[June 7, 2005 — 1:42 A.M. | 19th Ward, Tokyo]
The alley reeked of blood and gunpowder. Hayato crouched behind his father, shards glowing faintly as he steadied his breathing. Three humans lay broken at their feet, criminals who wouldn't be missed, but the echo of gunfire still rang through the streets.
"More will come," his father muttered, voice flat beneath the heavy plating of his kagune. "The CCG always follows the trail."
Hayato frowned. "Then… why don't they know it's you yet? Why don't they come here?"
His father was silent for a long moment. Then, without a word, he reached into the folds of his coat and pulled something free.
The mask.
It was heavy, plated leather reinforced with steel, stitched roughly but functional. It covered his face from brow to jaw, molded into a grim, expressionless plate with narrow slits for eyes. Along its surface were faint grooves and scratches, battle-scars that had never been polished out.
When he slid it on, the effect was immediate. He wasn't just his father anymore — he was something colder. An armored silhouette, faceless, impossible to read.
Hayato swallowed. "…Tou-san?"
His father's voice came muffled but firm through the mask. "This is why. The Doves don't see me. They see him. The one behind the mask. That's all they know."
Hayato's eyes widened. "So… they gave you a name."
His father's jaw flexed beneath the mask. He nodded once. "…They call me Bastion."
The word sat heavy in the air.
"Why?" Hayato asked, voice small.
"Because I don't fall," his father said simply. "Because I shield. Because when they see the plates, the armor, the mask, they see a wall that won't break. To them, that is all I am."
Hayato stared at him, awe and fear twisting in his chest. Bastion… Tou-san. Not just a man. A wall. A fortress.
His father crouched, one hand resting on Hayato's shoulder. "One day, they'll name you too. Whether you want it or not. Better you wear the mask before they give you a face you can't escape."
[June 18, 2005 — 11:56 P.M. | The Apartment]
The mask lay on the table, small and crude. His mother had helped stitch it, though her hands shook the whole time. The leather was patched from old coats, the edges lined with bits of broken metal scavenged from scrap. It covered Hayato's mouth and nose, leaving only his eyes visible, jagged seams giving it a rough, sharp shape like shards pieced together.
Hayato picked it up, running his fingers along the seams. It felt heavier than it looked.
"Put it on," his father said.
Hayato slid it over his face. The world dimmed through the narrow slits. His breath echoed inside, hot and close. He turned to the cracked mirror propped against the wall.
A stranger stared back. Small body, glowing red eyes above jagged leather and steel. A face that wasn't his.
His chest tightened. So this is who I am now. Not Hayato. Not Gabriel. Just… a mask.
"Don't be afraid of it," his father said, standing behind him, his own mask resting under his arm. "It isn't to make you someone else. It's to protect who you are when you're not hunting."
Hayato clenched his fists. "…Then what do I call him? The one behind the mask?"
His father's eyes softened, just for a moment. "That's for you to decide. But remember this: a mask isn't a costume. It's a promise. Once you wear it, the world will know you by it. The Doves. The clan. Everyone."
Hayato looked at himself again, the glow of his red eyes burning out from the leather's seams. He didn't smile. He didn't need to.
One day, when they see this mask, they'll be the ones afraid.
[July 2, 2005 — 1:11 A.M. | A Hunt Together]
They moved as one.
His father — Bastion — armored in his heavy Kōkaku plates, mask gleaming faintly under the streetlight. A walking fortress. Bullets pinged off him harmlessly as he advanced, unflinching.
Hayato followed close, his jagged shards flaring, mask covering his young face. His body still shook with the strain of his hybrid kagune, but with his father shielding him, he could strike without hesitation.
A shard-blade slashed a throat. Blood sprayed. The hunger roared in his stomach, but the mask reminded him: Control it. Choose it.
When the last body fell, Bastion stood silent among the blood. Hayato panted, shards retracting with a hiss, mask hot with his breath.
His father looked down at him. "…Good. A blade is sharper when it knows what wall it cuts from."
Hayato's eyes glowed faintly in the dark behind the crude mask. He nodded once.
I'm not theirs. I'm not just a boy. I'm not weak. I'm a blade. And this mask is the face they'll learn to fear.
[July 10, 2005 — 12:49 A.M. | The Apartment, 19th Ward]
The candle guttered low, throwing shadows along the cracked walls. Hayato sat at the table, mask in his hands, tracing its seams with his finger. His father leaned back in the chair across from him, mask resting on the wood, arms crossed.
"You're learning to fight," his father said. His voice carried weight, the kind that pressed down on silence. "That's good. But fighting isn't what keeps us alive."
Hayato frowned. "…Then what does?"
His father leaned forward, resting his heavy hands on the table. "Blending in."
Hayato tilted his head. "Like… pretending to be human?"
"Not pretending. Living." His father's eyes hardened. "We walk the same streets. We shop in their stores. We ride their trains. You look them in the eye and give them no reason to doubt. The mask is for when you hunt. But the life you wear every day — that's your shield."
Hayato looked down at the mask in his hands. A shield that isn't armor… a shield that smiles.
His father continued. "Eat quietly. Move quietly. Don't linger around raids. Don't grow close to humans if you can't control yourself. Every time you slip, the Doves get closer. Every time you stand out, you invite the clan to sniff you out. Both will kill you."
Hayato nodded slowly, but inside, he thought: I don't want to just hide. I don't want to just blend. I want to stand.
[July 14, 2005 — 1:33 A.M. | Rooftop, 19th Ward]
The city spread out below, lit by fractured neon and the faint glow of distant fires. Hayato sat on the ledge, kicking his legs idly, while his father crouched beside him, his broad armored back facing the night.
