Bleach Fan Fiction ❯ Mayuri ❯ One-Shot

[ P - Pre-Teen ]
Mayuri almost never concerned himself with popularity.

In another life it might have been "never concerned himself at all" but given Kurotshuchi Mayuri's endless competition with his former captain Urahara Kisuke it was bound to come up occasionally. Urahara had been very popular during his tenure as captain of the Twelfth Division and it was just another characteristic that Mayuri constantly found himself lacking.

Fortunately, it was an aspect that rarely raised it's head on Mayuri's consciousness. There were so many other issues that Mayuri was trying to beat Urahara on that he thought about this one infrequently.

That being said, Mayuri did, upon occasion, try increase his popularity among the Gohei 13. He had spent much of his time under the former president of the research institute observing Kisuke and he tried to emulate his ex-captain's better traits in an attempt to surpass him.

Kisuke had been popular because he had been 'friendly'. Mayuri tried to act 'friendly'. Kisuke had been 'friendly' because he had smiled a lot. Mayuri tried smiling a lot. In fact, he did one better than Urahara and started smiling all the time. For some reason, no one thought he was being 'friendly'. Kurotshuchi couldn't understand why people didn't react the same way to his smile.

Kisuke told jokes. People laughed at his jokes. Mayuri told jokes. No one laughed when he told jokes. For some reason no one seemed to understand Mayuri's jokes. They didn't really think he'd let Nemu die, did they? She was his current greatest creation and a lot of work would be wasted if she died. He had designed her body down to the smallest detail, he knew exactly how much abuse she could take and if she ever really got to her limit, he'd get her the attention she needed. Besides, Nemu never complained about his portrayal of their relationship. So why didn't anyone else see the humor in it?

Kisuke cooked and shared his cooking. Kisuke's friends adored his cooking. Mayuri cooked.

As stated earlier, fortunately, these episodes of ingratiating himself with the rest of the Gohei 18 didn't happen very often. They were often followed by a sudden mass visitation to the Fourth Division.