Tree of Dissent
Urahara looked uneasy. Taka was not very surprised.
"When can I be finished?" he asked, fidgeting. "It's hard to say. I mean-"
Taka shook his head. "No, no," he assured. "There is no need to rush."
Urahara sighed. "This is big. Why did you choose me?"
Taka smiled. "We have both been in similar situations, have we not?" he explained. "I think I can trust you."
"And if I betray you, you kill me. Am I right?"
"Painfully so."
----
"Uchikudake, Tengumaru!" Love shouted. A large kanabo appeared in his hands as he charged Harribel.
Stark frowned. "Uliquorra's taking too long," he muttered.
Lilynette poked Stark in the side. "Lazy-ass," she chided. "And all we have to do is stall these guys."
"Fine," Stark said, sighing. "Cero!" he shouted.
Love's eyes widened as the Cero raced towards him. He managed to shunpo out of the majority of the attack, but some of the energy blast caught him in the shoulder, blasting him away.
"Next," Stark said.
Rose's mask came down. "Kanadero, Kinshara!" Kensei quickly followed suit. "Futtobase, Tachikaze!"
Harribel drew her sword. Stark didn't make a move, to Lilynette's annoyance.
"Damnit Stark, do something!" she shouted.
Stark looked mildly irritated. "I already have. I took out afro guy, didn't I?"
Rose whipped his Zanpakuto around and slammed its edge into Stark's chest. The Espada flew backwards, right into Love's kanabo. Stark was blasted into the Vizard hideout's wall, demolishing it.
Stark got up, rubbing his head. "Ow," he muttered. "That really hurt. What are you guys playing, baseball?"
Harribel faced Kensei. "I'll take this one," she said. "Stark, you can take the other two."
"Fine with me," Stark said.
Rose turned around, looking weary. "You guys stay out of this," he said, addressing the former lieutenants.
There was an unspoken message as well. "We don't need anybody else dying."
----
"Sennen Hyoro!"
Pillars of ice surrounded Grimmjow. Chuckling, Grimmjow charged up a Cero and blasted them away. Suddenly, he spotted a figure below him. It was Ichigo's hollow, still in released form.
"Hey, hurry up, will you!" he called out. "You want me to join your little army, right? I want to meet your king!"
Grimmjow narrowed his eyes at the word "king". All the same, he liked the guy. Anyone who didn't interfere with fights was all right in Grimmjow's book. Anyone who could win a fight that quickly was even better.
Grimmjow chuckled. "Don't worry," he said. "This will be over quick."
He turned to the man he was fighting. "What's your name, kid?" he asked.
"Hitsugaya Toshiro, Captain of the 10th Division."
Grimmjow nodded briefly in acknowledgment. "And I'm Grimmjow Jaegerjacquez, Sexta Espada!"
Hitsugaya narrowed his eyes. "Ryusenka!" he shouted.
"Kishire, Pantera!"
Hitsugaya's eyes widened as Grimmjow performed Resurreccion. Soul Society had sent them down here without any limit restraints. He had been fighting all out from the start, and it appeared that these arrancar had some tricks up there sleeve.
"Haven't fought any arrancar have you?" Grimmjow observed. "This is our Resurreccoin!"
Grimmjow had grown black claws. White plates now covered his body, and his blue hair was long and flowing now.
"Your eyes are weak," Grimmjow observed. "You're confused."
Hitsugaya snarled, raising his sword. "Damn you!" he screamed.
Grimmjow made a small cut on his hand, drawing blood. He charged up a Cero, mixing his blood in with the energy blast. Just as Hitsugaya was about to strike him, he attacked. "Gran Ray Cero."
Hitsugaya took the massive Cero head on. The white captain battled the humongous blast for about half a second.
He failed miserably.
Grimmjow chuckled as Hitsugaya fell to the ground. He turned his head around. "Any more Shinigami, Uliquorra?"
Uliquorra avoided Uryuu's volley of arrows yet again. "You're done," he observed. "Time to wrap things up."
Uliquorra's sword lopped Uryuu's head off. Grimmjow winced. "You really had to kill him, didn't you?"
"Your opponent is still alive, Grimmjow," Uliquorra said. "Alacran seems to have been incapacitated-"
"I'm fine, Uliquorra," Alacran muttered, sonidoing to the pair. "Got a little roughed up, couldn't kill the guy right away."
Alacran drew his sword. "But now I can finally finish the-"
Alacran, nimbly avoiding the whip-sword that had almost cut his head off, sighed. "Just leave it to Shinigami to interrupt things."
"Just leave it to Shinigami to save your ass," he thought to himself privately. "Their stupid camaraderie can be pretty useful sometimes."
