Tumgik
#fuck yeah captain rukia folks
nonoakimbo · 2 years
Text
I finished reading Bleach for the first time. THIS POST WILL HAVE SPOILERS!
Idk why, but based on how people talk I was expecting it to be a lot worse. I thoroughly enjoyed it all the way through! I do have my complaints, but it’s important to note that the series was really fucking good.
One thing that’s NOT a complaint is the ending. Kubo was forced to rush it, so all things considered I think it went about as well as it could’ve.
Some things didn’t make sense. I loved the Fullbringer Arc but bringing them back for a 30 second cameo during the TYBW was weird as hell and had no explanation as to how they even got there. Grimmjow coming back for one exchange seemed kinda pointless. Wtf happened to Hallibel? How/why did Aizen get put back into his restraints after fighting Ywach? Ywach’s powers were super busted and left Kubo no choice but to introduce a literal Quincy-Kryptonite that was never talked about before. The Valkyrie fight felt like an endless cycle of “But wait! There’s more!” The fan service in the entire series is off the charts.
But I think the complaint that might anger some folks is that I don’t like Rukia. More specifically, Rukia served no function in the story outside of the inciting incident. She kicks off the story, immediately becomes a damsel in distress, and from then on attempts to be relevant but never actually does. And what’s more annoying is that she is constantly rewarded and promoted throughout the series, but on what merit? What did she ever do to earn these advancements? It always felt forced. Bleach has some really good women, but Rukia isn’t one of them.
I do wanna highlight some great things though. Chad is unironically one of the best characters in the series. Not only are his powers awesome, he’s never fully left behind in the power scaling. Like yeah of course he’s not on Ichigo’s level, but he’s scaled up enough to participate and have cool fights (TYBW not withstanding). And the Fullbringer Arc did wonders for him. The thing he has pride in is his skin? Fuck yeah, Kubo! Uryu was also a good character. I wish his conflictions and thought processes were more fleshed out in the TYBW but he was still great. All of the captains were great characters, Byakuya getting the award for Most Improved Character. Still love Kenpachi after all these years, Kurotsuchi was a new loved character for me. Some assistant captains could’ve been shown off better but overall they served their purposes in the story (I am mad we never got to see Hisagi’s Bankai but joking about it at the end was funny).
Overall, fucking loved Bleach and I’m excited to see the TYBW animated
5 notes · View notes
marionfantasy · 3 years
Text
me: maybe i should try and get captain rukia
me about to get a gold unit instead of a rare:
orihime : not today bitches i reject
captain rukia appearing:
me:
me: :)
2 notes · View notes
amrita-gsk · 4 years
Text
I've been staying at my sister's house for a while and my nephew which is ten years old started watching Bleach on Netflix, obviously, as the masochist I am, after work I've been sitting with him reliving the first seasons and crying at every step of the way over Ichigo and Rukia's relationship, but thing is he's quite a serious boy and believe me when I tell you he has no interest in girls or romance whatsoever so when we reached the SS Arc he wouldn't stop going on about how weird it was for Ichigo to be doing so much to rescue someone he spent so little time with.
Then we got to the scene when Hanatarou tells him about what Rukia told him about Ichigo in her cell and my nephew was all like "yeah sure, he just wants to save her because he feels indebted to her? As if!" (my sister has also been watching it and she said something similar as well), then skip forward to the bridge and the kid was puzzled as to why they would stop to bicker with each other when Byakuya and some other captain were standing right there. Like, priorities, Ichigo? He also noted how dramatic was Ichigo's entrance and believe me when I say he didn't miss the kneeling in front of Rukia.
Anyway, ffs to the end of the arc when they said goodbye and my nephew was complaining that Ichigo is way too mushy and cheesy whenever Rukia is involved and he's here for the cool fights not romance, goddamnit!! As for my sister she said "okay, so I get that he doesn't like the rain because of the thing with his mother's murder and then Zangetsu also said so... and he just thanked her for stopping the rain... and you're telling me they didn't end up together in the end?! For god's sake, he was the last thing Rukia thought of before preparing to die and did you see how baffled he looks when she tells him she's staying in SS, or the smile he gives her afterwards? How. Can. They. Not. Be. Together. The other girl with orange hair said so herself, she changed his world, there's no way to surpass that!"
As you can imagine I just sat there sagely nodding and inserting a "yes, yes, I know right?" and just to add insult to injury I quoted the "speed of the world" poem to them... My sister just stared blankly at me and said "how the fuck did he say something so cute and romantic, god I'm even embarrassed myself... And he didn't marry her? I call bullshit" and my nephew was just like "so you're telling me Ichigo is actually this big fluffy ball of love? The next fights better be awesome."
