Notes: Someone asked me to write this way back when I had first posted "Regrets of the Unregretting" and I immediately jumped on the chance to do it. However, I'd fallen out of Bleach before I could finish it. Now that I'm in it again (for now) I thought I'd finish it (because I really do love this miniseries). It was already pretty long at 1800 plus words so really it was almost done. I just had to finish it. Now that it is done, I hope you enjoy it. (As a side note I'm finishing this just twenty days shy of a year after where I left it.)

Warnings: None.

Timeline: Approximately a year and three months after the defeat of Aizen (aka around 15 months later)

Confessions of the Broken Moon

The silence was unbearable. It was stifling, it was suffocating, it was slowly killing him. He hadn't spoken to anyone at all the entire week and he hadn't even left his room for the past three days for anything more than a bathroom break or food. His family worried about him, his younger sister shooting each other concerned looks while his father tried his hardest to involve his only son in the affairs of the rest of them. All he would receive for his repeated efforts was a small smile that worried him more than a frown would have.

Ichigo hated that he was upsetting his family, but he couldn't bring himself to stop his self destructive behavior. His apathy toward his own wellbeing was troublesome at best. He didn't want to live his life wasting away, but the motivation to do anything other than mourn the loss of what – who – he lost was utterly drained from him.

He was lying on his bed after yet another day of inactivity. His curtain and window were open and the crescent moon shone down on him in all of its celestial glory. He couldn't bring himself to appreciate its full beauty as the only thing it served to remind him of was what he lost, what he was forced to sacrifice. It was about midnight according to the clock sitting on his desk, and the breeze flowing through his room was comfortably cool.

Brown eyes stared listlessly at the closet that once house a certain someone, a certain individual that not once tried to contact him after all these months. It had been a little over a year since then and he was seventeen now, not that it mattered, but it just went to show that he would keep changing while they would not.

He didn't care anymore anyway. He couldn't see them even if they had attempted to talk to them. (He would never say so out loud but he was secretly furious that they decided to cut off contact entirely, but at the same him he felt incredibly disappointed, as if they were ashamed to even know him now that he was no longer someone of any interest.) The silence in his soul was as oppressive as it was never-ending.

He pushed himself up slowly as if it pained him and he rolled gracelessly off the bed to stand on the floor. Not allowing his gaze to travel to the small closet again, he grabbed his jacket from the back of his desk chair and started for the door, leaving it hanging open as he trudged quietly down the stairs. Slipping on a pair of shoes, he left the house after checking his pocket for his keys. The night air was peaceful, and all he could do was assume that there was no extra activity going on where he couldn't see it.

He wandered around for several hours, the first time he'd left his house in nearly four days, his mind carefully blank and agonizingly silent. When he eventually stepped through his front door again, the clock told him it was four-thirty in the morning and he'd been aimlessly walking for four and a half hours. He felt exhausted but yet he knew he wouldn't be able to sleep, so he just padded his way upstairs once more. He entered his room and made his way toward the still open window, hanging halfway out of the frame in a way that made him feel as if he was going to fall. He pulled his feet up to the frame of the window and threw them over the edge to sit on the sill, hands holding the wood below him in a white-knuckled grip.

He wasn't sure how long he sat there before he heard a slight shifting behind him and a light cough, the sound of someone clearing their throat. He turned his head sharply, reflexes and instincts kicking in, and he swayed dangerously. He quickly tensed before his searching eyes found the face of the other, immediately relaxing once again as his eyes met those of his father.

"Dad…" he mumbled to more to himself as he watched his father approach him. He didn't move as the man moved over to sit on the bed with his back to the window. "Wha… What're you…?"

"Ichigo," Isshin stopped his son before he could keep going, turning his eyes to look up at his son, "I know this is a stupid question, but are you okay?"

Ichigo furrowed his brow and looked back outside, moonlight gleaming off of his orange hair. "I'm fine, Dad," he replied after a moment of silence. Isshin was completely unconvinced but never said another word, content to simply let the teen speak on his own terms. The man knew better than anyone that Ichigo couldn't be forced into anything. He wasn't disappointed.

"I've discovered that I absolutely hate silence," the boy revealed slowly, pulling one leg up to rest his chin on his knee. "I hate it more than I hate the rain."

"Hate's a powerful word, son," Isshin murmured, crossing his arms behind his head and glancing over at the desk top where he could see the small wooden - now useless – combat pass they had given his boy sitting innocently. His brows furrowed in old anger as he redirected his gaze towards the teen.

"But I mean it." Isshin could feel the truth behind the words. Ichigo fell quiet again as his brown eyes caught the light of the celestial body above them, golden flecks reflecting a blue tint that made the older male's heart clench painfully. "It's suffocating."

The silence stretched on for nearly an entire minute before the teen spoke again, his voice barely audible. "I feel empty… hollow."

Isshin sucked in a breath and turned his eyes again, unable to look at his son anymore. He had no idea what to say, no idea how to comfort his strong, broken boy.

"The last thing he – they – said to me was that what they – he – wanted to protect was me," Ichigo mumbled, squeezing his eyes shut as a shudder wracked his frame, the image of those eyes – not just the one but both of them – leaking those dreadful, awful tears assaulting his mind's eye. "I really hurt him, both of them." The boy pulled himself inside completely and sat under the window beside his father, his knees curled into his chest as if he was trying to appear smaller. "I feel like I betrayed them."

Isshin tilted his head slightly, almost afraid to speak. "Who, exactly, are you talking about here?" The older man had a pretty good idea, or at the very least half of one, but he needed the confirmation.

