Disclaimer:

I don't even own a bottle of bleach, much less Bleach Bleach.

I am my own Beta. Forgive me, for I know not what I do wrong.

AN: I think that the main reason I always write male/male stories is because I don't understand women very well. Is that deep or just self-depreciating? Thanks for the reviews! They motivate me. And that's a big deal because I'm lazy.

If you wanna come in
You'll have to stretch my skin
If you wanna survive with those beautiful eyes
You'll give in

-"Bleed Together"- Lovedrug

Gin picked erratically at the natto salad that one of the lesser arrancar had served him as a sorry excuse for a midday meal. Hardly a dozen of the sticky, pungent beans had passed between the shinigami's thin lips before he laid his chopsticks down and pushed the mostly full bowl away with a disgusted grunt. Gin couldn't bring himself to eat, not after last night. Hearing Izuru's voice for the first time in several years had stripped Gin of his already meager appetite.

The fact that he was lunching with an audience didn't do much to stimulate Gin's culinary enthusiasm either. He'd always had a problem with eating in front of other people; in fact it was that particular idiosyncratic social compulsion that had whittled the taicho's six-foot frame into a solid pillar of bone and sinew. Adipose buildup, or any of the usual fatty deposits that clung steadfastly to even the most ardent of anorexics, seemed to avoid Gin's body as surely as the ten Espada did. He blamed his unnatural slimness on a fast metabolism, or a pocket of energy-burning reiatsu he didn't know about.

"Gin." Sosuke's deep voice echoed massively in the large ballroom-sized space he'd refurbished to act as a dining room in the cavernous compound the resurgent Shinigami called home. Las Noches.

"Wha? Oh, gomen Aizen-sama. I wasn' payin attention." Gin was caught off guard when Sosuke addressed him as their meals were traditionally taken in silence (yet another reason Gin rarely ate communally. The chamber was so quiet he could hear himself chewing and the noise positively disgusted him).

"Kira Izuru's body was counted among the enemy dead after our last battle."

A day ago, Gin would have been visibly shocked- he might even have frowned at having such…interesting news sprung on him at mealtime. But this was no news to the deceptively sanguine shinigami; he merely cocked an eyebrow and answered Sosuke blandly.

"Don' trouble me with news like that, if ya please. I'm eatin and ya know how I hate sad stori-"

Aizen interrupted him, already having heard enough of Gin's dicey verbiage to confirm his suspicion.

"Kira-san's quarters were demolished in a fire last night, Gin. Soul Society is in an uproar. Now, I will only ask you this once: did you have anything whatsoever to do with the fire? You know better than to attempt to lie to me."

Well, shit. So much for keeping things secret. Gin would have wagered Shinso towards the probability that Ulquiorra had dashed into Aizen's lap and squealed like a big horned piggy the minute after he dropped off Izuru's records.

"Oh, 'bout that." Gin adjusted the collar of his robes and turned to smile apologetically at his superior. "Yeah, I had to burn his stuff. Mostly for security reasons. He was trackin' me, see."

Aizen's cold brown eyes scanned over Gin's perspiring frame. After an interminable silence, he sniffed and concluded the conversation.

"Eat your natto, Gin."

"Hai, Aizen-sama"

Gin looked up from his repugnant bean salad (the smell of natto repulsed him) and locked eyes with a solitary figure that had positioned itself across the vast hall at some point during his conversation with Aizen. Ulquiorra was standing so tranquilly that Gin had to open his eyes slightly to reassure himself that the espada wasn't simply a flaw in the architecture. As much as Gin wanted to strangle Ulquiorra for being Aizen's lapdog, he knew that he couldn't blame the espada for his unwavering loyalty. He cocked his head in an attempt to silently communicate with the stoic arrancar:

You hate me, so you betrayed me. I understand that. Did you tell him about the package?

Ulquiorra appeared to understand Gin's wordless message. He responded with an almost imperceptible shake of his head.

No. Todos necesitan sus secretos aquí. Lo entiendo. Estás salva conmigo. ((see note))

With one last fleeting glance over at Aizen-sama, Ulquiorra turned on his heel and disappeared down the nearest corridor.

--)eswie(--

December 20, 18:14. Session Two

"What did you mean when you called yourself an 'amputee'?"

