The Raven-1

Summery- AU. Ichigo has come back to Japan after studying in the West for 5 years. The last thing he expected was to be provoked by a raven haired beauty that crosses his path in an old book shop.

Disclaimer: I do not own Bleach, rights to Kubo Tite. Neither do I own Seinen Horeyasuku koi narigatashi [Doujinshi KHR] by Yoneda Kou where I got the idea from for this story.

1878

Japan

Meiji Era

Moonlight filtered into the room, spilling it's heavenly light onto the floor just above my head. The constant thrusting of the man on top of me allowed the top of my head to grace the light every time he pushed into me. It was a beautiful night, from my view of the window; the moon was hanging ominously low and the stars littered the sky like a billion sparkling marbles. I pushed a stray hair that was tickling my cheek out of my face just as the man on top of me came with a grunted cry. After a few seconds of panted breath he let out a loud sigh and pulls out of me. I let my legs fall from their raise position, the disgust of what I had done enveloping me like a suffocating blanket as it always did after I had been fucked. However, through time (and practice), I had somehow overpowered my self-disgust and after a few seconds it fell numb into my conscious. I hear the rustle of clothes as the man pulls his pants up and zips them. Without a word, he leaves the room to pay Yoruichi sitting at the front desk for a few hours of fuck. I imagine him then walking home to where his middle-aged wife would be waiting for him.

I push myself up, my kimono falling down my shoulders, and pull myself to lie against the wall. His juices leak from inside me, dripping down my thigh. It's uncomfortable, but I ignore it and just sit with my back to the wall, not moving for a few moments. I turn my head to the window beside me, the bars of the window creating an illusion of imprisonment. The night is quiet except for the occasional shouts in a bar a few houses away from the whore-house, as I liked to call it. White jasmines bloom a little ways from my window. This is why I had chosen this room. I didn't want any of the other larger rooms on the middle floor where the middle-class whores were. I wanted to see this, to smell this. The jasmines were in full bloom and their scent fills my senses. I close my eyes and relish in the aroma. From my view here, I could also see the little boy who came to stand across the street everyday to sell rotten peaches to passer-by's early every morning. He had told me his mother was sick and his father was doing everything he could to pay for her medicine to get her better. Tears had almost sprung to my eyes and I gave him the little change of money I had. Everything else I had belonged to Aizen-sama, the owner of this fine establishment, until I had repaid him.

I would see the house window opposite me where a young women would play with her year old baby; cooeing at it and breast-feeding it. She had seen me once and contrary to what I thought would happen, the usual scrawl and look of disgust before looking away, she smiled at me. Not those smiles that you give people for proprieties sake, a small smile with a hint of pity and sadness in her eyes. I had looked away before I could start feeling anything in my numb heart.

Now, as I looked through the jasmine trees and across tree-tops I heard the sound of slamming doors and shouts and brawls from the bar down the road. I sigh deeply and get up to wash the mans stink away.

I knew I should have stayed home.

"Come on, Ichigo, where's your sense of fun?"

I glare at my teal-haired comrade as he swings another drink into his mouth, a girl wrapped around his body at one side, giggling manically at his foolishness.

"Grimmjow, when you said you would take me out to celebrate my coming back from America, I didn't think you would take me to a cheap bar and make me watch you whore around."

He slams the drink down and uses the back of his hands to wipe the trails of sake that had spilled onto his chin. He scrawls at me and narrows his eyes dangerously.

"You got a problem with me whoring around?"

I roll my eyes at him and let out a frustrated breath. Grimmjow was obviously drunk, just another reason for him to pick a fight he's been dying for. I just wanted to leave before he did something really stupid, as he always did when he was intoxicated.

"I'm leaving," I tell him, getting up from my chair and discarding my half-full glass of sake on the table. Grimmjow grabs my arm, pulling me back.

"Oi, oi, just relax will ya? Here, how about I buy you a night with a girls here. You choose. Any girl."

He sits down beside me, smiling good-naturedly, like he had blessed me with the worlds biggest favour. The girl was still attached to him, tipsy as hell. I didn't even look around. Don't even grace him with a fucking glare.

"I gotta get home," I say, knowing I would only get more angry at him by lingering.

"Oh come on man. Here, how about her?"

