a/n - So this life as a post HSC student...it's pretty sick, althought doing the HSC to get to it... can't decide whether it was worth it or not
Oh, and here's a chapter
Enjoy dudes
"Welcome home, Grimmjow"
Atop his throne Aizen looked down on Grimmjow and Tousen, his fingers currently resting in the evil finger pyramid of evil contemplation,
"Well?" Tousen asked "Do you have anything to say for yourself?"
The blood was still leaking down Grimmjow's face
"Not a damn thing" he said flatly
"You bastard" Tousen growled
"It's all right, Kaname" Aizen cut in, leaning back in his chair "I'm not upset at all"
"Aizen-sama" Tousen said, dismay showing in his tone
Aizen leaned forward again
"I feel that Grimmjow's actions were indicative of a rare kind of loyalty, and extreme desire to serve, is that not right"
Grimmjow narrowed his eyes, unable to tell whether Aizen was being sarcastic or serious
"Yeah, that's right" he said finally
Tousen reached out and grabbed Grimmjow's collar firmly
"What are you doing Tousen?" Grimmjow asked, glaring at him
"Aizen-sama! Allow me to execute this man!"
"Kaname…"
"This is a personal grudge were talking about here, not me breaking the rules anymore" Grimmjow said arrogantly "Is a personal problem with the soldier a problem a commander should let get in their way?"
"I think I shouldn't have to tolerate those who willfully sow discord and wreak havoc" Tousen replied calmly
"For the sake of the Organization even?" Grimmjow asked
"For Aizen-sama's sake"
"Ha! You're a pro at hoisting up that great moral crusade of yours"
"It is a good cause yes" Tousen replied, taking his hand away from Grimmjow's shoulder and placing it on the hilt of his sword
"Justice without cause is nothing more than massacre…however if that massacre has a cause behind it then that is…"
Grimmjow didn't even notice that Tousen had sliced his left arm off until he was crouching in front of him, sword extended out
"AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH! FUCK!" Grimmjow howled in pain
"Hado Fifty Four, Haien" Tousen muttered, lobbing the purple orb at Grimmjow's severed arm, disintegrating it completely
"FUCK, YOU BASTARD… MY FUCKING ARM…I'LL FUCKING KILL YOU!" Grimmjow screamed
"Stop Grimmjow" Aizen said
The increase in reiatsu emanating from above, more than Aizen's words made Grimmjow stop
"If you were to attack Kaname… then I fear I would have no more reason to pardon you"
Grimmjow spat and walked off
"So you couldn't even kill one of them?" Kieran raged at Mollow "How fucking useless could you be?"
"If you wanted him dead so badly, next time go yourself" Mollow replied "I'm just as fucking pissed as you are that he still walks this world"
"Shit" Kieran cursed "I knew I couldn't trust anything that wears your face"
"Don't misunderstand me" Mollow growled, flaring her reiatsu in an attempt to intimidate Kieran "The only reason we are on the same side is that I don't dare cross Aizen-sama, I share the same hate for you and your friends as my counterpart"
"Don't you misunderstand me" Kieran replied, his reiatsu completely overpowering hers "The only reason I didn't destroy you on sight is because of Aizen … I don't care if you aren't Moll… you look too much like her for my comfort"
Mollow stalked off, cowed by Kieran's display of superior force
Jed and Anita approached from around the corner
"Arguing with it again?" Jed asked "That slut, as soon as she isn't looking, I'll drop Fuere Tyrann into her back, terrible accident"
"No, I think I've scared it this time" Kieran said "But damned if she couldn't kill off my useless blind older brother, and before he got his sight back too, Damned if I couldn't have convinced Visera to kill him the first time"
Kieran had neglected to mention that the last couple of times he'd seen this 'useless older brother' he'd gotten his ass soundly thrashed by Layne
Anita and Jed glanced at each other and decided not to mention it; after all they weren't much better
"What's with that silence? Are you two not up for this anymore?" Kieran taunted
"I'd light the world on fire, just to watch it burn…and you know it" Jed answered
Anita nodded, grinning wickedly
"Amazing" Renji whistled, looking at Orihime with a newfound respect "You're healed already Rukia"
Rukia couldn't help but look at herself in amazement
"I healed…incredibly fast" She turned to Orihime, who had stood up to deal with Layne's broken nose
"You've improved really fast Orihime"
Orihime finished with Layne, and turned around waving her hands so quickly that she accidentally whacked Layne's just healed nose, but he walked away like nothing had happened, deep in thought
"Are you healed already… Rukia?" Ichigo approached, looking worn out
"What's with that look?" Rukia asked "Stop being so arrogant, thinking that you're responsible for my injuries"
"Oh" Ichigo said, looking away
"Or if it's about your inner hollow, ask Urahara"
Ichigo nodded, fully intending to ignore that advice
The next day at school was a real surprise, with Layne, Ichigo, Uryuu and Chad nowhere to be seen all day
Up on the roof, Hitsugaya was using the mobile phone when he sensed a malevolent presence behind him
A pair of boobs sandwiched his head and a pair of hands covered his eyes
"Guess who!" Matsumoto shouted cheerfully
"Quit playing games Matsumoto" Hitsugaya said irritably
"oo, the Captain is good, he got it first try" Matsumoto said, a little disappointed "What are you doing here anyway, Children in Uniform have to attend school" she said a little mischievously
"The Report"
"Did you say 'Thanks to the limit release, we destroyed them with ease"
"…that gang was just trash, not even Adjuchas"
Hitsugaya sighed, and stood up
"We can't even beat Gillian Arrancer while limited…that is their level" he finished heavily
Chad approached the Urahara store, where Urahara was standing outside, apparently thinking
"Urahara-san …" Chad began
"If it isn't Sado-san" Urahara said "How can I help you?"
