Bleach Drabble (451-452)
I guess it didn't take a lot of thought for me to realize I wasn't going to stop at 450. I SHOULD though, shouldn't I? *is totally regressing in ficcing ability or something* ARGH.
451.
Title: Formal Education
Rating: PG
Pairing/Character/s: Renji, Byakuya (RenjixByakuya if you squint? But mostly friendship, I think. >>)
Word Count: 806
Warning/s: No spoilers I can imagine. Just OOC. But I’m having fun, so leave me alone. XD
Summary: Frat boy meets prep-school boy.
Dedication: seca- believe in the possibilities? XD
A/N: Silliness, because I haven’t written Renji and Byakuya in a while, or something. XD
Through the course of the years, Abarai Renji had taken it upon himself to teach Kuchiki Byakuya all the things he felt were missing from the older man’s admittedly rigorous, though frighteningly incomplete education.
“Renji, I don’t see why…”
“Shhh, just do it like I told ya, will ya? It’s an experience everybody’s gotta have, far as I’m concerned. Now go on’n stick it in. Ain’t gonna hurt nobody.”
And then Renji grinned at him, enough that Byakuya almost believed whatever it was the redhead was telling him.
He stuck the device in, and there was a pop and a hiss as air was released from the previously airtight container.
Some beer dripped onto the floor.
Renji whooped. “Keg’s tapped, boys! Dig in!!” he announced, and Byakuya watched with mild amusement as Iba, Shuuhei, Ikkaku, and a slew of others stepped forward and moved to fill their cups.
Byakuya didn’t see why tapping a keg was an experience he absolutely needed to have, but he supposed the pleased, relaxed expressions on everyone’s faces as they drank beer and chatted idly in his presence was something rather remarkable.
“So, you learn something?” Renji asked him later that night, amidst the drunken snores of their compatriots littered around the grounds of the Kuchiki home. Byakuya was certain the servants would have a ridiculous mess to clean up in the morning, but Renji assured him he’d make the assholes clean up after their own selves.
“I think I learned something,” Byakuya confirmed, though he wasn’t quite certain as to how to describe what it was, exactly. The content looks on all of their comrades’ faces-drunk and drooling in their sleep as they were-was a difficult sort of lesson to put into words.
Renji beamed. “There’s more where that came from!”
And Byakuya wasn’t sure why-this supplementary education seemed entirely unnecessary after his previous one-but he found himself looking forward to it anyway.
Next they tried bazaar shopping, and Renji bought Byakuya taiyaki off of a street vendor whose little stand looked older than Yamamoto-soutaichou himself.
Byakuya eyed the offering in the brown paper bag warily. “You want me to eat that?” he asked, and looked at Renji skeptically.
“’s good,” Renji declared, and bit into his own like that proved something. He burned his tongue and cursed, but promised that it was still good even through the pain.
Byakuya watched him. “The cook can make these back at the house,” he said, and arched a brow as Renji took another bite and panted around it in his mouth to try and cool it down.
“’s different,” Renji said, and didn’t even try to explain how exactly, it was. “Just eat it.”
Byakuya sighed and complied. He burned his tongue too, on the hot oil and hot bean paste, and watched as Renji finished off his own doing the same stupid thing over and over again.
He supposed the redhead was right-for some reason, it tasted much better than the ones the Kuchiki chef made at Renji’s numerous requests.
“Good, right?” Renji asked with a grin later, when they were both sipping cold drinks at yet another street vending stall in an attempt to cool their burned tongues down.
“Good,” Byakuya admitted, and tried not to think about possible means of unsanitary food preparation.
“Cheap too,” Renji added with a dreamy grin that told the older man that his companion was years in the past now, a scrawny street rat all over again, stealing when he could and dreaming of getting to burn his tongue on hot oil and red bean paste.
“Good,” Byakuya echoed, and wondered if memory made things taste even better.
