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In the distance, a storm rumbles in the neighboring Rukon district, sending spiderwebs of lightning through bruise-colored clouds. Not a drop of rain has hit the field. At least, not yet. The wind is too noncommittal to tell if it will.
Beneath the as yet blue sky, Ichigo wipes the sweat from his brow, panting down the force of his last strike. Tensa Zangetsu flashes in the sun; Rukia is momentarily blinded, but she is here, whether sunshine or rain.
“Again,” she says, brandishing Sode no Shirayuki. The white blade does not catch the sun’s brightness.
Ichigo shakes his head. “I felt something then,” he says. “Let’s call it a day.”
“Not on your life,” she growls, catching his lie. She almost wants to apologize for her tone, but she’s held his hand long enough.
“Rukia, c’mon,” he says, something like desperation flashing a warning she doesn’t believe. “We’ve been at it for an hour, and—”
“Forty-five minutes,” she corrects. “Tsugi no mai.” She presses the blade of Sode no Shirayuki into the ground one, two, four times in a semicircle. Trails of icy air pour out of the invisible holes, framing her in frost as she points the blade directly at Ichigo. “Hakuren.”
A blast of cold barrels from the tip of her sword, but in spite of its volume, Ichigo disappears and reappears beside it in the blink of an eye. She anticipated this: “Juhaku,” she mutters, having stabbed Sode no Shirayuki into the ground once more. Like a strike of the distant lightning, a jagged line of ice races across the grassy field toward Ichigo.
“Getsuga Tensho!” he shouts, and she flashes out of the way as a black and red crescent of energy blasts through the ice.
“Hakuren,” Rukia commands once more, and another icy barrage speeds at her target, then another when he evades, and another and another.
“I can do this all day, Ichigo!” she shouts over the shattering ice and flaming crescents. Faint thunder accentuates her words. “Put on your mask!”
“Getsuga Tensho!” he cries again, but the black and red are lost in the white.
More he releases, but for each of his counterattacks, she has another blast already prepared. Thoughts of exhaustion are as far from her as the idea of delicacy. Ichigo needs a frenzy, not a demonstration.
He’s suddenly behind her, and she raises her left hand. “Hado thirty-one, Shakkaho,” she incants, and a ball of energy, red and hot, flies from her palm, growing into a full line of power. Keep him on his toes, she tells herself. Anything that will drive him to full defense or, ideally, utter offense.
She’s just preparing another blast of cold when a speeding Getsuga Tensho comes flying at her. Her shunpo pulls her out of harm’s way—only to leave her before a volley of crescents just seconds from impact. She dives away, flash-stepping at the last second, but as she winks out of form, her right arm flares with agony that manifests as a shriek of pain from her throat. By the time she’s back in view, she’s barely clinging to Sode no Shirayuki as she forces herself to swing her arm, extinguishing her flaming sleeve. Gritting her teeth, she takes her Zanpaku-to in her left hand and assesses the damage: burnt skin and bleeding wounds. Nothing broken, just raw. Above all else, still functional.
So he’s finally taking this seriously.
She looks up, the crescents having been replaced with dusty smoke. Its slow billowing renders the sky gray, only for the smoke to fade entirely as a spike of reiatsu cuts through it. At once it parts, revealing blue sky, a tattered shihakusho, and—there it is.
She raises her chin defiantly.
At last, Ichigo has donned his mask.
--
Two days earlier
The iced coffee wasn’t unusual, nor were the generous drizzles of caramel and chocolate lining the large cup containing it. The whipped cream was maybe a little excessive but similarly inoffensive, much like the pink macaron adorning it like a fascinator. Rukia did, however, permit herself a small sigh at the sprinkles...and the brownie chunks, dried blueberries, and what looked like an entire fruit salad bobbing just under the dense whipped cream.
But all of this, from the gobs of passionfruit to the dashes of cinnamon, she was willing to accept if it meant the slurping would stop.
Naturally, it didn’t until Orihime had decided her thirst was sated a significant thirty seconds later. Smacking her lips, she set an elbow on the table and smiled at Rukia, oblivious to the air of relief surrounding her companion and the neighboring tables. “I’m so glad you suggested a café,” Orihime said. “I haven’t been to this place in forever, and a Princess Coffee was just what I needed!”
Rukia gave a closed-mouth smile and raised her modest cup of sencha in acknowledgment, quietly wondering how Orihime’s...concoction had come to be known as a “Princess Coffee.”
“So, is your squad member nice and settled in?” Orihime asked.
“Oh, yes,” Rukia said. “Hardly needed me, even.” Which was true: on paper, she was escorting a rookie to his first Karakura Town posting, but really she was picking up a new Chappy soul candy that Urahara had developed. Supposedly it came with more “hop,” whatever that meant. Not that she didn’t want to find out.
