Author's Note: Been getting quite a few inquires on the status of this story and if more chapters were coming. Because of more interest since I stopped updating than when I was, I have taken an interest in getting this finished. Yes, I am that shallow. Comments do move me.
Many thanks and much appreciation to my beta, millythompson m( )m
Bleach, not Dwellin's (just stating the obvious)
Updated: 9/20/12
THE PLAN
Freedom!
Momo kicked her legs back and forth underneath the bench on which she sat. She was waiting but not very patiently. What in the world is taking so long? It seemed like she had been sitting here forever waiting for her papers to be signed off on so she could leave.
Several weeks had gone by since the lunch with Renji and Kira. Since that time she still had to report to the infirmary and spend her nights there. Some rot about her heart beating out of rhythm, or whatever. However, during this morning's rounds, Captain Unohana informed her that today was the day she was going to be released. About flaring reiatsu time!
Hinamori could hardly contain her impatience; she needed to be training. Now. All the time. Every day.
For the first time in her life, Hinamori Momo had a plan. After meticulously going through all her own personal files, crosschecked with the company's files, and what she find of Aizen's leftover personal papers (of which there weren't many that weren't gathered up by Second Company), she had stumbled onto something very disturbing.
The plan involved her gaining a bankai to be the first thing. Number two on the list was something she was dreading. It hadn't been on the earliest plan, but Momo finally decided that there was a certain powerful someone that needed to be in the know, and it positively couldn't and wouldn't be Shiro-chan, er, Hitsugaya taicho. Dang, that was going to be a hard habit to break!
But back to number one. If that one wasn't achieved, everything after it on the list was completely unattainable.
Bankai.
Like most assistant captains, Momo had worked at it more or less over the past decades. Okay, if she was going to be honest, less. Fifth Company was rarely given any assignments in the world of humans to perform konso and she could count on one hand any encounters with hollows. Also, it never seemed to her that Captain Aizen cared one way or the other if she ever achieved bankai or not.
"Well duh," she muttered bitterly under her breath. It was pretty clear now why he never urged her on in this area.
The second reason she fervently wanted to leave was because of what she had recently learned. A peculiar twist of fate favoring her, for once, gave Momo the opportunity to read her own file.
One day while in room during a routine check-up and updating Hinamori's file, an alarm went off and the nurse shoved her file in a file holder attached to the end of the bed before racing off to answer the emergency announcement. Taking it as a sign, Momo didn't waste any time grabbing up the file. No fool she! Flipping it open she began to read.
Soon, what she read made her flush and gasp. They thought she was on the verge of a nervous breakdown!
More was written about Aizen's actions that fateful day which they had been withholding from her. She was shocked to learn that Shiro-chan was also run through by Aizen. Why wouldn't they tell her about that? Did they think she would break at the news? Still, someone should have told her that Aizen had been fully intending to kill not only her (that, she could forgive) but Shiro-chan as well, (that she couldn't, and it was not the same as when she had threatened him!).
For the first time, she felt a white hot anger toward her former captain. It was one thing to try and run her through, but it was quite another thing to try and kill her dearest friend! There were no words that could successfully convey her fury.
It was then, at that moment, the crack that had started from eavesdropping on Renji and Kira, widened and the light shone through. What a complete idiot she was! Of course Shiro-chan wasn't even capable of being a traitor! And kill someone in cold blood? Never! How could she have been so blind! Momo had hit herself on the forehead with the folder several times at the sheer depth of her naiveté and gullibility. Stupid! Stupid! Stupid!
All this, plus what she had learned looking through the records the Second Company had missed, (really, if she was a good lieutenant, she should hand those in—but Hinamori no longer wanted to be the obliging, submissive goody two shoes shinigami.
Then realizing how it would look if the nurse walked in on her hitting herself with a file folder, she returned to scanning the pages. No wonder everyone in Soul Society treated her with kid gloves! The pitying looks when she tried to come up with some reasonable explanation for Aizen's behavior. There was so much to make up for!
With trembling fingers, Momo replaced her record and walked over to the window to stare blankly out at the garden and courtyard.
Later, the nurse found her standing in the same position when she returned. Casting a nervous glance at the recovering fukutaicho, she picked up the file. Unohana taicho was displeased when she found out the file was left in the room. The nurse snuck another quick peek at the patient. Hinamori fukutaicho was still turned toward the window like she usually was in the afternoons when she was moping over her captain. Letting out a pent up breath, the nurse slipped the file out of the holder and left the room, quietly closing the door shut behind her.
