FIC - 20 Halves (Bleach)
I was playing a bit with style. And my newly installed Word 2007 was being weird, so the formatting drove me crazy. I'm really happy with this, though, so it's all good!
Title: 20 Halves of a Family or Inheritance
Fandom: Bleach
Pairing: Gen
Rating: PG
Warning: Not really
Notes: Division 11 should come as its own warning ... right?
Beta: None
X-posted:
division_11
20_souls
Summary: They say there are two sides to every coin. People aren't quite so flat, and you can never know exactly what's being passed on.
20 Halves of a Family or Inheritance
Memory
1. Her first memory is of light reflected off of water onto dingy concrete. The sunset had caught a dirty puddle outside of her half-collapsed shelter, and the summer heat combined with starvation probably made the sight better than anything she’ll see again. The light was a pretty white that wavered and danced, and when she lifted her hands, it flashed silver and gold across her pale skin.
She would rather claim that as her first memory than the sensation and the scent and the sound of congealed blood squishing between her fingers.
2. He doesn’t know what his first memory of the world of the dead is. He’s been fighting for too long to be able to count the years very well, let alone imagine that there might have been anything other than the heat of anger or the chill of death. He figures that his life restarted when he met her, so he doesn’t count anything before that desolate field as a part of his life.
His first memory of her is filled with the soft lilt of her laughter and the bright glint of her eyes.
Weapons
3. The wind whispers to her - a faint voice that tells her who to talk to, where to hide, when to run. It’s saved her life more times than she can count - even if she can’t count passed twenty yet. It’s always been there, a presence that twists in her hair and laughs in her ear and comforts her in the dark, small spaces. When it told her to go to the man with the sword, she didn’t question it.
As much as she loves and trusts him, she kind of misses that voice from time to time, though.
4. Every time a new sword passes into his hands, he feels a tingle in his palms and an expectation that pulses along his arms and speeds up his heart. It’s a warm, comfortable sensation, and he lets it linger in the back of his mind when he fights and when he sleeps and when he walks down the streets with a small, pink-haired child chattering in his ear.
He felt like he’d been sucker-punched when it went cold in his grip during the battle against the red headed ryoka.
Fashion
5. She came from a place where her hair was the only color. Gray and dark and dangerous, splashed with red sometimes, which was only another shade of her own hair, and she thinks she begged for more, wanted greens and blues and even white. She got a pink kimono that matched her hair, though it was stained with red not even two hours later, and she sometimes thinks that her need for color might have brought him to her.
When he took her away, he washed that kimono, and she still has it even though it doesn’t fit anymore because it reminds her of when there was less, so she makes sure to appreciate everything even if mean people like Freaky-Brow try to tell her that blue and orange don’t match.
6. There are days that he wonders if anyone realizes exactly how long his sword really is. They see that it fits in with his image, doesn’t look too small or too large, and stop thinking about it at all. If they did, they’d notice that one of their dinky swords would look strange on his hip, completely out of place, and these are things that he actually thinks about; after all, he’d had to rip up the bottom edge of his captain’s coat so that it looked that short due to negligence and not size. He hated having to buy things, but it was a strange, old impulse to at least try to make them look decent on his hulking frame.
He’s still not sure why the coat was too short when it fit just fine in the shoulders, though.
Intimidation
7. It’s always fun when the new recruits see her in the hallways after being introduced to the eleventh by their new captain. There’s something about men who have just been beaten to a pulp that makes them want to taunt and tease her about anything and everything their shaken brains can come up with.
No one bothers to warn them that they’re just setting up their next beat down because she really gets a rush out the twitches that a smile can bring about in most of her division.
8. He’s well aware that his intimidation lies in his looks. Size supposedly matters when it comes to fear and respect, but there are days where he wonders if anyone ever really looks at the smaller men and women in the Seireitei because he’s felt the chill sweep of fear before - even if he’ll never tell.
Of course, the fourth’s captain is topped by his own fukutaichou, but he’s certain no one will begrudge him that little weakness - they understand it well, after all.
Art
9. It all comes down to speed in her world. No one can match her shunpo, and she doesn’t want to let them because if they can catch her, they’ll stop her. They don’t seem to understand that the brown is bland and dull, and she’s taken it on herself to make her home brighter and more cheerful. Someone once told her that everyone liked art, so she’s been bringing it to the masses with her colorful markers.
She tags a small, pink flower at the edge of her wall and leaves the art to be found by the next gloomy gus.
