Chapter 10: Turn Up the Heat

Ishida Uryuu sighed as he edged closer to his home. He was just coming home from Urahara's shop after learning of the harsh situations that had occurred.

Ever since he saw Orihime with Ulquiorra, a wave of disappointment and hurt swept over him. He had never gotten over her, even if he had tried to go out on dates. None of the girls that he had gone out with even compared to Orihime, according to him anyway. She was someone whom he had loved for the longest time, ever since the events in Soul Society.

When he had heard that she was working for Aizen, he had felt so much more pain…and guilt. Sometimes he thought that it was his fault that everything happened to this point. If only he hadn't told Orihime about Rukia and Ichigo in the first place, then maybe this wouldn't have happened.

Then again, she had the right to know. She loved Kurosaki and wanted to be with him. It was better to let her know than to leave her hanging in the dark. Besides, even if he hadn't told her, she would still find out anyway.

Ishida sighed once again before opening his door, heart continuously breaking within his chest, waves of grief washing over him. Maybe he would get some rest tonight and try to keep his mind off of everything, if that were possible at this point.

Golden shield, gauntlets, and sword gleaming, Isshin stood in the air, waiting for his opponent to arise from the buildings he had crashed into. He knew that that attack would never have finished off the espada, so what was taking him so long? Unless he was probably scheming something… Isshin stood ready and alert for any attack that would come his way.

That was when a blade slashed at him from behind. Isshin saw it coming and blocked the attack before it came close to his neck. Leroux growled in disapproval.

"You can't beat my reactivity," Isshin taunted. Leroux recklessly sent a roundhouse kick crashing towards the former captain's head but he blocked that with his shield.

"My turn." Isshin held his shield in front of his face, where it glowed even more. "Onaa no Hikari." A destructive beam of energy shot from the shield, causing Leroux to distance himself and try to cancel it with his hands. He was pushed back a little and his hands and wrists were burned from the impact.

Isshin smirked. "Impressive. You had managed to cancel out Gotoro No Jin's signature technique."

Leroux was fuming. He knew that the captain was trying to toy with him.

Then he thought of something. He knew that when he fought the Sixth Division captain, Byakuya, back in Las Noches, he used his resurreccion to not only control parts of Byakuya's body, but also his own sister. Byakuya had managed to see past the technique and executed the vast power of his bankai, causing the espada's defeat.

But now things are different. Leroux doubted that his opponent would ever have the ability to see through his resurreccion's power.

He widened his legs and held his hands, palms facing up, at his waste. His zampakutou hovered above them. He clapped his hands together and twists his head so that it was perpendicular to his body, making Isshin gape in shock.

Leroux smirked triumphantly. "Your arrogance will cause your downfall. Suppress, Brujeria."

His sword bent into the shape of an edged spiral, and thick white smoke emitted from its corners and covered his body, transforming into thick, foamy liquid that mixed with his reiatsu. Isshin could only stare at the eyes – fifty in total – that covered the espada's entire body, most of which circled around some kind of structure that resembled that of a sea urchin that replaced his legs. Another structure resembling some kind of neck brace appeared around his head, and black markings appeared on his face.

The former captain did not know what to make of this new form, but he prepared his zampakutou and shield for another round of battle.

Leroux's smirk grew into a wider, toothy grin as he stared at his adversary. "Well? Shocked are we? Don't worry. The fun is just getting started!" One of his "eyes" started to glow as he shouted, "Amor!"

An even more unexplainable thing had happened. Isshin's right arm – the one holding his sword – started to move on his own accord. "Shit!" he cursed as he dropped his shield and, with his now empty left hand, snatched his sword away before he could run it through himself, slashing at the tendons and rendering the arm useless.

He panted as blood ran down his damaged arm. How could someone do such a sinister act of controlling parts of their opponent's body? It was such an incredible technique. At this rate, if he manages to lose the use of another limb, his chances of winning would go down even further.

Leroux held back his head and roared with laughter. "The last captain I had fought had this exact same problem!" he exclaimed, laughing uncontrollably.