Ichigo seemed to recoil into himself, pulling his legs closer and burying his face into the arms he crossed on his knees. His voice was soft as he whispered, "Zangetsu." Suddenly he let out an unnatural sounding bark of laughter. "And that damn Hollow," he mumbled afterward, laying his head sideways on his arms to look in his father's direction. "They were both there, like they always are-were," he corrected himself with a visible grimace. "They didn't want me to know how to do it, but I needed to know so badly…" Ichigo couldn't stop the words that bubbled from his chest, more than he'd said in a very long while, and he couldn't help tripping verbally over the name of his soul's partner. "Z-Zangetsu said he was the source of my despair, the Hollow, I mean, and so he brought him out, well, more like drug him out of me… and then there he was with that damn mask that looked way different than it used to, than it should have, like this reverse mirror image of the one that I would use and it was weird and black-" Isshin let out a small gasp at that, but Ichigo was so wrapped up in his own mind that he didn't notice, "-and then the two of them merged together somehow, and then Tensa and the Hollow attacked me together and the entire place was underwater and-"

"Whoa, slow down there, Ichigo," Isshin cut into the boy's ramblings as they increased in speed. "Okay, let me get this straight; Zangetsu and… your Hollow were both there, but only after Zangetsu drug the Hollow out, and then they merged together to attack you as one being?" Ichigo nodded, closing his eyes. "Okay, I get that, I guess, but who exactly is Tensa?"

Lips quirked up at that as he relived the moment when he wondered the same thing before he asked a similar question to the one he'd received. "What's the name of my Bankai?" Without waiting for an answer, he opened his eyes again to look straight into the brown of his father's. "Tensa Zangetsu and the Hollow worked together to try to stop me… by whatever means necessary."

Isshin felt cold momentarily at the intensity of his son's gaze before he was forced to look away, hot shame burning away the ice in his chest. "Was it like that the entire time you were in there?" He didn't have to go into specifics; he knew Ichigo would know exactly what he was talking about.

The teen wasn't gentle in his next sentence, answering bluntly with brutal honesty. "Yes, it was." Isshin just nodded, still not meeting the gaze of the boy beside him. The two lapsed into silence again, both lost in his thoughts. Several minutes later, Ichigo spoke up again in the smallest voice Isshin had ever heard. "He had tears in his eyes." The man turned back to the boy. "He didn't want me to know how to do the Final Getsuga Tenshou because he wanted to protect me." Ichigo shook his head, feeling as if the weight of the world was resting on his shoulders. "I didn't realize what I was doing at the time. I didn't know…" he trailed off, trembling slightly, "I didn't know, I didn't want to think about what was going to happen after." He forced his voice to get louder and heavier with resolve and regret. "I didn't know I was going to be left alone."

He was shaking, repressed emotions threatening to overflow as he continued in that loud, broken voice. "I feel lost, confused, angry… I feel powerless, and worst of all, I feel empty! I feel like half of me is literally gone and with it any motivation to do much of anything!" He shook his head roughly, hoping against hope to dislodge the unforgiving images plaguing his mind. "I hate this! I hate all of it! I can't do anything anymore and it's all because I was too stupid to stop and think for once in my life!"

"Ichigo," Isshin stopped his son cold, the teen frozen by the mere tone the older had used. "Calm down." The teen didn't move for several seconds before he slumped over sideways, resting against his father in a way that he hadn't since he was young and carefree.

"It hurts," he murmured, eyes slipping shut.

"I know," the man whispered to his son, wrapping an arm around his shoulders and stroking his head softly. "I didn't have my powers for years, so I can almost understand what you're going through. I didn't feel like I was being torn apart though, so I' sorry you have to deal with that. Just try to be strong for a little while longer. I'm sure things will turn around eventually and everything will be okay again, you'll see."

"How can you say that? How can I feel like everything will work out in the end when it looks so bad right now? No one's talking to me, no one tells me anything, and I have no clue what's going on with anybody. I feel like they don't care anymore," Ichigo confessed, his hands clenching into fists briefly. He relaxed again, exhausted. "I just…" he trailed off, voice quiet.

Isshin looked down at his son, the boy practically lying on his shoulder. He could see the bags under the boy's eyes, the thinness of his body and the slouch to his posture. He could feel more than see how frustrated and upset he was at everything, but he couldn't do anything – not yet anyway – but talk to him and try to reignite the fire that had all but withered and died. He opened his mouth to press Ichigo to finish his thought before he realized that his breathing had slowed and his body was limp.

Smiling softly, he slowly removed himself from the boy and laid him down on his bed, tucking him in as if he was a child once more. He brushed a hand through orange hair, resting it against his face before pressing chaste lips to the boy's temple, the most affection he'd shown him since he was a boy. "Just hang in a little bit longer, Ichigo. We've almost got it, and then everything will be better than fine, okay?" he spoke quietly as to not wake the boy.

As he turned to leaved, he paused as he heard a shifting behind him. Before he could turn around, he heard a whispered, "I just want everything to go back to the way it was." He hid a smile and crept through the door, shutting it almost silently.

Don't worry, he thought to himself as he looked at a nearby clock and saw that it was nearly six in the morning. It will.

Finally finished it. I realized I didn't have much to add but I wanted to leave the ending as definitive and slightly hopeful to counteract the angst of the whole thing, so that's what came out. I hope the end doesn't seem rushed, but wherever it was going when I started it, I don't think it's in the same place now. Regardless, I hope you enjoy this because I actually really like it.