[Bleach] Deathsong, Chapter Six: Blend the Antiphonal [6/12]
Title: Deathsong
Author: loquaciousquark
Rating: T for violence and language.
Word Count: 4335
Summary: Post-series. An accident has unexpected ramifications, and Ichigo suddenly faces a new life and a new threat in Soul Society. Living is never as simple as it seems.
Notes: We're finally at the halfway point, guys. I hope you're enjoying the ride so far, because things are about to start happening very quickly in the next few chapters. I'd love to hear what you're thinking!
Chapter Six: Beginnings are navigated, and the Hollow grows more complicated.
Index with chapter links, notes, and thanks.
Soundtrack for this chapter: Oil and Water by Incubus. Listen here.
<< Previous Chapter | Next Chapter >>
Chapter Six
Blend the Antiphonal
(vigoroso)
---
Rukia swipes the back of her hand across her forehead, mashing a healthy smear of dirt into her hair in the process and failing spectacularly to wipe the sweat from her eyes. A twig snaps from somewhere behind the trees to her left and she half-swivels to face them, careful to keep the empty hillside to her back. She strains her senses for any other signs of movement, but the woods she faces seem disinclined to offer any more helpful hints and instead only rustle in the morning breeze. Then, as if on cue, the eddying wind dies away, and the air stills to hang heavy and hot around her. Rukia wraps her fingers more firmly around her swordhilt and waits.
There is a breath of movement against her cheek and Rukia whips right, bringing her sword up just in time to block the blade that is whistling down. The two swords strain against each other, centimeters from Rukia's face, and for several seconds there is no sound but the creaking of hand against hilt.
Ichigo gives way first, swinging his sword away so that sparks rain between the blades. "I almost had you that time," he says, grinning, and Rukia finds herself unable to repress a returning smile.
"Still, you are out of practice," she accuses as she wipes Sode no Shirayuki clean. "You would not have been so slow a year ago."
Ichigo shrugs, unbothered. "First time sparring since the old man woke up. It'll come back."
"You're sweating."
"Maybe you're a slavedriver." Ichigo swipes his sleeve across his forehead.
Rukia shakes her head at the new streak of grime on his forearm; the Academy uniform, which had been a pristine blue and white so short a time ago, has been transformed in the space of an afternoon into a mass of grass stains and healthy perspiration. "When I attended the Academy, we took pride in our appearance," she says reprovingly, and sheaths Sode no Shirayuki.
Ichigo rolls his eyes. "When you attended the Academy, people still thought telephones were a pretty neat invention." He takes a few steps towards the cliff's edge and flops to the grassy precipice where it overlooks the city, rewrapping Zangetsu with the ease of much practice and then laying the sword carefully at his feet. After a moment, Rukia sits down beside him and draws her knees to her chest, and the two of them watch the city in easy quiet. Rukongai sprawls out beneath them under the afternoon sun, and in the distance Seireitei glimmers proudly against the backdrop of the towering Soukyoko Hill.
She had really meant to use her day off to catch up on her paperwork. But after that moment on her stone bench-she feels her cheeks start to flush and stifles the sensation immediately; she will not be so easily embarrassed, she will not-she'd lost herself in the grounds and her thoughts until Ichigo had showed up at her elbow, energy brimming over from his zanpakutou class, his cheeks flushed with what she thought, maybe, might be more than exertion. He'd asked her to train with him, of all things, when what she'd really wanted to do was-well. Still, he'd been so enthusiastic she couldn't find it in herself to break the moment, so she'd led him to the cliffs just outside Rukongai, where neither their shunpo nor his ridiculous reiatsu would disturb anyone.
All perfectly innocent, she'd thought, such as the circumstances allowed-and then he'd told her about the invasion of his inner world, with the green string twining around his soul and the chains binding the Hollow. She'd wanted to start searching the libraries immediately, but Kichida's lesson had still been fresh in his mind, and he'd convinced her that since they'd come all this way, they might as well take advantage of the empty woods and do some light sparring. Not, Rukia thinks, wincing as a muscle twinges in her back, that Ichigo's definition of "light" ever matches anyone else's.
A breeze picks up, teasing her hair into her face where it sticks to the still-drying perspiration on her forehead, and Rukia brushes it away from her eyes absently. The last time she'd been here, on Mount Koifushi, it had been Kaien-dono to bring her, and the place had seemed an open book to write her happiness in. Really, Rukia had never meant to return to this place, tainted as it is with the aching of a vanished peace, but somehow, being here with Ichigo is almost cathartic. The hole in her heart will never close over, not really, but seeing the hill like this, green and vibrant and glowing in the sunlight, is almost like a salve. Rukia smiles. Ichigo's fault, really, acting as new to his sword as she had with Sode no Shirayuki the day Kaien-dono had brought her, so green herself, to Mt. Koifushi.
Her mind goes again to the bench under the persimmon tree. She'd meant what she'd said, then, about the guilt she'd nurtured so long giving way to make room for-other things, and she thinks he understood, at least, but then that damnable girl had shown up and interrupted them, and now the awkwardness of the interruption is hanging over them both. Ichigo has always tended towards action over conversation, and she doesn't know how to bring it up at this point in a way that won't embarrass him into silence.
