What have you done to me!? [Hidane]

notes here.

@tagged

words: ####

Getting her hands on him, it seemed, would be fairly trivial. She sensed the incoming reiatsu. The world was strange... She seemed to sense in high definition compared to before. Despite the constant, uncontrollable leaking of her own reiatsu, she was somehow able to pinpoint him before he came into the room which before, would have been literally completely impossible. The person that opened the door, the source of the reiatsu, had black hair, that same face. The same guy she'd met at the café. The same guy who Blodeuwen had had to subdue when the Court Guard Squads were proven to be inept at their jobs. The same guy that was the reason for her hollowfication now. A bubbling, searing anger boiled up within Vanessa, and she felt the jubilation of Yousei as it sparked an angry rage. She leapt out of bed, and cast Hado 50. He was a threat strong enough that Blodeuwen had not been able to simply kill or apprehend him, though she had still had a Hole to deal with at the time. Nessa could take no chances. She flung the white orb of fire as hard as she could at the Visored, unconcerned with what he had in his hands, merely seeking to eliminate the threat as fast as she could.

"YOU!" She screamed as she threw it. "WHAT HAVE YOU DONE TO ME!?" she said, leaping forwards into the aftermath of her own flames, with the goal of launching a vicious spin kick straight at the visored's face, hatred burning in her eyes. She felt the ecstatic joy of Yousei within at the prospect of violence erupting once more.

heavy is the Hole in my heart

notes here.

@tagged

words: 418

All of a sudden, her fire spread out onto a shield of hollow reiatsu, and she just about stopped her own kick in time not to get caught on the flames that had attached to the shield. Nessa flared, apoplectic, at Hidane, hiding behind his shield, however he said something that cut through his rage. He didn't do anything? He described how he stopped her from completely wrecking the market. That did make sense somehow... She remembered shopping in the market, and nothing beyond that. She didn't respond as his barrier faded away and he drew up a chair. It made sense that if she became a hollow on the outside, someone would need to stop her. But something didn't make sense to Nessa.

"But wait, how on earth did I become a hollow?" she asked, uncertain. She listened to the rest of his explanation. Yes, that was right! They had met at the Café. Indeed, Nessa had almost forgotten about that. In fact the past couple of months seemed hazy. She had completely forgotten the spiritual world. She assumed that had just been a property of whatever magic that Blodeuwen had worked upon her. He recalled her question. She let out a single short sigh of laughter. What was she indeed? It was a good question. Vanessa sat back down on the bed, rubbing her temple.

"Do you know about... The Holer Crisis?" she asked, her voice ragged and weary. "No, it doesn't matter. The fact of the case remains that I was infected by a hollow who had originally been a member of the Kido Corps. I killed her, but it was too late. I crawled my way back to the Seireitei where the Soshi of the Kido Corps, Blodeuwen Hirashi, who I'm sure you know," she said, a touch of spite in her voice, "sealed me into a gigai, locking away both my Inner Hollow, and my shinigami powers. It apparently made me forget I ever was a shinigami. The question remains, why did that seal break? And how? I don't imagine it was a problem with the seal itself." she shuddered. The Grand Kido Chief was the title given to the shinigami with the strongest Kido in all soul society. It would take nothing short of a miracle to break a seal of that calibre set by Blodeuwen. Vanessa was under no impression that she or her inner hollow could have done that.

heavy is the Hole in my heart

notes here.

@tagged

words: 555

There was no reason Hidane ought to have known about the holes. She wondered if Blodeuwen and the others had ever managed to fix that. If not then they were probably in danger, even then. She cast her mind back to Aoi and Shiori... What had happened to those two? Aoi had stayed outside to fight him. To kill that blonde-haired arrancar. Aoi was strong sure but not that strong. It was likely that the kid had been killed. Yet another sacrificed upon the altar of the Soshi's crusades. And Shiori too. Nessa's old squadmate, from even before the Kido Corps. She realized that she had probably turned over a new leaf when she realized that she felt guilty for how much of a bitch she'd been to Shiori. God knows she didn't deserve it. If Vanessa had been hollowfied, and Kila and Aoi had been killed, there was no way in God's name Shiori had made it out of there alive.

Either way, she raised an eyebrow as Hidane said he hoped to apologize. Yeah right, as if that would ever happen. The guy had literally turned himself into a monster. Nessa was only there at that moment because she wanted answers, and she supposed that she was a bit of a monster too. But Blodeuwen was not the type to let that type of thing slide. And it'd be much harder to convince her than Vanessa that it wasn't him that ended her halcyon little life as a human. She repressed a sneer at herself. Was that really what she would revert to without her powers? Pathetic.

Hidane on the other hand seemed to have recalled what happened. He described a small shinigami an Nessa couldn't hold back a loud "FUCK!" as she recalled exactly what it had been. Moeru. The Soshi's nephew. He was allowed to run rampant due to nepotism and nobility alone, almost certainly. That little shit had thought it was a good idea to kick her out of her gigai. She recalled him smiling as he watched her hollowfy. What a fucking psycho.

"If I ever get my hands on that little shit I'm going to fucking wring his neck until he's three shades of blue and then crucify him on sogyoku hill." she said with vicious rancour, a vein popping out in her temple. She wasn't kidding either. If Vanessa saw Moeru at any point in the near future, she was going to kill him. He was the one that had done this to her, and he would suffer the consequences. She balled her gauntletted fists in anguish. She thought of Yeong... Of Kyuri... Of Alex. Oh Alex. A single tear rolled down the right side of her face. How could she be showing such weakness!? At a time like this?