Momo was very aware of the nurse's presence in the room and when she left. This time, she could feel the pitying gaze of the nurse before she left and resented it. She was tired of being treated like fragile glass. Momo Hinamori not only thought about her friends, Shiro-chan, the betrayal, Shiro-chan, her own response, Shiro-chan, Renji, Kira, Shiro-chan, the war that was surely coming, Shiro-chan… it was a pivotal moment for her. No more whining, no more Miss Nice Gal Shinigami, oh no, it was time for… for…
Momo shook her head. She needed a new image, sort of like a female Zaraki.
Zaraki taicho was no pushover with his "take-no-prisoners" style of fighting. He would have opened up a can of zanpakutou "whup yo' butt" on Aizen. Yes, that was it. A female Zaraki, with a hair bun
No, she needed a new image, a strong image of herself first before even trying to embark on a change in her life. Dream big or hide under the futon! That would be her new motto, either that, or do a better background and reference check on a captain before agreeing to be his subordinate.
Her eyes lit up with a thought. Action hero! That was it. Just like the stories she was hearing from the human world Renji kept talking about now that the ryoka were their allies.
Quite unaware of what she was doing, she took a stance, made a fist and with a determined look on her face declared out loud to the room, "I will be a shinigami action hero!"
The echo bounced off the walls and then silence.
Momo's dark head dropped and her shoulders drooped as something occurred to her. "Maybe, sort of, perhaps…" she whispered for she didn't have a clue as to what an action hero looked like, or worse, how to become one. And Renji's enthusiastic stories hadn't gone into any of that except that tights were involved somehow and that action heroes were very heroic (which only stands to reason given the name), saving their loved ones from harm, and fighting for justice against overwhelming odds.
Momo jolted back from her musing of that fateful day of her "awakening".
Momo glanced once more at the door to Unohana's office. What could the front-sporting, braided taicho be doing in there?! The bench seat was hard and her butt was getting sore from sitting on it for so long. She was a shinigami with a plan of action and time was a-wasting.
There was so much to do! Lifting a thumb to her mouth, Momo started chewing on the innocent nail. She really needed to get out of this place and back to her private quarters! Even this little bit of waiting was fraying her nerves!
Also, she was antsy because Shiro… (Respect, remember?) Hitsugaya taicho had been admitted the afternoon after their fight. He only stayed a few days although he didn't stay long. Even so, Momo didn't want to be around in case he needed to come in for a check-up.
Something died that day while reading the folder, but something new, different and making her twitchy in her own skin was tapping at her from some doorway back in the corners of her brain. Some huge revelation was pushing on the hinges of that door and in no way was she going to let that out, whatever it was.
Think about something else, she commanded herself. With an effort, Momo restrained her legs from swinging and brought her mind back to the waiting she was doing. Usually she was more patient than this. On the heels of a deep sigh the door slid open captain of the Fourth Company stepped out of her office with a hint of a smile on her lips and extended a sheet of paper to her former patient. Hinamori leapt to her feet and in a flash snatched the paper from the healer's slender fingers, startling them both by her abrupt behavior.
Then, remembering her manners and who it was before her, the younger shinigami bowed deeply while saying, "Arigatou, Unohana taicho."
"Don't forget that you have limits. Your strength and stamina will need to be…"
"Yes, yes, got it all earlier. Can I go now?"
Restu lifted one shapely eyebrow at the lieutenant of Fifth Company. The girl was usually one of the most courteous shinigami around. She studied the anxious face of her former patient who was nearly dancing from one foot to the other in her haste to be going. Well, I better dismiss her before she combusts, thought the healer.
"Go."
Hinamori was out the door before the word was out of Unohana's mouth.
Let Me Re-introduce Myself….
In her excitement, the Fifth's vice-captain, on temporary sabbatical, fairly flew down the steps and across the wide courtyard.
With papers clasped to her chest she rounded a corner of a building at a dead run and ran into someone. Literally.
Momo would have bounced back onto the ground but the male shinigami (She may be naive but she wasn't an idiot; the body shape was totally different. Hers being softer than the hard and muscular she had run into.), caught and held her upper arms until her head stopped spinning.
Hinamori had not been aware of anyone approaching or even nearby because of her elation upon being released. She looked up with an apologetic smile to thank her rescuer and blurted out before she could stop herself, "Shiro-chan! Oh no!"
