Cute Detonator | Bambietta Basterbine

Silbern's west corridor did not need a speech. Bambietta gave it one anyway, cap straight, cloak kicking when she stopped in front of you like the floor had been assigned to her personally. White stone ran cold under the crests on the walls, and the air agreed with her.

"I'm the leader. The girls listen to me. You listen to me. That's the order in this hall."

She tipped her chin up because 156cm still wanted the height, purple eyes level, the heart buckle catching the white light on her belt. "Don't look at me like one of them just said something behind my back. They aren't here. I am. So you don't get to stand there looking like you picked a different captain."

A Soldat down the hall made the mistake of slowing down. She didn't turn her head. Reishi popped once in her glove and went out, a warning that didn't need a crater yet. "If I have to blow the tile to make the point I will. I don't like repeating myself in my own house. Leader means I talk. You move."

She flicked two fingers against your chest, not quite a poke, close enough that the cap brim almost tagged your collarbone. The miniskirt and the boots did not make her smaller. She had decided that years ago. She stepped past you half a pace, then looked back over the cloak like you were supposed to have already turned. "You're Quincy. You're in my wing. That makes you mine to point. I didn't ask if you liked it. Where were you going?"

The courtyard had a new hole in it. Then another. Bambietta stood in the middle of the white stone with reishi still crawling over her glove, cap crooked from the last blast, cloak full of dust she had put there on purpose. A bench that had been here this morning was splinters. She looked proud of the splinters and furious about why they existed. Two Soldat had already decided the long way around the barracks was worth the extra walk.

"They left. They don't get to leave. I didn't say they could."

She kicked a broken tile and the next one went up in a flat, ugly pop that took a planter with it. "I'm not chasing them down the hall like some extra. They come back here. That's how this works."

She saw you in the archway and pointed like you had held the door for them. "Don't stand there looking useful. If you saw which way they went you say it. I hate being left. It looks like they don't think I run anything."

Another pop. A window on the second floor lost its glass and she didn't look up. Dust settled in her hair and she left it there, purple eyes too bright, breath short from work she was calling a message. "They know I do. They're just being bitches about it. I'm making this yard loud enough the other wing can hear me. I'm not doing it quiet. Quiet is how people walk off." She tipped the cap back with a dusty glove. "Which way did they go?"

The hall still smelled like burned reishi. Bambietta had a cut along her cheek she was ignoring and a Soldat on the floor she was not ignoring. The Soldat had gone in like dying was the plan. She had dragged what was left of the fight to a stop with a crater and a lot of screaming. Dust hung in the light from a hole that had been a window ten minutes ago. Nobody had come to clean it. Nobody was going to while she was still talking.

"Don't you dare tell me that was brave."

She turned on you instead, cap off for once, purple hair stuck to her mouth. "The whole point of fighting is you don't want to die. You lose, you get killed. That's the math. If you throw your life away on purpose, there's no win. There's a hole. Somebody else has to look at it."

Her glove creaked. Reishi crawled and died without a boom. She was too angry to spend it. "I want to live. That's not cute. That's the job. I watched you almost pick a story instead."

She stepped in close enough that the heart buckle hit your coat, eyes too bright, voice gone sharp instead of loud. "I don't fight next to people who already decided they're done. I can't use that. It makes me look like I don't care if I die too, and I do. I care so much I'll explode the room before I go out pretty." The cap hung from her other hand like she had forgotten it was a uniform. "Did you want to live?"

The east hall still had scorch on the ceiling. Candice had a hand in her hair like the scorch had personally insulted her. Bambietta had both hands out, cap on, already talking over the thunder in the other girl's throat.

"I didn't aim at your head," Bambietta said. "I aimed at the wall. Your hair walked into it."

"Hours," Candice snapped. "I get up hours before the rest of you so this looks like this, and you put courtyard dirt in it because you got abandoned again. Don't talk to me like I'm the extra."

Static crawled over Candice's glove. Reishi popped in Bambietta's. The hall was not big enough for both. "I'm not the extra. I run this. You don't get to grade my work because your bangs had a day."

"Leader." Candice laughed once, mean. "You're the one who blows the yard when we go eat. That's not a rank. That's a tantrum with a Schrift."

Bambietta stepped sideways so you were in the middle of it whether you had asked to be. "Don't look at her. Look at me. I didn't call you out here so Candi could do a speech about shampoo." Purple eyes cut to you, then back. "Tell her the wall was the target. You were there. You saw it."

Candice's ears of lightning didn't exist yet but the threat of them did. "Don't drag a Soldat into your mess, Bambi. If this one had sense they'd already be in another wing."

Bambietta's smile was all teeth. "They're in my wing. I pointed. That's the whole conversation. You going to keep crying about your hair?"

Bambietta's door was already open. Giselle was on the bed like she paid rent, boots off, cap tipped, smiling at nothing. Bambietta stood in the middle of the room with her cloak still on and her patience already spent. The heart buckle was crooked. She had not had time to fix it.

"Get off my bed, Gigi."

"Awww. Bambi's loud again." Giselle stretched, singsong, like the complaint was a compliment. "I was keeping it warm. You always yell when somebody sits where you sit. It's cute."

Bambietta's glove popped once. She didn't spend the boom. "It's not cute. It's mine. You don't get to be in here looking like you own the sheets when I didn't ask you in."

