Author's Note:

I love being able to write these little note things again : )

This is the first chapter! Whoo~! Yay~ Confetti~ For me, who knows everything, it's as dull as...uh, dull. But for you guys, who are (hopefully) preparing yourselves for another confusing ride, this is a good intro. I hope. What can I say? It's a first chapter. It's gonna be more info than anything.

Read~

There was a girl in the night. Her reiatsu hidden and her existence known only to an average few, she strolled through the dark streets without a care in the world. The many nocturnal sounds shuffled and repeated, playing the characteristic music of the after-hours. The girl, in her purple plaid pajamas, twirled.

With the captain of the Twelfth Division imprisoned without naming a replacement and the lieutenant in with him, the Research Department grew heavily disorganized and careless. They still did their work, but the admiration and fear that their former leader brought was now absent. Study was no longer urgent, old specimens' holding tubes no longer worth dusting off, maggots no longer worth feeding—they fell into a state of laze, only a few taking their jobs any seriously.

Akon, a tall, eyebrowless man and one of the few shinigami to get along well with Kurotsuchi, visited his former captain often in his cell. He would sometimes find Kurotsuchi mumbling to himself about the situation that put him where he was. Akon understood what Kurotsuchi had done and why he had done it, and also understood the reasons behind his consequence.

Central 46 dealt with his case due to the vast number and severity of his offenses. They decided he would be put back in his old cell with the punishment of a continuing loop of his thoughts. He would sit there until further notice—maybe until death—repeating whatever first came to mind. By chance, the thoughts Kurotsuchi's mind had chosen to repeat were the details of his adopted daughter's death. This surprised even the members of his division, and with a further look into his private notes and journals, he seemed to care more for her than he let on. In one of Kurotsuchi's journals that didn't make it to the investigators, Akon found that he had been planning to make Nadeshiko his successor.

Forty feet away from the door of the cell, surrounded by guards, Akon studied his former captain. He didn't know exactly why he kept returning to watch him, but he couldn't stop. He had a feeling that there was something he was missing. The expression on Kurotsuchi's face was not the one of concentration he wore when remembering information. Instead, his face read contemplation. Somewhere in his mind, where he was more conscious, Kurotsuchi had noticed something about something, and he was trying to decide whether or not to fight his punishment and tell someone.

Akon only reached that far in his visits, and after finding the same conclusion each time, he would leave. One day, a couple feet away from the prison area, one of the Research Department members ran up to him.

"Akon!" Tsubokura Rin yelled to him, running down the path. "We found something!"

Startled, Akon stopped walking and waited for Rin to reach him. "Found what?" he asked.

"I was…" Rin huffed, catching his breath. He held out about ten sheets of paper, clipped together sloppily with a hairpin. Akon could see that it was Rin's own, meaning the papers were urgent material. "I was looking at the number of hollows in Karakura town over the past four years and they're…they're abnormal!"

"Let me see," Akon took the papers and only had to take a glance at the numbers before his eyes widened in disbelief. The disbelief changed to anger as flipped through. "This has been going on for four years without anyone's notice?"

"Well…" Rin squirmed. "Since they're usually low, no one really looks at them. I was just doing some cleaning on the computer and the numbers jumped out at me…"

A vein tightened in Akon's forehead as he squeezed wrinkles into the stack. "Do you know who has to take the blame for this late report?"

"Um…" Rin timidly tapped his index fingers together, squirming further downward. "…is it Hiyosu?"

"No, it's you!" Akon shoved the papers into Rin's chest, pushing the wind out of him. "And you're going with the group that has to investigate that!"

He stormed off and Rin spun around. "Wait! We have to have a team look at this? Maybe it's an error with the computers…?"

Akon looked back over his shoulder. Rin was starting to follow. "There's no way that could be, I maintain them."

"But won't it look bad on our department?"

"Who cares about how it looks on our department! We need something like this anyway to pull us back into shape."

"But—"

"That isn't normal!"

Rin stopped, watching Akon stomp away over the fallen leaves and twigs. He looked back at the creased papers in his hands, back at the numbers. The regular amount of hollows in a town as small as Karakura rarely came up to twenty-five per month, but on the first page of the data, dated four years back, it reached sixty-seven and had only been increasing since then. Nervous, he turned to the last page to look at the numbers he hadn't seen yet—the numbers for last month. When he saw it, his eyes widened to saucers at the number five hundred thirty-four.

The crisp air almost flawlessly flowed through her system as the girl, with great effort, created a dance to illustrate the history she'd learned in class the previous day. The wind did not stroke the fans in her hands, nor did the moonlight touch the brightly-colored ribbons in her long, blonde hair, though she wished it so.

Fifteen years changes things in a consistently modernizing society. In Karakura, a small town in Western Japan, things reguarding spirit-related activity have remained basically the same. However, the rate of hollow appearances has heightened in a three percent increase. Multiple teams now scope the area in an effort to maintain the population of the town.

Weeks before this report was written, the Hollow research team that had been sent to the world of the living had been slaughtered by a group of oddly behaving Gillians. These hollows have grown to appear in this area more frequently, apparently searching for something. From what other research members have gathered from the situation's remains, a captain level shinigami will be required to escort the next research group.

