"One hundred and one?" Layne repeated quizzically "That's a really big number… Are you the newest Arrancar?"
"I respect your need for intelligence… but freely giving out information to my enemy would be counterproductive no?" The Arrancar replied calmly
"Well you're not stupid at least" Layne said with a half-smile "That's not a good sign"
Layne's eyes had finally adjusted and he lowered his arm and took in the appearance of the Arrancar blocking his way
It was a man of average height wearing the Standard white Arrancar uniform, slightly unzipped, and exposing the top of his pale chest to the open air, visible from his belt was the hilt of a katana, sheathed from his initial attack, with a brown wrapping and a plain rectangular tsuba
His hair was jet black and cropped short just over the top of his ears and his mask fragments formed a type of goggles over his eyes causing their color to be impossible to gauge, additionally he had more fragments over his mouth, resembling a dust mask
He stood still there as Layne observed him, his black gloved hands clasped behind his back but his patience was not infinite
"Are you finished intruder?" he asked Layne, who was surprised to discover that the Arrancar's voice was completely unmuffled, despite the mask fragment over his mouth
"Just about… I guess" Layne said easily, still wracking his brains for a reason why his number would be so high, despite Layne's bravado about the initial attack, the Arrancar had nearly lopped his head off, so he definitely wasn't weak
"This would go quicker if you would answer some questions though"
"You disappoint me, Layne Trell… I was informed you were worth more than just words" The Arrancar replied, his flat tone tinged with disappointment
"Well you've got me at a disadvantage Mr…"
"Aiza, Esteban Aiza, Arrancar One-oh-One"
"See, this chat isn't so bad is it?" Layne said, his half-smile creeping up the left side of his face again, It may have been irrelevant information, but it was information that he'd managed to gather, but by now Layne was painfully aware that every second he delayed here was another second Orihime remained in the grasp of Aiza's allies, so he made a split second decision, adopting a technique that had once been used against him
Layne vanished from Esteban's sight and reappeared behind him, slashing his front and his back almost simultaneously; mimicking the Senka technique that Byakuya attempted on him after he pulled Rukia out of her cell in Soul Society
A sudden pain as Estefan slashed across his back informed Layne that his attack was not as successful as he would have hoped and instinctively he flashstepped away and faced his opponent again
"I was afraid you were just going to talk and observe me to death" Esteban said with a grin, wiping Layne's blood off his katana with his gloves "But it seems like you have some fight in you after all, intruder"
Layne tossed his swords aside and murmured
"Drift, Roxas"
Oathkeeper and Oblivion appeared in his hands, a silent acknowledgement that this was an opponent that would pose more trouble than was first apparent… an opponent that Layne needed to defeat before he could continue on with his objectives
"Shall we get this over with then, Esteban?" Layne asked
In the dark room that Aizen had situated himself in a faceless Arrancar knelt before him, in a clear imitation of the Message Corps utilized by the Gotei 13
Aizen was flanked by Gin and Kieran; they'd been discussing something before the messenger made his appearance
"Reporting In! We have received information, stating that earlier, Arrancar One-oh-three "Privaron Espada" Dordonh Alessandro Del Soccaccion-sama was obliterated by an intruder
Aizen stood up from the chair he'd been sitting in and took a couple of steps towards the messenger
"It seems… that he had a little more trouble than I was expecting… I had thought that he'd be able to take care of an opponent at Dordonh's level a bit quicker… well whatever, more importantly, you're leaving something out of your report, aren't you?"
"Who was it that sent the Exequias after him?"
Aizen flared his reiatsu, terrifying the messenger, who was suddenly having a rough time breathing
"That… would... be..." The messenger choked out
"What's wrong, was that a difficult question? Aizen said, seemingly calmly, though Kieran and Gin recognized it as the taunt it truly was
"It was me, Aizen-sama"
An Arrancar with pink hair and glasses stepped into the room's entrance, wearing the standard Arrancar uniform and sporting a solemn look on his face, before he knelt down to the floor and faced the ground
"My most humble apologies… I thought that in order to be sure we execute the intruder, we must not let the instance when he is wounded escape us and issued the order with my own authority, and though my intentions were good I have acted without orders and am prepared to receive any punishment"
Aizen looked at the Arrancar for a second before slowly sitting down in his chair
"No, I don't mind. It's fine as long as you had a reason, I won't charge you with any wrongdoing"
"Thank you… thank you so much, please excuse me"
The Arrancar got up and moved to the entrance, but stopped at Aizen's next words and the intimidation behind them
"I just ask that you make your reports a bit more precise… Szayel Apporo, does the intruder's reiatsu that you harvested from Dordonh appear to be useful for your research?"
