Too Close to Feel [Closed]

Blood and viscera covered the room. Little bits of meat, and even a limb here or there, strewn across the throne room like macabre sprinkles on a cupcake. Standing directly in the middle of the room, noisily consuming what looked to be the last remaining piece of some poor soul's torso, was Souta Suzuki, his back turned to Walkren.

Of course, when his name was called, he turned around. Blood covered him in splatters, but his body was pristine, not a single mark on him. The red staining his skin was entirely that of his victims. His jaw was split in half, sharp teeth filling the gap, blood dripping from the serrated edges. As Souta's eyes locked onto Walkren, his expression and stance shifted. His jaw sealed shut, skin seeming to connect, leaving no hint of the horror Walkren had just seen, a normal mouth with a wide grin where just moments ago there had been a monster. His smile spread to his eyes as he began to laugh.

He almost couldn't believe that Walkren was here. It hadn't even been a month since this man had rejected his offer, and he'd already figured out how to get to Las Noches on his own and even wanted a rematch. But there was something off. Souta's nose twitched as he sniffed the air. Walkren didn't smell of hollow at all. Had he not gotten to Las Noches using his own power then? He was hoping for a bit more honestly. But still, to be instantly challenged to a rematch was pretty fucking perfect. Probably still upset about how badly he lost to a butt-naked Espada.

With a flick, Souta threw the last bit of meat he was holding into the air, arcing it perfectly into his open mouth and gulping it down.

"You have pretty fucking perfect timing Walkren. I just finished disciplining a few of my more churlish and insubordinate subordinates. They didn't seem to take it to well. But look at the bright side! Now I'm full and I'm warmed up and ready to go for you.

Let's just hope you can give me more of a challenge this time!" A cero suddenly launched from Souta's mouth, crackling with electricity and blocking him completely from Walkren's view with it's bright light. An overused tactic? Probably. But no sense fixing what ain't broke. The Arrancar moved with an uncanny speed, electricity already pumping through his body from the slaughter he'd just committed. Before the Cero even made it to it's target he'd moved around it, his leg swinging through the air, bearing down towards his head with enough force to crack a mountain.

