A/N: Hello again, and welcome to chapter 2 of 'To Protect, Again', which is AKA the sequel…
It's kinda like a continuation of what happened in chapter 1, except it becomes…more intimate in this chapter. Bet you guys will er, love it.
Enjoy.
ADD NOTE: Clueless Renji is clueless.
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Dense Vice-Captain
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"…"
"…"
Silence enveloped them as they waited for their meal.
Renji felt it was seriously very awkward to be just sitting there with absolutely no topic to talk about. It would be even worse if he tried to talk to his taichou about the paperwork today, though there had been stuff that he was rather concerned about.
But still! He wouldn't, and couldn't, because he wasn't the type of person who would do that. He was wacky, fun and interesting but he wouldn't just sit still and stare at the table as they waited for their food.
They were seated at a private area in the restaurant so that they could be left undisturbed by the crowd outside.
Seriously, his taichou was weird ever since he had gotten over Rukia's death. The noble had been weird, but nobody seemed to notice it!
More like he was weird towards me only, not the rest of the people…Renji thought as he recalled a few occasions which made him feel awkward but yet at the same time a little…weird himself too. He didn't know how to describe things like that, since he lacked the vocabulary.
There was once (or a few times?) when he came in late to work and casually greeted his captain by accident. By right, he should earn a cold, hard glare for being impolite; instead he kept getting smiling eyes directed at him and the twitching of the corner of his captain's lips. He suspected the man wanted to smile at his late entrance. Okay, perhaps he was over-thinking this. Perhaps his captain just wanted to laugh once in awhile, or laugh at his stupidity!
But how would he explain that previous incident not too long ago…?
FLASHBACK (Don't you just love them?)
Renji continued to walk along with his taichou, carrying heavy loads of paperwork. They had worked till rather late, and it was during lunch that they completed their work, so they decided to make a trip down to deliver their work since nobody was around during lunch.
The red-haired shinigami had offered to carry more, and the result was a rather wobbly stack of paperwork in his arms.
"Renji, are you sure you do not need help?" Byakuya was looking rather skeptically at Renji, who was trying his best to balance the stack of papers.
"I'll be fine taichou!" Renji grinned and continued to walk, and went faster hoping to quickly release his hands from the strain.
What he didn't notice was the banana skin in front of him, and he didn't take notice of Byakuya's warning either.
Imagine if everything proceeded in slow-motion.
Renji unknowingly stepped on the skin, and fell.
He fell forward with the stack of paper, which scattered off into different directions.
But what he didn't expect was, to fall on something warm.
What he didn't expect was to fall on his taichou, and with his face right into the noble's chest. The thing he least expected was to find a pair of hands encircling around his waist, and pressing him tight against the other man.
Who knew the great Kuchiki Byakuya would fall for somebody?
Renji hurriedly got up, feeling hot and he knew his face was flushed, and quickly turned away to hide it by saying that he'd pick up the papers.
He swore he heard some girlish giggling somewhere far away…
END FLASHBACK
And he knew better then to suspect Yachiru, because after all, her dear 'Ken-chan' will run after him for even attempting to suspect the girl. Or perhaps Zaraki-taichou may challenge him to a fight to death because he was a good friend of Ichigo's.
Renji's face blanched at the last thought.
"Are you alright, Renji? You've been acting strange for awhile," Byakuya said coolly.
Er, you're the one acting weird!
"Nah! I'm fine. Oh! Food is here! Finally!" Renji drooled at the food. They were in a rather high-class restaurant after all. And besides, if he was here with a noble, he would probably be treated like one very soon since he normally associated well with said noble.
As Renji continued to indulge himself in the delicious food, he missed the light smile that formed on his captain's face.
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A full two weeks had passed since their last luxurious dinner, and his taichou got even weirder!
This time, the 6th division captain had gotten physically closer. This happened on many occasions. One of them was when Renji had the time, he oversaw the training of new recruits (or the third seat would do it too).
