Author's Note : Yoo~sorry to keep you guys waiting and thanks to all for the reviews! It's much fun and delight reading them and do keep them flooding into my heart if you will. :) I don't know why but whenever I refer to the outline I did for this story, I'll smile. Hurhurhur. And as I typed it out in glorious detail, the smile widens. Especially when doing Ulqui's lines. Much fun! Do expect a fluffy dollop of cheese as we move along! But knowing me, it won't come so fast.
P.S. Just read the latest manga chapter, 364, and IT'S MADE OF PURE WOW. Honest. ONE HECKA BATTLE COMIN' RIGHT UP! (Is it me or did Tousen's lips get thicker?)
Disclaimer : All biographical stats of Ulquiorra (property of Kubo Tite – what an awesome mangaka) are entirely made up by me.
Chapter 3 – Hello, My Co-star (From Hell).
"ICHIGOOOOOOOOOOO! MY DEAR SON! HOW WAS YOUR DAY?" Kurosaki Isshin made a free lunge for the orange-haired man the moment he stepped into the house. The latter knew his father only too well and side-stepped him, before completing a well-aimed kick and punch to his face and torso.
"Oh no, that's bad, son. You're gonna make Daddy end up in the hospital with an IV drip strapped to the nose and arm one day! Bad, bad son of mine. Hence I shan't talk about you, but your co-star! I simply love his movies! The intricate ways he used to express the innermost feelings of his characters! Those intense green eyes! Be more like him, son! Don't just act cool, but BE COOL. Have you seen the one where he won th-"
Ichigo thought his exasperatingly pathetic excuse of a father was starting to resemble Renji – they were all gushing fans of that frigid man named Ulquiorra Schiffer. He couldn't comprehend why so, but decided his fanatical followers all shared a common trait – insanity coupled with extreme stupidity.
"SO HOW'S THE AMAZING SCHIFFER HIMSELF?" Isshin's face loomed beside Ichigo's suddenly, his black orbs filled with dazzlingly blinding stars. "I bet he's all warm and cuddly!"
"As does a packet of ice cubes," Ichigo miffed and stormed upstairs to his room, deciding to conserve his energy for conducting some research relevant to the filming, instead of the usual serving of smashing his father's sorry mug to smithereens.
xxx
"Ulquiorra...Schiffer..." Ichigo typed into the search box on Yahoo! Japan. He knew quite a fair bit about the background of the movie now, and that of his new co-star was what he had not. Articles coming off the back pages and gossip columns of tabloid weeklies did not quite count; they did add some pizzazz into his supposed personality, but Ichigo always thought that one should see things for themselves and not be subjected to personal bias. If he had to dislike Ulquiorra, he would need to have his individual set of reasons as justification.
Long lists of results appeared and Ichigo clicked on his official website first. A window greeted him and he thought the wholly black and white layout, coupled with a short flash montage of the green-eyed man's press release pictures, appeared befitting of his first impression of the man in question: coldly direct, unyielding, even snobbish to an extent. Later, he combed through a selection of sites dedicated to the stoic actor himself, with most of them declaring to have an 'inhumanely hot and awesome' Ulquiorra Schiffer marry them, and came to a sound conclusion of his own.
First, he had to be batshit crazy. He was enrolled in Waseda University, one of Japan's fore running varsities, and had completed the foundation year in the medical faculty with stellar grades when he dropped out abruptly, citing personal reasons. Then he registered for an averagely ranked university near his home and took up Psychology, graduating with first class honors. Whatever happened thereafter was public knowledge altogether.
Although Ichigo was hardly the most intelligent or dumbest person around, he could not comprehend the green-eyed man's 'alternative' ways in the slightest manner. He concluded Ulquiorra was either a crazy genius with insane foresight or a lunatic on the loose for possibly pocketing drugs in the university's affiliated hospital and selling them for a quick dime on the black market for twelve consecutive months. Henceforth, when he decided he had made enough and had enough of this high life, he left, the personal reasons being 'too rich to give a damn' about sick people.
Second, he was plain eccentric, bordering on blunt arrogance, and probably just about offended every single soul, even the bit part actors, on the film sets. When asked of his sentiments regarding his co-stars, even the rudest of people would forge something nice to say, statements construed by their managers or public relation representatives, but not him. Ulquiorra Schiffer would simply glare sharply at the reporters and stride away casually with both hands tucked in pockets. What bemused Ichigo was that Ulquiorra's manager seemed to do naught about it. Maybe they were both too cool to concern themselves with the public perception of the green-eyed man's image.
