Disclaimer: Bleach is owned and drawn by Kubo Tite and not by me…. But I do assume full ownership of Takeru Saito and Kei Reily.

Takeru stopped for a brief moment to catch his breath; this monster wasn't like any of the other hollows he'd fought. Not only was he bigger but also he had the brain capacity to match. When Takeru gained his breath he glanced over at Kei's body. It was even worse than he thought; Kei's spirit was separated from his body and it looked like the chain connecting Kei and Kei's body was about to split. "Hold on Kei!"

The hollow lunged at Takeru with intent to finish the battle and get back to feasting on his prey. Takeru swiped his Zanpaktou down and hit the monster's shoulder. It groaned in pain but kept on his path of assault. The wind had picked up around the battle, the trees became restless and many of the scattered leaves on the ground picked up and flew about the battle looking as if interested in the fight between Takeru and the hollow. Both Takeru and the hollow had jumped up to get the advantage of each other but meeting in midair they both took their respective swipes and fell backwards.

"Give it up, shinigami scum. This is a battle I won't let you have," Cried out the hollow as he circled back to jump back at Takeru.

"Never!" Takeru grasped his katana with two hands and tried his best to block the monsters attack. He thrust the monster back and with his last resolve he charged at the monster. He couldn't let the monster have Kei; even though they had only met earlier in the day, Takeru felt a strange connection with the young man.

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"Calm down students," the teacher grew impatient tapping her foot on the ground, "Students honestly is this any way to greet a new student?" As soon as she claimed that there was a new student the kids calmed down. "Class I would like you to meet Takeru Saito our newest exchange student. Takeru if you would please have a seat next to Mr. Kei Riley sitting over in the third seat to the left, Kei raise your hand."

Kei raised his hand and patted the empty seat next to him. He really didn't mind seeing a new face inside this classroom it really brightened up the white walls that were covered with papers. Besides, Takeru was kinda cute.

As it turns out the two had each other in every class and as was the case in his earlier class Takeru had been seated next to Kei. "Well it's pretty cool to learn somebody on my first day here," he said as he turned to Kei. "Thank you for showing me around the school during lunch."

"It's no problem dude," Kei said blushing heavily. "It's nice seeing new faces around here, it really livens up the place."

Takeru grinned and blushed at the same time. Not only was Kei being very nice but he also had a certain something else about him. Takeru couldn't quite put to words what it was but it was a nice feeling.

"Hey how bout I show you around the town after school, and maybe we could get something to eat as well?" Kei offered.

"Sure that'd be great, I'd love to."

"Okay then, how about we meet across the street at that coffee shop around four and hey we could even start there!"

"So… coffee shop at four, Gotcha see you then." The bell rang and as soon as it did the kids in the classroom rushed out. Takeru packed up his things, said goodbye to the teacher and left hoping that four o'clock would come very soon.

Takeru's walk home didn't last nearly as long as his walk to school had earlier that morning; the only difference this time was there weren't any hollows around. As soon as he reached his door however his phone rang. "Hello this is Takeru."

"A hollow has been spotted, Takeru you are to exterminate it immediately." The voice on the phone had been leaked of a soul society higher up. Nevertheless it was Takeru's job to take care of these bad spirits, he wouldn't be a shinigami death god otherwise. Takeru walked over to his coffee table and picked up a coin that had a skull emblazoned on it. "Looks like it's off to work." Takeru stamped the coin down on his hand and removed his soul from his body. Unlike the green and white t-shirt and Khaki pants he was wearing earlier, Takeru was now wearing black robes and had a katana sheath strapped onto his back.

Jumping from building to building, this hollow wasn't very hard to spot. It was in the center of a nearby park ripping up the swing set. The people in the park started to scream once the swing set had been picked up. To the people it had looked like the swing set was crunching and being levitated all by itself. They couldn't see the hollow or Takeru. The hollow was about Takeru's height and looked like he wasn't going to take that long to defeat. 'Good,' he thought, 'When I finish this it'll be time to meet Kei.'