He probably shoulda held back a bit more, but where the fuck is the fun in that?

~~~~~~
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Exactly the reaction he was hoping for.

Walkren licked his lips and tasted the static on the air. It tickled his mouth into a fanged grin that glinted with each crackle of the Cero barreling towards him. The ribbon of Souta’s reiatsu was still in his hand as the Arrancar barreled around the Cero. Walkren slid his right foot on the cool sandstone deeper into his defensive position and brought his arms out. One, with the ribbon, rose, palm out, towards the Cero. The other, holding the sword, flicked upward as if he was blocking something with his black blade. In that instant, both attacks landed.

The ground in a circle around Walkren cracked and exploded from the energy of both attacks. Debris and loose sand flew chaotically around the two combatants as the explosive electricity of the Cero snapped and mushroomed around them. Walkren lost visual on Souta as the clouds of dust and energy consumed them. An orange sheen cracked slightly where Souta’s leg hit Walkren’s Bakudo. The energy had always been around him. It was rare that he didn’t have some kind of Bakudo or Hado ready inside of him these days. It only took a thought and the weaves of binding energy had formed together into a shield around the Shinigami.

Walkren chuckled.

You’re going to have to do better than that, Souta.

With little effort, Walkren pushed more binding energy into the shield where Souta’s kick had landed. Clawing fingers of Bakudo shot up out of the cracked surface and gripped the Arrancar’s leg like a vice. Knowing Souta wouldn’t stand for being held for long, Walkren quickly fed his Hado through the laces of the Bakudo and released it on the immobilized Arrancar. Blue energy curled up out from the orange bindings and the reaction cascaded into two huge clouds of azure.

Soren Sokatsui.

As the explosion rumbled through the room and shook the cracking ground, Walkren shunpo-ed up into air and observed his work. His hazel eyes reflected clouds of ash and sand. His smile was even wider now. Taking a deep breathe, he slashed the air with his obsidian blade, feeling it’s power coursing through him. His fingers tingled with the power he wielded inside of him. He hummed his pleasure before speaking to the dark cloud, “Let’s turn this up a notch, eh, Souta?”

A short breath escaped his lungs.

With a quick motion, Walkren turned his blade on himself and shoved it into his gut. More breath was exhaled as he cut upwards through his torso. The power that built up inside of him was begging to be released. If he felt like he wielded true power before, then what kind of power was this? The built up power wasn’t let loose in one all explosive event, but in a slow calm drifting that encompassed the entire room. Onyx and emerald reiatsu reached into each crevice and crack, every heart that it could grip and smother with it’s numbing energy. Walkren’s pupils dilated and his body relaxed.

His lips parted just enough to let the word past, “Bankai.”

 

[516] [10] [23]

He felt his own blood flowing. In one move, Walkren had managed to do what those other ten or fifteen arrancar hadn't.

Souta smiled as he was knocked through the air by the explosion on his leg, a quick flip sending him onto his feet before he hit the ground. Honestly, he'd fucked up. Still high off of the slaughter he'd come at the Shinigami like he was any other opponent. But he'd fought this man before. He was weaker than Souta, but smart. And smart was dangerous. He was smart enough to get to Las Noches, smart enough to not be taken over by his inner hollow, of course he'd be smart enough to counter attack. As the warm blood flowed down his calf, he couldn't help but smile.

He was smart enough to be fun.

Looking up at him, the man drew his sword, wanting more. "You better turn it up as far as you can, Walkren. You already know that if you come at me with any less than everything you have, I will fuck you in the ass. Maybe literally this time, you're kinda cu-" He was planning to describe in great detail what he'd do to Walkren's ass, but his words were stopped short as the reiatsu poured off of him and that single glorious word escaped his mouth. This motherfucker had really gotten a Bankai. It hadn't even been a month! Last time he hadn't even used his Shikai, he'd been too busy have a spat with his spirit or some shit, and now this glorious jackass had brought a Bankai to Souta.

Sometimes, he loved it when he let people live.

"You shit-eating queef, you're just gonna go straight to Bankai? Fuck, I love you. I've never even seen your god damn Shikai! Did I kick so much inspiration into your ass last time that you went out and fucking got a Bankai?" He laughed, his foot drawing back, solidifying his stance on the ground. He needed an opening on Walkren to make the damage stick. He also wasn't going to rush head first into a Bankai without any idea of what it does. A strange release ritual, stabbing himself in the gut like that, cutting almost all the way to his heart. The power granted by it would likely be equally as fucked up.

Souta hadn't yet met a problem that tactical application of overwhelming force couldn't overcome. He just had to figure out where inside Walkren's asshole he needed to 'tactically apply' his foot. "So now that you've brought me a beau-t-i-ful fucking present, how about you tell me just what the fuck you're planning to do with it?" Likelihood of him telling him what his powers were? Near zero. But hey, might as well try.

WC/GP/TGP 466/9/18

As the Arrancar spilled useless quips, Walkren started to gather his spiritual energy inside of him. Folding layers and layers of the volatile energy, he compressed it to the farthest reaches of his finger tips. His focus was on gathering the chaotic energy. As long as Souta was giving him the chance, he would take advantage. That was the upside to his Bankai, or downside however you look at it. Walkren would normally be right there with Souta, throwing insults and smiling a wide razor grin. Instead, he was focused and merciless. A killing machine that wouldn’t stop until his enemy was pulp.

Of course, he didn’t plan to kill Souta. Walkren owed it to the man for his own life being spared. But, that doesn’t mean Walkren didn’t want to even the score. Not to mention what the Arrancar had done for Walkren. If he looked at it with his currently logical state, Souta was the most important person in his life, or was. No one had pushed him in such a direction that had changed so much about the man. He had pushed him to fight back, to give it his all no matter what. Walkren had and look where it got him. Souta deserved a beating just for that.

He had achieved Bankai and survived. He had met the King of Las Noches, all but giving up his soul to the monster. He had been put on a path that would forever change who he was. All because of the fuckface spewing insults below him. It was almost enough to make Walkren smile. Actually, it wasn’t, but the thought was still there. It was satisfactory.

Out of respect, Walkren let Souta finish. His face was blank and his eyes stared down at the Arrancar. As soon as he was done Walkren monotoned voice echoed through Souta’s throne room, “I’m planning to come at you with everything I have.”

A single step through the air and Walkren was right in front of the Arrancar, “Now, if you’re done...”

As he stepped, both of his hands lifted up, releasing binding energy inside of him. Sajo Sabaku. Two chains of glowing amber rose up out of the ground, twisting around Souta’s exposed legs. A deep part of Walkren’s consciousness, pushed back by his Bankai, took a sinister pleasure in seeing the blood dripping off one of the Arrancar's legs. The chains were attached to the sandstone ground, locking the Arrancar in place.

Hands, still in the motion of lifting, gracefully transitioned to one palm out, pointed at Souta, and the other holding onto the opposite arm for support. All of the energy he had time to fold and compress inside of him gathered and began to push to escape from Walkren. His face, still the shining example of blank, only broke to intone the words of the Kido, “Hado #88, Hiryu Gekizoku Shinten Raiho.”

Arcing azure bolts gathered in rapid succession around Walkren’s open palm. The chaotic energy compressed itself even further, building to the release. The Hado he chose wasn’t the most efficient form of destruction. It was quite the opposite. An untargeted beam of destructive energy. Similar to the Arrancar’s Cero. But, Walkren’s logical mind thought that Souta would enjoy his display of raw power. There were plenty of ways to kill the man with quick strokes, but death wasn’t the point of the fight.

The point was to enjoy it.

Could he even do that while in Bankai?

Logically, if the battle was sound and eventful then there could be some miniscule amount of satisfaction, right? The thought hung in Walkren’s mind as the erratic lighting suddenly finished gathering and erupted across the room as a huge wave of torrential spiritual energy. It cut a deep ravine in the soft sandstone floor and barreled out the side of the wall deep into the Las Noches sky before finally dispersing. As if an earthquake had shaken the immense castle, the walls around both of them shook. The destructive force of the blast had pushed Walkren backwards, the erratic and uncontrollable nature of the Hado left his heart racing despite his Bankai.

There may be a bit of satisfaction.

Just a bit.

[700] [14] [37]

A step brought Walkren to Souta, just out of arm's reach. Of course that wouldn't have mattered if not for the chains wrapping around his legs before the shinigami even finished his movement. They'd take a second or two to break, and that was all Walkren needed as the energy swirled around him. Electricity and Reishi concentrated, onto the open palm, other hand bracing it's arm. Souta didn't even need to wait for him to say the name to know what Hado he was casting. One of the most powerful of them all, the taste of it in the air was distinctive, and the arrancar could only grin. Walkren didn't know just how ineffective it was about to be.

His own arms swelled up with fire and energy, cero bursting to life around them. It was getting easier and easier to call it forth.

As the giant pillar of destruction rushed towards him, he pushed his hands forward, digging them into it. The electricity in the air flowed into his body, draining the spell of so much of his power, and the rest was pried in half by his fingers, the fire around them aiding in rending the withered pillar in half, sending each half to either side of Souta, blowing holes in his beautiful throne room, letting the sun in through more than just the wall of windows.

Massive arcs of electricity swirled through the air from where his fire wreathed hands had split the pillar, pouring back into his body as he cackled.

"Swing and a miss, but how about you have a taste of my"

Thrusting his hands forward back at Walkren he shot his own massive pillar, a mockery and imitation of the Hado, a spiral of Cero and electricity.

"SOARING HIP THRUSTING PUSSY QUAKING THUNDER COCK" To be a proper mockery, it required a fake name of course. His laughter infected his voice as he screamed it back at Walkren. A final flex of his calves broke the chains around them, and with a buzz he was gone, jumping up and over the pillar rushing towards the other man, out pacing it to slam down him, an axe kick aimed directly at his head, the fire of his Cero spreading to his foot before it began it's downward arc.

He'd have to use La Fiera soon. If not for his very next move. Walkren had already revealed his Bankai but if he pulls out his mask too and Souta no longer has a trick up his sleeve, he might be in trouble.

Of course, he always had the most fun when he was in trouble, when he was pushed to and past the very edge in a fight. And man did he love fun.

~~~~~~
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Then again...

