SM: Alright so this is my first attempt at writing a story without my co-writer. I'm not too sure how it's going to turn out but I hope it's at least entertaining. Enough about that though, it's time to get on with the story.

Disclaimer: I do not own Bleach or any of its characters.

Changing Winds

Chapter 1: Arrival-Welcome to the Gotei 13

"She's late."

"Maybe she just got lost."

"Yeah, after all the Seireitei is a big place. Newbies get lost in here all the time."

It was early afternoon and Kensei was sitting in the meeting hall of the squad 9 barracks. He was waiting impatiently with the rest of his squad for the newest member to walk through the doors, but she was already almost an hour late and it was starting to irritate him. He sat at the head of the room leaning heavily on his large fist in boredom. His gray fringe hanging just over his eyes.

"They're right, Kensei! Besides she looked really spacey!" the girl next to him exclaimed cheerfully. Her green curly hair bouncing as she wiggled in her seat.

"Tch, like you're one to talk," Kensei muttered darkly. She really knew how to agitate him, and some days just her voice did the trick.

Just then, there was a soft knock at the door that was barely heard over the chattering squad members. Kensei raised an eyebrow in the direction of the door and a few moments later it slowly opened an inch or two.

"Uh...is this...the squad 9 barracks?" a nervous voice asked.

The members all glanced at each other as one of the unseated members went over and pulled the door open further. As he did so the girl behind it fell in having been leaning heavily against it. Kensei internally groaned as he watched her fall to the floor and ran a hand through his hair in irritation.

"You're late," he stated firmly giving her a stern glare as she quickly returned to her feet trying not to meet anyone's eyes.

"I-I know, sir," she mumbled, sitting up and wringing her hands nervously. Her long, strait hair was a dark red, almost black, and hung loosely in front of her face thanks to her fall. "I-I'm so sorry. I got lost along the way."

"Then how'd you find your way?" a tall thin man asked with long auburn hair. He looked genuinely concerned about her well being.

"Well...Lieutenant Aizen...showed me the way," she answered. She hunched her shoulders up to her ears as she spoke giving off the air that she was embarrassed by this.

"So...because you couldn't follow instructions, you troubled the Lieutenant of a different squad to lead you here," Kensei summed up easily.

"N-no...well I guess maybe," she mumbled in reply. "B-but he offered to..." Her words cut off as she quickly looked up from the floor to argue her case only to freeze at the look he was giving her. "Yes, I-I troubled him...to help me."

"Kensei, you big meanie!" the green haired girl exclaimed, jumping up and latching onto the slightly taller girl. "You're scaring Ume!" She turned her head, brown meeting dark green for an instant, before she smiled widely at the girl. "I'm the Lieutenant, Mashiro Kuna. Welcome to squad 9, Ume."

"Ah...thanks," the girl muttered nervously looking in the opposite direction.

Kensei sighed at this as he got to his feet and marched over to the pair. The girl froze forcing herself to stare at the floor as he glared down at her. Then he dropped one hand onto her head and forced her to face the entire squad, her eyes widening in surprise. "Alright, enough of this crap," he growled lowly. "You're entering your first squad so drop the nervous act and introduce yourself already."

"R-right," the girl squeaked, her long dark red hair bunching up beneath his grip. "I-I'm Yukiko, actually...and um, I guess I'm the new 10th seat."

"You guess?" Kensei demanded incredulously. "You are the 10th seat. Quit acting so meek and have some freakin' confidence already."

"S-sorry," she squeaked again turning out of his hold and bowing deeply to him. "I-I'll try to do better, sir."

"And another thing, it's not sir," he grumbled. "The names Kensei Muguruma. Call me Captain, or Captain Muguruma, that's it."

"Yes...Captain Muguruma!" she acknowledged, flinching under his harsh tone.

"Kensei, you're scaring her again, you big meanie!" Mashiro scolded again grabbing hold of Yukiko from behind. "Now it's time to meet everyone else!" She turned and directed the girl's attention to a tall dark skinned man with a white mask and goggles covering his face and an afro. "This here is Tousen, he's our 3rd seat!" Yukiko visibly stiffened but it went on unaddressed as she turned again facing a tall bald man with a dark brown mustache. "This is Kazaki, he's our 5th seat." Yukiko nodded to the stern looking man appearing as if each new face was only adding to her fear. Then Mashiro turned her back towards the auburn haired man. "This is Eishima, he's our 4th seat." The man smiled at her in greeting and Yukiko managed a tiny quirk of her lips in reply before she was turned yet again to a man with black hair up in a high ponytail and a white headband. "And this is Toudo, he's our 6th seat." Yukiko barely inclined her head towards the man. "Well...I guess that's everyone important. So what do you think?"

The other members in the room sweat at this knowing there were at least a dozen other seated members that weren't mentioned, but she still referred to the them as unimportant.

"Lieutenant Kuna, I know she'll get the chance to meet the others, but I still think it's a bit much to refer to them as unimportant," Eishima hissed under his breath.

"What, she'll only really be dealing with us to start with," Mashiro reasoned. "Kensei said so. Is there something wrong with that?"

