*Rolls in* Hey guys. Here's the Kon and Grimmjow adventure chapter. I hope it meets your expectations.
Chapter Thirteen: A Matter of Pints
Kon lay on his back and glared up at the obnoxiously blue sky. How he'd come to hate that colour. He closed his eyes in frustration as the uncomfortable timber beneath his back rocked tirelessly back and forth upon the ocean's mild swell. Casting a side glance at his accomplice, he decided to start some form of conversation.
"Hey, electric freak," he called over.
Grimmjow glanced over at him, "What is it, Ichigo-wannabe?"
"You have powers, right?"
"Yeah, what of it?"
"Can you change the colour of the sky?"
"What the—why would I be able to do that?" Grimmjow demanded.
"Then can you at least dye your hair?"
Before Kon could react, he felt himself effortlessly hefted up by the scruff of the neck and deposited overboard. With a splash, he landed in the salty water.
He came up spluttering. "What was that for?"
"Being a damn moron, that's what," Grimmjow responded. "I thought you could do with a bit of sea water to cool you off. I'm not sure how much good it'll do in fixing your brain, but hey, not all broken things can be fixed."
Kon muttered a string of curses at the Arrancar as he inelegantly scrambled back onboard
"I'd much rather be with Rukia one-san, or Orihime, or any pretty lady right now," Kon grumbled, before purposely shaking his head with vigour, sending water droplets flying over to Grimmjow.
"I'd much rather be with the real Ichigo," Grimmjow commented flatly, raising a hand to partially shield himself from Kon's watery vengeance, "At least he's not so freaking annoying."
Kon sat still for a few moments, before both his and Grimmjow's stomachs rumbled simultaneously.
"Wait…" Kon said with a raised eyebrow, "How does your stomach rumble?"
"…I don't know," Grimmjow answered.
They continued bobbing along aimlessly for a few moments, before Grimmjow squinted his eyes out to what lay before them.
"Is that as island?"
Sure enough as they drew closer, a landform slowly approached from the distance, several buildings lined up on its shores.
"It is!" Kon confirmed and the two began to paddle.
"Paddle faster! I'm starving!"
Ichigo was feeling pretty damn good about himself. And why? He'd accomplished something he'd never thought he would. Rather, he'd accomplished something he'd never thought he'd need to, something he'd never thought would be relevant to him. But with Zangetsu out of his reach, he'd had to tap into other means of Shinigami combat. Namely Kido.
"Who'd have thought I'd be relying on Kido?" Ichigo questioned, admiring the dark katana he'd borrowed from Zoro, feeling the wind stream through his wet hair, slowly drying it as the ship continued to soar through the sky.
He grinned to himself, "I wonder what Rukia and the others would think…I'm probably better than Renji already, because my Kido no longer blows up."
"You seem pretty happy," Nami noted.
"It didn't blow up," Ichigo repeated to himself over and over, "I attempted some Kido and they didn't blow up."
"I told you it would be best to start from the lower numbers," Nami said with a smile, "And then you can work your way up! Not that I know much about it, but I assume that's the way it works, from what you told us earlier."
"The two I tried were both number fours," Ichigo explained, before proceeding to reposition the katana outwards, toward the ocean. "Let's see if I can do something a bit higher…Hado number thirty three! Sokatsui!"
Once again, a ball of electric blue shot forth from the blade, only to again implode on itself.
"You're really wanting to do that number thirty-three, aren't you?" Nami questioned flatly as Ichigo smouldered.
"Yeah…" he answered, "…But maybe going straight to thirty-three from four is too big a jump…"
"You think?"
The moment the tiny rowboat docked in port, the Arrancar and the Mod Soul rocketed out of the vessel, onto dry land, and chaotically ran into town. It was a marvellous sensation, no longer being confined to the small floating wooden structure with nothing but each other's company. The town itself was a descent-sized settlement, complete with towering brick buildings and curving, paved streets. But first thing came first and they were hungry. It wasn't long before they located a homely-looking inn and decided to make it their base. Pushing open the warm oak doors, they entered the inn's foyer, a cosy place with a warm fireplace built into the stone wall. Behind the desk sat a middle-aged woman with a thick turret of red hair which seemed to defy gravity.
