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Comatose	By : ShadowedEcho Category: Bleach > Yaoi - Male/Male Views: 2442 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 1
Disclaimer: I do not own Bleach, no money is being made by me, this was written purely for entertainment purposes

Chapter List
- 4
- 5
- 6
Chapter Four
Falling Inside the Black
Ichigo was glad he was allowed to keep Zangetsu, though the sharp jab Grimmjow made as he informed him just made his blood boil, "It's not like you could hurt us with that butter knife anyway."
He had stripped down to his hakama, knowing he would be fighting hard and he didn't want his movements hampered by too much fabric. He stood tensely as the four Arrancar sized him up, taking in his uncovered muscles and his instinctive fighting stance. "You're off balance, put your weight a little more towards the balls of your feet, your strikes will be harder." Tia commented as she took everything in. "The way you are standing now is more for blocking, when you fight us you better fight to kill." She finished explaining.
Ichigo shifted his stance according to what she said, and despite how green he was he could feel the difference, even his grip on Zangetsu adjusted a bit. She nodded in approval, and when no further comments came, Grimmjow took the lead once more.
"Here is what will happen. We are all going to come at you, and back you into a corner, we will not be holding back. We will release our swords in our number order, starting with me, and ending with Starrk if you survive that long. Your Hollow will respond to your vulnerability and rise, once you feel him come to the surface fight to stop him. We will be watching for the moment he starts fighting you, but we will have to wing it from there, every Visored has been different." He ordered, crouching down into his own stance, drawing Pantera as he spoke.
Grimmjow was already springing towards Ichigo before the other three had readied themselves for the fight, "Grind Pantera!" He called, clawing his hand down the blade.
A heartbeat later and all four Arrancar were descending on him, a white armor encased Grimmjow in the lead. Prepared for this attack unlike Grimmjow's sucker punch the day before, Ichigo was able to defend himself against the first wave, leaping nimbly over the sand avoiding the blades and fists coming at him. A predatory grin spread across Grimmjow's face, "Maybe this will be fun after all!" He called, pouncing again, not caring he had just smacked into Ulquiorra.
Ichigo held up under the onslaught until he heard the next release, "Enclose Murcielago," and the explosion of Ulquiorra's spirit pressure was enough to throw him off balance. If he had any doubts who was the stronger Grimmjow or Ulquiorra they were gone now, that had been enough to knock the wind out of him.
Harribel took advantage of his momentary distraction and sent a wave of sharpened water at him that he barely managed to dodge, but the move unknowingly sent him into the claws of Grimmjow. He stumbled away from the attack bleeding onto the sand as Starrk came up behind him and smashed his fist into the side of his jaw, making him see stars and spit blood from his bitten tongue. He got a moment of relief when the three backed away, but was quickly reminded of the battle when a bolt of what looked like lightening shot at him, sent his way from Ulquiorra's black winged form.
Ichigo was now completely on the defensive, he could do nothing but react and block, attacking was out of the question. He was bleeding from wounds and burned from ceros. He wouldn't fall though, wouldn't give in, they expected him to fail, he wouldn't give them the satisfaction of being right.
Another clawed punch followed by a swift kick from Grimmjow sent Ichigo flying right into a bolt of energy from Ulquiorra. Ichigo landed heavily in the sand, he was half way back on his feet when a wave of spirit pressure assaulted him, slamming him back onto the gritty ground, Harribel had released her form. Rising against the pressure, his own red tinged black aura started to seep out of him, countering the pressure from the three released Arrancar.
The whites of his eyes began to bleed back, and all Ichigo could hear was echoing laughter, with a red haze clouding his vision as his vicious alter ego pushed against the binding Ichigo had around him.
"Now we are getting somewhere," Grimmjow smirked as he saw the change in the Visored. "Look at his eyes."
