Disclaimer: Kubo Tite owns, I just make them breed.
AN:AU-ish, Set during the Arrancar arch. Hmm, warnings for language? I blame this fic on my mother's family. They are all… eccentric. And have way too many kids.
It's called a baby
Night-time. The stars were high and bright, twinkling. Witnessing a scene they had seen unfold countless times, and would witness innumerable more times before the world ended. It was not to say if the stars were particularly amused by the passing of events at this specific moment in time. Who can really tell what amuses the stars?
Night-time. A man was pacing back and forth in front of a building bearing a sign that spelt out "Urahara Shop". Head down, hands behind his back, he had an air of calm about him that reeked of being utterly fake. Proven a second later, when the front door slid open, and an orange-haired, scowling head appeared in the slice of light. The pacing man stopped pacing so abruptly he got his feet tangled and nearly tripped, sending his green-stripped head-wear flying.
"Urahara-san, dad says that if your partner in crime tries to turn into a cat one more time, he's going to dump her at a vet."
The scowling head disappeared back into the shop, leaving the man to look at the open door, a whole range of expressions running across his face, before his features settled back into his old, lopsided smile. Reaching down, he picked up the hat, dusted it off and placed it firmly back on his head.
"She's going to claw me if I run away," he muttered, and stepped inside.
☺☻☺☻
Tessai looked the same as ever, and yet one got the distinct impression he was going to split from ear to ear in a huge grin any minute. On the other side of the table, the three other regulars of the shop were doing a remarkably good imitation of the three wise monkeys.
See no evil - Renji was all eyes on his bowl of rice, his chopsticks going to his mouth with a single-mindedness that was quite impressive even for a free-loader; hear no evil – behind Renji, Jinta had stuck both fingers in his ears, and was humming like a crazy, and speak no evil – Ururu was looking at the hallway leading to the sleeping quarters with eyes even bigger than usual, her mouth slowly moving like she was quietly repeating something to her self, something she still didn't quite get.
When Urahara walked by, all eyes turned unerringly to him.
"Eh, you guys seem tense," he said cheerfully, tipping his hat. "Something going on?"
A high-pitched wail echoed through the shop, followed by a stab of reiatsu so intense Renji dropped his chopsticks. Jinta did a double take, pulled the pillow he had been sitting on over his head and buried his fingers so deep in his ears they had to meet midways. With a certain trepidation, Ururu got to her feet, looking like she was going to ask something, but the man in the hat and sandals was sprinting down the hallway, and out of reach of any questions.
Ichigo was leaning against the wall outside the bedroom, still scowling, and stifling a yawn. Why he had been dragged along, in the middle of the night, for something so – so foreign – was utterly beyond him. Apparently, his father thought his sisters were too young for certain facts of life, disregarding that they had been elbow-deep in the blood of traffic victims at the clinic. Obnoxious as ever, his old man had run out of the door in pajamas, clutching a bag of medical supplies in one hand and Ichigo's collar in the other, leaving an open-mouthed Rukia behind with the sleeping twins.
As Urahara came bounding down the hallway, flung open the door to the bedroom and literally jumped through the opening, Ichigo sincerely hoped he would be left out of the mess from now on. Give him a Hollow any day.
☺☻☺☻
In the bedroom, Urahara was met by a sight that would have made him flash-draw Benihime if the situation had been any other.
A dark-skinned woman, purple hair clinging to her sweaty face, lay quite naked on the tatami-mat, and kneeling between her spread legs, intently studying the scenario, was a large, dark-haired man.
"Ah, welcome back!" Doctor Kurosaki Isshin exclaimed, rising to his feet and smiling widely at the shop-owner.
"How is Yoruichi-san?" Urahara asked softly, giving an encouraging smile to the woman on the floor – who growled at him in return.
Isshin chuckled. "Yoruichi-san is in a rather festive mood. She has been treating all kinds of things. I thought your presence might ease her mind."
"She threw me out, promising to do things to me I'd rather not repeat," Urahara reminded the doctor. "Isn't that right, Yoruichi-san?"
The woman's golden eyes narrowed dangerously. Another spasm of pain raked her body, and she clenched her teeth.
"For fuck's sake, get your ass down here, Kisuke, or you're gonna eat through a straw for the next month!"
"See?"
Not one to let a lady down, Urahara knelt down at Yoruichi's side, and smoothed a strand of hair away from her cheek.
"I don't really think it's a good idea to change shape right now, Yoruichi-chan. It could cause all kinds of complications."
The dark-skinned woman muttered something obscene.
"Am I forgiven, kitty?" he inquired.
"Get it out of me, and I'll forgive you," she growled through still-clenched teeth.
"I think the correct term is ´baby´."
"SHUT UP!"
☺☻☺☻
Half an hour later. Jinta had fallen asleep, fingers still in his ears. Renji and Ichigo had 'volunteered' to do the dishes, and were now in the kitchen, yelling insults across the porcelain. And Ururu was still wondering.