Isshin growled with disapproval as he clutched his arm. Before their fight even started, he knew that his opponent would have tricks up his sleeve one way or another. It was just only a matter of time before they would surface, but what should he do? He could not afford to lose this fight.

"I think its time to take out the other arm," Leroux announced as the captain winced and, using sonido, dodged the attack before it came to him.

The espada reeled his head around to face his still panting opponent. "So you could see through my technique?"

"You could say that," Isshin answered, "whoever this captain you fought before may not have seen it, but I am the one that taught reactivity to my son during those times I had attacked him out of nowhere. I am not about to let some control technique affect me again."

"Oh really? How about this then?"

That was when all fifty eyes glowed at once, but Isshin thought fast. Like a magnet, his hand attracted his shield to it once more and he held the shield in front of his face, shouting, "Bankai!"

A shimmering, golden aura enveloped him like a cocoon. The sword and shield disappeared and the gauntlets expanded into razor-sharp, golden claws that extended past his fingers as though he were Wolverine from the comic book, X-Men. Gilded, plate armour covered his body except for his head and his wounded arm healed instantly.

For a moment, his arms were crossed, but he immediately spread them out to show the full extent of his claws. Isshin opened his eyes to show his deathly glare, and Leroux was astonished that all fifty of his "eyes" proved to be useless. "Ougon Tora, Gotora no Jin."

"I-i-im-impossible!" he stammered as he froze in amazement at his opponent's new form.

Isshin's lips turned upwards into a smirk. "Surprised? I would be if I were you. Let's see if you can withstand these abilities!"

He lunged towards his enemy. Leroux did not know what else to do so he tried to wing it by using his Amor technique again, but to no avail. A light, golden aura enveloped the former captain as the Amor technique proved to be no affect.

The pumpkin-like structure curled around the espada to try to form a protective shield, but that did not stop Isshin from reaching his opponent. "You're mine!" With one slashing sweep, the claws of one hand ripped clean through the defence like a hot knife through butter, ripping the protesting espada apart, thus ending their fight once and for all.

Once Leroux had completely disintegrated in midair, Isshin allowed his bankai to return to his shikai state, and then he reverted his sword to normal before sheathing it. He felt proud of his accomplishment after twenty years of absence and was glad that he was some use to this war.

Ulquiorra was almost beginning to think this battle with Ichigo was pointless. However, if he wanted to die, then might as well die during a battle between someone he loathed the most. That was the code of honour for all of the arrancar, and it was how it should be.

He also could not believe that Ichigo had almost surpassed his segunda resurreccion, seeing past every technique that he had tried to inflict on the shinigami. His current form was supposed to be much faster than Ichigo's hollowification form. It was something that he just could not fathom, not even for an instance.

Blow for blow, they matched each other's movements – blocking, evading, slashing, slicing. Over and over the tedious cycle repeated itself, and over and over memories of Ulquiorra's beloved Orihime flashed through his mind. He was going to join her soon, and that was something that he was looking forward to. Everything did not matter – not Aizen, not Las Noches, not even this worthless battle that he was having with this stubborn viazard.

Memories of Ryuichi and Yuzu flashing through his mind, Ichigo continued to fight as hard as he could. He was barely scathed at all, except for a few minor cuts and bruises everywhere, and he knew that Ulquiorra would go down eventually.

After all, ever since Orihime was killed, he had noticed that his opponent had been begun to lack the motivation to continue. It was as if the espada did not even want to continue their fight and had wanted to die instead. If that was so, then why won't he just stop what he is doing so that Ichigo could finish him off? Then again, it was an arrancar thing to continue fighting no matter how they felt. In Ulquiorra's case, he was still giving everything that he got to make his last moments worthwhile.

After what seemed like hours of intense fighting, Ulquiorra stopped and separated himself for a breath. Ichigo raised an eyebrow at his opponent in question. "What now? Look if you want me to kill you, then ask!"

