And here we are... the end of the road. For the Karakura arc at least.
Chapter Seven - And They All Fall Down
It was dark. The underground corridor had no light but that cast by the stone walls, it in itself a dull, smoldering red where it overtook the black. He didn't find it discomfiting; he was used to it. If anything it was the unusual brightness that took him aback.
Garganta were being overused today, and it was no question why.
Hollow bait. Thick, undiluted, processed reishi equivalent. He recognized it, recognized the scent. He remembered it, even if he hadn't smelled it in centuries. Perhaps because it hadn't been released in so long, it was surprisingly potent. Enough to send many solos running, enough to make the gillians sit up and notice; the latter was a miraculous feat in of itself.
He shook his head, the slow movement not disturbing a strand of fine white hair.
All of the garganta were focused on one particular place.
"The foolishness of youth," he murmured, darkly amused. "In any case, the results should be most entertaining, either way it goes."
-
"Chizu… Chizuru…."
The redhead's body, mangled and torn, dropped to the ground, and Tatsuki rushed over to it, bending down try and do something, but Orihime knew it was too late. Far too late; the broken chain protruding from her chest was proof of that.
Tatsuki dragged Chizuru's corpse over to her, demanding what had happened, what was happening. She couldn't answer, staring in mute horror as the limp, half-translucent figure that was Chizuru's soul was lowered, closer and closer until the jaws of the mask closed around her, first the legs and working up.
This is wrong…
Orihime choked back a sob.
"Didja like that, little human?" the monster taunted. "Someone help! Someone help!" The vines whipped around heading for Tatsuki this time. "Humans are so pathetic!"
No! Not Tatsuki too!
Tatsuki jumped when the vines curled around her wrist but wrenched herself free, thorns tearing at the blood vessels. Clutching it to her chest, she grabbed one the of the desiccated strips of Chizuru's shirt to form a makeshift tourniquet. A second later a second vine exploded from the ground, tossing her up, catching her in a deadly embrace.
No… not again….
Not Tatsuki too….
Not after… all she's done!
Her hairpins glowed, and as Tatsuki screamed, they shattered.
-
Chad didn't know what was wrong with Shigeo and Harutoki. He dodged a clumsy strike, and then a second one, trying to get closer to the motionless blur. He was fairly sure he had hit it earlier, had heard some strange static in his ears, and then his friends' assaults had literally doubled.
He didn't want to hurt them, but they kept getting in the way.
'You and your stupid-ass pacifism,' he could hear Ichigo sulking.
"Chad, at five o'clock, six feet!"
What does Ichigo have to do with these things?
Another memory formed sluggishly in his mind, answering his question but giving him more.
"The girl with the orange hair… I felt her too, she's scary… She's fighting the monster…"
Ichigo fights these things?
Chad held no delusions about the girl he somewhat considered a friend. She was in many ways like an animal; it was her instinct to seek out fights. She didn't fight out of an urge to protect, but because she enjoyed it. In many ways, she was very cruel.
He was thankful to Inoue Orihime for her influence on the orange-head.
In many ways, Kurosaki Ichigo reminded him of himself before his abuelo had taught him to be kind.
How can you be so mean?
Yet, even she could find it in her to turn her fists against a monster that tormented a child.
Abuelo… I understand that my fists are not to be used to hurt people. They are to protect my mighty body; they are to protect those that cannot protect themselves.
He ducked another pair of sloppy punches.
Please…
…give me the power.
-
Karin should be safe now… it seems like the Hollows are retreating.
Panting with exertion, Ichigo leaped from building to building, swooping down like a fallen angel whoever she came across a Hollow. Karakura was a mess. Here and there, there was a limp figure, where Ishida's stupid contest had come to a deadly result, and she felt more and more nervous about what condition Orihime would be in when she found her.
Tatsuki… you'd better have kept her safe, or so help me god…
Slash, dead Hollow.
Stopping at the edge of a particularly tall skyscraper and wiping the scum's blood off Zangetsu's blade, Ichigo frowned. It looked like all the Hollows in the area were congregated in one place, below where the cracks in the sky met and crossed.
