The Dragon's Queen

by Jo Terry

A/N: I do not own Bleach and its characters.

Chapter 25

"He's been discovered. Just as planned by His Majesty."

"But he's becoming human."

"Also as planned by His Majesty."

"And you? What did 'His Majesty' plan for you?"

"That's for me to know and for you… to never find out."

"What do you mean?"

"Your job is done. I have no need for you now."

"No…"

"Your purpose ends here. It is with a heavy heart, however, that I must tell you that there will be no hope for reincarnation for the likes of you."

"No, please. I can continue to…"

"Give my regards to Blue Hair and that babe he rules with."

"Please, no…"

"Burner Fing-"

"I can set up a virtual chat room for you!"

"What?"

"You can take your time to end the Quincy in there. There will be no reishi for him to summon. He will be defenceless."

"How do you know about the Quincy?"

"The Almighty… he visits me in a dream every night since that day at the Soul Palace. I want all this to be over. I can't keep having those nightmares. I don't even dare to close my eyes. It's been ten years. I need this to end."

"His Majesty appears to you?"

"Please… I will do anything to help you achieve your goal."

"The goal is not mine. I am merely an instrument to avenge the death of His Majesty… on the key people who contributed to it at the end."

"The key people?"

"Kurosaki Ichigo… and most importantly, the number one traitor of the Sternritters — Ishida Uryuu."

The three Kurosaki siblings sit quietly around Urahara's coffee table as they listen to their father go on and on about how Kazui is a lot like Ichigo when he was little. Shiba Isshin is secretly watching his grandson from the window of Urahara's meeting room. Yoruichi has taken the task of entertaining the little boy out in the garden. They couldn't possibly let him see his grandfather when he has always known that Isshin died long before he was born. Also the same reason why the shoten is the only place Isshin could see his children.

With a contented sigh, the old man - in his gigai, for Yuzu's sake because she can hear but can't see spiritual beings - comes back to take his seat at the table. "Do you send him for kendo training, Ichigo?" he asks.

"He's five, Dad."

"Six, this year. Old enough. You started at the age of four."

"Whatever," Ichigo dismisses.

"So," Isshin begins. His time in the World of the Living is limited, so he can't really waste it on being his usual goofy self. "A former Espada, huh?"

Urahara replies, "He's human now. I take it he has returned to Inoue's apartment after we released him on Monday?"

Ichigo knows that question is directed at him but his confrontation with Orihime didn't exactly go as planned. And the worst part is, "She's been staying at the apartment since; I suppose so has he." He doesn't even bother saying her name. For the past five days, he has gone back and forth between being furious at her and heartbroken for his son. Today, he's just thinking she's not worth getting angry over anymore.

Next to him, Yuzu's eyes are still red from crying a lot - even though she has never done it in front of any of them - and there's nothing he can do to make her feel better.

Because there's no way to feel better about this bloody situation!

Karin, on the other hand, looks as emotionless as ever. But according to Tatsuki and Renji, the new shinigami-daiko has been lashing out during her training every evening at Urahara's training ground after her work as a coach at The University of Arts and Designs. She started working the same day Ulquiorra was released. When she got to the shoten and found him gone, she knew where he would be and whom he would be with. Unfortunately, Renji fell victim to her rage before he left for Soul Society.

"What about Kazui?" Isshin asks. "Have you made any arrangements on how she is going to spend time with him?"

Clenching his fists, Ichigo shakes his head as he remembers what happened when he confronted Orihime the day after Byakuya's birthday party. It was the only time he could talk to her because Kazui was still at Hana's place.

"I know about Ulquiorra Cifer," he says, catching her off-guard while she is washing the dishes.

Turning around to face him, Orihime sighs as she dries her hands on the apron around her waist. "Where is he? What did they do to him?"

Ichigo does not know how he feels about her first questions. Apparently, she is more concerned about Ulquiorra's whereabouts than herself getting caught about her lies. Swallowing the anger bubbling up in his throat, he chooses to give her the answer she's looking for. "He's at Urahara's shoten. They've been observing and interrogating him the past two weeks. He will be released soon."

