Post by Kohara Hi-to on Feb 25, 2016 3:52:52 GMT -5
How long had he waited to see a hollow truly care for the beings that surrounded them? Far too many lifetimes for mortal men, and far too few for a Shinigami as young as he. That the topic of their distress would be some human girl of all things, Hi-to had to wonder if they were losing their minds. Perhaps in another time and place their bloodshed might make more sense, but for now, the drama of something so insignificant clung to his nerves like an internal shunko; twice as electrifying and thrice as deafening. He didn’t want to hear Takua’s idle philosophies any more than he wanted to believe them.
It was easier said than done. With the masked man sneering at him with a voice colder than liquid nitrogen, the implicit meaning behind the words couldn’t be ignored. It was a hurricane of vehemence and reasoning, and although he understood at least half of what the Arrancar was saying, pride refused to let him stoop so low as to agree. It was that pride that kept his lips sealed, a grim line as he willed his teeth not to grind in agitation.
“Not ’add to the problem’?” A short exhale of bemused laughter left him, the noise swallowed whole by the chirping of shunko. Ever the martyr, Hi-to wondered if Takua actually believed half the words that spilled forth from his mouth. There was a fine line between convincing others and convincing yourself, and every iota he got of the other man’s psyche told him he was living in a fantasy land. A realistic one, perhaps, but idealist all the same. “You pointed it out the moment you got here, Takua. I was doing my job and saving souls, right up until you decided to throw a severed limb at me, bringing us to this. Was that another part of your plan?”
But of course, there was a catch. There always was with somebody of Takua’s calibre, because such pure intentions never worked out well in practice. Exceptions were made, bonds discriminated, but the last thing he’d expected to hear from the scientist was that this was party for his benefit.
He’d hardly given the man a reason to care for his wellbeing, and how could he trust the words of a hollow? He’d entrusted his emotional wellbeing to a woman he’d ended up breaking, a woman he had trusted. He’d learned from such foolish actions, and now Takua expected him to trust him when he said this was for the best?
Unfathomable.
Words blurred together and became almost indistinguishable from one sentence to the next, reiatsu condensing the atmosphere and their intentions with it. Yet for each step the Espada made Hi-to refused to take one back, those blind eyes glaring from behind their mask until they burned into his own.
Of course it was all a ridiculous misunderstanding. But then again, it always was, wasn’t it? A simple tale of ‘it’s nobody’s fault’ and ‘we’ll be more careful next time’.
But this wasn’t a simple miscommunication, and the hollow’s words brought a flare to Hi-to’s chest that couldn’t be so easily extinguished. Knowing what he did, and apparently having the resources available to him that he did, he refused to believe there couldn’t have been another way. Even the afternoon it had taken him to track down Nazomi to Aokigahara gave the man a great deal many more hours than it had taken him today. Some form of middle man –anything would have been better than the blood running cold in his veins, that blinding rage that had shook him to the core
He’d ruined himself over a simple misunderstanding.
He didn’t need to show his anger. The heated plasma of Hyperion’s defences did enough of that for the both of them, flaying flesh from bone and charring meat until it choked their olfactory senses. Every step the man took towards him invigorated him as a snake would when shedding its skin, ugly layers peeling away to reveal the prime underneath. Weakness was something the man in front of him should never have known, yet he seeped it from his pores even as he stood burning, surviving like no other of his kind could.
It was the same bizarre mix of retribution and penance he’d started to feel by being around her as often as he had. It hurt to look at, seeing the characteristics that had been hurting him so in full swing, knowing that despite the odds he still felt some of them now. He needn’t tell Takua that because the Arrancar already knew, he was sure. It was the fact that his very weaknesses were being paraded around in front of him by a man who openly advocated them that set his nerves alight with contempt.
“We’re not relatable. You can’t pretend to know everybody, least of all me because of one common tie between us.” He was so close now, a hair’s breath away and a scythe away from a peaceful ending. It would have hurt a lot less than the plasma, the hissing animal warning him not to come any closer. Coupled with the manipulation of norepinephrine Hi-to could almost see the emotion coming off Takua in waves, could see his regeneration slipping as his motivation crumbled.
It was fascinating. Never before had he truly used this particular branch of Kaido in combat, least of all against anybody that he truly wanted to cause harm. It was like peeling off the layers of a ripe fruit to reveal the rotten flesh underneath, and for the first time Hi-to almost resented that Takua covered his eyes. It was a waste not to be shown true feedback of his work.
It surprised him to no end when Takua actually fought back.
Depression was something the older of the two had obviously had to live with for centuries at a time, had come to know better than his own biology if his repressed lifestyle was any indication. It wasn’t something that could be reconstructed because it wasn’t necessarily wrong. But if not cured then it could be manipulated, channelled, and as anger took its place Hi-to knew he’d finally pushed the button he’d been aiming for ages ago.
