Raw Heart (Tier/Ichigo)

His arm had been restored, but the same could not necessarily be said of the ambition he had felt building. Ichigo's willingness to make such a decision as invading Soul Society was something he didn't quite know if he could replicate now; despite everything, he was shaken to his core. The call for him to meet his friend in Las Noches was welcome, to be certain, but he doubted that he could have turned it down even if he wanted to right now.

"I didn't expect to come here again."

That was as much a greeting as anything else. Ichigo's voice was quiet, low, closer to when they had first met here in Hueco Mundo than to the man who had grown into his role as an impromptu leader. He might have wished to talk about what happened, but it was hard to think of where he ought to start.

"I almost died. We got what we went for, at least."

"Of course there will be. We don't have every ring yet."

His voice was lacking force, certainly, but he had not changed in his aims. He had not changed, if nothing else, in his desire to collect the rings. For what? That was a different question now, unfortunately. He had to wonder whether or not he could still say he wanted to follow that particular ambition to its end.

"I fought Komamura, and that was physically taxing. Most people still wouldn't have been an issue, but after that was one of the Vizards that taught me a hundred years ago. Rose."

It wasn't as if either of those men had been his closest friends, but they had still been people he fought alongside, people he'd once protected. Even that, however, wasn't why he was shaken. It wasn't why he felt doubt gripping his chest.

"His bankai was too much. There wasn't a way for me to fight back. I heard voices. Aizen, my friends. They weren't real, I know that. But..."

His hand clenched tighter as he remembered the last voice he'd heard. The one that had sent him into the deepest pits of despair.

"I heard my mother's voice. What would she want me to use these rings for, I wonder."

Ichigo's gaze moved toward the ruins as Tier's did, taking in the sight more fully. It was true, what she'd said. This destruction was because of him. It was because he'd been willing to fight for his friends, because he'd refused to allow Orihime to be taken away from him.

"She was a good person. She tried to protect me until the end. I couldn't protect her, but I wanted to at least protect everyone else."

He still wanted that. To protect the people left in his life, to give them a life that had been taken away. It wasn't as if Ichigo was under any illusions that it would be costly. If he died, would Orihime be at peace? Could he be at peace without her?

He couldn't abandon this path. That, in itself, wouldn't be the right thing. He could only wonder what he was supposed to do at the end of that road.

It was what it was. Ichigo wasn't intent on quitting just because of this setback. He was halfway to finishing this; that meant he was halfway through with this path, and he could be free soon enough. Is that what he wanted? Freedom from this?

That was hard to say.

"I've got no intention of stopping any time soon. Not when it's all so close. Thanks, Tier. I'll get out of your hair. Wouldn't want to get any heat on you."

That was still something Ichigo held as one of his principles. He knew that Tier had ambitions of her own, more peaceful aims that, perhaps, were far more respectable than his. He wasn't willing to undermine it all simply by making it known that he worked with her.