AFP Does Stuff

Bleach fanworks (mostly fanfic and drawings). Sideblog. @afinepiece is the main blog.

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Bleach Fanfiction Master Post

Figured I would make a fun little catalog of my years of Bleach fanfiction. (Jeez, I am so old.) All of it is ByaHisa because that is my special kind of brain rot. My favorite romantic set-up involves a firm stoic falling hard, and we know like… five things … maybe? … about the other half of this canon pairing, which leaves a lot open to interpretation/artistic license. Also, contextualizing or reframing the woman character whose sole function in a narrative is to serve as characterization for a male character is a Fine Undertaking* in my opinion, and Bleach has so many interesting dead wives to choose from….

So, without further ado, here we go (in-progress or completed stories only):

Mortal Devices: Part III of the Maid!Heist/Dark Academia series with The Darkest Black as Part I and An Education as Part II. This WIP departs from both Maid!Heist and Dark Academia, as it's more of a political slow burn with espionage and clan politics taking up most of the breathing room. It's still firmly ByaHisa (as the politics of their marriage is explored in depth), but the main plot revolves around locating stolen documents and research from the Twelfth before they can be used to devastating effect in the WOTL. [a03 exclusive]

An Education: Part II of the Maid!Heist/Dark Academia series with The Darkest Black (described below) as Part I. This is finally complete and is the “Dark Academia” portion of the tale. The chapters are broken up into seasons for each year (Year One: Autumn, Year One: Winter, etc.). Accordingly, the chapters are largely episodic with a few themes woven into each “Year.” I’m not quite convinced I’ve nailed Dark Academia with this one; it seems more “Slice of Life” than anything else, which I think is partially owing to the dual POVs with Byakuya (the other POV character) not attending the Academy. (He’s actually banned so… yikes….) [ff.net (discontinued on ffn, but there are a few chapters there so I'll link it) │ a03]

A Thin Red Line: This is my longest work to date, as it’s basically the length of four traditionally published fantasy novels (400k+ words). To be fair to me, this is a retelling of Bleach where Hisana does not die so it covers the Byakuya and Hisana origin story, the major arcs, plus that whole 40-year period where canon Rukia was basically living in a gothic novel. Mind the tags. Still in progress after like 10 years…. Edit 6/19/23: And she’s DONE! Bonus content on AO3 for registered users. [ff.net │ a03]

The Darkest Black: While stuck with writer’s block on ATRL, I wrote an entirely different “how did Byakuya meet Hisana” story that is… bleak? Bleak for me, at least. Probably not bleak objectively. Hisana is a thief who agrees to steal a priceless piece of art from the Kuchiki family posing as a maid. Hijinks ensue. Byakuya is particularly unlikeable as a character in this one, but that’s probably more of a side-effect of Hisana being the main POV character. This was my way to make a “Hisana as a maid” meet-cute between these two characters make sense in my head. Complete. [ff.net │ a03]

Smoke and Mirrors: A dark ByaHisa origin story with Hisana as an oiran. It isn’t particularly graphic in terms of sex or violence since that isn’t really my style, but the text and subtext are definitely there that terrible things happen to Hisana, and her mental state is understandably not great. [ff.net │ a03]

Without Frontiers: Like the Peter Gabriel song! (Yes, that song was the inspo. I write to music just like probably 95% of anyone who writes.) This is a pretty fluffy one-shot where Byakuya and Hisana are childhood friends. There is like 0 romance. They are legit kids just making up stories and being goofy. There are some hints that Hisana may be exposed to Bad Things that she is trying to process through story-telling because, really, who doesn’t want a little Adult Fear injected into an otherwise light-hearted story? [ff.net │ a03]

Charcoal Hearts: This is my very tame attempt at a reincarnation fic. The story is about Byakuya taking Rukia to a ballet during their off-time. He is there basically to ogle the reincarnation of his dead wife as a ballerina performing Serenade. It has a flirty ending, but, since I don’t particularly love Hisana reincarnation fics, it ends ambiguously. [ff.net │ a03]

