Intruders in the Seireitei.

Chapter twelve.

[Hidden quest completed:

Meet Kukaku Shiba.

Reward: 250 I.P]

''K-Kukaku is…'' Ichigo stuttered, shocked at the revelation that the person they were going to meet was a woman.

''A woman!?'' Ishida, Inoue and Chad screamed, much in the same shocked state.

''… What's so surprising about it?'' Kuromiya asked to no one in particular, he truly failed to understand how something trivial like that surprised them. ''I don't recall Yoruichi ever telling us that it was a man…''

''Exactly.'' The black cat agreed, turning her head towards them.

''Huh?'' Kukaku glanced towards the other guests, allowing her eyes to linger around them for just a few seconds. ''Who are this kids?''

''… Actually Kukaku.'' Yoruichi walked closer to the beautiful woman and decided to sit down not too far away from her. ''I have a favor to ask of you.''

''That's usually the case when you look me up.'' Kukaku pointed out, staring at the black cat with a blank look. ''Is it a difficult problem?''

''Most likely.'' Yoruich replied, both now staring at each other in silence.

''Heh, it's been a long time since we've talked like this…'' The head of the Shiba Clan smirked, having already decided what her answer would be. ''All right. Tell me about it, I love difficult things.''

. . .

''Thank you for transferring the prisoner here, Lieutenant.'' One of the guards tasked with escorting Rukia said, thanking Renji Abarai for his assistance.

Right now there were four guards inside the Repentance Cell, each of them covered from head to toes in some sort of grey mantle that distinguished them from the average soul reaper.

This so called Repentance Cell would be Rukia's last imprisonment location before her execution, the giant white tower was meant to be a location from where the prisoner would be able to look at the Sokyoku from one of the many windows, allowing them to gaze at it and repent their sins.

''… Yeah.'' Renji answered to the guard, said guard made a short reverence to him and prepared to leave the tower alongside the rest of them. However, the red haired soul reaper's focus was fixed on the silent girl, who had yet to utter a single word despite her situation.

''… Tch.'' This felt wrong to Renji for some reason, who finally had enough of watching the hopeless girl and decided to approach her, just enough to be able to whisper something to her ear.

''… Lieutenant?'' The same guard that had thanked him before watched in confusion as the red haired man approached the prisoner. ''Lieutenant!''

''Here's a little bit of unconfirmed information.'' Renji whispered to her, grabbing her shoulder. ''I'm sure you heard yesterday that there were a few ryoka in the Soul Society, right?''

''…'' Rukia didn't offer a response, her gaze just wandering around one of the window's inside the tower.

''There were six of them, and here's something more interesting…'' Renji started, confident that his next words would get a reaction out of the girl. ''Two of them fought Ichimaru, one of them had black hair and blue eyes, what's more interesting perhaps… He used a strange technique that emitted green light.''

''!?'' Rukia's reaction didn't make itself wait, her once stoic face was now plagued with an immensurable amount of questions. However, Renji wasn't over just yet.

''… And an orange haired soul reaper that wielded a sword as long as his body was there too.'' After this last words, Renji turned away and left, not even bothering to look back at her once again. Despite the fact that Rukia hadn't said a single word during the whole conversation, her face did nothing to hide the sea of emotions that she was feeling.

. . .

''… I see, I get the picture.'' Kukaku said, Yoruichi's explanation about their current predicament being finally over. While smoking from her wooden pipe, the young woman decided to give them an answer. ''All right, I'll take on the job.''

The entire group was now sitting down behind Yoruichi, listening to the conversation without interrupting.

''Really?'' The black cat asked, pleased with her answer.

''Yeah, Urahara's involved so even if I wanted to, I can't refuse.'' Kukaku replied, her gaze now landing on the five teenagers behind her old friend. ''However, although I do trust you, the same doesn't go for those kids.''

'Oh god, I was hoping she wouldn't send Ganju with us since there's six of us this time.' Kuromiya thought, biting his tongue in order to contain himself from uttering something that might get the woman to change her mind. 'Man, that brother of hers didn't do shit in the Soul Society, does she even know that he could get killed there?'

''I'll include one of my henchmen to keep an eye on them.'' Kukaku announced, much to Kuromiya's disappointment. The whole decision sounded a bit dumb to him, sending the last known male of the Shiba Clan to commit an act of treason didn't sound like a particularly wise choice.

