This is my first story so please constructive criticism would be appreciated.
Disclaimer: Tite Kubo is the respective owner of Bleach, the only thing I own is the story and the OC's.
Chapter 1: The Encounter
"You're too weak!" I heard the voice shout at me as I woke up from the nightmare. I look to my clock and see it's four o' clock in the morning. I wipe away the cold sweat that was running down my forehead and lie back down. 'How long will these nightmares go on for?' It's been three weeks since the nightmares began, they started ever since that boy Ichigo started disappearing during classes with that new student Rukia. "I wonder what they're doing every time they leave."
I walk to the mirror and I can already see dark lines underneath my eyes from the lack of sleep. I look down and see a silver necklace with a cross on it. I reach down and pick it up and put it around my neck as I walk away to get dressed for school. I try to straighten my long black hair but all the effort was in vain. So I walk down stairs and start my daily training of kendo with my katana. After about two hours of practice, I decide to make breakfast. I set out making two rice balls for now and two for at school. After making them, I sit down and pray for the food. When I'm finished eating, I look at the clock and see it's time to leave. "Well, time to see what the day will throw at me," I say as I close the door behind me and walk to school.
I hear the bell ringing, signalling that the day is over. As I'm about to walk through the door, I hear Miss Yukano call,"Katashi, will you stay for a moment please? I want to speak with you." I sigh at the request, but I obey anyway.
"Katashi, your grades have fallen during the last couple of weeks, this isn't like you. Instead of taking notes during class, you continuously draw these two pictures over and over again. Is everything alright?" she asks me as she hands me my two most recent sketches. I look down at the two and in one I remember drawing a beautiful woman dressed in black with pale but beautiful skin and long flowing black hair.
When I look at the other, I could only shiver at the memory of the cause of my nightmare the previous night. I looked at the picture of myself, but it wasn't me at the same time, we both shared the same black hair but his skin was completely white. But what made me shiver, were his eyes, blood red eyes with black sclera. I can hear the maniacal laugh echo through my head at the memory of the nightmare.
"Just been having some sleeping issues," I reply
"Why do you draw them?" she asks me.
"When I was younger, my mother told me to draw what made me afraid. When I was finished drawing what made me scared, I would realise that it was on a piece of paper and it can't hurt me," I say to her.
"Well, tonight I want you to get a good night's rest so you can get your grades back on top again," she says and gives me a small smile.
"Will do," I say as I walk out the classroom giving her a wave goodbye. As I walk home, I recap on the day's events. 'Rukia wasn't at school today and so was Ichigo, I wonder where they went this time.' I asked Ichigo's friends, Keigo and Mizuiro, about his disappearance, Keigo said that he was probably just bunking school. I laugh at the thought, 'even though Ichigo and I rarely talk I knew enough that even though he was missing classes, he isn't the type of guy that would just bunk school altogether.' But there was something I just couldn't wrap my mind around, every time I asked someone about Rukia, no one seemed to know who the girl was. I asked Orihime if she knew, seeing as they were close friends, where she was. She said no to me but I know when Orihime was lying, poor girl, she's never been really good at it.
I make a right turn into a small alley way before I came to a clearing to see Urahara's Shop, I see that Ururu and Jinta aren't outside as usual so they must be inside or somewhere else, seeing that it is Friday after all. I knock on the door and hear a voice granting permission to enter. "Hey Tessai, how are things?"
"Not too bad and yourself Katashi?" he replies.
"Same old, same old. Is Kisuke around?"
"Unfortunately he's not, needed to take care of some business errands. But he did leave me in charge of the store and left a list of what to give you," he says as he reaches down and pulls out a small plastic bag. "Two boxes of spicy chai tea and a chocolate bar," he says handing the bag to me.
"Thanks just put on the tab," I say as I start to walk to the door, "oh yeah, when will Kisuke be back?"
"In about ten days."
"Thanks, if gets back sooner, tell him I said hi," I say as I walk out the door and close it. As the door closed, I suddenly felt this massive amount of force weigh down on me for three seconds. "What the hell was that?" I silently ask myself. Shaking off the feeling several moments later, I start my walk back home thinking about what I just felt. 'That wasn't gravity I felt just now and it wasn't wind either.'
