The main screen in the workspace showed a rain streaked scene, the overcast, winter clouds painting everything in shades of grey. Rain pattered gently, just barely picked up by the speakers. The android's steps were so smooth and silent that the feed barely showed the movement as Shiro focused on its target, creeping through a deserted, empty lot. The steel door in the building's side didn't look like much. Nor did the building; squat and short, only a single story and a loft on the east side of the city.

Shiro had been in place, observing, for a couple of hours now, motionless until it'd been ordered to breech the building. Despite the bleak, deceiving appearance, this was the place Grimmjow had told them about. Shiro, and Ichigo from his workshop, had watched half a dozen guys enter.

The feed shifted to the side as movement caught Shiro's attention. A rain drenched stray paused, head low and hackles raised to snarl at the android. Shiro mimicked the sound and the dog flinched, before bolting across the street.

"Remember, Shiro." Ichigo said quietly, twisting a small screwdriver between his hands. "No collateral. There's going to be a friend in that building."

The android grunted a dry, rye sound, "Friend is a strong word for it."

"Shiro."

"Understood."

The door didn't budge when Shiro tried it and the android paused, took a single step back to reassess the door, then drove its shoulder into the scratched, dented surface. The impact sounded hollow, the entire frame shuddering with the force. The door caved inward enough for Shiro to reach an arm in and lift the bar lock out of place. It clattered to the floor and the damaged door screeched its opening like an alarm. Shiro stepped over the threshold, following the commotion of shouts coming from somewhere inside.

The narrow corridor of the entrance opened up into a single, large studio. A few people stood back, watching, waiting for orders, while a few more rushed the intruder. They all had the look of people who'd been caught in the act of something they didn't want company for. In the center, Grimmjow looked about as mean as one would expect of a man in his postion, glaring outrage at the android. He did well to hide his recognition. At his side, a colleague with a scowl on his face crossed his arms.

"Looks like he's alone, boss." One thug observed with a wry grin.

"Then what're you waiting for?" Grimmjow asked, "Get rid of him. We have business."

Shiro watched all of this as it waded further into the room, allowing itself to be surrounded. For the time being, the few men lingering at their respective higher up's side looked unperturbed. As if thinking this was too easy, the thugs hesitated to approach, before one finally took it upon himself to carry out his orders. Shiro caught the movement before the gun could be leveled at it and sprang into action. The gun went off, but before the trigger was pulled, the wielder's arm was snapped like a twig, the sound of it sharp in the silence just before the sound of the gun. The new angle sent the bullet straight into the chest of a second man, who dropped dead before his gun was even pulled.

In the background, a gun was pushed into Grimmjow's hand as he took a few steps back. Had any of his men been paying attention, they might have realized that his motion had less the quality of someone worried for his life and more like someone trying to avoid getting blood on his shoes. He watched impassively as the android cut through his guys.

The man he was meeting with was less calm about it, watching with an air of shocked disbelief. He finally collected enough of his stunned wits to pull his own weapon and aim. The bullet ricocheted off the android's metal chest plate and Shiro's head snapped around to find the new offense.

Grimmjow sneered, lifting the borrowed gun. He fired three rounds into the man's side, under his raised arm and watched as he crumpled to the ground. One of the thugs saw, but before he could react to the unexpected traitor in their midst, the android wrapped fingers around his arm and yanked him around. Metal knuckles shattered the man's jaw before Shiro's fingers circled delicate cartilage. Panicked and in pain, the man dropped his weapon in favor of clawing at the metal hand and forearm in his reach.

Dispassionately, Shiro crushed the airway below his grasp and left him to suffocate on his knees.

When the only human left standing was Grimmjow, the man turned and fired the rest of the clip from his gun into the wall behind him. Tossing the weapon aside, listening to it slide across the floor in the sudden and heavy silence, he tugged his phone from the pocket of his jeans and pulled up Aizen's number. "I can't believe I let you two talk me into this." He told the android, and through Shiro, Ichigo. Lifting the phone and wiggling it in front of Shiro's face, "Yeah?" he made sure the android saw it before he bent to set it on the ground, backing a few feet away from it. With a deep, fortifying breath, he turned and straightened all in one motion and grit his teeth has he threw his fist into the wall as hard as he could manage. His curse was loud as he pulled back, folding around no doubt broken knuckles. "Fuck! Son of a–" He shook his hand, but hit the wall again, until skin was torn and blood leaked between his fingers. "Ok, robot." Through clenched teeth, he straightened to his full height and gestured Shiro towards him, "Make it look good, asshole."