She supposes the most straightforward way to handle the situation would be to just reach down, right now, and pick up where they left off, but they are hot and sweaty and they are sitting on Mount Koifushi where Kaien died and she just-can't. And worse, part of her knows these are excuses. But there are more important things to worry about, she realizes, latching on to a more legitimate reason to postpone her uncomfortable wonderings. Tomorrow after her shift she will go to the library and see what she can find about the mysterious green thread-if, she remembers with a twist to her mouth, she can finish that blasted stack of paperwork she'd left unattended to bring Ichigo here to train.
Foolish, she thinks with lazy amusement, allowing herself to be dragged out here like this by a tender Academy first-year. Well, perhaps not so tender, she amends, darting a quick glance over to the figure lolling at her side-
Ichigo is asleep.
Both hands are tucked under his head, his hair blowing in the errant winds, and as his face angles slightly towards her, Rukia finds herself studying him. She has seen Ichigo asleep before, of course; one didn't live in another's closet for months without catching him dozing every once in a while, but this is the first time she has seen him sleep in years. His eyebrows are practically relaxed, she thinks in mild surprise, and the absence of the scowl makes him look-not tender, really, but still, something disturbingly close to it.
She wraps her arms around her knees and rests her head on them, unashamedly watching Ichigo sleep. A bird lets loose a brief burst of song nearby and Ichigo shifts, his head rolling away from her. Not dwelling on anything in particular, her eyes find his ear, then the tendons of his neck, and then they drift to his collar, where Rukia's gaze abruptly focuses.
The very tip of a scar peeks out over his collarbone, and she knows it stretches down across his chest, shiny and broadening, to end abruptly against his ribs. A souvenir of Aizen's-she'd been there when it was made, actually-but it is only one of many he's accrued over the years of near-constant battle. Several have been earned for her sake, she thinks, not without a painful gratitude, but so many more have been for a higher purpose that he hadn't even originally been called to serve. She feels the beginnings of an old rancor stir in her gut and she quashes it mercilessly; she is determined to move past these useless self-remonstrations, and Ichigo would be disgusted by pity.
"What're you staring so hard at?" comes his voice suddenly, rough with sleep, and Rukia's eyes dart to his. She hadn't even realized he'd awoken, so intent had her thoughts been on his scars. His eyes are tired but focused, and she notices that his eyebrows have fallen into their usual frown.
"Your scars," she answers, abandoning pretense, and Ichigo glances down at his chest in a hazy confusion as if he is expecting to see them networking across his uniform.
"Why?" He gives up on his self-examination to adjust his head on his hands until he can see the cloudless sky between the trees.
"Because," she says, and then adds with a morbid curiosity she cannot repress, "Which one hurt the most, back then?"
"Dunno," he answers, unoffended, and considers the question. "Probably when Byakuya stabbed me through the foot. Hurt like a bitch."
Rukia studies the limb in question with interest. She knows it does not pain him now, that it hasn't for years-Orihime had healed it, after all-but it still takes a long moment to quell her self-reproach. "All right," she says, because to thank him again would be abhorrent, and she falls silent.
Several quiet minutes pass before Ichigo stands, stretches, and begins beating the loose grass from his uniform. "First class with old man Edogawa this afternoon," he says by way of explanation and begins strolling back in the direction of the path.
Rukia gets to her feet as well, but as she starts after him, he stops with his back still to her. "I'd do it again," he mutters, almost too low for her to hear, and for a moment she thinks she has been imagining things until she sees the very tips of his ears turn pink, and despite her attempts to repress it, her own cheeks redden in response.
He stands still only long enough for her to catch up to him, and then, without so much as a glance in her direction, he starts striding off again with paces far too long for her to keep up comfortably. "Fool," she murmurs for more reasons than one, and she catches his hand to slow him. He obliges, after a second, and matches her pace.
Her fingers linger all the same.
---
Ichigo sidles into the classroom, empty save a dozen short desks, each bedecked with a large glass marble, and heads for a seat at the back near the open windows. He is not looking forward to this; familiar as he is with teachers prejudiced against him, the dislike Edogawa has for him goes beyond simple prejudice-not without reason, Ichigo admits to himself, as a man who had spent his life lecturing on the dangers of Hollows might be understandably unenthusiastic about teaching a guy with one living in his soul. But whereas in the human world Ichigo had been able to win his teachers' toleration with his grades, he expects this class to be different. He's always had trouble controlling his reiatsu; it tends to give him a blistering headache, and there hadn't been much free time during the war to give lessons on suppressing the one thing that often kept you alive.
He leans Zangetsu, wrapped and silent, into the shadows of the corner and sinks into the wooden chair nearest it. Thumbing the little glass globe provides a momentary amusement, but the gentle thrum reminds him of the entrance exam and the sense of invasion he'd felt then, and he isn't sorry for the distraction when he hears footsteps sound outside the door. He looks up just as two of his new classmates enter; a dark-haired girl appearing about his age and sporting a recently-broken nose whispers heatedly to her companion, a slightly older man with dyed brown hair, a number of thick gold earrings in each ear, and an attitude that Ichigo can sense from across the room. The pair, both in students' uniforms, make it several steps into the room before the girl notices Ichigo, and she breaks off mid-word to elbow her companion with a meaningful nod in Ichigo's direction. The man glances at Ichigo with a look in his eyes that Ichigo knows well-he's seen it too often, usually just before someone throws a punch, and he shakes his head at his terrible luck.
