Disclaimer: I do not own Bleach, or any of its characters. Tite Kubo does. I do, however, own this story.

Torn

Chapter 13: Betrayal

Ichigo woke up late that morning after several false starts, each time unable to shake the feeling that something terrible was about to happen and hoping that it would go away if he slept for a little longer. Realizing after the tenth try that he was going to have no such luck, the Soul Reaper got up, shrugged on his uniform and walked towards the main hall.

When he got there, Kurosaki was surprised by the scene that greeted him: Grimmjow looked like he'd been up all night, Neliel seemed depressed, Ulquiorra clearly had something on his mind and Nnoitra looked unusually pleased with himself.

Yeah, something bad was definitely about to happen.

"Good morning, Ichigo," Aizen greeted cordially. "I trust you slept well?"

"No, actually," the orange-haired Soul Reaper shot back as he took his place on the left side of Aizen, while Gin stood on Sosuke's right. "I feel like shit."

"I'm sorry to hear that," the former Captain replied, his voice utterly lacking in concern or sincerity. "Hopefully, the powers you will enjoy from your current position will do something to ameliorate your mood."

Ichigo shrugged.

"We'll see."

Giving a slight smile, Aizen began the meeting of the Espada. Ichigo looked over worriedly at Neliel, a gesture of concern that was not lost on the grinning Fifth Espada. That bond was going to make this so much sweeter; it was almost overwhelming.

As Nel rose up from her seat at the conclusion of the meeting, her eyes locked briefly with Jiruga's and what she saw there sent a shiver down her spine. Concealing all of her fear, the Third Espada waited until she was alone in one of the hallways before her hands started to shake. She knew that it was only a matter of time before Aizen realized that she was less than fanatically loyal, but the Third Espada never thought it might come to this. She was no fool, however; if there was one person Aizen would send after her, it would be his mad dog, the Arrancar who had wanted to kill her since the day they had both become Espada. Screwing up her courage, Neliel vanished with a buzz.

There was something she had to do, and then she would be able to face down Nnoitra with no regrets.

"Ichimaru," Ichigo said as he walked quickly to catch up to the silver-haired former Captain, "we need to talk."

"About what?" Gin replied, not slowing his stride at all.

"Aizen's up to something; I can feel it," Kurosaki pressed, but the red-eyed Soul Reaper remained unmoved.

"What's your point, Ichigo? He's always up to something."

"Yeah, maybe," the brown-eyed warrior conceded, "but this is different. This is something big."

"Your point being…?"

Ichigo stopped walking, gritting his teeth as he tried not to shout.

"Damn it, Gin," he hissed, "can't you see that it's time to make our move?"

"Please tell me you're joking, Kurosaki," Ichimaru parried calmly as he stopped walking, turning to face his student. "If Aizen is trying to force your hand, which he undoubtedly is, the worst thing you could do would be to take the bait. You're nowhere near strong enough to take him down right now; move against him and he'll crush you. Besides, you don't even know what he's planning yet."

"That doesn't matter. Are you with me on this, or not?"

Gin shook his head, chuckling scornfully.

"You're still so clueless, Ichigo," he answered. "Of course I'm still on your side, but you're insane if you think we should play all of our cards at once. Even if this situation escalates to the point where you openly turn against Aizen, I'm going to stay right where I can do the most damage."

"At his right hand," Kurosaki said evenly, and Ichimaru smiled.

"Precisely. Still, it surprises me that Sosuke is making this play so obvious… usually, he keeps things much closer to his chest."

"Is that a good thing?" Ichigo asked, and Gin shook his head as he turned away.

"No, Ichigo," the former Captain shot back, "it isn't. It means he's playing for keeps, and wants you to know it. It means he's going to hit you where it hurts, and he's going to hit you hard."

As Ichimaru flashed away, the orange-haired Soul Reaper cursed and slammed his fist into the nearest object, which happed to be a rather hard wall. Wincing slightly at the pain and the shock that reverberated up his arm, Ichigo wracked his brain for what to do. Coming up with nothing, he decided to seek out Grimmjow for a second opinion.