Sitting in front of the screen in his basement, Ichigo cringed as he heard the third hit connect with enough force to rock Grimmjow back. He slammed into the wall behind him too solidly and was silent when he dropped to the ground in a heap. Ichigo couldn't watch, face turned away, "Nothing permanent, Shiro, please."

The android scoffed, but knelt before the unconscious man. "Vitals are strong. He'll recover." Shiro reported, then reached out to push the call button on Grimmjow's dropped cellphone. As it dialed, Shiro straightened and walked from the silent, dead building. The power cut out a few minutes later, after it rounded the building to find the power box, bathing the scene Aizen and his reinforcements would walk into in confusing shadows.

No more than a handful of minutes later, Grimmjow blinked awake with a groan, disoriented. He tasted blood in his mouth and lifted his hand, smearing it across his features in an effort to wipe it clean. The torn skin of his knuckles stung and the sharpness woke him up a little more. Still, it took him a moment to realize there was a figure kneeling beside him and he jolted when a hand settled against his shoulder. "Fuck-! Nnoitra? Where's–? Oh, fuck."

"Easy, buddy." The lanky loanshark motioned for quiet, "We're not sure if they're gone." Nnoitra was hunkered low, leaning over him, but he kept looking up and over his shoulder. Footsteps shuffled uneasily in the dark. "You get a good look at 'em?"

Grimmjow shook his head, pushing himself unsteadily into a less prone position. His hand was mostly numb, but his wrist throbbed with each beat of his heart. "Dark- The power was cut." He leaned to the side to spit blood from his mouth. "What about the rest of-" He pressed the heel of his palm against the pulse in his temple, making a mental note to get back at that damn android. He wasn't sure how to do that, exactly, but hell if he wasn't going to try. Fucker really did a number; he could feel blood still trickling from his nose and his jaw felt stiff and wired shut.

"Not lookin' good. You and one other made it, but he's got a crushed trachea and he's been oxygen deprived for too long. Szazy say's he wont be much use to us even if he does survive."

In the dark, Grimmjow scowled, a little disbelieving that Shiro would slip up and leave someone else alive. It made it look more real, though, and maybe that was the point. Maybe it was carefully calculated. Oxygen deprivation and brain damage enough to keep the thug from talking, but alive enough to make it believable that Grimmjow could survive too.

Grimmjow braced his hand flat against the wall at his back and began trying to push himself upright, dizzy the moment he got his feet under him.

"Easy." Nnoitra admonished, but hooked a hand under his arm to help tug him to his feet. "Szayel's gotta-"

Grimmjow pushed him away with enough force to make it seem urgent. "Gotta talk to Aizen. Where is he?" He knew the android was nearby, hopefully within earshot and paying attention.

From the rafters, hidden in deep shadow above line of sight, Shiro watched and listened. Its artificial eyes allowed it to switch from normal to night vision, giving it an extra edge in the dark. Thus far, the plan seemed to be working. Aizen had responded to Grimmjow's call; high enough on the food chain to matter, like Grimmjow had said he was. Motionless but for the shift of its eyes, Shiro watched another figure enter the building, picking their way through the mess that had been made. To its right, the stairs that led to the open air loft creaked and Shiro's head turned slightly to watch a head and shoulders peek over the edge of the flooring at the entrance of the stairwell, a gun leveled and leading the way.

On the first floor, nearly directly below where Shiro had positioned itself, Grimmjow pivoted uneasily and glanced in the direction of those creaking stairs. But he hissed an unhappy question, "What do you mean, he's not here?! Do you not see what happened here? Someone was gunning for us, and they knew about this meeting."

Back in his home and listening over the screen through Shiro, Ichigo cursed at the news. He should have known it wouldn't be this easy. Aizen wasn't a fool. Even if he didn't suspect that he was being set up, there were a thousand reasons why he wouldn't personally walk into a building that had just gotten shot up. Still. The evening wouldn't be a total loss. There were plenty of Aizen's hired men crawling around.

"Shiro." The cue registered across the screen as a sharpening of the android's attention and a slight tilt of its head. "Have fun."

