A/N: Alright. Here we go with chapter 3. Please enjoy.

Disclaimer: I just got a brand new ferbroom... but it didn't make me own Bleach.

Tatsuki gave a faint smile as she glanced briefly up at the clouds. As she sat outside Karakura High School enjoying lunch with her friends everything seemed so peaceful, so idyllic. It was hard for her to remember all the unknown, concealed darkness she knew existed in the world. The only part that still teared at her even under this tranquil sky was that the one she cared for was not there to stare up at it with her.

"So, Tatsuki, you really haven't heard from Orihime, then?" the voice of Tatsuki's friend and classmate, Mahana Natsui, forced her attention back to earth.

"Yeah..." Tatsuki sighed, a sad gleam in her eyes.

"I swear, that girl... It's one thing for delinquents like Kurosaki to miss extended periods of school... but for a good student like Orihime..." Ryo Kuneida said, concerned and annoyed at the same time.

"I'm worried... what if she's sick..." Michiru Ogawa said softly, sadly.

"Have you visited her at home, Tatsuki?" Mahana asked.

"Of course, but she never answers the door. I doubt she's even in there..." Tatsuki said in a weary voice.

"That's really scary then. What if she's in the hospital? Did you ask when you went?" Michiru asked in an almost panic.

"I haven't been..." Tatsuki shrugged.

"But your hand..." Michiru stared down at Tatsuki's thickly bandaged right hand.

"I treated this myself. It's no big deal." Tatsuki said, lowly.

"It is a big deal, Tatsuki! This whole school counts on those hands of yours. How are we gonna do in the next Karate tournament when the star of our team won't be able to participate?!" Ryo scolded.

"It'll heal. I haven't been in the mood for competition lately anyways." Tatsuki gave a long, deep sigh. She wasn't in the mood for anything really.

"So how did you hurt your hand, Tatsuki? What's the story?" Mahana inquired.

"It just... happened." Tatsuki was really not even in the mood to talk to her friends.

"What kind of explanation is that, Tatsuki?! Don't they deserve more of the story than that?!" A loud, excited voice called out from behind where Tatsuki sat. She turned to find Chizuru Honsho, who had missed the earlier classes, standing there with a smile on her face.

"Hey Chizuru! So do you know something about it then?" Michiru greeted her friend happily.

"Sure do. Tatsuki hurt her hand standing up and trying to protect me from a vicious monster!" Chizuru announced proudly, leering oddly at the spiky-haired girl.

"Monster?! You don't mean one of those nasty homophobic bastards who like to go after you sometimes?" Ryo scowled, spite clear in her voice.

"Nope this was a real monster. It had impenetrable armor and giant crab claws and was over nine feet tall and twenty feet long!" Chizuru reiterated. Tatsuki laughed and the others looked at her with disbelief clear in their eyes.

"Are you trying to fill Orihime's spot in our group while she's not here, Chizuru?" Michiru tilted her head to the side and asked with a peculiar stare.

"No. I'm being serious!" Chizuru shouted. She then suddenly unbuttoned some of the lower buttons of her uniform shirt and opened it to reveal lots of medical bandaging. "Look, see this is where the monster tore me open with it's giant tail!"

"Oh... such a serious wound to the stomach... how terrible..." Michiru said as she stared up and down the bandaged area.

"I'll let you see further up if you want..." the redhead said in a teasing voice as she fooled with some of the further up buttons to her shirt.

"Those bandages sure look more professional than the old cloth ones you got at my place..." Tatsuki said as she glanced at the other, not completely ignoring the brief flash of pure white cotton before Ryo forcefully closed Chizuru's shirt.

"Well, after I got back from your place I sort of fainted from all the pain and blood loss and stuff...My parents took me to the hospital. I was just released. That's why I didn't show up to school until now." Chizuru explained with a faint smile.

"So was Orihime at the hospital?" Ryo asked suddenly.

Chizuru looked at her oddly. "Why would Orihime be there? Orihime is in another world right now training her super powers with Rukia, or at least that's what I gathered from this really sexy lady and this gay guy yesterday." Again Tatsuki was laughing and the other three were staring at her with due skepticism.

"Rukia...? Why does that name sound familiar...? " Michiru thought aloud.

"Maybe the Orihimeness just rubbed off onto you naturally from all the... rubbing... you've done with Orihime..." Mahana purposed, obviously confused.

"Hmm, I really wouldn't mind being Hime. It'd sure be nice to have a strong and daring girl committed to looking after me all the time..." Chizuru fired a sexy wink in Tatsuki's direction.