If he was to use the power of his Shikai, he could, potentially have some kind of satisfaction, artificial as it may be. That interested Walkren. Would long term exposure to that kind of manipulation effect something negatively? Theoretically, he could train himself to sustain Bankai indefinitely and, thus, his Shikai indefinitely. The only thing he could see that would logically be a problem was the fact that he couldn’t feel pain. Any sort of cut or bruise would go unnoticed and untreated. Even if he didn’t feel pain, he still could die from disease or blood loss. But even that could be solved with-

Ah. Souta was attacking. Leaving the bubble of his thoughts, Walkren analyzed the battle field with a quick scan of his mind’s eye. He did an instant double take when he saw the trajectory of the beam of raw reiryoku and of Souta’s screaming downward kick. Amusement would be the emotion dancing on his lips if his heart wasn’t locked away. Maybe, deep down, there was some kind of amusement, but, on the surface, Walkren’s face was a blank slate. He spoke lightly, not even intending for his words to reach the Arrancar’s ears, “The same attack?”

“Souta, you disappoint me.”

Déjà vu hit Walkren as the ravenous pillar of erratic energy slammed into a sphere of woven Bakudo in front of him. The second earthquake came almost an instant later, as Souta’s foot landed, once again, on a shield formed around Walkren. The reiryoku in his shield was thicker this time, woven tighter together. The boost of power from his Bankai easily flowed into his shields, strengthening them against Souta’s attacks. Nothing cracked this time, that is, not until Walkren made a crack.

Moving as soon as the initial wave of power washed over the combatants, Walkren ripped a hole in his own Bakudo and lunged forward, left arm pointed up at Souta. Tangerine shards exploded into a confetti from the Bakudo as Walkren passed it in the air. Souta’s kick, still holding in a fraction of the momentum it had, continued it’s inevitable fall towards earth, bringing the Arrancar ever closer to Walkren. The tip of Walkren’s left index finger made contact with him two inches from where his heart should be as he spoke again, “You haven’t seen this one before.”

Sassy enough? Walkren was trying to taunt the Arrancar even when it wasn’t a logical strategy in his current state. Mental warfare was completely valid if the user knew how to properly fire off the salvos. Souta’s most effective form of getting underneath his opponent’s skin was through words and actions that would make them slip up and falter. Unfortunate for him, Walkren was completely unphased by any such attempts.

As his finger jabbed into the impenetrable pectoral muscle of Souta, he released the full force of his Bankai onto the Arrancar. Like a syringe being injected into skin, Walkren’s obsidian blade drained it’s black ink through his body and into Souta’s skin. A web of tendriled molasse squirmed and clutched at the man’s heart, threatening to choke any and all thoughts of happiness from his soul. Walkren would be feeling this too, if he could feel. Instead, the calm, relaxed face just stared into the Arrancar’s eyes as despair washed over them.

A smile would be so perfect right now.

[562] [11] [48]

Neither block surprised him. But it's fine, cracking open a barrier is like breaking open an oyster to get to that delicious meat on the inside.

Course, usually the oyster doesn't break his own shell to jab you. It was painfully slow, but so unexpected that Souta didn't react until Walkren's finger was almost to him. Souta's hand wrapped around the other man's wrist, ready to crush it to a pulp.

And then it touched him.

It was like being dunked into the icy ocean. He just wanted out. He wanted to quit, to stop. His body began to fell limp. What was the point of this fight? Shouldn't he just gi- FUCK THAT SHIT. The ocean boiled over in a flash. He had no god damn clue what had just happened but he was willing to bet his left testicle that it was Walkren's Bankai. A demoralizing ability of some kind? Fucking hell that was dangerous. But now it had just pissed him off more, and there was nothing he could do to hold himself back now.

"Rabiar, La Fiera."

He growled the words out, his reiatsu bellowing in his voice's stead, tentacles bursting out of his back and instantly wrapping themselves around Walkren's limbs and torso. Who gave a fuck about barriers if he could just hold onto him. Actually fuck that, who gave a fuck about barriers at all! This man was an Oyster, and Souta wanted the delicious meat. His mouth flashed open into a three pieced maw full of teeth, his breath filling the Shinigami's face, as hot as his anger. All he had to do was crack the shell. His jaw clamped like an alligator, pointed fangs piercing through whatever Bakudo Walkren threw up, digging in as far as they could into his meat and skull before they finally met resistance, his barrier stopping the arrancar from getting to the final bit of meat he wanted.

Oh well, he'd crack this eventually.

His foot planted itself squarely into his chest, tentacles releasing him as he gave a massive shove, his teeth rending and ripping flesh before finally releasing their grasp as he went flying. Souta cackled, pulling something out from his teeth and found himself staring at one of Walkren's eyeballs, just making him laugh more before he ate it like a grape.

"Whoops! Looks like I just ate one of your eyes! Tasty though." His black eyes focused back on his opponent, loving the sight of this Shinigami's blood soaked face, but something critical was missing. It almost took him a full second to realize it, but this man had an entirely passive face. No anger. Despair. Sadness. Pain. Not even a fleeting fucking ounce of discomfort. How could he not be feeling...

No. . Could it be?

"Your bankai doesn't just steal my emotions, does it Walkren?"

That had to be it. An ability that sealed your emotions away and allowed you to do the same to others. In a way, Souta could see the use. Remove a man's fear, his trepidation, his sense of restraint and decency, and he will become a perfect killer. Remove your opponents hope, joy, resolve, determination, and they become a passive baby. In another way, it horrified him. The idea of a fight without emotion was foreign to him. He lived off the high of mortal danger. This was perhaps, one of the most thoroughly horrible things he could imagine

