To The Smallest Captors Goes The King! [Closed, Meili/Croocyt]

Another day, another patrol. One of Yuki's favorite things in the world. But today she wasn't alone. Oh no. For once she had a partner to hunt with! Another short Shinigami and, in fact, a noble she didn't actually hate!

Yep. Just patrolling. Nothing unusual about all this.

I don't like it. She's too close. Her weapon is so small. You could turn on her. You're quick enough. One good cleave and she's done. Then we can have ourselves a proper hunt.

No! No. I think this is nice. She's nice. And she's a good person. Honorable.

So far as you know. One day you're going to regret this. She will turn on you like everyone else.

It had been a quiet patrol thus far. Try as she might Yuki was having a little bit of difficulty holding her usual calm, stoic expression. Not just because of her zanpakuto either. Sharing a hunt with someone else like this was just weird for her. What did people even do when they patrolled together? What did they talk about? What else could they even do to pass the time?

"So. . ."

One of Yuki's fingers fidgeted with the tsuba of her zanpakuto. A good start! Break the silence. She just had to follow it up with something! Something meaningful! Or wise! Or informative! Or witty!

". . .How many patrols have you been on?"

Perfect.

For a brief moment she looked over towards her partner. It was nice to talk with someone without the need to look up. Sometimes it just tired out one's neck. The weather was pretty nice too. Sunny but not too hot. A slight breeze. There were plenty of Humans out walking the streets today, visiting cafes and window shopping, but it wasn't as though any of them could see the Shinigami. Well, hopefully not anyways.

Meili smiled as she looked around the world of the living. It was rare she was allowed outside the Soul Society, even rarer that she was allowed outside on a mission. Today's mission was an easy one though, just a simple patrol. They figured an academy student so close to graduating could manage something simple like that.

They're learning to trust you child, but that doesn't mean you should trust them...not jut yet.

I know...stop telling me things I already know...

She turned her head at Yuki's question. It was...a hard question, for Meili at least. Should she be honest and say none?

"Honestly, that's a difficult question...you know I'm still a student, so...officially, I've been on zero patrols. Unofficially, I've been on a few. They usually let me sit in on some patrols here and there, much like tonight's. But those patrols always ended up with nothing happening. For some reason, I feel like tonight's will be different."

She gave a toothy grin as her companion before returning her attention to scanning the area. She may act like a fool all the time, but she knows enough on how to do the job of a Shinigami.

The King hurled forward through a hole, his little legs trying to grab on to something, but there was nothing, just blackness. His anger was gone, but he was left with confusion, he didn’t know how he’d managed to confuse a cero with garganta. As he spun through the void between worlds, he opened his tiny toothless mouth again, a black energy formed ready to open a garganta back to his comfy chair.

Just as his brain began sending the signals, it shut off, his eyes shut, but half the signals had already been sent and the garganta still opened in front of him. His small limp amphibious body launched through the new hole, although this time it made new land. His light body made contact with glass, a light thud alerted a nearby parrot which began squawking, a cat in a cage began hissing violently, some dogs began barking aggressively, two fish across in a tank blub blubbed as they watched the chaos that ensued. Humans were terrified by some animals that managed to escape their cages and chased each other around the place, some managed to get out onto the street. A crow was the first to fly out through the door.  

It turns out, the King had crash landed in what appeared to be a human pet shop. His Highness came to for two to three minutes to be able to witness the commotion, his environment was perfect from what he could see, there was a beach, a small chair inside a hut, a little pond with some reeds, and another creature that looked like him floating around, not seeming to bother about his presence or the rest of the place being in chaos. Conveniently, he was in an axolotl fish tank in the middle of the store. Croocyt wiggled his way over to the tiny chair in the hut and sat on it, his little eyes rolled back, before he passed out again, his little tongue falling out of his mouth. The mind blanks had been becoming more frequent, it had seemed, since the tiny hollow had not been consuming souls to grow stronger in a while, his weak body not allowing him to do so.

Humans shouting, dogs barking their responses could be heard in the background, as the store owner had seemingly stepped out to chase some runaway dogs.

A slight smile slipped through. Honesty. Good. She liked that. Not that it was anything major to lie about. At least, she certainly had no issue with sneaking out on patrols.

"I'd do the same when I first started. Sometimes they didn't even know until we were here. Got into trouble for that more than a few times. But I think it's important for students to have this sort of training."

