Dragon Cross
By Spunky0ne
(A Cang Du/Toshiro love story)
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In the ruins of the quincy kingdom, Toshiro discovers a gravely wounded Cang Du and nurses him back to health. When Cang Du is stripped of his power and made to serve a corrupt noble lord, Toshiro challenges the noble to win control of the prisoner's fate…Cang Du/Toshiro, Byakuya/Renji, Ichigo/Tetsuya
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Chapter 1: Wreckage
"I just don't believe this, Taicho!" Matsumoto Rangiku complained, following Toshiro through the tumbled remains of the damaged Seireitei, "We were up there fighting with everyone else. Why do we have to come here and dig through this mess? Isn't that more a job for the fourth division?"
"Picking up after a war is everyone's job," Tosiro said dryly, "Grow up, Rangiku."
His red-haired fukutaicho gave him an amused look.
"Funny you should talk about growing up," she giggled, studying her taicho's handsomely matured form.
"Don't go there!" Toshiro warned her, scowling as he scanned the area ahead of them.
"Oh, come on!" Rangiku said, smirking, "You know, Kuchiki taicho and Renji-san have some serious competition for hottest division heads, now that you've…"
"Shut up, Rangiku!" the white-haired taicho snapped, "Go over that way and conduct a sweep of the area. I will cover this side."
"Do you really think we're even going to find anyone out here?" the redhead mused, looking around.
"This area is near what was the quincy prison," Toshiro explained, "If there were captives being held, this is where we will find them. They will provide important information about Ywach's regime."
"Ywach's regime?" Matsumoto inquired, "Why do we care about his regime? He was destroyed, wasn't he?"
"He was," Toshiro confirmed, his turquoise eyes scanning the area, then meeting hers, "But if we want to avoid another war like the one we just fought, then we need to know as much as we can about how he rose to power. This is important, Rangiku."
Rangiku looked back at him quietly for a moment, marveling at him standing at about her height and failing completely to hide a saucy smirk.
"What?" he demanaded, What's so funny?"
"N-nothing, Taicho," Rangiku answered, biting at her lips, "I'm just not used to seeing eye to eye with you, that's all."
"That's enough!" Toshiro scolded her, "Go do what I told you to do."
"All right, all right," the redhead said in an annoyed tone, "I'm going!"
"It's about time," Toshiro muttered under his breath, "I don't know why I still put up with her…"
He stalked away, moving into the jumbled ruins, his sharp eyes peering into the dark places, searching for any sign of something moving, sensing for the reiatsu of anyone who might have been left behind. He moved in a careful search pattern, examining places where small pockets could have formed or a body could have curled up inside. He found plenty of signs that both quincies and shinigamis had died in the area, but there were no signs of life remaining.
"Taicho, over here!" Rangiku called suddenly.
Toshiro's eyes narrowed and he flash stepped to his adjutant's side. Rangiku stood in front of a large piece of collapsed wall, where several weak voices were calling out from underneath.
"There are some prisoners trapped here," Rangiku said, pointing at the broken and precariously balanced piece of wall, "I would break it, but I'm worried big pieces could fall on them."
"It's fine," Toshiro assured her, "I've got this."
He drew his sword and touched the glinting tip against the fallen wall, wordlessly invoking his power. Water streamed from the tip of the sword, curling around the fallen concrete, then freezing it. He whispered a second command that sent a heavy blast through the impediment, simultaneously shattering it and blowing the pieces away, so that they wouldn't fall on the trapped prisoners.
"You did it, Taicho!" Rangiku exclaimed, dashing forward to greet the small group of shinigamis, who had been trapped underneath.
Toshiro remained at a slight distance, scanning the area as Rangiku swiftly pointed out the pathway back to the main shinigami camp in the area. He felt a little flicker, a short distance to the west and glanced back at his fukutaicho.
"Rangiku," he said quietly, "I want you to escort them back."
Rangiku gave him a surprised look.
"And leave you here alone, Taicho?" she inquired.
"I sense an enemy reiatsu nearby," Toshiro said calmly, "I want you to get these people to safety while I investigate."
"But…?"
"Just do it, Rangiku," Toshiro snapped, "If there's an attack, I don't want to be distracted, trying to protect injured people."
Rangiku hesitated, looking back at him worriedly.
"But Taicho," she said more softly.
Toshiro tried to look stern, but felt a twinge of understanding that made his eyes soften slightly.
"It'll be fine," he encouraged her, "Get them to safety, please. When you've done that, you can rejoin me here. Go on, Rangiku."
Despite her nagging worries, the redhead nodded.
"Yes, Taicho. I'll be back as soon as their safe."