"Be ready for anything, we don't know how he is going to react." Harribel warned, before they attacked again. Combining their fighting styles so no matter how well Ichigo twisted and dodged, and he was honestly doing better than they had been anticipating, he would be jumping into one attack to avoid the other. With this tactic they had expected Ichigo to confront his Hollow soon after Ulquiorra joined the fight, but now Harribel was there, and Starrk would follow soon after.
Ichigo was fighting a battle that didn't have anything to do with his Hollow, well not directly anyway. He didn't know whether he should call his Bankai or not, it would help him in the moment, but would it just make it easier for his Hollow to take over, after all it was during the fight with Byakuya when he was in full Bankai that the beast had made his first outward appearance.
With the way the four Arrancar were coming after him, he didn't have a choice, concentrating his power he called out, "Bankai, Tensa Zangetsu!" The blade in his hand changed from the giant cleaver into a thin dark sword, while he was clothed in a version of Zangetsu's tattered coat. He could feel his power rising and his speed increasing, at the same time as his Hollow started pushing harder against the chains holding him, snarls escaping the albino monster.
The Espada were duly impressed with the increase in power. Kisuke had warned them he would be worth training, and this proved it. The fact he had lasted so long with only Shikai was impressive as well. Now it was a waiting game to see how long he could sustain the higher release before the parasite in his soul attempted to overtake him again.
He landed heavily on the sand as a bolt of energy from Ulquiorra raced towards him at the same time as a wave from Harribel, Grimmjow standing out of the way of the powerful attacks but ready to pounce on him as he hit the ground. It was the feline Arrancar that saw the black fully bleed into Ichigo's eyes, and the irises burned amber against the dark background.
"Back off now!" Grimmjow called, leaping nimbly away from the struggling Visored on the ground, "The fight's starting."
Ichigo no longer saw the four Espada now circling him as they carefully watched over the process. Instead he was in a sideways world of blue, white, and gleaming steel. He held himself carefully, the way Harribel had corrected him in standing. He didn't have long to wait.
The demon wore his face, the exact same face that stared at him in the mirror day after day. They were the same height, and the same build. They would be perfect twins were it not for a few small changes. His parasitic twin was snow white, the only drop of color on him were his burning amber eyes set into a sea of black. The clothes on the copy's back were like a photo negative of his own, white where his were black. Hollow hands gripped onto the hilt of a similarly color reversed Zangetsu, the treasured sward hanging nonchalantly at the imposter's side, as if the monster cared little more for the blade than if it were a pairing knife.
A slow grin spread across his albino double's face, and an odd echoing voice taunted him, "I've been waiting for you King. You took too damn long."
"Well, what are you waiting for?" Ichigo called over to him, firming his grip on Zangetsu he was so tired of taunts and teases, he just wanted the ordeal over with.
The Hollow's smile turned deadly, "I was waiting for you to wake up. A victory without a battle is hardly worth celebrating. I have heard every word, seen every event, since I became a part of you. You were not worth the effort of fighting until now. No weeping heart, no hero complex, just you, me, and cold steel. Are you ready King to find out who is the ruler and who is the commoner?"
Ichigo raised Zangetsu and pointed it at the Hollow, "I'm sick of lectures, let's finish this."
The Hollow raised his own blade to match Ichigo's stance, the smirk on his face the only difference, "It will never be the end."
They stood tense and ready, only the rising and falling of their chests betrayed their continued life and not a transformation into statuary. A heartbeat later the twin swords clashed, a feral grin on one face, a determined scowl on the other.
Outside the Espada were ready when Ichigo's body started fighting again, with no control or restraint, just pure animalistic rage. Wherever a blow broke the skin, pure white material sprayed from the wound in place of blood hardening quickly into Hollow like armor. A regenerator. Things just got interesting.
Inside the Hollow was fighting his King, pushing Ichigo against buildings and blasting him through glass and concrete. Ichigo managing to block and keep himself alive, but hadn't been on the offensive since the first clash of blades. The monster side of his soul was winning, pushing his conscience further and further out of his reach.
