This is two and a half hours late. But, I have a very good explanation. I worked from ten to five for three days this week, got a vaccination, took a trip to my twin sister's uni twice to get stuff there for her, went on a shopping trip to get her necessities, and packed for a four-day camp next week. I literally almost killed myself getting this chapter out. Plus, it's 9000 words. So I hope you guys are okay with the minor delay :)
Thanks to reviewers: , Daedricdragon, laughingspider, KJC2025, Sunart, Guest, DLC2094, sulli-ssi, Phantom Claire, JTiberiusKirk, MerryKitten, EverMindTheRuleOfThree, poooy200, The Unknown ShiniGami, brialees, BleachFreak16, ilovebks, Guest, Darkness9825, Guest, MugetsuIchigo, Ethyrin Kairos, uzuki-chan, GhibliGirl91, Kireina-Ame, Mtmeye, ImSeriousBro, NarutoLuver896, mypupps1, The10Espada99, NobodyEpic, Chirpy Hitomi chan, AmandaaC, Orange3WhiteSkew, Miyo86, blades of blood488, Debido, Tsuki no Yukihime.
I don't own except the plot.
IMPORTANT: There are many typos here. I know. But I typed FAST. And my beta is now in her uni campus. So she couldn't read it. I know cause I spent a lot of my time on her behalf (see above) :) So don't judge the typos, neh?
Rukia's scream changes tenor, and all at once, Sode no Shirayuki cracks from tip to hilt, the snow-white shell of the blade splitting like a ripped curtain, and the magnitude of light that blasts out of cracks is devastating, shining brighter than the noonday sun.
Rukia curls inwards, head bowed over her clasped hands, sword next to her heart. "Bankai," she whispers, her voice carrying faintly to Byakuya's ears.
And her very being shines with tongues of white fire.
(BerryBREAK BerryBREAK BerryBREAK BerryBREAK BerryBREAK BerryBREAK)
It is very nearly night now.
The vast majority of the sky is velvet sable, a burial shroud of darkness, starless, moonless, black. The western edge of the horizon remains afire with scarlet, the last call of a dying sun. The crimson light bathes Sokyoku hill in vivid, liquid red, illuminating the whirling portal, the figures in the air and on the ground, and the fukutaichou kneeling at the side of her fallen taichou, whose haori is drenched with the dual stain of blood and sunset.
Kuchiki Rukia screams.
Byakuya winces at the portentous throb of reiatsu.
And the world turns silver and tarnished white, an explosion of biting cold that freezes their breath instantaneously into hundreds of droplets of ice that are caught in one, endless whirlwind of snow and hail and fiery frigidity, and Byakuya dimly thinks that he is burning in the cold, Senbonzakura dancing to enclose himself along with Isshin and their two seated officers in a shield of pink, roaring in a protective shield against what must be a thousand splintered needles.
The first bankai release is inexpressibly important.
Bankai is the highest achievement, technically, that any shinigami can reach. It is the pinnacle of unity between shinigami and zanpakutuo; both souls merged into one with a single forging of glorious power. The first use of bankai dictates the level of power that will follow from that time onwards. Kurosaki Ichigo's bankai was cemented in a frantic duel for Rukia's survival, matched only by his anger at Byakuya's coldness towards his sister; Abarai Renji's bankai similarly went through a trial of fire, fighting tooth and claw for much the same reason.
By the looks of it, Rukia's bankai could be forged in far greater rage and pain than the both of them combined.
The storm of ice is immbolizing – Byakuya doubts that even Aizen and Gin, somewhere above them, could move in the burning cold. All they can do is try to breathe, and wait for the gales to calm.
As quickly as the gust started, all falls deadly silent as the snow and ice is sucked into a blistering cocoon that forms in a sphere around Rukia. The winds are strong enough to lift her off her feet, but only her silhouette can be seen through the nearly opaque rush of flurried white.
Rukia's shadowed image raises her head.
Then the ice falls into nothingness like a dropped curtain, a forgotten mantle flung aside to reveal its treasure.
Byakuya draws a sharp breath.
Rukia remains lifted upon a crest of wind, her limbs featherlight upon the sentinent air that is servant to her will. She is no longer garbed simply in shihakushuo, for around her shoulders drapes a resplendent cloak of shimmering incandescence, cloth yet not cloth, for it flows and ripples like running water, and dances upon an unseen current in the air. The robe pools around her slim frame, swathing her in an ethereal glow, flickering with a glassy half-transparency that speaks of liquid diamond. And on Rukia's head is a stunning crown of gilded snow and ice, glossy tendrils framing her hair, honing into beautiful twists at her brow and sharpening at the tips into a tumult of elegant yet deadly spikes.
She is magnificent. She looks like a queen.
But there is more.
Her eyelashes glitter with frost, and her eyes are themselves covered with a sheen of mirrored ice, covering irises and pupils in a reflective gleam.
How can she see?
The answer provides itself in the next moment, for Rukia steps forwards in a smooth pace of almost dancing grace, and lifts her right arm, revealing the bankai form of Sode no Shirayuki. The sword is now crafted of sculpted ice, completely transparent except for a winding ornamental trail of pure white ivory that encases the guard and twines down the length of the blade. As the sword rises to eye level, the blade shivers once, in anticipation.
And the atmosphere shivers with it.
It is not the same as Ichigo's bankai. Zangetsu often creates bursts of power great enough to concuss air; but here, it is as if the air itself is part of Sode no Shirayuki.
Byakuya feels Rukia's reiatsu everywhere – he is literally breathing it, and exhaling clouds of frosty breath in the cold.
She has no need to see. He suspects that her mind at the moment is half-merged with Sode no Shirayuki, acting on the instincts of her zanpakutuo spirit rather than her own will. She would not look as calm if left to her own devices, considering how she screamed over Ichigo's fallen form.
Above, Aizen shrinks back in similar alarm, sensing that all is not well. He shunpos away from Gin to give himself space, and spins Kyoka Suigetsu in two large arcs, murmuring his shikai activation phrase under his breath.
A reiatsu wave thuds through the air as reality rearranges itself to Aizen's will. Byakuya stands closer to his allocated seated officer, within hearing distance, to better differentiate between image and truth.
But it is not needed.
Because as the reiatsu wave spreads, Rukia's head snaps up in Aizen's direction, and Sode no Shirayuki draws a clean cut through the air.
