Seireitei Monogatari

a/n: Sorry for the lack of updates last week. Real Life intrudes so quickly sometimes. But I'm back now! And I hope you enjoy this update, too! It's another filled request!

Thanks to Yakumo, Kuromei, Rachel, and uchiha mikomi for their lovely reviews!

Enjoy!

Title: Anywhere But Home
Pairings: Aizen/Ichigo
Rating: T to M
Warnings: Spoilers? Boykisses and bit more suggested
Words: 5,923
Description: It was ironic really. That the same man who had destroyed him had saved him from himself.
Inspired by the song Anywhere by Evanescence.
Dedication: For Panther, who wanted an Aizen/Ichigo.

His shoulders were beginning to ache, joining the dull throb of his knees. But those complaints were really the least of Sousuke's worries. Considering his current predicament, he should have been concerned about his future. His life.

A year ago, he never would have pictured himself in this predicament, in this utter failure. All because of one human, one teenager, one orange-haired child. Sousuke's carefully crafted plans had been shattered irreparably, his aspirations broken in so many shards. The Shinigami had been egotistic and content in their power, had been malleable. All too easily led into his delusions.

And then, Kurosaki Ichigo blazed his way into Seireitei and shattered every one of Sousuke's illusions. He had thought he had planned for everything, for any instance, but he had never foreseen this. Never could have dreamed the effect this one boy would have on his goals.

He couldn't have known that Kurosaki, just by being present, by choosing to fight, would spell Sousuke's end. He dragged the Shinigami from their complacency, forced them to their feet. Made them to see that if they didn't rise, Aizen would crush them. And he would have, if not for Kurosaki Ichigo.

And now, here he was. Bound in their hold, captive to their whims. His army, what remained of it, was scattered across Hueco Mundo, huddled and fearing for its life. Gin, his heir and perhaps only friend, was dead. Kaname was fallen. And his Espada had been defeated as if they were mere Academy students. His palace lay in crumpled ruins, and everything he had worked so hard to obtain was nothing more than ash and dust.

It was pathetic.

Sousuke lifted his head and caught sight of the moon barely gleaming through the bars into his tiny cell. It was the deepest part of night, and yet, he couldn't sleep. Tomorrow, they would come to take him to the darkest of their cells, to the most forgotten levels of Seireitei where he would spend the rest of his significantly shortened life. They wouldn't have been satisfied with an execution, not Seireitei, not with the way he had made fools of them all.

He could feel the emptiness inside of him. The lingering sense of something missing or forgotten. A sense of being hollow within and a loud echo of absolute quiet. Where once there had been a voice, a reflection of his own self, there was now nothing but the agony of silence. It was the worst punishment they could have given him. This vacant void without death.

How pathetic that he should long for his end. It was certainly preferable to this nothingness, to this isolation and imprisonment. How pitiable that he, the former lord of a grand army and would-be king, should be reduced to this.

Sousuke closed his eyes, unwilling to look at the moon as it streaked through the bars of his cell. At the moment, it closely resembled the half-crescent that always hung over Hueco Mundo. It reminded him of his former lordship. It reminded him of the things he had irreparably lost and would never find again.

On the edge of his senses, someone knocked on a door, but Sousuke barely spared the action any attention. It was likely another Shinigami, come to celebrate victory. Or the changing of the guard – always a vice-captain and captain together, as if there were anyone left to care for Sousuke's fate. What did Seireitei think it had left to fear? What would he do as powerless as he was now?

There were voices, but they didn't seem pleased. And then, he heard a pained grunt followed by an aborted shout. The feel of reiatsu in the air rose from a dull hum to a sizzling electricity, like the feel of lightning before the storm. It raised the hair on Sousuke's arms, and he cursed his lack of true senses. Now and forever unable to properly identify the perpetrators.

He heard clashing swords, the ring drizzling to his ears, and then two quiet thumps. Sousuke opened his eyes, staring again at the moon beyond the wall. He could turn to meet his fate, but he was vaguely curious if this new arrival would stab him in the back. Clearly, they had fought against all odds for the right to kill him themselves.

He simply knelt with his back to the door as his cell opened with a definite rattle.

“Ah… Fancying a midnight stroll, were we?”

But to his surprise, rather than a blade through the back, he heard the click of a lock as his shackles were released. A groan slipped through his lips before he could stop it as his arms eased to a more natural position, and Sousuke couldn't help rubbing his fingers over his aching wrists.