With that, Grimmjow pushes the girl who was wrapped around his bicep onto me. I grab her shoulder before she falls flat on her face as a reflex and straighten her. She giggles and pushes her breasts against my arm.

'How about it pretty boy?' she asks, her voice gargled. I move her away from me and get up, slightly disgusted as an exposed breast is threatening to fall out of her pink kimono.

"No thanks."

She crosses her arms across her chest, pouting. Her demeanour switching from drunk and stupid to drunk and pissed in seconds. "Whatever fag."

Anger stirs inside me but I know she was only saying that to rile me up. I walk away from her, she turns around to grab me but what she didn't see is the man who was passing ahead of her, chasing after a women who was ignoring him. I turn back just in time to see her accidentally spill the contents of his drink all over his clothes. She gasps while his mouth hangs open. He turns to her and without warning, slaps her across the face. She falls back with a loud thud.

"You fucking whore. This suit costs 100 times more than your worthless piece of ass."

I walk to where he is, tap him on the shoulder and when he looks back, proceed to put his fucking lights out. He falls to the floor and I step over him without a second thought, avoiding the blood that had spilt from his nose. The girl is on the floor, her lip bleeding, her eyes wide as she stares at the man I just punched. I reach my hand to her.

"You alright?"

She stares at me for a second, tears that had welled up made her eyes wide with fear and innocence. Just someone trying to live through the hardships of life, not a prostitute who was forced to smile when groped and open her legs for some spare change. She nods and a tear slips her cheek as she grabs my hands in her small ones. I notice her shivering and lead her to a chair where Grimmjow was. He was looking all this with wide eyes, his mouth open. I sit her down and take out a handkerchief from my pocket to wipe at the blood. Her eyes are wide and teary as her bottom lips trembles. She was just a girl, I noticed. A little older than Yuzu and Karin.

"Hey, hey, you know the rules Grimmjow. You fight, you get out."

Grimmjow turns with a wide smirk to the overweight man behind the bar wearing an apron and jumps down his chair.

"Natürlich, Drecksau," he slurrs to the manager of the Inn. The fat man eyes him suspiciously, ignorant to what the german had said to him in his native tongue. I snort at Grimmjow's childish words, having learned most of the language from him seeing as we had grown up together. I hand the girl the handkerchief and turn around to leave, nodding at her a last time.

Outside, Grimmjow lets out a groan as he stretches his muscles.

'Ah, that was a good show. Glad you grew some balls when you were gone.'

"Can't say the same about you."

"What?"

"All you did was watch."

He smirks at me. "I was just enjoying the show."

"Fuck you."

"Oh, I would."

"Just shut up."

Quiet.

"So how was America?"

I let out a sigh, reprimanding myself to think Grimmjow could follow such simple orders as to be quiet. I shrug as an answer to his question. "It was ok."

"I still don't understand why you came back," he says, turning away, looking towards the road, "I mean, you were at the top of your class in medical school and you still came back to this little shit city, for what?"

"I told you, my old man's getting…older. I have to take care of my family."

He turns to look at me in silence before turning back when he sees my serious expression. We walk down the street towards our houses. The road separates and we both take our respective ways.

"I'll see you tomorrow," I say, heading to the right side of the two pathways.

"Yeah, don't have any wet dreams about me."

"Keep telling yourself that asshole."

He turns his back to me chuckling and waves a hand at me without looking back. I turn away and head home.

"Nee-sama, hurry up please."

"I'm coming Yuzu, just wait a second."

I finish putting on my shoes and step out of the house, my sisters already down the street. I jog a little ways to catch up to them. We walk a few steps when a yawn overtakes my mouth.

"Yuzu, do you have to wake me up so early just so you could hang out with Ururu?"

She turns and starts walking backwards, nodding at me enthusiastically. "I just haven't seen her for a while and I can't wait any longer. I'm sorry I had to wake you up so early though."

"Don't apologize to him, it's already midday. If he wanted a few extra hours of sleep he should've come back early from the bar," Karin remarks hotly.

My eyes widen, staring at my devil of a sister.

"Karin," I ask cautiously, "how the hell do you know where I was?"

She turns to me, her face in a permanent scrawl, much like mine was. "I could smell you in my sleep when you came in last night. You stank."