''Henchmen?'' Ichigo questioned, unware of the fact that this so called henchman was also the one who had been fighting him last night.

''Yeah, though he's actually my little brother.'' Kukaku stood up, making her way towards the close door behind the group. ''He's still a brat and not that useful.''

'That's an underestimation.' Kuromiya added inside his mind, even Orihime who was the group's healer had more fire power than him.

''Hey, are you ready?'' Kukaku asked, now standing next to the same door from which the group had entered not too long ago. ''I'm opening the door, so behave!''

''Y-yeah!'' Ganju's nervous voice was heard from the other side of the door, though it appeared that the rest of the group had yet to notice just who that henchman was.

''How do you do? My name is Ganju Shiba!'' The man presented himself, kneeling in front of them while looking at the ground. ''Please be good to me!''

The moment that the man raised his face, all of the teenagers recognized him as the man they had encountered last night, the same one who Ichigo wanted to beat up.

''… Huh!?'' Both of them reacted at the same time, pointing an accusatory finger to the other. ''It's you!?''

''Uh? You know each other?'' Kukaku asked, watching their interaction with a surprised look. The silent majority of the people in the room knew a bit more about the situation, most of them already expecting what was about to happen.

''You… Take this you bastard!'' Ichigo was the first one to react, launching a powerful blow with his fist against the man. Ganju didn't stay still either, attempting to land a hit on the orange haired soul reaper too.

Before the situation could escalate further and end up with the eventual destruction of the room, Kuromiya decided to defuse the situation before it even started. Thus with a swift and quick movement he stepped in between the two of them, forcing them to stop their blows.

''Kuromiya, move out of the way! I need to finish what this guy started last night!'' Ichigo prompted his classmate to move, all while still glaring at Ganju.

''Shut it, Ichigo! I don't even want to hear about it, is it that difficult to understand that you need to behave sometimes?'' Kuromiya barked at him, this immature version of Ichigo had yet to learn some self-control after all. ''We need to get inside the Seireitei and just when we find someone who's willing to help us, you're about to beat the living shit out of her little brother?''

''But he's just…'' Ichigo attempted to answer, but was once again interrupted mid-sentence.

''I don't even care about what he did! Just deal with him for a while, and he'll soon be gone from our life. You seem to be forgetting about it, but we are here to save Rukia, not to fight some dumb fuck that just happened to make you mad!'' Kuromiya finished, realizing right at the end that he had started screaming at some point.

''… I get it.'' The substitute soul reaper answered after a while, clenching his teeth while returning back to his seat next to the rest of his friends.

''Hehe.'' Ganju's laugh didn't go unnoticed to someone, that someone being no other than his older sister. This didn't seem to amuse Kukaku at all, considering that she delivered a left hook straight to his brother's jaw.

''Aagh!'' Ganju fell to the floor with a loud 'tud', and he didn't move from there afterwards. ''What was that for, onee-chan!?

''What was that for, you ask!?'' Kukaku kicked his brother who was still lying on the ground, making him squeal. ''I tell you to behave yourself and the first thing you do is to fight one of our guests!? You've some guts, Ganju!''

Kukaku didn't stop there though, kicking the man again, and again, and again, and again, and again. Right around the ninth kick Ganju stopped resisting altogether, not even bothering to trash around in pain.

''Uh… I think he isn't conscious anymore.'' Ishida whispered to his classmates in the lowest voice he could muster.

''What's up with this family?'' Ichigo whispered back too, not knowing that he was a part of this same family too.

''Any complaints!?'' Kukaku asked once she heard them whispering, facing them with barely contained rage.

''No!'' Ishida, Ichigo, Inoue and Chad answered all at once.

'Talk about some anger issues.' Kuromiya thought, even then it was quite satisfying to see Ganju getting his ass handed.

''… Alright, let's just get over with it.'' Kukaku said, screaming to one of his gatekeepers that waited for her call just outside the room. ''Koganehiko, go outside with Shiroganehiko and start the preparations.''

''Right away, Kukaku-sama!'' Koganehiko answered, leaving without waiting another second.

''Ganju will follow us once he wakes up… Probably.'' The woman said while smirking at them, all the anger she had just a few seconds ago was now completely gone. ''The rest, be quiet and follow me!''

. . .

''Here it is… You, open the door.'' Kukaku pointed towards Ichigo, and he obeyed without a single complaint coming from him, after all he didn't cherish the thought of getting beating up just like his younger brother.

