Notes: Title taken from the August 2, 2005 prompt for the lj community 31_days.
It wasn't like what she had learned in the academy, not that she had ever paid attention very well. When the instructor devoted an hour to swordsmanship, shunpo, that was her cue to doodle, nap, or gaze absently out the window. She looked out the window. She didn't deserve to be here. Renji wouldn't graduate for months, at least, and he was much more deserving than her. Or more devoted, anyway.
But she was here, standing around uselessly, in hakama about two sizes too big, trying to find a way to speak up and ask where she should file the report she'd just finished on hell butterfly requisitioning or something. The kind of report that didn't live up to the glamour, the excitement of being in the Gotei 13, training alongside legends and cutting down hollows. The kind that she didn't really see coming in all those kidou classes and political lectures in which her professors would wax eloquent about their glory days serving under such-and-such taichou.
"Hey!" a sharp voice startled her out of her thoughts. She snapped to attention, feeling a flush spread across her face as she realized she had been caught unawares by her superior officer. She saluted respectfully.
"Kuchiki, how long have you been standing there? If you've got a question, you have to speak up! I'm not that scary, am I?" She nodded, and stammered an apology. "Eh, don't worry so much Kuchiki! Goddamn, you're wound so tight you're making me nervous just looking at you." He smiled a bit and cut her off mid-sentence. "And don't you think of apologizing for that too! Here, give that to me and get back to your work."
And he waved her off carelessly, as other squad members pushed around her to discuss their assignments with the fukutaichou, occasionally murmuring "excuse me, Kuchiki-san" but more often now a simple "sorry kid" or "new girl". A girl (third seat?) she had just met the other day gossiped with her about exactly where Kyouraku-taichou and Ise-fukutaichou were seen together yesterday, and dragged her along to lunch, talking her ear off the whole way.
No, she decided, it wasn't anything like the academy.