"Hey, you, don't say weird stuff like that..." Tatsuki said, gritting her teeth. Her friends all laughed politely.

It was at that moment that the bell signaling the end of the lunch period could be heard ringing from the school nearby. The group of girls all began at once gathering up their things. Just as Tatsuki was prepared to head back to class she felt a hand on her wrist holding her in place.

"Hey, Tatsuki, you got a moment?" Chizuru asked with a serious expression as Tatsuki's head turned to face her. Their other friends were already heading back.

"I guess... depends on what you want..." Tatsuki sighed.

"Oh it's nothing complicated, just a simple request..." Chizuru said elusively, trying the other's nerve.

"Just spill it already," Tatsuki groaned as the redhead's eyes met hers.

"Tatsuki Arisawa, will you go on a date with me?" Chizuru asked with a gigantic smile.

"Making us late to class for stupid jokes..." Tatsuki glared.

"Hey, I was being serious!" Chizuru said with a pout on her face.

"Well then there's probably something seriously wrong with you if you think I'm going to respond to a question so ridiculous." Tatsuki said coldly as she began to walk toward the school. Chizuru put forth an effort to stay a step ahead of her.

"I knew I'd just get pummeled if I tried anything physical with you like I do Hime. And if I just tried to court you slowly I knew you'd likely avoid my advances forever even if you caught them. Being forward and just asking you directly seemed to me like the easiest way to get you to go out with me." Chizuru explained her logic.

"O-kay... but why do you want to go out with me in the first place? Haven't you always said that I'm not your type?" Tatsuki shot the other a questioning glance.

"I never thought you were. After I saw how amazing you were yesterday I changed my mind though. I always thought I was only interested in really cute feminine girls like Hime, but I guess there's still a feminine side to myself that finds the idea of loving someone who is strong and would protect me appealing as well." Chizuru said reflectively, her eyes meeting Tatsuki's again. Her insane smile then broke out as she added, "And thanks to this picture I now no you can be a sexy cute girl too when you want!" Chizuru removed from her breast pocket the photograph of Tatsuki in a skimpy swim suit she had acquired the previous day.

"Why do you have that with you?!" Tatsuki asked, mortified, her face completely red.

"So I can threaten to show it to people if you don't go out with me." Chizuru gave a soft laugh that made it sound as if she was serious.

"What?! You're planing to blackmail me?!" Tatsuki couldn't believe what she was hearing.

"Well I didn't think you'd be all that interested in going out with me... I mean I'm not as pretty as Hime is..." Chizuru said with some over the top drama and tears that were obviously false.

"Now you're trying to make me pity you?!"

"Yeah... pretty pathetic, huh... I suppose I can understand if you don't want to go out with me." Chizuru took a long sigh.

"I was gonna say yes." Tatsuki smirked as she spoke.

"W-what?! You were?!" the bespectacled girl seemed stunned.

"I don't know if it'll really go anywhere, but I don't mind killing an evening with you. I don't have anything really better to do. After you explained why you wanted to do this I was prepared to tell you that." Tatsuki laughed at the expression on Chizuru's face. The dazed look was vaguely reminiscent of Orihime.

"O-k-kay? So I guess my... uh... 'back-up tactics'... weren't exactly necessary then..." Chizuru laughed nervously as she replaced her precious picture in her pocket.

"No. They weren't."

"So, um... is tonight fine for our date then...?" The usually forceful girl actually seemed shy.

"Whatever you want. With by hand all busted to hell I happen to have a pretty free schedule at the moment." Tatsuki shrugged.

"Cool. Then let's meet outside your place at six." Chizuru decided excitedly.

"Got it." Tatsuki nodded. She then added, "we should probably hurry. We're already gonna be late." Chizuru nodded and the two began to run.


Tatsuki sighed as she looked at the clock from her bed. It was quickly approaching six o'clock and her scheduled first date with Chizuru Honsho.

Just something about the whole concept of "first date with Chizuru Honsho" didn't sound quite normal to Tasuki. It was hard convincing herself that she had not made a mistake by accepting this offer. Chizuru hadn't asked to just hang out she had asked for a romantic date. Tatsuki had no experience with such things. A few of her private outings with Orihime she had maybe considered dates in the past but it was rather obvious Orihime hadn't viewed them that way.