The group had followed the black haired woman down a long staircase, and after a few minutes of an uneventful walk they had ended up in front of an iron door, which the orange haired soul reaper was opening right now.

The room itself was enormous, but the one single object that was inside it was a massive cannon pointing towards the surface.

''W-what is this!?'' Ichigo gawked, unable to hide his surprise.

''It's huge.'' Ishida added, just as surprised as his classmate was. Despite their reaction, the team walked inside following Kukaku's steps, who started talking once again.

''I'll shoot you guys into the Seireitei with this beauty here.'' She explained, turning towards them while pointing at the cannon. ''From the sky!''

''F-from the sky!?'' Ishida and Ichigo asked, the whole thing was just getting weirder and weirder for them.

''My name is Kukaku Shiba, and I'm the best pyrotechnic in Rukongai!'' Her declaration was more than enough to make them realize this wasn't some sort of joke, she really was going to shoot them to the sky with a giant cannon.

. . .

The whole room which used to be underground was now out in the open, since it turned out that the room itself was nothing but a mobile platform. Shiroganehiko and Koganehiko had lifted the room while using some sort of weird mechanism, and so all of them were now out in the open.

''W-what kind of joke is this? You might be a firework expert or whatever…'' Ishida said, fixing his glasses while looking at the woman with clear doubts. ''… But as if you could shoot us over with th-!?!?''

Before he was even able to finish his sentence, Kukaku threw some sort of crystal ball straight at his head, making him fall to the ground. The sphere bounced right into Ichigo's hands, who gave it a curious glance.

''What's this?'' The substitute soul reaper asked, looking at Kukaku as he waited for an explanation.

''It's a Spirit Core, though I prefer to call it Reishu-kaku.'' The young woman explained, pointing at the sphere in Ichigo's hands while doing so. ''Place your palms on it and focus your spiritual energy into it.''

''Huh, like this?'' The orange haired boy asked as he tried to 'crush' the ball with his hands, failing miserably despite Kukaku's instructions. Not even a few failed attempts later, he gave up and asked something that had been luring his mind since he heard about it. ''… How do I focus my spiritual energy?''

'… This dude would have somehow managed to beat Byakuya Kuchiki in no more than ten days… How sad is that?' Kuromiya though, sweating slightly at such an unfair thing.

''Huh, what're you talking about? If you're a soul reaper surely you know how to use kido, right?'' Kukaku asked with a blank stare.

To emphasize her point, she moved her left arm upwards and focused her spiritual pressure at the palm of her hand were a pure sphere appeared, glowing brightly.

''This is the newbie soul reaper I told you about earlier.'' Yoruichi explained from the side. ''He doesn't know how to use kido, at all.''

''… What?'' Kukaku asked, disbelief written all over her face. ''Ganju, show him… Oh, right.''

Realizing that her little brother was likely still unconscious inside her house, she sighed. While this was happening, Ichigo was still miserably failing at his current task.

''Yo, Ichigo, give me that.'' Kuromiya interjected, he was quite confident in his spiritual pressure manipulation since he was a fullbringer after all, most of his techniques relied on pushing his spiritual pressure into his necklace anyway. Without waiting for an answer, he snatched the sphere out of Ichigo's hands.

''Hey, Kuromiya! Give me that back, I can do it!'' Ichigo didn't seem to amused with his actions, but he ignored his screams.

''Hm, I wouldn't bother, if the soul reaper can't do it then I doubt…'' Kukaku attempted to say, but before she could even finish her words, the blue eyed boy pushed his spiritual pressure inside it.

The Spirit Core started glowing in a bright blue light, and sure enough the ball started 'creating' some sort of big transparent force field, surrounding the teenager in a perfect sphere.

''Oh? Seems like there's at least someone competent in your little group.'' The young woman commented to Yoruichi, now approaching the sphere and hitting it with her knuckles. ''But you should feed it a bit less energy, otherwise you'll tire yourself out.''

''I'm feeding it just a little already, though.'' Kuromiya replied, but he complied nonetheless and halved the amount of spiritual pressure he was pushing into the Spirit Core. ''Is this fine?''

''Huh… I guess you do have an abnormally high spiritual pressure.'' Kukaku noted, taking a few seconds to look at the boy in a new light. ''Well then, this is the cannonball!''