Tessai had gone to the storeroom to get a few items from the two catalogues worth of baby accessories he had ordered, when the reason behind one black cat caught in the pickles-jar had become apparent. Digging out a package of diapers and a white-masked, chest-holed plushie, he noted a small, neatly wrapped parcel placed on the lower shelf. Picking it up, he read the label: With thanks, was all it said, in neat, if somewhat cramped writing. Now where did that come from? The big man stuffed the parcel into his apron, wondering.
And in the bedroom, "a battle of wills" would be the most fitting description.
"Yoruichi-san, come here," Isshin said, with a rare note of exasperation. Said Yoruichi was currently crawling on all fours across the floor, heading for gods knew where, a just as rare expression of panic on her face.
"I don't want to!" she hissed, yanking her leg away from Isshin's hand. The doctor rolled his eyes, setting back on his haunches to take a short break from trying to convince a very stubborn woman that the kid in her belly only had one way of coming out.
Dealing with a woman as extremely fit as Shihouin Yoruichi had proven to be somewhat of a problem. The former commander was counter-acting the contractions, holding back instead of pushing, and she absolutely refused to listen to reason. Or stay in one place.
"It's your girl-friend," he said pointedly at Urahara, who was sitting next to him, sporting a dazed expression. Right now he just about wished Yoruichi had turned into a cat, into this stubborn, back-pedaling nightmare. Didn't animals have easy births?
Pushing back a few locks of hair that was by now about as sweaty as Yoruichi's, hat and sandals long abandoned, he crawled after the woman he adored, and managed to corner her under the shelf with the 'safe' firecrackers from Kuukaku's latest shipment.
"Yoruichi-chan, would you please stop?" he implored, speaking like one might to a wounded animal. She shook her head.
"I know it hurts, and I am truly sorry for not being able to share the pain with you, but would you at least give me a chance to help you?" Yoruichi bit her lip, her face shifting from anger to one of fright, and it truly shocked him. This nearly equaled the score, as Yoruichi swerved to the left, once more trying to get away. Urahara was quicker. Locking his arms around her, he held her tight, and after a moment, her overworked body went limp in his embrace.
"What is wrong?" he whispered into her ear, with the honesty she was perhaps the only person in the world to know from him. She hung her head.
"I'm afraid, Kisuke," she muttered. He stroked her hair. "Of becoming a mom?" he asked, keeping his voice carefully neutral. They had whipped the subject until both parts were ready to puke at the mere mentioning of 'baby', 'child', 'kid' or even something remotely reminiscent. But they had reached an agreement. At least he had thought so.
"No, not that." He breathed a sigh of relief, which Yoruichi never noticed, as she fought down another contraction.
"Of all the rest…" she said vaguely. "This one," – she touched her swollen belly tenderly, - "is the least of my worries."
"Our worries, Yoruichi-chan," he said, patting her lightly on the arm. "Ours."
And so the real work began.
☺☻☺☻
The kitchen was spotless, and the mysterious parcel had been left to stew on the counter. Outside, the stars were beginning to fade, but still the inhabitants of Karakura town slept the sleep of the deserving. Except for the inhabitants of one little shop.
Yawning, blinking, face-rubbing, they sat and hung at the table in various states of zombie. Renji was resting his head on the tabletop, his normally perky ponytail looking like a potted plant in dire need of water, and Ichigo was making a stain on the ceiling alternate between two and four blurry copies, depending on how much his eyes crossed. Jinta's fingers had evacuated his ears from sheer boredom, and as such he was not immune to the enthusiastic coaching coming from down the hallway, and which woke everybody up once every minute or so. Ichigo's dad had a very persistent voice.
Ururu, who had finally figured things out, was looking at the hallway with all the joyful expectancy normally reserved for chimneys at Christmas.
When the latticed doors materialized right in front of her, she hardly even flinched.
☺☻☺☻
"Very good! Now, just one more push and the head is out! And it looks like he has his mother's hair!"
Bracing Yoruichi against his chest as she did her best to obey the loud-mouthed doctor's suggestion, Urahara none the less found it fitting to give her a thumbs-up. The laboring woman tilted her face, colored even darker by her efforts, and hissed at him, her slitted, golden eyes telling him with in no uncertain terms that she was not amused. He gave her a kiss on the forehead.
Ever the scientist, and quite confident in his own skills, he had placed good money on the hunch that dark won out on fair even when dealing with exiled shinigamis and gigais. Yoruichi had taken the bet, because – as she put it – nature wouldn't allow any version of Urahara Kisuke with purple hair.
"Well, now there's no helping it. And I don't really think purple is that bad with green and white," he chucked, as Yoruichi set her chin to her chest and let out a wail that had Isshin go starry-eyed with admiration, startled the no-longer-so-sleepy gathering in other parts of the shop, and had a certain newcomer bend her brows in a frown that gave Ichigo a run for his money. Looking from one to another, and realizing that they were not getting up, she reluctantly settled back with a face like a thundercloud.
