Disclaimer: I do not own Bleach, or any of its characters. Tite Kubo does. This story, however, is mine.

Brief A/N: Just to give you guys the heads-up, from here on out, I'm using 'Shinigami' instead of 'Soul Reaper', because A) it's faster to type one word rather than two, and B) Shinigami sounds cooler.

Now, on with the story!

Torn

Chapter 26: Phoenix

Ichigo had thought that there was nothing worse than having his father try to blindside him with a dropkick at 8:00 AM in the morning, but he was wrong.

Having his father try to blindside him at 8:00 AM in the morning with a sword was much, much worse.

"What the hell is wrong with you, old man!?" Ichigo shouted as he dodged out of the way of the weapon with instinctive grace. "Don't you know what time it is?"

"Time waits for no man, my son," Isshin boomed as he brought his sword around for another attack, "and neither do I!"

"Remind me what the point of this is, again?" the younger Kurosaki barked, irritated, as he swerved out of the way of a strike that would have taken his head clean off.

"You need to learn how to focus your reiatsu, Ichigo!" Isshin replied far too energetically as his zanpakuto rose and fell again and again. "If your focus is always on dodging, you'll never be on the offensive. Think about your fight with the Kenpachi; did he dodge your first strike?"

"No, he stood there and took it like a brick wall," Ichigo admitted, beginning to see where his father was going with this. "But that's not a fair example! Zaraki's a fucking lunatic, and I'm not him!"

"So?" Isshin retorted, stopping his string of strikes for a moment. "What the hell does that matter, Ichigo? You have more raw reiatsu than most all the Captains in Soul Society, to say nothing of Zaraki. Learn to focus it, and you'll be able to take strikes head-on without flinching like a little bitch."

Ichigo sputtered in rage at the insult, and he almost didn't dodge the sword that grazed his chin, and would have cleaved his face in two if not for his battle-honed reflexes.

"Never let an opponent's taunts get under your skin, Ichigo," Isshin scolded, and Ichigo shot him a death glare while he wiped the small trickle of blood from his chin.

"Point taken," he said shortly while he caught his breath, taking his chance to reach out and grab his zanpakuto in case his father decided to try and chop his arms off next. "Any chance we can do something that doesn't involve you trying to kill me, dad?"

"Well, since you seem to be in a lazy mood today, my boy, I guess we can take a break from the combat and focus on a different way for you to channel your reiatsu instead. It's time you figured out how to seal that zanpakuto of yours; looking at that oversized shikai all the time is making me sick."

"What're you talking about, old man?" Ichigo shot back, bristling at the implication that Zangetsu was ugly. "Yoruichi-san said that my zanpakuto was a constant-release type, like Zaraki's. I can't seal it, even if I tried to."

"Gods, what is it with you and Zaraki?" Isshin exhaled, stretching his back out and sighing. "Look, Ichigo: saying that your zanpakuto is a 'constant-release type' is just another way of saying 'I'm a lazy twerp who can't control my reiatsu enough to seal my own zanpakuto'. Zaraki doesn't even try, but you're better than that."

Ichigo sat down on the floor of his room and leaned against the wall with a sigh, his giant, cleaver-shaped zanpakuto looming over him.

"All right, then," the orange-haired Shinigami conceded, "let's say you're right, and there is a way to seal my zanpakuto further than just its shikai. How would I do that?"

"Think about it, kid. If your zanpakuto is the physical manifestation of your power, it'll change its shape depending on how much control you exert over that power. The amount of reiatsu you have doesn't count for anything; my brother's got at least twice the reiatsu of a normal Captain, if not more, and he's perfectly capable of sealing his zanpakuto down to a sub-shikai state. The sooner you learn to do the same, the sooner you'll be able to fight without expending unneeded energy."

Ichigo's eye twitched in irritation at the lengthy explanation that had managed to explain absolutely nothing, and he sprang to his feet with a growl.

"You still haven't told me how to do it, old man! Quit yapping and give me some tips!"