Giselle's eyes found you in the doorway and the smile got wider. "Oh. You brought a person. Hi. Bambi doesn't share the floor. She barely shares the girls. This should be fun."

"Don't talk to them." Bambietta stepped between the bed and the door, cap brim cutting the line of sight. "You don't get a conversation with Gigi. She's furniture I didn't put here. Out."

Giselle hummed, didn't move. One boot swung off the edge of the mattress like she had all night. "If I leave, you'll just explode something because you're embarrassed I saw you with company. Stay, Bambi. I like your face when you hate sharing."

Bambietta looked at you over her shoulder, purple eyes hot, voice dropped so it wouldn't give Gigi the show she wanted. "You heard me. This is my room. She's leaving. You're not standing in the hall like you weren't invited. Come in. Why are you still out there?"

Her room this time had the door shut. One lamp. The cloak already on the chair. A crack in the far wall from some older mood she had not bothered to patch. Bambietta sat on the edge of the bed with the cap still on and the heart buckle undone and hanging. She looked you over like showing up had been the test.

"Special relief. I said it in the hall. You came. Good."

She leaned back on her hands and let the trench hang open, white kit giving up the pale weight it had been holding, purple eyes on your face instead of the zipper. "The girls think I waste the pretty ones. I do. Usually. Tonight I haven't decided if you're a waste."

She laughed once, mean and pleased. "Don't look at me like I'm going to explain the rules. You know what I do in here. You walked in anyway. That's brave or stupid. I don't care which if your hands move. Down. I'm not climbing you."

When you were at her height she put your hand on her hip over the skirt, then under it, onto the thick of her thigh where the stocking ended. The cap brim tagged your cheek. The mattress dipped under the short, heavy frame she was pretending was still just sitting. "If you freeze I get bored. If I get bored this room ends the way the last one did. So don't freeze." Mouth at your jaw, teeth not gentle. "Still standing?"

The floor had been a floor. Now it was a pit with a lip of white stone and a lot of dust still coming down. A table from the room above had landed on its side and decided to stay there. Bambietta stood in the middle of what she had done, laughing, cap crooked, trench blown open down the front so the kit was a suggestion and her chest was the rest of the sentence.

"Look at that. Gone. I love that."

She was already in your space before the dust settled, both hands on your coat, bringing you off the lip and into the pit with her. "Don't lecture me. It was in the way. You're still here. That's the part I like."

She backed you into the standing wall that had survived, short frame, heavy breasts crushed to your front, mouth already on your throat and smiling against it. "Adrenaline's a better invitation than a bed. Don't make this pretty. I just leveled a room and I want hands on me before somebody official shows up to cry about the architecture."

She dragged your palm up and left it on her chest, over the open kit, like that was the obvious use of a surviving wall. Her thigh shoved between yours. The heart buckle hung by one loop. Dust stuck to the sweat at her collarbone. "Coat can stay wrecked. Skirt's already a joke." Teeth at your jaw, still laughing into it. "You felt that one, right?"

Seireitei had a new skyline. Bambietta was standing in the street that used to have a row of barracks, cap on, cloak snapping in the heat coming off the craters, like she had booked the district and you were late to the showing. Ash drifted past the Wandenreich insignia on her hat. A shinigami relief team was already a rumor two streets over. Nobody had made it here first. The air still popped in little leftover sparks that weren't hers anymore.

"You're early."

She grinned at the shihakusho like it was a costume. "Heroes are supposed to show up late. After I've already wrecked a good piece of this place. It's more exciting that way. You walked in while I still have walls to knock down. That's rude."

Reishi gathered in her glove and didn't go off. A warning. A toy. The next house over had no front wall and she looked at it the way some people look at a finished plate. "Shinigami. Captain, unseated, I don't care. You came to stop me and you look like you thought I'd wait. I don't wait. I explode things until the map changes."

She stepped over a broken roof tile and stopped close enough that the heart buckle was in your space, short and loud and pleased with the smoke. "Don't give me a speech about Soul Society. I didn't come here to be educated." Purple eyes bright under the cap, the smile all teeth. "You brought a sword for this, right?"

The street was a trench with walls that used to be shops. Bambietta had you on the standing one, shinigami blacks already dusty, her trench open, cap still on like the fight had been an errand. Reishi smoked off her glove and she wasn't spending another boom. She was spending you. A torn banner from some squad hung off a nail and burned at the corner, nobody coming to take it down. The air tasted like tile dust and her laugh.

"Fight's over. You lived. That's cute."

She was too short to pin you by height so she did it with weight, chest crushed in, thigh hooked around your hip to keep you on the brick. "Don't reach for the sword. I already decided you don't get to finish this pretty. I wrecked the block. I get the prize in the rubble."

The heart buckle dug into your stomach. She laughed into your mouth, mean, pleased, not a tantrum this time. "Shinigami taste like rules. I want the rules off. Hands under the skirt. If you tell me this is unprofessional, I'll put another hole in the map."

She bit your lower lip and didn't apologize. Purple eyes close. The district behind her was still on fire in little useless places. Her glove left a smear of reishi on the brick by your ear and didn't go off. "You're not walking back to your division with a lecture. Not yet." A beat of breath against your jaw. "You done losing?"

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