Bleach: End of an Era ((Open 9/28/12))

[Ty Gwynnia]

((I guess for the sake of the people in that other realm that time passes differently or something, for now.))

Kousuke didn't reply to Daisuke, instead he yawned and rubbed at a dark-circled eye. He'd finally caught up on every bit of paperwork that littered his office, much to his lieutenant's utter surprise. Work was what he'd focused on since the encounter with Diego. Now he just wanted to nap. " 'Sides the usual "Let's go after Seireitei" vibe going on, I'd like to know that as well." He mumbled and ate a candy he carried around.

Takeshi watched as all three of the visitors left just as suddenly as they appeared. He could sense their spirit energy far better in this realm than at the Soul Society so he would know if they were up to no good, but he didn't want them more than a few feet away from him at all times. Especially since he'd told them not to move. Finding them and making them leave right now would be the best way to let them know that their guest pass had already expired. After a minute or two, he shook his head to himself and used hirenkyaku to disappear.  

[Silas Parrish]

"I thought I heard him say something to the effect of, 'you have the makings of greatness, but there is a long way to go.' What could that mean?" Daisuke countered. "You do not think these strangers with them cause for concern?" Daisuke stepped aside to make room for the arrival of Captains Manaki and Harada.
"What do we know about this Soul King, at any rate?" Zero interjected. "My squad's records are foggy at best."  

[Ty Gwynnia]

"Mm." Kousuke hummed as he thought, his eyebrows furrowing. "That's true, much of what this Reddo has said has focused on conviction or strength...I think." He didn't mention that plenty of it had been said to him, which lead him to believe that is was meant for him, but those words didn't leave his lips. They could've easily been for Kenzo or even Daisuke.  

[Silas Parrish]

"So... Is he recruiting manpower, do you think?" Daisuke asked, hoping that someone in the room knew more than he did.
"We do know that this Soul King's associate is a Soul Reaper. Perhaps we could run down records of missing members of each squad..." Zero suggested. He left Ryuusha standing with Kousuke and Daisuke to perform that very action.  

[Ty Gwynnia]

"What about the Quincy...?" Maria piped up. Captain Suzuki had asked her to tag along with him. Most times when there was a meeting concerning the safety of Seireitei he invited her along, for whatever reason he had. "He looked like he was with the Soul King too..."

Kousuke frowned. "It definitely sounds like he is. He and the other two with him fought against us, then left. They don't seem like they want to attack the city but I don't want to assume that and find out there's an army on the way."  

[Silas Parrish]

"Right, " agreed Daisuke. "I suppose we should keep an watchful eye out for any more movements from those intruders. As for the Quincy... neither of the Atsushi twins knows anything about him, and we have virtually nothing recorded of them. Let us hope he doesn't surprise us with any new powers. Now, then! Maria, I believe I owe you a training session before the intruders return. Will you be busy this afternoon?"

Akihime continued to push herself, feeling the reishi enter and flow through her like an electric river. She donned her Hollow mask as her power reached its peak, feeling an altogether different energy work in her. She forged a gigantic lance of reiryoku, perhaps the largest one she had ever attempted, and lobbed it straight into the air. She banished the mask just as she saw the bolt begin its descent back to the ground. Using her hirenkyaku, she moved in the blink of an eye to stand directly beneath her own attack. Akihime steeled her will and her very blood with borrowed reishi, and remained standing.
"Come on! Hurry it up, I can take it! Whatever you bring to bear against me, I can take it!" she roared to no one in particular as the bolt streaked toward her.  

[Orcus Fieres]

Ossman nodded a questioning nod. "How could I not? That's a near impossibility isn't it? The amount of Hollow a Vasto Lorde has to consume to become an Arrancar alone is ridiculous, we all know this. Then to work into getting a Resuraccion, much less a Segunda Etapa, is even more laughable. The lucky few who are able to reach such heights have been long gone for a while now." Ossman was sure of his statement, he knew how much effort it took for many Arrancar, himself included, to get where they are and to get further seemed impossible.  

