NOVEL WEB Chapter 23 – Cat Makes Bleach Piss Pants, and Annoys Lightbulb
Chapter 23
Yoruichi woke up to the rocking of a ship. She could hear waves crashing against the hull and the boots of sailors above her head. She quickly opened her eyes, vigilantly taking scope of the situation she was in.
Immediately she noticed she was in some sort of medical wing. ‘Nothing is ever this sterile otherwise.’ She thought. ‘Always so much white.’
White sheets, white walls, white beds, white curtains, even white gowns, one of which was on Yoruichi’s body. She sat up quietly, and took note of the tension pulling along her torso and left arm. A quick glance underneath the hospital gown showed that she was almost entirely wrapped up in bandages, again white, all the way from her hips to the tips of her fingers on her left arm. Her right had a few patch-marked bandages over bruises and cuts where she had blocked hits with her arms, and the same went for her legs.
Picking a little at the bandages, she started weaving her Kaido through her injuries.
‘Damn’ she thought. ‘I must’ve been out for a few days. My reserves are pretty full. I wasn’t that injured, was I?’ She started rubbing the injuries on her chest as they stitched closed, itching along the way.
A few minutes of careful healing, and a decent bit of Kaido usage later, Yoruichi hopped silently out of the bed, and proceeded to start peeling the bandages off.
While she was doing so, An extremely tall but thin man, with legs that took up ¾ of his body opened the door and spun in backward, looking down at a chart of some sort in his hand, while muttering to himself. He stood in the standard white marine uniform, with a white button up shirt, and blue pants. He had black boots on, along with an extremely long start white coat, more in style with a doctor’s lab coat than a marine officer coat. He had his hands through the sleeves, the pockets overflowing with various supplies. Pens, bandages, syringes, a stethoscope, gum wrappers, anything even remotely related to a doctor’s office was in his pocket. Somewhere.
“Oh, what the hell is this reading, how am I….” the man was mumbling to himself, scratching his head, which was completely bald.
To be honest, Yoruichi thought he looked like a stick figure, one of the ones the kids in schools use to draw hangman from, only if they drew a coat on him. He had like no hair at all, now that he had turned around. No eyebrows, no facial hair, nothing. Not even nose
Ooo hair.
Yoruichi kept peeling off the bandages wound tightly around her as the man started puttering around with his head in that chart of his. She was about 2/3 the way up her torso, just underneath her breasts and partly into her armpit as the man finally turned around to look in her direction.
“AHHHH!?? WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!” came a voice that was way too high pitched to be normal. Yoruichi glanced up at the man, an eyebrow raised in slight surprise at the decibel level.
She had her fingers curled underneath the bandage, in the process of peeling it off when the hopefully doctor rushed over, items jingling around, some of them falling out of his pockets. He immediately slapped her hand away from the bandage, causing Yoruichi’s hand to jerk upwards with surprising force.
There was a ripping sound as the bandages Yoruichi was holding onto were ripped right off her body. Immediately, Yoruichi raised an eyebrow in exasperation. “Seriously.” She deadpanned. “You could have just asked to see me. You didn’t have to help it along.”
Her words fell on deaf ears, as the man completely ignored her.
“Why would you take the bandages off?! You have at least a few days of healing…….” He said, trailing off as he saw the unblemished skin on Yoruichi’s torso.
The man immediately reached out and rubbed his fingers under Yoruichi’s ribs, an almost delicate caress as he stared at her in shock. “What- How- Why? What the fuck?” he cried after a moment of stupefaction. “I could have sworn you had a hole here. What the hell…...” he then immediately went into a daze, mumbling to himself while caressing Yoruichi’s stomach.
Yoruichi immediately grabbed him by the forehead and pushed him away, causing him to trip over his own feet and fall on his ass, most of the items spilling out of his pockets.
She glowered at him, her eyes narrowing dangerously. “That’s enough of that. I may like being appreciated like any woman, but that’s too much.” She said, a violent hint taking over her tone. She took a step forward, and leaned down to put her face closer to the doctor’s. “Now. I have a few questions.” She said firmly, her hands on her hips as she leaned down to face the now scared man on the ground. “Where am I, and where are my things?”
