DISCLAIMER: Bleach belongs to Kubo Tite, Ouran High School Host Club belongs to Bisco Hatori. I like pie.

Chapter 6: Friendly Neighborhood Shinigami

The world slowed down.

It didn't really, Ichigo knew, but when he was moving this fast, it certainly felt like it. He was a little irritated with not being able to fight with Rukia and Renji but Rukia was right; he was the only one fast enough to take out all of the incoming hollows before they spread out, or ganged up – whatever it was they were trying to do. He still kept an eye on them as he went; none of these smaller hollows were difficult – especially at this speed, there were just a lot of them. In fact, now that he thought about it, they were popping up not unlike the souls had been the past few days.

Before he could start to make connections, however, he caught sight of a hollow hovering over the hedge maze, Kon, Tamaki and Haruhi crouched in its shadow. Swearing violently, Ichigo slashed almost absently, took out the hollow he'd been in pursuit of then changed direction. The hollow over the maze never knew what hit it.

"What the fuck are you three still doing here!?" He roared, landing, then marching over to the trio of idiots as the world resumed its normal speed.

"People keep asking us that…" Kon drawled, rolling his eyes.

"The hollows herded us out here!" Tamaki snapped, throwing his hands in the air, flailing wildly. "We've tried running, we've tried hiding – they just keep coming!"

Ichigo growled and massaged his temples. "Kon, I told you to –"

"They're after Tamaki." Kon sighed. "They won't leave him alone."

"Ichigo-san?" Haruhi panted. She didn't look good.

"Yeah." Tamaki nodded.

He glared at the mod soul for a moment then shifted his gaze to the scared, angry and clearly exhausted blonde. Sighing, he listened to the battle for a moment, taking note of reiatsu levels… "Alright, I'll get you out of here myself. I'm gonna clear a path, Kon, you bring up the rear."

"As usual." He sighed.

"Come on Haruhi," Tamaki grunted, stooping to lift her off the ground, where she'd been trying to catch her breath. After a short pause he lifted her into his arms.

"Tamaki-senpai!?"

"Can you run anymore?"

She sighed and rested her head against his chest. "Probably not." She grumbled.

Tamaki nodded, took two steps and collapsed to his knees. Ichigo growled, ground his teeth together then knelt. "Alright, change of plans. Lemme have her."

Tamaki stared at him.

"Look, if the hollows are just after you, Fujioka should be safe once she's away from here. There's a fast food place a few blocks over, I'll take her there."

"What? What's going on?" Haruhi asked, climbing shakily to her feet. She reached a hand out, waved it around and found Ichigos shoulder, leaned on it for support. She blinked those big brown eyes of hers and slowly looked down, to where her hand was resting on thin air.

Tamaki stood as well. "Ichigo-san is going to take you to safety."

"What? How – ah!" Haruhi yelped as Ichigo scooped her up, shifting the grip on his sword (where'd he get that one anyway… and wasn't Renge wearing that outfit yesterday?) so he didn't accidentally take off any limbs.

"Ichigo-san?" Haruhi instinctively grabbed his jacket, looked up, trying so hard to see.

"Yeah, it's me." He sighed, even though he knew she couldn't hear him. "She'll be fine. I'll be back in a sec…"

And then they were gone.

Haruhi was not prone to motion sickness, but something about being a few dozen meters in the air, being carried by someone she couldn't see (but could most certainly feel – no wonder Tamaki and the twins had been so worked up over her talking with him, they were pretty, but they didn't have a snowballs chance in hell of ever taking him on), moving… she didn't even want to know how fast, set her stomach a rolling.

Then, almost as quickly as it started it was over, she found herself sitting on a bench outside of MacDonald's which she knew to be at least two kilometers from school. Shaking, she looked down at a napkin in front of her; a quick message was scrawled out on it in Ichigos handwriting;

"Should be safe now. In case of hollow: 555-0150."

She blinked, realizing with a faint shutter that he'd just left, that that unbelievable pressure on her head was gone. Digging her cell phone out of her pocket, she quickly added the number to speed-dial. Rising clumsily from the bench, she tucked the napkin into her blazer and staggered inside to order a drink. "I wonder how they'll react if they find out he gave me his number…"

Tamaki stared at the space they'd just been in. Kon whistled. "I knew Ichigo had achieved bankai but I've never seen him do it before. Damn he's fast!"