“So, whaddya think?” Renji asked after they’d finished their drinks and Byakuya paid the vendor for them both.
“I think I learned something,” Byakuya said, and didn’t say anything more than that. He wasn’t sure how to put Renji’s nostalgic smile and the ache of his burning tongue into words, after all. Not exactly.
Renji didn’t push again, though, simply slung a companionable arm around Byakuya’s shoulders as they walked through the marketplace and grinned. “Great,” he declared, and his breath was close enough that Byakuya could smell a combination of red bean and iced yogurt drink on it. “Next!”
“Next?” Byakuya asked, blinking up at the redhead.
“Next!” Renji repeated, with a nod. “I’m takin’ ya fishing.”
“You are?”
“Yup! That nice little creek couple miles into the forests outsidea this area. Real pretty.”
“Renji, that creek doesn’t have any fish in it.”
Renji’s smile broadened, if possible, at the simple statement of fact. “That ain’t the point.”
Byakuya sighed, but felt an answering tug on the corner of his mouth at the younger man’s enthusiasm. “I suppose it’s not.”
Renji laughed, and patted Byakuya’s back. “Now you’re gettin’ it.”
END
452.
Title: Self-Improvement
Rating: PG-13
Pairing/Character/s: Eleventh division, Twelfth division
Word Count: 881
Warning/s: Crack and OOC. I like being stupid today, leave me alone. >>
Summary: The eleventh division is an imprecise science.
Dedication: Errrr… this has more character rape than usual, so I guess it’s only fair that I only sort-of dedicate it to Shini and leave like, 50% of the dedication unattached so that whoever actually likes it can claim it. XD
A/N: It figures I get drab ideas while I’m supposed to be working on my paper outline that’s due Mon. *rolls*
The members of the eleventh division alter their bodies with sweat and hard work, primitive battles for idiotic causes and a general fear of their leader. They brawl and run and scream at the top of their lungs and either grow stronger for it or die.
Scars from imprecise methods of self-improvement litter their hard, muscled bodies and what works for one doesn’t work for another, the wide range and various results of their abilities enough to make any scientifically-minded individual mad with the disorganization of it all.
One whose muscles are thin and wiry, but whose endurance far outstrips that of the others, fleet of foot and swift of mind and just strong enough to get by.
One whose strength lies in arms and chest, whose greater size makes for slower, but more powerful attack statistics than his smaller companion. Less stamina perhaps, but brute strength to make up for it.
One whose stats defy most conventions. Strength and speed of equal standing but inexperience and a short attention span the greatest sources of weakness-too much little girl joy to do much but run around, concentrating strength in the legs and leaving the arms generally useless.
And then the leader, the epitome of a disorganized, old-fashioned (outdated) means of acquiring strength. Power without control, thoughtless and without strategy, musculature concentrated in the arms and the advantage given in humongous size and an almost limitless natural power garnered undoubtedly, from countless mindless brawls with like-minded individuals.
A nightmare for those who wish to compile any sort of concrete data sets on the patterns of shinigami types from division to division as found in seireitei.
Best to toss it out as an anomaly- a deviant set of findings from the established norm.
Mayuri can’t be bothered with trying to sort out something as freakish and unpredictable as the findings they’d gathered from the eleventh division, after all. He’s a man who prefers absolute order so that those who might look back on the records-- years, decades, centuries from now-- will know with just a glance, the heights, weights, methodical alterations, and means of experimentation used to build the members of his twelfth division. Via his rigorous and regimented documentation requirements, those looking back will know the precise ratios of added ability and the costs for each change made on any twelfth division member’s body.
Plus two units muscle mass for four times the additional strength. Minus one to two factors of speed depending on positioning of addition.
Plus one million synapses for a level two upgrade of mental processing ability. Overuse over the course of a year may lead to gradual breakdown of neuron paths required for basic motor functions of the body.
Plus seven genes for healing ability increased by a factor of eight. Lifespan deduction of half a century or more, depending on amount and frequency of injuries.
