A Single Frayed Thread

He had intended to retire to his room. Erasmus' new coronation wasn't something he was interested in attending...and there was only too much to think about. Severance was dead at his own hand, defeated by Truth's. Xiaobei had been devoured by her 'father', and here he was. Staying in the same kingdom of the dead and lost that he swore to leave. Because of opportunities he'd seen in staying...to give the King a chance. But that was all he had, only one chance. It was up to the man to either use that chance and show Takua he was truly the best chance for Las Noches...or to waste it and prove to be no different than Hatred or Severance.
 
So he needed time to think and maybe even unwind. Weeks of being stuck in Seireitei, constantly hunted by Shinigami, had a way of wearing on someone. And when you threw in back to back meetings with a Transcendent...yeah, maybe even an inveterate insomniac like Takua wanted to sleep. Fuck the nightmares, bring the rest. It'd been way, way too much for him to keep going, and he was rather looking forward to sleep.
 
At least until he opened the door, and found a man he couldn't help but recognize there.
 
Shock ripped through him and Takua sprung backward on reflex. Pointless when the other man could cross the distance between them in the same amount of time it took a bullet to leave the barrel of a gun, but instinct was something else entirely. The last time he'd seen that face with echolocation, it had been lying on the desert sands as his shoulder bled around Ine's zanpakuto. The pain of memory, watching Amaya break under what Ine had done, becoming an insane shadow of her former self. Unable to heal, unable to reach the person she had once been before Tova had battled Tova. Before she'd been abandoned by perhaps the only person she'd ever truly loved and snapped for good.
 
This man in front of him had been the one to kick the first stone. If Ine thought that Takua had forgotten his hand in the avalanche that followed, the man was dead fucking wrong.
 
But he was too tired for hate. Too tired to attack on sight, despite that he'd just killed the end effect of this man's handiwork. The woman he loved, insane in part because of this asshole. So for seconds, as the Captain Commander spoke, Takua just stared. Once Ine was finished speaking, Takua's face turned slack.
 
Was he so tired that what the man had said made no sense?
 
No. No he was fairly certain that that had made no fucking sense at all.
 
“Yep. No sense at all,” Takua stepped up and through the doorway, turning away from the Captain Commander quite as though he wasn't there in order to walk into the bathroom and splash water across his face. Calmly he turned on the faucet, pooled the water in his hands, and threw the ice cold liquid across his face with a shiver and a sneeze. Yep, okay, awake now. Drying off, he turned back around and walked back into his room.
 
Fuck, still there.
 
“So why are you here? To gloat? Take revenge on me for killing Severance?” Takua just sighed, shaking his head to clear his mind. Assuming that this was not a hallucination, then he was either half a second from being embroiled in a fight that trumped every other one he'd been in so far, or something very strange was happening. Especially since what he could sense of the man in front of him was damn peculiar...
 
“We're not exactly the best of friends,” he said, with what could be called generous understatement. “So why are you here?”
 
WC: 631 | GP: 12

The world melted away around him in a forced transition from one world to the next. One universe to the next, as the trailing reishi particles told him that something had changed. He'd felt this before, with Severance, a portal that could take you from one universe to the next. Only this time, it seemed, he'd come along for a ride into a place where Takua had no real way back. Not unless his original universe had some sort of pull on his soul to drag him back to where he belonged. Unless that happened, which was unlikely given the alternate Tova and Emilia, he was quite at the mercy of this man.
 
In the past, he could have been wary about getting pissed off because of that. After all, there was now no way home but for the whims of one Kenshou Ine. Rather low odds of getting home alive. But the man's words were more than sufficient to discard that plan. Not from fear, no. But from anger.
 
Who the fuck did Ine think he was? A God? Able to freely meddle with lives and think, “Oh they should turn out just like so?” As though Takua were a cookie that turned out a little crispier than he should have, traitorous bastard that he was, and didn't quite taste sweet when bitten into. As easily discarded as that same cookie too. The Arrancar was a monster, yes, but this went beyond that. The blind man was not a toy, was not some failed test to be tossed into the trash. That grated, to be not even a soul, just a pawn to be moved at will toward some ideal state. As though Takua wanted any kind of growth that Kenshou was interested in. Given that the last time they'd met the Shinigami had pretended to kill Amaya and Aya in front of him, he wasn't feeling exactly beholden to the Reaper.
 
