Shihoin Yoruichi was eight and bored at the family estate away from Seireitei.

An excursion into the town under the estate had her meeting a young boy in the most unexpected of ways.

tags: Shihoin Yoruichi & Urahara Kisuke, Shihoin Yoruichi, Urahara Kisuke, Original Character, first meeting, names

so, two things:

1. souls forgetting their lives upon getting to Soul Society is not canon (and canon says the exact contrary too) and I don't like that trope, so no, it's absolutely not normal what's happening with Kisuke here.

2. This is part of "The Hell Conundrum". Just know that I only take the first appearance of Hell in canon to build upon how that dimension is, because anything more is either not-canon (movie) or too open-ended to be able to speculate easily on it (the "last" chapter") so I decided i'd just do my own version. No, Hell isn't directly present in this OS. Yes, it still heavily relies on my Hell ideas.

Any OS relying on "The Hell Conundrum" will be marked HC in the title menu.

The boy of crimson soil

Yoruichi sighed deeply as she looked over Kuraitayotake, the 49th district of North Rukongai.

Her parents had dragged the young girl to the clan estate from Seireitei for the Quarter Celebration, and she was bored. None of the other family members were as young as her – the youngest after her was Nagisa from the second branch, and she was already forty-two, so – and Yoruichi would have rather stayed with Tessai back home, because even if he was a preceptor for kido, at least he had great ideas to entertain her. Even if Yoruichi didn't like kido that much – she preferred learning akuda and shunpo – she still liked her lessons with Tessai. He wasn't always there, because of his job within the Kido Corps, but she always looked forwards to seeing the young kido master again.

Had Tessai been here with her, they'd be working out how to make cool kido displays for the celebration – but he wasn't, because the only ones who could attend were Shihoin family members and their three following noble houses, the Todos, the Fengs and the Omaedas.

Every twenty-five years, the entire circus moved back to the Rukongai estate where the Shihoins lived when they didn't want to stay within Seireitei proper. There, they spent three months preparing a gigantic feast in celebration of the Great House's history and longevity, while the town underneath the estate – one of the few spots of relative wealth within Rukongai – made preparations for a festival – where Yoruichi certainly wouldn't be allowed to go, damn it...

Yoruichi had been there for one month already, and she didn't know what to do with her time. The preparations meant she didn't have lessons, her parents were busy helping her grandfather, the family head, with keeping track of everything, and she didn't have anyone to play with.

She wasn't allowed out of the estate, either, because this was Rukongai out there and the adults thought she was too young to wander around like she did in Seireitei.

Honestly. She was eight years old, not three.

Yoruichi sighed again and rolled over to look at the sky from the grassy garden.

There was absolutely nothing to do.

Maybe it was time to challenge her parents' boundaries – she was, after all, not supposed to wander around in Seireitei either, but that had never stopped her, had it?

Avoiding the servants wasn't that hard, as she made her way to the great entrance, but getting around Todo Honami's vigilance at the door itself asked for a bit more trickery. Nevertheless, Yoruichi grinned to herself when her father's cousin jumped around at the sound of a feeble explosion – all thanks to Tessai's patient teaching.

The girl was still young, but her natural reiatsu – the energy and pressure her spiritual power released when she wasn't forcing it one way or another – was high enough to be remarkable for anyone who knew what they were doing – like, say, shinigamis. Of course, Honami-san could read Yoruichi's presence without a problem for that very reason, and so she needed to conceal her reiatsu as well as possible.

Yoruichi wasn't yet good enough at that exercise to be entirely unnoticeable, but the kido from earlier would take most of Honami-san's focus for a little while, so she'd better scram if she wanted to see anything from the town below.

A few passersby blinked at her clothes when she ran down the very long stairs, but no one said anything. Shitansoku was a small city, nestled under the Shihoin estate up on Mt Kumori, and the inhabitants were used to having nobles from Seireitei and shinigamis passing by. It wasn't exactly safe to walk the streets alone – but with her reiatsu, Yoruichi wouldn't be armed even if a thug tried anything, not unless they had spiritual power too and knew how to use it.

Besides, if she ran away, they'd never catch up.

She wasn't scared.

oOo

Yoruichi had found a way to get to the lake to the East of the town, and now she was throwing pebbles in the water, watching them bounce a dozen times before finally sinking under.

Shitansoku was an interesting place, as far as those went – but it would probably be even better if she had someone to share the adventuring with. There was only so much admiring you could do without growing lonely.

Maybe she should try and see if some of the local children wanted to spend time with her, tomorrow. Mother would be furious, of course – but Mother was busy doing her duty by Grandfather's side.

