'Cuz I'm TNT

It was a wonderfully idyllic day in Soul Society. The weather had been calm, each division’s work had gone on without too many problems at all, and everyone was enjoying the nice, calming day they had been given. It’s too bad that it wasn’t meant to last.

Off near the back of the 12th Division Headquarters was a large, open field with little to no trees or other vegetation surrounding it. And for good reason, for soon the peaceful silence that had been granted that day was soon interrupted by two things: A female voice shouting “Clear!”, and a gigantic explosion that shook the walls of the Division, a large column of crackling blue energy rising up into the sky and shooting off into several directions before subsiding shortly after. When the smoke had cleared, the only thing left in the field was a woman with long brown, braided hair with her hands on her hips, laughing wildly.

“Yes! Perfect! Now that’s what I’m talking about!” Yukari Motou, newly minted Lieutenant of the 12th shouted as she began taking rapid notes down on a clipboard that was attached to her waist by a retractable clip. “Twenty percent more output at half the time of the previous concoction, and it even turned blue! Sure, I was going for lime green, but this works too!” She grinned toothily as she finished writing and let the board snap back to her side as she walked over to a distressingly large pile of bombs and bomb-shaped objects.

“Alriiiiight… Which one of you big boys wants to be next? A big promotion calls for a big celebration, after all!” Yukari rubbed her hands together excitedly, eyeing over several garish-looking explosives before deciding on three boxed-shaped charges sitting next to each other. “Yes… yes you will do nicely. Come, my tiny explosive friends, today we celebrate!” Yukari ran to the epicenter of the last explosion and piled on the three boxes on top of each other, quickly running back to her spot a good twenty yards away and holding her fingers up in the pre-snapping position. “Man, I love my job! CLEAR!”

snap

KABOOOOOOOM!

Most people, when loud explosions are heard in the vicinity, would probably walk away from the blasts, not towards them. Most people were not Alexander, however. He had been busy at work like usual on one of his latest projects when he had noticed the glassware in room he was in begun to shake intermittently. Now this meant either earthquakes or explosions, and for his part he was sure it was the latter, considering he had recalled a member of his squad having a certain explosive quality about her to say the very least.

Opening the door to the room in which he had determined the blasts were taking place, he was greeted to a large blast of smoke and debris blasting towards him. Seemingly unfazed by the experience, he quickly dusted his face off and eyed the young woman clearly behind these division shaking blasts.

"I see you seem to be enjoying yourself here...I'm glad you had the foresight to perform such tests in a room that could handle it." The captain remarked in a rather straight-forward manner. As he spoke, he took a few steps towards the woman, eyeing her face as if a computer scanning an item. Ah...Motou, Yukari if he remembered right. Well, that explained the noise. One thing that stood out as he observed, however, was a Lieutenant's arm-badge.

"Hmn...it seems as though that the Academy has seen fit to provide me with a second in command. Perhaps they are more worried about me than I thought..." He paused, smirking a little bit as he chuckled to himself, before turning his red eyes towards the younger woman.

"You are Yukari Motou, correct?" He gave her a chance to introduce herself.

Yukari waited for the last explosion to settle before moving on back to her pile of explosives when she was intercepted by a stranger. Well, okay, not exactly a stranger. He was kinda her Captain. But anyway!

"Captain Alexander, hi!" Yukari waved, picking up a few round charges from her stack of kabooms. "Yep, that's me! Yukari Motou, fresh Lieutenant for the 12th and explosives enthusiast, at your service sir!" She gave him a sort of half salute as her hands could allow as she stood in front of her captain with her arms full. "I actually just got the badge and everything today, so I thought I'd bring all my little toys out for some celebratory action!" She flashed Alex a bright smile and nodded towards the stacked sets of explosives.

"I figured, I get to work in the big lab now, so all these little guys are nothing compared to what I'm getting ready to work on with the good stuff! You know what I'm saying?" Yukari was positively bubbly as she talked, the soot and ash from previous explosions sticking to her clothing seemed to not bother her a single bit as she readied another set of "celebratory" charges.

