Characters: Ishida, Orihime
Pairings: onesided IshiHime
Warnings/Spoilers: Spoilers for Hueco Mundo arc.
Timeline: Hueco Mundo arc
Author's Note: Okay, I keep writing dome aftermath stories; I have no idea why. The ideas just keep flowing to me. This one will be, I think, the shortest one yet.
Disclaimer: I don't own Bleach.

There are black and red splashes on his white clothes, the clothes that make him highly noticeable in the night darkness. His eyes are slightly glazed over again as he stares out over the wilderness of Hueco Mundo, following the path of a dust devil with faint fascination.

"Ishida-kun?" He looks around when he hears Orihime calling his name. She is stepping over bits of loose rock and rubble, trying to keep her clothes from catching on the rock. Her voice is sad and faint and filled with an emotion he wished he couldn't hear—guilt.

Under the milky moonlight, Orihime is possessed of a pale, wan beauty. Chapped lips and deep-shadowed eyes, blue smudges under brown. Face still sparkling with long-dried tears, tendrils of light auburn hair sticking to her cheeks. She looks a mess, marred, but remains that way to Ishida, always.

"Why did you all come here?" She's already asked that question, and Ishida knows, instinctively, that Orihime won't stop asking until she has a satisfactory answer, and that she's not going to ask anyone but him. Because the people down below can't possibly understand what's gone on up here. Ishida isn't entirely sure what she wants to hear; the gleam in her eyes is alien and yet one he knows all too well.

Orihime rests a hand on a bit of rock; from where he stands, Ishida can hear her slightly hitched breathing, the prelude to tears he prays he won't see. Thankfully, Orihime seems to be utterly drained of tears, and Ishida breathes a sigh of relief; he's always hated to see her cry.

"Did you come to rescue me?" Orihime asks, in a quavering voice, her deep brown eyes imploring him to give some sort of answer.

Ishida stares at her for a moment, mouth open slightly. Almost involuntarily, his eyes soften as his head tips gently to one side. "Yes, I came here to rescue you—"

And he stops.

Orihime smiles sadly, a stranger's smile, and Ishida realizes that she knows.

She's heard the slip up. And so has he. Wrong pronoun. Should have been "We". Not "I". Ishida wishes he never said it, but he has, and he can't go back now.

Orihime's still smiling, the strange despondency deepening over her face, now compounded with a look of sympathy, and for just one moment, Ishida feels a deep, intense longing to close the distance between them. But he can't. He isn't quite brave enough, and only gazes at her, feeling a hopeless sense wash over him.

"But I think we both know that you're capable of saving yourself," Ishida whispers, combating her sad smile with a tiny one of his own.

Orihime nods silently, and says nothing to contradict him.

They both know what the other's not saying.