Oi. Coshiua came up with the white-trimmed cloak thing tho. I just added a bit.
Those are pretty mothy.That looks really familiar...
Warframe's Foxglove Syandana
Now You Feel Like Number None [Bleach Arrancar Quest]
- Thread starter Omicron
- Start date
- Users' Choice!
Voted best in category in the Users' Choice awards.
This is perfect. You captured the tone wonderfully, I love it
Thank you for the laugh!
Hampsterpig
I write stuff.
- Location
- Somewhere in my own head
Is this what happens when Nemo gets legendary Descorrer?
- Location
- UK
- Pronouns
- They/Them
I loved these lines. Such an adorable and funny omake EarthScorpion, kudos.
- Location
- Australia
The spots remind me more of Aizen's wings than anything.That looks really familiar...
Warframe's Foxglove Syandana
Kitten
Saturday morning had dawned cold and clear. The sky overhead was a deep blue, but in the tall shadows of this part of the city the chill lingered.
"So," Tatsuki said, looking up at the sign over the seedy-looking shop and adjusting the sports kit slung over her back, "this is where you've all been going to secretly hang out."
It didn't look like much. It was tucked away off the main street, facing onto a small grubby square. The buildings all needed a good clean. There was dust in the windows. A young girl in a pink dress half-heartedly pushed dirt around with an old fashioned broom.
Orihime rubbed the back of her neck with her mittened hands. "Well, I wouldn't put it like that exactly," she said, grinning nervously. "It's just… it's just Mr Urahara's secret base. See, it turns out he's actually a super-secret guy on the run from the spirit-ghost-law, oh and he used run the thing that that weirdo who did not know how to use foundation properly ran and he used to be a Captain - Captains are super-scary, you know that, even when they try to be nice and some of them don't - and did you know his cat is actually a lady even though she talks like a man when she's a cat… boy, I was so confused about that when I found out she was really a girl and I wonder how she even turns herself into a cat, because it'd be really fun to be a kitty, you know?"
Tatsuki blinked. "Uh," she said, pausing for a moment to try to interpret the Orihime-babble. "How much of that is actually true, 'Hime?"
"All of it!" Orihime insisted, wide-eyed.
"Right. Uh..."
"I'm so glad you now have superpowers and now know because things were super scary and weird and not having you around meant I had to fight and I really hate doing that and…"
"It's all right." Yes, Tatsuki thought, trying not to scowl, that was one of the things she was going to have to talk to Ichigo about. At length. There was no excuse for putting Orihime at risk. She was a precious little cinnamon bun who wasn't suited for threats of violence and needed people like Tatsuki to ensure that she was eating properly and didn't try to live entirely off her latest hellish kitchen creation. The day before yesterday, she'd tried to serve Tatsuki a bean jam, bird's eye chilli and banana soup. "Now, what do we do?"
"Ururu!" There was Orihime, already rushing off ahead. "Is Mr Urahara in? I did call ahead!"
The little girl dropped her broom, and gave an awkward bow. "Y-yes," she said softly. "He's a-awake. Um. I think."
Tatsuki frowned. The girl was familiar. Hadn't she seen her somewhere? Yes, that was it - she'd seen her over the summer, running around with Ichigo's sisters. Wait! How many people she knew secretly had superpowers and hadn't told her?
She was still pondering that question by the time she had been escorted in to an old-fashioned backroom. She sat down at the low table next to Orihime, who seemed to be familiar with the place. There was a dishevelled man there in greens and tans, as well as an attractive woman. Something about the way the woman held herself led Tatsuki to think she was a fighter; a certain alertness in her posture and her piercing gold eyes. She was certainly more awake than the man.
"This is Mr Urahara," Orihime said brightly, gesturing to him.
"Please, Orihime, keep your voice down this early in the morning," he groaned. "I can only take so much perkiness. Your presence is like shouting."
"He's hungover," the darker skinned woman said, smiling. Tatsuki wasn't sure where she was from, but she wasn't Japanese. Maybe she was Indian?
"And this is Yoruichi! She's the psychic spirit ghost kitty I told you about! She trained me and Chad!"
Yoruichi gave a little wave. "Hello, Tatsuki. And looking at you, you're the latest addition to the little gang."
"I don't believe we've ever met before," Tatsuki said. "Oh, I suppose you must have heard of me from Orihime and Ichigo."
"Oh, we've met. I probably saved your life from that Espada that snatched you," Mr Urahara said. "You can thank me later. Or now. Whichever you prefer."
Tatsuki smiled at the two of them, slightly nervously, and tried to resist the urge to swallow. They'd been there on that day? Yoruichi seemed nice - but with that new sense of hers, she could feel the crackling, hard, bright light at her heart. It was scary in its intensity - and she hadn't even been able to feel it from outside this room. The rumpled man was even worse. She didn't want to look at him too closely. "I… uh…"
"Oh dear." Yoruichi raised one eyebrow with a hint of mischievous amusement. "You're certainly more sensitive to spiritual concerns than Ichigo was when he was starting out. The boy's a lump."
"How do you know that?" Her question came out a little faster than she intended - even if the woman was right about Ichigo.
"You're squinting when you look at me and Kisuke," Yoruichi said easily. "And if you weren't in such good shape, you'd be out of breath."
"Oh, no, I didn't even think about that!" Orihime said, hands going to her mouth. "She didn't see any of things we did in Soul Society! And she's never ever felt the air go all fuzzy and blurry and then it gets hard to breathe and you feel like you're being crushed and…"
"It's spiritual pressure. She'll get used to it," Mr Urahara said, looking up slightly. "So, Tatsuki," he said, elongating his syllables, "why don't you tell us exactly what this wonderful new miracle power you've stumbled on is. What does it do? In fact, no," he said, interrupting himself, "that'd take too long and I'd rather take a look at it without… preconceptions. Tessai can watch the shop for now - and keep an eye out for any mask-wearing thieves." He seemed irked about something.
"All right," Tatsuki said, nodding. "Um. I… I'm not sure how to use it. And Kon said it'd only work when I had someone to fight with, because…"
"Uh uh uh. You have someone to fight with. Yoruichi is here. Don't worry, she's very friendly. And almost never bites."
Her eyes flicked over to the smiling woman. "Uh…" That didn't feel safe. Yoruichi was far too bright-hard-crackling! Except… what about her power? If she backed down from even training it'd mean nothing. "Okay! Okay! Let's do this!"
Kisuke smiled at her, eyes under the shadow of his hat. "That's the attitude I like," he said in a not-unworrying way. "It'll be fun. We all like fun, right? Fun is… fun."
Imminent violence had a way of focussing the mind. For example, Tatsuki was hardly thinking about the fact that the Urahara shop turned out to have a massive and possibly impossible space under the shop. Worrying why there was a barren wasteland with sky-like walls under a Japanese city would just have to come later.
Not when she was standing here in her karate practice clothing, eye to eye with - if Orihime was to be trusted - a spirit ghost lady ninja cat. Who was possibly also a magical girl. Yoruichi had changed into loose black clothing, and was radiating cheerful menace with a casual smile.
"Woo!" Orihime shouted from the sidelines, perched on a rock next to Mr Urahara. "You can do it, Tatsuki! You're our… uh, our woman! If you can't do it, no one c… well, Ichigo could, and maybe Chad and of course Mr Kenpachi could and..."
Yoruichi raised one finger. "Orihime," she said.
"Sorry, sorry, I didn't mean to put her off," Orihime mumbled.
