Archive of Our Own

“Ichigo-san, it is time to wake up.” Kisuke whispered to his ear, next to him.

“Five more minutes.” Ichigo grumbled, unwilling to open his eyes just yet.

The other man laughed, but subsided, choosing instead to lay back down and cuddle against Ichigo. “Alright, love. Five more minutes.

“Then you’ll have to wake up.”

Ichigo just grips his pillow tighter.

Ichigo tried relishing in the feeling of being in bed with his long-time spouse, knowing it was just them two in their house. But one by one, his war-scars begin burning. Ichigo refused to open his eyes.

His hands are trembling. “I don’t want to wake up.” He mumbled. “I don’t want all of this to be fake.”

“It is not fake, love. Not if you wake up and remember. Not if you wake up and fight your way through, as you’ve always done.”

His words were meant to be comforting but when Kisuke’s signal disappeared he knew time was up.

When he opened them, it was not Kisuke staring at him.

“It is time to wake up, Kurosaki Ichigo. You have all the information at your disposal. I trust you with the future.”

Ichigo wakes up with a gasp, choking on air and his tears and Soul King damn it why is he even crying?

His thoughts are slow, having to muddle through a migraine and the haze of dreamland.

…

Nobody is replying to his thoughts.

Where is…?

Ichigo frowns even though the action makes his headache worse. Where is who? What was he going to say?

He wipes his nose with the back of his sleeve as he looks around for-

His room from his fifteen-year-old-self greets his sight.

A wave of disconcerting nausea hits him as he struggles to understand what was going on, where was he, what was happening to him, and who he was supposed to be.

Someone knocked on his door.

Before he can gather his wits, it is flung open as his father invited himself in. “Good morning, sleeping beauty. you’re late for class already.”

The smile on his face slips off at noticing the tear tracks Ichigo can feel like a brand on his skin. He wipes them away harshly, before asking in a croak. “What do you mean class?” He frowns. “Wait what are you doing in my home?”

The frown is mirrored on his father. “Son, are you feeling alright? I know you feel like the adult figure in this house, but I’m still the breadwinner so I would have to say this is more my house…” The attempt at a joke is weak, neither actually acknowledge it after it is spoken.

Ichigo rubs at his eyes, his forehead– a migraine is building. “I don’t understand what’s going on.”

“Well, how can I help you? Were you having a nightmare?”

“No, well, yeah. Maybe. Maybe I am dreaming right now.”

“What do you mean?!

Ichigo made a vague gesture encompassing his entire bedroom, “this. It’s like I’m dreaming I’m fifteen again. Weird huh?”

“…does your head hurt by any chance?”

“Yeah it does, how did you-?” Ichigo stops rubbing his forehead as the words sink in and he glares at his father. “No, I didn’t hit my head you idiot. I’m serious. Either this is a dream or that is a dream. And I spent a larger chunk of my life there so I’m hoping that’s the real…”

“What are you talking about?”

Ichigo opens his mouth to clarify, but he decides that arguing with his subconscious wasn’t really productive and shuts up. He settled for a shrug.

“Hey, Ichigo.” Isshin’s voice was rather weak all of a sudden, as if afraid of something, “why don’t you stay home today? I’ll let your teacher know you have a migraine. Take it easy today.”

Ichigo looks solemn. He knows something is wrong and it’s about to unravel.

Somehow he’s scared to know what lies within.

He wasn’t too sure how, but he had managed to talk his way out of the situation before Isshin could put his medical authority to use and forced him to stay in bed. He had apologized and called it a dream, a nightmare, which his father is quick to corroborate.

“Yes, you were… restless all night. But you were just having a very vivid dream, Ichigo.”

A very vivid dream, huh.

Ichigo bites his lip and furrows his brow and he tries not to have a panic attack. Was it? Was it all a dream?

He gets distracted as he walks into the kitchen and finds the leftovers of a hurried breakfast on the kitchen table and a third plate, covered with an inverted bowl that still had warm food and a note to accompany it. Apparently Yuzu had not liked that he was not going to have breakfast if he came down any later.

He’s not feeling very hungry at the moment, but with his dad on his case, and his sister probably going to check whether he ate, he forced himself to sit down and get through his breakfast with tiny bites and a lot of thinking.

Had he been dreaming?

It… it does start to feel like a dream,  the memories fading fast, the details blurring.

Actually, the more he thought about it… what exactly had he dreamed about?

Somehow, not being able to recall his dreams made his heartbeat race, as he broke in cold sweat and he struggled to find something to anchor him to reality.

Rukia. The Hollows. The Shoten. Kisuke. Kisuke was special. He doesn’t know why but he’s special. He knows he can’t allow himself to forget his name.

Wait, the shoten.

He couldn’t corroborate if the hollows actually existed unless one decided to pop its ugly head in his city, but the shoten was actually a physical building. He should be able to corroborate everything if he just sought out…

But.

What for?

Was he really going to look for a building he had seen in his dreams? And it would prove what? That his dreams were vivid? That his mind had used real life buildings to give his dreams a sense of reality?

He says that, but he soon finds himself standing just a couple houses away from the shop itself. It was real, it was real and Ichigo didn’t know what to do with that information.

This wasn’t exactly an area he usually walked by.

A part of him desperately wants to go up to the front door and knock. And then greet the shopkeeper by name and say what?

“This is ridiculous.” Ichigo muttered to himself, hunching his shoulders protectively as he shoved his hands into his pants. With feeling of fright, he gives his back to the mysterious shop and walks away.

It had been a dream and it wouldn’t do him any good to play into his delusions.

He needed to wake up.

Kurosaki Ichigo , a voice whispers in his mind, like a faded dream. Another remnant of his bizarre illusions? Kurosaki Ichigo you have you wake up.

Well, at least his brain agreed with him, in a weird convoluted fashion.

Kurosaki Ichigo…

His lips thinned. He didn’t recognize that voice, yet…

He returns home, basically runs up the stairs and jams his earphone into his ear and begins blasting music to drown out the incessant voice in his mind.

It works, barely so. But he’ll take it.

He wonders if he should take this issue with his father. He normally was a huge dork, but he knew when to tone it down and he had already been privy to Ichigo’s insanity upon waking up this morning.

But what would he do? What could he do? Call him insane and admit him to the psychic ward? Make him see a shrink? Take meds?

He drums his fingers against his desk.

No. Not yet. He would… he would sleep. And try to make his brain reorganize itself and hopefully by next morning everything would get fixed.

He lies down, in his jeans and sock and tries to fall asleep.

He’s surprisingly tired, and it doesn’t take him long before drowsiness takes over him. Before he lets it envelop him, he catches a stray thought.

It wasn’t Isshin who he wanted to confide in. It was…?

Where was he?

Rukia. Hollow. Shinigami. Zangetsu. Zangetsu, it was him, where had he gone. Renji. Byakuya. Fight. Lose. Shoten. Power. Power. Kisuke. Hollow. Zangetsu.

Aizen. A trap. DECOY. IT WAS A LIE. IT HAD ALL BEEN A LIE, AIZEN HAD-

Ichigo wakes up and his father is in his room again.

“Ichigo… you were screaming; is everything alright?”

No.

Nothing really was.

Nothing really was because he was having vivid dreams of something that might or might not be his future.

The memories don’t fade as quickly and again the voice is in his mind. Kurosaki Ichigo, I have shared the memories of things to be, I task you with the duty of changing the future, of becoming the catalyst once more and seizing the future.

It was official, he was going fucking insane.

He goes back to his old life. Because that’s what sane people did, when confronted with insanity. He went back to school, tried explaining to his classmates that no he hadn’t died and…

He stares out at the sky, while he ate lunch on the rooftop with his friends, as always.

It felt as if something was missing.

He rubs at his chest, shoves the thoughts of empty, gone gone gone from his mind and joins his friends again.

He tried. He really did. To ignore the weird voice in his mind and just carry on.

But one particular night, in which the oppressive heaviness is not in his chest, but all around him, the air heavy with power, he realizes that it was not mere delusion.

A short girl landed on his open window, feet lithe, beautiful sword in hand. Her eyes were amethyst, fierce and defiant and would change his world forever.

A short girl lands on his open window, feet barely making a sound. She’s light on her feet, all slender beauty and lethal grace, like her snow-like blade shining in the moonlight.

Her eyes are amethysts. As ominous as a fortuneteller's orb.

This was happening. This really was happening.

The woman casts a dismissive glance to the room before turning around and preparing her blade as reality breaks in two and a portal opens up directly in front of the Kurosaki household.

The creature hollered and snarled its way into the world, knocking over some trashcans and his sisters had opened the door to-

The creature –Hollow– hollers and snarls and before it has the chance to topple their trashcans outside, Ichigo has already darted outside his room, descending the stairs, five at a time and practically barrels into his sisters.

“Ichi-nii!” “Onii-chan!” They both protest, but appear grateful to see him there.

He doesn’t really have time to explain things– not that he himself fully understands what is going on– so he just ushers them back upstairs. “What on earth do you think that you’re doing can’t you sense thefucking monster outside?”

“Yes, but our trashcans! There’s going to be trash all over our lawn!”

“I’ll take care of it,” Ichigo promises. “You just promise me you’ll stay in your room until the monster is gone.

They protest some more, try to wrangle him to stay with them but at last Ichigo is once again on their entrance. He takes in a deep breath before throwing the door open to see how the fight was going on.

