After a long day the captain of the 13th Division just wanted to get to her office, sit down and have some tea, maybe do some reading. She was walking peacefully when she was waved at by some shinigami from her division, " Hello Kiara-sama!" Kiara waved back and smiled to herself. She kept walking letting her captains robe flare out behind her, and her jet black hair, which she normally had up so it wouldn't be in her face, was pulled down and hanging over her shoulders.

It wasn't long before she found trouble, she was good at that. a crowd of Academy Students were in a circle, watching two boys fight. Some tried to separate them, but none succeeded. " oh for the love of-" she paused and walked through the circle, the students walking away as to not get in trouble by the 5'4'' captain. The two boys were attacking each other with fists, feet, it didn't matter. Kiara sighed, and with a quick and agile move of her hands she separated the boys. One boy was on his knees arms pulled up behind his back and she was standing on his wrists to keep him from moving, the other was on his knees with her zanpakuto at his neck. Both begged fro her not to kill them, she chuckled to herself, let the two go, sealed and put away her zanpakuto and looked at both the boys.

" I wasn't going to kill you, but if you get in another fight you better be wearing black robes or I will..." she said, both boys bowed and ran of. " men, geez..." she said and rolled her eyes...

It was a pretty nice day in Soul Society today. Sai usually thought it was everyday. He looked into the sky, and saw the infinite white puff of smoke sail through the azure as if it was their own ocean. The limit was the sky. Sai was laying on his back, staring at the sky, trying to make sense of it.

He had a small bowl of sake on the ground next to him. When he realized that he was thinking to hard, he would occasionally take a nice sip of the sake, and resume looking at the sky. He was careful, not to fill to much on sake, or else he would run the risk of being drunk.

"Ah man, I'm all out."

Sai said to himself as he stood from the building, with one shunpo, he found himself at the Divison 3 head quarters. His shunpo was exceptionally advanced because of his intensive years of training. Once could only master it within a few centuries, and Sai certainly had the experience. He placed the small bowl on his desk. The bowl sat down next to a mountain of paperwork, and behind it was a shinigami who was trying to get it organized.

"Sir, I don't think it's proper for you to slack off like this." The shinigami said.

"Don't worry about it, I'm paying you by the hour aren't I?" Sai said as he tossed a silver coin to the shinigami, who caught it with his teeth since his hands were to busy organizing.

"Well, I'm going to get some food and head over to the Academy for some nostalgic remembrances." Sai said as he did a quick shunpo out of his division hq, and he was in the middle of a busy market, just across the walkway of his favorite place to eat. He approached the food place, using his hand to move the curtain that was in his way.

"Hey Miki-chan!" Sai said respectfully.

"Hey Sai, your my favorite customer! So, would it be the usual?" The owner said.

"That is correct Miki-chan." Said Sai.

The owner, Miki, quickly walked into the backroom, and within a few minutes, she exited with a rice bowl that was covered with gravy and had trout on the top.

"Your my favorite Miki-chan!" Sai said as he removed the bowl from Miki's hands and took some chopsticks.

"That will be 60 yen." Miki said.

"Just put it on my tab." Sai said with a smile. With a quick shunpo, he was off to the Academy, to fast for Miki to protest.

Sai was near the front entrance of the Academy, when he saw a small crowd of Academy students. It seemed that they were observing a fight. Eating the rest of his fish in one big gulp, Sai didn't feel any sense of urgency to stop it, of course it was his job to if no one else was there, but he was to lost in thought.

"I remember my first fight. I lost of course, because I wasn't so good at hand to hand." Sai said to himself as he started to munch down some of the gravy covered rice that was below the fish he ate. As he approached the crowd to stop the fight, he noticed that another captain had beat him to the punch. Eventually, the crowd would disperse, and the school day for the Academy students would continue the next day, leaving only Sai and the captain.

"Hey, nice job with those students. I know plenty of captains, and I'm sure your one of the older ones like me, what's your name?" Sai asked the nostalgic captain.

Kiara looked up at the captain in front of her. She smiled and nodded in thanks for his compliment. She was popular with the students, due to her social personality and abilities. She sighed, this guy was familiar, but she couldn't tell from were. He was a captain so, that might have been it.

