~OoOoO~
Karakura Town—Kisuke's Basement

The small shop Kisuke ran was quiet during the slow season of summer. His wares becoming stale as time passed made the man rethink the products he sold to the humans in town. Though at first his shop was booming with customers, it now paled in comparison while he watched passerby's walk while completely ignoring his existence.
"I should really think about my career in this…" fanning himself thoughtlessly, he sensed the boy coming to him after his letter was sent. Snapping his fan shut and standing to greet his guest, he watched as Ichigo came up to the shop with his hands in pocket and a look of absolute boredom on his face.

"What's this about," Ichigo asked grudgingly. His eyes staring straight ahead, he was just a kid wanting something meaningful to happen. Kisuke smiled beneath the shadow of his hat and beckoned the boy to come into his shop.

"Nothing much…I'm conducting a small experiment that needs a little extra juice to get it going. I figured you would be the perfect man to call for such a task." Leading the way through his shop and down the secret door to the basement, Ichigo caught sight of Kisuke's other guests he had failed to mention.

"So why do they need to be here?" Referring to the two Espada waiting amongst the boulder in the distance, the two looked their way and moved. "Just what kind of experiment requires me and these guys?" He asked quizzically and perhaps a little defensively. Kisuke chuckled to the gesture he showed and opened his fan once more in a nonchalant manner.

"Between you and the Espada's I can conduct a rather peculiar experiment I've been working on with both Mayuri and Szayel. We wanted to establish a quicker more efficient garganta type gate that leads to the soul society with a little more precision. The problem is the power needing to get the task going."
Watching the Espada's come close enough for Ichigo to stand beside them, Kisuke kept his expression light and closed his fan and swung his cane instead. "I brought Grimmjow and Ulquiorra here to create a gate to Hueco Mundo using your garganta while Ichigo here contributes his powers to our gate here leading to the Soul Society. Mayuri should be helping out on his end while Szayel on yours," he pointed out. "No reason for such angry faces though," referring to Grimmjow and Ulquiorra, the two were not pleased being summoned for such a task.

"You got the psycho helping you out on this," Grimmjow snarled and ran his fingers through his hair. "What's the big deal of both of us being here when it takes one to open the garganta?"

"A mighty fine question," Kisuke clopped his way over and pointed to the gate Ichigo would be at. "Because I need an Espada to feed both gates using their reiatsu and powering the mechanisms on each side to really grasp the energies of the two precipice worlds." Trying to make sense of it all, Grimmjow merely narrowed his eyes while furrowing his brow and lacked the enthusiasm.
"You see, while Mayuri keeps the gate open on his end and feeding enough reiatsu to power it, Ichigo can use his power from here to establish the link. Szayel is doing the same but your gate requires a little more of a refined touch. The precipice worlds are a tricky matter and I need someone with strong reiatsu like yourself to keep the cores of the worlds steady."

"That seems like a lot to take on. And if something goes wrong, then what?" Making a valid inquiry, Kisuke shrugged to the thought that something bad might happen but nothing to worry about. "I don't know about this…" Grimmjow seemed worried about the experiment while Ulquiorra stayed silent on the matter. His stoic expression not helping in any way.

"I'm with Grimmjow here…what if something does go wrong, what would you do?" Ichigo asked.

"Come now you are thinking far too much about this. We've all done something far worse than having two gates open, am I right?" A side look to the Espada's, it made both of them look away as the matter was a touchy subject. "Alright you three, if you don't mind getting started." Standing aside and having them get into position, he ordered Ichigo to be ready to open the gate the same time with Ulquiorra. When both were opened Grimmjow is to feed the two cores of the two gates and let the scientist take over the rest of the delicate process. "The precipice world should be clear for the time being without the sweeper coming into play. Grimmjow, I need you to shoot your cero into both gates and connect the energies together on each side. You have to keep it the same power level, if one is too much then this will fall apart and we'll have to start over."

"Easier said than done," he grumbled. He focused on his hands to fire a cero with the same amount of power. A difficult task to be done, he waited until the timing was right.
Slowly he shot a cero into both gates at the same time and could feel the two gates connecting for a short time. But the two worlds having to become one was difficult, and the power between each gate was eager to shut itself down. Feeding more power into both gates and trying to grasp the power inside, something snapped, a loud crack echoed in the underground room and had everyone stop breathing as they heard the sound get louder.

"What's happening?" Ichigo spoke nervously. Kisuke looked around and found nothing out of the ordinary, but the pressure in the room did shift uncomfortably. He looked to the power readings for both gates and the one leading to the Soul Society was off balance. The power wasn't enough.

