Chapter 22: Day 1 Paper Building

The sun had not risen yet. Faint light coming from the street lights showed the time. It was 5:30 a.m. the alarm clock on the nightstand came to life, ringing out an awful tone that broke his sleep. "Hmmm…." A loud – SMACK! – silenced the wailing alarm. Eric moved in his bed to feel the comforting warmth and scent of roses of his wife but could smell only the clean laundered sheets. Blue eyes flew open in panic. Abruptly, he sat up looking around for his Janette and all he saw was the sleeping form of Ulquiorra, wheezing in his sleep. He smiled remembering his good old days.

"Man, how do I start up my day without a glimpse of her face or her chirpy good morning?" Eric sheepishly rubbed the back of his neck. "Well work is work, better wake this snoring ass up, or else we are gonna be late. Hey! Ulquiooooooooorrrrrrrrraaaaaaaa!Wakey wakey!"Eric tried to mimic Orihime's voice and imagined that this must have been her wake-up call for her husband.

He smirked when he got a stupefied glare from none other than his-stuffy nosed-wheezing-sore throated-highness, Ulquiorra.

"My head feels heavy."Ulquiorra thought to himself. "What would have onna – SNEEZE!-" a violent sneeze interrupted his train of thoughts and almost threw him off the bed. Eric was by his side within seconds.

"Umm, Ulquiorra are you sure you aren't allergic to this environment? I mean I don't think the climate is that bad and all. You think I should call Orihime and ask her for some med subscription or something?" Eric said uncertainly, placing one hand on Ulquiorra's shoulder, while the other was on his forehead, checking for temperature. "Doesn't seem like you have fever though….." He straightened up and crossed his arms over his chest, obviously in deep thought.

Being in Heuco Mundo, Ulquiorra never had to struggle against any lowly infections, but this gigai seemed to lower his immunity, resulting in this disgusting state of his. He never was used to such thoughts expressing his well being what with every other Espada and Arrancar trying to wipe him out, of course with no results.

"I think I am going to do fine. I already have some medicines onna- I mean Orihime packed for me. She probably knew about this 'allergic reaction' of mine. Don't fret yourselves over my well being."

"Uh yeah okay. Talk about one particular wife.." Eric replied apprehensively. " So you wanna go first?"

"Where?"Ulquiorra asked with a puzzled expression on his face.

"OH GOD! Ulquiorra! I can't believe you. To do THE business! Where else?!" Eric screamed, incredulous at Ulquiorra's morning senselessness.

"You go first." Ulquiorra averted his gaze, embarrassed by his nonsensical question. What was he thinking when he asked Eric "where?"?! with Eric going on to do the 'business', Ulquiorra lay down once again. He did not feel like leaving the warmth of the comforter, but knew he had work to attend to. When Eric came out after freshening up, shaving, having a bath, and probably looking more like a human than an overgrown baby orangutan, Ulquiorra still wasn't feeling any better.

"Hey buddy, I'm done. Good lord! Look at the time! It's already 6:30 and we need to be on sight at 8:00! It's freakin' 6:30! God damn it! WAKE UP!" Eric got all mad and shook the living hell out of Ulquiorra. As if the notion of an impending headache wasn't enough, now with Eric behaving like a freaked out mother chicken was certainly going to help bring about the worst headache in Ulquiorra's life.

"I …. I ..g.. …IT!*cough* *gasp* I get it. I'm up don't worry we will make it on time."- ACHOOO! Ulquiorra's body shuddered as he sneezed the second he got out of bed. He took slow steps towards the bathroom while Eric was engaged in some kind of dance, juggling all things at once. Any hasty movement sent a shock of pain through his spine, his neck and straight into his head. Slowly changing out of his clothes he turned on the hot shower, the steam slowly helping his head, the jets massaging his sore shoulders. After a thorough shower, Ulquiorra came out of the bathroom, all ready and set to go. He walked into the room, in a frenzy with a fully dressed Eric sitting in the center of the mess.

"OMMMMMmmm…" he breathed out. Slowly opening his eyes and facing Ulquiorra with a calm expression, he said, "I am sorry," getting up, " I get nervous before such events. And freak-out." He offered a sheepish grin. Ulquiorra was stunned- this man was desperately in need of psychiatric help.

"Hmm apology accepted." Ulquiorra finally relented. For a human trash to shake him, let alone touch him like that, it was beyond despicable. But he had been friends with Eric and- wait, WHAT! FRIENDS!?Probably the aftermath of the headache." Lets head out, shall we?" Eric looked at the wall clock that read 6:50 a.m. Ulquiorra simply nodded and gathered his belongings and joined Eric at the front door. They walked in companionable silence to the dinning hall.