And that's that folks. IchiRuki still wrecking havoc in 2020 and I'm here just watching it, I'm both proud and salty about it because it was so obvious but noooo, kuboid had to be an asshole.
119 notes · View notes
gunnerpalace · 4 years
Note
So how would you rewrite it? I think you said something about doing that?
That would be the subject of Hyperchlorate Part III. (Part II again being detailing everything that went wrong, and Part I being going over what made the story unique.)
In essence there are the four major changes I would make to Bleach:
Radically expand upon (and show, don’t tell) character relations in the story. We are repeatedly told that so and so are friends, or family, or colleagues, or whatever, and we essentially never see it (outside of Tatsuki and Orihime at the very beginning). It’s critical to caring about and interlinking the characters and seeing them grow and develop. For example, someone made a point that the Xcution arc demonstrates Ichigo’s bonds with Soul Society are stronger than with his own friends. That’s true, and you can see it in the Japanese cultural context of him using their first names (even for Toushirou!) whereas he keeps calling Uryuu and Orihime by Ishida and Inoue. There’s a definite social distance there. But it’s a subtle thing. And it really needs to not be subtle. There needs to be a lot more interactions between characters; plenty of characters literally never interact at all, and plenty of characters look fucking terrible for their apparent gross negligence that serves zero point other than to maintain the Mystery Boxes (here’s looking at you, Isshin, Ryuuken, and Kisuke).
Recontextualize everything after the Soul Society arc. I am not opposed to certain places, people, or concepts (e.g., Hueco Mundo, the Espada, Fullbring, the Soul King, etc.) but the way they were introduced and handled was, frankly, garbage. Arrancar, at least, were set up rather early on. The rest… was a bunch of ex nihilo shit. It came out of nowhere with no setup. I also don’t really enjoy the thematic inversion of Hueco Mundo seemingly purely for the sake of subverting expectations. So, I would restructure everything that happens after that point in gross detail.
Refit, standardize, and clearly and consistently implement and allude to the grand plot. If there was going to be some grand purpose to the Bleach universe, it needed to be made clear textually, not just thematically, throughout the story. It needs to be set up to the reader, if not to the characters, very early on so they “get” what everything is building toward. That absolutely was not done.
Having a real ending that actually involves our protagonists making a substantive change. I’ve definitely been over this before.
That’s all well and good, right? So what sort of things would I actually look to change?
As an example of the high-level stuff… In terms of narrative, internal consistency, and plot, the whole Substitute Shinigami thing makes no fucking sense. It makes literally zero sense that Ginjou was the first one in several thousand years, and Ichigo was only the second. It makes zero sense that a technique to transfer powers to humans exists and is taught at the academy, can be known to have a “low chance of success,” and then made a crime when it’s happened a grand total of two times, unless it was all a long con just to catch Ginjou, and in that case it’s dumb because he doesn’t matter. (We’re supposed to believe Soul Society allows Hollows to run roughshod everywhere but they’re really obsessed about catching this one dude but not enough to actually task anyone powerful to go do it? No, none of that makes sense.)
It also doesn’t make any sense that there are only a grand total of 6,000 to 7,000 Shinigami to patrol its nebulously defined area of responsibility. (Is it the whole world? Is it just Japan? If the latter, are there other Soul Societies? If the former, where are the foreigners? Sure seem to be a lot of people who look foreign, but they all have Japanese names and speak Japanese in a manga that clearly at least recognizes Mexico. Why would foreigners accept a feudal Japanese afterlife? This is another small example of what I mean by the grand plot being fucked.)
It also doesn’t make a lot of sense that the only Shinigami worth a damn are Captains, Lieutenants, and the occasional Seated Officer. (This is canonical, by the way.) Almost all of them are total trash who would lose to the most basic bitch Hollow, let alone an Arrancar. Meanwhile, your average Quincy can mop the floor with all three.
