Hinamori's Apprentice
Chapter 14
Karin yawned and stretched her limbs. She had just woken up, and she felt much better than the previous night. The soft bed really helped; she felt a lot less sore than she had the previous night. She rubbed her eyes and was stretching her legs when her foot bumped into something. It was only then that Karin remembered just where she was and who was also in the bed.
Karin turned bright red. She couldn't believe what she had done. She was so tired last night that she hadn't even thought of what she was doing. She fully understood now though. She had just slept, without invitation, in Toushiro's bed, and alongside Toushiro to boot! She felt incredibly embarrassed, and wondered if she should just leave now. She glanced at a clock across the room, and saw that it was getting late. Rangiku would come by to take her to her training soon, and she had to get ready. She glanced at Toushiro, knowing that she would have to wake him up to tell him. She gulped nervously before speaking.
"Toushiro?" she whispered, "Toushiro?" He didn't stir, so Karin gently nudged him with her foot. The bed was so big (and both Karin and Toushiro so small) that her foot was only able to reach Toushiro's ankle, but it was enough to wake him up. He groggily shifted in place, not opening his eyes but clearly awake.
"Toushiro," Karin whispered again.
"That's…Captain Hitsugaya… Now go away," he mumbled, groggily waving his hand at her.
"Toushiro, I need to get ready to go," Karin said.
"Then go," Toushiro said, his eyes still closed.
"I need to take a shower, can I use yours?"
"Whatever, just go away," he grumbled. Karin rolled her eyes. He may act mature during the day, but when he was still half asleep, Toushiro acted just like a little kid.
Karin got out of bed and walked towards the bathroom. When she arrived, she was pleased to see that Toushiro had a very splendid shower. Evidently the Captains had access to particularly nice facilities. Karin took off the clothes she slept in and turned on the shower, stepping into the water as soon as it had warmed up. She sighed contentedly. The warm water felt quite nice, and it soothed her still slightly sore muscles further. She grabbed some soap and washed herself off, enjoying the clean feel of it. She had gotten rather sweaty the previous day from all of the work Momo had made her do, and it felt nice to wash herself off.
She thought about the day ahead of her. It would probably be just as harsh as it had been yesterday. Momo was clearly quite serious about the matter. Rangiku had insisted that Momo was a kind, sweet girl, but Karin certainly didn't see it. If Momo really was the way Rangiku had described her, she was intentionally not showing that side to Karin.
After she had finished showering, Karin got out and dried herself off. She put her clothes back on and exited the washroom. When she walked out, she smelled something coming from the kitchen. She followed the smell, and soon found herself looking at Toushiro sitting at the table with coffee, toast and eggs in front of him.
"You're up I see," Karin said.
"Yeah," Toushiro said. He reached for his coffee cup and took a sip.
"Aren't you a little young to be drinking coffee?" Karin asked.
"I'm ten times older than you."
"Yeah, but you look about my age, maybe even a little younger," Karin said with a small smile, "So, can I have some of your eggs?" Toushiro didn't say anything, instead pointing across the table, where Karin just noticed was a plate of eggs and toast.
"You made some for me? Thanks!" Karin said, sitting down and pulling the food in front of her. She promptly ate her food, only just realizing how hungry she was. She was soon finished, and smiled broadly at Toushiro.
"Thanks, I really needed that. Trainings probably going to be brutal today, so I need all the energy I can get," she said.
"Uh-huh…" he said disinterestedly.
"That Momo girl is really tough. I wasn't expecting that training with her would be so difficult."
"You're lucky. Momo Hinamori is a strong Shinigami. You should be honored to be trained by her," Toushiro said, his voice expressionless.
"Yeah, I keep hearing that, but she's still really rough, and she hasn't done anything that I've seen to earn the reputation she supposedly has," Karin said.
"She's skilled, take my word for it. You haven't been around Shinigami enough. Hinamori, like the other Vice-captains, is a powerful fighter. She may have the physical form of a young girl, but she is a warrior, an executive officer of an entire division, and a brave ally. The average Shinigami cannot even begin to compare to her." As he spoke, there was a knock on the door.
