Saga of the Princess of the Hollow World (Youjo Senki x Bleach)

Saga of the Princess of the Hollow World

Chapter 1: Meeting Acquisitions

~

Tanya felt giddier than she had in the past 70 years—at least, she was pretty sure it was 70. Time was hard to keep track of when one was effectively immortal and lived in a dimension without a day-night cycle.

Still, the point stood. She had managed to get permission to 'scout for supplies' from Ichimaru Gin. Being the laxest of the three Shinigami leaders, she had hedged her bets that he would grant it with no questions asked or none that would be serious enough to actually dig at her true purposes. A simple, "Sure Tanya-chan, have fun," was expected and given, with a bit of teasing about how the 'little soldier' needed to 'eat enough to grow big and strong like her papa'. Most of the time, Tanya found herself grumbling about the man's lackadaisical attitude toward what was a complex operation aiming to topple the very order of the universe and fight forces thousands of years in the making with powers rivaling that of mythical gods, in this one case, she was thankful that he wasn't interested enough in whatever she was doing to carefully vet it. Though, that was also likely owed to her own history of working under the regime of Aizen, emulating in this 'life' what she had learned in her second about being a good soldier. And so, she would be able to get away with this one little less-than-reputable act:

She was on Earth, looking to buy some coffee.

Normally, letting an Arrancar go into the material world of the living would be a bad idea. Even the weakest of their number would light up sensors in the Seireitei made to detect major Hollow incursions and draw a response from higher-ranked seated members, at the least. It wasn't out of the question that captain and lieutenant ranks might be called upon. Unlike most Arrancar, however, Tanya was good at suppressing her reiatsu levels, a skill learned through applying old magical techniques to a new system of energy and adapting it over time through trial and error. She had also requisitioned a suppression cloak, a piece of technology that would only further mask her. With just one or the other, her signature could be mistaken for a spiritually-aware human or a weak Hollow. With both, she was effectively invisible.

Despite her timing getting her the perfect window, and her skills and technology giving her the perfect cover from enemy intelligence, there was one thing Tanya had overlooked when she had come to this Japanese town to obtain her precious resource.

"I forgot that I don't have any money," she bemoaned after searching her pockets and then remembering her species' current tribalistic status. True, she could easily steal whatever she wanted. Simply wait until a bag of coffee beans out of sight of cameras is being unwatched, grab them, infuse a slip of reiryoku into the object to make its 'spiritual frequency' match hers - thus able to be hidden under her cloak - and then abscond with her treasure.

However, Tanya was a firm believer in the principles of the market, even if she had been out of touch with most forms of such for close to a century. And while, as a survivor, she certainly believed there were acceptable times to steal, gaining a bit of comfort was not one of them. Even if she really, really wanted the things on the other side of the store's windows.

Right there.

Just within reach.

The glass wouldn't even stop her. As a purely spiritual being, she could choose to pass through some material objects so long as they weren't awash in reishi. Theoretically, of course.

But then again, her mission would be a waste if she-

"Whoa! What are you cosplaying as?" she heard from her left and turned to see a girl with chin-length black hair and grey eyes looking right at her.

'Drat! Spiritually-aware human! What are the chances? I thought they were supposed to be incredibly rare, like mages. Oh, wait, she thinks I'm a cosplayer? Okay, maybe I can use-'

"Is that...a hole in your chest?"

Tanya looked down, recalling one of the more unique features of Arrancar physiology: their Hollow Holes. Hers happened to be in her chest, at the bottom of her sternum, and the tailors always designed her clothes in such a way as to reveal it. Even when she tried to go around them and get shirts and jackets that didn't have that strategic uncovering, someone somehow always got a hold of it later to alter her wardrobe again.

"Wait, oh, I get it. You're another ghost. You just have a hole instead of a chain."

'Roll with it.'

"That is correct, in a manner of speaking," Tanya answered the girl. "The full reason is fairly complicated and would take a long time to explain without leaving room for misunderstandings, but you aren't wrong."

