It is dark.
He doesn't know how to fight an enemy he cannot see – doesn't know how to fight when he is the enemy himself. It is hot – too hot – and he doesn't remember how long it has been since he was last himself.
There are many things he doesn't know, but there are far more that he is painfully aware of.
He has tried, time and again, to will a single muscle to listen to him – to resist the Quincy that has taken control over everything, but his strength is failing him; his failed efforts no longer surprise him, and he is beyond frustration.
Stand, Captain.
The voice is chilly and hollow, like the gentle tinkle of glasses, yet simultaneously as commanding and fearsome as if mountains shifted as it spoke. It is the only thing he hears.
He doesn't want to stand, but his body moves anyway.
His only solace is a low rumble deep within his heart, where there once was an aching silence, and he knows that Hyorinmaru is his again. Yet the dragon doesn't speak, doesn't lend him its strength, doesn't urge him to battle for his life as it had on so many other occasions.
Perhaps the dragon is, like him, tired.
He has tried calling for Hyorinmaru, but the overwhelming darkness has rendered him a stranger to his own mind, where he could scream his throat dry and not hear himself.
This silence is far more excruciating than the dragon's silence.
He can feel, so painfully acutely, how his body is struggling to keep up with the alien force that has trapped him within himself. His muscles are at their limit – he can feel each and every forced movement grow sluggish with his fatigue, although he is in command of none of them. His lungs are burning, heaving for oxygen he is not getting – yet he is forced to fight, as if nothing is wrong.
Through the light-headedness, he knows the enemy has gained possession of his body, that one of the Vandenreich is imprisoning his consciousness, manipulating him like a pawn. He can feel his body execute well-practised motions of battle that he himself had honed through decades of battle. His body lunges forward in the black expanse that enveloped his senses, completely disregarding his desperate need to rest. Surely his lungs would give in soon, and he can't quite pinpoint the twinge of emotion that sparks through him as his physical body endures exertion after exertion when he is sure he will soon fail – could it be disappointment? When will this all stop? The overwhelming desire to surrender disgusted him, but it is all he can manage.
In his right hand, the familiar hilt of his sword rubs against his bruised and blistered palm, a constant reminder that Hyorinmaru might not really be his after all, not if he can't control his own body, not if he can't call on the other half of his soul. He swings his sword arm, and he feels it penetrate flesh, feels blood spatter his arms, but the world is still dark, and he hears nothing.
Without missing a beat, his body lunges forward once more, this time parrying a hurried block. He could feel what little was left of his reiatsu leave him as the Quincy drew on the depths of his soul, sending out a crescent of ice he shouldn't have been able to.
The cruel drainage of his life force feels as if he were attacking himself. Maybe he was – there was really no way to tell. It was so dark, so quiet he wanted to scream, though he knew so well that it would do absolutely nothing.
He doesn't know who he has hurt, whether they are alive or dead or dying.
He doesn't know whether he is alive or dead or dying.
He doesn't know if his resolve will break first, or if his body will.
Kill them all, Captain.
His title is a mockery, and he moves anyway.
He twists his torso, following through the motions of an explosive strike that gains its power from the rotation of his body. Feet apart, knees bent, right arm swinging outwards and upwards from the left hip, he straightens up as both arms swing around for a deadly strike at a speed he could never manage, his left arm acting as a counterbalance with a perfection he had never achieved.
Hyourinmaru is so heavy.
The blade connects once more, and he is sure the jarring shock that shakes his sword arm will shatter it.
His arm holds up, and a bone-chilling giggle permeates the air – his blood runs ice-cold at the sound, Unseeing, he lashes out with the last vestiges of his energy – he doesn't know where, but his reiatsu is quickly absorbed and locked away from him, not for the first time.
He should collapse, his body should not last this long, he tells himself. He's tired.
The silence echoes deafeningly in his ears, an empty ringing that grows louder and louder with each passing moment of nothingness. Fighting off the enemy seems like a far-off delusion, for he can no longer tell what is a result of the invasion of his soul and what is a result of his own sheer stupidity – perhaps there is no difference. Ice and frost swirl in the air around him, although he is sure he has no reiatsu left. The idea occurs to him that the power is no longer his, but he dismisses it as insanity – as desperation closing in on him.
Yet as his fingers grow cold and numb, a nagging thought persists – a growing suspicion that he is right, that his power and his sword are no longer his own. Hyorinmaru is no longer his; his soul is half gone – even the body he occupies has been taken from him.
His body crashes down to the ground, though his grip on his sword does not loosen. This time, he doesn't bother fighting, even though he can tell through the haze of the temptation of acquiescence that the enemy's control over him is waivering. His vision begins to return to him, ever so slightly, as his senses slowly creep their way into him. Kurotsuchi hovers over him, his mouth moving, though he cannot make out a single word being spoken, and he decides that seeing nothing is better than seeing the mad scientist's widening grin.
The moment his eyelids drop closed, a blade pierces him – he can't tell where; all he knows is that his body is on fire, that he wishes it were all over.
Soon, a hushing calm assures him, and he believes it – because there is nothing else he can convince himself of.
Bony fingers swipe across his neck, and a needle tip is pressed against the spot where he knows his carotid artery lies. With frightening awareness, he feels the metal slide under his skin, and pure fire enters his system.
His blood boils and freezes, and his head feels as if it has split open. His skin crawls with dread, and the atmosphere crushes his lungs while his heart fills with acid. The black that used to blanket his vision has turned into a blinding hot white that burns his eyelids, and he chokes on his own breaths.
The first sounds he distinguishes in an eternity is a frightening one – the feral screams of a broken creature – and it takes him several moments to realise that the mangled voice is his own.
Stop – stop it all.
Nothing does stop, least of all the pain.
He always thought he would die a valiant death on the battlefield.
He tries to lift an arm to reach out for his dragon, knowing full well the effort is futile.
I can't – I'm so sorry.
When his voice runs dry, he gasps out a pitiful cry of anguish, but he is sure not even Hyorinmaru hears it.
Forgive me.
Now, he realises, there is no honour – this is no sacrifice – only defeat.
The last thing he remembers is relinquishing his grip on his silent sword.
End
Oh my god, guys, I wrote something in canon. I tried using the present tense narrative because it sounds so modern and in but I'm really not used to it. Also tried to go for an increasingly more detached narrative, but I think it just sounds like I've lost half my vocabulary. Oh well.
In other news, I now have an AO3! Check me out please? I'm handoverthebiscuit over there too and I promise to beef it up in times to come but I've just started and am absolutely clueless.