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Hold My Heart
"Ichigo!" Rukia shouted, Ichigo growled and quickly disposed of the hollow in front of him, "I'm fine Rukia! Just a nick on the arm!" she snorted, "Hmph... gushing out gallons of blood isn't 'just a nick' Idiot," she muttered, not loud enough for him to hear her ofcourse, "Man, where do all these stupid hollows keep coming from!?" Ichigo shouted, slashing down another one, "I don't know! Someone must've dropped some hollow bait or something!" "There must be hundreds," Ichigo muttered, "GETSUGA TENSHOU!!!!" he successfully destroyed quite a few hollows, "I hope we don't have to use Bankai," he muttered, Rukia snorted, "Please Ichigo, these hollows are small fry, there's no need to overdo it," she hopped out of the way of one of the hollows, "Hakuren!" she shouted, destroying quite a few hollows as well, "Rukia!" she turned around towards Ichigo, "Menos at 3:00!" she turned in his direction and spotted it, "Let's do this together," she said with a smirk, he smirked back, "Right," "Tsuki Shiro!" she howled, once the Menos was frozen Ichigo took his turn, "GETSUGA TENSHOU!!" successfully destroying the other Menos, Rukia flicked some of the ice off of her sword, "Now, let's get back to the rest of thes-" "RUKIA!!!" she paused, mid-sentence, when one of the hollows came up behind her and slashed her back, blood drizzled out of her mouth and she coughed once, before loosing her ballence and falling out of the sky, "RUKIA!!!!!!!!!!" Ichigo yelled again, everything from then on was in slow motion for her, Ichigo unleashed his Bankai and slaughtered every hollow near them, she was falling and she knew that but she didn't have the strength to stop, her arms out-stretched, her face depictintg one of horror and regret, it was ungracefull and unbecoming of a Kuchiki, but the truth was that she really didn't care at the time, she couldn't hear anything anymore, she had lost that ability now and was slowly loosing conciouseness, she saw Ichigo rushing towards her but it seemed that even with his Bankai he was slow because she felt her foot crack the ice covering the lake below her, it sunk in and she felt her already injured back hit the ice as well, as it cracked beneath her her head hit it, she felt the water seep through her clothes and open wounds, the water soon surrounded her completly and she couldn't see, so she willed her eyes to close, strangely though she could still breathe, see, and even hear now, there was no pain, there hadn't been any even with her injurery, she saw Ichigo smiling at her, the world around him was a blank slate, "Rukia," he said, "I'll help you," he held his hand out and she took it

"Rukia! Rukia!" Ichigo cried, shaking her again and again, he was dripping wet and freezing with the low temperature and snow outside but he couldn't even tell, "PLEASE Rukia!" he cried, feeling the warmth of tears prickle his eyes, she still wouldn't move, he gulped, she was absolutely drenched, when he dove after her and pulled her out of the water she wasn't breathing, not a single breath, her eyes were shut and her face was so peacefull, he refused to think that she was dead, even though that was the way she appeared to be, "Please," he wispered, the tears wouldn't stay back any longer and they were freely falling as he tried in vain to wake her from her eternal slumber, "You're not..." he sucked in a breath to steady his trembeling voice, "You're not Sleeping Beauty Rukia, you're... you're gonna wake up, you have to wake up... please.... please wake up," he cried, his efforts stalled and he couldn't will his arms to shake her anymore, he didn't want to do this, he didn't want to because if he failed it would be the last straw and she would be undeniably dead, he didn't want to know that she was gone, but he had no choice, so he gently turned her onto her back, staring at her stilled face, he tilted her chin up, pinched her nose, and parted her lips, he took in a breath and then placed his lips over her's, pumping two breaths into her, no response, "Please Rukia," he sobbed, starting the compressions, "Please come back to me," he repeated the process another time and this time he got something, during the second round of compressions, she started to cough violently and water flooded out of her mouth, "Rukia!" he screamed in a panic, giving her a few wacks between the shoulder blades to help her get the water out, once she had finally coughed it all out she leaned against him, "Ow," she wispered, he had forgotten about the severe injurery on her back wen he tried to help her with the water, "I'm sorry, that must hurt," he wispered, traces of tears quickly disolving from his voice, "It does," she replied with a smile, her voice was hoarse and uneven, he had never heard it like that before, and he had never seen her like this either, her eyes were so bloodshot that they were nearly completly red and swollen, her body was so achingly pale, her robes drenched in water, sweat, blood, he didn't no which he hated worse, and she looked so frail, it was killing him, "You look tired," he stated dryly, standing up, "I'll carry you home," he offered, she attempted to stand up as well but before she was even on her knees he had scooped her up in his arms, "I-Ichi-" "I know riding on my back must be uncomfortable for you, what with my sword and all," that was enough explination in it's entierty, she held onto his robes as they flew through the sky, she felt her eyes getting heavy and she closed them without objection

