((This story isn't dead, so don't worry; just a bit of being burnt out on Bleach, but I'm back. I hope this 'I am back yay' chapter is good enough.))
Neliel staggers away from the devil in the bone white sands, eyes wide and terrified, tasting blood on the back of her tongue. She just wanted to save him. She just wanted to help him.
As soon as Grimmjow Jeagerjaquez falls, Nnoitra attacks Ichigo hot and heavy and without relent, like a high-quality whore. Nel, innocent, childish Nel stares up as her hero and her protector shinigami staggers, eyes wide as the crescent blade digs into his flesh and twists at just the right angle for the hollow girl to see blues and pinks beyond the ruby blood, and she doesn't recognize them as intestines at that moment in time for the daze that someone had finally injured Ichigo Kurosaki.
The blow shouldn't have thrown Ichigo off as much as they did, and Nnoitra doesn't let up with his relentless flurry of vicious blows, laughing and tormenting the shinigami as much as he can. He calls Orihime, whoever that is, a whore; he says disgusting, slanderous things about her that should ostensibly enrage Kurosaki.
They didn't.
"Oh, really?" Ichigo laughs, though the warm voice Nel has heard up until now is gone and replaced with a coarser tone, as he bares his teeth in a twisted grin to match Nnoitra's and swings back with his zanpakutou. It's forceful enough a blow to draw blood from the shocked Quinta Espada, who watches Ichigo closely as the shinigami puts distance between them, now laying a palm over the gash on his arm and drawing back to see the blood. He hadn't seen his own blood in ages. He narrows his eyes as Kurosaki spits on the sand, acting like a completely different person.
"The fuck are you?" Nnoitra demands, and 'Ichigo' looks back to him and lets out a sharp laugh, derisive in tone.
"What, you didn't expect it? I only play-act like that little bitch Ichigo when I'm not fighting, y'know. Grimmjow wasn't expecting me either, and just look at him." Ichigo gestures to what's left of Jeagerjaquez in the sand at Nnoitra's feet, and Jiruga snarls at it and presses his boot on the Sexta's head.
"Fucking pussy." He growls, and he leans his weight onto the Espada's skull until he hears it crack. If he wasn't dead before, he is now, and that serves as a sort of therapeutic release for Nnoitra's temper. Sure, he's just gotten slashed by some brat, but now Grimmjow is dead, and he got to kill him.
"Yeah? Grimmjow was a stupid fuck anyway." Nnoitra spits, before looking up at Ichigo again. "You're not Kurosaki, are you?"
"Bin-go!" Hichigo laughs, clapping his hands and speaking in a very patronizing manner that only serves to piss Nnoitra off. "Good job there, bet it was hard to figure out that toughie, huh?" He provokes Nnoitra, and it works, as the Quinta lunges.
Nel watches the two towering men fight. She's starting to fear them both. Nnoitra is a relentless maelstrom of power and bloodlust, and Kurosaki is a wild animal. She watches them tear one another to pieces, until Nnoitra gains the upper hand through sheer willpower, getting Kurosaki to the sand and preparing to swing a blow towards his neck that's sure to behead him.
Neliel strikes.
She, through pure emotion, returns to her adult form again and is able to strike at Nnoitra while he's occupied, and gives Ichigo enough of a chance to slip out of his grip and strike back. Neliel watches them battle to the terrifying finish, where Ichigo ends up lapsing into a monstrous hollow form, horned mask and terrible claws, laughing like a madman as he tears Nnoitra apart. Jiruga dies, however, with his own small victory as he swings one last time and manages to slice down Ichigo's face, cutting off his mask and leaving a deep gash from slightly below his hairline, down along and over his eye to his chin.
Neliel watches the wounded shinigami swear and spit and roar insults, slicing what's left of Nnoitra to unrecognizable bits. He's not her Ichigo anymore, he never was; he's something else entirely. When he turns to her, his eyes are black-gold and wild, and he's soaked in Nnoitra's blood.
