A lone petal had fallen, flickering passed the face of a young looking girl. This young girl held a sword in her hands, calculating the person that stood in front of her and was thinking so hard about a strategy that the sudden appearance had startled her.

But it wasn't the petal itself that surprised her, it was what it symbolised. The petal made her realise something was wrong.

"Nii-sama?"

Very wrong. She couldn't feel his strong presence because it was struggling to remain alive. It was fading away. It was dying.

"Nii-sama!" She screamed in fright and charged towards the dying brother that had protected her over the years without her knowledge.

But her attempt to get to him was in vain at first.

She was struck just as she realised the grave mistake she had made, rendered unconscious the moment she was hit. Darkness consumed her vision and her body became useless as she collapsed against the rubble her body helped create.

It was unknown to her as to how long she was out for, but it wasn't of her own will that had wakened her, it was a voice.

A voice she knew well. But in the way it spoke, she was jolted awake by how sad, how defeated it sounded.

Forgive me...

Despite the pain that instantly enveloped her body, she awoke to tears spilling from her eyes. Like before, she didn't look back at her original opponents, but she wouldn't give them a chance to get her this time.

Her feet carried her a great distance faster than she had ever gone before in order to get to him, the tears now cascading down her bloodied face.

She didn't want to believe it. She couldn't believe it.

But as her feet hit the ground she skidded to a stop. In front of her was no doubt a Quincy, the bottom half of the face concealed with a black material and spikes.

It wasn't the appearance that shocked her, it was the familiar swirling mass above the enemy that made something in her mind snap.

It was her brother's Bankai.

So many questions and insults flooded her mind that she had to summon a lot of willpower in order to stop them from reaching her mouth and make he situation.

The Quincy all, but chucked and yet, didn't move. Making a strategy, taunting, who knew.

"Ru...kia..." The breathless voice startled her. Not because she didn't expect the voice itself, but because of how weak it sounded.

Her eyes widened and slowly she turned towards the voice. What she saw would forever be engraved into her mind, she was surprised at how long it took her to react at the sight.

The body was stuck in a crater quite obvious made by his impact surrounded by blood. His own blood.

So much of it.

The clothes either lay on the floor in tatters or hung onto the shredded skin.

She trembled when she saw his eyes. Those familiar eyes were now vacant, crimson liquid dripped from their sockets down until it had nowhere to go except to fall from the chin.

But there was just so much blood.

It finally registered in her who she was looking at. This could not be happening. This shouldn't be happening. Not to him. Her protector. Her counsellor. Her family.

Her brother.

Byakuya.

A slight movement from his free hand, the other still weakly clutching onto the shatter blade that was his Zanpakuto, caused his body to jar just enough to make the foundation holding him up crumble.

With nothing to keep him up he fell forward, expecting to land on the broken floor, but was instead caught by a pair of hands. Laying her brother onto the floor, she cradled his head. The tears trickled onto his surprisingly peaceful looking face as his unfocused eyes stared up at the girl who held him.

He was going to die, he knew this and shut his eyes for the last time.

"I'm...sorry..." he exhaled once...and didn't breathe in. At all.

Rukia sat with her brother's head on her lap, staring in shock at what had just happened. Sobs began to rack her body when she realised.

She realised her brother had just died in her arms.

The mental strength left her completely.

Rukia screamed.

LITD: This is the first fic in a long time I've written something, but what happened in the last few chapters was just so...upsetting for me that I had to write something about it.

Note that I haven't had anyone look at this and edit it. I'm currently on a train and this came to mind.

I don't want to believe that Byakuya is actually dead, but considering that we are onto the final arc. I thought it was obvious that Tite was going to kill off a few main characters.

But Byakuya was one of the 2 characters I hoped would remain alive. Of course, despite the white-haired Quincy saying he's dead, he might not be dead. We've seen so many times where we thought someone was dead only to come back again.

But as I said, this is the final ever arc. So depressing.

But what do you guys think? Is it good that I'm back? I'm currently writing another Bleach fic, but because of my bad record for only getting halfway through a fic then giving up, I'm going to write a few chapters before I start posting it so I can keep ahead of myself.

Hope you're all doing well.

Until next time.