"Guess that explains why no one else is noticing you," the girl said while looking around. There weren't many people going up and down this particular street, but it was far from empty. Indeed, if Tanya had been as visible as any of them, she would have been very noticeable, being a blonde-haired, blue-eyed girl with a bone-like crown on her head and strange, white clothing featuring an altered military-style shirt and hakama, and a black, glossy cloak clinched over her shoulders.

"So, what were you looking at?"

Seeing no harm in explaining, Tanya gestured to the shop's window, where her desires were displayed.

"I was hoping to get some coffee, but I realized I lack currency, and stealing is...distasteful."

"Can ghosts drink coffee?"

"Sure, so long as it's infused with the right energy."

"Well, it's nice of you to not steal, I guess, even though I'm pretty sure the police can't exactly arrest a ghost for shoplifting."

"It's the principle of the matter. I'd rather not be one of the many factors making life that much harder for the proprietors and workers of this place, who I can only imagine have worked hard to run this lovely little shop."

'Besides, I need to set a good example for the rest of my kind. If we're ever going to pull ourselves out of our scattered barbarism and into civilization, then we have to start acting the part. It's already hard enough to rehabilitate them from their ingrained violent ways without constantly falling back to the 'might make right' mentality, and while stealing something inexpensive may seem minor when held against murder and cannibalism, it's still somewhere on that spectrum. If I'm to lead by example, what does it say about me if I decide to steal from someone just because they can't stop me, whether or not I can be seen? It makes me a hypocrite.'

"Hm, well, I can take or leave coffee, but my sister's pretty good at making it. If you want a cup, we could ask her."

Tanya was rather surprised by the proposition, and it must have shown on her face because the human girl allowed herself a small grin at her expression. There was even a hint of warmth in her heart that came with the seemingly sincere offer.

"Ah, I wouldn't want to impose."

"Nah, you wouldn't be. Yuzu's always bugging me about bringing more friends around to hang out but with my dad... Well, you won't be a bother. If anything, she'll be excited to see you. Well, not see you, but she'll know someone's there."

"Your sister can sense spirits?"

"Kinda. Not like me and Nii-san, but she definitely feels it when one's around."

'Three siblings who can all sense spiritual energy to some extent? One is rare, and two is nearly unheard of, but three? That sort of coincidence only happens for a reason. This bears investigating. I wouldn't normally do this, but if someone asks why I showed up empty-handed, I can at least offer what I learned as intelligence. It'd even explain why I wasn't able to procure the 'supplies' I sought. Yes, showing up with a bag of beans might have required some explanation, but I'd already thought of that. Coffee appears to give humans energy, so acquiring some for personal performance enhancement would have been sound, if awkward to phrase.

'Besides, she offered. It'd be rude to not accept now.'

"I think that'd be lovely, actually. Ah, I haven't caught your name."

"Kurosaki Karin," the girl answered as she stepped around to lead the way. "And you?"

"Tanya Louisenbairn."

~

When they arrived, Tanya noted that to the side of the Kurosaki household was a clinic, or at least it was advertised as such. The sign caught Tanya's interest for a moment, but she refocused on following her newly made acquaintance into the front door of the home portion of the house.

"I'm home," Karin announced, loud enough to be heard throughout before removing her shoes and putting on some slippers. Tanya decided to remove her own boots as well, even though she was certain she couldn't track any dirt in by accident. It was the gesture of respect that mattered, after all.

"Welcome home!" another girl answered from further inside. "Dad just went to get some things from the store, and Ichi-nii's not home yet."

"All right. By the way, I brought a friend."

The two walked into the kitchen, and Tanya saw who she supposed was Karin's sister. Their faces were extremely similar, but the other girl had short, blonde hair with one side held back by a strawberry hairclip. Tanya didn't see any uneven dyeing or dark roots, which likely meant the hair color was natural, despite the rest of her looking very Japanese.

'European descent? I didn't see any hint of it on Karin. They look about the same age. Half-sisters? Or perhaps each just favors one parent?'

"Oh, a friend? Anyone I know?"

"I don't think so." Karin pointed a thumb in Tanya's direction. "Ghost, you know."

"Ah, hello there, Ghost-san," she greeted in Tanya's general direction with a polite bow.

"Hello, I am Tanya Louisenbairn."

"Oh, I think I almost heard something!" she exclaimed in surprise.

