The Observer Effect
He had always had an experimental bent.
…
He watched her in the training yard, thrusting and parrying, whirling with grace and control matched by few.
Hinamori's reiatsu was clear and white, strong and fierce and innocent. She was so tiny it gave him the urge to crush her between his large hands. He imagined her pale bones cracking, crumbling, twinkling in shards at his feet.
"Captain Aizen!" she called from the other side of the yard, holding up one of the training swords. "This one has a defect. It could have failed to retract and caused an accident."
He affixed an expression of concern on his face. "That's odd," he mused.
She looked up at him. "What is it?"
He frowned. "That's the set Captain Hitsugaya last used. It's not like him to miss something like this." His frown deepened. "Unless… no." He shook his head.
"What?" she asked.
His face smoothed out and he gave her a gentle smile. "It's nothing," he said, reassuring. "We all make mistakes. Don't worry about it, Hinamori-kun."
…
Images were everything. He knew that from the mirror he faced every day.
Messy bangs, just slightly too long, falling over scholarly glasses. A mild, humble mien.
But most of all, the actions. The kindly twinkle in his eyes, the sincere remark accompanied by a pat on the head, the occasional personal confidence let slip in an unguarded moment.
Could someone fall in love with pure goodness?
…
He looked out the window. "The cherry blossoms are so beautiful this time of year, aren't they? The fall of white, so like snowflakes in a storm, apparently out of season."
She followed his gaze. "Yes, Captain Aizen, they are beautiful." When she said the word 'beautiful,' she blushed.
He smiled.
He had grown bored of goodness by the time he went to Hueco Mundo. It was time to amuse himself by indulging in darkness.
"Come here," he told the tiny, newly-made Arrancar. Her black pigtails quivered as she inched closer. "On your knees," he ordered lazily. He gestured with one hand and a sheet of nails sprouted on the marble floor, a shimmering, deadly carpet before him.
He smiled as dark red pooled on the floor, so striking against the white, a beautiful, intricate pattern swirling at his desire. Crimson and white, his favorite colors.
"Quickly," he commanded. She whimpered, crawling across the floor, and his smile broadened. "I have so much to teach you, Loly," he murmured. "Today, we'll start with the blood kiss."
It was so gratifying when she turned her magenta eyes up to him, beseeching, adoring.
…
"I do believe the cherry trees are setting fruit back in the Seireitei," he said, standing at the window gazing out over the trackless expanse of sand, hands clasped behind his back. "I miss their taste, sometimes, how they burst in the mouth, white teeth tearing into blood red fruit."
He smiled, not turning, as he heard her sonido away, and again later when a bowl of cherries was left in offering at his door, a trail of blood leading away on the white marble floor.
He had watched the battle in a Seireitei cherry orchard on one of his video monitors, unable to restrain the feeling of sweet desire as she sustained wounds while catering to his whims. As sweet as the cherries he ate alone in his rooms.
How strange it was, strange and sweet, that someone could fall in love with pure evil.
What, he mused, chin resting in his palm, gazing out at the endless night, what if he showed someone everything? Both sides, light and dark?
…
She had a remarkable ability, and an even more remarkable heart. He watched her on the video screen, lost in thought.
What could he do with one like her?
...
The triumphant laughter of the man she had just healed filled the hall. The man who had used the arm she had regenerated to do murder. To kill, and to laugh.
Through it all, the lord of Las Noches watched from his throne. He saw her glance at him, saw her face fill with horror and realization.
Later, alone with her in his chambers, he moved closer to her, fixing her with his eyes, wide and compelling. He could see himself reflected in her irises.
"… and I need your power. You will use that power of yours for me, won't you?" Softness and seduction, cold and manipulation, side by side. It was all of him, all the parts of the broken mirror, everything he had or could reflect.
How would she react?
…
It was only when it was too late that he realized.
In the twenty-thousand-year darkness, he had time to reflect.
Upon darkness and light, and why there was only loneliness in his soul.
…
And the fact that sometimes experiments affected the observer more than the subject.
A/N: This one was a little different; what do you think?