Chapter Eight
"Welcome, my fellow test subj-comrades!" Kurotsuchi happily greeted probably a nay bit enthusiastic.
On the other hand, the inspection crew did not look a bit interested. Terrified to be exact! Naori practically dove for cover behind Matsumoto, dreading for what was inside. Matsumoto even looked sufficiently scared and was backing off slowly. Of course, Hitsugaya was the one holding a pretty straight face, but even he wanted to get this thing done and over with.
"Captain Kurotsuchi! Stop messing around." Hitsugaya growled, effectively tearing off that maniacal grin off of the mad scientist's face. "Just show us what you have to show us and we'll be out of your hair immediately."
Kurotsuchi huffed, folded his arms, and removed all the nice decorations at the entrance. "I'm only giving you a little glimpse of my precious lab, enough to capture the essence of what I've been doing exactly over these years." Kurotsuchi quickly snapped his fingers and that prompted a sudden appearance of a certain emotionless lieutenant. "Nemu! Escort the Tenth Division inspection group through Entrance B. And-oh! Who's this?" His interests were visibly peaking high as he glanced past the three people gathered before him.
A man with bright red hair breezed by coupled with a little toddler with bright orange hair. He seemed quite surprised to bump into the inspection crew and she seemed quite ecstatic…at the least. On the other hand, Naori and Hitsugaya only shared a mere glance at each other before slowly sinking back to avoid the new pair's gazes.
"Auntie Nao! Uncle Shiro! Ran-chan!" Masaki happily greeted as she skipped towards them. "What are you doing here? I was grocery shopping with Pineapple Head!"
"Hey!"
Matsumoto gently smiled and gestured to the gates behind her. "Oh. We're just performing our inspections. Today is the Twelth Division's turn."
"Twelth Division?" Masaki turned her attention away and peered out through the gates. She saw nothing out of the ordinary. Everything in there looked exactly the same as any other division. She's heard stories of disgusting concoctions or secret experimentations in this area, but nothing seemed to be on the verge of an explosion at the moment. The captain, on the other hand, was such a strange fellow. He looked at her with such a gleeful smile that showed every single one of his teeth! How scary!
"Oh Masaki Kurosaki!" Kurotsuchi grinned at the oblivious child. "Would you like to take a trip down to my lab? It would be a great opportunity for such a rare speci-curious child like yourself."
Masaki cocked her head to the side. "Is it safe?"
"Of course it's safe! Nothing in my vicinity is going to harm such a rare child. I assure you that everything in my lab is perfectly child-friendly!"
Renji scoffed and crossed his arms. "I doubt it."
"Shut up you imbecile!" The mad scientist momentarily snapped before returning to friendly scientist. "Now how about I bring this group of individuals down now and you can see what I have to display."
Masaki innocently glanced up at Hitsugaya and Renji, expecting some sort of rejection. But Renji merely seemed skeptical as he gazed at the crazy scientist. On the other hand, Hitsugaya seemed to catch onto what Masaki wanted to ask. "You can come along." He reassured, earning a small smile from the child. But afterwards, he shot a glare up at Matsumoto and Naori, hinting both of them to watch out and be on guard. Both of them nodded.
Kurotsuchi clapped his hands, effectively gathering everybody's attention. "Now, before you enter, we need to take down some security precautions. Nemu!"
Out of nowhere, his silent lieutenant robot quickly appeared by his side with a tray of syringes and tubes. Before anyone can move, she was already dashing on her feet. Her quick hands fiddled gracefully with each needle, uncapping it, jabbing it into their arms, and recapping it. Dash and repeat. Dash and repeat. It was so simple, but yet so quick. Nobody could even feel a little needle protruding into his or her skin, except, of course, the youngest.
"Waahhh! It hurts!" Masaki bawled out loudly. Light streams of tears rolled down her puffy cheeks. Her free arm grasped onto her poked one and she quickly doubled forward, making Naori quickly dive down to catch her.
"Captain Kurotuchi! What was that for?" Hitsugaya angrily shouted out.
He merely shrugged. "I only took a small sample of your spiritual pressure. Once I enter it into our newly developed security system, you can freely walk around my lab without any worries of being potentially decimated. Of course this is necessary considering the amount of break-ins we've been having lately."
