A/N: Hello, my readers from Bleach fandom! I'm back with new computer and a head full of ideas. Can you believe that during the past three months I came up with two general outlines by which this fic could go on. The first one is the one that I eventually decided on and which I'm writing now. But hte second one... I love it too. It would be full of my OCs and Karakura would be filled with kids and grand-kids of Shinigami (plus a couple of reincarnated shinigami and one shady guy having kept a tea house for the past 200 or so years...) and they would be called Karakura protection squad (i.e. Division 15). In that version I had Mizuiro be Lisa's son with whom she still kept contact (and the woman that Mizuiro talks with at the anime filler episode would be his step-mother/father's wife) and Tatsuki would be Kensei's granddaughter...

I'm rambling, sorry. When I finish this fic or have this written far enough I might try my had at the other version too. The shady guy from the tea house is one of my favourite characters I've created in a while and I'd really love to write him.

But, please, enjoy this chapter. I'll ramble more about this fic in particular once you are done.

Created Life from Death 5
Kotobuki Mirai

Mirai enjoyed being mysterious and messing with people. She liked knowing more than others but withholding the information for them to figure it out on their own. But she also liked learning more from people who actually knew what they were talking about.

Thus Mirai's favorite past aside from spending time with Ichigo, was relearning her old skills and picking up new ones. And after the shock of realizing that she was living in the Bleached world and more specifically in Karakura, theorizing about kido and zanpakuto mechanics became one of her hobbies too. Not that she could do much without first having at least some sort of grasp of them first. Memories about a manga could only take her so far without leading her completely off the course.

Knowing that she was spiritually aware thanks to her heritage, Mirai took to meditating every evening when she was supposed to be sleeping. Because it was frankly the only way she knew that didn't include blowing herself up when trying to reach her own reiryoku reserves. And after two years of hard work, the little blonde girl finally managed to connect with the energy sleeping dormant within her. Something that Tomo noticed immediately next time she visited.

"My little genius." The woman sighed, patting her five-year-old daughter's hair. Mirai blinked at her, her grey eyes wide.

"Kaachan?"

"I need to give you a reiatsu suppressor sometime in the future. For now, you'll feel just like another human with a bit higher than average reserves but as you grow up, the situation will change. You'll need control and while learning it you need to hide your strength. Soul Society doesn't like anomalies…"

Mirai knew that. Tomo always mentioned something of that effect whenever she visited.

"Meanwhile though…" Tomo dug around her bag she'd brought with her and drew out a folded cloth. "I'll give you this. I've studied enough past decades to make myself another one."

"What is it, kaachan?" Mirai asked. Fingering the fabric of the… cloak.

"It's a reiatsu concealing cloak. My former captain made it a long time ago and I appropriated it from his quarters when he left.

"Huh? Interesting way to put it." Mirai thought and spread the cloak open in front of her. "Can I try it on?"

"It might be a bit too big for Mirai-chan but I don't see anything wrong with it either." Tomo smiled and helped the cloak on the girl's shoulders. The hood flopped in front of her eyes but overall the cloak was very warm and soft.

"It's so warm." The girl grinned. "I like it."

There were lingering reiatsu traces inside the cloak. And once Mirai had connected with her reiryoku, sensing reiatsu had become much clearer too. Ghosts she'd already been able to see but sensing other people had been new. And this cloak… It had traces of people who'd worn it. Tomo and 'her previous captain' both. It made Mirai feel safe and…

"Both reiatsu signatures have markers similar to my own… Is it Shinigami thing or…" While Tomo had never told Mirai who her 'touchan' was, Mirai did have an educated guess because of her own looks and Tomo's resources. But she wasn't going to pry. She wasn't going to ask until she was older. After all, she wasn't supposed to know about birds and bees yet and since she had Dina and Kenji as 'permanent parents' none of the neighbors or kids said anything that would've made a child in some other situation to wonder where the other half of their genetics came from.

School was boring. Mind-numbing really. The only positive thing Mirai found from it all that she could shock teachers and pupils alike with the numerous wigs she'd borrowed from the theater. And that while boring, she could finish her homework in record time and then have more time for her own extracurricular activities.