"That'll be Matsumoto," Toushiro said, "You can go now; she'll take you to your training."
"Um, okay. Bye! Thanks for letting me stay here!" Karin said, running over to greet Rangiku.
---
"Good, you're here," Momo said, "Are you ready for your second day of training?"
"Yes Vice-captain Hinamori…" Karin said apprehensively. She wasn't really looking at Momo, instead focusing on a large number of objects set up on the training grounds that looked like an obstacle course. She didn't dare ask about it, but it still dominated her attention.
"Okay, first we'll do warm-ups. Drop and do twenty push-ups," Momo ordered. Karin immediately complied. Luckily, she had always been good in her gym classes, so she was fit enough to do this without much difficulty.
"Now do twenty jumping-jacks," Momo ordered. Karin stood up and began doing jumping jacks. When she was done, Momo said, "Now twenty sit-ups." Karin tiredly got on the ground and did sit-ups. This was tiresome, but at least it wasn't as difficult as the exercises from yesterday. Still, it was somewhat dull. She would have preferred something more complex that didn't feel like something from gym class.
"Good," Momo said when she finished, "It is important to keep yourself in good physical condition. I personally work out about an hour each morning, but for you it should be sufficient to do those exercises two or three times a day. I recommend that you perform them before bed and when you wake up in the morning. Next, we go back to this." Momo pulled out the orb that they used in their practice last time, causing Karin to groan.
"You know how this works. I'll even cut it down to one hundred laps instead of two hundred. Okay, begin!" Momo handed Karin the orb, and she hurriedly filled it with reiatsu and ran to the two trees where she had done the exercise. She ran back and forth between the trees, trying to keep a steady flow of reiatsu as she did so. She was doing better than last time, but it was still incredibly difficult and tiring.
"Stop!" Momo suddenly shouted. Karin stopped, panting for breath.
"Am…am I done?" she asked tiredly.
"No, you've only done eighty laps, but it will be enough for now," Momo said, "I need you to conserve at least some reiatsu for the next task."
"Next task?"
"Indeed. You see that set up over there," Momo pointed to the numerous objects that were set up in a half circle around the training area.
"Y-yes."
"That's an obstacle course."
"Yeah, I sort of figured that," Karin said dryly.
"You will navigate that obstacle course, understood?" Momo said. Karin nodded.
"Yeah, okay," she said. She ran over to the front of the course. She was glad that the exercise would be like this. She had done obstacle courses before, and she was pretty good at them too.
"I'd rather not sit around and talk, so let us begin. You'll have to figure out how to do things correctly. If you mess up, I'll stop you and you'll start over again. One…two…three…begin!"
Karin immediately began. The first obstacle was a concrete tube that acted as a tunnel. Karin got on her knees and crawled through it. When she was out, she ran to the next obstacle, a rope swing. With a running start, she jumped off one side and grabbed onto the rope, swinging to the other side. Next were a set of monkey bars. She grabbed onto them and began swinging between them. When she reached the other side, she went on to the next part, a series of eight tires. She ran over them, but just as she reached the other side, Momo used Shunpo to cut her off.
"You did it wrong. Start over," she said.
"What did I do wrong?" Karin asked.
"You're supposed to step on the ground in each tire. You just ran on the tires. Start over."
"But you never said-"
"My word is final. Start over again."
Karin groaned in annoyance. "Fine, whatever." She ran back to the starting line and started over. She crawled through the tunnel, swung across the rope swing, went across the monkey bars, and finally arrived at the tires, which she carefully navigated this time, making sure to do it correctly. After this was a balance beam, which Karin got on top of and walked briskly across. When she reached the other side, she ran the short distance to the next obstacle, a short wall a little taller than her. She jumped up and grabbed onto the top, pulling herself up and over the wall, jumping off and landing awkwardly. Wincing at the pain in her ankle, she groaned a little when she noticed that there were a series of tall walls next, each about four meters high.
