Life of Simplicity

~Simply Panic~
*Isane*

"You mean to say, Isshin-san Taicho is alive, and no one bothered to tell me?" Isane couldn't help but think back on the look of the small taicho's face as he said those words. She would have thought there would have been some sort of bitter resentment in there about certain persons keeping secrets from the small taicho, but that wasn't the case.

Instead, she saw a smile plastered on the child taicho's face, the like of which she had only seen a few times in the many years she had known him. The child was odd in the fact that when it came to his emotions, he was very similar to Ichimaru Gin in the fact that they both rarely wore their emotions on their sleeves. The difference was that one always smiled, while the other always frowned.

Problem lay in the small detail that possibly had kept Unohana from telling Hitsugaya Taicho that his former captain was in fact still alive. There was the fact that Ichigo Kurosaki happened to be the biological son of Isshin, something that would likely place discontent in the small taicho's heart about whether or not he should belong.

Had not the small child taicho come looking for something to do, some way of helping the others, but ended up being turned down simply because he was supposed to be resting. Many members in the forth division never voiced their concerns aloud, they never felt comfortable with having someone so young in such a position. Then again, they dealt with death too much. It was one sorrow after another piled on.

Isane thus set out in search of the small taicho, hoping she could fix the situation. However, her concentration was broken by an exploding sound coming from Ichimaru Gin's room, which caused her to hurry over, despite the fact she found the man to be overly creepy. She stepped into the room, her eyes catching site of a rather large hole in the wall, surrounded by scorch marks.

Her head then turned quickly to see Ichimaru Gin, his head bent down, his entire body shaking, his mouth panting for some odd reason. Something told her that he wasn't well and she could tell from Rangiku's expression that she also knew this. "Matsumoto?"

At that, the other female looked up at Isane, her eyes filled with worry and fear. "Please... go get his former taicho," the female blurted out.

This caused Isane's eyes to blink a couple of times before she spun on her heals to get the Vizard leader, despite the fact that she didn't know much about said man. As she approached the room that the blond, female Vizard was in, she heard loud voices and saw both Isshin and Shinji step back into the room. Upon getting there, she heard one of the forth division's patients rather distraught.

"I can tell you... I knew him when he was your age. You're just like him." Hiyori spat out as soon as Isane opened the door to her room.

As she stuck her head in, she heard Hitsugaya Toshiro speak up, rather surprising her. "I am not like him!"

The fukutaicho of the forth saw the look on the small taicho's face and knew that the young taicho wasn't happy about whatever conversation the two of them had been having. At that, she managed to mutter out her words, instead of taking a deep breath like she should have. "Something is going on with Ichimaru Gin. Matsumoto Rangiku said that I should get Shinji-san."

At that, the blond followed her from the room and Isane could hear Isshin mutter an apology to the small taicho. They walked at a steady pace back to the room. The former taicho of the tenth division spoke up at this point. "Can you tell us exactly what is going on with Ichimaru?"

"All I know is that he shot kido off at the wall and that he is having a mental break down. I don't know why Rangiku asked for his former taicho, but I do know... I know something wasn't right." Isane found her voice strained. "Anyways, what was it that Hiyori and Hitsugaya Taicho were arguing about."

At that, Shinji let out a sigh. "You might as well say they were arguing about whether or not that small taicho is more like Ichimaru Gin or Matsumoto Rangiku, except Ran-chan never ended up being mentioned."

"But isn't Hitsugaya Taicho a lot like Ichimaru Gin?" The tall female had worry plastered all over her face. "He has nothing in common with Matsumoto-san."

"Ehh... well, I had a conversation with that child and I think that he has a lot in common with her. I guess though, they would associate him with Ichimaru because they look a lot alike." The man glanced away at this.

Isane placed a finger to her lips. "Hitsugaya Taicho looking like Ichimaru... I hadn't really thought about it that far. I mean, it isn't possible that they could be related." She didn't catch the looks that passed between the two former taicho. However, she did notice when she entered the room, one Ichimaru Gin.