"How can you enjoy a fight like that?" His voice was quieter than before.

~~~~~~
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Unexpectedly, Walkren found himself blind.

Like the sudden sad dip into darkness of an unplugged television set, Walkren’s vision melted into black. His back hit hard against the ground as the tentacled grip of Souta’s Resurrección released him. There had been no real time to react. Souta’s bite had been almost instinctual. As Walkren picked himself up off the ground, he listened to the man’s distressed words. If it could, it would have amused Walkren to no end the amount of wavering he heard in the man’s voice. There was no room for amusement though. There was no room for anything but results.

As the man spoke, Walkren’s hand drifted over his face, feeling the destruction and ravaged landscape that use to be his forehead and eyes. A cool green glow danced off of Walkren’s palm and weaves of green temporarily sewed any gaping wounds shut. Walkren licked his lips and the taste of copper filled his mouth. He wiped across his face clearing away the majority of the blood. Left in its place was a smearing of deep reds across a scared, eyeless face. Walkren found his other eye, still holding on for dear life to sinewed muscle.

If he could grin, he would have. If he could chuckle, he would have, but he couldn’t. Any feeling he would have had was locked away deep inside of his Bankai. The black of his blade was slowly returning. He knew he would be unable to use that power again, especially if Souta has so easily shrugged it off. So, instead, he ripped the eye off of the last bit of stringy muscle and tossed it in the direction that he thought Souta was in and spoke in his monotone voice, “You’ve found me out.”

“My Bankai seals off any emotion or feeling I might have.”

The blindness was an issue his mind was working over as he spoke. It wouldn’t do for him to not be able to see while he fought. There was still a tinge of his mind’s eye at work in the corner of the darkness. He could almost feel, he could almost taste, he could almost smell Souta’s released reiatsu flowing over him. Relaxing his concentration on trying to perceive the world around him with his actual senses, he instead focused on the bounding spiritual energy flowing out of Souta.

Last time he tried to do something like this he had failed. Ichiro had cheated, though. In the moment, feeling and emotion had clouded his judgement. Letting his concentration slip had been a mistake anyone in lo- anyone physically attracted to someone would have made. Now, things were different. With nothing to cloud his mind, he let Souta’s reiatsu flow into him. His location was the only thing Walkren needed to know. Everything else was useless information.

With the exhale, he felt a cool azure breeze wash over him. From the tinged darkness, a shape began to form. At first, it was a globulous mass made up of spiritual energy, floating and morphing as it slowly formed into the shape of Souta Suzuki. The rest of the world was dark, for now. His concentration was solely focused on the Arrancar and his flowing reiatsu.

After what seemed like a second pause in his speech, Walkren continued to speak, “Don’t be so naive, Souta. No ordinary combatant could continue fighting after getting their eyes gouged out by you.”

“No ordinary combatant could fight on and on until their body is as decimated as the battlefield they fight on.”

“Enjoyment lies in overcoming your opponent,” Walkren exclaimed, throwing echoes into the huge room. He knew that his normal self would not agree, but this Walkren was logical. He wasn’t clouded by emotion or by silly desires to push his limits. There was no need to be on the edge of death constantly. Challenging Souta wasn’t about that. It was about winning, despite the odds, no matter how it was done. The only thing that drove him was the desire to win. It was a puzzle to be solved.

It was a game.

With a lift of his hand, he finished his speech, pointing directly at Souta, “Hado #90, Kurohitsugi!"

[701] [14] [62]

The knuckles in his fingers rolled as he absently flexed them, stretching the muscles that hadn't been there for centuries. If he thought about it, he might think it weird, how this habit had been born when he was a child, and had lasted him through his adolescence and adulthood, through two deaths, and through being a mindless beast. But his mind was consumed with something else right now, something that was keeping him from even pressing the attack on Walkren.

What was before him was something alien to him. Something he'd honestly never fought before. Sure, he'd fought men and women who tried to seal off their emotions, who tried to approach battle with a passivity, but there was still always emotion that leaked through. A ferocity, a fear, a feral instinct. But every single thing about this Shinigami betrayed none of that. His stance didn't give away how much he wanted to attack. His muscle didn't tense in excitement or in an unconscious preparation to flee. His voice was as even as if he were having afternoon tea. The man was as a statue brought to life. Souta had a feeling that if he had a finger to his wrist, even his pulse would be muted.

It was the opposite of Souta. Where Walkren was Stone, Souta was Fire. His pulse was racing alongside the electricity in his body, his muscles were rolling, tensing in preparation for more combat, more action. He could feel the dilation in his own pupils, the surging of his heart, the ebb and flow of his reiatsu with every breath he took. Every part of him could feel nothing but antipathy for what Walkren represented. For five hundred years Souta had fought like this. He couldn't think of any other way to truly enjoy fighting. Maybe Walkren's way could be effective, but could it ever be truly enjoyable?

The arrancar shook his head, shock blue hair displacing in the motion before being set back into it's right place by his hand. "I've met my fair share of extraordinary people who could go on for quite a while without their eyes. And none of them had to seal away their feelings to keep fighting. I've seen them continue fighting as I ripped them limb from limb.

If you can't stand to keep fighting as your body is destroyed, then you don't deserve to be on the battlefield in the first place, Walkren."

Souta frowned, earnestly, his face lacking it's usual infection of grin. This Shinigami's words were honestly upsetting him, his lack of understanding of battle. And with his bankai, he wasn't even sure if he could beat it into him. "Enjoyment in combat isn't overcoming your opponent, Walkren."

The air turned black around him, the box forming and closing around his words, closing as his face shifted from a frown to a grin, his gaze renewing it's fervant vigor.

"It's overcoming yourself."

The box swelled from the inside the moment it closed, trying to contain a great pressure even as it tried to collapse with blades on it's quarry. But sometimes your target isn't so passive as to accept it's fate. White fingers dug through the purple black wall, blue flames burning outward from them, consuming the box in a flash second, leaving just Souta, wreathed in his cero energy, the blood flowing down his chest from where the hado had lacerated his flesh being burned to vapor before it could even hit the floor. He stepped forward slowly, making no great effort to cross the space between them instantly.

He had his piece to say. His hand waved toward his chest, to the missing flesh and flowing blood.

"Wounds that would make a lesser man fall to the ground, unable to continue. Wounds that would easily kill his lesser. And to me, they are nothing. Enjoyment is not in overcoming your opponent, it is in overcoming yourself! It is in finding something you can't do, and fucking doing it anyway! I don't ignore the pain. I revel in it. I don't seal away the doubt. I plow through it. If your biggest trump card is something so weak as ignoring and sealing away your weakness instead of overcoming it, then you are disappointing me, Walkren. I saw something great in you back in the human world. You defeated Kutsu for control of your own body, and now you can't even defeat the limits pain imposes on you?"

He spit to the ground, the tentacles on his back beginning to glow and lift, swirling about as they separated into five each. Energy flowed between them, preparing for their grand release. "FUCK THAT." His body shifted in a half second, fist dragging itself back as he leaned forward, the energy between his tentacles releasing explosively in two massive flares of energies, wings of fire and destruction erupting from Souta's shoulders as he accelerated to impossible speeds in a half second. It was impossible to dodge at this range, as the fire of his ressurecion raged behind him and the fire of his cero raged in front of him. His fist extended towards the shinigami's chest. There was no point aiming for the jaw with a punch like this. You aimed for center mass, to do the maximum damage. He would break Walkren of his weaknesses, even if he had to kill him to do it.

After all, what else were friends for?