Nnoitra stood in front of Aizen's throne, alone, and waited for his orders.

"Nnoitra," the former Captain said coolly, "it is time. Remember my orders; I need you to keep her alive. Once the drop-off is made, she will suffer more than enough. If she puts up any resistance, however," Aizen finished with a smirk, "feel free to use whatever level of force you deem appropriate to incapacitate her. As long as Neliel is still alive when you make the delivery, my former colleague will take care of the rest. There's no way he'd let something as valuable as an Espada go to waste, after all."

Jiruga nodded, a smile on his face that reached all the way up to his eyes.

"As you wish, Aizen-sama."

When he left the room, the Fifth Espada vanished in a burst of sonido and locked onto a pair of nearby reiatsu signatures. When he reemerged, Nnoitra recognized the two figures with their backs currently to him and chuckled. As they turned to face the new arrival, Pesche and Dondochakka's eyes went wide as they saw who it was.

"Yo," Nnoitra said smugly, brandishing Santa Teresa. "Know where I can find your boss, fraccion trash?"

"No," the smaller of the two said determinedly. "And even if we did, Nnoitra, there's no way we'd tell you."

"I think you're lying, Gautiche," Jiruga hissed. "I think you know exactly where that whore is, and if you won't tell me, then there's only one thing I can do."

"What would that be, you slime?"

Nnoitra's eye gleamed with malice.

"I'll just have to beat it out of ya."

Nel read over the note one last time, hoping that it would be able to convey all of her varied emotions. The Third Espada had a strong feeling that she wouldn't get another shot at it; this was basically her last will and testament, and she was leaving it in his hands.

Hopefully, he would understand what that meant.

Sighing and wiping a stray tear from the corner of her eye, Neliel left the room behind with a buzz. She hoped Pesche and Dondochakka were awake; she could really use a laugh right now.

Her room was decidedly empty, which the female Arrancar found unnervingly odd. Where could those two have gone? Frowning, Nel left her room behind and tried to seek out her fraccions' reiatsu on foot.

"Pesche? Dondochakka?" she called out, going from room to room in search of the two Arrancar and coming up empty time after time. Growing more uneasy by the moment, Neliel's fruitless search eventually brought her face-to-face with the one person she had absolutely no desire to see.

"Yo," Nnoitra greeted, his zanpakuto slung over his shoulder. Her frown deepening, Neliel walked right past the Fifth Espada.

"You shouldn't carry your weapon around in the open like that, Nnoitra," Oderschvank said testily. "Such posturing is a sign of weakness."

As she passed him, the Third Espada noticed the dried blood on the edge of his crescent-shaped blade and her own blood froze.

"What did you do, Nnoitra?" she asked, pushing through her trepidation, and Jiruga merely grinned as the wall nearby exploded apart.

"See for yourself, woman."

The green-haired Arrancar rushed over to the gaping hole and gasped in horror as two forms became visible, crawling towards her on their hands and knees.

"Forgive us, Nel-sama," Dondochakka uttered with a subdued voice, with none of his usual cheery affectation.

"We fought him as best we could," Pesche continued weakly, "but he was too strong… please forgive us…"

Neliel bit back a sob as her two oldest comrades collapsed onto their faces, shattered mask fragments clinking on the ground.

"You monster," she growled, her head whipping back around to face Nnoitra as her eyes glared daggers at her fellow Espada. "You killed them!"

"Don't be so morbid, bitch," Jiruga spat back harshly. "I didn't kill them, I just beat the shit out of them and shattered their masks. They're still alive… barely."

The Third Espada rose to her feet slowly, her face contorted with rage. Drawing her sword, Nel focused her reiatsu and readied herself for the duel.

"Oh, so I finally gave you a reason to fight?" Jiruga asked snidely, and Neliel shook her head.

"No, you didn't," she grit out, "but you did hurt two people very, very close to me, and I'm going to make you pay for it!"

She charged and clashed violently with Nnoitra, exchanging a few blows before striking hard and forcing him through a wall. As her prey cursed sharply and plummeted down to the sand below, the green-haired Arrancar took a deep breath and dove down after him.