You know what would make a lot more sense, and work better with what’s on paper? Here are some ramblings from my notes on this subject:
i think it’s sorta like… you wanna mirror the structure of the Hollows; Shinigami as a whole are like Menos, although they are almost all Arrancar (there could be some very low-ranked/new Shinigami who do not have shikai, these would be the “rookies”), whereas substitute Shinigami are like masked Hollows, with some overlap into Gillians/Menos Grande
- Captains (General Officers) are at the level of the Espada (with obvious differences among them correlating to Espada generated from Vasto Lordes and Adjuchas)- Lieutenants (Staff Officers) are at the level of the Privaron Espada and some of the stronger fracciones- Seated Officers (Officers) are at  the level of most fracciones and wild Adjuchas [sometimes from the 4th Seat up are more on the level of the above, e.g., Ikkaku and Yumichika]- Unseated Officers (NCOs) are at the level of weak fracciones, or on the order of holding off a Gillian- Substitute Shinigami (Enlisted) are at the level of individual Hollows
Substitute Shinigami are basically what Soul Society sets up to deal with the Living World rather than directly intervening, because “they have better shit to do;” they’re probably set up like a secret society of beat cops, and yeah, if the Shinigami proper notice spiritually sensitive people while setting up new districts or maintaining their assigned ones, they shank'em and induct'em (usually these people attract Hollows anyway so it’s a “become one of our grunts or die” type deal; maybe if they refuse, the Shinigami kill them instead for shirking their duties?)Hollows aren’t the only spooky thing running around in the night either; they’re probably relatively rare, and other weird shit like revenants and ghosts are more common
i also have some notes here about how it’d be cool if Substitute Shinigami were like, an established thingand were expendable gruntswith actual Shinigami being rather more elite, even if they’re not seatedlike it’s XCOM with supernatural shithaving shikai should be a big fucking deal; even knowing kidou should be like, impressiveyour average Hollow should be equivalent to a Substitute Shinigamian unseated Shinigami should be like a Menos Grandea Shinigami good at kidou and a weak zanpakutou should be like a weak Arrancara seated Shinigami should be like a medium Arrancar and know shikai for surelieutenants should be like Privaron Espadaand captains should be like the Espada (or higher)
I could go on, but I think you get the idea. My first big change to Bleach would be dispensing with the concept of substitutes as being rare. They should be the main interface for the human world (and expendable, and have a high turnover rate). Rukia being there should be A Big Deal. (Have her sent there specifically to monitor things, like a Commissar? To look for Grand Fisher? Whatever.)
Ginjou, were he to exist, would then need a different backstory, but that would be real easy to build out.
As an example of additional character interaction, I’ve already detailed my idea that Kisuke and Yoruichi should be Rukia’s surrogate parents. (And solving the problem of when Rukia got the Hogyouku.)
As another example, it has never made sense to me that Rukia is the one that stays to fight Shrieker while she tells Ichigo to take Karin home. Rukia knows her powers are iffy at best, and should know better. She damn near almost dies (along with Chad) for no reason other than… ??? For dramatic tension and to reveal Chad can attack Hollows, I guess. Even Ichigo calls her out on it. It should’ve been flipped, with Karin revealing things to Rukia and learning about her, and that should be built into Karin repeatedly noticing the two of them (which was never, ever paid off in any fashion whatsoever). This is just one example of more moments of character interaction outside of fights.
As an example of reworking things, I like the ideas of turning the hunt for Aizen into something more like Apocalypse Now, that Aizen kidnaps Karin and Yuzu instead of Orihime, and that his hideout is deep in Rukongai instead of Hueco Mundo:
in one of these posts, @icchiruki was like, Aizen shouldn’t have run off to Hueco Mundohe should’ve run into Rukongaiand that’s geniusbecause it makes him more sympathetic because they have a legit reason to be aggrieved with Soul Societyand also lets us see the other side of the coinwhich, conveniently, leads toward my idea of the HM arc as being more like Heart of Darkness/Apocalypse Now, with Aizen as the equivalent of Kurtz out among the Montagnardsand also lets there be some spooky eldritch shit like whatever was going on with Ukitake and folk belief in TYBW, but less out-of-nowherebecause it’s pretty clear that whatever’s going on with the divine in Bleach is fuckin’ weird and Lovecraftianwhich can tie into that other bit of work i was doing with “where does all this come from anyway”so you stitch it all together and pull the seams snug and you get an actual expansive worldthen you keep the focus squarely on Ichigo, Rukia, and co., as they navigate through itthe further out into Rukongai you go, the weirder it should get; Shinigami should also routinely get sent to Hueco Mundo (both of these being the more important shit they gotta deal with) and recon and do stuff there; Hueco Mundo itself should be less empty wasteland, more kind of weird dark mirror of Soul Societylike a Kill Six Billion Demons type deal
These are just examples. I could go on.
tl;dr Make Bleach much longer and more personable and personally relatable, show your hand on some of the mysteries and backstories much earlier, and make it simultaneously more fuckin’ weird and more human.
32 notes · View notes
tockzy · 4 years
Text
Heya boys, girls and everything in-between or out-between (comedic genius I know) I'm gonna give y'all another one of those RWBY/Bleach crossover things sometime but for now please accept this little filler follow-up post to the first one while I figure some stuff out for a suggested idea. On we go!
