Winter War - Nanao: Prisoners
Title: Winter War - Nanao: Prisoners
Authors: incandescens
Characters: Nanao, Ikkaku, others
Rating/Warning: PG-13.
Notes: This is a dark AU co-plotted with sophiap and liralen. The war against Aizen's forces went very badly. Nothing is sacred and no one is safe.
Summary: There are many sorts of prison, and many captives.
Index of Links
[...]
36. Grimmjow: Trauma
37. Ensemble: Haste
38. Ichigo: No Hiding Place
39. Ensemble: Crossfire
40. Ensemble: Sneaking About
PRISONERS
Nanao was uncomfortably aware of the new weight in her sash. Her own zanpakutou lay in her sleeve, the sheath comfortable against her arm, its balance something which she was used to, trained to. While carrying this strange zanpakutou wasn’t enough to throw her off balance, it was a constant presence in her awareness, enough to cause her to deliberately ignore it in the same way that she might ignore an itch or a broken nail.
Her own zanpakutou had chosen to be silent about her choice to carry it, and indeed anything at all concerned with it. While the blade had never been one of the more communicative sorts - quite a contrast with her, certainly, as Nanao was always ready to communicate - this time it felt even more deliberately opaque than usual. She wasn’t sure whether to interpret it as an attempt to avoid Suzumushi, or to avoid Nanao herself.
With an effort, she forced those worries to the back of her mind. This was not a moment to agonise about her relationship with her zanpakutou. It was not even a moment to consider how one might use a weapon like Suzumushi, if it could be done at all. The priority at the moment was following Madoka to wherever her route led - the mysterious “other place” which, according to Hoshibana, was so heavily inlaid with killing stone that even the surveillance room had difficulty focusing in on it.
Of course, it was obvious what that might mean, and she only had to look sideways to see Kyouraku-taichou’s blades in Yadomarou-sempai’s belt, and that was yet another topic which she could not afford to consider at the moment. It would sway her judgment. She must be calm. She was in command - well, as much as Madarame was, or anyone else was in the group. She could not afford to let her personal thoughts or wishes endanger the others.
He would never have done such a thing, after all.
As they approached the killing stone concentration, Nanao realised she was drawing her brows together in a frown. There was no reason why she should like it, of course, but in such a situation, and with the constant threat of Aizen discovering them, it was even worse. They would all be weakened in this particular territory.
The thought made her turn to speak to Madarame, keeping her voice to a soft murmur. “We need to be in and out of this area as fast as possible. If we’re caught here -“
Madarame nodded. “Right. Even deeper shit than usual.”
“You may be missing something there,” Yadomarou-sempai said, tilting her head as she joined them, her short skirt flipping round her thighs as she strode along. When Madarame glared at her, she shrugged. “Look, half the point about us having to all trot into this damn killing stone zone is that we can’t tell who’s in there, right?”
“Well, yeah,” Madarame started, and then he slapped himself on the forehead. “Right. Fuck, why the hell didn’t I think of that?”
Nanao’s eyes widened as she caught the idea. It almost made her want to slap her own forehead. “Perfect,” she said slowly, “or at least, as good as we’re going to get.”
“It only works until he actually starts looking for us in there,” Lisa said. “Don’t blame yourself, kids. I’ve been spending the last few months trying to stare into his warded zones and getting nothing for my trouble but eyestrain. Let’s use it against him for once. It may give us a little longer before he notices something’s up.”
Madarame flicked a quick glance at the others behind him, and lowered his voice a little further, though he kept his tone conversational. “It’s crazy that we’ve been as lucky as we have.”
“Good planning can take you a long way,” Nanao said dryly. “Just ask Aizen.”
Lisa snorted. “True, but it only goes so far. And why was that lab all dusty, anyhow?”
Nanao had been wondering about that. Why would Aizen have left his researches like that? What worse thing could he have been doing instead? Or was there something else going on that they didn’t know about? It was a big gaping unknown in the middle of their plans, and she didn’t like that at all. “Maybe he was visiting Ichimaru,” she hypothesised, “and the two of them were keeping it secret.”
“But why?” Madarame asked, and Nanao could only shrug in response.
“Here we are,” Hisagi hissed. He was standing just in front of the border of the heavy killing stone section.
Madoka had already walked into the area, and was continuing down the corridor as calmly as if she was bringing tea to a superior officer. She was carrying an empty wicker basket, lined with a dirty napkin, that contained nothing except a few crumbs.
Inoue Orihime halted, staring at the thick killing stone with wide horrified eyes. “It feels ghastly in there,” she said in a horrified whisper.
“It’ll be all right,” Kurosaki-kun said, patting her shoulder. “We won’t be splitting up or anything. We’ll all be together and we’ll be out of there as soon as we’ve checked.”
Nanao decided not to tell him about the new plan yet. “Keep on following,” she directed. “There may be some sort of barrier that she’s got clearance to pass. We can’t afford to let her get too far ahead.”
There was a faint but persistent buzz at the back of her mind as she went forward. She’d rarely been in the presence of so much killing stone before. Like most seated officers, she’d visited the Tower of Penitence once or twice, but she’d never lingered there for longer than was strictly necessary, and she’d always spared a moment’s pity for the guards whose duty kept them there hour after hour. Of course, it wasn’t actually harmful. It was just unpleasant. Annoying.
(Though would it be harmful, if you kept people here for months on end, with no way to escape the constant pressure, with their power bound so that they couldn’t resist it?)
There was no dust on the floor. There hadn’t been anywhere else here, now that she thought about it. “Yamada-kun,” she said softly.
“Yes, Ise-fukutaichou?” he questioned, scuffling up to join her. He shot her a quick, nervous glance as though expecting her to say that they were all about to die horribly.
“When you were sweeping or mopping the corridors, was there ever actually anything to sweep up?”
He frowned. “Not unless someone left it there, Ise-fukutaichou. Though that did happen sometimes. With some Arrancar.” He shuddered vaguely. “The slime, you see . . .”
“Quite,” Nanao said, trying not to think about it. “So the fact that there’s no dust here doesn’t actually prove that someone’s been here recently.”
“Er, no, Ise-fukutaichou. Or yes, rather, it doesn’t.”
“Thank you,” Nanao said before he could stammer at her any more. The walls were blanks at the moment. There were no doors in this stretch of corridor. The whole place seemed to have been laid out for maximum maze quality. If they hadn’t been following Madoka, she would have been trying to solve it like a standard maze. There had to be a key to it, after all, if only for Aizen’s own convenience. And it couldn’t be that big.
Another corner. This was the third left that Madoka had taken. Perhaps it was a case of first, second, then third left? That would fit.
“I still think - holy fuck, there’s a door ahead!” Madarame said. He snapped from casual strolling into combat alertness. “Yumichika, you’ve got the rear. Everyone else except Ise-fukutaichou, stay the fuck back until we can see what she’s doing there.”
Nanao nodded in thanks to Ikkaku, flash stepping forward till she was only a few paces behind the woman, with Ikkaku joining her. (And Kurosaki-kun, thank heavens, obeying orders and staying back.) They watched together as she put down her basket, took a key from her sash, and opened the door.