Chad knelt down and bowed low to Urahara
"Please Train me!"
"Go home Layne" Ichigo said, stopping outside the open roller door which led into darkness
Layne had his hands crossed behind his head, and had kept pace with Ichigo since Ichigo had noticed him, wearing faded light blue jeans, a pure black shirt with the English letter T emblazoned upon it, and a hoodie, tie dyed in all shades of blue
"Why would I do that?"
"Cause this is something I have to do alone"
"Ichigo, you've got something black in your eye" Layne said
Ichigo angrily turned to Layne, an explosive tirade dying as he saw that Layne's left eye had black creeping across it
"Don't get all lonesome on me now dude, I need to do this just as much as you do"
Ichigo just nodded and walked through the door, Layne two steps behind him, glancing around as they entered
"So you finally found us huh?" Shinji said, looking down on the two of them as they entered
It took a second for Layne's eyes to adjust to the lighting, and when they did he looked up, seeing eight people perched on the ruined floors above them
Shinji he recognized, and the girl with glasses, in a sailor's uniform was the same girl who'd led him to Shinji the other night, but the other six were new faces
"That expression" Shinji continued, tilting his brown cap back "You two look like you're determined to be all that you can be… in the Vizard Army"
"For someone who's pretty piss poor at detecting reiatsu, you found your way here easy enough, although the ton we were throwing out to guide you probably helped"
Layne didn't feel like mentioning that several times he'd had to nudge Ichigo in the right direction of the place
"So, Ichigo" Shinji continued "You came here to say, that you intend to join us…right?"
"Man, I'm being ignored like a boss" Layne thought mirthlessly
Ichigo looked up, directly at Shinji
"Hell no!"
"Huh?" Shinji exclaimed in surprise, jerking back at his instant refusal
"Join you guys? Stop joking… I came here, to use you"
"Say again?"
"I'm not here to join you guys, but you are going to teach me how to control the hollow inside me"
Layne was sure whether to facepalm or cheer
"And just who here… is going to teach you, tosser" Shinji asked
"Oh I'll get it out of you"
"How's that?"
"By force"
Ichigo reached into his back pocket and withdrew his Shinigami Seal and pushed himself out of his body, the second he was fully split he was leaping at Shinji
"What a pain" Shinji muttered out of the corner of his mouth, casually stepping on his sword so it flipped up to his waist, where he caught it and withdrew it in time to meet Ichigo's opening strike
Layne quickly moved over to where the other Vizards were standing, watching as their heads moved as Ichigo and Shinji moved from side to side, Ichigo getting destroyed by Shinji
The blond guy with a black suit on was the first one to speak
"That boy, Ichigo…he's squaring off pretty well against Shinji-kun"
"Idiot" Sailor Girl said, glancing at the blond guy with a slight frown "This is far from Shinji being serious"
The next person to speak was one of the largest people Layne had ever seen, in both height and girth, with pink hair, and a green suit
"Yes, but it appears that Ichigo-kun is holding back as well" he said, not taking his eyes off the fight at all
In front of him, the guy wearing a dark green track suit, and glasses, with his afro styled in the shape of a six pointed star confirmed what Layne already knew
"No matter how you look at it, he's scared"
"Scared?" asked the girl wearing a white jumpsuit, with orange scarf, gloves and boots and apple green hair "Of what"
"His hollow, duh…fighting under the fucking gun without calling your hollow out, this is the kind of weakass punk we're letting into our ranks?"
