A/N: Alright, here it is, chapter 2 of my first ever Bleach fic. Glad to see this fic doing well so far, I hope everyone enjoys. Here we go.

Disclaimer: I own several bottles of bleach, but I do not own the rights to the Anime/Manga Bleach by Tite Kubo.

Orihime felt her eyes gaze around the expansive hall, taking in the fine decor of the shimmering ballroom and the infinite sea of figures coupled in dance to the soothing melody echoing off the walls. Adorning her frame was the finest pink gown, delicately trimmed in a manner that made her look just like a princess.

She looked up, there standing in the radiant light perpetuated by the illuminate candle lamps hanging high above the hall was Tatsuki. Oddly enough she was wearing the same pink dress as Orihime, yet she virtually glowed in that shimmering light; the subtleties of her beautiful features highlighted by the radiance of the love in Orihime's eyes.

Slowly Orihime approached, offering her hand. Tatsuki motioned forth, accepting the gesture at once. The two girls closed the distance between their bodies and began to dance, gliding effortlessly on the slow, romantic waves of sound, just as did the surrounding couples.

The music momentarily stopped, Tatsuki drew the other in closer, to where Orihime could see her reflection in the depth of Tatsuki's deep brown eyes. In a romantic whisper, Tatsuki spoke, "My dear Orihime, you are more beautiful than the stars in the sky."

Orihime gave a sigh, "Oh, Tatsuki..."

Tatsuki brought her left hand to Orihime's back and let her right through the girl's hair as she said in a low dreamy tone, "Orihime..."

Orihime sunk into her partner's embrace; lovingly she cooed, "Tatsuki..."

"Orihime..." Tatsuki repeated, allowing her gaze to travel even deeper into Orihime's soul.

"I love you..." Orihime said in a cinematic tone.

"And I love you as well, Orihime." Tatsuki replied passionately as she eased the girl the rest of the way into her arms, touching her lips to Orihime's as they embraced.

The room spinned around them as they kissed passionately; the tender love they felt for one another emanating forth, sparkling and glowing in the serene light.

But then, as they broke their kiss, the zombies began to attack. They were surrounded, facing inescapable peril. Swiftly Orihime and Tatsuki grabbed the two nearby, full-powered cordless chainsaws as they struggled to defend themselves.

Orihime swung and swung at the approaching horde, allowing the blood and the dismembered pieces of flesh to fly in all directions as the rotating metal blade cut through the army of rotting undead corpses.

But there were too many zombies. Orihime could only watch as she saw Tatsuki sink into the vicious mass, her lovely pink dress now splattered red with copious amounts of zombie blood.

Then it hit her, a zombie manged to avoid the chainsaw's swipe and landed a fierce blow to her side, sending her hurt and flying to the ground with a thud.

It was then, once she had hit the floor, that Orihime realized that the warm, damp breath of the zombie was actually that of a large, terrifying hollow.

She had been daydreaming, there was no ballroom or pink dress, or any zombies for that matter. She was in the middle of the local park, wearing normal clothing, and facing down a rather large intimidating hollow, that had likely been attracted to her location by her spiritual energy.

As she returned to her feet, she asked herself if she had really been so distracted and lost to her thought that she had not noticed this hollow's approach.

This was a frightening thought, but it didn't change the fact that now she had to fight. Readily she pulled the hairpin from her hair allowing it to transform into the Shun Shun Rikka, the six fairy like creatures that were the manifestation of her power.

"Ha, isn't that an ugly one! Just say the word and I'll handle it." Tsubaki, Orihime's offense said in a cocky tone.

"Right!" Orihime nodded. Then forcefully she shouted the incantation for her attack, "Tsubaki! Koten Zanshun! I Reject!"

In seconds Tsubaki was swiftly racing toward the hollow, the cutting shield glowing around him. Th hollow growled hideously as it swept it's large claw in Tsubaki's direction, dishelving the attack and sending the small fairy flying several yards.

"Grr! What's wrong with you girl! Are you so distracted today you can't even fight a damn hollow right..." The injured Tsubaki shouted angrily as he returned himself to his place as a piece of Orihime's hairpin.

Orihime looked around fearfully. She wasn't in the right mindset to fight. She knew this. The hollow didn't though, it only knew it wanted to feast on her spiritual energy.

Suddenly the hollow made its move, swiftly launching it's oversized spiked tail in Orihime's direction. She had lost her offense but, she could still at least defend herself. She now shouted, "Hinagiku, Lily, Baigon! Santen Kesshun! I reject!"

A shield formed in a triangle between the three designated fairies, stopping the motion of the creatures strike. Even this seemed fated to go wrong as one of the three, Baigon, noted in a troubled voice, "There something wrong.. The barrier won't hold up that long at this rate."

"You need to get rid of distractions if you want our powers to be at our best." Hinagiku reinforced in his loud manner.

"Yeah, please snap out of it Orihime!" Lily called in a cheer. She continued by adding, "You can't let this guy beat you."

Orihime wanted to believe her, but she was struggling with herself at the moment. Even though she kept telling herself to fight and be strong, she couldn't help but notice her mind still wandering, still recalling that dream. Vivid thoughts of it still traveled through her mind, not so much of the zombies but of the proceeding kiss. Did she actually want to kiss Tatsuki like that?

It was all to confusing, but this certainly wasn't the best place for these thoughts. The hollow was hitting the shield with all it was worth, and inevitably Orihime's defenses were shattered as the three Shun Shun Rikka members were sent flying in different directions.

Orihime braced herself, the hollow was too close to her now, she couldn't escape. She was going to die here today. Was this distraction all because of the possibility that Tatsuki might love her? It was kinda ironic actually, to think she'd die on these thoughts and never actually be able to confirm them.