"Affirmative." The android said quietly, a grin spreading across its white features. Gold eyes tracked back toward the man poking around the loft, but that one could wait. He would have to come down to get out. Instead, the android shifted where it was perched and, silent as a ghost, dropped from the rafters. Its weight alone drove the effeminate man -one of Aizen's known top guys- to the ground with a sickening crunch and the snap of ribs.

A stunned grunt and pained gasp was all he managed before Shiro was straightening, a heel carelessly stomping down to further break bone. The android stepped over the fallen, writhing man.

The haze of being knocked unconscious cleared fast and Grimmjow felt ice slide down his spine upon seeing the creation Ichigo had built. He could have sworn, even in the dark, that it looked passed Nnoitra and straight at him for the briefest of moments. Same side or not, the attention was unwelcome.

"What the fuck is that?!" Nnoitra all but screamed, spinning to face the new and sudden threat. He had a gun out and moved to put himself between the enemy and his injured coworker. The first bullet skidded across metal. The second punched through, but the thing walking calmly towards them didn't slow.

Behind him, Grimmjow made a face and cursed himself for not having a weapon on him. He cradled his broken hand and wrist close to his chest and sidestepped, edging along the wall to get out of the way. The commotion of Shiro's arrival, combined with renewed gunfire had, predictably, drawn in the scattered men Aizen had sent to his aide.

Something bigger than a handgun was fired from somewhere behind Shiro and the android staggered, baring teeth, before it swung around in a burst of strong motion and surprising speed. A pale hand reached out and grabbed the barrel of the semi-automatic, fingers clenching to crush the smooth metal and yank it from stunned hands.

"Fuck this!" Nnoitra decided, he found Grimmjow, grabbed his arm, and started rushing around the outer perimeter of the room, attention fixed on the android. "We're gettin' the hell out of here while that thing's busy."

"Wait- Granz-" Grimmjow didn't really put much effort into trying to slow the loanshark's flight, though. It was all for show, anyway, and Nnoitra was far more focused on the terror of his impeding death than on Grimmjow's acting.

"-is broken in half and on his own." The taller man cut off, "Dude's a freak anyway. We can thank him for buyin' us the time to get out alive at his funeral." Nnoitra ducked through the doorway, still half leading, half dragging his coworker, as screams erupted from within.

Grimmjow listened with a cool detachment and maybe a hint of odd satisfaction, as Shiro decimated the crew sent to figure out what had befallen him and his meetup with Aizen's future partner. He finally shrugged his arm out of Nnoitra's grasp as they neared one of the cars that had been brought. He rounded the front to yank the passenger door open as the loanshark threw himself into the driver seat.

"We gotta talk to Aizen." Nnoitra said as he turned the key in the ignition.

"No shit." Grimmjow all but snarled back. "Get us out of here, the screaming stopped."

Nnoitra flashed him a wide eyed look before throwing the car into gear and screeching tires.

Shiro stepped from the building in time to see the car pulling away. The smell of burning rubber and gun smoke hung in the air. It had no sense of taste, but it could feel cooling liquid drying to a thick, sticky mess across its features and licked it clear of white lips.

"He got away alright?" Ichigo asked, like a whisper in the android's head.

Shiro nodded, "With the tall one. Same one we saw in the warehouse."

Ichigo sighed. "Ok. Make sure everyone's dead, then return for repairs." There wasn't much they could do at this point. Grimmjow would be on his own to sort out details and speak with his boss.

In the car, his single hand clenching and unclenching as he tried to work the sharp ache from his knuckles and wrist, Grimmjow looked over at the man driving. "That wasn't emergency enough to get Aizen's ass down here?"

Nnoitra's laugh edged on hysteria. "You shittin' me right now? Sexta, when was the last time you tried to get Aizen's help? The moment your number came up, he scrambled a team together. He wasn't stupid enough to come anywhere near something you were prepared to admit needin' help with. Damn good thing, too. What the fuck was that thing?"

"I don't know- A guy, I guess, jacked up on something-"

"Not a fuckin' chance, Sexta, you're missin' an arm, not an eye. Even I could see that thing wasn't a man."

"Then what the hell do you think it was?" Grimmjow half snarled back, even as something uncomfortable stiffened his spine.

"I don't know– I don't know! But it dropped from the goddamn ceiling like it was nothin'. Took a at least a couple a' bullets, too." Nnoitra's spidery fingers tapped an almost nervous rhythm against the steering wheel. He was quiet for a few moments, features creased, before his single eye darted over to Grimmjow in the passenger seat.

