A cold wind was blowing in from the south.
High above Hueco Mundo's endless sea of dunes, it cut through clouds of hypercharged spiritrons and bled pale moonlight down onto a master and her servant.
"The weather is ill-suited for us, Mistress. A harsh cold like this is bad for our health," the lesser of the two stated over the howling gale, doing her best to prevent the sand from stinging her face by raising her sleeve against the oncoming bluster.
Meanwhile, her superior, a sable-skinned woman carrying about her an air of tranquility, acknowledged the concern by waving her hand in an elegant gesture that granted her permission to leave if she so desired. She herself was content with remaining outside on her open-air balcony, reading amidst the first signs of an approaching tempest.
"You should learn to appreciate times like these," the mistress said in her naturally breathy tone, appearing surprisingly relaxed while she pinned down the flailing pages of her book with fingers positioned at odd angles. "There is a certain harmony to be found here, Sung-Sun. To find the order in chaos is a skill that you would do well to learn." A pair of cerulean orbs looked up from the novel in her lap and shot a sidelong glance to the where the veranda led back into her quarters. "Besides, your new sisters are fighting again, and I find them to be more distracting than the weather. Wouldn't you agree?"
Sung-Sun giggled and resumed scanning over her own literature, her acute sense of hearing picking up the bickering behind her as well.
Minutes passed, and despite her best efforts, she was shivering rather severely. Still, she was determined to prove that she could tolerate the elements. It was proving extremely difficult, however, to refrain from reading the same sentence of her book over and over again. Something about a thousand suns and a trinity of some sort. It made no sense in relation to the text from before, so she heaved a bitter sigh and grudgingly flipped to the next page where she was relieved to discover an illustration.
Upon further inspection, it turned out to be what she could only vaguely recognize as a photograph—an older one dated back to July 16, 1945. It depicted a bulbous cloud of light propelled upwards by what seemed to be a gigantic pillar of smoke and ash. A footnote described it as an explosion, one that was powerful enough to destroy an entire empire.
Sung-Sun was in awe, captivated by how the sky parted and the surrounding desert bowed in submission to this massive ball of flame. No cero could do this. In fact, she doubted even Aizen could do it. What could possibly cause this kind of destruction?
She eagerly moved to the adjacent page, hoping to see more of the enormous inferno. Instead, an elderly, gaunt sort of man stared back at her. His face had been aged beyond its years, brought down by the gravity of the immeasurable amount of lives that he had assisted in ending. And with lifeless, downcast eyes, he looked past the camera, past her, and into something that only he could understand.
Beneath his despair and attached to his suit, there was a caption that read, "Now I am become death, the destroyer of worlds."
She worked the quote over in her head, pondering its meaning until the wind decided that it had been far too lenient with her and sent a strong gust to slam her volume shut.
The Fraccion cursed under her breath and relinquished all thoughts of searching to find the photo again. Another drop in temperature had come, and pride alone was no longer enough to keep her warm. "I'm going in to make tea, Harribel-sama. Would you like me to prepare some for you as well?" she asked, tucking the book between her arm and side.
"What do we have today?"
"Well, a new shipment of supplies from the living world came in yesterday, and I managed to find a nice black blend from China. It smells a bit smoky, but it has some notes of plum that I think will come out well in the boil."
"That sounds fine," Harribel said approvingly, catching her retreating attendant one final time before she disappeared behind the door. "Please make a full pot in case your sisters decide to join us. I should be inside to keep them from each other by the time you finish."
"Very good, Mistress." Sung-Sun inclined her head deeply and proceeded indoors where she hurriedly set her book down and commenced rubbing the feeling back into her fingers. Never in the fifty years of her service to the Tercera Espada had she come to know how the woman could possibly bear the frigid intensity of the chill before the rainy season. She shook her head at the very thought, at the same time producing a small mirror from her pocket.
Her reflection was somewhat of an undesirable sight, prompting her to expertly smooth her hair and wait until the color of her cheeks returned to their proper alabaster hue. Once that was taken care of, she exited the small antechamber and entered the hive of argumentation that was the main living area.
"You're so full of shit," Apacci snorted.
