A/N: I don't own Bleach.
-A cliché little chapter, and actually, not so little of a chapter. Partly inspired by like the first episode of Supernatural and a few songs by Florence + The Machine.
[4] Fever
After weeks of boring office work, Yamamoto-soutaichou assigned us a mission in the world of the living. Matsumoto-fukutaichou and myself were sent to Karakura-chou to investigate a recent disturbance regarding the death of a young woman. The woman, after disappearing for a few days, was found dead in an abandoned school building with a stab wound in her chest a strange black mark on her left ankle. We split up in the abandoned school to find the apparent culprit.
"Purify those who deceive, Ayakashi!" My zanpakuto's spirit appeared as a ghostly pair of young children, with water flowing from every part of their bodies. I ordered them to walk far ahead of me, to draw out any hollow. I felt like my body was beginning to drag, and I started to suddenly feel very cold.
"Kirie-chan? Are you sick?" Matsumoto-fukutaichou said from behind me. I rubbed my eyes and turned around.
"Maybe. I don't know." Suddenly the vice-captain that was before me began to fade, and I heard the screeching of a hollow. It grabbed my leg and lifted me into the air, but then Ayakashi appeared back at my side. "Drown him," I said as I stabbed the hollow's mask with my sword. Water began to flow out of the hollow's eyes and mouth, and I heard his last screech before he was devoured by a bright light.
"Matsumoto-fukutaichou! Mission accomplished!" I giggled, a bit delusional. When she rushed to my side, I stumbled a bit and fell into her arms.
"Kirie-chan, you're running a fever!" She picked me up and took me back to Soul Society. I was half asleep when we arrived back at the office, but I could vaguely hear Matsumoto-fukutaichou and Hitsugaya-taichou talking.
"What happened, Matsumoto?"
"I'm not even sure, Taichou. She has a fever. I'll give you a report tomorrow," she said. When she handed me to him, I don't think she was expecting me to start rambling on about Taichou being a meanie chibi-captain who never has any fun.
He sighed, "You're lucky I'm not going to just stick you in a freezer to get your fever down." For some reason, I started flirting with Hitsugaya-taichou instead of insulting him. He carried me back home, paying no attention to my delusional blabbering. He tucked me into my bed and put a cold, wet rag over my forehead.
"You'd better be at work tomorrow morning," he said half jokingly, then kissed my cheek.
And the arms of the ocean
So sweet and so cold
And all this devotion I never knew at all
In the crushes of heaven for a sinner released
But the arms of the ocean delivered me
-Never Let Me Go, Florence + The Machine