Travel along the ice was treacherous, the not-horse had claws to dig into the ice and gain traction that way but I was not quite so lucky. I slipped and slid a little before I regained the trick of walking on ice. I'd had to learn how when I'd been a kid, since the fish went into torpor and stealing could be dangerous in the winter because a merchant could use footprints in the snow to track a thief back to where he laired if the thief wasn't careful, knowing how to walk over ice was a necessary skill for survival.
It took longer this time since there were three of us and we weren't flash-stepping but eventually we reached a point where I could sense the magic growing much stronger. We were almost there.
I signaled that they should get low and stay there. I crept up ahead to see if I could get a good look at my prey and after a moment or two of spiriting myself silently over the ice-path that spread itself before me at a quiet command from Isana, I spied the clearing where I'd previously observed the three shadows. There was only one now. The strange spell- circle seemed to be glowing more brightly and the bead, or gem, or whatever it hovering in the air over the center of the inky pool over-top the glowing circle-diagram was definitely looking a lot brighter. Oddly enough, the Shadow seemed to have changed as well. Where it had once been nothing but a formless cloud of inky black darkness looking slight more substantial in the middle in some undefinable way, the Shadow as it was now had a definite outline.
I paused and looked at it. It was black, an inky black that shimmered with starlight ever so slightly and instead of being a nebulous cloud, it now had a vague form, I couldn't tell if it walked on two feet or four, the forelimbs were massive and the claws at the end of his paws were big enough to slice a man in half. Before my eyes, the indefinite lump of a head began to take on actual shape, it grew a snout that was long with teeth protruding from it, the trunk-like neck elongated and the shoulders widened out. The spine stretched and the hind-legs became more defined, claws grew out from the ends of the feet. It was powerfully built, and surrounded by a deep shadow that spread out like a pool of ink at its feet, the diagram of the spell glowed out from under the inky-dark.
It was growing right before my eyes...
:I'll attack it before it has a chance to finish!: I thought eagerly, rushing in over the ice and leaping into the air, Zabimaru shikai-ing on my downswing.
I hit it with a textbook diagonal slash across its torso, bi-secting it with a long gash. In my experience with Hollows, that thing was toast.
:I don't see what Yoruichi was making such a big deal about,: I thought smugly to myself as I waited for it to disintegrate. :This thing wasn't any more difficult to defeat than yer average low-rank Hollow.:
Except that it wasn't disintegrating. In fact that gash I'd just cut into its chest stitched itself whole like it had never been. That was just not fair. I hated it when enemies regenerated themselves.
"Alright, bub, ya want me ta cutcha up? That's jus' fine with me," I muttered, stalking in for a good swing.
I charged in and started laying waste to the beast. It wasn't putting up much of a fight as I hacked and bashed away at it. In fact it didn't seem to be affected at all...
I sliced through where its tendons should be and it didn't even flinch. What the hell was this thing made of?
:I don't get it, why aren't any of my blows affecting it?: I thought to myself.
I tried to circle around, I was wary of touching that magical circle with the liquid shadow in the center. When my foot came close to the edge of the shadow of the Shadow-creature I got a reaction for the first time. It turned its trunk-like torso to look at me and one of its massive forelimbs sliced at me in a blur of speed. I had just enough time to doge out of its way, the longest of its fore-claws missed me by inches.
:Finally!: I thought in anticipation. :Now we're getting somewhere.:
That first motion seemed to rouse the creature from out of its slumber, and like any beast upon being wakened, it was not terribly happy about it. It swiped at me again, even half-asleep this thing was fast... comparable to Captain Kuchiki's level two flash-step.
I flashed out of the way of its left-hand slash only to find myself nearly caught by its backswing. I brought Zabimaru around in time to block the strike and when its foreclaw met my blade the impact felt a lot like a building falling on me. I was forced backward through the soft ground of the swamp.
