Byakuya's concern for his sister

She responds at last; as she opens her eyes, she is shocked to find her brother at her side.

"Brother, what are you…?"

"I was walking past and heard you having a bad dream. Are you alright?" asks Byakuya.

"Yeah, it was just a weird dream…" said Rukia embarrassed.

Byakuya makes a move to leave her room. Rukia panics and quickly grabs his arm out of instinct. He turns around with a raised eyebrow at her actions.

"Please, don't leave me alone…I don't know whether or not I can sleep after that…" she says, her eyes pleading.

"It was that bad, huh?" he says gently. She nods her head in response. He can tell by the look in her eyes that her dream was still haunting her. He gently holds her and she relaxes.

"Tell you what, you can stay in my room tonight, okay?" he says kindly.

"Thank you, big brother…" she says.

Rukia follows him to his room. She is mildly surprised, as she had never even been in his room before. He sits down, and he lets Rukia lay her head in his lap.

"Mind telling me what the dream was about?" he asks.

"Promise you won't laugh?" said Rukia.

"I promise…"

"Rabbit-shaped Hollows…" she says finally.

"Rabbit-shaped Hollows?!" he says in disbelief.

"A lot of them."

Byakuya sighs, as he knows all too well of Rukia's love of bunny rabbits.

"And let me guess, you couldn't bring yourself to kill them…"

"I would have destroyed them even if they were rabbit-shaped. That's not the part which scared me…"

"What was scaring you so bad?" asked Byakuya.

"It was when…Ichigo came. At first he looked normal in his Soul Reaper uniform, but then…"

"Then what happened?"

"He started turning into a Hollow himself; the thing that caught my attention the most was that he didn't have a hole and he still had his Zanpaku-to!"

Byakuya's eyes widened as she described her dream. He recalled something similar to this after the incident where he fought Ichigo up on the Execution Grounds. Ichigo was near defeat when he started to gain a Hollow's mask!

"That would be frightening…" said Byakuya finally.

"He and the Hollows started attacking me; though what really caught me off guard was when I drew my Soul Slayer to defend myself…"

Byakuya's eyebrows were raised once again as she said this.

"What was wrong with your Zanpaku-to?"

"You wouldn't believe me if I told you…"

"Try me. After what I've heard so far, I can start to see why you were so afraid."

"My Zanpaku-to…it wasn't even a sword at all. It was…"

"It was…?"

"A…carrot." Rukia said finally.