Post by Tsajara Dread on Oct 2, 2016 9:26:19 GMT -5
It had been quite a while since Tsaja and Niraja had been among the Espada. It had felt... interesting. Being separate from eachother. Talking in ways that were not instantaneous and immediate. This new part of herself, this new....being. Tsaj couldn't help but feel a deep protectiveness over them. A kind of.... maternal instinct. A notion that Nira found amusing to no end, and one that the two often had little disagreements about from time to time.
But among all of this, the pair of them both felt that... as they talked, Hueco Mundo was not quite as safe as they surmised. The mannerisms with which Sargon conducted himself. The warning she had received from his Fraccion. It all had culminated into something they didn't fully understand, but they felt compelled to create distance regardless.
And so... they left...
In the shade of what could loosely be considered night, they simply made their way out of Las Noches. Of course none challenged the either of them. Tsaj and Niraja had both become strong after all. Not only were they powerful, but none were too keen on annoying one of Sargon's fancies. So the both of them left, with the dome to their back, and the horizon in their sights. They began to head north, or toward the Moon at least, and simply kept walking. A walk that... slowly.. began to feel more and more like the proper thing to do. Something had stuck with Tsaj back on earth. During the Meteor shower.
Despite having not been separated at the time, Nira still had a memory of the event (Much to Tsaja's enjoyment and relief as explaining the situation would have been hilarious, but complicated. And as the sands began to shift past them on the wind, and the both of them trekked on, Tsaj couldn't help but feel that nagging edge at the back of her mind, as if some invisible knife were checking her, and old words in her mind began to take shadowy shapes across her mind's canvas. Shadows that barred her mental processes, demanding attention and addressal.
"Where do you suppose the quincy came from?" Tsaj asked, earning her something of a curious look from her companion as the both of them walked. A laugh was the smaller woman's reply, and something of a incredulous sneer as a scuff of her boot sent a bit of sand in Tasj's direction, that voice condescending as if speaking to a child. "The Fuck kinda question is that? For one it doesn't even matter. And for two, where everything else came from. Chance. Whatever the fuck went on, I'm sure there coulda been anything. Fuckin humans that hunted shinigami, humans that could fuckin eat hollows instead of oblterating them. Humans that could fuckin go in and outta hell at will. Doesn't matter that Quincy came out like they did. They just happened." She snorted.
Dread immediately frowned, her head tilting a little as she slowed her pace and eyed the smaller woman. "That doesn't really answer my question." she murmured lightly, giving a little scuff in reply as she sprayed Nira with sand. The smaller woman didn't even look in Dread's direction. She was staring. The idea that they had actually run into something was a little absurd. They hadn't even been walking that long, what could she possibly be... looking... at...... "What...."
They were standing before some massive temple. In the midst of the sand it had simply appeared. Massive as it were, as if they had been walking toward it this whole time, it's presence felt... empty. Simply looking at it's mass, Tsaj felt as if it were... gaping... open... voided. And somehow, she felt like that same void was in herself. Some unfulfilled sensation in the pit of her gut. And suddenly she felt a DEEP and unabiding urge to enter the Temple. The BOTH of them did. And as she began t walk slowly toward the massive gate at it's entrance, she knew that Nira was following behind her, both of them silently marching forth.
As the pair approached the archway, they could get a better look at it. The twisting winds of the sands seeming to die down. The thing was formed like a massive spade. Two curving sides that swelled outward before slowly curling in to a needle-like point above. In the center of that wall of a 'gate' there was a single spiral-engraved sphere. Like some sort of puzzle. The surface of the spiral was riddled with gears, pulleys, pistons and cogs. It was like some massive clockwork doorway, and as the pair of them approached the both of them couldn't help but wonder how they were going to get in. But as it were... the moment they drew close, something tingled. And somehow, the both of them could feel.... it.
What it was was something that seemed like... essence. To say that it was a being would be incorrect. There was no singularity to it. Nor was it the door itself. It was the many doors. As if a thousand walkways and paths had been twisted, bent, and folded into a single door. This portal before them, it felt as if it could have led them to a great amny places, and changed their fates in a great many ways. This thing before them was some sort of atrium. A crossroads, and as they grew closer and closer, they felt more and more....crowded. Something around the both of them felt...occupied. And as they drew near, Dread was the first to notice. It was them. Herself. Nira's Self. The both of them. And sometimes just one of them. She could feel a thousand others like them. A thousand selves. All of them slightly different. All of them slightly changed. And she felt the sudden wave of.... emotions.