Orihime began to fish for a strawberry floating in her beverage. “Well, I’m glad you came. I didn’t wake up today thinking I’d find an old friend on the neighbor’s roof, but now we can catch up! It’s been so long.”
“It has,” Rukia concurred. “You’re still at university, right?”
“More like at books,” Orihime said gravely, following with a humorously strained smile. “I thought a master’s meant more practical lessons, but so far it’s just memorizing theory. Good thing I’m a quick reader, haha!”
Rukia smiled again and sipped her tea.
“Then again, if anything Uryu says is true, the higher-level clinicals are no walk in the park either, even for the nurses,” Orihime said, still fishing for her strawberry. “I swear, some nights I don’t think he even comes home, he’s so busy at the hospital. But what about the Soul Society? Do you guys still have a lot of clean-up going on? How’s Ichigo settling in?”
“Ichigo has settled in very well,” Rukia said in gentle correction; it had been close to two years since he’d relocated to the Soul Society, joining her as unofficial co-lieutenant of the Thirteenth. “He’s overseeing the last of the squad’s reconstruction now. Most of the buildings have been repaired, but he’s determined to make sure the squad itself will be okay now that the war’s over.” She smiled proudly. “He’s actually really—”
“Aha!” Orihime said, having speared the strawberry with her straw and succeeded in pulling it through the whipped cream. She popped it into her mouth and crushed it between her teeth. “Mm, sorry, he’s what?”
“He’s actually really dedicated to the squad’s well-being,” Rukia finished. “There’s more than a few officers who are still reeling from the Quincy attacks. Some have actually confided in me they’re not so sure they’re willing to trust anyone who isn’t a Shinigami.”
Orihime frowned. “That must be hard for them then, if they’re around Ichigo so much.”
Rukia nodded solemnly. “We had a few disciplinary problems that we think have been resolved, but unfortunately, it’s not just our squad. The other day, Captain Hirako actually requested Ichigo and the other Vizards to plan a Seireitei-wide demonstration to familiarize the officers with their abilities. They seem to think it’ll help, and I agree, though I shouldn’t even know about it yet, so—”
“I know what pillow talk is like, Rukia,” Orihime teased.
Rukia snorted, hoping her blush wasn’t giving away that that was exactly when she’d found out. Thankfully, Orihime started slurping again, and whatever embarrassment she felt was replaced by mild (or perhaps not) irritation. “Y-yeah, well,” Rukia stuttered. “Anyway, they’re thinking about inviting Queen Hallibel and the Arrancars as well, both to demonstrate their abilities and to repledge our alliance in front of the officers. Ichigo’s already looking forward to a rematch with Grimmjow.” She rolled her eyes, but was quick to smile. “At the very least, it’ll let them blow off some steam.”
“I hear you,” Orihime said, stirring her graying coffee. “Then again, last time Ichigo fought an Espada....” She sighed heavily.
Rukia offered her companion a look of genuine compassion. Watching several back-to-back Arrancar fights had not left her unscathed, physically or mentally. Indeed, Orihime’s time in the Seireitei straight after the Winter War was not just to help the wounded: it was much needed time around others who shared her trauma and, more importantly, an opportunity to see her captor placed in the depths of Muken.
Rukia reached a hand across the table. “I promise you that their fight is all in good humor, Orihime,” she said. “And if it does get out of hand, there’s the entirety of the Gotei Thirteen to separate them.”
The corner of Orihime’s mouth quirked up in a would-be smile. “Yeah, but...at that level of fighting, do you really want to risk it happening again?”
Rukia tilted her head. “Risk what happening again?”
“Y’know, with Ichigo and his...Hollow....”
“What about Ichigo and his Hollow?”
A very peculiar expression came onto Orihime’s face then. Peculiar not so much for its indiscernibility, but because Rukia had never seen Orihime look so...disbelieving.
“He...told you, right?” Orihime asked. “About how he killed Ulquiorra? Well, I mean, did he really do it....” She looked away and sipped more of her coffee.
“What are you talking about?” Rukia said, utterly lost. How he killed Ulquiorra?
Orihime reluctantly released her straw. “It’s...not easy for me to talk about,” she said quietly. “Especially if you don’t know—”
“If it’s as serious as you’re leading me to believe, I am all ears,” Rukia said. “Just say it. I don’t have anywhere else to be.” Not entirely true, but it would put Orihime out of both their miseries.
Orihime smiled appreciatively, but it was short-lived. Her eyes were bright and full of memory, and her hands gripped her cup hard enough to compress the plastic.
Just as Rukia’s impatience began to swell, Orihime took a deep breath. “Rukia,” she began, “Ichigo was dead. Dead dead.”
