Hi, everybody. If you've just stumbled upon this story, I ask you to please read "An Imperfect Night" first. Though the two stories revolve around the same events, "An Imperfect Night" features some useful background information left out in this story, and is really meant to be read. I hope you enjoy both of them, and be sure to know that you are more than welcome to leave me any reviews or comments! Thank you so much for reading!
Also, if this text is underlined, I'm sorry about that. The document isn't saved in an underlined format, and this is the forth time I've uploaded it to try and get rid of those lines!
-Bird of Ice
***
Matsumoto Rengiku was struggling to re-apply her mascara in the dimly lit Tenth Division office when the door was torn open and the screaming began.
"Matsumoto! What are you doing? Putting on makeup! Does that mean you're going out tonight? Out to have FUN? Don't you realize that fun is not allowed in Tenth Devision?"
Reflected in the mirror was Twelfth Division Fukutaichou Akina Miharu, scooting across the floor on her knees and trying hard keep an annoyed scowl glued to her face. Matsumoto killed the act when she turned around and made eye-contact and both of the women burst out laughing.
"I need a promotion," said Miharu as she rose to her full height. "I'm a better Toshiro than Toshiro. Now tell me you're ready, 'cause I'm starving."
"No I'm not ready!" Rengiku snapped. Her hands were busy rummaging through a desk drawer until they found the just the right pitcher of sake. "A warrior knows better than to go into battle unprepared," she smirked, and filled two cups to the brim.
"Ye-es," Akina shouted as she shot across the room. A week of playing second in command to Kurutsuchi Mayuri had was enough to give anyone quite the thirst. With a quick shout of "kanpai," the women downed their cups in the grand tradition the Transient World called "pre-gaming." That night, Kyoraku Taichou had a get-together planned at Tetsumura Restaurant. A far cry from the captain's usual bars, tonight his friends would have the pleasure of getting trashed in one of the finest establishments in all the Seireitei..
"Oi, girl, where's that boy-toy of yours?" Matsumoto demanded of Akina as she conquered another cup of sake. "Sosuke couldn't come tonight. Had to do some boring captain thing or other," Miharu replied.
"That was Gin's excuse." said Matsumoto. "Lord knows where he is."
"Oooh no," groned Akina, the sarcasm practically dripping from her voice. "What a tragedy we won't be able to spend the night with Gin."
"Oh shut it;" said Rangiku, "now lets get going."
Flash stepping to hurry things up, it didn't take the lieutenants long before they were sliding open Tetsumura's doors. A hostess in an ink-blue kimono bowed low as she chirped what an honor it would be to serve the two shinigami.
"I will be most pleased to show you to your room," said the hostess, then turning her attention specifically to Akina she continued, "I must apologize but zonpakutou are not allowed within the restaurant. If you please, I will be happy to keep yours here during your meal."
"Oh yeah, forgot I was still wearing it," Miharu lied. Really she was almost never seen without Kooritsume at her waist. Nearly as large as Unohana Taichou's Minazuki, the weapon featured a unique silver cross guard in the shape of a swallow. The fukutaichou had never seen a problem with being needlessly armed just because she thought her sword looked cool.
The hostess lead the two women down a softly-lit hall to a room toward the back of the restaurant. "Who is it?" Kyoraku Taichou yelled before the doors had even slid open. "Who is it? Ahhhh, it's some women. I just can't escape them, these looks are a curse!"
"The heavens cry oceans for you, my poor Kyoraku han," Miharu sighed as she searched out a seat for herself. Aside from the captain, Iba Tetsuzamon and Akina's brother, Masato, were the only people who had already arrived. Akina looked over all of the empty cushions, pretending that of them were reserved for anybody from Squad Thirteen. Things would be much easier that way.
"Nice outfit," she said to her brother as took a seat next to him. Tonight he had picked out a bright yellow headband, a few rows of plastic beads and some girls' sunglasses from the Transient World to compliment his favorite hiori; blue with a pattern of penguins dancing around the hem.
"Thanks," Masato replied, then his eyes narrowed. "What did you do to your hand?" His little sister's right hand was swollen to nearly twice it's size and caked with rust-colored bits of blood that had managed to seep through its linen wrappings
"Yeah, Miharu chan, what is with your hand? It looks horrible," Matsumoto said.