Ichigo was doing something he never did, he was actually biting his nail, finally Orihime raised up, her six flowers returning to their proper places, he jumped up, "How is she?! Is she ok!?" "Well, her wound is healed but I wouldn't say she's ok," he stood, ready for the bad news, "I couldn't reject the affects of the ... drowning... so she'll still be pretty weak and raw after that, please be carefull with her Ichigo," "Why do you say that as if I'm gonna hurt her or something?" "N-N-No!! That's not what I meant at all! I just... it's just that Rukia is a very stubborn person, she'll say she's ok when she isn't and Ichigo... she isn't, so please don't let her fool you," "I won't Orihime, I can see her better than that," Orihime nodded once and left, Ichigo sat next to Rukia and picked up her hand, shocked and ill at how freezing cold she was, she was someone who had always given him warmth despite her cold exterior and now she was like this? His strength, his pride, his sun, diminished, destroyed, eclipsed, it wasn't fair, not to her or to him, all because of that stupid hollow! A hollow that she could take out with the flick of her wrist... has done this to her simply because she couldn't turn around fast enough, knowing that was the most destroying fact of all, if he hadn't been showing off so much then maybe he could stop it, he let go of her hand and walked over to his closet, grabbing every spare blanket he could find

Nearly a half hour had gone by and Rukia hadn't warmed up at all, he was quite tempted to wake her up, but she looked so peacefull that he couldn't bare to, and he was even a bit frightened, he didn't want to see her face in so much pain again, never again, so he did the only thing he knew to do, he laid down with her and tried to give her as much body heat as he could 'Please Rukia... please warm up soon so I don't have to take off my clothes....' soon after he could feel her start to warm up, that was a huge releif to him, "Rukia," he wispered, gently brushing some of the hair out of her face, 'Please be ok,' he thought, he couldn't imagine a life without her, he had to live through it once but he never wanted to do it again, he would never do it again, "Please be ok," he wispered

Rukia's eyes opened slowly and she was a bit surprised to find Ichigo's face so close to her own, luckily though he was sleeping, she examined their perdicament, she was in his bed.... in diffrent clothes than she was when she last lost conciouseness.... being held closely by a teenage male... yeah this didn't look good at all, 'Luckily I don't think any of the elders will be seeing me like this....' she mused, sighing and wondering what had compelled this situation, Ichigo, after all, wasn't a touchy-feely person, the last time she accedentally touched the back of his neck wile using her Kido on him he had blushed twelve shades of red, she smiled at the memory, gently running her finger down his strong jawline, "I don't even remember.... what happened to me Ichigo?" she wispered

He yawned and unconciously shifted closer to her, "Eek! Don't crush me!" Rukia yipped, he opened one eye, then the other, "Rukia? RUKIA!" he shouted, grabbing her in a sudden hug, she wasn't sure what to do, the only people that ever hugged her like this were people she could easily beat off of her, but she... she didn't want to make him stop, this felt good to her, warm, sweet, and he had a nice scent too, everything piled together made her want to stay this way, made her want to keep him like this, but she didn't quite know how to react to him, so she did what her heart told her to do, something she had tried to keep from doing since becoming a Kuchiki all those years ago, but she ignored everything she had learned in life and relied on her instincts for the first time since she was a child, and she hugged him back, burrying her head into his shoulder, "Rukia," he wispered, "Ichigo... I think you're squishing me... I can't breathe!" he moved away and held his hands up, clearly he really HAD been holding her too tightly, her face was redder than it had been wen he woke up... "What? Forget that you suddenly decided to crawl in my bed and trap me underneath your huge body did you?" he was a bit speechless at first, he didn't understand how she could joke about what happened, ".... Don't you remember?" "Remember what?" suddenly every ounce of releif that had been filling him when she woke up was gone and he was worried again, she can't have amnesia...can she....? "R-Rukia... you don't remember what happened?" "No! Clearly I don't so tell me!" she was starting to get worried herself, did something chatstrophic happen? Did they....? "You... the last thing you remember, what is it?" "We were fighting hollows then I... I ... fell..." "And?" "Then... then it's black," "You drowned," he choked out, "You uh... you nearly died, and then Orihime healed you and uh..." he looked away from her, "You just weren't warming up, you had hypothermia or something, so I .. I just did the first thing that came to mind ok?" she tilted her head, "Do you think I'm mad at you or something? Ichigo I'm just CONFUSED," "Well that's all that happened," he wasn't going to tell her about the moment on the bank when she first opened her eyes, he didn't even want to remember how horrible and frail she looked then, "So... we got home and you took off my clothes-" "Y-Y-Y-YOU did that yourself!" he stuttered out, nearly falling off of the bed when she actually brought that up, she gave him this LOOK like she didn't believe him, "Funny.... I don't even remember having this nightgown," he crossed his arms over his chest like a pouting child, "I got it out of Yuzu's closet for you and Orihime helped you put it on ok?" "Oh so it was ACTUALLY ORIHIME who did this... and you somehow couldn't tell me that? Oh MY Mr. Kurosaki I DO hope you didn't do something nasty to me in my fragile state of slumber," she teased with a ear-peircingly fake high pitched voice and a "you-moron" look on her face, he growled, "Shut your fat mouth Rukia,"