So Far Away: A pretty depressive one-shot where an injured Byakuya recovers in Hisana’s hovel in the deep Rukon. Here, Hisana is a barmaid who scavenges and does side jobs to support herself, and Byakuya is… well… sort of an asshole? Like I think writing this one-shot was where I had an epiphany about Byakuya’s character (or at least my attempt to write his character): That “epiphany” being that because he lives in a rich people bubble, he (1) is extremely entitled and (2) struggles to understand and connect with others. These two traits create a feedback loop that makes him come off as simultaneously arrogant and stiff/awkward. I don’t think Byakuya is canonically on the spectrum, but I could entertain that theory, especially in light of the CFYOW books. Instead, I think there is a point when someone has so much privilege that they never learn how to read the damn room because all rooms, at that point, are basically designed to cater to them. Everyone is artificial with them so genuine concern or emotion seems inconvenient, at best, to alien, at worst. All that said, in this story he very much trips all over himself, but he improves. Slowly. Over the course of like years. [ff.net │ a03]

Stages: A short ByaHisa origin story that incorporates the five stages of love challenge that was popular on LiveJournal back when LJ was a thing. (Is it still a thing?) Hisana is a courtesan. It isn’t the best, and I sort of hate it, but it is part of the plot bunny that prompted me to make a version of Hisana as a courtesan that would be interesting, or more interesting, and better researched in keeping with the Edo Period sensibilities of Soul Society, which led to Smoke and Mirrors and A Thin Red Line. [ff.net │ a03]

White Flowers and Red Hearts Trilogy: These stories are the earliest of my ByaHisa brain rot, and they probably read exactly like that. I have not done a re-write (or, hell, even a re-read) of any of these in like a decade or more so… yikes… But, from what I recall, the first story, Dissidence is the meet-cute, where Byakuya meets Hisana while on a mission. Hisana is a Rukon local working as a host performing tea ceremonies, and Byakuya sort of winds up in a “you broke the thing, now you must buy the thing” situation with Hisana, explaining his decision to marry her. Dimuendo is the middle child, and it chronicles their first year of marriage. Both Dissidence and Dimuendo are pretty fluffy with some light angst. Dolente is like super depressive because… well… death is pretty sad, and it is the final year of their marriage. Would not recommend any of these, and, like Stages, I would probably delete them if not for the sentimental value. [a03]

The Rites of the Dead: It’s a weird story. Technically, it’s a one-shot, but it has a few “movements” that break the story into parts. It has no romance. The subject matter is dark: Hisana is a member of the Fourth and is tasked with preparing the funerary arrangements upon Ginrei’s death. And, I like it? Still. For some strange reason. Sure, there are things that I would go back and fix on a technical level if I were to re-edit it (which I have no plans to do), but the idea of Hisana and Byakuya’s first meeting being on a tragic occasion seems poetic? Also, the idea of a bunch of “dead” people having to mourn and “bury” their dead is so on the nose, that it seems right. I found the wordplay in some parts of this story to be pretty clever. (No one else did.) [ff.net │ a03]

A Suggestion of Marriage: A light fluffy one-shot where Byakuya asks Hisana to marry him. She says, “yes.” Shocker. I know. I do kind of like the backstory for Hisana in this one, which is that of an Academy flunkie who goes on to work at a tea house. I think this is the story where I got the idea to finally take the plunge and make her an oiran; although, she isn’t technically one here. [ff.net │ a03]

Fan Dance: A one-shot where Byakuya and Hisana meet during a sparring match. She is the Lieutenant of the Fourth, Byakuya is the Lieutenant of the Sixth, and they get matched to spar during an event where all the fancy pants Shinigami are supposed to release their zanpakuto for public spectacle. Byakuya gets more than he bargains for when Hisana winds up not being a total powder puff. No hugging or kissing, which seems to be a theme among like half of the one-shots…. [ff.net │ a03]

*On a tangentially-related aside for anyone who comes across this random post and who wants recommendations from an internet rando on actual literature where real, serious authors reframe women who got the short end of the narrative stick, see Wide Sargasso Sea, The Penelopiad, or The Problem with Susan (Jane Eyre, The Odyssey, and the Narnia series, respectively).

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Chapter 2: Pain Is a Shut Door

Summary: Miyako Shiba and Captain Ukitake take tea with Byakuya Kuchiki, who makes an odd request.

