I just wanted to clear things up about the Neogene-Arrancar's uniforms and mask before I returned to the situation in Hueco Mundo. I personally like to be able to visualise the characters in any story so to help you out I've done it for you here:
Espada no.1 Coyote Starrk: Same as anime of course
Espada no.2 Reina Soho: Basically the same dress she wears in the anime except it's white not red; her mask covers the nape of her neck at the back; that also where her number is.
Espada no.3 Nora: Same long dress in anime (but now white) but no vest underneath, instead a black breastplate; her mask drapes over the right side of her face and has a slight jawline; her number is just hidden on her navel where her flesh is exposed.
Espada no.4 Ulqiuorra Schiffer: Same as anime
Espada no.6 Shiori Tsuzuki: Wears a thin white tunic which has no straps and a very short skirt; her mask comprises of three overlapping diamond shapes which cover her forehead and rise to a spike on top of her head; her number is located on her right ass-cheek.
Espada no.7 Aoi: Similar desigend uniform to the one she wears in the anime only longer boots; mask outlines her face (think of it like an amatuer boxing helmet only the front bit); her number is located inbetween her cleavage.
Espada no.8 Szayel Aporro Grantz: Yep same.
Espada no.9 Maria: Her uniform is like the one she wears after she matures (long smart dress etc.); her mask covers the top half of her face and resembles two drooping horns which bend forwards then curve right at the tip making two points strike froward and a halo like extension on top; her number is on her face on the right cheek.
Esapda no. ? Asagi: White singlet with black straps and black diamond pattern on the bottom as well as long pants set low so her belly and some of her crack revealed (much like her appearance in the anime yes!) she also has several bangles on both her arms; mask comes down from her forehead and covers the bridge of her nose; I haven't disclosed her rank nor where her number is but maybe you can guess what rank she will be.
But WAIT! I have only mentioned nine Espada. There's one more that need to be revealed some time.
Okay so now you all know what they look like and stuff, lets get on with the story!!!
7. Inevitable doom
TOKYO
HIGOUCHI:
"Kyah...Hah! Grrrahh!" I bellow from my chest as I take down a large hollow. For me it was tough but I catch Masane meanwhile facing another large hollow. She calls out Rihoko and she leapt in a vertical arc. When she drops again the hollow literally splits in two.
She makes fighting hollows look elementary now.
"Well done Masane. That's ten hollows in one day. We're way ahead of schedule."
She retracts her wrist-blade as it materializes back into a katana. "Yeah, it is great but..."
"But what?"
"Well my 'Shikai' seems a lot like my Witchblade the only difference is my whole body doesn't transform."
"So?" I say with angst.
"I remember all the bad things that came about through this thing and I don't want to relive that nightmare."
"But it helps us fight hollow. How can you deny your own power?" But she has already started walking away from me. "What about Rihoko then?" Just as I utter the name she comes to a grinding halt and about-faces. Her face shows no emotion. She simply stands idle for a moment like a zombie.
Maybe I went too far with the 'Rihoko' reference.
Just as I blink my eyes she has reappears in front of me her sword coming down in frenzy. Somehow I manage to unsheathe my sword and block the downward strike.
"I won't let anything happen to her." She vows in a voice much deeper and warrior-like in tone than usual. Her face looks nothing like before. Markings side her face and black-yellow eyes. Her hair seems to go from a chocolate brown to a fiery red. I concede my strength as I fall to the ground. I nearly thought she was going to deliver the fatal blow whilst in her trance but she moans then her body returns to normal.
"Masane! Are you alright?"
Disgusted at herself and what she had done she jumped away from me and bounced off the buildings as she left.
"Wait! MASANE!!!"
I was shattered. I was the one who saved her life. I was the one who gave her Shinigami powers. I was the one who helped her during her first week on the job.
And this is what she does in return, to ditch me like this?
An image flashes into my mind of her hollow state.