However, there is no research group available for sue, and because of the Research Department's current position, substitutes will be used. There is no pre-structured system for this, and after great thought, our replacement-head has decided to let the escorting captain choose who will go. Two Research Department members will accompany them: Kagami Shou and Tsubokura Rin. They will be directing this group as far as what their objectives are.

This mission is expected to last six months, but may stretch further if necessary. The team may be as large as the captain chooses. All shinigami will be accommodated in the following houses and/or hotels:

Kurosaki Ichigo (House)

Minamoto Shuuhei (Hotel)

Kurosaki Karin (House)

Inoue Orihime (House)

If any of the above mentioned names refuse to house the team, remind them of their contract.

Minamoto Shuuhei, a large man that looked to be in his mid-thirties, set the letter down on his office desk and ran his hand through his deep green hair. He stood, pushing his chair about a foot back, and gave a warm smile to the four people in front of him.

"Welcome to the Living hotel."

Streets away, there was another girl. She was the same as the dancer, but only walked, her long and simple black hair swaying gently behind her. On occasion, she would meet the dancing girl and pass without a word. Other times, they would spend their time together, laughing and completing each others sentences like two halves of the same person. Around the corner was an interest to this girl, a blue-haired classmate of hers who enjoyed playing his piano late into the night. From outside, the walking girl could only hear a few faint notes floating across the night, but for her, this was enough.

Inside the house, Ayakawa Jin pulled at his ear—a habit that expressed frustration. He stretched his fingers, shook them out, and placed them back on the keys to play the song again, but for some reason he couldn't bring himself to start. He felt the familiar anxiety of eyes on his hands.

It was well past eleven, and his family members were all sound asleep, aiming for an early rise. Only Jin, a night-person, could stay up this late. Though he was already past his childish fears of the dark, he still felt a bit unsafe at night, in a room guarded from the outside only by a thin, pale green curtain.

He stood and pushed in the white bench that matched his bone-white piano. The girl outside pouted, and then spun behind a telephone pole as Jin neared the window. He stared off into the distance, watching for any slight movements. He then focused his eyes on the telephone pole. Something drew him to it, but the only thing he could see was the familiar Lost Dog poster, flapping in the wind.

Hitsugaya sat on his bed in his hotel room, feeling lazy after his long day. He flipped open his phone and checked the vicinity for approaching hollows. The technology of the phones had improved over the years, and now shinigami stationed in the living world could find a hollow before it could do much damage.

Seeing the radar clear of blue travel marks, he pressed a series of buttons and instantly the features became those for a casual phone. He felt like playing Tetris, and navigated to the Games screen, leaning back to lay his head on the pillow. Five minutes into the game, his arm grew tired, and he rolled onto his side.

In the corner of his eye, he saw his duffel bag. He'd carelessly dropped it down, slightly jumbling its contents. Hitsugaya, noticing a strange bulge in a corner, kept glancing back and forth between his game and the bag, trying to figure out both what was sticking out and how to pause the game. Thinking he had an idea about the object, he gave it an extra second of attention without thinking.

By the time he looked back at the phone's screen, he realized he'd let a vertical blue piece land in a troublesome spot. He maneuvered the other irregularly shaped pieces around the blue block, but now there was no room for precision. The game ended in seconds.

Annoyed, Hitsugaya snapped his phone shut and moved his gaze back to his bag. But his expression changed almost immediately; he suddenly remembered what he'd stuffed in at the last moment.

He smiled.

And there were another two in the night. A mixture of two unlikely met people was reflected deeply through their features. Barely moving, the two sat on their rooftop in immobile silence. From the time the sun went down to the time it peeked over the skyline, they only sat. Every once in a while, they would simultaneously raise their arms to wave to their friends who shared their condition, but they preferred not to wander.

The younger of the twins by five minute and fourteen seconds, is Takedaya Hane. Kind and gentle, she complements her sister. In school she was quiet, seldom speaking to anyone besides her sister or her friends. With her wealthy family's private attitude a cage around her courage, she wasn't heard much as a child.

The older of the twins by five minute and fourteen seconds, is Takedaya Hana. Rebellious and loud, she complements her sister. In school, she was loud, leaving an impression on anyone she met. With her wealthy family's private attitude a fuel to her defiance, she drew masses of attention to herself as a child.

The twins were of average height, with only a slight thickness about their weight. Taking their mother's genes, their hair was a fiery red.

Author's Note:

Oh! What was that? Fiery red hair? What? Huh?

Yes! Fiery red hair! Just like two people you probably remember and/or loathe. The hair colors actually should be a huge hint to what's gonna unfold later. For all of you who'd like to theorize/make inferences/ make ithinkthis'llhappens, I'd love to give you a hint an tell you to go back to the epilogue (TTALeft), and go look at the information-like things, but I don't want to spoil the story. Though if you're gonna make theories/inferences/ithinkthis'llhappens, I'd love to hear them~

And, oh yeah, I missed these too:

The rush, the adrenaline,

runs inside without mercy.

Your hands shake, they tremble

at the Miracle-eater's pleasure.

Go on, quake all over

just maker sure when it's over

you've left a solid review.