On days when he was caught in a friendlier mood, he would give memorable and infamous oft-quoted phrases such as, "I can't talk about what I can't see.", "Is that so?", "I didn't see that.", "Why bother?", "Nothing begets nothing.", with "Everyone thinks they have the most beautiful wife at home." being his longest verbal statement to date. Even his address at the last Japan Film Festival was nothing short of unforgettable. It was probably the snidest thank you speech ever given in Japanese history and lasted a grand total of twelve seconds: three seconds silence and another three the brief scanning of those in contention for the Best Actor award, each putting on faux smiles for the cameras panning in on them. Then, six seconds with audio waves meshing together to form "You can't say you're happy when you don't win.".
Ichigo found some of the comments incredibly familiar, then realized that these were the very much parodied lines used by hosts and comedians alike in prime time variety shows. What were mere words pieced together to throw reporters off guard so he could get away from their greedy paws and soundbites hungry voice recorders, had unintentionally placed the socially impaired man in the hot seat, be it negative or positive and polarizing the majority of Japan's entertainment loving crowd.
All of a sudden, he was being hailed by the Japanese media as being 'unpretentious and proud of it' in this world where danger lurked behind pretentious smiles and meaningless air smooches and purposeful wardrobe malfunctions. He was a 'glowing beam of originality' in this society populated by homogenous factory churned products such as Johnny's talents and Morning Musume, with the most exalting of them postulating he be the twenty-first century poster boy who dripped with the essence of it: materialism, realism, skepticism, cynicism and all the -isms that staked a place in any decent modern English dictionary.
For all the otherworldly compliments lavished on him, Ulquiorra Schiffer was equally condemned for his 'incomparably conceited and snooty' attitude, and his 'emo poser' look in various social sites and tabloid articles, with most slamming his deplorable existence and cursing him to lose all his teeth then hair and whatnot. During a rare outing at a stipulated talk show where the topic of his very vocal haters surfaced, he answered in his usual unflappable stance: "I'm not their best friend."
That skimpy tally of five words was all it took to thoroughly instil the belief in Ichigo that Ulquiorra Schiffer was going to be one strenuous hell of a co-star.
xxx
(One week later)
Ichigo looked warily about him when he entered the hustle-bustle of a dressing room, located in a distinct corner of the filming location, which was by itself a behemoth building that sprawled across several hectares of suburban land. Renji was nowhere in sight and did not pick up his phone when he called, and he felt like a lost sheep, not knowing whether to sit or to stand or what to do. Having gotten tired of waiting, he made a snappy decision to give his redhead agent a piece of his pissed off mind later, then swung by a dressing table and sat on it, his sneakered feet placed in a lazy criss-cross fashion on the adjacent chair.
"Get your feet off my chair," an emotionally void voice rang out when he was about to shut his eyes for some rest.
Immediately, Ichigo's eyes flew open and he jerked his head upwards to find a raven-haired man with a pair of teal lines running down his sickly pale face glare at him. The man looked as irritated as a cat without its ball of yarn and excited as a panther when it sees vegetables.
"Your chair?" Ichigo asked courteously. If the pale man would answer politely, then maybe Ichigo would discard the previous presumptions he had of the man, and they could forge a conducive working relationship.
"I sat here moments before," he continued in his bland tone. "Move."
The orange-haired man removed his feet from the seat and crossed his legs, never moving from his position. "There, your chair."
Ulquiorra peered at the seat – made dirty by a dusty pair of shoe prints, then back at Ichigo. "Clean it," he said commandingly. "And remove your arse from the dresser in the meanwhile." He did not wait for Ichigo's response, but treated it as a given and tossed a packet of tissue onto the orange-haired man's lap, then stuffed both hands back into his pockets, leaving the latter confounded and irked at the stale reception.
Though Ichigo was peeved as anything, he held true to his word to uphold his persona as everyone's favorite young star, one forced into adoption by his talent agency when he first tasted fame. He placed both hands on the table to push himself off, then took a piece of tissue from the packet gingerly, performed a slapdash swipe around the chair and crumpled the contaminated three ply softness into a ball. Everything was done with a deformed smile plastered on his face.
