DISCLAIMER: I do not own Bleach or any of its characters, they belong to Tite Kubo
This is a different version from Old Memories, I was unsatisfied with it and decided to start a new fanfiction on Urahara. Hope you enjoy!
The first thing that Kisuke noticed about Yoruichi was not her bright honey coloured eyes- or so people liked to say, Kisuke thought that they were just plain yellow, nor was it the fact that her plum coloured hair had been chopped short like a boy's. He did not, could not, see the look of half irritation and half boredom that had settled itself innocently on her face as it only could on a child.
The first thing that Kisuke noticed was the expensive pink silks that hung off her in waves and the ostentatious jewellery that arranged her hair; a poor attempt at refining the snagged ends.
The next thing he saw was the expensive palanquin that she was in with the symbol of one of the Four Noble Houses on its side. That told him all he needed to know.
Kisuke jumped. His sleeves flew out behind him as he landed with a thump on the dry ground, creating a miniature sandstorm in the process. Ignoring the jarring pain spreading up his feet, Kisuke launched himself upright from his crouch with his fingertips as he clambered up. Once upright, he ran.
With the pads of his feet keeping minimum contact with the dusty soil, he felt the wind whistle through his hair as he leaped over rocks and other obstacles. His muscles tightened and carried him across the dusty ground and over a trickling brook. He sprang over the terrain, his lithe form and thin frame gave him the look of a predator, or so he would like to think, all speed and agility.
He chanced a quick glance behind him through his thick mass of pale blond hair. The two guards were still following him; their red faces covered in perspiration affirmed his assumptions. They were low level soul reapers, hardly trained, and could not even use shunpo.
Kisuke ran quick calculations of the odds in his head; the guards were obviously well-fed servants who probably did nothing but stand around all day. They did not have his fear hardened muscles or his hunger and desperation. If he could get to the hideout, then Tessai would be able to handle the rest.
The piece was decoration he had stole from the little girl's hair was well worth enough food to feed Tessai and him for a month. Clutching the comb close to his chest, he ran faster. He had pretty good chances, the hideout was not far off and he could easily out manoeuvre anyone who was in his way. At least, that was what he thought.
The third thing he noticed about Yoruichi was that she was fast, very fast. As she stood in front of him with a look of boredom in her eyes and her short form emitting regalement, Kisuke understood. Before he felt a fist collide solidly with his nose, he realized two things. The first was that she was the first one to disrupt his calculations; the second was that she was a true predator and that he was, and always would be, simply a scavenger.
When Kisuke woke up with a jolt, the first thing that he realized was that he had passed out. The next thing he realized was that his nose hurt. He leapt up and instinctively covered his face with his hands, expecting to be struck. The blow never came. As he cautiously peered through his fingers he saw the girl that had, presumably, punched him, smiling with an amused expression.
"Finally woken up have you? You little rascal." The comb was not in her hair, instead, she was twirling it on her index finger; maybe simply to irk him, show that she was superior, that she had more than he did.
Which was true anyway, but he detected nothing except amusement in her eyes, no scorn, no disgust, and maybe, just maybe, a hint of approval.
He had not been thinking when he had sprung to the palanquin and pulled the biggest, floweriest comb our of the girl's hair. He had been desperate, his insides squirmed from lack of food and his mind was muddled.
He then realized that they were in the palanquin, with its silk curtains and cushions piled around them. And moving, Kisuke froze for a moment in alarm, he would not be able to get back to Tessai if they left the district.
When he did not answer, the girl frowned; she was obviously used to having things her way. "Answer me, commoner." She demanded.
Kisuke did not know what 'commoner' and 'rascal' meant, but he guessed that they were somewhere along the same lines as 'brat' or 'thief'.
"Yes." He answered back the only way he knew how, short and simple. He knew too well that nobles did not take well to mouthy Rukongai residents.
The girl frowned again, crinkling her pretty brow. That was the fourth thing he noticed about Yoruichi, she was pretty. Even back then, Kisuke had noticed.
"Name?" She had switched to one-word questions; she must have thought that he was stupid, which worked in his favour. He hesitated anyway, if she knew his name, then she could track him down. Plenty of Rukongai shopkeepers would be willing to rat him out, for a fee of course, which the girl in front of him seemed to have no trouble in giving.
So he stayed silent, which he soon realized was a mistake as the girl shot another one of her glares at him. 'Remember Kisuke, never disobey a noble's whims because they can hurt you.'
"Urahara," he spurted out, rolling the 'ra's, "Urahara Kisuke."
"Kisuke huh? Nice name." The girl commented. Kisuke tried to hide his surprise, she had used his first name without any invitation. Then again, the girl looked more like someone who sent out invitations than someone who received them.
"I'm Yoruichi, Shihoin Yoruichi."
Kisuke's stomach sank; she was from the Shihoin clan. Even in Rukongai, rumours had circulated about the notorious Shihoin and its ruthless stealth force. His chances for escape would be next to none in front of this violent princess, if that was who she was.
"Come with me Kisuke, and become a Soul Reaper."
Kisuke quite literally jumped, and rammed his head directly into the ceiling of the palanquin, Yoruichi chuckled.
