Boredom, Tests and More! [Open]

Tap. Tappity. Tap, tap tap. Tap.

There, in the office of the Taicho, came an odd sound. It sounded almost like someone tapping a wooden spoon on a cooking pot. It was a sound reminiscent of childhoods around the world. Whatever could the sound be?

The door was wide open, though nothing could be seen behind the overly large stacks of paper and books. There might have been a path if one wished to tread it, for deep inside the sound continued, but would one wish to venture into this potential death trap unaided?

Hideki lightly tossed the book he was carrying into the air, catching it out of the sky as he walked the hallways of the 4th division. He sniffed. Never was a fan of hospitals. Smelled like sick. But he had a book request for the 4th squad captain. One Taichi Mehra had ordered a book and since apparently nobody else in Squad 10 did LITERALLY anything, it fell to him to deliver the book. He actually had delivered a number already but saved this for last. After all, he'd never actually met the captain and it would prove an opportune time to add their data to his book.

As he approached the office, he slowed however. What was that tapping? He paused at the door's entryway, pressing himself to the wall. What was going on in there? He peeked his head in quickly before pulling it back. Nothing too suspicious... the noise was coming from back there though. He slowly stalked into the office. Hrm... What if it was the captain... Best not to startle them... then again... what if it was an intruder!

He snuck forward to the stack of books, peering around the top of it.

Lakshmi laid on the floor, on her stomach, a pan used to hold surgery utensils in front of her. She was tapping it with a small wooden spoon while humming to herself lightly. She had a sheet of paper in front of her.

The normally fully composed Taicho was not even wearing her shinigami uniform. Instead she wore a loose skirt and blouse, both of which were bunched up slightly from her legs and arms position. Her legs waved back and forth, showing off her lower legs which she wore no shoes on. It was obviously something she was paying a ton of attention to, as she hadn't even noticed Hideki's presence yet.

What in the world was she doing here on the floor, hiding in the piles? Didn't she have work to do? Her free hand held her head and lightly teased a few strands of hair from a long messy braid and she seemed to sigh as she started over with whatever it was she was doing.

Hideki looked... perplexed.. okay... he was sneaking into the 4th squad captain's office to deliver a book, hiding from a mysterious sound that was coming from some sort of vixen WHO LOOKED COMPLETELY NORMAL AND LIKE ANY OTHER WOMAN GIRL PERSON SHINIGAMI just... laying there... wanging on a fucking pan and doing something on a paper. He slunk down behind the books.

This was suspicious as shit. What should he do? ....

Moments later, he had peeked back over the books with his glasses on and scanned the person, whoever they may be, before sneaking back out of the office. Once he was safely out of the office, he stood up, tucked away his glasses, cleared his throat and leaned in the doorway, knocking on it. "Hello? Captain Mehra? Are you in here?"

Lakshmi thought she heard...something. But she wasn't paying too much attention. She had to get this figured out, especially since she was on a break after a twelve hour shift. The Taicho should be at home sleeping, but they could find her there and she was too wired after such a harsh twelve hours. New recruits were always causing such headaches...

However a voice called out from the entry way and she stopped all of a sudden. It sounded unsure. "Oh bother."

The person outside probably heard that small exclamation, as well as the shuffling that meant the person was moving around. A squeak of a chair, some more shuffles and then a deep breath from someone weary... Before finally Taicho Mehra appeared around the stack of books and papers. She had her Haori on over her less formal clothing, which was somewhat put back in order, though she was still trying to fix the large white cover.

She smiled, a bit tight at Hideki and spoked gently. This wasn't one of her squad members, even the new ones. So who... would be calling? "This is she. Is there something you needed?"