"May I help you?" she questioned.
"Food," Grimmjow said, "We're hungry."
"Anything else?" the woman asked.
"Yeah, a room for two as well. Make sure it's one with two single beds and NOT just a double bed."
"Right," the woman said, scrawling the details onto a piece of paper.
"Oi," Kon hissed across to the Arrancar, "Whose money are we using?"
Grimmjow shrugged. "We can worry about that later."
"Your room is just this way, if you'll follow me," the woman said, before leading them up a flight of old stairs.
The stairs creaked under their footing and steeply ascended them to the inn's upper floor. About a dozen or so doors lined the hallway, each holding a different room.
"I think you'll find that this one suits your needs," the woman said, twisting a key into the lock of one of the final doors, having it swing open with a 'click'.
The room was small and slightly musty, with two single beds positioned at either end. Aside from that, there was an old dresser by the window and a chair in the corner.
"Much better than that damned boat," Grimmjow commented with a nod as he and Kon walked in.
"It's nice, but I'm hungry," Kon complained.
The small four-framed window showed them night was swiftly approaching, and the dull thrum of music and voices from downstairs told them the bar downstairs was beginning to get rowdy with the dinner crowds.
"If you'd like to move down into the bar, I'm sure a meal can be fixed for you," the woman said to them kindly.
And without unpacking (not that there was anything to unpack), the two hungrily headed back downstairs and out into the bar. As they entered, a flamboyantly-coloured rainbow poster caught Grimmjow's eye.
"Let's make sure we're out of here by Thursday night," he said, indicating the poster to Kon.
Kon gulped and nodded in agreement.
They sat at a small table, where they ordered a set of meals which were bought out for them quite quickly by a young barmaid.
"Are you free later tonight, Miss?" Kon questioned her with a twinkle in his eye as she set down a plate of steamed beef.
Grimmjow flicked him in the side of the head. "Oi, quit being an idiot."
Kon grumbled and began eating his food, shovelling it down by the mouthful. Grimmjow followed suit, but it wasn't long before they noticed a disturbance in the atmosphere. The bar had suddenly gone deathly silent.
"Hm?" Kon wheeled around in his seat to see a small group of men standing in the bar's entrance.
From what he could gather, these men were pirates. He could tell by the way they dressed and stood, as well as the air of intimidation which seemed to accompany them. Their overall appearance immediately made Kon think of the get-up of some of the heavy-metal bands he'd seen while channel surfing on the TV at Ichigo's home.
Who are these guys?
Grimmjow glared at the new arrivals as he continued picking at his dinner. The man whom appeared to be their leader stepped forward and glanced around the room, his small dark red eyes taking in his surroundings, briefly skimming over Kon and Grimmjow, before focussing ahead, on the bar. A couple of scars lined his face, surrounding his left eye, and a pair of dark goggles were positioned atop his turret of bright red hair. The overall structure of the man was quite impressive. He was heavily muscular and would easily have stood a head taller than Grimmjow. His choice of clothing only enhanced his intimidating appearance further, a large, red-fur-trimmed coat dominating his torso and almost sweeping the floor. At his side stood another tall muscular man, whom wore a blue and white full-head helmet ridden with holes atop a wild mane of blonde hair. The helmet obscured all of his face, save for a small blonde goatee which emerged from beneath the mask.
The leader opened his dark lips and spoke, addressing his crew. As soon as he heard the man's voice, Grimmjow decided he didn't like him. He couldn't quite put his finger on it, but there was something about his voice that put him off.
"It's the Kidd pirates…" Grimmjow could hear people muttering to each other with mixes of fear and anxiety.
"Relax, civilians," the leader, whom Grimmjow guessed to be Kidd said, hands raised, "Believe it or not, even monsters like us get hungry. We would do our own cooking, but someone had to go and incinerate the stove."
Kidd gave a begrudging side glance to a zombie-esque crew member with long tattery white hair, who smiled guiltily.
"Besides," he continued, "I've heard this place has good booze. That's all the reason we need for tonight."
