AN:I really needed to get this out before 'Bleach' actually ended, thus ruining any suspense for the final twist and giving this story a chance at credulity, no matter how thin that chance may be. Spoilers for the entire series as it has been released thus far. And I also didn't look up any proper Japanese names, just writing down the first thing that came to mind. (Plus, hint for upcoming story)
Kenpachi
The rain pelted his body, but he no longer feels the cold as he once did. To any other, the concept of the chill running through his bones would be considered detrimental to their health, or that they should find warmth. To him, it was only one of the ways that he absently noted the passing of the days; otherwise he could go for weeks without really registering the rising and setting of the ethereal sun that illuminated all of the Seireitei, save for his shadowy corner.
He no longer knew nor cared how long he had wandered the wasteland that had once been his home in a nearly catatonic state. When his body required nourishment, he killed whatever animal was closest; sometimes he had the inclination to create a fire to sear the meat, but more often than not he consumed it raw without thought. When fatigue caught up to him, he simply laid down where he was until he no longer needed to, not even bothering to keep an eye out for potential threats: such concerns had been so long absent from him that he wasn't even sure he had ever had them to begin with.
His name had not been spoken in an age, and he was dressed only in rags; the filthy and shredded remnants of what had once been his badge of office. His eyes did not behold what was before them: they were always relaying what had occurred on the day that his world had ended in blue craft-fire and death, haunting his every breath like the closing howls of ravenous dogs, desiring naught but his flesh and blood.
A sword was the only remaining facet of that life he had lost. His constant companion and torturer, it was nearly as bedraggled and haggard as he was, being chipped and worn dull from lack of care. But it could still sing its song, and had on any occasion that required him to lift it in mindless defense. Hollows, thugs and feral beasts alike fell under the deceptive savagery of the empty blade, cut to ribbons with no more than a thought from the one who craved death but could never be taken.
He had tried, in the first few years. When the pain and loss and desolation became too overwhelming, he had sought an end any way he could. But he had not been easily killable before the war, and he had only become vastly stronger just before it had all come crashing down around him, rendering him a true Death God. Neither steel nor fang could pierce his flesh, stone could no longer break his bones, water could never again steal his breath and fill his lungs, hunger withered him but failed to claim him and thirst merely parched him without turning his insides to dust.
Taking his sword to himself had never been an option as the blade, even without the spirit that had dwelt within, could never harm him, being born of him and still an extension of his soul.
It was for this reason that he detested it.
When his mind emerged from the mire of despair and self-loathing, every so often, he would look at the unnaturally long weapon, jagged from countless battles as well as the condition of his spirit, and recall some of the fights that he had been part of, the monumental conflicts of strength and skill that he had more often initiated than been invited to, and he could feel some flicker of the life he had felt in those moments of ecstasy, if even for a few fleeting seconds.
It was for this reason that he cherished it.
But still, the voice had never again spoken to him, long since dead when it should have been him to perish in the inferno of Quincy trickery. This broken man, once known as the fiercest and strongest of swordsmen, the equally idolized and demonized Kenpachi of Zaraki was alone with his sorrow, doomed to walk without seeing through the scorched earth of Armageddon.
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The land formerly housing the entirety of the Thirteen Court Guard Squads and several of the outlying districts of the Rukongai was not even and smooth: it had been blasted into oblivion, leaving fissures and canyons for miles around, crooked wastes of uprooted rocks, scorched desserts of white sand and cavernous maws in the ground that held no visible bottom. It was, without needing a second thought, a bitter hell where only the damned would remain.
It was perfect for Zaraki.
He never remained in one place, always walking, never trying to venture beyond the desolate barrier of the devastated kingdom for longer than it took to find food. He was as bound to this place as the smell of charred rock and burnt earth; the only things that had remained constant in the intervening years.
He never thought back to That Day, when the Quincy and Soul Reapers had escalated their conflict to the very seat of Heaven itself and dethroned the one who had held their realm together by existence alone. Yhwach had somehow succeeded in his lunatic's plan of becoming the New God. The Captain Commander had been slain at the height of his power and succeeded by the man he had considered a son but was not ready for command. Ichigo had lost his Zanpakuto and then reclaimed it in characteristically impossible fashion. Aizen had been brought out as some kind of weapon guaranteed to cause just as much death to those who aimed him as was aimed at. Yachiru Unohana, the First Kenpachi, had finally relinquished her hold of that title to Zaraki in a manner that was befittingly beautiful and ruthless, raising him back to his unprecedented power from years long past.
And just when it seemed like they were all going to partake in one last, indescribable battle - Soul Reapers, Hollows, Fullbringers and Quincy allied against the All Seeing and his most elite Shuttztaffel - with everything on the line for every realm and all who lived and died in them, the final move was made without the consent of the players.
Uryu Ishida. It had been that pretentious and severe boy that had managed to end a war that had lasted for centuries with only patience and a straight face, for the sake of avenging the death of his mother and to prevent any more such cases of suffering. He, his frigid father and Hashwalth had devised a plan without ever speaking a word to each other, one that would clear the board entirely rather than wipe away only one side: during the entirety of the conflict between age old enemies, five markers had been placed in exact locations around the entire realm, creating a massive pentagonal star.
With so many losing their lives and so many high-level battles occurring, reishei was absolutely abundant in the Soul Kingdom, slowly but surely fueling the Quincy artifacts well beyond their intended limit and into the scope of pure beacons of power that rent the air and space around them, rendering them clouded from Yhwach's eyes. And then the Soul King was murdered and usurped, rendering the Royal Palace a connected and physical part of the Seireitei, thus a viable target.
All that was left was to wait until the setting of the sun, when Hashwalth would resume his role as King and Yhwach would supposedly be rendered vegetative, regaining his spent strength. But the font of the Quincy had never planned to return to his slumber: he had every intention of saddling the similarly powered Hashwalth with his mortality and truly rising above the perceptions of all lesser beings and ascending to the unknown plane. He would be a God in purpose as well as name.
And when the moment came, after both Haswalth and Ishida had attacked their closest friends in order to stall, the transition occurred despite Ichigo's and everyone else's intervention. But in that span of a few heartbeats wherein anything was possible, Uryu Ishida finally sprung his trap, with he and his father working in tandem on opposite sides of the ritual.
