LONTANO DA CASA 1 [i]

Almost as quickly as it had begun, the silence and peace of mind that Cybele had finally achieved after a rather busy and stressful week had been shattered like glass. As two small Reiatsu sources appeared overhead, she closed her eyes and took a deep breath. Just two Hollows returning from a trip to the world of the living, most likely. How long had it been since she’d gone there herself? Decades? Centuries? That place was of no concern to her, when there was still so much work to be done here. It wasn’t until the two figures, that seemed to be falling uncontrollably, had nearly closed the distance to the sands near her that she began to pick up their scents… and one of them made her instantaneously seethe with anger. They landed, hard, stirring up a large cloud of sand. She felt one Reiatsu, the one whose scent was enough to make her want to flatten the area with her Reiatsu at once, stopped at the top layer of sand; the other, a larger Hollow, fell right through into the Menos Forest, the sands instantaneously sinking inward to close the gap as the cloud of sand cleared.

When it cleared, she saw the legs of the young man sticking out of the sand in what centuries earlier she might’ve found a hilarious predicament, as the sands threatened to pull him into the Menos Forest after his pursuer. Perhaps, in only a few moments, he might come to wish that that was what had happened, as suddenly the Arrancar Queen’s Reiatsu rolled out over the area, a suffocating, thick aura that would completely still any movement he might attempt to make; it was purely out of self-control that she did not make it enough to crush the life out of his frail body immediately. She approached the exposed legs in long, quick strides, reaching out and grabbing one with firm hands, tightly. She wondered if it was tight enough to pain him; she hoped it was. Pulling, she easily drew him from the sands, high enough that his head would clear, and held him for a moment so that he could take it to witness the eyes of the one that would kill him.

After only a moment, she tossed him, hard. Though the sands Hueco Mundo acted as a cushion of sorts, the force of the throw would still make it a harsh landing. Almost as soon as he would come to strike the sands and stop moving, her Sonido would bring her closer to him once more.

“After all this time, one of your kind dares enter these lands?” Cybele spoke in an arrogant tone, her posture pure nobility and authority. “You appear before Cybele Prisca, rightful Queen of all of Hueco Mundo. Tell me what your intentions are here, Quincy, and why I should not kill you this very moment?”

Cybele listened, though reluctantly, as the Quincy attempted to explain himself. Though he seemed to show some level of civility and respect for her that she would not have expected for her kind from a Quincy of all things, she was wary of him, and his story made no sense to her. Fulfilling his end of a bargain? Escorting a Hollow to Hueco Mundo? What sort of Hollow needed an escort to return to its own homeland, let alone from their natural enemy? She doubted his story very much, and wondered if he had made it up as a means of avoiding her ire. It seemed awfully convenient now that the larger Hollow had fallen into the depths of the Forest of the Menos; hopefully it had not recovered its senses too quickly and moved on.

“You say you escorted this Hollow that fell here with you from the world of the living,” she attempted to speak calmly, though the irritation was obvious in her tone, “though I find that unlikely. A Hollow requiring the aid of a Quincy to return here is ridiculous, though I will give your claim a chance to be proven. Come.” Without waiting for a response, for him to agree or not to follow, her Reiatsu enveloped the area once more, pushing the sand out below them in a wide circle, grasping the Quincy tight, though not enough to particularly harm him. She would have plenty of time for torture and a slow, pleasingly painful death later. Instead, her Reiatsu opened a hole clear through the sand into the cavernous drop into the Forest of Menos below. She let the Quincy drop, her Reiatsu only slowing his fall enough that it wouldn’t kill him or injure him too seriously, as she gently glided down the forest floor below.

Luckily, the Reiatsu of the Hollow that had fallen with the Quincy had not even moved at all. It seemed to be slightly injured from the fall, but nothing grave. Cybele approached the Hollow, the thickness of her Reiatsu stilling the air and threatening to snuff both the Quincy and the seemingly traitorous Hollow’s lives out at the mere whim of the Queen, should she be displeased by the outcome of the situation.

"This Quincy claims that he has come to this world, the home world of our kind, escorting you to return you to your pack.” She held Sporos nonchalantly to her side, her hand gripping the Zanpakuto tightly. “Does he speak the truth?”