Alteration of dietary supplements to add two hours of absolute concentration to maximum capacity in an individual who already possesses additional synaptic alterations as well as an upgraded healing factor.
Etc., etc., etc.
It’s all there. Every tweak, every experiment, every change he’s made on the members of his division. All noted with a date, a time, a number, and a result. Each study compiled into one large chart afterwards to provide a summary overview of the overall patterns of growth or decline discovered in that particular study. The records are then organized and filed separately for each experiment.
Stored alphabetically and all with his signature of approval after a thorough review whether he participated in the study directly or merely oversaw it.
Orderly.
Neat.
Precise.
A far superior method of self-improvement than that of the eleventh division, as the results can be reproduced with infinite and accurate consistency for generations to come.
That decided, Mayuri promptly ignores some of his division members as they stagger in, bloody and bruised and wet and cursing Zaraki’s men to the heavens.
“ARGH I hate those lazy, crude, gambling know-nothings! How is it fair that they don’t even know how to calculate something as simple as the angular momentum vector for a single particle in a polarized energy field but they can still judge how to throw me into the koi pond one-armed and backwards without looking?”
“Muscle memory, most likely. They probably spent days working out how to gauge the force and angle of arc trajectory required for that distance.”
Pause. Then, “A little sympathy, please?”
“Er, right. They’re just bullies because they’re too stupid to be anything else.”
“Tch. Still not fair. I’m going to the lab right now and getting a plus-two muscle mass upgrade! That’ll show them.”
“Don’t do anything hasty! You’re still recovering from the gene therapy that fixed your vision, remember?”
Mayuri sighs as the voices fade down the corridor, long-suffering, and rubs his temples as he feels a headache coming on.
Really, the eleventh division doesn’t make any sense.
He mutters to himself and stands, crossing his office to the little cabinet on the side where he keeps his headache medicine.
If anything, at least he knows without a shadow of a doubt that two pills taken with eight ounces of water will alleviate the pounding by precisely a factor of four in the next thirty-to-forty minutes.
END
EDITS PLZ.
451.
Title: Formal Education
Rating: PG
Pairing/Character/s: Renji, Byakuya (RenjixByakuya if you squint? But mostly friendship, I think. >>)
Word Count: 806
Warning/s: No spoilers I can imagine. Just OOC. But I’m having fun, so leave me alone. XD
Summary: Frat boy meets prep-school boy.
Dedication: seca- believe in the possibilities? XD
A/N: Silliness, because I haven’t written Renji and Byakuya in a while, or something. XD
Through the course of the years, Abarai Renji had taken it upon himself to teach Kuchiki Byakuya all the things he felt were missing from the older man’s admittedly rigorous, though frighteningly incomplete education.
“Renji, I don’t see why…”
“Shhh, just do it like I told ya, will ya? It’s an experience everybody’s gotta have, far as I’m concerned. Now go on’n stick it in. Ain’t gonna hurt nobody.”
And then Renji grinned at him, enough that Byakuya almost believed whatever it was the redhead was telling him.
He stuck the device in, and there was a pop and a hiss as air was released from the previously airtight container.
Some beer dripped onto the floor.
Renji whooped. “Keg’s tapped, boys! Dig in!!” he announced, and Byakuya watched with mild amusement as Iba, Shuuhei, Ikkaku, and a slew of others stepped forward and moved to fill their cups.
Byakuya didn’t see why tapping a keg was an experience he absolutely needed to have, but he supposed the pleased, relaxed expressions on everyone’s faces as they drank beer and chatted idly in his presence was something rather remarkable.
“So, you learn something?” Renji asked him later that night, amidst the drunken snores of their compatriots littered around the grounds of the Kuchiki home. Byakuya was certain the servants would have a ridiculous mess to clean up in the morning, but Renji assured him he’d make the assholes clean up after their own selves.
