Chapter 2: Gods Alone
(Thanks a million for all of the sweet reviews and the mountains of faves and follows rolling in. My gratitude to Tee (You've got it!), Anon (Here you go!), PrivateCaller (I will keep the chapters rolling!), SagenWarrior (More is granted!), Aizenfan6969 (So glad you like it!), Another Anon (Yup, there's more where that came from!), Jafma (So happy you're enjoying it!), Periwinkle (Ask and you shall receive!), Picklez80 (You're so sweet!), Winterheart2000 (I will certainly do that!), Willow (It's on!), Demonic Musix (Aww! *blushes* Thanks!), Sonia (So happy to make you happy!), Inma ( I will be updating this regularly, as there is a lot of interest. :) More is on the way!), Silvermist023 (Sure thing!), IchiNaruSunshine (You are right that Ichi is very stubborn. Still, as you said, it's meant to be!), Sariniste (Aizen will have to be on his toes. Quite a lot is going on that he can't see...), Shima-Taicho31 (No need to wait anymore! It's here.), Guest (Here it is and more is coming!), and ShadowKitten14 (Thank you so much!) Enjoy the chapter! Love, Spunky)
An invading shaft of light from the garden doors leaked into Ichigo's hazy mind, bringing him slowly awake. He grimaced and shifted beneath the cozy blankets, his warm, naked body enjoying the pleasant brush of crisp sheets and soft, thick blankets. His stomach rumbled impatiently as cognizance gradually returned and he peeked out from within his covers, extending his senses to make sure Aizen Sousuke was nowhere around.
He doesn't seem to be close by. Maybe this is a good time to look around and try to figure things out.
His stomach rumbled again and he sighed and climbed out of the bed. He stumbled across the room to the closet, where he found a number of yukatas in his size, as well as a few expensive kimonos.
What the heck?
He chose a simple white yukata and a pair of sandals, then remained in the closet to dress before stepping back out into the bedroom.
"Man, this is probably the fanciest room I've ever been in," he mused, studying the lovely dark wood furniture that reminded him of the furnishings at Kuchiki Manor, "Byakuya's place is nice, or at least, it was before the war. But this is off the charts."
He walked out the garden doors and stood still, examining the beautiful landscaping, lush, green grass, towering pines and countless flowers everywhere.
This is amazing. I wonder how it happened. I was there, watching, and I don't know who or what caused it, or why it shaped itself differently than the one the last soul king lived in.
He felt a twinge of sadness as he remembered the solemn face and distant eyes of Reiou as he had died.
Well, I'll bet that the new king isn't going to be like the old one was. The new king won't be a prisoner like that. Not if I have anything to say about it.
Aizen seems to think that we will have some kind of say in things. Of course, he tries to control everything...that's Aizen Sousuke for you.
"Good morning, Ichigo," Aizen said from somewhere behind him.
Ichigo turned and looked back at the palace, spotting Aizen standing on a balcony overlooking the gardens. He flash stepped down to where Ichigo stood, giving him a charming smile.
"I hope you slept well."
"I was comfortable," Ichigo answered shortly, "You?"
"It was a vast improvement from Muken," Aizen said blithely, "I was nearly brought to tears."
"Right," Ichigo said skeptically, crossing his arms, "What do you want?"
"It is morning," Aizen observed, "If you haven't eaten yet, I would like to have breakfast with you."
"You want to have breakfast with me?"
"Well, it is a little quiet here. I rather enjoy having company that doesn't want to sit out of my reach and toss insults at me while inflicting pain from a safe distance."
Ichigo frowned.
"Are you saying you were tortured in Muken?" he asked, "Someone hurt you?"
"Can you blame them?" Aizen asked calmly, "I murdered relatives or friends of theirs. And as horrid as those people were, they had some who loved them, some who mourned them, some who would go to some trouble to make me hurt for what I did...even more than the laws prescribed. Thankfully, because my reiatsu was only sealed into an area close around my body, they couldn't rape me, but some of the torments to which I was subjected...let us just say, I am very glad I will not suffer them again."
"What makes you think that?" Ichigo wondered aloud, "You don't know, any better than I do, who sent you up here, why you're really here and what we're supposed to be doing. You like to think you have some kind of control, but you don't. Neither of us do."
"You paint such a bleak picture," Aizen sighed, closing his eyes, "Think, Ichigo. The worlds below us are falling apart. Soon, everyone will be drowned. The rain will flood everything. That means that we have been chosen to do something to set things back in balance. We have to make some kind of move, or a set of moves. It has something to do with how the hogyoku disappeared, but I still feel its presence. I wonder, did anything similar happen to you?"
"I don't know what you mean," Ichigo answered off-handedly, his mind slipping back to the prism he had seen, "Maybe we're supposed to do something, but I don't know what or how. I don't know why we were just trapped up here with no clue what we're supposed to do? Seriously, who planned this?"
Aizen smiled.
"Why, don't you feel the tug on the strings, Ichigo?" he teased, "Obviously, Reiou had his ideas about what to do. You know what it was like for him. Think...do you really expect that if he had his say, he would choose for his successor to be a prisoner like him?"