A few seconds, though, were spent on the surroundings. The smell of death hung heavy here, but it was the same tower. Similar enough in construction anyways...although the massive holes and wreckage that lay here and there would have tipped him off to the change in worlds even if he couldn't have figured it out on his own. There had been a battle here...and nothing had been repaired afterwards. A world where maybe the Siege had finished off all of the Arrancar and Hollow here. Certainly there were no Hollows here...in fact there was no one at all but the two of them in all of Las Noches.
 
“Squandered what?” Takua's voice was heavily tinged with disbelief, almost unwilling to believe he was hearing what Ine was saying. What the fuck did this asshole want from him? Coming in here and proclaiming that it was the Primera's turn to die simply because he didn't measure up. Probably had nothing to do with that, just a goddamn fake way to make him feel justified in killing the Arrancar. But there was no point in going down that path of logic just yet. Takua could pretend that Ine had a point behind what he was saying, maybe even what universe they'd been sent to. But he was not going to just lie down and die for the Captain Commander.
 
Adrenaline began to banish exhaustion, pumping energy through his veins. “I'm sorry, I don't know exactly who you were watching, but I have, in fact, grown and changed. I'm so sorry I'm not one of the Broken for you, that's not exactly the growth I have in mind. But before we get into 'defending my continued existence', you'll have to go ahead and tell me exactly what I'm supposedly at fault for. You're not exactly being any more clear than you were at the start.” Anger surged through him, voice flashing with irritation, and a few sparks of flame spiraled around him as he glared at the other man even through the mask.
 
“But I'm going to make something very clear. I am not some fucking dog that didn't get trained well enough and is shot out back. So instead of acting all high and mighty, why don't you tell me exactly what I've failed to see and do, and then we can start having a nice and rational discussion. Otherwise, this is pointless.”
 
The burning power of his Resurreccion pulsed inside of his Zanpakuto, searing in its heat and its anger, but as of yet unleashed. One hand rested against the hilt though, waiting for the time when he needed to use it. If this turned into a fight, it might be far closer than Ine thought. Takua wasn't a Fraccion anymore, the weak little thing who had been utterly defeated in an instant. But all the same, the blind man wanted to give peace more of a chance. So his release remained sealed even as he sought every scrap of information he could find regarding the terrain and his potential opponent...if this turned into a fight, it would be ugly, and Takua did not want to be off guard for this.
 
WC: 853 | GP: 17 | Total: 29

It was difficult to consider. Ironic, given who they both were, what they both were. Given their past. Ordinarily that would have been Takua's first response, to consider that what Ine was saying was true. That, perahps, the Shinigami had a point. Or, stranger, that his purpose here might be something different than what he was outright saying. Otherwise there would be no point to this.
 
The first world, one in which all of Las Noches had been eradicated.
 
The second, where a man that was obviously a himself walked around as a Shinigami. A lieutenant of the Gotei. Proud, hardworking, a man who had never known the life of a Hollow perhaps. Someone who could purify the Hollows of the world. Maybe even someone who was not even as close to being broken as the Arrancar was.
 
Why?
 
These were not, could not, be random choices. How difficult was it to select worlds where events had unfolded differently?
 
Ine had a point that he was trying to make about the nature of the world. That was the reason for this. That might, he only now realized, may have been the point behind beheading an afterimage in the desert. Because Ine, in some warped way, was trying to teach an old, blind man something about the world. Of course, that warped way also included that Kenshou would try to kill him if he didn't realize whatever answer to this test he was aiming for.
 
Judging by their respective outlooks on life, Takua thought his answer might be just a touch different.
 
“Ah.”
 
Finally, this made just a bit more sense. So he took a moment, looking over at the man he would never be, and pondered his reaction for just a moment.
 
Because he did have an answer for the Captain Commander. He just doubted that it would be an answer the man liked. Not as fatalistic as the outlook the other man seemed to have.
 
“And?” Takua looked over at Ine, would have met his eyes were it not for the mask that covered his face. “Of course my life is decided by a mix of my own actions and someone else's. That's true for everyone.” He shrugged, looking down at the hilt of his blade and then back up at the Captain Commander. “If you attacked now to try and kill me, I'd fight. I might win, I might lose. If someone else wants to use their power to dominate your life, then you need power in kind to defend your ability to guide it as you want. But regardless of what people try to make me do, I still choose what I do. That's always up to me. Destiny is bullshit.”
 
Takua waved his hand at the other man who likely did not bear his name. Alexander Warde would be this name's name, utterly different from the Arrancar. “So what if another reality has me dead, or Shinigami, or reincarnated? They made different choices. Then, those choices matter. You say that as though my life were entirely up to someone else to decide, or entirely up to myself. It's not.”
 
