As night falls, man with curly, unruly blonde hair wearing a white and green pinstriped hat and green kimono takes a mental note of his store's stock. Today was about as slow as any other Saturday, but at least he did manage to part with some of the power necklaces that he recently added to the shop's inventory. This was more than great considering said power necklaces were really just bits of candy and spirit floss thrown together by a certain timid shop assistant with way too much free time on her hands.

Kisuke Urahara is your typical shrewd, a little shady, but ultimately good-intentioned small business owner, only his products are not exactly mainstream.

"We're running low on gikongan again," he sighs. The artificial soul pills have always been top sellers – a must have for any shinigami operating in the human world over long periods – but with the recent rise in local hollow activity, the demand for them has become nearly impossible to curb.

"I guess it can't be helped."

Before he can begin calculating the cost of another shipment, though, Urahara senses something. Something with a presence so powerful that it causes the atmosphere surrounding it to simmer and crackle is steadily approaching the shop.

Hoping it was just another stray shinigami hobbling about town after hours, Kisuke plays it cool.

"Sorry, we're closed for the night, but feel free to check back tomorrow," he hollers out the open window, more as a test to see if the entity was not something entirely less appealing than even a drunken death god.

"Mr. Urahara, help...it's me..." A young woman's voice responds between strained grunts.

After catching a glimpse of her staggering form through the open front window, he rushes to the open door.

"Karin Kurosaki, you don't look so hot!"

He is shocked by the appearance of the girl standing on his doorstep: her face and football jersey are covered in streaks of blood, still gushing forth from several bone-like thorns that are stuck into her body.

"What happened?" he asks, quickly letting her inside.

"We were walking home from my soccer game with my sister when a huge hollow attacked us." Karin struggles to say, shivering from the cold, and gasping with each breath. "Shinigami came to rescue us, and we barely made it out."

Incredibly, but slightly less so when you are as well acquainted with the Kurosaki family as Kisuke is, she had carried her unconscious sister on her shoulder the entire way; bravely limping and bleeding along the rocky, poorly lit back road that leads to the shop.

"That must be what's stinking up the place with all of this reiatsu," he says, looking past her to scan the empty street cautiously.

"I think..." she says, glancing over her shoulder, "it's still alive, and still after us."

Knowing that hollows are more attracted to humans with extraordinary spiritual power, Kisuke does not doubt her, nor does he seem even the slightest bit afraid. To him it is just another day of living between two worlds.

He knocks his cane on the wall to rally the rest of the house: Tessai, a Goliath of a man with hair done in cornrows and equipped with a glorious mustache, the indigo haired teen shop assistants Ururu - toothbrush in hand - and Jinta, who is three years younger than Ururu and with a head of spiky orange-red hair, at first looking annoyed, clamor down the stairs.

Donning a red polka dot pajama shirt looking like he was just getting ready to go to sleep, Tessai is nonetheless quick to act; laying the two siblings flat on the ground and after sending Jinta and Ururu off to retrieve the spare futons, gets to work examining their wounds.

"No doubt about it – they were attacked by hollows. They'll be alright, no doubt."

Even in her state, Karin is able to mutter a laugh. "You should have seen me. I gave it my best kick, and that took its entire arm off. Hell, if I didn't have to worry about Yuzu, I-"

Tessai motions for her to shush and with an annoyed look she obliges, as he begins the painful process of extracting the thorns one-by-one.

Meanwhile, Kisuke calmly draws his sword from its sheath in his cane.

"You did good, but leave the rest to me. Ichigo would kill me if anything happened to you on my watch."

With a tip of his hat he steps outside, into a wide open dirt yard that is partially bordered by a chain link fence. In Kisuke's eyes, it was as good an arena as any, for combating whatever foul creature picked the wrong girls to try and make evening snacks out of.

Urahara stands at the center of the empty yard.

"I know you're there, big guy. And if you're still after those girls, just know you'll have to get past me first," Urahara says, pointing his weapon at his adversary as it comes into view.

Rather than like the 'big guy' he imagined, though, the hollow appears relatively small – not much taller than an adult human – with unsightly, jagged bony protrusions jutting from its arms, legs and torso. Like all hollows however, it has a white mask with a unique design; this one's being two vertical fin-like extensions on either side of its head that are chipped slightly, but not only that...

As it draws closer, Urahara can see that a sizable chunk of the front of mask is broken away completely, revealing one black instead of white, blankly staring eye with a golden pupil.