Just like in his dreams –visions, whatever– Rukia was losing, and losing bad. Her face was bloodied, her left arm hanging limply by her side as she huddled under the neighbor’s porch to try to catch her breath.

This was really happening.

This was just like in his mind, exactly how it had happened.

In his dream sequence he would have tried to rescue his sisters, would have needed up beat up and had ultimately had no other choice than to stab his own heart and become a Shinigami– draining Rukia of her own.

Well fuck that.

Ichigo doesn’t think of a plan, doesn’t really think about what he’s doing as he rushes outside. He has to help, but he’d be damned if he lost his entire life for it.

Rukia is healing her left arm as she gauges the situation, wondering why had she been sent alone and why had the mission briefing failed to properly catalogue the strength of this particular hollow. This was sheer incompetence and if she didn’t think of what to do soon enough she was going to die thanks to that.

As she keeps spiraling, an unknown voice breaks her train of thought as a human child ran past her, face twisted in concern and annoyance.

“USE BAKUDOU, GODDAMMIT!”

She’s not sure if it’s the surprise factor, the authority layering his voice, or what, but she straightens her back and begins chanting the spell without having really thought about which exactly she was going for.

Somehow it works, the hollow is bound to the ground and Rukia would have wanted to jump in joy hadn’t she been this tired. Before her tired brain computes that the Hollow hasn’t really been defeated and just mildly and temporarily stuck to the ground, when there’s an ungodly honking noise and a Human truck appears out of nowhere and rams straight at the hollow’s face mask. It doesn’t shatter, but it cracks and begins breaking. The Hollow is stunned, bound and unmoving and Rukia doesn’t need the Human screaming at her for her to rush forward, Sode no Shirayuki raised high to deliver the fatal blow.

The Hollow shrieks and thrashes as his mask dissolves and soon enough the massive beast has been purified and has disappeared from the Human World.

There is silence.

The both of them just stand there, side by side, gasping and panting for a moment. Rukia is so relieved she feels lightheaded for a moment there before she regains her composure.

She turns to thank her helper and finds the man–boy– staring at her, eyes wide and half incredulous. Then there is blood on his forehead and the tension is broken.

The tiny Shinigami begins fretting over him, her tiny hands glowing green and while Ichigo allows her to heal his minor gashes before tending to herself, he can’t help the smile that tugs at his lips.

He didn’t even know how much he had missed her until now.

“Hey, midget.” He murmurs, almost to himself and is immediately thankful she doesn’t hear him. He clears his throat and speaks louder. “Hey, uh. Nice work we did together, huh?”

Rukia looks like she wants to object, draw herself to all of her height and say something pompous but deflates immediately. She looks at the aftermath of the fight and sighs with a half smile. “I guess you’re right.”

Silence.

His soul was greedy, it didn’t want just that tiny part of her powers, it wanted all, all. As she was stripped of her name and powers, amethyst eyes stared at him and begged him to stop.

Ichigo clears his mind of those hazy dark memories and tries focusing on the here and now. He didn’t do that this time around. Or ever, howver the fuck things worked. He looks back at her and an apology is right about to escape his lips but he instead says, “so hey, want to go in? Take a rest, maybe grab a bite to eat?”

Rukia stares at the strange human and remembers herself with a jolt. “Wait a second, don’t go acting so-so casual! How come you can see me? Why-why did you step in the fight- how do you know Bakudou?”

Right.

They didn’t actually know each other. Ichigo was just a Human. She was a Shinigami.

…He was probably fucked.

He rubs the back of his head as he thinks. Then he just tiredly shoves a thumb to point at his home. “Let’s go inside. Let me make some tea, then we can talk.”

Little, tiny Rukia stares at him warily before accepting the offer with dignity. As she walked past Ichigo, the memories-laden boy can’t help but miss everything they had been.

(Could he have that back?)

He doesn’t trust his family with a stranger girl they might or might not be able to see, so he ushers her to his room and goes downstairs to make tea.

He is already carrying the tea tray upstairs when he remembers his siblings and he takes a detour. He tells them that everything is safe now, hides his small injuries to his best ability and offers them each a cup of tea. They both accept and Ichigo leaves the tray with them.

Rukia was certainly going to nag at him for taking so long, but his sisters needed it as much as they did and Ichigo was brewing a new batch in no time.

So when he finally opens the door to his room, he’s not at all surprised at the pout-that-tried-to-be-a-frown she greeted him with.

“Sorry,” he calls before she can do more than open her mouth. “I had to tell my sisters they were safe before anything else.”

Rukia immediately softens her demeanour. “I see. Are they also spiritually aware like yourself?”

Ichigo lets the tray down on his desk, pours two cups and hands one to Rukia –who had taken possession of his bed– before sitting at his desk. He takes a sip of his own tea. “I guess you could say so. But nowhere near my levels. I think.”

“Well I would hope not, your reiatsu levels are so high I could barely pick up the hollow I was fighting.”

Ichigo grimaces. “Sorry. I didn’t… I don’t actually know that much? I don’t even know how to do that. Or how to know if I’m doing that.”

Rukia hums, her feet swinging back and forth. “You are an interesting Human.” Ichigo scowls at her, unsure how to take that, but she continues. “You have been taking all of this quite calmly, were you already aware of what shinigami and Hollows were?”

“Uhhh….” He hadn’t really thought about what he was going to do about his visions. What he was going to tell people.

He isn’t even sure if they were nothing more than delusions.

But he supposed he doesn’t really have to disclose anything yet. He can see how things pan out, if more dreams or memories or whatever these things were, could be triggered in the following days. With her presence, perhaps.

At her inquisitive and curious face, he feels a little bad to lie to her face. “I’m… I’ve seen Shinigami around. Briefly. And since they think I don’t see them, they don’t try to hide or protect me. And I’ve picked some things up, I guess. Like, they always go for the mask, and that they shoot energy out of their hands while shouting bakudou and things like that.”

Fuck was it too far-fetched? Had he said too much? He can feel the sweat trickle down his spine as he’s met with the shinigami’s intense stare.

“I see,” she says in the end, huffing loudly. “You have quite a keen mind, Human. And a rather bizarre lack of fear. Even new Shinigami, who know far more than you do are hesitant in engaging the actual Hollows. I’m not sure if to call you brave or an idiot.”

Ichigo can’t help but sigh, feeling the foreign voice crawling back to the forefront of his mind. 

“I’d say I’m unlucky.”

Rukia nods, sympathetic. “That too, probably. If you so wish I could report that there are spiritually aware humans in this town so whoever gets dispatched here again won’t cause you much trouble.”

Ichigo wasn’t sure that was a good idea despite the fact that he didn’t – shouldn’t – know who she would even report back to.

He hated this.

He hated feeling powerless and lost. Things were happening to him. Things were happening around him, and he wasn’t ready for it.

He needed to be ready for whatever might come.

“Actually,” he begins, his voice unnaturally old. “Can I ask you a favor?”

The wide-eyed Rukia looks at him, curious and unafraid. “What is it?”

“I’m… I have a lot of reiatsu.” True. “And I think I might attract more monsters like the one before.” True, if his dreams were more than delusions. “So I was hoping you could teach me a little about that. Can I control it? Can I use it as a weapon?”

“Oh, but there’s no need for you to do that. Shinigami will be dispatched every time-“

“But my reiatsu distracted you. It was a nuisance.” His voice is strong and begging and none of it is a lie. “What if I distract a Shinigami again and someone dies? It’s going to be my fault!”

Rukia is silent, as she slowly mulled over his words. In the end, no matter the façade she wanted to display, Kuchiki Rukia is a bleeding heart.

“Okay,” she says. “I’ll teach you to control your reiatsu.”

And he loved her for it.

As soon as he manages to understand what his own reiatsu feels like, he starts drawing it towards him. Slowly but surely he begins taming it, tampering it down so it wouldn’t suffocate the air around them. It takes a bit of focus, and he can feel some weird tension in his mind but he thinks he did a pretty good job for a first time.

And then, like a smack to the face he is swamped with the familiar-unfamiliar stench of the Hogyouku. His heartbeat shoots up as his first instinct is look for Aizen, and he turns around and stares right at-

Rukia, with a proud smile on her face as she looks back at him. Curiosity appears on her face as Ichigo tries breathing normally.

What was this?

What the fuck did it mean?

She wasn’t wearing a gigai, she hadn’t lost her powers so it didn’t make any sense . When could Kisuke possibly have implanted the Hogyouku in her?

Unless…

Ichigo licks his lips, tries modulating his voice. In as much as a casual tone as he can manage, he asks. “Rukia… have you been to Karakura before?”

And the damning words fall out of her lips. “Hmm? Maybe? I’ve had my share of missions in the human world, I don’t usually pay attention where exactly…”

Ichigo stared at the ceiling of his room, his new senses allowing him to feel his father in the clinic and his sisters in their room with Rukia.

And the Hogyouku.

Frustrated, he presses his palms against his eyes. Instead of static, he can see, as clear as day, fragments of things that had happened, that hadn’t happened, that would happen….

He bites his lip.

He needed to talk to Kisuke.

Kisuke always knew what to do, Kisuke-

Ichigo grunts and forces his mind away from intrusive thoughts by opening his eyes. Who even was Kisuke in the first place?

Somewhere within him, deep inside his soul, he hurts.

