This chapter, alone, was probably more fun to write than every chapter before it put together.
enjoy.
X-X-X
The Striking Snake
ch7
Gillians, and Ears
X-X-X
Gin's figure flickered into existence as he flash-stepped up to Uryuu's position in the park. Between the two of them, there were few small hollows remaining; those that lingered were hiding away in whatever cover they could find.
It was a good thing, too, because the evil reiatsu pouring out of the... dimension rift, or whatever it was called... swamped both of the hollow-hunters' reiatsu senses. But, by sheer luck, the small fry seemed at least as terrified by this huge presence as the boys were.
"Yo, Jam-san!"
"Ichimaru," said Uryuu shortly, ignoring the jab. "I fear our challenge may have to be put on hold."
"Suits me," replied Gin lazily. "I lost count anyway - high twenties, low thirties, somethin' like that. From what I could tell, I reckon ya made about the same numbers anyway."
"Around that, yes." Uryuu adjusted his glasses. "Since I know you're uneducated about spirit-world things, this opening portal is called a Descorrer. It leads to a dimensional tunnel known as a Garganta - it is known that very powerful hollows deploy through these portals, although I confess I do not know where from. Quincy texts do not seem to contain any information on what lies on the other side of a Garganta."
There was an unearthly wailing from the swirling black depths of the rift, echoing across Karakura like some kind of apocalyptic siren.
"Gin!" Came an irritated voice, immediately followed by the pattering of short footsteps. There was only one person it could be.
"Hello, Rukia," said Gin cheerfully. "Ya missed an entertaining contest, ya know. Really, quite an epic challenge - "
"Shut up, Gin," she said, punching him heavily in the ribs. "I think we all have bigger problems than the pride of boys right now. A Descorrer, here? With no warning? The Gotei Juusan-Tai must be scrambling to deal with - "
"Quit bickering!" Said Uryuu abruptly. "Whatever it is, it's about to - "
X-X-X
Pain.
The thing was old. So old, so very old. Yes. It had felt pain for a long time. Yes. A long, long time. So long that it had almost forgotten how to feel it. Almost forgotten what hurting felt like.
It had forgotten many things. Many, many things. Yes. Its name. Its favorite color. It had forgotten, yes, forgotten most things which made it an it. It had forgotten what anger was. It had forgotten desire and envy. It had forgotten love. It had even, after its own fashion, forgotten sadness.
Never quite forgotten pain, though. No. Never.
That pain never let itself be forgotten. It hurt forever. Eons of it. Yes. Pain of the heart, the heart which it had forgotten, the heart which no longer existed. Loneliness. Despair. Even after its heart had been ripped out, the ache lingered. It stayed on, an ache where nothing should be left to hurt. Yes.
The despair. The fear. The hunger.
The feeling as if empty. The feeling, as if hollow.
It could be sated, though.
It could reduce, if not remove, its pain. For a while, yes. A precious little while.
There were warm things ahead. The Garganta had been a long journey. Yes. A long time in the cold. But worth it, for the warm things.
All it needed was the warm feeling. Yes.
Heat, light. It hadn't forgotten heat or light, despite how scarce either were in the dark Forests. Heat, light, the feelings of living. The taste of life.
The taste could... ameliorate the pain, a little.
Not enough, of course. Never enough.
But a little.
The Gillian roared.
X-X-X
Two colossal, bony hands reached out of the thin but tall tear in the dimensional fabric, gripping the edges and abruptly pulling them wide open.
The trio of hollow-hunters went pale at the sight. Even Gin momentarily stopped grinning, his eyes narrowing even further.
"M- menos!" breathed Rukia, her voice shaking.
The monster that stepped out of the Descorrer was a terror to behold. Gin had no idea how tall it was, as there were no tall buildings near the park to compare it to - ten stories? Fifteen, maybe? It was colossal.
The beast itself seemed humanoid, and shrouded in a shapeless black cloak that hid most of its body. Its spindly hands were bone-white, and what could be seen of its feet beneath its robes, seemed to be wrapped in dirty bandages. Its mask alone was bigger than ten men, sporting small glowing eyes and an almost comical nose that was hugely long and pointed.