"Happy now, Ulquiorra Schiffer?" Deep down, Ichigo was never the friendliest person around and this time, he could not resist the chance to give Ulquiorra a taste of his true colors and added a snark twist to his name.
The green-eyed man did not reply, but made his way towards a dressing table at the other end of the room and stayed there.
"What a complete asshole," Ichigo muttered under his breath when the bizarre man with bizarrely bizarre habits moved out of earshot.
xxx
"HEY WATCH WHERE YOU'RE GOING!" Renji cried in surprise when he bumped into someone while turning a corner by the long corridor with yellow painted walls adorned with huge posters of movies, all of which were produced by the well-known Japanese film company - Soul Pictures. As he rubbed his forehead to ease the shots of pain arising from the abrupt human contact, he caught sight of a taut, muscular silhouette parading before him. He supposed they were both of the same height and build, but the crash had Renji keeling over in pain and allowed the silhouette to tower over him easily. It also seemed to snarl down at him unpleasantly.
"YA BETTA WATCH YA FUCKIN' DUMB FEET AN' LOOK BEFORE YA MAKE A TURN. AN' WHOA! YA HAIR!" The man yelled back, his annoyance at being knocked into was fueled by Renji's loud voice and being temporarily blinded by a cascade of long crimson locks.
The red-haired man was prepared to launch another boisterous attack when the comment on his hair took him by surprise, and a potential wolfish growl shrank into a downward curve at the man, who was stuck with a jester's name - Grimmjow Jeagerjacques, and owned a striking pseudo Mohawk of electric blue hair. "Speak for yourself, friggin' gangster."
"Hn," Grimmjow scoffed and fluffed his hair haughtily. "Anyyahairsucksway, nice tats," he added, running his light blue orbs over Renji's intricate patterning of tribal tattoos and nodded in approval.
"Yeah, kinda different aren't they," Renji patted the tattoos inked on his forehead satisfyingly, a lioness proud of its cubs for bringing home their first kill. "Nice shirt, too," he complimented in return when he saw the motif on Grimmjow's form fitting tee. It was a provocative graphic; a topless Kate Moss, with one bony arm covering her bare breasts and the other flipping a bird at whoever's looking at 'her'.
'Edgy,' he thought. To further bring out the 'E' in edginess, she contorted her facial features into that of a drugged out temptress and stuck her pinkish tongue out.
'No, make that VERY edgy,' was the sole thought about Grimmjow's top that Renji was left with when the blue-haired man sauntered off in the other direction and hummed a horrendous rendition of Linkin Park's 'New Divide'.
xxx
"Hello all," the smiley silver-haired man poked his head into the dressing room and waved comically, before entering the now crowded room of actors, stylists, make-up artists, prosthetic limbs, wigs and costumes. "Am glad to see all of you so geared up early this morning!"
"Gin, quit with the trash talking. Just tell them what they have to do this week," Soi Fon piped in without invitation. Ichigo turned in her direction briefly, and saw the all too familiar frustrated expression laid on her face. 'She needs to take a chill pill from Renji,' he mused, and the thought of Renji, who was still nowhere to be seen, handing the irksome Casting Director a pill made the corners of his mouth twitch.
"Aww, Little Bee, don't be angry with me. I'm just here to make everyone's lives more comfortable, including yours," Ichimaru Gin mysteriously took on a Westerner's country accent as he answered.
'Does he think he's Johnny Cash?' Ulquiorra grouchily thought from the other side of the room. He was bored stiff with the incessant waiting, and kept to himself while everyone else was making friendly banter as they bumbled about the place. To add onto his misery, that amoeba of his blue-haired, thuggish manager, who also happened to be a first relative, hung up on him once he saw his famous actor cousin's number on the Caller ID. As the green-eyed man folded his arms, he wished halfheartedly he had brought along something to read, a tabloid weekly even, but he had woken up hastily this morning, thinking he was late when he saw the hour hand on his alarm clock stop at eight. Later did he realize the clock had ran out of batteries since eight last night.
"Alrighty~folksies, here's our production schedule for this week! I'm looking forward to it myself even," Gin grinned foxily and the spots where his eyes should be creased into tiny rainbows. "First off, we'll be doing costume fitting and primary photoshoots for the first five days, a rest day on the sixth, then on the seventh day of the week, we'll be holding a press conference to announce the confirmed cast to the media!"