And the sky freezes. Every miniscule drop of water in the atmosphere turns to droplets of hail and thunders with Rukia's reiatsu, blitzing towards Aizen's wave and overwhelming it by sheer mass and weight, obliterating Kyoka Suigetsu's power from every direction.
For an instant, Byakuya sees double as he views both the doppelganger and the real figure of Aizen, and then all falls under the blistering hail of Rukia's bankai.
Dimly, he registers Isshin and his follower break away towards Ichigo's prone form, now having confirmed that his son's condition is not a trick of Kyoka Suigetsu.
Byakuya abruptly realises that the burning cold is no longer surrounding him or his follower. Instead, the air is being sucked dry of moisture, all water flying towards Rukia's single target – Aizen. Kyoka Suigetsu has fallen because Rukia's bankai is not sensory in the normal sense of the word; it relies on reiatsu alone.
So that was the function of the initial explosion.
The first storm of white that spread over five kilometres in breadth was not an uncontrolled burst. It had been an extension of the shikai Some no mai, Tsukishiro – instead of her power extending to all the area covered by a sweep of her blade, all areas touched by simply her reiatsu becomes her playing ground. It is also a preliminary scan of opponents – her zanpakutuo had identified ally from foe, and mobilized all power to concentrate on enemy only.
The air is her servant. Her bankai is powerful enough to rival Yamamoto's Ryuujin Jakka, except it sets the air on fire with ice instead of flame. It is also interesting how Gin was not identified as an enemy.
A swell of sudden pride emerges in Byakuya's chest, even though it remains swamped with worry. As he watches, the icy cloud surrounding Aizen tightens, although it does not collapse, probably due to a defensive maneuver on Aizen's part.
Then, Rukia flips her sword over in her hand, and rends the air with precise slashes, drawing Sode no Shirayuki over empty space. Over a hundred metres away, the air sharpens, and forms into a great mass of heaving ice spikes, each double-edged with scintillating fury, every deadly point aimed at Aizen. And as she flicks her sword-tip, the cloud of icy razors changes direction on a whim, a thousand gigantic buzzing hornets painted red by the sun.
Byakuya feels like the air has been squeezed out of lungs. It almost looks like Senbonzakura. Rukia's bankai honours her Nii-sama's.
Aizen leaps in cavorting bounds all over the sky, just eluding the grasp of a wintry coffin. His zanpakutuo knocks away the few spikes that do make it within striking distance. But his teeth are set in an angry grimace, and Byakuya knows why. At that shunpo speed, Aizen will tire relatively quickly. He no longer has defense in Kyoka Suigetsu. In five minutes, Rukia will win this game of cat and mouse.
Byakuya shunpos until he is directly below Rukia, following the fight with well-honed eyes. "Chire, Senbonzakura," he whispers. He feels his zanpakutuo scatter into a cloud of pink, and he wills it to flow in meandering rivers about his feet, ready to intervene and shield Rukia if needed. He brutally reins in his overwhelming inclination to rush in and send Senbonzakura to intercept Aizen, finishing the entire thing so he can carry her to sure safety. At Rukia's current power level, it would be more efficient to allow her to manage the attack alone.
Unexpectedly, a familiar reiatsu signature, only weaker, appears at the boundary of his senses on the eastern edge of the cliff, the opposite side to the portal.
Abarai?
No, not the Renji he knows. This one looks distinctly awkward in his shinigami shihakushuo, holds Zabimaru – unsheathed – in a basic grip, and sports a head of shorter hair. A rookie. Renji stops like a cat in headlights, staring dumbstruck at the sight of Rukia clothed in ice and snow.
In the next second, Byakuya meets this younger Renji's eyes. The abject fear and reverence that he sees there is a bit disconcerting. His fukutaichou had long waned his hero-worship into a sort of sarcastic respect, and an understanding of mutual reliance in battle. This one, conversely, looks like a child.
But before anything can be communicated in their shared gaze, a new signature that, if anything, is even more familiar – to an unsettling level – appears close behind the younger Renji.
Byakuya had steeled himself for the possibility of meeting his younger self before he entered the portal, but still the feeling of his own reiatsu washing over him is extremely uncomfortable. It is almost like viewing oneself out of one's own body, a detached spirit floating away. And this younger Byakuya's reiatsu is quite a bit weaker than his own. Still formidable, but less so. So this is what a war does to a shinigami, he thinks grimly.
The younger Byakuya is clothed not in shihakushuo and haori, but in a well-embroidered formal kimono, complete with the crest of the Kuchiki clan etched in delicate thread, kenseikan, and a refined look of annoyance on his face. Clan business, then.
The gazes of both Byakuyas fall each other at the same time. The younger version glances upwards at Rukia's suspended form, and his lips thin harshly. "Cease immediately, Kuchiki Rukia," he calls out imperiously. "You are attacking a respected captain of Seireitei, and bring shame to our clan."
The crowned Rukia continues in her persecution of Aizen, ice-covered eyes unblinking. She does not show any sign of having heard him.
At that moment, Byakuya, standing below Rukia, feels an upsurge of peculiar self-hatred. He had been like that, once. His softened attitude to Rukia in the past decade had been partly in recompense for the horridly cold way he had treated her before, when every glance at her face reminded him painfully of his Hisana. Now, he briefly wonders with a wry flick of an eyebrow whether his present desire to teach this younger self a lesson can be classified as self-harm. Probably. He doesn't care. No one speaks to Rukia like that. Not even himself.
He sees his younger self frown dangerously, moving a hand, and reads the movement in a flash. No. Byakuya takes a single step forward and gestures with both gloved hands in an elegant circle, the first form of a delicate kata. Simultaneously, his younger self brandishes his own Senbonzakura and sends the crest of pink towards Rukia, not to harm, but to push her towards the ground.
The two rushing storms of silvery-pink shards meet with a resounding roar, much like two waterfalls meeting in midair, each striving for dominance. The sound of their struggle is grating yet subtle, on one hand, the clash of a raging battle, on the other, the chiming of a thousand wind chimes as the pieces clash individually.
Their eyes meet again, steel iron against stormy grey.
"Why do you do this?" the younger Byakuya queries, tilting his head, kenseikan glowing dimly in the light.
Byakuya gives a "hn," flicking his wrist to maintain Senbonzakura's attack. "Because you pointed a sword at my pride," he says quietly.