“I think I learned something,” Byakuya confirmed, though he wasn’t quite certain as to how to describe what it was, exactly. The content looks on all of their comrades’ faces-drunk and drooling in their sleep as they were-was a difficult sort of lesson to put into words.
Renji beamed. “There’s more where that came from!”
And Byakuya wasn’t sure why-this supplementary education seemed entirely unnecessary after his previous one-but he found himself looking forward to it anyway.
Next they tried bazaar shopping, and Renji bought Byakuya taiyaki off of a street vendor whose little stand looked older than Yamamoto-soutaichou himself.
Byakuya eyed the offering in the brown paper bag warily. “You want me to eat that?” he asked, and looked at Renji skeptically.
“’s good,” Renji declared, and bit into his own like that proved something. He burned his tongue and cursed, but promised that it was still good even through the pain.
Byakuya watched him. “The cook can make these back at the house,” he said, and arched a brow as Renji took another bite and panted around it in his mouth to try and cool it down.
“’s different,” Renji said, and didn’t even try to explain how exactly, it was. “Just eat it.”
Byakuya sighed and complied. He burned his tongue too, on the hot oil and hot bean paste, and watched as Renji finished off his own doing the same stupid thing over and over again.
He supposed the redhead was right-for some reason, it tasted much better than the ones the Kuchiki chef made at Renji’s numerous requests.
“Good, right?” Renji asked with a grin later, when they were both sipping cold drinks at yet another street vending stall in an attempt to cool their burned tongues down.
“Good,” Byakuya admitted, and tried not to think about possible means of unsanitary food preparation.
“Cheap too,” Renji added with a dreamy grin that told the older man that his companion was years in the past now, a scrawny street rat all over again, stealing when he could and dreaming of getting to burn his tongue on hot oil and red bean paste.
“Good,” Byakuya echoed, and wondered if memory made things taste even better.
“So, whaddya think?” Renji asked after they’d finished their drinks and Byakuya paid the vendor for them both.
“I think I learned something,” Byakuya said, and didn’t say anything more than that. He wasn’t sure how to put Renji’s nostalgic smile and the ache of his burning tongue into words, after all. Not exactly.
Renji didn’t push again, though, simply slung a companionable arm around Byakuya’s shoulders as they walked through the marketplace and grinned. “Great,” he declared, and his breath was close enough that Byakuya could smell a combination of red bean and iced yogurt drink on it. “Next!”
“Next?” Byakuya asked, blinking up at the redhead.
“Next!” Renji repeated, with a nod. “I’m takin’ ya fishing.”
“You are?”
“Yup! That nice little creek couple miles into the forests outsidea this area. Real pretty.”
“Renji, that creek doesn’t have any fish in it.”
Renji’s smile broadened, if possible, at the simple statement of fact. “That ain’t the point.”
Byakuya sighed, but felt an answering tug on the corner of his mouth at the younger man’s enthusiasm. “I suppose it’s not.”
Renji laughed, and patted Byakuya’s back. “Now you’re gettin’ it.”
END
452.
Title: Self-Improvement
Rating: PG-13
Pairing/Character/s: Eleventh division, Twelfth division
Word Count: 881
Warning/s: Crack and OOC. I like being stupid today, leave me alone. >>
Summary: The eleventh division is an imprecise science.
Dedication: Errrr… this has more character rape than usual, so I guess it’s only fair that I only sort-of dedicate it to Shini and leave like, 50% of the dedication unattached so that whoever actually likes it can claim it. XD
A/N: It figures I get drab ideas while I’m supposed to be working on my paper outline that’s due Mon. *rolls*
The members of the eleventh division alter their bodies with sweat and hard work, primitive battles for idiotic causes and a general fear of their leader. They brawl and run and scream at the top of their lungs and either grow stronger for it or die.
Scars from imprecise methods of self-improvement litter their hard, muscled bodies and what works for one doesn’t work for another, the wide range and various results of their abilities enough to make any scientifically-minded individual mad with the disorganization of it all.