"Or maybe she's just more offended at the idea that those people could beat her," Mr Urahara observed, sitting back.
"Zaraki couldn't even notice me if I didn't want him to," Yoruichi said, running her hands through her hair. "Yes, I'm offended."
"What are you all talking about?" Tatsuki asked, deeply confused.
"I'll explain later," Yoruichi said. "But for your part, get ready, Tatsuki." She sunk into a ready position. "Get ready for a workout. We'll start out easy, and then work up so Kisuke can see how your powers work."
Tatsuki nodded and bowed, then took a ready stance. The other woman was favouring her rear foot, bent slightly. Ready to spring into action if Tatsuki advanced. She'd need to-
Yoruichi whipped her middle and index fingers around, pointing them at Tatsuki. That wasn't a striking move; her posture was all wrong! "Bakudou #1; Sai," she said calmly.
An unseen force wrenched back Tatsuki's arms, hard enough to hurt. She was trapped, arms behind her back, spine arched. She tottered, and the glowing light within her pulsed. Something cracked with the sound of breaking glass, and her arms were free. "What was that?" she protested.
"The simplest binding spell," Mr Urahara called out from the sidelines. "Now, no more questions. If you've got breath to ask questions, clearly Yoruichi isn't working you hard enough."
And like that Yoruichi was on her, flanking her to the left with a rapid sequence of almost teasing blows. Tatsuki could tell the older woman wasn't committing to each strike, each one more like a flick or a tap than a real strike. And yet despite that a single knife hand striking her forearm left pins and needles running all the way up and down it.
Grudgingly giving ground, Tatsuki tried to get a grasp on how this woman fought. They were the same height, but she was just so fast that it was like she had several heads of height on her for her effective reach. Worse, she wasn't even trying hard. Her breath was as easy as if she was sitting down; her motions were casual and never extended far enough for there to be anything to exploit.
Drawing on the inner light inside of her, Tatsuki pushed her body to speed up. Leaning back, she stored up energy in her left leg and then exploded forwards with a kiai and a palm strike. Her force formed a perfect line, flowing up from the ground through her legs and torso into her arm.
Yoruichi stepped sideways and casually slapped her hand out of the way with a stinging knife hand.
"Good form," she said casually, "but too slow. You're never going to hit me with something like that. How much more speed do you have in you?"
Forcing herself to smile, Tatsuki replied, "I don't know. This is why I came here to find out." Her right arm was stinging to the shoulder, like she'd just taken a particularly bad static shock.
"Look on the bright side. That'd have broken most people's arms." Yoruichi paused. "Want to keep going?"
Taking a deep breath, Tatsuki forced more of the light in her into her limbs. It made the tingling go away. "Of course! I'm not going to give up now."
"Oh?" Yoruichi tilted her head, her expression curiously sad. "Even if I do this?"
All the air was forced from Tatsuki's lungs in a sudden gut-punch. No, she realised as she doubled over, Yoruichi hadn't moved. She'd just… done something. Something that suddenly meant that each breath weighed a tonne and it was like she was wearing a lead-weighted stamina vest which had been overloaded by ten times or more.
Well, screw that. She gritted her teeth and took a deep breath. She could take it. Tatsuki could feel the pressure outside increasing, but she was like… like the front of a ship, parting the waves. It was flowing around her, rather than slamming straight into her.
"Nice!" Yoruichi said, her strange sadness gone. She was grinning again. "I can feel what you're doing! That's clever!"
"Useful," Mr Urahara observed. "Or maybe just suicidal. You don't want to be overestimated."
Tatsuki quite wanted to know what had them impressed. But she didn't have time for that, because Yoruichi was moving again. And somehow she was going even faster.
The next few moments were a blur of pain and desperate leaping dodges. Step by step she forced Tatsuki back. Each knifehand strike might as well have been a knife; each open palm strike sent a wall of air in Tatsuki's direction even when they fell short. She couldn't even block blows like that, so she had to give way. And there was a cliff behind her. No more space to retreat.
And then Yoruichi turned a lunge into a low sweep, and knocked both of her legs out from under her. Tatsuki hit the ground, slapping it with her forearms to eat the impact, and rolled to the side just fast enough to avoid a knifehand that split the rock.
This was madness, Tatsuki realised. Whatever the woman was doing, it was turning her hands into something that could take her head off or cut her in two. She couldn't do anything if she couldn't even touch her.
And like that, something unlocked in her head. Orange light unfolded around her hands, taking the form of padded training gauntlets. Tatsuki knew what they were there for. It wasn't to make her hit harder or better. It was just to let her block or deflect one of those punishing strikes without losing an arm.
Pushing off from the ground, she got her legs under her and leapt at Yoruichi. She forced even more power into her arms and legs, desperately trying to claw enough speed to be able to keep up with her.
Another open palm strike - and this time Tatsuki caught it on her forearm, batting the arm away. She followed it up with a straight punch, stepping in with an explosive lunge. This time it connected - not hard, because Yoruichi had somehow twisted so it only glanced her, but it was an actual hit.
Pressure, she had to keep up the pressure! Muscles aching, she threw hooks left and right, just trying to stop the other woman advancing. And this time Yoruichi was giving ground. Except, no, she was coiled up like a spring and-
Yoruichi was behind her. There had been the momentary impression of something passing over her hair - had that been her? - but the punch was still coming out and she was entirely off balance.
Then she was in the air, being dragged by the collar. She twisted her head, seeing Yoruichi's grin. Tatsuki blinked again.
The other woman was running circles around the impossible space. She was running on the sky-like walls, dragging Tatsuki like a child's toy.
Slickness, oiliness, an escape. Tatsuki's skin and clothes went mirror-bright for a second, and she slipped from Yoruichi's grasp and she had just enough time to think that maybe it wasn't such a good idea to be dropped when you were this high up.
She had the training to deal with this, with a bit of her new magical-whatever. Tucking her legs in, she hit the ground rolling. The stone ground battered and bruised her, but that was better than turning her into pulp - which is what would have happened the day before yesterday. For a moment, all she could do was stare up at the blue false sky, flat on her back. Her stomach muscles protested, but she flipped upright and stared up at Yoruichi who was looking down at her. Feet firmly planted on the wall.
"Gravity is… isn't something you believe in, is it?" she wheezed.
"It's really more of a suggestion," Yoruichi said, with a shrug. "Run."
"What?"
"Hadou #31, Shakkahou."
The red fireball made an almost lazy arc as it descended to the ground. Tatsuki screamed, and threw herself to the side. The heat washed over her, and she looked in horror at the glassy crater to her left.
"You know," Yoruichi added, "I said 'Run', not 'Dodge'." Another fireball was already forming in her hand.
Tatsuki ran. And ran. And ran.
"This," she hissed from between clenched teeth, "this… is not something…" she threw herself down a narrow gully, feeling the hair on the back of her neck singe, "this is not something that…" argh argh argh! Yoruichi was waiting for her at the end of the gully, how had she got there?
Tatsuki slammed her fist into the side, collapsing it in a landslide that stopped the next fireball, then kicked off from the walls, scaling up to the plateau above her.
"Are you trying to kill me?" she shouted down from behind the ridge.
The response she got was a trio of arcing balls of red flame, lobbed like grenades. She broke into a dead run, arms pumping. Okay. Okay. She just had to use her head. So, Yoruichi was both an amazing martial artist and someone who could throw fireballs like she was a fighting game character. Argh, why hadn't she asked someone other than Orihime to explain what these people could do?
