Pairings: This chapter contains slight Gin/Byakuya
Rating: M
Warnings: There is also slight OOC (sorry), dark thoughts, some errors, and it's really short
Disclaimer: I don't own Bleach Tite Kubo does.
It was only harder as he looked at the boy who lived in the house. He had lost his mind as he looked at him deeper. As he went through the manor, as he served and prepared his food, Gin was losing himself slowly in what this boy was offering him. He knew that he was falling of course. Even as Aizen's voice was echoing through his head, all he could think of was look at the young boy, thinking only of him. At that moment, he knew his mission was put on the back burner.
Every moment he could, he would go to Byakuya, cater to his every whim, waiting for Kuchiki Ginrei to be working in his office. Byakuya was different than everyone else in the manor, he had spunk. He didn't act proper, he was tough, he talked shit, he was something that Gin had never heard of in nobility. Most of the blue bloods were to above everything to even think of talking to a servant, but not Byakuya, he was different.
Ginrei told him not to talk to him, told him that he would kill him if he even thought about it, if that were the case, Gin shouldn't have made it past his first day. Yet the boy took a liking to him and smiled at how "proper" he was acting as he called him "Byakuya-san." They were polar opposites, like Heaven and Earth.
He walked into a room where Byakuya had been sitting, drinking a cup of tea. Kuchiki had ignored his grandson until there was nothing left. Byakuya waited desperately for him to come to the manor, but there was never any sign of him. Gin walked closer as he saw a look of sorrow in the boy's eyes.
"What's wrong?" Gina asked, the noble looking at him with watering grey eyes.
"Nothing," he breathed. "He's just busy all the time, I have to understand that."
Gin scoffed as he thought about the way the old man had been acting around his grandson. Byakuya was invisible to him. Everyday that went by, Byakuya was falling deeper into this distance that he knew he would never be able to crawl out of. He was being factored out of Kuchiki Ginrei's life. But as Gin looked at him, it was different; he was all that he saw, all that he wanted to see. Byakuya was the most wondrous thing that he had ever laid eyes on. He was something that should be treasured, and seeing tears in those eyes made Gin's heart break.
"Do you need some company?" Gin asked. "I can talk to you after the work is done."
"Your work is done," Byakuya smiled. "I'm in charge, everyone else is gone."
Gin moved to sit in front of the boy, seeing a smile roll across his lips. "So, Kuchiki Clan…"
"It's not that great, just a huge steaming pile of bullshit," Byakuya shook his head. "I'm told how to act, how to look, how to talk. It's like I'm trapped and I can't get myself out of it. You must feel the same way in the Gotei 13."
Gin shook his head. "I pretty much do what I want. Since Aizen-taichou was promoted after the disappearance of the previous captain I have been so absorbed in work, I can't follow those kinds of rules."
"You're lucky," Byakuya whimpered. "I can't even choose who I love."
"They choose for you?" Gin asked.
"I had an arranged marriage, but she's gone now," Byakuya shook his head. "I hated her so much for leaving, I mean I always hated her, but when she left it was like she left me nothing more than a broken masterpiece. There's no one who's going to want me now?"
Gin cocked his head as he took in the words. "You mean no one wants to marry someone who isn't a virgin?"
Byakuya almost choked on his breath as a blush rolled across his face. "That's not it. My marriage never went through and the clan would hate to hear that I've been sullied like that. They'd disown me in a heartbeat."
"Strict," Gin continued.
"You get used to it; you just stop thinking of yourself as capable of making your own decisions. You just have to make it seem like you're something that people own," Byakuya answered. "You must know that feeling."
"No," Gin closed his eyes as he thought of how Aizen was using him as a puppet, a puppet that he almost killed once or twice in the past. Gin looked at Byakuya and saw something that he knew no one had ever seen before, a trapped boy. Byakuya was his age, maybe a little older, but as he gazed at him, he knew some degree of his pain, he knew some ounce of his hurt, he knew that this boy was something that has only been forced into a life, he never had goals of his own.
"You're lucky," Byakuya took another sip of tea. "I don't even get to breathe on my own."
"I wouldn't know what that feels like," Gin smiled falsely.
Byakuya stood up as he finished his cup of tea. "I guess that's the difference between me and the whole world. They all have their own path, a path that they can change, and I have a path that was made for me, a path with gates, a path over dark water. I want to drown, Ichimaru Gin. I want to fall into that water and never be found."
"That's serious," Gin breathed.
"You were lucky; you escaped death, live your life knowing that there is a world outside of this," Byakuya walked out of the room, leaving Gin with a cloud of darkness. This boy, who was only a little older than him, was starting to die in front of him, yet he reached out to a servant and was able to put all of the pressure that had been destroying him and put some of that on him as well.
Gin was connected to him, and as he looked at him, he saw a boy who was going to grow up to be someone cold and detached. He stood up and walked to the library. Aizen destroying this clan would be the only way to save him from what the Kuchiki Clan had in store for him. He walked deeper into the library; this was the first step on the road to saving Kuchiki Byakuya from the path that he was walking on. He was going to save him from drowning.
I know that it took a while to get this chapter up, and now it's really short, but I thought it had a great impact. Gin's goals have changed since last time, but as the story progresses more will happen.
I will try to get the next one up sooner.
Happy New Year.