When you mess with fate

Chapter 2

A/N: I do not own Bleach and its characters. If I did... Never mind…

The senkaimon opened to reveal a shinigami taichou berating a tall fukutaichou from another division for causing them to be late. The fukutaichou only sighed in defeat, as he was too tired to argue with his short childhood friend. He had completely forgotten about their plan today and had gone off to the Rukongai to have a quick drink with Ikkaku, Yumichika, and Shuuhei.

The humans had decided to pay Orihime's grave a weekly visit for seven weeks after her death as a mark of respect for her. Today was the last of these visits. Rukia and Renji made it a point to come over to the living world to show their support to their friends, especially Ichigo and Kazui. After donning on their gigai, which were modified to look the same age as the rest of their 65-year-old friends, they made their way to a coffee house where they had promised to meet up with Chad and the gang before walking to the Kurosaki Clinic together.

When they arrived at the venue, the retired boxer told them to have a seat and order their drinks. Tatsuki was already there. "Ichigo just called to say that he is having a discussion with Kazui. The boy is leaving for the airport soon. He won't be coming back for a long time after this," he explained.

Tatsuki snorted. "That one is hardly a boy anymore. He's 41 years old. But I get why you would call him a boy," she remarked.

"Isn't he going to the cemetery with us?" Renji asked.

Chad replied, "Ichigo said he went early this morning on his own so he wouldn't miss his flight."

"Wait," Rukia said, her brows furrowed. "You said Kazui won't be coming back here for a long time after this?"

Chad nodded. "Yeah."

"He said he wants to focus on his new job," Tatsuki contributed as she rolled her eyes. "I bet he just doesn't want to live with Ichigo because his mother is no longer around."

"Ichigo was pretty strict with him," Chad commented.

"I would be, too," Tatsuki said. "That boy is really a handful. Seven universities in 15 years before finally getting a proper degree! If not for his mother's illness, he wouldn't have graduated at all. He only got his first job when he was almost forty. I would've smacked him a thousand times over if he were my son. Ichigo and Hime had the patience of a saint. I don't think any parent deserves a kid like that, much less Ichigo."

Rukia scoffed. "Serves him right for being such a brat when he was younger. You know what they say: like father, like son."

"But he's not..."

"Asano and Mizuiro are here," Chad declared, interrupting Tatsuki.

The two best friends came up to their booth and settled themselves in. Keigo playfully shoved the gentle giant when he sat next to Chad. "Why are you always so formal with me? You call everyone by their first names!"

Chad chuckled, "Old habits die hard."

The previous topic was then forgotten as they started to talk about the latest things that were going on in their lives.

Mizuiro was divorced for the fifth time and he now had at least ten kids to support but that wasn't a problem for him as he had always been rich.

Keigo was still not married. Although he had been dating countless women, none of them seemed perfect enough for him to want to call his wife. "I've been waiting so long for you, Rukia. When are you going to leave this pineapple head to marry me?" he pretended to cry.

"Ano..."

Before Rukia could say anything, Renji had already reached across the table to grab Keigo by the collar. "What did you just call me?" he demanded, gritting his teeth.

Rukia slapped his arm with the back of her hand. "Put him down, you big baboon. You're not supposed to hurt a human."

Keigo tried to pry Renji's fist off his shirt with both hands but to no avail. "Relax, man. I was just joking. And of all the things I said, you got offended by what I called you?"

Renji immediately released the brown-haired man, but not without a glare and a growl of irritation. Baboon, indeed.

"So, Tatsuki," Rukia began so they could have a change of subject. Again. "I remember you said you were handing over your third dojo to another student. How's that going?"

Tatsuki shrugged. "It will be officially his in a few weeks but I'm having second thoughts. I'd like to keep one for myself until I die. I was just talking to Chad about it before you guys came over. Might want him to conduct boxing classes there so I don't have to maintain the whole place on my own."

Chad grunted in reply. After winning his first championship, he became uncomfortable about this contact sport that he accidentally got involved in. He decided to go into coaching kids in Mashiba Junior High School to use it for self-defence instead. He had just retired from teaching not too long ago and had been enjoying his life for a while now; travelling all over the world on his own and had only come back to Karakura when Orihime passed away. Since he was the only one with a lot of free time on his hands, he thought he would see if Ichigo needed help. But the shinigami daiko seemed to have everything sorted out on his own. So Chad just hung around doing nothing for the past seven weeks. It could be a good idea to share a training gym with Tatsuki, he thought.