The man was sitting, his body still shaking, his head in his hands, muttering something under his breath while Rangiku was kneeling in front with her hands over Ichimaru's. Shinji stepped forward, his eyes suddenly turning to a certain area, which caused the tall female to notice that the silver haired man's zampaktuo was away from him. She slipped over to the zampaktuo and picked it up, slipping it into a drawer.

Turning back around, she saw Shinji step over to listen to whatever Ichimaru happened to be saying at that point in time. For some reason, the man let out a deep sigh. "Thank you for making it overly clear that I messed up when I was your taicho." He then turned to Rangiku, who had stood up when Shinji had moved over. "He honestly thinks someone is after that kids life?"

"He does think that Taicho is..." However, Rangiku's eyes looked at her former taicho a scowl appearing on her face for a short period of time. "Hitsugaya Taicho is in danger, as far as he is concerned. I am not sure how to tell him otherwise. If he reacts like this, to such a small scratch on taicho's face. Why is he being so over protective?"

At this, Isane's mind went numb, because the word protective didn't seem to go with the silver haired man and confusion spread across her face. Shinji though spoke up. "Sheesh. I saw the small taicho. It was like seeing a mirror image of Ichimaru the night that the third seat disappeared. I think Aizen had something to do with that."

"That night! He mentioned that he told you something, but you didn't listen." Rangiku let out a deep breath.

"Actually, Ichimaru told me nothing, other then the fact that the man was scum so it honestly didn't matter that he disappeared." The blond haired man scratched his head. "I decided to keep a closer eye on him after that."

"With Ichimaru Gin, that tends to mean something, as he isn't one to go around calling people names. Well, nick names, but not insults." Isshin stated firmly. "Actually, from my professional medical opinion here, he may be experiencing a major backlash from suppressing his emotion for this long."

"You mean for over a hundred years?" Isane blinked a couple of times. "And what is this about Ichimaru being protective of Hitsugaya Taicho? I mean, I can understand Rangiku slightly, but anyone else..."

At this, Rangiku at first tensed up, glaring at Gin as he simply stood there. "Can we talk in an empty room near here? Can I trust Gin to the two of you?"

"To the best of our ability." Shinji stated. "I'm not the medical expert, this guy is."

At that, the two females stepped into another room. The tall female hugged herself nervously. "Matsumoto-san, what is going on here?"

"Come on Isane, we are near similar age," the overly busty female laughed, only it was in truth fake. "How to put this?" The female paused. "Have you ever noticed how taicho looks a lot like Gin?"

"No, actually... I haven't. Not until the leader of the Vizard brought it up a few minutes ago. But now that I do think about it, Hitsugaya Taicho does have a lot in common with that man, including his looks." The female leaned up against the door, glancing away. "I guess I didn't like thinking about it because its kind of creepy."

"There is... well, a reason why they have a lot in common." Rangiku also couldn't look the other female in the face.

"You don't mean to say they're like, brothers?" Isane muttered.

"Brothers?" Matsumoto's head suddenly darted up. "No, they aren't brothers. Hitsugaya Toshiro is Gin and my son."

The tall female stared at Rangiku in silence, blinking a couple of times, and then her eyes went wide upon realization. "Matsumoto-san! That's! How could you not know?"

"Good question. Gin took Toshiro and hid him from me, yet I do think I knew I had a bond with him when I met that child." A deep breath came from the orange haired females nose. "Normally I would be screaming my head off, embarrassing Taicho by letting everyone around us know our family secret before I told him. But... Gin's behavior..."

"You're afraid that Ichimaru Gin may hurt your son? Didn't you say he was trying to protect him earlier?"

At that, the other female took a deep breath. "Gin's protecting our son borders on the insane. While Aizen was around, there was something that I guess he needed to be protected from, but now... he's lashing out at a delusion. Maybe it has to do with the fact that he can't deal with the truth that he never was really protecting Toshiro, not with the way Taicho got cut up."

"Matsumoto-san... isn't there something else you should be worrying about." Isane watched as Rangiku glanced up, confusion on her face. "If Hitsugaya Taicho is as much like his father as he is, perchance if he also bottles up everything, he might mentally break like Ichimaru has?"

I won't update, until I have at least eighty-nine reviews.