Winter War: Soi Fong: En Garde
Title: Soi Fong: En Garde
Arc: Winter War - an AU co-write with liralen and sophiap
Characters: Soi Fong, others
Rating/Warning: PG-13 for language, references to character death
Summary: Before tactics, one must have strategy.
Notes: This is a rather dark AU co-plotted with liralen and sophiap. The war against Aizen's forces went very badly. Nothing is sacred and no one is safe.
Links
1. Nanao: Winter
2. Ukitake: Waking Up
3. Ikkaku: What Is, What Was
4. Kuukaku: Holding Ground
5. Nanao: Morning, Interrupted
6. Ukitake: Chance
7. Karin: Keeping Up Appearances
8. Yoruichi: Hunting
9. Momo: Trust No One
SOI FONG: EN GARDE
Soi Fong arrived early for the meeting. She would have been ashamed to arrive late, and negligent to merely arrive on time: naturally she wanted the chance to look around first, to assess the condition of the shinigami here, to see how good the defenses were, and, last but not least, to so terrify the shinigami on guard (by appearing behind them with a knife to their neck) that they would maintain what she considered a proper state of awareness for a meeting of this level.
Fear, after all, was a wonderful motivator.
She regretted Oomeda's absence. It had taken years to train him, and while she scarcely missed his gluttonous munching of snacks, his carelessness, his overt stupidity, or his general grossness, there were times when she found herself listening for his step behind her, or tossing a comment to see how he would reply to it.
It was perhaps not quite as painful as missing her left arm, but she still felt his absence.
One of the younger shinigami, a man who she recognised as having been in Fourth Division before, but part of Madarame's squad now, escorted her to the conference room. She flicked a glance round automatically as she entered. Two doors, one at each end of the room, but the one she'd come through was guarded and so, presumably, was the other: windows, but with more guards on the roof and terrace outside: and a fireplace, but a fire burning in it, making the chimney unlikely as a potential spot for eavesdroppers.
Ukitake was already there, sitting at the head of the table and flicking through a set of papers. He looked up as she entered, and rose to greet her. His eyes were dark and sunken, and while he moved with more energy than he had last time she'd seen him, he was perceptibly weaker than he had been before.
She still wouldn't want to face him in a straight fight, though.
"Good to see you, Soi Fong-taichou," he said. "I hope that you didn't run into any trouble on your way here."
She gave him a slight bow. "None at all, Ukitake-taichou," she said. "We passed near a couple of Ichimaru's squads, but let them go so as not to let them know anyone had passed. From what I hear, Madarame and his teams are doing a good job of removing Ichimaru's more competent people."
"A shame that it's necessary," Ukitake said vaguely, seating himself again. "I regret the good people who we've had to leave behind in Seireitai."
"We all do," she said, taking a chair from which she could keep an eye on the doors and windows. Papers were laid out in front of all the places at the table. She picked up the sheaf in front of her seat, raising an eyebrow. "Are we actually putting any of this down in writing?" Her tone of voice said quite clearly, where anyone might see it.
"Ise-fukutaichou made the notes and copied them out herself, with assistance from Hinamori-fukutaichou," he replied. "Nobody outside the agreed group has seen anything."
Soi Fong considered that for a moment, decided that it was acceptable, and began flicking through the papers. "I take it that everyone else is here safely," she said, not looking up, "or you'd already have said something."
Ukitake chuckled, suppressing a cough. "Indeed. I would have told you at once."
She nodded. "About this prisoner --"
"He's being kept in one of the neighbouring rooms," Ukitake said, anticipating the rest of her question. "In case we need to question him. But if you don't mind, I'd rather leave the rest of it until everyone else is here."
Soi Fong nodded again. "Of course, Ukitake-taichou," she said, and returned to scanning the papers.
Perhaps ten minutes later, the others began filing in and took places around the table. Soi Fong rose to bow to Kuukaku, and nodded to the others: Sasakibe still working to stay unnoticed but responding to her nod, Madarame with that rag of a scarf round his neck, Ise focused and just a little too tautly strung, Isane with half her attention on Ukitake, Iba limping and leaning on his crutch, knee still splinted and bandaged, and little Hinamori burning with focused determination.
"Very well," Ukitake said, putting down his papers as everyone seated themselves. "Thank you for attending, Shiba-dono, Soi Fong-taichou. We all know the purpose of this meeting. Do we take this opportunity to strike at Aizen Sousuke, or is it a trap?"
Silence hung round the table, as everyone waited for someone else to answer first.
Soi Fong decided to break it. "I speak for Yoruichi-sama and for Urahara Kisuke as well as myself," she said. "Yoruichi-sama chose to stay to monitor the Karakura situation and pick up any information that she could from the spying posts we have, and Urahara is still unable to enter Soul Society. However, they both agree that we have good reason to believe that this is genuine, and that we should take this opportunity." She glanced round the table, and saw Hinamori Momo nodding. "They also have additional data to suggest that the imbalance of souls between worlds is growing worse. We may have very little time left in which we can take action."
Ukitake raised a hand to quell questions from the others. "How is the imbalance growing worse?"
"More souls not being sent on," Soi Fong said, with a twitch of her armless shoulder. "More Hollows present in the world of the living, and exacerbating the situation by preying on the souls and creating more of themselves. We've had situations of this sort of build-up before during wars, but at least then there was some compensatory shinigami activity going on. Yoruichi-sama suspects that Aizen might even be making the situation worse by forcing or permitting Hollows to come through from Hueco Mundo."
"But that'd be suicidal," Ise said, looking more shocked than Soi Fong felt the situation really warranted. "That sort of increased spiritual pressure could lead to degradation in the matrix of all connected worlds and --"
Ukitake held up a hand. "Point taken, Ise-fukutaichou. I see two possible answers to it. One is that Aizen Sousuke believes that he has some strategy which will incorporate the spiritual degradation and even make use of it."
"And the other answer, Ukitake-taichou?" Madarame asked.
"That he simply doesn't care," Ukitake said. He swept a dark-eyed glance around the table. "I think we have all had sufficient proof over the last few months that Aizen is not concerned with stability or good order, whatever he may say. We have all seen what has been happening to Seireitai under Ichimaru's governance. Why should we assume that he will be any more concerned about the world of the living? If he thought that he could raise himself to divinity by destroying the universe, does anyone here doubt that he would do it?"
Nobody answered that. Hinamori lowered her eyes to look at her hands, but she didn't recoil or try to shrink away.
"I agree," Shiba Kuukaku said. She leaned forward, glaring impartially at everyone. "We should act, and we should do it soon."
Ukitake nodded. "That is my opinion too. I find it --" He hesitated. "I find it plausible that Yamamoto-soutaichou would have suspected treachery. As it turned out, he was right to a degree. If Kurotsuchi had known that Hisagi was a spy, then Hisagi would already be dead."
And still, Soi Fong thought, you say 'Yamamoto-soutaichou' as if he was going to come back, and yet you don't give Hisagi the dignity of his own title.
"So can Urahara get us to Hueco Mundo?" Madarame demanded. "If he gets some of us through to there, then we find Hisagi and he helps us assassinate Aizen and get the prisoners out --"
Sasakibe held up one hand to stop Madarame. He had drawn his lips together disapprovingly at the word 'assassination'. "We have already discussed some of this, but without Soi Fong-taichou and Shiba-dono being present. If I may?" He turned to Ukitake.
Ukitake nodded. "Go on, Sasakibe."
Sasakibe coughed. "Very well. We have five main objectives. Remove Aizen. Bring out any prisoners. Distract Ichimaru and if possible strike at him while he lacks reinforcements from Hueco Mundo. Secure Karakura during this to avoid living casualties. Rouse Seireitai and take control of it."
The other vice-captains and Madarame exchanged quick glances. It seemed that while they'd heard some of the plans, the full scope of the operation was a surprise to them. It was a surprise to Soi Fong as well, but she didn't intend to show it.
Shiba Kuukaku whistled. "You don't plan by halves, Ukitake, I'll say that for you. And what do we do for an encore?"
"We don't have the option of leaving Aizen time to react," Ukitake said patiently. "If he feels seriously threatened, all he needs to do is retreat into Hueco Mundo and defend himself there. All Ichimaru needs to do is retreat into Seireitai and raise the killing stone barriers. Either would hold us out long enough for the other one to bring forces through and subdue us together. Ichimaru may not have many loyal followers, but he has the minions that Aizen has given him, and enough time-servers and thugs to control the lower ranks, short of anything other than all-out rebellion."
Soi Fong nodded. She felt that his assessment of the situation was correct.
