Hollow king Chapter eleven
War Zone
I love my Xbox 360! and Tite Kubo owns bleach.
Gondra and Isane scanned the crowds of the busy Karakura streets, looking for the two captains. It was harder than they had thought. The battle crazed berserker and the twisted mad scientist could have been anywhere. Gondra was about to turn to Isane to discuss what they should do next when they heard some familiar voices arguing loudly,
"Come on, Kurotsuchi. You look a lot better without all that damn makeup and crap on your head."
"Shut up, you fool! It's bad enough that I have to be sent on a mission with the likes of you, without having to be mocked about my choice of style. Besides, you're one to talk with those ridiculous bells you always wear."
"Whatever, man. So where the hell are they?"
Gondra and Isane followed the voices to find the two bickering captains standing next to a street light. Gondra could recognize that spiky hair anywhere, even though the eleventh squad captain was wearing a gigai. Kenpachi was wearing a rugged pair of boot-cut bluejeans with an open brown flight jacket, and underneath, a gray t-shirt with a black skull on the front and hiking boots.
"Hey, Captain! Over here!" Gondra called out as he ran up to Kenpachi with Isane a few steps behind him.
"There you two are. You ready to fight some arrancar? I know I am." Kenpachi stated happily as Gondra and Isane noticed the killer instinct in his lone eye.
"Can we move this along? I despise waiting and have research that must be done." the thin man with dark blue hair standing next to Kenpachi snapped coldly as he rolled his eyes impatiently.
Gondra turned his attention to the unfamiliar looking man. He was wearing a plain blue tank top with gray cargo pants, a lab coat and sandals. Gondra was pretty sure he knew who the man was when he noticed the surgical scars and menacing golden eyes.
"Captain Kurotsuchi, is that you?" Gondra asked, to be sure.
"Of course its me, you imbecile!" Kurotsuchi barked impatiently.
"Wow, you seriously look way more normal without all those prosthetics and paint." Gondra noted with a smile.
After an irritated sigh from Mayuri, he glanced over Gondra's shoulder to where Isane was clinging to Gondra's back and hiding behind him nervously.
"There's no need to worry, my dear. You're not on my research list. For now anyway." Mayuri stated with a faint malevolent smile on his slender face. His soft spoken words caused Isane to cling much tighter to Gondra's shoulders.
"Uhm...Professor, I think you're freaking her out." Gondra stated as he tried to wriggle out of Isane's death grip.
Kenpachi started to laugh and make a teasing remark when four different soul pagers went off at the same time, interrupting him. Mayuri was the first to take his out and read the screen.
"It appears the arrancar have arrived early." he announced loudly.
The four shinigami rushed over the where the arrancar had emerged. Gondra could see a small group of arrancar standing in the Garganta. There were four of them by the looks of it, he noted silently. The first was built like a tank with dark skin with a bony lower jaw attached to his chin. The second arrancar was smaller, with blond hair with a tiara shaped chunk of bone on his forehead. He bore an almost autistic look on his face. The third looked oddly feminine with a tooth shaped mask fragment in his hair. The fourth, Gondra recognized from his days as a demi- hollow. It was the arrancar with the bloody sword, the shock of blue hair and the upper and lower jaw bone on the right side of his face. He immediately sped off, leaving the others to the fight, as if he was looking for someone or something in particular. Even as he vanished from sight, Gondra couldn't help but notice the arrancar was missing an arm.
Before Gondra could even react to the threat, he saw four other shinigami rush forward to fight the three remaining arrancar. It was only then that he recognized Ikkaku and Yumichika among them. Gondra was about to join the fight when a second Garganta opened to reveal four more arrancar. Gondra saw that Ghelid was among them.
"Hello, Ghelid." Gondra said in a smooth tone as he swallowed a soul candy and stepped out of his gigai. Isane and Kenpachi did the same as Mayuri stabbed himself with syringe instead to separate himself from his own gigai. With a flourish he took on his usual shinigami form.
"Greetings, shinigami. I am pleased to see that you were wise enough to bring some captains with you."
"Let's go some place else to fight. It's a little too crowded for our battle here." Gondra stated while gesturing up towards the other battle taking place up in the sky.
"Fine with us. We'd be happy to kill you anywhere." Ghelid offered in a low, menacing tone as he smiled behind his gas mask.
XXXXX
The four shinigami and arrancar came to a stop at an out of town, deserted beach. Kurotsuchi noted with interest that Gondra used sonido instead of shunpo like he and the other two shinigami did. Kenpachi paid no mind to it as he was to focused on the upcoming fight, but Isane noticed and couldn't help but wander what Gondra was hiding about himself.
"Hey, Gondra! I'll let you take out the freak in the gas mask. Not that I don't want to, mind ya. It's just you need a challenge once in a while. Besides, you two already planned to fight, right?" Kenpachi said with a grin as he drew his blade and eyed the arrancar on the far right with three mask fragment horns on his forehead.
"Thanks, Captain. I owe you one." Gondra replied easily.
"You owe me five. Now, let's just fight already." Kenpachi chuckled, eager for the bloodshed to begin.