Rating: M

There are no ghosts in Soul Society.    Standing in House Kuchiki, however, has Miyako beginning to doubt the wisdom of these words.  House Kuchiki has stood for centuries.  Many long centuries.  Never in the same configuration, Miyako supposes, but largely in the same way.  Within, the walls are white as snow, the wooden floorboards all run neatly and firm, and the doors are mostly shut, all except one, the one directly before her and Captain Ukitake. They have been standing quietly for a while now, both too afraid to break the silence that has been holding this place steady. After a few more minutes collect, a fuzzy hum begins to swell in her ears.  It is an off-putting sort of sound, the kind that you feel buzzing in your bones long before you notice its source.  Briefly, Miyako wonders if it’s her mind playing tricks on her.  Maybe it can no longer take the oppressive quiet. No sane person could, really.

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Chapter 1: Ruin the Friendship

Summary: Kaien reflects on the death of a friend.

Rating: M (language)

Kaien Shiba's afternoon nap isn’t happening, not when there is a stirring in his soul.  He listens to these stirrings more than most.  Maybe more than he should. Right then, the stirring sends his hand to his sword and sets his feet on a path leading deeper into the mountain.  Nejibana is hungry to be released, which is never a great sign of what fortune awaits him.

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Snippets

Creativity has won out sort of. I did have a second to edit a scene from my current WIP, Mortal Devices. I think this scene is the next after the last snippet posted back in July, which feels like 10 lifetimes ago. Usually, I would... y'know, just wait and post the chapter, but at the going rate, that may be never-o'clock. Posting somewhere, however, does increase my motivation to prioritize some creative time something like +5.

Plus, this scene was sort of fun to write: It has a capture the flag (cyber edition) at the Twelfth, a rare Akon and Nemu appearance, and some connective tissue with the last posted chapter from Isane's POV.

Clutching her chest for warmth, flurries collect in Hisana’s hair as she waits outside the Twelfth’s side gates.  The air is clear enough to carry sounds from a distance so, when the winds go quiet, the groans and cheers of merrymaking reach her. 

Seems like a real rager.

“State your name and purpose, Shinigami,” the night guard directs her, his voice low and rough despite the slurring on the tail.

He must be drunk. 

She can work with drunk. 

“Hisana, Squad Two’s—”

“I know who you are!” chirps the guard, suddenly losing all pretense of gruffness.  “You’re Lieutenant Kuchiki’s—”

“Indeed,” she interrupts before he can fashion some unfortunate epithet.  (Pet.  Charity Case. Whore. Fiancée.) “I’m here for the capture the flag event.”

“Oh?”  The guard hesitates as if he wants to inquire as to how she knows about that, but he stops himself.  “Of course.”

The gate’s lock releases with a buzz before groaning back on its hinges.

“It’s in the defense readiness condition annex over there,” the guard notes, nodding his head in the direction of the little storage shed in front of the gate. 

Hisana offers him a tense smile and bows her head.  “Thanks.” 

Truth be told:  Hisana has never actually been to one of Akon’s capture the flag events even though it feels like she has. Akon has spoken at length about the various DEFCON activities they hold every other Thursday night.  Apparently, members of the Twelfth gather around to defend and attack the various computing systems that the Twelfth uses to monitor Soul Society and run the squad.  Along with sounding very complicated and technical, it also seems like a great excuse to drink and let loose after a week of coping under Captain Kurotsuchi’s eccentric brand of “leadership.”

To that end, Hisana’s expectations remain very much intact as she slides inside the annex.  Music blares through the walls, causing them to shake on certain beats.  It’s not a genre of music that she’s heard anywhere else before. If she's being honest, it's not really like music at all, more like some mechanical byproduct crudely repurposed.  

Whatever the hell it is, it certainly is jarring, drowning out all other sounds for the first few corridors.

Only on the last leg of the trek does a din of voices compete with the thumps of music.  The voices are mostly male—deep, raucous shouts and directives issued with pressing concern—but Lieutenant Kurotsuchi’s and Niko Kuna’s voices pipe in intermittently. 