"Well, I didn't expect that, Nel." He croons, with a suave smile, and she instantly falls into a defensive position. Something is wrong here, something is so very wrong. "Oh, don't be afraid, little…I can't really say brat anymore, can I?" His eyes roam up her figure, and she knows that whoever this is, he's someone dangerous that she needs to stay away from. "No…I can't. Bitch will work then."
"Who are you? What've you done with Ichigo?" Neliel demands, and he laughs. Oh, he laughs.
"Ichigo? He's far, far away honey. On the other side of death, as far as a soul can go." Hichigo narrates, as he feels Ichigo's rising disgust and fear deep in his chest. He's beginning to panic; that's good. Hichigo's voice takes on an excited, salesman-like tone as he narrates. "I'm the deluxe version, Hichigo! Smarter, faster, stronger; better than the original in every single way! Here's how to get yours," He snarls at the end, and in the blink of an eye, he's closed the distance between them with a shunpo and slashed at Neliel. She dodges, but not in time to completely move away from the blow and silver-hot pain slices through her side.
"Quick!" Hichigo laughs, and Neliel snarls. This isn't her friend, this is an enemy and she needs to take him down. He's even more dangerous than Nnoitra. Hichigo grabs the back of her neck with a quick snatch and drags her close enough for her to see her own reflection in his golden-black eyes. "Never quick enough, though. You think a bitch like you is going to be able to do what no one else could?"
Neliel just wanted to help her friend, and now, he's trying to kill her. Just like Nnoitra did. Offhandedly, Neliel thinks about Nnoitra now, as his body lies in ribbons on the sand. She hates him, hated him. But it wasn't like there was no sense of camaraderie there; she's always been a masochist, she's told Ichigo that. She and Nnoitra had, at one time before it all had gone wrong, been in a sort of relationship.
A highly abusive, demeaning and bloody one, but still.
She let Nnoitra know that he was below her, below a woman, and his anger at that pleased her greatly. She'd never let that show, but it did. He attacked her over and over again, and she came to look forward to watching him lay dejected in the sand, defeated once again. She liked how he snarled at her when he lost, how he called her a bitch and a whore and all these disgusting names, and how he only did that because he knew he couldn't hurt her the way he hurt most others, physically, and so tried to hurt her emotionally. It didn't work, and she could silently laugh at him while putting on airs of hating his pathetic attempts at murdering her.
They both knew the truth, though. He loved to hate her and she loved how he did it.
Nnoitra and Neliel hated one another so much that it looped back around into something else entirely. They loved to hate each other, and they couldn't get enough of it. He decided to start trying to ambush her in the hallways of Las Noches, and she, now and then, let him think he had the upper hand before slapping him down again. His enraged howls when she did so were very, very satisfying. Then one day, it turns into something else entirely when she lets him go far enough in an attempt to strangle her that she can't help herself and turns the tables, forcefully dragging him off to her room and raping him. Half because she's into asphyxiation and can't help her attraction now, and half because she wants to see what he'll do to know that he's been owned and used by the woman he hates.
He can never be rid of the shame and anger about it. Him, Nnoitra Jiruga, Octava-fucking-Espada, the one hollow that uses almost any woman he wants and then throws them away like trash, sexually assaulted. By a woman that he hates more than anything else in Hueco Mundo, Seireitei, and the Living World combined.
His attempts to kill her quadruple after that.
Neliel and Nnoitra begin a consensual physical relationship in pure secret, so secret that not even Dondochakka, Pesche or Tesla know about it. It's violent and rough and painful, sadistic Nnoitra and masochistic Neliel trying to kill one another in bed.
And then, one day, he decides to kill her. He tricks her, with the help of Szayel Apollo Grantz, that slimy little insect, and gets rid of her. Neliel thinks that Nnoitra couldn't handle their relationship, maybe he couldn't handle her still being dominant, maybe he just got tired of her. The possibility that he couldn't handle what might have been blooming, this tender, fragile notion of love, and so had to get rid of her and whatever emotions he was developing, doesn't even cross her mind. And why should it? They are hollows. Hollows do not love. They hate and kill and rape and murder, they're negative beings, less than human.
