Fear III

This chapter has spoilers for those who only watch the anime and do not read the manga. You have been warned.

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There was so much she did not understand.

She did not comprehend why she was unable to attack him. Every time her fist or leg was about to land a blow on him, the force of the attack seemed to fade, as though she had somehow slowed or weakened.

Time. Old Age. The Aspects of Death. I… I am facing He Who Brings Death Himself?

Soifon felt the sickening crunch within her left arm, but she did not understand. Baraggan had used Sonido and passed by her, barely touching her left shoulder. His fingers barely grazed her. But her left arm lay limp, and she bit her lip in pain. The bones inside her arm had been shattered with that touch and she knew it instinctively.

"You do not understand. That is what death is. And between now and the end of the battle, there will not be a single thing you can fathom." Baraggan's eyes narrowed. "Rot."

Soifon thought that seeing Ggio Vega's Resurrecion form would prepare her for the Espada's own transformation. Nothing could have prepared her for the sight before her eyes, as Baraggan's flesh seemed to peel away in a smoky mist, leaving a skeleton shrouded in a thick cloak of fur, a crown of spiked bone on his head.

She now understood why the Fraccion had called Baraggan "king". He was a king – a king of death, crowned with trophies, an embodiment of death itself.

The Skeletal King began to walk over the rooftop to Soifon and Omaeda. Each step sounded a crunch, and he left destruction in his wake, as though the ground had rotted beneath his feet. Soifon's eyes widened. What power is this… everything he touches rots and crumbles!

"No, Shinigami. You do not understand. My Aspect of Death is Age. Everything around me rots and dies."

Soifon began to understand fear. Her heart lurched and she did something unexpected.

She yelled for Omaeda to flee.

However, the Vice-Captain was too overwhelmed by Baraggan's display of power to realize that panic and concern in his Captain's voice. He stood entranced, rapt in fear, staring, equally unable to comprehend.

"Respira." The raspy, skeletal voice breathed out this word in a hiss, and a black miasma seemed to emanate from his very being, stretching out its deadly tentacles towards Soifon.

Her Onmitsukido training took over, and she fled, knowing that the enemy before her was too powerful. She did not understand the cloud and did not want to stand in its path.

Her shun-po was the best in Soul Society, but even her extraordinary speed and agility could not take her away quickly enough from Baraggan's Respira. It caught up with her, like the gentlest breeze passing through the fingertips of her left hand.

And her hand began to rot. Soifon screamed out in pain and horror as her flesh melted before her eyes, leaving behind a skeletal hand. The rot spread up her arm, and she knew it – Baraggan, Death – would take over her if she did not stop it. "Omaeda!!"

That scream shook the Vice-Captain out of his reverie and he looked over at his Captain and saw her shocking injury, which chilled him to his core. "Omaeda! Cut off my arm!" He hesitated, unable to believe what was happening or what was being asked of him. "Hurry! Do you want me to die??" Her voice was a raw cocktail of anger, panic, dread, pain, and a chilling fear.

All Shinigami were drilled in the laws of the Central 46. It is an offence to attack a Captain. However, Omaeda's Onmitsukido training took over. Obedience, duty, loyalty, protection. Not to Central 46, but to Captain Soifon, Commander in Chief of the Onmitsukido.

He flash-stepped to her, raised Gegetsuburi, and hacked her left arm off, just below the shoulder. He was just in time, for the rot had already spread halfway through her upper arm.

When the sword pierced through what remained of the flesh and bone, Soifon doubled over in pain and cried out, and tears misted over her eyes for the briefest moment. She had never been so badly injured in battle before, and indeed, in the past hundred years, had never thought that any physical injury could rival the emotional and mental pain of abandonment. Yet this was far worse than anything she had ever endured. And I must endure. I must overcome.

She clutched the bleeding wound on her shoulder, while Omaeda stood next to her exposed left side, looking grimly protective, his sword raised against the enemy.

The Skeletal god laughed mockingly, his laughter a hollow, empty sound that chilled her heart. "How fascinating. It appears that Shingami are actually afraid of death."

Soifon's heart lurched again at his speech.

He is right. Why should I be afraid of death? I am Shinigami, a god of death myself. Why do I fear?

Shinigami understand death in some of its aspects, as a process. Not all of us have died and experienced it firsthand. We are familiar with the ways and processes of death. To lose control over that which you are supposed to use, which is so much a part of your everyday work… that creates fear.

I fear death, because I have reason to live. I fear death, because I fear what might happen to the others, even to my fool of a Vice-Captain, if I were to die here.

Yoruichi-sama. I fear death, because I promised to return.

Soifon knew there and then that she did not want to understand death itself firsthand. Her wound throbbed painfully and insistently, and her shoulder blades were still rattled from the shock of the sword cleave. But she needed to fight on. I have no choice. I will have to use it.

"Omaeda!" She yelled, her voice still strong. He turned to her, worried. "I need you to act as a decoy…"