Nanao’s breath caught in her throat. She literally felt her heart tremble. Inside the cell, quite visible through the open door, was Kuchiki Byakuya.
But he’s dead, was her first thought. They saw him die. He’s dead. Can Aizen bring back the dead?
A heavy collar round his throat kept him chained to the wall, and similar manacles round his wrists were linked to a chain round his waist. His hair hung long and unkempt around his face, half-obscuring his eyes, but oh, how his gaze burned. Dirt and stubble marked his face and his hands, and his nails were broken short and jagged. He was in plain shinigami black, any individual honours or tokens long since removed, and he sat on his feet in seiza, perfectly calm and controlled except for those furious, desperate eyes.
Madoka picked up her basket and walked over to an empty basket that lay just within his reach. She bent down, and her hand moved as though she was transferring food, before she straightened again and made her way back to the door. She never seemed to notice Kuchiki-taichou, any more than she had noticed Nanao or Madarame or any of the rest of them.
And then the next thought hit Nanao. Is this one of Aizen’s illusions? Are we already caught in his net?
She glanced sideways at Madarame, and saw the same thought in his eyes.
But he was the first to speak. “Sparkles would have said something.” His voice was nearly, very nearly, certain. “That’s why he and the others are in that room. So the reports were wrong. So we cope. Suggestions?”
Madoka walked out of the room. She put down the basket again, and took out the key again to lock the door.
Nanao thought quickly. “Inoue-kun and I will get the door open and those locks off him. Leave me Ayasegawa-san and Yadomarou-sempai in case we need to carry him. We’ll get him out and catch up with you. If Madoka leaves the area, wait at the end of the killing stone zone. Is that acceptable?”
“I’ll take Yadomarou but leave Kurosaki with you,” Madarame said. They both kept their voices down. “He’s not going to leave Inoue-kun. And he’s carrying the captain’s zanpakutou. How long will it take you to get him loose?”
“If it’s the same locks that Aizen was using earlier, five minutes or so,” Nanao said confidently. “This is probably a brute force situation rather than complexity. The only problem may be if Kuchiki-taichou . . .” She lowered her voice again. “Wants to take over direction of the mission.”
“So handle it,” Madarame said. He gave her a little smirk. “You’re used to handling captains, right?”
Perhaps he hadn’t seen Kuchiki-taichou’s eyes as clearly as she had. She was going to speak again, when suddenly Hoshibana’s voice cut in, faint and shaky. “Ise-fukutaichou, Third Seat Madarame - is that -“
“Yes,” Nanao simply said. She turned to Ikkaku. “We’ll be with you as fast as we can.” Then she raised her voice. “Inoue-kun, Kurosaki-kun, Ayasegawa-san, you’re with me. The rest of you are with Madarame.”
A quick explanation, and Inoue-kun was staring at the lock together with her. There was an alarm worked into the kidou of the lock, as Nanao had expected. “Negate that bit,” she instructed the girl, pointing it out to her, “when you see it glowing, and I’ll do the rest. Do you understand?”
“And Byakuya’s really in there?” Inoue-kun said, her lower lip wobbling.
“Yes,” Nanao said, praying for patience.
“And he’s been in there for months now?”
Nanao didn’t bother to answer. She simply energised the kidou, separating out the structure of the spell on the lock and pointing out the part that she wanted Inoue-kun to negate.
After all, what could she possibly say that would make it any better?
Kurosaki-kun was shifting from foot to foot, his hand moving to touch the hilt of Senbonzakura in his sash and then twitching away again. “I thought he was dead,” he muttered to Ayasegawa.
Ayasegawa looked down at his white clothing mournfully. “I thought so too,” he said, his tone reserved.
The lock clicked open.
Nanao was the first through the door. “Kuchiki-taichou,” she said, working hard to keep her voice even and calm. “We’ll get those chains off. Ayasegawa, can you watch the door, please.”
“Is Aizen alive?” Kuchiki-taichou asked. His voice was dry and thin with disuse: instead of being cool and commanding, it was now simply cold and full of distance and forced control.
“He is,” Nanao said. She went down on her knees next to him to look at his chains. Standard multiple-binding kidou, suitable for restraining high-power prisoners. “Good, I don’t need your help for this one, Inoue-kun. It’ll just be -“
“Kurosaki,” Kuchiki-taichou said. His eyes moved to Kurosaki-kun and stayed there.
“Byakuya,” Kurosaki-kun returned. He folded his arms nervously, his head twitching a little.
“My sword,” Kuchiki-taichou said. “Give me my sword.”
If Kurosaki-kun had been a horse, he would have been tossing his head and rolling his eyes. “Look, just let them get those chains off you -“
“Give him his sword,” Ayasegawa broke in. He didn’t turn away from the corridor, but his back and shoulders were eloquent. “How would you feel if it were your own blade?”
Kurosaki-kun sighed. “Fine.” He drew Senbonzakura from his sash, sheath and all, and put it down on the floor in front of Kuchiki-taichou. “There.”
Kuchiki-taichou leaned forward till the tips of his fingers brushed against the hilt of his zanpakutou. He took a long breath, then nodded, as if sealing some private pledge.
“We’re checking for other prisoners,” Nanao reported, her fingers moving through the patterns of the kidou lock, “and then we’re planning a strike against Aizen.”
“A poor report.” Kuchiki-taichou did not abate the stiffness of his posture for even a moment. His hair hung lank around his face, and the planes of cheekbones and chin showed harsh through the skin. “Who is with you?”
“Ikkaku,” Kurosaki-kun said. “And Hisagi, and Yadomaru Lisa, and Hanatarou, he was a prisoner here like you.” He hesitated before continuing. Nanao could guess why. Kurosaki-kun might not be overly gifted with tact, but he had some inkling of it. Vizards and paltry survivors would be bad enough as comrades to a captain like Kuchiki-taichou, but an ex-Hollow like Grimmjow?
Kuchiki-taichou’s eyes narrowed. “That is all?” he asked, in tones of contempt.
“Please,” Inoue-kun said. She knelt beside him and reached out to touch his wrist, her eyes full of tears. “Please don’t be angry with the ones who died. They fought too. Please - please don’t blame them -“
With a nearly visible sigh, Kuchiki-taichou recomposed himself, his eyes tracking over Inoue-kun with disdain. “You were a prisoner as well,” he said, stating it as a fact rather than making a question of it.
Inoue-kun dropped her gaze, her hand falling to her lap. “I’m sorry,” she whispered.
He simply turned away from her, withdrawing his attention in such a way as to make it clear that she no longer merited it, and refocused on Nanao. “How much longer?”
“A moment, please, Kuchiki-taichou,” Nanao muttered, wishing people would stop talking while she was trying to work. “These are quite complex -“
“Byakuya,” Kurosaki-kun broke in. “They said you were dead.”
“Whoever said as much, they were fools to trust anything in this place,” Kuchiki-taichou answered distantly.