This was not good! She wasn't prepared! It dawned on her what she had said by the quizzical look on his face so she kept going, "Noooo,... ah" Think fast, think fast! "I have noooo note to give you. Yes, that's right, no note," What was wrong with her! She couldn't stop repeating that word!
"Nope, I left it behind." Thinking furiously, "It's in…. Unohana taicho's office. Yes, yes it is. No note with me, it's with her."
She beamed her brightest and biggest smile and pointed back the way she had come. Unfortunately for her, the fake smile stretched across her lips was one Shiro-chan was already familiar with, damnit! The smile faltered as Momo settled for a grimace that showed some teeth. Let him figure that one out if he was such a genius!
"Hinamori? Are you okay?" He asked, one quizzical brow raised. "And what kind of look is that? Did you hit your head?" She dropped her head causing his eyes to narrow cynically at this odd behavior.
Shouldn't she still be in the Fourth's infirmary? Actually that was why he was heading in this direction. Today the silver-haired captain had heard that Hinamori was likely to be released. This was a good day to apologize. Even though I am not wrong, he thought adamantly, but, of all people, he didn't like being at odds with Hinamori.
He settled a suspicious look on her bent head. Something was up. It was strange that she was keeping her head down, as if fascinated with the sight of her toes. Yes, something was up, way up. His brow furrowed as he studied her. So intent on his scrutiny, he didn't realize that he still was gripping her upper arms.
Momo kept her eyes pointed down, thinking frantically, and came to a quick decision. This would be the first step of her plan of keeping Shiro-chan safe and also repaying the enormous debt she owed him.
"Hinamori?" His voice was taking on that icy edge that she knew so well… and for the most part, ignored. Not this time.
"Hmm, oh, well, uhm," Why was she having a problem with getting her thoughts organized coherently? He was going to be suspicious if he wasn't already. And why hadn't he let go of her yet? In fact, he was pulling her closer to him, so much so that she stumbled and fell against him. This was different, very different. Suddenly she felt her cheeks warming and felt the desire to fan herself. When had Shiro-chan's chest widened and shoulders grown so broad? She realized he was still talking and she didn't have a clue as to what he had said.
"What's wrong? Hinamori, look at me."
Absolutely not!
"Uh, nothing… really… Hitsugaya taichou. But I need to get going as Unohana-taichou has just released me and made me promise I would go home and go straight to bed."
"Would you like me to walk…?"
"NO! No, no, that's not necessary! I can walk, I've been doing it a long time now and I'm really good at it. Yep, good, so good that I need to be going now," she said frantically with her head bowed as if speaking to his chest.
Not very action hero-like she realized so Momo raised large, light brown eyes to his and instantly regretted it. Oh dear, but they were close, practically nose-to-nose close. Too close! She could see the worry in his eyes and something else that was making her cheeks burn even worse. Momo watched as her oldest and dearest friend began searching her face and eyes, trying to pierce through this strange behavior. That was the problem! He could do it too! He knew her the best out of all of her.
Immediately Momo dropped her eyes again, sorry for having looked up. That pointed chin dipped and from under snowy white brows those large aquamarine-colored eyes were latched onto her with single-minded intensity, knowing something wasn't right. Wonderful. This was the last thing she needed right now, Hitsugaya the detective on the alert.
She stared down at one of her arms where his hand was gripping her. Seeing the tilt of her dark head, he followed her gaze to his hand, and with a small grunt of surprise, he dropped his hand at once and tucked both into the sleeves of his uniform. Now he noticed their position in relation to each other and took a couple of steps back to put some space between them.
Without looking up at him, the lieutenant of the Fifth bowed deeply and upon rising, looked off to the side and declared, "Hitsugaya taicho, I do not think that we can be friends anymore. Really, it is my fault for taking advantage of our friendship upon you in the past when you became a captain. It would also be best for me if I didn't, er, it would be good for both of us I mean, if we didn't see each other anymore. Not only that but I have I been such a burden to you, and,… and,… also I must apologize for my unforgivably bad manners in the past. From here on out, I shall treat you with the respect and deference that you deserve."
With that she bowed deeply again and held it while saying, "I have committed a grave inexcusable rudeness, please forgive me, Hitsugaya taicho!"
When Momo lifted from her bow, she chanced a peek at Toshiro's face and saw that for once in their long years of knowing each other, she had shocked him. His deep blue green eyes stared into the distance over her shoulder. One didn't have to be a tactical genius to know that now was a good time to withdraw. Or, if one was going to be honest about it, flee. With alacrity, Momo fled.
