Disclaimer: I do not own Bleach. Tite Kubo does. This story, however, is mine o' mine.

Torn

Chapter 24: Chop Suey

It was not an exaggeration in the slightest to say that, at this moment, Shaolin Fon utterly and thoroughly detested Grimmjow Jaegerjaques. That loathing didn't mean she wouldn't stay by his side and not budge an inch until those piercing blue eyes of his opened again, but it did mean she wasn't going to like it. Because as much as a part of her certainly cared very deeply about the Arrancar's wellbeing, another part of her that was equally strong absolutely despised being controlled.

She'd been groomed her whole life to serve under Lady Yoruichi. And once Shaolin had achieved that goal, she had let herself be deluded into thinking that it would last forever, the feeling of contentment that seemed to shroud her like a protective cloak whenever her Captain was around. But then Lady Yoruichi had abandoned her, and it was like the world fell away from underneath her feet. Her sole purpose had been taken away from her; she was nothing more than a shell, a dog without orders; she might as well not have even existed.

And there was no way Shaolin was going to let herself feel that hollow ever again, even if it meant staring her only shot at happiness in ages in the mouth and punching his teeth out. And yet…

And yet, she had to know. She had to know what the hell all of these visions were leading up to, and why they wouldn't leave her in peace. Her human life was supposed to be dead and buried in the ground somewhere, not haunting her dreams. But the images would keep sprouting up anyway, like an irrepressible hydra, and just as venomous. The poison of curiosity seeped slowly into her veins, and before she knew it Shaolin had been all-but consumed by the desire to know not only what she and Grimmjow had meant to each other in the past, but also just what had been cataclysmic enough to drive them apart.

Sighing in exasperation as her willpower finally cracked and caved in, the onyx-eyed Soul Reaper placed her hands on each side of the sleeping Arrancar's head. As her fingers rested gingerly against his temples, Shaolin closed her eyes and exhaled slowly, opening up the connection and letting Grimmjow's reiatsu flow into her own consciousness. The sudden rush of sheer power was almost suffocating, and her own thoughts faded away as they were overwhelmed by the crush of memories.

There was no turning back now, for better or for worse.

Grimmjow Jaegerjaques was not the kind of guy to plan things out way in advance, but he still tried to be prepared for worst-case scenarios.

Unfortunately, nothing he had prepared for had come even remotely close to this.

"What's wrong, Grimmjow?" the rough, gravelly voice of his Boss rumbled. "Don't tell me you are having second thoughts about this assignment?"

"With all due respect, Oyabun," the blue-haired man replied in a tone that conveyed minimal amounts of it, "we had an arrangement. I slum for you against Fujiwara, and in exchange for a severe pay-cut you don't give me any jobs that'd put Shaolin in danger."

"I fail to see how this would jeopardize the safety of your woman, shateigashira," the Yakuza boss retorted. "She is strong, is she not? Able to stand on her own?"

"Not against the Fujiwara's retribution, godamnit!" Jaegerjaques snapped, bringing his cup of sake down with a harsh clatter as the soldiers around him tensed up. The boss waved them off casually and took another pull from the cigarette dangling between his lips, unfazed by his Lieutenant's outburst. As the old man said nothing, Grimmjow continued his rebuttal.

"This is how it works, isn't it? The heat stays offa you 'cause all of the grunts are the triggermen, and the other soldiers come after them instead of you. That's how you stay clean, and I can respect that. But what I can't respect is your giving me a job that'll have the death squads goin' after what matters to me, simple as that."

"Well, if that is your only objection," the Boss replied with all the sly smugness of a python coiling its way around dinner, "I have the ideal solution. You can select a detachment of men to guard your woman for the duration of this assignment and its aftermath. How does that sound to you, Grimmjow?"

Jaegerjaques' blue eyes widened as he felt the noose tighten around his neck, and he had to bite back the urge to lunge across the table and plant his fist firmly in his superior's face. He'd let himself be trapped by a rookie mistake, and now nothing would stop his Boss from giving the order to off Shaolin from his end if Grimmjow refused to play ball.

