Chapter Text
Dating Orihime seemed like the thing he was supposed to do at the time; Rukia was newly engaged to Renji, and if Renji looked too eager and there were shadows in Rukia’s eyes when she told him – she’d made her decision. Proposing seemed like the thing he was supposed to do, too, even though Orihime dropped out of college after one semester because her aunt wouldn’t pay for it, and he felt untethered in classes that were maybe going to lead to a degree in something or other.
Anyway, at twenty-two, he has his degree, Orihime has a ring that his part-time job has mostly paid for, and by tomorrow night he’ll be a married man.
Ichigo’s trying on his gray suit when his father steps into his bedroom and stares at him, arms crossed over his chest. The suit doesn’t fit right; it’s one of Isshin’s, a decade old but barely worn and men’s suits don’t change that much anyway. Still, Ichigo should have gotten it tailored; he’s not as broad in the chest as his father and slightly shorter – the trouser cuffs are a little too long and wrinkle up against the tops of his shoes.
“You’re sure about this?” Isshin asks, voice as serious as he’s ever heard it.
Ichigo doesn’t look at him as he says, “Kinda late to change my mind.”
There’s a snort. “There’s still time, you’re not filing the paperwork until Monday.”
Tomorrow, his wedding day, is a Saturday. Everything has been arranged, and there are guests who are planning to see a wedding take place. Orihime has smiled her way through the larger than usual stack of RSVP cards expressing the sender’s regrets that they can’t attend, but there will still be fifty people waiting for them in the reception hall tomorrow afternoon.
“Take the suit off and come have a drink with me,” Isshin says when Ichigo stands silent, still looking in the mirror instead of at his father. “Maybe Yuzu can hem those trousers in the morning.”
“Sure,” Ichigo mumbles. The door closes and he’s alone again, stripping off the cheap gray polyester fabric and the brand-new shirt that isn’t quite the right size. He pushes the closet door open and grits his teeth at the empty expanse inside. It’s been empty for five years, he reminds himself, but it doesn’t help. He hangs up the suit and shirt and slides the door shut slowly.
His dad is waiting for him at the dining table, but instead of sake he has a squat bottle of shochu and two glasses, both already filled halfway. Karin and Yuzu are already asleep, and the house is quiet as a result. It’s kind of dim, too – the kitchen lights are dim, and the living room is dark. Ichigo sits across from him and they mutter a quiet kampai and drink. It burns going down, and Ichigo nearly chokes on the undiluted alcohol. And it’s no wonder: when he glances at the label, he sees that it’s strong, forty percent alcohol. “Kind of strong for a nightcap,” he says, but takes another sip.
“You’re a man now, my son,” Isshin says, and there’s the borderline crazy man he knows, grinning like a fool as he tosses back the rest of his drink like it’s water. “And tomorrow’s your wedding night. Do you need daddy to teach you the birds and the bees?”
Ichigo splutters and glares over the rim of his glass. “I already know about – that,” he grumbles. He hasn’t done most of it, but he knows the mechanics. Orihime squeals over how it’s so romantic that they’re saving themselves for marriage.
He gulps down the rest of the shochu and shudders.
Which is. Not the reaction he should have to the idea of having sex with his fiancée. Isshin raises an eyebrow and pours more for each of them. “Is Rukia coming tomorrow?” he asks, practically giving Ichigo whiplash.
“Dunno,” he mumbles. He hasn’t heard from anyone in Soul Society for a year; doesn’t even know whether Rukia has married Renji yet or if they already have a kid on the way. The shochu goes down easier this time, the nutty flavor coming out even through the continued burn.
“Hn. Well, it would have been nice to see my third daughter,” Isshin says wistfully. Their glasses leave marks on the wood tabletop; Yuzu will scold them about that later.
“She’s probably busy.” His throat feels unaccountably tight, and there’s a flush coming up his face. “Last time I saw her was when she told us all she was going to marry Renji.” Ichigo clears his throat and takes another sip.
“I see. She must be in love with him, then.”
Ichigo swears under his breath. “Guess so,” he agrees sullenly. Isshin fills his glass again.
“Did she look happy?” his father asks. “When she told you that she was going to marry Abarai.”
“No.” He empties the glass in one gulp.
By the time his father sends him back upstairs, the shochu bottle is half-empty and the world around Ichigo is spinning like a top. He falls into bed without bothering to change, vaguely wondering if he’ll be too hungover to attend his own wedding. If only.
In the morning his head pounds and his mouth feels – and tastes – like something died in it. He vomits, once, and showers in the hopes that it will make him feel less sick. He’s due at the shrine in a couple hours. Bile burns at the back of his throat and he hunches over in the shower, choking on it until there’s a thin, yellow stream of it circling the drain. There’s pain medication in the medicine cabinet and he swallows three pills with a palmful of water.
