Soul Societies, part 2.
At the Goban-tai, Buford has just returned after having heard Amagai's rejected idea for a joint training exercise, which is noticed by Inose. "Aren't you a little late, sir?"
Buford scowls at him before lowering his hood and apologizing, then telling that Abarai-Fukutaichō and some weird kid with electric cords in his hair dragged him and that freakshow Kurotsuchi to the Kuchiki estate because Isane and Nemu were caught trespassing. "By the time i got there, the latter woman was eating half of a camera."
"...Must have to do with the SWA's photography scheme." Inose says aloud, and explains that he heard about it from Gori-san, who heard about it while he was doing laundry at the Yonban-tai. "Anyway, i also heard that both Kurotsuchi's lost to one of the ryoka... is that t-n-nevermind!" He wonders before being scowled at again by the taichō, who is still not enjoying either Isane's misadventure or the time she mentioned asking the aforementioned Quincy to make a shirt for her(1).
"Please; it's bad enough I'm expected to pay those chumps back for the favor they granted, but just now i had to grovel to the worst of them because of Zaraki's evil blob of frosting." Buford replied while pounding his desk with his head down and causing Inose to gain a sweatdrop.
"Sounds rough... you know how dangerous it is to say that about the nobility; especially since you were once within 24/7 reach of the second son of the Kyōraku clan." The acting fukutaichō warned. "But how is Kuchiki-taichō-sama the worst?"
Buford sighs before turning to him and replies. "Those people take all and give nothing. They display things that are nice to look at once in a while but they're otherwise useless. The Kuchiki clan is the worst.. since they don't fit the description."
Inose looked on speechless as Buford took his seat. The two then spent the next few hours working when a jigokuchō arrived.
At the same time that Yamamoto was turning down Amagai's request, Thao, who just barely escaped after watching Kuzuryū be killed by Kibune, was pondering what to do now when she heard somebody approaching. "Crap, i must have been too distracted." She told herself as she hid, only to find who it was. "No wonder i didn't sense him coming." She then said, rolling her eyes as Yamada-nanaseki walked by.
"Yeah, he might as well be a chipmunk, shouldn't he?" She heard from nearby, and jumped away to find that it's Yoruichi. "But i think i get what Suì-Fēng sees in him."
"Shunshin Yoruichi." She thought to herself as she took hold of her hybrid weapon, but hesitated. Thao knew from earlier... no, from long before then, what this woman, one of the living legends of the Soul Society is capable of, but also that she knew very little, which cost her the first move. "Suì-Fēng-taichō likes one of the dorks from Yonban-tai?" She asked as a stalling tactic.
"You'd be surprised; i remember this one time i teased her about Kisuke just before he was put in charge of the Juniban-tai." Yoruichi bragged. She was just as wary after having secretly observed the confrontation between Kira-fukutaichō and Kibune-sanseki that led her to suspect that the latter also doesn't have an ordinary Zanpakutō(2), but risk and her are old friends. "Atleast it's not like your obsession with you-know-who."
This remark set off a mix of clash and dash that went on for hours until a clacking noise was heard from back in the direction of the Seireitei that caused Yoruchi to glare at the captive Thao, but was soon enough convinced that the latter had nothing to do with it.
Back at the Goban-tai, the two rush out of the office, joining up with Aida and some others. "A-another bunch of Menos?!"/"How many this time?"/"What if Aizen sent Adjuchas this time?!"
"Hold it; we will find out when you calm down and check outside." Buford orders, and they follow him. Once joining Kanō, who is with the rest of the subordinates, it's clear something is off. "Goseki, report. What the hell is happening here." He demands with what's clearly not a question.
"I can't say much, Taichō. the watchtower guys keep yapping about Menos Grande; but there's no screaming or explosions, right? It has to be a false alarm."
Buford and the rest accept this as they all look around. "Maybe, maybe not." He says cryptically, then instructs Aida to take a group and head left. "Kanō, you're on the right. The rest of us will head forward. If it has a mask, kill it; do i make myself clear?"
"Yes sir."
And with that, the search is on... but all that's found is the Kyuban-tai. "Whose responsibility is this cluster-"
"Fukutaichō!" Hisagi hears, and demands the approaching group of shinigami identify themselves.
"Er, Goban-tai rokuseki, Aida Kenji. I-i take it you haven't located them either, Hisagi-fukutaichō?"
"Strangely enough, no. The update said the north-eastern sector, but there's been no reiatsu or noises outside the norm."
Buford and Inose, meanwhile, end up facing the Niban-tai. "Just when i thought this couldn't get worse, Ja-chan shows up."
"I have no time for wisecracks when i have either a Menos to destroy, or simply a scammer to arrest."
Buford then shrugs and frantically points to a balcony. "Inose, get up there. I don't care if it's a Menos, a flock of bats, or some jerk's lantern; just find something!" He ranted while stomping from one foot to the other.
Inose and everyone else sweatdropped at him before he nodded and used Bakudō 4 to scale the wall. He walked around the whole perimeter but just as he was leaning over, several Gillians popped-up. "Taichō, on your left! Five of them!"
