~Cold but I'm Still Here~
A Bleach fanfic

Disclaimer: I do not own Bleach or any of it's components. If I did, momo would've died and I would've ended up with hitsugaya, happy? My dreams are crushed….

Summary: Ember is an ordinary girl, leading an ordinary life. But it was boring, lacking, and downright depressing. Her only high points were when she was watching anime, listening to music, and sleeping-all of which sent her to a better place. She longed for something to happen that would turn her life upside-down, anything to bring her out of her lonely, miserable shell, she longed for adventure. She never thought anything would happen, until one day, a mysterious stranger transferred to her school and turned her life out-of-whack. Yet for some reason, this mysterious stranger was highly reminiscant of her favourite anime character….

~CHAPTER ONE~

(NORMAL POV)

Amber sat in class, staring blankly at her computer screen. It was yet another boring day, at her horribly boring school.

"With this we can conclude that the reflection angle will equal the incident angle when measured with a protractor. For homework, textbook pages 14-18 as well as your science project! Now, get into your partners and take up last weeks questions…"

As her monotone teacher drawled on about things that she didn't care about, she absent-mindedly played tetris in a small window on her sidebar. I know what you're thinking, why was she on a laptop in the middle of class? Amber went to a top school in her country, did she belong there? No. Did she want to go there? No. was she getting anything out of the experience? Nothing except stress and lack of sleep. Could her family afford it? Not in this lifetime. A mix of her grandfather's support and a trust fund left behind by her uncle paid for her education. She thought it a waste, none of her classes were the least bit challenging. She was bored and suffering. She was excluded from friends close to home and activities because of the school's location. It was in a city about an hour's drive away from her small town. It wasn't exactly what you would call joyful. Anyways, the school was big on technology. Every student was supplied with a laptop, and everyone one of their classes was done on it.

"Hey, Amber, are you okay? You seem to be spacing out…" her friend sarah nudged her side. Apparently she had been spacing out. Snapping out of her trance, she responded.

"What? Oh, yeah, sorry. And I thought I told you not to call me that?" Sarah rolled her eyes and sighed deeply. Amber had a strict aversion to her name. While it was original, she sometimes didn't like it, and constantly requested everyone around her to call her 'Ember'. She loved fire, she thought it was pretty and downright awesome. (don't worry she's not a pyro-freak)It was her favourite element. Because ember related to both fire and her real name, it was her preferred nickname, and that's what she went by.

"Anyways, I don't really care about taking up the questions, so how was your weekend? Sleep well?" Amber groaned at this. She had recently started suffering from insomnia. When she did get to sleep, it was brief, and her mental and physical health was suffering as a result.

"Meh, the usual. A whopping total of 3 hours, but I did get A LOT of staring-at-ceiling time." Amber actually DID try to sleep, yet nothing worked. She hadn't slept properly since Wednesday(it was now Monday morning-first period) but her mom refused to bring her to a doctor or give her sleeping pills. Instead she was on 4-hour doses of tylenol for headaches caused by exhaustion, and eye drops for dry eyes due to lack of rest, not to metion her two daily coffees.

"You should see a doctor or something, you need rest, you need to be in your best shape for the ottawa trip…"She was right. Every year, their school took them on a trip to somewhere like quebec or montreal, and you stayed for an extended period of time depending on your grade. In february(lets just say it was mid-january) they were taking a 3-night trip to ottawa-grade 8's only. Everyone was looking forward to it, even Amber who hardly ever showed excitement for anything in her sleep-deprived, hermit mode.

"…yeah…" she sighed staring off into space.

"But that doesn't matter now, what matters now is that I have a math test next period, and I have no idea what it's on!" sarah laughed and amber let out a disgruntled mumble, her suffering seemed to amuse her friends greatly. You know how I said none of her classes challenged her? Yeah, sometimes her math class challenged her. But that's because for some reason, she mad a mathematical understanding of an eleventh grader. She had finished half of the grade 10 course in grade 7, but she was starting to have some difficulties. Mainly because she didn't study, do homework, or pay attention in class AT all. Amber was a total lazy-ass procrastinator. She didn't even have the motivation to go to the bathroom sometimes-though, she did eventually get up when she decided she was going to burst.

For the rest of the class, they mainly chatted quietly and laughed. It continued until…"uh-oh" Amber gulped as the bell signalling the end of class rang. Sure she hated science, and she was inwardly glad that it was over, but she was a teensy-bit nervous about her advanced grade 10 math test.

