50 Years Later
"Is the young master out again." A maid asked.
"Yes, he's out with Aoi-sama. I think they're running around somewhere. He didn't say where he was going just that he would be 'back for dinner probably.'" Said another servant, "I think they're trying to get in as much time together before Aoi-sama leaves for her training."
"Hm, yea indeed. He doesn't realize it but she means a great deal to him." Said the first maid again with a little laugh. "Ah, but he is young and she too. They're only teenagers by the looks of it."
"Where is Aoi-sama going to again?" Asked the servant.
"Rumor has it, that her father is sending her to the human world. It's for some type of mission to make her ready to join the Gotei 13."
"Good luck to her indeed"
~meanwhile~
A girl sprinted into view, looked around and scrambled up a nearby oak tree. She made it to the top surprising faster than a normal person could. She waited. A boy, staggered into view and peered around. He then clicked his tongue and looked up into the tree. He caught sight of the girl and she grinned.
"Byakuya are you ever going to catch up to me?"
He scowled up at her, "It wasn't even a fair race, Aoi. You took off way before you even told me where we were racing to!"
She laughed and jumped down from the tree. She disappeared and reappeared right by Byakuya. He stared at her.
"Since when have you been able to shunpo?"
"Since when have you been a nosey lil bitch?" She retorted with a smirk. "I'm just playing though. I figured it out two days ago. Yoruichi-san has been trying to teach me for a while and I finally got the hang of it."
Byakuya then smirked also and jumped up into the air, "I guess I beat you in that area, I've known how to do it for months."
Aoi laughed and said with a sparkle in her eyes, "Yea, I guess you do beat me. We're a pretty even match though." Byakuya frowned down at her. It always irritated him when she didn't get bothered by his teasing. Her teasing enraged him to no end but when he did it back it seemed to glide right over her head.
She then jumped up into the air beside him. "How about an even race? First person to our hideout wins."
"Wins what?"
"Gloating rights."
Byakuya grinned, "You're on."
They both took their running stances.
"Three, two, one...GO!" yelled Aoi.
They tooked off and left smoke in their wake. Their hideout was on the complete opposite side of the city in the wake of Soukyoko Hill. They sprinted over the heads of onlookers that just shook their heads and knew that Kuchiki Byakuya and Kitagawa Aoi were at it again. They were neck and neck the entire time, neither one faltering. As they headed towards the wooded area where their hideout was, they both grinned. This was where the real challenge was. They now had to wind their way through the trees the fastest. The trees grew extremely tall so it would waste time to go over them. They wound through the trees, in and out beating a familiar path. As a a dense group of trees came into sight they gave a last blasting push off of two trees that caused them to collapse. They both reached an extremely large and old pine tree at the exact same second.
"Damn," cursed Byakuya, "A tie again. How is it we always tie. This is friggin ridiculous."
Aoi merely smiled and jumped down to the ground, "Even match I guess but I still touched the tree first."
Byakuya jumped down to the ground after her and glared at her, "No way. You always do this! Why can't you ever admit that you're inferior to me?!" The last sentence came out more aggressive than he had meant. He blushed slightly and looked at the ground.
Aoi's smile faded slightly but she quickly recovered it and then crawled through a hidden hole in the tree. Byakuya followed after her and emerged in hollow area within the tree. The area was rather large and had blankets strewn around on the ground and empty packets of sweets here and there. On the walls were tally marks with the letters "A" and "B" over each categorie of tick marks. Byakuya stumbled over to a pile of blankets that already seemed to have an indent of a body. He fell into the pile and naturally fit into the indent. He closed his eyes and relaxed for a minute. After a while he opened them and looked around for Aoi.
She was on the other side of the tree, up in her favorite alcove looking through an opening in the tree side. She seemed deep in thought as Byakuya gazed at her. He noticed the way the sun caught on her red hair and made it look like fire. And how the the light made the shadows of her elegant cheekbones even more prominent in her face. And how tall she had was (around 6 foot mind you) and how even in her kimono her extremely athletic body still retained all its curves and-... He slapped his cheeks with both hands a couple times and looked away. His thoughts always seemed to get away from him these days. He let out a noise of annoyance and reached for an unopened bag of sweets.
Aoi noticed his surveyance of just seconds prior and let out a sigh. Byakuya had been doing this for the last couple days. He thought she didn't notice but her senses were much more acute than his ever were. Much had changed since they were kids she now reflected. He learned to shower for one. Also, not only did he grow to her height but so did his firey temper and attitude. It had made her laugh when he first started but he was going through a phase where he grew out his hair to shoulder length in imitation of his father which he now tied back in a regal like ponytail. Aoi enjoyed to tease him and call it a rat tail. Reckless and stupid as he was, Aoi had become very close with Byakuya through years of sparring and tomfoolery. She would deeply miss him.
A weight dropped in her stomach at the thought of her departure. She glanced down at Byakuya, scarfing down sweets. She had neglected to tell the idiot for reasons she herself did not know. Everytime she was about to tell him, she got tongue-tied and changed the subject. And it wasn't like she had just found out she was about to leave. She had known this since she was little that she would be sent out on some type of family mission. Only the head of the Kitagawa family partook in this mission and since she was an only child she had to go. She picked up a leaf and began the play with it with her fingers as she went deeper into thought.