"This is my sister, Yuzu. Yuzu, this is Tanya Louisenbairn."

"Oh, that sounds foreign. Spanish? German?"

"Something like that..." Tanya muttered. A lot of Hueco Mundo was strangely...Latine, though it had a fair bit of Japanese and Teutonic... She didn't want to call them references, but she wasn't sure what exactly caused the odd cultural echoes that showed up in the violent afterlife realm.

"She was wanting to try some coffee. Can you make some for us? Soccer practice has me feeling pretty drained today, too."

"Sure. I'd love to. Just a few minutes, Tanya-san. Feel free to wait at the table in the dining room."

"Right over here," Karin indicated before leading Tanya to the next room over where they sat on some zabuton placed next to the table.

'Ah, nostalgic!'

"So, where are you from?"

'Should I be honest here? Well, it's not like telling her will hurt anything. I could give her all the information I have, and there's nothing she could do with it unless some random Shinigami suddenly takes an interest in her, which I doubt. Lord Kaname said that they hardly ever interfere in the affairs of the living unless they do something to specifically upset the balance. Still, I shouldn't overwhelm her. Just the basics then.'

"I'm from a dimension called Hueco Mundo. It's the place where monstrous spirits dwell, born from the souls who lose their humanity after death, cursed to never fill the hole in their being, even as they eat other souls and each other."

"...That sounded like the most evil eye chuunibyo thing I've ever heard, and I'm 11. I've heard a lot."

Tanya couldn't help but bark out a laugh at that.

"Doesn't it? Like it's straight out of a shounen manga. But no, that's really what most of the place is like. Luckily, some of us are intelligent and have regained human form and reasoning. I was actually doubly lucky and was born like this. Well, as a baby, not this size."

"Figured. Wait, ghosts can have kids?"

"We're not so much ghosts as we are on a different part of a cycle of reincarnation." Tanya thought about whether or not she should explain Shinigami, but that might lead to having to explain their dynamic. While she was sure she could be persuasive once the facts were laid out, she'd still have to be arguing in favor of tearing down the old system to put a new and better one in its place, and she didn't know yet if the Kurosakis would be receptive to the idea of such change. As she mulled that idea, she caught sight of an oversized picture on the wall of a woman with strawberry-blonde hair and brown eyes, looking for all of the world like an adult version of Yuzu. Karin took notice and looked at the picture as well.

"Oh, that's our mom. After she died, Dad got kinda...eccentric. It's kinda sweet, even if he can be overbearing about it."

"Ah, I see. Sorry for your loss."

"It's fine. We were little when it happened."

Tanya also took note of several family pictures in more reasonable frames resting atop shelves and drawers, letting her see what the other members of the family looked like. The father was black-haired, square-jawed, and well-built, looking every bit like a strong, Japanese man. Their mother had a lovely figure, and while her eyes were Asiatic, her hair and lips were certainly more European in appearance. Then there was the brother, red-headed and resembling both parents a surprisingly equal amount. If she didn't have proof of his ancestry right there for comparison, Tanya might have thought he had taken to bleaching his hair to get that shade.

Next to all these pictures, however, was something else that caught her eye for a different reason, and once she saw it, she started noticing its presence in some of those photos. It was a pendant on a chain, placed upon a frame and set amongst the photos. It appeared the be a necklace charm, with five spokes, a circle halfway between the ends and the center, and a star etched into it where each point ended at the beginning of each spoke. Most might think it a simple shape, but Tanya recognized it from her studies.

'A Qunicy cross? But hadn't those been nearly wiped out so that only... No, wait, now this all makes sense! Each of these kids is spiritually sensitive, likely because they're Quincies, or at least the child of one Quincy and a more normal human. Their mother must have been a survivor. Or, well, a descendant of the survivors. It happened quite a while ago, after all. Assuming the father is unaware, she would have had three children, each with some potential to wield Quincy powers, though Yuzu might have needed more training to catch up to Karin's level. But since she died when they were little, she never got the chance to pass on whatever teachings and traditions they had.

