Title: Field Trip
Rating: PG for cheap shots
Characters: Kenpahci, Yachiru, Ichigo, Keigo, Hitsugaya, the rest of the party-crashers in the most recent arc, although they're unnamed.
Warnings: Ch. 195+
Summary: What's in a name, anyways?
A/N: Okay, so this is sort of set in the recent arc in a moment of peace of course but not really. Kenpachi and Yachiru aren't hanging out in the living world although it would thrill me to death if they were so I guess that makes this AU.

"Ken-chan! Ken-chan! What's that one called?"

Kenpachi scratched his chin, obviously trying to come up with a quick, satisfying answer without looking like he was trying to come up with a quick, satisfying answer. It would be his thirtieth save since the outing began and a record, for certain. Ichigo couldn't decide which was more spectacular, Kenpachi's quick thinking or Yachiru's blind acceptance of any lie the man happened to spit out.

"It's a sling-back humtpyhump," Kenpachi gravely announced, at last. The pink-haired back-leech cooed and ooed and aahed from her usual perch, straining this way and that to get a better look at the camel. The animal seemed significantly less impressed with the shinigami than they were with it; Ichigo snorted, agreeing with the camel.

"And that! What's that!" Yachiru squealed, pointing into the next pen.

"A razzle-dazzle fistybuns."

"What's it do, Ken-chan?"

Ichigo blinked, holding back an actual laugh. What does it do? He didn't think an aardvark did anything, besides eat, sleep, and procreate, of course. The awkward silence that rolled off Kenpachi, much like nervous sweat, showed that he didn't know the answer, either.

"It eats an' craps an' stuff," he answered at last, grumbling and growling all impatient-like. Ichigo had to bight down hard on his lip; the big guy was right, for once, and eloquent as usual.

"No, Ken-chan, no!" Yachiru whined, less than impressed. "What's it do?"

"Repeatin' tha' question don't change it none," he snarled, obviously tired of the incessant questions.

"Why?"

Glad to be quite a few paces behind the pair, Ichigo hung back with the others and out of the line of Yachiru's inquisitive fire. No day could have been more perfect for a trip to the zoo, a quiet respite in the middle of noisy times, and Ichigo decided to make the best of it. Which meant ignoring the eleventh division leaders, a concept that everyone in the group could easily understand, having experience with the unorthodox family unit.

Everyone except Keigo, unfortunately.

"Why doesn't he just read the signs if he doesn't know their names?" he asked Ichigo, unaware of the trouble his not-so-subtle volume could bring upon himself. A swift kick in the knee drew a yelp from his friend; Ichigo hoped that would be the only noise that followed. No need for bloodshed today.

It seemed that Keigo thought differently. Apparently unaware that the rest of the group had distanced themselves from him and Ichigo, hoping to escape the blood-spray zone, Keigo pressed the issue.

"What the hell man? What was that for?" he yelped, his voice climbing to that particular octave that irked Ichigo more than most anything.

"Shut up," Ichigo ground out quietly.

"Seriously though, man," Keigo continued to whine, "the names are right there and everything. Can't he read?"

Kicking higher and more central this time, Ichigo almost-winced at the half-squeak and following thwump. Keigo dropped hard and fast, clutching himself while moan-groaning long and loud. Ichigo ignored him as did the rest of their new "classmates." Hitsugaya's comment, something about "serving the moronic worm right," helped to lightened the mood and the tense moment passed.

Up ahead, Kenpachi smirked. It had been a long time since he'd seen a good, cheap crotch shot and the kid-idiot's whimpers were music to his ears. Kurosaki's form wasn't half bad, either.

A pleasant outing, indeed.

-fin-