The most frustrating thing to her was the fact that she didn't even know what the mission was and how long she would be gone. Her father said it's something that she had to do and that it was 'fine to fail' with a tone that hinted it was utterly unacceptable to fail. He and those beforehand had all apparently failed at this mission and he was heavily pushing Aoi to be the one to end this "family mission" business. He viewed it all as a waste of time. She crushed the leaf in her palm of her hand and clutched her hand in a fist. She was so frustrated that she was going on a mission she was bound to fail before joining the Gotei 13. While being gone people like Byakuya could surpass her. She unclentched her hand and only dust remained of the leaf. She stood up suddenly and jumped down to Byakuya and knocked him on the head.
"Oi dumbass, are you going to stuff your face all day or are we going to do this?"
"Bitch! I wasn't stuffing my face! And fine only if you're ready to loose?!"
They both stood face to face about a foot apart. The both drew back and arm and yelled, "JANKEN!"
Aoi held out a fist and Byakuya held out a two fingers.
"HAHA YOU LOSE AGAIN, DICKHEAD!" Aoi ran to the wall, as Byakuya sunk to his knees and stared furiously at his scissor hand, and added another tick mark to the column under the letter "A" which had significantly more marks than the column labeled "B". She turned around hands on hips, and smuggly looked down at Byakuya. "That makes it what? 1,367 to 432? That sounds about right." She laughed lightly and jumped up to the top of the tree where there was another alcove. It had a little door that opened out to the upper most branches of the tree. She opened it and looked down at Byakuya.
"Come on Byakuya! We're going to miss the sunset!"
Byakuya shook himself out of his anger and small grinned flashed across his face. He jumped up to the top and went through the door. As he closed it he watched Aoi already climbing to the very top of the tree branches. Byakuya used shunpo to catch up to her.
"Why do you still climb when you can use shunpo?"
Aoi clicked her tongue and shook her head, "Because it ruins the experience! When we were kids and first discovered this place we had to actually climb to the top. I do it for the nostalgia factor."
Byakuya didn't understand but sat himself down on a branch next to her. They sat in silence as they looked to the west as the sun slowly sunk beneath the horizon causing the clouds to be stained with colors of purple, blue, and red. Cicada started to sing their nightly songs as the birds of the day finally twittered to sleep. It was in late spring, so it finally was staying warm once the sun went down. Byakuya enjoyed this part of the day the most now. As a child he didn't think much of appreciating nature until he me Aoi. He would make fun of her as she watched the trees and clouds, that is until he started doing the same thing and was filled with an odd sense of peace. His favorite time of year was watching the plum blossoms. Aoi's birthday was around that time and so her family would always throw her a party where they were able to watch the plum blossoms. This was also his favorite time of year because somehow when he was asleep Aoi would leave the very last plum blossom by his bed because she knew how much he loved them. He only caught her doing it once but never again even if he tried to stay up to catch her. He was going to miss that.
"Ahhh, can you feel that?" Aoi suddenly said, jerling Byakuya back to reality. Byakuya sxowled at her.
"Dumbass, I can't read your thoughts, feel what?"
She flicked him in the forehead and said, "All the spirit particles in the air, giving everything life and meaning of existence."
Byakuya clutched his forehead and stared at her. He was born with a very high reiatsu and could usually sense reishi pretty well but her senses had always been very acute and the way she moved about with the spirit particles was unlike anyone except if you're from the Kitagawa family.
"You know," Aoi began, leaning back into another branch and closing her eyes, "My father used to take me out into Rukongai for trips just to sit and feel the reishi around us. He would always say that it would make me stronger than anyone but I never really understood. I mean if I can only sense they're there what good does that do me? It's like dying of thirst and seeing a glass of water but you're unable to drink it. Useless." She ended on a bitter note and opened her eyes. Her eyes had become hard as she now stared at the dark, night sky.
Byakuya looked at her, he knew that Aoi and her father had gone on these trips because he would be imensely bored as he waited for her to come back. All he would do was hang around Yoruichi and Urahara Kisuke as they had their lover's quarrels and got teased for being much younger than them. Other than that he would train frantically so that when she returned he would be stronger than her but it seemed like he was in the same place as he had been when she had left. He looked at her and opened his mouth, then closed it, opened it agin then thought better of himself. Aoi gave him a funny look.
"Whatever it is spit it out! Or are we going to sit here all night as you go Glub glub like a koi fish?"
Byakuya looked at her. What did he have to lose. Now was better than anytime considering she was going to leave soon. He opened his mouth again and said, "Why didn't you tell me you were leaving Aoi?"
She looked up at him surprised, with a guilty expression on her face. She made eye contact with him then looked away. "I was planning on doing it soon." She muttered.
Anger blew up inside him, "What do you mean, soon? What? Were you planning to tell me as you were leaving through the gate to the human world?! Or perhaps have a note delivered a week after you left?"
Aoi stood up angrily, shaking pine needles onto them both. "I just didn't know how to tell you! Get off my butt! I mean, I didn't have to tell you!" Byakuya rose too, red faced and shaking more pine needles onto them.
"Didn't have to?! Did those 5 hour ettiquette lessons teach you nothing about courtesy to others? How hard is it to tell me that you're going to be going on some long-ass journey and won't be back for a while? How could you conveniently leave me out of information that even my lowly servants know about? Are we not friends? Have these years been nothing? Aoi, how could you leave me behind so easily?!"
"That's because I don't even know what I'm doing or where I'm specifically going or how long I will be gone! This isn't my choice at all! Do you even know how scared I am at the fact I'm about to partake in a mission that my father and grandfather and great-grandfather have all failed at?! Do you think I want to leave you and everyone behind?!" Aoi shouted back just as red faced. She opened her mouth again but thought better of it. Her grey eyes had turned to cold stone. She slowly turned away from him. "It's dark and I'm expected home." She turned and immediately disappeared into the night.