When Kisuke wakes up, he finds Ichigo slumped on a table and passed out, perched on a stool which is leaning rather precariously on two legs. He considers hauling Ichigo off to someplace that actually looks comfortable to sleep, but decides he'll let the boy rest a bit longer instead of waking him. He takes off his reiatsu-concealing cloak, throws it over Ichigo's shoulders, and goes outside for some fresh air.
Ichigo snaps awake when the outside door to the research institute crashes open, the sound loud enough to echo through the entire facility. His stool topples underneath him and sends him crashing to the ground in a heap, striking his chin against the edge of the table along the way.
"Ow," he groans, slowly straightening up and rubbing his chin. He blinks in the light streaming through the lab windows. "Urahara-san? I swear, if that was you…"
He grabs the edge of the table and hauls himself up, weaving slightly on his feet. A blanket slips off his shoulders. He grabs it before it can hit the floor and finds it's actually a black cloak, the one Urahara had shown up in last night.
Ichigo slumps over the table, pressing the heel of his palm into his forehead. He grits his teeth against the oncoming headache. Last night…
And where is the mad scientist? Ichigo closes his eyes and tries to filter through the surrounding reiatsu the best he can, but Urahara's nowhere in his lab. Or the whole division.
With a groan under his breath, he slungs the cloak over his shoulders and heads for the door, waving a hand over the motion sensor.
Except the door slides open before he reaches the sensor. He barely catches a glimpse of a slight figure on the other side, wearing the black outfit of Onmitsukidou, then a knife impales into his chest.
He stumbles with a gasp. The cold steel vanishes from his chest and flashes up for his throat. Reacting faster than his thoughts, his hand snaps up and grabs the small girl holding it by the wrist.
His fingers dig into soft flesh. He plants a foot in the assassin's chest and yanks her arm hard, hearing a wet tearing sound, a liquid splatter across the tile floor.
Blood. The air is thick with the smell of it. Droplets spray onto his arms and face. His fingers let go and he hears a severed arm thump on the floor. He cringes and stares at his hand to find blood dripping from his fingertips.
Then he hears the sound of half a dozen blades being unsheathed and looks up to find knives leveled at him from every direction.
"Shiba Ichigo," says the man leading the group. "You are under arrest. Drop your weapon and surrender peacefully."
Ichigo's eyes wander past him, to the assassin on the floor with blood gushing from her shoulder, gasping and shaking but otherwise not making so much as a whimper. She seems to have been all but abandoned by her comrades.
"Have you no response, Shiba?" says the leader. "Shall we consider that resistance?"
Ichigo's fingertips prod at his chest, finding his shihakushou soaked in still-warm blood but the stab wound a fading scar. Right over his heart too. These bastard Onmitsukidou don't miss.
"Yeah," he says, his hand moving to the sword on his back. "Yeah, you can consider it resistance."
He draws it. The ninjas vanish and Ichigo does too, leaping out of the way of one strike and blocking another hand enough to knock the dagger out of the assassin's hand. It clatters to the floor and Ichigo stomps down on it, snapping the blade, then twists around as another assassin flies at him. He raises his sword and winces as metal screeches in a long slash across the flat of his blade.
Behind him—the whisper of reiatsu that comes with shunpo. He thrusts a hand back blindly in a palm strike, feels it connect with someone's jaw, feels a knife land in his back.
"Getsuga Tenshou!" he cries, blasting away the guy in front of him in a rush of black. He leaps away with shunpo and lands on a countertop, back against the wall.
His reiatsu is black. Damn, that can't be good. He yanks a throwing knife out of his back and hurls it across the floor in a clatter. The wound immediately starts regenerating, just a shallow cut within a few seconds. He didn't want to rely on that power, but dammit, it's just so easy. Half the time he's drawn on it before he even realizes, more instinct than thought. And the power calls to him with a siren's song, it seems to wield him more than the other way around. Why should he get injured if he doesn't have to? Why should he let his enemies walk away?
He drags a hand over his face and his fingers run over a mask beginning to form around his eye. He hisses a curse between his teeth. In a battle like this?
He leans back against the wall, gasping for deep breaths. If he fights like he is now, the Onmitsukidou unit is all going to end up like that first assassin, bleeding out from the stump of her arm on the floor.
