So, a remake. First lot of chapters still felt like a child wrote them...because they were, and I was, but I'm not going to change it because I really don't want to redo another 50k words. I started this like two years ago and stopped. It's still better than the original in my opinion, but it could be better. Don't expect frequent updates to this fic.

CH1:

Ichigo's pale hand shivered as the tiny nine-year-old fingers reached out to the next branch of the petrified tree. Grabbing on, Ichigo pulled himself up with a mighty heave and looked back down over the tree branch that held little Ichigo forty metres above the ground, or at least he thought it was the ground. He didn't really know considering it looked like there was a ceiling with holes in it. Did the floor have holes? Or was this truly the ground just below him.

Streams of dried up tears remained on his face, having long run out of any tears to actually cry. Blood coated his knuckles and the front of his shirt, making it have a rather unpleasant smell to it.

This had to be a dream. The stuff of nightmares.

One moment Ichigo was walking along the riverbank, the next had his mother atop him and he was lying on cold hard ground. Or rather, Ichigo had seen a little girl…or…at least he thought it was a little girl standing next to the raging river. After that, everything was blank, except for the part where he woke up with his dead mother atop of him. None of it made any sense, not to him anyway.

"Mum." Ichigo's dazed voice made itself known in the darkness that enveloped him.

There was no response.

That was when Ichigo first registered the warm liquid and flesh atop him when his mother failed to respond.

Ichigo grunted a little as he pushed his mother off of him to try and get a better look at what had happened. His mother had probably just fallen asleep after all.

The moment Ichigo's mother's body was rolled off of him the sudden brightness assaulted his eyes like a sudden flash and searing pain to his retinas. Blinking the spots out of his eyes and rubbing them a few times Ichigo took a quick look around, quickly noting the alien atmosphere of the barren environment around him. A few outcroppings made themselves noticeable in the thin streams of light that appeared to dot the ground every fifty metres or so.

That was when he heard the noise.

In his daze of looking at the unfamiliar environment around him and his mother he had almost forgotten the terrible noise that had come before he had blacked out and his mother lay atop him. A screeching roar echoed throughout the forest of petrified trees, which caused him to start shaking subconsciously. It was the same sound that had come from the girl he had tried to rescue from drowning in the river. Right before she vanished and the shadow of a monster appeared. A monster that his mother protected him from…

His breathing stopped for all of a moment as his eyes snapped back around to where his mother lay. Where his dead mother lay.

It came out in the faintest of whispers at first, a quite and unseemly "No." echoed around him. The second time however was much louder, "NO!" Ichigo's cries echoed deep into the forest surrounding him as he stared as the jagged hole that pierced his mother's abdomen through to the other side in a single stroke.

A part of him wished to scream to his mother as loudly as he could to try and wake her up but the words would not form, could not form. It was as though there was something physically stopping him from doing so. Was it fear, anger, sadness, betrayal for his mother leaving his side in this strange place, only to leave her body behind as a remembrance to show him what he had failed to do?

In truth, all of these were a small part of the cause. It was something else. A pressure at the back of his mind. Something that he had never felt before manifest itself as another presence, another voice, telling him, forcing him to keep his mouth shut even as his throat ached to let the noise leave his mouth.

"No…no noise…hide…must hide."

The voice made itself apparent in a warbled and broken tone, only bringing out a few words at a time as though speaking was a foreign concept to it and only knew how to be understood through a few words at a time.

Naturally however, little Ichigo was not sure where exactly the voice was coming from, only that it compelled him to keep his mouth shut and wipe his eyes clean of the tears that had sprung forth the moment he had lain them on his mother.

He was confused at first, then sad the next moment. Another moment later he was completely hysterical. The reason being that his right arm was moving completely by itself and his vision had blacked out in one eye.

Why was his body moving by itself!? Why couldn't he see!? Why couldn't he speak!?

Looking out of his one good eye, Ichigo saw his arm reach over his mother hand grab her left wrist before yanking it forwards in a careless manner before pulling on what looked to be like a small bracelet with a pentacle attached to the chain.