Isshin just shook his head lightly and chuckled, before turning around and walking towards the door.

"If you can't figure out how to do this, Ichigo," he said, "there's no point in continuing your training. I'm going to go eat some breakfast… feel free to join me when you've earned it."

The older Kurosaki flashed away with a whisper, leaving Ichigo to puzzle over this latest challenge on his own.

"Shit," he swore, foisting his gargantuan shikai up and staring at the blade balefully. "How the hell am I supposed to do this? I can't control my reiatsu enough to do kido, let alone seal my zanpakuto! Stupid old man…"

"I hope you're not referring to me when you say that, Ichigo."

The orange-haired Shinigami's head snapped up at the voice, only to find his gaze locked on the corporeal form of his zanpakuto spirit, Zangetsu.

"As I have said before, Ichigo, I am willing to assist you in any way that I can. All you must do is trust in me, as I trust in you."

"How is this a lack of trust, Zangetsu?" Ichigo shot back. "I'm trying to make you smaller, not fight with you!"

"But you do not believe I can be sealed, Ichigo," the spirit parried, "and that lack of faith will defeat any efforts you undertake before they even begin."

The younger Kurosaki sighed at the latest dose of cryptic rhetoric from his zanpakuto spirit, but bit his tongue. Maybe the old man had a point, after all. He'd always treated sealing his zanpakuto even further as a blatant impossibility, and had never even entertained the idea. But if he thought of his zanpakuto as a mass of reiatsu, all he would have to do would be to condense that mass into a small enough shape to bring it out of shikai and hold it there. Closing his eyes and passing into his spirit world, Ichigo opened them again to find himself standing on a sideways skyscraper.

When he took in what was in front of him, however, the Shinigami wanted to hurl himself off of said skyscraper. A gargantuan version of his shikai loomed in front of him, stuck into the side of the building as well and so immense that it blotted out the sun.

"This is your raw power, Ichigo," Zangetsu's voice called out from behind him. "This is what you must learn to harness, and to seal. Once you are able to wield this blade, you will have accomplished the task."

Ichigo nodded once, setting his feet and focusing. There was no denying that he could feel a connection between his own innate power and the energy that the massive blade was giving off, the only question was if he could exert direct control over it. Trying to imagine the sword not as an actual sword, but as a solid mass of energy, Ichigo began to try and condense the seething colossus. What felt like an eternity passed with no visible results, and the Shinigami was fairly certain he was going to grind his teeth to dust at this rate before shrinking this thing a goddamn inch.

"This is bullshit…" he growled, breaking his stance and wiping his forehead angrily with the back of his hand. "How the fuck am I supposed to condense that thing? It's impossible!"

"Some would call the very situation you are in right now 'impossible', Ichigo," Zangetsu retorted smoothly. "Stop seeing the matter in such relative, defeatist terms. Think, for once, instead of rushing headlong at this problem."

Chastised, Ichigo bit back a snide remark and sat down, thinking about every possible way he knew to focus spiritual energy. The method Ganju had taught him to focus energy for kido made no sense here, though, which brought him back to square one. After thinking about it for a bit longer, however, Kurosaki realized that he'd been approaching the problem from the wrong angle this entire time. If a zanpakuto was a reflection of its owner's power, then focusing the energy within himself would have the same effect as trying to compress the mammoth blade.

Assuming a meditative position, Ichigo exhaled slowly and tried to view his own reiatsu in much the same way he'd pictured the energy used for kido, except this time he stayed outside of the dark sphere rather than throwing himself into the middle of it. Once he was sure he could see all of it, the Shinigami started trying to make it smaller.

Maybe Zangetsu had been right after all, and that it was all relative, because this dark sphere was shrinking fast and faster by the minute as Ichigo made it denser and denser in his head. Nonetheless, his roll came to a screeching halt soon enough, and it took Ichigo what felt like hours upon hours to finish compressing the energy to the point where he could hold it in both of his hands cupped together. The amount of power present was still immense, but there was no question that it had been well and truly tamed, and was now infinitely more controllable.