Those cracks… are getting wider…
It couldn't be a good thing. It filled her with a feeling that wasn't quite dread but certainly wasn't positive.
Scowling, Ichigo looked between the fractured sky and the direction of Karakura High School, unsure which way to go. Zangetsu's bandage fell around her shoulders, weighting her down, and she nodded shortly.
The Hollows' congregation point wasn't too far out of the way, after all. If she had a bit of a time hacking them to bits while she was there, well… Orihime couldn't deny Ichigo her base nature, could she?
-
"Slaughter. White pain, red blood, black death. Dark skies and rolling thunder enshroud the plain; scream, says the wind, and wind screams! The forty-seventh destructive art: daishinen!"
The wind howled, shattering the nearby windows, tearing up the ground and the concrete and the Hollow for good measure, leaving a devastating trail of destruction behind. Though inordinately pleased by the sight, Rukia still cringed, realizing she had allowed her exhilaration with her renewed ability to use kido to overwhelm her judgment.
It had been careless. Like something Ichigo would do.
On the other hand, it had eradicated any remaining Hollows. With style.
She's rubbing off on me, Rukia admitted, not sure whether to be vaguely amused or just plain mortified. Compromising by brushing off the topic, she ran full tilt down the shard-strewn road, following a line of prints that had managed not to be obliterated by her over-the-top kido.
With so much Hollow activity centering in on the fractured sky, she had no doubt Ichigo would be headed there. The Quincy would probably be there as well, cesium to Ichigo's francium and both of them all but drowning in a sea of Hollows.
Turning a corner, Rukia nearly ran headlong into a tall, pig-like Hollow. Dispatching it with a careless byakurai, she spotted Ishida, his bow posed to fire and his hands bleeding, torn to pieces.
"Kuchiki Rukia," he acknowledged, loosing the arrow at an airborne spirit. He adjusted his glasses with a finger. "Shinigami. So you've recovered the ability to use kido?" For a second, the boy studied her, before he snorted. "Borrowing power. You can't even use your own reiatsu. Pathetic. Isn't that family name of yours noble?"
Rukia froze, the stored spirit energy in the contanobooster seeming to thrum in time with the heartbeat that thudded in her ears, hazing over her eyes in her growing anger.
The byakurai that destroyed the Hollow approaching at the Quincy's back also blew a hole in the building behind it.
-
The sound of a thousand whirling blades sheered the air as Orihime stood up, eyes filled with fury. The Hollow hesitated, looking back and worth for the source of the noise.
"Do you want to save Tatsuki?" a quiet voice sounded in her ear, and she looked down in shock - or tried to. It seemed like time had stopped; the Hollow, Tatsuki, herself, even the leaves in the air and the wind. Stopped.
The small voice repeated its question.
Yes, she tried to answer, and though her mouth didn't move, by the voice's reply, it understood.
"What would you do, if she lived?"
If she had been able to move, Orihime's eyes would have slid closed in sadness. I would… leave her alone, so she would be safer.
"Would you?"
If she could have gaped stupidly, Orihime would have done it then. Hovering in the air in front of her, incongruous to the serious nature of the moment, was a small fairy, shocking white hair pulled back into a topknot and dressed in a black kimono.
"Yeah," the fairy answered itself a second later. "You would." It nodded, satisfied, and nodded cheerily at her. "Pleased to finally meet you, Orihime. I am Shun'o of the Shun Shun Rikka." As if summoned by his words, the air was filled with fairies, most of them tiny and in white kimono rather that black. Of the fairies wearing black there were only five apart from Shun'o.
"Done talking yet?" one of the other five kicked Shun'o in the back of his head, tossing the fairy against Orihime's chest. "We can't keep this up forever, idiot. Woman! You want to save the other girl? Do you?"
"Tsubaki, she already said yes!" squalled Shun'o. The other fairy, obviously Tsubaki, ignored him.
"If so, the only way you can is with us. Retrieve her, heal her, and kill that bastard!"
It's a fairy version of Ichigo… Something in Orihime was horrified at the concept. The other, much larger part just wanted to giggle.
