As I stepped out of the portal panic flooded my mind, I had to stop Ulquiorra and save Ichigo. I ran through streets, I had no idea where I was going so I started yelling,

"ULQUIORRA-SAMA! ICHIGO! WHERE ARE YOU?" I was in the verge of being hysterical. I had no idea where I was going, I saw Orihime walking in the street coming home from school. She saw me and I swear that she almost fainted,

"Aki-chan… wait you can't be Aki-chan, she's…she's dead!" Orihime started bawling her eyes out; I didn't know what to do. I had to find Ulquiorra but I felt so sorry for Orihime. I walked over to her and awkwardly patted her on the shoulder; she looked up at me with blood shot eyes. All of the sudden Chad and Ishida turned the corner, they saw me with Orihime and I swear Chad was about to show some emotion.

"Akiko-san! What are you doing here and why are you an arrancar?" Ishida asked, going even paler. Orihime stood up and backed over to Ishida nervously. Ishida stood in front of Orihime, "You're not Akiko are you?" What kind of stupid question was that!?

"Of course I'm Akiko! Who else would I be!?" I yelled getting frustrated. Ishida must be a reverse nerd now because he had suddenly gotten dumb. "Look I don't have time for this I have to find Ulquiorra-sama!" With that I ran off, although Ishida, Chad and Orihime were following me.

After running for about five minutes I saw two people in the sky fighting with swords, one had orange hair and one had long black hair. Acting on an impulse I yelled,

"ULQUIORRA-SAMA WHAT ARE YOU DOING?" The person with long black hair looked down, it was defiantly Ulquiorra. I was so relieved to see him, Ichigo looked down, he looked down, and he looked like he didn't believe that I was there.

"Woman, what are you doing here?" He asked. I could only just hear him so I jumped up from roof top to roof top until I was level with Ulquiorra and Ichigo. I stepped out on to thin air and I didn't fall. I ran up to Ulquiorra,

"Who the hell are you?" Ichigo asked, looking extremely pale. I was shocked, how could he not remember me? I turned to Ichigo and ran up to him, he jumped back from me. That really shook me,

"Don't you remember me? Ichigo it's only been a week or two, it's me, Akiko." Red hot tears flowed down my cheeks; Ulquiorra walked up to my shoulder and pulled me back from Ichigo. What Ichigo said next made me feel even worse,

"No you're not Akiko's dead, I went to her funeral. Plus she's not a hollow." Ichigo wore a look of rage and lunged at me. At this point Ulquiorra decided to step in; he unsheathed his sword and carelessly blocked Ichigo's attack. "How dare you use Akiko's body!"

"Get behind me Akiko."Ulquiorra said. I stepped behind him, after a few seconds I realized the strange thing about this sentence, Ulquiorra has never called me by my name before, he must be serious.

He swung at Ichigo ruthlessly, attacking all his weak spots. Although Ichigo blocked all his attacks, he was getting considerably tired. Ulquiorra was about to finally cut Ichigo when Ishida stepped in front of him and shot at Ulquiorra with these blue arrow things. He held a metal bow and blue arrows which I guessed was reiatsu. I learnt about reiatsu from Starrk a couple of days ago,

"Ishida what the hell are you doing!?" I yelled, drying the tears from my eyes. He glanced at me and sent a reiatsu arrow my way. I easily dogged it and pulled out my sword, I never really liked Ishida anyway.

I swung at Ishida with the same type of ruthless blows as Ulquiorra did. Ishida would just block my blows with another one of his arrows, they were so annoying, I had to jump around a lot to not get hit with them.

"Why can't you have a sword or something manageable?" I muttered frustrated. Ishida shot an extra big arrow at me and this time I didn't dodge, I didn't see it coming. It got me right on the leg, right where my tendon was. I buckled, I couldn't move my leg. Ishida aimed an arrow at my head; I shut my eyes, not wanting to see when I was going to die. Strangely the moment didn't come; I opened my eyes and saw Ulquiorra standing in front of me,

"Don't you dare try to harm my fraccion!"Ulquiorra sneered, he was genuinely angry. He held his arm out and pointed his finger at Ishida; although he was a couple of meters away from Ishida it still looked threatening.

"Cero." He said, oh that makes scene he was pointing his finger for a cero. Ishida yelled and was pushed to the ground by the force if the cero. Orihime and Chad rushed over to him,

"ISHIDA-KUN! WHAT THE HELL AKIKO?" She yelled, wow she must really be angry because I had never heard her swear before and she always called me Aki-chan.

"I can't disobey Ulquiorra-sama."I murmured, soft enough so that no one could hear me.

Tears of anger and sadness rolled down her cheeks, she and Chad moved Ishida under a covered area, where I couldn't see what was happening. I turned to Ichigo; he stared at Ulquiorra in disbelief. He lunged at Ulquiorra, Ulquiorra wasn't concentrating. I swear that he was going to get hit, so I ran up to Ulquiorra and blocked the attack. He looked up, he seemed shaken. I looked into Ichigo's eyes and sent him a pleading look.

"It's me, it's Akiko. I'm not dead." Ichigo's face seemed to soften, I backed away from him, I couldn't see where this was going. Ichigo sighed and replied,

"I know it's you." He grinned. I ran up to him, grinning with joy. I was in arms length of Ichigo when Ulquiorra, all of a sudden stuck his arm and sword out between us.

"Stay back Akiko." He said sternly. I couldn't believe him, he couldn't tell me what to do, well he actually can but that's not the point!

"But Ulquiorra-sama…" I couldn't finish the sentence; he glared at me and yelled,

"Get back!" Just after I took a few steps back he swung ferociously at Ichigo, anger flared in his eyes. I couldn't do anything, all I could do I watch. Ulquiorra was swinging at him with all he had, Ichigo couldn't take it. This time instead of dodging but getting tired he was getting cut, quite a lot. He only got cut shallowly and on arms or legs. I noticed that Ichigo had a massive opening and apparently so did Ulquiorra. He got his arm ready to stab Ichigo right where his heart was when I snapped. I ran up to Ichigo and stood exactly where he was standing. I heard Orihime scream,

"AKI-CHAN!" After a few moments I felt the blade go into my stomach area. Ulquiorra couldn't react in time and stabbed me with the force, meant for Ichigo. His face was flooded with shock, I could see that he was about to say something but nothing came out.

The pain was unbearable I felt like ripping the sword out of my chest but I couldn't move.

"I'm sorry Ulquiorra-sama." I managed to choke out. He pulled out the sword but that made the pain worse. I coughed uncontrollably, blood coming out of my mouth. I couldn't hold myself up any more, I toppled over on Ulquiorra just as everything went black.

Ulquiorra's P.V.O

I couldn't believe it, I stabbed Akiko. I had caught her, she was breathing shallowly and quickly. The woman on the ground was crying and the substitute shinigami was staring at me with rage.

"YOU STABBED AKIKO!" He yelled, watching Akiko's blood fall to the ground twenty meters below us. I sheathed my sword and looked at the substitute shinigami in disgust. He lunged to grab Akiko from me but I just used the shinigami equivalent of a flash step to get about five meters away.

"If you touch Akiko again I will kill you!" I spat, malice filled my voice. Ichigo growled as I pocked a portal in the air and stepped through, Akiko still unconscious.