I Want...

[Senshi Odayakama (Crimson.)]

Odayakama Senshi had returned to Seireitei. It was a rumor that had been confirmed by reports in the various divisions from information gathering, to research and development, and amongst the various other faction members. As she returned to her barracks, there were those that bowed their heads upon seeing her badge, her form, but none may truly notice the blankness and dullness of her cerulean eyes as she isolated herself in her office. Files neatly arranged for her to take care of with the Captain's seal. She sat behind her smoothwood desk, and with it, she simply worked. Going through forms to keep her mind occupied and yet also mindless at the same time. Perhaps she didn't want to think. She wanted to put the horrors behind her perhaps. The redhead firmly stamps the first document, and with it, as she lifts that stamp?

Her right hand lightly shakes as she takes a deep breath, slowly resting it aside as she slowly and instinctively clenches it along her sleeve where her left arm might have been once. There was nothing quite as isolating as mental illness, and there was nobody quite as hurt as the Lieutenant of the Eighth Division. The horrors and tortures she had experienced were immeasurable. To be ripped and mauled into repeatedly whilst in chains day by day. She was Prometheus. She looks down and when she tries to think of what to do? How she felt about being home?

She tried to smile. She really did, but it felt hollow and empty, and she physically couldn't maintain it afterwards. It hurt to smile. It felt foreign as if she had forgotten how to do so. So, she wouldn't. Instead, when one of her subordinates came to bring her a beansprout soup, some rice, and a small fish, she closed her eyes, ate, and then acted as if nothing had happened. "Arigato Gozaimashita." As a person took her tray, she realized...she couldn't even recall the taste of the food she had just had. If it was delicious or not. She assumed it was however. Something had happened to Odayakama Senshi.

In a sense? She was broken. She wasn't untalkative because she was brooding and feeling sorry for herself. No. It was because she was nearly catatonic. She did paper after paper, and with it, she slowly looks at the long Zanpakutou that rest along her desk. "Sho-nin...Joka…" She sounds the name on her tongue before she swallows the gravity of the situation. Shonin Joka didn't speak with her anymore. She wasn't even sure if she could use Shikai...anymore. She takes a simple moment of reflection, but she wasn't sure if she could cry right now either.

She was lost and confused. There was something she wanted, she might have realized. As she slowly lowers her stamp, her eyes closing, so heavy and tired as a single rivulet of tears drip down her eyes. Maybe it was selfish of her. To be unable to come back and resume normally as if nothing had happened. To feel horrible for having gone out and having been captured in the first place. Perhaps it was indeed all her fault. The realization of many thoughts were surreal. The raise of a hand as her eyes scan another document and firmly stamps the final parchment for the file she had. She needed to sleep...

[Kaen Youji]

From outside of Senshi's office, there came sounds of a commotion. Several voices could dimly be heard. A voice that apparently belonged to one of Squad 8 piped up. "Excuse me sir you can't-- HEY!" Followed by a loud thump. "Move." Came the reply. The sound of running footsteps echoing down the hall, and the door to Senshi's office flew open. Whether it was locked or not as it so happened, the only difference being whether the door would be damaged in the process. A black blur of movement shot through the room as Kaen Youji flew through the room, and attempted to pull Senshi Odayakama into a tight hug. "Senshi!? Are you alright?" He exclaimed. The hallway outside revealed a pair of Shinigami, one of whom had been shouldered past by Kaen, and was still staggering to regain his balance, the other of whom was partway into the wall, due to being shoved by him on his way to Senshi's office.

Kaen had started for Senshi's quarters the minute he'd heard news of her return. When Kaen was motivated he became a force that became very, very hard to stop. A black blur that had blasted through the walls of Seireitei, leaving bewildered Shinigami in his wake, and jumping and clearing the walls entirely as he went. The front sentries of Squad 8 had barely registered the third seat passing them as anything more than a momentary flicker of movement. All in all, Kaen had gotten to Senshi's office all of an hour and a half after he had caught the news and almost all of that had been him sprinting there.

"Senshi?.... I'm sorry." He murmured to her as he tried to hug the one-armed Shinigami.

[Senshi Odayakama (Crimson.)]

When the burst had entered her room, she sound of move, Senshi wasn't entirely sure she had registered. As Kaen comes closer, wraps her into an embrace, a warm embrace that left her unable to understand what was going on. He said he was sorry, and as he hugged her, her eyes widened for a moment, as she gave a small nod of her head, and the smallest curl upwards of the lips as her dull cerulean stared into the man's chest. She seemed to go lax for a short bit, as she slowly tilted her head upwards.

