AUTHOR'S RAMBLINGS

Sorry it's been so long since I've posted! I've now had a total of four rounds of strep this year AND I'm recovering from a round of flu. Do you know how much it sucks to miss Honors Biology in a school that's very academically advanced? And yes, congrats, you've finally gotten me to reveal that I go to a private school. Have fun with that tidbit!

When Ichigo finally awoke for good, it took him a while to come around. It was warm… With a jolt, he sat up straight. He'd gotten knocked out… Hadn't he? He thought back. 'I remember fighting the menos grande…' he mused, 'I remember the… the cero? That's what Rukia called it anyways. I don't remember what happened after that…' Ichigo was suddenly aware of another presence in the room. He jumped to his feet, holding a defensive stance that could easily shift into offensive. Quietly, he looked around at his surroundings.

"Good job Kurosaki-san!" came an overly cheerful and awfully familiar voice. The only problem was that it was behind him. "Now we just need to increase that reaction time of yours~!" Ichigo sprang away just in time as a massive blast hit the floor where he had been standing.

"URAHARA!" Another annoying familiar voice shouted, "You said I could have the first shot at him!"

"Eh," Urahara started, "right, I did; didn't I?" With that shaky statement, the shopkeeper went to disappear into thin air with no word of warning for the daiko. He changed his mind though, and shoved a small green pill into Ichigo's hand.

"Kon?" he asked. Urahara nodded then vanished. After all, if you're the master mind behind an enormous plan, you very well can't help it along if you're slain by a Quincy can you?

Ichigo shoved Kon into his mouth, not even taking the time to wipe off the pill. If that shout belonged to who he thought it did, he had no time to waste. He burst away from his body in his shinigami robes and grabbed for the enormous sword on his back. To his surprise, it wasn't there.

"Looking for this Kurosaki?" Ichigo spun around to see Uryuu standing about twenty yards away.

"Give that back!" Ichigo fumed, angry more at himself for not seeing the know-it-all sneak up.

"Why?" Uryuu answered, an evil glint coming into his eyes. Here he was given yet another chance to prove how superior quincies were to shinigami. "You can't get it back on your own?" Ichigo bristled and ran towards the annoying class-mate.

"You'll pay for that Ishida!" he shouted. Uryuu turned and ran. Ichigo chased him all over the city, shouting profanities and doing his best to get his zanpakuto back. To his great frustration, every time when it was almost within his reach, Uryuu vanished. Ichigo just couldn't figure out how he managed to do it. He thought about it though. If that was something the Quincy could do whenever he wanted, then that was how he'd managed to get Ichigo's zanpakuto in the first place.

Ichigo started to pay closer attention to the Quincy's feet rather than focusing on getting back his zanpakuto. With that speed behind the Quincy and Ichigo stuck moving at regular human speed, then if he didn't buff up on his own speed, he was useless.

For the first few times, Ichigo couldn't see anything special about what Uryuu did. Then, slowly, he managed to see a brief flash of light underneath his feet. 'That must be how he's doing the speed thing…' Ichigo thought. Now the question was, what was the speed?

Before Ichigo could see anything else, they hit the river. He stopped and looked down at the spot where his mom died.

"Mom…" he whispered.

Uryuu stopped and watched as Ichigo slowly made his way down the bank to the water. His hand was on his chest and his hair was covering his eyes. Uryuu stepped closer and watched Ichigo with keen eyes. Something fell down Ichigo's cheek and landed on his hand.

"He's crying…" Uryuu murmured. This really shocked him. He had never seen Kurosaki cry. Sure he wanted to see it, but now that he had… He felt… responsible. But it was his goal to punish the shinigami! The only reason he was helping now was because they would never get a chance to finish their fight if Ichigo died! …right?

Ichigo clutched at his chest as a phantom pain hit his heart. This was more than just the pain of his mother's death… There was something else…

A girl with orange hair plastered to her head from the air ran down the river bank.

"Don't jump!" she shouted. Ichigo ran after her, trying to stop her when he saw the girl standing on the edge of the river. Instead of trying to stop the girl that looked like him, he tried to stop the girl on the edge of the water. When he was only a few feet away, the orange haired girl tripped and slammed- She went through her! Ichigo watched as she sank into the water.