Apparently, many of the new recruits found his tattoos extremely amazing, and all of them would crowd around and ask questions about it. He was more than happy to let people know of his experiences, of how and when the number of tattoos increased so on and so forth. But when one of them requested to see most of them, he refused (because there were a lot more down there), but the rest of them insisted. He was being pushed back by the new recruits when suddenly an ominous aura emitted from behind Renji.
It was no other than Kuchiki Byakuya. The new members hurriedly lined up properly, stood straight and politely chorused, "Good morning, Kuchiki-taichou!"
All the man did was nod, however, that morning he didn't just nod. He glared hard at them (causing them to cower) and turned to Renji.
The fukutaichou gulped and felt himself shrinking back a little at his taichou's intense gaze and their rather close proximity. He knew that his taichou would say that he was too soft, and that as a vice-captain, he was supposed to be much more firm about things like that instead of entertaining the new recruits. The man was probably also going to go on to say about how a disgrace he was and-
"Next time, talk about such stuff only when you're off-duty," said Byakuya as he turned back to the new additions, eyes narrowed dangerously at them. Needless to say, the rest of them automatically began to train.
However, it was not Byakuya's glare or aura that scared him, it was the close proximity that was making him freak out. First, his taichou really scared him because he wasn't the real taichou he was when Rukia died. And now, said taichou was acting all un-noble-like. In fact, Renji was starting to doubt that the Kuchiki-taichou now was the Kuchiki Byakuya he knew.
They were so close, their shoulders were almost touching. Byakuya in the past wouldn't allow that sort of thing to happen. In fact, he would be a distance away from anybody at all. And now here he was, standing so extremely close to his vice-captain. It was making Renji feel nervous, and feeling weird again!
So, what the red-haired shinigami tried to do was to shift a little to his left, which would put a little distance between them. Little did he know his taichou just freaking closed the gap yet again! Unable to take this any further, he excused himself hastily and made a run for it.
With that incident aside, it was even harder for him to try to stand beside, or be alone with that noble again. Except during the days when there was an overload of paperwork, where he would sit at his own desk, and his captain would sit at his own too. Both of them would be working on their stuff by themselves, and totally unconcerned with the other.
It was good for Renji, but recently the documents required more thinking and got harder to finish. So some times, Renji had no choice but to go to the man for a little help. Which something rather bad resulted from that, and that is whenever he handed the paper over to his taichou, their hands would brush by accident. The red-haired shinigami could feel a little jolt of electricity at the very slight contact.
It was weird. That weird indescribable feeling came up to him whenever he was around his captain. He really didn't want to think much about anything, he just wanted to have a very normal relationship with Byakuya, not some odd 'running around' or 'avoiding each other' relationship!
…Why was there a need to avoid Byakuya again?
Yes to avoid…the weird feeling.
Somehow, this weird feeling made him feel sometimes a little comforted and human as well. He didn't know if it was the right way to even describe that, so he should drop by Ichigo's house the next week (since he has work) and ask him regarding that.
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It was a weekend and it was very easy to find Ichigo in his room, trying to study again while Kon was creating a ruckus. The red head was sitting on Ichigo's bed and waiting for the strawberry to respond.
Renji frowned at the scene before him: an extremely beyond irate Ichigo stepping harshly on an entirely helpless and pathetic Kon.
Nope, he was not going to participate in this silliness. His…current worry was more important than silly acts like that.
He vaguely wondered what Ichigo would say as he felt something zoom past his head at a very high speed and out of the window. He guessed it was Kon and sighed as he watched Ichigo sit back down onto his chair at the desk.
"Ah, sorry 'bout that Renji. What were you going to ask me about?" Without so much of letting Renji even open his mouth, he continued, "What? Is it that you wanna ask me to go there and pay a visit to Rukia? I was planning to anyway, just that I haven't really moved my ass there because of school and all that shit…"
Renji sighed inwardly.
"No, not about Rukia, though it's about her brother," Renji paused for awhile thinking of what to say, while Ichigo raised an eyebrow.
"Say what? What's wrong with Byakuya now?"
"Er…I don't know how I can explain it to you. As in, you know…"
Again, his lack of vocabulary was insulting.
"…Weird."