He’s still undecided by the time another Hollow comes. He sees Rukia look down at her not-cellphone. and run towards it.

Ichigo isn’t too sure why he follows along.

These hollows are smaller, are lesser than the first one, and Ichigo is first-hand witness of Sode no Shirayuki gleaming and dancing and playing and slicing mask after mask.

He doesn’t know if he can separate his soul, he doesn’t know if he even wants to try. So he stays in the side-lines as he learns, or relearns. He sees her move, he sees her dance and his body wants to reply in kind.

So he jumps and dodges and throws stuff to distract the hollow. And his body remembers, it remembers how to move, how to dodge, and little by little more memories come back to him.

Rukia sees this, and doesn’t really admonish him, more than to berate him a couple times for almost getting sliced in two.

They become friends.

As easy as breathing.

He still has a heavy feeling of longing within him, but he’s content to know she’s still whole. Whole and not infringing abstract laws to trap her.

Or so he wants to think, because the pulsing of the Hogyouku never leaves his senses.

Ichigo decides. He needs to tell Rukia. If only to get her help. Or input.

But before he can do it, Rukia disappears one day.

Ichigo chokes on fear, on memories of being persecuted, of being stabbed, of looking at Renji, at Byakuya and finding no forgiveness in their eyes.

When Rukia returns, sporting a gigai and a Chappy pill dispenser, Ichigo drags her into a bone-breaking hug and doesn’t explain why.

They came to take Rukia away. One was her brother, another her friend, but there was ice in their eyes. Ichigo stood his ground, tried protecting her, and yet…

It was raining that day.

He tries hiding it, but he’s so visibly disturbed that Rukia takes him to the park and makes him sit on a bench.

“Let me teach you how to meditate.”

It helps.

It helps way more than what either of them could have expected.

He meets Zangetsu.

Zangetsu doesn’t have a form yet, he’s not exactly awake or aware. But Ichigo can feel his presence within him, and the weight in his soul manages to center him.

It gives everything around him a sense of reality he had been afraid of not getting.

And with the memories clogging his mind, and Rukia standing happy and powerful by his side, Ichigo decides to visit Kisuke.

He tells Rukia he wants to meet her supplier. She looks at him funny, but doesn’t see a reason to refuse.

She’s not wearing her gigai. Ichigo doesn’t trust it, and this time around she doesn’t really need it, so he convinces her rather easily to leave it behind most often than not.

She wasn’t too happy with wearing a gigai, but they had naively trusted Kisuke that this would be a faster way for her to recover her strength. Little did they know that the Hogyou-

“Are you sure you’re up to this? You’re looking a bit unwell. My mission is probably going to extend a couple more days, so I could take you to meet him another day.” Rukia, bless her naïve heart tries being mindful of her weaker, human friend but Ichigo knows he can’t keep postponing this.

Not when he saw the world on the brink of collapse. Not when he doesn’t know how to keep it from falling.

“I’m okay. I’m just a little tired.”

She doesn’t look too convinced but she guides him to the shop anyway.

Even though he had already dreamed an entire life with him, upon seeing Urahara Kisuke in the flesh for the first time again, Ichigo feels the breath escaping his lungs.

(This man was beautiful.)

“Welcome, welcome! Kuchiki-san, and…? Who might be your friend?” He says with an amiable grin, his silver eyes sharp and uncanny.

“I’m- I’m Ichigo. Call me Ichigo.” Please.

“My, my. It would be highly unprofessional of me to call you by your given name, wouldn’t you agree?”

Oddly enough, painfully enough, the memory that comes back to him, isn’t of an alternate ending of this situation.

He sat facing Kisuke, under the protection of the shrine. As they drank three times three, exchanged their vows, their promises and their zanpakutos, in a symbolic gesture of openness and mutual protection.

“Until the moon burns down, and the sun goes out. I will be by your side.”

“No, even then. Even if I have to go punch the Soul King himself, even then.”

His eyes crinkled. “I’ll take your word for it, husband.”

“…quite alright? Has he perhaps hit his head?”

Ichigo draws in a dizzying breath, “no, I’m okay. Sorry.”

He has his name on the tip of his tongue. He wants nothing else other than to storm Soul Society right this moment and murder Aizen before everything unravels.

He knows he’s not strong enough.

And, he thinks, feeling the constant humming of the Hogyouku behind him, and Kisuke’s eyes following his every move. It probably already unraveled.

Ichigo isn’t too sure what he was doing there. After his initial shock, he had apologized and stepped aside as Rukia made up something to buy, to take the focus away from her friend.

A thousand different thoughts and memories swarmed his mind, each more painful than the last, which ends up leaving Ichigo with a tied tongue, and a knot on his chest that only got tighter and tighter the more time went on. As his one and only chance at setting things straight slipped right past him.

Not to mention that every time he turned to look at Kisuke, he was swamped by the strongest memories so far. Memories, feelings, that some Ichigo in another world had held for Kisuke. Or would hold for him.

In the end, he runs out of time, but Rukia sort of saves the day and puts him on the spot at the same time. A hollow emerges and she heads out to dispatch it.

Leaving him stranded in the shop with Kisuke.

“Kurosaki-san, if I may,” Kisuke says, inviting him back inside, voice and posture deceptively non-threatening. Involuntarily, Ichigo’s eyes are drawn to the cane he’s holding, wondering if his blade really was in there. “I would like to ask you, what was your real purpose in coming here?”

Ichigo opens his mouth and swallows the first thought that comes to mind. “I, uh. I’m not sure, curiosity played its part of course.”

Kisuke blinked at him, letting him walk through the doorway of what he remembered to be the living room and closing the door at his back. “And have you satisfied this curiosity of yours?”

Ichigo suddenly has to look to the ground, overcome by a strong feeling of dissatisfaction. “No, not really.”

“Well, then-“

“Urahara-san,” Ichigo interrupts him, drawing strength from his dormant Zanpakuto. “I need you to train me.”

A beat of silence.

“If you wish to save Kuchiki-san, then I will facilitate the power for you. I will train you, I will give you back your Shinigami powers so you can go save her. Only if… are you sure?”

“Excuse me?”

Ichigo smiles at him, fisting the fabric of his pants. “Yeah, I’d like to become a Shinigami.”

Kisuke’s eyes are inscrutable. “I am not sure you are ready for such a thing.”

Odd. So odd, for Kisuke to refuse him. Especially when Ichigo was requesting to be stronger. Hadn’t that been an issue actually? Kisuke had asked if he wanted to become even stronger and he had grown afraid he was nothing but an interesting science experiment.

“Ho-how come? It certainly can’t be that-?”

“Why did you ask me, Kurosaki-san? Certainly Kuchiki-san wouldn’t have suggested such a thing to you. Who told you to come here?”

He could blurt out everything, Ichigo thinks. He could spill everything, and have someone else to carry this secret with.

But he knows he can’t. Not yet at least. Not when he’s not too sure he’s not quite delusional.

Ichigo inhales through his mouth and prepares his first lie. “I’ve seen you around. And like, I don’t know what this thing about reiatsu was, you could probably tell I barely can restrain my own. And I learned that just recently.” He’s rambling, oh god, he needs to shut up. “But I’ve seen you around and you… feel? Sort of powerful, and mysterious, like the wise old man in some manga. And, uh, yeah.”

“That doesn’t quite answer my question, Kurosaki-san.” Kisuke replies, still in a calm, sedate tone but there’s tension in the air and Ichigo knows he’s a second away from being impaled. “Try again.”

The truth, then.

He hunches his shoulders, lowers his head. “Because I’m scared, Urahara-san. Because things are happening around me that I don’t understand. And I am not strong enough to protect those I love from whatever nonsense this spiritual bullshit is. Rukia can’t train me. Not while I’m Human. I thought you could… Maybe I got the wrong impression but I thought you were a retired Shinigami. I thought maybe you would know more about this. I’m sorry for imposing on you.”

Silence.

“I still feel as if you’re hiding something from me, Kurosaki-san. But for now, I’ll see what I can do.” Kisuke replies in the end. His eyes are sharp when Ichigo next looks up. “But be warned, young man. That this is not a path for the faint of heart. If your conviction wavers, if your resolution is weak… you will die. Are you ready to face these consequences?”

A part of him wants to ask him, that how dare he tell this to a fifteen-year-old teen. How dare he allow this, just to further his own plans.

But Ichigo has never been a coward. And first and foremost, “I am a protector, Urahara-san. If it means being strong enough for whatever may come... I am more than ready.”

In the end, he wasn’t ready at all.

His memories become more and more vivid each passing second, but they’re wrong. He never stole Rukia’s powers, she was never sent for execution.

Unsure of what this all meant, of how things were going to play out, if Aizen was actually a threat in the first place…

Before he finally took the plunge into the Shinigami world, and even before he ascertained what he was going to do about his visions…

Rukia disappeared.

She had been requested to return to the Kuchiki manor, another Shinigami already here to complete her overdue mission.

It had been on short notice, she says in the letter Ichigo finds on his desk. She hadn’t had the chance to say goodbye, but she was thankful for everything he had done for her. And she would make sure to visit whenever she could.

His heart beats loudly in his head as he thinks that that was stupid. His hands are shaking and his vision darkens.

The presence of the Hogyouku had disappeared from this town.

Alongside with her.

