Chapter Text
Agony.
He struggled for consciousness - he had been fighting, it had been important - but memory slipped through his grasp like fog; heavy and obscuring anything else, but intangible.
The agony was centred in his chest. Not unusual - he thought, he couldn't remember why but he was sure that in itself wasn't - but different from normal; injury, possibly lethal injury-
Healing Kaidou formed in his mind on automatic, and he thought his lips moved, mouthing more than whispering the words to numb his body so he could think. He managed to move an arm, and it knocked what little air he was managing to get from him in a gasp that, had there been more of it, would have been a scream.
On his front. He was lying face down; not ideal, but moving before he had an idea of how bad it was-
A cry of mingled relief and instinctive protest, not entirely his own, went up in his mind as he pried his left hand from it's death grip on one of his swords. Move the arm - out, down, bend the elbow - fuck, fuck fuck... When he angled it and with as much control as he could laid it so his hand was resting on his mid back, the world whited out.
It came back, what seemed like a moment later, though he knew from experience that it could have been seconds, minutes, or even hours - probably not the last, he didn't feel significantly different -
You're dying. The whisper interrupted him.
...I know.
Then he ignored it, and reshaped the kaidou - his hand had the back resting against his back, palm facing the sky, but the proximity was the most important part and the thought of lifting it and turning it over-
Numb it. Feed energy there, enough to stave off the bleeding -
Assess.
It was bad. A hole blown clear through his chest, though it wasn't clean, something blunt and clawed rather than an energy blast-
Impact. A glimpse of a hand erupting from his chest, nonono something had used the primera as a distraction how had it got behind him, blacking out, falling, impact, unconsciousness.
If a lifetime of habit hadn't had him automatically focusing his reiatsu in his chest to reinforce it the moment he couldn't breath, he would have died before he woke up.
His head was turned to the side; when the light on the inside of his eyelid flashed the red of a cero he managed to open it, and through loose strands of white saw a flood of menos and more figures had joined the battle, not in a uniform, green topped white bouncing through a pack of menos that toppled in it's wake, one in black with long blond hair gesturing as the menos in front as it was constricted out of existence- I recognise that ability.
Cubes fell with the heads of more menos, but all the falling giant bodies were causing the ground to shake, and his eyes slid closed as he metaphorically grit his teeth and clung to consciousness. To see it at this angle meant the battle had moved some distance; even if the other team had arrived or would soon with captain Unohana it would take them some time to find him.
Stay alive.
That's the plan. Breathe out as best he could, slowly, words in a whisper, shape the energy to active healing rather than just being a stopgap,-
And keep going until he passed out again.
Shouting in the distance as people searched for survivors, but he couldn't manage more than a whisper - something he was very glad for a few minutes later as the shouting turned panicked and angry, and cut off screams started to echo-
"Shit, can we move him?"
"No other options-" Someone rolled him over and slung him over their shoulders and the world faded again as they started to run.
"-no matter what I do!"
"Kisuke-"
"Kaidou isn't enough, Unohana's shikai might have but he keeps slipping away faster than we can heal him; without any way to boost his healing-" The hands on his chest, warm with kaidou, froze.
"Kisuke? Kisuke!"
His lips felt clumsy and numb, and were tingling worryingly, but he managed. "What-" the breath ran out and he struggled for another.
"Ukitake!" A tumble of voices smeared into each other, urgent and worried.
Opening his eyes wasn't working, something held them glued together, he determined after a moment. "...happened?"
Silence.
"We lost."
The rasping voice with a suppressed hitch in it belonged to, he thought, Hisagi Shuuhei, vice captain and acting captain of the 9th division. "Aizen left for the real Karakura, then while we were still trying to find all the injured he came back and started to kill everyone; destroyed the pillars in the process..."
"The archive information was wrong," Soifon interjected coolly. "Killing all the inhabitants of Karakura did not create a complete Oken."
