I have a few important things to mention before this can begin. First off, this story takes place about twenty years in the future from the current Bleach chapters. The war with Aizen and the espada is still going on, and it looks like there's no end in sight. That's all I can say without spoiling the story, though. You'll find out the rest as you read. In terms of Phantom Brave, this story takes place early on in the game, like around chapter 7 or so. I think that's all you need to know for now, so go ahead and enjoy!

oOo

Hitusgaya Toushirou couldn't believe that he was being sent on a mission like this. It was a time of war and he, a captain, was being sent to take care of something this simple? His strength was needed elsewhere. Someone else could have been sent. It's not like performing a konso on a whole was a difficult task. Any Shinigami could do it. So, why him?

Getting to the location was easy enough. It was an island located in the middle of an archipelago in the North Pacific Ocean. He couldn't believe how tiny some of the islands were. The particular island he had to go to was just big enough to fit one house! True, there was a boat there as well, but Toushirou still couldn't believe that someone would live in such an isolated place. Ah well. To each his own.

It looked like there wasn't anyone home at the moment. That was good. At least he wouldn't have to worry about disturbing anyone who lived there. Now for the task of finding this whole. It had to be around here somewhere…Toushirou looked in both the front and backyards, but he didn't find it. He noticed that there were lots of flowers everywhere, and that the grass was very green. Whoever lived here must take good care of their yard, he thought.

He turned his attention back to his search. This was becoming difficult. The whole in question must have been weak, since he couldn't even feel it's presence. He looked around quickly once more before his gaze settled on the small house. Maybe it was in there? It couldn't hurt to look. Besides, the sooner he finished this, the sooner he could go back.

Toushirou tested the front door. It was shut, but not locked. He was about to open the door when he heard a voice behind him say, "You know, it's not polite to go in someone's house without permission."

He quickly turned around, hand on his sword and ready to draw it, but he stopped when he saw who was behind him. It was a spirit, most likely the one he was here for. It looked to be just a little older than himself, there wasn't anything too strange about it. So, he decided to go ahead and explain things. "I'm sorry it took so long to get to you," he said, "But now it's time to send you on to Soul Society."

The spirit looked at Toushirou curiously as he said, "Soul Society? Is that what the next life is called? In any case, thanks but no thanks. I have to take care of Marona."

Toushirou frowned. Of course this spirit had to be difficult. "You don't have much of a choice," he said, "I can't just leave you here. You would be devoured by a hollow. Actually, I'm surprised that you've gone so long without becoming a hollow yourself."

The spirit shook his head. He said, "I'm grateful for your concern, but really, it's not necessary. I can take care of myself. These hollows, whatever they are, aren't a threat to me."

"Many stronger than you have fallen to them," Toushirou said, sounding a bit sad as he did so, "Trust me, it would be safer for you to go to Soul Society."

Toushirou drew his sword and held it in such a way that the hilt was pointed at the spirit. The mark on the end of the hilt would take care of things quickly. He said, "It will only take a second, and it won't hurt at all."

The spirit backed up as Toushirou drew his sword. "There's no need to get violent," he said, sounding a bit worried, "We don't need to fight."

Toushirou sighed. "We're not fighting," he said, "I'm trying to send you to Soul Society. Pressing this mark against your forehead will do that."

The spirit, who looked like he was beginning to get flustered, said, "I told you, I don't want to go to this Soul Society place! Just let me live in peace already."

Suddenly another voice, this one belonging to a girl, yelled, "You leave Ash alone you big meanie!"

A brick hit Toushirou in the head, knocking him over. He lay there on the ground for a moment, trying to figure out what just happened. A brick…? He lifted a hand up to his head, then pulled it away. No blood, but his head hurt. He would probably have a nasty bruise later. What in the world was going on here?

Toushirou sat up and looked over to where the brick had come from. A green-haired girl, just a bit younger than he was, stood there, and she looked angry. The spirit from before, who was apparently named Ash, said, "Marona! You shouldn't throw bricks at people!"

The girl, Marona, looked to Ash and pointed at Toushirou as she said, "He was gonna hurt you!"

"No I wasn't," Toushirou said, then flinched and held his forehead. Great, now his head hurt. This wasn't going to make things any easier.

Marona looked to Toushirou again and said, "Yes you were! Why would you draw your sword on him if you weren't gonna hurt him?"

Toushirou sighed. "I'm just trying to help him move on," he said, sounding annoyed, "I'm not going to hurt him. Trust me, things are better on the other side. He'll be happy there."

He thought that this would calm the girl down. However, it did just the opposite. "You already have my mom and dad," Marona said, "Do you really need Ash too?"

