Cursed Parakeet

#let's shine on like that star#

An ambulance siren could be heard in the not too distant streets.

"A cursed cockatiel?" the boy asked in disbelief as he looked at the bird inside the cage.

"Well, all it's previous owners died some kind of violent death..." the other boy replied, slightly nervous to be talking about such a subject.

"Really? That's freaky..."

There was a short pause.

"Shigeo, you want it?" the one who had brought the bird in the first place asked, he must have been told to get rid of it.

"What? After what you just said? Hell no!" he backed away a bit to prove his point; he wanted nothing to do with the cursed bird.

"Chad, how about you, it's cute...?" Chad looked at the bird, he had to admit, it was kind of cute.

"Stop it man, you know Chad has a weakness towards cute things."

They were next to a construction site, a long way above them, something blurry moved, although none of them noticed it. One of the steel girders that wasn't properly secured somehow fell over the edge, straight towards the group on the ground. The bird shrieked and started flapping about with its wings.

Somewhere in Hueco Mundo,

"Consume, we must continue to consume... to fill the emptiness of our existence, we must consume souls, a soul of a Shinigami is especially tasty... "

Chad was hunched over, a steel girder lightly bent across his back and head.

"Chad... are you okay?" the boy who had brought the bird there asked in disbelief.

"It's nothing." a substantial amount of blood came down from his forehead.

"Nothing? You're bleeding!"

"My name is Shibata Yuuichi, what is your name mister?" the bird asked.

"What is with this bird, it's talking like a real person!" Shigeo said, once again backing away slightly to prove that he wanted nothing to do with the bird.

"What is your name mister?"

"Yasutora Sado, I'm 15."

"Crap! Chad is intrigued by it."

It was lunchtime at school again and Ichigo was with Suì-Fēng on the roof.

"Wow, that healing Kido of yours is great, I can't even feel any injuries from yesterday." Ichigo said to Suì-Fēng.

"Hmph, like I needed you to say it, I knew that." she actually wasn't that good at healing, since she was a trained assassin she needed to know the body and all it's weak points, that gave her a lot of medical knowledge and since she didn't want to see herself lose any potential, she trained in some basics. Hearing his compliments made her feel a bit better, though she would never admit it.

She was fiddling with a juice box, if she wasn't as independent as she was, she would have asked for his help, but no, a gentleman must offer his help to the lady; not that she would ever call herself a lady, or Ichigo a gentleman; but still.

"Oh, you two are together again. You seem really friendly." Mizuiro came to their usual spot for lunch.

"Mizuiro. Idiot, does this seem friendly to you?" It actually didn't seem very friendly; neither of them were completely facing each other before he came there, they were standing a bit apart and their stances were saying 'I don't feel like I want to be near you...'.

"Oh. Well, I'm not sure how to say this, but you really should care more about what people say." There have been rumors about a violent girl that came here to tame Ichigo... not that he needed to be tamed or anything, he was a pretty nice guy once you got to know him, Mizuiro thought to himself.

"If I cared even a bit, I would have dyed my hair black a long time ago."

"Well, that's true." he gave a small smile to him before moving to the new transfer student, he needed to make a good impression, after all, she might have a few good looking older friends; friends that were, hopefully, not as violent and cold as she was.

"Hello, Suì-Fēng-san." He did his best to smile at her as genuinely as he could, he was a bit intimidated.

"And you are?" her scowl was frightening.

"Ah I didn't introduce myself yet, Kojima Mizuiro I'm 15 and I like-" he was cut off by Ichigo

"Hunting for girls."

"What? No!" Damn Ichigo, ruining him with a single sentence.

"It's true, despite his innocent looks, he's a terrible womanizer, be careful." Suì-Fēng didn't show any signs that she cared about it, she listened, but she didn't care.

"Ichigo, don't say that! I'm only interested in older women anyway."

Ichigo just smirked.

'Oh, if he only knew how old she is...'