And at the center of what was probably its chest, piercing robes and body alike, was a huge, gaping hole, large enough to drive a truck through.
"Menos Grande... Gillian-class," whispered Rukia. "I'd never even seen one before, outside of diagrams at the academy! What - what's it doing here?"
Gin twirled his knife thoughtfully. "What about you, Ishida?" He asked. "Know anything about them?"
"Never seen one personally," he said, "and there's barely a trace of information on them in Quincy lore. I know they're enough to make a Shinigami lieutenant sweat, though, and the lieutenants are the second most powerful soldiers that the Shinigami can field."
"Huh." Gin's frown was replaced by a thoughtful look. "Okay, so how're we gonna kill this bugger? I mean, I'm hopin' there's a better way than just hacking at its feet 'till it falls over."
"I could kill that thing with a single strike." Behind his narrow eyelids, Gin rolled his eyes. Voices in his head. What a time to go insane.
"Hacking its feet? You would think of that first," Uryuu sighed. "I doubt I can fire anything powerful enough to seriously harm it. Kuchiki-san?"
Rukia shook her head. "I'm good at Kido, sure, but my reiatsu is still nearly nothing. Even with a full incantation, I wouldn't be able to deliver anything that could kill it..."
"So, nobody has anything - "
The Gillian howled again, apparently sniffing the air. Its beady eyes zeroed in on the town center.
Gin's grin seemed almost guilty as he saw the thing's target. "Oh. That ain't good."
Rukia snapped her hands up.
"Ye lord! Mask of flesh and bone, flutter of wings, ye who bears the name of Man!"
Gin watched with rapt interest, engaging his reiatsu sense to observe the mechanics. He had often wondered exactly how Rukia's Kido spells worked.
"Truth and temperance, upon this sinless wall of dreams, unleash a fraction of the wrath of your claws!"
Her power was still pitifully diminished, but what little there was focused into a blue glow in front of her hand. It seemed the incantation had an unidentifiable focusing effect on the reiatsu flare, possibly magnifying it somehow beyond what the caster could summon alone...
"Hado 33: Blue Fire, Crash Down!"
The lance of energy flashed and struck, burning into the Gillian's lower robes - and from the fact that it staggered and wailed, the attack must have struck a leg.
"Well, that got its attention," said Uryuu sardonically. "Now, how do we avoid a swift but painful death?"
"Yeah, I've been wondering that one myself for a while now," remarked Gin. "Surprised it took ya this long to think of it, really..."
Uryuu glared. "Now is not the time for flippancy!"
"Hey, I'm just saying..."
The Gillian wailed again, and this time, its eyes were focused on the trio. Its mouth opened, and between its teeth, an immense orb of glowing red energy materialized, growing larger by the second.
Gin's grin twisted downwards into a frown of apprehension.
"A Céro," hissed Rukia. "Gin! Ishida! Get away from - "
The orb flashed, and fired, the wide red beam flashing straight towards the teenagers.
The resultant explosion could have been mistaken for the detonation of a cruise missile warhead.
X-X-X
To an external observer, it would have appeared that Gin reacted without thinking.
This would not have been true. Gin hardly ever did anything without thinking, least of all try out dangerous experimental techniques with no guarantee of success. He had thought about this strategy quite carefully.
However, one could be forgiven for this mistake, as Gin thought very quickly indeed.
In two short flash-steps he had grabbed both of his erstwhile companions, dragging them around so that his body was between them and the oncoming Céro. Then, in a burst of teeth-gritting willpower, he focused his reiatsu down to the skin of his spirit body, willing it with every fiber of his being to defy mortal physics and shrug off the impending blast of lethal energy.
After all, reiatsu was a function of one's mental fortitude - attack strength was focused by the purity of one's will to strike, and flash-step was focused by the purity of one's will to move quickly. Would it not, then, logically follow that one could make oneself tougher by singularly willing one's body to become invulnerable?
