Playground Peril!

The squadmates all looked at each other. One gestured down to Daiji and the other sort of shrugged. One sort of... scratched his head before clearing his throat. "Uh... Lieutenant Nukui... We don't know what happened out here but uh... Well, your pants are undone and you seem to have a large... incision... on the back of your head.... You want us to patch that up for you?... Or explain what the hell happened?"

Daiji moved his hand to the back of his hand and felt that his hair was sticky with blood. Had he hit the floor of the play-set that hard? Wait, they said an incision. Had the woman...cut him?

"I...it's fine. I'll have Captain Lakshmi look at it."

What happened? How would he even begin to explain the night he had?

"Well I was...I was..."

The squad all looked around at each other. "Er... Are you sure you're okay, Lieutenant Nukui? There was a hollow here, but we managed to eliminate it. Did it get the drop on you or something?" They helped him up, as one took a closer look at the cut. "It doesn't look too bad. Some healing Kido will probably fix it."

Daiji sat up and put his hands over his face and took a deep breath as the other shinigami continued to talk to him.

"Yeah, it was a hollow, but it was evolved. It caught me off guard is all. You guys know I'm not the fighting type."

Daiji tried to make light of the situation. He still had a grim feeling, and he just couldn't bring himself to fully disclose what happened.

"Please don't worry with it. It's nothing to worry with at the moment."

The shinigami looked at each other. "Well, we're just glad you're okay. The hollow did seem pretty tough but I think we got it." He said with a little thumbs up and a nod. "You should get yourself back to Squad 4 and get a checkup though, or heal yourself up." He reached down to help Daiji up before stepping away. "We need to go comb the area to make sure we didn't miss anything. Will you be safe making your way back to Soul Society, lieutenant?"

Daiji took the man's hand and got back to his feet. His leg was still sore from the woman's blade. That vile demon woman. Daiji scratched his forehead and laughed lightly at the man.

"Yeah, sure thanks. I'll get right on that."

Daiji made sure he had his sword, and it was somehow reattached to his hip. That was odd. Did the woman do that?

"Yeah, I should be fine. You all go on ahead."

The man nodded. "All right. Be careful." He said before turning and giving a whistle and a gesture to the others and they headed off, leaving Daiji there alone in the playground. Nothing but bad memories, cold and a head wound. For now anyway.

Daiji gave a quick glance behind him as he headed off on his own. He wanted to clear his head a bit before he got back to Soul Society, there was just so much on his mind.

"I just...I just don't understand."

Little known to Daiji this was hardly the beginning of his trouble. Only once he had left back to seireitei would Esmerelda slink out of the shadows. She walked out into the street, leaning against a lightpole. She looked down at her wrist, at the little band around it. There was a little onyx silhouette of a shinigami on it. She smirked, playing with it. The seeds were planted....

- FIN