But this is where the story ends

[thelittlestbub]

Who: Kurosaki Ichigo 1stguardian and Jubilee thelittlestbub
When: Saturday afternoon
Where: The HoA's backyard
Summary: Two hotheads need to work off some frustrations on each other and then, they need to hang out.
Warnings: Tempers! Possibly swearing! Brattiness!

Comments

[1stguardian]

Taking the bottle with a murmured thanks, Ichigo dropped down heavily onto one of the lower steps and started unscrewing the cap. This had been a good idea. Between the stress of the last few days, a good sparring session had been just what the proverbial doctor had ordered, and he'd found a great sparring partner in Jubilee.

It felt good to fight again. Not that the rest of his training was lackluster or boring; he needed to improve his shinigami powers. But there wasn't anything quite as satisfying as relying on the strength of his body instead of his soul. And on trading blows with hands and feet instead of the razor-edged blades of zanpakutou. This was how he'd grown up, how he'd gotten strong in the first place. It was visceral and real in a way that fighting shinigami and hollows was not. And every bruise he'd gained today, and were a few, had been hard won and worth the effort

[thelittlestbub]

Jubilee couldn't help but laugh. She sipped her own drink, carefully stretching out a leg. It'd been a long time since she'd worked like that when it didn't involve saving her ass.

"I dunno if you live up to the hype; I was expecting someone eight feet tall with hammers for hands." Jubilee teased. She rubbed along her calf and teased out the beginnings of a cramp. "But, ya know, for someone not eight feet tall with hammers, you did alright."

Better than alright. She'd been slacking in her training. Again. Without Logan to ride her ass, she just let it go.

"But god yes, this was totally what I needed. It's been way too long." She bumped him gently with a knee. "A year ago, you wouldn't have been able to lay a hand on me."

[1stguardian]

"Eight feet tall with hammer hands, huh?" Snorting, Ichigo took another drink, longer this time, before recapping the bottle and setting it down at his side. "Someone's been exaggerating. Or confusing me with Yammy. He fit that description pretty well."

If there's one person Ichigo's glad hasn't made the transition to Siren's Port, it's Yammy. Everyone thought Grimmjow was bad. There wasn't any way they'd be able to deal with that asshole. Shaking his head to clear that thought away, Ichigo stretched out his legs, flexing his ankles to prevent his calves from getting too stiff.

"You were back home then, right?" he asked, curious to hear more about her life. "What happened? Did you stop having time to train?"

[thelittlestbub]

She grinned. "Well, I do live with Kenny, and we've talked, now and again, about the great Kurosaki Ichigo who fought him and whom he wants to fight again..." alright, now she was having a bit of fun. But just a bit. It was hilarious to her.

"I've been here almost a year, yeah." She thought and ran a mental calendar. "Huh. Been here a year tomorrow, I think? Maybe the day after." She shrugged. "Went home briefly, was two days here, and almost three years at home." Jubilee rubbed at her calf, still thinking.

"Not that I don't have time, but unless I'm out at night, I don't have a place." Jubilee shrugged, then had to roll her shoulder so it didn't bind on her. "My powers don't lend themselves to practicing in an urban setting." Not unless someone was investing in Urban Renewal. "What about you?"

[1stguardian]

He dismissed all of that with a toss of his head and a disbelieving quirk of his lips. Leave it to Kenpachi to make a big deal out of nothing. "I guess Soul Society's just a boring place. Any little bit of excitement that comes along gets blown out of proportion

[thelittlestbub]

She nodded and capped her drink. "Yep. Never even blinked. Was a bit confused, but that doesn't mean much. Lived through three years and came back to the Port remembering everything." Jubilee's fingers fiddled with the arm socks she was wearing, making sure they covered the scars on her hands.

She hoped he didn't ask. With Edgeworth's death, the crucifixion was just that more raw in her mind. Almost a year here, and she could still smell Logan's breath and the clench of her heart when she realized that Angelo wasn't going to wake up.

"I know that feeling. I lived like that for a long time." Still did, but that was more because she needed to get rid of the nightmares than because of training. "Sometimes still do. If we had the training facilities like back home, I'd totally show you how to really work on things. Unfortunately, all we have is this, and the Darkness." Jubilee shook her head. "Totally not enough, ya know?"

[1stguardian]

That was a relief, and he let the breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding out. The war wasn't going on without him, then. It would all be there waiting for him to get back to it. Get back to it and systematically lose just about everything in his life that made it worth the bother in the first place.

Shoving thoughts of home aside, Ichigo focused on the present, content to ignore it for as long as possible. He noticed the way she played with the coverings on her arms, but if he had seen the scars, he gave no indication. His own body was littered with the things, narrow slivers of pale skin that spoke of feeling too keenly the edge of sharp blades.

"I didn't really have training facilities. Not once I became a shinigami, anyway. There wasn't any time for it, I had to learn as I went along." It wasn't the most effective way to learn to do anything, but it worked for him. Just not as well as he would have liked. "What did you have at home? Maybe we could recreate similar something here."