He dresses in his montsuki kimono, moving as slowly as an old man. The outfit has been rented just for today, and it, too, doesn’t fit quite right: the kimono is a little too long and the hakama are a little short where his father’s suit was a little too long. The haori is fine but the loops for the haori himo are broken. Ichigo swallows down another pulse of nausea and tries to picture Orihime in her shiromuku.
He ends up on his knees in front of the toilet again.
It’s too late to stop this, he thinks a few minutes later as he opens the drawer of his nightstand and reaches in for his wallet. His fingers brush against something cool and smooth that rolls away at his touch. Ichigo takes a slow breath and wraps his hand around it.
Maybe it isn’t.
The old stuffed animal is easy to find, too, and Ichigo shoves the green pill into its mouth.
“How dare you keep me in that stupid jar for the last five years! What’s wrong with you, Ichigo?! Don’t you have any respect at all for all I’ve done for you?! Where’s nee-san? She’ll kick some sense into you, you ungrateful—”
Ichigo groans and covers his ears. The pain medication hasn’t kicked in yet and Kon is loud. When he doesn’t respond right away, Kon stops ranting and stares at him, the expression oddly human on the stuffed lion’s face.
“You look like hell. Why are you dressed like that?” Kon demands.
“I’m supposed to be getting married today,” Ichigo says quietly, and swallows heavily.
“To nee-san? How dare you get drunk before your wedd—mmph!”
Ichigo presses his hand against Kon’s fabric mouth. “To Inoue,” he admits.
Kon squirms and shoves himself away from Ichigo’s hand. “What?! But – why? Inoue’s hot, her boobs are out to here…” It’s strange watching those stubby arms try and make that particular hand motion. “But I thought you and nee-san…”
“I thought so too,” he agrees quietly. “Listen, Kon – I need to ask you for a favor.”
His tone is so serious that the stuffed lion settles on the floor of the bedroom to listen.
The Kurosaki family arrives at the wedding ceremony only a few minutes late. The Shinto shrine is beautiful in late spring, surrounded by blooming flowers and swaying trees. The wedding party cleanses their hands and mouths before entering the grounds, shaded by a bright red parasol carried by Isshin. Only he, Karin, and Yuzu have come to the ceremony this morning. Orihime is radiant in her shiromuku, styled hair covered by the traditional white hood. Her groom is impeccably dressed in the montsuki kimono rented for this occasion, and his bright hair is cut short and neatly tamed. There’s a grin on his face despite the solemn occasion as they climb the steps to enter the ceremony space.
The ceremony is short: they drink from shared cups of sake and so do Isshin, Karin, and Yuzu. Their vows are brief, though Orihime beams as she says hers. The priest makes offerings to the kami on their behalf, and then the first part of their wedding day is complete.
At the reception hall, Orihime changes into a beautiful white, Western-style wedding gown and her groom changes into a gray suit. Yuzu has quickly hemmed the pant legs so that they no longer spill onto his shoes. There is polite – though not excessively enthusiastic – applause as the newlyweds enter the reception hall together, her beaming and him still grinning.
Eight months later, Rukia lands upon a pole high above the Kurosaki clinic. There’s no trace of Ichigo’s reiatsu anywhere nearby, and she frowns in confusion. She keeps her own power pulled in as tight as she can so that no one can sense it as she drops down to the ground. Beyond the glass doors that lead into the clinic, she can see Orihime, belly rounded as she putters around.
Her heart twists and Rukia turns away. She has her answer, and she will return to Soul Society, to – A hand grasps her wrist, not Ichigo’s but Isshin’s. “Kurosaki-san,” she says quietly in greeting.
Isshin frowns down at her. “Kuchiki-san,” he says. “Or – is it Abarai-san now?”
Rukia swallows heavily. Her heart thumps uncomfortably, the idea of being called Abarai-san making her stomach churn. “My wedding is supposed to be in two days,” she admits quietly. “But—”
“But you don’t want to marry him,” Isshin guesses. “Why did you agree in the first place?” Then he looks more closely at her. “Face powder?”
She flinches back but Isshin’s thumb has already uncovered a mark, dark and fresh, along one cheekbone. Rukia feels the angry flare of his reiatsu even through the special gigai he wears. Her cheeks and throat flush with heat, shame turning her pale skin a dull, splotchy red. “I was injured during the war. And there were… threats.”
She remembers them in pieces, the visits to her bed in the Fourth when she would lapse in and out of consciousness. The gaps in her memory. The slow healing that Unohana would never have tolerated. She recalls the implications from Central Forty-Six, the strange look on her brother’s face. The over-eager look on Renji’s face when she stoically agreed to his proposal, and the shocked look on his friends’ faces when the announcement was made.
“Against my son?”
“Ichigo’s power scares them,” Rukia explains quietly. “Yhwach may have taken some of it, at the end of the war, but they know it’s coming back. They thought if I was out of the picture he’d be neutralized.”
