Authors Note: Wow, thanks guys! Your reviews keep me motivated and I am posting chapters sooner than I thought! I do have a rather busy week coming up though, so this time I seriously might not post till at least a week or two (or not..:P). I love your reviews and I thought I might address a few things. About Orihime being an airhead: I wanted to show her canon cherry personality. I can be air headed myself sometimes, so I definitely don't think its a bad thing. In my opinion, what makes Orihime special is that she is quite a complex character with lots of kindness and resolve. She has her flaws, but she is very self aware. She can be air headed but she can also retort back (I am basing this assumption ENTIRELY on that one time she bitch-slapped Ulquiorra :P). Hopefully I can bring out this complexity to some degree in my writing. Orihime's grumpiness is mostly because of the constant bullying and the fact that well.. Ulquiorra brings out the worst in her too. ;). Anyways here is the next chapter. This one focusses on mostly Ulquiorra. I just wanted to add that the chapters will tend to focus on at most one or two pairs as I want to develop the interactions between my four protagonists.

Disclaimer: You know the drill. Its Tite Kubo's characters and my plot.

Chapter 3

"The client, which happens to be the US Japan foundation, wants a symbol of the harmonious us Japan relations in a place where people can see and experience it on a day to day basis. For this purpose, we are proposing converting a 2 acre area in Bronx into a Sakura plantation. I have already spoken with the mayor and such an arrangement won't be completely impossible with the foundations backing... You want to say something Inoue san?" Ulquiorra stopped and stared at Orihime.

It wasn't that he was trying to be intimidating. But the way he went about facts with precision, reciting off of various documents opened on his Mac, he just came across as so in control of situation that Orihime felt that she might be making a stupid suggestion.

"Ano... Yeah. I read the initial request from the USJF. I was thinking that... Umm the idea of a huge plot of Sakura is... It's good. But maybe something more personal could be better?"

"Please elaborate."

He looked genuinely curious so Orihime ploughed on.

"Ummm, so firstly I think if the goal is to ensure that New Yorkers experience the us japan harmony, isn't it better to do something in a less remote place? Maybe Manhattan, so that even visitors can see it? Also, if it is about experience, we could go with something that is actually there for more than 2-3 weeks in a whole year. Sakura only blooms for a very short time. A Sakura field would just be a normal field the rest of the year."

"And how do you propose to create something that people can experience the whole year and plant it in the center of financial America..Inoue san?"

" umm... I... I don't know. I thought that was what we were supposed to do."

"So you are now telling me that instead of developing the logistics of this project, we should chase a new idea, which you haven't even thought through, which possibly goes against the two key points the clients raised, namely that they want the installation to be grand but not intrusive? What logic are you basing this on?"

Orihime stared at Ulquiorra a bit stunned. He was right, she knew that. And truthfully she didn't have any foolproof logic or even a retort to fling at his face for basically bludgeoning her idea politely. So she did the only thing she did when cornered. Mumbled.

"Err, but what about what people feel... "

"Which people? Right now the only feelings we consider are the clients feelings Inoue San. The client wants grand and we give them grand."

"Yes, but it's the people who will see..."

"What would you have me do? Ignore the client?"

Orihime was loosing her patience now. Ulquiorra had made her go through all the documents which had kept her awake the whole night, and deciding to actually go above and beyond her work she had spent another sleepless night researching. Since Ulquiorra had arrived, she was basically working non-stop and that wasn't the worse of it. Ulquiorra basically had a total of 2.5 emotions, which he used sparingly. So no matter what she said or did, there were times when she felt like she was talking to a wall. All this work and the thought she had put in.. she wasn't just going to stand there and let Ulquiorra dismiss her ideas without hearing her out!

"No! But we don't have to present something unimaginative that eventually most likely will be ignored by people; all for the sake of pacifying the client!"

Orihime blanched. Had she just raised her voice and called Ulquiorra's idea unimaginative?! If she were to be honest, she didn't think it was bad. It simply didn't go above and beyond. Actually it was created more to please the foundation into giving them the contract than actually making a difference in people's lives.

But she knew that even if she were dealing with a normal superior, she had crossed the line. And Ulquiorra was anything but normal.

In the few days that he had been in Tokyo, he barely spoke with anyone except Urahara on a few occasions, never said anything that wasn't work related and consistently turned down offers from her coworkers (mostly women) to go out drinking after work as if they were asking something ridiculous of him. Since his arrival everyone had come to the same conclusion: the weirdly hot new guy is not to be messed with.

And here she had gone on and messed with him. Oh great! Would he fire her? No,
Urahara San would save her surely. Wait. Maybe not, since she had been late too often these days. Oh dear... She was going to usher her 25th birthday unemployed...

"If you are done day dreaming, may I continue... Inoue san..?" Ulquiorra always made it sound like adding a San to her name was a favor she was undeserving of.