--
The sky has darkened with smoke and blue-gray clouds. Against it, diamond dust glitters in a facsimile of stars, bringing them into night.
If she weren’t so focused on the heavily panting opponent before her, Rukia might appreciate the sight. Instead, she raises Sode no Shirayuki, letting the ribbon curl around them. “Some no mai,” she commands, “Tsukishiro.”
A brilliant pillar of ice shoots up from the ground, and she steps just out of its reach. The ice shrieks as it builds toward the sky, filling the air with white steam as it slowly melts in the ebbing sunlight. Rukia peers behind the pillar. Through the steam, smoke still billows, and against it, breaking the would-be starlight....
“We only have twenty more seconds,” Ichigo says quickly, his mask rendering his voice as cold and crackling as the ice.
That may have been true at one point, but it can only be another excuse now. Rukia points Sode no Shirayuki at the ground, ignoring her burnt arm’s protests. “Keep your mask on,” she orders.
“I can’t control this!” he fires back.
“Don’t be ridiculous.” She jams her sword into the ground, and another Juhaku attack breaks through the grass. “You keep that thing on until you know what to do when it comes out on its own.”
Ichigo strikes Tensa Zangetsu against the ice, and her attack comes to a halt. “It won’t, Rukia, I told you!”
“Right, because you’re only going to hope and pray your Quincy blood keeps it in check.” She charges forward, Sode no Shirayuki piercing a path right toward Ichigo’s heart. He braces himself and pushes her to the side, but she pulls away to attack again, striking left and right. He is hers, and he will know it.
“Rukia, enough!” Ichigo shouts. By his count, they have ten seconds before he loses his mask.
“Yeah, enough like when you fought Yhwach?” She points two fingers at him. “Byakurai!”
He howls as the spell blasts through his arm, just as a real lightning strike falls behind him.
She doesn’t give him an inch and presses forward, black and white clashing once more. “If you use this power, you use all of it, Ichigo.” She grits her teeth. “Throw yourself into every little bit, not just what you think you can control.”
Five seconds.
Ichigo hisses, the sound all too clear despite his mask. “I’m not letting you do this.”
“Shut up!” She stabs at his side, all pretense of collectedness falling away in pieces. There’s a rush inside her chest as Sode no Shirayuki slices through his skin, Zangetsu just too late to block her. “You can do this, Ichigo, if you only open yourself up to him!”
Two seconds.
Ichigo staggers. “Y-you don’t know what you’re saying! You know nothing!”
One second.
“You forget, Ichigo!” Rukia drops Sode no Shirayuki and grabs the mask, pressing it into his face with her hands and very reiatsu as it begins to glow a familiar shade of red. “I know everything.”
--
Rukia.
Three empty wine bottles sat on the table, but with no more alcohol in the apartment, it was no issue to drink in each other instead. He pressed her onto the floor, she pulled off his shirt, and in seconds her legs were wrapped tight around his waist. She glanced away at one point as he kissed her neck and only then noticed the window was wide open. Oh well.
Rukia.
She turned back to him, held his gaze and dug her nails into his back when he started to close his eyes. She wanted to see it. All of it.
“R-Rukia,” he moaned, his hips thrusting faster.
“C’mon,” she growled.
Rukia.
Afterward, when both their eyes were closed and they were a sprawl of limbs on the hardwood, she had a thought. “Can I look at your mask?” she asked.
“My what?”
“That Hollow thing on your face,” she slurred, waving her hand above them like the gesture alone explained it all.
“Oh, psh, yeah.”
She crawled onto his bare chest as he raised a hand over his face. Reiatsu dark as blood drew forth from seemingly nowhere before forming a rudimentary mask, more a mass of red than anything tangible. Once there was enough, Ichigo pulled down his hand as if discarding the reiatsu, and it flared like flame.
“So dramatic,” Rukia said with a smirk.
An icy laugh came from beneath the reiatsu, which vanished to at last reveal the mask. It was just longer than his face, textured nowhere save its wide rows of skeletal teeth. It was predominantly white, broken only by two thick red lines that ran from the top of the mask, over the eyes, and down to the chin. Beneath the mask itself, Ichigo’s sclera had gone black, and his irises had brightened from warm amber to pure yellow.
Rukia?
With two fingers, she traced one red line and then the other. The mask was hard as bone and porcelain smooth. She gave an experimental rap with her knuckles.
Another icy laugh. “I can feel that,” Ichigo said.
“Duh, it’s on your face.” She returned to tracing the red lines, Ichigo closing his eyes each time her fingers passed over them.
“Not like a regular mask or whatever,” he responded. “Not like skin either.”
“So bone,” she offered.
“Nah, it’s...deeper.”
“Deeper how?”