Smiling in satisfaction and letting himself exit from his Spirit World, Ichigo opened his eyes to discover that he was now holding a regular katana in his hands. The sheath was midnight-black, with a golden oval tsuba acting as the guard. A single black tassel hung from the end of the hilt, an echo of his first, unnamed zanpakuto from what seemed like a whole lifetime ago. Sliding the weapon into its new resting place at his hip, Ichigo's smile widened as he vanished from the room to go eat some well-deserved breakfast.

When he followed his nose to where it told him food was being cooked, Ichigo was surprised to find that his father was nowhere in sight. Instead, a woman with long brown hair and warm blue eyes was sitting at a long table, eating some katsudon. She looked up when the younger Shinigami entered, flashing him a kind smile.

"You must be Ichigo, Isshin's son," she said. "I'm Kirio Hikifune. Please, have a seat."

Ichigo did so, but looked askew at the other Shinigami's choice of meal.

"Isn't it a bit early in the day for that sort of thing?" he asked, and Kirio just laughed.

"Early? Ichigo, it's already time for dinner."

"It is?" Kurosaki asked numbly as a plate of food was put in front of him, surprised that he'd lost that much time figuring out how to seal his zanpakuto. Too worn-out and hungry to think any more before eating something, though, Ichigo dug into the meal before him with abandon. A few minutes later he was done, sighing in contentment as he felt his lethargy easing away.

"So," Ichigo spoke after a moment, "how many of you are there in the Guard?"

"There are always seven of us," Kirio answered. "That number never changes. If one of us dies, another comes to take our place from the ranks of Soul Society. That's why I got brought up here, to replace a fallen Guardsman."

Ichigo nodded and remained quiet for a few more moments, but a question that had been gnawing at the back of his mind broke free and he spoke.

"So why doesn't the Royal Guard go down and deal with Aizen personally, if you're so powerful?"

"Because the Spirit King has enforced a doctrine of non-interference, Ichigo," Hikifune replied calmly as she rose from the table, beckoning for Kurosaki to follow her as she began to walk from the dining room.

"We are forbidden to engage in any conflict outside of the Spirit King's domain itself, in order to keep this dimension as secured as possible. That, and if we could always be counted on to intervene, the forces of Soul Society would grow soft. Captain Commander Yamamoto founded the Shinigami Academy specifically to let us focus on the King's protection, after all. Ah, here we are."

Ichigo looked up and his mouth dropped open slightly as he took in the vastness of the room he was now in. It seemed like multiple dojos had been combined into one; the younger Shinigami had no doubt that three whole divisions of the Gotei 13 could occupy this room and there would still be plenty of space left.

"Look alive, kid!" Kirio's voice called out from quite a few paces away, and Kurosaki looked over just in time to see a shakkaho racing right at his face. Dropping and rolling quickly out of the way, Ichigo had just enough time to breathe before a soren sokatsui arced towards him. Realizing at last that this was kido training, Ichigo dodged the attacks and tried out a spell of his own. Holding out his hand with the fore- and middle-fingers extended, he focused his reiatsu and spoke.

"Hado number 4: Byakurai!"

The energy came to his fingertips much easier than it had in his training with Gin, but the end result was still a painful shock that ran along his arm all the way up to his shoulder, rather than a bolt of lightning screaming from his fingers. As Ichigo held his stunned arm against his chest and tried to force the pain away, Hikifune flashed next to him and placed her own hand gently on his bicep. A few seconds later she had corrected the reiatsu flow, easing the shock completely.

"At least you went for a low-level spell there, Ichigo," she commented. "Had you gone for something higher, we'd probably be picking pieces of your arm up off of the floor right now."

"Thanks for the reassurance," Kurosaki grumbled, smarting from his failure to pull off even one of the most basic destructive kido spells. At this rate, he was never going to become strong enough to defeat the upper Espada, let alone Aizen. Kirio smiled again and spoke, her voice encouraging.

