The New Girl

Ichigo

"Iiiiccchiiiiigo!" I heard Keigo's morning greeting all the way down the hall.

"Keigo. What's up?" I said, close lining him in the process.

He fell to the ground as usual holding his face in his hands. "Everything….is….good." he said getting up. He followed me into the classroom.

I sat down at my seat. Rukia came in and took the seat next to me. "Hey did you feel that spiritual pressure last night?" She whispered. I guess she had noticed it too.

"Yeah. It was strange." I noticed that I could still sense it in the distance. She gave me a look and I knew she was feeling it too. "Have any idea who it is?"

"Not a clue. It's got to be a human. That's the only explanation."

"What are you guys talking about?" Keigo interrupted. "Are you making secret arrangements without me? It's not fair!" He complained.

I frowned. "Oh Please."

Miss Misato came into the classroom then. "Okay everyone settle down!"

Everyone scrambled to get into their seats.

"I have an announcement to make."

When doesn't she? I thought.

"We have a new student that will be attending our class from now on. She is from America so everyone be nice to her." She smiled and nodded to the door.

That's when I felt it. The spiritual pressure from earlier.

"This is Taylor Kari."

It's her.

She walked in, confidence showing on her face. She swept her wavy brown hair behind her shoulder. "Hey."

The class responded to her greeting with ones of their own. I remained silent and just watched her as she asked our teacher where to sit.

"Behind Kurosaki." She replied pointing at me.

I felt my face grow hot when she walked past me and sat down. What the hell is up with me?

Rukia stared at her for a moment.

Kari must have seen her staring because she suddenly asked, "What are you looking at?"

"No-nothing." Rukia stammered and turned around.

What is with this girl? I thought as I tried to focus on my studies. Whoever she was, I knew it was just a matter of time before she would be causing trouble. She looked like the kind of girl that didn't take any crap from anyone. But that wasn't really what I was worried about. I was worried about the trouble her presence would cause for the town. If she didn't stop releasing her spiritual energy, Hollows were bound to show up.

When the bell rang it startled me. I turned around to say something to her. I didn't know what to say exactly but it didn't matter because she was gone.

"Hey Rukia, where did the new girl go?"

"Don't know. Why?"

"Just wanted to talk to her for a minute."

"Oh really?" she eyed me suspiciously. "You just wanted to "talk" to her.

"Yeah. What of it?"

"Oh Ichigo." She sighed. "You're hopeless."

"What?" I was confused.

She ignored me and headed outside.

"Rukia!" I yelled and chased after her. Chad, Orihime, and Uryu were waiting for us.

"Did you notice anything about our new classmate?" Uryu asked me.

"Of course I did." I retorted. The damn Quincy still got under my skin at times.

"It seems that she has quite the energy built up."

Rukia nodded. "Yes, that's why we should keep our guard up. There's no telling when a Hollow will show."

"Well when they do we'll just have to take care of it." I smiled. The rest of them nodded. No matter how many Hollows came to my town I would always be there to beat them down. They were no match for me, or my friends.

"Well I have to go." Orihime waved to us. "Tatsuki and I are going to dinner tonight."

"See ya Later Hime." I called after her.

We all parted and headed to our own destinations. Mine was home where Dad continually tried to best me but never won and Yuzu and Karin tried their best to deal with his idiocy. It didn't matter really, we all loved him. he was just hard to handle sometimes.

The next few days went by without much trouble. The new girl was always the last one to class and the first one to leave. She kept to herself mostly and when the guys in the class hit on her, mostly Kiego, she would either ignore them completely or give them a sarcastic remark. We had heard she had gotten into some fights with the upperclassmen. By the sound of it, she'd won. I always tried to muster up the courage to talk to her. She was my partner a few times in class but we stuck to the subject topic. The only person she really talked to was Tatsuki and that was probably because they were the same. They were tough.

A week after her arrival things started to change. The moment that we had been waiting for had were walking home from school when we felt the Hollow. I ditched my body behind some bushes and took off. When we got closer I could feel a very familiar spiritual energy with it.

"Oh Great. It's after Taylor-san." I yelled to Rukia who was running behind me.

"Come on then!"

When we crossed the street we could see everything. Kari was standing in front of the snake-like Hollow. Its tail was wrapping around her lower body.

"Get back!" I screamed and lunged at the creature. It hissed and moved out of the way, letting go of Kari's legs. I looked down at her to make sure she was okay. What I saw shocked me. There was no fear in her eyes. They were set with determination. In her hands a small globe of orange light was shimmering uncontrollably. "What the hell?"

"Ryuu no Senshi" (Breath of Fire) she cried and released the fiery orb. It shot through the sky like a cannon and hit the Hollow in the face. Its mask shattered and it disappeared.

How….how did she do that? I spun around to ask her but when I turned she was gone again. "Rukia! What the hell? Why didn't you stop her?"

"I didn't see her leave!"

"Damn. What was that?" I asked scratching my head.

Rukia sighed. "I have no idea."

Could this get anymore complicated? I thought.

As I would soon find out, my life was about to become a lot more complicated than that.