"I'm serious. That guy's famous or something," Mila Rose fired back, adamant about whatever point she was trying to get across to her counterpart. "Go downstairs and see for yourself if you don't believe me."
Apacci blanched. "Hell no! I hear that he kills every servant sent to bring him out of the tower. Apparently, Ulquiorra-sama even avoids him when he can."
Sung-Sun frowned from the sidelines, no longer sure that she wanted to leave this discussion alone. She knew what the newly-created Arrancar were talking about, and she too shared their curiosity regarding that particular subject.
Supposedly, a new Espada had been hybridized shortly after Aizen's defection from Soul Society—the second recipient of the Hougyoku's power. Stories about him had flooded Las Noches with rumors about his origins and strength, each more outlandish than the last. He was allegedly the most violent soldier in the entire army, having earned his rank by immediately slaughtering the previous Sexta bare-handed upon his hybrid transformation.
Of course, she brushed all of this off as gossip that had blown up to what it was from the effects of Las Noches' perpetual boredom. But then again, the man was an enigma. He hadn't left his residence since his arrival, missing every meeting and answering every summons with the meatless skeleton of the messenger. That much was a fact. She was able to witness the results of his defiant behavior with her own eyes whenever she traveled down to his floor which lay between Harribel's level and the common barracks.
"I heard that he could kill a Vasto Lorde back when he was only an Adjuchas."
Both Apacci and Mila Rose ceased their heated argument and faced Sung-Sun with a strikingly similar look of disbelief. "No way!" they shouted simultaneously.
"Not even Harribel-sama is that strong," the fairer-skinned of the two added dismissively.
"I'm just telling you what I heard," Sung-Sun sang in the condescendingly melodious voice that she reserved for occasions such as these. "He would have to be an S-class gran bestia if that were true, and it's highly unlikely since he's only the Sexta."
Mila Rose rolled her eyes at the possibility, a sentiment shared with her cobalt-haired sibling. "Gran bestia, huh? You actually think those things exist? That asshole Baraggan sent his entire army into the forest trying to catch one of them and never found anything," she said disdainfully. "It doesn't matter though. Whoever he is, he's causing problems. None of the Numeros can make it up to our territory because he keeps slaughtering all of them."
Sung-Sun arched a single viridian brow. "Is that so?"
"Try it out."
"I already have…multiple times."
The mocha-skinned woman eyed her strangely. "That's right," she muttered. "You left and came back with groceries earlier. Why the hell didn't he go after you?"
"Who knows?" Sung-Sun tittered airily, moving in the direction of the kitchen. "Maybe he has a soft spot for cultured women."
She laughed at the distant scoff that followed, gliding over to a far cabinet and balancing all of the necessary equipment for brewing tea on her free hand. In no less than two minutes, she had already put the water on and lined a pot with the pre-selected leaves.
So, now what?
Admittedly, she didn't cope well with idleness. Being constantly engaged in one activity or another was a facet of her persona—something that helped immensely in performing her duties. It just so happened that she was able to cover it up under the guise of complacency. After all, a proper woman always hid her imperfections, she thought. Her mind on the other hand, well, that was a dimension of lawlessness.
Vagrant notions of the rogue Espada stumbled into her head, insinuating themselves onto the forefront of her train of thought.
Why exactly hadn't he intercepted her during her trips outside of the residential tower? The more she pondered it, the more peculiar it became. She had seen the corpses that littered his floor. Some had tried to coax him out. Some had been officially sanctioned by Aizen to install surveillance equipment only to have it assist in their demise through rather creative methods. Others were simply delivering food or themselves in the case of the handful of mangled concubines here and there. No matter what they came for, they received the same treatment. Everyone besides her, that is. She didn't get it.
Sung-Sun looked at the water. Another six minutes or so was needed to achieve a boil, and she figured that such an amount of time was sufficient enough to glean some answers.
Grabbing the book she had left by the exit, she ventured back out into the wind and retook her position next to her mistress.
"The tea will be ready soon, Harribel-sama."
Harribel spared an eye away from her reading for her oldest Fraccion. "Are your sisters bothering you so much that they've driven you to return to me?" she queried skeptically.
"Not yet, Mistress," Sung-Sun quipped humorously, "Although I doubt you would experience any discomfort in holding your breath until the time comes."
