Hi again everyone!

Yeah It been quite some time since my last update... sorry bout that

Anyway, I have a bit of character development in here so bear with it. It should still be enjoyable though... I hope

Enjoy^^

Edited:4/08/13

"Hey look who's back!" some kind announced as I entered the class room for the first time in two weeks.

I glanced around oh, how I had not missed it. Everyone in the room had turned to look at me; quite a few of them looked astonished, but I knew that majority of the class couldn't care less. Let's just say I had not gone out of my way to make friends with anyone. Still, more than a few of them came up to me and asked how I was feeling and to sign my cast. Ariwa was sitting on top of my desk grinning as I awkwardly held my arm up for people to write on it. I didn't really care the cast was coming off in a week anyway; so they could muck it up all they wanted. Kasai had doodled on it anyway so there was barely any space left for them to do anything. I sighed remembering the day when she had spent over two hours drawing on my cast and hitting me over my head every time I tried to look. The end result was a very short comic strip of a boy getting run over by a bright red cartoon car. Printed underneath it was the sentence 'don't you ever do this again'. Ariwa had cracked up when he saw it and this had been one of the very few times when I had seriously wanted to punch Kasai. Because the story of me getting hit by a car wasn't embarrassing enough she had to draw it out for me on my arm.

Just then Hamada-sensei came in and called me over to her desk. "It's good to see you back at school Takemitsu-kun," she smiled as she sat down and beckoned me to stand next to the desk. "I trust you're feeling all better," I nodded. "That's good. But the matter at hand is that you've missed out on two weeks' worth of school work. You're going to have to work extremely hard if you want to catch up with the others. After-school classes may be in order," I groaned. "It's not that bad only an hour or two a day."

"But Ariwa gave me the homework every day I was gone."

"That's nice of him but I'm afraid it's not enough. We've had many tests and assignments that you've missed out on and if you don't complete them you're grades will be at risk."

I let out a puff of air. "Can't I do the tests over or something. You could give me the material to study at home and I could take them during my free periods."

"Or we could just teach you the material in extra classes. Trust me, Takemitsu-kun, the term is ending soon and you don't want any extra homework right now. Exams are coming up," she scribbled a note and handed it to me. "Here, give this to your parents tonight."

I took the note from her ignoring that she had told me to give it to my parents. It must have been a mistake, a reflex. Teacher's usually told their students to give notes to their parents. I slumped down in my seat when I crossed the classroom. Ariwa leaned over to me

"What was that about?" he asked.

"She wants me to stay back for extra lessons to cover the things that I missed," I groaned stuffing the note into my pocket.

"That sucks."

"Tell me about it."

"But you're smart, I mean you're at the top of the class it shouldn't be too bad right?"

I snorted. Our midterm report had given me the title number one in the class, but that was beside the point. The point was that they were trying to make me stay longer than necessary in this hellhole. I had made it clear on countless occasions that I did not like staying in school after it was let out for the day. Yeah, I skipped detentions. What could they do? Other than give me more detentions which I would skip anyway.

The remainder of the school was relatively uneventful except during recess when Kasai told me that I still looked sick. She was the more perceptive of the two of my friends and could tell whenever I hadn't been sleeping or if something was bothering me and well frankly there was quite a bit bothering me at the moment. Such as the dream about the blizzard, Ichigo being able to fight hollows, and everything that was going on in my life at the moment. I had shrugged her off and that had thrown us off into an argument how I didn't care about them anymore. But back to the important stuff; school was pretty much uneventful, as usual, until the last period came about. Anyone who guessed that it had something to do with Adachi gets a cookie.

We had started a new topic in history class; the emperors of feudal Japan. The lesson in itself wasn't that boring, but I still felt myself dropping off to sleep. Ariwa kept on nudging me in my side to keep me awake, though.

Around fifteen minutes before the end of the day the teacher announced something that was about to change my life. She didn't know how much it would have affected me, though. Go figure, inadvertent actions lead to serious repercussions; I had learned that one first hand.

