Aizen's Kingdom
~Ice Breaker~

How does the chaos become sanity? The chaos simply doesn't melt away, despite someone giving orders to do so. Isshin held onto the preteen, while Ichimaru was on the ground next to him, bleeding due to the wounds his own wife had given him. Truth of the matter was, Rangiku was distraught still, and Tomo Atsuo was having a rough time of things. The one thing that was all right, was the fact that Toshiro had finally calmed down.

As the ice melted around him, Isshin found himself stepping over to the small fray, and when he got close to where Rangiku had her sword crossed with the fukutaicho of the tenth, she turned to look at the eldest Shiba, her words coming out. "I don't understand. Why are you siding with Gin in this matter? He put our son's life in danger."

At that, Toshiro's held jerked up, and from the corner of his eye, the captain of the tenth division could see the confusion written all over the boy's face. He used his hand to tug on the man's clothing, indicating for the man to let him down. Isshin lowered the white haired youth, and knelt down so that the boy could sit on his knee, due to the fact his legs were to weak to stand on.

"Matsumoto... you aren't my mother." At this, the fighting between the two fukutaicho stopped and the one of the tenth withdrew his weapon.

Rangiku's eyes began to tear up. "Shiro-chan, please don't do this to me too. I got enough of this from your father."

"Don't you realize that this is some sick game he's playing with you!" Toshiro snapped out. "I know full well that I wasn't born in Soul Society. As much as I want you to be my mother, that is impossible."

"I think it is time I actually come forward with a piece of truth, otherwise Shiro-chan will continue to think that everyone is against him." Gin stated, suddenly standing up as his own zampaktuo disappeared. He limped over to where Hyorinmaru lay on the ground, picked it up and walked over dropping it into Toshiro's lap. "Could we please go inside?"

At that, Rangiku folded her arms across her chest. "Understand, Ichimaru, I am not one bit happy with you."

With that, they headed down the stairs, where Kaien and Ichigo were trying to subdue Soifon without getting hit by her zampaktuo. Rangiku and Tomo Atsuo helped Gin down the stairs, his blood dripping onto the ground as he went. Kukaku, who had finished her duties outside let out a sharp whistle. "Soifon, do you want me to tell Yourichi that you are tearing up my home?"

At that, the taicho of the second division stopped and came hurtling over to where the other woman was and bowed her head. "Lady Shiba! I am so sorry for the intrusion. I was trying to capture the ryoka who entered Soul Society without permission."

"Him? He's not a ryoka." Isshin stated. "Unfortunately, he's my son... albeit it is impossible for him to exist in this world, he's still family. Can't you see the resemblance between him and the other Shiba Taicho."

At that, Ichigo paused, turning his head to finally look at the male who stood in front of him. He blinked a couple of times. "Wait a second. You look like me."

At that, the male suddenly let out a laugh and pulled the substitute Soul Reaper into a headlock, suddenly rubbing his knuckles on the top of the teens orange head. "I think you mean you look like your uncle. Where did he get this color of hair from? I'm guessing his mother?"

At that, Toshiro blinked a couple of times as he was set down against the wall. He then tugged on Isshin's sleeve. "First question... you aren't really my taicho, are you?"

At that, the man let out a deep sigh. "Yes... and no. I am the person who you knew as your taicho, but in this world, I never got to be your taicho."

"Second question... this one is for Kurosaki." At that, the child genius hiked his thumb at Isshin. "He's your father?"

Ichigo blinked a couple of times, not noting the cracking of the white haired boy's voice. "Yeah... I was told that because my mom and dad didn't meet in this world, I'm actually not supposed to exist."

"That means your sister Karin doesn't exist in this world?" At this, everyone simply looked at the horrified look on the child's face. "How can you exist, while she can't?"

At that, the orange haired teen snapped out his words. "How the hell should I know Toshiro! That is one of the questions I've been asking myself!"

The boy simply looked at the ground, his face completely sullen about the entire matter. He then paused, his mind twisting around the information he was getting. "Then... Isshin Taicho is the father of Karin."

At that, the boy's face suddenly paled, while his cheeks flushed red. The eldest Shiba let out a deep sigh. "For some reason, I don't want to know where your mind is going."

"Chibi Taicho tends to think in worse case scenarios. He's been that way really since he was a child." Gin stated, as he was set down and the healing process begun.

"How the hell would you know?" Toshiro muttered, folding his arms across his chest. "I don't trust you."

"Well, I've heard his story, I think he should explain things to us, about his side of things from the other world." Isshin stated.

The small child protested though. "He turned against all of us! He helped Aizen."

"Actually..." Ichigo piped up at that point in time. "If he was really a bad guy, I would have been dead a lot sooner. I crossed swords with him a second time, and there was no desire to kill me."

"What does that have to do with anything Kurosaki?" Toshiro spat out his words.

"He's talking about the fact I was playing double agent the whole time kiddo." Gin stated, watching as the boy's eyes went wide. "The secret I've been keeping, well... I had been planning on killing Aizen and stopping him even before I entered the academy, and look what good that did."

