I do not own bleach but I am now the proud owner of an Emperor scorpion.

Hollow King Chapter eight

Welcome Home

Gondra's mind was overwhelmed as he struggled to comprehend why the hell their base of operations in the human world was his old apartment. The place where he had died. Either someone was playing a sick yet incredibly funny joke or this was one hell of a coincidence. Come to think of it, he considered, why did he still remember parts of his past? Were shinigami supposed to be able to remember their past at all? Gondra chose not to dwell on it now. He could come back to it later. Or ask Sunaryu, Tyler or even Isane about it. He felt he could trust all three of them.

Gondra and Isane stepped through the senkaimon gate to find themselves in an alleyway in the middle of Karakura Town. The same alley where he was konsoed, ironically enough. "Smell that living world air!" Tyler chimed in the back of Gondra's mind. It was obvious that he was happy to be around so many tasty souls.

Gondra walked forward gesturing for Isane to follow him,

"This way. The base isn't far from here." Isane nodded and walked after him.

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Isane and Gondra stood outside the apartment door as they double checked the address. There was no mistaking it. It was 13A. His old apartment. Gondra knelt down and lifted one of the floor tiles, revealing a spare key. Isane gave him a confused look. There wasn't any mention of a key in the instructions they had been given.

"Gondra, how did you know that was there?" she asked curiously. Gondra looked up at her with a sad grin as he replied,

"Because this was my apartment back when I was alive."

Isane looked shocked but chose not to say anything as Gondra inserted the key and turned the door handle. He flung the door open, expecting to find an empty apartment but that wasn't the case. To Gondra's surprise it was just how he left it. All the metal and anime posters were still on the walls. The furniture was still in place. All his manga were still on the shelves. The scent of incense and bong water still lingered in the air. Even his ash trays were still filled with cigarette butts. Nothing had been touched.

Just then a horrid thought entered Gondra's brain. He ran to the back of the apartment, frantically thinking to himself, what if his body was still there? Still lying in his bed; all bloated, twisted and rotting with maggots squirming around in the mouth and eye sockets as flies buzzed around the blood and bile that stained the mattress. He also thought of the turmoil it would put him and Isane through having to bury his own body as Tyler made necrophilia jokes in the background of his mind. Gondra gulped hard as he reached for the doorknob, whispering softly,

"Please let me be in the ground. Please let me be in the ground. Please let me be in the ground."

He clenched his fist and flung open the door. His corpse was nowhere to be found. The only indication that he had died there was a large blood stain on the bed. With a sigh of relief, he quickly flipped the mattress over and changed the sheet, wading the old one up and throwing it in his closet with a dry thud.

Gondra exited his room to find Isane staring out a window at the city below. Gondra took the opportunity to study her further. She was almost as tall as he was with a slender frame and somewhat large breasts. Her skin was a creamy ash white. Her hair was a silvery lavender and cut tomboyishly short, accented with several long thin braids. He then noticed the plain white kimonos they both wore. Surely, they couldn't walk the city streets looking like they jumped right out of feudal era.

"We really should change clothes if we want to explore the town later." he commented. Isane looked at him questioningly.

"People will think we're crazy if we walk around dressed like this." Gondra stated, gesturing at their robes. "Besides white's not really my shade."

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Gondra felt right at home in his old clothes as he adjusted his belt and let out a content sigh.

"Um, Gondra?" Isane called out from inside his room.

"What's up?" Gondra asked as he opened the door. The sight before him almost gave him the mother of all nose bleeds. Isane was standing next to his dresser with a mad blush on her face, wearing one of his from Autumn to Ashes t-shirts. She pulled at it, trying to conceal a pair of white lacy panties. It took a few seconds before the blood rushed back into Gondra's brain and he could speak again. He averted his gaze as to not embarrass her further as he spoke,

"Oh, that's right. Sorry, guess none of my pants will fit you, huh? That's okay. I found my wallet. I'll go buy you a pair. Just tell me your size." Isane's blush turned an even brighter shade of red.

"It's fine. I won't tell anybody and it's not like I'm buying you underwear. You can buy that on your own." Gondra stated with a reassuring smile. It wasn't him knowing her size that bothered her. It was him going out of his way and spending his own money in order to help her that what made her blush. But she agreed.

An hour later Gondra returned with a pair of black jeans and navy blue cargo pants. He noticed Isane sitting on his couch, talking on her soul pager. As she said goodbye and hung up, Gondra placed a shopping bag next to her. She looked at the bag then looked back at him.

"Thank you." she said softly.

"Don't worry about it. We can't have you going around pantsless after all. There's a great mall near here if you want to go shopping some time. So who were you talking to?"

"It was Rukia. She wants us to meet her at the metro station in an hour. She also wants to meet you and introduce you to Ichigo. From what I told her about you, she thinks the two of you will 'hit it off', as she says." Isane stated with a faint smile.

"Sounds like a plan then. By the way...well...I got you these also. You don't have to wear them if you don't want to. I just saw them and thought you might like them." Gondra mumbled, blushing a little bit as he placed several small gray skull shaped beads, with heart shaped eye sockets, in Isane's hand.

"They're for your braids." he added.

"Th...thank you! They're so cute." Isane stated, once again blushing.

"Glad you like them." Gondra said with a smile.

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As the two shinigami walked to the train station, Gondra recalled what he had heard about Ichigo. He was unbearably strong, having held his own against Zaraki and then defeating Captain Kuchiki after achieving bankai, in order to rescue Rukia. "This calls for a flashy entrance!"