[Silas Parrish]

"That's what they say, " Diego said with a smile. "However, I'm not ready to give up yet. I'm close. Very close, hermano. As I said... I have a plan. I need your help, of course, as my most talented Fracción." He twirled his zanpakuto idly around first one wrist, and then the other. "Step two is to break Drekovec's old allies out of their confinement in Seireitei, and direct them to a particular neighborhood in the Rukongai. I'll tell you the rest when we're there. That's step two. Step one is to deal with the King's Quincy. He's coming."  

[Ty Gwynnia]

"So...looking for a nice place for a picnic?" Takeshi reappeared a few feet away from the Arrancars. The smile on his face was easy but his jade eyes were hard. They'd gone back on their word and he didn't like that. If they had just wanted to chat, then that was okay. Otherwise, he was more than ready to make them leave. "I'd suggest a nice sunny hill, but...hell, that's my hill."

"Um, no, I'm free." Maria nodded, her eyes glinting happily. She really wanted to show that she'd gotten better since they'd last trained together.

"I could always check my notes to see if they mention him. I didn't catch his name though," Kousuke put out in the open.  

[Silas Parrish]

"Hey, you weren't using it!" Diego protested. "I needed a private word with my associate, here. You don't mind, do you?" He shifted his weight, allowing the handle of his zanpakuto to slide within his reach, if he needed to take it up, but he did not move to do so, just yet. He kept his gaze cool and calm.

"Good!" Daisuke said. "Let's go, then." He Flash-Stepped away, finding the same tiny arena they had always used for training. Scorchmarks still decorated the stone flooring and surrounding trees, reminding Daisuke of his last sparring match with Captain Harada. He broke the seal on his zanpakuto, but did not draw it, and waited for Maria. He thought a moment on Kousuke's words concerning the King's Quincy. As he thought about it, he realized that he had never heard the warrior's name, either. Still, he expected that it would not be too difficult to track down references to him in records. How many Quincy were there around Seireitei, and how many of them kept company with rogue Shinigami?

The lance at last reach Akihime, but she dodged at the last instant, cursing her own fear as she rolled out of the spreading cloud of dust and reishi.
"Damn!" she cursed aloud. At this rate I'll never learn Blut Vene. With a sigh, she donned again her Hollow mask, and prepared another lance, for another attempt.  

[Ty Gwynnia]

"Oh. No, I don't mind much." Takeshi said as he looked from Ossman to Diego. From the annoyance in the the second one's voice it sounded like what they'd been talking about had been a secret. Not that it mattered. "But I like my hill undisturbed. Say, when were you guys thinking of going home? My lord doesn't really like outsiders to be here."

Maria glanced at Captain Suzuki before she left after Daisuke, seeing him mumble to Harada. She didn't like the appearance of the three strangers anymore than seeing the reappearance of the Arrancars that weren't on their side. She frowned worriedly and took off, making her way nimbly to the spot designated for training. She was sure that it was protected somehow so as to not damage anything outside of it, namely buildings or injure bystanders, but she wasn't that skilled enough yet to tell. Sadly, she noticed that one of the trees that was unfortunately in the arena had been marked with soot when she Flash-stepped next to it.

What had the Quincy called himself again?, Kousuke silently asked himself as he walked rather than Flash-stepped to his home/office. Takeshi, although the Quincy's last name had not been spoken, had it? There were plenty of Quincies around and plenty of Takeshi's around in Seireitei as well, but hopefully he'd be able to pin down who it was. Most of them probably didn't have that grayish hair. Probably. Ryuusha was following after him as he walked, talking about some time he'd stood up high in the air and fell into a lake to cannonball. That's right, Ryuusha was also fire-based with his attacks. He'd have to remember to have him tag along the next time Diego showed his face.
As he neared his office, he spotted Kaizeloye hanging around the front of it, as if waiting for him. "Hey, Kaize, what're you doing here?" Kousuke called out, grinning when the Arrancar's attention was shifted away from the number on his arm. Oddly, he was wearing his robes a little formal that day.