I used the slight pause in the battle to open out two of my chakra and sent a flare of Reiatsu down my blade, preparatory to a swing, but it moved with a speed that was definitely superhuman as it dodged out of the way and knocked me flat onto the ground with and overhand strike that was so hard I heard a rib crack on impact. I ignored the pain, shoving the concerns of the flesh to the back of my mind, as i rolled out of the way of its follow-up stomp and kipped to my feet. It blurred to my left and I flashed out of the way as one of its claws raked the air where I'd just squirmed out of the way. My reflexes were the only thing that saved me from being nearly decapitated by its right fore-claw as it lashed like a fencing sword for my throat, I bent backwards, the tip of the claw nipping to tip of my nose and flicking tiny droplets of blood over my cheeks. I threw my weight feet-up in a spring up over my head, my body wight supported by one hand as I simultaneously shoved a massive flare of Reiatsu down Zabimaru's tang to gather at its diamond-head tip.
"Denkou Hou!" I cried, releasing the reiatsu blast even as I was still upside down in mid-flip. I didn't hesitate to gather another flare at the tip a split second after I fired off the fist one. I didn't know if the first one had landed or not but I wasn't interested in taking chances.
The Shadow-creature disappeared from the path of the reiatsu flare and as I landed lightly on my toes I whipped my blade downward shouting the attack command as I released. The thing swung at the flare-orb as it tore its way through the air at him. He knocked it from mid-air with his blackened-dark forepaw. The resulting explosion made me pull Zabimaru around as a shield. Once the smoke and the spray of swamp-water cleared from the air it stood there, looking at me. It didn't do anything else, there was no taunting or anything in its stance to portray smugness, but just the fact that the thing hadn't seemed to be affected by it at all kinda ticked me off a little.
I wasn't one to just let an enemy stand there mocking me by standing there, so I rushed at it again, opening up my third chakra and sending a more powerful burst down the center of Zabimaru as I feinted a swing to its left. As expected he blurred to the right to avoid it and I pivoted on my follow-through and blasted out a powerful Denkou-Hou at practically touching-distance. The flare blinded me a bit but my senses didn't pick up any movement nearby, sudden or otherwise. I felt a small feeling of elation when my vision cleared and I saw that my enemy had been knocked back a couple of feet and was missing a piece of its forearm. Still, it just seemed to look blankly back at me.
I frowned at it while it did nothing. What kind of enemy was this thing?
The spell circle under the pool of shadow-stuff that the Shadow-creature seemed to be guarding flared up a bit more and it seemed to me that things started to get a little darker. I cautiously tried to keep one eye on the enemy before me and glance at the sky as well. It wasn't just my imagination... the sky was getting darker. The patches of dark Nothing that had been only minute missing bits were starting to spread, like someone putting a ciggarette to the edges of a paper, the paper didn't light up in flames but and edge of crimson would slowly eat away at it.
:Some serious juju goin' on here,: I thought, unnerved.
I pulled my concentration back to the Shadow before me wondering if I should engage it again or report back.
:Might as well report in, this could be important,: I thought.
I flashed off to the left and zig-zagged my way indirectly back the place where Isana and Yoruichi were waiting for me... no sense in leading the Shadow right back to them. However, I was not pursued.
"Renji! What happened?" Isana asked urgently as soon as she saw me. I'd sort of forgotten about the head injury.
"Played a round with that shadow-beast," I grunted even as she pulled me over and down to get a better look at me.
"It's a flesh wound," I assured her.
She frowned and promptly ignored me. I couldn't contain a small grunt of pain when she tested my ribs.
"Sit down," she commanded as she held her hands before her and that green healing-diagram wrote itself in the air between her cupped hands.
"You don't need to-" I protested by reflex.
The collar at my throat flared up and sat me down. Hard. I glared balefully over at her. Sooner rather than later we were going to have a serious talk about that damn spell of hers and what she was allowed to do with it. The beam of green light shot out from the center of the healing diagram in between her hands and and swept over me, I was engulfed in a wave of well-being every bit as strong and effective as anything that even Lieutenant Isane Kotetsu of Fourth Division could produce. My ribs weren't hurting anymore, that was for certain.
"How unusual," Yoruichi said quietly. "Is it like Orihime Inoue's abilities do you think?"
