*droops* I forgot to put this in last chapter… Last chapters episode of 'Fun in The Sanctuary~!' was suggest by Bladre MKT~!
ALL HAIL BLADRE~!
Also, if you have a suggestion for a 'Fun in The Sanctuary~!' topic, feel free to submit it and I'll do my best to write it. ^.^
Bleach is owned by Tite Kubo, meaning it does not belong to me. I am in no way, shape, and/or form claiming to be the owner/creator of these concepts, though I do claim any characters not apart of the original Bleach storyline (such as Aporro [in character, not name] and Vicenta Acere) mine. As such, I would appreciate fellow authors and readers to give credit where credit is due and not steal any of my characters and/or concepts. Thank you, and have a pleasant day.
The moment they burst through the thick layer of sand and set foot on the surface land, Vicenta fell to her knees and spat up sand, rubbing her hands against her clamped shut and sand-caked eyes.
Marccia had given her no time to prepare herself and had, literally, dragged her through the sandy layer between the world below and the surface, and all the young Arrancar had time to do was clamp her eyes tightly shut.
Several wounds on her face and neck stung dully, and she was sure she was going to have a Marccia's hand-shaped contusion on her upper arm, not to mention a nasty bruise around her shoulder where her arm had nearly popped out of the socket.
Vicenta was going to kick Stark's ass later for never giving her a proper display of just how powerful a Vasto Lorde class could be, the lazy prick…
Despite still feeling indignantly angry, Vicenta was starting to grasp just how outclassed she was, and was more than slightly anxious to meet this 'Daramos' that Vaida seemed so terrified of and Marccia seemed so reverent towards…
Still, she tried to reason, there was no way in hell this guy could be any stronger than Stark, so she didn't feel completely unprepared…
An annoyed sigh from next to her snapped Vicenta out of her trailing and irrational thoughts, and she ground her teeth and hissed when strong, slim fingers grabbed her by her hair and jerked her back to her feet.
Marccia gave her a thin smile, though her eyes were narrowed and detached slightly, giving her an impatient air, "Are you done lazing around yet? Yes? Good." The woman then turned sharply on her bare heel and started storming off, her hand wrapping around Vicenta's arm like a vice and dragging her along.
Weak and in pain, Vicenta bit the inside of her lip and stumbled after her, glancing around when several nervous-looking Adjuchas walked either alongside them or behind them.
Well, that wasn't good…
Vicenta figured that, since the jackal-faced Adjuchas who had 'found' Gavilan Pintado was amongst them, they were Marccia's followers, and if they were edgy and Marccia was short-tempered (as she seemed), then this 'Daramos' guy was probably excessively powerful.
Which was bad news for Vicenta, no matter how she looked at it.
After all, Daramos was the one who had destroyed the first pod, for whatever reason.
And, frankly, she wasn't exactly looking forward to finding out the reason.
Still, Marccia wasn't giving her a choice, and as the redhead pulled Vicenta along the young Arrancar quickly went from pretending to stumble to actually stumbling, her panting getting heavier and heavier and the pain in her lungs only worsening.
For all of her natural skill at running, Vicenta's many years underground in laboratories had done nothing for her endurance, and her weak scientist's lungs suddenly felt as though they had a rib or a spike going through them.
Though Vicenta knew that nothing had been pieced by anything, she still found herself looking down at her abdomen to make sure nothing had impaled her.
Of course, there was nothing in terms of impaling items or blood; nothing but a dirty yet intact and still mostly white jacket.
No injuries; just a cramp.
Wonderful…
"Pay attention!" Marccia snapped when Vicenta tripped, the woman sneering as she jerked the young Arrancar to her feet when she tripped over a rock, "And can't you go any faster?!"
"Maybe if my feet weren't still recovering from blood deprivation!" Vicenta snapped, as her feet were, indeed, still cold and tingling slightly from having been tied up for so long.
Marccia narrowed her eyes at her, then faced ahead again and flashed onward.
Vicenta's feet jerked out from under her and she couldn't hold back a screech of pain, her shoulder actually making a sound as the joint protested.
Marccia seemed to be ignoring her, though, all of her attention directed towards their destination.
It was official; Marccia was stressed about meeting Daramos.
And Vicenta could see why…
…Hueco Mundo was a desert; it doesn't get much more barren than a desert.
At least, that's what Vicenta had thought.
Her mind changed, though, the second they set foot on Daramos' territory.
Vicenta could actually tell where Daramos' territory began; the sand went from soft and whispering to hard and crunchy in an instant, each footfall sounding like the breaking of bones.