It was silver in colour and had a sapphire gem in the centre of the pentacle. The chain itself looked to be of a traditional chain link shape, all the way around until the two adjoining ends met with a small clasp that held both ends together rather securely.

Ichigo's possessed hands reached forward and undid the clasp easily enough before dropping the lifeless arm of his mother to the side and sliding the bracelet onto his own wrist. He could have sworn he saw a flash of red energy spark from the gem as his hands did this.

His arm raised itself and flexed the hand casually above his head jingling the chain casually before Ichigo's body moved again, rising to its feet and breaking into a clumsy looking run through the forest, the possessor clearly not used to manipulating a child's body to such an extent yet.

Another roar echoed throughout the forest as Ichigo's body continued to move itself with a hysterical Ichigo sitting in the passenger seat. The cacophony of noises drew nearer and nearer. Soon enough even the ground began to tremble as what could only be described as monstrous beasts crashed into the small clearing, eager to get at whatever had appeared only moments ago.

It was only through sheer willpower alone that Ichigo managed to turn his head enough to see the beasts instantly trample his mother's dead body and begin ripping into each other without a second thought as though all declaring at once, 'That's mine'.

It only took the beheading of one monster before Ichigo's resistance to run stopped completely and the possessor took complete control of his body in an instant, breaking into a dead sprint to get out of there as quickly as possible. It was during this moment that Ichigo became almost completely catatonic, his right eye looking almost dead to the world around him and looking straight ahead even as his other eye seemingly moved of its own accord, taking in the environment around him.

"No!"

The voice jolted Ichigo out of the state suddenly as it escalated in volume and urgency.

"No sleep! ...No sad! ...Forget!"

The child like speech of the voice penetrated Ichigo's mind deeply causing his senses to heighten once more to the point he was taking in his surroundings of dead trees and stone ground. Only this time one of his hands was grasping the ridge of a tree's petrified bark and using it as a handhold with strength Ichigo did not know he possessed as he pulled himself up one hand at a time, now an appropriate distance from his landing spot.

"Why?" Ichigo's voice croaked out, seemingly unrestricted now, unlike before.

The voice didn't respond for a moment, probably wondering why Ichigo would ask such a question, the situation escaping its underdeveloped mind as it hauled Ichigo's body another few metres up the side of a tree.

"…Won't survive."

The understanding was clear to most but the otherwise preoccupied Ichigo was confused.

Sensing Ichigo's confusion through their link of the mind the voice continued.

"…Won't live…need to live…want to live…see family again."

The voice attempted to push the image of his father and sisters into Ichigo's mind even as the grip of Ichigo's hand slackened on the tree greatly during the effort to do so.

It was then Ichigo understood. He needed to stay alive, and the voice was helping him to do so even if he didn't know who owned the voice or where the voice was coming from exactly. His father and sisters would be sad without him and his mother. His mother was dead and could never return, but maybe he could. Maybe, just maybe he could see them again.

Satisfied with Ichigo's improved stability the voice went completely silent and refocused on the tree climbing which had altogether ceased to happen during their short conversation due to the apparent need for the utmost sheer concentration required doing so.

Once more Ichigo watched as his arms and legs began moving of their own accord once again, hand over hand, foot over foot.

It was only in this very moment that Ichigo realised that his shoes and socks were missing in preference to the bare foot approach taken to climbing the tree. Apparently the voice had more coordination than he did with his own body as he noticed his big toe and the toe next to it wedge a ridge in between them and clench together to provide a better foothold. He would have never have thought of such a thing much less the thought of climbing so high straight up.

Ichigo scurried back to the foot of the branch, the thing being wide enough for Ichigo to lie directly across it and still have some room to spare above his head and below his toes.

For now, he felt so very tired. Tired from crying, tired from climbing with strength he didn't know he possessed, tired of being awake. Tired of everything.

"Sleep now…I watch."

The voice spoke once more telling Ichigo to rest while it looked out for him in his slumber.

Ichigo nodded to himself and the voice as his eyes began to droop closed even as the cold dead branch beneath him dug into his skin uncomfortably. He just didn't care anymore. This had to all be a dream after all.

"No dream."