"When?" she demands.

"Orihime," he sighs, taking a seat at the kitchen counter. "What's your plan after this?"

Orihime opens her mouth to answer him, but nothing comes out and she ends up looking away while she fiddles with her apron with shaky hands.

"Do you have any plans with him?"

Again, Ichigo is met with silence. His patience with her is running seriously thin. He has been trying so hard to be nice, putting up with her illness so they could co-parent Kazui as peacefully as possible and fulfilling his obligation as her husband to care for her despite the real state of their relationship; only to find out she doesn't seem interested in their family anyway.

"I need to know where we stand, Orihime," he continues. "Look, I have nothing against him staying at your apartment if he has nowhere else to go. And I get that he has to start a new life as a human being. But if there's anything more than..."

At that, she turns back and narrows her eyes at him. "You're one to talk about having anything more outside of this marriage!" she spits.

Ichigo is shocked into silence at her reaction. She has never raised her voice at him in all the time he has known her.

"Ulquiorra-kun and I are nothing more than two friends who are trying to protect each other. The nerve of all of you to accuse me of cheating when you're the one who's been unfaithful to me."

The scowl on Ichigo's face deepens as he feels the barrier of his anger starts to break. "What the fuck are you talking about?"

"You can stop pretending, Ichigo. It has always been Kuchiki Rukia for you."

"What has Rukia got to do with any of this?"

"She ruined our family."

"She did not! I married you, didn't I?"

"But you're still hung up on her!"

"How could you say that? We've all moved on. She's dating Ishida now."

"That doesn't mean you've moved on."

"Why are we even involving her in this? We're talking about Ulquiorra!"

"What, all of a sudden you want to lay a claim on me because he's back? All of a sudden you're concerned about us?"

"This isn't about us, Orihime. It's about Kazui. I need to know what to tell Kazui if you're not going to be around much anymore."

"Of course, it isn't about us. There has never been an 'us'." Tugging her apron off, Orihime grits her teeth as she says, "Just tell him whatever you want," and storms out of the kitchen towards the room she's been staying in since her discharge from the psychiatric centre.

She kept to herself the rest of the day until Kazui was home that evening. That night, she put her son to bed for the last time. Ichigo got a call from Urahara the next day, telling him that Orihime had gone to the shoten to pick up Ulquiorra. She hasn't gone home since and she's not answering his calls.

"Do you want me to go to the apartment and talk to her, Onii-chan?" Yuzu asks. "I'm probably the most neutral one among all of us. Maybe I can persuade her to tell me..."

"No," Ichigo interjects. "Ulquiorra may be human now, but we do not know what he is capable of. I don't want to risk your safety."

"What if I meet her outside somewhere?"

"That would be ideal," their father says. "Karin can go with you."

"She won't talk with me there." "She won't talk with Karin-chan there." The twins utter at the same time.

"What? Why?"

Karin sighs, "She thinks I never liked her as a sister-in-law."

"Have you ever given her a reason to think that way?"

Rolling her eyes, the dark-haired twin shrugs. "She told Tatsuki that I prefer Rukia-nee, which is true…"

"Karin…" Ichigo seethes.

"But!" she cuts in defensively. "I've never even mentioned Rukia's name in her presence. I don't know how or why she would think that way. I'd like to think I treated her the same way Yuzu did."

"No, you didn't," Ichigo scoffs. "You were not even home the past three and a half years."

Karin lifts her hands up and concedes, "Yeah, okay, okay. Maybe I wasn't the best sister-in-law to her…"

Both Ichigo and Yuzu snort at that.

"In my defence, she's not the easiest person to deal with either. And I had to move to Osaka because my reiatsu was going out of whack. You can blame Urahara for that."

Ignoring the squeak from the shopkeeper, Isshin says, "Speaking of which, how's the training coming along? Shunsui told me you were going to pay me a visit at Soul Society."