So, today I'm just gonna place the girls of Team RWBY in squads and what position they'd be (bar Blake but I'll still talk about her.) Please note that they might end up in other squads and thus sorta ruin their team dynamic, however I'm just gonna say fuck that anyways and have them be posted on missions together all the time (again excluding Blake for now, I might talk some bit about their little story arcs further down the line.)
Ruby: So! It's been a moment since I've really looked into the different philosophies of each squad but I feel like our little punk aesthetic ball of sunshine would either end up in squad 13 or squad 5 (post Aizen with Shinji). Squad 13 is obviously because of Ukitake (or Rukia if you prefer Weiss parallels lol.) she'd fit right in with their very homely and welcoming vibe and I'd say she'd probably be 5th or 4th seat. Shinji's squad five is for an entirely different reason, that being that Shinji is a little shit with huge Uncle Qrow energy (before he kicked his alcoholism) and the pure Chaos she could bring to a squad like that would be GLORIOUS! Also she's Lieutenant material in this one don't @ me. Like Hinamori is great but after Aizen I think it'd be good to denote her to 3rd seat to ease her stress some.
Weiss: Squad 6. That's all.... What? You want a reason? Ugh, fine. Byakuya and her would get along great, and Renji... Has... Big.. Ruby energy okay I'm sensing a pattern here in me putting these two in different squads with characters similar to their partners and I PROMISE it's accidental lmao. Anyways she'd be 3rd seat because there is no way I'm demoting Renji.
Blake: now, if you saw my first post you'd know I said she'd be an arrancar, and I'm sticking to that here. However I will explain where she'd rank in Aizen's Army (with maybe a "hypothetical" shinigami squad placement.) So, she'd replace Aaroniero as espada number 9. And before you guys get upset with me placing her so low or ranking her so "weak" (she's still an above captain level fighter, just not OP like Ulquiorra and above) hear me out. She's a speed and tactics fighter like Aaroniero but her ability would be a bit more hax than just eating hollows and getting their abilities. Plus, in the show she's not a power type fighter, and putting her at number 5 or something wouldn't make sense in my mind since she'd figure out a way to outsmart the soul reapers instead. Anyways, yeah, she's an espada. Her fracciones would be Illia and Adam, though Adam would get killed at some point (most likely by Yang, with hidden assistance by Blake? Eh?) now for her squad placement it'd have to be squad 3 because of their symbol and what it represents (I don't remember off the top of my head rn because it's been so long)
Yang: oh boy, here's the one I bet you've all been waiting for. The sunny dragon is 110% in squad 11. I will hear no other suggestions (that's a lie I will) Why you ask? Her and Kenny would be unstoppable and that's that. Her rank? Lieutenant. Why? Cuz she's a bad bitch.
That's all folks! If you guys have any suggestions/opinions on where I put the girls don't be afraid to like, mass reblog or blow up my inbox or something. I'd love to actually start some discussions on this stuff. I will be posting more stuff on this concept sometime but right now I'm still working out some stuff for other posts.
2 notes · View notes
recurring-polynya · 5 years
Text
I thought about Ishida and Renji too much, and woke up at 5:30 yesterday morning with a fic in my brain. I thought it was gonna be another drabble, but I think it turned into a full story. Inspiration note at the end, to avoid an extremely mild spoiler.
~ The Letter of the Law ~
Uryuu has run afoul of the Soul Society criminal justice system. Fortunately, he has, uh, Renji.
(AO3 link)
Takes place immediately after 684. Presumes that Rukia and Renji got together sometime during the TYBW. Before works, too, if you prefer. (If that sort of thing piques your fancy, I got you covered.)
I will not apologize for any continuity errors, the TYBW was extremely confusing.
Rated T for language, because Renji.
~ ~ ~
Other shinigami would surely be here any minute. The Onmitsukidou, trying to get Aizen back under wraps? Squad 12 maybe?
Renji sighed. There was no way around it.
"Hey, Ishida?"
The kid looked at him, exhaustion permeating his entire being.
"Believe me, I don't like this any more than you do, but, uh," Renji rubbed the back of his neck, "you're under arrest."
Ishida blinked. "Come again?"
Renji sighed again. "Under my authority as a Lieutenant of the Gotei-13, I am detaining you under the custody of the Sixth Division, Kuchiki Byakuya, Captain."
"You can arrest people?" Ichigo asked, incredulously. "Can Rukia arrest people?"
"Kurosaki!" Ishida protested.
"Of course I can arrest people, I was arrestin' Rukia the first time you met me, you moron!"
"Oh, right.” Ichigo remembered to get offended. “C'mon, Renji, it's Uryuu! Don't be an ass about this."
