Dream Worlds, Beating Hearts

Theme: #6 the space between dream and reality
Disclaimer: Bleach does no belong to me. This is a purely fictional story based on the characters and story created by Tite Kubo, to whom they do belong.
AN: This is the second of thirty entries to the 30Kisses LiveJournal Community (Link at the end)

~*~

The dream world was almost no different to the real world. One could achieve whatever they most desired in each respective world. The efforts involved to achieve those goals were vastly different, but no less achievable. If you wanted to gain more power and command respect from all those around you, it was possible in both worlds. Dreaming and reality were almost the same, yet worlds apart from the other. Karin, stuck in the space between the two, was learning the hard way that the two worlds were similar yet vastly different. She was floating on a cloud of bliss, ignorant of anything but emotions. There were so many of them that she could almost drown in all the sensations assaulting her senses. There were so many she didn’t know and not enough that she recognised.

Time had no place where she was. To her, it was an endless and timeless place where she could be invisible. To her, she could be privy to emotions of her friends without them prying into her own. To her, this was heaven.

Karin spent the most attention on her family, wanting to know more about them than she already knew. She knew that Yuzu had a secret crush on Renji Abarai, though she couldn’t fathom why. She knew that her own brother harboured not so secret feelings for Rukia. She even knew her own father was once a Squad Captain.

From time to time, she drifted away from her family and moved onto her friends, specifically Toushirou, Jinta and Ururu. She noticed that Jinta and Ururu had stopped fighting and had finally worked out a system that worked perfectly for them. She was happy that her two friends had stopped arguing as much.

And then there was Toushirou Hitsugaya, Captain of Squad Ten.

Karin knew she had feelings for the icy captain. She wouldn’t deny the fact at all. It started when she practically bullied the young looking captain into playing soccer for her team. She had met him several times after that, just sitting in various places and not saying much of anything. Karin knew instinctively that Toushirou was not one for words where they were not needed. From what she had sparingly seen of his emotions, she knew he was deeply in love with someone. Hinamori was her biggest bet. But she could detect a lot of concern coming from him, concern that surprised her somewhat. She was safe and sound, so whom could he be worried about?

Something stirred inside her timeless world at the thought of Toushirou. Still floating in the lack of time, she looked around slowly, determined to find out what was disturbing her bliss. She liked her world just the way it was, thank you very much. Even her zanpakutou’s spirit, Fuyu Kasai(1), could not entice her away from her world. Looking around slowly, she saw a fuzzy outline of a shadow.

‘Funny,’ she thought dreamily. ‘There aren’t any shadows in this world.’

Something in her half hoped it would be Ichigo. She missed him somewhat. Smiling to herself, she drifted upwards towards the sky, not really paying attention to the gradually approaching shadow. As she drifted along, fragments of her last few minutes in the Other World, as she called it, floated back to her gently.

She remembered wielding Fuyu Kasai against a Hollow and defeating it. She remembered turning to Ichigo and saying something sarcastic. She remembered rumbles, a panicked look, blinding pain and concerned voices. Karin remembered weakly grabbing onto someone covered in ice before she came to her Dream World.

Dreams, she mused. What were they really? And reality, what made that reality and not dreams? How did one know if reality was actually dreams and dreams were actually reality? She giggled at herself, wondering where this was coming from.

She flopped her head over her shoulders to look at the shadow. However, what she saw wasn’t a distant shadow, but a pair of gleaming red eyes. Rolling around slowly, she touched the snout of the owner of the red eyes, wondering where she had seen it before.

Karin Kurosaki, I assume.

Karin blinked, pointing to herself. “Me? What does such a beautiful creature like you want something to do with me in Dream World?”

They are worried about you, Karin Kurosaki.

“Who is they? Ichi-nii? Yuzu?”

The owner of the heart you hold has not left your side.

She looked down and saw the materialised heart appear in her hands. Crinkling her eyes, she looked back at the creature. “Who does this belong to?”

If you look inside yourself, young Kurosaki, the answer should present itself. But don’t take too long. The longer you are absent the lower their hopes get.