His own breathing hitched, long experience and a sometimes too-vivid imagination filling in what that massacre must have looked like. Pain flared, and he heard an alarmed mutter as he fell into a breathing exercise designed to prevent spasms and relax the muscles. "Sur-survivors?" he breathed, bracing himself to not physically react - he couldn't, not without compromising his own injuries and possibly his life; now a little more awake, he could sense that at least half of his ties to his body and life were sougyou no kotowari's desperate efforts at anchoring him there.
"We're not certain," Soifon clinically reported. "Unohana gave the order for those who could to scatter. We're in the visored's hideaway right now; you, me, Hisagi-fukutaichou, Yoruichi-sama, Urahara, Kensei-san and Yadomaru-san." He was pretty sure he could hear her jaw clenching. "We need your Shikai if we're to launch an effective counter attack; you need to survive."
Right. That had...that had been the plan. The senior captains had discussed it; his shikai's first ability could absorb and change most attack, in theory at least it should be just a matter of power to do that to Aizen's illusions. (Though what effect the implanted hogyouku would have had on that power struggle, he didn't know. Juushirou doubted it would have been beneficial to him.) None of them had been sure if Aizen knew that. Juushirou so rarely used his shikai's full abilities even on the scare occasions where he released it, and all reports from earlier times where captains and vice captains specific powers were mentioned were redacted as a matter of courtesy. They couldn't rule it out, though, and given he'd been ambushed while fighting the primera, so early on in the fights...the weight of what his being taken out meant hit him like another blow. She hadn't mentioned Shunsui, or sensei. That could mean that she didn't know, or just that she didn't want to give him the news now while his health, his life was strung out like a thread that could snap at any stress.
"Working on it!" Urahara sounded several stimulants past the point where he should have collapsed of exhaustion, higher pitched than he remembered and with a frantic edge. Focusing, Juushirou could just hear a staccato, irregular scratching and paper rustling.
"What?" that was right above him, and he thought - that was Kensei, his were the hands that had replaced Urahara's.
A shocked noise beside the rustling, then Soifon's furious "Is that what I think?"
"We're out of options!" Urahara's voice started to fade no mater how Juushirou clawed at consciousness, fighting to keep his grip on it. "Theoretically with the right small dose on a person with high enough reiatsu and so long as they win in time there's no need for an artificial stabiliser-"
"He's about to loose consciousness," Kensei called.
A rush of air at his side, followed by Yoruichi's urgent voice. "Ukitake-taichou, we may need to take drastic measures to stop you dying. Do you agree to that?"
A chill shot through him. He'd refused all of Kurotsuchi's offers of `help` for a century, and anything that the former commander of the omnitsukidou called drastic truly would be- but this disaster was in part his fault, and it was definitely his responsibility, his job to fix it. And he could feel how close to death he was; could feel, now that consciousness was starting to be too heavy for him to hold to, the electrical burns where they'd already had to restart his heart at least once.
Ideally in a situation where he couldn't hold onto consciousness long enough to hear the details and decide himself he would let another captain he trusted to be objective decide, but there was only Soifon, and he was well aware that if Shihouin pushed Soifon would fold and agree with her. That left Hisagi, but Soifon outranked and could pull rank on him, so Juushirou didn't bother with the wasted effort of trying to designate someone and just whispered, "Yes," before everything faded.
The ocean was glassy and flat when he landed in his inner world.
Standing on the surface with the sure-footedness of knowing that it was part of how his power manifested, and long practice, Juushirou looked around at an inner world that he'd never before seen lit with the dull orange red of a sunset, ill at ease. It was barely rippling under his feet, unnaturally becalmed, and the air felt...nearly clear, only a hint of the usual seed lightning tracing his skin as he shaded his eyes and spun, searching for his spirits.
Actually - he glanced up, swallowing hard at the sight of the patchy clouds. "I'm very close to death, aren't I," he softly asked the empty air, squared his shoulders, and let himself sink beneath the waves.