[thelittlestbub]

She couldn't help but laugh and lean back against the stairs. She stretched out and wished she had a gym to work out at. A good hard tumbling run would be good right about now. It'd stretch out the aches in her muscles.

"Sounds like me at first. When I first hooked up with Dad, I was thirteen and hadn't had any training with my powers, totally self-taught." She shook her head. It'd been a long time since she'd been like that. "Learned a lot on the fly, because there wasn't any choice."

She rolled her shoulders once again, then smiled a bit. "A holograph generating room that was virtually indestructible and programmable with various real world scenarios that worked both as a training facility and sometimes an escape from the real world, depending on what the program was." Jubilee grinned. "If we end up getting that here, I'm totally dragging you into and showing you a work out."

[1stguardian]

"Sometimes I think that's the best way to learn. Maybe not with everything, but..." Trailing off, Ichigo glanced over at her and rolled his eyes. "There's nothing like not having the option of failure to make sure that you do something right."

A holograph generator? Was that even possible? It sounded like something out of science fiction. The glance turned into a wide-eyed grin. "Seriously? I didn't think technology like that existed! How did it work? How do you fight against a holograph? Could you touch it?"

[thelittlestbub]

"Or do something you're never able to replicate." Jubilee had run into that more than once. She'd done something in a fight and not been able to replicate it no matter what.

Jubilee laughed. "It's hard-light, meaning it had three dimensions and when it hit you, you knew you'd been hit." She shrugged. "We got it from some friends, not sure where." She never paid attention, but saying 'we got it from these aliens, because the Professor was dating one of them' seemed... wrong some how. "It was... both fun and interesting way to train. We spent a lot of time in it, because our lives required it." She waved her drink around, indicating the port. "It's really kinda quiet here, despite of the little pockets of newsworthy events."

[1stguardian]

That sounded familiar. Ichigo'd lost count of how many times he'd pulled something out of nowhere, had it work, and was unable later to do it again. That, probably more than anything else, frustrated him.

"It sounds like an illusion. A technologically created illusion, anyway," he amended after a second's thought. "I've never experienced one, but I'm told there are some that are impossible to tell aren't real."

He wasn't used to things being as quiet as they were, but he had to admit that he was glad they were. Less people were hurt that way. If he had to lose some of his skill through inactivity, Ichigo felt it was a small price to pay. "I can't do much in the ways of holographs, but we can do this again as often as you'd like."

[thelittlestbub]

She nodded. "It is. And when you're in there, it's hard to remember it isn't real. Unless you have like, super senses." Like her Dad. "We used to go play in it, for all sorts of reasons - training, relaxation. Hell, once, we had a barbecue in there because we wanted to hang out and it was really cold out." She smiled slightly. "It was always fun."

Jubilee couldn't help but laugh. She put a hand on his shoulder. "Anytime you wanna be beaten by a little girl, gimme a call. I'm all yours." Jubilee add a wink, so at least she hoped he knew she was teasing.

[1stguardian]

"It sounds like fun," he said, just a tad wistful. As unbelievable as it seemed, at least outside of science fiction, it still sounded like a lot of fun. A world without consequences, where a person could relax and not have to worry about the result of every action. Try though he did to be responsible, there remained a part of him that wanted an escape from it all, even if only for a few minutes.

That made him laugh, and he responded with a grin. "It's something of a hobby of mine. Getting beaten by girls. It has to be. I've got twin sisters."

[thelittlestbub]

"It can be, depending on what's going on." She shrugged and leaned back with a heavy sigh.

Jubilee couldn't help but laugh at that. "Ah, so you've been well trained!" She teased. "I was an only child and was pretty spoiled." Jubilee nudged him. "Lemme guess, you've got the whole overprotective big bro thing going for you, huh?"

[1stguardian]

Oh, he'd been trained, all right. After eleven years of taking care of them, he couldn't be anything but.

"Oh yeah," he nodded, grin getting a little sheepish as he scratched at the back of his neck. "Kind of had to be. It was just me and Dad, and he was always too much of an idiot to do it properly. He's a good doctor, but..."

But he spent his off-hours shrieking ridiculous proclamations to a poster of his dead wife, lying in wait to ambush his son, and talking about himself in third person. Now that he knew what he was, Ichigo understood the stupid behavior even less. Unless Isshin really was crazy. He doubted it, though. He doubted it a lot.

"I watched them, played with them, that kind of thing. I was kind of-" Mom. "-sane Dad for them."

[thelittlestbub]

She laughed. "Sounds like fun." And she meant that. "You must miss them a lot." Jubilee sipped her drink again. "I was an only child. Daddy used to take me to see horror movies and stuff, on his days off, and Mom was just a housewife. It wasn't until after they died and I hooked up with Dad that I really learned what family was."

Like, a lot. It had always been nice, knowing that the X-Men were family. Or had been at one time.