As if to confirm Ichigo's suspicions, the man walks over to him with a pronounced swagger and a grin designed to intimidate rather than welcome. "Hey," he says, and crosses his arms. "Haven't seen you around before."
Ichigo knows this game. He misses the solid reassurance of Chad at his back, but he can still hold his own with ease. He lets the same undertones of quiet hostility slip into his own voice and offers an equally imaginative, "I'm new."
The man's eyes narrow and for a second Ichigo thinks they really will come to blows-but then his face relaxes all at once into a mostly ungrudging smile, and the girl collapses into a chair with an aggrieved sigh. "You are such an idiot," she mutters, but the man pays her no attention.
He leans against the desk in front of Ichigo's. "New, huh? What year are you?"
Ichigo hesitates for a second, thrown by the sudden shift in mood. "Uh, first, I guess. Only applied a week ago."
The other man's eyebrows shoot up, but he doesn't press the issue. "Yeah? Me'n Yoshida are sixth years, first class. Sasaki Isamu," he adds by way of introduction. "And she's Yoshida Noriko." He jerks a thumb in her direction and Yoshida gives him a bored nod, though her eyes still glare at her companion over her bruised face.
"Kurosaki Ichigo. How'd-" Ichigo begins, gesturing loosely at his own nose.
Yoshida props an elbow on her desk. "Impromptu hand-to-hand tournament in a bar over in 64th. A couple of guys in the second round thought I was an easy target," she says evenly. "I re-educated them."
"I helped," Sasaki puts in with some asperity, and Yoshida throws him a nasty look.
"You bet them to do it in the first place, asshole!"
"You were the one who said you were bored-you said you'd been spoiling for a fight, I was just trying to help-" Sasaki looks genuinely wounded, an expression that doesn't quite seem to fit his face, but Yoshida is unimpressed. This is clearly what they'd been arguing about when they'd entered, and Ichigo wonders briefly if he ought to step in. However, the situation resolves itself as a clamor of voices arises from just outside and the door slides open to reveal the rest of their classmates. There are nine of them in varying ages and sizes; the youngest is a short girl who looks no older than twelve drowning in a uniform far too large for her, while the oldest is a man in his late thirties deep in discussion with the woman next to him. They all arrange themselves around the classroom, chatting easily and with only a few glances at Ichigo's corner, but he is relieved that the entrance of the others seems to have defused the brewing argument.
"So, sixth-years." Ichigo starts, partly out of a desire to continue the distraction and partly out of real curiosity. "Then have you decided which division you want to join?"
Yoshida looks at him as if he'd just suggested they switch from zanpakutou to hearty handshakes. "Eleventh, of course."
Sasaki nods with a crazy grin, then leans in towards Ichigo with a conspiratorial look in his eyes. "I once saw Captain Zaraki out in the field with my own eyes. He took out three Hollows in one swing, laughing the entire time!"
Ichigo winces. "Good luck with that," he says, and hopes they don't hear the reserve in his voice.
"What about you? Kurosaki, was it?"
He opens his mouth, but before he can answer, Yoshida cuts in with a frown. "Wait, that name sounds familiar to me. I don't think I've met you before, but I know I've heard it."
Ichigo blinks. He knows the Academy is insulated-he hadn't met a single student over the course of his treks into Soul Society, after all-but this is far more isolation than he'd expected. And at the same time, he finds that he doesn't mind the anonymity; for once, he can almost pretend he's on an even playing field in Soul Society, a student just like everyone else in the room, and he offers as explanation, "I helped in the war. Before I came here."
Yoshida snaps her fingers. "That's it. I must've heard it from some of the shinigami in the bars. Some of them can't shut up about the war. So, which division?"
"Fifth."
Sasaki's eyebrow shoots up, the ring through it quivering. "Isn't the fifth one of those captainless divisions? Why the hell'd you want to go for one of those?"
As much as he values his privacy, he won't lie to them. "Uh-"
"Geez, Sasaki, he's got five years, they'll probably have somebody by then-"
"Actually-"
But Ichigo is cut off by the arrival of Edogawa Rampo bustling stiffly into the room, glasses and bald head and irritated glances in Ichigo's direction, and as the classroom falls silent and attentive, Ichigo resigns himself to the fact that, dead or alive, he is never going to escape the tyrannical power of the educational bureaucracy.
---
Still, the next two weeks find Ichigo easily settling into a routine. He feels his strength returning every day, and he spends the mornings testing it in training with Renji or Rukia when they are available and Ikkaku when they aren't. By noon, if the Eleventh-who invariably hijack the spars into gleeful free-for-alls-has left him with few enough bruises to skip a quick visit to the Fourth, he grabs lunch from one of the roadside stands on his way to the Academy for his afternoon classes. His evenings are generally spent at the library or in the Thirteenth's offices, poring over stacks of parchments and old books; Rukia tells Ukitake of Ichigo's problems almost immediately after the morning on the mountain and her captain offers what assistance he can, although he is kept busy enough that it mostly amounts to trays of tea and snacks when they find themselves drowsing over the pages.
The classes themselves are nothing much to speak of; his kidou still alternates between spectacularly exploding in his face and spectacularly failing to materialize altogether, and he's also been enrolled in a standard first-year course on materializing zanpakutou that seems to be nothing more than sixty young cadets frowning very hard at nothing in particular while Ichigo sits at the back of the room feeling uncomfortable.