~~~~~~
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It was like being in the center of a star going supernova.

The solar flare of released reiatsu curled and radiated a brilliant luminosity that threatened to blind Walkren’s only means of vision. He scrambled to focus, scrambled to find the Arrancar in the soup of spiritual energy. There was no panic, there couldn’t be, but he still knew the importance of keeping track of his foe. He pushed himself even further into the calm, forcing out even more of the outside stimuli until the bare bones of the world remained. It wasn’t enough, he couldn’t find the focus he needed to disperse the erratic patterns of reiatsu that Souta was throwing haphazardly into the air.

The only thing that really saved him was Souta actually attacking. Like turning on the headlights of a car in the midst of fog, Souta’s screaming strike flew out of the azure haze and Walkren diverted his focus to it. As if he twisted the lens of his eyes to just the right focal length, the Arrancar came into focus. It was still an amorphous outline of the Arrancar’s physical form, but it would do. It took less than a moment for Souta to cross the distance between them, it took even less for Walkren’s lips to form a single word: “Danku.”

Brilliant orange weaves of binding energy spiralled into being and strung themselves together into a thin wall of hardened reiryoku. At least, that’s what would have happened if there had been just a split second more time. Souta’s strike broke the sound barrier as it crashed forward into the partially made barrier. Thankfully, Walkren had focused the shield’s origin around his own body. Unfortunately, Souta was an unrelenting avalanche of power and the shield tore apart with a thud.

No, wait.

That thud was his fist connecting with Walkren’s chest, right underneath the hilt of his obsidian blade. In the span of an instant, Walkren was lifted up off the ground, propelled forward by Souta’s excessive energy. The outline of the Arrancar faltered as Walkren’s focus was drawn elsewhere. He could feel the frayed Bakudo still trying desperately to form. A thin membrane of binding energy between the erupting fist and his weak flesh.

Another thud.

This time from behind him. He had no time to wonder what it was. At this point, it was a speck of noise compared to the blaring sirens of Souta’s fist trying to bore a hole into his chest. His body was flying through the air, propelled up by the force of Souta’s mountain moving punch. He continued to pump binding energy into the rapidly cracking panel of Bakudo that was pushed hard against his chest. It was an uphill battle. All he was doing was delaying the inevitable. Souta would break through his barrier and, with the horrendously ridiculous power of the punch, break through his chest.

They were like a comet streaking across the sky.

Walkren might not be able to see, but, if he could, he would witness the two of them soaring across the sunny white sands of Las Noches. Souta’s punch had propelled the two of them out of his little throne room and into the vast expanse of dunes that made up the miles of space between the castles of Las Noches and the gargantuan walls of its exterior. The speck on the sky plummeted through the air in the space of a heartbeat and crashed into an abandon sandstone tower. Dust and sand billowed into broad clouds across the clear blue skies of Las Noches.

Deep inside the clouds, Walkren’s body was pinned against a still standing wall by Souta’s arm. Souta wasn’t just pressing his fist against Walkren’s chest to hold him up. No, no. Souta’s knuckles grinded against sandstone and his arm was covered in thick painful rivers of red as it moved inside of Walkren’s chest. The Bakudo had broken on impact. Walkren had accepted that Souta’s fist would get through.

It’s not like it mattered.

Body still unmoving, head still facing the ground, Walkren’s monotone voice drifted up through the harsh smells of dust and copper, “It’s you who doesn’t understand, Souta.”

The Arrancar’s words had merit. There was a sense of accomplishment and success that came with overcoming your limits and coming out alive and on top. Walkren had experienced it before with Souta. Though the Arrancar could have ended the broken Shinigami’s life with a flick of his wrist, he had pushed himself and overcame himself. That was no victory. He had fought against Evelynn, outgunned and outplayed, even after his body had been burnt into a crisp. The Arrancar had given him a second chance at life with his surrender. That was no victory.

Victory was standing over your opponent’s corpse and knowing that you overcame great odds to defeat them. Victory was losing an arm, a leg, your eyes and still defeating your opponent. Victory was laughing in the face of death and then defeating it as well. That was something he could enjoy. Walkren’s head still hung as he continued, blood dripping out of his mouth with every word, “I have defeated my limits.”

“I have conquered them beyond a shadow of a doubt.”

A hand moved into action and gripped the arm that pierced his chest. Blood splashed against every surface, coating the walls in red. Fingers, once thought to be dead of life, gripped Souta’s muscled arms with a ferocity that could rival the fire that burned in his soul. Slowly, Walkren’s head lifted from its placid state to fix Souta in the eyes, a twisted and mangled wall of flesh where eyes should be blankly locked onto Souta's burning blue. His lips, dripping blood, barely moved as he whispered, “There is nothing else to overcome except your stubborn ass.”

“What was it that you said?”

His other hand rose, palm out, reishi rapidly gathering at a central point. The bubbling blue outline of Souta was still stable and he aimed his hand at the point where his shoulder and arm met. He could feel the chaotic energy gathering and growing inside of him. It yearned for him to intone and release the built up energy. He could feel the words right on the edge of his consciousness. Hiryu Gekizoku Shinten Raiho. With just a whisper he could tear Souta asunder. Too bad the Arrancar just loved to get zapped. He had planned for that. With the slightest manipulation of the reishi, he dissolved the arcing electric energy back into pure spiritual power.

A grin to rival Souta’s would be plastering his face if he could smile.

There was accomplishment in overcoming your opponents.

Souta was naive to think otherwise.

“Soaring Hip-thrusting Pussy Quaking Thunder Cock.”

[1129] [22] [84]

The boiling energy didn't worry Souta. He could have pulled away from it all, just leaving his arm inside of Walkren as he dodged the attack, but that would mean he didn't get to do something he really wanted to do.

The modified kido blasted into him, tearing his arm apart and scattering the shards into the desert behind them, pulling chunks of flesh and blood out of his shoulder. But point blank like it was it didn't do any serious damage to any organs he really needed to keep, sure it completely took out a lung but he had two of those after all. He could afford to lose pounds of flesh and blood. The heat crackled against his skin, but heat was easy for hierro to handle. Even through the pain and even losing his flesh, Souta just kept grinning. Why? Because it just felt so damn good as his knuckles ground into Walkren's cheek, two quick jabs following the initial hook, breaking a bone at the least. The final punch left his hand wrapped around the Shinigami's jaw, keeping it pinned against the sandstone.

