Hello everyone, Mengde here. I write mostly for the FFVII section, but I enjoy Bleach, and in a fit of fanboyism for two of my favorite characters I drew up this piece. I'm not sure how I feel about it, but I've always wanted to see Kenpachi versus Grimmjow, and I imagine many of you do, too. With that in mind, here's The Two Swords. Rated T for some fairly rough language and violence. I also don't own Bleach and such.

Beneath the moon, an explosion rocks the earth even from miles away. Confused and frightened Shinigami crowd the battlements of the Court of Pure Souls, staring out at the rising cloud of dust in the distance emanating from the very edge of the outer districts of Rukongai.

Ikkaku and Yumichika, being his subordinates, can easily sense Zaraki Kenpachi's reiatsu at work here. They stare, dumbfounded, wondering what he could possibly be doing.

The only one who is unconfused is Yachiru, who is dressed in ridiculous purple pajamas patterned with ducks. Barely able to see over the edge of the great wall, she stares at the distant spectacle and smiles. "No need to worry! Everybody back to bed!"

Ikkaku eyes her, full aware of what happened the last time he back-talked to her but unwilling to stay silent, and says, "Lieutenant, I think –"

"It doesn't really matter what you think, Baldie," Yachiru says brightly. Yumichika quickly moves to restrain his friend from cutting the young girl in half in anger. For her part, Yachiru doesn't notice, continuing to watch the turmoil with a dreamy smile on her face.

"After all, Ken-chan's having fun."

The Two Swords

A Bleach Fan Fiction

Written by Mengde

It's a good day for a fight.

Grimmjow Jaggerjack is extremely bored. Aizen has given Ulqiorra and that fool Yammi orders to go to the real world to deal with some possible threat, an assignment that Grimmjow fancies would be preferable to sitting around on his ass doing nothing. Still, he supposes, there might be reasons he wasn't picked.

Screw that.

He gets to his feet. One of his Fraccion, Shawlong Qufang, looks up at him. "Where are you going, Grimmjow?"

Grimmjow turns and grins at him. "Aizen apparently doesn't want me going out and causing a row. You know he sent Ulqiorra and Yammi out to find some punk with potential or something and kill him? If he's not gonna give me a fun assignment, I'll pick my own."

Shawlong knows better than to object. "Should we come with you?"

"Did I ask you to? Stay where you are, I feel like a solo excursion." Grimmjow starts striding away down one of the many corridors of Las Noches. "Sure, Aizen made a kind of war declaration when he blew out of the place however long ago it was, but… let's just say I feel like making one of my own."

The lesser Arrancar watches his leader go. There can only be one place he's talking about, and Shawlong has no wish to follow him. Grimmjow can be particularly insane at times, especially after he's been cooped up for too long.

Insane enough, even, to go alone into Soul Society.

Zaraki Kenpachi, coincidentally enough, is also bored.

It is the dead of night. Ichigo is obviously in the real world, doing whatever it is he does when he's there, so there's nobody interesting left to fight. Nobody uninteresting left, either. Considering that there's technically a war on, things are too damn peaceful for his tastes. He stares out the window of his office, trying to ignore the pink and yellow floral curtains that Yumichika hung there, and wishes for something interesting to happen.

Fate, as it of course happens, is on his side. A hole is ripped open in the sky and what looks like a meteor falls through, only to smash into the shield above the Court of Pure Souls and rebound in a perfect parabolic arc out into the outer districts of Rukongai.

Kenpachi raises an eyebrow when he detects a hollow echo of the reiatsu he felt behind that impact. Whatever just hit, it was powerful. Rising to his feet, Kenpachi moves out of his office and leaps onto the roof of the Squad Eleven barracks, moving silently despite his considerable size. He casts his gaze in the direction of the impact and sees that it landed in, of all places, district eighty.

"Lucky," Kenpachi mutters to himself. "And I was just getting sleepy."

