Heartstorm

[nightheartchan]

I originally intended to have this ready for Renji's birthday, but sadly, there was another fic I wound up writing that day in tribute of Zyphen's chapter 11 post in which Renji died beautifully and honorably... but still, he did die. I finally got the ending written in a way that suits them. I hope you all enjoy.



He was upset, she could sense it. He had a sort of agitated restlessness to him, an inability to keep still or quiet... and his broken pacing was starting to drive her a little crazy.

"Will you just calm down already," she grumbled. "I'm fine... see?"

She once again pulled back the side of her robe to show him the fully healed scar that the not-Kaien arrancar had given her. The healer, Hanatarou Yamada had done a thorough job of fixing her up, though Renji had about flipped out the first time he'd caught sight of it (he robe had slipped aside when they'd ducked down to avoid a volley from a group of exequias, count on Renji to concentrate on her even right in the middle of a fight that might get them both killed).

In reply, Renji just scowled and paced over to the other end of the little cavelet they'd found. Outside the wind continued to howl and scream, turning the already dark sky of Hueco Mundo black as ink with its sand-bearing storm wind. They had nearly gotten caught in a sandstorm of all things. Renji had just managed to scent this cave and flash them over to it to hide in, after he had cleared it of its Hollow inhabitants first of course, before the true power of the storm struck and trapped them inside. There was no telling how long they were going to be there.

Renji went back out to the entrance of the cave and watched the storm continue on unabated for a long moment, then huffed in annoyance. Rukia tried not to glare at him and instead added another stick to the fire. They had a whole dead tree to burn, Renji had uprooted it from its position nearby and had reduced it to kindling with Zabimaru before the storm had gotten very big. That was good, because the night air of the desert was actually quite cold, even with their travel mantels to keep out the sand.

"It's not going to stop just by you staring at it," she informed him.

He plunked down in front of the fire across from her for the fourth time, and Rukia was sure it wouldn't be long before he started pacing restlessly again. He was like a caged beast.

"How's yer leg?" he asked her.

She'd suffered an injury to it during the fight and Renji had carried her out and away when everyone had scattered at the end of the fight.

"A little tender, but fine," she replied. "I'm pretty sure its only a minor sprain."

::Of course it would only be a minor sprain with you around,:: she grumbled to herself.

She was a warrior too! But every time it looked like she was in the least little bit of danger, there he was, getting in the way of her fight! She wouldn't be surprised if her older brother had sent him along just to make sure nothing happened to her. Of course, knowing Renji, if there was a good fight involved, he wouldn't have needed to be asked twice. He'd always been like that though, putting himself between her and all harm.

"Good," he said more to fill the silence than anything else.

"How long do you think the storm will last?" she asked him next.

"Dunno," he replied. "Could be a few hours, could be all day. I used ta run red-zone missions in desert areas when I was climbin' ranks in Eleventh, had sumthin' like this happen ta me once or twice. We'll be here a while, until that storm blows itself out."

"Oh," Rukia said.

Until Las Noches, she'd never once gotten anywhere near a red-zone mission. She'd only just been allowed out to visit the mortal world, and the asignment had been a nice, cushy, supposedly safe city-reaping mission. Red-zone missions were the most dangerous missions a Soul Reaper could take on, the ones in active battle zones, where the Hollows were big and scary and viscious as hell. She'd heard the stories. Renji had run a lot of them, that she knew from listening around.

"So what did you do then, to pass the time until the storm passed?" she asked curiously.

Renji looked at her over the flames and said

"I was usually in sheilded barracks at the base so we all did what we usually did ta pass the time..."

Renji's grin was a little crooked.

"Played music, drank, gambled, boasted... womanized with the other Reapers. Whatever."

Rukia felt a small pang of annoyance at that last. Yes, she'd heard that little detail about red-zone missions too. Some of the women reapers who had been on those kinds of missions had been quite frank about the way that being in situations that put your afterlife at risk gave you certain physical imperatives with urgency.

"I didn't know you played," she decided to say instead. "My brother plays the koto."

He played it very elegantly and with a fine form, but Rukia's tastes seemed a little more plebeian and, though she feigned polite interest for his sake, she'd never really much cared for the classical instrument. Renji too, made a face.

"I play guitar," he replied. "Harmonica too, I guess. They're easy ta pick up, and pretty easy ta carry with ya, so learning them helped ta pass the time. How about you, I'd figure with all that other noble-type stuff they got ya learnin' you'd pick up an instrument too."