“You can’t visit if you’re dead, you idiot.” He whispers brokenly, crushing the letter in his hand.

“Kisuke, we have a problem.” Ichigo says, knocking on his door at one in the morning. Fear claws at his entrails and muddles up his thoughts. “I need you to let me into Soul Society. I need to go save Rukia.”

Kisuke seems unperturbed by his urgency, by the hour, by his words. He sits there, Benihime held loosely in one hand, the other holding a cup of sake. His eyes pierce him.

“I’m afraid I cannot let you loose there without knowing whose team you’re playing for, Kurosaki-san.”

Ichigo does his best to explain, about his memories, his visions. About a world in which Aizen revealed his plans, in which Ichigo fell perfectly into Kisuke’s crafted plan.

What ends up convincing the man that he was telling the truth, is when he berates him, with a choked voice, that how dare he plan to put the Hogyouku inside Rukia and try to have her either become a Human or be executed?

And how dare he try regardless, and make her a vessel?

“And what would have you suggested I do with it?” He doesn’t apologize, but his fingers drum against the table, incessantly and without rhythm.

Ichigo hesitates just briefly, because all they did with the original was seal it away with Aizen, but that wasn’t really a solution. “Wish it away.”

The drumming stops, and perhaps there’s a smidge of surprise in silver eyes. “Pardon?”

“The Hogyouku… it grants wishes. I don’t know if you ever tried wishing it away.”

“I am not sure that would work. I did spend decades trying a way of getting rid of it.” Kisuke says, Ichigo is pretty sure he wasn’t aware of its wish granting properties.

Ichigo doesn’t relent. He stares at the man in front of him and whispers. “But did you really want it gone?”

Kisuke blinks.

“It was- it is like your child. Did you really want it gone, from the bottom of your heart?”

“This all sounds like a child’s fairy tales.”

“I’m-“

“But for now, Kuchiki’s decision to return to Soul Society is certainly an unforeseen twist. And we should plan for it. Are you ready to become a Shinigami?”

“I was born ready.” Ichigo replies, and the thought accompanies him throughout the process and his last thought before dying is that…

Perhaps, he had been born ready to become a Shinigami.

Meeting Zangetsu had been like entering a tiger’s den, unarmed and unprotected.

But Zangetsu had recognized his urgency, his will, his strength, and when he had tried playing up his horse and king act, Ichigo had grabbed him by the shihakusho, so they were inches away from each other’s face.

“Screw you,” he had said. “You are not my horse. You are my shitty partner, and you will act like it.”

Zangetsu is surprised. But Ichigo leaves his inner world unharmed, a gleeful cackling inside his brain.

He’s so focused on making Zangetsu his, that he briefly forgets the entire Hollowification drama.

He steps out of the god-damned hole and notices there’s something on his face.

He removes the mask and notices it’s far more frightening than what it should be.

It had twin streaks of red on both cheeks, and the teeth were bigger, and, well, there were horns protruding out of it.

He looks back at a surprised Kisuke– Tessai and the rest were still there, another weird thing.

“How long was I gone?”

Somehow this manages to bring a smile to Kisuke’s face. “About five minutes, Kurosaki-san.  I see you are a very hasty man.”

“Huh.” Ichigo says, and then grins.

This means he has more time to learn his own abilities.

Getsuga Tenshou comes as easy as breathing. Using his reiatsu to blend into the shadows was a little trickier, but he supposed he would get better with practice.

Shikai was a given, but somehow Zangetsu refuses to let him go into bankai. And it’s not for lack of trying.

Kisuke asks him his plan.

Ichigo rubs his temples, sighs. “I… things are happening differently. Rukia is not being executed, which is good, but also unplanned. I don’t know when is Aizen going to make his move.”

“Are you going to kidnap Kuchiki-san?”

Ichigo shoots him the unimpressed look this phrasing deserved. “I just might. And then you’ll have to put up with a tiny, meddlesome woman in your shop. And you won’t be able to kick her out, or bully her or anything because I will murder you if you try anything.”

Kisuke actually laughs.

Kisuke helps him device a much more concrete plan. If he wanted to take down Aizen before the man stole the Hogyouku they needed to act fast.

Already Yoruichi was in Soul Society, acting as their sentry, but it did nothing for the fact that Ichigo was completely alone.

In his mind’s eye he could see the faces of his friends, worried, scared and resolute to accompany Ichigo to hell itself, if he so needed.

Together they had stormed Soul Society, defeating everyone that stood in their path, a couple of teenagers against the order of an entire world.

Ichigo doesn’t know how long he has, but he does know he doesn’t have enough time for his friends to train and grow strong enough not to die in their first fight.

The thought that they wouldn’t believe him, or that they wouldn’t want to fight doesn’t cross his mind.

Sometimes Ichigo wonders what he did to deserve them.

He’s still thinking about them, so the night prior to his incursion into Soul Society– powerful but alone– he tells Kisuke,

“Please look after my friends. Inoue might have or might have not awakened her powers, and sadly we’ll need her if she does. If you screw her over you will pay, no matter who you are.”

Kisuke’s eyes are speculative, but he still nods his head and gives his word and Ichigo trusts him to keep it.

The man tries one last time to make Ichigo change his plans and not head off alone to his own execution. He proposes bringing in the Vizards.

Bonds forged in blood and fear. Chosen family, even if it was an annoying family. They had taken him in, screaming and kicking and gave him the first semblance of peace after his entire existence was flipped on its side.

“I… I can’t meet them yet. I don’t know how long I have, to make sure the Hogyouku doesn’t reach Aizen. They won’t listen to me, they’ll fight me every step of the way, and I don’t have time for that. I’ll come back for them later. I’ll tell them later, even if Shinji wants to throttle me for this.”

Kisuke hums, something clicking in his mind at his words. “I see. But for that, you need to come back safely, don’t you think?”

Ichigo laughs and he can barely hide a sob.

“Of course I will.”

So a fifteen-year-old child unsheathed his sword, and jumped straight into the gaping portal with no other help than flimsy memories, and his will of steel.

(Kisuke sees this and wonders why had it come down to this.)

Ichigo expects the fall, so he jumps out of the portal to land with his feet atop a tiled roof.

Somehow the single set of feet slapping against the tiles sounds stupidly lonely.

No matter.

They fell all on top of each other, Yoruichi protesting the loudest as they try remembering the plan they were going to carry out and hopefully not die trying.

Ichigo tries orienting himself, getting more and more annoyed by the incessant, useless and lonely memories assaulting his senses.

Things were different now. Why didn’t the visions stop?

With his newly developed skills, he senses someone drawing close, so Ichigo decides to focus on what was important and tries finding the Shiba compound.

He does a pretty crappy job at that, but after hiding from the umpteenth patrolling Shinigami, he almost gives himself away as a slender black cat walks up to him from behind and greets him with infuriating nonchalance.

Ichigo wants nothing more than to punt the cat as far away as he could, but settles for grumbling under his breath and lets himself be led to the Shiba compound. He tries pretending he had already known he was going in the opposite direction because of the patrols, but Yoruichi still laughs at him.

He feels really stupid that his first thought upon seeing Kuukaku in the flesh had been of her congratulating him after the wedding.

(It makes Ichigo want to cry, but it solidifies his resolve of earning that future for himself.)

He doesn’t get his mouth working fast enough for his aunt not to notice, but Yoruichi saves his ass by distracting her with plans and requests for help.

When Kuukaku demands to know why should she help some upstart brat infiltrate the military, Ichigo forgets himself briefly and says, “Because we’re family.”

She doesn’t look as surprised as Yoruichi. She just arches her eyebrows and whispers. “So he told you.”

Ichigo hunches in on himself. “Not quite. I, um. It’s a long story, but I know he was Shiba Isshin, and he fell in love with my mother, and had us.”

“Spot on.” Kuukaku replies, her eyes looking inordinately shiny. Then she cracks a grin and lunges to hug him. “Then I don’t have to pretend at all, come here you dumb kid!”

She gets twice as clingy and thrice as annoying, but Ichigo loves every second of it. She and Ganju both want him to stay, so they could teach him all about his family, about the Shibas, about Kaien, but time is ticking, and Ichigo is still not sure if he has the proper tools to dismantle the bomb.

He gets inside Seireitei at long last, with a nosy cat-woman and a confused cousin by his side.

Yoruichi uses her family name to allow them all to remain without suspicion as they make a beeline towards the Kuchiki manor.

Ichigo is still not too sure what he’s going to do or say, but as he knocks on their door and request a meeting with the Kuchiki head, Ichigo realizes that it would do him good to get Byakuya on his side as early as possible.

They use yoruichi’s name, and Byakuya comes out himself, urgency in his step. Ichigo only has time to ask if this was really a good idea, given that Byakuya looked angrier than expected but Yoruichi only grins…

And flicks him on the forehead.

Then and there, Ichigo gave up on any ideas of getting him on their side easily.

They fight.

Ichigo is a little worried because Zangetsu still won’t let him use his bankai and that distraction earns him several cuts from the irate Byakuya.

The man is mad because of Yoruichi’s teasing, and their lack of decorum in just knocking on his door. But he sees two Shiba men and a supposedly banished Shihoin on his doorstep and he knows there is something going on.

When Ichigo not only fails to die, but actually manages to stand on even ground with his sealed Senbonzakura, Byakuya admits that he is more curious than anything.