He paused. The mask began to fade away in swaths of that blood-like reiatsu, and her fingers were soon pressed against his cheek instead of a red line. He pulled her head down, and somewhere between the kisses and whispers of round two, she forgot that he never answered her question.
“Rukia!”
Rukia glanced up. She was still at the café, and Orihime was half out of her chair. She blinked once, and seemingly reassured, Orihime sank back down.
“Sorry, but you weren’t responding,” Orihime said with a nervous smile.
Rukia shook her head and forced a laugh. “No, don’t worry about me,” she said. “Not even a little.”
Unconvinced, Orihime leaned forward. “Are you okay? You’re acting strange.”
“Me? Strange? No.” Rukia grabbed her tea and downed it all in one gulp, the lingering heat scorching her throat. “I’m just surprised, is all,” she said through a wince.
Orihime’s frown didn’t waver in the least. Quite unlike Ichigo’s ability to control himself, apparently. If Orihime was to be trusted. Then again, she was the only source she had because Ichigo had never told her any of this. It wasn’t like he’d answered her question on the floor that day or any others like it in the years since. All day every day they could talk about fighting in the general sense or his unwavering need to protect. She even knew his opinions about the false sun at Las Noches and the floor tiles of the Soul King’s palace. But never anything about what he did—really did—to win.
Just as quickly as this thought came to mind, Rukia struck it down. Orihime had to be embellishing somewhere; the girl’s hyperactive imagination would be the end of her if she wasn’t careful. Besides, this had happened what, almost ten years ago?
That still didn’t explain why Ichigo never even hinted about what had happened when he killed Ulquiorra.
I mean, did he really do it, Orihime had said.
Dragging up a wide smile, Rukia pulled her soul pager from her pocket. “Orihime, I’m afraid I don’t have Uryu’s number,” she said politely. “After our chat today, I think I want to catch up with him too.” She flipped open the pager and went to her contacts.
“O-oh, you still have that old thing!” Orihime said, her enthusiasm just a second too late. “How retro!”
Rukia waved a hand. “Urahara upgraded the hardware, now what’s Uryu’s number?”
Orihime made a show of reaching into her purse, shifting around its contents, and slowly pulling out her phone.
“It’s very...sweet of you to call Uryu,” she said, holding out her phone for Rukia to take the number. “But remember, he’s deep in his clinicals right now. Please don’t be offended if he doesn’t answer—”
“He’ll answer,” Rukia said. She pushed back her chair and stood, not bothering to tuck her pager away again. “Well, it was great seeing you Orihime. Thank you so much for telling me about Ichigo’s Vasto Lorde side—”
“W-wait, he’s a Vasto Lorde?”
“Oh, yes, a Vasto Lorde,” Rukia said. Not a Vizard who’d kept his mask down too long or an Adjuchas crawling around on all fours. He was a proper, fully realized Hollow, with hands like claws and a voice that no longer screeched of hunger but of rage. Completely lucid, endlessly powerful, and driven by nothing less than chaos. Capable of taking down the Fourth Espada in less than five strikes. Felling Uryu in just one. What the fuck else could he be?
“But—”
“I have to go. Nice seeing you, Orihime.”
Rukia turned away, but hardly had she taken two steps when Orihime grabbed her arm.
“Rukia, please don’t....” Orihime sighed. “Please don’t think he’s completely lost. He’s back now, and remember, he was able to control some of that power when he fought Yhwach.”
Rukia narrowed her eyes. “Then why are you still worried he can’t?”
Orihime’s eyes widened. She attempted a response, but in the end, her face fell. She was cornered.
Without much effort, Rukia pulled her arm from Orihime’s grasp, holding it very still against her side to hide her shaking. Not for fear, so like Ichigo’s secret confidant. Definitely not fear. “Thank you, Orihime,” she said. “Enjoy the rest of your Princess Coffee.”
She had Uryu’s number dialed before she made it to the sidewalk.
--
The sky is finally overwhelmed with dark clouds, and Ichigo has taken the offensive.
Sode no Shirayuki is back in her hands, and it is all Rukia can do to keep it that way. Swirls of ice and black-red reiatsu curl off each of her and Ichigo’s clashes, but neither unleashes in full at their close proximity. Besides, she can’t risk injuring herself further at this point. If Tensa Zangetsu slips past her defenses again to slice her cheek or bruise her hip, so be it, but she needs to keep herself ready for what is yet to come.
Which just might be sooner than later. With each press of his blade, the eyes behind Ichigo’s mask grow steadier. She hasn’t seen them waver in minutes, almost like they’ve frozen in their intent. But even if his eyes don’t show it, his blade certainly does. Beyond the intent is something angry. Beyond that, the truth.
She slams Sode no Shirayuki against Tensa Zangetsu, pressing the blades together with the flat of her left hand. “Stop protecting me, Ichigo,” she growls.