"Shinigami," it mutters, with a voice so husky and distorted that it is impossible to tell whether its owner had once been male or female. One of its arms is missing, having been cleanly removed at the shoulder by an impact with enough force behind it to change the course of an oncoming bus. Karin's one good kick.

"Brzzt, wrong. I'm not a shinigami, although I assure you that my Zanpaktou is the real deal." He flourishes his Benihime, smirking confidently. "But my shop is closed right now, so I'm afraid I'll have to ask you to check back another time."

The otherworldly entity laughs, shaking up the surrounding atmosphere as it exerted more of its spiritual power.

"You're cocky. Just like the other worms." It says without any breaks in its lumbering stride. "Even that girl. As much as I'd hoped she would have been enough, she was too concerned about her sister's safety to fight at her full capacity."

"Full power or not, she certainly did a number on you," Kisuke snickers.

With a loud roar, the beast pulls a spiked bone out of its body and throws it at Kisuke. Although caught off guard he still manages to evade the sharp projectile, but not fast enough to avoid losing something to the deadly nail.

The now hat-less Urahara appears behind the hollow.

"Hey, that was my favorite hat! Not cool."

"You could have attacked me from behind but instead, you moan about your tacky headwear?"

"You're taking this pretty seriously, aren't you?"

The hollow swings its arm at Kisuke, but he easily blocks it with his sword.

"Sing, Benihime!" Urahara shouts.

The blade of his sword glows crimson red and, with a shrill whistling noise like fireworks being set off, releases a crescent shaped blast of energy that cuts through the hollow's arm as easily as a pair of scissors does through paper.

"Ah, that felt so," the hollow shrieks orgasmically, falling down on one knee, "exhilarating!"

"Here I thought your appetite for teenage girls was creepy enough," Kisuke muses.

He is about to deliver the coup de grace when he picks up on the subtle shifting of surrounding airborne spirit particles, indicating something was moving rapidly nearby.

"What are you waiting for? Kill me!"

"No can do. It looks like the cleanup crew is on its way."

Sure enough, three shinigami appear out of thin air and encircle the downed hollow. The one standing on the left, lean built and completely bald, with small red markings at the outer corners of his eyes, is the first to step forward.

"Damn, we got here too late," Ikkaku Madarame says, stabbing his zanpaktou into the ground angrily, as is his typical response to missing out on a good fight.

On the right, an effeminate, well-groomed man with meticulously arranged purple hair adorned by peacock feathers shakes his head. "This is quite an ugly predicament we've found ourselves in, Captain. The entire unit was totally decimated. A relief team is moving in now, but they say it doesn't look good," he says.

At the center of the odd duo stands a man garbed in the traditional white Thirteen Court Guard Squad Captain's uniform, whose hair is blood red and flowing, and whose skin is marked with exotic tattoos done in dark ink along the sides of his face and forehead (as well as covering most of his back and shoulders).

This Captain abruptly punches the hollow in its face, leaving it sprawled out on the ground.

"From this point on, a ranked officer should be in direct command of all Joker brigades," he says, casually massaging the knuckle that had just left a visible dent in a mask made of pure bone.

Urahara fans himself with the folding fan he keeps stashed in his sleeve, watching with amusement from the side.

"How could one hollow be cause enough to bring Lieutenant Madarame, Third-seated officer Ayasegawa and Captain Abarai out to the front line? It must be a real troublemaker."

Renji Abarai glances at Urahara as if noticing him for the first time.

"Tell me about it – this isn't even our first call tonight."

Ordinarily Kisuke would joke, but the Captain of the Living World-stationed Squad 14 looks dead serious. He goes so far as to deliberately stand in front of the weakened hollow, clutching the hilt of his sheathed zanpaktou.

"We've received orders to keep this one alive," Renji says.

"Now why would that be?"

The execution of hollows is a primary role of Shinigami; necessary for the maintaining of the spiritual equilibrium of both worlds. Therefore, what possible reason could there be for one particular hollow be exempted?

"Apparently the eggheads at Squad 12 wanted to get a nice, long look at a Joker," Ikkaku responds, rolling his eyes.

Renji cuffs him in the back of his neck.

"That's confidential information, Lieutenant," he says with authority. "Besides, where do you get off calling anybody an egghead?"

"Damn you interfering shinigami," the hollow growls, earning a stomp on the face from the rustled Ikkaku.