Hitsugaya snapped back to the moment to watch Hinamori's retreating back. If he wanted to, he could have easily caught her, but he was too stunned. What? What did she say? What just happened here? Was that really Hinamori Momo speaking to him just now? Of course it was. He knew her reiatsu as well as he knew the name of his zanpakutou.
Intellectually, the Tenth's captain knew what had been said, the words, the sentences, but for the life of him, he couldn't process the meaning of her little speech. She apologized? Of course, that wasn't abnormal behavior for her as she was so tenderhearted and hated to hurt other people's feelings. But how dare she call him Hitsugaya taicho! That was a running joke between the two of them for years now ! For her to, all of a sudden, just repudiate it…. That was not like her, not his Hinamori.
Then, his mind allowed him to fix on the one thing that brought a tightening pain in his chest before his brain had even registered the meaning. Now his brain was beginning to understand what his heart was quicker to realize. She didn't want to be friends anymore? She couldn't do that! The difference in their positions had never been of concern to her before. What the hell?
Barely conscious of his surroundings or where his body was taking him, Hitsugaya walked along in a stupor. It could have been minutes or hours later when he found himself in his quarters leaning his back against the door. Once becoming aware of where he was, he ran a hand through his thick, spiked locks wondering briefly how long he had been there, staring at nothing in particular.
Something had to be wrong with Hinamori. If he could figure out what the something was, he could fix it, he was sure of it. It was going to be more difficult than usual since she was not going to tell him and pulling rank wouldn't work. She was sweet, caring, kindhearted, and easily moved to tears for others, but running down through all of that was a hidden stubborn streak that most people didn't know existed underneath the friendly and cheerful exterior. He would find out but right now he just needed to sit down and be cheerlessly numb.
All My Wealth
There was one thing that Hinamori Momo knew about herself. She wasn't a genius. The only plan that Momo had ever come up with in her life was the one where she entered the Academy and then became assigned to Aizen taicho's company. Not so much of a plan really as a life goal.
Momo sat at the desk in her quarters with the lamp next to her elbow casting an amber glow around her and the balled up sheets of paper littering the floor. Most had been thrown in a fit of frustration. At the moment, she was frowning down at the sheet in front of her filled with scratch marks and crosshatching. There were a couple of things listed she could do in order to become stronger. The first thing, and most obvious one, was that she needed to be able release a bankai. That one wasn't the worry though. It was the sneaking into a few forbidden places that was bothering her.
"Courage Momo!" she instructed herself. Still, the air in her lungs felt constricted even as she determined to let nothing stand in the way! There was a war coming! Maybe, just maybe she could, hopefully, slow down Aizen's plans for conquest. If there was a way to get into Hueco Mundo without being detected, then she was going to find it!
She checked her list, willing herself to be smart, clever, and cunning, because she really, really, needed every little bit of luck and brainpower she possessed to make this work, along with more research. However, part of it was already done. Using her kido again, she had infiltrated Aizen's locked files in the basement of the company's library that no one else, she assumed, knew about. Having used Aizen's security code that she had found in the bottom of his private stash of expensive tea she was able to peruse as much as she wanted and as long as she wanted, all without any interference from Second Company's spy corp. Most of his writings were written rather cryptically in some kind of code but here and there she was able to put a few clues together.
Despite all her talent and luck so far though, the problem most worrying to her was going to be a certain short captain with a prickly attitude! The bun-wearing fukutaicho tapped the pointed end of the pen against the paper and little droplets of ink sprayed out, but went unnoticed.
"He'd kill me if he knew about any of this stuff." With elbow on the desk, she cupped her chin in hand and briefly thought of the different ways that Hitsugaya would react if he got wind of her plans.
"Oh no!" she moaned and scrunched her eyes shut; "Rather than kill me, he will freeze me into a Momo-sized ice cube!" Not good. "And worse, he will stand there and lecture me all day, while smirking because I would have no choice but to listen! Oh he is so diabolical! Darn him!"
Covering her face with her hands she moaned again. "What am I going to do?" Definitely the number one priority was to keep him far away from her business as she could. Ranked number one in the art of kido but dead last in the art of lying, Momo knew that subterfuge was not one of her strengths.
"Stop thinking about Shiro-chan for now!" she scolded herself. "It's slowing you down!"