And with that, something unspoken passes between them, as both gazes harden as one. The younger Byakuya steps forward, hands flinging his sword's shards into high velocity, expression grim. Byakuya flows into a seamless advance, hands curving into form after form like the silent steps of a kata, pacing from one foot to the next as his hair fans out behind him, and each stance dances and runs into the next, like falling water scattering into a thousand raindrops.
The other Byakuya frowns sharply, struggling to keep up as he conforms to rigid sequences that had previously served him well in sparring. He had never run into an opponent capable of putting such pressure on Senbonzakura before.
Byakuya laughs internally, a bitter echo in his mind. Here is an example of his own hubris, the shameless arrogance ingrained into his blood that had shaped his actions like a polished shell until the day he met a true genius, a ryoka boy who trounced him soundly with a bankai learned in three days. There are things in the world that you have not seen, he thinks to his other self.
And so he leaps from foot to foot, an endless waltz governed by the rhythms of Senbonzakura as the sword-shards meet the petals of his opponent's zanpakutuo, forcing the other Senbonzakura into an ever-tighter corner. Every attack by the other Byakuya is ruthlessly countered.
The other Byakuya is breathing slightly heavier now, disbelief etched on his features. He has not tried bankai. Byakuya knows why – for if he is outclassed in shikai, how will he fare in bankai?
On the side, Renji keeps a safe distance, following the attack with an expression of terrified wonder. His dream is to outclass Kuchiki-taichou. If this taichou from the future is crushing the current one so easily, he has a hard time imagining ever being able to match him. And Rukia, gloriously shrouded in frost and icy fire, bankai thundering with power – how can he ever live up to that, he doesn't know.
In the sky, Aizen is slowing, the shivering ice spikes touching the hem of his haori, ripping holes in the edge like growling teeth. Rukia's cloak flies and shimmers, flinging out in sweeping arcs of iridescence as she gestures with Sode no Shirayuki. But she too is slowing, her limited reiatsu draining away.
Behind them, the portal convulses yet again, and spits out a whole plethora of shadowed figures seemingly at once. Leading the pack is Abarai Renji, a battle-scowl already firmly in place, and Zabimaru roaring into bankai the instant his sandals touch the ground. His assigned seated officer can barely keep up as he takes in the scene with one glance – eyes lingering on the white Rukia for a moment longer – and shunpos immediately to his captain's aid.
After Renji, the Visored land in battle formation with predatory grace, haori and fukutaichou badges gleaming, Shinji at the head. Matsumoto follows a half-second later, shoulders tense and curved inwards. She looks up, skimming the sky, and latches upon silver hair gleaming. She is gone in a flash of shunpo.
By this time, Byakuya has his opponent's Senbonzakura locked in a death cage, suppressing but not crushing, struggling against his younger self's reiatsu. He glances back at the Visored, and gives his fukutaichou a pointed look.
"Hai, taichou!" Renji answers, understanding perfectly and dashing past him towards the younger Byakuya. They pass each other without any more acknowledgment, their silent communication born of years of shared battle. As Renji reaches the cloud of two Senbonzakuras, Byakuya retracts his zanpakutuo with a sharp twist of his fingers, turning towards Rukia.
The younger Renji's eyes could be compared to the kitchen matron's largest dinner plates. Himself. Fukutaichou under Byakuya. With bankai. He doesn't know whether to feel ridiculously happy with himself or slaver in jealousy.
Renji reaches striking distance of the younger Byakuya, and forces himself to think, not my taichou. He has to strike without hesitation. Zabimaru is alive in his hand with trembling anticipation, and he gives in to that excitement, flinging Zabimaru's snakelike hooks at the steel-eyed captain with a war cry.
The look on the other Byakuya's face shows his contempt as he brings Senbonzakura almost lazily at him. Renji grins, and within an eyeblink, he flickers out of the pink cloud's reach, zigzagging across the dust towards a better angle for Zabimaru. His speed rivals his captain's by now, and on a good day, he reckons it is better. I'll show you, Kuchiki Byakuya, he thinks gleefully as Zabimaru howls in its chase.
Meanwhile, Byakuya, in allowing Renji to pursue his younger self, races lightly to stop right underneath Rukia. She cannot keep this up much longer, he thinks. Considering the arrival of the Visored, it would be better to let them take over, and bring Rukia back to safety. But it looks unwise to approach Rukia, who is hovering in midair – the air around her seems to be on guard for attack.
And so Byakuya chooses the safest of all routes. He does what he has been longing to do since he first stepped through the portal. He calls out to her, softly, gently. "Rukia."
She falters, ice-covered eyes searching for something.
"Rukia. We have to go home now. Will you come with me?"
And she shivers, small shoulders shaking, and suddenly she is falling like a dropped stone, silvery cloak wrapping around her like a barrier. The ice shards after Aizen melt into nothing.
Byakuya darts forward, and catches her small form, his arms holding her securely. The moment she comes to a stop, the bankai coat fades, and the ice crown melts into her hair, leaving only a light dusting of frost in the black strands.
"Nii-sama…" Rukia whispers, ice-eyes shattering back into violet, half-lidded from exhaustion. She rests her face against his haori, limp.
Byakuya marvels with a touch of alarm at how unhealthily light she is. She is small, yes, but the burns on her wrists exacerbate just how thin she now is. His heart clenches. "Come," he says lightly, and shunpos towards the portal.
Her small hand bunches in his haori. "Ichigo." She murmurs, turning her head frantically in search for him.
"He'll be fine," Byakuya says shortly. He shunpos towards the gateway without another word, acutely aware of Isshin kneeling next to his son but a short distance away, and the breadth of that pool of blood.
Rukia doesn't answer. Byakuya runs quicker, throwing them into the portal, and towards Unohana and her medical team.
And surging like a river parting around them, tearing towards Aizen, is the Visored, not even slowing to nod their heads at Byakuya and Rukia's passing. Every face is the same, a mask of hatred that rivals the sneer of each of their hollow masks. Shinji is in the lead, zanpakutuo already glowing in his palm, and Hiyori is only a half-step behind, growling in her eagerness for blood.
Aizen is surprisingly immobile, half kneeling in midair and struggling to breathe. Shinji narrows his eyes as he comes to a stop a short distance away, allowing the assembled Visored to fall into formation beside him. Eight zanpakutuos are bathed red in the light. Aizen coughs, suddenly, and a splatter of red dribbles from his mouth.