So why one earth had she agreed to going out with Chizuru, a first-class pervert who had always ended up on the other side of Tatsuki's fist? It was true that the last couple days Tatsuki had seen sides of Chizuru she hadn't know existed before, vulnerable sides, sides that Tatsuki could relate to. Maybe it was this ability to relate then, the fact that Tatsuki knew her and Chizuru could understand each other. Then again, maybe she was just lonely without Orihime.

As the hands of the clock continued to move Tatsuki reluctantly went about preparing herself for the evening. She chose casual clothing, nothing fancy, just some jeans and a black shirt. It was just before six when she finished getting ready. It was three minutes after six when she walked out her front door.

Chizuru was waiting there as promised. She too was wearing simple casual clothes, a cute white shirt and jeans as well. She smiled widely as Tatsuki appeared before her.

"Cute look, even if I miss seeing you in the skirt..." Chizuru said as she eyed the other intently.

"Whatever... you ready to do this?" Tatsuki said rolling her eyes a bit, incognizant of the fact that she was blushing slightly.

"Oh yes! Me and Tatsuki's first date! This is going to be so much fun!" Chizuru said energetically as she began walking down the street. Tatsuki walked with her.

"That's good to know..." Tatsuki said sarcastically.

"Hey, you did agree to go out with me! Don't be afraid to have fun!" the redhead gave a bit of a scowl.

"I know." Tatsuki smiled faintly.

A brief moment of silence was allotted before Chizuru asked with a smile, "So what should we do Tatsuki?"

"How should I know?! Don't you have some plan?" Tatsuki said, annoyed. She had a feeling this evening was going to turn out to be an interesting one.

"Oh... well I was going to just leave it up to you... I don't have any good ideas..." Chizuru said meekly.

"Well I don't even know how this is supposed to work! I've never been on a date before," the black-haired girl said forcefully but awkwardly.

"Well, that makes two of us then," Chizuru admitted shyly with a nervous laugh.

"Okay... so do you at least have some idea what's supposed to happen with these sorts of things?" Tatsuki felt a little embarrassed.

"Well if it's anything like it is in manga and TV and stuff then it's pretty much just the same as hanging out with a friend, except you have along term goal of, after enough dates, getting that 'friend' to take off all her clothes and have sex with you." Chizuru grinned intensely.

"Uh, don't get ahead of yourself..." Tatsuki murmured with a cool laugh.

"Oh? Does that mean I shouldn't even bother asking that we just skip the date part and go back to my bedroom instead?" Chizuru said with an overtly sexual tone to her voice.

"Yeah. Pretty much." Tatsuki gave the other a violent stare.

"Fine! Fine! I get it!"Chizuru said insistently, noticing the malicious intent in the tomboy's eyes. She then returned to conversation to its previous point, asking, "so what should we do?"

"We could just go see a movie, that'd be pretty easy." Tatsuki suggested after a moments thought.

"Tch, boring. Don't you have anything better than that?" Chizuru dismissed the notion.

"Okay... well what if we just go eat dinner...somewhere..."

"Lame! Come on, we need to do something more creative than that."

"Well then why don't you think of something then?!" Tatsuki sad with a glare.

"You could go back and get your sexy swimsuit and we could go to the beach and snuggle together while we watch the sunset..." Chizuru's eyes were sparkling at the image.

"I think I'll be skipping that..." the spiky-haired girl growled under her breath.

"Well we could go to the amusement park then and we could ride in the ferris wheel and watch fireworks while holding each other closely..." Chizuru continued to swoon over her mental pictures.

Tatsuki stared at the girl in disbelief. She decided to simply say, "It's probably too late to be heading to some place like that."

"Yeah... you're probably right.. that's more a whole day thing..." Chizuru sighed.

"You got any more simple ideas?"

"We could go to the mall and I cold pick out some outfits that I want you to wear." the aggressive lesbian smirked.

"Something tells me I don't want to see the outfits you want me to wear..." Tatsuki spoke under her breath again.

"You probably don't..." Chizuru admitted distantly, her brain obviously lost to some perverted thought that would likely frighten the other.

"I'm not much for shopping anyways," Tatsuki laughed.

"How about the arcade then, that sound like fun?" the black-haired girl was surprised to find the other for the first time suggesting something that wasn't in some way perverted.

Orihime was hopeless when it came to understanding anything electronic so Tatsuki never really did get to spend much time in the local arcades. It was a good idea and sounded like fun but she still had to refuse. "I doubt I'd be much good at video games with only one hand, Chizuru."

"Oh. That's right. I guess that cuts out the possibility of bowling and min-golf too than..." Chziuru sighed sadly.

