The Arrancar Wars
Volume One: Let There Be War
Chapter One
Chemistry was normally one of the most interesting subjects in Ichigo's class load. The necessity for it in his future medical career aside, the potential for disaster from a few of his lab mates was too intriguing for him to not pay attention. Especially since he had no desire to throw off his average and lower his excellent academic standings. He'd been in the top five percent since he began medical school, and he aimed to finish it out in the same fine form—blowing his GPA halfway through was not in the plan.
Unfortunately, his attention couldn't be bartered this fine morning when a hell butterfly was winging its way to him after having emerged through the dry erase board his professor was currently scrawling their latest chemical formulae on, conveniently missing the bright red marker with a sudden dart of its translucent wings before aiming unerringly for him.
Had Kurosaki Ichigo been any less of a shinigami his eyes would have been darting all over the place for fear of a sensitive classmate seeing. Luckily Ichigo already knew (thanks to Rukia's prodding at the beginning of every semester, which translates to showing up in shinigami form to harass him through an entire day of classes) that none of the students in his chemistry lab were sensitive.
No. They were all about as psychically dense as a rock.
Thank god.
The fact that the creature was headed straight for him didn't bother Ichigo in the least. He'd long since grown accustomed to having the things pop up when least expected and most undesired, but it was a necessity and a fact of life for him. After the Winter War had ended Soul Society and Seireitei seemed intent on keeping him close. Ichigo had no arguments; it meant that he was able to continue his shinigami activities and see Rukia regularly.
However, it also meant that he had demented undead butterflies flitting into his chemistry lab a few minutes into lecture to land on his desk in front of him. This made one of his vivid orange eyebrows arch suspiciously. Unusual behavior, which meant abnormal, which always, always, meant that something was wrong and Ichigo had to go to Seireitei.
The habitual scowl on Ichigo's face deepened. Aside from the fact that the messengers never landed in his classes, but merely flitted, this hell butterfly was beginning to take on a distinctly misty shape. Within the mist Ichigo was sure that he could see the outlines of a scroll, one of the high security scrolls no less, taking shape where the butterfly had been fairly solid appearing moments before. His fingers itched to lay down his pen and notebook and snatch it up to learn what he could. The scroll surely had to do with the suspected Arrancar incursions on the edges of Soul Society.
"Kurosaki-san, is my class so boring that you refuse to pay attention?"
Ichigo's head whipped around to face the diminutive professor who was standing at his lab table attempting to peer over his shoulder. The sad thing was that even sitting, Ichigo was still tall enough to manage to keep Professor Kensei from seeing exactly what had his attention. Not that the professor could, the man was about as sensitive as a rock. The first time he'd said that Rukia had hit him upside the head and told him to quit insulting the rock. The mental image was nearly enough to make him lose his infamous composure, she'd looked so ridiculous defending the honor of an imaginary rock.
Ichigo pulled himself away from the thought to send an unkind glare at his teacher. "No." Short, succinct. Distinctly annoyed on top of that. Surely the man would leave him alone and let him get back to trying to discretely unroll the scroll that had finally finished materializing on his notebook, the hell butterfly completely gone now but for a few faint smudges of tiny black feathers across the creamy rolled velum.
Professor Kensei narrowed his eyes but didn't step back even as Ichigo frowned at him. Unmoved by Ichigo's imposing expression, the professor reached across the lap table to pick up Ichigo's notebook and peer at it. His hand and the notebook slipped through the scroll leaving Ichigo staring at it. Even his reputation was in danger of a back slip as he glanced up at his professor. It never failed to amaze Ichigo that average humans had no idea there was a whole other world out there that they couldn't touch. These moments only made it that much more real for him, even more so than the fact that he spent a great deal of his nights prowling his hometown in search of other worldly soul-eating creatures.
The professor hmm'd for a moment over his notes, but Ichigo contented himself with a scowl and a faint drumming of fingers. It wasn't like he didn't already have the highest average in the class. Not paying attention for thirty seconds was hardly going to ruin it. But Kensei Megamura reminded Ichigo forcibly of Kurotsuchi Mayuri: an egomaniac as well as megalomaniac, intent on being the center of focus. Where as the insane taichou had constantly tried to better himself than his predecessor, the chemistry professor was apparently still smarting over his declined application for appointment to head of the science department.
Ichigo could hardly fault them, the man was a toady. No, just a toad. He'd had the gall to ogle at Rukia the one time she'd come by in her gigai to snag Ichigo after class. An evening out with Ishida and Orihime and Tatsuki. No, Ichigo hadn't liked his chemistry professor at all after that.