...Yeah, she might snatch food from the kitchens and use it to get some of the locals' attention. It was unlikely that any of the kids there actually needed to eat – very few souls had any kind of spiritual power – but it didn't change the fact that eating something good was pleasant for them, and since their families didn't usually focus on food it would be an enticing gift.

Something like that might get her a few playmates, and the Shihoin Family could definitely afford it.

The children could show her around, and maybe they'd have ideas of games – the kind Yoruichi never played, because she had few friends her age, because she was a noble and not supposed to play around much – and she'd get them something in return. It would be good for everyone, and...

Yoruichi blinked.

The ground was moving, a few meters away from her. Bits of soil rumbled, as if something was pushing from underneath.

Yoruichi stared, curious, and a little bit dumbfounded.

...Was a mole going to emerge from the earth right under her eyes?

After a handful of minutes, a dirty-white color appeared where the ground was breaking apart. Something hard and curved shoveled the earth aside, opening a true hole around itself and revealing more dirt-caked white into a roundish form.

This was definitely no mole.

Yoruichi's eyes widened as she recognized the shoveling tool – a skull without the lower jaw, soil and blades of grass stuck in between the upper teeth.

At least it wasn't a skull-like mask, but a proper skull. At least it wasn't a weird hollow.

The girl hid once again her spiritual pressure and prepared herself to shunpo away, just in case. A little focus on her surroundings told her that reiatsu was coming from under the skull, that someone was using it to shovel the ground from below, no matter how ridiculous that sounded. It wasn't a hollow, no – it didn't exude the vaguely sickening pressure of hunger and rage.

If she hadn't been doing her utmost not to get noticed, Yoruichi would have let out a startled, maybe unsincere, laugh.

There was someone in the ground, using a human skull to get out.

The first thing she could see from the unknown person was a headful of blond hair, barely recognizable as such from all the earth that had fallen into it.

Yoruichi took a tentative step forwards, and yes...

The size of the head made it obvious – this was a child. Perhaps a bit younger than her, too.

Two grey eyes blinked wearily from under the blond hair – uh, European, definitely, even though Yoruichi was a bit unsure of what Europe was exactly, they hadn't yet started studying Living World geography yet – and the child didn't seem to notice her quite yet.

The child tiredly pulled himself out of his hole, squinting painfully with the sunlight glaring at him after – Yoruichi had no idea how much – a long time hidden in the depths of the earth.

It was a boy wearing bright red clothes with darker red sections, all of it drenched in dry brown earth – but still visible, still garnet and crimson and scarlet. Yoruichi found that it looked a bit like a kimono, but not quite.

When souls arrived into Soul Society from the Living World, something in their brain switched without them even noticing to use and understand Japanese rather than their maternal language – it had something to do with the Soul King being from around what would later become Japan, but Yoruichi would be hard pressed to explain why exactly. They didn't forget their language and culture, of course not, but things pushed them to adapt to Soul Society rather than bring their old world into it.

Everyone who got brought to a field of arrival by a shinigami, for example, ended up there in a simple kimono, even if their ghost had been wearing other clothes before.

You only saw non-japanese clothes during festivals across Rukongai, in the villages and towns with a concentration of a certain ethnicity and enough wealth to actually afford festivities – Shitansoku had an Indian Festival in March, and a Chinese Festival in October.

Yoruichi had absolutely no idea where the kid came from or where he'd gotten those clothes.

Or why he was appearing out of a hole as if a mole, with a skull for a shovel.

The boy closed his eyes and took a deep breath of air, letting go of the skull that rolled down the ground and into the nearby lake.

Yoruichi lost any kind of apprehension at the sight.

"...Did you dig all the way from the town?"

The boy jumped at her voice, finally noticing her.

He stared at her for a moment, mouth agape – but didn't answer, rather looking all around him once he finally registered her presence, as if he'd never seen anything quite like the meadow or the lake or the city or the estate or the mountain up above them.

The boy bent down to touch the grass – and stopped for a moment, staring at something instead. His own arm, perhaps, though Yoruichi wasn't sure why he would. Maybe because of the earth all over his clothes and skin?

A small, uncertain smile drew itself on his face, and his eyes started shining with curiosity and absolute glee.

The boy finally looked back at Yoruichi – and something about his face made her feel a bit weird, as if there was a secret there to discover, something worth hiding – and asked:

"This is Soul Society, right?"

oOo

Yoruichi strode up confidently to the main entrance, determined not to let the bafflement and disapprobation she'd get when the guards would realize she'd gone out get in her way. She had a goal – and a boy roughly seven years old still half covered in dirt following in her steps – and wouldn't let anything get in her way.