Some of them were angry. Venemous. Violent Even. In her mind she could almost feel the heat of the blast as her other selves obliterated the door before them. Others felt fear. she could feel them shrinking away. In her mind's eye she could see them running, never looking back, trying to run back to Las noches. She saw so many bizarre things. So many... shifts and alterations. But most importantly, bit by bit, the more...fanatical iterations seemed to melt away. Fading into the background as more and more mild chices laid out before her. Less and less extremes, less and less outbursts of this or that. Little by little, she seemed to FEEL that what was left... those other selves that were more.... true.. or more 'same', seemed to converge. And before the gate, just as she and Nira were before that portal. They were gone. The two were alone again. And somehow...looking to her side...
She wondered if the Nira beside her, was the Nira she had arrived with. Or if perhaps somehow one of the variations had slipped in. And in that very same way, she saw Nira looking back at her, just as incredulously. Only the Rumble drew their attention, away from one another, and to the opening. That massive gape as the cogs and bobs and bits that comprised the gate began to twist and wink out of existence. It did not just fold and twist into the sides of the gate. It warped, collapsed, and wound into hidden pockets in the air, a thousand little intricacies that seemed too bizarre fr the realm they lived in seemed to be at work, until at long last it was open, and she saw it before her, before them.
The temple they had so suddenly found themselves in. Suddenly they weren't just at the gates. They were at the center. The Pinacle. The Heart of that Shining Shrine. And around them, were hundreds of what might have been considered hollows. Were they not all completely... identical. It shocked her at first, both of them. Dread and Nira both, stunned into silence. Feeling the air still in their throats. The dull ringing of soundlessness in their skulls. As if those hundreds and hundreds of identical hollows, their masks like great fans above their heads, were draining all of the voice from their throats, leaving them Mute. Leaving EVERYTHING mute.
And then they opened their mouths.
And all of the sound came rushing back.
The sudden roar of the husks seemed to drown out Dread's thoughts, before she knew it she was on the ground as the harmonious wails of the things surrounding them slowly boomed into existence. And all of them, even with how ear-splitting the shout, even though it was in a language neither of them recognized, they knew exactly what they were screaming out. That void in her chest seemed to scream with them, and indeed, the two of them began shouting that word involuntarily, without thought, and without any reservation, as if keeping the word inside would consume them.
Empty.
And as the echoes of the call faded, and the Temple quieted once again, Dread looked around and saw that Nira was gone. She was alone, atop that shrine, and suddenly in the altar at it's peak, she saw her weapon. Destripadora. As if Nira had been sealed back into her sword form again. As if they were one once more. And all at once she could feel the... darker thoughts that had once entered her mind. Those fleeting murmurs of dissatisfaction. Those hungers for revenge. Those hungers for Conquest. those hungers for... blood. As a slow building symphony, she could feel every single malcontent thought that she had ever humored. And all of it was radiating from the weapon. All of it was radiating from Nira, from Destripadora, from this Altar.
This is your Darkness
The shiver that ran down her spine was palpable, and turning, she suddenly found herself looking at.... herself. No mirror, or even an inkling of a thought that it WAS one. The other her was smiling, darkly, in a way that seemed to sink claws into her chest and begin peeling away what she was. And slowly, she realized that her face itched. She wanted to be smiling too. Or at least her face did. But she resisted the itch, pushing it aside with all of those dark thoughts, and as if sensing her attempts, the other her laughed loudly, a booming laugh that was echoed by those fan-masked hollows all around them.
Is there anything you could do to be ANY more pathetic?! You're a hollow! Its only NATURAL you would feel this wal. CRAVE these things! Just because you had a bit of a fucked up start, you have been ignoring these urges for AGES! Did you think they had just vanished?!
The other self suddenly planted her hands firmly into the alter, glaring at Dread from across it and leaning in, but never crossing the center. As if she couldn't reach that halfway point. As if her other self were confined to their side of the shrine. And somehow, she was glad that was the case. Somehow she knew that if she could reach her, her other self would rip her body open and crawl into her skin like some sort of massive parasite, and almost instantly that would be the end of that. She could SENSE that whatever barrier was keeping them on their respective sides, she aught be glad for it.
You've been Ignoring them for long enough! It's fucking TIME to get your ass back into the game! We're not waiting around any longer! This shit's gonna be resolved NOW!