Yes, that was it. Everything around him was all so very real. But why? He had never seen them before, those monsters that ate each other and people alike. So where was he exactly?

Unfortunately for Ichigo that would have to wait until morning when he awoke as his eyes finally closed, unable to keep them open any longer.

When Ichigo's eyes opened the next morning he was shocked once more that what had happened had not been a dream and that his mother truly was dead. A despairing fact that still shook Ichigo to the very core. However the effect seem far less prevalent than it had been yesterday. This was possibly due to the pressure he could still feel lingering at the back of his mind. It felt as though it was suppressing many of his emotions to a great extent even with its child like processing capabilities.

Sitting up Ichigo peered over the edge and saw below him much more clearly than what he had seen the day before. The ground along the landscape was pockmarked with outcroppings, craters, and small holes.

It wasn't until the voice in Ichigo's mind spoke up did he realise that there was something taking a stroll through the area.

"Breakfast."

The voice commented almost gleefully as it directed Ichigo's vision to a beastlike creature with a mask on its face. It appeared to have a hulking stature as it leaned forward heavily on its front two appendages that appeared to look like arms for the most part and were much larger than its hind legs. The rest resembled that of a gorilla.

The only problem with the gorilla shaped green beast was that its size was clearly at least three times larger than that of a normal gorilla and it had some rather nasty looking protrusions on its back that appeared to be spikes of some kind with squiggly lines drawn up the sides of each one to the very tip.

These spikes lay flat on its back and were packed together neatly so that there were no gaps in between each one. The overall shape of the area in which these spikes lay resembled that of a spade. A line coming down from the back of its cranium to then split in a 'T' like fashion to the sides and then go straight down just before reaching the shoulders and curving in just before the hips to meet at a tip just before a stub that could barely be considered a tail. The space in between the spade like structure was filled with more spikes.

Ichigo shivered once he had taken in the entirety of the beast and ducked back behind the edge of the branch when the beast stopped to pause and sniff the air for something.

"I can't eat that." Ichigo quivered in fear. "It'll eat me like they ate Mum."

It didn't seem like it at first but after the voice began its reply it was clear that it knew something like this was bound to happen despite its own zeal for the beasts corpse.

"Will protect you…will give you power…will grant me breakfast…must sustain existence."

The voice clearly wanted this meal, and badly if the way its voice seemingly shook with excitement was anything to go by.

"Power?" Ichigo questioned the voice. That was the only thing that really stuck out to him besides the breakfast part. If he had power he could do more. But what was power exactly?

There was no answer from the voice this time, only the images brought forth by the voices existence at the back of his mind, the images brought forth by the pressure.

His sisters giggling and smiling adorably, his father making a goofy smile as he acted up around his children, his best friend Tatsuki as he sparred with her at the dojo, his mother walking home with him. They were all shown to him in great detail. Yes, he wanted them back but why was the thing at the recess of his mind showing him these things exactly he was not sure of.

"Protect."

Masaki giggled slightly as Ichigo picked himself back off of the sparring mat as Tatsuki once again beat him and knocked him over once again.

"Ichigo." Masaki called out to Ichigo whom turned his head and smiled when he saw her. "It's time to go Ichigo." Masaki called out once again.

"Ok Mum!" Ichigo waved and called back before looking back to Tatsuki and waving goodbye. "Bye bye Tatsuki-san."

Not long after Ichigo and Masaki left the dojo Masaki thought she'd break the silence with a little question for Ichigo.

"Ichigo," Masaki said getting Ichigo's attention immediately as his eyes snapped over to her in an instant. "Do you know what your name means Ichigo?"

This immediately caused Ichigo to frown deeply and look away in thought. He hummed deeply to himself, poking the inside of his cheek a few times before scratching the back of his head and looking back to his mother with a bright smile on his face.

"Nope!" Ichigo let out in a singsong voice happily oblivious to the meaning of the name his parents had given him.

Masaki chuckled lightly to herself bringing a hand up to cover her mouth to try and not provoke Ichigo too much. It was too late apparently however as Ichigo adopted a little frown on his face and let out a small huff, crossing his arms as he did so.

"What?" Ichigo demanded.