"Something broke…" Kisuke whispered. The gates remained unchanging as they held the power level and the gate open steadily. Something inside the precipice world perhaps? He stepped lightly towards the two open gates and peered inside the darkness within and found nothing inside them. He didn't hear wrong though, something snapped. There was something wrong, but he couldn't tell what it was.
"Continue feeding the gates and increase the power. The worlds seem to be—"

A snapping sound broke through the silence and a tear in the air began to form behind the three. Dropping everything and shutting down the gates quickly, Kisuke planted his cane into the ground to steady himself as wind kicked up the field and began to make the place look like a desert storm.

"Get back!" Kisuke quickly got out. Ulquiorra leapt away in time before being blinded by the sand. He knelt down and buried his free hand to keep him from being sucked into the deformed gate that had torn itself open.
Ichigo dug his zanpakutou into the ground and kept himself from being sucked in when he heard Grimmjow gasping and watched as he was lifted into the air.

"Grimmjow!" Ichigo reached for him, to take hold of his hand and not have him sucked into the strange gate. Being sucked up into the air and unable to grasp at anything around him, Grimmjow was swallowed by the deformity of a gate and was completely taken. The others were ready to rush into the gate itself to retrieve him but the deformity sealed itself in a blink of an eye and vanished without a trace.

"Oh no…" Kisuke faltered where he stood and couldn't believe what happened. In seconds he witnessed a gate taking someone by force and even so much as closing. He had to get to Mayuri or Szayel to see if the two of them had felt any readings of that gate and see where it had taken Grimmjow. If not them, they would have to find a way to get the readings and locate him as quickly as possible. The experiment had taken a very wrong turn.

"What the hell just happened?!" Ichigo reached for Kisuke's collar and held him on the spot for answers. Ulquiorra wanted the same and approached slowly with a glooming glare surrounding him. They were not pleased in the slightest that something like this happened, but so much of it could have been prevented if there was some warning.

"That's what I'm going to find out," Kisuke wanted to plead more, but time was of the essence and he really needed to get that data. "I need to head to the soul society and speak with Mayuri, time is imperative Ichigo."

"Did you figure this would happen? What the hell are we going to say to—"

"I will handle the matter when I return to Las Noches." Ulquiorra spoke quickly while opening a garganta. He took one more look back towards Kisuke and a heavy aura emanated from him. "If you dare make Hanako cry I will end you."

A threat that both don't want to come to fruition, Kisuke escaped Ichigo's grip and opened up a senkaimon back to the soul society and the two departed quickly to seek answers.

~OoOoO~
Kasumi

Having ran farther than intended, I was bent over gasping for air and leaned against a wall to take a breather. My legs were sore from sprinting so hard and I feel like I'm swallowing fire with each gasp. But having ran this hard in such a short time, it gave me a good chance to recall some of the things that's happened in a span of a year.
In retrospect, not all of it was bad. I've experienced love, pain, fear, and a whole lot of randomness thanks to the club. Too bad everything began to change and drift apart the closer we got to graduation. But at least the school year will be over with soon…the moment I get my diploma I can take over my business without further distractions. Then again I would still have to deal with .
"No matter how I look at it, my future is already decided for me."
Staring blankly at the pavement and feeling my pulse become slower, it was time I headed back and explain to Kim all my troubles and perhaps hearing hers as well. Stretching out my limbs before the return home a large gust of wind kicked up and something extremely bright made me shut my eyes. As the wind picked up like a storm and kicking up the leaves around me, I heard something like tearing? Was a tree being ripped up from the ground by the wind? My ears tried making it out if I had to move away but before I could decipher if it was a tree I felt something like a human body ram into me!
The force of whatever slammed into me took my breath away and my head hit the ground hard enough where a piercing pain ripped through my conscious mind and made me groan in response. Whatever hit me did it with everything it got and pinned me to the ground.

"Dammit that hurt…" a man—as far as the voice goes—grumbled as he lay on top of me and I felt my head still throbbing with thundering pain. "I'm going to kill that guy if it's the last thing I do," cursing to whoever he had issues with, I tapped him on the chest and winced to the movement. I managed to open my bleary eyes to whoever it was and saw him look down at me.

"Mind getting off," I spoke as evenly as I could, but my head hurt pretty bad. Hope I'm not bleeding. Heading to any clinic means the Ootori will find out and I am not dealing with that if it's the last thing I do.

"Oh," feeling his weight shift and getting up, I too was helped up and it was probably the worst thing to do since now the ground and everything around me was spinning. "Shit you hit your head," feeling his hands grab hold of me, I was braced against his chest and could hear him cursing under his breath for his mistake. "I don't know where the hell I am…" he grumbled. "Shit…this is bad enough…" grumbling and making sure I was pressed against him to not fall over, I tapped his arm to get his attention. He flinched to the touch strangely enough but it did grab his attention.

"….um…take me to my house…" I winced moving to look at him and could barely focus. "My house is not far from here…find the biggest house possible down the street with a large black gated entrance." Shutting my eyes to not see everything spin around, he seemed to understand my bad directions and started lifting me up?! "Um?!"

