Angina/Symphony

Chapter 38

Devil's Chess Game

Part XIII:

Checkmate

We lived our lives

In our paradise

As gods we shaped the world around

…

Now the day has come

We are forsaken, there's no time any more

Life will pass us by

We are forsaken, we're the last of our kind.

-Forsaken, Within Temptation

Flakes of snow fell and spiralled around Rei.

She hadn't practised using her ability in a while, and she was astounded at how easy it was to create a snowstorm.

It was comforting, in a way. Rei had considered bringing Orihime down the same way she'd had Luppi killed. It would be more than easy to subtly push Loli or Menoly into doing it, from the look of things.

But she knew Aizen had figured out it was her who was responsible for Luppi's demise. If she tried to kill Orihime, Aizen would know about it. And it was more than possible that she wouldn't end up as fortunate as Grimmjow. As much as Rei hated to admit it, Luppi had been right.

You've fallen from Lord Aizen's graces, Amane-sama.

Whatever you think, Amane-sama, you're just a woman. He can get another one any time he wants.

She loved Aizen, but Aizen couldn't care less about her.

The spirit particles around her, gathered in the crystalline shapes of snowflakes, whirled into a tempest. Aizen had chosen Orihime over her. It was hardly surprising. After all, Orihime was physically attractive, whereas Rei herself was not.

As if that wasn't enough, there were probably going to be repercussions for the stunt she'd pulled with Grimmjow's Fracción yesterday, even if Aizen had granted her permission to kill him. Rei had suspected that Aizen himself hadn't been particularly happy with Luppi, which would explain why she hadn't experienced any kind of payback. But there could be no denying that she'd killed Ilforte Granz, right in front of Aizen to boot.

She hadn't been able to read his face, either. That had alarmed her. She had always been able to gather a sense of what Aizen was thinking, what he was planning, what he was trying to get her to do. But now Rei had no idea where she stood with him.

It had been fairly obvious before that he'd been trying to get her to trust him. But now -

What is he playing at?

Rei couldn't answer that question. She'd known that he'd worked out that she didn't trust him, and then he'd given her a position of authority over the Espada, and she knew he knew about what she'd done with Luppi. He hadn't really spoken to her in days, not since the day she'd sat next to him at the piano and they'd kissed.

Oh God, she thought. I've gotten in way too deep.

Rei cursed herself. She'd grown overconfident in her position of safety and power, her place as Aizen's favourite.

The snow whirled and howled as her thoughts did the same. He could probably see her now, she realised. It wasn't as if she was trying to hide herself.

The cool impression she'd given yesterday had been an eloquent lie. Aizen had certainly taught her to lie, and to lie well. On the inside Rei felt anything but in control. Nevertheless, yesterday had felt like a victory, albeit a small one.

Victory? She laughed bitterly inside her head. I killed an Arrancar in front of Aizen. I've given him an excuse to do what he likes with me. That was a colossal mistake, not a victory.

Rei couldn't deny that it had felt good, wiping the smirk off Ilforte Granz's face. She had faced off against an Arrancar, a being much stronger than herself, and won, even if she had taken him off guard. She had thrown down a gauntlet in front of Aizen, and dared to walk away from him. She had cast Kurohitsugi, which she'd never thought she'd be able to do. Rei strongly suspected that she'd only been able to do it because Ilforte had antagonised her, but that was irrelevant.

She had lost, but it had felt like she'd won.

Pulling her legs to her chest, Rei no longer felt the urge to cry. She wasn't afraid for herself. She only felt a dull aching emptiness at the fact that she'd lost Aizen Sousuke to a girl who couldn't plot her way out of a paper bag.

The stone of the wall was cold underneath her. If she made the snowstorm dense enough, she could block out that false blue sky.

Aizen was well and truly her opponent now, and her opponent had finally won their convoluted game of chess. Rei shivered unconsciously. Apparently she'd been able to affect the air temperature as well. It was bitterly cold, but only her body noticed it.

Rei wrapped her arms around herself, just as the approaching reiatsu made itself known. It was his, and she felt like it was pressing on her, constricting her even. Her heart gave a silly little skip at the thought that Aizen was coming, and Rei clamped down on it.

His footsteps sounded through the snowstorm, moving closer to where she was sitting. Rei felt the familiar tingling in her cheeks at his presence, and loathed herself for it. Have some dignity, she thought to herself.

A flurry of snow segued out of the way, revealing Aizen Sousuke.

As confused as her feelings were, Rei couldn't help but let the breath she'd been holding go. He really was beautiful. Her snowflakes nestled in his hair, on his shoulders, even on his nose and lips. She noticed the slight flush in his cheeks and lips from the cold. His white outfit was open at the throat, and Rei inexplicably wanted to kiss his neck, press her lips against the sculpted lines of his collarbones.

She bit down on her lip, hard, tasting coppery blood in her mouth.

'May I join you?' Aizen asked, his voice warm and pleasant.