In his nanosecond of breathing time, Gin almost laughed at the swift mental gymnastics that spirit powers seemed to require.
Then the Céro struck, and his world was washed away in a sea of red fire.
X-X-X
The Céro was, in a sense, the Menos' answer to the Shinigami Hado-Kido. The latter focused controlled reiatsu blasts into subtle and tailored effects that required complex concentration, and could not be done without a clarity of mind no hollow could claim.
The former, however, simply collected a large pool of raw, unstable energy - the kind of power generated by bitterness and hate - and blasted it at its target in a ray of indiscriminate destruction.
The Gillian's attack had laid waste to everything in its path. Trees were ground into matchstick oblivion, reduced to smoking stumps or, further from the blast, stripped of leaves and bark. Grass was a fond memory in the mind of the baked, dusty ground, which was dotted with uneven patches of glowing, molten glass. The concrete and tarmac of the pathways had been pounded to various grades of fine sand and gravel.
The halo of emerald luminescence faded from Gin's form. Biting back a curse at the sharp stab of pain, he raised his head.
He was standing in the center of a crater large enough to fit a house in. Underneath his hovering form were unharmed specimens of Rukia and Uryuu.
The top half of his shihakusõ was ripped to shreds, hanging off his shoulders as barely more than scraps. His pants had fared little better, having been unceremoniously turned into ragged shorts. Entertainingly, his tabi socks had been mostly burned away, but his sandals were relatively unscathed - effectively, his socks had been burned right out of his shoes. Gin suppressed a giggle.
His back ached as if an elephant had sat on it, but his skin felt no worse than a light sunburn. His little experiment had, apparently, worked. The focused reiatsu had given him - for as long as he concentrated - an armored skin more durable than reinforced concrete.
"Ichimaru, you fool!" He vaguely registered Uryuu's rant, while Rukia seethed wordlessly. "A Céro can strike down a lieutenant if it catches them off-guard! That was beyond foolish - "
"Didn't catch me off-guard, though..." Gin replied heavily. "Did it, Jam-san? I'd kinda... expect ya to be kinder ta' the man... who just saved yer life."
"It was idiocy, that's what it was! You could have just flash-stepped away; I can do the same with Hirenkyaku, and I'm skilled enough to carry Kuchiki-san with me!" The Quincy archer grabbed Gin's arm. "Now, we need to - "
Uryuu abruptly paused. Gin's smile narrowed slightly, and he raised an eyebrow.
The moment Uryuu had touched Gin's skin, the Quincy cross - the talisman bound around his wrist that generated his reishi bow - had begun twirling and bouncing as if electrified.
Uryuu looked up, a new light in his eyes. "My god, Ichimaru," he said, "you really did learn to hide your reiatsu quickly, didn't you? Bloody hell, touching you - it's like sticking my fingers in a power outlet!"
Gin rolled his carmine eyes, although Uryuu was probably not aware of the fact, for obvious reasons. "I ain't in the... mood for word games. Is'at a good thing, Jam-san?"
Uryuu narrowed his eyes at the nickname, but nodded. "It is. I think I have an idea of how to kill this thing... or at least hurt it enough for it to run back through the Descorrer."
"I'm all ears."
X-X-X
Rukia felt like she was in shock.
She had known from day one that Gin was powerful. His reiatsu alone was substantially higher than your average 20th or 15th seat. Hell, in a mere month, he had learned - much of it on his own - enough to easily pass, and ace, fourth year academy exams. And judging by his raw combat skill he might even be above the level of a 10th seated officer by now - after all, not every officer had shikai.
Rukia felt a moment of pride that, despite being unseated, she had a strong enough bond with Sode no Shirayuki to release shikai if she needed to.
But what she had just seen... defied all reason. He had no bankai, no shikai; the kid didn't even know more than three or four kido spells and had only just learned to flash-step... and yet... and yet...
He had literally stood in front of a Céro and shrugged it off as if it was nothing. He had just... hardened himself until the blast bore him no threat.