"Without much further ado, let's welcome our Head Costume Designer, Ishida Uryuu!" Gin stepped aside to allow for the limelight to fall on a bespectacled man who was all clad in white, and went on to fix everyone in the room with an unnecessarily supercilious gaze. Gin then continued in his doubtful accent. "For today, everyone is to try on their costumes and see if they fit, since the sizes were taken days ago and some of us here are practically balloons. Good luck to Ulquiorra and Ichigo~ you two have the most work to do."
"What do you mean?" Ichigo asked. He almost raised a hand, but was reminded by his inner voice in the nick of time that he was no longer in high school, much less a classroom. "Do we have that many costumes?"
"YEP!" Gin answered happily, and Ulquiorra thought he saw a furry tail sprout from the silver-haired man's backside and swished about in the air for a fleeting moment. He blinked a few times in rapid succession to clear his head, and nearly fell off his chair when Gin added in sadistic glee, "You have twelve, Ulquiorra has FIFTEEN! Don't fatten up once filming starts, 'kays?"
xxx
Three hectic days of costume fitting had dashed past without much fanfare, and Ichigo found himself liking his nine sets of civilian clothes so much that he almost wanted to persuade Ishida into imparting his impressive sewing skills to his younger sister Yuzu. They were influenced by the Meiji Restoration period, all of which were colored in dark shades and contrasted with a similar lighter tone for the inner linings. Ishida had told him that the colors complemented Ichigo's lightly tanned skin tone and would make his bright hair pop out even more.
Ichigo was not sure what Ishida meant by that, and his pesky habit of pushing up his frameless pair of spectacles with a finger as he spoke painted a scheming picture of him designing the clothes with a sole consideration in mind – Ichigo's orange hair. It was not the best of thoughts and although the end result was highly satisfiable, Ichigo felt an unnoticeable quiver travel down his spine.
The remaining three pieces were military kits and as 'delightful' (claimed by Gin) Ishida's designs for them were, Ichigo found the 'classically aesthetic styles' (another claim made by the smiling loon) woeful. Each had a heavy plate of armor as the outer layer, then a pair of outerwear which mixed cornflower blue and black and ash gray together, one that was reminiscent of a hounds tooth pattern. The inner clothing pieces were as white as fresh snow, but Ishida insisted they were an 'off-white', and when Ichigo protested that they were not and Ishida was being overly sensitive, the latter proclaimed the orange-haired man in dire need of an optometrist.
Ichigo then wondered if anyone watching the movie would even give a shit about the pieces in their separability, of which Ishida had declared them to be 'excellent works that mirror the craftsmanship of a fine outfit befitting of an honorable Japanese samurai', and especially when involved in bloody, dirty, grubby battle scenes.
As Ishida lost himself in his clouds of needles and threads and abstract designs, his waxen hands stroked the edges of the clothes as if it was the bottom of a newborn. Ichigo thought it to be a mightily gay action but decided against pointing that out. He did not wish to further incur the bespectacled man's wrath and have him sneakily add bits of heat retention fabrics into the kits and then die of heat stroke while filming.
Ichigo also tried to make small talk with his stoic co-star whenever possible, wanting to give the latter a chance to redeem himself for his mistreatment days ago, but each time he was either blatantly ignored, or shot back with a dismissive remark. That said, he was not one to give up easily; he never was. Though his nonexistent patience was wearing thinner by the hour, he futilely pushed on to foster communication with Ulquiorra, who simply could not be bothered. Despite his well meaning attempts, he had unwittingly driven the green-eyed man into a state of irritation, hence the increasingly snippy snaps thrown towards the very persistent orange-haired one.
Ulquiorra never desired the need to befriend anyone, let alone with people whom he knew only as 'his colleagues' and nothing more. He supposed on the psychometric scale of 'Extroversion', he would thrive right on the opposite end: The Most Introvert Of Introverts, and remained stagnant till kingdom came. The usual crop of co-stars had seen his permanently, deceptively depressed facial expression, heard of his offbeat temperament and never spoke to him unless absolutely necessary, each of them warped in their own thoughts about the entertainment circle: that everyone should make nice to everyone else and probably end up in bed if possible. Hence, it was unsurprising that he was never involved in sex scandals, but speculation regarding his sexuality never died down. One minute he was reckoned as a closeted homosexual, seeing he had zero interest in his female co-stars, the next he was deemed an asexual, because he was reported to display not even the littlest of lusty affections towards anyone at all.
