Disclaimer: If I owned Bleach, strange things will happen to Ulquiorra and Orihime. Alas, I don't.
Chapter 1 : My Classmate Is An Arrancar
"Nice to meet you, my name is Ulquiorra Schiffer. I come from Greenland, my interests are ren'ai games, watching anime, and collecting figurines. My favourite mangaka is K-bo Taito, and..."
"Ulk--what?"
"...wow, a foreigner in our school..."
"But his Japanese is so good!"
"They have anime in Greenland...?"
"He's an otaku!"
"But he's a...pretty good-looking otaku..."
"It's always the good looking ones..."
"Aii...I was thinking of getting to know him too..."
Orihime put a hand to her forehead.
She nearly cried out of embarrassment for his sake. Ren'ai games? What had Urahara been teaching him?! Actually, did he have any idea what he was saying at all?
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"Kisuke-san..." A small, meek girl with antenna-like bangs hanging down to her nose opened the sliding door a crack. "Inoue-san's still there, Kisuke-san..."
The blonde man reclining on the tatami sighed. These children, they never give up. First it was that trip to Soul Society (ok, so he had a hand in the circumstances), then it was Hueco Mundo (alright, alright, he had a hand in that too!), and now...
"This must be the most ridiculous thing I have ever done..." Urahara chuckled, getting up, "A gigai for a...hollow...eh?"
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"This is what...will help me live in the human world?"
The black-haired, human-shaped Vasto Lorde Menos known as Ulquiorra Schiffer, previously Espada Cuarta of late Aizen Sousuke's army, looked with certain disdain at the replica of himself standing before him. Its eyes were closed and devoid of tear marks and half a helmet. Thankfully, it looked like it was capable of retaining a similar poker-face.
"That's right," The strange storekeeper said, "Since you are a hollow, it's different from the other gigai I've made. This one--" He paused and cleared his throat for effect, "Will convert the food you eat into spiritual energy, so you don't have to run around gobbling up human spirits. It also serves as an insulator from detection by other shinigami and hollows. Just don't pop out of it when there's no need to, you'd make every shinigami's cell phone within a 50 mile radius go haywire. And of course, this is the human world, you have a lot to learn, such as..."
Ulquiorra wasn't sure he was listening, but in any case. That woman wanted him to come here, and he found that he couldn't go against her wishes for some reason.
"How am I supposed to...wear it?" He finally asked the only question on his mind.
The storekeeper knew he wasn't listening.
One shunpo.
The arrancar felt a not-so-soft poke on his lower back. And lost his balance. Straight at the gigai.
"That is how..." Seeing the non-corporeal being disappear into the artifical body via poke by the cane, Urahara said, "You wear it."
The gigai twitched, then opened its eyes.
First thing it did was try to impale the man in yukata and sandals, but found that it didn't work like that.
Hand hit cane. Ow.
"How does it feel, Ulquiorra-kun?" Urahara asked, somewhat cheekily.
The hollow-in-gigai didn't answer.
"You can't come out without the new and improved soul candy that works on hollows as well as shinigami, but sadly, I don't have any stock of that just yet..."
If looks could kill, Urahara would be dead...all over again.
"Now, I've enrolled you in Karakura High under my name as my distant aunt's cousin's neighbour's cat's kitten's owner's son. Before you go though, there are some things you should be aware of..."
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And that...was how all this came to be. Orihime knew Urahara-san would get a great kick out of this with her hollow-friend. It was a shame she had a part-time job and couldn't be there to keep things at a sensible level (oi, Orihime?)...
But that gigai...he does look good in it. Or rather, the gigai itself was a perfect replica of him without his telltale arrancar mask and face markings.
What was she thinking?! Orihime found her cheeks going a bit hot. He was just that one arrancar who had been kind to her during that whole time in Hueco Mundo...and just happened to be the reason she was still alive. She tried to return the Hougyoku to the state before it existed, but Aizen figured out what she was doing and ordered her executed. It was Ulquiorra who had hidden her and reported falsely to Aizen. Then the former Shinigami captain betrayed his hollow underlings by using them as an ingredient in his concoction to make the King's Key. Which made the lower arrancars turn against her, seeing her as the reason of their downfall. The last thing she remembered was hollow-masked Ulquiorra fending off a white sea, with her safe in the crook of his left arm...
Anyways! What was she thinking? She must be crazy to have asked him to come live in the human world, despite the jaw-dropping reactions from Kurosaki-kun and the others. And even more surprisingly, he agreed.
"...Right." Ochi-sensei didn't question the new student's seemingly unhealthy hobbies, "Since Kurosaki transferred away, you can take his seat."
Oh...that's right. Orihime suddenly remembered. Kurosaki-kun...decided to stay in Soul Society...didn't he?
But...since when did that fact start to not...bother her as much? So much that she almost forgot he...wasn't here anymore...
The black-haired green-eyed...apparent teenager (heaven knows how old he actually is...) took his seat without a word. Orihime watched him with some concern, wondering if he could get use to the sudden change in environment.
His emerald-coloured eyes darted her way, there were no searching glances in other directions, as if he knew where she was, and that she was watching him.
The girl quickly lowered her gaze, cheeks flushing.
Why...are things becoming this way?
tbc
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A/N: Having gotten fully into this pairing, here's to them both surviving until the end, and this is what I think will happen...XDD Reviews are my motivation -hums-.