Hisashiburi Da

Ichigo had been avoiding Urahara for months upon months. He stopped visiting the World of the Living, save for when he lead expeditions of his division into an area with a high Hollow infestation. He ignored the messages the crazy scientist sent after him too, never even opening a single one.

Ichigo was done. He couldn't keep playing the game of hide-and-seek followed by watch-her-die every couple decades or so. It was too painful. And, perhaps, the little nagging voice at the back of his mind was right. Maybe it was his fault. He should leave her to live a full life and wait for her to find him. It would happen when the time was right.

And of this, he felt very sure. They were connected, forever attached at the souls by some unusual bond. She'd find him. Eventually. Besides, he still carried a piece of her that she gave to him so long ago. He'd always have that.

Though he kept trying to remind himself of all these things, he could barely drag himself through each and every day. He was haunted by her memories and these images that replayed in his mind. No, he could never atone. He could simply wait for it all to end, somehow.

As he continued to wallow in metaphorical darkness, the world around him continued to spin on. He couldn't imagine why it wouldn't. But it still bothered him that it did somehow. The worst cruelty of all, however – the crowning jewel of brutality – was that this death went relatively unnoticed. There wasn't a service held in her honor this time. There was not a candle lit or a chant sung. Byakuya took the news in silence and Ichigo had barely seen him since. Renji had looked like someone punched him in the gut and became uncharacteristically quiet. And neither of them blamed him.

And he hated them for it.

It would have just been better if they accused him of not protecting her well enough, not doing his job, failing her yet again. Ichigo would even have felt better if they drew their zanpakutos and sliced him up something awful. But they didn't and he—

"Onii-san, you're playing with your food."

The brooding man lifted his gaze and saw all eyes focused on him at the dinner table. His beautiful, grown-up sisters watching him with obvious sympathy as his father stared at him with an expression half between patience and annoyance.

"Ah… Sorry, Yuzu. I think I'm just going to head out on a walk…"

His cheerful sister nodded with understanding and worry, immediately coming over to take his plate of untouched food. "I'll just wrap up your dinner so you can eat some later then. Do you know when you'll-?" She paused mid-sentence, looking up at the sound of the panel door snapping closed. "Ichigo?"

"Don't worry, Yuzu. Your brother just needs to mope and brood for a bit." Isshin tried to insist to lighten the mood. The face Karin gave him said she was very unsure of that. He waved off the disbelief in his other daughter's eyes and reached out both hands to the light-haired woman still holding the plate. "But I'll take his food!"

"Dad!"

"He hasn't responded to any of my messages… Surely he doesn't doubt my scientific process." Urahara mumbled to himself, checking through his mail. There were all of the usual: bills, advertisements, and subscriptions. But none from the individual he had been writing to for nearly half a year.

"Perhaps he hasn't opened any of them. He wouldn't be able to resist learning more if he had," Tessai offered off-handedly in his kind fashion, stepping into the room with a tray of hot tea. His longtime friend watched as he set the tray on the low table in the center of the room, turning over the cups.

The blonde man's mouth was down-turned in a thoughtful and serious expression. He mindlessly watched as the tea was poured and set in front of him. "Hm," was all he offered before taking up his cup to breath in the calming aroma.

They sat in companionable silence for a few moments, enjoying the peace and quiet. Both men were lost in thought as they let the tea quiet their minds. The sound of porcelain cups being set into their plates, the birds outside, and the occasional appreciative hum was all that was heard. And though it was a beautiful spring day for the Living World Operatives, they were troubled by one young man's stubbornness.

"Perhaps you should visit him personally," the kido master offered in his quiet, deep voice.

Another clink of porcelain and a pause.

"Perhaps I should visit, Tessai-san. And it would be rude for any visitor to come empty-handed, you know." And a familiar playful smile began to spread across the blonde-stubbed face.

"You mean…?" His friend finally looked over the table to meet knowing gray eyes. When he saw the fan spring open to hide the growing grin, he sighed. "I'll pack the bags then. Hopefully the search won't take too long."

Dark.

Dark.

Still dark.

And warm.

It felt so warm. It was like… Well, it was hard to recall what this felt like. Memories were flying around, teasing, like little butterflies. But none could be caught. How could you remember what to compare the feeling to if you couldn't remember, well, anything? The butterflies evaded playfully but hung just close enough to remind that there was more to know, more to remember.

Feeling no panic, no fear, only curiosity. Wanting to know more and reaching out to the fluttering memories hovering around. Supposed to remember something. But what? One of these memories could be the one to unlock the mystery.

