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A New Window	By : Platinumsabr Category: Bleach > Het - Male/Female Views: 13905 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Bleach, nor the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story. Any Original Characters are mine however, as is the story itself, and if you see it or any part of it posted elsewhere please report it

Chapter List
- 27
- 28
- 29
Epilogue
2 � Sakura�s Bloom Only After Time Melts The Ice

~Six Years Later~

He could honestly say that during
his entire life so far and everything he had ever been through, there were only
a few other instances where he had ever been this confused. He didn�t know what
to do.

He, the great Byakuya Kuchiki
of all people, didn�t know what to do!!

He had never been one to seek
advice, nor was he certain that if he did ask, that that person would
even take him seriously at this point. He wasn�t blind, or deaf, and it would
seem that over the past few years his fellow Shinigami had forgotten to lower
their voices in his presence. Did they honestly believe that just because he
was a noble, that he couldn�t understand their body language!? It was coming on
again, he could feel it, and the stoic captain actually allowed himself the
luxury of rubbing his temples while he was in the confines of his own home.

If he was a lesser man, he would
probably be banging his head against a wall, shouting �why� over and over
again, but he was Byakuya Kuchiki, and Byakuya Kuchiki did not do that under any
circumstances.

This�was close though.

He couldn�t understand it, he
couldn�t understand anything anymore. He was a captain of the Thirteen Squads,
a man in control of one of the most powerful zanpakutou�s
in Soul Society, a man envied for his heritage and appearance, and a widower
who had loved his wife as much as any man was humanly capable of. To this day
he prayed in front of her memorial every morning before he began his day, and
the feelings he had for her had not waned in the least.

Yet why, why was he
feeling something for someone other than Hisana??

It tore at his organs, ate at his
stomach like acid, his throat felt like he had inhaled dry ice, and his mind
even went as far as depriving him from sleep in its hyperactive calculations.
What was even worse than all of this though was that his heart wasn�t bothering
him at all. It was like out of his entire body his
heart was the only one relaxing on a beach chair, scoffing at all the other
agonized organs with remarks like �you�re still worried about that?�

It was absolutely infuriating
that his own heart wasn�t telling him the answer he wanted to hear!

Hisana�s
memory was as sacred as his sword to him, and yet even when he looked at her
younger sister he saw something he didn�t want to admit. Life�went on. Change
was inevitable, the only constant in all the worlds no matter how arrogant
Center Forty-Six might ever try to be. He had known his adopted sister, at
least as well as one can know someone when one is terrified to look at their
face because of a resemblance too heartbreaking to endure, but that is what
outside sources are for.

Yet she changed. She was sent to
the Living World, and even when he was sent to get
her, the woman he encountered was not the one that had left Soul Society. There
was something burning in her eyes, something permeating her small body with
pride not bestowed by the Kuchiki name. At first it had disgusted him, she was
acting like a human, showing way too many emotions for one bearing the
Kuchiki title, but as time went on it happened to more people. One by one his
fellow Shinigami were infected as he could only call it, and the Society
had changed for the better because of it.

He wasn�t devoid of emotion, he knew them all too well. He had thought they had
died when Hisana had, but that didn�t stop him from
being able to recognize them. He couldn�t explain what hit him when Renji and
Rukia presented his newly-born nephew to him, and barely even a year later a
niece as well. Rukia had gone from a silent sister, to proud woman, to glowing
wife, and then a loving mother. She had changed, and embraced change.

He didn�t want to change. He was
a noble, a symbol of strength, beauty, and order. Once upon a time he wouldn�t
have cared, once upon a time he remembered having a temper he wasn�t afraid to show
people, but life seldom allows gold things to stay. He had loved Hisana, did still love Hisana,
but she too had been taken away, just like his parents. For him, change only
brought pain.

And yet now, facing this as he
had for the past two years, he was afraid of the answer he would come to,
afraid of what he might find buried deep under the snow of his heart. In this
not even Senbonzakura was any help, because she was just
like him in most ways, as is the case with most zanpakutous
despite their gender. She seemed to agree with his heart though,
she knew it better than anyone, though like all zanpakutous
she refused to give him the answer directly. She could only help guide him along;
he would have to find the answers he sought on his own.

He had kept up his stoic nature,
unchanging even through the six years when she never stopped. At least, he had
thought he had.