"Nah, I'm pretty sure it's different," I replied as she finished up her healing. "She doesn't get the abilities from inside her like the girl does, she learns it from... why doncha show her, Miss Isana?" I said.
Isana smiled a bit and with a graceful gesture with her hands the pentacle from the Court of Genbu on her wrist began to glow with an emerald green light.
"By right and power granted by the Earth Court and by our contract together, hear my call and come to my aid... Carbuncle, I summon thee!"
Out of the now mirror-sized disk held in front of her, rippling silvery-white with green edges like the surface of a pond hopped the little weasel-badger-rabbit thing with multiple sets of pinkish-red gemstone eyes and aqua colored fur. It squeaked cutely at us and hopped its furry little self right up into Isana's arms. I could feel a sense of Healing radiating from it like heat from a fire; all the minor little aches and pains that I'd accrued over the last several days that Isana's healing hadn't taken care of dissiapted as though they'd never been.
Yoruichi looked in awe at the little ferret-thing and remarked on the power that emanated out from it. Isana related the tale of how I'd won its contract from the Earth Court on her behalf then re-expanded her pentacle again and sent the little thing back to its Realm once more, adding
"It costs me in energy to keep one of the Guardian Spirits here in his plane with me so I can't do it often or for very long at a time. The spells they teach me though, are a lot easier to use than summoning one of the Guardian Spirits themselves. However, the spells I can handle without them aren't nearly as powerful as the ones they can handle on my behalf."
"How perfectly fascinating!" Yoruichi celebrated. "Have you ever tested it?"
"N-not really, no," Isana said. "The closest I've come was when I was visiting the elves and showing off for them. I summoned them all one after the other but I didn't use any of their powers or their special abilities. I've used Carbuncle once, when Renji was poisoned by a lake monster..."
For some reason, she was smiling widely at that and I decided that I really didn't want to know what was going through her mind right then.
"You should try it out as soon as you can, perhaps when we stop for the night tonight, just so you know what your limits are and how to use them in a fight," Yoruichi recommended.
I nodded agreement.
"I'm healed, you got the recorder?" I asked Isana.
She held it up and I fed it a little reiatsu and gestured she should point it at me.
"Is it on?" I asked her.
"It's going, go ahead," she replied.
"Reporting in again," I replied, feeling a little silly about it. "Tracked the Shadows down again but two of them are gone, the one that remains seems to be..."
I frowned, uncertain how to put it.
"It seems to be growing a body. I engaged the enemy, hoping to destroy it before it could finish generating... even unfinished, it's fast, and strong. Speed comprable to Captain Kuchiki's level two flash-step, strength on par to an ass-beating from Zaraki, when he's only half sober. I've experienced both, this thing's got power to spare. Speaking of power, the strange diagram that was glowing in my last recon-run, that's purpose I wasn't certain of I have... a conjecture. During my battle I scored a good sized hit on the shadow-beast with my reiatsu, it knocked the creature back and removed one of its limbs, the thing took a second to recover, in that second, the diagram beneath the Shadow-beast's shadow got brighter for a moment. The sky got darker and it seemed to me that I definately noticed an increase in the size and number of those patches of sky where there is nothing."
I pointed up and around, gesturing that Isana should capture images of the missing bits of sky-scape and she obediently took footage of it, lingering on one patch that seemed to be growing larger faster than anyo of the others.
"I believe though I don't know, nor can I prove, that this Shadow is able to grow a body by sucking the power that this world is made of up into that spell-circle."
I thought for a moment to see if there was anything else I wanted to say.
"Also," I added, after a moment. "In case I can't get any footage later, I think I should mention the presence of a strange sort of bead or crystal. It was hovering over the center of the diagram, right behind where the Shadow-beast was forming up. It was glowing brightly, visible plainly, even in broad daylight. In addition to that, aside of the spell-circle there was one other thing that might be significant though I don't know how. Inside the spell circle, flowing right out to its edge was some kind of shaddowy-substance. It was pure black, and it looked kind of thick and liquid-like at the same time. Sorta like if ya spilled an ink-pot and let it sit and get thick. It shimmered a bit and the glowing lines and funny glyphs from that spell circle showed through from under it."
