"There are three things I have learned never to discuss with people: religion, politics, and the Great Pumpkin."
-Linus
Rukia had been familiar with the concept of Halloween. It wasn't done in Soul Society because, well, everyone was already a ghost. No need to pretend. But they were all well aware that on October the thirty-first, the veil between the Real World and the spirit realms thinned out. This was not merely a myth, but a result of time and space and the fact that this was the date of the annual inspections of the Precipice World, so there was an unusual amount of traffic flow between the worlds on that date. Swarms of 12th Division officers came to study, collect data, analyze, and generally just get in the way of everyone else who was actually doing something. The extra traffic, of course, drew out extra Hollows.
It wasn't surprising that humans had managed to pick up on it. And their traditional customs for this time of year indicated that even thousands of years back, normal humans had had an awareness of the spirit world and a knowledge that there really were evil spirits out to get them. It wasn't just superstition. As Rukia had been forced to admit to herself a number of times over the past months, humans were often sorely underestimated. Sure, they had short life spans. That didn't mean they were stupid.
So, as Ichigo and Inoue had kindly detailed for her, on the last day of October the living people would dress up in the guise of a ghost or goblin or witch in order to fool the evil spirits into thinking that they weren't really humans. It was an admirable effort on their part, and such a shame that it couldn't possibly work. A Hollow would eat any soul, and it could smell the difference between a Plus and a living soul without effort. No amount of disguise or trickery could fool them, and so the Shinigami were on high alert on the thirty-first as always.
Rukia knew she shouldn't be participating in such an absurd ritual, but Ichigo and the twins were going out trick-or-treating (a ridiculous activity, but if it involved candy then Rukia was there) and she couldn't very well just let them go wandering off into the darkness by themselves. She and Ichigo had already spent the whole week leading up to Halloween tracking down Plus souls that didn't want to depart. They all wanted to stick around in hopes of being sighted by a human prowling the streets for sweets. They wanted to jump out at someone from the bushes, just for shits and giggles. One would think that dying would knock a bit of dignity into these folks, but who was Rukia to talk? Right at the moment, she was dressed like a pirate.
"Okay, repeat after me: Arrrr, matey."
"Arrrr, matey."
"Perfect!"
The afternoon before they had made some things called Jack-o-Lanterns. Isshin and Ichigo had brought in half a dozen large pumpkins and together with the twins and Rukia, they had cut them open and emptied them of seeds, which was fairly messy. Then, they'd used knives to carve faces in the fronts, and added a little glitter to make them sparkle. These were now lined up along the front steps with candles inside, glowing eerily into the twilight. Rukia eyed them as they left. She hadn't got a clear explanation of what they were for besides decoration, but glancing back at them over her shoulder, Rukia fancied the notion that they seemed to be keeping a cheerful watch over the house. These silent orange sentinels flickered goodbye to them as they turned the corner and entered the street.
Sado joined their party a block away, dressed as a zombie (some sort of undead thing) and carrying his guitar on his back. Captain Hitsugaya had forbidden the rest of his team from dressing up, but since Rukia was technically assigned to watch after Ichigo and the others didn't actually work for the Gotei 13, they could mostly go with the flow. Ishida was meeting up with Inoue and Tatsuki at a different location so that they could cover more ground separately. Hitsugaya and Urahara both had their people stationed around the city, ever alert for signs of trouble. Karakura attracted a lot of spirit activity as it was, and with the war brewing and the level of Hollow activity already off the charts, there couldn't be too many eyes out.
Rukia clutched her sword in hand as they set out towards the more residential areas. She'd declined to wear the eyepatch that Ishida had included with the costume, for safety's sake, but she did put on the boots because he had insisted that they were perfect for swashbuckling, whatever that was. She thought that tonight they may have a good advantage over any enemies they met, as there were so many other people out that they'd be lost in the crowd. Plus, they were less recognizable as high-profile soldiers with their costumes on. On a normal day they were easily identifiable, but tonight their hair and faces were mostly covered. Ichigo was wearing a sheet with holes cut out for his eyes (Inoue had said that this was a traditional western ghost costume, but Rukia just wasn't seeing it). Karin was a witch with a pointy hat and Yuzu was a fairy of some sort.