"Oh, nothing." Masaki chided Ichigo gently. "Your name means 'to protect one thing' or 'number one guardian angle'."

Ichigo quit his pouting and a moment later a large smile dawned on his face.

"Protect…need power."

The voice spoke up once again after revealing that particularly fond memory of his when his mother first revealed to him what his name exactly meant.

Again, the voice did not make that much sense. Yes, he loved his family dearly and he so wished that he could have lived up to his name and protected his mother…wait! Did the voice mean he was going to give him the power to protect his family from now on!? If so, he just wanted to know what to do.

"Pendant…hold and think…about family…protect."

The voice gave more advice yet again, and Ichigo was about to decline the voices wishes. It had kept him in one piece so far, if by only suppressing his emotions of his dearly loved and departed mother. Still, he would listen, the voice had him living within its best interests as far as Ichigo knew.

Looking down at his right wrist where the pendant hung from the silver chain Ichigo grabbed it in his right hand and held out his arm closing his eyes, feeling himself being guided by some sort of ingrained instinct…or hand? Neither cause really mattered as Ichigo felt a flux of warmth rising up within him and a tingling sensation making itself known within his right arm, hand and both feet.

Opening both eyes, Ichigo couldn't believe the sight before him. A massive wheel of dark energy is all he could really describe the thing as, though its shape was much more easily discernable. A prong stuck out each end of his clenched hand for a total of two. At the ends of each prong a bar sat perpendicular to the main prong, which curved around and touched with the tips of the other bar in a perfect circle.

Mouth agape Ichigo almost didn't hear the voice calling to him.

"Too weak…not enough to defeat breakfast…focus more."

Ichigo grimaced somewhat when he heard the voices assessment of the strange energy circle in front of him. It already felt as if his arm was beginning to heat up from the amount of energy he was putting through it subconsciously and the voice said he needed more heat!?

"Alright, you can do this Ichigo." Ichigo said to himself to get in focus.

Closing his eyes once more Ichigo 'felt' the heat that he was channelling into his arm and tried to push more through. He was somewhat successful as he felt the warmth increase slightly and his hand tingle a little more. Opening his eyes once more Ichigo was only slightly disappointed when there appeared to be a third bar forming only for it to sputter out of existence.

"I don't know if I can do this." Ichigo muttered to himself as he hung his head.

Suddenly however the voice in his head let out a low growl and Ichigo felt his arm shaking slightly as the voice seemed to be trying to push more power through his arm. The temperature increased dramatically from the coolness that had come from the air and before he knew it his fist was gripping the pendant so tightly that it dug into his flesh and blood began to leak out through the wounds his hands now sported.

The blood coalesced around his hand drop by drop, meeting with the black wheel in his hand. It was sudden, and it was very powerful. With a burst of energy the black wheel ignited in a furious frenzy of blue energy that pulsed periodically and sent out twitching bursts of razor shaped energy among the black mass that still made up a majority of the wheel.

Ichigo stared wide-eyed at the difference in the energy that he felt in his hand. If what he could feel before was lukewarm water, this was boiling.

Ichigo convulsed suddenly when his legs moved on their own once again, though with much less control than before, causing him to leap off of the tree branch and towards the beast below. Letting out an involuntary yelp as the wind rushed past his ears Ichigo felt the control return to his body. The voice had let go leaving Ichigo to secure a landing strategy for himself.

Panicking for a moment Ichigo never noticed the beast snap its head in his direction in reaction to the small sound Ichigo made when he leapt from his hiding place, though it was a little too late for the beast as Ichigo landed feet first in the beasts face causing it to move back a step as the force form the boys fall dissipated.

The beast took a small moment to look at the child that had landed on its face and then promptly crumbled to the ground. Seriously! This small thing only manages to get the jump on it, to then screw up and fall over after attacking. What a joke!

Well that didn't matter to the beast as it swiped at the little child on the ground as it barely managed to scramble to its feet in time in order to take a quick step back and make a swiping motion at the beast with the strange wheel like construct in its hand.

The wheel itself barely managed to score a hit on the beast's finger as they connected for a fraction of a second.