"And there are the people living outside the walls of Seireitai," Sasakibe added. "All eighty districts. Aizen knows that we have a duty to protect them. If Ichimaru seals Seireitai and then Aizen brings in Menos Grandes or Espada, they will be ground against the walls, hammer against anvil."
Kotetsu Isane winced and bit her lip. Of course she was sensitive on the subject, Soi Fong reflected. It had, after all, been the tool that Aizen had used to force Unohana to surrender.
She herself had been barely conscious at the time, shuddering with phantom pains from her missing arm, trying to give orders to Oomeda and then remembering that he was dead. Unohana had been in command in Seireitai after her group's hasty retreat from Hueco Mundo, and the captains and vice-captains who had survived the fake Karakura disaster had been unconscious, disabled, or at any rate unfit to try to take down Aizen and his people. Unohana had brought in as many civilians as she could before raising the barriers, but she had been in an untenable position, with Aizen and his forces camped outside the walls and threatening to ravage the countryside and turn his Hollows loose to devour the helpless souls.
Unohana had acted according to her best judgment. She had negotiated surrender terms (Aizen as ruler, Unohana herself to surrender, no civilians to be harmed, the shinigami to continue their normal duties) and taken the gamble that Aizen would keep his word. She had also smuggled the other captains and vice-captains out of the city through the maintenance tunnels, one step ahead of Aizen's people. Soi Fong had had enough time to give certain orders to her own Covert Operations people, and one day, one day soon, the occupying forces in Seireitai would have a very nasty surprise.
The thought of the surrender still galled her. But what would she have done, herself, if fate had placed her in Unohana's position? How would she have managed? Would she have kept the walls up and left the civilians to scream outside, and waited for Aizen to find a way to crack the defenses and come through?
Little surprise that Kotetsu Isane was pale and silent. Unohana's last order to her had been to leave with the others and to care for Ukitake-taichou and the wounded. It had only been later that they had heard how Aizen had taken Unohana-taichou and the best of the Fourth Division away in chains and collars.
"So how do you plan to split our forces?" Soi Fong asked. "I'm assuming that you are leaving Karakura to Urahara Kisuke and his group."
Ukitake nodded. "That was my intention. They know the ground and are best equipped to defend it. How do your numbers stand? I understand that a couple of the Vizards are with you."
Soi Fong nodded curtly. "But not reliably fit to fight. Kensei is crippled, and Mashiro cannot control her -- her transformation. You know. The thing that they do to access their Hollow selves and gain power." She gestured vaguely. The whole thing was still rather incomprehensible and somewhat disgusting to her. "And Rose is incapable, and will be so for the foreseeable future. They would help if they can, but we can't consider them definite assets. Other than that, we have a few locals who can assist, but I would only consider them as seated officer level, if that. The mod soul Kon, the human Arisawa Tatsuki, Urahara's two assistants, Kurosaki Isshin --"
"Who?" Madarame asked.
"Kurosaki Ichigo's father," Soi Fong snapped. If he couldn't be bothered to read the regular updates and reports, that was hardly her fault. "There's something about him. He's more than just a human, and Urahara says he's reliable. But he's keeping a low profile and refusing all contact. Probably wants to keep his daughters safe." She suppressed her indignation with an effort. Just because the man didn't feel a proper sense of duty wasn't his daughters' fault. "Urahara says we can rely on him to help hold down an area of the town if we're forced on the defensive, but we shouldn't expect any offensive assistance."
"He has already lost his son," Ukitake said gently. "We can hardly expect him to give us more than that."
"Lost for good?" Madarame asked. "Grimmjow says that Aizen turned him into some sort of half-Hollow. So if we can fix that, we can get him back."
Soi Fong noted but did not remark (yet) on Madarame's overly familiar mention of the Arrancar renegade. "The boy's a Vizard," she said. "If he could regain control of himself, he'd be a vital asset. We know how well he fights. But as long as he stays under Aizen's thumb, he's just as much of a danger. The group that goes into Hueco Mundo will have to bear that in mind."
"Right you are, Soi Fong-taichou," Madarame said, leaning back with a satisfied air. She could read his thoughts as clearly as if he had them written on his forehead. He was planning a nice simple chat with the boy, a straightforward reconversion, and a glorious fight or two.
Fool. It couldn't possibly be that easy.
Soi Fong turned back to Ukitake. "Our mobile forces therefore consist of Yoruichi-sama, Tessai, and myself. Tessai has expressed a wish to remain with Urahara in Karakura: he feels they will operate best there as a team."
"And Urahara's . . . assistants?" Ukitake asked, a note of distaste in his voice. He must have seen the reports about those two children. Well, maybe children. Soi Fong had serious doubts about their childishness, and even their humanity.
"Will remain at the shop," Soi Fong said. "If it is attacked, then they will assist in defending it, but you could hardly expect them not to do that. Urahara has said that he will not be using them in any aggressive strikes." She didn't comment on whether or not she thought Urahara had been telling the truth about that.
Ukitake nodded. "Much as I had expected." He leaned forward, steepling his hands. "Now, Sasakibe and I are considering the following teams. I am expecting everyone to give their opinion on these plans."
Heads nodded around the table. Ise was scratching down quick notes, not looking at her brush and paper, her eyes on Ukitake. Iba's face was set in lines of dogged resignation: obviously he could guess that he was going to be placed on the defensive, and equally obviously he would rather have been on the offensive. Hinamori was biting her lip in stubborn dignity and self-control, and Madarame was grinning like a wolf. Shiba Kuukaku looked cheerfully ferocious, while Sasakibe was perfectly, totally bland.
Sasakibe must not be too pleased about his planned assignment either, Soi Fong decided.
"Firstly, the Hueco Mundo group. Ise-kun, Madarame-kun, you two will be acting as joint leaders, and we will shortly discuss you taking one or more junior shinigami with you, as backup and to ensure that at least one of your group has not been subjected to Aizen's shikai. I would suggest that you take at least one trained healer from our reserves."
"But, Ukitake-taichou --" Hinamori started.
Ukitake continued, ignoring her. "Hinamori-kun and Iba-kun will be with me. We will be functioning as the group to draw out and strike at Ichimaru and his men. We will be working with some of our reserves here, and I hope that Shiba Kuukaku will prepare the ground beforehand with some of her very best explosives."
"Glad to oblige," Shiba Kuukaku said happily. "Show me the terrain you want and I'll make a minefield of it."
Ukitake nodded. "I don't intend for you to be present there, though. You, Sasakibe, and Soi Fong-taichou," he turned to Soi Fong, "will be busy retaking Seireitai."
Soi Fong blinked. "Please explain," she said. She had expected to be on the Hueco Mundo group, or at least with Ukitake.
"I understand from the reports of our spies that Seireitai is unhappy under Ichimaru's rule," Ukitake said.
Soi Fong nodded. "Yes. Ah. You intend us to represent the old guard, if you like."
Shiba Kuukaku was nodding. "Me for the aristocracy, Sasakibe as a reminder of Yamamoto, Soi Fong here for backup and to make sure we don't get stabbed in the back. I like it."
The little suppressed quiver of Sasakibe's mouth suggested that he did not like it, that he would far rather be with one of the other groups, and that he and Ukitake had already discussed the matter beforehand and he had lost. "If we can retake Seireitai," he said neutrally, "then Ichimaru will be unable to fall back on it and barrier himself inside it. Also, once we have the city, we can send out forces to assist Ukitake-taichou. With any luck, Aizen will be preoccupied in Hueco Mundo at that point."
Soi Fong considered the plan. "I dislike relying on luck," she said. "But it would be a vital strategic objective. Once I contact my people inside Seireitai --"
Iba looked as if he was about to ask some sort of stupid question such as what people inside Seireitai? then reconsidered. Probably he had realised that of course she had people inside Seireitai.
She had people everywhere. That was what being head of Covert Operations meant.
"-- we will be able to move against the people whom Ichimaru put in power," she concluded. "Take them out and rally the shinigami who are still loyal, and I think this has a good chance of success."
Ukitake nodded. "I realise this depends on my group occupying Ichimaru for the time that you need to take Seireitai. Hinamori, Iba, and Kotetsu will be with me, but we cannot be sure what forces he will bring against us, or if we can manage to bring him to battle in the area that Shiba-dono here will have prepared. We know that he has Kira Izuru with him, and some Hollows, and some shinigami who are loyal to him. Frankly . . ." He shrugged. "If he can draw more forces from Aizen, then the Hueco Mundo team will have an easier time of it, but we may have some problems."
Hinamori looked as if she was chewing over the thought of getting a chance to strike at Ichimaru. She didn't make any comment, but the idea seemed not to displease her.