"I'm sure that all of you will be happy to hear that there isn't going to be test on this topic."

The entire class cheered, but I knew there was going to be a catch. There was always a catch.

"But, don't get too excited," I told you so, "Instead of a test you all are going to have to do a project on a historical figure. It should include background such as family, history, and early life; the reasons why the person is such an important figure in history; and their rise and or fall to and from power. I also want pictures if available; the person with the most creative project will get extra credit," there was a long loud groan from almost everyone in the class.

"But Hamada-sensei, that's going to take forever; it's so much work!" someone in the front row exclaimed. I had to agree that was a pretty big project. Maybe that was why she had told me I wouldn't have time for extra work.

She grinned. "I know. That's why you all will be working in pairs."

Ariwa shot me a glance. I nodded; we were always partners for stuff like this.

"I took the liberty of assigning each of you a partner."

I stared at her, horrified. I didn't like anyone else in the class. Okay, that was harsh. It was better to say everyone else was mildly annoying. They would sponge off of me or at least try to. Assigned partners really? This could not go well. Many others seemed to agree with me; I could tell from the annoyed noises.

"You guys can't tell me that you've been in the same class for three months but can't work with each other? Anyway, I'll be calling out the pairs now; you can have the rest of the period to start working."

This was perfect I growled inwardly. The only person I could stand working with was Ariwa, because he pulled his own weight. He didn't try to take advantage of my smarts, though he did use me as a resource sometimes. Back in Tokyo my group partners always tried to make me do all the work and I'm sure they would do the same here. Many times people who I had never talked to before asked me if I could help them with a difficult maths problem or a science assignment. Actually, I could have made a bit of money if I started a tutoring service. But back to my dilemma, from what I had learnt, students were lazy and when they could shove off all their work onto someone else they would. Plus I wasn't about to let my grades drop because of some lazy kids, so more than likely I would end up doing the entire project by myself.

I thought I had made it clear that I didn't like working with others. Hamada-sensei had even written on my midterm report that I had difficulty communicating with the other students. She should have known that I wouldn't like this arrangement. I ranted on in my head until I heard her call my name. The entire class had gone silent. I would have used the old saying; you could have heard a pin drop because in this dead silence you could have heard anything.

"Takemitsu Hyōka and Adachi Kouta you two will be doing emperor Keitai."

What. The. Hell. The entire room held its breath waiting for one of us, or both of us, to explode.

I raised my head and glared directly at the teacher. "You must be out of your mind," I snapped. "There's no way I'm working with him."

Ariwa quickly elbowed me in my side. Being rude to a teacher warranted to trip to the principal's office. Why was it so easy to get into trouble?

"That is the partner arrangement, Takemitsu. You have no choice unless you want to fail the project."

"You think I want to work with him as well?" Adachi shouted.

Hamada-sensei took a deep breath. "Both of you go to the principal's office. Takemitsu for being rude, Adachi for shouting. You can explain to him why you don't like this arrangement. Go, now."

I rolled my eyes and shoved my chair roughly back from my chair. Adachi did the same and we both shot Hamada-sensei dirty looks before leaving the classroom. This was ridiculous; she knew that the two of us hated each other's guts so why would she force us to work together for this project? Maybe she thought that it would help us with our problems, but this was Adachi we were talking about. You could bring a dog to school and it would get higher marks than him; he was that stupid. I lead the way to the principal's office not that I was in a rush to get there, but I didn't want to walk next to the big oaf. Eventually we reached the office and we both barged in.

He looked up from his computer and glared at us.

"Takemitsu, you just came back today how is it that you're already in trouble?"

I shrugged. "Maybe it's because of the buffoons you chose to employ," I was not in a good mood and when I was not in a good mood I snapped.

The principal pursed his lips. "Why are the two of you here?"

"I was rude and he shouted," I jerked my finger at Adachi who had clammed up behind me.

He rubbed his temples. "Both of you are here too much. It was a minor offense this time, but you will stay after school. Get back to class."

...