"What? Our new transfer student Suì-Fēng-san is here!" Ichigo would recognize the voice anywhere. Mizuiro was being his usual exuberant self, and he would probably try and hit on Suì-Fēng, that could be bad, people would die, cities would burn.

"Ichigo seduced her and brought her here." Mizuiro was hoping to get back to Ichigo for ruining his image in front of the new transfer student. He missed the short deadly glares he got from both of them."

"Thank you for coming to join us in this garden of manliness!" Keigo exclaimed, overly enthusiastic about a girl joining them for lunch. Seemingly ignoring the seducing part, mostly because he saw the looks Mizuiro missed, and they were scary." Today instead of lunch we'll have a party!" They started ignoring him once he bumped into Chad.

As usual Chad had come to the roof without making much noise or attracting attention.

"Chad... you're injured." and indeed he was, his forehead was wrapped in bandages, and his right forearm was bandaged. They waited for his explanation, even Suì-Fēng glanced at him to asses the injuries.

"Yeah, the one on my head is from a steel girder that fell on me yesterday, the one on the hand is from a collision with a motorcycle, the rider was hurt badly so I had to carry him to the hospital and that's why I'm late."

Suì-Fēng was surprised but didn't show it, this young man was sturdy and probably strong, if he died he could become very good in Hakuda.

Chad on the other hand didn't think much of Suì-Fēngs presence on the roof. His reasoning was simple, if Ichigo was fine with her being here, he was fine with it too.

"Man, I still don't know what you're made of." Ichigo wasn't surprised, he saw how tough Chad was, and his story was probably true.

Chad put down a birdcage and everyone looked at it, some more interested than others.

"Hello, my name is Shibata Yuuichi, what is your name?" the bird spoke to them, Suì-Fēng and Ichigo were suspicious, as they felt a presence inside the bird.

"Woah, it talks really nicely! My name is Asano Keigo, come on say it."

"Chad, where did you get that thing?" Ichigo asked, trying to keep the serious undertone of his voice as low as possible.

"I got it..." there was a long pause, "...Yesterday." Keigo was the only one to protest at the obviously shortened story. Everyone focused on the bird, trying to make it say stuff.

"Stop worrying, there is certainly a spirit inside it, but it is nothing evil. However, we cannot let it be; we will give it a proper burial this evening." Suì-Fēng always knew how to cheer him up, staying up late and hunting birds.

"Great, I'll be losing even more sleep."

"Stop complaining." over the last few days she had softened a bit towards him, mostly because she figured out that the chances of everything going back to normal for her were slim to none. She would never again get called to a captains meeting, she would never again get to train and scare the hell out of new recruits, no more hunting in squads, no more Omaeda... well she could live without Omaeda. Actually, she would live this life just because, if she ever meets Omaeda again, she would have to kill him... not all was bad in her new life after all.

"Yeah, whatever." he took the juice box from her hand and poked the straw through before giving it back.

'He started worrying about his friends at the first sing of anything supernatural, he seems to be getting himself more and more into being a proper Shinigami.'

"I used to get into a lot of trouble because of my hair color, and one time, when it got really serious, Chad came to help me... No matter how hard you hit him, he doesn't fight." Ichigo in short explained the history he and Chad shared.

"That's unusual."

"Yeah."

A short pause.

"This tastes really nice."

He smiled, she was getting into living as a human.

"Out of the way!" Karin yelled as she almost ran into Ichigo.

"What's going on?" he knew that there was probably a medical emergency at hand, seeing his sisters dressed in small nurse uniforms.

"There was a big traffic accident at the intersection nearby. We have a lot of people that need help." was Yuzus reply, he would have commented on how nice the uniform looked on her but he was the always-scowling big brother, so that was out of the question.

He heard his dad yelling at someone and went to see if he could help in any way.

"Dad, anything I can do to help?" he asked after Isshin hung up with whoever he was talking to on the phone.

"No, just stay out of the way." Isshin didn't even look at him as he left the room, and Ichigo briefly accepted the fact that he liked his goofy dad just a bit more than this one. He stood to the side, waiting to see if something needed to be done to help.

