Warnings: Rated Mature for language, gore and adult situations. Readers under the age of 18 are discouraged from reading.
Pineapple Hearts & Sparrow Kisses
Chapter One
“Friends and Invitations”
~ Suzume ~
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| Gates Of The Ninth |
I was distracted a disappointed this morning. As I passed through the gates of the Ninth Division I couldn’t help but feel antsy, like I had aggravating itch that was just out of reach. That in itself was enough to make me edgy but as I failed in my personal mission of the day, I felt all the more so.
Being sent on an errand to the Serietei’s most artistic squad was a connotation that excited me since my return to the Serietei and my beloved father. I’ve longed for too long to come here but now that I have my entire reasoning for my excitement isn’t even in at the moment. Still not in from night patrols, his Third seat had told me.
Truly, I shouldn’t have been so surprised. He was after all, an important man now. I snorted at the very idea. It was just to ludicrous not to find humorous. A Captain! I laughed every time I heard it.
Determining that I had covered enough paper work back at my own squad and that Lt. Iba would not die without my aid, I decided to shop around for a while. After all, what was the point of coming to Squad Nine without sampling some of the goods their members always had for sale.
As I suspected anything and everything that wasn’t nailed to the floor had a price tag. Absolutely anything you could need or want was on display within these walls. From bolts of beautiful silks to hand painted pottery and hand carved furniture. Writing implements of the likes I had never seen before and some of the strangest spectacles I had seen to date. Not that Iba’s were any less comical.
Caught up at a especially interesting booth of crafted jewelry I paid no mind to the soft footsteps at my back.
 | ||||
| Captain Shuhei Hisagi of the Fifth |
Smiling excitedly to myself, I spun on my heels and came face to face with my long parted friend. “Yes,” I replied, more shyly than I would have liked but as I hadn’t seen him in so long, I found myself nervous.
One thing was certain, he sure had changed. It was foolish and a little naïve but I still have expected the little boy I had befriended at my grandfather’s estate so many years ago. Feeling my face flush red, I realized quickly that there was nothing little or boyish about him now.
“Captain Hisagi,” I bowed.
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| Third Seat Suzume Kamamura |
Warm fingers gripped my chin, pulling my gaze upwards to meet his once more. “Awe, none of that,” he teasingly scolded as he pinched my nose. “It’s just plain old Shühei to you.”
As the apples of my cheeks pinked in embarrassment at his ridiculous antics, I scowled at him. “That shouldn’t be a problem,” I supplied with a chuckled, slapping his arm playfully and earning myself a small whimper of pain from my macho friend. At least some things hadn’t changed.
He laughed, obviously coming to the same conclusion as I had and threw his arm over my shoulder, proposing to give me a tour of his barracks. I agreed readily.
As we ambled around the common grounds of the Ninth, I took the time to study the man I had known as a boy from childhood. It would be easy enough for a blind woman to see that he had grown into a fine man, as I always knew he would. Shorter and a tad thinner than I had presumed but that just might be due to the fact that as a girl, he was always so much larger than me. Hisagi was still everything I had imagined in my wasted days at my Uncle’s shoji. Though his Captain’s effects and horrible scars were shocking to the eye, I could still see the brave little boy that had nearly lost his own life saving me from a hollow shine through.
We talked about trivial things at first, both of us skirting around anything serious that would lead to questions that he no more wanted to ask, than I to answer. Throughout our conversations he would glance down at me through the corner of his eye and a small blush would fan across his face. It made me wonder if he was just as nervous as I was about meeting again after such a long separation.
It was expected that I would run into him at some point or another with our divisions being so close to one another but I hadn’t expected the true weight of seeing him again. So much had changed. We had changed and it scared me to no end that the only friend I had ever had wouldn’t receive me now.
We were nothing more than children to the eyes of the Soul Society when were forced to part ways, each of us following our path of destiny. Shühei went on to procure his dream of becoming a soul reaper and attended the Spirit Arts Academy, while I attended academies of a different kind.
