Note: Reviews make me smile ^_^!

WHEN THE SNOW FALLS
by Yih

Chapter Thirty-eight
Mission Complete

Just as Rukia thought, with the release of her zanpakuto into shikai form, the Grand Fisher abruptly turned his attention to her and he flung his arms at her, trying to hit her – to steal her memories. She dodged both of his arms easily, mentally thanking Byakuya for teaching her shunpo without it she would not have been able to evade the Hollow. Rukia flashed to and fro, keeping the Grand Fisher too busy trying to keep up with her to think about the boy and she had successfully drawn him away, far enough that it was safe to use one of her dances.

Now if only she could get the Grand Fisher a little closer, so she slowed down a little, just a little. She sliced the air behind her, where the Grand Fisher was, and said softly, "Some no mai, Tsukishiro."

Behind her, the air grew cold – frigid – and a burst of ice shot up into the sky, engulfing the Grand Fisher in a frozen prison. Rukia sighed and was about to resheath her zanpakuto when something encircled her neck, it was soft and flexible and she instinctively grabbed it, but it only tightened – suffocating her. Rukia brought up her zanpakuto, about to cut what must be the last remnant of the Hollow, its angler, but her vision was blurring and she was about to black out when suddenly she was breathing again.

"Are you all right?" the boy – Ichigo – asked, crouching next to her.

"What? How?" she asked.

Ichigo held up a pocket knife. "So are you… all right?"

Rukia nodded. "Yeah."

He reached over to help her sit up and she was grateful for his help. "Who are you? What was that thing? How did you do that? What—"

"One question at a time," she said, still breathing heavily.

"Who are you?" he asked.

"Rukia," she answered. "I am a shinigami."

"A shinigami?"

She nodded. "We fight Hollows, sending them back to be reborn, hopefully as better than what they became."

"What do you mean?"

"They," she began, "the Hollows, they were once human and when they died, they became ghosts and over the years, their bitterness and negative emotions turned them into what you saw – former shell of what they were – a Hollow. We, as shinigami, we send the Hollows back so they can begin again and we also send ghosts back as well, the ghosts that linger when they should already be in the Soul Society."

"What is the Soul Society?" he asked.

"A place for souls to live," Rukia answered, "and to wait to be reborn into this world, eventually."

"Shinigami," Ichigo murmured.

"Yes," she said and tilted her head, intrigued by this human boy who had such strong latent reiatsu. He could see her, which meant he was not ordinary and the fact she could sense his power… He would someday be a shinigami, perhaps once he had finally passed into the Soul Society. "I have a question for you."

"What is it? Go on."

"How long have you been able to see them?"

"The Hollows?"

"Yes," Rukia said.

"I don't know. I have only seen them recently, but I have been able to see ghosts since I was a child. I don't remember a time when I couldn't see ghosts."

"Interesting," she remarked.

He shrugged. "Inconvenient if you ask me."

"Your name, it's Ichigo, isn't it?"

He nodded. "How did you know?"

"The Hollow, the part that resembled your mother," she said, "that's what she called you."

"Kurosaki Ichigo," he said, holding out his hand.

"Kuchiki Rukia," she said, taking it. "I will be here for a while. There has been an abnormal amount of Hollow activity in Karakura Town recently and I have assigned here to reduce the threat. Please be careful and be safe."

"You too," Ichigo said softly.

Rukia smiled at him and waved her hand in good-bye before she disappeared via shunpo in the direction where she felt the presence of another Hollow. It had much less reiatsu and was rather insignificant compared to the Grand Fisher, but not to be taken lightly. She had used a great deal of her reiatsu already by summoning Sode no Shirayuki into his shikai form.

She quickly darted over to the Hollow, flashing before it and not giving it even a moment to react before she brought her zanpakuto downwards, sending it back to the abyss. Rukia sighed as she crouched down, close to the ground, exhausted. She reached into her pocket for her Hollow monitoring device and she shook her head. There were at least five more Hollows within her vicinity. Luckily, they did not seem to be emitting much reiatsu. Rukia straightened up and dashed off to the next target, not using shunpo to save herself some energy.

-

It wasn't exactly easy to sense a person's reiatsu, especially when said person was in the human world, but Byakuya had his means within the Kuchiki clan. He did not like the idea of Rukia leaving the Soul Society, regardless of if it was mostly a simple mission of destroying small-fry Hollows. Byakuya clenched his fist when he felt Rukia's reiatsu flare up in the way that only meant she had released her zanpakuto.

Why? The mission was supposed to be easy, simple, nothing for a shinigami of her caliber. So why did she need her shikai release?

Byakuya couldn't concentrate on his work, instead he ended up shuffling back and forth across his office, worrying about her until he felt her resheath her zanpakuto. He didn't sense she was injured or anything, but he would not feel any relief until she was safely back into the Soul Society… when her misison was finished.

It wasn't a long mission, by any means, clear up some of the congestion of Hollows in Karakura Town. It should only take a seated officer like Rukia a night or two to complete it, but that was a little too long for him to be separated from her – not when they had rarely been separated in the last nine decades.

Byakuya sighed and sat down at his desk, determined to focus on his paperwork and to trust in Rukia and her abilities.

She would be okay, how could she not? She might only be a 3rd seat, but she was good enough to be a fukutaichou and moreover, she was close to achieving her bankai. In time, if the Elders were willing to be lenient, in time she would make Taichou. In time…

A/N: Exactly what I'm going to do is not for certain at this point. I just wanted to inform you that I have exams coming up in about two weeks and I will be busy studying. I will probably be writing sporadically, so please forgive me. I may write a oneshot/short novella in a slightly different setting for Byakuya/Rukia as I think more about where exactly I want When the Snow Falls... to go. I have plans for it, but I'm uncertain how I want to incorporate the non-shinigami characters. I may leave a lot of them out (mainly b/c they aren't my favorite characters). Thank you for all your support and I hope you enjoy this chapter!

Released: 4/6/2009