"Oh this?" said Akina, lifting the bandaged mess for everyone to see. "I was fighting this hollow today and somehow it sent Kooritsume flying. The thing really pissed me off, so I ran up and punched it in the face!" She then burst out laughing. "You guys have to try it, it's hilarious!"
Masato smiled . "Yeah, you would do something like that."
"Well it was either that or use kidou," Miharu continued, "and if I'd have done that my whole body would be wrapped up like this! Then she shot a glance to her brother, "oh, and by the way, Masato, if you tell Mom I'll kill you."
Akina stretched her good hand out to her sake, still laughing with everyone else; then she heard voices in the hallway.
"...you saw it last time, didn't you, Kaien?"
Her throat tightened and she began to choke violently. That was Shiba Miyako's voice...so Devision Thirteen had finally arrived. Desperate to stop the choking, Miharu downed an entire glass of water, then straightened up and braced herself.
The door slid open, and Kaien and Myako Shiba entered the room. Only Kaien and Miyako Shiba.
Kyoraku looked up, and the smile fell from his face. "Where is Jyuushiro?"
"The captian had a bit of a spell tonight," said Kaien.
"Is he okay?" four voices demanded in unison. Akina tipped over the water cup she'd just emptied.
"Yes, he said he'd be fine and went back to his room," Kaien replied. "Miyako chan and I were skeptical at first, but I've seen him much, much worse before." A sadness filled the fukutaichou's eyes as he spoke those words.
"Ah, poor Ukitake," Matsumoto sighed. "He's too much of a sweetheart to be so sick all the time."
"I won't lie," Miyako's soft voice chimed in, "sometimes I just feel like crying when I see him like that. It's hard for the entire squad."
"Hell, I'm not even used to it, and he's been my friend since before any of you guys were even alive." Said Kyoraku, an unusual gravity lowering his voice.
"Yeah, he's one hell of a guy," Tetsuzamon chimed in. Then he turned to Kyoraku. "Taichou, what was that story about that kid and the dog?"
"Oh yeah," Shunsui began. "Way back in our first year at Yamma Gi's academy, there was this one guy who was real homesick. Well he found a stray dog and snuck it into his room; there were no pets allowed in the dorms, but the dog reminded him of home. Really made the kid feel better; so we all helped him keep it a secret."
The captain took a swig of sake before going on with his story.
"Well one day after class, we came back and the dog had gotten out of the guy's room. He'd torn open the garbage and threw it around all over the place. Chewed the hell outta' the woodwork and ripped a whole pile of futons to shreds. Oh and he'd even taken a big steaming crap right in the middle of the hallway."
"So the kid saw all this and was terrified...then we heard footsteps, and there, coming right down the hallway was the old man. We all knew how much trouble the guy would be in, he was just shaking...looked like he was about to faint. So Yamma Gi sees the mess his new school is in, and all hell's about to break loose, but before he can even say anything, Jyuushiro jumps outta' his room and yells 'oh no, my dog got out!'"
"He took the rap for the entire thing, got suspended for two weeks and had to pay for all of the damage. Turns out the kid who the dog really belonged to was from Rukongai, and Jyuushiro knew there was no way this guy's family would be able to afford the cost of repairing everything."
Kyoraku smiled. "He'd do stuff like that all the time. Just the kind of guy he is."
With a harsh thud, Akina slammed her cup on the table. She couldn't take any more of this. "Ergh, can we talk about anything that isn't Ukitake tonight!?" she yelled.
"What the hell's with you?" Masato growled to is sister. He looked just as shocked as everyone else around the table.
"Sorry," Miharu said, her cheeks reddening by the second. "I...uh..I just think it's kind of rude to talk about someone who isn't here." She couldn't bring herself to make eye-contact with anyone. "Actually, I'm just having a really bad day...my hand's starting to hurt too much, I need to go home and take some pain-pills."
She had risen and left before anybody even had a chance to protest. Her footsteps quickened and quickened, until she stormed right out of the restaurant without even bothering to reclaim her zanpakutou.
"Don't think about him." She told herself. "Don't think about him; don't you do it!" But it was too late. The tears were already streaming down her face. Somehow she managed to make her way home, falling to her knees as soon as she was through the door, she started sobbing like a lost child.