"Shun'o!" barked Tsubaki. "Show her how it's done!"
The world kicked back into high gear.
"First, you need to get her down," Shun'o said shortly. "To do that, you have get to her. Repeat after me. Hinagiku!" Hesitantly, she repeated. "Baigon!" Again. "Lily! Santen Ketsuhun - Senko! I reject!"
A cloud of the white-clothed mini-fairies reacted to the incantation, congregating under her feet and forming a thin golden shield. The shield exploded in energy, and then she was gone from the ground, soaring through the air, rocketing to Tatsuki, whom she tore out of the thorny grip of the Hollow.
"Now summon them again!" Shun'o ordered quickly.
Orihime complied, and the golden shield reappeared above her erupted and sent them flying back earthward, where they landed in a rough tumble.
"You… you bitch!" The vinous Hollow roared in anger, and half a dozen deadly tendrils weaved through the air chasing them down. Gritting her teeth, Orihime threw herself over Tatsuki's mangled but still breathing, still living body to shield it from an onslaught that never came.
Three of the black-clothed fairies made the corners of a triangle-shaped golden shield, composed of thread upon thread upon thread that entangled the attacking vines and then smoothed out.
It was beautiful in a way.
"That's their ability… Hinagiku, Baigon, and Lily's," Shun'o informed. "They and the senko reject beyond the shield. For those three, it's actions. Anything with malicious intent. For the senko, it's you. They're the movement specialists. Ayame and I, on the other hand, reject within the shield, countering damage like it wasn't there to begin with."
"But that means…" Orihime let go of Tatsuki and scrambled out of the way, and the two fairies took positions at her friend's head and feet.
"After me, Orihime…
"Shun'o! Ayame! Soten Kisshun… I reject!"
Like magic, a second warm golden shield enveloped the martial artist, and the various rips and tears in her arms, legs, and torso began to mend.
"Woman!"
She jumped. "T-Tsubaki?"
The last of the black-clad fairies nodded at her. "Unlike those five, I am capable of rejecting on both sides of the shield. I break through and reject the union of matter! In effect, I slice the enemy apart! Woman!" he shouted again, and pointed over his shoulder at the Hollow Hinagiku, Baigon, and Lily were still holding off. "I ask you. Do you want that monster dead?"
Do I… want it dead…? Tatsuki's wounds had all but disappeared, but she could see Chizuru's maimed corpse out of the corner of her eye, and felt ice settle in her stomach. Yes… I do. For Chizuru… whose only sin was caring for me… "I… do…"
"Good! Shun'o!"
The healing shield shattered, revealing a completely healed but sleeping Tatsuki.
Shun'o nodded and fluttered over to Orihime's shoulder. "After me!"
I do…. I want it dead. Tears welled up in her eyes, but she blinked them away, setting her face in a serious scowl. "Yes."
"Tsubaki!"
"Tsubaki!"
"Koten Satsuhun…"
"Koten Satsuhun… I REJECT!"
-
Chad didn't know where the armor had come from. He only knew that suddenly, he could see the monster clearly, see the seeds burrowed in his friends' bodies, see the seeds sprouting from the monsters head.
He only knew that somehow, before Shigeo and Harutoki could recover, the monster would have to be destroyed, and that he could do it.
Thank you, abuelo…
-
Hack and slash, hack and slash. Dripping red cloth whipped through the air, a sturdy shield and able weapon at the same time, acting under no will but Zangetsu's own. Ichigo's technique was far from graceful, but if was far more effective than the pansy-ass Quincy's arrows, which were having difficulty taking down a Hollow per shot.
Rukia, on the other hand, took them down in droves per shot.
But I still have her beat. Ichigo grinned wildly.
Ishida seemed to be gravitating toward her for some reason, disturbing her as much as it pissed her off, something the Great Hollow Sea felt keenly. She had to flip over his head to keep from braining him, and almost did so out of sheer frustration.
"Stay out of my fucking way, shithead!"
"If you weren't always getting in my way, I might try," he retorted darkly, ducking under the hilt cloth as it snapped around.
