It Was Late and You Were Not Dying

Inspired by "Dead-Eyed Tsuna" which was written by wyrvel. It's my first Katekyo Hitman Reborn fic which I just found and finished on June 17th of 2017 (read: yesterday) and it's so good, so satisfying, so frustrating it's awesomeness made me swore off reading and just get my ass on writing out my stories.

So, before this year's June, the only things I know about the anime Bleach is that there are Shinigami battling with swords and explosions with no care for collateral damage, there's that midget that I think people ship a lot – Ruki-something, and Ichigo is the orange-haired main character with the badass long blade that was equally awesomely named Zangetsu which he swung like it weights nothing. Then I finally got bored enough of reading to binge watch Anime again and discovered a forgotten file of Bleach 4th Movie. I liked the first scene of Ichigo's human life haunted by ghosts, hated the typical high school involvement, loathed the predictable hostage-lure scenario, abhorred the megalomaniac monologues, extremely disappointed that the monster I vaguely remembered Ichigo turning into in that one scene I watched on TV before switching back to National Geographic is just that, a mindless monster that only fires and doesn't know he has legs and can walk just fires and fires and fires and got taken down so easily from behind, and amazed by the concept of Hell's will (making up a tiny bit for my disappointment that Hell wasn't portrayed as Hell and more like a dimension that will probably be forgotten by the characters outside this movie, as if Hell is not truly Hell and just another dimension a character from an RPG can get in and get out as an adventure).

If you feel some kind of synchronization of desires with my rant, I highly recommend reading Straight-Outta-Hobbiton's Ichigo fictions, and this one titled "Sight", which I uuuuh forgot the penname of the author who wrote that amazing fic, but you can find it on the top of 'Kudos' filter in Archive of Our Own. My Bleach fic is a sort of rewrite, inspired by "Tensai" which was written by Shadewolf7. Stories in which there are no authors suddenly establishing a relationship or lustful attraction that conveniently ignores the grand plot of Bleach itself, where the adventure takes you at the edge of your seats because you just can't help but wonder where the hell will this go because they fucking tethered, where there are no slips of authors describing outfits and appearances in high detail and attaching a "Google Search, see Hollow Ichigo here's the link" or something similar in the middle of paragraphs breaking our concentration, where there are no misleading or silly summaries inviting you to read Ichigo falling in love and having sex immediately after, conveniently forgetting that most of those are acts of molesting and raping, and AUs that makes me absolutely PISSED because I can literally switch Ichigo's or the others' names with characters from Harry Potter or Life is Strange or the freaking Teletubbies and it wouldn't change anything, because it felt more like a story born with a poor plot to begin the smut and makes it feel more like pornography than a genuine fiction where Ichigo actually fell in love!

…Er, I'm just asking, if you like writing modern, high school AU so much, why not make your own stories? Before flamers' flaming fingers finishes flaming me, I just want to say, yes, I'm aware of preferred fandom fantasies and even the professional reason of using fandoms as practice for the real pieces, but still… come oooon.

- SUMMARY -

Ichigo was practical-minded for a young boy. Beat up the mean kids and avoid the strangers. It was ridiculously impulsive of him to run after a girl drowning when he could barely swim himself.

Supernatural, dark themes, graphic content. Heavy AU.

Our love story
Could be kinda gory.
Far from boring,
We'd meet at a post-apocalypse.

1

School was boring. Tatsuki listened to lectures, had lunch with Orihime, took notes, didn't really accomplish anything much. Ichigo was absent again. Stupic strawberry likes to skip school but the school staff never calls his parents because his grades remain impeccable. Some elementary schools are like that, she guessed. Or maybe they did and Ichigo's Mom let it slide. It's not like she's his babysitter but it's always more fun if her childhood friend was in class with her. Orihime's not really interested talking about boxing or karate or kendo, despite her love for explosions and alien-robots. It had been a normal day. And it would have stayed that way and she would remain ignorant had her parents didn't mention 'oh, Tatsuki. Your friend Ichigo happened upon something terrible. His mother is dead—' during dinner like it was a sad gossip. Sad, her perfect ass, she was pissed. She just up and left her half-eaten plate and ran towards Ichigo's house.

