1. Prologue (1/2)

the will to protect

prologue

disclaimer:

i do not own bleach. it belongs to kubo tite. this story contains spoilers of the manga chapters 195 and up. if you have not read thus far in the manga or you only watch the anime and do not wish to be spoiled, feel free to click the back button. to fit this plot, the timeline has been tweaked. also, do not sue if you do not like the pairing. feel free to hit the back button at any point. i only own this plot. thank you.

full summary:

he didn't waste a second. as soon as urahara and yoruichi took over, he made a dash over to her house. if what the exiled shinigami said was true, it meant that she was in danger too… he had to protect her from them. and it wasn't just because of his duty…

as soon as he sensed the arrival of the allankar, his first concern wasn't about reverting to his shinigami form. in fact, it was far from the simple task of popping a soul candy into his mouth to expel his soul from his gigai.

his mind was on her.

he was worried about her.

'her' being one of ichigo's high school friends.

'her' being arisawa tatsuki.

if the situation wasn't already so tense, renji could've smacked himself. why in the world was he worrying about that human girl, albeit one with some amount of spiritual power, when there was also an allankar heading for him? besides, she didn't have enough spiritual power to pose a threat to the allankars. he had pressing concerns himself too, considering the allankar had just appeared before him. well, he had no time to think about her anymore. if he wanted to live, he had to fight this allankar… and win.

his opposition charged at him, zanpakutou drawn. renji drew out his zabimaru and blocked the attack. the surging amount of spirit power through both zanpakutous caused a small explosion and both spiritual beings jumped apart to avoid the aftershocks. renji was preparing a second attack when he heard someone call him.

"abarai-san! leave this to us!"

despite knowing it was a stupid move, renji spared a quick glance behind him to see urahara and yoruichi. urahara had his zanpakutou out and yoruichi was in her ninja battle outfit. then in a flash, yoruichi was beside him and urahara had gone ahead to engage the allankar in combat.

"yoruichi-san! are y-"

"we can take him, renji. the allankars aren't just aiming for you shinigamis and ichigo."

"what?" at yoruichi's words, which held grim undercurrents, he felt a chill run down his spine and his grip on zabimaru tightened. if they weren't going to target just the shinigamis, it meant that they were no doubt going to attack…

"that's right. they're going to kill anyone who has even half a speck of spiritual power," urahara added, as he gracefully – almost leisurely – jumped away from an impending strike. "i suggest that you should go and protect the weaker ones." he turned back to send a powerful blast towards his opponent.

renji couldn't help it. his mind reverted automatically back to her and his initial worry sprang back, and attacked him with ten times the original power. shit. this was bad. very bad. knowing tatsuki's nature from what he had seen so far, she would never run away from a fight, especially one who could give her a good contest. at least not until she had tried to defeat them and realized that she really couldn't. even then, renji wasn't very sure the female spitfire would have the sense to just put down her pride and run far, far away.

"then i'll leave it to you two," he said to yoruichi and urahara as he bounded up to the rooftop. he barely heard the duo's reply as he had

oke off into a run towards the general direction of tatsuki's house.

as he ran and leapt over dozens of rooftops, renji couldn't help but pray and hope fervently that the allankar had not arrived yet. or if it had… well, he just hoped that tatsuki would run… and run at

eakneck speed. but somehow he couldn't fathom the black-haired tomboy escaping just because of an allankar's appearance; something that she didn't know actually existed.

renji had first noticed tatsuki as she was constantly around orihime. he soon found out that they were best friends and that due to orihime being the number one target of the class' sex-crazed lesbian, chizuru, tatsuki was constantly putting the redhead female in her place. which was, of course, in the form of harsh punches or kicks. he also knew firsthand that she rarely backed down from anything that threatened (or seemed to threaten in his case) her and her friends' safety no matter how large the odds were against her.

it was something he admired; yet he knew that trait of hers would undoubtedly cost tatsuki her life in the impending situation…

it had been the shinigamis' fifth day at karakura high school. they were still getting accustomed to the ways of modern life… and the most infuriating thing they had all encountered so far was still the darned juice pack.

ichigo had starkly refused to show them how to open the juice pack after the first time. so it was left to just rukia, who had finally learnt how to open it after having stayed in the human realm for a few months before, and hitsugaya, who had gotten the hang of it after two tries ("tensai…" ikkaku had muttered sulkily), to help the rest who were still struggling with the fiddly things even after five days.

unfortunately, that friday, he had been alone when he encountered the tricky pack again. after trying valiantly to open it for about ten minutes, renji was close to giving up when orihime appeared. despite knowing that the orange-haired girl could be quite the airhead, he decided that there was no harm in asking her for help. it would be less embarrassing than asking hitsugaya or even rukia. and although he found the object tricky, he was relatively sure that it wouldn't cause as much trouble as a hollow on a soul-hunting spree.

"eh, inoue-san, could you help me with this juice pack?"

"of course, renji-kun!" the girl replied cheerily as she took the pack from him. sometimes renji wondered where she got all her energy from even after getting injured very badly by the first two allankars.

as orihime was removing the straw, she asked, "renji-kun… why are you and the other shinigamis here? is kurosaki-kun going to be in trouble?"

"why do you ask?"

"because kurosaki-kun wouldn't tell me anything… and i know you all still have a lot to do in soul society after the three captains' betrayal…"

renji noticed that orihime had poked the straw into the, he presumed, correct place a little harsher than what was required and guessed that it was her nerves working on overdrive that caused the less than gentle ministration on the juice pack. this girl was really worried about ichigo. still, he had to reassure her. it'd do no good if she freaked out and placed herself in greater danger.

"don't worry, inoue-san. he'll be fine." renji placed a hand on orihime's shoulder to comfort her as his other hand reached out for the juice pack orihime was holding out to him.

unfortunately for him, at that moment tatsuki appeared, and took the wrong signal from the fact that his hand was on orihime's shoulder. in what seemed like less than a second, tatsuki was in front of him and had pulled orihime behind her. she had a deep scowl on her face and a death glare that, in his opinion, was fairly reminiscent of captain kuchiki's. well, if he could hold his captain's death glares, hers was nothing to be worried about.

"look here abarai, i don't care if you're the new hotshot around here and that the girls are falling flat at your feet. if you try anything funny on orihime, you'll have to deal with me first. got it?" she snarled at him and he felt her spiritual power flare.

"you're reading things too deeply arisawa. i'm not planning on 'trying anything funny' inoue-san. stop being so overprotective. it's not like you can always protect her!" the last bit was very true. if whatever was attacking orihime was a hollow or some spiritual being, tatsuki would be more of a hindrance to orihime. of course, he couldn't let tatsuki know that since it would require a lot more of explaining than he would like to do.

"are you doubting my ability to protect orihime, abarai? want a match right here, right now? i'll prove to you that i'm more than capable!"

"tatsuki-chan!" orihime protested. "you don't have to! renji-kun was-"