Bleach 1. Dead Roses

_**A/N: This is something new I'm trying here. I don't know how long is going to be and I don't know how many people will take interest in it, but I want to try doing this, so... whoever decides to give it a try, be my guest. The song is called 'Heartless' by The Fray and was my inspiration for this story. The text in the italics in the beginning of each chapter is a retelling of Andersen's popular story 'Snow Queen'.  
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Disclaimer: I don't own Bleach.

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><p>Heartless<p>

Part 1

Dead Roses

_In the night, I hear 'em talk,_

_the coldest story ever told_

_Somewhere far along this road, he lost his soul to a woman so heartless..._

_The story of the Snow Queen begins with the tale of a hellish magical mirror, designed by the Devil himself to mock and distort the beauties of the world, to crack the sight of the most unbiased ones and mar, disfigure, **corrupt** all that is good and honest into ugly and abhorrent lies. Enticed by the power of his atrocious creation, Lucifer takes the looking glass and flies with it to heaven to sneer at the angels and God as he shows them their own reflections in a burlesque of what their true, celestial nature actually represents. But as he flies higher and higher into the sky, cutting through the fleecy clouds towards Eden, something goes wrong and the foul invention begins to shake, vacillating madly, screeching in silent, berserk horror as it tastes its own upcoming demise. Before the Devil's own eyes, the mirror shatters to tiny shiny pieces that scatter and spill like limpid water-drops and carried by the wind, shower the Earth in myriads. Some fall in the eyes of ignorant people, disfiguring their image of the world forever – till all that they see is the evil and the ugliness of the world – and others sink into the hearts of their victims, turning what once beat with the warmth of emotion into a cold block of ice._

Ichigo shifts restlessly in his seat, his fingers twitching against the fabric of his trousers as he waits nervously for the interviewer to enter and for what could be the greatest ordeal in his life to begin. The office that he's sitting in is exactly as he imagined it: vast, well-lit, ornate, and soaked with that archaic scent of paper and ink that seems to be the very skeleton of a publishing company's building nowadays. Each element of this room – from the fleecy dark-blue carpet, to the azure walls, the fancy modern-style paintings that hang on the walls and the classically manufactured furniture – is arranged in perfect synchrony with everything else, bestowing a hint of a soft, plush glow to the atmosphere, a rich sort of air that makes the place look both busy and stylish in a bit of an unconventional kind of a way. _In fact_, as Ichigo absently reaches to trace a timid zigzag pattern across the armrest of the comfortable black chair he's been occupying for the past thirty minutes, he feels an odd, probably rather silly swirl of warmth lay its motherly hand on his chest. He reminds himself to thank Kyouraku for managing to get him a job interview in this place – after all, this is the most successful publishing house in the country, the most _impenetrable_ sphere that a young author could ever hope for, and the mere fact that he's here is a small miracle in itself. For what feels like a millionth time, he tries to remember everything that he knows about '_Dragon_''s impressive history, tries to recall details about their innumerable connections and world-wide influence, their greatest successes for the past decade or so, and most of all particularities about the sub-companies that the mighty creature has swallowed – this being two rather popular newspapers and a magazine which Ichigo's fiancée has been collecting for as long as he can remember.

_Fiancée._

The word – or rather, the _term_ – has been stuck on his tongue like the aftertaste of overly minty toothpaste for what feels longer than a century, and even as he swallows diligently in some optimistic attempt to remove the vestiges of uneasiness from his mouth, the nasty flavor remains. It doesn't help that he's feeling _guilty_ about his _discomfort_ either – incidentally, it makes it all far worse, far,_ far_ worse, turning him into a miserable soon-to-be groom who is realizing he's not ready to be married the moment the big question has left his lips. No matter how many times he goes back and tries to reason himself into believing that he has done the right thing, that what he _is_ doing is the natural development of a long-term relationship, something still just _keeps_ bugging him. Sure, he and Orihime, the notorious Krakura high school sweethearts, the epitome of the perfect couple, the perfect students, the perfect collage pair, the embodiments of perfect, perfect, _perfect_, are just bound to have the perfect, perfect, _perfect _engagement and the perfect, perfect, _perfect _wedding, family, career, (Ichigo swallows)… whimpering, snotty, whiny children... In truth, now that he's made the big step and popped the '_Will you marry me?_', laying down the foundations of something so pristine and promising that most grannies would most viciously disembowel any misfortunate soul that tries to interfere (with their live soap opera, you see), Ichigo has realized with a great deal of shock that he's never really taken much of a hard decision in his life. From the day he met Inoue till this very moment, he has hardly spent a day without his girl, glissading down the well-slicked path to the most commercial-ish image of a lifestyle possible, never really taking a moment to pause and hesitate, lest he should come to the conclusion that maybe not everything is as he wants it to be. It's not like he doesn't love his fiancée – he does. She's smart, funny, cute, and so many other amazing qualities that are so rare to find nowadays… And she's absolutely beautiful, too, with her long, strawberry blond hair, full, pouty lips and large, doe eyes that glitter with that childish innocence which is so rarely preserved in the mind and heart of the adults nowadays…

But… _But…_ _What if I'm not ready? _

Of course, he has no plausible reason for being un-ready… That is about half the problem. If he knew what was wrong, what was _holding_ him back, then maybe, he'd figure out how to fix things, how to stifle this inexplicable anxiety that seems to prod at his throat, chest, palms and knees every time he remembers the commitment he has made… For now he can do nothing but blame his mental state on cold (wedding) feet and the fact that he's currently about to be interviewed for the job of his life.

Behind him, the muffled voices and steps of someone approaching reach his hearing, a bubbling female laughter sneaking between the bleary, grumbling words and phrases of someone else similarly to a sun ray through thunderclouds, and then the handle to the office jiggles insistently before the door is pushed open and the sounds finally blossom in vivacity inside the tastefully designed oval space. Ichigo instantly jumps to his feet, feeling a tad bit ridiculous for being so obviously eager, but he clumsily spins around anyway, a wavering smile forming on his dry lips as he faces the people who have just come in. Much to his dismay, though, the two individuals who are standing on the threshold seem more than a little shocked to see him, a hint of very mild surprise fleeting across the otherwise staid features of the male, while the girl who's with him gasps in a charming wonder, her cautiously manicured hand flying to her glossy lips.

"And who might that be?" the woman's voice resembles a gentle ripple of life on the surface of a cold, mirror-like mountain lake, and the low purr that underlines the tone, so thick and suggestive, has the candidate flushing madly within a trice. Sure, he knows that overall he's an attractive guy – 23 years old, tall, athletic build, gifted with a mop of flashy orange hair that possessed the impressive quality to act like airplane landing light, and chocolate brown eyes, quite strong in colour and just as endless in depth, to soften the effect of the rebellious mane – but even _he_ is fully aware just how out of this girl's league he is. There's something about her… a very strange kind of a radiance that he can't quite define, that seems like a nearly impossible mixture between a Barbie doll and a star from an elite stripper club, the result being a blend of sexual energy, liveliness and sweetness that literally has the carrot-top's throat running dry. Her body is generously endowed, her cleavage rather bluntly put on display in that tiny blouse she's wearing, but somehow he can't find it in himself to dislike such audacity, discovering with surprise that an attitude like this one, in combination with her gleaming blue eyes and the long, wild hair, suit her perfectly. In fact, he'd-…

…And then, Ichigo sees _him_ and for an entire minute the world just stops spinning.

The carrot-top isn't sure what it is about the boy that makes his jaw go slack. It could be the general smallness of this supposedly matured body, the delicacy and the royal exquisiteness in right about everything in the stranger's appearance… It could be the snowy-white hair, so soft and tempting to whoever fool dares to touch it, and yet so strangely rebellious in comparison to the neat attire and the composed, almost _too_ composed demeanor that is etched in those soft features; it could be the smooth milky skin or the pale lips that are now pursed obstinately together… Or it could be those eyes. Just the eyes. If he didn't know any better, if he wasn't standing right here, right now, gawking stupidly at the guy in front of him, Ichigo probably wouldn't have believed just how breath-taking those irises were. Rimmed by a set of heavy black lashes and widened ever so slightly by what is probably a tiny implication of annoyance, the stranger's orbs are an intense, enthralling nuance of turquoise, their surface flashing like glass, _no_, ice, like a frosted crystal window that repel the curious peeker just as much as it allure him to try and see what is hidden inside, within, _beyond_… All of a sudden, the carrot-top can't stop himself, he's fidgeting, shifting his weight from one foot to the other, unable to restrain the sudden jolt of incinerating energy that has surged through him in an awkward, maybe too childish manner. Every plan that he's had about this interview has fallen through some crack in the floor and he's lost as to what to do, thrown off the right track and absolutely shocked by whatever incontrollable emotion is now surging through his body.

"I completely forgot." The white-haired boy mutters flatly, one brow arching with excessive slowness as he allows his eyes to run over Ichigo's figure once, informatively. His small, pale hand is still rested on the door-handle and after a moment of hesitation and very, very uncomfortable greeting, the taller male decides to purposefully focus his attention on that one harmless part of the other guy's body, just to keep himself occupied. "Kurosaki, was it?"

"Yes, I've come for the-"

"I know what you've come for." The boy cuts him off sharply, a bit of irritated dissatisfaction flashing beneath the tone, probably as a sign of indignation at the idea that someone might assume he did not know who and why was waiting in… his office? "I'm Hitsugaya Toushiro. The owner of this publishing house."

_Yep_, Ichigo thinks with a nod of his head, _his office_.

"Take a seat." Hitsugaya offers coolly, gesturing back to the chair that the other man has just stood up from, and as the carrot-top gingerly obeys, the shorter male makes his way across the room and towards his desk, sitting down himself with an expression that now looks vaguely browned off. "I hope we didn't keep you waiting for too long, Mr. Kurosaki."

"No, not at all." Ichigo croaks out and somewhere from behind his back, a low giggle can be heard along with some shuffling that the candidate can't quite define. For a moment he spots something like a disapproving, almost warning frown on Toushiro's expression – one that he's directing at whatever is happening out of the taller lad's vision - but just seconds later the dashing beauty that has entered along with her boss is standing beside the desk with a vase that holds just one. Single. Red rose.

"Matsumoto, I told you-" the boy begins lowly, wearily, but before he can finish, the woman is arranging the flower (which, as Ichigo realized belatedly, she hasn't been carrying along with her upon entering the room) amidst all the papers on her superior's desk, her smile such a soft, tender shaping of those seductively plump lips, that she kindda reminds the carrot-top of a teenage girl with too many boyfriends and not enough romance.

"Humour me." She utters quietly and Hitsugaya closes his mouth, shaking his head the tiniest bit as though what is going on just can't be helped. The woman glances at the orange-haired guest behind the desk warmly and grins, her lashes fluttering coyly in the process. "Matsumoto Rangiku. Hope to see you around." And with that, and a small conspiratorial wink, she leaves the room, the delicate crimson flower seemingly reaching with desperate petals after her despite the almost warning glare that the white-haired bloke was giving it.

"So, um…" Ichigo finds himself rubbing his palms up and down his thighs in a gesture so obviously uneasy, that he forces his body to freeze all movement the moment he catches himself acting so awfully conspicuous. It's so tempting to do it again, though… And by the way the side of Hitsugaya's mouth twists upwards, teal eyes remaining as lifelessly static as before, he has a feeling the shorter male has seen his candidate's uneasiness and registered it somewhere in the vast library of his bossy brain. "I'm guessing that you want to know more about-"

"Are you married?" the white-haired lad asks suddenly, and the bluntness of the question, lacking even that remotely human tickle that comes with curiosity, has Ichigo pausing in surprise. His brown eyes slip to his own right hand, which is clutching his knee-cap a little too hard, and he blinks owlishly at the thin engagement ring that encircles his fourth finger, denoting a commitment that he's been doubting ever since he's made it. Most men don't really like wearing anything on their hands, he knows, even after proposing to their significant others, but Orihime has insisted, pleading him with those large, velvet orbs to share his promise for loyalty with the world, and the carrot-top hasn't minded or felt uncomfortable doing so… up until this moment, that is. "I don't think I saw this mentioned anywhere in your personal information profile."

"I'm engaged." Ichigo clarifies, smiling crookedly, if a little reluctantly at his interviewer. Hitsugaya's impenetrable eyes lift from where they had been riveted on the austere jewel, to meet the other man's gaze instead, and those thin pale lips jolt up for a moment in something that is probably meant to be a smile, only to fall still like marble again. Against all reason, the taller male has the oddest feeling that he's said something wrong, something inappropriate, because instead of some kind of an interest or approval in his potential boss' expression, he notices an unsteady shadow swirl across the pale features, darkening the otherwise astoundingly beautiful face and giving it a cold, ice crust that downright pains the misfortunate side viewer. _Almost like snow… _the thought comes unwanted and unsought and crowds Ichigo's head in one single heartbeat, refusing to leave its new home. _It always hurts to gaze at freshly fallen snow._ "Is-… Is that a problem?"

"No." Hitsugaya replies smoothly, lashes fluttering for merely a second as he adds in a lower, drier voice. "You must think you've got it all figured out."

"Excuse me?" This is definitely not starting as the job interview that he's expected.

"Nothing." The smaller male says, gaze diving as he watches his own slender fingers thrum across the slick surface of his working desk. "Nothing at all. Congratulations."

It doesn't seem like the guy is congratulating him on anything though. It just sounds the same. The same flat, indifferent and empty tone that he's been using ever since he opened his mouth for the first time, the same emotion-devoid voice that has Ichigo swallowing hard, because it all feels terribly wrong, terribly unnatural; the same sparse gestures, tiny reactions, frugal expressions…. And as he continues observing Toushiro for another trice or two, brows furrowed and lips slightly parted in suspicion, the taller man realizes that the sensation that this reserved pale lad ignites in his stomach, however clashing it is with reality, resembles the one a person gets when coming across a sick, fey creature with failing organs and only superficial charm. Everything the boy (because he looks, and feels like a boy, no matter what his age is) says, every sound he produces and every movement he makes, seems somehow calculated, mechanical, as something that Hitsugaya knows he _has_ to do, but isn't aware how to act it out plausibly enough.

"I've read your CV, your papers, recommendations, your short stories, everything you sent." The owner of the publishing house continues, this time more loudly, as though he's making an emphasize on what he's talking about now, in comparison to what he has muttered just a few seconds ago. "Everything is, of course, very neat, very good, very much perfect. But then again, I'd never expect anything else from Kyouraku's protégées." Startlingly intense teal irises lifted towards Ichigo again, scrutinizing him. "But you must know, Mr. Kurosaki, I get a lot of 'perfect' every day. It gets rather tiring sorting through all of them and finding one that stands out as more perfect than the other."

He does sound tired as he says it. Bored, actually, and uncaring. As though what he's working is some everyday gymnastics program that he must go through to keep fit, but would rather skip if he could, in favour of a big bowl of French fries.

"Why should I give you this job?" for the first time there's something more in Hitsugaya's voice, a bit of a taunting, a bit of a challenge, and it's _this_ almost exotic kind of flavor that has the hairs on the back of Ichigo's neck raise because he understands, as odd as it is, that underneath the pinch of colour, there's still a sea of grey bellow. Tons of it, all of which just oscillates with the robotic apathy of a person who is reacting, responding and behaving according to some complex program that turns all the right switches, in all the right moments, to affect all the right electronic parts.

Ichigo swallows.

"I love writing, I've been writing for as long as I can remember. It's the one thing-"

"I've heard this a thousand times." Hitsugaya cuts him off cruelly, leaning back in his chair and letting his mouth twist with the distaste and impatience that more often than not defines the behavior of the modern titans. "I don't give a damn how much writing means to you."

Ichigo is thrown for a loop at those words, his eyes widening ever so slightly at the shock of being cut off in such a careless manner. He tries to collect himself as quickly as possible, but his thoughts have absconded the scenery in fear, and Toushiro's piercing gaze is boring into him like a drill, granting all attempts for a sane response useless and pathetic.

"I-… I don't know what you want me to say…" the carrot-top admits, feeling all the more foolish as the boy's orbs flash glassily at this line. _You're wasting my time, _those teal pools say, _You're wasting my time, and you're not even fun to toy with. _Ichigo feels a hot flush rise up his spine, reaching for his neck with long, scalding fingers, and he experiences the sudden urge to pull at his collar and ease his breathing passage a little. He resists, though, knowing in advance how terrible that would look, and tries to concentrate again, one final effort, one final endeavour that-

"We're done."

…-ends nowhere.

"W-what?" Ichigo can't believe it. In the snap of a finger, just like that, he's frittered away the opportunity of his life, he's tricked himself into believing that he has stood a chance in a game that he doesn't even know the rules of, and 'stupid' doesn't even begin to describe how he's feeling right now. His throat runs dry as he open and closes his mouth futilely, seeing a retort, a respond that can help him walk away with at least a little bit of dignity in his hands... He finds nothing. "That's it?"

"That's it." Hitsugaya confirms, leaning back forward to collect the paperwork that has been lying scattered across his desk for God knew how long. The boy doesn't even glance up as he searched for something particular between the pages, his left hand reaching blindly for a pen from the nearest pen cup. "I could say 'We'll call you.' if it's going to make you feel any better, but I think we both know that there'll be no calling."

"Yeah…" Ichigo mutters dejectedly, his chest slumping down as he allows the stress to drain from his system, something like a bittersweet sort of relief cooling up his insides as he gives himself a moment longer to sit in the comfortable chair. Toushiro doesn't seem to mind, already working on something nameless in front of him, scanning through documents and plans that the carrot-top probably couldn't have understood if he tried. As the tension leaves his muscles and his misty mind clears out from the fog that has been keeping every bit of creativity, boldness and knowledge from coming up on the surface, the orange-haired man finally takes a deep breath in and prepares to stand up. Something makes him pause though… A thought. A sudden whim that assaults his consciousness and struggles to adapt a shape and form with more vehemence that any idea ever has for a long, long time. Rising slowly from his seat, Ichigo watches with unnecessary fascination as a lock of startlingly white hair falls over the boy's forehead, only to be brushed away by a slender little hand that with its small size and downright royal exquisiteness just doesn't match the calloused behavior of its owner. Licking his lower lip, Ichigo allows a lop-sided smirk to dissipate across his face as he blurts out, recklessly ignoring the potential consequences this action of his could have. "You have very interesting eyes, you know."

This earns him a scoff from Hitsugaya's side, said eyes remaining plastered on what he's doing as he scribbles something across the paper with gusto and just a tad bit of belligerence.

"If this is a way to tickle my ego to get the job, it's really not working."

"I didn't mean it as a compliment." Ichigo points out, and this time this captures the boy's attention, blue-and-green gaze lifting to meet the carrot-top's one as the pen freezes over the document on the desk and all attention is suddenly back on the tall, tan man. "It's like…" he falters, searching for the right words that seem to once again evade him now that he's in the spotlight… But this time it's not only nerves that are troubling him, there's more. More. "…It's like they are not moving at all."

"Oh, they are moving." Toushiro states, unimpressed, flat humour underlining his even tone, but the mechanical smile disappears almost as soon as it has appeared, replaced by a vaguely surprised scowl as his interlocutor shakes his head.

"They are… but they're not. I get the feeling that I'm staring at coloured glass, not-… human eyes." Ichigo lets out a short chuckle, enjoying the first signs of some actual interest that emerge on the smaller lad's face. "This must sound crazy."

"It does." Hitsugaya's frown deepens slightly and he lifts his pen off the desk, twirling it around his tiny white fingers for a moment before beginning to tap rhythmically with its blunt end against the documents that lay underneath. The silence stretches like glue between them: awkwardly long, unpleasantly hard to get rid of, and the carrot-top shifts hesitantly, wondering for a moment whether the other male is actually planning to speak up. The boy's expression remains conveniently blank, however, unreadable, yet somehow less hostile than before, and although Ichigo can tell that the guy's still guarded and uncertain whether this is a good idea or not, something definitely appears to have changed for the better. Another minute, another chunk of wasted time, and then Toushiro straightens in his seat, petite hands tangling together on the desk in front of him as he enquires rather cautiously: "What do you think is the hardest genre to write?"

This time Ichigo doesn't even skip a beat wondering over the question.

"Fairy tales."

Something that could've been interest flashes across Hitsugaya's face, chasing away the last remnants of that inexplicable shade that was settled there not so long ago.

"Favourite book?"

_Funny you should ask…_

"'Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tales and stories.'"

For a second the boy actually looks startled, shocked by the answer he has received, but this sort of surprise is a dull, stifled version of everything else that the taller male has ever seen. The emotion is there, trying to break through to the surface, but it's almost as though… Toushiro doesn't know how to let it out.

…Or, Ichigo's mind amends in a frighteningly wicked whisper, he has _forgotten_.

"You're not going to try and impress me with classics?" Hitsugaya trails off, somewhat challengingly, one brow arching idly in the epitome of perfect irony. "'War and Peace'? 'The Grapes of Wrath'? For fuck's sake, 'Gone With the Wind'?"

Ichigo actually laughs at that, the rich sound making the boy's other brow join the first one in something that could've been a question, perhaps even amusement at the fact that the man has dared to produce such an audacious sound when in the presence of a person who can literally paint his future in whatever colour he finds suitable. Somewhere at the back of his mind, the carrot-top realizes that this room has hardly heard anyone express their emotions so openly, the walls haven't been soaked with the life and energy of a vital and vigorous person, they haven't met enough smiles, giggles, jokes, warmth… All they know is the strict and plain aloofness of someone who looks like a child and talks like an old man, the waft of fresh roses that Matsumoto brings every now and then, and maybe the occasional cheer of some newly-hired employee. Nothing more. Nothing less.

"Andersen _is_ classic."

"His stories are for kids." Toushiro argues mildly, but the softness of his voice speaks in contrary to the words.

"His stories are everything _but_ for kids." Ichigo mutters with a genial smile. "His, and Oscar Wilde's tales… they are just written to touch your heart, make you fall in love and then break it."

The carrot-top isn't sure what exactly it is in what he said that causes it, but somewhere deep inside the pair of turquoise eyes, behind the invincible, bulletproof shield that seems to cover their erstwhile shine, something flares for a moment, something battered and banished that has been kept in wrecks for a long, long time. _What is this…? _He tries to find its fading trail again, but the gleam is so small and insignificant, so far beyond what is palpable, that Ichigo doesn't think that even _Hitsugaya_ has noticed its distanced quiver.

"They are, aren't they?" the boy mumbles to no one in particular, retrieving his hands from the desk only to let them fall limply in his lap. "Good answer."

Ichigo shrugs, unsure whether to say thanks for the praise or just remain quiet. Another silence stretches, this one heavier than the first one, but it breaks faster than the carrot-top has expected as Toushiro lifts his gaze from where it had drifted away to some spot on the wall a moment ago, to survey the other man again.

