A/N: Oh, honoka, how I miss thee! I didn't know if you wanted fluff or angst, so I tried to mix it up! I hope it worked. I thought this would work perfectly because it did for Go-Devil-Dante of deviantart, so...yeah. Just youtube that. It works. Oh, and L is tired of walking. I suspect some OOCness ahead. You were warned.

I hope you and 'UrUr' enjoy this...*shudders*

Sleeping Beauty by A Perfect Circle


Hauntingly So

"Delusional, I believe I could cure it all for you, dear

Coax or trick or drive or drag the demons from you

Make it right for you sleeping beauty.

Truely thought I could heal you."

Ulquiorra did not believe in many things. He was not a man of beliefs.

Ulquiorra did not believe in emotions.

He did not believe in love.

He did not believe in a thing like a heart...

He did not believe in many things.

Ulquiorra was not a man of action, but a man of thought. He was a man of stillness and strength. He was a man of truth and nobility.

He was not like any of the other arrancars.

And this is why Honoka Yamanshi changed him, through and through.

She was the complete opposite of him. She was loud and obnoxious. She had to get her word in before the case was closed. She believed in emotions and love and a heart. She was a woman of pure action. She was a liar and a thief. She was imperfect in everyway. She was unique, special...pure ecstacy in human form...

This was the only person who ever came close to breaking his barriers. She got so close to him. He felt like she could reach inside him with just a glance, her blue eyes clutching onto his soul, making him feel...she made him feel something...something warm, something good.

She saw him as something interesting. She saw him as something confused and complicated, something broken and jagged. She saw him as this being that had no idea why it existed, why it was living. So she gave him a purpose...


"Drunk on ego, truly thought I could make it right,"

"Ulquiorra, please, talk to me," She whispered to the darkness.

I cannot be saved. I'm worthless. I mean nothing to you.

"You can't keep doing this to yourself. You're going to break yourself," She pleaded to the silence.

I am trash. I am grotesque. I am a failure.

"I'm trying to understand you, Ulqui, but it's hard to do that when you won't even let me hear your voice..." She mumbled to the nothingness.

Stop trying to love me. I have nothing to offer you. I have nothing you want.

"You..." he began, feeling that warmness bubble in his chest like toxic acid, "...you are trash. Leave me be. You have no right to be here. Go," he spat, his face turned to the bleached walls, his eyes unable to focus on the bleary color. She kept getting to him. She kept digging and digging and it hurthurthurt but he knew she was only doing this because she wanted him, needed him, lov---

Her lower lip trembled, almost audiably in the thick tension of the room.

"Okay..."

He refused to believe someone so wonderfully amazing intoxicating could ever love him...

Of course, he never believed in love in the first place.


"Far beyond a visible sign of your awakening, failing miserably to rescue sleeping beauty,

drunk on ego, truly thought I could make it right, if I kissed you one more time to help you face

the nightmare, but you're far too poisoned for me,"

Hueco Mundo had become a war zone. A battlefield. A place of death.

So it was only logically that lives were lost that day.

...Right?

The ungodly smell of blood was everywhere, but, by now, Ulquiorra was used to it. The arrancar wondered why the world hadn't stopped moments ago, when Honoka had fallen to the ground, limp and pale. He wondered why heads didn't turn, shocked faces watching as their comrade died slowly and weakly. He wondered why her opponent didn't look horrified, as if he had just commited the deadliest sin...

Maybe it was because that wasn't the way in which war functioned.

He knew none of the Espada cared about the life of Honoka Yamanashi. He knew that the world didn't know about this deadly war. He knew that her opponent was more than happy to kill her. Although, he could see from the corner of his now blurring vision that the red-headed Shinigami was screaming, blind rage building up inside him. He looked like he could have just died on the spot...but Ulquiorra could not hear the words and profanities he screamed. He could not feel anything either. All that was left was his vision, and his uncanny ability to walk.

He could see her form, coming closer and closer to him with each step, bloodied and hollow lying on the sand.

"Hey, Ulquiorra! Don't make me have to come back here to save your ass again!"

She looked absolutely distraught, the last look on her face one of failure and sadness.

"You're a jerk, you know that?"

Her hollow mask had completely covered her face only moments ago, but now, the shattered remains looked like shells in the sand, sharp and jagged.

"I care about you!! Don't you get it yet?! I love you more than anyone ever will or can!"

Her body was contorted, her bones sticking out of her skin, her eyes still wide with horror. He could see every curve of her body now uselessly laying on the maroon, gritty ground.

"You don't look so good. Sit,"

"I'm perfectly fine. You have no reason or right to worry about my well being,"

"Like hell I don't. Now sit,"

"...okay..."

