Chapter 37 - Paranoia & Preparations
We arrived back at the edge of the campus in record time. I couldn't feel my legs anymore, but I didn't allow myself to relax. Before we left the shade of the trees I turned to Renji.
"Get home as quickly and quietly as you can. They will come after us so you need to hurry. Don't let anyone see you, travel through the shadows, do not step into the light unless it's unavoidable. When you get back clean yourself up and get rid of your clothes, or at least hide them but don't let your roommates know. Understand?"
He nodded, too shaken to answer.
"Good, be careful and don't mention anything to anyone. Get in bed and pretend you've been there all night as soon as you can. I'll see you soon," and for the second time I cast my camouflage Kido and bolted off towards my bedroom window across the vast field and lake.
When I got back I slipped through the window at a crack and locked it behind me silently, completely forgetting to check it for bugs for surveillance like I had before leaving, but that didn't seem to matter right now. On my floor was a towel from my shower the previous morning. I stripped down, burying my singed clothes into the corner of my closet and poured a half-empty bottle of water from my nightstand over my skin and the towel, scrubbing myself quickly.
I managed to get the soot off my face, but the smell of fire was still there. I upended the last of the water onto my hair and combed it through before spraying myself with some perfume that my parents had sent me for my birthday.
I threw on a baggy t-shirt with a pattern of a kitten playing with a ball of wool and jumped into bed, making sure to roll around and make myself look like I had been there all night: Messy covers, bed hair, the works.
I was too nervous to sleep. Every creaking floorboard, every drip of the shower head in the next room, every gust of wind outside of my window felt like someone was coming for me. I lay there staring at my ceiling trying to piece together what had just happened. It all came by so fast that I could barely remember the details, like an unsettling dream I had just woken up from.
Sure enough, around an hour later, long after midnight just as my weariness overtaking my fear, a blaring alarm began to sound and I rocketed up out of bed startled.
I didn't have to fake my surprise. I ran out of my room into the hall at the same time as Rukia and Momo.
"What's going on?!" They asked also in pyjamas, eyes heavy with sleep.
"What is that sound? A fire alarm?" I shouted over the ear-piercing noise.
I hurried forward not bothering to put on better clothes, opening our apartment front door and peering out. Our neighbours were doing the same, the dorm building main lights were off and red alarm lights rotating constantly at either end of the corridor.
"Everybody up! Everyone get downstairs and line up in the assembly hall, now!" A voice called from the end of the corridor, barely audible over the noise.
Kanisawa strode towards from the top of the stairs still wearing her school uniform at this time of night. Clearly, she had been out patrolling somewhere while everyone else was tucked away in bed.
She glared at me as she passed, looking me up and down as if expecting to catch me red-handed in my black Stealth gear. As if I would be stupid enough to still be wearing it.
The three of us went down with the rest of the occupants and waited as instructed. I intentionally stayed towards the back of the room leaning casually on the back wall hoping that the smell of smoke would be undetectable after my improvised shower, but it wasn't worth risk of getting close to people and letting them notice. I wasn't naive enough to think that Kanisawa didn't have plenty of snitches in the dorm who would be happy to rat me out if they spotted something suspicious like the smell of burnt clothes when I should have been in bed.
Once everyone was there Kanisawa flicked a switch on the wall to deactivate the alarm and climbed on stage to address us.
"I pray that none of my girls would be stupid enough to disobey direct orders," she began, her eyes finding me like radar. I rolled my eyes and looked away to examine my none existent fingernails in response, showing her that I didn't care for her assumptions. "But the reason that we give you orders is for you to follow them. As I'm sure you all know by now, earlier today there was a hollow attack on campus, so we called an early curfew and kept all students locked in their quarters for their own protection while we carried out investigations and hunted down the last hollows. However, SOMEONE" she said emphasizing the accusatory word. "In fact, two someone's, male and female, broke that order and went out there to do a little bit of their own hunting tonight."