“If I'd come to kill you, it would’ve already happened,” a suspiciously familiar voice replied with edged humor. Footsteps followed as he ghosted around Sousuke, until he stood between the former captain and the barred window. “Unless you truly do want to die.”

Sousuke frowned, looking up at his guest. The man – for he was definitely a man now, if still a very young one – still held his zanpakutou bared, body taut with tension.

“You? Not at all what I expected,” he commented with some semblance of calm. “And may I ask what you are doing here?”

Kurosaki Ichigo scoffed. “What's it look like?” he demanded, free hand tossing forward what appeared to be a cloak. “Getting you out.”

Sousuke caught it on reflex, and his hands rubbed over the fabric. They found nothing unusual.

“Why?” He tilted his head, fingers toying with the edge. “Why would you do that, Kurosaki-kun? I am hardly your friend.”

“You’re hardly my enemy now.” Ichigo glanced at him, brown eyes seeming black in the gloom of Sousuke's cell. “And because you weren't wrong. Not about all of it.”

Deeply suspicious, Sousuke's gaze tracked his would-be rescuer’s every movement. Watching as he did nothing more than sheathe his zanpakutou.

“That is a rather evasive answer,” he countered lightly, attempting to figure out Kurosaki’s true intentions.

“That’s rich coming from you,” the younger man retorted in a clipped and borderline irritated tone. “It's the only one you'll get. So either get off your knees or wait for your death. We don't have a lot of time.”

Kurosaki was right in that at least. Sousuke was an important prisoner. Someone was constantly checking in, even if logic dictated he couldn't possibly break free on his own. And the moment someone sensed the quiescent reiatsu of those Ichigo had defeated, the alarm would spread.

He entertained an internal battle over trusting this boy… this human. Would Kurosaki free him only to turn and destroy him later? Was this a farce of a different sort? A means to humiliate him further?

All that Sousuke had thought he'd known about Kurosaki flitted away in the face of his incongruity. Yet, in any case, he had a point. Stay and die or take a chance and flee. And when given the choice, Sousuke couldn't honestly say that he would choose death. Some foolish, desperate part of himself still thought to live, even if his ambitions were impossible now.

‘I should have seen this,’ Sousuke thought to himself, even as he rose on trembling limbs and threw the cloak over his shoulders. ‘The boy has always been an anomaly. I was never able to predict him. I doubt even his master Urahara is able.’

In that, Kurosaki Ichigo had only been predictable in his unpredictability.

And truly, he shouldn’t have still been surprised as they exited the prison and fled into the night with only a few exchanged words between them. Kurosaki led the way and admittedly did all of the fighting. Even as Sousuke's fingers tingled with the urge to lift blade again, marking the echoing emptiness inside of him where Kyouka Suigetsu had once called. But all he could do was watch from the sidelines, as the boy took out everyone in their path with blunted and silent strikes. He could only trail behind and breathe in the crisp, evening air.

But freedom filled his lungs with each gasp. It had never tasted so sweet. Or so completely bitter.

-----

Sucking in a breath, Sousuke wiped the sweat from his brow, and stared at the cut on his arm. It oozed blood and stung but wouldn't kill him. He hated how difficult battle was for him now. Without his reiatsu, he could only rely on his skills with a sword; one which could never compare to Kyouka Suigetsu at that.

A hand grasped his arm, dragging it into view. Sousuke blinked at the sudden invasion of his personal space, but he didn't pull away. He watched as Kurosaki frowned over the wound, fishing a piece of cloth out of his pocket and placing it over the seeping cut.

As usual, the boy – young man – was barely winded, not a speck of dirt or injury on him. Sometimes, Sousuke wondered if the assassins and soldiers that Seireitei sent after them were just to keep the illusion that they were being chased. Surely, they had to know that those they sent weren't strong enough, not for someone like Kurosaki Ichigo. If the boy wasn’t captain-commander level by now, he would eat Kyouraku’s hat.

“Doesn't look too bad,” Kurosaki murmured as he turned the arm in his hand this way and that.

By now, the both of them had become pretty skilled at treating injuries. And Sousuke was forced to concur with his assessment.

“Might sting a little,” the young man added a heartbeat later.

“I think I'll live,” Sousuke replied lightly.

