Chapter 2

Toshirou watch everyone enter the house to pay their last respects. "I guess it's a ghost's duty to be at their funerals." He thought.

His mother was weeping in a dark corner of the room, seeing his mother sobbing like that made him uneasy. "I wish I wasn't here though." he glanced around at the people draped in black, carrying gloomy expressions on their usually cheerful faces.

Out of the corner of his eye he saw Tomoe, "So she managed to get away after all."

"Hitsugaya-kun, a-arigato. If you weren't there that day I'm sure I would have died. Gomen nasai I didn't mean to get you involved in this." tears dropped from her eyes, as she bowed her head in grief.

"Baka, it wasn't your fault, I was the one that stuck myself into that mess." He turned and decided to leave the gloomy house for a few hours.

Toshirou walked aimlessly around his old neighborhood, "Hm...I wonder if I can pick stuff up in this form..." He walked up to a stall selling apples and picked one up; as soon as he did he heard a screech."Ah! Kaa-sama! T-the apple is floating!!?!?" a kid screamed.

Toshirou dropped the apple back into the basket, "Opps."

"Ryuken, stop lying or else ghosts will spirit you away." his mom scolded him.

Toshirou rolled his eyes, "Yeah, right."

The sun was beginning to set; he turned around and started to head for the cemetery. There he saw his grave for the first time. On top of a grassy hill, kneeling before the cold tombstone was his mother.

"Toto-chan, did you have to go?" she whispered quietly. A while afterwards his mother finally left to go home.

Toshirou remained next to his grave and sighed miserably, "What am I suppose to do now?" A voice came from behind him, "Go to Soul Society of course." Toshirou looked up to see a figure dressed in black robes with a sword in her hand, on her arm there was a weird insignia bearing a flower and the kanji for four, "Who are you?"

"Konnichiwa, I'm Unohana, Retsu. Pleased to meet you." she said. "Wait, you can see me?" Toshirou suddenly remembered that he was dead, and couldn't be seen by humans. She smiled, "Of course, I'm a shinigami." Toshirou froze, "S-shinigami?" she nodded. "So they do exist." he thought. Unohana unsheathed her zanpakuto, "Don't worry, you're going to a better place now." She quite forcefully stamped his forehead with the end of her hilt.

Toshirou felt lightheaded and sank into a pool of light, moments later he emerged as a Hell's butterfly. "Nani, I'm a butterfly now?" he flapped his wings towards a gate that was open in front of him. "I think I'm suppose to go through there." he hesitated at the sight of the gloopy purple walls. "EW, what is that stuff?" he slowly entered the gate.

When he reached the end of the gate, he was changed back into his human form dressed in a blue kimono, and dropped to the ground, "Ow!"

"Ohayo gozaimasu." he looked up to see an older boy looking down at him. "You're a new soul right? Then you better get off of these streets before jii-sama thinks you're one of those kids."

"Huh?" yelling and running could be heard in a distance. "Opps got to go now. Bye!" he ran off as a bunch of other kids ran past him. Toshirou watched them in confusion as a girl with raven black hair, a kid with crimson hair and two other kids ran past him.

"Come back here you damn kids!" an old jii-san called after them holding a rather large stick. He stopped in front of Toshirou,"You must be one of their friends."

"Nani?" his head swirled with confusion as he tried to figure out what was going on.

"You kids aren't going to get away with stealing from my stall any longer! Prepare to die!" he prepared to strike Toshirou on the head. "Baka, run for it!" an older kid with blazing red hair grabbed him and dragged him away in just in time.

Once they got to the river bank, the red haired kid dropped him. "That was dangerous, baka 'jii-san might have killed you chibi-chan." he said. Toshirou glared at him, "Oi baka, don't call me chibi! Who are you anyways?" He scowled, "Chibi, be grateful to your savior! My name isn't baka either! It's Abarai, Renji!"

Both of them grimaced at each other until the raven haired girl whacked the both of them on the head, "Cut it out!" she scolded the both of them. They immediately stopped and backed slowly away from her. The raven haired girl was scary when she got angry. "What's your name anyways Chibi?" Renji asked a few minutes later. "It's Hitsugaya, Toshirou." he scowled at Renji," Not chibi!!"

The raven haired girl and the three others introduced themselves next, "Tsukioka, Rukia/Yamato, Seiji/Shinko, Usagi/ Sasaki, Kizho, please to meet you Toshirou!"

Later that day, Rukia and Renji took him to their home on the riverbank. "Toshirou-kun, you can stay here with us!" Kizho, the one in the blue yukata, told him. "Yeah, Toshirou! Stay here with us; it's better than living on those streets! The more the merrier, right Ren-chan?" Usagi shouted to his crimson haired friend. "Ah..." Renji replied lazly.

"A-arigato."

-

Owari

-

Chapter 2 at last! Sorry for the huge gap between updates, I was busy with my summer reading and other stuff.

Gomen nasai! I'll try to update sooner next time! Sorry if some of the stuff doesn't make sense. The "turning into a hell's butterfly" was something I assumed since we always see a butterfly after the Soul Burial. So I'm assuming that they turn into butterfly and fly to Soul Society, then change back. Someone correct me if I'm wrong please! Yes, Rukia's surname was something I made up since I don't know what it was before she was adopted into the Kuchiki clan, and so are the names for their three friends.Once again, please correct me if I made any mistakes!

Special thanks to imisscalvin, Sireylithy, ROSELIACOOL, Kana090, skwon2, KazeRose, and KaRiSa for their reviews! Thank you so much!

Romaji Words: (The words in this chapter are pretty simple but just in case someone doesn't know what they mean)

Arigato – Thank you
Kaa-sama - mother
Konnichiwa - hello
Shinigami - Deathgod/God of death
Zanpakuto – Soul Slayer
Nani – what?
Ohayo gozaimasu – Good Morning
jii-sama – Gramps/ in this case a mean, cranky, old dude that runs a stall somewhere in Soul Society that gets robbed all the time by a bunch of kids!
Baka – Stupid/Idiot
Chibi – small/squirt/runt

I'm not updating till I get at least 5 or 6 reviews desu!