"Ichigo, if you were able to seal your zanpakuto, that means you have enough control over your reiatsu to be able to condense it and force it to maintain its shape. The trick to mastering kido is to be able to let your contracted reiatsu expand, just enough to allow it to flow while simultaneously maintaining control over its direction. If you can do that, you should be able to eventually shape that loose reiatsu at will. That skill is the cornerstone of all kido."

Kurosaki's brown eyes narrowed in anger at the revelation: he had just learned to control his reiatsu, and now he was supposed to throw that out the window? Still, he thought with a sigh as he closed his eyes and slipped back into his Spirit World, it wasn't like he really had a choice.

The sphere of dark energy was still there, floating in midair and giving off a distinctly perturbed aura, as if it was pissed off that Ichigo had confined it into such a small space. After shaking off the fact that he'd just attributed human emotions to a sphere of pure energy and assuring himself that he wasn't going insane, Ichigo approached the condensed ball of reiatsu and reached out to it. He cautiously relaxed the barrier he had placed around it to keep the energy compacted, expecting some kind of gradual reaction as the energy began to flow freely once again.

Instead, the orb immediately expanded to five times its current size and slammed into Kurosaki's chest as it grew, throwing him backwards. After hauling himself up off of the ground and brushing off his robes, Ichigo angrily compressed the sphere of reiatsu and tried once more, only to be met with the same result again and again.

This was going to take a while.

What felt like hours later, Ichigo had finally managed to control the flow of reiatsu to the point that he could extract a limited amount from the sphere and mold it according to his will. At that point, though, the Shinigami was seriously considering cutting his own Soul Chain and Soul Sleep to just get rid of the annoying sphere that seemed to exist just to make his life miserable. Sighing and exiting from his Spirit World once again, Ichigo looked down and was pleased to find a baseball-sized sphere of raw kido energy sitting in the palm of his hand.

"Not bad," Hikifune mused. "It usually takes rookies like you much longer to get to that point; I must admit I'm impressed. But don't go slacking off just yet, Ichigo… there's one more step before you can actually translate that raw energy into useable spells. You need to know the incantations."

"Can't I just bypass them like everyone else?" Ichigo shot back. "And besides, I never see any of them calling up pure energy like this before they cast their kido. It always just kinda… happens."

"You need to learn how to go through every step before you can start skipping them, kid," Kirio retorted, pulling out a thick book of incantations from within the folds of her robes and tossing it to Ichigo. "Now let's get to it; we have a lot of ground to cover. First we'll do the bakudo… those're less messy."

Ichigo smirked as the memory of Rukia locking his arms behind his back the night they first met flashed through his head. Finally, he would be able to return the favor.

"So, how's he doing?"

Kirio sighed, sipping gratefully on the cup of sake that Isshin had given her.

"He's as stubborn as you are, Isshin-san, that's for sure. He's stuck on rikujokoro, and refuses to let himself rest until he can bypass it."

"Sixty-one, eh?" the elder Kurosaki replied, chuckling. "That's my boy for ya. I couldn't get over Fourty for the longest damn time when I was starting out, and Ichigo's already at Sixty-one. He'll be on the Hado in no time, at this rate."

"GOD DAMN IT ALL TO HELL!"

Ichigo's frustrated shout was so loud it caused the pair to wince, before Isshin recovered himself and smiled.

"Well, maybe a little longer than that…"

Ichigo eventually exhausted himself to the point where he collapsed and was carried to his room by two un-amused Guard members for some much-needed sleep, only to wake up infuriated that he had let himself pass out when he should have been able to keep going. Redoubling his efforts and using the newly-learned hyapporankan in an unconventional way, Ichigo was able to physically barricade himself inside the room and refused to exit or let anyone else enter until he had finished learning Bakudo number 99. Isshin could have dissolved the kido in a second if he thought it was needed, but he decided to respect his son's wishes and left him alone to train, only dropping by long enough to slide meals underneath the door.