That was all it took though. That fraction of a second, that one mistake, that one slip up, one bout of ignorance.

The beast felt a tingling in its offending limb and lifted it to its face for a closer inspection only to narrow its eyes when it saw the place where it touched the now identified weapon of the young child before it. Flesh sizzled and steamed from the small connection but disappeared a moment later as new skin replaced it in the blink of an eye.

Ichigo himself was just amazed that he managed to score a hit at all, though slightly disappointed when he realised that he only managed to score the skin.

Noticing the beast contemplate its new injury, Ichigo rushed forwards with a battle cry announcing his intentions to the beast, mistakenly believing that he would easily score another hit.

Instead the beast itself leapt backwards and sprinted behind some outcroppings before vanishing altogether.

Its presence was only announced a moment later when a slight crunching sound was heard behind and above the young Ichigo.

Leaping from above the creature attempted its own dive bomb on Ichigo much like he had a moment earlier. It was Ichigo this time who went to meet the beast however as he stepped forwards, many thanks to the murmers of the voice in his head telling him to do so, and shoved the wheel into the beasts abdomen as it passed overhead.

The scores that marked its flesh could easily be seen as it howled and landed in a tumble before righting itself and abandoning all pretences of caution that it may have had to the childs initial attack to its hand.

The beast rushed forwards and went to slap the boy with its giant hand, successfully landing a hit on the boys left side, but not without its of lightly seared flesh in ruturn.

Ichigo tumbled away and knicked his body in multiple places as he came to a stop, not to mention his now more than likely broken arm as it swayed gently at his side eliciting a gasp of pain every time he tried to move.

"Move!"

Ichigo leaped to the right as the voice commanded him to move and rolled over his right shoulder as he came back up, trying to be careful as to not aggravate his broken arm.

It was just in time as well, as the second after Ichigo came to a stop again there was the sound of something having impaled the ground right next to him.

Looking forwards, Ichigo once again saw the beast rapidly moving into position and the spike on its back standing tall as they suddenly shot out of its back and headed towards Ichigo. The spikes arced through the air and managed to scrape Ichigo's side as he attempted to avoid as much of it as he could. He was unlucky however as one of them went right through his right foot and pinned him to the ground.

Ichigo let out a scream of pain. Before the voice had dulled the pain when he had had his arm broken, but now the pain was excruciating, reaching a much higher level than before. It felt as though his foot had been severed from his ankle. He couldn't feel his toes much less the sole of his foot. All that registered was the now intense throbbing that originated from his right ankle as he attempted to crawl away from the scene. He didn't dare look as he scrambled for his life.

His right hand jerked to a stop as his sobbing continued unabated.

"Nooo!" Ichigo whined, "Make it- Make it stop!" Ichigo urged the power that held his limb fast.

"Turn around!...Strike now!"

The voice urged him on and twisted his head enough to see the beast charging towards him at a speed that would put Olympic athletes to shame.

Ichigo screamed once again as he brought his right arm around once more and reignited the wheel in his hand, though it sprouted three prongs this time and in a much more triangular fashion compared to the circular formation that was brought about the first time. Blue sparks ignited once more from the blade as his blood met the wheel and seared in his hand turning the flesh black from the shear power that it gave out.

The beast leapt up and onto the young boy, its giant hands landing either side of the boy creating a massive impact and causing the earth in the immediate vicinity to shake. It then lifted a hand and pressed it to the boy's chest to prevent him from escaping as it opened its maw and pressed downwards ignorant of the tiny weapon the pitiful creature before it held. It had only managed to burn the surface of its flesh before, so why would it be able to kill it now. The mask was much sturdier than the skin for all low level hollows. This was a well-known fact to all of the denizens of the world they were currently in, but the boy did not know that.

Ichigo panicked as he struggled to breath and almost dropped his weapon in favour of relieving himself of the pressure on his chest. He steadied his arm however even as his vision began to leave him. When the creature's mouth neared him he pulled back and slammed his triangular weapon into the beasts face once, a crack appeared, twice, a chip broke off causing the beast to press down in panic to kill the boy causing the remaining air in the boys lungs to leave his chest. Saliva leaked from the boy's mouth as his darkening vision became hazy and spots began to appear.

