Main Characters: Ishida (it's all about Ishida, little smartass that he is), Ryūken (Ishida's dad), Unohana, and scant mentions of Kenpachi and Ikkaku

Warnings: Language (cause Ishida's a tweenager, *stifled laughter*), minimal OCC (for once), sentence fragments, obscure information that you will never need to know and…hmm…I think that's it. Okay!

Disclaimer: I am…in no way, shape, or form associated with the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art. I haven't even been there. Seriously.

Just because, Ishida frowned in the backseat of his father's car, he liked to sew did not mean that he was a complete idiot for art-centric things. Not that there was anything wrong with art, of course, but he didn't understand why people felt the need to pretend they saw deep meaningful symbols in crudely expressed layers of color. Simulacra was the technical term for the religious representation of this phenomenon (people who suffered from it were deemed mildly delusional) but when it happened with ART then you were either a future philosopher or some kind of revolutionary free thinker.

Stupid and pointless both ways but despite his emphatic arguments with clear, valid points on why he did not want to go to the Metropolitan Museum of Art on his Saturday when he could be doing other more productive things like reading about Fermat's Last Theorem or finishing the miniaturized rendering of a Chinese silk kimono from a 16th century harem for his two foot tall mannequin (Christmas present: age 10), he was still forced into the car.

His father was clearly underestimating him if he didn't see that Ishida knew the only reason he was getting dropped off at the place was so that his father could drink at home in private. It was almost sad. Almost, not quite, because he was still in the damned car on the way to the damned museum without his freaking books. His thirteenth birthday had just passed the other day and he was not pleased with the progression of his station at all.

"Father –" he began.

A pale hand twists the knob of the ancient stereo cranking up the volume of the Oldies Channel.

Yummy, yummy, yummy.

I got love in my tummy,

"Father," he said louder, "I must object to this."

Peaches and cream.

Kind-a like sugar,

Kind-a like spices.

"Yes, son?"

Good enough to eat thing,

And sweet thing, that ain't no lie.

Ishida's eye is twitching and he stifles the childish urge to flail around screeching until the horrid sound ceases and his father agrees to take him home, "Could you please," he adds in the please to speed things along, "turn off that," disgusting noise, he wants to say, "particular brand of music?"

Sweeter than sugar.

Ooh love, I won't let you gooooo.

"Relax; it's only fifteen more minutes till we get there."

Either his father had developed an intense hatred for him overnight and desired to torture him with auditory stimuli or he was going deaf in his old age and failed to hear the question. Perhaps his temporal lobe was malfunctioning and he misinterpreted the query.

Ooh love, to hold ya,

Ooh love, to kiss ya,

Ooh love, I love it sooooo.

Ishida breaths deeply, covers his ears, and slumps over to the left. He hits his head on the door frame and the seatbelt is digging into his windpipe. He remains curled in that position with his eyes closed thinking of dresses with floral designs and perhaps a pleasing infusion of geometric shapes to draw the eye, for the remainder of the ride.

Yummy, yummy, yummy.

I got love in my tummy,

The very long remainder of the ride.

XXX

His father ushers him out of the car, leaving Ishida to stare forlornly after the rapidly retreating vehicle while standing, quite depressed, on the front steps of the museum. He considers sitting there on the stone for the next three hours. He sits. Waits. Counts seconds by Mississippi's. In five minutes, 300 Mississippi's later; a guard taps on his shoulder.

Ishida turns minutely to look up at him, and continues up, and up, head tilting to squint in the glare. The guy had to be over six feet tall and looked like a nut job with dozens of golden bells dangling from his hair. The fact that he was wearing a security uniform and therefore, in possession of a weapon, did not help matters.

"Kid."

Ishida turns back around to stare at his sneakers and feels his shoulders rise in an attempt to make himself smaller. Maybe if I'm very still, he won't see me, is the mindset of prey and never a very successful mindset either.

"Your parents here?"

He shakes his head very slowly, looking from his left shoe (light blue with a white rubber sole and crossing dark laces) to his right shoe (likewise, but with a slight smudge on the pristine heel).

"You all alone?"

Ishida sees a leg in his peripheral vision and subtly inches away from it. He spots the doors to the museum behind him and –

"Come with me."

- makes a break for it. He hears a shout behind him but doesn't stop, sprinting through the double, handicap friendly, doors. He pauses for a split second, eyes darting, and hurtles into the elevator in front of him jabbing the CLOSE button as the guard comes into view. The metal doors slide soundlessly shut and Ishida heaves a sigh of relief, ignoring the scandalized looks from the family of four already occupying the elevator.

"It's rude to point," he addresses the child leaning against her mother. The parents are quietly conferring and he senses a call to security may be imminent, "I'm playing hide and seek with my brother," he lies easily, "he works here."

They buy it and he steps out on the third floor, turning left to walk along the display case, peering past the glass at the exhibits. He notes the title: BRITISH SILVER, in copperplate font, and the subtitle: The Wealth of a Nation. Tableware, intricately decorated spoons, plates, and bowls, with gold overlays, but tableware nonetheless. A middle aged woman wearing a shirt two sizes too small for her ohhed and ahhed over a set of forks while her husband glanced at his watch.

He moves on and sees equally embellished sword sheaths. A boy, maybe his own age, with orange hair is pressed against the glass, gaping at them in wonder. Pathetic, he nearly snorts with contempt, remembers himself, and brushes past the uneducated moron.

Next to said uneducated moron is a twin to the moron with white hair. This one appears; if possible, less intelligent as he is sitting on the floor, hands in his pockets, glaring at passerbys, and smiling in an unbalanced fashion. Ishida dismisses them both and enters the next wing.