Grimmjow frowned and marked the captain and crew furiously as they took a table not far across from them and began ordering their various meals and drinks.
"What kind of a man orders pasta?" Grimmjow questioned as he watched two large platefuls of the food be delivered to the table a few moments later.
"Uhh…Does it really matter?" Kon questioned.
Grimmjow growled and returned his focus to his own food, eating angrily and with increasing vigour.
A moment later, a large jug of some sort of alcoholic beverage was bought out and placed in front of Kidd.
"If he thinks he can take on one of them, then I can as well," Grimmjow said, before calling out to the barmaid. "Hey! One of those over here as well."
"I'll take two more," Kidd called over to her, his sharp gaze clashing competitively with Grimmjow's.
"Then I'll take three!"
"Four!"
Several minutes later, after a flustered barmaid had retreated to the sanctuary of the inn's kitchen and emerged with ample jugs of hard liquor, Kidd and Grimmjow eyed each other from their opposing tables and each took a swig of the closest pint. Kon looked on blankly and the masked man beside Kidd continued slurping away, the long noodles sliding snugly through the many holes dotting his mask, and likely also observing the exchange between Grimmjow and his captain. Kon then eyed the several pints in front of them, and with a shrug, reached the nearest one and began chugging it.
Grimmjow raised an eyebrow as he watched Ichigo's body take a swig of the beer.
"Isn't Ichigo underage?" he questioned.
"Maybe," Kon said, admiring the contents of the jug as he swirled them indifferently, "But I'm not. What's it matter to you anyway?"
The Arrancar shrugged apathetically and returned to chugging his own pint of grog.
As the hours went past, the number of empty jugs began to dominate the number of full ones. But Grimmjow and Kidd still weren't done.
"I'll have five more jugs of this stuff."
"Six!"
"Seven!
"Ten!"
Kon paled and looked back over to Kidd's crew. He frowned in contemplation, swashing the contents of the pint. His thoughts were growing fuzzy, but he wasn't about to stop listening to them.
You know…those Kidd guys look like real friendly people…he decided, I'm gonna go and talk to one…
Having made up his buzzing mind, Kon stood and weaved his way over to the other table, sliding into place beside the masked blonde man.
Killer gazed through the holes that decorated his mask and observed the young man now seated opposite him. He shrugged and re-slot the straw he had been drinking with through one of said holes, appreciating the sensation of the alcohol burning down his throat. He glanced back at his captain, who continued to argue with the blue-haired guy who was mysteriously alive despite a sizable hole through his gut.
"Hi," the teen across from him regained his attention.
"Hello," Killer responded.
"Wha's ya name?"
"Killer."
There was silence, save for his captain yelling something along the lines of 'puny cat' at the blue hair guy, followed by the response of 'stupid pasta-lover'.
It seemed though, that his new friend had gone off on a tangent.
"I dun even know why Urahara sent me here in the first place, yeh know?" the teen slurred at him, "I mean, the entire point of me being around is to fill in for Ichigo when he's away, right?
"But of course," Killer chose to go along with whatever the intoxicated young man was nattering on about, "And what do you think you'll do about that?"
Grimmjow countered Kidd's latest insult but ordering four more jugs of the beverage. The barmaid disappeared back into the kitchen, muttering about hoping they had enough left. He turned to his left expecting to see Kon, but was instead greeted by an empty seat.
Where did he get to…
It seemed that in all his verbal feuding with the pirate, he hadn't notice his own accomplice wander over to their table and begin pouring out his life issues to the crew.
"Oi, you!" Grimmjow shouted
Kon looked over.
"What are you doing over there?"
Kon shrugged. "Somethin'"
"How many drinks have you had?"
Kon used his fingers to count. "Two or three…I think…"
"What a pathetic tolerance," Grimmjow remarked, "Now get your ass up to bed before you do something even stupider than usual."
Kon pouted, but decided to do what the Arrancar said. He was getting pretty tired after all.
After Kon was gone, Kidd seized the Arrancar up and down, eyes lingering on the unusual feature of the hole through his gut, a trait people didn't normally have.