Toshiro continued to watch in the direction where he sensed the quincy reiatsu as Rangiku gathered the group of survivors and led them away. When he was alone again, he moved slowly in the direction of the enemy, his sharp eyes watching and his senses scanning for any sign of an incoming attack. But the reiatsu of the quincy seemed to continue radiating weakly in the same area, indicating he or she must be trapped, or perhaps, unconscious.
The reiatsu feel kind of familiar. This must be someone I encountered during the war.
He was relieved at knowing it definitely wasn't the wide-eyed female sternritter who had zombified both Rangiku and him.
She was horrible. I don't want to think about what it felt like being poisoned with her blood and dressed in the clothes of the enemy. Thankfully, I was not cognizant during most of the time.
He closed in on the enemy's position, his senses piqued and his body slightly tensed as he edged around a fallen column, then stopped in front of a pile of rubble. Toshiro's turquoise eyes narrowed and blinked slowly, scanning the pile of debris as he walked around it. He found the collapsed quincy on the far side, nearly buried, so that only a very sharp-eyed person who was aware of his presence, would have discovered him. Toshiro made a sound of surprise as he recognized the young man's short, dark hair and his pale face that was marked by a long, vertical scar running down the left side of his face, from the lower part of his cheek to his chin.
"Cang Du?" Toshiro mused, dropping to his knees at the Sternritter's side to examine him more closely.
It was then that he noticed that much of what covered him wasn't fallen pieces of the building, but rotting garbage.
"What in kami's name?" he whispered, staring.
His heart pounded in reaction as one of Cang Du's pale blue eyes opened and blinked, working to bring him into focus.
"What are you doing here?" Toshiro demanded, noticing the dried blood that had formed a pool under his body before solidifying, "How long have you been here?"
Cang Du's hazy eye blinked and squinted.
"Hitsugaya Toshiro?" he inquired weakly, "I sh-should ask what y-you are doing h-here. Aren't we in the sh-shadows?"
"We are," Toshiro confirmed, brushing a few stray hairs away from his face as he dug around the trapped quincy, "I was ordered to find and rescue all survivors."
"Even e-enemies?" Cang Du asked, "But I h-had the chance to see what kind of person you are. It m-makes sense, I suppose."
"What's that supposed to mean?" Toshiro asked, continuing to work at freeing him.
"You don't h-hate me for being an enemy. You would kill me if you had to, but you would only defeat me without killing me, if you could. Th-that's why I was dishonored. That's why you f-found me here."
"Cang Du, who did this to you?" Toshiro demanded.
Inexplicably, the stoic quincy's lips curved into a little, mocking smile.
"Who cut me d-down and put me in a garbage pile?" he mused, "You hope it wasn't one of your allies, don't you? You don't want t-to think your friends could be so cold, even to an enemy. You betray your humanity, Hitsugaya Taicho."
"Just tell me who did this," Toshiro insisted, carefully extracting the quincy from the rubbish pile and turning him onto his back.
"Why? Why does it matter. Three times now, I should have died and haven't."
He studied Toshiro silently for a moment.
"You and I seem to have the same bad luck," he commented.
"I don't know what you mean," Toshiro said shortly, laying his hands on the injured man's chest and beginning a stabilizing infusion.
"I overheard some of our men talking while I was lying here. I know you were zombified by Giselle."
Toshiro's expression darkened.
"So, you want to make fun of my pain, do you?"
"No."
Toshiro gave him a curious look.
"I only meant that you were supposed to die when I stole your bankai, and again when I returned to finish you off. But you escaped death both times and it appears you escaped zombification too. You've aged, haven't you? But you've also grown stronger."
"Well, isn't that a living world saying?" Toshiro said, increasing the flow of reiatsu to the deep wound in Cang's chest, "What doesn't kill you makes you stronger?"
"I suppose that's true," the quincy sighed, "Except that I don't feel any stronger. I have lost everything but the power to breathe."
"Well, that's only until you are healed. After that…"
"After that, I will rot in a shinigami prison, won't I?"
A troubled look crossed Toshiro's face, but disappeared quickly.
"One thing at a time," he said stiffly, "Let's just keep you alive for now."
"Do you want that much for me to suffer?" Cang asked more softly.
"Why would I want that?" Toshiro asked in reply, taking out a package of healing supplies and beginning to clean the chest wound, "You may have been an enemy, but the war has ended. I have no interest in seeing you suffer."
"But I took something that was dear to you," Cang persisted, "I stole your Daiguren Hyorinmaru and would have let it linger on without you. That is a grave sin, Hitsugaya taicho."
"It's Toshiro," the shinigami taicho said shortly, "And that was a matter of war. I already told you, the war has ended."
"So, you're taking me prisoner?" Cang asked, looking up at him wearily.
Toshiro started to answer, then went silent and staring as a rumble went through the area, and the reiatsu around them shifted ominously.