Exactly as I said. If I lost an arm or a leg I'd be impaired. I wouldn't be able t-to function as I had before. I'd have to learn a new way of life and retrain myself to live without the… without that missing part of me. That's what would happen if somebody I cared about lef- got lost.

A long pause.

"Is that what you think Ichimaru Taicho did? He got lost?"

No, my Taicho never get lost. He just…absconded.

"And what did that mean for you, to have him abandon you?"

The timbre of Izuru's voice changed dramatically as his rarely piqued temper flared up at the other speaker. Gin imagined for a moment that he could feel the frantic pulse of Kira's usually stable reiatsu flowing out of the phonograph, but of course that was impossible. Izuru's voice, seasoned or not by his oft-hidden anger, was nothing but the shadow of a footprint left behind by the dead fukutaicho.

I didn't say he abandoned me! I said he absconded. That's- it's different! He didn't desert me! There's one thing you need to get straight right now- my taicho did NOT abandon me! He didn't- he couldn't!

A crash; a brief scuffle. The noise cut out abruptly as someone had evidently had the sense to reach over and turn the recording off before it got damaged in whatever fracas had occurred.

End of Session Two.

Even in flashback, Izuru's unbreakable loyalty struck a chord of appreciation in Gin's noticeably deficient heart. But even that faithfulness had been deemed suspect by many seated officials. Brainwashing, they called it. Stockholm Syndrome. Gin had chalked it up to the possibility that Kira was the tiniest bit in love with him.

December 27, 19:00, Session Three

He saved my life, I mean we would have been slaughtered by those Huge Hollows if Aizen-san and…you-know-who never showed up. I watched him fight with such control and…and I became enraptured. I knew that he smiled all the time but when he looked down and reassured the three of us that everything would be all right, I don't know. I was young and I imagined that he was smiling just at me. He said I was brave. I almost fainted. I thought he was fearless.

I was a silly freshman and he was a vice-captain. The distance, um…the power gap rather, it was immense. He was so cool with the premature grey and everything. I know a lot of people wouldn't have agreed with me on it but I thought he was very handsome in his uniform. And tall! I knew that I wanted to either be just like him or serve under him forever, whichever came first.

Izuru was never aware of how close he came to losing his only opportunity to be with Gin. When Aizen took Kira into his division along with Hinamori and Abarai, it had been his intention to groom them all into Sosuke loyalists. They were the most promising graduates of the shinigami academy, but none of them proved themselves to have that outstanding trait- the fear of death- housed within their souls. They would be useful as pawns and nothing more.

When the time came to release the gifted trio into the greater ranks of the Gotei 13, Kuchiki Byakuyu had asked Aizen specifically for Izuru Kira to be transferred into his newly acquired sixth division. He wanted Kira-san because he felt that he had much in common with the powerful young man. They were both reserved, quietly elegant men with noble blood and a keen sense of social propriety. His intentions were perhaps fatherly. Either way, Gin had fought to secure Izuru's place in the third division after learning that he had competition for the blond's subordinateship. Especially if that competition was that high-riding, flowery pompadour Byakuya. Izuru had been marked as Gin's for months, there was no way that he was going to allow Kuckiki to steal him away then.

Gin's closeness with Aizen ensured that he came out of that battle in the place of the victor. Pretty Kira was awarded to the disorganized, sarcastic, lazy, slit-eyed taicho and Byakuya eventually wound up with…Abarai Renji.

…And people still wondered why Gin seemed to smirk a little wider whenever he passed Byakuya in the street. He'd never allowed that baroque nobleman to forget that he couldn't always get what he wanted. Gin always made a point to strike up pointless conversations with Byakuya to test his resolve and to rub their shared standing in the sixth division captain's exquisite face.

Everyone avoided him and advised me to do the same. Renji didn't like him and Momo changed the subject whenever I brought him up. It was the smile. They- I heard people say that he was so fake, so counterfeit with his emotions.

I just thought he looked lonely. Like he smiled because he had nothing else to do with his lips.