"Mm~, I'm inclined to agree." Harribel marked her page and turned her full attention to her attendant. "So, why have you come to me?"
The coral-eyed girl's smile fell as her demeanor shifted into one of probing curiosity. "If you would allow it, I'd like to know more about the new Sexta Espada," she said with emphasis on her subservience in hopes of producing a more willing response. Nevertheless, Harribel was hesitant, and Sung-Sun could easily tell by what little she could see of her master's features that she was having difficulty with the request.
"What is it about him that you would like to know?" the Tercera answered, her tone carrying an uncharacteristic edge.
"A name is always nice."
Harribel leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes before letting out a steady sigh. "The ancients of the human world would have called him Angra Mainyu," she said cryptically, preparing to delve into a history that she would have rather kept to herself. "That man, though, he calls himself Grimmjow Jaegerjaquez."
In an effort to conceal her surprise, Sung-Sun brought her sleeve to her lips and felt an invigorating chill run up her spine.
"I see. You're old enough to recognize that name, aren't you?"
"Of course," the Fraccion blurted, forcing her blood to cool. "Grimmjow Jaegerjaquez was said to be the first S-class Hollow to evolve into a Menos Grande. But how is he here? He disappeared without a trace one hundred years ago."
Harribel clenched her teeth from underneath her collar, anticipating the bad taste that her next words were sure to conjure. "That is true. His six century dominion over the forest ended so abruptly that he was presumed dead." She touched her hand to her forehand and toyed with one of her golden braids. "I'm sure that he would have preferred that reality."
"So, what really happened to him?"
"Do you recall the time when I had told you that I was once assigned a security detail in the detention ward, one involving two very…unique individuals."
Sung-Sun nodded. "That was over fifty years ago, about when I came into your service back when you held the rank of Segunda. I remember that I had asked about your periodic absences with Nelliel-sama, and you told me that the two of you were watching over prisoners. I just never thought that one of them would be someone like him. Well, considering who the other one was…"
"Indeed. He had been captured after receiving irreversible damage to his mask and imprisoned along with Starrk until the day that Aizen possessed the Hougyoku. It was a plan to preserve them so that he could turn them into soldiers surpassing the definition of an Espada. Unfortunately, neither case succeeded. Grimmjow was incapable of evolving, and I was recently informed that his hybridization was somewhat immature, further weakening him. Then, Starrk's previous form was released into the desert and urged to feed in order to become a Vasto Lorde."
"But once he evolved, he wandered the surface, later tearing off his own mask and making it into Lily-chan. By doing that, he changed into a natural Arrancar like us," Sung-Sun relayed from memory. This part of the story was familiar to her.
"It's frightening that he remained more powerful than Baraggan, isn't it?"
Sung-Sun agreed and paused, knitting her eyebrows together. "You never asked why I wanted to know any of this."
Harribel chuckled lightly. "I never had to. Despite his disposition as my inferior officer, I continue to acknowledge Grimmjow's presence as greater than mine. Do you know why? Because only his claws have dulled since his days as king of the forest. He is still the kind of man that could raise an army while he slept and light the sky on fire with his tongue. It's not unnatural to want to learn more about him."
"By that same logic, would I be over-stepping my bounds if I desired your permission to meet with him?"
The Espada made a noise somewhere in between concern and caution. "You are not my slave, Sung-Sun. You may do as you wish, but I won't be there to prevent him from harming you," she admonished. "Even now, I can't face him after playing a part in stripping him of his pride."
"Perhaps I can act in your interest then."
"If there is no way that I can dissuade you."
Sung-Sun smiled. "You're leniency will be your undoing, Mistress. However, I'm certain that Nelliel-sama, wherever she's gone off to, is very proud of you."
Harribel's mirth grew from behind her mask fragment. "Mi amor would tell me there's nothing to worry about, I'm sure. She had made kin out of all of us before she left." Her aquamarine orbs shimmered in remembrance. "Very well, you may go once you pour the tea."
Standing up from her seat, Sung-Sun bowed graciously and quickly set off to fulfill her superior's wishes.
