Hey ! I just want to say thank you to my betas, who helped me to translate my fanfiction in english :) I hope that you gonna like it ^^

I still remember their pained expressions. The tears that Mashiro was struggling to hold back. I remember how Shinji was trying to avoid our gazes, while Hiyori, reaching for her zanpakuto, was ready to use it against three too familiar ones. Ready to make them understand that they had to choose between us and their work at Soul Society. They were either shinigami or Visored. Two opposite sides. They couldn't possibly expect us to quietly accept that kind of decision.

I remember how I woke up that morning. I was in a decent mood. I went down to join everyone in the Kitchen, but only found Love and Hachi. Hiyori was down training, with Mashiro watching over her to make sure that her injury wouldn't open. She was finally getting better after the fake Karakura town attack where she had been cut in half. We all had been worried for her, even though she was a fighter. Dying was not one of her priorities. Shinji had made sure everything was set up so she could rest, but one morning she decided she had had enough. One month stuck in her room had used up all of her patience, and to be honest I would've been the same. Two weeks later, she was already training again.

I turned to Love siting at the table and reading a comic book, and asked him where were the three missing Visored. I wasn't able to feel their physical pressure. Which could mean that they were either miles away or in an other dimension. « They are going to see the old man. Now that they have found that we are still alive, they will probably try to keep an eye on us. » he started laughing, and I wasn't sure if it was for the funny thing he just said or the one he just read.

None of us could have expected what would happen next. We were not prepared to see the Visored, our family of hundred of years, being destroyed by the ambition of three stupid and selfish idiots. I'm still angry at them even today. Everyone would understand in my place. Seeing Hiyori and Mashiro's pain had been enough to convince me that those selfish ones were no longer a part of our family.

I remember when I got out of the kitchen to lie down on the couch to read my magazine. Contemplating women in bikini, not preoccupied with anything else. I regret not being able to see what was coming. Not being fast enough to grab and bring them back by the scruff of their necks. Not being quick enough to save Hiyori and Mashiro from a choice that they should never had to make in the first place.

I don't know how much time elapsed between my earlier discussion with Love and their return. But it was enough time to allow them to make their decision. As usual, when I felt their pressure in our home I didn't move from my comfortable spot right away.

Shinji called us and asked us to gather in the entrance of the warehouse. At first, I was thinking that he probably only wanted to talk with us about their discussion with the Captain-Commander. But when looked in his eyes, I saw a look that I had gotten acquainted to over the years, and I understood that something that wasn't good had come up. I wasn't really scared of the guilt that I saw at first. It was the joy and pride that I could see behind that rang the alarm. He started by clearing his throat; he then threw us news that pinned us down. With once sentence, he destroyed years of friendship.

"We got our Captain ranks back."

There was this big silence in the room. No one dared to move. I wasn't even sure I understood properly what he just said.

"You WHAT ?" Hiyori asked, her voice threatening to brake from anger. "You better be making a sick joke."

"The old man proposed to give us our ranks back. He apologized for everything that happened to us and that he punished us too fast those years ago," Rose explained, blindly excited.

Love just raised his shoulders, not really affected by that decision. I didn't know how to respond at that point, but Hiyori's betrayed expression broke my heart.

"You're all fucking stupid. The only thing that old geezer wants, is to control us. If he was really feeling as bad as he's saying, he should have moved his old-ass here and apologized to everyone. If he can't even do that, I don't see why we should forgive him, Hiyori responded."

"Hiyori, you need to stop that. He is the Captain-Commander," Shinji answered. "He doesn't have time for those kind of things. He apologized and gave us our ranks back, that's better than nothing."

"Really ? We are all getting our ranks backs ?" Mashiro hoped.

"No, idiot," Kensei explained. "Only the vacant ones are returned. The ninth division already has a lieutenant, like all the others. Except for the 13th, but Juushiro doesn't want to replace Kaien."

"So... what about us then ?"

"I don't know, do whatever you want. Just wait for a rank to become free again," Kensei continued.