Kira spent the first few weeks reorganizing the third division's headquarters and trying desperately to get Gin's drastically overdue paperwork in before the whole division was cited. Gin would lounge lazily on a futon in his office and watch as the skinny-legged blond would scurry first to one end of the room, then the other, then to the desk, then out the door…it was like watching a busy ant trying to bring an entire loaf of bread home one crumb at a time. Fruitless. Pathetic. Hilarious. Gin would occasionally call for Izuru to make tea for him, but mostly he would nap in the shade of his quarters and watch Izuru mill about from underneath his heavily hooded eyelids. Izuru would occasionally cast a glance behind him, as if wondering if Gin was ever going to acknowledge his work or (dare he hope?) help out with the massive deficit of labor Gin had dug himself into.

That's where the sex came in. Gin walked into his office on one otherwise uneventful evening to find Kira snoring lightly over a half-inked report that was supposed to have gone to the General yesterday. His young body was worn out and sprawled limply across the surface of the cherrywood desk. A thin line of drool had descended from Izuru's bottom lip to waterstain the parchment beneath his head. The forelock of soft blond hair that Izuru had just started to grow out over his face had been swept back counterproductively, leaving the smooth expanse of his golden forehead exposed. Despite the peace brought on by the sudden slumber, Gin detected a silent note of sadness in Izuru's reaitsu. He sensed Izuru's hurt that his Taicho was ostensibly ignoring him. Izuru had desired a closer relationship with Gin; he needed to feel that he was needed and not just convenient.

Gin laid his head down on the desk next to Kira and wiped away the trail of spittle with the tip of a long, bony finger. After wiping his hand on his hakama, Gin woke Izuru up by reaching into his shirt and lightly pinching the first fold of skin he could get between his fingernails. Izuru woke up to see Gin's face planted not an inch away from his own and…screamed.

Gin had found Izuru's yelp to be the funniest sound he'd ever heard his fukutaicho make. He expressed his amusement by crushing their lips together, chucking darkly as he physically pried Izuru's jaws open and forced his dexterous tongue through the younger man's forcibly parted lips. Kira's shrieks melded into whimpers that somehow gave way to gasps and guarded moans as Gin proceeded to lavish the virginal blond with all the attention Izuru ever could have desired…from the waist-down.

"I see ya sighin' at me, Izuru" Gin had whispered in Kira's ear after they had been spent, sated and showered. They were curled up with postcoital finality together in Izuru's bed, despite the blaringly obvious fact that the bed was better suited for more singular sleeping pursuits. The satisfied taicho possessively draped a skeletal arm over Izuru's chest as they stared at a sickle moon through the skylight in his room.

"Don' go thinkin' that your taicho doesn' appreciate ya." Gin had rolled over onto his side and pressed an obligatory kiss at the base of Izuru's neck.

"Thank you, Izuru." He knew how badly Izuru needed to be accepted. Would fixing Izuru's damage be as easy as a few languid fucks and some well-placed compliments? Gin sincerely hoped not, but it was a grand start. You can learn a lot about a person by seeing how quickly they adapt to being molested.

Izuru had answered Gin with a kiss administered with such bruising force that Gin literally felt himself swallow his next words. This time it was Kira who coaxed Gin's lips open and Kira who clutched Gin's shoulders with able hands that trembled with pent-up emotion. He kissed Gin and kissed Gin until they fell asleep.

I was…astounded by Gin's body. There- I said his name, didn't I? Gin. Ichimaru Gin. Gin Gin Gin. Hurrah.

His body. I was astonished by it. The first thing I noticed was his skin. He was so flawlessly pale except for a few, uh, these two little birthmarks on his thigh and a tiny fifth division tattoo he'd had done between his shoulder blades. I think he's had it removed since.

Izuru was wrong. The tiny number was still there- Gin kept it out of a show of deference for Aizen, he supposed. Even after he earned his own division in his own right, Gin remained marked as Sosuke's subsidiary.

But when I say pale, think the moon. Think linen, think mushrooms. He was always perfect like that- like even tan lines were afraid of him. He towered over me by ten, maybe twelve centimeters but it wasn't all in one place, you know? How some people are all legs or some people just have a long torso…not Gin. (There it goes again! Gin!) He was measured out in some divine ratio and I-I stared. For a long time I just watched him remove his clothing. Did you ever think about his hair? Yeah, it's silver but I mean the rest of it. It's not grey. He had this thin, kind of downy covering on his arms and legs. Dark, but you can hardly notice it. No knuckle hair, no chest hair.