10. He tilts his head in confusion when they drag him in front of the wall. They’re yammering on about proper decorum and discipline, but he’s not really listening. The walls are brightly lined with a familiar style, and he can’t help but wonder when she got enough markers to be able to cover the entire south wall. He’s rather proud of her accomplishment, honestly, and can’t understand why everyone else is so upset.
She managed to cover the wall in three seconds with a fairly decent rendition of her latest battle, after all.
Food
11. The stages of her life can be defined by food. Before him there wasn’t much beyond tepid water and sour milk. Traveling with him gave her meat. She much preferred the warm, bloody center to the blackened, crispy shell. Freaky-brow and Baldy had brought sticky, sweet fruits and crunchy vegetables with fun colors and textures. Inside Seireitei there were candies and cakes made with sugar and filled with sugar and coated with sugar that were so complicated it took people hours and hours to make them to be eaten in one bite.
Some days she misses the meat, fruit and vegetables of earlier times.
12. She liked to chew on things, so he’s never been surprised that she’ll eat just about anything. Which was lucky for him because he couldn’t cook all that well. He wonders if she tastes the food or if it just tumbles over her taste buds to fill a stomach that still remembers extreme hunger because she never seems to notice that everyone else avoids his barbeque or the fruity bastard’s latest concoction smothered in cheese.
He doesn’t let anyone know that he’s aware of the poor quality of his cooking because they’ll demand he stop, and he doesn’t want to loose the strange glow in his chest when she blithely gnaws on a bone from their latest kill.
Morals
13. People always tell her what a good little girl she is, and she never understands what it is that she’s done that makes her good. See, they never explain to her what she’s done right, but they’re free with the quiet mutterings of what she’s done wrong, and they all blame it on him, but they’ll never tell her what they think is right or why they never think he has anything to do with that when he apparently has everything to do with her wrongs.
He always tells her exactly what she’s done right and what she’s done wrong, and she’s fairly certain it’s saved her life a few times, so she mainly ignores people who are too stupid to teach her better.
14. When people start preaching at him about good and evil or right and wrong, he tunes them out. They’re only talking at him because something in their petty little souls needs to, and he doesn’t really care about their morals or honor or whatever it is that they call their excuses to keep their lily white skin clean.
To him it’s simple: As long as he’s the one that’s alive, he’s the one that’s right.
Glass
15. She collects glass. Broken glass that’s green and blue, stolen glass that’s red and yellow, and gifted glass that’s clear and smooth. Some she hangs up in front of her window to sparkle in the early morning light. Most of it, though, she grinds up into a shimmering dust.
Running away is much easier when your opponent’s lungs are being sliced to bits.
16. There was a time when he tied glass and wood and bone into his hair. No one ever thought of the decorations as weapons, and he took full advantage of this for a long time because he never relied on anything that could be taken from his hands. It’s the biggest barrier between him and his zanpakutou, he thinks, and it takes a long time to change such an ingrained mind-set.
It only took one time of her trying to eat a piece of glass for him to switch hairstyles completely.
Home
17. People are always telling him that he should be providing a proper home for her. She can never quite understand why. She has three people who take care of her, protect her, teach her anything her little mind can desire. She’s never wanted for food or clothing or the shelter of a warm chest and tight, comforting arms. Pretty much everything she’s ever wanted or needed, really.
She wonders what people think a home is when hers comes with her wherever they go.
18. It’s hard to settle when you’ve never been in one place for longer than a week. He didn’t think that they’d actually stay in this rather elite district for any length of time, either. Then he suddenly had people piling paperwork on a desk that was supposedly his, and somehow he had a room with new bedding right next to a sparkly place that she claimed as hers.
Expectations and responsibilities seemed to fall on his head in this place, but she was happy, so he grumbled and growled and settled.
Inheritance
19. She’s learned a lot over the years: Who to trust, who to sucker punch, when to run because your life is counting on the speed of your feet. She gives a different answer to every person who asks because she’s also learned that they don’t want the real truth, just a version that fits neatly into their little world. When he asks, though, she will always tell him that she didn’t learn anything from him, just inherited his good sense and great skill.
He gave her everything that he was and is, and she refuses to let it be a lesson that only stays in her head, so she lives with all the vivacity he does to prove that she really understands it.
20. No one bothered to help him. No one wanted to teach him. All his life he learned from the experience of fighting for every bite of food and scrap of respect, and he wasn’t surprised that death was no different. He figured for a long time that since no one gave him anything, he wouldn’t give anything to anyone else. It’s odd how inheriting a little girl from a dead woman that should never have been on a battle field changed his views.