Toushirou was getting more frustrated by the minute. His words just weren't getting through to this pair. The fact that he was bad at talking to people probably had something to do with that. He might have to resort to violence after all. Unless…Toushirou pulled out his phone and pressed a few buttons. The phone beeped angrily at him. He paused, then tried pushing a few more buttons. Another angry beep was all that happened. Then he noticed that he had an unread message, so he opened it up and read it.

All connections to the human world have been temporarily closed. We are sorry for this inconvenience.

What the- was something wrong back home? Now Toushirou was beginning to get worried. Several years ago he would have thought of this as a minor inconvenience, but nowadays something like this could be a disaster. At least, that's what the more paranoid mind of one Hitsugaya Toushirou thought. It worried him to the point where he had forgotten about the other two people present entirely. At least until Marona blew on a whistle loudly, that is.

Toushirou looked over to Marona angrily as he held his hands against his ears and said, "What is your problem!"

"You're not listening to me," she said matter-of-factly, "I said, you better just leave now, 'cuz I won't let you take Ash away!"

Toushirou gritted his teeth. Why did she have to be so annoying? "You know what," he said, "More important things have come up, and I can't send him to Soul Society right now anyways! Just stop already!"

Ash raised an eyebrow at Toushirou's outburst. Marona didn't seem so angry now, either. She was a bit surprised too. "You have some serious anger management problems," she said.

Toushirou let out an irritated noise and was about to yell at Marona, but he stopped himself. He took a deep breath, then counted to ten before he calmly said, "I'm leaving now. I'll be back, though."

He turned and started to walk away. Marona called after him, but he ignored her. Once he reached the edge of the garden, though, he stopped. They were on an island, and Toushirou couldn't go back to Soul Society. The closest island was miles away, and he doubted that he could make it that far without a boat. His bankai wouldn't last long enough. In short, he was at the mercy of the very people who had driven him to such frustration.

Today was not Toushirou's day.

He heard light footsteps behind him, and he heard Marona say, "How are you going to leave? Can you fly or something?"

Toushirou tried his best to not lash out again. "No. No I can't," he said slowly.

Marona stopped a few feet behind him. "Well, then how are you leaving," she asked, "If you need a ride to the next island-"

Without a word, Toushirou walked to the very edge of the beach. He went as far down as he could without getting wet, then sat down in the sand. Marona paused, then turned back to Ash and called out, "I guess he's waiting."

Ash made his way down to where Marona was, then stopped. "Don't worry," he said, "Go ahead and make yourself lunch. I'll keep an eye on him."

oOo

By the end of the third hour Toushirou was seriously regretting his decision. It turned out that Ash and Marona weren't the only people on the island. There were at least ten other spirits present, and they all took turns bothering him. The current one was some sort of rabbit, and it seemed to delight in getting really close to Toushirou and saying "I'm not touching yooooou!"

It took a great deal of restraint to keep from utterly destroying that little spirit. Never in his life had he been bothered so badly. And, given the crowd he hung around with, that was saying something. This really was a bad day.

Toushirou tried not to let the rabbit thing know that it was bothering him, so he looked away. That's when he saw a new creature. This one was a bottle, but it had arms and legs. It looked odd, that's for sure. The rabbit seemed to see it too, and it ran off as it said, "Oi, Marona! Mail!"

That was mail? Toushirou thought that it was weird. Actually, it wasn't just that. Everything about this island was weird. It was as if logic took a break when it got to this place.

Marona ran out of the house and down to where the bottle was. She squatted down next to it and said cheerfully, "Hi there! Do you have some mail for us?"

The bottle nodded and handed Marona a letter. Marona gave the bottle a coin, and the bottle waddled off towards the sea. Then Marona opened the letter and read it. Whatever it was, she seemed to be happier as she read it. When she was done she folded the letter back up, and ran towards the nearby rock Ash was sitting on as she said, "Ash! Ash! We have a job!"

Ash looked happy as well. "A job? Awesome! Where is it?"

Toushirou couldn't hear the rest of their chatter, since the rabbit had decided to bother him some more. Now it was screeching loudly at him. Toushirou covered his ears and said, "Could you stop already?"

The rabbit paused. "No," it said, then went back to screeching.

After half a minute or so of this Marona scolded the rabbit, then sent it away. Then she turned her attention to Toushirou. "Say," she said, "We're leaving now. Are you sure you don't want a ride?"

The last thing Toushirou wanted to do was accept help from the people. However…He looked over his shoulder at all the other spirits, and they all grinned back at him. "Actually," he said, still looking at the spirits, "I think I'll take you up on the offer."

oOo

Marona looked around sadly at the village. Everyone had already been evacuated from this area, and it looked empty. She couldn't help but feel badly. These people had to leave everything behind and flee for their lives. She had to stop the monster that was causing all this fear. She looked down at the letter once more, then said, "It says that the monster is in the nearby forest. Are you ready, Ash?"

