I press my back against hers as we sit together on the stone floor. This is where one of us will die. In the dark, cold, endless space. They say it is underground. I don't believe that, not really. It is beyond time and death. It is eternity. It is the void. Muken.
Her heart beat is steady and strong. It keeps guiding my own back into its rhythm, every time I fail. Every time my shackles slow my arms and dull my blade. Can I kill her after what she has given to me? Can I spare her after what she has taken from me?
The whispers in my head have grown stronger. Is that the voice of the nameless boy I sealed away? The boy so strong that gods and demons were like dry grass before his blade? Maybe. But maybe this new challenger will be worthy of the name Enemy. Maybe not. I do know one thing. She is my enemy.
I turn my head enough to see her black hair resting on my shoulder. Our swords lay carelessly on the stone floor beside us. We have no need of them at the moment. There is no hurry down here. We have lifetimes upon lifetimes. As she drives me to my limits again and again, the shackles loosen. It has been so long… So long since I had an Enemy to fight.
In the darkest corner of my soul, the corner where in lies my greatest fear and my greatest joy, the voice grows stronger. The shackles grow weaker. Every lifetime brings me a step closer to what I once was. Every lifetime brings me a step close to losing everything. To the pain it took me centuries to bury.
Who is she now? I think she may be throwing off her own shackles as well. The healer… A woman with no Enemy. A warrior who loves nothing more than the fear of loosing their life and the thrill of victory over an Enemy. I hate her.
I love her.
She turns as well, and now we come together once more. A thousand lifetimes. The passion, rage, fear, hatred, adoration, longing, desire. We revel in this eternity. Our bodies move together as if we are of one mind. Or mindless. It is the insanity that comes with the endless darkness. The endless silence.
What fool would ever want sanity in its place?
We are told that Hollows are creatures of instinct. No heart. Anger. Pain. Hunger. Fear. Loneliness. Is there really a difference? We even hid beneath masks to protect us from that emptiness. Here in the void, we need no masks, but they are hard to set aside after so long. The masks and the shackles. Once they are gone, she will die. Once she is dead, I will have to face a world with no Enemy again.
I have never felt like crying as much as I do now.
Is she holding back tears as well? This is a battle, though. We can not shed tears here. We can not burden the other with that as well. Instead of tears, we will shed blood.
We lay together in blood already. Streaks of rust on empty stone. Pools of crimson flecked with black. A gift of the void. It will remember. No rain will every wash away our blood, shed in place of tears. No laughter will ever drown the echo of our cries of pain and pleasure.
Another lifetime gone by, and we have cast off the masks now. Ranks… Names… Duty… They are not a part of us. If we are Captains, then we are surrounded by strength. If we have names, then we have allies to call us by those names. If we have orders, then we can set aside our hearts and wear our shackles quietly.
Two tattered Haori make our bed as we chip away at the shackles, one more step toward freedom. One more step toward emptiness and completion.
We are nameless, as we were meant to be. Where did we come from? Were we born, or did we die a mortal death? How old are we? Our lives didn't truly begin until the day we met. Maybe they ended when we parted, and this is the second day of our lives. Five hundred years melt away so easily as our two days of life ring in the dark.
Kenpachi. Is it a name or a title? Can a name be passed from one to another? Can a title belong to a soul so entirely? Nameless, yes. But we have named ourselves and each other. We are Kenpachi.
Lips. Skin. Legs. Hands. Hot, damp breath. Shudders that run deep in our bones. Shivers that dance across our skin.
Blood. Blades. Muscles. The ringing of blades meeting. Two swords. Two souls forged in steel. All things must end… It makes me chuckle, the truth of her blade's existence. Is mine so true? A piece of metal, stolen from a corpse. My first kill. Will it ever speak to me? Do I dare know the name of my soul?
Another lifetime has come and gone, and I think of those we will leave behind. Her name bearer. My daughter. A symbol to remind me that there can be joy for the strong without fear. Hope that maybe, even once I remove my shackles and mask, that it will not be the end. Hope… Is that really what she is to me? I think so. Fearless. Nameless. Powerful. And yet, still happy. She is everything I am, and everything I never dared hope to be.
I will return to her. I will leave eternity for her. For her alone, I will step back out of this void. Just as for her namesake, I descended into the void.
If we were weaker, would we have lived our lives together? Would we have been something besides Enemies? Or, perhaps, if we were stronger? There are different kinds of strength. That I do know. I surround myself by a certain kind of strength. Pride myself on a certain kind of strength. But I can not deny that in the presence of another kind, I feel weak.
Kurosaki… His strength of will. Kotetsu… Her strength of compassion. Sui Feng… Her strength of devotion. Conviction. Loyalty. Determination. Can I learn to see them as Enemies as well? Can those with other kinds of strength feel the despair of standing without an equal?
Isane Kotetsu. Will she hate me for killing her Captain? Will she weep to know the truth of the woman she followed? Or maybe… Maybe she knew all along. Maybe the tall, awkward, kindhearted girl saw more than the rest.
The healers… What will they do now? They are so weak… They have their own strength, but when battle rises around them, they will fall. Without them, my men will fall. Without them, everything will fall. If I let them all die, would I care?
A shift, and now she is above me. Exploring, hand and tongue. This lifetime will be longer and shorter than the previous. My heart beats with hers, and I imagine spending a lifetime exploring her in return.
Lifetimes pass as pages of a book, and all too soon, the book is at an end. I forget myself. I shed tears to mix with the blood. Her heart fails, and I am so certain my own will stop to match it. So many times her heart beat has led mine back from the grave, for mine to find its own rhythm alone serves to break my resolve as I cry over her body.
Then I hear that voice, and I know the shackles are nearly gone. Loosened more than they have ever been. She wasn't strong enough to pry them off. But she did enough. She earned her reward. She will never have to leave our eternity.
The voice calls out a name. I remember, I claimed that name. Is it the nameless boy, still chained where I left him all those lifetimes ago? No...
The weather beaten one. So, it is true after all. This is my soul. Ragged, but never broken.
I step out of the void. Her body remains. I have taken everything else. I have taken her name. I am the Kenpachi, now. More truly than ever before. It belongs to me, and for the first time, I am no longer nameless. Maybe that is why, in that moment, I could hear its voice. Maybe it was never nameless. Maybe it never called me, because I had no name to call.
I look at the second sword. All things must end. It would forever remind me of this place, and that woman. My beloved Enemy. I freeze but do not look back. I smile, and toss the sword into the darkness, listening to it ringing in the void.
All things must end. But not today. Behind me, in the cold, still, darkness that stretches on and on and on, I can feel it.
Nameless.
Nameless, but alive.