If she can carry on without him, he’ll be quite glad to know that she’s in good hands - her own.
~JJ~
Title: 20 Halves of a Family or Inheritance
Fandom: Bleach
Pairing: Gen
Rating: PG
Warning: Not really
Notes: Division 11 should come as its own warning ... right?
Beta: None
X-posted:
division_11
20_souls
Summary: They say there are two sides to every coin. People aren't quite so flat, and you can never know exactly what's being passed on.
20 Halves of a Family or Inheritance
Memory
1. Her first memory is of light reflected off of water onto dingy concrete. The sunset had caught a dirty puddle outside of her half-collapsed shelter, and the summer heat combined with starvation probably made the sight better than anything she’ll see again. The light was a pretty white that wavered and danced, and when she lifted her hands, it flashed silver and gold across her pale skin.
She would rather claim that as her first memory than the sensation and the scent and the sound of congealed blood squishing between her fingers.
2. He doesn’t know what his first memory of the world of the dead is. He’s been fighting for too long to be able to count the years very well, let alone imagine that there might have been anything other than the heat of anger or the chill of death. He figures that his life restarted when he met her, so he doesn’t count anything before that desolate field as a part of his life.
His first memory of her is filled with the soft lilt of her laughter and the bright glint of her eyes.
Weapons
3. The wind whispers to her - a faint voice that tells her who to talk to, where to hide, when to run. It’s saved her life more times than she can count - even if she can’t count passed twenty yet. It’s always been there, a presence that twists in her hair and laughs in her ear and comforts her in the dark, small spaces. When it told her to go to the man with the sword, she didn’t question it.
As much as she loves and trusts him, she kind of misses that voice from time to time, though.
4. Every time a new sword passes into his hands, he feels a tingle in his palms and an expectation that pulses along his arms and speeds up his heart. It’s a warm, comfortable sensation, and he lets it linger in the back of his mind when he fights and when he sleeps and when he walks down the streets with a small, pink-haired child chattering in his ear.
He felt like he’d been sucker-punched when it went cold in his grip during the battle against the red headed ryoka.
Fashion
5. She came from a place where her hair was the only color. Gray and dark and dangerous, splashed with red sometimes, which was only another shade of her own hair, and she thinks she begged for more, wanted greens and blues and even white. She got a pink kimono that matched her hair, though it was stained with red not even two hours later, and she sometimes thinks that her need for color might have brought him to her.
When he took her away, he washed that kimono, and she still has it even though it doesn’t fit anymore because it reminds her of when there was less, so she makes sure to appreciate everything even if mean people like Freaky-Brow try to tell her that blue and orange don’t match.
6. There are days that he wonders if anyone realizes exactly how long his sword really is. They see that it fits in with his image, doesn’t look too small or too large, and stop thinking about it at all. If they did, they’d notice that one of their dinky swords would look strange on his hip, completely out of place, and these are things that he actually thinks about; after all, he’d had to rip up the bottom edge of his captain’s coat so that it looked that short due to negligence and not size. He hated having to buy things, but it was a strange, old impulse to at least try to make them look decent on his hulking frame.
He’s still not sure why the coat was too short when it fit just fine in the shoulders, though.
Intimidation
7. It’s always fun when the new recruits see her in the hallways after being introduced to the eleventh by their new captain. There’s something about men who have just been beaten to a pulp that makes them want to taunt and tease her about anything and everything their shaken brains can come up with.
No one bothers to warn them that they’re just setting up their next beat down because she really gets a rush out the twitches that a smile can bring about in most of her division.
8. He’s well aware that his intimidation lies in his looks. Size supposedly matters when it comes to fear and respect, but there are days where he wonders if anyone ever really looks at the smaller men and women in the Seireitei because he’s felt the chill sweep of fear before - even if he’ll never tell.
Of course, the fourth’s captain is topped by his own fukutaichou, but he’s certain no one will begrudge him that little weakness - they understand it well, after all.
Art
9. It all comes down to speed in her world. No one can match her shunpo, and she doesn’t want to let them because if they can catch her, they’ll stop her. They don’t seem to understand that the brown is bland and dull, and she’s taken it on herself to make her home brighter and more cheerful. Someone once told her that everyone liked art, so she’s been bringing it to the masses with her colorful markers.
She tags a small, pink flower at the edge of her wall and leaves the art to be found by the next gloomy gus.
10. He tilts his head in confusion when they drag him in front of the wall. They’re yammering on about proper decorum and discipline, but he’s not really listening. The walls are brightly lined with a familiar style, and he can’t help but wonder when she got enough markers to be able to cover the entire south wall. He’s rather proud of her accomplishment, honestly, and can’t understand why everyone else is so upset.