Emotions tangled themselves around each other so tightly inside of her that she felt as if she were going to vomit. "Oh," she screamed out loud to the emptiness of her room, "why? Why does it have to be like this?" Her mind was not just spinning, it was grinding, tearing at itself. Yet even in this state of complete irrationality she could still go over and over a few solid facts...
There was a man suffering out there tonight. He was in great pain; pain she Miharu wanted nothing more than to ease. Yet that man wanted none of her comfort...he wanted none of anything having to do with her.
***
It had started way back in her maiko days, when Akina was the apprentice known as Renshiro. One night, she was sharing a rickshaw with her mentor Renume, and as the pair where wheeled from one engagement to the next, she caught just a glimpse of white hair and brown eyes. The man was only in her sight for a second, but in that tiny bit of time all it took to leave her mesmerized. He was the Captain of the Thirteenth Court Guard Squad, and the most beautiful being she'd ever seen.
Years went on, and from maiko to student to shinigami, Akina's fascination with Ukitake Jyuushiro never went away. As luck would have it, one of her drinking buddies happened to be Ukitake's best friend. Giggling and daydreaming, Miharu worked hard, using all of the techniques she'd learned as a maiko, to try and bring herself closer to him...
...And all of those techniques failed. Miserably. The messages of his body language never escaped her. Sitting or standing, Ukitake would always angle himself away from Miharu, and never make eye contact. For a while, this truely left her baffled. Here was a man who went out of his way to be friendly with everyone, yet she rarely even got a smile or a conversation out of him. Then it hit her...there could only be one reason for the Captain's unusual coldness; he must have somehow found out about her feelings for him, but he had none what-so-ever toward her.
Akina was really a veritable expert on unreciprocated affection. She considered herself fairly decent-looking, and by no means stupid or inarticulate. However she'd always had a tendency of attracting only men a good deal shorter and wider than she, usually sporting beer-guts and receding hairlines, and always of a level of intelligence that was down-right intolerable. The white-haired captain's actions around her mirrored exactly those of herself when in the presence of a less than desired admirer.
Really, she had to ask herself who she was kidding with ever even dreaming of catching Ukitake's attention. He was practically a living legend, deadly powerful on the battlefield yet with a code of honor and kindness few others even came close to. All of his subordinates loved him--really all of Soul Society did. And then there was the way he looked! Even in the height of sickness he was purely breathtaking; with his fair skin and distinguished bone structure he might as well have been the living work of a master artist.
Yes, he was a man who could easily have any woman in Seireitei or beyond for that matter...why would he bother with some foul-mouthed upstart who needed layers of makeup to feel beautiful and fought like a blood-thirsty maniac?
And then the day came when something completely unexpected happened...that same maniac was asked out by Aizen Souske of Fifth division! Miharu was thrilled. Gorgeous, sweet and wonderfully witty, her first boyfriend would surely be enough to cure her of her pathetic infatuation with Ukitake. Or so she'd thought.
***
"That's right!" Akina called out loud. "Sosuke, Sosuke, Sosuke. Think of Sosuke Aizen! You are his girlfriend damn it!" She gritted her teeth and her good and bad hand both curled themselves into fists. She was dating a magnificent man that most woman would give up their right arms to be with, and that still wasn't enough for her idiotic self! "This is ridiculous!" she screamed, pulling herself up off the ground. Then, before she could realize what she was about to do she'd drawn back her injured hand in a sweeping arc and punched it into the wall with all of her strength. The pain shot like hot needles all the way up her arm. Miharu was sure that she'd broken some bones, but she didn't bother to take any care about them, letting the hand fall limp at her side like the raw piece of meat it was. She hated being stuck in a world were there were only two types of men: Ukitake Jyuushiro and everyone below him.
She was a complete mess, black mascara running down her face and red blood dripping from her hand. Yet she ignored her horrifying appearance, the late hour and even her shattered hand and decided to set out from her home. She needed to walk.
Hours and hours passed. Akina's hot tears kept falling and her feet kept dragging her foreword. Finally she found herself in front of a large pond. Exhausted, she collapsed to the ground, eyes drifting to the orange and white koi beneath the water. Her gaze lingered on the beautiful fish for mere minutes before sleep finally took her over.