“But if you’re alive . . .” Kurosaki-kun seemed to be having trouble getting the words out. “If you’re alive, then maybe Rukia -“
“She is gone.” Kuchiki-taichou did not look at Kurosaki-kun. “You will not speak to me of her again.”
“But -“ Kurosaki-kun began to protest.
“Be silent.” Even with his reiatsu bound, those words shuddered in the prison cell. “You and I have nothing further to discuss.”
The bindings came loose as Nanao muttered the final words of an unlocking kidou. First the cuffs clattered from his wrists, then the belt from his waist and the collar from around his neck. Nanao could see old galls and fresh blisters where they had pressed against his skin.
Kuchiki-taichou straightened, picked up his zanpakutou and rose to his feet, trying to make a single smooth moment of it: he was a fraction too long in settling his shoulders, a little too careful in loosening his knees, though the thin lines at the corners of his mouth might have been temper just as well as pain. He strode towards the door, forcing Kurosaki-kun to step out of his way.
Then he paused. “Which way from here does Aizen den?”
Nanao scrambled to her feet, shaking the last few sparks of power from her fingers. “Sir, we are in a warded section where the prisoners are kept - we are not sure which way from here he might be - if we could join the others -“
“Unnecessary,” Kuchiki-taichou said flatly. “To give him more time to react is to allow him the advantage. We must strike now.”
She had to head him off before the entire plan was ruined. “Kuchiki-taichou -“
“Yes, Ise-fukutaichou?” He was using her title quite deliberately. Either you are still in the Gotei 13 and you obey me, or you stand against me, his tone said.
“Our priority is Aizen’s death.” He nodded faintly to that. “To strike at him in less than full numbers, to sacrifice a possible advantage, would be an error. We should at least rejoin the others before we move against him. Third Seat Madarame, Hisagi-fukutaichou, one of the Arrancar who is fighting with us, one of the Vizards who was also a prisoner here . . .”
Hisagi’s name drew no particular reaction from him, nothing more than the nod he had given Kurosaki-kun earlier. So he didn’t know that Hisagi was serving Aizen, Nanao thought. He must have been kept totally isolated here.
But he did give a slight, a very slight inclination of his head in acknowledgement of her words. “True. Where are these others?”
Was it wrong of her, to wish that they had found someone else here? No. She couldn’t let herself go down that route. Or else she’d be blaming every prisoner they found for not being the one that she desperately wanted to find.
She did wish, however, that Kuchiki-taichou had been just a fraction more grateful to see them, and more open to discussion about what would be done next. He hadn’t even asked how many of them there were -
An alarm bell at the back of her head made itself obvious. No. He hadn’t asked how many of them there were. He hadn’t demanded a situation report, or wanted to know how many of the Gotei 13 were alive, or how Seireitei and the world of the living stood. He had simply taken up his sword and said that they would attack Aizen.
Whatever his other traits, Kuchiki-taichou had always been a good and sensible captain. This current behaviour was not appropriate to a good and sensible captain. She glanced across to Ayasegawa as unobtrusively as she could manage, and she thought that she saw the same concern in his eyes.
“They left us about five minutes ago,” Kurosaki-kun said, apparently not having noticed anything out of the usual. “But they aren’t going fast. And if they’d come to any crossroads, then they’d have left some sort of mark for us - right, Yumichika?”
“Correct,” Ayasegawa said coldly. He moved to open the door. “If you will - oh, one thing, Kuchiki-taichou. There is -“
Kuchiki-taichou ignored him, pacing calmly out of his cell.
A gasp of relief and answered hope rippled on the air. Hoshibana’s voice echoed in the corridor, louder than previously but still distorted. “Kuchiki-taichou!”
Kuchiki-taichou frowned. He glanced up and down the corridor with a barely perceptible flick of his eyes, then raised his fingers to touch the side of his head.
“Hoshibana, how far ahead are Madarame and the others?” Nanao asked.
“Madoka-san has been going at the same speed,” Hoshibana reported. “They haven’t come to anywhere of interest yet. Shall I tell them you’re safely out?”
“Please do,” Nanao instructed. “We’ll be with them in a moment. Nothing else in the passageways?”
Pagally’s voice broke in. “There’s that thing! We’ve told Hisagi-sama, but it’s not anywhere near him. It’s closer to you -“
“Explain this,” Kuchiki-taichou demanded. The note of irritation in his voice was more pronounced than it would have been a year ago.
“There’s a surveillance room, Kuchiki-taichou,” Ayasegawa said quickly. “Hoshibana is with us: he’s hiding in it, with a couple of our other people. It can broadcast to us here. And there’s a creature that we saw in the corridors earlier. Some sort of warped Arrancar or something: we got away before it caught our scent, but we think it’s a guard.”
“You should have cleansed it and had done with it,” Kuchiki-taichou said disdainfully.
“It’s not like I got a chance to see it,” Kurosaki-kun drawled.
“Our priority was to investigate and to rescue any prisoners, sir,” Nanao said, trying to cut this off before any more blame could be placed. While she certainly had experience at managing some captains, Kuchiki-taichou wasn’t one of them, and she wasn’t sure whether to try to pacify him with unnecessary apologies or to go for strictly professional behaviour and clipped no-nonsense speech. “We were afraid that fighting and cleansing it might set off an alarm.”
Kuchiki-taichou gave a faint nod. It implied disapproval but comprehension. “And that woman. Who is she?” A pause. “And why are Ayasegawa and Kurosaki wearing white -“
“Kuchiki-taichou, the threat is rapidly approaching your location,” Hoshibana broke in. “I recommend moving to avoid it if you wish to avoid giving the alarm.”
If Nanao had had a spare moment, she would have used it to be grateful that she didn’t have to explain that Ayasegawa and Kurosaki-kun had been working for Aizen up till less than an hour ago, or come up with a complicated lie about wearing white in order to sneak into Las Noches. And she didn’t want to think about the fact that she was considering lying to Kuchiki-taichou in order to keep him calm, or that Kuchiki-taichou of all people might be on the verge of losing his self-possession. “We have to go, sir,” she said urgently.
Kuchiki-taichou nodded again. He turned and flash-stepped away, not even bothering to check that the others were following him. Kurosaki-kun muttered something as he swept Inoue-kun up into his arms and followed, leaving Nanao and Ayasegawa to bring up the rear.
The passageway turned to the right, then promptly devolved into a nested tangle of openings. Kuchiki-taichou paused for a moment, his head turning from side to side as though he were sniffing for a trail.
“Hey, this is new,” Kurosaki-kun said unhelpfully.
“To the left,” Ayasegawa said, nodding to where someone had left a small mark on the wall by one opening, a darkened scratch at ankle height. “It’s standard Eleventh Division pattern. Ikkaku -“
Kuchiki-taichou barely acknowledged him, sweeping on, with Kurosaki-kun following.
“-would naturally have indicated where he was going,” Ayasegawa finished, addressing the remark to Nanao as the only one left.
“Of course,” Nanao agreed. “And it’s a good thing. You can’t track by reiatsu in here at all.”
Ayasegawa nodded, then glanced back over his shoulder. “Which is a good thing, if that thing is trying to find us.” His wistful tone hinted that yes, he would rather like it if the thing did find them. Eleventh Division. They never changed.
