Prompt One: The Mirror is Broken

Teary-Eyed Reflection

Hitsugaya Toushirou watched her from several feet away, characteristic frown prominent despite the poor lighting within Los Noches. She, on the other hand, was staring fixedly in the other direction, the direction in which Kurosaki Ichigo's reiatsu was flaring up against none other than Aizen Sousuke's. He held Hyourinmaru at his side. He had gained a fair amount of injury to make it this far, yet still she looked the other way.

Of course, she did. That was the way it always had been, and that was the way it always would be. Ever since he and his fukutaichou had taken up residence within the confines of her home, he had gauged what kind of woman she was. His frown deepened into a grimace. She was not that kind of woman any longer. No, rather, she was trying not to be that kind of woman. Hitsugaya snorted at the thought, and this brought her back to her senses.

Inoue Orihime whirled around to face the diminutive taichou for the first time since she had left to Hueco Mundo, his zanpakutou drawn and ready. "Oh, right," she whispered heavily, as if just realizing the fact. "I'm against you now, aren't I?"

Hitsugaya eyed the dull, brown eyes questioningly. She wasn't serious, was she? "You do understand why your friends have come, do you not?" he asked, stepping forward. She nodded. "You do understand why I have come, do you not?"

Inoue faltered, stepping back for each of his slow steps forward. Finally, she shook her head, and he halted.

"Why are you here?" he asked, an unexpected urgency in his voice. "Why aren't you fighting with your comrades instead of against them? You do not belong with Aizen."

His tone was so sure, that she almost couldn't reply. She almost went back with him through sheer lack of self-esteem. But no. She had been watching Kurosaki-kun fight arrancar after arrancar, Espada after Espada for far too long; she had to know. Why? "I don't understand," she admitted, just barely managing to keep the tears in. "I don't understand at all! I don't understand any of it! He almost died! You almost died! All of you almost died! I don't understand!"

Hitsugaya knew exactly who she meant by he. It wasn't hard to figure out. "He faced all of Soul Society to retrieve Kuchiki. How is this any different?" he replied, his earlier urgency replaced with slight bitterness.

"I'm not Kuchiki-san!" the girl bellowed, her resolve no longer enough to hold back the tears. "So why?!"

The Tenth Division taichou's eyes narrowed sharply, and he quickly closed the space between them, grabbing Inoue's wrist as soon as he was close enough. He glared into those moist, chocolate orbs, his voice more reminiscent of the snarl of a wolf than anything else. "'Why?!' You really are the stupidest of all of that idiot substitute shinigami's friends!" he countered, the volume of his voice now matching her own. "It's because you're not Kuchiki! It's because you are Inoue Orihime!"

"I'm not!" she screamed, her voice going hoarse as she frantically tried to release her arm from his grip. "I left! I left all of you! I betrayed you! I've been healing the arrancar just so they could go out and kill you! It's all my fault! I helped Aizen! I left! So just go away already! Leave me alone!"

"Kurosaki, Abarai, Kuchiki, Ishida, Sado, and everyone else are all risking their lives here so that you may return home! And you're just going to ignore all of that?!" Hitsugaya hissed, his grip around her wrist only tightening. "Fine! If you're so set on siding with Aizen, you might as well kill Kurosaki yourself! I'll take you to him right now!" He yanked on her arm as she sobbingly protested and pulled her bodily out onto the balcony. But as soon as the artificial light laid itself upon her face, she snapped.

"Koten Zanshun!" she shrieked, without even realizing what she was saying. "I reject!"

Hitsugaya's eyes widened in shock as he hastily brought Hyourinmaru up to block. But Inoue's compiled anger, frustration, and fear were finally enough to fuel Tsubaki's long unfulfilled needs, and he could only watch helplessly as the blade was sliced in half, along with his body.

Inoue Orihime stared in awe, watching in slow motion as her own reflection in the intricate zanpakutou cracked before snapping in two and falling to the dusty floor. It was soon followed by a bloody corpse.

"H-Hitsu … gaya … kun?" she managed to choke out. "Hitsugaya-kun?"

Silence.

"Hitsugaya-kun!"

And suddenly, like a ton of bricks, it hit her. She scrambled over to his blood soaked body, pale white and breathing ragged, but now there was a new glint in her eyes. A determined shine that had been so dulled by her own misunderstanding. "Souten Kisshun! I reject!" she croaked, tears still running freely down her cheeks. They had stopped, but somewhere, sometime along the line, they had returned. When? A strange, detached part of her mind gave her the answer even as Ayame and Shun'ou began to form their healing barrier.

Her reflection had been crying just as it shattered.

"Come on, Hitsugaya-kun!" she sobbed, putting all of her concentration, all of herself, into the healing. "You said you came to take me home! I'm ready now! I'm ready! So please! Please, wake up! I want to go home! I want to go back home! So please! Hitsugaya-kun!"

"Decided to stop pretending, have you?"

Orihime's eyes darted down to the small taichou's face in shock, but when she saw his eyes open and his lips set in the smallest of smirks, she couldn't help but release a relieved chuckle of her own. "Yeah," she nodded, wiping her eyes. "Yeah."

But when she remembered what she had done, she stopped, no longer able to look him in the eye. "I … I broke your zanpakutou," she said softly, eyeing the two pieces of metal with deepening anguish.

Hitsugaya, however, said nothing. Slowly but surely, he pushed himself into a sitting position, wincing at the remnants of the near fatal wound as he did so. Leaning over, he picked up half of his zanpakutou by the hilt, and then he picked up the other half. He held them in the air, fitting the pieces together back into their original shape. He lowered his head toward the blade, but kept his eye on Orihime.

"Idiot," he grunted, smirk still firmly in place. "Anything can be fixed with the right tools." And when he whispered softly to the blade, it reformed itself right in front of her eyes.

Orihime smiled a genuine smile. She hadn't done that in a long, long time. "Let's go home."

"We have to defeat Aizen first," the white crowned taichou grumbled in reply.

"Of course," she nodded as they made their way out onto the balcony a second time, raising her hands to her face in order to hide her smile. But after she said that, another thought occurred to her. "Um … Hitsugaya-kun, could I see your zanpakutou for a second?" Hitsugaya eyed her curiously before giving up Hyourinmaru.

It really was fixed, she grinned. The crack in the sword was gone and so was the crack in her reflection. Her smile only grew as she handed it back to its owner and charged ahead, waving for Hitsugaya to hurry up and laughing as he grudgingly complied.

Her reflection had broken. She no longer needed to pretend. Because she was Inoue Orihime.

And he was Hitsugaya Toushirou.

"Ah! But I read that when you break a mirror, you get seven years bad luck!"

"What mirror? What are you talking about?"

End