Takua shrugged again, not really caring if he was 'failing' this little test that Ine was trying to teach him. He'd rather be true to himself than pretend otherwise now. “It's always been a mix. And if you decide to kill me based on my answer, then remind me how I won't have influenced my destiny?” Because, of course, if Ine did try to kill Takua...it was because of what he said. The architect, in a way, of what the Arrancar had said. Even this moment right now, almost daring him to do it, could be the deciding factor. But it would be Ine's choice. And then Takua's choice on how to respond.
 
Just like the rest of the world.
 
It...wasn't a particularly difficult concept. Maybe that wasn't what Ine was after, but then, for such a supposedly awakened being, he should know how to step it down enough for the blind man to understand.
 
WC: 678 | GP: 13 | Total: 42

"Always so fast to jump to the a violent example as well, you should recognize when you aren't in any real danger. You really think you could kill me, I have walked across the winds of time, I have witnessed events so small and fast they could not really have even been said to have happened at all. You Takua are a man, you the strongest arrancar are no more a threat to me then the world's strongest termite."

He wondered when the idea that there was some kind of danger to him would pass over, maybe it was a self preservation reaction. The thought that he could instantly be killed or left here and that would simply be it. It was certainly understandable, but it he really wanted Takua dead he could have simply just killed him in the beginning and not done any of this.

A simple flick of his wrist and a blade could appear, one made of the entropy of time. It would cut through Takua and erase him from history, he simply would have never existed. Why did it always come to the thoughts that violence must occur, history maybe, but it was different, he was different now. Why could Takua not understand this? Why could he not understand what he was doing for him?

It was almost as if Takua understood, but even with the answer in front of him he still missed it. The concept floating barely above his head, yes his decisions mattered and yet at the same time they did not. Spinning around infinitely, their stories were never ending. Such was their fate, but that was the barrier. Life was nothing more than bondage by fate, by destiny. The only way to gain freedom was to step outside the weaver's pattern.

To recognize one was stuck was the first step, it was only after insight into what was really happening in the world would anyone be able to grow beyond the limits imposed on them. Artificial limits placed simply by living in and among the pattern of the world.

"You made the choices, yes and so did this you and that you, but if every choice is made the infinite amount of you spanning the sum of all choices ever made then do you really make the choice? Are you not simply a set path to make a choice and then your others making the alternatives? If the choice mattered then wouldn't every one of you have made the same choice? They are you after all."

A nudge, maybe it was cheating to lead him into the answer but he was not going to simply let him leave without being able to break free of the strings that gripped onto him so tightly. Not when he showed promise. He was already so close to being free, the invisible chains that surrounded everyone had loosened and barely held around him.

He doubted that he should have said what he had, but then his time might be infinite but it was also finite. He embodied a paradox, maybe that's why he was not like the others. He simply would not let the limited time he had be worthless and he would be damned if any silly rules would get in his way.

He was sure that Takua would understand now what he was pushing him towards, the decisions were there and they went through the motions that were laid at their feet. That was until they recognized the situation, only then could they decide to step outside and truly make their own decisions. Only one could transcend to greatness in any given life. In the infinite possibilities it would be thought that an infinite amount could achieve that greatness, but the truth was that only one life could. The inherent paradox of the transcendence of a life, that it had to be unique among an infinite amount of possibilities.

2,425 Total Words - 48 GP

Takua smiled lightly, without real rancor in it. “You yourself are saying that if every choice leads to each conclusion in one universe, then there's a universe where I don't fail to kill you. That could be this one, that could be another one. But regardless. You say I'm in no real danger, but your words kinda contradict one another. I jump to the most violent example because that's the one you've alluded to, “A chance to defend your continued existence” does sound like a violent end, doesn't it?” The Arrancar chuckled, shaking his head. If Ine really was here without meaning to attack, then this could be a far more peaceful chat than he had ever thought possible. It was certainly true that the man felt different...not just in reiatsu, but in mind. In person. The blind man regarded the Captain Commander silently for a long moment, trying to put aside preconceptions and really look.
 
Silence filled the air as a Shinigami version of Takua strode proudly on the stone path below them. So different than the one who floated invisibly in the air. What differed between the two of them? An outlook on life, certainly. Their experiences. People they'd met, loved, fought. They may as well be two completely separate people with the same soul.
 
How much had Ine changed to do this?
 
