Chapter twenty five... phew. This took a while, didn't it? To those of you who are still reading, thank you so much. There are a lot of you, I think, based on the charts of how many people read each chapter. Thank you so much for sticking with me, even if this story is crap.

I've gotten a bunch of requests to make my chapters longer, and I'm sorry to say that that's not the case this chapter. Next chapter is short, this one is medium, but two from now is long. I have that far into the future planned out as for what's going to be in each chapter. Right now, though, I'm trying to get something, anything out so that I don't lose my readers.

Emmy

One Hundred and Twenty-Seven Years after Orihime's Arrival in the Royal Realm, or Sixty Three years before Ichigo's Arrival in the Royal Realm. The Year of Orihime's Promotion to the rank of Chief Caregiver.

"I'm dreaming, aren't I?" She must have been. Honestly, this place was so surreal, and she didn't think that she quite recognized it.

"Why would you think that?"

"Because you're dead, Kurosaki kun."

He smiled at her, a little sadly. "Yes, that is quite the issue, isn't it?"

"So I am asleep?"

"I don't know. Why don't you tell me?"

She looked at herself, wearing not a hakama and kimono, but a skirt she hadn't seen in centuries, along with a shirt that she remembered from another lifetime. He was wearing what he had always liked to wear. Tight blue jeans, a t-shirt with the silhouette of a drum set painted on top of dark red. She looked at his face.

The same as it ever was. It was that same expression that made her want to crack up as she imagined any number of different hairstyles, earrings, even makeup.

"I suppose I could always pinch myself."

He gave a sad chuckle and looked down into his lap. "Yeah, you could. But then you would wake up, wouldn't you?"

She sighed. "Then I am dreaming."

"Yeah, you are."

"I see."

They were silent, staring out over the sea of foliage in front of them. They were sitting in an unusually high tree, one that went above the canopy of the others, making the leaves below them look like grass on hills that went until the end of sight in all directions.

"Do you know where we are?"

"Do you?"

" I think... are we in my head?"

He gave a grunt and a nod. "I see."

And they were silent again.

"Why are you here, Kurosaki kun?"

He looked up from his lap to her face. "You brought me here. You tried to bring yourself to home, or whatever was the most real thing for you. In this case, it was your own mind and... well, me."

"So... this means that you are the most comforting, real thing to me?"

"I think so."

"Am I imagining you? Are you really dead?"

"Yes, I am your imagination."

she looked down to her lap. "I see," she said once again. Her voice was quivering, her hands wrapping nervously against each other. "Well, then, imagination, how can I help you?" She was trying her best to sound chipper and bright, but it wasn't working. There was no real use lying to herself, she should have known.

"I'm here to tell you," he said, "to accept changes."

She turned to him and laughed, a high, chiming sound. A nervous laugh. "What does that mean?"

"It means that you need to move on."

"What does that mean?" Her voice was louder, and screechy—she had little control over her tone.

"You need to get over me, Inoue."

"What does that mean?" she all but screamed. She jumped to her feet and started pacing, walking back and forth on their branch. "What is there for me to get over, exactly? That I practically killed you? That I practically gilled the person you loved? I couldn't save her, that's close enough." She was in hysterics now, her hands gesturing wildly as she talked, her voice completely wild as she prevented herself from crying. It was harder than usual. When there were other people, she could keep everything nice and quietly shut inside. When it was just him, though, everything became more difficult.

"It meant exactly what I said, Inoue. You must accept that I am not who I was, and you are not who you were. There was a time for you and me, the two of us, but that time is passed. It passed a long time ago. Accept it. Move on."

"And how," she began in something of a whisper, though she was too visibly upset for the intended effect, "do you expect me to do that? And why should I? Remembering you is good for me, Kurosaki kun. It reminds me to do my duty. It tells me not to live by my emotions. It reminds me that emotions are nothing more than weakness that get you killed."

"And I remind you of this, how?"

"Because my emotions got you killed." She resumed her pacing, which had stopped when she's gone off on her last tangent.

"So you're going to stay like this forever?"

"Stay like what?"