Ulquiorra neither minded the senseless allegations nor lack of interaction. He personally believed that an actor should spend his free time on the set practising and improving upon his performances to achieve refinery of his craft, and not partake in time-wasting tactics, or so he deemed when he observed the many flirtatious glances shared amongst others on the set. He never once thought it to be his fault that he was criticized badly and that his words propelled his reputation skyward and hell bound never failed to make him smile skittishly at his pet, a ginger cat, as he stroked its soft orange-brown fur and tickled its white underbelly while belatedly recounting matters blown out of proportion.
When the news of a certain orange-haired film actor (there was no way he would see him as a proper movie star) being his latest co-star reached him, he almost wished he had not signed up for the movie. He had problems dealing with veteran actors as he learned the hard way that their credentials more than often not match up appropriately with their real talents, what more one who was a literal greenhorn? He also puzzled over the foursome's choice in selecting Ichigo despite having actors with more promising reputes to their names, and suspected they aimed to create feverish hype for Japan's first ever mainstream movie to feature a pair of gay lovers.
It had been almost ten days since they first met, and already Ulquiorra found Ichigo a nuisance. He was a terrible actor to begin with, as do all wannabes of his make. He was tardy – being late for the first meeting could never leave a good impression on anyone. He frowned too much for a twenty something year old, and although Ulquiorra hardly looked at people other than when the cameras were rolling, it secretly put him off to no end.
Ichigo also talked too much, especially to him, and when Ulquiorra tried to dismiss the orange-haired man with an insult so he could be in peace, the latter would either blissfully ramble on at a spectacular acceleration of volume, or endeavor to be sarcastic in return. Ulquiorra thought Ichigo woke up late the day genes of sarcasm were handed out. Last but not least, Ichigo had the most striking hair color ever. Well, almost. It was comparable to that of his blue-haired cousin's, which made Ichigo even more tiresome in his eyes.
"Costume fitting times are such a drag, ain't they?" Ichimaru Gin waved his hands like a mime actor pushing his gloved hands against an imaginary piece of glass. "But good times come after bad times! We'll be doing a primary photoshoot for our two hotties today~ First up, Ichigo! Then, Ulquiorra! And then, both! With a few poses, too."
"Let us put our hands together and give a warm welcome to the Director of Photography, shall we?" He continued, this time adopting an Osaka dialect to his speech. "Aikawa Love~!"
A tall man with thick black hair worn in an Afro that was shaped like a starfish and adorned a pair of slanted opaque shades, planted himself beside Gin. He wore a multi-colored Adidas jacket and zipped it all the way to the collar, and had on a pair of matching track pants and sneakers. Ichigo figured if he squinted hard enough, he could probably spy an eighties boom box sitting atop the man's shoulder. He then squeezed his brown eyes into narrow lines and inclined towards Ulquiorra, who happened to stand next to him. Helpfulness did not run in the green-eyed man's veins and he moved away from the still inclining man, who was continuing to bend sideways to the point of disequilibrium. Ichigo fumbled about for a while before regaining his balance, and glared poisonously at Ulquiorra, who simply stood by and watched the scene unfold before him with his hands tucked into his jeans pockets.
"Why did you move away? I almost fell!" Ichigo hissed irately. "Can't you help at least?"
"You invaded my personal space," came Ulquiorra's charming reply.
"Wh-" Ichigo began.
"'Sup, dudez?" Aikawa Love asked, and struck a 'Yo momma, check diz out!' pose to complete his ghetto style. "Peaz out! Make lurrrrve, yeah thaz mah name, nort war! In da wordz of mah late 'Fathah' - ze grea' MJ - We ar' de world! We ar' de chewdreeen! We ar' de onez who may-kah brighta dae! Sooo lez st-"
"Don't sing when you don't have the voice for it!" Soi Fon again popped out from nowhere and whacked Aikawa Love's head with a hefty stack of rolled up papers. His spiky Afro was flattened in the process and what was a starfish now looked like a cult symbol: a curved moon with three triangular edges.