"Masaki-chan, it's okay. I healed it so it doesn't hurt anymore." Naori coaxed the child in her soft voice and placed that child back up onto her feet. But Masaki was still sniffling and trembling. "Maybe you're not ready for this. I can take you back home?"
"No Auntie Nao. I'm okay." Masaki weakly tried to smile back. That shot was so sudden that she practically broke down! She absolutely hated shots!
"Besides, you can't leave. I still need you for this inspection." Hitsugaya quietly whispered into her ear.
"Yeah, about that, why am I here with you? I thought only captains and lieutenants are able to conduct these inspections. Why bring me along?"
"Well…just in case Captain Kurotsuchi here tries anything suspicious. I'll have someone handy to conveniently cut off power." Hitsugaya smirked back.
A noticeable pink rose up to Naori's cheeks when he gazed at her and the frantic girl quickly looked away. "Idiot…"
Slowly, the group of newcomers began their frightening descent into the depths of such a horrid lab. The first couple of floors were not that bad. It was actually quite normal with desks, hallways, and light. But then they went deeper and the décor got a little more…elaborate. Oddly shaped creations were mounted on the pastel green walls. Odd tubes and pipes stuck out at weird angles. Even weird buttons and scanning screen appeared at random places, eerily buzzing off at random intervals. In the elevating darkness, Masaki occasionally felt chills rise up her spine and she frantically pressed herself against Renji who was carrying her. She couldn't see anything and could only here shuffles of feet across the floor. Even Naori felt a little frightened as she continued on. She sometimes finding herself holding onto Hitsugaya, not that he minded.
Soon, they found themselves at a door, which Kurotsuchi promptly opened after a couple of scans. Inside, they found tubes with bodies, specimens, and unidentified globs floating about and officers working their butts off at their respective stations. Nemu quickly went ahead and stood by a bunch of huge, pink tubes with humanoid bodies floating inside.
"This lab here is where we study our live specimens. In this aisle, we record their spiritual pressure data and in this aisle, we can make any necessary changes towards our independent variable. Over here-"
"Hold on." Hitsugaya suddenly said, walking forward towards the long aisle of pink tubes. "What is this? This seems familiar…"
"Ah that? That is nothing more than gigai research specimens." Kurotsuchi scoffed and hand waved it off.
"Kurotsuchi!" Hitsugaya glared back at the mad scientists. "That's not only gigai research. This is also reigai research! This is Project Spearhead! Why are you reopening such a dangerous project? Have you forgotten what this thing did to Soul Society years ago?"
"On the contrary, Captain Hitsugaya, I am not 'reopening' that disaster Project Spearhead. No. I am merely reinventing the concept of having reigai along with gigai. Allow me to explain!" With a dramatic flair of his hand, Kurotsuchi instantly opened up a huge screen in front of the group. "As you can see here, reigai is merely the exact same thing as a gigai except it works primarily in Soul Society. Inserting souls granted with immense spiritual power or an enhanced ability would change a reigai into a Mod Soul, which are the entities that had been causing us trouble. But there are other uses for reigai such as infiltration, training purposes, and of course, decoys."
Renji stepped forward, while still holding a trembling Masaki. "Captain Kurotsuchi. Are you sure you are able to do this project? Does Captain Commander Yamamoto know anything about this?"
The mad scientist merely smirked and from his coat, brandished out a freshly signed and stamped document. "Right here! He gave me legal permission to proceed."
"Well…he has permission, so I guess it is okay." Matsumoto remarked.
"No it's not!" Hitsugaya snapped at her. "How can you be so sure that this project won't go haywire and lead to another reigai rebellion?"
Kurotsuchi tilted his head to the side at the short captain as if telepathically asking if he wanted some sort of proof or reassurance. "Would you like to see a demonstration? Nemu! Bring out the samples!"
"Yes Captain Kurotsuchi", the emotionless woman nodded and silently walked over to a cabinet. With a couple buttons pressed and a retinal scan, the lieutenant grabbed hold of five different beakers and she placed each onto a separate pad on the counter. Her nimble fingers quickly fiddled around with the keyboards and random levers and buttons. "How much? Captain Kurotsuchi?" Her emerald eyes gazed back at the group.
"Ten percent should do."
"Yes Captain Kurotsuchi", she turned back around and typed some more.
"And what exactly are you doing now?" Hitsugaya suspiciously glared at the mad scientist.
