In the House of Tomorrow

Mild Spoilers: Set ten years after the war with Hueco Mundo. Assumes knowledge of current manga plot line.

Author's Note: Follows the general history/character development in my previous stories, "King's Key: The Four Prongs" and "Empathy," but you don't need to have read those stories to understand this one. RenjiXTatsuki

Disclaimers: The story is mine, but the characters belong to and are from the incredible imagination of the manga god Kubo Tite. Thank you, Sensei.

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"You may give them your love but not your thoughts. For they have their own thoughts. You may house their bodies but not their souls, for their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow, which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams." –Kahlil Gibran ("On Children")

Chapter One: Prologue

Even for souls, there are days best forgotten, regrets that linger and cause pain. For Renji Abarai, Vice-Captain of the Sixth Division, there had been only one such day. There had been days of disappointment in love and failure in battle; but these paled in comparison to the one day he had tried hardest to forget.

Disappointment in love had been the easiest to bear. Renji was used to rejection, although he had rarely been rejected. Handsome and charming, he had never had much difficulty meeting women. In fact, his winning smile had, on a number of occasions, resulted in an overabundance of the fairer sex and with that overabundance, complications. Still, that most desirable of all interactions between men and women, true love, had continued to elude him for nearly a century. There were only two women he had ever truly loved, and both, it so happened, had loved other men.

It was Renji's gentle nature which facilitated the loss of Rukia. He had wanted what was best for her. When the Kuchiki clan offered to rescue the former street waif from her life of poverty, Renji had quietly congratulated her and wished her well. He had told himself that she deserved a better life, with a real family. And so, despite his misgivings about her adoption into one of the most powerful Seireitei noble families, Renji had said nothing.

It had been the same when Rukia came to tell him of her first posting to the Real World. Instead of sharing his excitement and pride at the news of his own promotion to vice-captain, Renji had simply smiled and wished her success in her first mission. He often wondered whether things might have been different for them if he had told her how he felt about her. Instead, her heart had been free to love another; a man whom Renji admired and counted among his closest friends.

The only other woman Renji had really loved was Ichigo's sister, Karin. No longer the insecure, newly-minted vice-captain he had been when Rukia had first left for the Real World, Renji had pursued Karin unabashedly. Still, she had fallen in love with someone else. Unselfishly, he had guided them together, knowing what he was losing. Because it was right. Because he had loved her that much. Enough to let her go.

In truth, Renji had never truly failed at any task related to his work, so there was little about which to be disappointed. He was good; one of the strongest shinigami in the Gotei Thirteen. Still, he had never succeeded in besting the one man who, above all others, he longed to defeat.

Despite the offers of promotion which came from time to time, Renji had chosen to remain at the Sixth Division, vice-captain to Byakuya Kuchiki. It was his obsession, to one day conquer the man whose cool demeanor and powerful bankai were the stuff of legend. Still, rather than weigh on him, his painful defeat at the hands of his superior had strengthened Renji's resolve to become stronger. No, despite the pain of loss, both in love and in battle, Renji had only one regret, one day that he longed to forget: the day he had finally found his mother in the Soul Society.

Renji had died as a child in Okinawa, in a car accident. He had been four years old. His mother, injured in the same accident, had died several hours later. Though fortunate enough to find his way to the Soul Society, Renji had longed for his mother. Alone and hungry in the Rukongai, he had begun to search for her after hearing of the arrival of a woman with red hair, who looked so much like him, and who had also died in Okinawa in a car accident. The other children who lived in the squalid, abandoned warehouse did not understand why the little red-headed boy kept asking about his mother. They had long since forgotten their loved ones, and had come to see each other as family.

As an adult, Renji learned that most souls entering the Soul Society quickly lost their memories of their prior lives; a process which made it easier for souls to transition from life to death. Only souls possessing particularly powerful spirit energy, or reiatsu, were likely to retain any memories from their lives in the Real World. It was, for most, a blessing to forget. Life in the Real World went on without them, and their lives in the spirit world began without encumbrances.

