Love Runs Out

5

Sorry for the lateness. Also this might be kind of a filler chap because I honestly didn't know what to do here. The next chap is going to be awesome and a bit long. But please read this it has more info about the war but has more on Ichigo this time than Kisuke. I hope I did well with Kuro and please remember I'm trying to be a bit more realistic and the wars are longer. Also watching the anime and reading the manga for bleach I've always felt like there was more to Shiro/Kuro than was portrayed, that he was extremely underrated and that he felt more towards Ichigo than just wanting to be the one in control. And I guess my suspicions were semi right because he became half of Ichigo's Zanpokuto.

--(xXx)--

The two shinigami separated and went to complete two different jobs they had decided upon previously, before they had docked at the island.

Kisuke went to gather some maps of the world, if they even had any on this little island, only to discover that there was exactly one map in the entire town. And it wasn't even a complete map. It depicted only the East Blue Sea. The guy that had it even tried to overprice the ex-shopkeeper, but Kisuke hadn't been fooled and walked out of the shop not giving the store owner a dime, while unbeknownst to the scam artist of a store owner, Kisuke had slipped the map into his clothes. Effectively stealing it.

Kisuke mentally laughed at the irony, he ignored that his mental laugh sounded hollow, as he made his way back to the small ship he and Ichigo would leave in.

Ichigo went to get them some food to take with them. Ichigo knew Kisuke had purposefully told him to do this job because it was a more social one. He was not social. His face was in a constant impassive frown, that very little found friendly. He knew this was Kisuke's way of mischief. But he bore it. Because at least Kisuke was causing some chaos again, no matter how little, after not doing so for several years now. He also didn't like this idea because neither of them liked to be social to strangers lately.

Ichigo was disappointed though. He ended up going back to the ship with only enough food to last them three days.

It wasn't that he couldn't have paid for more but that there wasn't much food actually there to sell, and he didn't want to clear out the shipowners who looked like they were struggling enough.

Ichigo walked to the docks with the small amount of food he had. He saw Kisuke ahead of him already on the boat and getting it ready to leave.

They didn't stay long.

--(xXx)--

Ichigo and Kisuke had left Dawn Island three days ago. They were out of food, had only one unfinished map of East Blue, and were hungry.

They were also on opposite sides of the ship from each other. Not because of anger or tension or anything, but because they were both doing there own thing.

Kisuke had one of his notebooks out and was intently focused on whatever it was he was writing, and Ichigo was sitting on the deck with both halves of Zangetsu in his lap. As he stared at them he was remembering, alongside his partners, about the war and the period of time before where he had lost them.

To be honest, before the Quincy war, he had subconsciously had a suspicion of Kuro, or Shiro as he had called him during Aizen's war, being more than just his Hollow. And there had been some proof.

When Muramasa had taken Zangetsu and entered his enter world to fight Kuro there had been some things that raised suspicion. The fact that Kuro had been brung to the surface when the old man was taken was one thing. The only reason Kuro wasn't was because Muramasa only aimed to pull out one being not two.

When Kuro protected him, even though he refused to admit that, instead of immediately trying to consume Ichigo.

The only reason Muramasa's power didn't work on Kuro was because their relationship, Ichigo's and Kuro's, to each other was so messed up at the time that Kuro, with his Hollow side's instincts, already acted out his desires and darker instincts of a lust for battle.

Ichigo is a little ashamed to admit that there was signs he should have noticed when either of them talked to each other that he ended up ignoring. Even feelings he had himself about Kuro that were ignored. Like the protectiveness he felt towards him, it had always been the same as his protectiveness for Tensa.

Then there was their reitsu. When Ichigo fought Old Man Zangetsu, his manifested Zanpokuto's reitsu was pale blue. But Kuro's had always been a red so dark it looked black. The same as his Bankai form, even if his reitsu in bankai didn't feel like a Hollow. It was still some of Kuro's.

When Zangetsu had broken both Kuro and the Old Man had gone silent. When he checked on them in his inner world, while his sword was still broken, both spirits had been unconscious and were bleeding from cuts all over their body. It really should have been obvious then, and Ichigo even wanted to ask Kuro for the truth, but he had no idea how. Besides the spirit had been unconscious and wouldn't have woken up anyways.

So he had left his inner world and not long after the Royal Guard had come. Both the old man and Kuro had stayed unconscious for the duration of the reforging, but when he called on his true blade Kuro had woken with a deep gasp before groaning, falling back against the skyscraper under him, and sinking into the building as he fell asleep, more cuts appearing on his body.

The old man didn't do anything like that and had simply faded before disappearing completely.

When his blades were forged and the water had been thrown on them to cool Ichigo forcefully zoned out for a moment towards his inner world.

Both Kuro and Tensa had risen from inside the skyscraper, like it was water, backs facing each other, cuts healed, and eyes closed. When he had grabbed the handles of his blades their eyes had snapped open.

After the first fight between the Quincy and Ichigo with his new blades, and the enemies had been pushed back for a day or so, he had isolated himself from the other Shinigami and entered his inner world.

Ichigo and Kuro had just stared at each other for the longest time. Kuro's face no longer twisted in an angry, smug glare or sneer and instead replaced with hesitance and guilt, probably even slight worry.