Almost iridescent in the dark. Yearning to reach further, wanting them to come closer. Feeling that those memories were somehow very important.

So warm. So comfortable.

Must focus on those memories. They're right there but so difficult to recall.

Touching a soft wing, like silk. Landing on a finger, it flutters its wings almost joyfully. The butterfly slowly evaporates, releasing a memory.

What does it mean? A place? A time? A person?

A name.

Ichigo.

Ichigo tried desperately to get comfortable but the wooden desk would have none of it. He stretched his legs out and hide his face in his arms around his head, pressing closer to the surface of his desk. It was almost soothing, the cool surface and the smell of wood polish. But it was anything but comfortable.

He had been having bad luck with resting around his family, the guilt and shame too heavy to bear without it affecting his attitude. He wasn't sure which was worse, Yuzu's empathy, Karin's frustration, or his Dad's patience. Everything was wearing him down.

Finally feeling himself succumb to the physiological need for sleep, his shihakusho no longer feeling as itchy and the chair no longer feeling as hard, his mind relaxed. Before his mind could take him into his past, a place perhaps by a river or a cemetery or his childhood home, a loud noise startled him.

Slightly jumping back against the chair, its legs rattling slightly against the jarring motion, he blinked his tired eyes. Before he had time to ask himself what had happened, he heard it again. A loud, but polite, knock on his office door.

Barely biting back a moan of extreme annoyance, he rubbed his forehead with a single hand, hiding his eyes. "Yes?"

"K-kurosaki-taicho, you have a guest that requests a moment of your time." His fifth seat officer opened the door just enough to poke a dark-haired head into, nervously polite. The entire squad knew of the captain's ever worsening mood and were careful around him. Ichigo could tell this shinigami barely wanted to step inside.

"Who is it?" he demanded in a voice with little patience.

"Er… He says he's a friend of yours. He didn't give a name."

"If it's a crazy blond man with a fan, tell him I am too busy and to go away."

"B-but, taicho-!"

"NOW!"

Faster, it seems, than even Ichigo's flash-step, the officer was gone. He could hear the heavy footfalls against the wooden beams of the walkway. But knowing that wouldn't be enough to keep the lunatic of a scientist away from him, the orange-haired man rose from his chair and calmly strapped his zanpakutou to his back. With a quiet nonchalance, he gently swung open the window panel and landed quietly outside his office to flash-step away.

"Kurosaki-taicho! You brooding punk of a young man, I have some good news for yo-! Eh?" Urahara paused mid-excited breath to glance around the office: beneath the desk, in the closet, behind the bookshelf. "Honestly it shouldn't be this hard to help you, Kurosaki-san. But you're making it very difficult for me."

With half a shrug and a secretive smile, he whipped out his fan as he strolled back out of the office. "May as well check on the surprise instead."

Having decided not to head to his family home, Ichigo wandered around the outskirts of Rukongai. It was peaceful, quiet, and relatively undisturbed. At least, it was all those things if you knew what areas to avoid that would currently be inhabited by shinigami training. There was a light breeze that made the leaves dance, shining golden rays off the foliage. The mild scent of mountains and the feel of the soft grass under his feet kept him strolling at a leisurely pace.

There were no loud noises out here, no faces watching him, and concerned ears listening for him. In a place that offered him the solitude to fully wallow in his angst, he found it difficult to do so. It was through these woods he and his friends had found their way to the strange Shiba home for the first time. He remembered contemplating his rescue, his anger at the world for passing a judgment of execution on someone who had grown so important to him so fast. He had been thoroughly and single-mindedly focused on the one task of saving her. And nothing else mattered. Not the consequences of having his soul chain cut, not the fear of pain of every battle to come, and certainly not the possibility of his own death.

It wasn't about him; it was completely and totally about her.

Rukia…

Sighing to himself, Ichigo realized how childish he had been behaving. It should be about her, her soul and her future. Not him and his selfishness just because he was separated from her yet again. She may have already been given another chance and he was too busy moping about to bother to check. He was getting caught up again, just like he'd done before after first facing an Arrancar. He was giving up.

Screw that! Ichigo clenched his fists and set his jaw. He knew if Rukia were here, she's probably kick him or punch him to make him stop. She would remind him in no uncertain terms that he needed to grow up and do better than this. But it was what she didn't say that held the most power. She wouldn't be ashamed or disappointed, just tired of waiting for him to pick himself back up. In her own way, she would remind him that he wasn't alone so to stop acting like it. He could do it and if he struggled, she was there.