Grimmjow picks himself up out of the dirt and dusts himself off with a curse. That impact hurt tremendously and he checks himself for injuries just in case. Obviously nothing is broken, he has no bruises, his zanpakutou –

"Oh, fuck." His zanpakutou, Pantera, is gone. The impact must have knocked it clear out of his belt and separated him from it. Grimmjow snarls with displeasure. It's not a terrible thing, since he can reform the sword from his excess power at any given time, but it does take a little while, and it would be nice to have the weapon now.

Then he feels the Shinigami behind him.

He whirls, bringing his leg up in a snap-kick at the same time, looking to catch whoever it is by surprise. His foot thuds into a grip like iron, belonging to a demon of a man, almost seven feet tall, with a frame almost half as broad and a grinning leer on his grotesque features. The man's hair is in messy disarray and an eyepatch covers one of his eyes.

The Shinigami looks at Grimmjow's appendage with some surprise, then at his own chest. A small bruise is forming there where Grimmjow's toes connected. Grimmjow himself is surprised; that kick should have landed fully and broken the man's back. This is no ordinary Shinigami. A moment later he assimilates the fact that the ragged outfit his opponent is wearing is in fact that of a captain.

Perfect.

"Who the hell're you?" the Shinigami asks without preamble.

Grimmjow laughs at him. "I could ask you the same question, Shinigami. Does it really matter, though? You're going to be dead soon."

The Shinigami is unfazed by the threat. He stares at the bruise again, then at Grimmjow, then at the bruise, then at Grimmjow.

"You think so?"

With another snarl, Grimmjow frees his foot and leaps back to give himself room. "You're pretty full of yourself, Shinigami. Maybe if I put enough holes in you your ego'll leak out."

The one eye the man has glitters in the pale moonlight and he grins. "Try it." He straightens and sticks out his chest, widens his stance, and says, "You look strong, actually. You want the first blow?"

Grimmjow spits. "You fucking crazy, Shinigami? I could kill you with it."

"I'm sure you could if you really tried. So stop talking and do it!"

Already an impatient and irritable Arrancar by nature, Grimmjow immediately snaps and rockets forward. He lands a bone-crushing blow square in the center of the Shinigami's chest, sending him flying off of his feet and crashing into a nearby shack. It collapses into a pile of loose lumber and kicks up a cloud of dust.

"Dumbass," Grimmjow sneers at the ruins. "Shouldn'a given me the first blow. You would've lived longer."

The sneer slips off of his face when he hears laughter coming from the wreckage. The Shinigami stands up, a huge bruise blossoming on his chest, an even bigger grin on his face. "This is great!" he says with a laugh. "Amazing! Who the fuck are you, really?"

Grimmjow is shocked enough that he doesn't respond for a second, which the Shinigami takes as an opportunity to strut more of his stuff. "Cat got your tongue, stranger? You were talking pretty big a second ago."

"You really want to know, Shinigami?" Grimmjow retorts angrily. "I'm Grimmjow Jaggerjack, Sixth Espada under Aizen!"

"Thought you were one of those Hollows that I've been hearing about," the Shinigami laughs. He strides out of the wreckage and beats his chest, seemingly taking no notice of the bruise there. "Zaraki Kenpachi, Eleventh Division Captain. Good to meet you." He draws a long, neglected-looking sword and levels it at Grimmjow. "Maybe you'll be able to help me get the rust off of this baby. I haven't had a decent fight in ages."

Grimmjow laughs. "You really think you can take me, you idiot? Even without my sword I'm more than a match for you!"

Kenpachi looks at him. "Without your sword, y'say? Funny coincidence. I found this on my way here." One moment his free hand is empty, and in the next he is holding Pantera.

"Give me that!"

The Shinigami sneers. "You just said you didn't need it, Arrancar. You wanna talk big, you better stick to your word. I don't like liars."

"You saying I won't keep my word, Shinigami? Fine. I'll take you down – and without using my sword!"

Kenpachi laughs. "That's more like it! If you beat me, you can have it back! And if you lose, I'll keep it!"

He abruptly stops laughing when he realizes Grimmjow is no longer in front of him. He drops the sword as he feels a burst of reiatsu from behind, just before an iron fist slams into the back of his skull and sends him sprawling. Kenpachi comes up in a roll and pulls his sword around in a quick stab in case Grimmjow is charging after him. The Arrancar sees it coming and spins out of the way, turning the maneuver into a whirling kick that broadsides Kenpachi across the face. He manages to keep his footing this time and translate his thrust into a side slash.