"I'll see you tomorrow in 8am, Mr. Kurosaki. Now have a nice day." He says staidly and as he leans back over his work once more, obviously planning to continue whatever it was that he had stopped doing a few minutes ago, Ichigo just blinks, not entirely certain he has understood correctly.

"What does that mean?"

"It means I'll give you a job, we'll see how it goes, and if you prove to be worthy, I'll consider transferring you to the newspaper's department. That's what you wanted, right?"

_Oh, my- _Ichigo is granted speechless, his mouth opening and closing in shock as he tries to comprehend what has just happened... How out of a conversation about books, fairy tales and Andersen, he's suddenly being told he got the job he's been prepared to actually _fight_ for no more than half an hour ago. It just sounds absurd.

"Will you, please, leave my office now? I'm not prepared to endure a scene of unseemly triumph." Hitsugaya states absently, once again refusing to even glance up from the arsenal of documents in front of him. "Go celebrate with your… fiancée. Or something."

"Oh, wow, I-.. Thank you-"

"I _said_, have a nice day, Mr. Kurosaki. And leave my office." Toushiro cuts him off for a second time, a bit of annoyance peeking through the veil of indifference as he signs something with a gorgeous flourish of his wrist. Before him Ichigo just stands awkwardly and clears his throat in wonder of what to do, but after a moment of contemplation, he decides to just listen and sneak out of the room as quietly as possible. Pausing one last time with his hand on the door-knob, the carrot-top glances at what is now his official boss and bites his lower lip, pondering shortly how all of this is going to turn out in the end…

…Then something else catches his attention and he freezes.

The rose…

…It is completely withered.

Drooping, like a sad, broken human body and facing away from the boy that is still diligently scribbling across his paperwork, the flower is completely lifeless, drained from every bit of its previous freshness and beauty. _How is that possible?_

Ichigo hurries to leave the room before he can think twice about what he has just seen.


	2. Frostbite

_**A/N: Okay, sweethearts, my friend DarkHolyMagic, who's not only an amazing writer but also a gifted artist has drawn a little fanart-ish piece for this story (and even if it doesn't look like it's very based on the story, I still think all of you should go look) so the link is in my profile page, or you can just google 'Darkholymagic heartless' and see what comes out. :3**_

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><p>Heartless<p>

Part 2

Frostbite

_How could you be so heartless?_

_Oh... How could you be so heartless?_

_In a small village not far away, two neighboring children – a boy and a girl - befriend each other, tying a bond that is meant to last for life. Ignorant of the deeds of the higher forces, they live their childhood in happiness and nonchalant joy, listening to the legends of the Snow Queen that lives in a palace of ice and frost at the end of the world itself. The stories they neglect with ease, refusing to believe what is meant to stay in the bewitching confines of the magical fairy tale world, and so the chilly blue eyes that watch upon them, remain forever unnoticed. Hidden._

"Does he have some Napoleon thing going on?" Ichigo asks between rhythmical intakes of breath, glancing with the corner of his eyes at Kyouraku, who - just like him - is currently jogging on the neighboring treadmill. "I mean, not that one week of working in that place is that long to judge, but-"

"What? Because he's short?" the dark-haired man asks with an amused arch of his brow and laughs, his voice sounding completely calm despite the fact that he's been running on a much greater speed for a much longer time than the carrot-top himself. It's pretty amazing, Ichigo notes enviously, because no matter how many times he has had the stupidity to meet with his friend in the gym, or how hard the older man is working out while they're talking, Kyouraku just never breaks into sweat. "I don't think he's all that fond of his stature, yes, but he has no plans to take over the world. The power and responsibilities he's got at hand are plenty as it is."

"Then… he's not a people person?" the carrot-top guesses again, nearly tripping over his own feet when he dares to turn his head in his companion's direction.

"He's not an anything person."

"Why does he run the business then?"

"Well, what else is he supposed to do?"

"Sell it. Get a girlfriend. A flat. Be rich for life." Then something else infests Ichigo's mind and he grasps the handles of the treadmill, steadying himself till he manages to formulate his question more clearly. "Does he have… any personal life at all?"

Beside him Kyouraku reaches to casually press the button for an increase of the speed (Once. Twice. Five times.), the side of his mouth turning upwards in something of a coy smile that for a moment seriously throws the carrot-top off the track.

"Why are you so interested?"

"No reason." Ichigo insists hurriedly. "He just reacted in a weird way when he saw my engagement ring."

"Is this why you haven't been wearing it lately?" the dark-haired man inquires absently, adjusting the pony-tail at the back of his neck while his feet easily catch up with the new tempo of the machine that is buzzing unhappily beneath him. Beside him, Ichigo turns to fix his gaze right in front of himself before the brunette has had the chance to gauge his expression, the odd feeling that he's flushing crawling up his tan neck like an avalanche of terrible heat. He kindda hopes it's the work-out that's getting to him… Or maybe-

"…No."

Kyouraku guffaws with incredible gusto at that one single word.

"Is that the first time in your life that you've lied?" the taunt is good-natured and friendly, albeit rather painfully obvious in its implication and as the carrot-top feels his comrade level him with half-teasing, half-wondering eyes, he can't help it but let out a small huff. He's only talked about this once – and while not particularly sober, too – but he knows quite well what is his friends' opinion about his neat, uneventful life, and he's ashamed to admit that deep inside he agrees with them all. _Why?_ Well, sitting in a bar and trying to remember what your fiancée has asked you to buy on your way back home, while your single and very much adventurous buddies rant about their most recent escapades with a glass of copper-coloured whiskey in their hand… it is humiliating to say the least.

"What was I supposed to do?" Ichigo grumbles mirthlessly, panting when another wave of warmth explodes across his already overheated body. "I told him I was engaged, and he looked at me like I was some kind of a leper!"

"Hitsugaya doesn't look at anyone like that. He has the same expression about anything, except sometimes it's a little more… passive-aggressive. Like in your case."

Ichigo frowns, biting the inner side of his cheek as the familiar tendrils of suspicion flourish up his stomach and threaten to make him trip again. He has slipped towards these wonderings several times before, quickly and unnoticeably despite what his beliefs about discretion and integrity keep telling him, and he has ended up being plagued by his own blitheness assumptions, _possessed_ by the luring image of his cold-hearted boss and his inexplicable behavior the way a body is relentlessly seized by a rare, yet fatal disease. There's something about Toushiro… something in those quiescent jade eyes, in the barely curved lips and that exhausted, physically draining smile, that has been titillating Ichigo's nerves similarly to the silky wings of a tiny butterfly. _Dammit… _This tickle is nearly painful in its incredible evanescence, it has been frazzling and fretting at him from the inside in a way that the carrot-top can neither describe, nor understand. He's barely talked to his employer, and when he has, he's felt more than a little intimidated by the way the boy glides upon the surface of the conversation, nudging at the rents in the taller man's composure and never,_ ever_ raising his voice, no matter what the topic is… Ichigo knows that Kyouraku is the head of one of Hitsugaya's newspapers, that they are – if not close – then at least on better terms than what most people can hope to achieve when it comes to the white-haired blizzard… and yet, the orange-haired lad can't help it but think that no matter how hard he tries, he'd still get nothing substantial from his comrade regarding Toushiro. This isn't a matter of complicity or wits. It's about something else entirely – a character that appears nearly inhuman in his liquidly way of thinking, a boy with patronizing and unbearably hard gaze, a person who looks like a child and possesses the mind, the hauteur, the eccentricity of a king.

Ichigo clears his throat:

"It felt like I hit a nerve." He admits half-heartedly. "Like the mere fact that I had someone by my side was personally offending him. Do you know anything about that?"

"You should stop being so terribly interested in your boss' personal life." Kyouraku points out matter-of-factly, reaching to increase the speed of his treadmill with five more points as though this is nothing but the warm up to the actual working-out. Beside him, the carrot-top can merely gape and gawk in astonishment at the innatural endurance this seemingly beyond lazy man keeps manifesting so bluntly. _And here I thought I was fit…_

"You just said he doesn't have one."

"I said no such thing," the dark-haired man amends, lifting his index finger for emphasize as he keeps running without a single care in the world, the occasional hum of some nameless tune rolling off his tongue in the pauses between the retorts he gives his younger friend. "You just automatically assumed it."

"So does he?"

"What? Have a personal life? No. I can't remember the last time he's taken interest in anyone."

Ichigo gives himself a moment to chew over those words, thoughtful brown orbs lifting up towards the ceiling to find a less distracting spot to contemplate.

"This makes no sense." He concludes after about half a minute of reflecting over what he has just been told. "He's rich. Young. Good-looking. So why the hell not? _Why?_"

Kyouraku just chuckles at the incredulity in his comrade's voice and shakes his head before muttering with an elusive quirk of his brow:

"Because gods don't like to bleed."

* * *

><p>When Orihime first asked him what he was going to be doing at his new job, Ichigo had simply told her that he would be sorting through unsolicited manuscripts, picking out the worthy ones, and contacting writers that already had connections with the publishing house for new projects. But it's so much harder than this simple little explanation… In reality, spending so much time over someone else's works, rummaging through lists of already known names and making a thousand phone calls a day feels like more of a secretary's job than an editor's one. By the time it hits noon, he's usually on the verge of a headache, seeing the words on the pages double and triple, and unable to concentrate on the responsibilities at hand simply because he has blocked… Yes, this is definitely not what he has been imagining in his mind, the carrot-top admits to himself, slumping back in his swirling chair one Monday morning and pushing himself around with the toe of his sneaker-clad foot to possibly jiggle what is has left in his skull… he has come to this place with the idea that <em>he<em> would be doing the writing… not fighting for strangers' works to be published as the next best-seller...

As he lets his eyes rest a little from the black-and-white paper that they have been staring at for the better part of the morning, Ichigo thanks his lucky star that at least he's got an office of his own and he doesn't have to work in one of those atrocious cubicles that seem to enhance claustrophobia and depression and god knows what else. He can't get it through his head how someone would agree to spend their day between the plastic walls of something that painfully resembles a cell in a honeycomb; it makes him shiver just thinking about it … Or maybe he's exaggerating. Maybe he's just too stuck after those last few draft books he had to go through, the content of the hateful pages reducing his mind activity to pointless little topics and pitiful complaints. Damn. It's honestly amazing how some people believe they've achieved some unattainable literature high, when they can't construct a sentence that is longer than four words and three exclamation marks. Ichigo hates the three exclamation marks… they give him the creeps.

Swaying from side to side a couple of times more, the carrot-top decides that it's time to get a coffee from the coffee machine not far away down the hall. The caffeine could nudge his mind a bit, and he definitely needs to stretch his legs – _needs_ it after so many hours of sitting in the same spot. He should probably call Orihime, too, because if he doesn't – she will – and who knows in what condition his thoughts will be if she picks the wrong moment to do just that.

Pushing himself off the chair, Ichigo makes his way towards the door and turns right, passing a couple of closed office doors till he reaches a vast round space near the staircase, a lonely hot drinks automat resting against the left wall, between two neat benches. As he steps closer to the machine and begins to rummage clumsily through his pockets for some coins, the carrot-top can't help it but turn in the opposite direction to face the only, by now painfully familiar, office that rests across of him. With its door usually widely open for reasons that he still can't fathom, Hitsugaya's work spot is about the largest and most opulently furnished place on the whole floor. _Unlike_ most of the time, however, the white-haired boy is not alone in the room, bent over whatever papers he needs to be going through at the moment – instead, he's currently talking to somebody. Or rather, the somebody in question is heatedly trying to convince the owner of the publishing house that-…. That…

Ichigo narrows his eyes, trying to listen more closely to what is happening inside Toushiro's office, and he finds himself nearly gagging when he hears the stranger raising his voice.

"What the hell is wrong with you? Have you got _no heart_?"

"Funny you should ask." Hitsugaya's voice ripples with the smallest drop of wizening amusement, and Ichigo can almost see his boss leaning back in his large, comfortable chair, pale lips turned upwards in one of those artificial, on-duty smiles that he obviously feels the need to manifest every once in a while. "_I'm_ the very heart of this company, Mr. Kato, and as every heart, I represent the vital organ that makes everything else work. You, on the other hand? You resemble more of a… greying hair that's just fallen off. I'd rather grow a new one than try to stick the old back in place."

Taking a couple of quiet steps towards the office, the carrot-top narrows his eyes in vague disbelief of what he is hearing. The sweetness in Toushiro's voice, the velvety texture that underlines every cold, cruel word, every spoken thought and ingenious mockery, stabs his flesh similarly to a heated needle, and he's not even on the receiving end of this all. It's just… it's just _amazing_, in the most twisted sense of the word possible, how someone so delicate, so classy and composed can let so much venom and malice flow between their lips with the same soft tone, in which one could actually whisper in the ear of a lover. It creeps Ichigo out to think about it and it fascinates him, too, because no matter how far back he digs in his past, he can't recall ever meeting a guy quite like Hitsugaya…

"I am not asking you for a leave so I can go somewhere and have fun and relax… My wife is sick. I need to be by her side for the next week or two, I need to be there for her."

"That doesn't concern me." The impatient sound of Toushiro's pen tapping against the edge of the desk reaches Ichigo's ears and he takes just a few more steps towards the door, standing at a safe distance from it so he can both hear what is going on and remain invisible for the people inside. "You're healthy, aren't you?"

"That- that's not the point!" Mr. Kato exclaims in desperation, probably staring at his employer with the same wide and disbelieving eyes that every person tends to develop especially and explicitly for their trysts with Hitsugaya. "It's not-"

"It's the only point that is of importance to me." Toushiro states in an easeful, completely sated manner. "It's quite ridiculous to pretend otherwise, because you've already wasted all your off-day allowances, and I'm quite sure you are aware of that… In fact, do you know Dicken's 'A Christmas Carol'? Such a classic tale, I've always despised the story and its edifying nature fully and completely, and I know quite well that in your head right now I'm the very embodiment of Scrooge, his evil and his gloating, and his inability to give… but there's the catch: I'm not stingy and I'm not a liar. I pay my employees generously and fulfilling, I never deceive or mislead you and I always keep my promises. All I ask in return is for a little loyalty, responsibility and professionalism, and if you can't handle _that_, then I'm afraid your services are no longer required."

"Loyalty?" the stranger repeats, disbelieving, maybe even close to the verge of hysteria. "_Loyalty_? My wife could be _dying _and you're asking me to pay attention to contract details?"

"Well, she'll be dying with or without you there, won't she?" Hitsugaya admits, the careless shrug shadowing his tone as the chair screeches in response, probably being pulled harshly away from the desk as the employer rises on his feet. "One thing that might change though? That would be your working place, I hope you realize that."

"You're actually asking me to choose between my _family_ and my _job_?"

"Tch. I'm not asking you to do anything other than weigh your possibilities. I couldn't care less if you're working here or not. Everybody's replaceable."

"Then what _is_ this all about?"

Toushiro wastes no time replying, the bubbles of some blood-curling laughter rumbling along with the simplicity of his answer:

"I have an image to uphold." He clicked his tongue and the picture of the delicious, inviting lips, forming one of those soulless smiles emerge in Ichigo's head. "And what is one without an image nowadays?"

* * *

><p>Ichigo spends the rest of the day in some kind of a half-shocked state, doing his job automatically and meticulously, like a newly bought, but badly explored, machine. He has already called Orihime and let her ramble for a while, catching a few key words in her usual tirade, just enough to understand that she's going out and won't be home till late in the evening. The news neither bother, nor excite the carrot-top in any way – the long years that he's spent together with this girl have made him practically immune to emotions such as jealousy, envy, and anxiety when it comes to their relationship, and for that he can be nothing but grateful. This is what love is supposed to be, he tries to assure himself as he glances at his watch and goes back to arranging the few dozen folders in separate piles, love should be certain, and unyielding, and strong. So maybe they don't observe each other's movements, they don't worry about who is coming home when, and they don't sit next to the window, calling non-stop when one of them is running late. What they have is based on trust, reason and a lot of things which most couples would die to have…<p>

…So why does this everlasting routine feel so dull, so lifeless, so… mundane? Why does he find himself secretly rolling his eyes or just plain tuning out his fiancée rather than adoring the mere sound of her voice the way books and movies claim that he should? Why is it so hard to stay interested in how Orihime's day went, and who she met and what she did, when he knows well enough that if he's planning to spend the rest of his life with this girl, he'll need to at least be able to have a decent, unimportant, small talk with her over dinner?

Frowning slightly, Ichigo is surprised to find himself thinking back to the conversation he accidentally overheard (or purposefully eavesdropped to, depends on how you want to view it…) right in front of Hitsugaya's office, the vague, indefinite feeling that his boss can't be a healthy person tugging at his stomach with foreign, clammy fingers. He's seen spiteful people before alright, he's seen angry, apoplectic, depressed, melancholic men and women, with either no real purpose in their lives or too many failures left behind them…_But_- But Toushiro simply doesn't fit in any of these categories. Toushiro doesn't fit _anywhere_, he's too young, too attractive, too _successful_ to belong to the chipped, imperfect definitions that one often gives to those chosen few who tend to exist for the sole reason of ruining the others. Every bit of this boy, every inch of flawless milky flesh, every slow, beautifully drawn out gesture, each illusion of an emotion that those carefully etched, soft features arrange in order to preserve some kind of a fake facade… All these things have built a doll, and a masterpiece. They have _not_… created a human being…

…But what scares Ichigo isn't the fact that these thoughts come so easily and so persistently to him, and neither is it this odd sense of distance that he experiences whenever he faces his boss… it's the dull, undetermined idea that he gets as he watches Hitsugaya: the nagging notion that this astounding person has been amputated, _crippled_… like maybe a single thread has been ripped from this little body, and beneath the smooth surface which the skin depicted, everything has fallen apart.

…A lone, withering rose emerges in the carrot-top's mind, and for a second he feels his blood run cold in daunting confusion. _What the hell was that… How did the- How… _He manages to chase away the image almost instantly, blaming the incident on taut nerves and artificial illumination, and automatically reaches to line up one of the piles of documents. His thoughts wander back to the man that Toushiro downright fired for having family troubles, and he feels an unpleasant sting swipe up his lungs, momentarily messing up the rhythm of his breathing. _Where the hell have I landed myself…? _What kind of a person treats his employees like this? What kind of a man puts people on the edge of a cliff and tells them to either jump or single-handedly cut their hearts out of their chests…? _This can't be normal…_ Shaking his head, Ichigo stands up and gathers one of the stacks of papers in his hand and heads for the door, a mix of preposterous dread and even more preposterous curiosity travelling through his veins like liquid bane. His work hours are almost over…All he needs to do, is deliver these files to Hitsugaya's office and possibly get some new directions for the next day. Then he can take off for home. And forget all about this, have a cup of tea and possibly spend the rest of the evening watching TV on the couch…

…A little peace and quiet is all he needs, _honestly_, some idiotic show that doesn't demand any cerebral activity, and pop-corn. And he'll put his feet on the table, since Orihime won't be there to see.

The familiar corridor opens up for him with its naturally cold, lean arms, and as he approaches Hitsugaya's office, he's surprised to find its door closed, the slick wood hostilely unmovable as though the mere presence of such a pathetic being makes it grow even taller and more repellent. Standing in front of this formidable barrier, Ichigo wonders for a trice whether he should just go back to his office and come again another time, but that idea melts away immediately, replaced by rather unexpected determination instead. What is wrong with him? Getting all worked up over his short, ridiculously young boss? Sure, Toushiro is rather unpredictable from what he's got to see of the boy so far, very whimsical, very controversial, (and awfully small for such a haughty, imperturbable character) but he's a person, _just like him_, what is the worst that could happen?

Sucking in a deep breath of air, the carrot-top lifts his fist and knocks on the door twice. When no answer follows, he wraps his hand around the door-knob and twists it, ever so carefully, surprised when instead of resisting as he has expected it to, it clicks and opens smoothly, welcoming him in the vast, stylish room.

"Um. Hello?" he calls carefully, poking his head inside the office and letting his eyes swipe across the darkening horizon. No one has bothered to turn on the lights as the natural daily illumination has exhausted its warmth, and so after sunset the place seems to have sunk in the very much expected ashen grey, muffling the shine of most of the furniture and making everything seem softer, smaller. The air is crunchy and static, _freezing cold_, and as the carrot-top steps over the threshold and closes the door behind him, a powerful, bone-wrecking shudder shakes his whole body from head to toe. "God, what the fuck is wrong with the heater?" the words come out as a plaintive little whisper, although for a moment he isn't entirely sure why his mouth would struggle to keep everything quiet when there's obviously no one in the near vicinity, but the question remains unanswered. Instead, as he slowly fights to ignore the vicious frost-bites that the temperature threatens to plant on his prickling skin, something else catches his attention and he pauses in confusion.

The chair in which Toushiro usually works is still there, resting quietly behind the large, impressively well-ordered desk, but unlike most of the time, it's facing away from the door – currently representing a large, dark block of darkness in the center of an obscure and unwelcoming room. Unseen ice teeth – cruel and calloused like the season that created them – nibble at the carrot-top's fingers, knuckles, collar-bone, but he steps deeper inside the office anyways, drawn by a force that he can neither fathom, nor resist. A single, thin arm comes up from the initially impenetrable shadows, hanging limply from one shapeless arm-rest and Ichigo's eyes widen, the realization that the owner of this little fading palace is still here both coming as a surprise, and as something expected to him. Another shudder, this one having nothing to do with the cool surroundings, licks up the carrot-top's spine, and similarly to a robot with no thoughts and no will, he finds himself approaching the place where he assumes the boy would be. The familiar name pushes against his lips tautly and hesitantly, but he manages to swallow the call's sour texture, suddenly overwhelmed by the idea that he's doing something wrong, something _forbidden_.

…_He can't be… Is he- Is he really-_

As he rounds his boss' chair, tiptoeing along the fluffy dark blue carpet on the floor with something akin to mischief spicing up his movements, he can't help it but smile slightly at the sight of the shorter male, curled in the corner of his seat and slumbering soundlessly with his knees drawn to his chest. _Guess he is..._ In the smoky shroud of the perishing day, hidden by too many growing shades and exposed to too little light, the pale face looks incredibly young, startling fragile, and once again rimmed with that frightening, invisible line of unhealthiness, which seems to grow more and more perceptible the more time Ichigo spends in the presence of this person. With his right hand holding onto the arm-rest, cheek placed on top of its little knuckles and his other arm dangling lifelessly in the air, Toushiro could've been taken from a bold, yet strangely soothing, modern black-and-white photo. Those unique jade eyes, frighteningly intense in their unnatural, almost arcane nuance, are now hidden behind veils of white, and with that one last detail concealed from the avid gaze of the world, every bit of colour that this boy could possibly possess, has been taken away from him.