"Yes…sir" Szayel muttered, sweating slightly at the fact that his duplicity had been found out
"That is all" Aizen said, dismissing him before turning back to Kieran and Gin as he rose from the chair again
"Now, Kieran…I have already made the arrangements to correct some of your glaring flaws in the deployments of the Privaron and Auxiliar Espada, Given the usual standard of your previous work this deployment was quite disappointing… One might even think that you intended to give Layne Trell a clear run through Las Noches"
As Aizen spoke he flared his reiatsu, knowing that Kieran had intended exactly just that, desiring nothing more than to go a second round against his brother Layne and be the one to kill him, He'd known that Layne would do something unorthodox, like running through the path in the sky, and had attempting to clear the way… giving the unaware Layne a clear run to the center of Las Noches… where Kieran would be waiting
Kieran nodded with gritted teeth, turning and walking away
"Kieran… now is not the time for personal vendettas. Do not defy me again" Aizen finished coldly as Kieran stalked out the door
Once Kieran was gone, Gin looked at Aizen with his usual grin
"Seems like you're having a lot of fun with this, even though your subordinate got killed"
"Is that how it appears?"
"Am I wrong? I wonder if you ain't enjoyin' the fact them kids're winnin' and getting' closer to here, that's the kind of face you're makin'"
Aizen was silent for a second before replying "Enjoying? I wonder why… I certainly am feeling something akin to that… Do you think it's strange? Gin."
"Not at all… Strangely 'nough, I'm feelin' the same way"
Layne parried another strike from Esteban and pushed him back, pressing his advantage with a flurry of blows, his sense of urgency rising as he scanned around, He could tell that Ichigo and Ishida had finished their engagements and were continuing to move forwards, and Chad was currently still fighting, in much the same situation Layne was.
Esteban's blade rushing towards Layne's face snapped him back to reality and he rolled to the side, the blade harmlessly passing through air where his face had been a second ago
"We could fight like this forever… intruder" Esteban said calmly, ducking under a Rain that Layne fired over his head as he advanced towards Layne
A sudden surge of reiatsu attracted both of their attention, and they whipped their heads around, looking at a nearby ivory tower, just under the top on a balcony, where Kieran, Jed and Anita stood, in their white uniforms, staring down at Layne as he battled with Esteban
"Kieran!" Layne muttered, immediately flashstepping in the direction, all thoughts of his fight with Esteban forgotten, until Esteban appeared in front of him and kicked in the gut, sending him back to the ground, where he impacted the pathway with a loud crash
"The intruder does not simply bypass the guardian and gain free access into the rest of the facility" Esteban explained "Not in Las Noches…not when I am the guardian"
Layne said nothing as he stood back up, brushing dust off his clothes and wiping a trickle of blood from his cheek
"You have continued to disappointment, Layne Trell, you have proven to be worth even less than words, I shall do you a favor and crush you with my full power"
Esteban brought his sword to his face and shouted
"Erode, Arena!"
Kieran, Anita and Jed looked down at the fight in front of them
"Are you sure you even want to fight Layne anymore?" Anita asked Kieran "He doesn't seem to be worth the effort"
"I don't care about not being worth the effort or not… I want to kill him… I have to kill him, why don't you pieces of shit seem to understand that!"