The quartz trees that dotted the landscape like they did in the rest of Hueco Mundo were all broken short, some charred at the edges and the rest split so that the trunks were splayed out like millions of sharp, glittering, razor-edged petals of flowers, facing the sky and ready to impale anyone who wasn't careful with their path.
Unlike the rest of Hueco Mundo, there were no small signs of life; no small lizards or snakes darting in and out of the sands. Just miles of hard, rolling landscape punctuated only by the occasional gust of wind.
Then, just as quickly as the sand had hardened, it suddenly hardened further; in fact, it solidified.
The pain that shot up her legs when the heavy footfalls she'd been using to propel herself across the impeding sands was suddenly too much, and Vicenta winced and looked down, her eyes widening slightly when she saw the desert had become flat, smooth white stone.
Her arm was jerked sharply yet again before Vicenta realized they had stopped, and when she looked up from observing the ground she had to forgo glaring at Marccia to stare at who they had stopped in front of.
There, lounging in a giant skull of some former Hollow's mask, sat the figure of a young man.
However, his humanoid build was where his similarities with the human species ended; everything after that was purely Hollow.
The male Vasto Lorde's skin was the color of tar, which sharply contrasted with the white bone he was reclined on and made him seem even darker.
Jagged, bright red markings lined his chiseled torso like scars, and one thick strip of red ran down each leg, starting from somewhere underneath the makeshift trousers he wore.
As Vicenta and Marccia came to a stop before him, his closed eyes snapped open to reveal bright yellow irises. They didn't glow, Vicenta noted, like her Mother's and Father's did when they were angry. No, instead the yellow of his eyes was simply a naturally bright color, almost so they were white.
Tracing from the bottom up, his mask started at the tip of his nose, a thin shell of bone tracing the bridge up between his eyes before spreading across the top of his skull, several slices of bone slightly loose in his relaxation.
A single long, spine-ridged, thick black reptilian tail was draped over his legs, its spiked tip flicking in sudden irritation.
Vicenta's attention went right from his tail to his feet, which she noticed were scaled, zygodactic claws, just like the footprint that she'd found on her late PAPA unit.
And, like she had theorized back then, he was massive; not in girth, but height, as he was a man who could easily stare down not only Stark, but possibly Kenpachi Zaraki.
And his reiatsu…
The moment his eyes flickered over to meet hers, Vicenta felt as though a bottomless, sucking void had opened beneath her, a mountain of stone falling down on top of her to push her through and knocking the air straight out of her lungs.
She wasn't even aware that she'd passed out until she opened her eyes again and found herself staring at the night sky instead of the man who could only be Daramos.
Vicenta found out she hadn't been unconscious long, though, because as soon as the ringing had cleared from her ears she heard the talking start.
"What have you brought me, Marccia?" The man asked in an oddly soft, smooth voice.
"This, Daramos, is the Broken One who made the pod that attacked you."
…Attacked…? Vicenta felt lightheaded.
Vicenta didn't even have time to blink before he was standing over her, staring down at her with his bright, bright eyes.
"So, you're the heathen bitch responsible for that giant black rock…?"
"…Not a rock…" Vicenta mumbled, her body threatening to pass out on her again as she met his eyes, "Wasn't… supposed to attack…"
"…Is that right?" Daramos asked softly, slowly starting to turn, "Then explain this."
Even weaker than she was before, Vicenta wasn't able to hold back a scream when Marccia's hand buried itself in her hair and jerked her up, flaming pain spreading along her scalp as her feet left the ground and she had her face shoved uncomfortably close to the powerful Vasto Lorde's back.
Even in her pain and reeling, though, Vicenta could still see it clearly; a deep, deep, very deep, clean and perfectly straight burn running down his back, all of the skin that had previously filled the void gone and leaving behind nothing but eschar.
She could actually see his ribs and sections of his spine protruding, and the hardened flesh of the channel was a pale, sickly white that displayed the burned black veins beneath the thick scar.
A wound that, on any other creature, would have resulted in an either immediate or slow and painful death.
And now, on top of everything else, Vicenta felt like she was going to be sick.
"Wha…" She rasped, her head spinning, "Wha…"
"Your pod did this." Daramos explained simply, turning back towards her, his eyes narrowed, "Your pod and the red beam that came from it."
Vicenta stared at him in utter confusion, her legs buckling as soon as Marccia had lowered her enough to stand on her own two feet.
Suddenly, it struck her; she knew what had happened.
"The laser grid…" She rasped in shock, her eyes widening, "The beam concentration… I must have miscalculated for relative distance in comparison to the amount of force the reishi density in the air would have put on the beam and forced it to concentrate… For the old unit that didn't burn energy as cleanly, it… it probably should have been configured so the energy output was less…"
Daramos stared at her with a fathomless expression.