Ichigo feels his breath hitch as he slowly approaches the smaller male, chocolate orbs wide and bleary, drinking in the view in front of them with grueling thirst. The need to touch, to _feel_ Hitsugaya and make sure he is real, is like a shot in the head: he never saw it coming, he only ever feels the consequences of this lethal bullet, and all of a sudden… he literally can't breathe. This boy is like a beautiful, frighteningly well-preserved corpse. Gorgeous. Brittle. _Soulless._

Something snaps in Ichigo at that thought and he swallows hard, shaking his head as a tepid wave of compassion washes over him without explanation and without a real purpose. He watches those slim little fingers, spread with unwilling grace under the boy's face, and he watches the relaxed, froth-like features, and he watches the bony pair of knees, pulled so closely, so _childishly_ to Hitsugaya's chest… and he can't fight the overwhelming need to _protect_ this person that grasps his heart, and fills him up to the brim.

_He's too young for this… It must be draining him._

Reaching through some kind of an inexplicable trance for Toushiro's wrist, planning maybe to gather the lifelessly hanging limb and put it on the arm-rest as well as its twin, Ichigo nearly jumps back at the contact of his own skin with his superior's one. The pale flesh, so delicious when admired from aside, is _deadly_ cold - almost painfully so - and as he cautiously wraps his fingers around the dainty hand, he feels something inside him paralyze in fear. There's… There's… _There's no pulse!_

Momentarily he loses any sense of awareness, any thought, any _reason_, as the floor shatters beneath his feet and he almost gags on thin air. His whole being ignites with the horror of what this could mean; it doesn't matter if it's logical, it doesn't matter what the cause could be – pills, drugs, an anomaly of some kind - it just _is_. Like a bullet in the desert or a needle in the spine, he knows that the chances are slim, _but the results are there_, heightened by the freshness of the body and the depth of the mind that define the very essence of the victim. A hundred images and chaos-stricken words rush through Ichigo's head, but he can neither catch them, nor see beyond the fog that this chaos has created. With the desperation of a man who has no idea what he's doing, he decides to check one more time – with fingers that are shaking madly in fright and apprehension - and tries to find some proof for heart activity as he presses two digits under the boy's jawline and seeks. Seeks the warmth and life that deep inside he already knows he won't find, he seeks comfort for his suddenly withering heart, and hope for his wilting soul… _This can't be happening!_

…_Nothing._ Absolutely nothing…

Ichigo can literally feel the blood withdraw from his face, leaving his tan cheeks an unpleasant shade of vapid grey, his eyes drowning with the realization of what is happening.

_I need to call an ambulance... He's-_

…And at the same time… At the same time, _there_, he's breathing. He's _breathing_, like a completely normal human being, a sleeping creature that has slipped away into the dream-land, but also a creature with skin so cold, so _fey_, that it's literally searing the carrot-top's flesh.

"Oh, God…" it's the only thing that he can utter, and after what feels like eternity, but is in reality no more than a few seconds, he's dropped on his knees, shaking the boy, whispering that sweet name, again and again, with urgency that a beloved man might pour into the calls of his precious one, and he knows, he _knows_, that it'll all prove to be in vain in the end, but he can't help himself... What _can_ he do? How could he save this child? He is neither aware of what's wrong, nor if it's fixable… And it most likely isn't. People like Hitsugaya… drowned under stress and parades, struggling to maintain a façade that is slowly corroding them from the inside… they don't survive for long. Their body doesn't. Their minds fail. And yet… And yet the illusion that he might be able to rouse Toushiro is stronger than the carrot-top's reason, stronger than the calloused knowledge that books have stuffed into his head. So he doesn't stop. He doesn't care. Although the blood-curling voice of truth keeps chanting in his mind anyways: _He won't wake up if his heart isn't beating… He won't…_

Ichigo grits his teeth together.

…_Wake up… Please, wake up…_

And then…

A loud gasp tears through the air and to Ichigo's surprise the once motionless boy jumps in his seat, wide turquoise eyes staring in shock at the person before him. Pale, frost-like lips part in confusion and lashes flutter, chasing away the fading vestiges of sleep. The scent of biting winter drips in the air between them, crispy and surreal, and it makes the carrot-top's breath swirl in tiny clouds of white in front his mouth – a detail that he fails to notice.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?" Hitsugaya whispers in disbelief, indignation maybe even horror wafting from his tone, and he tries to pull away from the uninvited guest, but before he can do anything of the sort, Ichigo's hands are on either of his cheeks, chocolate orbs staring through the cinereous darkness in the nearly glowing teal pools.

"You had no pulse." Ignoring the unpleasantly cold feeling of the soft skin under his touch, the man moves his fingers down, right under the delicately-chiseled jawline and nearly chokes. "There's _still_ no pulse! What the-"

"Let go of me!"

Hitsugaya wrenches himself free so hard and so fast, that Ichigo involuntarily recoils from the sharp reaction, baffled by the sheer spite focused in that one single movement. It's the most abrupt motion he's ever seen his boss make and the fact makes the fine hairs on the back of his neck raise along with a deep, harsh shudder. As he stands up and steps back, watching the boy raise to his feet with a malign little curve in the end of his mouth, he is almost sure the temperature has dropped low enough to make the air practically screech along with each movement. Something is terribly wrong with this room, this boy, _everything_. It makes his thoughts creak and fracture under the weight of this mind-crushing ignorance, because he has _no idea what is going on_. And it doesn't look like he's going to find out any time soon… He has got nothing to deserve such information.

"Closed door, means you don't enter." Toushiro states, and although under the surface of the icy façade something shifts similarly to an insect beneath thin bed-sheets, the unnatural stillness of that low voice is back, suffocatingly inhuman. "_This_ is invasion of my privacy."

"For a minute… for a minute I thought-" the pressure around his throat loosens and suddenly Ichigo feels a strong tide of frustration wash over him. "What the hell is wrong with your heart?"

"There's nothing wrong with my heart." Toushiro replies evenly, eyes narrowing for a trice, only to relax again as he wraps his arms very loosely around his middle. "As you can see, I'm perfectly healthy. You, on the other hand seem a little pale, Mr. Kurosaki, maybe you would like to sit down?"

"You had _no pulse_!"

"I beg your pardon, are you a doctor?"

"I don't have to be one to _know_-"

"Then I suggest you don't speak on subjects you're incompetent in." Toushiro's voice slices through the air like a cold blade and the carrot-top can't help it but freeze, contemplating mutely as the boy slowly tilts his head to the side, all remnants of emotion, all implications of something, _anything_, thawing off that perfect, slick mask of indifference till there's nothing to see. Nothing to understand. "I'll assume that this is your first offence and you can't really be blamed for being ignorant… I have enough things on my mind, Mr. Kurosaki, if the door is closed and I've given myself an hour of rest, that means neither you, nor anyone else for that matter, is welcome to violate my peace and quiet."

Ichigo clenches his jaw, feeling his muscles tense and curl under the tanned skin as for the first time since he's stepped into this company, he experiences the almost savage need to slap this boy, shake him till he can't see, hit him till he bleeds, because _no one_ can be this cold-blooded! _Gods… _He knows he can't lose his nerves, he can't go too far, can't challenge his superior merely a week and a half after being hired by some miracle in the most promising company in the country… but he's sure, he's so _sure_ there was no pulse!

"I just wanted to help." He manages through his teeth and Toushiro lets out a small huff; a tiny sound that expresses dry, unnatural amusement.

"How sweet." He mutters and the sarcasm burns similarly to a smoldering amber against unprotected fingertips. Without really paying attention to the incredulous look that the other man is giving him, the white-haired lad reaches for the pile of documents that are still miraculously resting in the carrot-top's hands and straightens his thin shoulders. "I suppose these are what all this was about?"

Pressing his lips in a tight, angry line, Ichigo throws the papers on the desk just behind the smaller male and strolls right out of the room, barely containing himself from slamming the door in the process. Behind him, Toushiro follows the taller figure with his barren, emerald gaze till the door is closed shut once again, and then he slowly lifts his hand to his chest, pressing his cold fingers right over where his heart is supposed to be.

He can feel nothing.

* * *

><p><em><strong>AN; You know what to do with that 'review' button down there. ^^**_


	3. Icefall

**_A/N: IMPORTANT! Due to the fact that the site is recently running a great purge on fics with the so-called MA content (extreme violence, sexual scenes, etc) I've cut out all all the lemons from my stories and put them in my LiveJournal account. The places of the missing scenes I've pointed out where necessary and the links to those scenes are all easily organized in my profile page. Despite that fact, I am not happy for having to cripple my stories and I ask you all to support a petition in favor of fanfiction introducing an MA rating, appropriate for my stories and the stories of many other people. You can find a link to the petition on my profile page as well as if you google 'stop the destruction of fanfiction petititon'._**

**_Anyways... I'm quite upset over this, so some nice comments could do me good.  
><em>**

* * *

><p>Heartless<p>

Part 3

Icefall

_How could you be so, cold as the winter wind when it breeze, yo  
>Just remember that you talkin' to me though<br>You need to watch the way you talkin' to me, yo_

_One day, as the two children are playing near the river, a speck of the Devil's mirror falls in the boy's eye, blemishing the innocent, unpolluted sight of the growing child, and turning him into an aggressive and cruel youngster, who can no longer see the delicate allure of the world and the good in the people around him. The only thing that seem perfect to him, are the tiny, speck-like snowflakes that fly from the sky, bringing numbness and cold to the people and the frost-bitten soil._

At first Ichigo was curious.

Then… he felt like a stalker…

And now? Now he can't really be bothered to care.

He noticed the tendency about two weeks ago when the fact that he had lost his keys had him spending about thirty minutes in solid search for the misplaced possession. When he finally came out of his office and was just about to turn round the corner and walk past his boss' office to get to the elevator, the sound of slightly impatient, maybe even angry steps, made him slow down to a stop and peek cautious around the wall's edge at what was going on outside Hitsugaya's working place.

The scene he witnessed at that moment remained plastered in the carrot-top's mind for days to come. For what reason – he isn't sure - but after several nights of stumbling upon similar incidents, he already knows. It's the same thing every time. Every evening, without exceptions.

Hitsugaya comes out of his office about half an hour after the work-time is over, strides slowly towards the litter-bin that is snuggling next to this floor's vending machine, and after several long seconds, drops a single, withered rose in the basket beneath him. During those few moments before Toushiro completes his 'daily mission', a side viewer could be left with the deceitful impression that the boy is hesitating, maybe even regretting what he's about to do… But after weeks of watching this happen from his place at the end of the corridor, Ichigo knows better. His boss is incapable of either of these feelings: Toushiro doesn't waver, doesn't ponder, doesn't even pretend to do so… And what sparkles treacherously in those vitreous jade orbs in the broken trice before the dead flower hits the bottom of the trash can, is no more than a mere shadow of something akin to curiosity - perhaps even triumph? - that in the next minute has already melted away to nothing.

Just like that.

It's a sad scene, really. _Agonizing_. Whether because the fragile rose inevitably survives no more than a few hours after being gifted to its new possessor, whether because Toushiro never seems to care about what kind of a beauty he's throwing away… But for some reason Ichigo can't help it but make the association between the person and the wilted blossom. Someone so fresh, someone so beautiful and exquisite, isn't supposed to seem so exhausted and tormented by life. And everything about Hitsugaya screams of physical and emotional fatigue; every breath, every movement, every blink, _everything_. This seemingly painfully unpleasant but important routine that the boy has dragged himself into is frightening in its endlessness. Like the performance of some ancient sacrifice ritual, Toushiro rids himself of the presence of the once fresh flower, and then walks away, never, _ever_ faltering in his decision, as though it's something that can't be helped. Something tedious and tiresome, but ultimately necessary that he's learned to deal with, learned to accept, and honour, and respect, cherishing this peculiar funeral of a sort as an unbreakable, albeit strange rule that he can't expect others to understand.

Sometimes Ichigo wonders what it is that has caught him up in this odd habit of his to watch his boss leave and re-enter his office at the exact same time every day. What it is that keeps him there, several minutes after everybody else has already left, waiting in silence for the much expected spectacle of disposal to occur. Again. And again. And again.

Confusion? Certainly. But what else?

What kind of a fascinating miracle could be drawing him in, making him stay day, after day, when nothing ever changes and the drill all but repeats like an endless, punishing cycle…?

After a while he figured it's the motion that thrills him… The fact that he can actually _see_ the infamous ice prince move, walk, _do _something as human as throwing away a useless item. And it is a rare and unusual sight, indeed, something almost scandalous in its essence because of how forbidden, how _undeserved_ it feels for someone like Ichigo to be there to witness it. There is no doubt in the carrot-top's mind that his boss is aware that he's being watched – those lifeless orbs, such a perfect reflection of everything that is going on in the world around them, can't have missed the presence of this obtrusive lad that seems so irritatingly persistent on finding out more about his young employer – but such knowledge doesn't appear to be worrisome for the owner of the publishing house. From the single time when the strawberry has actually noticed the boy's gaze flitter in his direction during these little spying escapades of Ichigo's, the taller male has learned one thing: Toushiro couldn't have cared less about what his employees were thinking of him. The snowy-haired guy's time is a precious and delicate silk strand, something gorgeous and valuable, yet easy to spoil with rough treatment, and so Hitsugaya doesn't even bother to pretend that being scrutinized is a problem to him. As long as Ichigo is doing his job, as long as no one else is complaining and the company doesn't suffer, why should he do anything about this? _Why?_

The carrot-top knows that his behavior is probably quite unacceptable and all the more alarming considering he's engaged, but all these facts seem to fade away into the distance whenever the thought of his peculiar superior comes to him. There's _something_ about Hitsugaya… He can't quite put his finger on it, but it's there; this mysterious aura, this absolutely devastating demeanor of a royal figure with no qualms and no inhibitions, and it's fascinating the orange-haired man far more than what he's willing to admit. And the rest of his colleagues? He can describe their behavior as nothing but pathetically timid, that quite foolish ass-kissing attitude that they use to cover up their fears, occasionally tainted with large splotches of passive hatred and disdain that mostly derive from their employer's age and fame. _And how can one blame them?_

As far as everybody in the company is concerned, Hitsugaya Toushiro does not go out of his office unless it's for something extremely unpleasant and terrifying for his subordinates. The boy doesn't have lunch with the rest of the staff, comes and goes to work at hours when nobody is there to witness said arrival and departure, he hardly speaks to anyone and knows the actual names of even fewer people… So how could a person this closed off and this eccentric spin the fate of three large companies on the tip of his pinky finger?

_Heh…_

The same way an emperor rules over three continents.

The thought of _that_ evening comes to Ichigo far more often than he would've liked it to, and not so much because of the shady discovery he's made (Or he thinks he's made? Because the more time he spends trying to figure out the meaning of it all, the more likely it seems that everything has just been a figment of his imagination..), but due to the constant, nagging image that entertains those memories…

…The picture of a completely still, almost vulnerable Toushiro, curled in his arm-chair like a kid that has fallen asleep during a car ride out of utter and overwhelming exhaustion.

_That_ picture.

Because it _can't_ be fair, Ichigo muses, for nature to encase someone this ruthless and full of faults in a body so utterly flawless, so _perfect_ that it almost _hurt _to look at them. He's seen the extents of Hitsugaya's cruelty plenty of times by now - sometimes by accident, sometimes because the employer has found it necessary to make whatever case public for a greater impact on the rest of his subordinates – and after all these weeks, the carrot-top's left with absolutely no traces of doubt regarding the boy's unscrupulousness. When a demand is made, the demand should be met strictly, without delay, without dawdling; when a deadline is put, the deadline's _final_ and nothing anyone says, no excuses, no begging and promising can make the date change. _This is the cost of success, the value of a fulfilled ambition in its purest, most extreme form… _Being late, being sloppy, being anything _but_ irreproachable is the same as signing your own discharge. And although Ichigo wouldn't say that he feels particularly intimidated by the short, half-mechanical being that is ruling over the publishing house, he has to admit that the only person sharing such a leisure attitude regarding Hitsugaya, is the boy's dashing right hand –Matsumoto Rangiku. A young woman that the strawberry has only met briefly, but who seems to cherish very warm feelings towards the newest member of '_Dragon_''s crew, most probably due to the fact that out of all the men on the floor (excluding Toushiro, of course), the carrot-top is the only one who doesn't attempt to flirt with the sultry beauty whenever the chance arises.

Most of the time, he chooses not to deem over the fact that his lack of interest regarding the female is probably to be blamed on his unnatural preoccupation with someone much smaller and much colder, but occasionally the nagging thought comes anyways, unwanted and rather intrusive, followed by a much more mortifying one that just can't seem to shut up: _you're engaged to be married!_

He knows all of this, he does, he really, _really_ does, Ichigo muses gruffly as he gathers his coat, his hat, scarf and gloves one Friday evening and swiftly wraps himself up like a Christmas present. The scarf is new – a soft cloud of grey cashmere that Orihime has bought for him less than half a week ago – and under his fiancée's treatment, it now emits the faintest scent of lilacs and lemon. As he inhales the fragrance avidly, closing his eyes to preserve the intimacy of the moment, he can't help it but wonder how come this little gesture of affection his soon-to-be-wife has made for him has ended up making him feel so heavy-hearted instead of grateful or at least a little bit happy… Everybody likes presents – especially such thoughtful, sincerely loving ones that prove the giver is aware of the taker's taste and needs – but even this undoubted knowledge doesn't help the newly-fledged editor to feel in any way better about how his life is progressing. He wishes there was an actual reason to be upset – something he could put into words and dress up into eloquent, only half-true phrases that would certainly grant him at least a tiny loophole that he could later use to slip through… But he's got nothing. His life is perfect, exactly the way everybody else think it is, and it's draining, _suffocating_ him, just like this scarf seems so strangely tight around his neck now, so oddly heavy…

He lifts his hand and runs his fingertips along the soft, silken material, nose still buried into the aromatic puff around his face, and sighs dejectedly. A part of him doesn't really want to go home. Not because there's anything bad awaiting him there – an argument or a discussion of any undesirable kind - and not because he's made any kind of an offence to feel guilty about, or even cuz he's got better things to do, but rather… he knows there'll be nothing different to look forward to. _Nothing _new. It's like eating the same dish, day after day, after day, _after friggin' day_, with nothing else to vary your diet… Even if the food had been your favourite at the beginning of it all, you can barely stomach the meal any longer, yet you are too much of a goody-goody-two-shoes to tell the cook that you want something else.

Collecting his things with obvious reluctance, Ichigo makes his way out of the office, locking the door behind himself and putting the key into his pocket. Within five minutes he's exited the building and is crossing the parking lot, a tornado of tiny snowflakes swirling around him and pecking his face unpleasantly as he stamps his way through the several inches of downy white that have been adorning the streets for the past few days or so. It's a lot colder than it has been in the morning and he can't help it but bounce a little in his spot as he finally discovers his car and stands beside it, fumbling with the keys. He enters the automobile a minute or so later, shivering spasmodically and dusting the snow off of his hat as he adjusts himself in his seat. Not much later, he's joining the usual evening flow of cars, driving with reasonably low speed down the relatively vacant streets and humming some Christmas tune to himself while his fingers frisk restlessly across the controls of his radio, searching for a decent station to listen to. He pauses at the weather forecast when some old, bored man announces that a rather vicious storm is coming up tonight, and is about to move on to some other frequency that wouldn't make him fall asleep behind the wheel, when something makes him pause.

_Fuck! _He slogs the claxon so hard that the door elderly woman that is crossing the street all but collapses in terror, but he can't be bothered to feel sorry. The file of manuscripts, the documents, the articles that he has been planning to take with himself and read during the weekend are back at his office – through his inane musings, his constant pre-wedding worries and the stalking tendencies he's developed towards his boss, he's completely forgotten to pick up the meticulously prepared folder on his way out. And despite his complete lack of desire to do this and the pressing urge to just continue driving towards his home and forget all about it, he knows he's got to go back.

So at the next possible place, he turns around and heads straight back to the office.

* * *

><p>When Ichigo reaches the publishing house he's all but fuming. He gets out of the car in a hurry, gloves, hat and scarf forgotten, and is just about to race through the blizzard to the entrance of the building, when something catches his attention and he pauses, shielding his eyes with his hand as he lifts his head and squints up at the eleventh floor's windows where he just so happens to be working. The only balcony belongs to his boss – a large half-circle surrounded by curvy, bronze railings that despite their simplicity still manage to stand out a little unnaturally from the lean figure of the blue-grey edifice – and although at first the carrot-top isn't sure what the meaning of what he's seeing could be, the realization sinks in – gradually and mercilessly – kindling a new kind of emotion inside of him.<p>

_Panic._

"Oh, God…" he whispers in shock, and before his mind has managed to catch up with the rest of his body, he's rushing towards the entrance, running as fast as he can in the direction of the elevator, while his wet shoes squeak unpleasantly along the smooth floor, threatening him with quite a vicious fall if he doesn't slow down.

Somehow, with the mercy of some great miracle, he manages to make it to the little transporting cubicle without collapsing in the process, and he reaches (quite desperately) with his hand to punch the needed button, his body spinning around just in time to let him see the two metal doors close with an overly merry clink before him. Then the machine is carrying him up, languidly, certainly, gliding him towards the needed destination, and as the speakers croon some relaxing melody above his head, he realizes for the first time since he's reentered his job place just _how much_ his hands are shaking and how _hard_ it seems for him to be able to stand on those weakened knees of his. His world tilts and nearly tumbles out of his vision when the elevator finally stops and opens up for him, and he all but bursts out from within the confines of the silver cell, sprinting in the direction of Toushiro's office as fast as his legs agree to carry him.

His brain registers barely half of the information it usually would and as he pushes his way through the door of his boss' office (completely disinterested in the 'privacy' he's supposedly 'invading'), he find himself frozen on spot in terror. The balcony's door is opened, cold, incisive gusts of air billowing the curtains in an almost arcane manner, and through the twisted dance of the heavy silk, he can clearly see the snow-covered platform outside; he can easily distinguish the figure that is standing right on the edge of said platform… A delicate little phantom, left in the very core of the storm; an elusive illusion that would vanish in the snap of a finger, the way a dream shatters into dust the moment the morning sunlight hits your face…

_Is he… He can't be really-…_

Ichigo's blood curdles in his veins at the sight, the realization of what is happening making his heart leap in an unpleasant, rhythm-less manner inside his chest... And yet, even with the shock and fear trying to paralyze his muscles, even with his mind as blank as a fresh piece of paper, he still manages to stumble forward, _towards __**him**_, towards the one person he's supposed to despise with everything that he is... _Don't. Let. This happen._

Insides tied in a knot, the carrot-top manages to get to the borderline between the room and the open space outside, and then pauses again, trying to get it through his head what he's seeing, what really _is_ there and what _isn't_. The railings, the very same ones that had been perfectly solid, thick and unmovable mere hours ago, are now broken in the middle of the circle, twisted and bent as though a large hand has reached out and torn them apart, leaving an unprotected space in the center of the balcony, exactly where one Hitsugaya Toushiro is now standing with his narrow back facing the building. The whole scene makes absolutely _no sense_, something at the back of the carrot-top's mind insists, as the employee takes into account the thin dress shirt the white-haired boy is wearing, the naked arms that are stretched to his sides, the pale hands that are grasping the edges of the distorted barrier… The snow that separates them - so strangely untouched despite the fact that someone _must've_ walked through it to get to the other side - has already half-covered one black shoe and then a little further – the second. And now, as Ichigo stares in bewilderment at the figure before him, he can clearly see that the other lad is completely bare-footed, standing there on the edge of his own balcony without anything to protect his feet from the caustic cold, and without any means of safeguard between himself and the town beneath him...

