Title: Lily and Thistle
Author: paws_bells
Beta-ed by: MelissaRose85
Characters/Pairing: Sarugaki Hiyori and Hirako Shinji
Type: One-shot Collection (InComplete)
Genre: Romance/Humor
Word Count: 2063
Rating: T (Contains content not suitable for children)
Disclaimer: Bleach belongs to Kubo Tite.
Summary: 'Say Please'-verse. The language of flowers. The devoted and passionate Lily. The brave and loyal Thistle. A bouquet of love. One-shot series.
Created on: 12/08/13
Completed on: 13/08/13
Chapter Last Revised on: 12/09/13
How to Get Yourself a Date, Shinji Edition – Part I
They were down in the training area of the Vizard Warehouse, together with Hachi, Love and Lisa. The latter trio were staying put on the sidelines though, interested enough to pull away from their usual activities to come and observe the match.
Shinji and Hiyori stood at opposite ends of the expansive grounds, their stances loose but their postures alert, both facing each other. The Fifth Division Captain was in his full Shinigami uniform, his sword sheathed by his side, his hands relaxed and hidden by the long sleeves of his white haori. On the opposing side, his lover was dressed in her usual red tracksuit, the pants rolled up to her calves, her jacket unzipped and showing the white tank top that she wore underneath it, her own zanpakuto encased safely in its scabbard and slung unobtrusively over her back. She was all but vibrating with pent up excitement, and unlike his calm demeanor, was smirking with anticipation, her catlike eyes glowing eagerly at the prospect of the impending battle, the bloodthirsty little thing.
"I'm callin' the rules first," he told her, and she grunted impatiently for him to get on with it already.
"No cero 'ta be used indoors. We still want the warehouse in one piece after this. Everything else goes. Ya win if ya can force me 'ta pull on my mask. I win if I can outlast your attempt 'ta do so. Simple, right?"
Hiyori's eyes narrowed slightly. There was nothing remotely simple about fighting Shinji. In spite of his deceptively lighthearted and frivolous nature, the man was a brutally efficient killing machine out in the field – he had always been that way even back when they were all still seated officers in the Gotei 13, and his fearsome, well-honed fighting abilities had only gotten even more deadly and powerful over the century. Even though Shinji regularly let her smack him around, it was the truth that Hiyori had never won in a spar against her lover before, not even once, but that fact was not going to deter her from trying all the same.
"Friendly reminder that the loser will have 'ta do anything the winner wants for a day, no complainin'."
That had always been the tradition between them; in the past, it had been an incentive to get him off of his ass to fight her seriously, since according to him, she had sucked so badly at controlling her Inner Hollow during mock battles that sparring with her was about as exciting as stealing candy from a baby. He usually made her his gopher for the day though, back when they hadn't gotten together yet, and made her do things like run stupid errands or clean his room, so she wasn't particularly alarmed by his bringing up their usual agreement now. Still, if he thought that this was going to be another easy victory, he definitely had another think coming; she hadn't been training hard for the past year for nothing, and had every intention of making him earn every minute of her time as his free servant.
"Well, then, are ya ready 'ta go, brat?" he asked, signaling the start of the fight, and she promptly responded by flashing off in a swift burst of shunpo. He was somehow unsurprised when she crossed the distance between them in what seemed like the blink of an eye to launch a flying kick right at his head. He moved at the very last moment to avoid her attack, but she had already anticipated his reaction and adjusted her trajectory accordingly in midair, revealing an astonishing amount of aerial agility as she did so.
He immediately defended, knocking away her leg with the edge of his forearm only for her other knee to swing around almost instantaneously in an attempt catch the side of his temple in what would have been an concussion worthy collision. Shinji quickly fell backwards, pushing away to create distance between himself and his viciously offensive opponent so that she could not press her advantage any further – knowing her like he did, engaging her in unarmed combat at this point of the fight would be a really bad idea.
