Time and Tide

Chapter 10

Shinji opened the door to find Kisuke slumped against the wall, a cup of cooling tea before him. "Do I want to know?" he asked and Kisuke lifted his head to look at him.

"The Hollow that killed Masaki is dead," he answered. "Isshin came to tell of the fight so I went to investigate...it was Grand Fisher according to my instruments. I detected the fight but didn't go to see, despite the date..." he sighed.

"The kid kill it or the Shinigami?"

"Ichigo, though he may have had help from young Potter, I detected traces of magic as well."

"Any sign of it?"

"No," Kisuke shook his head.

Well, that was a relief. Let the kid get used to Shinigami powers before finding out about it. He knew Kisuke would want them to handle that part of his training and it made sense, who else could teach him to use and suppress the monster sealed within his soul?

~~

They sat quietly on the riverbank together, fingers tangled together as they watched the water flow by.

"You okay?" Harry eventually asked and Ichigo nodded.

"I know Dad got him last time but..."

"Yeah," Harry agreed. "So what next?"

"Nothing much, pretty standard patrols and small fry until..." he thought it over and then grimaced.

"What?"

"Don Kanonji," he muttered, and Harry frowned.

"Who?"

"He's a spirit medium on tv, unfortunately he does actually have some power, enough he was apparently able to move around Aizen when Tatsuki couldn't move."

"Oh! That weird tv show I caught Rukia watching the other day."

"Yeah, even Dad and Yuzu love it. Thing is he's got just enough power to cause problems, last time around he filmed at an abandoned hospital which had a demi-hollow and of course he used his stick thing to dig around the forming hole."

"Ah, so it went from demi to full?"

"Yep. Rukia and I got caught on national television trying to stop him" he grimaced, and Harry snickered.

"Well then, simple fix, let's go deal with any spirits before he shows up. Which is?"

"After my birthday, though not by much," he answered, having to think about it.

"So we've got time."

~~

Isshin watched his son and his boyfriend (and hadn't that been a shock! He'd thought Ichigo was uninterested in anyone) as they sat together, talking softly. He didn't know what to think of his son anymore...the boy had changed, and it had begun the first day of school. If it had been after meeting a Shinigami that would be understandable. There was something...too old about his eyes and Potter was the same. Had something happened that day to both boys that no one had detected?

Nothing out of the ordinary had been spotted by anyone who had kept an eye on them since, but he was still sure something had happened. He'd heard the explanation of what had happened to Ichigo when the Hollow attacked, how he'd been knocked out of his body. How was that possible? There was too much unknown and that put their plans at risk. At least Ichigo was aware of his powers and the Shinigami was in the special Gigai. All they had to do was wait for her to be drained to human to destroy the Hogyoku. Without it, Aizen wouldn't be as powerful as they feared him becoming.