"You look terrible, Grimmjow."

"You're one to talk, Ichigo," the Sixth Espada shot back with a weak smile. "So, what's up?"

Ichigo decided to cut the crap and get right to the point, taking one last breath to calm himself down before beginning.

"I need to know something, Grimmjow," he said seriously. "If I were to rebel against Aizen, would you go with me?"

Jaegerjaques looked at his comrade for a long moment, before his blue eyes went wide with understanding.

"Jesus, you're not joking, are you?" he asked. "You're seriously thinking about doing something that stupid?"

"Serious as a heart attack, buddy," Kurosaki replied. "So, what would you do?"

"You know you could just order me to go with you, right?" Grimmjow said, but Ichigo shook his head.

"I'm not going to pull rank on this one," the orange-haired Soul Reaper parried. "If you want to come with me, that's one thing, but I'm not going to force you to lay your life on the line."

Grimmjow stayed quiet for a few moments before getting up from his seat and sighing.

"Well, Aizen's already shown just how much respect he has for me, and I still owe you one for saving my head from Tosen. I'd much rather go out in a blaze of glory than wait for Aizen to sacrifice me like a piece of fodder."

"So, I take it your answer is 'yes', then, Grimmjow?"

The Sixth Espada gave a wide, bloodthirsty smile.

"Hell yeah."

Ichigo smiled in kind, glad that he had at least two allies secured for when the time came to break away. When he was about to say something else, a surge of reiatsu from a ways off froze him in his tracks. It wasn't the feeling of reiatsu being released in a controlled fashion, like it was when someone powered up before a duel: this reiatsu was leaking away, and he could tell exactly whose it was.

"Oh, no…"

His heart pounding in his chest, Ichigo flashed away, hurrying towards the place where he felt the reiatsu of one of his only allies in Hueco Mundo ebbing away into nothingness.

"Please be okay, Neliel," Ichigo said to himself, growing more and more anxious. "Please be all right."

"Well, I'd say that my device's first test was a rousing success," Szayel Aporro spoke smugly as he looked down at the unconscious form of Neliel Tu Oderschvank, her breathing faint as reiatsu continued to drain from the crack in her mask. She had retained her physical form, but it was obvious that her power level had been extremely crippled by the trauma.

"Look at her," Nnoitra scoffed. "So pathetic. Can you still hear me, you whore?" he asked the prone Arrancar, before kicking her cruelly in the midsection. "How does it feel, huh? How does it feel to be beaten down by a beast?!"

As he delivered another vicious kick to her already-battered form, Szayel stepped forward and put his hand on Nnoitra's shoulder.

"Take it easy, Jiruga," he cautioned. "Aizen-sama said he wanted her alive, remember? We still need to make the delivery, in case you've forgotten."

Nnoitra growled, shaking off Grantz' hand and giving the cracked mask one last kick.

"She can take it," he spat, and the Eighth Espada just sighed.

"That kid's going to be here any minute, Nnoitra," the pink-haired Arrancar said. "Hurry up and do your job before he gets here, or things are going to get a lot messier."

"Fine," the Fifth Espada groaned, slinging the limp form roughly over his shoulder and ripping open a garganta. Stepping into the whirling blackness, Nnoitra solidified a path out of spirit particles and walked towards his destination.

"I don't know what that Ichigo kid sees in you, to be honest," Jiruga spoke to the unconscious form he was carrying like a sack of potatoes. "He must just have mommy issues, because I have no idea how anyone could ever care about an obnoxious bitch like you."

Reaching his destination at last, Nnoitra opened up another garganta and stepped out into Soul Society. Specifically, the part of Soul Society on the outskirts of the Rukongai where the Twelfth Division conducted its daily field research. Dropping his cargo roughly onto the grass, Jiruga spared his nemesis one last glance as he opened a return garganta.

"I hear this guy's a real sadistic bastard, Neliel," the Fifth Espada said evenly, a vicious grin splitting his face a heartbeat later as he briefly released his reiatsu. Stepping into the black rift, he uttered a final parting shot to the helpless female Arrancar.

