BLEACH: The Dusk In Red

A sea of cold never ending snow swept across the human world. The touch of death, frost, and loneliness, all cooped up into the innocent form of a snow flake. Despite it having taken the lives of many, despite the terrors it may bring and the accidents it may cause, it was an inspirational sign for even more.

The hope of Christmas.

**

6 months had passed since then. Nothing had been able to return back to what it once was, but it was clear the damage was healing. Since the time of holidays was near Chikako thought it would be a good idea for the students to go on break slightly early.

This left Kai with nothing to do of course. Ito had disappeared somewhere, and well... Yuki was Yuki. 

"I guess I could go to the Dojo..?"

Yet for some reason, he just couldn't bring himself to go there. Every time he tried, he kept remembering Shinten's face, their happy moments, and then suddenly he was dead. 

To freshen his mind, he decided to go on a walk instead. Not without his Zanpakutō of course. Ever since that attack, even student's were allowed to carry their weapons wherever they went. Furthermore, he felt a strange uncomfortable feeling whenever he didn't have it. He just had to know where it was at all times.

Kai's trip took him outside of the Seireitei. Staying here any longer was just too much for him to bear. Although they had mostly recovered from the damage, he blamed himself for the destruction caused. It was loosely his fault after all.

Little did he know, his Journey to the outside would take a far too bizarre twist.

**

Every time he looked he was still surprised. The hollows had not touched even a single square foot of the Rukongai. Everything was intact, and no one had been harmed, all still getting to live their lives as per usual. It was an interesting phenomenon.

And then suddenly, that peace and quiet disappeared as something crashed right in front of him.

It was like a meteor, barrelling through the sky while partially lit on fire. It's impact into the ground was right in front of Kai, creating a massive shockwave which blew him and several others back.

People screamed as they hurriedly got away from the source, apart from Kai himself who ran towards it. He shook his hands as he tried to make out what just happened, and was shocked as he and one other called it out,

"A Sleigh?"

The World Of Winter, Antarctica

"Oh no. Oh no oh oh oh no... NOOOO!"

An abnormally small humanoid with pointy ears, dressed in a warm coat of green screamed at the top of his lungs. He bursted through two wooden double doors, as his face turned purple from all the shouting.

"It's a disaster, neigh... AN EMERGENCY! THE WORLD OF WINTER IS IN DANGER! WE'RE ALL GONNA DIE! CHRISTMAS IS DONE FOR!"

The room he shouted in was a massive factory. A bunch of other short humanoids like him were working away, assembling would be toys that travelled down numerous conveyor belts. Most ignored him, while others looked at him with concern before quickly getting back to work.

One of the quite not human beings, approached him with a clipboard in his hands. It was slightly taller than he was, and very menacing too boot. Suffice to say, he was not happy.

"Watcher Kahn. What the hell are you doing?"

"ITS THE APERTRICE! IT'S GOING TO BREAK THIS YEAR! I SWEAR IT, IT'S GONNA BREAK!"

The elf looked at him with frustration in his eyes. He had been saying that every single day since the start of December, for every single year for the last 10 years. He just softy put his hands on his shoulder before instantly smashing the clipboard against his head.

"Don't you ever get tired?? That thing was going to 'break' for the last 100 years! All you need to do is slack off, and leave the rest of us real workers, to do our jobs! Can you not tell everyone here is sick of your shit!??"

This was the Northern Soul Society, The World Of Winter. Unlike the other 2, this place existed for the sake of one particular tradition, Christmas.

Elves, Santa clause, a reindeer with a glowing red nose, those were all real in this place. And it was this Societies sole purpose to make sure no good child goes without a present this year.

In this Society, each Elf had a born purpose. Whether that was to make toys in the workshop, or to make sure everyone was properly on task, every job was important and critical.

And it was this particular Elf, Watcher Kahn, was born with a particular task that everyone saw as useless, the Watcher.

As Kahn stumbled back up, he quickly ran away back through the double doors he entered from, crying. Of course, delivering to hundreds of millions of Kids all around the world was a difficult task, so every elf was expected to do their part, yet Kahn had almost nothing to do, apart from... watch.

He ran through a terribly dark corridor, with only a small blue light at the end of it. Once he ran through, he was introduced to a stupidly large room with a giant floating spherical glass orb, filled with a glowing blue liquid inside. Its glow lit up the whole room, dowsing it in an aquatic light.

