Unity, I thought, implies the possibility of disunity. Beginnings imply and require endings.

-Ann Leckie

"You know this is for your own good." Isshin had practiced the words in his head for as many days. Urahara was terribly inventive when it came down to it. The room was specially prepared out of the maze of rooms contained in the Shoten, inland kido spells prevented detection while a simple lock on the door kept him from escaping through more normal means.

The room was simple, a cot, table and cardboard box filled with white T-shirts, jeans and tennis shoes. Isshin had even remembered a few of his son's favorite books.

None of it mattered.

Ichigo resented him. He could see it in his glassy eyes, in the flicker of yellow swimming in the amber irises. Several times, he had thought of asking him if he had any memories, where his recollections began. But he had been afraid. What if Ichigo remembered everything? What if remembered the rain-drenched cemetery and the glowing sword that was not a sword anymore but a weapon of pure energy? Did he remember being pierced by it through the place where he had lost his heart…screaming in a containment cube, transferred by Tessai's immediate and imperfect spell-casting to the shoten? All the way through it, Amakusa had stood there beside the small woman he had rendered inert with kido. Kuchiki lay on the sodden grass, pushed under by a will stronger than her own. Amakusa wouldn't assist them at all, watching with dark inscrutable eyes.

Urahara said they could never be certain it would be entirely safe. He had thought once they could build a new gigai for his son. They could move away and start over. With a sinking heart, he began to think it was never going to happen.

"Why do you bother?"

His son lay stretched out full-length on the bed, arms propped beneath his head, eyes focused on him.

"No reason, I thought you might like the company." Isshin said easily. He set up the folding chair they had left behind for when he wanted to visit. Every time he did, Ichigo's face sunk into a deep scowl, his mouth turned upside down. For years it was an expression he had become accustomed to, a look of deeply ingrained unhappiness or dissatisfaction with life. Ichigo wore a scowl perpetually since Masaki's death. Isshin had tried his goofball act to get his children to keep smiling, but sometimes he was aware of how it failed, only exasperating them more.

The first time he had seen Ichigo in that room, he had tried carrying on as he always had.

"Who in the hell are you?" Ichigo had asked with little heat in his voice, only annoyed at this pushy stranger who kept badgering him.

"I'm your dad," Isshin had thought it was a pale imitation of the infamous Star Wars denouement. "Don't you remember me?"

"No." Flat, without consideration. Abject as if nothing remained in his head. Ichigo hadn't ignored him, maybe that was worse. He had only stared at him like one would a stranger, waiting for them to make the first move. Sometimes the hostility wasn't so veiled. Isshin had broken down once he left the shoten on those days. It wasn't right for Urahara to see him like that. He had even taken to visiting Masaki's grave, becoming a familiar sight for the groundskeeper.

"I'm going to talk about your first day at school." I'm going to keep talking until you remember, he thought stubbornly.

Ichigo's eyes flickered from him to the ceiling. "Do whatever you want. It isn't like I can get away from you or get you to shut up."

He lapsed into silence, hurt. Was it really not helping? He was a patient man, but even he had limits. There was anger in Ichigo's voice that he didn't understand. "Why are you angry? This place is for your own good."

"I'm not -" Ichigo stopped short. "You wouldn't understand." The tail end of the sentence ended in a snap.

"Try me."

Their eyes met and Ichigo was the one to look away.

"You said it yourself…my own good."

Ah. So he was chafing at being locked up. Furious because he was being treated like a wild animal.

"It's Kuchiki Rukia you should turn your anger on."

She made you what you are and no matter how I'm trying I can't seem to fix you.

Ichigo looked at him hard, the anger simmering beneath the surface rising up to a boiling point. "If that's the case then where is Rukia? I would rather see her than you."

This last stabbed him deep. All of Isshin's words failed him and he averted his face. "I'll come and see you when you're more attuned to reason."

...

His heart was no longer in it. Toya had sent Hiyori to collect the bounty on a minor pair of Hollows ravaging parts of Sendai Province in the living world. After setting up a containment field, they'd lured them within, slaying them quickly. He couldn't explain the disappointment he felt to his irritable blonde partner.

The subject of the ex Twelfth Division Taichou was still a sore one with Sarugaki. He supposed he didn't blame her. She had been roped into his charge of illegal experimentation, nearly suffering the same punishment of execution by sundown. He supposed she was guilty by association and some wouldn't openly speak with her anymore, pretending she didn't exist. It was complicated to say the least and now to think Aizen was behind everything...well, he didn't blame her if she vented her frustrations on weak Hollows.

For his part,

Urahara would do nothing, his hands were tied in a sense, and that left them as open targets.

