Episode 2: A moment's respite... peaceful, beautiful days.

Alice didn't feel herself getting carried as she was already deep in sleep. She only felt the comfort of the bed beneath her heavy body. Her dreams became clouded and misty as if trying to hide something from her. Alice felt unexpecting presences in her dream. "Where am I...? This feels really weird..." Closing her eyes, Alice tried waking herself up. "Mm? That's strange... Maybe I'm not dreaming after all." Alice concluded and began walking deeper into her dream world.

Collin smiled back. "So your not distrcted by this...?" Collin asked and he suddenly dissipated in front Phoenix. Collin breathed heavily, finding himself only a few feet away from where he was only moments ago. His breathing became suddenly ragged as he fell to his hands and knees. Weakly bringing a hand to his chest and gripping lightly, Collin's face began to pale. 'C-can-n't... B-breathe' Collin's breaths came in small gasps. "B-break?" He asked, his voice quivering as he tried to calm himself so he could breathe again.

Phoenix frowned. "Sure, a break is fine. Are you okay?" she asked. "Maybe you should go to the 4th."

Asashi searched the academy high and low but couldn't find anyone. "Well, shit. Where the fuck is everyone?" he wondered aloud as he neared the training grounds. He looked over and saw two people, a boy with short black hair he thought was named Collin and a girl with fiery red, braided hair ('Uh... Phoenix? I think?), talking. He thought he recognized from his graduating class. 'Maybe I'll ask them' he thought heading over there, catching the tail end of the conversation they were having.

"Sure, a break is fine. Are you okay?" the girl asked. "Maybe you should go to the 4th."

"Um, excuse me!" Asashi called out "Hi, um. Sorry to interrupt. My name's Asashi and I'm looking for Kiyone-sensei or Sentaro-sensei. I need to find out what happened during the graduation exam. I... um... I kinda got knocked out early on and don't remember much" he blushed, rubbing the back of his head...

As Serenity walked towards Colin and Pheonix, she noticed a new person approach them. She walked up to Colin anyway, and said to him quietly, "Alice is sleeping at the 4th. I thought I would let you know so you wouldn't worry." Upon further inspection, she noticed he was extremely pale, and seemed to be shaking. "Maybe you should follow her suit and make a visit to the 4th also.... You don't look too well." She smiled at Pheonix warmly and waved to the new boy.

Today was perfect, Kohaku mused. The weather was exceptional, she had today to herself, and she was feeling productive; much could be done. That is, Kohaku thought with a sigh, if the Seireitei wasn't such a labyrinth. She had known where she was going, or so it had been assumed, and she still got lost. How could this wondrous day be productive if she spent it trying to find her way around?

Kohaku's class was taking the graduation exam very soon; she had to be prepared. It would probably be a good idea to buy some basic field medicine. Excess most likely could be bought off the fourth, or maybe various shops in the Rukongai sold some? Light practice (with caution not to get injured) would be smart, too. Hmm, should she—

The woman stopped, curious, tilting her head. She could faintly hear the sounds of combat drifting around one of the corners of up ahead. It abruptly stopped, followed by an irritated masculine voice. Subconsciously, the newbie Shinigami began to move towards the voices, driven by curiosity. It would be more entertaining than wandering around the Seireitei's poorly designed grounds for another hour. Perhaps she could ask directions, too?

Right before rounding the corner, she stopped once again, but frozen in her tracks this time. A thick reiatsu surged through the air. Kohaku hesitated. The best plan of action would be to turn around and quickly retrace her steps. Something of that level... it was beyond her capabilities in every way. Still...

It wouldn't hurt to look, would it?

Kohaku took a moment to steel herself, peering around the corner. Was that... 3rd seat Madarame? He stood with his back to her, a long spear in his hands, prepared for combat. Her eyes widened slightly. He released his zanpakuto? That would explain the reiatsu. Across from him stood a female Shinigami, who seemed almost hypnotized by her own shikai. Were they going to fight here? Right now?

A latent instinct persistently urged her to leave, but... Kohaku was so curious. She'd never seen a high ranking officer fight before. And of the 1th, too! If she stayed back, it'd probably be safe. Probably.

The girl who had observed the group training up until now frowned as the final wound was inflicted upon Colin, recognizing the shift in phoenix's eyes as it struck.

"We think she's met Alexi..." She said quietly, the plural being the only way she could ever find to address herself. "He should have taken responsibility, like he used to." She brushed her short golden hair behind her ears and stood up, her kimono loose in the breeze as she extended her arms and rushed down to the large group that had begun forming now that the training had ceased.

Serenity placed all her weight onto the balls of her feet, and heaved Colin to his feet. Holding him up, she looked over at Pheonix. "Would it be okay if I took him over to the 4th?" Serenity was hoping to get back to training, but wasn't sure if she would be able to now.

Phoenix nodded, momentarily ignoring the people that had just shown up. "Of course." She gave Collin a friendly pat on the back. "You did good, kid. Now go get yourself healed up, and maybe we'll train again sometime." She turned her attention to one of the newcomers. "What's with the trenchcoat?" she couldn't help but blurt.