Even as a child I was never one to kick a gift horse in the mouth, and easily accepted my graces when bestowed. Nobility, however, was not something I would wish upon any man or beast.
It had been my duty to restore honor to my mother’s name, since it was my birth that brought her shame in the first place. It was a feat nearly impossible to accomplish and to this day, I have not found a way around it.
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| Lord Kannogi |
Tutor after tutor and finishing school after finishing school, I struggled to obtain the grace and skill that would see me to the station of a Lady of my clan. Had I known that all the labor I endured as I fought against my very nature was for not but to gain entry to my Uncles home so that I might gain a husband, I would have fled home and lived out my life as a vagrant in the Rukongai. Perhaps I would have even followed Hisagi to the Academy and I would be of Captain’s station myself.
With a heavy heart, I did what was expected of me to uphold the Kannogi name. It was my mother’s dying wish, or so my Uncle told me. Now, I find that lunacy very hard to believe.
Nonetheless, I became the Lady I was born to be, befitting any powerful, wealthy noble but, being married into a respected house of Soul Society did not turn out quite the way my Uncle had expected. He soon learned that though I was pleasing to the eye and well mannered, not many clan elders were interested in marrying their respected men create a union with a half-breed. A freak of nature. A shun of nobility.
It became all to clear that I would no more be restoring my mother’s honor with kimono and song, than he would turn into a prince overnight. When that misfortune came about, I was sent to the Spirit Arts Academy to earn my name with blood and steel. I couldn’t have been more ecstatic.
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| Spirit Arts Academy |
I was elated to be back among my father and the Serietei and I entered my new life with a smile on my face and a tune on my lips. I may never yet be fully excepted into my mother’s family but the smile that accompanied my overbearingly-proud father was worth so much more. From what I understood he had been boasting for months about my early graduation of just three year attendance and the extra merits I had earned in Hohö, Kidö and Janjutsu. It would have been very embarrassing if I wasn’t so flabbergasted myself.
It was surprising when my father had informed me that it was my Uncle’s grand idea for me to become a soul reaper but deep in my heart I knew it had little to do with my own wishes. It was nothing more than a last ditch effort to save his own hyde from the social atrocities he had been dealing with since my mother allowed herself to be defiled by a demon, or father as I preferred to call him. He was saving face. Since I had been deemed unfit for a proper union he was hoping that I would somehow possesses my father’s skill with a blade and become famous. In my opinion my Uncle was nothing more than a pompous ass.
It hurt a first, as I sure it did for any woman to rejected so. I was branded as the outcast of my family and called unworthy. Yes, I was unworthy material for a fitting man to marry but that didn’t stop anyone of the ‘good’ men from trying to couple with me. Apparently, I was good enough for that. After meeting with many of the men my Uncle deemed as a good match, mating with any of those brutes was the last thing from my mind. Many have called me a beast, an abomination since the hour of my birth… an yet, I find that in nobility the eyes are truly opened to abominable and beastly sights.
My musings were broken as my sensitive ears picked up a mischievous chuckle and found that it was coming from my friend. He had his arms behind his back and the troublemaker was definitely hiding something. “Zume…” He called in a very disturbing sing-song tone.
“Yes,” I growled at him, knowing that by the glint in his eye and smirk on his lips, what ever he had planned was going to mortify me to the point of stepping foot outside my door.
I hated being right.
As expected, Shühei did have something behind his back and it was also ‘mortifying’ beyond anything I had previously assumed. The statue itself was not particularly vulgar but the means of which my friend used it was definitely so. “You bastard,” I snarled as I darted from shop opening to shop opening… running for my modesty from my best friend and the large phallus of his fertility statue.
Hisagi and I chased each other through the market like children with no morals. Him teasing me about my lack of knowledge of the male species and I teasing him about too much knowledge of it. Either way, I had not enjoyed myself this much in decades. It was so freeing to let go of my inhibitions, to forget that I was a Lady of the Court and just be myself.