"I don't understand." The boy shrunk back to the one place of security, leaning up against the eldest Shiba.

This caused Gin to let out a deep sigh. "The truth is, when I was around your age, I lived to the north peacefully with Rangiku. We went there to get away from the West Rukon district, because there were bad memories."

"I remember that. We came back because we found out that we couldn't take care of a child on your own, which is why we came to stay with your mother." The busty female stated, only to receive a glare from her husband, and a look of utter horror from Toshiro.

"Don't pay her any mind Shiro-chan. Focus on what I am saying here." Ichimaru stated, quickly pointing a finger at his chest. "Well, one day. Rangiku was attacked by some of Aizen's thugs. They took something from her, and Aizen put it into the hogyoku."

At that, the boy found his body suddenly tensing up, his hands tightening around Isshin's uniform to the point his knuckles turned white. Gin continued though. "What Rangiku lost was the precious memories we had. She forgot everything but her name, which is why I told her my name was Ichimaru Gin. I wasn't the only person she forgot though."

"If it had been just myself, I likely could have lived without worrying about getting her memories back. But she forgot who our child was." Ichimaru watched Toshiro carefully, and then spoke up quietly. "I took you, placed you in the care of my mother, knowing full well that you would be well taken care of. I dropped off money every so often..."

At that, the temperature in the room dropped. Two bright teal eyes darted up, looking the man straight in the face. "How could you! How could you make me think, all this time that I wasn't born in Soul Society! Hell, how could you make me think that I had parents who didn't care about me at all! Do you care at all, Ichimaru?"

At that, the man gave him a weak smile. "In hind sight, I could have possibly gotten Rangiku accumulated to the idea that she was a mother, but I was a child and thought in childish ways, including the now. I wanted the problem fixed and what I thought was the solution, wasn't the solution. By the time I had gotten in, keeping you out of Aizen's hands became another priority. Yell all you want at me, because I know I deserve it."

However, the small taicho simple shut his mouth, his cheeks puffing out in anger while he glared at the man. Rangiku though poked at the wound, causing Gin to yelp. "I think this is better punishment. I don't understand this other world stuff. Why all of this?"

"The hogyoku grants wishes." Isshin stated. "It grants wishes only to twist them around into something a person really doesn't want."

"For example?" Kaien spoke up.

"For example, my wish was to finally be a family with Ran-chan and Shiro-chan." Gin stated, spitting out his words. "I got this in this world, but at what cost? The kid asked me earlier, what I had done to his legs. Well, his inability to walk, and his need to learn to walk now is the fault of my wish."

At that, Ichigo glanced at the ceiling. "I wanted to protect everyone, no matter what the cost. The cost was, I get to exist in this world, but my sisters don't."

At that, Toshiro found himself swallowing, as his mind was thinking. Gin tilted his head towards Rangiku. "I always knew, once she found you in the Rukongai, that she wanted to be the best mother figure to you, no longer drinking. She didn't know you were her own, but she had that feeling. Well... truth is, she became a great mother, but in this world she became over protective, stifling you."

At that, the woman elbowed Gin in the ribs and hissed into his ear. "What was that for?"

"You do realize that he made a wish too?" The male hissed back.

"I likely made the wish of being here, in my position as a captain. I was likely thinking about what happened to Toshiro during the battle, and he was my fukutaicho, not to mention what happened to the fukutaicho I had now. And then there was the fact I couldn' stop my own brother's death. Each of us has something we wanted gone/"

At that, Toshiro bent his head down, a few tears falling onto his hands, which had finally losened from Isshin's clothing. "I wished I could forget hurting Hinamori like I did. I ended up forgetting everything, and now I don't know where she is. I don't know how much my wish effected her."

Suddenly, Gin moved away from the two other fukutaicho, despite the fact he was still in need of healing. He placed a hand on Toshiro's head. "I think Hinamori wished to be with her mom and dad, so they are alive in this world."

"But that seems like a good wish." The boy stated, glancing at the ground.

"She forgot about us..." Ichimaru stated.

"That is still a good wish and sounds like something she would want!" Toshiro stated, looking up, his face twisted due to his frustration. "I know you're lying to me. You know exactly where she is, and you know that it was my stupid wish that got her into that situation."

"I refuse to tell you." Ichimaru stated rather coldly. "There is no point in making you worry."

"I'll worry anyways!" Toshiro stated, the room temperature dropping again.

Author's note – Ch19 2,072: ; Total: 20,888

So, how does one make confusion into sanity? That was one of the problems I faced in this chapter, along with two errors from last chapter that I can't fix due to a rule in the 200 prompt challenge. The first mistake was that Isshin called her "Matsumoto Rangiku", but it isn't that big of a mistake. The second mistake was, I planned on having Yorichi show up using a second gate along with everyone else, but that... just needed to be cut. And then, I got five reviews. It's not a "I won't update until I get five reviews for this chapter", but it is a "I have to update when I get five reviews", another rule of the 200 prompt challenge. It took a few tries, but finally I got the chapter I wanted.