"Yeah… about that. Once I'm done with my shunpo training, I'll go over to Soul Society to report to the Soutaicho," Karin replies.

"Oh? I take it that Yoruichi-san is training you?" Ichigo asks.

Urahara lets out a snicker, which the former shinigami thinks sounds rather sinister.

"It's actually one of the captains…" Karin stammers, a blush forming on her cheeks.

"Huh… who? And why is your face red?"

"Because it's Kuchiki Byakuya," Urahara drawls.

"Someone's been looking rather… sprightly," Tanaka comments, settling on a chair behind the nurses' counter where Ishida is studying a case note.

"Whatever do you mean?" the Quincy hums, not taking his eyes off his work. Of course, he knows what Tanaka means. It's been almost a week since that night they came back from Kuchiki Byakuya's birthday 'party' and Ishida's been walking on air. No doubt, it shows with his entire demeanour changed and charged just from Rukia's confession. But Tanaka doesn't need to know that, does he?

Tanaka scoffs, "And he's even responding to my small talk. Spill it, Ishida. You know you can trust me with your happy news."

"What happy news?"

"C'mon, man. Tell me, tell me, tell me. Is it a cat? Is it a ring? Is it a..." he gasps. "A baby?"

Ishida decides to ignore him this time. But of course, the other guy has always been known to be persistent, even more so when it has nothing to do with work or himself.

"You know, normally I would've added 'moving in together' as a guess, but I suppose that does not apply to you. You're already living with your girlfriend. So, it has to be something more exciting than that."

"Who's living together with his girlfriend? Dr Ishida?" asks a clocking-out nurse who just happens to drop by the counter to collect her stuff. "That's quite a shock. When did this happen?"

Ishida rolls his eyes. Don't these people have better things to do than to poke their noses into his business?

"Actually, Dr Ishida is dating his roommate," Tanaka makes it his duty to inform the nurse.

"Shut up, Tanaka." Ishida casts him a scowl before he shows the nurse the clipboard in his hand. "Why is this patient without a name and how old is he?"

"Oh, someone brought this guy in for an x-ray. Not really sure what this is about, though. But Dr Shimezu says to pass the case to you because he has an emergency surgery," the nurse replies as she puts on her coat and continues, "It's that girl who comes to play basketball, isn't it?"

Ishida deadpans, "Are we still talking about the patient?"

"Obviously, not." Tanaka chuckles. "And yes, that's the girl, alright."

"She's cute!" the nurse exclaims. "Didn't know that's your type, Dr Ishida. Would've expected you to go out with someone serious and boring like yourself."

Ignoring Tanaka's cackling, Ishida huffs, "Do you have any other information about this patient? Otherwise, you should go since your shift is over."

The nurse shrugs as she steps away from the counter. "Anyway, you'd better check out that patient. I don't have any information about him. I think he's outpatient, though."

"Thanks," Ishida mumbles, flipping the chart to find out more about this mysterious person.

"So is it a baby?"

Deciding that even Tanaka couldn't annoy the hell out of his high, Ishida smirks, "Whatever that'll keep you calling me a 'lucky bastard'." And makes his way to the outpatient clinic.

Another nurse comes up to him when he arrives and places a big envelope in his hands. "Dr Ishida, Dr Shimezu needs you to write the x-ray report for this person."

Ishida nods, "Yes, I was told. But what other information do we have on this patient? Name? Age? What is he here for?"

"Apparently, he had a memory loss and is not able to recall who he is," the nurse briefs him. "He was reported as a missing person but he's not in Karakura or Japan's missing person's lists. The police department sent him here for medical verification. We have done several tests on him but it doesn't look like there's anything wrong with him at all. His MRI scan shows no tumour, injuries, or anomalies, so we do not know why he fails to remember who he is."

"That's odd," Ishida mutters as he checks the time. It's a Saturday and he has an afternoon date with his shinigami before he drops her off at Nichibotsu's. "I only have to write the x-ray report, right?"

