"Oh what the hell…" Ichigo said slowly as he woke up. He looked up and noticed Koko was gone, and he had a massive headache, so he just sat there with his head down looking at his door. Around twenty minutes passed when he decided to get up and walk out the door and as he got to the door, it flew open and Orihime ran into him knocking over and falling on top of him, staring into his eyes before realizing what was happening and then she was frozen with embarrassment. they heard someone knocking on the wall next to the open door, and the sound of someone chuckling.
"Ichigo, I knew you loved her, but with the door open, and so early in the morning?" It was a female voice, and Ichigo's headache returned when he saw who it belonged to. Lieutenant of squad ten, Rangiku Matsumoto. When Orihime realized there was someone else who saw what had happened, she just stood up and flash stepped away, she ran from embarrassment, but usually only when she causes it, with a bright red face.
"What now Rangiku? You're welcome to go to sleep on the couch over there again, just no sake."
"Ichigo I'll take up that offer. But who is that little girl running around with your captain's coat on? She's cute; you better not try anything with her!"
"What the hell, she's my adopted daughter, Rangiku, her name is Koko and she's also my third seat. She didn't explode or stab herself did she?" he asked while sighing.
"What!? No! She just explodes and stabs herself!?" She exclaimed, looking worried.
"Yeah sometimes, not on purpose though, she only stabs herself when she is training with me or the squad, and explosions seem more common than not." He said without any worry, which worried Rangiku about if he's a good father or not. "Koko!" he called out the door. "Get in here! Bring Inoue and give me my coat back! I have something else to show you, I promise it won't break your ribs this time!"
"You broke her ribs?" Rangiku hit him for being a bad father. As the two walked in, she stopped, turned to Orihime, smiled and walked over to the couch and lied down. Koko was staring at him suspiciously and looked even smaller because she was wearing Ichigo's coat, which was dragging on the floor. Orihime looked as she always did, with a giant smile. The two orange haired friends pulled together for a tight hug, then Ichigo let go, took his coat put it on, and said… "How would you two like to come to the World of the Living with me tonight, I need to go talk to Mr. Urahara about something, and maybe after we can get him to give us gigai, and we can visit with everyone, if you want? Also, I want to see how my father would react to Koko." Ichigo asked the two girls in front of him and laughed at the end, all they did was smile widely and nod.
"Who's Mr. Urahara?" Asked Koko
"He's a horrible person, a pervert, never gets to the point, but he is very helpful when he wants to be" Ichigo said to her about the evil man in the green hat.
"Sounds like fun, let's go dad!"
"It's settled than! Rangiku, wake up, I have some paperwork to do, and you're distracting." He stated as he prodded at the passed out woman on his couch which didn't even budge he sighed and said that they can go do whatever they want until later, and Orihime walked out after a moment of wondering why Rangiku was asleep in his office. Koko just stayed there with him
"Rangiku! Wake up!" Ichigo spoke loudly into her ear. Nothing.
"Damn, really didn't want to use kido to wake her…but let's see what happens." He held up his hand as he sighed in defeat and pointed a finger.
"Hado no. 1 Sho!" He used the kido to throw the couch back against the wall at the other end of the room, the big busted lieutenant jolted from her slumber and just glared at Ichigo, his hand still up.
"Why Ichigo? I was having a wonderful dream abou-"she was interrupted by Ichigo.
"Not one more word of your dream, I know you, and I don't think Koko wants to get into the depths of your mind." He said while pointing at the girl next to him. "I have something I need to talk to her about, now would you please leave, you can come back, later, but this is a personal thing." He looked her in the eye, and she got the message and walked out.
"Okay, Koko, I have to fill out these forms for your adoption," he told her as he pointed to a stack of papers. "I want to know if you would prefer to stay as Koko Mitsu, or change to Koko Kurosaki? Which would you prefer?" He asked with a smile. Without any thought at all the girl looked up smiled and answered.
"I want to be Koko Kurosaki!" she said happily, as she jumped up onto him and hugged him.
"Alright Koko Kurosaki it is, now if you want to stay while I do this mountain of paperwork, you can, or you can go do something else if you want."
"I'm actually going to stay here, I like it here." She said as she fell on the couch and stared out the window.
"Alright but I can't take a break, I've put it off for too lo-" he was interrupted by someone opening the door. And looking in was the squad four lieutenant. "Isane? What's up? You're like four hours early."
"Umm, I had nothing to do, and I remembered that you invited me here. I hope you don't mind that I'm here so early." She said quietly standing in the door.
"No, no, have a seat," he motioned her to the couch in front of him. "I have some paperwork to do, but when I'm done we can talk."
She walked in and as she turned to look at the couch, she saw the same little girl who blew up a kido in her hand from the day before. "Oh, hello, Third Seat Mitsu, I hope you haven't been injured again."
"My name isn't Mitsu anymore…" she stated proudly, to Isane's confusion. "It's Kurosaki now. And Ichigo broke my ribs yesterday, but immediately had Inoue heal me. What's wrong, don't give me that look I'm fine, it's not the first time he broke my bones, I don't mind, he is the only one who doesn't hold back on me during any type of training." She said with a large smile.
"I'm sorry, did you say your name is Kurosaki now?" said the tall girl trying to pretend that comment about broken ribs never happened.
"Yep, Ichigo is filling out adoption forms now. I achieved my Shikai earlier and collapsed shortly after, Ichigo caught me, and when I came to, he set me down and asked why I called him dad so much, so I explained it, and I guess it tore his heart up and he decided to adopt me." The two girls sat there talking about things that Ichigo couldn't be bothered with, finally after two hours he started to sort the pile of paperwork and he shuffled it all into one neat pile. Stood up, and took off his captain coat and threw it at Koko, who put it on and sat there happily.