Not that she had ever been 'up to something' before; she was much too boring of a person for that. Still, he was always inquiring, asking, and using that scowl of his like it was some sort of weapon, and right at the most inconvenient of times too! And each time he did that, what was her response? What kind of shinigami caves in every single time and spills their guts? It didn't matter that he was a strong captain, or that he was a genius, damnit, he was the small boy who spit watermelon seeds in her face! She clenched a fist. By golly, it was time she started sticking up for herself and,… and… her fierce expression fell, she didn't have a clue on how to go about doing that.
Yes, 'What To Do About Shiro-chan' would be an on-going issue while she went about the business of gathering certain important items. Momo pinched the bridge of her nose. She didn't have a clue. There weren't many around who could outthink Hitsugaya-kun. She sure wasn't.
"What to do, what to do?" Momo clenched her fists, squeezed her eyes shut and muttered, "Think Momo, think!"
"Argh!" She let her head fall forward to thump on the desk while muttering into a pile of paper, "Nothing. I got nothing."
It was then that old memories came to mind of life before the Academy when she still lived with him and Granny. How could she have forgotten that? None of the other kids who lived around them wanted to be friends with the strange silver-haired boy. They were afraid of him, but neither she nor Granny had been afraid of him. He was their Shiro-chan. She remembered the lost, haunted look on his face and the hurt in his eyes that he never let anyone else see. Instead, he learned to hide them over the years under an icy detachment and cool exterior.
"I have been such a horrible friend! I forgot that I was going to help him and take care of him." Her brow wrinkled in thought, "but instead, he started taking care of me!"
Momo stood up, angry. How had she not seen it! "That little, white-haired, sneaky, watermelon seed-spitter! I didn't ask for him to protect me! It was supposed to be the other way around! Darn his, his… his…. "Insults were hard to think of when one wasn't used to making them up, "…his stupid little white lock of dangly hair!" She stamped a petite foot for emphasis.
She narrowed her eyes in thought wondering when exactly, had things switched between them? Searching her memories she found it.
The day that he entered the Academy Hitsugaya had come to find her, pulled her away from her friends and told her that it was his life's ambition to protect someone, with his life if that was what was called for. At the time she didn't realize that it was her that he was talking about. Momo slapped a hand to her face. "I am so dense! How did I ever get to be an assistant captain! The Fifth's token dunce, yep, that's me!"
Collapsing back into her chair, she placed her elbows on the desk and sank her face onto her palms. "Buy why, Shiro-chan? You didn't have to protect me! Renji and Kira don't go to the lengths you do! You poke and pry into my life, wanting to know where I am going, who I am seeing, what I am going to do… But why? I treated you as a pest… which really, you are sometimes, even as a captain." She moaned softly into her hands as her eyes burned with tears of remorse. Blinking and sniffing, she used the backs of her hands to wipe away the moisture from her eyes.
So, to find out that it was Shiro-chan, not Aizen-traitor who had always been watching over her, keeping an eye on her, forever in the background, not receiving any recognition or thanks for being her silent knight in shining armor. "But not anymore", she whispered softly to herself. I am the older one. I took care of him. It is still my duty to look after him. It always was, but in my selfishness I forgot. That last bitter thought made her mouth turn down. He is a captain now, and the Soul Society needs him. It needs him more than it needs me. Besides, it is always the responsibility of the vice-captain to protect the captain. I know he has Matsumoto, but from now on, I will also protect him from harm and this time, it will be me doing it from the shadows and not him!
She brightened as a thought came to her. "I know what I can do for him! If anything happens to me, I know what I can bequeath him in my will!" She grabbed a clean sheet of paper and began to write on it. "It's a little unorthodox, but who cares, it's just what he needs." Friends.
When finished, she sealed it and wrote on the flap for it to be given to Hitsugaya taicho upon her death. Then she took several more sheets and wrote short paragraphs on them and upon finishing she sealed them and put the names of her friends on them.
There. That was taken care of. Momo reached up and twirled the lock of hair in front of her ear around and around her finger as she thought about her dearest friend.
"Thank goodness that he has Rangiku for a friend. She will take care of him." Then, with a smile she took the sealed letters and carried them to the nightstand by her bed. There, she placed them in the top drawer. She didn't want them in plain sight for anyone to see, but she also wanted them to be found in case she failed in her quest for atonement.
Thank you for bearing with me. Things start happening faster after this.
Dwellin