Isshin’s expression is dark but his hand rests on her shoulder, surprisingly warm and comforting, before he pulls her into a hug. No one except Ichigo has ever really touched her like this – not her brother, and certainly not Renji, who – Rukia shies away from the thought as the bruise on her cheekbone throbs.
“I should have known that my third daughter would never betray my son.” Then he tells her: “But he has an eight-month head start on you, Rukia; it will be hard work to find him.”
Rukia blinks up at him. “Head start?” she repeats. Movement catches her eye, and she sees Ichigo through the clinic doors. He presses a kiss to Orihime’s temple and grins down at her – but there is still no trace of his reiatsu. Not even a whisper of it. “Kurosaki-san, what’s going on?”
Isshin’s head turns to see what she does, and he steps back, letting one hand fall from Rukia’s shoulder to her elbow instead. He draws her out of sight of the happy couple. “Ichigo couldn’t go through with the wedding, in the end. That’s Kon, in his body.”
Her head spins with the implications: Orihime has married a mod soul, and Kon has gotten her pregnant? And Ichigo, probably in soul form, is missing. “Does Orihime know?” she demands. “Is – is the marriage real?”
Isshin shrugs. “Urahara took care of things at the municipal office for me. Kurosaki Kon is now my adopted son, married to Kurosaki Orihime.” He grins down at her. “It won’t be a problem when you find Ichigo and marry him.”
“But that’s cruel,” Rukia whispers. “If Orihime thinks she married Ichigo…”
Another shrug. “She seems thrilled. That says something about my daughter-in-law, doesn’t it?”
Rukia looks back toward the clinic and then up at Isshin again. The former captain of the Tenth Division doesn’t look even a little repentant. And Orihime does look… happy with Kon, she supposes. Though she didn’t realize that Kon had gotten quite so good at imitating the former substitute shinigami. She wonders if the mod soul resents being called Ichigo all the time.
But that’s not her problem to solve. “When I do not return to Soul Society in a few hours they will look for me,” she says quietly. “Karakura will be the first place they check.”
“Let them check,” Isshin says with a snort. “You’ll be long gone. Here,” he says. “From Urahara – we thought you’d catch on eventually.” He hands over a phone – a regular, human cellphone, she sees as she looks it over. “It’s pre-programmed with my number and Urahara’s, and there are minutes loaded into it.” He hands over a bulky cord along with it. “The charger,” he explains.
Rukia pockets the phone and cord, then bows in thanks.
“Call Urahara when you find him,” Isshin orders. His expression darkens again as he adds, “And Rukia – you do know what it means if you go looking for my son.”
She nods, one hand resting on the hilt of Sode no Shirayuki. “I know. Thank you, Kurosaki-san,” she murmurs. She leaps back into the sky, and thinks she hears him murmur thank you, Rukia as she leaves, jumping from rooftop to rooftop as easily as she breathes.
Stopping on another electric pole, Rukia takes a deep breath and centers herself. Ribbons appear before her in her mind’s eye, hundreds of them at once. Only one is the red of another shinigami, and she dismisses it immediately; it’s only the one assigned to Karakura. But then, she knew he wouldn’t be here; too many people in Karakura can see ghosts and sense reiatsu, including Orihime. “Where would he go?” she asks in a whisper.
They have shared pieces of their souls back and forth, and as she reaches, finally there is a very faint tug.
North, Sode no Shirayuki whispers. Zangetsu is far to the north. Her voice is quiet, far in the back of Rukia’s mind, but there is hope in it.
Well. North it is, then.
It takes weeks to arrive at her destination. Rukia stops frequently to search for him and finds nothing even as Shirayuki urges her to look further north. But what really slows her down is the fact that there are few shinigami stationed permanently in the smaller villages and towns. Rukia dispatches dozens of weak hollows as she passes through. There are souls, as well, who have not yet turned into hollows; these, she gently but efficiently performs konso for, sending them off to Soul Society.
She follows the coastline for a while, and outside of Takahagi Rukia removes her lieutenant’s badge. She stares at it for a long time. It’s the badge that Kaien wore and that Ukitake tied around her arm. It’s a symbol of her brother’s decision to finally stop standing in her way. It represents duty and authority.
And their control over her.
It also could very well be something that Soul Society can use to track her, the way they used Ichigo’s substitute badge. As the sun sets, Rukia throws it into the ocean and walks away.
She moves inland and keeps traveling north, following Sode no Shirayuki’s guidance. Rukia hitches a ride on one of the ferries that travels back and forth between Akita and Hokkaido. We are close, Shirayuki murmurs, and Rukia stops on the edge of the dock to look for him. There are fewer spirit ribbons here, and at the very edge of her senses she finds one, red and achingly familiar. “Ichigo,” she whispers, and grabs for it. He is still far from her, but at least she knows the path to follow.
The ribbon leads her northeast, through smaller towns and places too rural to earn even the designation of “village.” No souls call to her, and Rukia wonders if Ichigo took care of them as he passed through. She follows his ribbon along the coast to a fishing town on a peninsula that juts northeast into the sea. It’s – not exactly where she expects to find him. The coast is beautiful, but the town is small: there is a museum, some houses and shops, a couple of restaurants. The main attraction, from what she can glean as she leaps from building to building, is a national park further out on the peninsula.
