The Secret Of Shiny Sparkly Soul Slayers: REVEALED

i had sudden inspiration during bio today (no, not smut) and i scribbled my paragraph of inspiration down onto my little notebook while my insufferable teacher droned on. so, uh, yep. might be boresome, but no matter.

disclaimer: the last time i checked, my name wasn't kubo tite. fine. be that way.

Some might have wondered, why is it that Zangetsu never ever got plagued with bouts of bloodstains on its blade? Come on, with all that hollow-stabbing and saving-the-daying a million times over-ing, you would think that there naturally would be some random bits of gore and muck left on Ichigo's sword, no? Rukia's Shirayuki somehow maintains its blinding perfection, by a secret method (undoubtedly taught to her by Byakuya) that housewives all over the world would die for.

But noooo, we haven't seen Rukia nor Ichigo wipe down their soul slayers. Never, in my memory. I mean, AIDS can spread that way! It's dangerous! Since none of the characters have contracted any form of disease of that kind, thank yama-ji, I shall therefore assume that Urahara has taken the matter of keeping the soul slayers super shiny (ooh, alliteration) into his own hands.

---

Ichigo settled down on his bed after a very, very painful day of school. Ochi-sensei had given them five assignments to do. FIVE. The their PE teacher (who Ichigo would swear on Shakespeare that that teacher was actually Noitora in disguise) had made all of them run FIFTY LAPS around the goddamn track just because they came to class FIFTY SECONDS late.

Bastards, all of them. He prodded his screaming leg muscles.
Fighting hollows? Sure. Running fifty laps randomly every PE lesson?
He'd rather take on fifty grand fishers.

Ichigo decided that the number five was cursed by some random witch doctor, and moved on with life.

He stretched extravagantly,and attempted to get up from the mattress to start on his work when something small and dangerous landed a flying kick right smack in the stomach.
We all know Ichigo's really nicely defined and stuff, but such a projectile would hurt ANYBODY.

It could probably give Zaraki a rather nasty bruise, really.

That projectile in question, who happened to be wearing one of Yuzu's dresses, stood in the middle of Ichigo's room and glared at him. Ichigo dully felt lava creeping up all around him through the pain in his abdomen.

'BAKA. Remember where you promised you'd go with me after school TODAY?'

'...hello Rukia.'

Rukia narrowed her eyes at him.

'You PROMISED. Shirayuki's complaining is going to drive me insane.'

'But Zangetsu never said-'

He was immediately silenced by the fear that actual lava was going to come spilling out from her eye sockets.

'Zangetsu's JUST LIKE YOU, YOU BASTARD. Both of you are one and the same. You can live up to your NECK in filth and not bat an eyelid.'

Ichigo looked around him just in case he was indeed,up to his neck in hot, boiling lava.

'Shirayuki is just like me, and we both feel the NEED to keep our personal hygiene IN CHECK. She will not stand for hollow's filth coating her blade, and NEITHER WILL I.'

Ichigo didn't understand why he let her rant at him right in his face, and let her get away with it. Ah, said a snide little voice in his head, that's what love does to you, right? Ichigo almost snarled, but caught himself just in time. Out, nosey little pastry of a conscience. Out.

'I don't care what state you let Zangetsu get into, but if you're fighting alongside ME, you had BETTER KEEP A CLEAN IMAGE. What would Nii-sama think?'

'I wouldn't know, I'm not him.'

The room started to feel like a furnace. Not that Ichigo had ever been in one before, but he suspected that if he kept this up, he soon would be.

'JUST GET YOUR BUTT OUT AND FOLLOW ME, ASSWIPE!'

Ichigo wondered vaguely, as Rukia grabbed him by his collar and hurled him out of the window, why he took all her crap. He landed on a bush rather painfully as he came to a rather painful conclusion that maybe he did li-

NO, BAD THOUGHTS, BAD TH- owww. His legs hurt just ten minutes ago, but now his whole body hurt.

'Can we get a MOVE ON, LITTLE DANDELION BOY?'

'...yes, you brat.'

That earned him a bruise on his backside, and they both walked to Urahara's after that.

Actually, Rukia walked. Ichigo hobbled.

---

Urahara was sitting on his stupid mat again, wearing his stupid hat and his stupid smile.

'Good aaafternoon, Kuchiki-san & Kurosaki-san! What can I offer you?'

Ichigo let Rukia do the talking. His whole body was intent on folding in on itself at the moment.

'Do you have those blood repellers specially for soul slayers? Our soul slayers are feeling rather unhygenic again.'

Ichigo shot a rather dirty look at Rukia, and she returned the favour.

Urahara flipped his fan shut and sighed in that perverted way of his. 'Oh, yes we do! The stock just came in this morning, so almost everything should be there.' He beckoned enthusiastically towards a particularly dusty row of shelves, and Ichigo highly doubted that the stock 'just came in'.

But no matter.

Rukia walked along the shelves, picking up a container here and there while muttering sombrely to herself.
Ichigo, on the other hand, inspected a row of products that read:

We keep your soul slayer shinily clean, and not to mention giving it a temporary coat of concentrated acid which lasts for 2 days after application!

Cheating bastards. He swore that stuff was freaking corrosive.

At last, after encountering some excruciatingly disgusting looking bright pink sparkly bottles of soul slayer gore protector, he managed to find a decent looking white bottle that read:

It's the magical Impervius! soul slayer shiner! Soak your soul slayer in this fast acting agent for 3 hours, and it'll last you 2 years of clean blood-free blades. Why pick something else when you can pick Impervius!

It reminded him of the bottle of washing liquid for plates or something that Karin had lugged home the other day, but he figured it was about the same thing.

He grabbed two bottles of the stuff and looked around for Rukia. Not much trouble at all for him, really, since she was waving her arms and yelling at him to come over and look at something.

Ichigo sighed, and made his way over, taking a detour to avoid the corrosive shit.

Rukia was a picture of elation.

'They have it in Chappy's Zanpakutou-Zoop! There's the scratch removing variety, the 1 year sparkle product, the fast-drying type, oh, I don't know what to choose!'

Ichigo snorted inwardly.

Women.

Not really. He decided to switch the stereotypical word for something else much more narrowed-down.

Rukia.

'And all the bottles are soooo cute!'

Ichigo grunted.

'Which one should I get, Ichigo?'

'Mmph. Just get whatever.'

'But there's over 4 kinds, and I want all of them!'

'...Then get all of them.'

Ichigo sorely regretted his ability to speak coherently when he discovered that Rukia had left her wallet in Soul Society.

He pulled out his wallet. He could feel the two measly bills inside trembling.

Hello, bankruptcy.