"Okay, Isane, you wanted to know why I let Inoue call me Kurosaki-kun, instead of Ichigo. Well if you couldn't tell, she is hopelessly in love with me, and has been for years now, although she only started talking openly about her feelings when she arrived in Soul Society somehow having all her memories, which I'm taking her to someone to see about that, later, well when we…" he continued the long story keeping the attention of Isane and Koko, throughout the entire thing. without realizing his story had taken several hours.
"You should marry her" the two girls rang out in unison; they looked at each other and started giggling. Ichigo had to snap his fingers in his ear to be sure that he heard right. Isane giggled.
"Yeah, maybe sooner than she thinks. There are four reasons I'm going to the World of the living. To find out about Orihime from Mr. Urahara, meet with friends that we haven't seen in almost a year and a half, to see how my dad reacts, and get my mother's wedding ring." He sat back in his chair and started staring at the ceiling. Then he realized how late it was. "Wow that took a while, it's almost one, and good thing you came a couple hours early wouldn't want to keep you so late, you should probably go, unless you plan on sleeping here while we're gone?" he joked at Isane and she blushed and stood up. Then realized he was joking because he was laughing.
"I might as well, you sleep in my barracks, I might as well sleep here" she said while laughing.
"I don't care, go ahead." He said as he sent a Hell Butterfly to Inoue telling her to meet him outside the barracks. "Either way, I'll be back in a couple days, let's go Koko, were leaving." He waved his hand at the tall lieutenant behind him, and Koko followed him out.
"He is nice, but he loves Orihime…Damn Isane what's wrong with you, stop talking about him! He may be handsome but…Stop it!" Isane said to herself frantically and with her self-contained rant, she ran out the door.
As the two walked out of the barracks they saw Orihime who was sitting under a tree staring at the stars. She looked exceptionally beautiful under the moonlight, her long orange hair seemed to have a white tint to it and seemed to glow, her pale skin was glowing, and her smile was enough to make Ichigo just stand there and admire her for a minute before he walked over to her and helped her up.
"Kurosaki-kun! Koko-chan!" she said with a giant smile.
"Let's go, Inoue we'll have to stay at Urahara's shop tonight so he can make us gigai. Koko, ignore everything he says to you." He spoke to them both with a chuckle
"Alright let's go, I want to see everyone again!" Orihime said loudly grabbing Ichigo's hand, and dragging him toward The Senkaimon. Koko still trailing behind him still wearing his white coat
…
They arrive in a familiar part of Karakura Town. Which was near where Orihime used to live, the three of them started their way to Urahara's shop, Ichigo and Orihime were walking on the street, holding hands tightly, while Koko was jumping all over the place from building to building, but making sure to not get lost. They walked for around twenty minutes before coming up to the little shop that they knew all too well. Ichigo releases Orihime's hand, walks up to the shop and starts screaming. "Urahara! Get your ass out here, how long do you intend to make a couple of clients wait!?" He backed up and smirked…
"Oh? To what do I owe the pleasure of this visit Ichigo and Orihime? And oh, who's the cute girl with you and why is she wearing your coat?" said the man with the striped green hat from behind his fan.
"This is my daughter, Koko Kurosaki, we need gigai that suppress our spiritual pressure and I have a few questions for you." Ichigo spoke as he dragged Koko in front of him as to show her off.
"Your daughter? So I can assume that you and the lovely Orihime finally had s-" He was interrupted by Ichigo which had a death glare on his face.
"Finish that sentence and I will castrate you, you old pervert. She's my adopted daughter." The only thing that prevented Orihime disappearing from sight was the fact that Ichigo had a grip on her arm. "Oh no, you aren't running this time, let's go." And he dragged the two inside after Urahara turned around and let them in.
"Well what exactly beside gigai did you need?"
"I came to ask you, how it was that Inoue retained all of her memories, abilities, and how her spiritual pressure multiplied to such a point." Ichigo asked as Orihime was sitting next to them after bringing Koko into the room.
"Oh, I have no Idea." Urahara said after a minute of thought behind his fan, and just shut the fan abruptly.
"The hell? What do you mean you have no idea!?" the young captain yelled.
"Calm down, I was joking, and it isn't impossible for this to happen, just rare, I guess she was lucky. I'm going to say that her spiritual pressure increase is due to her being not a normal human in the first place, and her becoming a spiritual being has increased her natural power. Now, onto the subject of gigai, I already know what to do for you and Orihime, but what should I do for Koko over there? She doesn't exactly have a normal appearance with those eyes and that golden chain."
"I guess you could keep everything the same, but without the gold chain and with some normal clothes of course, whatever she wants." He said waving him off as Urahara was halfway out the door. After ten minutes of small talk between the three remaining in the room, Urahara comes back in, saying the gigai won't be ready until morning, and he said that they could just sleep in there. After nodding and getting mats for the two girls, Ichigo just sat against a wall, and let his head fall back against the wall and closed his eyes. Not ten seconds later, he was startled when Orihime came over to him and lay her head down in his lap, she just looks up and smiles at him.
"I love you, Kurosaki-kun." She said gazing into his eyes.
"I love you too, Inoue." He smiled and started running his hand through her hair.
"Dad, I love you also." Said the tired voice of Koko, who was already half asleep against the wall across from him.
"I love you too, Koko" he said as he put his head against the wall closing his eyes, still stroking Orihime's hair as he gradually drifted off to sleep.
AN: Well somehow I ended up making Isane like Ichigo, although, she is respectful of Orihime and will stay away from trying anything with him. (I hope my mind agrees with this in coming chapters) Don't worry, Rukia, and Renji, and some more of squad five will find their way into the story.
I hope you enjoyed!