" I wonder what's for breakfast?"

"Hmm." Ulquiorra replied trying not to speak much. Eric noticed, and stayed mum, fearing that this time if his nerves took over and he became over caring, Ulquiorra would definitely bash him up pretty well. They found their team already eating. Ulquiorra walked towards the breakfast buffet, grabbed a plate, fork, and spoon and then started piling food on his plate. Eric followed suit and they sat down with their team. Ulquiorra had a sip of his honey and ginger green tea to soothe his throat and took a bite of the eggs over rice and almost gagged. He started coughing really hard. Eric smacked his back to help him get over the hacking fit. Ulquiorra drowned his tea and gasped for air.

"You okay?" Eric asked, concern clearly etched on his face.

"Yes *gasp* I'm *gasp* fine," Ulquiorra replied, trying to calm his breathing.

"Okay, now I am pretty concerned. I haven't had to experience such a fit but I know definitely that it is because of that sore throat you have there. Are you sure that you don't want me to call Orihime?"

"Yes, I'm sure. I can take care of myself. I'll just take some medication and try not to speak," Ulquiorra croaked .

"That's going to be hard since you're the architect," Eric reminded him. Ulquiorra knew he was right but Ulquiorra wasn't one to be deterred by something like a coughing fit even if it meant that he would text what he needed from his team, he'd do that.

"These eggs over rice aren't really good. I crave Orihime's cooking," Eric pouted. Ulquiorra couldn't agree more to that. At least her food was savory and edible but this wasn't food it was trash.

"This must be how Onna felt about Hueco Mundo's food," Ulquiorra thought, remembering a time when Orihime was complaining about the food being horrible and distasteful. Now he knew how it felt like getting disgusting food.

"Did any of you receive the envelope?" Eric asked, looking at all their team members.

"No but the boss might have," replied Mark. Everyone finished up their little breakfast and went to look for Mr. Thomas. They tried calling him on his cell phone but they got his voicemail instead. Even the service desk tried to call his room but to no avail. "I wonder if everything is alright." Mark looked around worriedly. All of them walked up to the reception desk.

"Can you give us the key to his room?" Adam asked the receptionist.

" I am sorry. But would you please tell me if you have tried going and trying his door once?"

" We had one of our men go check, but he came empty handed. We are worried something might be wrong and we don't want to be late."

"I am sorry sirs, I can't do that of my own accord. I have to get permission from my manager. Would you masters be so kind as to wait patiently, please, while I go look for sir. " the rep replied. The men waited while the rep was talking to the manager who gave the okay to give the keys to them. Eric took the keys and they went towards boss's room. They arrived at room 518 and knocked. Ulquiorra heard a slight tumble coming from the room. They heard a big bang and harsh cuss words from inside.

"We might as well make use of that." Mark pointed towards the spare key. As soon as the key went into the hole, the door finally opened to a disheveled looking and half naked Mr. Thomas, sweating profusely. Nate could see a lady grabbing all of her clothes so she could escape the sights of the men.

"What is it?" Mr. Thomas asked panting, anger evident in his tone of voice.

"We wanted to know if you happen to have the envelope with the requirements for the competition?" Ulquiorra asked pretending not to notice that Mr. Thomas' morning romp had been unceremoniously interrupted by their small visit. Mr. Thomas went over to the nightstand to get the big envelope. He gave it to Nate and closed the door in their faces.

"That was very rude of him," Mick alleged. "He can't blame US if we caught him fucking his secretary!" The rest of the men grunted in agreement. Nate opened the envelope and read the contents out loud;

"Greetings Team,

Today is the first day of the competition month. Now, I know you're wondering what you're gonna be building today. Well, wonder no more. Teams you're going to use paper to construct a Law Firm for an unknown client. You have a week to finish this paper structure. Remember you can use the cards that are at the bottom of this envelope. There are thirty different sites to build this firm. Your given site is at the bottom of this letter. Go there immediately and kick start your project. No cheating and be good sports. Good Luck!"

Sincerely,

The Judges

Silence washed over them like a giant tsunami wave. Ulquiorra didn't know if he was over thinking the information, judging by the contents of the letter or was still repulsed by his boss coming out of his room, still half naked. The nerve of that man, feeling so comfortable in no more than a flimsy bathrobe, that barely covered his large pot belly. Eric and Nate reread the letter and got out their phones so they could find the site. Mr. Thomas did a satisfactory huff in all of his sweaty glory for helping somewhat in the moment.