Shirayuki murmurs reassurances, coos for the sword that should be her partner.
She passes a beautiful waterfall, avoiding hikers in colorful boots and layered clothes – the temperature doesn’t bother her, but she supposes that it’s quite cool, this far north. Rukia finally finds him beyond the falls, in a cheap gigai that does little to disguise his reiryoku. She doesn’t expect him to be working in a souvenir shop of all places. But as soon as she passes through the open door, he focuses on her, eyes wide and staring.
“I’m going to take my break now, Masuda-san,” Ichigo says. The person he’s addressing, an older woman in a branded shirt, nods to him, but then her attention turns in Rukia’s direction.
“I see. Go ahead, Ichigo,” she says, and smirks.
Rukia wonders if Masuda knows what she is. But it doesn’t matter, really, if she does. Ichigo jerks his head in the direction of the back of the shop and Rukia hurries to follow, flushing under Masuda-san’s apparent scrutiny.
He leads her into a small breakroom beyond a door that’s labeled employees only. “Figures they’d send you to drag me back,” Ichigo says without preamble as soon as the door shuts. “Who finally figured out it’s Kon in my body?”
The gigai isn’t quite right; Ichigo’s real eyes are paler than these, and his hair is much lighter. It’s like looking at a picture taken in bad lighting. “Idiot!” She swings for him and Ichigo dodges, rolling his eyes even as Shirayuki hums her amusement and calls for Zangetsu. “No one from Soul Society knew what you did when I left Karakura. But they’re probably looking for me, now that I’ve been missing for almost a month.”
Ichigo raises his eyebrow, and his eyes dart to her bicep, free of the lieutenant’s badge. “They demoted you?” he asks, but Rukia shakes her head.
“I threw it in the ocean.” Before Ichigo can respond to that she adds, “Your father’s known this whole time that you gave your body to Kon, you know. He adopted Kon as his second son and Orihime’s officially married to him, so you’re technically still single according to your family records.”
“Helpful,” Ichigo says blandly.
“She’s pregnant, by the way. I’m not sure if it’s technically his baby or yours since it’s still your body, but they seem happy enough together and Orihime doesn’t seem to know that you lef—"
Ichigo’s hand slashes through the air to stop the flow of words. “Rukia. Why are you here?” The words come out in a growl, and even in the gigai his eyes are flashing golden, like they did back when his hollow would threaten to take over. He’s angry – at her – and she supposes he has every right to be. “You haven’t bothered to even say hello to me after the war except to tell me that you’re marrying Renji. Are you here to tell me you’re having his kid or something?”
The very thought of it makes her gag. “No! No, I’ve never let him touch me,” Rukia protests with a shudder. Shirayuki echoes it, a low murmur of disgust. “We were supposed to get married weeks ago, but I – I came to tell you goodbye,” she says quietly. “And your father told me what you did.”
Ichigo leans back against a wall of plain wooden cabinets and crosses his arms over his chest. “And?”
“I’m not marrying him,” Rukia says flatly. “I only agreed to do it so that they’d leave you alone.”
“What.” He stares at her slack jawed, and she feels his reiatsu spike even through the gigai. It’s a piece of junk and she spares a second to wonder where he even got it from. Urahara’s work is better than this.
“When I was recovering after the war,” she says, not looking at him, “I was kept isolated and… spoken to. You’re a threat. Apparently the new Central Forty-Six thought you’d stay here and keep your life small if they married me off.”
A chunk of the cheap, laminate and particle board countertop behind Ichigo breaks clean off in his hand. “And you just went along with it instead of telling me,” he says. “Is this why you wouldn’t let me see you while you were in the Fourth?” He tosses the piece of countertop away with a grimace.
“I wasn’t the one keeping you away,” Rukia mutters.
“Damnit, Rukia,” he swears. “You’re always trying to sacrifice yourself to save me! You should have told me, I’d taken care of it.”
“How? By storming the Seireitei again?” Rukia scoffs.
“If that’s what it took! Don’t you know I’ll always come for you?”
The words bring heat to her cheeks. “Because we’re nakama, I know,” she mutters.
“That’s not—” His cheeks are pink too, suddenly, and he steps closer to her. She’s backed up against the wall suddenly and he’s so close and so much bigger than her and Rukia flinches back from him. “Hey,” Ichigo says, voice low and softer than it’s ever been. The touch of his fingertips on her cheek is barely there. “D-did someone hurt you?” His reiatsu spikes again and wraps around her protectively, like a warm blanket.
She can’t look at him. “I’m a soldier,” Rukia mutters, eyes focused on a spot on the scuffed white linoleum floor. “Soldiers get hurt all the time.”
