This story got way more popular than I ever thought it would.

Part 25

When school reared its head once more, Ichigo dove back into routine fast enough to give Zangetsu whiplash. Suddenly there was homework and clubs and responsibility and Zangetsu realized that now Ichigo was making a concerted effort to keep one foot firmly planted in the World of the Living.

He went to a goddamned movie. With his friends—and not just Chad, he brought Keigo and Mizuiro and Tatsuki and Orihime and Uryū and fuck Ichigo actually knew a lot of people.

When the hell had he last gone to a movie? Or anything like that?

And as the days and weeks flew by, Ichigo changed. Not anything groundbreaking; not worth panicking over. But the skyscrapers in his inner world actually scraped the sky and the sun was almost blinding most days. Ichigo trained in his free time and though the frequency of those sessions went down, Ichigo's intensity and focus during them went up.

"He found his balance," Zangetsu remarked to the Old Man while Ichigo pored over his math homework.

"Indeed."

Zangetsu shot the other spirit a sidelong glance, catching something in his tone. And he hadn't misheard; there was pride in the tilt of the Old Man's lips.

So that was the strange sensation in his chest.

Pride in his King. Not for battle prowess or strength of body, but for finding a way to live his life in two different worlds. That took strength of mind.

Zangetsu was grinning. "Way to go, King."

The feeling of dread washed over Zangetsu like a wave. He stopped in the middle of practicing his stances and looked around, seeing nothing unusual in Ichigo's inner world.

"Hey, Old Man?"

The Quincy spirit appeared a few paces away in a swirl of black. "You feel it too?"

Zangetsu nodded. "You know where it's coming from? I can't tell."

The Old Man looked at the horizon, his lips thinning. After a few tense seconds, he shook his head. "It's Reiatsu, but the source is widespread. Diluted. We need to warn Ichigo."

"He's in the middle of class," Zangetsu pointed out. "If the source is widespread, maybe we can stand to wait a few minutes. It's been a few days since any hollows have interrupted his school hours."

"I don't know if that's wise."

Zangetsu did a quick mental check of the disasters that were left to come, that wouldn't be affected by any of the actions he had taken.

He couldn't tell whether any of them had started like this. The accident before school was suspicious, but Zangetsu had never focused on the beginning of a fight; it was the end that mattered.

So.

"You're the one always yappin' about patience. We'll wait."

The Old Man sighed. "I suppose Ichigo can handle whatever comes."

"See? Now you're gettin' it."

"Alright," Zangetsu said mildly, watching Ichigo destroy the fourth skyscraper in his inner world, "maybe we were wrong."

The Old Man didn't dignify that statement with a response, and Zangetsu didn't blame him. "Wrong" was an understatement; Ichigo was down a sister and the one that remained, while alive, was heavily injured. Even with Orihime making her rounds, the time spent watching Karin lie so still with blood on her face had sent thunderclouds rolling through Ichigo's inner world.

Zangetsu could hear Ichigo shouting every time he released a Getsuga Tenshō, berating his speed and strength, all of which had fallen just short. Their opponents had fled the moment it became clear that Ichigo and his friends would be able to stop them in a prolonged fight.

But they had taken Yuzu with them. Ichigo had watched the portal to Hell close, too far away to do anything but shout Yuzu's name.

And now he was destroying skyscrapers while, outside his mind, the others regrouped in the Kurosaki Clinic. At least Zangetsu now knew what was going on:

Hell had come knocking, and brought with it several pains in the ass, the most notable of which was sitting on a stool next to the unconscious Chad.

Kokutō. Oh, Zangetsu couldn't wait to get at him. Sure, his time in Hell was a bit of a haze and he could only remember bits and pieces, but he remembered enough to know that Kokutō was an enemy. He couldn't let Ichigo trust the guy. But to warn Ichigo, Zangetsu had to stop his protective-fury-induced-inner-world-rampage. Which, judging from the sixth (seventh?) skyscraper collapsing with a roar that shook Zangetsu's bones, was not going to be a pleasant task.

Joy.

(Like Zangetsu wasn't tempted to do the same thing, like he hadn't seen the portal close and screamed just like Ichigo because that was his goddamned sister—)

"King!"

No response.

"King! Hey, King!"