"Can we do anything to sour the relationship between Aizen and Ichimaru?" Ise asked, putting down her brush for a moment. "Or is there any way that Urahara Kisuke can jam communications between Soul Society and Hueco Mundo?" She glanced towards Madarame. "As far as I can see, we will be pretty much on our own once we're there: it's more important that Aizen and Ichimaru be unable to communicate, than that we should be able to."
Madarame nodded. "She's right. The less they know, the better. Anything Urahara can do with that, Soi Fong-taichou?"
"I'll ask," Soi Fong said. "It's a good thought. I don't think we can do anything about Aizen's relationship with Ichimaru, though. The best we can hope for may be to get Ichimaru reacting impulsively when he comes out after Ukitake-taichou. Maybe a few of my agents can work to shake the mood in Seireitai: put up graffiti, start rumours, and so on. If he's already irritated by us, he might take the bait all the more readily. And speaking of bait, how do we plan to lure him?"
"I think there is one thing that would definitely bring him out in person," Hinamori said softly. "He'd come if he thought Matsumoto Rangiku was there."
Soi Fong squinted at Hinamori thoughtfully. "You may have a good idea there," she said. "My people tell me that he still doesn't believe she's dead. But then, with his paranoia in general . . ."
Ukitake nodded. "A good thought, Hinamori-kun. How should we pass him the information, Soi Fong-taichou?"
It was almost a pleasure to have a tactical problem of this nature to think about. "The easiest and safest option is to leak it through an innocent third party," she said briskly. "It needs to be convincing, and Ichimaru will be more convinced if he believes that he got the information against the informant's wishes."
Ukitake frowned. "Are you suggesting that we should leak the information to some innocent who will confess it when Ichimaru has them tortured?"
Soi Fong twitched her shoulder in a half-shrug. "I don't think he'll believe it any other way."
"Unacceptable," he said shortly. His reiatsu crackled for a moment, like suppressed lightning or thunder far away. "Surely if one of your agents can pass the information that Matsumoto was seen in a particular area, that would be enough."
Soi Fong tapped a finger on the table. "No, Ukitake-taichou," she said. "Ichimaru is paranoid. He would question the person who provided that information. In person. I believe you underrate his paranoia and his current mental instability. And if one of my agents were tortured, I cannot entirely guarantee that he would hold his tongue. Even if he were to commit suicide on the spot, that would only rouse Ichimaru's suspicion. This information has to come from a channel that Ichimaru considers safe and reliable, or he won't accept it, and our plan will founder."
Ukitake nodded. "Very well. Then find another alternative, Soi Fong-taichou, if you please, because I am unhappy with the option of sacrificing yet more innocents in this war."
Soi Fong could feel the eyes of everyone else on her in the silence.
Yoruichi-sama had warned her that something like this might happen.
It's quite possible that Ukitake-taichou and you will disagree during this meeting. Remember that the others will be watching you. Be careful, my dear. Some of them are young and reckless. Don't give them an excuse to think about disobedience.
Yes, but you yourself in your own time --
I did in my own time and place, yes. But don't be the one to give them the excuse to doubt him.
She nodded equably. "In that case, the next option would be to let some of his trusted men think that they had seen her or found her trail. I would suggest finding a woman of suitable build, disguising her as Matsumoto Rangiku, and letting her cross a patrol's path before escaping. Maybe let it look as if she is injured and travelling to a meeting, if that can be done with sufficient subtlety. Choose a candidate, and I'll brief her for the mission. If Madarame can update me on where Ichimaru's patrols are operating, and give me the names of any patrol leaders that Ichimaru would trust, and Shiba-dono can help me choose a location in their patrol zones, then we can see about laying the bait." Her tone, her manner, said I have provided my advice: you have given orders: you are the acting captain commander, and I obey you.
There were nods around the table. "Very good," Ukitake said. "We'll go over the ambush details later. Now, the Hueco Mundo group. Your priorities will be somewhat dependent on what Hisagi can tell you, but if some of the Captains are prisoners there, then releasing them would obviously be a good idea."
Ise and Madarame both nodded. "Do we know where in Hueco Mundo Urahara will be dropping us, Soi Fong-taichou?" Madarame asked. "From what I heard, last time the group came out in the desert outside Aizen's base, and they had to find their way in."
"Yes," Kotetsu Isane said. "But on that occasion, Kurosaki and his group had already forced their way in: we didn't have to worry so much about setting off alarms or passing guards. This time, it might be harder getting in without alerting them to your presence."
Soi Fong smiled thinly. "Actually, Urahara says that he may have a solution to that. Both Kurotsuchi and the Espada called Szayel Apollo have sets of rooms that breach the walls or actually extend outside the walls. Holding pens and that sort of thing. He believes that if he can open a Garganta into their areas, then it might get ignored as merely experimental debris from their usual habits. Of course, the team would have to handle any immediate problems, but . . ." Her shrug suggested that she was confident they could manage that.
"I like it," Madarame said. "They'll have the normal entrances watched closer than ever, after Grimmjow and Sado got out. This'd get us round that."
Ise nodded. "Kurotsuchi's territory might be easier," she added. "Assuming he follows the same laboratory practices that he did when he was with the Gotei 13, the same layout to his working rooms and so on . . . we would probably find it easier to get out without causing an alarm."
"I'll ask Urahara," Soi Fong said. "Has the prisoner been able to provide any information on the layout of Aizen's base?"
"Not very much," Ukitake said ruefully. "Actually, I was thinking we could bring him in to ask him a few more questions. Some other points of view might be . . . enlightening."
"Certainly," Soi Fong said.
Ukitake held up a hand. "Just one thing. No death threats and no torture threats. He's been quite cooperative so far."
"No threats at all?" Soi Fon said, disappointed. "Not even an implication or two?"
"Maybe an implication or two," Ukitake said. "But you haven't met this one, Soi Fong-taichou. Threatening him would be about as useful as threatening Zaraki-taichou would have been."
Soi Fong suppressed a sigh. "Oh. One of that sort."
Madarame muttered something.
"Ah," Ukitake said, "thank you for volunteering, Madarame. Please go and fetch him in."
As Madarame shuffled off to find the Arrancar, back rigid and shoulders expressive of his thoughts about anyone who'd criticize Zaraki by so much as vague implication, Shiba Kuukaku leaned across. "It's true, Soi Fong. The worst you could do to this one is threaten not to fight him."
"Bah," Soi Fong spat. "Why couldn't our defector have been an intelligent man? Is that too much to ask for?"
"Oh, he's not unintelligent," Ukitake said. A slight smile tugged at the corners of his mouth. "He's just terribly, terribly focused. I believe he could give us more than information, in fact: I suggest we send him with the Hueco Mundo group."
Ise looked as if she had bitten into a pickle. "Ukitake-taichou --" she said uncertainly, clearly not wanting to outright disagree, but clearly not happy with the idea either.
"Might work," Shiba Kuukaku said. "If you think you can trust him."
Ukitake glanced round the table. Kotetsu dropped her eyes. Hinamori looked uncertain. Iba grunted, but didn't say anything. Sasakibe considered, then gave a brisk nod.
Soi Fong turned the option over and over in her mind. If he could be trusted, then the prisoner would be a vast asset to the infiltration scheme. If he was going to betray them, then it'd be hopeless from the start. She'd had no opportunity to gauge this Grimmjow yet, but while every instinct recoiled from trusting a Hollow, let alone one of Aizen's pet Hollows, from what she'd been told he wasn't a Hollow any longer. How much difference would that make, to have the constant hunger for souls removed?
She would have trusted Zaraki. She wouldn't have liked it, but she would have trusted him.
"Let's see him," she finally said.
The door swung open. Madarame shepherded a blue-haired, thuggish, wiry man into the room. He was dressed in plain shinigami clothing, and carried himself with the unconscious swagger of a tomcat who'd been victor of too many brawls to count.
He also had a rising black eye and a split lip.
Ukitake considered him for a long moment, then turned to Madarame, raising an eyebrow in enquiry.
"Bare-handed combat practice," Madarame said hastily. "Just to keep everyone busy while they were waiting --"
"Yeah, and you should have seen what the others looked like," the prisoner said with deep satisfaction.
Soi Fong wasted half a second itemising all the qualities she would have liked a prisoner to have had -- intelligent, repentant, up to date on all Aizen's security procedures and secret plans -- then sighed and resigned herself to reality. "So," she said. "What can you tell us about the situation in Hueco Mundo?"
Grimmjow looked her up and down, and sneered. "I've already been through that crap with all these others. Why're you asking me even more damn stupid questions?"
"You're here so that we can make you an offer," Ukitake cut in before Soi Fong could do more than sneer back. "We have no interest in deliberately invading Hueco Mundo in its normal state: the Hollows who live there are part of the natural cycle, and while we hope that some day they will be purified, as long as they don't prey on the living, we leave them be. Surely you must see that Aizen Sousuke has disrupted this status quo."