"Oh, this is a big one, Ichigo, get your ass here, you have work to do!" Isshin yelled from the other room some time later.

Ichigo recognized the 'big one' right away, his two sisters were barely holding up Chad, he was struggling to stay on his feet.

Karin however was focused on the strange bird, she felt a presence inside it, but she also felt something else from it, a memory...

"Phew, this is a bad wound, you'll have to stay here for a while." Isshin said as he did his best to disinfect the giant paw print on Chads back.

"That isn't necessary, I'm fine." Chad took the birdcage in one hand, and his shirt in the other. He made three steps before collapsing like a tree.

"Told you so..." was Isshins answer to all that. "Alright, let's put him to bed..."

After they placed him in the bed to rest, Ichigo left to his room, Suì-Fēng was already in there, sitting on his bed waiting impatiently. She thought about voicing her impatience, but felt that it would fall on deaf ears so she decided against that.

"Did you feel it?" Ichigo asked seriously, closing the door behind him, the silent agreement was that they would be quiet while in his room; to avoid further incidents with Isshin.

"Yes, once again I felt nothing from the bird, but the wound is definitely from a Hollow."

"Should we give it a burial while Chad is asleep?"

"No, there is something more happening here, we wait to see what it is. My guess is that there is a Hollow chasing the soul inside the bird, we should lure it out first."

"Yeah, that makes some sense, besides, we can keep an eye on Chad if he's close."

"We will have to interrogate him in the morning, he knows more than he lets on." Suì-Fēng remembered the 'story' how Chad got the bird.

Karin, on the other hand, could not wait for the morning to come, she was wide awake, staring at her ceiling. The memories she got from the bird were not pleasant.

"Good morning!" Yuzu greeted as her brother came to the kitchen.

Ichigo rubbed his head as he came downstairs, there was another Hollow intervention last night, it wasn't especially late or difficult, but he still lost at least half an hour of sleep because of it. He noticed that there was only one person in the kitchen, Karin was usually up before him.

"Good morning. Where's Karin?"

"She said that she's not hungry, she's feeling sick today."

That was something new, he could clearly see that Yuzu was anxiously waiting to get everything ready for him and dad so that she can go and devote herself fully to Karin before school.

"She's sick? I guess there's a first time for anythi-" he was cut off as Isshin burst into the room.

"Ichigo! Chad-kun disappeared from his room." there wasn't much else that could get Ichigo moving so fast, so early in the morning.

Ichigo was now running around the place, trying to find out where Chad left; he had split up with Suì-Fēng from the entrance, he would go one way and she would go the other way.

The plan they came up with last night was simple, she would wait for him outside the house and he would bring her in with an excuse that she wanted to talk to Chad about something school-related, they would interrogate him and come up with what needed to be done next.

But Chad was missing, sometime in the night or early morning, while they were sleeping, he left with the bird.

"Anything?" she asked him as they met up on the other side of the block.

"No, nothing, you?" judging by her face, she didn't find a thing either, but he had to ask.

"No, it can't pick up the trail." on the inside she was frowning, her powers were coming back very slowly, but still, it was something. If she was at full power she would probably be able to find him by his reiatsu, if this was a forested area, she would be able to track him easily. Damn concrete, no footprints, no broken foliage, she was helpless when it came to tracking Chad.

"Dammit..." Ichigo then got an idea, it was crazy, but it might work, after all, crazy ideas always work, right?

"Wait, the cockatiel, we can track the spirit inside it!" the idea seemed ludicrous to Suì-Fēng, sure, it could be done, by a few techniques actually; but he didn't know any of them and only the higher ranked officers had the power to actually pull them off.

Before she could voice her protest, he relaxed, closed his eyes and gathered the spiritual energy around him, she looked at him wide-eyed.

"This is..." she recognized what he was doing, it wasn't a really hard concept, but the execution was more than a little tricky; for him to be able to do that on his own was simply mind-boggling. She would have to ask Urahara for more info.