She had always been a creature of whim. At least that was how Sung-Sun chose to describe her increasingly impulsive behavior. In actuality, she was a well-disguised malcontent doing her best to identify something, anything fulfilling to her above a fleeting satisfaction. Harribel wasn't enough, not nearly. While it was true that she gained a sense of place and function from her service, it was only a platform from which she could expand outwards. She needed more to fill the void inherited from her birth as a boundary being with no specifically defined niche in the natural world.
That was how she had come into Aizen's grand army. She had hoped that his ambitions would put an end to her continuing search for purpose, but her situation now was proving to be worse than ever before. From the horizon, the prospect of bringing about a new world had appeared attractive, glamorous even in her desperation. Fifty years later, she was past that illusion and looking for something corporeal to attach herself to on the downhill march to the grave that her 'fearless leader' had dug for her. And it was the sheer intensity of this yearning that brought her search to Grimmjow's Jaegerjaquez's bloodied doorstep.
Taking a deep breath, Sung-Sun raised her hand to knock and recoiled slightly when the heavy metal door was pulled open from the other side.
Out from the darkness of the Espada's chambers, a tall man of average build bearing long, mandarin features stepped onto the threshold and leveled a neutral gaze towards the wary visitor.
"Are your reasons for coming here informal?"
Sung-Sun silently gauged the man and eased into a state of refined sociability. "Yes, they are. Would I be correct in assuming that you are Shawlong Koufang, the first of Aizen-sama's new Arrancar?" she inquired politely, placing her hands cross in front of her uniform and realizing inexplicitly that she'd forgotten to leave her book behind.
"You would," the male Fraccion said dryly, plucking the hardback from the woman's grasp and flipping through it before handing it back to her. "Forgive me. I'm sure you're aware that we receive many who have come here with dishonest intentions." He gestured haphazardly to the half-disintegrated carcasses piled up further down the hall and directed her inside. "Leave your affiliations outside, and please come in."
The serpentine Arrancar stiffened and inwardly frowned. Things were proceeding so normally that they were starting to become awkward. She had expected to be greeted by hostility, not cordiality. Surely this was a front of some sort, a show put on for the cameras in the corridor.
She looked again to the mountain of bodies and suddenly her attempts at reasoning seemed useless. These were obviously not the kind of people that cared about security personnel.
"Thank you," was all she could say as she accepted Shawlong's invitation, tentatively crossing the boundary that separated her world from a realm unexplored.
Inside, the environment was instantly foreign to her, harboring a low-hanging musk of men and scents attributed to battle—a far cry from the heady, feminine smell of Harribel's quarters. Beyond that, the entire household was in severe disrepair. The scattered reishi lamps had all been neglected, immersing the majority of the area in such a degree of blackness that even the eyes Sung-Sun had trained by hunting in the forest were exerted to their limits just to make out the most basic of shapes.
Upon closer inspection, the majority of those aforementioned silhouettes turned out to be heaps of wreckage. From what little she could tell, almost every piece of furniture had either been deliberately broken or thrown aside with extreme force. In fact, the damage was to such an extent that at one point she came across a structural tear spanning clean through the tower that still retained the trademark scent of burnt atmosphere attributed to a cero.
I can feel that man's rage lingering here…
Wading through debris ranging from broken glass to chunks of heat-scored sandstone, Sung-Sun soon found her way into a large common room.
Ahead of her, Shawlong caught his guest surveying the dilapidated state of his accommodations and cleared his throat. "Grimmjow hasn't been coping well with everything that's happened recently," he commented distastefully, leading her into a circle of chairs inhabited by four other hybrids whom she failed to recognize. "While I can sympathize with his frustration since I too was exposed to an imperfect Hougyoku, I've been having difficulty dealing with the living conditions around here."
One of the others grunted from his position on an overturned ottoman. "Don't try to compare what you gave up to what he lost. He wasn't at the end of his rope like we were."
Shawlong shook his head solemnly in agreement, righting a toppled armchair and offering it to Sung-Sun.
"No thank you."
He nodded and took it for himself.
"Who's she?" a different speaker piped up, pointing lazily to the newcomer. "Smells too good for food and not enough fear in her for any fun."
Shawlong shrugged and retired to a relaxed pose, opening to a random page of a novel he had scooped up off the floor. "I didn't bother to ask why she came, but I assume she's here to see Grimmjow."