"Hnh." Grimmjow chewed that thought over. "So what're you saying? That if you can get rid of Aizen and we don't come pissing around with living souls, we got no quarrel?"
"Do you actually want a quarrel with us?" Ukitake leaned forward, voice hoarse but persuasive. "Fights are one thing. Outright war is something else. From what you've said, you had friends. Is the current situation really what they died for?"
"They died like they wanted to die," Grimmjow snarled, but it was more of a reflex than genuine fury. "They died fighting."
"We can give you that too," Soi Fong said, pitching her voice like a knife. "If that's what you want."
Grimmjow gave her a grudging nod. "So what do you want?" He turned back to the others in the room, glaring around like a bear baited by dogs. "All of you. What do you fucking want from me? Because this isn't what I want from you! You talk nice and you act nice, but I get more fucking honesty out of him," he pointed a finger at Madarame, "when he tells me to stop acting like a fucking idiot and knocks me down. What do I want? I want to be what I was or I want to go out fighting. That's what I want. Give me that and I'll cooperate. I'll do whatever you damn well want. Because without that I'm fucking nothing."
"I think that you underrate yourself," Ukitake said, and there was an odd gentleness to his voice.
"Think what you want," Grimmjow snarled.
Ukitake turned to Soi Fong. "Do you think that Urahara could return him to his previous state?"
"Urahara said that he'd have to examine the subject," Soi Fong said grudgingly. "He didn't say that it was impossible. But it might take time. And it'd be useful to have Inoue Orihime, so that he could look at what she did to him."
"The Inoue girl would be an asset in any case," Shiba Kuukaku put in. "I may have something to say about that later."
"So you can do something," Grimmjow said.
Ukitake coughed, triggering a tense surge of nervous glances from everyone in the room except Grimmjow, then said hoarsely, "Maybe. Possibly. Are you willing to help us, given that possibility?"
Grimmjow shrugged, and a weight seemed to lift from his shoulders. "I'll take that chance. Okay. You got a deal. What do you want from me? Me to go into Las Noches with your team to try to fuck Aizen's shit up where it'll hurt him the most?"
"Yes," Ukitake said. "But I need you to understand that you will be working with Ise-fukutaichou and Madarame here. They will be the ones calling the shots. And if you can't accept that, I suggest that you say so now."
Grimmjow chewed on his lower lip, then tossed his hair. "Well, fuck that. I'm not going to take orders from Madarame or Ise here. But you're not gonna give me what I want unless you get your people out of there and take Aizen down. So fair enough. I'll listen to them if they say be sneaky. But if we run into Aizen, all bets are off. Right?"
"Accepted," Ukitake said.
"Right," Madarame said. He offered Grimmjow his hand to shake. Grimmjow took it, and the two men tried to crush each others' fingers in a traditional manly way.
"I think this is where I make my suggestion," Shiba Kuukaku said. "It's about Inoue Orihime."
"The girl's abilities would be useful," Sasakibe said. "But the girl's not a trained fighter -- even if she did get some practice," he added, with an apologetic glance at Ukitake, "and I don't think it advisable to make her an essential part of any of our plans. We can't be sure of her mental state."
Grimmjow disengaged his hand from Madarame's, both of them trying to look as if they hadn't done their best to break the other's knuckles, and snorted. "The girl does what she's told these days. If you tell her to follow you, she'll do whatever you say."
Shiba Kuukaku nodded. "So ideally you want someone on the team who knows her. Knows her well enough to judge how stable she is, and if she's going to break down or if she can help you."
Ukitake nodded slowly. "A good thought. I don't want to send Sado, though. The boy's still recovering. I don't know how well anyone here knows her . . . Madarame? You were on that visit to the world of the living." And the only one of that group still alive and with us hung in the air.
Madarame shrugged, and shoved his hands into his sash. "I wasn't staying with her, didn't have much to do with her. I can make a guess, sure . . ."
"I can do better than that," Shiba Kuukaku said smugly. "I brought one of our trainees with us. He's Academy final-year level, but talented: I'd have been sending him to you in a few weeks anyhow. He's got the best reasons in the world to be able to judge the girl's sanity and get her to help us." She paused for emphasis. "He's her brother. Inoue Sora. Died a few years back, spent a while as a Hollow, got purified and sent on by Kurosaki himself."
Soi Fong suppressed her habitual flare of annoyance at anyone who knew something which Covert Operations should already have been aware of, and nodded. "It seems a good idea. But if he's just a trainee -- will he be able to handle that level of reiatsu and combat?"
"Hell no, he won't be able to handle Captain-level combat." Shiba Kuukaku shrugged. "I said he was talented, not that he was your level. But if that happens, then he can stay well back out of the fights. In any case, you're not sending him along to do fighting. You're sending him along to handle his sister. Maybe to save his sister. Right?"
"Another fucking waste of space," Grimmjow muttered.
Ukitake nodded crisply. "I'll see him together with the Hueco Mundo team after this meeting, but I favour this idea. Any dissenters?"
He glanced round the table. Everyone was nodding.
"Very good." He turned back to Grimmjow. "You've told us that you believe Aizen Sousuke is holding at least two Captain-level prisoners, but that nobody knows who they are or what their condition is."
Grimmjow shrugged. "Well, maybe some of the others know. I don't. They're in his private set of rooms, where he keeps his own lab and his own prison cells and all that shit. Even Kurotsuchi and Szayel don't get let in there. Sometimes one of their people who tried to get in gets held up as an example and taken to pieces real slow. There's some sort of guard in there as well, not just traps. He's got secretive, these last few months. I mean, he was bad enough before Kurosaki broke in and there was all the fighting, but since then he don't tell anyone nothing, if you know what I mean. Except maybe Ichimaru. And Ichimaru talks even less. He just smiles."
"Clearly a priority," Soi Fong said. She chose not to speculate on the identity of the prisoners. It wouldn't help. "Ise, can you deal with any lock or trap kidou?"
Ise frowned. "Soi Fong-taichou, I don't know. I'm good, but we all know that Aizen is very good. I can't be sure that I can open something he's locked. The best I may be able to to may be to make it look as if it was a Hollow or Arrancar trying to break in, since Grimmjow has confirmed that they sometimes make the attempt." She nodded politely to the ex-Arrancar. "That would at least confuse the issue, or make it look like a normal thing, rather than a shinigami effort."
"Right," Madarame said. "That might buy us some time. So our objectives are to get in there, make contact with Hisagi, assess the situation, maybe pick up Inoue Orihime, get into Aizen's private rooms and bring out any prisoners, and kill Aizen. Do I have that right?"
"Sounds good to me," Grimmjow said. "Let's do it."
Soi Fong had the very strong impression that Ukitake was struggling not to sigh. "Very well. Tomorrow the Hueco Mundo group moves to the world of the living, and Urahara prepares to open a Garganta for them into Hueco Mundo. By which point we need to have the bait set up for Ichimaru --"
Soi Fong raised her hand. "We need to have the bait moving today, Ukitake-taichou. Allow at least one day's delay for it to be reported to him. I suggest we select the battlefield at once."
"Agreed," Ukitake said. "Very well. At the close of this meeting, Shiba-dono and Madarame are to arrange the battlefield, and Madarame is to assign a group from his squad to guard her while she sets explosives. Kotetsu, you and Hinamori will prepare tactics and scout out the area and its approaches to Seireitai, consult with Madarame and Shiba-dono, and provide me with a strategy. Soi Fong-taichou, you and Sasakibe will consult on how to take back Seireitai, and you will also need to arrange the bait, and if you could manage it, I would like an estimate of Ichimaru's current resources in Seireitai. Ise, you and Grimmjow will assess Inoue Sora's abilities, and select a healer from the available shinigami, and discuss your operation: coordinate with Madarame when he gets back. Iba, I want everyone prepared for battle or evacuation." He rose to his feet, and everyone else stood as well. "My friends, whatever may come, I am proud to have served beside you. Let us go out and bring down ruin on those who have betrayed their honour and their friends."
There were nods around the table. Slightly embarrassed nods in a few cases, but nods nonetheless. Soi Fong caught Sasakibe's eyes and began to walk around the table towards him, already considering the best method of taking Ichimaru's picked men out of their positions. Madarame went to throw the doors open, taking a somewhat dramatic breath of fresh air.
Then he paused, looking at the shinigami from his squad who were guarding the doors. "Where's Rikichi?" he asked.
A muttered reply. Madarame's voice, louder, overlying it: "What do you mean, you don't know where he is?"
Silence spread through the room like a cold hand, cutting off words half-spoken, and the sky was abruptly that much darker.