"It's faster this way," he said rather quickly before I felt weightless as if he jumped into the air to fly or something! "There it is," he said.
I chanced to open my eyes and found us in the goddamn sky! Holding my sanity to not faint and feeling his muscles pressed against me as he ran on nothing but air above the buildings, he dropped down on the grounds of my home as if nothing was strange about him walking on air and continued to my front door.
"Let's get that head tended to then," opening my door and waltzing in like he owned the place, I stupidly directed him to the cabinet that held the medical kit and got sutured up from this stranger. Baffled and unable to defy the help given to me, this entire act was bewildering in so many ways that I wanted to speak up and ask how he knows how to close head wounds, but words never left my mouth. "I did the best I could, but you should have it looked at by someone else." He admitted. "At least the bleeding stopped."

My mind went immediately to the question at hand. "…how the hell did you do that?"

"What, sew your wound?"

"No, run on air like you were on the ground!" Pain shot through my head for raising my voice and I turned and popped some aspirin in my mouth. "No yelling…" I whispered to myself.

"Well I ain't human," speaking matter-of-factly; he seemed quite serious about that statement. I looked at him with my head not spinning everything I looked at and saw his striking features.
Blue hair all spiked in a particular way that fell short past his ears. Blue eyes that matched his hair color with a striking green eye liner to accentuate his features. He had a good chiseled structure to his face that followed suit to his bare chest taut with strong muscles. His clothing choice was strange, but it looked like he was ready to fight at any time with the way he looks in it. It was rather hard not staring at the six-pack in my face that led to a flattering V shape with his pants hugging his hips just right. The clothing style could possibly be a matchup for hand-to-hand combat. Flexibility being the key could explain his taste in style.

"Not human you say," clearing my throat and trying to be a little modest, I turned away. "That's ridiculous. You have to be human…if not that then what are you?"

"An Espada," he declared. "But it's interesting that you could see me. I wonder how…" seemingly curious, I gaped at him and was utterly confused.

"Espada? Somehow can see you? You must have hit your head or something when you fell on top of me. You're not a spirit," speaking logically, he faced me and put his hands on his hips.

"I guess you could say I'm a form of spirit. Not really sure how to explain it—I leave that to the crazy scientist. By the way, can ya tell me where the hell I am? Besides that can't you tell by—" he went to point to his abdomen and seemed utterly confused for something not being there and scratched his head. "The hole is gone…" he whispered. He reached for his face and seemed more in shock. "My mask too?"
I ignored what he said and just answered the question of what town he's in.

"You're in ***."

He rubbed his jaw and fidgeted with his coat that was highly distracting to me before he looked at me with another question. "….do you know where Karakura Town is?"

"That's South from here. Maybe about a day's trip…that where you from?"
He shook his head and rubbed the back of his neck thoughtlessly and looked around thinking to himself. I could hear him mumbling, but there was nothing in particular I could make out.
"Look if that's where you're from I can arrange something and have you—"

"That might be easier said than done. But if I leave the moment I get here and the scientist comes up with something to bring me back something else may go wrong." He looked like he was ready to explode if he thought about anything else and begrudgingly sighed and looked back defeated. "Is it alright if I stay here a while till I figure things out?" He asked.

Thinking about letting him stay here, a total stranger, it took me a few minutes at best to consider it before I gave in. I did owe him for bringing me home and tending to my head. But then again letting a loon stay here is very questionable of me. But I owed him a debt for patching me up…loon or not, I had to repay him somehow. This guy also didn't look the type to accept money and be done with it. A thug best describes him if he were to wonder around town. And since he knows where I live he might let out that I was the one he was with last.

Taking one more careful look at the man and considering other small options, there really wasn't any I could come up with and I made my decision. "You can stay, but all I ask is you behave yourself. I can't entirely trust you since I know nothing of who you are. But you did bring me back home and even stitched my head…" trailing off, he seemed to understand and nodded.

"Then for starters I guess introductions are to be made. The name is Grimmjow Jaegerjaquez." A thumb to his chest, his chiseled features were more profound in the light as I looked at him. Taking a moment to gather myself properly, I responded.

"And I'm Kasumi Matsumoto."

"Alright then," he gave a wry smile and I felt my heart jump to it. His bearing was very different than Kyoya's and it startled me a little bit to be near this guy, but at the same time it intrigued me since he was different. Hopefully I'm not making a big mistake letting him stay here. I really hope Kim doesn't panic when she gets home either…this is going to be hard to explain when Kim sees him here.
In fact, when I took a look around she wasn't home. Checking the time and noticing it was a little past noon I figured she was in class getting her senior project done. Shifting uncomfortably off the counter and slowly walking to the dining hall, I motioned for Grimmjow to follow me and I showcased the house and would find him a room he could stay in.