The dream was always the same dream, with the same gratifying result. He bade it welcome as he gripped the hilt of the katana tightly in his hand, eyes frosting over as the air around him responded immediately. The command fell from his mouth smoothly, looking to where his enemy stood paralyzed in the seeping frigidity descending upon them.
"Souten ni zase, Hyourinmaru!"
The ice bristled and glinted and branched out, Hyourinmaru's cold draconic form otherworldly as it sought out the opposition in white. Ice closed in, crushing and silent, chilling bloodstreams and slowing organs. Cells shut down and skin turned blue, all in slow motion even though it was mere moments in this world. The brain stopped functioning as the skin began to peel back, mottling and turning grey from lack of metabolism. It was violent. It was perfect. It was beautiful.
To freeze to death was less than pleasant; take hypothermia and multiply it tenfold with half the time. But this man deserved nothing less. It was merely ice to accompany his frozen, twisted heart, that is, if he still insisted on saying he had one.
As the process completed itself, only one flaw manifested in this dream, this glorious inward victory that he had seized from his enemy. Before the ice closed around him, he had closed his eyes and smiled, anarchy as obvious as daylight in that subtle curling of the lip and long eyelashes closing off the sight of his doom. It was like he knew how desperate Hitsugaya was to kill him and he found it futile, in the same fashion that a predator feels when its prey struggles in its last desperate attempts to break loose. The head slightly turned away, the curl of dark brown on his forehead a striking contrast to flawless pale skin and immaculate attire. Usually there was no expression in his eyes, just a blank stare as the ice wrapped its unforgiving fingers around him and squeezed, shattering his image into a thousand sparkling pieces. But here he was, his smile denoting amusement and what was unmistakably omniscience. Hitsugaya squeezed his eyes shut as his dream began to turn on him, a sickening feeling rising in his stomach as he strained to keep the enemy's voice at bay.
This is only a dream, Hitsugaya.
This is the only realm you hold sway over. Or so you think.
And then he was behind him, white uniform following the swift arrival of his body as he chuckled slightly. Hitsugaya looked up as the ice before him reflected what was behind. And behold, the form of Aizen Sousuke: tall and sleek in his form with the subtle expression of a private upset. The voice sounded again, as sweet as honey but as toxic as venom.
I, however, hold sway over many realms. Including yours.
A flash of metal, a ringing in his ears as the ice dissipated before his eyes. The air was still deathly cold, accentuated by the visible inhalations and exhalations of Aizen's calm breathing. Hitsugaya knew his next choice of words, yet it was he who was now paralyzed, the source of which was unknown to him. As he waited for the release, another small amused sigh resonated in the chasms of his mind.
To shatter your ice is simple. I don't need my illusions to trap you.
The world swirled around him, colors spinning before his eyes as he stumbled, sword clattering away from his grasp with a hollow sound. He was falling for the trap; he was losing the internal struggle. It's just a dream, he told himself, but as the time elapsed he was having problems believing in the credibility of his own words. Aizen spoke again, but his voice tickled Hitsugaya's ear as the proximity between them was further enhanced.
Do you know what it means to kill someone in your dreams?
Hands closed in upon his shoulder blades, softly caressing the skin through the layers of black and white fabric. They were firm but soft, weaving a false sense of security with each passing second. The 10 th Division captain could only stand there as the architect of betrayal did as he wished. His own thoughts, his own world had betrayed him, had brought him to a standstill. Eyelashes crushed together as he winced from the touch of Aizen's hand upon his face, fingers softly tracing their way up his neck to his jaw line and cupping it there. Slowly he walked around to face him, bending down so that they were eye to eye. Hitsugaya tasted rust in his mouth and realized he had bit his cheek from clenching his jaw so tightly. He didn't want to hear this, didn't want to feel this but he had no choice.
It means you are killing the parts of yourself that resembled the person you killed.
Lips hovered over his cheek and jaw line, eyelashes brushing against the side of his face. He winced as if they were weapons, feeling hot from Hyourinmaru's silence and from the closeness of their bodies. This was wrong, this was just a dream, this wasn't what he wanted. He didn't want to be in this dream any longer, he wanted out.
It means you are killing yourself.
The room shattered, split into a colorless void as time slowed down between the two. The taller man leaned in, eyes closed as he smirked before brushing lips with the white-haired taichou, briefly settling upon them before removing himself to whisper in his ear the words that would set his world on fire.
Do you want to kill yourself?
He hadn't noticed the katana before it plunged into his side, blood arcing out as he choked and fell back, held close to the man in white by his hand. The ice formed around him as he lay in shock in Aizen's half-embrace, eyes widen as crimson mist fluttered before the white before him. His own blood stained Aizen's hakama, yet the traitorous man did nothing, almost reveling in the sight of the small captain's blood upon his clean image. He wiped beads of the sanguineous liquid off his cheek where it had fallen and smiled, tongue darting out to wash the fingers that were stained red.
Cleaning the hands stained in the blood of the enemy.
It wasn't a foreign concept to Aizen.
Hitsugaya tried to scream, his rage and his fury choking him as it lay lodged in his throat. But he was silent, eyes fixed in a glare that he hoped would sear holes through that smirk with blood at its corner, his blood. All he received back was a slight smile before the darkness filled his eyes and the taste of blood thickened itself in his mouth to overpower his will...
He woke up with a start, gasping heavily as the taste of rust faded from his tongue. It had all seemed so real, felt so real…was it only a dream? Blue eyes flashed in the solitary moonlight before he ran a trembling hand through his colorless hair, still feeling the cold air and the flashing smile, not to mention the lips that had skimmed the surface of his pale face...
He shook the image of the latter away, face growing hot from the embarassment. The memory of Aizen left him cold and trembling, mind only now realizing that the pain inflicted upon him in his reverie was merely what it was—an illusion.
Once again, he had fallen for the deceit. He had believed everything and bought into the words and the images that lay before him. A fist came down on the bed next to him in frustration, teeth grit together and eyes glassy from withheld tears. He would not cry, it was just a dream! But why did he feel so weak, so cold and broken?
The man's voice, the man's very image had him frozen.
He wondered if the warmth would ever return to him.