I own neither Bleach nor Tropico. Would be a tad weird to write fan fiction if I owned either... or better yet both. (Squints.)

A/N: To those who know me... yeah, saw the opportunity... FIRST!

Just a starter page for now though...

El Kurosaki!

(Viva la) Tropico(!)

"With the polls coming to a close, everyone is waiting with baited breath to see who the new Presidente is!"

He couldn't help but sometimes observe with mild amusement at how odd his meandering thoughts can become in either its journey or its final conclusion whenever he managed to notice it. They could range from all sorts of things from pondering the almost nonexistent price of a papaya in his hand to appreciating the general beauty that is the artwork of Michelangelo for example thanks to a mild tangent such as if such a person of renown ate such a fruit. Then they could then run from artwork to an advertisement simply because some advertisements, especially posters, occasionally produce works rivaling such in either pure aesthetic beauty or the sheer emotion they can evoke. From there he would wander over into literature as some advertisements either egregiously made use of tortured puns from either other works or stories or written their own little stories in an attempt to lure customers. And from there to computers... or more specifically the internet... fan fiction really...

While there are those who could write with a modicum of skill, others a legend in their own right that it's almost a shame that they do not write more published works, or worse yet maddeningly disappear and leave their stories UNFINISHED, be it curiosity or some kind of draw, Ichigo had ended up reading more than fair number of bad stories. Some of which were more horrendous than others, giving rise to the notion that some people shouldn't be aloud near a keyboard much less be given the notion that they should write something. Some of which were tolerable. But almost all these bad stories had one of the following as decreed by his own observation and musings: an overpowered character that was more or less god in that story, often a vengeful one that curb stomped everything that even mildly disagreed with them with either physical violence or a seemingly 'perfect' logic; it was marginally worse when they basically slept with everything that moved as well. A self insert or Mary Sue story where they are again overpowered or had the ability to talk through situations and/or make friends out of recognized enemies taken to almost nonsensical extremes. Or, his... 'personal favorite'... where the character of interest is allegedly and even written to be 'canonically' hated to ludicrous extremes on a good day...

Sadly in this particular aspect alone he couldn't help but feel like his life was something of a bad fan fiction story in itself. More often than not these stories featuring often inexcusable hostility had a trigger of some kind be it an event the main character was unfortunately associated with or, sadly, due to the death of a beloved figure... such as his mother... While the entire family was devastated by her loss even if his sisters were too young to be truly affected by her lack of presence alone, their father... took it badly... extremely badly...

While Child Protective Services received a crap ton of criticisms over the years no matter which country it was operated by or its official name in said country, there was a valid reason it existed in the first place. As such even though he and his sisters have long since been separated he liked to think they were living well, wherever they are. He couldn't help but wonder what they looked like now from time to time. Or if they even knew they had a brother, doubtful though it was since they were still babies when he last saw them.

Regardless though, he endured. His wounds, at least the physical ones, having mended a long time ago while he was passed on from one foster family to another till he was of legal age. From there he struck out on his own and tried to make a life for himself. The operative word of course being 'tried.' Between a permanent scowl that, to his secret delight, could scare off the yakuza and his orange spiky hair that seemed to attract trouble, getting a job was difficult at best on a good day. The same could be said for getting an apartment too, even the scummy ones where the landlord is more happy to see one's money than one's credentials. As for getting into college with the hope of gaining a worthwhile job... well, that was stymied somewhat with the lack of a proper job that didn't make him want to strangle either his boss at the time or a customer... or both at the same time which was sadly often. Without a steady paycheck to at least feed himself and house himself, it practically wasn't worth pursuing if he couldn't even hope to pay for the student loans whenever his jackass boss of the week had need of a scapegoat or was actually going out of business much to everyone's shock... In the end it felt like he was running around in circles at best. At least until he entertained a rather... risky idea.

No one ever said that immigration was an inherently bad idea. But there were some risks involved, especially when there's more rumor than fact involved. As such he sought out the facts when he saw fliers other promotions for an opportunity to learn overseas in a nation called Tropico. For free no less. Needless to say it was a bit suspicious to say the least...

On its face Tropico is a republic, a democracy, in the Caribbean... at least on the surface. Unofficially it was supposedly a dictatorship, though who was in control was really anyone's guess between the "Presidente" and the "Generalissimo." In fact the line was so blurred that their relationship destabilized to the point a civil war erupted, the likes of which that had the citizenry leave the island in droves for greener and, more importantly, safer pastures. Going there would have one of two outcomes for him if he entered under the pretense of learning abroad: either he was going to be conscripted into an army the minute he stepped onto their shores despite the bureaucracy involved, or, if he was insanely lucky, be enrolled in their college regardless of the outcome, as impossible as that sounded.

... sadly his prospects here in Japan weren't that much better—even on a crappy job as a soldier of fortune paid more than a store clerk any day of the week. Not only that but even if he was conscripted there were at least three meals a day and a roof over his head, a necessity and given for anything passing itself as a formal military. Even if that wasn't an issue, him being recruited against his will, there was one catch toward the 'free' education: a five year stay working for the government; there was no guarantee he would even get a job worthy of the education he sought to improve his chances.

... again, sad as it was, it beats having to find a job every other week.

Since Spanish was the small island's prominent language amongst its equally small populace, what was left of it at any rate, he was forced to undergo a crash course in the foreign language alongside English given its proximity to the United States, just in case. Once he was confident he had at least a passing level of understanding he applied for a student visa for Tropico at their college, after several weeks it was accepted. After that it was a simple matter of packing his things and arranging transportation there, by boat no less. Unfortunately Tropico didn't seem to have an airport, just a dock for seaside transportation. An all purpose industrial dock at that as he later learned but that was neither here nor there. From there though... that's where things got a little... odd.

