Bleach: The Captain Part Two & Three, Toshiro Hitsugaya x OC

Chapter 18: Sacrifice

Warm light cast its rays through the window ledge. I had nestled myself into its nook, drifting lazily in and out of sleep. The trees rustled gently with the wind outside; the soundtrack of my summer. Yuki was on his hands and knees in our vegetable garden, grumbling to himself. Kneeling over the patch, his blue robes were caked in grim. He stabbed the trowel in the ground and brushed himself off, marching into the house. Quickly, I covered my grubby feet with an old quilt I found laying nearby, feigning sleep.

"Kiri wake up, you're not fooling me." I could tell he was agitated from the edge in his voice.

I peeped one eye open and found my brother looking more than a little perturbed. I knew that I earned the look he was giving me.

"What's up big brother? I was just sleeping." I stretched a little too long and maybe a little too exaggerated, even yawning for added effect.

He hitched his hands on his hips, giving me his most serve look; a look reserved for chiding and lectures. "So I suppose you happened to sleep walk through our garden again?" He yanked the quilt from my feet, exposing my filthy toes.

I tried tucking my feet under my bum to hide the evidence. "I wasn't walking through the garden." I fibbed.

"Kiri you know how much I hate lying." he held his ground firmly.

I swung my feet outwards, jumping off the window ledge. "Fine." I muttered. "I was in there."

"and why were you in there when I specifically asked you not to?" he asked.

I tried mimicking the motion of a bird with my hands. "There was a pretty blue bird and I was trying to catch it, but it flew into the garden."

He raised an eyebrow. "Why would you try to catch a bird?"

"To keep it."

He squatted to my eye level and grabbed my hands.

"Birds shouldn't be in a cage, Kiri. They're wild animals and they belong outside. Understand?"

I had to disagree. "I'd feed it and take care of it."

His eyes grew softer. "But that wouldn't be much of a life would it? Being stuck in a cage?"

I thought about it for a moment and realized he was right.

"I guess not."

He ruffled my hair affectionately and got up. "All lives are precious, remember that. Now why don't you help me salvage whats left of those carrots that you trampled to the death and we'll make some dinner?"

I hopped to the door and swung it open, waiting for my brother to follow.

He looked at the tracks I had smeared on the floor and chuckled. "Kiri you're seriously a handful."

***

An awful stabbing pain ripped its way through my stomach, waking me from my daydream. With a great deal of struggling I pushed myself up, retching on the ground in the process. I touched my ribs tenderly, they were bruised maybe, but not broken.

I pushed myself to a kneeling position, surveying the landscape. I held a hand to my face, shading it from the invading light. I noticed the walls were blue like so kind of artificial sky and the ground beneath my feet was dry earth. Aside from that there was nothing that could help me identify where I was.

Yuki must have read the confused look on my face. He jumped off his perch on a boulder, walking towards me.

"This is Kisuke's underground training room. I'm surprised he never showed it to you."