And then Toushiro moves and everything in the carrot-top's world dissolves to pieces.

At that moment Ichigo realizes that the other male is about to jump, and all of a sudden he can no longer remember any of his carefully collected prejudices, the well-deserved reproaches he has gathered for the smaller guy, or the meticulously erected odium that he has developed towards his boss the past few weeks. In less than a second the opinion that he has been trying to convince himself he's got about the younger person, is obliterated like a salty teardrop that was never meant to be shed, and all he can recall is this crushing feeling of pity towards the boy. This devastating knowledge that Toushiro is just a kid, a kid who can probably hardly bear the pressure of such an enormous world on his shoulders, and a kid who's going to let himself go because he can no longer support the weight of the sky with those thin, brittle bones of his.

He sees the toes of Hitsugaya's right foot leave the ground and as the skinny leg move towards the open, towards the abyss that stretches beneath, Ichigo knows he can no longer ignore what is going on. Pushing himself away from the door-frame, he bolts forth, a choked sound that was probably supposed to be a name ripping from his lips. His shoes sink into the thick layer of snow, slowing him down just a bit, but the urgency to get the boy is stronger than any obstacles and he pushes himself to go faster – a mistake that nearly costs him everything…

His left sole finds something slithery – spilt, now frozen water, some unnaturally slick piece of a tile or just a patch of wet snow – and he slips stupidly, skidding forward as a loud yelp replaces the inarticulate gargle from a moment ago. His arms flail at his sides in a rather ridiculous manner and his upper body lurches back as he tries to catch his balance, but without anything in the near vicinity to support him, he can hardly do anything to help himself. _Oh, God, no… _For a single modicum of the second, he can nearly feel the time shudder and slow down to an oddly lazy pace around him, the world stumbling in its movement as it lets him comprehend exactly what's taking place. And it's a cruel phenomenon, really, something akin to revenge from Fate itself for his bold treading through the forbidden lands… Because ignorance truly is bliss. Whereas knowing what awaits you, being so painfully aware of how palpable Death's breath feels against the skin on the back of your neck – that's about the most terrifying sensation one could ever experience…

_No, no, dammit, this isn't supposed to be happening! _Wide-eyed and helpless, Ichigo realizes that he's slipping uncontrollably exactly towards the one person he has foolishly been planning to save, and the fact that he won't be able to stop his own movements and will therefore push them both off the balcony, is frighteningly clear to him.

He's about to die, reduced to a human stamp by the side of the road, and all of this just because he's a clumsy idiot.

"Toush-"

His boss whips around, brows knitting together in a mix of confusion and shock, and those turquoise crystals of eyes flash oddly with the quick understanding of what he's witnessing. And then…

The two of them clash.

Ichigo doesn't scream, but strangely enough, it seems like he has, his chest tightening with the effort to keep breathing as his right hand shoots to the side, grasping the bent edge of one of the broken railings and squeezing the thing in a vice-like grip. His left arm wraps around Hitsugaya's thin waist and clutches it tightly, crushing their bodies together despite the indignant '_oomph!_' that escapes the smaller male's lips at the moment of the abrupt contact. In the tiny trice of the micro fall that follows, the carrot-top's heart hammers and pounds against his rib-cage with such power that he can't help it but fear that the organ will rip from his body or burst from the pressure. Neither of those happen. Instead, the speed in which he is moving sends him and Toushiro flying briefly into the air, the carrot-top's shoes depicting a wide arc, before the hold Ichigo's got on the piece of iron beside him has the two of them sharply changing trajectory…

…And then, a mere trice later, the taller male finds himself pressed against the outer side of the bronze-coloured barrier, squeezing the cold metal under his fingers for dear life and keeping his body as close to the distorted bars as possible, as the enormous chasm of the ignorant city stretches similarly to a large, ancient lizard behind his back, beneath his feet… Toushiro's tiny frame is sandwiched between his own one and the railings, a pair of palms resting neatly on the employee's chest, but the boy is neither shaking, nor looking scared in the slightest.

Something that Ichigo fails to notice until much, _much_ later…

"Okay… Okay…" the carrot-top mutters, nodding more to himself than to anyone else as he tightens his suffocating hold around the other one's waist. "Okay. We're good."

He feels Toushiro shift against him, that lanky body pressing back against the barrier behind the boy to increase the distance between him and the taller male, and then a pair of weary jade eyes are piercing through Ichigo's ones like needles stabbing a pin cushion. The gaze is so intense, so oddly numinous even without that vital particle that would make it feel real, and human, and _normal_, that for a second the carrot-top forgets where he's standing.

"You shouldn't have come up here." Hitsugaya deadpans, his voice quaking just a bit at the end as the first tendrils of exasperation creep in the employer's tone. "You should've just gone home."

A powerful gust of wind blows between the two, chasing a vortex of dry snowflakes in a wild silver dance around them, but even as the crispy flakes of ice kiss along the white-haired lad's bare skin, no reaction, no flinch or shudder comes from Toushiro's direction. Instead, those thick lashes flutter with the mildest hint of frustration and the boy shakes his head as though the irritable situation can't be helped, as though Ichigo, who is now openly gawking at his boss in disbelief, is just an imbecile who can't be blamed for acting irrationally.

"I- You were going to-" the carrot-top begins in a stutter.

"It's fine." Toushiro cuts him off sharply, his colourless lips twisting with distaste, before he spins around and starts climbing over the railings to the other side. "I get it. You've been born stupid like that. It's not your fault."

_What did you just call me? _Ichigo watches in shock as his boss leaps gracefully over to the other side, bare feet landing softly in the snow, and then Hitsugaya is striding right back towards his office, toes digging in the downy white mass as though it is warm beach sand rather than a sea of milliards of frozen crystals. Before he has completely realized what he's doing, the carrot-top is swiftly surmounting the bronze obstacle between himself and the balcony, and racing after the other guy, his arm shooting forward to grasp Toushiro's elbow in a way that immediately has the white-haired lad pausing in his track.

"Hey! Hold on a minute!" the indignation in Ichigo's tone is much more tangible than what he has been expecting, and he well-neigh growls as his employer turns his head to give the strawberry that special blank stare which can drive anyone up the wall with vexation. "Maybe it wasn't the most stylish rescue you could expect, but I _did_ just save you from jumping off the 11th floor."

Toushiro blinks slowly, almost tiredly so, wrenching his arm from the other one's hold and moving to fully face the carrot-top.

"Well, what do you want, a cookie?" the boy enquires sarcastically, cocking a brow as he eyes Ichigo up and down. "I don't give away promotions to impromptu stuntmen if that's why you did it."

Ichigo jerks back at that comment as those physically hit, his features rearranging in something akin to hurt as he tries to figure out if the last part of his boss' comment was in fact a joke or indeed an honestly expressed assumption. _He can't honestly be thinking- _The carrot-top's eyes dart restlessly across the strange being in front of him, looking for something, _searching _for an explanation, but all that he finds is this inimical, unmovable coldness, a _nothingness_ that burns and mars the viewer, the seeker, the intruder… It's almost intimidating how little there is to see, really. How useless it is to even attempt such a quest… And Hitsugaya? Hitsugaya doesn't even move a muscle under the scrutiny, a bit of vague curiosity managing to emerge on the surface of those glassy teal orbs before that too, is extinguished into the gelid, bottomless void that lies beneath the iris.

"How can you even say that?" the carrot-top utters in some kind of a strange defeat, all anger suddenly drained from his system as he lifts his hands uselessly, almost pleadingly. "Do you honestly not understand why I interfered?"

"I really don't care." Hitsugaya snorts in resentment, his mouth twisting unpleasantly at the side as though he's been forced to observe something unworthy and disgusting. "I just want you to stop trying to stick your nose in my business."

"I think you need help." Ichigo announces unexpectedly, boldly, all of a sudden completely uncaring about whether this comment could cost him his job or not. "I think you're under a lot of stress and you need help from a professional. You're obviously very unhappy with your life, and it's making you take irrational decisions in the worst moments possible."

Instead of reacting in the belligerent way in which the carrot-top has expected him to, Toushiro just rolls his eyes demonstratively, a low, half-coherent mutter that sounded a bit like '_Oh, God, no…_' forming on those lips before the boy turns around on his unprotected heel and slinks right into his office, Ichigo following right behind. Strangely enough, the moment the carrot-top manages to get inside the room, the wind behind him grows significantly stronger, the powerful air movement slamming the balcony door shut with a bang and making him jump in surprise. _This can't be very good… _The lights in the room are off, much like that other night when the taller male made the mistake to enter uninvited, and in the dimness that comes with this late hour, it is rather hard to see where Hitsugaya has disappeared all of a sudden. The hazy shifting of something, somewhere to the right catches the orange-haired lad's attention and he clears his throat, almost as though he feels that if he doesn't make a sound, his presence might be completely forgotten.

"What do you know about happiness?" comes Toushiro's slightly gruff voice and the sound of drawers being pulled open and hands rummaging through numerous objects echoes around the place. "When does happiness ever come without consequences and aren't we always punished for escaping the inevitable for even one moment? I'm not _un_happy, Mr. Kurosaki, I cannot feel that way. How can you be unhappy if you can't be miserable or sad, or hurt, or disappointed? If you don't let yourself experience those, you can't say you're unhappy, can you?"

"You can't shut everything out." Ichigo states a little too quickly, a strange sensation, much like dread crawling up his skin, slowly, certainly, painfully. "It's impossible. So why are we having this conversation?"

A hollow sound, brittle, ancient and forbidden like the kiss of some divine creature, ripples from Toushiro's direction and then something is closed shut as the smaller bloke turns around so his back is to the desk, the weight of that turquoise gaze falling on the taller male even from behind the thick wall of darkness that the carrot-top's eyes cannot penetrate.

"What if it is?"

"It's not." Ichigo repeats, his throat running dry despite the fact that he knows that what he's saying is true. He can feel his own numb, stiff fingers tremble restlessly by his sides as he takes a step or two deeper inside the room, shuddering in the cold that seems to stretch from outside and within the confines of the closed space. "That would be like single-handedly taking everything that matters out, just because you're scared… That would be like dying."

"Dying?" Toushiro's voice repeats vacantly and Ichigo can see that frail body move, leaning against the desk as the boy turns his head in the taller male's direction. "_Dying_? Are you happy, Kurosaki?"

Much to his surprise, Ichigo doesn't even hesitate, the word rolling off his tongue with readiness that scares him a little.

"No."

Hitsugaya chuckles joylessly at that answer, tapping an absent finger across the smooth wooden surface of the piece of furniture behind him.

"Isn't _that_ like dying, then? Falling apart, little by little, every day?" he whispers wickedly, seemingly enjoying the little verbal trap in which he's pushed his interlocutor. "Don't you just want to shut it all out sometimes? To have it disappear forever and leave you alone?"

"No." Ichigo counters softly, suddenly finding himself right in front of the smaller male as his slightly disappointed gaze falls down on the person before him. "Emotions are the only real magic that we have. Why would I want to give up the one thing that makes sense in this whole fucked up universe?"

The room falls silent. From this distance the carrot-top can make out more of the other one's facial expression, and the surprise that he sees there, the incomprehension that is etched like fine silver dust all across those dainty features, catches the taller male slightly off guard. Toushiro's empty look – so overwhelming, so frightening in its sincerity – is much more impactful than Ichigo has expected and for a moment the orange-haired lad isn't really sure what to do next, how to respond... And then something indefinite glints in the bottom of this child's eyes – something new and yet too dull to be named – and Hitsugaya turns his head away, lashes lowering in vague wonder. Like he doesn't understand what is going through his own head, either. Like it's so different, so unnatural for him, that he doesn't know if he wants to let it affect him.

"You must be cold." The boy mutters suddenly, and before his employee can react, his snowy-haired superior has spun around and renewed his searches, those nimble fingers moving along the insides of the desk so quickly that the carrot-top can hardly follow. A moment later a small electric heater is produced out of nowhere and Hitsugaya stuffs the object in his subordinate's hands, quickly stepping back as though the machine has somehow personally offended him. "Plug that in, I'll go turn on the lights."

As Toushiro disappears to find the switch, Ichigo is left standing there rather awkwardly, switching his weight from one foot to the other till the much expected click is heard and he can finally see further than a meter before himself, his eyes burning a little with the white light that splashes around the room. Blinking a few times in order to adjust, the carrot-top looks around, swiftly finding an electrical contact in the corner and making his wait towards it to turn on the heater. The machine buzzes to life right away. A wave of warm air envelops the man and he groans in delight, kneeling in front of the spinning vane and reaching with his hands towards it to warm up his fingers.

"Your wife might get worried." Hitsugaya's voice comes from somewhere behind the taller male and Ichigo frowns at the slight irony that accompanies the statement. "You should call her, tell her you're thawing your limbs and you'll be right there as soon as you can feel the wheel again."

The carrot-top turns his head to glance over his shoulder, his eyes falling on the smaller lad, who is currently standing as far away as physically possible from the only source of heat in the room, his narrow shoulder plastered to the opposite wall as the boy watches his employee with a slight, static smirk on his lips.

"We're not married." Ichigo corrects, a tad bit disgruntledly. "And you probably need to melt far more than I do."

"I'm not cold." Hitsugaya says quietly, something akin to malice pouring in those words as the white-haired bloke allows his gaze to slip over the heater. Under the bright illumination that is leaking from the ceiling, the taller male can see much more clearly the expression that has twisted those incredibly delicate features, he can survey the almost translucent, paraffin-coloured flesh and the thin, miffly shapes lips… But what surprises him isn't even the fact that no piece of skin looks bloodlessly mauve after being directly exposed to the winter's merciless caresses, and no gracelessness could be spotted in the supposedly cold-stricken body… No, the detail that makes Ichigo's breath hitch is the realization of how _dry_ the other person is. How perfectly untouched Toushiro seems, his clothes neat, spotless, immaculately arranged… There isn't a single sign that could hint, _in any way_, that this guy has just been outside in the open, tiptoeing along the line between life and death - and in the middle of a snowstorm nonetheless…

And then Hitsugaya's face crinkles in repulsion, lips pulling back to reveal a roll of even white teeth, and the boy spits out with thick, naked spite, like an animal that is preparing to bite another one on the neck:

"Warmth makes me _sick_."

With that said, Toushiro sucks in a sharp breath of air and turns his head to the side, allowing the silence to settle nicely between them. His hands are gathered behind his back, palms turned towards the wall behind him, and he's leaning against his fingertips, bouncing slightly against them as though he's uncomfortable staying still. In any other circumstances Ichigo might've found the picture quite endearing, kind of childish really, but right now, with the way the boy is acting, restlessly and hostilely, he can't help it but feel strangely out of place here. A peasant in the palace of a prince; a mortal in a temple, built for a god… Someone, who has no right to trespass the borders of the strange boy's world, but who can't help it but marvel now - the way a sinner always does when tempted with the right lure – at how beautiful and untouched Toushiro looks. It must be a feeling that only this unusual person can evoke – a craving that is just as bitter as it is sweet… Because it shouldn't be possible, _it shouldn't be_, to be so pathetically overwhelmed by the need to protect and care for somebody, when mere minutes ago you could barely keep yourself from slapping them.

_You aren't doing this on purpose, are you? You can't-… You just don't care._

…And so after a minute or two have passed, trickling away like golden dust in a sand-glass, the carrot-top slowly stands up with a sigh and makes his way towards his boss, yielding to some invisible pull that he can't struggle against right now. Toushiro doesn't react immediately, merely watching the other male through lidded, taciturn eyes, but when the carrot-top lifts his hand to touch him, the boy flinches.

"_No._"

"No what?" Ichigo asks softly, almost soothingly so, and then carefully reaches for the other lad's wrist. At first Hitsugaya seems like he's about to resist against the physical contact, but then he just rolls his eyes and allows the carrot-top to take his smaller, paler hand between his own tan ones, that strange look of apathy swiftly taking over the white-haired male's face. "You're freezing. You need to warm up."

For a couple of seconds Toushiro watches his subordinate rub the ice-cold palm with his own, significantly warmer ones, and then huffs somewhat boredly.

"That won't work." It's a declaration that seems to accept no arguments and no persuasions, the unhidden tinge of imperiousness that paints the tone summoning a slightly condescending smile on Ichigo's face. The carrot-top's fingers run along the unpleasantly icy flesh, the thin bones that support it so very cautiously, and pause along the exquisite knuckles, touching the thin skin there with a strange kind of reverence. _Heh, could you seem any easier to shatter? _Toushiro's hand is like porcelain under his tan digits, a fine make of some wicked deity, the creation of a being that enjoys mocking the human kind in the face… And for a moment Ichigo feels strangely cheated on. Why did Fate have to pick someone like Hitsugaya to carry the face and the traits of something this beautiful, and why did he have to be here now, to see it? After a minute, the carrot-top figures he probably doesn't want to know the answer. Some things, people say, are better left unknown.

"It will, if you let it."

"Don't be ridiculous." Toushiro scoffs sharply and then swiftly wrings his fingers from the other person's hold as though the higher temperature has somehow maculated his perfect little hand. "Just dry off a little and get going. There'll be a storm tonight."

Ichigo cocks a brow, barely keeping himself from letting out a loud snort at that comment.

"You really think I'll leave you alone in here after what happened?" he mutters quietly and Hitsugaya falls silent for a second, seemingly confused by the meaning of that retort. Then realization slowly dissipates along those soft features and the boy shakes his head wearily.

"Haven't you understood by now?" the owner of the publishing house utters almost meekly. "I wasn't trying to kill myself."

"Then what where you planning to do?"

"None of your business."

"You just made it my business." Ichigo enunciates slowly, earnestly, his brows knitting in a scowl as he takes the tiniest step forward and tries to peer through the impiercable veil that covers the other one's eyes. "You're coming at my place tonight and that's final."

Toushiro doesn't even seem amused when he responds, flatly and uninterestedly, as though this is a complete waste of his time:

"You think you can order me about and get away with it?"

"I wouldn't even dare assume such a thing." The carrot-top admits with a morose little smile, knowing well enough that he's risking his job place at the moment. "But I can't have you weighting on my consciousness for the rest of my life."

For a moment Hitsugaya actually looks like he's about to laugh, but the sound never really makes it through. Instead, the boy tilts his head to the side and folds his thin arms in front of his chest.

"That's selfish."

"Would you honour anything else?"

The edges of the employer's mouth curve a little into some kind of a twisted semblance of a smirk.

"I guess not." He admits, before pushing himself away from the wall. "Let's go."

* * *

><p>The ride home is quite difficult for Ichigo. He's trying to figure out what sort of an explanation he's going to offer Orihime for bringing a teenage millionaire home instead of dinner, and at the same time, he's trying to decide what he'll do with Toushiro in the morning, when the pressing need for more serious measures comes up. His boss seems bothered by neither of these issues. Settled neatly in the seat next to the driver's one, the boy spends the whole time during the ride with his eyes glued on something behind the windows, the doll-like blank expression giving the smaller male the look of someone who isn't entirely healthy.<p>

Ichigo decides not to think about that much, focusing instead of positive things, such as the calm weather that they are enjoying at the moment. It appears that the weather forecast wasn't as accurate as he has originally thought – no signs of a storm have been present ever since he and Toushiro have left the publishing house.

Maybe luck is finally finding its way back to the carrot-top after all.

Several minutes later, Ichigo is pulling up in front of his apartment building, turning off the engine and exiting the vehicle all the while his fingers are vehemently rummaging through his pockets for a key. He can hear Toushiro open and close the car's door and he absently reaches to lock the machine up, still desperately searching through his jacket.

"Take your time." Hitsugaya says patiently and the carrot-top glances up to give his boss an apologetic look before slowly starting to make his way towards the front door of building. As he finally reaches the steps, his fingers discover what he has been searching for and he almost cries out in joy, turning around to brandish his key-ring victoriously.

"I found it!"

Silence is all that meets him.

Eyes widening in shock, Ichigo lowers his arm and looks around, searching mutely for the familiar figure that seems to be nowhere in sight. Then a soft clinking sound attracts his attention and the carrot-top pulls out his phone, looking down at the text message he's just received.

_**Go home. It's going to be one hell of a snow storm tonight.**_

And all of a sudden, a powerful gust of biting wind hits the carrot-top in the face, almost making him lose his balance.

After a few minutes of searching in the blizzard, Ichigo is convinced to follow the anonymous texter's advice.

* * *

><p><strong><em>AN: In the next chapter more things will happen, so bear with me. And please, review._**


	4. Solid Water

_**A/N: I'll be at my grannies for a while starting Wednesday but if I'm lucky, there'll be a (slow) internet connection, so with some delays, I'll be able to reply to reviews and so on. My artistic friend Miribirdy has drawn a fanart for this chapter, the link is in my profile, so GO check it out. I hope you enjoy this chapter - I had some difficulties with it.**_

* * *

><p>Heartless<p>

Part 4

Solid Water

…_Hey yo, I know of some things that you ain't told me  
>Hey yo, I did some things but that's the old me…<em>

_A year later, as he is skating outside the village, a magnificent sleigh appears in front of him, driven by a woman so beautiful and mesmerizing, that the boy cannot resist the temptation and approaches her. The Snow Queen, drawn seemingly from a world beyond reality, takes him in her arms and kisses him only twice, as the third kiss will inevitably kill him. Climbing on the sled, they take off towards the Queen's palace, leaving everything that the child has ever known behind._

The morning light is clear and crispy, palpable as a thin veil of water as Toushiro pulls the curtains back and allows the stark white sunrays to hit his smooth, almost translucent skin. Unsurprisingly, his flesh immediately catches the gentle illumination, glowing faintly under its tender caress as though just to remind the side viewer of the way snow reflects every spark and gleam during the most serene hours of the day, blinding one with the power of the milliards of tiny crystals and their cold refusal to absorb warmth. Gazing up at the cloudless sky that is stretching far up and in the distance like an endless ocean of trembling blue, the employer takes merely a moment to try and remember what it was that used to affect him so much about this scene, what had once moved him, touched him, shaken him about this panorama alone... The effort is too much, though, and he loses interest instantly, focusing instead on the landscape that is spreading more closely outside his office. His petrous eyes penetrate through the nude window easily and a bit languidly, and he pauses to contemplate the immaculate workmanship of the bronze railings that are surrounding his balcony. There's no flaw in the perfect little circle. Nothing broken. Nothing torn.

Just like the day the bars were first erected there.

