Special note: Thought it'd be better to mention this before we start.
Ichigo left for Hueco Mundo December 16. Goes into coma December 20. Students leave for winter break on December 21. Class begins again January 7. Ichigo wakes up January 20. He resumes class January 28. School year ends March 22.
*dates based on our actual 2012/2013 calendar, also school dates based on how the Japanese school year should work. Don't question it, just accept it :) Use this info to how you see fit.
Now onto the story!
Do you wish to be like the sun?
The sun cannot see any of the shadows it casts,
and the sun shines it's light all over the galaxy.
But don't forget that the brightest light makes the darkest shadow.
Do you wish to be like the sun?
.
Session 1: Under Blue Skies—There is No Such Thing as Clemency
Chapter 3: Welcome Back to Peaceful Days?
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The sun was always blindingly surreal in his dreams.
Normally Ichigo would wake up without recollection of anything he had dreamt. But within the past few days after arising from his coma, he had been finding himself awaking with vivid details.
And in every single one of these dreams the sun was always shining.
Most of them would consist of his mother still alive, where she and the rest of the family would go out to picnics at the park or to the beach; grassy dewey fields, sharp sea-salt air, and toasty sunshine.
It all seemed remarkably real, these dreams that he recalled in brilliant pieces.
But one night came and what seemed like what would be pleasant dream got completely shattered by the appearance of...
Aizen.
.
.
The sun was more brilliant than ever before —where he couldn't even see blue in the sky— casting pure brightness upon the world.
Or whatever left of this world existed, from what Ichigo could distinguish through this strange glass film that he had found himself under.
He tried to breathe but only found water quickly filling up his lungs and that was when he realized he was underneath the surface of a sea, paralyzed there.
There was Aizen standing at the peak of a very dark colored slanted cliff. It seemed he was back to his original appearance before the Hōgyoku had obscured him; Ichigo could see the short dark tousled hair but his face was blurred by the sun.
Orihime was there too, he can only tell because of the long tresses of her red golden hair that dipped underwater. She sat along the side where she could fall over at any moment. Her feet were dangling, toes barely grazing the water's surface and just like Aizen her face was blurred.
He began to struggle when he saw a tall white figure approach, standing right behind Orihime, intimidating and foreboding but she paid the figure no mind.
Ichigo wanted to reach out, to reach towards the sun, to get out of the water but something wrapped around his wrists and ankles and around his throat—chains. He turned back to find Zangetsu pulling him down, it looked he was simply sleeping, eyes closed with a serene expression.
He tried pulling at the chains, see if he could drag Zangetsu to surface with him. Ichigo didnt want to leave his Zanpakutō behind except he was too heavy and Ichigo couldn't breathe. He was suffocating and the surface was growing dark. He was being pulled deeper into the abyss of his world.
Wait! Someone shouted and instantly he was pulled out of the water, onto the only piece of land in the endless sea and under the sun. Aizen stood over him, face still completely blurred out. Ichigo suddenly felt weightless.
There were no more chains holding him down but that meant Zangetsu was...
He looked over the edge towards the sea— an endless stretch of blue, both deep and bursting with iridescence— but he saw nothing.
Gone.
The thought had Ichigo choking on his breath, realization clogging up his throat and lungs.
Kneeling on his hands and knees, he scraped his dull finger nails against the surface, that turned out to be glass and cement of a building. Refractions of light shooting from every angle from the sun's unforgiving rays.
While struggling to gather his bearings, Ichigo briefly thought about how this skyscraper must have been a real tall one, being the only one that managed to break out of the sea, marring it's perfection with crumbling broken edges.
Wait... And he was immediately alert once more. Wait, the sound more important than the actual word. The voice soft, barely audible and indistinguishable.
Wait, and Ichigo turned just in time to see Aizen running off the edge. The resounding sound of the splash felt heavy on his ears enough to have him almost topple over as well.
There was a deafening pause afterwards. Not even a single sound or thought cutting through to break it. But the moment receded with an exhale from Ichigo, eyes lightly closed, and when he opened them he noticed that Orihime had not moved an inch from her spot.
