Disclaimer: I love Bleach, but I don't own it. : (
Chapter 4: Yachiru やちる
by DemonicDragoness
A/N: This one is mostly information on the first Yachiru, and my version on how Kenpachi gets his scar. : )
italicized text in this chapter shows a flashback
A week later:
Yachiru was around two when she died, and could walk, run, and talk. Kenpachi knew it would be many years before she would look three. On average soul children aged around a "year" every decade, but that was a very loose average. Kenpachi himself had been rather fast at aging. He had also died young, even younger than Yachiru, at around eighteen months. He'd almost died again, starved, beaten, and with a bad fever from infected wounds, before the first Yachiru had found him and taken him in.
The first Yachiru had been intelligent. She'd been trained as a tutor for a rich family before they had been disgraced and their household beheaded. The sharp woman had shown him how to read, write, and speak correctly, as well as teaching him humility, respect, and determination. She also taught him the art of the sword, and infused in him a huge bloodlust and need to be stronger.
Then she had been killed by a group of jealous and angry Zaraki men. She had resisted their advances, and had a nasty habit of cutting off the ears of those who came too close to her for her comfort.
The two of them were walking cautiously down a road in Zaraki. It was filthy: blood and dung ran freely in the gutters, drunk men traded blows in dank alleyways, and stains from countless years marred the cobblestones beneath their feet. The smell of human sat in the air, untouched by a single breeze; it was the reek of blood, sweat, and less pleasant things. Beggars approached them, but a single warning glance from Yachiru was enough to scare most away. Other, more persistent ones only retreated when she showed them her fully functional sword. They were both used to the horrors of Zaraki, the very worst of Rukongai's slums.
"NOW!" Fast as viper, twenty men sprang form various alleys and rooftops. Before the two could even take another step, they were surrounded. A man with a deeply scarred face and no ears stepped forward.
"Well, well, well, deh pretteh bird's been caugh' in deh cage. Wotcha gonna do now, birdeh?" He leered at her, and she glared back.
"I guess I'll have to take an eye or your nose now. Looks like you don't have any ears left for me!" His face contorted into a snarl.
"Teme! I'll carve yer pretteh face 'tel yer cryen' fer merceh!" He lunged forward, sword in hand, only to be blocked by the thin "twelve-year-old" (who was actually around fifty,) who had been at Yachiru's side.
"Boy! You idiot, get out of here!" She shoved him out of the way.
"No! He insulted you, I won't-"
"Shut up, yeh brat! Get outta deh weh! Scram, an' I won' even kill yeh. Yer not meh target."
"No! I won't let you insult Senpai!"
"Boy, go! You know my rules! I fight alone, so leave, and live to fight another day!"
"But-" A sword came slicing down. Only sheer luck and quick reflexes saved the boy's eye. A scar would forever remind him of his senpai's killer.
"I tol' yeh tuh scram!"
"GO, boy!"
He left, but did not go home, watching through his from a rooftop as Yachiru cut down man after man, even as she slowly died from the many injuries now littering her body. At last she collapsed, and only three were left. With a roar he launched himself off the rooftop. The mens' last sight was of his glowing yellow eyes before he cut them down. He then scooped up Yachiru's still form, crying openly for the last time.
"Don't cry, you idiot. Get stronger, so that you can make me proud. Get stronger, so you can fight. But don't cry, boy." She took her last breath, and the boy swore he would never, never, fight ganging up on someone. Because how could he get strong like that?
But Yachiru had never called him by a name. To her he was "boy." Kenpachi remembered the agony of being nameless, and gave his senpai's name to his new charge.
"Yachiru, come here." He beckoned to the toddler to come closer, and picked up two sticks. One he placed in her hand. He drew やちる.
"This is the hiragana for 'ya-chi-ru'. Now, you do it." He guided her clumsy fingers as the girl wrote her name in the dirt, on the floor of Kusajishi forest.
A/N: Hmm, a little sappy. Oh well. Please review!