As Vicenta continued to meet his eyes, her thoughts swirled ever more and more, and without thinking about it she found herself mumbling, as if from outside of her body, "I'm sorry… I'm so sorry… That… I should have tested that before I launched it…"
Daramos stared at her for a moment longer, then slowly quirked a hairless brow, "Are you actually apologizing?"
"…I am…" Vicenta mumbled, her eyelids slipping closed and her body starting to go limp, "I'd be lying if I said I wasn't pissed about everything else, but… Despite… despite everything that's happened… I am sorry for that… I am… sorry for the pain you had to suffer… because I was careless… and far too giddy about launching the project…"
"…I see…" Daramos blinked down at her as Marccia let her go, watching with mild curiosity as the young Arrancar collapsed, her head smacking the smooth slab of stone rather loudly. "Well, I suppose under the circumstances I can forgive you…"
Mild shock ran through Vicenta's body… either that or pain.
"…However, you and yours aren't getting off the hook that easily…"
Vicenta's eyesight started to dim, the world going black…
"After all… half-bred beasts such as yourselves really are just a smear on our world."
Even in the darkness, Vicenta still felt like she was being smothered.
Daramos stared down at the creature dully, then walked back over to his seat and flopped down, waving dismissively in Marccia's direction. "Thank you for delivering her, Marccia. You can go now…"
Marccia frowned at him slightly; despite her natural aversion to being around her own kind, she still felt inexplicably drawn to him and was reluctant to go…
Still, as if she were actually about to disobey Daramos.
The thought was nearly enough to make her laugh, but Marccia suppressed it and leaned over to grab Vicenta and drag her back to her territory.
"She stays."
Marccia blinked, then tilted her head up and looked at Daramos questioningly.
He wasn't even looking at her, though; his eyes were closed and his face was turned skyward, one arm bent behind his head in lieu of a pillow.
She wanted to ask… However, when she lingered too long, Marccia felt pressure slam down on her and she narrowed her eyes, hissing as her own pressure instinctually fought back.
Though hers wasn't as strong as his, it still held him at bay and prevented her from feeling pain…
Not that pain was his intention; it was a warning, as well as something of a challenge.
But it was one Marccia wasn't about to ignore and/or accept.
Growling and baring her teeth at him in a threatening manner, Marccia lowered her body slightly before flashing and disappearing.
And as Marccia ran back towards her territory, she slowly became more and more pissed.
How could Daramos suddenly treat her as if she were nothing?! After all she'd done to help him in his ambitions?! After the trouble she'd had to endure with Gillo?! After the danger she had put herself in to retrieve that little Arrancar bitch?!
How could he just cast her aside and speak to her as if she were nothing?!
And just when she'd delivered the little bi— …That was it!! That little chit must have done something to catch his attention!!
Infuriated, Marccia didn't notice the figure that appeared right in front of her until something slammed into her chest heavily and she was sent sprawling on her back.
Marccia stared up at the sky, stunned, then screeched and flailed when a thick, heavy foot pressed down onto her chest.
She looked up into Gillo's face and cursed at him profusely, only to be silenced when he ground his foot down and asked in a deadly calm tone:
"Where is Vaida?"
Fun in The Sanctuary~!
the only time he's calm…
Aporro turns towards her mate slowly, carefully propping herself up on one elbow and looking him up and down.
The only time he's ever really calm, the only time he's ever really peaceful, is when he's asleep… and she loves to watch him when he's like this.
When the finely tuned hold he has on his reiatsu unravels, allowing his essence to leak into the air.
When his creased brows and near perpetual working frown smooth, the muscles in his face twitching slightly from the strain of being held in place all day.
When his shoulders, always rolled back in good posture, slump into a position only his body will admit is far more comfortable.
When he isn't dressed from neck to foot in concealing yet tight clothes.
When he isn't calculating, when he isn't plotting, when he doesn't have something sinister stirring beneath the surface.
When she can hover over his form and trail one finger down his back and smile at how he squirms.
When she can lean over, pull his loose sleeping shirt aside at the collar and kiss his skin, just to see him smile genuinely.
When she can ease him into her arms and hold him close for a bit, coddle him and treat him like he's fragile.
When she can watch him complain softly when she pulls away.
When he has his guard down…
…And then, when she's done having her soft moments, when she can grin and pounce on him, just to hear him scream like a little girl and tease him about it.
"Hyaaa~!"
"AH-APORRO!!"
…Though no matter how much fun the end might be, she still prefers the prelude; when he's sleeping.
The only time he's calm…