He approached her with silent yet shaky steps. For some reason anticipation and anxiety grew in his stomach with each step he took towards the motionless girl.
It was only when he peered over her shoulder did he see something that had him choking on nothing all over again, his legs buckling as if the world was crumbling underneath his feet. All from a simple reflection of Orihime and...
Stark white skin.
Long orange hair, tufts of red.
Horns, claws, yellow eyes behind a horrid mask.
A monster.
But it was the reflection of her wide, terrified grey eyes that finally made this world to truly fall apart.
.
[5 days later-Kurosaki household]
.
"GOOOOOD MORNINGGGGG–"
Ichigo was already up and waiting for his father.
"ICHIIIIIII"
Here he comes.
"GOOOO-WOO-AHHHH!"
Not bothering with a fight he simply let his window opened and ducked when the old man pounced.
A dull thud was heard a second later as well as a pained groans from outside.
Ichigo sighed and shook his head in mild annoyance as he went towards his closet. Things in this house would never change.
Yuzu was still sensitive.
Karin was still snarky.
His dad was still an idiot.
And Ichigo? Well he was dressed and ready for the day.
.
.
"IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII"
Dammit, it was still too early.
"CHHHHHIIIIIIIIII"
He wasn't ready to deal with this again.
"GOOOOOOOO!"
Keigo's flying-tackle-greeting was immediately shot down by Ichigo's fist; a backhand to the nose that sent the over active teen flying back.
While Keigo layed pitifully on ground, Ichigo briefly scanned his hand making sure there wasn't any blood on it.
Geez it was his first day back after being in a coma for a month, you think that his friends (just Keigo really) could give him time to readjust to things?
Keigo undeterred by his friend's hostility latched onto Ichigo's arm, sobbing right on his sleeve, "Ichigo! You're so cruel to me! I was only trying to be a good friend and say hi after you've been gone for so long!"
Obviously Ichigo wouldn't have that luxury.
"Listen Keigo..." When Ichigo failed to come up with a good retort, he grumbled, "just shut up" and simply walked away.
Chad quietly followed Ichigo to class while Mizuiro, barely taking his eyes off his phone, offhandedly commented, "you should learn to keep your voice down, Asano-san."
He left Keigo to sob there, in the now deserted hallway, abandoned and alone.
"My friends hate me..."
The tardy bell rings.
.
[11 days later - Karakura High School]
.
It was finally Friday.
The after school bell had rung and students began packing up and rushing to either go home and study, hang out with friends, or participate in their after-school clubs.
But not Ichigo Kurosaki.
All day he had been distracted by things around him. Particularly someone.
Inoue Orihime.
It had been a little over a month since he rescued her from Hueco Mundo and a couple of weeks since he had woken up, seeing her alive and well.
And within those couple of weeks he couldn't help but notice her whenever she was in his vicinity. Watching her soft nature, her gentle features, her day-dreamy expressions, and —something he noticed but was afraid to fully acknowledge— her luminous beauty.
It brought both a sense a calm and warmth to see her safe and sound, to see that she was alright.
But in a way she wasn't.
Lately, instead of the serene look she got whenever she reminisced about her brother or the excited silly look she had when she imagined something overly ridiculous, he had been noticing these looks that would momentarily settle in her eyes that were utterly and completely blank. He couldn't see the emotions that would normally flit across her eyes. It seemed as though there was fog clouding over them.
Not to say that her mind wasn't focused on the present, because she still payed attention. It was more like as if she simply was not entirely there, that a part of her was wandering somewhere else.
But then soon enough the moment would pass and in each of those times where she had caught him staring she would face him with a bright smile, with that special little gleam back in her eyes.
Thinking back to those blank expressions and linking to the ones from a month ago brought a sense of unease. The pitiful excuse he had come up with was that maybe it was more like she got lost in a fog and simply needed a little more time for her thoughts to fully settle. From wherever they went.
Still it didn't stop him from feeling on edge.
