroom that remembers footsteps, a soul holds on for one more night.
Ahead of them, the path curves gently forward.
And for the first time since Jesse’s promotion, the partnership doesn’t feel like an assignment.
It feels like a promise neither of them has to say out loud.