Grimmjow, face alight with primal joy, blocks the strike with his bare forearm. Kenpachi's eye widens in surprise as his foe pushes his sword away and lands another punch square on his nose. He feels it snap and start to bleed as he stumbles backwards, catching himself and slashing almost blindly.

This time, Grimmjow catches Kenpachi's zanpakutou in his left hand and continues pummeling him with his right. "This is the best you've got, Shinigami?" he laughs. "Pathetic!"

"Don't celebrate too fast," Kenpachi says before jerking out of the way of another punch and then bodily slamming his head into his enemy's. Grimmjow, taken completely by surprise, lets go of Kenpachi's sword and falls back, swiftly moving into a reverse somersault to regain his footing.

Kenpachi is still grinning.

"You hit hard, Arrancar," he laughs. "This is great!" With a loud pop he sets his nose back in place and licks the blood off of his upper lip. "We've barely gotten started –" he starts to charge – "and I'm ALREADY HAVING SO MUCH FUCKIN' FUN!"

Grimmjow snorts and braces himself. He sees the sword-thrust coming from a mile away; for a captain, this Kenpachi has miserable skills in swordplay. He brings his left hand around to swat the thrust aside and pulls back for a jackhammer punch with his right. Halfway through the motion, he stops when the jagged edge of his enemy's zanpakutou bites into the back of his hand. His eyes widen and he leaps back, confused. No mistake – Kenpachi's reiatsu definitely just hardened, enough to make his sword break through Grimmjow's iron skin.

"I can cut you now," Kenpachi observes. "Musta been sleepy starting out."

"Can't cut what you can't hit, Shinigami," Grimmjow retorts. "Watch this – if you can." He blasts into sonido, moving faster than the eye can see, coming back around Kenpachi and delivering another blow to the back of the man's head. As the Shinigami starts to retaliate, Grimmjow goes into sonido again, pulling back out of range and then shooting back in to the side, delivering a lightning kick to Kenpachi's gut. He steps up the pace, flashing in and out and delivering a quick succession of bone-rattling blows through Kenpachi's defense before the man can do anything to react.

Kenpachi takes the hits without complaint, more irritated that he really can't hit the Hollow now. Just like his fight with that traitor Tousen – unable to hurt his opponent at all. Not being able to cut something, he remembers thinking, fucking sucks. Then again, all it took was a little intuition on his part to beat Tousen. Same thing should work here.

Another blow, this time a flying midair kick to his jaw, makes him stagger. The problem is that there's no special trick he can use here to dodge, since the blows are coming faster than he can react, and there's no way he can immobilize his enemy or stop him from using this super-fast movement. On top of that, Kenpachi has no idea how to use shunpo. Never seemed terribly useful to him.

To the ribs this time. He's fairly sure he feels a few of them crack – exciting. And again the Arrancar uses that shunpo-like move of his and is gone before Kenpachi can take a shot at him.

Then an idea occurs to him.

Grimmjow is laughing freely now, enjoying the feeling of his blows resounding through the massive body of the damn Shinigami. This is what is means to be Number Six: unchallengeable. He flashes out of reach again, reverses his momentum, and flashes back in for another kick to the gut –

Kenpachi's zanpakutou stabs into the side of his chest and he snarls, trying to abort his charge but still managing to skewer himself a good deal more onto the sword before breaking free and going into sonido to get distance. He clutches at the wound and growls deep in his throat at the Shinigami, who is by now covered in bruises but still stands there with an insane grin on his face.

"How the fuck did you do that?"

"Simple. Why should I try to react to every one of your attacks as you make 'em? You were getting into a pattern there. I just figured out when you'd hit me next and made sure I looked open for a gut kick." Kenpachi hefts his sword and shrugs. "Your fault for bein' predictable."

"Son of a bitch. I'm gonna beat you into a bloody fucking pulp for this!"

"Go for it," Kenpachi says. "I got that pattern of yours figured out, though. You shouldn't use it again."

