---
Stray Cat Strut
Home Ground Arc
two: Here There Be Dragon
produced by
Two Greedy Losers Without A Fairy
---
Step.
"Just be sure, everything else ... is secondary."
Step. Step. Twist.
"When you get right down to it, it's all about will."
Slide. Pant. Eye the distance. Whatever you do, don't stop.
So he ran. He ran until his muscles burned and his veins pumped battery acid. Then he ran some more.
This would be awfully dramatic, if it weren't happening every other day now.
How do you make a simple journey from point A to point B more exciting?
Easy.
Just make it be literally from point A to point B, in as close to a
straight line as you can manage.
"Ohshitohshitohshitohshit!"
Truthfully, it was as much his fault for going along with it as it was
hers for egging him on. And more his fault for trying something he
wasn't sure would work.
He'd only managed to understand how that 'flash step' thing worked last week, and had been keen on using it ... well, now he had, and it ended up dying on him in the middle of a step, over a moderately busy intersection.
He'd ended up flailing comically for a moment, before snagging the top of a passing light pole and hanging on for dear life while at the same time thanking whatever kami may be listening for having remembered to wear gloves that day.
He'd never been quite as thankful for learning how to use reiatsu as a
SEP field of sorts as he was there and then, dangling dozens of feet
over the pavement and rushing traffic ...
Yoruichi touched down on top of the street-light.
"In a bit of trouble, are we?"
"No, no, *wheeze* I'm fine, really. I *grunt* meant to do that," Ichigo deadpanned, pulling himself up, in spite of twinges in his arms that he knew meant he'd be feeling this, come next morning. "Gimme a sec ... umm, you mind moving some?"
"Hmm? You say something, kiddo?" the cat had curled down on the section between his hands, looking for all the world like she intended to take a nap right there and then.
Prompting the blond to try and pull himself up without upsetting her
perch, for self-preservation's sake if nothing else.
"Aww, man," the boy groaned after finally managing to plant himself on top of the light housing. "I thought I had it down."
The pedestrian and vehicular traffic below went on unperturbed, unaware of what was going on above their heads.
"Fufufu," chuckled Yoruichi, and Ichigo had to struggle to regain his
balance after finding his shoulder once again occupied by several kilos worth of cat. "Then, obviously, you thought wrong. Now get up and get going, after all, that package isn't going to deliver itself."
He frowned, reflexively checking for and finding his belt-pouch still
present, then breathed a sigh of relief.
"How the hell am I supposed to get down from here?"
"Same way you got up here, I'd think ... hey, practice makes perfect,
after all."
Ichigo frowned and looked around, instead of down, settling his eyes on a store at the far side of the intersection. Or rather, the rooftop.
"Hmm, ambitious today, aren't we?"
"What, you think I can't make it?"
"Care to put your money where your mouth is?"
"Alright, if I can't manage this, then I'll let Yuuko-san draft me into
doing inventory for her," he shuddered for a moment. "If I can, you'll
give me more than just hints about what I'm doing wrong."
"Hooo ... you sure you want that, boya? You sure you know what you're getting into here?" Yoruichi asked.
"Hell, no! That ever stop me before?! Now watch, here I gooooooooooooo ...!"
The boy and cat duo seemed to blur for a moment, before the streetlight housing's underside cracked and they disappeared, without anyone below being the wiser.
Well, _almost_ anyone.
Brown eyes, wide in a combination of disbelief and shock, looked up to the streetlight. Then to the form of boy-and-cat blurring back into
focus on top of a store at the far end of the intersection.
Arisawa Tatsuki blinked.
"What the heck was that?!"
***
What difference do four years make to the human psyche? In some cases, not much of one. In others, quite a bit.
In four years' time, Arisawa Tatsuki would have been a far more ...
grounded individual. Not sedate, by any stretch of the imagination, but certainly sufficiently down to earth.
In four years' time, she wouldn't have believed her eyes at first.
In four years' time, it would have taken her a while to accept that,
yes, what she had seen hadn't been just a figurement of her imagination.
That isn't to say she didn't have her doubts. It just took her so much
less time to work through them.
