• • •

"Morning, Orihime, Tatsuki~!" I greeted, covering my mouth slightly as I let out a small yawn. I was still a little tired from the whole 'Chasing Chad Around' fiasco yesterday, and me not being able to sleep well at night didn't help either.

"Ah, good morning to you too, Jun-Chan!" Orihime returned my greeting with a cheerful smile. Tatsuki just nodded in return; I understood that she wasn't a morning person either. "Oh, do you know what's wrong with Kurosaki-Kun?"

I blinked at the eagerness of Orihime's question. Why on Earth would Orihime think I would be the first to know if there was something wrong with Kurosaki..?

"What are you talking about?" I asked, opting for the lazy question.

"Well, it's just that he had to be taken to the nurse's office by Kuchiki-San earlier this morning. Kurosaki-Kun didn't look that good, either. He was all pale and Kuchiki-San was literally dragging him away." Orihime answered.

Ahh. Rukia must have punched Kurosaki. She did have a pretty killer punch when she concentrated. Knowing Rukia, she probably had something private to talk to him about and did that to get him away from normal humans.

"Hm, I dunno." I spoke, and then decided to hopefully change the topic. "I'm just glad that it's getting warmer! Pretty soon we get to wear our summer uniforms, ne? I personally think that they're much better."

Orihime happily nodded, following the change of topic directly. "They're much better in the warmer weather. We'd die if we had to wear our long-sleeved tops! Besides, this means that summer vacation isn't too far off..!"

"Mhm!" I nodded. "I can't wait to go to the fireworks festival that I've heard so much about! I don't think that I've been to one before… At least, not after I was about four or five…" I explained, only to gasp as my phone went off.

"It's not good for your phone to be left on like that." Orihime advised, as she pointed to the phone that was now in my hands. "If it goes off when a teacher is instructing they can take it away."

"Thanks for the tip. I just didn't know that I'd left it on." I said, lightly scratching the back of my teased hair as I chuckled. It felt weird being lectured by the biggest ditz in the class.

However, my phone beeped again; only once this time, which indicated that I had received a text message. I looked down at the flashing envelop picture and clicked 'Open new message.'

Don't worry about this one.

We've got it covered.

-Rukia

Good for you, Rukia. You get to go and help Kurosaki slay a Hollow; all the while I'm stuck here in this torture chamber. All I know is that you both had better make it back quick. It's unusually boring without Rukia and Kurosaki here…

• • •

Lucky for me, lunch seemed to come around unusually fast. However, you wouldn't spot me complaining. Lunch meant no more boring lectures and being assigned busy work and homework later.

Although, I was a bit surprised. Rukia and Kurosaki were still gone. I couldn't sense their reiatsu nearby either. That had to mean that they were still out and about. But I knew that if Rukia and Kurosaki needed help they'd let me know. So I would just have to wait for their return and question them about it later.

"Yaaay~! It's lunch!" Orihime cheered, tossing her arms into the air.

"Not again," Tatsuki lightly whined. "It's just lunch, so calm down!"

"Tatsuki's right." I nodded, "I don't see why you like lunch so much anyways."

"What are you two talking about, Tatsuki-Chan, Jun-Chan?!" Orihime asked, wide eyed. "Normal high school girls only come to school for lunch!" She explained and struck a pose which she so humbly called her 'Lunch Eating Pose!'

"Alright, alright." Tatsuki spoke, rolling her eyes.

"Come on, Orihime. Let's go ahead and sit down." I said, gesturing to the group of girls that had already formed a semi-circle to eat.

"What are your guy's lunches?" Orihime asked. "Mine's bread and honey~!"

My eyes widened at the size of the loaf of bread that Orihime managed to pull out of her lunch bag.

Tatsuki lightly laughed, patting the top of her auburn head. "Good, good. Unfortunately, mine is only a normal lunch."

"I only have a normal lunch, too." I added in, watching as Tatsuki moved our desks closer together so we could sit and enjoy our lunch.

"Hime~! Let's eat together!" Chizuru called out, holding her lunch.

"Yeah, okay!" Orihime responded, believing the lie 'the more the merrier.'

"So cute~!" Chizuru squealed as she glomped Orihime. "Eating a whole loaf of bread and smiling with crumbs on her mouth! A normal person can't replicate this cuteness! This is the girl that captured my heart~! In many ways, I want to eat you!"