A tiny curve at the end of Hitsugaya's mouth is the only indication of approval that appears on his face, and then he pulls away, heading back to his desk as though nothing has happened. He seats himself in his chair with aristocratic grace, demonstrating elegance that he has no idea how to appreciate anymore, but which has been carved into his mind and body so deeply and so beyond repair, that he seems to know no way around it anymore. Fingertips tapping along the ends of the arm-rests for a few seconds, he leans forwards with a sigh, metallic turquoise swiping across the wooden surface in front of him before pausing on the one object that seems to evoke some kind of an interest.

The mirror appears… almost surreal, really. It's not very big, with an elliptic main part and a long handle stretching down from the head. Picked up, it weighs a lot more than it looks, and Toushiro never dares to hold it with just one hand. After all… it's quite an antique, isn't it? It deserves at least that much of a respect for surviving this long.

As he lifts the object now, the boy can't help the dull hint of reverence that sparkles in his chest, albeit it is more like a recollection of some old and forbidden emotion rather than a real, _actual_ feeling. Supporting the back of the mirror with his left palm, Hitsugaya holds the thing up till he can see his own reflection, but he doesn't really focus on the image beyond the looking-glass, allowing himself a few moments to admire the fine make of one of his most precious possessions instead. The frame and the handle are very thick, yet brittle and ethereal to the touch, like foam that is ready to indent from the smallest pressure, and the young man inhales slowly at the sight of it, resisting the urge to run his fingertips over every little engraving, each figure, curve, pattern… He doesn't need to touch to know what the dozens of beautiful figures represent, because he's memorized them all: every divine celestial creature, every fantasy character, every impersonated myth, legend, fable… He's seen the faces of the angels, mermaids and spirits so many times by now, that he has them all etched in his mind like letters in the bark of a young tree. Sometimes, when he has nothing better to do and he just muses over what used to be, what he once had and then lost, what he gave up, but also achieved… sometimes, when his mind reaches back for those things, he thinks about the snow-like, pure white body of the mirror and how it seems to hold _magic_ in itself… How this colour, this _symbol_ of innocence has always been so much more than what meets the eye and how few have ever understood… how few will ever understand…

_Meerschaum_. A _meerschaum_ mirror. Such a precious, stunning thing… Except he can only _remember_ how he used to admire its beauty. He can only remember… nothing else…

Toushiro's lashes flutter as he scowls and his lips part as though he wants to say something, to speak up, but no real words come to him and he just cants the mirror back so he can look at it directly. He stares at the person that faces him – a boy static, cold, _white_ - and he wonders whether he has the right to do what he wants to do. But conscience doesn't come to him, doesn't nudge his frozen insides like it would've done _before_, and he moves one hand so that it's hovering just above the smooth, cold glass surface in front of him. He considers giving a warning of some sort, announcing his intentions first, the way etiquette requires of him, but the never-ending exhaustion that his body is enduring every single moment of every single day doesn't spare him its weight and he keeps his taciturn mouth closed.

And then he touches it…

The contact is brief and he frowns when he makes it, his loosely splayed fingertips flattening against the unwelcoming surface momentary before tiny, crackling tendrils of frost begin to gather around the skin. He watches the mosaic spread like a silver infection for a few seconds, and then he pulls his hand back, one thin brow arching curiously.

"You can't keep this up forever, you know," Toushiro points out evenly, tilting his head to the side as he contemplates his reflection. "This silent treatment is getting old. Have you considered what happens if I never come to you again?"

His words are interrupted when he hears steps and his gaze slowly lifts to the door to see who is approaching his office. The tuft of orange hair that emerges uncertainly in his line of vision doesn't surprise him and he carefully puts the mirror back on the desk, pulling his hands in front of himself to intertwine their fingers together as he eyes his visitor expectantly.

"May I come in?" Ichigo asks softly and Toushiro huffs, unimpressed by the polite tone.

"When the door is closed, you just barge in, but when it's opened, you remember to ask, huh?" the boy mutters quietly, killing every last bit of spunk that his employee has gathered. "You're really something, aren't you?"

"Well, you're not helping much…" the carrot-top trails off awkwardly, but walks further inside the room anyways, carrying a stack of paper with himself as though it's an uncomfortable extension of his long, tanned arms. His brows eyes are shifting nervously between the dark blue carpet beneath his feet and his boss' unblinking stare, but instead of turning around and making a run for it once he had deposited the heap of documents on Toushiro's desk, the man just straightens up and clears his throat in preparation to speak. "I wasn't entirely sure if I would find you here today. You disappeared so suddenly on Friday, I tried to find you, but the weather-"

"I told you to go home," the boy cuts him off with slight impatience, referring quite bluntly to the text message. "And I also pointed out rather clearly that while I'm sure a lot of people will mourn this sad truth, I was not, in fact, trying to kill myself." He lifts his chin a little, remembering that he has to now smile to denote that this is a joke, and pulls his lips in the needed shape, hating how hollow and annoying this theater really feels. "Shit happens, as you say. Next time, if you're more careful, I might as well fall off for real, and then you wouldn't have to torture yourself with so many questions any longer."

"What _were_ you trying to do?" Ichigo insists with irritating sensibility, his face twisting in an obstinate, overly-emotional expression. Toushiro finds it exasperating that they are still clinging to this ridiculous topic and makes a mental note to improve his efforts in dry humour, because apparently the irony hasn't been appreciates as he has hoped. "I find you standing bare-footed on the edge of your own balcony, who knows how many feet off the ground, and you expect me to _believe_-" Ichigo's rant is cut short when he turns to gesture towards the balcony in question, his arm hanging loosely in the air for a second before he drops it back down and turns completely towards the windows. "What _the fuck_?"

"Mr. Kurosaki, language, please." Toushiro scolds calmly, much like a mother than is reproaching her son, but despite the remark, he doesn't do much more than observe as his employee stumbles, slack-jawed and beyond bewildered, towards the balcony and the perfect bronze railings that surround it. The carrot-top doesn't really reach his destination, managing only a few steps before turning back to the smaller male with an incredulous expression on his face and what seems to be some kind of a deep indignation paining his body.

"What happened here?"

"I beg your pardon?" Toushiro replies with a tasteful raise of his brows. The other man doesn't seem impressed by the show, however, returning to the desk where his employer is still sitting with a slightly flustered tan face and fists that are clenched loosely by his sides.

"How did you get that fixed on such a short notice?" Ichigo hisses and the boy's lips stretch in a mechanical little smirk when the familiar titillation of amusement teases his chest from the inside.

"Mr. Kurosaki, I sincerely do not fathom your interest in minor details. I understand how such enthusiasm and energy could be considered vital for certain jobs, but I would appreciate if you saved that gusto for completing your work rather than standing menacingly over me as though there is something that I owe you that I haven't given you in time…"

The words have the needed effect and the carrot-top visibly shrinks, his features relaxing as he lets his shoulders slump with a deep sigh. He eyes the boy for a few seconds, brown eyes shifting from side to side as though he's trying to find a weak spot to see through, and then he just shakes his head and looks up at the ceiling.

"I've got no idea why I even care." He points out with bitter regret, turning around on his heel as he says that. Before he has managed to make even a single step though, Toushiro is on his feet, his brows furrowed in a slight frown and lips tightened at the ends with something akin to hesitation.

"Mr. Kurosaki, just one more thing before you go…" the boy enunciates carefully, staring with a vacant, mechanical gaze at the broad back that is now facing him. "I hope I can rely on your discretion, yes?"

He quite truthfully expects an instant confirmation of that question, a nod, an obedient gesture of agreement of some sort… So when instead of doing any of those things, Ichigo just snorts and side steps so he can look back at his employer with a half-offended, half-concerned expression on his face, Toushiro can't help the mild feeling of uncertainty that washes over him at the retort he receives.

"I am in no way obliged to stay silent." The carrot-top claims rather insolently, the side of his mouth twisting up in a tiny, challenging smile that fills the boy up with confusion. Hitsugaya's lips flatten a little in something between a purse and a curious pout and he narrows his eyes as though trying to discern what this is all about.

"Certainly." Toushiro says slowly, mildly, folding his arms in front of his chest as he makes his way around the desk and stands in front of his subordinate. "But it is _important_ that you do."

He is convinced that the emphasis in his words is enough to pass forth the message that he wants to deliver, but it doesn't really seem like it. Letting out a short, fragile laughter, Ichigo shakes his head once again and then lifts a hand to press his thumb and index finger to the bridge of his nose.

"If you want me to keep your secrets, you should at least give me something in return. A little honesty would be nice, for example." The man notices unrelentingly, seeming oddly tired by the conversation as he removes his digits from his face and allows a caustic little smile to graze his lips. "I've got this feeling that you're toying with me, pushing to see how far I will go, what I'll do, how it'll affect me, and I'm not enjoying this game one bit. I'm not sure that you'll get this, because you seem to have some serious problem putting yourself in the place of anybody else, but what you're doing right now is like some kind of a constant mind fuck, with no real reason and no real aim, and although it's probably not the most honourable thing to admit, I've got to say, it's slowly getting to me…" Ichigo tucks his lips between his teeth for a second, shaking his head again as his eyes draw up to some spot above his boss' head, unfocused, entreating almost… "For God's sake, I barely slept this weekend… I kept coming back to me, _this whole_-… This _fear_ that I didn't do enough. That I didn't search for you long enough. That I didn't push myself harder, when I could've and _should've_… Every minute, every second of every day, I sat there, wondering when I'd hear about your death on the news, or when your lifeless face will appear in the morning papers, underneath a blood-freezing headline that I'll _know_ is my fault, and now… Now, after _all_ this, you expect me to just brush everything off, like nothing's ever happened?" he scoffs humourlessly, jerking one shoulder in a shrug. "I'm sorry. It doesn't work this way."

Toushiro has to admit he is surprised, _more_ than unpleasantly surprised by what he's just heard as he lets his arms drop by his sides, eyes slightly widened as though trying to perceive everything that his mind, his soul, his _heart_ wouldn't. A gelid, wayward sensation glissades under his skin, a mix of power and venom that moves and twists in some absurd need to break through, to make itself _known_ to this ignorant person, who has no modesty and spits like a fool in the face of the nature's very laws as though his own beliefs matter. As though his pathetic existence is more than a stain on the face of the earth.

Since _when_? Since when does _anything_ not work the way the Toushiro wants it to? Does this guy have _any_ idea who he's talking to?

No. Of course not.

He hasn't got a clue.

Toushiro's chest swells with a deep inhalation as he tries to keep everything in check, suppressing the dull commotion that comes with the umbrage of being belittled like this, and he nods his head, not sure how to respond just yet. Some ancient traces of his once brisk and effervescent temper coil beneath layers and layers of ice, prompting him to puck back a biting remark, to respond in some way, but the intention clogs his throat instead of bursting free from him and he ends up speechless, apathetic, unmovable. His lips part at the intense, blunt look that his man is giving him, yet the desire to take the challenge, to see where this could lead him, snaps similarly a fragile flower stem and Hitsugaya just lets out a tiny huff instead of an answer. If he had to be completely honest with himself, he would have to admit that it bothers him a little how sincere and truthfully worried Ichigo appears to be… Much like a child that's trying to stop his parent from making a bad choice, from picking the wrong road and ending up with regrets that no one deserves and no one's ever truly earned for themselves. How… touching.

_Touching_…

Touching was the correct word, right? Because sometimes he forgets, sometimes the terms evade him, the way distant facts and useless information often do after years of obsolesce… Matsumoto finds it more than a little scary that this is happening – such lapses, such inability to recall the true definition of the simplest things _terrify_ her and she often ends up reacting in overly impulsive ways when she catches him faltering, searching for words… _He_, of all people, shouldn't be at a loss as to what to say and how to say it, she claims, daunted by his listlessness and lethargic detachment; how can he not _see_, how can he not _understand_, after all these years…

…that some wounds should be left to heal on their own. That certain types of pain must be endured, not suppressed with benumbing salves and dubious ointments.

Sometimes… sometimes suffering is for the best. It makes you who you are. It makes you grow up, change, _mature_…

Toushiro usually tries not to roll his eyes when she preaches him like that, because he recalls that she is who she is and can't help herself. Ichigo is the same, the boy reckons, he can't abstain from trying to '_do the right thing'_, as they call it nowadays. Instead of thinking about his own problems – which he undoubtedly has - and his own position in this company – which is most certainly on the line here – the carrot-top launches chest first, mind second to aid and assist and _care_ for other's well-being…

_Hm, yes, just like-… just like-…_

The idea sends Toushiro in a momentary reverie over someone else, another person that once tried to restrain him from doing something stupid, albeit necessary… And that tickling returns to him, the morbid amusement that the white-haired lad has trouble recognizing at certain occasions. Maybe if he could _feel_, he would find all these far-fetched semblances endearing, the unneeded concern sweet in its own deplorable way, but as it is he can only guess the name of what he's supposed to experience. He recalls it used to be a pleasant emotion once, this 'endearment', something both warm and a little painful, likes a spiced up dish, a strong alcohol beverage, a snip of cinnamon and pepper…

Useless, really. Simply useless.

Although… _Perhaps_…

Biting the side of his lip, Toushiro tries to summon every bit of acting skill that he once possessed. The image of that small, overly-susceptible being, ready to ravish, to tremble, to dance and laugh boisterously, not unlike the seas, the oceans and the earth that spread unbidden outside, and beyond, and within him-… The picture of that creature swims behind his eyes like a piece of a gorgeous, albeit incomprehensible art and he resists the urge to touch his chest, to search for the lost heartbeat again… He's never felt the need to make sure there's no pulse before… not before the appearance of this curious and clumsy employee of his anyways, and although he's sure there's not need to be concerned, he can sense the presence of a dark cloud as it flits across his features, only to dissipate into the nothingness a trice later, vanishing along with the aerial remnants from the past that the boy has spent so much time shuffling into…

He looks up at Ichigo, prompting his eyes to clear up a bit from the uniform mist that usually enshrouds them, and allows his brows to knit very gently, very cautiously, like he's maybe hesitating, wondering whether to 'open' himself up like this. _What a joke… _He allows his pale lips to part, the tip of his small tongue pressing languidly against the end of his mouth for a second, and then he steps closer, _closer_ to his companion, and gazes up similarly to a kid that's begging to be spoiled. He breathes out – cold air, but Ichigo doesn't need to know that – and gathers his arms around his waist loosely, shoulders rising demurely as the crystalline turquoise of his own limpid irises quivers against the sight of the slightly widened brown orbs above him.

Once upon a time this was all he needed to do to attain what he wanted. A tiny smile, a miniscule, sad curve of his mouth, a flash of desperation across those brittle features, and there wasn't a single man in the entire universe who could say 'no' to him. He knows what he is doing now is _nothing_ in comparison to the effervescent, dulcet boy from his past, who possessed no shame and no qualms in utilizing this ineffable ability of his to charm on whoever stood in his way… But even these current efforts Toushiro is putting into this spectacle are bound to have an effect, they _must be _enough. He doesn't have to be who he was one to get his way, does he? He needn't go back to his old self… His _old_ self, disgustingly full of emotion, full of life and affection, and curiosity… That Toushiro who used to whisper 'please' and the world shattered to pieces to grant his wishes, he's gone, unwanted now. _That_ Toushiro, whose laugh rang with the wind and vibrated in the kiss of the snowflakes, ticking the nude tree branches, brushing against the face of the shushing rivers and cuddling against the sprawled body of the earth, he no longer exists. _That_ Toushiro who knew how to cry and how to make the skies weep along with him, bitterly, endlessly, shaken with pain and sorrow… he's just a memory now.

A naïve, forgotten memory…

Hitsugaya swallows and then utters softly, making sure to sound resigned this time, uncertain…

"I'm _asking_ you to do this for me." And the words spill from his lips in a cascade, sweet, _sweet_ sounds that slips from him and caress Ichigo's ears. He can see the carrot-top's face flush a bit, a hot flame flickering behind the employee's usually cashmere gaze, and the man's hands lift up ever so slowly between their bodies, seemingly hesitant as to whether to proceed or not. Soon enough the need to touch, to _feel_, obviously takes over the previous shyness and the taller male grips Toushiro's narrow hips, squeezing them lightly. The boy's lids fall a bit, a dull victorious sensation burning the edges of his lips in attempt to summon a smile, but before he can give in to the unexpected temptation, the carrot-top is pushing him back, increasing the distance that separates them.

"Don't do that again." Ichigo utters quietly, averting his gaze as a tiny frown furrows his brows. There is a pause, but it lasts no more than a broken couple of seconds, and then the young worker turns around mutely and leaves the office, a pair of quiescent jade eyes watching his retreat in a mix of emotionless wonderment and dull interest.

As soon as the orange-haired lad is out of his sight, Hitsugaya lets the usual veil of apathy drape over him and makes his way back to his desk, placing both palms on its end as he gazes down at the mirror that is still lying in the center of the piece of furniture, the white, exotic antique resting there among tons of plain paper and half-used pens.

Then Toushiro bends forward at the waist, lowering his head ever so slowly till his mouth is mere inches away from the one of his reflection, and he whispers softly, almost maliciously against his inexpressive duplicate's pale lips.

"I guess I just found myself someone else to play with."

He watches the clear glass ices over where his breath has touched it and it makes him smirk lop-sidedly, almost contently really, as he slumps back in his chair with another freezing cold sigh.

* * *

><p>"Hey…" she whispers mellifluously in his ear, a set of thin fingers running soothingly down his arm. "Hey, it's okay. You don't have to be nervous."<p>

"I'm not _nervous_."

"Really?" Orihime says, raising an incredulous brow. "You're not nervous?"

Ichigo lets out some indefinite noise as he lifts a hand to adjust his tie, a pained expression twisting his features despite his best intentions.

"Okay. Maybe a little bit," he agrees exhaustedly as he casts his fiancée a small smile. "It's been a rough month."

_A rough and very, very confusing month, indeed…_

"I know, honey, but I'm sure it'll get better soon." She mutters with that trademark optimism that makes people grin against their will whenever she's around, and he find himself victim to that magic as she pats his shoulder with her dainty little palm. "Don't worry so much. It's just a party. No one is going after you tonight, you just need to let it go this once."

She's right, he knows, about everything… They should be having fun, laughing, and relaxing, and enjoying the free food rather than stressing over when and how his boss will end up appearing. Their attendance here is neither compulsory, nor required, they could leave at any time, at any moment if they so decided… To be honest, he's feeling almost guilty for asking his girlfriend to come here with him as his plus one, because other than him and possibly Kyouraku, who else does she know around here? What could possibly give her the pleasant experience he's promised her, or the good mood that such events are meant to leave you with?

He's been telling himself he should just skip all these troubles and spend a nice evening with his fiancée ever since he got the invitation, but other than torturing himself till the very last moment, he's done nothing to denote he's decided not to go to the cocktail party that so many have already declared they would like to attend. This is a big event, he claims as an excuse – the publishing house's birthday – and the whole company is celebrating today… no matter that it's the middle of the week or that tomorrow they still have to go to work after getting up at an ungodly hour. It's a good chance to meet people and make connections, especially since he wants to break through to the newspaper or the magazine sector rather than stay under Hitsugaya's slipper for the rest of his existence, and he'd be damned if he missed a career opportunity because he was lazy. He'd fucking regret it for the rest of his life…

…or so he keeps telling himself for his own sanity's sake…

The enormous, baroque-style hall that his boss has hired especially for the occasion, is jammed to the brim with chatty people, the shuffling of feet and the soft clink of glasses filling up the free molecules of space in a way that makes everything oddly vivacious, heavy with iridescent emotion. The place is appropriately spacious, the golden illumination, the tall windows and the high ceiling stealing away any sense of crowdedness that could come with the high number of people. The suits and the long evening gowns that the guests have been delicately prompted to don for the occasion make everything seem like an image, filched greedily from a modern fairy tale, the atmosphere, the elegance, the soft classic music that's playing at the background, all building up an air of exquisiteness and finesse that scream Toushiro's name with every detail, thread, crumb that build this little fantasy world.

And yet, even when all is so carefully thought over and the smallest things are designed to match the manners and taste of the one person who's organized all this, the young prince that rules over this palace is curiously lacking. The hall is full, the party has been going at a decent speed the last hour or so, and still, no trace of Hitsugaya or his dazzling right-hand…

Distracted momentary by a pair of waiters that are passing gracefully past him, Ichigo reaches to snatch himself and his date a drink from the floating silver trays, the obligatory smile appearing on his face as he hands Orihime a glass of champagne and tries not to appear uncomfortable by the quick peck on the lips that she gives him in return for the gesture. He'd have to lie through his teeth if he said that the girl didn't look positively beautiful tonight. With her long, bright-red dress with bare back and low-neckline, the extravagant, loose bun, in which she's arranged her hair and her warm smile, she's managed to attract more than a few male glances by now, and none of them has been anything even remotely fleeting or innocent. He knows he should feel proud, glad that he has been able to capture the heart of such a gentle, yet kind-hearted creature, but other than restlessness and discomfort, there's nothing else filling up his insides as he awkwardly wraps his arm around her waist and lets her snuggle close into his chest. The glass feels cold and slick in his hold, numbing his fingertips as he balances his drink precautious, and the low temperature that radiates from the champagne almost severs through his skin in comparison to Orihime's warm body, pressed against his own. The contrast is really… really quite painful.

He lifts his gaze from his fiancée's smiling face just in time to see a familiar short figure emerging from the hall's entrance, thin brows knitted together with calm disapproval as he walks inside, followed Matsumoto, whose mouth seems to be moving in a non-stop fashion behind him. The boy doesn't look particularly interested in what she's blabbering about, but the effort to ask her to stop appears to be too grueling, so he just lets her continue, snatching a glass of wine from the nearest tray as he makes his way through the groups of people, who respectfully pull back to allow him to come through.

Toushiro doesn't look like he's put a lot of effort into a more formal attire, the white dress shirt he's now wearing in no way more special than the ones he usually dons for work, the only difference being that the thin sleeves are currently rolled back to his elbows to bare two pristinely white forearms, delicate wrists and slim little fingers. The tie around the boy's neck is knotted loosely, killing any chance for the whole outfit to appear even remotely prim, but the expression on his face is so starchy and so unreadable, that no matter what he's put on, there's no way anyone could relax around the little ice prince. In complete contrast to her superior, Matsumoto is like a bright star, emerging on a lightless night sky. Clad in a long, dark purple dress with a slash up to her mid-thigh, she is more stunning than a model, her dazzling smile and long strawberry blond hair giving her a sort of natural look that few women manage to sustain while looking like _this_.

"Pretty, isn't she?" Orihime whispers playfully in his ear, but the small 'hmm?' that escapes the carrot-top's lips is about all the answer he manages to give her. His eyes are glued on Toushiro now, his idle saunter between the crowds and the thin smiles that he gives upon greeting his colleges, for while the sight is in no way as dramatic as Matumoto's flamboyant appearance, there's something about this exquisite, almost frighteningly fragile air that his boss unleashes around himself, that is simply beyond comparison, beyond the mundane fabric of mortality… Hitsugaya is stunning in a cold, harsh way, that at the same time is so sad, so distanced from everybody around him, that the rough lines fade, the jagged edges peel off, and all that is left for the eyes to see, for the heart to _feel_, is the absolutely ethereal beauty that lies beneath.

