Chapter 1

In Karakura town, it was a nice and peaceful day. The sky was a brilliant shade of blue, there were no clouds in sight, birds chirped a beautiful melody, and children were laughing and having fun at the park. The grass was a luscious green, soft and misted from the earlier shower of rain. Parents stood together, talking about the most recent gossip they could stir up. From the looks of it, one would say that there was no miserable person in sight. Unless they were to see the little boy sitting on the swings by himself, tears gathering in his eyes.

None of the kids went near him, for their parents had told them not to. The boy was too strange looking and different for their liking. Thus, the child sat alone at the swing set while the rest of the kids laughed and played at the jungle gym. The black haired boy had been bullied often, verbally and physically, but it was the loneliness and envy that got to him the most. He was envious of everybody else playing together and having a good time. Self-hatred lurked in the child, angry at himself for being different than the rest. Finally, the tears began to fall from his eyes and stream down his face. He hated crying, but he did it often, even though the kids that had bullied him picked on him for it. Once they had drawn tears streaks in green marker going down his face. The only person that was nice to the emerald eyed boy was now out of his life and he was thrown into immense loneliness, unable to escape it.

"Hey look! It's that freak, Ulquiorra!" the boy heard. It was coming from one of his regular bullies and his followers. The boy kept his head down, not wanting the other children to see his tears. "I'm talking to you, you freak!"

"…I can hear you." Ulquiorra replied.

"Well then acknowledge me next time I take my precious time to notice a freak like you!" Then Ulquiorra's regular beating came. He was thrown off of the swing and into the dirt. Other children's parents did nothing to help- as usual- and continued with their gossip. The kids started to kick and punch the defenseless child. Ulquiorra let out shrieks and whimpers occasionally and continued to cry. He wished that he didn't exist. He wished that he could just vanish from the earth and return to the one person that treated him like a human being. He couldn't have cared less at the moment if one of the kicks or punches were to end his life.

"Hey! Get off of him!" he heard a very high pitched voice demand. Ulquiorra kept his head covered by his hands and his body in a fetal position.

The beating paused and he heard the leader of the group say, "Shut up! Who are you to tell us to stop? This guy is a freak! He's not like us and it makes no difference what we do to him! He's just a freak!"

"Well the only freaks I see here are you! Who cares if he's different? My brother told me that different is good!"

"Wait a second," the leader said, "I know you! You are that girl that recently moved here because you are just like this freak! You two stand out too much!"

"We are not freaks! My brother told me-"

"I don't care what your brother told you! You are nothing but a freak, just like Ulquiorra. C'mon guys, let's go. She took the fun out of this today." With that, the group left, leaving the outcasts together.

Ulquiorra slowly and cautiously lifted his hands off of his head and looked up to see his rescuer. Tears were still streaming down his face and now he was bloody and bruised. Casting his gaze to the person who saved him, it was as he predicted: it was a female child. She looked about his age with short, auburn hair. The color of her hair deeply fascinated him and it was clear that her hair is what the kids meant by her being different like him. She had big grey eyes and a smile that greeted him warmly. She had a couple of scratches and Ulquiorra figured that she was being tortured just as he was.

"Hello there," the girl said, extending her arm out to him and offering to help him up.

Ulquiorra slowly accepted her help up and replied, "…Hello."

"My name is Orihime, Inoue! What's your name?"

"…Ulquiorra, Schiffer."

"It's nice to meet you, Ulquiorra! Look, don't listen to them! My big brother Sora says that others are too boring and jealous and that's why that can't handle people like us!"

"…Thank you for helping me. Nobody has ever done that for me before."

"Well, we are friends now! That's what friends are for!"

Ulquiorra looked at her in shock. The green eyed child has never had a friend in his life. He just met this girl and she is already claiming they are friends. He didn't mind it at all. Instead, a smile was graced upon his face. "Yeah!"

The two kids then played like any other child, completely forgetting about how they were mistreated. They laughed, smiled, jumped, ran, and had the times of their lives together. Ulquiorra wished that it could stay like this forever. But sadly, all good things come to an end in his life.

"Orihime, it's time to come home!" a peaceful voice said.

"Sora!" Orihime squealed, jumping into the man's arms. Ulquiorra stood in disappointment, sad that he and Orihime's time together was coming to an end. The orange haired girl turned back and looked at him. "This is my big brother! I have to go now! Maybe we can play again together some other time?" Ulquiorra smiled at her and nodded. "Well, bye Ulquiorra! And don't just let those kids bother you from now on! Stand up for yourself!" The two Inoue siblings then walked away together, leaving a sad and once again lonely Ulquiorra.

"I can't wait to see her again," the boy thought as he walked home.