She had very small hands, so it limited what she could play easily.

"Fife," she replied, a little defensively.

"I'll have ta come over an' hear ya play sometime," was all Renji said.

"Same here," Rukia replied with a small smile.

The polite conversation died, tapering off into silence as they both listened for any sign of the storm outside abating.

"You sure you're warm enough?" Renji asked.

She getting a little tired of him asking. She was practically cocooned in a nest composed of her mantle his mantle and the fire, if she got any warmer she was going to start taking clothes off.

The naughty thought occurred to her that she should tell him so just to see what his reaction would be.

"Yes, I am quite warm," she said with exaggerated patience.

Really, what would he do if she told him she was freezing, offer her the shirt off his back?

::Probably,:: she thought dryly.

Lord knew that he had done it before. When they'd been traveling from Hangdog to the first district in order to take the test that would allow them to enter the Academy there had been more than one cold night where he had wrapped her up as best he could to keep her warm without regard to his own comfort.

"Are ya hungry?" he asked next.

"Even if I were you can't exactly go out into that storm to hunt idiot!" she snapped finally.

Honestly, they get away from Kuchiki and out into the howling wilderness for only a day and all those protective provider instincts of his just kick right back in with a vengeance.

"Uh, right," he said gruffly.

She caught the flicker of hurt that was quickly covered up by his glancing out at the entrance crack of the cave to gauge if the storm was letting up or not. She felt a small pang of guilt for snapping at him, she really hadn't meant to but she was having a hard time being cooped up with him in a small enclosed space with nothing to do or distract herself with. It had only been a day, maybe two, since she'd come very, very close to dying herself. Even as she had resigned herself to her death, content with the knowledge that she had redeemed herself and her former Lieutenant (who would no longer sleep restlessly in his grave with a small portion of his spirit trapped within a creature that was anathema to him) there had been another part of her that had railed and fought desperately against the heavy darkness seeping in around her mind and pulling her under into its comforting embrace. It had been in that moment, on the very edge between life and death, that she had come to realize what truly mattered in life. The connections you shared with the people you loved. That was what it was all about.

Rukia looked across the fire at the man who had once been the boy she'd grown up with, who had been the first to take her in and make her part of a family. Sure, it had been a rough sort of family made out of necessity, but that did not mean they had not all loved each other any less. She had grieved deeply when each of them had died, grieved until it felt like there were no tears left, and though it all he had comforted her, stayed strong for her, provided for her as best he could. Renji had always shared with her unstintingly anything he had; blankets, food, shelter, water, even when the only thing he had was the warmth of his skin to ward off the bitter chill. She often wondered what she had done to deserve such a good friend.

"It's just that-" Renji cut himself off and went back to moving about restlessly.

She could sense his emotional distress from there, his reiatsu flared and popped and flickered erratically, as unable to keep still as the man himself.

::I wonder what's eating him?:: she thought to herself.

That he was upset was obvious, but she wasn't sure why. She could always try to ask, but Renji was a typical Rukongai male; he'd just bluster about it and try to deny that there was anything wrong if he thought that an honest answer might make him expose weakness.

"It's just what, Renji?" she asked in the silence.

She tried making her tone gentle instead of demanding like she wanted to, she'd learned that demanding just made him clam up faster, if she was gentle and coaxing with him, sometimes she'd manage to wriggle a few honest answers out of him before he put that damned shield of manly pride up again.

"I... You... Fergit it," he grumbled, sinking his chin into his hands.

She supressed her first instinct to pick a fight and bicker with him like usual, granted she sometimes felt better after relieving stress by a good argument or beating him into submission, but there was a strangely haunted quality around his eyes now. She'd seen that look once or twice before, and it had been right after they'd lost their family. Rukia had been wrapped up in her own grief at the time, and he'd always been the one to stay strong and take care of things , allowing her the luxury of indulging her greif. He never talked about it, and it was such a painful subject that she never brought it up, but she'd seen him once or twice, in a rare unguarded moment, and she knew that whatever terrible thing had happened when her friends had died (he never let her look) he carried it with him.