As he settles into the routine of his classes, Edogawa, at least, seems more willing to tolerate him. The only thing they've done is put tiny amounts of reiatsu into the glass marbles on their desks in a miniature mimicry of the admissions exam. Sasaki bursts three globes in the first week, something he seems irksomely proud of until Edogawa informs him with a face like thunder that any further breakages would result in a delayed graduation. Ichigo, at least, has managed to control the amount he feeds into the globes, albeit with admittedly dubious success-the very first time he tries, he feels that horrible green thread of wrongness leaching from him into the glass marble and he panics, sending out a small surge of power that cracks audibly in the quiet of the classroom. Still, save a few curious glances and a reprimanding glare from Edogawa, it attracts little attention outside of the classroom, and for whatever reason, his attempts after that have not awoken the green thread winding its way around his soul, resulting in several large but satisfactory infusions that at least allow him passing grades.
Early in the course, Ichigo finds that the mindset Edogawa's class requires is ideal for attempting kidou, and he bribes Rukia with a blank sketchpad to meet him in the Academy's training halls two evenings a week for practice. They try the Kuchiki grounds only once; when a brilliant blue ball of flame accidentally erupts and reduces the number of giant koi by one, Byakuya unceremoniously declares the gardens off-limits, and the pair retire to the Academy's public training halls in chagrin.
Still, the extra practice is helping. In the last session, he'd managed to manifest a tiny red ball of energy that neither exploded nor maimed any unwitting koi. Rukia had even deigned to call him "not entirely hopeless," which he takes as the compliment it was meant to be.
Tonight, however, seems determined to undo all the goodwill he's earned in one fell swoop. His kidou is refusing to materialize; no matter how clearly he envisions stepping into the black circle of calmness in his mind, his fingers remain stubbornly void of even the smallest speck of energy. Rukia is looking more and more peeved in the light of the tall lamps and he can tell she is on the verge of calling it a night.
"One more time," Ichigo says tersely, and it takes a second before Rukia gives an irritated nod, and before she can change her mind, he contorts his fingers into the first position. "Oh lord, mask of blood and flesh, all creation, flutter of wings, ye who bears the name of Man-"
Something twitches in his soul.
Ichigo's voice falters with his concentration, but he takes a breath and gathers himself for a second try. "Oh lord, mask of blood and flesh-"
This time there is no mistaking it-the something jerks again, hard, as if yanking on a line fastened directly to his breastbone, and without wasting another instant, barely aware of Rukia short-temperedly grabbing his fingers to correct their position, Ichigo is diving breathlessly into his inner world.
---
He only needs the briefest instant to orient himself. Besides, there is no time; in the space of a heartbeat he is racing across the sideways skyscrapers to where he knows the Hollow lies; now that he is here, he knows this is the source of his problem as sure as he knows his sword's name. And indeed, as the binding grounds come into sight, he can see Zangetsu's figure towering over the still-prone shape of the Hollow, and Ichigo allows himself a sigh of relief. But it does not last; as Ichigo approaches, Zangetsu's face pulls into a serious frown, and Ichigo can immediately see why.
A full third of the chains have eroded, and the Hollow's arms are free.
The green thread winds its way through the chains, but Ichigo can see that it no longer stops at the end of the metal; now it has twisted around the Hollow's wrists, and ankles, and seems to want to creep further. The fact that it still sleeps is only a mild consolation. Even as he stands there, there is an ominous rumble beneath his feet and before he can move away, the Hollow's arms thrash unconsciously and wildly and he bucks against the glass beneath him. A window cracks under its elbow, and Ichigo feels the same jerk behind his breastbone that he did in the real world.
His eyes fly to Zangetsu's, and when his sword returns his gaze as gravely as he's ever seen him, Ichigo knows that he is in serious, serious trouble.
---
"Ichigo!"
His eyes jerk open. Rukia is kneeling so close to him her knees press against his, and her face is tense and worried. The room seems dimmer than he'd left it and almost not quite in focus, and Ichigo shakes his head sharply to clear it.
"What happened?" she asks, and her voice is low. "I have known you to lose control before, but not like that."
Damn, his head is still groggy. "What do you mean?"
She jerks her head over one shoulder, and Ichigo follows it to see the small wooden target they had been using for practice blown into two charred, smoking pieces. Two of the tall lamps have been overturned, explaining the dimness of the room; their glass chimneys are shattered and scattered in the tatami mats. He starts and turns back to Rukia, stunned, and she sees his confusion.
"Your reiatsu surged uncontrollably as I was correcting your hand positions," she explains tersely. "Because you had not finished the incantation, the power had no direction or control and was threatening to injure us both. Since you would not respond, I had to use my own kidou to redirect it safely away."
There is a quiet moment as Ichigo tries to swallow down his guilt, and his eyes fall to his lap. Belatedly, he realizes that her hands are still wrapped around his fingers from her efforts to control his botched kidou attempt. There are livid singe marks across her knuckles, and without conscious thought, he swipes futilely at them as if to erase them from existence. "Sorry," he mutters to her fingers.
Her hands gently close around his in answer, and when she speaks, Ichigo can feel her breath against his cheek. "I am frightened and angry," she says softly. "I would prefer an explanation."
He forces his eyes up to meet hers, gripping her hands like a lifeline. "Rukia," he says, and his voice is heavy in his own ears, like stones dropping one after another into a pond, "the Hollow is waking up."