The doctor nodded frantically, his body trembling. “I-uh, we are on Admiral Kizaru’s warship, a few hours o-out from Marineford. Your things are….” He stuttered out, finishing with his hand pointed to the far wall near the door he had come in. Because of what she assumed were privacy curtains, she couldn’t see the small bedside table that held her things, clothes, Zanpakuto, satchel and all. Now that she was in the ‘hallway’ so to speak, she had enough of an angle to catch the edge of her orange jacket piled on top of her black jumpsuit, with Rain laid neatly across the hooded clothes.
Yoruichi glanced over at the corner he pointed to, and the. Immediately scanned the room again. ‘You’d think Kizaru would be treating me like a prisoner….’ She idly thought. ‘But there are no signs of guards, restraints, or even locks on the doors.’ Her eyebrows furrowed again as her brain caught up to what the doctor said.
“Wait.” She said abruptly, causing the man, who was still slightly trembling and trying to get back on his feet, to jump again and fall back on the ground. He turned around jerkily, and said hesitantly, “Y-yes, miss?”
Yoruichi didn’t ask him anything, just sighed in exasperation. She stood up straight and pinched the bridge of her nose as she just mumbled to herself, “Never mind. I’ll figure it out later.” She turned and walked down the aisle between the multiple beds, taking off the hospital gown which still rested on her shoulders and tossing it onto the bed she just vacated.
A few minutes later, while Yoruichi was busy putting her clothes on, the door opened once more. Kizaru took a step in, having to bend slightly to fit through the doorway.
“Ohhh, I did not know you were awake.” He said slowly. “I felt something happening down here, and I thought I would check on you.” He looked over at the doctor, who was now on his knees picking up all of his knickknacks off the floor.
Kizaru’s face immediately turned to comic surprise, with the eyebrows raised and his mouth open in an ‘o’ shape. He took a step forward, then paused when some of the knickknacks started moving.
A baby bird hopped up from where it had fallen, a beetle of some kind started walking slowly toward the window, and an entire family of crabs crab walked right past the frozen Admiral.
Once all the living things vacated the area, the doctor was finally able to put the rest of his things back into his pockets. Kizaru just looked at him impassively, his surprise gone and his exasperation starting to show.
“Menemen.” Kizaru started. He then sighed heavily. “What have I told you about experimenting with animals? Why would you think a crab, or a bird, would have anything able to assist in healing people?”
Menemen, the doctor, sputtered in indignation, obviously much less afraid of Kizaru than he was of her. “Sir, animals, while fundamentally different from us, hold the same basic components. It is up to us to study-“ he started ranting, but was cut off by the Admiral.
The admiral waved his hand, and said “Mah, that stuff is too annoying. Keep it to yourself. Anyways….” Kizaru turned to look at Yoruichi who was in the middle of putting her orange jacket on. He raised a single eyebrow at the purple haired woman, who just glanced disinterestedly at him.
“What do you want, lightbulb?” she asked snidely. Even though she was fine, she was still miffed about losing to the Admiral. ‘Thinking back on it now…’ she thought idly, ‘Why did we even fight? I was completely fine with telling him to screw off and go my own way, but he seemed to really want to fight for some reason.’
Kizaru sniffed disdainfully, but continued talking. “Mah, could you tone down whatever it is you’re doing? I could feel it up on deck, and it is scaring the crew members. Not to mention Menemen.” He glanced pointedly at the man, who was still glancing fearfully between the tall light logia and Yoruichi.
Yoruichi’s face scrunched up in confusion. ‘What’s this overgrown laser gun talking about?’ she thought. She quickly looked inward and after a moment, grinned ferally.
She focused back on Kizaru, and kept a dangerous grin on her face. “Ohhhh, I am so gonna kick your ass the next time I see you.” She taunted the man, who just went ‘hmm’ in response, and left the room, after giving a few orders to Menemen.
Yoruichi didn’t pay any attention to either of them any longer. She had immediately reached out and grabbed her Zanpakuto off the table, causing her slightly fluctuating spiritual aura to calm down almost immediately.
“Oh, how nice of you to join Us.” Rain said sarcastically immediately after she touched him.
