TTGL: So this is the Heavens

Chapter 18: It's just a flesh wound.

Faint voices reverberated at the edge of consciousness. They were blurry and indistinct but were gradually becoming more clear, their softness soothing the ever present pain.

"How is he doing?"

"Not well. He's stable but I doubt if he'll ever fight again."

This brought Kamina all too suddenly back to his senses. He tried to sit up but he couldn't. As he looked around he discovered that it was Captain Unohana and the orange haired medic that had cared for him after the shinigami tournament all those weeks ago. Orihime Inoue He vaguely recalled.

"Who the hell do you think I am." Kamina coughed, taking the two women by surprise. "I was born to fight! If I'm stable then I'm able. As long as I'm alive I'll keep moving and never stop."

"Calm down, Kamina-san. You need to rest or you wont be able to move let alone fight." cautioned Unohana. She kept her pleasant smile but here aura darkened.

Kamina closed his eyes so that Unohana's eyes couldn't pierce into his soul. With her intimidation blocked he forced himself up and staggered out of the bed, nearly falling in the process until Orihime ran and caught him.

"You're lucky to be alive." came Unohana's soft yet stern voice. "I managed to save you but at the cost of all of your spiritual energy. I am afraid that you are no longer a shinigami."

"You've gotta be kidding me. This thing," he indicated the raw skin over his heart. "It's just a flesh wound. A bit of exercise and I'll be feeling back on form."

"In yourself you will fully recover, that is true, but you will never be able to produce spiritual pressure again. Aizen destroyed all of your spirit glands and what was left I consumed in order to produce more life energy. Your days of fighting powerful enemies are over."

Kamina took a few pained steps toward the door. "Screw that. I coped perfectly well before I became a shinigami, I'll manage fine now. My body is still stronger than before which means I'm still stronger."

Unohana sighed. "I can see that you won't listen to reason. I hope everything works out fine for you, although I'm sure we'll see each other again. People like you can't help but to get into fights. Orihime, please escort him to the war council that is being held, I'm sure he'll want to be there."

"Yes captain Unohana." affirmed the younger girl. With her supporting Kamina they left the room into a white corridor. The surrounding sounds were familiar enough to tell Kamina that they were aboard the Dai-Gurren.

Orihime looked anxious, like she had something else on her mind. "You seem to be taking this very well. Do you really intend to keep fighting?"

"Of course. Real men don't give up after every little setback. Spiritual power or not, I'm gonna give that smug bastard a rematch and I'm gonna win!"

She hesitated a moment. "Do you want your power back?"

Kamina turned his head to look at her. "Why you asking? The captain lady said it's a no go."

She looked around, her face torn with indecision. "Follow me."

They backtracked through the medical wing until they came to a door a few down from where Kamina had emerged. Orihime slid the door open and entered. Inside was a single bed that contained the sleeping form of Ichigo.

Approaching him she shook him lightly. "Kurosaki-kun." she said softly.

Ichigo stirred and opened his eyes. He sat up revealing a heavily bandaged chest. "Orihime. Kamina."

"Kurosaki-kun, Kamina-san has lost his powers. I was wondering, since you once lost yours then got them back, could he do the same?"

Ichigo ran a hand through his orange hair. "I don't know. It isn't possible by the method I used since I was alive. Give me a bit and I'll think through everything that Urahara ever told me. I've still got all of his notes somewhere. In the meantime, help me up. I want to be present at the meeting."

Orihime tried to help both men down the corridors but was struggling. Hinataro nearly bumped into them along the way and so volunteered to help. Slowly they made their way out onto the deck.

There were dozens of shinigami clustered around. A large bonfire had been lit while large sheets had been fastened around the deck's edge to serve as wind shields. All of the captains and lieutenants sat around the fire and this was where Kamina and Ichigo were taken.

"Kurosaki-san, Kamina-san, glad that your up and about already." greeted Head Captain Hitsugaya. "We weren't expecting you to be awake for a while yet after the damage you both received."

"We're well enough to attend here." commented Ichigo as he sat himself beside Renji.

A short, black haired woman sat next to Renji and greeted Ichigo in a friendly fashion. On closer inspection Kamina saw that she had the armband stating her rank as the Fifth Division lieutenant.

Kamina seated himself between Ichigo and Hisagi, wincing as he bent. He offered a few nods of recognition to those that he knew then waited for the meeting to begin.