Ichigo knew that quite some time had passed by the time he finally got a good grip on Bakudo, but the Spirit King's dimension made him feel the same way he had underneath Urahara-san's shop; there was a sense of timelessness, making it hard to pinpoint just how long the process had taken. Not that it mattered, though; he was willing to stay here and train as long as it took for him to become powerful enough to overcome Aizen. That was his duty now, his purpose, and he was going to see it through to the end no matter what.

Having figured out the way to channel the energy within him directly into the spells rather than first bringing its raw form into the physical world, Ichigo found himself climbing the ranks of the Hado spells with ease. The thrill he felt after pulling off a flawless sokatsui was quickly eclipsed by awe at the sheer power of raikoho. The young Kurosaki felt more than a little trepidation at the unadulterated murderous potential of kurohitsugi, understanding at long last why his Hollow had held it in such high esteem and praying that he never, ever wound up on the other side of those black walls.

By the time he had attained a reasonable level of proficiency with the final Hado, shuddering at the effect it would have on a living target, Ichigo was more than ready to sleep for a whole week.

His father, however, had other ideas in mind.

"It's time for you to show me what you've learned, boy!" he boomed, striding into the room holding a haori identical to the one he was wearing. It was designed like a Captain's robe, but the symbol on the back was not of any Division's number. Instead a pair of crossed katana rested inside the black diamond, blades pointed outward and sitting just below a crown.

"This is the haori of a member of the Royal Guard, Ichigo," Isshin explained, taking up a stance a few paces away and placing it on the ground next to him.

"It belonged to your uncle, as a matter of fact, who abandoned it when he went into his self-imposed exile. If you can get through me and claim it as your own, I'll consider your training complete and let you go back to the Human World. But until then, you're stuck here, and don't even think about trying to sneak out on me."

Ichigo smiled viciously, drawing his zanpakuto from the sheath at his hip and readying it for the duel, while his father did the same.

"I wouldn't dream of it, old man," he replied cockily, before the two warriors charged and clashed.

If Ichigo had thought that learning kido had been annoying, that was looking downright pleasurable compared to trying to get past his father. The man made the brick wall that was Kenpachi Zaraki look like Kon in comparison. Almost no strikes even made contact with his body, and those that did stopped cold. Even after switching into his Hollow-enhanced bankai form, none of his attacks made Isshin so much as flinch. A barrage of multiple cero beams at least made him give some ground, but the recoil left Ichigo so exhausted that all it took was a half-hearted kick to send him flying into the wall on the opposite side of the room.

"I gotta say, it's been a while since someone's made me budge, kid, and I ain't going easy on you. But you're nowhere near strong enough to get past me yet, and you're sweating like a pig. What have you been doing all the time you were supposedly training? Stop messing around and fight me!"

Ichigo snarled and shot to his feet, deciding to stick to what had worked and unleashing a horde of bala. Isshin stood his ground, but went as far as to use his sword in order to slash through the projectiles, rather than just batting them away with his hands like he had Ichigo's kido attacks. When Ichigo realized what was going on, his black-and-yellow eyes narrowed in anger.

His father was testing him. All he was doing was trying to get Ichigo to hone his Hollow powers, rather than constantly leaning on his Shinigami abilities. It felt like everything he'd done lately had been nothing more than a test, and Ichigo was sick of it. Jacking his power up to as high as it could go and ignoring the fact that the man he was attacking was his own father, the younger Kurosaki slashed open his own palm and charged up a gran rey cero, letting the powerful attack fly. Isshin was ready for it, however, and blocked the attack with his zanpakuto.

Which is exactly what Ichigo had hoped he would do.

"Getsuga Tensho!"

The added power of Zangetsu's black energy wave was enough to force Isshin to jump to the side in order to evade the combined attack, and Ichigo dashed forward to triumphantly grab the haori from the ground before it got scorched into oblivion.

"Well done, my son!" Isshin called out, sincere in his praise. "I have taught you the final lesson I had left to teach: You cannot see your enemies as who they might seem to be, only as what they are, and strike without hesitation. Otherwise my brother's illusions will ensnare you, not to mention that you might find it hard to go all-out against someone who looks exactly like you."