The guy who said that was wearing khaki cargo shorts, and a black basketball singlet with white trimming, and he said it out loud, ignoring the fact that Layne had approached them
Layne held his hand out, pointedly ignoring the comment
"Layne Trell" he said in greeting
Blondie reached for his hand, but was stopped as Sailor Girl jumped in front of him
Layne raised one eyebrow a fraction, without moving the other one, then exulted inwardly as he'd never been able to pull off that before
The Sailor Girl grasped his hand, and tossed him over her head into a wall, breaking his inner exultion
"Don't think that you can just ignore your friend's actions" she said, as he rolled over, ending up near where Ichigo had dropped his substitute badge
Layne was thankful that impacting with the wall didn't break any bones, far too much of that had gone on recently
"Well, I tried" he muttered "Plan B, I suppose"
Layne picked up Ichigo discarded Shinigami badge and pushed himself out of his body with it
"What's your name? Layne asked
"Does it matter?"
"Yeah, calling you Sailor Girl in my head only works for so long"
She smiled at that
"Lisa, Lisa Yadomaru"
Out of the corner of his eye, Layne saw the small girl in the red jumpsuit mutter something and then walk towards Shinji
"So do it then" Lisa said "Call out the hollow"
Layne was surprised
"But, I don't know how to control it yet"
"It doesn't matter, if we are going to train you, we need to know what we're dealing with, if it isn't worth our time…then we'll leave you in the gutter, and you can become a hollow
"If it's only for me, then I'd rather do this without letting that thing take another shot"
Lisa shook her head in frustration and opened her mouth to explain that Layne had no choice in this matter
A monstrous wave of reiatsu overtook the both of them, and they quickly turned Ichigo's direction, who had grabbed the girl in the red jumpsuit by the throat and pushed her into a pillar
Instantly Layne knew something was wrong, and flashstepped over to Ichigo, Lisa on his tail
Layne appeared flying, tackling Ichigo away from the girl, who let out a grateful breath and slumped against the pillar, breathing heavily
Ichigo hissed at Layne, furious that its killing had been interrupted
"If you're in there Ichigo…I'm sorry if I have to beat the living shit out of you while I beat the living shit out of this thing" Layne said, readying Oblivion and Oathkeeper
The Vizards all moved to subdue Ichigo, but Lisa held her hand out in front of them, stopping them
"Wait just a second...let's see how powerful his is as well"
"If it's to help Ichigo" Layne thought quickly, as Ichigo reached for his neck "Well… I don't think I mind becoming a monster then"
Layne relaxed his tight mental hold on himself, and instantly his focus distorted, his eyes blackened and the irises changed colour
"Fucking finally!"The hollow inside screamed "This kingdom is mine!"
On the outside, Ichigo watched as Layne apparently did nothing, and decided that enough was enough, and made the first move
Instantly Ichigo was in front of Layne, throwing a flurry of punches at Layne
Layne seemed to sway, and all the punches missed, eliciting a frustrated snarl from Ichigo as he span around and aimed a kick at Layne's head
Layne blocked with his right hand, clenched into a fist and knocked Ichigo back, who had to roll several times to regain his footing
Layne looked up and the Vizards got a look at his transformation
Unlike Ichigo, his masked visage covered a full three quarters of his face, the entire right half, and from the bottom of his chin to the tip of his nose on the left side
The mask itself was another point of difference, whereas Ichigo's seemed shaped to his face, Layne's looked more like a welder's mask, boxy and square around the eye sockets with goggles, fitted to his eyes
Also unlike Ichigo, the pattern was a deep green, the colour of Rain and consisted of three horizontal stripes across the forehead
Their reiatsu's were draining each other out, and the big Vizard quickly made multiple motions with his fingers, hastily reinforcing the reiatsu barriers which barricaded the Vizards from the outside world
Layne and Ichigo faced each other off, the hollow's pulling their strings each recognizing an equivalence in strength
But it didn't stop Ichigo from screeching a challenge and rushing at Layne, who merely met his opening punch with the same punch, and neither's fist moved a millimeter
Layne followed up by headbutting, and normally it would of meant nothing, since Ichigo would of headbutted back and they would have been deadlocked, but unfortuanately, beaten up by both Shinji and the red jumpsuit girl, his body wasn't in prince condition, and the sheer force behind Layne's headbutt cracked the mask over Ichigo's face, forcing the hollow out of control
Sensing victory, Layne lifted Ichigo by the collar with his left hand, and pointed his right hand, which had morphed into a hollow claw, each finger as sharp as a knife, at Ichigo's throat
But before he could bring it down, Afro and Combat boots tackled him, and all the Vizards had their swords holding him down, Lisa cracked the mask over his face, returning Layne into control
"Well done" Shinji said, "You two pass…we'll pound the core of hollow suppression, into your very souls"
a/n - Finito, another few thousand words for your enjoyment XD
bit of shameless endorsement, y'all should go check out Wulf's latest story
not ashamed to admit that i get a bit too excited when i read it D=
Oh, or you could review here...maybe do both, yeah that works