Ichigo’s snort cut him off. “Zombies?” he asked incredulously.
Renji’s face turned red. “Well, not like a zombie…I dunno, it was dark! It was slimy, and spitty, and was oozing puss or somethin’,” he finished in a defeated tone. Ichigo continued to snicker. “It was freaky, okay?” Renji sighed. His anger had returned, and with it his courage. He yanked the pipe out of the door handle and kicked the door in, Zabimaru in front of him. There was nothing there.
Ichigo peered over his shoulder into the darkness. “I don’t see anything. You sure you didn’t imagine it?”
Renji turned around, growling. “No, I didn’t imagine, it was right here!” He pointed to the spot on the floor where he had cut it earlier. “Look, you can see the puddle of ooze it left!” Ichigo squinted at the spot.
“How do you know that’s not just a spot?”
“Cause it’s not, ok?” Renji rubbed his hand over his face, the intense emotions he had experienced in the past twenty minutes were beginning to wear him down.
Ichigo put a hand on his shoulder, more gently this time. “Look, I’m sorry I doubted you. And that I ran off.”
Renji just sighed, and Ichigo took the lack of backlash as an apology accepted.
“It was the thing with the weird reiatsu, right?” Renji nodded. “Well, just track it again, and we’ll find it.” He slapped Renji on the back.
Renji concentrated, and felt out with his reiatsu. He could feel a faint trail, like the zombie had run off. “It went this way,” Renji growled, walking off. Ichigo followed.
They had run about three blocks, when Renji slowed down. “It’s stronger in here,” he said to Ichigo, pointing to an old apartment building.
“Yeah, I can feel it too,” Ichigo said, unslinging Zangetsu from his back. Renji waited for him to make a move. When he didn’t, the red-head asked,
“Aren’t you going in there?” Ichigo turned to look at him.
“Are you kidding? If it is a building full of zombies, I’m not going in there first!”
A smug smile now crossed Renji’s face. “Are you afraid?”
“Are you?”
“Well…” Renji seemed to think about it. “No.”
“Well, fine,” Ichigo said. “Let’s go in together then.”
“Fine,” agreed Renji. With his blade held in front of him, Renji kicked down the door.
There was nothing in the front hall. “Well, this is a bit anti-climactic,” said Ichigo, glancing around. Renji peered back at him suspiciously. “See, I do go to school,” Ichigo mumbled.
Renji put one foot on the narrow staircase in the hallway. “Wait, should we split up?” Renji turned back to look at him.
“Uh, no?” Ichigo shrugged and followed Renji up the stairs. Renji walked slowly along to the end of the hallway, where there was a door. Renji could feel the foul reiatsu behind it. “Ready?” Renji turned to face Ichigo who wasn’t there.
***
Ichigo had been following Renji when everything blacked out around him. The next thing he knew, he was in a dark room, by himself, on his back. He sat up, groaning. Dim moonlight seeped in through the one window in the room. “Renji?” he called. He heard a low moan from across the room. “Is that you?” The moan turned into a snarling, and Ichigo stood up slowly, extending Zangetsu in front of him. “You’re not Renji, are you?” The thing began moving slowly towards him on all fours. As it crept into the moonlight, Ichigo could see that what skin it had was gray and peeling, leaving green, rotting flesh underneath. Drool poured from in between the teeth in its mouth. Even though its eyelids were sewn shut, it still looked at Ichigo with hunger.
“Well, that is the last time I ever doubt Renji,” Ichigo mumbled. He lunged at the thing, but it skittered sideways, hissing. He roared as he swung in a wild arc, but the thing leapt on the ceiling. A cracking noise issued from its mouth, sounding like it was laughing. Then it melted through the ceiling, still making the noise. “Come back and fight, you bastard!” Ichigo screamed. When it didn’t come back, he slashed through the door…
…into an identical room.
“What?” Ichigo stood there puzzled for a second, before he kicked through the next door. He wasn’t really surprised to find himself in another room looking the same as the first two. “Damn it!” He turned, slashing through the wall. It was the same room. He sat down in the middle of the floor, exasperated. How was he supposed to beat something he couldn’t fight?
He tried to feel out with his reiatsu, as he had been taught to. It just stayed in a muddled cloud around him, not extending beyond a few meters. He stood up and pounded his fists against the wall. He stood there for a moment, then slowly backed up into the middle of the room. Closing his eyes, he focused solely on Renji’s reiatsu. A scream tore from his throat.