"You really, really, need to stop doing the same shit he does. It's getting annoying. And that was my favorite punching arm, so fuck you!"

The hand still inside of Walkren's gut turned into a ball of spikes, piercing through the shinigami's flesh as Souta spoke, but not a single reaction for him to revel at was had. This Bankai was possibly the second most distressing thing Souta had ever fought. It was pissing him the fuck off. His hand let go of Walkren's jaw and grabbed onto the hilt of the sword stuck in his chest, as a white foot planted itself onto his bloody chest.

"Time for you to feel all the damage you've accumulated, Walkren." With a single powerful motion, he kicked Walkren through the wall, his firm grip on the sword holding it in place as his flesh released it with a squelch. A powerful swing out of his arm sent it flying off into the distance. Souta had no need for it, and neither did Walkren now. His first step was unsteady, but he found his gait in the second and third.

"I'll tell ya Walkren, pain will not be ignored. She is a cruel fucking bitch, and if you ignore her she'll claw your fucking eyes out. Oh wait." He paused to cackle, stepping over the rubble from the wall, into the interior room, the bloody shinigami near the middle of it. "You're a bit young. And I've seen enough Bankai to recognize a juvenile one. So you finally attained Bankai, and rushed to Las Noches to track me down to beat me with it, only to have me insult the very concept of it and break it. Tell me Walkren,"

He stopped far enough away that he could dodge anything Walkren threw at him, and leered at the Shinigami before him, adopted a tone of fake empathy.