It was around the time when the school started that Mirai begged her parents to buy her a violin. And that kick-started another chapter in her life.

The fact that she was only approximately seven years old in this new life of hers (she didn't keep count on the years just like she'd stopped paying attention to her own age as Airi after she'd hit twenty) meant that people expected her to start from zero in whatever thing that she was interested in. It happened when she started karate and again when she picked up the violin. Dina and Kenji enrolled her on lessons but those could teach her only so much of the basics before she got bored.

So Mirai resulted in hiding at local park and practicing her pieces in secret. Ichigo was the only one who knew of her true skills and like a true friend, he didn't question them.

It was at the park that she met with Otoribashi Rojuro, aka Rose of the Visored. The man was lured in both by the music and the reiatsu enhancing it. Embarrassingly enough though, the first time they actually saw each other was when Mirai's finger's cramped in the middle of playing Rainbow Colored Symphony and the little girl let out a litany of curses and stomped her feet, leaving a small dent shaped like her shoe on the pavement.

"Well, at least you aren't venting your anger on your violin…" The visored had chuckled, making the girl whirl around and promptly fall on her butt. Mirai stared at the blond man in surprise and confusion but then got up and dusted her skirt.

"I wouldn't want my parents' money go waste." She stated.

"Do you play here often?" Rose asked then.

"Why do you want to know?" Mirai frowned at him.

"You simply play beautifully." The man brushed his wavy locks behind his shoulder and offered a smile to the girl. "You must have practiced hard."

"Hai…" Yes, Mirai had practiced quite hard when she was Airi… And she still did practice a lot in order to dig out all the songs she remembered from her muscle memory since not all of them – especially the ones from some anime – were composed yet and thus she couldn't find music sheets of them on the internet or anywhere else.

Noticing that she was uncomfortable with him, Rose merely smiled and left.

Next time they met was a week later. And the week after that. While Mirai could've changed her routines in order to avoid him if she really wanted to, she didn't do so. Instead she even let Ichigo to meet the man.

"Did you know him?" Ichigo asked her after the man had given her a white rose and once again complimented her playing (Oracion from Pokemon movie this time).

Mirai thought about her answer for a moment.

"Hm? Bara-san you mean? Maybe from other life…" She simply smiled, elicting a huff from her best friend and a light punch to her arm. But Ichigo didn't ask any more.

It took a couple of meetings – with and without Ichigo – during which occasional phrase of praise or greeting were exchanged when Rose started to bring music sheets of his own and a violin – a viola actually – with him too.

"Why did you come the first time?" Mirai asked one day. "Usually only ghosts listen." She knew that Rose was mostly out of gigai when they met and thus felt partially like a plus soul but she was young enough to question her observations.

"You can see ghosts then?" Rose asked even if it was unnecessary.

"Kanzo-iro can too." Mirai said instead of replying.

"I know. That day I was without gigai and he could see me…"

"So why?"

"Your music carried a strong trace of reiatsu with it. Probably what led the 'ghosts' here in the first place." The former captain of the third division explained. "I'm surprised no hollows appeared here because of it…"

"Hollows? You mean the monsters and bad ghosts?" The little girl's statement made the man whip his head at her direction from where he was tuning his viola.

"You've seen them?" He asked with alarm, no doubt wondering how she was still alive.

"Yup. I had a super cloak with me that made me invisible and no monsters saw me!" Mirai grinned. Rose blinked but smiled at the girl sitting on the park bench next to him. They had numerous music sheet strewn around them, some of them even on the ground, and they played a couple of notes in turn while tuning their instruments.

"Really?"

"Uh-huh…" The girl nodded.

The conversation flowed from there and somehow Rose managed to appoint himself as reiatsu control teacher for the girl which later would evolve into teaching her kidou too.

(Mirai would later teach the same exercises to Ichigo but eventually drag him to park to meet properly with Rose.)

Masaki's death when Mirai was ten was… terrible. She had barely paid attention to the date when she suddenly realized the it was June and they were about to walk home from karate lessons and it was raining.

"Masaki-basan? What day is it?" Mirai asked, barely keeping her voice from trembling.