Nanao had another sudden lurching thought. “If Kuchiki-taichou sees Grimmjow -“ she began.
Ayasegawa’s sudden twitch showed that he had come to the same mental conclusion. He didn’t bother answering. He just ran after Kuchiki-taichou like a hound after a hare, leaving Nanao to follow in his dust.
Fortunately, by the time they caught up with Kuchiki-taichou, Kuchiki-taichou had caught up with the rest of the group, but he wasn’t trying to strike Grimmjow down on sight. In fact, he was barely paying any attention to him, which was evidently annoying Grimmjow. His focus was on Madarame, who was clearly trying to give a captain due respect while at the same time keep an eye on Madoka and hold the rest of the group together.
“-and explain to me why so many of your group are in white,” Kuchiki-taichou was finishing.
Hisagi gave Madarame a panicked roll of the eyes.
“Hisagi and I are freed prisoners,” Yadomaru-sempai interposed calmly. “Much like yourself, Kuchiki-taichou, we have had no choice about what we were given to wear. Kurosaki-kun was controlled by his Hollow side. Grimmjow here was an Espada until he was cleansed.”
“Yeah,” Grimmjow said. “You got anything to say to that?”
“Why should I bother?” Kuchiki-taichou inquired. “You are quite obviously no longer an Arrancar or Hollow, as you have no mask or hole.”
Grimmjow blinked. “You actually noticed that? You genuinely fucking noticed?” He did a little dance. “See, fuckwits! Someone noticed!
“I know what Hollow reiatsu feels like,” Kuchiki-taichou said, and once again something very cold and very furious looked out of his eyes. “You are nothing like it.”
Grimmjow stopped his dancing. His hand fell to stroke the hilt of his sword. “So what do we do now?” he asked Madarame, pointedly ignoring Kuchiki-taichou. “You think she’s going to lead us to anyone else?”
“We can hope,” Madarame said. “Kuchiki-taichou, I don’t know how much Ise-fukutaichou’s told you -“
“Be brief,” Kuchiki-taichou said. “Are these people here all that we have as resources?”
Madarame nodded. “Unless we find someone else locked up like you, sir.”
“And who do we face, beside Aizen himself?”
“Ichimaru’s in Seireitei and he’s being engaged by Ukitake-taichou, Soifon-taichou and Sasakibe-fukutaichou,” Nanao said, trying to condense the information down as much as she could. “Tousen’s dead. Kurotsuchi Mayuri seems to have left the area for the moment. Harribel is dead. We don’t know the whereabouts of Szayel Apollo, Yammi, or Ulquiorra.”
“Ulquiorra was looking for Harribel,” Inoue said, white-lipped and shivering. “If he can’t find her, then he’ll try to report to Aizen. If Aizen starts investigating things . . .”
“Then we have limited time,” Kuchiki-taichou agreed. He was calm now, rather than icily quick and tense: a man resigned to what was coming, and glad that it was coming soon, and wilfully and gratefully blind to everything else.
Nanao looked sideways, and caught Madarame’s glance towards her at the same time. Had they both thought that they’d find a Captain and that everything would then be neat and tidy? That the Captain would have a plan? Why yes, they had, irrational bit of unstated optimism that it had been. Even Madarame, who was more used to command of this sort than she was, had hoped.
They had another weapon now, but Nanao wasn’t sure that they had a leader.
Which left her and Madarame to organise. Manage. Coordinate. Lead.
“Grimmjow reported rumours of two powerful prisoners,” she said firmly, raising her voice a little, just enough to make it a statement rather than something which could be discussed and argued about and ignored. “If Kuchiki-taichou is one of them, then there may be another. If we can free that person,” the careful blandness of the words were like sawdust in her mouth, “then we improve our odds against Aizen.”
Kuchiki-taichou looked at her a little too long, and then he nodded. “A reasonable risk.” His movements had shaken the dust off his clothing, but he didn’t try to brush the dirt from his hair and hands. Maybe to do so would have been to admit a weakness. “Continue to follow this woman, then.”
“Yes, sir,” Madarame said, with a little too much relief.
Then Hoshibana’s voice broke in. “Kuchiki-taichou! The creature is approaching rapidly, it took a different corridor, it’ll be on you in a moment -“
Kuchiki-taichou drew his sword. So did Kurosaki-kun and Madarame and Ayasegawa and Hisagi, and Grimmjow snarled, white teeth flashing in his mouth as he fondled the hilt of his blade. Yadomaru-sempai grabbed Inoue-kun and Hanatarou, pulling them to the back of the group, and moving behind them to watch the rear. Nanao felt the words of blasting kidou crawling through her mind, ready for use, and it was such a relief to finally be about to strike an enemy down, to be able to take vengeance --
Cold as glass in winter, echoing at the back of her mind, a voice which might have been her own voice or the voice of her zanpakutou said, That is not part of us. We do not speak of vengeance.
Nanao swallowed. She moved her hand from where it was almost touching Suzumushi’s hilt. Nobody was looking. Nobody had noticed.
Nobody except, she thought, Suzumushi.
The creature came round the bend in the corridor with a hissing leap, and crouched there, assessing its prey. It stood half bent over, wide bullish shoulders rounded and thick with muscle and bone, and a mane of dirty hair the colour of old blood tangled over its face and round its shoulders. White rags of clothing clung to its body. Its face, where it could be seen through the masses of hair, was half fanged skull, half warped flesh. Clawed feet dug into the smooth white floor, and a spiked tail lashed behind it as it slowly moved its head from side to side, considering its next move.
There was something burning behind the skull, in the hollow of the mouth, some sort of power building there.
Madarame had seen it too. “On your mark, sir,” he said to Kuchiki-taichou. There wasn’t going to be any sort of manly single combat here. They had to take it down before it could give the alarm.
Kuchiki-taichou looked at the creature.
The creature looked at him.
“Stand down,” he said.
“What?” Kurosaki-kun demanded. He held his oversized blade as casually as if it was a butter knife.
“I said, stand down.” Kuchiki-kun’s voice was as toneless as ever. He slid his zanpakutou back into its sheath, not looking away from the creature, still meeting its gaze. “Everyone is to sheath their blades and stand back.”
“Sir -“ Madarame began.
“Fools.” Kuchiki-taichou took a step forward, extending an empty hand. “It seems that you are all fools and blind. Renji.” He addressed the creature. “Renji, to me. Now. Obey.”
No, Nanao thought numbly. No, it couldn’t be, Aizen couldn’t have . . .
And the creature obeyed. It moved forward slowly, in a dangerous stalk that was a hundred miles away from Abarai-fukutaichou’s habitual fast careless stride, not looking away from Kuchiki-taichou. The burning light inside its mouth flickered and began to pale, losing cohesion.
Another pace. It was within clawing distance of Kuchiki-taichou now. Nobody had sheathed their swords as they had been ordered to. Nobody had even moved.
Another.
And then the creature bowed its head, going down on its flexed knees, and curled itself in a ball at Kuchiki-taichou’s dirty feet.