There were whispers of surprise and interest around the crowd.
Momo and Rukia looked around wide-eyed as if to judge the people around us. Not once did they look at me. I loved that they trusted me so unconditionally but felt like a horrible person for pulling the wool over their eyes.
"These two people must be brought to justice. They have broken some of the most important laws and rules of our society tonight, and my sources inform me that they would not have made it back here in time for this roll call. If someone is missing here tonight, do not expect to see them ever again." she said strongly.
She began reading out names and each person would call back to confirm their attendance.
As she got through the list of over two hundred, her face became more and more frustrated.
Eventually, she came to the realization that either the perpetrator wasn't an emerald girl, or they had somehow made it back in time.
"If the criminal is here, make no mistake: We will find you. I will not allow such a blatant disregard for rules! Now all of you get back to bed, all of you." She said sternly. In an orderly queue, we filtered out of the hall and headed back to our rooms.
No one pulled me over to integrate me as I had expected, but by getting myself locked up on house arrest earlier today and making it back in time for the search, I had given myself a good solid alibi and hopefully, they would overlook me completely, unless the Soul Reapers could recognize me somehow.
Exhaustion hit me quickly after that and I conked out for the rest of the night.
To my astonishment, no one of authority even bothered to come and check on me during the week that I was incarcerated. Considering I was generally the number one suspect for any strange activity it seemed odd that they didn't so much as spare me a glance. Apparently, they must have been absolutely certain that whatever security they had put in place to keep me in my room for the next week must be completely fool-proof.
Honestly, it felt like they had just left me there and hoped I would finally obey orders, but I was smarter than to think they would leave me completely unsupervised. They had to be observing my movements somehow, so to keep under the radar I decided to sit tight and wait out the storm, though it killed me to be locked up for so long without human interaction apart from Momo and Rukia in the mornings and evenings.
I made a point of being extremely loud with my music on most of the days just so they got the point that I wasn't going to spend my time doing homework and sleeping, though that was, unfortunately, an unavoidable portion of my day.
I longed to break out of here and go to the music club, or even just spend time with everyone. Even Renji would have been a sight for sore eyes at that desperate point, but that was partly due to me needing to know that he was okay after what had happened and that he hadn't spilt his guts to anyone.
But judging by the quiet week I assumed everything was okay. I was surprised he hadn't made an attempt to come to speak to me. Either he had enough sense to keep away in these troubling times or he really hadn't been bothered by the situation, which I found hard to believe by the fear in his eyes as we escaped through the forest.
If he didn't approach me first I would definitely have to find a quiet moment to talk to him when the opportunity arose, just for my own piece of mind. It was my fault that he got caught up in the situation after all.
On the day of my release, Kanisawa came to our apartment and whisked me away to her office. She had me sign papers to agree that I'd served my punishment and essentially that I'd learned my lesson and wouldn't take part in illegal activities anymore. I signed it just to get her off my back, but I knew full well she had no way of stopping me from sneaking out at night, and if she tried I would make her regret it.
And with that, I was finally allowed to attend classes again. The teachers all welcomed me back and Onabara decided that my new nickname was to be "Troublemaker". I didn't mind, anything was better than powderpuff or snowball really. What I did mind was all of the whispered and stares that followed me around campus everywhere I went.
I knew it was about the mini-invasion and nothing else. As it does in a campus full of gossiping teenagers, the news had travelled like wildfire, giving me an infamous reputation as someone whose name should be known.
But that did nothing to help with my new found sense of paranoia. In other circumstances, the attention may have given me a much-needed confidence boost, but I had this horrible feeling that the attention would only make me more identifiable for anyone who was on my tail. So, I vowed to keep my head down and the punishment slate clean… at least for a little while.
Renji didn't really speak to me on my first day back. He seemed unusually quiet, but I had a feeling he was bottling it all up. He kept glancing over like he wanted to say something but I waited and waited and he never spoke a word. Not even an insult, which told me something was bothering him.