When silence descended Hitsugaya began. "Aizen managed to escape us in the last battle but his minions were easily defeated. Anything he throws at us we have proven time and again we can deal with without major casualties. All we have to do is focus our efforts on capturing or killing Aizen. We now have every captain with us except for Captain Kurotsuchi who's whereabouts is currently unknown but we do have his lieutenant so our science needs can still be resolved."

"Our main problem is that we cannot locate where Aizen is hiding. Squad Two is hunting him even as we speak but nobody knows where those black portals could have taken him. They didn't appear to be Garganta so Hueco Mundo is unlikely to be his current residence."

"Hueco Mundo." muttered Ichigo absently. "That's it!" he exclaimed.

"What is it?" asked Hitsugaya.

"As you all probably know, Kamina lost his powers in that last battle. The same happened to me once and while I got mine back by exploiting the thin chain between life and death, the principle of hollowfication should still work."

Hitsugaya looked ready to interrupt. "Just hear me out." injected Ichigo.

"We send Kamina into Hueco Mundo to meet up with Nel, an espada whom we have good relations with. He gathers information when their about Aizen and sees if she knows a way he can perform a controlled hollowfication. It kills two birds with one stone."

"It's too risky." pointed out the white haired captain. "Hueco Mundo is still the most dangerous place to be and you recommend sending in someone with no powers? That is crazy."

"Who the hell do you think I am! Never ever dare to rule me out or side line me or I'll prove myself by socking you in the face. If I'm no good to you anymore then what difference does it make if I go on a suicidal mission, eh. I know, you're just scared that I'm gonna steal your thunder!"

"Jeez, fine. I'll let you go. Just shut up and let me continue." grumbled the Head Captain agitatedly.

"Yes! In your face, everybody. Woo!" shouted Kamina triumphantly before Ichigo pulled him down to avoid a ice shard from hitting his face.

Hitsugaya continued. "As I was saying, this new portal is unknown and it seemed to belong to an outside body rather than Aizen himself so he may have another unknown ally. When we do find him, we send in everything we have at our disposal. We will end this at the next battle. Until then, we're at constant Red Alert. Make sure you're fully prepared for a life or death battle at a moments notice."

Kamina stood and stretched. "Right. So how do I get to this Heuco Mundo?"

Ichigo heaved himself to his feet. "It'll say in Urahara's notes somewhere. Lieutenant Kurotsuchi, if I could have your assistance."

The three headed back inside the Dai-Gurren and Ichigo picked out a blank room that had no current purpose. Once inside he began to draw symbols upon the wall and speak a kind of kido that made the ink lines glow. They swirled and changed then folded back upon themselves, taking the section of wall away with it. Beyond the wall was a small hole that that had a faint luminescent glow to its surfaces.

Inside was a collection of strange miscellaneous items that varied from pieces of paper to old artefacts of unknown purpose.

"This is my vault. Urahara himself designed it. Its physical location is in a far away and sealed area where no one can get it. The only access point is through one of these vault gates." Ichigo explained.

"Who is this Urahara guy you keep mentioning anyway?" asked Kamina

"Probably the smartest guy that ever lived. He was the captain of squad Twelve before Mayuri Kurotsuchi."

"If he's so smart where is he now?"

"He was banished from the Soul Society for a crime that Aizen framed him for. That was a long time ago though and that has been rectified. He's currently in hiding somewhere though after he was accused of being a sexual deviant."

"Ah."

"He left me all of his notes." finished Ichigo, withdrawing a small notebook from his vault.

"I was expecting something bigger." commented Kamina.

Ichigo sighed. "This is Urahara's, things are never what they seem with him." he opened the book and there was an explosion of paper as wave after wave of note scrawled sheets flew upward until a pool of paper filled the entire room up to their waists.

"God damned hat wearing bastard." muttered Ichigo. He leafed through several of the sheets until he came upon the process for opening a gargantuan. He rooted around a bit longer until he had the full set.

After reading through them he handed them over to Nemu. "Can you reconstruct this?"

Nemu scanned the pages. "Given the correct resources I would be able to replicate this design without problem."

"Good. Take whatever you need in both supplies and man power. You may as well build it in here." instructed Ichigo. Nemu nodded and set straight to work.

Kamina and Ichigo left her to her work and set off to the canteen. Neither were very steady on their feet yet but they managed the short distance easily. Sitting down with a trey of food they began to regain their strength by stuffing their faces.

"You've come a long way since I first met you. From some punk kid to a powerful shinigami in the space of a few months." said Ichigo between mouthfuls.

