Disclaimer: The ideas and concepts used in BLEACH belong to Tite Kubo, as well as any regular characters. Most of the characters in this story belong to me. Thank you.


The town of Xierd Leek was bustling with the energy of its constantly moving citizens. The people moved from square-walled building to building in their strangely foreign clothing of flamboyant ruffles and intricate weaving. The men wore suits of tight-knit pants that hugged their legs and smooth, heavy cloth vests with a row of buckles running form the thick collar to the waist. The women wore huge, billowing dresses adorned with layers and layers of frills and lace of beautiful colors along with head dresses and intricately decorated hats. None of these plebeians wore swords, nor did they have the swords to wear.

It was certainly a shock for the people at the town's edge to see the newest foreigners walking in from the wild plains. Men clad in almost identical black robes over white inner robes, long and wide black pants around their legs, and swords at their hips. One had his black outer robe tucked into his pants and tied off around his waist by the sleeves, a nearly bald head with a tail of black hair whipping in the gentle winds. Another man wore no upper robes but a form-fitting shadow of black, hair smooth and close to his head that seemed matted from what may have been years without washing.

And then there was the man between them. He walked with his sheathed sword rested on his shoulder, tapping it on his stone-hard neck occasionally. His robes were tattered with battle at the edges, and those frayed edges blew in the wind like a cape. His short, unkempt black hair seemed to frame his face with a silhouette of distant dread. Just looking at his fixed, emotionless gaze gave one a sharp chilling sensation of approaching death.

Shin Kenpachi and company arrive now to their destination to rescue the captive orphan for Rei Unohana. Days of travel and fighting along the way have finally payed off...somewhat.

"TCH!" Hoji scoffed loudly. "I'm hungry!"

"You're always hungry" Shin pointed out. "We passed at least twenty apple trees on the way into town and you didn't even look at them."

"APPLES AREN'T MEAT!" Hoji shouted.

"It sucks to be you, Hoji" Suichi said fearlessly. Hoji started growling and attempted to reach across Shin to grab and possibly thrash Suichi but Shin stopped him with a quick smack to the wrist.

"No fighting" Shin said sternly "until we find the dirty mercenaries. Then we can rampage as much as we want."

"Fine" Hoji angrily agreed. He rubbed his wrist and muttered quietly about the pain while Suichi held himself high beside his comrades.

"Halt!" some man shouted. A guard strapped with metal armor of strange make stepped out with a sword around his waist. His armor was all flat, many plates of rather thin metal strapped together by leather bands and a helmet made of some creature's thick hide. Shin focused on his sword, which was broader and straighter than his own. The handguard wasn't rounded or flat, but stretched out to form a cross connecting the hilt with the sheathed blade. "What be your business here?"

"None of yours" Hoji answered.

"Eh?" the guard asked.

"We're here on a mission" Shin said. "Can you point us in the direction of anyone claiming to be a mercenary?"

"Where do you hail from?" the guard asked intensely. The shinigami stood around for a moment in confusion, then started shifting curiously and asking each other discretely. "Answer me!" the guard demanded. Shin turned with his eyes half-open in a terrible glare and stared the guard down until he saw a lump form and get swallowed in the man's throat.

"Seireitei" Shin answered. "We're all from the Seireitei territory. Problem?"

"Uh" the guard hummed nervously. "No, no problem at all. Uh, the mercenaries, you asked?" Shin crossed his arms impatiently and shifted his feet to a shoulder width apart. "They are in the palace in the center of town..."

"Great" Shin said. "Thanks. Evacuate the area for us."

"Shin" Suichi whispered "can't we be discrete about this for once?"

"Tch!" Hoji grunted. "Screw discrete! I wanna fight!"

"So do I" Shin said "but I agree with Suichi. Just rushing in with no plan against an enemy with an ability we can't predict won't exactly play in our favor. We need a tactical approach."

"Aww, man" Hoji said disappointedly. "Fine. What's the plan then, Suichi?"

"Yes Suichi" Shin said in agreement. "What's the plan?"

"What?" Suichi said startled. "Me? Why me?"

"Excuse me" the guard asked, now stern again, "but I cannot condone any violent activity within the city. I am a member of the Reagent Guard, after all! I'm sorry sirs, but you cannot proceed into the city any further." All three looked at him expressionlessly. In an instant the men formed their own analysis of the situation and vanished. "EH!?" the guard exclaimed.