Grimmjow caught the look, his eyes narrowing. "What?" His fingers itched for a weapon, mind going into overdrive. If Nnoitra figured it out here and now, his only option was to wreck the car. He had no weapon, only one arm, and his one hand was broken. The odds weren't good.

"Why'd it wait around?" The loanshark asked, eye on the road again as he sped through the streets. "There had to be at least twenty minutes between the time you called and when we got there. It was hiding, it coulda killed you and left. It was a set up. You were bait."

"I don't- You're getting ahead of yourself, talkin' crazy. You hear yourself? You don't think it was human, now you think it's setting traps? For what?" Grimmjow shook his hand out, before pulling it close to tuck against his stomach. He could still taste blood in his mouth, but he was pretty sure he had all his teeth at least. Leaning to the side, he let his head settle against the cold window, "Fuck." He muttered, shoving his hand against it with a relieved sigh. "Drive faster, asshole."

"What if it's followin' us?"

Grimmjow turned a skeptical, annoyed look on the taller man. "It's not fuckin' following us."

"How do you know?! If it's after us, it might be after Aizen-"

"It's not following us." Grimmjow insisted, "Unlike you, I'm not half panicked. I've been paying attention to the cars around us. No one's following us."

"How the hell are you not panicking?! That was some kind of fucked up I can't even describe!" Tires screeched as Nnoitra took a turn too fast, forcing another car to slam on their breaks.

"I don't know, shock? How should I know? The resident creepy doctor's dead. Fuck. I just got my seat back, I can't afford to panic." He braced his hand against the dashboard and immediately regretted it, snarling a litany of curses at the pain that shot through his wrist and arm. The phantom feeling of his missing hand clenching into a tight, nail-biting-into-palm fist was an unwelcome addition to his discomfort. "Get us there in one goddamn piece, for fuck's sake."

It was late by the time he got back to Ichigo's side of the city. Hand wrapped and wrist splinted, he glared at the dressage, then up at the door, and realized he wouldn't be letting himself in. A fleeting thought that he might wake the man up crossed his mind, before he pushed it aside; Ichigo worked through most nights, he was surely still up. The graver risk was that he'd be too deep into whatever project he was working on to hear.

It was so automatic to try knocking with his uninjured hand, that it took him a split second to realize why he didn't hear his knuckles against the door -he could sure as hell feel it- before his lip curled and he sneered. He used the toe of his boot instead, assuming Shiro was back by now and he wouldn't have to be too loud.

To his surprise, it wasn't the android to pull the door open a few seconds later. He blinked before looking down to see Ichigo instead. There was something like tight relief on his features as he dropped his hands and wheeled himself backward to allow Grimmjow entry.

"I was starting to worry." Ichigo admitted, then dug between himself and the side of his chair and produced Grimmjow's phone. "Shiro found this and rightly figured it shouldn't leave it behind."

Grimmjow took the phone and gingerly stuffed it in a pocket, using his elbow to push the door shut behind himself.

"How's your hand?"

Grimmjow grunted, moving far enough into the house to drop heavily onto the couch he'd been sleeping on most nights for weeks now. "I've had worse." He said, shrugging, "Nothing I wont recover from." Something of a grin tugged across his features, "It was convincing enough, though. Aizen and everyone else was convinced I broke it on your robot's face."

"Aizen didn't show up." An unhappy expression twisted Ichigo's features.

Grimmjow sighed. "Our bait was too strong." When all he got was a confused look, he shrugged and elaborated. "He knows I hate him. He knows I wouldn't ask for his help unless I was dying. When my number came up on his phone, he knew bad shit was going down and sent someone else. Shiro got one of the top ten with all that canon fodder, though. Szayelapporo Granz. Number eight. We have Aizen and eight more to go."

"Nine." Though, Grimmjow worked for the man. He should know. "Right? Aren't there ten generals or whatever?"

Grimmjow hesitated, but nodded, "There were, yeah. But six didn't last long. This scrawny, slimy little thing. The others didn't like him and got rid of him."