"Yes, Dr Ishida. But if you need to speak to the patient, he's in the consultation room right now."

"Sure, I'll head there now," he says, removing an x-ray sheet from the envelope as he walks towards the room. His eyes still on the film, he opens the door and greets the patient, "Hello, I'm Dr Ishida and…"

The other two people in the room are just as shocked to see him as he is when he realises who they are. It takes them a full awkward minute before one of them speaks up.

"Ishida-kun."

"Inoue-san..."

Harukami is back at Nichibotsu's for the weekend and she has insisted on giving Rukia the Saturday night off. The shinigami figured she would surprise Uryuu about this when he picked her up for their date. The initial plan was to catch an afternoon show and have an early dinner before he drops her off at work.

Now that they have more time, she's thinking of taking a walk by the waterfront after dinner and going ice-skating before heading back home, which is how they find themselves at the entrance of the skating rink right now.

"You seriously don't have to go to Nichibotsu's?" Uryuu asks, pulling Rukia to the side to let a small group of kids go through the entrance.

Rukia finds it curious that Uryuu should be hesitant tonight. He's usually game for anything she suggests. And that's not all… he's been quite distant during their entire date. She guesses he must've been tired after work and needed a little more time to wind down.

The movie was a good start to the date as they didn't have to talk much, so it should've given him a bit of space to take his mind off work. However, even throughout dinner and their walk, they were mostly silent. He was mostly silent. Rukia didn't want to pry but if he's not in the mood for anything else, she might as well take them home so he could have a rest.

"I'm off-duty tonight. But if you don't want to go in," she says, gesturing towards the rink. "We could go back instead. Or do whatever it is you want to do."

"Why ice-skating all of a sudden?"

"I haven't done it in awhile. I just thought it would be fun tonight since I'm not working. We hardly get to spend long hours together."

"It's not something I'm good at…" Uryuu admits.

Rukia snickers. "It's okay. I'm not good at it either. But I can remember a little bit of what Ichigo taught me years ago."

An odd expression crosses Uryuu's face. It is brief but Rukia catches it nonetheless before he manages to return to his usual stoic look.

"Uryuu?" Rukia reaches a hand up to his face.

He blinks under her touch and takes her hand to his lips for a quick peck. "I'm sorry. I'm kind of tired. Can we do this another time?"

Rukia inclines her head slowly, still wondering what it is that's bothering him. Something must've happened at his workplace. Maybe another one of his patients didn't make it. He has always had a hard time dealing with his patients' deaths. She's fine if he doesn't feel up to talking to her about it and she would give him the space he needs. But as his girlfriend, she feels hopeless that she can't do anything to help him get through it.

Uryuu takes her hand as they walk away from the skating rink towards the train station. He didn't drive his car because Rukia said she wanted to take a walk along the waterfront, something that she regrets doing now that she knows how tired he is.

The 20-minute ride back to their apartment is just as silent. Although, Uryuu does keep an arm around her as they sit close together through their journey in the almost-empty train.

Walking back to the apartment, Rukia tries to compose how she should ask him about his day without coming off as nosy. She just wants to know if he'll be okay before she heads off to her night patrol in about two hours or so. Maybe they'll get to spend some time watching a couple of episodes of Prince of Lan Ling.

However, all her plans go down the drain when they arrive at their apartment to see Karin sitting on the floor, waiting for them.

Mentally cursing her apprentice's bad timing, Rukia asks her what she is doing here, while Uryuu unlocks the door. His brief scowl at his cousin doesn't go unnoticed by the shinigami captain.

"I went to look for you at the bar but that new bartender told me you had your night off. So I came over here to look for you."

Disregarding the need to correct her that Harukami isn't a new bartender, Rukia asks instead, "How long have you been waiting here?"

"Not long. About 10 minutes, maybe? Where did you guys go?"

Rukia watches in concern as Uryuu goes straight into his room without a word before turning back to Karin, who is still loitering at the doorway.