---
Authors: incandescens
Characters: Nanao, Ikkaku, others
Rating/Warning: PG-13.
Notes: This is a dark AU co-plotted with sophiap and liralen. The war against Aizen's forces went very badly. Nothing is sacred and no one is safe.
Summary: There are many sorts of prison, and many captives.
Index of Links
[...]
36. Grimmjow: Trauma
37. Ensemble: Haste
38. Ichigo: No Hiding Place
39. Ensemble: Crossfire
40. Ensemble: Sneaking About
PRISONERS
Nanao was uncomfortably aware of the new weight in her sash. Her own zanpakutou lay in her sleeve, the sheath comfortable against her arm, its balance something which she was used to, trained to. While carrying this strange zanpakutou wasn’t enough to throw her off balance, it was a constant presence in her awareness, enough to cause her to deliberately ignore it in the same way that she might ignore an itch or a broken nail.
Her own zanpakutou had chosen to be silent about her choice to carry it, and indeed anything at all concerned with it. While the blade had never been one of the more communicative sorts - quite a contrast with her, certainly, as Nanao was always ready to communicate - this time it felt even more deliberately opaque than usual. She wasn’t sure whether to interpret it as an attempt to avoid Suzumushi, or to avoid Nanao herself.
With an effort, she forced those worries to the back of her mind. This was not a moment to agonise about her relationship with her zanpakutou. It was not even a moment to consider how one might use a weapon like Suzumushi, if it could be done at all. The priority at the moment was following Madoka to wherever her route led - the mysterious “other place” which, according to Hoshibana, was so heavily inlaid with killing stone that even the surveillance room had difficulty focusing in on it.
Of course, it was obvious what that might mean, and she only had to look sideways to see Kyouraku-taichou’s blades in Yadomarou-sempai’s belt, and that was yet another topic which she could not afford to consider at the moment. It would sway her judgment. She must be calm. She was in command - well, as much as Madarame was, or anyone else was in the group. She could not afford to let her personal thoughts or wishes endanger the others.
He would never have done such a thing, after all.
As they approached the killing stone concentration, Nanao realised she was drawing her brows together in a frown. There was no reason why she should like it, of course, but in such a situation, and with the constant threat of Aizen discovering them, it was even worse. They would all be weakened in this particular territory.
The thought made her turn to speak to Madarame, keeping her voice to a soft murmur. “We need to be in and out of this area as fast as possible. If we’re caught here -“
Madarame nodded. “Right. Even deeper shit than usual.”
“You may be missing something there,” Yadomarou-sempai said, tilting her head as she joined them, her short skirt flipping round her thighs as she strode along. When Madarame glared at her, she shrugged. “Look, half the point about us having to all trot into this damn killing stone zone is that we can’t tell who’s in there, right?”
“Well, yeah,” Madarame started, and then he slapped himself on the forehead. “Right. Fuck, why the hell didn’t I think of that?”
Nanao’s eyes widened as she caught the idea. It almost made her want to slap her own forehead. “Perfect,” she said slowly, “or at least, as good as we’re going to get.”
“It only works until he actually starts looking for us in there,” Lisa said. “Don’t blame yourself, kids. I’ve been spending the last few months trying to stare into his warded zones and getting nothing for my trouble but eyestrain. Let’s use it against him for once. It may give us a little longer before he notices something’s up.”
Madarame flicked a quick glance at the others behind him, and lowered his voice a little further, though he kept his tone conversational. “It’s crazy that we’ve been as lucky as we have.”
“Good planning can take you a long way,” Nanao said dryly. “Just ask Aizen.”
Lisa snorted. “True, but it only goes so far. And why was that lab all dusty, anyhow?”
Nanao had been wondering about that. Why would Aizen have left his researches like that? What worse thing could he have been doing instead? Or was there something else going on that they didn’t know about? It was a big gaping unknown in the middle of their plans, and she didn’t like that at all. “Maybe he was visiting Ichimaru,” she hypothesised, “and the two of them were keeping it secret.”
“But why?” Madarame asked, and Nanao could only shrug in response.
“Here we are,” Hisagi hissed. He was standing just in front of the border of the heavy killing stone section.
Madoka had already walked into the area, and was continuing down the corridor as calmly as if she was bringing tea to a superior officer. She was carrying an empty wicker basket, lined with a dirty napkin, that contained nothing except a few crumbs.
Inoue Orihime halted, staring at the thick killing stone with wide horrified eyes. “It feels ghastly in there,” she said in a horrified whisper.
“It’ll be all right,” Kurosaki-kun said, patting her shoulder. “We won’t be splitting up or anything. We’ll all be together and we’ll be out of there as soon as we’ve checked.”
Nanao decided not to tell him about the new plan yet. “Keep on following,” she directed. “There may be some sort of barrier that she’s got clearance to pass. We can’t afford to let her get too far ahead.”
There was a faint but persistent buzz at the back of her mind as she went forward. She’d rarely been in the presence of so much killing stone before. Like most seated officers, she’d visited the Tower of Penitence once or twice, but she’d never lingered there for longer than was strictly necessary, and she’d always spared a moment’s pity for the guards whose duty kept them there hour after hour. Of course, it wasn’t actually harmful. It was just unpleasant. Annoying.
(Though would it be harmful, if you kept people here for months on end, with no way to escape the constant pressure, with their power bound so that they couldn’t resist it?)
There was no dust on the floor. There hadn’t been anywhere else here, now that she thought about it. “Yamada-kun,” she said softly.
“Yes, Ise-fukutaichou?” he questioned, scuffling up to join her. He shot her a quick, nervous glance as though expecting her to say that they were all about to die horribly.
“When you were sweeping or mopping the corridors, was there ever actually anything to sweep up?”
He frowned. “Not unless someone left it there, Ise-fukutaichou. Though that did happen sometimes. With some Arrancar.” He shuddered vaguely. “The slime, you see . . .”
“Quite,” Nanao said, trying not to think about it. “So the fact that there’s no dust here doesn’t actually prove that someone’s been here recently.”
“Er, no, Ise-fukutaichou. Or yes, rather, it doesn’t.”
“Thank you,” Nanao said before he could stammer at her any more. The walls were blanks at the moment. There were no doors in this stretch of corridor. The whole place seemed to have been laid out for maximum maze quality. If they hadn’t been following Madoka, she would have been trying to solve it like a standard maze. There had to be a key to it, after all, if only for Aizen’s own convenience. And it couldn’t be that big.
Another corner. This was the third left that Madoka had taken. Perhaps it was a case of first, second, then third left? That would fit.
“I still think - holy fuck, there’s a door ahead!” Madarame said. He snapped from casual strolling into combat alertness. “Yumichika, you’ve got the rear. Everyone else except Ise-fukutaichou, stay the fuck back until we can see what she’s doing there.”
Nanao nodded in thanks to Ikkaku, flash stepping forward till she was only a few paces behind the woman, with Ikkaku joining her. (And Kurosaki-kun, thank heavens, obeying orders and staying back.) They watched together as she put down her basket, took a key from her sash, and opened the door.
