Editor's Note:
For comedy purposes, I have decided to keep Kon as a talking stuffed animal.
Chapter 2: A Goody Bag and A Captured Plushy.
Orihime Inoue was in the kitchen, singing away to herself while making breakfast. Her phone went off in her pocket, and she looked at the text message that was sent to her:
'Good morning! Can't wait 2 c u 2morrow. I promise u'll love ur present! Lyl Ichigo xxx'
Orihime smiled as she read the text, and then, putting the phone back into her pocket, resumed cooking...whatever the hell it was she had come up with today.
Rukia Kuchiki rubbed her eyes as she made her way into the kitchen. She had been living with Orihime for about half a year now, and in that time, she had managed to enjoy the food that Orihime made, no matter how...different it was...to normal food.
"Good morning, Orihime." Rukia said, as she sat herself down.
Orihime was so busy making breakfast, that Rukia suddenly saying 'good morning' has startled her. She turned around to face Rukia, and then smiled.
"Ah, good morning, Rukia!"
"What's for breakfast today?"
Orihime put a couple of slices toast on a plate, and brought a bowl into Rukia's view. The mixture inside was...sort of a reddish brown paste. Rukia recognised it as something Orihime had made before, and happily took a knife and spread some of it onto her toast.
"This is very delicious, Orihime..." Then something lurched in her throat. At first, she thought she was going to be sick, but she managed to force it down. When Orihime looked at her, she had turned very, very pale.
"What's wrong, Rukia?" Orihime said, slightly worried.
"Nothing. It's just..." Rukia had managed to finish forcing down her food. "...What did you put in this?"
"Well," Orihime thought about it. "I was in the fridge, and there were all of these thing that looked really nice and I wanted to eat them all, but..."
"So you mixed them all together?"
Orihime grinned. "Exactly!"
"What exactly did was in the fridge that you mixed together?"
"Hmmm...well, there was some jelly, some peanut butter, a bit of leftover turkey..."
As Orihime listed more and more thing that had gone into their breakfast, Rukia turned a pale green. She gulped loudly, and tried to make the greenness go away.
"...And some mayonnaise!" Orihime had finished listing.
Rukia didn't want to upset Orihime by admitting that she thought today's breakfast made her feel like she had been forcefully fed a cowpat with a spoon, but she didn't want to eat it, either. Thankfully, Rukia was good at making excuses.
Specifically, excuses that no-one except Orihime would believe.
"Oh my goodness, Orihime! I just remembered something!"
"What is it, Rukia?"
"I have to meet...um...Renji about...something very soon! I should get ready!" And with that, she bolted up the stairs, and got dressed.
"Would you like me to put your breakfast in the fridge so you can eat it later?" Orihime called.
"NO!" Rukia screamed at the top of her lungs. Then the calmed down. "Uh, I mean, you can have it, Orihime. I'll grab a bite in town."
"Ok then!" Orihime sat back down, and tucked in to Rukia's leftover breakfast, as Rukia dashed out of the door.
A few seconds later, Rukia looked back the way she came. I think this is far enough, she thought. She then proceded to throw up in a bush by the road.
"Good morning?"
Rukia looked up, wiping leftover sick from her mouth, and saw Ichigo standing next to her. She stood up, looked at him, and then threw up again.
"No..." She managed to say after. "It isn't!"
She then explained what had gone into Orihime's latest dish. When she had finished, Ichigo's face turned slightly pale.
"...I'm glad I'm going down the opposite road, then."
"Mind if I tag along?"
"Sure." They started walking. "But you can't tell Orihime anything about this, promise?"
"Ok, just don't tell her I threw up her newest meal."
"Deal."
Uryu Ishida worked in a charity shop near the centre of town. If clothes given to the shop had tears in them, it was his job to stitch them back together. If there weren't any clothes to stitch up, he sewed completely new clothes or made stuffed animal toys to sell. It wasn't a difficult job, and he quite enjoyed it.
Uryu looked up as Ichigo and Rukia walked in. He knew what Ichigo was here for. He reached under the counter, and lifted up a plastic bag, which had something inside it. Ichigo walked up to Uryu.
"Morning, Ichigo."
"Hey, Uryu."
Rukia looked puzzled at Ichigo. "Why did you come here? I've never known you come to a charity shop in your whole life."
Uryu looked at Rukia. "Are you ok, Rukia? You look slightly off-colour today."
"An incident involving Orhime's cooking." Rukia replied. "Best not to go into detail."
Uryu pushed his glassed back up to his eyes. "Ichigo, could you please pay me now? These did take quite some time to make."
Ichigo grinned as he took some money out of his pocket and gave it to Uryu, who then gave him the bag, which Rukia looked at. "Well, what's in it?"
"Orihime's birthday present." Uryu replied. He looked at Ichigo. "Are you going to tell her what it is?"
Ichigo looked at Rukia. "You promise not to tell Orihime?"
Rukia nodded. Ichigo opened the bag. Rukia looked inside it. After a few more seconds, she looked back at Ichigo.
"She'll love it."
Ichigo smiled. Then looked back at Uryu. "Thanks for this, Uryu."
"No, problem, but..." Uryu lifted a cardboard box from underneath the counter. There was something inside it, thumping away and screaming.
"LET ME OUT! I'M INNOCENT! LET ME OUT, URYU! I'M GOING TO KILL YOU!"
Ichigo looked at the box. "...Kon?"
The thing inside the box stopped moving. "Ichigo? Thanks god! Get this lunatic to let me out right this moment! Oh, hang on! Is Orihime with you? Is Rukia? Nee-san!"
"How..." Rukia questioned. "Did he even get here?"