Minute by minute, hour by hour,
day by day, month after month, she had slowly gotten under his skin. He had
always felt something, but truth be told he thought it was the feelings of a
teacher for their student, being that he had never took on anyone to train
personally before and so had no expectation of what he might feel. He had
naturally thought that he could endure it like he had the rest of his life. He
could easily cast off concern for her as the feelings of a trainer to their
pupil, could easily dismiss the desire to see her as the wish to constantly better
a student; it was all explainable. Then, as those minutes turned into hours and
hours into days, as those days turned into months which gradually turned into
years, that student suddenly seemed to change into a woman in the blink of an
eye.

That was when he felt it, truly
felt all those feelings for what they really were. The one feeling he knew as
that which had caused him the most joy as well as the most pain. The one
formerly reserved for only Hisana, he felt that
traitorous emotion in his heart bubble up from under the snow when he looked at
her, uncovered from the guise he had put over it.

And it terrified him.

He, Byakuya Kuchiki, was terrified.

From that point on confusion had
swamped his soul, and he had spent every waking moment justifying himself since
then. With that the confusion only got worse, because he refused to admit that
he had felt that emotion around her, he refused to believe it. She was tactful,
he had to admit that, but he could recognize the look in her eyes, he had seen
it in Hisana�s every day when she was still with him.
That, and she had a part to herself that seemingly had
no concept of the word �shame.�

He chuckled lightly and froze
solid upon doing so. It had gotten to the point where he could�laugh�just
by thinking about her. Both of her even.

Outwardly it would appear that he
was the same, but he had been going through an inner battle for close to two
full years. Ever since she had legally become an adult and nothing but personal
barriers stood between them.

He was alarmed at how little of
those he found he had left. She wasn�t an accomplice, an acquaintance he met
occasionally in his everyday life. She wasn�t like everyone else,
she had never felt the kind of inferiority he used to keep everyone at arm�s
length. He was a leader, a loner since Hisana, and it
wasn�t that he didn�t withhold his usual persona from her,
it was just that she didn�t let herself be affected by it. She had been a presence
in his life for years now, even when she didn�t need to be near him she had chosen
to stay, but never too close, just�close enough. It was to the point where he
wasn�t surprised if she was at his division, if she took things on that would
make his life easier even if he didn�t find out about it until later. The only
thing he could equate it to was he was slowly being worn down, that was the
only explanation he could find for himself behaving in such a way.

Mentally and emotionally he was
exhausted, but he wouldn�t allow it to hinder his responsibilities. Dressed in
his kimono and haori, and of course his Kenseikan and
scarf, he set out for the Sixth Division. At least when he was working his mind
was freed of its torment in the monotony of it all, and the chance of a mission
was too good for him to ignore. He had forgone the chance to choose a
replacement lieutenant when Renji had been promoted to captain, and so he was
free to do any mission the division was appointed, whether it required a
captain or not. He could trust the paperwork that didn�t require his signature
to his subordinates; they had been trained well after all, he didn�t accept
ineptitude in his division.

When he reached the main entrance
to the division headquarters, he was stopped dead by a sound that a mere decade
ago would never have been heard in the Sixth Division.

Laughter.

There were people laughing
inside, happily conversing even though he was usually the first into the
office, though admittedly that had started changing over the past two years. He
didn�t need to open the door to know who was making them laugh, probably
talking about some inane thing or the other, because he knew that voice, it
haunted his dreams.

It was the last person he wanted
to see, and nowadays she was usually never alone except in the rare case that
her other half had gotten tired, or bored, as was more likely. What was worse
was he wasn�t just confused over her, he was confused over them.
Then again, the case could be argued that she and her white counterpart were
one and the same, so she was still one person.

Yet another part of the confusion
that plagued him.

He sighed inaudibly and mentally
prepared himself before he opened the door, and naturally all the heads in the
room turned to see who the new arrival was. The first thing most of them did
was widen their eyes before quickly bowing in respect to their superior, but
his eyes only took in her as she turned to look at him, gracing him with one of
her radiant smiles before she remembered her manners and bowed slightly to her
teacher. Just his luck, she wasn�t alone today either, and the carbon-copy
mimicked her actions with a far more dangerous smile on her face.

For a second his mind played a
trick on him and what stood before him were the two harmless fourteen year-olds
in barely matured bodies, a threat but not fatal. Back then they had only had
their personalities going for them, and a cuteness that anyone other than him
could recognize. Even if he had been ready to try life after Hisana back then, he couldn�t have been bothered to
consider them. A threat, but not fatal. He almost
breathed a sigh of relief, but then he blinked and reality took its place.

Now, they were fatal.

Even if she could strike him
breathless, he wasn�t about to show it.