Before anyone else could speak, the Captain's fist came down on the Lieutenant's head. "That's enough, they don't need to know what we're going to be doing just yet," he growled. "Now we got a lot to do, so why don't you take the kid around the barracks and show her where her new room is."

"Okay!" Mashiro agreed readily grabbing a hold of Yukiko's arm. "Come on! You'll love it!" And with that the two disappeared out the door, the Lieutenant still happily holding onto the new girl who looked like she'd rather be anywhere else.

After the two were gone, Kensei dismissed the rest of the squad accept for his commando unit. "Captain, what did Lieutenant Kuna mean about us dealing with the new girl more than the others?" Eishima asked curiously.

"She's got a lot of uncontrolled power," Kensei explained easily pulling out a few documents. "Problem is everyone she's ever dealt with has been unable to deal with it so she's had to try to learn to control it herself. We're going to be kicking her into shape before I let her go on any missions with the other squad members."

"How powerful is she?" Toudo asked confused by the explanation.

"Just her reiatsu has injured her fellow classmates back at the academy," the captain explained looking each of them over. "It tends to be triggered by her emotions or by losing her focus."

"So she has no discipline," Kazaki stated in understanding. Everyone nodded in agreement picturing the small girl and trying to figure out why their captain decided to make such an untrained girl their 10th seat.

"What are her powers?" Tousen asked, drawing everyone's attention back to the captain.

Kensei gave the group one of his special smirks. "You'll have to wait 'till tonight," he told them mysteriously. "I made sure Mashiro knows to take her to the southern training grounds. She'll give all of you a quick demonstration. Once that's over, I'm going to need all of your assistance in getting her trained properly."

The Commando Unit all declared their agreement to their captain's declaration. Once that was settled, they turned their attention to the folder their captain held in his hands as he began handing out important assignments to each of them to carry out.

Yukiko was silent as she was dragged along by the over excited Lieutenant. The older girl showed no sign of letting up either. Unfortunately, the new member could not get up the courage to say anything to her about her now aching hand.

"This is the cafeteria, Ume," Mashiro explained pointing out a room filled with tables that had people sitting at them eating. "Doesn't all that food look good?" It was clear her mouth was watering and she wanted to stop and eat, but somehow she managed to keep her focus...sort of. "I'll have Kensei get me something when we're done."

Yukiko nodded though she really didn't get what the girl was talking about. The next couple hours were spent with Mashiro dragging her all over the barracks and the rest of the squad nine area, while Yukiko tried with all her might not to fall or have her arm ripped out of her socket.

The last place she was shown to was a small room with a table in the center, a small shelf against a wall and a mattress lying on the floor at the back. "And this is where you'll be staying, Ume!" Mashiro explained before twirling around the room. "It's a lot smaller than mine...but that's okay. You can come stay over whenever you want."

"Uh...thank you...Lieutenant Kuna," Yukiko murmured nervously.

"NO! We're friends now, so just call me Mashiro."

"Ah...M-Mashiro..." she stuttered finding it difficult to call her superior something so informal.

"Much better!" the Lieutenant exclaimed happily as she hugged the young 10th seat. "Well, we should get going. Kensei's waiting for us. Oh and don't worry, all your stuff is being brought here, so when you get back it'll be filled."

"Th-thank you...I think."

"Come on!" Mashiro called out, grabbing a hold of her arm once more and dragging her out the door. "Kensei's waiting!"

Hours after the introduction of the strange girl, Kensei and his Commando Unit stood on the edge of the southern training grounds as the sun set below the horizon. They waited patiently, quietly, for about twenty minutes as the grounds grew continuously darker until the two females appeared. Mashiro was still dragging the other around, her face beaming with an expectant smile while the other looked increasingly nervous, again.

Once the two reached the edge of the training grounds, Mashiro finally let the younger girl go and went to stand next to the others as the captain approached her. "All right kid, I saw the demonstration you put on at the school," he started making her flinch slightly and her face redden. "I want you to do something similar here. Show us all what you have to offer, what your skills are, what you are able to do with just your reiatsu, and even how far you can go with your Shikai."

"B-but, my Shikai is really..." she started in a timid stutter.

He cut her off with an amused glare. "If you can manage to hurt any of us with that, then we don't deserve our positions," he told her seriously. "Now get moving."

She nodded reluctantly before heading down into the center of the grounds while the Commando Unit all relaxed on the grass where they'd been standing; Mashiro sprawling out completely on her back complaining about being too tired.

Once they were all settled in, Kensei called down to Yukiko letting her know she could start. She bowed to him, signaling that she'd heard, and made her way to the very center of the grounds before taking up her starting position.

Then she began slowly raising her reiatsu, the air around her starting to shift until it became a torrent of wind, barely leaving her visible as it shot out in all directions making her stop and stare in fear. The group of spectators didn't flinch as one strip headed right for them only to be stopped by a flick of the captain's wrist.