...he couldn't avoid responsibility anymore.

…

Rukia turned over the pages of the sketch pad Toya had brought her. He had said they were both stressed out over the events from the past week. Until he was sure she had cooled her heels off, he was making sure she wasn't on the mission roster. Despite her protests, he insisted. Once, Toya had threatened to name his reasons for her needing a break to Kanzaki, she had reluctantly agreed.

They didn't need her freezing up or so went his argument. Rukia wanted to shout she hadn't frozen up, she had...acted on what she'd wanted to do. He wasn't censuring her, Toya's eyes had pleaded with her to understand, he just wanted her to think clearly.

So now he went on missions with Hiyori.

Kanzaki had taken up cooking duties.

And she was alone. Rukia scribbled over her drawing of cutesy characters, flopping off the bed. She padded barefoot downstairs, avoiding the kitchen where the sound of pots and pans clattering brought to mind chaos.

He was trying.

She understood he was trying to work through his grief by learning a new skill. If Hiyori's takeout containers wouldn't stop appearing, she would've said he was successful. At least he wasn't cooped up in his room every day. At least he was trying to work through it.

She went to the connecting door that resonated with Toya's spirit pressure. She laid a hand upon it, calming her mind as he'd said, then she went inside. In the murky gloom of mid-afternoon, the windowless room had a set of paper lanterns in discreet corners. Rukia put her palms together, summoning a will o'wisp kido ball for light. Her objective being the bookshelf across from his work bench which contained textbooks from the academy.

He had bought most of his extensive collection, receiving some in upper division coursework as gifts from his mentors. Rukia had traced the spidery inscriptions with a faint smile. She rarely if ever had received gifts from anyone, none especially from her academy instructors. She ran her gaze over the titles now, selecting a few ponderous tomes for personal study.

Rukia carried her burden upstairs, settling in with a cup of lukewarm tea. She flipped through well-worn pages, spotting ink splotches from Toya's strong flourish-laden writing. Notations dotted side columns; asterisks marked important sub-sections. Rukia went through the section on Hado, then flipped all the way back to the index.

...the spells weren't categorized by power level...

She went through them slower, frustratedly trying to remember Toya's exact words. Rukia hadn't been as unconscious as he would've liked once he had taken her back to Soul Society. She had lain still while they talked above her. Only parts of their conversation had stuck with her, the most important of those concerning Ichigo's father. He wanted to split Ichigo's soul from the Hollow, was it even possible? Rukia couldn't fathom the kind of power it would take to cast something so devastating, let alone embed the spell into an object. She looked twice, then reached for an older book with a crumbling spine.

...if the spell was forbidden, it stood to reason it wouldn't be in newer textbooks.

She found it. The book opened up to the page it was on as if Toya had consulted it frequently. Taizokai, Bakudo 109. A hand-inked mandala of Buddhist origin occupied the opposite page. "Twelve hand gestures are required to initiate the spell as the following incantation is recited." Rukia read the words silently, trying to imagine the sacrificial attitude of the caster as the spell took form. Toya had said it was sacrificial in nature yet it wasn't mentioned anywhere. His sensei must've told him. "It is known to be a positive casting if the caster glimpses the serene face of Mahavairocana, who signifies sunyata, emptiness. His serene image is surrounded by the always tranquil place, the pure land." The passage went further to describe tenets of Shingon Buddhism whose concepts inspired the creation of the final five spells of level ten bakudo.

"...all conditioned existence is empty and without permanent identity." She frowned down at the text. "But what does it do?" She couldn't see how a spell epitomizing emptiness could split two souls. Unless...she was startled by the sound of a door slamming below. Quickly, Rukia closed the slim book and slid it under her mattress, pulling one of the newer books toward her and flipping to a random spot. She had barely done this when she heard footfalls on the stairs.

…

"There's something wrong with him." Isshin slammed the door. Urahara looked up mildly from behind his fan. "Of course there is. He's not the same human boy he was months ago."

"No, it's not that! He almost doesn't remember me." Isshin ran his hand frustrated through his hair causing the spikes to rise higher than usual. "Maybe it was the sword. The spell wasn't strong enough to sever their souls."

"Listen, Ichigo is the dominant soul right now. I watched his form become that of a human soul." Urahara had begun to fear the spell hadn't been done right. "Taizokai was meant to cleanse the Hollow while White Dragon performed the severing." Would Amakusa have avoided the outright sacrificial aspect of the spell to save himself? The answer was yes. Anyone would except for someone with close ties to the afflicted.

"You must remember, your son is like half a person."