I guess there was something to be said when both Adachi and I skipped out on detention that afternoon. Like hell I was going to do some menial chore that could be considered child labour, but wasn't because we were supposed to be learning a lesson. The principal could kiss my butt. Anyway, enough about adults and their skewed perception of justice. I sat on the curb waiting for a certain oversized bully to walk by. I had some investigating to do. I might hate his guts but I would gladly follow him around if it meant that I would get answers. I sighed, the things I would do to abate my curiosity. I pretended to be tying my shoelace when I saw him walk past me. Now was the time to be stealthy. I waited a few more moments until I got up and casually walked in the same direction as him.

I think I should be a spy when I get older because I was seriously doing a good job tailing Adachi. James Bond would be asking me for tips. We headed down so many streets that I thought I would have a problem getting back home, but my troubles were rescaled when I realised exactly we were heading. This wasn't exactly the best part of town. There were broken bottles laying all over the street and sidewalk. Where the hell was this boy going? The buildings were shabby and a few were covered in bad graffiti . In the back of my mind I was praying that Adachi didn't live here and that this was just a short cut to get to his house. This place gave me a sinking feeling in my stomach. I felt like someone was going to jump out of the shadows and stab me with a knife or something; TV did nothing to help the stereotypes. Adachi turned a corner and I counted to ten before dashing after him. I rounded the corner only to see him standing sideways knocking on a door.

I ducked behind the building on the corner; he had nearly seen me. My hear t was pounding. That was close if he had turned his head a few seconds earlier I would have been dead meat. Go figure, I set one foot into the bad part of town and I come up with a hundred ways I could die. I snorted and was about to peak out from behind the building to see if Adachi had moved on when a heavy hand was placed on my shoulder.

I jumped and screamed. My heart leapt to my throat and I saw my life flash before my eyes.

"Hyōka, relax!"

I turned to see none other than my worst nightmare; Ichigo. He was glaring at me like I had done something wrong and was in big trouble because of it. Well technically I hadn't done anything wrong yet. It wasn't like I was forbidden to come to this part of town. Then again, I don't think Mikmai thought I was stupid enough to do so. I winced; I always had to prove her wrong didn't I?

"What are you doing here?" he demanded his voice low. "Do you even know where here is? You could get hurt. Come with me now, we're going home."

I planted my feet and shook my head I had come here to do something. I wasn't leaving until I got it done.

"I'm not joking, Hyōka; we're leaving now. This place is dangerous," he grabbed my arm.

"I'm not going anywhere, Kurosaki. If something is going to happen to me here, it would have happened already," I snapped.

Ichigo's scowl deepened and he clenched his jaw. "Stop being such a brat. We're leaving."

"You're not in charge-"

"I'm the adult and what I say goes," he gripped my arm tighter. I narrowed my eyes.

"I should have known it was you," I spun wrenching my arm from Ichigo's grip and turned to see Adachi walk up to us. "What the hell are you doing here? Don't you have better things to do than follow me around?"

I scowled. Great now I needed an excuse. "We're partners, dumbass. The project is due in three weeks so we need to talk about it."

He folded his arms across his chest. "Like I'm going to believe that crap; why the hell were you following me?"

Ichigo was staring at us dumbfounded, but I noticed his eyes lingered on Adachi.

"I just told you moron."

"So why were you hiding behind this building?" he raised an eyebrow.

"I... uh," I paused. Okay, he had caught me this time.

"This you're friend, Hyōka?" Ichigo asked putting his hand back on my shoulder.

"As if? You've met my friends; does he look like he'd be one of them?"

He lightly slapped the back of my head. "Don't be rude," he extended his hand to Adachi with a smile. "Hi, I'm Kurosaki Ichigo. Sorry about Hyōka's behaviour."

I rolled my eyes. Adachi regarded Ichigo's hand with a raised eyebrow but he eventually took it. Oh what do you know? He did know how to behave sometimes. I guess he wasn't completely stupid. "Adachi Kouta, and I'm used to him being an ass anyway."

Oh so I was the ass now? I clenched my hands into fists. That infuriating little bastard making me look bad in front of Ichigo.