"Huh? Oh yeah sure. Don't hold back on my account."

Ulquiorra smirked. The woman was giving him sass. Well, they'd see about that.

"I was saying that since you have such a keen understanding of what people want, and obviously a better idea up your sleeve; why don't you lead the project? And I ll work under you." He finished, looking, Orihime though, exceptionally smug. The little emo bat! She would show him..

"WAIT WHAT?! This is obviously a joke right? I mean there is no way a despotic dictator like you would ever hand over his position to a minion like m.." Orihime clamped her mouth shut.

No no no! this is not good. He looks way too happy and smug. Did I just call him a despotic dictator?! What it is about him?! It's like he enters the room and all restrains on my mouth come undone! Shit! And why in the lords name does he look so smug!

Orihime looked at Ulquiorra with what looked to him like a mixture of confusion, terror and ... The look adults give children who have exceptionally chubby cheeks. Huh?! Ulquiorra quickly dismissed the last bit. No... The woman pulling his cheek would be beyond mortifying. How did that thought even enter his head?! Of course, being around someone as illogical and trippy as Orihime was probably rubbing onto him. He would have to amend that... By going as far away from this woman as possible.

"You heard right... Inoue San. You are leading the project and I am at your command. Now, I should get some lunch. Please let me know what I am supposed to do via e-mail. I shall see you later... Bosss"

As Ulquiorra slurred the last word in his deep voice, just a tad bit seductively; an image flashed in Orihime's mind.

Her, dressed as a secretary with glasses, leaning in on the work table while her "boss" Ulquiorra "punished" her from behind. WHAT...The Royal Fuck! She turned completely red, thanking her stars that Ulquiorra had already left the office.

Then and there, Orihime decided that she was never going to watch office themed porn ever again!

Ulquiorra was having a very good day. If anyone could read his barely moving expressions they would have been able to tell. But to the rest of the world, he appeared as stoic as ever.

However on the inside Ulquiorra might as well have been hopping and strutting through poppy fields.

That woman was better entertainment than anything one could watch on television. Ulquiorra prided himself for his ability to remain calm and rational even in the most unlikely circumstances. So it was no surprise that he found people like Orihime downright amusing. She wore her heart on her sleeve, had inane ideas and dared challenge him. Him! Never once had he met someone who had managed to talk him down or stand up to him. More often than not he simply intimidated people.

It wasn't like he tried to. He was simply too serious. He minded his business. And he was extremely intelligent. Ulquiorra was raised in an orphanage, and to get out of that life he had worked very hard. Combined with his superior intellect he had whizzed through high school and gotten and full ride at Keio. But as always he found the curriculum unchallenging and finished his degree in 2 years instead of 4 and with top honors. That's how Aizen had noticed the prodigy.

Ulquiorra had no interest in urban planning, nor in Aizen. However Aizen offered him the one thing he had been looking for: challenge, and an opportunity to grow. He offered Ulquiorra a position in his New York office and an offer to fund his higher education at the best universities in US. This sounded challenging enough and Ulquiorra had agreed.

He had finished a graduate degree in urban planning at Columbia (again in one year) and risen to the position of RnD head so quickly it still shocked his colleagues. Especially since Ulquiorra sucked at office politics.

He was direct, honest and brutally critical. He could spot a tiny mistake from miles away and would point it out. If anything, he practically scared the rest of his coworkers due to his perceptiveness and the fact that most of the time he didn't bother hiding that he thought of them as thrash.

Needless to say, Ulquiorra had never had a meaningful interaction with anyone except Aizen on a few occasions.

That was, till he came to Tokyo. He had to admit, Orihime Inoue baffled him.

He had marked her as an airhead. Yet he had noticed that she single handedly took on the work of her entire department (mostly because she was easily bullied). She was easily bullied by worthless trash like that lily girl and yet she had given him snark on more than one occasion now. And despite her air headedness, he had agreed with her arguments in principle.

She was right, the Sakura plantation was unimaginative and overly grandiose. Much like the clients who had requested it. He knew that that was sole reason Aizen had even suggested it. After all, their job was to please the client and get the contract. If the client were classless then the proposal would have to resonate with that.

What was the woman talking about anyways? What people want? How they experience their surrounding? The people on whom this project would be dumped had already done their job by choosing their spokesperson. The mayor hadn't minded, the clients were bound to love the idea. Everything else seemed irrelevant to the project.

But the woman didn't think so. She had rightly spotted the error with the plan, yet her critique seemed illogical. So Ulquiorra had thought that maybe it was best if she lead the project.

Yeah! That was the reason. Not because he found it amusing to watch her flail around and suffer. No, not at all. After all that would be almost... Unkind.

Unknown to him, Ulquiorra had a half smile playing on his lips the entire day.