Disclaimer: Kubo is god. Kubo is king. Tite Kubo owns everything. Except the quotes used at the start of each chapter. They were all found on the internet, and if they have an author I say who it is.

AN: See all author's notes in part one. Thanks to all who voted on what should happen to Karin, either by going to my poll or by putting it in your review. Although I do wish people had reviewed the chapter instead of just saying what their vote was. I've never really written a fight like this and was curious what people would think. Oh, and someone PM'd me pointing out that I'd made a mistake in the last chapter by having Orihime call Ichigo by his given name. It wasn't a mistake; remember that this is two years in the future and you don't know all of what's happened to the other characters. You'll have to wait for my other stories to know that.

No Warm Memories

By Lady Callista

Chapter 9: Song of Siren and Swan

OoOoOoOoOoO

It is a fearful thing to love what death can touch.

OoOoOoOoOoO

"Karin - what's going on?" Yuzu's screech filled her ears even over the screaming of the souls of the Hollows, and she spared a second as her ball rebounded to see her twin at their bedroom window, her hands clutching her head as if she was in pain.

"Stay inside!" Karin screamed. "Wake dad up, but stay inside!"

"Bakudo Number 26 - Kyakko."

Karin screamed as Yuzu suddenly vanished from sight.

"Yuzu!" The same voice that had cast the kido called out. "Don't move!"

Ignoring the other enemies for the moment, she spun towards the source of the voice, and her jaw dropped as she saw her father in shihakusho, with what could only be a zanpakuto naked in his hand.

"She's safe, I hid her from sight." Isshin said rapidly as he moved forward to stand beside his daughter. "You should go hide with her."

"You can handle them all on your own?" Karin asked sarcastically as she reclaimed her ball and launched it into what Kyokon told her was the second weakest Hollow. The fact that her father was a Shinigami only half-surprised her, and she quickly tucked away all other emotions for another time.

"Soul Society will sense this." Isshin replied as he mumbled something under his breath and a bolt of red light shot from his hand, destroying one of the strange, narrow Hollows. "They'll send help soon."

"Well, until then, we work together." Karin replied as her ball bounced back to her yet again. She'd had to learn way more about geometry and angles than she'd wanted to when training with Urahara, and now she could only appreciate it.

"They're not normal Hollows." Isshin shouted at her even as he shot another blast of light from his hand. "They're too strong for you."

"I've taken out three so far, old man." Karin shot back as she spoke to Kyokon again and found the next weakest. Although it was still fairly strong. She called up her newest power, one she'd only learned of a few months ago. She could finally talk to other souls! "Sasayaku, Kaze no Koe."

Whisper, Voice of the Wind.

I offer you release from your suffering…cause conflict within that which devoured you…

The Gillian that had been moving towards Karin froze, it's internal voices suddenly becoming conflicted, and Karin kicked her ball with a yell, destroying both the mask and the Gillian.

"Kurosaki Ichigo is gone. His friends are gone. All the Shinigami are gone." A voice suddenly spoke from behind Karin and her father, and she spun to face it, putting her back to her father's instinctively. Unlike the dozens of other opponents, this one looked more like a normal Hollow, although she could tell it was more than that. "This town should have no resistance."

"I'm Kurosaki Karin." Karin shouted at the creature, not knowing what she faced. "And I guard this town in my brother's stead."

"Then die in his stead!" The Adjuchas replied as it charged towards her.

"Karin, no!" Isshin realized what his daughter faced, and grabbed her and reversed their positions so that he faced the Adjuchas and she again faced the Gillians. "Take out the Gillians. The long white masks. One after another. If I fall, go into the house with Yuzu and hide in the barrier I set up. The one I face is beyond you."

"Dad…"

"Karin…do what I say. If the barrier falls, only you can protect your sister. If anything goes wrong, go to your sister! That's an order. " He yelled at her, his zanpakuto beginning to glow in her peripheral vision.

'If you insist on fighting, you will one day face an opponent you cannot defeat. If others with you are capable of defeating it, there is no shame in letting them do so. It is better to stay alive, and do what you can to help, than overreach your ability. Because through your death you will be no help at all.'

Urahara's words echoing in her head, Karin felt her resolve firm. "Yes, sir." Yet as she prepared to kick her ball again, she couldn't help but add, "I love you, dad."

"I love you too, Karin." Isshin replied. "Now make me proud."

Karin heard her father shunpo away from her, but trusted him to still be guarding her back. Even as she heard the first clash of steel on steel ring through the quiet night she sent Kaze no Koe into the nearest creature to her, confusing it long enough for her powerful kick to destroy it.

'Kyokon, there're too many of them. There must be 30, 35 of them. I can only destroy one at a time…'

You have all the power I can give you. Anything else could destroy your body.

Karin narrowly avoided the sweep of a huge cloaked arm, jumping out of the way an instant before she would have been sent smashing into a wall.

'Could destroy my body? Kyokon, this fight could destroy my body! Is it certain?'

Nothing is certain.