‘Yeah yeah, sorry about leaving you around, you lazy bum.’ She gave him a mental image of her waving him off with her hand dismissively, before giggling like a schoolgirl mentally.
‘Oi, tell me it’s true, please, I really want to go kick Kizaru’s ass. Snarky bastard just gets on my nerves.’ She said to Rain, who just huffed in annoyance.
“The only reason he gets on your nerves is because a Human being defeated you, a former Captain of the Gotei 13. Yamamoto would be so proud of you.” The lion said, smugness oozing out of his voice.
Yoruichi just grabbed her weapon and shook it like a rattle.
She hadn’t noticed in her early moments after waking up, but there is a slightly interesting phenomena that happens when a Shinigami is close to breaking through to the next level. That phenomenon is the unstableness of a Shinigami’s Spiritual pressure, or Reiatsu. However, this 4is only a side effect of the actual phenomenon, which is the instability of the Reiryoku, or spiritual power.
Think of it like two balls of water, suspended in the air. Each ball has enough surface tension to hold themselves together into a sphere, but when the connection between the two balls is created and deepened, i.e. they are pushed closer together, there is a distortion of the ‘perfect’ sphere shape into something more commonly associated with a water droplet.
Both spheres are pulling on the connection to each other, and when they get close enough to touch, the surface tension breaks, and the water droplets become something larger, something more. It is the same with a Shinigami and their Zanpakuto. Shinigami nurture the piece of their soul within the weapon, enough so that it makes its own ‘sphere’ or Reiryoku. When reaching the next level, the precipice before success, the connection is close enough that the surface tension has broken, but not enough to combine to make something greater than both parts. This causes the Reiatsu to have some unconscious side effects, like a minor release of such pressure, which the Shinigami doesn’t notice. The surface tension of the Reiryoku is broken enough that without the stopper on the other side, the Zanpakuto, it flows out through the hole.
Most of the time this isn’t even noticeable, for a few reasons. One, most of the time Shinigami always have their Zanpakuto with them. It is very rarely they do not. Another reason is that Most Shinigami do not have enough Reiryoku to really have much of a visible effect on their surroundings. 99% of Shinigami who reach the next level reach Shikai, and most of them do not have amazing levels of Reiryoku. This pressure from Shinigami like them may be noticeable, but only enough to recognize it.
Yoruichi on the other hand, is not a ‘normal’ Shinigami by any means. She was on the higher levels of Reiryoku levels among Captains back when she was still in the Gotei 13, and she did not loose those levels when she lost her connection to her Zanpakuto. So when her pressure was released unconsciously, it had visible effects on people, such as the ‘poor’ doctor.
Yoruichi snorted internally. ‘I was probably seeming like a demon from hell, pressing down on his soul in preparation to eat him.’ She thought. ‘Wonder why Kizaru didn’t do much. He certainly noticed. Might be because of his Haki. That stuff is broken anyways.’
She shook her head, a slight smile still on her face. ‘Hey Rain, did our little talk seriously change enough between us that I am close enough to feel the Shikai release?’ she asked mentally.
The lion snorted, before replying, “Let This King remind you, you are at the boundary of your Shikai. You still have not achieved it. You have taken enough steps in the right direction to know it is the right direction, but you still have not arrived at your destination. You still have not found your pride, of what makes you, you.”
The werecat’s eyes closed in exasperation. “Thanks for the wholly unhelpful talk, you condescending fur coat.” she muttered out loud.
She finished putting her ensemble on, with the satchel going over her head to rest on the back of her hip, she spread her senses out, hoping to find the Admiral that had just left.
After only a moment, she succeeded. ‘Hm. He is under the deck still. Are those cannons?’ she asked herself, as she walked over to the door and exited the hospital wing.
After a moment of losing herself within the lower decks, she was able to find Kizaru. He was in what looked like the gun bay, with cannons reeled back from the gun ports, and the windows closed. He was over in the corner next to an office, talking to a buff, but short man.
‘Must be another officer.’ Yoruichi thought idly as she strode through the archway that led into the bay. Immediately Kizaru looked over to her when he noticed her entry, which wasn’t hard since she wasn’t hiding herself, and she was the only other person in the room.