"Day? Why, it's Thursday, don't you remember? You and Ichigo have karate classes on Tuesdays and Thursdays. And you have your violin lessons on Fridays." The woman smiled down at her.

"I mean, what date is it?"

"It's June 17th. Now, put on a jacket and let's go before the rain becomes any worse."

Seventeenth of June? Today? Mirai opened her mouth as all color drained from her face. She closed it then. No words were coming out. She didn't know what to say. The girl ducked her head to adjust her pick headscarf and felt her eyes burning with tears threatening to fall.

But what could she say? And even if she said something, would it help any? And if it did help, how would the timeline turn out from there on? Should she do something? Did she have a right to decide whether or not someone lived or died? Or should she just pretend that she knew nothing extra and just let things happen despite how much it would hurt Ichigo?

Mirai didn't know. All the emotion was clogging her throat and she felt like choking. She grabbed Masaki's hand and hold onto it tightly. She didn't dare to look in Ichigo's direction. Not even when he was lying on the ground with Masaki's dead body on top of him and her last words ringing in Mirai's ears.

"I'm sorry!" The blonde girl cried. "Don't look. I'm sorry, I couldn't do anything. It's alright. She's beyond now. She'd safe. But please don't look. It's not your fault. It's mine…"

She shielded Ichigo from the rain with her own body but her tears fell on his cheeks and wet his face like she wasn't even there. Ichigo was numb but Mirai distraught. She had managed to smile and greet her mother like nothing was wrong in seeing a hollow slay the mother of her best friend and then see her own mother to slay the hollow. And she just knew that Masaki would cry once she was at Soul Society but had acted strong in front of Ichigo and Mirai.

The only positive thing that came from that day was the fact that Grand Fisher was gone and hadn't managed to devour Masaki.

Mirai explained the spiritual world to Ichigo. And eventually Tomo stopped by to meet the boy too at Kotobuki's.

"Nice to meet you, Ichigo-kun. I'm glad that Mirai-chan has a friend like you!" Tomo had told the boy. Mirai had smiled a bit embarrassedly at the background until the woman had left.

"She's all over me whenever she comes over." The girl had shrugged and lifted a black garment from a hook in her room. "Do you wanna come monster watching with me? To see what the monsters really look like?"

While Tomo had told the two of them that the 'monsters' were actually called 'hollows', it was easier for the kids to think of them as simply monsters. Or bad ghosts whenever they felt more charitable towards them. But Masaki's death was still raw and sore wound for the two of them.

"If I don't need to go home yet… Okay." Ichigo shrugged and ducked underneath the cloak Mirai threw over the two of them. It was big enough to cover both of them easily.

"How are things at home?"

"Yuzu wants to learn cooking and become just like okaa-san. Karin… She tries not to be burden to any of us. Otou-san is still crazy. He doesn't seem to have any plans of reopening the clinic yet…" It was August already. Ichigo was ten too. School would continue soon. Mirai looked to the side. Katagiri Kanae would die in September.

"Does he still try to train you?" The girl asked.

"Yeah… But how can it be training if he doesn't teach anything beforehand in order to test it later? That's what we do at dojo." The boy frowned. He'd been doing that a lot lately. Mirai pressed a finger between Ichigo's brows and lifted his head up from where the boy had begun to stare at his own toes.

"Don't frown. You'll get permanent wrinkles." The girl admonished him gently. "Are you going to keep going to the dojo?"

"I don't know… If otou-san doesn't work, wouldn't it be better if we'd save money with me quitting karate? I can try and learn from you and Tatsuki, right?"

"If you aren't coming to dojo, I won't either." Mirai said resolutely while trying to stamp down her anger towards Isshin. It was lucky that neighbors and Kenji were making food to share with the Kurosaki kids since Isshin was absolutely lousy cook and if there wasn't that much money for food or general living.

They spend the rest of the evening sitting in a street corner underneath Mirai's cloak and watching hollows being disposed of by the local Shinigami patroller. And while underneath it, Mirai made a resolution to make Kurosaki Isshin's life hell without it affecting his children.