Karin could swear she felt Kyokon sigh, as if deciding what to do. She shoved more of her reiatsu into her ball, destroying yet another Gillian. As she waited for the ball to rebound to her, one of the creatures managed to get a hold of her, and Karin felt herself lifted off the ground.

A bolt of purple light abruptly shot into it and destroyed it, and suddenly Karin was back on the ground. Sparing a glance towards her father, she nodded once in thanks and spun to retrieve her ball.

There is a way. The greatest power I possess. You can turn the attention of every Gillian to you, and you can make them stop attacking. But not for long. And it will exhaust you. If the others do not arrive before you tire…

'I don't think I have a choice.' Karin screamed in her head as she narrowly dodged another attack. The corner of her vision caught her father getting slammed back into a wall, although he was back on his feet instantaneously. Two of the Gillian were moving towards her house, the house where her sister was hidden, and she knew she could never kill them both in time.

This time Karin was certain she felt Kyokon sigh, and words she had never known suddenly erupted from her lips. She focused her mind on each of the Gillian.

"Kyokon - Uta no On'na-yuwakusha."

Mirror Soul. Siren's Song.

Karin heard a note of music welling up in her soul, and as one all of the Gillian turned to stare at her, seemingly mesmerized. She kicked her soccer ball into one of the two that had been moving towards the house, and ran closer so that she could catch the rebound faster. None of them moved as she destroyed the second one by her house, yet Karin could feel what Kyokon had meant about this draining her. She wouldn't be able to hold them for much longer, because they were trying to break free. Keeping her mind focused on the Gillian, she didn't notice a sudden rush of air behind her.

"These creatures answer only to me, little girl."

Karin gasped in pain, looking down to discover what looked like a sword sticking out of her stomach. But there couldn't be a sword sticking out of her stomach, because…

"Karin!!!"

It was her father's voice, but it seemed so very far away. She fell to the ground, grasping her stomach as blood began to pour out of her.

Then new voices. Three that she hadn't heard in a while, and one achingly familiar.

"Ban-Kai. Hihio, Zabimaru."

"Mae, Sode no Shirayuki - Some no mai, Tsukishiro."

"Unare, Haineko."

"Ban-Kai. Daiguren Hyorinmaru."

Eyes beginning to close, Karin watched as a disjointed snake made of bone segments and a tornado of grey ash cut into the Gillians, destroying half a dozen of them in mere seconds. A circle of light flashed into existence on the ground below some of them, and a second later became a column of ice, trapping several inside.

The last thing Karin saw as her eyes slid closed was Toshiro's face above her, giant wings made of ice surrounding his body. "Missed you…" She whispered as she fell into darkness.

"KARIN!" Toshiro screamed as her eyes slid closed. He bent closer to her, his hands already beginning to glow with a healing kido, when he abruptly sensed a presence behind him.

"Ryusenka!" Spinning around, he shot ice at his attacker, freezing it into a pillar of ice. It was the second Adjuchas, the one neither Karin or her father had known was there. Her blood was still on it's blade.

"El Directo." A huge blast of energy cut through three of the Gillians.

A second later, with no word of warning, dozens of blue arrows made of light shot into the Gillians.

"Ban-Kai. Tensa Zangetsu. Getsuga Tensho. " A huge crescent of red and black light shot towards the Gillians, cutting through the Adjuchas and it's icy prison on the way.

"Inoue!" Toshiro shouted even as he bent back down over Karin, trying to start a healing kido. He folding his wings in around the two of them to protect them from the insanity going on around them.

Although less than a minute had passed since she'd been stabbed, she was no longer breathing.

Toshiro felt why the instant he began trying to heal her. Although the sword had exited through her stomach, her opponent being so much taller than her meant that he had attacked at a downward angle. From the back, his sword had entered below her shoulder blade, going directly through her heart and many of her internal organs before exiting.

He cracked his wings open as he felt Inoue approaching, and the girl slid into the ice cave he'd created without hesitation, although she began shivering almost immediately.

"Soten Kisshun."

The familiar oval of golden light covered Karin at once, but Orihime frowned after only an instant.

"I…I don't understand." A few tears streamed down her cheeks.

Toshiro looked at her in horror. Although he could see Karin's wounds beginning to heal, her reiatsu was completely gone. Her soul…

"TOSHIRO!"

Toshiro let his bankai evaporate without thought at Ichigo's shout, knowing the battle was over. Everyone gathered around them in a matter of seconds.

"Karin." Isshin whispered, his hand reaching out towards his daughter, although he knew better than to try and reach through the shield around her. "I didn't know there was a second one…"

Tears streamed down Orihime's face as she tried to bring Karin back. She'd healed the dead before! Although not a human…

It was Rukia who knelt beside Orihime after a moment, gently putting her hands on the girl's shoulders. "There's nothing you can do. Without the soul, you can't bring the body back."

"Once the chain of fate isn't attached to the body…" Rangiku whispered, kneeling between Orihime and Toshiro.

