"Are you sure that's all she said?" Ichigo demanded, turning over his shoulder to stare at Uryu.
Uryu sighed, holding on to his seat as Chad swerved the car into yet another block. "Did you put the vest on?"
"Uryu," Ichigo growled.
Uryu paused, looking troubled. That expression only worsened Ichigo's internal panic and he was very well ready to snap when Uryu said, softly, "She said she loved you."
All the men stopped preparing their guns to look up at Ichigo. Something sank deep into the bottom of Ichigo's stomach, and he wanted to hurl. To break something or scream at the sky. He wanted to do something with this restlessness, this anguish that Orihime could already be—
No. He couldn't even think of it.
"She can tell me herself when I find her," he said eventually, his tone sounding brusque to his own ears as he pulled out his gun.
The car slithered onto the neighboring curbside so as to not rouse any suspicions. All five men got off, their footsteps as silent as possible as they took off for Highwell Hall. Ichigo gestured for Keigo and Mizuiro to stand by the fire exits, while Chad and Uryu flanked him on either side, waiting for his instructions.
Ichigo considered his options. If he walked through the front door, he'd be a dead man even with the bullet-proof vest on. Worse, they might shoot Orihime.
(If she's still alive, a voice told him, and if the opposite was true, Ichigo told himself Grimmjow's mother would be very sorry she went through all that trouble to give birth to him).
Ichigo took a deep breath and calmed himself down. He crawled away from the windows and pushed himself against the bar's side door, eyes peeking through the slit. Though he couldn't tell much, he counted six men and another figure wearing a long skirt. Orihime's skirt. They were not touching her but had surrounded her on all sides as she sat on one of the bar stools.
"Keigo says all the civilians are gone," Chad reported in a low murmur, and Ichigo's eyes widened. Gone?
How? And more so — how the fuck did Grimmjow get in? Even if they killed the bouncer, the doors were still reinforced and had to be opened from inside, which they could only do if they had the password.
Ichigo shook himself off. The only possible solution was to draw them out. For that, Ichigo had to give Grimmjow the impression he was alone.
"Spread out," he muttered, barely sparing Uryu and Chad a glance as he kept his eyes glued to the scene in front of him. The two exchanged glances, then broke off as one headed to hide behind a car and the other took refuge near the staircase of a neighboring apartment.
Ichigo clicked his gun's safety off and slammed his fist against the door. He quickly crouched beside it. He knew making any sudden moves would cost him, so he stayed silent, even when a man approached the door and said, "Who is it?"
The air felt tense. A dog barked somewhere in the distance. One move —any wrong move—and it would all be over. Even the neighborhood civilians had all wisely shut their doors and windows, anticipating blood. Lots of it.
The door opened and a tall, lanky man stepped out. Ichigo immediately lunged, one elbow swiftly locking around the man's neck, the other hand holding up a gun to his head. As the man writhed and screamed, Ichigo pushed him through the door as his shield, finally making it past the bar's threshold.
"What the fuck—!"
Ichigo's eyes caught Orihime's first, and he breathed a sigh of relief. However, it was a relief short-lived when Grimmjow turned to Orihime and grabbed her neck. "Did you warn him?"
Ichigo could hardly feel himself move, a terrifying rage burning through him like pure ice. He fired the gun, watching unfeelingly as the bullet sliced into the thick meat of Grimmjow's bicep. Grimmjow's back arched on impact and he let out a howl, but Ichigo fired again, and again, and again, blood spurting in short bursts, a wildfire of maroon soaking through Grimmjow's white suit.
Someone could have wailed. Someone could have cried. Ichigo had no idea—his ears had gone silent except for the tinny ringing that vibrated through his skull.
And then the sound barrier cleared.
"Grimmjow!" someone shouted.
Orihime sprang away in the midst of all the chaos, wide-eyed, giving Ichigo the perfect opportunity to grab her wrist and tug her closer. "Come on."
He led her with him through the door, his heart pounding as the split second of shock wore off and Grimmjow's men began shooting again.