The young Quincy had weighed the lives of all within the blast radius of the overwhelmingly powerful attack against all of those who would suffer and perish if Juha Bach transcended reality, and he had made the hardest decision anyone could ever have made: to sacrifice everyone he had ever cared and countless innocents for in the eradication of the ultimate threat.
The explosion had been beyond description, outshining the sun and roaring so loud as to deafen and those leagues away. Within the pentagram, there was only destruction. From the lowliest rukon dweller to the highest Captain, all burned. Yhwach, caught at his most vulnerable, was not sparred from this fate by the strength he had accrued and stolen; he burned, and was but ash and dust. Yamamoto had finally been redeemed for his failure a millennia past by one he had never thought consequential to the grand scheme.
And yet, Kenpachi survived where all else perished.
He had been saved from that blissful nothingness by the being he had both neglected and nurtured: the spirit of his Zanpakuto, Nozarashi, long manifested as his adopted daughter, Yachiru Kusajishi.
It had never been heard of beyond one notable member of the Kuchiki clan- a Zanpakuto spirit appearing to everyone, not just its partner. Many believed it to be a myth dreamt up by the foolish and insane, nothing more than a fantasy academy students would pass around at the back of class rooms.
But Kenpachi Zaraki had always been an exceptional person in one way or another all his life.
When he had nothing, not a name, home, destination, goal or hope, when he had even been cut off from the bulk of his devastating power, he had been found by a child, no larger than one of his long-fingered hands. Pink haired and wide-eyed, she had laid a hand on the blood drenched blade of his and had been delighted. He had found someone who would not forsake him for his being a monster. He named her after the only woman he would ever love and hated with all his dark heart. She was his sole light.
From that very moment, she had passively guided him. It was to her that Ikkaku Madarame had been drawn to, from her that the idea to join the Gotei 13 had stemmed, around her that others were influenced in how they saw him, looking beyond the despicable exterior and to the man beneath the animal, even going so far as to deliberately lead him away from fights and ween him from his thirst for death. She had been the focal point on which his life had at last taken meaning. Though he could not speak to his blade, since unconsciously shutting away that section of his power from himself, the spirit itself found new meaning as his conscience and guardian.
And then she had been allowed back home, as Unohana willingly died by his hand and his self-made blocks evaporated, rendering blade and wielder whole once again. The little girl he had known died that day, having fulfilled her purpose and returning to her rightful place. He was stronger than he ever imagined he could be, and his potential for growth was now practically unlimited, no longer bound by his shackled power.
When Ishida initiated that final, fatal technique to wipe the slate clean, Kenpachi would just as assuredly have been disintegrated as all others within the blue-white dome of destruction; not even Aizen would escape alive. Power was meaningless when confronted with a force that was powered by the very world around you and charged beyond capacity.
But what could counter the Quincy craft, something far less tangible than strength, was the love that Nozarashi had for him. Nearly all Zanpakuto exist in cooperative, if not harmonious, partnerships with their wielders, forming bonds closer than family. But they are all extensions of a Shinigami's soul, and this is to be expected from one who has brought balance and resolution to their soul. What Nozarashi felt toward Kenpachi was not just as a blade towards its wielder, but as a friend and as a daughter, growing beyond Zanpakuto spirit and cultivating her own aspect of a soul from all she had seen and done while separated from Zaraki.
She did not want him to die, and she would not let him.
Kenpachi awoke a week after, undamaged, alone, holding a sword that no longer held a spark of life within it. Nozarashi had shielded him at the cost of herself, a sacrifice that should have been impossible and he wished dearly had been.
While he survived what had killed practically every single powerful being alive or dead, he was no longer alive, not inside. His desolate life was a match for the barren and decrepit land he now traversed in a stupor of guilt and loss. Kenpachi was now a lost soul without cause or purpose, as he had been years before in his darkest days.
The last Soul Reaper walked.
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They found him sitting on a boulder, back hunched and sword gripped only loosely in his hand, eyes inattentive. The spirit pressure coming off of him wavered in extremes- from horrifyingly huge to practically nothing; they still barely felt any resistance as they stood cautiously nearly twenty meters away.
Not even his once legendary 'killing intent' was present to ward them off.
They observe him for over an hour in silence, not sure what to make of this shell of a man they had been directed to. Their expectations were so very unmatched by the reality that they even doubted he was the same person as they had heard stories of.
Kenpachi moved not an inch, breathing slowly with his vacant eyes leveled towards the horizon.
When it seemed that no more could be gleaned from observation alone, one of the two, the spikey haired woman with a fire in her eyes, determinedly set off towards him. A frantic hand landed on her arm to stop her, succeeding in that regard, but she swung about to glare at her partner fiercely, one hand threateningly grasping the hilt of the katana tucked into the belt of her coat.
"What are you thinking?" He hissed, not at all concerned by her hostile move; she had tried it on him far too many times for it to be effective now. "That is not a sane person over there. You heard what they said about him now!" His voice never rose in volume, only pitch.
"We've talked about this," she snaps right back, slightly louder. "We don't have any other choice and you know it. It's either him or nobody, and that seems like a pretty clear choice, yeah?"
He glanced over her shoulder at the unmoving bulk that they are debating over, back to them and stationary as the stone beneath him.
"I can't let you get yourself killed after everything we've been through," he growled with uncharacteristic venom, startling her slightly. She has only seen this side of him several times in the past, and only after their deaths and subsequent transference to the Soul Society. He may act like a coward most of the time, but that was a guise for the sake of normalcy: most of the fear had been burned out of him years ago, alongside his youthful optimism.
"I told you already that I wouldn't throw my life or yours into danger without a good reason, and I can't think of a better reason than what we came here for," she placates, voice much less hostile but still firm. "You've trusted me this far, what's a few more minutes?"
He exhales forcibly, already knowing he's lost this bout. Nervously tapping the pommel of his own katana, he nods at her and falls into step just behind her as they traversed the ragged terrain to their goal. They stop again several paces away, the caution born from surviving dozens of Hollow attacks serving to ensure their safety in this situation as in all others.