Shinji smiles delightedly. So. Rukia had done more than send a hailstorm of ice after him. Her reiatsu had pervaded the air itself, and Aizen, serpent and monster as he is, does need to breathe.
Rukia sent particles of her reiatsu into his lung tissue, and refroze them into spikes.
Lovely. Beside him, Hiyori laughs out loud, tossing her head back harshly. She has reached the same conclusion.
Well, this gives us some time for a proper introduction. Tilting his head so that his fringe clears from his eyes, Shinji gives the Visored a sweeping look. Hiyori. Rojurou. Mashiro. Love. Lisa. Hachigen. Kensei.
He flicks his fingers in a hidden signal, and the eight sink into mocking half-bows, their derisive contempt and hate reflected across their postures.
"Our long-awaited greetings," he calls out sardonically. He completes it with a little twitch of a two-fingered salute. "We have come to pay back what is due."
Aizen raises his head, still folded over in pain. He manages to scrape together an imitation of his past scorn, brown eyes flickering dangerously over the group. "Hirako Shinji. It's a pleasure, I must say. I take it you didn't like what you experienced the last time we met?" His hand slowly creeps towards Kyoka Suigetsu. "I never really had time back then to ask you how you felt – you were too busy screaming."
Shinji's smile has a morbidly pleased twist to it, as he wastes no more time in sweeping his sword to the side and raising a hand to his face. He feels a rustle of air on both sides as his friends and comrades lean into crouches, copying his movement.
He looks Aizen straight in the eye. "I give you –"
Eight hands claw away their human visages, revealing white-faced masks of savage power, hiding skin away under the shield that is their shared blood and inheritance.
All their voices come together, a grating rasp of sawing roughness, their words resonant in the near twilight. "– the Visored."
And the eight rush forward as one, a veritable tsunami of echoing, thundering power, only barely keeping to the regulation formation, so eager they are to see Aizen's blood.
The shockwave from eight hollowfied taichou and fukutaichou entering shikai simultaneously turns half the sky into a mottled patchwork of competing reiatsu, a ragged, eight-petaled flower blossoming in an ever-increasing expanse, with Aizen at its center.
Mashiro, by far the fastest of them all, reaches Aizen first and twists into a sweeping kick aimed at his feet, her green hair whipping into a streamlined tail behind her.
Aizen flips backwards, missing the two antennae-like strands of her fringe by centimetres while trying to draw Kyoka Suigetsu, wiping the trail of blood from his mouth with a snarl.
"Don't let him –" Shinji snaps the order, but the rest of the Visored are already nearly upon Aizen, pressuring him relentlessly. They cannot afford for him to draw his zanpakutuo and activate shikai, and the only way that they can assure this is to throw themselves at him from all directions, and force him to dodge instead of draw his sword.
Rojurou flings his hand out, and with an ethereal score of musical notes, his zanpakutuo stretches into a pure gold chain, spiked tip encircling around Aizen and reining in the captain's shunpo. Finding his path blocked, Aizen drops a dozen feet, trying to evade the attack from below.
A crackle and snap, and a roaring ken'atsu that precedes a warming current on one side of his face. Aizen barely has time to duck before Love's shikai release, a gigantic fireball of orange flame that singes the frame of his glasses and sears itself into his retinas.
Then a rising of wind, an unnatural shift in the atmosphere, Kensei's threads of air weaving through Rojurou's firestream, oxygen combusting with a pop and magnifying it ten times in breadth. The resulting explosion clears a cloudless channel in the stratosphere, all water and moisture burned up in the rage of red.
The Visored retreat slightly, to the edge of the storm. Shinji holds his hand out horizontally in a gesture to wait.
A shadow on the eastern edge of the dying fire, and in an eyeblink, Shinji bears down upon the slightly tattered Aizen, whose haori is burnt along the bottom hem.
Aizen looks up, reflexes unscathed, and hisses, "A straight-on attack? Do you think this low of me?" He dodges to the left –
And a long trailing scarlet cut opens on his right collarbone, a match to the angry wound put on his arm by Ichigo. Shinji's sword sings with the taste of blood, even as he is joined by the rest of the Visored. "My shikai has interesting properties, if you would be bothered to remember," Shinji says, smirking. The mirrored zanpakutuo is capable of confusing his opponent to think that he is attacking from the complete opposite direction.
Before Aizen even has a chance to recover from the blow, the Visored swarm forward as one. As Hiyori swings her serrated zanpakutuo with a bloodcurdling roar at Aizen's head, Shinji uses the distraction provided by his teammates to scan the battlefield. As satisfying as it is to batter Aizen to a pulp, they are here to ensure that Ichigo and Rukia make it back safely, and for Urahara to implement his plan. Rukia went back with Byakuya…
Where's Ichigo?
Far below, some distance from the portal, a father crouches over his dying son.
The moment that Isshin had heard Urahara proclaim that the portal's destabilization had to do with Ichigo's reiatsu, he had hurled himself into the portal, a white blankness settling over his mind and heart, a terror that he had not felt since the day he sensed his dear Masaki falter on a rain-drenched street.
When he had first heard Rukia's heartrending scream, his first thought had rather selfishly been a relieved It's not Ichigo crying out.
And then he saw him. Ichigo, his son, his firstborn child, bleeding out from a gaping hole in his chest, and the red, the scarlet, the spreading liquid. It was like someone had taken a white-hot iron and branded the image into his soul, and then wrapped it around his windpipe so he couldn't breathe.
Time dilated into a strange pattering of heartbeats and shunpo. Isshin was by the portal, and then suddenly beside Ichigo's too-still form, and he couldn't see his face, only his fiery orange hair that was the exact shade of his mother's, oh Masaki…
And Isshin knelt in the pool of crimson, and the blood soaked through his shihakushuo immediately, a shivering wetness that clung to him and smelled of broken iron. He had gathered Ichigo into his arms, and held him like a child, ripping the sleeves of his uniform to pad the tattered hole through his son's heart, only to feel the blood running in weakening throbs between his slitted fingers.
Who is making that whimpering sound? Stop it. Whoever you are, stop it.
Then Isshin realises that the sound is coming from his own mouth.
"Wake up, Ichigo," he half-pleads in a choked whisper. "Please." His hands clench tighter, stoppering the blood flow from Ichigo's chest by pure strength. He feels his son's ribs shift a little under the force, and he winces. But it is necessary. Any more blood, and Ichigo wouldn't have any left. His son is so pale, deathly so, and where is that always-present scowl that he uses as a self-defense mechanism after his mother's passing?