"No!" he screamed, "Ritsu!" he ran after her, but he slipped and banged his head. When he woke up, something heavy and cold was on top of him. He opened his eyes to see his mother. Crawling out from under her, he refused to believe the obvious. Blood mixed with the rain all around her.

Ichigo looked around and spotted a yellow rain boot down river. He checked his own feet. Both boots were there. That meant…

"Mom… Ritsu…" tears poured down his cheeks. Now his mother and sister were gone…

Uryuu watched as Ichigo collapsed on the side of the river. Using hirenkyaku, he appeared next to him and picked him up. He had been watching Ichigo try to figure out the Quincy method and had noticed him see the light from the displacement from the shifting reatisu. It wasn't very surprising though, Kurosaki could be very observational when he wanted to. Other times though, expecting him to even remember his own name was too much. Uryuu used hirenkyaku to get back to Urahara's shop.

"My, my, my…" the shop keeper said, walking up next to the Quincy, "What happened this time?"

"Like you don't already know Shinigami." Uryuu responded coldly.

"No!" Urahara protested, "I was tending to Ritsu-san!"

"Fine." Uryuu said coldly, "We passed the river; he stopped, started crying, looked like he was in extreme pain, then passed out."

"That's it?" Urahara asked, disappointedly. The shinigami was upset. Uryuu gave descriptions just like his father. Medically and distantly. No juicy details whatsoever. Urahara whipped out his fan and gestured for Uryuu to follow him. From the sound of things, his theory was correct. Now all he had to do was to see what Ritsu knew…

When Urahara climbed down the ladder, Ritsu wasn't laying where he had left her. He could still sense her spiritual pressure though, so he found a seat near the edge and waited. As expected, she showed herself soon enough. She danced through a fluid set of movements, her zanpakuto strapped to her back. Urahara watched silently, wondering how long it would take before she noticed he was there. After five minutes, he stood.

"You noticed when I came in didn't you?" he asked, pulling out his fan. She stopped in front of him, her fist pointed right at Urahara's throat.

"Yes." she said shortly.

"Who are you?" he asked, staying frozen in place.

"Masaki Ritsu." she replied quietly. Urahara smiled behind his fan and took a step back from the clenched fist at his throat.

"Well then Masaki-san," Urahara started, "it's time we got to work."

Two hours later showed Ritsu sitting at the foot of the ladder, drenched in sweat with only minor scrapes and trickles of blood running down her cheek. The most serious injury was a severely sprained ankle. Urahara came forward and knelt next to her. She tensed and started to scramble away, keeping one fist up between her and the shop owner.

"Stop." Urahara commanded, "I'm going to heal your ankle." Ritsu stopped and let him near her, but she watched him sharply. Urahara started a kido silently and Ritsu watched the green light with fascination as the pain in her ankle subsided into a throb before disappearing completely. A frown wormed its way onto her face. The feeling of the… spell, for want of a better word, was familiar. She'd experienced it before.

Urahara watched her concentrate on the kido and hid a smile when she frowned. It was familiar to her. That meant she was receiving an echo of her memories. What Urahara didn't expect was for Ritsu to copy his hand position and feed her own reatisu into the air. He watched as she struggled, but made an acceptable replication of the kido.

Ritsu pulled her energies into the palms of her hand and forced it into a shield like he was doing to her ankle. It took her a few tries, but she managed to do it. Her face started to pull into a smile, but she stopped it. For some reason, she must have been a happy person on the outside before she lost everything. Now, she wasn't going to fake. She was going to show how she felt. Hiding behind a mask wouldn't help anything. At least, not a mask of smiles anyways…

AUTHOR'S RAMBLINGS

OK, this is late because most of the time when I write chapters, I write them in one go, so it takes me a little while. Neddless to say, I don't have time every other week or even every month to sit down and plow out six straight pages. This is only three pages because it's kind of a filler chapter because I felt like Ritsu needs a little training before I have what I have planned... happen. I already have the chapter after next written, so I'll try to get the next one out then we can get on with the kidnapping! I should probably stop talking now, but I exist only as a semi-real entity who only lives to cause chaos in your life and attempt to consume all of your time. Plus, I was rewatching Beauty and the Beast while I wrote this and I discovered that Bell and Beast were reading Romeo and Juliet together. Did anyone else know that or am I just REALLY unobservant?

Hit the button!

You know you want to!

It's right there!

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