The dust cleared and Layne caught a glimpse of four white and black wings sprouted from Esteban's back like a butterfly, before the whole world became sand as he was enveloped within a sandstorm, blinding him and forcing him to curl up, coughing as the sand seemed to fill every gap and exposed area Layne had available… his ears, his nose, his eyes, his mouth, the gaps between his skin and his clothing, all suddenly attacked by the coarse sands of Hueco Mundo. They whipped against his skin, their abrasiveness scraping him uncomfortably and causing him moderate pain as they dug into the cut on his back
Through the sands, Layne could hear Esteban's laughter clearly, as if the Arrancar was standing next to him
"How do you like that intruder" he said arrogantly, confident that his ability was going to be the end of Layne
Think Layne… I'm running out of air, and I'm blind…oh
A sudden idea occurred to Layne, one brought forward from his previous experience, and the training he did with Lisa while learning to control his Hollowfication
"Bankai"
The air seemed to erupt around him, blasting away all the sand within a three metre radius of himself as his Bankai activated, the familiar gloves, and the armor from the elbows to the shoulders
Layne stepped to his feet, momentarily surprising Esteban, who cursed and flapped his wings harder, forcing the sand back around him
"Even your Bankai is powerless here… Shinigami"
"Will you just pick a name and stick with it?" Layne said with exasperation, unlike Esteban, his voice was muffled by the whistling winds and the shifting sands "Intruder, Shinigami, Layne Trell, seriously, it's not that hard to have some consistency"
Esteban was infuriated that Layne didn't seem to be taking this seriously anymore and growled, setting down on the ground, the sands clearing around him as he walked towards where Layne had been, sword held out in front of him
"I figured out what one-oh-one meant too… I think, Privaron means the deprived right… so you've lost something, something important, and now you act as a guard dog for Aizen's bullshit"
"You're correct…I and the others with three-digit numbers are the Fallen Espada, I used to be the first among Aizen's warriors…before the Hogyoku"
"It's got to sting that you're out here on the first line of defense, but I suppose I should thank you, If I didn't find that out it was going to bug me for the rest of the day… and since you were an Espada… there's no shame in showing you this"
Layne raised Oathkeeper to the sky and brought it down forwards
"Riptide Strike: Maelstrom"
Instantly clouds formed above their heads, darkening their immediate surroundings, though at the edge of the cloud cover, the brightness of Las Noches artificial light remained
The clouds began unleashing their precious cargo, the water falling to the ground as uncaring rain drops, negating the effects of Esteban's sandstorm entirely
Esteban was shocked, he had been informed of the ability, but he hadn't believed that it could completely negate his own, not insignificant power
Layne discarded the green cloth that had appeared over his eyes, ears and mouth since Esteban last saw him upon the activation of his Bankai, which disappeared into nothingness before they hit the ground, explaining why he wasn't bothered at all by the sandstorm after the activation of his Bankai
"You can leave, run away and don't come back" Layne said quietly "My only problem with you right now is who you've chosen to follow, I don't want to hurt you for that"
Esteban held his sword out in front of him
"I believe in Aizen-sama's cause wholeheartedly… imagine, if you will a world where your kind is persecuted for simply existing, the only real source of sustenance you have available either protected by an army, or by turning on your own kind… That is what it is like to live as a hollow, and why we threw in our lot with Aizen-sama, a shinigami that told us we were not just the demons forever on the edge of the minds, that we could be more, That Shinigami were the ones who were wrong"
"That's a load of crap; you're trying to justify an endless existence of madness and destruction"
"But it is an existence… unlike the one you Shinigami are determined to force upon us"
"I can't accept that" Layne said apologetically "I'll make this quick"
Layne's reiatsu darkened and twisted as he formed his mask over his face, his green reiatsu gaining a black edging as the mask tore into existence, his irises and sclera changing their colors from brown and green to gold and white to black respectively
Despite himself, Esteban laughed
"Ahh, you are a hypocrite… Arrancar, using our power against us"
"Not Arrancar, not intruder, not Shinigami…my name is Layne"
Layne spoke calmly, dismissing his mask and Maelstrom as he appeared behind Esteban, who split in two from Layne's strike and faded into nothingness, his existence erased by Layne's Oblivion keyblade
"Despite everything… I genuinely feel bad about having to do that" Layne muttered to himself, his aversion to killing not lessened by the situation he was in
Layne glanced up at the tower where Kieran, Anita and Jed were still watching him, seeing Kieran make a taunting gesture
Layne looked behind him as he sensed a killing intent embedded so thickly in a reiatsu, that despite the distance, it made his blood run cold
Layne looked back at the tower and extended his middle finger, intending Kieran to see it, before he flashstepped off in a different direction
As Chad fell forwards from Nnoitra's attack, bleeding heavily from the deep wound that his unusual blade had inflicted, Nnoitra sneered as he stepped forwards to stand over Chad's fallen form, casting a long shadow as his spoon hood blocked a section of Las Noches' artificial daylight
"You're just a weakling…I almost don't even want to finish you off" he continued with disdain "What good will crushing a thousand nobodies do if there's no one to admit I'm the strongest?"
Nnoitra lifted his crescent blade straight up, intending to bring it straight down on Chad, separating the top of his chest from the rest of his body if Layne hadn't appeared and blocked the strike with crossed keyblades, pushing Nnoitra backwards as he stood up lifting the blades with him
Chad's defeat had reached all of his friends and allies instantaneously as they all sensed his reiatsu fall, but Layne had been the only one close enough to be of any help… and at this point, He was glad he came, and it looked like he was being a big goddamn hero, yet again
"Looks like Chad could use a nap… Sorry… but you'll have to party with me instead" Layne informed Nnoitra as he studied his opponent, recognizing that there was a large difference between this Arrancar and Esteban
Nnoitra's grin grew larger as he too studied Layne "That's a pretty nice reiatsu you got there…Mind if I crush it?"
"I guess we'll find out if you even can" Layne shot back