He knelt down her to her, feeling his knees digging into the ground. He was so numb, so cold now...the air was so thin...his chest wasn't warm anymore and his skin felt mealy.

"I love you."

"..."

"Hey, UrUr, did you catch that?"

"...yes."

"I said I love you,"

"I heard you..."

"......oh,"

He reached out, noticing the shakiness of his hands. His fingers were long and bony, the sudden feel of soft flesh beneath them made him jump. He let his hand lay there for a while, his eyes starring straight at her face. This wasn't right. This felt so wrong, so completely out of place. She was supposed to sit upright, she was supposed to look at the gaping wound on his abdomin, then smile at him and say some cocky remark. This was all, all wrong. This had to be some horrible dream. This was impossible.

"What's wrong? You've never been kissed?"

"No..."

"Oh. Well, there's a first for everything, right?"

"I suppose..."

Stop.

"Honoka...?"

"Yeah, Ulquiorra?"

"...do you have a heart?"

"Well, yeah, I guess I do,"

Stop.

"...do I have a heart?"

"...I would assume so."

"Where would I find it?"

"Well...I guess you'd probably find it..."

STOP.

"Riiiiggghhhhttt...here!" Her warm, delicate hand stayed there on his bare chest, right where they had placed the number 4. He looked up at her, curiousity in his eyes, something that he showed to no one but her. He looked at her figure that towered over him, her hollow hole within his reach. She wore a robe over her underclothes, the lace of her panties showing through the thin fabric.

"Oh...aren't they supposed to...beat?" He mumbled, looking at her hand.

"I'm no biologist, but I'm pretty sure they do," She bopped his nose with her finger.

"So...why doesn't mine?"

"......Oh. Well. I don't know, really---"

"Yours does. I know. I feel it when you lay next to me or when you hold my hand or when you return from the human world after you've fought with someone. So why doesn't mine?" He almost sounded upset and angry at the fact that he had no pulse, no beating heart to be found.

"Well, UrUr, I don't know quite how to explain it, but...maybe you're unique. Maybe your heart doesn't have to beat. You're special...at least, to me you are," and she leaned down, pressing her soft, warm lips to his. He felt this sudden weight in his gut and his closed his eyes---

STOPSTOPSTOPSTOP!!!!

"Honoka, please, you have to tell me why I'm the only one without a heart! Why?! What's wrong with me?! Why am I this way....why..." He couldn't speak through the tears that began to dribble down his face. He knew that Ichigo was watching him, waiting for his return. But when he saw the orange-haired soul reaper, he saw the way that his face had flushed and fallen, and he turned his head, holding Orihime to his chest. He saw the way Ichigo showed utter respect because he knew...he knew that this was killing him.

"I'm sorry, Honoka. I'm sorry for everything I ever did. I'm sorry that I told you that you were trash, or that you weren't good enough. I'm sorry that I refused to show you affection in front of everyone else, I'm sorry that I didn't say I love you, I'm sorry that I hurt you more than once, I'm sorry that I made you bleed..." After a while, the words all became hurried and rushed and were choked by sobs. Renji tried to fight his way to her, but it was no use. Ulquiorra ran his hands along her body, following the trails and patterns that he'd already established. He felt the new bumps and bruises, the cuts and scars. He could see where the poison seeped into her skin, where it traveled, where the veins sent it all...his body shook and trembled and this was the worst kind of hurt he had ever felt.

"You were so close, Honoka, so close...you almost tore it all down. You almost broke the walls. I'm sorry that you had to die, knowing that you didn't accomplish that..." He inclined his head, turned so he could feel the coldness and revenge that lingured on his lips. He could taste her last words and the poison.

"Such a fool to think that I could wake you from your slumber, that I could actually heal you.

Sleeping beauty, poisoned and hopeless.

Far beyond a visible sign of your awakening, failing miserably to find a way to comfort you,

and hiding from some poisoned memories,"

"I don't know if I have a heart...but I'm willing to find out," Suddenly, Ulquiorra felt the hilt of his sword in his palm, words he never planned on saying spilling from his mouth. He pulled it from it's sheath, placing both hands on it. He looked crazed, raising the blade up and pointed it at his bare chest.

"I can't wait to see you, Honoka...I really just can't wait,"

"Poisoned and hopeless, sleeping beauty,"


Well, maybe no one got it, but he ended up carving his heart out and gave it to her. Guess he really did have one, right? Hehehe...dementedness!! AND OCCNESS!! YAAYYY! *claps proudly* so if you just LOVED it to death, because you should, REVIEW. Bitches. Or Grimmjow will find you.