"…"
"…"
Ichigo frowned and continued, almost jokingly, "Er, isn't he always weird? As in, he has a stick stuck up his ass and so he'd glare and frown at everyone he sees. So now what, he's starting to smile and treat people kindly?"
"Exactly."
"Oh! So that's…WHAT?!" The orange head almost choked.
The red head sighed for the thousandth time and said, "That's the reason why I came here."
"What, to escape his smiling wrath?" The strawberry chuckled.
"Yeah, doing so," Renji said as he nodded gravely.
"…You're really desperate eh? Is he that weird right now?"
"Do you know what he does? He invites me to dinners, and some times over to his place for some sake. Also, he'd suddenly ask to go for walks for no apparent reason. Also, whenever I came in late it'd be just a teeny smile that was invisible to everyone, and I get away with that. Another time was when we were walking to pass the main documents to the 9th division, I tripped on a banana skin," at this point, Ichigo couldn't help but snigger, which earned him a dangerous glare from Renji, "and…"
"And…?" The substitute shinigami smirked.
"He kinda…shielded my fall," Renji's face just went a shade redder.
"Oh…? That sounds to me like what a big brother would do," Ichigo said as he shut his eyes in thought.
"I thought I had to ask you 'cause you know, you've got siblings and all that…Perhaps you'd understand what he meant, right?"
"Yeah. I mean, it couldn't be anything else because he lets you get away with stuff, and he spends more time with you and all that. I don't wanna be overlooking things, so I guess he treats you like a kin, like a brother! But, how do you feel about all that?" Ichigo asked.
"I feel…weird." Renji shrugged, and cursed himself for his lack of vocabulary again.
"Nah, don't worry too much 'bout it. You've never experienced this sort of sibling thing, so it's hard for you to understand. I know 'cause I treat my sisters this way. I want to protect them and well, spend time with them too, to make sure they don't get hurt or anything…You get what I mean?" Ichigo looked at Renji's face closely.
Renji nodded.
"Yo, Ichigo!" A voice sounded from behind Renji, and it caused the red-haired shinigami to jump.
"Huh? What're you doing here, Shinji?" Ichigo frowned.
"Wha? I jus' came here to say hello! What's the problem?"
Renji stared at the boy who squatted at Ichigo's window. The…hair and teeth…He almost laughed out loud.
Said weird hair and teeth looked over at the red head and commented, "Well, perhaps I should get some tattoos as well…Oi Ichigo! You'd better get some training with us soon, and it's weekend anyway, so there ain't no school!"
"Gah, that aside! Shinji, have you done your studying for History?! We have a freakin' test on Monday!"
"Huh? Let's see, let's see…" Shinji said as he hopped over to look at Ichigo's text.
I guess that's that…Renji said his goodbye, and left for Soul Society.
Perhaps I should go speak to Kuchiki-taichou about it…
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So here he was, standing in front of the Kuchiki manor, going to go in and pay a visit to his taichou.
But he had no idea what he should be saying. It was odd just facing his taichou on days, much less to speak to him face-to-face. He found that day after day, it got even more awkward and harder to actually even try to strike up a conversation with the man. It's not like they had anything in common. Last time, when Rukia was still around, Renji would be the one relaying messages from Byakuya to Rukia, and vice versa. That was about the only thing he really spoke to Byakuya about. And now, it was hard to even strike up a conversation of any sort, and it was even harder to look into the older man's eyes.
However, he had to get things settled as soon as possible, or that weird feeling won't go away.
He walked his way slowly towards his taichou's room and tried to think of how to start the conversation.
'Eh, hello Kuchiki-taichou. You know recently, I…you…' Nah, that's not going to work! How about, 'Taichou, I have got something to clarify with you. You know, you've been treating me way too nicely, what's wrong with you?' That sounds unpleasant. Then what about, 'Hey taichou. I wonder what our relationship is for you to treat me so nicely…' But that sounds too suggestive!
Renji brought his hand up and slapped his forehead. He didn't want the question to sound abrupt, and he didn't want to be too straightforward too, for fear of embarrassing stuff escaping his mouth.
