AN: Argh, I know it's been a long, long time guys, and I'm sorry! ): Life has gotten really busy, and on top of that, I had trouble writing this chapter... but hey, I brought you an update now! And it's pretty long too! XD Hope you enjoy it! Please leave me a review with what you think!

Orihime wakes up to bright, dazzling sunlight- and despite the fact that she immediately knows that it's a dream, and the warm feeling caressing her skin is not really warmth, or the blindness she feels from the sun in her eyes is not really blindness, it cannot cover up the immediate happiness Orihime feels at the sound of an all-too-familiar voice.

"Orihime."

She sits up- because apparently she had been laying down- jarringly, twisting around with her eyes wide, and faintly dull with shock.

Her brother stands in front of her, looking much as he used to- brown trousers with a cream colored tunic, tall, handsome, and an aura of kindness beyond measure surrounding and taking over his presence.

"B-big brother…" She whispers involuntarily, eyes suddenly filling with tears. "Big brother…"

As if jumping from one moment in life to the next, she finds herself held in a warm embrace, with her arms wrapped tightly around her older brother's waist. Even if she can't remember or didn't see it, she knows that she jumped into his arms.

"I miss you! I miss you! ImissyouImissyou!" She sobs out violently, burying her face into his chest. "Why did you leave me?! Why, why?!"

He gently rests his hand on the top of her head, stroking her hair gently, in a comforting manner, eyes faintly sad.

"Orihime, you need to wake up."

Faintly hurt that her brother didn't acknowledge her question, she pulls away- or at least she knows she did- as she now stands around two feet away from him, suddenly cold, tears unexpectedly stopped.

"W-what?"

"You need to wake up." He repeats again, voice faintly stern, though still velvety with gentleness and care.

She stands in silence for a moment, sharing a steady gaze with her brother, who stands still, while she racks her brain to try and figure out what to say.

"I don't want to." She finally replies.

"Why?" He asks quickly, with sudden concern.

She turns around, the moment ending and flashing to another, the sunlight now gone, moonlight caressing the ground in its stead.

"Because you aren't there. Because he's not there. Because nobody… nobody is there." She replies, looking down at the ground for a moment, and then off into the far horizon where nothing is, though she feels that somehow Ulquiorra is waiting there, in his castle.

"You can go to him."

"But I left… I don't know how to get back. He-he's too far away!" She half-way screams with sudden emotion, turning around to look at her brother, though he has disappeared. She starts, confused, spinning around wildly, trying to find him. "Big brother? Big brother?!"

"Orihime, you need to wake up, or he always will be… you found him once, didn't you?"

Her eyebrows furrow together in confusion, and suddenly she's sitting down- the world around her crumbling, crashing and slamming together.

"Wake up, 'Hime. Wake up."

As the last of his voice fades away into darkness, she does as well.

Gasping for breath, chest heaving, Orihime roughly sits up in bed, clutching the blankets around her in her fists, tears streaming down her cheeks.

"Grimmjow-"

She stops, caught off-guard with the overwhelming sense that something is terribly wrong washing over her. She glances around the empty house, her eyes already adjusted to the darkness, immediately noting the absence of anything related to Grimmjow in the room. Heart pounding, she immediately understands where he's gone off to.

"Thank you, Sora." She whispers under her breath.

Within moments, she's running out into the woods.

Grimmjow stands at the entrance to the bridge connecting the castle to the forest, eyes narrowed, bow drawn. He's already decided that the first person that gets in his way is going to die, and if that means a second, or a third following, he has no qualms against it. The sound of a thin branch snapping in the thick hedges close to the castle door sends an arrow flying, though it ends up bouncing off the cool stone of the castle wall, into the piles of snow below. Grimmjow immediately pulls the hood of his cloak off, growling, notching another arrow.

"It really is you." A quiet female voice whispers in awe. "You're alive."

"Show yourself!"

Loly steps out from behind the hedge, Menoly following close behind, cloaked themselves. He immediately drops his guard, though it quickly comes back up when he sees the bone surrounding the empty sockets of their cursed eyes'.

"What the hell-"

"Oh calm down, Grimmjow. You've seen Ulquiorra, surely you expected something like this." Loly murmurs sarcastically. "Really, shouldn't we be the ones worried? For all we know, you could be a ghost, especially since you've been long thought dead around here…"

She smirks insanely, magenta eye glinting with vice. A few snowflakes begin to fall from the sky.

"It doesn't matter though. All you need to know, is we've come to help you take back what's yours."

Grimmjow scowls.

"And who said I need any help?"

Both Loly and Menoly chuckle faintly.

"You'll need someone to help you get through the army waiting inside those doors."

Orihime crashes through the trees, holding her cloak tightly around her to shield herself from the cold in the air and the falling flurry. She hadn't expected it to start snowing again- and it only seems to be getting worse as she heads deeper into the forest. She doesn't attempt to hide the noise she's making, remembering over and over what her brother said in her dream.

"….you found him once, didn't you?"

She still remembers, clear as day, the night she found Ulquiorra's castle- and how she had happened upon it. The wolves had chased her there.

"Common… common…" She thinks heatedly, slamming her hands against the trunks of every tree she passes. "Find me."