"Well, your notes do seem to be in order." Ichigo's notebook was returned to him, and the scowl deepened ever more at the teacher's back.
Of course his notes were in order. They were neat, concise, and without a doubt a sight better than anyone else's. They also fit themselves neatly over the scroll again, whatever mystical properties it held making it lift itself to level with the surface paper instead of the top of the table it had descended to when the professor snatched his notes away.
He waited until the professor's back was already turned to the dry erase board again, the marker skimming smoothly along the surface in some formula that Ichigo really hoped was in his book, because his fingers were already grasping at the scroll as casually as he could make them. It would be so odd for someone to see him clutching at nothing as though his life depended on it. Even more ironic that it wasn't his life he was concerned with, but theirs, and their afterlives. He shook his head faintly trying to clear the thoughts. It was neither here nor there, and the fact that he was so able to protect himself while still living wasn't any of their fault or problem.
It was sealed with kido, and Ichigo fought the urge to roll his eyes. It had come from Yamamoto-Soutaichou, the paranoid old bastard. Only he would seal it with such a high level kido and still expect Ichigo to be able to unseal it without drawing attention from the rest of the class. He sighed, contemplating the old bathroom excuse.
A thump from the front of the classroom made Ichigo's eyes dart forward again, and he found the disapproving frown of the professor. Again. "Is there a problem, Kurosaki-san?" the diminutive man all but hissed at him.
"No," Ichigo said again, his voice the same foreboding sound it had been before, even as his eyes told the teacher, Yes, you're the problem, and I have so many painful ways to deal with insects like you.
Without even caring what the professor would think Ichigo turned his back on the little man, propping his book up and letting reiatsu flare along his long fingers until it was strong enough to break the kido seal. He certainly didn't have the time to mutter and mumble his way through one of those epic length spells Rukia was always spouting off when some quick work with her zanpakuto would suffice as easily. He was lucky there wasn't anyone remotely aware of what he was doing, because the seal broke with a dazzling display of light—no doubt old man Yamamoto had expected he'd take the shortcut of sheer power.
Ichigo twitched one of his shoulders, a half shrug that was barely noticeable. Sheer power had saved him—and many of those he cared about—more times than he cared to admit. Not always, but nearly.
The scroll unraveled itself and Ichigo's amber eyes scanned the smooth script until his fingers dropped it numbly, not wanting to believe what he was reading.
All taichou's of the Gotei 13 are hereby recalled to Seireitei under sealed orders. The Arrancar incursions have been confirmed and new intelligence has been checked and verified. Aizen Sousuke is alive and creating a new army. Report to the 1st Division immediately—this information is on a need to know basis. Anyone below the rank of taichou is not authorized to read this scroll.
-Y.G.
Ichigo's chest froze for a moment as he forgot what it was to breath, the sudden ice slicing through him even stilling his heart. It was supposed to be old Arrancar that slipped through the cracks, not new ones fresh created by a psychopath who should be dead! The Winter War was over, he wasn't supposed to have to worry about losing anyone else because of that power hungry megalomaniac. He wasn't supposed to have to sacrifice anything else for Aizen Sousuke.
Memories were such a funny thing, even more so than Senna had ever been before she'd turned to nothing more than thoughts on the wind. Things that Ichigo had buried for six years were welling up inside of him, threatening to break his composure. He hadn't cried then, he refused to cry now, not for anything. But he could never deny how much it had hurt. The pain lessened a little each time he visited Chad's grave, each time he saw him in the Rukongai, but that didn't change the fact that Sado Yasutora had given his life to save Ichigo's in the Winter War.
If it were possible to see red then Ichigo would have been seeing it. The sheer memory of Chad's death, of the pain that they'd all been through because of the war and it's aftermath, were always enough to drive Ichigo into a killing rage. It was one of the things that had won the Winter War in the first place, the death of such a stalwart compatriot driving so many of them to push themselves unto the breaking point.
Renji, Rukia, Ishida. Himself. Even Kyoraku-Taichou, though he'd been somewhat fond of Chad from the moment he'd stood up to the captain. It was to be expected; the Gotei 13 always respected loyalty.
But now? For Aizen to actually be alive? To have tricked them all and still be scheming to destroy Soul Society and Seireitei? No—that was unacceptable.
The scroll was left, not forgotten, but unneeded. He had his orders: the Gotei 13 required all of its captains present. As acting captain of the 5th, Ichigo had no choice but to go.
