I literally cannot express how sorry I am and I know no amount of apologies will make up for it. Just know that I had my own reasons for not updating and it was not on purpose or because I gave up on the story. I'm seeing this to the end. I'm thankful to those who've stayed till now and I'm sorry to have disappointed those who left.

Without further ado, let's jump into Soul Society. Literally.

At the risk of repeating myself, Ichigo Kurosaki is my property

"Akira?" the black cat looked at me intensely and I knew she had caught the glimmer of moisture in my eyes.

"Never mind now! Focus on the cannonball!" I barked and glared at the orb. Suddenly, the cannonball jolted and shot upwards with great force. There was a tense silence before Ganju spoke about there being a second part to the incantation, which he had to continue. Since he wouldn't be able to put in his reiatsu, we'd have to compensate for him.

And so we did, as he steadily began chanting words that had no meaning to me. Until, Ichigo's reiatsu began increasing more than the others. First Orihime spoke up, then Ishida and then Chad that his reiatsu was coming too strong. "Ichigo, damn it." I closed my eyes and placed my free hand on his shoulder, trying to regulate his reiatsu.

It was working a bit until Ichigo shook off my hand with a glare "I can do it myself."

Seriously? I just gave him a very unimpressed look. "If we die, you'll be to blame." I retorted and rolled my eyes. Ichigo must have been about to retort when Ganju suddenly screamed "DAMN YOU! I READ THE SAME LINE TWICE!"

"WHY ARE YOU YELLING AT ME?" Ichigo screamed back, startled.

"YOU KEPT YAPPING AND I LOST MY CONCENTRATION!"

Ishida and Inoue tried to calm them down, but my attention was drawn to the sight below us. An entire city of white buildings dotted with shinigami in black - Seireitei. "Guys, it's Seireitei!" I called out, catching everyone's attention.

"We're going to crash!" Ishida yelled in panic.

"It's unavoidable! Everyone put in your maximum reiatsu and make the cannonball as hard as possible!" Yoruichi sensei ordered. I closed my eyes and began liberally pouring in my reiatsu. I didn't catch Ishida and Inoue gawk at me as my reiatsu level was par with Ichigo's.

Suddenly, the cannonball hit the shield of Seireitei, It was an odd feeling, as if we were being suspended in a vacuum. It was dead silent for a moment as we floated slowly and the cannonball began breaking its shape. "Everybody don't separate!" Yoruichi sensei's voice pierced the silence, startling me.

"The shield was melted by the high concentration of reiatsu, this is just temporarily holding us together! Soon, a tornado will begin and if we separate, we'll be sent flying to different directions!" she yelled desperately.

With a jolt of horror, I realized that I had drifted farther from everyone in my reverie. Panicking, I tried to move my limbs through the air to get closer to the others when with a great rushing of wind, a tornado began swirling around us. Ganju swam through the air and latched onto Ichigo while Chad caught hold of Inoue.

"Everyone hold onto the person closest to you! Don't let go!" Yoruichi shouted and her eyes widened when she spotted me floating away, while desperately trying to reach out.

"Sensei...!" I shrieked in panic, my eyes widening in horror. My heart was beating furiously as I drifted even further. Yoruichi shot towards me and gripped my shirt tightly with her claws. I was relieved momentarily as I knew sensei was with me.

Chad caught hold of Ishida and flung him towards Inoue, separating himself from the others in the process. "Damn it, Chad!" I yelled as he soared away from us.

"Don't worry about him, he'll survive." Sensei spoke gravely. "Worry about yourself." I gritted my teeth and whipped my head around when I felt Ichigo's reiatsu.

"AKIRA!" Ichigo bellowed with his eyes wide and vainly tried to reach out to me, but he knew we were too far apart.

I reached my hand out and looked into his chocolate brown eyes and I spoke firmly "Don't worry, Ichigo. I'll find you." Just as I said this, Ichigo's face cleared of doubt and he nodded and our surroundings exploded us away from each other.

Opening my eyes slightly, I realized sensei and I were plummeting at high speed towards a building and immediately drew out my ReyInk. 'Crap! I need something solid to draw on!' I realized and pressed the ReyInk to the stomach part of my top.

A huge, air filled cushion grew out of it and surrounded us like a cocoon. Just in time too, as we felt it hit the building hard and bounce off. As we landed on the ground, I quickly dismissed the cushion as we heard the shouts and yells of shinigami running towards us. "Sensei," I gasped and set her down. She looked a little woozy, but none the worse for the wear. "I'm going to disguise myself as a shinigami, so stay out of sight okay?"