"Ah! Captain Hitsugaya! As you can see, I have collected some leftover reigai for experimentation. I have discovered that a little spiritual pressure…"
Zoning out, the Tenth Division's little fifth seat paced away from the group around Kurotsuchi. Naori's golden eyes travelled from the blank screens of black to dimly lit lamps hanging from a high ceiling. When she felt her shoulder tap against glass, she finally stopped and took a long look closely. It was only a body, probably a reigai. She's seen many gigais in her life and she fought against reigais in that battle. She was quite fond with them so this one didn't scare her at all…
Did that mouth just twitch! Naori's eyes widened in surprise and she instinctively jumped a step back. Was she seeing things? Her clammy hands flew up to wipe her eyes, praying that the gigai was not moving on its own. Finding bravery in her soul, she glanced back up at the pink tube before her. Phew! It's back to normal again! She sighed, content and in relief, and prepared to walk away.
Tap. Tap.
Who did that? Is it moving again? Naori quickly whipped around…only to see a monster smirking down on her. The same blue hair, the same hairstyle, the same golden eyes, and the same pink lips, the same everything looking back down on her with a content little smile.
"Ahh!"
"Naori!" Hitsugaya quickly turned back. But he couldn't see her at all! She just exploded! Literally!
Naori quickly crouched down onto her knees and let all her explosive spiritual pressure do all the work. Test tubes and beakers exploded at her whim. Lights flickered on and off. Screens that were once black sizzled with intensity as the voltages of electricity swept by them. Wires flung around the whole place, dangerous if they ever touched the flowing pink liquid, with Naori stuck right in the middle.
"Captain Kurotsuchi! There's a disruption in data transfer." Nemu calmly reported.
"Captain Hitsugaya! Control your subordinate!" Captain Kurotsuchi angrily yelled.
Hitsugaya only gave him another icy glare before running after Naori. He could feel another wave of her spiritual pressure pulsating through the air like a bomb preparing to explode. He quickly reached out and grabbed her shoulder, pulling the young girl towards him close. "Calm down Naori! What's wrong?" He frantically asked in a worried tone.
"The tubes! The reigai! They're-They're…" She couldn't even talk and could only point.
His eyes travelled to where she pointed, but he saw nothing. He saw a couple of huge broken tubes with pink liquid flowing down like a waterfall. It seems she pierced these tubes in her whole freak out. But nothing was inside!
"Uncle Renji!" Masaki yelled, pointing at a figure nearby. "I saw him! He escaped from one of those tubes!"
"Got it!" Renji yelled back. He smirked at this figure trying to run away from him. What an idiot! This guy was too slow for his own good! And he probably chose the worse way of getting out! Straight through the front door, really? After only one single flash step, Renji already had this reigai tackled to the ground. His arm wrapped around the chest of this guy and his leg crossed with the other leg. In one swift move, the reigai hit the floor with a deafening clap, indicating that something was definitely broken. "All right, let's see who you are…me?"
"That reigai was Renji?" Matsumoto gasped.
Suddenly, everyone heard little cackles erupt from around the laboratory. Where did it come from? There was no source. Everything bounced back and forth between the walls of such a huge lab. Yet, out of the corner of her eye, Masaki was able to catch a couple people escaping from a window.
"Ran-chan. The other bad people escaped already." Masaki said, tugging onto Matsumoto's pants.
"Well…all I have to say is this 'me' is as good as dead." Renji remarked, letting his reigai copy fall to the floor in front of him.
"Hm…these reigai don't seem to stand well against physical attacks. Nemu! Write this down!"
"Yes Captain Kurotsuchi."
"Captain Kurotsuchi!" Hitsugaya demanded, walking right up to the mad scientist after calming down Naori. "Just what were you trying to do? What are those reigai? And why is Renji a reigai?"
"They were supposed to be demonstration. Remember I collected your spiritual pressure not too long ago. Well, I was going to use about ten percent to induce these reigai's to take your form, behavior, etc. Basically, I wanted to make a copy of you for a short time. That is…" His daggered eyes glared right at Naori, who flinched and turned away. "That is…until your little subordinate here messed up everything."
"My apologies…" Naori bowed her head.
"Whatever. What's done is done. It can't be helped." Hitsugaya then turned back to Kurotsuchi. "Are these things dangerous? Should I authorize our soldiers to hunt down and capture these reigai?"