"Point taken," Ichigo replied seriously, relinquishing his bankai and catching his breath. "So, can I go now?"

"If you want, sure," the elder Kurosaki said dismissively, shrugging his shoulders. "The exit's right over there," he continued, pointing towards a blue portal that had opened and begun to glow in the middle of the room. "But I bet you," he finished slyly, his mouth curving up into a smirk, "that you couldn't beat me in a duel if I was actually trying."

Ichigo froze in his path towards the rift, his desire to get back to Rukia and fervently apologizing for being such an idiot warring with his innate competitiveness and desire to be better than his father at anything that could be decided through brute strength. He considered taking Isshin up on the offer for a few moments before he chuckled, shook his head, and kept walking towards the portal.

"Sorry, old man," he said as he stepped through, fully shrugging on his new haori as he did so, "but I have somewhere I need to be."

"I know, Ichigo," Isshin said proudly as the portal closed, leaving him alone in the room. "I know. Just remember who you're doing this for, and don't let my brother convince you otherwise."

Ichigo took in the smell of the air as he passed fully through into the Human World and smiled broadly:

He was back home.

And yet he still felt like something was off; that something wasn't quite right. Glancing over a man's shoulder at his watch, Ichigo saw the date and realization slammed into him like a brick to the back of the head.

It was June 17th. The day his mother had been murdered by Grand Fisher. Sighing as the memories that refused to leave him in peace festered in the back of his mind, Ichigo flashed away and headed towards the graveyard where his mother lay in eternal rest.

It shouldn't have shocked him to find three additional markers next to his mother's, as he had held the corpses of his other family members in his arms, but the actual sight of the other tombstones still made Ichigo feel nauseous.

"About damn time you showed up, brother."

Kurosaki spun around at the familiar voice, a harsh imitation of his own that could belong to only one person. Shiro stepped out slowly from the shadow of an oak tree and into the light, and Ichigo could tell immediately that he had changed. He looked much older now than when Ichigo had last seen him: his face was leaner, his eyes more detached and apathetic rather than holding their usual keen, focused and borderline-homicidal look.

"What happened to you?" Ichigo asked, his tone solicitous. "You look like hell."

"You have no idea, brother," Shiro said with a bitter chuckle, "you have no idea. You know, I kept telling them you would come back, but none of them ever believed me. They're gonna flip out when they see you, Ichigo."

"What do you mean?" Kurosaki asked slowly, the nausea in his stomach shifting and mutating into a totally different kind of fear. "What the hell are you talking about?"

Shiro looked at him cockeyed for more than a few heartbeats, before his eyes narrowed and he spoke.

"How long do you think you've been gone for, Ichigo?" he asked, and the Shinigami summed up a quick guess in his head.

"I dunno, maybe a little under three weeks, tops. What's going on, Shiro? Where's Rukia?!"

Rather than answer his question, the Hollow just threw his head back and laughed maniacally.

"Oh Gods, you have got to be fucking kidding me," he said after he calmed down a few moments later. "This is just too fucking perfect. Brother, you haven't been gone for twenty days," Shiro answered,

"You've been gone for twenty years."

……….

……………..

A/N: And so the good stuff finally begins in earnest next chapter! Hope you enjoyed this installment and that the training wasn't too boring, and as always, please review!

A Few Things: So you might be thinking, "But Jazz, if Isshin can open up a portal directly to the Spirit King's dimension, then why can't Aizen do the same?" Well, for one, it would make for a much less interesting story. Also, Aizen lost his connection with the Spirit King's Realm, and thus his ability to open those portals, when he 'died' and went into hiding.

Also, even though it seems at first glance like I've turned on God Mode as far as Ichigo is concerned, don't worry; just because he knows a ton of high-level techniques doesn't mean he'll be busting them out all at once, or that they won't still tire him out if used to excess. They're just there so that if he does break out a high-level Kido or what-have-you, it won't seem like a Deus-Ex-Machina.