Once they hit the curb outside, Ichigo felt a surge of confidence strike through him again. Here, in this territory, he had back-up, so he relaxed as his men emerged from the shadows to square off against Grimmjow's crew. In a second, he managed to squeeze himself and Orihime into the space behind a waiting car.
Then he relaxed and took a moment to look at Orihime, who was trembling. Her skirts were spattered with Grimmjow's blood. "Are you alright?"
Orihime's wide eyes roamed over his face as she tried to nod. "I—"
A loud shot had him cupping her head protectively as he glanced over his shoulder through the rearview mirror. A terrifying screech of wheels signaled the arrival of a police car, though how they were going to manage this circumstance was beyond Ichigo. Things were not good. The precious weight of Orihime against his chest only reminded him of the stakes. He was almost certain Grimmjow Jagerjacques was dead. The police were here.
Something sagged. Ichigo was shocked when he looked down to realize that Orihime was using his weight to hold herself up, seemingly pale and faint.
"Orihime," he breathed, cupping her face, his stomach sinking with the worst kind of dread. "What's wrong?"
"I'm—I'm fine," she replied, dazed. But something was wrong. When Orihime drew a hand away from herself, he was shocked to find it damp and red with blood. Her own blood.
"You're bleeding," Ichigo noted, almost nauseatingly sick as he caught her wrist. "Did they hurt you?!"
Orihime shook her head, looking troubled. "They didn't touch me at all…"
A harsh sound had them both flinching. Bullets were ricocheting everywhere, double in volume now that the police were here. Fear lanced through Ichigo at the prospect that one of them might have grazed Orihime, and just the thought of it alerted him into action.
"Come on, let me get you somewhere safe. Can you walk?"
Orihime nodded, quickly letting Ichigo lead her by the hand out of their narrow hiding spot. They were nearly out when they were ambushed by a white-faced Uryu.
"Ichigo." He sounded tense. "The commissioner is here. We need to—"
"I know," Ichigo said roughly, grabbing onto Orihime's arm. "I need you to take her to the hospital."
Uryu looked confused. "I—" His eyes fell to Orihime's blood-covered hand and he frowned. "I understand. But Ichigo, we're deadlocked. It's a hunting ground out there for guys like us, now that the police are here."
Orihime's eyes widened in panic. "Ichigo, what if they catch you?"
Ichigo scowled at Uryu but answered her. "They won't."
"She's right," Uryu said grimly. "If they found her, they would definitely escort her to the hospital. They have no reason to hurt her. If they found you though…"
Uryu's words began slurring in Ichigo's ears. The truth is, they had already hurt her. Orihime was bleeding. Just the sight of it made him sick, filled him with a fury that bordered on homicidal. He wanted the world to burn. He wanted this world, the world that had hurt someone he loved, to burn.
"I'm not leaving her here!" he snapped, startling Orihime and Uryu. "I don't care if you have to crawl through your own blood to do it—just get her out of here!"
Uryu's expression cleared. "Understood." He turned to Orihime. "Miss Inoue, please come with me."
Orihime opened her mouth to protest. "Ichigo—"
"Go," he said gently. "Leave. Now."
"But—!" Orihime felt Uryu's hands on her arms, dragging her away, but her eyes were still fixed to Ichigo's silhouette, a terrible sense of foreboding filling her.
Ichigo didn't glance back even once.
..
..
Rukia assessed the shitshow with a grim frown. Cracked glass and bullets were scattered everywhere, though neither camp seemed to have any intention of stopping.
She hopped down from her perch and hid behind a half-destroyed car. Renji had already gone up the stairs of a neighboring building, chasing after some of Ichigo's men who had been stationed there. It was unclear what exactly had happened to start the fight; their anonymous tipper had been rather hysterical on the phone.
But regardless of how it began, the two gangs were now at war—Grimmjow's fraction of the New York Trident versus Ichigo's.