"No need. No need. I specifically designed these reigai to not be so vengeful. They are merely there as tools for us to use. But then again, I don't know what personality they're going to take on initially. Besides, I only gave them ten percent of your spiritual pressure. Think of it as a battery. Once that ten percent is gone, they are just going to collapse and turn back into dolls."
"How long is that ten percent going to be?"
"Who knows?" Kurotsuchi shrugged. "One hour? Two hours? Three? I don't know. I didn't go that far in my research. But I would like my reigai back, so if you find any, collect them and give them back to me."
"Okay then." Hitsugaya nodded. "In the meantime, we should make sure no one is confusing us with any of the reigai. Let's designate places for each person to stay in so it's easier for us to recognize the reigai lurking around."
Renji quickly picked up Masaki, who protested along the way. "I'm bringing this kid back to her parents. It's too dangerous for her to be dealing with something like this."
"But Uncle Renji!" She started, only to be hushed.
"No buts!"
"Naori, you still have patrol duty today in Rukongai District One. You should be there and in the meantime, Matsumoto and I are going to stay inside the office to finish paperwork. If any of you see our copies walking around, quickly capture it and bring it back here."
"Yes sir!"
OoOoO
Hitsugaya gradually paced himself as he approached the office. Everything should be fine now! He shouldn't worry! He already informed every officer to be on guard for their doppelgangers. Matsumoto should be inside his office already, Masaki should be home with Ichigo and Rukia, and Naori should be lazing around somewhere in Rukongai. Everything should run smoothly! He thought this as he opened the door of his office…only to be greeted by his lieutenant working and someone still there.
"Oh hello Captain Hitsugaya", she answered with a blink of her golden eyes.
"Naori! You were supposed to be on patrol duty!" Hitsugaya exclaimed.
"I had to finish a couple documents first. Then I'll head out." Naori replied as she stood up from the coffee table in the room. "You look tired. How about a cup of tea?" She offered, holding up a steaming tall cup filled with green liquid.
He suspiciously eyed his subordinate, only to be met with her usual glance at him. That seemed normal. What about the tea? Was it poisoned? If this "Naori" was a reigai, was she deliberately trying to kill him? So far, he couldn't deduce that just from talking to her. But the tea…the tea was the answer… Oh well. There was only one way to find out.
Hitsugaya cautiously took the cup out of her hands and took a little sip. Nothing happened. He didn't feel a sharp pain rising to his chest. He didn't feel his throat close up. No weird tingling sensations sprung through his body. He only tasted tea, nothing more than simple green tea.
"It's good isn't it?" Naori asked with a small smile.
"Yeah…did you make this yourself?"
"Yeah!" Naori nodded.
Suddenly, the cup fell to the floor with the green liquid spilling out onto the wood. But that piece of china was not the only thing that hit the floor. Hitsugaya lunged out and grabbed onto his subordinate, twisting her arm behind her back and pinning her down onto the floor.
"Naori can't make tea." Hitsugaya proclaimed. "She may be a good cook, but she brews tea into sugary crap. You are not Naori. You are a reigai."
"Oh…so you've caught me." The reigai smirked. In one flash, this copy quickly flipped Hitsugaya when his guard was done and had him pinned down to the floor. "So…when are they coming by to pick me up?"
"Huh?" Confused, he made no move to fight back. What confused him even more was that she sat back comfortably, freeing him from under her, and was even waiting for him to rise!
"I asked you, Captain Hitsugaya, when are they coming to get me?"
"You're not going to try and escape? Fight? Take over?"
The golden-eyed reigai shook her head. "No. That's not my nature."
"Why?"
"All of us were programmed this way." She simply replied. "But not exactly. Why did stubborn old me let you take me down so easily? Why did Renji's reigai get captured first? Why hasn't Masaki bothered you yet? Why is Matsumoto doing her paperwork?" She nodded off at the lieutenant still working, which Hitsugaya just picked up on.
"Something must have gone wrong and it switched your personalities", he concluded. "It must have been that explosion that Naori created."
Naori's reigai nodded in response. "Exactly", she suddenly sighed and leaned back. "I didn't mean to frighten her so much. I just wanted to see her reaction if I moved just a little."
"Well you are Naori. You should know how she acts like. You are made out of her spiritual pressure." Hitsugaya replied back. "By the way, where is Matsumoto? She's supposed to be working here, not her reigai."
