A/N: Ok, peeps, a new chapter! Sorry it took so long, but family issues, including several near-deaths…Not much to say here, 'cept I don't own Bleach...dammit...oh, and just so ya know, the more of you read my other fic, Mending Destruction, and review it as well, the faster I churn Taming out...GIMME FANART! Best FANART will be the main pic for TD!
Ch 10
Move It On Over
Grimmjow reclined on his cot in the moonlight. An interesting day, to be sure: he'd sought out his limit, and found it. Not only had he found it, but he realized that, quite possibly, Retsu Unohana was to be feared more than Sosuke Aizen and Old Man Yamamoto combined.
Despite himself, Grimmjow smiled a bit, fangs gleaming in the silver shine. Now that he knew his limit, he could dance on the edge, never crossing the line completely but juuust close enough to annoy the powers-that-be...
The smile faded as the next thought hit him, the thought that dancing too close would bring the woman with berserker eyes down upon him.
Grimmjow shivered, not for the first time wishing that he had Pantera in his hands. But Pantera wasn't there; his beloved sword, the storehouse of his true power, was in the short dyke's office...
He grunted. "Well, shit..."
Ah, well...didn't matter in the end. Sooner or later, the bastard Soul Reapers would do one of four things: Execute him, turn him over to the nutcase they kept threatening him with, end up trusting him enough to let him have his freedom, or just plain releasing him.
The last two were the most desirable outcomes, and the final being what he wanted most...but both of those would take work...
Grimmjow groaned a bit inside.
He hated work.
Went against the catlike nature of his Hollow side.
As he snuggled down into the thin mattress of his cot, the Sexta Espada considered the facts he knew, of which there were few, and his options, of which there were surprisingly many.
Fact: He was a prisoner/project of his natural enemies, the Soul Reapers.
Options: Annoying them into Execution, into Torturing him, allowing him to Defect to their side, or just plain Releasing him.
Fact: There were other Arrancar besides himself still alive. Some of them had aligned themselves with the Soul Society already, but more than likely there were other groups out there who hadn't.
Options: If he could find some way to contact those factions unwilling to join the Shinigami, then he could perhaps convince them to help him escape somehow. He could then beat the shit out of their leader, take over, and systematically begin absorbing smaller groups of Arrancar and lesser Hollows until he had an army that even the Captains of the Gotei would think twice about poking in the eye.
Fact: He was severely weakened by an infernal device around his neck that drained his reiatsu into a shadow of its normal level and rendered him incapable of opening a Garganta. His "caretaker" was easily able to overpower him, but Grimmjow scared the piss out of her.
Options: ...he had surprisingly few regarding this one. Before today's little "incident" with her Captain, Grimmjow had all sorts of plans to make her life miserable...if she hadn't submitted into letting someone else take the reins first.
But then Unohana had put an end to that, what with turning out to be almost as batshit crazy as Nnoitra had been.
It wasn't that Grimmjow was afraid of the late Fifth Espada–Gilga had made him extraordinarily cautious, was all. Nnoitra had been an unhinged individual, liable to swing out at anyone without any warning or provocation, and his thick-as-hell hierro made it almost impossible to counter-attack. Even Starrk had trouble with Nnoitra's natural armor.
'Speaking of hierro...' Grimmjow rubbed his black eye. This goddamn collar was proving to be a major pain in his ass. It hadn't been until today, what with Stretch's suckerpunch and all, that he realized it affected his defense and natural healing against such attacks.
Troublesome.
Grimmjow folded his arms behind his head and dangled one leg over his knee, staring upward in thought. Somehow he knew if he bothered to try it, his other abilities, such as Bala and Cero, would be nullified as well.
Another thing that the Urahara wackjob forgot to mention.
Jackass.
So that left Grimmjow at an even greater disadvantage, it did.
And now, to top it off, he wasn't even going to get his evenings alone anymore! Now the Panther Lord would have to put up with some little chit of a girl, mousy and annoying as hell!
He couldn't even make his situation the least bit fun since "Mommy Unohana" was going to be watching!
"Shit..." Grimmjow's growl echoed around the small cell, which made him reflect on one bright spot. At least he might have enough room in his new digs that he wouldn't be able to cross the floor in two-and-one-half strides.
That would be nice. It wouldn't be his palace back in Hueco Mundo, but it would be nice, at least.
He sighed through his nose, mollified a bit. More space would let him think a bit clearer, let him breathe a bit, let him plan his escape.