"Oh shut up you two!" Rukia snarled, rattling off another retarded incantation before torching a dozen Hollows. "We're in a bit too big a fix for you to be acting like children!"
"And whose fault is that?" Hack. Slash. A Hollow howled in pain as the hilt wrap caught it in a stranglehold. "The dickless wonder over here!"
"I only proposed the contest, Kurosaki," Ishida argued. "You agreed to it."
Rukia looked over in shock.
Of all the sanctimonious assholes… "I agreed to a match," she corrected. "You know, one-on-one, last one standing wins?" A moment later, after a subtle prodding, Ichigo's lips lifted into a nastier grin. "'cause the way it looks, there ain't going to be anyone else standing after this's done."
The Quincy's blue eyes shot to her own, filled with dread. He didn't want to believe it, she could tell, and it amused her, because he knew better.
Quietly, because then it would hit harder, Ichigo sidled up to his face and murmured, "There were over a score of fresh corpses in the streets that I saw on the way here." Patting him on the shoulder, she continued. "I hope you're happy, Ishida. In the two months I've substituted, I hadn't even lost one."
-
Chizuru…
"Orihime," said Chad softly, before going silent, realizing from her expression she didn't feel like talking. She tried to offer him a weak smile, but it went flat when giggles started working up her body, making her shake.
Chizuru's dead. Those monsters that Ichigo fights don't seem so harmless anymore….
Orihime couldn't fight off the giggle this time. She had thought them harmless. Ichigo could fight them off with such ease, dispatch them with one careless whack, laughing and taunting and not even trying, and it had taken Chizuru's death and Tatsuki being mangled before she could kill one.
She couldn't let Tatsuki be hurt again, not for her sake.
She wouldn't let anyone be hurt, for her sake.
She wouldn't let anyone hurt anyone she cared about either. Tatsuki, Rukia, even Ichigo… she'd protect them.
Orihime giggled again, and Chad watched silently, concerned.
-
"That is one big-ass Hollow," said Ichigo reverently.
"Big and stupid," Rukia corrected, her words not managing to disguise her nervousness at the monstrosity she had called 'Menos Grande.' "But even so, Soul Society has a special squad trained for no other reason than to deal with the Menos; its sheer size is enough to overwhelm all but the stronger seated officers."
Ichigo frowned at that. They had a division set aside for these things? "You shinigami really are pathetic, aren't you?" She flinched as she was enveloped in blue fire, only to stare as it failed even to singe her shihakusho. "What the hell…?"
The disempowered shinigami waved the contanobooster and grinned.
Stupid Rukia. Cramping my style.
"Shinigami," Ishida snapped, as several stories in the air, the Menos' mouth opened wide, a roiling scarlet conflagration flinging to life in the maw. "Rather than playing around, we should be coming up with a plan."
The playfulness drained out of Rukia's face. "That's.. a cero blast!"
Ichigo looked at her in disbelief. A zero blast? They called a huge energy ball of destruction a zero blast? What the hell?
And what's with the Spanish? "Menos Grande," "cero"… Are they trying to say that the Spanish are evil or something?
"How observant." The Quincy boy was on a roll. "Kuchiki, do you know of any kido powerful enough to turn back a cero?"
As Rukia shook her head mutely, Ichigo blinked. Zangetsu's bandage wrap flopped over her shoulder, sodden dark red, as though coated with slime. She rubbed at it with a finger, expecting to brush away flakes of something like paint, but nothing gave way.
It was like the cloth was clogged with something.
And Zangetsu didn't like it. At all. He wanted her to get rid of it. But how…?
"Ichigo!"
The Menos discharged its blast.
She barely had time to pull Zangetsu up, catch the blast on the blade, and felt her strength flag under the assault. Damn, but there were some times she wished she'd been born a boy, so she wouldn't have to compensate for a female's weaker body.
I have… to push it back somehow….
Maybe I could… She gritted her teeth, struggling not to be crushed to the ground. …use my spiritual pressure…?
