OK, people. Some of you didn't understand this, but Ichigo, Orihime and Yachiru are only going to be in Dex's world for 3 months of their summer break. They will then return to take care of the 1000 Year Blood War.
Why go to Dex's world? Simple. That's where the Quincy King is from in this story. There may be some useful information on him there that can help them to beat him quickly.
Now, onto the story.
It was a Sunday morning in summer. The sun had just come up. After all, it was 6:00 AM. But, the sound of an alarm clock went off for one former-Substitute-turned-full-time-Soul reaper went off.
Chizuru hit the sleep button on her clock, for this morning, she woke up in bed with a really bad hangover. She sat up and held her head. "OK, now. Ichigo and Orihime got married. Damn it. I can't remember the wedding. How drunk was I?"
Chizuru then heard someone snoring next to her and turned her head to see a sleeping Tatsuki. The redhead quickly put on her glasses to see that both Tatsuki and herself where naked in bed together meaning that Chizuru and Tatsuki had had sex.
Chizuru smiled a perverted smile. "Yes."
Tatsuki then woke up and saw Chizuru. Then, she saw that they were both naked in bed. The tomboy then jumped out of bed as she held on to the sheets to cover herself and screamed.
Chizuru held her head. "Don't scream so loud. I have a hangover." She then got out of her bed and headed for the shower leaving a trembling Tatsuki behind.
Tatsuki shivered. "I went down on another girl and it was Chizuru." She was crying anime tears. "I lost it to Chizuru."
Meanwhile, a universe away…
Ichigo was lying in bed with Orihime. They were both only covered by the bed sheets. Orihime was fast asleep. Ichigo held her tight. He was married and had a daughter. He needed to win against that Quincy King this time around and fast.
Ichigo held Orihime tight. They were staying at Dex's Soul Reaper barracks in his world's version of New Orleans. Yachiru was staying in the room across the hall from theirs so that Orihime and Ichigo could enjoy their wedding night.
This trip would be part relaxing, part sightseeing and part training.
Meanwhile, back in Karakura Town…
Chizuru was now fully dressed in her Soul Reaper outfit. She still had a hangover, but she still had a job to do.
She then opened the door to her room to see that Tatsuki was still crying on the floor, only covering herself with bed sheets. "When you've stop freaking out, I washed your clothes. They're downstairs. Also, you got drunk and had sex with another woman. It happens. Get over it."
Chizuru then closed the door and headed out.
Chizuru used to love being a Soul Reaper, going from rooftop to rooftop, standing in the air and just seeing people go about their daily lives, but now that everyone could see her, it took a lot of the fun out of the job. People were now watching her taking pictures of her. Part of the fun was being able to go unseen even while facing someone.
She quickly dashed away, the run helping her to sober up and helping with the hangover. When she stopped, she was in a construction site and she said to herself, "Why did they have to have an open bar?"
She then took a quick look around. There was a half-finished skyscraper and lots of construction vehicles, but not one worker. Normally, she would think that they just had the day off, but she saw something out of the corner of her eye that shocked the hangover out of her.
She quickly turned as she drew her sword. What she saw looked like a man in a black robe with a hood. Under the hood, his face was covered by a red, blank mask that only had eye holes which looked empty. The skin on the man's hands looked to be green and in his hand was a long spear.
The man held his spear out, showing a strange crystal embedded in his left hand. The crystal kind of looked like it was blasted off of something. The man then said, "Give me back my master!" He then charged with quick slashes and trusts of his spear.
Chizuru countered by ducking and blocking with her sword. Normally, she would release her Zanpakutō but, in her release state, Kyu-piddo was a bow and arrow – only good at long range, but this man who kept saying, "Give me back my master," was doing a good job at keeping her at short to mid-range.
Kyu-piddo then told Chizuru something that would shock the girl. "This thing is a Zanpakutō that's somehow moving around on its own!"
Chizuru ducked and rolled away from a downward thrusting spear and ran to the unfinished building which was, right now, only a frame of metal beams. "If it's a Zanpakutō, how is it moving on its own?" The redhead asked the world as she jumped up the beams, hoping to get to the top and fire off a long range shot. "SHOOT! KYU-PIDDO!" Her sword then transformed into a heart-themed longbow.
Once she made it to the top, she turned around and faced the sword that was walking own its own which was jumping after her. Chizuru quickly fired off a shot and said, "Fire arrow!"
Her arrow burst into flames as it flew right at the freaky moving sword only for it to be cut in half by a long spear.
The Zanpakutō which was moving on its own made it to Chizuru and quickly brought its spear around in an ark in an attempt to bisect her. Chizuru quickly resealed her Zanpakutō and used her sword to block the spear blade.
Chizuru sighed in relief as she jumped back, landing on the dirt below. Her heart was racing. This thing that should not be real was above her in power. It was faster, stronger and she was horrible in close to mid-range battles.
She then looked up to see the thing jumping down after her with the blade of its spear held down in an attempt to impale her.
Chizuru's eyes widened as she ran out of the building and watched as the Zanpakutō landed with its weapon's blade in the dirt.
The thing tried to pull its weapon out, but the blade was stuck in the ground and it didn't have the muscles to free it.
Chizuru placed a hand on her heart. "Thank goodness. It can't free its spear. Now, I can get a shot in." Just before she could speak her Release command, a Hollow appeared behind the Zanpakutō-freak.
The Hollow looked like a human-sized, fur-covered lizard with white bone covering its head. Its Hollow hole was in its chest. It walked around on all fours like some kind of dog.