"It's...alright." She'd say, slowly looking upwards. When she looked at his face however, she seemed to be distant, or perhaps confused. In a sense, Senshi had shut down. The next statement would make that evident. "G-Gomenasai...Who are you?" Her throat felt dry, and for some reason, in the pit of her stomach, she felt an incredible sense of despair. Yet, she didn't know why.

She however seemed resigned, as she instead, slowly nestled her head back into his chest. The short redhead didn't seem to understand the situation, though with it, she seemed to be in a dazed sense of realization. "Ah...I need to get to work." She if allowed would slowly seat herself back into her seat, and with the dark rings under her eyes would look at the desk, and would then look confusedly at her left arm. "Mnh? What-..." Her brain was in a state of shock perhaps.

At seeing him. At seeing Kaen. She was trying to defend herself, and it seemed in those moments that she'd suddenly forgot about things that had happened to her. It was as if she had fallen into some sort of relapse perhaps. "Do you...need any help? I'm sorry if I have-haven't been useful. I'll try better...I'll try better." The last part fades into a murmur as she seemed to lull. 

[Kaen Youji]

Kaen's eyes widened in shock, then glazed over as the impact of Senshi's words hit him harder than punches from Kimiko Shihoin. "Senshi... What did..." His words failed him for a moment. He was stunned. He wanted to say "it's me" but somehow didn't think his words would land. Maybe... maybe Senshi didn't want them to land. "Senshi, your work can wait. Talk to me. What happened to you?" He asked, hesitantly, as if worried he was about to dredge something up by his question. He did not know why Senshi had disappeared, or how she'd come to return. He wondered if she could tell him, but he wasn't sure. He wasn't even releasing her yet, just holding onto her protectively, like an older brother shielding his little sister.

"...I think I do need some help, yeah." He replied after a moment of pause. He worked to keep his voice steady. He knew that Senshi had been through a rough time of it, but her earnest nature to keep pushing onwards despite it had been one of the qualities he'd truly liked about her. What... could have happened to her that had broken that. Or was it many things? Their last meeting flickered, hauntingly in his mind. ...Is this my fault? Kaen asked himself, and the question was a shard of ice that was worming its way into his chest. "Just... talk to me alright. Tell me... what's happened? Where have you been?" His voice was steady despite the pauses, and he was avoiding having his voice tremble. He had to focus on maintaining composure here.

Kaen's primary driving goal that had driven him to work at becoming a Shinigami (besides familial pressure) had always been his intense desire to protect the people he cared about. Senshi definitely qualified for that. Whatever had happened to her... it was a failing on his part. He wasn't strong enough. It's still not.... Kaen tried to bring his mind out of that mire. For a fleeting instant in his mind's eye, he saw it, glaring from the depths of a fetid swamp. Nearly masked by the murky depths, he his own face, with dead eyes that belied the combination of despair and tranquil fury that burned in his heart. The rage, misery and hatred that had boiled over and claimed Kaen as theirs; consuming him utterly. He had been there once. Consumed by the darkest feelings in his heart. But he'd been brought back from that, before it had destroyed him completely and he would not fall into that quagmire again. But it would be a lie if seeing Senshi's current state hadn't knocked him a step back in, despite his progress.

"Tell me everything."

[Senshi Odayakama (Crimson.)]

Her work could wait he said. Kaen wanted to know where she's been, what's happened to her, and with it, she was at an utter loss for words for a bit. She whilst held in his grasp would proceed to feel foreign. This wasn't familiar for Senshi. The tender hold of another was something that didn't seem or feel right for her in any capacity. "I...went to Hueco Mundo to train myself." Though the reason why she went there was by all means undisclosed. Her own mind seemed to be wandering though a series of memories as they lightly flickered left.

"That's right. I fought the Tercera there. Then." She seemed to go silent for a bit as she seemed to take deep breaths. Slowly getting faster as memories flashed of the torture. The dark cell of which she was imprisoned in. How her body was mutilated, dismembered, only to be regenerated and healed when she was on death's door. She remembered the tube that ran down her throat for the nutrients needed to survive. Being subject to torture.

'Help me! Someone help!' No one ever came. Time was irrelevant and meaningless inside of that cell she lingered in. She could have been in there for a few days, or perhaps she was there for a hundred years. It felt like an eternity when there was no reference. There was no day and night, nor were there windows inside of the cell she lingered. All she had to remember was the pain. She seemed to be in a deep daze for quite some time as Kaen held her close.

