Sorry for the wait! Here's the chapter. It's a little short, because it was longer, and I decided to split it into two chapters, since I haven't started on the next one yet, which will take a while, so I'll post the second half of this later so you don't have to wait so long between chapters.

Anyway, here we have the wheels starting to turn. Hope you enjoy.

Disclaimer/Warnings: (No additions, see first chapter)

Chapter 10: Red Hands

"A diplomat is someone who can tell you to go to hell in such a way that you will look forward to the trip."

The Shinigami never stayed in Las Noche for long, possibly due to the fact that they were Shinigami and therefore had Shinigami duties to attend to. Their visits to Las Noche were sometimes as frequent as a few hours daily, and other times as scarce as an hour in one week. But despite the fact that they never stayed for longer than a day at a time, they had their own quarters built in Las Noche.

Sangre had never been there, as Ichimaru had not introduced her to it during her orientation. Perhaps there was an unspoken rule that Arrancars should not enter the Shinigami's residence—Sangre was not sure. She did try asking her friends, but they weren't sure either. But they—and later, she—knew of its existence, though they did not know where it was located.

Still, it came as a surprise when Ichimaru came looking for her one day, when she was browsing through her plans for the unpainted parts of Las Noche and trying to decide if repainting Ulquiorra's place was worth the risk or not—she knew Jaegerjaquez would be delighted to try, but she also knew that he was sometimes foolishly reckless when it came to certain people when he thought he could get away with it. As the one in-charge of the whole operation, it fell to her to prevent him from doing something like repainting one of Aizen's throne room fluorescent orange, just because the Shinigami was absent.

As it was, Nnoitra was entirely purple when Ichimaru dropped by Las Noche, even though she had overheard them talking about whether it was fine to leave Las Noche for a week without supervision due to some captain duties of theirs.

(The dye she had used on Nnoitra was one that could seep through hierro and would not become visible until it had been fully absorbed into the body and had circulated a few times in their bloodstream, courtesy of Pink Hair and one of his failed experiments that Sangre suspected was supposed to work as a slow-acting poison.)

"Konnichiwa, Kōryū-kun~"

Sangre looked up from her sketch of Ulquiorra's living room, which she supposed she shouldn't be able to produce but considering how much he seemed to be stalking her, it seemed only fair for her to scout him out as well.

"Kitsune-taichō," she greeted him warily. There was something about him today that put her on edge. It could be the fact that his reiatsu felt like snakes that had found a potential meal, something she had not experienced directed at her before.

"Las Noche is lookin' pretty colourful these days," he said, fox-face a perfect grinning mask. "Have ya seen Nnoitra?"

Unwilling to confirm anything, even if it was Ichimaru and not Aizen, Sangre replied dryly, "Have you seen Jaegerjaquez-san's hair? Or Neru-chan's? Or Ulquiorra's face? Or Cirucci's hair and face? How about my hair?"

If this place weren't a delinquent centre full of soul-eaters, Sangre thought with a mental grimace. We could be a circus.

"Your hair is… fiery," Ichimaru said, for the very first time sounding somewhat uncertain. It was as if he still wasn't sure if he needed his eyesight corrected. (Perhaps he did, considering how he squinted all the time).

"Yeah, I didn't like the previous colour, so I just dyed all the greenish parts red and orange," said Sangre. "It washes off after a few days though. Last week, I tried dyeing the golden parts blue, to get turquoise, but it didn't quite work out. You weren't here to see it though."

"Then you should do it again next time when I'm around," said Ichimaru, as if she'd try to dye her hair wrong again.

"Why do we even have such strange hair colour?" said Sangre, grimacing. "Did Aizen-sama colour our hair to make up for the lack of colour in this place?"

Ichimaru chuckled. "It's common knowledge that the souls of individuals with high reiatsu levels tend to manifest certain traits representative of their reiryoku. These traits could be a specific hair length or colour, pupil shape, eye colour or markings on the skin. Some are born with it, others develop them later on due to an… evolution in their spirit, while others only manifest them when certain states of release are activated—that would be Bankai for Shinigami and Resurrección for you."

Sangre stared blankly back at him. "Common knowledge? Why does everyone always assume I know things? Is there a school I missed? Is there such a thing as Primary education for Hollows?"

The Shinigami looked way too amused for her liking. "We have a Shinō Spiritual Arts Academy, but I suppose that's only for those in Soul Society aiming to become Shinigami."

"You suppose?" Sangre was incredulous.

"Well, I believe we have strayed away from the original topic," was all Ichimaru had to say.

"What was the original topic?" She asked cautiously, because friendly discussion aside, his reiatsu was still a little unnerving, like the feeling a cold hand resting on her nape. She could ignore it for the most part, but she wasn't sure if she should.

