Chapter Text
The Sōtaichō Kyōraku is waiting for Ichigo the moment he steps out of the Senkaimon. The two Shinigami escorts leading Ichigo bow low to Kyōraku, then shuffle aside to make way for Ichigo himself. He approaches the dark-haired man and gives him a solemn nod.
“Sup,” Ichigo says, then carries on immediately without additional formalities, “Where’s the place?”
Kyōraku gives Ichigo a grim smile, finding his lack of decorum to be as amusing as always. It’s a breath of fresh air for him, for he is almost always surrounded by rule-bound officiants these years. Nanao may occasionally break face in private, and sometimes even in public, but she is one soul in a sea of many.
Kyōraku shakes his head, ridding himself of his straying thoughts, then returns to more pressing matters. “Follow me.” He turns with a sweep and strides off, knowing Ichigo will be close to heel.
The gate Ichigo departed from is a fair distance away from Muken, but Kyōraku seems to want to walk instead of taking hurried Shunpos toward their destination. Ichigo can’t say he’s pleased by that, but he doesn’t want to kick up a fuss. While his heart says he wants to get this over and done with quickly so he can go home, he knows things involving Aizen are never quick nor easy.
Their journey takes them into a building, then down a seemingly endless flight of staircases. Ichigo is sure they’re underground by now, but he doesn’t have an efficient way to determine how far.
The bottom of the stairs leads to a small outpost manned by three souls. One man sits at a terminal, and two guardsmen observe by a door. They all salute Kyōraku and shoot Ichigo a look, appearing nervous, but saying nothing.
Kyōraku nods to them, then walks toward the door, which opens to reveal it’s an elevator. That makes Ichigo blink, but he lets it pass because Soul Society has always been an eclectic mix of modern and olden times with no followable pattern. He follows Kyōraku into the room, but they cut their entourage down from six guards trailing them to just the two who once guarded the door. Ichigo figures they are necessary to navigate the prison.
The ride is long enough that Ichigo crosses his arms lightly and he taps a finger against his elbow with near impatience. He is antsy, which isn’t surprising. Hearing ‘Aizen has unexpectedly disappeared’ would set anyone on edge, really—but Ichigo most of all, for he had suffered and sacrificed much to defeat him.
With a smooth jolt, the elevator arrives at their destination, and the door opens into a hallway. Ichigo hasn’t realized it until now, but ever since they started their descent down the initial flight of steps, the entire area is blanketed in darkness. The only sources of light are torch sconces inlaid into the walls. Otherwise, there is nothing but an infinite, abyssal darkness. Ichigo is unsure if there are walls, or if it’s simply a space that stretched onward without end.
The vibes of Muken make Ichigo shiver as he follows Kyōraku into the hallway. It’s a short walk and Ichigo blinks in surprise when he realizes they have arrived at a door. It feels like this is the final one, with the way Kyōraku has grown tenser by each footfall.
They all stop right before entering. Kyōraku turns to look at Ichigo, then gestures to the door. “It doesn’t seem like much,” he begins, amused, “but this is Muken.”
“Well, I figured you all wanted to stuff Aizen into the deepest hole you could find, so this is…an on-the-nose location.”
“Heh.”
Kyōraku’s reply is more subdued than usual, although Ichigo can’t rightly say he knows the man that well. He knows him decently, at least, to say that Kyōraku is typically a cheerful, if not subtly sardonic, man.
“I wanted to send in other investigators, but no one can pass this door. I had been considering taking a step in myself, but Nanao suggested sending you in first.” Kyōraku shrugs, eyes suddenly shadowed and looking tired. “Can’t risk the commander walking headfirst into danger and all that.”
“Yeah,” Ichigo replies agreeably. “If you had to pick only one person, it makes sense to send me, anyway.” He throws his hands up in a brief shrug. “Well, let’s get going then.”
