Disclaimer: Bleach is the property of Kubo Tite, etc. I am merely borrowing his characters for writing exercises, so that one day, I can earn money too by thinking up insanely cool characters like Hitsugaya Toshirou. P Leave me be? Please?

Spoilers: If you don't know Ise Nanao or Kyouraku Shunsui then there's no point in reading this fic.This revolves around manga chapter #138 .

I have a multichap to finish and a multichap to start, but here I give you my first try in writing Bleach.

Tada!

(--;; I suck.)

Conundrum

by Melpomene melancholica

Gotei 13, protective duties aside, was part of the bureaucracy that kept the daily happenings of Soul Society smoothly adhered to Fate's dictations; analogously, such strict adherence to fixed rules and highly specialized functions required a hierarchy of authority that communicated largely by paper----long involved documents that tackled every aspect of a division's workings, especially the unusual and the emergent, those that starkly contrasted with the routine. With precise words and finely arranged sentences, Ise Nanao could easily produce a scholarly, no-nonsense report in a matter of minutes, even while tightly running a division as a fukutaichou and maintaining a neat and aesthetically-pleasing office as the Eighth Division fukutaichou.

A single iris of periwinkle blue, rising from a diaphanous, narrow-rimmed vase, enlivened the severity of the heavy ebony desk and the immaculate white sheaves of paper covering it. It was on this blossom her eyes alighted when she looked up from the monotony of ink and brush. A second was all she took to relax her strained eyes, then, with the minimalism that characterized her tastes and gestures, she pushed her wire-rimmed spectacles up the bridge of her nose and stoically finished the detailed account of her taichou's encounter with one of the drifters that invaded the tororei.

The pen is mightier than the sword.

Heaven help her if circumstances had forced her to rely upon time-worn cliches to put form to her thoughts. Yet, that simple saying basically summed up why she was frequently seen with a hard-bound book, instead of the usual katana form most unreleased soulcutters took, even now that orders from the higher echelons required all seated officers to keep their weapons close. Few knew that the black book was her blade; her confidence and efficiency was that much higher in the demon arts than in sword play that her own soulcutter incorporated itself in the book of spells in times of dormancy. The black volume contained some of the most ancient and some of the most potent spells of the demon arts. It was her duty and burden to protect the ancient writings she chose to master—just as it was a privilege to be partnered to so esteemed and so knowledgeable a blade.

Which was not to say that she was totally useless in the weaponed martial arts. The badge of the Eighth Division was around her upper arm, was it not?

Of course, during more peaceful times, her faithful soulcutter was kept away to make room for an all-purpose organizer. Such an object was an absolute necessity, what with her taichou's predilection toward the spontaneous and... dare she say, bohemian?

Ise Nanao's finely chiseled features momentarily erupted into the crisp creases of a rare scowl.

"That man!" she muttered.

She was not a woman to waste words, not even on expressions of exasperation-----of which any fair person would be willing acknowledge her helplessness to stem. Indeed, she was a woman who wasted not at all. She moved upon a very orderly world, made exceeding efforts to maintain it so. Of course, that man had his ways to ruin the schedules she orchestrated for his sake and ease. She moved briskly, efficiently fulfilling her duties as vice captain, while he insisted on a maddeningly relaxed pace. His go-with-the-flow demeanor seldom failed to disrupt her structured, goal-oriented thinking. Many a night she had spent deciphering the reasons behind his carefree manner. Perhaps, it was due to ennui? Or maybe a disgust for the crude and the brash?

But he had called her graceful and lovely several times in the past, even as she rushed for deadlines and such (while he sat there delicately forming each kanji with relish, that fool), praising the unshakable calm of her visage, admiring the way her rapid and precise movements offset the hints of womanly curves concealed by the cylindrical padding of the kimono.

.... though the sullen expression on her face was a little melodramatic, he often mourned.

"Rushing around like a duck with its head cut off, my dear, dear Nanao-chan? How very unbecoming! No. We will honor our duties, but we keep our dignity."

Oh, but he had speed, too, if he so chose to use it. He fought as he lived: observing, but not judging; abiding, but not ambivalent; resigned, but never hopeless; gracious, but deadly. Swift and just, she had seen him dance with his blades and wreak havoc among his foes.

Why then the insouciance? Why the air of having all the time in the world?

Truly, they clashed when first she was chosen as the vice captain of the Eighth Division. Practicality and order was her world, while he thrived on the theatrical. He loved the finer things in life: food and drink, the arts, women and their conversations... In spite of his burly appearance, he was a seeker of beauty, a man who was able to see it everywhere, be it on a pale unfragrant weed, lopsided and bruised on the sod, or a monstrously powerful drifter, who dared attack Soul Society as a human. She, on the other hand, had no time for such intricacies, had no space for the weakness afforded by emotions.

Yet the years were kind to them both. Nowadays, she rarely had to fight off apoplectic furies whenever he requested her assistance in props management (eg. strategic deployment of flower petals to picturesquely swirl in his midst for a dramatic entrance); she could never refuse, anyway, because it was a shocking thing to defy ones captain in insufficient grounds.

