I found Aizen already well ensconced in the rooms that the original master of this Realm, the Katschei, had inhabited. It was a spacious suite, really more like its own miniature palace. Besides a bedroom and bathouse of palatial proportions, the rooms led directly to Katschei's immense private library (who knew what the public one was for since, to my knowledge the old miser had never had any visitors) and a tower with several floors of magical workrooms where he presumably conducted his research and experimentation into the uncombed depths of magic.
"Up here, Abarai," I heard the voice of my new master call.
I shrugged mentally to myself, trying not to feel too leery about getting too close to a man I considered to be a dangerous enemy. I already knew he was way smarter than I could ever hope to be, I was hanging all my hopes on a very slender thread indeed when I had made my play to try to trick him. Chances were very very good that I had not fooled him at all. I had the sinking feeling that Aizen had already decided to find another way to make sure his new henchmen stayed loyal to him, hopefully it didn't have anything to do with that drink Hisana, er, Isana had just consumed.
I tried not to drag my feet as I stepped on to the flat circle inset into the floor and it rose up on its own past multiple levels of the Katschei's private work-tower. I caught glimpses of the rooms as I passed them level by level. Many were lined with multi-tiered cases holding what looked like books, but they were all exactly the same size and shape. Other rooms had long benches in them with all manner of paraphernalia on them, others were filled with glass-lined closets full of row upon row of neatly labeled jars, bottles and boxes, all of which were of uniform sizes only the substances in them were different.
:This guy was not only a miser, but clearly more than a little OCD as well,: I mused to myself.
One room held glass spheres with glowing clouds roiling inside them like captured thunderstorms, another room held what looked like a hundred different bird cages each holding some poor elemental creature within it. At last the lift slowed and stopped in another room that had more crystal spheres in it, but I recognized these ones... they held Shadows in them, and there were hundreds of them. The sphere's came in varying sizes from no larger than a child's playing marble to about the size of a basketball. Aizen had his back turned to me, examining the contents of one of the more sizable spheres with one eye while he held open a book in one hand whose pages seemed to glow a bluish-green color.
"You called for me sir?" I asked, using the same deferential tone for him that I would have used for my own Captain.
"I did," he replied easily.
Aizen paused in his perusal of whatever was written in the book to look over at me with that piercing, searching look of his. I stared blankly back at him, showing him my very best idiot-about-town look and prayed I wasn't over doing it.
"Your defection was... unexpected," Aizen said.
I was afraid to ask whether he was being frank with me or using it as an opener.
"You must understand that such unexpected behavior from you is cause for a bit of concern for me," he continued when I didn't say anything.
This could easily be a trap and my instincts warned me that if I hastened to reassure him of my loyalty towards him, he'd decide I was definitely his enemy... and kill me before I could cause trouble. Instead, I relied cautiously.
"Yeah," I said, acknowledging the truth of his words, but my tone implied "what of it, get to the point!"
Aizen smiled ever so slightly as he discerned my unspoken demand, he head raised in yet another long, appraising look.
"You will have your use to me in time,"He said casually, but his affable tone belied the sheer creep-factor underneath it. "Make no mistake of that. I do not take in those I do not think will prove useful. It was one reason why you were weeded out in the first place, as I am sure you are now aware. However, that is a project for a future date, after I have come sufficiently far in my research to require a test subject. For now, you are at loose ends, and you can understand that I don't want you causing... trouble."
I looked at him with one of those flat looks I did so well, and Aizen looked, if anything, even more amused. He held up a small crystal in the palm of his hand, one with a miniature Shadow roiling in a tiny cloud inside of it.
"What's that?" I asked as if I'd never before seen a Shadow in all of my life.
"Call it insurance," he replied.
He stepped over to me and I had to steel myself from flinching away and managed it, just barely. I didn't bother hiding the suspicious look from my face as Aizen released the seal on the Shadow and knelt down on the floor. The Shadow hissed out like a genie from a bottle then flowed downward like black mist. It found my own shadow stretched out along the floor from the sole light within the room and... merged with it. I felt a weird tingle roll over me and then nothing as it seemed to settle in.