Turning the corner into the control room, the scene that confronts her next is just… a whole mess…. 

A mess of wires.

A mess of flickering monitors and equipment. 

A mess of randomly fitted together tables full of bodies leaning into the blue and white light of screens and strange devices. 

At the head of the room (if one could really call it that), Akon sits close to his monitor, chain-smoking, ashes of his cigarette falling into a mug of what is (or was) coffee.  A flickering screen has his full attention.  His face is awash with electric blue light.  He trades some technical jargon with a member of “Team Red” in the back of the room.  It could be a barb or a direction; Hisana isn’t sure.

With arms folded tightly against her chest, she stops a short distance away from the back of the monitor, where she proceeds to stare at him. 

And stare. 

And stare. 

And stare some more.

A few minutes into all her pointed staring, Akon’s reiatsu snaps out, striking hers.  It hits like a zap of static electricity.  And, yet, she is not surprised. 

Not sparing her a glance, he bites out a quiet, “What is it, Two?”  

“I need my suit.”

He ignores her.    

“I said--” she begins again after what feels like infinity.

“I heard you.”  His voice barely eclipses the clicking of fingers hitting computer keys.  “Why?”

“Official business.”

“You can make a requisition order.”

“I need it now.”

“You can make an expedited requisition order, then.”  He wheels his chair over to another overly large screen, his fingers drumming some command or another into the attached keyboard.

“I need it right now.”

“Impossible.”

“I need it right now, or….”

“Or what?”  He then glances past her to bark some nonsense direction to Niko, who is manning a smaller device a short distance away.

Hisana dangles her fancy new badge for him to see.

Sliding his chair back to the monitor where she lingers, Akon pauses for a nanosecond.  “Internal affairs.”  His eyes flicker. “What’s that?”

“Well,” Hisana sing-songs, “it’s less about what it currently is than what it could be.” 

“Yeah, and that thing being?”

“A big pain in the ass.”  Hisana glares at him.  “Your ass, specifically.”

Akon’s gaze slides away.  “Good luck, then,” he murmurs under his breath without looking at Hisana or, hell, the fresh pack of smokes that his fingers are stripping open. 

Her jaw drops and a thousand impolite curses surge through her head.  Before she can say another word, though, Lieutenant Kurotsuchi cuts the overhead monitor that lines the entirety of the back wall.  This disables all the nearby screens.  Then, for a split second, the room goes silent.  This small reprieve is quickly chased by a choir of grunts, complaints, and jeers. 

“I hear you!” Lieutenant Kurotsuchi says softly.  She repeats herself a few times before turning to the command station at the front of the room.  Her fingers fly across a few keys and, as if by magic, the large screen lining the wall begins transmitting video feed of what appears to be a crowd of Shinigami standing next to a sealed off perimeter in the woods. 

When the last of the grumbling dies down, the familiar cadence of a readout rises above the dissent, “Squad Seven was deployed to the West Rukon shortly after Squad Nine reported a failure to make contact with one of its patrols—”

Hisana’s brows furrow.  That doesn’t make sense, shouldn’t Nine have—

“—Captain Komamura along with the scouting party have been rushed for care at the Fourth—”

“You wouldn’t happen to know something about this?” Akon’s voice worms in between the lieutenant’s words.

Sane men would be forgiven for jumping to conclusions, especially when a member of the Second blows in off the streets shortly before calamity strikes.  Sane men would also know better than to expect straight answers from a member of the Second.  Sane men, however, don’t work for the Twelfth.  So, Akon will continue eying her until she responds, a fact that is as unsettling as it is unsurprising. 

“Can’t say that I do,” she says as coolly as the winter’s breath.

“Can’t or won’t?”

“Does it really matter?”

Akon leans back in his seat and takes a long drag from his cigarette.  His gaze settles on the screen.  The lieutenant’s polite droning has ceased, leaving the scratchy audio from the sound system overhead to filter into the room.  Whatever technology has been planted in the forest isn’t very good or isn’t positioned near anything interesting.  A few muffled voices fade in and out of the transmission, but the words are incomprehensible. 

A caravan of Shinigami carting supplies enters the frame.  Then another.  And another. 