A clatter of marker on desk made Ichigo's eyes shoot to the front of the classroom, his amber gaze cold and hard and, if anyone in the room had the experience to tell, full of death. "Is there a problem, Kurosaki-san?" Professor Kensei was little more than a broken record at this point, and Ichigo gave the teacher a smile full of malicious pleasure.
"Yes, there is."
xXx
Aizen Sousuke is alive and creating a new army.
Hitsugaya's eyes closed as his fingers clenched around the paper. He didn't need to read further to know that he would never tell Hinamori. It could wait until the public announcement—for there would be one. They had won by the edge of two traitors six years ago. Aizen had gone for god only knows how long unchecked as he made his new army; Hitsugaya didn't lay good odds on the shinigami ranks to stand against him. Not now, maybe not ever. There were still too many wounds that had yet to heal, and six years was nowhere near long enough.
The mere thought of Aizen was enough to make him lose control: Hitsugaya forced his jaw unclenched and his eyes open, but did nothing about the way his fingers clawed into the paper of the scroll. It was riddled with wrinkles and stares, but his ocean colored gaze only looked at it impassively.
There were few things in his life that Hitsugaya Toushirou had ever truly hated. Aizen Sousuke topped the list with an ice-cold hatred that sometimes left the young taichou shivering and dumb with its fury. The man was a viper, a snake in the heart of the Gotei 13, twisting and warping every good thing he touched with the venom of his illusion and the depths of his madness for power. A traitor—worse than that, a betrayer. Hitsugaya was one of the few people in all of Soul Society who could ever understand that distinction. It was bad enough that Aizen had turned on his fellow shinigami, that he had turned to the very creatures he should have been destroying and purifying.
It was worse because he was taking innocent shinigami with him.
There was a list several dozen names long of the shinigami Aizen had manipulated, brainwashed, illusioned into being his unwitting accomplices. Hitsugaya only cared about one of them, the very one who had been injured the most by the ex-captains treachery. Hinamori had loved her taichou in every way possible, the source of so much anger and jealousy on Hitsugaya's part. Every single thing that he had ever wanted from Hinamori, Aizen had had.
And what had he done with it? He'd used her, turned her on her friends, the only family she had ever known, and then abandoned her for it. And when she still sought him out in blind love he'd killed her.
The scroll was gone in an instant, startling Matsumoto from the doze she'd been in on the couch as it thudded against a bookshelf, the weight increased exponentially by the ice that suddenly encased it. The wooden shelves shook, a handful of books and neatly rolled scrolls on kido crashing down with the frozen missive from the soutaichou.
"Taichou?" she asked, sitting up and blinking the sleep from her face. He knew that had there been an actual threat she would have thundered from her dreams, Haineko in hand and ash already seeping free to protect her captain. Hitsugaya also knew that the woman, one of his closest friends, already knew that the most dangerous thing in the vicinity was him, just as he did.
"Get out, Matsumoto," he ordered, his voice harsh and low. Hitsugaya turned away from her so that she couldn't see his face, couldn't read what was written there. She would assume, as he hoped, that the cause of his sudden rage was Hinamori. He'd been driven to anger so many times in the last six years because of what had happened.
At least then he wouldn't be lying if she asked who was at fault. He could say Aizen without fear of breaking the written order. The gods only knew what would happen then. Surely he wouldn't be executed for violating the direct written order that had followed the statement that triggered his rage. But he could never be sure, even with the surety of war looming once again.
To her credit, Matsumoto didn't argue, and Hitsugaya watched silently as she left, tossing worried glances back at him. The moment the door closed behind her, though, Hitsugaya let his reiatsu go. Within seconds the walls of his office were coated in ice, shimmering blue and white with the midday sun streaming through and bouncing from the frozen caps. The scroll from Yamamoto, anything and everything that Hitsugaya hadn't been touching, was buried under several feet of ice. He and the chair he sat in were the only things not encased, and Hitsugaya leaned back in the chair, letting his eyes stare up at the ceiling.
The ice distorted his view of the wood above him, but he didn't care. It was easier to let himself be mesmerized, try to forget for a moment that he'd suspected all along. It was different, though, to be handed the confirmation that the only person Hitsugaya wanted very much dead was still alive.
But it explained so much, that scroll did. Hitsugaya himself had been given charge of the initial investigation into the arrancar. It was only right and so, since he'd been the one to realize after a handful of encounters, that these arrancar were none that had ever been seen before, and had neither been known by captured and executed arrancar nor by their informants within Hueco Mundo and Las Noches. He'd led two reconnaissance missions before being pulled from the duty, and that in itself only seemed to confirm what he'd begun to suspect: that their extermination of Aizen and his organization was not in any way as complete as Seireitei had thought.