“BANKAI!”
***
“Ichigo! You bastard, where did you run off to?” Renji whispered fiercely. Half of him wanted to find his misplaced friend, but the other half of him wanted to find and kill whatever was causing this. What “this” was, Renji still wasn’t exactly sure. “Howl, Zabimaru!” Renji released his shikai and tore through not only the door, but the wall in front of him.
He was greeted with a hissing and cracking noise, and saw four of the zombie creatures in the room. He yelled swinging Zabimaru like a whip, but the creatures just cackled and dodged. One got behind him, and before he could turn around, leaped on his back and bit down deep into his shoulder. Renji growled and grabbed the thing’s arm, slamming it into the wall. He hissed as his wound began to bleed, and swung his sword into the zombie while it was still stunned. It screamed as Zabimaru tore it to pieces.
The other three had stopped cackling now, and instead clung to the walls and ceiling watching him. Renji’s arms felt weak, and he couldn’t swing his sword. His vision began to blur as he sunk to one knee. Damn it, now he was going to turn into a zombie or something. He chastised himself for letting Ichigo show him too many horror movies. His vision was turning completely black, but he could feel the creatures approaching him.
“BANKAI!” Renji felt, rather than heard, the blade of energy smash through the wall, followed by what he could only describe as an explosion of reiatsu. He heard more screaming from the creatures. Damn it, had his ass saved by Ichigo. Again.
“Renji! Damn it Renji, this is no time for a nap!” Renji felt Ichigo shaking him, but could not reply. He was effectively paralyzed except for his hearing and sense of touch.
The rational part of his mind held admiration for the perfect way of terrorizing prey. But Renji was not impressed. He felt Ichigo swing him up on his shoulder. God, he’d never live this down. Renji felt Ichigo’s shoulder jab repeatedly into his abdomen as he ran. “I’m sick of saving your ass,” he said.
Renji could feel some of the paralysis wearing off. “Least I…didn…hafta use…bankai…” he slurred.
Ichigo took a particularly big step, jarring Renji very hard.
“Ass’ole,” he murmured. He then felt his stomach reacting violently, probably to whatever that zombie had pumped into him. With the feeling returned to his fingers, he gripped the back of Ichigo’s gi tightly. “Gonna be…sick…”
“WHAT?” Ichigo stopped suddenly and put Renji on the ground as quickly as he could without hurting him. Seeing that Renji could still not hold all his weight, held him by his shoulders firmly.
When he was done, Renji rolled weakly onto his back. “At least you didn’t turn into a zombie,” Ichigo quipped. Renji moved to swat at him, but Ichigo dodged easily.
“They all…dead?” Renji asked.
Ichigo plopped down next to him, releasing his bankai. “As far as I know. Man, those things were gross, no wonder you were so scared.”
“Was not,” Renji mumbled.
“Were too!” Ichigo accused. “You were shaking all over!”
A new voice cut in. “What are you two, 12?” Ichigo turned around and Renji’s eyes rolled back in his head so he could look above him. Rukia was standing there (out of costume), along with Orihime, Chad and Ishida.
“Bout time you showed up,” Ichigo said, aimed directly at Ishida. Renji was glad to have his annoying accusations focused on someone else. “We were fighting zombies!” Rukia laughed, and the other three looked uncomfortable.
“Weren’t…weren’t you? With the weird reiatsu?” Ichigo asked Ishida, confused.
Ishida pushed his glasses up higher on his nose. “We did not find anything and when we couldn’t find either of you two, we got the girls. We didn’t sense your reiatsu until about five minutes ago,” Ishida glanced at the puddle Renji had made on the street and grimaced.
“That’s cause we were in the House of Horrors over th-”
Ichigo turned to point at the building, but instead of an apartment building they had just run out of, there was a park.
Everyone else turned to look, unimpressed.
“There was…we were…I mean…” Ichigo trailed off, finally at a loss for words.
“Kurosaki-kun, you are horrible at pranks. The next time you and Abarai-kun want to sneak off to go drinking, just tell us.” Ishida, Chad, and Rukia stalked off, followed by Orihime who threw an apologetic look over her shoulder at them.
Ichigo looked at Renji questioningly. Renji just shrugged.
“I hate Halloween.”
*End*
Well, I hope I entertained you for a few minutes.