It was his own power, so he could breath here, and did, haori and hair drifting around him as he scanned the water. Still nothing. Swimming down, he could feel both clothing and hair dragging through the heavy, near still ocean, barely a hint of the usual swirling currents. If he looked up, he could see the clouds through he surface. "Sougyou no Kotowari?" he called, redoubling his pace and in short order reaching the seabed.
He didn't think it was just the stillness that made the dark boulders scattered in piles across the sand and exposed rock look almost...fragile.
He called their name again, and there was a long moment with only the feel of his ever-so-slightly-irregular pulse in this throat where he wasn't entirely sure they would be able to respond.
A low note echoed through the water, and though it was a response the sheer fact that it was almost too quiet to hear only increased his worry.
Call and response led him some distance away to the pair of large fish, half sheltering, half lying in the sandy-bottomed space between two of the bottommost boulders of a pile. Drifting to his knees, Juushirou reached out, his heart feeling like it was breaking.
"Sougyou no Kotowari," he whispered, fingertips brushing over against scales.
"We tried to reach the surface, meet you there," the darker blue spirit whispered. "We couldn't, I'm sorry."
"Thank you," Juushirou managed in a soft voice, though his chest felt like it was seizing at the implications. "For trying."
Even were he awake, shikai would be impossible, one of the last signs that a shinigami was about to die. His heart raged at the idea - he wasn't finished, he was needed, he had things he still needed to do - but that rage only provoked a feeble stir of water in the immediate vicinity.
"There's still a chance," the lighter fish said. Juushirou looked at him.
"How?"
The lighter fish wriggled unhappily, sinking a little further into the sand. "Or perhaps a choice. If you decide to die, now, they will not be able to stop you."
Juushirou frowned deeply, not hiding how much the thought displeased him. "And if not?"
"Urahara knew we could hear him, even if you couldn't," the lighter fish said softly. "So he gave us all the information on what he is about to do."
"You're past the point where you can be healed," the darker fish interjected. "So his plan is to make it so you have more power to heal yourself with." A pause. "And the ability to use it to regenerate your injuries."
"Regenerate-" that was a- "I see." By the gates of hell and Yamamoto's beard, he saw.
"Hollowfication," the lighter fish confirmed. "Partial, like those ex captains and vice captains who're sharing their hideout at the moment, but hollowfication."
"You're badly injured enough that they believe they can keep everything contained with kidou while you get it under control," the lighter fish warned, "but once an inner hollow starts to form, you'll still only have minutes to beat it." The pair gave him a meaningful look. "Since they don't have a stabiliser like the hogyouku to pause the process, if you don't fight and defeat the inner hollow in those minutes and in doing so force the hollowfication to stop, there will be no chance for a rest and adjustment period before trying again; it will just continue and you will be eaten from within."
"Well." Pushing back some hair that was starting to float in front of his face, Juushirou looked around. "I actually can't remember the last time I heard a set of options that terrible."
Turning, he settled on the ocean floor against one of the boulders, carefully setting his sealed katana at his side. If I fight, it will be without shikai, even here. "And how long do I have to decide?"
A pause. "Perhaps a minute and a half."
That startled a huff of laughter out of him. "Precious little time to mull it over in, then."
The darker blue fish let out a mournful note. "Don't pretend you've not already decided, please."
"Ah." Scooping up a handful of dark sand and watching it drift through his fingers, Juushirou sighed. "I do still have a minute in which to change my mind."
That earned him a smack to his arm from the lighter blue of the pair. There was less force behind it than there should have been, but he didn't let his concern show. "Following through with your decisions has never been your problem," that fish scolded. That drew up memories of the various messes, covering the full range from innocent pranks to high treason at dawn atop sokyouku hill in front of the other captain's and sensei's disbelief and fury, that he had either entangled himself in or caused through the centuries, and he smiled in rueful acknowledgement.
"I suppose not." The water was still and heavy; he stood anyway and swallowed hard, sliding his sealed sword's sheath back through his obi. "It's as you said; I need to see this through." All of it. Even if this was the cost.
