Chapter 2: End of Subservience

"Oh!" Tesla gasped, his chest heaving as he took a pained, ragged breath and tried to move.

He was inwardly glad that whatever restraining method Grimmjow had used during the night had been withdrawn, and as much as it hurt, he could slowly sit up. Instantly, more pain shocked his recovering body, making him grunt in agony and bend forward slightly. Stars danced in front of his eyes, even when he closed them, so he slowed his breathing and waited patiently for them to disappear. Gradually, it hurt less to move, and he managed to crawl to where a tall, full length mirror had been placed near the bed. He looked into the mirror, examining his bruised face and naked, crouched form. He startled as a yukata was dropped onto his back, and fresh waves of pain jolted him inside.

"Good, you're out of bed. C'mon, stand up," Grimmjow said, taking Tesla's trembling hand in his and helping him to his feet, "Put some clothes on before you make someone want to rape you."

"Let go of me!" Tesla snapped, pulling free of Grimmjow and nearly falling.

He picked up his yukata, where it had fallen on the floor, then wrapped it around his emaciated body. Then, he took a step back from Grimmjow, who crossed his arms and grinned good naturedly at his former associate.

"You look a lot better," he commented, "better enough to start helping out around here. You can start by pouring the two of us some of the tea Nel made. She's getting our plates ready. Lunch will be ready in a few minutes.

"I'm not...hungry."

"Bullshit," Grimmjow said sternly, "You're fading away into nothing. Now get your little, warty ass in there and make us some tea!"

Tesla turned his head and spat in the Sexta Espada's direction as Grimmjow disappeared out the door.

"Bastard!" he seethed.

He looked in the direction that Grimmjow had gone, then looked out the exterior doorway of the dwelling they were in, casting his senses about and focusing in the direction of Las Noches.

I should be able to sense him. Maybe I am still just too weak. I need to get closer.

He glanced again in the direction Grimmjow had gone, thinking quietly, then forcing himself into sonido. A surprised gasp escaped him, both at the splinters of intense pain the attempt caused in his spirit centers and the fact that, not only did he fail to achieve added speed, he stumbled over his own injured feet and fell on his face on the sand, just outside the door.

"That's not the way to the kitchen, baka," Grimmjow said dryly, standing over him and looking down at him disapprovingly.

"I was just..."

"I know what you were 'just' doing," the sexta Espada assured him, "No question about that. But I'm not letting you run off and get yourself killed. As you noticed, your spirit centers aren't exactly functional right now, so you don't have sonido, or any of your powers. Get this through your thick skull, Tesla. You are healing right now, and you aren't going anywhere."

"But Master Nnoitra..."

"The fucker's DEAD! Do you get it? Dead, as in, not living anymore. You know, I can see that you don't want to accept that. But sorry, you're gonna have to. And if you're just going to keep trying to run off to find out what we already told you, then I have no damned choice, but to take you there, myself!"

"N-no, stop! What are you doing, you bastard!" Tesla cried, beating his hands against the blue-haired Espada as Grimmjow's sonido engaged and the desert began to fly by, "Let me down!"

"Grimmjow!" cried Nel, her widened eyes staring as the two disappeared into the distance.

The toddler hollow released a sad sigh and shook her head as she turned back into the small dwelling to wait for their return.

"What was that, Master Nel?" asked Dondachakka, looking off into the distance, where a swirl of sand had risen under Grimmjow's feet.

"I think that someone's getting a little reality check," said Pesche, shaking his head, "Poor kid's taking it pretty hard, huh?"

"Yes," Nel agreed, "But I think he will be all right if Grimmjow isn't too harsh with him."

"Fat chance of that," chortled Pesche, "Eh, sorry."

"Hmm," Nel sighed, looking worriedly off into the distance.

The desert turned into a blur around Grimmjow and Tesla as the former used his fastest sonido to carry them across the sand, away from Grimmjow's house and back to the area near Las Noches, where both had fallen in battle only days before. They scented the dusty hints of old blood and rotting flesh as they passed the hulking remains of Yammy Riyalgo's slowly diminishing body and kept moving swiftly. Grimmjow only slowed when he spotted the place still marked with their blood. The sand had clotted and dried again with the sticky mess, but although there were plenty of signs of the fighting and that someone must have died, there were no more bodies.

"He isn't here!" Tesla cried, looking around frantically, "You see, he must have..."

Scowling, Grimmjow grabbed the younger man's hand and brought it down to touch the scorched sand that Nnoitra's blood had splattered onto. He forced a flicker of reiatsu through the fraccìon's trembling hand.