Nanao’s breath caught in her throat. She literally felt her heart tremble. Inside the cell, quite visible through the open door, was Kuchiki Byakuya.
But he’s dead, was her first thought. They saw him die. He’s dead. Can Aizen bring back the dead?
A heavy collar round his throat kept him chained to the wall, and similar manacles round his wrists were linked to a chain round his waist. His hair hung long and unkempt around his face, half-obscuring his eyes, but oh, how his gaze burned. Dirt and stubble marked his face and his hands, and his nails were broken short and jagged. He was in plain shinigami black, any individual honours or tokens long since removed, and he sat on his feet in seiza, perfectly calm and controlled except for those furious, desperate eyes.
Madoka picked up her basket and walked over to an empty basket that lay just within his reach. She bent down, and her hand moved as though she was transferring food, before she straightened again and made her way back to the door. She never seemed to notice Kuchiki-taichou, any more than she had noticed Nanao or Madarame or any of the rest of them.
And then the next thought hit Nanao. Is this one of Aizen’s illusions? Are we already caught in his net?
She glanced sideways at Madarame, and saw the same thought in his eyes.
But he was the first to speak. “Sparkles would have said something.” His voice was nearly, very nearly, certain. “That’s why he and the others are in that room. So the reports were wrong. So we cope. Suggestions?”
Madoka walked out of the room. She put down the basket again, and took out the key again to lock the door.
Nanao thought quickly. “Inoue-kun and I will get the door open and those locks off him. Leave me Ayasegawa-san and Yadomarou-sempai in case we need to carry him. We’ll get him out and catch up with you. If Madoka leaves the area, wait at the end of the killing stone zone. Is that acceptable?”
“I’ll take Yadomarou but leave Kurosaki with you,” Madarame said. They both kept their voices down. “He’s not going to leave Inoue-kun. And he’s carrying the captain’s zanpakutou. How long will it take you to get him loose?”
“If it’s the same locks that Aizen was using earlier, five minutes or so,” Nanao said confidently. “This is probably a brute force situation rather than complexity. The only problem may be if Kuchiki-taichou . . .” She lowered her voice again. “Wants to take over direction of the mission.”
“So handle it,” Madarame said. He gave her a little smirk. “You’re used to handling captains, right?”
Perhaps he hadn’t seen Kuchiki-taichou’s eyes as clearly as she had. She was going to speak again, when suddenly Hoshibana’s voice cut in, faint and shaky. “Ise-fukutaichou, Third Seat Madarame - is that -“
“Yes,” Nanao simply said. She turned to Ikkaku. “We’ll be with you as fast as we can.” Then she raised her voice. “Inoue-kun, Kurosaki-kun, Ayasegawa-san, you’re with me. The rest of you are with Madarame.”
A quick explanation, and Inoue-kun was staring at the lock together with her. There was an alarm worked into the kidou of the lock, as Nanao had expected. “Negate that bit,” she instructed the girl, pointing it out to her, “when you see it glowing, and I’ll do the rest. Do you understand?”
“And Byakuya’s really in there?” Inoue-kun said, her lower lip wobbling.
“Yes,” Nanao said, praying for patience.
“And he’s been in there for months now?”
Nanao didn’t bother to answer. She simply energised the kidou, separating out the structure of the spell on the lock and pointing out the part that she wanted Inoue-kun to negate.
After all, what could she possibly say that would make it any better?
Kurosaki-kun was shifting from foot to foot, his hand moving to touch the hilt of Senbonzakura in his sash and then twitching away again. “I thought he was dead,” he muttered to Ayasegawa.
Ayasegawa looked down at his white clothing mournfully. “I thought so too,” he said, his tone reserved.
The lock clicked open.
Nanao was the first through the door. “Kuchiki-taichou,” she said, working hard to keep her voice even and calm. “We’ll get those chains off. Ayasegawa, can you watch the door, please.”
“Is Aizen alive?” Kuchiki-taichou asked. His voice was dry and thin with disuse: instead of being cool and commanding, it was now simply cold and full of distance and forced control.
“He is,” Nanao said. She went down on her knees next to him to look at his chains. Standard multiple-binding kidou, suitable for restraining high-power prisoners. “Good, I don’t need your help for this one, Inoue-kun. It’ll just be -“
“Kurosaki,” Kuchiki-taichou said. His eyes moved to Kurosaki-kun and stayed there.
“Byakuya,” Kurosaki-kun returned. He folded his arms nervously, his head twitching a little.
“My sword,” Kuchiki-taichou said. “Give me my sword.”
If Kurosaki-kun had been a horse, he would have been tossing his head and rolling his eyes. “Look, just let them get those chains off you -“
“Give him his sword,” Ayasegawa broke in. He didn’t turn away from the corridor, but his back and shoulders were eloquent. “How would you feel if it were your own blade?”
Kurosaki-kun sighed. “Fine.” He drew Senbonzakura from his sash, sheath and all, and put it down on the floor in front of Kuchiki-taichou. “There.”
Kuchiki-taichou leaned forward till the tips of his fingers brushed against the hilt of his zanpakutou. He took a long breath, then nodded, as if sealing some private pledge.
“We’re checking for other prisoners,” Nanao reported, her fingers moving through the patterns of the kidou lock, “and then we’re planning a strike against Aizen.”
“A poor report.” Kuchiki-taichou did not abate the stiffness of his posture for even a moment. His hair hung lank around his face, and the planes of cheekbones and chin showed harsh through the skin. “Who is with you?”
“Ikkaku,” Kurosaki-kun said. “And Hisagi, and Yadomaru Lisa, and Hanatarou, he was a prisoner here like you.” He hesitated before continuing. Nanao could guess why. Kurosaki-kun might not be overly gifted with tact, but he had some inkling of it. Vizards and paltry survivors would be bad enough as comrades to a captain like Kuchiki-taichou, but an ex-Hollow like Grimmjow?
Kuchiki-taichou’s eyes narrowed. “That is all?” he asked, in tones of contempt.
“Please,” Inoue-kun said. She knelt beside him and reached out to touch his wrist, her eyes full of tears. “Please don’t be angry with the ones who died. They fought too. Please - please don’t blame them -“
With a nearly visible sigh, Kuchiki-taichou recomposed himself, his eyes tracking over Inoue-kun with disdain. “You were a prisoner as well,” he said, stating it as a fact rather than making a question of it.
Inoue-kun dropped her gaze, her hand falling to her lap. “I’m sorry,” she whispered.
He simply turned away from her, withdrawing his attention in such a way as to make it clear that she no longer merited it, and refocused on Nanao. “How much longer?”
“A moment, please, Kuchiki-taichou,” Nanao muttered, wishing people would stop talking while she was trying to work. “These are quite complex -“
“Byakuya,” Kurosaki-kun broke in. “They said you were dead.”
“Whoever said as much, they were fools to trust anything in this place,” Kuchiki-taichou answered distantly.
“But if you’re alive . . .” Kurosaki-kun seemed to be having trouble getting the words out. “If you’re alive, then maybe Rukia -“
“She is gone.” Kuchiki-taichou did not look at Kurosaki-kun. “You will not speak to me of her again.”