Un-surprisingly enough, amber doubted she passed her math test as she slowly walked down the hallway to her world languages class. Her school was also big on diversity, in grade 8 they did a rotation of 4 language courses, they were on their second rotation-mandarin(chinese). Amber drifted in and out of the lecture, thankful that it was a review class. When it came to the dim-witted language teacher, study time roughly translated into, 'youtube/email/msn/facebook, etc.' glad to finally get a break, she put in her ipod headphones and went on outlook to check her email. To her surprise, she got a message from the international student coordinator which was sent to the whole school. 'ah, more exchange students, they never have any middle school exchange students, its annoying, I don't care who's entering grade 12…' she was then forced to eat her words as she read the email.

To Teachers and students,

I am pleased to announce we have 2 new transfer students! They are from japan, and have recently moved to a town close-by. They will be staying with us for the rest of the year. We have a new female student entering grade 11, and a male student entering grade 8. I hope you all make them feel welcome and comfortable here. I encourage you to interact with them and say Hi to them in the hallways. They are new...

And with that amber deleted the email. The usual teacher crap. 'say hi to them' 'be nice!' 'show them around campus!' yeah amber had heard all of it before. She was always the one who had been forced to show the new kids around. Teachers thought she was, 'a kind, talented young student' but the truth was, she was only quiet because she was off dreaming in her own little world. She only got good marks because she was naturally smart, and she should thank god she was too. The rest of her family was a little slow. I'm not saying they were stupid, she just out-ranked them when it came to debating/math/reasoning/logic…okay, she was smarter than them. She was actually a gifted child. She preferred not to think this way though, she preferred to say, 'the aliens infused her brain with learning-enhanced liquids when they abducted her 10 years ago'. Yes, she was one of those smart-ass sarcastic types who was great at belnding in with the crowd. It was quite amusing to family when she got into a fight with her mother while they were visiting. When they fight, her mom screams, threatens, yells, anything to make amber recoil in some way, but instead, amber stands there resisting the urge to cause her mother physical pain, and shouts back witty remarks and comebacks, until she finds something that stops the argument, and leaves her momn standing there like an idiot while she walks back to her room to watch bleach having won the argument.

Amber weaved through the crowds of the cafeteria with some difficulty, but with hints of proffessionalism-she had clearly done this before. She finally saw the tall, blonde head she was looking for. "karen!" she yelled. Her friend gave a slight wave before setting her lunch tray down and carefullt ripping the crust off her sandwich.

"hey, what's up man? Haven't seen you all morning, ain't you gunna eat?" amber shook her head and had a sip of water. Since she had entered her stage of insomnia, she had lost her appetite and instead drank endless amounts of water. Karen shrugged and ate her snadwich. They were soon joined by many of their other friends. Sarah was the one to start conversation.

"So what do you think the transfer student will be like? It must be pretty neat living in japan, if he doesn't speak much english Ember can translate for us, can't you?" Amber rolled her eyes. Her friends new she loved japan, and had always wanted to go there. She knew basic vocabulary because of all the anime she watched but not enough to lead a full conversation.

"I'm not a bilingual I can't translate a whole crapload of a conversation I can say hi, sorry, goodbye, how are you, stuff like that, and I can barely pronounce it come to think of it…" her friends just shook it off and entered into gossip and conversation. Amber just drifted in and out of what they were saying, her thoughts were straying. Lately, she had been having trouble keeping focus. She mindlessly followed her friends when they stood up and left the cafeteria, deeply immerssed in her thoughts. Having a photographic memory, she replayed a few scenes from 'Bleach' in her head. Okay, so she was particularily obsessed with the anime bleach-not that anyone knew what that was. She was preety sure she was the only one 'uncool' enough to watch shows in a different language in the whole school, not that she really cared what others thought.

The rest of the day flew by. She had sport practice(hockey skills, which she skipped and just did some freestyle skating) music, and french before the blissful release that was the end of classes. When she got in the car for the lengthy drive home, she stuck her headphones in and mouthed the words to the songs while staring out the window, absorbed in random thoughts. The night flew by, and before she knew it, she was staring at the ceiling listenign to her ipod again trying aimlessly to get to sleep.

When she actually managed to get to sleep it was 5:30 in the morning. What time did she wake up? 6:00 obviously. Whenever she managed to get some sleep, her mom always woke her up for something, her getting rest was obviously an issue.

