UlquiHime One-shot
Just a conversation between Ulquiorra and Orihime on a dark day in Las Noches.
"If I were the rain. . . that binds together the Earth and the sky, whom in all eternity will never mingle. . . Would I be able to bind two hearts together?" –Inoue Orihime
It was a dark day in Las Noches. Ulquoirra made his way to the woman's room. He paused in front of the door. 'What am I even doing here? I don't even need to talk to the woman.' Ulquiorra was trying to convince himself out of knocking on the woman's door. Leaving his thoughts behind him, he decided to walk soundlessly away.
Just then, the doors to the woman's room opened. Ulquiorra looked behind him in alarm. The woman stood there with a worried look on her beautiful face.
"Ulquiorra, did you want something?" The woman asked in concern for him.
Ulquiorra felt a pang in his chest. Her words always seemed to cause him pain. It's never happened before. No one had felt concerned for him until she came along. She had ruined his façade of despair and emptiness. In truth, however, he was the one who had felt the most out of all of them. He had disclosed himself from the world as to not feel pain again. He had locked away his heart in hopes of it not breaking. But, every time the woman spoke, it chipped away at his heart. Soon, he was going to break and give in to the very emotions that he didn't want anything to do with.
"Nothing. I was just going to check on you, woman. But, then I decided against it." Ulquiorra spoke in a seemingly unconcerned way.
"Okay. I do hope everything's alright though. You looked concerned for some reason." The woman was still so persistent on being kind to him even though he had done nothing but threaten her friends and herself. She truly was an interesting human.
The woman opened her mouth again to speak. "Um, Ulquoirra, do you want to talk? I do have time because I- I'm kind of trapped here anyways." The woman had blushed at the last part. A shy smile made its way onto her face.
"Why would I talk to you?" Ulquoirra said in a harsh tone.
The woman's smile fell a little as she spoke next. "I- I don't know… because you look lonely and sad. You look like someone who's given up."
"That's insane. I have not given up on living. I have a job to do for Aizen-sama and I will not fail." Ulquiorra winced after he said that. He had been lying. Surviving and living were two different things. Ulquiorra was only doing what he was told. By giving up on living long ago, he had sacrificed his heart. His powers had certainly given him things that allowed him to do things for the sake of living, but he was in fact lonely. He lusted for someone to hold and cherish. But, he knew it was impossible.
"I didn't say that you've given up on living. I meant someone who's given up on love. Like someone who has no heart." The woman said in her kind and insightful voice.
"Love is such a useless emotion, woman. Love doesn't do anything but harm and it will lead to the cause of more despair." Ulquiorra said, as if trying to end the discussion between them.
But, the woman was relentless, and continued on with the conversation. It was as if she was trying to break him.
"Ulquiorra, you sound as if something happened to you before." How was the woman able to know that something had happened before?
"You are mistaken. Nothing has happened to me." Ulquiorra tried desperately to maintain his façade of an emotionless beast, one who doesn't care about such petty things as love.
"Are you sure Ulquiorra? You seem upset." The woman kept on moving forward with the conversation.
"I'm sure, woman. Now stop this useless talk." Ulquiorra returned to his cold and demanding tone.
The woman turned silent for a while. Ulquiorra then realized that he might have seemed a little too harsh. She was only trying to help him. Wait… what is he thinking? The woman is poisoning his mind. He never would have thought that before. His world was turning to ash right in front of him.
"Woman, let me ask you something." Ulquiorra said, trying to sound emotionless, but not harsh.
"What, Ulquiorra?" Her voice seemed to have a tinge of hope in it.
Ulquiorra tried to make his face remain impassive, but it was a futile gesture. His face showed the emotion of someone who's about to break, someone who's torn between all he's ever known, and all he knows now. "You humans are always talking about hearts. It's as if you have them in your hand. But my eye sees everything. Nothing can escape it. What it doesn't see doesn't exist. That's how I've always fought. That's how I've always lived." (A/N: His actual quote)
"That's a sad existence, Ulquiorra." The woman said with such a saddened voice that it bothered him. He brushed aside his worry and continued to ask the question he so longed to ask.
"What is a heart? If I rip open your chest, will I find it there? If I crack open your skull, will I find it there?" (A/N: His actual quote continued)
His question seemed to take the woman by surprise. "I-I don't really know, Ulquiorra. But, I imagine that it's what you feel. When you love people, then a feeling of warmth spreads over you. Like, when you love someone, just by being with them will make you happy." She smiled a sad smile at that. It made him curious as to why it was such a sad smile.
"Woman… can the heart cause despair?"
The woman blinked in shock. "It can cause despair… if your heart was broken or you know that you can never truly be together."
"Do you know what it feels like to have your heart broken, woman?" Ulquiorra asked this because he wanted to know if she had ever suffered.
"I-I know what it feels like." The woman said in a soft, reminiscing tone. She paused for a brief second allowing Ulquiorra to get his mind wrapped around the preposterous idea. Ulquoirra was in disbelief. How could this cheerful woman, know what grief, pain, and despair was? It's impossible for someone to act so cheerful when their heart has been broken.
The woman continued on with her story. "There is this boy that I love, but he doesn't even notice my feelings. I love him with all my heart.-"
Ulquiorra winced slightly at that. He didn't even know why he did. Maybe it's because the woman had stirred some feelings in him… feelings that were long forgotten. She had stirred the embers of his blackened heart.
"-and he makes me happy. He protected me..." The woman soon lost herself in her own thoughts of the mysterious man who she loves. "I was so miserable and heartbroken that he didn't notice my feelings. I shouldn't feel that way, because I had never actually admitted to his face that I liked him, but it still hurt. Watching him from afar nearly broke my heart." The woman started to tear up.
Ulquiorra looked at the woman curiously. "Woman, why are you crying?"
"Because, Ulquiorra, I'm human. I show emotions."
"What emotion are you showing now?" Ulquiorra enquired, trying to figure out the humans so called "heart".
"I'm in pain. I'm showing sadness." At this the woman started to smile despondently and stopped crying.
"What does that have to do with the heart?"
"It has everything to do with the heart." The woman said in a matter-of-fact tone.
"How so?" Ulquiorra was getting closer to the truth about the heart.
"Well, all hearts love, but all hearts can be broken, just like humans. When we face heartache, we become weak and sad. In this world you need both pain and sadness to even understand love." The woman sighed.
"Are you afraid of me, woman?" Ulquiorra didn't even know why he had asked such an absurd question.
"W-What? I'm not scared." The woman looked confused, as if she didn't understand why he had asked such a question. To be honest, Ulquiorra didn't know why either.
"I see… You are interesting, woman." The woman blushed slightly at that.
Ulquiorra wanted to sound as if he had known why he had asked the question. But, now that he knew she wasn't scared of him he felt relieved. It was as if an invisible weight disappeared from his chest.
"Good-bye, woman. I must return to my chambers." It was a lie. He just knew that he had to leave before he said anything that he would regret.
"O-Oh. Okay. It was nice talking to you, Ulquoirra." The woman seemed sincere.
He turned to leave.
"Oh! Ulquiorra! The heart isn't something that you can hold rather it's something that you feel."
"I will keep that in mind, woman." Ulquiorra walked away slowly.
He knows now that his heart is with the woman. With that last thought, he disappeared around the corner.