The hollow spotted him and started to growl. "Yea yea, you'll be gone soon," Takeru remarked and started his charge towards the hollow. He swung down his sword pretty hard and rejoiced to see it hit the hollow's shoulder pretty hard. However that didn't do much, within seconds the hollow had gotten up and charged right towards Takeru. Thinking quickly Takeru had stuck out his sword and stuck it right through the hollow's head. "See what did I say? Not long at all," Takeru laughed as the hollow had split into tiny dissolving pieces.

Once home Takeru squeezed his spirit back into his body and headed out back to the coffee shop. It only took him a few minutes to get there but Kei had beaten him there, looking very eager at that. He saw Takeru heading down the path and raised out his hand. "Glad to see you made it," Kei called.

"Likewise," Takeru remarked.

The afternoon continued on as the two got to know each other and as Takeru got familiarized with the town. Finally stopping at a diner Kei had asked Takeru if he was hungry. "Oh god, I thought you'd never ask," he replied very hastily.

"That's why I waited so long." Was Kei's coy reply.

The two had been seated and were talking about school when Takeru had heard a growl come from nowhere. He glanced out the window but didn't think much of it. He fingered his coin in his pocket. 'Maybe it was just a car backfiring," he thought.

"What's wrong?" Kei asked.

"You didn't hear that noise, I think a car's engine backfired somewhere out there." He said pointed towards the direction of the park.

"Nope, I didn't hear anything. Anyways our food is here."

Both Takeru and Kei picked up their food and began to eat it when people started to run away from the park. "What's going on?" Kei asked setting his hamburger down.

"I don't know," Takeru said with a mouthful of food.

"Real attractive you know," Kei laughed and stood up. "Let's go see what's happening." He walked over and paid the cashier for their meal and they both headed out the door.

The park had been pretty deserted by the time the had reached it. A bunch of park benches had been scattered about as well as some trees knocked over. Their scattered leaves made it look like the winter. But, nothing was as bad as the playground. Scraps of metal had been laying all the ground and the none of the equipment had been standing up.

"What happened here?" Kei said as they both explored the area. "Did a tornado come through when we weren't notic…." He fell silent and hit the ground with a large thump.

"Kei what happened?" Takeru ran up to Kei's body and saw that his spirit had been knocked out. Fearing the worst Takeru pulled out his coin and hit it against his palm. His body fell to the ground lying near Kei's as he drew his sword. He looked around but didn't notice anything until it jumped out at him.

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His sword plunged through the hollows shoulder but at the same time the hollow had bitten the same place on Takeru's shoulder. Takeru removed it as soon as he could and tried to hit its face as it drew away. He hit air and tumbled over onto the ground.

"I've got you now." The hollow started walking on all fours closer to Takeru. Takeru tried to back away but ran into a bench. "It's no use walking away, you can't escape now. Not after you did this to my shoulder." The hollow clutched his shoulder and advanced towards Takeru.

"Get up, PLEASE!"

Takeru's head shot over towards Kei's spirit. Kei was waving his arms furiously and bent over to pick up a rock.

"Take this." Kei chucked a rock over towards the hollows head and it hit dead on.

"Oh I see you want to be eaten sooner than later eh? Well that's no problem." The hollow stopped his procession towards Takeru and jumped in front of Kei. Kei's spirtly face turned even paler than it was when the hollow had landed right in front of him. He considered running away but it was way to late.

The hollow picked up his arm and furiously struck towards Kei. Kei ducked down and waited for the pain to end his life. "Don't do that again." Came Takeru's voice right in front of him. Kei glanced up and saw that Takeru had plunged his sword right through the hollow's white and red mask. The hollow began to slowly disappear into the evening wind.

"Lets get you back into your body." Takeru brushed himself off and picked up Kei's spirit. It looked like they'd be in luck. Kei's chain was still attached.

"Who are you?" Kei asked in a hurried, scared voice.

"I am who I have been. I'm Takeru Saito, shinigami death god in charge of protecting this town."

Once Kei had been placed back into his body he got up to his feet and continued with his questions. "If you're supposed to protect this town why'd you go to school today?"

Takeru connected his spirit and his body and replied with a sly smile "Wouldn't you get bored being by yourself all the time. Besides I got to meet you."

Kei laughed and embraced Takeru in his arms. "I love you too."

Takeru wasn't expecting him to say that but he wasn't expecting the kiss either.

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