(TOUSHIRO HITSUGAYA)

"captain, can you feel it?" I nodded slightly at my lietenant, eyes not leaving the moon.

"I've been able to feel it since we stepped foot into the real world. No wonder we were sent here on such a high-priority mission, now we just need to find the source of it…" Matsumoto just nodded numbly back at me before clapping and brightly exclaiming, "weellllll there's nothing we can do about it now I expect! Let's get some rest shall we? We have school tomorrow!" grumbling at the thought, I followed her back through the window of the house we were staying in for however long we needed to. She was right though, tomorrow we find it…. Whatever 'it' was.

(AMBER MATTAYA)

I lazily opened the door to my first period history class and sat down. It was a double period, which just meant more droning on about stuff I don't care about, and will probably forget within 15 minutes of learning it. I plopped down in an empty seat next to my friend Gabby, actually it was one of two empty seats I was the last one there. Grudgingly, ,we all started taking notes on the boring subject as the teacher began her lecture, it was really annoying, I had completed this history course last year so I was just wasting my time. Deciding notes were not worth my time, I secretly logged onto msn and started a conversation with Gabby(even though she was sitting next to me-we weren't aloud to talk).

PinkPolish123: Hey im bored hbu?

Black_fire: im practically dying, history is suicidal.

PinkPolish123: So are you excited for the exchange student?

Black_fire: should I be? When's he coming anyways? I didn't read through the whole email, it used too much unneeded energy.

PinkPolish123: -_-;; wow that's great. I suppose I get the honour of letting you know that he's comign today. He's supposed to be here now, but I guess he's running late…

Black_fire: oh really? Hm, well lucky him, how come the newbie gets to miss this freakkin lecture?

Gabby rolled her eyes and signed off to take notes. Sighing realizing no one else was on, I signed off too and grudgingly took notes, just so I'd have something to show at the end of class. I was really…REALLY sleepy, could I fall alseep now? Ahh, that'd be nice, but I knew it wasn't going to happen no matter how much my eyes burned, so instead, I finished the notes on the lecture before the teacher finished it (remember-I already took this class!) and played tetris quietly of my sidebar, leaning my cheek into my hand. Suddenly there was knock at the door. The teacher was upset that she had to stop droning in her monotone voice, but nevertheless spoke up with a perky "come in!"

A guy around my height walked into the room. I felt the sudden urge to jump out the window screaming my head off. Standing at the front of the class was…no, I wasn't going to say it. This is obviously a dream right? Nodding to myself, I pinched my arm firmly with my nails, and had to restrain from yelping in pain and letting my eyes water, 'ouchhh, that was painfull….' The teacher then spoke up. "Oh! You must be the new student from japan! Welcome to garde 8 history! Why don't you stand up in front of the class and introduce yourself! Tell us some information like hobbies, likes and dislikes, things like that"

I held my breath, trying to make it as un-obvious as possible that my eyes were practically trying to escape their sockets they were bulging so much.

The boy stuck his hands in his pockets and looked up at the class with a cold, stony look and spoke in a clear, bored voice. "oi, I'm the transfer student from Japan, I don't like many things, but I do like winter and watermelon. I have lots of dislikes, but I won't bother telling you all those otherwise, we'll be here for a long time. I don't really feel like listing my hobbies because I don't have many of those either…oh yeah, and my name is Toushiro Hitsugaya"

…I nearly passed out on the spot.

A/N: woo!! Fist chappie of a new fanfic!! Hope you like it!! Anyways, I think I should explain what's going on for anyone who's confused…I'm actually from canada and so, let's explain a few things…

This story is based in Ontario, Canada, because that's the place I know best. Why toushiro is in canada will be explained in later chapters. Anyways, obviously for safety reasons, I won't be using the real names of towns/cities/people. I only used my name for the main character because…I couldn't think of anything else, kay? Also I needed a name somehow related to fire…you'll find out why…

Anyways, thanks for reading!! PLEASE REVIEW!!! I got one review on my other short story and it made me feel soooo special/happy/hyper that I want lots more for this story!!!!! Remember, reviews=longer/more chapters and faster updates. Give me your thoughts! Flames accepted but they will make me realllllly sad…and you don't want that do you? ;3

Anyways…that's about it, message me if you have any questions!! I WILL update soon…as soon as someone reviews, nah jk, I'll get bored and do it today probably. Thanks again!!!

~ember-chan~