And she'd been working through her doubts for the past year, ever since the day Kurosaki had come back to the dojo several weeks after... well, _after_.
Tatsuki preferred not to think about that bit too much.
What had come in its wake had, after all, given her more than enough food for thought. Ten, and then eleven, she may have been, but she'd have had to be blind not to notice.
Kurosaki Ichigo, the one she'd met and who she'd become friends with ... it was hard to see what was left of that carefree smile of his buried underneath ... what was it? Determination, yes, but of a sort she'd never really experienced, or had even seen before.
Ever since 'that', Ichigo had shown a sort of drive that was just on
the border of being plain scary.
Where he'd been the one to struggle as to not fall behind before, now
he was the one pressing forward, with Tatsuki sweating her skin off to try and keep up.
It was a point of pride to her - martial arts had always been her
thing, and he'd been a relative newcomer.
If she were to be honest with herself, and the girl usually was, then
she'd have to say she was jealous. The day she'd realized that was the
day she'd realized she didn't like parts of herself very much.
So she made efforts, not just to keep up, but to try and bring at least
some of their old dynamic back.
Bits and pieces of it did. Come back, that is. But regardless, Ichigo
always remained that barely perceptible distance away.
Worse, she noticed on one particular day several weeks back, though it wasn't anything too obvious. He was holding back.
At first, the notion seemed ridiculous ... at first.
Up until yesterday, when she'd been returning from an outing with
Inoue, and she'd seen what had at first appeared to be a publicity stunt.
Only there were no cameras. Nobody was noticing anything. And the
actors were awfully familiar.
Kurosaki-bloody-Ichigo had, before her very eyes, pulled the sort of
thing she'd only seen in her more over-the-top martial arts mangas and wuxia films.
Tatsuki didn't sleep a wink that night, and was out the door come dawn.
She was pounding on another door a few minutes later, panting, having run the distance in impatience. And a mild fear that she'd lose resolve and convince herself she really _hadn't_ seen him do all that, if she didn't do something about it right the hell _now_.
With a quick apology to a bleary-eyed and confused looking Kurosaki
Isshin - it was damn early, yes - she made up the stairs, and straight for her target.
Open door.
Close door.
Deep breath.
"Ichigo."
It was a very serious, very solemn start to things, all told. She was
very proud of how stern she sounded.
Then the pillow hit her in the face.
"Ow! Hey, what're you doing Ichi ... go?"
The object of her frustration snored slightly, grumbled under his
breath, and didn't seem even the least bit, you know, _awake_ ... which was about the point when Tatsuki realized just how early it was.
Oh well, nothing for it.
She'd come this far ... might as well go the distance.
Ichigo, sprawled as he was on top of the covers, one forearm covering
his eyes and the other thrown to the side ... likely the one to have
launched the unfortunate projectile that had had a close encounter of the Tatsuki kind ... grumbled under his breath.
The cat currently wrapped around the top of his head opened one amber eye to regard her, then closed it again and went back to doing as the room's other owner was.
Tatsuki took a step forward.
Then another.
And so on, until she was standing over the blond's bed.
Poke.
Poke.
Poke.
Okay, this wasn't working.
Time for more drastic measures.
She reached for his face, and pinched his nose shut.
Or, tried to.
The moment her fingers were about to make contact, her target moved, the arm that wasn't resting across his eyes groping blindly for
something, fingers catching on the hem of her hoodie - it was a chilly morning outside, after all - and tugging her off balance.
"Eeeek! What're you ... Ichigo! Damnit, don't _do_ that you ... Hey!
HEY! Quit it ...!"
"Oh-kay ... right ... nope, not seeing anything. Not hearing anything
either, lalalalala," went Isshin, who'd poked his head in around the
time of the first exclamation, as he closed the door.
She was, in a word, mortified.
Ichigo would pay. Oh, yes, he would _so_ pay for this.
Tatsuki tried to shimmy out of the deathgrip, to no avail ...
... when a snickering caught her attention, momentarily diverting her
from her quest for freedom.
She looked left.
She looked right.
She looked up.