The other scowled, furious. "I can understand no one comes back themselves, but that still doesn't explain everything! Why does he have memories of that Shinigami? Clearer than seemingly the fifteen years he spent alive?"

At that revelation, Urahara's shadowed eyes widened briefly. He hadn't thought it possible for Ichigo to retain many memories of the Hollow's period of domination. His lack of surety, held his tongue. He didn't have all the answers.

"He asked for her," Isshin sank down to the floor resigned, as if all his energy were spent. "That bitch who killed him."

Urahara didn't have to ask, he knew as his shadowed eyes lowered pensively. Kuchiki Rukia. The one soul Ichigo's Hollow self had stalked for months since the death of his soul seemed to the one thing he held onto to the point of obsession. "Perhaps, we should allow Rukia-san to see him."

...

Toya leaned in the doorway, after a brisk knock to announce himself, he had simply opened the door. Rukia sat up quickly from where she'd been reclining beside one of his advanced kido textbooks.

"I need to talk to you."

"Is it about the book?" She gestured to the small pile beside her for meaning. "I didn't get permission beforehand to take them out of your room."

"No, that's okay. I was going to tell you to start practicing level four destruction spells without incantation anyway." His gaze lowered. "It's about Kurosaki." He stopped and gestured. "Can I come in?"

"Sure."

Toya closed the door, then went and sat on the edge of Hiyori's rumpled bed. "Some weeks ago, my old sensei, Tessai Tsukabishi, asked me to help him create a kido sword."

Her heart started to pound uncomfortably hard. This was likely connected to that little bit she'd overheard while under the kido-induced sleep. "I saw them mentioned in Advanced Techniques."

"Yeah, they're somewhat rare now that the Kidoshu doesn't actively participate in conflict." Now, came the hardest part. Rukia could see him hesitating. "He was making the sword for Isshin Kurosaki. They believed...well, that it was possible to use kido to sever two souls. Kurosaki was trying to save his son." Toya didn't want to go into how risky the maneuver was. "They weren't going to purify him." He looked at her small white face, the color drained from it and sighed. "At best, it's only for a proper goodbye."

"What do you mean?"

"His son is now the dominant soul. The Hollow's lost its power."

She started up to her feet, hope eclipsing all else in her expression. "Can I see him?"

"That's up to them. I just wanted to let you know my part, and also for you to understand the scope of what can be done with kido."

Rukia fell silent, she wanted to ask how they'd achieved the impossible. At the moment, she couldn't fathom how kido could resurrect something of him. Her thoughts turned toward the idea of a kido sword.

"I want to make one."

"Rukia, you need a base. They used Kurosaki's zanpakuto, but-"

"I have one." She had written to Haruka, about the gifts he had sent her. Although she appreciated the delicate workmanship, she couldn't in good conscience keep anything. Haruka had sent her a response, gently encouraging her to keep the small chest and dagger. Rukia thought of it now, wrapped in linen placed carefully at the bottom of the chest of drawers.

She took out the beautiful ninjato now. Toya whistled softly at the impressive workmanship from Omaeda's shop. "This'll work wonderfully."

She knelt on the bed, biting her lip anxiously. "Do you think I can do it?" Rukia was used to being doubted, reminded she was less than other Shinigami.

He smiled, gently setting it down. "You can do anything you want to do if you set your mind to it. I must warn you, though, it'll probably take longer to form a full blade. Think of it like your final if you were still in school. I was kind of planning on it anyway."

She didn't really want to think about her days in the academy, that would just dredge up memories of Renji...but they were friends again. Rukia had begun to feel like their relationship, although not as close as the one she had formed with the Sugeki, had healed. She could count on Renji to support her if she needed it. "I'm better now," she met his gaze unflinchingly. "Really. I want us to start our search in Hueco Mundo."

...

Some part of him knew Isshin was his father. That part was faint, buried beneath layers of fury, pain and other unnamable things. On some level he knew he was Ichigo Kurosaki, son of Isshin. At one time he had two sisters and a mother who had died, but their faces, their voices were a distant echo. The only thing left were the trace of strong emotions.

Ichigo craved emotion. Emotions made him feel something than the subtle emptiness, the sharpness of its edges in the center of his being. He let himself feel anger toward Isshin. If Isshin had loved him as much as he claimed then he shouldn't have let anything happen to his family.

He raged like a caged lion or tiger, a beast in the veil of a human soul. He raged against the bars of his cage, abusing his wardens with foul words,, pounding at the walls, at the door until he thought he would go crazy.