Kurosaki nodded and released his hold, though the warm impression of his fingers lingered. “We should move on,” he said, sliding Zangetsu against his back. “They'll be back.”

“They always do,” Sousuke agreed, only casting a brief glance to the defeated bodies strewn about them.

Most of them still lived, but a few might not if help didn't come quickly. The boy still refused to kill, an endearing if naïve trait. It was the last untainted part. And some piece of Sousuke wished that he never learned to accept death so easily himself. Perhaps that he had never been so willing to dispense it.

But he brushed that thought away as he watched Kurosaki start off in a random direction. They never really picked a destination. It was far safer to be haphazard, to be unpredictable.

They walked in silence for a time, companionable as it usually was. There was often little need for words, and yet, Sousuke couldn’t help but wonder, but have the question fell from his lips.

“Why?” His voice was soft, and when there was no immediate reply, he thought that his companion hadn’t heard.

“That's the second time you've asked me,” the boy replied a moment later. It was obvious he didn't need an explanation to know what Sousuke meant.

“I believe there's more to the story,” the former captain elaborated.

Kurosaki inclined his head. He glanced over his shoulder as he gingerly stepped around an unconscious member of the Onmitsukidoh. One who’d been thrown this far from the main group but still managed to survive.

“Because I'm next,” Ichigo answered succinctly. “And I'm not one to sit and wait for the fire. For them to stab me to death in my sleep.”

He wasn’t surprised by that, but Sousuke wished he could be. This boy was Soul Society's hero, their trump card. He was the main reason, the only reason, they’d won the war.

But Aizen Sousuke had not come as far as he had by being foolish. Kurosaki was a hero, yes. He was also dangerous. Impulsive. Allied only to himself and his friends. He couldn't be controlled. He couldn't be kept under their thumb. He had no vices to blackmail and no desire for wealth or power. He only wished to protect what he already had and even they – his friends – were more than capable of fighting.

And more than that, he was strong. Kurosaki held power that Soul Society would never understand. And much of it had nothing to do with his bankai or his skills with a blade. More than the reiatsu pulsing at the air around him. He had in spades what the Shinigami lacked entirely.

Sousuke could understand their fear, even if he didn’t support it. Fear was for the weak. For those incapable or unwilling to stand on their own. It was the slow poison that led the Shinigami to desert their most powerful asset for the possibility that he might one day do something they didn’t want.

The boy was right to choose as he did. Better a life of his own making than to be chained and subservient to anyone. Even if it meant that life was one constant battle after another. Even if it meant that he had to take Sousuke along for the ride.

-----

The storm was like a howling tempest, hurling wind and rain both at them as they crouched in an abandoned building on the outskirts of Rukongai. The roof leaked, and the pungent odor of decay was ripe on the air. It was little more than a hovel, offering little protection against the elements.

Sousuke fought back a shiver, wishing now more than ever that he had his reiatsu to cloak him in warmth. Perhaps even provide the illusion that the sun shone warm and tender on his face. Though the illusions had never worked as well for him as they had to the people he chose to show.

The quarters were cramped, but they had enough room to stretch out their legs if they wished. Not that he or the boy did. It was too cold for that. They sat apart, but somehow, Sousuke felt as if they were only inches away from each other. He could feel lingering tendrils of Kurosaki’s reiatsu curl around him, restrained but present, prickling at his skin but not harming him.

The boy had improved over the years. He could now hide himself with the best of them, rivaling even those Sousuke had admired. Sometimes, it was as if he had none, as if he weren’t a Shinigami at all, he hid so well. And it was those times that he alarmed Sousuke the most. As if Ichigo had become another person.

Looking through the darkness, where he caught sight of brown eyes staring out through the sagging doorway, Sousuke believed that he looked at another man entirely. This one before him was much older – though his appearance remained largely unchanged – and he was altered by what he had seen. What they had done to survive.

Those eyes – once so innocent – were haunted. Sousuke wondered what he saw when he gazed into the distance like that. What he thought of. The past perhaps. Or the future forever lost to him. One he had willingly given up for one who should’ve been his enemy.

Again, Sousuke was haunted by reasoning. The same that Kurosaki hadn't given him. Oh, he'd received plenty of answers. But Sousuke suspected they weren't all to the tale. They were never enough.