“Miss Yoruichi.” Kizaru said, cutting off the officer from speaking. “To what do we owe the pleasure? Here to scare more marines?”
Yoruichi smirked at the dig, immediately replying in form, “Only the ones that are scared of their own shadows. Additionally so, if they are Mr. Clean knock offs.”
Kizaru’s eyebrows furrowed slightly, but he said in his slow pace, “I’m afraid I do not know who a Mr. Clean is, but was there something you needed?”
She continued smirking, and she walked over to a cannon and leaned down on the back of it, causing it to tilt upward. She crossed her arms and looked up at the man who was almost twice her height.
She said, almost casually, as if talking to an old friend, “Yes there was. What exactly am I doing on your ship, and why are you so ‘friendly’ now, when before you seemed to want to ‘come out swinging’ as the young ones would say.”
Kizaru clasped his hands in front of him, the same comical expression of surprise on his face. It seemed to be one of his default expressions. “Ohh, those questions I can answer. The first answer would be that Sengoku wants you, preferably still able to do something for him. What, I do not know. All I do know is it has something to do with Garp bragging about you after the few months’ vacation he took around a year ago. He came back bragging about how he found someone who could keep up with him in his spars.” The man gave a little shudder at the mention of ‘Garp’ and ‘Spars’ but it was minimal enough that Yoruichi only noticed due to her training from the Second Division.
“As to why I am friendly enough with you, well, you do not have a bounty, at least not yet, though with the rumors going around about a cat breaking into a meeting with the Warlords going around, I would imagine you do much else along those lines you might find yourself with one.” He paused, an expression of thinking then realization crossing his face. “Mah, I got off topic. You do not have a bounty, therefore you are a civilian. Civilians are to be protected, and A Marine must act friendly in their discourse with the civilian population. We are there to assist them after all.” He smiled like he was getting his picture taken for a magazine, all professional and polite.
Yoruichi just raised an eyebrow, not moving an inch from her perch on the cannon. ‘That sounds like a quote. Probably from the marine handbook.’ She then glared lightly at the man. “You still haven’t answered the question.” She said, a slight threatening note in her voice.
‘Better to figure out why there are hostilities, than to walk back into the lion’s den with no information.’ she thought wryly. Currently she was in a pretty bad position. Fighting Kizaru gave her a wake-up call to the true power some people hold in this world. While she can match them with some effort and her Shunko, people like Kizaru show a real challenge to her. Especially someone like Kizaru, who she cannot abuse her speed in front of.
The man kept his professional smile on his face. “Mah, that has something to do with Sengoku wanting you to come back immediately. And probably because he was annoyed at you, what, sleeping on his head? What is this I keep hearing about a cat on his head, when Garp kept saying it was you. You aren’t a cat zoan, or you would have used it by now.” His polite smile cracked again, and he mumbled, “My, off track again. Oh well…..” he then walked away from the office of the marine, who had decided to vacate the area well into the beginning of the conversation she was having, and started walking past her.
“Walk with me and I will explain.” He said, and Yoruichi just shrugged internally before falling into step with the man.
He started his soliloquy in a grand way, by saying, “Garp is one of the most physically overpowering people in the Marine core. The only person that can really match his sheer power are Sakazuki, who you may better know as Akainu, and Sengoku himself. Because of that, and his general disregard for anything but a direct order, there are some things that the Admirals have leave to do to reign him in.
Specifically, when Sengoku wants Garp to come back immediately, and he knows that Garp would not want to, he decides, to, ah, give the man some extra persuasion. Usually in the form of me.” He then glanced down at the petite woman, who was just walking along with a resigned acceptance on her face, knowing that was exactly how Garp acts.
He then continued, making his way through the belly of the warship, headed to what Yoruichi could sense was probably the main stairs to the upper decks. “Because Garp and the other two Admirals are broken from the same mold, with Kuzan being the man’s protégé, and Sakazuki being someone who would rather beat the old man to death than bring him in alive, and Sengoku himself drowning in too much paperwork, he usually sends either Me, or Tsuru to go get him.” Kizaru then smiled slightly fearfully, as he opened a door that led to what was a very congested hallway, full of marines walking back and forth.