His eyes narrow behind his mask. “What are you talking about?”
“Don’t play dumb,” she snaps. “You’re holding back. Let him out.”
“Do you not see the mask?”
“All the way, Ichigo!” She pushes their blades harder, only to fly back as Ichigo’s strength wins out and he shoves her away.
“Enough, Rukia.” Ichigo raises a hand to his face. “You’ve made your point—”
“Juhaku!” Rukia cries, rushing just behind the crackling line of ice. Counting on the distraction, she slams into Ichigo’s blade, swings left to parry before sliding along Zangetsu to cut at Ichigo’s leg. His mask is still on, and she allows herself a wisp of relief.
“Just look at yourself,” she says as he blocks her attack. “You’re fighting in Bankai right now, and you can barely handle my Shikai. You don’t get to defend me anymore!”
“You don’t know what you’re asking for,” he hisses.
“Show me what’s inside of you, Ichigo.” She raises Sode no Shirayuki for a heavy blow to his shoulder. “Show me!”
Her blade lands, and Ichigo’s roar of pain turns into a shriek beneath his mask. Immediately she’s met with an onslaught of attacks. They leave her with everything from nicks on her neck to a cut across her burnt arm that staggers her. Her list of wounds grows with each attack, but if her blood and his anger is what it takes to amp up the fight, so be it. She kicks at his ankles, maneuvers the fight so he’s looking into the fading sun, even spits in his face when they’re too close for anything honorable. And behind his mask his eyes grow steadier yet, taking on the glowering focus of a predator—
“ENOUGH!” Ichigo suddenly shouts. He hooks Zangetsu around Sode no Shirayuki and swings his arm in a circle, sending the white blade flying.
Rukia raises her hand, pressing her reiatsu into her palm. “Hado—”
“Stop!” Ichigo drives Zangetsu into the grass, and Rukia sneers as his mask fades in a rush of red reiatsu. Beneath the encroaching storm, his forehead glistens with sweat. His body shakes and he pants heavily, but there’s a darkness in his eyes that hints at the real fight that’s exhausted him. In fact, if she looks carefully, beyond the palm she does not lower, she can see it right there in the corner of his left eye, a slowly building mass of black....
Ichigo swallows hard. “Rukia, whatever you’re doing...just stop.”
Her heart aches for him, but she doesn’t dare let him know. He might be convinced that her efforts are futile, but he has yet to see what she sees. That to destroy the Quincy god, he tapped into a power he knew he couldn’t trust, convinced that he could pull just enough from it that he could get away with it. Dumb luck filled in the gaps, the only difference between their current reality and one in which Orihime was dead, Yhwach reigned supreme, and Ichigo was a howling monster destroying what was left of the world.
And now he thinks to tell her he’s still perfectly capable of keeping everyone safe?
Her extended hand starts to shake. “You don’t trust your life to chance, Ichigo,” Rukia growls. “And you don’t trust others’ lives to it either.”
Ichigo shakes his head, but the gesture is more aggressive than his tone. “It’s always worked out.”
“And when it doesn’t? Are you just going to let however many years pass before someone else lets slip that you died and some creature took over?”
“I’m not going to die!”
“Oh yes you will, Ichigo, even if I have to kill you myself!”
Ichigo’s eyes go wide, and he wavers so hard he falls forward. He barely catches himself on Zangetsu, and it’s several seconds before he speaks. “So...that’s what you’re doing,” he says weakly.
Rukia clings to her glare, to her trembling arm, but his hurt forces her hand down at last. “Ichigo, that’s not what I want at all.”
His lips purse into a tight line. “What if I don’t come back?”
“That’s why—”
“I can control part of him, but what if I die for real? Who’s holding him back then?”
“That is exactly why we’re doing this, Ichigo,” Rukia says in exasperation. “We’re making sure you can control that Hollow inside you no matter how powerful it might be. And if you do fall to it, I’ll reach out to you each and every time until you can come back yourself. I swear it.”
“And if you don’t, or I don’t come back at all?”
“Then I’ll go after you, just as you’ve done for me every time I needed you.”
Ichigo scoffs, shaking even harder; the sclera of his left eye is blackening more by the second. “You say that, but even you’re scared I’ll hurt someone. Hell, you had this entire area cordoned off.”
Rukia rolls her eyes. “I did that for privacy, dummy. Now you don’t have to pretend for an audience.”
“You’re here.”
“I’m not an audience.”
“Then what the hell are you? Because I won’t let you be a victim, no matter how much you want to be.”
Brilliant lightning flashes, quickly followed by thunder so close that the earth beneath their feet trembles.