She had only grown a few inches
over the years, and that was one thing that probably wasn�t going to change any
time soon. It was enough that they matched their mother in height and had been
given the privilege to annoy the now shorter Kin, but had that just been it he
wouldn�t have been too affected. She, and therefore they, had allowed her hair
to grow like her grandmother�s, and now she had incredible orange hair that
flowed to the middle of her back. Even when she was fourteen she had still
looked more like a child than a woman, but that had changed all too quickly in
his mind. As she grew her body evened itself out, proportioning her into that
of a woman he could never have imagined she�d turn into.

Her innocent amber eyes were now
framed by thick orange lashes and fit into a face more suited to that of a
model than a warrior, and yet he had seen time and again her fierceness in
battle. Her smooth skin looked much too soft for a calloused fighter, and her
full, pink lips looked even more inviting. Though she clearly held strength in
her body, her figure hadn�t suffered at all. Like her mother, it pronounced it.
It had caused him no end of torment when he had first realized she had started
wearing her kimono like Rangiku Hitsugaya, and it had
only gotten worse when he also saw that she had the bust to make it work. Every
day it took all of his discipline not to follow that tempting V in her kimono
to the pale flesh it revealed.

He was still taller than her, and
he couldn�t help but imagine what it would feel like if that supple body was
pressed against him as he made those deliciously full lips of hers to swell�

If he was a lesser man, he might
have taken up banging his head on the wall again.

Instead, he expressionlessly
swallowed his emotions and graced those in the room with a small nod in
greeting. �Good morning, Masaki, Ikasam, you look
well today.�

They both glowed under his
praise, even if it was minor. The beautiful white counterpart
mock-scowled at him. �Jeez, how many times do I have to tell you
to call me Ikki before you start doing it?�
She asked playfully as she leaned herself forward too look at him with her head
crooked upwards.

As much as he might not look it,
Byakuya Kuchiki was in fact a red-blooded male, and it was only thanks to his
intense self-discipline that he resisted looking past her eyes to see the
cleavage she was exposing rather tauntingly. Unwittingly, he gave her a small
smile before walking past them and towards his office, whereas he had meant to
just walk past them wordlessly.

Of course, it wasn�t long before
he heard the patter of steps behind him and as he stepped into his office,
Masaki and Ikki slipped in behind him, nonplussed by
his silent display before. They had gotten used to that a long time ago.
He sat down and twined his fingers together on his desk as he looked at them,
unnoticeably waiting for their next antics.

�Aw com�on,
I know you smiled a bit there! It couldn�t be too hard to say it, right?�

His glare was a conditioned
response, and for once he actually felt bad when he saw her flinch back like
she had been hit. �I�I apologize, that was uncalled for.� It was one of the few
he had done in the nearly two centuries he had been alive. When his chest
warmed at the sight of their smiling faces, Byakuya almost contemplated that
wall idea again. He was not supposed
to feel that.

�Nah, everyone knows Ikki�s as annoying as they come. Sensei should put
her in place every now and then,� Masaki said happily, and Ikki
in all her maturity, stuck her tongue out at her sister and host.

Both of their voices made his
insides tremble, and Byakuya Kuchiki did not tremble. He forced himself to keep
a calm face. It was too early in the morning for this.

�Still, he won�t even give
me a reason! No offence, but your name really sucks said backwards.�
Masaki had to give her that; Ikki was a nice
compromise. She cast those molten gold Hollowized
eyes on him and he could only hope his fa�ade was still in place.

He let none of this show, as was
his way, and he silently pulled some files from the side of his desk to
distract himself from looking directly at them. �I find nothing about you to
fit that description, that is all.�

It took a while for that to sink
in, but when it did both women turned a shade of red even he found quite
amusing. He realized very quickly he shouldn�t have said that, because then the
voluptuous body was sauntering towards him like an animal that had cornered its
prey. Masaki was trying to look uninterested and failing horribly, and all too
soon she had inched her way forward as well.

�Did you just call me
pretty?� Leave it to Ikki to push the limit.

Byakuya was struck speechless.
She had always been forward, but this was further than either of them had ever
gone before.

As it turns out, he had no
idea.

�B-Byakuya-sensei,� Masaki
stuttered embarrassedly. The sight of her, flushed and embarrassed made his
pulse quicken for some reason. She took a deep breath to steady herself and
when she opened her eyes to look at him again, he saw a determination he had
seen many times in her father. �B-Byakuya-sensei, do you know how I feel about
you, how we feel about you?�

Indeed, they had never been this
forward. This was�this was a confession.

He did his best to keep up his
emotionless mask as his insides continued in the confusion he had hoped to
forget by doing work. He didn�t want to hear it, if he
heard it�he just might recognize it. He could see their eyes were hopeful
though, and warm to the extent of a lover. Before their eyes they saw his
unfeeling steel-grey orbs soften in quiet torment and their combined hearts
cracked. He didn�t mean to say it, but when their sensitive ears picked up the
whisper of �Hisana,� it was all they could do not to
run out of the room crying.