It was easier that she'd thought. Just a couple of 'innocent' yet cruel remarks occasionally like…

"You are training Ichigo but not Karin-chan and Yuzu-chan? Why? Do you think they don't need it because they are girls and it is boys' job to protect them? What century were you born in again?"

"Leave Ichigo alone! Seriously, get a life! Oh wait… You can't 'cause you'd just drown it in booze."

"Ichigo could've been seriously hurt by that! What sort of doctor are you, inflicting injuries on your own son! How the hell did you even get your credentials?!"

In general, they were all related in Isshin hurting Ichigo with his 'training' and Mirai slipping a little hint that she knew that the man wasn't all he seemed to be. Thus making the man extremely paranoid and wary of her.

The final straw (for the man at least) was when Mirai was sleeping over Kurosaki's. There had been a series of violent break-and-enterings at Karakura. And a couple of them had been in the area where the Kurosaki's, Arisawa's and Kotobuki's lived, Minamikawase. So as a precaution Kenji had given Mirai a butterfly knife and taught her how to use it. And that knife was underneath her pillow when Isshin came in the morning to wake up Ichigo with a kick in the back.

Mirai, already slowly rousing from her sleepy state, had sprung up, flicked her knife open and stabbed the man in the torso. There had been blood and yelling. Karin and Yuzu running to the room and starting crying. Ichigo staring at Mirai's bloodied knife and her own startled expression. No apologies were said from either party and…

The girl woke from her room with a feeling that something was seriously wrong. It wasn't until Ichigo came running to Kenji's dojo after lunch and told her that Karin and Yuzu remembered nothing of the previous night or anything about Mirai at all.

Cold feeling flooded the girl.

"Kikashinki…" She whispered.

"A what?" Ichigo frowned.

"A memory replacer. The… special ghosts use them on humans so they forget encounters with hollows and replace them with something else, like gas explosion or arson or car accident or something. Kaachan told me about them." The girl swallowed. She'd pushed Isshin too far and as a result he'd tried to erase her from the lives of his children. He'd realized that she knew of the spiritual world and would eventually drag Ichigo, Karin and Yuzu into it too.

"But why didn't it work on us then?"

"Your father thinks that your reiryoku reserves are still small enough for the replacer to work. Same with me. My head feels a bit fuzzy but if I remove these reiatsu suppressors kaachan made for me, I should be fine…" Thank kami for the leather bracelets Mirai wore in her wrists. They kept her reiatsu level just below Ichigo's (Tomo had probably gauged his reiatsu level when she'd met him) and thus she wasn't deemed as… 'to be disposed of' kind of threat. The girl shuddered. She needed to be more careful.

"So this definitely proves that otou-san knows about spirit stuff even if he pretends otherwise." Ichigo frowned, crossing his arms.

"Yeah… And knows someone with access to special ghost equipment." Mirai added.

"…How should we go on about this?"

"Let's… Let's meet again. At school. There are class projects coming up soon. I heard that they are going to be done in groups of three. If we can get Tatsuki-chan as part of our group, we can work at her house. And we can still see at dojo on Thursdays. And here sometimes too. Or something…" Mirai bit her lip and wiped at her eyes. She was scared. She was scared of what a Shinigami – retired/exiled or not – would do to her. Her mother's warnings and the reason why she was in the world of living rang in her head. Division 12, Maggots Nest or dead… And funnily enough, being dead was the option she preferred. After all…

She had been dead before she was living.

Ichigo ended up writing a letter to Masaki which they sent on by burning it at the local temple. Together they decided not to tell Tomo or Dina and Kenji about what had transpired. And to be more careful about displaying their knowledge about spiritual world.

"When with Shinigami, play dumb. Ask questions and repeat any 'new' words and terminology they give you. Shinigami like to think themselves above living humans and won't be surprised by 'lack of knowledge' or understanding." Mirai sighed. "Even kaachan is like that sometimes. She gets excited over something from world of living but ultimately thinks of living humans as fairly intelligent pets of something… Like we look at dolphins or monkeys or something…"

Mirai knew that while Tomo was her 'kaachan', Dina was her 'mama'. Dina was the one that took care of her. Dina was the one that taught her to stand and walk in this new childhood. Dina was the one cleaning her messes and making sure Mirai had everything she needed.