She threw herself behind a pillar of rock and gasped for breath. Right. Okay. So, these fireballs could arc, but didn't home in and couldn't punch through solid objects. So she'd need to ambush Yoruichi somewhere where she was too close to risk using them without catching herself in the blast. Yes! She could do that. She glanced around, seeing a canyon that looked like someone had literally cut the world with a sword. Perfect. Tight quarters, but better than being bombarded from a distance.
Running her fingers through her sweat-slick hair, Tatsuki noticed that her protective arm gauntlets had vanished. Oh well, they weren't useful for this. She'd… yes, she'd need to be seen, and then lure Yoruichi into the canyon. Then… then she'd just need to give everything she got into one solid blow.
It wasn't a great plan, but it was the best she had right now.
There weren't any sizzling fireballs in the air right now. But she knew how damn fast Yoruichi was. She could be anywhere now. She'd just have to make a run for it and assume she'd be seen. If Orihime was right about the psychic spirit kitty bit, maybe her hearing was sharp enough to catch footprints.
Tatsuki threw herself forwards, zig-zapping erratically to try to avoid any incoming magic. Her toes gripped the rocks and gravel as best they could, and she was silently thankful that whatever she was doing to make herself faster and stronger also stopped her cutting herself. There! Up in the sky; a flash of orange and a red light! But the canyon was just ahead and Yoruichi had to know where she was going!
Deeper, deeper; Tatsuki reached deeper and managed to claw out a little more speed - enough that the fireball which would have landed in front of her instead hit metres behind. The sweat on her neck flash boiled, but now she was in cover and away from the orange demon in the sky.
It was dark in here, the false light barely reaching in. There were plenty of shadows to lurk in. Long years of endurance training helped her slow her breathing, though she knew for a fact she'd be regretting this in the morning. And also in an hour or so. Honestly, she was regretting it right now.
There. Footsteps at the mouth of the canyon. She squeezed in tighter, wishing she was wearing dark colours. Closer. Closer. Tatsuki held her breath, imagining the inner warmth inside her wound tighter and tighter and tighter until nothing escaped…
… until she released it in an explosive leap. Her fist passed a hair from Yoruichi's nose. When she hit the wall, it blew a car-sized crater in the solid stone. Tatsuki would have been impressed, if it wasn't for the fact that she had other things to worry about.
"Oh no," Yoruichi said easily, even as those deadly fists flicked and toyed with Tatsuki. "You lured me into a trap. What am I going to do?"
Orange light flickered and danced between them. It was like tar in the air, slowing Yoruichi's fists enough that Tatsuki could block and parry. It wasn't anything pretty, though. It was a brutal and inelegant fight up this close. Her teachers would have yelled at her for how sloppy some of her counters were - but desperation was a harsh mistress. One blow low, another high, and she was twisting past a knifehand to grab Yoruichi's wrist. Only the other woman twisted free and delivered a bone-shattering kick that shattered the crumbling stone walls. But that in itself was an overextension and Tatsuki used the chance to knee her in the thigh. Yoruichi stumbled back and Tatsuki pressed what little advantage she could steal before the other woman was recovered.
Tatsuki's breath clawed at her throat. She could feel the strain in her muscles. Worse, she could feel the strain in her bones. Humans weren't meant be be able to move this fast. Her power; the light within her, was giving her the bare minimum of what she needed to operate at this level. Just enough speed of thought to be able to follow Yoruichi; just enough agility to be able to react; just enough reinforcement in her flesh that her muscles didn't snap her ribs and shred her tendons.
But that bare minimum was spreading her as thin as butter on too much bread. She didn't have the reserves to keep this up!
The dark-skinned blur in front of her grinned, and sped up once again. Grabbing one of Tatsuki's outstretched arms, she twisted, ducked, and tossed her out of the canyon. The ground and sky spun around her, but Tatsuki managed a tuck and roll, and came up, fists raised.
"Is… is that all?" she tried. She was keeping up! She was! "I can still fight you!" Pretend she wasn't gasping for every breath; pretend she couldn't feel her bones grate; pretend her vision wasn't greying.
"I'm impressed," Yoruichi said, "but we're still playing right now. If I-"
A flash, and she felt Yoruichi's buzzing, crackling brightness right behind her. How fast had that been? Far, far too fast for her to possibly react to!
"-got serious…"
There was a yelp of pain. Yorucihi's presence was gone, darting backwards. Tatsuki staggered and slumped. All around her was the sound of breaking ice. And her back felt pleasantly cold.
"That's enough!" Mr Urahara announced, from the clifftop, one hand clutching his hat.
Slowly, Tatsuki sagged and began to topple forwards. She caught herself, but barely, staggering over to a rock. She felt like she'd pulled her… her everything. She'd pulled her everything.
"Owww," she moaned when she had some breath back. It took a while.
"Tatsuki! Tatsuki!" That was Orihime, warm and soft and easing her down to the ground. When had she caught up with them. "Are you hurt? That was amazing! You were going to fast I couldn't follow you! And when you and Yoruichi were hitting each other there were these flashes of light - pow, flash, flash - and I had to close my eyes because they were so bright and white! And you stood up to her spiritual pressure! I only caught the fringes of it! But it must have been as bad as what the really mean and smug and mean - and did I say smug, because he really was the smuggest, seriously, I wonder if there was a secret Soul Society project to make the smuggest person who ever could live and honestly there probably was because it's the sort of thing that that guy who used way too much foundation would do because he was just the worst - what was I talking about? Oh yes, it was as bad as what the smug captain did and I nearly fainted but you didn't!"
Tatsuki only managed to make a faint pained noise. Her vision had greyed out. She just wanted to sleep.
"Oh right, you probably need healing! Everyone always needs healing! Seriously, you should have seen things in Soul Society! It was like after every single fight that at least someone would be on the floor bleeding lots and then I had to heal them! And you're hardly bleeding at all! So that's good!" Orihime reared up to her full - albeit kneeling - height. "Do you hear me, Tatsuki! You're not allowed to get yourself injured like Ichigo! I can't take the stress of worrying about the two of you! And… oh, right, yes, the healing! Coming right up!"
Whatever Orihime did, it was magic. Well, obviously it was magic, but it was metaphorically magic as well as being obviously literally magic involving glowing fairies or something. She could have done with this when she broke her arm. Actually, why hadn't… no, no, she mustn't say anything to hurt her friend's feelings. Even though it hurt to know that Orihime had the power to heal her arm and hadn't done it back then.
"'Hime?" Something was nagging at Tatsuki now that she was able to think more clearly.
"Mmm hmm?"
"Why's the ground all frozen over?"
"Oh, that was you! You went and did some kind of thing where you covered your back in spikes made of ice! It was really cool… well, obviously it was cool because it was ice, but it was also cool in the wow sense - although it was also a bit scary because it was like 'shunk' only much faster and you kind of stabbed Yoruichi a bunch with it so I'm going to need to probably heal her too. I wonder if the Fourth Division have to worry so much about people they care about getting hurt a lot. I talked with their captain a bit and she was very nice and much less scary than most of the other captains, even if she wears her hair in a strange way. I wonder if I could wear mine like that if I grew it? Oh, but I'd always be worried about getting it caught in something and it strangling me."
That was a clear and present danger with Orihime, Tatsuki had to admit. Although… "Ice spikes?"