And he wasn't alone, even in that moment. He suddenly remembered the full meaning of the small piece of reiastu that he still carried of hers. It wasn't just some happy coincidence so that he could track her soul. It was her heart. He carried her with him every day. So why was he mourning something he hadn't lost?

After all, the afterlife lasted a long time. It was a possible eternity that he had to carry the precious heart inside him until he could reunite it again with the heart he had given her.

"Ok, I'm done now! I'm through sulking, all right? I get it." It even almost felt like he was talking to Rukia. He wanted to tell her to stop being so noisy about it. He wanted to throw a smirk over his shoulder at her and see her eyebrow twitch with the desire to clock him for his tone. He felt… pretty good.

"Good. Took you long enough."

There was a split second that he would have bet his life on that being an apparition of his lonely mind. Merely a figment of his imagination conjuring up what he most wanted to hear. Within the next half beat, he thought maybe he was losing his mind and honestly hearing voices. But slowly turning his head to the left, he saw the most amazing thing that even his deprived, longing heart couldn't have fabricated.

There, no more than thirty odd paces away from him, stood Rukia, his Rukia, just as he remembered her. Her soft black hair reaching down just below her chin, her wide, discerning eyes a brilliant color between indigo and sapphire, and delicately plump lips set in a tired smirk. She was dressed in a common blue and yellow yukata and looked slightly on the frail side, as if recovering from one of their many past battles. But it was unmistakenly, undoubtly her.

Without any motor control whatsoever, all Ichigo could manage was a soft whisper of "Rukia…"

Letting out a tired, but amused huff the spirit woman walked toward the frozen captain. He could hear the slight sound of grass beneath her feet and saw her hair move with the wind. She was real. Oh heavenly god, she was real and walking toward him!

"You're lucky I don't have the energy or you'd be clutching at least one body part right now, dummy." Teasing him, just as she always had, it made him want to laugh and cry and shout and jump and praise, all at once.

"B-but… I don't understand… How is it that you… I saw… What…?" Stumbling over every thought flying through his head all at once, he still couldn't fully comprehend the blessing standing right before him. He was almost too scared to reach out and touch her, too fearful that it may turn out to be just a dream.

A small laugh, a light an airy chuckle from her and he felt goose bumps all over. "Idiot, that was what Urahara has been trying to explain to you."

"Urahara what?" Distracting him from her beautifully shaped mouth as it moved to talk to him for a moment, he blinked up to look into her eyes. He stopped all movement, having only just then realizing he had been stepping closer to her as well, leaning as close as he dared.

She stood so patiently in front of him, they were less than an arm's length away and both so casual about their nearness. He wanted nothing more than to fold her into his arms and never let go and it took all it had in him to wait for her to finish talking. Besides, the view was just as nice.

"I passed on back to Soul Society but recovered my memories. My soul couldn't change, couldn't reincarnate again. Not after it had met with the missing piece of me that," she paused, licking her lips in a shy manner that Ichigo felt was just plain cruel, "that you carry. It was like lighting candles. I remembered what happened, who I was, and my soul needed to be whole. It was because you found me, Ichigo."

His body shivered at her voice lowering into a whisper as she said his name. Her eyes softening as she stared back into his. "I'm back here because you found me and you kept me with you."

It was when he could see the forming of moisture in her jewel-like eyes that he couldn't hold back. Almost lunging forward he wrapped her tightly inside his arms and pressed her into his chest. One hand behind her head to gently keep her there while the other pressed against her back to mold her body into his. Her small hands reached behind him to grab onto his captain's haori as hard as she could, pressing her face into his chest to try and quell the tears threatening to fall.

"I would never leave you, Rukia." He whispered with conviction and choked emotion.

"I know." She whispered back, muffled by his clothing.

They swayed there together, nature around almost moving in tune with their embrace. It felt wonderful to feel her solid again him, her body warm and alive. And she knew. She knew once again exactly when he felt close to giving up and appeared. She knew exactly what he needed to hear. And after so long, decades upon decades without her, there was no way he was letting her go now.

Leaning back only just enough to look down upon her face, Ichigo placed two fingers under her chin to lift her eyes to his. Their watery depths were full of the same emotions he was experiencing: longing, gratitude, and contentment. His hand slowly lifted from her chin as his palm settled against the curve of her jaw, holding her face so tenderly as the pad of his thumb brushed her cheek. Warm chocolate brown eyes gazed fondly down into deep ocean blues with intensity.

"Don't ever leave me again," he whispered, not breaking eye contact.