Grumbling to herself, she went up to the next wall, where there was a rope tied to the top. She grabbed onto the rope and climbed up with a little difficulty. When she reached the top, she saw that there was a large pad on the ground on the other side. She leapt down, landing on the pad, which cushioned the fall. She ran up to the next wall, this one with a ladder attached to it. She climbed up the ladder to the top, by this point beginning to feel quite tired. There was a ladder on the other side of the wall too, which she used to climb down. The next wall didn't have ropes or ladders, just a series of rock-shaped protrusions that presumably were meant to be used for climbing up.
She ran up and grabbed onto several of the protrusions and began pulling herself up. This was much more difficult. She used all her strength to pull herself up from one protrusion to the next, using her feet to keep herself in place. With a great degree of difficulty, she managed to climb to the top of the wall and get to the other side. She was in a daze for a moment before running ahead to the next part of the obstacle course.
The course went in a semi-circle, arriving a short distance from where it started. Karin was quite tired by this point, and her limbs were sore from all of the work. Individually, most of the obstacles seemed quite easy, but when done together in quick succession, they were extremely tiring.
"That was…adequate," Momo said. Karin gave her a slight glare, a bit put off by the statement that the physically taxing ordeal was merely 'adequate'. Nevertheless, she didn't voice her irritation.
"What next?" she asked.
"Next, you will do the course again, only this time, you will be doing it by sense alone," Momo said.
"What?" Karin asked, but Momo did not respond. She raised her hand so that her outstretched palm was facing Karin. There was suddenly a bright flash of light, after which everything went dark for Karin. She fell down in her panic, rubbing her eyes frantically as if to assure herself that they were still there. Her vision was completely gone. Even though her eyes were open, she could not see a thing.
"What's going on? I can't see!"
"I've taken away your sight," Momo said. Karin gave cry of panic.
"What?! You've blinded me? Why did you do that? How could you do that? When Ichigo finds out about this-"
"Relax, it's only temporary. Do you think that I'd actually blind you?" Momo said. Karin calmed down a little upon hearing this, but was still rather upset.
"But why did you blind me 'temporarily' then? Are you just trying to mess with me or something? Are you enjoying putting me through this kind of thing?!"
"That is no way to speak to a Vice-captain," Momo said sternly, "You will follow my directions without complaint."
"Fine! What are your orders, Vice-captain Hinamori?" Karin said, putting extra emphasis on her formal title.
"I already told you. Run through the obstacle course."
"But I can't see! How am I supposed to-"
"I will not tolerate any further questions! Go!"
Left with no other option, Karin ran forward to the obstacle course. She could only hope that her memory of the obstacles would be enough to help her navigate it. She soon bumped into the concrete tunnel, at which point she got on her knees and crawled through. Next came the rope swing. She roughly knew where it was from memory, but when she jumped, she was only able to brush her fingers against the rope, and she fell down into the dirt. She heard Momo shunpo to her side.
"Start over," she ordered.
"I know, I know…" Karin groaned. She shakily stood up, trying to remember where she had begun. Not being able to see anything was extremely disorienting. For several moments she just stood stationary, unsure where to go.
"That way, to your left," Momo finally said. Karin turned towards her left and began walking in the direction of the start. As she did so, she suddenly crashed into something and fell down. She thought she recognized it as the concrete tunnel, but wasn't sure. As she got back up, Momo suddenly grabbed her arm and led her towards the starting line, apparently tired of waiting.
"Now this time, do it right," she said. Karin didn't respond to her as she began the course again. She crawled through the tunnel and went to the rope swing, this time careful to ensure she was in the right spot before jumping for the rope swing. In doing so however, she had to slow down before jumping, meaning she did not have as much momentum when she grabbed the rope. She ended up just swinging in the center of the structure. At this point, Momo grabbed her by the back of her robes.
"Since you apparently will never figure this out on your own, I'll spell it out for you plainly," she said, "I covered all of those obstacles with my reiatsu. You will have to sense that reiatsu to navigate the course." She shunpoed Karin back to the starting line, putting her down to start over again.