"Did we fire a cannon at you once?" the captain questioned.
"But that would kill him!" the man with tattered white hair said.
"I know that, moron," he took another swig of his current jug, "I was just asking."
Grimmjow grinned. "I could keep this up all night."
In the early hours of the morning, Kon awoke. He needed to take a leak. As he turned over, a dull thrumming pounded, and he wasn't quite sure if it came from downstairs or was just in his head. It was pretty obvious Ichigo had never had any alcohol before, and now he was paying for it. Groaning and stretching up from his bed, he glanced across the room to see he was alone.
Wonder where that bastard's gotten to…he thought to himself as he stood and exited the room.
Wandering up the hallway he found, to his distaste, the upstairs bathroom was already in use. Sighing in defeat, he opted to use the downstairs one. He wandered along the corridor once again and down the stairs. He paid no head to the going-ons in the bar as he crossed the room and entered the men's bathroom. Walking across the tiled floor, he reached the special men's wall. He unzipped the pants he was wearing and commenced his bladder-relief with an accomplished sigh.
His eyes opened at the sound of the timber door creaking open behind him and he glanced over his shoulder to see Killer enter the room. Kon remained silent as the masked man crossed the room and took residence in the slot beside him.
A loud clatter of metal sounded from just outside. It was clear that Kidd and his crew were still out in the bar it only made Kon's head pound more.
Damnit. I'm still a bit drunk.
Noting Killer still beside him, he opted to try and make the situation a little less uncomfortable.
"H-Hi," he said awkwardly.
The masked man glanced over at him and inclined his head in greeting.
"Your blue haired friend is still exchanging with the captain," he said matter-or-factly.
"He's not my friend," Kon snapped.
"Oh. I'm sorry."
There was a pause before Kon realised what Killer's statement actually meant.
"Wait…you mean they're still trying to outdrink each other?"
"Exactly. I don't think either are intoxicated yet either. Though I think they've started throwing things at each other."
A large crash followed by a shout confirmed Killer's thoughts, and Kon quickly finished up his business and exited the bathroom, Killer not far behind. They entered the bar, only to see it a mess with a variety of miscellaneous items that had been hauled tirelessly around the room.
"Ah, there's the electric-blue freak," Kon noted blearily.
His eyes widened when he noted a vast multitude of metal products in the room reseeding toward the red-haired captain, who proceeded to haul them toward Grimmjow. And then, Kon remembered.
The Kidd pirates…I read about these guys in the paper the other day…he watched as Kidd manipulated the metal to his will, He's one of those fruit users…
"Look here, ass-hat," Grimmjow began, "I don't know who you are, but you really piss me off."
Kidd opened his mouth to reply, when one of his crew members burst into the room.
"What is it, Wire?" asked Kidd, agitatedly dropping the array of metal.
"There's some marines coming," the man replied.
"Marines?" Kidd questioned, "Who cares? Let them come."
"Rear Admirals Metsumeri and Daigan are with them," Wire reported.
Kidd sighed and cursed, looking around at the destruction they'd caused.
"Fine, let's get going" he said begrudgingly, before turning back to Grimmjow. "Maybe we can finish this another time."
At their captain's word, the crew peeled themselves from the floor and their seats and exited the bar. Kon observed their departure with mild interest, before turning and gazing out the window. The view of the rugged mountain landscape nearby was slowly creeping into view as dawn came, though the sun was yet to rise. Grimmjow muttered something and stood, departing to, Kon guessed, the bathroom. Deciding he may as well stay up, Kon stood and exited the bar, out into the foyer and the street beyond it. It was very quiet at this hour, though Kon wasn't really surprised. He watched as a small platoon of Marines marched somewhere in the distance, among them who he assumed were the Vice Admirals Kidd had been hesitant about opposing.
Must be pretty powerful he noted offhandedly to himself as he sat by the gutter.
A few minutes later, he noticed a small portion of the officers coming his way. They were chatting quietly amongst themselves, likely about monetary subjects, or complaining about such an early morning.
As they came closer still, Kon decided he'd do the friendly thing and greet them.
"Hello," he spoke once the marines were close enough to be in earshot.