"Have you heard from Uryuu lately?" Rukia asked. The question was directed to Chad. No one had seen him in ages but the big guy had dropped Uryuu a visit in Germany last year during one of his travels.

"Still the same," was Chad's short reply.

"He's not married?"

Chad shook his head. "He doesn't want to have kids who would inherit his Quincy abilities."

They all nodded in understanding. It was no surprise to all who had been through the Thousand-Year Blood War that Uryuu felt especially guilty about it even though he had helped to destroy Yhwach.

There was a short silence as everyone thought about the raven-haired doctor. After Ryuuken had passed away, Uryuu took over his father's hospital for a while before selling all his shares off to another shareholder. He only became a doctor because he felt he owed it to the old man for helping them finish the war. Now that Ryuuken was no longer around, he decided to move to Germany and make a home there on his own. However, he would usually travel across Europe, writing about the latest fashion, and contributing his ideas to that world that had always held his true passion. Of course, no one wanted to talk about the real reason he had moved so far away from them. It definitely had more to do with Orihime than his guilt about the war.

Fifteen minutes later, Rukia said she wanted to leave earlier so she could see Kazui before he went off for kami-knows-how-long. There was a startled look on her friends' faces but no one said anything. Renji got up as well to go to the Kurosaki Clinic with her.

"It still feels weird without Orihime around in the group," Rukia commented as they walked the familiar streets towards their destination. "I mean, she would've shoved red bean flavoured tea in my face had she been there at the coffee house with us."

Renji chuckled. "You know what's even weirder?"

"What?"

"That you don't resent her in any way," he said, his voice almost inaudible.

Rukia narrowed her eyes. "Why would I resent her? She's such a nice person. She was like a sister to me."

Renji shrugged. "You know, because..."

"Bastard, don't you even go there," she snapped at him. "I've gotten over it for so long now. I've moved on, haven't I? I'm glad they were married and that he made her happy."

"You do know that's not true, right?" The tall redhead glanced at his childhood friend beside him.

"She told me she led a happy life, married to the man of her dreams. She was happy, Renji and she deserved that for being the kind and selfless person she was," she insisted, folding her arms across her chest. "Can we stop talking about it now? This is just so inappropriate."

"Yeah, yeah," he sighed in annoyance. "We're here, anyway."

The two were just about to knock on the door when they heard a lot of shouting coming from inside the Kurosaki home.

"Why do you have to make it so difficult? Your mother would've wanted you to be back here!"

"Don't you tell me about what my mother wants! You don't know a damn thing about what she wants!"

"Of course, I know. She was my wife."

"Yeah, because you didn't have a choice!"

"I'm going to choose to ignore that, son."

"You've been ignoring that for years! Whatever. I'm still going to look for him. Okaa-san is not here anymore. You can't stop me."

"Watch me, Kurosaki Kazui."

"I am not a Kurosaki!"

Slap! "I raised you!"

"But you are not my father!"

Rukia covered her mouth as she gasped in shock. She snapped her eyes towards Renji who was looking back at her, biting his lower lip anxiously. She furrowed her brows, her face full of questions. Before she could verbalise them, the door slammed open as Kazui stormed out of the house with his luggage. When he realised they had guests outside their home, his steps halted for a while as he threw glances at the two people standing awkwardly at his doorstep.

"Kazui..." Rukia reached her hand out to him.

The human boy she had seen growing up to be this man before her glared at her for a few seconds too long before he left, seemingly angrier than he was when he was having the argument with Ichigo.

What just happened?

Haha… second chapter in less than a day. I told you the ideas were being shot straight into my face. This chapter may seem a bit too informative but I wanted to show you my take on how the gang ended up who they are in 686. If you noticed, none of those who were directly involved in the war got what they really wanted, instead they got exactly what they didn't want. So I'm giving them some sort of redemption through this fic. I'm sorry I killed Inoue. I'm not doing it because I hate her or anything, because I really don't. I've always felt that she was better off with Uryuu who has given her so much attention throughout the manga. But you will soon see that Inoue plays a role in this redemption.

Thank you to all those who have read the first chapter. Now that the second chapter is out, I will begin to share every update on tumblr as well.

Shirayuki992: Hey! Thanks for being one of my faithful readers. With regards to how a soul looks when it is separated from its human body, I've always thought it would be awesome to look like yourself at the best time of your life. If I died looking all wrinkled, and skin and bones when I'm 87, I wouldn't want to look like that in my soul form. Haha… That's why I made Inoue to look like she was still 18 during the Quincy War.