Disclaimer: I don't own Bleach or any of the characters, unfortunately. I'm just playing around with them, and making them play around with each other.

forenote: thank you very much to tetsuya, who inspired me to do this and has helped me with the wording and given great adive on how to work this, this is dedicated to you my friend.

It's been a While

Chapter 1

Emptiness

Rukia stared out the window, two years had past since she had last seen Ichigo. After defeating Aizen and his motley crew of vazairds and arankaru, she had gone back to Soul Society and left him to his life. Never in all that time could she have imagined how much she could miss him, but she daren't go near him, for every time she saw him, it was harder to pull herself away from him and his pig headed attitude again.

'But', she sighed to herself,' her life was here, in Soul Society, the Gotei 13 needed her and also, more importantly, did her brother, Kuchiki Byakuya. Ever since he had confessed that he was her step brother, she had been with him, trying to fill in the hole left in his heart by Hisana, Rukia's older sister. He even seemed to be happier than she was now she mused.'

Suddenly, out of nowhere she felt a painful sensation on her back and found herself pinned to the floor.

"Daydreaming about him again eh Rukia" A familiar sounding voice said.

Rukia spun out of the pin, "Renji! You idiot, I was not thinking about him at all!"

Renji smirked, "Now I know you were thinking about him, you didn't even try to hit me, anyway", he continued in a pompous voice, "I just wanted to check up on the 13th division's new vice-captain"

Two years ago, she would not have believed it, but staying in Urahara's weird reiatsu sapping gigai and being close to Ichigo, had actually made her far stronger than she had been before Ichigo took her powers. While training with captain Yamamoto, which was indeed a great honour for a low ranked shinigami, they discovered that Ichigo's reiatsu had been seeping into her body through the gigai, awakening powers that would have taken her years to obtain naturally, raising her reiatsu past vice captain level. She also knew what Urahara would say if she ever asked him if he knew the gigai would affect her like this;

"Of course I did Kuchiki-san, do you think I would try and harm one of my best customers"

'What I would give to wipe that smirk off Urahara's face', she thought to herself.

"Idiot, I was perfectly fine till you showed up", she shouted at Renji as she kicked him in the shin.

"Ow, that was uncalled for, why hit me there? You know I still hurt there from practice with Captain Zaraki!" Renji whimpered.

"Serves you right for practicing with that maniac", Rukia, had been worried that Renji would get off a whole lot worse than with just a sore shin. "Just because Ichigo defeated him, doesn't mean you have to go out and do it to prove how tough you are."

Rubbing his shin furiously to get rid of the pain, Renji forgot to watch his words about Ichigo round Rukia, "Why in every conversation we have does that kids name keep coming up! I mean come on Rukia, its been two years are your still saying, Ichigo this and Ichigo that, we all know you like this guy, for the love of god I cant see why, but why don't you actually go and talk to him instead of moping round these halls!", The last word seemed to echo round the room, Renji finally realised what he had said and expecting another kick to his sore shin, wrapped his arms around his legs and closed his eyes.

About 5 seconds had past before he heard a small sigh from his long time friend and he opened his eyes.

"Maybe you're right Renji," She said quietly," but I can't risk losing him again." And with that, she turned and walked out the room, leaving Renji, to stare out the window.

'Idiot', he thought to himself, 'how could, not seeing that stupid, spiky haired brat Ichigo not help her when she was this unhappy', as much as he himself hated to admit it, he could do absolutely nothing to bring Rukia out of her mood, she had been like this for the past two years! He had tried everything, even making a fool out of himself on purpose, and still she wouldn't brighten up. He scowled, he had to do something t… All of a sudden a thought hit him; if she wouldn't go see him, then maybe he would come see Rukia.

Renji, thought more about this as he went to meet his Captain,

'Ichigo will probably come; I mean he went to all those lengths to save Rukia in the first place! But just in case, I better think up an excuse to get him here that he can't refuse', he though, walking straight into a wooden beam in the process.

"Ow, my nose!" he shouted, holding his nose up to stop the bleeding.

He turned round, to continue on his way when he noticed Captain Kuchiki was standing next to him.

"Renji, what on earth must you be thinking about for you to concentrate so much you walk into that beam, come in and talk with me about whatever is on your mind."

Renji mused about how much his captain had changed in the past two years, Rukia really had made a difference, he was far more open and treated his squad members with more respect than he had done previously. Captain Kuchiki had even started meeting up with some of the other captains! This never happened unless it was necessary before. This guy owes Ichigo more than I do, he thought.

Byakuya sat down behind his desk and motioned for Renji to take a seat as well, "What's on your mind Renji? I have never seen you this distracted before."

"Well Captain… "

Byakuya cut him off, "Call me Byakuya Renji, we are not in front of anyone just now, it's ok to be informal".

Renji blinked in surprise, he had changed even more than he though, "Well, Byakuya, I was wondering if you noticed how unhappy Rukia has been recently." he paused waiting for a reply, getting none he continued, "She seems to be missing that idiot boy, Ichigo, more than any of us thought she would and it's beginning to get to me. I can't see her being that unhappy all the time, so I was wondering..." he started to squirm in his seat," if we could bring Ichigo to soul society for training or something..."

Renji looked up at his Captain; he could not get used to the idea of calling him Byakuya, and watched his face for any sign of emotion. After about a minute of silence, he couldn't take any more," did you hear me Captain?"

Byakuya looked up from the table, "yes I heard you." Hmm, he thought, 'I have noticed Rukia's unhappiness, and she still talks about that damned place and boy all the time', "I agree Renji, I cannot stand to see her unhappy either, but Ichigo cannot come to Soul Society, that fool Zaraki, as you well know, has almost attained his shi kai and would be itching to fight Ichigo if he came here. And I though I told you to call me Byakuya?"

Renji blinked, he hadn't expected Captain Kuchiki to respond so favourably," eh, ah, sorry, Byakuya, but if we can't bring Ichigo here then what? Rukia won't go down to the living world and visit him."

A smile formed around Byakuya's lips, Renji found this a tad disconcerting, no matter how much he smiled these days, "I think I have a way," he said, taking out a request form from his desk," Myuri is looking for someone of high reiatsu to test out his new gigai for a month on the living world. This new gigai even has something that Myuri calls, "Money", whatever that is.", he sat the paper down on his desk and looked at Renji with a mischievous smile, "What do you think Renji?"

"I think its a fantastic idea sir!" Thinking for once he was glad Myuri was doing weird those experiments of his, "When will you tell her?" Renji pause for a minute, "What will we do if she refuses to go?"

Byakuya laughed, 'Jeez how much is he going to freak me out today', Renji wondered, "I shall talk to Captain Utikate, I'm sure that between us, we will be able to get Rukia to go along, though I am not expecting too much of an objection in the first place.Right Renji, I need you to go now, I need to do some things before we tell Rukia."

Renji walked out of his Captains office happy, happy that he might actually see Rukia truly happy again.

He could not imagine the events that had been set in motion, events that would change all their lives.