"Quit running King, stand and fight, if you are going ta die anyway do it with some pride," The taunts crossing to Ichigo's battered form didn't cause much of a stir, but the accompanying kick to his stomach had the air rushing out of his lungs, his landing causing a good size crater to form in his internal world.
Picking himself out of the hollowed out spot in the sidewalk, he called out, "BANKAI, Tensa Zangetsu!" The large cleaver formed smoothly into the thin black Daito blade. Ichigo not having time to ponder the oddity of his reverting back into Shikai mode when he was pulled into the fight with the Hollow in the first place, he had been in Bankai fighting the Espada before hand.
The Hollow copied Ichigo, letting his own dark spirit pressure flare changing his blade to match Ichigo's once more, the fight intensifying once both were in Bankai. "You're pathetic King, how do you expect to protect anyone if ya can't even defeat little ol' me?"
That line hit a soft spot, and Ichigo growled at the Hollow before attacking him full out, the Hollow dancing away from blow after blow with that annoying grin on his face. Ichigo sent a Getsuga Tensho at the annoying being, it having little more impact than his previous tries at defeating him.
"Please King, I showed you that move, haven't you done any learnin on your own?" He mocked, before sending his own energy blast at Ichigo.
Ichigo ducked under the blast, speeding towards his Hollow rage coloring his every move. The earlier comment on his inability to protect anyone was still boiling the blood in his veins. He wanted to destroy the menace that brought his shadowy doubts into clear focus.
"That's it King, you can't only defend you have to attack. If you want to win, you must fight to kill." The Hollow informed as he narrowly dodged Ichigo's dive towards him.
He rushed at his orange-haired landlord, grinning once again as Ichigo's blade landed a blow on his cheek, the blood pouring down his paler than milk skin not fazing the Hollow.
"I will not lose!" Ichigo followed the landed blow with words far more powerful than he felt. He remembered Lesson One.
Assume everyone was stronger. The important part was that you could beat a stronger opponent, as long as you don't panic and do something stupid.
This wasn't his first fight. He had fought many a gang member as a human, and his recent journey into the spirit realm had pitched him against some of the best fighters Seireitei had to offer. He could win, but his Hollow was right, he would never win if he only defended.
He needed to attack.
Gathering up all his courage and determination, he stopped cold in his tracks, stood upright not caring about his scratched, bruised, and ripped appearance. He looked his Hollow dead in the eyes, and charged. The mocking smirk changing into a sadistic grin as their swords clashed, and for the first time Ichigo was the one forcing the Hollow to defend.
All the anger, all the desperation, and all the frustration that had been building up inside him exploded all at once. He ripped and tore into the Hollow, who wasn't just standing there taking it, blood was running down both their bodies now with their clothing in tatters. A dark shadow crossed Ichigo's deep brown eyes and the gentleness and compassion usually there vanished. He surrendered to the instinct inside of him, telling him to fight, telling him to win.
Lesson Two, there is power in submission, even if it is to your own desires.
"He finally understands," The Hollow mumbled to himself, pleased with the outcome. He followed up his words with another strike, toying with his King, enticing the bloodlust inside the teen to come out and play. Throwing one last taunt, he knew the time had come to end this, "You will never beat me Ichigo, I am the part of you meant to destroy, you will never get rid of me!" He left a small opening, nothing so big as to let Ichigo know it was done on purpose.
Ichigo fell for it, taking the bait and ending up with his blade resting smoothly at the monster's throat, but the Hollow's words brought him up short a few millimeters away from cutting into the smooth expanse of skin. "You and Zangetsu are my power right?" He demanded, digging the blade in a bit for good measure.
A mocking grin, "We are."
Ichigo's ever present scowl deepened, "If you are a part of my power, I shouldn't kill you."
A dangerous gleam came into amber on black eyes, "You should kill me, an enemy has no business being left alive."