"Bad time?" the younger girl murmurs, chewing the nail of her thumb.

Rukia shrugs. "Kind of?"

"Sorry," Karin whispers, looking genuinely guilty.

"Nevermind," Ruki dismisses. "Why were you looking for me?"

"Urahara needs you to come into the shoten earlier tonight."

"What? Why?" Rukia furrows her brow. She really wants a bit more time with Uryuu tonight. She's adamant on making sure he's alright before she goes patrolling. "Is it Ulquiorra again? I thought we're done with him."

"We are. But there's another stray reiatsu…"

"If this is going to be another one that ebbs into nothing, it can wait until tomorrow."

"It… may not be?"

Rukia huffs heavily. "Karin, please tell him I'll go over as soon as I can. Just give me an hour, okay? I'll be there once I've taken care of something."

"You mean Ishida-kun?" Karin smirks, nodding at the direction of the bedrooms.

"Nothing that concerns you," Rukia snaps, ignoring the other other girl's quiet chuckle. "You go ahead first. I'll be there in an hour."

"Sure. Byakuya-sama is also there, by the way…"

It is Rukia's turn to smirk. She knows that her Nii-sama trained Karin with her shunpo the last couple of times he was in the world of the living, including that night after his birthday 'party'. And she also suspects that Karin has a crush on her brother. The first time she told Rukia about her training, her face was absolutely flushed. "Byakuya-sama?"

And there it is again: Karin's cheeks are darkening under her black lashes.

The girl stomps her feet and turns away. "See you there, Rukia-nee," she harrumphs before disappearing into the hallway.

Rukia snickers as she shuts the door. Taking a glance at Uryuu's shoes by the genkan, she heaves a sigh. She needs to talk to him. But he's probably already asleep in his room if he really was that tired.

She decides to take a chance and heads to his room, knocking on the white wood twice before she twists the door knob slowly.

"Uryuu?" she calls out softly while peeking through the small opening of the door.

He is lying on his back with an arm over his eyes but upon hearing her voice, he glances towards her and pats the empty spot on his mattress beside him.

Entering the room, Rukia shuts the door behind her and cautiously approaches the bed.

Uryuu turns on his side and gestures for her to lie down next to him.

She climbs into his bed and aligns herself comfortably to face him. "Are you alright?" she asks, brushing his hair back with her fingers.

Uryuu gives her a brief smile that doesn't quite reach his eyes before he lowers his lips to hers.

With a hand at the nape of his neck, Rukia pulls him closer to deepen the kiss, eliciting a moan from the Quincy.

"Sorry," he says when they pull apart, his face hovering over hers.

Rukia looks up at him quizzically. "For?"

"For making you worry about me. I'm fine. Got a lot on my mind, that's all," he replies, kissing her swollen lips again.

"Do you want to talk about it?" she asks, reaching her hand up to intertwine her fingers behind his neck.

Shaking his head, he descends to flutter kisses along her jawline causing her to squirm and giggle under him, his palm moving across the flat of her abs adding to the sensation. "It's just work stuff."

"Are you sure?" she huffs, not too convinced as he looked quite down during their date.

"Yeah," he says, breathing in her scent as he buries his face in the crook of her neck.

"Alright," Rukia stammers as she feels his lips nipping at the hollow of her throat. Letting out a defeated sigh, she has accepted that any serious discussion is out the window whenever they start making out. He says he's fine, anyway. An hour of cuddling in bed doesn't seem like a bad idea. Anything to make her dragon feel better.

"Is that a hickey?"

"What? No. Shut up!"

"Tsk… so shameless, Rukia-nee."

"Shut. Up. Karin!"

"Oh hey, Rukes! Is… is that a hickey? Fuck, what were you thinking? Taichou is here, you know."

"Urgh…"

"Why, Rukia-san…"

"Shhhh!"

"Rukia."

"Ye- Yes, Nii-sama?"

Can you guess who the characters in the first part of this chapter are?