Getting up, the lone Arrancar made his way to the small pile of belongings that were given him by Division Four. Mostly personal hygiene stuff: a coarse loofah for the evening shower he was usually allowed, a toothbrush and toothpaste, some floss as well. That, added onto his thin blanket and under-stuffed pillow, was the extent of his property in the cell.
Grimmjow absentmindedly surveyed this meager pile, thoughts elsewhere. Soul Society was turning out to be a hazardous place for an Arrancar, more than he had thought originally. One old man capable of wiping a small city off the map with his shikai alone (or so Aizen had claimed; for some reason, the word Pompeii kept knocking around in Grimmjow's head when he thought about this), one blood-crazed woman masquerading as a healer, and assorted other nutjobs and weirdos in the immediate surrounding area, all of them at least semi-hostile to him, merely for being what he was.
Grimmjow Jaegerjaquez was entirely cognizant of the fact that he could allow himself to feel incredibly bitter about this, but that would have been hypocritical.
After all, he hated Soul Reapers for being Soul Reapers.
In his musing, it occurred to him that the key to his release, or at least getting the collar off and Pantera back in his mitts was his guardian, whatshername...
Isane. Isane Kotetsu. The girl who said she just wanted to help him.
A snarl erupted from his throat, and Grimmjow spat to the side. Like he fucking wanted her to help–
A thought struck him as his blue eyes watched the large glob of snot and saliva slime its way down the wall.
The collar was tuned to her voice; he had plenty of evidence of that, what with her telling him to come and go, start and stop plenty of times over his incarceration.
Only she could do that...only she could give him orders...and only she could...
"She can take this piece of shit off..." His whisper barely registered to his own ears. Slowly, lost in his own head, the imprisoned Panther Lord went to his barred window and looked at the full moon outside.
The moon in Hueco Mundo was not like this–back in his home, it was always a crescent, never full, a grim reflection of what drove a Hollow to devour souls.
Grimmjow Jaegerjaquez's mind did not think about this, however. Instead, it was busy ruminating upon this revelation it had stumbled upon...
And how he could use it to his advantage.
Once again, fangs gleamed silver in the moonlight.
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Genryuusai Shigekuni Yamamoto was walking this evening.
This was not an unseen occurrence. Many people walked; it was a very common way to get somewhere. Some ran, some jogged, some walked.
Yamamoto walked. Rarely was it any other way; when one reached his age and stature, they took their time. Only Retsu Unohana walked as much as he did.
However, by the same token, one must consider; if Captain-Commander Yamamoto wanted something, usually it was brought to him.
What could be important enough that he walked to it?
Perhaps seeing would be easier than describing it, dear reader.
Yamamoto walked out of the final border of Division One and into Division Two territory unmolested.
This is not typical behavior for the Sui-Feng's boys. If you didn't have an appointment, you didn't go onto their turf except through the main gate. The first time this happened, one would typically get a very polite, if vaguely threatening, warning, and be briskly escorted off to the border.
Nobody had ever returned from a second uninvited excursion to say what happened then.
However, Yamamoto was (obviously) a special case, so he went through without a contrary word.
Unwatched? No.
Unbothered? Yes.
Deeper went he into the wood of Division Two. These trees served three purposes; they provided aesthetic appeal, were an excellent training ground...
And they gave a somewhat less-disquieting facade to the entrance of the prison known as Maggot's Nest.
Only one person ever accompanied him to the place Yamamoto was traveling to, and that was the Captain of Squad Two themselves. No, not his most trusted subordinate, Chojiro Sasakibe, nor his closest friend, Retsu Unohana. Not even his favorite students, Jushiro Ukitake and Shunsui Kyoraku.
This was intensely personal for him, and he only trusted a professional to follow his wishes in this matter.
One didn't get more professional than a Shihoin, or, for that matter, a Feng.
Speak of the Devil...prompt as usual, Sui-Feng stood next to the bulkhead door that comprised the first line of security of this prison. She snapped to attention and gave her clan's customary greeting, placing the knuckles of her right fist to her flat left palm and bowing slightly at the waist.
The Old Man returned the greeting with a perfunctory inclination of his head. "Warden Feng," he grunted, using her ancestral title.
"Great-General Firesword," she said quietly as she straightened, using the title the Spirit King had bestowed upon the ancient for his role in the Great Clan Wars millennia before.
Wordlessly, they both turned to the door. Stepping forward, the diminutive woman made several hand seals whilst channeling reiatsu through her fingers, and then touched the handle-less door directly in the center.
The door, embedded in the cliff face the facility was housed under, noiselessly swung open on oiled hinges...
And a cacophony of noise surged out.