He still hasn’t released his Zanpakuto, but neither has the other unseated officer and he can see the power lurking in brown eyes.

“What is your aim in coming here, Shiba?” Byakuya asks at long last, watching the other Shinigami retreat and shoot him a wary glance.

“Can’t you just call me by name already?” Ichigo says, before giving that up. He had far more pressing matters at hand. “We are here to warn you. There is a complot on its way. Your sister is caught in its midst and I want your help in protecting her.”

He’s 100% unimpressed and Ichigo vaguely wonders why this surprised him.

He unseals his blade and Ichigo vaguely wonders if he’s really going to die by Rukia’s brother’s hand. Talk about ungrateful.

The flurry of lethal petals is endless, incessant, but memories continue flowing in, muscle memory he didn’t know he had coming to life as he ducked, and jumped, accurately predicting the path of the blades seconds before they ripped him to shreds.

He’s nowhere close to defeating him, but he doesn’t need annoying memories to know that there’s no way of beating him without bankai. And probably with his mask as well.

The only up-side was that his Getsuga Tenshou was strong enough to make this man wary of it. That sure felt good.

Ichigo dances around, and somehow gets a clear shot at the man’s back he’s not planning on wasting. So he lunges forward, a Getsuga Tenshou on his unsealed blade. He doesn’t get to land the attack.

The world darkens, and Ichigo tries not to cower as they are both suddenly in the vortex of a deadly tornado.

He’s already trying to figure a way out when Byakuya speaks.

“No one can see us now.”

Ichigo stares. He lowers his blade and stands up straight. “You believe me?”

“It all depends on what is this conspiracy you’re speaking of. Who are you, Shiba?”

“Something… something happened in the human world. There is this… artifact, that someone here wants desperately. And it was implanted inside her soul. They wanted to hide it, but this man can probably detect it, and will probably kill Rukia to obtain it.”

“Who did it?”

“I-uh… A friend of mine. I- I know, that it wasn’t a good thing to do, and I still have to beat him up for doing this in the first place, but he didn’t mean to hurt her. He thought that it would disappear after merging.”

Silence, nothing but the screeching of a thousand blades around them.

“This thing that was implanted in her… will it hurt her?”

“No, it shouldn’t.”

“Why her? How do you know of this?”

“That’s, um. That’s a long story. But it was bad luck on her part. She was there at the wrong time, at the wrong place.”

“What were you doing there?”

“I, um. I lived there.”

Ichigo panics because he had basically confessed to being a human, but regardless of if Byakuya connected the very obvious dots or not, the tornado waned and died down.

“Let’s talk inside.”

“Wait but first, where’s Rukia?”

“At her division. She’s probably-“

“Oh no.”

“What is it?”

“You… you have a traitor in your midst.” Ichigo chokes out, and he’s a little surprised Byakuya doesn’t slice him in two.

“Bold accusations for a ryoka.”

“I’m a Shiba.”

“But you’re also human. You do not belong here.”

“Please don’t call me a ryoka. I cannot do that again.”

Byakuya shoots him a confused look, but doesn’t insist. “Who is the traitor?”

Ichigo opens his mouth, hesitates and tries again. “It- it might be hard to believe.”

Byakuya looks at this trembling young man and sneers. “If you cannot bring yourself to say it, surely it must not be important. Go home, kid.”

Ichigo’s knuckles tighten, and before he can argue with his stuck-up friend, he’s assaulted by more memories.

Ichigo had just regained control of his body, and he stared surprised and defeated at the disheveled form of Byakuya at his feet. The man was panting, his hair was a mess, but somehow there was no fear in his eyes.

“Kurosaki Ichigo,” he had begun, and Ichigo was already wincing at the expected question of, what are you. But the words that slip out are. “Please help me save her.”

He drew in a shaky breath, somehow revitalized with those words. “Of course I will. We’ll save her together.”

Ichigo presses his hands against his temples. “I promised you, Byakuya. Once upon a time, I promised you we would save her together. I know you are a trustworthy man, I know you are loyal, but I haven’t earned either your trust or your loyalty. So all I can ask from you is be careful of Aizen Sousuke.”

Byakuya’s features are solid ice, but his eyes are still scrutinizing, still willing to offer him a chance. “Is this some kind of a joke? A veteran, well-loved captain, a traitor? Stop wasting my time.”

Ichigo tries not choking on his words, his fears, his memories. “I don’t have time to explain everything to you but all of that is a façade. Do you not know of the Hollowified incident all those decades ago? Where several captains and lieutenants were found partially becoming hollow? Do you not know that they were exiled without a trial? Or is this not disclosed information to even the captains of your precious Gotei?”

Byakuya’s eyes are inscrutable, but he turns to Yoruichi. “You were involved in this, were you not? I never saw you again after that incident.”

“Did you miss me?” Yoruichi replies with a cocky grin, but there’s something sad about her. She sobers up. “My people were threatened. I had to save them.”

“You abandoned all of us.”

“You were not alone, Byakubou. None of you were. Kisuke and Tessai had nobody else.”

“What is this Hollowification you speak of? How is Aizen-taichou involved in this?”

Ichigo sees the small glimmer of doubt in his face, and with a sigh of relief he explains to the best of his abilities.

Byakuya’s features don’t change from a stone-cold mask, and Ichigo can just hope something of what he’s saying is getting through to him. He explains what he knows, what his memory has provided him. Yoruichi is the one to tell the gritty details, to bring rage and anger to the table as she explained what happened to her fellow captains and lieutenants. To bring sadness and grief as she also disclosed who had been Kaien’s true murderer.

Shiba Ganju, who had remained silent for most of this interaction began demanding answers too, because how could it be, Kaien had never done anything wrong so why…

“He knew too much.” Yoruichi says, and Ichigo can’t bear to look at his cousin’s grief-stricken face.

“Just for that?”

“Aizen is…” Ichigo says then, memories of his fights, of his interactions with the man, of how his life had been twisted by this man. “He’s ruthless, he’s evil. He doesn’t need much of a reason to kill someone he finds troublesome. Whoever gets in his way…” He sighs. “Sorry. It doesn’t make it any easier, but Kaien must surely have found something important about him. But I’m going to bring him down, and avenge our family.”

Ganju laughs, tense and angry, as he patted his shoulder. “Why do you think I’m going to let my baby cousin avenge Kaien on his own? I would be a disgrace as a Shiba if I did. No, Ichigo. I’ll help as well.”

Ichigo’s eyes shoot to his lap, suddenly overly aware of the fact that he was leading a mission to murder a person.  That he, a fifteen-year-old kid with no combat skills other than unfamiliar muscle memory, and no other drive than a hazy future he had seen in a dream.

He was in over his head.

Before he can continue spiraling, or begin considering that maybe this wasn’t the greatest idea ever, Byakuya cuts in.

“Is there anyone else I could corroborate this with?” He asks, looking between all three of them with something like uncertainty on his face. Maybe, this could actually happen?

“You mean beside the very angry vizards over at the Human World?” Ichigo replies as a knee jerk reaction, understanding that it wasn’t an easy solution. “I mean you could ask Gin but… he’d sooner stab you than give away his…”

Ichigo trails off, eyes locked on something far away in his mind.

“Ichigo?”

Despite his previous thoughts, despite his doubts regarding his own visions, memories or whatever the fuck they were, despite his claims of just being a fifteen-year-old kid – Kurosaki Ichigo had stopped being one, ever since that night. That night in which he lived his life until the age of thirty, with a war and several deaths on his hands. The war veteran in him awoke at last, his thoughts running rampant with scenarios that had happened, with regrets and had-beens and a plan began forming in his mind. “We need him on our side.”

“Gin?” Yoruichi is the one to voice their collective disbelief. “Why do you want that backstabbing snake on our side? Why do you even think that Aizen’s loyal puppy would betray him for our cause?”

“Because we will guarantee amnesty to him and Matsumoto-san.” Ichigo says, eyes lost in the future. “Because once upon a time he saw a child waging a war and told him to stand down. Because once upon a time, he would give his reputation, his job, and everything he earned in decades just to steal back what was stolen from Matsumoto-san.”

“Are you sure we’re talking about the same Gin?”

Ichigo matched their gazes, and with steel in his voice he sentenced. “Ichimaru Gin is not a good person. But he will be a good ally, if our cards are enticing enough.”

Byakuya listened through the following discussion of trying to win Gin to their side and with a weary sigh, and looking a decade older than before this afternoon, he says. “I’ll need time to think. I do not think you are deceiving me, but Aizen-taichou has several decades’ worth of captaincy backing him up.”

“It’s okay, you can take your time but please protect Rukia. Don’t let her out of your sight. Or at least not where Aizen can see you.” Ichigo then freezes, a dozen different memories cluttering to the forefront of his mind– starting what felt like a horrible migraine. “Oh no.”

“What now?” Both Yoruichi and Byakuya snap, sensitive and wary. The veteran inside him berates him for this oversight, for missing such an obvious flaw.

“Aizen has- he has illusions. He could very well slip under the radar, and you wouldn’t know it, I-“ Ichigo couldn’t continue, not with the unyielding fear of being trapped in an illusion clogging up his throat.

“How did you defeat him then?” Yoruichi says, shoulders tense, and fists on the table. “You were sounding so sure about this, and suddenly you don’t think you can defeat him?”