"What did you expect from the mighty Kamina. Its nothing special though, you did the same when you first found out about this world. Then Head Captain whitey too became a captain while he was still a kid."

"True. Maybe its just because there have been so few people of skill come through in recent years. People live meaningless and fear filled lives on Earth, die and become weak and scared souls. Very few of them have any spiritual power and those that do have very low levels."

Kamina took a contemplative sip of sake. "I have a question though. You're clearly a man of action, why the hell did you sit back doing nothing as the world descended into chaos around you?"

"Damn red tape and bureaucracy. The Gotai Thirteen is only a military branch, the guardians or police force of the Soul Society. We can't act without the approval of Central 46. They are a civilian civil body that makes our laws." Ichigo began to explain.

"With the falling number of souls they didn't want to risk unnecessary deaths so limited the number of missions we could do and the means by which we do them. They don't exist anymore though, so now we can finally sort this mess out."

"Man, this bureaucracy stuff sucks." huffed Kamina. "When Simon liberates Earth I hope he comes up with a better system."

Ichigo ran a hand over his stubble. "That's something I never worked out. How do you still have your memories? I retained mine because I was already a shinigami before I died, but you, I can see no reason why yours would stay."

"Cos I'm awesome." was the simple reply.

"Toshiro thinks that it was because of your manifestation of spiritual energy just before your death."

"Eh. What do you mean? That's a shinigami thing."

"So fuelling giant robots and forming large drills from nowhere is a normal human thing?" Ichigo pointed out.

"That's fighting spirit! Or at least that's what Leeron told me anyway."

"Who knows. It doesn't matter though." he stood and yawned. "I've got some stuff to sort out so I'll see you. It'll probably take Nemu a few days to build it so just try and build up your strength."

Kamina wandered the ship aimlessly for the rest of the day, training and talking to pass the slow crawl of time. He quickly became bored out of his mind with little to do other than wait. He had another early night and awoke expecting another day at least of tedious waiting.

This was not the case though. No sooner had he got up and limped to the canteen for some breakfast was he encountered by Nemu.

"The gate is completed." she said. "It is ready for your departure."

"Wow. That was pretty fast."

"I worked all night. My body does not require the same levels of sleep as normal shinigami. It was also an interesting project that was new to me."

Kamina followed her back to the room. One inside he found that Ichigo was already there, checking over the simple looking wooden posts that stood at either side of the room. Kamina could tell though that there was more to the structure and layout of the wood than met the eye.

Seeing Kamina enter, Ichigo nodded to him the jumped onto the top of one of the posts.

"Are you ready for this?" asked Ichigo seriously. "It'll be tough and once in there you're on your own."

"Of course I'm sure. It's Hueco Mundo that needs to be ready for me, not the other way around."

Ichigo nodded and placed his sword tip onto the wooden beam and knelt down. "Here in my right hand the stone that connects the worlds. In my left hand the blade that binds existence. The shepherd with black hair, the chair of the noose. I strike the ibis from the clouds. Gather."

A blue glow spread from Ichigo's sword down into the beam which then passed on to the second beam, connecting them with an azure line. This line opened up like a mouth revealing a black abyss beyond.

"The space beyond has no ground and can only be crossed by creating a path using spiritual energy. Since you have none presently and couldn't control it if you did, I asked Nemu to modify the design slightly. Now the gargantuan will stay open until I decide to close it and as long as I pour my own spiritual energy into it a solid path will still form."

Kamina stepped up to the gargantuan. He grasped his sword tighter. It was a comforting feel but without spiritual energy the weapon felt somehow empty and lifeless.

"This is you last chance to back down."

"Real men never back down!"

"I had a feeling that you would say that. Well, I'll see you when we're equals, one way or another."

Kamina smiled devilishly. "You bet!" He jumped, disappearing from the Soul Society into the dark maw of the world of hollows.

000 000 000 000 000 000

A/N: Sorry that this chapter was so short and contained 90% dialog. Its more of a go between chapter to link the last and next together. I have a lot planned for the next chapter so that should live up to your expectations a lot more.

As for the omake competition, deciding this week's winner was tough. In the end I decided upon archsage328 due to the fact that he was last weeks runner up and the person who has probably given me the most reviews so its only fair he gets a prize.

So to archsage328, you have three choices: I send it you as a PM, an email or I post it on this story for the public. Your call. Just give your answer in a review or PM. Well done.

Everyone please review, thanks for reading. Next chapter will be better.

-FWF