"Yep! Like a hedgehog! Made of ice! Only much larger. More like a porcupine, actually, because porcupine spikes come out while hedgehogs don't."
Tatsuki caught sight of Yoruichi. The older woman was bleeding from many shallow cuts and her clothes were shredded. Her hands seemed to be particularly bad off, but her face was untouched. Tatsuki breathed a sigh of relief. It looked like Yoruichi had managed to get her hands in front of her face, protecting her eyes.
"Uh," she called out. "Sorry! I didn't know my power did that!"
Yoruichi smiled back. "That was fun," she said. "It's been too long since I got to spar against someone who values the fighting arts for what they are. I'm sad to say Chad doesn't. He just punches people. And Ichigo doesn't like putting down his oversized meat-cleaver. I'm telling you if that boy ever gets disarmed, he's in trouble."
Tatsuki managed a pained smile. The other woman was far too cheerful for someone who was bleeding like that. "Are… are you hurt?"
"They're shallow. Those came out fast, but if I'd known they were coming I could have avoided them. I can wait until Orihime's seen to you."
"Oooh!" Orihime said brightly. "I bet Ichigo's dad has someone who could get me one of those ticket machines so I could go 'take a ticket and I'll be with you in a moment'. Oh, and a nurse's outfit!"
"Sure thing, Orihime," Tatsuki said kindly. She looked straight at Yoruichi. "I wasn't even pushing the limits of how fast you could go, was I?" she said. "You were going easy on me all along. And I don't think you were aiming to hit with those fireballs."
"Oh, I was aiming to hit," Yoruichi said, sitting down beside her. "But I was using Hadou #31 rather than anything faster because it gave you the chance to dodge. And they weren't very big - or hot - versions of it. You'd have survived if one had hit. But I was sure you'd dodge. You've got talent. More talent than Ichigo in a lot of ways, but he's just got so much raw power that he can afford to be sloppy and crude with how he uses it. You can't." She reached out with one bloodied hand and squeezed Tatsuki's hand. "If you want someone who can help you with things that a human instructor couldn't, I'd be honoured to…"
"Ahem!" Mr Urahara stared down at them from his position atop the cliff, leaning on his cane. "Please stop chattering, so I can say what I have to say and then go back to bed. So, I think I've seen enough to draw some conclusions. Your power is a human one. Beyond the basic ability to enhance your physical capabilities, which you seem to have a natural knack for, it - seemingly unpredictably and without much control - produces countermeasures for enemy techniques. But not all of them. I think - and correct me if I'm wrong, which I'm not - when you feel things are 'unfair' or 'something you can't fight', that's when it does things. As long as you could force yourself to keep up with Yoruichi's speed it didn't help you, but when she was hitting too hard and fast for you to block it made things to protect your arms - then later interfered with her strikes to slow her down. And then when she showed some of her true speed it tried to impale her with icicles so she wouldn't try that again."
"I am really sorry about that…" began Tatsuki.
"Shh." Mr Urahara stood on the ridge, eyes shaded by his hat. "You don't need training from Yoruichi," he said, eventually. "Not most importantly. It'll help you build up spiritual stamina and learn more techniques - and no doubt she wants someone to talk martial arts with, but…"
"You have that right," Yoruichi interrupted. "All you sword-wielding maniacs don't understand a girl's need to just punch people in the face. Or sometimes kick them in the head."
"Do you mind? I was talking." Mr Urahara cleared his throat. "Where was I? Oh yes. First and foremost, you think it's fair for someone to use kidou against you." His hand blurred, and pain flared in Tatsuki's arm.
"Ow!"
"Or throw rocks at you," he added, tossing a second pebble up and down.
"Well…" Tatsuki squirmed. She took a deep breath. "I can fight someone with a weapon. It's not something I want to do, but I can. If they have a knife, you can get it out of their hands. If they had a gun, you can keep out of their line of sight or dodge their aim. Just like I can dodge those fireballs."
"But you just shattered Sai," he pointed out.
"That's different. That's… it just ties you up. There's not even anything to avoid. It just happens."
Yoruichi grinned. "You're such an innocent. The only fair fight is one you win."
"I'm not sure that's what fair means," Orihime pointed out.
"The way I see it," Mr Urahara said, "if you cheat the very hardest you can, you'll be just about able to maybe possibly come up with counters for the kinds of tricks that ex-Captain Aizen and his subordinates - oh, and their legion of arrancar soldiers…" he took one look at Tatsuki's confused expression, "that is to say, super-Hollows can pull out. Your main weakness right now is anything that attacks you at range, which you seem to consider 'fair' but is a bad matchup for you. Oh, and your power seems to have a mind of its own because it doesn't even always react the same way. I'm not sure if the reason it sprayed Yoruichi with icicles was because it couldn't move you fast enough, or just that it thought she might have been able to overcome you moving even faster, but…"
"My power can think for itself?"
"Mine can!" Orihime provided happily.
"I'll be honest here, your common-or-garden Zanpakuto can think for itself," Mr Urahara said dryly. "I'm assuming it can until I get evidence to the contrary. So we're going to teach you that ranged weapons are something your power should help you with, and get you used to a variety of different manifestations your countermeasures can take, by making you face a constant barrage of ranged attacks combined with a wide variety of immobilising or otherwise-impossible-to-fight special abilities."
"How are you gonna do all that?" asked Tatsuki
"I'm glad you asked!" beamed Kisuke. "Tessai is going to agree to help you."
"The big man up in the shop?" Tatsuki checked.
"Yes, him. He's also out of shape and there was a little security incident here, so clearly he needs to wipe the old dust off. You'll be training buddies. He'll cast lots and lots of spells at you, and you'll learn to counter them." Mr Urahara smiled. "It's like killing two birds with one fireball."
"Um," she said.
"Don't worry," Mr Urahara said, turning around to leave. He looked behind him. "I'll send Tessai down, but I'll be with you in spirit. It'll be fun. Kids these days like fun, right?"
"I'm not sure this is a…"
"Don't worry, this will also be training for Orihime! She needs to practice her healing anyway!" He essayed a little wave over his shoulder. "Good luck, everyone! And believe in yourselves."
Saturday morning had dawned cold and clear. The sky overhead was a deep blue, but in the tall shadows of this part of the city the chill lingered.
"So," Tatsuki said, looking up at the sign over the seedy-looking shop and adjusting the sports kit slung over her back, "this is where you've all been going to secretly hang out."
It didn't look like much. It was tucked away off the main street, facing onto a small grubby square. The buildings all needed a good clean. There was dust in the windows. A young girl in a pink dress half-heartedly pushed dirt around with an old fashioned broom.
Orihime rubbed the back of her neck with her mittened hands. "Well, I wouldn't put it like that exactly," she said, grinning nervously. "It's just… it's just Mr Urahara's secret base. See, it turns out he's actually a super-secret guy on the run from the spirit-ghost-law, oh and he used run the thing that that weirdo who did not know how to use foundation properly ran and he used to be a Captain - Captains are super-scary, you know that, even when they try to be nice and some of them don't - and did you know his cat is actually a lady even though she talks like a man when she's a cat… boy, I was so confused about that when I found out she was really a girl and I wonder how she even turns herself into a cat, because it'd be really fun to be a kitty, you know?"
Tatsuki blinked. "Uh," she said, pausing for a moment to try to interpret the Orihime-babble. "How much of that is actually true, 'Hime?"
"All of it!" Orihime insisted, wide-eyed.
"Right. Uh..."