"You weren't honestly going to suggest stuff like that were you...?" Tatsuki stared at the girl as if she were insane.

"Nope. Of course I wasn't." Chizuru smiled fully. Tatsuki began to laugh.

"So for our date are we just going to wander around aimlessly arguing over what our date should be?" Tatsuki asked, oddly amused.

"That's what it looks like... hope you don't mind..." Chizuru looked at her feet as they moved.

"It's not the least bit unpleasant. I kinda like long walks..." Tatsuki put her left hand on Chizuru's shoulder as she spoke causing that girl to look up. They were both smiling.

"That's good to hear. I'm enjoying just talking..." Chizuru looked down quickly.

"Even though were really not talking about anything important?" Tatsuki snickered.

"It's hard to find anything good to say that doesn't involve Hime." Chizuru sighed.

"The two of us really are hopeless, aren't we?" Tatsuki gave a bitter laugh.

"I like you Tatsuki. You're cool, fun to talk to, and pretty cute. I didn't ask you out just so we could mope together." Chizuru said in a crisp voice making Tatsuki stop and look at her.

"You're a very likable person too, Chizuru, even if it took me till yesterday to figure that one out..." Tatsuki took a serious tone as well.

The two were silent for an extended period of time. Tatsuki was lost in thoughts that didn't even really piece together. Chizuru seemed lost in thought as well. The sun was beginning to set already. The street they were currently walking was deserted save for them. Tatsuki had to wonder if it had really been so long since they left.

Just as she was about to suggest that they begin heading back, Chizuru stopped in place and opened her mouth to speak. In a low quiver she asked, "Tatsuki, will you ever let go of Hime?"

Tatsuki was taken aback by the question but wasted no time in answering it as she stopped as well, " No. Never."

"So... is this hopeless than... should I give up on you as well?"Chizuru looked so vulnerable as she asked this.

"No. I won't ever let go of Orihime completely, she's special to me and always will be... But my heart could easily be bent to hold more than one..." Tatsuki blushed. The line she uttered sounded unbearably cheesy to her.

"You think you'll be able to move on then, in case Orihime continues to drift away?" Chizuru asked somberly but with a content smile.

"I hope so. I really, honestly hope I can." Tatsuki said miserably.

"Kiss me." Chizuru whispered as she closed the gap between herself and the other.

"Excuse me? I thought I told you not to get ahead of yourself," Tatsuki delivered her lines gently, without any of the usual bite.

"I'm not forcing you to do anything more. Just a simple kiss. I want to help. I want to keep you from becoming miserable..." Chizuru demanded softly. Her eyes told that she was quite serious about this.

Tatsuki was nervous. She hadn't ever kissed someone before. She had fantasized about kissing Orihime before but had never even come close to a real kiss. She was scared but she also was hopeful. She wanted to fill the emptiness in her heart, she wanted to cast away her misery, she wanted to move on. She didn't think this would work. She was at least willing to give it a try.

"Okay." Tatsuki said softly, blushing profusely.

"Really? Awesome!" Chizuru's cute smile reformed. Suddenly it became easy. Tatsuki closed the rest of the gap between the two of them and brought her lips to those of the other girl. Her arms found the girl's back as her lips pressured pleasantly against Chizuru's soft ones. It felt nice. It felt right.

Then it felt weird. One of Chizuru's hands found its way to the backside of Tatsuki's upper thigh while the other cupped one of her breasts. Very soon after that Chizuru's tongue flew lustfully across Tatsuki's lips, prying them open forcefully until Tatsuki's own tongue emerged to meet it.

With much reluctance Tatsuki kissed the girl back passionately. She was unsure why she was doing it. It was definitely the wrong sort of kiss for their first. It was also definitely not the simple one the other had promised. Tatsuki figured that she just didn't care anymore, that's why she was allowing this to happen.

Eventually Chizuru was thoroughly satisfied with herself and pulled aways. Tatsuki knew her face was deep red and saliva was trickling from her lip. She sighed and laughed lightly as she spoke, "That's your idea of a simple kiss?"

"I thought you'd stop me..." Chizuru actually seemed quite surprised.

"I just thought I'd let you have your way for once..." Tatsuki growled and continued to blush.

"You protect Hime much better than you protect yourself." Chizuru laughed.

"I know." Tatsuki smirked.

"So did you like it?" Chizuru asked licking her lips.

"What?" Tatsuki looked away and pretended she was clueless. She didn't want to admit to anything.

"The kiss. Personally I loved it. I'm guessing you liked it too with how good you kissed me back..." the redhead said almost teasingly.