Locking the door, Ichigo wheeled himself closer to the couch, shaking his head. "Killing their own?" His tone made it obvious that he didn't doubt it, but found it reprehensible, "Whatever. One less for us to deal with." The distance, even angled slightly and twisted in his chair to face Grimmjow, was a little awkward, but when Ichigo reached for Grimmjow's hand, the bigger man slouched forward and let him take it. Ichigo carefully ran his fingertips across bruised, cut knuckles and managed a short chuckle as he glanced up to see those too-blue eyes studying him. "Your hand is going to match your hair for a while, I think." He winced a little, "Your face too…"

"I hope you know you raised your robot to be an asshole. The fucker grinned at me while he was doing it."

"Would it surprise you if I said I think it's getting that from you?"

Scoffing, Grimmjow arched a brow, "You callin' me an asshole?"

"I'm not not saying that." A slight smirk tugged across Ichigo's features, before his expression lit up like a kid in a candy store. "If you're feeling up to it, I have something for you to try on."

There was a long, drawn out minute while Grimmjow processed that. He was almost hesitant. "…so fast? It's done already?"

"No," Ichigo shook his head, releasing his light grip on Grimmjow's hand, "No. No, sorry, I should have been more specific. I have a design for the rigging that I think will work. I want you to try it on, make sure it fits comfortably, and then I'm going to see how heavy I can make it before it's not practical." When he earned a skeptical, mildly confused look, he shrugged a bit sheepishly, "I'm going to make it as lightweight as I can, but having a weight limit will give me a place to start while building and designing it. Robotics aren't very light, and I want it to be able to bear enough weight to be functional. You should feel how heavy my brace is one of these days," He rapped his knuckles against the metal band that would secure around his thigh if it were activated, "It's just a prototype, but it was too heavy for me to get into place myself, Shiro had to help. Granted, it has to be sturdy enough to take my entire weight and whatever I might be carrying. Your arm could–" He paused when he caught a small smile sitting on Grimmjow's lips, "What?"

"Nothin'." The big man said, starting to straighten.

Realizing he'd started rambling, Ichigo cleared his throat and hoped the heat in his features wasn't too visible. "Oh, you don't have to get up. Shiro can bring it up here. Shiro-?"

The android interrupted, "I heard."

Grimmjow jolted, turning to look over his shoulder and up at the pale creation where it half loomed over him behind the couch.

Ichigo snorted a laugh, "You didn't really think I came up here to answer a knock on my door in the middle of the night by myself, did you?"

"He's been up here this whole time?" Grimmjow turned back to Ichigo, "I didn't see him, didn't hear him. How the hell's he do it?"

"It's part of what I was designed for." Shiro supplied, heading for the staircase. It returned a few minutes later, carrying a tangle of straps and clinking metal buckles and a vaguely arm-length rod in one hand and balancing a small stack of weights in the other.

"Looks complicated." Grimmjow commented, eyeing the collection speculatively.

Politely thanking his android, Ichigo took the contraption and began straightening straps out, leaving the weights with Shiro for now. To Grimmjow, he said, "It'll make more sense when there's an actual arm attached to it. Right now it all looks out of place and half finished because it is." Once he had the harness organized, he held it up. "The cuff obviously goes over your arm and should reach about to your shoulder. Now that I'm looking at it, though, I think I'll need it to cover a little higher, probably up over your shoulder entirely, to make sure we have good leverage and a solid connection." He made a mental note of it. "It should fit pretty snug in order to ensure full contact with your skin. If it's not, the arm might lose connection and turn into dead weight in the middle of whatever you're using it for." Shifting in his chair, he leaned in and began sliding the cuff into place, only realizing after he'd began that it might be something of an awkward situation for Grimmjow. The man would just have to get used it, though, because the arm he was designing was going to require two hands to put into place. Maybe eventually, if they both lived that long, he'd make something lighter and simpler, but for now, what he had in mind would sacrifice ease and simplicity for function and durability. Once the cuff was in place, he began puling the straps tight; one from near the top of the cuff, crossing Grimmjow's chest to buckle under his other arm; one from lower on the cuff, criss-crossing to connect to the first strap near Grimmjow's collar bone. When that was done, he hooked fingers in the straps and gave experimental tugs to check the fit, then sat back to give it a look. "Ok. Try moving around, roll your shoulders, lift your arms, twist, maybe do some one armed push ups or something."

Grimmjow, running a finger under the straps as he checked it out, grunted a laugh. "You just wanna watch that last one."