"Sounds like a plan, Oyabun," he growled, finishing off his cup of sake quickly and rising before stalking out of the room, pushing past some rank-and-file soldiers as he did so.

"I am truly glad we understand each other, Grimmjow," the Boss mumbled to himself as he finished his cigarette, ashing it in his underling's empty sake cup.

"Okay, spill it."

A single blue eyebrow arched quizzically at the demand.

"What?"

Shaolin's dark eyes narrowed as the man across from her feigned ignorance; she couldn't stand when he tried to stonewall her like this.

"Cut the bullshit, Grimmjow. Something big is bothering you; you're never this quiet otherwise. What's going on?"

Jaegerjaques took out his sudden anger spike on a piece of chicken, chewing it until he was just grinding on his own teeth before he answered the woman across from him.

"The Boss asked me to do something," he began heavily. "Somethin' dangerous, more than usual."

"So?" Shaolin shot back, totally unperturbed, and Grimmjow almost choked on the gulp of water he'd just taken. "What's your point? It's not like being a hired gun's all rainbows and fucking butterflies, you idiot."

"What's my point?" The blue-eyed man echoed, mystified, before he regained his balance and continued with fire back in his tone.

"My point is that this is serious shit, Shaolin! If it goes wrong, or even if it goes right, you could get killed, or worse!"

After staying silent for several moments, Shaolin arched an eyebrow of her own and spoke, her tone slyly teasing.

"Grimmjow, are you worried about me?"

"What kind'a question is that, you moron?!" he half-shouted back. "Of course I am!" Realizing too late that he had tread onto overly emotional ground, Jaegerjaques shoved a piece of chicken into his mouth and chewed on it mightily.

"Yer thucking imposhible, uhman," he forced out around his mouthful, and Shaolin's expression wrinkled slightly in disgust.

"If this is going to be our last dinner together, Grimmjow," she said disdainfully, "please don't eat it like a five-year-old."

Grimmjow responded to the taunt by expertly flinging a piece of chicken across the table with his fork, leaving a red stain on Shaolin's white shirt as the tomato sauce made its mark.

"Classy," she groused, and Jaegerjaques just grinned like a cat with a mouthful of canary in response.

"Always am, kid," he parried as soon as he'd swallowed, and Shaolin couldn't completely fight back a smile. Damn this man for always being able to slip past her layers of coldness every time she tried to be mad at him. Then again, if anyone would be able to pull that feat off, leave it to the infuriating bastard sitting across from her.

"I'll be fine, Grimmjow; seriously," Shaolin rejoined after the tension between them had seeped away entirely. "I always am."

"I know; I know," Grimmjow replied with uncommon seriousness as he finished his dinner and rose from the table. "But there's a first time for everything, right?"

Feeling herself growing more and more annoyed as Grimmjow's negative buzz was killing her own mood, Shaolin got up and walked purposefully over towards her… well, she was kind of unsure exactly what Grimmjow was to her at this point. That ambiguity didn't change the fact that he was being pointlessly gloomy, though.

"Stop acting so melodramatic, Grimmjow," Shaolin said as she came up behind him, wrapping her arms around his shoulders and laying her hands over his sternum. "It's pissing me off."

"Do something about it, then," Jaegerjaques spoke back in a half-growl, "other than getting that tomato sauce on my shirt. I like this shirt."

"And whose fault is it that my shirt got dirty in the first place?" Shaolin parried, a smirk in her voice as she began to unravel the embrace, only to stop with both hands gripping the back of the shirt's collar. With one smooth pull, the garment had been torn clean in half, red stain and all.

"Problem solved," the dark-haired woman half-purred with smug satisfaction. As Grimmjow turned slowly to face her, Shaolin fought to keep back a shiver as those blue eyes pinned her with his most predatory and unpredictable gaze.

"I thought I told you," he began, glancing pointedly down at the pieces of now-useless cloth in Shaolin's hands before looking back up at her, "that I liked that shirt."

"Do something about it, then," she parried, shooting his own words back as her eyes glinted with a combination of mischief and lust.