Renji shook his head, a warning. "I'm telling you guys, you absolutely need me to be an--"
"QUINCY SCUM, YOU ARE UNDER ARREST--"
So it was the Onmitsukidou, after all. There were about a thousand of them swarming Aizen, but they hadn't forgotten about Ishida, either.
Renji hefted himself to his feet. Time to get to work. "Too late, boys, I've already arrested him."
Two black-clad ninja looked at each other, and back to Renji. "But we're supposed to arrest him."
Renji gave a big, genial shrug. "That's a pickle, now, isn't it?"
"What do you care, why not just give him to us?" one of the ninja suggested.
"Oh, we do things by the book over at the Sixth. Captain wouldn't like it if I just went around transferring prisoners without the proper paperwork. You can fill out a transfer request form, of course. You'll need your Captain or Vice-Captain to approve it, and then you can file it with the Sixth Division front office. I should warn you, though, we've been short-staffed lately, so we may not get to it right away."
"What. Is. Happening?" Ichigo murmured.
"Due process," Renji replied cheerfully. "Sorry, Uryuu, I'm gonna have to take you in. Don't worry, Ichigo, I won't let him outta my sight. I’m sure you’re gonna be real busy for the near future." Renji clapped Uryuu on the shoulder. "Don't you worry either. If anyone can utterly bog down the Gotei-13 legal process by fucking up paperwork... it's me."
~ ~ ~
"Here's a blanket," Renji said, shoving it between the bars. "And I brought you some books." He passed them through one at a time. "This one's historical fiction…this one's a literary novel that was real popular a few years ago...this one's non-fiction, about the history of zanjutsu...and here's some shitty vampire manga I keep around for when Rukia comes over. I didn't know what you liked, so I tried to bring over a bunch of different things."
"These are... your  books?"
Renji raised one eyebrow. "Whose else would they be?"
Ishida turned one of the books over his hand. They were cheaply printed paperbacks, the paper much rougher than you’d find in the Living World, the spines all utterly bent and creased to hell. "I, uh, didn't know they had popular books in Soul Society."
Renji narrowed his eyes. "You wouldn'ta guessed I read for fun, is what you mean."
Uryuu took a deep breath. "I assumed. I'm sorry." He turned over the historical novel curiously. "Looks like you’ve read this one a few times."
"That's my favorite book." Renji was thoughtful for a moment. “You got ‘Romance of the Three Kingdoms’ in the Living World, right? It’s a little like that.”
Uryuu raised both eyebrows. "I'll give it a try."
Renji shrugged. "I won't judge you if you read the vampire manga. Anything else I can get for ya? Tea? Playing cards? Get you some ink so you can work on your prison tats?"
"I'll, ah, pass. Um, is there a way to get someone's attention, if I need something?"
"Oh, I'm not leaving you alone down here."
Ishida blinked. “What?”
Renji leaned up against the bars of the cell. “You can trust any and all of the Squad 6 folks on duty down here, I hand-picked 'em. But Squad 2 and 12 are both after you, and they’re lying, tricky bastards, one and all. That’s to say nothing of any of your old Quincy pals we might not’ve caught. Everything outside of this barracks is chaos right now, and I’m not about to get caught on my laurels, so I’m just gonna bring my paperwork down here and hang out with my ol’ buddy Uryuu until the rest of the captains get back.”
“You give all your prisoners this much personal attention?”
Renji shrugged. “Only the ones who don’t make fun of my eyebrows.”
~ ~ ~
Renji leaned back so his chair balanced on the back two legs. The back thunked against the bars of the holding cell. "The problem is," he drawled, "that Squad 3 has  also  requested a prisoner transfer. And they got their paperwork in first."
The Squad 2 flunky clutched his approved Form PTR-0003-36A like a lifeline. "What do I do with this, then?"
"Oh, I'll take it," Renji offered, delicately plucking the crumpled form from the man's sweaty hands. "But since there's more than one request, it will require adjudication, which means I'll have to wait until my captain gets back."
"When will that be?" the Onmitsukidou squeaked.
"Hard to say," Renji shrugged, shaking his head. "As far as I know he's still in the Royal Realm, and I don't have any way to communicate with him directly."
"What if we got Squad 3 to retract their request?"
"Worth a try, I s'pose. I've already started processing it though, so they'll need to file a formal withdrawal, and they'll probably want to document that it was at the request of another squad, so made sure they attach a Schedule E. That’s ‘E’, like earwax, not ‘D’ like dead dodo."
The ninja slunk off, mumbling "E, not D" to himself.