Rei forced herself to answer. 'If you want, Aizen-sama.' What do you want from me? she wanted to demand, but couldn't find a way to.

Aizen sat next to her, and Rei tried not to notice her opponent's thigh just touching hers. 'You seem troubled,' he observed.

Grimmjow's voice spoke up inside Rei's head, harsh and sarcastic. No shit, Sherlock, it retorted.

'Please don't feel the need to concern yourself with me, Aizen-sama.' Rei made her voice as cold as the snow whirling around them. 'After all, I'm just your subordinate.'

'Indeed,' Aizen agreed. 'I will admit it was my intention to make you think that way.'

Rei stared at him in shock.

Aizen chuckled. 'I'm sure you noticed that I distanced myself from you after I gave you command of my Espada. If that's not the case, then I'm disappointed in you, Renata-chan.'

'I noticed.' Rei left it at that. 'Am I correct in assuming that you tried to make me think of you as my superior, and only my superior, because you suspected I wasn't particularly trusting of you?' She tried to stay calm. If Aizen had intended to come here and confuse the hell out of her, then he'd definitely succeeded. Rei didn't intend to give him the satisfaction of letting him know that.

Aizen's lips curved into a smile. 'I see. You understand, just as I thought you would. I wanted from the very beginning to make you trust me, Renata-chan.'

The snowstorm flew around them in eddies, occasionally letting through flashes of blue. 'Why?' Rei asked, figuring the question was as good a reply as any.

Aizen's smile subsided at that. 'Because here I am king, and you were the only thing in my kingdom to resist me.'

Rei couldn't help but to laugh, even if the laugh was more than a little self-deprecating. To hell with it, she thought. I don't know which way is up in this conversation. I'm beyond confused. I can't lie to him when I don't know what's going on. He can have the truth from me. I don't care any more.

'I know perfectly well that you could have used force any time you wanted to,' she replied. 'You didn't need to make me trust you. You could have just threatened me, or done what you did to Grimmjow. Don't bother denying it. I know it was you.'

Aizen nodded, which surprised Rei. She'd fully expected him to deny it, despite what she'd said. 'What you say is true. I could have coerced you into obedience, following my every demand, but I chose not to.'

Rei wanted to ask why again, but then she remembered Grimmjow's words, so long ago in her room. He'd be making it too easy.

'You just decided to try and make me fall in love with you,' she said bluntly, changing tack. At least she could lie by omission. She wasn't going to tell Aizen that he'd succeeded in his aim.

'So I did.' Aizen was looking at her thoughtfully. 'And I was partially successful, but not quite.' He paused, waiting for her to speak.

It clicked. 'Inoue Orihime,' Rei said, staring at him. 'You knew I was watching that night. You needed a new tactic, and that was it.'

Aizen clapped. 'Well done,' he said, smiling at her as a teacher might when praising a particularly gifted student. 'Unfortunately for me, that tactic wasn't particularly successful.'

Rei nodded, slowly. 'No, it wasn't.'

'Interesting. So you aren't prone to jealousy, then, Renata-chan? You are a rarity.'

'Of course I am.' Rei was standing on steadier ground now. She'd found her feet, because she could sense that Aizen wasn't lying. What she couldn't guess were his motives for telling the truth. 'But being jealous of Orihime didn't make me love you.'

'Ah, I understand. It made you see me for who I really am, I suppose,' Aizen replied, amusement dancing in his eyes.

'That's interesting too,' Rei noted, watching his smile form again. 'You seem to think that my knowing what you're really like and me falling in love with you are two mutually exclusive events.'

'Is that an incorrect assumption?' There was seduction in Aizen's voice again, and Rei's heart leapt at the sound of it.

'Well, what are the two different cases?' she replied. 'Either your hypothesis is correct, or it isn't. Let's say you're right, and no one can ever love your true self, least of all me. Then, assuming that what Orihime-san told me about you was correct, you've failed to achieve your goal.'

'And what did Orihime-chan tell you about me?' Aizen looked interested, but Rei knew it was artificial.

'You know already.' She folded her arms. 'You didn't peacefully leave Seireitei, like you would have had me believe. You're no expatriate, Aizen-sama. You betrayed the Shinigami and then you left them.'

'Does that bother you?' Rei could tell the interest in his face was genuine this time around.

'Not particularly, no. I suspect I would have done the same thing. I never told you that I used to think about killing my mother.'

There. She'd said it, the secret that she'd never told anyone. Anyone else would have stared at her in astonishment, shock, but most probably horror. Aizen only smiled that intrigued smile again.

'I did think that might have been the case,' he said. 'Please, tell me about the alternate situation. What if my assumption is incorrect?'

Rei felt herself turn very red then. 'Then -' She stopped, almost running out of courage. 'Then it really depends on when I figured you out.'

'And when did you figure me out?' Aizen's tone was deceptively innocent.