She managed to cover the wall in three seconds with a fairly decent rendition of her latest battle, after all.
Food
11. The stages of her life can be defined by food. Before him there wasn’t much beyond tepid water and sour milk. Traveling with him gave her meat. She much preferred the warm, bloody center to the blackened, crispy shell. Freaky-brow and Baldy had brought sticky, sweet fruits and crunchy vegetables with fun colors and textures. Inside Seireitei there were candies and cakes made with sugar and filled with sugar and coated with sugar that were so complicated it took people hours and hours to make them to be eaten in one bite.
Some days she misses the meat, fruit and vegetables of earlier times.
12. She liked to chew on things, so he’s never been surprised that she’ll eat just about anything. Which was lucky for him because he couldn’t cook all that well. He wonders if she tastes the food or if it just tumbles over her taste buds to fill a stomach that still remembers extreme hunger because she never seems to notice that everyone else avoids his barbeque or the fruity bastard’s latest concoction smothered in cheese.
He doesn’t let anyone know that he’s aware of the poor quality of his cooking because they’ll demand he stop, and he doesn’t want to loose the strange glow in his chest when she blithely gnaws on a bone from their latest kill.
Morals
13. People always tell her what a good little girl she is, and she never understands what it is that she’s done that makes her good. See, they never explain to her what she’s done right, but they’re free with the quiet mutterings of what she’s done wrong, and they all blame it on him, but they’ll never tell her what they think is right or why they never think he has anything to do with that when he apparently has everything to do with her wrongs.
He always tells her exactly what she’s done right and what she’s done wrong, and she’s fairly certain it’s saved her life a few times, so she mainly ignores people who are too stupid to teach her better.
14. When people start preaching at him about good and evil or right and wrong, he tunes them out. They’re only talking at him because something in their petty little souls needs to, and he doesn’t really care about their morals or honor or whatever it is that they call their excuses to keep their lily white skin clean.
To him it’s simple: As long as he’s the one that’s alive, he’s the one that’s right.
Glass
15. She collects glass. Broken glass that’s green and blue, stolen glass that’s red and yellow, and gifted glass that’s clear and smooth. Some she hangs up in front of her window to sparkle in the early morning light. Most of it, though, she grinds up into a shimmering dust.
Running away is much easier when your opponent’s lungs are being sliced to bits.
16. There was a time when he tied glass and wood and bone into his hair. No one ever thought of the decorations as weapons, and he took full advantage of this for a long time because he never relied on anything that could be taken from his hands. It’s the biggest barrier between him and his zanpakutou, he thinks, and it takes a long time to change such an ingrained mind-set.
It only took one time of her trying to eat a piece of glass for him to switch hairstyles completely.
Home
17. People are always telling him that he should be providing a proper home for her. She can never quite understand why. She has three people who take care of her, protect her, teach her anything her little mind can desire. She’s never wanted for food or clothing or the shelter of a warm chest and tight, comforting arms. Pretty much everything she’s ever wanted or needed, really.
She wonders what people think a home is when hers comes with her wherever they go.
18. It’s hard to settle when you’ve never been in one place for longer than a week. He didn’t think that they’d actually stay in this rather elite district for any length of time, either. Then he suddenly had people piling paperwork on a desk that was supposedly his, and somehow he had a room with new bedding right next to a sparkly place that she claimed as hers.
Expectations and responsibilities seemed to fall on his head in this place, but she was happy, so he grumbled and growled and settled.
Inheritance
19. She’s learned a lot over the years: Who to trust, who to sucker punch, when to run because your life is counting on the speed of your feet. She gives a different answer to every person who asks because she’s also learned that they don’t want the real truth, just a version that fits neatly into their little world. When he asks, though, she will always tell him that she didn’t learn anything from him, just inherited his good sense and great skill.
He gave her everything that he was and is, and she refuses to let it be a lesson that only stays in her head, so she lives with all the vivacity he does to prove that she really understands it.
20. No one bothered to help him. No one wanted to teach him. All his life he learned from the experience of fighting for every bite of food and scrap of respect, and he wasn’t surprised that death was no different. He figured for a long time that since no one gave him anything, he wouldn’t give anything to anyone else. It’s odd how inheriting a little girl from a dead woman that should never have been on a battle field changed his views.
If she can carry on without him, he’ll be quite glad to know that she’s in good hands - her own.
~JJ~