Hundreds of voices mumbled and muttered, sobbed and cried, screamed and shrieked as the man and woman began to make their way on the steps of stone that led down into what several outside (and, indeed, inside) Division Two called "the Third Step from Hell", the place where those who posed a threat to the security of the afterlife, guilty of such an act or not, were imprisoned.
Men, women, children, human, intelligent nonhuman...regardless of age, race, or creed...
Those sealed in here were doomed forevermore, to a slow death from insanity, or a quick one by suicide. No one knew what made the prisoners here insane. While it was true that the cliff above them was made of seki-seki, thus draining those who were without proper protection (such as a Captain's cloak, or certain insignia like a Lieutenant's badge), it was only here that it had the maddening effect exhibited by the poor souls trapped in the prison's confines. Only one man had ever been released from here, and it was often a point of hot debate on whether or not the Mayuri Kurotsuchi that had come out was mentally the same Mayuri Kurotsuchi that had gone in.
Down through the first level, shouldering through the mass of sobbing indigents that looked into their faces without seeing, whispering secrets only the bearers understood, unwashed bodies wrinkling the Captains' noses.
Sui-Feng and Yamamoto did not respond to any semi-lucid pleas for help, for food, a little clean water, help to set a broken arm. Indeed, they said nothing, merely shaking off weak hands that futilely grasped at the edges of their robes, ignoring bitter tears of anguish, harsh oaths of revenge for this unlawful, unfair imprisonment, panicked protests of being innocent, because they didn't mean what they said, they didn't mean to kill Fourth Seat Akamura, couldn't the Central Forty-Six understand progress?
Another stairwell. Another level, this one less full of incarcerated than the last, but still full of those who wished to plead their case before the uncaring enforcers of the law.
Another flight. Another floor. And again.
And again.
And again.
This repeated several more times, each level of Maggot's Nest growing more and more sparsely populated, eventually reaching the point where the only incarcerated present were those whose minds were too far gone to beg for help, who had, in the prison of their own minds, had become free of the shackles of what was left of sanity, and inhabited worlds of their own, crouching in corners, hugging the ragged scraps of their clothing to themselves, muttering and shaking, oblivious to the goings-on around them.
And still Sui-Feng and Yamamoto went down.
Finally, after nearly an hour of downward travel, they stopped in front of a large, oaken door.
This level was where the cells were, such as the one where the aforementioned Captain Kurotsuchi had been imprisoned. Such was the common belief that he had been the only "member" of the Maggot's Nest to have been locked up, actually having been caught vivisecting several of his fellow inmates to, in his own words, "see what made them tick."
This is not true. He is not the only one, nor is he the first.
The first, and only other, resided behind this door. It had no handle, like every other door in this gods-forsaken place, and nothing to denote who was behind it...save for one word, crudely hacked into the wood, as if with a sharp stone.
Butcher.
The Old Man and his silent companion stood in front of the door, and he frowned at the inscription. It had been there since the first day the cell's inhabitant had occupied it, almost a thousand years ago, scratched there by some other inmate with knowledge of their fellow's crime. Since then, several kido charms and other, more subtle and secret magicks had rendered the barrier impervious to such weak attempts at vandalism.
An eye slid open beneath a hoary brow and slid over to the young woman next to him, who met it with a frank gaze.
"Open it."
Immediately, the slender, small hands of the assassin went through more seals, reiatsu was harnessed, and again the exact center of the door was touched.
This time, the door opened with groan as the hinges grated upon each other.
Once again, the eye pinned the diminutive woman, this time in reproach.
She made a point not to return it.
They both stepped in, the Warden behind the Great-General, who stood some small distance in front of the sole occupant.
In the center of the room were two objects stuck in the ground. The largest and most obvious was huge pillar, against which the cell's sole occupant was seated. Four chains, links thick around as a man's index and middle finger together, were attached to even thicker brackets embedded in the wall. The other ends were connected to manacles around wrists stretched out behind the prisoner, far more than was comfortable.
The man (for that was what he was) sat on his legs, knees spread apart, back to the large seki-seki column embedded in the floor. His head was free, chin to his chest, raggedly-cut chin length indigo hair, broken by a single white streak over the left eye, bound only by the black leather blindfold around his face, which did nothing to hide the enormous scar stretching from under the discolored hair and down under the mask. The only clothing he wore was his hakama, the baggy black pants of the Soul Reaper shihakushou. The exposed torso was thin, muscular, covered in scars.
The prisoner, what with his body braced against the pillar and arms agonizingly stretched behind him, could not move from his position of painful, kneeling humility, and his blindfold prevented him from seeing his visitors or surroundings. The seki-seki pillar was there to continually drain his strength and weaken him, but not enough to kill him.