<< Previous Chapter | Next Chapter >>
Author: loquaciousquark
Rating: T for violence and language.
Word Count: 4335
Summary: Post-series. An accident has unexpected ramifications, and Ichigo suddenly faces a new life and a new threat in Soul Society. Living is never as simple as it seems.
Notes: We're finally at the halfway point, guys. I hope you're enjoying the ride so far, because things are about to start happening very quickly in the next few chapters. I'd love to hear what you're thinking!
Chapter Six: Beginnings are navigated, and the Hollow grows more complicated.
Index with chapter links, notes, and thanks.
Soundtrack for this chapter: Oil and Water by Incubus. Listen here.
<< Previous Chapter | Next Chapter >>
Chapter Six
Blend the Antiphonal
(vigoroso)
---
Rukia swipes the back of her hand across her forehead, mashing a healthy smear of dirt into her hair in the process and failing spectacularly to wipe the sweat from her eyes. A twig snaps from somewhere behind the trees to her left and she half-swivels to face them, careful to keep the empty hillside to her back. She strains her senses for any other signs of movement, but the woods she faces seem disinclined to offer any more helpful hints and instead only rustle in the morning breeze. Then, as if on cue, the eddying wind dies away, and the air stills to hang heavy and hot around her. Rukia wraps her fingers more firmly around her swordhilt and waits.
There is a breath of movement against her cheek and Rukia whips right, bringing her sword up just in time to block the blade that is whistling down. The two swords strain against each other, centimeters from Rukia's face, and for several seconds there is no sound but the creaking of hand against hilt.
Ichigo gives way first, swinging his sword away so that sparks rain between the blades. "I almost had you that time," he says, grinning, and Rukia finds herself unable to repress a returning smile.
"Still, you are out of practice," she accuses as she wipes Sode no Shirayuki clean. "You would not have been so slow a year ago."
Ichigo shrugs, unbothered. "First time sparring since the old man woke up. It'll come back."
"You're sweating."
"Maybe you're a slavedriver." Ichigo swipes his sleeve across his forehead.
Rukia shakes her head at the new streak of grime on his forearm; the Academy uniform, which had been a pristine blue and white so short a time ago, has been transformed in the space of an afternoon into a mass of grass stains and healthy perspiration. "When I attended the Academy, we took pride in our appearance," she says reprovingly, and sheaths Sode no Shirayuki.
Ichigo rolls his eyes. "When you attended the Academy, people still thought telephones were a pretty neat invention." He takes a few steps towards the cliff's edge and flops to the grassy precipice where it overlooks the city, rewrapping Zangetsu with the ease of much practice and then laying the sword carefully at his feet. After a moment, Rukia sits down beside him and draws her knees to her chest, and the two of them watch the city in easy quiet. Rukongai sprawls out beneath them under the afternoon sun, and in the distance Seireitei glimmers proudly against the backdrop of the towering Soukyoko Hill.
She had really meant to use her day off to catch up on her paperwork. But after that moment on her stone bench-she feels her cheeks start to flush and stifles the sensation immediately; she will not be so easily embarrassed, she will not-she'd lost herself in the grounds and her thoughts until Ichigo had showed up at her elbow, energy brimming over from his zanpakutou class, his cheeks flushed with what she thought, maybe, might be more than exertion. He'd asked her to train with him, of all things, when what she'd really wanted to do was-well. Still, he'd been so enthusiastic she couldn't find it in herself to break the moment, so she'd led him to the cliffs just outside Rukongai, where neither their shunpo nor his ridiculous reiatsu would disturb anyone.
All perfectly innocent, she'd thought, such as the circumstances allowed-and then he'd told her about the invasion of his inner world, with the green string twining around his soul and the chains binding the Hollow. She'd wanted to start searching the libraries immediately, but Kichida's lesson had still been fresh in his mind, and he'd convinced her that since they'd come all this way, they might as well take advantage of the empty woods and do some light sparring. Not, Rukia thinks, wincing as a muscle twinges in her back, that Ichigo's definition of "light" ever matches anyone else's.
A breeze picks up, teasing her hair into her face where it sticks to the still-drying perspiration on her forehead, and Rukia brushes it away from her eyes absently. The last time she'd been here, on Mount Koifushi, it had been Kaien-dono to bring her, and the place had seemed an open book to write her happiness in. Really, Rukia had never meant to return to this place, tainted as it is with the aching of a vanished peace, but somehow, being here with Ichigo is almost cathartic. The hole in her heart will never close over, not really, but seeing the hill like this, green and vibrant and glowing in the sunlight, is almost like a salve. Rukia smiles. Ichigo's fault, really, acting as new to his sword as she had with Sode no Shirayuki the day Kaien-dono had brought her, so green herself, to Mt. Koifushi.
Her mind goes again to the bench under the persimmon tree. She'd meant what she'd said, then, about the guilt she'd nurtured so long giving way to make room for-other things, and she thinks he understood, at least, but then that damnable girl had shown up and interrupted them, and now the awkwardness of the interruption is hanging over them both. Ichigo has always tended towards action over conversation, and she doesn't know how to bring it up at this point in a way that won't embarrass him into silence.