But right now, she could feel the ripples of dilemma mar the mirror-like stillness of his spirit. He, at least, made room for her obsessive-compulsive idiosyncrasies, but the chaotic world inexorably pulverized order and civilization, and all those little things she gripped to steady herself, whenever and however it pleased. It was during these times she wished she was indeed mightier with the sword than with the pen. And she was, really, for wasn't her occupation of the second seat proof enough?

She looked at the time piece on the desk, nestled among the straight stacks of completed paperwork. She looked at the open page of her behemoth daily planner.

Kuchiki Rukia was scheduled to die in thirty minutes.

So now, where was her captain, that impossible man?

Ise Nanao stood from her desk, stayed still where she stood for a few silent moments. Then, after ensuring that everything in the office was in order, she went outside and up the rooftop.

She could hear him sing half-heartedly, even as she climbed the rickety ladder of straw-tied bamboo. Each rung she covered brought her closer to a dilemma of her own.

Kyouraku Shunsui, captain of the Eighth Division, trusted her and valued her opinions-----at least, enough to dispose of his more garish attires on her subtle suggestions. No doubt, he would consult her on what to do with Kuchiki Rukia, and in accordance to her responsibilities, she would advise him to do what she deemed best: nothing. The Chuuouyonjyurokushitsu never altered directives so easily. Justice was as blind as Kyubantai-taichou Tousen Kanami, and even if her taichou did not think the girl warranted death, it was out of their jurisdiction to judge her guilt or the appropriateness of her penalty.

But perhaps, Kyouraku-taichou had already been won over by those impudent humans? He fancied the stubborn expressions of the abstract notions of love and friendship and vows and such. Perhaps, this circus of a rescue effort had already stoked some fire in his bosom. And there, too, was Aizen-taichou... perhaps, that event had made her captain even more wrought to more bloodshed. Would his ideals really prompt him to defy his superiors?

Such musings were out of Nanao's character. It was clear on her mind what she had to do; her brain had already delineated the irrefutable arguments she was determined to deliver.

Vice captains existed, not only as assistants, but also as keepers of balance. Captains have a wide-range of powers, both as shinigamis and as leaders, that had to be kept in check in some way, carefully placed under control to prevent conspiracies, coup de tats, and insubordination. Vice captains served as both support and restraint. Thus, all official business necessitated the presence of the vice captains; a meeting between unaccompanied officers implied the discussion of personal matters.

Her duty as vice captain was clear.

Nanao's head, perfectly coiffed naturally, popped up the roof top.

"Ah, Taichou! There you are," she said businesslike, as if she didn't know from the start he was there. "Please, get up and get ready to go."

"Nanao-chan..." he drawled.

The disturbance in him was so palpable, even in the way he said her name. He sounded... helpless? He really was such a riddle sometimes.

"I have a few problems that I'm not sure what to do about... Want to hear about it?"

There it was. She had predicted this would happen.

"... What is it?" she asked.

"Truth is..." he said earnestly. "I was distressed and tried to relax by chewing on this blade of grass but..."

But what, taichou? she challenged silently. But you can't relax because you're itching to act all heroic and manly, right taichou? How typical. It's exactly how she expected her captain to think and act. She would have smirked, if she didn't think such betrayal of the inner workings of her mind a weakness. Yes. Kyouraku Shunsui was indeed a riddle of a man, but he was one whose hidden convolutions she had learned to uncover well through the years.

"...I don't know it if it's poisonous or something," he was saying. "My mouth got numb and I'm dumbfounded---"

"Then, throw it away!" she shrieked, yanking the piece of weed from her captain's mouth.

That man.... she raged inwardly, now profoundly off balanced. That. Man! There she was racking her brains of what to say to best restore his peace of mind and there he was with his ridiculous and, and... facile comments! There he was being such an enormous pain in the---

"...Nanao-chan..." He was speaking again, even as she simmered in the privacy of her mind. She rose from her squat beside him with as much dignity as she could muster, turning her face away from his questioning one. "I... What should I do?"

Her rehearsed speech was ready as braced her jaw to open, but then she hesitated. Quick to grab that blank split of a second, her powerful mind was now haranguing her prepared reply. And now, she couldn't decide what to say. What to say...

What should she say?

"Why are you asking me?" she said finally. Sadly. "You'll just end up doing whatever you felt like in the end."

That's true. Only in this case, perhaps he was being held back by something else?

She went on. "Don't worry about me. I will follow at a safe distance... so that I won't get dragged into anything."

A pause.

"That's bad then," he lamented pensively. "Since I will once again be the only one getting scolded by the old man Yama."

Ise Nanao said nothing else, perhaps satisfied with what she heard, perhaps not. Her captain was being overly dramatic again. Of course, "old man Yama" was bound to perform quite a number of scolding after this fiasco. It was his duty, just as hers was to stand by her captain.

How close or how far... That part was entirely her prerogative and nobody else's business. Ise Nanao guarded her thoughts and feelings well, for though she may not look it, she was a warrior to the core.

She smiled in the end.

Jan-4-2005 (2:31 am)

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Whew! Finally. My first Bleach fic and my first fic for year 2005.

By the way, the conversation between Nanao and her captain was based on the translation of manga chapter #138 of Manga Rain.

The stuff about Nanao's soul cutter... er, I invented them. (sweatdrop) In retrospect, maybe I should have waited and read the succeeding chapters before writing this. Ahaha.. Oh well.

Many thanks to my alphareader Midnightcrow.