The black cat, who'd wisely vacated the bedspace before it had become overpopulated, looked back at her with sleepy amber eyes.
"... great, now I'm hearing things as well." Tatsuki sighed in
momentary defeat, closing her eyes.
"Mm. If you say so."
They snapped open instantly, wildly scanning, because that had not been Ichigo's voice.
That confirmed what she'd already known beforehand. The room was empty, except for her, Ichigo - oh, he was so going to die for this - and the cat.
That was still staring at her.
Nah.
Impossible.
"You did _not_ just talk ... did you?" Feeling extremely silly doing
so, the girl asked.
There was silence.
She breathed a sigh of relief, and ...
"No, you must be hearing things."
... her hair stood on end. Well, metaphorically speaking.
"Hmm? What's the matter, cat got your tongue, chibiko?"
Silence came again.
The cat was still staring at her.
The cat ...
... that had just talked.
She tried to wrap her head around the concept.
The cat.
A cat had just talked to her.
A cat had just talked to her, and made a bad pun about it.
Lack of sleep and recent excitement decided to make a house-call there and then, and her eyes rolled up as she went off into blessed
unconsciousness before anything else found a free second during which it could shock her spitless.
In the distance, crickets chirped.
"Whazza ...?" a muddled voice cut through the sudden silence. "...
hell? Why's my pillow smell like Tats'ki?"
Yoruichi snickered.
Say what you will about it, this was a damn sight better than any show on pay-per-view.
***
"What. The. Hell?!"
"Yeah, that's sort of the usual reaction," Ichigo said, before yawning.
It wasn't a school day, so being up at oh-dark-hundred had had him at less than his best at first ... as illustrated by the whole pillow debacle.
The plot of land was likely worth obscene amounts of money, given that it was right smack in the middle of a business district and surrounded by skyscrapers.
Compared to the towers of steel and glass around it, the building there should have seemed almost ... quaint.
It didn't.
Maybe it was the odd architecture, crossing more styles than one cared to point out, with a somewhat Victorian influence throughout. Maybe it was the fact that, flawlessly pitch-black fence around it and all, it appeared almost surreal and perhaps even larger than life to the watcher.
The trees? With brilliantly vivid green leaves all but embracing the
property from all sides but the front, showing no typical signs that they were growing in an urban environment in their appearance.
Or maybe, just maybe, it was the fact that - other than Tatsuki and
Ichigo - the sporadic passer-by didn't as much as _glance_ at it, as if it wasn't there at all.
_Tatsuki_ hadn't noticed it until Ichigo tugged on her shoulder to stop her and pointed to the side.
Commence jawdrop.
She'd thought that conversations with a cat would be the weirdest thing
she'd experience on this day.
It was rapidly becoming clear that she'd thought wrong.
She shivered, feeling a sudden chill as she remembered the words Ichigo had spoken when she'd all but bludgeoned him into not being an ass and _telling_ her - his, for all intents and purposes, closest and maybe _only_ real friend - what it was she'd seen him doing over the intersection.
"Well? You want to stand here all day? That's fine with me. Don't expect us to keep you company, though," spoke the feline, whom Ichigo had introduced as Yoruichi, as it/she jumped from the boy's shoulder and proceeded to strut over to the ornate gate closing off the property.
Then hopped on top of it.
"Manservant! Attend me!"
Ichigo grumbled a brief "Yare yare" and with a shrug that might as well have been him saying 'well, what can you do?' complied.
Tatsuki followed behind, flinching a little as the gate opened on its
own accord, allowing them entry. Yoruichi simply hopped down on the other side.
And what an other side it was.
As oddly impressive as the view had been from the outside, seeing the place up close was another matter altogether.
Because it was no longer unreal.
No longer surreal.
But totally and unquestionably real. Moreso, in fact, than anything
she'd ever seen before.
Scents were more intense, images sharper and clearer ... it was like a
mixture of falling headlong into a pool of icy water and taking off
heavy ear-muffs and dark-tinted goggles.
It was ...
"Ara ara, You-chan, Ichi-chan, how nice of you to visit. And such a
pretty little thing you've brought me, too. What fun!"
