A/N: Wow, it's been way too long since I've posted a chapter! I promise I'm still alive and working on this story, just a bit slowly. But here is an extra-long one to hopefully tide you over until the next update. :) Leave a review! Thanks to everyone who's reviewed so far! You guys are the best!

Another side note: Pay close attention to the dates/times in this chapter—there's some going back and forth.

Wednesday

6:05 p.m.

Orihime was a star student. She was rarely absent, turned her homework in on time, and always did well on tests. School came easy to her.

But sometimes during class, her eyes would drift from the squiggles on the board to the back of Ichigo's head where he sat a few rows in front of her, and she would find her mind wandering. This was a common occurrence for Orihime who daydreamed often about robots or penguins or world domination, each fantasy more ridiculous than the last. But her daydreams about Ichigo were always... different.

She imagined that she was assigned to work with him on a project, just the two of them. They would work hard, but wouldn't have enough time to finish during class, so they would have no choice but to go to his house to complete it. He would open the door for her and she would take off her shoes in the entryway, arranging them neatly to one side. She would shyly introduce herself to his dad, who would excitedly proclaim how happy he was that his son finally had a girlfriend, and such a beautiful one at that. Ichigo would turn beet red in embarrassment, sputtering She's just a friend, just here to work on a project— while Orihime stood to one side blushing and stuttering. They would go to his room and he would slam the door to keep out his prying father and nosy sisters and she would be alone with him, sitting on his bed, almost close enough to feel the heat radiating from his skin.

Her daydream about visiting the Kurosaki residence for the first time was vastly different from the reality that she now found herself in—perched on the edge of Yuzu's bed, clutching a mug of hot tea, Ichigo nowhere in sight. She was both tremendously relieved and extremely disappointed at his absence.

Rukia sat at the other end of the bed, staring silently into her mug. It was a moment before either of them spoke.

Rukia finally broke the silence. "I suppose it wasn't me you were expecting," she said quietly.

"It wasn't," Orihime admitted. "But I'm very glad it was you anyway. I didn't realize it until now, but you were the person I've been wanting to talk to the most."

The words came out suddenly, unbidden, but as she spoke them, Orihime realized they were true. An anxiousness that had been constricting her chest ever since the day Rukia disappeared was starting to loosen.

"More than anyone else, more than Chad or even Ichigo, it was you I had the most regret leaving behind," Rukia confessed. "I'm sorry I left without telling you why. I'd half hoped you would lose your memories of me like everyone else and find a way to… move on."

Orihime tentatively took a sip of her tea. It was too hot, and scalded her tongue.

"It's not been so much moving on as it has been life dragging me by the wrists and me running after it, trying not to fall down," she mused. "A lot has happened since you left." That's an understatement, she thought.

"Oh?" Rukia asked, smiling sympathetically. "May I ask what?"

Orihime's thoughts turned back to the madness of the past few months. Shinji showing up at school. Tatsuki in the hospital. Being attacked by a creature that was and was not a hollow. The conversation with her family last night…

Rukia noticed Orihime's troubled expression. "I'm sorry. It's rude of me to ask about you when I'm the one who suddenly went missing. I think I should go first."

Tuesday

8:47 p.m.

Orihime sat on the couch in the middle of their "living room." Rose sat next to her. Hachi stood on her other side—sitting would mean turning one of their only pieces of furniture into matchsticks. Others gathered around, some (like Hiyori) stayed out of sight, but within earshot, Orihime knew.

"It's finally time we tell you about the day we took you in, Orihime," Hachi began.

Orihime was perched on the edge of the couch, her back straight, hands folded politely on her knees as if she was having a meeting with her boyfriend's parents for the first time and not her family. Orihime knew where she had come from, technically—she had been to the house where she had supposedly once lived, had met her "brother," had seen the family portrait. But that was a different Orihime. This Orihime had lived forever here in this warehouse-makeshift-home with these people. It didn't matter where she came from, she told herself.

"It was me and Hachi who found you!" Mashiro blurted from where she was sprawled out on the floor. "We were going to pick up lunch, but Hachi said he felt something weird so we went to go investigate."

"There'd been a hollow attack," Hachi continued. "An unusually powerful hollow had attacked your home and killed your family, but for some reason left you alone. It was gone when we got there, dead or otherwise we didn't know. But there you were, sitting out front, looking a bit dazed and confused."

"But then Hachi went up to you and handed you a red bean bun and you ate the entire thing almost in one bite!"

"And then you smiled at me like it was me you had been waiting for the entire time. And I knew we couldn't just leave you there."

He lapsed into silence.

"And then...?" Orihime prodded.

This time it was Kensei who spoke. "And then we raised you. The best we could, at least. Some of us better than others." He looked pointedly at where Lisa sat across the room, absorbed in a magazine.

"Hey, I babysat as much as anyone else did," she countered.

"If you count 'babysitting' as being in the same room as her while reading your dirty magazines!"

"At least I didn't try to get her into a matching jumpsuit."

"This is fashionable!" Mashiro protested, pouting.