The Gotei 13 are fairly stingy with supplies during the best of times.  These, however, aren’t the best of times.  Not with the antics coming from the World of the Living.

Captain Tousen steps into view.  His usual calm demeanor breaks when he turns to the forest.  His features tense, and he gestures to a few of his subordinates, who disappear past the treeline.  The Shinigami barely make it a meter in before being unceremoniously flung backwards, like dolls. 

Hisana’s attention flits to Akon. 

Twin wisps of smoke begin to emerge from his nose, and he turns with a jerk to whisper-shout, “Niko, grab Two’s suit.”

“Got it!”  Niko’s chair shoots down the table to another computer, and her fingers begin drilling the keyboard.  “One body bag coming up!”

“Body bag?” squawks Hisana.

“I’ve told her to stop calling them that,” he grumbles and leans forward, hands fiddling with the devices.  His eyes narrow on a red flashing light, and he pauses.  “This could be good.”  

Of course. It should be no surprise that where some see danger, the Twelfth sees observable phenomena, capable of being reduced to data.  And, yet….

She’s getting soft.

“You’re not going to flake out this time?” deadpans Akon.

Hisana folds her arms against her chest and frowns. 

“Right?” he goads. 

“I don’t think I have that luxury,” she says stiffly.

“Good.”  He pushes away from the desk just as Niko appears in the doorway.  “I made a few modifications.  Should be able breathe easier now.”

“Oh, pity.  I really enjoyed the corseted look.  The rough edges stabbing into my ribs really kept me on my toes.”

Akon blinks.  “Sartorial preference isn’t really worth your O2 levels—”

“It was a joke.”

“Oh.”  He blinks.  “I knew that.”

Hisana takes the bodysuit and gear from Niko and leaves before anyone has the chance to rethink the wisdom of their choices. 

Herself included….

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Writing update: there is no update LOL. I live on barely.

A N Y W A Y

Part of me very badly wants to write *something* despite having no time or energy. And, right now, the creative varmint scratching at the ole brain wall is fixated on the period between Rukia's adoption and the start of Bleach. I really want to make some spooky Gothic ghost story so much but have never found a great entry point to begin even a paragraph... until ... now!

Sort of...

(Not really.)

So, picture it: Instead of writing the "between period" (I'm already cheating, I know), making the "between period" the Kuchiki ghost that needs expelling. And by "expelling," I mean therapizing the members of House Kuchiki (obviously). You know... because with Kyoraku trying to make Soul Society a teeny bit more humane as Commander, you get your friendly neighborhood Gotei-assigned social worker/therapist/exorcist. (Work with me here.) You also get: Byakuya being completely back on his shit; Rukia very much torn between "get me out of this story" and starring in the Gothic novel of her dreams (inside her own head of course); Renji getting scooped up in the mess because he is always *around*; annoying aunts and uncles; underpaid Kuchiki staff who are ready to spill the tea to someone also bound by an nda so tight it would cut out their tongues via a magic spell if they dared breach it; and, last but not least, the *past*.

It would still be Gothic but like... more backward looking wistful *regret* after all that character growth we got at the conclusion of the series.

So... like... torturing your favs with their past misdeeds...

...y'know... the true ghosts haunting the narrative of Bleach.

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Writing Update 7.25.2025

I am, as Mr. AFP likes to say nowadays, living somewhere in "the quantum realm." At the time, it sounded like an exasperated, "Girl, what in the world.... I cannot keep up with your level of abstraction and contingency planning." Now, I'm like... he may have a point!

Due to this (unfortunately?), most of my creativity has been locked up in planning and scheduling in Real Life, which is infinitely less fun and exciting than planning and scheduling in Creative Life. So....

The 45 minutes that I got to edit something written a while back, though, is under the cut.

When will I get to do anything super fun and fandom (whether that is reading and fan-girling over what I've read) or writing or drawing? Who can say? Whoever that is, though, is definitely not me while "quantum realm-ing." (Which sounds dangerous, I might add!)

Anyway.... below is a little excerpt of what I've been editing.

For the second time that day, somewhere between picking a ripe persimmon and a head of greens, the thought of going soft melts Hisana’s brain, and she thinks she knows the reason why. 