The leader mistakes his move for weakness. In a blur of black he's in the air in front of Ichigo. Ichigo raises Zangetsu and their blades meet in a ringing clash.
"Where's Urahara?" Ichigo growls as he meets the man's eyes.
"The Squad Twelve captain is in custody. Surrender now and you may receive a more lenient fate."
"What does that mean?" Ichigo says. "What've I done?"
"Do not feign ignorance." The ninja withdraws his sword and flashes back to the ground. "The punishment for obtaining hollow powers is execution."
Ichigo grits his teeth. "You're not planning to execute Urahara, are you?"
"Urahara Kisuke will be tried by Central 46 for his crimes," the ninja intones.
"What crimes? Urahara tried to save us! He did nothing wrong!"
The man narrows his eyes. "Are you claiming that Urahara-taichou did not hollowfy four captains and lieutenants?"
Ichigo slashes his sword through the air. "Of course not!"
"Preposterous." The man raises his blade. "The evidence stands before me."
A growl comes from deep in Ichigo's throat. "I didn't ask for—"
He whirls around as a black-clad figure flies at him from the side. He raises his sword, clamps both hands on the hilt, and swings the base of the hilt into the man's forehead sledgehammer-style. The man crumples abruptly in a heap on the floor.
Ichigo winces and lurches a step back. Shit, he's just trying to take them down. He'd acted without thinking.
The onmitsukidou rushes him all at once. He leaps down from the table, raising his blade behind his back to deflect a dagger strike. He whirls around, flashing backward with his sword held like a shield in front of him. A flying blade tears a gash into his calf and goes clattering across the floor.
Ichigo hisses as pain flares in his leg and it collapses underneath him, pitching him to one knee. He grits his teeth, struggling to get back up, but it's dead weight under him. He'll recover quick enough, but two ninjas are already charging him.
He points his sword at them. "Getsuga—"
He stiffens and throws himself forward as a blade slashes diagonally across his back. He turns the move into a roll, comes up facing the other way, and brings his sword down. "—Tenshou!"
The torrent of energy swallows the ninja and blasts him into and through the far wall, leaving a hole almost the length of the room. A bit more power than Ichigo had wanted. He doesn't care.
He gets to his feet and leaps away from the ninjas behind him, whirling around, ignoring the pain that shoots though his leg and the blood trickling down his back. The leader of the onmitsukidou unit rushes him, in his face in an instant with his wakizashi drawn back to strike.
Ichigo's hand shoots out and catches the bare blade. The man's eyes widen. Ichigo rams his sword through his chest, just to the side of his heart, ribs splintering under the blade one after another. The man makes a gurgling sound and becomes dead weight at the end of Ichigo's sword. Someone else rushes Ichigo in a whisper of displaced air. Ichigo doesn't bother freeing his sword. He plucks a knife from the belt of the man in front of him, spins around, and plunges it into his attacker's eye. The ninja screams and falls back, fingers clawing at it.
Ichigo tears his sword free of the leader's dead body with a scrape of metal and bone, flicking blood droplets into the air. He backs up, looking around for enemies—none. The lab is silent and still except for settling dust and debris. One wall almost completely blown away—he'll have to apologize to Urahara later. And—shadowed in the slanting light streaming through the windows—way too many still dark shapes strewn around him.
The sudden silence sets his ears ringing. He gasps for breath and the air hits him with the scents of blood and terror. He shakes his head, backing away.
"Fuck, fuck. What did I—"
Hearing a gasp and a scuff against the ground behind him, Ichigo whirls around. The man he'd stabbed in the eye has gotten to his feet, and lurches away from Ichigo, one hand clapped over his right eye without stopping the blood streaming from it. His back hits the edge of the countertop and he collapses, scrambling back. He freezes when Ichigo levels his cleaver at his throat.
"Urahara," Ichigo growls. "Where've you guys taken him?"
"I don't know!" the man says.
Ichigo's sword slams into the wall behind him, grazing his neck to draw blood. "Think harder!"
"Central 46," the man says. "Trial."
"Trial for what?" Ichigo says. He leans closer, plunging his sword into the ground near the man's leg. "What's going on? Tell me. Did Aizen set this up?"
In a lightning-fast motion, the man raises the knife stained in his blood and slashes it across his own throat.