Just like this, Byakuya caught Renji standing in his manor's walkway, with a hand slapped over his forehead, looking like he'd been questioning himself why he was even in the Kuchiki house.
"Renji."
"Ah! Ahhh…good evening taichou…" Shit, I haven't thought of what to say to him yet.
"I'll ask for dinner to be prepared. Go to the usual room," Byakuya said as he walked off to look for an available servant.
The red haired shinigami sighed and went off to sit down in the usual room they chatted. He remembered that night when he loudly told the head of family off in his own house, which then this little 'scolding' spread around the whole manor. Apparently, it was said that some of them sided with Renji's reasoning while some of them had sympathy and pity for the head. That time, Renji didn't pity his captain, but instead was angry at his own selfishness. He seemed like he couldn't understand the existence of others, and chose to only remember about the promise with Hisana, and about Rukia.
But since that time under the cherry blossom tree, Renji knew his taichou wasn't the taichou before Rukia's death, and wasn't the taichou who was dead when his sister's death was still a pain for everyone. This Byakuya felt more different. He felt much more at comfort with more people, and honestly hoped to bring Soul Society and his own squad to a much higher level. The captain now showed a little more affection towards many, but what puzzled Renji was…
Why is it only me? Why am I the only one getting weird feelings when he is near? Why am I the only one who feels nervous yet happy when he's around?
Renji really sighed a lot recently. He felt like a troubled teenage girl who had loads of conflicting feelings, who often pondered on which boy to choose, and which boy would feel the most-
Hang on, when did his mind think this way…? It was the wrong analogy to use from the start!
He heard footsteps approaching and tried to clear his thought-filled head.
"The food will arrive in awhile." The deep and smooth voice rang out, and it made Renji feel comforted yet a little nervous at the same time.
Goddamnit. I must stop thinking like a schoolgirl!
Silence continued for awhile, until Byakuya spoke up.
"What is it that you wanted to talk to me about, Renji?"
"…Eh?"
"I'm very sure you have something you want to say, since you came all the way here."
"Ah…" Renji looked down at the wooden floor, unsure of how to start, or even what to say.
He thought maybe, he should just be straightforward. Yeah, just be how I am…
"T-Taichou…Eh, I just have a question for you that's all."
"And that is…?" Byakuya asked.
"Eh…Do you erm, do you treat me like your little brother?" Renji dared not look up, in case Byakuya's eyes (or facial expression) laughed at him.
"Little brother?"
He could just hear the raising up of the Kuchiki's eyebrows, and the mocking laughter that was going to ensue in awhile. The Kuchiki would say that it was ridiculous, and he hadn't changed at all…
"I'm afraid that I need to tell you the truth."
I knew it. I just made a fool of myself…
Well, at least a little of the nervousness had disappeared.
He saw a shadow towering over him and he vaguely wondered what his taichou was going to do to him. Laugh at him like that?
"I never treated you like a little brother…"
He felt his chin being lifted up to face a smirking Byakuya.
"I always treated you more than a little brother…"
Renji blinked. And blinked. And blinked. And only managed to get out a 'huh?', leaving his mouth hanging wide open.
Of course, Kuchiki Byakuya wasn't the type to let opportunities slip away easily. Moreover, this place was his place, he could silence anybody who even dared to say anything or even suspect anything.
Renji didn't react, until about 10 seconds later. And that was when his mouth had been brutally assaulted by his captain's mouth. That delicious mouth had moved away and to the red head's chin, and moving along the jaw line, and down the neck, pass the adam's apple and licking the collarbone, all the while placing butterfly kisses along the route.
Renji felt really hot, and he knew he was blushing like mad as he felt his captain's hands roam everywhere over his body, leaving tingling sensations over the sensitive spots of him.
"Ah…T-taichou…W-we should stop…here…ha!" Renji was pinned on the floor by Byakuya, and the delicious mouth once again took over the job of silencing Renji.
Byakuya removed his mouth, and Renji almost groaned at the loss of contact on the lips.
"Really, Renji. How dense can you be?" Byakuya smiled a little, causing to Renji to avert his eyes away from his captain's gaze and blushing even harder than before.