... exquisite.
The house and grounds were one thing.
The apparent occupant?
Left her looking poleaxed to the nth degree.
Arisawa Tatsuki's introduction to Ichihara Yuuko was an event that
burned itself into the girl's memory.
Just before everything went black.
***
"Well, this is interesting, to say the least," Yuuko grinned, not
bothering to do anything about her mode of dress.
Or lack thereof. Oh, the light yukata was there, and the patterns woven into it were a sure sign that it was a piece of the sort that usually cost an arm and leg.
The light yukata was also thrown on so carelessly that it barely
covered a thing, and what it did left nothing to the imagination at all.
"Yuuko-san, please ..." Ichigo started, supporting Tatsuki's limp form, then paused. "Nevermind."
"Mmm, he learns quickly, doesn't he?" the hostess chuckled, followed closely by Yoruichi ... which, the blond had to admit, was a little more than simply creepy.
"For all of that, he's still surprisingly dense," replied the cat.
"He's also still here, in case you didn't notice," grumbled the object
of their exchange.
"Your point?" returned to him in stereo.
"Nothing, nothing ..."
"Mmm, do put her down, Ichi-chan."
He gave Yuuko as much of a 'look' as he could, not quite managing to ignore the expanses of alabaster skin and silken, inky-black hair in favor of her eyes. Those were as fascinating as the rest of her, changing color as the light, or the mood, shifted, and momentarily a shade of royal purple.
Resolutely, he did not ask "Where?", and instead turned around.
He was met with a pair of impish grin, one for each of Yuuko's
assistants. Younger, at least in appearance, than him, the blue-haired
Morodashi and the pink-haired Marudashi were impish where their Mistress was exquisite.
They also had the uncanny trait of being able to appear out of, as far
as he could tell, thin air. With items of convenience.
That being a fairly general description, since 'sofa' apparently
qualified, and he was sure one hadn't been out on the front lawn when he, Yoruichi and Tatsuki had come in.
***
"Alright, what I don't get," Ichigo said, sitting on the grass, leaning
back against the sofa. Yoruichi had taken up residence on top of the
backrest, and Tatsuki had been laid out across the expensive looking
leather. Yuuko ... was still barely dressed and sipping her sake with her usual expression of 'I know something you don't know, and I'm going to knock you silly by dropping it on you when you least expect it', "is why she reacted like that. Sure, it's a little intense at first, being in here, but ..."
"Oh, she's just not really used to it. Give it time," Yuuko cut in.
"What? How can she ... I mean, it's natural, isn't it? She could spot
me, even with the precautions, so ..."
"Ah-ah-ah, Ichi-chan. You're _assuming_ again, instead of thinking. I thought You-chan got rid of that nasty habit of yours."
"Well, _humans_," the cat shrugged, as much as a reclining feline can. "What can you do? Ne, kiddo, you're thinking 'she's a sensitive, so why's she passing out at something she should be able to handle', right? Well, put this through your brain. She didn't _used_ to be one. Or, not until she made friends with an annoying little blond brat you know pretty well."
"Saaa ... Ichi-chan, it's the Law of Contagion. You know it, think
about it," their hostess finished. "She's been sparring with a budding
reiatsu Adept for more than a year now, talking with him, visiting him sometimes, fufufufu. Quite simple, when you think about it, ne?"
It was Ichigo's turn to look poleaxed, as he recalled that particular
lecture, given in the middle of a mountain hike done the 'interesting'
way some time ago ...
"This is my fault?"
"Well, _fault_ ... that's such an ugly word, Ichi-chan ..." drawled the
Dimensional Witch, shopowner, and self-proclaimed Biggest Curiosity of the World, Ichihara Yuuko. "But yes, when you put it that way, it's pretty much your mess all the way. Congratulations, you've got yourself a disciple."
Crickets.
"A _WHAT_ now?!"
... surprisingly, that was Yoruichi as well as her friend/pupil/scratching-post.
Which was the moment Tatsuki chose to wake up.
Tatsu-chin?
Welcome to the real world.
Whether you want to or not.
