1.
Uryu was bothered.
Granted, his demeanour wasn't generally happiness and sunshine, but something had happened that afternoon which he had found himself unable to stop ruminating over.
He had been sitting in the handicrafts club room at lunchtime when he suddenly became aware of a certain two people's spiritual pressures from the door, and they appeared to be watching him.
Ordinarily, the presence of two acquaintances wouldn't bother Uryu. No, he was far more alarmed by his own response to them. When Michiru Ogawa had approached him with a toy to be repaired, Uryu had made a point to stitch the animal up as epically and dramatically as he possibly could. And then, when Michiru had thanked him, he had discarded his usually impeccable manners and brushed her off in a most ungentleman-like fashion.
This puzzled Uryu; he was largely perfectly content to blend into the background at school, so why was he suddenly showing off?
The only possible reason he could think of was that he had unconsciously been attempting to intimidate Ichigo Kurosaki in preparation to declare himself as an enemy.
Yes, that had to be it. Such behaviour could only be an intimidation tactic, and it wouldn't make sense for the incident to be an attempt to intimidate sweet, gentle Orihime Inoue, who had, after all, done absolutely nothing to incur his wrath. He knew this for certain; he had been watching her for long enough to determine that she was possibly the only person in their class he had nothing against.
Uryu only wished he knew why.
2.
"That was too close earlier."
Uryu muttered to himself as he paced the room he and Orihime had found in the Seireitei to hide in overnight. "Jirobo Ikkanzaka came far too close to hurting Orihime..."
"What are you mumbling about?" Orihime's voice asked from across the room. Uryu hastily pushed his glasses further up his nose, keen to conceal his face from her gaze for some reason.
"Oh, nothing. Don't worry about it."
Orihime smiled broadly. "Oh, okay! Actually, while you're answering questions, why did you hold onto me for so long after you had rescued me from Jirobo earlier?"
Uryu blinked. Yep, he was definitely blushing now. Crap.
"I wanted to reassure myself that you were safe," he said, carefully. "As far as I'm concerned, the safest place for anything to be is in my hand. Thank you for humouring me, and I do apologise if it made you feel awkward." I know I'm feeling awkward now, he added in his head.
Orihime stared at her companion in surprise. "Oh, no! I didn't mind at all! It was reassuring. Nice."
"Good," responded Uryu, perhaps a tad too quickly. Great. Now she probably thought he was an idiot. Of course, although he wouldn't be admitting to it any time soon, she would probably be correct if she did.
Orihime smiled at him, and Uryu realised that he was off the hook. For now, at least.
3.
"Did you see Orihime yesterday?"
"You mean during P.E.?"
"Yeah, her top was so tight. Really didn't leave much to the imagination!"
Uryu tried his best to block out the sound of his classmates' inane jabbering, but that last comment was too much to ignore.
"Who do you think you are, talking about Orihime like that?" he demanded, drawing himself up to his full height and glaring at the culprit; a particularly scared-looking Keigo Asano.
"I am but a simple admirer," Keigo responded, cowering away from the thunderous expression on Uryu's face.
Uryu bristled, pushing his glasses up his nose until he knew all Keigo could see in them was his own reflection.
Keigo straightened up at his comment and frowned at Uryu. "Whaaat? But anybody with eyes can see how gorgeous she is! Don't tell me you're immune from the charms of Karakura High's resident beauty!"
Uryu blinked, and he felt his face heating up by a couple of degrees. Now that Keigo mentioned it...
"I just absolutely can't stand it when morons like you treat women with so little respect," he spat, turning away from the crowd of his dim-witted classmates before Keigo could notice the blush on his cheeks.
After a couple of seconds, Uryu heard the rumour mill starting up again.
"I knew it. He's gay."
"But everybody loves Orihime, even the girls!"
Uryu winced as the crowd retreated, leaving him on his own in the corridor. This wasn't exactly the reaction he had been hoping for, but at least his classmates would leave the issue alone if they incorrectly believed that they had solved it.
4.