Kyōraku steps aside to give Ichigo unfettered access to the door, which he approaches. His hands grow clammy as anticipation swells. Ichigo reaches out, touches the knob, and expects a jolt, but he feels nothing but cold steel. He twists the knob and pushes the door open. He’s surprised to find it moves just fine, but then finds the insides to be more inky darkness. Ichigo surmises this is the reason no one could enter. He steels himself, then steps toward it and pushes. There’s resistance, but it’s not enough to stop Ichigo from entering.
The inside isn’t as empty or what Ichigo expects. The air is still, like a mausoleum. Ichigo expects Aizen’s cell to be hollow and without comfort, but he finds someone has decorated the insides with linens draped over pieces of possible furniture, if only they had features. The shape of the coverings appears almost ritualistic in a way. The bolts of cloth converge center, merging in a pile and draped across a raised stand. It almost looks like an altar, really, and the feeling is only compounded when accounting for the Hōgyoku resting atop the bolts of cloth like a sacred treasure.
Ichigo continues to weigh his options. Things involving Aizen and the Hōgyoku always promised a headache. But could he really change his mind and leave now? He doubts there are other people who can handle dealing with Aizen’s messes. Maybe Kyōraku, sure, but Ichigo has something no one else has: experience putting down aspirant gods.
He sighs, then takes a step further into the room until he’s standing in front of the ‘altar.’ Ichigo has already decided to touch it, as he’s not one to linger on what-ifs anymore, and won’t allow himself to dawdle on doubts. He’s learned by now to simply do and deal with the consequences as they come.
Ichigo reaches out and touches the Hōgyoku to inspect it deeper, and to bring it outside the room if he can’t glean any information on his own. He’s the brash type that discovers by doing, not loitering.
Upon touching the orb, Ichigo’s vision abruptly fades to complete darkness. He cannot discern his own body, but he wants to say he’s surprised and looking around wildly.
Is he holding his hand in front of his face? Ichigo doesn’t know. Is he even awake? He doesn’t know that either. He feels like he’s drifting in and out of sleep, but he can’t be sure.
Eventually, consciousness finds Ichigo, and reality seats his ass in a patch of dirt.
Ichigo searches around and picks up sights of worn down hovels that cannot even be considered shacks.
That was…abrupt.
Ichigo blinks, then rises to his feet. He dusts himself off, then pats his hands together to remove more dust. Mostly, he’s doing this to buy some time as he gathers his wits about him. Ichigo’s been through his fair share of ridiculous encounters, so touching the Hōgyoku, blacking out, and waking up in a random place couldn’t be wild enough to flummox him. It is disorientating, though. Ichigo has no idea where he is, which is…concerning.
Ichigo contemplates his situation. He thinks that perhaps this is an elaborate trick or illusion, but recalls Kyōka Suigetsu has never influenced him. Ichigo spends more moments considering whether Aizen would need to do that anymore in order to perform illusions, considering he fused with the Deus Ex Hōgyoku. Couldn’t he pull illusions without preamble now? Ichigo can’t quite recall. Regardless, Aizen’s mind games never really worked on Ichigo.
With a sigh, he begins his investigation in earnest. Ichigo starts down the dirt path. He sees people who avoid him and tries their best not to make eye contact with him. Ichigo notes it as odd, but doesn’t make a comment or take any action.
He works to piece together his potential whereabouts, but Ichigo doesn’t recognize the area. From what he can gather, it looks like an exceptionally run-down village. The people here are skeletal, held together by skin and little else. They looked so starved, belonging more to a horror movie rather than reality.
Ichigo returns to his initial thought that perhaps this is all an illusion, so he reaches out to a hovel and touches it. The splintered wood feels solid underneath his fingertips, if not damp because of the excessive humidity. Ichigo draws his hand away to look at his fingers. He rubs them together, testing and feeling the grit of wood shavings on his fingerpads./p>
Ichigo blinks and finally notices the sound of cicadas. It’s normally a noise he filters out, but he notes it now because it’s important: the setting is somewhere in the early summer. Ichigo recalls he entered the Seireitei during winter. This is an abrupt change that unsettles him further.
He ignores the stares he catches in his peripherals. The people here are trying their best to gawk at him without being caught, but no one seems hostile. No, that was wrong. Rather, no one here is a threat, even if hostile and potentially harboring malicious intent. They all regard Ichigo with spiteful looks, but no one seems willing to attack him. He leaves them to their business and continues on with his.