This was the Apertrice.

"Why? Can no one understand? It's really going to break this year??"

The entire thing was covered in scratches and cracks. It seemed the liquid inside would burst out at any moment, but surprisingly, it had been like this for the last 200 years. By now, 50 generations of watchers had already seen it in this state.

The Apertrice is a sealing device. 2,000 years ago before the holiday of Christmas was even conceived, a demon of snow and Ice roamed the continent known today as Antarctica.

It lived a secluded life without bothering anyone, but one day something changed. It suddenly went on a frenzy as it began to terrorize the human world, but three heroes stepped up to seal it.

The hero of the dead. With his black robes and burning sword, he melted away all of its terrors with his powerful flames.

The hero of Mysteries. With his collection of strange masks and magic, he scared the beast to the farthest reaches of Antarctica, and sealed it away for all eternity.

And finally, the hero of Joy. With his jolly face and innumerable number of gifts, he brought back happiness to the terrified kids. Although most don't believe in him anymore, he was still remembered by one name...

Klaus.

Heavy footsteps began to make their way to the sealing room, followed by the sounds of heavy breathing. From the shadows, a large old man with a beard as white as clouds entered the room. Although he wasn't in uniform yet, you could tell who he was despite him wearing his causal brown long coat.

Kahn turned around in surprise, and quickly got up as he saluted,

"Santa Claus! Good evening sir!"

"Good evening Kahn."

He jumped a little. Rather then by his title, he was addressed with just his name, and by the great Santa Claus no less. It made him somewhat happy.

"I heard you got into another scuffle with Gerbert. What he did to you was unacceptable, so I had him put in detainment."

"Detainment?? That's a bit harsh isn't it?"

Klaus then put his hand on the Elf's' shoulder.

"Listen, everyone else may not care, but you have the most important duty of all Elf's. And that is to watch the Apertrice. If the being in there is ever set free, it will be the end of not just Christmas, but the human world as we know it."

He spoke with a sense of nobility and calmness. Just hearing his voice made the Elf feel an immense responsibility for watching this thing. He slowly turned to look at Santa in the face, only to see his eyes locked onto the Apertrice.

"Which is why if you truly feel that there is something wrong. If you truly think that it will break this year, then do what you heart tells you to do."

Santa then turned around and began to head off, leaving those words of encouragement forever engraved in that Elf's brain. In just a heartbeat, the Elf knew what he had to do.

As far as he knew, there was no way to fix the Apertrice. Once it started to break, it was only a matter of time until the demon inside found its way out. Which is why the only way it could be stopped, was by defeating it once it broke free. However, there was a problem.

No one in the Northern Soul Society was a capable fighter, even Santa himself was as weak as a regular human. Which is why if the Elf wanted to do something, he would need to head outside and look for a saviour.

"The East branch! That's it!"

He had heard about it a long time ago. The Hero of the dead was a man who came from a land in the east. If he could go there and find him, surely he would help to defeat the demon once again.

The Elf quickly sped out of the room, with time dwindling by the second. He quickly broke out of the work shop, and found himself in the engineering room.

There was a stable containing several reindeers, all with varying heights and looks, but what he was interested in, was the sleighs. Thankfully, there was no one in the room, so no one would see what he was about to do.

Santa travelled the world in a sleigh pulled by nine reindeer. However, that was only in his Sleigh model X-500. There was a total of 5 different sleighs that he travelled on, in the past, with his oldest being the most unreliable.

His oldest, the model X-MAS, required no reindeer and it was the fastest of his sleighs, but it was considered a failure in the fact it had no control. This effectively made it useless for delivering presents since stopping it was nearly impossible. But for what Kahn needed it for, it was perfect.

He quickly jumped onto the old thing, and pressed a button. There, a strange looking steering wheel made from a wreath spawned. The Elf grabbed onto it, instantly turning it on.

**

The Elf's were enjoying their long break. Playing in the snow, throwing snowballs at each other, making snowmen, and whatever else you could do with snow, even eating it.

Until suddenly, an explosion wrang out in the distance as a flying red object quickly zipped into the sky. They all looked in confusion until they quickly realized, what was going on.

They've been robbed.