Gone was the bravado of pacifism, the philanthropist he worked so hard to portray himself to be. Instead he was awarded a man in as much emotional pain as he himself had been that night at her shrine, angry, lashing out with the powers that suited him best. The cero was to be expected, even multiples of the same variety, but when Hyperion came up to defend the lack of pulse and contact caught him unprepared.
By the time he realised their true purpose it was too late.
The noise was suffocating. With his body locking up in shock he could hardly process the sheer volume of the reishi tearing into him, how the individual beams had come together to produce something so devastating. It was like being hit with a Kurohitsugi from a talented caster, and no matter how densely his shunko condensed in hanki, it simply wasn’t enough.
It hurt. Even if he killed the pain receptors in his brain, there was no way it could be comfortable. Bones snapped and ligaments tore, and for everyone healed another injury took its place. The carnage of Takua’s anger was so heartfelt it felt as if it were tearing him body and soul, the first real fight the man had brought to the table since his petty words.
Something faded, danced along the edges of his awareness, the perpetrator who’d forced him into this mess. With the remnants of the collaborative barrage fading to smoke, he couldn’t tell if Takua’s fading presence was his return to sealed form, or his own senses were simply failing him. His ears still rung as the smoke cleared and his eyes were dirtied with blood, making him cough as it began to clog his windpipe.
Motherfucker- Ragged breaths forced the blood from his sternum, kaido surging like a panicked life stream. Each strand of reishi worked in tandem, biomechanical nanites programmed with the correct information from experience, choking up energy as the power needed to maintain bankai faded.
Words left Takua’s mouth, no louder than the sound of the surf kicking at the beach. It was only as his eardrums fixed themselves that Hi-to even realised the other was speaking, too preoccupied with making sure every bone and ligament was in check to pay them much heed. It was exhausting, a step that he never predicted Takua would be pushed to take, and the complexity of the man’s attack left him reeling in the aftermath.
”You’d better make it quick, before my stamina regenerates itself.” Even as he spoke he could feel the reiatsu vents in his wrists swelling, pores opening as they worked to restore themselves. With the blue eyes of his bankai lost, Hi-to peered at the other’s sealed form through sweat damp lashes, fingers twitching across the hilt of his single headed scythe. He felt oddly exposed without the security of his bankai, skin rubbed raw without the plasma to ground him.
He’d made a mistake in assuming Takua wouldn’t fight back if pushed too far.
He wouldn’t be making it again.
******
1560 words: 31 GP
Total GP: 256 GP
It was easier said than done. With the masked man sneering at him with a voice colder than liquid nitrogen, the implicit meaning behind the words couldn’t be ignored. It was a hurricane of vehemence and reasoning, and although he understood at least half of what the Arrancar was saying, pride refused to let him stoop so low as to agree. It was that pride that kept his lips sealed, a grim line as he willed his teeth not to grind in agitation.
“Not ’add to the problem’?” A short exhale of bemused laughter left him, the noise swallowed whole by the chirping of shunko. Ever the martyr, Hi-to wondered if Takua actually believed half the words that spilled forth from his mouth. There was a fine line between convincing others and convincing yourself, and every iota he got of the other man’s psyche told him he was living in a fantasy land. A realistic one, perhaps, but idealist all the same. “You pointed it out the moment you got here, Takua. I was doing my job and saving souls, right up until you decided to throw a severed limb at me, bringing us to this. Was that another part of your plan?”
But of course, there was a catch. There always was with somebody of Takua’s calibre, because such pure intentions never worked out well in practice. Exceptions were made, bonds discriminated, but the last thing he’d expected to hear from the scientist was that this was party for his benefit.
He’d hardly given the man a reason to care for his wellbeing, and how could he trust the words of a hollow? He’d entrusted his emotional wellbeing to a woman he’d ended up breaking, a woman he had trusted. He’d learned from such foolish actions, and now Takua expected him to trust him when he said this was for the best?
Unfathomable.
Words blurred together and became almost indistinguishable from one sentence to the next, reiatsu condensing the atmosphere and their intentions with it. Yet for each step the Espada made Hi-to refused to take one back, those blind eyes glaring from behind their mask until they burned into his own.
Of course it was all a ridiculous misunderstanding. But then again, it always was, wasn’t it? A simple tale of ‘it’s nobody’s fault’ and ‘we’ll be more careful next time’.