Though the reactions and movements of the people confuse him, Ichigo has other things to worry about. He continues to follow the dirt path and takes in his surroundings as he goes. He is still unsure of where he is, except that he is in an area with little to no technology present, and the people are melancholic and frightful.
Ichigo considers perhaps asking a local about the area, but he isn’t sure what to question them about. He imagines ‘Where am I?’ would draw suspicion, if anyone even deigns to speak with him.
He carries on, walking for another stretch. The sights barely change. As Ichigo surveys his surroundings, he picks up the faintest hint of reiatsu on the edges of his senses. It’s small and furtive, almost like the person is weak or nascent and doesn’t have much to them yet.
Ichigo notices something else too, off the back of this newest discovery. He pauses his stride and scans the area, then takes a moment out to do it again, but with his spiritual awareness. Humans don’t carry a lot of reiatsu in them, but the people around Ichigo are like flares. They are spirits?
This knowledge disturbs Ichigo further. So, he’s still in Soul Society, he surmises. But where? …The Rukongai? This place might match a description of what he had heard about the place. So, after touching the Hōgyoku, he’s been tossed out into the Rukongai as punishment. Well. He’ll just have to get back to the Seireitei, then, and report his findings. Ichigo figures this must be an annoying defense mechanism for the Hōgyoku to prevent tampering.
Oh, well. Nothing a few Shunpos can’t take care of.
But, before he leaves, Ichigo wants to investigate the largest mote of reiatsu. There’s something to it that catches his attention and nettles his insides. His instincts have latched on and won’t release its bite. It keeps telling him, ‘this is important.’ He’s seen and felt this reiatsu before.
Ichigo walks into a dark alleyway between two buildings and follows its serpentine path. Perhaps in such an inauspicious place, he might have been mugged if the people were more daring. However, he knows he exudes an aura that must certainly be intimidating. By his expression alone, Ichigo figures he is unapproachable and unfriendly looking. Sometimes, it was a detriment, but today, he’s thankful he has a scary face.
Ichigo dismisses his idle thoughts when he reaches the source of the reiatsu. It emanates from a child with an unruly, tangled mop of hair. Like everyone else around Ichigo, the kid’s hair is matted and dirty. Ichigo is unsure if his hair is brown because of that, or if it were naturally the color. Ichigo, however, has the slightest inkling that it’s perhaps the latter when the child looks up at him, eyes wary.
Ichigo has seen those eyes before, but more sharp and discerning than wary, guarded, and plainly fearful. He spends a moment to consider that he has never seen fear before in those eyes until now. He almost dismisses the pity he feels, but then recalls this is—
What sits before him, curled into a ball and looking exhausted and beaten, is just a kid. He’s huddled underneath what Ichigo figures should be an awning if there was more cloth. There’s just enough to keep the mop of dirty hair out of the drizzle should the rains come, but little else.
Ichigo hesitates for a moment longer but decides the only way to get answers is to keep plowing forward. He walks closer, making the kid draw back in alarm before his face screws up into a mockery of defiance and bravery. It’s almost heartbreaking how hard he tries to maintain a strong front, but his body—and likely mind—is no older than Kazui.
Ichigo crouches down and holds himself as non-threateningly as he could. He imagines it might be difficult, with his enormous sword draped across his back. It is an imposing piece of mastercraft and the tip digs into the ground as Ichigo maintains his crouch. He keeps his movements slow as he reaches a hand out in as welcoming a gesture as he can get. He wants to say something, but words fail him. What could he say in this situation? There are a lot of things wrong here and Ichigo doesn’t know how to address any of it.
He eventually settles on, “I’m not going to hurt you.” His voice rings clear through the stifling silence, making the boy before him flinch in surprise. Ichigo watches as those irises steel themselves marginally as his face screws up in determination.
“W-Who are you? What do you want?”