"Chizuru!" Tatsuki yelled, eyes wide as she slammed her hands down on her desk. "Not during lunch!"

Tatsuki continued to threaten Chizuru, and I was secretly rooting for Tatsuki to just punch her already. Frankly, Chizuru frightened me. She was just…creepy!

However, it was during the middle of their creepy argument that Orihime stood up and ran over to one of the open windows in the classroom. She was attempting to jump out! It was a good thing that Tatsuki was able to rush over to her side and stop her. Otherwise she would have probably fallen to her death. After all, our class was located on the third floor. It wouldn't be easy to survive a fall from such a height.

"What the matter, Orihime?" I asked as Tatsuki continued to try and restrain her from jumping out of the window.

"I smelled Kurosaki-Kun!" Orihime explained, breathing in and out through her nose like a dog.

"Smelled?" Tatsuki asked, rolling her eyes. "What are you, a dog?"

"Plus this is the third floor. Even if you did manage to smell him, he couldn't possibly come through the window." I explained, trying to reason with her. However, I could see that I was clearly wrong, "WHA?!"

Kurosaki had managed to jump up to the third floor window! I mean, he had appeared out of nowhere and just jumped to the top of the window sill! That could not be humanly possible..!

"This is Class 1-3, isn't it?"

The whole entire classroom erupted into screams. And I'm not trying to exaggerate. I'm serious when I said that everyone screamed; well, if you exclude Orihime, Tatsuki, and I. We were all in too much shock to scream.

Tatsuki's arms quickly locked around Orihime's and my neck, as she ran backwards to put more distance between us and Kurosaki. "Y-You! How'd you get up here?!"

"How?" Kurosaki questioned. "Didn't you see it? I jumped up. Are you surprised?" It was quiet for a few moments, and I was calculating in my brain. I knew that this couldn't be the same Kurosaki. Something had to have happened. "It's amazing, right? You're surprised, right?"

While I was lost in my thoughts, he was gazing across the classroom. His gaze landed on the three of us, and before I could even blink, he had jumped again!

This time, however, he landed on the desk right in front of the three of us.

"Pleasure to meet you, pretty lady. Would you please tell me your name?" The imposter Kurosaki asked, lightly taking Orihime's hand and kissing it like a gentleman would do.

"What do you think you're doing, Kurosaki?!" I yelled, forcibly pulling him away from Orihime. "This isn't funny! Get away from Orihime right now!"

While I was yelling at him and forcing him to slightly retreat, Tatsuki grabbed Orihime and forced her further back and out of the way. I scowled at the strawberry, wondering what was up. I mean, did he hit his head really hard against that Hollow he was supposed to take care of? If not, then none of this made any sense..!

"You know," Kurosaki began, his deep cinnamon hued eyes zooming all around my face before locking with my own bright blue eyes. "From close up you're really pretty, too. Especially when you get mad. Your cheeks flush."

"Huh?" I asked, feeling my eyes widen. What did he just say..?

"It's true!" He spoke, as his large hands quickly grabbed mine. He tugged my hands away from their previous position where they had been sitting on my hips. When he locked my small hands in his larger ones, he gently tugged me so that I was forced closer to him.

I gasped; I couldn't get my hands out of his..! He was way too strong for me to fight back. He tugged once more, causing me to lose my balance and trip, lightly landing on his firm chest.

I felt my eyes widen as my forehead hit his chest. I hadn't realized how much shorter than him I was. I did the only logical thing and looked up at him. It took my brain a while to process the fact that his eyes were moving closer to mine. I was frozen as the tip of his nose softly grazed against my own. His lips were still moving even closer.

The next thing I felt were his lips lightly grazing against my own, causing my knees to almost give out; which, I'm sure they would have if he wasn't still holding me firmly to his chest.

"DIE!" Tatsuki screeched, picking up a desk and holding it up above her head. Her eyes were literally burning holes into Kurosaki's face; I don't think that I'd ever seen her that mad. However, it did do the trick of making my brain restart itself, and I was finally able to jog my thoughts.

Before I knew it, Tatsuki released the desk, chucking it straight towards us. It was aimed more at the Kurosaki impersonator, though.

"Whoa! Watch out!" The imposter strawberry yelled as he tucked me under his arm and jumped out of the way of the oncoming desk. Not only did he save himself, but he saved me as well. "I didn't do anything to you!"

