AN: Sadly, we are coming to the end of this ficlet-that-was-only-supposed-to-be-at-most-4-chapters-long! I think somewhere around 4 chapters left, with MAYBE an Epilogue so I can leave it open for the actual story (seeing as I decided to make this a prequel…go figure, right?)

Anyway, let's get this show on the road! I can't wait to finally say that I finished a story! Woo-hoo!

A Long Way Home

Yoruichi was just minding her own business when someone opened the door to Ichigo's room on the base. She stretched languidly, opening her eyes only a scant slit, expecting to see Urahara or Ichigo.

It was then that she noticed through her sleep-fogged mind that none of those entering the room had any spiritual pressure beyond that of a normal human.

She spat and hissed, unable to prevent the animalistic sounds from heaving her mouth. It was all those years spent in the body of a cat that did it to her. How embarrassing…at least the mundane couldn't see her and her slip.

They gathered up all of Ichigo's personal belongings, going through them seemingly to try and find something. When the soldiers didn't find anything, they started to stuff his belongings into the duffel bag on the bed.

If Yoruichi was worried when they all charged into the room, she was even more alarmed that it appeared they were forcibly packing up Ichigo's things. Being a soldier in her own dimension, and knowing how things like that tended to work, she had a bad feeling she knew what was happening.

Someone found out they were erasing information from the system.

She needed to go and save her precious people.

They had left the door ajar, so as fast as she could (and, being the Goddess of Flash, it was very fast) she charged from the room and into the labs. Never mind that to the mundanes in the room the door just opened on it's own and no one walked through it. Never mind the startled expressions on Ichigo's, Urahara's, and (damnit! How could she have forgotten that man!) Daniel Jackson's faces. She made certain to use the language most Soul Reapers spoke, and yelled, "They are on to you! Get out! Now! There is no time!" as she jumped onto the counter top, spitting at Daniel Jackson. He had to be the one that told someone; he was around her boys the most, and had been trying his hardest to learn modern Japanese as quickly as humanly possible.

She needed to contact Yamamoto, she needed to get a hold of Isshin, they needed to be saved—

A hand on her back caused her to spit and jump, not realizing that Urahara had come up beside her. In Japanese he said, "Ah, I had wondered where you had gotten off to Yoruichi. Were you in Ichigo's room this whole time?"

In the elder language, she spat back, "Of course I have been! I told you on the first day that that is where I would be most of the time! Now COME ON!" She took her mouth and dug her teeth deep into Urahara's hand. He yelped, hopping backwards with the black cat still attached to his hand, trying to shake the feline off. It took Ichigo's assistance to pry her mouth away, and to get her to calm down under Daniel's watchful eyes, and the confused expressions of the staff around them.

With a glance up at Daniel, and after understanding what Yoruichi was trying to tell them, Ichigo said in Japanese, "It's too late. If they are already gathering our things together, then they will be coming through the door any moment now to arrest us and probably kill us." Ichigo's eyes drilled into Daniel's. "After all, this is how war is. We must protect what is ours, be it information or things or people. And they," this gestured to the whole of the lab, "have been fighting for a long, long time. You know how it is, Yoruichi. You remember, surely, the capture of the Visored," Daniel's eyebrow twitched like he was struck on the side of the face gently. "Once the higher ups feel that what they are doing is just, there is nothing that can stop them. Not the United States military, their Government, or even our Central 46."

And that was when the door burst open, and the Military Police came barreling into the room, cuffing the two foreign scientists and removing them bodily, though without much of a fight, from the room.

Only the remaining scientists were left in the room when Daniel fell to the floor, twitching like he was having a seizure as a flood of memories suddenly came back to him from his time as an Ascended.

It only took 3 minutes for Janet Frasier to get to the lab, and by then, Daniel was in a coma, reliving a time that no human besides Ichigo Kurosaki, Uryu Ishida, Chad Yasutora, and Orihime Inue had ever lived beyond to experience.

His time in Soul Society had finally come back to him. It was a shame that he could not tell the rest of the Military that the two "Scientists" were no threat to the United States or Humanity; one was even one of the greatest War Heroes that the Afterlife had even known, killing off he who could have killed the Spirit King, whose vassals were known in the afterlife as the Spirit Court…and to those in the Cheyenne Mountain Complex as the Ascended.

"What happened to Daniel?" This was asked by Jack, the rest of the team behind him as they observed their friend from behind a glass window. He was hooked up to a few machines, and the rest were only in the room in case his "stable, good condition" status decided to crash down to "Unstable, critical."

Janet sighed, lifting a hand to her forehead. "I'm still waiting on the CAT scan to tell me what's going on with his brain, but from what the other researches told me happened, I think that something Ichigo said triggered a memory, and a big one at that. He seems to be in a coma, but he has amazing neural activity and muscle twitches, like he is dreaming. I think the deluge hit him so hard that the brain did what it does best: tried to preserve itself while processing the information in the only way it knows how."

"Dreams," Sam said, her eyes stuck on Daniel's mostly unmoving form.

Janet nodded. "Yes, dreams. As soon as I get the CAT scan results back I will know more, but that is my best educated guess at the moment."

Jack nodded. "And what happened with the two Japanese folks?"

Teal'c spoke up. "They were apprehended and taken to the brig, where they are being debriefed and then sent home to be reprimanded by their home government. Japan did not authorize any of the activities that they did to the missing and corrupt files, so this reprimand probably means life imprisonment or death."

Most of them winced a little, unhappy that death was still an option on the table for dealing with the two strange, kind, and treacherous researchers. They had all gotten to know the twosome over the last few weeks (a little over a month, really,) and hated that they had been betrayed in such a way…and also hated the fact that they may never have an opportunity to see them again.

Teal'c continued. "They are scheduled to be flown back to Japan by way of the Airforce in two days. We are allowed to question their motives and search through their things until then…except for our team. They feel we have too much of an emotional attachment to them to give them justice."

Jack sighed, looking away from Teal'c back to Daniel. "I just wish he could tell us what triggered this memory, and why it hit now instead of when the two first got here."

"Ah, so you're awake."

He squinted his eyes into the bright light. How was the sun shining inside the base? Had he not truly ascended?

"No, you are among us now. Friends, fellow Ascended beings…or, as we are known here, part of the Royal Court. You have been here for the last two days, but have only just now woken up."

Daniel opened his eyes fully, looking into the face of an older man with a face crinkled by laugh lines. He must've said that previous thought aloud and not intended to.

"Yes…unfortunately, it's part of the transition. You will soon learn to keep your inner musings to yourself. It usually only take a few hours for you to com fully back to our own mind."

As the man was talking, Daniel looked around, marveling at the style of house he was in, and even the clothing that he and his elderly caretaker were dressed in. It all had a distinct old-style Japanese feel to it, and as he sat up and noticed he was laying on a futon, it hit him.

And in the back of his mind, Jack's voice said, "Daniel…we're not in Kansas anymore."