Slowly, Rukia raises her hand again. It shakes harder than before, but it cannot stop her. “I am not a victim, nor will I ever be,” she mutters. “And you better know it by the time I’m done with you.”
She releases her Kido as both of Ichigo’s eyes are once more lost to the Hollow.
--
The sun was nearly set when she finally returned to the Soul Society. Orihime hadn’t been kidding when she said that Uryu was difficult to contact. In fact, after an hour of constant redialing, Rukia had finally ditched her gigai at Urahara’s and cornered the Quincy while he was shadowing a doctor. He hardly needed persuading to confirm that Orihime had not been exaggerating.
Deciding what to do about it had taken significantly more time.
Returning to headquarters, Rukia barely acknowledged the squad members who greeted her as they left their shifts. She waved away Sentaro’s attempt at a question as she passed him in the hallway, and she ignored the draw of her office’s distraction. She had eyes for exactly one person, one man, who hardly looked up from the memo he was reading as she pushed open the door to his office.
“Hey, Captain,” Ichigo said, rising from his desk with his eyes still on the page in his hand. “Captain,” he called her. Not because she had been officially promoted, but because he’d decided she’d earned the title anyway. How easy it was for him to acknowledge her prowess—so long as it was on his terms.
“Ichigo.”
He strolled over and lowered his head to receive her kiss. Only once he realized no kiss was forthcoming did he finally look away from the memo.
“Ah, hell, what did Urahara do this time?” he said. “I told you that extra ‘hop’ was just—”
“You lied to me, Ichigo.”
He raised an eyebrow. “What are you—?”
He had no chance to defend himself. There was no way she was letting him speak after he spent so much time doing the exact opposite. After all they’d been through, after the very best and worst of each other they’d seen, was he really so convinced that she was incapable of learning that he’d not just died but then become an uncontrollable Vasto Lorde? Did he really think she’d excuse his decision not to tell her that he’d later used that power again and combined it with another latent ability he’d only just discovered lying about his soul? She’d seen him seconds from death, whether he knew it or not, multiple times within just a few weeks of knowing him. Unprompted, he’d confided truths in her that he’d shared with no one else in that same period of time. And after all these years, it was still to each other they turned when the world was demanding too much of them and cracks were forming under the expectation of their greatness. But all of a sudden, he was afraid she couldn’t handle that sometimes he was hanging on by a single, shrieking thread?
“You don’t think I know how that feels, Ichigo?” she nearly roared at him. “You don’t think I’ve been there too?”
He stared at her incredulously, firmly at the border of argument and defeat.
She scoffed. “Alright, fine, I don’t know exactly what it’s like, but you are jumping off the edge of a cliff with a frayed rope keeping you in place. You cannot keep fighting with that kind of instability inside of you, and you cannot keep it from me.”
He continued to stare at her, that bewilderment still in his gaze but his intentions now unreadable.
Rukia threw her hands into the air. “You really have nothing to say for yourself?”
Something like fire flared in his eyes. “You don’t know what it’s like to have an endless flow of power inside you, Rukia,” he retorted. “You’re a strong Shinigami, no one can argue that, but you don’t know the feeling that for all that power inside you, you’re not powerful enough to keep it in check. You don’t know what it’s like to finally begin to accept that, then have that power grow tenfold over and over again. But you know what? You don’t have the time to figure it all out because Orihime’s getting dragged off to Hueco Mundo, or the Soul Society’s being invaded again, or something else is causing the world to end for the millionth time.” He narrowed his eyes. “So you do what you have to do, even if there’s a risk.”
Rukia glowered at him. “You say that like it’s an excuse.”
“It’s not an excuse! Every single one of those moments was life or death, and, sorry, I wasn’t gonna die and leave you unprotected!”
Rukia snarled. “Don’t insult me.”
“Rukia, you have no idea—”
“Because you haven’t told me anything! Do you really think I can’t handle it?”
For all the anger pulling at his lips, Ichigo remained completely silent. It was all the answer he needed to give.
Shaking her head in disgust, Rukia turned her back to him. “I’m really disappointed in you,” she said, only to snarl as the swirling disbelief inside her willed more venom into her words. “You have no trouble telling the likes of Orihime about your Vasto Lorde side, but the second it comes to telling me, me—”
“That was happenstance, Rukia, it had nothing to do—”
“That is not the POINT!” She whirled around again. “I’m the one you’ve let inside! I don’t care if you two were screwing each other up until I came into your sorry life, it’s me and it’s always going to be me! You make such a big deal about wanting to be with me in the Soul Society because this is where you feel ‘yourself’ and where you ‘can stretch your wings’ and whatever else you always go on about, yet when it comes to your worst moments, you turn to her rather than someone you know is going to be there for you!”
He stared at her wordlessly.