He pulled his cloak tighter about him, the same one given to him long ago, watching Kurosaki watch the rain fall. The boy – no, man now; he must try to remember – really was attractive. His features carved as if from marble, a firm set to a masculine jaw but softened by a subtle roundness to his cheeks.

“You're staring at me,” Kurosaki suddenly said, voice breaking the silence.

Amused despite himself, Sousuke inclined his head. “So I am.”

Dark eyes slid towards him, though Ichigo didn't turn his head. “You seem confused.”

“Maybe because I'd like to know why you are doing this,” Sousuke answered smoothly, though it was something he had prompted many, many times before. “Don't you have another life? Somewhere else you'd rather be?”

Kurosaki snorted, gaze shifting back to the falling rain. “Because this is the only way to have a life. They'd never allow it otherwise. Not with what I am.” His lip curled bitterly. As though the taste of the words offended him.

Maybe they did.

“And what are you?” Sousuke questioned with clear interest.

A hand dropped from his lap, reaching down to stroke fingers across the bared blade of Zangetsu. “Human. Shinigami. Vizard.” Kurosaki shrugged. “None of the above. All of the above.”

“What a crime.” It was an ironic statement coming from him.

Kurosaki's head turned towards him, a crooked smirk easing the placid expression on his face. “Unforgivable,” he agreed sarcastically. “Absolutely and completely. Even Ukitake would’ve gone for my head. Undoubted for some noble reason.” He gave a sound that was halfway between snort and laugh. “Like they would’ve needed an excuse.”

“No, it is they who have no excuse,” the ex-captain countered with a shake of his head. Beneath the cover of his cloak, his hands drew into fists. “If only I had succeeded.”

“A little late for that.” The younger man tilted his head back against the aging wood, the dark circles beneath his eyes even more prominent in the limited light.

An overwhelming deluge of emotions, too many to count, flooded Sousuke. “Or regret,” he added, thoughts turning to Gin and the still sharp jab of guilt that cut through his belly.

“Yeah, that one, too,” Kurosaki confirmed and closed his eyes, as though preparing to sleep.

It had been a long day, after all. No Shinigami had been sighted. No proof that they had been found or were being tracked or traced. Even so, both of them remained on edge, just waiting for the necessary moment to flee again.

This wasn't a life. Not for him and definitely not for Kurosaki. And yet, the boy was still here. It baffled him, further than he could understand.

“You haven't abandoned me yet,” Sousuke murmured, barely above the rain striking against the sagging roof or the wind battering at the loose wood on the sides. He wasn't sure if he meant it to be a statement or a question. Or possibly even a plea.

Silence followed to the point where Sousuke was certain he hadn't been heard. Or was being ignored. Either was fine. He didn't intend to repeat himself.

But then, Kurosaki stirred, lips moving but nothing else. “I saved you, Aizen. You're my responsibility now.”

He wouldn't stand for that. “Sousuke.”

Kurosaki’s eyelids peeled back, revealing the depths of his eyes. He tilted his head to the side in silent question.

“Let's drop the formality,” the former lord clarified, an odd warmth inside of him. “Why bother with it now? We're outlaws. And we’re rather stuck with each other, I should think.”

“Hnn… that we are.” Kuro-- Ichigo clutched his cloak tighter against himself and pulled the straying tendrils of his reiatsu around him until Sousuke couldn't even feel a hint, a taste of his power. “We should get some sleep.”

Sousuke said nothing in return and just closed his eyes. There was an overwhelming feeling that something had just occurred. Something fortunate perhaps. He simply didn't know what.

-----

Another faraway place. Another unknown shore. Ichigo had borrowed something from his master that enabled them to wander to the living world. And while he was curious, Sousuke didn't ask because using both items prompted a strange gleam in Ichigo's eyes. Thick like regret and heavy like sorrow. So Sousuke didn't ask; this was the boy’s show.

The city was a massive metropolis, and it was all too easy to lose a single person within, much less two. Even easier when one of them didn't have any reiatsu that could be tracked and Ichigo had become a master of hiding his. It helped having a human body as well. One that wasn’t aging as it should be.

The underworld was dark and seedy, like the worst parts of Rukongai only for the living, infested with drugs and prostitution and violence on every corner. It was the perfect place to hide, to make use of an education that was never quite completed and fighting skills that had no purpose elsewhere. It was also the only way for them to acquire necessary identification. The constant need to be on the move required such.