It was dark and so obviously empty, it scared her. She knocked five—maybe twelve times—but no one opened the door. She tried calling but no one answered the phone either. After a while she admitted defeat and went back home. She'll spend the time… thinking about what she'd say. They're probably at the hospital or something. There's no way Ichigo would just up and leave. Right?

. o . 0 . o .

In the hospital, a nurse was trying to sooth the Kurosaki twins. She was a pretty nurse with long flowy black hair, and she was letting the twins tie her thick long hair into a high ponytail to the left side of her head (it was so heavy she strained to keep her head upright) and planting tiny grass flowers they picked on the garden. It was going to be a mess cleaning it up, but Mayumi was new on the staff and she was of the opinion that talking about their beloved mother's death was the last thing two young kids would want to do.

"LET GO OF ME!"

"Saegusa-neesan, why is Chi-nii so angry?" The twin named Yuzu asked. She was the younger twin with light brown hair—the color so identical with what their mother had.

"Your big brother is very upset, sweetie," Mayumi explained gently to the five year old. "He did not take what had happened very well." The black haired one, Karin, pursed her lips as they heard their brother yelling even louder upstairs.

"Do you two want to go outside?" Mayumi asked.

"No," the twins said at the same time. Karin continued, "Chi-nii would get even more upset if we're gone. We'll stay. He's only angry for a few minutes anyway."

Mayumi recalled her offer to get the twins out of the room when the young boy started rampaging violently. She really hoped it was nothing more than a tantrum, because the boy didn't look like he was just lashing out.

Inside the room, a male nurse was clutching his nose from having been the recipient end of a flying round-house kick performed by Ichigo jumping off the bed. Or, Doctor Shiba Tatsuya amended, Not-Ichigo.

The Kurosaki family had come in rushed by the ambulance. The mother was clearly a lost cause. And though the son was bathed in blood and covered in some bruises from what appears to be a wound from being slammed onto the hard rocky grounds, none of the blood was his and the bruises were only on his the left side of his arm and legs. They had successfully saved him from choking the water he had swallowed in the river, but then the boy opened his eyes and lashed out at the nearest thing he could reach—the side table with glasses and perishables. Guess that what the father meant when he said the kid always finds a way to get aggressive despite being injured. Except, Isshin also said that this time is different for some reason.

The new nurse, Saegusa Mayumi had been quick to extract the young girls out of the room, but Tatsuya was more worried about the possible concussion, asphyxiation symptoms and the risky blood infection from the new cuts on his hands and his mother's blood which he keeps flinging and punching at the other nurse and his father holding him down. And he kept shouting threats.

When the boy leaped up and nearly dug his teeth in the meat of a nurse's neck, the doctor decided that the situation calls for a major tranq. He may not show any signs of speech disorganization, but the boy's threats indicate that he was seeing monsters and little girl with chains on her chest and other sorts of things that points to psychosis.

They managed to hold him down and Tatsuya successfully administered Thorazine to send him to sleep. It was a derivative from phenothiazine and will make highly agitated patients quiet and calm without making them unconscious. The doctor sighs in relief and prepares himself. Thoughts of half-lines were forming in his head ready to be picked and spoken to make another young child accept a parent's early death.

But it was as if the boy just burned the dose off with rapid metabolism. For a few seconds he was weak and sluggish and not long after his efforts redoubled.

"Ichigo, please calm down!" Isshin yelled.

"KING AIN'T CALMIN' DOWN YA STINKIN' MORON. DON'T MAKE US WEAK!"

At first, the doctor figured that the boy normally refer to himself as a third person, but the father soon made it clear that it wasn't really his son, for some reason, pointing out the eyes and that apparently, the boy has brownish amber eyes. Not burning gold. He said it was a new development, for some reason, and it looks like witnessing his mother's death resulted in some kind of multiple personality disorder.