He berated himself for it. He didn't like thinking so negatively all the time, as if he were searching for something to be wrong. But he decided he could continue to keep a close eye, just in case. Well it was a matter he couldn't look into right now anyways because class had ended, the students including Orihime had all left, while he stayed behind to turn in the first part of his seemingly endless makeup work to the teacher.
.
.
It took longer than he expected, Ochi-sensei kept going over the material with him and teh he had to make plans to make up a missed test.
With all that done and with no one around Ichigo began dawdling around the halls. Somehow he began thinking about the peculiar, (and on some level) disturbing dream he had of Aizen and Orihime. He could only wonder why Aizen, of all people, would pull him, of all people out of the water. He also wondered how Aizen in the end could easily just... Lose himself.
Then there was Orihime and her wide bright eyes and also the yellow eyes, the sharp eyes, the violent eyes, the eyes of a monster.
"Hey Ichigo!"
Good thing a voice broke him out of his musings, thoughts like those were dangerous.
Ichigo swung his bag over his shoulder and took the opportunity to glance back and see Tatsuki run up to him, "hey Tatsuki, what's up?" He answered back lazily, he honestly wasn't in the mood. It was Friday and he just wanted to go home. And forget about that fucked up dream.
As soon as she reached him she took deep breaths of air before waving a yellow notebook in his face, "listen can you do me a favor? Go find Orihime and give back her notebook. She should be heading towards the handicrafts club right now."
"Why can't you–"
"Because," The stress cut Ichigo's complaint abruptly, "I have practice to get to and it's not like you have anything better to do." He scowled and wanted to argue that he did in fact have things to do; there were piles of makeup work waiting for him at home.
Although it wasn't like he was looking forward to them.
At the look he gave her, Tastsuki sighed as though she had no more patience (not that she had any to begin with) to deal with anything at the moment. "Look, sorry to trouble you but Orihime really needs these notes to study— Ugh, I swear she's been so forgetful lately." She muttered the last part before ranting again, "you know she has missed school for as long as you have! If anything, you two could study together to catch up!"
The new piece of information grabbed Ichigo's attention. He hadn't heard anything about Orihime missing school. Why was that?
"What are you talking about?"
The look that crossed Tatsuki's face for a split second was indescribable; a strange sort of grimace mixed with hesitance and it unnerved him.
But that didn't stop him from pressing firmer, "well?"
"Ichigo I really got to get going."
"Tatsuki." If he raised his voice up just one more notch he would've been shouting.
He didn't miss the minuscule flinch from her either but she growled back, "I don't know! Okay!?"
Ichigo's jaw tightened, he could feel the molars grind together while his eyes were set in a harsh glare.
"Fine, I get it." He said gruffly and snatched the notebook from Tatsuki's hands. "You can go now."
But Tatsuki said nothing, instead she merely eyed him silently before picking up her bag and turning her back to him.
Ichigo was about to walk away before she spoke up, "what I do know," her tone was hard and her face stony, "is that she left with Rukia and came back almost a month later. That's it. Will you take the notebook to her now?"
Rukia. It hadn't been too long since the last time he saw her yet hearing her name brought a strange feeling in his chest. A dull nostalgic feeling, as if he hadn't seen her in years.
It also brought back memories like...
How close Rukia and Orihime were that day.
He didn't want to know why he had remembered that of all things. He also hated jumping into conclusions, even if he did that most of the time. Blame it on the familiar twinge of dread and worry that were beginning to resurface.
Ichigo did his best to neutralize his expression before answering as evenly as he could, "Alright, I'll make sure she gets this." He waved the notebook for emphasis.
Tatsuki merely nodded and walked away.
Not where I wanted to leave off ^^! And sorry for the long update. Again. Life keeps getting in the way and just when I was getting close to finishing this chapter, I get sick (still am). Which is why I decided to wrap it up now or else it would never get updated. (Haha just kidding).
Next chapter! Ichigo learns its rude to eavesdrop...
Review please! Let me know what you think; what you like, dislike, what I should work on. I'd like to know these things!
Take care~