"Like this!" and he stood up on the branch and gestured at her. "Look at you, Inoue. You're wearing that outfit that you had the night Sora came back. Your mind, your mental state, hasn't let you get beyond that night. That was almost two hundred years ago, Inoue! Two centuries! And you still think of yourself that way. And me," he he added, gesturing to his own body, "wearing what I wore as a human. You barely knew me as a human, Inoue. You knew me as a Soul Reaper."

"And your body, Inoue! You've not aged a day since you were fifteen! Sure you look a little older, but you and I both know that it's just a change in style, and in attitude. And here I am, a figment of your imagination, the exact same way. I look exactly the way I used to look before I even became a Soul Reaper. I'm your goddamn crush, Inoue, not someone you knew. Not someone worth remembering two hundred years later." He calmed himself down, and gestured for her to sit back down, which she did, albeit reluctantly. He joined her, and leaned over to hug her around the waste as she leaned sideways into him.

"Everything changes, Orihime," he said. "Everything and everyone. You can't stay the same way forever. You can't kill yourself like this. I'm dead, Orihime. I'm already gone. I shouldn't be hurting you anymore. You're hurting yourself, and you need to stop." He grabbed her hand and held it with the one that wasn't around her waste. "It's time you let go."

She was sobbing into his shoulder. "I can't."

He let out a sigh. "No, I suppose not." and they were silent for a while, looking over the landscape. Orihime's eyes began to droop. Of, she was so very tired. She fought back a yawn, but it couldn't be helped.

"Go to sleep, Orihime," he said, "and remember this when you wake up. For your sake."

When she woke, she remembered nothing of her dream but a large amount of green and an immeasurable amount of sadness.

Orihime jerked awake, her torso's muscles clenching at once as she raised her self to sitting position. Or at least tried to—she was prevented halfway though as she felt her head collide with something that was both remarkably solid and that caused her to fall back onto her makeshift mattress. Groaning, she clutched her head and resumed her attempt to get up, though more slowly this time. When one of her eyes opened, she saw what she had hit: Kurosaki's head. He was sitting next to her, clutching his head in exactly the same way she was. Atara was next to him, laughing. "That was on hell of a bonk, are you both alright?"

"ugh," Orihime groaned out before falling back into her pillow again. Ichigo let out a similar sentiment, apparently in agreement, and she felt him lie down next to her. Atara walked away some, roaring with laughter. When Orihime felt alive enough to use her eyes and move her head, she turned to look at Ichigo to find him looking right back at her, having turned his own head at the exact same moment. Each of then had their hands covering one of their eyes.

Their eyes met for a few moments before they burst into simultaneous laughter. Even when Orihime rolled back onto her back after several seconds, she was still laughing, her whole body shaking with her mirth. It took them a few minutes to calm down; they kept stopping for a few seconds, thinking they were calm, until one would break it and they would be lost in amusement for another thirty seconds.

When they were finally back, Orihime sat up and, still smiling, reached down and gave Ichigo a hand sitting up. "Is your head okay, Ichigo?"

"Yeah," he grinned back, "It's all good."

As the two of them rose to their feet, Orihime could feel her cheery mood slipping away into an abyss of exhaustion. How long had she slept? Four Hours? Six? Six hours of sleep was not enough to make up for practically three days without, not to mention the time to come before she would rest again. She forced herself not to yawn as she turned to her guards. Now, just as always, was not the time to show weakness. Weakness has no place in any world. Those who are weak die.

She also had to work to keep herself from sighing. It was so stupid, that something like that had become her mantra. Sad, but necessary.

After a brief conversation with her guards, most of which involved talk of food and what was happening back at the palace in their absence, the five of them began another day of running, and Orihime, as usual, drifted away into her own thoughts. She was careful, though, not to go off track.

After a few hours of going in mental circles, Orihime became vaguely aware of a conversation going on to her left side, between Atara and Chiyo. By the time that Orihime was consciously paying attention to their conversation, it was almost over.

"-have no idea where we're going! Not to mention why we're going there, wherever 'there' is." Chiyo, of course. What a girl. She wasn't made to be a guard. She was too smart, and far too curious. She noticed too much. To her, the truth was more important than anything. It was a good quality in a person, but a terrible thing to have in a personal body guard, especially when the person being guarded was not the most honest or open. Even more unfortunate that Orihime was a very secretive person.