A throat clearing loudly stopped us both in our tracks and I felt my body blaze with a blush. We had been caught and I couldn’t have a care. As I shifted my gaze to the approaching red-head my cheeks burned all the more brightly when I realized that not only had we been caught acting a fool, but by another Captain and a stunning one at that.
He stopped a few meters away, his face set in stone as he regarded Shühei softened and was now stretched wide with a look of awe as he took in my appearance. After a few minutes of his blatant ogling I felt myself wanting to revert into myself and hide till the end of eternity. Shühei having obviously caught on to discomfort elbowed the man in the ribs, muttering about tact and conduct unbecoming a Captain. Had I not been so ready to sink into my turtles shell I might have pointed out his own conduct of just a few moments prior. Needless to say, all the attention had me shifting uncomfortably and blushing harder than before.
“Right,” the man said, finally jarring himself to right his behavior. “Sorry.”
Of course Shühei had to lend his two cents. “Don’t mind this idiot, Suzume. Contrary to popular belief he has actually seen a woman before.” he joked. Though, I found nothing about this situation funny.
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| Captain Renji Abarai of the Third |
Or so I thought, until I saw the positively murderous expression on the strange Captain’s face. I giggled quietly, finding it humorous that a dignified captain would find himself a stammering idiot because of my presence.
“This is the friend I told you about,” Shühei offered after a moment with nothing said, waving his hand in my general direction as if with that hand motion it explained it all.
Perhaps it had. Because the crimson-haired captain’s eyes grew in epic proportions. “This is Komamura’s daughter?” He spluttered, his eyes raking me over again before he added, “I’ll admit you’re not at all what I was expecting.”
His face reddened to the likeness of his hair as the words seemed to have slipped unbidden from his mouth.
“Suzume,” I supplied with a courtly bow. “And no one ever does.”
I wasn’t taken back in the slightest by his reaction to my appearance. I had long ago learned to ignore the incredulous stares and hurtful slanders. From childhood my mother made it a point to stress that my father differed greatly from the looks of normal men and as I was brought about by his seed, so was I. Though, my differences are much easier to hide than his.
In fact, it had been so long accustomed to it, I would be disconcerted should someone not gawk at me. I was treated as nothing more than a beast in my mother’s home and something of an unusual science project here in the Sereitei. People, normal or not, were generally curious beings and I had learned to live with it.
It was common knowledge amongst my father’s peers, that he had sired a daughter and I knew even as I arrived that most would be expecting me to have taken more of my father’s more animalistic genes. It was hardly the case most times. For the most part I could hardly be told apart from the human race, and only those at close range or who had been gifted with enhanced eyesight would ever be wiser of my uniqueness.
His eyes widened. “Oh, that’s not what I meant…” he stuttered nervously, his cheeks turning pinker by the second. “I just never expected Komamura to have such a beautiful daughter…”
Shühei was falling apart at the seems now, cackling at both our blushing faces.
His eyes widened further. “Not that I thought you’d be a dog or something…,” he tried to backpedal which only further dug his grave. “I didn’t mean that either…” he finally groaned, putting a hand to his temple and shaking his head.
There was a pregnant pause before Shü gave in and doubled over in laugher. He was nearly howling in his mirth as he pointed at his friends face it took on color deeper than his unruly hair. “Oh man,” Shü coughed, slapping his hand against his knee. “You should see your faces!”
As Shühei continued to cackle like a dying animal we were shadowed by a tall, buxom blonde who practically appeared out of nowhere. “What’s all the fuss about?” she chirped, seemingly excited at the prospect of juicy gossip. Quickly saddling up between Shühei and the red head she asked. “Who’s this?”
Both captains greeted her in the same manner, with a hug and kiss to the cheek. Instantly, I was jealous of her. Not of her apparent beauty, or even her attention she obviously was used too from the better looking half of the Y chromosome. It was the freeness of her own skin. She seemed so at home in her body, not even bothering to cover the widely gaping robes of her uniform. I longed to be more like her.