Then there was a flash. Seconds later a rush of blood spouted from the hollow's white mask as it was cleaved completely in half. Orihime looked around and at once caught sight of Ichigo Kurosaki, a shinigami, Orihime's classmate, and her crush for years now.

"Hey Orihime. That one too much for ya?" Ichigo called out coolly as he caught sight of the girl.

"Yeah, I got distracted. I'm sorry." Orihime said with a relieved giggle as she skipped toward the boy, undermining the level of danger she had just endured.

"No problem" Ichigo nodded. Flicking the blood off of his large blade, Zangetsu, as he brought it to rest at his back. He gave a smirk as he said warmly, "That's why I'm here to take care of things like that."

Orihime smiled radiantly before allowing herself to return to thought. She liked Ichigo. She had always told herself that. But Tatsuki liked her and she knew Tatsuki before she knew Ichigo. It was complicated, but the more Orihime thought on the matter the worse she felt. Ichigo was great, but Tatsuki was important to her, and if Tatsuki liked her then that would mean that all this time she would have been betraying Tatsuki's love by having these other feelings for Ichigo.

But did that mean that she should just give up on Ichigo? Did she really want to be with Tatsuki? So much was uncertain to her at that moment, but after the pathetic display she had just put on moments ago she knew this needed to be resolved and resolved quickly else she be put in serious danger.

"Say, Ichigo. Can I ask you some things?" Orihime asked forcing a wide smile.

"Uh, sure I guess. I don't sense any other hollows around today." Ichigo responded, a bit taken aback by Orihime's request.

"It's about Tatsuki..." Orihime clarified.

Ichigo gave a perplexed nod before saying, "She's your best friend, I doubt there's much I know about her you don't."

"But you've known her longer than I have." Orihime reminded him.

"I guess so" Ichigo acquiesced reluctantly. He gave a shrug as he then asked, "What do you want to know?"

"I was wondering if she has ever said anything to you about me." Orihime said in a low tone.

"Well now a days when she sees me, she usually asks the same questions about us, about the things we can't tell her." Ichigo remarked with slight but noticeable guilt in his voice.

Orihime nodded before delving further in her pursuit of answers, asking, "Yes, but was there anything before that?"

"She really cares about you and wants to look out for you. Tatsuki's tough, but she really cares about people." He broke off a moment, adjusting his expression into a comforting smile, "She's a good friend."

Orihime knew this much. She likely wasn't going to get much out of Ichigo like this. She turned to a new method, giving a new question, "Chad's your best friend, right, Ichigo?"

"Hmm, I guess you could say that..." Ichigo answered.

"So, why'd the two of you become friends?" Orihime asked cheerfully.

"We had a lot in common." Ichigo asserted taking a reflective stance. He said in a thoughtful tone, "We both were people who always stood out and always ended up in fights."

"Me and Tatsuki don't have much in common." Orihime sighed.

"It doesn't always need to work like that." Ichigo assured. "You can be good friends with somebody even if you don't have much in common at all." He now seemed to have a bit in worry in his voice as conversations with Orihime were usually a little more lax.

"I know." Orihime nodded. She let her voice take a down note as she added, "But it makes me wonder why we became friends in the first place."

"Tatsuki's a good friend, Orihime." Ichigo assessed in a certain tone as he urned to face the opposite direction. He offered his final advice, saying in particularly cool manner, "Even if your power, this soul society thing, and everything else is making you feel distanced from her, it's not worth it, don't abandon her." With that he flew off, leaving Orihime once more to her self.

Ichigo was wrong in his reasoning, but Orihime couldn't help but wonder if there was any sound to his final words. Now that she knew, if Orihime continued to ignore Tatsuki's feelings wouldn't that be the same as abandoning her? Ichigo was right, Tatsuki was a good friend, a better friend than Orihime could have ever asked for. Why then was she so hesitant to give in to these feelings?

She noticed she hadn't even thanked Ichigo for saving her life. Only a day ago she would have been all over Ichigo with words of gratitude and admiration for something of this accord. Yet at this moment she lived only to solve this new mystery, who's seed had been implanted by Chizuru the previous day. Did Tatsuki love her? And if she did should she accept and return that love?

She was beyond ignoring these questions now. She had almost died only moments ago; she knew she would continue to think about Tatsuki and would not be able to have peace of mind until the doubts in her mind were settled once and for all.

Orihime remembered that dream. She was a chronic daydreamer, drifting off into such fantasies all too frequently. She typically didn't dream about scary stuff like zombies. Usually when her dreams were disheveled by some random detour it was something more fun. When she returned to that dream she knew she would now face an option: massacre the ensuing zombie army with her chainsaw, thus restoring serenity to her and Tatsuki's blissful dance, or let herself be eaten up.

A/N: Wow, this is certainly turning out... interesting. It could have been better. It was short and I wasn't too satisfied with the battle scene or really with the dialog for that matter. I like Ichigo's character, but you can only cover so much in having him interact with Orihime, you can only see the cool, confident nice guy Ichigo and not one of his more interesting sides. The high point of this chapter for me was definitely the opening. I know some of you probably thought that was a little crazy, but I thought it was fitting for Orihime. It also provided a nice heavy metaphor for the story which hopefully you all picked up on (I doubt it since you were probably like, wtf?! Why are there zombies?). Zombies were supposed to be a creation of Orihime's mind, her doubts; the ball, her moment with Tatsuki that's all supposed to represent the happiness she has to fight for or something like that. I don't know maybe I shouldn't stay up so late to write this stuff. Either way, Tatsuki will actually physically be in the next chapter, and it will also hopefully be a tad longer. I hope you all enjoyed and I'll try to get the next chapter out soon.