Bandage it in Paper (Bleach OC-Centric Fanfic)

Chapter 6 | Secret Keepers

Lyn had barely survived a month of gruelling training. She was barely making it conscious through hakuda and zanjutsu classes, but Akon had snuck into the school grounds twice to heal her since Lyn refused to go to the medical ward and attract attention. Akon agreed with this, not wanting a healer to unknowingly overload Lyn's fragmented soul by trying to force too much reishi into her system at once. It helped that he needed to come by regardless to record more data.

However, not all of Lyn's classes were going terribly. Classes on history and Soul Society laws and regulations were straightforward enough to study. But, Lyn excelled in the class that introduced documentation, reporting, and other forms of paperwork and office management. Her father had been an accountant who had taught her the basics of ledgers and general journal entries when she was considering following him into the same field (an interest that quickly died when she realised just how boring his job was) and helping her mother out in the small local library that she managed.

Those results were ones that Lyn could expect, but surprisingly, Lyn wasn't completely physically inept. She was nimble and quick on her feet in hoho classes, even without being able to speed her movements up with reiryoku yet.

But that only made her fall down the stairs even more embarrassing.

"I swear, I swear I'm not that clumsy," Lyn was talking to herself, head in her hands, as Hanataro led her by the arm to their zanjutsu class.

Shino looked Lyn up and down. "I'd say your fourth fall down the stairs says otherwise." While Shino was in class two for zanjutsu, she still walked with them since all the zanjutsu classes for the first years were done simultaneously – just in different levels of the zanjutsu hall.

Lyn wanted to throw her hands up in the air. "Something tripped me."

"Your feet?" Ryunosuke suggested.

"Is there a kido that can make someone invisible?" Lyn asked.

Hanataro gave Lyn a few pats on the back. "It's okay to be clumsy, Chiba-san. I'm sure you'll grow out of it soon."

"I'm not in denial."

Lyn lightly stumbled again, suddenly feeling her left leg painfully cold to the point where it was starting to burn. "Actually, I think I might have hit my head on the way down those stairs," Lyn awkwardly rubbed at the back of her neck and started to split away from the group. "I'll meet you guys in class after I take a quick trip to the medical office."

"That's what we were telling you to do earlier!" Shino shouted at Lyn as she started to shuffle away into the crowd of other students moving between teaching areas.

"Maybe I should help you get there?" Hanataro asked.

Lyn shot him a strained smile over her shoulder. "I'll be fine, Yamada-san."

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They watched as Lyn walked around a corner, and Hanataro could have sworn he saw a barely disguised limp in her step.

Hanataro sighed. "I wish Chiba-san would let us help her more. She did just fall down some stairs, and she keeps getting injured in training and reopening her wounds. Maybe I should go after her anyway to make sure she makes it to the healers?"

Shino shook her head and started to lead them back towards their classes. "There's no point. That stubborn idiot never lets us go with her when she gets treated, and she's never let any of us check her injuries either."

"Now that I think about it," Ryunosuke cupped his chin thoughtfully. "We've only been training with our bare hands, kido, and wooden swords, and I don't think that we've been getting thrown around hard enough to cause us to bleed. Even I just get super bruised." Ryunosuke lifted his sleeve, revealing a red bruise with a purpling edge.