Abruptly, a boisterous round of laughter filled the once quiet parlor before swiftly deteriorating into low snickers.
"Knock yourself out, woman." The man on the ottoman rose and approached Sung-Sun jauntily, taking her by the shoulder and spinning her around so that she now faced a narrow hall. "He's right down there, holed up in the training room at the end. Let me tell ya though, you'd first better finish up everything you've left undone in this life 'cause that bastard is pissed."
"I'll keep that in mind," Sung-Sun huffed, shaking the fellow Arrancar off of her. "And I don't appreciate your rudeness."
"Oh?" The man cackled brusquely, glancing back to his comrades and receiving their humored encouragement. "Forgive me, mi querida. A man such as myself isn't suited to entertain women. I was only trying to move a flower away from a flame."
"I am not so attached to this world" Sung-Sun haughtily retorted, provoking a twinge of bafflement in the myriad of soldiers. "What if I am here for Grimmjow-sama? This flower isn't foolish enough to be unprepared for death under Aizen's command. If you think otherwise, then perhaps you are unsuited for a great many things, chiquito."
Her verbal adversary bristled disbelievingly at her riposte, reaching for his sword only to have Shawlong intervene by gripping his wrist. "Yylfordt," he reprimanded sharply, "leave her be. She's one of the Tercera's."
"Like I care," the blonde growled, wincing when the pressure on his joint increased to a level that threatened to fracture bone. "Fine, whatever," he conceded with a shout." Let the suicidal bitch get it from Grimmjow instead. Makes no difference to me."
"A wise decision," Shawlong muttered, releasing his hold and turning a glare towards the woman whom he had spared. "For a lady of such emphasis on etiquette, you're quite impudent when you choose to be. Now, go see him, and leave if by some miracle he doesn't eat you."
Behind her sleeve, Sung-Sun smirked victoriously. "I will, thank you."
With that, she gave the five demi-Hollows a splendid view of her back as she advanced steadily towards the door that Yylfordt had, in his bounteous kindness, accentuated for her. In no time, the entrance was upon her, and she was startled to discover a needle of dread hidden amongst the many sensations creeping up her spine. There was no mistaking it. She was standing upon the fringe of an aura of killing intent so pure that nothing other than an Espada could generate it.
It was like a thick steam, carrying with it a passionate array of emotions that instilled in her something greater than average fear. Her pulse quickened in realization. For a Sexta to make her feel horror with his presence alone was no small feat. After all, she shared regular company with the Tercera, and often times the Primera too. The fact that he could do this to her without any conscious effort when two higher-ranking Espada in the same circumstances could not was testament to his S-class heritage.
Excited by the prospect of meeting such a creature, she dashed all remaining reservations and pushed the door open with more force than she had intended.
"Pardon my disrespect," she apologized to the murky shadows on the other side, entering when no response came and letting the exit seal itself behind her. She knew she wasn't in her element there in the darkness. Sung-Sun had come to that conclusion after seeing the rest of his territory and how his own servants, despite their lack of formality, overtly avoided him out of self-preservation.
One wrong move in here would be the end of her. Of course, that was assuming that she hadn't already exceeded her boundaries.
Still, she bowed to the ground, waiting for permission to stand as sounds akin to dripping water reverberated throughout the chamber in an irregular cadence. They came sometimes with a drop or two at a time, sometimes much more until minutes passed and a wet impact could be heard from the other end of the room. It was a sickly resonance that gave Sung-Sun the beginnings of second thoughts.
"Pardon my disrespect," a gruff voice repeated over the telltale noise of metal sliding against wood. "It's been a while since the last time I heard someone talkin' like that. Bring your head up, brat. Let me see your face."
Fully aware of the consequences that disobedience entailed, Sung-Sun complied immediately and shifted into a seiza position on the floor. She then tried to locate the source of the voice amidst the umbra, electing not to use pesquisa and opting instead to rely on her natural senses which were of significantly lesser assistance. Useless was more like it. In the timeframe between her arrival and when she had sat down, the demon in the shadows had done the impossible and made himself totally undetectable. Not even his scent could be distinguished from the prevalent odor of blood.
