Disclaimer: Bleach, its characters and its settings aren't mine

I hit Tatsuki like a cannonball and ran with her. I've gotten bigger, right? Tatsuki hasn't. My shoulder, her stomach, she folded right up.

For a second it was easy – she didn't know what had hit her, but when she started to struggle she kicked like a fiend. Holding onto her got old fast, if you know what I mean. After about twenty seconds I'd had all of that that I cared to.

Thankfully, with legs like mine twenty seconds was long enough. We were some distance away from campus, away from anywhere in fact. A field.

Tatsuki obviously didn't like being carried so I dropped her in a heap.

She scrambled almost upright. The expression on her face was pure poison. Tatsuki hates me and wants me dead. I realized that all over again as she slowly got up.

"Well?"

She looked at me like I was a walking pile of shit. "Kurosaki Ichigo. You disgusting, filthy – what the hell are you doing here? Come to beat me up for telling the truth about you? Is that it?"

"What happened to you?"

"I got sick," she snarled. "What's it to you?"

"Calm down." I was in no mood for this. "What, no more insults Tatsuki?" Sarcastic, I know, but I couldn't stop myself – the words were just pouring out of me.

"I'm going to tell you this once, you son of a bitch, leave me the hell alone! I don't ever want to see your ugly face-"

"You'd better get bloody used to my ugly face, Tatsuki, because you're going to be seeing a lot more of it. I go to school here."

She put her hands on her hips and laughed at me.

"So the almighty Substitute wasn't good enough to be a captain? They enrolled you here like the rest of us grunts? You're not worth my time, you despicable prick."

I had no conscious control over the rest of the conversation. She'd found the magic spot and she'd hit it and everything else that happened after-

"Don't you dare take that tone with me, you little skank!"

"Shut your fucking hole, Ichigo!"

"No you shut it! You're going to drop that Goddamn holier-than-though attitude and you're going to drop it now or I'll beat it out of you! You Goddamn little bitch! You think I want to be talking to you? I have to know if you'll rat me out!"

I was roaring, angry like I'd never been. The frustration of years was coming out and I could no more stop it then I could cork my spirit pressure. I don't even know where it came from – I hadn't known I was this angry. It had never occurred to me that I was this angry, and I honestly couldn't stop myself-

"You're going to damn well answer me Tatsuki!"

She just sneers. "Say your peace and get out of my face."

"To make it easier for you? I don't think so. You rat me out, you're going to watch. You're not getting away with deciding you did the right thing and leaving me to – you're going to watch me die!"

"What the hell are you talking about, idiot?"

"You rat me out they come and kill me. Got that Tatsuki? I want you to see that! I want you to know that you're the one who killed me!"

"What the hell are you talking about, Ichigo?" That was the insulting version of no honorific, not the friendly one.

"Simple as that, Tatsuki. You wanted to kill me, here's your chance! Tell on me! Rat me out! There'll be a dozen captains here before your echo dies away! Well? Aren't you going to yell it from the damn rooftops? Here's Ichigo? Come and get him?"

She slapped me.

"Make sense, you crummy bastard, or I'll pound the shit out of you! What the hell are you talking about?"

"I'm a vizard, remember? Remember that, honey? The whole mask thing? They catch me they kill me, the Seireitei doesn't want a Vizard anywhere in existence, certainly not their precious academy!"

"So I rat you out and you go away?"

"Oh yeah, I go away. I go away forever - Way to say it Tatsuki. Go on, be my fucking executioner. My one hope is that some day you wake up in the night and think you were wrong. But that would never happen – not with you, Tatsuki! You're never wrong! Make yourself feel good Tatsuki, succumb to the urge! Tell yourself you're doing the right thing! I never thought you were such a low-down, vile, disgusting creature! Go on, get me killed! Make yourself feel better!"

"What are you talking about? For the last bloody time what are you talking about?"

"No one knows I'm here! If they did they'd kill me!"

"Then why are you here?"

"Where the fuck else can I go? I'm dead you stupid woman! The first thing that happened was the captains swarmed the real world looking for me! They would have killed me! Now they think I've gone to Hueco Mundo!"

"So you're on the run?"

"Isn't that what you wanted? Ichigo chased to the ends of the earth and beyond? Punished for his sins? News flash, you bitch. I tried and I failed. I did the best I could to save the lives of the people around me and I wasn't able to save them all! It's my fault Orihime's head is messed up! Hell, it's my fault Ishida's fucked up! It must be my fault that all those shinigami died! Go on Tatsuki! Rat me out! Make yourself feel better! Think of how goddamn wonderful you'll feel knowing you've got a home in the Seireitei and I've got nothing, nobody and nowhere to go until the end of fucking time! Well fuck you! I did the best I could!"

She got quiet for a moment, asked me "Does Chad know?"

"He knows. We don't talk anymore."