Within record time, I had drawn shinigami robes and put them on over my other clothes and disguised my shoes into tatami sandals. With a dummy zanpakuto hanging off my waistband, I mussed up my hair to hang in my face. The less people who remembered my face, the better.

I looked up as footsteps rounded the corner and quickly flash stepped to the next corner, then turned around and ran towards my crash site again, making it seem like I had just arrived on the scene. A crowd of shinigami had developed immediately with yells "Did anyone see the ryoka?"

"Has the ryoka escaped already?"

"What did they look like?"

"How many of them were they?"

I put on a confused face to match everyone else's as they hustled and bustled about, until a loud order to shut up broke through the crowd. "Move! Now," a man made his way to the front of the crowd. He must be in an important position as the crowd parted instantly for him.

Spiky black hair and a stern expression, there was a band of blue across the bridge of his nose and a tattoo of the number 69 on his left cheekbone. He looked menacing, to say the very least, as he inspected the crowd. "Was anyone in the area when the ryoka crashed here?"

"No one in the immediate area, sir! Everyone who was close by rushed to the scene." One of them shouted and the rest murmured agreements.

"Did anyone see what the ryoka looked like? Male, female, age, attire, anything?" the stern man asked again.

Everyone shook their heads and uttered negatives. He tsked in impatience and dismissed everyone. I took this chance to hunt for Yoruichi sensei. Spotting her on a rooftop, I nodded to her and she nodded back, flicking her tail. She'd catch up with me later. Carefully, I adapted a scared look and hunched my shoulders slightly, then called out to someone "Excuse me, I'm sorry to trouble you," I spoke softly to a male shinigami, who stopped.

"Can you tell me the way to the 8th division please? I'm new and I was running an errand for my division." I said quietly and looked down shyly.

"Oh sure," the man replied quickly. 'Sucker.' "It's two blocks away from here as you're in the 10th division now. Keep moving left from this path and go west. You'll reach the 8th division." And then he walked off.

That wasn't very helpful. I had to make do though, so I began jogging steadily when I bumped into someone. Inwardly, I screamed expletives at myself when I saw it was the stern man from before. My mind raced 'Okay okay, think. If this man is important, that means he should be a captain, however, he wasn't wearing that white robe over his dress like Ichimaru was, so he must be second in command, which is the Lieutenant!'

The stern man stared impassively at me as I adopted a scared look "I'm so sorry, Lieutenant! I wasn't looking where I was going! It won't happen again." I held my breath until I heard his response.

"It's okay, be careful. With these ryokas around, don't stray too far from your division." He spoke briefly and disappeared. 'Shunpo, huh? That, was a close one. Never doing that again.' I thought with a sigh and continued to travel.

Abruptly, I felt a reiatsu come out of nowhere and instinctively, I darted to the right. When I looked back, there was a sword where I stood a second ago. "That was a good reaction..." The stern man commented nonchalantly and he looked up with an intense expression, "Did you really think shinigami are fools? That I wouldn't notice your above average reiatsu?" He actually looked kind of pissed, now that I think about it.

I groaned out loud "And here I wanted to avoid fighting...Seriously, can we not fight? I don't want to fight with anyone." The last sentence was spoken seriously by me, as I took a step back in readiness and vanished my shinigami attire because I knew what his answer would be.

He narrowed his eyes at my clothes, confirming that I was indeed a ryoka "I do not wish to fight a woman, but if you are a threat to Soul Society, then it cannot be helped." He spoke and raised his zanpakuto. The next moment he disappeared and I cursed, flash stepped to the roof.

"Why does a ryoka like you know shunpo?" he questioned with a deep frown.

"I had a very good teacher." I said calmly, feeling much lighter now that I was out of the shinigami robes. 'That disguise plan didn't last after all.'

He simply lunged upwards. I dodged, bent down and swiped a ReyInk across the ground. My handy metal staff popped out of it and immediately met his sword with a resounding clang. The man looked surprised at the sudden appearance of a weapon and pushed harder. Gritting my teeth, I realized he had much more physical strength than me, so I had to go about this a different way.

Poking the staff with the ReyInk, I slammed down the staff vertically on the ground, creating a shock wave that cracked the pavement. He dodged by leaping upwards, staring at the ground ripple with cracks. "You..." he muttered, gazing at me with curiosity and suspicion "You're not human, what are you?"