As Tatsuki threw another desk, this one missing and going through the window, it was able to distract him enough for me to slip out of his grip and run over towards Tatsuki. I could feel my cheeks burning, and I was breathing heavily. Throughout that whole experience I don't think that I ever once breathed. No wonder I couldn't think around him, my brain was deprived of oxygen..! That was the only logical explanation.

"Shut up!" Tatsuki roared, firmly stepping in front of me to block me from his view. "You went after Orihime and Jun! And you kissed them!"

Tatsuki seemed to have enough of this and stopped throwing desks at him. This time, she ran towards him and tried to land a few punches..!

"That's enough!"

I blinked. I recognized that voice.

Rukia slammed open the classroom door, observing what was going on. The 'Imposter' Kurosaki's face showed surprise, as his eyes dramatically widened. It was almost as if he was scared of Rukia! He took off running towards the windows, because Rukia was blocking the only exit.

As the imposter ran towards the windows, he sent many of the upturned desks flying in his hurry.

"There he goes, Ichigo!" Rukia exclaimed, causing me to quickly turn my gaze towards the windows. The real Kurosaki, in his Shinigami form, had just jumped through the window. However, he didn't have much luck in catching his body, because whatever it was that was in his body was faster than he was. The imposter jumped right next to Kurosaki and leapt through the window..!

"Wha?! Wait a second! Jumping down from here..! Just whose body do you think that is?!" The real Kurosaki yelled, watching in horror as his body flew towards the ground from the third floor.

Rukia and I shared a glance, before running towards the window. We were just lucky that nobody else in the classroom had a high enough spiritual pressure where they could see the real Kurosaki.

"W-What's going on!?" Kurosaki muttered, looking down at his body. Whatever was in it had landed safely and had taken off with a running head start. "What in the world is he..?"

"Could he be..? Yes, there's no doubt about it. He is a mod-soul!" Rukia muttered as we watched it run off.

"I don't care what he is." I muttered crossly as I quickly withdrew my soul candy from my pocket and popped it into my mouth. Paku took over my body as my soul came out. "We're going after him. Paku, stay away from all of the others. Don't let them ask you any questions, got it? It'd probably be better if you hid out in the nurse's office and claimed that you didn't feel well."

"Yes, Jun-Sama~!" Paku saluted, running behind us all into hallway. We parted ways when she went into the nurse's office, my body still looking quite flushed from the incident before. Paku should have no trouble convincing the nurse that she didn't feel well.

Bursting through the schools doors, we looked around for any sign of Kurosaki's bright orange head of hair. However, we couldn't find a trace of the color anywhere.

"Ah! Damn it! We lost him!" Kurosaki cursed, frantically looking around. "I lost myself!"

"That's a paradox." Rukia pointed out, crossing her arms as she corrected Kurosaki's speech.

"It's no time for complicated jokes! We have to hurry up and catch me… I mean, him…!" Kurosaki exclaimed, pointing an accusing finger at Rukia.

"This is confusing." Rukia muttered, slightly rolling her eyes at Kurosaki's antics.

"You heard that too, right? The trouble in the classroom…" Kurosaki muttered, his eyes downcast with a dark aura around him. "I…err…he… used my body and… with Inoue and Jun… he ki-ki-ki-"

"Seemed like he kissed them." Rukia finished his statement, seeing as how he wasn't even able to stop stuttering the word 'kissed.'

My face felt hot as I remembered that encounter.

"Aww! Don't say that; it's embarrassing..!" Kurosaki bellowed, only to meet my gaze and flush and look away.

"Pft." Rukia exhaled, crossing her arms again. "Locking lips is nothing. They say that young people have no morals these days. Locking lips is like saying hello. At least, that's what I read in a magazine the other day."

"Idiot..!" I yelled, crashing my knuckles against the back of Rukia's head as my eyes widened. "Besides, what kind of magazines have you been reading?! It's definitely not normal to just suddenly kiss fellow classmates!"

Kurosaki's cinnamon eyes studied my pink face, only causing his own face to turn a deep red. Seriously, his face could have rivaled his namesake; those strawberries probably would have been jealous. He blinked, eyes widening at a sudden realization. His hands dove into his bright orange locks as he pulled on his roots. He spun around, cowering like he was in a dark corner. "Maaan..! The solid image that I have been building over the years… How can I show my face at school tomorrow..?!"