It seemed the Hollow in question was struggling greatly against her Reiatsu. A Menos, then, not even evolved to the point of hoping for enlightenment. It was by pure luck that it was even surviving the onslaught of her Reiatsu. However, she had a soft spot for the weak of her kind, and entirely let her Reiatsu fade around herself and the Hollow. She kept the Quincy hard-pressed yet, however, under a focused field of it. The Quincy would not be free to leave, or move as he pleased, unless it pleased her, and it did not please her, and it likely wouldn’t any time in the near future. She stepped calmly towards the injured Hollow, her Zanpakuto contorting in on itself and seeming the crawl into her skin and up her arm, leaving the palm through which it burrowed without even the tiniest mark. She sat on her knees in front of the Hollow, soft silver hands reaching out and caressing its cheek. She felt the life slowly ebbing away from it; perhaps she should not have approached with such hostility, having sensed earlier that it had been rather weak.

But, there was still the matter at hand. The Hollow nodded that the Quincy’s story was true, which disturbed her.

“So, you were in the world of the living, and encounter a Quincy of all things, and you do nothing to try to kill him? To avenge your fallen kin of the past ages? Instead, you seem to have befriended this vile murderer, and gained his assistance in returning you to our home, with a QUINCY in the lead?” As she spoke, her voice began calmly, but slowly rose in the level of irritation becoming evident. “In what way do you perhaps believe this makes you anything other than a traitor to this realm, MY realm, then?” She lifted the Hollow’s head to face her, rather abruptly. “For what reason shouldn’t I end your life right here and now, as well as this filth you’ve carelessly opened the door to our home for? Did you even consider the tragedy that could come of this!?”

She stood again, stepping back, lifting her right hand, palm facing towards the Hollow, as she lifted her Reiatsu slightly on the Quincy to focus on the execution at hand. A black orb slowly grew in front of her hand, a Cero waiting to happen, though she forced herself to be patient enough to hear out the Hollow’s response before deciding whether the Cero would be the Hollow’s death or merely a display of power to put the fear of death in the Quincy. “Speak, now, should you have words to say.”

As the Hollow appeared to resign to its fate, speechless, Cybele couldn’t help but feel disappointment. The coward could not even admit to its crimes. She was about ready to fire her Cero, to end the traitor’s life, when she felt the Quincy move. She averted her eyes to look at him, though found that her Reiatsu had still been too much, and that he’d managed little more than to crawl forward onto his knees. She begged him to be spared, claim he’d tried to kill the Quincy and failed. Which, given the Hollow’s low power and condition, was… plausible, she hated to admit. She clicked her tongue, a sharp “tch” noise, and looked back at the Hollow, shrinking against the ground in fear. She moved her hand to the side, away from the Hollow and Quincy; the energy had already been built up, so she chose a relatively safe direction where she didn’t feel anything more than a few of the Lost wandering the forest, and released the energy. Black Reiryoku lined with red sung out, obliterating trees almost as far as the eye could see, as the tops of the trees crumbled and fell down with the fresh lack of support; behind them, columns of sand poured downward, creating a large gash in the desert above that would likely take centuries to heal.

She sighed, kneeling in front of the injured Hollow again. She withdrew her Zanpakuto from within her body once more, gently holding it across her lap as she stared at the Hollow, without speaking. She renewed the strength of her Reiatsu on the Quincy, making it so he would find it difficult to even exert the effort to speak, let alone move. She wished for silence right now.

“Anatrefo, Sporos.”

Her Zanpakuto contorted, the grip growing shorter and the blade longer, as a thick black tail slowly emerged from under the back of her dress, splitting off into ten or more small Hollow-like heads that each went their own way, attempting to nip at the Hollow and Quincy before she reined them back. She held up her Zanpakuto, caressing the Hollow’s neck once more, looking over its body as it failed to regenerate itself.

“Easy, my child,” she spoke softly as the Hollow squirmed, expecting death. She lowered the blade of her Zanpakuto, tip-first, poking the Hollow’s injured leg and letting the blade sink in, deep. The Hollow howled with pain, but then there was a sickening snap that came from the leg, and she withdrew the blade. The wound closed almost as if the blade had never pierced it in the first place. The Hollow stood as if it hadn’t been injured in the first place, and backed away slowly. “That should last long enough for you to find your kin. Go now.” The Hollow left quickly, moving to a nearby tree that was still intact and beginning to climb its way back to the sands above.

“And as for you,” Cybele said, turning her cold gaze back to the Quincy, “as it seems you have shown mercy to my kind, I have spared him as you have.” She stood, and stepped closer to the Quincy, almost completely closing the distance between them. “But I have no care for your silvered words, nor do I believe them in full. You will live, for now. You will return with me to my castle, and answer for the crimes of your ancestors and your people, and then you will die.” The tail heads leaped forward, nipping at the air in front of him as if they could taste him already, but Cybele held them back. There would be plenty of time for him to suffer later.