"Kenpachi Zaraki?" She asks loud enough for her voice to carry over to him on the dead wind, words steady despite her twitching nerves.
Kenpachi doesn't move a muscle. Practically a rock himself.
"Kenpachi Zaraki?" She tries again, a hint of her temper coloring her inquiry. "We've been looking for you for months."
Still he did not move, and the male traveler gets the suspicion that the towering man had died on that boulder some time ago and his body was left in this position. It wouldn't surprise him.
Annoyed, the woman threw her caution to the wind and stomped around to stand in front of the insensate warrior, much to the panicked distress of her friend. She glared into the eyes of the person she had been told was the last of an extinct order. She saw only a broken man.
"…Kenpachi?" She's less sure now, wondering if he truly is beyond hearing her words. But if he is, then she only has to speak in a language he's sure to understand.
Taking a step back, she looked up and beckoned for her companion to get behind her in preparation, drawing her katana. Naturally, the worrywart makes a face of alarm and moves to stop her, but she doesn't give him the opportunity, swinging down with a speedy one-handed strike, straight towards Zaraki's-
TSH!
She gaped as her sword bounced away from where it collided with Kenpachi's, having seemingly been lifted to intercept instantly. A retaliatory slash almost guts her in her surprise, but the intervening wooden sheath of her friend flies up from below and swats the long blade up into an angle so it only just misses taking her life.
Kenpachi is obviously not even trying, barely maintaining his grip on his sword.
She steps forward and jams the flat of her blade against the back of his, pushing it so his arm is left extended awkwardly. If what she has heard of the Kenpachi is true, then she won't be able to hold him here for any length of time, and wouldn't even have been able accomplish even this much if he had been even partway serious. She can't try and fight him, she needs to talk dammit!
"Just tell me: are you the Kenpachi Zaraki that Kurumadani told us about? The one who fought Ichigo?"
There, a spark behind his glassy eyes! She needed to dig him out of his complete withdrawal, and she needed the right incentive to do it with.
"Ichigo Kurosaki," she affirms, keeping eye contact. "He was our friend years ago, before he and the others disappeared." His eyes shifted as life visibly returned into his movements, followed by a slow blink. The hand holding his sword slowly goes lax, allowing the long blade to scrape into the dirt. Chapped lips crack apart, trembling as he struggles past the atrophy of disuse.
"I…Ichi…go?" His voice is like grinding rock, unheard by his own ears for as long as his fogged mind can recall. Sunken black eyes rove upwards to meet hers, the first time in decades that he's done so.
She grins triumphantly and removes her sword from where it kept his at hopefully safe distance, but she doesn't sheathe it. She only stands a slightly taller than Kenpachi's head, despite him sitting, so she saw no need to sit down herself, opting rather to take a step back. She has no idea that he could have easily cut her down in the initial meeting of blades, and no amount of distance could make her safe when she had drawn his full attention. Her friend waited anxiously to the side, not quite apart and not quite among them, ready to step in if required. He doesn't aim to fail her now.
"So you are Kenpachi," she nods to herself as well as him in confirmation, seeming to finally be able to place the legends she's heard to the pale shadow in front of her. "My name is Tatsuki Arisawa, and this is Keigo Asano. Forty years ago, we were just spiritually aware enough to be able to see Hollows and Soul Reapers, so we knew that Ichigo was one of you and had a responsibility far larger than what someone his age should ever be forced to shoulder."
The former martial arts champion and her less than academic companion had been dead for half that time, having been killed by the same building collapse that had claimed the third member of their group, Mizuiro during a fight between a rampaging Hollow and Karakura Town's sole defender, Zennosuke Kurumadani, otherwise known as 'Afro Dude' (Keigo had unfortunately never heard of Afro Samurai before he had made that nickname, so it was the best he had gotten).
The Soul Reaper had been trapped in the World of the Living during the Thousand Year Blood War, and as such hadn't been killed with everyone else. With no other choice, he had kept at his duty to usher the souls of the departed into the next world and defend pluses from Hollows. He had tried repeatedly to open a Senkaimon to his home, but the dimensional gate wouldn't appear, no matter how much effort he put into it, leaving him stranded.
The three departed humans had opted to stick around for a bit after their demises, with nothing holding them to one place, and decided to quiz the tragically morose Zennosuke on the land that he would soon send them to by way of the konso. From him, they had learned all that they could of the world he had left, and for all he knew it was all still the same after the years of his exile.
"Why…" Kenpachi rasps, narrowing his eyes at her, scar crinkling across the left side of his long face. His voice gives out, and he doesn't try to continue, settling for fixing them with accusatory looks. Tatsuki glances upwards, and then at Keigo; the lanky man nodding shortly to her unasked question.
"We wandered through the outlying lands for years, trying to piece together what happened to our friends. There were conflicting stories, complete lies, horrible embellishments and biased opinion, but we eventually puzzled out the general details about the Quincy and the war. We then knew that Ichigo, Orihime, Chad and all the others were gone forever."
The lump in her throat as she said this nearly made her choke over the words, but she had years of practice to file away the pain still felt at the loss. Right now, she needed to focus on the path ahead of her.
"We eventually decided that, since we were spiritually aware and had a degree of reitsu, we should try and become strong enough to fight Hollows." Another lance of pain shoots through her at what she must say next, and the look on Keigo's face is enough to tell her that he knows as well, all too well. "We overestimated ourselves. We…lost our friend."
Mizuiro had been so courageous, leaping to the defense of the elderly couple and right in the path of an eight limbed Hollow, katana held in shaking hands but face set in stone. He had fought with all his might, but such a creature had merely toyed with him, allowing him to exhaust himself before moving in for the kill. Keigo had been closer than Tatsuki, who had been fending of several dog sized Hollows coming from the woods, and he had had his sword in hand.
But he had hesitated, petrified. Mizuiro had been slain by the beast, dying the final time in his cycle.