Ichigo’s careful fingers tip her chin up so that their eyes meet. “You’ve never been scared of me,” he murmurs. “Not even when I’ve worn a hollow’s mask, Rukia.”
Her eyes prickle and Rukia blinks a few times to suppress the feeling. She won’t be an object of pity, she won’t. “Sometimes my conversations with Renji get out of hand,” Rukia says calmly, and watches his expression darken. It’s not the whole truth, but it’s enough for him to guess at the rest of it, and he does.
“I’ll gut him if he ever touches you again.” His eyes gleam golden and then Ichigo backs off. “Look, I have three hours left on my shift still. I have to—”
“Shinigami.” They look up at the older woman standing in the open doorway. She crosses her arms over her chest as she looks them both over. “Have you come to drag him back to Soul Society?” she asks.
Rukia blinks. “Wait, how do you know what I am?”
Masuda snorts. “Urahara does have friends outside of Karakura, you know. When this one,” she nods her head at Ichigo, “stumbled into my territory with a gigai stolen from Urahara’s discard pile, I already knew who he was. I put him to work and found him a room to rent. So, shinigami,” and she reaches for the pin holding her hair in a bun, “are you here to take him back?”
“No.” Rukia’s eyes grow fierce as she looks between Ichigo and Masuda. “And it’s Rukia.”
“Good, because I’m done being Soul Society’s tool whenever it suits them,” Ichigo mutters, “and I’m tired of you being their sacrificial lamb.” Rukia opens her mouth to speak, and Ichigo pins her with a look. “Don’t tell me you aren’t.”
“If you aren’t here to take him back, then why are you here, Rukia?”
Once again Rukia looks away. “I’m tired of being their sacrificial lamb too,” she admits quietly.
“Hn.” Masuda purses her lips. “You could have gone anywhere, but you sought out Kurosaki-san.”
“Well of course I did. Ichigo is…” Rukia’s cheeks flush. This isn’t how she wanted to say it, with Ichigo in a bad gigai and one of Urahara’s friends watching them. She had her opportunity just minutes ago but of course she flinched and then chickened out altogether.
Coward, Sode no Shirayuki murmurs.
His hand brushes against hers, and Rukia takes a deep breath. “Ichigo is my person,” she blurts out.
Masuda takes in Rukia’s blush and the echo of it on Ichigo’s scowling face, and smiles. “Well then,” she says. “Good. Take the rest of the day off, Kurosaki, and call Urahara.” Then she glances at the damaged countertop. “That’s coming out of your paycheck.”
Ichigo swears under his breath, but his fingers twine with Rukia’s.
He marks his departure on his timecard, and they leave the shop, walking beside one another past the waterfall and down into the town near the nature reserve. Ichigo has found a beautiful place to hide, Rukia thinks; it’s close to the ocean, rural and peaceful, and far from the bustle of the larger cities further south. They don’t speak again until he’s led her to a low-slung house a block from the ocean. It’s on the older side but in good repair, and Ichigo holds the painted white door open for her.
“You’re back from work early, Kurosaki-san,” a voice calls, and Rukia stiffens. But it’s another older woman, one whose eyes don’t even glance in her direction as she pokes her head out of the kitchen. She’s wearing a floral housecoat and her black hair is pulled back in a soft bun.
“Ah – yeah, I’m not feeling well and it’s a slow day,” Ichigo fibs. “Masuda-san let me go early. Don’t worry, it’s just a bad headache.”
“Ahh. Well, get some rest,” the woman advises. “I’ll leave a plate for you if you don’t come down for dinner.”
Ichigo gives a little nod. “Thanks, Ayame-san,” he murmurs, and turns to walk up the stairs. Rukia follows him into a clean but very plain room with a single bed. There’s a small television against one wall and books stacked beneath it, but not much else.
When Ichigo shuts the door behind her he gestures. “Can you do something so she can’t hear us?” he asks quietly. “She doesn’t know anything like Masuda does, and I don’t usually talk to myself.”
Rukia frowns at the closed door. “Any kido I cast will be obvious to anyone looking for it,” she says quietly.
Ichigo scowls, but he sheds his gigai without much trouble – and without the substitute badge, she notices. He reaches back to touch the hilt of Zangetsu’s blade and then slings it off to rest on the dresser. Rukia places Sode no Shirayuki, still sheathed, alongside it, and the blades hum faintly in welcome.
Then she blinks, because the ribbon of her zanpakutō, normally only visible in shikai, slides into existence and wraps itself around Zangetsu’s hilt. Ichigo smirks at the sight and glances down at himself. “Feels weird being out of that gigai,” he comments. “We don’t get hollows much out here.” The uniform still looks good on him, though Rukia frowns at the sight of the white bandolier and red scaled pauldron. It’s always looked heavy and out of place to her.
He catches her. “Oh, that. Zangetsu’s still sulking I think.”
Rukia blinks. “Sulking?”