"I am not going to ask you to do that yet," Ulquiorra replied, in his monotone voice filled with despair. "I want you, once again, to show me that hollow form that you suddenly changed into the last time we fought."

This was an odd request, Ichigo thought to himself. Was he crazy?

"Seriously," Ulquiorra continued, "If I were to be defeated in battle, then I would want my opponent to finish me off with his most powerful form."

Ichigo sighed. "You asked me to finish you off last time as well, which I had refused. Honestly, you are such a stubborn child. Why can't you realize that?"

The insult did not phase the espada one bit. "Even if you refused to land the finishing blow on me, Orihime was the one that saved my life with her powers and gave me a purpose. I may be a stubborn 'child', but I am making this my final request."

"Are you insane?" Ichigo protested, holding onto his sword tightly. "If you wanted me to kill you in the first place you would have stopped and allowed me to kill you ages ago."

"And you know that that is not what espada and arrancar are capable of," Ulquiorra contradicted, twitching his tail in frustration. "Show me your hollow form or I will bring it out by force like I did last time."

The last thing that the young father wanted was to be killed once again, especially by an espada like Ulquiorra. However, it was the only way that he would transform into his hollow form, and that was something that Ichigo had refused to do.

"The answer is still no," he replied flatly.

Ulquiorra sighed. "Very well then." He held two fingers in front of him; black reiatsu was forming at the fingertips. "You leave me no choice. Cero Oscuras." A gigantic, pitch-black, fearsome blast shot out of his fingertips and burst towards Ichigo, who was also forming a cero at the same time.

Both blasts collided at the centre, causing reiatsu to explode outward. The opponents on either side of the blasts growled as they tried to overpower one another in a last ditch effort. Slowly, the collision point was moving side to side with each attempt.

While Ulquiorra's thoughts were filled with the chances to see Orihime again, Ichigo's thoughts were filled with the chances to reunite with his sister and son. Therefore, his resolve was greater. After a while of struggling, he managed to bring forth more power and force his side of the blast towards Ulquiorra at a greater speed.

The espada smirked at this move and closed his eyes, allowing the cero to swallow him whole. He slowly opened his eyes into slits as he saw an illusion of Orihime smiling at him against the light and his smirk turned into a soft smile before turning into dust.

Sensing that his opponent's reiatsu had disappeared, Ichigo immediately stopped firing his cero and removed his mask.

His eyes softened as he reverted his zampakutou back to normal and sheathed it. Although Ulquiorra was his enemy, he respected the espada for his efforts throughout the battle. At least he would be a lot happier with Orihime wherever they may be.

Narrowing his eyes, Ichigo turned his heel and ran up the long staircase to continue his desperate search.

Meanwhile, back in Soul Society, Hitsugaya and Halibel were in the middle of their intense bout. Like Leroux and Isshin and Ichigo and Ulquiorra, their reiatsu levels were evenly matched as they blocked, parried, and countered each other's attacks.

Unlike the last time they had fought, Hitsugaya had seen through all of Halibel's techniques, dodging, blocking, and parrying them with ease and then coming back with a horrendous counter with his zampakutou release.

The female espada did not know what to make of this. How could this little brat evade her techniques so quickly? She had figured that it was because the young captain had experienced them and had learned from them. It was so surprise to her, but it had frustrated her to no end.

"What's the matter, bitch?" Hitsugaya taunted, parrying her swings like they were nothing. "Getting frustrated because your attacks no longer work on me?"

"Shut up!" Halibel snapped as she countered with a downward strike which Hitsugaya blocked immediately. "You are really getting on my nerves!"

"Sit upon the frozen sky, Hyourinmaru!" Hitsugaya shouted as the ice dragon flew out of the tip of his zampakutou, heading towards the third espada, who pointed her blade outward, shouting, "Hirviendo!"

Boiling water erupted out of her sword and burst toward the dragon, but Hitsugaya thought fast. Adding shunpo to the combo, he managed to evade the technique and the dragon flew right into her, encasing her in ice.