Tomo in the other hand… Mirai wasn't even sure that Tomo knew the proper concept of love. After all the woman's own parents had been dead so long. Mirai was dear to the woman. But she was also an experiment. A successful one and one of a kind. And sometimes, Tomo had this look in her eyes that Mirai didn't like. A look that went through Mirai and left nothing but her physical components and 'ingredients' for the woman to observe. Tomo was a scientist through and through and it showed in their every interaction. Tomo always told her to keep a low profile so she wouldn't attract Soul Society's attention. But the worry wasn't about Mirai's own well-being. It was about Mirai being taken out of Tomo's reach.

"I need to know…" Mirai muttered, huddled under a slide in at Yumisawa Children Park. She'd had to take a bus to get safely to this part of Karakura but she needed to get out of Minamikawase. "I need to know more about touchan…"

While Mirai had a solid guess about who her father was, she needed a certainty. And just maybe she could come grips with her own existence as well.

"I'm scared… I can't…" The girl choked and began crying. "I'm scared… I don't want to lose Ichigo…-kun. He is my Kanzo-iro. He is my best friend… I don't wanna lose him like Sumi-iro and Ukon-iro…"

And hadn't that hurt. On a trip to grocery store, Mirai had briefly met with Yuzu and the five-year-old's eyes had just slid over her, like Mirai hadn't even been there!

"I'm scared!"

At his shop in Mitsumiya, Urahara Kisuke looked up from his current experiment and tilted his head thoughtfully.

A/N: Cliff-hanger! Next chapter will be Yoruichi's and she will explain what just happened here. The whole debacle with Mirai and Isshin just wrote itself here... I had originally planned it to the other version of this fic because that one is more dramatic and convoluted plotwise.

Mirai has issues.

Timelinewise this covers only about October of the year when Masaki died.

Replies to Reviews:

-XIV - La Temperanza:
It's alright. I have experiences with overenthusiastic autocorrect too, it's exhausting to go back and correct the words into from I actually desire.
Great to know you likes the chapter. I decided to include here Mirai saying her advise and considering what she and Ichigo just went through, it's perfectly understandable.

-CallmeCrazylol:
Yep. And isn't it with Ichigo like, if it has four syllables or more, the name isn't worth remembering? Mirai isn't quite consistent with her referring to people. She uses 'Kanzo-iro' and 'Ichigo' about equally.

-ZiggySmallz:
Thank you! I hope you like this chapter too.

-xenocanaan:
Great to hear. :)

-Silverlined Phoenix: (chapter 1)
I know the problems with the zanpakuto arc but I just live the designs of the zanpakuto and their interractions with their wielders and that more than makes up for the lack of cohesive plot. But if I have the zanpakuto arc (and movies) in this fic, it may change the plot later on too. For example Ikkaku's bankai that was seen even in movie 2.
There are plan's for Mirai's mother. While she will remain at the background a lot, she does have more purpose than just being the donor of the other half of Mirai's genes.
Visoreds will have more role too. Mirai will introduce Ichigo to them one by one (but not all of them) but they will meet him as a group only during the Arrancar arc.

-Jessicamathews65:
Thanks.

-DeliciousCookie: (chapter 3 and 4)
No worries, I always try to make my character matter at least somewhat in the canon timeline too. As you can see from this chapter and the previous ones, Mirai will have a lot of influense on Ichigo.
The choking thing is explained. It's mostly metaphorical as you can see but... have you ever for example cried or been so distressed that you could barely make a sound? This was more like that. It's not a nice feeling but in the end Mirai was faced with her first major decision regarding the timeline and found herself thinking too much of the possibilities that she ended up unable to act.

-Maester Ta:
Thank you! Great to have new readers here too. I hope you like this chapter.

-Silverlined Phoenix:
Nope. I'm not gonna pair Mirai with Kensei. Interesting pairing, thank you for suggesting it but sadly impossible. Mostly stems from the idea of the alternate version of this fic where Kensei is Tatsuki's grandfather so things would be a bit awkward. This is also the same reason why I won't be pairing Ichigo with Kisuke despite adoring UraIchi.