Rukia and I turned towards each other with questioning gazes. I shook my head. "That's one sucky image." Rukia nodded in agreement.

"Wait…" Kurosaki spoke, as he slowly retracted his hands and stood up with his back still facing us. "You called him a… 'Mod-Soul', didn't you? What is that?"

I was clueless on this one; when I was admitted into the Academy they only enrolled me in the so called 'action' classes. I learned swordsmanship, Kido spells, how to control my reiatsu… Basically, I learned only the hands on stuff. I was never allowed to take the courses that taught the Soul Society's history.

"Once, Soul Society had an operation called 'Spearhead.'" Rukia began.

"Spearhead?" Kurosaki asked.

"Yeah," Rukia nodded. I blinked as she seemed to pull her sketchbook from thin air, trying to explain it with the help of her drawings. "To insert souls created for combat into dead human bodies that lost their souls. Then use that as a soldier to fight Hollows. It was a foolish plan."

"What?" I asked, blinking. This was news to me.

"It was then that they were created… Battle type artificial spirits that, depending on which one is used, strengthens one part of the body to superhuman levels. That's a 'Mod-Soul.'" Rukia paused in her speech for a moment, pointing to her drawings. I swear, they were as bad as her other ones, which wasn't saying much. They were about the only thing that could make this serious situation actually seem comical. "From what I saw, he seemed to have enhanced leg strength. He would be called an 'Under-Pod' type."

"So," Kurosaki asked, "One of the guys created for that operation escaped, then?"

"That's the problem. It turns out that 'Spearhead,' and its distasteful plan to make corpses fight, was canceled before it was put into place. With the cancelation order, all 'Mod-Souls' that were already created were ordered to be destroyed, but… It seems some escaped and still exist."

"Hold on. That means what? He… Was created for the convenience of your Soul Society, and he'll be killed for Soul Society's convenience too?" Kurosaki asked, looking stunned.

"That's the gist of it." Rukia murmured, not being able to fully meet his heated gaze.

"Wait, you mean that you're satisfied with that?" I asked, furrowing my eyebrows. I didn't think that this was like Rukia; she seemed like someone who would care for the Mod-Souls, not someone who wouldn't care for their ordered death. However, this struck me hard. This story seemed awfully familiar to me…as if I'd heard it before.

"Satisfied or not, that's not relevant." Rukia answered, turning her back on us. "The Mod-Souls must be destroyed! That is a rule of the Soul Society! And don't forget! The rules of Soul Society are created to protect you human spirits!"

My glare hardened as I switched my gaze from Rukia to a nearby building. That's why this story sounded familiar. It was the same one that I'd heard from my Mother's side of the family.

'To protect the human spirits…'

Yeah, right. Like I'd believe that for a second.

It was probably all a cover up act for something that they weren't sure would work out perfectly. That sounds much more like something the Soul Society would do.

"Now, let's go!" Rukia commanded. "You want your body back, right?!"

"I call dibs on him first. When I get through with him, he's gonna wish that he was never born..!" I exclaimed, my glare hardening.

Of course, I couldn't really hurt that Mod-Soul after hearing that story. We were too much the same. But that didn't mean that I would let his little act go without punishment.

Kurosaki turned scarlet while Rukia darkly chuckled.

"I don't know what you're laughing at. It wasn't funny. After we teach him a lesson, I'm going home and taking a long, hot shower..! I feel the need to scrub my skin off." I said, crossing my arms and huffing as my cheeks felt warmer all of a sudden. Memories of him holding my close resurfaced in my mind, making me shiver all over again.

Kurosaki heard my statement and sent a heated glare my way. "Hey! There's nothing wrong with me!"

"Oh, yeah? Well, I thought I was going to die!" I argued back, feeling argumentative.

"You two are so immature. Yet, you fight like an old married couple." Rukia said, looking back at us with knowing violet eyes.

"Do not~!" We both shouted at the same time. Our heads sharply turned to the other as we glared. Kurosaki had to look down, while I had to look up, craning my neck. We held each other's glare, matching it with our own, and then simultaneously looked away. With a huff, we both crossed our arms and walked off in silence.

Okay… Maybe we did fight like an old married couple.

But, I'd be the one begging for a divorce…right?

The truth was, I just didn't know after the incident that occurred earlier.

That's what scared me the most.