A/N: So yeah, after my friend nearly bit my face off to make something of a sequel to U.C. So this is what I barfed up. I apologize for the possible confusion. So this is for you, Sove. Stop bothering me now.

Ichigo groaned in disgust. He woke up today thinking everything would go his way. He'd rush in, save Orihime, beat the living hell out of Aizen and all will be well. It was that simple. Right?

Apparently, it wasn't so.

It started with the fights. No one expected the incredible strength of the Arrancar, no one truly understood the brillance of the Hogyoku until they saw, and fought, it's creations with their very own eyes. Who was the first of his comrades to fall? Among the chaos of it all it was getting harder and harder to remember. Did it matter?

"Ya dead yet, Ichigo?"

Brown eyes fluttered open and immediatly shut. The glare of the light in the room was the least damaging to his eyes. The most damaging was the man who address him, one of the last people he wanted to see him like this. Gin Ichimaru.

"My, my, Aizen-sama beat cha up pretty damn good, mm?" Ichigo furrowed his eyebrows and imagined the infuriating man tilt his head in a childlike manner. Just his voice was enough to piss him off. Surprise was tossing into his anger as he felt a rough grip on the back of his head yank him up.

"F-fu--!" Ichigo barely managed the first sylable, the sudden movement bringing back aches and pains he thought were gone.

"Ah? He didn't hit your forehead. Why's there blood? Tch, bad lil' Ichi. Tha's disgustin', coughin' up blood on your face." Gin's voice held a scolding tone to it, but the ever-growing grin on his face told a different story. Ichigo cracked open his eyes just a sliver, trying not to gag from the feeling of still-drying blood on his eyelids. His vision slowly came to him along with the dull pains coming from the simple movement.

"Ya know, if ya'd just behave like a good lil' toy, you'd be just fine, yeah?"

The shinigami let out a strained growl. A good little toy?

"'Like hell, I'd ever obey that bastard!'"

Ichigo didn't know when his eyes fully opened. He didn't feel Gin letting go of his head and he had somehow found the strength to stand, despite Aizen's beatings. He also didn't know how this traitor of an ex-captain had reached into his mind and spoke the very words he had almost growled out himself.

"Tch, you're so predictable, Ichi. Really, find sometin' else to say when I wake ya up next time, mmkay?"

Ichigo didn't register when Gin left. He wasn't even looking at the floor his eyes were so focused on. The man had spoken his own words before he did. Word for word, the emphasis was even exactly as he had thought it. This wasn't the first time Ichigo had felt this way. Even when he had woken up from his torture to find himself alone in a white room, he felt it. When Aizen had first come in and addressed him by his first name, he felt it. He felt it when Aizen smacked him across the face and when he had kissed him. Time and time again that feeling returned.

Calling it deja vu wouldn't be correct. No, deja vu was something you would stop and think about for maybe a second or two. But it was never something that would leave you without strength, making you feel utterly alone and confused.

It made his stomach twist and twist until he had emptied out everything in it on the sickenly white floors. The smell of throw-up, blood and sweat made him dizzy, his mind and body more than grateful when his head managed to make it's way over to the soft pillow.

There it was again. That feeling. It drove Ichigo crazy. Why would that feeling, now of all times, show up? It happened only when someone predicted his movements down to the last detail. When Orihime knew exactly what he was going to greet her with when she healed his torture wounds...When Aizen knew exactly what emotion shone in his eyes before they even appeared.

But this, this shouldn't be something like that!

Aizen's grip held his arms behind his back, bending him over the bed, face pushed into the white covers. He attempted to struggle each time he felt Aizen carefully remove one hand off of his wrists and onto his clothes, but was quickly rewarded with increased spiritual pressure that seemed to break his back.

Ichigo bit the covers, keeping himself from grinding his teeth down to nothing. Humilating was an understatement. He was practically naked under the arrancar leader and it didn't help that Gin had mentioned something about survellaince in every room in their last meeting.

A heavy shiver ran throughout his entire body when Aizen's fingers lightly trailed down his back. He felt the man's fingers trace shapes onto his back, on a patch of skin Ichigo knew well. On one of his nights here, he had noticed a rather odd detail about his back. There were healing cuts on his back, shapely oddly like an 'A' and 'I'. Aizen had taken the liberty the next day to re-craving the two letters into his back, and finished it up by craving in the last three letters. This time, when it healed, the letters remained as a scar; a patch of light skin contrasting his sun-kissed skin.

Ichigo grinded hard through the sheets, feeling Aizen's fingers wriggling up his backside. He was in pain, but more than anything, he was scared. There were several times before this that Aizen had 'played' with him. Always he had taunted him, never actually going all the way. But this time he was silent, not a word came from his mouth and that seemed to frighten Ichigo even more.