Not-Ichigo had been yelling and cursing for an hour now, and Tatsuya gathered he had a pretty straightforward personality so far. To this new person, Ichigo was his ('it' doesn't seem to be an apt pronoun for this case) 'King', whom he was very protective of—violently so. Tatsuya was sure he can reason with him, if they could just get him to listen.

"Doctor, should we?" Nurse Chiba Erika asked, holding up another 0.55 mg dose of the antipsychotic drug.

You have to space it by 4-6 hours, Chiba! Tatsuya shook his head. "No, a second dose might be fatal for the child." Or the depressant could ignite further aggression in the outpatient. Tatsuya narrowed his eyes at Not-Ichigo who kept yelling off their ears for drugging his King. Tatsuya pursed his lips and knelt down on his knees, grasping the boy's upper arms to keep them in place ramrod straight. It wasn't an unfair comparison that it felt like holding a rabid kitten at arms length. He let the boy shout for another minute before he squeezed hard, sending an apologetic look at the father for a second. The boy whimpered when the doctor's grip became too painful on his injured shoulder. Deeming him to have calmed down the doctor let his grip loosen.

The boy didn't waste anytime before slamming a fist against the side of his head. Tatsuya suspected that his eardrums would have ruptured had the blow didn't came from a nine year old child – but it still felt like he was hit by a truck. Vaguely. As it was, he just glared at the nasty grin set on the childish face.

"Ichigo!"

"King's deaf!"

"What should we call you then?"

The boy sneered but Tatsuya kept his stare. People tend to crack if he looks at them long enough.

It worked. Halfway. The boy petulantly wiped the blood on his legs on the sheets. Not-Ichigo didn't give them a name so they can address him properly, but at least the boy also didn't continue his aggressive behavior. The boy pouting and staring a hole in the wall was oddly disconnected to the boy that nearly ripped off Nurse Shibata's neck.

. o . 0 . o .

If that nurse didn't have some real skill to trip on a flat surface, his son might have started his body count.

"Ichigo, please calm down!"

And he wondered if it would have been his fault. If Isshin didn't lose his powers he could have sensed a change in Ichigo's spirit pressure. Then again, he wouldn't have had Ichigo in the first place. He wouldn't have Masaki.

Saki's dead.

As things were, he had only figured out that his son may not be his son because the eyes were too golden, the violence too vindictive, and Isshin has no idea what this is. Masaki would have known.

But she's dead.

"Ichigo!"

He barely heard himself chastising Ichigo Not-Ichigo.

Me. I. Us. We. Ichigo was this Not-Ichigo's 'King'. Was his son possessed? Had he somehow hidden the existence of a split personality this whole time? Was this his spirit Zanpakutou somehow taking over Ichigo's body? Was this Masaki's hollow manifestation – was Kisuke's theory true? Should he trust this entity that Ichigo was asleep asleep and not the forever kind of sleeping?

The Doctor, Shiba Tatsuya (not part of the Shiba Noble Family, surely. Kisuke would have told him. It must be a coincidence with the surname) – Isshin hoped he was a good doctor. Although this may not be the best time to even indulge in his internal dissing of incompetent or mad scientist doctors (damn Twelfth Division Shinigami for screwing the profession) when his son clearly needed help.

Ichigo would calm down in an instant if it was his mom but he won't be seeing any of that loving mother relationship anymore, will he? She's dead.

He wouldn't care much. Half of him, maybe. Would regret she's leaving their beautiful, living children behind. But Isshin wasn't a human raised with the choice whether he can believe there are ghosts or afterlife or God. He would know her spirit lingers for a while. He loved to think she would show herself to Ichigo who can see spirits since he was born and hug the twins with her wispy hands and blew him a kiss and say goodbye before going to the afterlife.