I hesitated and then went on, after all, he'd said that I was to include some of my own thoughts in the report.
"I can make a few guesses based on what I've learned from the nature spirits; I think the Shadows that have faded from what they were a long time ago are itchin' ta get hold of new power because I'm almost certain that they need power to take form an' shape, I think they've suddenly found a way ta get some. I think those funny beads and that spell circle have a lot ta do with it. I don't have any answers as ta how or why, but Yoruichi here- say hi Yoruichi!"
The recording device turned to capture the cat cleaning her whiskers on the back of the not-horse and she gave a long level stare that encompassed Isana me and the recording device and said
"Hello, brat."
"Ain't she a charmer?" I commented dryly. "Anyway, she's joined up and we're going to look into it. I'll update as soon as I've got something more for ya. Lieutenant Abarai, Sixth Squad, out."
Isana lowered the recording device and I cut off the reiatsu stream.
"Whatcha think?" I asked Yoruichi, feeling a little smug about my idea of getting rid of the paper and just recording my reports directly.
"I think he's still going to make you write it out when you get home, after all, you can't file that," Yoruichi replied, sounding as amused as ever.
I slumped down in disappointment, knowing perfectly well she was right.
"Are we going to get finding my son sometime today?" Isana demanded with an edge to her tone.
"The Gate we want is on the other side o' that Shadow-circle," i informed her. "If we wanna find out where our quarry is going, then we're going to have to defeat that Shadow-beast first."
"Are you sure you're just not itching for a re-match?" Isana said skeptically.
Ah, she was getting to know me better.
"Noooo..." I said, only partly lying. I did want to take it on again, but it was also true that it was in our way.
"Really..." she said, still skeptical.
"Well anyway, thanks for the heal-up. We should get going, time's a'wasting."
Isana and Yoruichi exchanged a long, very female look that transcended the need for words.
"Might as well let him," Yoruichi said in reply. "He's right when he says we have to go through it anyhow and I doubt it'll just kindly step aside and let us pass."
Inwardly I celebrated a little. I had spent so long chasing Shadows, I was glad I was finally, at long last going to get a chance to fight one in a battle. I'd be the first Soul Reaper perhaps ever to take on a Shadow!
:Put that way...: I thought with a rising feeling of elation.
I was going to get to do something no-one, not my own Captain, maybe not even the Captain of First Division, in the whole Seireitei had ever done before! Man! I'd get to be the very first Soul Reaper ever to fight one of these things!
:Of course, that also means that there's no known way to defeat it,: I thought to myself with a small frission of nerves.
Fighting arrancars and Espada were one thing; they might be super-Hollows enhanced by the Hougyoku but in the end they were still Hollow's, and defeating Hollows was a Soul Reapers job. Hunting down the Hollow-equivalent of Elemental Spirits fell somewhat outside of the usual job description of even a high level officer of the Court of Pure Souls.
:But by interfering in the balance of souls in Soul Society, they placed themselves within my job description, so whether they're an enemy I'm already used to or something entirely new, I already know what I need ta do.:
I stopped feeling hesitant and was washed over by the sort of calm that always came when I had made my decision and had accepted the possibility that I would not see the next day, but the thought that I would lose was far from my mind. I wanted to win. I wanted to defeat the enemy before me and complete my mission; more to the point I wanted to be able to get rid of the damned collar and return home to Rukia. I was not going to allow my resolve to waver. My feet were firmly upon the path and I would not be turned from it. My strength and focus turned inward, refining myself and my spiritual blade sharpened inside my heart. I was ready for the battle.
Sorry it took me so long to get this posted, I was at the end of my list of pre-loaded chapters with the last one, but it took me a little while to get back to my computer and load up some more, then I got distracted and forgot to edit and post. So... I hope you all enjoyed this chapter as a small taste of things to come. The next chapter contains (in my personal opinion as the writer) the best fight scene in the whole story so far. Certainly it is the longest. This baby weighs in at over seven-thousand words, all of them action packed fight. So please look forward to it!
(P.S. remember to leave a contribution if you please...)