Silence, then the pair appeared at his shoulders, the large fish heralded by the water they displaced that brushed over his skin. "We'll be by your side," the darker blue of the pair promised, the gravity of 2000 years of history together resonating through the words.
The lighter blue made a noise of agreement, brushing against his shoulder. "20 seconds; Urahara's about to fill the syringe." A hesitation. "Are you sure we can win?"
Juushirou breathed deep and gripped the hilt of his sword. "Sougyou no Kotowari. Are you suggesting that the three of us cannot beat one brand new hollow, in my inner world?"
The lighter fish laughed. "Just making sure."
The ocean began to move as Juushirou drew his blade.
For a moment everything remained as it should be, then the ocean floor shivered under his feet and Juushirou's breath caught at the not painful, but deeply uncomfortable and unfamiliar feel of something breaking and shifting at the very core of his being. There was suspended moment where water grew hazy then near opaque all around them, and Juushirou held his stance steady as the disturbance coalesced into ribbons that drew together - like a hollow forming from a demi-hollow, a distant part of his mind noted - into a shape that was surprisingly human.
Juushirou lunged before the hollow had a chance to get it's bearings, blade sweeping towards it's neck; the hollow ducked, long white hair trailing as it laughed and drew it's own sword, dancing back as they fenced. (Juushirou understood the basic concepts behind hollowfication, knew that it was formed as a twisted reflection of himself, but he still hadn't expected it to look so much like him.) Gold-on-black eyes met brown-on-white and they darted in at the same time, swords sparking off each other, a kick from it that he dodged, a strike from it that he deflected with the palm of his hand against the flat of the blade and Sougyou no Kotowari was there, one corkscrewing through the water to impact against it's side, teeth tearing through shadow dark haori and shihakushou and skin the white of death as the other intercepted a blast - bala, a cero would have taken longer to charge - whipping around in the water with a thrash of tail that sent it curving tightly around their body and right back at the hollow that disengaged with a spat "Always the damn reflection-!" and dodged, launching up and back, away from all the attackers, a trail of blood hanging suspended in the water for a moment before Juushirou's kicking off a boulder and chasing whirled it away to disperse.
The hollow lifted it's chin, then lifted it's blade to a guard position. "Just going to keep attacking me, are you?" It spat.
"Pretty much the plan," Juushirou quipped, a small gesture creating a moment of current that landed him in front of another boulder, one foot on the ocean floor, one against the boulder in case he needed to push off again.
The dark haori floated in the listless water as the hollow snorted and gestured around them. "You sure you can manage that? This place - well, it's sure as fuck not properly alive. Not like it should be."
Juushirou raised an eyebrow, and despite knowing exactly what the hollow was doing, decided the information was too useful to pass up. "And you know this, how?"
That resulted in an are you an idiot look from the hollow, which was more disconcerting than he would ever admit. This was a hollow; so how did it not have a mask? "Because I'm you. Not a reflection or whatever you've been thinking, just you as a hollow. I know what you know, I know what our inner world is supposed to be like." The hollow scowled at him. "I don't suppose we could talk this out?"
"Considering I have a few minutes before I die, at which point you would take over, unless I win in that time and use your powers to heal, you stalling is not an option." Juushirou launched himself forward, drawing attention to him while a thump of both fish's tails against the water caused a blast of it to hit at just the right time to compromise the hollow's defence and allow Juushirou's blade to bite deep into it's hip, but in the moment they were close together as he drew back the hollow grabbed for his shoulder and managed to grasp a fistful of clothing and score a long cut across Juushirou's shoulder and arm as Juushirou caught it's wrist and hit the pressure points that could cause the hand to spasm open - only the skin was as unyielding as porcelain and he ended up wrestling to keep the blade away from another slice as they both planted their feet as best they could for leverage and it's free hand pushed Juushirou's blade deeper into it's thigh, which seemed hopelessly counterintuitive until Juushirou yanked at it and discovered it was now stuck in bone.