"I just might, Shaolin," Grimmjow replied edgily, a hungry smirk on his face as he trailed his fingers from her cheek down to along her collarbone before slipping them under the top of her shirt. He paused for a moment to admire the half-lidded look in her eyes before grinning as they snapped open in shock at the moment he returned the favor and ripped her shirt in half. It had been a ridiculous-looking piece of crap anyway; the world was better off without it.

"What the fuck, Grimmjow?! What'd you do that… for…"

Her complaint trailed off into nothing more than mumbles punctuated by the occasional moan as Grimmjow planted hungry kisses along her chest, thanking all the gods he could remember at the moment that Shaolin made a habit of not wearing a bra.

"Turnabout's fair play, little bee," he half-hissed as he brought his face up to look into her eyes again. "Didn't I tell you not to give unless you can take?"

Grimmjow had silenced Shaolin's voice with a kiss before she could reply, and the onyx-eyed woman allowed herself a moment of pride over having gotten rid of Grimmjow's melancholy before abandoning conscious thought altogether as Jaegerjaques pushed her up against a wall and their pants quickly joined the remains of their shirts in a pile on the floor.

A few hours later, Grimmjow stood over the slumbering form of Shaolin Fon and a rare, genuine smile crossed his lips. She always looked so peaceful and relaxed when she slept, it was hard to imagine that the tough-as-nails iron belle he spent his days with was the same person. Brushing a stray bunch of hairs out of her face, his smile grew as Shaolin mumbled cutely in her sleep and curled into a tighter ball. After another moment, though, Jaegerjaques steeled himself and left the room to prepare for the last thing he wanted to do. Five minutes later, the mercenary was armed and ready to go. Before he headed out the door, Grimmjow locked eyes with the head of the detail he'd picked to guard Shaolin in his absence and spoke in a steely, commanding tone.

"If anything happens to her, and I mean anything, I'm going to hunt you down and skin you alive. Is that in any way unclear?"

"Not at all, sir," the soldier replied, and Jaegerjaques' blue eyes glinted hard in approval.

"Good. Don't let me down."

And with that, Grimmjow Jaegerjaques left his only true friend behind and walked out into the night.

The mission turned out to be what Grimmjow would normally call a 'Resounding Fucking Success', and yet he couldn't shake the feeling that something was very, very wrong. As he opened the door to his apartment, Jaegerjaques' worst fear leapt out of his nightmares and spread out in front of him in all of its gory, bloody glory.

The bodies of all five of the handpicked soldiers were sprawled out on the ground, triple-tapped with bullets and almost afloat in pools of blood. Swallowing his gut reaction of panic, Grimmjow went from room to room quickly and methodically, gun at the ready, looking for the only corpse that mattered. When he couldn't find it, however, the knot in his stomach only tightened.

As if on some perverse cue, the shrill sound of the phone ringing broke through Grimmjow's thoughts. Hurrying to the phone, he ripped it off of the hook and brought the receiver to his ear, about to speak when a cold voice cut him off.

"Hello, Jaegerjaques. Long time, no talk."

The harsh tone of his former superior cut through Grimmjow's anxiety like a blade, replacing it with a focused, growing hatred.

"Boss Fujiwara," the blue-eyed assassin replied, struggling to keep his voice even. "This isn't a call I was expecting to get, considering that I killed you about an hour ago."

"Silly child," the rival yakuza boss said mockingly, "all that time you spent working for me, and you never took the time to figure out that I had a body double waiting in the wings for the day someone vicious enough actually managed to come after me? Well, Grimmjow, I'm not in the habit of making such pathetic, short-sighted mistakes. I learned a lot about you, Jaegerjaques. About what makes you… tick.

"That's why I sent men to your apartment as soon as you left, that's why I had those men eliminate the weak guard you put up around your woman, and that's why she's… well, I'll let you see for yourself. Suffice to say, according to the troops she put out like a true whore, even after the sixth round…"

"I'm going to kill you," Grimmjow hissed, the corners of his eyes burning with something he refused to acknowledge as tears. "I'm going to find you, and I'm going to kill you. Your entire fucking family is dead, you old sack of shit. Do you hear me!?"