"...Where...did my arm go?" She'd ask softly, and with it, as she looks ahead, perhaps she didn't see Kaen for a moment as she very much was in a regressive state of mind or tendency. "Did you eat it?" She seemed to be talking past Kaen perhaps, her right hand slowly raising up and holding her forehead. Senshi then slowly spoke forth. "Kaen-Kun..." She said softly, almost as if a death whisper that brushed his ears. If guilt was already racking Kaen's mind, then Senshi's next words may mark a great change and feeling in his heart.

"He'll come...save me? I love Kaen-Kun. Who are you?"

[Kaen Youji]

Kaen frowned as Senshi began to walk through her story. Hueco Mundo... dangerous. Reckless. Even Kaen wouldn't have opted to carelessly wander around out there. Too much that could go wrong. But he didn't say so right now. She didn't need to hear that right now. Especially not from him. And she'd fought an Espada....? The Tercera Espada... Sargon Deumeric. Kaen had seen records but hadn't fought him himself. "Oh..." It was all he could say. Kaen stroked Senshi's hair, trying to be reassuring. "...It's over now Senshi. He's never going to hurt you again. I don't know how you got away, but you did. You escaped him, and he can't hurt you anymore. Okay?" He tried offering. Trying to give her some solace or positivity in this.

"Your arm... We can get it back. Okay? We can get it back." Kaen offered. And then she added that last line, and Kaen's face went stricken. "...No. I didn't come and save you. ...I'm sorry Senshi. I wasn't... able to help you when you needed me. That's why..." His head lowered and he stopped stroking the girl's hair, held for a moment as he tried to figure out what to do from here. "It's why I'm going to help you now. I have to make up for that. We'll... get you back to your normal head space, okay?" At least he had to hope so.

Your fault. The voice echoed in his mind. You weren't strong enough. You've never been strong enough. Once again, you arrive to the show too late to save anyone. You're not a shield. You're a sword. No. You're not even a sword. A sword can parry. You're a loosed arrow. You strike, you wound, you kill. You do not protect except in striking before evil people can hurt others. Kaen once again pushed those thoughts aside and his mind rallied. I'm not like that anymore. Even if it's true. I will fight to become that shield. I'll be strong enough to stand where I need to be. Push myself to my limits. I might fail again. But I will not stop trying. Even if I leave a legacy of failure. It will be a legacy of endless persistence and determination to do the right thing. And I'm going to start right here. I won't break again.

"Just... I need to know where to start."

[Senshi Odayakama (Crimson.)]

"Never hurt me again?..." She seemed to ask it in a confused concept, as if finding difficulty understanding such a concept. "I-I-..." She didn't know what was going on. The tears streaming down her faith when she was held like this, and reassured. They furiously streamed down and burned her eyes, and she for some reason just burst out crying, like a little girl, burying herself into him and weeping, her hand clenching around his haori as she didn't know if this was real. Because for the first time in a small forever, she felt oddly as if she was loved.

Maybe not in a romantic way, but it was love all the same. The duties of the Shinigami had worn down on Senshi over the last two centuries, especially because they were tumultuous times, a rush to recruit after Kuroi's machinations. She remembered the pain and agony that was experienced in her earlier days, and sadly, she also found that the earlier days were so much easier than now. The naive Senshi was once an optimist that found beauty and opportunity to do more in her days.

However, for the small redheaded Shinigami with a blade that was almost as tall as she was, she honestly found no greater happiness than this singular moment in her entire afterlife. "Ahaaaaagh! Ahahaaaagh!" She shook, and with it, her mourns could have been considered to that of a Hollow. It seemed like whatever what path one traveled in the afterlife, there was always a deep sorrow and pain about them. As her cheeks flushed hot, and she found it hard to breath, she felt a dam burst.

"Kaen-San! Kaen-San!" She heaves through her sobbing tears. "I do-do-don't deserve you. Hh-h-hggh. Y-Y-Yet I love you so much. It hurts." She might have sounded like as if she was speaking as if he wasn't there, but perhaps instead to herself, and with it, her cerulean eyes flashed upwards at him, giving him a look into those cerulean orbs that seemed to shine with that primal sensation of fear. However, with it, she slowly releases him and finds herself curling inwards on herself almost, as if making her seem even smaller than she was.