He frowned slightly. Oh bother? He was bringing her HER book. Or at least he was pretty sure she was the captain. Her getting up the Haori all but confirmed it for him. She seemed like she was on downtime maybe? the Haori didn't look like it was service ready, that was for sure. He might have given more thought to it if he didn't find himself just a tiny bit distracted by her face... His eyes fluttered as he snapped out of it. "Oh. Yes." He walked up to her before standing up straight, almost overly formal for the situation, reaching into his robe pocket and, with a snap, pulling out a book and holding it straight out.

"Captain Mehra, I am Vice-Captain Hideki Nishimura, here on official book request duty. Here, ma'am, is the book you requested." He spoke cheerily with a snappy tone of voice.

"You... didn't see anything did you?" Lakshmi's face was a bit concerned and if Hideki had known her better or seen her before he might be able to see a tint of red on it. She accepted the book but had to smile slightly at the young man. He was taller than her, most people were, but she still felt like she should reassure him. He was rather... formal.

"Please call me...anything but that. I am Lakshmi and rather off duty. Thank you for bringing it all the way here, I regret I couldn't pick it up myself." She gave him a small bow before straightening."They sent the Vice Captain out to bring such a small thing? I am honored they think so highly of me. Oh dear... Where are my manners. Would you like some tea? Since you came all the way out here. I also have some coffee and snacks. I really should thank you for such prompt efforts."

She gave him a warm smile, pushing over her shoulder her messy braid.

Did he... see anyhing? Crap, was there something to see? Was she hiding something? Why oh why had he been distracted by her legs? Damn it, Hideki! Get it together! "No... What was there to see?" He asked with a furrowed brow. Ah, whichever. He visibly relaxed when she asked him to call her by her first name. He gave a beaming smile and leaned forward, taking her hand and giving it a small respectful peck. He felt like it was pretty charming, but it more then likely came off as sort of silly. "Glad to meet you, Miss Lakshmi." He said, voice bright and friendly.

"Well, with the library department, I actually wind up doing the bulk of... most of the jobs." He gave a more nervous smile this time, before a slight 'hm?' "I'm not much of a tea person, but coffee and snacks sounds delightful. I finished my book runs, so I have some time, and I've been meaning to get to know all of my other officers. Don't feel like you owe me anything though. I'm glad to see at least some of our officers are studious. It makes a librarian sleep easy at night."

"...N-Nothing. Nothing had been happening." Lakshmi stuttered for a second, knowing he had seen her practicing... Oh no this was a problem. No one could know of her wish to learn to sing. She had been practicing measures and timing but was still having issues. It was why she had kept the paper maze up for so long.

The...little dork! Lakshmi grinned at his action, not sure of how to respond to such... gallant actions? This was business of sorts, so she put it into that category. He really was an adorable one, the same sort of aura of dorkiness pervading him as Alexander. "I suppose this means I am free to call you Hideki then? Or would Sir Nishimura be more appropriate?"

"That sounds tiresome for one with your position. Why do you end up doing this all?" She shook her head at the squad management. As he mentioned coffee, she smiled and waved him through the stacks to the far back of the room. "I am glad, I had coffee already ready and it is so much easier than tea."

There was a couch with a coffee table, a tray with a heated carafe and what looked like creamer and sugar. On the tray were a variety of sweets. Along a counter on the wall sat a few coffee mugs, odd shaped ones. They were all designed like either cute animals or rather fancy. She grabbed the two biggest and set them down as she replied. "I have such curiosity, I don't think I could avoid being studious if I tried. I do appreciate the book though, thank you once again. I hope this is fine, Sir Nishimura?"

She waved to the table and items there. It was obvious she had planned to hide in here a while.

"Nothing.. Alrighty." He didn't sound particularly convinced, but he sounded like he was willing to drop it. For now, at least. It was definitely filed away under "bring up later" in his head. He filed it quickly, however, eager to answer her question about how to address him. "Well, Hideki would be fine. You're welcome to call me Sir Nishimura, but then I'm going to have to, by law, refer to you as Lady Mehra, or M'Lady for short."