***
END here there be dragon
***
Stray Cat Strut
Home Ground Arc
two: Here There Be Dragon
produced by
Two Greedy Losers Without A Fairy
---
Step.
"Just be sure, everything else ... is secondary."
Step. Step. Twist.
"When you get right down to it, it's all about will."
Slide. Pant. Eye the distance. Whatever you do, don't stop.
So he ran. He ran until his muscles burned and his veins pumped battery acid. Then he ran some more.
This would be awfully dramatic, if it weren't happening every other day now.
How do you make a simple journey from point A to point B more exciting?
Easy.
Just make it be literally from point A to point B, in as close to a
straight line as you can manage.
"Ohshitohshitohshitohshit!"
Truthfully, it was as much his fault for going along with it as it was
hers for egging him on. And more his fault for trying something he
wasn't sure would work.
He'd only managed to understand how that 'flash step' thing worked last week, and had been keen on using it ... well, now he had, and it ended up dying on him in the middle of a step, over a moderately busy intersection.
He'd ended up flailing comically for a moment, before snagging the top of a passing light pole and hanging on for dear life while at the same time thanking whatever kami may be listening for having remembered to wear gloves that day.
He'd never been quite as thankful for learning how to use reiatsu as a
SEP field of sorts as he was there and then, dangling dozens of feet
over the pavement and rushing traffic ...
Yoruichi touched down on top of the street-light.
"In a bit of trouble, are we?"
"No, no, *wheeze* I'm fine, really. I *grunt* meant to do that," Ichigo deadpanned, pulling himself up, in spite of twinges in his arms that he knew meant he'd be feeling this, come next morning. "Gimme a sec ... umm, you mind moving some?"
"Hmm? You say something, kiddo?" the cat had curled down on the section between his hands, looking for all the world like she intended to take a nap right there and then.
Prompting the blond to try and pull himself up without upsetting her
perch, for self-preservation's sake if nothing else.
"Aww, man," the boy groaned after finally managing to plant himself on top of the light housing. "I thought I had it down."
The pedestrian and vehicular traffic below went on unperturbed, unaware of what was going on above their heads.
"Fufufu," chuckled Yoruichi, and Ichigo had to struggle to regain his
balance after finding his shoulder once again occupied by several kilos worth of cat. "Then, obviously, you thought wrong. Now get up and get going, after all, that package isn't going to deliver itself."
He frowned, reflexively checking for and finding his belt-pouch still
present, then breathed a sigh of relief.
"How the hell am I supposed to get down from here?"
"Same way you got up here, I'd think ... hey, practice makes perfect,
after all."
Ichigo frowned and looked around, instead of down, settling his eyes on a store at the far side of the intersection. Or rather, the rooftop.
"Hmm, ambitious today, aren't we?"
"What, you think I can't make it?"
"Care to put your money where your mouth is?"
"Alright, if I can't manage this, then I'll let Yuuko-san draft me into
doing inventory for her," he shuddered for a moment. "If I can, you'll
give me more than just hints about what I'm doing wrong."
"Hooo ... you sure you want that, boya? You sure you know what you're getting into here?" Yoruichi asked.
"Hell, no! That ever stop me before?! Now watch, here I gooooooooooooo ...!"
The boy and cat duo seemed to blur for a moment, before the streetlight housing's underside cracked and they disappeared, without anyone below being the wiser.
Well, _almost_ anyone.
Brown eyes, wide in a combination of disbelief and shock, looked up to the streetlight. Then to the form of boy-and-cat blurring back into
focus on top of a store at the far end of the intersection.
Arisawa Tatsuki blinked.
"What the heck was that?!"
***
What difference do four years make to the human psyche? In some cases, not much of one. In others, quite a bit.
In four years' time, Arisawa Tatsuki would have been a far more ...
grounded individual. Not sedate, by any stretch of the imagination, but certainly sufficiently down to earth.
In four years' time, she wouldn't have believed her eyes at first.
In four years' time, it would have taken her a while to accept that,
yes, what she had seen hadn't been just a figurement of her imagination.
That isn't to say she didn't have her doubts. It just took her so much
less time to work through them.