Being with Byakuya has made her soft.  Part of her—the mean, never-satisfied part of her—argues that it has made her too soft.  And, well, maybe it’s right. 

Here she is, after all, in the market, head full of plans to make dinner at the manor dedicated for the Sixth’s lieutenant. 

These plans, however, turn to smoke the moment Hisana steps foot across the threshold of the Lieutenant’s house. 

Her stomach sinks as if pulled into a void.  Absence.  The air is too still.  Absence.  The little wooden townhome smells like winter and remnants of a fire long extinguished.  Absence.

A smudge of white on the table opposite the entryway solidifies the fact that she is on her own tonight.  On approach, the smudge morphs into a card tented next to a small black compact with an engraving of a mountain wreathed in juniper berries. 

‘Something French,’ reads the card in Byakuya’s unmistakable handwriting.

Hisana runs her thumb across the black ink, which is dry enough not to smear.  She closes her eyes and sucks in a big breath.  A thread of spring sun, golden and warm, pulls through the darkness. 

His spiritual signature is faint, but it’s just as unmistakable as his handwriting.  Only an hour or two has passed since he drafted the card. 

Without looking, her fingers skate across the top of the compact.  Iron.  Thick iron.  And the engraving feels precise, likely from a machine. 

She flips back the lid on its hinge and grins.  Perfume, the solid kind.  Unsurprisingly, the scent of juniper hits first, then jasmine, before finishing with a note of cedar.   She runs her finger over the white, waxy surface, but stops short of dabbing the spot behind her jaw.

‘Something French.’

Hisana pauses and stares down at the compact, as black and as cold as a lump of coal.  She turns it on its side and finds the word “France” engraved into the metal.  So, Byakuya Kuchiki stole a perfume during one of his treks to the World of the Living. 

Who would’ve thought? 

Her lips press together at the strain of imagining him standing somewhere, anywhere French.  The only image that her brain can scrape together is one of him dressed in his blacks, standing knee-deep in snow on the Champs-Élysées, staring grimly at the day-to-day drudgery of life under occupation.    

Mindlessly, Hisana applies the perfume to her neck, right against her pulse point.  Her heart gives a hard squeeze, and she’s back.  Inside herself.  Inside the little wooden house.  Inside that quiet absence.

Except.   

She blinks and sets the compact down.  The clicking of iron against wood is quickly replaced with the hiss of paper against wool as the long-forgotten bag of groceries that had once swung from the bend of her elbow slides down her arm to her wrist and then off her hand to the table.  The weight of the bag and the “thunk” of the squash as it rolls across the wood do not register.  No, instead, her senses narrow to the room above her, the bedroom that she shares with Byakuya.  Up the wooden stairs she goes, careful to keep her tread light so as to avoid the creaky fourth step.  Then, down the hall.  To the right.

It's strange, the way she can shift from seeing the world with her eyes to perceiving it with her soul.  It’s a bit like tracking an animal by sight, to suddenly tracking it by scent.  The “scent,” in this case, is hazy, a phantom thread. 

Whatever has entered the house does not want to be discovered.

And, indeed, whatever lurked in the bedroom has disappeared by the time she crosses the threshold.  Her heart knows first, slowing its pace.  Then, her blood, which no longer pounds in her ears.  Only after that do the deep blues and purples of nightfall sweep into view.

A cold wind blows through a window that’s been cracked open.  The corner of a scrap of paper wings up and snaps in the breeze.  It would take flight if only a well-placed book were not pinning it down.

‘Make sure you leave a window open.  It’s hard for her to get into places, what with her having no opposable thumbs.’  Kyōraku’s voice blares in Hisana’s head.

Not that she would ever heed his advice.  The man is made of questionable decisions. 

But, one of the servants must have left the window open to invite fresh air inside when they last cleaned the house. 

Rounding the bed, Hisana tugs the slip of paper free and brings it into the moonlight.  Inked in black are the coordinates of a place somewhere in Kuroi Jukai, West Rukongai.  Further down the page, an ominous directive reads: “Meet at 2300.  Bring the badge and gear from Twelve.” 

In lieu of a traditional closing there is only a black paw print.

