it’s interesting how orihime essentially rejects tsubaki in the ss arc as a trauma response because she fundamentally cannot imagine dishing out violence she herself has been subjected to in the past, but it also brings up the question of why tsubaki exists in the first place if she was meant to be a traditional healer anyway, and the short answer is that she's not! not entirely. tsubaki is the teeny part of her soul that is capable of a great anger/a killing intent, but unlike ichigo’s rejection of his hollow/zangetsu, orihime does acknowledge tsubaki early on; she just doesn’t want to use him the way he’s "supposed” to be used. this creates an intriguing conflict, where orihime has some killing intent, but the only points of reference she has are the shinigami, uryuu (quincy), and arrancar who use theirs quite traditionally, so she’s not quite there yet in figuring out how she can use hers without compromising her fierce pacifism. this is why i’d argue that meeting hachi was quite formative for her, because there’s a guy who is not a fighter but still fights in a way that doesn’t take away from his nature. in fact, it’s kind of strange to me that this moment —

— comes before the 17-month timeskip and not during, but kubo loves a timeskip so i guess this was the most appropriate place to include this scene. post-lust-arc orihime has this realization that she’s sabotaging herself and those she loves by not capitalizing on tsubaki more. the obvious conclusion most people in her place would arrive at is that they need to reject pacifism as a principle entirely, but orihime is stubborn, so she comes up with shiten kosshun (her detonation shield) instead. she forges her powers based not on how they should be or are expected to be (more combative) but on how she wants it to be (a fighting style that is effective but still rooted in pacifism). i think it’s really cool how she has agency here, and isn’t pressured into giving up something that’s really integral to her being just so she can still fight alongside her friends (i also think this is that “something” rukia was talking about in ch 228, because rukia is well-aware of the kido corps, and as a kido user herself, she knows there’s more than one way to be useful on a battlefield and was confident they could have found it together with enough time and training). orihime’s self-actualization shapes her powers rather similarly to how shinigami’s internal motivations shape their own bankai, which @/troius talks more about in this excellent post. ultimately, she accepts tsubaki but on her terms, though it's unfortunate we never really saw him and the other fairies much physically after the time-skip.