A stale wind fluttered against the tails of Sousuke's coat as he stood on a corner, waiting and contemplating a cigarette. It wasn't so much that he liked the taste of nicotine, but the very act of smoking made him appear like an entirely different person. The best disguises were ones that weren’t really disguises at all. And Aizen Sousuke would never lower himself to such a level, to do something so plebian.

There were bright lights and fast cars and the press of a crowd, far too close for his liking, all around him. Sousuke longed for Soul Society, for the quiet of his former division. He missed Hueco Mundo, the serene silence of the desert and the stark white corridors of Las Noches. The taste of Gin’s tea and the easy quiet between them as they stared at into the endless night. The melody of Kyouka Suigetsu’s voice ghosting through the air and the weight of a zanpakutou at his side.

Smoke was heavy in his mouth at that remembrance. The flavor of ash and something all too bitter. But that drifted away with the wind as footsteps and a body sidled up beside him.

“Did you wait long?” Ichigo asked, voice faintly hoarse. He stomped his boot against the sidewalk, scraping off a piece of refuse.

“No,” Sousuke answered succinctly, the two of them turning to their mutual destination. “Did you get it?”

Ichigo held up a package, slim and wrapped in paper. Sousuke didn't want to know the contents; neither did his friend. They didn't ask, and Sousuke hoped that their time of obligation to the local underlord was soon to be over.

“Easier than I thought it would be,” the younger man answered as he fell into line beside him. “And no, I didn't kill anyone.”

“Did I ask?” Sousuke returned, cigarette still burning in his hand but now forgotten. “I never do.”

Ichigo snorted. “It was all over your face.”

The very fact that Ichigo had to make that statement unsettled something within him. Made that familiar hollow ache rise up.

“We don't belong here,” he murmured a few heartbeats later.

The other man shrugged. He tucked the package under his arms, though he kept a wary eye out for thieves. Not that many would be foolish enough to approach them. Ichigo might not leak reiatsu like a sieve anymore, but he still had an aura of power and ferocity.

“We don't belong much of anywhere, Sousuke.”

A stirring reminder to their current situation. He glance at Ichigo and saw a boy turned man, who could’ve been something great. Who had been something great. He'd had a life once. He’d been human. He’d had family and friends. He’d had a future.

Ichigo had none of that now. Only his freedom and a ruined would-be god as a companion.

Sousuke, however, said none of this.

“Where's the drop off?” he inquired instead, throwing his cigarette to the ground and simply allowing it to burn out.

Ichigo rolled his shoulders, tiredness darkening his eyes. “A few hours from now. We have time.”

They wandered into a park or what was left of one. Surely, it must have been beautiful once upon a time. A place where children played, laughter filling the air. Now, it was abandoned and decrepit, the equipment rusted and rotten. Weeds cluttered the flower beds, along with the refuse of society, and a lingering odor of unsavory things tainted the air.

Sousuke gazed at the man walking beside him and wondered as he had many times before. Years had passed; he should just accept what had happened. Yet, he still couldn't fathom Ichigo, this strange man who he now called friend. Sousuke couldn't understand why he had risked everything, had thrown it all away. He could’ve just as easily disappeared with the other Vizard. Could’ve taken his friends and family with him.

“Ichigo,” he began, voice soft but reaching. “Why are you doing this?”

Brown eyes flickered to him, and he shifted the package from one arm to the other. “What? Carrying a suspicious package through an abandoned park? Or why am I helping you? Because I'm pretty sure I've already answered the second one.”

“It doesn't make any sense,” Sousuke countered logically. “You helped defeat me. You were there when they severed my soukatsui.” As much as it pained him to remember, Sousuke did it anyway. “And then, a day later, you knocked out the guards and freed me. Why? Why would you do this?”

Ichigo sighed, raking a hand through his significantly longer hair. Not quite enough to pull back but getting there.

“Because I stopped believing in Soul Society a long time ago,” Ichigo replied, once again with a different answer. His tone dropped, filled with disquiet. “Maybe even before I lifted Zangetsu against you. Maybe before I even saved Rukia.”

“What do you believe in then?” Sousuke had a driving desire to know; something that surprised himself. He didn’t have much drive or desire these days. “Strength? Justice?”

“None of the above?”

Frustrated, he pushed for more. “Well?”