----
Aizen's eyes hovered over Hinamori's sleeping form. "An angel in the devil's den," he mused. "How ironic."
His illusions had certainly done their job. Hinamori was as complacent as ever now.
Something was bothering Aizen, however. Why didn't he just kill her? His genius mind ran through all the possibilities.
He finally satisfied himself with the fact that the white-haired boy would be sufficiently enraged if Aizen ever decided to reveal Hinamori's captivity.
Aizen knew it was a flimsy excuse.
He didn't really care.
----
Uliquorra snapped his fingers. "We're going," he declared.
Grimmjow snapped his head around. "What?!" he exclaimed. He could sense the reiatsu of the tall man he had fought previously, and had prepared himself for a long and exciting fight. There was no way in hell Grimmjow was leaving now.
"The Shinigami are far away. We have defeated the first wave and retrieved the hollow. We're going."
A negacion beamed down from the sky, enveloping the three Espada. Grimmjow cursed. "Damnit Uliquorra!" he shouted in frustration. "Why the fuck did we have to go now!"
Alacran sighed. He was glad he had killed Nnoitra in order to take his position. If he hadn't there would have been two psychopathic idiots infesting the Espada's ranks.
----
Gin entered Aizen's room, smiling. He knew that Aizen was observing the Hogyoku. It was what his master did in his free time.
"You know, Urahara's notes said something about a quick awakening. If you were to join your reiatsu with it-"
Aizen smiled. "I know, Gin. I won't do it."
"Why not?"
"There's an old story down in the human world," Aizen began. "Once there was a goose that laid golden eggs. When a poor old lady found the goose, she was ecstatic- but she wanted all the gold at once. She cut the goose open, trying to find the gold, but there was nothing, and the goose was dead, unable to lay anymore golden eggs."
"The Hogyoku's not a golden goose, Aizen," Gin pointed out.
"I'd rather not take any risks, Gin," Aizen countered. "And anyways, we have time."
Gin smiled widely. "Whatever you say, Aizen-sama."
"Are you patronizing me, Gin?"
"You don't care, do you, Aizen-sama?"
"It's hard to care when you know that your sword is pressed against that person's neck right this instant."
Gin sighed. "I was joking."
"Don't worry, Gin," Aizen said, removing his blade from Gin's neck. "I know you're not stupid enough to try and rebel against me."
Gin shook his head. "Never," he said, grinning.
"And if you do, it's all the more reason to kill you."
----
Stark looked over his shoulder as a negacion beamed down from the sky. Quickly turning back to the fight at hand, Stark blocked another blow from Love's kanabo.
The Prima turned to Harribel. "Hey, Harribel," he called out. "Looks like Uliqourra's finished things up. Should we go?"
Harribel nodded in affirmative. Stark quickly turned his attention towards the pink-haired man, the one who could stop negacions. Quickly sonidoing deep into the Vizard's ranks, he raised his hand and slammed his fist into the Vizard with all his strength, knocking him out.
"Let's go!"
Two separate negacions beamed down from the sky, evacuating the two high-ranking Espada.
"We're done here," Stark said, addressing the Vizards. "We'll meet again."
----
Ichigo's hollow stood before Aizen, Gin, and Tosen. The hollow had not been very surprised when it found out that Aizen was still alive. He had never really believed that he was dead in the first place.
Aizen observed the hollow with a glimmer in his eye.
"How interesting," Aizen remarked. "You have a hollow form, yet you have an arrancar's sword. And you appear to have an actual personality. Normal hollows shouldn't have these- and if they do, they are limited to a very small number of traits."
Ichigo's hollow didn't say anything. He just smiled.
"You know," Aizen continued. "The problem we have with our arrancar concerns the number of facets their soul has. The Zanpakuto of Shinigami, the arrancar's resurreccion- both of them draw their strength from the soul. The diversity of a soul directly relates to the power of a Zanpakuto. The Hogyoku splits the hollow's soul into an uncountable number of facets. A fully awakened Hogyoku will split the soul infinitely, giving it all the power possible. "
Ichigo's hollow could already see a hole in Aizen's lecture.
"This was the only explanation Szayel could find to account for the weakness of some arrancar. The more savage they are, the weaker they tend to be. The more primitive the method used to remove the mask, the weaker they were. But something struck me as odd. A hollow, with only one facet of its soul present, can easily defeat a weak Shinigami, with all their infinite facets. Why? A Vasto Lordo can easily overpower a weak captain. Why?"
Ichigo's hollow was puzzled. Aizen seemed to be contradicting himself.