Curse her habit of persistence.
She scanned the inky expanse uneasily, doing everything short of fumbling around blindly with her hands.
"Quit moving."
She froze, barely suppressing a gasp as hot breath tickled her neck. How had he gotten so close?
"You look like a mainlander," the enshrouded Espada observed dispassionately, propping up her chin with an odd kind of delicate roughness. "But you speak the language better than most and know how to use it. I know Aizen didn't pound that into your head. So, where'd you learn that?"
Sung-Sun pretended to be unaware of the physical contact and obliged her invisible predator as best she could. "I was born as a Hollow already possessing my knowledge of Japanese culture," she explained evenly, hints of anxiety seeping into her words.
"Past life stuck with ya, huh? Where were you from?"
"I'm sorry, but I don't have any memories from before I came here to Hueco Mundo three hundred years ago."
"You don't know anything?"
"Just scraps of days gone by."
There was a frustrated sigh followed by a feverish rustling that resulted in a white light blinking into existence and dispelling the perpetual night. "Figures," Grimmjow Jaegerjaquez said bitingly. Several swears were heard as he moved away from a flickering reishi lamp and crouched down next to his blinded visitor. "None of the fucking books Aizen keeps in this place can tell me anything about the country either."
As he lamented, Sung-Sun forced herself to endure the dramatic change in lighting without closing her eyelids for more than a second at a time. From her perspective, the world was a spackled blur centered around one blotch larger than the rest.
"Too bright, isn't it? There any way to turn it down?"
She nodded and the blotch drew closer.
Wholly unprepared for what came next, Sung-Sun let out a surprised yelp when a pair of strong arms hoisted into the air and carried her over to the origin of her discomfort which no longer held a top spot on her list of worries. In all honesty, she had preferred the way things were in lieu of her new predicament. Karma, she supposed. This ill sentiment went on to be reinforced when her skyward voyage unceremoniously ended, and she was placed in between a small table and a hard, unmistakably male body.
"Show me," a rough murmur commanded into her ear.
Blushing madly, she did the only thing she could and slid her hand along the brass pillar supporting the lamp's filament, locating and adjusting the dial controlling the burn of spiritrons.
If only Apacci and Mila Rose could see her now.
The radiance of the spiritual particles dimmed to a comfortable glow, allowing Sung-Sun to focus her vision and, in turn, give her the opportunity to maneuver around and finally see exactly whom she had been talking to.
His eyes caught her first. Profoundly expressive, they burned with ancient passion beneath a matching head of spiky azure hair. And try as she might, her mind went blank and her mouth dried at the sight of them. They were so impossibly similar to the eyes of the man photographed in her book—tired and eroded by ten lifetimes of strife.
A pang of sympathy stalled her racing heart, forming a mixture of intrigue and apprehension as their mutual stare broke when she arched her head submissively downward. However, that gesture was simply used to seize an opportunity to investigate him further. She went first to the carnal smirk amplified by his grinning mask fragment, then to his tan, wood-carved torso, and lastly to his torn hakama that just barely preserved whatever modesty he might have had.
Sung-Sun bit her lip as her face darkened even more. Propriety be damned, she had never seen anyone like this. His features were more animal than human, from his gleaming canines and his lithe frame marred by a multitude of scars that appeared self-inflicted to his bloodstained shred of clothing. Wait. Her admiration was put on hold as she scanned his body with more attention to detail. Those scars were self-inflicted, and some of the stains were still growing in size.
"You're wounded," she stammered and met his frozen sapphire pools once more.
He merely stretched his smirk thinner, taking a step forward and forcing her to sit atop the table behind her as he practically stood between her legs. "Been trainin'. This is a training room, you know?"
The accumulated color drained from the woman cheeks at his mischievous tone. He was playing a game with her that she didn't know the rules to. And no matter what he said, something drastic had been done to himself to create the scattered pools of crimson that she spotted around the room.
"Tier's girl, right? You look like the one she was telling me about."
At the mention of her Mistress' name, Sung-Sun put aside her concern. If Grimmjow Jaegerjaquez was half of the atrocity she had heard about in stories, then he was capable of taking much more than a severed artery or two.