"What the-?" I explaimed, not having to feign the very real surprise and suspicion in my voice.
"That creature is called a Shadow," Aizen said. "I won't bore you with the trifling details. All you need to know, Abarai, is that I have set it on you as your own personal watchman. It will perforce consume a minute amount of your own reiatsu to sustain itself in its half-existance, but it does not eat or sleep ever. It will be part of your every move, monitoring everything, as inseparable from you as your very own shadow. It will, of course, report back to me of everything you do."
My mouth quirked to one side as I looked down at my shadow and moved my hands and legs to see if I could notice a difference in it. The show was for Aizen's benefit, to buy me time to keep my face from showing how very inconvenient this new addition was. I had thought he'd set some kind of watch on me, but I had figured that it'd be something I could beat the crap out of somehow. How was I going to get in touch with the Captain now?
:I'll have to figure something out,: I thought to myself.
"You won't see it or hear it," Aizen said for my benefit, not really bothering to hide the contempt and boredom he already felt for his new subordinate.
"That's great," I said, my tone conveying that I could really care less.
I was about to serve him with yet more of just what he expected of me, just to really throw him off the scent.
"When am I fighting Kuchiki, and where can I train until then?"
Under even the most normal of circumstances that would have been the first thing I asked about and the only thing I cared about. My mania for training myself in order to defeat him was well-known among both strangers and my own social set in Seireitei. It was the reason I was friends with Madarame (or at least it had started out that way) it was the reason I was a lieutenant in Sixth... it was just about the reason I did anything. As my best friend Momo's former Captain for many decades, Aizen would naturally be well aware of it.
Aizen didn't, quite, roll his eyes but his tone of dismissal was clear. My monomania for trying to bring down my captain was about to buy me free run of the pace and a minimal guard if I wasn't mistaken.
"There are testing courts in the lower levels and gardens outside," he said in a bored tone, already turning back to whatever it was he was working on. "See that you stay clear of the ones with the ruins as there are delicate spells in place that maintain this realm."
"What about food and sake?" I asked next.
That would naturally be second on my list of priorities. I could almost see Aizen starting to regret saddling himself with a moron. Ah, but I was a moron with information, and information was power.
"You will have to discover that for yourself," he said, sounding a little irritated now. He didn't quite flick his fingers at me to shoo me off, but it was clear that he wanted to.
"Right then, call me when it's time to fight," I replied strolling jauntily over to the lift, looking like I didn't have a single thought in my head except for the next battle.
:Zabs?: I asked my zanpaktou. :Can that Shadow hear what I'm thinking?"
If it could, I was in deep kimchee.
:It is a nearly powerless specimen of its type,: he reassured me. :Even if it had the ability I would certainly be powerful enough to sheild us.:
:Good, that's one worry out of the way.:
:What do you think he has planned for you?: Snakey asked curiously.
:Who cares?: I replied. :Whatever it is, it can't be good. Let's just focus on finding his heartstone and thinking of a way to warn Captain without Aizen knowing about it so he can think up some way to defeat that guy. We gotta move quick, but first we should train for a good long session so that Aizen sees me behaving exactly the way I always do.:
The training session would be done in roar-form naturally, no sense in laying my ace in the hole out on the table already. After a good long session I had the vague notion of using the search for food and drink as a cover for my real objective: finding Aizen's heartstone. Once I had that found, I could figure out some way to get in touch with Captain, let him know what was going on. I didn't know what to do about the other prisoners. I felt bad that they were there at all, but I had a mission of my own to take care of. If I didn't find that heartstone I had a feeling we were all screwed.
:I don't know what he's going to do with Rukia if he actually manages to do what he's set out to do.:
Aizen had already proven himself utterly ruthless when it came to getting a hold of the hougyoku. He'd tried to kill Rukia once already in his first attempt.
:If he tries to kill her a second time, it'll only be over my dead body,: I swore to myself. :Rukia, be safe. I'll get us out of this somehow. Rukia...: