“Ji-san!”

The unexpected call startled Kisuke, pulling his attention away from the chess set and towards—

A small child?

Erich chuckled and turned, one arm outstretched in welcome, and caught the young, grey haired boy as he lunged at him. “And how are you today, Uryuu-kun?” Erich asked as he settled the boy in his lap and nodded a greeting at the woman walking towards them.

Uryuu scowled up at Erich. “You didn’t come see me this morning,” he declared as he tucked himself into Erich’s side.

Kisuke tried to suppress the smile that wanted to emerge at the sight, but it was hard. There was a softness, a warmth, to Erich’s expression that he’d never expected to see; the man hadn’t precisely struck him as a family man, but…

“I’m certain I told you that I would be busy this morning,” Erich replied with a small smile, though Kisuke caught the way Erich’s arm tightened protectively around Uryuu’s body. “Kanae-san, I hope he didn’t cause you much trouble…?”

“Not at all.” The woman, Kanae, shook her head and stopped a few steps away from the porch in order to bow deeply to Erich. “Good morning, Erich-sama. I hope you can forgive our intrusion.”

Erich snorted and waved a hand at her. “Enough of that, I don’t mind. Come and sit with us.”

Kanae straightened up and cast a glance at the area around them, then gave Erich a soft smile and said, “I think I will see if Ren-sama has tea and snacks, then I will come sit with you.”

Kisuke arched an eyebrow at Erich as Kanae swept past them to enter the house. “‘Erich-sama’? Is there something I should know?”

“Kanae-san’s family was… strict about propriety,” Erich said with a grimace. “But enough about that. Urahara Kisuke, meet my nephew Uryuu.”

He gave the boy a cheerful smile and a small wave, and had to laugh at the flat stare he got in return. “Maa, it’s nice to meet you, Uryuu-kun!”

“You’re the man that ji-san found almost dead on the shore.”

“I wasn’t almost dead,” Kisuke protested with an exaggerated pout, earning him a giggle from Uryuu. “I was injured and decided to rest,” he finished with a sniff, even as he shot Erich a questioning look, surprised by Uryuu’s knowledge of events. Finding a bloody, unconscious man on the lake shore didn’t seem like a thing to share with young children.

(Well… he didn’t think it was, at least.)

(He could be wrong.)

“We’re a small community out here. Keeping secrets is impossible.” Erich shrugged and leaned forward to move a chess piece, though the intense focus of earlier was missing from his expression. The look he gave Kisuke when he sat back was still one of challenge, though. “You were indeed almost dead, however.”

“We’ll have to agree to disagree on that,” Kisuke said with a teasing grin, though he suspected Erich had the right of it; he might not have been almost dead when the man found him but… without aid he would have been.

But that made him wonder about the ‘small community’ that Erich claimed lived out here. He’d seen few signs of habitation beyond this small home, the adjacent bathhouse, and the two little footpaths, one of which led into the forest and other down to the lake with its ever-present swans.

Considering the amount of open space around the lake, he’d have thought there would be other homes built near it.

Unless the lake itself was avoided for some reason?

(The swans, maybe.)

(He could understand that reasoning.)

“Urahara-san?”

“Ah, sorry.” Kisuke dragged his attention back to Erich with a sheepish smile. He scanned the chess board and made his move, then sat back to watch Erich’s reaction.

The tiny furrow between Erich’s brows meant the man had caught the trap Kisuke had set up, despite his focus being split between the game and Uryuu.

Kisuke hadn’t expected to enjoy this little diversion as much as he was; strategy games against an average opponent held little interest for him, but Erich had a cunning mind and a talent for strategy that meant he could — and did — hold his own. He’d even employed several strategies that Kisuke hadn’t predicted him likely to use, forcing him to reevaluate his impression of the man.

It was a fascinating look into Erich’s mind that made Kisuke want to learn more.

(He’d not found someone so interesting in decades.)

(It was refreshing.)

Kanae returned with a tray as Erich was making his next move, being careful not to disturb either of them as she sat down and began to pour tea into the cups she’d brought out. She set a small plate of finger food next to his elbow, another next to Erich’s, then settled back with her own cup of tea and took in the board between them.

“Thank you,” Kisuke said as he picked up a small cake to nibble on.

“I know how Erich-sama gets when he pulls this set out,” she told him with a tiny, secretive smile.

Erich made a noise of protest. “I don’t ‘get’ any specific way,” he grumbled without heat, absently passing one of the treats to Uryuu.

Uryuu twisted around to give Erich a wide-eyed look and said, “But—”

Erich ruffled Uryuu’s fluffy grey hair, which made the boy cut himself off with a pout. “Hush you,” he ordered, the corners of his eyes crinkling and his lips curling up into a warm smile.

Kisuke laughed at the interactions, enjoying the chance to see yet another side of this interesting man. It made him wonder what /else/ there was to Erich, what skills the man still hadn’t revealed or even hinted at; the sort of twisty, strategic mind he’d displayed through their games was fascinating enough, but what else was there to discover? Between the strange maybe-hallucination, the song-based healing he’d never before seen and the casual display of cunning, Kisuke couldn’t help himself.

Curiosity itched at his mind, begging to be satisfied, and he had every intention to satisfy it.

(That Erich seemed to be giving him the opportunity was interesting.)

(Did that mean Erich was equally interested…?)

(How promising!)