"How does that make you feel?"

~~~~~~
WC/GP/TGP 510/10/66

For a split second, Walkren was blind again.

He could see nothing through the haze of spiritual energy that his Hado cast out, betrayed by his own reiatsu. The blurred outline of Souta Suzuki dispersed in Walkren’s thick cloud of energy, but Walkren knew the Arrancar’s scent. As fast as his opponent faded away into obscurity, Walkren found the distinct pungent smell of the man’s reiatsu. Like dragging a body out of water, Walkren grit his mind and yanked the reiatsu through the haze. The outline buzzed through the waves of Walkren’s spiritual energy and surfaced as Souta’s punch barreled for the Shinigami’s face.

All of the lessons that Ichiro taught him had prepared him for this moment. The intimate touch Walkren had to Souta’s reiatsu had slowly made him privy to a few things. The Quincy had been right. Walkren had felt the punch before he had been able to see it. The internal coiling of the Arrancar’s muscles, the tension of him winding up, it all happened in a split second, but Walkren felt it that split second before it was released. It was as if he could see the moves Souta was making before he actually made them.

His Bankai helped him ignore pain, it helped him ignore feelings, but what Walkren truly didn’t understand until this moment was how powerful that was when he put his mind to it. Without the hindrances of feelings or emotions, without those distractions, the full brunt of his powerful mind could completely focus itself on anything. There was no doubt, apathy, lethargy, anger, sadness, anything clouding his mind. There was only the logical truth and the logical goal. Walkren’s mind was completely focused on Souta’s reiatsu, and, with it, he felt the echoes of the punch combo that were flying towards him.

He wouldn’t be able to stop them. Their power difference was still great. Even with Bankai, the Arrancar outmatched even Walkren’s most powerful attack. Or was it his most powerful? That thought danced in his head as he twisted Bakudo directly in front of the punches. Each bit of weaving emerald was exactly the size of Souta’s fist. The Bakudo was compact and so minute that the Arrancar probably missed them as he unleashed his unrelenting attack on the Shinigami.

The Bakudo broke and Walkren felt his face move with each hook. There was no pain, only the rapid release of thoughts as he thought about his next move. A quick analysis of the battle and what Souta was spouting at him made him realize what was about to happen. Without a second thought, Walkren threw Kaido at his body, jump starting the healing process. Light green globs of reiryoku weaved his wounds shut and stopped the bleeding that would eventually kill him.

A wave of actual pain swept across him as Souta gripped his blade. He felt tears come to his eyes, he felt hate bubble forth from deep inside of him, he felt glee try to make him smile, he felt. It was a leak from his lock that soon turned into a tidal wave as Walkren was kicked back into the next room. The blade sang a sorrowful tune as it was ripped from Walkren’s cold heart. His focused mind held onto the nothingness that was his Bankai for as long as he could. All of his energy poured itself into healing his broken body while it flew through the ruins of the tower.

His body crashed against the rough sandstone as all of the emotion and feeling rushed across his body and consumed him. He used it to his advantage. The hate for Souta’s arrogance boiled up inside of him and he let it fuel his desire not to scream out in pain. His teeth grit hard as he felt the spikes inside of his chest and the pain that pulsed from almost every part of his body. The glee he felt from being in a battle for his life with Souta again cracked his stolid face and his smile burned bright against the pain.

He just let the laugh loose as tears streamed down his face.

Souta was a fucking idiot, but he was a powerful idiot.

Walkren’s voice cracked through gritted teeth as he slowly rose from the rubble, “I thought I told you, Souta.”

Every fiber of his being stung and he was using them all to stop himself from collapsing into unconsciousness. It was the will of his raw soul that pushed him forward each step. They started off shaking at first and then, as he got closer to Souta, they became more and more sturdy. The outline of the Arrancar was shining stronger than ever as Walkren stepped towards him. One of his hands rose and touched the bicep of his other arm.

Defiant. You can overcome this asshole.

“I don’t feel.”

Clarity rang in his voice as he took a final solid step forward towards the Arrancar, “ITTO KASO!”

A Forbidden Hado. One whose name is only whispered in secret in the halls of the Academy and the Seireitei. Walkren had confidence running through his veins in the place of his lost blood. He reached deep inside of himself and ripped the power from his soul. The palm of his hand that rested on the opposite arm started to emit heat as the skin of his arm started to bubble and boil like the surface of an active volcano. The charring skin cracked and glowed a deep red as raw reiryoku built itself from his very flesh.

Walkren’s vision dipped out of focus as the Hado forced the last reserved of his energy into a sacrificial explosion of his very soul. There was no stopping his power being drained from him as the Hado rapidly built itself up in his arm. The cracked, weaping skin glowed with a fiery intensity and Walkren quickly realized the mistake he made. There was not enough energy left in his body for the Hado. It started to consume the deep power of his soul, his very life essence. The only thought he had was for his own survival. The Hado would be significantly weaker than it should be, but he would be consumed by his own flames of he didn’t act.

He may not be able to control the Hado, but he had control over his own spiritual energy. With one thought, he cut the Hado off. Full stop. No more juice. The abrupt roadblock caused the Hado to come crashing to completion without any thought of it’s form or function. The red glowing cracks and bubbling skin came to a crescendo of deep sanguine reiryoku as Walkren’s arm erupted in front of him. The two creatures were consumed in the unrelenting power of the raw energy and the tower shook from the earsplitting explosion.

Blood red clouds curled in on themselves as the dust settled from the instant expulsion of Walkren’s last reserves of energy. Somehow, he still stood defiant in the cloud, barely holding himself together. His body looked as if he could take another round, but he was utterly spent. The smallest butterfly could flap its wings and he would fall over. Remnants of his arm hung loosely off of his shoulder as blood dribbled quickly onto the cracked sandstone.

He spat blood on the ground in Souta’s direction.

“Fuck you."

[1232] [24] [108]

That force of will was what made him loves this Shinigami so much. His Bankai ripped from him, his chest split open, his energy almost depleted, and his opponent confident enough to taunt him, and he still stands and moves forward, towards the man he has declared his enemy. Souta knew that Walkren wouldn't, hell, he couldn't stop. He knew exactly what he was feeling, the Shinigami's determination mirrored in the Espada. Both men were resolved that they were not going to lose today.

But someone had to lose, didn't they?

His mouth split into a wide grin, sharp fangs filling the space as his lower jaw split open for a second, revealing the mouth full of daggers before it closed again. He was denying his feelings even as it was obvious they were wracking his body, the pain obvious in his face and in his stance, in the forced motion of every step he took. But still he took every step! Watching it drove Souta's energy even higher, fighting a kindred spirit the truest high he could ever get. Flames danced to life around his left arm. He preferred hitting things with his right, but thanks to the man in front of him he was exclusively southpaw for now. The five tentacles he had left began to whip through the air, slowly rotating as sparks flew between them, arcs of electricity travelling down their lengths. He had enough juice left in him for two or three more big punches. Walkren's stance didn't worry him. He was prepared now, he'd cleave straight through whatever was thrown at him. The same Kido wouldn't work again without being point blank against his flesh.

But then it wasn't the same Kido.

The room shook as Walkren spoke those two words, and with them, Souta was briefly worried. He was far from an expert on Shinigami Kido, but he had a good grip of most of their names, especially the more powerful ones. And he'd never heard of this Kido. That left two possibilities. Either it was some weak Kido that Souta had never heard of... or it was something more powerful than Black Coffin. His eyes shined with battle lust as he realized it could only really be the latter. Something stronger than the strongest named Kido he'd ever seen. He'd heard of forbidden kido before. Could this be one of them? Was Walkren really that desperate to defeat Souta? That kind of determination, it had to be matched. He couldn't leave it unanswered by trying to dodge, he couldn't insult this man like that, not after all he'd done to fight Souta! His foot drug back through the floor, leaving a deep groove, the rotating limbs behind him accelerating to a blur in a blink of an eye. He had enough energy left for two punches, maybe three, but it didn't matter. He was going to put it all into one. Walkren was pushing himself to a dangerous place, and this Espada just couldn't bare to be outdone.

In a second the two men had each prepared their final attacks, a Shinigami's desperate determination matched by an Arrancar's wanton lust for his next high.

And in the next second the world exploded.

The energy exploded out of Souta's shoulder as the tentacles worked to funnel it, spinning faster and faster, concentrating it as tight as he could. His fist split the air in front of him, cloaked in blue fire cascading down over his entire body. Where before he was a winged messenger of destruction, he was now a spear. A bright blue lance heading towards the red cataclysm erupting from Walkren's arm. As blue split red, his laugh was drowned out by the cacophony filling the room. He could feel his wrath, pushing through his curtain of destruction, burning and melting at the arrancar's flesh, but he pressed on. He wasn't worried.

Until he felt himself slow down slightly, with distance still to cover towards his target. The pressure outwards on him was increase exponentially with every increment he moved, slowing him more and more. His mouth split open in a silent roar as the tentacles tightened further, the pressure from the jet behind him increasing beyond what he thought it could, and far beyond what was sane for him to do. He could feel the bits and pieces of the five limbs behind him break off as they met and exceeded their limits, but he couldn't stop now. He'd already lost an arm, what did losing a few more tentacles matter!?

His progress through Walkren's outpouring of raw energy felt excruciatingly slow, even if only fractions of a second had passed.

His fist was almost there.

Just a little more.

His body was fraying as he pushed it further and further, the ceros around him that had been protecting him were beginning to fall apart, massive holes letting the red energy burn at his flesh.

But he just needed one more inch.

His eyes locked into onto where Walkren's used to be, and despite one of them having no eyes, they stared at each other. Two men locked in a violent embrace without touching each other. His roar shifted to a grin as he closed his eyes, the tentacles on his back finally falling apart. The spear that had been pushing him forward flared outwards, dispersing in all directions like a blooming flower as Souta was blasted away from Walkren, carried along by the edge of the explosion.

It took him a second to get back to his feet out in the desert, and he stared for a second at where the building they were in used to be, a crater carved out in the sand in its stead, bright pillars and waves of glass radiating out from it, gleaming in the sunlight.

His footsteps were unsteady at first, but he found his gait, making his way to where he knew his opponent still was, in the middle of the massive cloud of dust rising from the shallow crater. With every step he took the dust cleared a little more until he saw Walkren in front of him finally. The arm that he had channeled the kido through hung by his side, a mangled wreck hanging by bits of flesh off of his shoulder.

How he was still standing was amazing. Maybe the fact that he had been at the center of the explosion had kept him straight up, the simple fact that the destruction canceled out any kind of directional push. If it weren’t for the ragged movement of his chest, Souta might almost think he’d died standing, until with a loud hacking noise, the Shinigami launched a glob of blood to the ground between the two of them, a simple fuck you aimed at him.

The arrancar broke out into a struggled laugh, blood leaking from almost every part of his body. All he could think of suddenly was the two of them standing there. Souta with a massive chunk carved into his side, an entire lung blasted away with his arm and shoulder, bits of burnt flesh still slipping off of him as he moved, and he was pretty sure he’d lost some of his hair. Meanwhile the Shinigami infront of him had destroyed his own arm, had Souta’s fist still lodged inside of him, and had his own extensive burn wounds.

All Souta could do was laugh, before reaching out with his remaining hand and placing it on Walkren’s shoulder.

”We’re done here, Walkren. It’s a draw. Nobody wins today.” A soft push breaks the tenous force that had kept the Shinigami standing, and as Souta dropped to the ground with him he guided him into a seated position. He kept his hand on the other man’s shoulder, electricity beginning to flow into his body.

”I don’t think either of have any go left in us, but I’ve got enough to keep us from dying from bleeding out at least.” The electricity flowed through Walkren’s body, painful as it took its actions to spur on his healing, stopping the profuse bleeding he was suffering from. ”Your bankai is long over, Walkren. We both know you can feel again.” Souta grinned softly, wiping the blood dripping out of the corner of his mouth onto his shoulder.

”So tell me how it all feels. Tell me how it feels to be so determined that you force yourself to unlock your Bankai. Tell me how it feels to be so driven that you find your way to Las Noches. Tell me how it feels to be so sure of yourself that you challenge the man who ripped you apart a month ago. Tell me how it felt to fight me, to push me to the edge, to throw everything you had, to bet your life against mine like I told you to, to almost kill me and almost die in the process.”

His fingers suddenly dug into Walkren’s ruined shoulder, each one digging deep into his eviscerated flesh, Souta’s voice taking on an angry growl as he finished.

”And then once you’ve figured all that out, tell me how it feels to be so fucking amazingly stupid that you would dare to come and fight me without actually bringing everything you had.”