"Good idea." Gondra muttered as he hid.

Rukia and Ichigo looked up to see Isane approaching as Gondra crept around the group without being detected.

"Isane!" Rukia called as she ran up and gave Isane a hug. Ichigo studied Isane's face as he asked,

"Have we met before?"

"She's one of the three lieutenants you knocked out when you were saving Rukia." Gondra called out coldly.

Ichigo, Rukia, and Isane all looked up to see him perched on a high railing, grinning down at them with a lit cigarette between his teeth.

"Who the hell are you?" Ichigo asked.

"Gondra Durden, fourth seat of Division eleven. Nice to meet you, substitute shinigami Ichigo Kurosaki." Gondra chimed as he jumped down. Ichigo turned to find Isane looking down. Self-consciously scratching the back of his head, he spoke,

"Sorry about back then."

"Its okay. You did what you had to." said Isane.

"Hey, Ichigo! Aren't you gonna introduce me to your friends?" a small stuffed animal asked as it popped out of Ichigo's backpack.

"What's with the weird looking puppet?" Gondra asked, eying at the thing skeptically.

"Go back inside, Kon." Ichigo ordered with an annoyed groan.

"Weird looking? What about you? You look like you were thrown up by a Hot Topic! You Emo or somethin'? And what are you grinning at?" the stuffed animal shouted angrily.

"I'm just trying to suppress the urge to throw you into a wood chipper." Gondra stated, giving the plushy an evil smile. With that the doll hid in Ichigo's backpack, posting a sign that read, 'No Emos Allowed'. It was true Gondra was dressed vary darkly with his Slipknot shirt and bondage pants.

"As you probably already know, Isane and I are here to provide backup to you and team Hitsugaya. Oh, and I'll be taking care of the hollows." he commented, ignoring the toy and his sign.

"That's okay. They can get pretty fierce around here so I'll deal with them." Ichigo replied. Gondra took the statement as an insult and stepped up to Ichigo, flaring his reiatsu wildly.

"Look, I'm not some weak shit shinigami like that loser with the afro that I'm replacing. I can handle them, so take a break and leave it to me, okay?" Ichigo nodded slowly as Gondra started to walk away with Isane in tow.

"Well, what do you think of him?" Rukia asked giving Ichigo a grin.

"He gives me the same vibe as that bastard Grimmjow." Ichigo complained. Rukia shuddered at the name and instinctively rubbed her abdomen where the arrancar had impaled her with his hand in their previous battle.

"Hey Ichigo, don't you think we should deal with them?" Gondra asked, pointing at the sky. Two seconds later Rukia, Isane and Gondra's soul pagers started beeping like crazy as Ichigo's combat pass screamed,

"Hollow! Hollow! Hollow!"

Gondra took a soul candy dispenser, with a scorpion etched upon it, out of his pocket and popped one of the pills into his mouth causing him to step out of his gigai. The gigai leaned against a nearby wall, taking a manga out of its back pocket, and began reading.

"Let's go, Ichigo. They're coming." Gondra called out. Just as Gondra finished his sentence, the sky tore open, to reveal two adjuchas. Ichigo tapped his combat pass on his forehead and separated from his human body. It landed with a thud on the pavement behind him.

Gondra and Ichigo ran up the side of a nearby skyscraper to face the adjuchas, who were waiting for them. The one on the left had large bat like wings and the one on the right had four long arms.

"I'll take the one on the left!" Gondra shouted as he drew his blade. As the two men reached the top, the hollows fired off two cero blasts. Ichigo shielded himself with his large cleaver as Gondra cut the other beam in half with one hand, sonidoing forward and stabbing his target between the eyes. The creature disintegrated with a loud shriek. Ichigo called out some sort of attack as a electric blue blast of energy shot out of his cleaver, killing the other hollow. With the two hollows dead, Ichigo and Gondra returned to there bodies. Rukia walked up to Gondra with an impressed look on her face.

"You took out an adjuchas without even releasing your shikai? Impressive." she said admiringly.

"Why, thank you, Rukia. I did learn how to fight from my captain, after all." Gondra stated with a grin not unlike Kenpachi's.

"Yeah, you do fight like him. You're like a Kenpachi Jr." Ichigo stated with a faint smirk.

"Is that the new model gigai? I thought Captain Kurotsuchi was keeping it under wraps? He wouldn't even let me see it." said Rukia as she eyed Gondra's fake body.

"I'll let you in on a little secret, Rukia. It's good to have a captain or two as your ally." Gondra chuckled.

"That guy has friends?" asked Ichigo.

With that Gondra and Rukia let out a laugh as the group separated; Gondra and Isane returning to the apartment and Rukia and Ichigo going to school. As Isane walked next to Gondra, she couldn't take her eyes off of him. This had been the first time she had seen him fight and she was amazed by his display of power. Gondra noticed her gaze and made eye contact with her causing her to yet again blush.

"You....you were amazing back there." Isane stated with a tremble in her voice." Gondra leaned forward planting a light kiss on her cheek as he said,

"Thanks, babe."

With a smile, he started to walk away while Isane stood, frozen, with a hand on her cheek.

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Sorry for the delay. Word crapped out on me so I'm using Open Office now. That was chapter eight. I would like to thank Rinda for beta'ing it for me. I'm trying to get Gokuss400 to beta the older chapters for your reading convenience. Thank you to all my fans for reading this fic. And please leave a review and spread the word. That's all for now.

-Sandragon out! Peace....