---
Arc: Winter War - an AU co-write with liralen and sophiap
Characters: Soi Fong, others
Rating/Warning: PG-13 for language, references to character death
Summary: Before tactics, one must have strategy.
Notes: This is a rather dark AU co-plotted with liralen and sophiap. The war against Aizen's forces went very badly. Nothing is sacred and no one is safe.
Links
1. Nanao: Winter
2. Ukitake: Waking Up
3. Ikkaku: What Is, What Was
4. Kuukaku: Holding Ground
5. Nanao: Morning, Interrupted
6. Ukitake: Chance
7. Karin: Keeping Up Appearances
8. Yoruichi: Hunting
9. Momo: Trust No One
SOI FONG: EN GARDE
Soi Fong arrived early for the meeting. She would have been ashamed to arrive late, and negligent to merely arrive on time: naturally she wanted the chance to look around first, to assess the condition of the shinigami here, to see how good the defenses were, and, last but not least, to so terrify the shinigami on guard (by appearing behind them with a knife to their neck) that they would maintain what she considered a proper state of awareness for a meeting of this level.
Fear, after all, was a wonderful motivator.
She regretted Oomeda's absence. It had taken years to train him, and while she scarcely missed his gluttonous munching of snacks, his carelessness, his overt stupidity, or his general grossness, there were times when she found herself listening for his step behind her, or tossing a comment to see how he would reply to it.
It was perhaps not quite as painful as missing her left arm, but she still felt his absence.
One of the younger shinigami, a man who she recognised as having been in Fourth Division before, but part of Madarame's squad now, escorted her to the conference room. She flicked a glance round automatically as she entered. Two doors, one at each end of the room, but the one she'd come through was guarded and so, presumably, was the other: windows, but with more guards on the roof and terrace outside: and a fireplace, but a fire burning in it, making the chimney unlikely as a potential spot for eavesdroppers.
Ukitake was already there, sitting at the head of the table and flicking through a set of papers. He looked up as she entered, and rose to greet her. His eyes were dark and sunken, and while he moved with more energy than he had last time she'd seen him, he was perceptibly weaker than he had been before.
She still wouldn't want to face him in a straight fight, though.
"Good to see you, Soi Fong-taichou," he said. "I hope that you didn't run into any trouble on your way here."
She gave him a slight bow. "None at all, Ukitake-taichou," she said. "We passed near a couple of Ichimaru's squads, but let them go so as not to let them know anyone had passed. From what I hear, Madarame and his teams are doing a good job of removing Ichimaru's more competent people."
"A shame that it's necessary," Ukitake said vaguely, seating himself again. "I regret the good people who we've had to leave behind in Seireitai."
"We all do," she said, taking a chair from which she could keep an eye on the doors and windows. Papers were laid out in front of all the places at the table. She picked up the sheaf in front of her seat, raising an eyebrow. "Are we actually putting any of this down in writing?" Her tone of voice said quite clearly, where anyone might see it.
"Ise-fukutaichou made the notes and copied them out herself, with assistance from Hinamori-fukutaichou," he replied. "Nobody outside the agreed group has seen anything."
Soi Fong considered that for a moment, decided that it was acceptable, and began flicking through the papers. "I take it that everyone else is here safely," she said, not looking up, "or you'd already have said something."
Ukitake chuckled, suppressing a cough. "Indeed. I would have told you at once."
She nodded. "About this prisoner --"
"He's being kept in one of the neighbouring rooms," Ukitake said, anticipating the rest of her question. "In case we need to question him. But if you don't mind, I'd rather leave the rest of it until everyone else is here."
Soi Fong nodded again. "Of course, Ukitake-taichou," she said, and returned to scanning the papers.
Perhaps ten minutes later, the others began filing in and took places around the table. Soi Fong rose to bow to Kuukaku, and nodded to the others: Sasakibe still working to stay unnoticed but responding to her nod, Madarame with that rag of a scarf round his neck, Ise focused and just a little too tautly strung, Isane with half her attention on Ukitake, Iba limping and leaning on his crutch, knee still splinted and bandaged, and little Hinamori burning with focused determination.
"Very well," Ukitake said, putting down his papers as everyone seated themselves. "Thank you for attending, Shiba-dono, Soi Fong-taichou. We all know the purpose of this meeting. Do we take this opportunity to strike at Aizen Sousuke, or is it a trap?"
Silence hung round the table, as everyone waited for someone else to answer first.
Soi Fong decided to break it. "I speak for Yoruichi-sama and for Urahara Kisuke as well as myself," she said. "Yoruichi-sama chose to stay to monitor the Karakura situation and pick up any information that she could from the spying posts we have, and Urahara is still unable to enter Soul Society. However, they both agree that we have good reason to believe that this is genuine, and that we should take this opportunity." She glanced round the table, and saw Hinamori Momo nodding. "They also have additional data to suggest that the imbalance of souls between worlds is growing worse. We may have very little time left in which we can take action."
Ukitake raised a hand to quell questions from the others. "How is the imbalance growing worse?"
"More souls not being sent on," Soi Fong said, with a twitch of her armless shoulder. "More Hollows present in the world of the living, and exacerbating the situation by preying on the souls and creating more of themselves. We've had situations of this sort of build-up before during wars, but at least then there was some compensatory shinigami activity going on. Yoruichi-sama suspects that Aizen might even be making the situation worse by forcing or permitting Hollows to come through from Hueco Mundo."
"But that'd be suicidal," Ise said, looking more shocked than Soi Fong felt the situation really warranted. "That sort of increased spiritual pressure could lead to degradation in the matrix of all connected worlds and --"
Ukitake held up a hand. "Point taken, Ise-fukutaichou. I see two possible answers to it. One is that Aizen Sousuke believes that he has some strategy which will incorporate the spiritual degradation and even make use of it."
"And the other answer, Ukitake-taichou?" Madarame asked.
"That he simply doesn't care," Ukitake said. He swept a dark-eyed glance around the table. "I think we have all had sufficient proof over the last few months that Aizen is not concerned with stability or good order, whatever he may say. We have all seen what has been happening to Seireitai under Ichimaru's governance. Why should we assume that he will be any more concerned about the world of the living? If he thought that he could raise himself to divinity by destroying the universe, does anyone here doubt that he would do it?"
Nobody answered that. Hinamori lowered her eyes to look at her hands, but she didn't recoil or try to shrink away.
"I agree," Shiba Kuukaku said. She leaned forward, glaring impartially at everyone. "We should act, and we should do it soon."
Ukitake nodded. "That is my opinion too. I find it --" He hesitated. "I find it plausible that Yamamoto-soutaichou would have suspected treachery. As it turned out, he was right to a degree. If Kurotsuchi had known that Hisagi was a spy, then Hisagi would already be dead."
And still, Soi Fong thought, you say 'Yamamoto-soutaichou' as if he was going to come back, and yet you don't give Hisagi the dignity of his own title.
"So can Urahara get us to Hueco Mundo?" Madarame demanded. "If he gets some of us through to there, then we find Hisagi and he helps us assassinate Aizen and get the prisoners out --"
Sasakibe held up one hand to stop Madarame. He had drawn his lips together disapprovingly at the word 'assassination'. "We have already discussed some of this, but without Soi Fong-taichou and Shiba-dono being present. If I may?" He turned to Ukitake.
Ukitake nodded. "Go on, Sasakibe."
Sasakibe coughed. "Very well. We have five main objectives. Remove Aizen. Bring out any prisoners. Distract Ichimaru and if possible strike at him while he lacks reinforcements from Hueco Mundo. Secure Karakura during this to avoid living casualties. Rouse Seireitai and take control of it."
The other vice-captains and Madarame exchanged quick glances. It seemed that while they'd heard some of the plans, the full scope of the operation was a surprise to them. It was a surprise to Soi Fong as well, but she didn't intend to show it.
Shiba Kuukaku whistled. "You don't plan by halves, Ukitake, I'll say that for you. And what do we do for an encore?"
"We don't have the option of leaving Aizen time to react," Ukitake said patiently. "If he feels seriously threatened, all he needs to do is retreat into Hueco Mundo and defend himself there. All Ichimaru needs to do is retreat into Seireitai and raise the killing stone barriers. Either would hold us out long enough for the other one to bring forces through and subdue us together. Ichimaru may not have many loyal followers, but he has the minions that Aizen has given him, and enough time-servers and thugs to control the lower ranks, short of anything other than all-out rebellion."
Soi Fong nodded. She felt that his assessment of the situation was correct.
"And there are the people living outside the walls of Seireitai," Sasakibe added. "All eighty districts. Aizen knows that we have a duty to protect them. If Ichimaru seals Seireitai and then Aizen brings in Menos Grandes or Espada, they will be ground against the walls, hammer against anvil."