She supposes the most straightforward way to handle the situation would be to just reach down, right now, and pick up where they left off, but they are hot and sweaty and they are sitting on Mount Koifushi where Kaien died and she just-can't. And worse, part of her knows these are excuses. But there are more important things to worry about, she realizes, latching on to a more legitimate reason to postpone her uncomfortable wonderings. Tomorrow after her shift she will go to the library and see what she can find about the mysterious green thread-if, she remembers with a twist to her mouth, she can finish that blasted stack of paperwork she'd left unattended to bring Ichigo here to train.
Foolish, she thinks with lazy amusement, allowing herself to be dragged out here like this by a tender Academy first-year. Well, perhaps not so tender, she amends, darting a quick glance over to the figure lolling at her side-
Ichigo is asleep.
Both hands are tucked under his head, his hair blowing in the errant winds, and as his face angles slightly towards her, Rukia finds herself studying him. She has seen Ichigo asleep before, of course; one didn't live in another's closet for months without catching him dozing every once in a while, but this is the first time she has seen him sleep in years. His eyebrows are practically relaxed, she thinks in mild surprise, and the absence of the scowl makes him look-not tender, really, but still, something disturbingly close to it.
She wraps her arms around her knees and rests her head on them, unashamedly watching Ichigo sleep. A bird lets loose a brief burst of song nearby and Ichigo shifts, his head rolling away from her. Not dwelling on anything in particular, her eyes find his ear, then the tendons of his neck, and then they drift to his collar, where Rukia's gaze abruptly focuses.
The very tip of a scar peeks out over his collarbone, and she knows it stretches down across his chest, shiny and broadening, to end abruptly against his ribs. A souvenir of Aizen's-she'd been there when it was made, actually-but it is only one of many he's accrued over the years of near-constant battle. Several have been earned for her sake, she thinks, not without a painful gratitude, but so many more have been for a higher purpose that he hadn't even originally been called to serve. She feels the beginnings of an old rancor stir in her gut and she quashes it mercilessly; she is determined to move past these useless self-remonstrations, and Ichigo would be disgusted by pity.
"What're you staring so hard at?" comes his voice suddenly, rough with sleep, and Rukia's eyes dart to his. She hadn't even realized he'd awoken, so intent had her thoughts been on his scars. His eyes are tired but focused, and she notices that his eyebrows have fallen into their usual frown.
"Your scars," she answers, abandoning pretense, and Ichigo glances down at his chest in a hazy confusion as if he is expecting to see them networking across his uniform.
"Why?" He gives up on his self-examination to adjust his head on his hands until he can see the cloudless sky between the trees.
"Because," she says, and then adds with a morbid curiosity she cannot repress, "Which one hurt the most, back then?"
"Dunno," he answers, unoffended, and considers the question. "Probably when Byakuya stabbed me through the foot. Hurt like a bitch."
Rukia studies the limb in question with interest. She knows it does not pain him now, that it hasn't for years-Orihime had healed it, after all-but it still takes a long moment to quell her self-reproach. "All right," she says, because to thank him again would be abhorrent, and she falls silent.
Several quiet minutes pass before Ichigo stands, stretches, and begins beating the loose grass from his uniform. "First class with old man Edogawa this afternoon," he says by way of explanation and begins strolling back in the direction of the path.
Rukia gets to her feet as well, but as she starts after him, he stops with his back still to her. "I'd do it again," he mutters, almost too low for her to hear, and for a moment she thinks she has been imagining things until she sees the very tips of his ears turn pink, and despite her attempts to repress it, her own cheeks redden in response.
He stands still only long enough for her to catch up to him, and then, without so much as a glance in her direction, he starts striding off again with paces far too long for her to keep up comfortably. "Fool," she murmurs for more reasons than one, and she catches his hand to slow him. He obliges, after a second, and matches her pace.
Her fingers linger all the same.
---
Ichigo sidles into the classroom, empty save a dozen short desks, each bedecked with a large glass marble, and heads for a seat at the back near the open windows. He is not looking forward to this; familiar as he is with teachers prejudiced against him, the dislike Edogawa has for him goes beyond simple prejudice-not without reason, Ichigo admits to himself, as a man who had spent his life lecturing on the dangers of Hollows might be understandably unenthusiastic about teaching a guy with one living in his soul. But whereas in the human world Ichigo had been able to win his teachers' toleration with his grades, he expects this class to be different. He's always had trouble controlling his reiatsu; it tends to give him a blistering headache, and there hadn't been much free time during the war to give lessons on suppressing the one thing that often kept you alive.
He leans Zangetsu, wrapped and silent, into the shadows of the corner and sinks into the wooden chair nearest it. Thumbing the little glass globe provides a momentary amusement, but the gentle thrum reminds him of the entrance exam and the sense of invasion he'd felt then, and he isn't sorry for the distraction when he hears footsteps sound outside the door. He looks up just as two of his new classmates enter; a dark-haired girl appearing about his age and sporting a recently-broken nose whispers heatedly to her companion, a slightly older man with dyed brown hair, a number of thick gold earrings in each ear, and an attitude that Ichigo can sense from across the room. The pair, both in students' uniforms, make it several steps into the room before the girl notices Ichigo, and she breaks off mid-word to elbow her companion with a meaningful nod in Ichigo's direction. The man glances at Ichigo with a look in his eyes that Ichigo knows well-he's seen it too often, usually just before someone throws a punch, and he shakes his head at his terrible luck.