"I am," she affirmed. "I apologize for my lack of introduction. My name is Sung-Sun, but even Harribel-sama just calls me Sun-Sun. It's less difficult, especially for Japanese speakers."
"I wouldn't worry about it. Living in Hueco Mundo has taught me plenty of languages," Grimmjow denounced casually, his expression becoming inquisitive. "Haven't heard a name like that since I hung around Heian-Kyo, though. Are you sure you're from the islands?"
"Positive…" Sung-Sun let the word trail off and looked at the Sexta with blatant disbelief. "Did you say Heian-Kyo? I may not remember my life as a human, but I know that Heian-Kyo was renamed Kyoto almost a millennia ago."
Grimmjow's smirk vanished. "That so? Time sure goes by quickly at my age," he mumbled, turning his back to the lamp and ignoring his guest's horrified reaction while he slinked over to the center of the area to sit down.
"What did you do to yourself? You need help right now!" Sung-Sun exclaimed, abjectly fixated to the grotesque patch of skinless flesh that spanned from his Hollow hole to the right side of his ribcage. Earnestly, she sidled alongside the wound, setting a steady hand on top of the gore and working past the blood to determine the depth of the injury. Fortunately, it was shallow enough for her manage alone. Any more and she would have had to call his Fraccion for support, and that was not something she was keen on doing. Their apathy towards their master was highly offensive to her.
An amused rumble was building up inside Grimmjow's chest. "I've had a lot worse, youngblood. My tattoo just started to piss me off again, so I cut it off. That's all. The problem is that it keeps coming back, sometimes when I'm not healed yet. This fuckin' body can't even grow skin well."
"I fail to see how any of that is humorous," she chastised, ripping her sleeve and fashioning it into a makeshift bandage. What was he thinking? Had his imprisonment warped him into believing that he was something lesser than what he actually was? He was a gran bestia, a Hollow peerless in nature, and here he was humbling himself to her. She hadn't come for this. It was disgusting. She had come to put her faith into one of the last great members of her species, not nurse its insanity.
I must have been starstruck when I first saw him.
"I understand now why Harribel-sama didn't want to see you."
The laughter ceased. "Yeah, how do you figure?"
"I don't know what's happened to you," Sung-Sun said in between careful applications of cero energy aimed to cauterize the raw sinew, "but I haven't seen very much of the Grimmjow Jaegerjaquez that Starrk-sama described to me in you. It seems that I was wrong to have trusted Harribel-sama when she told me that only your claws have dulled. Has Aizen taken your pride too? There's no excuse for-"
"Shut your fucking mouth!" Before her body could fully register the impact, she was smashed backwards into the wooden floor and managed to remain lucid enough to know that a sword was at her throat.
"No one talks to me like that. No one," Grimmjow snarled, asphyxiating her with his left hand as he cut a thin line across her throat that stopped just short of delivering a mortal wound. "I was fine with letting you talk equally to me since you were Tier's bitch, but now you're going to have to wait until the next life for another chance at that. Make one more noise and I'll gut you just like I've done every other smartass whose come in here, got it?"
Sung-Sun said nothing, only glared at him daringly. She wanted to see more of this. She wanted to see in him what the Tercera and Primera saw.
"Listen to me, woman." The hand constricted tighter around her windpipe as the full force of his reiatsu came down upon her. "Twice now, I've lost everything. And just like last time, I have to build myself up from nothing. From the day my mask was torn, that's all that mattered. I get destroyed and I rebuild myself better than before. Over and over again. That's how it's been for a thousand years, and not you or Tousen or Aizen can do anything to stop me. I'm the king of this world, me! You just lay here with one foot in the grave and watch, brat. One day I'll turn Hueco Mundo to ash!"
"Prove it," Sung-Sun gurgled, watching him go wide-eyed at her tenacity. "Show me that you're more than what I see right now. Kill me if you have to. Save Aizen the trouble."
"What the hell are you going on about?"
Irate, the Fraccion boldly brought her face closer to his, her hierro straining under the pressure of his Zanpakuto. "You know that we have no place in Aizen's world. Once he's used us, he'll throw us aside like trash. I don't want to be alive when that happens, Grimmjow-sama. Either prove that you can change my fate, or cut off my head right now so that I don't have to experience the death of everyone I've ever cared about."