"Say, you want in on this too? I mean, I can't really stop you if you want to join anyway, but hey invitations are always good too!" Besides, the Captain of the Research and Development Division has to be into explosions even a little bit, right? When you look at it, life's just a big ol' chain of chemical reactions anyway, so how can you not? Speaking of reactions, it was time to place the charges!

Well, she was a lively one. I mean, not that the explosions and her apparent love for them gave it away in the first place, but still. At her urging, he merely smiled a bit in a mischievous manner and reached into his robes, pulling out a small spherical object and tossing it at one of the targets.

The small metal sphere made a whud as it landed, followed by a what sounded like a beeping priming mechanism that got quicker and quicker before the room would light up in a small explosion, rocking the room just the same as before and making an audible boom. Unfazed by all of this, the Captain turned towards the younger woman and continued his chesire cat smile.

"Explosives aren't exactly my one true love, but I have experience in them myself. You and I shall work together and see what we can create." He remarked, his smile turning more genuine for a moment before he resumed his normal serious composure. He was a Captain, after all.

"So tell me, what is your background? Self trained, or did you attend the academy?" Alexander wasn't about to dismiss the woman if she had not gone through proper protocol to gain her rank. He wasn't a stickler for tradition, being a man of science.

Yukari watched with curious eyes as Alexander pulled out the small metal sphere from his robes, eyeing it carefully as he threw it towards the mound of targets that she had. Well now, let's see what the Captain's got... I mean just because it doesn't look that impressive doesn't mean too mu-

And then her thoughts were interrupted by the wonderful explosion the beeping thing made. The goggles on her face pressed a little more snugly as the blast wave hit, but Yukari didn't seem to pay it any mind, here eyes shining with excitement as the smoke cleared from the test area.

Oh yeah, Captain just earned some "Cool Dude" points.

"HAHA! Now that's the ticket!" She lifted the goggles from her face, a clear line separating the not-ash part of her face from the ashen part. "I mean you could use a little more showmanship in it I guess, and the yield could be just that much more in the long run, but that was still great! The way you packed so much power in that tiny thing... Yes!" The fresh Lieutenant was practically jumping up and down in joy as she smiled brightly at Alexander. "Er, no disrespect and everything, though."

Create things, blow up things, it's all the same in the long run! Yukari thought happily, taking the large, padded gloves off of her hands. What was he talking about? Oh right, her training! "Pffft, I wish I could claim this was all me, but I got to give some credit to the Academy: They know how to get all the best materials after all!" She laughed loudly. "A lot more strict about safety guidelines too though, as I found out. Not before doing this to myself though."

Yukari opened her palms towards Alexander and showed him the blackened tips of her fingers, wiggling them rapidly. "Got a bit to excited with one mix and whoops! Right off in my hand. Doctors say I lost most of the nerve endings in the tips, but hey, I've got the whole rest of the hands to use right?" Putting her hands back on her hips she grinned widely back at her Captain. "But I've been blowin' stuff up since I was little, and I don't see any reason to stop now!"

Well, to Alexander it didn't truly matter where this young woman had learned her skills from. A skilled person was a skilled person, even if their education was a bit unorthodox. Knowledge was not something achievable only by those who followed certain guidelines. The captain respected those who pursued it.

When Yukari showed him her blackened fingertips, he took her hands into his own in an examining manner, turning them over a few times to observe them.

"Yes, the damage is easily visible. I believe I should be able to come up with something that would be able to restore feeling, with some help from a friend of mine." He mused as if he was already thinking up many different ways to go about it...which he was, but that was besides the point. Letting go of her hands, he took a step back and grinned just a smidgen.

"But yes, you're right. I could employ some more power into these little devices, but at the same time, one must take into account functionality. In a fight, you never want to sacrifice the latter for the former...Still, as I said, let us see what both of our minds can create on this matter." His grin turned into a bit of a genuine smile. It seemed as though he had gained a second in command as enthusiastic as he was about science. Exploding science, but science none the less.