"You'd be surprised how much grunt work is involved with running a library. Plus, it's not like our captain does anything. Sometimes I can barely remember what they look like." He thoughtfully said with a quizzical look on his face. "And this is quite lovely." He said with a pleasant smile as he sat down, cautiously picking up one of the sweets and taking a bite of it.

"Please don't. It makes me feel my age, and all the formalities I have to deal with sometimes." Lakshmi shuddered, smiling and brushing aside some hair that had fallen into her face. "We shall stick with informal names then, and not bring up such boring memories."

"I imagine its dreadfully... intriguing. All that knowledge right at your finger tips... A few shelves away you could learn anything, at any time." Her eyes glimmered with happiness at the thought. She adored libraries or repositories of knowledge and liked to learn many things. The captain aside, she wanted to learn more about the library and its duties. It had been one she had looked at back when she had been a student...

She gave him a small smile and sat down next to the Lieutenant, reaching forward and eating a few herself as she prepared sickly sweet and milky coffee. Just how she liked her tea. Some cookies were dunked into the cup, and the Taicho leaned against the edge of the couch, curling her feet up under her as she watched Hideki intently. "So you deliver books, I assume take back books... What else do you do there? I had once thought about that division, but alas I had a calling here."

Hideki wasn't old enough to have tired of formalities, nor did he feel like Lakshmi could possibly be that age... but then again, with shinigami, sometimes age was all but impossible to judge. Still "Alrighty then, Lakshmi. Agreed, as long as we don't hear any more nonsense about your being old, either." He gave a slight smile, adjusting himself in his seat to get comfy.

"You'd be surprised at some of the information you can find though." He opened his mouth to continue but hesitated. Should he tell her about his zanpakuto? All that knowledge was more literally at his finger tips than she had meant. He considered holding off on it, but her next inquiry made it too relevant to ignore. "Well, there's a lot of spare time. I file things, shelve books, try to keep the place running. Depending on the day, I have a lot of extra time." He reached into his robe and pulled a small book out. "Most of which I spend reading things in this." He gestured to his zanpakuto.

"Ahah, I am rather middle aged I suppose for a Shinigami. My 800th naming day is coming up soon." Hideki looked young... and acted young. He probably wasn't a day over a hundred or so. Strong for one quite young. He was rather charming in his own way, and Lakshmi was happy with his company.

Radiating a pleased aura, she listened with rapt attention. Her icy blue eyes warming from the kind expression on her face. "I bet I would... What do you find normally surprises you?"

Her eyes dropped to the book he was showing her, and her hand almost went out to touch it. That would be rude though, so she just smiled a bit bashfully, giving a small laugh at her mess up. "It looks rather small, how much is in there? Can I look at it? Oh dear, I keep asking so much. I apologize, my curiosity always runs rampant."

"Middle Aged? Please, you're worse than the women on earth these days. The day YOU need to worry about how old you look will probably come some time around the heat death of the universe." Hideki, what did you discuss with yourself about science jokes and compliments? Don't do them.... anymore... He couldn't help but pick up on her good mood and smile though.

He had been about to answer her question about surprises when her hand came out. He reflexively went to pull the book from her but stopped, joining in with her small laugh. "Uh...No no, you can go ahead and look at it. It's... Well, it's Librom. My Zanpakuto." He flipped it open and held it out to her. "It has infinite pages and can hold any book I scan with..." He paused for dramatic effect as he pulled his glasses out. "These!"

He cleared his throat and placed them on his face, resting his chin on his knuckles as he looked over at her and let his zanpakuto do the rest, filling out a profile for the captain right before her eyes. "As you can see, these glasses scan information into the book. Just leafing through a book puts it in Librom so I can read it later. My hope is that one day I can enter the whole library, even if it takes me a few thousand years."