But she's not going to be there. She's not even going to be a ghost. She was eaten. Eaten by a Hollow who would have eaten Ichigo had Tessai didn't decide to follow Kisuke on his trip outside of Karakura in favor of patrolling. She was worse than just dead she was inside a Hollow who was the Grand Fisher Hollow from Tessai's description and was probably screaming with the other souls that Hollow had eaten so many souls—

A hand was on his shoulder. It was large and tense and not Masaki's and Isshin nearly lashed out but the white walls and vauge beeping and clean coats reminded him that he was in the hospital and—

"Ichigo?!" Isshin blinked as if he had just came out of a dark room and saw Ichigo's slump form half-fallen from the bed's edge, held by the doctor lest his body plummets onto the floor with broken glasses and things Not-Ichigo used as projectiles.

"Kurosaki-san."

"I'll pay for the damages," Isshin spoke before the nurse would say any condolences. And other than feeling that he should, he also felt it would be appropriate payment anyway for Ichigo's yelling which probably disturbed the whole building. "Let's just – put him to sleep first." He hoped no one actually died from the noise and crashes in this room. He hoped— "I'm going to see my girls."

. o . 0 . o .

"I promise you that we are not trying anything other than helping Ichigo-kun. These medicines will help him. You are a doctor's son, you can ask your father and confirm that the injection is notto keep you under to experiment on you. We swore an oath to heal people in need, not keep them for study. I can gather you do not like your m—your King's mother, but he does, and you do care for Ichigo-kun, do you not? Please rest. Throwing a fit will not do any good for Ichigo-kun's body." The doctor stared down at the Not-Ichigo's golden eyes, patient in the face of the outright hostility.

Ichigo couldn't really recall all of the words he said then. It was like, well, he did hear it, in the way he kept an ear on the news channel but the words just went out the other ear because he was busy doing something else? Like trying to wake up and get out.

/Hey, let me out./

Did he say it as an order? Did he hiss or shout it out? He's not sure. It didn't really matter. Probably.

"When I wake up," his mouth was—was his mouth moving? "Ya better hope," and that's his voice, but, "The world is ending."

Different.

Then something/one/what—vanished. Poof.

And he felt the doctor's hands shot up to hold his shoulders when his head nodded sharply down, making his neck ache and his body limping like their strings were cut.

. o . 0 . o .

They treated Ichigo's injuries. The father had his wife's medical records and they were relieved that she didn't have any blood borne pathogen. Some of the skin on the bruises was broken, but the rinsing was easy and the boy was smart enough to not scrub or suck on the wounds. The purplish skin along his left arm and leg will return to normal after 2-3 weeks, and he didn't show any symptoms of concussion. His skin was also cold and bluish from the near-drowning and it was astonishing that the child had managed to throw such a big fit with chest pains.

They insisted to keep the admittance short and Tatsuya mostly agreed because Isshin Kurosaki was a certified doctor and they have a running clinic at home. His sister, Shiba Miyuki, took over monitoring the child while Tatsuya took care of the paperwork. They kept him under strict watch during the treatment. The child spent a worryingly long time in the bathroom, but Miyuki was listening in and reported the child was just by the mirror, probably examining his injuries. Other than that, for all intents and purposes Ichigo was a normal boy. There was no more sign of the other personality or if the boy was even aware of it.

The family left the hospital by morning. Pensieve, subdued. Isshin was mostly numb just thinking about Masaki's funeral.

The reality sort of… crashed… when they got back. Their feet found the dining room and they sat down on their chairs before realizing that there was no one stirring the pot or setting up the table or smacking Isshin's face with a medical magazine for sleeping in.

Something scraped the floor. It was Karin pushing off her chair. "'M not hungry," she mumbled and quietly left.

Ichigo stared at the empty table. And the vacant fifth chair. He's supposed to cry right? He squinted but his eyes remained dry. He tried rubbing them but he stopped else he'll make the blood streak.