It bothered her now to think that the one person in the world she had always felt had known her best, and that she had known better than anyone else ever could, had things that he hid from her. If he was hiding this then what else was he hiding? Was he as honest an up-front as he had always seemed to be? If anyone had asked her that question before her execution she would have said yes without hesitation, but the betrayal of three well-respected captains had turned the whole world on its side and cast shadows of doubt over everything, suddenly she needed to know. She needed to know what was in there, needed to know if it was going to hurt her or not. That fight with the not-Kaien arrancar-espada thing had torn open old wound she thought had healed, and while she had been granted a measure of inner peace because of it, and had found some answers that she hadn't known she'd needed, the manipulative tactics that it had used on her and her response to them had raised some others.

"I'm not going to forget it Renji," Rukia said clearly.

She had decided on what her course of action was going to be.

::We're stuck here alone in this cave together. He can't go anywhere. If there were anyone else in this place with us my rank would be a barrier between us and he could rightly plead inpropriety but there isn't. He can't run away and I won't be denied.::

She had him cornered.

::So that's why he's pacing,:: she realized, suddenly filled with a feeling of powerful malicious delight.

She had him cornered, he knew it, and he was afraid. Well, so he should be after avoiding her all those years and then just showing back up at the eleventh hour, bloodied, bruised and beaten from taking on her brother, a man who out classed him and out fought him by over a century's worth of experience. Anyone else with any sense at all (save the other idiot) would have backed the hell down and thought of another way. Not Renji though, not only does he face down her brother, but also Aizen. Rukia still recalled the way her heart hammered in her chest when he held her tucked against his side, sword placed in front of him defensively and flat-out refused to give him what he demanded.

"Since we're essentially stuck here, I think it's time we cleared up a few things between us."

She wanted answers. She had already existed for decades on assumptions, but recent events had strongly suggested that the assumptions she had made (that this man had apparently been content to let bide) had been erroneous.

"I thinks it's time that you and I had a nice long chat," she continued. "And since we're not going anywhere, there's no-one to overhear and go carrying tales to that brother of mine, and there won't be any interruptions... we're going to have our discussion, one way or another."

She was a little gratified to see his face pale with that that same look he got when he got caught with his hand stuck in the merchant's purse. That look that said "busted" all over his face. He knew he was in for it. She watched, slightly amused as Renji swallowed nervously and looked frantically toward the cave opening.

"Hey look, I think the storm's letting up," he tried.

"Freeze," she commanded... because he would try to walk out into a storm.

"Are you sure you're not hungry, or thirsty," he tried again, clearly frantically trying to steer the conversation anywhere else.

"I'm fine!" she snapped. "Stop trying to change the subject."

He got up and paced frantically, like a tiger in a cage.

"And sit down! You're driving my crazy with all of that pacing!" she snapped again, irritated.

"I'll pace how I want, when I want to," he snapped back, clearly agitated. "It's yer fault anyway!"

"What?" Rukia said, irritation sparking up in her.

::Really! This man!::

It was a wonder that either of them had survived to adulthood without killing each other after pushing one another's buttons one too many times. She wasn't alone with him for twenty minutes and she already wanted to strangle him.

"How is any of this my fault?" she demanded. "You're the dumb one!"

"I'm dumb? I'm not the one who-"

Renji looked pained again and choked off what he was going to say. He stared at her intensely for a good long minute, that powerful, unpredictable reiatsu of his wrapping around her, stroking gently with the feel of heated silk against her skin. His eyes traced over her face like he'd never seen her before...

::Or is that, that he'd never see me again?:: she wondered.

Then it hit her. The fight with that not-Kaien arrancar had nearly killed her. Rukia had been within an inch of starting on the road to her next life when she'd been brought back from the brink by her plucky young healer friend. But if the healer and her brother hadn't been there, Renji would not have made it in time to save her. Just like he hadn't been able to save their friends from their own fates in Rukongai. Just like he hadn't been able to protect her from Aizen, though he had tried.

"Renji," she said quietly, her tone kept low and unthreatening. "Are you so upset because you felt my reiatsu go out? You thought I was dead?"

Renji looked down and to the side, unable to meet her gaze as he tried to keep his face from betraying his emotions. He could see the look of repressed pain, but what surprised her was its depth; she'd rarely seen a look of such anguish on anyone's face before. It was strange and disconcerting that she would see it on his face; it wasn't that she felt Renji incapable of feeling, he'd always been hot-temptered and a little moody at times, what surprised her was the fact that had seemed to feel so strongly about her. His reiatsu retreated a little but she could hear the tremor in his breathing. He was shaking and trying not to show it.

