3Title: Friends
Summary: Whether you're sad, happy, hurt, angry, in love, in hate, in pain... through it all... they're always there for you... That's what friends are for... right.. Kurosak-kun?. A series of un-related Bleach one-shots focusing on friendship.
Disclaimer: I don't own Bleach, last time I tried to use Bleach I ruined by favourite jacket... thanks
A/N: so I tend to write a lot of Stories down that don't fit in with my other Bleach one-shot story "How to be Human" so I figured I'd write a one shot of non-related one-shots that show friendship and the relationships between the characters in Bleach with each other... most of them are three people relationships... or at least the ones I've written.. and most are ichiruki with Orihime... because I love Hime... she's really sweet
Chapter: Please, tell me, am I on the right end?
The sun had finally begun to set on this day. The soft orange-pink light filtering gently through thick spring leaves. An eerily beautiful glow lighting up the stark white of the flowers that seemed to grow out of control in this deathly serene place. Thunder could be heard in the distance, soft rain clouds gathering on the other side of Karakura, where the sun was set to rise the next morning.
Petals flew by dancing in the warm spring air, coming from the east. Amber eyes trailing their orange-pink glow as they pirouetted and spun through the air in a deathly dance. Some would fly high in the sky and land gracefully to the ground a few inches from where they were born, others would fly dangerously high and disappear into the abyssal night sky that was slowly changing their hue purple, the rest would float serenely through the air, only to rest on the fast moving stream only a few feet away, for a moment they would rest happily on the water only to be crushed under the cruelty and pressure of the stream.
It would never allow to go with the flow.
It only brought death.
He mused for a moment on the irony of it all. Of the few things that gave these flowers life, wind would steal it, sun would dry it, and the water that it longed for after the heat of a spring day…. Would crush it mercilessly.. Stealing it's body away to a place far from home.
He almost felt soothed by such a morbid look on life, the universe, and everything. He was more amused though, by the cruelty of life, the universe, and everything.
He would've laughed, it his life wasn't hanging by the very thing that amused him.
Her life had.
He ran his hands over the cold marble, fingers tracing the delicate letters. He etched every feel of his finger against the rough carving, dedicating it to memory. He figured that if he could only choose one moment to take with him to soul society, it would be those letters.
The only thing that kept him fighting.
He vaguely wondered what would happen if those lettered disappeared from his mind completely. If he forgot those five simple letters, then he would loose everything he ever valued. Everything he had fought for in life would be in vain. He knew the answer to what he would do, if that situation ever occurred, the cool barrel in his left pocket was just a casual reminder.
He fell to his knees, the pressure of just being there… too much for one man to bear. The flowers flew happily past him, not even knowing the fate that awaited them. For only a moment… he was jealous. Ignorance, as they say, is bliss. But after that brief envy had passed he figured he'd much rather know how he would die, than to die suddenly without warning. That way, as he lay bleeding on the cold floor, or as metal jammed into his chest, or in the case he hoped most for… cold metal pressed into the back of his mouth, he could think of those five letters and the word they formed so smoothly…. And that way… he would try his hardest to remember them as he passed on.
If there was an afterlife for those as low as he.
Hell seemed more suited for some one of his nature.
A killer at heart from the day he was born, first his mother, then all those who had laid their lives down for his sake, then Tatsuki, Keigo, many others, and now.. Those five letters… etched gracefully into marble stone.
Grass grew dark on the surrounding stones, he wondered how long it had been since his last visit here.
It seemed like such a nice place before.
Now it was rampant with weeds and flowers, that drank precious water from the ground, stealing it from the deserving beneath, yet giving them a sense of funereal grace.
He supposed that it was best to have those five letters placed in a place as beautiful as this one.
His fingers vaguely reached into his pocket and grasped the handle of the object that rested dead and peaceful in it's place. The fell of human warmth bringing it back to life, thirsting for the only thing it ever brought.
Blood.
His fingers closed over the trigger gently as his arms moved the cold metal barrel upwards. He almost grinned at the feel of the cool metal against the back of his throat. His fingers shuddered and shook against the trigger, unsure if this was really the right means,
The means do not matter if the end is right.
The five letters etched into his mind and formed the word that he missed so dearly.
These five letters had formed a word that had belonged to someone he had been friends with for a long time.
His fingers squeezed the trigger.
Your love is the barrel of a gun.
A shot rang out in the area. "Rukia"
Please, tell me, am I on the right end?
The bullet hit off a wall on the far right.
"BAKA!"
Instead of hot bullets he felt a cold small hand against the back of his head.
"BAKABAKABAKA!" She screamed, hitting him with strength he hadn't known the woman to posses.
He looked up at the woman with such grief and pain, she could've cried.
"Baka…" she whispered, kneeling beside him, orange locks falling past the asterisk pins in her hair.
Silence took over the two ginger adults, filling the air with a sickeningly awkward silence.
"Do you really think she'd find this end fitting?" she whispered, hatred in her voice.
He looked down at the gun resting on the ground before the marble. His fingers red from gripping it so tightly. "No, but I like to think she would."
"Then why.." she whispered, looking at him through the locks, "did you think you could get away with this?"
He shrugged, looking at the stone before him. "Because of me, she and countless others have surrendered their lives, your best friend… being one of them… you should hate me as much as I do."
She grinned sadly, a tear rolling down her cheek. "I could never hate you, because of your cause… my friend…my friends fought to their ends.. And died good deaths. They could've lived and died normal people.. But now… Tatsuki… Rukia they're heroes."
"Only you and I know that. Tatsuki's mother… her father.. They'll never know." He whispered, "The world will never know."
"The only thing that matters…" she mused, "Is that you.. And I know what they did."
He sighed, mind etching those letters in his mind. Her hands reached across the small expanse, one grasping his, the other stealing the gun.
"You don't have to end it this way.." She stated, "knowing Rukia… like I did… I know she'd want you to die like she did… a hero, fighting to the last moment. Not as a coward seeking comfort in the barrel of a hand gun."
A soft white flower, stained purple in the last moments of sunlight, landed at her grave. He picked it up, a sadness filling his dead heart, the hue reminiscent of her violet eyes. A gentle love filling his gaze as her half smile filled his mind.
His amber eyes wandered over to the orange haired woman beside him, and he slipped the flower behind her ear, the translucent petals taking on the deep blue hue of the now dead night and the serenity of her warm brown hair. The colours mixed and he smiled sadly, orange and black the way he always recalled it.
He stood silently, the heaviness still resting in his heart, but his eyes landed on the woman beside him and he recalled the strength his once lover instilled in the girl.
Those five letters, etched carefully into a marble headstone, had changed the timid girl beside him.. Into a strong brave woman, a boy who kept to himself in selfish hatred… into a man that fought alongside those he once hated with every fibre of his being, another boy who was silent and had no use for his strength.. Into a man who knew what he wanted to use that power for.
Most of all, she changed a boy who could never rest, a boy who hated who he had become, a boy with no purpose.. Into a man who could sleep peacefully tonight, a man who would grown to respect the face looking back at him in the mirror, a man with a purpose.
For her sake, he would fight on.. Even if it hurt him deeply.
Things, he mused…. As a flower petal flew past him…. Would calm… like the river that now pulled it gently along…. And he would find himself in a new and exciting place…. Wherever the current brought him… and he would fight twice as hard and with twice the purpose than he had before…alongside his friends...
All in the name of the five letters, carved gracefully into the marble headstone.
"Rukia"
He glanced down at the sad woman, his amber eyes soft. "Thank you... Ino-... Orihime..."