"I'm so glad you now have superpowers and now know because things were super scary and weird and not having you around meant I had to fight and I really hate doing that and…"
"It's all right." Yes, Tatsuki thought, trying not to scowl, that was one of the things she was going to have to talk to Ichigo about. At length. There was no excuse for putting Orihime at risk. She was a precious little cinnamon bun who wasn't suited for threats of violence and needed people like Tatsuki to ensure that she was eating properly and didn't try to live entirely off her latest hellish kitchen creation. The day before yesterday, she'd tried to serve Tatsuki a bean jam, bird's eye chilli and banana soup. "Now, what do we do?"
"Ururu!" There was Orihime, already rushing off ahead. "Is Mr Urahara in? I did call ahead!"
The little girl dropped her broom, and gave an awkward bow. "Y-yes," she said softly. "He's a-awake. Um. I think."
Tatsuki frowned. The girl was familiar. Hadn't she seen her somewhere? Yes, that was it - she'd seen her over the summer, running around with Ichigo's sisters. Wait! How many people she knew secretly had superpowers and hadn't told her?
She was still pondering that question by the time she had been escorted in to an old-fashioned backroom. She sat down at the low table next to Orihime, who seemed to be familiar with the place. There was a dishevelled man there in greens and tans, as well as an attractive woman. Something about the way the woman held herself led Tatsuki to think she was a fighter; a certain alertness in her posture and her piercing gold eyes. She was certainly more awake than the man.
"This is Mr Urahara," Orihime said brightly, gesturing to him.
"Please, Orihime, keep your voice down this early in the morning," he groaned. "I can only take so much perkiness. Your presence is like shouting."
"He's hungover," the darker skinned woman said, smiling. Tatsuki wasn't sure where she was from, but she wasn't Japanese. Maybe she was Indian?
"And this is Yoruichi! She's the psychic spirit ghost kitty I told you about! She trained me and Chad!"
Yoruichi gave a little wave. "Hello, Tatsuki. And looking at you, you're the latest addition to the little gang."
"I don't believe we've ever met before," Tatsuki said. "Oh, I suppose you must have heard of me from Orihime and Ichigo."
"Oh, we've met. I probably saved your life from that Espada that snatched you," Mr Urahara said. "You can thank me later. Or now. Whichever you prefer."
Tatsuki smiled at the two of them, slightly nervously, and tried to resist the urge to swallow. They'd been there on that day? Yoruichi seemed nice - but with that new sense of hers, she could feel the crackling, hard, bright light at her heart. It was scary in its intensity - and she hadn't even been able to feel it from outside this room. The rumpled man was even worse. She didn't want to look at him too closely. "I… uh…"
"Oh dear." Yoruichi raised one eyebrow with a hint of mischievous amusement. "You're certainly more sensitive to spiritual concerns than Ichigo was when he was starting out. The boy's a lump."
"How do you know that?" Her question came out a little faster than she intended - even if the woman was right about Ichigo.
"You're squinting when you look at me and Kisuke," Yoruichi said easily. "And if you weren't in such good shape, you'd be out of breath."
"Oh, no, I didn't even think about that!" Orihime said, hands going to her mouth. "She didn't see any of things we did in Soul Society! And she's never ever felt the air go all fuzzy and blurry and then it gets hard to breathe and you feel like you're being crushed and…"
"It's spiritual pressure. She'll get used to it," Mr Urahara said, looking up slightly. "So, Tatsuki," he said, elongating his syllables, "why don't you tell us exactly what this wonderful new miracle power you've stumbled on is. What does it do? In fact, no," he said, interrupting himself, "that'd take too long and I'd rather take a look at it without… preconceptions. Tessai can watch the shop for now - and keep an eye out for any mask-wearing thieves." He seemed irked about something.
"All right," Tatsuki said, nodding. "Um. I… I'm not sure how to use it. And Kon said it'd only work when I had someone to fight with, because…"
"Uh uh uh. You have someone to fight with. Yoruichi is here. Don't worry, she's very friendly. And almost never bites."
Her eyes flicked over to the smiling woman. "Uh…" That didn't feel safe. Yoruichi was far too bright-hard-crackling! Except… what about her power? If she backed down from even training it'd mean nothing. "Okay! Okay! Let's do this!"
Kisuke smiled at her, eyes under the shadow of his hat. "That's the attitude I like," he said in a not-unworrying way. "It'll be fun. We all like fun, right? Fun is… fun."
Imminent violence had a way of focussing the mind. For example, Tatsuki was hardly thinking about the fact that the Urahara shop turned out to have a massive and possibly impossible space under the shop. Worrying why there was a barren wasteland with sky-like walls under a Japanese city would just have to come later.
Not when she was standing here in her karate practice clothing, eye to eye with - if Orihime was to be trusted - a spirit ghost lady ninja cat. Who was possibly also a magical girl. Yoruichi had changed into loose black clothing, and was radiating cheerful menace with a casual smile.
"Woo!" Orihime shouted from the sidelines, perched on a rock next to Mr Urahara. "You can do it, Tatsuki! You're our… uh, our woman! If you can't do it, no one c… well, Ichigo could, and maybe Chad and of course Mr Kenpachi could and..."
Yoruichi raised one finger. "Orihime," she said.
"Sorry, sorry, I didn't mean to put her off," Orihime mumbled.
"Or maybe she's just more offended at the idea that those people could beat her," Mr Urahara observed, sitting back.
"Zaraki couldn't even notice me if I didn't want him to," Yoruichi said, running her hands through her hair. "Yes, I'm offended."
"What are you all talking about?" Tatsuki asked, deeply confused.
"I'll explain later," Yoruichi said. "But for your part, get ready, Tatsuki." She sunk into a ready position. "Get ready for a workout. We'll start out easy, and then work up so Kisuke can see how your powers work."
Tatsuki nodded and bowed, then took a ready stance. The other woman was favouring her rear foot, bent slightly. Ready to spring into action if Tatsuki advanced. She'd need to-
Yoruichi whipped her middle and index fingers around, pointing them at Tatsuki. That wasn't a striking move; her posture was all wrong! "Bakudou #1; Sai," she said calmly.
An unseen force wrenched back Tatsuki's arms, hard enough to hurt. She was trapped, arms behind her back, spine arched. She tottered, and the glowing light within her pulsed. Something cracked with the sound of breaking glass, and her arms were free. "What was that?" she protested.
"The simplest binding spell," Mr Urahara called out from the sidelines. "Now, no more questions. If you've got breath to ask questions, clearly Yoruichi isn't working you hard enough."
And like that Yoruichi was on her, flanking her to the left with a rapid sequence of almost teasing blows. Tatsuki could tell the older woman wasn't committing to each strike, each one more like a flick or a tap than a real strike. And yet despite that a single knife hand striking her forearm left pins and needles running all the way up and down it.
Grudgingly giving ground, Tatsuki tried to get a grasp on how this woman fought. They were the same height, but she was just so fast that it was like she had several heads of height on her for her effective reach. Worse, she wasn't even trying hard. Her breath was as easy as if she was sitting down; her motions were casual and never extended far enough for there to be anything to exploit.
Drawing on the inner light inside of her, Tatsuki pushed her body to speed up. Leaning back, she stored up energy in her left leg and then exploded forwards with a kiai and a palm strike. Her force formed a perfect line, flowing up from the ground through her legs and torso into her arm.
Yoruichi stepped sideways and casually slapped her hand out of the way with a stinging knife hand.