"What are you saying? What are you trying to tell me here?" Ichigo demanded.
"I'm telling you that it's no coincidence that we are here, that we are here now, or that we are together. There is something we can do to change the way the heavens are run, and part of it is us being here alone. Why don't you tell me where that leads you?"
He moved closer, gazing down into Ichigo's angry, sparking eyes as his hand caressed the younger man's soft cheek.
"What are you doing?" Ichigo asked in a soft, almost panicked voice, "Don't touch me like that!"
He started to pull away, then stopped as his chest, near his heart, began to glow softly. In front of him, Aizen's did the same.
"What is that?" Ichigo mused, his eyes rounding and his fingers shaking as he touched the area that was glowing, "What's going on?"
"Our souls are resonating," Aizen said wonderingly, laying his hand over Ichigo's where it rested on the younger man's chest, "Fascinating!"
"What are you doing to me?" Ichigo snapped, trying to pull away, only to feel a strange numbness pass through him that left him weak-kneed and dizzy, "Aizen!"
Aizen's dangerously handsome face came closer and his lips moved until they were a breath away from Ichigo's.
"Why can't I move? Let go of me!"
"I am not doing anything," Aizen assured him, frowning, "But I do think that you have been holding back on me, Ichigo. You see, I know that you must have found it. It was something that wouldn't have been lost, even when Reiou's palace was blown away and remade into Wahrwelt, it would have remained here somewhere, hidden from the eyes of the enemy. And because it is intricately tied to the making of the new king, it would have found its way to one of us. I had the hogyoku within me."
Aizen paused, glaring down into Ichigo's eyes warningly.
"You...have the king's prism in your body, don't you, Ichigo?"
Ichigo's jaw stiffened rebelliously.
"What do you expect me to say?" he asked sarcastically, "You think I'd just tell something like that to you? I didn't tell that thing it was okay to climb inside me. But maybe it did that to get away from you!"
"Is that what you think?" Aizen said, brushing his lips against Ichigo and breathing in his pleasant, masculine scent, "I think that the truth is, we aren't, either of us here to be the new king, we are here to make the new king."
Ichigo stepped back, his legs shaking as struggled to regain control of his more fiercely glowing body.
"N-no! Get away from me!" he gasped.
"I can't do that," Aizen said with perfect calm, "and even if I could, I don't want to. I am at peace with this."
"Only because you have some kind of agenda!" Ichigo accused him.
"And what agenda would that be?" asked the elder man, nuzzling his cheek.
"I don't know," Ichigo admitted uneasily, "I do know you haven't accepted that you won't be king! Like I'd be stupid enough to believe that for a second!"
"Let me make this easy for you," Aizen said, his voice going suddenly deadly and ice cold.
Ichigo made a sound of dismay as Aizen wrapped an arm around him and dragged him to the side of the king's healing pool. He glared down into the hot, bubbling water.
"Show me the worlds below."
"Aizen!"
"Look Ichigo," Aizen said, pointing at the chilling reflection of the rain drenched and drowning worlds, "Our worlds are dying. Our homes are being swept away. The people we care about are sinking ever deeper into the rising waves. If we do not make the new king, then we have to watch as everything is destroyed. Is that what you want?"
Ichigo stared at the faces of his suffering family and friends as they appeared on the surface of the water. Tears leaked onto his face as Aizen's hand touched his shoulder, making him stiffen reflexively.
"Stop it!" he pleaded softly, wrapping his arms around his quaking body, "Make it stop! They're going to die, all of them!"
"Yes," Aizen agreed, "they will all die...unless we accept our fate. It is a choice we have to make, Ichigo."
"Right, it's a choice!" Ichigo snapped furiously, "Let you have me or watch them die? Reoiu is going to have his revenge on me for killing him, one way or another, isn't he?"
"You really think that he is taking his revenge, Ichigo? I think I'm hurt," Aizen said, looking amused.
"I'm sure this is all very funny to you!" complained the younger man, "Of course you're happy about it! It got you out of Muken. It brought you to the palace and gave you a shot at the crown."
"I got more than that even," Aizen said sedately, slipping his fingers under Ichigo's chin and making their eyes lock, "I think I've watched you forever. I manipulated things so that you were born and I watched you grow and change until you became the stunning creature you now are. Not much touches my heart..."
"You don't have a heart!"
"Oh, I assure you, I do," Aizen whispered, closing in on Ichigo's flushed lips, "and it is pounding out a rhythm with yours. Don't you hear it, Ichigo?"
"You're crazy!" Ichigo hissed, his legs giving way as Aizen's mouth claimed his.
They sank down onto their knees beside the healing pool, savagely feeding on each others' mouths. Ichigo's fingers clenched at Aizen's shoulders, at first gripping fiercely, then loosening and stroking very lightly. He blushed over the length and breadth of his slim body as Aizen opened his yukata, then nibbled and licked sensuously at the white flesh. Ichigo groaned in protest, but couldn't fight the strange, wanton feelings that claimed him as he was lowered onto his back.
"W-wait! Stop!" he cried, stiffening.
Aizen paused in his ministrations and looked down at Ichigo through hungry, feral brown eyes.