He looked at his hands and saw no blood. Ten seconds later he realized they weren't soaked in red. He wasn't at the… he was at the dining table. Alone.

Yuzu and Isshin had left.

. o . 0 . o .

The entire affair was sordidly depressing, and Ichigo mostly spent it nursing his resentment at – at everything. The condolences from strangers. The white monster. The ghosts. His Dad. Himself. The fucking rain.

"It's raining in here too, King. Stop."

'I can't. I hate you.'

"Why?"

'I thought you'd protect me.' He was something strong and scary and safe. He had never really spoke, but Ichigo often felt emotions that were easily distinguished to be not his own, thoughts not his own, images not his own. Thoughts weren't really conveyed by words, they were too fleeting and way too abstract. But the meaning behind them was so easy to be transfered they might as well have been speaking to each other.

"I am."

Ichigo caught images of syringes being thrown away – glasses breaking – and he made it clear that it was wrong. 'If you have been, Mom wouldn't have had to dive into the river with me and let herself get eaten.'

No one in Karakura would visit the river anytime soon. Masaki became 'that woman whose half of her body was chewed up by a wild animal with sharp teeth'.

"She's the one who chose to protect you by throwing out her own body."

'She's our Mom.'

"And I never cared. You're mine. Not hers."

'Don't you have anything useful to say?'

Images of steel clashing, surroundings blurring, and after Ichigo pinpointed a couple of bodies getting stabbed he figured out his idea of useful was fighting.

The other him sensed his distaste and radiated his own indignation. "I can tell you that that thing came for you. It wanted you."

Ichigo flinched. 'So Mom wasn't supposed to die after all. Dad's wrong.'

"Of course he's wrong. It was all your fault. You're too delicious."

'Because I'm human?'

"Because you're powerful."

His confusion was palpable. 'But I thought I'm weak. Mom wouldn't have died otherwise.'

"I never said you're strong. You have power. But your shitty human body is too weak to use it. Those things can sense your power and you're yummy to them."

'Well how do I make myself not tasty to those things?'

"How am I supposed to know? I'm you. But be thankful I'm smart. Try to hide your power maybe? Cloak it. Shield it. Whatever. Just don't suppress it. I have a feeling you'd explode if you do."

'I don't even know what it is.'

"Does its name even matter? Fuck, King, it's yours."

. o . 0 . o .

Blood scenes are pretty awesome, but the movies or fictions when the characters are drenched in blood as the glory of battle I mostly scream "DON'T ACT SO FUCKING BADASS! You're drenched in BLOOD. INFECTIONS! You could catch HIV or Hepatitis B and C!"

Request #1: I would very much love a fic, or at the very least for someone to explain, why when releasing powers for the first time, your clothes disappeared and formed into a Shinigami's uniform. I don't know if a Shikai release's clothes is universal for all souls (Shinigami and the students and the Rukongai souls), but please tell me why the clothes when it's stated that Yamamoto founded the Academy and Gotei 13—meaning that before, there were no Shinigami, just souls in what used to be Rukongai.

Request #2: What. Exactly. Is the Soul King? A thing? A God? They actually procreate (it was mentioned that there are Royal Families) so they can be replaced—really? The (assumed) wise ruler of Afterlife can be REPLACED? And what kind of afterlife after afterlife is that? When you die… you appear in Rukongai or Hueco Mundo depending on how you died. Then Shinigami and Hollows can die again… where do you appear? And Central 46—a system that refuses to change alongside a constantly changing environment, argh, typical corrupt absolute government, as if when the world is created, the Soul King (presumably God of Bleach) didn't think or is not really all-knowing or maybetheyareall-knowingandit'spartofasuperlongtermplaninvolvingichigotounitewow. *snort* I think my pet peeve about this Central 46 is that they serve as that vague authority that can be used as an excuse, demonizing them so the first authority, i.e. Yamamoto or etcetera can be seen as better. I'm currently tossing up coins whether or not I should even have a Central 46.