Ichigo tries not to balk under her accusing glare. “I didn’t say that.” He almost whispers. “He underestimated me. I was weaker, and he didn’t even need to try making illusions to stab me. So he just did, and gloated about it. But… but that’s the trick. If you touch his blade, then you become immune to the illusions. That’s what we have to do, in case the asshole tries anything.”

“So… we have to let ourselves be stabbed by him? Oh joy.” Yoruichi huffs, looking unamused and borderline angry.

“No, well, I mean… That’s the most reliable way yes. Not stabbing, just a small cut on your finger would do the trick.” Ichigo says, trying to calm them down before they decided to refuse his plans. “If you’ve seen his shikai release then you’re probably fucked anyway.”

Yoruichi muses. “Then the entirety of the Gotei is discarded. I could do it. I missed his shikai demonstration, and I’m fast enough to catch him off guard. Does the future memories tell you something about my plan?”

Ichigo hesitates. “I… You didn’t face him. I mean, you held him off, with Kisuke and my dad. Until… Until I was ready.”

Byakuya shot a withering glare his way and Ichigo flinched. “I’m sorry, I wasn’t- I didn’t know I would be taking so long, you know I wouldn’t have let them fight if I could have had a say in this.”

“How far in the future are we talking about?” Byakuya shot back, a sneer on his face. “In your visions, how old were you?”

“What? Well, this all happened fast, I was still fifteen…”

Byakuya closes his eyes and even Yoruichi looks pained. Ichigo understands and shoots to his feet.

“No, don’t give me any of that. Age doesn’t matter when you’re the strongest. Besides I won, I won and everyone was safe because I defeated him.”

Yoruichi, despite all of her joking and drunkenness was a leader at heart. She saw the unwavering determination in his young face and reluctantly subsides. Besides, they had a very alarming discussion to have. “So I teamed up with Kisuke and Isshin and we only ‘held him off’, huh?”

Ichigo drops his eyes to the table. “Yes.”

“Okay,” she says, golden eyes gleaming. “Ichigo, you will tell us everything about this fight we all had with Aizen, my role and yours, every single detail you can think of. After that, Byakuya you will leave to ensure Rukia doesn’t fall in Aizen’s hands. I’ll be thinking about how we’re going to defeat him.”

“Wait then what will I be doing?”

Yoruichi grins and Ichigo almost cries with how much he had missed that mischievous smirk.

“You’ll be our little snake whisperer.”

Ichigo briefly considers that he really should have planned this a little better before he tries hunting down Gin.

This man was currently the only one immune to Aizen’s illusions, and while he understood the value of turning him to their side, he was also keenly aware that it would take a heck of a load more convincing than Byakuya, or even Kisuke.

He hadn’t dealt long with him, personally. And both occasions –had they really only been two? – he had almost been skewered alive by Gin.

He was wary, and honestly a little terrified since this man had been able to seal off his heart, pretend good enough for Aizen to fall for it, and attempt to kill a man he spent most of his life with.

All in all, he hadn’t been expecting to end up threatening his future ally with a sword to his throat and Quincy arrows pinning him against the wall.

To be fair, he had been skewered and was probably bleeding out as they spoke. Gin’s unnerving icy eyes were locked on his face as Ichigo spoke, about how he knew what Gin was planning to do, about who Aizen really was and that Ichigo’s ultimate goal was making sure Aizen died and Gin didn’t.

He’d like to think that Gin was finally listening to him, but honestly the energy he irradiated was just of a cornered fox waiting for the chance to pounce.

“Did you escape the Maggot’s Nest by any chance?” Are the first words that come out of his mouth, the litany of curses notwithstanding. “Tell Aizen-chan that this is a really horrible idea of a joke.”

“What?”

Gin’s piercing blue eyes are terrifying and frigid as they lock on his face. “You can drop the act. I know Aizen-chan sent you. And if you don’t get off me this instant, I’ll have to explain to him why his newest toy died. I’d rather not go through that hassle.”

Sudden realization hits him and Ichigo feels the panic rising within him. If this man didn’t believe him, he could kiss his plan and life goodbye. “No, wait, no, no I’m not with Aizen. I’m not- Gin, what do I have to do to-!”

Gin then does a strange thing with his reiatsu, he doesn’t flare it, it’s still tightly reigned in, but a tendril snaps out and breaks all the arrows Ichigo had clumsily shot. His panics grows when he hears footsteps drawing near, but before he can think of a way to escape, drag Gin with him or simply turn his head to look at whoever was about to walk in on them–

Gin draws him closer and suddenly Ichigo’s mouth is very occupied.

It’s messy, with too many teeth slicing his lip open and Ichigo opens his mouth in surprise and alarm and half-ready to voice several complaints when he realizes who exactly just walked in.

Gin continues on attacking his mouth, slightly less harsh and it takes Ichigo way too long to understand that this is a distraction tactic.

He’s giving the both of them some time to gather themselves. He hasn’t completely shoved him with Aizen.

“Gin-taichou? While it’s nice to see you having fun, I don’t think it’s proper for a captain to be displaying such public shows of affection. It sends a bad message.” Aizen finally speaks, his voice mellow like poisoned honey. A shiver crawls down Ichigo’s spine.

Gin finally separates from Ichigo, mask perfectly intact. He’s still holding Ichigo’s front with a death grip, but his smile is mischievous and his tone playful.

“Ah, it wasn’t our intention to disrespect the precious Gotei. We… got a little distracted, is all. Won’t happen again, probably.” Gin then tugs subtle but hard and Ichigo finds himself bowing over him, forehead against his shoulder. Gin laughs. “Ah, seems like my friend is embarrassed having been caught by you, honestly if you weren’t so hot I wouldn’t even consider you.”

Aizen laughs in turn, “you will never change. Don’t be too harsh on him, we need all of our comrades in a good mental and physical state. And please do clean the blood off the walls, it’s unseemly.”

“Will do!”

With that said, somehow Aizen excuses himself and leaves them alone.  As soon as his signature disappears, Gin curses and pushes him away so hard, he falls on his butt.

Affronted, confused and wary, Ichigo looks up at him, one hand on his bruised mouth, the other clutching Zangetsu for dear life. He’s still bleeding out, but still he finds enough blood to rush to his face. He waits, heart on his throat as Gin thinks and snarls and thinks some more.

“Get the fuck out of my sight.”

But Ichigo notices the frown between his eyebrows, the way he’s hunched over, as if still somehow cornered.

He doesn’t forget how Gin had created a diversion for both of them, how he had hidden his face from Aizen and even now how he wasn’t running his heart through.

Gin was giving him a chance. He was still playing safe on all possibilities, but he was giving him a chance.

Ichigo just needed to offer the correct cards, figure out the password to Gin’s trust.

“I’ll be back.” Ichigo says, and it’s as much of a promise as it is a threat.

When he returns to the Kuchiki manor, he’s tired, defeated and still wondering if he had read Gin correctly, or if he was just playing in the bastard’s hands, when he sees her.

In two long strides, he lunges for Rukia and feels his shoulders tremble and his soul exhales a sigh of relief. “You’re safe.”

The first time he had held her after coming to Soul Society had been when he had been standing atop her execution stand, pretending as if he didn’t want to puke his guts out because he had been so close to losing her.

And then, faced with so many enemies, not being strong enough to ward them off and protect her, he had let go off her and almost lost her as a consequence.

Familiar cursing reaches his ears and he’s briefly disoriented and he’s not sure where he is, and who he is supposed to be.

“Rukia are you okay?” He manages to ask, and with her louder protests he realizes he was crushing her against his chest. He lets go. “Sorry.”

Rukia has something to say on the tip of her tongue, but one look at him shuts her up. She frowns, not looking away as her brother finally steps in. “I have to ask the same, is everything alright? What are you-?”

“You will step away from Rukia this instant. I did not listen to your tall tale simply so you could so brazenly take advantage of her while-!”

“Wait, Byakuya, this is not what-!” Ichigo starts, releasing her as if he had been burned. “I’m just really glad she’s alive-!”

The words somehow chill the fire in Byakuya’s eyes. And it is then that Ichigo finally understands the effect he has on the world.

“What does that mean?” Byakuya asks, in a soft whisper. Suddenly, achingly, Ichigo can’t bear to look into his eyes, into hers.

Once again he misses Kisuke.

Misses having someone having his back, without second thoughts, without hesitation.

“Byakuya, I’m sorry, it was just… she’s fine. Rukia’s fine and I’m here to make sure she remains that way.”

“What are you talking about? What is going on? Actually what are you doing here, Ichigo? Since when were you a Shinigami?!”

“It’s a very long story, Shrimp.” Ichigo says, softly. He pats her head and tries not to think how it felt matted with blood and guts. “Hope you have time.”

She’d be lying if she said it didn’t scare her, but Rukia nods all the same.

“Where’s Ganju?” Ichigo asks, trying not to keep staring at Rukia.

“He’s off in the armory, making explosives just in case.”

“Huh, okay I’ll go see him. I…”

“Ichigo? Ichigo you’re bleeding!”

“Am not.” Ichigo says, before he crumples to the ground, adrenaline finally leaving.

When he next wakes up, his wound is gone, and there are tears in his eyes.

He had had more visions, more memories of things that had been, vivid details of things that could have been.

He misses everything so bad, he feels his heart breaking in two.

He would get it back, he swears. He would get it back and it would never be taken away from him.