Sighing, Karin began again. She tried focusing on the reiatsu, but she couldn't see it. When she was calm, she could vaguely sense reiatsu, but in her tired, stressed out state, it was exceedingly difficult. She highly doubted that she would be able to sense reiatsu well enough to navigate the course. After crawling through the tunnel and emerging at the other side, she began running towards the rope swing. This time however, something was different. She felt a strange, invisible force in front of her. She ran straight towards it without thinking, and it was only after she had instinctively jumped that she realized that this was the feeling of the reiatsu Momo had put on the rope. She grabbed onto the rope and swung across, finally landing perfectly on the other side.
She had no time to celebrate however. She immediately ran the short distance towards the monkey bars that were next. She grabbed onto them and began swinging between them. She tried sensing the reiatsu that was supposedly marking them, but had more difficulty than she had with the rope swing, and ended up using only her sense of touch to swing across them. Next were the tires, which she could just barely sense, but not nearly well enough. She had to slow down to nearly a walk as she went over them, carefully positioning her feet into them by memory alone. She came to the balance beam next, which she only noticed when her ankle bumped into it.
She lifted her foot to climb onto it, but ended up putting too much weight on the side, subsequently off of it. She tried again, this time lifting herself onto it correctly. She carefully put one foot forward after the other, trying to navigate it. She swayed and almost fell off several times, but managed to make it to the other side in the end. After she got off of the balance beam, she ran forward to the next obstacle, nearly crashing into the short wall, which she quickly scrambled over. She then went to the next wall, where she grabbed onto the rope and began pulling herself up. She put one hand over the other while climbing the rope, slowly going up. When she got to the top however, she lifted her hand up to grab at the rope even after it had ended. With nothing to grab onto and her other hand already loosening around the rope, she fell backwards off the rope, hitting her head painfully as she landed on the ground.
---
Karin's mind was blurry. She vaguely felt a coldness surrounding her and water on her face. She still couldn't see anything, but the sounds she heard were enough to make up for it. She could hear violent winds gusting and waves crashing in the distance. Sometimes she could hear the booming sound of thunder over the howl of the wind. Where was she?
Suddenly there was a bright flash, the first thing Karin had seen since Momo used Kido to take away her sight. The bright flash was followed by a loud crack, indicating it was probably lightning. Karin blinked her eyes several times and was relieved to find that her vision was coming back. It was blurry, but she was beginning to regain her sight. Now that she was able to see again, however, she became even more confused.
She was standing on a rocky shoreline. She had barely noticed her first few minutes here, but she was now aware that it was raining heavily, and that combined with the spray of the sea had left her completely soaked. It was dark, so her regained vision was of limited usefulness, but she could tell that the sky was dark and cloudy, and that behind her were a series of steep cliffs that trapped her on this rocky shore. She was very confused. She had been training with Momo just minutes ago, but now she was here in this strange place.
Karin suddenly noticed something. Off in the distance was a shape unlike that of the rock formations. She instinctively ran towards it, feeling strangely drawn to it. As she ran, there was a flash of lightning that illuminated it, revealing it to be a sailing ship resembling a 15th century Portuguese caravel. What it was doing in a place like this, Karin had no idea. The fact that it was not moving with the rough ocean indicated it was probably beached. Karin ran as close as she could to it, staring up at the old wooden ship.
"Hello?" she shouted as loud as she could, "Is anyone there?" There was no answer, but a flash of lightning a few minutes later revealed that there indeed was someone there. The outline of a man against the stormy sky was visible for just a moment before things went dark again.
"Excuse me, who are you? Where am I? What's going on?" Karin shouted over the rain, wind, and waves.
The figure spoke, but Karin could not hear a word of it, as the howl of wind and the crashes of waves blocked the sound out.
"I'm sorry, I can't hear you!" Karin shouted.
"Wel…gi…no…begin…mo…liv…this…wol…forev…spir…"
"I can't hear what you're saying!" Karin yelled. Just then a particularly large wave came crashing, on the shore, engulfing Karin and knocking her down.
---
Karin coughed and sputtered, spitting out water and blinking her eyes to clear them.