She shook her head. “You couldn’t even tell me that you’d died, Ichigo. Don’t you think I deserve that? Don’t you think....” Her eyes suddenly burned, and she stared helplessly at the floor. All she’d ever wanted was his honesty, and for a while there, that’s what she had. At least, that’s what he’d let her believe. And maybe somewhere along the way, she’d added her own perceptions of it all, deriving neither truth nor lie but fantasy. A hopeless dream.
Rukia wiped her eyes as Ichigo came forward. She slapped away his outstretched hand, but he did not press for touch.
After a few moments, he spoke. “Rukia, I know you’re mad...but what are you really upset about? Don’t take that the wrong way! I just get the feeling I’m...missing something....”
Oh, you’re missing something alright, Rukia growled to herself. But angry as she was, he was acknowledging her, and maybe there was still a part of her that felt that was enough.
She swallowed past the lump in her throat. “It....” She took a deep breath. “This...not telling me about your Hollow...it just makes me wonder why I’m still here when you don’t want me around in the first place.”
He sighed. “Rukia, of course I want you around. Don’t say that.”
Exasperated, she looked straight at him, tears and all. “Then what other reason is there to tell some ditz who can’t even order coffee properly and not me? Aren’t I the girlfriend? Aren’t I the priority?”
“You are, Rukia.” He reached for her hand again, but she still didn’t let him take it. “But that’s why I didn’t tell you. I thought it was taken care of, and I didn’t want you to worry—”
“Oh, please—”
“Rukia, please let me finish—”
“No, Ichigo. I am a lieutenant, almost captain of the Gotei Thirteen, a veteran of multiple wars, and survivor of Inuzuri. I willingly followed you into Hueco Mundo despite an explicit order not to, and I singlehandedly took out the Sternritter who nearly killed my own brother. I have a Bankai I can’t even practice unless I have the permission of the twelve captains.” She stared right into his eyes. “I’ve seen so much, Ichigo. And I’m destined to see more, because I want to. So don’t you dare think that I can’t help you when you so desperately need it.”
Ichigo stared down at his feet, his jaw taut but his eyes those of a scolded child.
Rukia shook her head. “I don’t need your protection, Ichigo, and I never again will.” Her heart began to pound, and she clenched her fists. “But I do need you. So please, if I still mean anything to you, let me in.”
Ichigo scowled as his eyes grew glassy, sheer gold filtering through the muddled amber of his irises. He exhaled deeply, nearly caving in on himself.
She waited in silence.
When he could finally look at her again, his scowl was gone, replaced by a look she’d only ever seen once before, just before she restored his power after he’d sacrificed it all: cold, unrelenting defeat. “What do I do, Rukia?” he whispered.
Her first instinct was to hold him close and tell him it would be alright. But she forced down the urge. She’d already arrived at her conclusion, after this longest of afternoons. Beginning immediately, lies were no longer welcome in her relationship. Only the raw power coursing through her at every moment of every day.
Rukia narrowed her eyes. “I don’t know what you’re going to do,” she said, “but this is what we’re going to do.”
--
The rain melts against a fog of curling exhalation. Long, white fingers with talons for nails shift in a gentle splay, as if their owner only just realized their potential. More raindrops absorb into lantern-bright hair, grown long with no consideration of the time it would take to reach that length naturally. Over the face of the man she loves, a cruel reminder of that afternoon she asked him what it was made of, is a mask, bone white and porcelain smooth. Two red lines like smears of blood run down its length, and from the forehead protrude two long, curved horns. And right there in his chest, peeking out from where his shihakusho has no hope of hiding it, is a hole.
A full realization. A complete transformation. An undeniable Vasto Lorde.
Rukia clutches her side where Ichigo’s most recent attack has broken several of her ribs. The flesh wound itself is shallow, but it aches and bleeds freely. With Ichigo unmoving and silent, she offers herself what healing she can; her shihakusho reflects the pale green light from her Kido. But in her other hand, burnt and throbbing though it is, she keeps a firm grip on Sode no Shirayuki, ready for whatever Ichigo or the Vasto Lorde inside him have planned next.
“You’re perfectly in control,” she says, no longer entirely sure who she speaks for. She coughs, winces as her broken ribs strain from the effort. “It’s okay to be unsteady...but remember that you are always...in control,” she repeats effortfully.
She limps forward as lightning flashes within yards of the field. In the second before thunder deafens her, she hears Ichigo’s first word since his final transformation: “No.”
She waits for the thunder to quiet. “I’m perfectly safe,” she says, grunting when her leg slips against the slick grass and she must right herself. “You’re...perfectly safe.”
Ichigo exhales again. “...What...if....”
“There will always be an ‘if’...just like whenever you fight a Hollow...or cross the street.... But you know how we...diminish it?”
“How....”