The guilt from that failure had nearly pushed the former jokester over the brink into despair, leaving him a mental wreck. But Tatsuki had been there, just there, and this proved to be what he needed: to have something to focus on. He had vowed by the blood in his veins that he would never fail his only remaining friend in the world, giving himself to the executioner's blade before letting her down again. The light-hearted man had vanished, replaced by someone willing to take the risks and endure the pain, if only to enforce his vow.
"It was a harsh wake up call, but one we took to heart. We weren't anywhere near ready to defend others when we ourselves couldn't even handle the threats we aimed to fight. What we needed was somebody stronger and more used to fighting to guide us, teach us. We asked around as much as we could, but nobody came close to what we required.
"Then word began to surface of a madman, haunting the scar that was the Seireitei, cutting down any who tried to attack him without hesitation of effort. Then, somebody said that the last Kenpachi had managed to come back from death itself and continued to slaughter, if only as a wraith of his former self. So we followed the trail, and here we are."
Tatsuki stopped talking, mouth uncomfortably dry, but she didn't move to drink from her water gourd. She had laid down their story, as politely as she could make herself, and now the silence was set back into place. Keigo had crossed one his left arm across his chest, hand tucked under the armpit of his sword arm, uneasy.
Kenpachi didn't look at them. His mind was starting to work through the webs of time, actually functioning beyond instinct with rusty progression. She said forty years…hasn't it been centuries? The short time span almost seems insulting. 'Asano'? Hadn't Ikkaku-
He slides his flat stare slowly up to the sky, trying to find reason in the overcast clouds. He never bought into that hokey mysticism crap before, did he? Probably no reason not to start now anyway. Why were they here? Why was he here? Couldn't he finally die now?
"Scram." He stands up from his rock, body now towering over the other two souls. He flipped his hold on his katana, using it as an impromptu walking stick as he ambled away, willing his mind to return to the merciful blankness it had been for so long.
Five and a half feet of indignation jumped into his path.
"That's it? You're just going to walk away? I heard that you were barely more than a savage, even before the war, but this is unbelievable!" Tatsuki had dropped her cautious veneer of civility and her temper had burnt through, something that had gotten her into as much trouble as it had gotten her out of it. "Soul Reapers are supposed to maintain order and peace, not sulk around and wish everything was all better!"
Her words were dangerous, and a Kenpachi of a few years ago would gladly have chopped her arms off for such a slight. Now, he barely glanced at her before stepping around her and continuing his trudging path.
"Don't walk away from me, from us! Not after everything we've been through and lost to get here and find YOU!" She can feel the desperation sinking its claws into her and attempting to turn her shouts into sobs, but she pushes it back, willing anger to fuel her mind as she runs ahead of Kenpachi once more, pointing the end of her generic sword at his already scarred chest. "I won't let you. I have strength, and I have just enough crazy to make you train us."
Keigo had followed close behind them, and now stood a few feet away from Zaraki, hand on his partially drawn sword. He's sweating, both out of fear and anxiety; Tatsuki was always flying off the handle when it would do her no good, and often more harm.
Kenpachi stopped walking, shoulders slumped. Beady black eyes glanced down at the weapon directed towards his torso. Without haste, he reached up with his free hand and snapped the metal between his thumb and forefinger. Arisawa gaped in either horror or astonishment, he couldn't really tell.
He wasn't angry with the two. Anger just had no place left to fill beside the overwhelming desolation he was constantly beleaguered by. They were just wide eyed youngsters in a world that would soon crush their optimism rather than nurture it. He was neither the one to teach them nor show them how the real world worked. He wanted to be alone.
"Leave," he grunts before resuming his endless pilgrimage.
Keigo moves to stand next to his friend, watching the back of the departing berserker.
"Could have gone better," he mused aloud. When Tatsuki glared at him sidelong, he merely shrugged his apparent disregard.
"If he thinks we're going to give up trying to be stronger, then he has no idea who he's dealing with."
"What, you're actually going to try again? I think that was a pretty definite 'no' right there and I don't want to anger the guy who just broke a piece of metal like it was a candy cane."
"No," Tatsuki murmured, her voice suddenly much quieter, making him look at her in surprise. "He didn't have anything but sadness in his eyes. He won't kill us out of anger."
"And you still want to keep talking to him? You're nuts."
She shrugged. "Maybe. Are you coming?"
"Of course," Keigo sighed, already walking beside her as they pursued one of the strongest fighters to ever exist. "I'm never going to let you fight alone again."
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Three weeks later, and they have been pulling in the same luck in trying to coerce Kenpachi into training them. Following him is a chore in and of itself; he can and will walk for days on end without showing any signs of slowing, while tatsuki and Keigo have to contend with normal levels of endurance and stamina. If they lay down camp to rest for the night, chances are pretty good that the goliath of a man would be long gone.
Fortunately, it was comparatively easy to track his movements. He was a heavy person despite his deceptively slender frame underneath his clothes, and he left very visible tracks in the ground. When they were going over terrain that wasn't as forthwith in aiding their novice survivalist skills, such as hard rock, then they had only to travel in the same direction as him until they found a trace they could follow until they caught up again, often at the end of the day and restarting the whole cycle over again.
Tatsuki was persistent in her attempts to win the giant over. She would walk in front, abreast and behind him, talking at him and trying any tactic she could think of to get him more responsive. For his end of these exchanges, Zaraki would either completely ignore her, or utter a one word refusal in his slowly returning rumble. Keigo would always remain on watch.
Tonight happened to be one of the few times that the man finally stopped to sleep for the night, lowering himself ungracefully onto an outcropping of rock that overshadowed a miniscule canyon. His two shadows made their own resting places a decent distance away; their careful precautions had kept them alive this far, and they weren't going to stop now.
Their legs were sore and their bodies ached, but they still managed to find a crease in the rock that would fit both of them shoulder to shoulder, if squeezed. Keigo always slept with his katana on his chest while Tatsuki had a slightly less defensive habit of tucking hers under one arm, the cross guard and hilt poking up over her shoulder at an angle (they had had a single spare with them, and even though it was a bit longer than the one she had trained herself with, she managed alright).
Neither spoke. The silence was relaxing. And safe.