Tamaki sat back down, sure that, for the moment, they were free of hollows. "How fast is he?"

"Hmmm. That's a tough one…"

"Okay, she's safe. She doesn't get motion sickness does she? 'Cause she was looking a little green… I tried to slow down a little but, you know… force of habit…"

"Gaaah!" Tamaki keeled over as Ichigo flickered in just then, landing lightly in a crouch.

He winced. "I kinda didn't think about it, but she's never flash-stepped before and doesn't really have any spiritual powers so that probably did a number on her stomach."

Tamaki just stared at him. "How far did you take her?"

"To that MacDonald's… about five steps… I mean… two or three kilometers over there." Ichigo jerked a thumb over his shoulder.

"It only took you like, a minute…?" Tamaki squeaked.

"Well, I figured it'd be a good idea to write a note. Oh, Kon, gimme my cell, I left her my number in case a hollow shows up."

Kon fished a slim black cell phone out of his pocket then tossed it to the shinigami. "It's not like you can talk to her."

"I won't even answer, I just have to check the ID to know something's up."

"Ah."

"You gave her your number!?" Tamaki yelped, suddenly springing back to life.

Ichigo blinked cluelessly. "Yeah…"

Tamaki went through various shades of red before finally settling on something edging towards purple. "Daddy… Daddy will allow it just this once… but after all of this is over you will no longer be on her buddy list!"

"Oookaaaay…" Ichigo and Kon exchanged glances. "Actually, you get it too, I'm sending you to investigate something."

"Oh really?" Tamaki suddenly reverted back to normal… or as normal as he ever was anyway.

"Yeah, I realized something on the way back from MacDonald's… anyway you get to go and see what's happening with the Black Magic Club."

"…"

"Whoa! Did he just flash-step!?" Ichigo yelped, jumping back as Tamaki zoomed over to a handy corner, shadows gathered over his hunched form.

Kon scratched his head. "Maybe. Er, Tamaki-san? Can you hand me your phone?"

"Not going up there." He pouted.

"Come on, they can't be any worse than those hollows."

"Just shows what you know."

"But if they're up to something, shouldn't we stop it?"

"You go, I'll stay here."

Kon ground his teeth together. "Damnit you stupid idiot -!"

"What if Nekozawa is behind all of this?"

Tamaki started as Kon and Ichigo swiveled around. The twins were leaning nonchalantly against a tree, Mori, Hunny and Kyoya lurking a tad nervously behind them.

"What if more monsters come and one of them finds Haruhi."

Tamaki twitched again, letting out a faint squeak.

"Haruhi will just have to call Ichigo-san to come and rescue her." Kaoru sighed. "Kind of romantic really…"

Tamaki stood, spun around, then struck a heroic pose. "Host Club Assemble!"

"Sir!" The twins beamed.

Kyoya sighed and tapped his glasses. "What's the plan?"

"Karou, Hikaru, gear up. Kyoya, get everything appropriate from the cosplay closet. Mori-senpai, Hunny-senpai, start planning the battle. Kon-san, tell them what they need to know."

"Sir!" Kon saluted.

"Tamakis cell number." Kyoya said, handing a dumbfounded Ichigo a slip of paper.

"Oh, ah, yeah. Here's mine." He shoved a hand in his pocket – "Wait, you can see me?"

Kyoya didn't flinch, those cold eyes of his searching the immediate vicinity. Ichigo shuttered. Kyoya'd never actually handed him the paper, he'd just held it out, Ichigo'd grabbed it out of habit. Shaking his head, Ichigo found the spare napkin he'd grabbed and shoved it into the bespectacled boys hand. Kyoya looked down at the napkin and smiled faintly. "A very curious phenomena, this."

Ichigo backed away from them. "Well, I'm going to go keep cleaning up."

"Ah, yes, good hunting Ichigo-san!" Tamaki flashed him a dazzling smile then started back towards the school at a jog.

Ichigo leapt, spotted a knot of hollows heading this way and zoomed towards them. "Wait, how'd they know…?"

A/N: Hmmm. This one ended up kinda short. :P