Kotetsu Isane winced and bit her lip. Of course she was sensitive on the subject, Soi Fong reflected. It had, after all, been the tool that Aizen had used to force Unohana to surrender.
She herself had been barely conscious at the time, shuddering with phantom pains from her missing arm, trying to give orders to Oomeda and then remembering that he was dead. Unohana had been in command in Seireitai after her group's hasty retreat from Hueco Mundo, and the captains and vice-captains who had survived the fake Karakura disaster had been unconscious, disabled, or at any rate unfit to try to take down Aizen and his people. Unohana had brought in as many civilians as she could before raising the barriers, but she had been in an untenable position, with Aizen and his forces camped outside the walls and threatening to ravage the countryside and turn his Hollows loose to devour the helpless souls.
Unohana had acted according to her best judgment. She had negotiated surrender terms (Aizen as ruler, Unohana herself to surrender, no civilians to be harmed, the shinigami to continue their normal duties) and taken the gamble that Aizen would keep his word. She had also smuggled the other captains and vice-captains out of the city through the maintenance tunnels, one step ahead of Aizen's people. Soi Fong had had enough time to give certain orders to her own Covert Operations people, and one day, one day soon, the occupying forces in Seireitai would have a very nasty surprise.
The thought of the surrender still galled her. But what would she have done, herself, if fate had placed her in Unohana's position? How would she have managed? Would she have kept the walls up and left the civilians to scream outside, and waited for Aizen to find a way to crack the defenses and come through?
Little surprise that Kotetsu Isane was pale and silent. Unohana's last order to her had been to leave with the others and to care for Ukitake-taichou and the wounded. It had only been later that they had heard how Aizen had taken Unohana-taichou and the best of the Fourth Division away in chains and collars.
"So how do you plan to split our forces?" Soi Fong asked. "I'm assuming that you are leaving Karakura to Urahara Kisuke and his group."
Ukitake nodded. "That was my intention. They know the ground and are best equipped to defend it. How do your numbers stand? I understand that a couple of the Vizards are with you."
Soi Fong nodded curtly. "But not reliably fit to fight. Kensei is crippled, and Mashiro cannot control her -- her transformation. You know. The thing that they do to access their Hollow selves and gain power." She gestured vaguely. The whole thing was still rather incomprehensible and somewhat disgusting to her. "And Rose is incapable, and will be so for the foreseeable future. They would help if they can, but we can't consider them definite assets. Other than that, we have a few locals who can assist, but I would only consider them as seated officer level, if that. The mod soul Kon, the human Arisawa Tatsuki, Urahara's two assistants, Kurosaki Isshin --"
"Who?" Madarame asked.
"Kurosaki Ichigo's father," Soi Fong snapped. If he couldn't be bothered to read the regular updates and reports, that was hardly her fault. "There's something about him. He's more than just a human, and Urahara says he's reliable. But he's keeping a low profile and refusing all contact. Probably wants to keep his daughters safe." She suppressed her indignation with an effort. Just because the man didn't feel a proper sense of duty wasn't his daughters' fault. "Urahara says we can rely on him to help hold down an area of the town if we're forced on the defensive, but we shouldn't expect any offensive assistance."
"He has already lost his son," Ukitake said gently. "We can hardly expect him to give us more than that."
"Lost for good?" Madarame asked. "Grimmjow says that Aizen turned him into some sort of half-Hollow. So if we can fix that, we can get him back."
Soi Fong noted but did not remark (yet) on Madarame's overly familiar mention of the Arrancar renegade. "The boy's a Vizard," she said. "If he could regain control of himself, he'd be a vital asset. We know how well he fights. But as long as he stays under Aizen's thumb, he's just as much of a danger. The group that goes into Hueco Mundo will have to bear that in mind."
"Right you are, Soi Fong-taichou," Madarame said, leaning back with a satisfied air. She could read his thoughts as clearly as if he had them written on his forehead. He was planning a nice simple chat with the boy, a straightforward reconversion, and a glorious fight or two.
Fool. It couldn't possibly be that easy.
Soi Fong turned back to Ukitake. "Our mobile forces therefore consist of Yoruichi-sama, Tessai, and myself. Tessai has expressed a wish to remain with Urahara in Karakura: he feels they will operate best there as a team."
"And Urahara's . . . assistants?" Ukitake asked, a note of distaste in his voice. He must have seen the reports about those two children. Well, maybe children. Soi Fong had serious doubts about their childishness, and even their humanity.
"Will remain at the shop," Soi Fong said. "If it is attacked, then they will assist in defending it, but you could hardly expect them not to do that. Urahara has said that he will not be using them in any aggressive strikes." She didn't comment on whether or not she thought Urahara had been telling the truth about that.
Ukitake nodded. "Much as I had expected." He leaned forward, steepling his hands. "Now, Sasakibe and I are considering the following teams. I am expecting everyone to give their opinion on these plans."
Heads nodded around the table. Ise was scratching down quick notes, not looking at her brush and paper, her eyes on Ukitake. Iba's face was set in lines of dogged resignation: obviously he could guess that he was going to be placed on the defensive, and equally obviously he would rather have been on the offensive. Hinamori was biting her lip in stubborn dignity and self-control, and Madarame was grinning like a wolf. Shiba Kuukaku looked cheerfully ferocious, while Sasakibe was perfectly, totally bland.
Sasakibe must not be too pleased about his planned assignment either, Soi Fong decided.
"Firstly, the Hueco Mundo group. Ise-kun, Madarame-kun, you two will be acting as joint leaders, and we will shortly discuss you taking one or more junior shinigami with you, as backup and to ensure that at least one of your group has not been subjected to Aizen's shikai. I would suggest that you take at least one trained healer from our reserves."
"But, Ukitake-taichou --" Hinamori started.
Ukitake continued, ignoring her. "Hinamori-kun and Iba-kun will be with me. We will be functioning as the group to draw out and strike at Ichimaru and his men. We will be working with some of our reserves here, and I hope that Shiba Kuukaku will prepare the ground beforehand with some of her very best explosives."
"Glad to oblige," Shiba Kuukaku said happily. "Show me the terrain you want and I'll make a minefield of it."
Ukitake nodded. "I don't intend for you to be present there, though. You, Sasakibe, and Soi Fong-taichou," he turned to Soi Fong, "will be busy retaking Seireitai."
Soi Fong blinked. "Please explain," she said. She had expected to be on the Hueco Mundo group, or at least with Ukitake.
"I understand from the reports of our spies that Seireitai is unhappy under Ichimaru's rule," Ukitake said.
Soi Fong nodded. "Yes. Ah. You intend us to represent the old guard, if you like."
Shiba Kuukaku was nodding. "Me for the aristocracy, Sasakibe as a reminder of Yamamoto, Soi Fong here for backup and to make sure we don't get stabbed in the back. I like it."
The little suppressed quiver of Sasakibe's mouth suggested that he did not like it, that he would far rather be with one of the other groups, and that he and Ukitake had already discussed the matter beforehand and he had lost. "If we can retake Seireitai," he said neutrally, "then Ichimaru will be unable to fall back on it and barrier himself inside it. Also, once we have the city, we can send out forces to assist Ukitake-taichou. With any luck, Aizen will be preoccupied in Hueco Mundo at that point."
Soi Fong considered the plan. "I dislike relying on luck," she said. "But it would be a vital strategic objective. Once I contact my people inside Seireitai --"
Iba looked as if he was about to ask some sort of stupid question such as what people inside Seireitai? then reconsidered. Probably he had realised that of course she had people inside Seireitai.
She had people everywhere. That was what being head of Covert Operations meant.
"-- we will be able to move against the people whom Ichimaru put in power," she concluded. "Take them out and rally the shinigami who are still loyal, and I think this has a good chance of success."
Ukitake nodded. "I realise this depends on my group occupying Ichimaru for the time that you need to take Seireitai. Hinamori, Iba, and Kotetsu will be with me, but we cannot be sure what forces he will bring against us, or if we can manage to bring him to battle in the area that Shiba-dono here will have prepared. We know that he has Kira Izuru with him, and some Hollows, and some shinigami who are loyal to him. Frankly . . ." He shrugged. "If he can draw more forces from Aizen, then the Hueco Mundo team will have an easier time of it, but we may have some problems."
Hinamori looked as if she was chewing over the thought of getting a chance to strike at Ichimaru. She didn't make any comment, but the idea seemed not to displease her.