And she'd been working through her doubts for the past year, ever since the day Kurosaki had come back to the dojo several weeks after... well, _after_.
Tatsuki preferred not to think about that bit too much.
What had come in its wake had, after all, given her more than enough food for thought. Ten, and then eleven, she may have been, but she'd have had to be blind not to notice.
Kurosaki Ichigo, the one she'd met and who she'd become friends with ... it was hard to see what was left of that carefree smile of his buried underneath ... what was it? Determination, yes, but of a sort she'd never really experienced, or had even seen before.
Ever since 'that', Ichigo had shown a sort of drive that was just on
the border of being plain scary.
Where he'd been the one to struggle as to not fall behind before, now
he was the one pressing forward, with Tatsuki sweating her skin off to try and keep up.
It was a point of pride to her - martial arts had always been her
thing, and he'd been a relative newcomer.
If she were to be honest with herself, and the girl usually was, then
she'd have to say she was jealous. The day she'd realized that was the
day she'd realized she didn't like parts of herself very much.
So she made efforts, not just to keep up, but to try and bring at least
some of their old dynamic back.
Bits and pieces of it did. Come back, that is. But regardless, Ichigo
always remained that barely perceptible distance away.
Worse, she noticed on one particular day several weeks back, though it wasn't anything too obvious. He was holding back.
At first, the notion seemed ridiculous ... at first.
Up until yesterday, when she'd been returning from an outing with
Inoue, and she'd seen what had at first appeared to be a publicity stunt.
Only there were no cameras. Nobody was noticing anything. And the
actors were awfully familiar.
Kurosaki-bloody-Ichigo had, before her very eyes, pulled the sort of
thing she'd only seen in her more over-the-top martial arts mangas and wuxia films.
Tatsuki didn't sleep a wink that night, and was out the door come dawn.
She was pounding on another door a few minutes later, panting, having run the distance in impatience. And a mild fear that she'd lose resolve and convince herself she really _hadn't_ seen him do all that, if she didn't do something about it right the hell _now_.
With a quick apology to a bleary-eyed and confused looking Kurosaki
Isshin - it was damn early, yes - she made up the stairs, and straight for her target.
Open door.
Close door.
Deep breath.
"Ichigo."
It was a very serious, very solemn start to things, all told. She was
very proud of how stern she sounded.
Then the pillow hit her in the face.
"Ow! Hey, what're you doing Ichi ... go?"
The object of her frustration snored slightly, grumbled under his
breath, and didn't seem even the least bit, you know, _awake_ ... which was about the point when Tatsuki realized just how early it was.
Oh well, nothing for it.
She'd come this far ... might as well go the distance.
Ichigo, sprawled as he was on top of the covers, one forearm covering
his eyes and the other thrown to the side ... likely the one to have
launched the unfortunate projectile that had had a close encounter of the Tatsuki kind ... grumbled under his breath.
The cat currently wrapped around the top of his head opened one amber eye to regard her, then closed it again and went back to doing as the room's other owner was.
Tatsuki took a step forward.
Then another.
And so on, until she was standing over the blond's bed.
Poke.
Poke.
Poke.
Okay, this wasn't working.
Time for more drastic measures.
She reached for his face, and pinched his nose shut.
Or, tried to.
The moment her fingers were about to make contact, her target moved, the arm that wasn't resting across his eyes groping blindly for
something, fingers catching on the hem of her hoodie - it was a chilly morning outside, after all - and tugging her off balance.
"Eeeek! What're you ... Ichigo! Damnit, don't _do_ that you ... Hey!
HEY! Quit it ...!"
"Oh-kay ... right ... nope, not seeing anything. Not hearing anything
either, lalalalala," went Isshin, who'd poked his head in around the
time of the first exclamation, as he closed the door.
She was, in a word, mortified.
Ichigo would pay. Oh, yes, he would _so_ pay for this.
Tatsuki tried to shimmy out of the deathgrip, to no avail ...
... when a snickering caught her attention, momentarily diverting her
from her quest for freedom.
She looked left.
She looked right.
She looked up.
