#Isshin is also responsible for keeping Kon alive in this AU

[gallusrostromegalus]

Actually on the subject of anime/ whatever your preferred young adult media is and having terrible parents, what is Ichigo's dad going to be like?

(I have like less than passing knowledge on bleach but I know a lot of people don't like his dad and I am definitely going to read AEIWAM because it sounds fantastic and I'd love to hear more)

Actually I'd love to hear more about any of the parents, I've never really gotten why people want parents to be more active in the escapist stories but now I've read a couyple really good fics and stories with it and yeah I get it now and think there should be more of it. It's great

Anyways I'd love to hear about more of any of the parents (sorry for being a bit vague I don't really know the characters and it sounds like talking about some of the parents mentioned might be spoilers but I am so excited for the fic it sounds really cool! May you have a lovely time writing and creating with it!)

You have excellent taste in freshwater fish, so of course I'll oblige. It's key to remember that I've taken an excavator to the backstory of a good many characters in the fic.

So Isshin is a... marginally better dad? I think it's fundamental to his characterization that he's kind of a fuckup who prefers to avoid interpersonal conflict, which is not a sin, but it does not make good parent material in a shonen series.

So AEIWAM!Isshin... Kind of tells the kids the truth- or at least, the stuff necessary to keep them safe.

The way he tells it, there was a shinigami that lived in his family's attic when he was a little boy- that part is kind of true! In canon, all the shinigami that turn up in Karkura town have nowhere to stay and end up crashing at the houses of psychically aware people. He tells the kids that the Shinigami's name was Kaien Shiba, so if he started telling stories about his favorite nephew, it's just the guy who lived in his attic!

...Which is why he knows all about hollows, and tells his young children about them and to avoid them at all costs, especially after three-year-old Ichigo points at one circling over the house and asks what the "Big Bird" is. He signs Ichigo up for Karate that afternoon, because if his son inherited either of his parent's powers, he's going to need to learn to defend himself.

Isshin also explains why his children can see ghosts and he can't, as well as the fact that they never see their grandparents AND how he met their mother in the same story- What actually happened was that Isshin had met Masaki, an escapee of the Quincy cult (previously engaged to her cousin, Ryuken, who ALSO did not want to be engaged to his cousin, partly because Ew and partly because he was already married) and dying of hollow poisoning, and did a magical blood transfusion to save her, losing his shinigami powers and committing some mild treason in the process.

What Isshin and Masaki tell their children is that Isshin used to be able to see ghosts, just like them, but when he was a young man, he and his parents were out driving and got hit by a truck. They died immediately, but Isshin had a serious head injury and spent months in the hospital. But! In the next hospital bed over was a young woman who had recently lost her family as well, and had fallen gravely ill. Love may or may not be able to bloom on the battlefield, but it can bloom in the Hospital ICU. Mommy and Daddy's friend Ryuken is Masaki's cousin who treated both of them in the hospital. That part is even true!

Speaking of Ryuken Ishida, he's also trying his best.

He had a terrible loss some nine years ago, when his wife, Kanae, died. Ryuken was a pureblood (read: Highly Inbred. White-haired Anime Boy syndrome has the same cause and detrimental health effects as high-white merele in dogs) Quincy, but his wife was not, and when Yhwach decided to do The Big Slurpy where he sucked the soul energy out of every descendant of his except one particular line, she decided to go down swinging and take as much of the Quincy cult out with her as she could. Like Uryuu did in canon, she used her powers until they burnt right out of her soul and killed her, rather than let that cancerous, cult-leading sonofabitch go after her family.

Ryuken then had another terrible shock a year later when his father-in-law was killed by hollows while secretly training his son in the Quincy arts, something Ryuken had explicitly forbidden, but Soken thought it important that Young Uryuu at least learn to control his inherited abilities. Uryuu was saved from the same fate by an exceptionally powerful hollow that tore the others limb from limb as soon as she recognized the frightened cries of her son.

Much like his friend Isshin, sometimes true love can be found in the midst of tragedy, and now Ryuken and Kanae are reunited and raising Uryuu together. Karkura has more than it's fair share of hollows, and so she's on a modified Santa Clarita Diet to keep her hunger at bay. She's doing quite well on it even! It's a bit strange to say, but Ryuken is possibly even more madly in love with her now that she's a hulking monstrosity with an appetite for flesh than when she was still human.