However, her icy prison did not last long and she shattered the frozen walls as though they were nothing. Holding her shark-like blade outward, she shouted, "La Gota", causing a large amount of water to burst outward in the form of a shark tooth. Even though Histugaya managed to dodge the first projectile that came towards him, Halibel managed to fire several more in rapid motion, causing the diminutive captain to dodge with super speed.

However, the last projectile managed to strike one of his wings and damage his shoulder. Hitsugaya gasped in pain as blood flew out of his wound and his wing shattered. Another petal dissolved from behind him, leaving two more "lotuses" behind.

"Looks like your luck is running out," Halibel noticed as Hitsugaya panted. With a lot of concentration, he managed to summon water from one of the Rukongai districts to repair his shattered wing. The espada had expected him to do that.

Hitsugaya smirked. "I'm…just getting…warmed up!" He attacked her head-on with his Guncho Tsurara technique, shooting razor sharp ice shards towards her, before disappearing using shunpo. Halibel countered with Hirviendo, melting the shards, but was caught off guard when Hitsugaya used Tenso Jurin, darkening the sky around them.

"Not this again," Halibel muttered as she looked around for her opponent.

"Hyakko Hyakkoso!" Hitsugaya yelled from behind her.

Before she could do anything, snow fell all around her. Frustration built up even more as she shrieked under her breath. "CASCADA!!!" A gushing surge of pressurized water was sent towards the young captain, who blocked it immediately with his wings.

Slowly, the snow started to form ice around her, encasing her arms and legs and rendering them useless. "YOU'LL PAY FOR THIS!!" She screamed with disapproval as she struggled against her gradually forming prison.

"How so exactly?" Hitsugaya asked with feigned interest. "Isn't that a bit of an understatement?"

Halibel was going to fire another water technique at him but the shark tooth blade that she was holding immediately froze solid. "NO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" She shrieked in protest.

"I had managed to fully improve this technique," Hitsugaya explained as more ice started to encase his panicking opponent. "This time I will make sure that you will never get out of this. The ice had been made 30 times stronger and it will be even harder for you to escape the frozen domain. Sooner or later, the flowers will grow and your fate will be sealed.

Halibel ground her teeth together as the ice made her way to her throat. She thrashed her head ever which way until the ice made its way to her chin. "Noooo!!!!" she panicked as the ice completely covered her, silencing her even though she was still alive.

Then, one by one, the ice started to bloom pristine yet deadly blossoms throughout the frozen espada's body. Hitsugaya watched intently as the blossoms doubled, then tripled their numbers until the entire column was covered in crystal flowers, snuffing out the life of the third espada.

To make sure that she would never break out of her tomb like she had done the last time, he whipped his zampakutou to the side, shattering the blossom-covered pillar and the espada along with it.

He then changed himself back to normal by shattering the ice wings, tail, and claws into shards which disappeared immediately and sheathed his zampakutou, giving out a triumphant sigh of relief that that battle was over.

Double-curved blade against katana, Grimmjow and Nnoitra fought each other hard. While Nnoitra laughed and taunted Grimmjow with every blow, the former espada snarled as he blocked and countered each attack with just as much equal force. Reiatsu exploded between them as they moved around the room using sonido, clashing their weapons together and putting everything that they had. Even though they were inflicting damage to the store room, none of the rivals cared.

This was not a battle to determine which weapon was the strongest; this was a battle for honour – Grimmjow and Neliel's honour. That was what Grimmjow was thinking the entire time he blocked and countered Nnoitra's attacks.

The sooner he would end this, the sooner he would reunite with Neliel. His instincts told him that she was close by, and Unohana and Byakuya were probably making their way towards her right now. He was sure that she would understand his decision for wanting to stay behind to defeat Nnoitra once and for all.

The fifth espada, on the other hand, had other plans. He never cared about honour from the very beginning. Instead, all what he cared about was his opponent's humiliating defeat and suffering not only as payback for his rebelliousness against Aizen but also because he loved to make others suffer, no matter if they were friend or foe.