"I prefer to learn the name of the person I'm about to kill. Would you kindly tell me yours shinigami?" Ghelid called out as he drew his blade from behind his waist.
"Gondra Durden, fourth seat of Squad eleven." Gondra replied proudly as he drew Sunaryuu slowly from his back.
"Excellent! Now, Gondra Durden, let us begin!" Ghelid shouted as two of the arrancar dashed forward and clashed blades with Kenpachi and Mayuri.
"This is such a bother. I hoped my fighting prowess wouldn't be needed. I would much rather just observe. But to do that, you are in my way!" Mayuri shouted as he knocked the arrancar with a mask fragment resembling a lens over his left eye, back.
"Scratch out. Ashisogi Jizo!" Mayuri commanded his zanpakuto. It instantly morphed into a jagged golden trident that bellowed poison from it's infant-like face by the hilt. Kurotsuchi deflected another blow from the arrancar, slicing him across the shoulder in the process. The blow paralyzed the arrancar's left arm. He struggled to regain the use of his left arm, falling back slightly. As he retrieved his dropped sword off the ground, he said quietly,
"Shift Ivory Tower."
Instantly the tall thin arrancar's body became riddled with white spike-like obelisks that he fired in Kurotsuchi's direction.
"Such a bother." Kurotsuchi complained again as he deflected most of the spikes but one slipped through, hitting him in the arm. He looked down at the wound, noting curiously,
"But still an interesting ability."
Meanwhile, on the other side of the beach, Kenpachi was furiously slashing away at the other arrancar. The hollow fought back with gusto, returning blow for blow. Despite this, Kenpachi roared,
"Come on, man! You can do better than that. Fight me like you mean it!"
With a lunging attack, the horned arrancar stabbed Kenpachi through the chest. After a moment's pause, the arrancar looked up to see Zaraki unaffected and grinning.
"Now, that's more like it!" Kenpachi laughed happily before slicing the arrancar across the chest and sending out a wide spray of blood that colored Kenpachi's face red. Hungrily, he licked the blood from his teeth and lips. The arrancar staggered unsteadily, glaring at Kenpachi, he called out,
"Crush Ravager!"
The arrancar's body twisted as he mutated before Kenpachi's eyes. His upper and lower jaw jutted out like a bear trap and his chest and back became encased in white armor.
"Hmm...things are finally getting interesting." Kenpachi noted as a smile spread across his face.
Meanwhile, in the middle of the beach, Gondra was locking Horns with Ghelid. As he fought the arrancar, he struggled to keep an eye on Isane. So far, she was effectively dodging the attacks of the female arrancar, who wore a mask fragment resembling a headband holding her hair back. He watched as Isane just barely sidestepped another thrust of the arrancar's blade that tore open her hakama top in the process, revealing a part of her chest and bra.
"Nice rack." the arrancar she was battling chimed teasingly with a half perverted half evil grin on her face.
"That's it! Bakudo 61! Six rod prison of light!" Isane shouted as she pointed at the arrancar. A moment later, her opponent was trapped in the kido spell and struggling to escape.
"Run Itegumo!" Isane called out, causing two shorter blades to form on a forty five degree angle from the hilt of her zanpakuto.
With a little hesitation, Isane lunged forward. Her blades stabbed the arrancar in the shoulder. The tissue surrounding the wound instantly froze. Even the blood seeping out crystallized. With a shriek of pain, the arrancar broke out of the binding spell and raised her sword in the air.
"You want a fight, bitch? I'll give you a fight! Split Characterantula!" she shouted angrily. The woman's form began to split, forming tentacles on her shoulders and sides.
Gondra tore his eyes from Isane's fight. He had to focus on Ghelid's deadly assault. With both of his hands on the grip of Sunaryuu, and a moderate amount of effort, Gondra parried most of Ghelid's strikes, only getting cut now and then. He used one of the moves that Tyler taught him, spinning around on his heel and smashing his blade against Ghelid's, knocking him back.
"Damn it! Sunaryuu's recoil effect barely works on this guy." Gondra said to himself as he tried to think of a plan.
"Babe, they're playing our song! Target locked Sunaryuu!" Gondra shouted as he raised his blade in the air, transforming it into the heavy rocket cleaver with mounted canon.
With twice the drive to win, Gondra smashed his blade against Ghelid's with the rockets activated causing a shower of sparks. Ghelid looked at Gondra through the sparks with a mild look of surprise on his face.
"So this is your shikai, eh Gondra? Rather unconventional but impressive none the less."
Just before Ghelid finished his statement a familiar red orb of energy formed at the end of the plug on Ghelid's gas mask. Gondra barely had time to block when he was blasted by a deadly cero attack. Knocked to the ground, Gondra turned to see Isane with a tentacle wrapped tightly around her neck, holding her off the ground as the other arrancar clone was readying for an attack.
Had to cut it off at some point folks. Hope you liked the cliff hanger. Be sure to leave me a nice offering in the form of a review on your way out. Thank you and have a nice day.
Sandragon out.....