Shühei smiled lecherously as his beautiful companion threw her arm around him. Immediately he straightened, puffing out his chest like a mating bird. “Rangiku, this is Suzume Komamura, Third seat of Squad Seven.” I may have been under the influence of adrenaline but Shühei looked very proud of this fact. Maybe he thought I’d be a wilting flower my entire life… I had news for him.
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| Lt. Rangiku Matsumoto of the Tenth |
“Suzume, meet Rangiku Matsumoto, Lieutenant of Squad Ten and my…” he trailed off gesturing pointedly between them. It was a little irritating to have my older friend treat me as if I were so incompetent I couldn’t understand the concept that they were seeing each other romantically. Kami, she was practically staking a claim as she plastered herself to him. Idiot.
I may have been sheltered by I was fare from uneducated and I prided myself on common sense. The more I thought about it, the more it, quite frankly, pissed me off.
“I’m his…”
“Partner…” I supplied for her.
“Yes!” she chirped happily as she shook my hand with enough force to rock me on my heals. She was not a particularly strong woman but I was in no way prepared for her enthusiasm. Her breast were bouncing wildly in my face as she giggled and rambled about her relationship with Shühei, even going so far as to divulge things that I was certain would lead to nightmare later on tonight. There were just some things I had no desire to know about my friend.
I thought I might faint when one wayward breast smacked against my nose.
Does she purposefully not bind them?
It was only when I was nearly spilled backward did Hisagi’s red-headed friend come to my rescue. “Alright, Ran,” he handsomely intervened, releasing me from her death grip and taking my hand in his own to steady me. Of course, I just had to blush. Ridiculous pheromones. Had the man bathed in them?
“Thank you…”
“Renji Abarai, Captain of Squad Three.” He informed me with a cocky grin. I decided right then and there that I liked this man. He had all but made a fool of himself several times since meeting him and still… he was confident enough to smile at me like he had known me for years.
“It’s an honor…” I replied a little brazenly as I rolled my eyes. Even in my bold flirting the heat would not dissipate from my cheeks. Then it hit me. Renji Abarai. I head heard that name before. Many times, in fact.
“Oh! You’re the crazy one from the Eleventh, aren’t you?” I asked with wide eyes. “The one that Shühei was always writing to me about.” I giggled, remembering a particular funny correspondence that I received that had kept me in stitches for weeks. It was Shü’s sixth year. “Is it true you singed off your own eyebrows during a basic Kidö exercise?”
Captain Abarai’s face glowed in embarrassment as he turned to Shühei and growled. “You asshole! You told her about that?”
Shühei made no comment this time, only doubled over again, this time with Rangiku in tow. “It’s true,” she managed through her laughter as she covered her mouth daintily to hide her very unladylike snort. “Izuru told me all about it the first time I got him drunk.”
As Renji’s face began to turn purple I started to feel bad for starting the conversation that made fun of him. Though I hadn’t had many experiences with making small talk outside of my schooling but I did know better than to tease someone so mercilessly.
“Forgive me, Captain Abarai… I really meant no insult.” I apologized, bowing my head.
All three of them stopped what they were doing and turned to stare at me. With wide eyes and mouths agape they stood there looking at me like I had just sprouted a second head.
As I shifted nervously from foot to foot Matsumoto spoke up. “Is she serious?” she asked incredulously.
“Zume, you don’t have to apologize for teasing this goon, he knows you didn’t mean any harm.” Shü added, throwing an arm over my shoulder to comfort me.
“Yes, but-” I tried but was cut off by the man I had slighted to begin with.
“No buts,” Renji chided. “I’m not insulted and you only spoke the truth. I did blow my eyebrows off at the academy but I also saved your boy here’s, ass,” he smirked and pointed to the three scars than ran the right-length of Shühei’s face. “Bet he didn’t include that in his stories, did he?”
“A-actually, h-he did.” I stuttered in truth. Kami, I sound like a child.