"Can we do anything to sour the relationship between Aizen and Ichimaru?" Ise asked, putting down her brush for a moment. "Or is there any way that Urahara Kisuke can jam communications between Soul Society and Hueco Mundo?" She glanced towards Madarame. "As far as I can see, we will be pretty much on our own once we're there: it's more important that Aizen and Ichimaru be unable to communicate, than that we should be able to."
Madarame nodded. "She's right. The less they know, the better. Anything Urahara can do with that, Soi Fong-taichou?"
"I'll ask," Soi Fong said. "It's a good thought. I don't think we can do anything about Aizen's relationship with Ichimaru, though. The best we can hope for may be to get Ichimaru reacting impulsively when he comes out after Ukitake-taichou. Maybe a few of my agents can work to shake the mood in Seireitai: put up graffiti, start rumours, and so on. If he's already irritated by us, he might take the bait all the more readily. And speaking of bait, how do we plan to lure him?"
"I think there is one thing that would definitely bring him out in person," Hinamori said softly. "He'd come if he thought Matsumoto Rangiku was there."
Soi Fong squinted at Hinamori thoughtfully. "You may have a good idea there," she said. "My people tell me that he still doesn't believe she's dead. But then, with his paranoia in general . . ."
Ukitake nodded. "A good thought, Hinamori-kun. How should we pass him the information, Soi Fong-taichou?"
It was almost a pleasure to have a tactical problem of this nature to think about. "The easiest and safest option is to leak it through an innocent third party," she said briskly. "It needs to be convincing, and Ichimaru will be more convinced if he believes that he got the information against the informant's wishes."
Ukitake frowned. "Are you suggesting that we should leak the information to some innocent who will confess it when Ichimaru has them tortured?"
Soi Fong twitched her shoulder in a half-shrug. "I don't think he'll believe it any other way."
"Unacceptable," he said shortly. His reiatsu crackled for a moment, like suppressed lightning or thunder far away. "Surely if one of your agents can pass the information that Matsumoto was seen in a particular area, that would be enough."
Soi Fong tapped a finger on the table. "No, Ukitake-taichou," she said. "Ichimaru is paranoid. He would question the person who provided that information. In person. I believe you underrate his paranoia and his current mental instability. And if one of my agents were tortured, I cannot entirely guarantee that he would hold his tongue. Even if he were to commit suicide on the spot, that would only rouse Ichimaru's suspicion. This information has to come from a channel that Ichimaru considers safe and reliable, or he won't accept it, and our plan will founder."
Ukitake nodded. "Very well. Then find another alternative, Soi Fong-taichou, if you please, because I am unhappy with the option of sacrificing yet more innocents in this war."
Soi Fong could feel the eyes of everyone else on her in the silence.
Yoruichi-sama had warned her that something like this might happen.
It's quite possible that Ukitake-taichou and you will disagree during this meeting. Remember that the others will be watching you. Be careful, my dear. Some of them are young and reckless. Don't give them an excuse to think about disobedience.
Yes, but you yourself in your own time --
I did in my own time and place, yes. But don't be the one to give them the excuse to doubt him.
She nodded equably. "In that case, the next option would be to let some of his trusted men think that they had seen her or found her trail. I would suggest finding a woman of suitable build, disguising her as Matsumoto Rangiku, and letting her cross a patrol's path before escaping. Maybe let it look as if she is injured and travelling to a meeting, if that can be done with sufficient subtlety. Choose a candidate, and I'll brief her for the mission. If Madarame can update me on where Ichimaru's patrols are operating, and give me the names of any patrol leaders that Ichimaru would trust, and Shiba-dono can help me choose a location in their patrol zones, then we can see about laying the bait." Her tone, her manner, said I have provided my advice: you have given orders: you are the acting captain commander, and I obey you.
There were nods around the table. "Very good," Ukitake said. "We'll go over the ambush details later. Now, the Hueco Mundo group. Your priorities will be somewhat dependent on what Hisagi can tell you, but if some of the Captains are prisoners there, then releasing them would obviously be a good idea."
Ise and Madarame both nodded. "Do we know where in Hueco Mundo Urahara will be dropping us, Soi Fong-taichou?" Madarame asked. "From what I heard, last time the group came out in the desert outside Aizen's base, and they had to find their way in."
"Yes," Kotetsu Isane said. "But on that occasion, Kurosaki and his group had already forced their way in: we didn't have to worry so much about setting off alarms or passing guards. This time, it might be harder getting in without alerting them to your presence."
Soi Fong smiled thinly. "Actually, Urahara says that he may have a solution to that. Both Kurotsuchi and the Espada called Szayel Apollo have sets of rooms that breach the walls or actually extend outside the walls. Holding pens and that sort of thing. He believes that if he can open a Garganta into their areas, then it might get ignored as merely experimental debris from their usual habits. Of course, the team would have to handle any immediate problems, but . . ." Her shrug suggested that she was confident they could manage that.
"I like it," Madarame said. "They'll have the normal entrances watched closer than ever, after Grimmjow and Sado got out. This'd get us round that."
Ise nodded. "Kurotsuchi's territory might be easier," she added. "Assuming he follows the same laboratory practices that he did when he was with the Gotei 13, the same layout to his working rooms and so on . . . we would probably find it easier to get out without causing an alarm."
"I'll ask Urahara," Soi Fong said. "Has the prisoner been able to provide any information on the layout of Aizen's base?"
"Not very much," Ukitake said ruefully. "Actually, I was thinking we could bring him in to ask him a few more questions. Some other points of view might be . . . enlightening."
"Certainly," Soi Fong said.
Ukitake held up a hand. "Just one thing. No death threats and no torture threats. He's been quite cooperative so far."
"No threats at all?" Soi Fon said, disappointed. "Not even an implication or two?"
"Maybe an implication or two," Ukitake said. "But you haven't met this one, Soi Fong-taichou. Threatening him would be about as useful as threatening Zaraki-taichou would have been."
Soi Fong suppressed a sigh. "Oh. One of that sort."
Madarame muttered something.
"Ah," Ukitake said, "thank you for volunteering, Madarame. Please go and fetch him in."
As Madarame shuffled off to find the Arrancar, back rigid and shoulders expressive of his thoughts about anyone who'd criticize Zaraki by so much as vague implication, Shiba Kuukaku leaned across. "It's true, Soi Fong. The worst you could do to this one is threaten not to fight him."
"Bah," Soi Fong spat. "Why couldn't our defector have been an intelligent man? Is that too much to ask for?"
"Oh, he's not unintelligent," Ukitake said. A slight smile tugged at the corners of his mouth. "He's just terribly, terribly focused. I believe he could give us more than information, in fact: I suggest we send him with the Hueco Mundo group."
Ise looked as if she had bitten into a pickle. "Ukitake-taichou --" she said uncertainly, clearly not wanting to outright disagree, but clearly not happy with the idea either.
"Might work," Shiba Kuukaku said. "If you think you can trust him."
Ukitake glanced round the table. Kotetsu dropped her eyes. Hinamori looked uncertain. Iba grunted, but didn't say anything. Sasakibe considered, then gave a brisk nod.
Soi Fong turned the option over and over in her mind. If he could be trusted, then the prisoner would be a vast asset to the infiltration scheme. If he was going to betray them, then it'd be hopeless from the start. She'd had no opportunity to gauge this Grimmjow yet, but while every instinct recoiled from trusting a Hollow, let alone one of Aizen's pet Hollows, from what she'd been told he wasn't a Hollow any longer. How much difference would that make, to have the constant hunger for souls removed?
She would have trusted Zaraki. She wouldn't have liked it, but she would have trusted him.
"Let's see him," she finally said.
The door swung open. Madarame shepherded a blue-haired, thuggish, wiry man into the room. He was dressed in plain shinigami clothing, and carried himself with the unconscious swagger of a tomcat who'd been victor of too many brawls to count.
He also had a rising black eye and a split lip.
Ukitake considered him for a long moment, then turned to Madarame, raising an eyebrow in enquiry.
"Bare-handed combat practice," Madarame said hastily. "Just to keep everyone busy while they were waiting --"
"Yeah, and you should have seen what the others looked like," the prisoner said with deep satisfaction.
Soi Fong wasted half a second itemising all the qualities she would have liked a prisoner to have had -- intelligent, repentant, up to date on all Aizen's security procedures and secret plans -- then sighed and resigned herself to reality. "So," she said. "What can you tell us about the situation in Hueco Mundo?"
Grimmjow looked her up and down, and sneered. "I've already been through that crap with all these others. Why're you asking me even more damn stupid questions?"
"You're here so that we can make you an offer," Ukitake cut in before Soi Fong could do more than sneer back. "We have no interest in deliberately invading Hueco Mundo in its normal state: the Hollows who live there are part of the natural cycle, and while we hope that some day they will be purified, as long as they don't prey on the living, we leave them be. Surely you must see that Aizen Sousuke has disrupted this status quo."