Yukari watched carefully as Alex took her hands and inspected them. She’d definitely shown them off to other people before, it was kinda a neat party thing to do when a little tipsy so she didn’t mind Alex taking a closer look. His next statement however was a little surprising.

“Oh you don’t have to worry about all that! I kinda wear it with pride, honestly. Reminds me to watch out for what I’m doing just a little bit more, you know what I mean? I mean, if I can just heal away every time I mess something up how am I gonna learn to watch out, right Captain?” Yukari said, grinning brightly. “For example, that’s when I learned to use gloves! Handy little things, aren’t they? Hehe… ‘handy’” Chuckling at her own little joke, Yukari slipped her gloves back over her hands and looked back over at the pile of explosives.

“Believe me, Captain; I’m psyched about working with you too. It’s tons better being a Lieutenant than just an ordinary student back at the Academy. I even get my own room and everything, it’s great! Not to mention I don’t have to fight for space with a roommate again.” She eyed a small stack of explosives and sighed wistfully. “I had to hide my babies all around the school just to make room for all the other stuff. But not anymore! Now I can let them be free as they were always meant to be!”

Yukari all but skipped over to the pile and gathered several more bombs into her arms before looking back over her shoulder at Alex. “Y’know, if you don’t mind me taking a look at your notes for the bombs I’d be willing to work some more power into them. I’ll try to keep them all functional and everything too but hey, sometimes the explosion just has a mind of its own, y’know?” She winked playfully and went to start setting up the next explosive display.

"True. There are instances where experiments often do not go the way we intend...still, you are free to take a look at my notes on the matter." Alexander merely nodded. It was nice that Yukari intended on taking the initiative...although a part of him hoped he wouldn't have to deal with missing rooms in his division caused by explosive testing...Well, in the end, that was part of the process he surmised.

Suddenly remembering something, he reached into his haori and pulled out a minor device, tossing it towards the young woman's way. It could either function as a watch or a small pocketed object, depending on the way the user wanted it.

"If you are my second, then you will need to be outfitted properly. That is a portable version of the database I have built. I've already input your credentials and you have access appropriate to your rank as according to the Gotei Thirteen...although I am not one for rules particularly if they get in the way of progress..." He smirked a little bit, letting his Lieutenant know in a subtle way that he would grant her access to topics that HE deemed important, not the Gotei.

"The drawback to the size of the device is that one is unable to add to the archive, only access it. To do the former, you will need to go to the mainframe itself. I will acquaint you with it shortly. I take it you are already familiar with the general layout of my Division, however?" The captain asked. He would not be surprised if she had already introduced herself to the Storeroom...not that he could really blame her.

“Oh boy, don’t I know it? There was this one time where I designed a charge for a research project that you could kinda shape to explode a certain way? Well in all the fuss in making it I accidentally made it to type of sticky explosive instead. On one hand, failed the project. On the other hand? Had a ton of fun making really small ones to stick on people’s chairs to give them a bit of a scare when they sat down.” She chuckled brightly as she arranged the pile of explosives into a nice little pyramid before sensing Alex tossing something her way.

Yukari quickly caught the device in her left hand, inspecting it a bit as she listened to her Captain explain its purpose. “Ohhh, I see! Pretty neat thing you got here, Cap!” She gratefully pocketed it for now as she stood up and turned around to face Alex. She really wanted to explode this new pile, but it would have been kinda rude to just… ignore her new Captain right off the bat. She’d give it a few more weeks before doing that.

Databases, mainframes, sounds like Captain Alex really has his work down pat. Pretty sure I can take a look at this and see if he needs any help on the explosive front~ Yukari thought playfully. Now what was he asking? Division layout stuff?

“Uhh, I mean I kinda know my way around the place? To be perfectly honest I tried a bit of a tour, but then saw this really open field out back and just had to get my babies out and celebrate a bit, hehe…” She shrugged apologetically as she gave Alex a little grin. “But hey, I’m all up for that tour if you want to give one. What kinda Lieutenant doesn’t know her way around the Division, right?”