My Ichiruki skype chat were discussing an Ichiruki chef! AU where Byakuya's 5-star patisserie and the Kurosaki's award-winning Japanese restaurant are right next to each other, and Rukia and Ichigo are the patissier/chef at their respective restaurants. Of course, the AU soon disintegrated into 'food fight in Byakuya's 5-star patisserie past midnight' because these two are absolute children (I apologise to any actual chefs and patissiers who would never desecrate a kitchen this way), so that's what we have here.

Pity That Byakuya Only Requires 1 Point to Jump Straight to Murder

by hashtagartistlife

Shitfuck.

Look, Ichigo's never been the eloquent type, even on the best of days, so when something like this happens he reckons he's entitled to a pass for his not-so-graceful way of phrasing things. Rukia's constantly ragging on him about it (never mind the fact that she has the roughest street-rat guttersnipe mouth on her when she's pissed; oh no, he's the one who's apparently got to watch where he drops his relatively tame 'fuck's), but honestly, he's pretty sure he's about to die within the next five seconds so if she has a problem with him swearing she can yell at him at his funeral. He doesn't give two shits about her and her rants about propriety– as if she can talk when she's the one who seduced him in their kitchen last week!– not when his tragically short life is flashing before his eyes on fast forward.

Still, he does kind of wish his last words could be a little less 'I fucked up, I'm a human disaster' and a little more 'I am facing my certain annihilation with heroic calm'. Ah well. You win some, you lose some. And he's had a relatively good run so far, he decides. Countertop sex with Rukia last week had been a definite highlight. And he'd actually gotten away with that one (and the one before that, and the one before that), so he decides to count the current tally as 5-1 to Kurosaki Ichigo. Which is, you know, quite good when one is playing against a Kuchiki.

Pity that Byakuya only requires 1 point to jump straight to 'murder'.

The Kuchiki in question raises a hand slowly to the pizza dripping down his face, and wipes the cheese off with the kind of icy dignity that no other person on earth would have been able to manage with mozzarella on their cheek. But, of course, because he's Kuchiki Byakuya, he somehow makes the movement look both mortally threatening and graceful as fuck. Ichigo closes his eyes and accepts his imminent destruction. Yeah, he's had an alright life so far. He doesn't have many regrets. He only hopes Byakuya will be merciful and make it relatively quick–

"Kurosaki Ichigo."

He should be so lucky. "Yes?" he squeaks, cracking an eye open to assess the situation.

Byakuya regards him with a bland expression that Ichigo knows is hiding daggers behind it. "You threw a pizza at my face."

"Yes."

"… and 'shitfuck' is all you have to say about it?"

"….. yes…?"

Behind him, Ichigo can practically see Rukia mentally facepalming. Don't ask him how he knows, he just does. Bitch. Just because it's not her life on the line. She's the instigator here! The food fight, the workbench sex, the everything. He's innocent, goddammit. He's been wrongfully framed.

… Not that Byakuya looks to be in the mood to listen. Ichigo sees the tomato paste splattered all over his pristine suit and mentally calculates how many hours he needs to work to replace it for him. He gives up halfway through when the numbers start looking around the five-figure mark. He's pretty sure he could sell all his organs on the black market and he still won't make enough to repay Byakuya for the suit. All things considered, the easiest way out of this situation is probably just death at Byakuya's hands.

He can't take this tense silence anymore.

"Look. I'm sorry. I'm sorry, ok? I fucked up. I fucked up, I know I fucked up, and you're probably pissed off as hell and you know I don't have enough money to repay you for the suit and– oh god, just, just kill me quickly, ok? That's all I ask of you."

He hangs his head after this ridiculous outburst, and waits for the inevitable, but then–

"… I trust this kitchen will be spotless by tomorrow morning."

What?

"What?" Ichigo says, stupidly, looking back up at Byakuya with an incredulous expression– "That's it? No threats of dismemberment? No kidnapping and live dissecting to harvest my organs? No swift but painful cleaver to the gut? Nothing? All I have to do is clean the kitchen?"

Byakuya sweeps his cold gaze over him from head to toe. "As much as I am displeased to find my kitchen in this state of disarray, I can hardly punish only you when my sister was clearly an active participant in the destruction. But both of you had best to be warned–" he turns his displeased glare on Rukia now, and she does her best to look trite (liar) – "any further attempts to debase my kitchen with any acts aside from the act of creation, and I–"

He stops, and the following silence is ominous. Ichigo follows Byakuya's line of sight, wondering what exactly his gaze has landed on, and sees–

oh, shit.

"Rukia," he mutters out the corner of his mouth, and Rukia unfreezes just enough to nod her head a tiny fraction.

"What–" Byakuya says in a strangled voice, and Ichigo reaches behind him stealthily to grab one of Rukia's wrists.

"-is–"

Rukia swallows heavily and reaches her hand out, but Ichigo yanks her back and shakes his head at her.

"–the meaning–"

"But Ichigo–!" Rukia hisses, but Ichigo's resolute: she's not getting that particular item of clothing back, well, ever. She's gonna say her goodbyes to it right now. It's gone. Zip. Nada.

"–of this–?!"

Byakuya finally manages to finish his sentence, and whirls around to face them again. Ichigo swears he sees his hands twitching towards the collection of kitchen knives on the counter, kept honed by Hanatarou's tireless hands, but like hell they're gonna stick around to see what unholy wrath Rukia's lacy white underwear hanging off the corner of that bench is going to unleash.

"Run," he tells Rukia, and promptly proceeds to give her no choice in the matter, hauling her onto his shoulder and legging it out of there.

"….Hey, Rukia, reckon Byakuya'd forgive me if I told him you were an 'active participant' in that, as well?"

"Kurosaki Ichigo, don't you dare–"

"– But Byakuya said 'no acts in the kitchen aside from the act of creation' and what we were doing was technically an act of creation–"

"Ichigo, I will throw this cleaver at your face—"