Ichigo is quiet at first. He has been presented with another piece of evidence pointing at something that is obvious, but he simply didn’t want to accept it at first; not until the boy in question responded to him, as any living being was wont to do.
“I’m… Someone who is worried about you.” He tried for comforting and perhaps friendliness, but that has achieved the opposite of what he wants.
The boy grows more guarded by the second. He furls around himself and almost becomes a ball. If he could, the kid would have scooted away further, but he’s currently pressed against the wall. “I don’t know you,” he replies, as petulant as a child could. “Go away.”
Ichigo wants to say, ‘But I know you,’ but decides not to in the end. Perhaps that’s not the way to go about it. Instead, he fibs a little by feeding the fearful boy a bit of the truth. “I was walking around when I detected your aura. You seem—” Ichigo stopped, unable to put the feeling into words. He’s not sure if it’s because he expects a vast reservoir of power to emanate from someone he mentally dubbed as ‘Aizen Sōsuke,’ or if it’s because the boy before him is actually this weak. He looks malnourished and fading by the moment.
“You seem to be hurt.” Ichigo isn’t sure if that’s the best thing to say, but it is the only thing he can think of. “Do you need—some reiatsu?” He’s never healed anyone before, and only understood spiritual healing in theory. In vague theory. Yet, Ichigo still pushes his hand out toward Aizen, having never dropped it in the first place. It’s palm up, welcoming and patient.
The more kindness Ichigo shows, the more doubtful Aizen becomes. He has stopped being as fearful, at least, and seems more defiant as the seconds tick on. “I’m hungry,” he replies tersely, as if that was all the answer Ichigo needs. Perhaps it truly is, but Ichigo is ignorant of the workings of Soul Society, so he doesn’t know what to do with that knowledge.
Ichigo glances at his surroundings. He can only see the sides of the ‘buildings,’ but the intent and message are the same. “There’s not much around here,” Ichigo states, more to himself than to Aizen. He receives a baleful look for his foolish comment, but Ichigo lets the brattiness pass. He’s been subjected to it often enough. Children are children.
Perhaps that’s what unnerves Ichigo the most. He’s come across the spiritual pressure he cannot mistake for anyone else, but he’s not sure how he’s supposed to feel about a small, five-year-old-looking Aizen. A part of his mind still thinks this is all a trick, but Ichigo doesn’t know the purpose for such a ruse. What was the gain? Sympathy? That seems foolish and not like something Aizen would do.
“Hello?” The annoyed voice of a pipsqueak cuts through Ichigo’s thoughts, drawing his attention back to Aizen. “Don’t stare like that.”
“Sorry,” Ichigo says. He lets out a sigh before licking his lips. He is stalling for fractions of seconds, but that’s enough for him to decide on his next move. “I was thinking about something. Why don’t you come with me and I get you something to eat?”
“Why? How?” Aizen keeps his words short and lets his eyes do all the talking. He thinks Ichigo is lying or being absurd, or both, and is entirely unmoved.
“Because. I’ve got a weak spot for kids, and you’re the sorriest-looking one I’ve ever seen.”
Insults seem to be what Aizen is used to, because he seems less ‘taken aback and guarded,’ and more ‘belligerent and exasperated.’ That makes him open up more, but if he realizes it or not, Ichigo cannot tell.
“Go away,” Aizen replies, lacking anything better. He only has the mantle of immaturity to wear as his own and has nothing else by defense.
“Not without you.”
“Why?”
“Like I said. I can’t look at someone who’s suffering and leave them to their fate.”
Aizen surges forward, eyes blazing, and points around wildly with his small, feeble hands. “What about everyone else? They hurt too. Go talk to them.”
Ichigo is quiet for a moment. He settles down to sit on his ass, legs crossed. Aizen looks defeated when he realizes Ichigo isn’t going away anytime soon. “I used to have a bit of a savior complex,” Ichigo shares, surprising himself with how honest he’s being. With Aizen. With Kid Aizen—but maybe that’s why Ichigo is so free with his words. This is a child, or an illusion, and as far as Ichigo is concerned, telling the truth has worked out better for him than lies.