“We train with our blades...and we look both ways before crossing the street,” she says. “Only you can decide...how you make your ‘if’ smaller...but I am here to help you...however you need.”
She now stands directly in front of him, close enough that she can take his fiendish hand in her own. And so she does, abandoning her useless Kido. His fingers have hardened, and his talons scratch against her wrist with zero effort.
“I will protect you, Ichigo,” she says.
He does not move as the rain’s steady fall morphs into a downpour.
She meant what she said. These are words she’s always wanted to speak, but now if feels like she’s finally worthy of saying them. No, Ichigo doesn’t need to protect her nowadays, but it’s always been a concern, what she brings him. How do you provide for someone so powerful? How do you offer them reassurance when that is what they embody? For so long, she didn’t know. He made sure she didn’t.
Now it’s all here, held in their clasped hands. What for so long they’ve called reassurance, she now knows to be green youth, sheer inexperience, trembling and scared inside a soul too powerful for its own good. For all the light of Ichigo’s existence, he knows where to find the darkest recesses and linger inside them.
Unfortunately for this fear, there is more than one source of light. Even when the daylight goes out, the moon will always rise.
“Ichigo,” she whispers.
And so she will carry her light, illuminating his dark world for him, until he is able to carry his own.
His hand tightens around hers, the message received.
She smiles—then slashes at his arm.
Ichigo bursts back to life and backhands her. She flies across the field, landing hard despite the rain-softened earth. Within seconds he’s on top of her, brandishing Tensa Zangetsu to drive down into her body. She deflects as fast as she can before firing a series of Kido blasts simply for the distraction. She rises to her feet before his next attack, but as hard as she parries, there are too many strikes to block them all. Each of her wounds scream with the force of the blows, and through the cold rain she can feel the blood coating her skin. But she can’t afford to die, not until she’s the one at the edge. Only then will Ichigo finally know triumph.
And only then will she know that she is in control, too, for no one has put her in this position save herself.
Ichigo hisses, and she’s down on the ground again, the breath knocked out of her. She gasps for air, made all the harder when Ichigo slams his foot onto her chest, holding her firmly, agonizingly, in place. She stares up at him, wide-eyed. His long hair hangs over his shoulders, dripping onto her shihakusho and casting the glaring white of his mask in shadow. But it’s not his hair that has her heart beating faster than she’s ever felt before. It’s not the mask itself either, for all its predatory warning.
No. It is the red, pulsating orb coming into form between the two horns, already dense with the might of its destruction.
Rukia forces herself to breathe in something, anything. She will not die in silence. She will not receive this Cero without her final say.
“Ichi...go...” she croaks. But it’s not just the force of his foot holding her down: the wild, unrestrained reiatsu of a Vasto Lorde bears down on her too.
The Cero builds between the horns, now the size of a soccer ball.
She attempts more speech, but her lungs will not allow it. Rain falls into her eyes, blurring her vision. The idea of lifting Sode no Shirayuki is laughable.
She reaches out with her own reiatsu, but it’s ripped to shreds the instant it touches the force above her. For the first time this fight, she allows herself to feel the panic that arose the moment Orihime told her Ichigo had died. Because he may very well have.
Humming louder than the thunder, the Cero glows bright as the sun.
She does not close her eyes, fighting through the driving rain and blinding light to find his blackened gaze.
The Cero grows large enough to fully hide Ichigo’s face, his mask...
“Ichigo,” she whispers.
...and reduces to nothing.
A loud crash of falling metal sounds next to her head as Ichigo drops his blade. The pressure on her chest lifts before he falls to his knees beside her. She cannot see his face for the swaths of blood-red reiatsu lifting away his mask and returning his hair to the length it was this morning.
She does not release her grip on Sode no Shirayuki until every bit of the reiatsu is gone and Ichigo, his breathing shallow, his face gaunt, and his eyes once more warm amber, has returned to her.
Lightning flashes overhead, and as thunder shakes the earth, Ichigo observes her in silence, taking in her bloodied mouth, her bruised eyes. His gaze traces the line of her broken ribs and burnt arm, her bleeding abdomen and lacerated legs, her dislocated ankle.
His surveillance complete, Ichigo exhales heavily, collapsing beside her. “Thought I was gonna die there a couple times,” he says.
“Really now?” she croaks.
He lets out a short laugh, but it falls to more thunder.
Slowly, painfully, she reaches for his hand. His touch is warm and soft, far from the claws that scratched her wrist. “How do you feel?” she murmurs.
“Better. You?”
“Same.”
She’s wondering if she should say more when Ichigo releases her hand, only to encompass her in as tight an embrace as their fatigued bodies will allow.
“Thank you,” he whispers.
Too weak to answer, she rests her head against his chest, cherishing his beating, most powerful heart.