Suddenly, Matsumoto's reigai raised her head from her desk. "Lieutenant Matsumoto came in half an hour ago and she complimented on my work. She told me to keep it out and then she went drinking." She reported back before returning to paperwork once again.
As if out of instinct, his fist punched straight into the floor just like he would at his desk. "Damn that Matsumoto! Even using a situation like this to get out of work!"
Naori's reigai smiled at his pissed-off face and chuckled a little from his outburst. Her hand rose up to her lips, trying her best to stifle her small chuckles. But, even that was not worth it, she already caught the eye of the short-tempered captain.
"What's so funny?" He raised his eyebrow in question at this reigai.
Naori's reigai chuckled again before calming down a little. "It's just so funny. I wonder how my original can take this every day from you two."
"She doesn't. She only finds something like this dumb and repetitive." Hitsugaya corrected her. "Wow. You really are her exact opposite. Maybe I should just keep you and that Matsumoto reigai here. That should bring at least some peace and quiet in this mess of an office."
The reigai's face turned sullen and she gently reached out to touch his hand. "You wouldn't like that, would you? You'll miss her."
Surprised at her keen intuition, he quickly turned towards the reigai. "You…"
"I am the opposite of the real Naori. She's a little oblivious to these kinds of things. I'm not. I can learn so much about you just from your little actions…like your feelings for her for example…" She paused a little after watching his expression turn mellow.
For a long time, he didn't respond. He didn't know what to say. Should he confess outright to this fake? Should he keep it locked in as he always has? What to do? What to say?
"I may not be the real Naori, but I know her the best. I know that she will never know about your feelings unless you say something to her." Reigai Naori gently smiled as she said those words, tenderly holding onto his shaking hands. "I know I'm only just her reigai and I know I'm going to be taken away. But take these words of wisdom: Do not be afraid to tell her."
He curiously stared back as he firmly gripped back, signifying his promise and appreciation. "Do not be afraid." He repeated once more.
A familiar voice suddenly broke through the pristine silence. He could recognize this voice and he quickly pulled away from her copy. The reigai also noticed this voice and she merely smirked, calmly sitting back to watch this particular scene unfold before here. She did see them interact before in the lab but not like this, where it was them two, techniqcally, alone.
"Wait outside for a little while! I'll ask him to see what we're going to do about you. Captain Hitsugaya, I found your reigai! He's…" Naori quickly paused after stumbling upon them two. Her reigai could only return a questionable stare back while Hitsugaya was looking away with a red hue apparent on his cheeks. "Is my reigai trying to seduce you too?"
"What!"
The reigai's smile just cracked, watching the pair's argument unfold. Scratch that. This may take a while…
OoOoO
"I brought her back." Yu reported, carefully placing the body of a young child before him.
It was Masaki.
Her tiny eyes remained closed and her head rolled slightly on the pavement as she lied down. Her white kimono was slightly torn, probably from a scuffle earlier on. Long slithering arms crept up towards such a fragile child and touched her leg only for a split second. Its arm suddenly rose up and dove down, smacking into the child and turning her into nothing but dust.
"You fool!" It roared, shaking the entire hut. "You brought me a fake!"
Shinigami Cup
Naori leisurely relaxed on the couch while watching her captain trying to force Matsumoto back into working. Apparently, everything was sorted out nicely. All the reigai's made it back to Captain Kurotsuchi safely, except for Masaki, but he told them not to worry since her reigai was expendable. After that trouble, peace had returned into the Tenth Division office.
"Naori? How did you find my reigai?" Hitsugaya asked, sliding next to her.
"Well…I was preparing to go on my mission when I saw him standing there, watching me. I greeted him like I usually do to you, but then, he took my hands and started saying random stuff like my hands are so soft, my eyes are so gorgeous, and I have pretty lips. From then on, I could tell he was a fake." Naori recounted, not taking notice in the horror settling into her captain's face. "He wanted to go on patrol duty with me and he seemed harmless so I let him. I didn't know he would start flirting with every female we passed by. I wonder why your reigai's personality is like that though…is it maybe your suppressed personality?"
He rose up, glared down on her so hard that she was literally shrieking in fear. "Don't talk about this ever again!"
I think we can all come to a consensus here and say, "I loathe AP Bio with a burning passion!" and that's why I haven't updated this story in ages. I have chapters typed out and all, well in between my labs, and I just need time to edit. But, in the little time I have left, here's my chapter. Please read and review!