"Look at me," she said softly, reaching one of her small hands up to his cheek to gently turn his face toward her.

That simple motion seemed to be the straw that broke the camel's back because before she'd even seen him move, she was engulfed in his embrace. He was on his knees before her, arms wrapped tight around her waist pressing her to his solid wall of a chest. His head was buried in the crook of her neck.

Renji had never been much for open displays of emotion, a light shoulder-squeeze or a punch on the arm or on a rare occasion, a one-armed hug were usually the extent of his appropriately manly displays of affection. Unless of course, one counted the times that they had slept curled up for warmth under a collection of ragged blankets in winter. On lonely nights in the academy and even lonelier nights later on in the Kuchiki household she recalled the way he had slept wrapped around her. But barring that, she had only been embraced by him like this once, on one other occasion. It had been on the night they had lost their last friend in an epidemic of the Riverfront Ravage. The medicine he'd managed to steal hadn't worked and they'd sat a lonely vigil as he'd slipped off. When he'd reached down to close Haru's eyes after it, he'd suddenly turned and held her close, as if to assure himself that she was still alive. She hadn't known what to do then, so she'd just stood there.

"I'm right here," Rukia said in the present, gently putting her arms around him this time. "I'm okay."

"You gave up," he accused her. "You never give up, and you... you did. Why?"

There was an entire universe of hurt and confusion in that one word. Of course, he was confused, Renji would be confused because he really couldn't understand it. He didn't know what it was like to go through life everyday wanting the affection and approval of someone, trying to be perfect just so they'd look your way. He didn't know what it was like to pour time, and strength and energy into trying to gain even a single shred of warmth and approval. Renji had always been so strong, so self-reliant, he'd never needed anyone, not even her. After all, hadn't he so easily given her up at the first opportunity? He couldn't understand what it was like, feeling doubt and insecurity and unworthiness eat away at him everyday.

"You... Renji, you wouldn't understand," she said softly.

"I wouldn't understand what? What wouldn't I understand?" he demanded, but there was a strangely desperate pleading note to his voice.

"You're so strong, and brave, you wouldn't understand what it's like trying to live every day feeling unworthy of everything."

She hadn't meant to admit it out loud, this was the last confession she had ever wanted to say to him. He was just going to probably poke her in the chest or flick her foehead or thwack the side of her head lightly and tell he she was being an idiot.

"Who says you're unworthy?" he growled, pulling back to look at her fiercely. "Point him out ta me, I'll set 'im straight."

He looked as ready as ever to go and pick a fight with some random stranger for some imagined slight to her. He really hadn't changed at all.

"You idiot," she murmured, partly in despair.

"Yeah, yer right," he sighed, sounding defeated.

He got up and sat down again a few paces away from her on the other end of the fire. He looked sad and a little defeated, his expression resigned.

Rukia blinked, taken aback. Had Renji just agreed with her? Not only that, but over the fact that he was an idiot?

"I don't get it," he said sounding sad. "You gave up on yerself then, but me an' the brat managed ta stuff some fight back into ya. Why in the world would you give up on yerself again?"

He paused for a bit and when he asked his next question, his tone was strangely hesitant and guarded.

"That man still mean that much to ya? You'd give up yer life because he asks?"

He'd completely missed the point, as usual.

"It wasn't about Kaien-dono," she replied irritated at him. "Well, I guess it was, but not really. I mean... well, what if it had been you? Back then. What if you had been asked to take the life of someone you admired and respected and... and liked probably a little more than you should."

Renji frowned, the look on his face a little angry and yet unfathomable.

"I'da done it," Renji said plainly.

::Of course you would,:: she thought with an inner eye roll.

Maybe it was a guy thing. She didn't see how ending someones life, or helping them to end their own was supposed to do anyone any good. Rukia had no real frame of reference for assisted suicide; in her book, she had killed him. Even if he had asked her to, it was murder. She had cared for him and she had still killed him, and she carried that horrible guilt with her from that day to this day. She tried something else.

"What if... what if it had been me? What if someone told you that the only way to save me had been to kill me, and you did and then you were expected to live every day afterward like there was nothing wrong with that?" she had tears springing to her eyes, willing him to understand how she felt. "How would you feel about that?"