"It doesn't matter," Atara said sharply. "Our duty is to protect and obey Inoue-Sama" Orihime cringed a little on the inside. She hated it when they called her that. "If she doesn't want to tell us what is happening, then she doesn't have to, not should she. Do not forget your duty. That's all that there is to be said. Now do your duty."

Chiyo didn't answer. At least she was honest, Orihime thought. At least she didn't lie. Orihime didn't really mind that Chiyo used her head. In all honest, Orihime didn't like that she had a personal guard at all, but all the complaining in the world had done her no good on that front, so she dealt with it. If a guard had less than optimal affection for her, that was fine. It was not Orihime's job to make anyone love her. It was not her job nor her desire to make anyone die for her. If Chiyo didn't want to, than good on her. At least she wasn't a blind idiot.

But what was she complaining about? Orihime thought back. None of her guard had any idea where they were going, and were following her blindly. All that she had told them was that it concerned the life and safety of the King of the Realm, a cause which singly demanded the sacrifice of all their lives without hesitation.

Chiyo always had been the most curious. Perhaps...

Maybe she would tell them everything. Maybe she could tell them. If she didn't, and they died, they wouldn't remember why. If she did tell them and they survived, though, there would be nothing besides her command to keep them from talking about it in the future. With Chiyo, Orihime's command was not worth the truth, which, as inconvenient as it was, was a good thing. The truth almost always came before anything else, especially blind loyalty. That was how Chiyo thought.

She mulled over the idea in her head. It's not like she could tell all of them except Chiyo, that would end in calamity. Chiyo would figure out that they were keeping secrets, and, as much as Orihime preferred honesty over loyalty, there were times when even she just needed her allies.

It was all or nothing, she supposed. She could tell them all, or she could not tell them all.

What a frustrating decision.

When she's started running out of the palace, Orihime had had no intentions of telling any of them anything. They could see what she did and make according assumptions, but she hadn't wanted to tell them everything flat out. The idea was just so... odd. They were guards. They didn't need to know this kind of thing.

But times change, and the more Orihime thought about it, the more viable an option telling her guards the whole story seemed to become.

She weighed the pros and cons according to each individual member of the guard that was with her at that moment. Ichigo didn't mind not knowing the details enough to say anything, she knew. He was smart enough to understand that he didn't need to know everything. He would follow her literally into hell. He was fine. Musaru, too, would be fine. Musaru was man who was loyal to anyone who had a kind disposition towards him. He was loyal to nobody so much as Orihime. The idea of questioning what she was leading them into wouldn't even enter his mind. Atara was safe, he would follow any order she gave him. He hero-worshiped her, which was sad, but useful. Again, the problem was Chiyo.

There were two options: if she told Chiyo, she could run away. If she ran, Orihime would send Atara after her to offer her one chance to come back before killing her if she refused. Atara would do it. Ichigo would do it, though he would be reluctant. He wouldn't like it at all, but he would do it. Musaru...she knew he would never kill someone who innocent.

Musaru was not made for war. He was not a violent person, much like Orihime and Ichigo weren't violent people. But they had been able to change. They had become ruthless in their age and experience. Musaru had never forgotten his morals. Orihime smiled a bit ruefully at the thought. He didn't belong here any more than she did.

Orihime had changed with time. She had learned what war was, what violence was. She had seen what must be done to win, and the price of losing. Orihime no longer held onto foolish things like standards. War was war. Talking about honor and morality has no place in war. War is nothing but violence, and violence should not be mixed with morals. The two were incompatible.

Musaru was a walking contradiction. He would not kill Chiyo unless she turned on him or Orihime.

But no, she was getting head of herself. There was every chance that Chiyo would take the whole thing perfectly well and accept Orihime's reasons. If She told them the whole story, there was a chance that Chiyo would develop a loyalty complex. If she showed them that she was a human being, perhaps she would follow Orihime for a reason more important than just duty.

Orihime couldn't fight back a sigh. If she kept the story a secret, than Chiyo's loyalty would be in question. She could not go into a potential battle without all of her allies defined for her. She needed them loyal.

Telling them would be fine. If Chiyo stayed, then she would have proven her loyalty, and gossip would not be a problem. If Chiyo ran, than at least she would know who was truly on her side.

She would have to tell them. All of it.

She felt herself shuddering. It was not a happy story.