"Have fun."

As Nnoitra left his former comrade behind, the immense reiatsu pulse he had emitted drew nearby Twelfth Division scientists like flies. Chief among them was none other than the Captain of Twelfth Division himself, Mayuri Kurotsuchi. As the unbalanced scientist looked down at the odd form and recognized it as an Arrancar, his mouth twisted into a disturbing grin.

"Well, well," he said excitedly, approaching his quarry like a wolf, "look what we have here. An Arrancar, in the flesh. Even better, it looks like it's still alive! Nemu!"

"Yes, sir?" the diminutive Lieutenant said, flashing to her superior's side in an instant.

"Get this thing properly restrained, and then move it into my lab. And make sure no one knows about it, either," Mayuri ordered harshly. "If anyone interferes with my research, I will hold your worthless hide responsible."

"Of course, Mayuri-sama," Nemu said with a nod of her head, ordering a team to begin preparing the unconscious Arrancar for transportation. As he looked down at his newest specimen, the Captain felt a thrill build within him that had been absent for a long time: finally, he had some new materials to work with.

"What treasures are you hiding in there, Arrancar?" he asked, half-to-himself. "Oh, the fun I shall have prying them from you!"

Ichigo arrived at the spot where Neliel's reiatsu was the strongest, but there was nothing there. Shouting out a curse, the Soul Reaper felt his vision going red when a strained voice from behind him caught his attention.

"Ichigo…"

Kurosaki spun around, his anger being replaced for the moment by shock as he saw the de-masked forms of Pesche and Dondochakka before him.

"What happened to you two?" he asked hastily, rushing towards them with the intent to heal them somehow. He was stopped, however, by words from Dondochakka.

"Don't bother," he said, his voice scratchy. "We'll manage. If we can't make it, then we'll see Nel-sama in the beyond, don'tcha know."

Ichigo's heart stopped beating at the implication.

"She's not…"

"No," Pesche said, "but part of me wishes that she was, for her sake."

"Tell me what happened," Kurosaki insisted, his voice growing steely as frustration and guilt began to weigh down on him. "Now."

"It was Nnoitra," Dondochakka answered. "He started a fight with Nel-sama, and then he used a dirty trick to ambush her and broke her mask open!"

The orange-haired Soul Reaper's directionless, raging anger had found a target, and his brown eyes narrowed as they began to bleed into yellow and black.

"What happened next?" he asked in a murderous voice, and the larger fraccion drew in a rattling breath before continuing.

"He dragged her through a garganta, but we were too far away to tell just where he dropped her off. When he came back, he was alone, don'tcha know."

"Was there anyone else with him?" Kurosaki practically growled, and Pesche shook his head.

"Not that we could see, no…"

Before the fraccion could finish his sentence, Ichigo was gone in a malevolent burst of reiatsu that sent a shiver down the fraccion's spines.

"Do you think he's going to kill Nnoitra, Pesche?"

The smaller Arrancar nodded and replied, his voice vengeful.

"If he doesn't think of something worse, Dondochakka."

The powerful reiatsu that appeared out of nowhere sent a shiver down the spines of all of the gathered Espada outside of the Vasto Lorde. Hichigo, who was lounging over to the side, smiled like a bloodthirsty maniac.

"He's furious," the Hollow said gleefully. "I've never seen him this angry before; one of you worms is so fucked!"

No more than two heartbeats after this declaration had been made, the doors to the main hall were ripped clean from their hinges. As the dust cleared, the figure that had caused the damage stood revealed as none other than Ichigo, currently adorned in his white bankai uniform. His reiatsu rolled off of him in thick, oppressing waves, as if it was trying to reach out and crush anything it could get its hands on. Any Espada below the Sixth was feeling paralyzed, and even Stark flinched at the fierceness of the Lieutenant's power. But Ichigo couldn't have cared less about the effects his power was having on anyone: his eyes were focused squarely on the Fifth Espada, and no one else.