"Fuck!" Ichigo lunges for him, grabs the knife, presses his hand over the man's throat, but it does nothing to slow the blood gushing out. The man's eyes are fixed on him as they glaze over.
Ichigo stands up shakily, stares at the blood covering his hand and dripping from his fingers, shudders and tries to wipe it off on a lab coat hanging nearby. He looks around the lab again. The sun is climbing steadily. He's wasted time. Still, he can't leave until he checks on every onmitsukidou member to make sure they're just unconscious, not dead or about to die from their injuries. The girl outside the door whose arm he'd ripped off is gone, leaving a trail of blood down the hallway. She must be smart.
So, Central 46 has their hands on Urahara, huh? Ichigo'd better pay a visit. And he may not spend too much effort on holding back either.
"And the eight subjects of his experimentation... shall be dealt with as hollows!"
"No!" Kisuke says. "You can't—"
The door to the underground chamber blows open behind him in a bang that echoes in the darkened room. The shadow in the doorway, silhouetted in the light outside, fumbles at the doorframe to support himself and slumps heavily against it. He looks up. Acid-yellow eyes glare through the darkness.
"Ichigo?" Kisuke says hoarsely.
Those eyes focus on him. Ichigo staggers a step forward, dragging his sword behind him with a harsh scraping sound against stone. Dark liquid drips from its tip. He straightens up, gaze sweeping over the chamber and taking in the assembled council.
"Trying to decide my fate without me, huh?" Ichigo growls. The council members scream and shout for guards. None respond.
Ichigo flashes down the stairs into the chamber, standing beside Kisuke. A red-streaked white mask stretches across the left side of his face, and his irises are bright yellow instead of their usual brown. Kisuke's reiatsu-concealing cloak is throw over his shoulders. He points his sword at the faceless assembly.
"What the hell is going on here? Why has Urahara-san been arrested?"
"He is guilty!" a reedy voice calls out above the crowd. "He has been conducting hollowfication experiments!"
"That isn't true at all!" Ichigo says. "Urahara-san was trying to help us!"
He steps forward, clenching his free hand into a fist. "It was Aizen! Aizen did this to us! He's a traitor, he—"
"That's impossible!" someone shouts. "Aizen-fukutaichou was here the whole night!"
"No!" Ichigo says. "He was there! I saw him with my own eyes! Do you think I would lie?"
"It's your word against the word of one hundred and twenty-five shinigami. Who do you think we'll believe?"
"Aizen tricked them!" Ichigo says. "He has this ability, he calls it Absolute Hypnosis—he was bragging to us about it!"
"Nonsense! Kyoka Suigetsu's ability is manipulation of mist!"
"You think it is!" Ichigo says.
"How could Aizen hypnotize so many people at once?"
"I don't know, but he did it! Urahara's innocent! He was trying to help us!"
"Have you any evidence?"
Ichigo looks to Kisuke, who can do nothing but shrug. He should've known Aizen would try something like this, should've come up with a contingency in case anything happened—but he hadn't been thinking clearly last night. And now it seems he—Ichigo, everybody—had fallen into Aizen's trap.
"That's enough!" a man bellows. "We do not accept the testimonies of hollows!"
"What?" Ichigo takes a step backwards. He reaches up to his face involuntarily, the tips of his fingers brushing against his mask. He grimaces, visibly shaken.
"I'm not a hollow," he says quietly. "How am I a hollow? I'm a shinigami of the Gotei 13! You can't just decide to put me down like I'm some monster!"
"The ruling body of Soul Society must act in a way that maintains the peace of Soul Society, and most effectively eliminates threats to Soul Society. Such is the law."
"Your law is going to get Kensei-san killed. It's going to get Mashiro and Shinji-san killed. Your law is going to execute the victims, let mass murderers walk free, and make innocents pay?" Ichigo curls his hand into a trembling fist. "That's not right! I won't stand for your laws!"
"The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few!" a man shouts. "You must understand that!"
Ichigo growls in a low tone and there's something else mixed in with it, something not quite human.
"I don't care what justifications you give. I won't let you kill them." He takes a step forward, slashing his sword out to one side. "I won't let you kill my captain, I won't let you kill Shinji, I won't let you kill any of them, not while I'm alive!"
"You intend to obstruct the deliverance of justice? I think your actions thus far have more than proven that you are a threat to Seireitei, Shiba Ichigo."