There was nothing else for him. No life, no future college, no girlfriend, no friends. No children's memorials to defend. Nothing that had made him who he was. Ichigo slunk to the bed, folding his long legs beneath him, pondering Isshin's words.

"It's Kuchiki Rukia you should turn your anger on."

Rukia.

A face of pale skin, large blue-violet eyes, black hair surfaced. She was unsmiling, perpetually serious, shouting. He had seen her - many times - but where?

Rukia kneeling over him, pushing green light from her hands into his cut and bleeding body. Was that even a memory?

Rukia blocking a reversed edge sword wielded by a man with long dark hair pulled into an untidy ponytail.

Rukia's bloody lips shaking as she struggled not to cry. In his most vivid memory, she stood on a sandy plain, her reddish black clothing in tatters exposing her body more than what was decent, her pale skin glistening with the refractive glow of ice crystals.

Vividly, he remembered the salty-sweet taste of her skin on his tongue, a sensory sensation that caused a deep blush to creep up his neck and his pants to feel tight. Who was Rukia to him? Where was she? It was driving him up the wall not to be able to see her. Isshin had looked like he had been slapped in the face when Ichigo had asked where Rukia was.

...

Over dinner of shoyu pork ramen, Kanzaki set aside his napkin. "I'm going to resume leadership."

"Are you sure?" Toya was pushing around tiny scallions through brown sauced noodles. Rukia thought the petite bites of pork were perfectly savory. She cast a worried glance to the two empty chairs opposite.

...Sarugaki was missing out.

"No one blames you if you still want to hold off."

"I'm fine." He stopped him with a look. "We're no closer to stopping Aizen by me wallowing in self-pity here. We need leads," he sighed when Toya set down his chopsticks.

"We might have one." Toya looked over at her. "Rukia, would you like to tell him what we've learned?"

"O-Okay!" A little surprised, she quickly summarized the Hollows in Menos Forest appearing organized. The few Vasto Lordes strength Hollows and one...,

"Starrk? That bit about crushing your souls reminds me of Valle de Las Almas. If this Vasto Lorde or Arrancar owned the territory, it stands to reason he's either allied with Aizen already or could've witnessed something."

"I didn't think about them being connected like that." Toya admitted, lifting his glass of water.

Kanzaki bridged his fingertips together, meal forgotten. "How did you guys find this all out?"

"We," Toya hesitated for the length of a heartbeat, catching her eye. "...interrogated one of those Hollows. Unfortunately, it didn't know where we could find the others."

"We can sense them," Rukia spoke up. She was subtly relieved he hadn't mentioned Ulquiorra knowing how Kanzaki would've gone off the deep end. "They're the strongest in Hueco Mundo that we know of. Just pick one and head in their direction."

"That would require several days to get a good fix." He said, but seemingly approved. "It would also be dangerous. You'd have to travel under the radar..."

"I have some reiatsu-suppresant cloaks I was working on." Toya offered, a little of the old glint came into his eyes. "With some lightweight gear, we could camp out under the never-ending moon, only fight when necessary."

"It's risky. But I'm liking it so far. What do we do when we find one of them?"

"Hope they're reasonable." Rukia said, "and hope they know something that can point us to something concrete about Aizen's dealings."

...

A mixture of anxiety and excitement gripped Rukia. She didn't sleep much that night, rising early in the morning to the sound of snores coming from the other bed. She stretched her arms up, glancing over to see Hiyori sprawled across the coverlet, still wearing her crimson shihakusho. The midget blonde smelled of cheap Sake when Rukia drew near. Shaking her head slightly, she showered and dressed in a purple yukata.

Toya was down below in his workshop, inspecting finely woven filaments of kido into a span of silky dark cloth spread out over the table. When the worklamp's light hit the material, the cloth altered color. "Are those the cloaks?" She asked, eyes wide.

"One of them." He answered, running the cloth through his hands, checking the seam. "I used to joke to Rizu that I was going to make our uniforms out of this." He held it up to his body for example. "Kind of a peekaboo effect when worn right. Needless to say, she shot me down pretty fast."

Rukia found a smile forming. "She told me once you were perverted in a suave way."

"Ouch." He said, grinning. "Sounds about right." They were both quiet for a few minutes, absorbing the feeling of camaraderie. Recovering from the loss of a friend was easier when you had someone to share grief with. Rukia could think of Rizu without her throat tightening as much. She could smile now and think of the way forward, knowing she had people who supported her. "I want to ask Kurosaki-san if I can see him."

Toya set aside the cloak. "Okay...now? We'll be missing Kanzaki's gourmet breakfast."

"The more for Hiyori." She said, smirking. If she knew the blonde any, Sarugaki would be positively ravenous with a hangover once she had slept enough.