"Loud and clear, old friend," Boss Fujiwara replied casually, as if Grimmjow had been threatening to steal his car. "But before you embark on your oh-so-noble quest for vengeance, don't you think you should take out the trash?"

The line went dead with a dull click, and Grimmjow let the receiver dangle lifelessly as he dashed out onto the fire escape and hurried down it, jumping the last six steps and landing on the gravel with a crunch. Crossing the ground in three long strides, Jaegerjaques paused in front of the dumpster and forced down his anxiety with a hard swallow. Reaching out with numb arms, he lifted the metal lid and came face-to-face with a sight that broke his heart in an instant, before grinding the pieces into the dirt and making sure he would never find them again.

Shaolin's black eyes looked up at him, open and tense, the expression on her face twisted with pain. Her face, however, wasn't connected with the rest of her body past the neck. Her head had been cut off, and judging by the wound a katana had done the job. Fujiwara's henchmen, there was no doubt about that now. The rest of her body had suffered a similar fate, and it took every ounce of strength Grimmjow possessed to keep it together as he slowly retrieved the pieces of Shaolin's corpse.

Ten minutes later, the grizzly deed was done. Five more and he'd put them all in a plastic bag and hit the road, driving until his car ran out of gas. The old hunk of metal rolled to a stop by a public park, and it was there that Shaolin Fon's earthly remains were buried. It was also on that spot, in dead of night, that Grimmjow Jaegerjaques shed his first, and last real tears. By the time he had left the remains of his best friend and confidant behind, the blue-eyed soldier's eyes were bone-dry, his gaze as hard as stone. Boss Fujiwara had taken absolutely everything from him:

It was time to return the favor.

Grimmjow's hatred was exceeded only by his determination to achieve vengeance, and his determination in turn was only surpassed by his capacity for unrestrained brutality. The Fujiwara Clan's fall was swift and bloody, with a body count that made the police think a full-blown yakuza war had broken out. And in that case, there was no way they were getting in the middle of it. And yet, no matter how many corpses he left in his wake, the hole that had been carved in his heart by Shaolin's death had done nothing but grow with time. Soon enough he found himself sitting in the park, alone, looking out at the patch of earth where he knew she was buried with dead eyes. Nights melted into days and back into nights, but Grimmjow couldn't have cared less. When the son of a Fujiwara gangster he had vivisected walked up to him and put a gun barrel to his head, Jaegerjaques didn't even flinch.

When the trigger was pulled, though, was when his hell well and truly began.

Every instinct in his ethereal body was screaming at him to move on, to leave her behind and pass into whatever shit-hole would pass for his next life, but the ghost that Grimmjow was now couldn't move on. Shackled by his guilt, self-loathing and boundless, directionless hatred, the blue-eyed soul languished until his eyes became yellow. The hole in his heart widened to encompass most of his abdomen, and the soul known as Grimmjow Jaegerjaques eroded away in a burst of agony to become a Hollow. Along with the hardened, white mask and monstrous, panther-like body, there was another facet of being a Hollow that caught Grimmjow completely off-guard.

The hunger.

Everywhere he looked, he saw the lingering souls of the departed just waiting to be devoured. Old, young, it didn't matter to Grimmjow whom he ate: all that mattered was filling the hole in his soul, but no matter how many he consumed the hole never came any closer to filling up; in fact, his hunger simply became more ravenous, the need to consume more and more fervent. This, Jaegerjaques assumed, was what it meant to be damned.

The non-corporeal carnage went on for several more days totally unimpeded, until the newborn Hollow ran into the last soul he thought he would ever see.

He had been about to pounce on the soul that had been foolish enough to wander the streets alone and rip its jugular out, when that idiotic soul turned around and looked right at him. If Grimmjow had still had a heart, he was fairly certain that it would be breaking all over again. And from what he could see, his little bee seemed to be thinking exactly the same thing.

