Chapter 20

Ichigo arrived at his house. He quietly opened and closed the door. He quietly took his shoes off and was about to go up to his room when he noticed his father's form in the door way of his office. He turned to look at Isshin. "Dad?"

"Ichigo, you don't have to worry. Go and rest, I will tell you if the battle starts." Isshin said.

Ichigo's eyes widened a bit. Then he smiled softly. "Thank you." He then went up the stairs.

Once in his room he took his clothing off and changed into his pajamas. He laid down under his covers and let out a sigh. He stared at the wall in front of him for a while, then sighed and closed his eyes, falling asleep.

In his sleep he saw a dream. In it was a battle between two sides: the Volturi and the Cullens with their witnesses against vampires who were all dressed similarly into black and red. Both sides had losses. But at one point, the Volturi were winning, thus the tides were turned by a powerful ground shaking punch which spread the ground separating the two sides. Many of the vampires fell into the crack in the ground, mostly the Volturi, which made their numbers less.

Ichigo sweated and panted in his sleep, but he was unable to wake up. His heart raced, he moaned lowly. He thought his heart would stop when he saw Leah fall into the depths of the crack to the hungry lava bellow. Ichigo's heart jumped every time a werewolf or one of the Cullens or their witnesses got hurt or even died, his heart ached with the desire to jump in and save the righteous and kill the wrong. But he couldn't, he didn't know what was holding him back. His heart raced in its confines, it pounded against the inner walls of his chest and it hurt. Ichigo's breathing became raspy. He wanted to interrupt the battle and kill all of the Volturi with his Getzuga Tensho but he couldn't, something was holding him back.

Then he slowly began to calm, his expression of pain and desperation in his sleep switched to that of confusion. In his sleep he saw... himself?

Black energy shot up into the cloudy sky in the form of a pillar. Surges of it ran fast along the ground, separating the ground as well, running for long miles. And some of it escaped slowly like fog. The energy was darker than the darkness that a blind man saw when he opened his eyes.

After the pillar shot into the sky, the clouds were pushed back by the shock wave from the energy and cleared the sky, letting the sun down upon the vampires. Then all the energy pulled back into the crack in the ground. It formed into something like a skull, a black skull. Usually skulls didn't have expressions, but this one had and a very clear one. The face of skull looked angered, disgusted, blood thirsty, and most of all, evil. And all that was pointed at the dumbfounded Volturi.

Everyone just froze on their spots, from both sides, and simply stared because that was all they could do. If the vampires could breathe, their breath would be stolen. But the werewolves did literally have their breath stolen. The vampires didn't notice but it wasn't just fear and surprise gripping them and keeping them from moving, the wolves were especially sensitive to it... This power in the air...Reiatsu.

The black energy shaped into a skull then appeared to be sucked in into something at the center of it, then it cleared in the form of a shockwave, one that cut off the tops of the trees and scarred the mountains. There, in the bright sun light like in the spot light, stood the savior of the day. The sun made the vampires sparkle, but Ichigo shined in the sun light. If one was to get poetic, they would say he shined brighter than the sun.

There he stood... On air. The long fire-kissed hair floated in the air gracefully as the wind blew. It had a golden shine to it in the sunlight, as if its owner's head was on fire. His marble white skin was whiter than snow with a pearly shine to it (as mentioned when Ichigo just came to school. His skin is just that way and only the supernatural beings can pick up that property). His upper body was completely nude, revealing his masterpiece of a lean build. His lower body had his usual black hakama pants but he didn't have his white socks and sandals, he was barefoot. In his right hand he held his one hell of a butcher knife sword. The sword was white Zangetsu, the top of the blade white and the sharp edge black. The hilt was bandaged up in black smoke which seemed to take on the form of fabric but its tips were made of smoke.

But that was not the only shocking thing about his whole appearance. He looked like he had a full body skeleton tattoo, but in fact they were markings. The vampires were the first to realize that was actually real skin color in the places of the marks. There wasn't a single part of the body uncovered by the skeleton design. From his collar-bone and around his neck as well as from around his wrists emitted something like coral-red smoke, so thick at one point it seemed like fur. His nails grew into black claws on both his hands and feet. On his face was a bone mask of a human skull's face. From the eye sockets of the bone mask ran blood tears. In the darkness of the sockets of the bone mask could be made out blood thirsty eyes. The clear emotion in them was portrayed by the look of determination and the crimson red color of the irises, the rest of the eyes was pure blackness. From the forehead of the mask grew ram horns. They were black with a clear, glassy shine, their tips razor sharp.

Everyone was in fear and shock, while no other than Aro seemed mesmerized. He gazed at this new appearance which interrupted the battle like at a work of art with a dreamy look. Then Aro's eyes widened and he grinned widely. "Marvelous! Work of art! Masterpiece! God has sent us an angel from Heaven! What a blessing!" He looked at him with wide eyes like a child at a new toy in the window of a shop, panting with excitement.

The pressure in the air seemed to lessen, allowing every one to move, and those who needed it, to breathe. Animals and the birds around the area in the forest and the sky dropped dead, they were unable to overcome such crushing pressure.

Caius and Marcus gave a wide-eyed, almost scared look at Aro, then their eyes returned to Ichigo who stood still in the air. Some of the Volturi seemed to back away a bit.

Aro, the mad one, seemed to be over excited. He took a few steps forward to the crack in the ground and Ichigo above it, his hands extended forward. "I beg you, oh Angel, come with us!"

Ichigo stayed silent. Then he raised his sword into the air, the shine of the sunlight on it traveled up from the hilt to the tip as it was raised.

Aro's smile seemed to slowly vanish as he realized the silent yet obvious answer.

Then Ichigo swished his sword down, a crescent-shaped surge of black energy erased the vampires in front of him before anyone could even think that it was better to run.

Ichigo jolted up, eyes wide, panting heavily, cold sweat covering his body. His eyes ran around the room. He breathed like that for a while, then he brought his left knee to his chest. He rested his hands on his knee and scraped his left hand's thumb tip with his teeth as his eyes slowly wandered from side to side around his room as he processed the dream through his mind. He let out a sigh. Outside was already morning, the birds were perched on the tree branches and chirping. He got off his bed and went to his bathroom to wash. Little did he know that because of his excitement and worry for the upcoming battle, which actually didn't take place, had caused him to see the vision that Alice showed to Aro.

Now both sides: the Cullens with their company and the Volturi, were departing from what would be the battle field.

After the vision, Aro and his two 'brothers' were sure of several things after Aro told them. One, Renesmee was no longer the center of their attention. Two, the Cullens as always endangered the existence of the vampires. Three, they had all their eyes and attention on this Angel from Heaven with fire-kissed hair by the name 'Strawberry', or as Demetri translated from Japanese to English after stalking Ichigo a few times and finding out his name. And four, they had to come up with a plan and means in order to obtain Ichigo. And currently, they were processing ideas through their corrupted, rotten minds as they departed for Volterra.