Something else replaced the fingers between his legs. Ichigo bit down harder, not caring that his teeth were digging into his bottom lip as well, staining the sheets with his blood; this pain would distract him from the pain in his mind and back.

Aizen pushed in roughly, ignoring the hiccups of pain from the shinigami under him. Ichigo arched his back, letting out a soundless scream. The arrancar lord just thrust in and out, making a noise similair to a groan and a chuckle. Ichigo's vision blurred with tears, his throat suddenly dry leaving any cries of pain sounding coarse.

All in the energy in his body suddenly seemed to disappear leaving dry, quiet, ragged cries as Ichigo's only response to the harsh thrusts.

Ichigo found the floor more interesting. Rather, the best explaination would be that he had no energy to look up. No energy, no will, to stare up at the scowling arrancar. How long had it been since he'd been here? Maybe a week at the most? Aizen's tortures always came on time every day. The torture methods were always something different but their time together always ended up with Ichigo unable to sit down for days.

Grimmjow wasn't at all surprised. His orders were simple. Bring Ichigo his food. Make sure he eats. While this was usually a job for Ulquiorra, the sexta espada decided to indulge in his curiousity. He wanted to see the look on the shinigami he hated so much.

He didn't bat an eye when he entered the room to find the orange haired boy sitting in a chair. In the back of his mind, he chuckled at the pain the boy must of felt just by sitting. Grimmjow waited for a response. Ichigo's only acknowledgement of Grimmjow's presence was a quick glance and then his eyes seemed to drop back to the floor. That quick look was enough for Grimmjow to see his face. Tired, defiled, ridiculed, embarassed and ashamed were the words Grimmjow chose to describe Ichigo.

But along with them, he also chose 'angry'. Despite all that Aizen had done to him, Ichigo still managed to maintain the tiniest sliver of himself.

"Not bad."

Grimmjow chuckled, dropped the plate of food on the floor and left.

Ichigo gripped his knees and winced. There it was again. That feeling.

"How many times?"

Tosen stopped in his tracks. He never divulged into his curiousities; but this time was an exception. Watching him with his sightless eyes for so long through the dozens of screens in the security room had actually gotten boring after some time. Maybe, he had thought, it would be better to see the boy I pitied.

He could practically feel the feeling of utter shame from Ichigo. It made the blind man close his eyes, averting them from the sight they could not see.

"How many times?" Ichigo repeated his question again, a bit louder.

Tosen didn't look back at him. "What do you mean?"

"How many times...has this happened? You...coming here." Ichigo hesitated in his speech, having trouble putting his thoughts into words.

Tosen straightened his back, turning away from Ichigo completely. This visit had went on for too long.

On his way out, Tosen picked up on the last thing the shinigami mumbled out to him.

"...so this has happened before."

Tosen could only wince, having repeated the same words in his head just a moment before Ichigo had spoken them. Hopefully, this time, the cycle would end.

"Your hair is so unique, Ichigo."

Ichigo couldn't feel his body. There were definitely huge gashes all over his body, so logically, he must be feeling pain. So did that mean that he had felt pain so often, pain was nothing to him now?

How nice that would be if it were true...

"It has it's own level of uniqueness...But wouldn't it be wonderful...if it was red as blood?"

His mind shuddered. He felt disgusted with himself. Aizen's touch was beginning to be something usual for him. He no long cringed or shuddered under the man.

"My, my, so quiet today. Don't tell me this is all you got?"

Aizen lifted up Ichigo's chin, staring into the chocolate brown eyes.

"Giving up are we?"

Ichigo didn't respond. He stared back into Aizen's eyes.

"That's a shame."

Big fuckin' shame, king.

Ichigo's mind went blank. His eyes seemed to work. He could see the eyes of the arrancar lord, the eyes of the traitor, the man he hated so much. He could feel the pain from the bleeding gashes. It was unbearably painful, but he felt worse. But most of all, he felt alive.

"Fuck you!" All the pent up vemon seemed to explode out of the orange haired shinigami. He bit down on the older man's wrist, ripping off a bit of skin as a prize. Ichigo felt pride, accomplished, and alive. Yet, the look on Aizen's face made it all turn back into the feeling he knew so well. Horror.

The man didn't flinch from the bite. He didn't even tend to his freely bleeding wrist. Instead, he was stared at Ichigo with a renewed interest, his eyebrows raised.

"That...That was a new reaction. I really do love you Ichigo. You never cease to amaze me. Such a perfect toy."

The breath left Ichigo's lungs. There it was again. That feeling. Just...how many times has it happened?