"Good form," she said casually, "but too slow. You're never going to hit me with something like that. How much more speed do you have in you?"
Forcing herself to smile, Tatsuki replied, "I don't know. This is why I came here to find out." Her right arm was stinging to the shoulder, like she'd just taken a particularly bad static shock.
"Look on the bright side. That'd have broken most people's arms." Yoruichi paused. "Want to keep going?"
Taking a deep breath, Tatsuki forced more of the light in her into her limbs. It made the tingling go away. "Of course! I'm not going to give up now."
"Oh?" Yoruichi tilted her head, her expression curiously sad. "Even if I do this?"
All the air was forced from Tatsuki's lungs in a sudden gut-punch. No, she realised as she doubled over, Yoruichi hadn't moved. She'd just… done something. Something that suddenly meant that each breath weighed a tonne and it was like she was wearing a lead-weighted stamina vest which had been overloaded by ten times or more.
Well, screw that. She gritted her teeth and took a deep breath. She could take it. Tatsuki could feel the pressure outside increasing, but she was like… like the front of a ship, parting the waves. It was flowing around her, rather than slamming straight into her.
"Nice!" Yoruichi said, her strange sadness gone. She was grinning again. "I can feel what you're doing! That's clever!"
"Useful," Mr Urahara observed. "Or maybe just suicidal. You don't want to be overestimated."
Tatsuki quite wanted to know what had them impressed. But she didn't have time for that, because Yoruichi was moving again. And somehow she was going even faster.
The next few moments were a blur of pain and desperate leaping dodges. Step by step she forced Tatsuki back. Each knifehand strike might as well have been a knife; each open palm strike sent a wall of air in Tatsuki's direction even when they fell short. She couldn't even block blows like that, so she had to give way. And there was a cliff behind her. No more space to retreat.
And then Yoruichi turned a lunge into a low sweep, and knocked both of her legs out from under her. Tatsuki hit the ground, slapping it with her forearms to eat the impact, and rolled to the side just fast enough to avoid a knifehand that split the rock.
This was madness, Tatsuki realised. Whatever the woman was doing, it was turning her hands into something that could take her head off or cut her in two. She couldn't do anything if she couldn't even touch her.
And like that, something unlocked in her head. Orange light unfolded around her hands, taking the form of padded training gauntlets. Tatsuki knew what they were there for. It wasn't to make her hit harder or better. It was just to let her block or deflect one of those punishing strikes without losing an arm.
Pushing off from the ground, she got her legs under her and leapt at Yoruichi. She forced even more power into her arms and legs, desperately trying to claw enough speed to be able to keep up with her.
Another open palm strike - and this time Tatsuki caught it on her forearm, batting the arm away. She followed it up with a straight punch, stepping in with an explosive lunge. This time it connected - not hard, because Yoruichi had somehow twisted so it only glanced her, but it was an actual hit.
Pressure, she had to keep up the pressure! Muscles aching, she threw hooks left and right, just trying to stop the other woman advancing. And this time Yoruichi was giving ground. Except, no, she was coiled up like a spring and-
Yoruichi was behind her. There had been the momentary impression of something passing over her hair - had that been her? - but the punch was still coming out and she was entirely off balance.
Then she was in the air, being dragged by the collar. She twisted her head, seeing Yoruichi's grin. Tatsuki blinked again.
The other woman was running circles around the impossible space. She was running on the sky-like walls, dragging Tatsuki like a child's toy.
Slickness, oiliness, an escape. Tatsuki's skin and clothes went mirror-bright for a second, and she slipped from Yoruichi's grasp and she had just enough time to think that maybe it wasn't such a good idea to be dropped when you were this high up.
She had the training to deal with this, with a bit of her new magical-whatever. Tucking her legs in, she hit the ground rolling. The stone ground battered and bruised her, but that was better than turning her into pulp - which is what would have happened the day before yesterday. For a moment, all she could do was stare up at the blue false sky, flat on her back. Her stomach muscles protested, but she flipped upright and stared up at Yoruichi who was looking down at her. Feet firmly planted on the wall.
"Gravity is… isn't something you believe in, is it?" she wheezed.
"It's really more of a suggestion," Yoruichi said, with a shrug. "Run."
"What?"
"Hadou #31, Shakkahou."
The red fireball made an almost lazy arc as it descended to the ground. Tatsuki screamed, and threw herself to the side. The heat washed over her, and she looked in horror at the glassy crater to her left.
"You know," Yoruichi added, "I said 'Run', not 'Dodge'." Another fireball was already forming in her hand.
Tatsuki ran. And ran. And ran.
"This," she hissed from between clenched teeth, "this… is not something…" she threw herself down a narrow gully, feeling the hair on the back of her neck singe, "this is not something that…" argh argh argh! Yoruichi was waiting for her at the end of the gully, how had she got there?
Tatsuki slammed her fist into the side, collapsing it in a landslide that stopped the next fireball, then kicked off from the walls, scaling up to the plateau above her.
"Are you trying to kill me?" she shouted down from behind the ridge.
The response she got was a trio of arcing balls of red flame, lobbed like grenades. She broke into a dead run, arms pumping. Okay. Okay. She just had to use her head. So, Yoruichi was both an amazing martial artist and someone who could throw fireballs like she was a fighting game character. Argh, why hadn't she asked someone other than Orihime to explain what these people could do?
She threw herself behind a pillar of rock and gasped for breath. Right. Okay. So, these fireballs could arc, but didn't home in and couldn't punch through solid objects. So she'd need to ambush Yoruichi somewhere where she was too close to risk using them without catching herself in the blast. Yes! She could do that. She glanced around, seeing a canyon that looked like someone had literally cut the world with a sword. Perfect. Tight quarters, but better than being bombarded from a distance.
Running her fingers through her sweat-slick hair, Tatsuki noticed that her protective arm gauntlets had vanished. Oh well, they weren't useful for this. She'd… yes, she'd need to be seen, and then lure Yoruichi into the canyon. Then… then she'd just need to give everything she got into one solid blow.
It wasn't a great plan, but it was the best she had right now.
There weren't any sizzling fireballs in the air right now. But she knew how damn fast Yoruichi was. She could be anywhere now. She'd just have to make a run for it and assume she'd be seen. If Orihime was right about the psychic spirit kitty bit, maybe her hearing was sharp enough to catch footprints.
Tatsuki threw herself forwards, zig-zapping erratically to try to avoid any incoming magic. Her toes gripped the rocks and gravel as best they could, and she was silently thankful that whatever she was doing to make herself faster and stronger also stopped her cutting herself. There! Up in the sky; a flash of orange and a red light! But the canyon was just ahead and Yoruichi had to know where she was going!
Deeper, deeper; Tatsuki reached deeper and managed to claw out a little more speed - enough that the fireball which would have landed in front of her instead hit metres behind. The sweat on her neck flash boiled, but now she was in cover and away from the orange demon in the sky.
It was dark in here, the false light barely reaching in. There were plenty of shadows to lurk in. Long years of endurance training helped her slow her breathing, though she knew for a fact she'd be regretting this in the morning. And also in an hour or so. Honestly, she was regretting it right now.
There. Footsteps at the mouth of the canyon. She squeezed in tighter, wishing she was wearing dark colours. Closer. Closer. Tatsuki held her breath, imagining the inner warmth inside her wound tighter and tighter and tighter until nothing escaped…
… until she released it in an explosive leap. Her fist passed a hair from Yoruichi's nose. When she hit the wall, it blew a car-sized crater in the solid stone. Tatsuki would have been impressed, if it wasn't for the fact that she had other things to worry about.