Hiyori had always been terrifyingly adept at hakuda; in a serious battle, there was no hesitation or doubt whatsoever in her movements as she threw everything she had at her target, hammering relentlessly at her foe's defenses like a battering ram until they caved to the sheer pressure of her forceful attacks. Her style was extremely erratic, opportunistic and crude; there was no fixed martial arts discipline that she adhered to and that made her attacks extremely unpredictable, especially since she fought like a dirty gutter rat and would seize every advantage available to exploit, all and any cheap shots included. Her small size also granted her impressive maneuverability and speed – she was a tiny whirlwind of flying fists and kicks – and together with her gritty, highly aggressive combat style, it gave her an undeniable edge over opponents who had never fought against her before.
But Shinji was definitely no stranger to Hiyori's simple but brutal strategies, as had crossed swords and sparred with her on numerous occasions over the last century alone, and was probably the most familiar with her various attacks and approaches out of anyone else. As such, he hardly batted an eye in response to her ferocious, right-in-your-face tactics that were specifically meant to rattle his composure and unnerve her opponents, and merely positioned himself subtly and pulled back even further to lure her right into an arrangement more advantageous to himself. Sure enough she followed after his retreating form unhesitatingly, landing on her feet briefly and then charging low right at him in a blur of fiery crimson.
He intercepted this time, moving in with a deceptively lazy, fluid ease and deliberately disrupting her momentum, catching her before she could deliver a vicious jab. There was considerable force behind each of her attacks, and simply weathering the hits was not an option with her enhanced strength and abilities, especially when her speed would not allow for any recovery time on his side and she would gleefully press her advantage and keep attacking until she had completely disabled him. Hiyori had no mercy for her opponents on the battlefield and was definitely the type who would continue to 'kick a man even when he's down,' so to speak. Shinji quickly grabbed her wrist in a firm, unyielding hold and used the remaining inertia of her fierce rush towards him to throw her forcefully away from him, and she swore loudly as she soared a distance away, though she recovered quickly enough, deftly flipping in midair before landing in a skidding crouch right in front of a small cliff face.
He was already making his move. Lifting his hand, a glowing bar of energy materialized as if summoned by his thoughts, and her eyes widened in recognition. Shit! He had her cornered!
"Bakudo Number Sixty Two: Hyapporankan!" He hurled the bluish white rod straight at her. Instantaneously, a hundred more just like it appeared and rained down on her in a dangerous hail of offensive spiritual energy, and her body tensed as she tracked and calculated the trajectories of the rods all aiming right at her. She quickly flickered out of sight, literally vanishing in an impressive burst of shunpo as she dodged every single one with breathtaking agility, literally running up the vertical cliff face to crouch defensively on its edge.
"Heh. You've gotten even faster," he commented approvingly with a small, amused grin as he looked up at her, and she hissed at him from her perch, watching him carefully and not taking her eyes off of him for even a single moment. His first attack had been a goddamn Kido spell with strength in the high sixties – as always, he was taking their fight seriously and she could not afford to fool around.
He seemed content to wait her out though – he was at an advantage in this aspect since she was the one who had to engage him in order for a chance to win this match, and sure enough, after a quick pause (she had never been a particularly patient individual), she was on the move once more, pushing off rashly from the cliff and taking to the air, leaping towards him in a single minded attempt to take him out.
He was quite surprised (and rather disappointed) that she was going for such a straightforward attack despite still being so far away. She was a sitting duck when airborne, and she really should know better than to let her emotions cloud her head so much, especially during a fight. The last time she lost her head in one, it had nearly cost her life, and he was not pleased that she seemed to have had completely forgotten that brutal lesson already. Shinji immediately moved to shut her down, calling forth another high level Kido spell to immobilize her, and like before, completely forgoing the incantation as he did so.
"Bakudo Number Sixty One: Rikujokoro."
