Chapter Eleven

And from there, I had mostly free reign of Las Noches, which I learned was in Hueco Mundo. Still wasn't entirely sure where Hueco Mundo was, but given that it seemed to be a land of eternal night I figured that I really, really didn't want to know. The moon never changed it shape, either—it was consistently the same thin sickle shape.

I say "mostly" free reign because I couldn't actually go anywhere by myself; Usagi had threatened that she would lock me in my room if I did. And so, the only time I could leave was if she or Grimmjow was with me. Unfortunately, they weren't around all that often and so I couldn't exactly "explore" my expanded white prison.

And I still didn't know why I was there.

Thankfully, there hadn't been much of a resurgence schizophrenia-wise since my episode in the hall three—or was it four? I couldn't recall. Time here passed strangely to me, slow and fast all at once—days ago. I was very nearly out of medication, though. Every time I thought about what would happen when I finally did run out of the pills, my lungs decided to constrict and toss me into a small panic attack. Of course, I only thought about that when I was alone, and even then I tried my best to keep my mind off of it.

Most of my time was still spent sleeping, either on the sofa or on the floor. Both were far from comfortable, but it wasn't like I could go back and sleep in Grimmjow's bed again. That would be frowned upon, I was sure.

And of course, I thought about Mom and Mizuri. They had likely reported my disappearance by then, had scoured every inch of town for me, placed posters all of the place, but it wasn't like they could find me. Nobody had probably even seen me, not after I jumped out in front of that car.

Just thinking about what they were going through, the panic and the fear they likely felt over my disappearance, sent me into another panic attack, so I did my best not to think about them, either.

And then there were the insidious thoughts, the ones thought by myself and not spoken by the voice. The thoughts that suggested that they didn't care that I was gone; that I was going to die in that white palace, and even though they would never know what had happened to me; they wouldn't care.

But I knew that wasn't true (At least, I hoped it wasn't).

Someone kicked the couch. "I said get up."

I didn't bother with opening my eyes; I wasn't even close to sleep, but I could always just pretend. "I see "please" still isn't in your vocabulary."

"Will you just get your lazy fucking ass off of the couch?"

"Go away. I'm sleeping."

"You are not."

"Yes I am; My eyes are closed." Grimmjow unleashed an irritated snarl, and although it was fun to make him so mad, I knew full well that it wasn't good for my health because at some point, he was going to snap severely and by the time Usagi heard about it, it would be too late for me.

Instead of saying something else that would annoy him further, I sat up with an obviously fake yawn, stretching before running a hand through my still frizzy, still tangled hair. He was glaring at me, but that was normal. At this point, everything seemed "normal", even his blue hair and the hole in his abdomen and the weird bone-thing on his face (none of which quite honestly made any sort of sense to me; it was like a fashion sense gone terribly, horribly wrong).

"Told you you weren't sleeping." In the time I had spent with Grimmjow—which, admittedly, hadn't actually been all that much—I had discovered that he always wanted to be right when, generally, he was quite wrong. It was maddening when attempting to argue with him, that was for sure; it's always hard to argue with someone who always seems to want to have the last word.

"Well not anymore; you woke me up!" My hood was somewhat twisted around my neck in a halfhearted attempt to strangle me. I made no move to rearrange it; it was completely normal to wake up as such when I slept in it.

Grimmjow reached out and pushed the hood off of my shoulder, reaching around my head on the other side to straighten it out on the back. I sat completely still, confused and somewhat frightened from his sudden movement; his face was unnervingly close to mine, his cheek nearly brushing my own.

It was really, really kind of creepy.

He pulled away slowly, searching my face. I wasn't sure what to do; how to react. His face was less than two inches from mine, and it was making me rather uncomfortable.

But then he smacked me on the back of the head and withdrew quickly in anticipation of my retaliation. I frowned and rubbed my noggin instead of jumping up to punch him in the face (because, really, let's face it: I didn't stand a chance, and we both knew it).

"What was that for?" I shouted, jumping into a standing position and pushing him backwards. Well, trying to; he didn't budge at all. It would require much more force than I was capable of generating to get him to move.

"Because you were awake."

"Okay you two, stop flirting." I hadn't realized that Usagi was in the room; they never came together. She was leaning against the wall nearest the door (which seemed to randomly disappear; I could find it sometimes, but other days I had no idea where it possibly was).

"We're not—we-" And for some reason, Grimmjow couldn't form a sentence; he wasn't one for coming to a loss for words, either. "I was just—she-"

"What he means to say is, no, dear Usagi, we were not flirting because that's just. . . I can't put it into words. It's just no. Flirting with me in any way, shape, or form is like trying to flirt with a shark when your arm is spurting blood off into the ocean: it's dangers, and it doesn't really work because you're going to end up dead."

Okay, not really. But it sounded like a good analogy, so I used it, even thought it did elect a queer look from Usagi. Grimmjow, on the other hand, hadn't seemed to have heard me: he was still sputtering about "we" and "not" and "just" and "how". I couldn't hardly make any sense of the words that seemed to be tumbling out of his mouth, so I found it best to ignore him.

"Looked like flirting to me," the green haired woman said with a shrug. "But whatever. We can just disagree. Now come on, you two; Aizen-sama requires your presence, Kaori. Immediately."

"And it's going to take two of you to get me to him?" The only two times I'd seen him, it was just Grimmjow and I. Usagi had never been in that cavernous room at the same time as the two of us.

"Why do I need two escorts?" Something fishy was going on; I could practically smell it.

Unfortunately, Usagi just shrugged again. "I don't know. I was just told your presence was requested and that I was to bring you. That idiot," she pointed at Grimmjow, "just decided to come with me."

Lo and behold, the room was echo-y and spacious and still terrifyingly white. It was a little colder than it had been, too. Goose bump raising, shivering cold.

And of course, Aizen was sitting up on his pretty little throne, head in his hand and eyes closed. From the look of the material, the throne looked colder than the room did; I would hate to sit on it without some kind of heating pad or butt warmer. I mean, you know, I wouldn't mind sitting on it anyways and feeling empowered butt warmer or not, but beggars can't be choosers.

"Is that voice bothering you at all, Kaori?" There was no "hello, how have you been?", no "good morning" (or was it night?). He was sharp and concise and I think he was beginning to get irritated with my tendency to avoid the question.

"Not a bit, sir. I'm in tip top shape." And can I leave, by the way? People are going to be looking for me. "Although I am curious as to why I'm here." I motioned widely to my room. Usagi and Grimmjow stood slightly behind me on either side, almost like they were at once interested and impartial to me.

"All in good time, Kaori-san." Yes, but what was his definition of "good time"? I mean, the guy lived in a land of eternal night; time didn't seem to matter much to him. I could be fifty by the time I figured out why he had had me kidnapped. I could die here without even knowing why I had been taken captive and held in this place.

And then, I was dismissed.

And there we go. This should start moving a little faster now? I think. I hope. It will. Yes. It will. This is also posted over on AO3 (link on the profile).

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