Unfortunately for Shaolin, that moment of hesitation allowed another Hollow to leap out of the cover of some trees and tackle her to the ground. Grimmjow's yellow eyes narrowed in rancor as he watched the mantis-like Hollow pin the soul of his dearly departed friend to the ground, and all of the ravenous hunger that fueled his hunt was shifted into seething hatred for the shitstain that would dare lay its mandibles on what was his. Before he could get too caught up on the issue of whether or not he could really consider Shaolin 'his' at this point, Grimmjow's animalistic instincts had propelled him forward with enough force to knock the mantis-shaped Hollow off of her.

The next few moments were a blur of blood, rage and adrenaline as his claws tried to hack viciously through the other bastard's carapace, wanting nothing more than to tear, rend and destroy this worthless insect with his fangs. Suddenly a strong concussive blast threw both off the Hollows away, and they came apart as they tumbled along the asphalt. The other Hollow vanished through an improvised, sloppy garganta with a snarl, but Grimmjow stayed right where he was. If someone else wanted a crack at Shaolin, they'd still have to go through him. Rising back up from the ground and trying to ignore the leaden feeling in his limbs, Jaegerjaques blinked a few times and snarled at the new figure that had appeared next to Shaolin's soul, or ghost, or… well, whatever the fuck she was now.

This new arrival was a man who was far too solid to be a ghost, and yet he could obviously see spirits. He was dressed oddly, too, in a black set of almost funeral-style robes and carrying a sword held in place at his hip by a sash. Messy blond hair hung down partly over his face, and his gray eyes seemed to be paradoxically both aloof and incredibly focused.

"My, my, you're a tenacious one, aren't you?" the man said as he stepped forward, drawing his sword from its sheath. "Just the kind I can't afford to take any chances with. Sing, Benihi—"

"Stop!"

The deceptively strong grip of Shaolin's slim hand around the strange man's wrist halted the attack before it could be launched, and he turned to regard her with thinly-veiled shock.

"What do you think you're doing, kid? This Hollow just tried to kill you, and now you're saving its worthless hide?"

"He didn't just try to kill me, you idiot," Shaolin spat back, fire in her eyes. "He saved my ass, and I'm just returning the favor."

Seeing his escape opportunity and taking it, Grimmjow tore open a hasty garganta and dashed through it, leaving the physical world behind and entering the blasted, barren landscape of Hueco Mundo. As he lay sprawled out on the sands, half-asleep and slowly recovering his energy, Jaegerjaques swore to himself that he would never again rely on anyone to save him, like Shaolin had back there. From here on out, he fought alone, pure and simple.

Grimmjow arose a few hours later and began hunting once again, and the more he consumed the thinner and thinner the sliver of his self-control became until he had completely embraced the predatory life of a Hollow. Slowly but surely the memories of the young woman he had known as Shaolin Fon faded away into nothingness, and after enough time had passed it was as if she had never even existed at all.

For her part, Shaolin held on to the fading images as long as she could.

"Don't worry," the blond man with gray eyes—or had they been blue?—had told her, whose name she could no longer remember. "Once I send you to Soul Society, you'll forget all about the pain you've felt in this world. You'll be reborn, have a second chance, all that good stuff!"

But it hadn't happened entirely like the man—or had it been a woman?—had said. There were some memories she had held on to, images where none were supposed to be. They felt like someone else's recollections, but Shaolin clung to them because she had nothing else. Snapshots of a boy with blue eyes and equally bright hair, of a young woman who looked oddly like her and a grown-up version of that boy embracing under an awning in the rain…

Soon enough, however, those images washed out completely and were forgotten, leaving Shaolin to wander the streets of the Rukongai with nothing but her one name and an odd ache in her chest, like she was forgetting something important. As minutes ticked by into days and days bled into months, though, the ache disappeared as though it had never been, and it was only a matter of time before Shaolin got noticed for her fighting skills and was adopted into the Fon Clan to serve as a potential bodyguard for someone they called "Lady Yoruichi". Shaolin didn't know why, but that last name just seemed… right to her. Fon. Like she'd been meant to carry it.