"Hnh." Grimmjow chewed that thought over. "So what're you saying? That if you can get rid of Aizen and we don't come pissing around with living souls, we got no quarrel?"
"Do you actually want a quarrel with us?" Ukitake leaned forward, voice hoarse but persuasive. "Fights are one thing. Outright war is something else. From what you've said, you had friends. Is the current situation really what they died for?"
"They died like they wanted to die," Grimmjow snarled, but it was more of a reflex than genuine fury. "They died fighting."
"We can give you that too," Soi Fong said, pitching her voice like a knife. "If that's what you want."
Grimmjow gave her a grudging nod. "So what do you want?" He turned back to the others in the room, glaring around like a bear baited by dogs. "All of you. What do you fucking want from me? Because this isn't what I want from you! You talk nice and you act nice, but I get more fucking honesty out of him," he pointed a finger at Madarame, "when he tells me to stop acting like a fucking idiot and knocks me down. What do I want? I want to be what I was or I want to go out fighting. That's what I want. Give me that and I'll cooperate. I'll do whatever you damn well want. Because without that I'm fucking nothing."
"I think that you underrate yourself," Ukitake said, and there was an odd gentleness to his voice.
"Think what you want," Grimmjow snarled.
Ukitake turned to Soi Fong. "Do you think that Urahara could return him to his previous state?"
"Urahara said that he'd have to examine the subject," Soi Fong said grudgingly. "He didn't say that it was impossible. But it might take time. And it'd be useful to have Inoue Orihime, so that he could look at what she did to him."
"The Inoue girl would be an asset in any case," Shiba Kuukaku put in. "I may have something to say about that later."
"So you can do something," Grimmjow said.
Ukitake coughed, triggering a tense surge of nervous glances from everyone in the room except Grimmjow, then said hoarsely, "Maybe. Possibly. Are you willing to help us, given that possibility?"
Grimmjow shrugged, and a weight seemed to lift from his shoulders. "I'll take that chance. Okay. You got a deal. What do you want from me? Me to go into Las Noches with your team to try to fuck Aizen's shit up where it'll hurt him the most?"
"Yes," Ukitake said. "But I need you to understand that you will be working with Ise-fukutaichou and Madarame here. They will be the ones calling the shots. And if you can't accept that, I suggest that you say so now."
Grimmjow chewed on his lower lip, then tossed his hair. "Well, fuck that. I'm not going to take orders from Madarame or Ise here. But you're not gonna give me what I want unless you get your people out of there and take Aizen down. So fair enough. I'll listen to them if they say be sneaky. But if we run into Aizen, all bets are off. Right?"
"Accepted," Ukitake said.
"Right," Madarame said. He offered Grimmjow his hand to shake. Grimmjow took it, and the two men tried to crush each others' fingers in a traditional manly way.
"I think this is where I make my suggestion," Shiba Kuukaku said. "It's about Inoue Orihime."
"The girl's abilities would be useful," Sasakibe said. "But the girl's not a trained fighter -- even if she did get some practice," he added, with an apologetic glance at Ukitake, "and I don't think it advisable to make her an essential part of any of our plans. We can't be sure of her mental state."
Grimmjow disengaged his hand from Madarame's, both of them trying to look as if they hadn't done their best to break the other's knuckles, and snorted. "The girl does what she's told these days. If you tell her to follow you, she'll do whatever you say."
Shiba Kuukaku nodded. "So ideally you want someone on the team who knows her. Knows her well enough to judge how stable she is, and if she's going to break down or if she can help you."
Ukitake nodded slowly. "A good thought. I don't want to send Sado, though. The boy's still recovering. I don't know how well anyone here knows her . . . Madarame? You were on that visit to the world of the living." And the only one of that group still alive and with us hung in the air.
Madarame shrugged, and shoved his hands into his sash. "I wasn't staying with her, didn't have much to do with her. I can make a guess, sure . . ."
"I can do better than that," Shiba Kuukaku said smugly. "I brought one of our trainees with us. He's Academy final-year level, but talented: I'd have been sending him to you in a few weeks anyhow. He's got the best reasons in the world to be able to judge the girl's sanity and get her to help us." She paused for emphasis. "He's her brother. Inoue Sora. Died a few years back, spent a while as a Hollow, got purified and sent on by Kurosaki himself."
Soi Fong suppressed her habitual flare of annoyance at anyone who knew something which Covert Operations should already have been aware of, and nodded. "It seems a good idea. But if he's just a trainee -- will he be able to handle that level of reiatsu and combat?"
"Hell no, he won't be able to handle Captain-level combat." Shiba Kuukaku shrugged. "I said he was talented, not that he was your level. But if that happens, then he can stay well back out of the fights. In any case, you're not sending him along to do fighting. You're sending him along to handle his sister. Maybe to save his sister. Right?"
"Another fucking waste of space," Grimmjow muttered.
Ukitake nodded crisply. "I'll see him together with the Hueco Mundo team after this meeting, but I favour this idea. Any dissenters?"
He glanced round the table. Everyone was nodding.
"Very good." He turned back to Grimmjow. "You've told us that you believe Aizen Sousuke is holding at least two Captain-level prisoners, but that nobody knows who they are or what their condition is."
Grimmjow shrugged. "Well, maybe some of the others know. I don't. They're in his private set of rooms, where he keeps his own lab and his own prison cells and all that shit. Even Kurotsuchi and Szayel don't get let in there. Sometimes one of their people who tried to get in gets held up as an example and taken to pieces real slow. There's some sort of guard in there as well, not just traps. He's got secretive, these last few months. I mean, he was bad enough before Kurosaki broke in and there was all the fighting, but since then he don't tell anyone nothing, if you know what I mean. Except maybe Ichimaru. And Ichimaru talks even less. He just smiles."
"Clearly a priority," Soi Fong said. She chose not to speculate on the identity of the prisoners. It wouldn't help. "Ise, can you deal with any lock or trap kidou?"
Ise frowned. "Soi Fong-taichou, I don't know. I'm good, but we all know that Aizen is very good. I can't be sure that I can open something he's locked. The best I may be able to to may be to make it look as if it was a Hollow or Arrancar trying to break in, since Grimmjow has confirmed that they sometimes make the attempt." She nodded politely to the ex-Arrancar. "That would at least confuse the issue, or make it look like a normal thing, rather than a shinigami effort."
"Right," Madarame said. "That might buy us some time. So our objectives are to get in there, make contact with Hisagi, assess the situation, maybe pick up Inoue Orihime, get into Aizen's private rooms and bring out any prisoners, and kill Aizen. Do I have that right?"
"Sounds good to me," Grimmjow said. "Let's do it."
Soi Fong had the very strong impression that Ukitake was struggling not to sigh. "Very well. Tomorrow the Hueco Mundo group moves to the world of the living, and Urahara prepares to open a Garganta for them into Hueco Mundo. By which point we need to have the bait set up for Ichimaru --"
Soi Fong raised her hand. "We need to have the bait moving today, Ukitake-taichou. Allow at least one day's delay for it to be reported to him. I suggest we select the battlefield at once."
"Agreed," Ukitake said. "Very well. At the close of this meeting, Shiba-dono and Madarame are to arrange the battlefield, and Madarame is to assign a group from his squad to guard her while she sets explosives. Kotetsu, you and Hinamori will prepare tactics and scout out the area and its approaches to Seireitai, consult with Madarame and Shiba-dono, and provide me with a strategy. Soi Fong-taichou, you and Sasakibe will consult on how to take back Seireitai, and you will also need to arrange the bait, and if you could manage it, I would like an estimate of Ichimaru's current resources in Seireitai. Ise, you and Grimmjow will assess Inoue Sora's abilities, and select a healer from the available shinigami, and discuss your operation: coordinate with Madarame when he gets back. Iba, I want everyone prepared for battle or evacuation." He rose to his feet, and everyone else stood as well. "My friends, whatever may come, I am proud to have served beside you. Let us go out and bring down ruin on those who have betrayed their honour and their friends."
There were nods around the table. Slightly embarrassed nods in a few cases, but nods nonetheless. Soi Fong caught Sasakibe's eyes and began to walk around the table towards him, already considering the best method of taking Ichimaru's picked men out of their positions. Madarame went to throw the doors open, taking a somewhat dramatic breath of fresh air.
Then he paused, looking at the shinigami from his squad who were guarding the doors. "Where's Rikichi?" he asked.
A muttered reply. Madarame's voice, louder, overlying it: "What do you mean, you don't know where he is?"
Silence spread through the room like a cold hand, cutting off words half-spoken, and the sky was abruptly that much darker.
---