As if in answer, Ichigo felt her spirit power erupt, focusing on the edge of the blade; when the pressure lightened, she forced her aching arms to bring it down in a slash. Scarlet outlined in black poured from the edge in a stream, pushing back the cero like it was nothing, splintering around it and ripping into the Menos like a dozen steel-tipped feathers.
The howl it gave as it retreated was enough to chill her bones, but the light touch of the cloth, fresh as though newly laundered, and the phantom weight of a hand on her shoulder that she hadn't felt since Grand Fisher left her warm.
As she fell back on her ass, Ichigo smiled. "Getsuga… Tsubasa."
And then she screamed.
-
Rukia looked back and forth between the sober high school students, feeling grossly out of place. It was a moment of reflection, over something she was aware was a fact of life as a shinigami. You couldn't save them all.
Chad was quiet as always, watching. His gaze remained on Ichigo for the most part, as did Orihime's, who was half sitting in her lap, sobbing quietly. Apparently Chizuru, the redhead at school with whom Ichigo often had catfights, had been one of those eaten, before Orihime had awakened her "power."
Ishida merely sat there, looking down at his bandaged, shredded hands, his gaze darkly contemplative.
At first glance, Ichigo herself was somewhat awkwardly comforting Orihime; it had been funny, seeing her dumbstruck expression and hearing the somewhat unfair, "A Hollow ate Chizuru? Of all people?"
But she'd fallen silent after Orihime's anguished sob, and now alternated between a stiff pat on the back and leaning backward, eyes distant, as though into an invisible person's embrace. She had wiped away Orihime's tears only once, cringing in distaste and biting back a nasty remark.
Crying was a sign of weakness, and Ichigo hated weakness. Better yet, she loathed it with a passion.
Guilt, despair, anger… the emotional atmosphere was suffocating.
Soul Society will be after me soon, Rukia reflected, a twisting feeling in her gut she refused to name. Shinigami didn't need emotions. Foolish emotions. I have to leave. Ichigo can take care of herself now…
It made sense.
So why was she still arguing with herself?
-
Foolish, foolish emotions.
Shaking her head as she ran, Rukia whispered, "I have stayed far too long in this world…"
"Yes!" a voice erupted - a painfully familiar voice. "You're quite right!"
She whipped around, saw red hair bright against the black night and his shihakusho. The distance made it hard to see clearly, but she knew him. "R-renji? Abarai Renji?"
His zanpakuto bit into the ground, leaving a thin gouge in the concrete from where Rukia had jumped. He looked up, smirking, and shook his head. "Really, Rukia. Hunters from Soul Society are on your heels, and you're so lost in thought you don't even notice? I understand you're in a gigai… but two months has been enough for you to completely lose your edge."
Renji pulled his zanpakuto from the ground and balanced it on his shoulder. "Talk, Rukia. Where's the human that stole your powers?"
How do they know?
"Wha-what are you talking about?" she demanded. "Just because I'm in a gigai doesn't mean my powers were stolen. You dare you imply that-"
"It was a human!" he interrupted, shocking her into silence. "That's what's responsible for that expression on your face!"
"Renji-"
"Isn't that right - Captain Kuchiki?"
Rukia swallowed, turning slightly, meeting the dark eyes of Kuchiki Byakuya with dread. "Brother…" For a second she thought he was going to say something, before she was forced to leap back a second time to evade another slash.
"Transfer of shinigami power is a serious offense," Renji continued, the dead seriousness in his voice sending chills down her back. Was this really Renji? "Cooperate and it's likely your sentence will be reduced. Where is the human the captured you and stole your powers?"
Captured me? Is that what they think? A large part of Rukia wanted to feel insulted that she was considered weak enough that a human could subdue her. The other part, as brutal as it hit upon her ego, said that Ichigo probably could have taken her down.
Apparently mistaking her silence for noncompliance, Renji's eyes narrowed and he shifted into a lunging stance. "Don't protect her, Rukia. Those evasions you made? I let you. If I wanted to cut you, there wouldn't be a thing you could do to stop me."
She was really beginning to regret not bringing the contanobooster with her. Not that having it would do her any good, but it would feel wonderful to give him a face full of Soren Sokatsui. Ichigo really had rubbed off on her too much.