The twins ran up to the first house they came to and rang the doorbell, dancing around excitedly. Big brother was right on their heels. Momentarily an elderly woman came to the door, dropping handfuls of sweets into their open bags. They thanked her politely, with Ichigo glowering over them in a positively comical fashion under his sheet, and hopped back down the walk.
"We got Skittles!" Karin exclaimed. Another party of trick-or-treaters was crossing the street ahead of them, so they crossed to the opposite side, in a kind of zig-zag. The second house had a boy on the front porch, wailing that his costume was torn. Too bad Ishida wasn't in their party, he'd have had it fixed and heavily embellished in a matter of minutes. The twins were given popcorn balls.
At the third house there was the ghost of a black cat milling around. Rukia wondered for a moment whether it somehow knew that tonight was a special occasion—normally animal spirits just passed through on their own—but she surreptitiously sent it on its way without interrogating it. The twins received candied apples.
They had been out for nearly an hour when they first spotted any real trouble. There was a weak Hollow following them, no doubt having picked up on Ichigo's obnoxious spirit pressure. It was hopping from rooftop to rooftop as they went along, but as soon as Rukia fell behind with the intention of taking care of it, it disappeared in a haze of sparks—someone had slain it, and with a zanpakuto, no question. Yumichika was waiting to greet them on the roof of the next house, though, and so the short-lived mystery was solved.
"Isn't it a beautiful night?" he said. "Captain Hitsugaya assigned me to this area, so you've no need to stick about. I'm only disappointed that I couldn't have a costume as lovely as yours, young lady!" he indicated Yuzu, but she was the only one who couldn't see him. He didn't seem too miffed.
"Well don't work too hard!" Ichigo yelled at him as they walked away. "The night is young, you know!"
Yumichika disappeared into the night and they continued on their merry way. It was actually kind of fun, and Ichigo seemed to have put away some of his seriousness. He pointed out that Rukia could easily pass for a kid young enough to trick-or-treat herself, but she declined. Byakuya would be so ashamed if he found out that she'd been begging for candy—and he would find out, as surely as the sky was blue. Rukia had learned long ago that he had spies everywhere. She was shocked that it had taken him two months to find her after she'd exchanged powers with Ichigo here in the Real World. Her best theory on that was that perhaps Captain Ukitake had given him a stern lecture about minding his own damned business on the day she'd left.
They met Ishida, Inoue and Tatsuki in a well-lit park about two hours after they'd set out. Ishida was a vampire. No doubt he'd chosen the costume because it had a cape. Inoue was a... pumpkin thing, perhaps. Maybe even a duck. Tatsuki was a witch, but her costume was much better than Karin's and she had a broom with her for some reason. The three had been at a party and told Ichigo about "bobbing" for apples, whatever that was, and playing truth-or-dare with the other kids from school. It hadn't ended well for Keigo.
Nearby between the trees there was a cheerful orange bonfire burning, with a dozen or more familiar schoolmates gathered around. Sado produced a package of white puffy sweets that Ichigo called marshmallows.
"These don't look like food, Ichigo."
"They're better when they've been roasted, here, let's find a good stick..."
"A stick?"
And in a matter of minutes Rukia was holding a stick with a marshmallow on the end as close to the fire as she could stand. Humans customs were so strange sometimes. But later, when she was eating it smashed between sweet crackers with some chocolate, she decided that strange wasn't quite the word she was looking for. Perhaps ingenious would fit the situation better.
Some of the group had begun to tell ghost stories, and some were trying to commune with the dead by holding hands and chanting—right, like that would ever work. While Sado pulled out his guitar and began to sing a song called "Monster Mash" with Inoue and Tatsuki, Ichigo sat down on a bench with Karin and Yuzu to help them inspect their candy, he said.