The first thing I did in my theory classes was to check the textbooks for any info whatsoever about hollows. Methods of capturing them, the bounty lists, a list of their names and pictures, anything that could give me some clue about what actually went down out there. But there was nothing that even remotely resembled the monstrous dragon or the canisters of caged light that imprisoned it in any books I checked. I could only assume that we really did intrude upon something absolutely top secret, like newly developed technologies or something.
I was dying to talk to someone about it, I desperately needed to get my thoughts off my chest and finally, at the end of Zanjustu that day Renji took the only opportunity to be alone with me, though it only lasted a moment.
He appeared next to me at our usual meeting spot next to the water cooler after we finished our sparring match and leaned against the wall trying to look inconspicuous with an empty drinks cup.
"You free after school?" he asked conversationally.
I shook my head, water sploshing around in my hamster cheeks and he snorted at how stupid I looked. With a massive and painful gulp, I said: "I was planning on heading to the studio to catch up on practice sessions but I'll be back just before curfew, why?"
"Nevermind, I was just gonna talk you about that… you know… that thing we did the other night"
I stomped on his foot. "Will you think before you speak! That could have sounded so wrong if anyone was listening!"
He blushed and stuttered trying to recover and clarify, but just then the others came in from the Dojo having just finished their matches.
"Are you two arguing again? Let me guess, he shoved his cup under the tap and made you spill yours again?" Rukia asked rolling her eyes at us.
"Yeah! Again! Can you believe his audacity?! How hard can It be for a girl to get a drink around here!?" I complained giving him a look that clearly said: "Just play along."
"They say the first cup from a new bottle is the freshest" he shrugged. And they snorted doubtful laughs.
Kira patted him on the shoulder with pity. "Not sure who told you that, but I think they were pulling your leg, bro"
"Alright! So, who's my next opponent? I'm getting rusty here, I need to get back into shape!" I said trying to steer the topic away from mine and Renji's secret arrangements.
Rukia linked her arm with mine and steered me back out into the dojo. "It's my turn. Come and show me how to do that weird twirl jump thing you do before the lunch bell rings"
"You're really into that Rapier style, huh? It suits you" I smiled.
"She's getting really good at it!" Momo told me linking with my other arm as we turned away from Kira and Renji.
The boys watched us go quietly. "Feels nice to have all that bursting energy back in the group, huh? I feel revitalized. I enjoy the quiet to study time but sometimes it feels wrong when she's not around," Kira said conversationally grabbing a drink too.
Renji continued staring at my retreating back. "Yeah... never a dull moment..."
After dinner, we split from the boys who didn't bother to question us, and we went to the music club. Now that we were alone Rukia and Momo filled me in on how far they'd gotten with the "Green Project" as it was now being codenamed.
They'd come home in the week with exciting stories of things they'd learned and then gone to bed but now I would have a chance to see their progression for myself.
I hadn't expected most of the club to be eagerly awaiting my return when we entered the studio. I got swept away on a sea of excited club members who all wanted to show me their ideas and have my opinions. The writers were fighting over who's lyrics were better, while the composers all crowded around shoving scores in my face.
"Whoa, guys! I know you've missed me but please"
"Back up people, give the girl room the breath! One at a time!" Rukia instructed sounding more like my manager than Shuhei. We sat down in our usual corner and I allowed my club mates to pitch their ideas to me.
I was extremely impressed. Some of the ideas had a real flare that I could happily get behind and I gave the ones I liked the thumbs up to be worked on as future songs for the band if the first live show was a success.
Once everyone had dispersed to get on with their new jobs I spotted Shuhei hovering near the door waiting for me to notice him, but I pointedly ignored him and went to Aoga instead.
"Dude, long time no see," I said offering a fist bump that he accepted.
"Yeah. They've missed you." He said simply.
