After another day of continuous yelling, arguing, and explosions, Isshin had finally conquered the ability to create a cannonball. Everyone thanked whoever looked over them in a quick prayer. They decided that at dawn break of tomorrow, they would be launched into the air and break into Soul Society.
The night came and went as the women of the group were excited of the flight launch. The other two members hoped that their plan wouldn't come crashing down, literally.
"Is everyone here?" Kakaku asked.
"It seems like it. Though, you little brother seems to be missing," Yoruichi answered, waving its tail lazily.
"I think I remember seeing him in the dojo. He was saying something and reading a book," Masaki recalled.
The older sister exhaled deeply and looked towards the doorway to the dojo. When the door showed no signs of opening, she walked closer to the cannon.
"Wait!" a voice screamed. Ganju came running out in a new set of clothes and holding a piece of paper folded a million times. "The hero always arrives late," he smiled and posed like a cheesy action hero would.
At first, everyone looked shock that he would actually say that. After a second of recovery, Rukia asked, "Aren't you just going to see us off?"
"No way. I still owe Ichigo my life for saving me back there in that forest. He wasn't like a normal Shinigami who just bragged about reiatsu. He acted like my brother. But then, my brother got killed by a Shinigami."
"Ganju!"
"You be quiet and listen to this too, Sis," the younger brother ordered. The Shiba leader looked shocked that Ganju had just ordered her around for once. Rukia tensed at the words "kill" and "brother". The petite officer looked at the leader in hopes of making him stop, but she did no move to do so.
"My brother was a genius. He was accepted into the institute after his first try and finished the six year curriculum in only a year. Five years later, he became a lieutenant. But then, he was betrayed by his comrades, the Shinigami. I was still young, but I remember that face of the demon Death God who killed him, and the face of my brother thanking the female Shinigami, Rukia Kuchiki," his eyes glared at the suspected murderer. The young Shinigami held her breath for a moment, speechless. She mentally slapped herself for forgetting about Ganju. Kaien was his brother too.
"Ganju, I'm sorry, I can explain-"
"Ganju. You sure are smart, just like how you described your brother" Masaki commented, interrupting Rukia's sentence, "But your not too keen on keeping your mouth shut. You kept your hate for Rukia inside of you this whole time, didn't you? You wanted to have Rukia train so she could rescue Ichigo. But when the time came, you wanted us to all exclude her from the group because of what you saw that night years ago. You wanted her to feel the "pain" your brother felt when he was "betrayed" by his comrades.
"But even if she did kill your brother, I can tell you that she wouldn't have done it on purpose. If she truly did want to kill your brother, why wait until then, at that moment? And why bring him here of all places? You don't know the answer, do you?" Masaki asked. Her eyes accusingly glared at Ganju.
"I'm not asking you to forget you hate for Rukia. I'm only asking that you wait until you hear the everyone's side of this story before you make any judgments on anyone. Though, I'm afraid that Rukia is a bit shaken up by your accusation of her killing your brother. So I'm suggesting that you wait until this whole fiasco is over to ask her about it. Then you can decide who's truly at fault. Until then, I hope you will be satisfied those few words of forgiveness," the mother finished.
Ganju only stared at the mother in disbelief. Isshin smiled proudly at his wife, resisting the urge to hug her and tell her that he was proud of her to make that wonderful speech. Kakaku remained quiet but smiled when the determined mother knocked some sense into her idiot brother. Rukia could only looked stunned at Ichigo's mother. The caramel eyes of the mother looked down towards the noble adoptive.
"I told you, you could always look up for me for help. All you need to do is call me "Okaa-san" for now on. Do we have a deal?"
Rukia nodded, thankful that she had come along on their mission.
"Hmp. Fine, but you better not ask me to watch her back. Even if she's a friend of Ichigo, there's no way I can still trust her a hundred percent," the younger Shiba agreed and looked down on the midget officer as if he was better than the raven haired Shinigami.
"Thank you," the wife smiled and walked back to her place near her husband.
"Ganju," Kakaku called after finally recovering from all the surprises she received today.
The younger brother stared at Rukia once more with an expression of mixed emotions and then ran to his sister's call.
"Ganju," Kakaku repeated and smiled, "It looks like your mind is made up. Just don't run away mid-battle, brat. If you want to do it, give it all you got!"
"Yes ma'am!"
"And don't forget that bargain with Masaki over there. Shiba clansmen don't go back on our word. I want you to watch Kuchiki's back and she'll watch yours. So you can forget about what you just said,"
"B-b-but," Ganju complained.
"Kakaku," Rukia whispered.
"No but's with me! You're going through this as a team! You all have to trust one another. Even if she did kill our brother, you're dead meat if you don't watch each other's back," the Shiba leader finalized. Ganju looked at Rukia with dissatisfaction. Rukia refused to meet his eyes.
"Now is everyone ready? I'm not waiting for little brats anymore," the fireworks expert smirked. Everyone answered "yes" with determined faces. Even Rukia, who was still feeling guilty of killing the Shiba's oldest brother, began to look at the cannon in hopes of retrieving her old friend.