One whose muscles are thin and wiry, but whose endurance far outstrips that of the others, fleet of foot and swift of mind and just strong enough to get by.
One whose strength lies in arms and chest, whose greater size makes for slower, but more powerful attack statistics than his smaller companion. Less stamina perhaps, but brute strength to make up for it.
One whose stats defy most conventions. Strength and speed of equal standing but inexperience and a short attention span the greatest sources of weakness-too much little girl joy to do much but run around, concentrating strength in the legs and leaving the arms generally useless.
And then the leader, the epitome of a disorganized, old-fashioned (outdated) means of acquiring strength. Power without control, thoughtless and without strategy, musculature concentrated in the arms and the advantage given in humongous size and an almost limitless natural power garnered undoubtedly, from countless mindless brawls with like-minded individuals.
A nightmare for those who wish to compile any sort of concrete data sets on the patterns of shinigami types from division to division as found in seireitei.
Best to toss it out as an anomaly- a deviant set of findings from the established norm.
Mayuri can’t be bothered with trying to sort out something as freakish and unpredictable as the findings they’d gathered from the eleventh division, after all. He’s a man who prefers absolute order so that those who might look back on the records-- years, decades, centuries from now-- will know with just a glance, the heights, weights, methodical alterations, and means of experimentation used to build the members of his twelfth division. Via his rigorous and regimented documentation requirements, those looking back will know the precise ratios of added ability and the costs for each change made on any twelfth division member’s body.
Plus two units muscle mass for four times the additional strength. Minus one to two factors of speed depending on positioning of addition.
Plus one million synapses for a level two upgrade of mental processing ability. Overuse over the course of a year may lead to gradual breakdown of neuron paths required for basic motor functions of the body.
Plus seven genes for healing ability increased by a factor of eight. Lifespan deduction of half a century or more, depending on amount and frequency of injuries.
Alteration of dietary supplements to add two hours of absolute concentration to maximum capacity in an individual who already possesses additional synaptic alterations as well as an upgraded healing factor.
Etc., etc., etc.
It’s all there. Every tweak, every experiment, every change he’s made on the members of his division. All noted with a date, a time, a number, and a result. Each study compiled into one large chart afterwards to provide a summary overview of the overall patterns of growth or decline discovered in that particular study. The records are then organized and filed separately for each experiment.
Stored alphabetically and all with his signature of approval after a thorough review whether he participated in the study directly or merely oversaw it.
Orderly.
Neat.
Precise.
A far superior method of self-improvement than that of the eleventh division, as the results can be reproduced with infinite and accurate consistency for generations to come.
That decided, Mayuri promptly ignores some of his division members as they stagger in, bloody and bruised and wet and cursing Zaraki’s men to the heavens.
“ARGH I hate those lazy, crude, gambling know-nothings! How is it fair that they don’t even know how to calculate something as simple as the angular momentum vector for a single particle in a polarized energy field but they can still judge how to throw me into the koi pond one-armed and backwards without looking?”
“Muscle memory, most likely. They probably spent days working out how to gauge the force and angle of arc trajectory required for that distance.”
Pause. Then, “A little sympathy, please?”
“Er, right. They’re just bullies because they’re too stupid to be anything else.”
“Tch. Still not fair. I’m going to the lab right now and getting a plus-two muscle mass upgrade! That’ll show them.”
“Don’t do anything hasty! You’re still recovering from the gene therapy that fixed your vision, remember?”
Mayuri sighs as the voices fade down the corridor, long-suffering, and rubs his temples as he feels a headache coming on.
Really, the eleventh division doesn’t make any sense.
He mutters to himself and stands, crossing his office to the little cabinet on the side where he keeps his headache medicine.
If anything, at least he knows without a shadow of a doubt that two pills taken with eight ounces of water will alleviate the pounding by precisely a factor of four in the next thirty-to-forty minutes.
END
EDITS PLZ.