"No, you see? His reiatsu disappeared here. There wasn't much to him but skin and bones, the way he kept you."

"Master Nnoitra said that we must not make ourselves too heavy to fight. We kept our bodies lean so that we would be faster!" Tesla exclaimed, "And he didn't die here! Someone must have come here and..."

"Look!" Grimmjow yelled, gripping Tesla's head and turning it so that the younger man could see Yammy again, "If no one came to take him away, no one came for that guy. Get it?"

"No! He...he must have crawled away or...or...!"

"The son of a bitch is DEAD! Do you get it? He's dead, Tesla! Get it through your thick skull!"

"NO!" Tesla sobbed, sagging against Grimmjow and starting to collapse, "He's not. He c-can't be!"

The overwhelmed Arrancar descended into a storm of heavy sobs, his hands sometimes pushing, sometimes pulling and the fingers tearing, but sometimes seeming to hold on for dear life as the grief poured out of him. Grimmjow went silent, holding the younger man's shaking boy tightly and watching solemnly until Tesla's reiatsu flared fitfully and raged, but quickly began to flicker and lose its strength.

"C'mon, stop it, Tesla," Grimmjow said in a lower, more sympathetic tone, "I get that you were completely devoted to him. It was the only thing you could do to survive when that bastard stole you away from me. You were just trying to survive, and he knew just how to twist your mind so that you'd be completely dependent on him. But you have to break yourself out of that. You have to do that, Tesla, or you really are gonna die!"

"AND WHAT DO YOU CARE IF I DO DIE, YOU BASTARD!" Tesla screamed, "YOU LET HIM TAKE ME AWAY FROM YOU AND NEVER CAME BACK FOR ME, EVEN WHEN NNOITRA ADMITTED TO ME THAT YOU WERE STRONGER! YOU GAVE UP ON ME! I HATE YOU FOR THAT! I HATE YOU! I HATE YOU!"

He beat his fists against Grimmjow's chest furiously, until the pain of moving became too burdensome and he finally collapsed on the sand, panting and shaking. Grimmjow held him silently, waiting until he was sure the fight had gone out of the other hollow, then ran his fingers through the Arrancar's light colored hair and kissed him on the forehead.

"I'm sorry, okay? I know sorry doesn't make up for shit, but if you want to know why I didn't take you back once I could have, I'll be honest. It wasn't because I stopped loving you."

"Then, why?" Tesla asked weakly, rubbing his eyes and looking up at Grimmjow with a devastated expression, "Why didn't you come back?"

"Because by then, I thought it was too late," Grimmjow confessed softly, "By then, I thought that even if I killed him and took you back, I would only hurt you more than you already had been. Shit, look at the mess you are now. It would have been even worse than this if I was the one who killed him. I swear, I just didn't want you to be hurt anymore. But you got hurt anyway, and I'm sorry. You can hate me if you want. I deserve it. But Tesla, look, even if you have to hate me, do one thing for me...live. Keep on living, because if you die, then I gave up on you for nothing."

Grimmjow knelt in the sand, holding Tesla against him as the former fraccìon descended into soft, heartbroken sobs.

"It's gonna be okay now. I promise. And this time, Tesla, no one's gonna take you away from me. No matter what happens, I'm gonna be there for you. So, let me take you home, okay?"

Tesla wiped his eyes and nodded briefly, looping his arms around the blue-haired man's shoulders as he was lifted off of the sand. Grimmjow carried him back across the desert slowly, glad for the darkness that had returned to the area after Aizen's fall. Tesla rested his head on the sexta Espada's warm shoulder, gazing quietly up at the stars and crescent moon.

"Looking up there," Grimmjow said softly, "You can almost forget, you know? It's almost like that son of a bitch never came here and fucked with our heads. You remember how peaceful it could be when we'd lay out on the dunes near the old fortress and make love under stars like these? We didn't think about fighting so much as just being. Maybe we weren't trying to be great or powerful, but we were happy."

"I was happy before, too, Grimmjow," Tesla said softly, "I was happy being with you like that. Sometimes, when we'd make love, I would stay awake after and think about the stories I heard about the souls who have hearts, how they beat fast when people make love. I wondered what it would be like to have a heart that would beat like that. I used to put my head on your chest and pretend I could hear yours."

Grimmjow let Tesla down onto his feet as they reached the small house where Nel waited.

"Where were Grimmjow and Tesla?" she asked in a small voice, "Nel was scared. Nel wanted to cry."