NO! I can't let her do this! I have to save her...and Rihoko
*****
MASANE:
Something strange happened to me back there. I need to escape from this life. It isn't real. All of this must be an eternal dream I've become trapped in and only by reuniting with Rihoko can I free myself from this dream.
As I leap across the building I hear the clanking noise from my feet. They are metallic and pointed like a boot.
This is my old power. Fighting back to reclaim my soul.
I collapse to a thud when a throbbing pain stabs me in the wrist then enters my whole body. I break through the roof and cough as the debris falls over me. I must have fallen at least five metres but my new Shinigami body isn't as affected by such trauma. Moreover, this throbbing pain is more urgent.
"Ahh-Ugh-Grrh." I unsheathe my sword ready to end the pain even if it means...
But as I bring down my sword the rope like tentacles grip my oncoming blade. So it knows if I cut of my arm it will die.
I must up all my strength as I wrestle against my own power. Veins popping in my arms as my muscles swell in lactic acid.
"I...MUST...END...THIS...NOW!!!"
The tentacle's grip slips as my blade hammers down. My arm cleanly slices away like it was made of butter. I stare at the stump that was my arm and almost burst out in a maddened laugh but instead I shiver enters my spine and it's enough to make me collapse in my own pool of blood. At least now I now when I wake up the blade will truly be gone.
*****
HIGOUCHI:
"What was that?" I say to myself as I feel a massive drop in reatsu nearby. I dart over towards a seemingly destroyed warehouse. I was utterly appalled at what I saw inside. A naked woman with pure white hair, curled up on the ground with blood pooling and oozing from her.
As I step closer I see the separated limb with the bracelet on it.
"Oh Masane..." I sigh as I gather her destroyed body. She seems similar to the state she was in when I first met her. Whatever this 'Witchblade' thing is. It seems to have the power to not only enhance its hosts to near unstoppable strength, but inevitably doom them to destruction and despair.
Her breath is also cold on my exposed sternum. It feels like a blizzard wind.
I decide I will return her to Seretei. She doesn't deserve this. She deserves peace in her afterlife.
I kiss her wet forehead as I open a Senkai, returning us home.
*****
SERETEI – INFIRMARY
ANOTHER MAD SCIENTIST NAMED MAYURI:
These days I don't receive any new or exciting specimens. After we fought the Arrancars over a hundred years ago I did some groundbreaking research on one of them. But after that nothing else has come in out of the ordinary.
"Mayuri-sama." I hear a soft voice from behind.
"Retsu Unohana, and how might you be?" I claw my fingers in delight.
"The patients tell me they feel uncomfortable with you around." She gives me a pathetically tacky smile. "If you could please remove yourself from this area that would be great."
"I'm bored. So I came here to inspect the injured."
A sinister reatsu engulf me as she speaks in her kind tone. "Please leave Mayuri-sama."
"Tch fine. Let's go Nemu." my loyal daughter hops to my side as we leave the infirmary.
As we depart some incompetent lower grade Shinigami bumps into me. I would have cleaved him n two if not for the strange woman he had in his grasp. He looked at me with a look as if I was the last person he wanted to come across.
I tilt my head jerking and offer my hand. "Tck-Tck-Tck. Well what have we here?"
*****
SERETEI - BUREAU OF RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT FACILITY
HIGOUCHI:
Just my luck. We ended up crossing straight into the one man in soul Society I just plain don't like: Mayuri Kurotsuchi. If there was a person to represent the embodiment of everything that is evil, it would be him. I have heard stories of him using live subjects to analyse their pain thresholds and testing their powers under certain conditions. He has used, abused, dissected and bisected an array of species including hollows, Arrancar, Bounts, Quincy, and even Shinigami. Now that he had Masane what kind of crude experiments would he perform on her?
Nemu whilst in her robotic trance had stitched up Masane's self inflicted wound. Mayuri now had her lay on a cold steel table with only one source of light in the otherwise pitch black room. Of course the way did things, she would remain naked and with no anaesthesia. But rather than cut her open, he just paced around her, peering at her various body parts and humming with interest.