☺☻☺☻
"Congratulation! You are the lucky parents of a bouncing, healthy boy!" Isshin exclaimed. With a ridiculous cooing sound, the doctor held up a red, wrinkled and mewling bundle. Smiling, Yoruichi slumped back against Urahara with a low sigh, her eyes closing briefly while Isshin proceeded to count fingers, toes, ears and other appendages, cut the cord, and swathe the infant in a soft cloth adorned with paw prints.
"Here you go," he said, carefully placing the infant into Yoruichi's waiting arms.
"I thought you were supposed to hold them by their feet and slap them in the butt 'till they cried…" Urahara muttered, looking at the tiny face of his son with the strangest feeling in his long life. It was utter wonderment, but also a heavy weight settling on his shoulders and in his heart. Like someone was tugging at the chain of fate a shinigami was not supposed to have.
"It's called a baby, Kisuke," Yoruichi whispered, her smile soft as velvet.
A moment later, the baby did cry. Not because of any kind of butt-smacking, but because the door was slammed to the side. To admit a very tense woman in a black, back-less uniform.
"Oh my, welcome back to my humble shop, Soifon-Taicho!" Urahara exclaimed.
☺☻☺☻
The stars had yielded to the light of the sun a long time ago, and things had returned to normal - as much as they probably ever would.
Yawning mightily, Urahara Kisuke had to admit he had found one thing he could not out-sleep – the sound of his son testing his lungs. He pushed his hat further down over his face, in the vain hope it would render him invisible. Not really going to happen, he conceded in defeat, when he was buried hat-deep in Matsumoto's cleavage a moment later, the only comfort being that her impressive assets cut off most of her squeal of congratulation. Then she was off, bouncing over to the calm center in the circus his shop had been turned into – Yoruichi with the baby at her breast, quite serene and relaxed. Soifon perched on her shoulder, looking torn between the instincts of a body-guard and a woman. Others were not so inhibited. The opposite, rather. Every female that had any connection to the shop, even some girls in school uniforms that had been dragged along by Orihime, had formed a veritable wall around Yoruichi and the baby, filling the air with nonsense words and cuddly sounds.
The men were there in strength as well, starting with Ichigo and Isshin that had never gotten around to leaving, over Ishida complaining to the deaf ear of said Ichigo that he had to redo all of the baby-clothes in blue, to Hitsugaya Toshiro who stood on tip toes to try and sneak a peak, when he thought no one noticed.
As he tried to count the visitors, Urahara began to notice something disturbing. Was it just him, or did they glance at him every so often, shaking their heads? And was that Rukia snickering?
He hadn't expected them to dote on the father – and after having his spine rearranged by a congratulating backslap from Chad and being smothered by Matsumoto, he was grateful for that. But did they have to look like so… skeptical? The idea was still rather intimidating; he would be the first to admit, but come on – he was a nice guy. Responsible, clever, handsome, loving, cute…Look at Jinta and Ururu – well-fed, top-notch fighting abilities, obedient and yet self-assured. Ok, maybe not. But was it really that bad?
"Oh, manager-san, I nearly forgot about this." Tessai cut through his rising misery, and held out a small parcel. Urahara took it with a questioning look. "It was lying in the storage-room. I haven't seen it before."
"No card?"
"Only this." The big man showed him the thank-you-note.
"Hmm…" Eyeing the package with some suspicion, Urahara decided to brave the front.
"Excuse me, daddy coming through," he exclaimed, pushing his way to Yoruichi's side. Placing the baby on her shoulder for a burp and closing her shirt, she gave him a smile that reassured him plenty.
"Have you seen this one before?" he asked, showing her the package.
"No. But let's open it." Gingerly, she handed him the baby – they really needed to find a name for him – and began to tuck at the bright yellow ribbon.
Wiping a bit of drool from his son's face, Urahara had to shake his head. Purple indeed. Now that his features had smoothed out, there was no doubt in his mind that the baby was the most gorgeous blend of him and Yoruichi. Soft, dark downs covered the tiny head, but his skin was pale (later, Urahara had to admit that he might know about the genetic rules for hair, but how much skin could darken after birth he had not a clue about) and the chin was definitely his. The large eyes were the indeterminable milky blue of the newborn, so that score had to be settled later.
"Who on earth gives away a baby blanket embroidered with tea cups?" Yoruichi said. Urahara looked up to see her hold out a big piece of shimmering fabric, patterned with – tea cups.
"One who really likes tea?"
"Yes, that must be it, Kisuke," she said tersely. "But it does have a nice smell." She held the blanket to her nose. "Whoever sent this must have a kitty as a pet."
"With blue fur?" Orihime asked, plucking a few blue hairs from the blanket.
Somewhere, far, far away in a big, big castle, someone sneezed.
- Fin
More AN: And yes, – it's very possible to hold back on the contractions. My aunt did, and she's only a fitness instructor, not a former Commander of the Special Forces.