For three hours they fitfully dozed, slipping to and from the realm of sleep with cruel regularity; it had been quite a while since both of them had had a full nights. Keigo especially was haunted by the specters of his past; all of he failures that had never truly left him, nor would he have let them. He needed that pain, that guilt, to remind him every moment of every day that he could never again afford to slack off, or joke around when lives may very well be on the line. Asano would be a name he could live with without shame.
…
…
…
…
There was something out there.
Not making a noise, Keigo reached over his chest and shook Tatsuki's shoulder, rousing her immediately. She blinked repeated;y, eyes trying to adjust to the cloudy night sky, and shifted her katana back down her body so as the hilt was safely in her grasp, sliding a scant inch free in preparation. They jointly rolled to their shoulders, back to back, and brought their legs beneath them into mirrored crouches. They had been practicing and using these defensive methods for so long now that they really were habit, and the more natural reaction than hesitation.
The martial artist went first, vaulting the shallow lip of their shelter and sprinted several feet away, practically crawling. Her sword remained sheathed in the event that any reflection off of it could give her away, but she was more than ready to draw it with a jerk of her wrist and an opening slash that had managed to fell a good number of their opponents in the past. Her dark eyes darted about, searching for danger.
Keigo was only a second behind her, going in the other direction to create enough distance between them that any attack would have to be directed at one or the other, or divided if there were multiple attackers, but not so far that they couldn't leap back to the others aid. He had his thumb coked directly beneath the crossguard of his sword, anticipating the need to pop it out in a move that was even faster than tatsuki's, thanks to countless hours of training. His earthen eyes penetrated the long shadows that stained the land around them, seeking the hidden threats.
Several tense moments later, and they were still standing there, trying to sense a first move for them to defend or counter against. But nothing moved against them. Nothing attacked with mindless abandon or cruel cunning. They were alone in this miserable and inhospitable land.
The Arisawa valkyrie looked over her shoulder, catching Keigo's eye. She made a small movement with her head, as if to ask 'well?,' in a snappish way. He shrugged, showing confusion rather than dismissal. He knew he had felt something out here, and even though his sensing ability really wasn't adequate, it was still there, and it had saved his hide on more than one-
The flat, inky shadow behind Tatsuki reared up away from the ground without any sound at all and revealed the chalky, leering mask of a Hollow.
Keigo's wordless exclamation was enough for Tatsuki to dive to her left, but it was entirely in vain: all the other shadows that had surrounded their hidey hole rose and surrounded them in a joined, solid wall of velvety darkness, a single Hollow with a body like a massive sheet.
Tatsuki lunged, drawing her sword and plunging it into the skin of the soul eater – only for it to stretch with the blade like some kind of elastic or rubber, not even leaving a mark. Shocked, she nevertheless tried to cut the monster several more times, all with the same lack of progress as the last. Keigo too was trying his hardest to shear through the resilient Hollow, but he seemed only to be swimming against the raging current.
The Hollow wasn't bothered in the least by the attacks being made on it; only loosing a croak of laughter and tightening the circle around them, skowly constricting them until there wasn't any more room. See what was happening Keigo made his decision in an instant.
"Tatsuki!" She turned at her name, seeing him crouched down and slumped forward – a maneuver that they hadn't actually practiced much at all but she took the cue easily. Jumping over the hole they had been sleeping in and running across the space between them, the grown athlete planted one foot on his upper back, mid stride, in the same moment he surged back to his full height. That boost plus her leap launched her in the air, high enough to clear the Hollow trapper and hopefully find some way to save her friend before he was devoured.
But that hope was for nothing, as a previously unseen tentacle sprouted from the otherwise flat creature and ensnared her around the waist, pulling her back into the ring. Keigo shouted and tried to hack off the offending extremity, but it proved just as pliable as the rest of it and went unharmed. An identical tentacle sprouted and grabbed him up as well, two more joining them to pin their arms and halt any further attempts to attack.
The two souls thrashed and struggled for all they were worth, but the oddly frictionless skin of the Hollow had them in a deathgrip, and there was no escaping it now. They were brought before the mask of the entity, now seemingly larger than it had before, dwarfing them entirely.
"Well, well, well. I seem to have found myself the first decent supper I've had in ages! You couldn't possibly know how rare it is to find any of you worms with spirit levels even worth consideration. You may have been hiding under that disrupting presence, but I found you and now I'm going to eat you!" it rumbled with a voice made for of echoes than of actual sound. It laughed again, a hideous noise, and lifted both of the former humans up to its great maw, stretched wide to accommodate them in their entirety.
For the briefest of moments, a bright white line seemed to superimpose itself over the Hollow, going up and between the empty eye holes of the mask. It froze, as did they.
And then the Hollow split in half, already dissolving into loose reishei. Tatsuki and Keigo landed hard on their sides, but they were back on their feet in time to witness the last of the monster disappear. Standing right behind it, looking as blank as ever, was Kenpachi Zaraki, sword held loose in hand as he studied them.
After a stunned moment, Tatsuki hastily sheathed her sword and took a step towards the towering former Captain, but that was when he turned on his heel and strode back towards his own resting spot. Without turning his head, he called back to them, "Always go for the mask; it's what holds a Hollow together."
It was the first time he had ever spoken more than one word at a time.
Keigo tapped the flat of his blade against his leg and sandal thoughtfully. "I may be delirious from adrenaline, but-"
"The Kenpachi just taught us our first lesson," tatsuki finished, grinning widely for the first time in years.
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"Stance's too narrow," Kenpachi grunted, walking around Keigo as the latter relentlessly swung his katana through the air. Without even staying to see if his instruction was followed, Kenpachi strode over to where Tatsuki was running through one of the very few katas that he had bothered to memorize, drumming the structured movements into her head with each retry. "Now backwards."
She glared at him, but began to reverse the entire sequence, albeit much slower than normal. Zaraki squinted at her, spotting all of the flaws that became glaringly apparent when she couldn't really on muscle memory to fill in the gaps.
"If you need to take it slow, then go slow," he barked, startling her somewhat and angering her as well. "You obviously can't manage it at normal pace so you might as well do it at the only speed you seem capable of."