Her outfit never really helped with that, the elongated sleeves and the sash that made her outfit seem a bit too big for her. It didn't help that she wasn't the most effeminately blessed. Was Senshi always playing pretend? Is that the analogy? She bites her lip, and with it, she seats herself on the floor. "G-Gomenasai. Gomenasai. Gomenasai. G-G-Gomenasai." She seemed to repeat repeatedly, and with it, she lowered her head into her lap. It hurt so much...to love someone. 

[Kaen Youji]

Kaen hugged Senshi close and tight to his body as he heard her sobbing. "Hey... it's going to be okay. Just... get everything out. Nobody's here to judge." More accurately, the only other two individuals that could have been around to judge were currently looking for help as to how to resolve the protocol of a higher ranking officer in another division pulling rank. The other being still unconscious via being put most of the way through a wall. He continued to pet Senshi's hair in an attempt to be reassuring. "You don't need to apologize. You've done nothing wrong here. I'm the one who helped create this situation." He knew he still couldn't return Senshi's feelings. Not since his sparring session and chat with Shizuyoko. But he could still do his part. Who knows... hearts could change. His or Senshi's, he didn't know. Couldn't know. The future was always in motion, and it couldn't be predicted. But that... that didn't need to be discussed with the girl he was hugging right now. That's not what she needed to hear today.

Kaen gave Senshi a few minutes to get things out of her system, and attempt to compose herself. Not that he was in any place to judge if it took her longer than that. If anything this was a far less self-destructive means of snapping than he'd undergone. "Senshi. Tell me everything you can. I can tell you've gone through a lot. Do you want to take a walk?" He offered. He didn't move yet though, making sure to give Senshi the physical closeness and support that he was pretty sure she needed right now. He wasn't going to be the one to break off this physical gesture of affection and comfort that it was very clear Senshi needed.

"You can say whatever you need to say. I won't judge you for it."

[Senshi Odayakama (Crimson.)]

"I've always been the one in the wrong! Every single time!" She cries out, and with it, she shouts out through clenched eyes, as she hugs into him, wanting him so desperately, knowing that she wasn't what he needed, and the fact she desired him only sought to hurt herself more than anyone else. There was a pain, a suffering she experienced because of all of her life choices. She wielded a blade when she had no skill in it. She fought against those that were stronger than her, despite knowing the gap.

She had lived looking to the heavens despite living in the gutter, in the deepest pit of hell that she had dragged herself into. She had always hoped and lived for the best of life, and now, she was thrown into a state of desperation, a pathetic weakness, where she was so weak, she needed to cry before a man and press herself into him for a modicum of comfort. Senshi was always weak, ever since she was a shy and withdrawn recruit in the academy, and even now, despite her tremendous growth. She feared everything.

It was only from her bravery, or perhaps stupidity she continued to live and walk step by step on a day to day basis. "I-I'm nothing but a burden to e-everyone. I try to do things despite lacking the power, and I need to rely on others. I-I try to reach for the impossible even though I know I can't. I try to think I'm growing despite the fact I'm nothing but a failure!" She let out the emotions and feelings of deprivation, the deep sense of depression she had never told a single soul in full feeling. 

This was how she truly felt about herself after all. "I-I'm nothing but a coward. Someone who runs into battle with their sword drawn, but never truly grows and accomplishes anything. I work hard saying that it's for a goal, but I'm just...playing pretend! I've never been able to save anyone! I've never been able to make a change in anyone's life! H-Hgh! I-I just...I just run in with a brave face, because I-I always hope that something will end me. That if I keep on fighting and trying, and throwing myself into the grinder, that someone will notice..."

She tried not to bawl, right now, but perhaps it was because Kaen was the one she loved the most in this world that she could spill her feelings, and her weakness, and her doubts, and her insecurities that she had bottled for centuries. She had talked to Kaen before, briefly of these negative feelings, when she had lost all hope, and Kaen was the one to make her life move forward again. He continued her stopped time and made her feel like life was something worth living for. She wielded a blade to protect, to defend, and she had in a sense wished for him to be the reason she wielded that blade.

"I-I'm s-selfish. Because I know you can never love me, a-and yet...I-I want this moment to last forever. In your arms. T-Thch." She chokes on her breath, and with it, her cheeks were flushed red with shame, tears dripping from her eyes before he asked what she wanted. What she needed. She didn't know herself. 