It was the quizzing Uryu had been dreading ever since he had made the decision to follow Kisuke Urahara from his father's basement. Of course Chad would be the one to ask; Chad saw everything.
"By the way, Uryu, Mr. Urahara said you made a deal with your father. In exchange for the training he gave you, aren't you supposed to stay away from Soul Reapers and their friends from now on?"
Uryu's heart sank through the floor as he heard the deeper questions behind Chad's statement. What exactly is your motivation for joining us, Uryu? Why are you risking life and limb for a mission you have a really good excuse to stay away from, Uryu? Why does rescuing Orihime mean so much to you, Uryu?
And there was the anticipated question. "So what are you doing here with us?"
Uryu wracked his brains for a believable explanation, tuning out the sound of Ichigo yelling at him. Finding himself uttering a simple confirmation of the agreement, Uryu was unexpectedly saved from his embarrassment by Ichigo, of all people.
"I don't get it," the Substitute Soul Reaper declared. "The Soul Society may have gone, but I'm still a Soul Reaper."
Bingo. A contradiction.
Uryu took the opportunity to explain his loophole in detail with the aim of distracting Ichigo and Chad with the hows, rather than the whys.
It seemed to work, at least on Ichigo (and who could tell what Chad was thinking), but Uryu just hoped that neither of them remembered later on and thought to ask Kisuke Urahara, who had witnessed first-hand his very visible reaction to the news of Orihime's kidnapping.
No. Uryu knew that Kisuke wouldn't say anything.
5.
Uryu glared at Mayuri Kurotsuchi's back as the mad scientist examined his new specimens in detail. "Am I allowed to put my clothes back on, yet?" he asked, squirming uncomfortably under the scrutiny of the Twelfth Division Lieutenant as he struggled to remove the strips of black fabric binding his shoulders and upper-torso.
Nemu tilted her head slightly to the side and lifted her gaze from Uryu's exposed torso to meet his eyes. "What's the rush?"
"Are you kidding me?" Uryu demanded. "Aizen just inferred that he intends to kill Orihime!"
Nemu gave a small smile and returned her eyes to his body. "You have a nice chest," she murmured. "I would very much like to cut it open."
"Right," Uryu interrupted, rising to his feet before Mayuri could turn away from Szayelaporro's toys and protest. "Come on Renji, we have somewhere we need to be."
"Oh, are you two still there? I had completely forgotten about you."
Uryu rolled his eyes as Mayuri gave him and Renji a blank stare. "Are we dismissed, Master Mayuri?" Uryu asked, a hint of mockery evident in his voice as he tossed the black bindings aside. Renji did the same.
Mayuri turned back to his spoils, immediately losing any lingering interest he may have had in Uryu and Renji's presence. "Yes, yes, get out of my sight."
"Gotcha, Captain Kurotsuchi," Renji piped up, and the pair seized their remaining clothes from the ground as Nemu gave Uryu's torso one long, last stare.
Uryu swiftly put his clothes back on, grudgingly grateful that Mayuri had allowed him to keep his trousers on, and after waving goodbye to Pesche and Dondochakka, who remained to assist the scientists, he and a now fully-clothed Renji took off, Hirenkyaku and Flash-Step carrying them briskly away from the destroyed laboratory.
After a while, Uryu became aware that Renji was turning away from him and preparing to sprint off in another direction.
"Hey! Where are you going?" Uryu called.
Renji stopped running and Flash-Stepped back.
"I'm going to help Rukia," he explained, his face wearing a surprisingly gentle expression which took Uryu aback.
Uryu understood. "I guess we're parting ways for the moment, then."
"Looks like it," confirmed Renji. "Can you feel their spiritual pressures? Rukia needs me right now, and Orihime needs you. Go to her."
"I... I wouldn't put it that way!" spluttered Uryu, hyperaware of the blood he could feel rushing to his cheeks.
Renji smirked. "Guess not," he said, winking pointedly.