The marines, whom had likely come by for an early breakfast simply ceased their walking and chatter immediately to stare at him as though he'd come from another planet. Which probably wasn't that far from the truth.
Okay…Kon thought, slowly lowering the hand he'd raised to wave at them, Is this how they normally respond when someone waves at them? They're starting to creep me out…
Finally, after what seemed like an age, one of the marines found his voice.
"It's…It's him!" the marine shouted pointing a menacing finger at Kon.
"Yes…" Kon nodded, confused, "It's me…"
"Seize him and bring him to the Rear Admirals!" the marine ordered.
"Huh?" Kon blinked dumbly as the set of marines advanced on him.
Before they could reach them, he stood and put the Mod-Soul strength in his legs to action by springing up onto a nearby shop roof, a feat the actual Ichigo wouldn't have been able to accomplish in a terminal body.
"Hey, what's the problem?" he snapped from the rooftop, "I haven't done anything!"
"Nonsense!" one of the other officers called up at him, "Now tell us, fiend, where are the rest of the Straw Hat crew?"
"Eh?" Kon tilted his head to the side, "'Straw Hat crew'? Am I supposed to know who that is?"
Though when he thought about it and said the name out loud, he couldn't help but think he'd read it somewhere earlier as well.
"Well yeah," one of the other marines replied, "After all, aren't you and your sister with them?"
"Look, I think you've got the wrong guy," Kon said, "I think I'd know if I had a sister or was with a pirate crew. If you're interested in pirates though, you just missed Kidd and his crew."
"He's trying to steer our attention away from him so he can escape," another marine noted.
However, before anything more could be done, a sudden interruption halted their advances. The officers barely managed to dodge as a blade narrowly avoided slicing them through.
"Next time I won't miss," Grimmjow said, stepping forward.
"Is this your accomplice?" one of the marines demanded up at Kon.
"Do you always sprout bold accusations at the first idiot you come across each day, or is this idiot a special case?" the former Espada questioned, resheathing his blade as he stepped forward.
The marines instinctively took a step back and brandished their weapons.
"Who're you?" one questioned, eyeing Grimmjow's hair and Hollow hole.
"None of your business," Grimmjow shot back and Kon jumped down from the building.
"After them!" the marine ordered, and the lot of them began advancing at once.
"Let's get out of here," Kon said, "I'd prefer to stay somewhere we can relax a bit."
Grimmjow grunted in agreement and the two shot off towards the harbour.
"Oi, electric freak," Kon called across to his accomplice, "Did you do something to tick these guys off?"
The former Espada shook his head. "Why are you asking me that? You're the one they're after."
"But I haven't done anything," Kon answered as they continued to run, "Unless…"
"Unless?"
"Ichigo has done something…"
Grimmjow glanced across to the man he'd labelled 'Ichigo-wannabe' and frowned in realisation.
"You both look exactly like each other…you could be the same person."
"Which means…"
The pair instantly jumped to the same conclusion.
"Ichigo must have done something stupid!
"Damnit! This is all his fault!"
They may have had little in common and a mutual dislike for one another. But right now, none of that mattered. All that mattered was that they had been quite unceremoniously shoved into a wacky world by a flamboyant shopkeeper in pursuit of that troublesome teenaged Substitute Shinigami whom they were now both cursing.
It was at this moment, whilst being chased into the glorious sunrise by a herd of marines, that the Arrancar and the Mod Soul shared their first moment of unspoken understanding.
Next Time: As the Straw Hats sail towards the next island, they receive some news, which is cause for celebration…Also, some other stuff happens…
This chapter made me realise I really like Killer…Although I hope he's kinda ugly beneath the mask to prove to the fangirls that there's a reason people wear masks. Grimmjow disliking Kidd the moment he hears his voice is a reference to Kidd's voice actor, Daisuke Namikawa, who voices Ulquiorra over in Bleach. He also voices Italy from Hetalia, which explains the pasta. Killer also eats it, 'cause it fits through the holes in his helmet. Anyways, I'm off to work on the next chapter, which will be out in about a week. Please review~
*rolls out*