Hitsugaya never considered that Aizen was still alive.
"Goddammit," he muttered as he shoved himself to his feet.
Aizen had cost so many so much. Even Kurosaki had paid for it in blood, when his nakama had been killed. Poor bastard had shown up in the Rukongai without a trace of reiatsu, doomed to toil like the rest of the souls there unless whatever influence Ichigo had wrought on his soul in the mortal coil manifested itself here in his afterlife. Three divisions had lost their captains; Seireitei had lost hundreds of shinigami. Matsumoto herself had lost a man she's known from childhood, a man that Hitsugaya knew she loved more than anything bar Haineko. Not that his fukutaichou had ever told him what was between her and Ichimaru Gin. Not that he'd ever asked. But some things needn't have been, because the fox-faced taichou had betrayed Aizen before the last, and he'd done it for Matsumoto Rangiku.
And Hinamori. Hitsugaya was sure that his Hinamori had died the day that Aizen had faked his death, letting an illusion be pinned to a snow-white wall like a butterfly on display. Gods above, it always came back to her. But nothing had been the same after the Winter War, and neither had they. She was so scarred from what Aizen did, and he was so scarred from what she did.
It went without saying that whatever they had once been, they weren't any longer. Unahona had forced him to wait until a year after the war before she allowed him to see Hinamori. She had forced Hinamori to wait six more months before she allowed her near Hitsugaya again. But they'd fought. Each other, everyone else, and they had come back to something close to before. Friends again, near unto family. She'd started calling him Shirou-chan again sometime in the last year.
He still dreamt of her drawing Tobiume on him.
But it was a start, and he would be damned if he let Aizen Sousuke change it.
Hyourinmaru welled inside of him; Hitsugaya let the dragon rise to beneath his skin, drawing the ice back away from the walls and into him again, a freezing swirl of pure reiatsu. As it went the scrolls and books waylaid were returned to their shelves, and the parchment scroll from the 1st found its way back to Hitsugaya's hand. He spared a glance for his office, noting that the paperwork in his outbox (because there was never anything in Matsumoto's would need to be redone—the damp from the ice had made the ink run. Then he was headed to the other side of Seireitei, his captain's haori flapping behind him like great, white angel wings.
xXx
The War Room always made Ichigo think of something much bigger and far more grand than it was in actuality. The fact that he'd been fifteen six years ago let him point things out that the other taichou's had surely been dying to for decades, if not centuries. By simple virtue of his youth he'd managed to cut through some of Seireitei's red tape in ways that were nothing but beneficial to the overall structure of Soul Society and, quite possibly, the continued sanity of the remaining taichou's.
Six years ago the leaders of the Gotei 13 would have gathered in the hallowed halls of the 1st while Yamamoto handed down orders like edicts: to be blindly followed with scarcely any input outside of his own. On the rare occasions he allowed input it was usually only assigned reconnaissance, nearly entirely handled by Toushirou and Soifon-taichou's forces. Ichigo had told the old man that his insistence on being sole leader was useless and outdated.
The War Room was loud with the still gathering captains, but Ichigo could easily remember the gasps that had arisen when he'd dared speak so rudely to the soutaichou. He snorted as he leaned back in his chair. Rudeness his ass; it was nothing more than prudence and practicality. Granted, after sitting as head of the 5th for six years, he could have handled it with a bit more tact now than he had back then—but not much more. He was only twenty-one; he still didn't have that much tact.
In the end it had worked out well. The War Room was still in the first division, but it wasn't much more than a medium sized room with a long table. Yamamoto still lorded it over one end, but Unahona-taichou countered him directly opposite, with everyone else spread in between. Ichigo made a point of always trying to sit next to Nemu or Toushirou. Hisagi-fukutaichou was all right, but he wasn't exactly fun to annoy. The man let far too much roll off his back, so Ichigo let his best disrespect go to the youngest taichou of the remaining captains.
Nemu, however, was never to be teased. She was far too sweet for her own good, though she barely showed it. She reminded him of Rukia, which always made the tedious meetings better.
The table was less filled than usual today, since Yamamoto had forbidden the fukutaichous. It effectively left the 3rd, 9th and 12th out of the meeting, but there was nothing Ichigo could think to do. Kira and Hisagi were both… damaged by what Aizen had done, and the fact that their captain's had followed the man into hell, abandoning their comrades in Seireitei. Worse for them especially since for a time, they'd followed Ichimaru and Tousen. At least Nemu had the peace of mind that she had not betrayed Soul Society, though Kurotsuchi-taichou's death in the Winter War had come as something of a shock.