Urahara shrugs. So long as he could be certain that the shinigami Having at one point assisted Renji in his training – back before he made Captain – he is willing to put his faith in the motley crew, because so long as the wretched thing will not be around to harm the girls anymore and his name would not show up in any documentation differed back to the Soul Society (he is in enough trouble with them as it is), he is perfectly fine with handing over the keys.

Unfortunately Karin, who had overheard everything from inside while Tessai was mending her wounds, was not.

Karin bursts through the front door and limps out of the shop, making an aggressive beeline toward the small gathering.

"What the hell," she shouts, "are you just gonna let them go after what that thing did to Yuzu?"

The blaring pain behind every step she takes is made plainly obvious by her twisted facial expressions, but she remains adamant.

"She can see us?" Yumichika asks.

He is rightfully surprised by the fact that this normal looking high school girl could clearly sense shinigami and hollows, although he and his partner are also immediately struck by something else.

"Hey, isn't she someone I've met before?" Ikkaku says, rubbing his bald head as if it were a good luck charm.

"How do you expect me to remember something for you? Although, I feel like I've known her from somewhere before, too..."

Renji shakes his fist at them.

"That's Ichigo Kurosaki's sister, you idiots!"

"Huh? No way..." Ikkaku says.

Urahara butts in, "It's kind of hard to recognize her now because she's gotten so gosh darn pretty, huh?"

Ikkaku's expression brightens. "Oh wait, I see it now. You're the snarky one."

"My, Urahara is right, that rugged tomboyish look you're sporting does suit you rather nicely." Yumichika sneers.

"Shut your mouth, you old pervert," Karin snarls at Kisuke, pointing her finger at him. Then, at the snoody Ayasegawa. "And is my style really being criticized by a guy wearing dark eyeliner, with feathers in his hair?"

Ikkaku cracks up, as his squadmate seethes.

"Why the red face? You've heard that one plenty of times before, Yumichika."

As the back and forth arguing intensifies, Renji watches as the downed hollow opens up its mouth and from it, another of its spikes protrudes; aimed at Karin. Faster than a man can bat his eyelid, he moves in and catches the spike as it is being launced.

"You think you're sneaky, asshole?"

He breaks the spike over his knee, then motions quickly to his subordinates.

"Bring our friend here back to the barracks. I'll send a butterfly over to have them prepare the Senkaimon for transport."

Karin cannot believe what she is hearing.

"You're seriously not gonna kill it? What's wrong with you?" Karin says, tugging at his hanging robe. "Mister Urahara, do something!"

"Don't look at me – I'm just a lowly merchant who was just out on a nighttime stroll," he says, while searching around in the dark for his hat.

Renji seizes his cloak from Karin's grasp and glares at her.

Unimpeded by the human girl's protests, Yumichika and Ikkaku each take one side of the hollow, whose head is bowed and has fallen silent, and pulls it back unto its feet. The two of them disappear along with their captive, leaving Renji Abarai alone with Karin and Urahara, who was off in La La Land on a quest for that special hat.

"Hey, Kurosaki."

She looks up at him slowly.

"Did you really kick that thing's arm off?" he asks with his back still turned to Karin, silently appraising her over his shoulder.

She nods, still fuming over her denied vengeance.

"Like brother, like sister. Not bad," Renji says with a grin.

She watches him walk away until he fades into the impenetrable darkness. As the sounds of his sandals scratching across the rocky ground subside, Karin can struggles to regain her breath then falls over sideways like a tormented rag doll.

For a split second the Captain had subjected her to the full extent of his spiritual pressure, which was normally kept subdued for stealth reasons. It was like he had control over the Earth's gravity, and could use it at any minute to pin her down, and crush her. Whether it was a gesture meant to challenge her, make her feel vulnerable, or just make her be quiet, it served all of the above purposes for Karin. The older Kurosaki sister realized then that she wasn't so much mad at the shinigami as she was at herself for not being strong enough to protect Yuzu from harm in the first place.

Without uttering a word, Renji Abarai dared her to change that.

So, by the time that the newly rehatted Urahara comes to her aide, Karin assures him that she is okay and just wants to see Yuzu, but is also prepared to voice a new resolve awakened within her.

"Hey Mr. Hat-and-clogs, I need to get stronger," She says simply, grinding her teeth like a ravenous wolf.

"Like brother, like sister, huh?"