"Eh, don't start all of that. We were just...taking a walk, okay?"

"Okay."

Nel looked up at Tesla, who gave her a shaky smile in return.

"Is Tesla feeling better now? Grimmjow wasn't too harsh, was he?"

"No," Tesla said quietly, "Grimmjow wasn't harsh. He only wanted me to understand that M-master...th-that Nnoitra isn't coming back."

Nel patted the blonde Arrancar's hand gently.

"It's okay," she assured him, "Tesla can be one of Nel's fraccìon if he wants to, so that he won't be lonely."

"That's very kind of you," Tesla said, more calmly, "but..."

"Tesla's not gonna be anyone's fraccìon anymore," Grimmjow said firmly, "As soon as he's healed, he's gonna train so he'll be judged strong enough to be an Espada, like us."

Nel's face was made over instantly into a huge smile.

"That's great!" she shouted, "Nel's so happy!"

She hugged the bemused Tesla, then ran inside, calling out to her fraccìon.

"Tesla's gonna be an Espada! Tesla's gonna be an Espada!" she yelled.

"You've got yourself a cheerleader," Grimmjow chuckled, "And that's saying something, because Nel's stronger than both of us, and if she's convinced you can do it, then it's a pretty sure thing."

"Yeah," Tesla said, looking down at his thin, bruised and bandaged body, "Well, that's great, but I still have a long way to go."

"You'll get there, little warthog," Grimmjow said, ruffling his hair and earning a scowl, "C'mon, let's eat."

They started towards the kitchen, but Tesla paused, just inside, reeling as dizziness overtook him and he dropped to his knees, groaning uncomfortably. Grimmjow swept him up and carried him back to bed, laying him down, then leaving him with a kiss on the solemn lips and an admonition not to 'run off.' Tesla sat quietly, with his hands folded in his lap, breathing slowly and trying to get the stars in front of his eyes to go away again. They disappeared slowly, and by the time Grimmjow returned bearing a tray of food, the injured Arrancar was able to eat and drink a small amount. He leaned against Grimmjow's shoulder afterwards, looking out into the darkness with distant eyes.

"You okay?" Grimmjow asked.

"I will be," Tesla answered softly, "Thank you."

"You've got nothing to thank me for."

"I know, but...thank you for not letting me die."

"Well, don't be too grateful, because I did it more for me than you. See, once you're all better, I'm gonna make love to you every night."

"No, you're not!" Tesla laughed, shoving the blue-haired man away, "Who says I want you to make love to me?"

"Oh, playing hard to get now?" Grimmjow asked, smirking, "Sounds like little warthog's getting too big for his britches. I'm gonna have to take you down a peg or two."

He grabbed Tesla's blonde hair and yanked him into a forceful kiss. He froze as he realized that, for the first time since returning to him that Tesla hadn't fought the contact. The two gazed into each other's eyes for several long, silent moments, then Tesla leaned forward and met the blue-haired Espada for a longer, open-mouthed kiss. He moved forward onto Grimmjow's lap, spreading his thighs and biting at his lip as he tried to capture Grimmjow's awakening arousal.

"Hey, knock it off," Grimmjow breathed affectionately in his ear, "No way are you in good enough shape for that."

"I don't care," Tesla whispered back, "I want you."

"Tesla..."

The blonde Arrancar's warm mouth stole away his objections as Tesla, held onto his tightly, kissing him and taking him slowly inside.

"Baka!" Grimmjow panted, "You sh-shouldn't...!"

He grabbed Tesla's slim, round bottom and kept its motions slow and gentle. He wrapped an arm around the slighter hollow, infusing his injured back with healing power as they made love.

"You're crazy," Grimmjow whispered, gazing into Tesla's sad eyes and kissing him until the dark emotion went out of them and his lips curved into a small smile.

Tesla's writhing motions slowed as the pleasure inside him mounted and slowly overcame him. He rested his head on Grimmjow's shoulder, his head spinning madly and the bright stars exploding in his head as he climaxed. He barely felt the other man's hot release as it flooded him inside, and sent him spinning away into unconsciousness.

"I told you it was too soon, Tesla," Grimmjow panted softly, laying him on his side and curling around him.

He continued to infuse the other hollow with healing reiatsu as Tesla slept more peacefully in his arms.

"I'm glad Aizen's gone. And even though it might piss you off, I'm glad Nnoitra's gone too. Now, we can go back to what we were like before. It was good, Tesla, and it's gonna be good again. You'll see. I'm going to make you happy. And I'm gonna keep you safe this time."