Shortly after her dark eyes had fallen on the majestic face of Lady Yoruichi Shihoin for the first time, Shaolin Fon became Soi Fon, and the image of the blue-haired boy she had once held so close to her heart vanished forever.

Soi Fon's eyes flew open and she stumbled backwards several steps as the onslaught of memories finally ceased, the flood of emotions that didn't feel like her own making her head feel light as the room began to spin around her. Desperate for air she flash-stepped outside, inhaling breaths in huge gulps as she fell to her knees and screwed her eyes shut in a vain attempt to block out the pain that throbbed deep within her mind.

But it wouldn't go away that easily; it was as if her human persona, the one she had cast off like an old skin upon transferring to Soul Society, was warring with her own for dominance, and it didn't seem like it wanted to lose this battle. The only way to keep from losing either of her equally-vital halves, Soi Fon quickly realized, was to combine them into a single, functioning whole. While it was true that this meant accepting the pain and loss that came from all of her human experiences, including her rather gruesome death, it also meant preserving the first truly happy memories she had known in centuries. In her mind, that was worth the cost of the human torment.

Opening up her consciousness to the foreign memories was in some ways more painful than having them bashing at the gates of her mind, and Soi Fon was immobilized for several moments as the swirling, tempestuous flood of human memories made itself at home in her head for good. She felt oddly calm in the aftermath, as if a long-lost part of her psyche had finally been found and replaced, filling the odd lack of something she'd felt throughout her time as a denizen of Soul Society. But alongside this feeling of strange completion, a piercing longing blindsided the Soul Reaper and lodged itself right in her heart.

It had been so long since she'd felt even an inkling of genuine emotion that her gut reaction to it was so strong it almost bowled her over all over again. She kept her footing, though, and regained her breath a few moments later. In the moment of reconciliation with this almost-overpowering feeling that could only really be one thing, Soi Fon unexpectedly came to the answer of a question she thought she would never know.

Now, she knew why Yoruichi had left her all those years ago. She really, truly knew. Urahara was to her former Captain what Grimmjow was to her; if she had been in Yoruichi's place, she would've departed from Soul Society without a second's hesitation if it meant saving Grimmjow's life. Soi Fon's calm only increased as the bitter weight she had been carrying with her all of this time rolled off of her shoulders: she could forgive Yoruichi now, now that they understood each other. Sighing and turning around, the onyx-eyed Soul Reaper was about to walk back inside the Shop and check on Grimmjow when she found herself staring into a pair of bright, icy blue eyes.

"Hey."

The word sounded worlds away from his usual sharp, brash tone, but at its core it was still his voice. Clearly, the flow of memories hadn't been just one-way. Snapping herself out of her thoughts, Soi Fon's newborn concern surged to the front of her mind and she frowned.

"What're you doing out of bed, you idiot?" she growled, in an effort to keep herself from doing something terribly cliché. She wasn't about to let her guard down completely, not until she was sure they were on the same page. Grimmjow just smirked that smirk of his, flexing his healed and decidedly bandage-free left arm to drive the point home.

"What're you talking about, Shaolin? I've been patched up for hours already."

Soi Fon's eyes widened in surprise as the words sunk in, before narrowing murderously.

"You what?" she hissed, pacing towards Jaegerjaques like a lioness on the prowl. "Why didn't you say anything, you asshole? Do you have any idea how worried I was!?"

"Well, you looked like you could've used a rest after that fight," Grimmjow parried, unmoved by the death-glare Soi Fon was giving him, "and once you started that last avalanche of memories, there wasn't much I could do anyway…" the Arrancar's voice trailed off as a glint sprung up in his eye, a knowing smirk crossing his face that made Soi Fon freeze in place, her movement towards Grimmjow completely stymied.

"Is it just me, little bee," he said with a smugness that made the Soul Reaper want to tear his throat out with her teeth, "or did you admit to being worried about me just now?"