"Or maybe it was Schedule D,” Renji replied airly, scratching his head. “Or maybe even Schedule C.  Who can keep them all straight? Anyhoo, Squad 12 will probably have submitted one of these by the time he gets Kira to back off," he mused, glancing over the form. "Oh, they spelled your name wrong, too, that'll gum things up for sure."
"What does Squad 3 want with me?" Uryuu asked suspiciously, from the other side of the bars.
"Nothin'. I just asked Kira to fill one out. For funsies. You probably owe that guy a drink." Renji thought for a moment. "Actually, I'm not sure he'll be drinking anytime soon. But I bet he's in the market for a real classy lookin' cape, or maybe, like, a caftan? Is that the right word?"
“A flowy garment that a woman of a certain age wears for drinking wine?”
“Yeah, yeah!” Renji nodded. “‘Zactly. Matsumoto has one.”
"Hmmm," Uryuu frowned. “I’ll think about it.” He tried to get back into his book, but after reading the same paragraph three times, he closed it. "There's really no way to communicate with the Royal Realm? I was just wondering when everyone-- I mean, if Inoue and Sado--"
"I absolutely did not say that,” Renji clarified. “I said there's no way t'contact  my Captain directly  , because that old fogey refuses to carry a spirit phone. If I wanna talk to him, I gotta call Rukia and get her to hand him  her  phone. What a pain, am I right? Anyway, I talked to 'em all this morning. They'll be back in about two days, maybe sooner."
~ ~ ~
Renji banged his way into the 6th Division front offices. "What is all the commotion up here?" he hollered.
"Renji!" Orihime cried, her voice cracking with relief.
Renji stopped cold. It seemed very weird to see his human friends here, in his office, in the place where he spent most of his time reviewing mission reports and working out tactical exercises with Captain Kuchiki and mainlining too-strong tea in order to stay awake until quitting time. Much weirder than seeing Ishida down in his holding cell.
"That's Assistant Captain Abarai to you, " Third Seat Ohno snapped peevishly.
Renji rolled his eyes so hard it was practically audible.
“We’re here to see Ishida,” Chad demanded. “He’s our friend.”
"This is not the Coordinated Relief Station! We do not have  visiting hours !" Ohno went on. He turned to Renji. "These ryouka want to see the prisoner, which, of course, is simply out of the question." As irritating as the guy was, Renji really had to hand it to ol’ Third Seat Ohno. He’d done an absolutely masterful job of gleefully kicking out all the secret police and mad scientists and generalized revenge seekers that had been mobbing the offices for days. The guy did not believe in exceptions. Which meant this was going to require some creativity.
"Yeeeeeahhh," Renji frowned. "We can't just let anyone go down there. Ishida's a dangerous criminal, you know, and a member of a widespread secret alliance and we got procedures to follow, and regulations stating the number of unauthorized personnel allowed in restricted areas…" As soon as he noticed Ohno close his eyes and start to nod along smugly, Renji started pointing to himself and miming punching himself in the face.
Chad might be soft-spoken, but he was not slow on the uptake. He pulled back his fist and slugged Renji in the jaw, at roughly 1/10 of his usual strength.
"That's assault of an officer!" Renji declared, trying to shake off the blow. 1/10 of a Chad punch was still an awful lot of punch.  "You're under arrest, I'm throwing you in the brig!"
Orihime was also not slow on the uptake, although she sometimes she got her exits confused and ended up on the wrong uptake. Her fist smashed into Ohno's nose at 100% of her full strength. "You'll never take me alive, coppers!" she yelled.
From the floor, Ohno whimpered.
"I will," Renji corrected her. "I will most definitely take you alive. I will take you down to the brig, where Uryuu is. Because you are also under arrest."
"Oh! Right!" Orihime cheerfully agreed.
"My noooose," wailed Ohno.
An hour later, Orihime and Chad departed Squad 6, released on their own recognizance.
 ~ ~ ~
"LIEUTENANT ABARAI!"
Renji's disheveled head poked out of Holding Cell B, blinking muzzily. His hair was a rat's nest, his jaw was blue with stubble, and his shihakusho looked distinctly  lived in.
Captain Kuchiki swept in on a breeze of cherry blossoms and efficiency. His silks were spotless, his hair perfect. He looked like he had just returned from a relaxing vacation. His sister trailed behind him, a 4’9” echo of his own perfection.
"What have I told you about napping in the holding cells?"
Renji hopped to attention. "Welcome back, sir! And if it's more than three consecutive hours, it's not a nap, it's plain ol' sleepin', sir."
"That's some nonsense, Lieutenant," Lieutenant Kuchiki chided him, making a face that she had clearly appropriated from her elder sibling.
"Welcome back, to you, too,  Lieutenant ," Renji replied, unable, or perhaps unwilling to keep the joy off his face at seeing her again.