He arrived at the island and enrolled without incident thankfully enough. As luck would have it, or quite possibly due to the will of a writer given his analogy, both the Presidente, one Duran Guerrero, and the Generalissimo had ended up killing one another, at least according to the locals: evidently they had a sword fight atop of a bridge, or so the story went. How true that was was up for debate, not that he nor anyone else cared. Still, with both its official leader dead as well as its... majordomo, de facto leader maybe? Regardless, with the both of them dead there were elections being held to restore a semblance of government once more as oppose to the more fragile coexistence between the factions that remained after the civil war. Needless to say it was a who's who race between almost everyone that had some appearance of being not only important but capable of leading, i.e. the faction leaders themselves... and himself, though not by choice nor intent on his part. He wasn't even campaigning for that matter just to further cement the fact that he had no interest in becoming the next Presidente of Tropico! Unfortunately though some people didn't seem to get that particular note...

As to how that happened, evidently even temporary visitors like himself had the inherent right to vote right off the bat. Whether or not they would indeed vote was another story. As for Ichigo, since he had absolutely no idea as to who was who and what their goals were he wasn't exactly inclined to vote in the first place: he simply wanted to get in, get his education, get his degree and slip out as quietly as possible. He wasn't even alone in this regard when it came to his fellow immigrants and students taking advantage of the situation to get their own degrees, free of charge.

Some people didn't like that however.

The Militarists, the Religious, the Capitalists, the Communists, the whathaveyous and so on couldn't care less for the most part as to whether or not the latest immigrants decided to vote or not. The barely organized gangs calling themselves the Nationalists were of a different mind however. Since law and order was crippled for the time being they took whatever opportunity that came their way to harass immigrants in general, regardless of which side these immigrants were on, in broad daylight no less. What was worse however was that they were actively attempting to coerce each and everyone they either bullied or assaulted into voting for their own leader, or spokesman really given their more fractional gang nature, El... Skinhead, or whatever his name was... certainly looked like an American's skinhead stereotype at least. At any rate, even with policemen out and about, all the factions could do in response was circle their respective wagons and defend their own till the elections were over. As for the immigrants whom weren't aligned with anyone, they were left to fend for themselves. Ichigo himself included... The Nationalists were quick to find out that their Japanese target wasn't nearly as easy to intimidate or even accost as their other targets however.

Not being a stranger to violence, especially gang violence thanks to his hair, the unconscious bodies were starting to pile up in what was turning into one sided fights between Ichigo and the Nationalists, all of which in Ichigo's favor. Sadly though not entirely in the aspect of simply kicking racist ass enough into simply leaving him be. While it was understandable that the unallied immigrants would begin to rally around him as a result of mauling the Nationalists, others from the other political camps began to notice him as well, especially the Militarists, particularly whenever he had came to the conclusion that he had to beat the crap out of Nationalists for varying reasons whenever he happened upon them: muggings, voter intimidation, robbery, strong arm crimes in general, all of which aimed at the immigrants. Before he knew it he had himself quite the... following which only grew as more and more flocked to him under the pretense that he would beat up the Nationalists the moment he was made aware of their trouble making, which he did of course... but mostly to get his 'followers' to stop badgering him with their problems. As his fame as being the 'protector' grew his 'followers' had taken it upon themselves to add his name to the ballot despite his own protests. Since then he did everything he could to avoid attention, aside from attacking Nationalists that is, within reason of course. Sadly though his scowl did little to scare off his admirers. Nor did his normally brusque attitude deter them in the slightest in their worship. Hell, he could've sworn he saw a Llama with his name shaved into its side at one point!

As noted earlier, in the end though he tried to keep to himself whenever he could. He stuck to his studies. He slept. He ate. He occasionally took a break to enjoy a game of soccer at the pub when there was almost no one but himself left in order to have some privacy. He did everything he could think of to not deliberately encourage them as he kept an ear bent in regard to the elections should the worse come to worst.

"And the ballots are counted! The new Presidente is...!"

He did his best not to tear his eyes away from the papaya to the radio sitting on the counter of a nearby shop. It was only thanks to that little device that he was afforded a measure of privacy as everyone's attention was upon it.

"Tropico's Rising Star—!"

... Oh no. He squinted his eyes shut and prayed to whatever god that was listening that Juanito, the predominant DJ for Tropico News Today, was not about to say what he thought he was going to say.

"Ichigo—"

Please let it be another Ichigo! He only wanted to study and get his degree damn it! It may be a degree from a backwater country but a degree was still a degree!

"Kurosaki!"

"Ugh..." Noooooooo-ho-hooo! He hung his head in defeat just as the first of his abhorrent admirers practically teleported themselves across the way to tackle him in a celebratory hug.

... with any luck the first ship out of here came in next month.

A/N: FIRST!

Kind of like my other story Of Consequences: From it an Empire, this was kind of the result of playing too much with a game. Tropico 3 specifically after a bit of a hiatus from it. After so many years I finally got off my ass just started playing Tropico 4 as well...

... It was also born with the idea as to what would happen if Bleach had a more... tropical background... yeah...

Anyway!

Kind of a one shot for now, a basis for what is to come. Going to try to reduce the number of my other unfinished stories first before I turn my full attention to it. So until then...

Monkeybandit2, making off with your attention! No Refunds.