ＤＯＮＴ ＬＥＴ ＧＯ (Byakuya Kuchiki/Ichigo Kurosaki)

ＤＯＮＴ ＬＥＴ ＧＯ (Byakuya Kuchiki/Ichigo Kurosaki)- 6

The sunlight hits his face.

Ichigo wakes up with a groan, remembering he is on the floor. Standing up and arching his back in a deep stretch, he looks over to his bed, finding it empty.

"Good morning Onii-chan."

"Good morning Yuzu." Ichigo glances at the table noticing a lack of a plate for Byakuya. "Seen Byakuya this morning?"

"Yeah," Karin walks in with her book bag over her shoulder and a soccer ball in her hand. "He left about twenty minutes ago. He said he had something to do."

"Oh, ok thanks." He goes back to his room to get his badge and knocks over a paperback book. Turning it over, he recognizes it as the same book Byakuya was reading the night before. Flipping through it for a moment Ichigo reads an underlined section on treading water. The flash of the light bulb in his head could have powered a small mid-western city for a year.

Running out the door, he punishes his legs in a furious sprint. Turning the corner to his high school, Ichigo ignores the many greetings of his classmates. Widening his stance, climbing the steep stairs leading to the gym, he skips three steps at a time. Dashing past the bouncing basketballs and ignoring the teacher's orders to change his shoes, Ichigo jumps over the locked gate of the swimming pool.

"Crap!" There, floating face down in the pool was Byakuya Kuchiki. Ichigo dives in with clothes and shoes on and his heart in his throat, and grabs Byakuya's chin. Tugging him to the edge, Ichigo yanks him out of the water and pulls himself over the side. Flipping him over on his back, he cringes at his blue lips.

His mind in a daze, Ichigo holds his head to Byakuya's chest, and hears nothing. He pushes on his chest, and then wraps his lips around Byakuya's to force air into his lungs. After a minute, Ichigo's hands begin to shake as fear sets in. Byakuya is dying...

"Come on! You've got more fight in you than anyone I've met!" Touching his neck, Ichigo closes his mouth over his again. Ichigo hears it, the faint pulse, and Byakuya's shoulders lurch as he coughs up water.

Byakuya turns over on his side and struggles to breathe in as much air as possible to force the water out. His dark blue eyes focus on Ichigo who is kneeling down next to him holding his hair back from his face.

"You can't swim?" Ichigo asks with his voice low and soft.

"No."

"What were you thinking?! You could have died!" His right hand moves through his orange hair while his left was touching Byakuya's hair. Byakuya's gaze never left the smoldering amber eyes pointing daggers at him. Ichigo let go of him and stood up with his hands on his hips. Water falls through the air as Ichigo moves hand from his hair to his sides. Dripping on the ground under his shoes and streaking down his angry face, it soaks everything. "Why didn't you tell me? Ask for help?"

"I... have never had to before." Only then does he allow his gaze to fall and the humiliation starts to sting his pride.

"Welcome to the human race, where you have to fight and claw your way through everything." Ichigo sighs and holds out his hand to Byakuya. "I will teach you. Come on, let's go get changed before we are late." Byakuya takes his hand, stands up and shivers slightly from the cold.

"I have spare clothes in the locker room. You are a little bigger than me but, I think they will fit." Ichigo replies releasing the cold hand and leading him into the boy's locker room.

Byakuya sits on the bench, watching Ichigo from behind his long, wet bangs. The way his fingers move the padlock and open the locker door, the pensive wrinkle of his eyebrows, and the way he gets angry when people around him get hurt. Is it this side of him that people gravitate to? He is also becoming affected by him, drifting toward him like a comet caught in the suns pull.

The towel Ichigo tosses lands on Byakuya's head, yanking him out of his thoughts. He slips it off his head and lays it over his lap, then looks at his hands. Holding them up, he can see the slight tremor in them and frowns.

Ichigo steps next to him and looks down at the long shaking fingers. Water drops from his long black hair fall and glides down his large hands.

"Is it always like this?" Byakuya asks, looking up at him with a soft expression. "The fear...it's stifling."

"The fear you feel now, it's nothing. The fear that chokes at you and keeps you awake at night, is when it's the people you care about that are bleeding." Ichigo pulls his towel from around his neck and rubs Byakuya's hair.

"Will I ever get used to it?" Byakuya's head drops to give Ichigo room to rub the towel on the back of his hair. "Have you?"

"Notice how much I sleep at night?" Ichigo replies patting Byakuya's shoulder dropping the towel over Byakuya face. Students begin to filter in the locker room and Ichigo walks away, chatting with some friends.

"I notice everything." Byakuya whispers, buttoning the slightly tight shirt without his eyes looking away from the orange haired shinigami.

"Yo. Byakuya! Meet me here after classes." He waves and vanishes behind a blue painted cement wall. Byakuya can still hear his voice thundering and his occasional laugh above anyone else's as he dresses in Ichigo's old uniform.