"Or try to lure her away with a trail of bean buns," Shinji sniggered.

A wayward shoe appeared out of nowhere and struck him on the face.

"I understand all of that," Orihime said. "And I remember well enough what happened that night when I ran away, and the conversation following. I understand what hollows are and why they exist and what they do. What I want to know is what you're doing here. Who are you, really? Why do you live in this warehouse instead of a normal house? I know where I came from. Where did you come from?"

There was silence. Orihime could hear a bird chirping outside. Lisa flipped a page of her magazine. And then—

"That's a long story," Shinji said. "So get comfortable."

Wednesday

6:58 p.m.

"So you see," Rukia concluded, "It was never really about any kind of punishment. I hadn't done anything wrong. I was just a pawn caught up in an unfortunate game of—what do you call it? Chess?—and I happened to be standing in the way of the other team making the final checkmate."

"But Ichigo came to save you."

Rukia smiled. "Yes, the knight in shining armor. And a bishop and a rook, as well."

"Uryu and Chad."

"Yes. They all risked their lives to save me and almost died. For me! I didn't deserve it. A knight shouldn't risk his life to save a pawn."

"He would risk his life for a queen, though."

Rukia sighed. "You don't understand. You don't know what I did to him, what I said to him. He was just trying to save me and I left him on the street in the middle of the night, in the rain, to die. He should have just let me die," she said bitterly.

"That's what makes him a knight, I suppose. If we were only allowed to protect those who deserved it, we wouldn't be able to defend even ourselves."

Rukia gave her a reluctant smile and stared into her mug.

"But what I don't understand," Orihime said suddenly, "is who the other team was."

"The opposing team's king," Rukia explained, "would be a cold-hearted soul reaper named Aizen."

Tuesday

9:23 p.m.

"Aizen?" Orihime asked.

"Yes," Kensei nodded. "An ex-soul reaper with a penchant for performing twisted experiments."

"And he experimented on you?"

"He experimented on all of us," Lisa interjected from her corner. "Kensei and Mashiro were the first."

"And then Hiyori!" Mashiro chirped. Orihime heard a grunt from behind the couch.

"And then the rest of us," Love concluded. "And we were banished from the Soul Society as his unfortunate victims."

"But... what kind of experiments exactly?"

Wednesday

7:14 p.m.

"Hollowfication," Rukia explained. "To put it simply, combining the powers of a soul reaper and a hollow into one being. Using the Hogyoku makes it possible, makes for a more finished product."

"And this...Ho—thing was inside of you somehow? And by killing you he would get it out and take it?"

"Yes, although he ended up not killing me, as you can see. The whole execution business was a bit over-the-top, I think. He has a flair for the dramatic."

"I see," Orihime said slowly. All of the information she had gathered in the past 24 hours were a jumbled mess in her brain, but she was slowly piecing them together. Before long, she would figure out where she fit into everything, she was sure.

"Just one last question," she said, tracing her pinky finger around the lip of the empty mug. "You came here in the first place because you were assigned here, went back to this 'Soul Society' to be executed, and stayed there because Ichigo saved you and cleared your name. So why are you here now?"

"Ah," said Rukia, leaning forward slightly. "Well, that's where it starts to get interesting."

Tuesday

9:45 p.m.

"We had no other choice but to come here," Hachi answered. "After we were 'hollowfied' against our will, we were treated as any hollow found wandering in the Soul Society would be—sentenced to death. We were rescued by a man who risked many things for us—he made all of the necessary preparations for us to live quietly in this world, among humans. And we've been doing so for many, many years."

"And that's the end of the story," finished Shinji.

When she was little, Orihime had often wondered about the life her family members lived. They rarely seemed to leave the warehouse, except to pick up food or other supplies, though she supposed they had plenty of time to be out and about while she was at school. She wondered why they didn't have jobs and go to work like her friends' parents did, dressed in their suits and carrying their briefcases. She had a greater respect for them now, knowing what they had gone through and what they were still going through.

"Hold up," she interjected. "So now that you're all these special soul-reaper-hollows—"

"Vizard," proffered Rose, stopping her with an index finger.

"Vizard," accepted Orihime. "So you all have, like, special powers? Can I see them?"

"No," Kensei announced, in a tone that allowed no room for argument. "Absolutely not."

"Why not?" Came Hiyori's drawling voice from where she was reclining behind the couch. "She knows everything else. Why not show her your mask?"

"Because I said it's enough!"

Hiyori knew a fight when she smelled one, and she never backed down from an opportunity to heckle someone into one.

"Scared, Kensei?" She taunted. "Scared of what might happen? Scared you won't be able to control your hollow around her? If you are, then I'll—"

Kensei's eyes flashed with rage and his sword was in his hands in a moment, Hiyori's in hers. What took place next happened too fast for Orihime's eyes to follow, but all of a sudden Shinji was there, his sword crossed with Kensei's, his foot pressing Hiyori's into the ground.

"Now it really is enough," he said softly, yet with obvious authority. "Our little family meeting is over for today, I think."