Hideki was an adorably cute young man, and Lakshmi found herself warming to him right away. He made her want to hug him to her chest and pat his head, though his flirting showed he was rather attracted to her. Probably in a hero-worship kind of way, than actual feelings. She got that way with pretty people as well, so she couldn't fault him. "Well, I hope I look as good as Gigi at her age then."

Noticing how he pulled back, she gave him a small smile. She really should restrain herself more, though as he spoke she realized why. A hand went to her mouth as she stared, realizing her gaffe was larger than she had thought. His zanpakuto had such a unique form, though hers wasn't any different in that aspect. Pulling the book close to her, she stared at the page in amazement

The glasses... She laughed, rather happily. "This is quite perfect! Ah, such an amazing power. And such an amazing goal. Hideki. You have all this information with you at all times..."

Lakshmi's face lit up and she looked like a kid in a candy shop as she stared at the data about herself. It had her exact age, her measurements... Height weight, bust hips... It had a graph with information about her spiritual energy with the color being the beautiful icy blue she loved. Tapping the page, she grinned. "I seemed to have gained some weight. The bust measurement in an inch off."

At least she didn't seem too perturbed by the science joke. Score one for nerdiness. He wasn't entirely sure who gigi was... maybe a euphemism for grandmother? Hrm... But who was her grandmother? He made his concentrating face for just a second.

"Yeah. It's pretty handy. There's a lot of sitting around as a librarian, so having all those books at the ready can be a blessing. It's fun to doodle in there too." He said, going quiet as he realized how dumb that sounded. "Sketch, I mean." He corrected quickly with a grimace. He was too pleased with her reaction to get self conscious though. He almost choked on his drink however, when she mentioned the bust, narrowly avoiding spitting it out. "I uh.. uhh..." an inch off in which direction? His face turned momentarily red before he managed to laugh nervously with a small shrug. "Eh. Miscalculations happen." Ever so smooth.

"Here." He said, recovering quickly. He took the glasses off and reached over, gently slipping them onto Lakshmi's face. "Take a look around. Anything you scan will show up in the book."

Something she has said made Hideki think for a second, but the Taicho could not figure it out for the life of her. It was rather well known who's granddaughter she was, even if it wasn't known how or where she had come from. She was used to everyone knowing already.

She was distracted by his words, so it seemed there was a lot of sitting around to be done? It could be relaxing honestly. Lakshmi didn't get enough time to rest that she would become too bored, though a few days she had no idea what to do with herself. Intrigued by the thought of doodles, she left behind the page with her stats and started flipping through the book. There didn't seem to be any other pages filled in though and she frowned slightly as she concentrated. "Oh, I doubt there was a miscalculation. The other statistics were rather spot on, and it is hard to measure ones self... Huh?"

Lakshmi had been focused on the book, not on Hideki, so as his glasses came down on her face she startled up. They were crooked and she quickly adjusted them, staring around the room in awe. "I can see just fine out of these, they don't make my vision blurry at all... To be expected of a zanpakuto for sure. Thank you Hideki, it is rather nice of you to humor me."

"Oh my look!" As she smiled at the young man, a page was flipped to with lots of information in it about the young man. One number caught her eye and her hand came up as she gasped. She adjusted the glasses on her face and looked utterly shocked. "You... are only twenty-two... I have never heard of a shinigami so young... Were you born here? Or..."

The second alternative was worse. She didn't want to look at the page below her, no matter how curious she was. If it said it, it would be awful prying.

If he weren't such a RESOUNDING GENTLEMAN, he might have made some comment or joke about the bust measurement. As it was, he was simply trying as hard as possible to not visualize the scene. Not necessarily succeeding, but trying his best, damn it. He also would have told her the trick to finding pages if he hadn't been busy putting the glasses on her. Which just looked absolutely adorable, by the way.