As for its maddening effect?
Well, it could have no further impact upon the Butcher of Squad Three, the man once known as the greatest of Yamamoto's three students.
For some time, the Captain-Commander merely stood there, observing his former protégé. Sui-Feng quietly watched from her place by the door; this particular inmate made her nervous, bound and weakened or not.
If the man on the pillar notices the presence of his old master and his jailer, he made no sign of it. His head remained bowed, and the only movement came from the slow, steady rise and fall of his chest.
"Sui-Feng," rumbled the ancient warrior. "Has there been any change?"
The Warden of the Maggot's Nest shook her head needlessly. "No, sir. Our sensors haven't picked up any change for the last seventy-five years. He hasn't spoken a word at all in that time, not even when Omaeda comes to clean and feed him."
A nod from a bald head. "I see." Silence fell again. "He is eating well?"
A bit of a sneer colored the young Captain's words as she answered. "Every bite, apparently. Omaeda whines about having to feed him each time he comes back from it."
Another nod. Yamamoto stood there silently once again, slitted gaze upon the disgraced Shinigami.
"Sir." He turned his head at the words from his subordinate. "Why does he warrant special treatment?"
"Because," the old man said quietly, "it is both my will...and that of the Central Forty-Six."
Sui-Feng shook her head. "But...but sir, that's completely unfair! If we treat one of them," and she jerked her head angrily at the bound man, "with this sort of consideration, we would have to treat all of them the same way! Do you know the sort of trouble that will be to facilitate? If people know we are giving the likes of the Butcher–"
Yamamoto turned completely around at these words, and Sui-Feng promptly shut her mouth at the look on his face.
"Do not," said the Old Man, deathly calm in his voice, "call him that. Am I understood, Shaolin Feng?"
The Captain swallowed hard, not meeting his gaze. "I...I beg your pardon, sir. Forgive me."
The Captain-Commander turned back around, not bothering to respond. He looked once more at his old apprentice, then Yamamoto stepped closer to him and placed a hand on the ill-cut head, bowing his own.
A great weight seemed to descend on the old shoulders, and a few seconds passed.
Then, in a sweep of his robes, Captain-Commander Genryuusai Shigekuni Yamamoto, Great-General of the Spirit King, began walking away…only to pause at the other object embedded in the floor
A sword, a Zanpakuto to be exact, hilt in the air and point buried in the stone.
The Great-General glared at it balefully for a moment.
The sword, inanimate though it was, seemed to do the same.
Grunting in an unnamable fashion, the oldest Soul Reaper in existence stalked out of the room. A slightly off-guard Sui-Feng quick-stepped after him, and the door slammed shut as they both made their way back to the surface of the world of the Afterlife.
At the squeal of the hinges, a faint, feminine voice could be heard meekly assuring Yamamoto that they would "get someone to oil the door".
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The noise echoed around the large cell, assaulting the ears of its sole inmate. Still, the man known as the Butcher did not move.
Instead, he strained those same ears, listening.
So many noises to distract...shuffling? No, not what he wanted to hear...
A stumble...no, no that, either...
Running? Possibly...
Ah, there it was...even, measured steps, heavy with age, broken by the tap of a wooden cane...try as he might, the man known as the Butcher of Squad Three had difficulty hearing the light, near nonexistent steps of the Captain of Division Two.
For the better part of an hour, he ignored all other sounds, the screams of his fellow madmen, the thudding of his own heart, focusing solely upon those ancient steps of a man that had once been held dear...and then...
The clunk of a closing door.
The prisoner did not do anything unexpected, dear reader. There was no sudden slackening of the chains. No dramatic shedding of bonds, accompanied by a deep breath of relaxation. No hidden door opening, followed by a secret escape.
None of these things. Instead, thoughts passed.
'I wonder if he noticed the drop in his spiritual pressure.' The thinker looked deep inside of its own mind. 'I don't think so...do you?' A cold, reptilian gaze regarded the battered, beaten psyche locked deep in an unreachable mental cage.
It did not expect an answer.
None was given.
Outwardly, bound to a defective, malfunctioning pillar of reiatsu-draining stone, the creature in Shinigami guise smiled a grim, evil smile.
One of its fists tightened around the small, glowing, cross-shaped object it clutched.
Just a little more patience...
And he could finally get the next phase of The Plan underway.
And he would be free...
A/N: Uh-oh…who's this guy? And what is Grimmy planning? AND WHERE IS MY FANART?!