They landed on the other side by falling down onto a hardwood floor. The beam of light was still there and the invisible force, which was not so invisible anymore, was trying to get through it. She could see exactly what it was, but always found it hard to describe. A huge creature the size of a 40-story office building, the feet were huge, but its body was thin despite its huge chest and broad shoulders. It's face only consisted of an odd-shaped mask. The man, Kisuke, she could see now had a gadget on his arm that wrapped around his right wrist, and a ring on his middle finger. There were several wires that connected the ring to the gadget, and from that ring was a blue light that formed into a point at least a foot in front of his hand.
Kisuke stood up quickly and stabbed the blue ray into the eye of the mask the creature was wearing. The creature drew back in pain, giving Kisuke time to perform the same hand motions, but backwards, to close the 'gateway' as Kiara would call it. He breathed a sigh of relief and sat down. Kiara, instead, stood up.
"What was that? Where are we? Who are you exactly? Is that thing still alive? Is it going to hurt more people? Wha…"
"Stop," Kisuke interrupted, "Just… stop." He was breathing heavily, "Sorry. It takes a lot of energy to run this thing," he lifted up his right hand; the blue beam had retracted now. At this time, Kiara attempted to push her glasses up on her face, only to find out they weren't there anymore. She hadn't changed cloths, but her entire body-type had changed. She was slightly thinner, felt stronger, was taller, and apparently didn't need glasses. Her hair was the same color, but the length was shorter and had many layers slightly spiked out.
"First of all," Kisuke continued, "That thing is called a hollow. They're a type of creature that you should remember soon, but it's not alive and thus will not harm anyone else. Where we are is my house, a room in my basement that is protected enough that nobody would be able to sense that I was going to that dimension to get you. And don't worry, your look changes depending on the dimension you're in."
"What do you mean by, 'you'll remember soon'?"
"There is a man named Aizen, and you were a threat to him. So, he had one of his scientists create a serum and inject you with it. This serum caused you to forget everything about any of the dimensions except your own because of the parts of the brain it targeted. It also drained your energy, strength, and endurance to a more normal placement. However, I had to bring you back here."
"You keep mentioning dimensions. What do you mean?"
"Different worlds, different time zones, parallel zones of your times and these times… there isn't an easy way to explain it. You see, you come from your own dimension, the one you were just in, and I come from this dimension that has nothing to do with your dimension, but your dimension does have other dimensions that run next to it, but are still different from your dimension, even though some of them are exactly like your dimension but aren't your dimension and are more of a spirit world, but that is a creepy place I must say, this dimension has a place like that but I wouldn't ever go there again, and every dimension has one and others like it, but then there are dimensions like yours and mine that are completely different and have nothing to do with each other besides the fact that all dimensions are inhabited prominently by human or human-type people."
"There is no way I caught all that."
"Well, if you did or didn't, one thing you must know is that you are a dimension 'jumper'… err… traveler, saver, skipper, hopper, whatever you want to call it."
"That sounds a bit too much like the T.V. show Quantum Leap."
"Yeah, you said that the first time you had this explained to you."
"How come it doesn't seem like I'm forgetting anything? There aren't any blank spots in my past."
"When you are in any other dimension other than your own, your body there is asleep and refreshed as if this would just be a dream in that world. You would often travel during the sleeping hours of your world and would be completely awake and ready to go when you returned."
"What if I staid in a different dimension longer than the period when I was sleeping?"
"You couldn't, your body in that world would tell you it was time to wake up and you would. Everyone here would go on about their business, but whenever your body in that world went back to sleep or you found time to come back, you would continue right were you left off, like you had saved a game but all the other characters had continued with their lives while you were gone. Even though, time slows down for whatever dimension your not in. Like, you once described it yourself like the Chronicles of Narnia. So most of the time, by the time you woke up it was the sleeping hours of the night for us. Yours is the only dimension that doesn't follow in sync."
"Then that means my body in that world is…."
"Sleeping."
"But… they're going to think I'm dead!"
"You're still breathing, I assure you. They'll probably take you to a hospital and Rylan will watch over you. I would have brought him, but I only have so much power to run this thing. Anyways, before you ask another question, let's go into the kitchen and I'll make us breakfast. It's in the morning here, normally you would usually come around two in the afternoon, which is around midnight your time." He stood up and started walking towards a ladder in the middle of the room. It felt like she had been there before. It wasn't really a basement at all, it was a large room created by this man underneath his house and it appeared to be a desert in the middle of nowhere.