"I guess... it was sorta... fun..." Tatsuki admitted feebly.

"If you want we could head back to my place and do more fun things." Chizuru cooed sensually.

"I think I'd rather take this 'moving on' thing one step at a time." Tatsuki gave a hard laugh as she turned and began walking. .

"Cool. Sounds like a plan." Chizuru smiled. Tatsuki was looking down at the ground in front of them but she was smiling brightly as well.

A/N: let's end this chapter and begin the longest author's note ever. Okay so this was a cute fluffy romance chapter. A bit of a departure from the story thus far. I thought it was needed. This is a Tatsuki X Chizuru fic after all, not a Tatsuki and Chizuru miss Orihime fic. With the date scene, how I have it is kind of how the conceptualizing stage went. I kept trying to come up with some good idea as to what they should go do but couldn't come up with anything, so instead i had them just walk around trying to think up something to do. I tried to keep most of the dialog light and humorous in this chapter. I hope it wasn't boring. In the first scene I had a hard time remembering what the personalities of their friends were like (I remembered they didn't have much personality in the first place). I seem to remember Ryo being serious and outspoken, Mahana being cheery and talkative, and Michiru being shy and cute, but I might just be assigning them personalities there based on appearance. Overall I think this chapter was cute. It did a fair enough job of building the relationship and puts me in a good place for the fourth chapter. Tell me what you think. I love reviews.

Okay, now I am going to ramble on about my reader poll for awhile so you can feel free to leave now (and go review). I have a hard time believing the sort of response my last poll got. The poll, asking what series people might be interested in seeing me write for, which was only left up for the usual one week, received an astonishing total of 50 unique voters who cast 115 total votes. I am simply stunned that there are so many people who actually care about what I do. Of course almost half of those voters were just the rabid Naruto fans who mobilized seeing this as a possible opportunity to drag me back to their side and make me forcibly pull more uninspired Naruto fanfics out of my brain. Needless to say, the fact that I made you sound like an idiot when you chose the Naruto option, should make it rather obvious that I was going to ignore that option no matter how many votes it got.

Okay, to be honest, the rest of the poll, really, truly surprises me. I had initially put this poll up because I had a good Death Note idea running around in my head and was curious as to how many fans would follow me to it (apparently only ten of you...). I didn't expect most of the choices to get very much attention at all. Maybe just a few stray votes here and there. Imagine my surprise when I see there are more readers who would potentially want to see me do a Soul Calibur fic than there are who want me to just stick firmly with Bleach. Mai-HiME and Fire Emblem surprised me by getting very nice numbers of votes as well. I guess I shouldn't be surprised with HiME since it's pretty much a staple of the yuri community but I didn't think most of my fans watched stuff that wasn't on TV. As for SC and FE, I guess their success proves that video games are more universal than anime, go figure. Haruhi did alright and Claymore did much better than expected. A personal favorite series of mine, Code Geass, was pretty much drowned by the other options with only 6 out of the 50 voting for it. I guess I just have to give the series some time to become popular though, Adult Swim has only gotten up to the fourth episode of the English broadcast so far.

So now I think I'm going crazy. I'm probably going to write at least one more Bleach story before I do anything weird but now you people have convinced me somehow that it's okay to do stuff for other series. Death Note didn't do as well as I hoped but I still have my idea and likely will get to it. Now it looks like I'll be doing a couple Soul Calibur fics as well. I'm insanely pumped for SC IV this July (by which time I will have secured the funding for a PS3 so I can play it), so I might get compelled pretty easily to write some SC stuff. Those girls are probably some of the hottest girls in any series... and they have weapons... So don't be surprised if you see a Sophitia X Cassandra story form me sometime this summer (yes, I would make my introduction to the series with sister incest... there's nothing wrong with that, is there...?). And once SC IV does come out there might be a couple more. It will be hard for me to resist Hilde (who due to my strange fetish for girls in armor is the number one reason I'm excited about the game... yeah, more than Darth Vader... I know... I'm a sad person). Next time I watch Mai-HiME or play Fire Emblem I now know it's safe to write the stray Nao X Yuakariko or Marcia X Astrid ideas down and maybe work with them if I'm so inspired to as well.

So thank you everyone who voted, the current poll is something simple that I've thought about and just thought I 'd ask you all real quick. I'm asking if you think it's a good idea for me to attempt to write something in the first person. Please note that I will still make the call as to what perspective I use based on the particulars of that story. Anyways, enough rambling. If you're still reading this you're strange. Go review already.