“Myself. And no one else.” Ichigo paused mid-step, surrounded by the dying trees and graffitied benches. His lips pulled into a wry and crooked grin. “Well, maybe the geta-boushi. And my sisters. Yeah, Chad, too.” His voice grew melancholy as he recalled his friends and family. “But that was a long time ago. Years and years. All I have now is myself. And you, I suppose.”

Sousuke shifted, vaguely uncomfortable but unwilling to let this drop. “Do you regret your decision?”

“I make it a point not to,” Ichigo retorted, the wind stirring at his hair and throwing it into his eyes. He impatiently tucked it behind his ear. “Because once you start, you find a bunch of other things you should regret. And it never ends.” He turned as if to continue moving, only to flick his eyes back towards Sousuke. “Do you?”

Furrowing his brow, the ex-captain breathed in. He let the intoxicating scent of Ichigo wash over him, helping to combat the horrid and lingering odor of the park.

“Do I what?” he asked, though he already knew the answer.

Ichigo watched him for a moment. “Regret any choice you made.”

Sousuke faltered, considering the breadth of that question. With failure hanging over his head like a never-ending storm and the death of his companions clinging to his conscience, did he regret? With the reality that his existence would never be anything more than a constant escape into the night, could he claim that he would choose the same? That he could once more have Gin beheaded by that airheaded fool Hirako and be powerless to stop it? That he could be desperate to reach Kyouka Suigetsu only to have her slip from his grasp?

Did he regret any of it? Could he regret when it would devalue so much?

“Even knowing what I know now,” he replied slowly, even if such a thing were an impossibility, “I do not regret anything. Otherwise, that would belittle everything I attempted to accomplish. Every choice I made and all that was sacrificed for it.”

“Which is another reason why I don't regret. Not anything I've done.” Ichigo angled back towards him, closing the distance. “Not fighting. Not bleeding. Not even ripping you out of their clutches.” He smirked then. “In fact, that last one is pretty damn amusing.”

Sousuke had to admit that Ichigo was right. He wished he could have seen the look on the old man's face when his precious prisoner had vanished. The way Hitsugaya must’ve torn his hair out in frustration. How Hirako had probably shouted and his blonde chit screamed. And Urahara… Sousuke could only imagine how he had reacted. To know that his dear student had made off with his worst enemy. That image alone was almost worth losing.

“They never saw it coming, did they?” Sousuke asked ironically, lips curling upwards.

“Not a chance,” Ichigo murmured with gleaming eyes. “They never did understand me. Never even tried to. Not like you do.” And suddenly, he was very close, breath mere inches away. Near enough to fog up Sousuke’s glasses.

Sousuke wondered why, even as he unconsciously admired the striations of colors in Ichigo's eyes. He wanted to say that they were brown, but they were also so much more than that. Fading like leaves in autumn. Fresh like newly turned soil. Smooth like the richest and most expensive chocolate.

And when had he become so internally poetic? A different creative outlet since he was no longer plotting death and mayhem perhaps?

But even that wasn’t enough to quiet him, to have him pull away. It was undoubtedly safer to do so. However, he did like to live dangerously these days.

“I expected to die in that place,” Sousuke said then, careful but on the edge. “I had wondered many times why they did not just execute me. It would’ve been smarter.”

Ichigo laughed, and for once, it was a true sound. “When have the Shinigami ever been smart. They just wanted you to suffer. And I obviously didn't approve.”

“And someday,” Sousuke inserted as he pressed in closer, “you'll tell me the real reason why.”

The look Ichigo gave him was all cocky grin and recklessness. A hint of the rash and bold boy who still lurked beneath the surface.

“What?” he questioned with a tilted head. “My previous answers weren't good enough?”

Ichigo was teasing him. Even Sousuke could tell that. He shook his head and tossed the younger man a glance. And as regrettable as it was, he knew it was time to move on. From both the conversation and the park.

“We can't be late for the drop, Ichigo,” he reminded gently, taking a step away and turning.

Behind him, he heard a boot crunch against the dry ground, crackling over broken glass and dead leaves. Ichigo's hand reached for his shoulder, surprising him. And when Sousuke turned back, mouth open to ask a question, Ichigo was suddenly there.