"Inspect it for what?" Rukia asked, rubbing the chocolate off her face.
"Oh, foreign objects, open pieces that could be covered in germs... there's always rumors of poisoned candy this time of year, too."
Sado and the others had moved on to a song about a zombie jamboree, to which Chizuru was dancing inappropriately.
"What?" The possibility of poisoned candy was startling, not to mention dangerous. "If you're worried about poison, then what's the point of doing any of this?"
"Nah, it's always just a hoax to scare people."
And then Karin took off her witch's hat so she could see into her bag better, and her face was flushed with excitement and smeared with chocolate in the firelight—and Rukia saw exactly what the point of it all was.
The crescent moon had risen and floated more than halfway across the sky since they'd left the house. Things wound down slowly, and Ishida made his way home alone, as was his habit. Rukia wondered just what a human did if they were alone on Halloween night, but thought it would be rude to ask him. Inoue and Tatsuki left shortly after, though Chizuru nagged them to stay. Inoue would probably spend the night with Tatsuki's family, leaving Captain Hitsugaya and Lieutenant Matsumoto in peace with their work at her apartment.
Wound up and flying high on sugar, the twins skipped home ahead of them with their bags of candy, pointing their magic wands at passersby and shouting gibberish at them. Ok, so sometimes human customs were pretty strange. Ichigo, Rukia and Sado walked along behind them, eyes darting here and there in the darkness. She spotted Renji atop a chimney as they passed by Urahara's shop, which was still lit up brightly. Urahara must have thrown a small party for his associates while they kept watch through the night.
Back at the Kurosaki residence their six Jack-o-Lanterns glowed almost blinding orange in the pitch dark. It seemed that Isshin had turned out all the lights so that he and the twins could watch scary monster movies in the dark until bedtime. Ichigo argued that this couldn't end well—Yuzu would undoubtedly have nightmares—but Isshin and Karin won out and the three parked themselves on the couch with Sado. Isshin ordered a pizza and made popcorn, insisting that Sado stay the night. Ichigo, disgusted, went up to take a shower.
Rukia stripped her costume off and took up her usual perch on Ichigo's bedroom windowsill, keeping watch in her pajamas late into the night. Ichigo came up after a while and put a mug of hot chocolate and a plate in her hands.
"What's this?" she asked. It seemed to be some sort of dessert, and it was covered in fluffy white cream.
"It's spicy pumpkin pie." Ichigo set his plate and mug on the desk and flopped onto his bed. "My mom used to always make pumpkin pie for Halloween, and roasted pumpkin seeds. One year she put too much spice in the pie, I think I was four, and we all thought it was much better that way. So that's how we've made it ever since."
Rukia took a bite. It was sweet and earthy, but there was definitely a slight burn in the aftertaste. The cream, however, took it away quickly. She would have to make this for her brother sometime, since he was so fond of spicy things.
"It's really good," she told him. "I wish we did this sort of thing in Seireitei."
"Now all that's left is to wait up to see the Great Pumpkin."
"The what?"
"The Great Pumpkin, of course." Ichigo propped his head up on his arm, looking past her out the window. "On Halloween Night the Great Pumpkin rises from the pumpkin patch he's deemed most sincere, and he flies through the air bringing presents to all the children who believe."
"That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard."
Ichigo grinned. "Suit yourself," he said, and took a bite of his pie. "I bet you don't think Santa is real either." He really had put away some of his seriousness, hadn't he?
She rolled her eyes and turned her attention back to the city. On the street below a small gang of kids whooped and hollered as they ran by, and the blackness was dotted by the occasional twinkling orange Jack-o-Lantern and the moon as it set. A gust of wind blew in and brought with it the scent of a wood fire—someone else must be roasting marshmallows nearby. Rukia took another bite of her pie and decided that if ever there had been a more perfect night, she couldn't remember when it was.
A/N: This one is complete, but subject to revision like all my other stuff. Yay candy!