After revealing to the other 9 taichōs that he arranged last night's ordeal, and hearing of the Sanban-tai's prowess throughout it, the Sōtaichō has Dang Thao summoned to his office, along with the previously mentioned nine, along with the Shihōin and Tsunayashiro clan heads. "Today's session will decide the fate of Dang Thao; former Goban-tai fukutaichō. You are charged with deserting the Goteijūsantai, assaulting a noblewoman of the Kuchiki clan... of whom circumstances prevent the attendance... and worst of all, being a willing instrument in the attempted murder of the Kasumiōji clan head." Yamamoto says, staring her down with both eyes. "Plead your case, Dang Thao."
"I... I am not guilty of any of that, Sōtaichō." Thao announces, having lost two/thirds of her sidelock to a shuriken, tied up with Yoruichi's over-shirt, dragged for miles, traumatized just as much as Kotetsu Kiyone at the sight of the Niban-tai taichō being humiliated, and then carried to the Ichiban-tai by Omaeda-fukutaichō. "While it's true that i was privy to Kumoi-sama's plot, the only person i have any intention of killing is Aizen Sōsuke." She says, not willing to admit she never paid attention to what Kumoi's first name is.
"You claim that, yet you still give an honorific to the pretender of a lesser's throne?" Tsunayashiro pointed out due to considering Thao's Zanpakutō, which unlike the one belonging to his clan, has to come into contact with an opponent to copy it, as a mockery.
"The Tsuyashiro clan head speaks out of turn. Okikiba-haya kisha, disregard his observation." Yamamoto declares, and turns his gaze from his sanseki, acting as stenographer, back to Thao.
Her former taichō spotted Tsunayashiro smirking obnoxiously. She, however, spotted Amagai glaring at her, which she knew as a warning not to say anything about the Bakkōtō project.
When the trial is eventually concluded, Thao is found guilty and indefinitely sentenced to level two of the Shin'ōchikadaikangoku. Escorted to a penal cart, she glances to Buford, who only tugs the tip of his hood down. She takes the hint as Hanatarō and another shinigami make their way past Unohana and Kuchiki. "Pardon us, taichō... a-and Kuchiki-taichō-sama."
Who he means by "us" is clear when she turns around. "Hinamori-senpai."
"Dang-san, how could you?" She asks the prisoner. "You were almost as duty-focused as i was."
"Please don't, fukutaichō, whatever you heard about me is wrong. I only-" Thao is saying before Amagai interrupts.
"I think we've all had enough drama these last few days, wouldn't you agree?" He asks rhetorically, and turns to Suì-Fēng, who orders the cart puller to move out.
Thao sent them all one last glare as she leaned against the back of the cage. "You'll see that this is a mistake! We have the chance to stop whatever Aizen betrayed us for; just take it!" She yelled at the crowd.
Days later, everyone's attention is on Ichigo, Rukia, and Kannogi Shū.
Thao's last statement is soon to prove true when Kiyone and Sentarō are racing to be the first to return from the Ashita Tora pharmacy while Ukitake is at the Ichiban-tai, only for something to knock Sentarō to the ground. "What the hell was that?"
"That was somebody just as bad at finding his way as his taichō." They hear from Hisagi on a nearby roof as Sentarō and Ikkaku both brush themselves off.
"You leave him out of this, paperboy... is what you wanted me to say, ain't it?!" He asks aloud before using his sheath to bust a chunk off the corner of the building under Hisagi.
The four of them then watch the recently escaped Thao walk out of the hole. "Pretend you didn't see me, and walk away." She requests coldly, but Ikkaku scoffs.
"Not sure how long you've been there, but you can't possibly think we'll be scared off by one wanna-be hired thug." Hisagi replies as he jumps down.
Thao kept staring at them before sighing, and raised a hand. "I warned you not to get in our way, shinigami." She replied, as a shadowy mass can be seen, out of which she pulled a human sized cobra with chrome scales... and, to the horror of her four enemies, several fleshy growths on it's body.
"Bankai..."
Shinigami Zukan.
In the Rukongai, Thao is lying unconscious near a waterfall when she hears a high pitched squeaking, and when her vision clears, she finds herself gawking at Yoruichi with only a hagoromo around her back, and Pendleton-taichō's daughter wearing a tacky looking happi(3) over her Shihakushō and carrying a poster-filled bag and an autograph sheet. "Jusanban-tai Dai-sanseki, Kotetsu Kiyone. I've been a fan of yours for ages. Please give me an autograph."
"The heck is this supposed to be; if it's Pendleton-taichō's scheme to get me out of the Niban-tai's cluches, I think I'll pass." Thao thinks to herself, when she hears a thud right next to her, and lets out several pings as she realizes that it's Suì-Fēng-taichō. "Crappity crap crap, i take it back!"
"It'll be a thousand years before you get a nude picture of me!" She then hears from Yoruichi.
Kiyone joined Thao in fright as Yoruichi began using the camera Suì-Fēng had for reasons unknown to the captive.
(1) This has to do with an event in a Bleach novel titled The Honey Dish Rhapsody.
(2) Unofficial. It's my opinion of where Yoruichi was doing in the first half of the Amagai arc.
(3) A type of Japanese jacket. I'm only assuming this is what Kiyone wore in that omake.