There, she said it. He was her last ditch effort to make real the corrosive desire that had been gnawing at her heart years before she had ever thought about ripping off her own mask.
"I need out one way or another," she continued somberly after the stranglehold slackened and fell away. "There has to be more to life than going day to day with no direction except what's given to me by someone who has no place even being here."
She wrapped her fingers around his sword, edging it deeper only for it to draw back.
"Weakling," Grimmjow spat, sheathing his weapon. He sneered at her despair. "Don't come crying to me about your existential crisis. Hopelessness is just an excuse to stop trying."
Sung-Sun grit her teeth, completely dashing her visage of a cool-headed servant in favor of a persona that was more appropriate for what she was feeling. "What do you know about hopelessness? You came into this hell with more strength than I have now," she screamed.
"So what?" Grimmjow fired back, his eyes ablaze with zealous vehemence. "I was a damn kid when I first came to the desert. Not even a day had gone by before Baraggan and the other Lordes threw everything they had at me. I was alone against armies, fucking organized armies trying to take my head. And you think you have it tough just 'cause you're bored of living in safety and luxury. Fate has put me up against a lot more than Aizen, woman. I know more about hopelessness than you ever will. You want to quit? Fine. Do it on your own time. I don't drink the sour blood of cowards who've settled in the shade of the strong because they've given up on themselves. I will get through this, and I will climb back up to the top."
For the second time, he turned his back to her and sat on the floor meditatively.
Following his departure, minutes ticked by in an echoing silence until Sung-Sun joined him, fastening the bandage she had prepared around his waist.
"I'll give ya some advice for you to share with Tier and Starrk when you see them," Grimmjow said wearily, paying no mind to the pain lancing up his spine every time the woman pulled the cloth tighter. "Don't narrow your options down to slavery and death. If I could carve a niche in Hueco Mundo back when the entire world was told to kill me, then I can do it again. In time, we can make a place for ourselves."
He felt Sung-Sun finish his treatment and set her cheek atop his naked skin, placing her hand on his shoulder instead of leaving like he had expected.
"That was what I wanted to hear," she whispered, shutting her eyes as she rose and fell with his breathing. Harribel had been right about him after all. He had the power and indomitable spirit to make a difference. The only question left was if he could sharpen his claws again before Aizen commenced his suicide war… No, that wasn't the proper mindset. It was better to adapt his philosophy so that she could proudly tell the other souls in hell that she had died trying.
"I can't do it just by myself this time though," Grimmjow grumbled, rotating so that both he and Sung-Sun could speak directly. "I turned myself into a demon to survive the odds, not beat them. I'll be needing a pack to fight Aizen, and not those pathetic bastards leeching off of me outside. Do you think you have what it takes to stand beside me?"
An answer came in the form of a wayward smile.
"Alright then, I'll give you a chance to show me that you're not completely worthless, but you'd better not pull anything like you did today ever again or I swear I'll split your skull, got it?"
"I won't disappoint you."
"God damn right you won't. Now, let's go. You're bringing me to Tier," Grimmjow ordered, taking her by the arm and heading for the door only to stumble over a stray copy of An Introduction to Nuclear Physics.
Regaining his balance, he looked at the book menacingly and kicked it aside, causing it to explode into a rain of pages when it struck the wall.
"Already read it."
Sung-Sun giggled at her new pack leader as he led her past his baffled Fraccion and out into Las Noches' maze of corridors. The loss of one book was inconsequential compared to what she had gained by accepting his offer. She no longer had to waste her reverence on pictures of destruction, not when the path she walked was paved by destruction incarnate.
He had transformed her doomed existence into hope, and for that she owed him all that she had.
They walked side by side, traversing the route from Grimmjow's floor to Harribel's countless times over long months spent steeling themselves for what was to come. And somewhere along the way, he had stopped dragging her from place to place, and she began softly taking his hand instead.
Time went by, and together, they watched their pack grow as scarred tissue healed over and the mark on his back changed from a paltry six to a number far more fitting of his strength.
Author's Note
As this one-shot is a companion to Change My Fate, please read that as well if you found this enjoyable.