She clasped her hands in front of her and answered his question, " Kiara Evean, 13th Division Captain..."

She looked the tall and lanky captain over and frowned, " ... and you are?" she asked, her head tilted to the side just a touch.

Sai observed the captain in front of him. She was quite beautiful to him, despite her size. Well, Sai himself isn't well known for his incredible height either, but at least he wasn't as small as Hitsugaya, now that kid was short. With a soft smile, Sai answered the captain's question, it seemed that smiling was the only thing Sai could do since he loved to do it.

"I'm Sai Sakata, Captain of Squad 3." Sai said. He was used to the title, it seemed that he would never lose it since it had been with him for such a long time. It was quite an odd feeling to him, but if you've been called the same thing for 200+ years, you'll get used to it, or should.

Sai laid his back against the Academy wall near the front entrance, and he sat comfortably on the ground and started eating some more of his gravy covered white rice. He softly patted the ground next to him, inviting the Captain to sit next to him so they could talk more.

"So, do you know the approximate time you entered the Academy?" Sai asked.

Kiara smiled softly, and almost laughed. She sat down next to Sai and thought about when she was in the academy.

She pouted to herself " um... about 300 or so years ago, it's been awhile!" she said and chuckled. She smiled and reached over taking the chopsticks from him, taking a piece if rice and eating it, then stuck the chopsticks back in the rice. " mmmm... my favorite!" she said and laid her head against the wall. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath.

She looked over at him and opened her red eyes before pouting again, " you look so familiar but... I just can't put my finger on it. "

Sai gave Kiara an inviting smile when she sat down, and he listened closely about when she said she was in the academy for at least 300 years. 300 years? I was definitely in it by then, so I wonder..... Sai thought to himself.

Kiara did bring up some familiar feelings deep inside, it was very nostalgic indeed. While he was deep in thought for awhile, she sneaked some chopsticks from Sai and ate some of his rice, by the time Sai was done thinking, he could only laugh at her. He quickly ate the last remaining bit of food from the bowl and sat it beside him.

"I tend to have that effect on women." Sai said, chuckling a little bit.

"But, I do think we may have crossed paths before, but I just can't put my finger on it. Well, there was somebody in my combat class that was kind of small." Sai said. He didn't know if it was Kiara or not, so he needed her confirmation.

Kiara giggled when he said he had that effect on women. She started thinking about her combat class. She hated it, she was always bad at combat, she would have failed that class if it wasn't... wait... She looked over.

" the small girl, never one anything, when we had simulations she always failed and had to have her teammates save her from stuff? " she asked, knowing that if he said yes it was her. She tired to think if she had seen Sai in her combat class, well in any of her classes. I do remember one time were I was getting bullied by some big guys and somebody got them away, but I never saw the person...

"Yea, her teammates helped her out a lot. But, I think she grew from it. People tend to be better when they learn the hard way and work their way up instead of being gifted, she could be captain for all we know." Sai said putting scratching his chin, he became lost in thought for awhile, thinking about how this could have related to her.

"There was a time, when I stopped some bullies from picking on a girl. It was sometime after combat class, I think it was the same girl. Well, she was grateful to me, but I don't think we saw much of each other. I was mostly asleep in class or skipping, I never really liked school since I was pretty good at it." Sai said as he chuckled to himself. It was true that he was good at school, he was an exceptional swordsman and very adept at Kidou, but he never really paid enough attention as he should of, and he felt a little ashamed about it.

Kiara looked down at the ground... she sighed and ran a hand through her hair.

" that girl is a captain..." she said and looked up, but not a Sai, " your lookin' at her..." she said and frowned, her face more serious then happy and bubbly. " I did get better, but I'm famous for my brains, not my brawn. " she paused before sighing again, " I remember you now, you were always good in that class, I envied you for being so talented with a sword..." she sat in silence unless Sai started to talk again.

During the brief silence between the two, Sai started to chew on a small piece of fish left in his bowl with his chopsticks.

Sai was surprised to hear that the girl he was referring to was actually a captain. It didn't seem really likely to him, but if you work hard enough, then anybody can do anything. At least, that's what Sai thought.

"Really? She's a captain? I couldn't even fathom that in the Academy." Sai said surprisingly.