"Not surprising Kurosaki, nobody wants to talk to you. You're poison, you fuck up every life you touch."

"Oh, this from you-"

"Shuddup! You ruined Orihime, you ruined Ishida and Keigo and now you're trying to ruin me!"

"Oh that's it! Break down and cry! All of this - everything - everything in the world is my fault! Must be nice not to have to take responsibility for anything! Everything is Ichigo's fault! I never told anyone to fight! I would have - I wanted to come alone to clean up my own mess! Orihime chose to start down this road and she chose not to bring you! It was Orihime! It was your best friend that excluded you, you stupid bitch! Stop blaming me for everything that ever went wrong! It's not my fault!"

It's not my fault.

Epiphany.

Shock.

It's not my fault.

Understanding.

It's not my fault.

Release. Let it go.

It's not my fault.

Since the day my mother died I've always considered everything bad the result of my weakness. If I were stronger, if I were faster. If I were better it wouldn't have happened. But I'm not better and that's my fault.

But here there's blame to go around. I had to be the protector, Chad was infected with it too. He never blamed me for his death but he did blame me for Orihime and Ishida after. But I didn't break them. And Tatsuki blamed me because I blamed myself. Nowhere does it come into the equation that Orihime and Ishida made choices of their own, and that taking blame for what happened disrespects them in the worse possible way. They were great warriors, they made a difference. Because of them people lived who'd otherwise have died. Who am I to disregard that?

Tatsuki is crying on her knees because of this - but not because of me. Because of herself. She assigned all the ills in the world to me and I've just shrugged them off, thrown them back in her face. I also made decisions and saved lives that otherwise would have been lost. She's just asked herself who she is to look down on me for it. Because if I'm not to blame for everything that ever made her unhappy, who is?

I've gotten a jaundiced point of view in this line of work, because I stepped back and forth between the world of the living and the world of the dead, but it's not like that for other people. Tatsuki has an incredibly sharp line drawn in her mind, on one side is written 'here I am alive' and on the other is written 'here I am dead.' And she's just realized that this great realization should have come to her while she was alive, so that she could have enjoyed her time with her friend Orihime, rather than allowing her resentment of me to shade every moment of every day of the final years of her life. That was her fault, not mine.

It doesn't have to be my fault.

As strange as it sounds, that had never occurred to me before.

Tatsuki and me. We are the embodiments of each others anger.

Go ahead Tatsuki. End it.

"I'll take you back to campus. You can call the Captains, you can do whatever the hell you want."

"No." She looked up. Her face was a mess, all tear stained.

"What?"

"You want my silence, Kurosaki? You're going to buy it."

"I'm going to what?"

"I'll make you a deal, Kurosaki Ichigo. You make me the strongest Reaper in academy history and I won't give away your little secret."

"You want me to train you? Why?"

"Captain Soi Fon is good, but you're better. Much as I hate you, you're the best with a Zanpakuto. You're going to make me into a monster, Kurosaki." Tatsuki glared at me. "It ought to be easy for you."

"Cheap shot hon, that's nice. Just about what I expected-"

"It's the truth," she snarled. "Ichigo the hero, a hero at any price, at any risk! You took shortcuts! Show them to me!"

Shortcuts? Why you wretched little-

"I don't think you know what you're asking-"

"I know exactly what I'm bloody well asking. I'm going to take all the same risks. You're the only person who'll teach me that way. There's no emergency! Soi Fon and Yoruichi are holding back! I need to go faster!"

You want to go faster? Bitch, you have come to the right place.

"You want to be a killer then I'm your guy. I can make you the most frightening thing this academy has ever seen. Do you have a Zanpakuto?"

"Not yet."

"Get one. When you do I'll show you how to use it. First of all I'm going for a run and you're going for a ride."

"Pardon me?"

I turned my back to her. "Get on. I'm going to carry you just like I used to carry Rukia. You're going to practice raising your spiritual energy and holding on. Your power is going to mask mine, that way we can get far enough from Campus to practice. You just tell me when you've had enough."

Tatsuki snarled at me. "I can take anything you've got to give, Kurosaki."

"I somehow doubt that. Get on."

Tatsuki jumped on me, no doubt trying to hurt me. Elbow, heel and knee, she managed to turn every sharp edge my way. So I returned the favor, grabbed her legs and jumped into a shunpo. Seconds later we were off and picking up speed fast. It felt good, even with Tatsuki trying to choke the life out of me while I tried to pull both her legs out of their sockets.

"Keep your power up!"

I thought for a moment she was going to sink her teeth into me.

And that's what happened with Tatsuki.

My Protege Tatsuki.

I never realized I'd so massively lose control, but she's always told me everything is my fault – she knew the one way to hurt me. To see her here, about to take away what little I've got left, this life of fear and uncertainty I live – it was just more than I could handle –

You know, I don't even want to talk about this.

I'm going to bed.