"Just shut the hell up. If anyone knows anything about being an ass it's certainly you," I snapped.

"Hyōka," Ichigo growled warningly.

I glared at him while Adachi snickered softly. Great. He probably thought that Ichigo was my father or something and now he was going to make fun of me for this. I turned on the ginger man. "Kurosaki, leave me alone."

He blinked slowly as if he didn't understand what I was saying. The he slowly shook his head. "I can't do that kid. Now, you said you came here to talk about some project; I don't hear much talking."

How annoying. I turned back to Adachi. "Can we go to your house or something? We should start by taking some notes and planning the project."

All of a sudden he was no longer smiling at my predicament with Ichigo. He seemed hesitant, uneasy even. I raised an eyebrow. It was like he was hiding something. Ha, I had struck gold. If he was able to sense the hollows then his family should as well, and he must have known this.

"Fine," he snapped. "Is he coming?" he jerked his thumb in Ichigo's direction.

I glared at him. "No."

Ichigo scowled but made no argument. "I'll be waiting for you at the clinic. If you don't come back before five Hyōka..." he let the threat hang.

I rolled my eyes. Who did he think he was, Mikami? He couldn't order me around.

As Ichigo turned to leave Adachi started to head in the opposite direction. I had to jog to catch up. He made a few more turns and we both headed down a narrow street bordered on either side by small houses. I swallowed, so he really did live here. I guess I would have felt bad for him if he hadn't been such a dickhead. Ah, who am I kidding, I did feel bad for him. No one should have to live in such a place. It made me think, what kind of family did he have? Did his parents have jobs? How could they even think about raising a family in this neighbourhood? I glanced at the boy in front of me, but all I could see was his back and glances of his clenched fists as he swung his arms. I could tell by the way his shoulders were slouched that he was ashamed. Maybe this was what he was trying to hide. I felt sick to my stomach. He may have been a bully, but to live in this neighbourhood maybe that was all he knew how to do. There was trash all over the place, the buildings were falling apart and I'm pretty sure that this was the hub for a billion and one gangs; it must have been scary as hell. I knew if it was me living here I wouldn't want to take one step out of my house; Adachi really must have it hard.

All of a sudden I felt a painful blow on the side of my head. I reeled back with a loud curse and stared up at Adachi. His hand was still raised from the punch. He glared back at me his face steeled as if he was fighting a secret internal war. I clutched the side of my head willing myself not to fight back.

"Stop looking at me like that. I don't want you're freaking pity," he hissed his eyes flashing.

"Like I would ever feel sorry for you," I snapped. Old habits die hard. I realised from now on if I fought back I would feel like the dirtiest person in the world. Damn consciences.

We glared at each other for a split second before he turned away. "When we go in I don't want you to utter a single word. If my parents are there you say hello and that's it. I'll murder you if you do anything else."

It was only then I realised that we were standing in front of a house. It would have been a pretty decent two story house if it wasn't so ratty looking. A window was boarded shut and it just seemed dirty. We walked up the uneven driveway to the front door. Adachi seemed even more on edge than he had been earlier. He opened the door like he was disabling a bomb then tiptoed inside. I followed without a word.

The first thing I noticed once we stepped into the house was the smell of cigarettes and alcohol; I almost gagged. This was terrible; no wonder Adachi was such a dickhead. There was a ratty old couch a few feet away from us and I saw a just as ratty looking man lying down snoring loudly, a bottle of beer was in his hand. It didn't take a genius to figure out what had happened here. Adachi let out a sigh of relief which I'm sure he didn't intend for me to hear and proceeded to tiptoe up a flight of stairs. I took one last look at the man on the sofa before wordlessly following him up the stairs. Once we reached the top Adachi grabbed be by my jacket and threw me into a room. He shut the door and pushed me up against it. I was too shocked from what I had just seen to even react; I just stared at him. He looked like he wanted to beat the crap out of me this very moment and was doing all he could to stop himself.