"I don't know what you're talking about," she replied petulantly, clearly trying to save face and failing in a way Grimmjow found quite hilarious. Restraining himself to barking out a short laugh, he closed the distance between them in a stride and wrapped his arms around her svelte form, pulling her to him.

"I missed you, kid," Grimmjow said softly as he rested his chin atop her head, and Soi Fon smiled into his collarbone as she realized that those words were as close to a confession as she would ever get from him.

"I know."

Isshin Kurosaki sat in the large, comfortable chair in his living room, one arm resting over the side while his other hand was full of a lowball glass and a liberal amount of scotch. As another figure walked purposefully and quietly into the room, a bitter smirk crossed the older Soul Reaper's face.

"Took you long enough, brother," he spoke to the new arrival. "And here I thought you were always the punctual one."

"My apologies," the smooth voice of Sosuke Aizen replied as the brown-haired Soul Reaper stepped out into the dim light. "I thought I would be doing you a favor, giving you time for one last drink. I had no idea you were in such a hurry to die, Isshin."

"I've done what I came here to do, Sosuke," Kurosaki replied easily, finishing his drink. "If I die by your hand tonight, I'll consider it nothing more than atonement for my sins. Where is Ichigo?"

"Stark, Barragan and Halibel are keeping Ichigo and his band of misfits occupied," Aizen answered as he sat down across from Isshin, settling into the chair with a slight sigh. "He doesn't need to see this, don't you agree?"

"No," Kurosaki replied stonily, "he doesn't. But tell me something, little brother. What exactly do you think Ichigo is going to do when he arrives here and finds my dead body?"

"Exactly what I know he will do," the other Soul Reaper replied calmly, "and that is all that matters."

"He's stronger than you give him credit for, you know," Isshin mused as he put down his glass and rose to his feet, Aizen following suit. "He has too much of his mother in him to be swayed by something as petty as what you can offer him."

"I beg to differ, elder brother," Sosuke replied evenly as he drew his zanpakuto, the moonlight glancing off of the silver blade. "He takes after me more than you allow yourself to realize, and once he achieves true power there is only one path he will walk: the path I will lay out for him."

"We'll see soon enough, Sosuke," Isshin replied with a sad smile. "I just wish I could see the look on your face when he proves you wrong."

Aizen smirked, a twisted expression that Isshin knew all-too well, no matter what face his snake of a sibling was wearing.

"I'm surprised at you, brother, honestly," he said with venomous smoothness. "You didn't even notice that your two daughters were already dead by the time I came in here, did you?"

"What!?"

Isshin Kurosaki's eyes widened in shock as his devious sibling's smirk widened. But before he could switch completely to his Soul Reaper state, Kyoka Suigetsu had already buried itself deep in his chest.

"For what it is worth," Aizen spoke in a tone shockingly close to guilt as Isshin felt his lifeblood ebb from his veins, "I am sorry. If only you had not been so blind, things might not have come to this."

"You bastard…" Kurosaki gasped, his voice hard with rare, unadulterated hatred. "I should have killed you all those years ago, when I had the chance."

"Yes, probably," Sosuke admitted pensively, "but you were a fool, and let me live. And now, it is because of that compassion that you die by my hand."

Aizen withdrew his zanpakuto with a hiss, wiping the blood off of the blade and re-sheathing it as the dying body of Isshin Kurosaki fell to the floor with a thud, blood gathering slowly in a pool underneath it.

"Farewell, brother," Sosuke spoke as he tore open a small garganta, stepping through it and closing the portal behind him just as the door burst open and Ichigo charged into the room.

A/N: And so the endgame finally begins. School just wrapped up for me recently, which is why there was such a long delay in writing up this chapter, but hopefully the content made up for it.

And in case any of you were wondering about the title, I took a page out of my buddy JasoTheArtisan's playbook and used the title of a song that had lyrics I thought meshed well with the contents of the chapter. In this case, it was 'Chop Suey' by System of a Down. Speaking of Jaso, mad props to both him and MatsuMama for beta'ing this, or looking over it, or however you want to put it :-P.

Hope you enjoyed the chapter, and as always, please review!