The Soul Society had no formal laws regarding contact with souls from one's prior life. At first blush, the lack of legislation on the subject, in a society that was so highly regulated, might have seemed surprising. The reality, however, was that most of the souls who possessed memories of the past knew better than to search for their lost loved ones. It was simply too painful to find those you loved; a lesson Renji learned at an early age.

Renji's mother had been beautiful, full of life and happiness. Renji had been her pride and joy, the spitting image of his father. Like most young boys of his age, Renji worshipped the ground his mother walked on, and looked to her for protection and comfort. Their small family had not been wealthy, but Renji had never lacked for anything, least of all love. And so, when he found himself alone, alongside the wreckage of their small car, he had been frightened.

A young man dressed in a strange black costume had found Renji at the side of the road, crying. The young man had looked at him with sympathetic eyes, and gently touched his forehead with the hilt of a sword like those in the old samurai movies his grandfather used to watch. Renji's small body had felt light as air, and he remembered laughing with excitement as he flew up into the clouds like a bird, chasing a black butterfly.

Five years later, little of the joy of that day remained. Renji, now nearly ten years old, had been living on the streets with the other Rukongai children, stealing food from vendors in the main marketplace, and sleeping on the floor of the warehouse. It was later that same year that Renji met Rukia, and the two had become inseparable. Like brother and sister.

In those five years, Renji had neither forgotten his mother nor had he given up on one day finding her and being reunited with her. One day, a friend told Renji about a beautiful red-haired woman who lived in an area of the Rukongai nearly a day's walk from Hanging Dog and looked remarkably like Renji. Determined, Renji had packed the meager belongings he had, grabbed an apple from a street vendor, and headed out to find her. He didn't care that he had to sleep under boxes that night, he knew that, soon, he would be with her. Happy and safe again by her side.

It was mid-afternoon when Renji arrived in the place where the red-headed woman lived. It was one of the better Rukongai neighborhoods, with tiny homes lined up in straight rows, flowers growing in window boxes and neatly-tended yards. He walked behind the houses, afraid to attract too much attention and risk being run off by adults who might not take kindly to the sight of a dirty street urchin.

As he walked over the grass, he saw a young woman, her back to him, red hair cascading down her back. She bent down to pick up a piece of wet laundry from a wicker basket, lifting it up onto a line strung between two small trees and clipping it into place. There was no question but that it was his mother. He walked over to her, and she turned towards him as she heard the sound of his footsteps on the paving stones by the house.

"Mom?" he said, in a small voice, trying to contain his excitement and relief at having finally found her. She turned to look at him and smiled.

"Hello," she said, looking directly at him. "What can I do for you, young man?"

"Mom," he repeated, his voice stronger this time. "It's me, Mom. Renji."

"I think you must have mistaken me for someone else," she said. There was no hint of recognition in her eyes. "I don't have any children. I'm sorry."

"Mom," he said again, and this time, his voice trembled, as tears welled up in his eyes, threatening to spill over, "don't you remember me? I'm Renji, Mom. I've been looking for you. Please, Mom, tell me you remember me."

She looked back at him, her eyes sad. "I'm so sorry," she said, "but I'm sure I'd never forget I had a son. I'm not the person you're looking for." And, with that, she picked up the empty basket and headed back towards the house, glancing back at him once before opening up the door and stepping inside.

He ran after her, pounding on the door, desperate, now crying openly. "Mom, please," he begged, "I miss you." She opened the door and looked at him, no longer smiling.

"I'm sorry, child," she said, and he could see fear in her eyes, "I cannot help you. Please leave now. I do not wish any trouble for you." He stood silently, wiping the tears away with the back of his hand.

"Please," she said again, "leave, and don't come back here." He opened his mouth to say something, but she closed the door in his face. He banged on the door for several minutes, but she did not open it again.

Renji slept outside the little house that night, hidden underneath a tree. In the morning, Renji again knocked on the door. This time, however, it was a man who answered. "She is not your mother any more, child," said the man. "She has forgotten you. She does not understand. Please. If you love her, please leave her alone. Leave her in peace."

And so that day, for the first time in his life, but certainly not the last, Renji walked away from something he wanted desperately. Because it was right. Because her loved her that much. Enough to let her go.