“But -“ Kurosaki-kun began to protest.
“Be silent.” Even with his reiatsu bound, those words shuddered in the prison cell. “You and I have nothing further to discuss.”
The bindings came loose as Nanao muttered the final words of an unlocking kidou. First the cuffs clattered from his wrists, then the belt from his waist and the collar from around his neck. Nanao could see old galls and fresh blisters where they had pressed against his skin.
Kuchiki-taichou straightened, picked up his zanpakutou and rose to his feet, trying to make a single smooth moment of it: he was a fraction too long in settling his shoulders, a little too careful in loosening his knees, though the thin lines at the corners of his mouth might have been temper just as well as pain. He strode towards the door, forcing Kurosaki-kun to step out of his way.
Then he paused. “Which way from here does Aizen den?”
Nanao scrambled to her feet, shaking the last few sparks of power from her fingers. “Sir, we are in a warded section where the prisoners are kept - we are not sure which way from here he might be - if we could join the others -“
“Unnecessary,” Kuchiki-taichou said flatly. “To give him more time to react is to allow him the advantage. We must strike now.”
She had to head him off before the entire plan was ruined. “Kuchiki-taichou -“
“Yes, Ise-fukutaichou?” He was using her title quite deliberately. Either you are still in the Gotei 13 and you obey me, or you stand against me, his tone said.
“Our priority is Aizen’s death.” He nodded faintly to that. “To strike at him in less than full numbers, to sacrifice a possible advantage, would be an error. We should at least rejoin the others before we move against him. Third Seat Madarame, Hisagi-fukutaichou, one of the Arrancar who is fighting with us, one of the Vizards who was also a prisoner here . . .”
Hisagi’s name drew no particular reaction from him, nothing more than the nod he had given Kurosaki-kun earlier. So he didn’t know that Hisagi was serving Aizen, Nanao thought. He must have been kept totally isolated here.
But he did give a slight, a very slight inclination of his head in acknowledgement of her words. “True. Where are these others?”
Was it wrong of her, to wish that they had found someone else here? No. She couldn’t let herself go down that route. Or else she’d be blaming every prisoner they found for not being the one that she desperately wanted to find.
She did wish, however, that Kuchiki-taichou had been just a fraction more grateful to see them, and more open to discussion about what would be done next. He hadn’t even asked how many of them there were -
An alarm bell at the back of her head made itself obvious. No. He hadn’t asked how many of them there were. He hadn’t demanded a situation report, or wanted to know how many of the Gotei 13 were alive, or how Seireitei and the world of the living stood. He had simply taken up his sword and said that they would attack Aizen.
Whatever his other traits, Kuchiki-taichou had always been a good and sensible captain. This current behaviour was not appropriate to a good and sensible captain. She glanced across to Ayasegawa as unobtrusively as she could manage, and she thought that she saw the same concern in his eyes.
“They left us about five minutes ago,” Kurosaki-kun said, apparently not having noticed anything out of the usual. “But they aren’t going fast. And if they’d come to any crossroads, then they’d have left some sort of mark for us - right, Yumichika?”
“Correct,” Ayasegawa said coldly. He moved to open the door. “If you will - oh, one thing, Kuchiki-taichou. There is -“
Kuchiki-taichou ignored him, pacing calmly out of his cell.
A gasp of relief and answered hope rippled on the air. Hoshibana’s voice echoed in the corridor, louder than previously but still distorted. “Kuchiki-taichou!”
Kuchiki-taichou frowned. He glanced up and down the corridor with a barely perceptible flick of his eyes, then raised his fingers to touch the side of his head.
“Hoshibana, how far ahead are Madarame and the others?” Nanao asked.
“Madoka-san has been going at the same speed,” Hoshibana reported. “They haven’t come to anywhere of interest yet. Shall I tell them you’re safely out?”
“Please do,” Nanao instructed. “We’ll be with them in a moment. Nothing else in the passageways?”
Pagally’s voice broke in. “There’s that thing! We’ve told Hisagi-sama, but it’s not anywhere near him. It’s closer to you -“
“Explain this,” Kuchiki-taichou demanded. The note of irritation in his voice was more pronounced than it would have been a year ago.
“There’s a surveillance room, Kuchiki-taichou,” Ayasegawa said quickly. “Hoshibana is with us: he’s hiding in it, with a couple of our other people. It can broadcast to us here. And there’s a creature that we saw in the corridors earlier. Some sort of warped Arrancar or something: we got away before it caught our scent, but we think it’s a guard.”
“You should have cleansed it and had done with it,” Kuchiki-taichou said disdainfully.
“It’s not like I got a chance to see it,” Kurosaki-kun drawled.
“Our priority was to investigate and to rescue any prisoners, sir,” Nanao said, trying to cut this off before any more blame could be placed. While she certainly had experience at managing some captains, Kuchiki-taichou wasn’t one of them, and she wasn’t sure whether to try to pacify him with unnecessary apologies or to go for strictly professional behaviour and clipped no-nonsense speech. “We were afraid that fighting and cleansing it might set off an alarm.”
Kuchiki-taichou gave a faint nod. It implied disapproval but comprehension. “And that woman. Who is she?” A pause. “And why are Ayasegawa and Kurosaki wearing white -“
“Kuchiki-taichou, the threat is rapidly approaching your location,” Hoshibana broke in. “I recommend moving to avoid it if you wish to avoid giving the alarm.”
If Nanao had had a spare moment, she would have used it to be grateful that she didn’t have to explain that Ayasegawa and Kurosaki-kun had been working for Aizen up till less than an hour ago, or come up with a complicated lie about wearing white in order to sneak into Las Noches. And she didn’t want to think about the fact that she was considering lying to Kuchiki-taichou in order to keep him calm, or that Kuchiki-taichou of all people might be on the verge of losing his self-possession. “We have to go, sir,” she said urgently.
Kuchiki-taichou nodded again. He turned and flash-stepped away, not even bothering to check that the others were following him. Kurosaki-kun muttered something as he swept Inoue-kun up into his arms and followed, leaving Nanao and Ayasegawa to bring up the rear.
The passageway turned to the right, then promptly devolved into a nested tangle of openings. Kuchiki-taichou paused for a moment, his head turning from side to side as though he were sniffing for a trail.
“Hey, this is new,” Kurosaki-kun said unhelpfully.
“To the left,” Ayasegawa said, nodding to where someone had left a small mark on the wall by one opening, a darkened scratch at ankle height. “It’s standard Eleventh Division pattern. Ikkaku -“
Kuchiki-taichou barely acknowledged him, sweeping on, with Kurosaki-kun following.
“-would naturally have indicated where he was going,” Ayasegawa finished, addressing the remark to Nanao as the only one left.
“Of course,” Nanao agreed. “And it’s a good thing. You can’t track by reiatsu in here at all.”
Ayasegawa nodded, then glanced back over his shoulder. “Which is a good thing, if that thing is trying to find us.” His wistful tone hinted that yes, he would rather like it if the thing did find them. Eleventh Division. They never changed.