"The explanation is very simple. Certain facets of the soul are stronger than others. Who would dispute, for example, that bravery is stronger than cowardice? That ambition trumps acceptance? That rage overpowers reason?"
The hollow's interest was piqued. Suddenly realizing Aizen's train of thought, he smiled.
"And our instinct to become king," he suddenly said. "Is the strongest of them all."
Aizen smiled. "Precisely. Hollows are born from this instinct. It is the strongest emotion in the entire soul- and it is the only emotion that lower-levels hollow have. As hollow evolve, other emotions begin to surface- rage, greed, lust, arrogance. But the instinct is ever-present. It is the basis of a hollow personality."
"To put it simply," Aizen said. "Hollows are superior to Shinigami. The moment a hollow takes of its mask even more facets begin to support instinct. The arrancar becomes the pinnacle of evolution."
Gin caught the look of puzzlement, quickly covered up, in the hollow's eyes. The confusion, he observed, was quickly replaced by an amused expression. "Now then," he drawled. "Don't take Aizen-sama for an idiot, you."
"Gin's right," Aizen said. "What kind of general would allow his army to become more powerful than him? There is only one race of being that can match a Hogyoku-powered hollow."
Aizen smiled, amusement all too present in his gaze. Narrowing his eyes, Aizen's reiatsu boomed, washing over the hollow.
Ichigo's hollow sighed. It had been far too confident.
A hollow's reiatsu was ingrained into Aizen's reiatsu.
----
The hollow didn't flinch as the Espada filed into the room. A couple hours before he had entered this room, Szyael had removed his mask. When he awoke from the operation, he could tell that he no longer had a hollow form. When he looked in a mirror, he realized that he now looked exactly like Ichigo did, except for a small fragment of his mask, covering the left part of his forehead. A few stripes from the original mask could be made out, but his horns were not present.
He quickly analyzed the eyes of all of the Espada. He was disappointed with what he saw. There was no desire, no lust for power, in most of them.
Of course, there were always exceptions to everything.
Gin began the meeting. "Well then," he said, smiling widely. "We have an Espada-level comrade on our hands here. The amount of power he has is exactly the same as an arrancar created by the awakened-Hogyoku."
This statement caused a murmur throughout the Espada.
"To put it simply, he needs a place in your ranks," Gin said. He chuckled lightly. "This is the part where the fun begins."
Stark sighed, clasping his hands behind his back. He remembered the ruckus that had began we he had become an Espada. There were two ways a Numeros could become an Espada. Aizen could place the arrancar in the Espada's ranks, demoting everybody above the new Espada's number by one. Inevitably, number nine would be kicked out of the Espada's ranks.
And there was the second, more violent way. A lower ranking arrancar could challenge an Espada to a duel, regardless of the Espada's rank. If the arrancar won, he took the Espada's place. There was no ex-Esapda to deal with in this situation. The duel was always to the death.
Gin turned to the hollow. "Well then," he said amicably. "Which method do you choose?"
The hollow laughed. "Anybody want to step up?"
Stark yawned widely. He certainly wasn't going to fight him for no reason. His position as Prima was secure.
As for Yammy, the 10th" Espada, his position was also set in stone. He was the weakest Espada- but in Resureccion, he was the strongest. The position of 10th was forever his.
In fact, the only Espada that should have been showing signs of concern was Aaroniero, who didn't really care if he was demoted. He had joined the Espada's ranks to join the winning side. Who cared if he became a Numeros? He would still be on Aizen's side.
Ichigo's hollow narrowed his eyes. It seemed like nobody wanted to risk their position.
Aizen smiled. "Well then," he said. "Make him Tercera Espada. Aaroniero will become a Privaron."
Aaroniero nodded in acknowledgment.
The hollow almost gaped in disbelief. He had spent the majority of his rather short life in Ichigo's soul, and had never truly interacted with another hollow of his kind. As such, he assumed that they were all similar to him- with a burning desire to be king, and a deep contempt for all who were weak.
The hollow had gotten his first hints that some hollows were rather… weak-minded, as the hollow would put it, was in their eyes. And now he had concrete evidence that a large number of these arrancar were absolute weaklings.
"Cero."
Aaroniero had a hole blasted through his chest.
"I," the hollow said. "Don't like weaklings. At least you won't have another Privaron on your hands."
Grimmjow laughed. "He's got a point."
---
After the meeting, Ichigo's hollow approached Grimmjow. The blue-haired Espada smiled. "Hey, kid, you have a name?"
"Not yet."
The new Tercera smiled. "I like your eyes," he commented.
"When are you going to get your little rebellion started? I want in."
Grimmjow chuckled. "Any time."