Hello everyone! This is my second fic, and my first long fanfic, so please be easy on me! I love ByakuRuki, but I don't see enough of it around so I decided again to write some yummy ByakuRuki goodness. Yum yum. Enjoy!

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

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Nii-sama. Byakuya. Kuchiki-sama. Him.

He was a mystery to her. Everytime she seemed to get herself in a troubling predicament he'd always come to save her at the last possible minute. He always seemed to choose that last minute to save her, but he always succeeded in protecting her. Was it because of laziness to move until she was completely helpless, or was it because he wanted to test her capabilities? She wondered.

Whenever their eyes met, he would always act indifferent, as if she wasn't someone special to him. What was she, Kuchiki Rukia, to him, Kuchiki Byakuya, anyways? A sibling? His late wife's sister? A burden?

She definitely did not want to become a burden. All the time, she'd train until her body lay battered and her hair drenched with sweat. At the end of the day, she would be so worn-out, Renji would drag her tired ass home after accompanying her with her training. She silently thanked Renji for having to carry her back to the Kuchiki house everyday even when he was probably exhausted as well. Rukia desperately wanted to make sure she wasn't in Byakuya's way.

But most of all, she wanted to impress him, for him to change his uncaring glances, she wanted to show him she could do something. So far, she had been unsuccessful. Was she not worthy enough? After all, he had even gone through the trouble of suppressing her position in the Gotei 13. Everyone thought she was definitely in the vice-captain level, but he didn't seem to think so.

But it wasn't like he looked down at her in disdain or anything. It was just that he didn't seem to care if she accomplished something new or not. She knew she should have given up ages ago, but she refused to. She wanted to be worthy. She didn't want to appear weak to one of the people she respected most. No way.

Rukia put her face into her hands. With all this thinking, she knew her hair would turn gray even before Ichigo's would. What made her think of all of this anyways? Sometimes she thought so deep into it, she'd forget why she even bothered to impress him in the first place. She constantly reminded herself that she wanted him to see her as an equal, but she wasn't so sure anymore.

The more she thought of it, the more confused she got, that was for sure. Once, she almost thought she actually loved Byakuya (and not in the sibling/family way either) and that was why she wanted attention from him so much. There was no way she'd actually fall in love with her brother…right?

Then why else would you want so much attention?

Rukia stood up and paced around the room. No way. No way. No way. This was not happening. She was his sister for god's sake! For more reasons than one, it was wrong. Adopted sister or not, there was still the fact that she was the sister of his late wife. She could not fall in love with him. It was hopeless anyways, he would never return her feelings, and it'd be a hopeless, unrequited love.

She chuckled. Rukia knew if Renji or Ichigo knew about this, they'd freak out and haul (and literally haul) her to the 4th Division to get her head checked. They were especially protective of her, there was no way they'd let this go.

Rukia groaned and lied down on her back while clutching her contorted face.

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"Kuchiki-san? Are you alright? I heard some groaning." A servant passing by had overheard Rukia and truthfully, was more curious than concerned about her.

Muffled groan.

"Kuchiki-saaaan?" He started getting worried.

Grooaaan.

"Kuchiki-san! Hang in there! I'll call the 4th Division!" Now he started panicking.

"No, I'm fine, re—" She started, but the young male had already ran as fast as his legs could take him and sprinted out of Rukia's vicinity before she could stop him. Damn. Damn. Damn. Groaaaaan.

Suddenly, she felt queasy. Was the room spinning or was that her imagination? And was her skin always this green? That couldn't be right…

She rushed to the washroom just before anything could come up, leaned over the sink and let her stomach do all the work. When she was done throwing up, she slowly trudged her way back to the cold flooring of her room. She was definitely not well. Her head pounded and her stomach still felt sick, she seemed to also have a fever.

"I called her several times, but she just kept groaning and I guessed there was something wrong with her. I was going to call the 4th Division, but I met you on the way." It was the servant from before again.

"I see. You may go now. I'll call you when I need you to call the 4th Division." said a smooth, deep voice.

It was Byakuya.

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How was it? Bad? Good? I know it's kind of repetitive and not really going anywhere, truthfully, I had a hard time thinking of ways to end this chapter. I was even thinking to make this another one-shot, but naaaah. I might not update a lot (I'm not much of a write, to say the truth), but I'll try. Thank you everyone for reading this chapter and don't forget to review!