She yells a few times, her breathing slowly becoming very labored and tired. She can't run much more, and at this rate, she feels more likely to freeze in the storm brewing around her than find the castle.

A strange sound to her left causes her to stop, and before she can even register what she heard she sees the outline of fur.

A large wolf, bigger than any of the ones she's seen before, steps out from the thick brush of the forest, it's fur white as snow, eyes red as blood. Orihime takes a step back, though it only steps toward her quickly, staring her straight in the eyes. She freezes for a moment, then understands what it's trying to tell her.

"I'll follow you." She whispers, halfway in a trance.

And so she does.

Grimmjow stands at the top of the entry-way stairs, unaffected by the sound of war behind him. Both Loly and Menoly were a lot stronger than he thought- and the number of followers they have are much more than he would've expected as well, the population of the castle being about split in half against each other.

An ethereal glow begins to surround the blue-haired man- tinged pink, and filled with energy. They had warned him this could happen, and of course, he had expected it would- and when the transformation is over, he fits in quite well with the other cursed, though it's obvious he's more akin to Ulquiorra. He glances down at his black clawed hand, carefully closing and opening his fingers, a very serious look on his face.

"Not bad." He eventually says, smirking, tail flicking dangerously, canine teeth shining and sharp as a blade. His whole body is wired with strength, he can feel it pouring through his veins… and now he's excited. It's been a while since he's had a good fight, especially with new toys. Screw his real weapons- he won't need them.

"Grimmjow, stop!" Nelliel screams behind him, from somewhere in the mess of the fight. He doesn't glance back, but he knows she's fighting with someone, his hearing far advancing what it had been before, his now-long ears much more adept to far off sound than his human ones.

"Don't worry, he won't feel much." He calls to her absently.

With no hesitance, he steps deeper into the castle.

Nelliel panics as she sees him traveling farther away from her, and she pushes off the person attempting to stab her, (not much of a killer), turning to try and run after him, though Loly immediately steps into her line of vision.

"You know, for such a nice girl you really piss me the hell off." Loly growls, lunging at her, blade poised for her heart. Nelliel immediately dodges, though the blade slices her arm, and she hisses in pain as the burning sensation from the slice is overshadowed by something far worse traveling down her arm through her bloodstream. She can literally see it traveling through her veins- nasty stuff, black as night.

"Do you like it?" Loly murmurs, grinning. "It's a little something I came up with, just for you and your friends. I was gonna use it on Nnoitra first, but, Ulquiorra took care of that job for me."

Nelliel glares at her, glancing over her shoulder to see that the now-cursed Grimmjow has already disappeared.

"Don't worry about him sweet-heart, he's already gone. Didn't he look much more like a king in his cursed form than Ulquiorra? So much… stronger- not so much a whiny-prince kind of look, is it?" She chuckles darkly.

Nelliel grits her teeth and turns away, heading for the stairs, tired of listening to the magenta-eyed servant, too worried about Ulquiorra and the rose to care.

"Oh no you don't!" Loly screeches, running at her.

"Nel!" Starrk screams from somewhere in the crowd, hidden in the mass of armed men and women.

Nelliel turns just in time to realize that it's too late- though, really, it isn't.

Loly's hand suddenly separates from the rest of her arm, and seconds later she goes flying, her hand landing where she once stood, the knife still clutched tightly in its fingers. She slams into the opposite wall, cracking it in multiple places.

"You were really gonna let that weak bitch hurt you?" Nnoitra murmurs sarcastically, stepping out of the crowd, scythe in hand. "Leave it to a woman to be stupid enough to turn her back on a poisoned blade."

He smirks faintly, and Nelliel's eyes widen with happiness, though the immediate joy is overshadowed by the memory of Grimmjow heading up the stairs. She glances back at the stairway and then back up at Nnoitra, conflicted.

"I know it's been a while but Grimmjow needs to be-"

"You and I both know we aren't gonna be able to stop him now… we aren't strong enough." Nnoitra murmurs, cutting her off, glancing at her arm. "Especially not with whatever the hell is on that blade running through you."

Nelliel grits her teeth in frustration, though it slowly melts into a faint smile. She scoffs a little, eyes warm.

"I missed you, you know?" She murmurs, looking up at him.

He gives the most genuine smile he's ever given her, nodding a little.

"I know."

Starrk runs into the small bubble Nnoitra has created (because there's no way in hell anybody is getting close to him after he cut off Loly's hand like that), breathing heavily, a cut on his cheek but no other damage visible.

"Sorry for breaking up the love-fest over here, but we need to clear a path. Orihime's on her way here."

AN II: Yayyyyy Nnoitra is alive and well! I can finally write a bit of Nnoinel again! Oh, am I the only one super excited about that? Whoopsie... ^.^" ANYHOO, I'm just letting you guys know, this story is starting to wind down and head toward its conclusion- I can't give you a definite number of chapters left (because goodness knows I may have an idea tomorrow that gives me a bunch more ideas), but it is heading for the end as of now! As always, though, next chapter to be up ASAP! (Finally getting toward the final battle, eh? :P) Thanks for reading, thanks for being patient, and hope you loved this update as much as I loved writing it!

PS: Longest. Authors Note. Ever. XD