Ichigo paused, his chest heaving and his sword still poised in the air, the blade glowing with violent energy. Zangetsu slid in front of him, one hand on the hilt of the sword on his back while he held the other out in front of Ichigo.

"What?" Ichigo asked while finally meeting Zangetsu's eyes.

"As much as I want to rip the world to pieces too," Zangetsu said, "We've got more important things to worry about. You're ignoring your friends."

"If I go out there right now, I'm going to do something I'll regret."

"Your Reiatsu is already causing a storm," the Old Man said. "I have been trying to contain its effects, but hollows have already come."

That was enough to give Ichigo pause, his frustration at Yuzu's capture warring with his natural instincts to protect. "Has anyone been hurt?"

"No. The Shinigami are handling it, from what I can tell."

"But?"

"You are avoiding the issue," the Old Man said bluntly. "Your problems are out there, not in here, and talking with us will not fix anything right now."

"I don't like agreein' with him, but he's right," Zangetsu said. "But I gotta tell ya something before you go."

Ichigo made a visible effort to calm down, and the ominous rolls of thunder in the distance quieted. "Okay. What is it?"

"It's about your new buddy. White haired, chain obsession, doesn't seem to enjoy exposing his whole face to sunlight?"

"Kokutō?"

"That's the guy. Yeah, he's gonna literally stab you in the back. Or did he throw his sword?" Zangetsu shook his head. "Either way, you get stabbed. I don't want that. I'm sure you agree with me."

Ichigo's frustration bled through his Inner World. Zangetsu could understand why; without Kokutō around to open and close the Gates of Hell, Ichigo couldn't save Yuzu. Sure, they could force Kokutō to open the Gates, but what would they do to leave? They couldn't make the guy open a portal out.

And Yuzu was going to die, and get trapped in Hell for all eternity.

Which was great.

Zangetsu finally stopped yelling his frustration at the sideways sky and stopped to think. There had to be something he could do, something he could tell Ichigo that would fix this problem and make everything be fucking sunshine and rainbows again.

But he couldn't think of anything.

Everything he knew about Hell was actually so little. He hadn't been himself during that escapade. Nothing had been right. He hadn't been right. The air in that place had been goddamned unbearable.

And now they had to go back! Because Yuzu was dying! And he didn't know how to fucking save her!

"Calm down."

Zangetsu barely stopped his sword from biting into the Quincy spirit's neck.

When had he even grabbed his sword?

"I'm totally calm," Zangetsu said. "What's Ichigo doing?"

"They have decided to go to Soul Society," the Old Man said, watching with unreadable eyes as Zangetsu placed his sword on his back. "They believe that there may be old Kidō spells they can use to enter and exit Hell."

Zangetsu licked his lips, his gaze darting to the thunderclouds and then back. "There might be. I think that's how Ichigo got out—before he destroyed the Gates."

"He did what?"

"They got better. But I bet the head captain isn't gonna be so willing to just give that kinda stuff out to a substitute Shinigami for his sister."

"How can you be so sure?"

"Experience."

This was so stupid. He was going to get himself killed. Burned beyond repair. Incinerated to the point of being an unrecognizable pile of ash. Bones blackened, skin melted.

Head Captain Yamamoto looked up from his desk right as Zangetsu used Sonido to appear in front of him.

The spirit tried to be casual. "Yo."

"Who are you?" Yamamoto asked. He didn't sound surprised, though his eyes had opened slightly. His cane was within easy reach, and even without the man touching it Zangetsu felt like the room temperature had gone up ten degrees. Then Yamamoto's posture changed. "No. What are you?"

Oh. Rude.

No, this wasn't the time for laughing. Ichigo was depending on this conversation whether he knew it or not, and Zangetsu had to come through.

"I'm an interested party in the conversation that went down about ten minutes ago," Zangetsu said. The conversation that had ended with Ichigo, Rukia, and Renji getting shot down and with no way of getting in and out of Hell. Apparently one human girl wasn't important enough.

To hell with that. She was Yuzu.

"Are you a hollow?" Yamamoto asked. His hand had moved onto his cane.

A bead of sweat slipped down the back of Zangetsu's neck. Could he take the Head Captain? Maybe. If he got to the guy before he went bankai. And even if he did, it was possible—

But risky. Very, very risky.

Zangetsu swallowed. He could do this; he would do this.