It was explained beforehand that once everyone entered the cannon, they were to form the cannonball. The instructions were followed immediately and the blue orb surrounded them. Outside, Kakaku had begun to say the spell's incarnation.
"Kakaku Fire Method Number Two! Kagizaki!" The cannon was fired and the guests inside were all launched into the sky. Everyone had braced for a strong impact, but were surprised as it was launching as easy as a plane would.
"Huh? That wasn't the impact I was expecting," Masaki observed.
"Just wait. We're only in the first stage," Ganju smiled and pulled out his scroll. Suddenly, the orb was lunged in another direction at a great speed.
"Everyone! I'm going to recite the continuation spell. During then, we're going to need to focus our reiatsu so it's all equal to each other. This way, the spell would have more accuracy and we probably won't die from the crash," Ganju explained. Everyone nodded in agreement. They tried to match each other's reiatsu as best they could, but in the end they weren't able to make ends met.
"Isshin, could you please lower it some more?" Masaki asked.
The father nodded and took a deep breath to lower his spiritual pressure.
"Kurosaki-san, a little lower please," Rukia asked, struggling to raise her reiatsu to match the amount Isshin was emitting.
"I don't think I can lower it anymore," Isshin said.
"Isshin, I didn't think you were this unskilled," Yoruichi commented, chuckling at the adult Death God's continued attempts to lower his reiatsu.
"Be quite, you filthy cat," the father insulted.
"What did you call me?" the black cat asked, raising its reiatsu enough to be considered threatening.
"Isshin. Not now!"
"A filthy cat without a sense of beauty," Isshin mentally smacked himself for starting this whole conversation. Yoruichi felt the last nerve of tolerance it had for that man snap into two. The cat scratched the bearded man in the face which caused the man to scream in pain.
"Masaki! Help me!"
"It's your fault for getting in this problem in the first place," the mother sighed, not bothering to look at her husband's helpless state.
"Oh! Masaki! Even my Masaki cannot help me in my helpless state! Why, Soul Society, have you taken not only my son, but my wife's caring nature?" the husband screamed.
"This really isn't the time Isshin!"
All of the loud yelling from the mother and father and the constant yells of Yoruichi's beauty rant resulted in Ganju breaking his concentration and accidentally said a line twice. That resulted into more arguing between the parents, Yoruichi, and Ganju. The spiritual pressure emitted by the three rose gradually to the point that it could overload the cannonball.
"Everyone! Calm down!" Rukia yelled, attempting to calm down the trio.
"You be quiet murderer!"
"Ganju! I thought we had a deal!" Masaki yelled.
CRACK!
Everyone stopped from their arguments to look for the source of the sound. With grim faces, they found a crack in their sphere. Isshin was then reminded of his training period with Kakaku and how that crack was strangely nostalgic for him.
"There's no choice now! Everyone pour in your spiritual power! Isshin, try to restrain yours a bit!" Yoruichi ordered. The cannonball crashed into an invisible force covering Soul Society.
Below them, several officers and even a few captains were gawking at their shield being penetrated by the sphere.
"It must be an extremely dense spiritual force if it can go through the shield," one captain said.
But unknown to them, the cannonball had begun to dissolve above their heads. Its passengers didn't fall to the ground, however. They stayed in mid-flight, as if there was no gravity pulling them down.
"No one panic! Right now, the cannonball has hit the shield and is now dissolving. They are only momentarily intertwined. Soon it will begin to whirl, then burst and be destroyed," Yoruichi informed.
Everyone stared in panic. The spiritual force became denser and began to have a whirlwind type pull.
"It has begun! Quick! Everyone grab the person closest to you!"
"Masaki!" Isshin grabbed his wife. Masaki pouted slightly at her husband's fake tears of how he almost lost her. She looked over towards Rukia and saw that she didn't have a partner, but neither did Ganju.
"Rukia! Ganju! Grab hands!" the mother yelled. The Shiba refused to acknowledge his brother's murderer and refused to grab hold.
Yoruichi saw the conflict and pushed the younger brother towards the Kuchiki adoptive and had them lightly touching each other.
Ganju would have argued and tried to a fight with the cat, but the pull had begun to become even stronger. A great flash of light and the two pairs and Yoruichi were separated, each being represented by a comet-like glow heading towards the ground in three different directions.
Officers who witnessed the event, ran to their divisions to warn others and to capture the intruders. Captains were dispatched to find the captive Ichigo Kurosaki and could not be bothered to help obtain the ryoka. The calm that held Soul Society together was finally broken and had the City of Souls in chaos.
"Ichigo-san, wake up," a sing-song voice lightly said. Ichigo's amber eyes slowly opened to a dark room. The single window that was behind him allowed silver moonlight to shine through and created enough light for Ichigo to see a few feet in front of him. But what he saw made him wish he could destroy the window and fill the room with darkness.
What he saw was a silver haired man sitting patiently on a stool. The man wore a captain's haori that was covered in blood, but he didn't seem to mind it too much. He had a perpetual smile that made his appearance even more creepier than it should have, and his eyes were seemingly closed shut. And it all made Ichigo's blood boil.