Shin, Hoji and Suichi had decided, almost telepathically, to take to the tops of the steep-angled roofs and sprint their way to the center of town. From their perspective outside of town in the apple orchards everything had looked the same. Now they could see everything at once, and chose their destination at once.

"Head for the biggest building near the square" Shin called out to his comrades. "That's where these bastards will most likely be."

"Then we kill them?" Hoji asked hopefully.

"Do whatever you want, Hoji" Suichi said. "I'll search for the kid while you two are fighting."

"It's a plan" Shin shouted. The three raced on across the shingled roofs for the square, people watching them go in fearful wonder as they went.


Inside the royal estate of the Reagent a merry band played. Raucous men cavorted and sang drunken songs with each other in their twisted take of shinigami garb. They had shortened their sleeves and hemmed their pants so they were closer together, much like the pants of the regular people of the town the were quartered in. The Reagent, ruler of the town under direct order of the current regional emperor, sat at his wooden throne behind his private table where the two most influential people of the town's militia were already eating beside him.

His garments were those of the people, a red men's vest with golden buckles and a frilled, silver hemming and shining black pants with leathery boots. He was a young man in the political field, one who had experienced the war strictly on the side of papers and administration, but he still kept a serious furrow in his brows with his warm smile so no one could call him cold or uncaring. His brown hair was tied in the back in a tail that was then tied again to form a sort of knot at the base of his skull, a traditional hairstyle for men in power out in Death God country.

"What a great feast" the reagent marveled as he took a spoonful of some gooey, creamy cheese mixture. His lips pursed in great pleasure, his eyes filled with sparkling wetness. "AH!" he gasped almost effeminately. "It's sooooo goood! The chef's have certainly outdone themselves once again!"

"Agreed!" the town militia captain, bearded regally with an upper lip and chin full of thick, curly hair said. He wore a crown of hair around his head as well, another mark of age, and sported long-set scars atop his healthy scalp, a sign of battle. He wore more articulately carved armor sporting the insignia of the guard on each shoulder and the left chest plate. He was eating a plate full to the brim of dripping wet meat. "This roast is scrumptious! I can barely find the proper words to describe this meal!"

"Open a book then" the other man, who sat farther apart from the two more casual men in his own shadows, said snidely. He was the mercenary captain, dressed in full shinigami attire. His outfit had no modifications or changes to it, it was a simple traditional set of robes and pants with a sword at his side. His hair was short, if not shaved, and his face was very sharply carved from the way the shadows hit it in his dim light. He sat leaning forward, sipping some gourmet soup, and choked it all down in large gulps. "I promise, there will be good information in it."

"Please try to be less cynical, sir" the noble Reagent pleaded. "We are all here for the same reason...ish."

"Quit abusing language" the mercenary demanded. "I'm only here for the money."

"That's what I meant" the Reagent said, shaking his fork. He took another small, steamy bite of his dish and sighed at it lovingly once it entered his mouth.

"Agreed!" the captain said once again in agreement. He took another twirled forkful of meat and ate it enthusiastically. The revelry and peace of the gallant feasting room where the men ate was broken by the fearful panic of a running scout who made a beeline for the throne. The Reagent noticed him running forth and broke away from his delicious food long enough to turn his attention to the message this man brought.

"Sir!" the sprinter shouted. "I bring grave news! Outsiders are coming, wielding swords from the Seireitei region!" There was a hush among the leaders. Even the captain of the guard broke away from his meaty meal and looked over with a start.

"Seireitei!?" the Reagent growled loudly. The soldiers in the hall stopped and turned to the loud man shouting at the central throne. He immediately saw them and nervously sat down, embarrassed that he had brought so much attention to himself. "Are they moving upon us already?"

"Is it a direct act of war?" The captain asked.

"I don't know" the nervous man said. "The report was that they were here on business, and something about an orphan, that's all I know." The last bit caught the mercenary captain's attention. He grinned, and true to his apparent position of dirty, soulless crime, it wasn't a pleasant one.

"Let me take care of them" the merc captain insisted. He stood up, a league taller than most of the men he commanded, and gripped at his elegantly woven ring-gripped sword. "I can be very...persuasive."