He observes various examples of red and black Chinese lacquers from the 13th to 16th century. He stays a minute to memorize the distinctive swirl pattern for later integration in design patterns and avoids another guard standing superfluously in a corner by exiting the exhibit swiftly.

Resigned to the overall mediocrity of the following experience, Ishida steps under an arch reading, in a nearly illegible scrawl of cursive, Byzantium and Islam: Age of Transition. He examines the carved marble, barely glances at several articles of moth-eaten clothing, and stops dead in front of a map depicting the migration of pilgrimages. He blinks at it. Tilts his head to the side as if that will help him see it better. Blinks again. Tilts his head the other way.

Ishida sighs, and cleans his glasses with the bottom of his shirt. He replaces them and walks over to an information spewer by the marble. He sighs, shakes his head in disgust at the relative idiocy of humanity, and attracts the attention of the guide.

"Excuse me?"

The guide, a bald, caucasian male, talks over him. Unacceptable. He has been ignored too many times today. He isn't happy, his father left him, he was practically assaulted by a giant (a slight exaggeration), and he wanted to go home. Being ignored by someone who was likely still in high school like he was some kind of child was the last…fucking…straw.

"Sir," he says sharply, "your map of the Byzantium Empire is incorrect."

"Hah?" the guide doesn't look like he cares, "It is correct, kid."

Ishida's eyebrow tics, "Actually," he begins pleasantly, drawing the attention of the group formerly focused on the baldy, "in addition to the fact that the Sea of Azov is missing, sir, you've mislabeled Caesarea as Ctesiphon. Ctesiphon was, as I'm sure you know, a city in the Persian empire to the south east of Edessa and Antioch."

He notes the blank expressions of the majority of his audience and finishes snidely, "Sir." Normally, he isn't quite so obvious with contempt but it's been a hard day.

"Yeah," the guide is befuddled (as he should be, the idiot), "Lemme just…call my superior. Okay, right," and he vanishes minutely in search of a telephone.

Ishida crosses his arms, "You do that," he mutters and waits, scowling. The tour group observe him like he's a particular breed of mammal they've never seen before. He's sorely tempted to snarl at them but restrains himself.

The idiot tour guide who is now sweating profusely returns in tow of a kind looking woman with a long braid draped over her shoulder. She crouches down to Ishida's level and smiles at him, "Hello," she says, "I'm in charge of this exhibit. My name is Unohana. What did you say the problem was?"

"The Sea of Azov isn't there," he explains as they walk over to the map. He points it out, and she nods in contemplation. The tourists follow like sheep after their Sheppard, "and Ctesiphon right there should be Caesarea."

"Oh my," she whispers, "however did we miss this? Thank you very much…?"

"Ishida," he relaxes at last, "Uryuu, Ishida. No problem."

"Thank you Ishida," she smiles at him, "We'll fix it right away. Are your parents around?"

Again with this question. "No," he tenses again, "my Dad left me here."

"Mmm," Unohana hums and peers at him more closely, "How would you like to see the new exhibit we're working on while you wait?"

Ishida is suspicious but asks, "What is it?"

"The Rinpa Aesthetic in Japanese Art," she raises a skim brow, "Are you interested in Japanese history as well as Middle Eastern?"

He's just died and gone to heaven. It's the only explanation. With new visions of kimono designs forming he nods mutely and follows her away, barely noting when she takes his hand to lead him to something new.

In two hours, 7,200 Mississippi's (not that he was keeping count or anything) later, his father arrives back at the museum to pick him up. Ishida is silent in the backseat on the ride home until his father asks in a mildly slurred tone, "Have fun?"

Ishida considers the probability of his father actually caring about his response and finds it minimal. "A little. I met the Curator and she bought me ice cream." Two scoops of vanilla and all the chopped peanuts he wanted. It was perfect.

"That's nice."

He settles himself back into the upholstery, "Yes," he says, "it was."

XXX

A week later when Ishida takes in the newspaper he pauses, reading the front page. BOY, 13, FINDS MISTAKE ON METROPOLITAN MUSEUM OF ART MAP. He carefully folds the paper over his picture (he had no recollection of one being taken) and straightens the edges until one lays precisely over the other. Then he resolved to burn it in the middle of the night.

"Uryuu!" he hears his father call him from inside the house.

"Yes?" he reminds himself to be perfectly calm. Nothing out of the ordinary here. He begins walking back to the porch.

"Did you get the paper?"

"No," he stuffs the newsprint under his shirt, "must be another postal delay. Perhaps it will be here tomorrow."

"Oh never mind. I'll just be modern and use the computer."

"Father that may not be the best ide-"

"Look," he is cut off, "it's that museum you were at the other week on the home page. It says here that…" the voice trails off. Ishida considers running very quickly in the opposite direction. He palms the doorknob wondering if the following lecture is going to be worse than the one he received the time he informed his music teacher (a first year college graduate) that he was playing a B-flat scale when he should have been playing a B-sharp (Ishida was eleven at the time and expelled from Musical Theory. He was still right, even if the teacher was too embarrassed to admit it).

"URYUU! AGAIN?"

Shit.

XXX

A/N: Because you too can go through puberty, define socially awkward, and still be smarter than someone twice your age. Go for it. I dare you. Original article was:

Boy, 13, finds mistake on Metropolitan Museum of Art map (of the Byzantine Empire) the Connecticut art history buff spotted an error in an exhibit no one else had noticed.

And this is for DestinyCrusader's birthday. Because I'm too broke to actually buy something and I think she prefers this anyway.