"But maybe because of that denseness…" The Kuchiki smiled wider, and lifted up his hand to gently caress Renji's cheek, "…you have become something that I will hold dear to, and someone whom I will protect. It's also thanks to Rukia that I have found someone like that once again."
Renji's eyes widened and then softened after awhile.
"It's no wonder I've been feeling…weird ever since you started acting strange."
"And how is it that you have to find today to…confess?" Byakuya laughed inwardly as his expected response from his vice-captain came.
"I didn't intend this in the first place! It's just…I went to find Ichigo last week, and he told me what he felt, and he said it was brotherly feelings so…"
"…How you can ever trust Kurosaki's words is a mystery to me…"
Renji bit his lip and he flamed up. Stupid Kuchikis…are all of their personalities like that?!
Then he just realized.
"…Eh, taichou…Do you mind if you get up? I believe there is food arriving soon…You wouldn't want the servant to see us like this right?"
So, the older man was still lying on his vice-captain. However, that man didn't have any intention of getting up ever since he laid himself on the other.
"I believe I have no need for dinner. You are more than enough for my dinner," said Byakuya in his ever-so-emotionless face, but his eyes said a lot of other things.
"What?!" Renji, for once, really feared for what was going to happen.
He had a feeling he wasn't going to be able to walk for three days straight.
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And his thoughts came true. In fact, the soreness lasted for four days straight. The stupid Kuchiki had requested (forced!) Renji to do it every night, and three times straight no less!
It was more than enjoyable, the red-head had to admit, but the price to pay was too much! Even people were looking at him oddly as he tried to walk properly.
So instead of staying in Soul Society for a longer time, he decided to pay a visit to the real world, and to go find Ichigo.
Again, he sat in Ichigo's room, really tired from last night's activities.
"Let me tell you Ichigo, you got your interpretation all wrong."
"You mean 'bout Byakuya? Ah well, how can I be wrong? He's always looking out for you…" said Ichigo.
"No, he's always looking out for my ass, not for me, but for my ass," Renji gritted out.
"What…?" Ichigo didn't seem like he got it.
So, Renji kindly said the word 'gay' for Ichigo. It took Ichigo more than 10 seconds to react.
"…Are you serious? Haha, it's no joke you know…"
Renji sighed, and continued, "It's no joke. In fact, since you suck so much at sensing reiatsu, he's heading over here right now."
"You should say, 'Speak of the devil', Renji."
Behind Renji was Byakuya, floating directly outside of the window.
"Now, let us head back Renji. You had a long vacation in the real world, and have intruded for far too long in Kurosaki's house."
"I…don't wanna go back there just as yet taichou. Can you please give me a break?"
The answer was immediate. "No."
"Ah, please don't fight you guys…" Ichigo was starting to get worried. What if Renji blew, and blew up his house instead? His bankai was rather big-ass too!
"We're not going to fight, Kurosaki…Renji, don't make me wait any longer. Let us go."
"No…" Renji refused to budge, and Byakuya sighed as he came through the window.
"Lend me your closet, Kurosaki."
"Huh?"
In a flash, both Renji and Byakuya had disappeared, his closet door was opened and then closed. Gasps and moans and groans came from the inside.
"O…OI! DON'T FREAKIN' USE OTHER PEOPLE'S CLOSET! YOU'RE HURTING MY EARS! YOU GUYS! OI!" Ichigo seriously didn't want to open the door, nor try to get them to come out now.
A sensual moan came from the inside and Ichigo shivered, and then he chose to exit his room. He'd probably go find Shinji and train or something.
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"Renji, if you had said 'yes' to go back in the first place, we probably wouldn't be doing it in Kurosaki's closet. And we probably wouldn't need to traumatize him."
"Then why can't you wait?!"
"I'm missing my meals and nutrition…Mmm…"
"What kind of a shitty reason is that?! Ahhh!"
There really was nothing else to say as they continued.
If Renji knew more about Byakuya, he would have taken extra precautionary measures before falling in love with his perverted captain.
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A/N: There you go! Dense Renji is dense! And a bad sequel is bad!
Review please?