I sighed "I don't know if Soul Society is aware of my species, but I'm a Reylan."

"Never heard of it. I'm surprised that more of your kind haven't been found." He spoke and darted forward with his sword, meeting my staff.

"I haven't met anymore either." I admitted and he seemed surprised, but he thrust his palm forward, saying "Hado no 1: Sho!"

I exclaimed in surprise as I flew back and hit the wall, dodging his next attack by mere seconds as he came at me. "Kido..." I muttered under my breath, feeling my back throb with pain.

"You're going to be a stubborn one." He said seriously, glaring at me.

"Looks like it." I smiled slightly.

"In that case...Reap, Kazeshini." He uttered like it was a curse. Suddenly, his sword transformed into another shape altogether, making my eyes widen. "Look at it...doesn't it remind you of the grim reaper's blade?" he said bitterly.

I didn't say anything, but agreed with him. Lethal looking blades that curved in opposite directions and attached on a thin iron staff which connected with a chain to an identical one. "So this is a zanpakuto..." I whispered in awe.

"I really did not want to use this, so I'll try not to kill you." He narrowed his eyes at me, raising his reiatsu.

I felt uncomfortable as the full force of his reiatsu hit me - it was far more than I had expected and it had me feeling nervous. Suddenly, the blades disappeared from his hands and I gasped. I felt something come towards me from the right and I dodged, but a second too late.

"Gyaah!" I screamed as my shoulder was sliced. Clutching the wound, I cursed as the blood seeped between my fingers and fell to the ground. 'Oh god, that was my right arm. How can I fight now?!'

"Give up now." He warned again, almost regretfully.

I gritted my teeth "I can't."

"So be it." he whispered and swung the blades at me again. This time, I dodged with shunpo, but a chain wrapped around my ankle and pulled me to the ground hard.

"Son of a...!" I swore under my breath, feeling my arm go numb. 'Ok ok, think. Those swords seem to be effective at long range, which means I'll have to fight at short range. Hakudo then!'

Taking advantage of my boots, I rocketed off the ground towards him and slipped through the gap between his swords. Swinging my left hand, I punched him in the chest. He grunted and flew backwards. My eyes narrowed when I saw his hand tug one of the chains towards us, so I caught hold of his shihakusho and jumped upwards high.

He caught my wrist and twisted it out of the cloth's grip but I thought fast and head butted him, eliciting a grunt of pain. As we fell to the earth, I swiftly touched my staff with the ReyInk and threw it into the ground, watching the ground change.

During the same seconds, I swiped the ReyInk over his wrists, binding them and then kicked him hard in the stomach, right into the ground next to where my staff landed. He hit the ground, but he was surprised when it didn't feel hard. However, his eyes widened when the ground began to suck him in, feeling like sludge. He tried to move but his hands were bound and his feet were stuck to the substance.

When just his head remained, I removed the staff and the ground went back to cement, solidifying and trapping him. "Damn Ryoka...!" he cursed, glaring at me.

"Listen please." I requested and sat in front of him. "My friends and I are here to save Rukia Kuchiki from her execution, can you please tell me where she's being held?"

"What makes you think I'll tell anything to a Ryoka like you? You're just here to destroy Soul Society." He said stubbornly.

"For god's sake, man! Look at me! Look into my eyes and seriously see if I'm lying!" I yelled in frustration. He looked suspicious but looked at me anyways. "Rukia saved my friend's life, so we're indebted to her. She's our precious friend and I don't want to watch her die." I said softly.

"Besides, you're a lieutenant, don't you find anything wrong with this? The way she's being executed for helping out a human?" I asked in a grave voice. He looked away, seemingly conflicted.

"I may regret this...but she's being held in the detention tower." He said hesitantly "It's that tall white tower, but you should hurry. I heard they were planning to pre pone her execution date."

I gave a wide smile "Thank you so much! May I know your name please?"

He scowled "Hisagi Shuuhei, now go."

"Ma ma, just wait." I waved him off and quickly drew something off the ground. He looked confused as I placed a small vial of clear liquid next to his head "The ground's effect will wear off in half an hour. When you're out, please drink this as it will restore your health."

"Che, you think a mere Ryoka can injure me?" he looked a little pink in the face as he said that.

I shrugged and said "I'm Michi Akira, by the way. I hope to be on the same side in the future!" I called out and ran off, fastening my scarf around my head.

Ehehehe...any comments people? Wonder who'll come next...maybe the chibi captain? Ahahaha who knows?!

~Blu