Higgins realized that someone new had appeared when I heard Phoenix's question. He stood up and made his way in that direction.

Serenity let Colin lean most of his weight on her, and nodded at Pheonix as she walked him to the 4th. Upon arriving, she dropped him off with the same squad member that had taken care of Alice, and made sure he was comfortable. She walked out of the 4th division compound and made her way back to the place they had been training.

The Third Seat shook his head as he watched his challenger take on a rough academy-taught zanjutsu stance. She was clearly not knowledgeable in the use of the naginata, and had the most basic zanjutsu training, unpolished and unimproved because of how her unreleased zanpakutou turned out. “You’re not going to start the battle like that, are you?” he mocked the woman as he exaggeratedly lowered himself into the starting stance of a naginata kata. “Of course not!” Jin yelled back as she shifted her feet and adjusted her arms to imitate her opponent.

Before Jin could figure out how she would make her first attack, Ikkaku thrust Houzukimaru in her direction and executed a series of powerful swings, leaving her in a strictly defensive mode. ‘Lesson number one learned: I am completely outclassed,’ she thought wryly.

The mockery of a battle went on as such, the Gotei 13 officer whipping out more and more classic katas while the cadet picked up as much as she could as she defended herself, blocking and parrying, dodging and some fancy footwork. The split focus, of course, led to a good amount of nicks and bruises, but even as the Third Seat made a show of his technique, we was clearly holding back on the power. Part of Jin appreciated it, but part of her was reminded of how the arrancar had toyed with her and the self-reproach pushed her to fight harder.

The bald man noticed the sudden ferocity in his opponent’s eyes, and he was reminded that overconfidence could end any battle when one of his earlier moves was thrown back at him and the jagged edge of Jin’s blade almost dug and shredded through his side. In theory, he knew that Jin had missed; but for a moment, he felt a sharp pain where the weapon’s tip came closest to his skin, and it knocked the air out of his lungs. As he struggled to regain his bearings, Jin followed through with weaker and rougher but decent imitations of his techniques, but he beat her back with a more powerful and more complicated set of sweeps and stabs, not even bothering to break Houzukimaru into its tripartite form. Soon enough, Jin found herself on the ground, disarmed and slightly bloody while the one she challenged stood over her unscathed.

“Heh,” Ikkaku huffed amusedly, his blade making Jin cross-eyed as it came dangerously close to her forehead then stalled. “I think someone just got their ass kicked.”

Jin failed to completely hide the frown of annoyance and humiliation that crossed her face, but then this outcome wasn’t at all unexpected. She was, after all, a newbie, and he was the Third Seat of the Eleventh and she was lucky to have picked up even a few things from him from this encounter. She gingerly batted away the tip of the spear and dusted herself off to get up, a slight pout still on her lips and a line or two still marring her brow. “Yeah, I guess so,” she conceded softly. Now standing before the clearly stronger and more experienced fighter, she coughed slightly as she picked up and retracted her shikai, sticking it hurriedly into what was left of the bun on her head. “I’m sorry to have implied that it wouldn’t happen,” she spoke as she gave a quick but humbled bow, then quickly walked away.

Ikkaku raised an eyebrow, partly in confusion and partly in amusement as he recalled his shikai and stuck the blade in its sheath. “You said you’d do better than these grunts,” he called out to the woman.

Jin stopped and turned slightly, waiting for the man to make sense.

“I think you may need to have your ass kicked a couple more times before that happens,” he continued as the newer shinigami nodded defeatedly, like a toddler being chastised. “Tomorrow, after these idiots give me another embarrassing showing, I might need to take out my frustrations on someone, and that someone will also have their ass kicked,” he said, briefly eying the woman who was by now facing him and wearing a confused and wary expression. “I bet you’re not up to it,” Ikkaku nodded to himself smugly. “I don’t think you can take having your ass kicked twice in a row,” he went on as he pretended to buff his nails on his shoulder.

When Jin caught on, she let slip a small and genuine smile before she reigned it into a smirk. “Psh, I don’t think I’ll need to take having my ass kicked twice in a row. I’m off to train, and tomorrow, it won’t be such a cake walk.” And even as she said it, she felt her body protest from the punishment it had received and she wondered where all the bravado was coming from.

“Oh, you’d better be off to train, because tomorrow, I won’t take it easy on you, and none of those kidou powers will work on me,” Ikkaku finally said as he began to walk back to the Eleventh’s building.

“Kidou powers?” Jin was left in thought as even the beaten members of the Eleventh, slowly rose and made their way back to the building.

Asashi watched the Serenity walk away with Colin when Phoenix asked her question. "Huh? Oh, this thing? It's badass. And I've had a thing for trenchcoats since... well. ever I guess" he responded fingering his coat "But anyways, he looked pretty bad. What did you do to him?" he asked, pointing his thumb towards where Serenity and Colin took off...