Yuki took a quick sniff at the air. Different? Possibly. But most of these patrols ended peacefully. Well, at least, that was until recently. Recently things had been quite a bit more active.

Speaking of which a couple shops down people and animals suddenly took off into the street! Something wild was happening in a pet shop. It was at this time that her denreishinki beeped to life, prompting Yuki to remove it from her pocket. She held it up, arching a brow at the image presented.

"Ooh? Perhaps you are right. Something just appeared in that shop. Shall we?"

She didn't wait for an answer. The wolf picked up the pace, hurrying over towards the pet store. Ears lowered as she entered through the front. It was so loud! But she didn't really notice anything unusual either. Had something simply passed through? A quick glance at her phone indicated that something was still here.

An illusion? Could it be invisible? Is this a trap?

"Be careful. It's still here."

Cautiously she led the way inside, sniffing repeatedly at the air. It didn't appear as though the other Humans inside could see either of them, but she also didn't hear anything out of the ordinary either. A bunch of animals screeching and howling and mewling and hissing and growling didn't help with her search. Nor was it easy to detect the scent of a Hollow with so many powerful scents hanging around within the air.

And so the search began! It took a good twenty minutes. By that time some of the animals had calmed down and the store itself had mostly emptied out of customers. Finally she located what she felt might be the Hollow. Two little lizard creatures sat within a glass case. One appeared to be different. It had a tiny little mask, or at least it looked like a mask.

A claw was raised and repeatedly tapped against the glass wall. Was that really a Hollow? A sleeping Hollow? She had never seen one sleeping before. A quick look at her phone indicated that this was indeed where the Hollow was located. She hadn't seen any other signs either.

Meili cautiously followed Yuki into the store. She wasn't surprised that the humans couldn't see them, however was quite surprised to see one of the animals who didn't bolt staring directly at her. She would move around a little, watching the animal's head follow her movements. This brought a smile to her face.

"Hey Wolfie, this doggie seems to be able to see me, or at least sense me. Watch."

She waited until Yuki turned around and repeated her movements, watching as the dog's head followed her around before barking a few times. This elicited a giggle from Meili. She'd heard tales of animals having some kind of sixth sense for the spiritual, but had never actually experienced it herself. However, she was quickly broken out of her reverie when she saw something.

"Oh...my...Soul King! It's so cuuuuute!!"

She bolted over to a fish tank that had some kind of sleeping lizard, seemingly the one that Yuki's soul pager was saying was the Hollow they were after.

"I thought Hollows were all supposed to be these giant ugly hulking monstrosities. Nobody told me there'd be cute ones like this little guy!"

Her emerald eyes were sparkling as she spoke. She was truly taken by this cute little guy.

The Kings tongue slurped back into his mouth, his eyes slowly opened as he peeked around his surroundings, checking to see if the other lizard like creature was still keeping him company. It seemed to be staring out the glass prison the king had trapped himself in, at two humanoid creatures radiating enough energy to feed the axolotl and his new companion for weeks, maybe months, even thought it might not know of his presence, yet.

His full body twisted over, his four tiny feet made contact with the ground at the same time. Tap. Tap. Tap. One of the creatures that looked so delicious, was creating such an aggravating noise, almost intimidating Croocyt and his companion. Maybe they wanted his attention, or maybe they wanted to offer themselves as tributed to the new king and queen, who knows, however he was hungry.

He trotted towards the boundary of the fish tank, readying himself for the meal of a lifetime. The closer he got, the weaker his feeble body felt with each trot. His body still hadn't fully recovered from overexerting itself in his previous altercation, let alone coming up against these two able bodies energy beings.

His face just about reached the boundary, his mouth opened in preparation to consume his bountiful buffet, before a *thud* as hit tiny bone face smacked against the glass fish tank as he fainted from exhaustion. A whimpering “Chair…” was whispered to the axolotl that was left looking at his direction, confused by the sound of the thud produced by nothing but thin air.

Yuki turned to observe the younger Shinigami. For a brief moment a smile slipped free. Just a little one. More akin to a smirk. It was pretty cute. And for obvious reasons she did tend to get along more with dogs. This one could see them too! If only she could take it back with them.

It would probably die.

Yeah, I know.

