Disclaimer: I don't own Bleach or any associated ideas. Kubo Tite is in charge of that, being the genius he is.
A/N: Inspired by Sting's song "Fragile." No, this is not a songfic. There may be more like this, though probably not sequels.
Blood everywhere, once again. There was more this time, but it wasn't as bad as that time. Nothing ever would be, though, so it was pointless to compare them.
Even so, this day would stay with him, just as that one did. They were, after all, so much alike…
That hollow. That damned hollow. The start of everything, the birth of all changes in him.
He was not, by nature, a violent person, regardless of his reputation. Yes, he got into a lot of fights. Yes, he had a habit of kicking people, especially when they did something stupid. But this—the rain turning red from all the blood spraying from a body—did not appeal.
And yet, a part of him relished the feeling of ripping through the hollow's flesh with his zanpaku-to this time. The fur matted with blood. The look of pain somehow discernible on that stupid smiling mask.
The hollow brought it on itself. The sick, twisted fuck, using his mother's face as a shield. He had hesitated, unable to hurt her, to kill her a second time.
And then the rain had started to fall. Just like that day. Every damn thing repeating itself. The rain was washing him—and it—clean of the blood, but the smell of it, the pain, the fresh memory of the fight still lingered. They clung to the scene with an almost human desperation, dredging up older memories, and the whole of it made his head ache.
In the end, he knew nothing had really come from this fight, save the knowledge of his mother's killer. She had not come back. The suffocating guilt still hung about him, even with his father's words to alleviate some of the burden.
These endless battles… He understood their necessity, but also their futility. They were maintenance. An endless uphill climb. There was no gain, just an endless fight against losses.
Yet he couldn't give them up. He knew what would happen if he did. He had seen it. And, however impossible or pointless it may seem, there was revenge.
So he wouldn't stop or give up.
Even so, the rain was pissing him off. It felt like it was mocking him. A reminder of how fragile humanity was.
On and on, the rain will fall…