"What the hell is that?" Toshiro gasped, casting around with his eyes as the area darkened.
"It is die Sperrung," Cang explained, "The closing. It's a failsafe that Ywach employed so that if we were defeated, we could retreat into the shadows and lock the enemies out."
His blue eyes fixed on Toshiro and he gave the shinigami a faint smirk.
"So, it seems like we are both prisoners together, Hitsugaya taicho."
Toshiro scanned the area and tensed slightly as voices rose up somewhere nearby.
"We're vulnerable, out in the open," he said softly, "Do you think you can walk if I help you?"
"You should just leave me," Cang Du said, looking up at him calmly, "If Ywach has fallen, it's right I should die as well. You know that's my way of life. I told you that before."
"Well," Toshiro said, helping him to sit up, "You and I have also lived together, both escaping death as it reached for us on at least three occasions during the war. I would say that ties our fates together…at least for now, Cang Du."
The quincy's eyes widened slightly at the informal use of his name, and he gazed more intently at Toshiro.
"You have changed," he noted, "in more than just size. It seems like your values have shifted."
Toshiro shook his head firmly, pausing to address a place where Cang Du's chest had started to bleed again. He fed reiatsu into the spot, carefully closing the wound again.
"I told you, the war ended. While during the war, you were an enemy, now you are…"
"A prisoner?"
"A survivor," Toshiro said sternly, "When I take you back to Soul Society, you will stand before Central 46. They will determine whether or not you are an enemy anymore. My job is to see you stay alive to face justice."
"Wouldn't it make more sense to leave me to my people's justice?" Cang asked, "I am, after all, a quincy. I was sentenced to death."
"You were ordered executed by Ywach," Toshiro corrected him, "Ywach has fallen. There is no leadership here, only chaos. If you or the other sternritters are seen, you might be torn apart. I have heard from several sources here that Ywach was secretly hated and greatly feared. Many quincies only followed him because they could not fight him. They felt they had no choice. The sternritters were considered his privileged officers, so the ones left here will have no desire to give you justice or show you mercy."
"I don't want mercy," Cang sighed, leaning heavily against Toshiro as the shinigami lifted him onto his feet, "I shouldn't even be breathing now. You should have just ended my life mercifully. What point is there in me being alive now?"
Toshiro's turquoise eyes fixed on Cang Du's hopefully.
"You believe that things that live together should die together, ne?" he asked.
"Yes."
"Then, by your thinking, it's only right for you to help me cross the barrier and go home to my people, isn't it?"
Cang gave the shinigami a skeptical look.
"That's stretching things a little, don't you think?" he inquired.
"Maybe, but it's a way for me to get back home in one piece."
He tightened his arm around Cang Du's slim waist, helping him to stumble along as they headed away from the approaching voices.
"If I help you to escape the shadows, will you let me go as well?" Cang asked.
Toshiro peeked at him out of the corner of an eye.
"That seems fair to me," he agreed, "No one on my side knows that I found you, and we are in your people's territory. If you act as my ally, I have no reason to hold you captive. It's a deal. You get me out of here and I'll let you go."
"Okay, but before we can open the sun gate, we'll need to go to the palace and steal a key. My sun gate key was confiscated when Ywach had me arrested."
Toshiro frowned.
"I don't understand. Why were you arrested? What did you do?" he asked curiously.
"It's not what I did, but what I didn't do," Cang explained, wincing as they moved over a rough patch of ground, "I was the one who stole your bankai. Ywach's order was for those who stole a bankai to kill the taicho it was stolen from. I tried to kill you, but I failed. Failing to kill you denied Ywach your soul, so he wanted mine in payment. Haschwalth cut me and Ywach had me dumped in the garbage pile. I think he knew I wasn't dead and wanted me to suffer complete humiliation."
"That's horrible," Toshiro said, shaking his head, "You are a valuable officer."
"I was nothing to his majesty," Cang said softly, "None of us were. I didn't know that before. I thought we were comrades…but that man treated all of us like stepping stones."
"Well, he's gone now. Once I've gone, you are free to live how you choose from now on."
Cang went quiet as Toshiro helped him limp away from the ruins and into the cover of the darkened forest.
"I hardly know what I'll do," he said, after some thought, "I was prepared to die, not to live."
"You want to live, don't you?" asked Toshiro, "You're holding on to me pretty tightly."
Cang smiled shakily, looking down at his clinging hands.
"I suppose I am. I suppose I do want to live. I just need to find a new reason."
"Ah," Toshiro panted, wiping the rising sweat from his forehead and mussing the long ends of his hair, "There's time for that, once we are somewhere safe."
Cang looked around, noting their position.
"That way," he said, pointing, "The palace is that way."