No, I am not dead, as you can plainly see but the holiday's were horrible this year and I did not have time to write, but here I am again and I hope you enjoy. This one is a bit mushy and sad but you know how I am already so I hope you enjoy it.

By the way…. I don't own any of this.

Dying is not a comfortable thing, he's been there before a few times, but this is a new experience. Most of the time he is dying alone or at least he is the only one dying at the time, this time she is laying there with him not quite thrown together but still close enough to look at each other as they wait for the inevitable to finally catch up to them.

"We're dying." the blood dribbling from the corner of his mouth had started to congeal and crust along the edges. Ichigo waited for the smart-assed answer of the girl laying next to him but when he did not get it he started to drag himself closer to her to make sure she was alive, he didn't know if he could die somewhat peacefully knowing she had gone first.

As he touched her face she opened her eyes and blinked away the blood that had run through them, "Ichigo, you're an idiot, I'm quite aware of that." She looked pitiful laying there in her own blood but he couldn't deny that he wouldn't want to die laying next to anyone else.

Rukia blinked again since the blood had started flowing into her eye and looked at him very closely, if she had never come to Karakura town would he be happy with the life she had taken him from? Somewhat normal and without any kind of worries besides the worries of the dead that followed him around.

Ichigo had closed his eyes a little bit, feeling heavy and sleepy he was thinking about Rukia, if he hadn't jumped in front of her she would be dead right now, but instead she was dying with him because he hadn't been able to push her out of the way or take the blow sufficiently enough to protect her, and she was dying anyways, but at least he wouldn't be far behind her.

'I love you.' She could only think those words, she had been thinking them for the past year but now she would never say them, they would stay in her mind along with her imagining of his reaction to them. She had hoped that he would love her as well, but she was pretty sure that what she saw in those brown eyes was just the love of a friend and nothing more.

He opened his eyes to her crying pink tears, "Hey…" He dragged himself closer to her as she laid there crying silent tears. It was getting harder to move, the hole in his abdomen wasn't helping with the mobility either.

"Ichigo, I'm so sorry, I shouldn't have dragged you into all of this…" the pink tears were turning clear now, but he could tell that they were still there. "Shut up, if you hadn't dragged me into all of this we wouldn't have met." He moved the last few inches to her and wrapped his arm around her careful not to hurt her wound.

She was dying anyways, mind as well do what she wanted, or so her line of thought went. She reached up as he held her and touched his face, her hands shook with goodbyes, she traced his eyes, his lips, even down to his chin, everything that she had memorized and everything that she loved about him.

Not sure if he was feeling what he was feeling he opened his eyes again to see her head buried in his shoulder and her shoulders shaking, from fear or crying he couldn't tell. "Rukia, I need to tell you something." he reached up his free hand and ran it through her hair once, that was all he had strength for now.

She turned her head so she could look up at him, not such a difficult task now that she was so close. "What is it?" She stopped to cough, she could feel it getting harder to breathe, the blood was leaking into her lungs now, that blow was meant for her alone, but he had stood in front of it to protect her.

Ichigo rolled and pushed just a small bit so that they were face to face now, lying in the street in the middle of the night, dying together. She blinked at him, to tired to do much more than that. "Don't be sorry that we met, don't be sorry that were here right now, I wouldn't want to be anywhere else." His vision was starting to blur, and he tried to focus on her face harder than he had ever tried anything before.

She stopped crying oddly enough, she just scooted closer to him until they were touching all down the lengths of their bodies, closer than they had ever been. "Ichigo, I don't ever regret meeting you, I don't even feel sorry about where we are right now, I just regret that you have to die too." She curled herself closer to him as her breathing became labored and she prepared to die.

"Stupid idiot." He watched her trying to breathe and for the first time in a long time he could feel that lump of sorrow rising in his throat "Rukia, I know were not going to live though this but I want you to know that I love you okay?" He had taken this long and used up all of his courage and strength left to tell her that and now he waited for what she would say, but the answer never came out.

The last thing that she remembered was his voice and then she was unconscious but she had heard the important message, and she was so sad that she couldn't tell him the exact same thing.

The last thing he remembered was squeezing the small girl with everything he had left in him and then the golden light over their heads and bodies that would save them both if it wasn't to late.