The freaky Zanpakutō that was moving on its own turned to it and placed its left hand on its mask. "Finally! A new master!"
The crystal in its hand glowed as it turned into energy and entered the body of the Hollow.
The Hollow's lizard tail vanished as its hind legs grew longer and it stood up on its back legs, making it stand 3 feet taller than the average man. Its front legs morphed into arms with hands that looked like a cross between fur-covered lizard feet and human hands.
The same crystal that was once in the spear-wielder's hand was now on its mask, right between the eyes.
The Hollow freed the spear… No… Its new Zanpakutō… It declared, "I'm an Arrancar, now!"
Chizuru's eyes were bugging out of her head. This thing was a Hollow with a Zanpakutō so, yes, it was an Arrancar, but it became one by merging with a self-moving Zanpakutō. This was just plain freaky.
The head of the new Arrancar's spear then glowed purple as a ball of energy formed on the tip, signalling that it was about to fire a Cero through its Zanpakutō. "Any last words, Soul Reaper?"
Chizuru held her sword out and yelled, "BANKAI!" Her sword then morphed into its Bankai form.
As the hollow fired its cero, Chizuru fired her Bankai but, this time, instead of fire, it shot an electrically charged ball of energy. Both blasts were the same size so, when they hit, they cancelled each other out, but electric energy from Chizuru's blast was conducted by the metal of the unfinished building that the Arrancar was standing in.
The electricity went from the metal frame into the Arrancar, making it scream in pain as it was toasted. While this was going on, Chizuru fell backwards. Her Bankai's lightning attack was less draining than her fire shot.
But, the girl was still too drained to continue. Her Zanpakutō transformed back to its sealed katana form. Then, Chizuru did the last thing that she could think of. She threw her sword at the Arrancar and hoped.
The sword landed in the imperfect Arrancar's neck which was in the process of being toasted, cleansing it. A moment later, the electricity from her attack vanished with the Hollow.
Chizuru smirked as she said, "I've never been so happy to have the first Zanpakutō capable of using all elements." She then saw the crystal fragment that was in the Zanpakutō's left hand and, later, the Arrancar's head, on the ground.
She crawled over to it and picked I up. "I better bring this to be analyzed… after a quick nap." The girl Reaper then passed out in the middle of a construction site – not the safest place to sleep.
An unknown amount of time later, she woke up on a bench, still holding the crystal fragment.
She then saw a construction worker walking up to her. "Thanks, Miss. We couldn't work with that thing here."
Chizuru sat up and looked at the nameless construction worker and said, "You're welcome, and thanks for putting me on this bench, I guess."
The worker spoke. "It was the least we could do but, I've got to ask, Miss Soul Reaper. When we found you, you wouldn't let go of that crystal. What's so important about it?"
Chizuru looked at it. "Well, that thing was a spiritual being. Normally, when a spiritual being dies, it vanishes completely, but when this thing vanished, it left behind this crystal and that's not normal. Thanks for making sure I didn't get run over or something, but I have to bring this in to be analyzed, now."
She then got up and took off in Flash Step.
Later on, in Soul Society's Research and Development Institute, Chizuru was sitting in the lab as Mayuri analyzed the fragment in some type of computer.
The clownish, makeup-wearing, mad scientist Captain rubbed his chin as he said, "Yes. This looks like it's part of the Hōgyoku."
Chizuru's eyes bugged. "As in, Aizen?! He's dead and he is still fucking with us!"
The crazy clown agreed by saying, "Well said, Miss Honshō. It appears that, when Ichigo shattered it, its fragments still held some power and fused into the remains of the fallen Soul Reaper's and Arrancar's blades."
Chizuru raised an eyebrow. "I thought they vanished with their owner."
Mayuri looked at her. "True, but if part of the blade is broken off, that piece becomes dead and no longer part of the Zanpakutō. These pieces are what the fragments fuse to. The fusion regenerated the blades back into full, living copies of the Zanpakutō they broke off of. Then, through the remnants of the Hōgyoku's power that's held in the fragments, they were given bodies of their own."
Mayuri rubbed his chin. "These things are not any form of Hollow or Soul Reaper, but a new kind of mutated Zanpakutō." He hummed to himself before snapping his fingers. "I'll call them Tōjū, or Sword Beasts. But, as they are manifested into our world out of their blades, we can think of them as being in a state of constant Bankai!"
Chizuru nodded along. "Meaning that these things are as strong as the average Captain, right?"
Mayuri laughed. "Right you are, Miss Honshō."
Chizuru then raised her hand to ask a question, saying "Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh!" over and over.
Mayuri grumbled. "What is it?"
Chizuru spoke. "The one I battled fused with a Hollow and made it an imperfect Arrancar. Any idea how that works?"
Mayuri rubbed his chin again. "Well, now. Zanpakutō normally have a master, so it makes sense that they would be confused by being entities of their own and seek to gain a master. That explains why it fused, but as for how, I can only image it has to do with their mutation." Mayuri then added, almost reading Chizuru's mind, "As for numbers, that would have to be equal to the number of Hōgyoku fragments and there's no way to know until after we've gathered the fragments. Also, the fragment you brought is now powerless, showing that destroying the Tōjū destroys their fragment's power."
Chizuru spoke up. "So, kill all the Tōjū and end the threat of the Hōgyoku once and for all. Got it." She then left.
Chizuru was racing to the gates that lead to the Human World. She needed to get home and gather the gang. After all, they didn't have Ichigo to go medieval on this problem.
To be continued…
Bex spoke. "Read and review, people."