Then she leaned forward, and all mirth was gone from her eyes, "You have reiatsu Kisuke, that's why you're always hungry, right?"
Inwardly, Kisuke asked himself why the girl would bother asking him a question that she knew he had no answer to.
Outwardly, Kisuke could only nod numbly with his head still ringing. In the back of his head, he heard a stray thought, a mixture of fear and awe, the early symptoms of respect. This girl, how had she known?
It was a well kept secret between him and Tessai; they had never uttered a word about the strange need for nourishment that plagued no one else. As children and outcasts, Kisuke could only imagine the consequences if anyone found out that they were not eating out of habit, but out of need.
"I can feel it, your reiatsu. It's coming off you in waves, you are strong Kisuke, and you'll become a great Soul Reaper."
Kisuke's head was no longer spinning from the impact but from what Yoruichi was saying. She was almost hypnotic and his mind filled with visions her words had weaved. Soul Reaper, those lofty beings that lived inside the big white walls. Reiatsu, such a strange word, food, he would never be hungry again if he lived in the Sereitei. He was tempted, so tempted to say 'okay, I'll come', he imagined himself looking up at the wall, the feeling of being on the other side. No longer stealing, no longer running.
Then it hit him. His dream shattered and reality struck him like lightning. Tessai, if he left then Tessai would be all alone, wondering where he went, worrying over him like the big brother he had tried to become for Kisuke's sake.
He turned his head away from her, the strange girl that had tried to barge into his life. "No."
The fifth thing that Kisuke noticed about Yoruichi was that she was strange, which was quite something if it had been remarked by Kisuke.
Instead of becoming angry like before, she simply smiled as wisely as a smile could look on dimpled cheeks, told him where to find her if he ever changed his mind, and let him out of the palanquin.
So Kisuke was left there, alone, standing in the middle of a dusty road in the 56th District of North Rukongai, with the comb clutched tightly in his hand and the palanquin disappearing into the distance.
Very melodramatic, Kisuke thought among the millions of other ideas swirling in his head.
The sixth thing that Kisuke noticed about Yoruichi was that she did not play fair, which suited him well enough anyway.
When Kisuke finally reached the hideout it was night. The sliver of moon that had risen did little to illuminate the black night surrounding the outskirts of the village. He looked slightly worse for wear with a torn and dirty yukata, a massive tangled nest of hair, and a noticeable bruise his nose.
Kisuke's eyes were triumphant nonetheless when he ducked through the low entrance of the hideout. They glinted victoriously in the fire light as he held up a sack of potatoes.
Tessai, wide shouldered and heavily muscled, jumped up from where he was hunched over the carefully kindled flame and all but suffocated Kisuke with a bear hug.
Wriggling out of the embrace, Kisuke tossed a pouch on the floor and ripped off a chunk of dough with his teeth from the pancake he had stored in his yukata's folds. Dangling the bland confectionary from his fingers, Kisuke offered the remainder to his friend before unceremoniously flopping down on the floor and sighing contently.
"Put two of those potatoes in, would you?" Kisuke gestured to the old iron pot bubbling over the fire.
Tessai nodded, still too stunned by the younger boy's sudden return to answer, and threw the unpeeled potatoes into the scalding water.
"Where did you get all this food Kisuke?" Tessai asked when he felt that he was composed, though his voice still shook as he eyed the skinny boy wearily. He had long grown accustomed to Kisuke's rather questionable ways of acquiring food, but then again, he had never brought back such abundance.
Kisuke lazily opened one eye and yawned, "Don't worry, I didn't kill someone or anything, even I wouldn't stoop that low," ignoring his large friend's deepening frown, he sat upright.
"I got it from a pretty little noble's flowery little comb." He sang in an off key tune.
Tessai's forehead creased and smoothed several times as Kisuke retold his adventure.
"A Soul Reaper? The Shihoin girl, if that is what she really is, offered you a chance of becoming a Soul Reaper?"
"Uh, yeah, I turned her down though." Kisuke rubbed his eyes and lay back down. But Tessai would not let him sleep yet.
Tessai paced agitatedly across the small one-room hut that they called their hideout. Kisuke had built it, as he had all their previous 'homes'. Admittedly, his architectural skills had much improved from their first straw-and-sticks home. The ceiling stopped leaking somewhere along their third home and their current hideout, built with baked mud and wooden boards, was the very epitome of comfort with its threadbare blankets in one corner and the aforementioned pot in the other.
"Kisuke, you do realize that you refused a direct order from a noble? And a Shihoin at that!"
The scrawny boy rolled his eyes, "It was a request, not an order. Besides, who knows if she was lying or not? She could have just wanted a reason to give me a good thrashing."
"Perhaps, but that doesn't explain why she gave you her comb."
Kisuke's snort was as sarcastic as a noise produced from nasal passage ways could be, "Who knows? For entertainment or something else those nobles like doing." He rubbed his nose absentmindedly before crawling on all fours over to the pot.
He grinned crookedly as he sniffed its contents, "Hmmm, potatoes with onion skins boiled in water, delicious."
The seventh thing that Kisuke noticed, or deduced really, about Yoruichi was that she probably ate three meals a day.
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