Ichigo snarls, deep in his throat. He takes hold of his zanpakuto's hilt in both hands, a feral light burning within his eyes. "I'll show you threat." He leaps forward and swings his sword in the direction of the man who had just spoken. A wave of chaotic black energy crashes against an invisible wall and disperses.
"Ichigo!" Kisuke shouts. Ichigo doesn't acknowledge him.
The assembly is in panic. "Guards!" people scream, clamoring over each other to get away from him. "Isn't there anyone?" "He's going to kill us!"
"He won't get through the barrier!" someone shouts.
"You think?" Ichigo bares his teeth in a manic grin. Standing in midair, he slashes the tip of his zanpakuto against the barrier, tracing a path of faint blue sparks that light up its surface. "Let's see how long your little wall can hold up."
"Ichigo, stop!"
Ichigo flinches. Everyone turns toward the door as it crashes open. A lithe figure stands at the doorway, shadow cast deeply across the chamber by the sunlight from outside. White cloth is wrapped around her head and body, obscuring her face, but Kisuke recognizes his childhood friend immediately. He inwardly winces at dragging her into this mess—can't he get anything right today?
The Shihouin princess flashes into the chamber and shatters both Kisuke and Tessai's shackles in a single swift move. She gestures at Ichigo, who is standing by the side staring at her. "Come on!"
Ichigo flinches away and raises his blade. In a blur, Yoruichi's right next to him. Her hand lashes out, strikes his sword hand and the back of his neck, snatches his sword from him and catches him as he collapses. A white ribbon whisks around her, Kisuke, and Tessai, and the four are gone in a flash of light.
Yoruichi lets Ichigo go and he crumples to the ground, wincing and rubbing at his neck. He looks up and his eyes widen as he notices his surroundings. Guess he's never seen anything like Kisuke's training room before.
Yoruichi heaves a sigh and pulls the cloth wrap off her face. She slings Ichigo's zanpakutou off her back and leans it against the ground, fingers tapping idly on its hilt as she watches Ichigo.
"Give that back," Ichigo rasps, pushing himself up to his knees. Those eyes glare at Yoruichi in a way that Kisuke can't recognize as Ichigo at all.
Yoruichi turns a frown at Kisuke, one that strains her brows. She doesn't often look worried. "Is he okay?"
Kisuke sighs and raises a hand. "Bakudou # 63: Sajou Sabaku."
Ichigo hisses and tries to get up as the glowing chains wind around his body, pinning his arms. He falls to the ground, snarling and struggling, black reiatsu flaring around him.
"You bastard!" he yells. "What the hell! Get me out of this! Give me back my sword!"
Kisuke tenses but the kidou holds for the moment. He turns back to Tessai. "Could you put up a barrier over the hideout?"
Tessai nods and makes a swift series of hand signs, weaving reiryoku into kidou. Kisuke gingerly steps closer to Ichigo and kneels down. Ichigo growls and snaps at him.
"Ichigo, listen," Kisuke says. "Do you trust me?"
Ichigo stops struggling. He blinks up at Kisuke, looking puzzled, frustrated. He clenches his jaw and turns away, closing his eyes. "Well, yeah. Yeah, I trust you."
"I can't return your zanpakutou until I'm sure you won't do something you'll regret later with it," Kisuke says. "I'm sorry."
Ichigo blinks wearily at him, then pushes himself to a seated position with a groan. "What do you think I'm gonna do with it?"
"Maa, it would be troublesome if the Central 46 judiciary wound up dead."
Ichigo frowns. "I wouldn't…"
He glances away. "Whatever. Get rid of the bakudou."
"I'm sorry." Kisuke offers his a vague smile. "Have a bit more patience." He turns to Yoruichi. "You have good timing. I'm glad you brought us here."
Yoruichi snorts. "Good timing, my ass. You, Kisuke, have the worst timing ever. I'm the leader of the Onmitsukidou. I heard the warrant go out for your arrest, the circumstances made me suspicious, and I went over to your labs." She glances over her shoulder at Shinji slumped behind a barrier along with the other captains and lieutenants. "He told me the whole story. As always, where there's trouble, I'll find you."
Kisuke wanders over toward Shinji. "You brought them here?"