"Ugh, pizz off, biyatch! Lemme do mah stuffz, ya juz stay away!" Love grunted unhappily, and his big hands shot up to desperately mold his hair back into its original shape. "'Newayz, mah job 'ere iz to take pix of ya peepz, so ya all gotta listennnnn to mah requez, ya diggin' me?"
"I, for one, don't dig you," Gin said, and laughed a fake, huge guffaw, "That's quite an introduction, Love. So, shall we get ready for the shoot?"
Everyone in the room nodded, save for Ulquiorra, who hardly moved a muscle. They then ushered both Ichigo and him into separate rooms, and busied themselves with piling make-up on the two leading actors' faces, then fixed their wigs on their heads, and finally the putting on of civilian costumes. It took approximately three hours for them to prepare adequately for the shoot, and when they reached the set, with overhead lights aplenty and a huge white canvas backdrop, Ulquiorra was shouted at by Soi Fon when she saw him remove a hand from the pockets of his forest green pants to flick something off his shoulder.
"ULQUIORRA SCHIFFER!" She hollered. "DIDN'T I TELL YOU TO REMOVE YOUR BLACK NAIL POLISH BEFORE THE SHOOT?"
xxx
"Ooookaez, tiz iz no goode at all! Act mor' lykz luvahz! Closerrrr!" Love griped from behind the camera. The first few pictures were excellent – solo shots of Ichigo as Murakami Yoshihito and Ulquiorra as Takamatsu Soujiro, and both men had no trouble owning the photoshoot and adding their signature distinction to it. This was not the case when it finally came down to the wire, where they had to share many frames together. Ulquiorra seemed to root himself to the spot during the readying of positions, refusing to move nearer to Ichigo when asked to, and the suave orange-haired man lost control of his limbs, posing at awkward angles to accommodate Ulquiorra's weird bout of obstinacy, occasionally bumping into the stationary green-eyed man, and wound up stepping on his toes more than once.
"ULQUIORRA SCHIFFER! WHEN LOVE TELLS YOU TO MOVE, YOU MOVE!" Soi Fon grabbed hold of a loudhailer and put it to good use.
"Yea babeh, sankew! Schiffah, puh-leese move! Me tinkz Ichi boi dun stink one bit, duzen he?" Love questioned.
"He does. It's affecting me," Ulquiorra's brilliant green eyes flashed dangerously when Ichigo accidentally jutted a knee into his shin. "He stinks of no talent."
"HEY! You're the one who's refusing to co-operate and how dare you push the blame onto me! AND YOU'RE CALLING ME A NO-TALENT?" Ichigo shouted back, and decided he had enough of being all nice and gentlemanly to his co-star. Since patience was never his virtue and it had long been overstretched, thus it had to snap at one point. 'Which also makes it NOW!'
"I knew you're a fake all along," Ulquiorra said smugly. "Your hair color indicates you're a hothead underneath it all."
"WHAT HAS MY HAIR COLOR GOT TO DO WITH THIS?" Ichigo yelled into his co-star's ear. "I WAS BORN WITH IT! IT'S BETTER THAN YOUR DULL BLACK HAIR ANYWAY!"
"Everything," Ulquiorra retorted, covering his ears with both hands. "Plus, you can't act. Makes me wonder what did you do to obtain this role."
"I WAS CHOSEN OUT OF GOD KNOWS HOW MANY PEOPLE! CHOSEN! DURING TWO ROUNDS OF AUDITIONS!" Ichigo panted after his short but deafening tirade. "AND IF YOU THINK I'M EASY TO BULLY, LIKE YOUR LOSERISH CO-STARS BEFORE ME, THEN YOU'RE DEAD WRONG!"
"Woh, relax, guys! We only wanted to have you two move closer to take a better picture, not an all out fight!" Gin cooed, hoping to pacify the two stars. "Don't argue anymore, and you're supposed to be tragic lovers, not warring fighters. Well, although they can easily transcend from one to the other..."
Both looked set to debate Gin's words, but they never did, for Soi Fon appeared behind them in a flash and forcibly placed Ulquiorra's arm around Ichigo's waist, then pushed them together, their shoulders touching.
"Don't you two dare move until Love shouts 'DONE!'. UNDERSTAND?" Soi Fon admonished, and stared at them so fiercely that her eyeballs were going to drop out of their sockets and bounce onto the floor anytime. "Try me, and I'll make the both of you go through hell together and never make it back."