This time, the glowing burst of light that shot out from his index finger immediately split into six wide yellow beams and shot straight towards Hiyori, each stabbing right into her middle and holding her in place before she could complete her attack. She froze immediately in midair, a look of frustration stuck on her face, and once he ascertained that the spell had completely taken hold of her, he made his way towards her slowly.
"Well, that was kinda anticlimactic," he deadpanned flatly, and even though she could not move, her glare seemed to intensify as their eyes met. "I told ya before not 'ta attack blindly, didn't I? You wanna admit defeat and call the match now-"
Before he could finish his sentence, she summoned her mask by sheer power of will. It was only a partial masking, her sclera bleeding black and the beginnings of the bone mask forming on the side of her head but leaving her face uncovered, and he tensed in surprise when it was enough to allow her to forcefully expel the restraining sheets of energy from her body and completely shatter the bonds of the powerful Kido spell, freeing her once again to fight. Her spiritual pressure shot sky high, and she wasted no time jumping back into action, chambering a powerful roundhouse kick and launching it right into the side of his face, unceremoniously punting him across half the length of the humongous training field with the force of her Hollow-enhanced strength.
Love pumped his fist from the sidelines. "Hooo! The lil' shit finally did it!" Granted, Shinji's Rikujokoro had not been at full strength since he had skipped the incantation, but it was still a breakthrough as far as Hiyori's personal growth was concerned – Kido spells ranked level sixty and above were near impossible to break by sheer physical force as a general rule of thumb.
Hachi smiled ruefully. "Looks like I'm going to have to upgrade the barriers again," he noted musingly to himself.
Hiyori's bloodlust went straight up, and Kubikiri Orochi was released from its sheath and clasped in her hand in the blink of an eye even as she shot after her momentarily downed lover, but he proved to be very resilient, recovering swiftly before she could further press him with her assault, launching to the skies in a swift flash of white to put space between them and take quick stock of the situation. He had genuinely been taken aback by Hiyori's improved abilities – her intensive training the last year had obviously bore fruit and she was a lot better than he had expected – his already throbbing jaw was certainly going to be paying for his mistaken oversight tomorrow, and it was a good thing that he had instinctively shielded himself with his reiatsu, or she probably would have taken his head clean off with that single ruthless attack.
The Gobantai Taichou pulled out Sakanade just in time to block Hiyori's quick, vicious strike from above. Their swords clashed with a fierce, jarring ring as his katana stopped hers in its track, holding perfectly steady despite the sheer force that she had put into her trademark Suikawari, and her eyes narrowed dangerously. She snarled.
"Buttegire, Kubikiri Orochi!"
::tsuzuku::
Questions That I Would Like To Answer Before You Ask:
So, this new arc will be the largest one so far, and will span 5 chapters in total (current one included). It's a 'date'-themed mini-series, and anyway, I'm hoping that some of you will enjoy this.
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I also hope that I managed to make the fight scene realistic. Hiyori's such a kickass little hellion, and I really enjoyed writing out her fighting style.
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Even though not much is known about Shinji's abilities right now, I feel that he would be at least proficient in Kido spells, since it seems to me like it might be a required specialty of the Fifth Division, and the Lieutenant and previous Captain are all at least experts in it. Not to mention, Kido spells seem to go very well with illusion-based zanpakuto in terms of tactics and fighting strategy.
By the way, the two spells that Shinji used in this chapter are also from canon-verse.
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According to Bleach Wiki, Suikawari (西瓜割; Japanese for "Watermelon Splitting") is one of Hiyori's trademark attacks. It basically entails her coming down with her sword upon an opponent. She used this technique to cleanly cut down through the head and mask of a Gillian with ease in the series.
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For those who are curious, this arc follows directly after 'The First Step Is Always the Hardest' (chapters 12 and 13) in terms of timeline and chronology.
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As always, thanks for reading!
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Your reviews fuel my passion for writing. So please leave a comment if you like this fic!
-paws