(He still cries that night.)

Ichigo is restless and antsy, worried that he’s not doing enough to stop his envisioned future from happening, from sparing his friends and family of a lot of the suffering they had gone through with the war. And when Yoruichi asks him why is he so restless, why is he so impatient if Rukia is already safe within the Kuchiki compound, and Gin had already accepted to help them.

Ichigo is not too sure he can answer her. Because the reason he was most restless was just because if he dared stop for a second, his memories, his visions, the future he had lived would come back to haunt him.

Would haunt him, choke him, suffocate him with everything he had lost, everything that had never been his.

He’s still debating with himself over what to tell his unlikely allies, when none other than his future husband, and current migraine decides to swing by unannounced as if he was popping by for some tea, instead of infiltrating the Kuchiki manor.

“Why are you here?” Ichigo asks and he’s not too sure what he means by that.

“Are you not happy to see me?” Kisuke sing-songs as he makes himself at home in the kitchen, even as Byakuya glowers darkly at him and then goes reinforce security around his property.

“I…” Ichigo opens his mouth, and without warning or permission, he begins to cry.

“Kurosaki-san?” Kisuke sounds perplexed, more than concerned, and the fact that he doesn’t draw near serves as the bucketful of ice he needs to remember himself.

He’s not his Kisuke. And if he doesn’t get his act together and defeat Aizen, he’ll never be.

“Shit, ignore me. Don’t mind.” Ichigo says even as his face scrounges up, trying to contain the feelings within him. “I’m just really tired.”

Kisuke shoots him a questioning glance, but relents.

Ichigo would like to think he’s doing it to be polite, but he knows better.

He wipes his eyes and clears his throat. “What are you doing here?”

“I have a plan.” Kisuke says, and Ichigo almost breaks down crying for real.

Instead, he draws up the thirty-year-old veteran within him as he says.

“Walk me through it, then.”

Aizen’s illusions are the most dangerous thing of all. So this is what Kisuke decides to tackle first, of course.

They know Aizen is proud, too proud. He would never expect anyone to invade his own territory. To steal from under his own nose.

For that reason, Hinamori Momo is kidnapped and placed under a stasis kidou. Yoruichi quick to supplant her, after some truly horrifying shape-altering techniques. Forbidden techniques, if the amount of blood and bone he saw was real.

Yoruichi plays her part of diligent and lovely subordinate, adding more and more sighs each time she saw Aizen, until one night she comes looking for him and asks if it would seem weird to throw a party for Hitsugaya since it would be the anniversary of their first meeting soon.

Aizen lets her do as she pleases, even suggesting the Shibas himself, when she mentioned fireworks.

(When Yoruichi tells them this, so they can keep planning, she looks furious enough to destroy the entire world.)

 Ganju makes ruckus after ruckus, blaming the Shinigami, setting off fireworks near the walls of Seireitei. Casually, in one of these escapades, Gin captures him and takes him to jail to play and because Hinamori was looking for him in the first place.

Hinamori stops him, berates him, and asks Ganju if he had any family to vouch for him to get him out. He tells them he has a cousin. She decides to ask for the fireworks, now that the elusive Shibas were within reach.

This is where Ichigo come in to play.

Yoruichi then goes find Hitsugaya, and plays her annoying card to the max, embarrassing him publicly enough for him to snap. He yells at her, threatens to never talk to her again.

This breaks Hinamori’s heart so bad. So, so bad that she comes crying to Aizen.

She cries and sobs and refuses to leave his side. He begins patiently, quickly turning surly, unable to leave her side without breaking character.

“This is the Gotei’s fault.” She sobs one night, fake-drunk and half-asleep. Aizen is barely pretending to pay her any attention, probably expecting her not to remember anything in the morning. “Me and Shiro-chan, Kuchiki-san and Abarai-fukutaicho…”

Aizen pauses. “Kuchiki-san? Do you mean Kuchiki Rukia?”

Yoruichi almost breaks character then, her bloodthirsty smile barely hidden with her sleeve.

“Yes! Did you know those two were a thing?! She’s been staying at the Fourth –something about her captain being worried she had caught a human illness with how long she was gone. But Abarai has been going there all too often, lately. It’s not even funny at this point.”

“Really, now. It would be a pity if that Human illness killed her, wouldn’t it?”

“Hmm?”

“Sleep now, Hinamori. You will need to rest, if you want to reconcile with Hitsugaya-taicho.”

She breaks down in hysterics. It’s bad enough that Aizen has to put a spell on her to quiet her down. And then, as if regretting his actions, decides to get her to bed.

It is then that Ichigo releases his control over the shadows of the night, letting his form shimmer back into existence as he swapped the forgotten Kyouka Suigetsu with a plausible fake.

Time is of essence.

The first thing he does is stab himself, to be rid of the illusions.

But little does he know that his incomplete Hogyouku would be hidden inside.

It pulses, vibrant, angry. Giving off a warning bell.

Warning its owner.

Ichigo freezes for a moment, his heartbeat in his ears as he gazes at the whole universe in his hand.

He runs, managing to immunize Gin, who he meets by absolute chance.

And then Aizen appears.

He’s furious, livid– just like the stone in his hands.

Gin is the one holding Kyouka, and when he doubles over in pain as Kyouka refuses to be wielded by him, Ichigo wastes just one second to curse whoever or whatever had infused him with incomplete memories of the future.

All of the pain, and barely anything of what he should know to win-

Ichigo intercepts Aizen as he lunged for his fallen blade (what a stupid Zanpakuto, to be loyal to someone who would discard them at the barest thought). Zangetsu slices neatly through his shoulder but somehow Kyouka jumps into his hands, and Ichigo barely has the time to retreat before Aizen screams in victorious rage,

“ BANKAI! MEIKYOU SHISUI!”

Ironically, Ichigo’s last thoughts are not to Kisuke.

They are to Gin, and he prays that the bastard will come through.

Otherwise he could kiss his future-

“Wake up, love,” A voice whispers in his ear.

Ichigo jolts awake, confused and disoriented. His limbs get tangled with the bedsheets as he jerks upright, and he stops.

Where…?

“Did you have a nightmare again?”

Ichigo turns to his side and he’s greeted with none other than Urahara Kisuke in the flesh, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes as he waits for his response.

“I…” Ichigo is not sure. What had he dreamed about, in the first place? “I don’t think so.”

“Well that was a mighty way of waking up for it not being a nightmare. Are you worried, then?”

“What?”

All sleepiness fades away as Kisuke sits upright, a frown of concern on his expression. “Ichigo, are you okay?”

The words fall out before he can even think them through, “I’m always okay when I’m with you.”

Kisuke smiles briefly, as he put a hand to Ichigo’s cheek. “I love you too, Ichigo. But I’m asking because today is the final battle against Aizen. Are you ready?”

“Oh,” Ichigo says as he finally understands.

Yes, Aizen.

He was going to fight him…

But where were-?

Ichigo exits their room and suddenly he’s faced with the entire Gotei army. He trips back, because he had been in his night robes but…

Zangetsu is in his hand. His clothes are different too.

He doesn’t have the time to wonder about these bizarre details as Aizen of all people crashes into the scene, and Ichigo can’t think of anything else as he and Kisuke take to the air.

Everything is a blur.

Ichigo attacks, fights, dodges and he’s winning, they’re winning but then-

A sharp scream, blood in the air.

Kisuke plummets to the ground.

Ichigo runs towards him, but he’s too slow. Kisuke hits the ground, his head lolling in an unnatural way. He meets his eyes and they’re-

Void.

But no, surely he just needed to ask…

Who?

He looked around and nobody was there.

He looks back to Aizen and he trembles and cries and suffers as Aizen stands above Kisuke’s corpse, Byakuya’s too. And Rukia limp in the air, Kyouka Suigetsu stabbing her through the chest.

“It is your lose, Kurosaki Ichigo.” Aizen says with a smile.

Ichigo chokes, vaguely he wonders if he’s puking, but he soon notices the blade running him through.

“Wake up, love,” A voice whispers in his ear.

Ichigo jolts awake, confused and disoriented. His limbs get tangled with the bedsheets as he jerks upright, and he stops.

Where…?

“Did you have a nightmare again?”

Ichigo turns to his side and he’s greeted with none other than Urahara Kisuke in the flesh, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes as he waits for his response.

“I…” Ichigo is not sure. What had he dreamed about, in the first place? “I don’t think so.”

“Well that was a mighty way of waking up for it not being a nightmare. Are you worried, then?”

“What?”

All sleepiness fades away as Kisuke sits upright, a frown of concern on his expression. “Ichigo, are you okay?”

The words fall out before he can even think them through, “I’m always okay when I’m with you.”

Kisuke smiles briefly, as he put a hand to Ichigo’s cheek. “I love you too, Ichigo. But I’m asking because today is the final battle against Aizen. Are you ready?”

“Oh,” Ichigo says as he finally understands.

Yes, Aizen.

He was going to fight him…

But hadn’t he-?

They meet up with the Gotei army. He shares a nervous laugh with Renji and Rukia, regroups with Kisuke, they make a plan.

Far in the distance, Aizen is approaching.

Ichigo and Kisuke stand side-by-side.

Ichigo is suddenly frighteningly, viscerally sure they’re going to die.