"I brought your new gigai model too." Yoruichi crosses her arms. "So, what's our next move?"
Kisuke's shoulders slump. "Next move…" He glances around, at Shinji, unconscious with a mask over his face, Ichigo staring at him with eyes that aren't his own, looking weary and defeated in the kidou binding him.
"Urahara-san," Ichigo says, sounding worried.
Kisuke shakes his head with a sigh. "We'll escape to the human world. I'm glad you brought the cloak, Ichigo. With it and the reiatsu-concealing gigai I can create right now, we'll be able to effectively disappear from Soul Society's radar. We can take our time."
Ichigo scowls. "And do what?"
Kisuke gestures at the hollowfied shinigami. "Cure this. Figure out the weaknesses of Aizen's Absolute Hypnosis. Plan action against him. It'll all take time. There's nothing we can do right now."
Ichigo straightens up. "That can't be. You're just throwing the fight?"
"There's no fight," Kisuke says.
"You're just gonna run?"
Kisuke bows his head. "Yes."
"We can't!" Ichigo says. "We can't just let Aizen win! If Shinji is gone, Aizen will become captain!"
"Yes."
"We'll all be treated as criminals, and Aizen will get off scot-free!"
"Mm," Yoruichi says. "On that, technically you are a criminal. You've been charged with two counts of murder, several counts of assault, and treason for attempting violence on the Central 46 council."
Kisuke frowns at Ichigo. Ichigo shuts his eyes and groans.
"What exactly happened?" Kisuke asks carefully.
"Wasn't supposed to be that way," Ichigo says in a brittle voice.
"It was the Punishment Force unit sent out to apprehend him," Yoruichi says. "Can you believe it? An entire unit, taken out by this whelp. What a crying shame. Did I really let standards slip so much?"
Ichigo cringes. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean—"
"Oh, hush," Yoruichi says, appearing next to him and tousling his hair. "We hear you."
Ichigo shakes her off with a growl under his breath. He fixes his eyes on Kisuke, scowl edged by a bitter weariness that doesn't seem right on him. "What did Aizen do to us? Really?"
"Hollowfication," Kisuke begins, "is an illegal process to give a shinigami the powers of a hollow. Aizen's method is injecting the reiryoku of a hollow into a soul, then introducing a toxin that disrupts the balance between both, making the original soul closer to a hollow."
Ichigo glares down at the ground, worryingly quiet. "The powers of a hollow?"
Kisuke shrugs. "Combat prowess. You may have noticed something."
Ichigo looks up. "I'm not going to start eating people's souls, am I?"
"You seem to be getting along well enough so far."
"And I suppose that's why you have me in a kidou," Ichigo snaps.
"That reminds me," Kisuke says. He waves a hand dismissively at Ichigo and the golden chains binding him dissolve into light. Ichigo blinks, stretching his arms out and rolling his shoulders.
Kisuke gives him a crooked smile. "I needed to assess your mental state. I apologize about that."
Ichigo makes a displeased sound and stands up slowly, turning to look around him. He walks up to one of the sandstone crags and flicks it with a finger, leaving a mark on the rock. He looks around at the skeletal trees and fake sky.
"This is Yoruichi and mine's playground," Kisuke says. "It's an underground chamber below Soukyoku Hill, something only Yoruichi, Tessai, and I know about. Of course, you may not be able to tell it's underground. My genius engineering ensures—"
"Oh, cut the crap, Urahara," Ichigo says, and Kisuke hides a smile behind the boy's back.
"Well, in any case," Kisuke continues, "It's the best place we have for a temporary base right now. Care to help me out? We have a lot of preparation to do before we can get to the human world."
Here's something no one cares about. The statuses of the ninjas.
Ninja 1: Arm torn off
Ninja 2: Taken out by Ichigo's first Getsuga, minor injuries
Ninja 3: Head injury from getting whacked by Zangetsu. Gets amnesia, retires
Ninja 4: Thrown through wall by Ichigo's second Getsuga, major injuries
Ninja 5: Collateral from same Getsuga, minor injuries
Ninja 6: Stabbed in eye, suicide
Leader: Stabbed through chest, dead
Ninja 8: In gay relationship with Ninja #1, takes her and runs off to have the life they longed for together. Currently fugitive from the onmitsukidou
This is all 100%
Please review! Reviews are the best.