"Gin Ichimaru," Ichigo snarled, saying the name with great distaste.
"Good, you're awake. I was worrying that you were going to die," the captain said happily, ignoring the red head's spiteful tone.
"You're lying. You're just following Aizen's commands. I bet he said to make sure I don't die today," Ichigo retorted and began to attempt to sit up.
"You never know, Ichigo. I could have done it out of the goodness of my heart. And, you shouldn't try to sit up right now. You're injuries were healed by me, and ya' should know by now that I'm no Fourth Division officer," the silver haired man warned, smirking at Ichigo's attempts to be in a sitting position. After a few tries at sitting up normally, Ichigo had settled to just lean against the wall behind him.
As his eyes began to adjust to the darkness, and he could see that Zangetsu was in a corner that was furthest away from him. And judging by his current condition and situation, it would be very unlikely that he would be able to get it anytime soon. Right next to his zanpaktou, he saw a iron door. A faint trail of blood leading from the door convinced Ichigo to believe his suspicions were true.
"Why did you save me? I was fighting Byakuya, wasn't I? I don't think that he would like it that you would just kidnap me all of the sudden of a fight," the red head asked, curious to why his kidnapper had done something that could drastically hurt their plans if he was seen.
The captain in front of him frowned slightly at the statement. He sighed before answering.
"Your senses are slow now. Didn't ya know that it wasn't the real Byakuya? It was an illusion, made by Aizen himself. I thought that it wouldn't work, that you were too smart for that, but it seems that I was wrong. I guess owe Tousen dinner now," he paused, frowning even more at his captive's shocked expression, "You're not the same as you once were, Ichigo. You're actually becoming predictable, and actually, quite dull."
"I'm sorry if I can't quite live up to you expectations, Gin," Ichigo growled, accenting the last word of the sentence. He had already recovered from the shock and a amber eyes were filled with malice. They glared at Gin, hoping that he would burn into flames that very moment.
Gin leaned back on the stool slightly, almost like he was remembering something from the past and avoided the teen's hateful glare for a few moments. During those few moments, Gin's face was without worry, something Ichigo hasn't seen for a while.
"It's too bad you decided to move out of my division," Captain Ichimaru commented, suddenly changing the topic, "And here I thought that you would stay in my division the whole way through too. But then you left, just when everyone was warming to ya' too. You know, Izuru still bakes a cake for your birthday every year still too. Why did you run away like that? Are you a coward?" the fox-like captain asked.
"I'm not a coward. The things you were doing weren't right. Maiming innocent officers like that, it's against the law," Ichigo felt the anger inside him rise as Gin continued to question his past decisions.
"Then why didn't you stop us? You could have, ya' know. Back then, I think even Captain Aizen was a bit fearful of your power, especially ever since that incident. Nowadays, I think he could care less about you. Your power is diminishing. Ever since you left to the thirteenth division, you could feel yourself becoming slowly weaker. Do ya know why?"
Ichigo stared intently at Gin, scanning his face for a sign that he was lying. The guardian felt his heart race when he could find nothing. Inside, he knew that everything that the prodigy in front of him was right. He was becoming weaker by the days. And Gin, Aizen, and possibly Tousen knew everything about it. He had to stop them as soon as he could. He had too. He had-
His head began to throb from all of the thoughts. He needed to rest. There was too much to think about right now and his energy hasn't fully recovered yet.
When the silver haired captain saw that he was going to get no response, Gin stood up and walked closer to Ichigo. He bent his knees so he was eye level to the teenager. Ichigo didn't notice how close the captain was in relation to him due to his headache.
"Do you want me to save your family?" the silver haired man asked. His voice held no tone of sarcasm in it. He was dead serious, and it was proven by his slightly open eyes.
Ichigo looked up at the captain. His headache was subsiding for the moment. Memories of his past came up and he looked down to the ground again, trying to rid himself of memories of candles and swords. Light blue eyes blinked as he saw the teenager become suddenly quiet and his breathing becoming more softer.
"I'll just take that as a 'yes' then," Gin whispered as he stood back up and walked away silently from Ichigo. He took off his haori and threw it over the giant sword. He took a new haori off the rack on the other side of the door.
Gin looked back once more and saw that Ichigo had dozed off to sleep again.
"See ya later, Ichigo," Gin smiled an honest smile, one that isn't forced on. He locked the door from the outside and walked away from the jail house.
"Do not get too attached to the boy again, Gin," a familiar voice ordered from behind. It came from the shadows, so the person couldn't be seen. But the captain prodigy had worked with the man long enough and knew exactly who he was.
"Ah, Tousen, ya' know me better than that. I'm not one for sad stories. Now what would you want for your end of the bargain? After all, you did win our little bet," Gin smiled. The blind man walked away in silence, not answering Gin's question.
In front of him, the sun was rising and three streaks of light shot though the air. One was coming closer to his direction. The spiritual pressure it emitted was a similar match to Ichigo's. It flew over the third division's captain's head and landed approximately three miles away.
Gin resisted trying to see what had landed there. He didn't have anymore time to spare to go look at some comet. He flash stepped quickly to Seireitei. It was just about time for the show to begin.