Nanao had another sudden lurching thought. “If Kuchiki-taichou sees Grimmjow -“ she began.
Ayasegawa’s sudden twitch showed that he had come to the same mental conclusion. He didn’t bother answering. He just ran after Kuchiki-taichou like a hound after a hare, leaving Nanao to follow in his dust.
Fortunately, by the time they caught up with Kuchiki-taichou, Kuchiki-taichou had caught up with the rest of the group, but he wasn’t trying to strike Grimmjow down on sight. In fact, he was barely paying any attention to him, which was evidently annoying Grimmjow. His focus was on Madarame, who was clearly trying to give a captain due respect while at the same time keep an eye on Madoka and hold the rest of the group together.
“-and explain to me why so many of your group are in white,” Kuchiki-taichou was finishing.
Hisagi gave Madarame a panicked roll of the eyes.
“Hisagi and I are freed prisoners,” Yadomaru-sempai interposed calmly. “Much like yourself, Kuchiki-taichou, we have had no choice about what we were given to wear. Kurosaki-kun was controlled by his Hollow side. Grimmjow here was an Espada until he was cleansed.”
“Yeah,” Grimmjow said. “You got anything to say to that?”
“Why should I bother?” Kuchiki-taichou inquired. “You are quite obviously no longer an Arrancar or Hollow, as you have no mask or hole.”
Grimmjow blinked. “You actually noticed that? You genuinely fucking noticed?” He did a little dance. “See, fuckwits! Someone noticed!
“I know what Hollow reiatsu feels like,” Kuchiki-taichou said, and once again something very cold and very furious looked out of his eyes. “You are nothing like it.”
Grimmjow stopped his dancing. His hand fell to stroke the hilt of his sword. “So what do we do now?” he asked Madarame, pointedly ignoring Kuchiki-taichou. “You think she’s going to lead us to anyone else?”
“We can hope,” Madarame said. “Kuchiki-taichou, I don’t know how much Ise-fukutaichou’s told you -“
“Be brief,” Kuchiki-taichou said. “Are these people here all that we have as resources?”
Madarame nodded. “Unless we find someone else locked up like you, sir.”
“And who do we face, beside Aizen himself?”
“Ichimaru’s in Seireitei and he’s being engaged by Ukitake-taichou, Soifon-taichou and Sasakibe-fukutaichou,” Nanao said, trying to condense the information down as much as she could. “Tousen’s dead. Kurotsuchi Mayuri seems to have left the area for the moment. Harribel is dead. We don’t know the whereabouts of Szayel Apollo, Yammi, or Ulquiorra.”
“Ulquiorra was looking for Harribel,” Inoue said, white-lipped and shivering. “If he can’t find her, then he’ll try to report to Aizen. If Aizen starts investigating things . . .”
“Then we have limited time,” Kuchiki-taichou agreed. He was calm now, rather than icily quick and tense: a man resigned to what was coming, and glad that it was coming soon, and wilfully and gratefully blind to everything else.
Nanao looked sideways, and caught Madarame’s glance towards her at the same time. Had they both thought that they’d find a Captain and that everything would then be neat and tidy? That the Captain would have a plan? Why yes, they had, irrational bit of unstated optimism that it had been. Even Madarame, who was more used to command of this sort than she was, had hoped.
They had another weapon now, but Nanao wasn’t sure that they had a leader.
Which left her and Madarame to organise. Manage. Coordinate. Lead.
“Grimmjow reported rumours of two powerful prisoners,” she said firmly, raising her voice a little, just enough to make it a statement rather than something which could be discussed and argued about and ignored. “If Kuchiki-taichou is one of them, then there may be another. If we can free that person,” the careful blandness of the words were like sawdust in her mouth, “then we improve our odds against Aizen.”
Kuchiki-taichou looked at her a little too long, and then he nodded. “A reasonable risk.” His movements had shaken the dust off his clothing, but he didn’t try to brush the dirt from his hair and hands. Maybe to do so would have been to admit a weakness. “Continue to follow this woman, then.”
“Yes, sir,” Madarame said, with a little too much relief.
Then Hoshibana’s voice broke in. “Kuchiki-taichou! The creature is approaching rapidly, it took a different corridor, it’ll be on you in a moment -“
Kuchiki-taichou drew his sword. So did Kurosaki-kun and Madarame and Ayasegawa and Hisagi, and Grimmjow snarled, white teeth flashing in his mouth as he fondled the hilt of his blade. Yadomaru-sempai grabbed Inoue-kun and Hanatarou, pulling them to the back of the group, and moving behind them to watch the rear. Nanao felt the words of blasting kidou crawling through her mind, ready for use, and it was such a relief to finally be about to strike an enemy down, to be able to take vengeance --
Cold as glass in winter, echoing at the back of her mind, a voice which might have been her own voice or the voice of her zanpakutou said, That is not part of us. We do not speak of vengeance.
Nanao swallowed. She moved her hand from where it was almost touching Suzumushi’s hilt. Nobody was looking. Nobody had noticed.
Nobody except, she thought, Suzumushi.
The creature came round the bend in the corridor with a hissing leap, and crouched there, assessing its prey. It stood half bent over, wide bullish shoulders rounded and thick with muscle and bone, and a mane of dirty hair the colour of old blood tangled over its face and round its shoulders. White rags of clothing clung to its body. Its face, where it could be seen through the masses of hair, was half fanged skull, half warped flesh. Clawed feet dug into the smooth white floor, and a spiked tail lashed behind it as it slowly moved its head from side to side, considering its next move.
There was something burning behind the skull, in the hollow of the mouth, some sort of power building there.
Madarame had seen it too. “On your mark, sir,” he said to Kuchiki-taichou. There wasn’t going to be any sort of manly single combat here. They had to take it down before it could give the alarm.
Kuchiki-taichou looked at the creature.
The creature looked at him.
“Stand down,” he said.
“What?” Kurosaki-kun demanded. He held his oversized blade as casually as if it was a butter knife.
“I said, stand down.” Kuchiki-kun’s voice was as toneless as ever. He slid his zanpakutou back into its sheath, not looking away from the creature, still meeting its gaze. “Everyone is to sheath their blades and stand back.”
“Sir -“ Madarame began.
“Fools.” Kuchiki-taichou took a step forward, extending an empty hand. “It seems that you are all fools and blind. Renji.” He addressed the creature. “Renji, to me. Now. Obey.”
No, Nanao thought numbly. No, it couldn’t be, Aizen couldn’t have . . .
And the creature obeyed. It moved forward slowly, in a dangerous stalk that was a hundred miles away from Abarai-fukutaichou’s habitual fast careless stride, not looking away from Kuchiki-taichou. The burning light inside its mouth flickered and began to pale, losing cohesion.
Another pace. It was within clawing distance of Kuchiki-taichou now. Nobody had sheathed their swords as they had been ordered to. Nobody had even moved.
Another.
And then the creature bowed its head, going down on its flexed knees, and curled itself in a ball at Kuchiki-taichou’s dirty feet.
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