The smile died slowly as he looked down at the man below. Takua spoke abruptly, words shattering the silence that had built, “You're trying to teach me something. Just as you tried to teach me, over a year ago, that it's power that matters. Didn't you. That without power, you can't do anything, because someone more powerful than you can just use their will instead.” His lips thinned to a slim line, words distant, “No, you're not trying to kill me.” If Ine really was trying in some twisted way to give Takua a lesson...then why?
 
What did he see in Takua that was worth teaching? Or was this some cruelty instead?
 
If what Ine was true, then what? If every choice led to every possible outcome in some universe, did choices matter? Takua wasn't ready to believe it yet, but it was an interesting thought exercise regardless. It seemed far more likely that there were a great number, perhaps even infinite, number of universes. But it would not be every decision ever.
 
Because the most likely choice would dominate. Maybe there really was a world out there where he agreed with what Ine was saying. Another where he couldn't muster up any argument against them.
 
But the majority of those Takua's who were like him would think similarly. Oh, not identically...but close enough to come to the same conclusion.
 
“If every choice were ever made- I think humans call that a Quantum Multiverse? Assuming that's true, which is an assumption. Then yes, it still matters. Those Takua's who are like me will make a similar decision, and there will be far more of those out there than the edge cases. Who are very likely no longer like me by sheer virtue of the fact that they're making a different decision. They're all their own people who happen to have a similar soul. That doesn't mean the choices we make don't matter. They matter to us, they matter to the people they affect. Just because another me made the other choice doesn't mean that the one I did make doesn't matter any less.”
 
He hadn't meant for his voice to become quite so passionate, but there was no denying his fervor. That Ine was trying to tell him that choices didn't matter struck something deep inside of him. A raw chord of denial that he refused to budge from.
 
It was wrong. That was all.
 
“It's my choice to be evil or not. My choice to be insane or not. That matters to me, it matter to the people that choice affects. If I make the wrong choice...then I live with the consequences.” The Primera looked at Ine solidly in the eyes. There was no doubt to be found, no hesitation at all, “And that will always matter, regardless of whether there was any 'choice' to it at all.”
 
Which, after all, was still up for debate. Takua wasn't nearly as fatalistic as Ine in this stance, although there were others he might be just as bad.
 
WC: 732 | GP: 14 | Total: 56

It was odd with every movement that Takua made he could see each possible option, the ones that happened more often than not were much more clear. It was like watching everything that ever could, would, and did happen.

"You still hold the delusions of free will, it's like watching a prisoner rattling his cage and insisting he's free. I think some might say I have a gift, but I think it's more of a curse. I see the cage, even I sit in one."

It was the simplest, purest form of the truth that he could see. Truth, now that was an odd fellow and one who was more of an annoyance than anything else. It was dangerous to discuss anything with that man. It was easy to fall into an endless cycle coming away with less understanding than you went in with.

He had said that those who broke free of the normal cage were able to bend fate around the choices they make, but even that was only a half fact. Reality was that their thread was ripped away from the tapestry of lesser beings and woven into something much greater. It was possible to see how all the threads were really the same, regardless of everything they went through. The bigger picture was so much more important.

"Be careful in your assumptions, you assume that those who make the other decisions are like you. That would be so far from the reality, you, this you is singular and that's what makes you special from the rest. You and you alone have the potential burning inside of you, the rest of them can only fail. Of course that doesn't grantee success, it only means you have the capability to succeed."

Every instance of a life was just a piece of the endless possibilities and across it all there was only a singular opportunity and it would only come in a singular moment. It was rare to see the true capability of an individual unlocked, but it was rare to have seen so many happen before his own eyes. His own capability would be burned away in time, a true travesty but it was inevitable. He was not meant to exist, it was dangerous for him to simply be.

He was willing to open his eyes and see that even now they were still bound and chained, even if it was on a different level than before. Being held in bondage like this was no better and it was better to turn a blind eye and be unknowing rather than live out a complete existence of eternity knowing such a terrible truth. He doubted that the others even understood what it was he saw, they had no dominion of this aspect of reality and they were able to live in the bliss of ignorance.

That was why he held hope that someone could exist in his place that could balance those who had decided that this life was acceptable. So he would meet those who had the potential and that he believed would be the best pieces of thread to repair the gaping errors that his removal would cause.

"Some actions have an end, but no beginning. Some begin, but don't end. It all depends on where you stand. Where will you stand Takua?"

He snapped his fingers again, they were no longer in the Seireitei. They were where they had started, both as if they had never moved. To any outside presence not a single moment would have passed while they had been gone.  He did not even wait for any response, another snap and he was falling through the chair and the floor disappearing from view. He had another to visit here in this kingdom of wasteland sand.

3,057 Total Words - 60 GP