"I can see. Well, I'm gonna go listen to Momo and Rukia in the recording room"
"Kimi," Shuhei said to grab my attention as I turned to walk away.
"Hm?" I mumbled barely sparing him a glance.
He raised an eyebrow. "Well? Is that it?"
"Is what it?"
He sighed. "I should have known you wouldn't have learned your lesson."
"And what lesson would that be? To sit tight and get my ass kicked because the so-called professionals are too lazy to help? For breaking the rules by defending myself? I've made it clear that I think that's bullshit, Shuhei. End of conversation." And I walked away.
The girls shrugged and apologized on my behalf as I walked away.
Our first attempt at singing with the three of us together surprisingly sounded excellent. The girls had a lot of training to do but overall had good voices.
The song we had gone with was a pop-rock love song about getting prettied up to seduce boys on the weekend night out, which really worked with the edgy rock band theme that Shuhei was going for, even though lyrics weren't really the kind of thing any of us would actually do. As Shuhei so kindly put it, the rock genre suited us because I had the fiery temper and energy, Momo had the bouncy happy energy and Rukia had a passionate deep voice. Surprisingly, all of those contrasts mixed very well together.
After a few nights of singing scales until the moon was rising past the treetops outside of the high studio window, they were finally able to hold high and low notes reasonably well, and we've moved on my other things like harmonies.
That was were bossy pants Shuhei kept butted in, telling us which parts each character should sing and how to harmonize which lyrics, only confusing us even more and creating more work to be done to learn the changes.
Momo had the cute high pitch parts, Rukia had the deeper parts and I was just in-between, bringing it all together.
We continued like that for the rest of the week, besides the two days Momo and Rukia took out for their other clubs. In that time, I sat around practising the lead guitar part I would be playing as well as singing.
I made a point of ignoring Shuhei as much as I could, avoiding him and pretending he hadn't spoken if ever he had an input, but It didn't take long for me to forget my little grudge.
On my second night of freedom, I finally got the visit I had been hoping for. As I lay in bed with my notepad on my knees, sketching an idea for an outfit I'd imagined by lamplight, I heard a faint knock on my window. I ignored it at first thinking a bat had flown into it again. I had spent a few nights so far watching the tiny creatures zooming around eating early summer bugs.
Then it happened again, louder and more insistent. "What the hell?" I mumbled, jumping down from my bunk and pulling on some shorts to go with the tank top I'd been sleeping in. It was way too humid for PJs.
I pulled my curtain aside and found Renji standing on my balcony leaning against the rail.
My heart leapt into my chest. "What are you doing here?" I asked in surprise whisper as I pulled my sliding door open.
"I wanted to talk to you if that's okay?"
I blinked. "Took you long enough! I'll get dressed, be with you in a sec" and by getting dressed I meant pulling on an oversized jumper that acted as a dress.
I crept out of the window barefooted and left it open just an inch before jumping up to the roof with him so not to disturb the girls or neighbours.
"How are you?" I said sitting down cross-legged in the shadow of the chimney above my window.
"I'm okay, it's just… a lot has happened"
"Tell me about it. And I was stuck in there for most of it" I said nodding towards my room.
"That's why I didn't visit before now, I didn't want to get either of us into trouble. I figured it would be best to keep away from you in case anyone was watching"
"Smart boy" I grinned. "Spoken like a true sneaker!"
He smiled faintly. "I knew you'd kick my ass if I even thought about it out loud, so I stayed quiet, but It's hard to get my brain around it… I wanted to talk to you about it just to make sense of it. What do you think actually happened?"
"To me, it seems like they were hunting that hollow that had you guys hypnotized with its fishing lure, and then the giant dragon hollow swooped in for a piece of the action. We just happened to get caught up in it."
"That's what I thought too, but how the hell did something that big go unnoticed? How did we not see it before? Are there more of them out there?"