“Hopes of what?” Karin demanded, clutching the heart to her own. “I don’t understand!”

Believe in what you feel, Karin Kurosaki, and you will return.

In a blink of an eye, Karin was alone again with the beating heart still in her hands. She looked down at the fragile thing, frowning for the first time since she had arrived. She placed it on the cloud next to her, staring at it intensely as if it would shout out the answer. When she figured that wouldn’t work, she picked it up gingerly and held it above her head.

“Who could you belong to, Heart? Who would give their heart to me to look after?” Karin mused, turning it around in her hands gently.

The heart emitted a pulse, going straight to her heart. With each beat the heart seemed to emit, flashes of scenes appeared before her eyes. Scenes of her family and friends around her, flashes of random people coming in to see her, flashes of people crying, she saw people looking more and more haggard and people crying over her still body. Karin noticed that in every single flash, Toushirou had not left her side once. He had his paperwork brought to him so he didn’t have to leave, she carefully assumed.

It took a few seconds for it to sink in. The love she had sensed from him wasn’t for Hinamori at all. All his love and concern wasn’t for Momo.

It was for her.

“NO WAY!!” she cried, shaking her head.

Her revelation caused her entire world to shake violently. She cried out for Fuyu Kasai to come to her aid, which she did without question.

Are you ready to return, my mistress?

Karin nodded her head as she was whisked up and away, her Dream World falling further and further behind as Fuyu Kasai brought her to the border of Reality and the Space Between.

You must cross this alone, my mistress. When you have strong resolve and sound reason, the barrier will drop and allow you safe passage. I wish you luck, my mistress.

With those instructions, Fuyu Kasai disappeared back to Karin’s Inner World. Nodding her head in acceptance, she closed her eyes and thought hard about her family and friends. She thought of what they were to her and how she had to return. She thought about Toushirou, the Icy Prince who loved her and her alone. Karin thought hard about how he had to know that she loved him back with everything she had to give.

Her eyes flew open, her resolve and reasoning strong in her heart and mind. She stepped towards the barrier and walked through it, confident in herself for the first time since she entered the Dream World.

~*~

Toushirou refused to give up. He knew Karin had a strong sense of survival. He knew she would pull through this. He kept a vigil watch over her, not wanting to not be here when she finally awoke. He knew her family had been contemplating shutting off her life support. It was something he would not accept. He could not accept it. As long as he was there, there was no way they would be shutting anything even remotely connected to Karin off. He moved his hand over her pale face and stroked her cheek gently, hoping beyond hope that she’d awaken soon. He pressed a gentle kiss to her forehead before he drew back reluctantly.

Just as he was moving back, her eyes flew open and she sat up suddenly, knocking Toushirou off the side of the bed. He let out a yelp of surprise, landing on his knees. He quickly got up and helped her take the tubes out her mouth gently. As soon as they were all gone she threw herself into Toushirou’s arms, burying her head into his shoulder. He immediately clutched Karin to himself, not wanting to let go for fear it was just an illusion.

“Karin…” he murmured, holding her tightly.

“Toushirou…” she rasped, coughing after she spoke.

He immediately got her a glass of water, which she had to resist from gulping down immediately. After she had taken at least half of the water in, she tried speaking again.

“Thank you… thank you for trusting me with your heart,” she said quietly, coughing again after her sentence.

Toushirou stroked her hair, still not wanting to let her go even for a second. She looked up at him with unusually bright eyes, needing him to say something. Toushirou saw the need in her eyes and smiled a genuine smile.

“You have held my heart in your hands for a long time, Karin. I hope that you will be the one holding it for a very long time.”

Karin’s eyes watered unwillingly at the words. She nodded, unable to say anything at all. Toushirou held her cheeks gently and placed his lips on hers in a chaste kiss. Karin felt her eyes flutter closed as the one she loved above all held her gently. He broke the sweet kiss after awhile, resting his forehead against hers.

“I love you, and you only, Karin Kurosaki. I would die for you and I swear to protect you at all costs,” he whispered fiercely.

Karin smiled gently as she pulled the snowy haired captain down for another kiss.