~~~~~~
WC/GP/TGP 1554/31/97

Walkren’s smile cut his face and grit against itself as his body gave up its vague attempts at standing. Souta’s forced guidance didn’t help the piercing ache that was pulsing across his body. He gave up his attempts at putting on a face for the Arrancar and flinched as the two of them hit the ground. His head spun from the influx of pain and his head fell back as he angled his face up into the faux sky of Las Noches.

The sleep that stalked him found him again, adrenaline slowly leaving his body, and he found himself fading slightly as the Arrancar spoke. The digging grip of Souta brought Walkren back into reality and he quickly slapped the Arrancar’s vice grip off of his shoulder. After flinching from the pain of his raw flesh being raked by the Arrancar’s fingers, Walkren’s face cut a wicked grin, “You’re an arrogant fucker, eh Souta?"

“I was just in the neighborhood, figured I’d give you a progress report.”

His voice was steady and cool as he spoke. There was a tinge of annoyance that trailed through his words. He had hoped to pay the Arrancar back, bring him an inch from death and then let him live. Instead, all that had been accomplished had been a stalemate. The two combatants had gotten close to death and any more would be disastrous for not just one, but both of them. Only gravity and the positioning of his body was keeping him sitting up straight at this point. If he could wink he would have, “Don’t worry.”

“Next time won’t be so one sided.”

He chuckled and thought about how he felt. The annoyance was a blade of grass on the grassy knoll of his feelings. It didn’t matter that the fight had ended in a draw. The deep throbbing of his heart made him feel alive. In the moments before he released his raw soul to the world, he had felt fucking amazing. The risk of throwing his very life essence into the world and putting his own life on the line purposefully to try and take down the Arrancar only served to remind him of Souta’s first lesson.

Always give everything you’ve got.

Fight like your life depended on it.

“Well,” Walkren continued, drawing out the world as he mused on what he would say. The thrill of the fight was like a drug to Walkren. He savored the feeling of pain washing across his body. He reveled in it. The sleep and the darkness inside of him could do nothing to match the utter euphoria that was tickling him. It was like he was waking up for the first time all over again. There was a renewed freshness to the world. A new smell on the air. If he could, he would enter combat with Souta forever and fight until the world ended. His smile danced across his face as he tilted his head back up towards the sky, “Honestly?”

“It feels right.”

He sucked in air, stinging his sides, as he continued, “Like I’m suppose to fight you, like I’m suppose to push myself to the brink. I feel more in control than I have in a long time and that’s saying a lot. I don’t think I can ever be myself as much as I am when I’m fighting.”

Only Walkren’s opponents would ever see the real him.

Poetic.

[571] [11] [119]

Souta laughed at his counterpart, shaking his head slightly. One sided? He awkwardly wiggled the massive hole in his side at Walkren, where his arm and shoulder used to be.

”I’m not sure how ‘one-sided’ this was today, Walkren. Seems to me like we’ve got comparatively awful wounds. What with how we’re both missing goddamn arms. Oh right, speaking of that.” His hand slipped from Walkren’s shoulder to the no longer bleeding hole in his gut, and with a gentle pull, his other hand slipped out of it like water, the shards composing it gliding over each other and pulling out of the Shinigami in a continous white stream, before the hand reformed itself and pulled Souta’s hair out of his face before beginning to float roughly where it should if he still had his arm. ”I guess considering I still have my hand I did a little better in that department, but I do miss my lung you know.”

Souta grinned wide at Walkren’s every word, as he described the true thrill of a fight, something he had always known to be true.

”Fighting brings out our core, Walkren. Especially when we have to push ourselves. Especially when the world pushes back. A true fight strips away all your layers. You have to go at it with the purest part of yourself to have a chance of winning, to survive. And if that purest part of you isn’t fully committed to that moment, to that battle, to that instinct to survive… You’ll die.”

He let out a happy, wheezy, one lunged breath,chuckling softly. ”So there’s nothing wrong with it. You are the most you you can be when you’re fighting me because I’ll push you to the edge every time. Because I’ll accept nothing less.” The arrancar sighed softly, shaking his head a little. ”That’s why I’m so dissapointed Walkren. That you would go as far as attaining your bankai, but ignore your other source of power.” He drew his eyes to where Walkren’s should be. If the man’s eyes were still there he’d be looking for signs of acceptance, of remorse, of knowledge that ‘Hey, I fucked up.’ But instead Souta could only watch his face.

”If you’d come at me with everything you had, you might have won today. So tell me Walkren. Why did you not even attempt to master that power inside of you, to bring it against me?

Why are you afraid of Kutsu?”

~~~~~~
WC/GP/TGP 411/8/105