She stared at them in slack-jawed awe as the rest of her expelled reiatsu dissipated; all except for a single strip that struck the tree-line directly across from the spectators, knocking over several of the trees before finally dissipating. "I'm so sorry!" the girl finally expressed bending fully at the waist to show her apology.

Kensei took a moment to look at the expressions his men wore at the display and was pleased to see a rather surprised response. He could tell from that one display of power, the girl had their full attention, just as she'd done with him, and just as she'd done with Shinji; or at least he was sure that was what caught the blonde's attention.

"Don't worry about it, just keep going," he shouted down to her waving away her apology.

She nodded reluctantly after that before moving on to her sword play. She easily drew her blade and began going through all the training exercises she could remember. This part obviously was not well received by his men as they stared at her with bored expressions.

"She's not very good at this is she?" Kazaki asked frowning down at her.

"Not really," Kensei agreed.

"Her movements are rather elegant and flowing though," Eishima pointed out.

"They are just lacking any real strength," Tousen supplied.

"Yeah, but I didn't pick her for her swordsmanship," Kensei stated easily. "Just wait a second...you'll see."

They all shrugged and continued to watch as she paused, took a deep breath, and used her right hand to hold her sword by the handle pointing down, while sliding her left hand down the blade to the tip and called out, "Breathe, Soyokaze."

The energy around her exploded, shooting a barrage of wind in all directions. When the wind calmed down they were able to see her holding two fans, one in each hand. She then proceeded to swing them around her body churning the air currents around her. The amount of energy she was releasing was fairly impressive for someone who just exited the academy but what really caught their attention was when she started releasing jets of wind that would slice through everything in their path.

The Unit saw her expression become far more serious as she continued to fling the deadly wind with fluid, elegant motions. Then all at once, they felt her energy spike and a particularly powerful gust fired off towards the barracks. She almost fell over in her attempt to stop it, but soon found it was a pointless attempt as Kensei was already in front of it and blocking it with his hand.

Yukiko sighed in relief as she collapsed to her knees and panted heavily trying to get her breath back. "I can see why she needs a more powerful trainer," Tousen murmured voicing the others' thoughts.

Meanwhile, Kensei made his way down into the training ground. "You need to have better concentration when handling your Shikai," he muttered darkly.

"I-I know," she whimpered tensing in her position on the ground. "I'm so sorry. I slipped up and nearly hurt everyone."

"You're right, you really screwed up," he said firmly. Then he reached down and lifted her up off the ground and back on her feet. "That's kind of the whole reason I had you demonstrate your abilities here. Everyday you're going to be training with all of us here until you have complete control over your own power."

"S-sir?" she asked looking up at him in surprise. "How come?"

"Uncontrolled power is just a disaster waiting to happen," he explained. "Don't worry, you won't be around the unseated members until you've gained control. Can't have you accidentally killing off my squad."

"R-right sir."

"That's Captain Muguruma."

"S-sorry. Captain Muguruma."

"Ume!" Yukiko jumped as Mashiro tackled her to the ground. "You were awesome. We should spar, it'll be great!"

"Not right now, Mashiro," Kensei sighed pulling his Lieutenant off the lower seated member. "The kid probably needs some sleep too. Just wait until tomorrow."

"Ah, you're no fun Kensei," Mashiro pouted. She didn't argue though as Kensei began escorting her away from the training ground.

Before he got too far, he turned back to his new 10th seat and gave her a curt nod. "Hey, get yourself some sleep. Make sure you're ready first thing in the morning for training."

She nodded and bowed to him as he turned back around dragging Mashiro with him.

Yukiko's POV

She couldn't believe what she was hearing. It was the first time anyone had actually attempted to assist her in gaining control. She was thrilled at the idea that she'd finally be able to learn how to use her abilities without hurting anyone by accident.

She watched her new captain leave with the rest of the commando unit without any of them looking back at her and she felt her spirits plummet. They weren't doing it to help her. She was certain they actually hated the idea of needing to help such an undisciplined and frankly dangerous soul reaper.

She sighed to herself and started heading back to the barracks to get some much needed sleep trying hard not to think about her new trainers. As she went, she got some odd looks from the other squad members that she passed. Had they seen her screw up?

No one so much as spoke to her and she felt her spirits plummet even more. It was turning out to be the same as the school and the orphanage. No one would want to approach her, or talk to her much less actually befriend her. She was going to be all alone again and there was nothing that would change that.

When she finally reached her room, she collapsed onto her bed and curled up into a protective ball before starting to cry. She'd never be an effective soul reaper. She'd always be the plague that everyone that she was. It had always been a hopeless endeavor to try, as everyone had always told her. Maybe...she should really give up.

Shippoman: So that's the end of chapter 1. I know there wasn't a whole lot of information and it probably seemed weird. All the chapters will be switching from Kensei's POV to Yukiko's POV. Anyway, since my cowriter Copper Moon is unable to write currently I decided to try my hand at writing my own stuff. So let me know what you think. Criticism is always welcome, though no flames please.

Squad 9's got themselves a new 10th seat and boy does she need a lot of work. Will they be able to train her to have control or will she become a destructive entity? Stay tuned to find out.