"Hayato," his father said quietly. "There's something you need to understand about me. About what I am."
Hayato glanced up, frowning. His father wasn't often hesitant.
"I've carried this for years," his father continued. "The reason the clan disdains me. The reason the Doves hunt me harder than most."
With a deep breath, he called it. His kagune flared, plates erupting along his arms and chest. But then — it grew further, sharper, denser. The armor spread along his shoulders, his jawline, his thighs, until his body was nearly encased. The plates merged into monstrous shapes, overlapping, jagged like an insect's carapace. His silhouette thickened, his breath a low rumble under the weight.
Hayato's eyes widened. "Tou-san…"
"This," his father said, voice distorted beneath the heavy armor, "is kakuja."
The word hung in the air, sharp and heavy.
Hayato whispered, "The thing… that happens when you…"
"When you eat your own kind," his father finished grimly. He retracted it slowly, the armor hissing back into his body, leaving him panting. He wiped blood from the corner of his mouth. "Long ago, I did what I had to. To live. To fight. I thought it made me stronger." His eyes met Hayato's, hard. "But it made me a monster. Unstable. Every time I use it, I hear the hunger louder. That is why I am Bastion. Not just because I shield, but because I built walls inside myself — to cage the thing I became."
Hayato stared at him, chest tight. So even he… even tou-san struggled. He bled for this. And now he fears it too.
His father placed a heavy hand on his shoulder. "Promise me, Hayato. Never feed on our kind. Never seek this. Power won that way takes more from you than it gives."
Hayato swallowed hard. "…But if they come for me—"
"Then you fight with what you are," his father interrupted, voice sharp. "Not with what you should never be."
Hayato lowered his gaze, fists trembling. But if it made you survive… what if one day I have to
[July 20, 2005 — 10:17 A.M. | Commission of Counter Ghoul, 2nd Ward Office]
From the window, the city stretched in the haze of morning, indifferent. But beneath it, war was stirring — and the name Bastion had returned to the CCG's stage.
The room hummed faintly with the sound of old fluorescent lights, a monotone buzz that blended with the scratch of pens on paper and the quiet shuffle of files being sorted. The smell of coffee gone stale clung to the air.
At the center desk sat Senior Investigator Takahashi, his sharp features lined with years of exhaustion. His tie was loosened, his coat draped over the back of the chair. His eyes scanned the report in front of him without haste, each line absorbed, weighed, filed away in a mind trained to notice the smallest inconsistency.
Across from him, Junior Investigator Mori stood stiff, file in hand, posture betraying the tension of speaking about one of the ward's most elusive predators.
"Multiple civilian reports," Mori began, voice clipped. "All within the last two weeks. The same description appears across three separate incidents." He tapped the folder. "A tall male ghoul, upper body encased in dense plating — crimson-black in color. Gunfire ineffective at close range."
Takahashi leaned back slightly, eyes narrowing. "Always the same pattern?"
"Yes, sir. Brutal force. Fast suppression of targets. Limited witnesses — those who survived describe it as fighting a wall of iron. One even called it 'like a fortress that walked.'"
Takahashi's lips pressed thin. He reached into the folder and spread the attached photographs across his desk. Black-and-white images captured the aftermath: alleyways gouged with deep, jagged grooves, bullets flattened against fragments of hardened kagune, and in one image, a concrete wall cratered from a single impact.
The senior investigator's fingers lingered on the fragment. "Kōkaku density," he murmured. "And not ordinary. Armor-grade."
Mori nodded quickly. "We believe it matches archived sightings under the codename Bastion. Last confirmed activity dates back four years, 19th Ward, before he went quiet."
"Quiet…" Takahashi muttered. His gaze sharpened. "Or careful."
Mori hesitated. "…There's also mention of a second figure. Smaller. Younger. Witnesses are inconsistent, but all note shards. Jagged, crystalline. Could be Ukaku, but denser. Possibly a mutation."
The older man stilled. His pen tapped once, twice, against the desk. "A partner?"
"Possibly offspring," Mori said carefully. "But the description doesn't match any ghoul currently in our database. No mask reported, but all agree the smaller one fought alongside Bastion."
Silence pressed the room. Takahashi leaned forward again, hands clasped over the photographs.
"An A+ ranked ghoul," he said slowly, "now accompanied by a second combatant. If that's a child, it makes him more dangerous, not less. Training. Grooming." His jaw tightened. "The ward cannot afford Bastion to resurface unchecked."
He pulled a second sheet from the file — the formal incident summary. Lines of typed text listed prior encounters, suspected feeding grounds, estimated strength. His pen hovered over the rank notation: A+.
Mori swallowed. "Orders, sir?"
Takahashi considered for a long moment. His gaze returned to the photographs — to the grooves in brick, the shattered pipes, the stories of bullets useless against crimson plates. He sighed through his nose, low and sharp.
"Send someone to investigate," he said at last. "A senior investigator. Experienced in Kōkaku engagements. Someone who understands full-body plating and knows what kind of prey they're stalking."
"Yes, sir."
Takahashi closed the folder with deliberate weight. He reached for the wooden stamp resting at the corner of his desk — worn, stained with ink from years of sealing reports. He pressed it firmly to the file's cover, the thud echoing through the office.
The red kanji burned onto the paper: ACTIVE CASE — PRIORITY.
He set the folder aside, eyes narrowing. "The Bastion returns to the stage. And if he's raising another…" He let the thought trail, but his gaze was cold, decisive. "Then we'll cut them both down before they grow into a fortress we cannot breach."