After reaching home, I open the door and decide to forget about what I felt earlier. I put down the packet on the counter and decide to go upstairs and sleep. As I walk into my room, I walk towards my bed and sit down. I look at the small picture that is on my lampstand, I reach down and pick it up to get a closer look at it. As I do, a stray tear falls down my eye, "Miss lil' sis, haven't stopped thinking about you," I whisper, putting down the picture showing a younger me with a little girl with beautiful hazel brown eyes and golden brown hair tied in a pony tail. I collapse on the bed, exhausted from the day's events,"I hope I don't have any of those nightmares," I say just as sleep takes over my eyes.
"Hehehe..."
I awoke to the sound of giggling, "Who's there?" I asked, but there was no reply. 'I locked the front door and I made sure the windows were locked as well, so who is it?' I thought to myself.
Just as I was about to fall asleep again, I heard the giggling. When I decided to look up, I saw a little girl sitting on the edge of my bed with her legs crossed smiling at me. Now I was worried, so many questions were going through my mind. 'Who is this girl and how did she get inside?' I wanted to ask her the questions I had but when she suddenly stood up, I saw a chain hanging from her chest. Now I started to panic, before I knew what I was doing, I asked her, "How did that chain get in your chest?!" She gave me a confused look and looked down and saw what I was talking about.
"Oh this?" she then reaches down and pulls up the chain, "when I woke up I just found it there."
"D-Does it hurt?" I stutter in shock.
"Nope," she says and smiles at me. She then looks down at her feet,"when I woke up, I couldn't find my brother so we could play together." I could hear the sadness in her voice, seeing her sad little face reminded me of Hikari. Without realising, I ask her before she could burst into tears, "I will play with you." She looks up at me with a gleam in her eyes.
"Y-You will?" I could only nod my head to her question.
"Yay!" she yells as she throws her arms up in the air, "thank you mister." I gave her a small smile and asked,"what was your favourite game that you and your brother used to play?" I asked her.
"We used to play hide and go seek, that was our favourite game," she says. I look down at my clock and see it is half past one in the morning. 'Well, I guess I can play with her, maybe this is a dream,' I think to myself.
"I will go hide and you go seek," she says to me.
I smile at her and raise my hands to cover my eyes, "One, two, three. . ." She giggles and runs away.
"No peeking," she says as she turns around the corner.
"I won't," I say trying to suppress a smile.
"Caught you again!" I shouted as I looked in the cupboard.
"Aww, you cheater!" she says to me in defeat.
I laugh at the nickname she gave me, I look over to the clock and see that it is two o' clock in the morning. I look to the girl and ask,"Do you mind if I asked you something?" she nods her head at me, "how did you get in here?" She looks at me and gives me a big smile.
"Sure mister, I came in through the window," she says. 'Well, if this is some crazy dream, that does explain how she got in.' I think to myself. But another question dawns on me. "Of all the houses that you saw, why come here?" I asked.
"Well. . ." she says as she plays with her hair,"it was the only place that I could see that the big scary men couldn't follow me to." I narrow my eyes at this. "Scary looking men?" I ask. "Mmhmm, they wore black kimono and carried scary looking katanas," she says with a hint of sadness in her voice.
"Well the big scary men won't find you here," I say trying to cheer her up. As I walk over to her, I stub my toe on a chair. I let out a cry of pain as I grab my foot trying to soothe the pain. A strange thought entered my mind now. 'Hold on a second, one doesn't feel pain in dreams,' I thought, and then I slowly opened my eyes, expecting to find myself in my room, but I instead find myself in the study.
Then I look to my left and before I could mutter a single word, the little girl jumps straight into me, giving me a giant bear hug. "Thank you mister for playing with me, I felt so lonely since I couldn't find my little brother. But now I'm happy because you played with me. Something I wanted to do since I woke up," she says to me and gives me a small bow. Before I could say or do anything, a blue hue engulfs the little girl and she slowly starts vanishing from my eyes. "I'll never forget you," those were her last words before she vanished completely. After seeing this, I came to one conclusion. "So she was a spirit? Well that explains how she came in," I say. But another thought crosses my mind that makes me worry. "Then who were those men in black kimonos carrying katanas?" I ask myself.
I start my slow trek back up to my bedroom, feeling exhausted. When I finally reach my bed, not even bothering to look at the time, I fall down and close my eyes, waiting for sleep to wash over me.
Author's Notes:
Well that's the first chapter to my story. Chapter 2 will be posted soon and I hope to update 2-3 chapters every two weeks. Maybe even four if I'm lucky. See you next time.