Ichigo had been the first to break their silence and Kuro had tensed when Ichigo opened his mouth, which he later found out was because Kuro had thought that as soon as he could Ichigo would go back to hating him and trying to chain him back down in the deepest darkest parts of his soul. He didn't blame Ichigo for doing that either. He hadn't been exactly unhostile when he woke to find Ichigo ignoring him and instead using the old man when his power was first regained by Kisuke's help.

So he should blame Ichigo when he was mistaken as a Hollow and when Ichigo was told the solution was to suppress him. His wielder had taken it as truth.

He had screamed and screamed trying to fix the mistake. He had been hurt and angry and had felt betrayed, so he took it out on Ichigo. It had been wrong, but he didn't care to fix it, up until that point. Up until the point came where it looked like Ichigo would chain him in the depths of his soul forever.

He didn't blame Kisuke or the Visored either, though he did a little, but not for everything, because they hadn't exactly been wrong. He was a Hollow but not exactly, he acted like a Hollow because he had some of the instincts of one, he was only made as a Hollow because Ichigo was part Hollow himself so it manifested as him. As Kuro.

His screams had gone unanswered because at that point him and Ichigo had such a bad relationship towards each other, from Ichigo hate and slight fear and from Kuro betrayal, anger, and bitterness, that Ichigo couldn't hear him.

And then he was chained, and always just used as a power source, and it was too late.

But then Zangetsu was reformed in their true form, and the chains were gone and he finally had his chance to fix the mistake.

But when Ichigo had a chance to come to his inner world and talk to him, he had been at a loss for words, and yet so scared that if he didn't explain first he wouldn't get a chance before Ichigo used those sickly burning chains again to make him disappear.

So it wasn't a surprise that when Ichigo opened his mouth, the first thing he expected was something of hate.

Instead Ichigo only asked if there was a name other than Zangetsu he had in mind to be called. Since he was gonna call the old man, Tensa now.

Too stunned to actually make his mouth work he just numbly shook his head and Ichigo had smiled a half smile and said 'How about I name you Kuro.'

Kuro would deny it to the day he died, but that was the first and last time he ever cried.

Ichigo's eyes had slightly widened when he saw the black tears run down his Zanpokuto spirit's face, before understanding hit him and he smiled a sad smile. He was so sorry to Kuro he could never apologize enough.

Though it stunned him when Kuro had used his heightened speed to get to him quicker before his chest was covered by the Spirit. Kuro had buried his head under Ichigo's chin and his arms wrapped around his back in a vise grip. He didn't let out a sound, but the wetness Ichigo could feel through his clothes near Kuro's head and the spirit's slightly trembling shoulders gave him away.

Ichigo had just rested his chin on the head of white and wrapped his own arms around his sword's spirit.

He had noted absentmindedly while he stood there that some changes had been made to Kuro as well. He had already seen the changes on Tensa but only now did he notice Kuro's fully.

Kuro had become shorter and although he still had strength wrapped in his body in layers, and was still visible, his stature had become slighter and more built for speed than before. But he didn't doubt that Kuro was just as strong physically as he was before.

Both Ichigo and Kuro had put in a great effort to form a strong relationship between them and since then they had succeeded and maybe even had a stronger relationship than he had with the old man before. Though he didn't ignore Tensa and they had bonded just as much as well.

Though it had annoyed the three of them greatly when they had discovered that Ichigo had to relearn how to use their techniques because how they called upon them before to summon them into use just didn't work anymore. What Ichigo was used to, didn't work.

For several battles and in between, during the war had been spent either training them in downtime or Ichigo being instructed step by step how to do them in the heat of battle.

They still hadn't even unlocked Bankai, but had made the Quincy King think they did, by achieving a partial Bankai and having the help of Aizen, before he was killed, with his illusions.

He still had to constantly train to learn the new way to use his techniques to their full capacity. They had figured they could just relearn the techniques together, because really all three of them were having to relearn them, before putting more power behind it.

He was brung out of his thoughts when there was the, very faint, sound of a bang in the distance. It wasn't loud enough for human ears to hear but that didn't include his Hollow Zanpokuto spirit who had come to the surface and comfortably sat next to his consciousness in Ichigo's body.

'King.' That caught Ichigo's attention and he pulled himself out of his thoughts and looked up across the ocean. He had told Kuro many times not to call him that, but Kuro refused to stop. Something about it felt natural, but Ichigo secretly thought that to Kuro the name King for Ichigo was similar to a nickname or what the name 'Kuro' was to the Hollow spirit.

'Yea?' Was his reply. And he felt Kuro shift before falling back into his inner world.

'It just sounded like there was a gunshot from a really big gun in the direction we're heading.'

Ichigo raised an eyebrow. 'Really. Well we've got nowhere else planned to go.' At his reply Kuro roared in laughter.

Ichigo stood and rechecked the boats steering and direction before calling to Kisuke. "Oi. Kisuke. Kuro heard a gunshot coming from the direction we're going. Figured no better place to go."

He heard a hummed acknowledgement and he chuckled. Kisuke was absorbed in his work. He knew the blonde had heard him but wasn't going to make an effort to stop his thought process long enough to reply.

That's fine.

They'd make it there, eventually.

And hopefully they'd have food.