And Ichigo shifts, a miniscule movement, a fluttering of his eyelids. Isshin latches onto it like a lifeline, calling his son's name again and again.
"Come on, Ichigo, open your eyes, please…"
A tiny murmur, and a sliver of brown irises become visible. "Iss..in…taichou?"
Isshin frowns through eyes blinded by tears. Isshin-taichou?
Then Ichigo tries to smile, a tiny twitch of the corners of his mouth. "Not…Iss…in..san. Tou…san…" His eyes begins to drift closed again, but he rests his head against his father's shoulder.
Isshin feels like someone had just plunged their hand though his chest and squeezed his heart in a fist. Tou-san. Ichigo had switched to the more impersonal Oyaji mere months after his mother's death. He didn't blame him back then, and not now. He wasn't a very responsible father, after all. Ichigo had to grow up so quickly – he was the one that made sure his sisters brushed their teeth, checked their homework, walked them to school. He was, and is, such a brave boy. And then he shot up to his ridiculous height, and discovered his shinigami powers, and started gallivanting off to fight nameless monsters, hollow and shinigami. Ichigo had never been his Daddy's little boy since that rain-soaked night.
But now – but now…and Isshin remembers that sunny smile of Ichigo's childhood. My child…
Isshin looks towards the portal. He has to get him back, somehow. If he could somehow get Unohana and her team to him in time – Ichigo coughs up a shuddering spray of red on his sleeve, and Isshin moves a hand to stroke his hair, mumbling rushed nonsense words of comfort, leaving streaks of ochre in the orange spikes.
But if he is to move him, he can't put pressure on the wound. And without pressure, Ichigo would bleed out and die. But if Unohana doesn't see to him, and quick, he would still succumb to his wounds.
Isshin is torn between the two choices, looking frantically at the portal and back to his son's unmoving face. He wants to scream in frustration.
And the moment when he thinks his head is going to split in two from hopeless pain, a very disconcerting voice sounds from right in front of him.
"Let me help you." A younger, haori-wearing Shiba Isshin, not a trace of jovial laughter on his face. In fact, his lips are drawn so tight, they appear white.
Isshin just stares at his younger self, unable to process this new development, only hugging Ichigo tighter to himself. He is unaware of how he appears – blood-streaked, hyperventilating, tear tracks coursing down his face.
"He's my son too, you know," the other Isshin says softly. "He's a good son. I can tell, even from only knowing him for a few days. Let me carry him. We can't have him losing any more blood." He reaches forward and touches Ichigo's limp hand.
This time, Isshin lets his other self touch Ichigo without jerking backwards. There is something mutual in that shared gaze. They both have a son. And the thought shocks Isshin from his catatonic state.
"Fine, I need you to lift him in a way so that I can keep the pressure on," Isshin says sharply, struggling to his feet as the other Isshin takes Ichigo's weight.
"We going over there?" the younger Isshin asks, jerking his head towards the portal.
"Yeah. Steady, don't shunpo. I don't think we can keep ahold of him with our different skill levels." Isshin tries not to think about the incessant throb of blood under his palms, or the red running down his arms to drip on the dirt ground.
"Yessir." The other Isshin doesn't even make a snarky comment about the different skill levels phrase.
"I'm going to kill him when we get back," Isshin mutters, trying to distract himself by talking. "He's going to miss his sisters' graduation." The blood means his heart is still beating.
The younger Isshin grins slightly. "I – we – have more kids?"
"Yeah. Karin and Yuzu. Twins. My darlings." Ichigo slips slightly in their grip, and Isshin claws at the soaked cloth, gritting his teeth until his son stops falling.
"And what was their mother like?" There is a dim flicker of hope in the younger man's gaze.
Their eyes meet. "Masaki was the most beautiful, wonderful woman I ever, and will ever, meet," Isshin says bluntly. "The day she died, a piece of me died with her."
The other Isshin nods gravely. He doesn't expect to understand what grief his counterpart has gone through. He won't understand, until his own time comes.
The portal is right in front of them now, a hazy storm of blue.
Isshin takes Ichigo into his arms again, his son groaning in pain unconsciously at the movement. "Shhh, Ichi. We're going home now," he soothes. He hasn't called Ichigo by that pet name since a long, long time ago. But he has to use it now. "Thank you," he calls after the retreating figure of his younger self.
"Take care of our family," the other Isshin smiles sadly. Then something of a grin appears again. "I'm looking forward to meeting Masaki."
And Isshin tips backward through the portal, clutching Ichigo to his chest tightly. Just before his vision is swamped by the blackness of the space, he sees a chain of people pass beside him to land on the ground.
Urahara. Ukitake. Kyouraku.
Kyouraku strides forward, looking at the state of the battlefield.
Across to the eastern edge of Sokyoku Hill, Abarai-fuktaichou dances and cavorts in between angered swipes of Senbonzakura, a kimono-clad Byakuya snarling in his effort to catch him. A very rookie-looking younger Renji watches with gaping amazement, flinching at the screeching clash between Zabimaru's teeth and Senbonzakura's petals. Above, a spectacular frenzy of whirling metal and flipping haori reveals the Visored attacking as one, an oiled machine of defense and counter, Aizen tearing his way across the sky, still unable to draw Kyoka Suigetsu. The assorted seated officers that are now surprisingly unneeded mill together in a loose group on the ground, watching the battle with barely concealed awe.
There is a stir of multiple reiatsu signatures to the east, towards Seireitei proper. In particular, the lights of the Sixth and Tenth divisions are ablaze. The rest of the Gotei have undoubtedly risen to the commotion by now.
Kyouraku gestures briskly. "Urahara-san, please work quickly. We will soon have company, I should think." His one good eye is trained onto the distant lights.
Urahara is holding a peculiar entity within his hands – a spherical object seemingly made out of spun threads of glass, translucent and delicate, yet beating with an intense spike of reiatsu. The very core of the sphere is a dark, clotted red, almost like blood, and scores of different reiatsu signatures warp the air around the ball. Urahara holds it like a newborn child, cradling it carefully on the tips of his fingers. He nods his affirmation to Kyouraku's order. "We've gathered Kuchiki Rukia's reiatsu and blood before crossing over. We have Ichigo's reiatsu. All we need is Ichigo's blood, and we will have accounted for everyone."
Ukitake breaks in, staring up at where Matsumoto and Gin are. "Urahara-san, we may need Gin's blood as well. Considering Kuchiki-taichou's preliminary report, Gin may have deserted Aizen fifty decades early. We will have to remedy that."
"Right. See ya!" And with a tip of his hat, Urahara blurs towards the pool of blood where Ichigo had previously lain.
Kyouraku draws his zanpakutuo slowly and deliberately. "So, Juushiro," he says conversationally, "looks like we're not needed. Everyone seems to be handling things well. You shouldn't join in the fight unless absolutely necessary, you know. You're only on the first trial of that new medicine."
"Of course, Shunsui," Ukitake says rather distractedly, prompting the Soutaichou to snap his gaze towards him. Ukitake's line of sight is focused on the still figures of Matsumoto Rangiku and Ichimaru Gin, off to one side. They are standing so motionless, Kyouraku had missed them out in his first scan of the skies.
"If we're lucky," Kyouraku murmurs, "we might be able to get what we need from him without a struggle."
Ukitake dips his head once, green eyes still fixed upon the two figures. They are speaking, although their words cannot be heard over such a distance.
When Matsumoto had first volunteered to be part of the team going through on the rescue mission, she had almost immediately regretted her decision, only to revert back to a desperate longing to see her childhood friend again. Torn between a terrified fear – how would this younger Gin react to seeing her? – and an aching sense of loss – so many days spent with visions of their time in Rukongai together, and his last words choked before his death – she had only hugged herself and trembled, dithering until the last moment to enter the portal.
And when the light of the sunset rushed and enveloped her, she had looked up, skimming the sky, and latched upon that painfully familiar shock of silver lightning. She had thrown herself into the air without a second thought, feet moving seemingly without her own will, a tripping, stumbling shunpo like that moment in the ruins of Karakura when she had seen that same head of hair drenched with blood, lying prone on rubble, run though by Aizen.
And there he was, unadorned by a captain's haori, still with his fukutaichou's badge, looking younger, somehow, and more vulnerable. His zanpakutuo was half-coated in blood – Ichigo's blood, even as Isshin below them desperately tried to save his son.
The moment she appeared before him, their eyes had met. Teal grey-blue, and icy cerulean. Rangiku had never known why, but she could always see Gin's eyes, from the moment they had first met on that desolate field in the Rukongai. Others had told her that the snakelike slits obscured his true nature in a mask of intimidation, but she had always been able to see the windows to his soul, no matter how he had tried to hide them behind his curved eyelashes.
And now those ice-blue eyes show shock, recognition, and guarded pain.
She swallows. I must do this. "Hello, Gin," she says softly, arms still around herself, trying to comfort.
He doesn't answer, just stares at her, lips not even in that trademark grin, his face curiously childlike.
"I missed you," she whispers, eyes filling with tears, and she chokes back a sob, hugging herself tighter and tearing her eyes from him as she fights back against the emotion, trying to regain some semblance of control. A tear slips down her cheek.
A ghosting of black and white and silver, and suddenly he is there, catching the single tear on a fingertip, carefully avoiding touching her face. The teardrop glistens sliver-white on his finger, and his hand shakes momentarily, as if the liquid is painful to him.
She looks up at him, finding him but a step away, holding her teardrop like it is a precious gem. He still doesn't speak. She nods. It's okay. She doesn't expect him to understand.
"I –" she stutters, swallows, and tries again. "I wanted to say, I never thought less of you after that day, when you – you –" She stops. "I finally understand, you know. All of it. I'm sorry I misjudged you, even h-hated you for a while, when you followed Aizen." She takes a shuddering breath.
Is it her imagining, or are Gin's eyes softer? Still he holds her gaze, unwavering.
"And," she continues, "I want to say, thank you. Thank you for everything. I knew that you were someone special from the moment you found me in that field. Thank you, Gin." She is about to cry again, and she wants to fold in on herself and disappear for while.
Then, a voice she hasn't heard for a long, long decade.
"Rangiku." Gin's voice, quiet. His gaze holds words that he cannot ever express.
And Matsumoto sees what Gin never had a chance to say, all those years and months and days before.
"Rangiku," he says again, even softer.
She smiles tremulously, for the first time. Her shoulders stop shaking, and she stands straighter. And Gin's mouth twitches upwards too.
The truest imitation of a real smile that Ichimaru Gin will ever produce.
Then he shifts, and draws his blade across his palm in one, rapid stroke. Matsumoto gasps, reaching forward to catch his hand. His reiatsu-filled blood trickles through her tear droplet and runs back to pool into her cupped fingers.
"Why?" she asks simply.
Gin's snakelike smile is back. He tilts his head behind her, and she looks back to see Urahara heading towards them, spherical object in hand.
Matsumoto understands. If the memory of his defection is not wiped from Aizen's mind, there is a very real possibility that the timeline would Seireitei would fall, and she would die. So Gin is protecting her, by giving his blood willingly, sacrificing his knowledge of Aizen's future.
He closes his fingers over her hands, his blood cradled in her fingers. They look at each other for a long, long moment.
"Goodbye," she whispers.
He tilts his head.
And she turns, hair flying in an arc behind her as she spins towards Urahara, her hands still holding his blood, and her tears, merged into a seamless whole.
Below, Kyouraku watches as Urahara lifts the globe to Matsumoto's hands, a round hole appearing to catch the red liquid. The sphere actually stirs, waves and currents of light rippling across its surface as it absorbs every drop of blood on her hands. "It's done," he says. "Urahara-san's solution is primed and ready. We have the blood and reiatsu of every shinigami that needs to be forgotten."
Blood, as a signature of physical self. Reiatsu, as a signature of their existence at that particular point in time.
Ukitake doesn't reply. Kyouraku is about to turn around when an alarmed hand on his arm snaps his attention to his friend.
"What is it?" he asks Ukitake, whose eyes are fixed far into the distance.
"Look, Shunsui," he says quietly, solemnly.
Kyouraku turns his gaze to follow Ukitake's, and immediately tenses into a loose battle stance. His hand drops to his zanpakutuo.
For a score of distinct figures have detached themselves from the streets of Seireitei, speeding towards Sokyoku Hill with fleet haste, their feet drawing long white streaks in the slipstream caused by their shunpo.
Kyouraku's remaining eye is sharp enough to pick out at least seven or eight recognizable figures out of the group at this distance.
Soi Fong, Komamura, Zaraki, Unohana, Tousen. Two figures running beside each other that look suspiciously like themselves – a younger Ukitake and Kyouraku. At the center of the formation, a wizened face that he has not seen for a decade, crafted stick gripped in one hand, riding on the wind. Yamamoto Genryuusai.
Sensei.
Next to him, Ukitake has gone a shade of milky white, and his fingers tighten their grip on Kyouraku's arm.
"Juushiro?" Kyouraku asks sharply, pivoting to look into Ukitake's face. "Are you alright? Is it your illness acting up again – you shouldn't have come."
"No," Ukitake hisses, "I'm fine. It's just –" He raises a long, slender finger and points.
Kyouraku sees on the very edge of the incoming cloud of shinigami, a tall figure with a fukutaichou's badge that makes him frown for a moment. Ichigo-taichou? But no, this figure has sable-black hair, and wears his zanpakutuo belted to his side.
Shiba Kaien.
No wonder Ukitake looks pale.
"Ah," Kyouraku says sagely. If there are words for this sort of situation, he can't find them. He focuses on his duties instead, amplifying his voice with reiatsu into a cutting tone of command. "Abarai-fukutaichou! Hirako-taichou! Fall back and return to the portal, it's time to leave before we're surrounded. Hirako-taichou, I would appreciate it if you could, ah, deter our dear friend Aizen so that Urahara-san can do his work. Seated officers, return now."
The group of seated officers react with some professionalism, only looking back at the fight once or twice as they snap to attention and file back to the portal.
Abarai salutes cockily, upside-down and hair in a starburst, from where he is currently executing a double backflip in an attempt to avoid Senbonzakura's clutches. "Hai, Soutaichou-sama," he calls nonchalantly back towards them.
Shinji catches Kyouraku's eye, and nods once to indicate his understanding. They need to immobilize Aizen momentarily, just enough time for Urahara to set the sphere in action.
Next to him, Hiyori pouts at the soon-to-be end to their satisfying and extremely violent rematch with their greatest enemy. Aizen has escaped serious injuries, more due to their holding back than his agile defense. Nevertheless, a trail of red runs freely from his temple, his hair singed and haori smoking, the two deep cuts caused by Ichigo and Shinji are raised and angry, and his expression is beginning to show a hint of humiliation under that pitiless rage. But Hiyori's appetite for revenge is yet insatiable, and she, as all of them do, cannot burn the sight of Ichigo bleeding out on the ground just moments ago from their vision. Hiyori too had suffered under Gin's zanpakutuo in the Winter War.
Shinji has just completed his spin towards the Visored, preparing to order their retreat, when Hiyori blazes past him in a bright flash of red and yellow, a telltale nimbus of crimson light forming just past her open lips.
Cero.
Shinji whirls and dashes after her. Too much, Hiyori! Aizen can't survive a direct hit from her full-power cero, not in his current state. He catches her wrist deftly in his free hand, and yanks himself towards her so she can hear him speak. "Ten percent power," he says. Hiyori glares at him, and shakes her head. "Ten percent, fuktaichou. It's an order," he says sharply. "We can't kill him without killing Ichigo," he reminds her.
At that, Hiyori visibly reins in her power, and lets the singularity reverberate into sparking, dancing sphere, before arching her back and roaring at Aizen, an animalistic howl of crowing victory. The Visored maneuver themselves into position so that Aizen has nowhere to run.
The flaming conflagration is reflected in Aizen's glasses a moment before it consumes him.
Shinji flicks his fingers, and the Visored once more form one unbroken line. "Good job," he calls out shortly. "We're done here. Fall back."
The cero clears to reveal and choking, gagging Aizen, with soot smudged across his lenses and a doubly intense stare of hatred behind them. He tries to form words, but is forced into hacking coughs as he struggles not to fall from the sky.
Shinji holds that serpent's gaze with a stare even colder than the one drilling into his skull. "One thing you must know. Kurosaki Ichigo is one of us. That was done in his name. We have already seen you humiliatingly defeated once before. We were glad to oblige once again."
And with a swish of his haori, he leads the Visored in a concerted flash-step to the ground, two paces behind Kyouraku, Ukitake, and Urahara. Renji lands beside them a second later, sheathing Zabimaru with a rasp.
Kyouraku acknowledges them with a nod. "Urahara-san," he says quietly.
Urahara hefts the spherical object closer to himself, fingers tapping it in a complex pattern. It starts to glow brighter.
And with a strange sort of supernatural absence of sound, the opposite edge of the cliff is suddenly lined with shinigami, sandaled feet and white-gilded haori ghosting to an utterly silent stop. A score of hands land on a score of zanpakutuo hilts.
On Sokyoku Hill stands the shinigami of Seiretei against each other, on one side a spinning portal, on the other a nest of half-drawn zanpakutuo. Here is the sum total of it all – a fading creed and a new order, past and present, old and young, war veterans and soldiers in a war's creeping shadow, a checkboard chessboard of black against white, with a different king and a different doctrine.
Ghosts and the living.
The silence stands, immortal, endless, both sides evaluating the other.
Then it is Kyouraku and Ukitake's voices in tandem that shatter the quiet like a sharp knife against paper-thin glass, the barrier of silence falling in a million incandescent shards to scatter across time and space.
"Greetings, Yamamoto-sensei," both intone with deep bows of utmost respect. "It is good to see you again." It is the formal greeting between students and teacher long separated.
The assembled shinigami shift in surprise. This is not what they expected – they had thought there was a great incursion into Seireitei's shields, not a dozen respectful shinigami.
Yamamoto regards them both expressionlessly. Then he strides forward, cane tapping the hard-baked crust of earth, until he stands clear from the crowd. He surveys Kyouraku and Ukitake with eyes unreadable as steel. In the gathering behind him, the younger Kyouraku and Ukitake also look on.
The air suddenly goes dry as sun-drenched bone, crackling with suppressed energy and robbed of all moisture. Each breath burns the lungs and dries the tongue. Yamamoto's cane shivers under his weathered hand. Several younger shinigami in the back have to grab onto each other to stay standing.
Kyouraku and Ukitake share a glance. Then Ukitake bows his head in formal deference, and steps back as Kyouraku meets his teacher's heavy gaze full-on. Kyouraku draws his zanpakutuo, and flips it once.