Orihime went to her room and lay in bed. She fell asleep knowing she had more answers than when she had woken up that morning, but also with a better understanding of how little she really knew. If only there were someone else who could give her more answers, more pieces to the puzzle, she thought with frustration.

Wednesday

7:16 p.m.

"The reason I'm here now," Rukia continued, "would be Aizen's doing. Think about it. He now has an object that will let him turn a hollow into an arrancar—a kind of hollow with soul reaper powers if you remember—it's only natural that he would use it. What's to stop him from building an army to destroy the Soul Society and wreak havoc in the world of the living?"

"So you think that's what he's doing, then?"

"Yes, or something similar to that. We think there's something that he wants from this world, from this town perhaps, though we're not quite sure what it is."

"What could he possibly want from Karakura Town?" frowned Orihime. "There's nothing here."

"Perhaps," admitted Rukia. "Perhaps not. But the arrancar have already been to this town twice, most likely ordered here by Aizen himself."

Orihime's mind flashed to her encounter the night before. The creature who was not a man and not a hollow—he must have been one of these arrancar.

"I know," she said. "I think I met one yesterday. But when was the other time?"

Rukia's surprise was palpable. "You—you met one? But—how did—ah." She closed her eyes for a moment. "That can wait. Yes, there were many that appeared last night. I fought one myself. The other time was not long ago, just before I came back here. One of Ichigo's friends was badly hurt."

Tatsuki. So she'd had the bad luck to have a run in with an arrancar herself. She was lucky to be alive, Orihime knew. How much was happening in this town without Orihime realizing?

"There's so many more things I want to ask you," Orihime admitted, absent-mindedly bringing her empty mug up to her lips. "But not enough time."

"There's never enough time," Rukia agreed, smiling. "Besides, it's your turn now."

"It's a long story," Orihime sighed. "How about I make some more tea?"

8:42 p.m.

It was completely dark by the time Orihime finally left the Kurosaki residence. Mr. Kurosaki had invited her to stay for dinner and his girls had chimed in excitedly, but she had politely refused, insisting that her family was waiting for her. Besides, she would feel strange eating at Ichigo's house without him there, and Rukia had quietly told her he had gone missing after yesterday's battle, just outside of the range at which she could detect spiritual pressure.

The revelations about Ichigo and the role he had played in rescuing Rukia had not surprised her—it fit inside her understanding of who Ichigo was as a person. Fierce, determined, willing to do anything to protect his friends. She wished she could have gone with him and stood by his side while he fought to save Rukia, and wondered if anything would have gone differently had she been there. Maybe she would have come back different. Maybe she would finally understand whatever force it was inside of her, whatever presence it was that was trying to make itself known.

Heading down familiar streets, she listened to the skree-skree of the cicadas announcing a summer that was soon coming to an end. She was not sad to see it go. It had been a strange and difficult one.

She finally made it to the street where her warehouse-home was, slipping inside the barrier that she had no trouble sensing. "I'm home!" she shouted, striding through the open doors and loudly announcing her arrival.

She was met with a silence that puzzled her. There was no Shinji lying on the couch playing video games, no Lisa sprawled in the corner reading magazines. No Kensei came out to scold her for coming home so late, and she could hear no telltale sounds in the kitchen signifying that someone was making dinner.

She gazed around the room, confused, until she noticed a strange opening in the ground that she had never seen before. It connected to a flight of stairs that led down, down somewhere far below ground. It seemed her family hadn't told her all their secrets. She took a few tentative steps down the stairs and peered in.

She could make out the massive form of Hachi standing near the bottom of the stairs, in a room that appeared to be a wide, barren landscape rather than a cellar underneath a warehouse. The ceiling was even blue like the sky and lit up as if it were the middle of the day. She knew better than to be surprised at this point. She carefully made her way down the steps to demand answers.

Hachi caught sight of her and called her over with a wave. "What is this place?" Orihime demanded.

"We built this place many years ago so that we could train secretly, out of the way of prying humans," he said by way of explanation. "Here we can let loose and fight and be ourselves with no restraints."

"And use your powers?" Orihime asked.

"Yes," he answered.

She looked around eagerly for a sign of any of her family members using said powers. Kensei had been so adamant the day before about her not seeing them, which in turn had only made her want to see them more. Maybe he had just been in a bad mood and had changed his mind since then.

Orihime noticed most of her family members were sprawled or crouched or standing a few feet away, their gaze directed towards something she couldn't see. Orihime counted eight, including herself. Only Hiyori was absent.

She heard her shrill voice suddenly, yelling something across the landscape that she couldn't make out. Orihime would have thought it was Shinji she was taking out her grievances upon, had he not been sitting just off to the side picking his nose.

Then suddenly, someone else stumbled into view. Someone dressed in a Japanese-style black robe, his orange hair disheveled, face coated in sweat and grime. Ichigo looked up in her direction.

"Orihime?!" he exclaimed, just before he was pummeled into the earth by one of Hiyori's sandals.