Title: 44. Walls

Characters; Grimmjow, Ichigo. Meant as frienship, might be taken as yaoi.

Rated: Strong T

Genre: Humor

Words: 1750

44 – Wall

Grimmjow frowned as looking around himself, a hand coming up to scratch his bright blue hair as he gave the former magnificent palace a blank look.

"...ya really take spring cleaning seriously."

"Shut up," the Shinigami next to him grumbled as he crossed his arms over his chest (and the torn Shihikasho), his ever-present scowl slightly deeper, and his lips being in an almost-pout. "It's not my fault they were hiding."

Grimmjow nodded, as if that made perfect sense, a smirk twisting his lips. He could turn that almost-pout into a full-out-pout. It was always fun teasing the Shinigami, after all. "Maybe they shoulda' hid behind a rock," Grimmjow mused, pointedly looking at the single, big rock that resided a bit outside of the palace, not long from where they were standing. It was the only object around them that hadn't been reduced to, well, crumbles.

"Shut. Up," his former enemy and current friend-because-it's-pointless-trying-to-kill-each-other-the-whole-time repeated. This time the words came out a lot more heatedly and with his teeth showing in a snarl. Cute. Grimmjow's smirk widened. "As if you were any better."

The words was accompanied with a pointed glare towards the other end of the Las Noches palace. Which had been taking its own toll of damage. There was a big difference between what Ichigo had done, and what Grimmjow had done, though.

"At least my side still have walls," Grimmjow deadpanned.

Cue the pout.

Yes! Grimmjow forced back a snicker, so not have Ichigo punch him. Teasing came first, punching later, and they were both a little exhausted still after having taken on seven hundred or so (Grimmjow lost count at three-hundred-nine, and Ichigo just didn't bother to count once he had been slashing at twelve) Hollows and Arrancar trying to kill/eat them. They deserved some rest. And Ichigo deserved a lot of teasing. As per usual.

In Grimmjow's personal opinion, the young Visored deserved a lot of teasing all the time all the time.

"I told you, they were hiding,"Ichigo hissed, throwing a longing glance towards Zangetsu that was stuck in the sand next to him. Oh, how tempting it was to just grab the sword and slice the annoying ex-Espada in half. "If they had just been out in the open and fought like normal people, I wouldn't have tried to lure 'em out."

"And luring 'em out means taking down the walls, and burying 'em in shambles instead of letting 'em die honorably."

"I didn't think they were that weak! It was just a few Getsugas!"

"Whilst ya were Hollowfied."

A pause. Another pout. Grimmjow's smirk widened. Ichigo chose to ignore the smug expression. "Alright. I didn't think about that, okay? And... can't you just have your servants build it back up? It's not that bad..."

They both looked back to Grimmjow's home.

Or, Ichigo supposed, it would have to be called former home now.

The side he had been at, had twenty or so walls remaining, whereas before there had been... well, over two-hundred, if Grimmjow remembered correctly. Aizen had always enjoyed to make things over the top, after all. Their gazes soon drifted to the side Ichigo had been occupying, where there remained a full total of one wall. The rest had turned into crumbles, debris and something that only could be classified as sand. How one turned whole walls into sand, Grimmjow didn't understand, but he had to admit that it was impressive what Ichigo could do with just one Cero.

At times, the former Espada regretted taking the time to teach Ichigo how to fire off an Cero. Most of the times, it was when the red ball of pain was aimed at him. When it was directed at others, he just felt smug about it. Unfortunately most of the time the Ceros was aimed at him - not that he deserved it.

Okay, so maybe he deserved it occasionally.

Actually, he deserved it most of the time.

Alright. He did deserve having the red ball crashing into him every time it was aimed at him.

Not that it would really make him stop messing around with the orange haired male.

And, truthfully, he didn't really regret teaching Ichigo how to fire a Cero. It was just too impressive seeing what Ichigo could do with one move - even if it was directed at him. He took pride in that he was such a great teacher - and happily ignored people telling him that Ichigo was just a quick learner. He was a good teacher, dammit!