"What is wrong?" he asked, his lips curling slightly with impatience.
"I know we have to d-do this, but...but I never..."
"I know," Aizen breathed hotly into his ear, "I won't hurt you...not this time anyway!"
XXXXXXXXXX
Byakuya stood, staring at the golden door that led from the back of the Kuchiki archive, into the royal realm, his expression guarded and his reiatsu swelling around him. He was so intent on the door and the little shifts in the reiatsu behind it, that he didn't sense his red haired fukutaichou approaching from behind until Renji's arms slid around his waist and his lips brushed warmly against the sensitive skin of his white throat.
"You all right?" Renji asked worriedly, "You look kinda haunted."
"I don't like what I sense is happening on the other side of that door."
"Well, Kisuke did say that we couldn't enter the royal realm until they made the new king, right?"
"Yes," Byakuya agreed, "he did say that. And I just wonder if we'll be able to get there fast enough...to protect Ichigo from what that monster might do, and get Aizen trapped and taken back to Muken."
"I want to see him locked up as much as you do," Renji agreed, "but I'm worried about how this is playing out. You don't think he's hurting Ichigo right now, do you?"
"Probably not," Byakuya surmised, "Aizen might be the greatest beast Soul Society has ever grown, but he is well aware the balance has to be restored, and by now, he knows that their mating is completely necessary. I think that necessity will cause him to consider Ichigo's emotions and well-being as they join."
"Ichigo must be all kinds of freaked out," Renji reflected, "He's never been with anyone sexually."
Byakuya gave Renji a surprised look.
"What?" Renji inquired.
"N-nothing," Byakuya said, trying to brush the awkward moment off.
"No, tell me what you were thinking," Renji said, frowning.
"I...I don't know," Byakuya said uneasily, "I just...remember there was a time when you seemed very interested in Ichigo. Before we got together. It's not my business what went on with you before. I am sorry."
"What are you sorry for?" Renji said, giving the noble a more affectionate look and kissing him on the cheek, "I guess that it was a fair assumption. I was interested, but it never went anywhere. Ichigo never even noticed me at all. I've always just been a friend to him."
Byakuya gave Renji a rare smile.
"I wish I could say I was sorry for that," he confessed, "but you would know I was lying."
"You don't have to worry about me liking anyone else that way," Renji assured him, "Ever since you let me kiss you, you're the only person I want to be with. Aishiteru yo."
He brushed a warm palm against Byakuya's soft cheek, making it flush as the noble nuzzled him in return.
"Watashi wa anata no mono," Byakuya whispered back, seeking Renji's lips hungrily.
They kissed several times, before Byakuya pushed the redhead gently away and refocused on the door into the royal realm.
"Well, at least I got you to relax for a few minutes, eh?"
"Thank you, Renji," Byakuya said gratefully, "I appreciate the effort."
"You still holding vigil?" Kisuke said from behind the two.
He paused, sensing the heavy throbs of reiatsu that swelled on the other side of the door.
"I guess they figured out what they had to do," he commented dryly, sighing and shaking his head, "Poor Ichigo. I can't imagine what he's thinking right now."
"I am sure he is thinking of all of us," Byakuya said softly, continuing to focus on the door, "He knows what will happen to everyone he cares about if he is not successful in helping to make the new king."
"But having to let Aizen put his hands on him," Renji mused, scowling, "It makes me kinda sick, you know?"
"It unsettles me as well," Byakuya agreed.
"Too bad there's no damned choice," Kisuke said in a frustrated tone, "Well, we may not have any control over Aizen getting his claws into Ichigo, but we can make damned sure it's only this time, and then that guy is back in Muken, where he belongs"
"Aizen is slippery," Byakuya said warningly, "He nearly overcame all of our Gotei forces. He can barely be restrained."
"That's okay," Kisuke said, glaring darkly at the closed door in front of them, "We've got his number. He'll be pretty weak after the mating and will have to expend energy, giving Ichigo infusions of his reiatsu to keep everything in balance. We can use that time to gain control and restrain him, then he's back in Muken as soon as the new king emerges. He won't be any kind of threat anymore after that."
"Nice," Renji commented, "as long as it works."
"It'll work," Kisuke assured him, "We'll make sure of it."
He ran an appraising eye over the two officers.
"You two should get some rest while you can," he suggested.
"You are probably right," Byakuya agreed, "The mating will take several days and nights to complete."
"Kami, Ichigo's going to be pretty damned sore," Renji said, shaking his head, "It wouldn't be so bad if it wasn't sex with the most wicked shinigami that ever existed."
"This isn't about sexual enjoyment," Byakuya chided him, "It is a solemn duty to bring a new royal heir."
Renji gave Byakuya a knowing smirk.
"What about making a Kuchiki heir?" he teased, "Does that need to be solemn too?"
"Ahem, I think that's my cue to leave," Kisuke snorted.
Byakuya glowered at his red haired counterpart and Renji cringed at the rise in his reiatsu.
"Eh, sorry, Byakuya," he apologized, "I was just trying to lighten the mood."
"It's fine," Byakuya said in a tone that suggested mayhem, "But let's go to our bedroom, where I can receive your apology more appropriately."