The black cat, who'd wisely vacated the bedspace before it had become overpopulated, looked back at her with sleepy amber eyes.
"... great, now I'm hearing things as well." Tatsuki sighed in
momentary defeat, closing her eyes.
"Mm. If you say so."
They snapped open instantly, wildly scanning, because that had not been Ichigo's voice.
That confirmed what she'd already known beforehand. The room was empty, except for her, Ichigo - oh, he was so going to die for this - and the cat.
That was still staring at her.
Nah.
Impossible.
"You did _not_ just talk ... did you?" Feeling extremely silly doing
so, the girl asked.
There was silence.
She breathed a sigh of relief, and ...
"No, you must be hearing things."
... her hair stood on end. Well, metaphorically speaking.
"Hmm? What's the matter, cat got your tongue, chibiko?"
Silence came again.
The cat was still staring at her.
The cat ...
... that had just talked.
She tried to wrap her head around the concept.
The cat.
A cat had just talked to her.
A cat had just talked to her, and made a bad pun about it.
Lack of sleep and recent excitement decided to make a house-call there and then, and her eyes rolled up as she went off into blessed
unconsciousness before anything else found a free second during which it could shock her spitless.
In the distance, crickets chirped.
"Whazza ...?" a muddled voice cut through the sudden silence. "...
hell? Why's my pillow smell like Tats'ki?"
Yoruichi snickered.
Say what you will about it, this was a damn sight better than any show on pay-per-view.
***
"What. The. Hell?!"
"Yeah, that's sort of the usual reaction," Ichigo said, before yawning.
It wasn't a school day, so being up at oh-dark-hundred had had him at less than his best at first ... as illustrated by the whole pillow debacle.
The plot of land was likely worth obscene amounts of money, given that it was right smack in the middle of a business district and surrounded by skyscrapers.
Compared to the towers of steel and glass around it, the building there should have seemed almost ... quaint.
It didn't.
Maybe it was the odd architecture, crossing more styles than one cared to point out, with a somewhat Victorian influence throughout. Maybe it was the fact that, flawlessly pitch-black fence around it and all, it appeared almost surreal and perhaps even larger than life to the watcher.
The trees? With brilliantly vivid green leaves all but embracing the
property from all sides but the front, showing no typical signs that they were growing in an urban environment in their appearance.
Or maybe, just maybe, it was the fact that - other than Tatsuki and
Ichigo - the sporadic passer-by didn't as much as _glance_ at it, as if it wasn't there at all.
_Tatsuki_ hadn't noticed it until Ichigo tugged on her shoulder to stop her and pointed to the side.
Commence jawdrop.
She'd thought that conversations with a cat would be the weirdest thing
she'd experience on this day.
It was rapidly becoming clear that she'd thought wrong.
She shivered, feeling a sudden chill as she remembered the words Ichigo had spoken when she'd all but bludgeoned him into not being an ass and _telling_ her - his, for all intents and purposes, closest and maybe _only_ real friend - what it was she'd seen him doing over the intersection.
"Well? You want to stand here all day? That's fine with me. Don't expect us to keep you company, though," spoke the feline, whom Ichigo had introduced as Yoruichi, as it/she jumped from the boy's shoulder and proceeded to strut over to the ornate gate closing off the property.
Then hopped on top of it.
"Manservant! Attend me!"
Ichigo grumbled a brief "Yare yare" and with a shrug that might as well have been him saying 'well, what can you do?' complied.
Tatsuki followed behind, flinching a little as the gate opened on its
own accord, allowing them entry. Yoruichi simply hopped down on the other side.
And what an other side it was.
As oddly impressive as the view had been from the outside, seeing the place up close was another matter altogether.
Because it was no longer unreal.
No longer surreal.
But totally and unquestionably real. Moreso, in fact, than anything
she'd ever seen before.
Scents were more intense, images sharper and clearer ... it was like a
mixture of falling headlong into a pool of icy water and taking off
heavy ear-muffs and dark-tinted goggles.
It was ...
"Ara ara, You-chan, Ichi-chan, how nice of you to visit. And such a
pretty little thing you've brought me, too. What fun!"