Rukia was no stranger to using reiatsu as a defensive armor, but she wouldn't have expected such a brash display of... invincibility... from even a captain-level Shinigami. Even with a reiatsu like a god on earth, it would be risky. The weakest Gillian's Céros were, not to put too fine a point on it, fucking powerful - and this Gillian hadn't been particularly weak. If there had been even the tiniest slip of concentration, the smallest gap in the armor, the Céro would have bored through him like an auger through balsa wood.
Even with his powerful reiatsu, it should have been impossible for Gin to survive. Certainly, he had to have been severely injured. And yet there he stood - but for slightly reddened skin on his skinny shoulders, unharmed.
He hadn't even opened his foxy eyes yet.
She snapped out of her amazed trance at the realization that Gin was saying something. "Sorry, what?"
Gin chuckled, causing her to blush slightly. "Now that yer awake, I'll repeat myself. Ishida has a plan to hurt this big guy, but he says there's a slight chance of it exploding and killing us all. So ya might wanna get behind something big."
"Wait, what are you planning to - "
"O-kay, Jam-san, ready to go!" Gin reached out... and grabbed hold of the Quincy's earlobe.
There was a moment of silence.
"I know that the reiatsu transfer requires skin contact," said Uryuu menacingly, "but that is crossing the line, Ichimaru."
"What? Grabbing your ear?" Gin put on a look of mock innocence. "But ya need both hands to aim your bow. Unless ya want me to grab your neck, or your nose, of course. And before ya ask, I ain't touchin' yer feet. That's just gross."
The corners of Gin's triumphant smirk threatened to meet at the back of his head. Uryuu bit back a growl.
"Fine," he said through clenched teeth. "But if I feel any yanking or... wiggling, this arrow's gonna find a new target."
"Oh, you're no fun." Gin's smile didn't waver. "Now hurry up and take the shot before it decides to liquefy us and half of Karakura."
Rolling his eyes, Uryuu summoned his reishi bow.
With Gin's incandescent energy powering it, the longbow-sized weapon had grown even larger, rivaling a ballista in scale. Instead of the clear, sharp blue, the bow was crackling and blurring from the overdrive of power.
Uryuu drew his hand back, pulling the string and manifesting the lethal bolt of energy -
There was a wiggling sensation in his ear.
"DAMN IT, ICHIMARU!"
"Sorry! Sorry! I just couldn't resist one wiggle! I'll be good!"
Seething, the Quincy took aim again.
He had to calm down if he was going to hit the Gillian's mask. He took a deep breath, remembering archery lessons with his grandfather.
'An arrow is not something you fire, my boy; you merely give it the bow's power and... release it.'
The pulsing arrow lined up with the Gillian's mask, far above them.
Uryuu released the arrow, and with a warbling, high-pitched hiss, the lethal energy bolt sped forward.
Gin, Uryuu, and Rukia cringed simultaneously. The overpowered arrow had generated a shockwave of reiatsu that - in their weakened states - was like being hit in the face with a hammer. Despite this, however, none of them lost their footing.
The fletched missile struck the white bone of the mask, discharging its energy in a bright blue explosion. The Gillian screamed, and the sound of cracking bone could be heard.
As the dust cleared, the trio got a good look at the damage done.
The Gillian wasn't dead, but it was in sorry shape. Its robe was ragged around its neck and hood, and its mask was outright broken - a bleeding fissure straight down the middle was leaking black liquid. The monster howled in agony...
And stepped back, retreating once again into the Descorrer. As the bony hand pulled the rift shut, Gin finally released the breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding.
"You can let go of my ear now."
X-X-X
lol, Gin, you so funny.
Anyway... minor note. Since I've finished the Bleach anime, and 9 out of 10 fanfics are mediocre at best, there's not a lot to inspire me, and I'm writing slower. I'm only 5 chapters ahead as of this one.
I may have to slow my update schedule to once every 2 weeks instead of once a week. Next week's chapter will go up on schedule, but if I need to change it, I'll announce it there.
Ciao.