A rustling of the fabric between words, and suddenly the air is moist again, the scent of spring and rose petals and fresh green grass flooding across the gap between the two soutaichou.
Yamamoto's eyebrows lift ever so slightly.
And all at once, both reiatsus disappear.
"My children," Yamamoto finally heaves with a sigh, "why are you here?"
Kyouraku's smile is tinged with sadness. "We came to bring back our own. I apologise for entering unannounced, but we mean Seireitei no harm."
Yamamoto snorts, eyes flicking to Aizen, the kimono-wearing Byakuya, the Visored, and Urahara. "Kyouraku-soutaichou," he says, and the honorific spreads a ripple across the shinigami crowd. "I fail to see how no harm has been done. I see our captains injured, and your captains traitors. Where are Kurosaki-taichou and Kuchiki-fukutaichou?"
Kyouraku flicks a hand at the portal. "Gone. We will trouble you no further. We take our leave, respectfully. Farewell, Sensei." A hint of regret.
Beside him, Ukitake catches Kaien's eye, and inclines his head. Thank you, and my respect, dear friend. As he straightens, Kaien shakes his head and bows back, only deeper. I have done nothing to deserve such honour. I return it to you. Ukitake's leaf-green eyes are wet.
The shinigami from the future shift as one towards the portal.
Yamamoto steps forward, all the weight of his years in command suffusing his voice. "You cannot leave, not after trespassing on our territory."
Kyouraku looks back, and there is something indescribably sad in his eyes. Then the shield of a captain is up again, and he gestures to Urahara, sharply.
And the cliff detonates into an explosion of movement, as all shinigami from the future throw themselves in the direction of the portal, save Urahara. The shinigami from the past move forward in a crested wave the moment they see them apparently fleeing, zanpakutuos drawn in a cacophony of metallic songs –
Only Urahara faces them, a smile weirdly in-between laughing and sad, a seemingly mocking grin clashing with a hidden hardness in his mouth. He raises the sphere in front of him, and releases it, half-turning away, eyes shadowed beneath the rim of his hat.
The sphere reaches the ground just as the first shinigami reach level with it, reiatsu throbbing at a frenetic pace.
CRACK.
And it shatters almost in slow-motion, a perfect wave of broken glass-like slivers that roll in a beautiful wave from base to top, a single, clairvoyant note that hums upon the air and thunders upon the sky and burrows into ears and reverberates in ribcages and resounds in glorious timbre in every heart.
Every shinigami stops. They have to. It is not a conscious choice.
The shards hang in the air, indispersed with a thousand more droplets of ruby liquid, every blood-drop a mark of an individual shinigami, glowing with their own reiatsu signature like a throbbing symbol of their self and identity. Somewhere in the cloud of translucent crystal and warping crimson, there is a single teardrop. It goes unnoticed, and it is not important, save for the two hands that it has touched. In the very center of this half-frozen dance, there is a bright singularity of incomparable power.
It shines silver, then golden, a dazzling luminosity greater and warmer than the almost-set sun on the western horizon. Only a hairsbreadth of crimson light is visible along the great curve now – and with something like an exhalation, Seireitei falls into night.
With a muted thud, the golden center of the hado washes outwards in a scattering of gilded raindrops, a concussion that accelerates exponentially, covering all of Seireitei in an eyeblink. But it is concentrated on Sokyoku Hill itself, and all the higher-level shinigami gathered there.
As the last golden drop melts into the ground, the crooked edge of Urahara's hat disappears also in the shrinking portal.
All across the hill, shinigami reel, clutching their heads. Weaker footsoldiers and some seated officers go still immediately, looks of serene emptiness on their faces, eyes glazed over. Others, fukutaichou and taichou, keep on hand on their zanpakutuo, blazing their own reiatsu in a futile attempt to resist.
Kuchiki Byakuya grips Senbonzakura, shoulders tense, gritting his teeth.
Abarai Renji collapses on his knees, clawing at Zabimaru, feeling images of himself with bankai, and Rukia glowing a luminous being of white fire, falling like lost puzzle pieces from his mind.
Ichimaru Gin clutches his zanpakutuo to his heart, and bows his head, thinking of orange hair and brilliant teal-blue eyes.
Shiba Kaien smiles sadly, raising his eyes to the glimmering stars, and sheathes Nejibana with a sigh.
Aizen Sousuke roars with fury, holding his head between his hands, struggling with Kyoka Suigetsu against the river of attacking reiatsu around him. Kurosaki Ichigo. Kuchiki Rukia. Hollowfied. Quincy. Visored. Gin. But all is fading, blacking away, slipped through his fingers like slippery silverfin, going, going… Kurosaki Ichigo. Hollowfied. No, encroaching blackness, and Urahara's echoing laughter. Kurosaki Ichigo. Kurosaki Ichigo. I will brand that name into my skin if I have to. Kurosaki Ichigo.
And when Aizen opens his eyes, everyone around him is dazed. He is dazed, blood streaming from wounds.
A flicker by his side. Ichimaru Gin, his faithful follower. "What…happened?" Gin asks, uncharacteristically shaken.
Aizen opens his mouth to answer – and stops. He can't remember. How strange. Someone has tampered with my memory. He stands, and scans the surrounding shinigami. Even Yamamoto is holding his head.
He struggles to his feet, and looks at the moonrise to the east.
And something surfaces like a piece of wood half-drowned in a flood, on the flat plane that is his mind.
A name.
Kurosaki Ichigo.
Aizen smiles. No face with the name, but a name nonetheless. He will seek out the meaning of that name, one day.
I will find you.
Now, that was over 9000 words. A single, unbroken scene. Nine thousand. I think I'm going to die. Whew. Please appreciate, and give me some pepper-up for the effort :) Now, I'm going on a camp until Thursday. This means that the next chapter might be a bit late. But look out for it anyway, I'm definitely going to try my best to get it out fast.
Review please! I basically trooped around the entire day, then threw myself at my laptop and typed frantically for a couple hours straight.
Replies to guest reviews:
Guest: Thank you so much for the review! I'm glad you liked it (although you probably hated me for the cliffie). Hope this one made up for it :)
Guest: Thank you! Haha did you like her bankai?
Guest: Your review is my favourite, ever. How many "o"s was that? Haha :)
Guest: I'm evil, that's what. I left it there cause I'm evil. Merheheheh. Thanks for the review!
Miyo89: The complicatedness was here. Whew! All done :) Thanks, and I hope you liked it.