Among the Trident's capos, Grimmjow had the largest fraction by far. Shawlong Koufang, Edrad Liones, Nakeem Grindina, Yylfordt Granz and Di Roy Rinker. Rukia had seen their files. She knew what violence they were capable of.
Out of the corner of her eye, she spotted a bright flash of hair. She narrowed her gaze, frowned.
It was Ichigo Kurosaki, his temple wet with blood, crouching against another car's tire with a gun in his hand. Rukia tensed. Something was off about his body language, the way he was cradling his gun. Had he run out of bullets?
That was when Rukia caught sight of the vision in the rearview mirror. Di Roy Rinker was approaching the car Ichigo was hiding behind, unaware that the head of the Kurosaki family was lurking nearby. Ichigo himself seemed unaware that Di Roy was near. From Rukia's vantage point, it all came down to one thing—who would spot whom first in the broken car mirror.
Di Roy's brows narrowed as he walked forward, his gun heavy by his side. Ichigo panted, distractedly wiping the line of thick blood dripping down his face. Rukia sensed it before it happened. It was going to be Ichigo.
Three things happened at once: Di Roy caught sight of Ichigo and raised his weapon, Rukia leapt out of the shadows, and a gun went off.
"Commissioner!" Ichigo said, startled, but Rukia's bullet hadn't finished the job. Di Roy lifted his head from where he was lying in a fast-filling pool of his own blood, hoping to go out in one last blaze of glory as he raised his hand and shot.
Rukia gasped as the bullet struck her in the shoulder. Pain flared through her entire body as blood spurted out of the split wound. She was still half in shock when Ichigo took the gun from her hand and shot Di Roy once—clean and precise. Di Roy squelched, then went quiet. Lifeless.
"Thank you," Ichigo muttered, taking in Rukia properly for the first time. "You saved my life." He sounded surprised about that, and honestly, Rukia was too. She had moved on instinct, not sure which man she was going to shoot until she did it. But despite his cocky exterior and his moody demeanor, there was something about the man that made her trust him, implicitly.
And now he had shot a man to protect her.
"You returned the favor, so I say we're even," Rukia bit out, trying to ignore the pain emerging from her torn shoulder.
"You should get out of here," Ichigo said grimly when he caught sight of her injury. "Where's your partner?"
Rukia had just about opened her mouth when another slew of bullets began sailing down from a rooftop above.
"What the fuck did you do to Di Roy, you son of a bitch?!" screamed Yylfordt Granz.
Ichigo and Rukia both ran to duck for cover, though Ichigo's gun had long lost its ammo, and Rukia was fast losing blood. It was becoming increasingly clear that they had run out of places to hide, and that their last refuge would soon be exposed when Granz would come down the stairs.
"I'll distract him," Ichigo gritted his teeth. "You think you can make it out of this alley and flag down a car to take you to the hospital?"
"Don't be stupid!" Rukia hissed. "He'll kill you."
"Not if I can reach for that." Ichigo jerked his chin towards the gun that was lying beside Di Roy's body. He crouched, almost ready to leap, when a screech of tires swerved into the alleyway.
"Ichigo!" Uryu Ishida bellowed, the driver's seat window open. Rukia could spot Miss Inoue beside him, eyes wide with worry. "Quick! Get in the car."
"Go with them," Ichigo muttered to Rukia, eyes still fixed to the stairwell for any sign of Granz.
"Are you cra—"
"Go!" he snapped, shoving Rukia towards the car. In one single motion, he dove towards Di Roy's gun and swung it up in the air, just as Granz was coming down.
"Commissioner, I'm not going to warn you twice!" Ichigo yelled over his shoulder, aiming at Granz as his back provided cover for her to get to the car.
Rukia ran, head dizzy with blood loss, barely registering her surroundings as two pairs of arms pulled her into the open car door. The last thing Rukia caught sight of through the window was a flash of red hair at the top of the stairwell, gun aimed at Granz.
Good, Rukia thought hazily. Renji is here.
Then, she passed out.