On the third strike the beast came down to meet the boy in an attempt to eat him before any more damaged occurred to its mask. It was then the boy let out a soundless scream as several ribs broke under the pressure and his heart felt like it was being crushed, that the triangular weapon crashed through the mask and ploughed into the flesh beneath, digging a hole right through its skull and out the other side. This was in no small part due to the beast's own efforts however as the force that the boy was exerting on the mask was not nearly enough to break through in three tries.

As blood and grey matter dribbled onto Ichigo, the pressure that was once on his chest was relieved as the beast tumbled to his left and immediately began to dissolve into the air.

Immediately Ichigo made gasping and wheezing breaths, the broken ribs making it difficult to breath for the absolutely terrified young boy.

In his attempt to sit up with his one good arm he never noticed the wisps of energy that the creature broke down into being absorbed into his body. In this moment of recovery, Ichigo let out another yelp as he looked as his right foot, or rather where his right foot should have been. It had been severed at just above the ankle and wasn't bleeding nearly as heavily as it should have been.

Looking around with his blurred vision Ichigo managed to make out the trail of blood he had made in his attempt to escape right after his foot had been severed.

Following the trail back he managed to see his foot among the spikes that still riddled the ground.

Seeing the bone and flesh from the top of his foot made him instantly feel nauseous and attempt to scream as he had done before. However, the lack of sound to escape the mouth signalled him that the voice had once again managed to gain some semblance of control after it left due to the subsequent loss of the offending piece of flesh.

Reaching out with his now dulled thoughts and senses he attempted to reattach the foot in a desperate attempt to believe it never happened to begin with, though with his blackened hand, it was harder to do than he initially thought. Just grasping for the foot itself was painful and tedious as the remaining nerve endings in his fingers, thumb and palm screamed every time some sensation passed through the skin.

When the two fleshy ends finally met it almost seemed hopeless as the flesh just slapped together continuously and the bones clacked when they hit.

He almost gave up, and he would have had the second to last hit not wielded any result.

It was almost undetectable at first, but when he tried to pull the two apart to go for the last hit he felt some resistance, before letting go and staring at the severing point intently, watching as the flesh of his leg ending turned white for the briefest of periods and an apparent clay like white substance sprouted from the stump and latched onto the foot before pulling it back on and returning sensation to his foot, though it felt cold at first.

When the sensations completely returned he attempted to wiggle his toes and was immediately surprised that he could. After this he carefully rose to his left leg and stood on it before lightly pressing down on his other foot and was pleasantly surprised when it didn't fall off. It did worry him slightly however when the clay substance hardened over his leg and had yet to go anywhere. He summed it up to his leg still healing. He didn't want to remove it if it was the only stuff currently holding his foot on his leg after all.

It was then, for the first time since Ichigo arrived in the dark forest that he smiled a small smile. It wasn't much, but after he had reattached his foot he felt a little better considering that he had almost died and was now discovering that he could reattach lost feet.

"Ara," a voice broke the silence of the dark room. "I didn' know ya watched little children Aizen-Taicho…"

The new voice sounded like it was almost snickering at an inside joke it had made up as its presence was made known to the only other occupant of the room only to trail off when he heard the decrepit sobs of the child beyond the monitor.

"Aren't you a little old for such childish jokes Gin?" the one identified as Aizen replied from his chair without looking back at the silver haired joker with the face of a snake.

Aizen readjusted himself in his chair contemplatively as he viewed the child on the screen sobbing away and coated in blood on the cold stone floor of the forest he was currently in.

"Who's that?" Gin replied in a slightly mystified voice looking towards Aizen as he made his comment, taking careful note to watch the mans brown eyes behind his square rimmed glasses and guess what was going on beneath his brown kempt hair. If he had to guess from the reiastu readings that were present beside the display, he would say a slowly dying child.

Aizen looked back at Gin as he stood there, white haori draped over his shoulders with both hands tucked into his sleeves across his chest, with his ever present smile somewhat diminished by the view of the child on the screen.

"…A failure." Aizen switched off the screen.