Orihime's shield finally vanished, and the girl collapsed into Rukia's arms, sobbing her heart out. Ichigo and the others could only stare, too stunned to move. To stunned to accept it. Karin couldn't be dead.

Toshiro let out a scream of pain and collapsed over her body, hugging her to him. Rangiku wrapped herself around her taicho's back, holding him as he cried.

No one asked why he was so broken up about it. It didn't matter at the moment.

It was Ishida who finally said it. "So where is her soul?"

As the others looked at him in confusion, realizing that was a very good question, Isshin alone turned the opposite direction.

He turned to face his house, where Yuzu was still hidden. If anything went wrong, he'd told Karin, she was to protect her sister. Maybe… He dropped the kido he'd woven around Yuzu.

OoOoOoOoO

Karin's eyes opened slowly, her body feeling strange. The pain was gone now, and instead of staring up into Toshiro's concerned face she was staring into Yuzu's even more concerned one.

"Karin?" Yuzu asked in a whisper. "What's going on?"

Karin realized quickly that in addition to concern there was also fear on her sister's face. She looked down at herself quickly, expecting to find a bloody hole where her stomach had once been. That would explain her sister's fear. Instead, she found a chain anchored into her chest, it's end locked firmly around her sister's wrist.

"Ichigo's gonna be so mad at me." She whispered to herself.

"What's going on?" Yuzu asked again. "Who are all those people outside?"

"It's a long story." Karin sighed and she stood up and pulled her sister up with her. She turned towards the stairs and made her way towards the others. "I'm sure you'll get to hear everything now."

Karin locked eyes with her father as she and Yuzu stepped out of the house. He was the only one looking their way. Although at his gasp, the others who were still standing turned quickly, their faces unable to decide on what expression they should show.

Ichigo was beside her in an instant, wrapping both his sisters in his strong arms. "I told you that you shouldn't be fighting." He whispered in Karin's ear, and she could hear the tears in his voice.

"They were going after Yuzu." Karin whispered back, unsurprised when her father's arms suddenly joined her brother's around her. "I knew none of you were here… I had to…"

They held her a moment longer, then Karin caught sight of the four people who were still gathered around her body. Rukia had noticed what was going on, and was trying to get Orihime to stop sobbing long enough to tell her. Rangiku was wrapped around Toshiro, and neither of them had noticed anything yet. She could hear Toshiro sobbing her name from where she stood.

Breaking away from her family gently, Karin crossed the ground and put her hand on Rangiku's shoulder. The woman's head spun around and she let out a gasp as she moved quickly off of Toshiro.

Karin wrapped herself around her boyfriend's quivering back. "It's okay." She whispered. "Now we can be together."

Toshiro stopped embracing her dead body and turned to take her into his arms, clinging to her tightly. "No, we can't. Don't you understand?" His tears hadn't stopped. If anything, they had grown worse.

Karin clung to him even as confusion overcame her. What was she forgetting? It came to her an instant before he spoke.

"If you stay on Earth, you'll eventually either become a Hollow or be eaten by one. But if you pass on the Soul Society you'll forget everything. Karin, you won't even remember my name!"

Karin started crying with him as the horror of the situation settled in.

TBC…

AN2: (ducks objects thrown at her and runs for cover)

Omake: Radio Kon

Producer: Where the hell is he? He tells us he's going to have a special guest, then he doesn't even show up!

Cameraman: Um, sir?

Camera pans to Yuzu as she clutches Kon in her arms, his bright pink dress drenched from her tears. His eyes widen imploringly at the camera.

Producer: Right then. Let's wrap it up for the night, people. It looks like our star is otherwise occupied…

Glossary:

First off, I know some of you are confused about the title, because my beta was as well. Siren Song obviously refers to Karin's power. Swan Song is an idiom indicating a final performance or accomplishment, generally by someone who knows, or at least suspects, that they are going to die soon. It comes from the (untrue) ancient belief that a certain species of swan are mute their entire lives, finally singing one beautiful song right before they die.

Bakudo: "Way of Binding," one of the two main types of spells that Shinigami cast. The other is Hado, or "Way of Destruction." Almost all spells we see cast by Shinigami fall into one of these two categories.

Kyakko: "Curving Light," a spell to bend light and hide both the physical appearance and reiatsu of whatever it is cast around. Cannon.

Sasayaku: literally "Whisper."

Kaze no Koe: literally "Voice of the Wind" or "Wind's Voice," Karin's power that allows her to speak to the souls of others. Created by me.

Uta no On'na-yuwakusha: literally "Song of the Siren" or "Siren's Song." The word used for Siren translates, sort of, as seductress, and is a reference to the Sirens of Greek myth who could lure men to them with their beautiful voices. Instead of entrancing men's hearts, Karin's power entrances the souls of others, making them unable to do anything but stare at her in awe. It requires a tremendous amount of power however, as the souls she has entranced try to fight against her. Created by me.

Sorry, but I'm too lazy to translate all the zanpakuto names and powers. They should all be familiar anyways if you watch or read Bleach. Otherwise there's this wonderful thing called the Bleach Wiki…