That fucking cat.

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I have had the worst stint ever. No words logged. One hospital visit down, though (my body seeks to kill me unprompted). It is terrible. All systems red.

I hope to get back into at least reading and commenting on fandom things that bring me joy. But, good god, are things un-great at present. From waking up to read the news (a mental health kick in the teeth every time) to having to deal with the side-effects of such news in my work to... health issues... it's just a whole un-fun thing all around.

Hopefully, I get back to some equilibrium where I can have a moment's peace to be and think as a person. When that will be? I hope soon. But, honestly, who knows.

In the meanwhile, thanks to all that I follow who write and post cool stuff, and thanks to the folks who have asked if I am alive. (I am!)

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Writing Update 2.20.2025

Goodness! Not that my free time has increased exponentially, but my spiraling about... well... the state of the world... has forced me to seek some sort of shelter in creativity, and let me tell you what, yes, yes, I will do that with my tens of minutes a week.

Anyway, while I have not written anything on the next chapter, I have been writing what is probably the thrustiest chapter in the next Part (is that a word? "thrustiest"?) as in it will be determinative of how the next major plot-point gets pulled off. Whereas the three chapters before it are various limited versions of what happens here. It's not quite a retelling of the same events in five different POVs (a thing I personally love in fiction), but there are elements of that in the overlap of how characters get to where they go.

Anyway, below is an excerpt written like a year ago that feels pretty complete (as in, I'm not fiddling with it as much now) and is more mood and vibes of the aforementioned chapter.

Snowflakes dart and give chase on a stray gust, floating up toward a sky blanketed with clouds. The midday sun makes itself known in the only way it can: by turning the seams between the clouds a molten shade of yellow. Pinpricks of light shine through these tight stitches. The wind dies down for a brief moment, and all goes quiet and still. 

It’s whimsical, Hisana thinks. 

Almost whimsical enough to distract her from the fact that she’s standing in the slaughter yard of Squad Two during a snow storm. 

As punishment (no doubt) for requesting an opportunity to leave the Second, Hisana has been saddled with the thankless task of witnessing and verifying the execution of traitors, dissidents, and defectors. 

Because in Seireitei, even state-sanctioned killings entail paperwork…. 

Today, the blood of the condemned largely stains the Central 46’s hands. 

Hisana never knows what to make of the decisions handed down by that organ of Soul Society or the proportionality of the purported crimes worthy of death, which include (but are in no way limited to): adultery, insulting a noble, petty theft, murder, arson, defection, betrayal, and emotional distress of a noble. 

Hisana frowns at the stack of files.  The cold has numbed her fingers, making it difficult to flip through the pages to confirm the prisoner’s name, charges, and sentencing information.  She rarely pauses to look too closely at the post-arrest pictures of the soon-to-be-executed.  By the time they reach the slaughteryard, they no longer resemble their former selves.  The various jails around the city seem to have a transformative effect, marking up faces and bodies with casual cruelty.

For the record, Hisana would take the Nest of Maggots to whatever they got going on at the Central Chambers and Noble Assembly.  The nobility there is vicious. 

“You want to trade?” teases Itabashi, his breath fogging midair. 

The warden is alarmingly spry for his bulky stature.  His height, too, is alarming, a feature that can only be described as “looming,” like a shadow cast from a sky-scraper.  His face isn’t much to write home about, either, if Hisana is being completely honest.  His features are all either too small or too large to be considered average, let alone handsome.  He does have keen, bright eyes, which gives the impression that he knows more than he lets on. 

His gaze scatters in the direction of the large, shiny, black metal box set in the middle of the field. 

Hisana’s frown deepens at the sight of it.  “For the murderer?” she sighs.

“One of ‘em.”  He laughs and then jerks his head in the direction of an enormous cauldron being hauled from one of the storage units.  Three well-muscled guards struggle with placement due to the icy and uneven ground.

Hisana sighs harder. 

Not that she loves processing twenty people for a good old-fashioned beheading, but she’d rather that than watch a man be tortured to death. 

“It’s only one,” he practically sings.

Dragging her gaze back to him, she asks, “Why don’t you want to do it, then?”