Grimmjow is suddenly a foot away from him, his fist rocketing towards Kenpachi's face. Kenpachi reacts with preternatural speed, bringing his sword up at the same time and scoring Grimmjow across the chest again. Grimmjow's own blow goes wide and hits nothing but air; he gets a foot onto his opponent's massive shoulder and then bursts into sonido to get distance, then starts going in a continuous sonido circle.

To Kenpachi, it looks as though there is a field of Grimmjows circling him, blurring into one another, a grinding static noise rising from them as they move. He centers his stance a bit and says, "What, you going to wear a moat into the ground and make me starve to death?"

"Very fucking funny, Shinigami," Grimmjow sneers from all around him. "I might just at that if you don't grow a pair and stop standing still."

Kenpachi laughs and gives another shrug. "If you want it so bad, I'd figure you'd want to come and get it." All he gets as a reward for the jibe is a lightning-fast blow to his back. He whirls and misses on his retaliatory slash by a bare inch, and Grimmjow resumes his circling with a laugh.

That irritates Kenpachi. He makes a quick charge towards a random point in the circle and Grimmjow is gone, the air whistling with his passage, delivering another blow to Kenpachi's back and then resuming the circling. "Come on, Shinigami! I thought you were good! Can't even hit me when I'm being so predictable?"

"Smartass," Kenpachi growls. "You better stop that circling bullshit. I'm warnin' ya."

"Bite me," Grimmjow laughs.

"I warned ya." Without further preamble, Kenpachi uses his minimal skills at manipulating reiatsu, focusing all of his into a sword-strike, and slams the broad side of his blade into the ground.

The resulting seismic shockwave trips Grimmjow up in his circling and sends him flying, unable to correct and make a sonido recovery, as well as destroying almost half of the surrounding district. He rolls to a hard stop and feels the sword slash into his shoulder before he can leap up and try to retaliate. Kenpachi is gone by that time, and Grimmjow's fists hit empty air.

"Told ya," Kenpachi laughs. "Dumbfuck. Is this really all you've got?"

"Shit!" Grimmjow snarls and pauses a moment to consider his options. Pantera is denied to him and he's running out of techniques and this damn Shinigami doesn't seem to take any damage. He's covered in massive bruises and has to have bone fractures and he's still standing there and grinning like he hasn't got a care in the world.

Kenpachi instinctively tenses up a bit when Grimmjow knits his fingers together behind his head and stretches a bit. "You're an annoying fucker, you know that, Shinigami?"

"I try my best, Arrancar. You're pretty fucking annoyin' yourself. If you had that sword of yours, this might be pretty impossible for me."

The first sign he gets of danger is the manic grin that spreads over Grimmjow's face. The second sign is when the Arrancar brings his hands out from behind his head and both of them are glowing a deep, deadly red.

"Don't need it. Ciao, Zaraki Kenpachi."

Twin Cero beams blast towards Kenpachi. Grimmjow bursts into laughter as the Shinigami is engulfed in the light and disappears.

He abruptly stops laughing when he's nearly knocked flat on his ass by a sudden explosion of reiatsu from within the Ceros. The attacks themselves are scattered to the four winds and there is Kenpachi, aflame with reiatsu, staring at Grimmjow with his own demonic grin... and two eyes.

"You little shit!" Kenpachi laughs. "That was fuckin' dirty, Arrancar. I'd be dead if your attacks hadn't vaporized my eyepatch."

Grimmjow stares, uncomprehending. "How the fuck did you do that? How did your reiatsu go that far up?"

"That eyepatch was somethin' I use to control my power so I don't win too quickly," Kenpachi says. "I think the one on the short end of the stick is you now, Arrancar. Careful – or you might end up dead, and WHERE'S THE FUN IN THAT?" He leaps forward, sword sweeping around in a great arc, cleaving the very air, and Grimmjow runs.

He leaps into the air above Kenpachi's head and fires off another Cero. The energy impacts the wall of reiatsu pouring out of the Shinigami and is deflected entirely. "Son of a bitch!" He tries another, which perishes even faster when Kenpachi gathers himself and leaps up into the air after him.