All the spiritual energy in the air condensed into ribbons, Ichigo grabbed one of them and ran, following the source of the ribbon.

"Yes! This way!" his yelling got Suì-Fēng out of her daze and she followed after him, getting her glove ready just in case.

Chad was sitting against a thin metal wall, he hid in a warehouse somewhere. After he managed to get out of the clinic, he took off and found this abandoned industrial complex nearby.

"Mister, I'm really sorry, this is all my fault. All the people who owned me met misfortune. I'm sorry, I-"

"Don't worry, I don't mind."

"Mister, don't worry about me, you should just leave me."

"I can't do that."

"Mister, please just leave me."

"Don't worry, being sturdy is my only worth anyway."

'Those with power are obligated to be kind...'

Chad saw something move above him, he looked up but didn't see anything strange. But then it moved again, he could barely see a silhouette of something big falling towards him. He jumped forwards, dodging the blow that destroyed a part of the wall.

"It found us." He ran, holding the cage tightly.

"Mister!"

"Don't worry."

Chad ran and jumped through the window that was close by. He needed to hide, but he couldn't just hide anywhere. He needed a place where he could stay without other people getting hurt. There was a park close by, but the path there would take him close to the clinic.

Ichigo and Suì-Fēng were close to the clinic when they saw Chad. He saw them too, before he turned and ran the other way.

"Dammit! Chad!"

"Icchi-nii..." He turned to see Karin leaning to a wall, dangerously wobbling.

"Karin! What's wrong, you look like you can barely stand!" True to his words, she fell to her knees.

"Karin!" He ran for her, checking her up, having a doctor as a father had a few benefits.

"Kurosaki. Take her home, I'll go after him." Suì-Fēng spoke after seeing him worry over his sister.

"But-" He didn't want to leave his sister, he didn't want to let Chad go, he didn't want to leave Suì-Fēng alone with a Hollow around. He couldn't be everywhere.

"Don't argue! I can't have your concentration breaking in the middle of a fight." She was right, he hated to admit it, but she was right, if he left his sister, he wouldn't be able to think about anything else. He resigned to his duty.

"Suì-Fēng, if you can't handle him, don't try and be a hero, alright?" His voice was serious and showed genuine care.

"Fool, like I would give you the chance to worry over me... now go!" while the emotions in her voice were a lot less obvious, they were there.

Ichigo ran towards his house and Suì-Fēng ran after Chad.

"Karin, how do you feel?" he asked as he ran, still trying to figure out what was wrong with his sister.

"Ichi-nii..."

She was crying, that wasn't supposed to be happening.

"I saw it, I saw the strongest memory from the ghost... I saw it... right in front of him, his mother... his mom was killed right in front of his eyes." He stopped dead in his tracks, being a Shinigami had a tendency of bringing out all the worst memories he had to the surface.

"Please...Ichi-nii, please... save him..."

'Damn, he's fast, I'm getting slower... this Gigai is too weak...'

'I won't be able to catch up to him, hurry up Kurosaki!'

"You smell really nice..." The voice was deep and unmistakeably from a Hollow. Suì-Fēng stopped right away, looking around frantically, trying to find the source.

"How about letting me have a taste?" it was behind her, whispering in her ear. Why didn't the phone ring?

It opened it's maw and attacked, it was easy for her to roll out of the way, even while in gigai. This Hollow was reckless, it was used to easy meals, it also liked to torture it's victims.

"Oh, you didn't die from one hit? You can see me too... Who are y-" She attacked while it was talking, sending a knee to its' mask, she used her hands to hop over the entire Hollow and land behind it, before it could recover she was already making symbols through the air, and preparing the incantation.

"Disintegrate, you black dog of Rondanini! Look upon yourself with horror and then claw out your own throat! Bakudo #9: Geki!" the symbol she drew in the air appeared and red energy flowed around her, the Hollow was engulfed in the same red energy as it started howling, it was paralyzed.