Sousuke received a glimpse of dark eyes before lips fell over his, warm and sweet. Tasting faintly of the candy Ichigo had grown fond of eating, his one remembrance of his sisters and Urahara’s candy shop. His tongue slipped out of his mouth, taking advantage of parted lips and coaxing Sousuke's mouth to widen. He did, out of surprise and want both, letting Ichigo control the kiss.

And then, it was over.

Ichigo pulled away and ahead of him as if nothing had happened. As if the near decade of their association had always been full of such things. Even when it had so obviously not.

“Try that for a reason,” he called out mischievously, tipping the package back at him as if in salutation.

Sousuke stared at him for a second before trailing behind. The faint taste of Ichigo burned on his lips.

-----

Warmth for the first time in so long. And bright beams of sunlight spilling in dappled streaks across a thick comforter, rumpled from use. The smell of cooked food on the air, the scent enough to make his belly rumble. But that was to be saved for later. Right now, he had more important business.

Sucking in a breath, Sousuke pressed his face to Ichigo's bare throat, breathing in the scent. A pulse throbbed beneath his lips, and Ichigo's fingers dragged down his back, urging him onwards. Demanding, promising that if he didn't, Ichigo would be the one to turn the tables.

A rare moment of peace. He reveled in it and the body beneath him. The slide of skin on skin and sweat dotting his forehead.

His hand skated along the outside of Ichigo's bare thigh, fingers curling around as he dragged Ichigo where he wanted him. Sousuke coiled with want, heat flushing over his skin. His lips passed over a tender neck, nibbling and sucking and tasting what he had never even thought to desire before. And still, despite this, despite the urgency and denial of years pressing down, Sousuke wondered.

Things had changed, were still changing. The answers couldn't be the same as they were before. And he dragged his mouth upwards until he sealed his lips over another pair, tongues immediately touching. Ichigo never surrendered to a kiss; he always greedily fought to make it his own. Such adamant battle made Sousuke's blood boil with lust, with a fire he hadn’t experienced in so long.

“Why?” Sousuke whispered, demanded, breath a moist puff against Ichigo's lips. “Why?”

Ichigo rolled his eyes, fingers digging into the muscles of Sousuke's back. “You ask me that now?” He gasped and hooked a leg around his soon-to-be lover, dragging him closer.

“Of course.” Sousuke nipped at his ear. “What better time?”

“Maybe when we’re not two inches away from actual sex!” Ichigo growled, full of annoyance. But the sound was sexy, rattling down Sousuke's spine.

He chuckled, nuzzling into Ichigo's throat and inhaling. “Why?”

Ichigo groaned and arched beneath him, a familiar part of him bumping against Sousuke's bare hip. “Shut up. Sex now. Talking later,” he all but snarled.

And honestly, it took a stronger man than Sousuke to resist such a request.

He just smiled and pushed down with a slow thrust that made both of them moan. And the world dissolved into pleasure and heat and the feel of hands sliding up his back and into his hair.

That night, Sousuke understandably didn't get an answer.

-----

However and very true to form, he asked again. The previous responses just hadn't satisfied him.

“Why?” Sousuke murmured in the dark of their shared room. Eyes barely able to see in the light shining in pale beams through the lines in the blinds.

Ichigo shifted, arms warm around the man beside him and close enough that Sousuke could feel his heart beating. He just gazed at his lover for a long moment, eyes softened and gleaming.

“Because I love you.”

He made it sound so simple. He made it sound so easy. And ironically, Sousuke thought that for all the reasons Ichigo had told him over the years of running and hiding and reveling in freedom, it sounded the most honest. The most true.

It made him wonder if that should have been Ichigo's answer all along. If it would have been had Sousuke only dared to listen. Had he looked back at their time together with something other than curiosity.

And he simply closed his eyes, pressing his lips in a soft kiss to the nearest flesh he could reach, part of Ichigo's arm. It was his silent answer to such a truth. To words and a sentiment he returned but couldn’t yet say.

He just settled in beside his lower and wondered at what the morning would bring. More running. More hiding. Forever chased by the Shinigami. An endless lifetime of flight, always looking over their shoulders. Always wondering but always together.

Strange how it didn't sound so bad anymore. Not bad at all.

**************

a/n: Yet another request fulfilled. I probably could have posted this one on its own. Maybe I will later. But for now, it's in here. I do so love this pairing. It's so much fun to write from Sousuke's POV. Thanks for reading! I hope you enjoyed!