Imagine his surprise when he saw
their warm, understanding eyes were brimmed with tears as they smiled at him
softly, truly like that of a lover, or even a wife. He simply couldn�t believe
it when they each reached forward a hand and put it over his�nearly
shaking�entwined hands.

�My dad said something to us when
Senna was born, Sensei. He said that love doesn�t
divide the heart, it multiplies it. I love my little sister, but does that mean
I love my parents, my siblings, or anyone else any less?� Masaki stopped
momentarily to wipe her eyes before smiling that kind, understanding smile at
him again, and little by little Byakuya felt his body quiet in a warmth he
hadn�t felt in a long time. All but his heart, and at last it was revealing the
horrible, terrifying, beautiful truth to him.

�Of
course not. When you find something new to love it doesn�t
divide the love you already have, it doubles the size of your heart so you can
give even more. We know you�ll never stop loving Hisana-sama,
but�that doesn�t mean that you aren�t allowed to love someone else too.�

For once, his stoic visage
couldn�t contain his surprise, and with wide eyes he stared at the two sets
looking back at him. He couldn�t deny it anymore; he had wanted to, he had
tried to, he had done everything he possibly could to make it not be so, but
his heart wasn�t lying to him, and neither was his mind anymore. He no longer
felt confused, he couldn�t feel confused, not after that emotion had
burst forth like water from a broken dam throughout his body, quieting all the
inner torment he had been going through in its cleansing waters.

Silently, Ikki
retreated back inside her host and left Masaki alone with Byakuya, though she
felt and saw everything from within as well. She couldn�t stop looking at his
eyes. People had teased her, saying her crush wouldn�t last long, but she was
now twenty years old and her love for him had never left, not once. It had only
grown.

The years had gone by in a blur.
School, graduation, real life; she was living in a division apartment�which
technically had been her home all along�before she knew where the time had
gone. She knew time, she and Ikki controlled it at
will, and never before had it seemed to go so fast. She spent as much time with
him as she could, even if it was under the excuse of training. Both parts of her loved him, they had different way of
showing it, but they did. She still didn�t know why she had fallen for him, but
she had. She had a theory though.

She had never been alone. She was
a twin from birth, she and Tsukiyomi had a relationship they could have with no
other. Her parents were both alive and well, and they had never made her feel
the least bit unloved. Even when she became aware of her self as a Shinigami,
no sooner had that happened had she discovered an aspect of herself that was it�s own person. She was honestly and truly, never alone,
and she loved that. She had gotten as far as she had today because of the
people supporting her. The concept of loneliness was one she feared, one she
couldn�t understand.

Yet he was alone. Even as she
watched him in a crowd she could see that he was alone. Among hundreds of
subordinates, among thousands of admirers, even among the noble houses he was
set apart. He was alone. He had had parents once, and they had died, leaving a
son too young to have the weight of responsibility crush his na�ve shoulders.
He had loved once too, like any man, and yet she as well had fallen to the
nemesis of his life: death. The thought had been forced into him that
attachment could only mean more pain, and so he had cut off his emotions,
buried his heart under ice and became the noble everyone expected him to be. He
was alone, but she knew, deep, deep down�he didn�t want to be.

She knew out of the whole world,
this man was the only one right for her. She had found her soul mate when she
was ten years old, and the initial crush had only grown into a burning fire in
her heart over the years. They balanced each other, they both had experiences
the other could never understand, they both had things they could teach each
other, their very existences complimented each other.
She counted herself and Ikki as one, and together the
three of them would be what she suspected he had always wanted to be. Happy. He had known it before, and knowing she was the only
one that could bring it back to him made her chest warm. It wasn�t pity, she would smack anyone that called it that. She
couldn�t describe her love, it was something that had
come to define her. She and Ikki were of one heart,
and they both had different things to offer.

They enjoyed every moment around
him, and though they suspected he didn�t know it, he had started changing
around them. Every once in a while, maybe when no one was looking or they were
talking, the corners of his lips would edge up in a small smile that they both
knew he would only show to them. His grey eyes would soften for the smallest
instant and they could sense that he cared for them, even if he didn�t know it
himself. They could live for those moments, but they wanted more. They wanted
to heal him�so that they could love all of him, and so that all of him could
love them back.

And now they were at that final
step.

Ikki
was letting her have this moment, though she knew her white half was as much a
part of her as she herself was of her white doppelganger. This was their
moment, their step. She leaned
forward over his desk to look directly into his eyes.