Ichigo smirks, but his cheeks turn a faint pink and he rubs the back of his neck. “Long story.” He gestures at the bed, which is the furthest from the door. They settle onto the narrow mattress, her very properly with her hands in her lap and him with legs crossed and slumped over. But then he looks at her carefully and says, “You called me your person.”
Her fingers knit together. “You were going to say something earlier, when I – backed away from you,” Rukia murmurs.
They’re too close and not close enough at the same time, and not seeing him for almost two years has put distance between them that’s more than geographical. “I should have seen it when you told me,” Ichigo mutters after a long, awkward silence. “I should have figured out that you weren’t happy.”
“I didn’t want you to. I didn’t want you to worry about me.”
Ichigo snorts. “Someone has to.” His eyes meet hers and his whole face softens. “I should have come for you.”
Rukia huffs out a breath. “I was trying to keep you safe,” she reminds him. “Only to find out that you left Orihime at the altar and ran away, you idiot!”
“Che. Would you prefer it if I had married her?”
“I should say yes,” she murmurs, staring at her hands as her fingers tangle and untangle on her lap. “But no. I’m too selfish, Ichigo. I’m glad you didn’t marry her.”
Her fingers separate and one hand leaves her lap to rest on the bed between them. A much larger one covers it, and their fingers twine together. She lifts her head, and their eyes meet. The late afternoon sun shines in through the window as they look at one another, before her head falls to his shoulder and his rests on hers.
It’s a long time before they stir themselves to call Urahara.
“So, you found him,” the ex-captain says cheerfully over the phone line, and Rukia can hear the way he snaps his fan open. She visualizes the way he waves it in front of his face. “What have you decided to do, now that you and Ichigo are reunited?”
Rukia sets the phone down carefully on the bed between them and hits the speakerphone button so that she and Ichigo can both hear the shopkeeper and former captain. “We’re not going back,” she says calmly. Ichigo’s hand wraps around hers again and she twines their fingers together. “Are they looking for us?”
There’s a long, meaningful pause. “There are more shinigami coming through the senkaimon than there should be, Kuchiki-san, and I heard a rumor that your badge was found in the ocean.”
Ichigo huffs out a breath. “Guess you were right about them using it to track you,” he mutters. “I don’t want to cause trouble for Masuda-san,” he says more loudly.
“Rausu isn’t the first place they’ll look, but they will find you sooner than later,” Urahara agrees cheerfully. “The gigai you stole isn’t very good, and you’re not using one at all, Kuchiki-san. Abarai-san will be able to find you.”
His hand tightens around hers as the color washes from Rukia’s face. “They sent Renji?” she asks quietly through lips suddenly gone numb. He won’t stop in every town and every fishing village to perform konso; he could be here in days, not weeks.
There’s another pause. “Isshin told me,” Urahara says, uncharacteristically careful, “What he saw when you were last in Karakura.”
Ichigo’s hand tightens around hers. “Rukia,” he says quietly.
“Don’t.” But Rukia’s lips are bitten bloodless before she demands, “I know you have a plan, Urahara. What is it?”
“How’s your English, Kurosaki-san?”
They blink at one another. Then Ichigo ventures, “It’s decent enough. A little rusty.”
“Good. I’ll be there tomorrow afternoon with gigais that will hide you both more thoroughly, and forms to fill out. And something to help you learn English quickly, Kuchiki-san.”
“Forms for what?” Rukia asks sharply.
“For immigration, Kuchiki-san. You and Ichigo are moving to Canada.”
“We’re – what?”
“Canada is well beyond the boundaries of Soul Society’s authority,” Urahara explains. “Importantly, the Gotei Thirteen doesn’t understand air travel, and doesn’t have any kind of treaty with the Soul Society branch that covers North America. I hear they’re more progressive as well.”
“But Canada? What about Ichigo’s family?” Rukia asks. She hadn’t thought much past finding him. Moving clear across the world? Leaving Yuzu and Karin behind? This isn’t what she wanted for him.
“It’s up to you. Take the night to decide – I’ll be there tomorrow.” The phone goes silent; Urahara has hung up.
“Karin and Yuzu will understand,” Ichigo says immediately. “And so will Oyaji.”
“But Ichigo, you might never see them again,” Rukia protests.
“It’s safer that way,” he says quietly. “I don’t like it, but – it’s safer if they don’t know where we are.”
“You’re sure you want to do this,” Rukia says after a long moment. “We’ll both be exiled, unless Central Forty-Six changes its mind. We could still go back and beg forgiveness.” He’d probably get it, if she binds herself in marriage to Renji and agrees to whatever punishment they levy upon her.
He cups her cheeks with both hands, then, and Rukia didn’t think her first real kiss would be on a rented bed in a rural town with the ocean softly hissing in her ears through the open window, but when their lips touch, she closes her eyes and sinks into it, into the way his mouth, soft and slightly chapped, brushes hers so very gently. They draw back to look at one another and her gaze drifts down to his mouth.