"Oh no," Yoruichi said easily, even as those deadly fists flicked and toyed with Tatsuki. "You lured me into a trap. What am I going to do?"
Orange light flickered and danced between them. It was like tar in the air, slowing Yoruichi's fists enough that Tatsuki could block and parry. It wasn't anything pretty, though. It was a brutal and inelegant fight up this close. Her teachers would have yelled at her for how sloppy some of her counters were - but desperation was a harsh mistress. One blow low, another high, and she was twisting past a knifehand to grab Yoruichi's wrist. Only the other woman twisted free and delivered a bone-shattering kick that shattered the crumbling stone walls. But that in itself was an overextension and Tatsuki used the chance to knee her in the thigh. Yoruichi stumbled back and Tatsuki pressed what little advantage she could steal before the other woman was recovered.
Tatsuki's breath clawed at her throat. She could feel the strain in her muscles. Worse, she could feel the strain in her bones. Humans weren't meant be be able to move this fast. Her power; the light within her, was giving her the bare minimum of what she needed to operate at this level. Just enough speed of thought to be able to follow Yoruichi; just enough agility to be able to react; just enough reinforcement in her flesh that her muscles didn't snap her ribs and shred her tendons.
But that bare minimum was spreading her as thin as butter on too much bread. She didn't have the reserves to keep this up!
The dark-skinned blur in front of her grinned, and sped up once again. Grabbing one of Tatsuki's outstretched arms, she twisted, ducked, and tossed her out of the canyon. The ground and sky spun around her, but Tatsuki managed a tuck and roll, and came up, fists raised.
"Is… is that all?" she tried. She was keeping up! She was! "I can still fight you!" Pretend she wasn't gasping for every breath; pretend she couldn't feel her bones grate; pretend her vision wasn't greying.
"I'm impressed," Yoruichi said, "but we're still playing right now. If I-"
A flash, and she felt Yoruichi's buzzing, crackling brightness right behind her. How fast had that been? Far, far too fast for her to possibly react to!
"-got serious…"
There was a yelp of pain. Yorucihi's presence was gone, darting backwards. Tatsuki staggered and slumped. All around her was the sound of breaking ice. And her back felt pleasantly cold.
"That's enough!" Mr Urahara announced, from the clifftop, one hand clutching his hat.
Slowly, Tatsuki sagged and began to topple forwards. She caught herself, but barely, staggering over to a rock. She felt like she'd pulled her… her everything. She'd pulled her everything.
"Owww," she moaned when she had some breath back. It took a while.
"Tatsuki! Tatsuki!" That was Orihime, warm and soft and easing her down to the ground. When had she caught up with them. "Are you hurt? That was amazing! You were going to fast I couldn't follow you! And when you and Yoruichi were hitting each other there were these flashes of light - pow, flash, flash - and I had to close my eyes because they were so bright and white! And you stood up to her spiritual pressure! I only caught the fringes of it! But it must have been as bad as what the really mean and smug and mean - and did I say smug, because he really was the smuggest, seriously, I wonder if there was a secret Soul Society project to make the smuggest person who ever could live and honestly there probably was because it's the sort of thing that that guy who used way too much foundation would do because he was just the worst - what was I talking about? Oh yes, it was as bad as what the smug captain did and I nearly fainted but you didn't!"
Tatsuki only managed to make a faint pained noise. Her vision had greyed out. She just wanted to sleep.
"Oh right, you probably need healing! Everyone always needs healing! Seriously, you should have seen things in Soul Society! It was like after every single fight that at least someone would be on the floor bleeding lots and then I had to heal them! And you're hardly bleeding at all! So that's good!" Orihime reared up to her full - albeit kneeling - height. "Do you hear me, Tatsuki! You're not allowed to get yourself injured like Ichigo! I can't take the stress of worrying about the two of you! And… oh, right, yes, the healing! Coming right up!"
Whatever Orihime did, it was magic. Well, obviously it was magic, but it was metaphorically magic as well as being obviously literally magic involving glowing fairies or something. She could have done with this when she broke her arm. Actually, why hadn't… no, no, she mustn't say anything to hurt her friend's feelings. Even though it hurt to know that Orihime had the power to heal her arm and hadn't done it back then.
"'Hime?" Something was nagging at Tatsuki now that she was able to think more clearly.
"Mmm hmm?"
"Why's the ground all frozen over?"
"Oh, that was you! You went and did some kind of thing where you covered your back in spikes made of ice! It was really cool… well, obviously it was cool because it was ice, but it was also cool in the wow sense - although it was also a bit scary because it was like 'shunk' only much faster and you kind of stabbed Yoruichi a bunch with it so I'm going to need to probably heal her too. I wonder if the Fourth Division have to worry so much about people they care about getting hurt a lot. I talked with their captain a bit and she was very nice and much less scary than most of the other captains, even if she wears her hair in a strange way. I wonder if I could wear mine like that if I grew it? Oh, but I'd always be worried about getting it caught in something and it strangling me."
That was a clear and present danger with Orihime, Tatsuki had to admit. Although… "Ice spikes?"
"Yep! Like a hedgehog! Made of ice! Only much larger. More like a porcupine, actually, because porcupine spikes come out while hedgehogs don't."
Tatsuki caught sight of Yoruichi. The older woman was bleeding from many shallow cuts and her clothes were shredded. Her hands seemed to be particularly bad off, but her face was untouched. Tatsuki breathed a sigh of relief. It looked like Yoruichi had managed to get her hands in front of her face, protecting her eyes.
"Uh," she called out. "Sorry! I didn't know my power did that!"
Yoruichi smiled back. "That was fun," she said. "It's been too long since I got to spar against someone who values the fighting arts for what they are. I'm sad to say Chad doesn't. He just punches people. And Ichigo doesn't like putting down his oversized meat-cleaver. I'm telling you if that boy ever gets disarmed, he's in trouble."
Tatsuki managed a pained smile. The other woman was far too cheerful for someone who was bleeding like that. "Are… are you hurt?"
"They're shallow. Those came out fast, but if I'd known they were coming I could have avoided them. I can wait until Orihime's seen to you."
"Oooh!" Orihime said brightly. "I bet Ichigo's dad has someone who could get me one of those ticket machines so I could go 'take a ticket and I'll be with you in a moment'. Oh, and a nurse's outfit!"
"Sure thing, Orihime," Tatsuki said kindly. She looked straight at Yoruichi. "I wasn't even pushing the limits of how fast you could go, was I?" she said. "You were going easy on me all along. And I don't think you were aiming to hit with those fireballs."
"Oh, I was aiming to hit," Yoruichi said, sitting down beside her. "But I was using Hadou #31 rather than anything faster because it gave you the chance to dodge. And they weren't very big - or hot - versions of it. You'd have survived if one had hit. But I was sure you'd dodge. You've got talent. More talent than Ichigo in a lot of ways, but he's just got so much raw power that he can afford to be sloppy and crude with how he uses it. You can't." She reached out with one bloodied hand and squeezed Tatsuki's hand. "If you want someone who can help you with things that a human instructor couldn't, I'd be honoured to…"
"Ahem!" Mr Urahara stared down at them from his position atop the cliff, leaning on his cane. "Please stop chattering, so I can say what I have to say and then go back to bed. So, I think I've seen enough to draw some conclusions. Your power is a human one. Beyond the basic ability to enhance your physical capabilities, which you seem to have a natural knack for, it - seemingly unpredictably and without much control - produces countermeasures for enemy techniques. But not all of them. I think - and correct me if I'm wrong, which I'm not - when you feel things are 'unfair' or 'something you can't fight', that's when it does things. As long as you could force yourself to keep up with Yoruichi's speed it didn't help you, but when she was hitting too hard and fast for you to block it made things to protect your arms - then later interfered with her strikes to slow her down. And then when she showed some of her true speed it tried to impale her with icicles so she wouldn't try that again."