"Well, the vision shouldn't be altered at all. I actually don't need glasses. Those are just there for the scanning effect." he admitted before his stomach tightened into a little bit of a knot, realizing around the time she gasped what she was about to learn. He visibly sank when she started asking about his age. Not that it was a sore subject or anything, but... "Yeah... I died about 6 years ago." He absentmindedly crossed his arms. "It's not a particularly big deal or anything. I mean... I'm doing pretty well here and given how aging seems to work, I'm a little glad I died now and not when I was like... in my 60s or something..."

"That does seem logical." A bit of her hair fell forward as she nodded, the Taicho still thinking about how it must work. Her zanpakuto was also odd, in the shape of chains. It should have been a continuous release zanpakuto with its shape but... It seemed to have some sort of shikai, though that may just be its release of its energy or locks. She had thought it over for years but had no idea. Honestly it was something she should bring up with the Division Twelve Taicho. He was rather cute enough.

She was still paying attention enough to realize she had made a huge mistake. Sighing and fluffing her hair, her curiosity and lack of holding her mouth when too busy searching for knowledge struck once again. His words said one thing but his actions another. It was bothering him even if he tried to ignore it. Moving to her knees on the couch, she set the book to the side. Reaching forward, she gently pulled Hideki to her in a soft hug. Her head on top of his, she stroked his hair as she held him to her. "Mm. It is okay to be upset about things, you know Hideki. Especially painful things such as that."

His eyes tracked as some of her hair fell and then as she fluffed it. What was she doing with her hair? He never understood why women worried about their hair so much. Not that her hair wasn't nice. She moved to her knees. A confused "Eh?" was all he got out before being pulled into the hug. His arms flailed about in his confusion, suddenly squeezed into... well... incredible comfort and... heavenly scent. Oh dear. His face was exactly where he thought it was, and Lakshmi smelled exactly as nice as one would suspect of her. He was trying to answer her question, albeit muffled, but the second she started stroking his hair, she'd noticed him give in to the hug and sort of collapse into her, giving a relaxed noise.

Damn it... not the hair... It was like Hideki kryptonite...

Hideki melted against her and Lakshmi took that to mean she was forgiven and he was going to feel a bit better about things. Hugs always healed and she continued stroking his hair softly with a smile on. "I'm really sorry... It must be hard for you, having your family still be there where you know they are...but not being allowed to see them. I have Gigi at least, so I have comfort. Have you made friends though?"

Hm? She said something right? He was in soft and comfy dimension, with a thick layer of fluff between him and the outside world now, all buffered out by the soothing feel of Lakshmi's hand going through his hair. "Uh-huh." Was all that he managed to mutter, turning his head to lean further into her, his weight starting to fall against the captain. He tried REALLY hard to keep it together, but found himself... not quite drifting off, but he felt like he was floating just a little bit. Surely even the captain had to realize that poor Hideki was practically hypnotized?

Hideki seemed to have melted entirely against her. Lakshmi was not sure what to do with such a situation, as Hideki definitely wasn't doing it on purpose. In fact he seemed rather broken by something... Pulling her hands away, she helped prop him up from her body with a small frown.

"Are you okay, Hideki? Was the hugging too much? I was sure hugs helped people feel better. Oh bother."

As she pulled him away, it was like a spell had been lifted. He sat up, under his own power now, and shook his head to clear his mind, before looking at her, face flushed. "N...N-no. Hugs are fine." He just... He just was not going to discuss where she'd hugged him into. But the other subject. "Um... I just.." His face turned brighter red. "Messing with my hair is just sort of.. It's uh... I guess like my off switch?" He wasn't sure why he was letting her know this. Just... at least so she wouldn't wonder about it, he supposed.

"Oh! That makes a lot of sense. I suppose I should not do that again." Lakshmi nodded as the hand that had played with the young man's hair slid up her neck. It stopped on her cheek as she leaned her head against it, one finger tapping against her cheek. "Your hair is rather soft, you must take such good care of it."

"I wonder if there is more in your book I could look at? That way I don't bother you with hugs and turning your mind off, hm?" She gave him a soft knowing smile, understanding his predicament.