"Our phones can't find this location," Nate huffed. Eric groaned and started pacing back and forth. The envelope was passed around until Ulquiorra got a hold of it. He read through it and saw the address of their site ."It's near the park where Onna and I met to leave for Hueco Mundo," Ulquiorra thought. He glanced up from the letter to his team mates and mentally sighed.

"Eric stop panicking. It's best that your nerves are kept under control, lest you start beat…behaving in an undesirable manner.," Ulquiorra simply reminded him of the morning's events. Eric and the rest of the team stared at him with confusion. Ulquiorra turned to walk away when his disgusting sweaty boss grabbed him by the shoulders and asked;

"How do you know where it is?"

Ulquiorra just stared at his boss like he would when a lesser hollow asked him an unnecessary question. "Trash. How can I forget 'that' place. It is a place of great significance. It is where we perfectly executed Aizen-sama's flawless plan." But of course he said so only within his head. "I am inclined to think," Ulquiorra replied slowly, "that you have forgotten that I lived and worked here before I transferred over to this firm and became part of the team." He brushed off Mr. Thomas's hand and started walking again. Every one followed him except Mr. Thomas. The men left the hotel and went to the van that the contest's sponsors had provided them. Ulquiorra got in the driver's seat, switched on the engine and headed over to their appointed site.

Hueco Mundo

" Well, well, well. Great minds can always find their way around anything. So does anyone know where the site is going to be?" Szayel asked. No one really knew where the site was or if they had even been there. Of course Ulquiorra would know; he remembered everything and saw, everything.

"It's not like we can read minds Octavia," Aizen said.

With Ulquiorra in Tokyo

They made it to the site and got out of the car. There was an envelope resting on an empty trashcan; waiting for them.

Tom went over to the trashcan and grabbed the envelope. The men surrounded him to see what it was all about.

"Dear Scuklars and Thomas team,

You have made it to your site. This is the site that you're going to build the Law Firm for the unknown client for the entire month. Remember that you need to build this building out of paper; anything other than paper will be disqualified. Have fun and no cheating.

From,

The Judges

Tom finished reading the letter and looked around at his fellow team mates. Eric was rereading it again in his head; Nate was glancing around the site to see how many acres of land they had and Mick was mumbling on how to create the floors and rooms in the building.

"We need the plan immediately if we are to go on," Mark said. Everyone nodded in agreement.

"We can separate into two teams. The first team can go to the store to buy the basic requirements and the second part of the team can stay here and draw up a blue print that we can go by," Ulquiorra put in. They agreed. They separated in two teams with appointed assignments.

First team consisted of: Tom, Nick, Ulquiorra, Mark and Joe.

Second team consisted of: Eric, John, Mick and Nate.

Eric's team went back to the car and drove off in order to buy paper, construction paper, pencils, rulers, glue, tape, colour pencils, markers, scissors, staples and tacks. Eric found some cough drops and bought them for Ulquiorra. Ulquiorra's team stayed behind and started making a blue print on the building and did the proper measurements, deliberated upon the materials, and floors on a tablet. Eric's team came back and brought all the supplies out of the car. Mick went through the contents while Joe went over the construction plan with Eric and the rest to get approval over the designs and the idea. Eric made some suggestions but other than that he approved.

"Okay, let's get started so we can get this finished early," Eric said. He grabbed blue construction paper and started assembling a long table for the meeting room. Mark and Nick started building the exterior of the building while Joe and John were busy cutting and coloring paper to be wallpaper or pieces of art. Ulquiorra, Mick and Nate were doing origami chairs, desks, carpets and kitchen appliances. It was eight when they finally finished. Of course, they had to stop to find the cough drops for Ulquiorra, who was having a cough attack, but other than that their job was done. Ulquiorra's phone went off and he looked at the screen to see a text message from the judges.

" I seemed to have received a message from the judges," he announced.

"Really? What does it say?" Mick and Nick asked.

"Okay okay hold on. Give it here, I'll read it. It'd be better if we don't have you speaking a lot, lest the coughing returns," Tom said.

"Congratulation team

Scuklars and Thomas, you have finished ahead of schedule and for that you have the remaining days off to relax and explore the city or do whatever you want. Have a nice night."

AN:/ I hope you guys like this chapter and sorry it took so long but now you can enjoy.