'Neglecting the fact that I vaguely suspected you weren't the nice man you were pretending to be from when I first came to Hueco Mundo? My first concrete proof that you definitely weren't a nice person was when you told me that you murdered your own mother.'

'And you've already said that such things don't bother you, Renata-chan. So please explain to me, because I'm curious - what exactly do you define to be a nice person? Forgive me for taking you off track.'

Rei tried not to stare at the melting snow on Aizen's lower lip. 'Well, there are a lot of stereotypes of nice,' she said, thinking. 'Being kind to animals and small children and those weaker than yourself, caring for other people, and things like that.'

Aizen nodded.

'But they're just behaviours that are seen as being good. Really, nice and its opposite are dependent on human points of view. And points of view are all flawed anyway. All I know for certain is that I think I am thinking. I think it might have been René Descartes who said that. I can't really remember.'

'A logical conclusion.' Aizen was smiling still, and Rei knew that her answer to his question had pleased him. 'So if I don't conform to these ideas of good, therefore I must be bad, as far as general opinion is concerned.'

'And general opinion is flawed. Therefore, whether you are good or bad is irrelevant, since those terms are essentially meaningless,' Rei finished.

'May I assume then, that you consider morality to be trivial? It is, under that argument.' Aizen rested his hand on his chin.

'It is, really, when you think about it.' Rei looked at him. 'Morals are just points of view.'

'And points of view are flawed. I see. So my assumption was incorrect. The fact that you know me for who I really am,' Aizen concluded, 'has no bearing on whether or not you love me.'

Rei shivered, and suddenly Sousuke's arm was around her, turning her body to face his own.

'You're cold,' he noted, seemingly indifferently.

She felt him drawing her into him. Rei couldn't have resisted it even if she'd wanted to. His arm was around her waist, and she was leaning into him, her head underneath his chin.

Rei couldn't stop herself. She buried her face in his neck, breathing deeply. He smelt like cinnamon and warm tea and Sousuke, and all those things melted away the last of her defences.

Sousuke chuckled again, and Rei felt the sound in his throat. 'Either way, I've lost this game, haven't I, Renata-chan? I couldn't make you pine for me by using Inoue Orihime. And she's really quite attractive.'

'You should have told me you were morally bankrupt as soon as I followed Tousen-san here,' Rei mumbled into his neck. 'That would have done it.' Then his last words hit home, and she levered herself away from him. 'Do you really think she's attractive?' she asked, looking Sousuke in the eye.

He looked amused. 'Of course.'

'Then why didn't you keep her instead of me?' Rei asked, perfectly neutral. 'Don't lie and try to flatter me. I can't compete with that.'

'Oh, Renata-chan. Don't underestimate yourself. You're quite appealing as well.' With that, Sousuke pulled her back against his body, tilting her head up with his other hand.

Rei knew what he was going to do before he did it, and closed her eyes.

She'd missed him. She'd imagined the moment so many times, wearing the memory thin almost, that she'd almost forgotten what his kiss was really like.

His lips moved against hers, with that same subtle confidence that she'd noticed the first time. Sousuke parted his own lips first in invitation, and Rei gladly accepted. She licked the melting snow off his lower lip, and then he took control. His tongue moved inside her mouth, tracing along her teeth, eliciting an involuntary noise from Rei before he withdrew.

She heard that amused chuckle in the back of his throat, and he leaned forward again, the curl of hair between his eyes brushing the side of her nose. He moved his head down lower, kissing first her upper lip and then the lower. His mouth closed around her lower lip, lingering there for a moment before he moved further down.

Sousuke kissed her chin, then the line of her jaw, then moved down to her throat. Even to Rei, inexperienced as she was, there was something innately sensual about the warmth of his mouth on her neck, the way she kept feeling his teeth graze against her skin.

All of a sudden, he stopped, lifting his face. 'Besides, I have to say I'm disappointed, Renata-chan,' he said reprovingly.

Rei thought for a moment that he was talking about kissing her, and felt vaguely nauseous.

'I would have thought that you could recognise that Inoue Orihime could never be queen of Hueco Mundo,' he continued, straightening. 'She's far too soft-hearted.'

Rei did a double take. 'Queen - of Hueco Mundo?' she repeated. 'But you -'

'I don't love you?' Sousuke finished for her. 'That's certainly true. However, I am very much attracted to you, and you are very much attracted to me.' He smiled, and Rei's entire body tingled at the wickedness in his eyes. 'And you and Gin are the only two people in the world who are capable of standing on the same intellectual level as me.'

He moved down to kiss her again, and Rei lost herself in him. Her hands moved over his shoulders, fingers knotting themselves in his hair. Part of her could hardly believe that Sousuke - Lord Aizen - had chosen her.

The rest of her could believe it all too well. After all, he'd simply spoken the truth.

There was no way Aizen Sousuke would ever choose anyone inferior to him to rule by his side, as his equal, as his queen. It was laughably obvious now that Inoue Orihime could never have replaced Rei.

Orihime didn't have anywhere near enough steel in her.