... exquisite.
The house and grounds were one thing.
The apparent occupant?
Left her looking poleaxed to the nth degree.
Arisawa Tatsuki's introduction to Ichihara Yuuko was an event that
burned itself into the girl's memory.
Just before everything went black.
***
"Well, this is interesting, to say the least," Yuuko grinned, not
bothering to do anything about her mode of dress.
Or lack thereof. Oh, the light yukata was there, and the patterns woven into it were a sure sign that it was a piece of the sort that usually cost an arm and leg.
The light yukata was also thrown on so carelessly that it barely
covered a thing, and what it did left nothing to the imagination at all.
"Yuuko-san, please ..." Ichigo started, supporting Tatsuki's limp form, then paused. "Nevermind."
"Mmm, he learns quickly, doesn't he?" the hostess chuckled, followed closely by Yoruichi ... which, the blond had to admit, was a little more than simply creepy.
"For all of that, he's still surprisingly dense," replied the cat.
"He's also still here, in case you didn't notice," grumbled the object
of their exchange.
"Your point?" returned to him in stereo.
"Nothing, nothing ..."
"Mmm, do put her down, Ichi-chan."
He gave Yuuko as much of a 'look' as he could, not quite managing to ignore the expanses of alabaster skin and silken, inky-black hair in favor of her eyes. Those were as fascinating as the rest of her, changing color as the light, or the mood, shifted, and momentarily a shade of royal purple.
Resolutely, he did not ask "Where?", and instead turned around.
He was met with a pair of impish grin, one for each of Yuuko's
assistants. Younger, at least in appearance, than him, the blue-haired
Morodashi and the pink-haired Marudashi were impish where their Mistress was exquisite.
They also had the uncanny trait of being able to appear out of, as far
as he could tell, thin air. With items of convenience.
That being a fairly general description, since 'sofa' apparently
qualified, and he was sure one hadn't been out on the front lawn when he, Yoruichi and Tatsuki had come in.
***
"Alright, what I don't get," Ichigo said, sitting on the grass, leaning
back against the sofa. Yoruichi had taken up residence on top of the
backrest, and Tatsuki had been laid out across the expensive looking
leather. Yuuko ... was still barely dressed and sipping her sake with her usual expression of 'I know something you don't know, and I'm going to knock you silly by dropping it on you when you least expect it', "is why she reacted like that. Sure, it's a little intense at first, being in here, but ..."
"Oh, she's just not really used to it. Give it time," Yuuko cut in.
"What? How can she ... I mean, it's natural, isn't it? She could spot
me, even with the precautions, so ..."
"Ah-ah-ah, Ichi-chan. You're _assuming_ again, instead of thinking. I thought You-chan got rid of that nasty habit of yours."
"Well, _humans_," the cat shrugged, as much as a reclining feline can. "What can you do? Ne, kiddo, you're thinking 'she's a sensitive, so why's she passing out at something she should be able to handle', right? Well, put this through your brain. She didn't _used_ to be one. Or, not until she made friends with an annoying little blond brat you know pretty well."
"Saaa ... Ichi-chan, it's the Law of Contagion. You know it, think
about it," their hostess finished. "She's been sparring with a budding
reiatsu Adept for more than a year now, talking with him, visiting him sometimes, fufufufu. Quite simple, when you think about it, ne?"
It was Ichigo's turn to look poleaxed, as he recalled that particular
lecture, given in the middle of a mountain hike done the 'interesting'
way some time ago ...
"This is my fault?"
"Well, _fault_ ... that's such an ugly word, Ichi-chan ..." drawled the
Dimensional Witch, shopowner, and self-proclaimed Biggest Curiosity of the World, Ichihara Yuuko. "But yes, when you put it that way, it's pretty much your mess all the way. Congratulations, you've got yourself a disciple."
Crickets.
"A _WHAT_ now?!"
... surprisingly, that was Yoruichi as well as her friend/pupil/scratching-post.
Which was the moment Tatsuki chose to wake up.
Tatsu-chin?
Welcome to the real world.
Whether you want to or not.
***
END here there be dragon
***