Uryu looked at Ichigo. "Yuzu and Karin came in here with some boxes of old toys that they wanted to give away to charity. Kon...or as Yuzu called him, Bostov...was amongst them. Yuzu didn't want to get rid of him. He had hiden himself there as a means of escape."
"And it was working perfectly, until you SHOVED ME BACK INTO A F**KING BOX!" Kon screamed.
Uryu thrust the box into Rukia's hands. "Can you please just get rid of him?"
"...Sure." Rukia started walking out of the charity shop. Ichigo soon followed.
Just before Ichigo walked out of the door, he turned to face Uryu. "You going to Orihime's birthday tomorrow?"
Uryu pushed his glasses back up to his eyes. "I wasn't originally, because of work, but Orihime came round earlier with an invitation." He held up a pink piece of paper with the words 'Dear Uryu, please come to my birthday party. From Orihime' written on it.
Ichigo looked at it. "The hell? She didn't even say when to come round!"
Uryu put the invite away. "I'm sure she expects everyone to just arrive at reasonable times."
Ichigo shrugged, thanked Uryu again, and walked out. Rukia was waiting from him. "So," she said, holding up the box which contained Kon. "What do we do with him?"
It wasn't abnormal to see the fighting dojo pack with people. Almost everyone was either learning some form of martial arts of swordplay, sometimes both. But today, it was almost empty. Only a few people were in it today, including Ikkaku. As Ichigo and Rukia walked in, Ichigo saw one of the martial arts teachers standing by a door on the opposite wall.
"Hey, Yoruichi!"
Standing by the door was a black cat with golden eyes that looked up at Ichigo when he spoke. Standing next to the cat was its owner, Yoruichi Shihoin.
"Hey, Ichigo. Hi, Rukia."
Rukia waved, while balancing the box on her other hand, being careful not to drop it. Kon had managed to fall asleep inside the box, and she knew if she dropped it, all hell would break lose. From the other side of the door, Ichigo, Rukia, and Yoruichi could hear swords clashing, and someone screaming something like "PLEASE GOD, MAKE HIM STOP! AAH, S**T!"
Ichigo looked to Yoruichi. "Enter at you own peril." She said, smiling.
Renji Abarai was one of the people clashing swords. He was also the one screaming. Ikkaku watched as he ran desperately from the advances of his sword teacher, Kenpachi Zaraki, who was swinging a sword at him, very dangerously.
"Come on, Renji!" He shouted. "You should have expected this when you became my student! Stop running and fight me!"
Ichigo and Rukia stepped quietly into the room. Ichigo was one of Kenpachi's favourite students, and if he noticed him enter the room, he would ignore Renji and go straight for him. Next to Ikkaku, Kenpachi's adopted daughter, Yachiru Kusajishi, as balancing on a bo-staff while eating a chocolate muffin. She was the first one to notice Ichigo enter. She instantly waved at him.
"Hi, Icchi!" She shouted.
Ichigo froze in fear. "Oh, s**t."
Upon hearing 'Icchi', Kenpachi swiftly turned from attacking Renji and moved straight for Ichigo, who quickly rolled, avoidinjg a horizontal swing. Rukia managed to leap backwards out of the door. Ichigo stood back up, managed to get his hands ona nearby katana, spun round, and blocked Kenpachi's vertical strike. Ichigo tried to stab Kenpachi's eye, but his sword was pushed away by Kenpachi's own, which Ichigo expected, so he ducked, and swung his leg into Kenpachi's shin, causing him to topple to the floor. Ichigo rolled sideways just in time to avoid being squashed. Kenpachi was not a person you wanted lying on top of you. He looked towards Renji, who grinned at him, and they both nodded at eachover. As Kenpachi stood up, and turned to face Ichigo, Renji ran at him, with his head low and his sword outstretched, and Ichigo leapt above Renji, bringing hiw sword down on Kenpachi's head. But Kenpachi knew what to do when it came to something like this. He kicked Renji right in thr face, causing him to drop his sword and slide underneath him. At the same time, Kenpachi blocked Ichigo's attack with his sword, then used his free hand to grab Ichigo's sword, tore it out of his hand, and threw it towards Ikkaku, who ducked to avoid it. Ichigo then tried to take Kenpachi's sword away from him, but failed miserably, as Kenpachi grabbed Ichigo by the throat, and slammed him into a wall.
Kenpachi grinned. "You lose again, Ichigo."
Ichigo groaned, but was surprisingly less injured than he thought he would be. The walls of the dojo were covered with a type of soft material to reduce injuries, as many people ended up being slammed into walls by either Yoruichi or Kenpachi.
"Yeah," Ichigo grinned, "I didn't actually come here to fight."
Rukia was back in the room at this point. She handed the box to Kenpachi.
"Can you look after this for a while?"
Kenpachi opened the box. Kon squinted his eyes because of the light, but eventually he was able to open them.
"Thank you!" Kon shouted, thinking it was Ichigo who opened the box. "I always knew you were more than just a orange-haired bully!" He started crying. "I thought I was gonna die!"
He then looked up at his 'saviour', and then realised who it was. He stared, unsure of what to do. Kenpachi lifted him out of the box by his head, and looked at him for a few seconds.
Then he grinned and turned to Yachiru. "Hey, Yachiru! Look what Ichigo's letting you borrow!
For the few seconds that it took for Kenpachi to throw him to Yachiru, Kon prayed for a quick and painless death.
But that wouldn't happen. Not today.
By the way, does anyone know how to look at reviews that your story gets? I get an e-mail every time I get one, but I want to know if I can view them on the actual website. Thanks!