�Byakuya Kuchiki�I, we, love
you.� She had finally said it.

The beautiful woman hadn�t
addressed him as a captain, or as her teacher, nor even as one in a higher
social position than her. She had merely confessed to him by his name, a man on
no different ground than she as a woman. Her heart was in her throat as she
watched his steel-grey eyes soften, and with a gentle hand he cupped the side
of her face.

�You were barely ten years old
when we met, a little girl that shouldn�t even know what a sword is, let alone
own one. I don�t know which one surprised me more, the sight of that little
girl with a Hollow�s mask on her face, or the twin summoned by that mask. To
this day I don�t know what possessed me to train those four kids�but ten years
later and�� This was the first time he had ever spoken to her like this,
probably the first time he had even spoken to anyone like this since the
death of Hisana, and Masaki found her throat closing
up on her. He looked at her and heat shocked through her so quickly she almost
flinched at what she saw in his eyes. ��and now the women both a good century
my junior have just taught me a lesson none but they could teach.�

She really was like her father.
The man had taught him more things than he would ever truly realize, and it was
a trait he had passed on to his children.

The tears now wanted to come for
a very different reason. She was so happy she could barely contain herself.
�What�s age got to do with it?� She asked semi-sarcastically. In the spiritual
realm it meant absolutely nothing. Her smile was too wide for it to be anything
but her regular humor.

In front of her eyes, right in
front of her very eyes, with his large hard still holding fast on the side of
her face like one who had found a long lost love, Byakuya Kuchiki smiled.
It wasn�t a small grin, or a toothy, face-stretching smirk, just a loving,
grateful smile that reached his eyes and set them into a warm glow, something
she guessed he had only ever shown to one other human being.

�Indeed.� He gave a soft,
one-breath chuckle. �If we are going to do this, we are doing this�properly.
May I assume your confession to be an agreement to courtship?� He almost
laughed again at the look on her face, but that may have been a bit too much.

�Does�does this mean�?�

�I will always love Hisana, like you said, but I do love you as well, Masaki
Kurosaki. Even a heart covered in ice and steel can only last so long.� He had
actually said it, and the funny thing was he wasn�t afraid to. He would
always love Hisana, but he couldn�t deny his love for
Masaki and Ikasam either. It would take some getting
used to, especially considering she was essentially twins, but they could worry
about that if it ever became a problem.

He could feel her tears on his
hand as she smiled radiantly at him, and just like before he felt his chest
warm. Happiness. He had almost forgotten what that
felt like, and now he could recognize it again.

From now on, his life was going
to change, but he would face it and everything the future brought with her at
his side. It was a nice thought.

�I believe this is one deal�� she
started seductively, ��that should be sealed with a kiss.�

There was no argument there.

Their lips met hesitantly, a
first for Masaki�with a man, she and Ikki were more
like lovers than sisters, because technically they weren�t. His lips weren�t
like she had thought they would be, they were much,
much better. He guided them skillfully, though it was gentle, soft, tentative even. She wanted so much more, but she was willing
to wait. This was his first relationship, his first kiss since Hisana, and at that moment she didn�t know if anyone could
love someone more than she loved him. When they split apart she almost whined,
but then he held her hand softly and she couldn�t care less.

They had all the time in the
world, and now they could learn about each other not as teacher and student,
but as a man and woman.

~One Year Later~

Kuchiki�s
were famous for never leaving anything they started unfinished, and Kurosaki�s
had a reputation of tenacity as well. The initial relationship itself had
caused a huge shock throughout Seireitei, but this, this wasn�t surprising at
all.

With the slip of a ring Masaki
Kurosaki officially became Masaki Kuchiki, and the roar of applause went
unheard by the two as they sealed the commitment they had made to each other
with a kiss that meant so much more than the traditional.

Now the future had even more
possibilities than before, but if Byakuya was sure of one thing it was this:

The future would never stop
changing, and they were in for one hell of a ride.

THE END�for
now.

~~~~~~~~~

Author�s Notes: Well, here�s the second epilogue.

I�m really disappointed with the
amount of reviews I received for last chapter, but I am encouraged by the
number of hits. Please review, it makes it much easier to keep going. I do want
to write the story I presented last A/N, but I do need feedback. I don�t want
to write something people don�t want to read.

I�m sorry if Byakuya seems a bit
OOC, but this chapter deals a lot with emotions and I believe they are something he has, even if he doesn�t
show them.

Review please! More reviews,
faster next chapter comes out!

Thanks for reading and I hope you
enjoyed it!
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