As if to confirm Ichigo's suspicions, the man walks over to him with a pronounced swagger and a grin designed to intimidate rather than welcome. "Hey," he says, and crosses his arms. "Haven't seen you around before."
Ichigo knows this game. He misses the solid reassurance of Chad at his back, but he can still hold his own with ease. He lets the same undertones of quiet hostility slip into his own voice and offers an equally imaginative, "I'm new."
The man's eyes narrow and for a second Ichigo thinks they really will come to blows-but then his face relaxes all at once into a mostly ungrudging smile, and the girl collapses into a chair with an aggrieved sigh. "You are such an idiot," she mutters, but the man pays her no attention.
He leans against the desk in front of Ichigo's. "New, huh? What year are you?"
Ichigo hesitates for a second, thrown by the sudden shift in mood. "Uh, first, I guess. Only applied a week ago."
The other man's eyebrows shoot up, but he doesn't press the issue. "Yeah? Me'n Yoshida are sixth years, first class. Sasaki Isamu," he adds by way of introduction. "And she's Yoshida Noriko." He jerks a thumb in her direction and Yoshida gives him a bored nod, though her eyes still glare at her companion over her bruised face.
"Kurosaki Ichigo. How'd-" Ichigo begins, gesturing loosely at his own nose.
Yoshida props an elbow on her desk. "Impromptu hand-to-hand tournament in a bar over in 64th. A couple of guys in the second round thought I was an easy target," she says evenly. "I re-educated them."
"I helped," Sasaki puts in with some asperity, and Yoshida throws him a nasty look.
"You bet them to do it in the first place, asshole!"
"You were the one who said you were bored-you said you'd been spoiling for a fight, I was just trying to help-" Sasaki looks genuinely wounded, an expression that doesn't quite seem to fit his face, but Yoshida is unimpressed. This is clearly what they'd been arguing about when they'd entered, and Ichigo wonders briefly if he ought to step in. However, the situation resolves itself as a clamor of voices arises from just outside and the door slides open to reveal the rest of their classmates. There are nine of them in varying ages and sizes; the youngest is a short girl who looks no older than twelve drowning in a uniform far too large for her, while the oldest is a man in his late thirties deep in discussion with the woman next to him. They all arrange themselves around the classroom, chatting easily and with only a few glances at Ichigo's corner, but he is relieved that the entrance of the others seems to have defused the brewing argument.
"So, sixth-years." Ichigo starts, partly out of a desire to continue the distraction and partly out of real curiosity. "Then have you decided which division you want to join?"
Yoshida looks at him as if he'd just suggested they switch from zanpakutou to hearty handshakes. "Eleventh, of course."
Sasaki nods with a crazy grin, then leans in towards Ichigo with a conspiratorial look in his eyes. "I once saw Captain Zaraki out in the field with my own eyes. He took out three Hollows in one swing, laughing the entire time!"
Ichigo winces. "Good luck with that," he says, and hopes they don't hear the reserve in his voice.
"What about you? Kurosaki, was it?"
He opens his mouth, but before he can answer, Yoshida cuts in with a frown. "Wait, that name sounds familiar to me. I don't think I've met you before, but I know I've heard it."
Ichigo blinks. He knows the Academy is insulated-he hadn't met a single student over the course of his treks into Soul Society, after all-but this is far more isolation than he'd expected. And at the same time, he finds that he doesn't mind the anonymity; for once, he can almost pretend he's on an even playing field in Soul Society, a student just like everyone else in the room, and he offers as explanation, "I helped in the war. Before I came here."
Yoshida snaps her fingers. "That's it. I must've heard it from some of the shinigami in the bars. Some of them can't shut up about the war. So, which division?"
"Fifth."
Sasaki's eyebrow shoots up, the ring through it quivering. "Isn't the fifth one of those captainless divisions? Why the hell'd you want to go for one of those?"
As much as he values his privacy, he won't lie to them. "Uh-"
"Geez, Sasaki, he's got five years, they'll probably have somebody by then-"
"Actually-"
But Ichigo is cut off by the arrival of Edogawa Rampo bustling stiffly into the room, glasses and bald head and irritated glances in Ichigo's direction, and as the classroom falls silent and attentive, Ichigo resigns himself to the fact that, dead or alive, he is never going to escape the tyrannical power of the educational bureaucracy.
---
Still, the next two weeks find Ichigo easily settling into a routine. He feels his strength returning every day, and he spends the mornings testing it in training with Renji or Rukia when they are available and Ikkaku when they aren't. By noon, if the Eleventh-who invariably hijack the spars into gleeful free-for-alls-has left him with few enough bruises to skip a quick visit to the Fourth, he grabs lunch from one of the roadside stands on his way to the Academy for his afternoon classes. His evenings are generally spent at the library or in the Thirteenth's offices, poring over stacks of parchments and old books; Rukia tells Ukitake of Ichigo's problems almost immediately after the morning on the mountain and her captain offers what assistance he can, although he is kept busy enough that it mostly amounts to trays of tea and snacks when they find themselves drowsing over the pages.
The classes themselves are nothing much to speak of; his kidou still alternates between spectacularly exploding in his face and spectacularly failing to materialize altogether, and he's also been enrolled in a standard first-year course on materializing zanpakutou that seems to be nothing more than sixty young cadets frowning very hard at nothing in particular while Ichigo sits at the back of the room feeling uncomfortable.