“Kisuke.” He says, trying not to choke on his fear. “You should run, you should hide and run and-“

But when he turns to look at him, Kisuke only makes a choked off noise, blood pouring out of his parted lips, a red flower blooming in his chest.

Ichigo screams.

He screams and screams and Aizen smiles at him and then-

“Wake up, love.” A voice whispers in his ear.

Ichigo bolts to his feet, adrenaline propelling him almost across the room. He turns around and sobs at seeing Kisuke alive and well on the bed.

“Ichigo, is everything alright?”

“Did we defeat Aizen?”

“Oh, love. Are you worried?” Kisuke smiles and stretches out a hand for him. Ichigo approaches like a skittish cat. He’s barely starting to relax when his husband continues, “we’re going to defeat him today, you’ll see, everything is going to be alright.”

Ichigo is too stunned to say anything about it.

He goes to the final battle feeling more unease than he ought to. He tries being more prepared, he tries remembering what had happened before– but the memories fade just as quickly, leaving him empty-handed and confused.

He should have a plan, hadn’t they just agreed on that? He was going to lure Aizen away and then Gin-

Gin?

Like his fleeting thoughts, his actions are uncoordinated and lousy. He keeps missing, and screwing up and- and-

Aizen kills them all.

“Wake up, love.” Kisuke says by his side.

Ichigo bolts to his feet, a sob tearing itself free from his throat.

Kisuke is on him, hands on his shoulders, shushing him softly, asking him what was wrong.

Already half-way through a panic attack, Ichigo can’t help but think, hope, dread, that Kisuke wouldn’t remember.

So he just whispers empty platitudes, regains his own confidence, little by little.

Maybe it had been a nightmare.

Anything else would be absurd.

So he squares his shoulders and vows that he will defeat Aizen, and take Kisuke home with him.

And then they could finally…

He frowns to the sky.

What was it again?

He’s brought out of his musings by people crying, screaming.

He shares a horrified look with Kisuke.

Had Aizen beat them to it?

Had Ichigo taken too long? Had be really decided to have a panic attack instead of saving lives?

He runs out, reckless and unprepared and the parries Aizen’s first assault, but the second one slices him in two.

Or it would have, hadn’t Kisuke stepped in at the last second, crying out in agony as he’s cleaved cleanly in half.

Ichigo screams his name, something hopeless crawling up his throat and choking him.

When the sword rams through him, lifting him off his feet, it’s almost relieving.

“Wake up, love.” A voice whisper in his ear.

“Kisuke,” Ichigo replies, tears in his eyes. “are we married?”

He laughs.

“Of course, love. Did you want to propose again?” Kisuke replies, voice light and unaffected and perhaps this is what hurts the most. Perhaps this is the most sobering thing of them all.

Something is severely wrong.

Besides the fact that this day was repeating itself over and over again.

“Kisuke,” Ichigo asks again, turning to face him. “we got married a decade after defeating Aizen. That bond is carved into my very soul, Into my brain. This isn’t real.”

Kisuke smiles, as the vision, illusion, whatever, his will, as all things do. “What is your plan?”

Illusion Kisuke was merely less than a nuisance, with no ideas of his own, no actual support other than his presence and love, as fake as they both were.

So Ichigo is lost, horribly so. He doesn’t know how he got there, doesn’t know what this place is even supposed to be, but he clings to the memory is a different time.

Or… he tries to.

But as he keeps dying, seeing everyone around him succumbing to Aizen, seeing their dead eyes over and over again-

Every time he has to wake to empty words of a distorted memory, it chips away at his sanity.

But every time he asks the illusion to come with him, and the fake illusion smiles and agrees, it gives him a breath of hope.

By the hundredth time he wakes up, Ichigo doesn’t want to keep trying.

He’s tried not fighting Aizen. He’s tried staying right there in his bed. He’s tried running away with Kisuke. He’s tried killing Aizen a million different times.

It all ends the same way.

With the world burning at his feet, his own blood in his mouth as Aizen kills him over and over again with every body that dropped.

Something that never changed, no matter what he told the illusion Kisuke, was that he never left him alone. He would listen, would hide and go away. Would run and would disappear.

But invariably, every time he faced Aizen, Kisuke was there. And in no turn, was Ichigo able to save him.

He gave up, a couple of times.

He just sat in his living room, with Kisuke wrapped around him as he waited for Aizen to appear.

And then, Ichigo’s tired mind hears the same threat as a thousand times back and thinks that maybe they’re a little more than that.

“You will never defeat me, Kurosaki Ichigo!”

That was true. He thinks, as he looks up at the menacing monster, a jarring sight in his cozy Living room.

He’s not too sure what makes him hear the words differently than before.

He has defeated Aizen.

Or maybe not, but he had dreamed about it. He had known how to defeat him. What was different now?

If this was an illusion inside his mind, if he could trust his memories of a time that had been, then what was stopping him from defeating Aizen?

“I was always scared of you.” Ichigo confesses, still not getting up from his couch. “The fear is real; I really am terrified of losing everything to you. But I have no reason to fear. You are not real.  And I have every weapon, every knowledge needed to defeat you.”

He gets up, wills Zangetsu to his outstretched arm. In the other he holds Kisuke.

He stares up at the monster of his nightmares and says.

“Once upon a dream, I vowed I would not let even the Soul King harm Kisuke. No matter your delusions, you’re no god. So get the fuck out of my way, I have a wedding to get to.”

He attacks. Aizen charges.

Everything goes white.

Aizen is howling. Ichigo is in pain. Pain. Pain.

He’s not sure where he is, he’s not sure if he has his eyes open or close.

But Aizen is screaming and that noise is a beautiful symphony.

Ichigo opens his eyes at the perfect moment.

Aizen is clutching his head, blood coming out of his ears and eyes and nose. And in that brief moment of weakness, an endlessly long sword pierces his heart.

And Ichigo knows, for some reason, that the poison within that blade will kill him.

Aizen stutters and spits blood everywhere, as he tries turning around, angry, irate and somehow smiling at none other than Gin.

“You think a measly stab will kill me?”

But Aizen was not fused with the Hogyouku this time.

Aizen did not yet know of the true ability of Shinsou.

So even as he gloats about not dying from that, Ichigo breaks out laughing. Wheezing, bloody chuckles leave his lips, and even Gin breaks out in a savage smile.

“What…” Aizen manages to say.

“Korose,” Gin sings. “Kamishini no Yari.”

And Aizen Sousuke comes to an end.

Ichimaru Gin may have decided to take a leap of faith and trust Ichigo wasn’t in cahoots with Aizen. But that did not make them allies, so Ichigo was prepared to die forgotten and exsanguinated by Aizen’s corpse when green flutters in his peripheral.

“Ichigo,” he hears distantly. Warmth enters his body and suddenly he feels at peace. “Ichigo, stay with me, you foolish boy. I can’t believe you… I thought you said you knew how to defeat Aizen.”

“He’s dead, we did it, Kisuke.”

“Yes, and if your body doesn’t stabilize you will be dead as well. I thought your goal had been not die in the war?”

“No, that had never been my goal.” Ichigo tries laughing. How funny, how ridiculous, of course that had never been why he fought.

"Then pray tell, what is your goal, Kurosaki Ichigo?" Kisuke asks him, as he tries healing him to his best capacity.

"Marrying you." Ichigo mumbles, drunkenly. He doesn't notice the falter, or the hitched breath of his companion as he finally succumbs to sleep.

He dreams of everything he had lost.

He dreams of everything he was going to get back.

After the sheer insanity of trying to stop a coup, and an invincible man, Ichigo decides it is well time to tackle the hardest task of them all.

To woo Kisuke back to his side.

He’s alone on this though, not even his thirty-year-old self had known why the fuck Kisuke thought he was funny, or good, or anything.

So he meets up with him, to talk about everything under the sun. About the mission, about the aftermath. About how crazy it all had been.

He tries being subtle, but he conveniently forgets he has already spilled the beans.

Kisuke plays along, feigning to be oblivious, not yet knowing how to react. He just drops subtle hints, gives him a couple playful advances, and adores how he responds. Open, willing, foolishly in love.

(It terrifies him.)

He’s curious. He’s oh so curious, as to how they got together, how the spent their time together. He’s curious and lets Ichigo guide him through it all.

He fails at keeping him at a distance, but what is new.

Just as Aizen’s fight had been different –had been better–, Ichigo’s and Kisuke’s wedding was not quite as he remembered.

They wed by Shinigami standards, as he had suspected and hoped for. They don their dark robes, a mimicry of the military shihakusho of the Gotei. They sit by the shrine, facing each other, with the priest between them.

Ichigo is sporting far more scars than he had suspected. Kisuke too, that shine pale and beautiful as they contrast with his dark garments.

The Shibas are there, as well as the Kuchiki siblings, and the Vizards (once they had forgiven them for not involving them). His friends of the Gotei are also there, exactly like in his memories.

Funnily enough, Gin was now also part of the crowd.

When the Shinigami officer asks them for his vows, Ichigo’s are different.

“The Soul King himself knows, that I will move mountains, I will rend the heavens asunder and break the Earth apart. I will smite monsters and nightmares, and I will crush fate itself if I must, but I will always come back to you, my husband.”

The priest looks ready to pass out, but Kisuke laughs and reaches forward to kiss his husband-to-be with lips that taste of sake, of flaws and sins and promises for a new future.

Their new future.

Ichigo returns the kiss.