"Nnoitra," he hissed, and Jiruga had to fight to hold back a shiver as the killing intent that was dripping from each syllable stabbed at him like a sword.

"Yeah?" the Espada replied nonchalantly, but his cool attitude was soon disrupted as Ichigo flashed in front of him, grabbed him by his throat and slammed him into the closest wall, slowly choking the life from his enemy.

"I'm only going to ask you this once," Kurosaki said coldly, as Nnoitra tried to break free from the hold and failed miserably. "Where… is… Neliel?"

Aizen did nothing as one of his soldiers squeezed the life out of another; Ulquiorra, however, heard the question and his eyes widened ever so slightly. What had happened to Nel?

"Fuck you, Soul Reaper," Nnoitra gagged out.

Ichigo gave the Espada a hard hook across the jaw, and then another and another, until a substantial trickle of blood was leaking from the corner of Jiruga's mouth.

"Start talking, or I start cutting off your limbs."

The Espada gasped out a chuckle at the threat.

"You don't have the guts, brat, or the strength."

Ichigo's yellow eyes blazed at the challenge.

"Oh, really?" he asked, before letting go of Nnoitra's neck. As the Arrancar gasped to regain his breath, Ichigo raised his katana and sliced off one of his arms. Jiruga screamed bloody murder at the sudden amputation, but the Soul Reaper's eyes remained stony.

"Start talking, you bastard, or I'll take the other one."

Nnoitra shrugged off his pain long enough to reply, his tone feral and mocking.

"If you really want to know," he hissed, "then I'll tell you, but don't say I didn't warn ya. That bitch is in Soul Society, currently in the custody of one Mayuri Kurotsuchi."

Ichigo's blood froze as the name rang in his ears and the horror stories that Ishida had told him all that time ago rose back up into the forefront of his mind like a roiling nightmare. Mayuri Kurotsuchi was a madman, someone who drew as much pleasure from performing a vivisection as a normal person might experience from winning the lottery. He was a sick, twisted freak, and now, because Ichigo hadn't acted quickly enough, Neliel was in his clutches.

As the rational part of his mind tried not to panic at the news, the primal part that wanted nothing to do with reasoning took over Ichigo's actions. Kurosaki took a few steps away from the still-reeling Fifth Espada, his fist clenched hard enough for his fingernails to dig into his palm and draw blood. As his hand unclenched, a focused, absurdly powerful orb of red energy began to appear and grow a few inches away from the surface of his palm. As the gran rey cero finished forming, Ichigo raised his arm up behind him and fired it off without even looking at his target, engulfing and annihilating the Fifth Espada.

The spontaneous, uncontrolled and instinctive outburst seemed to drain the Soul Reaper immensely, but he didn't show it as he turned to face Aizen.

"Requesting permission to—"

"No."

The Soul Reaper's still-yellow eyes widened in shock at the blatant refusal.

"What?"

Aizen smiled at the look on his subordinate's face; human emotions were just too precious sometimes.

"I refuse to allow you to attempt a rescue mission, Ichigo. I assume that is what you were going to ask me for permission to do, no?"

"But… but she's… Nel's the third-strongest Arrancar you have under your command! Why would you not want to rescue her?"

Aizen's smile widened as he replied.

"Because I'm the one who ordered Nnoitra to do what he did," the former Captain explained as Ichigo's expression became even more surprised. "Oh, come now," Aizen said condescendingly. "Don't look so shocked, Ichigo. Neliel was seditious, and she had been from the first day she joined me. It's common sense that a military leader cannot afford to have potential traitors in their ranks, don't you agree?"

The double meaning of the question was not lost on Ichigo, and he had to fight to retain his composure.

"Of course," the orange-haired Soul Reaper said as evenly as he could, before bowing and taking his leave. After the meeting had been concluded and the hall stood empty but for Aizen and Ichimaru, Sosuke smiled and spoke.

"And so it begins," he said. "Let's see how far Ichigo strays before he realizes the truth."

Gin's brow furrowed in confusion; Aizen had planned this out as a test?