Tatsuki positively snarled at that, and just to defy him, she immediately began moving faster and faster, painfully sloppy for the first half dozen runs, but slowly starting to smooth it out after that, remembering all of the steps and stances that went into it and placing them in the right order.
"Forwards." She didn't waste the air to further show her resentment for his teachings, only doing as he said, trying really hard to show him that she was way better than he was going to admit. After only a week with the subdued berserker as their "teacher", she was willing to see that, just maybe, she hadn't really done her research extensively enough in this case. Kenpachi was a known lunatic before the war, and she had actually wanted to find him! "Backwards."
Keigo, still practicing his kendo, glanced over and was rather amazed to see that Tatsuki had riled herself up enough that she was angry enough to excel: back and forth, she flew through the kata in quick succession, any mistake made on one run was absent in all the ones after that.
Standing behind her, Kenpachi was nodding slowly, fingers playing over the cloth wrapped hilt of his vacant sword.
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"-was Kaname Tousen. He was blind."
"Blind?" Keigo sputtered around the mouthful of charred rabbit he had been chewing on. His tongue was slightly burnt.
"Yeah blind, didn't ya hear me?" Kenpachi snapped, brandishing his own skewered mammal like a threat of doom. "He relied on sensing reiatsu at such a pain in the ass level that he probably could even tell what someone looked like."
"Sounds like 'The Matrix'," Tatsuki muttered, quietly enough that only Keigo heard her. He shrugged indifferently but kept his peace.
"Well, then he was replaced by the guy he had replaced, Kensei...Muguruma, yeah that was it, who seemed like a bit of a dick. Still, he had a better Bankai than Tousen did in any case." Remembering the disappointment that had been, Zaraki bit off another mouthful and chewed in retrospective indignation. First Bankai he had ever fought in a life or death fight, and it was that? Shit.
"And the Lieutenant?" Keigo prompted, eyebrow raised at the scrunched face the other man was making right then.
"Hm. Shuhei Hisagi. Good shikai. Had the numbers '69' tattooed on his face."
"..."
"...what?"
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Their blades clashed for only a second, the resounding ring generated from the contact hadn't even fully gone away when they pulled away. Tatsuki twisted around to slice at Keigo's legs, barely avoided by a jump back. Not waiting for him to retake the offensive, the firecracker of Karakura took a step forward and kicked all the way up at his nose. Predictably, he craned his neck back to avoid the blow, and that was just what she had been looking for.
Jumping forward with her other leg, she drove her heel into the base of his neck, pushing him down and back, straight towards a hard fall with the ground.
What happened instead was Keigo grabbing her ankle and twisting around, throwing her on her own collision course with the flaky, sun baked earth. Once again, her other foot saved her as she managed to spin and land on it, perilously leaning backwards, only held up by Keigo's hand still locked around her ankle. He had been saved from the fall as well by her maneuver, pulled into a half squatting position and likewise leaning too far out backwards and only just balanced by her counterweight.
Grinning despite the situation, Tatsuki swung her sword towards her friend's hand, which he blocked in a quick motion that carried little grace. She tried to break his grip several more times that way, working on a quick strategy.
When Keigo blocked another swing on the outside of their defenses, he wasn't quite fast enough to avoid her pulling with her captive foot with a mighty effort, pulling both of the towards each other. Her other leg flew upwards and connected with his whisker laden jaw in a spiritually charged fan kick that took him off his feet and released her foot.
Rolling with the fall, Keigo dug his sword into the ground to bleed off momentum and then used it as a fulcrum to yank himself back towards Tatsuki with a lightning fast flurry catching her as she righted herself from her kick. While she blocked them, she was forced back several feet until she had reaffirmed her stance and defended herself evenly.
On the sidelines of their duel, Kenpachi watched with a critical eye.
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"And just who the hell are you?"
The man froze at Tatsuki's harsh words, the tomboy standing at the edge of their camp and glaring at him without pity. Her sword hung at the back of her belt where she had taken to carrying it over the past couple of years, but she didn't need naked steel to be intimidating. Not in the least.
"Y-Yoshiara Shostiueke." He mumbled, gripping his own, basic katana as a form of support. He had made his decision weeks ago, and he would just have to stick by it. "We-I heard that people were training as Soul Reapers out here."
Tatsuki raised as skeptical eyebrow at that. She and Keigo only ever went where Kenpachi went, and he remained with the Seireitei, and there weren't too many observers anywhere near there. Nobody could have seen them, let alone see that what they were doing without them sensing them first.
"Your-your Spiritual Pressures. We can feel them, even from miles away."
"You sensed us?" Very interesting.
Yoshiara swallowed a bit too audibly. "Yes, those of us who have higher than average spirit energies can sometimes feel...impressions, suggestions, of these much higher powers. You. I followed the feeling," he finished meekly, barely maintaining eye-contact.
'Makes sense,' Tatsuki allowed to herself, 'to any that actually could feel us, we'd be the biggest point of interest in probably the whole Soul Society.'
Outwardly, she scowled a little harder. "So why did you track us down? Want to take a shot at ending us and becoming famous? The 'Next Big Thing'?"
"No! Nothing like that!" The panicked man waved frantically, thinking the conversation had just gone very, very badly against him. "I-I actually...I...I-"
"SPIT IT OUT DAMNMIT!"
He fell to his knees in pleading, his pack falling to the ground next to him.
"I wanted to be trained as well!" His voice rose to an almost hilarious pitch at the end.
"Oh? And do you think you have what it takes to be a Shinigami? To constantly fight against all threats, whether fellow soul or Hollow, and know that any day may probably be your last? Can you even swing that sword with killing intent?"
Yoshiara blanched as he looked down at the blade never once bathed in blood. He hated fighting, and here he was hoping to join the fighters? He must have been crazy to ever even think of coming here.
But that wasn't true. He knew exactly what he had been thinking when he had set off to find the Soul Reapers. He needed to keep a hold on that conviction, or he would just shrivel up on himself and die an unassuming death in a corner, never having made a difference.
Unsteadily, but unflinchingly, he looked back up at the silent warrior watching him. "I came here with the desire to protect, and that's just what I mean to do. With you, I have the best opportunity to as many as I can. So," he stood up again, feeling a weight in his stomach as he swore himself over to eternal violence, "yes, I will fight any threat that comes this way."
