Assassination's Note: If you came back to read this story thinking it's what I left behind years ago...I'm sorry to say that you're wrong. This is the revamp. There's no romance, no sci-fi - Hell, I couldn't even tell if it was. This is a different story and it's not really a happy one. As you're about to find out.

A man crouched in front of the child. "Now be a good boy and do what the nice people say."

The boy nodded, slow and the uncertainty still clear on his face as he stared up into warm brown eyes. He was smiled at, the man raising a hand to ruffle up his hair.

"Behave yourself, Shirosaki."

Those were the last words he heard from the man before he was led deeper into the facility by a woman in white.

Little did Shirosaki know that he would never see him again.

He cried when the needle punctured his skin, squirming away and screaming because it hurt so much. He didn't know where he was or why he was there. All he knew was that he was being held down and forced to endure the pain.

Shirosaki tried pushing the hand away. Vain as it was.

Whatever the man in white just injected him with burned, and it only hurt more as he pulled the needle out. His skin felt like it was on fire and his cheeks were sticky from all the tears. He was shushed and, "It's for your own good, Kuroji."

He sniffled and clamped his eyes shut.

If that was the case, then what was wrong with him?

Shirosaki was seven when he realized something was very wrong.

The people in white didn't treat them as kindly as they had when he was five. They never even so much as given him their names. In fact, they stopped calling him by name and had taken to 'Project WHITE.'

He didn't know what was worse. That he was tolerating all these tests or that he was no longer a person.

To top it off, the man that brought him here never bothered to visit him.

Shirosaki didn't remember what he even looked like.

No.

His memory hasn't been that great lately.

It gave him headaches that required pills to make it go away. He didn't like taking them. They were bad, really bad, and didn't make the headaches go away.

A woman was sitting with her back pressed to the wall. Her arms were wrapped around her curled knees and her hair hung in front of her eyes. She sobbed and Shirosaki couldn't bring himself to walk on by.

He stopped and crouched down in front of her. "Um...excuse me."

No response.

"Miss?"

Shirosaki placed his hands on the floor before sitting down and crossing his legs. He placed his hands on his linked ankles, leaning forward but keeping a respectable distance. Just so he wouldn't be taken as a threat. After all, she's the first person he's seen in a while.

Someone who wasn't dressed in white.

After what seemed like hours, she lifted her head. She jerked back once she finally acknowledged his presence. "Oh!"

Shirosaki offered up the best disarming smile he could. "Hi."

"Oh...oh. Um, hi." She paused, wringing her hands. She lowered her gaze to her bare feet and chewed on her lower lip.

Shirosaki nearly decided to get up and walk back to his room before any of the nurses saw him talking to her. Wouldn't do to be forced back into his room if they thought he was harassing another patient.

"You know," she said, voice soft and hesitant. "I've always wanted to work in a hospital just like this one. To help people and make them feel better."

She didn't say much after that.

Shirosaki never saw her again.

He thrashed, straining against the restraints that secured his wrists to the bars beside the edge of the bed. His eyes wide from the horrifying realization that one of the ladies in white was holding a scalpel and the blade was inching closer to his skin. Shirosaki screamed, redoubling his efforts to escape but was soon subdued by one of the many men in the room. He winced from the bruising hold and squeezed his eyes shut.

A frantic wail of, "No!" filled the room as an incision was made.

Voices went round and round around him. Casual tones, blatantly ignoring his cries for them to stop and, "It hurts!"

Funny how everything still hurts. Even after all this time.

There was a crash from somewhere outside, but it was loud enough to make them stop. No one made a sound and the only thing that could be heard was the ruckus going on outside. Whoever caused the disturbance was shouting, demanding to be let go and, "Where am I?"

"Is Sousuke-sama bringing more people in?"

"Maybe."

Shirosaki dared to open his eyes.

A nurse turned and locked eyes with him, her face paling as if she'd seen a ghost. He didn't know what was wrong but she screamed, absolute terror lacing through her pitch. It was enough to make him wince.

It caught the attention of the man holding him down and the grip tightened to the point Shirosaki whimpered.

"His eyes..."

What? What about my eyes?

"They're not human."

The session that day ended horribly. Shirosaki was forced to stay still as they 'collected samples' of skin and blood decorated the floor. His throat was sore from all the screaming and his eyes were red from all the tears shed.

He felt lucky enough to have his arm bandaged before they left him to his devices.

The names 'Project WHITE' and 'it' seemed to stick after the revelation of his eyes taking on a golden hue came to light. Even the whites of his eyes began to change.

He should be dead with all the chemicals and drugs they've pumped into his system. He knew, without a doubt, that anyone else would be dead.

Shirosaki wandered down the hall, happy that he was allowed to leave his room for the day. Maybe he might run into someone like him. Someone who wasn't supposed to be here, or, recalling the day of the crash, didn't want to be there. If he was good enough, maybe they could be friends and call each other by name. (Oh, how he so desperately wanted that.)

He turned a corner, ignoring the claw marks on the walls alongside a couple dents. It was never good to question how those got there. The people in white didn't like that. It got people put in solitary confinement. Punished.

Shirosaki paused mid-step once he caught sight of a man leaning against the wall. His hair was blue, pushed back to keep his bangs out of his face and looked rather annoyed. Shirosaki stood there, staring at the man and dropped his head the second blue eyes locked onto his own. He fiddled with the sleeve to his hoodie, keeping his eyes down and out of sight.

There was a moment of silence before, "Hey, kid." made him look back up.