He spots Kyouraku making his way towards the boy from the opposite end of the hall, and he's surprised to see the man leading a young lady with him. Then the perfectly arranged bun, the stern rectangle glasses and the classy blue gown she's wearing make something inside Ichigo's head click, and he recalls his friend's endless rants about his gorgeous and overly-serious assistant Nanao Ise: the one girl the older man seems to never manage to win over…

The thought makes the carrot-top chuckle as he finally fits Kyouraku's vague descriptions with the actual person and admits to himself that his gym buddy's compliments simply do the lady no justice. Even from this distance, Ichigo can tell that Nanao does indeed possess a unique kind of appeal. Her beauty is simple and immaculate – the charm of a magnificent ancient goddess, whose allure doesn't strike you instantly, but comes gently and generously if you just allow yourself a moment to spare… She's the perfect date one could take to an occasion such as this one. Elegant, radiant and self-controlled, she's the epitome of perfection in its most pristine and unattainable form – the exact thing that certain hard-boiled womanizers would die to conquer.

…And then Kyouraku and his companion reach Toushiro and something quite odd happens.

At first glance the event isn't so extraordinary – probably just a pretentious gesture of respect that an employee knows to give his boss in order to keep the superior's benevolence - but knowing his friend's character, Ichigo just can't seem to comprehend how what he's seeing now could possibly be real. The usually teasing and laid-back expression melts off Kyouraku's face, replaced by an earnest, darker one, and he bows his head ever so slightly – not in greeting… in admission of Toushiro's higher power. The boy does nothing to acknowledge the recognition, merely pulling the end of his mouth in a wry, paper-thin smile, and then turns to Nanao, something akin to expectation flashing across the frozen features. Without wasting a single second, the woman pinches the sides of her dress and makes an elegant curtsy, eyes lowering with sincere reverence for the much shorter and younger person that is standing before her, and then she is straightening up again, not a single trace of discomfort or reluctance visible on her face.

_What the fuck was **that**?_

"Honey," comes the familiar voice, a hint of bewilderment painting the mood of those words as Orihime leans in the carrot-top's direction. "You're staring."

"Huh?" blinking a couple of times, Ichigo turns to look at his date, mouth struggling to produce a grin despite the fact that he feels honestly disorientated. Orihime obviously notices that fact, because she takes the glass of champagne from his hand and puts it away on the table besides them, lifting her hand to press it against his forehead for a moment.

"Are you feeling alright?"

"I'm perfect, don't worry about me," Ichigo manages awkwardly, clearing his throat when his fiancée removes her knuckles from his skin. "I'm a just a little-… You know."

"I do?" she asks him incredulously, the first signs of the infamous 'worry pout' beginning to wrinkle the end of her lips. Ichigo opens his mouth to say something comforting, but before a single word has managed to leave his lips, another voice cuts through their conversation, sharp and cold as an ice blade.

"You must be Kurosaki's fiancée, is that right? It's really nice meeting you at last." Toushiro's gelid gaze flips absently – quite disinterestedly, really – over Orihime's form and he bares a dutiful line of teeth, looking rather doll-like for a second before he drops the smile to a lazy smirk and allows his irises to shift smoothly back to his employee's face. "_Ichigo_'s told me so much about you."

_What did he just call me?!_

"Mr. Hitsugaya?!" Inoue hiccups and for the first time the carrot-top realizes that he hasn't actually _told_ her who his boss is out of the enormous crowd that is surrounding them. Naturally, she looks shocked, staring down at the incredibly small, limber person before her and wondering – like many have before her – how someone so _young_ could climb all the way to this impossible position and remain taintless. _Unblemished_ by the unholy fingertips of the cruel business world that has bred and then fed on him like a parasite.

"That would be me." The boy nods mercifully, crisp emerald orbs remaining fixed on Ichigo for another moment before he turns back to Orihime. His smile crinkles softly like a shattered crust of frost as he offers his hand to her girl, the deceivingly benign expression on his face holding something distorted and misplaced in its thin outlines. "Pleasure."

Pulling her lips up awkwardly, Inoue shifts to extend her right hand for the handshake, but in a fluid, unexpectedly fast movement, Toushiro has grasped the girl's _left_ palm in his own one, hyaloid blue-and-green eyes leveling with hollow interest the simple engagement ring that adorns her slender fourth finger. Ichigo can feel his fiancée tense beside him, her eyes widening slightly at the unexpectedly cold skin that is currently touching hers, but she doesn't let a sound till the white-haired boy is satisfied.

"That's a beautiful little jewel." Hitsugaya comments finally, letting go of the very much flabbergasted Orihime and nodding his head in ostensible approval. There's no warmth in the flimsy congratulation that leaves his lips afterwards, but Ichigo hardly noticed, stupidly caught up for a moment in the way Toushiro lifts his hand to tug gently on the short strands under his ear. The motion is completely involuntary – possibly a habit that Ichigo hasn't spotted before – but the sight of the thin, frail fingertips, running across equally tender and smooth alabaster skin, is oddly enticing. Like an ephemeral peek of something forbidden and untouchable that the human nature can't help but crave with earth-born greed. "Kyouraku tells me you've been together since high school, is that right?"

Usually, Inoue would immediately beam at one such question, rushing to tell the overused tale of how they met and how their relationship survived all these years, but for some reason the usual excitement does not irradiate the girl's face, making her look rather uneasy and reluctant instead.

"I guess sometimes you're just lucky enough to meet your one and only early in life instead of after many attempts and errors…" she mutters with a half-shrug, to which Toushiro musters another mechanical smile.

"That is indeed an interesting theory," the boy agrees with a hint of condescension, hands gathering calmly behind his back in a manner that makes him look even younger than usual. "And you're telling me than neither of you has ever… Tried a relationship with anyone else?"

Under the pressure of the glass-like, mildly mocking gaze, Ichigo feels somewhat ridiculous, reduced to a mere teenager who is trying to persuade his parents to let him marry his first girlfriend. He can see the cold amusement hidden like invisible silt in the corners of the boy's mouth, the golden light from the hall refracting against the impenetrable shields of those turquoise eyes and transforming into a dark, lusterless glow underneath the surface. Toushiro is playing with them, the carrot-top realizes with a purse of his lips, and what is even worse, the employee has the deep, gnawing sensation that he knows where this is heading.

_Not_ in a good direction.

"What would be the point in seeking something new when we already have enough?" Ichigo asks, trying to sound at least half-convincing – an attempt that merely results in his boss giving him a lazy, displeased scowl.

"I'm not talking to you, I'm addressing the lady. I see your face every day, so if you don't mind…." Toushiro trails off with a tired sigh and blinks very slowly as he once again turns to Orihime. "You were saying?"

"I-…' the girl's voice dies away for a second, squished underneath the power of the teal irises that are now pinning her in place, and then she clears her throat and adds more firmly. "I think he's right, why would any of us want to ruin our happiness for the chance to pursue something else?"

"Happiness?" Toushiro repeats flatly, brows arching up as though he's surprised by the naivety of that word. "Oh, yes, Kurosaki and I had a pretty interesting conversation regarding this… phenomenon… some time ago."

"Did you?"

"Indeed," with calm tilt of his head, Hitsugaya artistically brings his hand from behind his back and balances something in front of himself, the slick, shiny crimson surface of the object making Ichigo arch both brows in surprise. "Tell me one thing though," the set of white, thin fingers slowly turn the perfect red apple around, the nude beauty of the silky ivory skin against the bright peel of the fruit seeming almost divine in their perfection. "How can you know that the apple is your favourite fruit if you've never tasted anything else?"

"What?" Orihime doesn't even manage to look properly offended, the surprise that emerges on her face making Toushiro chuckle as he lowers his hand.

"It gets tiring," he whispers in a tone that could've been compassionate if it had held any emotion at all. He isn't even looking at anyone now, lidded gaze focused on some spot in far distance. "Eating sour or overly sweet apples all the time. And Kurosaki's one with an artistic flair, isn't he?"

"What does that have to do with anything?" Ichigo rasps out rather helplessly, gaze flickering back to the apple that his boss is still holding casually by his side. Where did that thing even _come_ from?

"Well, you know," Toushiro jerks one arm in an absent shrug. "Artists usually need-… Diversity. Excitement. Not some mundane idea of _perfection_ that someone else has planted into their heads... But then again, there're always exception." The boy's eyes flicker back to the orange-haired lad and he forces that well-trained smile back on. "Food for thought: how much time does it take for an apple to rot, hm?"

With that said Toushiro pushes his way past the carrot-top and disappears into the crowd, melting like a snowflake into the vast sea of guests that eagerly await his appearance.

Ichigo can hear his fiancée murmuring something disapproving beside him – some kind of bitter complaint regarding the verbal torture she's just been forced through - but he can't seem to be able to focus on her words. He needs a moment. A minute. _An hour, _if necessary_…_

So, without even bothering to make a proper excuse, the carrot-top mumbles something about needing to go to the bathroom and slinks away from Orihime's range, heading quickly in the opposite direction of where Toushiro has gone. He vaguely registers his girlfriend's indignant squeak from behind his back, but decides to ignore it, focusing instead on meandering his way between the groups of chatting and laughing people.

Once he reaches the men's rooms, he slips into the nearest cubicle and locks himself in, finally daring to look down at his hand and the object that his boss has hurriedly pushed into his hold upon leaving.

"The hell…"

Ichigo swallows as he lifts the peculiar gift to his eye level.

He is holding a rotten apple.

* * *

><p><strong><em>AN: Review._**

**_* Meerschaum is a fragile white-ish material, usually used for making expensive, complex smoking pipes.  
><em>**


	5. Imbalance

**_A/N: It's been so long._**

**_Merry Christmas, kids!  
><em>**

* * *

><p>Heartless<p>

Part 5

Imbalance

_I mean after all the things that we've been through_

_I mean after all the things we got into_

_Unable to accept that her friend has drowned, the way people at the village claim him to be, the girl leaves on a journey to find him. After many excruciating ordeals, she finally discovers the palace of the Snow Queen and enters, finding the boy in the middle of a task that the winter's mistress has given him – to build the word 'eternity' out of countless ice pieces that she's left him with._

He can still feel it in the palm of his hand - the shape, the weight, the texture of the rotten apple – as he stumbles out of the cubicle without the fruit and braces himself against the nearest sink. His fingers are shaking as they cling to the exquisite marble beneath, and he tries to soothe his breathing into a regular consecution of ins and outs, despite the fact that he intuitively feels that the efforts to find normalcy are thrown in vain. His vision is spinning a bit, mockingly inviting him to give in and reject the experience, but although with every fiber of his being he craves nothing more than oblivion and ignorance, he knows he can't go back.

And the unnatural, inexplicable fascination that this discovery ignites inside his senselessly gushing blood, makes him want to retch and run, to flee the distorted reality that he has had no idea he has been living in. He realizes that this decaying apple has been nothing but a sublime invitation, written down and delivered by its own empyreal writer. The message is so painfully, frighteningly clear, that it sets his eyes and mind ablaze, it melts the marrow of his bones and mocks him then for the spineless style of life that he has been enjoying so carelessly the past few years. He can take down this path – he can leap in the rabbit hole if he thinks he's got the guts to follow through the madness – but what awaits him at the other end may or may not alter his perception and sanity forever.

So the question stands: is he truly ready for such a jump? And if he is, what is he willing to give up to challenge the very fabric of reality, to bend everything he's taken for granted before, and either move forth or be left behind on the borderline between one choice and the other?

Ichigo closes his eyes and breathes again, tentatively moving between the messy strings of words that have woven their poisonous webs all across his mind. He feels small and miserable all of a sudden, like he's got absolutely no control over anything in his life anymore – and perhaps, a nasty voice inside his head suggests, you've never really had any. The talcum-coloured face that peers at him from the mirror doesn't help him at all, for as he finally dares to take a full look at his sickeningly pale self, he realizes just how lost and silly he looks in comparison to the slightly restless and confused wanna-be-writer that was entertaining his girlfriend half an hour ago. He knows he needs to get back to that – to the laughter, and celebration, and the loving woman that is surely worried out of her mind that something's happened to him – but if he could choose to do anything whatsoever at this moment, if he could make one selfish decision for the first time since he entered high school, he would've picked to be left alone with his thoughts in some secluded nook far away from here instead of forced back in that enormous beehive that is this party.

Shaking his head as though it can somehow help him get the hooks of desperation out of where they've struck his skin, he bends down again to splash some water on his face. The cold liquid feels nice and refreshing on his petrified features, and once again he steadies his rhythm of breathing, clinging to the calming exercise like a drowning man to a straw. Then, after a period of time that feels much too small for such a huge mental recovery, he straightens up and squares his shoulders, determined to push the questions and doubts out of his system till he's had the chance to at least sleep on them.

And then he leaves the bathroom much like a mouse, slipping out from a hole in the corner of a forgotten room.

The corridor that he finds himself into resembles a street that he needs to cross to get to the wide, spread wings of the door that leads to the celebration hall. He can see the bubbling, swelling mass of people that shifts and sways a couple of meters away from him and he feels his feet grow heavier, their weight almost large enough to indent the wooden floor that he's currently standing on. He swallows. Then breathes. And just as he is about to make his first step forth and towards the gullible, yet safe universe that he's grown so terribly accustomed to, a waft of cold air swishes past his ears and tangles its mockingly tender fingers in the mop of orange strands that adorns his head. The scent of something familiar and quaint grazes his skin, raising hair and wonderment in its wake until, almost without really having a choice in the matter, Ichigo turns his gaze to the right to follow the source of the current.

At the very end of the corridor, far enough from the noisy core of the building, where it can remain as a relatively secluded place even in such overcrowded surroundings, there is a tall glass wall, separating the warmth inside from the wide, majestically designed round balcony outside. The arched door that trembles like an ethereal borderline between this world and the one beyond, is slightly opened now, swaying in a silent invitation that becomes all the more hard to resist when Ichigo spots a moving silhouette behind the crystal divider. Before he can scold himself for being so easy or at least give his consciousness one healthy moment to hesitate, the carrot-top is striding towards the balcony, his eyes wide and searching, straining towards a goal that his rational mind is yet to fathom.

One. Two. Five. Six. Ten meters.

He pulls the door open and a powerful gust of winter wind hits him in the face, making him raise an arm to protect his squinted eyes as specks of white cold bite at his exposed skin.

"The hell, Toushiro!"

The blizzard sings again, winding its spine across the balcony with more cruelty and power than before, but on the crest of the air wave a brief, smooth laughter – strong like an electric vibration through a naked limb – runs and leaps, only to collide with Ichigo's body and make the carrot-top stagger.

"I told you not to call me that," Hitsugaya mutters in his crispy, flat baritone, and he lifts his arms in the air as though he expects the breath of the winter to catch him on its back and lift him off the ground. The fingers of his right hand are holding onto the ends of two slick black loafers, the socks crammed carelessly in their toes while the feet that are supposed to be residing inside the expensive shoes are balancing carelessly on the edge of the cold iron railings.

"Goddammit, I'm not going through this again!" the carrot-top shouts in desperation, one palm partially covering his eyes as the caustic slaps of the wind continue falling on his unprotected skin. He watches his boss peer at him over his slim shoulder, that skinny body not even sparing the weather a single shiver as the cold billows his thin white shirt, strokes his bare arms and kisses his nude, unprotected soles like a slave might adore its master.

"Nobody's making you," Toushiro states, and, surprisingly, his voice sounds loud and clear even over the roar of the blizzard. "I didn't call you here, Kurosaki. You came on your own."

The brash truth burns the carrot-top's throat like gall and he finds himself struggling to swallow as the gelid oxygen slips inside his chest and chews his lungs with frenzied, deranged glee. More cold. More sour words and confusion, and yet he can't find it in himself to hate, to despise, to neglect the person who seems to stand behind all of his recent troubles. For there is something about Toushiro – something hard and perhaps unpleasant to process at first – that draws him in, makes him stare at the boy and try to peek through the shineless surface to whatever secret lies beneath.

And that secret, Ichigo realizes, is the very thing that makes him pity his young boss more than he's ever pitied anyone in his entire life.

"Can we-… Can we finish this once you get off of there?"

"Jesus Christ," the boy drawls in clear tedium, dropping his shoes on the balcony behind him. "Haven't you learned anything yet? I thought I was beginning to be painfully obvious."

Ichigo's mind is a blank, empty canvas as he carefully approaches the railings, daring at last to lower his hand as he gazes with narrowed eyes and chapped lips at the slender back of the person before him. Toushiro seems in no way in discomfort as he continues staring ahead of himself, his fingers splayed gracefully and his eyes dimmed as the air runs over, by and through him, urging him to take just one step more, one foot closer to what is beyond.

It makes the carrot-top's stomach roll in a knot, his heart beating faster as he imagines the gruesome outcomes this could all have lest Hitsugaya loses his balance or – which sounds strangely more likely – does indeed let himself go.

"Toush-"

"Stop," the white, snow-like hair whips around an equally pale face, wisps – dry and soft like silk – scattering across almost baby-soft cheeks and a beautifully etched jawline. "Calling me that." And then his body ripples and Ichigo all but ceases to breathe, watching with wide eyes and tightened chest as Toushiro rises limberly on the balls of his feet and, without so much as a derisive scoff at the other male's behavior, lifts his right foot from the railing.

"_Don't_!"

It happens too quickly and yet too effortlessly for anyone's mind to accept it – like a thick fluid that moves through a thinner one, Toushiro easily spins around, using his left leg as a pivot as he turns to face his employee, hands now stuffed in his pockets and hyaline teal eyes gazing emptily at the carrot-top beneath him.

"I'm not going to die," the boy states softly, not a single wrinkle of emotion resurfacing on the blank, porcelain-like face as he speaks those words. "You should've figured that much by now, or at least, you should've had – if you weren't fighting reality so damn much ever since you met me… Am I right, Kurosaki? Am I right, or am I wrong?" And with that, he slips his palms to his knees and crouches to Ichigo's eye-level, his blank stare piercing through the other one's warmer orbs like needles through flushed skin. "I must say, though… You have a lovely wife, through and through."

For no particular reason, the taller male feels his momentarily frozen blood bubble with an illogical burn of irritation, his breath coming out in a single hot huff as he shakes his head at the statement.

"She's not my wife."

"Well, she's still charming," Toushiro points out quietly, slipping one arm forward and propping his elbow on his mid-thigh so he can rest his cheek in his palm. "But not very bright, is she?"

Ichigo almost can't believe the guy's nerve – they are standing on a friggin' balcony, with Hitsugaya balancing unprotected on the balls of his feet atop the thin iron railings meant to separate the building from the opened space beneath, and they are still discussing Orihime (his fiancée), as though the conversation is taking place in a comfortable and warm piano bar, rather than in a place that seems barely patched to the fabric of this world. The carrot-top tries to find it in himself to protest – the objections coiling like a white cloud in the confines of his head, nudging him to react, to figure out something sensible to say – but at the end the need to preserve some fucked up version of normalcy prevails, and he just slumps his shoulders in defeat.

"If you mean that she doesn't possess your special ability to twist around a conversation, no, she doesn't," he points out in a small, weary voice as he studies the person before him. "You don't marry a person because of their IQ."

Toushiro blinks, weighting the response, and although every fiber in the carrot-top's body is telling him that there should be some form of change on his boss' face (a smile, a frown, a grimace even), there is still nothing there. Just a carefully constructed mask that the wearer seems to have forgotten to stretch in its proper expressions.

"Not if theirs is so unimpressive, no," he agrees mildly, and then decides to trail off in an attempt of unnecessary and unhelpful politeness: "Not that I want to discourage you on your decision or anything…"

Ichigo takes a step forward, his brows knitted to create a tiny, crinkled ball of tension in the middle of his forehead as he narrows his eyes and resists the urge to fold his lips critically. He can feel the cores of a future headache being ignited in a steady consecution in all potentially painful spots across his scalp and the realization of what will await him the following day makes him sigh audibly, now with far more weariness than panic in comparison to before. For a single second he honestly doesn't know what to do, simply standing there at a complete loss as his fingers go stiff from the low temperatures and the rustle of the darkness whispers with deceptive gentleness in his ear. Then suddenly, another urge comes over him, another impulse. So he bravely peers into the glazed-over pools of green and blue, and strains to see beneath, unsurprised when the colours don't yield, and the ice stands between them once more, harsh, beautiful and relentlessly cold.

"Who are you?" Ichigo whispers, but although he isn't entirely sure that he will get an answer, the mechanic way Toushiro regards him at that question makes him feel oddly hollow, robbed of an emotion that he was surely supposed to feel lest his employer had bothered to show some kind of a gesture or reaction of his own.

"We are not talking about me now," the boy declares without a single stammer or a pause in his claim. "We are talking about you and your choices."

"My choices?"

"Yes," he says it so naturally, so silkily, almost as though the mere idea that this could be untrue is a strange and absurd notion in itself. "Many of them."

"What makes you think you have the right to comment on my personal life?"

"Give me a reason why I shouldn't."

"And you'll give me a reason why you should?" Ichigo questions incredulously, arching a brow when Toushiro nods in his empty, flat version of agreement.

"Of course."

The carrot-top huffs, shaking his head ever so slightly as he continues staring at his boss, urging some kind of an expression, some kind of a fervor to twist those perfect hard features.

"You don't know me."

"How naïve," Toushiro points out softly, letting the words fall from him like waterdrops from withered, dying tree leaves. "You should know better than this."

"Really?" the carrot-top mutters, unimpressed. "Presumptuous much?"

"Not at all," Toushiro objects mildly, his white hair dancing across his ever-so-colourless face as he finally forces his mouth to crinkle in a sort of a tiny smirk. "It doesn't take a genius to figure you out, Kurosaki. Your life is your curse. And you might wear it with pride, but it still is a curse – no matter how many pretty ribbons and golden dust you throw on it – for a man's heart knows its place, and it certainly isn't where you've put it." Ichigo can feel his pulse slow down, his carefully schooled beliefs tripping and reeling in the shoelaces of their own uncomfortable footwear as doubts and hesitation rains down on him like pebbles and water from a ripped, injured sky. He watches Hitsugaya's hand drop from where it is supporting his face, long pale forearms draping over his closed knees as he seems to prepare his elaborate answer behind the guarded fort of his impenetrable eyes. And then it begins, and there is nothing Ichigo can do, but swallow every syllable and every scorching truth.

