Crimson and Ebony Chapter 5: Plan Orange
The battles had begun.
The constant hammering of spiritual pressure was clearly felt all through out Las Noches, like a bell ringing constantly, until you had the worst kind of headache.
Ichigo had no idea how long he'd been inside the white washed halls of Aizen's kingdom. There was no way to tell the passage of time. Days or hours, he had no clue, but it was like the whole place was leeching the life from him. He picked up Zangetsu once again, leaving the body of another low level Arrancar behind as he walked down another endless hallway. It was so empty, barren, lifeless. The human heart that beat inside of him ached whenever he looked around.
The little girl was drooling happily on his shoulder, healing the small wounds there while she happily gurgled. He had such a weird feeling about this kid, like there was more than he was seeing. But then she'd start chatting his ear off about the game of tag she'd played with Dondachakka and his worries immediately fled his mind. The big brother in him just couldn't think of this child as an enemy, a Hollow.
"Oi, Nel..."
"Yesh, Itsygo?"
"Can you be quiet for a minute? I think I hear something." He stood still, listening carefully, everything was silent.
It was far too quiet...
-//-
It had been nearly a day since the rescue party had reached Las Noches. She'd learned to count the hours, so she could tell. But from the way both her and Grimmjow were on edge it could've been a week.
"Fuckin' Aizen..." Grimmjow muttered for the thousandth time. He was still peeved that he'd been denied the chance to go after Ichigo again.
Tatsu's stress was for a completely different reason, as Grimmjow didn't have friends out on the battlefield, probably heading for their deaths. Not to mention the fact that her schooling of Grimmjow on how to fake their relationship was not going well.
They'd quickly figured out that pretending to kiss didn't work well for Grimmjow, he got bored and kissed her properly. Not an unpleasant thing by itself, if it weren't for the fact that it threw her concentration out the window. They kissed a lot when there were others around, pretending not to see the people watching as Grimmjow pinned her up against a wall.
Unfortunately for the Sexta Espada, every time he tried this when they were alone Tatsu nearly had a panic attack.
She still had trouble being touched, it was uncomfortable for her, even though she was working on pushing past what Aizen had done to her. She was endlessly thankful that now that she'd "changed sides" the man seemed less intent on torturing her. She thought that it might have had something to do with the fact that she'd pretended to show an interest in wanting to have sex with him. As far as she could tell, he only liked it when his partners screamed in pain. He could only get it up it they were unwilling and forced.
With Aizen's attention distracted by their would-be invaders it was a simple matter to work around him, outside of his supervision. Though Tatsu couldn't help but feel distracted herself...
"Rukia... Renji..." she murmured, feeling the faintly familiar reiatsu pulses that accompanied her thoughts. She knew they were fighting, and while Renji seemed to be alright, Rukia was doing badly, and her life force kept getting weaker. It made Tatsu's chest clench, knowing that she couldn't go over there, couldn't help, couldn't even offer the slightest assistance without blowing her entire scheme against Aizen. She couldn't afford that...
Grimmjow glanced over at her. They shared a room now, which was expected since they were apparently lovers and she was now his Fraccion. They even managed to share a bed, though sleeping beside her without being allowed to touch her was completely frustrating. But he could tell that she was warming up to him, acting less cold. He figured it would only take a couple more days before he could get his hands on her. The thought was satisfying, since he was completely sick of people denying him what he wanted. He was the fucking King, even if nobody realized it yet.
"You can't save them, no matter how much you brood about it." he said, rolling his eyes at her.
She scowled. "Yeah, I know, Mr. Compassion. Doesn't stop me from worrying."
She flicked a few red locks over her shoulder, an idea dawning on her that made her bite her lip.
"Unless..."
"Unless, what?"
She looked at him as the idea slowly dawned on her, her lips trembling both at the risk, and at the hope that it brought in its wake. “Unless we get them captured...”
Grimmjow frowned at her. “The orders are to kill, not capture. Unless it's Kurosaki, nobody is worth keeping.”
Tatsu nodded, knowing that was how everyone thought. “But Kurosaki will come for them if they're captured... If they're killed then he'll focus on Inoue and it'll be harder to put him in a vulnerable position, right?”
Grimmjow looked thoughtful for a moment. “Yeah, that's true. He'll come for 'em, for sure. That Orihime girl is well guarded enough that Kurosaki will work to save the others before her, since she's relatively safe...”
“If we gather them, we can grab him too. And we might even be able to get Inoue if they need to be healed... If we gather all of them together... We can escape with them. All of us.”
They looked at each other, a little stunned by the opportunity that had been placed in their laps. Grimmjow's lips spread into a grin as he looked at her.
“So where do we start?”
-//-
All across Las Noches people were finding places to sleep, falling down in exhaustion in dark corners where they hoped they wouldn't be found. Ichigo, Rukia, Renji, Sado, Uryu, even Dondachakka and Pesche were all settling in to rest before facing the battles that the morning would bring. Ichigo settled in with a small girl happily snoring on his chest, sleeping restlessly. Rukia was injured and bleeding, but she'd managed to heal the worst of it. Her weakened reiatsu kept her hidden as she collapsed, exhausted in the shadows. Sado and Uryu had ended up meeting again at a crossroads and were taking turns watching for enemies while the other slept.
Renji couldn't sleep, though he was tired. His uniform was mostly torn from his torso, ripped away by blades and spirit energy. This was almost becoming too much. If he wasn't as strong as he was there was no way he'd be alive by now. He had no idea how they were going to fight a war when their opponents were this strong...
He looked up at the white ceiling, wondering what he would find deeper inside. Was his death waiting for him here? It was possible. He'd known it was possible from the moment he had decided to come.
Death didn't frighten him, he'd been at the gates of his own demise before and the thought no longer scared him. But he would fight to his very last breath, with everything that he had. It didn't sound like such a bad way to go, at least if you asked him.
Not that he wanted to die, far from it. But it was a possibility.
He rested against the wall, breathing out a sigh. There was so much that could happen, so many complications. He wasn't sure they would be able to work through them all. But hell if they were going to give up. He was in this to the end, and he knew the others were with him. So he kept alert, rested himself and waited for what was to come.
-//-
In another room, a distance away from the sleeping heroes, Grimmjow and Tatsu were laying in their shared bed, discussing their plans for the morning.
“Ya sure ya wanna risk this?” Grimmjow asked her. “Tryin' to save all of 'em might overcomplicate things. Make it more difficult then it needs to be.”
Tatsu scowled at him. “You keep forgetting that I know these people, at least some of them, and I'm not willing to leave anyone behind regardless. We'll do what we have to in order to save all of them.” she stated firmly.
The blue-haired man sighed, shaking his head at her. “You're gonna blow our whole plan apart, and then we're just gonna end up dead.”
“Dead is better than enslaved.”
She had a point there.
“Did ya stop to think that we might not be able to pull this off?” he asked her, wryly cynical.
“Yes, I've thought of it. But imagine if we do...” she replied, and her smile was sharp as a sabre when she looked at him. “It'll be like we're spitting in Aizen's smug face. And won't that be fun?”
Grimmjow chuckled and couldn't help but grin. With that kind of logic she could probably convince him to do just about anything, a fact which pissed him off just a little.
“Well, when you put it that way...”