"Good, you're awake."
"Wha…wha…what ha…happened?" Karin stuttered, shivering and looking around frantically. It was gone. She was back at the training grounds with Momo.
"You passed out after hitting your head," Momo explained, putting a cap back on a bottle of water.
"But…but I was on a coast somewhere! There was a storm, and a ship, and…"
"I assure you, you were here the whole time," Momo said.
"I… Very well, I understand," Karin said, the memory still vivid in her mind.
"You've been knocked out for a while, so we're going to do the obstacle course one more time," Momo said.
"No way! Again?" Karin said in exasperation.
"I beg your pardon?" Momo said.
"Look, there is no way I can go through that course without my sight! You're asking the impossible, I bet nobody could do what you're asking!" Karin protested. Momo looked like she might be angry for a moment, but then smiled.
"Very well, I'll take that bet," she said. Momo reached into her robes and pulled out a piece of cloth, which she then tied around her eyes. By the time Karin realized what she was doing, she had already started. She went through the tunnel swiftly, emerging from the other end running. She jumped to grab onto the rope swing without pause, landing on the other side already running. She went across the bars and through the tires. She climbed over each of the walls swiftly and without apparent effort. Soon she had navigated the entire course, and arrived back at where Karin was standing. She took the cloth off from her eyes and looked at Karin with a triumphant look on her face.
"You see, it is possible. A skilled Shinigami can still fight even without the use of his or her eyes, and keep in mind that in real battle, the opponent will try to hide their reiatsu, not intentionally use it to mark obstacles. You must learn this if you hope to become a Shinigami."
"But how do I learn it?" Karin said in frustration, "You're not exactly being clear with your aims, you're just giving me one exercise after another! Are you ever going to actually teach me anything?"
"Of course I will, but only when you're ready. Your reiatsu and physical strength are not yet sufficient for regular training," Momo said, "Now, since you refuse to go through the obstacle course again, you'll just have to do this for the remainder of our time." She pulled out one of the glass orbs that they used during their exercises, causing Karin to shudder.
By the time they were done, Karin was absolutely exhausted. She felt like her muscles were going to explode. All of the reiatsu she had built up was gone, and her limbs were stiff and sore from the physical exertion. Momo had watched her the entire time, not letting her stop to rest even once.
"Rangiku Matsumoto will come to retrieve you soon," Momo said, "That is all for today, but before you go, I have something for you." She held up a large, heavy book and thrust it into Karin's hands. "That book contains information regarding a wide variety of basic Shinigami topics. I want you to read it carefully," Momo explained.
"Fine…" Karin said dully. She was really starting to become frustrated. Despite all of the work she had done, she didn't feel like she was getting any better, and the months of training ahead of her were looking increasingly painful. As she stared at the ground panting, she heard the whoosh of shunpo. She looked up, expecting to see Rangiku, but to her surprise it wasn't.
"Toushiro?" both Karin and Momo said at the same time.
"Matsumoto asked me to take you back today," Toushiro said, "She said there was something she needed to do."
"What?" Karin asked.
"How should I know? I have better things to do than keep track of what that woman does," Toushiro said dismissively.
"Whatever you say," Karin shrugged, "So can we go now?"
"Yeah, whatever…" Toushiro said. Karin noticed that he and Momo were staring at eachother for a moment before both suddenly turned away. Toushiro began walking away, and Karin quickly followed after him.
She walked quietly behind him for some time, not saying a word. Toushiro seemed rather brooding, and Karin wasn't sure why.
"So…it's a nice day, isn't it?" Karin said, trying to start conversation.
"It's a lousy day," Toushiro said bluntly, taking Karin by surprise.
"What? But it's all nice and sunny!"
"I know, that's what I don't like about it," Toushiro said.
"You're impossible," Karin said with a little smile.
"Whatever."
Karin snorted with laughter at this, causing Toushiro to look at her with a raised eyebrow.
"Sorry, you're just… I don't know, you're funny when you act like that," Karin said, "I think I know why that old friend of yours likes to hang out with you. You're really funny when you act this way!"