The blade dug in no further, something not adding up in Ichigo's mind, "You are me, not the enemy. If I die so do you, if I fail so do you, but if I win that is also your victory. You gave me the strength to defeat Byakuya and save Rukia, at the cost of a good portion of my sanity. You are the reason I am still alive. You saved my life, so now I am saving yours." He let go of the Hollow, pulling his blade away from the sensitive neck, a thin trickle of blood dripping from where Zangetsu had been pressing into the pale column.
Only to be grabbed around the waist and pulled back against the Hollow's rock hard body, a blade pressed against his own throat. "It is a foolish King that lets an opponent go free."
"You are not free," Ichigo defended his actions, "You are still inside me, still under my control. You could kill me right now, I have no doubt you could, but you won't." His stomach clenched as he felt warm liquid flow from the deepening wound on his neck, he hadn't pressed that hard when he had the Hollow pinned like this, had he read him wrong?
"Oh, why wouldn't I?" The hollow practically hissed, more like a reptile than a cat, at his King's words.
"You would have done it already," Ichigo replied as calmly as he could with several feet of cold metal pressed against his neck.
"I should kill you, you know that, for letting me go. You made a break through, but ruined it by getting too damn mushy. "He complained, "For a moment you felt it, to have nothing but instinct, blacking out everything but you, me, and our swords. Why couldn't you kill me?"
"To kill you would be killing part of me. As dangerous and violent as you are, I need you. I need that side of me if I want to protect what's important." Ichigo was surprised, relieved, but surprised when the blade didn't sink deeper but instead pulled away.
He turned to look at his Hollow and was surprised to see the mocking grin had turned into a smirk, but not the one earlier, if Ichigo didn't know better that was pride on the albino's face, the words that followed only making Ichigo think he had fallen into insanity and this was all some kind of joke, "Finally you admit it."
"Huh?" Ichigo wasn't in the mood for a more eloquent response.
The odd look was replaced by the more familiar grin, the once creepy expression now calming Ichigo with its normalcy, "You admit that as much as you want me to be separate, we aren't. You just admitted I was a side of yourself, to the point of saying you needed it. What do you think all of us had been waiting for?"
"They wanted me to defeat you," Ichigo was caught off guard by his mirror's snort of laughter.
The Hollow wiped a few tears of mirth from his eyes, "Why would some of the most violent people I have ever come across want you to defeat the part of you that makes you more like them?"
"So this wasn't about me defeating you?" Ichigo hated feeling this confused.
The Hollow shook his head, "No, not defeat, understand. If you hadn't started to understand, to finally let go and let the feral side come out, I would have killed you, I will not serve a weak King. Violence is a part of you, has always been, and will always be. If you are constantly trying to suppress me, and keep me chained away, you will lose your fights."
"Why am I King?" Ichigo hadn't missed the Hollow's favorite form of address.
"You aren't yet, but you will be," The Hollow answered, "You are only on lesson two, there are many more to come."
"Why are you doing this?" Ichigo forced himself to ask, not expecting an answer.
The Hollow seemed to huff a bit with the question, "I'm not sure I should answer ya, if you can't figure it out why should I tell you?"
"If I understand deeper, I can give you more of what you want." Ichigo shrugged a bit at this, not missing the slightly stunned look on his Hollow's face.
"I want to be strong." The Hollow answered, "We are both strong alone, but together we are more than they know."
"I want to fight with you, not against you, can we do that?" Ichigo wasn't so sure about that.
"We have to," The Hollow answered, "If you don't want to die by the hands of the Soul Reapers they must believe you have conquered me and have me under control. They want you to dominate our soul, when in truth we are equals."
"We had better get some practice or they will see right through us." Ichigo ran his hand through his hair in agitation at the thought of getting caught and executed over this.
The mocking grin was back, "Why do you think we are in Heuco Mundo?"
"How in the Hell did they plan all this out, when I could have sworn they all hated the thought of you?" Ichigo grumbled, feeling like he was lied to again.