''I'm guessing this will make it so the shakonmaku doesn't tear us apart?'' The black haired boy asked, prompting the woman to move on with her explanation.

''Oh, so know about it already?'' The Shiba's clan leader questioned, deciding to move on with her explanation. ''This little thing here will allow you to push through it, if all of you manage to put your spiritual pressure into it, that is.''

'Hm… I wonder if there's a limit to how much spiritual pressure I can feed to this? Maybe I could envelop myself and one of my enemies on it? I could activate my Bookmark and blow both of us up.' The fifteen-year-old thought while holding the sphere.

''Now, any questions?'' Kukaku asked, while looking at the four teenager sitting down in front of her.

''Ugh, well…'' Ichigo tried to voice his doubts, but was once again interrupted mid-sentence.

''All right, you are dismissed!'' The woman announced, snapping her fingers as she called for her henchmen. ''Take them to the underground training room, Shiroganehiko, Koganehiko!''

The two muscled men picked Ichigo, Ishida and Orihime up while Chad looked at them from the sidelines, and a few seconds later Kuromiya and Kukaku were left alone.

''Can I keep this ball? I've a few ideas in mind for it.'' The blue eyed boy asked, allowing the Spirit Core to disappear as he stopped feeding it his spiritual pressure.

''Hm? Sure, just don't make my house blow up and we should be good.'' The young woman replied without giving much thought to the matter. ''By the way…''

''Is there a problem?'' Kuromiya glanced at her, unsure on what could she possible need from him.

''You're their leader, right?'' Her sudden question caught the teenager by surprise, he certainly wasn't expecting that.

''I mean, not really?'' He replied while scratching his head, unsure about the answer himself. ''Yoruichi aside, I'm the strongest in the group… But I wouldn't call myself the leader either.''

''Yoruichi aside?'' Kukaku asked, sounding a bit curious at his remark. ''Then you know about her true form, right? I wouldn't expect for her to reveal it to a bunch of kids.''

''The others don't know about it, though.'' He explained, recalling the time he had met Yoruichi. ''I don't know about all the details, but she kind of scratched my front door and then…''

''Pfffft.'' Kukaku snorted with laughter at his words. ''You've got to tell me about that later. Tell you what, since you know about her already, we are going to have a nice talk with her tonight to catch up, if you don't have to train you might as well join us.''

''Fine by me, but I still don't get why would you ask me if I'm the leader?'' Kuromiya accepted without a second thought, it would take an idiot to reject such an offer after all.

''You know…'' She trailed off, shifting her gaze towards the Seireitei. ''I'm sending my little brother there, Ganju is… He might be a little hot-tempered like me but he still is a nice person, so please keep an eye on him, will ya?''

''…'' Kuromiya widened his eyes at just how vulnerable the young woman appeared to be, never in a million years would he have imagined that Kukaku Shiba could make such a face.

'I guess it's only natural, she just saw a soul reaper that couldn't even use his own spiritual pressure properly and she's sending her last family member with him.' He reasoned, and thought about just what would his answer be. This were no longer some anime characters after all, everyone ends up showing some sort of weakness at some point.

''I'll do my best.'' He promised, but deep down he knew that this was nothing more than an empty promise. The cannonball would break, and so Ganju would likely end up next to Ichigo which meant that he would have no way to protect him.

'Might as well get her to be grateful to me, though.' Kuromiya added, even if it was somewhat of a lie, it wouldn't hurt to get on Kukaku's good side.

. . .

It had been around a day since the group had arrived at Kukaku Shiba's home, and so it had been plenty of time already for the Gotei 13 to arrange a captains meeting. Thus, eleven of the thirteen captains were already waiting for said meeting to take place.

''You're here...'' The unmistakable voice of Shigekuni Yamamoto Genryusai declared those words, while all the captains present turned towards the newcomer.

The sight was quite incredibly, the sheer power of the captains standing there would be more than enough to choke the life out of a lesser soul reaper. Said captains were distributed in two parallel lines, making some sort of 'hall', and at the end of that hall was standing the captain commander himself.

On the left line, Mayuri Kurotsuchi, Toshiro Hitsugaya, Shunsui Kyoraku, Byakuya Kuchiki, Unohana Retsu and Sui Feng where standing next to each other, making quite an intimidating line up.

Meanwhile on the right line the captains Kenpachi Zaraki, Tosen Kaname, Sajin Komamura and Sosuke Aizen stood with their blank faces hiding their thoughts from the world.