Disgusting. She heard the voice of Yousei. Whatever. Fuck her, anyway.

"To answer your question... I... I'm a human. I'm a human with a life and a future, trapped in this eternal hell which is called: Visored." She said ominously. She looked at him, her usually piercing alabaster eyes dull and blank.

"What happens now Hidane? What steps do I need to take?" She asked, angrily wiping her tear away with a gauntlet.

heavy is the Hole in my heart

notes here.

@tagged

words: 470

Of course a person like Hidane, a person who had seemingly given so much of himself to the darkness within would say it wasn't so bad. Though she appreciated that he did not try and tell her she could not be human. The pain of that revelation was too fresh, too sore. Like an open wound, it festered and burned, and each second was a fresh wave of hell. She had lost two lives, the life of a shinigami, and the life of a human. She had lost friends twice. Lost... Lost love twice. It seemed that no matter how hard Nessa tried, everything was stripped away from her. First she had lost her dream of becoming a member of the stealth force. Then she had been banned from taking the representative position within the second division. Then she had become infected, and had to leave her life, her world and everything she knew behind. And when finally she had found some peace, had become a better person, found her gentleness...

Your gentleness? Get a grip. You have power now, stop your whinging. The voice of Yousei told her in her mind. She nearly growled. She wanted to rip out her sword's spirit. No. She wanted to rip out that monster that dwelled within it. Instead she listened to Hidane blithely, gormlessly eating the food he had prepared. The flavour brought her back to the moment as he spoke, and she focused on him with her remaining eye.

"I heard nothing about Captain Hirako, Captain Muguruma, or Captain Otoribashi." she spoke about them still in the stiff formal tone. Vanessa's allegiance still lay firmly with the shinigami and with soul society. "Hidane, my Zanpakuto spirit... Yousei... It's taken my Zanpakuto spirit." she said, her eyes haunted. "I thought... I thought I would do anything for power. I thought no barrier would stand between myself and greater strength, but to live out the rest of my life with a monster breathing down the back of my neck. Is that really a life at all?" she sighed, finishing her food. Her black mood worsened. She sank deeper into a kind of bleak depression. She rubbed her ruined left eyesocket.

"Thank you for breakfast." she said, uncharacteristically demurely. "I don't... I don't think I'll stay. I think I'll go. But... Is it going to take over again? I guess I probably have a- a mask now right? If I wear it I'll still be me, won't I?" she asked, looking down sadly. She put the plate down. Vanessa had no posessions, her gigai had been destroyed when she exited it. Only the clothes on her back, and her zanpakuto. She got to her feet, her face hard-set and determined.

heavy is the Hole in my heart

notes here.

@tagged

words: 644

She nodded in response to his first question. Little did either of them know, that things worked a little differently for Nessa than they did for Hidane. Hidane's hollow spirit had taken over his zanpakuto spirit. He was... Some kind of abomination, not really a shinigami any more, but not a fully fledged hollow either. He called his "fused-spirit" by the name of his inner hollow. Nessa, on the other hand... Well, her hollow had simply made her already difficult zanpakuto spirit into a bitch. That was because of the somewhat unique way Nessa had defeated her inner hollow. It had illuminated something to her; holes in her own abilities. Stripped of its ability to perform kido, her inner hollow had been helpless as she had literally ripped its body apart, turning it to dust and destroying it with the fearsome power of her Demon Arts. It had fused with her zanpakuto as it had literally no other way to survive.

She listened to his story with a mixture of fascination and disgust. As much as it told her about Hidane, it told her even more about herself. No matter power hungry she thought she was, or had been at least, Hidane had been even more so. While he seemed to repent now, she got the distinct feeling that the guy wouldn't change much, even given the opportunity. She tried to imagine how desperate for strength she would have to be to take that road willingly. No wonder he'd spent twenty years as a fucking alcoholic. She visibly recoiled at the sight of his black, hollow skin.

She wasn't sure if he was trying to reassure himself or her when he told her that he was the same guy. What you did, and what you saw... It always changed you. This was no exception. But maybe that was his answer to her question, albeit in a kind of roundabout way. One thing she felt confident in was that she would be fine to use her powers, as now... She knew she would never be tempted by the fate that Hidane chose for himself. She had mixed feelings right now. This guy... He truly was an abhorrent creature. But he still had reason, and he appeared to use it to do good things. Was that enough to make him a good person? She knew that no matter what happened in the future, he would never, ever be accepted back in soul society.

But would she? That was the question. She followed him out into the warehouse, and began to walk down the stairs, towards the exit. The only other Visored she felt she could talk to, Hachigen Ushoda, wasn't around. He ran off to go and retrieve something, and she waited patiently. He returned, and presumably tossed the thing at her instead of venturing back into that other room. Ahh yes. An eyepatch. She put it on. She examined her reflection in the sheen of her glove. It'd definitely do for now. Maybe a change of colour or something later.

"Thanks... Hidane. I'm going to go. I... I think first I need to do some soul searching. I'm determined to show the Court Guard Squads and their blasted government that this isn't my fault. I don't think you're a monster, Hidane. But I vow here and now to never stray down the path you're at the end of. That's not the road for me, the path you have taken is a monstrous one. Having said that, I'll pray to whatever damn god Blodeuwen believes in that we never find ourselves at the end of each others' sword." she said, and that was a promise.

With scarce another word, she stepped cautiously out of the warehouse, and into a brave new world.

heavy is the Hole in my heart