Phoenix looked startled. "What did I do to him?" she repeated. "Nothing, we were just training when he collapsed all of a sudden." She looked troubled. "A few of my hits connected, but I was going easy on him, so I'm pretty sure I didn't even hit him hard. Not hard enough to do that, anyway."

"Aww, but you did..." The golden haired young woman ran up to the group, shaking her hands excitedly.

"We saw you, we saw that look in your eye, too!" She said, her voice sincerely cheerful. "We're so excited to see it again! We feel like we have a sister!"

Phoenix stared at this new person, befuddled. "What-what are you..." she trailed off. Had she actually hurt Collin without being aware? She was pretty sure she hadn't, but knowing of her inner hollow left room for her to doubt herself, especially since the others seemed convinced it was her fault. "I didn't - didn't mean to...hurt anyone." Her posture shifted, making her look forlorn.

The strange woman gazed at Phoenix sympathetically. "We wonder if you've been having nightmares recently? Have you been feeling particularly hungry or violent? Have you encountered a man named Alexi?" As she asked each question, she took another step closer to Phoenix, by the time she asked the final one their noses were almost touching. She retained her sincere smile through it all.

Phoenix was too frozen with both fear and guilt to move, even if part of her brain wondered who the woman meant by "we." How did she know these things? Phoenix shifted her eyes away. "Alexi was there the other night when we went out on a mission," she managed, avoiding answering the other questions.

Higgins didn't particularly like where the conversation started, nor where it was going. He decided to intervene as he heard the name 'Alexi'. "Stop. What do you know about Alexi?"

"Ohhh! We understand! Isn't he a nice guy! Funny things can happen to souls when he's around though. We're sorry for the trouble he caused. He used to fix it when he made those kinds of mistakes, but that was back before that girl showed up... so you'll probably be on your own for a while."

The girl said all of that in one breath, so excited she was shaking. She almost never got the chance to talk to other people. It felt good. She turned and faced the others in the area.

"Hi everyone! We're pleased to meet you!" When her eyes met Higgins' she paused again. she stopped for a moment, as if preparing to say something important, but ultimately just said "We like you!"

Phoenix stepped back, now that the woman's attention wasn't on her. Part of her wanted to leave and be alone so she could think about things, but a larger part was curious about what she could learn from the mysterious woman. "Who are you?" she asked bluntly, to get it out of the way.

The question made the woman blink, her deep green eyes tearing up for just a moment as a wave of nostalgia flashed over her.

"So, now that you've calmed down, do you have a name?" Alexi asked gently, his expression one of concern.

"Na-name...?" She tried to spit out the word, not certain of its meaning.

"Yes. You're an experiment of twelfth division, am I wrong? Surely they must have referred to you as something."

"Umm... We are... Artificial hollowfication project three-one-one-three..." She responded, after forcing herself to remember things she'd already begun to forget. To her surprise, Alexi started laughing.

"Well now! That's hardly a name fitting for a living thing. I'm glad to hear Mayuri Kurotsuchi is as heartless as ever... still... 'three-one-one-three' makes things a little easier on us. Let's just call you 'Elle' from now on."


"We call ourselves Elle, but we don't really have a name." She responded, her voice so saccharine and happy that it could give an elf diabetes.

Phoenix frowned, not sure how to take the statement, or the fact that Elle was referring to herself when she said "we." She decided to try another line of questions.

"Are you a new Shinigami like the rest of us?"

"Oh yes! We were just recently born. They don't come much newer than us!" She responded

Higgins wasn't one to beat around the bush on something like this strange girl that seemed to know Alexi personally. "Why do you refer to yourself as 'we'?

Kohaku watched Officer Madarame and the other shinigami fight with fascination, stepping around the corner more for a better view. Even to her inexperienced eyes, Officer Madarame was obviously just pushing the other woman around. Still, the fight was beyond anything she or her classmates ever got to experience or watch. Not only was it genuinely entertaining, watching different styles was a real treat.

The inexperienced woman blinked as the fight seemed to be over. Kohaku couldn't hear what was being said between the two, and frowned when the bloodied woman turned, walking away. Her brow furrowed briefly, not giving the idea much thought—she rarely did—before trotting after the woman.

As she sped by Ikkaku, she tried to give the third-seated officer a respectful short bow mid-run, stumbling (but quickly catching her footing) as she tripped over an unconscious man, calling after the lightly injured woman.

"Hey! Hey, wait up!" While Kohaku's feet stopped suddenly, her momentum didn't get the memo and carried her on, forcing the Neo-Reaper to stumble a bit. Kohaku didn't seem to notice. "You know you're bleeding, right? Lemme help you out. It's only basic first aid, though." She raised her hand to Jin's shoulder, but stopped questioningly. She wouldn't heal someone who didn't want to be healed.

Kohaku tossed a good-natured grin at the other shinigami as another train of thought struck her. "That was pretty ballsy of you to take on the third seat of the 11th like that. You did good not to get knocked out. Just gotta be careful, you know?"