This faces all turned around at once, their undivided attention focusing on a single person, and no one else.

''Captain of the Squad 3…'' Yamamoto said, looking straight at the one person that was the sole responsible for the meeting. ''Gin Ichimaru.''

''What is going on?'' Despite the situation in which Gin found himself in, his careless tone made it seem like he was above this whole situation. ''I get called so suddenly, and look at this crowd? The captains who control Soul Society… Are all here for just me?''

''… Maybe not.'' Gin added, despite the fact that he had yet to open his eyes, he was able to determine that there was one person absent. ''The Captain of Squad 13 isn't here. Did something happen to him?''

''He's absent due to his illness.'' Kaname replied.

''Again? I hope he gets better soon.'' Gin's words didn't manage to fool anyone; it was crystal clear that the man couldn't care less about it.

''Quit joking around. You know damn well you weren't summoned here for that.'' A new person jumped in the conversation, this one belonging to no other than Kenpachi Zaraki. You went and played with the ryokas by yourself, didn't you? And to make things worse you failed, explain yourself.''

''There wasn't much I could do, two of them were quite interesting fellows after all.'' Gin answered with a careless smile. ''One of them managed to fool me and escaped, there's not much I can say about that.''

There was no one with their attention onto Sosuke Aizen, but there was a barely perceptible curiosity reflected in his eyes at Ichimaru's words.

''What? Do you expect me to believe that a ryoka managed to fool you?'' Kenpachi interjected, finding it more than a bit hard to believe.

''It's the truth though.'' The silver haired captain answered, his hand shaking his hair around while offering him an apologetic look. ''I would swear he vanished from my very own eyes! OnceI reacted, the gate was already down.''

''Hm, quit with that monkey business.'' Mayuri Kurotsuchi interrupted, his creepy smile making him look even more eccentric than what he already was. ''There's no scenario in which a ryoka would manage to outspeed a captain-level class soul reaper like us.''

''I didn't say that, though.'' Gin corrected the man, his foxlike smirk widening ever so slightly. ''I said he vanished.''

''There they go again.'' Toshiro sighed while listening to their conversation, his interest on the meeting diminishing more and more. ''Stupid squabbling among old fools, great.''

''Oh?'' This spiked the man's scientific curiosity, the wording itself suggested that one of the ryokas possessed a technique that would allow him to vanish from sight and if Ichimaru's words were to be trusted, it even managed to fool someone like him. ''Now, isn't that interesting? This might be worth my time after all.''

''You should shut your mouth, Kurotsuchi.'' Kenpachi Zaraki snapped, taking a step towards the captain of the twelfth squad. ''Or do you want to be done in by me?''

''What did you just say?'' Kurotsuchi questioned, taking a step forward too.

''… So stupid.'' Sui Feng muttered, turning her head away from the meaningless scene.

''Oh, boy… Tempers are sure running high today.'' Shunsui commented with a slight smile, tilting his hat downwards.

''Enough of this!'' The captain commander barked, having enough of the pointless conflict that the other captains were about to start. ''But I think the reason why you have been summoned has been made quite clear. Acting alone and letting the target escape… Have you something to say in your defense, Ichimaru?''

''I don't.'' Gin replied without pause, his smile still very much present on his face. ''Aside from what I have already stated, there's not much else I can say. I won't make any excuses, it was a genuine mistake, I'll accept any punishm-''

''Wait a second, Ichimaru.'' Aizen stepped forward, his gaze landing on the silver haired captain. ''First, let me ask you something.''

''Urgent alert! Urgent alert! Intruders in Seireitei! All Squad get into position!'' The voice of a shinigami sounded all around the Seiretei, warning all the shinigamis about the current situation. ''Repeat! Urgent alert! Urgent…''

''Huh? Intruders?'' Zaraki asked, while all the captains turned their eyes towards the door leading to the outside of the office.

Throughout the whole confusion that ensued from the alarm, there was just one man who remained smiling, like he had been expecting the intrusion from the very beginning, that man was of course Gin Ichimaru.

Though there was also a man who had been expecting this whole thing, that being Sosuke Aizen, his interest peaking at the topics discussed during the short meeting.

'Vanished, huh?' He smiled, the amount of possible explanations for such an event managing to amuse him to no ends. 'How amusing.'

End of chapter twelve.