"A Zanpakutō spirit with technical difficulties," Zangetsu clarified. "Ichigo's, if you haven't guessed."

"Does he think this is a joke?" He was angry. Yamamoto was angry. "I will not disclose ways to get into and out of an entire realm dedicated to being an inescapable prison, especially not to a boy with a history of being dangerously reckless and who got his powers by accident to begin with. Begone."

"I won't."

The temperature was definitely going up. Zangetsu set his shoulders.

"Listen, Old Man. I'm not goin' anywhere until we get those spells or formulas or whatever. If you don't give them up, Ichigo's gonna do something colossally stupid. Maybe blow up the Gates of Hell. Either way, he's getting into Hell. It's your choice whether he does it cleanly or with collateral."

"Are you daring to threaten me?"

"I'm stating fact. I don't know what you think you're protecting, but it ain't worth it. We're going to Hell, one way or another."

Yamamoto stood, his Reiatsu crashing down and suddenly gravity doubled. Or it felt like that, and Zangetsu had to take a second just to get air in his lungs again.

"You are a thousand years too young to understand your foolishness—"

Zangetsu grit his teeth. While Yamamoto postured, Yuzu was dying. Ichigo was growing more frantic every second and Zangetsu's mind was a mess of static and shrieking instincts and if he didn't get those goddamned Kidō formulas he was going to destroy Soul Society down to its roots—

"ENOUGH!" Zangetsu roared. Yamamoto stopped, though from surprise or indignation was unclear. "A thousand years? The hell does time have to do with fucking anything, you stupid, incompetent jackass? The shit I've seen and been through would put early Soul Society to shame and you have the fucking nerve to tell me that I'm a thousand years too early? Bullshit! I fought tooth and nail to get where I am and I'll be damned if one stubborn piece of shit tears down all of that progress because he can't cough up some shitty Kidō! Hell will look like paradise by the time I'm through if you don't give me them in the next ten seconds. I'll burn this place to ash. I'll cut you open and dance in your withered chest cavity while the flames destroy everything you've built. And I'll laugh as I do it."

The words ran out and Zangetsu glared at Yamamoto while he got his breath back, daring the head captain to say anything, anything at all. The spirit was breathing hard and he was pretty sure the roar in his ears wasn't from outside, but he was too far into this to back out now.

For a very awful minute, silence reigned.

Not total silence. Zangetsu could hear alarms in the distance; Yamamoto's Reiatsu had tripped some kind of warning system. Zangetsu had a minute, possibly less, and then Ichigo's secret would be out to the rest of the Soul Society.

Come on, Zangetsu thought. If nothing happened, he was going to do something very stupid. And Ichigo would give him That Look, and he'd probably fuck up Ichigo's future worse than what it already was.

Yamamoto opened his eyes, his expression blank. Carefully blank. The kind of blank that was intentional.

"This will not be the last I speak with you," he said, and Zangetsu understood.

He was going to have to explain himself to Yamamoto.

But, after conveying the Kidō formulas to Ichigo, he couldn't help thinking that it was worth it.

Hell was bad. Hell was very, very, very bad. The air leeched into Ichigo's inner world and yanked at Zangetsu's lungs, playing with his brain and drawing out everything he tried to keep under control so fast and with so little warning that Zangetsu couldn't restrain his power in time. Even with the Old Man doing his utmost to keep Ichigo's power stable, energy leaked through the cracks.

"I'm gonna fuckin' murder Kokutō," Zangetsu snarled. "I'm gonna fuckin' murder him. And then I'm gonna wait by that fucking pool and murder him again. And again. And again. And again. And—"

At some point the words stopped making sense. Zangetsu just kept repeating them, and endless string of sounds that anchored him to reality just as much as the Old Man's presence.

But Ichigo finding Yuzu? Zangetsu was aware of that. Of the tight knot of pain in Ichigo's chest that snapped apart so quickly at the weight of Yuzu in his arms that it created a kind of emotional whiplash that left Zangetsu reeling, and sure Ichigo was beaten and bloody but he was alive and Yuzu was safe and protected—

When Ichigo left Hell, Zangetsu's vertigo caught up with him and his vision flipped nauseatingly sideways, and though he didn't throw up he fell to his knees, waving off the Old Man.

"I'm fine," he grunted. "Just—gimme a second." His guts were twisting around themselves. "A lotta seconds."