"Ha!" From directly behind the now petrified Shostiueke, Kenpachi loomed over him, having approached silently and listened in. He liked what he had heard. "Forget the frontlines kid, I see Fourth written all over you. Pansies through and through, but damn useful. Lucky for you, I personally spent enough time there getting patched up that I picked up a few of their little tricks and techniques. Keigo!" The monolithic soul called towards their current campsite. "Get some for furs out, we'll need another place to sleep!"
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The first building that was built was, appropriately, a crude barracks, the likes of which the men and women of the Eleventh would have called home. Though the seventeen that now followed him like puppies wasn't quite like the four hundred previously under his command, it had started to feel familiar.
"Oi! That one's my bed, jackass!"
"Yeah? Well then prove it Karin!"
Really familiar.
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The day Keigo and Tatsuki managed to achieve Shikai was perhaps the most painfully lucid he had spent in decades.
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"Well look at that, they actually managed to beat your challenge!"
"So what? Twenty different Kido spells ain't that many."
"It is if you only knew some of the names and just snippets of the incantations to teach them and told them to go from there."
"Not as if I'd ever actually learn any of that demon magic crap."
"Hmmm."
"And what's that supposed to mean?"
"Oh, nothing. I'm just proud of you is all."
"Well, you are a part of my soul, so not mush surprise their."
"Crotchety Bastard."
"Nozarashi had better manners than you."
"Hey, I can only take my examples from you, now can't I?"
"Don't be a smart ass."
With that final note, Kenpachi ceased his mental communication with the soul of his blade and turned to face one of the New Reapers (not his pick, but he'd been outvoted) as she jogged up to him in the space between two of the rather ramshackle buildings that made up their equally ramshackle village, or hamlet, or whatever the hell you wanted to call it.
"Hn?" He grunted in acknowledgment.
"Uh, Miss Arisawa is trying to beat up Marazoki and Ochauba to decide who has to fetch the bath water again."
"Is she losing?"
"Well, no; she's Miss Tatsuki."
"Then it's either a lesson or a punishment. Either way, nobody gets involved 'till it's over. You know the rules about sanctioned fights."
"It's just that Mr. Asano said you might want to be there because Miss Tatsuki agreed to tie both of her arms behind her back and let both of them use Shikai."
Kenpachi though for a moment before walking briskly towards where the fight would doubtlessly be taking place. "Yeah, maybe I should be there just in case. Don;t want those two idiots hurting themselves too much to be able to get the water."
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Tia Harribel stood near the back of her assault force, watching to make sure that order was maintained amongst the ranks of the lesser Hollows. The Menos were always the hardest to direct, since they could barely retain memory for five minutes straight, but she and her ever loyal Fracción were managing. Besides, the promise of a large meal was always enough to harness the cooperation of most Hollows in the cold sands of Hueco Mundo.
Deciding that the time had come, she signaled to Sung-Sun to head the mass gathering and a large garganta ripped itself into existence, opening a doorway into the Soul Society, the only place they had detected large amounts of reitsu in over two centuries. Scouts had reported a growing city in the middle of the ruins of the Seireitei filled with souls bursting with spiritual energy, and it was here that she had chosen to loose her forces in order to gorge their fill.
She had held a respect for the Soul Reapers, once upon a time, but they were all long dead, and there was no point in starving herself or those around her to appease the memory of those she had barely known, let alone cared for.
The huge wave of Hollows swarmed through the dimensional opening, raining down on the hapless city like the judgment of of an old and wrathful god.
For twenty two seconds, the pillaging went exactly as planned.
Then a colossal wave of raw spirit pressure and killing intent actually disintegrated well over a hundred Hollows, all Adjuchas level. Then there was some sort of commotion near the front that she couldn't see accompanied by multiple explosions of power than made her blink in surprise, about as emotional as she got recently.
Scores of the weaker Hollows were now running back into Hueco Mundo, running away from whatever it was causing havok. That was unacceptable.
Drawing Tiburón in one smooth arc, she unhesitatingly cut through a Gillian that was passing her by as it fled. Without word or gesture, her Fracción gathered behind her and followed her to discover what would dare throw itself in the path of their lady.
An army of angry, excited and undeniably powerful souls battling the Hollows may not have been their first guess.
Everywhere they looked, sword wielding (no, that girl had a rocket launcher) souls were fighting, matching, beating her vanguard. They suffered the occasional casualties, but every time one of them fell, another one wearing a blue sash would appear from out of nowhere and carry them away before the final blow could be delivered.
They weren't organized as an army: they were wild as a mob, and seemingly enjoying themselves while they ran rampant through her forces.
A pointed glance to Apacci and Mila Rose was enough for them to leap into the fray, swords drawn and howling for blood. They had grown incredibly in strength since Aizen's subjugation of the Arrancar, now rivaling some of the Espada of that age when fully released. She had never once been left wanting from their service to her, and had always enjoyed their irrefutable loyalty and devotion.
They didn't make it ten seconds out of the Garganta before they were brought to a halt by two other figures.
One was a woman, though it was slightly hard to tell with her spiky black hair cut so short. She had a scar that creased her bottom lip in the corner, making an automatic smirk or scowl depending on the rest of her face. At her waist was belted no less than five swords, though Harribel had the suspicion that they were truly Zanpakuto; the four on her sides, two on each, were all identical in length and the dark crimson of their sheathes, but the one just visible at the back of her belt was rich green with seven gold bands imposed at equidistance across it, and was perhaps several inched longer and held a deeper curve than its mates.
The other figure was clearly a man, with his neatly trimmed beard and long, wavy brown hair tied back in a casual tail. His dark eyes held an easy and friendly demeanor that only just masked the cold certainty and wicked anticipation. Hie sleeves were rolled up to reveal tattoos running up both forearms, tiny squiggles that at second glance became a long list of names: "Uryu Ishida...Orihime Inoue...Yasutora Sado...Kiuske Urahara...Yoruichi Shihoin..." His Zanpakuto was apparently already released, resembling a halberd instead of a katana, and it appeared to be made entirely out of thick, roiling, solid smoke.