Tilting his head to the side, Grimmjow cleared his mind whilst leaning down, grabbing a small stone the size of his fist. Standing up again, he swung the stone forward, a loud crack echoing in the otherwise silent desert as it hit the wall remaining.

Correction; the wall that had remained

There was now a grand total of zero walls remaining at Ichigo's side.

"...you suck."

Grimmjow took a smug, prideful moment to enjoy the full-out pout and relaxing of his eyebrows, a proof that Ichigo wasn't as annoyed as he wanted to pretend to be (from Grimmjow's experience, that expression meant that the Berryhead was amused), before he focused on slightly more important matters.

"...I need to find a new palace," Grimmjow observed, frowning. "And I think we killed my servants."

With Aizen-bastard gone, it had been such a good place, too. It had been fun living there, occasionally killing Hollows and such, before he had come to stay in the Living World because it eventually got boring to kill lame-ass Hollows without a real fight. It might have been fun in the beginning, but it quickly lost its charm. He had stayed longer than intended in the Living World due to obvious reasons (read; tormenting the Strawberry and making his life pure hell), so it was no surprise that sixteen months later upon returning to Hueco Mundo, the place had been overrun with annoying creatures.

Hence, he and Ichigo had chosen to do some 'spring cleaning', in the words of the eccentric shop keeper.

Meaning; kill all the Hollows and Arrancars that had gotten together and chose to live there in Grimmjow's absence. Instead it seemed as if Ichigo and Grimmjow could open a very successful demolition firm.

Even when not fighting each other, they still managed with creating chaos. And shambles. They were a really, really bad pair to be around, unless having a death wish.

"That place was huge," Ichigo complained as standing up, grabbing Zangetsu to heft over his shoulder. "How the hell did we manage to- to... destroy it all?"

"We're talented," Grimmjow sounded almost proud of the fact that they could easily destroy a eight floor palace, that was at least the size of a small country in less than two hours, and the smug grin stretching over his face proved to Ichigo that his so-called-friend-because-no-other-description-really-fit actually was proud of it.

Admittedly, so was he.

Not that he would say that out loud. People compared him enough to Grimmjow and Kenpachi as it was - he didn't need to fuel the fire.

Sighing, Ichigo shook his head, thoughtfully tapping his fingers over Zangetsu's hilt. Then, without a word, he swung his sword outward, a black, crescent shaped blast flying from it. Crashing, thudding and a surprised squeak was heard, and then, a few minutes later, silence once again laid over Hueco Mundo.

Grimmjow's side of the battle ground – formerly know as a palace – now had zero walls as well.

"What? If we're going to ruin the place, we can as well do it properly," Ichigo shrugged at the incredulous look the ex-Espada gave him. "T's not like you coulda been living there anyway. With there being no roof and... you know..."

"And no walls. At all," Grimmjow agreed, that godforsaken half-insane smirk stretching over his lips again as he placed Pantera in its sheath. The expression irked Ichigo, due to it oddly enough reminded him of the look a proud father would give his son. And wasn't that thought just way past disturbing? Okamisama, Grimmjow was probably proud of him. "Seems like I'ma keep crashin' at your place, Shinigami."

Oh. Right.

That was the reason they returned back. To kill some Hollows, and have Grimmjow start living in 'his' palace again. Former palace, that meant. Destroying the place hadn't been part of the plan. Karin would kill him for bringing the pain-in-the-ass Arrancar back home (even though she liked him, which she would never in a million years admit without a very good reason).

Sighing, Ichigo turned from the once magnificent building, head hanging low as Grimmjow opened a Gargantua and they both moved through it.

Ah, well. At least it had been fun. With taking down Hollows and walls and all.

Hopefully Grimmjow wouldn't decide to repay the favor, and destroy his home too. Daring a look towards his friend, seeing the relaxed stance, hands shoved into his pockets, and the psyched grin, Ichigo could only let out another deep sigh.

His house would remain, but without a doubt Ichigo would still get punished – one way or another – for ruining Grimmjow's home.

Oh, well. That could be fun, too.

He had been working on a way to fire of one Cero from each hand at the same time and was eager to test it out (on Grimmjow) after all.

Let it not be said that the two had anything near a normal friendship.