"If you ever tell anyone what you saw here, I'm going to hunt you down," he growled into my ear. When I didn't respond he shook me, causing my head to bang against the door. I winced and struggled against his hold. "Did you hear me, Gomi? If you ever-"

"Was that your father?" I cut him off. I no longer felt the urge to fight him.

His eyes widened in shock, but he let go of me and took a step back. "That man is not even related to me," he sneered.

I clutched my throat; he had a strong grip, but I couldn't care less about that. I stared up at him. "Foster home?" I asked softly, but he didn't seem to hear me.

It had to be the only other option for this. Now I really did feel sick to my stomach. All of a sudden I understood why he was so mean. Why he beat up every other kid at school, why he hated my guts. I knew how people perceived me. Both Mikami and Teito had well paying jobs and I knew that I made people think I was better off than I actually was. To Adachi I was probably some stuck up rich brat. He was more than likely jealous of me. He didn't know that both my parents were dead or that I suffered from anxiety attacks and had a sleeping disorder. I chewed my bottom lip. He had a reason to be so bitter.

He had sunk back onto a sagging bed behind him and stared off into space. I swallowed my pride and pushed every mean thing he had said or done to the back of my mind and walked up to him. He snapped out of his trance and glared at me.

"Adachi, I-" the next thing I knew I was on my butt and my right eye was throbbing painfully.

"I told you I don't want your pity!" he yelled rising from the bed. His face was red and his eyes flashed in anger. In the three months I had known him I had never seen him look angrier. I swallowed heavily. It wasn't that I was afraid of him or anything I just felt guilty all of a sudden. I pulled myself to my feet feeling my eye start to swell. My pride had taken the bigger blow, though. But damn him if he thought I was not going to respond to that. Fine, if he didn't want my pity he wouldn't get it. Bastard.

"Don't flatter yourself. I would never feel sorry for someone like you. In fact you probably deserve everything that you're getting here!" I ended in a yell.

His eyes widened. "Keep your voice down, idiot. If you wake him up I swear-"

But he was cut off by a slurred call from downstairs. "Who the hell is upstairs? Kouta, I know you're home from school."

The glare Adachi sent me could have killed a grizzly bear in its tracks. He shoved past me and opened the door. "Get the hell out," he muttered as he passed me. When I made no movement he growled and grabbed me by my coat again and shoved me out into the hallway. "You go downstairs, show your face then get the fuck away from here."

He pushed me down the stairs and in less than a minute the front door was slammed in my face. I could only stare at the peeling paint as I tried to understand what had just happened.

...

The look on Mikami's face when I entered the clinic that afternoon would have sent a biker gang crying home to their mothers.

"What happened to you?" she demanded as soon as I set foot through the door. My hand flew to my swollen eye and I sighed.

"Some guy punched me," I muttered.

She looked to the heavens before coming over to me and examining my face. She firmly held my forehead and chin and tilted my head this way and that. Eventually she let go a long sigh and straightened.

"Sit down. I'll get you an ice pack," she disappeared to the back room.

I plopped myself into one of the chairs and stared at me feet. Usually my brain would go into hyper drive after something like this, but right now I could only focus on one thing and that was Adachi. I don't know, I guess I had always pictured him as being a big douche bag. I had never really thought about his home life; I had assumed that he came from a normal family. Never would I have dreamed that he was a foster kid and now he suddenly didn't seem like so much of a douche. I felt bad for him, actually. I snorted softly; I felt bad for the guy who made my school life a living hell. It was his fault most of the time that I got into trouble. However, when I thought of his home life I began to wonder who the victim here really was. Sure enough he started most of our fights, but now I felt like the bully. I chewed my bottom lip. I sure had made things difficult for him as well. Maybe I should have stood down more often than I had. Maybe-

"So how did everything go?"

I raised my head to see Ichigo going through some files at the front desk. He dropped them when he saw my face.

"Oh good god, can't I leave you alone for one minute without you getting yourself beat up? I thought that guy was your friend."

I sighed. "Adachi and I are the furthest thing from friends and please, I know you didn't really leave."