Ash nodded. "I'm ready, but…" he jabbed a thumb over in Toushirou's direction. "Why is he still here? Wasn't he supposed to go off on his own now?"

Toushirou scowled at Ash and said, "I wanted to see how you two plan on defeating this monster," he said simply.

Of course, that wasn't the truth. Hitsugaya could tell that this monster was actually a hollow. As soon as Ash and Marona had their backs turned he was going to sneak off and fight it. Though this did present a problem…the gateways were still closed. What would happen to the spirit? Maybe he should let these two mess around with the hollow for a bit, at least until the gateways were open again. The hollow didn't seem to be that strong, so as long as he kept a close eye on them then they should be fine.

While Ash may have been bothered by Toushirou's presence, Marona certainly wasn't. In fact, she was being downright friendly to him. Apparently, as long as you weren't threatening her or her friends, you could be on her good side. "Alright," Marona said, "But stay close. It could be dangerous."

Toushirou doubted that he was in any danger, but he still nodded in agreement. He said, "Alright, I'll be careful."

It didn't take long for them to find the hollow. In fact, just as they were at the edge of the woods, the thing came running out of it about three hundred feet to their left. "There it is," Marona yelled as she pointed at it, "Are you ready, Ash?"

"Yeah," Ash said.

Marona looked around quickly, then settled on a nearby rock. Her hands began to glow ever so slightly, as did Ash. She ran up to the rock and slammed her hands against it as she yelled, "Confine!"

Ash disappeared from where he had been standing. A bright light flashed, and the rock disappeared. In it's place stood Ash, and he was holding a really big sword. There was something a bit different about him, though. He was more…solid was the word Toushirou thought of first. It sort of reminded him of how shinigami take control of a gigai. However, it was as if Ash had replaced the rock all together.

The hollow noticed Ash after this transformation, and it roared before it began to charge at him. Ash ran at the hollow, but jumped a few feet in front of it. On his decent he let out a burst of energy and swung his sword at the hollow, cutting it cleanly in half. The hollow faded away as Ash landed on the ground.

Toushirou couldn't believe his eyes. How could a spirit like this be so strong? Sure, the hollow was a weak one, but a non-shinigami shouldn't have been able to beat it in one hit! What in the world was going on here?

Ash stood up and looked back at Marona with a grin. "Done," he said.

Marona cheered. "Alright Ash," she said, "Now we can collect the reward and add it to our savings!"

Ash nodded, then said, "We should probably check the island over once, though. There might be more monsters like this here."

Marona nodded, then turned to look at Toushirou. She smiled up at him as she said, "Well, what do you think? We can take care of ourselves. You don't have to worry about anything."

Toushirou was inclined to agree with Marona, but he said nothing. This power was amazing. Ash hadn't seemed so strong before, but after Marona used her strange power he had become a lot stronger. Maybe she had the power to unlock someone's hidden power? He didn't know. One thing was for sure, though: Toushirou couldn't go back to Soul Society quite yet. Even though he was worried about his friends back home, he had to stay here. Marona and her strange powers might prove useful. The trick was getting Ash and Marona to let him stay. "Yes, that was pretty good," he said, "But I'm still not convinced."

He paused, then said, "You might be able to convince me, though…why not let me stay with you for a few days and see for myself? I can't go back right now anyways, and if you manage to convince me that you can take care of yourselves then I'll let you be."

Marona looked so happy at that. "Do you mean it," she asked excitedly.

"I wouldn't say something that I didn't mean," he said. Then he looked at Ash and said, "Are you okay with it?"

Ash looked a bit suspicious. "I don't know," he said, "Just a little while ago you couldn't wait to leave. Why do you want to stay all of a sudden?"

Toushirou pointed to where the hollow had been previously. "That was before I saw that," he said, "Now I'm interested."

Ash thought about it for a moment, then nodded. "Okay," he said, "As long as you don't try to pull one over on us or hurt Marona. I'm going to keep an eye on you."

"I'll behave," Toushirou said.

"Alright, then you can stay for a little bit," Marona said. Then she pointed to herself as she said, "I'm Marona, and this is Ash."

Toushirou nodded. Then he said, "I'm Hitsugaya Toushirou. It's nice to meet you both."

As he said his introductions, Toushirou couldn't help but wonder what sort of adventure these next few days were going to be.

oOo

Author's notes

I'm still getting used to the new FF.N system. Well, it's new for me, at least. I haven't posted anything here in a couple years. What I'd really like to know is why the thing keeps eating my dividers. sighs ah well. If you want to read this in it's original form (which isn't too different from this one, really), then head over to my livejournal. The table for this is in one of my past entries. Also, major props to my beta, cherakin.