As he settles into the routine of his classes, Edogawa, at least, seems more willing to tolerate him. The only thing they've done is put tiny amounts of reiatsu into the glass marbles on their desks in a miniature mimicry of the admissions exam. Sasaki bursts three globes in the first week, something he seems irksomely proud of until Edogawa informs him with a face like thunder that any further breakages would result in a delayed graduation. Ichigo, at least, has managed to control the amount he feeds into the globes, albeit with admittedly dubious success-the very first time he tries, he feels that horrible green thread of wrongness leaching from him into the glass marble and he panics, sending out a small surge of power that cracks audibly in the quiet of the classroom. Still, save a few curious glances and a reprimanding glare from Edogawa, it attracts little attention outside of the classroom, and for whatever reason, his attempts after that have not awoken the green thread winding its way around his soul, resulting in several large but satisfactory infusions that at least allow him passing grades.
Early in the course, Ichigo finds that the mindset Edogawa's class requires is ideal for attempting kidou, and he bribes Rukia with a blank sketchpad to meet him in the Academy's training halls two evenings a week for practice. They try the Kuchiki grounds only once; when a brilliant blue ball of flame accidentally erupts and reduces the number of giant koi by one, Byakuya unceremoniously declares the gardens off-limits, and the pair retire to the Academy's public training halls in chagrin.
Still, the extra practice is helping. In the last session, he'd managed to manifest a tiny red ball of energy that neither exploded nor maimed any unwitting koi. Rukia had even deigned to call him "not entirely hopeless," which he takes as the compliment it was meant to be.
Tonight, however, seems determined to undo all the goodwill he's earned in one fell swoop. His kidou is refusing to materialize; no matter how clearly he envisions stepping into the black circle of calmness in his mind, his fingers remain stubbornly void of even the smallest speck of energy. Rukia is looking more and more peeved in the light of the tall lamps and he can tell she is on the verge of calling it a night.
"One more time," Ichigo says tersely, and it takes a second before Rukia gives an irritated nod, and before she can change her mind, he contorts his fingers into the first position. "Oh lord, mask of blood and flesh, all creation, flutter of wings, ye who bears the name of Man-"
Something twitches in his soul.
Ichigo's voice falters with his concentration, but he takes a breath and gathers himself for a second try. "Oh lord, mask of blood and flesh-"
This time there is no mistaking it-the something jerks again, hard, as if yanking on a line fastened directly to his breastbone, and without wasting another instant, barely aware of Rukia short-temperedly grabbing his fingers to correct their position, Ichigo is diving breathlessly into his inner world.
---
He only needs the briefest instant to orient himself. Besides, there is no time; in the space of a heartbeat he is racing across the sideways skyscrapers to where he knows the Hollow lies; now that he is here, he knows this is the source of his problem as sure as he knows his sword's name. And indeed, as the binding grounds come into sight, he can see Zangetsu's figure towering over the still-prone shape of the Hollow, and Ichigo allows himself a sigh of relief. But it does not last; as Ichigo approaches, Zangetsu's face pulls into a serious frown, and Ichigo can immediately see why.
A full third of the chains have eroded, and the Hollow's arms are free.
The green thread winds its way through the chains, but Ichigo can see that it no longer stops at the end of the metal; now it has twisted around the Hollow's wrists, and ankles, and seems to want to creep further. The fact that it still sleeps is only a mild consolation. Even as he stands there, there is an ominous rumble beneath his feet and before he can move away, the Hollow's arms thrash unconsciously and wildly and he bucks against the glass beneath him. A window cracks under its elbow, and Ichigo feels the same jerk behind his breastbone that he did in the real world.
His eyes fly to Zangetsu's, and when his sword returns his gaze as gravely as he's ever seen him, Ichigo knows that he is in serious, serious trouble.
---
"Ichigo!"
His eyes jerk open. Rukia is kneeling so close to him her knees press against his, and her face is tense and worried. The room seems dimmer than he'd left it and almost not quite in focus, and Ichigo shakes his head sharply to clear it.
"What happened?" she asks, and her voice is low. "I have known you to lose control before, but not like that."
Damn, his head is still groggy. "What do you mean?"
She jerks her head over one shoulder, and Ichigo follows it to see the small wooden target they had been using for practice blown into two charred, smoking pieces. Two of the tall lamps have been overturned, explaining the dimness of the room; their glass chimneys are shattered and scattered in the tatami mats. He starts and turns back to Rukia, stunned, and she sees his confusion.
"Your reiatsu surged uncontrollably as I was correcting your hand positions," she explains tersely. "Because you had not finished the incantation, the power had no direction or control and was threatening to injure us both. Since you would not respond, I had to use my own kidou to redirect it safely away."
There is a quiet moment as Ichigo tries to swallow down his guilt, and his eyes fall to his lap. Belatedly, he realizes that her hands are still wrapped around his fingers from her efforts to control his botched kidou attempt. There are livid singe marks across her knuckles, and without conscious thought, he swipes futilely at them as if to erase them from existence. "Sorry," he mutters to her fingers.
Her hands gently close around his in answer, and when she speaks, Ichigo can feel her breath against his cheek. "I am frightened and angry," she says softly. "I would prefer an explanation."
He forces his eyes up to meet hers, gripping her hands like a lifeline. "Rukia," he says, and his voice is heavy in his own ears, like stones dropping one after another into a pond, "the Hollow is waking up."
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