"My rooms are plain white."

Sangre blinked. "Pardon?"

"That is to say, when do I get the honour of having my place repainted by our very own resident artist?" The Shinigami's face was now way too near for comfort.

She leaned away from him as she held herself back from pointing out that while the colour schemes were all decided by her, the paint job itself was not done by her alone.

"Why are you asking me? I'm not one of the architects of Las Noche," she said. Only previous winding conversations with Ichimaru kept her treating him like Aizen, because as counterintuitive as it seemed, experience told her that she had a higher chance of getting away from Ichimaru alive and sane if she didn't simply submit to him and his words.

"Nnoitra seemed very sure it was you who knocked him out and 'humiliate' him, to use his own word," said Ichimaru serenely. "So Kōryū-kun is the likeliest candidate aside from Lilynette, considering your rank and personality."

Sangre considered the Shinigami and could not help but think that if the white colour of Las Noche suited anyone, it would be him, except perhaps with the addition of silver and a pale colour—mint or periwinkle or lavender?

"What exactly are you expecting from me?" She finally said.

"Wow, I get to choose?" Ichimaru laughed as if he were truly delighted. Perhaps he was. Sangre wasn't sure because his reiatsu still felt like it was either going to hug her or strangle her, and she didn't know which would be worse.

"A mural would be nice," Ichimaru went on to say, seemingly oblivious to the fact that she was slowly inching away. "Paintings on the wall of your choice, of course. I trust your artistic sensibilities, after all."

Sangre jerked backwards in reflex, her back hitting the seat of the bench, and suddenly found herself lying down, with Ichimaru casting a shadow over her, supported by a hand placed directly beside her head. She blinked up owlishly at his grinning face which looked a lot more hellish when shadowed. If she thought she hallucinated laughing writhing snakes behind him, she felt she could be excused this once.

"Surprise me," he said in a soft lilting whisper. Then he was sweeping away as suddenly as he had cornered her, taking away with him that disturbing reiatsu of his.

She tried, she really did, but apparently her self-preservation skills were sometimes as bad as Jaegerjaquez.

"You're welcome, Kitsune-taichō!" Sangre yelled at his retreated back, missing heart still managing to make her feel like it was thundering in her ribcage even though it was not there. Ichimaru merely raised a hand and waved without turning around. She wouldn't be surprised if he were laughing to himself.

"What is wrong with him today?" She muttered to herself and shuddered.

"I would be more concerned about you, Sen-chan," Nelliel said from behind her. Sangre resisted the urge to curse. She had been so focused on that annoying snake, she had failed to notice the other Arrancar approaching.

"What? Why?" Sangre asked with a frown. "Nothing's wrong with me."

Nelliel raised an eyebrow. "If you say so."

She didn't sound convinced.

Sangre never got around painting Ichimaru's room. She spent days agonising over what to paint and procrastinating the job. In the meantime, she would find someone—either Jaegerjaquez, Nelliel or their Fracci óns—to spar with, paint some other parts of Las Noche with her new painting team which now included Pesche and Dondochakka who were only too happy to join in the fun, or bring her hyena companions out on hunting trips, usually in competition with whichever Números was in charge of helping the kitchens that day. (She always managed to get better quarries than them of course, and it seemed like the more she helped the kitchen staff, the more delicious food they served her).

There were even times when she would cross paths with Ichimaru—whose reiatsu did not take on that unnerving quality again—which somehow led to him teaching her how to play chess and card games once he found out that her only current hobby was reading. Sometimes, he would make an innocent comment about her progress in repainting Las Noche, and she would quickly swerve around the topic. The funny thing was, she was pretty sure he knew she was avoiding it, but he let her anyway, as it seemed to amuse him.

But in the end, Sangre did her research and found his quarters, which she realised he failed to introduce her to. It made her wonder how he expected her to paint his rooms when she wasn't even told where it was. The Shinigami residence was a building by itself, with each Shinigami owning two floors each. She did not dare to check out Tōsen's and Aizen's floors, but she visited Ichimaru's.

A few days later, she finally had some idea of what to paint. Snakes, of course, and perhaps oriental dragons and koi. The colour scheme would probably be white, black, vermillion, gold and silver.

She was still debating whether vermillion and gold would suit Ichimaru on the day she did her most daring act, which was to paint one of the bigger meeting rooms.

The original colour of the walls was a dull slate colour that looked absolutely dismal with the lighting of the meeting room, so she decided to liven it up by painting in the colours representing each Espada. First, she divided the room into four, with Jaegerjaquez's Fraccións taking two quarters, since they had five people, and her and Nelliel's Fraccións taking a quarter each. (Jaegerjaquez had been busy the past few days with some errand of Aizen's, no doubt involving one of his recruitment plans) Then, she picked a colour for each Espada—indigo for Starrk, amber for herself, emerald for Nelliel, viridian for Ulquiorra, violet for Cirucci, turquoise for Jaegerjaquez, orange for Gantenbainne, lilac for Nnoitra, plum for Aaroniero, crimson for Yammy.