"What is it Captain Kurotsuchi?" I weakly spat out.
"You have certainly satisfied my hunger for a new specimen. She is no one I have ever come across before." He looks at me with his dead eyes. "You say you gave her the power of the Shinigami?"
"That is right." I sternly reply.
"Yet her reatsu is not Shinigami, in fact it is more of a conglomerate of Shinigami, hollow and something else I haven't analysed for quite some time."
"Well in the real world she was the latest carrier of the Witchblade."
Mayuri tripped back, aghast to what I revealed. One of his cone ears fell out as he got back up. "Good God! She was THE wielder of THE Witchblade?"
"Uh yes."
"Do you have any idea who you're dealing with here?" He stammers as he stabs his long fingernail towards me.
I admittedly shake my head.
"The Witchblade is a unique power, unlike that of the Shinigami. The only famous wielder I can remember was Joan of Arc. The blade is passed on generation to the next, so only one person at a time on Earth has the blade in their grasp." He looks over to her idle body and continues. "The Witchblade can be said to be somewhat of a symbiotic parasite that initially provides benefit to its host by enhancing their speed, strength and stamina – effectively making them superhuman." He seems to sigh for a brief moment as if he actually has empathy for Masane. "Unfortunately the reality is the Witchblade feeds off of their host, emitting more and more power until one day the host's body crystallises and perishes."
"And then they enter Soul Society right?"
Mayuri walks over to me so he's talking right in my face. "Anyone who wields the Witchblade has their body and soul decayed by the parasite; they can not become a konpaku, or even a hollow. They simply die and transmit the blade to the next host, often the eldest daughter or someone they share a significant bond with." Then he points his bony finger at Masane. "This should be real. She should not exist here right now. The blade should have left her body and passed on to the next host, why has she carried the power on with her?"
I decide to show him the lopped arm. "She cut off her arm when I arrived. So maybe she has lost the power.
He sees the bracelet that contains the source of power. "This is even more intriguing. She should have either died from expelling the blade or at least return to a normal status, but she is continually emitting the reatsu of a Witchblade wielder – only at a higher potency." He adjusts his cone ears in thought. "Perhaps she has unlocked her full power by doing so."
"But the blade is gone, how is that possible." I say confused.
"Perhaps it is similar to the Final Form the Quincies obtain by snapping their glove. It gives them for a short period of time the full power of a Quincy, but once over they lose all Quincy powers." Remembering Mayuri dismember hundreds of Quincies is perhaps why he knew so much about them. "So maybe she will eventually lose her power after a while."
"Is she going to be okay?"
"Well if she has both Shinigami and full Witchblade powers I'd rather not see her okay. I suggest for our safety we amputate her limbs and place her in a chamber for a brief period until she winds down."
I couldn't believe what he just suggested (or maybe I could). "No way, you can't do that to Masane, it's not her fault. She never asked for this power." I walk over to her resting body and grab her hand. "Besides, she's not a monster, she's still human."
"We should at least restrain her until we see how she wakes." Mayuri tried to compromise.
"She will be freaking out when she wakes up in such a place. She should rest at the fourth squad infirmary."
"Fine." Mayuri sighs, the sadistic man disappointed he would not be able to perform any future experiments on her. "But make sure she is supervised by a captain class officer, she did not arrive here as a normal human. Her powers are unpredictable."
"Of course.' I say, just happy to see her away from this man.
As I carry her back to the infirmary I smile at her new appearance. She looks peaceful with such white hair and pale skin. Her breaths are still icy cold, but I know that the Masane I got to work with, for what was the most thrilling week of my life as a Shinigami, is still in there. One day I hope to tell her how I really feel about her.
I kiss her forehead one more time before I leave her in the care of the much more trusted fourth squad.
Next chapter will return to the crisis at Las Noches. So you'll have to be patient while I compose the next Chapter.