Shirosaki blinked a couple times, gripping his sleeve tight as the man pushed away from the wall and approached him. He almost took a step back, stopping only when the man held up his hands in a harmless manner. It didn't stop Shirosaki from tensing up.

"Calm down. I ain't gonna hurt ya." He lowered his hands, sliding them into his pants' pockets. The man looked him over for a minute before locking eyes with him once more. "What're you doing here? You're just a kid."

Shirosaki frowned. "I'm not here because I wanna be."

"You and me both."

"I'm..." He paused, looking down on his sneakers. He didn't really expect to run into anyone, hopes having been dashed years prior.

"C'mon, kid. Spit it out."

"I have a name, you know." he grumbled.

"'sides the stupid ass 'codenames' they're handin' out?" The man sounded miffed at the mere mention of it. It made Shirosaki laugh. When he looked up again, he was greeted with the sight of a man who'd accomplished his goal. "Good. Now that that's outta the way, how 'bout you tell me yer name?"

It was odd, having someone ask for his name. Odd yet incredibly amazing at the same time. Like a weight had been lifted off his chest. A ray of hope.

"Kuroji Shirosaki."

The man grinned, canines glistening in the bright lights. "Jaegerjaquez Grimmjow."

Turns out Grimmjow was forced to come here and was being held captive. He relayed every detail to Shirosaki, letting him know just how fucked up the place and the people running it were. It didn't take long enough to link Grimmjow to the person who had caused the ruckus the day Shirosaki had samples taken. Not that Shirosaki could blame him for trying to escape his captors' hold.

He'd been trying to do the same himself, after all.

Grimjow went on to tell him that some 'Aizen' was behind all of this and eventually told him to just call him by his first name. Especially since Shirosaki kept flubbing on saying his family name. Which was fine by him, really.

It wasn't until Shirosaki told Grimmjow his age (he turned ten a couple days ago) and the things he's gone through that he came to realize how great of a mistake he'd made. Grimmjow had grabbed on to a nurse's neck when she came to take Shirosaki to his appointment and slammed her against the wall. The look in his eyes was feral and full of malice as he shouted, "You bitch! Yer experimentin' on a child!" and proceeded to squeeze hard enough to cut off her air.

Shirosaki's eyes widened in shock and horror. "Grimmjow -!"

The hall was soon flooded with men dressed in black suits and they worked fast to free the woman. One stayed by her side while the others restrained Grimmjow and sedated him, even as he thrashed in their hold. The one kneeling beside the shaking nurse turned his attention to Shirosaki and scowled.

Shirosaki knew that particular look and took a weary step back. "I-I didn't -"

The man tisked. "Go back to your room."

"But -"

"Go back to your room!"

He cast a brief glance to Grimmjow, fearing what they were going to do to him, and saw that the men were dragging him off to the far end of the hall. With that one look, he didn't dare push his luck and turned around to run back to his room.

He didn't hear from or see Grimmjow for three days.

There were two projects going on from what he could gather. ARRANCAR was the one Grimmjow and many others were forced into. Shirosaki came to find this out after accidentally catching a glimpse of a six tattooed on the right of Grimmjow's upper back. Then he soon saw a three on a young woman, Neliel.

Shirosaki was the only one in Project WHITE. In fact, he was the only child in the entire facility.

Well if that wasn't disappointing then he didn't know what was.

He stared at the wall opposite his bed and fiddled with the string to his jacket absentmindedly. The building was quiet today and everyone had been confined to their rooms. It was weird, but Shirosaki wasn't going to complain. Much.

He missed Grimmjow.

The last few days had been nothing but test after test that left Grimmjow exhausted and irritated beyond all belief. He'd refused to open the door to his room when Shirosaki went to visit and flat out told him that, "Now isn't the best time, Shiro."

As far as that went, Shirosaki began to wonder just what the people in white - no. The 'quacks,' as Grimmjow put it, were doing to the people in Project ARRANCAR.

Were they pumping them full of unknown chemicals and fluids too? Or were they focused on other aspects entirely?

Shirosaki had yet to see another person with gold eyes. He knew no one else had the whites of their eyes overtaken by black, like he was unfortunate enough to have. Guess he couldn't blame that lady for looking at him like he was a monster now.

Freak. Disgusting. Abomination. Waste of time.

"It's for your own good."

"Behave yourself."

"Not human."

It hurts...it hurts.

"Yer experimentin' on a child!"

Useless, useless, useless -

"Inform Sousuke-sama that 'it' is a danger to society."

"Project WHITE is -"

"Shut up, shut up, shut up, shut up!"

He grabbed the thing closest to him and flung it across the room as hard as he could with an agonized scream.

"Yer a good kid, Shiro."

He buried his face into his hands and cried.

By fourteen, Shirosaki overheard some of the nurses talking about how his body might not be able to sustain any more tests in a few years. That perhaps Project WHITE was a bust. A failure. Should've had funding cut a long time ago.

Grimmjow didn't try reassuring him that the inevitable wouldn't happen. There was no sense in trying since they both knew it was coming at some point.

All he did in place of that was let Shirosaki sit in his lap and read a book that some doctor left behind. Occasionally he'd let Shirosaki read, helping him sound out words he didn't know and make a couple wise cracks about the plot. Grimmjow would rest his chin on Shirosaki's head as the boy read, turning the pages and readjusting his position whenever his leg cramped. Sometimes they'd pause to acknowledge a passing patient but would immediately go back to reading.

Neliel would come into their little 'study group' at random times when she was free. She usually had her hair tied back and always carried a notepad to help teach Shirosaki his letters.

"Dummies should at least show you how to read and write." she said.

Shirosaki couldn't be happier.