I frowned at his worried reaction. "I'm sorry Renji... It hasn't hit me so hard because I'm used to dealing with dangerous situations, but that was a lot for you to take in and you've handled it immensely well. I know it's scary to think that those things were lurking out there but try not to think about it. Were safe now"
"Thanks… I just can't believe that I nearly left you there"
"What do you mean? I told you to leave me there and save yourself, that was our agreement. The only thing you did wrong was putting yourself back in the danger by coming back for me. I am thankful, but that was reckless."
He shook his head. "No, That's the part I did right. Leaving you was wrong and selfish. I freaked out and ran for it, then realized It would be my fault if something happened to you." he hesitated for a moment before continuing. "Iv… I've had dreams of finding your body charred in the rubble back in that clearing… Every single time I run away, I come back to find you dead… I just keep reliving it."
I put a hand on his shoulder and squeezed. "Forget about them. They're just bad dreams. It didn't happen like, I fought with the Reaper and lived thanks to you coming back and saving my ass from that tail swing. I just feel terrible for dragging you into it in the first place. The idea of a good fight doesn't scare me… but the idea of having a friend's blood on my hands is terrifying. I would never forgive myself."
"...How can you be so… brave? You brush off all the bad things like they're insignificant. That thing was the size of a volcano and spit fire like one too, and you act like it's just another day"
I shrugged. "Like I said I'm used to dangerous situations. That was your first taste of the field work and wasn't exactly the type of gentle exercise that the academy would organize as a class. There is no gentle training in the real world. Honestly, dropping you in the deep end like that will probably give you more confidence when you get to do real field work after graduation. Compared to that night anything else will seem like a walk in the park. You're prepared for the very worst now"
"You're so positive" he laughed in disbelief.
"Hey, don't get me wrong, I was scared shitless but there was no room to dither and cry. The job had to be done. Every Soul Reaper has the same responsibility to man up and do their job at any cost. That's what I did."
"So, what now? Aren't you worried that they'll somehow be able to track us back?"
I didn't answer for a moment, weighing my words carefully so not to concern him. "If they were coming after us, they would have found us already. They have ways of identifying people that we could never dream of. If they needed to they would use them. I think as long as we keep out noses out of trouble were safe."
We sat there staring out over the distant forest for a moment, almost expecting to see something we shouldn't. But it was still as always. Then Renji began to laugh.
"What's so funny?" I said a contagious smile forcing at the corner of my lips.
"Nothing really. It's just crazy that we did that insane stuff and lived to talk about it. I mean us, two stupid kids, who spend most of our time arguing and looking for new ways to piss each other off and we're the ones who get dragged into this mess and live."
"You sound so surprised. We made a great team!"
"Yeah we did, which is always crazy considering were meant to hate each other," He said wiping away a tear from laughing so hard.
"I don't hate you, I never have," I told him sincerely.
He looked surprised. "Oh get real, you totally did in the beginning. You were so butthurt by that first defeat-"
"Yeah, butthurt. Exactly. I had a bruised ego because I'd spent the last fifty years listening to my brother in law on how to be an honourable fighter just for some punk to win against me in the least honourable way possible. You can't blame me for being pissed"
"But you're not pissed anymore?"
I shook my head. "I'm stubborn, but I'm not stubborn enough to keep being angry at someone for the rest of my life. To be honest, you're an alright guy. You're strong, fast, funny and actually kinda friendly when you want to be. I enjoy fighting with you because you don't treat me like a delicate butterfly as most people do. I can take the hits and the insults and hurl them right back at you. No one else is as relaxed as you. They think that girls need to be looked after. I don't. I can look after myself."
He stared at me like I'd gone crazy then smiled. "Thanks, you're not so bad yourself when you're not being a spoilt brat"
"Hey! I'm trying to have a nice moment here, don't go ruining it!"