Halfway through painting elaborate flowers behind Nnoitra's preferred seat, Sangre froze. Two reiatsu had blossomed nearby, faint as a whisper but Sangre knew better than to think it was because they were far away, because of them was cold and bright and slippery, the other burning dark with sharp teeth. If Ichimaru was a snake, Aizen would definitely be a weasel.

"Everyone," said Sangre, grabbing her glaive. "The Shinigami are coming. Artemisia, Apsithia, grab the slowest ones and go."

This was followed by some shrieking as the two hyena Arrancars bit the collars of the Arrancars they deemed to be the slowest and made off with the Arrancars being hauled along like too-big kittens held by the mouth of a mother cat.

Then she stabbed her pole-arm downwards, where its tip touched the floor and stopped, making it look like the glaive was balancing on just one point as time froze.

Half a minute was the longest she could make the technique last so far, and because there was a time delay between the technique's release and its subsequent reactivation which Sangre had yet to be able to shorten, she had four and a half minutes to pack up all the painting equipment before the Shinigami reached the room. All the painting equipment that she had no doubt Aizen would be able to tell who used them based on the residue reiryoku on them, considering how often she had used them in her paint wars with Jaegerjaquez.

What were the chances the Shinigami would enter this particular room?

Sangre thought that between Aizen's ability to sense her reiatsu no matter how much she could hide it from any other Arrancar, and his no doubt observation of the rest of Las Noche—because there was no way he wouldn't have come across at least one repainted room, she was pretty much doomed, even if she did manage to escape in time.

Aizen looked faintly amused in that sadistic you're-dead-even-though-I'm-not-really-angry sort of way. Sangre thought it might be because her entire head and neck was currently a shade of red that was as dark as it was startling. She shifted from one foot to the other, and hid crimson hands behind her back.

It wasn't a new thing, not really. She had been sporting that look ever since she accidentally spilled her new dye all over her head while trying dye Jaegerjaquez's hair which had resulted in a scuffle, and apparently it stained skin as well. Jaegerjaquez now had red stains on his face and hands, but most of it had gotten onto Sangre, whose head and neck were red. So were her hands, as she'd stained them when she was trying to get the dye off.

(The only bright side to it was that it seemed to discourage the other Arrancars from disturbing her. Even Nnoitra seemed to have made himself scarce the past couple of days. And Jaegerjaquez's fraccións were more obedient too.)

Ichimaru stood beside Aizen, a little behind and to his right, like a proper subordinate. He was grinning, as usual, but he didn't seem as amused as Aizen, which was unusual, partially because Sangre had actually expected him to be tickled since he had said before that he wanted a chance to witness the results of a mistake with dye. On the contrary, Sangre noted with some apprehension that his reiatsu seemed restless.

"Aizen-sama," she greeted with a polite smile, hesitating before, "Ichimaru…sama."

Behind Aizen, whose amused smile only widened at her greeting, there was a small abrupt movement and Sangre couldn't decide if she was delighted or troubled by the fact that the Shinigami had actually reacted as if she had just pointed her glaive at him.

"Had a fruitful morning, Sangre?" said Aizen casually, surveying the newly repainted conference room. His voice seemed to echo ominously around the room. "I hadn't realised I'd appointed you as a painter or interior designer."

There was an uncomfortably long pause where Aizen merely smiled at Sangre as if they were having a conversation about the weather. She was sure he was staying silent on purpose. To make her squirm. And squirm she only just barely refrained from doing. Instead, she sneaked glances at Ichimaru who had been silent the whole time and she would have thought he was enjoying the show if not for the fact his reiatsu seemed to be squirming.

"While it's nice to see some initiative, allowing you free reign would send the wrong message wouldn't it," Aizen finally continued. "We can't have every other Arrancar thinking they are allowed to do anything they want in this place, after all. That means you require a punishment."

Sangre froze at that, suddenly feeling like there was a mouth full of sharp teeth at her throat. But she forced a smile on, and gritted out a, "As you see fit, Aizen-sama."

Aizen's smile widened into a smirk. "Good. How about spending some time in the human world? That sounds like a decent punishment for an Arrancar, don't you think? Ah, Gin, do escort her out."

How was it? Feel free to leave a comment or a question, either by review or PM!

Next chapter will be up by the 7th of May!

(Did I have to give her literal red hands? No, but the image in my mind of her with a red head and red hands was funny in that errr-is-that-blood? kind of way.)