After another thwarted apology, I still didn’t understand. I was taught to respect your elders and those of a higher rank than yourself. I knew for a fact that what I had said, intentionally or not, was insulting… and yet, there was no reprimand.
“So, where’s your pops?” Shü asked when it became abundantly clear that I was lost in my own thoughts. He was fidgeting with the hem of his sleeve as he steered us off the topic of the fateful night he almost lost his life.
“He’s around here somewhere, I suppose.” I said carefully, fiddling with my fingers under the long sleeves of my Kodsode. “He did mention something about tea with the Captain Commander this morning, perhaps that’s where he ran off to.”
“They do seem to spend a lot of time in each other’s company lately. But I guess that’s to be expected, your father’s been pretty lonely with you away… especially now, since Tösen defected-”
A hush of silence descended upon us after Shühei’s last comment, even he slapped a hand over his own mouth. Truthfully, I wished he hadn’t reminded me of my Uncle’s treachery, it may have been a few years since it happened, but it still felt fresh in my mind and in the mind of my father, I’m sure. Tösen was once a brother to my father and now, he was nothing more than Aizen’s plaything, our enemy.
More so I hated that I was unable to be here, to comfort my father in his time of need. Tösen had just as much betrayed me as he had my father in the aspect that at one time, I had called him family… now he was dead to me and I swore at my father’s first tear… I would also be the one that ended that traitor’s life.
“So, Suzume, was it? How long have you been here?” Rangiku asked, thankfully changing the subject to something a little less murderous. This I could handle.
“I’ve only just arrived at my father’s barracks about a week ago. I’m still trying to settle into my position and blessedly Lt. Iba has been a lot of help.” I smiled shyly, thinking of how much the man had really done for me since I came home, even if he was a little crass and noisy.
“I just bet he has,” Shü muttered under his breath.
With my face growing red, I asked. “What’s that supposed to mean?” I was a little offended at what he might be implying. He knew better than anyone that I wasn’t the type of girl to use my looks to gain favors from men.
When he gave me the dumbfounded ‘how did you here that?’ look, I merely tapped the pointed shells of my small, yet elf like ear. It was really the only significant difference I carried in this form from humans. The other was my rather rare eye color. To me the interesting shade of rust-gold was a beautiful ode to my favorite season… it reminded me of the changing of the leaves. But to most, they were different and different to most humans was misunderstood and therefore, off-putting and frightening.
As the others stood completely confused as the reasoning I had just bit my friends head off, Shühei looked sheepish and shamed. “Uh… it was nothing.” he finally got out as he scratched at the back of his neck… a clear sign that he hadn’t meant to have said anything out loud. “So,” he drawled in a nervous laugh. “Are you coming to the party tonight?”
My confused look must have said it all.
“Awe, c’mon!” he exclaimed exasperatedly, when I said nothing he continued. “You mean to tell me you haven’t heard?”
“Hey now! Leave the poor girl alone!” Rangiku butted in, obviously coming to my aid. “Not everyone spends their nights lousing about in the slums with us…” she finished with a giggle.
“Yeah,” Renji agreed. “She probably really doesn’t know.”
Hisagi looked absolutely horrified by this. “But- but… she’s a noble and all that shit-” he spluttered, gesturing to me with hands and eyes. “You’d think she’d know when another noble is getting’ hitched.”
“Hitched?” I asked, raising a dainty but confused brow.
“Ya know, married?” Renji offered with a smirk.
It made me swallow hard. He really was a gorgeous man and his scent was most definitely messing with my head. He was becoming unnerving to a point I couldn’t speak to him at all.
“Oh, um, yes.” I replied lamely. “I wasn’t made aware of an upcoming event like that, I haven’t been invited.”
“No one has,” said Rangiku. “Ichigo knew it’d be pointless since we’d all just show up anyway, there’s no way to keep us all out. So he decided it was a waste of money to have invitations drawn up and sent out.”
“Pardon me,” I interrupted politely. “Who is Ichigo?”
