Chapter 1

He could hear the screams from Orihime Inue's quarters before he could see the door. Turning the corner, he saw it had been ripped from its hinges yet again.

This was no surprise. Another part of Lord Aizen's plan to bind the woman to them was this charade in which Ulquiorra was to arrive and save her, repeatedly. She would come to crave his presence, Lord Aizen assured him.

This made sense to Ulquiorra. Humans depended on so many elaborate self-delusions, even under normal circumstances. No doubt she would go to extraordinary lengths to derive comfort from his periodic intervention, contrived though it was.

He entered the room to find one of the jealous little esprits ripping into Orihime Inue's chest. Half the screeching was coming from the attacker, Esperell, this time, a particularly vicious piece of trash.

Ulquiorra observed briefly before interfering. Esperell had torn a couple of the woman's chest muscles and cracked at least two ribs. While this could be considered superficial, there was also a profusely bleeding wound on her skull, which looked more dangerous. Ulquiorra noted the excessive damage. They weren't supposed to kill her, or cause her so much damage that she couldn't heal herself. This had gotten out of hand.

"Stop," he said, calmly.

Esperell turned at his interference, looking truly feral. Her rage was out of control, and he had interrupted her with her prey. She snarled and leapt at him.

Not bothering to dodge, Ulquiorra hooked a finger through one of the jaw bones projecting around her face and idly threw her through the wall behind him, out into the hallway. The screeching stopped, replaced by a stunned whine. "Remember your place," he said, without turning. He was satisfied when he heard the chastened harpy limping away.

He approached Orihime Inue, who stared up at him with glazed, expressionless eyes. He pulled away the shreds of the white and black espada uniform from her torso, examining the damage there. They were painful injuries, yes, but nothing that would kill her immediately. The blood loss eventually might, but there was some time before that. He turned his attention to the head wound. Blood trailed behind her to a crumbling dent several feet up on the wall of her bedroom. She didn't seem to be unconscious, but was unresponsive when he asked, "Woman. Can you heal yourself?"

He knelt across her, placing his long, pale fingers behind her neck, carefully lifting her head towards him and exploring the back of her skull with his other hand. Orihime grunted and winced when his fingers found the wound, sticky and matted. Her eyes focused on his face, finally, and she brought her own hand up to rest on his cheek. There was a brief flare of intense light, and Ulquiorra felt a bright energy searing his face beneath her hand. It took him a moment to realize what she had done. She had healed the scratches Esperell had left there.

It was ridiculous. He could regenerate whole limbs. What need had he of her healing a wound so trivial, he had even failed to notice it? It was especially ridiculous considering her very life was leaking out and making a bright red mess of the floor.

Orihime shifted her position and flinched, bringing his attention to her lower body. There were still more injuries he hadn't yet catalogued. He removed the remainder of the uniform and saw that her left leg was likely broken just below the knee. She couldn't move on her own, and he needed to bring her to her senses quickly. Ignoring the stains she left on his own uniform, he gently placed his arms beneath her knees and shoulders, and carried her into her bathroom, to weak moans and unintelligible protests. He lowered her into the bath and opened the cold water portal.

She gasped and began to breathe in sharp bursts as she became more aware of the pain. Ulquiorra grabbed one of her flailing hands in his and steadied her with his other hand on her shoulder. He guided her captured hand to the back of her head. "Heal this," he demanded. She squinted at him, as if trying to understand a foreign language through sheer will, and then finally nodded. He felt that searing heat again, as the hand he was holding channeled the healing of her cracked skull.

When the light faded, Orihime glanced around with more awareness, taking stock of her injuries. "C-c-cold," she said to Ulquiorra through gritted teeth. He opened the hot water, as well, and stopped the drain. She sighed and folded her arms over her hunched body, hands extended. It took a few more minutes to heal the rest of her, but eventually, she relaxed against the wall of the tub, whole again. Nothing but a slight pink tinge to the water remained of the ordeal.

Ulquiorra considered these events. Orihime might very well have been killed by the overexuberance of her attacker. The situation would need to be reevaluated. He was impatient to discuss it with Lord Aizen. "Are you able to care for yourself?" he asked the nearly unconscious woman. Orihime stirred, and began to drag herself out of the bath. She listlessly plucked up one of the bathing cloths stacked next to the tub to dry herself, slowly, methodically, swaying a little on her feet as she concentrated on this task. Ulquiorra readied himself to carry her to the bed, but she brushed past him and managed to lurch into the next room on her own. She fastidiously avoided stepping in the blood in the middle of the floor, and collapsed into the bed, which, miraculously, was entirely intact.

"I'll bring some food shortly, and a new uniform," he said to the woman, as she lay face down on the bed cover. She mumbled something he couldn't quite hear, which he took to be acknowledgement. As he turned to leave, however, she said again, more loudly, "I want it to be you."

He looked back over his shoulder, waiting for her to explain. Had he not just told her he would be bringing the food? The weight in her voice implied she was speaking of something else. She began to shift to get under the cover. He watched her do so as he waited, his still, green eyes noting that there was nothing else in Hueco Mundo that could quite match the color of her skin. When she was fully covered, she began to speak again, face to the wall.

"I… know that I am regarded as an enemy. I expect to be punished. Just… please… next time... I want you to be the one to do it."

This surprised him. He was not often surprised, but he silently agreed. If the campaign to break her spirit was to continue along these lines, it couldn't be entrusted to someone who would be carried away by their emotions. It should be him. Still, it was a decision that would be made by Lord Aizen.

He turned back to the door without responding, and left.