They continued to climb the ladder, but Kiara was too full of questions to stop asking them.
"Why would you bring me back when there is only a chance I will remember only some things and not even gain any strength or powers back?"
"There is a reason, but I don't think you are ready to hear it. There is something that must happen in order for you to remember anything about me; I just don't know what it is."
"Does it have something to do with our friendship? Since I'm supposing we were pretty close for you to come back for me and everything."
"Friendship… yeah… you could say that."
They were silent on their way to the Kitchen.
"Eggs and waffles sound good?"
"Sure, I like my eggs…"
"Scrambled," he cut her off, "with ketchup and cheese." He trailed off his sentence into a whisper more towards the end, he looked reflective to Kiara. There wasn't much more doubt in her head that she had known this man very well at one point.
The door flew open,
"Master," a very tall man walked through the door and knelt on the ground, "the shipment is in for your customer." After he had finished his sentence, he looked up.
"Tessi, you remember Kaida, right?"
"Well, of course, but wasn't she 'destroyed' in a way?" he stood up, walked over to her, and poked her shoulder.
"Watch it, I'm sensitive!" Tessi stepped back, apologized, then went to tend to the shipment.
"You are?" Kisuke looked worried, "That won't be good for your re-training if it happens. Hopefully that will be soon."
"Why do you want me to re-train for anything? That seems pointless."
"One of my theories is that you will remember things as you fight. Fighting triggers certain portions of adrenaline that cause you to remember things you have learned while fighting others. Since you've fought me a lot in training, maybe if we reenact it that will help you remember something."
"Well, I suppose, but you have to go easy on me."
"While he can lower your power and strength, he can't lower your reatsu. When you transform into a shinigami again you should still have your zanpaktu and the ability to achieve bankai, but nowhere near the strength. That will all be saved for later today though. I know a few good people that will be happy to see you."
They continued to eat breakfast. Kiara noticed that the man would glance up at her every so-often. She thought that this would make her feel uncomfortable, but she actually found herself feeling safer because of it. Like he wasn't staring at her in a "I'ma gonna rape jOO" kind of way, but more of that he was checking to make sure she was still there, where he could protect her should something happen.
"That was amazing! No wonder whenever I had eggs in…err… my dimension… they were never quite right. These are perfect!"
"You always…well, always use to say that. I made eggs for dinner once and you always would ask for them afterwards."
"We were really close, weren't we?"
"You have no idea."
"We weren't… married… or anything… were we?"
"Would that upset you?"
"I don't think so, it would just be awkward. Seeing as how you're from a different dimension and all, I guess you'd be 'out of this world' so they say."
"You use to hate it when I made that joke."
"So it's true then?"
"Yes."
"I see. That's why you wanted to come back for me so badly. But, I don't understand. How does this effect me in that dimension, or does it?"
"It doesn't at all. You see, you became what you are because the previous Traveler wanted a child with an open mind, who knew what was right, who was strong-willed, and who wanted to live… not just survive. It had nothing to do with strength. However, the person explained to you everything you needed to know, including the fact that you could have one boyfriend or be married to one person in every dimension. You alone are a different person in each world you travel to, while the rest of us remain the same. If we pick up a quality from another dimension it is because we've been there and brought it back. This can be a dangerous thing for us, so not everyone can travel. Only those gifted by you can do so. Since you've forgotten how, so has everyone else. I made the gadget I used to bring you back my work for the past six months. It's been seven months since you left."
"May I ask what you were doing during that month?"
"Grieving"
"Oh, I'm sorry… I didn't…"
"No, it's fine. I should have acted on it sooner, I know. I did decide during that time what I had to do and worked up the plans to execute it. I kept it all hidden in case it didn't work. I also believed that people would take me for a madman going insane over the loss of his… umm… wife."
"I understand. I wasn't going to judge you for it. If I could remember who you were, I'm sure I would be more capable of comforting you. Speaking of which… umm… are you expecting anything of me now, as in, being a wife and all…"
"No. I still consider apart of you my wife and I will never take another woman, however, I will not even dare ask you to think the same of me. That would be a terrible thing to do. As far as I'm concerned, until you are ready or until you return to your old self, you are not my wife. And don't take this the wrong way, please, you have to understand that if I don't think of you this way, it will make everything a lot harder for the both of us."
"I think I understand that. I mean, with training and all. I wouldn't want you getting pissy with me and going off on 'you use to do this' and 'I can't believe you can't do this' and 'you use to be this way' sorta things."
"That's exactly right!"
