A Wandering Soul

--A while later--

"Kisuke, we need to talk about it."

Kisuke sighed and turned to face the disguised form of his childhood friend. "I don't see much to talk about really, she isn't hostile to us and doesn't have even the beginnings of being a spy."

"Or, she is going for the clueless approach to make us lower our guard," Yoruichi retorted, staring down on him from her perch on one of the shelves in the store. "It wouldn't be the first time someone tried taking advantage of your weakness for pretty girls that way."

Kisuke winced at the reminder of the bar incident two years ago, "I thought we agreed to never bring that up again?" he weakly protested.

"No, you requested that we didn't. I said I would take it into consideration." Yoroichi said aloofly. "Now stop trying to put this off. An anomaly shows up out of nowhere, sets off kido alarms all over town, and you don't want to get to the bottom of it? You figured something out, now spill."

Sighing again, Kisuke internally complained that his friend knew him far too well. "Fine, where do you want to start?"

"Why do you think she isn't a spy?"

"Very well, when we asked how she knew me did you notice what she called me?"

Yoruichi glared at him a little harder, "Yes, a fighter and a scientist. What of it?"

"You couldn't see her eyes when she said scientist. Alexandria was absolutely terrified of that fact even if she hid it well."

That made Yoruichi pause, "You gave her a medical scan before she woke up?" Kisuke nodded. "And I assume that you found something, then?"

Kisuke slumped a little at the question, "Not at first? Even going back over the data doesn't really give me a clear picture. What little I can make out of her spiritual profile is that something is modified her soul to some unknown degree."

Yoruichi straightened quickly, "She's a mod-soul then?"

Waving off the comment, Kisuke laughed, "Hardly, I only noticed there was something up with her soul cause she reacted so strongly to scientists. Even then its more of a hunch then clearly stated in the data. No, my suggestion would be that she was an experiment of some kind."

"Aizen?"

"Not a chance. The data we have suggests highly specialized work with hundreds of years worth of refinement. Aizen simply doesn't have the time to come up with something like this while pursuing other goals."

Kisuke watches as Yoruichi deflates at that somewhat. He understands that blaming a known enemy is easier then suddenly finding out there is an unknown out there doing something to souls.

"Fine, I agree she likely isn't one of Aizen's. What makes you so sure she is harmless then?" Yoruichi sighs as she settles down again.

"Hmm, well as that Hollow found out she is far from harmless," mused Kisuke, ignoring the renewed glare from the increasingly agitated cat. "But I doubt that she is here on orders for anything. If she was then she would have a cover story at the very least or some easy objective to draw attention instead of just avoiding talking about why she is here. Instead she wanders town randomly looking for out of the way places and flees at the sight if Isshin Kurosaki, before wandering some more and then getting into a fight with a Hollow.

From this, I can guess that she has seen profiles on people from the Soul Society from at least 100 years ago but not more recently than 15 years ago since I don't think she would have run so quickly if she knew that Isshin doesn't have his powers right now."

Both of them are silent for a while while they reflect on the info.

"In addition to that she chooses to fight a Hollow when it's clear she doesn't have a good grasp on her abilities. The Hollow only caused minor injuries, while her own movement technique caused significant damage." Kisuke continued. "She clearly knows how to fight academically, but actual experience seems to be something she lacks."

"So you're thinking she's a runaway from whoever was experimenting on her?"

"That's my top theory right now. I'm hoping that we can get more info about where she comes from either by Alexandria opening up to us some, or by this unknown coming after her."

Yoruichi gave him a sidelong glance, "Is that why you didn't use a healing Kido? Even as torn up as they are, her legs wouldn't be that hard to heal."

"From your observation of her, how would you describe Alexandria, Yoruichi?" asked Kisuke, choosing to ignore the question.

Drawing herself up, Yoruichi considered the question. "Scared, I guess? She hid it pretty well, but it was obvious that any movement made her nervous. It makes sense if she is a runaway and doesn't have anyone to rely on."

Kisuke nodded, "Exactly, so I figure we give her a safe place to heal and plan her next move. If she is comfortable with us she might open up. At least this way we might gain some insights into her situation."

"Fine," Yoruichi sighed, "I don't like it, but it's better than letting her run loose, especially with Aizen making fewer noticeable moves. He is getting ready for something and that means trouble." She jumped down from her perch and wandered out the door, most likely going to look for signs to where Alexandria came from.

'I don't like it either' Kisuke thought to himself. After years of dealing with some experiment of Aizen's, the sudden lack of activity was concerning. Currently Kisuke lacked the ability to do much more than react to anything Aizen did since he was off playing the loyal captain at the moment. But given time maybe he could persuade their new guest to assist them?

'Just have to wait and see,' thought Kisuke. Patting himself down as he got up and returned to the storefront.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Support the Author at ko-fi.com/azurawriting

or over at patreon.com/AzuraWriting to read a few chapters ahead in the rotation