But this wasn’t a simple miscommunication, and the hollow’s words brought a flare to Hi-to’s chest that couldn’t be so easily extinguished. Knowing what he did, and apparently having the resources available to him that he did, he refused to believe there couldn’t have been another way. Even the afternoon it had taken him to track down Nazomi to Aokigahara gave the man a great deal many more hours than it had taken him today. Some form of middle man –anything would have been better than the blood running cold in his veins, that blinding rage that had shook him to the core
He’d ruined himself over a simple misunderstanding.
He didn’t need to show his anger. The heated plasma of Hyperion’s defences did enough of that for the both of them, flaying flesh from bone and charring meat until it choked their olfactory senses. Every step the man took towards him invigorated him as a snake would when shedding its skin, ugly layers peeling away to reveal the prime underneath. Weakness was something the man in front of him should never have known, yet he seeped it from his pores even as he stood burning, surviving like no other of his kind could.
It was the same bizarre mix of retribution and penance he’d started to feel by being around her as often as he had. It hurt to look at, seeing the characteristics that had been hurting him so in full swing, knowing that despite the odds he still felt some of them now. He needn’t tell Takua that because the Arrancar already knew, he was sure. It was the fact that his very weaknesses were being paraded around in front of him by a man who openly advocated them that set his nerves alight with contempt.
“We’re not relatable. You can’t pretend to know everybody, least of all me because of one common tie between us.” He was so close now, a hair’s breath away and a scythe away from a peaceful ending. It would have hurt a lot less than the plasma, the hissing animal warning him not to come any closer. Coupled with the manipulation of norepinephrine Hi-to could almost see the emotion coming off Takua in waves, could see his regeneration slipping as his motivation crumbled.
It was fascinating. Never before had he truly used this particular branch of Kaido in combat, least of all against anybody that he truly wanted to cause harm. It was like peeling off the layers of a ripe fruit to reveal the rotten flesh underneath, and for the first time Hi-to almost resented that Takua covered his eyes. It was a waste not to be shown true feedback of his work.
It surprised him to no end when Takua actually fought back.
Depression was something the older of the two had obviously had to live with for centuries at a time, had come to know better than his own biology if his repressed lifestyle was any indication. It wasn’t something that could be reconstructed because it wasn’t necessarily wrong. But if not cured then it could be manipulated, channelled, and as anger took its place Hi-to knew he’d finally pushed the button he’d been aiming for ages ago.
Gone was the bravado of pacifism, the philanthropist he worked so hard to portray himself to be. Instead he was awarded a man in as much emotional pain as he himself had been that night at her shrine, angry, lashing out with the powers that suited him best. The cero was to be expected, even multiples of the same variety, but when Hyperion came up to defend the lack of pulse and contact caught him unprepared.
By the time he realised their true purpose it was too late.
The noise was suffocating. With his body locking up in shock he could hardly process the sheer volume of the reishi tearing into him, how the individual beams had come together to produce something so devastating. It was like being hit with a Kurohitsugi from a talented caster, and no matter how densely his shunko condensed in hanki, it simply wasn’t enough.
It hurt. Even if he killed the pain receptors in his brain, there was no way it could be comfortable. Bones snapped and ligaments tore, and for everyone healed another injury took its place. The carnage of Takua’s anger was so heartfelt it felt as if it were tearing him body and soul, the first real fight the man had brought to the table since his petty words.
Something faded, danced along the edges of his awareness, the perpetrator who’d forced him into this mess. With the remnants of the collaborative barrage fading to smoke, he couldn’t tell if Takua’s fading presence was his return to sealed form, or his own senses were simply failing him. His ears still rung as the smoke cleared and his eyes were dirtied with blood, making him cough as it began to clog his windpipe.
Motherfucker- Ragged breaths forced the blood from his sternum, kaido surging like a panicked life stream. Each strand of reishi worked in tandem, biomechanical nanites programmed with the correct information from experience, choking up energy as the power needed to maintain bankai faded.
Words left Takua’s mouth, no louder than the sound of the surf kicking at the beach. It was only as his eardrums fixed themselves that Hi-to even realised the other was speaking, too preoccupied with making sure every bone and ligament was in check to pay them much heed. It was exhausting, a step that he never predicted Takua would be pushed to take, and the complexity of the man’s attack left him reeling in the aftermath.
”You’d better make it quick, before my stamina regenerates itself.” Even as he spoke he could feel the reiatsu vents in his wrists swelling, pores opening as they worked to restore themselves. With the blue eyes of his bankai lost, Hi-to peered at the other’s sealed form through sweat damp lashes, fingers twitching across the hilt of his single headed scythe. He felt oddly exposed without the security of his bankai, skin rubbed raw without the plasma to ground him.
He’d made a mistake in assuming Takua wouldn’t fight back if pushed too far.
He wouldn’t be making it again.
******
1560 words: 31 GP
Total GP: 256 GP