It wasn't even thick down there. Yes, it was there but it wasn't obnoxiously there. Which is nice, I guess. I mean you can't rule people out just because they've got a lot of hair but Gin was really blessed in that sense. I saw his body in the light and didn't want to take my own clothes off. I have scars and sunburn and I'm not totally blond; I was very inexperienced. He had to undress me the first few times, but that's okay. I think he liked it.

"You speak as if…Gin was flawless in your eyes."

Izuru's hollow, hurried laughter erupted again from the depths of Gin's phonograph.

Kami, no! Gin wasn't flawless. He shed his hair like a summer panda. It was impossible to get it all off my pillows and my clothing. Silver threads everywhere, clogging up my drains and winding up in my food.

His elbows were razor sharp, his ribs stuck out more than his stomach, and when he slept on top of me all I remember feeling is his bones on my bones. He was emaciated, but he still managed to have his beauty within that.

You're looking at me strangely, is it because I've said Gin had beauty? I never understood how the others never saw it. Gin was stunning and I'll always give him credit for th-

Kira corrected himself. I shouldn't talk in this past tense. "Gin was this and Gin was that." It's not like he's dead or anything. He's not dead…just gone.

Gin choked on the tea he'd been enjoying up until that moment. Those precise words coming out of Izuru's mouth were unsettling. And converse.

I hope he likes the food better wherever he is now, because he never ate much here. Or, at least, he never ate in front of me. Do you think he had a……an issue with that? I've never even thought about it. I should have cooked for him or something.

End of Session Three

"Honestly, Izuru," Gin raised his cup in a lighthearted toast to his late lover,

"I'm not sure whether or not I'm s'posed to be flattered by that, but I appreciate tha detail all tha same."

He drank down the dregs of his tea before removing the record from its revolving podium. It was very interesting to hear these things so many years after they'd initially occurred. The idea that that he left such a lasting impression on Izuru from the first day they'd met reawakened the substantial ego Gin had abandoned in favor of serving Aizen so many years ago. And to hear Izuru speak of his body so candidly was…informative, to say the least.

Gin recalled being impressed with the solidly aureate figure Izuru had cut when released from the constrictions of his shinigami uniform. Where Gin had bones, Izuru had freshly trained muscle. Gin's blue eyes were washed-out and insipid; Izuru's were cheerless but vivid. Izuru was athletic, moisturized, and limber. Gin had patches of dry skin behind his knees and wasn't anywhere near as flexible as the oft-mentioned "snake" comparison would have led one to assume.

All the tea that was left in the pot was ice-cold. Gin rang for someone to come and make him some more (Izuru had spoiled Gin into relying on other people to make his tea and the convention had persisted through the years…). When the service arrancar appeared at his door, Gin politely asked for another pot of hot water and some white tea leaves.

"Hai, Ichimaru-sama. It will take me five minutes."

In a moment of nostalgic impulse, Gin called out for the arrancar to wait a moment.

"Actually, if ya could grab a snack for me while yer in the kitchens, that'd be great. Don' ask me what I want. Surprise me."

Eight minutes later, the arrancar returned with a pot of fresh tea and a bowl of…natto bean salad.
Gin ate the whole bowl.

"You got it wrong, this isn't right
There's something beautiful that hasn't yet died
This stupid song
My popularity
I see my misery and it looks fine."

--)eswie(--

Omake:

Ulquiorra: "I'm acting kinda sketchy. Does this mean that I get a subplot?"
Seldelaterre: "Eh….maybe."
Ulquiorra: "Oh come on, I'm your favorite Espada! Gimme a subplot."
Seldelaterre: "I'll think about it."
Ulquiorra: "What do I have to do to convince you to give me a subplot?"
Seldelaterre: "…make me a sandwich."
Ulquiorra: "This is degrading…"

((note -)) - "No. Everybody needs their secrets here. I understand that. You are safe with me."

Ulquiorra: "...Hey man I've got your sandwich but- HEY! Since when do I speak Spanish?"
Seldelaterre: "Thanksforthesandwichulquigottagobye!"
Ulquiorra: "Lo coño."