Then their lips meet again, surer this time and the rightness of it sings between them as she tilts her head and his tongue traces the seam of soft, pink skin. His arm wraps around her and when Ichigo tugs her just a little closer she gasps. He takes advantage, and their tongues tangle until they’re both breathless and holding one another, her body sprawled against his and his forehead touching hers.
“I’m sure,” Ichigo says a moment or maybe an age later, when the sun has turned the sky the color of an overripe peach and glitters off the glimpses of ocean they can see through the gaps between houses.
“I am too.”
Later, after he’s gotten back into his gigai and brought a plate of tonkatsu and vegetables upstairs from the kitchen, Ichigo glances at the closet and clears his throat. “There’s no room in the closet. Ayame-san keeps her stuff in there.”
Rukia’s cheeks heat but she raises her chin and pokes him in the chest. “Then you’ll just have to share, Strawberry. Just don’t be handsy.”
There’s an answering blush on his cheeks, too. “Only when you want me to be,” he mutters so quietly that Rukia has to strain to hear it.
In soul form like this she can’t exactly change into nightclothes, but she lies down beside him on the narrow bed and Ichigo presses a kiss to her lips, soft and chaste, before he curls an arm around her back and she settles her head against his chest. She expects her racing mind to keep her awake – she’s found him after weeks of searching, they’re moving to Canada, they’re exiles from Soul Society – but Rukia sleeps more deeply than she has since before the war, with Ichigo’s warmth wrapped around her and his heartbeat slow and strong under her ear.
Urahara arrives as promised the next day, parking a run-down truck in the driveway. He spares a moment to tsk over Ichigo’s gigai as he and Ururu drag new gigai into the house. They merge with the new ones in Ayame-san’s living room while she is grocery shopping. “Much better,” he declares when the process is complete. “These gigais are state of the art and will disguise your reiatsu. Yes, even yours, Kurosaki-san.”
“Thank you, Urahara-san,” Rukia says quietly as she flexes her fingers. She hasn’t used a gigai in a long time and though he does excellent work, she still feels a little too heavy, a little too stiff.
“Yeah,” Ichigo murmurs. She can’t even feel him – it’s as if his reiatsu is completely gone.
Rukia’s nails bite into her palms and she shudders, unnerved by the absence of his power, but if it hides them from Soul Society she’ll tolerate it.
Urahara gestures, and Ururu hurries forward, setting a portfolio down on the coffee table. “You’ll need to sign each of these files where I’ve marked them,” he instructs. “Your passports and identification documents are in there as well.” Then he looks at them over the top of his fan. “It will be much easier if you file the immigration application as husband and wife.”
Ichigo’s blush could melt ice. “You could have said something about that last night,” he growls while Rukia’s cheeks grow far too hot.
“Ichigo—” But he spins away and takes the stairs two at a time while Rukia is left to stand in awkward silence, eventually thumbing through the paperwork that Urahara has prepared.
“Why are you helping us?” she asks.
Urahara waves his fan lazily. “I have my reasons, Kuchiki-san,” he says. But he seems in no mood to explain them, for he merely watches Rukia silently as she looks at the passport he’s created for her. Her picture is a little grainy but the name on the thin page reads Kurosaki Rukia in kanji and katakana.
The idea of being called Abarai Rukia twists her stomach into knots. The idea of being called Kurosaki Rukia turns her cheeks pink.
“Take this,” Urahara says when she sets her passport down. It’s a curved device that, at his instruction, she fits over her ear. “You’ll still need to study English, Kuchiki-san, but it will come to you much more easily than if you didn’t use this device. Kurosaki-san can use it too, if he wants.”
Ichigo clatters back down the stairs and glares at Urahara. “Give us a minute,” he demands, but the look he gives Rukia is softer. “Come out back to the garden with me?”
She shoots a look at Urahara, whose eyebrows waggle above his fan. Rukia removes the language device from her ear before she follows Ichigo outside.
Garden is an understatement: Ayame-san’s little plot of land is full of raised beds that teem with colorful flowers and trailing vines. The sun’s rays are softened by a haze, casting the world in a softer light as Ichigo leads her away from the house. They stand silent for a long moment, neither quite looking at the other. Rukia doesn’t recognize most of the flowers behind Ichigo; the ikebana and hanatokoba lessons pressed upon her by the Kuchiki clan never quite stuck.
“It’s a lot to ask,” Ichigo says finally. “I wanted to – date you properly, not force you into something you don’t want.”
Rukia scoffs. “Since when have we ever done anything properly, Ichigo? And who says this isn’t what I want?”
But the set of his jaw is stubborn as he scowls down at her. “This is different,” he insists. “This isn’t you stabbing me to save my family or me breaking into the Seireitei to save you.”
“No,” Rukia agrees. “This is us making a decision to save each other.”
And wouldn’t they always break every rule to do that?
Ichigo’s expression softens, and he pulls something from his pocket. One hand reaches out for hers. “The other one,” he mutters, cheeks red, when Rukia offers her right. Cool metal slips over the knuckle of her left ring finger and settles against her skin.