"Your fiancée's kind, sweet, beautiful, indeed like an angel that has fallen from the sky… And yet no matter how perfect she is or how little there is about her that you could ever wish to change, she doesn't excite you. Instead, her plain and prosaic existence bores you to tears. Where is the magic, you think, where is that sparkle, that miracle that drives people to do all these crazy things? Why is it so simple? Why is it so mediocre?" Toushiro's face changes again, the awkward line of his smile stretching condescendingly as he tilts his head to the side and continues watching his employee's reactions. "Oh, Kurosaki, but you're marrying the exact same girl you met in high school – she hasn't changed one bit and she could never be anyone else, and deep inside that fact frightens you. Orihime is the safest, most natural choice for you, but is she the right one? Who do you see when you look at her? A partner? A lover? A road that you are too afraid to swerve from? Does it scare you that you can't voice any answers, that you keep asking yourself all these questions when you get up in the morning or stare at the dark ceiling long after she's fallen asleep on your shoulder?" A low, thorny scoff. "You need someone a little less perfect, someone who can thrill you, surprise you, lead you on and bring out both the best and worst in you. Yes, Orihime agrees with you and accepts you, but she doesn't understand where you're coming from or what you need. You want more from life. You want to make a mistake and enjoy it with all your heart. But your heart is instead caged, your soul is chained, and, ironically, you're the only one who has the key. Let yourself go. Or you'll be miserable forever."

At that instant, as he is standing on the lonely balcony before the oddest, most mysterious person he's ever met, Ichigo can almost feel the seams that hold him together rip open and spill everything he is on the snow-covered floor beneath him: organs, dreams, uncertainties, disappointments… and along with that a throbbing, bleeding soul that tumbles out and falls in his feet with a dull thud. The cardboard face of an emotionless boy is the only thing that stands there and watches him crumble – stone features, colourless lips and a pair of excavated teal eyes that feel more ill and inhuman than ever before as they stare unblinkably at what they've done and patiently wait.

And wait.

And wait.

"What do you want from life, Ichigo?" Toushiro asks quietly, and the wind blows from behind him, ruffling the very tips of his hair without bringing a single trace of flush to his white cheeks. "Money? Fame? _Happiness_?"

Such a simple question with such a simple answer. Ichigo knows that it is simple, for the simplest things are often the hardest to accept. And then he wonders why, _why_ he is letting someone like Hitsugaya dictate the way he feels, alter the way he thinks, just because a whim has driven him to push at the sore spots of the carrot-top's existence. Ichigo is fully aware that he is being ridiculous by letting the smaller male get to him like this, yet after so many years of questioning, so many days and months of ignoring the one realization he's been afraid to reach, the response to what Toushiro's just asked him floats to the front of his mind more clear and certain than ever.

"I want to find out who I am," he says, though his chest contacts at the admission, and his breath comes out short as though he's hollered those words at the top of his lungs rather than let them slip from him in a weak mumble.

"Ah…" Toushiro's lips pull in a lazy smile then, and after a long second he nods in what could be interpreted as approval. "Now, _that_'s an answer."

_Or is it?_

_Because it feel like just another new, complicated question._

Ichigo isn't even sure what he wants to say as he opens his mouth to speak up, but he never gets to find out, because at that moment the gentle creak of a door being pushed open sneaks through the hush of the wind and he turns around in time to find his fiancée standing at the back of the balcony with her thin arms wrapped around her body and her shoulder trembling from the vicious licks of the cold. Her sweet features are twisted in a sort of pained confusion and she looks visibly anxious, a childish sort of helplessness painted across her pretty face like a sheen of gentle sunlight across a blossoming garden.

"Ichigo," she whispers, shaking her head as she struggles against the violent shivers that shake her thin frame. "I don't understand."

There is a hint of betrayal in her frail voice and that very same, nearly non-existent tinge causes the carrot-top's to wince with guilt. He doesn't know how to explain this, doesn't know how to come up with a decent reason as to _why_ she is now finding him on a secluded balcony with the very person who's so violently diminished her back at the party, but even though as usual the apology strains to come, this time its phantom shape meets a new, unfamiliar wall of muteness. And he just stands there. Awkward, speechless and so very out of place, whilst beside him Toushiro remains the very epitome of heartlessness, his lips barely parting in a single chilly sigh as he contemplates the scene.

"You could've told me," Orihime says quietly, and Ichigo's chest tightens with growing fear and anguish. Told her what? Told her _what_, exactly?

_What the hell is she thinking_?

"Inoue…" he begins, though once again he doesn't know what he wants to say other than that he is sorry, that he is just so, _so_ sorry. She cuts him off with no more than a shrug and he feels himself growing small and pathetic as he watches her rub her palms up and down her upper arms in attempts to warm the naked skin there.

"No, it's fine, you don't have to explain," her voice is trembling as her gaze dips to the floor and her lips press together for a moment. Beside Ichigo, his boss merely scoffs, still as strangely quiet as ever as he regards the girl at the other end of the balcony through lidded, apathetic eyes. "You needed your space, you needed time to think. But you should've at least said something," she swallows with difficulty, blinking back the wind from her lashes before directing her gaze back at his sad, regretful face. "You could've warned me, instead of coming here to stand on your own and leaving me in there to wait for you like an idiot."

_Wait, what?_

"On my own?" he barely manages, and it feels like he's spitting paper as the words leave his suddenly lax tongue and drown in a taunting roar of the wind. But although it's the most impulsive, most honest question he's asked this evening, Orihime doesn't hear him, once again staring at the floor as she tries to keep the warmth around her slender body even as the dress gives her little to no chance to fight the blizzard. "What-…What do you mean 'on my own'?"

He catches Toushiro's chuckle from behind him, but this time the sound of the laughter echoes loud and brittle like a cracking ice-crust and the vibrations from it run down the carrot-top's spine to the very bottom of his soul, crawling, slithering, moving similarly to insects and worms that he can't shake off of himself. There is no doubt in his mind that his fiancée doesn't hear anything – she seems just as engrossed in her own trite problems as ever, and for some unknown reason her naivety makes him feel miles and miles away from her all of a sudden… Almost as if the ground between them has gaped open, pushing them wide apart without her ever noticing or caring to see what lies beyond the surface.

What's kept them from being something amazing ever since they've started dating.

Ichigo ventures a glance at his boss and swallows, shaking his head when he doesn't even get a hint of a smirk from the plain, blank face that is staring at his own. Somewhere at the other end of the balcony (perhaps a whole world away from them) Orihime is saying something, and she is uttering it quietly, with confusion and ruefulness that appear so petty and unimportant right now.

"She doesn't see you," it's a realization, and a clear one for that matter, hauled from the very bottom of his denial-soaked heart and hanged to dry on an invisible string next to them.

"She doesn't need to see me," Toushiro states unabashed, accompanying his statement with one of those slow, idle gestures of his hand that make him look like he's got all the time in the world.

And perhaps he does.

Perhaps he _fucking_ does, Ichigo realizes, suddenly overwhelmed by a strange, abnormal sense of tranquility and defeat. He's been a fool to ever assume that he and Toushiro belong to the same constricted universe, follow the same trivial rules or need the same shallow things. And he's probably a fool still, for he's not even close to understanding it all, and he doesn't think his boss really wants him to. Not today, at least. Not tonight.

"And I do?"

"Yes, you do." For a single instant the skin of Toushiro's cheekbones flashes under a strange angle, catching the light from the windows in such a way that the pale flesh looks almost translucent, adorned beneath its fragile surface by a bizarre, silvery frost-like pattern that gleams cold and perfect, only to fade away again. Ichigo resists the urge to blink. "But perhaps you need more time to let it sink in."

"What are you?" Ichigo forces out through his teeth, watching as Hitsugaya gracefully rises on his feet again and stares down at the carrot-top with something desolate and strange in his irises that – if regarded carefully - could be interpreted as wonderment.

"I'm your employer," Toushiro points out as though that answers all possible questions and gives the most thorough explanation there is to offer. "And you should probably take your wife home."

Five minutes later Ichigo has left the balcony and the party behind and is getting in his car, his lips mechanically producing the soothing words that his fiancée needs while he buckles his seatbelt and for a hundredth time tries to make sense of what has happened to him tonight.

* * *

><p>"What do you think you're doing?" there is no anger or malice in the voice as it pours from the dark corner of the balcony and caresses Toushiro's ear, but the boy finds himself annoyed by the soft, slightly disappointed tone nonetheless, his arms lifting to fold in front of his chest as he arches a single brow at the source of the enquiry.<p>

"You have no right to question me, or spy on me for that matter," he points out purely for his interlocutor's information as a pair of quiet feet stroll slowly towards the center of the platform and take the place that Ichigo has been occupying ten minutes ago.

"Don't play dumb. You knew I was there."

"Then _you_ know what _I'm_ doing," Hitsugaya retorts without skipping a beat, the corner of his lips giving up the smallest of quivers. "Everybody has the right to entertain themselves when the chance arises. Don't be a joy-killer – it doesn't suit you at all."

Kyouraku doesn't look particularly impressed by the liberal statement, his usually amused, slightly lazy face now pulled in an expression of wistful reproach that does absolutely nothing to stir an emotion in Toushiro's hollow insides. They stare at each other for a few moments longer, and then the taller male just sighs and shakes his head in silent defeat, perhaps knowing too well that there is little he can do to change the situation.

"I'm not going to ask if you realize the extents of the damage you're causing, because you're not," Kyouraku says, picking his words carefully as he takes just another step closer to the smaller male. Toushiro's gaze falls with a displeased huff at the thin ropes of steam that float from the rapidly evaporating snow around the other one's feet and he feels an unpleasant chill run down his spine. _Such unnecessary display._ "But I'll ask you to think about this from a rational point of view. This is a good man that you are messing with, a man who wanted nothing but a nice job and a loving family, and I trusted you to see his potential and give him at least the former of those two. Instead, you are acting on a whim and breaching a line we were never meant to cross."

"He doesn't know what he wants," Toushiro argues smoothly, feeling the snow and ice crinkle impatiently between his fingers as the radius of dry ground idly widens around where Kyouraku is standing. "And I'm bored, I need something to do."

"You are bored because your life is meaningless," the taller man states, his voice a bit sharper than usual, trying to touch something beneath the boy's skin that has been abandoned and frozen for many, many decades. "You are bored because you don't know how to feel pain or happiness anymore. You're bored, because your chest is numb, empty and infected by the choice you've made."

"I'm bored because I'm bored," the boy objects with a jerk of his right shoulder, his face calm and colourless like a wrinkle-less sheet of paper. "Don't overthink it."

"This isn't even a game like a proper game. You can't experience the joy from it, you can only delude yourself and pretend you are," Kyouraku continues, each word a well-aimed arrow that is shot with painful precision, but which fails to hurt anything in its wake. "Go back to your mirror and entertain yourself with it. You owe me at least the courtesy of leaving Kurosaki Ichigo alone."

The statements don't affect Toushiro the way they should – in fact, they don't affect him at all – but his mind is yet to wither and his sense of pride is just as strong as ever, and so he doesn't fail to see the disrespect where it sizzles hotly in the corner of the other one's mouth. The mauve lips of the winter lay a tempting, voracious little kiss behind the boy's ear and he feels his own cold power swell and swell behind the confines of his once quite inconsistent and wild temper. He can see Kyouraku's frown falter for a moment, the determination dissipating just enough to show a hint of unneeded concern for the white-haired lad, but then the façade hardens again and Toushiro pulls his lips in a bad caricature of a smile.

"What was that?" his voice is quiet, dangerous and it reeks of death that even Kyouraku can feel crawling up his legs with its clammy, sticky paws. "I'm not quite sure I got this right. Are you _ordering_ me?"

Kyouraku's chest swells for a moment with the growing need to say something, but then then his shield breaks and a violent shiver shakes his body as Toushiro's coldness overpowers his heat. A ball of warm steam bubbles from the man's breath like a single source of life in the near surroundings, albeit no passionate arguments follow the little cloud, and its evanescent existence quickly melts into the wind. A rare clash like this one can't even be called a proper battle of wills – they both know the taller man doesn't stand a chance. They both know that Toushiro doesn't care about anyone other than himself.

"I'm merely asking you to reconsider," the man declares, still firm, still standing tall despite the invisible, yet suffocating fist that tightens around him. "And if you don't, if you can't even do that much, then you really _have_ become a mere hollow echo of what you once were."

_A mere echo, you say? _Hitsugaya scoffs quietly as the snowless space around Kyouraku's feet begins to crinkle and perfect, stunningly exquisite laces of frost swiftly creep over it. His power. His beautiful, beautiful power, so absolutely fey and devoid of any sprinkle of vitality.

_Your concern makes me want to vomit…_

"You. Are. _Forgetting_ your place," the boy's voice booms louder and harsher than before, slicing through the air like a blade as the wind roars in exhilaration behind him. "I might look young, but I sure as hell aren't and you should all do well to remember that when you come to me with your petty lectures."

Fools.

_You must not forget who is in charge._

_You must not forget whom you serve!_

Another screech of the blizzard, another strangling reminder… Then Kyouraku's face contorts in a grimace and he nods his head, the heated revolt still clear in his eyes, though its flames are more subdued now, more tame.

"I understand."

"Good," Toushiro approves, and then remembers to smile, because a smile is surely what is needed at this moment. His grip around the taller male hastily retrieves and he allows himself to relax, a throb of dull delight drumming somewhere in the pit of his stomach. He gives his interlocutor one more glance and closes his eyes, his arms once again lifting up as though he's expecting the wind to take him for a flight. "Good…"

And then he lets himself go.

Before him, Kyouraku Shunsui watches, unimpressed, as his boss' body falls backwards, disappearing into the abyss of the streets beneath. There is no sound, no scream, no thuds. When the man finally approaches the railings and peers down at the road beneath, a gust of snowflakes is the only thing that meets his eyes.

Toushiro has left.

* * *

><p><em><strong>AN: I'm so completely out of shape with this story. Bout time it got updated, though. Reviews, please.**_


	6. Freakish

_**A/N: I don't know how many people are following this story still. I've been approaching fanfiction a lot more leisurely recently. I'm trying to do something else with my writing if possible, which is one of the reasons that I want to say I'll be pulling down 'Dearest'. I'm guessing most people who read this won't care since they are most likely IchiHitsu fans, but I'm saying anyways, and I'll be announcing that in 'Headstrong Possession' before I pull "Dearest" down. I received a review today asking me not to do this, but although I've been so very touched by the person's words, I want to say - to you, if you are reading this - I have not stopped writing the story. I just want to see if I can turn it into an original, independent piece rather than a fanficion that very few will ever appreciate. :) Thank you.**_

* * *

><p>Heartless<p>

Part 6

Freakish

…_And now you wanna get me back and you gon' show me  
>So you walk around like you don't know me<em>_…_

_Having finally found him, the girl runs to him and embraces him, crying hot, heavy tears that fall upon his frozen body and awaken it, destroying the splinter of glass in his eye. The Queen's spell breaks and suddenly all of the boy's feelings and memories come back to him, bringing him to the realization of what has happened. As he, too, weeps in joy, the girl kisses him, filling his frozen body with warmth and love._

The engine grunts again, then chokes on its own breath and dies completely, leaving Ichigo to curse at the uncooperative car and punch the panel in frustration. He resists the urge to smash his head against the steering wheel and simply leans his brow against it, closing his eyes for a few deserved seconds of peace. He can feel his breath coming out in harsh white clouds against his bare wrists and it makes him all the more aware of the cold that seems to have seized him in its unrelenting grip, its infinite icy tendrils and tongues slithering up his feet and ankles deep into the folds of the thick winter clothes. This whole week it hasn't stopped snowing for a single goddamn day and although there isn't much wind and the weather is more or less calm and generous, the problem with the low temperatures still remains. He has been trying to start the car for nearly half an hour now, resorting to all basic automobile knowledge he could recall, but none of it has worked out for him thus far. His old, reliable vehicle has completely abandoned him and with it, his chances of reaching his workplace on time.

Which in no universe can be a good thing.

_Oh, God…_

Letting out one last sigh of despair, Ichigo kicks the door open and slowly climbs out of the car. His boots sink in two feet of fresh, crispy snow straight away and he groans, shaking his leg to clear off the substance before it has managed to melt and soak him. Locking up the car – although with the way it has frozen up he can't imagine anyone succeeding in stealing it – he makes his way back to the sidewalk and fishes in his pockets for his phone, all the while grumbling morosely to himself about shitty luck and resident evil. He has never been late for work before and he has no clue how his boss is going to react to it. A part of him knows he's ahead with this week's tasks, but at the same time he has a feeling Hitsugaya won't care in the slightest about his excuses. Punctuality is probably on the very top of that boy's list of priorities, right next to world domination and daily execution of puppies.

Unlocking the screen with his half-numb fingers, Ichigo manages to somehow tap the taxi company's number in his phone and has just pressed the device to his ear, when a slick black Peugeot rounds the corner and slides into his street, its long shiny body in almost painful contrast to the clear white surroundings. The carrot-top watches the machine distractedly as the familiar waiting melody is played from the other end of the line and straight into his aching brain, and is just opening his mouth to respond to the dispatcher's greeting, when the dark vehicle slows down to a stop right in front of him.

"Hello? Yes, good morning. I would like a taxi, please…" the request crumbles on his tongue as his face scrunches up in suspicion at the sight of the purring car in front of him. He looks around, checking if there is anyone else in the near vicinity that might be of interest to the driver, and when he realizes he's all alone, he feels the hairs on the back of his neck bristle with worry. He swallows thickly and nearly takes a step back, half expecting a bunch of villains to jump out of the Peugeot and drag him against his will in the back seat, but nothing of the sort happens. Instead, the window from the passenger's seat slowly rolls down halfway, just enough to expose Kyouraku's grinning face and a pair of sunglasses that the guy clearly hasn't realized are way out of the season.

"Need a ride?" the man asks jovially and Ichigo's eyebrows nearly shoot up from his face and into the sky. Quickly hanging up on the dispatcher, he awkwardly makes his way through the snow to the car and leans into the window.

"What are you doing here?" he hisses, completely shocked. "You don't live anywhere nearby."

He gets a laugh from his friend and the man jerks his thumb over his shoulder, pointing at the back seat.

"Get inside. We'll talk on the way."

Half-grateful, half-suspicious, Ichigo pulls away from the front door and tries the back one instead, stumping his feet before he clumsily slides into the seat. A bubble of warm air envelops him instantly and he hurriedly closes the door behind himself, shuddering and moaning contently as he closes his eyes and allows himself to enjoy the luxury of thawing down in a well-conditioned vehicle.

His happiness, however, is tragically short-lived.

"Good morning."

Ichigo nearly jumps through the roof, his eyes popping wide open with surprise at the familiar voice that meets his ear. Turning very slowly to his left, he all but sputters in shock as his eyes fall on the person sitting against the opposite window with one leg crossed over the other and his hands folded neatly in his lap.

"Mr. Hitsugaya?"

"Oh. Very nice. You remember my name." The response is dry and it seems to crunch as it falls from Toushiro's stiff, unrelenting lips, but Ichigo fails to feel the usual healthy sting that tends to follow his boss' responses. Rather, a mixture of incredulity and curiosity swiftly comes over his benumbed body and he adjusts himself in his seat, looking for a proper stance that would allow him to see and interact with the other passenger in the car without looking stupid.

"You'll have to excuse me, I just expected… I thought you'd already be at the publishing house," Ichigo points out sincerely, blinking a few times before he stretches his mouth in a grin. "Does that mean I'm not late?"

Toushiro scoffs at the question, his almost weary gaze slipping towards the window with a sort of disdainful impatience and Ichigo watches him tug on the fingers of his gloves, pulling them up and down his fingers as though he isn't quite sure if he wants to take them off or leave them on.

"Don't be ridiculous."

"Comfy back there?" Kyouraku butts in from the front seat and, without really waiting for a reply, presses down on the gas. The car lurches forward with a beautiful, feline roar, and Ichigo's gaze snaps back to the front, now full of apprehension. "This is going to be so much fun!"

Ichigo opens his mouth to say something, but all that comes out is a shocked yelp when the car lurches again and abruptly accelerates to a frightening speed. Swallowing audibly and telling himself not to freak out, the carrot-top feels himself shrink in the seat, half trying not to look at the snow-covered road, half-hoping that by becoming smaller his life would be spared lest there really is an accident.

"How come you decided to swing by to pick me up?" Ichigo asks carefully, consciously trying to deflect any thoughts about the madly skirting landscapes outside his window. "I didn't think it was on your way."

"Oh," Kyouraku said, unpinning his gaze from the road to glance back to the seats behind him, much to Ichigo's horror. "Hitsugaya-kun said your car won't be working due to the cold."

Ichigo's head snaps to his boss, brows scrunched up in shock and confusion, but try as he might, he can't catch Toushiro's gaze, which is currently all but drilling a hole in the back of the driver's neck. Perhaps sensing the white-haired boy's tension, Kyouraku does another glance over his shoulder, this time sparing himself a second to grin and shrug before redirecting his shaded eyes to the road so he can make a wild left turn on the nearest crossing. Curiously enough, not a single horn seems to go off, regardless of the very much obvious careless driving and the fact that the car is boldly surpassing the speed limit.

"What?" Kyouraku chirps, pumping the acceleration pedal like a child might treat the one of a pink push bike. "He asked."

And that, clearly, is supposed to cut it.

"I didn't-" Ichigo begins, but then his mind fills up with fog at the next crazy turn and he groans when his head nearly slams against the side window in response to the stunt. He ponders for a second how come they haven't yet stumbled upon any serious traffic jams in such hour, but his inner turmoil is harshly disturbed at the next roundabout where he all but falls across Toushiro's lap, only managing to save some dignity by clutching at the back of the front seat with his half-frozen fingers. Recalling for the first time the possibility to buckle himself up, the carrot-top scrambles to do just that, all the while still desperately sifting through his tangled thoughts for the right question to ask. He can already feel his boss' eyes on him, piercing so deeply he wouldn't be surprised if he spat out blood the next minute, but at the end all that seems to formulate properly on his tongue is: "I didn't know Kyouraku was the one driving you around."

He looks up and he is correct – Toushiro is indeed staring at him, and judging by the subtle hint of wonderment in the curve of the smaller male's mouth, he clearly hasn't been expecting this kind of response from his employee. His long, thick lashes flutter as though the boy is about to blink, but regardless he doesn't, merely relaxing his right leg back down from where it has been crossed over the left, and smoothing his trousers with slow, frugal movements of his hands.

"I don't drive," he utters at last, his words clearly shaped, the sounds immaculate to the last syllable. It's like he is spitting out a neatly typed up version of his answer straight in the open and handing it down for Ichigo to sign. "Kyouraku is so kind to do it for me."

"Well…" lost for a moment as to what to say, the carrot-top rubs his thumb across the edge of the safety belt and after a bit of bafflement goes for lame small talk. "You should get a license, it's pretty practical."

Toushiro's eyes darken and for a moment Ichigo almost thinks he's going to get a proper, genuinely annoyed reaction out of his boss, but all he receives at the end is a weary sigh and a look that reminds of an owner that's just found out his dog has made a mess in the kitchen.

"I didn't say I _can't_ drive," Hitsugaya states very slowly, as though addressing a particularly unintelligent individual. "I said that I don't."