Ichigo chuckled. "It's my job to keep an eye on you. Like I would let you wonder around a neighbourhood like that, anyway. If Adachi isn't your friend then who is he?"

"He's the school bully," I explained, but the explanation sounded wrong in my mouth even if I had said it countless times before.

"Ah, now you see you're making me look like a terrible guardian. If I had known that guy was bad news I wouldn't have left you with him."

"He has a troubled home life," I shocked myself when I said that. I was making excuses for him now.

Ichigo frowned. "That's no excuse for him to give you a black eye. I'll talk to him tomorrow-"

"No, don't." I cut in.

"Listen Hyōka, this guy is bullying you. It doesn't matter where he's from or how messed up his family is he has no right to take it out on someone else."

"I can handle myself, Kurosaki. I don't need your help with this. Plus, you don't even know the full story."

He paused and sent me a weird look. "Regardless, I'm still going to talk to him."

"Kurosaki..." I growled.

"He has high spiritual pressure. I want to know if he can sense hollows as well," he blurt out. My jaw dropped. So, I had been right Adachi could sense hollows. Well, I guess that meant I didn't have to investigate anymore.

"How can you tell if someone has high spiritual pressure?" I asked.

He scratched the back of his neck. "I don't really know they just give off this... feeling. It's hard to explain, you just know. Like... um, I'm sure you've gotten this feeling when Mikami's around. She gives off this kind of, I don't know, an air of confidence, but it makes you feel warm and safe."

I cocked my head. Now that he mentioned it I actually did feel safe with Mikami around. "So that's how reiatsu feels?"

"It varies from person to person; my friend Rukia's reiatsu is cold like ice, but generally people with high reiatsu make you feel safe they just feel strong. The good people that is..."

"But Adachi never felt like that."

"You may not have noticed it. When I was younger I couldn't sense reiatsu at all."

"Oh. And Kurosaki, don't mention my name when you talk to him. And-"

"Just because you don't want me too I won't bring the bullying up, but mark my words, Hyōka, if he touches you again I'll be giving him a piece of my mind."

Just then Mikami came back in with an ice pack in her hand. "Here," she handed it to me. "What were you two talking about?" she turned to Ichigo. "Who are you going to give a piece of your mind?"

I shook my head. "It's nothing."

But Ichigo had other plans. "Hyōka's being bullied at school."

Damnit Ichigo! I hadn't mentioned it to her for a reason. I shot him a death glare. He just winked at me then waltzed off to the back room.

Mikami sat down in the seat next to me. "Were you ever going to tell me?" she asked calmly.

I turned to face her slowly finding myself trying to sense her reiatsu, but I still didn't know what to look for. I shook my head forgetting all about this sensing thing. I had expected shouting or something. This calm questioning was kind of scary. "I... uh... if it got really bad, maybe, but it's not as bad as it was in Tokyo so you don't have to worry."

"Did he give you that black eye?" she didn't look comforted by my words at all. I thought she would have been. In Tokyo I had to transfer out of a school once because the bullying was so bad. That had been when I was young and stupid and didn't know how to fight back.

I sighed and nodded. "I deserved it, this time."

She raised an eyebrow. "You deserved it? Since when do you admit that you did something wrong?"

She had a point. I was always right, never wrong. It was physically impossible for me to be wrong. I wasn't feeling like my cocky self that afternoon, though. "I did something that he told me not to do."

"So who's he to tell you what you should and should not do?"

I shrugged. "He kinda called the shots on this one, Mikami. Anyway can we drop this? I'm tired."

She sighed. "We'll talk about this at home. I'm going to have to stay a little while longer. You think you'll be able to wait?"

"It's not like I have a choice anyway," I grumbled.

"Keep the ice on your eye," she instructed as she headed back to the back room. "Twenty minutes on twenty minutes off."

I sighed; now what the hell was I supposed to do until closing time?

Well, tell me what you think?

like I said Adachi was going to become more important later on and well yeah. I don't really like flat characters so, I gave him a little bit of background. It's all going to come into play sooner or later so bear with me.

Don't forget to review!

-Mymomomo