Apparently Aizen had been more wary of the mad scientist than anyone had realized, to send one of his arrancar on a suicide mission. Lucky that Nemu had been there and was able to kill it before it went after any of the other taichou's. They were down five at the time; they could scarce afford to lose another. Fortunately two of the five had been replaced, one of them by Ichigo himself. The other replacement was entering the War Room even as Ichigo thought about it, Yoruichi golden eyes flashing as she found him and immediately came to sit on his left.
"Have you spoken to anyone?" the older shinigami asked him, and Ichigo simply rolled his eyes at her.
"And go against old man Yamamoto's orders? Not even to Urahara," he answered simply as he examined her. Yoruichi was looking at him from beneath her lashes, her hair swept over her shoulder in a thick wine-colored tail. He knew that she had already spoken with the shop owner; how could she not have with such a feline smile of superiority?
"You shouldn't have done that, Yoruichi-san. Yamamoto takes his orders so seriously," but Ichigo was cracking a smile, the first since he'd received his orders, and trying to hold back a chuckle.
The captain of the 2nd waved her hand at him before lounging back in her chair. "Ah, you worry too much. Kisuke has every right to know everything. It's his life's work, after all."
The chuckle did escape, but Ichigo smothered it quickly. Maturity wasn't all he'd hoped it would be, and grown up responsibilities were usually worse than annoying. But everyone now present, from junior to senior taichou, knew that they were present because of Aizen and the arrancar. There was no sense in trying to antagonize his associates when their very presence brought back every loss and sacrifice they had made.
As much as he wanted to tease Yoruichi properly, the gravity of the situation seemed to leech all of his good humor away. "I could wish that he did," he told the Shihoin princess. "Maybe if he had, we wouldn't be here right now."
"Ah, who knows?" she asked rhetorically as she settled into her chair next to him.
Ichigo didn't even bother pretending she wanted an answer and instead just leaned on the arm of his chair, drumming his fingers as the rest of the captains began to take their seats when Yamamoto entered the room. Yamamoto settled in to his place of pride at the head of the table and Ichigo stopped drumming, his attention focused on the soutaichou. Yamamoto didn't seem to be in a terrible hurry, despite the fact that he'd called the immediate meeting, and questions were swirling around inside Ichigo's head as he waited.
Wrinkled fingers splayed on the table and the commander finally spoke. "You all know why I've called you here, and the floor will open on this momentarily. But there is never an ill that is not countered by some good: The verified return of Aizen Sousuke has brought a new member into our hallowed ranks."
Ichigo spared a glance at Yoruichi as he wondered blankly for a moment who might have been promoted without a council being convened. Not that Ichigo would have been on said council, since he was merely an acting captain; but he would have known. And honestly, he already knew who the best candidates were, and none of them were suited to the divisions in desperate need of a taichou. Especially when the front-runner was Ikkaku Madarame from the 11th. That man was entirely too violent to belong anywhere outside of Zaraki-taichou's keeping, though he might have made a decent go of it in the 9th. If Hisagi didn't try killing him first.
Yoruichi's face was split in a wide, smug smile, and for a moment he was reminded of the short but potent conversation they'd just had. She was telling him who it was, and he knew it. But Urahara had been exiled, and he'd refused to come back no matter what, even in the aftermath of Aizen and the Winter War. Sometimes Ichigo thought that he was performing a penance for creating the Hogyoku by not allowing himself to return. And yet, Yoruichi looked so pleased, like the proverbial cat with cream covered whiskers.
When the lean figure of Urahara Kisuke swept in, shinigami robes replacing his ever-present green striped hat and wooden clogs, Ichigo felt his jaw drop. The white haori carelessly draped over the mans shoulders only seemed to emphasize it, though the displeasure flashing in his gray eyes was in no way hidden by the pale hair that was trying to cover them. Benehime was swept over a shoulder, and Urahara glanced around the room for a moment, nodding at a few other captains besides Ichigo himself, before dropping in to the empty seat next to the younger shinigami.
On his other side, Yoruichi chuckled as she poked a finger at Ichigo and Urahara ignored her. "Didn't I tell you that you worry too much, I?" she drawled at him. Ichigo just glared at her.
xXx
This will probably be updated once a month at best, but enjoy. Barring changes there will be five volumes. This AN will be deleted in the future.