He stood up and stretched. "Yeah, I don't do mushy moments. Thanks for talking to me though, I feel better now. Maybe we should sneak out again sometime when this whole thing blows over. It was fun when I forget about nearly being blown to pieces"
I grinned standing up and pulling my jumper down over my thighs as I stretched. "I'll come and call on you again sometime when I need a sneaking partner"
"Alright, Goodnight Kimi"
"Night Renji, see you tomorrow. Don't let the bad dreams bite!"
"Shut up." And he flashed away.
"Thank you for being there for me…" I whispered into the night air before carefully tip-toeing to the edge of the roof and leaping down to my balcony for an early bedtime.
The one afternoon we walked in and had a shock waiting for us and I temporarily forgot about mine and Shuhei's falling out. There he was standing with his back to the door, kneeling down as he fidgeted with something black on a mannequin.
Aoga stood off to the side with a clipboard as if ready to make notes and a few other club members milled around looking expectant.
"Hey, what's going on?" I asked merrily, holding the door open for the girls to enter behind me. Then I saw the mannequins. "No way, is that what I think it is?!"
Shuhei turned to greet us with a wide grin on his face.
"Certainly is, the Fashion club really pulled through- careful though, there are still a few pins in them"
"Oh my god oh my god oh my god" Momo squeaked jumping up and down. He removed them from the mannequin carefully, piece by piece one at a time and handed them to us.
"They're prototypes to try on for measurements" Aoga explained simply.
A tear came to my eye.
That dress that I had dreamed of on the first night of this project... The fashion club had taken mine and Shuhei's crappy little doodles and made them better than my imagination could ever conjure, for Momo that is.
It was clear who's outfit was who's by the mild difference in theme.
Momos dress was the frilly black dream tutu, but with green and black tartan accents, chains, studs, leather gloves, a lacey choker with a green gemstone and a green tartan tank top underneath a leather waistcoat.
Rukia's was exactly the same colours and materials but more like a short-sleeved skater dress with a tight leather and green tartan belt around the middle and the same black flat heeled, buckled ankle boots.
Mine was a vision of the punky, badass, edgy rock chick style I was going for, doing away with the skirts completely in favour of shorts as I had requested in a number of my doodles. At least now I wouldn't be uncomfortable and bouncing around on stage.
Chains and studded belts hung from the pockets of the tartan-patched shorts to wrap around my butt and legs above fishnet stockings and biker boots.
Instead of a vest, I had a cropped belly top with short sleeves and a neckline that stopped just below the lacey choker.
My gloves were leather with black gems embedded on the back and tight arm bands wrapped around both upper arms.
I literally melted and jumped on Shuhei in a huge hug. "YOU MADE IT HAPPEN THANK YOU SO MUCH THEY'RE AMAZING!" I squeaked tightening my death grip around his waist.
"Hey no problem, Troublemaker. I'm only doing my job, but the fashion deserves all the credit really" Shuhei wheezed patting me on the head. "Now go try them on, we need to note any adjustments that need to be made, then you can start moving on to the full band and costume rehearsals"
Still hugging each other and bouncing like hyperactive toddlers, the three of us picked up moved to one of the private rooms to change.
The only real problem was that the shorts were a little tight for my athletic legs. But otherwise, there were only minor tweaks that needed to be made.
We finally had the lyrics and individual vocal parts nailed before moving onto choreography with private lessons from the dance club leader. It took us a couple of weeks to get the moves right, seeing as we had a whole three-minute sequence to learn and the girls had harder parts than me.
I only really had to stand at the front and join in with some of the moves on certain queues while playing the guitar, whereas they had to coordinate and keep constantly moving which they currently didn't have the stamina for. They were out of breath before the end of the first verse on most runs.
I mentioned this problem to Shuhei and, reliable as ever, he pulled through and procured gym passes for them so they could join me in the stamina improvement machines. I just had to find a way to stop Renji from knowing I was going to the gym so he wouldn't find the girls there and start asking awkward questions.