...

Isshin had taken Ichigo's breakfast out with the teenager's grumpy voice rebounding after him.

He didn't want anything.

Not his favorite, not upside smiles of condiments in his plate.

"Now he's refusing to eat." Isshin said in disgust, scraping the contents of the plate in the trash can. Truth be told, he didn't know what to do with his son now that he had part of him back. "Sorry." He commented offhand to Ururu. The small girl shrugged, resuming washing dishes from Urahara's own morning meal. Isshin wandered through the maze of rooms to the main living quarters where he found Urahara poring over inventory lists. Ginta was busy stocking new items in the front with Tessai's help.

"I suggested we allow Rukia-san to see him." Urahara said without looking up.

"And I said no."

"It's your choice." The shopkeeper sounded tired of it. Isshin supposed obligating him to look after them both was unfair.

"I did suggest my gigai might be the best option for him."

The craving for tobacco had returned. He had forgotten how many packs he had smoked. "Ichigo has very little reiatsu right now." He was afraid of making his son independent again. Ichigo might run away first thing. Urahara's concern seemed limited now to reducing his son to even less of a threat, his reason being all that power the Hollow possessed, had to have gone somewhere. Isshin agreed, but for the meantime, he had very little resources in which to consider moving far from Karakura Town to restart life. He was about to outline his argument against using the illegal gigai when Tessai appeared at the door, giving a short bow.

"Excuse me, sir, Kurosaki-san, Toya and Kuchiki-san are here."

...

When Ichigo laid eyes on Amakusa Toya for the second time in his life, he despised him and he didn't know why. The man was around his height, with some muscle to his lean frame. He wore crimson robes, a black outer haori and sandals. In his mind's eye, he saw the man scooping up Rukia, embracing her hard in his arms. He saw the matched look of relief on her face, their hug extending to a small pigtailed girl whose freckled face looked close to a teary outburst.

He saw this man in the sky, slaying masked monsters, blasting them with light from his hands.

"Do you remember anything else from that time?"

Ichigo looked at them, seeing them, not seeing them. He saw a woman on the sand, fighting him tooth and nail. He tasted victory in her wounded body, in her thrashing form. The memory came of stabbing her, taking pleasure from the action, the blood like rubies spilling across the sand.

Just the same another memory slid into the gap of his conscious mind. Two young men looking at a board of numbers and names. Ranks. He was berated for being smart, almost top of the class. I'm not a punk, not really even though he acted like one.

Ichigo's left hand twitched.

"Nothing." He said, shrugging. He was getting better at lying. The fact that he was lying to their faces, lied to Isshin every day made him feel nothing. At least that part was true. He was just surprised his father had let them in.

"That's probably a blessing," Amakusa muttered, but didn't look as though he believed it.

Rukia looked at him, close to smiling. She was worried, he could tell. What had Isshin said? What had Urahara said? Had they mentioned his screaming fit, his initial wake up into this world of walls and no sunshine? Ichigo had raged for an hour, a seamless moment from blackness to a room he didn't recognize.

Rukia would worry more if he said it even casually.

- And Amakusa might take her away.

"Could you wait outside, Toya?" Her eyes were on him. The small girl so full of life from his scattered memories, was here now, present with that faint bite of cold he always associated with her presence. Ichigo shifted his glare to the tall dark-haired man, injecting his own punkish two cents. Amakusa, unfazed, shrugged.

"If you want, I guess." Amakusa in his ridiculous feudal getup, matched his stare. He let himself out into the hallway, sliding the outer bolt home. Now that he was alone with her, Ichigo could fully appreciate her small stature. Rukia wore a summer yukata patterned with tiny butterflies, past the knee. Her longish hair was bound up and fastened with a matching lacquered clip that coordinated with the double-strapped purse she had at her hip. When she was agitated, she worried her lip to pieces, which was what she did now.

"Who is he?"

"A friend." Her quick answer hid something. In Ichigo's mixed up memories, he thought he could ascribe another moniker to the man.

"Will you keep coming? It's only goat face," his expression twisted into a scowl. "-and he gets old fast."

"I'd like to, but-" She almost smiled again at his reference to his father.

"Amaku-or whoever won't let you."

-TBC

AN: We're under a mandatory stay at home order here, in light of that, I urge you all to stay safe and limit your face to face interactions with other people. In response to the global pandemic, I'm hoping to update and release new chapters. Another writer whose work I follow, has stated that fanfiction can be comforting to us as readers.

Hollow Ichigo will return. He isn't gone just yet...

Thanks for reading!

No flames!

Reviews loved and take care all!