They both wore painfully familiar white coats over their clothes.
"Sooo," began the man, grinning invitingly to Mila Rose, causing her to flush with anger, "are you going to start the introductions or...?"
"Franceska Mila Rose," she bit out, glowering even as she drew her own sword. Beside her, Apacci was staring daggers at the woman, who was taking the opportune lull to watch the fights going on below them.
"Emilou Apacci."
"Tatsuki Arisawa," the tomboy looked back at her opponent and grinned, "Captain of Squad Nineteen."
That garnered a reaction from both her adversary, Mila Rose and, though it was internal, Harribel herself. 'Nineteen? But they were wiped out!'
"Keigo Asano," the male spoke up, his own smile now looking more devious as he relished in their discomfort, "Captain of the Twenty Second."
Whatever may have come next in the stand off was interrupted by the appearance of another one of these unexplained Shinigami, one of the blue sash wearing ones. His face was creased with worry and smile lines alike, and he had streaks of silver popping up in his bangs, despite his apparent young age.
Over his shoulder was slung the unconscious Sung-Sun.
"Here, take her," he instructed the nearest Hollow and deposited the Arrancar into its confused arms before turning to leave. He stopped just before leaving, manners catching up with him, and turned back to the gathered elites, and bowed modestly to the three other Arrancar women. "Yoshiara Shostiueke, Captain of Squad Seventeen, very pleased to meet you." And then he was gone, flash stepping back to the massive melee to offer medical assistance where he could and combat assistance everywhere else.
"That's it!" Apacci shrieked and threw herself at Tatsuki. Mila Rose followed her example and slammed her sword down onto the shaft of Keigo's smoke halberd. The two separate fights grew distant from Harribel, and she could again view the battlefield undistracted. It was clear that the Hollows were far superior in numbers, but that was the only advantage they had. The Soul Reapers had ferocity, home field advantage, battle lust, hard training and a dedicated medical force that was by itself too tough to wipe out in one and cripple the others. Even the low level Vasto Lorde she had brought were being matched by several other white coats apiece, more captains for this absurd order.
"Hm, ya' like it?"
Harribel swung around to point her sword at the source of the voice, and found herself looking at the back of a head: whoever he was, he was sitting down in the air and surveying the other half of the miniature war going on beneath them. Unconcerned , he didn't even turn to look at her. His white coat simply said '14'.
"Guess that's a no."
"Just who are you?" She hissed from behind her bone mask. She didn't believe she knew him, even if she could only see his shoulder length, dark gray hair.
"Me? Guess you can say I'm the Head Captain here."
Despite herself, Tia's eyes widened slightly. Could this be true?
"I am Tia Harribel, the Last Espada, Lady of Hueco Mundo and the Pariah Queen." She felt that spur of pride smolder in her chest whenever she had opportunity to say those wods.
"Yeah, I think I remember hearin' about you. Fought little Hitsugaya, didn't you?" He snorted. "Whatever. You can just call me Kenpachi Zaraki."
Now there was a name recalled from days long since past. The Kenpachi had been likened to a Boogeyman for the Hollows, his legendary status as an engine of war was insurmountable, overwhelming even the psychotic Nnoritora Gilga in sheer power. The only person who, if even mentioned, could cause the stony faced Tousen to straighten up in either fear or loathing.
A relic in need of being thrown out to make room for the new.
"Well, Kenpachi Zaraki, it seems that you are the one responsible for my vassals' plight, and the cause behind our pilgrimage being disrupted. For that, I will kill you here and now, atop the ruins of your failed community."
"Sister," Kenpachi turned to address her, both eyes communicating his lack of impress, "you've got things a little screwed the hell up in there, least of all being a raging bleach queen." Harribel had no idea what that was, but there was no mistaking an insult when it was made. "I'm not the one responsible for all this," he nodded his head toward the city below and its residents fighting tooth and nail above and around it. "They all are. If not for them I'd just be a mindless drone walking around until I rotted away. They got me off of my ass, so it's my job to watch all of theirs'."
Kenpachi stood up, revealing the lengthy katana that had been leaning up against him, and turned all the way around to look at the Espada. Then he unleashed the full restraint of his reiatsu and let it all blast her head on.
Harribel gasped at the tremendous weight of his spirit energy, briefly recalling the terrible anger of Souske Aizen.
Then her surprise turned into contempt.
"Perhaps once that power might have been enough to overwhelm me, but I have not been idle these long, long years. I have consumed and grown and evolved, a reaper in a far truer sense than pretentious pretenders such as you could ever hope to perceive. Now grovel, nameless Kenpachi, for the mercy I will not show. Destroy, Tiburón."
The wave of reiatsu that was unleashed was like a tidal wave where Kenpachi's was a splash. Anything too close to the epicenter either lost consciousness, died straight out or were repulsed out of the field of effect. The sky darkened from her fury and the ground shook, and that was only a passive response. She felt the ecstasy of power and basked in the unending satisfaction of truly being the strongest. Stronger than Yamamoto. Stronger than Yhwach. Stronger than Aizen.
But, standing just where he had been before, Kenpachi Grinned at her, sword propped over his shoulder.
"Now that is what I call 'god like'," he appraised openly, laughing heartily, unhinged. "Not even my shikai could hope to match that, and I gotta say I've wanted to say that for a very long time."
"Why?" Harribel inquired, humoring him before she eradicated him like the insignificant vermin he was. "Because you have been seeking death at the blade of one stronger than yourself?"
"Hell no!" His laughter took on a new meaning as he brought his sword up, spinning it twice before inverting his grip on it and holding it in front of his face, obscuring the eye with the scar running down it. "I've just been wanting somebody to try all of my techniques on." There was a terrible moment of premonition, where she knew that she shouldn't let him finish, that she should kill him, but her arrogance made her hesitate, and it was the last mistake she ever made.
"BANKAAAAIIII!"
Harribel froze in complete and absolute horror at what she beheld, and couldn't avoid the single attack that shattered her body like it was glass. She had likened her attack to a wrathful god before.
It ended with her waking one.