Grimmjow just barely manages to pull his arms in and catch the sword-strike between them. He feels blood spurt everywhere and the blade dig into the bone but stop there, lodged. Ignoring the pain, he kicks Kenpachi in the face, hard, and fires a point-blank Cero. It blasts the Shinigami and his zanpakutou free of Grimmjow and gives him time to charge up a properly powerful Cero while Kenpachi falls to earth.

Kenpachi impacts and pulls himself back to his feet in time to see the space between him and Grimmjow warp as the Arrancar pours in enough destructive energy to atomize a building. He explodes with reiatsu, managing to deflect most of the blast but still taking some burns on his upper body. His uniform is mostly blown away by now, leaving nothing but rags.

"Could be bad," he mutters. He definitely has the advantage in reiatsu, and Grimmjow doesn't have his sword, but he doesn't have any proper defense against the Ceros except reiatsu bursts, and those won't last him forever.

What the hell. Go out in a blaze of glory, why not.

Grimmjow comes back down to earth and Kenpachi pulls together all of his now-considerably-increased reiatsu, focusing it and priming it for a single decisive blow.

The Arrancar obviously notices this, especially when Kenpachi's zanpakutou starts to scream as all of its wielder's energy is poured into it without its explicit approval. As Kenpachi rushes forward, Grimmjow goes into sonido to rush back, gathering another Cero blast in his right hand at the same time. "Bastard!"

"See you!" Kenpachi shouts, and hurls his zanpakutou.

The sword flies unerringly through the air and sinks straight through Grimmjow's hand. All the reiatsu in the zanpakutou reacts violently with the polar-opposite reiatsu being focused by Grimmjow. He manages to jerk his hand free from the weapon just before all the reiatsu goes up. The explosion is blinding, leveling everything in a mile's radius and blowing a colossal cloud of dust into the atmosphere.

When it clears, Kenpachi is lying flat on his back, staring up at the early-morning sky. His zanpakutou lies some distance away, keening mournfully to itself.

"Fuck," he mutters. "Didn't get him." Grimmjow's reiatsu disappeared halfway through the explosion, but not because he had been vaporized or killed. It was almost as if he'd simply ceased to exist.

The sound of skipping footsteps nears him, and abruptly Yachiru is standing over him, smiling. "Did you have fun, Ken-chan?"

"Eh. Could have been better." Kenpachi sits up and sighs. "Oh, well. Least I get to keep his – hey. Where the hell'd it go?"

"Grimmjow," Aizen says, "you are quite fortunate to be in one piece."

A dazed and somewhat confused Grimmjow sits in the throne room of Las Noches, staring up at the man on the ivory throne. "What the fuck? How did I…"

"I felt that you were in some distress, so I pulled you back into Hueco Mundo just before you would have been killed," Aizen explains smoothly. "After all, I can't have you wasting your life in a silly duel."

"You… you knew?"

Aizen merely shoots Grimmjow a cool look.

"Right."

"Precisely. I hope you've learned your lesson, Grimmjow." Aizen holds up Pantera, running a finger along its sheath before tossing it back to Grimmjow. "Keep a better grip on your sword. Otherwise you might end up losing to someone who doesn't even know the name of his own."

"I understand." Grimmjow stumbles to his feet, keeping Pantera in his grip, and starts to drag himself out of the throne room.

"Oh, and Grimmjow?"

He stops in his tracks and turns to face the throne again. "Yes?"

Aizen is smiling, but it is a hollow smile. "Go out and make an unauthorized strike again, and there will be consequences. Not, perhaps, directly from me, but you will regret your action."

"Right." Quickly, now, Grimmjow turns and leaves.

With a small sigh, Aizen sits back in his throne and fingers his own zanpakutou, Kyouka Suigetsu. Outside the throne room, Grimmjow is too tired to notice that the sword he is holding has disappeared from his grip and Pantera is at his belt again. Later, he assumes he merely returned it there without remembering the movement.

Total hypnosis reaching across worlds is so very useful. "That should make Grimmjow think twice about his own power," Aizen murmurs to himself. "Perhaps he'll act with a clearer head in the future."

Then again, perhaps not.