"What! It was you!" Sai was so surprised that he started to choke on his little bit of fish left. He started to beat his chest in with his fist in order for the fish to smoothly go down his throat. With that, he regained his breath and composure.

"Wow, you've grown." Sai said, complimenting her.

"Well, I got my sword talent mostly from during my life as a human, I-" Sai paused himself, thinking about his human life made him a little sad. It was a horrible time to live, people were killed for their ambitions, and so were his parents.

"I just, had a lot of experience you could say." Sai said. His smile reemerged in his face, but talking about his human life was really hard for him.

Kiara smiled softly when he started to choke, " thanks..." she said softly when he complimented her. She listened to him talk she could tell by the way he was speaking ti was hard for him to talk about it. She was good at noticing those things. She didn't want to think about the academy, it was the one thing she hated about herself, the one time Sai made the bullies leave was not the only time she had been beaten up.

She looked over and patted the side of his face, " don't put on a mask..." she said and turned away, looking up to the sky, " I used to do that and it got me nowhere, when I was that pathetic girl in the academy, I put on this mask like the things people said didn't hurt but they did... it just made me insecure and scared of making friends. It took me years to get over that and start being social again..."

Sai didn't feel sad when he felt the soft hand of the captain upon his face. She told him about the dangers of a putting up a mask. Even though it was sad to him, Sai felt that in order for her to know him a bit better so they could work well in the future, she deserved to know his past. Sai took a deep breath before he decided to tell her about his past.

"Well, I was born in the Warring States Era of Japan, around the late 1400s. Both of my parents joined the army of Hideyoshi Toyotomi. He was a general and a wise ruler, or so I thought. He foolishly entered a battle that he couldn't wind, but believed that it was his "destiny" as the monkey king or something. Well, to make a long story short, my parents died in the battle. I was only 17 years old. A few years later, a general by the name of Nobunaga Oda captured Hideyoshi and his army. Under Nobunaga's leadership, no officers died during battle for a few months. I was very impressed and I joined his army. I was an excellent swordsman because of my father, and on the battlefield I would be tested greatly. However, an officer of Nobunaga turned on him, and when I tried to kill him for treason on one on one combat, he fled and lead me to a trap of musketeers. They fired at me, and next thing I knew I was in Soul Society." Sai said, explaining his entire human history to her.

Kiara sighed, she didn't remember her past, all she could come up with was little blurbs of memory that didn't make any sense. She listed and put her head on her knees. She closed her eyes, and then opened them, when he was done she sighed. " at least you remember, I don't even know if Kiara is my real name... I don't remember anything from my human life..." she said and ran a hand through her hair again.

" but I did make a life here..." she smiled, " there was a boy when I was younger, we were really close, I liked his company. But on our first mission... he didn't make it back... I've never been able to cry since..." she said and ran her hand through her hair again. The movement of her hand kept her from getting too emotional.

Sai absorbed the sad life Kiara had. She didn't have any of the same memories he had, good or bad, it didn't matter for her since she didn't know her past. Sai could only help but keep a smile, if one of them was optimistic and positive, then maybe the other one would get that same vibe and they could share the same energy. He placed his hand on Kiara's shoulder, and gave her a light smile.

"Despite everything that has happened to us, I think it's important that we look toward the future. We learn from the past, weather it was here or from the time we were humans. We can forge a future for others." Sai said, maintaing his light smile. After his small speech, he stood up on both of his feet.

"I'll be right back." With a quick shunpo, Sai left the area, and just as fast as he left, he came back with two cups of warm tea. He gently handed one to Kiara.

"They say tea is good for the soul." Sai said as he drunk some. The tea really did help his optimism, he was hoping that they could talk about more things then just things that made them sad, but happy moments too.

Kiara looked back when he touched her shoulder, he just kept smiling, which made her smile softly as well. Contagious, that was how she could describe his smile, he was one of those people that no matter what happened there was always something good out of it. She couldn't help but smile at his optimism. When he left and returned with two cups of tea she took it and sipped it quietly.

The warm tea in her throat made her feel happier so she relaxed and let her tense shoulders relax, her hair falling over them. She looked over at him her small face had a curios look across it, " something tells me you know a lot of women..." she joked, though she had a feeling she was right.