I glare at her as my cheeks heat at her apparent bluntness. She turns away and walks ahead of us. We reach Urahara Bookstore in a matter of minutes and both Yuzu and Karin go up the stairs located at the side of the store to head upstairs to the little girl's room. I start walking through the bookstore, trying to find something to occupy myself with. There was a large sign beside every aisle, written in large and bold writing that customer's weren't allowed to read while standing. I groaned at the managers cheap nature. Coincidently, I spots Urahara at the register, sleeping while leaning back against his chair, his ridiculous hat obscuring my view of his face. Not wanting to disturb him yet, knowing I would probably get a kick to the face, I turn into an aisle and pick at a random book in front of me. I open it and start reading the first page. Boring. I put it back and pick up another one. Another one. Then another. Ah, Shakespeare. I pull the book out and notice someone standing on the other side through the gap. Though I could only see the top of their head, deducing that it was a kid with that small height, I became curious as to what a child was doing in such a complex book aisle. I lean down and look through the gap. It was a girl. She held the book to her face and I could only see the ebony color of her hair and her think eye lashes.

"What's a little kid like you doing in the adult section?"

Her eyes look up at me. Amethyst. They were large and the most unique color I had ever seen. Round and surrounded by heavy lashes. She narrows them at me and looks back down at the book she's reading.

"What? Are you lost?" I start thinking the worst as I walk across the aisle to her side. I falter in my steps as I reach her. She wasn't a girl, but a women. A short women but there was no childish innocence or stubbiness in her figure. Just delicate curves over where her kimono wrapped around her. She didn't look at me as I came towards her.

"Sorry, my mistake. Your so short I thought you were a kid," I say, scratching the back of my head. This was awkward. She looks up from her book, a fake smile on her face and her eyes wide.

"And here I thought you were a giant pumpkin from my nightmares," she lets out a short chuckle with no humour then suddenly stops, her smile dropping into a frown and her eyes taking an angry sheen, "Silly me."

I glare at her, my signature scrawl taking place on my face. I would never admit it but when it came to the bright color of my hair, I got a little sensitive as to what people said. "Hey, watch your mouth."

Her eyes angry and her nose flaring slightly. "You insulted me."

"Truth hurts."

"I could say the same for you."

We glare at each other until we hear both hear Urahara mumble something. She turns away from me, going back to her book.

"Now, if you'll excuse me."

My anger flared inside me as I look at her composed and calm expression to Urahara. I let out a frustrated breath and walk past her to the store owner.

"Ichigo, long time no see. It's good to see you back."

I nod at him. Some of the anger from before leaving me. "Good to be back."

He nods at me. "How's the family?"

"They're fine. Yuzu and Karin came to visit Ururu so they dragged me here."

He pouted at me, wanting to look cute, but just ended up looking like a baboon. "What? You wouldn't have come otherwise."

"No."

"Ichigo, you're so mean."

I shrug at him. Feeling no sympathy for the man in front of me.

"Oh are you leaving?" Urahara asks, looking over my shoulder, his signature fan covering the bottom half of his face. I turn around to see the girl from earlier bow at Urahara and give me a glare before walking out the door.

"Good bye," she says.

I turn back to him. "Hey, doesn't the sign say you're not allowed to read in here?"

He nods, smiling at me. "Well you know me. They want a library they build a library. I have to pay my rent. Can't let nosy little brats read my books for free."

"That brat was reading them, and you saw her reading it but you didn't say anything."

His smile widens slightly, yet his eyes fall a little.

"I heard you got into a fight yesterday night."

I narrow my eyes at his avoidance on the subject. "Yeah. This bastard hit a girl."

"Tsk tsk."

"I was just returning the favor," I narrow my eyes on him. "How do you know where I was last night?"

Everybody seemed to know where I was last night. He flaps his fan against his face and laughs at me. "Don't expect any secrets in this town Ichigo."

He chuckles as Yuzu and Karin both come to me ready to leave, handing me a book Yuzu had decided to get. I paid for it and promise to visit again soon. My mind on the girl I had just met.

(A/N) I'm no expert on the German language and i apologize if i made a mistake with the sentence but i just googled the translation.

Natürlich- of course

Drecksau- dirty pig