"By which you mean...?" the young Reagent asked, pausing for an adequate explanation. The mercenary captain sighed in disgust and stepped out of the shadows, revealing his thin, defined figure and his deep facial features. His eyes were thin from his life of constantly furrowing them, his nose had an angular beak form and his lips were thin wisps of flesh above a pointed chin.

"I'm going to kill them" he said slowly, almost condescendingly.

"I can't allow that" the guard captain insisted. "I'm sorry, but what if these men are here on business of peace rather than war? We could be labeled as instigators in this conflict!"

"NO! It's HORRIFIC!" A young man shouted from out of the hall. He ran in soon after, clutching a bleeding stump at his shoulder, and dove onto a table.

"What the hell!?" a soldier shouted.

"What happened!?" another asked.

"What now?" the Reagent man concernedly asked.

"A man" the soldier said in short breaths "is at the gates. He is demanding something...about us. He wants...to fight you...Captain..." The man drew one final, pained breath and rolled off the table dramatically. His comrades gathered around him and tried to heal and revive him with no avail. He was dead.

"Poor guy" a soldier remarked.

"Yeah" another added. "Now he won't get his next payment."

"He'll never get to fight again" another said somberly.

"Who was he?" some soldier asked.

"Men!" the mercenary captain called. All the seedy, nefarious criminals of war turned to their captain with mixed looks of duty and disgust. "Form a perimeter. We cannot let some renegade outsiders bring war to us! If their intentions are truly peace then they are going about it in a completely incorrect way. We will fight them back, and for every head you bring I shall award an extra ration of riches!"

"YAAAAAAHHHH!!!" the mercenaries cried. The bitterness they had for their weak leader dissolved instantly upon hearing the wonderful news about their potential bonuses. This man manipulated the masses through his charismatic qualities, his rugged handsomeness, his political absolutism. He was a general fighting for his proper ranking in an unorganized army. He had won the respect and admiration of hundreds, and the fear and loathing of thousands for his tactics and his forces.

"Guy Rose!" The Reagent called. The Mercenary captain, Guy, turned slowly to the short man seated beside him and watched him stand with arms crossed. "I forbid you to fight. It will only result in unwanted damage to the morale of your men if you are injured. Instead, send out your ringer, that man you keep in the box. That is my demand. You cannot change my orders."

"Of course, sir" Guy said patronizingly. "I wouldn't do it any other way..."


"TCH!" Hoji shouted. "You think you're so big!? Come on out here! I've got enough muscle and more than enough metal for all of you punks and bitches!!!" Hoji started stomping around on the stone-tiled floor of the mayoral palace's main foyer. He was standing in a large, open room with decorative flowers on the walls and an ornamental rug spanning from the main doors he busted open to the first main staircase. "I can't believe this" Hoji growled to himself. "I get here first and there's barely anyone to fight! Just those three weak-ass guards and that one that ran off. Maybe I should chase him..."

"You there!" a man shouted from upstairs. He came running down, hands on the rail, and drew out his sword once he reached the ground level with Hoji. "Surrender! You're surrounded."

"Really?" Hoji said, mocking total surprise. He whipped his head around and started pacing fearfully away from the door, constantly taunting the mercenary with his sarcastic antics of fear. "Wow! You guys move fast! You're all over the damn place, and you hide so well that I can't even see you!"

"Who the hell are you!?" the man asked, sinking his torso down low and holding his sword far out in front of him. Hoji noticed him and turned his back, still gaping and quietly awing mockingly to provoke his opponent. "Answer me! What is your name, dammit!!!" The man ran forward and lunged forward with a stab. Hoji was instantly standing on the blade, arms crossed and sword drawn in his hand. The man was paralyzed in shock.

"I don't see the need" Hoji began "for a corpse to know my name." The man stood silently in shock for a moment more while Hoji jumped off his blade and landed gracefully behind him. The man started oozing precious blood from his mouth, and just as he noticed that he had been stabbed repeatedly in the torso. He collapsed, dead almost instantly, a victim of unnecessary circumstance from the impatient Hoji Araijin.

"Come on out" Hoji called. "I wasn't joking. You're all damn good at hiding..." Just then, from seemingly nowhere, a battalion of armed men dropped down in their hemmed garb. They came from the rugs that hung on the walls, from under the rug on the floor, between the columns in the hallways, through the shadows; an army out of nothing stood ready to fight Hoji. "...let's just hope you're good at fighting!" Hoji growled. For their sake they better be...