Itabashi runs his thick, stubby fingers through the dusting of gray hair left on his head and shrugs.  “Thought it’d be good to ingratiate myself.”

Not liking the sound of that, Hisana’s eyes narrow.  “Ingratiate yourself to whom?”

His brows jump up toward his hair line as he eyes her with intention.

“To me?” she crows.

“What?” He chuckles.  “You’re a Kuchiki pet.”

Hisana tries to mask a harder, longer sigh with a snort.    

To no avail.

Itabashi continues, undeterred, “Figured if I did you a favor that you’d have to repay me whenever the time came.”

Oh, yes, the Second’s time-honored tradition: the bartering of kindness.  It’s Hisana’s favorite pastime.  The Second even has a ledger tracking the debts.  According to squad legend, Ōmaeda had a hand in implementing the system.  Not surprising.  Ōmaeda is the crown prince of pettiness.

“What do you want, Itabashi?”  She swallows back the urge to groan.

“The straw grilled pigeon from Umenohana,” he says, stars in his eyes.

Umenohana, eh?  Good choice.  It’s also something that she could actually swing, what with it being a Kuchiki-owned restaurant. 

“Never would’ve taken you for a gourmand.”  Hisana cuts him a sideways glance before heading toward where her prisoners are being lined up. 

“What about it?” He wags his brows expectantly.

“Not a chance.”  Watching a guy get slowly skewered through with kidou swords for a solid fifteen minutes is a vignette straight from her nightmares.

“Who gets the Central Chambers Special?” Hisana calls to Suzugamori and jerks her chin toward the cauldron.

Suzugamori, who is in charge of processing the prisoners from their jails to their execution stations, pauses to check his list. 

The snow is really coming down now, falling in sheets that angle with the wind.  Some of the flakes catch in Suzugamori’s eyelashes, forcing him to squint when he finally acknowledges her.  “Some maid who caused a noblewoman distress.”

“Oh.”  Hisana’s jaw clenches as she watches the men begin to set the spells to fill and heat the cauldron with boiling oil.  Usually, it’s murder, like Itabashi thought.  “And what kind of distress merits a boiling death?” 

“Maid fucked her son, I think.”

Oh, dear.  You can get boiled alive for that?  Praise be that Byakuya’s mom is very much past-tense.  Maybe distressing a nosey auntie nets a lesser sentence, like being drawn and quartered by wild boars….   You know, something festive.

“Rethinking some life decisions, huh?” teases Suzugamori.

“Who?  Me?” Hisana jabs a thumb into her chest before flashing a wolfish grin.  “Only every day of my life.”  She then steps to the line of prisoners standing against the western wall.

She’s been preparing for what she sees next.  Knows the exact way her heart will jump.  Knows that her breath with stop.  Her preparations, however, weren’t close to enough. 

They never seem to be.

Every molecule in Hisana’s body freezes at the sight of a face that she knows well.  Threads of terror and dread and hate and rage weave together, forming a tangled knot so heavy and thick that it threatens to suffocate.  Fortunately, the vibrations of a consuming indignation dislodge the bolus from her chest and set fire to her veins. 

[create-with-afp]

Writing Update 2.15.2025

I did it! I finally finished the next chapter of Mortal Devices. It took so long to write, not necessarily because it was hard, but because time is so increasingly fleeting. Life is exhausting, doubly so now.

But, I did it! And that's not nothing. Here's to the small wins of collecting enough free moments to do something that is for personal enjoyment. Sometimes, that feels revolutionary in and of itself.

Mortal Devices

Chapter 5: Code Yellow

Summary: Just a normal day at work with Isane. Nothing to see here, no sirree.

Rating: T

[create-with-afp]

Writing Update 10.11.24

Okay, I have literally five minutes of quiet time to myself so here goes!

I had meant to re-do the last update that I trashed, but life found a way... and it has continued to find a way since then.... I did manage to start my Isane chapter, and the first scene turned out well so far. She's not having a wonderful time in it, but it's about to get a good deal worse (for her). It was so fun to write creatively for a moment, and I truly hope I find like an hour this weekend between everything else to continue the chapter.

Alas! My free-time is up.

Until the next update, in which I hope to have this chapter done.