Just as Rangiku started to open her mouth a loud crash shook the very ground and was followed by a stream of curses that had a blush even rising to Shühei’s face. Shühei spun me around and threw his arm over my shoulder, pointing. “You see that orange-haired idiot in the crater?” He asked and I nodded, unable to form words with what I was seeing… but he was right, it would be easy enough to point out that head of hair anywhere.
Just like Shühei had pointed out, there laying flat on his back was a strange looking Shinigami with wild orange hair. He was absolutely purple in the face and cursing at an almost dwarf sized woman with short hair as black as crow feathers.
“Well, that’s our future Captain of Squad Thirteen, Ichigo Kurosaki… when Ukitake hangs up his hat, so to speak or at least I think he will, he’s currently the Fourth Seat … and that little hell-cat yelling at him is Rukia Kuchiki, Lt. of Squad Thirteen and Ichigo’s fiancé.”
“K-Kuchiki?” I spluttered, unable to believe my ears. That woman is a Kuchiki? My Uncle would have beaten me to death for acting like that in public. It was true… My Uncle always considered me a beast, and from the moment I entered his home he held no reserves when it came to disciplining me like one as well.
“Yeah,” Renji chuckled, easing up behind me along with Rangiku. “It’s not so hard to remember where she came from when she get’s in one of her moods.”
Confused, I looked over my shoulder to meet his amused milk-chocolate eyes and asked. “What do you mean?” It was easy to see that they were comrades of some kind, possibly very close friends of I were to determine things by how he looked at her.
He laughed this time. “Rukia wasn’t born a Kuchki, Byakuya adopted her in her first year at the academy. She’s the younger sister of his late wife. She’s actually just a street rat like me from the seventy-eighth, though you’d never be able to tell when her brother’s around.”
I smiled warmly at him. “You care very deeply for her.” I hadn’t really meant to say it out loud, but as it was the truth I didn’t feel bad for saying it.
“She’s my best friend, always has been.” He smiled in return then directed his eyes back to the action between what I assumed was the happy couple soon to be married.
“So,” Shühei interrupted, shoving Renji aside. “Are ya gonna come?”
I hesitated, not all that sure that going to an engagement party uninvited was such a good idea. I didn’t even know the bride and groom.
“C’mon, it’ll be fun,” Renji added. “You can come as my guest if your really that worried about being invited.
“How-”
“It’s just a gift.” did you know what I was thinking? Was what I was going to say until he cut me off huffing on his nails and cleaning them on his shoulder. A gesture that wasn’t completely lost on me. Smug bastard.
Ad I thought on the pro’s and con’s of attending, it occurred to me that I never in my adult life did anything spontaneous, and I really wanted to get out there and meet new people. Like my father told me when I first arrived here. “Not everyone considers being different a curse.”
Having made up my mind, I smiled at him. “Okay, what time should I be ready?”
His returning smile was brilliant and it nearly stole the oxygen from my breast. “I’ll pick you up at your place at nineteen hundred hours, that alright with you?”
“Perfect.” I beamed. “Well, I really should get back to the barraks. It was really nice meeting both of you.” I told them, nodding to Rangiku as well.
“Yeah, you too, Suzume.” she nodded, smiling widely.
“And I’ll see you at seven, correct?” I asked, turning back to face Renji.
“Ya got it, babe.”
I think my face went from roaring campfire to the Captain Commanders shikai in a matter of seconds. I couldn’t even look at him anymore, I was so embarrassed by my blush.
But Kami, it wasn’t every day a man that looked like Renji did called me an endearing name of any kind.
“You idiot,” Shü barked, elbowing him in the ribs again before he threw and arm over my shoulder and started for the direction of my office.
“See ya later, Suzume.” Rangiku called at my back and I could help but smile and wave goodbye. No wonder my father loves living here.
Once we were out of earshot of the others, I turned to my friend and asked the question no woman should ever ask a man like Shühei, “So, what does one wear to an event like this?”
He just looked at me in complete horror.