"Yeah, hilarious," he said, rolling his eyes.
"I'm right, aren't I? I bet you raised quite a few eyebrows when you were a kid. Between your attitude and your hair, you probably attracted attention everywhere you went!" Karin said.
"Unfortunately…"
"Huh? What do you mean?" Karin asked.
"Other children were afraid of me as a kid. The ones that weren't picked on me. Even the adults treated me like a freak," Toushiro said calmly but coldly.
"Oh… I… I'm sorry," Karin said awkwardly, embarrassed at having broached a sensitive subject.
"It was lonely back then. The only people that treated me with kindness were Granny and Momo…"
"Wait, Momo? Momo Hinamori?" Karin said, her eyes wide, "You and her…" Toushiro sighed, immediately regretting his offhand comment.
"Yes, Momo Hinamori. She's the one I told you about before, remember?"
Karin did remember. Toushiro had mentioned her when watching the sunset. All of those times he had watched the sunset, he had been thinking of Momo. Karin would never have expected that the friend he had vaguely mentioned in the past was none other than Momo.
"Why didn't you tell me before?" she asked, "I've seen you all these times, yet you never mentioned that she was the one you were talking about?"
"Does it really matter? I don't have an obligation to tell you everything there is to know about my life," Toushiro said.
"But still, that's a pretty big thing that you kept from me. You say that you and her have been friends ever since you were little kids?"
"Yes, she and I lived together with our Granny and-"
"Wait, Granny? You two…you two are siblings?" Karin said in shock, "Momo Hinamori is your sister?"
"No, not exactly," Toushiro said, "Remember, in Soul Society it is rare to find one's real family. Momo and I aren't related, we just lived together with an old woman that we called Granny. I suppose you could call us adoptive siblings, but that's not entirely accurate either. Let's just say that she's a very dear friend and leave it at that."
"If that's the case, do you think you could talk to her?" Karin asked.
"About what?"
"About the training. She's been really tough, and she's coming off as rather mean. Do you think you could just talk to her and ask her to be a bit more reasonable?" Karin said, "Just…ask her to be a bit more understanding."
"I'm afraid that can't be done," Toushiro said.
"Why not?"
"Momo and I had a bit of a falling out, unfortunately," he said, "We haven't really talked to eachother or anything in a while. I don't think I could just go and talk to her about something like this."
"What caused-"
"I don't want to talk about it, alright?" Toushiro said wearily, "I just…it's a delicate issue and I'm doing everything I can to solve it, but I'm not interested in talking about it."
"Fine, if you're going to be stubborn about this, have it your way," Karin said.
"I'm sorry if you think that, but I can't help you with this. Besides, I probably shouldn't be doing favors like that for you anyways," Toushiro said.
"But Momo, she's being…" Karin trailed off, not wanting to insult someone who Toushiro cared about so much.
"She's not trying to be mean to you, she's just doing her job. She was assigned to train you, and she's doing what she thinks will help you the most with your training. Shinigami training is difficult after all, both for the instructor and the learner. She's not intentionally being mean; cruelty does not exist in her heart. She probably feels that she needs to be a bit rough on you to train you properly. Just try to understand that everything she says and does during your training is all in an effort to help you. Over time, you two will forge a close bond, and you'll grow to be quite fond of eachother. Until then, I have confidence that you'll make it through the more difficult aspects of training. You're a tough girl after all, you can handle it."
"Thanks Toushiro, I understand," Karin said with a smile. Toushiro nodded and gave a rare smile back as they walked off towards the quarters she shared with Rangiku.
Thanks for reading! Thank you to Taeniaea, blackwitchkarma, nexuswarrior, Hinata-cutie, war90, Thunder Claw03, Ladiie-Angeliie, Chillis, Shirochan21, chiharuSAICHI, Photophopic, Reven Firebane, The Great Pineapple MEKI, The Catch, Hikari Droflum, and DigiPal for reviewing! A lot of people seem to be enjoying this fic, I'm going to have to start updating faster lol. Please review!