"Of course I do. For scientific purposes." Ichigo cleared his throat. "Can you…? Do a one armed pushup?"

Going through a few of the motions that were suggested, Grimmjow glanced up with a smirk, "Sometimes it really shows how long you've been cooped up alone."

Ichigo's features heated, but he insisted, "I'm serious! You're going to have to be able to move around and work and strain in it. It needs to be comfortable enough to wear longterm, and still stay secure while-"

"Ok, easy Tiger, I was kidding." Grimmjow cut him off, but the amusement was still obvious in his tone and on his features. "Yeah, I can do a few pushups."

By the time Ichigo was done running Grimmjow through various exercises and stretches, and testing the weight limit of what he could feasibly carry on his left and still keep his range of motion, Grimmjow was sweating. It was a better workout than he'd had in what seemed like ages, since he lost his arm at the very least. He dropped back to the couch heavily, then turned to sprawl out on his back, arm thrown over his eyes, while he worked to catch his breath.

Ichigo smacked his thigh, "You're gross, take a shower before you fall asleep on my couch!"

Grimmjow grunted unhappily, but when he peeked under his raised arm, a glass of water was being presented to him. He sat up and gladly accepted it. "Fine. A shower." He said after downing half the glass, "But if I'm gonna be squeaky clean, I get the bed tonight." Preoccupying himself with another drink, he watched Ichigo's reaction over the rim of the glass.

Features blanking out for a delayed moment, a frown slowly settled across Ichigo's face. "You know I can't sleep on the couch, right?" He motioned down at himself as if it should have been obvious.

Merely shrugging, Grimmjow settled the empty glass against one knee, absently twisting it. "Yeah. So what?"

"A-are you…inviting yourself into my bed? With me?" Heat was beginning to creep up Ichigo's neck. Nearby, after having dropped off the harness and everything else back at its master's workspace, Shiro's narrowed gaze flickered between the two men.

"I guess I am." A smirk tugged across handsome features as Grimmjow quit twisting the cup and straightened to his feet. "Think it over, I'm gonna take that shower now." He detoured to the kitchen to drop the cup off on the counter before heading down the hallway.

"I could still kill him." Shiro chimed in helpfully when all Ichigo did was stare after the bigger man as he disappeared through the bathroom doorway.

Settling his elbow against the armrest of his chair, Ichigo dropped his features into his hand and muttered, "No… That wont be necessary."

They spent the first twenty-five minutes of that night in awkward silence, a solid six inches of space between them on the bed. To Ichigo's surprise, when he'd let Grimmjow follow him down the hall and into his room, the man had simply held his chair still for him while he navigated with practiced motions and got into bed on his own. It wasn't an easy task, and some nights were a lot harder than others, but it was one he was used to and, living alone all this time, he didn't want help with everyday things if he didn't need it. Grimmjow hadn't asked or commented, showing no pity. Then he'd rounded the bed, tugged his shirt and pants back off, and climbed in on the other side in just his boxers to lay down quietly.

Finally, after an awkwardly long time, Grimmjow rolled over and, without a word, slung his arm around Ichigo's middle over the blanket. Brows arched, Ichigo slowly looked over, studying Grimmjow's features in the darkness of the room for a few moments, before turning his head to look up at the ceiling again. Settling back in, he rested a hand on the warm forearm over his waist and found it suspiciously easy to fall asleep after that.

That morning turned into a lazy one. They woke up late and stayed in bed even later, enjoying the peace of a companionably quiet room and a warm bed. Eventually, Ichigo lifted his hands to scrub the sleep from his features and scratch nails through his sleep-rumpled hair with a lazy yawn. "I need to get up." He announced with a hint of disappointment in his voice.

"No ya don't." Grimmjow muttered against his shoulder, not moving a muscle.

Ichigo smiled lightly, but pushed up on an elbow, watching as Grimmjow rolled onto his back beside him. "I do. I have things to do. And breakfast sounds nice."

"Mmm. Breakfast does sound nice." The bigger man agreed, finally opening his eyes to look up at him. He folded his arm behind his head. "You cook? Or does that truck sittin' out front actually run? I know I nice little, hole in the wall diner on my side of town I could take you to."

Ichigo huffed a laugh. "Both. I can cook, but I don't particularly enjoy it. And the truck does run, but you couldn't drive it anyway."

Grimmjow grunted. "Shoulda guessed that old thing would be manual transmission."