After the first two weeks were up Rukia and Momo decided that they preferred the music club to their other clubs and decided to drop one each. Thankfully Rukia chose to quit Arts & Crafts. We all knew that no amount of practice would make her a good artist, the only problem was that all of the doodles of outfits designs she was putting together were permanently stuck in stick-bunny mode and I doubted that would ever change.
Momo's decision caused us all a great deal of pain and regret, however. Instead of choosing to drop the stupid ASS club, where all she did all day was talk about Aizen and look at the photo's his stalkers had taken of him, she ditched damn the cooking club! This meant no more wonderful homemade treats to look forward to while we studied and practised in the nights. Even the club members seemed mournful when she told them she wouldn't be bringing leftover cookies to the studio anymore.
She did promise that she would try to make stuff on the weekend of she could get ingredients from town, so I settled for second best.
Somehow, we managed to keep the secret from the guys without much effort. As far as they were concerned we just coincidentally had club meetings at the same time in the same days, or we were all splitting off to take on extra lessons, or the girls were coming to the club to watch dress rehearsals. They never suspected a thing that to me it must seem clear that something was going on.
Until we nearly had a heart attack when Kira walked through the door with Aoga and Shuhei, who were carrying black clothing bags over their shoulders, while the three of us were standing on stage preparing for another practice session one evening.
We all squealed in shock and rushed to hide, tripping up over each other in our extremely conspicuous and not at all stealthy haste to get out of sigh, causing Kira and Shuhei to laugh loudly.
"It's alright, I'm in on the secret," Kira told us as we recovered from our frantic scramble.
"You're what?!" We demanded angrily.
"Shuhei! You told us not to tell anyone!" I complained.
"Relax, squirts. I told you not to go telling any outsiders, but Izuru here happens to be a member of the Newspaper club who has kindly agreed to help us out"
"Meet your new promo manager," Aoga grunted.
"In other words, I'm your photographer and I'll be writing articles about the band in the school paper to promote you" Kira smiled kindly.
"Are you for real!? You knew about this and never told us?!" Momo said running up and beating on his chest with her fist softly. " Do you know how much trouble we went through to keep this secret from you?!"
"Sorry, but I didn't know if I was supposed to tell you anything either."
"What about Renji?" I asked the thought occurring to me. "Is he in on it too then?"
Kira snorted. "Of course not. If you're looking for a way to spread a secret, go tell big mouth Renji. No one in their right mind would trust him to keep his trap shut"
We all nodded in agreement.
"So, he's the only one who is still clueless" Rukia realized. "He's going to be so mad..."
"We have to keep up the charade as long as possible. I can't wait to see his reaction when he finally finds out" I snickered slyly.
"If he ever finds out-" Shuhei corrected hovering near the door with Aoga. "The longer you guys can keep the act going, the better"
"Given that the band is even successful in the first place of course" I pointed out.
"Of course it will be. I created it" he said proudly.
We rolled our eyes. "There he goes again, preening like a peacock" I groaned.
"Nah. I'll be preening when the first show is a success, but until then I'm just gonna stay positive"
"There's a lot of preparation left to do." Aoga chipped in again.
"That's why I'm here today. You have your outfits now" Kira said nodding towards the clothing bags that Aoga and Shuhei had placed flat on the sofas our usual corner, "So we need to make a start on promoting the band ahead of the first live. No one will turn up if they've never heard of you, but a few well-placed posters around camp should produce some hype "
We glanced at each other and grinned. "This is gonna be fun!"
It turned out that wigs were super annoying but after a little of adjustments we finally finished off getting into costume and Shuhei came in with our contact lenses.
If I hadn't seen the conceptual designs for Rukia and Momo's stage characters on paper I would never have recognised them.
Rukia now had long and straight mahogany hair with a severely straight fringe and shining viridian green eyes, and Momo was a bright platinum blonde with high pigtails on the sides of her head held up by green ribbons and light olive contacts.