"How about I give you an example?" Renji offered after a moment, freezing her in stupefaction a second time.
A bright blue arrow that sang through the air was her only saving grace.
-
I am so going to kill her…
Blade met blade.
Ichigo met the redhead's gaze, noting the shihakusho - a shinigami? - before she snorted, shifting her weight, and pushed. He fairly flew off his feet, landing gracelessly some feet away. She heard Rukia's outburst - "Renji!" - and smirked, kicking almost playfully at the downed Ishida.
She couldn't kick him hard; she owed him one, after all. "Idiot. Getting your ass kicked so easily. For being so generally useless, you certainly have balls." He grunted, attempting a nasty glare that only looked comical with his face so messed up.
"Who're you?" the other shinigami demanded. "What division are you in? And what's with that messed up zanpakuto of yours?"
Did that bastard just insult Zangetsu? Very, very stupid bastard.
She caught sight of Rukia palming her face out of the corner of her eyes.
"I ain't in any division, fucktard," Ichigo retorted, hand reaching back to take Zangetsu from her back. The bandage, rather than unfurl to shield her, curled comfortably around her neck.
"That means… you must be the human who stole Rukia's powers." He bared his teeth, suddenly angry. "I'll teach you to screw around in matters you don't belong," he snapped. "Hoeru, Zabimaru!"
With a puff of smoke, the simple katana morphed into a strange, segmented saw-blade. She frowned at it in distaste, batting away his first strike with ease, stepping forward to nail Renji's chin with her fist. He actually raised up in the air from the force, and their blades unlocked, allowing her to slash back across, opening a furrow in his chest.
A light displacement of air, much like a snort of amusement, gave her Zangetsu's point of view on the weakl-
Blur.
-ing.
"Ichigo!"
What's Rukia shouting for?
Then she couldn't breathe, couldn't speak, couldn't see. The last thing she knew what collapsing on top of Renji like a puppet with its strings cut.
-
Uryu stared in shock. First as Kurosaki effortlessly crushed the shinigami who had played with him, and then as she brought down by a single strike; strangely, the small, neat hole from the attack didn't leak much blood.
That's kyushi… the point that disables all use of spiritual power for a time. With her zanpakuto in permanent shikai, Kurosaki was always expending spiritual power, and it was no wonder she was unconscious.
"Brother…" Kuchiki looked in shock as Renji struggled out from under the orange-headed shinigami substitute, begrudgingly resealing his zanpakuto.
"She is merely unconscious, Rukia," said the shinigami captain calmly, as his lieutenant attempted to pick Kurosaki up, only to crash down a second time in a scene that was almost comical. Almost.
They want her alive…?
"Why?" Kuchiki Rukia took the thought from Uryu's mind. "What does the Gotei want Ichigo for?"
The hell butterflies fluttered around, all four of them, he now realized.
Kuchiki Byakuya gave his sister a long, quiet look. Then: "The Gotei do not. Captain Kurotsuchi, however, does."
The look of utter shock and horror that painted Rukia's face white gave Uryu chills.
-
Urahara Kisuke leaned back on the wall, having listened in on the entire affair.
He sighed, adjusted his hat. "Well…" For once he couldn't hold back the words. "Shit."
Isshin was so going to kill him.
KARAKURA ARC - END
Solos, mentioned in the first scene, are Hollows that have yet to begin consuming other Hollows. Depending on whether it's accented, the Spanish translation is "only" or "single." Either would be appropriate.
Getsuga Tsubasa - Ichigirl's variant on getsuga tensho. Yes, I'm aware that if you translate it, it sounds retarded ("moonfang wings"). But it wasn't a random choice.
Hado 21: Tosatsujo (used by Rukia last chapter) and Hado 47: Daishinen (used by her in this one) are of my creation... and if the latter's incantation made you go "wtf?" I must have done better than I thought. Kido incantations are... very vague. Hard to come up with.
It'll probably be a few months before I start posting more, because I need to get most of the SS arc done beforehand if I intend to update on any respectable schedule. See ya then.