"Oh, there you are." Kaizeloye waited until the two Captains had approached and stopped. "I wanted to let someone know I wasn't going to be around just in case they were looking for me."  

[Silas Parrish]

"Very well! I do hate to overstay my welcome. However, I should have a word with your master before I go anywhere. I'd rather hear it from him, if I am asked to leave." Diego flashed an innocuous smile, but did not move.
((If Strider ever gets back on, that is. XP ))

"Have you been training hard, Maria? I've heard great things from Captains Manaki and Suzuki about you. Would you care to show me what you've learned since I last trained with you?" Daisuke said amiably. He took an iaido-style stance, and drew his weapon.
"Vivisect... Yamato!" he commanded, squinting into the bluish light of his shikai.

"Oddly, that's what I wanted to speak to you about," Zero said, reappearing after finishing his errands. He held a horokuron, borrowed from Daisuke to carry massive amounts of data without keeping up with stacks upon stacks of paper.
"I've heard rumors that you've been looking into going back to Hueco Mundo, and some of the archivists said you'd been checking into our records on Hollows and Arrancar."
((I thought I'd send Zero with him, so he's not talking to himself. XD I can edit, if you don't like it this way. =3 ))

The pain was unbelievable... but Akihime managed to use the reishi she had pushed through her veins to protect her from her own attack, from the inside out. She was still not satisfied. She began to feel around for Kenzo. She needed an item of their mother's that he had been keeping safe. She also hoped to help him out in some measure with his unstable new powers.  

[Strider Wolfheart]

"If you wish to speak then I suggest you do young one." Reddo had finally chose to turn his attention from the fight brewing outside to the girl. He shifted in his throne as he tried to get more comfortable, his dress robes on making him uncomfortable at times. "Meiso, please go and escort our guests and Takeshi here. I don't want a fight to take place here." Reddo whispered aside to him, trying not to be heard.

"Yes, my lord." Meiso flash stepped away to do his king's will.

"Now, come closer. Let me see you better. I find that my eyes aren't as strong as they once were." Reddo strained his eyes in a sarcastic way.  

[Silas Parrish]

"What are you?" Chouku began unabashedly, her eyes cut at the man. "You're definitely not a Soul Reaper. I can't see you absorb reishi or reiryoku, so you can't be one of those Quincy people. Actually... you feel sort of like a Hollow, though you clearly aren't one. What are you? And what am I, for that matter?" She made use of her Bringer Light, and pulled on the air itself to propel her toward the Soul King. She stopped just short of him, staring directly into his face.  

[Ty Gwynnia]

"What, you can't trust my word?" Takeshi titled his head to one side ever so slightly with a growing smirk. His arms crossed over his chest to keep them from darting to his weapons. "Funny, because I'm starting to doubt yours, too."

"Er, yes, whenever they're not busy. And whenever I'm not resting..." Maria admitted, rubbing her fingers on the cloth that wrapped around the hilt of her zanpakuto.

"You're leaving?" Kousuke asked, confusion written all over his face. Disbelief tinged his words as if he couldn't believe Kaizeloye would want to go back there. Perhaps he'd set his sights on tracking down another one of his former friends, if they could be called that?

Kaizeloye grinned sheepishly as he focused his eyes on a particularly interesting spot on his sleeve. "Uh, yeah."

"But why? I thought you were done with that hot...deserty place." Ryuusha also wore a perplexed look.

"Not for long...And don't think that it's because I want to join up with those guys again, especially with Angel-boy flying around either," the Arrancar continued. "I'm just...I guess I'm homesick." He sighed and shrugged hopelessly. "That place kind of grows on you after so long, and by that I guess birth or something like that. Higgie's marker is there too, with whatever I could find left of him. Nothing much, just a flake of mask. I like visiting it and when I got to thinking about him...this time, I wanted to go for some sightseeing instead of wrestling and shackling my old "pals"."