Spoilers through Manga 353 - takes place offscreen, immediately after that chapter. My nice-thought-though-it-probably-didn't-happen course of events. If the reviews on this come back favorable, I'll probably do a second chapter.

Disclaimer: Not mine, just playing with the characters a bit.

DUST AND GOLD

Ash drifted, silent on the slow-moving air of Las Noches.

A single sob broke the air.

Kurosaki Ichigo fell to his knees, anguish written across his face, as Orihime cried out again, a fresh wave of crystalline tears tracing their way down her cheeks.

"What... have I done?"

Orihime was still sobbing, quietly, when she dropped to her knees beside Uryuu with a whispered apology, her hands trembling as she summoned Souten Kisshun to restore the hand that Ulquiorra had cut away, the wound in his stomach from the Ichigo-that-wasn't.

Souten Kisshun could heal the body, but it would never be able to heal the scars on their hearts that this battle had left. Uryuu was calm, his face composed and his eyes steady, fixed on Ichigo.

His tattered shihakusho rippling in the sporadic gusts of wind, Ichigo stood silently, his back to them, a few paces away. Zangetsu, still in its Bankai form, was held loosely in his right hand, and his gaze was fixed on nothing. Every few breaths, a tremble would run across the line of his shoulders, accompanied by a weak gasp.

"It's not your fault, Kurosaki," Uryuu said finally, startling Ayame and Shun'ou as they held the glowing shield over him, making Orihime jump and stare at him with tears still flooding her eyes, before she turned to look at Ichigo with guilt written plainly across her face.

"I killed him."

The words were barely more than a whisper, but they echoed up here in the silence.

"I killed him."

"He was our enemy, Kurosaki," Uryuu answered, feeling a weight in his gut that had nothing to do with the healing wound there. "You had no choice. He gave you no choice."

"And I killed him," Ichigo repeated, his voice rasping harshly over the words. "What kind of monster does that make me?"

'A practical one,' Uryuu thought but didn't say, because viewing life and death in terms of sheer practicality was an appalling thought. He flexed his restored hand, feeling a slight tightness in the knuckles, a tingling in the tips of the fingers. Both problems vanished within seconds, as the last shreds of flesh restored themselves.

"Was I dead?"

The question was from so far out in left field that it took Uryuu a moment to understand what Ichigo was asking.

"He blasted a hole the size of a basketball in the middle of your chest, Kurosaki. You were dead. And when Orihime healed you, the wrong you came back. That's all."

"He kills me, so I kill him back." The short, bitter laugh sounded like tearing silk, harsh and ugly in the suddenly-still air. "Except here I am, again."

Uryuu didn't have a response for that; he stayed silent, staring impassively at Kurosaki's back, wondering when Ichigo's shoulders had become so broad. Beside Uryuu, Orihime trembled, soundless sobs, soundless tears.

The sound of steel on stone caught both of their attentions; Ichigo had thrust Zangetsu into the surface of the dome, spinning to face them, his eyes fire-bright with a gleam just short of madness.

"Uryuu, how good is that reiryouku absorption technique of yours?"

Uryuu hesitated a beat before answering, trying to figure out how that actually pertained to anything they had been discussing. "Excellent. Why?"

"Can you target a specific reiryouku that you want to gather?"

An interesting thought... "Probably...?" Uryuu answered, feeling his forehead crease in bewilderment. "Kurosaki, where are you going with -"

The meaning of it hit him all at once, and if his back hadn't been against a rough lump of stone, he would likely have fallen over from the shock.

"Kurosaki, are you absolutely out of your mind?!"

The faintest ghost of that familiar, sad-sweet smile brushed over Ichigo's mouth. "Probably," came the shaky admission, and Uryuu wondered how confident you could be in your sanity when you knew you had a murderous monster living within you.

"He was good to me," came the sudden, fractured whisper from Uryuu's shoulder, and he turned to look at Orihime in confusion.

"Ulquiorra," she explained, her voice breaking as her shoulders continued to shake. "He was good to me, as good as he was able. He... protected me..."

The sight of her tears, of the anguish on her face, was enough that he would have fought his way through Hueco Mundo single-handedly just to never see that pain in her eyes again.

He didn't need Ichigo's harsh whisper, echoing on the air, to urge him to his feet on the shattered stone.

"Do it, Uryuu."

A single, dark mote of dust drifted close to his hand as he focused on that single reiryouku, one that tasted of despair and nothingness, fighting the drifting winds above the dome that sought to tear away the particles he sought.

The single piece alighted on his fingertip, and suddenly there were others, drifting purposefully, moving to him from all directions, ignoring the currents of the air that tried so desperately to scatter them.

He seized them all, pulling them close and gathering them between his hands; not many of them, so little left of the empty-eyed Espada who had so nearly swept away their last hope.

Orihime needed so little.

Souten Kisshun glowed gold.

Slowly, the ash began to grow.

It was torturous, waiting here while his friends fought below, knowing that Renji and Rukia and Chad were struggling for their lives somewhere under that false and fractured sky.

But until he saw this through, he knew he wouldn't be able to lift his blade against anyone, friend or foe. Not until the bleakness weighing on his consciousness was dealt with, one way or another.

Under the golden glow of Souten Kisshun, the ash continued to grow.

Measuring time by heartbeats, Uryuu felt himself growing numb to the horror he knew he should have been feeling. The featureless ball of ash he'd gathered was expanding, beginning to take shape, a rough pentacle under that gleaming shield, the merest suggestion of a living form.

Watching the progress of her power, her defiance of the gods, Orihime measured time with tears.

White, black. There wasn't enough yet for there to be more colors, none of the glowing green that had defined him, but he was there, if only in the meanest form. Skeletal and barely-defined, the body rested against the broken stone, glowing under the shield that defied Fate itself to restore him.

The twist of metal appeared, at first the merest splinter, growing rapidly as it became his blade. As it grew, the half-formed body jolted, flesh and muscle and skin returning in a rush as the regenerative powers he'd been so proud of suddenly came back, doubling the power of Orihime's shield.

With a gasp that echoed like a scream, Ulquiorra Schiffer opened his eyes.