[Kaen Youji]

Kaen bit his lip but let Senshi pour her heart out to him. She deserved to have that much. His hand continued to move, stroking the girl's hair while she cried out to him. But her comments about being a failure struck home to Kaen. These were thoughts he'd held himself not so long ago... "Hey..." He began but Senshi continued to beat herself up before he could properly interject. As Senshi finally finished, Kaen waited a moment before pulling her in closer and holding her tight. "I've got you right here Senshi." He told her softly and gently.

"I know where you are. I've been there. It's dark. It's painful. So far down that you can't see the light anymore, and a part of you doesn't even want to look for it, because all it does is remind you of what you've lost. Of what you tell yourself were delusions of grandeur, and that it's so much easier just to stay down there and immerse yourself in the darkness because at least down there it's impossible to fall down any further." He murmured. "Am I close?" He sighed. "That feeling of being a failure, a burden.... reaching for the impossible and failing each time. I know that feeling too. That prayer and hope every time you face down an enemy that maybe, just maybe, this will be the one that succeeds where the others have failed." He took a deep breath.

"I've been there, and would still be there if someone hadn't come to pull me out of it. And I'll do the same for you. There's no shame in falling. Nothing wrong with relying on others. The ability to trust and rely on others is something to be treasured, not something to hate about yourself. And I promise that you're not a burden. Nobody would say that of you." He continued to advise. "As for not making a change in anyone's life... how do you know that? You can't know the lives you've touched. For all you know there's someone fresh out of the Academy, who's heard tell of the kido genius, Senshi Odayakama, and is swearing to themselves that one day they'll be just as talented as you are. Or maybe some other down on their luck Shinigami that's had a run of bad days, but hears about some of the days you've gone through, and realize, you're still here and fighting, so they have no grounds to give up. Just because you've never met them or haven't seen how your life touches others doesn't mean that it doesn't." He advised Senshi.

"You're not being selfish. Even if you were, that's not always a bad thing. I can't lie to you, and won't mislead you. But I'm not going to abandon you. I'll stay right here as long as you need me to be. If you want to go somewhere, I'll take you there. I'm going to help you get through this Senshi, and then we'll see what the future holds."

[Senshi Odayakama (Crimson.)]

He said he had her, and in those moments, she never wanted to leave. He said he could understand how she felt, having been in a dark spot, and with it, she never doubted that whatsoever. She just wanted to be able to feel weak as well as fall deeper into this state of euphoria. Everything he said, it was truth. Everything he said, she could confirm deep down in her soul. She didn't want to look to light, because when she did, when she got her hopes up, it would tend to slowly break her down. She closed her eyes.

"Y-Youji-Kun." He said he would pull her from darkness, if she would pull on him, and with it, she could feel herself loosening, wanting to slip away into what was Kaen. However, with it, she found herself getting rigid. In a way, it seemed as if this was the cycle. She felt a sense of deja vu, and yet, she wanted to take that opportunity. To be able to rely on others and feel weak. The biggest difference however was the idea that her existence touched people's lives, even if she didn't know it in a wider spectrum.

See what the future holds. Her brilliant blue eyes stared into his own dark brown, and with it, she could only smile. That brilliant smile with her teeth shining, her eyes shut as a small rivulet of tears streamed downwards. "Y-You're an amazing guy. Youji-Kun. Haha~" She hugged into him again, tighter with her one arm, and with it, she felt in a sense endeared, but also indebted to Kaen. There was one main thought of him then.

He was truly a man above others. For when she was at her lowest and he himself was being enveloped in a darkness, he had the compassion and kindness in his heart to stop to try to save others. He thought of her when she was missing in absence, and with it, even as the lay tortured for days, weeks, months even within the darkness, he had always thought of her. When she had first arrived, broken, haunted, and demoralized, he had been the first to visit her of all who knew her personally. Yet that wasn't all.

He didn't scold her, or hate her, or despise her, or ridicule her. He consoled her and comforted her in a way that nobody else in the Gotei ever did. It was why deep down in her heart, despite the fact she knew he loved someone else? She loved him, and wished that at least a small part of him could have that kind of love for her as well. That he could squeeze some little semblance of room. However, this hold, this comfort she had now? That would be enough, and it made her inclined to have a new goal and ambition. Not like the old one she had before, but instead a new development.

To stand by his side and to protect him. To bring him into the light also. She would do it, or so that was how Odayakama Senshi felt. She wanted to devote herself in a sense to him. After all, she was a maiden at heart, and she intended on being here for a very, very long time.