Renji found morning merged into a strange dream. Ever since his taicho beginned smelling everyone around (especially Renji), the redhead shinigami started having those dreams about his superior. That morning Renji was dreaming of himself seated under a sakura tree in one of the gardens at the Kuchiki manor, wearing his day off hakama, totally relaxed. He was listening to a soft and tranquilizing music played in the piano by...hum...Kuchiki taicho in one of the rooms. Renji was able to feel the scent of sakura petals floating in the air around him...maybe it's senbonzakura and he is going to kill me, run! Then is heart fell into a softness and his mind just sunk in gracefulness as Byakuya ... er...taicho...started to sing a beautiful jazz song, one that Renji never heard in is conscious state. He can sing? Uau! A sad song ...like taicho´s eyes. Also soothing and calming...lovely...like taicho's eyes...WHAT? Renji suddenly woke up feeling dizzy and thinking to himself "He is driving me crazy smelling every thing like that!"
***
That same morning Byakuya decided to take definitive measures. It was impossible to get to know Renji's scent! He had tried all the possible explanations. Even the weakest shinigami in Sereitei carried a scent Byakuya could figure out. That said shinigami still had a scent after taking several baths day. Byakuya made sure of that, albeit the terror expression on the eyes of the poor creature when Kuchiki Byakuya told him for the 10th time that day " Bath again and return here to report on the mission, you still smell of that hollow". So Renji's lack of scent had nothing to do with bathing more than any living or dead soul, although the reason for the readhead taking so many baths lately was another mystery to Byakuya...
What could it be then? Could it be an ethereal type of scent like that of Hitsugaya's taicho? Hitsugaya smelled like the air on the top of a very high mountain, a scent very hard to catch daily, but pretty obvious in bankai releases, as the taicho of the sixth was able to notice during Hitsugaya's bankai practice with Ukitake. So, with that hypothesis in mind, Byakuya made his way to the eleventh division training grounds, where his fukutaicho was probably practicing is bankai with not-so-very-morning-person-who-is-always-late-for-bankai-practice-with-Renji Ikkaku.
Just as he arrived on the spot he noticed Ikkaku was nowhere to be found but Renji was already in bankai mood. Yes, his fukutaicho was a very moody person, Renji's bankai mood was something like...well...he could almost say it, but he was Kuchiki Byakuya, and Kuchiki Byakuya would never say anything like a paramastorbatory experience, he would have died on the same instant. So Byakuya carrying on with the plan just masked his reiatsu and tried to smell the air around without get caught, but then again... no smell at all! Baboon king zabimaru had no scent whatsoever. Byakuya's bankai was intoxicating but his fukutaicho's bankai didn't produce any kind of fragrance. Was that possible, when he was such a discrete person and Renji was a loudmouth? But then, why that discretion in this particular matter? It was almost like..."That doesn't make any sense, why would he do that? I DON´T CARE! STOP BYAKUYA!"
" Ne, taicho, what are you doing here? And why are you concealing your reiatsu?" , Byakuya snapped out of his thoughts at hearing Renji's voice.
" What is it, Renji?", he asked, not letting his guard down.
"Ha...nothing taicho, just find that odd, that's all. Is Soul Society in any kind of danger or something?" , Renji asked with concern.
"Renji...Why are you concealing your scent?", Byakuya asked before he could stop himself.
Small, sharp, fiery eyes pierce through Byakuya.
"So you noticed...", Renji said in a low voice.
"Yes I did", was the pragmatic response.
" Kinda hard to explain...you see people in Rukongai, most of then don't have any scent, those who have it are the ones with greater spiritual power. I mean a personal scent, one that passes thru skin, even if you take all the sweat away and bath in parfum. I guess it is just another difference like we having more hungry. Don't really know why that happens taicho"
"And you noticed all that by yourself?" Byakuya raised an elegant eyebrow. Renji noticed the same thing that took him so long to notice?
Renji grinned.
"I ain't only a stupid monkey howling at the moon, taicho. I can also be the snake..."
For some unknown reason Byakuya blushed, he would process the reason later, since Renji was still finishing his sentence.
"... and I guess I have a good sense of smell."
"I see, but why conceal it?"
" ' Cause...I didn't want them to know, so I learn how to conceal my scent way before I learned here at the academy how to hide my reiatsu. It's no big deal", Renji stated with a shrug.
Byakuaya pounded Renji's words.
"But why hide it now?"
"Hum...got me there taicho", Renji replied, looking away in sudden discomfort, "Guess it's just something I do without much thinking... ", as ever thing else you do, Byakuya thought, "...er… and because... I... ah, never mind..."
"Tell me Renji", Byakuya demanded.
"Er...it keeps the girls away if I don't have my scent with me, those times I had my scent in public I had to run away from a bunch of them... ", Renji grinned blushing at the same time.
Byakuya raised and eyebrow in disbelief. Was that man really telling him that? Was the scent so great? What was that? That fine needle of jealousy, of pain, of fear? Was he jealous? Of Renji? Of course not, you are crazy Byakuya, he thought to himself.
" Ne taicho, why are you interested in all this? Why are you sniffling people all around Sereitei? Are you conducting some kind of experiment?", Renji asked, trying to change the subject.
" I'm cataloguing all the shinigami's scent in the Kuchiki's family arquives", Byakuya replied without one blink.
" Wow, really?", Renji looked too enthusiastic.
"No", Byakuya indulge himself a little smile. Renji was so easy to tease, it was like stealing the candies from a scout boy. Then a panic thought ," You noticed" , said in a calm, indifferent voice.
" What? You sniffling around or you teasing me? Of course. I just don't know why. I mean, I noticed long ago that shinigamis have different scents, every one knows that , at least they must know...I...if you were really doing that research for the arquives I could understand..."
" You do not need to know what I am doing that for Abarai fukutaicho. Since when do I give you explanations?"
Renji bowed in excuse. Byakuya remained in silence. There was something disturbing about Renji's last words.
"Does everybody know I smell like cherry blossoms?", he asked, letting a bit of curiosity slip into his tone.
Renji laughed. A clear sound in the morning day light.
"So what taicho? Bet you got to run from the chicks too! ", Renji chuckled at his words, and immediately thought: What a stupid thing to say to your captain, I mean tell another man he smells good...really good...right...brilliant Renji!
Byakuya blushed again and Renji couldn't help think that it wasn't possible, that what he just saw was a sun reflex in Byakuya's pale skin. Still looking away the brunet man remarked:
"No one except you have told me how I smell."
This was Renji's turn to blush...hard.
" Hum...guess I'm just a loudmouth."
" Yes you are Renji", that smile ever so slight. Am I dreaming? Do it again, please! Wait... WHAT? STOP DAMN. Renji thought, almost as the same time he noticed his taicho stiffen. He turned around and then he saw Ikkaku, standing just behind him and grinning.
" No way you gonna know how to describe Renji's scent in that arquive Kuchiki taicho, even if you smell it...Unless you go to a said place in the real world, of course... So what are you gonna say about my scent? Did you notice it's like wood?", Ikkaku didn't lose the mocking grin on his face.
" No, I didn't, the records are only about taichos and fuckutaichos", Byakuya responded calmly.
" No way! I have a fucking bankai!" , Ikkaku growled.
" No worries taicho, I'm so gonna beat his ass!", Renji swung Baboo King Zabimaru and sprinted away, with Ikkaku.