"Why are you down here?" Byakuya demanded.
"Got a person of interest here, sir, didn't want to leave him unguarded."
Byakuya regarded him with lidded eyes. "Yes, I have already heard quite a bit of angry complaining about your 'person of interest' from  multiple  other captains."
"It's the paperwork, sir. It's a morass. But I want this done right, I refuse to rush. Crossin' every t, dottin' every i. That's the Squad 6 way, am I right?"
"Of course, Lieutenant. I know what a….stickler you are for these things."
"In fact, sir, I got in a request yesterday that I'd really like some of your expertise in processing. Bit complicated. Political."
Byakuya nodded. "Fine. Meet me upstairs in the office in ten minutes." He glanced sideways at Rukia, who was holding up one finger on her left hand and five on her right and mouthing the word “fifteen” hopefully. A strange, pained look crossed his face, as though he were trying to prevent some glaring new piece of information from actually making its way into his brain. Stubborn obliviousness appeared to win this round. "Make that fifteen minutes." He turned on his heel and glided out.
Rukia scowled at Renji, jerking her thumb toward Uryuu, who did not bother to look up from his book. "You given this idiot what for, yet?"
Renji shrugged. "Not really. I figured he’d get enough grief from everyone else. And he was with us in the end."
"I don't mean that! I mean worrying his friends, the jerk!"
"Rukia," Renji said gently, taking her hand in his. "Is this really how you want to spent the first fifteen minutes you’ve seen me in three days?"
Rukia stiffened, and her voice lowered to a whisper. "Did you tell him that we're…?" she pointed back and forth rapidly between the two of them, and jerked her head to the side twice meaningfully.
"Together?" Renji suggested. "The word is 'together.'"
"He wouldn't shut up about it," Uryuu added. "Congratulations." He turned a page. "Or condolences. One or the other."
Rukia made a face she usually made at Ichigo. "Thanks," she finally sputtered. Then she grabbed a fistful of Renji's kosode, and hauled him into Holding Cell B.
Uryuu turned another page. "Took you long enough."
 ~ ~ ~
"Glad to see everyone here with so much enthusiasm today," Captain-General Kyouraku said, clapping his hands. "The quicker we get started, the quicker we'll be done! Nanao, do you have my list?"
"There's been a request that item 7 be moved to the top of the agenda," Lieutenant Ise informed him as she passed over a sheet of paper.
His eyes skimmed it. "Well, that seems fine. I've received the approval to name Kuchiki Rukia as Acting Captain of the 13th Division. I know my good friend, Juushirou, had the utmost confidence in her, and I think it's a very appropriate appointment. Are there any objections?"
If there were, no one felt like a big enough jerk to voice them while the Captain-General was getting misty about his fallen companion.
"Wonderful! Congratulations, Kuchiki, please reach out to me if you need any assistance."
"Me," Nanao corrected. "Please reach out to me."
"Thank you, sir!" Rukia barked. "I will do my best!"
"Next...oh, dear. I guess we need to discuss the Ishida boy, who, apparently is in the custody of the Sixth Division?"
Captains Kurotsuchi and Soi Fon both started talking at once, and then Captain Otoribashi started in once someone mentioned Squad 3. Captain Hitsugaya and Acting-Captain Kuchiki both had strong opinions on the matter. Then Captain Hirako started talking because he liked to talk while other people were talking.
"All of this is moot.” The room went quiet. Even though he wasn’t particularly loud, people tended to shut up when Captain Kuchiki bothered to say something. “We have received a request for the prisoner's extradition, on the grounds that he has a right to be tried in his realm of origin, by his own people."
"What?!" Kurotsuchi squawked. "We don't have any diplomatic relations with the Quincy."
"The Quincy of the World of the Living, to be exact. My lieutenant will explain," Byakuya could barely keep the boredom out of his voice. Not that he was trying.
"Uh, technically, we do,” Renji explained. “There's a binding legal entity between Division 13 and all officially appointed shinigami substitutes, of which there is currently one, who happens to be of Quincy heritage and domiciles in the World of the Living."
"Oh, no," Soi Fon groaned.
Renji went on, "And furthermore, there's precedent, namely the previous Captain-General releasing the body of Fullbringer Kuujo Ginjou into Kurosaki Ichigo's custody." Renji blew air out of his cheeks. He hated talking in captains’ meetings.
"So Kurosaki Ichigo has already filed his request?" the Captain-General asked, bumping his hat aside to scratch his head.
"It's already been processed, it just needs my signature," Rukia replied. "Now that I am officially Acting-Captain." She gave a dirty look to the captains of 2 and 12.