That answer did not please Mashiro.

"Baka ! You can't have someone else than me as your lieutenant !"

The re-installed Captain of the ninth was pissed off, as he was every other time that Mashiro made a scene. But what I saw in the eyes of my friend were tears. Real tears. The kind that only a woman that had been betrayed by her lover could have. I hated them for that. They were leaving us. In the end, their rank was the only thing that truly mattered for them. I saw something changing in Hiyori's physical energy. She was angrier than never. She looked up at Shinji and gave him a glare of absolute defiance. Challenging him to abandon us. She was giving him an ultimatum. I finally understood that everything we had built over the years since our escape had just blown up in our faces.

"If you're leaving, you're not coming back."

"Hiyori-" Shinji started, but she interrupted.

"If you want to go back there, it's your call. But you're not coming back. If you guys want to leave us behind, just do it. I don't give a shit if you want to be their puppets, I won't hold you back. But this is OUR home. The real home of the Visored. It doesn't take no fucking traitors. If you leave, it's a one-way ticket. We don't accept shinigami here."

"Hiyori, stop," Shinji growled. "We are still Visored. It's not because we are captain again that we can't be a part of this group anymore."

"In fact, yeah. It is exactly that. Hachi, get them out of here," Hiyori ordered.

The big man didn't move, not knowing what to do. I didn't comment either. Kensei had turned towards Mashiro, but she stepped back.

"If you want to go, do what you want. But Hiyori is right. You are all traitors. You're throwing us away. You're evil. Go find your new lieutenant and leave me alone."

"Mashiro," Kensei screamed at her.

She didn't reply and turned to Hachi. Hiyori, meanwhile, grabbed her zanpakuto handle in one hand, ready to us it. If they didn't leave, she would have no problem to grab her mask and cast them out of the warehouse with her sword. I knew that Shinji wouldn't ever return the attack, or even try to stop her, too worried it would reopen her wounds. She was just starting to heal, that would be too dangerous. I think Love came to the same conclusion as I, because he chose this moment to intervene.

"Well, it seems that we have no choice. All right ! Guys, y'all need to get out of here and find yourselves a new home for now. We will call you when we will be ready to forgive you, but I think that right now, we just need time to accept that. Next time, try to talk with us BEFORE you make the big decision. Oi, Hachi, get them out of here ! I guess that you're gonna return in the quarters of your respective divisions, so we just gonna send you your stuff there."

"Love ! You can't be serious," Rose exclaimed, hurt by his best friend's reaction.

Love just raised his shoulders. He didn't appreciate more than me to see our two friends hurts by the overhasty decision of the three idiots. Kensei looked at Mashiro, not knowing if he should beangry or hurt by her attitude. He hadnt expected this reaction. Shinji glanced at me. He knew that the decision belonged to me at this point. Hachi wasnt the king of person to take a side andhe would do whatever the majority would chose. I turned towards Mashiro, who was fighting with her tears. She clenched her fists to stop herself from crying. A few step behind, Hiyori was holding her zanpakuto firmly. I noticed that she was shaking, from both anger and sadness. She was the one who hated shinigami the most, and now she was watching as one of the most important person in her life turned his back against her to join the people who had abandoned them years ago. She hadnt totally recovered from the winter war, and now she had to deal with all this crap. We always had been a family. But if they truly believed that we wew just friends because of our common hate for the same person, and now that this person was out of sight they didn't need to care about us, then Hiyori was right. They didn't understand what it was like to be a Visored. Shinji seems to have followed my thought, because he looked down, but not before I noticed the pain in his eyes. He knew and resigned himself. I turned back to Hachi and dropped the verdict so faintly that I'm still surprised that he heard me.

"Hachi."

I didn't have anything else to say. My voice and the look on my face told him everything. Rose had tried to say something, but before a sound came out, Hachi had ejected them out of barrier surrounding the warehouse, in the same way that he let Love out when Ichigo was fighting with his inside hollow. But this time, it wasn't a mask that was broken, but a century-old family.

Hope you enjoy it :D