"What's that noise?" Chad asked as he heard some strange howl from behind him.

"The girl that was chasing you is being attacked by the thing that was following us."

Chad was now thinking, he rarely had to think in detail, most of his thoughts were simplistic, but now he was broken.

He could continue to run with the bird and maybe even get away. But he had no way of knowing that, since he was clearly dealing with something he couldn't see. He could go back to see what was happening with the transfer student, but he would have to leave the bird here for that.

"You stay here." He decided, he would help her.

Ichigo obviously had faith in her, others were talking about love between the two of them, Orihime seemed a bit down when the two of them were together; but he didn't see any of that, he saw some awkwardness between them, but when Ichigo looked at her, Chad saw it in his eyes, Ichigo was grateful to her. Chad didn't know the details, and he didn't need to know them, if Ichigo owed her a debt, he would do his best to help him pay it.

"Mister, it's dangerous!" he turned to the birdcage and thought about it, that was true, the birdcage wouldn't be safe on the sidewalk, so he put it up on a nearby wall, where it wouldn't get hit by something.

"No, that's not what I meant. Mister! You can't see ghosts, please don't go!" Chad already left, he didn't know about things he couldn't do, he knew what he could do and what he had to do.

Suì-Fēng frowned slightly, she couldn't properly gauge her own powers so she decided on using a continuous spell (Bakudo #9: Geki) to see how much reiatsu it would drain. She could probably hold it for a while longer but there was no need for that.

She needed to make sure Chad was safe, she also needed to stall the Hollow enough so Ichigo would catch up sooner. She could bind the Hollow and run away, but if she got too far away from it Ichigo would then run into it and he had no way to fight back without her and the glove. She needed to get him a ginkogan, maybe it works on living humans...

So she had to stay with the Hollow, stay alive, conserve her energy if possible, wait for Ichigo and make sure that it doesn't go after the bird and Chad... and finding out why it was chasing the damned bird would be nice too.

She released her spell and jumped back a bit more.

"Bakudo #4: Hainawa!" she skipped the incantation, not wanting to make it too strong, she wanted to be followed after all...

She ran back towards the clinic, this way Ichigo would catch up even sooner, and this mess would be gone. After running a few corners the Hollow caught up and jumped ahead.

"So you're a Shinigami... that's why you smell so tasty, but you're weak. I already ate two of your kind that came to send off that kid..."

Running was no longer an option, but talking to it was a good idea, especially since it seemd to be the talkative type.

"So you have been chasing the spirit inside the cockatiel, why?"

"Let's see, I'll tell you if you let me eat you, hahaha!"

"Icchi-nii, please, tell him, tell him that he can see his mother on the other side... please Icchi-nii..."

#1, 2, and so the bells echo, spreading far and wide in the depths of my heart.#

Authors Note:

Still no sign of a beta reader.

I forgot to mention it before,

-In canon, Ichigos sword before he achieves shikai has the guard (tsuba) the same as Rukias sword before she activates Shikai; therefore, same goes for this fanfic, Ichigos sword looks exactly the same as it did in the anime/manga, except the guard (tsuba) which looks like the enlarged version of the one Suì-Fēng has on her sealed sword.

[In canon=giant version of Rukias sword;:;In fanfic=giant version of Suì-Fēngs sword]

I never put in a disclaimer anywhere, so here, I don't own Bleach, Death Note or any other series I manage to squeeze in here... (Yes, there is a Death Note character in the last chapter, or is it the second one? Shibuimaru Takuo is the second guy Light kills, I'm sure you remember him...)

Bakudo #9 is the one Rukia used on Grand Fisher, I wanted to show a few things by using that instead of a failed version of Hado #33 Sokatsui. One, Suì-Fēng has more power left than Rukia had in canon; and that ties into one of the plot changes that will be explained later, maybe even in a few chapters.

4k-4.5k words seems to be the standard length of a chapter/episode for me, I'll try my best to make sure that no chapter falls below 3k. I doubt that I'll be splitting chapters up if they get too long.