She hates this new Ichigo now, Neliel realizes. Nnoitra was hers to kill, goddammit. Hers. He was to kill her and she was to kill him, and the survivor was to forget about the dead and move on with their non-lives. That was how it was supposed to be; both Nnoitra and Neliel had agreed upon this wordlessly. And now Ichigo Kurosaki walks into the equation and destroys such a carefully-planned ending. Rage from nowhere builds in her heart.
To Hichigo's surprise, Neliel rears back and slams her fist into his face, and her hierro proves to make the punch feel like he's been kissed by a lead pipe swung at terminal velocity. He staggers back a couple steps, dazed, as she puts distance between them. He spits. Two teeth. Neliel watches him grin, sardonically, and raise his eyes to her again.
"Oh, you."
A moment later, he's walking towards her in an easy swagger, confident and proud and sure of victory. Neliel can't say that she can do the same.
"Silly bitch; you think you can win? I have to say though; it's always more fun when they fight. Rukia-chan…well, I liked her for a little while, until she got worn out. Like a good shirt; you can only wear it so long before it gets a little too loose for your tastes. But a hollow…I wonder if hollow women are any wilder than human ones?" He adds that little bit at the end to show the lascivious intent on his mind, and Neliel knows that she's going to have to tear him to pieces to save herself.
"Proclaim…" Neliel begins, as Hichigo stops and sighs slightly, Zangetsu in his grip, and waiting.
Orihime walks with Ulquiorra at a good clip, her face passive and emotionless, as they ascend Las Noches. She feels a reiatsu that is unfamiliar to her fade away, as Grimmjow's and Nnoitra's drop off entirely as well. She very slightly wonders if Ulquiorra is worried about Ichigo's strength.
She then allows that thought to die away. Of course Ulquiorra knows, and of course he doesn't. Ulquiorra has never cared about that sort of thing. Fear is unnecessary.
She lets the Cuarta lead her away, and prepares herself and her silent fairies for the battle to come.
Hichigo walks away from the ruined body of Neliel tu Odschervank, feeling quite a bit more relaxed than before. He feels Orihime's reiatsu and can feel that it's very close to Ulquiorra Cifer's, that prick, and grins. He gives chase, as Ichigo Kurosaki howls with grief and rage for Nel and what his body, his other half, has done to her, the blood on his hands.
Behind him, Nel drags herself across the glass-like sands to Nnoitra, and shudders to find him still alive, but just barely. Pure willpower? It would make sense; it's what's keeping her alive right now.
"Hey, you whore." Nnoitra breathes, rasping so dryly, and Neliel snarls very weakly. There are claw marks up and down her shaking form, bites and sword marks. Right now, she feels almost exactly like she did when she sat on the edge of Nnoitra's bed, rubbing her healing saliva (it was much more powerful back then) over the scratches and gashes to try and close them up so that she could shower and get rid of the evidence, while Nnoitra dressed himself again on the other side of the room, neither speaking a single word to the other.
"Shut up, bitch." Neliel responds, her voice low and gravelly, as she lies beside him in the sands. They're both going to die, and they know this.
"We going to finish this?" Nnoitra asks her, his one good eye beginning to go out of focus and his vision getting hazy.
"Let's." Neliel answers, and she knows that they've both lost too much blood to ever survive. And so she moves at the same time he does, her dragging herself upwards and onto his chest, both closing their hands around one another's throats, eyes meeting and locking to one another's. There is no hate here, though; there is only defeat, and shame, and anger, and a fragile notion that they will both never even consider. They will not die at the sword of a shinigami that is not. They are soldiers and they will die on their own terms, by the hands of their greatest enemy and closest friend.
When Aizen's forces will find them later, as far on the other side of death as two hollows can be, Neliel will be laying on top of Nnoitra with her fingers digging into his throat and her head laying down over where his heart should be, eyes closed peacefully, windpipe crushed. They'll find Nnoitra with his chin set on the crown of her head, eye closed, a serene expression and his throat torn out by Neliel's bloody hands.