“A…?” Aizen’s brows wrinkle, letting Ichigo know he’s not yet the smart aleck he grows to be in the future. The thought makes Ichigo flinch, causing Aizen to mirror his movements. “Hey!” he cries, suddenly scared again. Aizen pulls away and just about cowers, though he does it with a prideful glare at Ichigo. He’s ready to be beaten, but won’t take it without dignity. He has his hands raised to protect his head, but he still stares at Ichigo.
Seeing the response breaks Ichigo’s heart. He lets out a sigh. “Hey. I promise you I won’t hurt you.” He holds out his hand, pinky up. “Promise.”
“What are you doing?”
“Making a promise.”
“That’s not how you make promises.”
“It is where I come from. Here, hold out your pinky too. We wrap them together like this and then we make our promise.” Ichigo is only mildly surprised Aizen lets him touch him to move his hand around.
Their pinkies touch and Ichigo curls his digit around Aizen’s stiff, unmoving finger. “See? Pinky promises are like super promises. Can’t break ‘em unless you want to break your pinky finger.” Ichigo is fibbing a little, but he can’t help but start treating Aizen like he would Kazui. Every so often, Ichigo would blink and see the face of his son superimposed over Aizen’s. He realizes with a blink that he misses his kid already. Ichigo can’t wait to go home and tell his family the wild tale that’s only just beginning.
“O…kay,” Aizen replies slowly. He lets his finger curl just as slowly until their pinkies intertwine. “No hitting.”
Ichigo’s voice is grim, as is his impression. He’s growing furious as he imagines what Aizen must have been subjected to in order to elicit such a response. Ichigo’s wiser to the way of the world and imagines a place such as this is far from friendly, but he’s still pissed all the same. “Yeah,” Ichigo finally agrees aloud. “No hitting. I won’t yell at you either. Well, if you do something bad, I’ll try not to yell. But if we get excited, then we can yell all we want.”
“No.” Aizen jerks his hand away. “Loud voices are bad.” He almost cups his head and curls up more, but stops himself. Aizen still possesses a sort of dignity that has yet to be beaten out of him, to which Ichigo cannot help but pity the boy more.
“We’ll work on that,” Ichigo says, then rises to his feet. He dusts off his ass, then looks at Aizen expectantly, who has yet to stand. “Well? Let’s go.”
“Where?”
“I don’t know. Anywhere? We’ve got to get you fed.” Ichigo eyes Aizen’s frame, emaciated and pitiable. He resists the urge to sigh, knowing in his mind that it would only make Aizen upset and self-conscious.
The boy eyes him in return for a long moment. His thoughts are clear as day in his eyes, which startles Ichigo. He’s used to an Aizen who is unfathomable. Perhaps this kid version of him has yet to learn how to mask his emotions, and if Ichigo has a say about it, he won’t let him learn.
Ichigo brings his head up to look around at his surroundings while Aizen wrestles with his inner thoughts. Ichigo reaches his hand up to brush his bangs out of his face, slicking it back along his head. He needs a bit of a haircut, but Orihime had insisted he leave his hair long like that because she thinks he looks handsome. Ichigo suddenly feels a pang of longing as it sets in that perhaps he may be here for a while, elbow-deep in the next spot of drama that Soul Society has found itself in.
Movement catches Ichigo’s eyes and he looks down to see Aizen clamber to his feet. He has his lower lip pushed out, almost in a pout, but appears to trust Ichigo enough to follow his lead. Ichigo gives Aizen another assessing look before he holds out his hand. “I don’t know how crowded it is here,” he explains to Aizen’s questioning look, “but I don’t want to risk getting separated.”
The boy’s face twists into another look of doubtfulness. “Why do you try so hard? Who are you?”
It tempted Ichigo to reply, ‘Just a nice guy,’ but he figures that would be more off-putting than reassuring. Instead, he peers into the depths of Aizen’s eyes and says, “You’ll become important to someone one day. I’m here to make sure you don’t lose your way.”
Aizen doesn’t look like he buys it, but he doesn’t question it either. He takes Ichigo’s proffered hand and allows him to lead him wherever.