The girl waved as soon as she recognized her father's cousin sitting by the gates:

"Honami-san!"

The woman rose quickly and ran their way, a scowl on her face.

"Yoruichi-sama! Where did you...!"

Yoruichi didn't let Honami-san finish, rather turning around and grabbing the boy's right hand, getting his attention back at the same time – he'd look around any time something new appeared, taking absolutely everything in, and if Yoruichi hadn't decided she'd bring him back with her, he'd probably still be by the lake examining everything there.

The boy blinked at her before addressing a polite – but a bit awkward, as if he wasn't certain this was what he was supposed to do – look at the adult who'd joined them.

"Hello."

Before Honami-san could ask anything about the strange boy, Yoruichi offered her a large smile:

"I'm keeping him! He just got there and doesn't have parents in Soul Society, and he has reiatsu so he needs to eat! And I want a friend my age!"

The boy blinked at her – both in wonderment and in awareness that Yoruichi wasn't saying everything there.

Honami-san looked like she knew it too, if the way she squinted at the boy's clothes and at Yoruichi's smile was anything to go by.

"Yoruichi-sama, this district's field of arrival is several days away. I doubt your... friend... just got in Soul Society."

"Uhm, I..."

Yoruichi slammed her hand against the boy's mouth. There was absolutely no way she wouldn't keep a boy who'd emerged from the soil as if a mole, no matter how weird it all was – especially because of how weird the situation seemed to be.

"He has reiatsu and needs to eat and I want a friend!"

Honami-san kept silent for a moment – but by the time more guards came over, she was sighing deeply and gesturing for them both to follow.

"You'll have to ask your grandfather, Yoruichi-sama. Still, I suppose it wouldn't hurt to let the boy bathe and get new clothes. Something simple, red if you want, too... Ah, what's your name, boy...?"

Yoruichi beamed for a moment – then realized that she hadn't thought of asking, either.

She turned curious eyes onto the boy, whose smile had taken an uneasy tilt.

"I, ah... I like green better, actually."

Honami-san frowned at his clothes, there, and threw one more glance Yoruichi's way. The girl wasn't quite sure why, though she guessed such bright clothes didn't look like something you'd get randomly, looking for something – anything – to wear, so perhaps it was a bit weird that the boy wouldn't have taken his preferred color instead, and...

Wait a minute.

"Hey, Honami-san asked you your name, you know!"

The boy looked away for a moment.

Yoruichi made a face.

"Come on, I'm not going to call you 'the boy' forever, you know."

"It's not... I mean, names are for people who... I don't have one."

"Uh?"

Honami-san put a hand on Yoruichi's shoulder before she could ask for more – and the girl guessed it was one of those things she wasn't old enough to understand without having lived through it.

The woman's frown was a bit different from before, now.

"Didn't your parents give you one, then? Or... wasn't there anyone to call you?"

The boy wavered, but forced himself to look at them, both Yoruichi and Honami-san.

"No, I, uh... Mother and Dad didn't have names either. Not... not the way you guys do, I guess? So... They just called me 'son'. And it's alright, I don't need a name, I..."

"Well that's stupid!"

"Yoruichi-sama!"

The girl had absolutely no idea what kind of people didn't have names, but of course the boy needed one. How else would she call out to her future friend, if not?

Yoruichi took a moment to look him over – half-caked in dirt, blond and grey-eyed and just slightly younger than her, delighted with everything he saw and at the same time ill-at-ease whenever he had to interact with someone, as if he felt he didn't belong there. She'd found him by the lake, right next to a very small beach, and...

"Alright. Kisuke. You're Kisuke, now. And for a family name, I think Urahara will do. Urahara Kisuke. It's a nice name, and you're damn well going to accept that gift, Kisuke."

Kisuke blinked at her, his smile gone and replaced by a puzzled look.

"Don't... Yoruichi-sama, don't you think it's a bit... Do you decide everything alone like that, or..."

The girl huffed and turned to her father's cousin.

"Nope. You're Kisuke now, deal with it. And don't call me Yoruichi-sama, I've decided you're going to be my friend, so no niceties, just call me Yoruichi too! And Honami-san, take care of my friend, I'll go and look for Grandfather, I need to tell him that I've found a friend and I'm keeping him."

On those words, Yoruichi disappeared inside the compound, leaving the adult woman and the boy behind – she had to make it obvious that she was keeping Kisuke and the rest of the family had no say on the matter.

It wasn't much of a stretch, anyway. Taking in orphans with spiritual power until they could choose to go to Shin'o or go back to live in Rukongai wasn't unheard of – and if usually that was something the lower houses did and not the Great Houses, well.

Shihoin Yoruichi didn't care.