“Tsuru has her own, shall we say, methods of dealing with her longtime friend, but I am the only one who can fight him at a faster pace than he himself can move, allowing me to tire him out with somewhat minimal damage to the environment and the populace. I’m sure you know why that is a thing I can do, considering you are quite fast on your feet yourself.”
Yoruichi just hummed in agreement. Her and Garp had spent a decent bit of time sparring on the Goa Kingdom Island, though from what she could tell now he was holding back considerably in his physical prowess. Don’t want to obliterate the island, after all. But what she was able to tell was that the man was not as fast on his feet as most might think. He was quite good at short bursts of speed, through one of those marine techniques of his, but he was not as good at moving at those speeds consistently.
Essentially, he could move fast in an offensive manner, in a single direction, but his defensive reflexes and general movement was not as fast as Yoruichi herself. The only way he could defend himself from her attacks was because of this Observation Haki, which she eventually figured out how to evade. Overall, he was more of a punch first, ask questions later type.
She then looked directly at the taller man, and asked bluntly, “What does all of this have to do with me, then?”
Kizaru paused in front of a staircase, most likely the final one to the upper decks. He turned to face her fully, a disturbing grin on his face. “Oh, but it has everything to do with you. The Fleet Admiral considered that you could put up with Garp on a physical level, so he told me to treat you like Garp. Of course, you were considerably different from Garp’s usual style, so it ended up with the both of us destroying a third of the island.” He said, a lilt to his voice that suggested he was very much amused by the fact that he destroyed most of an island.
Yoruichi just looked at him dumbfounded, thinking, ‘He seriously got told “beat her up and bring her back here”, and he agreed with no hesitation? What is he, some sort of sociopathic kidnapper?’ She just shook her head and brushed on by the man, taking the stairs two at a time.
When she got to the top, she realized why everything was so busy. She could see the slightly familiar pagoda shaped headquarters of the Marines.
The ship was in the process of docking, and it seemed to be just ending. She was glancing around the upper deck when Kizaru came up beside her, and said, “Ah. We have arrived. Follow me, Sengoku wanted to see you immediately.” He then walked off without further discussion, forcing Yoruichi to walk faster to catch up to the man’s fast and long strides.
‘For all the man talks like a snail, he walks fast as hell.’ She grumbled, finally giving up catching up to him normally and using a small flash-step to fall into line with him. He led her off the ship, down the docks, and quickly into the underbelly of the headquarters.
There was nothing special about this place. It was completely different from how Garp led her, with him going up the outside of the building and then in toward the top. This section of the headquarters was all storage facilities, and maintenance offices, things required to keep the upper section of the building running smoothly. She could hear the clanging of pots and pans, and could smell food, so she assumed the kitchens were down in this section as well.
After a brief process through the winding corridors, they reached a large double staircase, with something that reminded Yoruichi of the conveyor belts going up the middle. She could see someone near the top holding onto a handle built into a crate which was laid on the belt, and she assumed it was for easy transport of supplies up and down the massive staircase.
The two made their way quickly up the stairs, arriving in a more familiar part of the building. Kizaru then immediately turned and took her up another staircase, and then another, and then another, all the while saying nothing.
After 4 more twists, he finally stopped going up stairs, if only because there were none going up anymore. He went down a long hallway, this one much more extravagant than others. She glanced into a double doorway with windows and could see what looked to be some sort of conference room. She didn’t think much of it, and just followed Kizaru down a side hall which led into a more spartan section of the building, with a hallway just as large as the first.
At the end of the hall, she could see large double doors, at least taller than Kizaru himself, and there was engraving on the door that she could pick out as saying, ‘Fleet Admiral’.
Sure enough, Kizaru headed right for the door. Once they arrived, he stopped and made an overexaggerated bow, leaving his hand laid out to his side gesturing to the door. “Here we are, Miss. I hope you enjoy your stay.” He said, before immediately leaving.
Yoruichi just snorted when he was around the corner, and muttered, “Not likely, you flashy prick.”
She then looked up at the door, and without further hesitation, pushed the doors wide open and walked in.