"Well, that all seems very neat and tidy," Kyourakou congratulated, amid the groans of his captains. "Great job, everyone. Thanks for taking care of that. Uh....this was the Quincy that was on our side, right? The nice boy with the glasses?"
~ ~ ~
“I should thank you,” Uryuu said quietly, as Renji led him through the shattered streets of the Seireitei.
“Eh, you woulda done the same for me.”
Uryuu was very quiet.
Renji looked at the boy out of the corner of his eye. “Look, man. Every time we go anywhere, you say you aren’t gonna help and you hate shinigami and we ain’t your friends, and the rest of us have learned to ignore you, because you always turn up when the shit hits.” He palmed Uryuu’s head and shook it playfully a few times. “You should learn to ignore you, too. I tell ya, you woulda done the same for me.”
Uryuu snorted. “Still. Thanks.” He gave a small smile. “I liked your book, by the way. Is there any way to get books back and forth from the World of the Living? I think I have one you might like.”
“Oh yeah?” Renji asked, raising an eyebrow. “Talk to Yadamarou. I’ll give it a shot.”
Everyone was waiting in a neat line at the Senkaimon, when they crested the hill.
"Ya did it," Ichigo hollered on behalf of everyone. "You got yourself kicked outta Soul Society, just like you always wanted."
“Well,” Renji said, "I guess this is it for us." Then he twisted Uryuu into a headlock, and proceeded to noogie him to within an inch of his life. Everyone else watched, solemnly, while Uryuu squirmed and yelped. Finally, Renji let him free. "I release him into your custody, Acting-Captain Kuchiki."
"Thank you, Lieutenant Abarai." Rukia turned to her young friend, who was gripping his scalp and cowering. "I do not envy you. His knuckles are like friggin' boulders."
"Diamonds," Uryuu whimpered.
Then Rukia grabbed Ishida’s ear and  twisted.
"Owowoeewoow!"
She hauled him a few yards away from the group, and pulled his ear down to the level of his mouth. "Listen up, nerd. I am not planning some Kuchiki-ass, high society wedding without your help, you buttface. You have until that dummy over there decides to propose in order to get back in the good graces of the Gotei-13, you hear me?"
Uryuu tried to escape her iron grip and failed. "That could be the rest of my natural lifetime."
"It could be,” she agreed. “Or it could be  tomorrow . You know how he is. So get on it."
It struck Ishida that he  did know how Abarai was. And Kuchiki, as well. How had this happened? He blamed Kurosaki. He huffed. “Can’t you just go down to City Hall or whatever?”
Rukia looked hurt. “I didn’t say I didn’t  want  a fancy wedding. I just said I wanted you to help me with it. And y’know. Be there.”
“Oh,” Uryuu replied. “Oh. I”ll, uh...I’ll do my best.”
Rukia smiled. “Thanks.” She dragged him back over to the others and shoved him in the general direction of Ichigo. "Here you go, Substitute Shinigami and Quincy Cultural Attache, he's your problem now."
"Thank you, Shorty McCaptainface," Ichigo proclaimed formally. "Ishida Uryuu, you have been tried by a jury of your peers (that’s us), and been found guilty of  being a crummy friend. You have been sentenced to the following: You will come to the next three movie nights, even if it's Keigo's turn to pick the movie, and you will bring those weird little pink French cookies you made that one time!"
"They were macarons."
"You will answer your texts within 2 business days, even if it's just a smiley face!"
"You're the one who doesn't answer his texts for weeks on end."
"You will let us wear your cape for five minutes each while we make fun of you!"
Uryuu sighed.
"And you will promise to trust us and let us help you and not join our enemies in order to betray them without telling us first, you got it?!"
Uryuu sighed  louder. "I promise."
"And!" Orihime added, "you will bring it in for a  group hug!"
This had presumably been planned, because the three humans immediately tackled their friend in what looked like a well-practiced maneuver, with Orihime coming in from the back, Ichigo from the front, and Chad coming in last, enclosing everyone with his huge wingspan. Uryuu exhaled one final sigh of long-sufferance, the lament of a man cursed with excellent friends.
"Shinigami are not excused from this!" Chad rumbled, and suddenly, Rukia had wormed her way  into the middle , and Renji piled in opposite Chad.
"I promise I will be better," Uryuu from somewhere in the middle of all this.
"See that you do!" Ichigo shouted. "Also, I think you owe Renji, like, ten million yen in legal fees."
“I accept payment in little pink cookies!”
~ end
End note: While I was writing the group hug, I realized that I was just describing one of my all-time favorite pieces of fanart, by the very talented @chameshida I hope this fic has managed to capture a tiny fraction of that energy.
46 notes · View notes