They separated from each other for a bit to catch their breath. Grimmjow glared daggers at his opponent as he held his sword tighter.

"What's yer problem?" Nnoitra asked with his toothy grin, "Mad at me 'cause I gave ya and Neliel trouble? Ha! Yer somethin' else, Grimmjow! When will ya ever learn? The more ya try to rebel against Aizen-sama the harder it will be for the both of ya!"

Grimmjow spat to his left. "I don't fucking care what you think," he snapped, "you never really cared what Aizen had in mind either. All what you fight for is your own personal gain."

"Ya've gone soft on me, Grimm. Ya used to do the same thing back when we were on the same side. Now, you are on the same side as the shinigami. That tells me that you are obviously just as weak as Neliel. Did yer fight with that pitiful human damage yer brain or somethin'? It seems like that ta me."

"Again," Grimmjow repeated slowly, "I don't fucking care what you think. I also don't have the time to talk right now. Let's finish this!"

"Heh, ya might not have the time to talk to me, but once I cut yer voice box out, ya won't be able to talk at all!"

That was when Grimmjow burst out laughing. "Don't make me laugh, Nnoitra! You can't even catch up to me to begin with!" He pressed his claws against the blade of his sword. "Grind, Pantera!"

Ribbons of blue reiatsu formed all around him, transforming his body to that of a panther, but still keeping his face as is. Grimmjow roared as power overtook him and reiatsu exploded outward.

Nnoitra's smirk never faded. He knew that Grimmjow would show his most powerful form sooner or later. "Pray, Santa Teresa!"

He grew another pair of arms and his double-bladed weapon turned into four enormous scythes, each donning a hand of its own. A pair of horns grew on his head, with one horn longer than the other and resembling a crescent moon and a golden marking ran from his forehead to his right eye. The hollow mask became torn, extending over the eye patch that covered his signature hole.

Both opponents stared each other down for a moment before they lunged towards each other using their topmost speed, attacking, dodging, and blocking with everything that they had.

Next time on Incomplete Sorrows…

Ichigo's heart nearly shattered and emotion almost took over him as he saw his son, Ryuichi, fussing around in his crib. Without thinking, he slowly and silently stepped over to his son's crib. Ryuichi noticed him right away and made a happy squeal but his father hushed him gently as he took him into his arms. The baby whimpered, almost as though he was telling his father how much he missed him and Ichigo rocked him back and forth, calming his little boy down.

"I'm so proud of you, Ryuichi," he whispered as he kissed his son's forehead, "you managed to be strong in such a scary place. Now let's find your auntie and mother and go home. You're going to be all right."

You've read it, folks! The reunions are coming up next chapter! *cheers* I have been looking forward to writing this chapter for quite some time and finally I will be able to!

This chapter was very hard to write – mainly because I could not remember Nnoitra, Leroux, Halibel, Hitsugaya, and Ulquiorra's abilities very well and also I had to find names for techniques that Isshin would do. I had to do a lot of research to find information for this chapter.

Another reason why it was hard was because I have never been very good at writing fight scenes, but because of my fabulous boyfriend Liam who is writing stories of his own, he had inspired me to write them. His name is Leanbow and he's got a story up that is based on Power Rangers RPM. It's really good and if you like Power Rangers, check it out.

Speaking of Liam, the part about Isshin's bankai was sort of inspired from one of his stories, entitled The Team and also inspired by the Wolverine from the X Men. After all, his character, Morgue, was also inspired by Wolverine since he has the claws. I am not trying to copy the aspect of Wolverine even though he is an awesome character. It's a little bit of inspiration as we would say.

Isshin's technique, Onaa no Hikari, and bankai release, Ougon Tora, are translated as Light of Honour (loosely anyway, my Japanese is beginner level so please correct me if I am wrong!) and Golden Tiger respectively. I also must tell you that Tora is actually Tiger so his zampakutou would be called Gotora no Jin (Guardian Tiger of Man).

Anyway, please read and review and I will have this video up as soon as I can!

Take care, you all! :D