Pilgrimage to Hell
"We've always been with you, Orihime-sama."
"We are a part of you, born to protect you. We are your Power!"
"Fire me with no hesitation, Onna! My ability is to repel both sides of the shield."
Her Shun Shun Rikka, her six flowers of obstruction, healing and attack. They are her. And she is Them.
The exhilarating energy she felt in her skin, pulsing in her blood in time with her anger, when she first build that shield to defend herself from the octopus-like Hollow who had manipulated, disfigured and injured Tatsuki-chan and Chizuru-chan.
Her utter happiness at Tsubaki's revival by Hachi-san after that enormous Arrancar in the park had smashed him to pieces using just his fist.
Her connection to her Rikka is as strong as any Shinigami's bond with their zanpakutou, a phenomenon which had surprised and endeared the young girl to the Vizards like an extended family member.
Her Rikka speak with her – teases, jokes, advice, and in Tsubaki's case, criticism and reprimands to grow a stronger killing intent the latter of which she is still training towards. But ultimately, they obey her. She is their Master (or is it Mistress in this case?)
She guides their actions, imbues them with the strength - or lack therof - to continue on, depending on her will.
And now, there's no time left.
Not now.
Not when that verdant-eyed Arrancar with the tear marks had ambushed her and her two escorting guards from Soul Society in the passage of the Dangai with an explicit threat to kill her nakama and Rangiku-san and Toushirou-kun and all the others who have come to gain extra footholds in her heart if she chose to struggle. In return for her cooperation, Ulquiorra made a trade-off of a 12-hour grace period.
Her tasks have been listed out. She has whispered her farewell to Kurosaki-kun.
Goodbye Halcyon Days.
Five minutes to midnight.
The spell is about to wear off for Cinderella.
But there is no magical pumpkin coach to whisk Orihime off to her Happy Ending, only her own two feet to bring her to the outskirts of town to meet her captor.
And that is the unbearable thing.
Orihime knows that she is being made to betray herself, betray her friends in order to save them. Just because she does not voice her protests does not mean she is unaware that Aizen is forcing her to come to him by her volition, to be made a traitor despite her hidden good-will.
Ulquiorra is not dragging her to meet him, nor is he is capturing her by force. It is Orihime directing her own two feet to walk past these quiet streets, behind each darkened window slumbers blissful Karakura Town residents, unsuspecting of her unwanted journey to an abyss from which she cannot envision herself returning from.
She pauses at the river to look back at the town which she has called home for more than 15 years. She looks at the moon, its silvery glow reflecting on the mirror surface of the placid river.
You're not alone, Orihime-sama.
Shoulders square. Eyes narrow in determination as she takes another and another and another step forward.
That's right. She's not alone.
Her Shun Shun Rikka are with her, will forever be with her.
Orihime may forsake others. Others may forsake her. But in this pilgrimage to Hell, she will not be going alone.
She will not go dying powerless.
The demon rises from the shadows.
The unzipping sound of the Garganta shatters the nocturnal silence. It seems almost surreal that no one comes running at the disturbance.
"You look … resigned."
Orihime briefly glances at her commentator before facing forward, eyes betraying nothing despite the mouth of the barrier snapping close, like a pair of jaws, behind her, plunging her and her captor into pitch blackness, slamming out the light of Life.
She does not answer.
No.
You're wrong.
I am Ready.
A/N My fill-in of the missing story gap of Orihime's walk towards Ulquiorra after her confession and goodbye to Ichigo; I don't think she is as gullible as she is often portrayed to be. After all, what does one do, what decision can one make when all the choices are bad?