The next invisible blast of water tore the hilt from his hand along with the hollow, and he only had a moment to grab instead at the blade that had formed with the hollow, identical but in inverted colours and wrapped in grey instead of the deep red that matched his spirit ribbon in the moment before his hand closed on it and colour bled into it and the hollow let go without the expected fight, twisting in the current and stopping themselves in the water so they were floating a few meters off the ocean floor.
Juushirou's gut wrenched as he saw the inverse happening to the blade in the hollow's hand. "I refuse," he spat, and with an effort of all the will he could call up the change halted partway along the blade.
Almost comical surprise swiftly followed by fury swept across the hollow's face. "You-!" he shouted, but when the colour began to return he flung the blade away from him, recoiling.
Juushirou narrowed his eyes. "So easily scared?"
"It's not a crime to not want to not exist!" the hollow yelled down, and Juushirou blinked.
"You care about that?"
"Am I just not getting through - you care, of course I care!" The hollow sneered for a moment, making a circle through the water with his hands that pushed him further away, before his jaw firmed and eyes focused with the intensity of an oncoming tsunami. "I don't agree with how you put up with some of the bullshit rules, but I still care about justice."
Was that the expression he had had when fighting the captain commander? Jolted by the thought, Juushirou swallowed. "Then why are you attempting to prevent me going to fight Aizen?"
"Oh, because you've done a brilliant job so far? Let's see, duped for a hundred years plus, a third of your seated officers killed by a loose experiment that was probably an attempt to kill you, your lieutenant and third seat, only limited the damage of the sokyouku hill incident and surrounding events, was taken out by a pair of espada without even getting to fight Aizen directly?"
That hurt. But, "Given the lengths he's gone to in order to try and stop me from facing him, I think I've been doing something right."
"Harr de harr, good for you, how did that last battle go for your lot again?" The hollow retreated further, and this time Juushirou followed, swimming forward and lifting his blade again, now in full colour, (And that, that was interesting and was making him consider options...) even as Sougyou no Kotowari lagged behind, unable to keep up the pace any longer.
The ocean was less well lit now, he noticed, white almost luminescent in the gloom. Time was running out - but he'd already known that. He slashed again, but this time the goal wasn't to cut, but to grab as the hollow dodged and put his power, and his will and sense of self into that grab, white spreading into the haori under his hand as the hollow made an exclamation of fear and grabbed his wrist. Colour wavered back and fourth for moment that seemed to last eternally, unnatural pallor creeping over his hands for a moment before he pushed it back, again and again, and then with a cry the hollow attempted to throw itself out of his reach but he held on, sword still held in his hand along with clothing but all but forgotten in the struggle which had moved beyond the physical.
"You claim to be me?" Juushirou said with quiet force. "Then you're going to help me, not kill me."
He won, colour sweeping over the other's skin until only the hollow's eyes remained, staring at him from his own shocked face. "You'll consign me to existing only in here," the hollow whispered bitterly.
"I am sorry," Juushirou replied gently, a little surprised to realise he meant it.
The hollow mustered up a pained smile. "That's not going to stop you."
No. The captain of the thirteenth sighed. "It never does."
"Ha. No." The hollow abandoned even the vestige of struggle, head falling forward to rest on the shinigami's shoulder. The world was starting to brighten again. "You'd better win," he heard the hollow whisper as his inner world faded.
A babble of voices, the feel of mostly-intact heavy kidou restraints lifting. With assistance from the tears forming, Juushirou blinked his eyes open. Grey; a warehouse with floors removed above the centre where he was lying, he saw in the moment before a desperately concerned Hisagi-fukutaichou was filling his vision, talking, helping someone check his injuries, eyes going round at whatever he saw.
Juushirou mustered up a reassuring smile as his eyelids slipped down, refusing to worry about the glimpse of pale bone on he floor beside him in his peripheral vision, and drifted into a warm, healing sleep.