“What…?” The smooth, white gold ring on her skin is modest, a marquise-cut diamond solitaire that sparkles in the hazy sunlight. It’s a little big on her, but a strange sort of giddiness overtakes her just the same.
“I know Urahara already has all the paperwork inside with our names on it. Yours probably already say Kurosaki Rukia.”
“They do, I looked,” she says softly, and her lips curve helplessly as she raises her gaze from the ring on her finger to Ichigo’s eyes, warm amber and focused on her.
“That’s paperwork, though, and plane tickets, and the koseki,” Ichigo says. “But this is for us.”
“Oh,” she whispers, but just as Ichigo’s expression starts to fall Rukia loops her arms around his neck and Ichigo’s fingers slide into her hair as her lips meet his, warm and soft.
Urahara rolls his eyes when they come back inside, pink-cheeked and holding hands, but he only checks the kitchen clock and says, “You’ll have to lie low for a while. I’ll return when your applications are approved. Perhaps I can distract our old friends in the meantime.” The smile he gives them suggests that his distractions won’t be kind.
Ayame returns from her grocery shopping to see that her supposed bachelor of a renter has acquired a wife. “My distant relatives opposed the marriage and tried to separate us,” Rukia explains tearfully. “But my brother had a change of heart and helped me rejoin my husband here in Rausu.”
The judgement fades from the elderly woman’s face and she pats Rukia’s hand gently. “What a good brother you have,” she says as Ichigo hides his expression. “Well, I don’t have a room big enough for the two of you, but Chiba-san does.”
Two hours later they’re in a different house, this one right on the ocean, in a two-room apartment with a kitchenette and a bed twice the size of the one Ichigo has been using for the last several months. It’s still temporary, theirs for a few months or maybe only a few weeks, but when they fall into bed and kiss one another goodnight, Rukia turns into his arms and lets herself dream, for the first time, of making a home with him.
Urahara shows up again three months later with plane tickets and more paperwork. “You’ll be traveling to Toronto by way of Tokyo and Hong Kong,” he explains as they look at the tickets. After just a few months of study, Rukia isn’t anywhere close to fluent, but she can read the tickets and the immigration paperwork that Urahara hands over. Their flights are in two days. “You’ll need to find a place to live and jobs, when you arrive. But you’re being granted residency.”
Then he hands over a huge envelope. “Keep that on you,” he advises Ichigo.
“What is it?”
Urahara fans himself. “The funds that convinced the Canadian immigration authorities that you two have enough money to support yourselves until you get jobs. Captain Kuchiki and your father send their regards.”
“Nii-sama?” Rukia asks quietly, and Ichigo’s hand covers hers. Maybe they do have an ally in Soul Society.
“Don’t attempt to contact anyone,” Urahara advises. “Kuchiki is still subject to whatever charges Central Forty-Six hands down.”
They only have one suitcase between them – his clothes and hers, purchased hastily at the clothing shop in Rausu after the arrival of their gigai – and take the train to Sapporo the next day, spending the night in a hostel before boarding a plane to Tokyo. The second flight, to Hong Kong, is longer, but they make it in plenty of time to catch their third flight, this one to Toronto.
The tickets for their flight say that they’re in economy class, and it’s just as small and uncomfortable as the name would suggest. Rukia is so petite that it isn’t so bad for her, but Ichigo struggles to get comfortable with his longer, lankier body in an aisle seat. By now she’s used to the sensation of a plane taking off and no longer clutches at Ichigo as the jet leaves the ground.
They both sleep on and off during the flight – more than fifteen hours long – rising only to stretch their legs and occasionally use the tiny lavatory ten rows back. Despite the cramped quarters it’s fine until Rukia has a nightmare of Renji and Kira (of all people) hunting her down, Renji’s zanpakutō encircling her while Kira’s blade hooks beneath her chin and –
“Shh, shh, I’ve got you,” Ichigo murmurs, when she comes back to herself in his arms and blinks owlishly up at him. The people around them are looking at them and Rukia’s cheeks turn bright red.
“S-sorry,” she whispers, offering little bows of apology to the flight attendant and the other passengers who have looked over to see what the commotion is.
“Is everything alright?” the attendant asks. “Would you like some water?”
“Just a nightmare,” Ichigo says quietly.
“Ah – yes, please,” Rukia manages. She drains half the bottle of water in a few gulps with Ichigo still rubbing her back, hand gentle and warm even through the plain black shirt she wears.
“Do you want to talk about it?” Ichigo asks after a while.
“I dreamt they found me,” Rukia mutters. “Renji and Kira.”
“They won’t,” Ichigo promises. “We’re going to be in Canada in a few hours and anyway they don’t know what planes are, remember?”
She laughs softly, and when she falls asleep again, curled under a blanket with the armrest pulled up so she can rest against him, she doesn’t dream.