"Shinigami know little about those with Hollows inside. We are the first crossbreed to start out as a Shinigami and retain our sanity. They have no way of knowing what was going to happen. They brought you here in case I was a threat as much as if I wasn't, we could do far less damage to the realms here if we failed to come to an agreement."
Ichigo had to interrupt him there, "What do you mean damage?"
"While we fight in here, our body fights out there. Those four have been keeping us from rampaging all over the desert, but you are fully Hollowfied at the moment. That form will not break until you release it. Our mask has a time limit because of the huge amounts of Spirit Pressure it controls in such a small form, but our full form doesn't have the constraint of size."
"Our mask?"
"Yes now that you have acknowledged me, the same as you had to do with Zangetsu by learning his name, you can call on my power and pull up our Mask, it will double the power of our Bankai at least."
Ichigo's scowl softened at the thought, "We are that powerful?"
"Yes," The Hollow's grin never waivered as Ichigo came to his newest revelation.
"Are the other Visored's just as strong?" He asked quietly.
The Hollow shrugged, "I have no way of knowing that, Urahara had to help me understand as much as I do as it is."
"What do you mean?"
"I haven't been around forever, my knowledge was a gift from my creator, otherwise I would only know what I was around for since you climbed out of that pit." The albino admitted.
"Did he give you a name? I had to learn Zangetsu's in order to partner with him in battle, is it the same for you?"
The Hollow seemed to shudder, "Oh he gave me a name alright, I originally had no name, but he thought it would be amusing to stick me with something he knew I would want to kill him for."
"What is it?" The teenaged Visored asked curiously.
His grumbled reply was barely audible, but it had Ichigo wanting to laugh outright, "Junichi."
"Obedient one?" No wonder you want to kill him. Other than the meaning it is a nice name, and my name has Ichi in it too, and you are a part of me. He managed to find a name that both fits and insults you at the same time. Sounds like Urahara to me." Ichigo spoke to keep himself from laughing too hard, it really wasn't a bad name, but to give the head strong Hollow a name that meant obedient was only something Urahara could pull off while managing not to get killed in the process.
"Shut it Strawberry," Junichi griped.
"Hey I was trying to be sympathetic!" Ichigo protested.
"Well it didn't work!" Junichi grumbled some more, "I think maybe you should go back to the outside world and give the Espada a break. They could fight us all day, but they probably think I killed you by now or something."
Ichigo took offense to that, "Thanks for the vote of confidence, did anyone think I could win against you?"
"Starrk did," Junichi teased.
"And you could tell that how?" Ichigo demanded, working on controlling his blush.
A sly smirk scarily reminiscent of Grimmjow crossed Junichi's face, "You really think he would bother with such a personal 'lesson' if he thought you wouldn't make it through today?"
Ichigo saved himself the trouble of responding by abruptly pulling himself out of his mind and back to the outside world.
It was an odd feeling the shell of his Hollow form peeling slowly away, leaving him with the mask as the last piece. As everything hit him at once, he collapsed forwards in the sand, the new white accessory slipping off and falling to the ground.
"Well is that you Whelp or the Hollow?" Grimmjow was the first to speak after his mask fell.
"It's Ichigo," He replied numbly, fatigue washing over him.
"So you won did you?" Grimmjow pressed.
A slow smile crossed Ichigo's face, not a grin, just a slight upturn of his lips, "No, but I wasn't supposed to. He is my equal." With that Ichigo stopped fighting the blackness and let himself fall. Nothing sounded better right then as hour upon hours of sleep.
"Well Starrk, looks like a single kiss was all it took for your laziness to infect him," It was at that moment that Grimmjow realized he had just insulted the fully awake Primera Espada.
Glowing blue wolves chased the feline Arrancar over the sand dunes, all the while Starrk stared down at the sleeping Visored, glad that he had been right about the boy.
Ulquiorra and Harribel dropped into the sand, slipping out of their released forms, but the two stoic ones did not speak. They respected the privacy of their eldest associate, Starrk had claimed the boy, it would be interesting to see what came of it, but no one was suicidal enough to interfere.
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