Rukia sighed, "Why do I have to do this again?" Ichigo slapped himself in the head, "Great, you ruined it," he muttered, taking the thermometer out of her mouth and getting a new one, "Didn't I tell you not to open your mouth? And to answer your question it's because I'm trying to see how low your body temperature is so I'll know if I need to take you to a hospital," she groaned, "I hate being treated like a kid," "I'm not treating you like a kid! I'm treating you like a person!" he protested, shoving the thermometer in her mouth, she rolled her eyes, watching him re-start the timer on his watch, "You just don't get it ... do you Rukia?" she blinked, "You scared me really badly, I was so afraid that I had lost you, more than I had ever been, you just... you just wouldn't wake up, don't you get that? Don't you understand how it felt to think that I'd never get to see your eyes open again? It... I ... I don't know ... I've just never seen you like that before, ever, you've always been strong in my eyes, always, but in that moment you were suddenly so fragile that I thought touching you would shatter you completly, I couldn't bare it, you were, you ARE my strength, forever, my strength, and yet you weren't even strong enough for yourself then, it was like I had lost my world," he took the thermometer out of her mouth and sighed in releif, only a few degrees low, "You're wrong Ichigo," she stated, he looked down at her, "You're wrong and so naieve, you see... I DO understand, I've had my world crash down before my very eyes as well, I've seen it happen, I've tried to wake someone that would never open his eyes again, and I know what it feels like to fall apart in front of that person because they're gone, I've felt it before, the non-stop heartache, the feeling wen you... when you keep shaking someone and shaking them again and again and yet... they won't wake up, they just won't wake up, and I know what it feels like run out of energy crying and yet continue trying to wake that person, and it is a TERRIBLE feeling that I NEVER wanted to feel again, and I've felt it twice, I never wanted anyone around me to expereince that," he looked away from her, he knew what she was talking about, the second time she mentioned was at the end of the war wen he collapsed on top of her, and he knew that that had caused her a deep, deep pain, now he was looking at the floor and she was looking at the ceiling, "It's snowing," she wispered, he nodded once, "Yeah," "Don't you know what snow means?" he shook his head, "Snow means it isn't raining," and just like that he understood, he understood what she meant better than he understood anything, when something bad happened it always rained, that was true for him and it was true for her too, but snow was diffrent, "Snow means that there isn't rain" that's what she said, but what she MEANT was "Snow means I'm not leaving, nothing bad will happen" and that was all it took for him to feel at ease, "I know what it sounds like," she wispered quietly, watching the snow, "I no what it sounds like to hear your own heart breaking, and I know what it feels like to stand by and watch it break and not be able to help it, it's a horrible, helpless feeling, and I swear Ichigo," she looked at him with sincere eyes, "I won't make you witness that," he flinched, it was a hard promise to keep, an easy one to make, he sat next to her and held her close to him, "You better keep that promise," he wispered, "I will, as long as you keep that same promise to me," "I will," he wispered, "I don't break the hearts of the people I love Ichigo," "Neither do I, so I won't break your's," it was that simple, she leaned up the same moment he leaned down and the result was the meeting of their lips, it was as simple to them as the snow falling outside his window, the snow falling meant that there was still life for them, it meant that their hearts would not break, and that's all they needed to hear

"If you're everything you say you are,
Would you come close and hold my heart?"

-"Hold My Heart" by Tenth Avenue North