"No, it's not, actually. But it has a wheel chair ramp and no driver seat. Besides, I already have plans."

"Oh, and you just didn't invite me."

Rolling his eyes, Ichigo reached over to pull his chair closer. "You're here, aren't you? Now get out of my room so I can get changed."

Grimmjow laughed, but sat up. "Oh please. I saw that morning tent in the blankets an hour ago, what do you have to hide from me at this point?"

Halfway in his chair, Ichigo's head snapped around to send a sharp, embarrassed glare. "I have two fists, asshole, you can't block both."

"Good luck catching me." He grinned widely as he straightened, stretched with a groan, and began pulling his pants on. Standing, he rounded the bed, bent to kiss Ichigo on his way by like he'd done it a thousand times, and finally left the room.

"Infuriating." Ichigo muttered to himself, his inner monologue chastising him when he realized that he really wasn't annoyed at all. It was silly, maybe, and certainly ridiculous, but he hadn't been quite this happy in a long time. Whatever was building between them was still new, but it had skipped most of the awkward parts and what they had now was already comfortable and fun.

Once done dressing, Ichigo made his way to the bathroom and readied for his day, before joining Grimmjow again. He rounded the corner of the kitchen entry just in time to see Grimmjow lowering the empty milk jug, using his heel to push the refrigerator door closed.

"Really? You're that kind of man? You're going to help yourself to my fridge and can't even use a glass?"

Grimmjow scoffed, tossing the empty carton into the trash. "It was almost empty anyway, why dirty a glass?"

A cheery knock on the door made them both pause. Grimmjow, half frozen where he stood, slid a glance over at Ichigo, blinking, then frowning when he realized Ichigo didn't look surprised in the least. "Your plans." He grunted.

Ichigo smiled. "Go answer that, will you?"

"You're having company over and you didn't warn me to put a shirt on?" He moved towards the door.

"No way. I like when you walk around half naked."

Shirtless and grinning his amusement, Grimmjow pulled the door open and was met with a very surprised young woman.

"Oh!" The woman's attention shot upward when she wasn't greeted by who she was expecting, getting an eyeful of naked torso and low slung denim waistband. Her features tinted and the grocery bags in his hands crinkled as she bowed a slight apology.

From further in the house and out of sight came the familiar voice of said home's owner. "Let her in, Grimm, don't make her stand in the doorway."

Grimmjow stepped aside and watched the young lady shuffle awkwardly passed him. Pushing the door shut behind her, he grabbed a few of the bags as he followed her to the kitchen. She clearly knew where it was.

"Thank you!" She chirped happily, leading the way and glancing over at him. "Ichigo! You didn't tell me you would have a friend over. You didn't tell me you had friends at all." The note in her tone was teasing as she slid the bags onto the counter.

"It was… a last minute thing." Ichigo hedged, a little bit of heat creeping up his neck. "Orihime, Grimmjow. Grimmjow, Orihime. Orihime has been a huge help with things like this. And Grimmjow is… A friend."

The young woman began pulling groceries from bags in an automatic, mechanical way as she glanced between the two men. "A friend." She smiled sweetly and knowingly at them. She offered her hand to Grimmjow, "Nice to meet you. It's good to see he gets out often enough to make friends. Every once in a while, he lets me drag him to the store with me. How did you two meet?"

Ichigo hesitated, but Grimmjow cut in with an easy answer. "PT."

"Physical therapy, yes."

Orihime's features lit up. "I thought you said you'd quit going, Ichigo, that's great."

"I- Uh… Still not going as often as I should, but…"

"That's alright!" Turning from the two, she began putting things away, bouncing around the kitchen like she'd been there a thousand times. "It's a start, and now you'll have more incentive to keep at it."

Grimmjow glanced over at Ichigo while her back was turned, receiving a shrug for the look he gave. "You quit going?" He ventured. It was news to him.

"Yeah. Well. It was nothing but an exercise in futility and frustration." Ichigo admitted, backing his chair towards the kitchen table.

"Not enough to keep you from trying again." Orhime chimed in, not looking at them, but the smile was obvious in her tone. When she finished putting the groceries away, she turned to Ichigo, leaned in conspiratorially, and stage whispered, "He's extremely attractive, maybe you two can practice some in-home PT."

Ichigo's features went bright red and Grimmjow barked a laugh.