"I don't know what you're talking about!" Uryu insisted, fighting to get his pulse back under control. "I'm just going to her because Ichigo would screw everything up if he went alone. Orihime's my friend, of course I care about her."
"Of course, of course," said Renji, holding his hands up in a placating manner. "Well, it was good working with you, Uryu. You're all right. You know, for a stick-in-the-mud tsundere with no sense of humour."
Uryu raised an eyebrow. "You're all right, too. For a delinquent Soul Reaper who likes to stick his nose where it doesn't belong."
"is that an actual confession that I'm right?" teased Renji.
"No, it's definitely not a confession!" Uryu asserted. "Now, I thought you were going to Rukia?"
"Crap, you're right. See you, Uryu."
And with that, Renji disappeared.
+1
Uryu frantically dug in his concealed pocket with his remaining hand, searching for a syringe as he felt his entire body freeze, as though he had suddenly been plunged into ice-water.
No, no, no, don't go into shock, Uryu pleaded with himself, wrapping his fingers around the small plastic cylinder he had hoped he wouldn't need to use and bringing his hand out of the pocket.
Wonderful things, pockets. A prime example of functionality over aesthetics. Uryu felt rather sorry for females, who it seemed just couldn't buy nice clothes with lots of pockets. He had yet to find a well-designed, mass-produced female blazer or evening dress with pockets.
Shut up, Uryu ordered himself, fighting the desire to just give up on attempting to unwrap the syringe one-handed and stand motionless as the blood poured from his stump of a wrist.
A nap would be nice right now...
"No," Uryu muttered to himself, suddenly becoming aware of the fact that he was flying like a birdie through the air, past a pretty girl who appeared to be speaking Simlish. Uryu jabbed the pointy-thingy into his arm, pushed the pushy-slidy-button-thingy, (oh, how he hated buttons,) and...
The pain began to fade as his elevated pulse pushed the anaesthetic through his veins, and rational thought returned. More or less.
As Uryu landed, a few metres away from Orihime and Ichigo, he took stock of the situation.
Batma... Ulquiorra is very much still alive. My draw hand is sitting at Ulquiorra's feet. Wait, have his feet always been so hairy? That's unpleasant.
"Uryu..?"
Uryu shook his head slightly as he looked up towards the source of that wonderful voice, and his thoughts slid into focus as though he had just woken up and put glasses on his brain.
Okay, as focused as it was possible to be under the circumstances.
Orihime appears to be in a reasonable state for the time being, Uryu noted, relief flooding through his veins in place of the blood he had lost to the ground. He glanced down, away from Orihime's beautiful, petrified face, and he found himself unable to breathe. Ichigo... Ichigo is dead.
Suddenly, his vision blurred, and Uryu realised that he had lost far too much blood.
I am not going to survive this.
He didn't look at Orihime as he addressed her. There was no need; she would know he was talking to her, and he acknowledged that the image of her face was pretty much burned into his brain as permanently as it possibly could be by now.
"Don't worry," he said, staring ahead at Ulquiorra. "I've already injected myself with an anaesthetic and an haemostatic drug."
If Orihime responded with any misplaced sign of relief, Uryu wasn't aware of it. He was too busy calculating.
I can't beat Ulquiorra. The only way out of here for any of us is if I hold Ulquiorra off for long enough for Orihime to bring Ichigo back to life, so he can protect Orihime and defeat Ulquiorra. She certainly has the power to heal him, if she can keep it together for long enough.
Uryu weighed this up for less than a second before deciding that he absolutely trusted her to keep it together. Yes. That way, Orihime will survive, Ichigo will survive, which will make Orihime happy, and I...
Well, if Orihime really wants to, she can bring me back. If she does, perhaps I'll eventually get around to telling her.
"I leave Ichigo to you," Uryu told her, unhooking a Seele Schneider from his belt and gripping it in the wrong hand, preparing to attack Ulquiorra.
These are your last words. Think fast, what do you want to be the last thing you ever say?
"Orihime."
I love you.
He threw this thought at her as hard as he could, and then he charged.