Rukia let out a shaken breath and opened her mouth to reply. But she wasn't given the chance to voice her thoughts as the shinigami captain leaned down to gently capture her lips in his. Interlocking together, their eyes slipped close, her with a sigh of pleasure and him with a small groan of satisfaction. Mouths moved against each other slowly and deeply, learning their first real taste of each other that they waited a lifetime for.

Rukia rose on her toes to get closer, gripping against his clothes for support. Her growing fervor lead Ichigo to push past her entrance with his tongue to taste her fully. Bodies shivering in overwhelming joy and hunger at the first touch of his tongue to hers.

Gripping each other tightly, they felt around each other's desires and soft mouths. Ichigo learned that she practically keened when he dove deep. Rukia learned his body tensed in a delicious manner when her teeth gently nipped.

Sometime later, their soul kissing and passion slowly eased itself down to a slow and easy tide. Their lips very slowly interlocking, tasting and feeling each other at an unhurried and deliberate pace. The ache for each other lying just underneath a patient exterior of wanting to fully savor each new step of their relationship. Pushing off each other's mouths again and again, brushing swollen lips against one another, and feeling labored breathing against their faces, they had never been more at peace. The thrill of the first kiss, so intimate, vulnerable, fantastic, exhilarating, making them nearly tremble in their embrace.

Slowly, tentatively, eyes opened to view one another's flushed faces. Ichigo's mouth slowly broke out into the happiest, most pure, and silliest grin Rukia thought she had ever seen on his face. The light blush across his cheeks not enough to make him shy about how deeply he tasted her or how tight his arms were around her. He had a lot more time to accept his feelings for her with such comfort and he was so handsome in his easy way of showing it.

The dark-haired woman hadn't had near as long to ready herself for such open displays of affection and desire. Blushing crimson but sporting her own silly smile, she averted her eyes to the side and bit her bottom lip, feeling an odd overwhelming desire to giggle aloud.

"Let me take you home, Rukia," he whispered against her skin, his lips pressed against the soft hair on her forehead. She nodded and squeezed his chest one last time, taking in his scent, before pulling out to smile up at his peaceful, confident face.

Ichigo took her hand and interlaced their fingers together as they slowly walked back in the direction of Seireitei, never once loosening his grip on her. Just in case.

"How long has it really been, Ichigo?" Rukia asked, glancing up at her orange-hair partner.

"You don't know?" he responded curiously, still wrapping his mind around the logistics of her being sent back to him, complete and whole.

"How could I possibly have a sense of time with everything that's happened? Urahara told me it took more than a few years to be reincarnated to begin with." She explained in a serious manner, in awe herself.

"A very long time, Rukia," he whispered. "It's been a very long time… Wait, how much do you remember?"

"Well, I remember after the war very clearly. You dying… And I…" She let out a shaky sigh and looked away, though stepping nearer to him. "Well, you know that part."

"And being Mizuki?"

"I remember that only like it was a dream. The memories aren't sharp and clear like my own. It's like I was witness to someone else's life." Making a half shrug as she blinked up at the clouds above them. "And then the next thing I know, I'm waking up in a strange room with no clear idea how I got there."

"That brings me to my next question, how did you get here?" Raising a curious eyebrow, he looked down at his love.

"Urahara knew this might happen. And since he couldn't get you to listen to him," Rukia looked back up at him with obvious amusement that she tried in vain to hide behind exasperation. "He came to find me himself. Apparently I came back somewhere out here in the forest but I was still unconscious. He used the same type of locator he said you had and he took me to the Rukongai to rest, build up my strength until my memories returned and I woke up."

Ichigo's mouth slightly opening in realization, wanting to kick himself for it being so obvious. And for wishing he could have found her sooner. But before he could admit to anything she continued.

"It didn't take long of him filling me in on the situation for me to realize that you needed sense beaten back into you." She grinned like a beacon up at his surprised face. "I could feel you walking out here, not far from me, because we're connected."

He couldn't hold back his answering smile.

"That we are, Rukia."

Author's Notes: Oh my goodness! I finally finished this one-shot-turned-mini-series! Yay! I hope the last chapter was worth it, everyone! And I hope no one wants to beat me up anymore! And I seriously edited the crap out of this last chapter. And I'm still unsure if I'm fully satisfied… But I couldn't beat myself up over this anymore and felt I just needed to let it go. So PLEASE review and leave me a comment full of your thoughts, feelings, etc.

I'm open to suggestions and requests for one-shots too – the more unique, the better. But I won't promise I'll use EVERY one.

Also noteworthy – the title of this chapter comes from Rukia's greeting she uses more than once in Bleach when greeting Ichigo after a long absence. It roughly translates into "It's been a while." I always found it profound.