Renji looked at her for a long, long moment, his expression strangely unreadable. There was a deep, fathomless quality to his rose-brown eyes, something he kept hidden away in their depths unrevealed.

"I... I don't think... I don't think it's exactly the same thing, Rukia," he said quietly.

She glared in frustration. They had been friends since forever, there wasn't anyone else Rukia could trust to understand this. Even her wonderful captain, who was so wise and supportive in every other instance, still didn't understand this. Her brother prated at her about duty and honor and redemption and all that other crap. She needed just one person in her world to understand the kind of burden she felt. Ichigo might, but he was mortal.

"How is it different?" she snapped.

"Even if he was someone you liked, he was still your superior officer and someone you respected as well."

"Well Mister Vice-Captain," she growled. "Are you saying you don't respect me?"

"I'm saying the analogy doesn't work," he growled back.

Rukia got that nagging feeling again that there was some part of this conversation that was being left out.

::He's hiding something from me, and I want to know what it is,:: she thought.

She'd sort of forgotten her original objective of cross-examining him when Kaien had been brought into the discussion.

"Why doesn't it work?" she demanded next. "Explain it to me. Why?"

"Rukia," he said, his expression looked closed-off and pained. "Don't ask me that."

"Don't ask you what?" she replied demandingly, this time it was she who got up and paced.

"Don't ask you why, after not saying barely five words to me in as many decades, you suddenly want to burst back into my life and pretend to be my friend again?"

"I'm not pretending, how can you say that?"

She continued as if she hadn't heard him, still pacing angrily.

"Don't ask you why you never spoke to me, or looked at me, in public? Don't ask you why you always bowed properly, like we were strangers? Don't ask you why... why..."

Tears flowed down her face in the sudden stillness caused by her standing right in front of him as he knelt on the ground, looking down as he looked up at her, their places a curious reversal of that day as she finally asked the very question that had troubled her for fifty years.

"Don't ask you why it was so damn easy for you to just give me away like an unwanted pet?"

When she was feeling particularly petty and resentful towards him for giving her up she had sometimes imagined a scenario like this, where he was on his knees at her feet, clutching her robes and begging for her forgiveness. Renji never begged. He'd steal, he'd fight, he'd trick and he'd connive but he'd never beg. His eyes pleaded with her now.

"Rukia," he said, his tone was so soft and compelling and strangely intimate.

Of its own accord her heart sped up. She had never seen him so vulnerable before.

"Are you sure you want to know the answers?" he asked next. "Because once you know, you can't go back to ignorance. It'll change things. Once you know, things won't ever be the same."

"They haven't been the same for a long time now," she said quietly. "And even if it will change something, I think I deserve to hear the truth from you Renji."

"As you wish," he said, but it didn't sound resigned at all.

In fact, now that she had cornered him he looked strangely elated and determined. He stood up, towering over her for a moment and took her hand then moved over to the warm little nest he'd made for her with their mantles next to the fire. He sat down and tugged her down beside him, building up the fire a bit, then he turned to face her, making himself comfortable. She tried to look as encouraging as possible, because she was finally getting what she wanted out of him and without having to pull it out, inch by excruciating inch, argument by argument, trying to sift through endless rounds of bicker and male-pigheaded bluster (that Renji did so well) for those few kernels of truth he might have let slip unintentionally. She wondered a bit at how easily he capitulated (finally!) but decided that she'd finally run him into the ground.

"Well...?" she said after a silence that stretched on too long for her taste.

"Gimme a minit!" he grumbled. "I'm tryin' ta think o' th' best way t' tell ya."

Their mutual street accent thickened when he got upset or nervous.

"Renji... Just tell me," she said softly, coaxingly.

She wasn't quite sure why but her heart was pounding. She hadn't felt like this in a very very long time, she'd almost forgotten what it was like. The concept of time as a number of years in a lifespan did not generally apply to Soul Reapers, many of them were centuries old, some of them even millenia old, but that did not mean that time passed any less slowly for them. Days were still days, years were still years, decades were still decades... the wait between when she asked him to tell her the truth and when he finally found his voice seemed interminable.

His hand lifted to cup her small cheek in the large, warm rough square of his palm. His face was unguarded, his eyes weren't hard or shuttered, his expression wasn't feirce or angry or carefully blank, in fact he seemed infused with an inner light. All of that light was focused on her.

"I love you," he said softly.