"Why?" Ichigo blurts before he can think better of it, and then he nearly slaps himself for his stupidity. Of course someone like Toushiro wouldn't bother with things such as driving, not when he is likely wallowing in banknotes before bedtime and using what remained to make covers for his books to prevent outward damage. The only real question in this situation isn't why Toushiro doesn't drive; it's why _Kyouraku_ is the one driving him rather than the much more acceptable choice of a professional chauffeur who would be at his beck and call 24/7.

Ichigo is definitely missing something, and the feeling is starting to become something of a daily treat.

"The car skids a lot," Shunsui supplies suddenly from his place behind the wheel, his sunglasses shining in the rearview mirror as he drums his fingertips in rhythm of a tune only he can hear. "It can get dangerous for other people, the way he does it."

"Skids?" Ichigo reiterates dumbly, noticing immediately the displeased shift of Toushiro's body next to his and the distinctive shadow of a frown that digs between the employer's thin white brows.

"Yes, when he's not paying attention, the road gets kindda slippery," Kyouraku explains jollily, his teeth flashing in glee as in the reflection of the windshield. "Citizens can get hurt. It's definitely horrible."

Ichigo's jaw goes a bit slack. Kyouraku's elaboration sounds totally unserious and he's all but ready to laugh it off, but then he sees the look on his boss' face and the merry sound dies in his throat, nearly choking him. Toushiro's face has grown smooth and cold like porcelain, and while it is not much different from his usual expression, his eyes have hardened like marble, oozing threat in long, steady waves that visibly make the driver's smile wither.

"Are you trying to provoke me?" Hitsugaya inquires flatly and this time his tone is not only slightly threatening, it holds a hint of blood-freezing amusement. Kyouraku's usually relaxed and cheerful expression seems to tighten a little around the edges, a sort of detained strain brewing under the thin surface of his tanned skin.

"Don't get paranoid," Kyouraku offers at last and before Ichigo can figure out a way to ask for a clarification on what this is all about, the car twists around and comes to a halt right in front of Toushiro's publishing house. "Have a nice day, dear. Eat all of your lunch and try not to fire anyone."

Toushiro just rolls his eyes at the mock saccharine words and kicks the door open, getting out of the car long before Ichigo has managed to unbuckle his belt and follow suit. Cursing under his breath at his own clumsiness, the carrot-top thanks Kyouraku in a hurry and stumbles out of the Peugeot, leaving his friend to drive off to his own job while he jogs after his boss in hopes to walk through the company's door right beside the man who owns it instead of with a five minute delay.

"You are trying too hard," Toushiro states evenly when Ichigo catches up with him just in time to hold the door open. "It's not going to get you anywhere, you know, acting like this."

"Maybe I'm just humouring myself," the taller male suggests with a small smile as he waits for his boss to walk through before him. "You did just save me from a potential white death out there in the open, didn't you?"

"And it is the last time I'm doing you a favor."

"You mean the first?"

"I mean the last."

"Fair enough," Ichigo drops the door close behind them and walks with Toushiro past the reception down the strict, grey carpet that leads to the elevator, all the while suppressing a tiny smirk as he watches his companion's rigid back and perfectly measured steps. He can tell his boss is expecting to be questioned – to be asked, now that they are out of the car, what the hell has just happened – but the truth is, the carrot-top has no intention to make any inquiries or demand any explanations whatsoever. He's reached the point where he's ready to accept every single strange and mysterious detail surrounding one Toushiro Hitsugaya, and if it means he's going to have to swallow his own doubts and concerns, he's ready to do just that. There is no point in him torturing himself by trying to investigate an un-investigatable situation, especially considering Toushiro's penchant to give unclear and misleading answers to everything he's been asked. After that night at the party, he's realized there is much more to the world around him than he is ever going to understand or fully accept, there are powers out there, too unfathomable and clandestine for anyone to fully comprehend, and even if every cell in his being burns, twists, aches with the need to _know_, he is not going to chase air any longer. All the trump-cards are in Hitsugaya's hands. Any answers there might be, any questions Ichigo could ever come up with, they are not his to shove in his boss' face, they _belong_ to Toushiro's realm.

A realm which Ichigo has breached without ever asking or hoping to do.

The elevator clinks when it reaches their floor and as the doors roll open to reveal the usually peaceful lobby and hallway, a cloud of whispers and giggling voices infiltrates the cabin where Ichigo is still standing beside his superior. For one split second the carrot-top is too surprised to move, just staring in shock at the enormous crowd of people gathered in the foyer, and then he tears from his stupor at the sight of his boss calmly walking out to meet the buzzing masses of suits-clad employees that seem to await him.

"Someone care to explain to me what is happening in here?" Toushiro asks smoothly, his eyes travelling around the place to meet the faces of his gradually quieting subordinates. "Did someone organize a lousy fire drill or something?"

If it were a normal person asking, someone might've actually laughed. As it was, spoken in Toushiro's robotic, blood-curdling deadpan, nobody dared to venture anything even remotely close to a smile. Pushing his own uncertainty aside, Ichigo carefully steps behind his employer, wondering for a minute if he should hurry to join his colleagues in their half-circle around the elevator or just stand where he is and hope things get cleared out as quickly as possible. Before he has managed to make up his mind about his next actions, he spots Matsumoto elbowing her way to the front of the crowd, her perfect strawberry blond hair spilling freely over her shoulders as she stands before Hitsugaya and stretches her lips in a broad, maybe a little bit too broad, grin.

"The guys from channel three came for the interview," she announces, stating it as though it's a concluded and expected fact that her boss should be perfectly aware of. Instead of a gasp of realization, a nod or any other humane reaction, she receives a very much blank stare.

"Interview?" Toushiro repeats very slowly, one brow furrowing incredulously towards the middle of his forehead as he gently pulls his gloves off to reveal white slender fingers. "What interview?"

Matsumoto's smile fades at that question and she gathers her hands in front of her, a hint of distress making itself known on her face as she takes a step closer to her boss and clears her throat meaningfully. From where he is standing, Ichigo is the only one who can see all of her face, and a part of him wonders if he should swiftly move away when she leans very closely to Toushiro's ear and whispers:

"I know you said no interviews, but these men just came in anyways, and they had a good point. You can't keep the media away forever, it's not normal. People start wondering if you are hiding something," she bites her lower lip, her lashes slightly lowered and irises shifting from side to side as though she's searching for words, and then she tilts her head towards her superior's ear and adds, very softly. "Just give them what they want. They'll be out of your hair, and you'll have a valid reason to refuse any other publicity the next year or so."

Toushiro is completely still for a while, seemingly mulling over his right hand's suggestion, while his hands continue to toy with the gloves he is yet to stuff in his pockets. Finally he nods his head in what seems to be a rather reluctant agreement and Matsumoto steps aside with a relieved smile, her shoulders visibly relaxing now that she has avoided what could've turned into a natural calamity. As she moves out of the way, a group of two unfamiliar people is revealed from behind her back, one of which – tall, slim and loudly chewing on a piece of neon green gum - clearly being the cameraman, accompanied by a middle-aged guy in a suit whose face Ichigo vaguely remembers having seen on TV.

"Good morning, then," Hitsugaya greets evenly, eyeing the two intruders as though he's gauging the quality of a pair of socks that have the note 'on sale' stuck to them with cello tape. "How may I help you?"

At the sight of the boy, the man with the gum leisurely adjusts the bulky black camera on his shoulder, a sort of sneer slowly stretching across his lips as he eyes the young, skinny individual in front of him with a great deal of pessimism. The person beside him seems less surprised by Hitsugaya's appearance, only a vague shadow of wonderment and humour touching his eyes, but he does seem a bit amused as he toys with the microphone in his hand before giving his colleague a nudge.

"We need two of your employees for the interview," the cameraman remembers to say, his perfect white teeth still grinding the gum unperturbedly. "That's why we've got them all in the lobby, outside their offices. We've already explained the situation, it's just our brave volunteers that we really need."

Toushiro blinks languidly, his movements almost drowsy as he carefully unwraps the smooth cotton scarf from around his neck and unfastens his waist coat to hang it over his arm. His eyes are on the people in front of him the whole time, calculative, measuring, perhaps even a little guarded despite the slick wall of cold reticence that he's built around himself with such care.

"If that is the case, why haven't you picked up your chosen two and spared me this whole circus?"

The cameraman and the journalist in the suit exchange a glance and then the former turns back to Toushiro, a tiny, audacious simper twisting his lips as he once again regards the younger, smaller male in front of him.

"Well, you see, Mr. Hitsugaya," he enunciates, very, very slowly and very, very nastily. "Despite our best efforts, so far nobody has agreed to do this. Nobody except your beautiful wing-lady, that is, and we don't really want anyone with a high position in our project. We find someone like that to be a bit subjective when asked questions and what is real journalism if not genuine and unforged?"

_Genuine and unforged? _Ichigo doesn't completely realize he's moved till he finds himself standing right next to Matsumoto, watching the scene from aside while still very much bound in his thick winter attire. A part of him has a bad feeling about this whole thing, his gut tight behind the belly button as though he's expecting some unpleasant and catastrophic turn of events. He knows he's being ridiculous – after all, this can't be the first time this company has had to deal with the media and its venomous spawn – but he doesn't enjoy watching Toushiro being subjected to such half-concealed taunting stares, even if nobody else in the room seems to care about it.

"I'm sorry," Toushiro utters in deceptively quiet voice. "I'm not quite sure what you're telling me, Mr…?"

"Smith," the journalist with the microphone butts in arrogantly, clearly oblivious to the exasperation that flashes dully across Toushiro's face. "His name is Michael Smith. And I'm Steve Catcher, the host of this show. I believe we called about two weeks back to arrange this meeting."

"I do know who you are, Mr. Catcher," Toushiro replies gelidly, all but rolling his eyes at the pompous introduction. "You weren't the one I was addressing, however, so please desist from any further interruptions, if you may," ignoring the way the journalist's neck visibly colours at the outright scolding, the white-haired youth turns back to the cameraman, his glass-like eyes fixed, scathing and merciless, on the tall man's face and on the gum that continues to wag from one side of his mouth to the other. "You didn't answer my question, Mr. Smith. Care to grace me with an explanation now that all necessary greetings have been carried out?"

The guy pops a bubble and grins, his expression a little hungry, a little too pleased to match the intent of his visit. Adjusting the camera he's carrying on his shoulder and shifting his weight to his left leg, he lifts his free hand and makes a brisk circle around with his index finger, indicating the room and the people within it with one careless, cocky gesture.

"I think it ought to be pretty obvious what I mean, _sir_," he states, half laughing despite Toushiro's chilly gaze. "People are scared shitless to come forward, because, _well_, they don't want to suffer the consequences of your wrath in case they say something they shouldn't be saying in the interview."

"That's bullshit," Hitsugaya bites back, not even missing a beat. "Just take two people, find an empty office, and get this over and done with."

Smith's chuckle reminds of the eerie, mirthless laughter of a hyena and he shakes his head at the smaller male, oddly amused despite the lack of humour on Toushiro's face. There is a hint of condescension in the way he looks at the white-haired boy, a sort of brassiness and insolence that Ichigo can tell his boss is finding disgusting… but although he's clearly unhappy with the two guests, Hitsugaya says nothing, simply waiting for the show to be over as the cameraman steps forward and slowly turns around in a circle.

"You heard the man," he shouts out, sniggering a little before he carries on. "Who would like to be on TV? C'mon. Don't be shy, people. We need _two_."

The room is deadly silent, safe for the clank of Smith's boots across the polished grey floor and Ichigo's gaze slowly slips to Toushiro, watching the employer's face as he waits, along with Matsumoto and the rest of the crowd, for somebody to step forward. It seems like the whole room has frozen up, not a single molecule of air changing its position as each and every curious face lowers down or turns away, avoiding the unwanted attention, refusing to be singled out from the bunch.

"Anyone," Smith urges again, the smirk on his face completely unhidden now as he glances at his colleague and wriggles his brows as though the two of them are sharing some kind of a private joke. "Anyone. At. _All_."

The lobby smells like fear and apprehension, and it's a strong, suffocating reek, overwhelming like a poisonous gas that nearly clogs Ichigo's breathing passages and makes him cough. He can see Toushiro's initial confidence waver a little as the clock on wall beside them continues to announce the hollowly flying seconds, and very vague signs of puzzlement and agitation start to emerge on the boy's features. His lips part a little and he turns his head from one side of the other, guiding his eyes across the crowd in search for somebody who might've been neglected, anyone who would like to talk on the interview and answer questions about the company's purpose, ideas and organization instead of spending the morning in their office, filling blanks. Toushiro's brows knit together and he closes his eyes for a second, clearly not understanding what is happening, but when he looks up again, his bewilderment is even more powerful than before. It's the first time that Ichigo has seen his boss looking so lost, so young and confused, despite the thick layers of ice and stone that he has erected around and within himself. His gaze is just slightly wider than usual, expectant and dismayed, like the one of a child who is struggling to understand something incomprehensible and elaborate that only an adult is meant to know, and then he lets a small sound, like a laughter, or a huff, or something-

And at that moment it downs on Ichigo and his heart drops in his stomach like a cold, hard rock.

_Oh, God, he doesn't know these people are afraid of him._

_He doesn't know what he's done wrong._

It's a mistake so ignorant, so naïve and childish in its essence, that Ichigo can't help the way it makes his insides ache as he observes his employer's face, his unnaturally covert body language and stiff, callous features, all of which undeniably confirm his suspicion. Besides him, Matsumoto is lifting a hand to press against her mouth, her eyes wide, her whole frame rigid with tension and concern that she can't find a way to express without embarrassing herself and her boss altogether. She doesn't turn to him, but Ichigo can sense her anxiety and frustration, and it makes him realize for the first time how much this woman cares for her superior. How much she seems to relate to him – even now, when he is trying to find out the answer to the easiest question in the world, and figure out what to do, how to get out of this situation without making a mockery of himself. Around them, the time seems to be trickling by too quickly, and Toushiro remains just as speechless, just as unable to assimilate what is going _on_. And although Ichigo has never seen the boy in a state of weakness or bemusement, and he knows he should be gloating, enjoying the sight with all that he is, he can't seem to bring himself to feel anything other than pity. And sadness.

And maybe, as strange as it is, a little bit of tenderness even.

Because for the very first time ever, it becomes clear to Ichigo just how infinitely and endlessly lonely Toushiro must be.

Not to know. Not to be _able_ to understand that he's being abandoned by his subordinates for a reason.

"I'll do it." His voice declares it long before his mind has managed to catch up with his intention and the carrot-top steps forward, trying not to cringe as every single person in the lobby turns to stare at him in surprise. Swallowing thickly, he manages a nervous smile and stands beside Toushiro, his hands quickly occupying themselves with pulling his scarf off as he meets Smith and Catcher's incredulous eyes. "It's no problem. I volunteer."

Momentarily, he sees a glimpse of Matsumoto's face from his right and he manages a quivering grin at the expression of relief and gratitude that dissipates across it, but his attention is quickly drawn back to the reporters as the man with the microphone clears his throat overly loudly.

"That's very good, Mr..?"

"Kurosaki."

"Mr. Kurosaki. But this still leaves another empty spot, I'm afraid. I don't suppose anyone else would like to join in on the fun now that one person has decided to step forth?" Catcher's brows draw together in a questioning expression, but even though his demeanor is much less glaringly disdainful than his colleague's one, there is still something of a jeer in his grey eyes, something intrusive and brash that he's only half-bothered to conceal. Ichigo opens his mouth, intending to try and persuade them to either settle with one man, or take Matsumoto for a second, when Toushiro's voice cuts through, clear and calm despite the foul spotlight that's been directed at him.

"I'll find you another person. He's a little late at the minute, but I can give him a call and let him know he needs to hurry up."

Ichigo involuntarily turns to look at his boss at the very improbable-sounding suggestion, and he has to bite back a gasp of surprise when he finds out that Toushiro is staring right at him, his vitreous jade eyes piercing straight through him like two elegant, deadly blades. There is a bit of wonder in that gaze, naked beneath the many veils of restraint, and the carrot-top can't help the tiny blush that seems to creep up his cheeks at the sight of those intense irises that, for the very first time ever, seem to watch him with bold interest. Almost as though they actually _see_ him. See _who_ he is, and not _what_ he does or needs to do for the company. Ichigo isn't sure if he understands the reason behind the stare and, quite frankly, he doesn't know if he actually wants to discover what it is, but the power of it holds him rooted for what feels like eternity before the smaller male finally turns away and looks at the pair of reporters questioningly.

Catcher seems uncertain at first, exchanging meaningful glances with his colleague, but at the end he turns to Toushiro and lifts his shoulders in a dismissive shrug, his wordless permission making the crowd around the four of them sway with sudden excitement. Without waiting a single moment more, Hitsugaya makes his way straight down the hallway, his voice booming dangerously behind him as he heads towards his office:

"Everybody else, go straight back to work, your participation in this parody is _no longer_ required."

The crowd explodes like a soap bubble the moment the last syllable of the order echoes in the lobby and immediately people rush to get to their respectful offices and cubicles, each of them bumping and elbowing through the others with no care of who might get hurt or offended in the process. Within thirty seconds the coast has completely cleared, leaving only Ichigo, Matsumoto and the two reporters, standing stupidly in the middle of the lobby and waiting for Toushiro to _– supposedly_ – make his call to this one specific employee who'd volunteer to participate in the interview. Smith and Catcher look positively pessimistic about the whole deal but they don't bother to voice their suspicions, patiently waiting for Hitsugaya's return so they can finally get their piece started despite what must already be a rather time-consuming morning.

In the awkwardness of the resulting silence, Matsumoto suggests bringing some coffee or cakes, but one by one, all of the present males thank her and decline the offer. Ichigo takes his coat, hat and gloves off and folds them over his arm, enjoying the lightness of his dress shirt and the warm air over his bare neck and hands while the clock on the wall continues to make its assigned noise.

By the end of the first five minutes, the reporters begin to get restless. They don't talk among each other, but the looks they throw in Ichigo and Matsumoto's direction and the gradual change in their expressions from wary to impatient seems to say it all, and after a bit more, the carrot-top decides to be helpful.

"I'll go check if he's coming soon," he proposes, chucking the suggestion out in the open as carelessly as possible. Beside him Matsumoto, suddenly having realized that perhaps this is more of her kind of a job than his, scrambles to offer him to stay while she goes to fetch Toushiro, but Ichigo brushes her off easily, already heading down the corridor towards his boss' office. He makes his way out of the lobby and turns the next corner, surpassing the drinks machine and emerging beside the entrance of the infamous lion's den - now firmly detached from the rest of the surroundings, the blinds shut, the door closed and unwelcoming like a sinister gate to the underworld. Taking a hesitant step forward, he wonders whether he should knock or wait outside the way Hitsugaya has always told him to do in such situations, when he sees the doorknob slowly turning, the muffled sound of voices sneaking from within the room.

Next thing he knows, the door has swung open, its wide wooden body completely blocking Ichigo's line of vision, as a pale, long-fingered hand envelops the edge from the inside, holding steady for Toushiro's stiff, tense form to walk through and come into view. The carrot-top has barely a moment to take in the displeased, uneasy turn on the boy's mouth and the deep, strained crinkle between his scowling brows, before another figure steps forward, its long, straight limbs and tall lean spine contradicting almost unnaturally the graceful movements of the person whose physique they belong to. The very first thing that Ichigo sees is the grin – a thin, insidious curve cutting right across a sharp and well-defined face, the length of the smile only underlined by the high cheekbones and dry silvery locks that frame it. The man's eyes are almost impossible to see, the eyelids dropped low enough to hide most of the colour like impenetrable white curtains that refuse to lift, though for one split second two electric blue irises shine from below their veils, clear, dangerous, frighteningly omniscient, only to disappear again when they spot the third presence in the corridor.

"Well, well, well, what have we got 'ere?" the stranger's voice whips across the hallway, it slashes through the air despite the deceitful softness with which each word is uttered, and Ichigo tenses, suddenly feeling awfully on edge. The man's gaze is like milliards of slippery ants, all over his skin and innards, and he swallows thickly, unable to utter a single sound. He knows Toushiro is right there, probably giving him the most impatient and exasperated look his rigid features can muster, but the carrot-top just can't seem to be able to move, frozen on spot like a mouse before the eyes of a cobra. A long, disgusted shudder runs down his spine and he bites the inside of his cheek, completely lost as to why he has been reduced to this pathetic state. The man in front of him is without a doubt the oddest creature he's ever met, and yet there is nothing specific about him that can be defined as bizarre or unacceptable. He just _is_. Freakishly, frighteningly _inhuman_.

"Gin," Toushiro's voice sounds unexpectedly weary, piercing through Ichigo's trance and finally rendering him strong enough to look away from '_Gin_'s paralyzing gaze. "Leave the boy alone."

Ichigo watches the man's brows jolt up with something akin to uppity humour and then he tilts his head to the side, regarding the carrot-top from head to toe one more time.

"Dun be like that, pet, I'm not botherin' 'im," he insists, making an overly wide dismissively gesture with his hand, like he's not entirely aware of the definition of personal space or physical dimensions in general. And then, just as Toushiro opens his mouth, possibly to produce another brief scold, Gin leans forward and grabs the carrot-top's hand between his own, shaking it a bit too vigorously. "Gin Ichimaru. Pleased ta meet ya."

Ichigo is completely dumbfounded for a second, not sure how to react to the sudden expression of cordiality, though his hand makes a feeble attempt to shake back and his lips automatically twist in a wavering smile.

"Um. Ichigo. Kurosaki Ichigo. I don't think I've seen you here before?"

"I know," Gin says cryptically – though to which part of the response he means that, it's hard to tell – and drops the carrot-top's fingers just as suddenly as he has clutched them a moment ago. "I work at the very, very end of the floor. I print."

"You print?" Ichigo chokes out, utterly flabbergasted, but much to his shock the other guy nods his head with utmost earnestness and taps his breast where, for the first time, the orange-haired lad spots a neat white name badge.

And the name badge says:

**Gin**

**From Printing**

Ichigo lifts his eyes from the title, his mouth slightly agape and his brows sky-high in his hairline as he once again contemplates the freakish worker's face and the still very much present grin which, in the current moment, looks almost comic. Ichigo is half-planning to ask if this is some kind of a joke, half fearing the consequences of one such question, but he doesn't get the chance to ponder over the dilemma for long as his attention is sharply drawn to the sound of Toushiro slapping a hand over his face in a display of what must be an enormous deal of exasperation.

"_Really_?" he hisses, palm still over his eyes as he seemingly tries to collect his thoughts. "Really, Gin?"

"Sorry," the tall man says with a shrug, though he doesn't sound terribly sorry. "Shall we go?"

And much to Ichigo's dismay, he grabs Toushiro by the wrist and all the drags him away from the office door and towards the reporters.

* * *

><p><em><strong>AN: Hope you enjoyed. Let me know if you did.**_


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