"Whoa- Look at you guys!" I laughed, lost for words at their transformation.
"Whoa- Look at yourself!" Momo squeaked pointing to the mirror over my shoulder.
I turned to look at myself and found straight but choppy copper brown locks similar to my real black ones in straightness, only that my real hair was naturally messy rather than intentionally cut unevenly, and this wig was far shorter reaching just below my shoulders rather than the small of my back. My contact lenses were a piercing emerald the exact same shade as my guitar and reminded me vividly of my Sister. If my hair was still black could have finally passed as a real Murasaki.
"This is incredible-!" I managed, twirling left and right to get a better look at Jade in her edgy punk rock chick leather outfit.
"I know, right? The fashion club wasn't very happy about not having models to size the garments on, I didn't think it wise to give the fashion students chance to see you three and start talking to their external friends so I made them agree to work on measurements alone, but despite that they really outdid themselves"
"I feel like an evil fairy~" Momo cooed dreamily bouncing up about down to make her frilly black tutu bounce.
"Such exceptional quality... No one will ever guess who we are!" Rukia said in awe examining her elbow length gloves.
"You look fantastic. Oh, one more thing-" Shuhei said reaching into his pockets and pulling out three black masquerade style masks, black and lacey with black stones around the edges, tied on with clear ribbon around the backs of our heads.
"I think I'm in love" I gasped trying to mine on and taking another look in the mirror.
"If that does produce hype over your mysterious identities, nothing will" Kira smiled. "Now it's time to take some snaps of you three for your first promo poster" and he unexpectedly took a picture causing the bright flash to startle and momentarily blind us.
"Whoa, a little warning if you don't mind!"
"The best pictures come from unexpected moments" Aoga grunted wisely and we all raised an eyebrow in his direction. It was always so strange when Aoga spoke. He was like a gargoyle bodyguard whos the main purpose was to look intimidating.
"Riiiight... So, what's the plan?"
Shuhei suddenly whipped three full length black hooded raincoats out of thin air and handed them to us.
"It should be going dark about now, but you need to cover up anyway. We don't need you attracting attention"
"Because being covered from head to toe in black doesn't attract attention when being escorted across campus in wide open spaces. Can't, we go on the roof or something?" I asked rolling my eyes.
Shuhei gave me a strange look as if a thought had just occurred to him but he didn't say anything.
"It'll be fine."
Little bit more fluff in the next one, then on to the finale of the academy arc, stick around for more! Feel free to leave a review, let me know what you think! I'm open to questions and ideas as always~
3rdseatofsquad2
Loool I had a feeling you might have missed that little detail with Shuhei :P
You and I seem to be on the same page with these ideas, are you in my head? lol
Yeah, I do plan to put some romance in here (or at least tomorrow potentials flames) but I've never wrote any romance so I'll probably be very subtle with no Lemons. My boyfriend will eventually read this when he catches up so that would feel super weird to put dirty stuff in here lol.
I've got the couple's planned out, there's already one relationship currently blooming that's probably not obvious yet, and the whole basis of the Hueco Mundo arc revolves around that relationship.
I'm with you on the Rukia X Ichigo which is one of the reasons I made Rukia and Renji more like unofficial siblings. They make no sense to me. Yes they had their past together, but there was no sign of affection as such in the main story, maybe in the flashbacks but not in the main parts.
Personally I think that Yuzu and Karin were sooooo such wasted potential and now I have a basis for developing them in Misaki being alive, and if I have Dark Raven Day's blessing, I may show some development from the rescue arc onwards, but he had plans for them in his sequel/sister story so I'm not sure where I'll stand by the time I get to that arc, unless he STILL hasn't published anything by that point lol
But yeah that's the plan- I think with Yuzu having such a sweet innocent personality being a Quincy with the pure white and light arrow themes would suit her more.