The wooden doorframe dug into the space between Zangetsu's shoulder blades. In the dark room, the splash of moonlight against the floor was almost painful to look at. But Zangetsu wasn't focused on that; he was focused on Ichigo.

The teenager stood a few feet away from Karin's bed, his posture not rigid but certainly not relaxed.

Karin and Yuzu were sharing Karin's bed. Zangetsu understood; after the traumatic events surrounding Hell, letting Yuzu or Karin out of each others' sights would be a huge mistake.

But it was the middle of the night and Ichigo wasn't sleeping. He had bags under his eyes and Zangetsu suspected that he would stand guard in his sisters' room all night if the Old Man would let him.

"King," Zangetsu said, keeping his voice quiet. Ichigo didn't move. "King."

"What?"

"You gotta sleep. It's been hours."

Ichigo swallowed. "Just a few more minutes."

"Go to bed, King."

"I said, just a—"

"Ichigo."

Zangetsu didn't budge from his spot leaning against the doorframe as Ichigo walked by.

Ichigo stopped, his shoulders tense and his lips drawn in a hard line. He looked at the floor while he spoke.

"You were right, Zangetsu."

He liked hearing that, but not with that tone.

"About what?"

"About Karin and Yuzu." Ichigo's hands were fists at his sides. "About me not being able to protect them. About everything."

"Hold on," Zangetsu said, grabbing Ichigo's arm to stop him from just walking away. "I wasn't wrong about everything. You got 'em back. They're here now, and safe."

"Yuzu was in Hell," Ichigo hissed. "She's going to remember that for the rest of her life and it's all because I wasn't fast enough to save her!"

Zangetsu winced. Ichigo was fast in his Shikai, but Bankai…

No. Not yet.

"Not everything is gonna work out," Zangetsu said lowly. "You're gonna lose some. You know this. Trust in your family to heal, King. Don't be an idiot and think all of this is your responsibility. Ya can't instantly regenerate minds."

Ichigo clenched his jaw hard enough to makes the muscles in his cheeks visibly tense.

Zangetsu softened his tone. "Yuzu 'n Karin are strong. They'll recover."

All at once, the fight left Ichigo. His shoulders slumped and he sighed, tipping his head back to stare at the ceiling. "I know." He looked at his two sisters, emotions flickering across his face too quickly to be identifiable. "They were defenseless. With Dad at the medical conference…they had no way to defend themselves. No way of stopping those bastards from Hell."

"What are you gonna do?" Zangetsu asked, because Ichigo had that look on his face that said he was coming to a decision.

"I'm—if they want to—I'm going to ask Yoruichi to train them. Nothing like what Uryū, Chad, and Orihime are doing, but something. They deserve to be able to protect themselves, or at least hold out until I can get there."

Zangetsu levered himself off the doorframe. "It's your decision, King. Now get some sleep; you can sort the rest of this out when you're not about to collapse."

"I'm not—"

"Go. The fuck. To sleep."

And, much to Zangetsu's surprise, he did.

A/N A little hint at how Zangetsu isn't as stable and in control as he seems, because why not. I dunno when the next chapter is gonna be out.

Reviews:

MistyPaws: Thank you!

Krazyfanfiction1: They could, but they don't want to start that process until Ichigo's feeling a little more stable.

Harbinger of Kaos: This story is centered on Ichigo and Zangetsu's relationship. The reveal will carry that theme. I can't say more without spoilers.

BrokenLifeCycle: Tbh he probably does. But hopefully Ichigo's showing a little more personality and action at this point.

general zargon: Thank you!

Darke13: Can't say without potentially spoiling anything, sorry! Though, in all honesty, I'm a big fan of Tatsuki. Do with that info what you will.

Guest: Ichigo suspects, but he hasn't given the matter serious thought yet. He trusts Zangetsu and the Old Man. I can't answer any questions about what powers (if any) the twins will develop, because frankly, I don't know myself.

Boyy2k: Beats me.

Cute Kirby: Indeed he does.

yiggdrasil: Zangetsu and the Old Man weren't paying attention. There may have been other factors at play as well.

DumbassAnon: Nope.

42e3: I'm glad the frustration was real without being...unrealistic.

Silver IV Jhin: I'll update whatever story I damn well please.

-RoR

Please review.