"I am really sorry about that…" began Tatsuki.
"Shh." Mr Urahara stood on the ridge, eyes shaded by his hat. "You don't need training from Yoruichi," he said, eventually. "Not most importantly. It'll help you build up spiritual stamina and learn more techniques - and no doubt she wants someone to talk martial arts with, but…"
"You have that right," Yoruichi interrupted. "All you sword-wielding maniacs don't understand a girl's need to just punch people in the face. Or sometimes kick them in the head."
"Do you mind? I was talking." Mr Urahara cleared his throat. "Where was I? Oh yes. First and foremost, you think it's fair for someone to use kidou against you." His hand blurred, and pain flared in Tatsuki's arm.
"Ow!"
"Or throw rocks at you," he added, tossing a second pebble up and down.
"Well…" Tatsuki squirmed. She took a deep breath. "I can fight someone with a weapon. It's not something I want to do, but I can. If they have a knife, you can get it out of their hands. If they had a gun, you can keep out of their line of sight or dodge their aim. Just like I can dodge those fireballs."
"But you just shattered Sai," he pointed out.
"That's different. That's… it just ties you up. There's not even anything to avoid. It just happens."
Yoruichi grinned. "You're such an innocent. The only fair fight is one you win."
"I'm not sure that's what fair means," Orihime pointed out.
"The way I see it," Mr Urahara said, "if you cheat the very hardest you can, you'll be just about able to maybe possibly come up with counters for the kinds of tricks that ex-Captain Aizen and his subordinates - oh, and their legion of arrancar soldiers…" he took one look at Tatsuki's confused expression, "that is to say, super-Hollows can pull out. Your main weakness right now is anything that attacks you at range, which you seem to consider 'fair' but is a bad matchup for you. Oh, and your power seems to have a mind of its own because it doesn't even always react the same way. I'm not sure if the reason it sprayed Yoruichi with icicles was because it couldn't move you fast enough, or just that it thought she might have been able to overcome you moving even faster, but…"
"My power can think for itself?"
"Mine can!" Orihime provided happily.
"I'll be honest here, your common-or-garden Zanpakuto can think for itself," Mr Urahara said dryly. "I'm assuming it can until I get evidence to the contrary. So we're going to teach you that ranged weapons are something your power should help you with, and get you used to a variety of different manifestations your countermeasures can take, by making you face a constant barrage of ranged attacks combined with a wide variety of immobilising or otherwise-impossible-to-fight special abilities."
"How are you gonna do all that?" asked Tatsuki
"I'm glad you asked!" beamed Kisuke. "Tessai is going to agree to help you."
"The big man up in the shop?" Tatsuki checked.
"Yes, him. He's also out of shape and there was a little security incident here, so clearly he needs to wipe the old dust off. You'll be training buddies. He'll cast lots and lots of spells at you, and you'll learn to counter them." Mr Urahara smiled. "It's like killing two birds with one fireball."
"Um," she said.
"Don't worry," Mr Urahara said, turning around to leave. He looked behind him. "I'll send Tessai down, but I'll be with you in spirit. It'll be fun. Kids these days like fun, right?"
"I'm not sure this is a…"
"Don't worry, this will also be training for Orihime! She needs to practice her healing anyway!" He essayed a little wave over his shoulder. "Good luck, everyone! And believe in yourselves."
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Aleph
Princess of Stabbity
- Location
- The sixth circle of Hell (second on weekends)
- Pronouns
- She/Her
I know what you meant here, but I gotta admit, I'm now super curious to know what the shikai and bankai of a garden zanpakuto would be.
Also, Orihime is a super-cutie who appears to have borrowed extensively from OTSagi.
- Location
- Here & There
Oh yes training arcs. This is unironically my favorite part of Bleach.
chocolote12
A Penguin Flailing Against The Keyboard Of Life.
Just translating her mannerisms into text, I guess.
- Location
- madison
no sense of right and wrong.
NephyrisX
Luck is my dump stat. And the dice shows.
- Location
- Singapore
Deliquent bamboo sword zanpakuto when.I know what you meant here, but I gotta admit, I'm now super curious to know what the shikai and bankai of a garden zanpakuto would be.
Well, she's almost always been the innocent airhead, especially in the early days of Bleach.
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- Location
- Texas
I know what you meant here, but I gotta admit, I'm now super curious to know what the shikai and bankai of a garden zanpakuto would be.
I refer you to Yumichika.
- Location
- Somewhere
A Hedge Maze is You...r BankaiI know what you meant here, but I gotta admit, I'm now super curious to know what the shikai and bankai of a garden zanpakuto would be.
In the spirit of wacky Bleach powers, using this bankai traps your enemies in a giant leafy game of Pacman. Fighting with or against Shunsui's bankai could be a nightmare.
- Location
- Here & There
No joke a trick type bankai like that would be fun to fight, until a stronger enemy just destroys the maze. Or how about the bankai's ability turns it into a 3 dimensional ever changing maze that constantly regenerates and only the user can navigate it with perfect ease?A Hedge Maze is You...r Bankai
In the spirit of wacky Bleach powers, using this bankai traps your enemies in a giant leafy game of Pacman. Fighting with or against Shunsui's bankai could be a nightmare.
- Location
- madison
doesn't she turn it up when she's nervous? her one "normal friend" just go super powers and is eager to go punch a captain. I can see her babbling more than normal out of stress.
HatsuZ
Phantom Thief
- Location
- Over the rainbow!
iirc, wasn't he supposed to be the main villian instead of Aizen at some point?
- Location
- Head in the clouds
Is anyone else hoping that we don't fight Tatsuki? Especially if she does figure out how to make ranged attacks unfair from her perspective?
And have a sinking feeling we will especially given how she'd probably take Nemo apart in close range?
And have a sinking feeling we will especially given how she'd probably take Nemo apart in close range?
Cornuthaum
Be kind to each other.
- Location
- Austria
- Pronouns
- He/Him
This is a girl whose stated ambitions are to turn herself into a 50ft giant killer robot with flame breath and laser eyes.
edit: I'm wrong, it was missiles and a gatling cannon
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- Location
- Here & There
But, muh drama. And themes of the powerless fighting to protect those they care for.
Like that's a bad thingThis is a girl whose stated ambitions are to turn herself into a 50ft giant killer robot with flame breath and laser eyes.
edit: I'm wrong, it was missiles and a gatling cannon
Shit this makes me miss the goofier parts of early Bleach.
- Location
- Should be a bit higher
As presented Tatsuki's power is even worse than I imaged it. Hopefully it gets tweaked into something more manageable.
- Location
- Here & There
That's what the training arc's for. Though there the possibility of character degradation if Tatsuki starts seeing everything as "unfair."
- Location
- Should be a bit higher
I don't mean that it's too weak. The second part of your statement is actually what I meant. It's (potentially) completely broken.