"And what, pray tell, would that 'truth' be?" the silver-haired Captain asked, and Sosuke's smile widened.

"That, in the end, there is only one place for a warrior and a killer such as him," the former Captain answered ominously, "and that place is at my side."

Ulquiorra Schiffer walked slowly through the halls of Las Noches, trying to buy himself as much time as he could to sort out his thoughts before he reached his quarters and had to make a decision. The Fourth Espada knew that Ichigo was going to rebel, and he also knew that Aizen had used Neliel's life as a chip with which to force Kurosaki's hand. But Schiffer was far from stupid, and realized that any force rebelling against Aizen, and especially one of a small size, had a very slim chance of succeeding, if any at all. It was a choice between choosing to die in a suicidal fashion or living with self-loathing as his constant companion, mocking his cowardice.

Ulquiorra was in no hurry to make that choice, hence his slow pace towards his quarters. In what seemed like no time at all, the Arrancar blinked and found himself in his room, staring down at a piece of paper that had been left on his desk.

It was a note from Neliel, and judging from the slight smudges left by moisture, she had been shedding sporadic tears while writing it. As his green eyes moved carefully and methodically over the words that had been written with chilling finality, acceptance and heart-wrenchingly sincere regret, Ulquiorra grit his teeth and made up his mind. Folding the letter up and putting it into a pocket inside of his jacket, the Fourth Espada sighed in defeat and disappeared with a buzz.

That woman was going to be the death of him.

"You know this mission is suicide, right?" Grimmjow asked Ichigo as the Soul Reaper prepared himself for his second journey to Soul Society under arms.

"Yep."

"And you're still going to go, right?"

"Yep."

"Even though, regardless of whether or not we succeed, Aizen is still going to hunt us down like dogs?"

"Yep."

"Do you have any idea where we're going to stay afterwards?"

Ichigo's pattern of affirmative replies stalled at that question.

"…I'm working on that."

"Great," Grimmjow shot back, sarcasm lacing the word.

"Would you just relax, Jaegerjaques?" Hichigo broke in. "Even if Gin can't come with us since he wants to be a pussy and maintain his 'cover', the three of us are gonna be more than enough to bust into Soul Society and get this broad back, safe and sound."

"I would be inclined to disagree," an even voice called out from the other side of the room. The trio of would-be rebels turned around to find themselves face to face with the Fourth Espada, Ulquiorra Schiffer.

"Ulquiorra," Grimmjow growled, their rivalry emerging once again. "What are you doing here?"

"If you came here to try and stop us, I can tell you right now that you'll fail," Ichigo said sternly, his hand gripping Zangetsu's hilt. Ulquiorra, rather than drawing his own sword, just shot the orange-haired warrior a skeptical look.

"Are you always so headstrong, Kurosaki?" he asked. "I'm not here to stop you, Soul Reaper," the Espada finished, stepping forward,

"I'm here to join you."

Ichigo's jaw all but hit the floor at the idea of the stoic Ulquiorra taking part in a rebellion, but he wasn't about to look a gift horse in the mouth.

"Welcome aboard," the brown-eyed Soul Reaper replied as he opened a garganta, the black void swirling ominously in front of the four.

"Ulquiorra," Jaegerjaques asked before they crossed the threshold, "why exactly are you doing this?"

"My reasons are my own," the Fourth Espada answered calmly as he stepped forward, solidifying a path wide enough for the four warriors to walk abreast of each other. "What are you three waiting for? We don't have time to sit around."

The remaining rebels stepped forward and Hichigo closed the garganta behind them, severing their ties with Aizen for good. This done, the group rushed forward, headed straight for Soul Society.

Now, there was no going back.

A/N: I feel like a huge jerk doing that to Neliel, but it had to be done. And in case any of you are wondering, yes, the contents of the note Nel wrote to Ulquiorra will be revealed next chapter. So begins what I like to call "Soul Society: Round 2", which should be an awesome arc full of action, tension and diabolical schemes brewing in Las Noches. In short, business as usual. I hope you enjoyed it, and as always, please review!