Kisuke finished cleaning up the Kitchen and they started heading out of his house.
"You own a store?"
"Yeah, it's a small business, but I get by."
"Tell me about yourself."
"I won't. I want to wait until we've started training because I tell you much. Right now I'm just showing you off because I'm excited you are here."
"This Aizen fellow… what do you think he would do if he knew I was back?"
"Capture you, for sure."
"Oh, goodie, sounds like a blast."
"It would be, aimed right at your head… unless he wanted you alive for something."
"Well, he must want me alive for something and be expecting me back or else he would have killed me. I suppose that means he wants me to be able to remember something too, but he wanted to buy himself time for something, which all means that whatever the 'trigger' is to get my memory back must be pretty simple."
Kisuke stopped walking, turned around and stared at her.
"What?"
"I'm…a… sorry... the way you said that. You sounded like your old self."
He turned around and continued walking, Kiara walked close behind. She started thinking about Rylan. She assumed he would be upset at her for storming out on him. She wished she hadn't now, but then wondered if she ever would have run into Kisuke then and figured all this stuff out about herself.
They went down a few roads and then turned into a yard. The house had a sign "Kurosaki Hospital" on it.
"This is the home of a man by Isshin Kurosaki. His son is Ichigo Kurosaki, and he has two daughters. His son is a substitute shinigami, but doesn't know that his dad use to be an actual shinigami. Now, Isshin's wife died a long time ago, so he's a bit eccentric… and always was around you especially, since he knew that I wouldn't do anything to him for it."
"What did I do?"
"Either smacked him, punched him, or knocked him out."
"I don't think I could bring myself to do any of those things to a man I can't remember ever meeting."
"We'll see once you actually meet him." Kisuke knocked on the door.
"It's open!" yelled a voice from inside. Kisuke and Kiara walked inside.
"Where are you?" yelled Kisuke.
"I'm in the Kitchen, old friend! Come in and sit down! I just made myself breakfast since the kids went off to school."
Kisuke walked down the hallway, but before he turned the corner into the kitchen, he leaned over to Kiara and whispered, "Wait till my cue to come out." She nodded and he walked into Isshin's sight.
"Hello, Kisuke, long time no see it feels like."
"We just played cards with Tessi two days ago."
"Of course we did! How could I forget?" Isshin sounded drunk as far as Kiara could tell. Even though he wasn't, to her surprise.
"You forgot because you spent half of your one daughter's college savings."
"Oh, yeah," he cleared his throat, "Anyways, come, sit down and have brunch with me!"
"Nah, sorry, we just ate."
"We? You talkin' in third person now? I knew you were a mad scientist, but I had no idea it could get worse."
"Well, actually, I have a bit of a surprise for you." Kisuke motioned his hand to signal Kiara to step forward, so she did.
Isshin saw her, but didn't respond for a minute or two.
"Um, hello, sir…I…" Kiara started.
"I knew it!" Isshin jumped out of his chair and over to Kisuke and Kiara.
"That's pretty sick of you, man, creating a gigai and mod soul that looked and acted like her!"
"Since when did she ever act polite around you?"
"Never, but," he clasped his hands together and tilted his head onto them, looked off into space, and spoke in a dreamy manner (if this were an anime, his eyes would twinkle and the background would be filled with hearts, ponies, and things that go "awww" in the night), "deep down, beneath that cold exterior she wrought upon me, there was always a bit of her that knew I was a true man that no one could ever stand up to and that she had to stay with you only because she never deserved a great husband, father, and doctor such as myself…"
Kiara punched him right in the face, all Kisuke could do was laugh.
"Aw, that wasn't very nice, I think it's defective, buddy."
"Not at all, this is the real deal. I brought her back from her dimension. She doesn't remember anything still, but I figured you would want to see her since you did love her."
Kiara blushed from hearing someone say that, she hadn't even dated anyone since Rylan. Half of her believed she still had feelings for him, but she passed it off that it was just because he was the only guy she really got along with.
Isshin shimmied up closer to her, poked her a few times (once in the boobs, she punched him for this too), and came to the conclusion that Kisuke was telling the truth.
"Wow, it really is you."
"Yeah, it's me all right."
"Well, there is only one thing to do now!" Isshin grabbed her arms, pulled her in for a hug, and kissed her full on the mouth. Yeah, she punched him.
As he recovered, she realized something, "Wait… do that again!"
"What, crash into the table? I already broke it."
"No! Kiss me!"
"What!?" Kisuke and Isshin both said at the same time.