She scooted aside as Meili charged on over. Despite her general distaste for their kind Yuki did have to admit that this Hollow did hold an appearance bordering on the adorable. "Some can be pretty small. This might be the smallest one that I have seen, however."

It appeared to finally be awakening. As it approached them Yuki's body tensed. Was it going to reveal its true nature? Attack them?! Try to blow them up?!?

Thud.

Okay, maybe not blow them up, but it had clearly attempted to bite her finger! How dare it! Then again if it was one of the savage types then she couldn't really blame it. They just wanted to feed, after all. Didn't mean she couldn't hate them, but she didn't hate them quite as much as the ones who could actually think for themselves.

Ears raised as the creature made a little sound. Almost a whisper. Was that a word? Or was she just hearing things?

"It might be safe enough for us to grab. Perhaps we should return with it?"

Or you could just kill it.

Could be useful to someone.

"Oyo~ Would that be feasible? Would it really be OK for us to return to Soul Society with a Hollow?"

She quickly turned around to face Yuki, ignoring the lizard-sized Hollow as it slammed into the glass.

"Wouldn't we get in trouble? My sensei's always say our job is to eliminate Hollows...not capture them...but they're all old fuddy duddies...so...who knows, they could be wrong."

She casually turned back around to see that the Hollow seemed to have passed out again, and a frown crossed her face.

"Oh no! He seems sick...what should we do Wolfie?"

She had genuine concern on her face for this Hollow.

Fuddly duddies. I don't quite understand what that means but it sounds fitting.

"I'll accept any blame should there be consequences for our actions, but yes. I think bringing it back will be fine. It is pretty small. Pretty weak. We shouldn't have any issues. It is also pretty rare to find them this little."

One hand reached up, gripping at the top of the glass cage. With a tug she pulled herself up, reaching into the terrarium in order to very carefully pick the Hollow up by its body! Hopefully it wouldn't be able to bite her then. That would not be very fun.

When she settled back down upon her feet she turned towards Meili, holding up the tiny Hollow. "Perhaps we should bring it to Watari? He probably knows someone who can take a look at it."

I still haven't thought up a good nickname for her. Isn't that a vital part of friendships?

Whore-child.

What? No.

Future betrayer.

That isn't even clever.

Cu-

You are terrible at this.

Didn't even let me finish.

I didn't have to.

Meili watched as Yuki had to get up on off her feet to reach into the terrarium. This brought a slight giggle from her lips before she returned her attention to the sickly Hollow. She looked from the Hollow to the terrarium and an idea came to her.

"Wolfie, set him back down into the terrarium. I wanna try something I've been working on."

She waited for Yuki to do what was asked and grabbed the entire terrarium, setting it on the floor. Inside the terrarium was another lizard that was currently eyeballing Meili and Yuki. Meili would place her hand in the center of the empty lid.

"I've been practicing this and wanted to see how well it could work in practical application like now."

As she spoke, she concentrated some reiatsu into her hand. As that happened, within seconds, a near invisible barrier started to form, the only indication it was there was the brief glimpse of a mirrored image of Meili and Yuki standing over the top of the terrarium.

"Kyoumon."

She would pull her hand away and sight a little, winded from expending energy in the kido spell.

"It's a spell that usually is designed to keep people out, but I tried reversing it so that it'll keep the little guy in."

As instructed Yuki set the terrarium down, taking a step back to observe the young Baozhai's plan. A glimmer of something appeared. Initially Yuki was confused as to what she had done, although after a few moments and some careful scrutiny it became readily apparent. She had crafted a barrier to hold the little Hollow within!

"Ah. Very wise. Yes, this should do well."

With a nod of approval Yuki carefully lifted the tank back up onto a shoulder. "Hm. We should move to the rooftops" she mumbled, only to leap right up onto the nearest one! The Humans normally could not see them, but they could still see the tank. This way they wouldn't. Well, most wouldn't. Perhaps a few stationed higher up might, but it should be fine.

"We will be cutting our patrol short. But perhaps we should celebrate this capture. There is a dish that I have been wanting to try. A sweet dish."

And so with that the two Shinigami ventured off to acquire a couple of ice cream cones! It was a delicious treat and well deserved following their successful capture of the little Hollow. Unfortunately during the experience their prey did manage to escape. A quick search ultimately turned up nothing, but it was at least an enjoyable day!


// EXIT THREAD (Abandoned.)