'Might be for the better, if that thing about them destroying souls is real, but then again, she may have only been practicing in self-defense, likely in the case of a Shinigami attack as well as Hollows. Wouldn't be surprising if one of them got her. They nearly killed off the whole race once before rather than try to find out why their powers work like that and perhaps find an alternative. Then again, that risks the monopoly on the reincarnation cycle. Like an army of squishier Being X's, they have to lord over it and deny that anyone could do a better job. And kill you if you disagree before sticking your soul in the slums.

'Still, this is a good find. Quincies would naturally hate Shinigami if they learned about what they did, and these don't seem to have a bias against Hollows. Even if they did, I'm sure they can be turned around on Arrancar. It's basically the same as becoming human again, just more complex, and a lot more rewarding.'

"Here you go!" Yuzu cheerfully announced as she walked in with a platter with three steaming cups, a sugar bowl, and a glass of milk. "Wasn't sure how you like it, so I didn't add anything to yours, Tanya-san."

"Luckily, I prefer mine black," Tanya said as she picked up the unaltered cup of steamy goodness and took a deep whiff, almost crying as the aroma filled her nose and lungs.

"She said thanks, she likes it black," Karin passed to her sister, who was staring at the cup in mild wonder. Tanya's smile deepened when she realized that to her, the cup must have looked like it was floating in the air.

"Itadakimasu!" Tanya declared once she was sure her cup was at a safe temperature. While she was sure her Hierro wouldn't let something like scalding coffee actually hurt her, she wanted this sip to be as perfect as possible. The sisters repeated after her, Karin then Yuzu, and she took her first sip of coffee in over 70 years.

Bliss filled her being. Happiness and joy. An absolute flood of Arrancar dopamine and serotonin. It was possibly one of the best cups of coffee she had ever had, and not just because it had been so long. Truly, Yuzu was a talented girl, and anyone would be happy to taste whatever she made.

So total was Tanya's euphoria that she didn't notice when Yuzu gasped, nearly fumbled her own mug, and then frantically waved for her sister and then towards Tanya.

"I- I can see her! She's visible now!"

"Huh, you can?" Karin looked over, and Tanya looked between the two with a bit of confusion. Not enough to spoil her enjoyment, of course. She continued taking slow, deep sips.

"Can you hear me, too?"

"Oh my goodness, I can!" the blonde exclaimed. "Wow, I never got to talk to a ghost before! Karin, why didn't you tell me she was a cute girl around our age? I thought she was a grown-up for a moment."

"It didn't come up?" her sister said with a shrug.

"Ah, well, I'm not actually your age. I'm over 70 years old now. Arrancar just age slower." She took another deep draught and sighed contentedly. "If my father's to be believed, he's over a million years old, as in, he claims to predate modern humanity. Not sure if he's being honest or not, but he is old. At the very least, he poked around during the Bronze Age."

"Oh, that's actually pretty cool!" Yuzu remarked. "And, I think you're getting clearer, every time you take a sip. I think...my coffee made you visible to me." The girl then looked at the mug in front of her in quiet contemplation. "Ah! That's it! I must have put my heart into making you a good cup of coffee, and now through our bond I can see and hear you as clearly as any person."

"...Sure, makes sense."

Tanya hated to admit that it didn't not make sense. Not with the new logic of afterlife physics applied to it. Things tended to seem a lot more wooly when it came to magic or magic-like things in this world than her last. It had gone from a science that they didn't know the source behind nor the reasoning for the effects, and now she was in a system where the sources were a lot clearer, but the science was muffled and sometimes inconsistent, but effects had clear reasons. So, a girl with minor spiritual sensitivity made a cup of coffee for a spirit, put her metaphorical heart and soul into it, and now she could see the spirit that drank it? Sure. Made sense, if you skipped a step or two in the middle.

Then again, Yuzu could have just passed some threshold. But maybe Tanya drinking her coffee caused that? Made as much sense as anything. Tanya saw an Arrancar grow back all his limbs without losing any body mass a few months ago. Where did the mass for his regenerated limbs come from? Szayel was still cutting him apart to try and find that answer.

'Ooh, no thinking about him. Just enjoy coffee.' Tanya took a sip of the ambrosius liquid. 'Much better.'

~

"Well, it was nice meeting you and everything," Karin said as she and her twin escorted Tanya outside. Their gifts of coffee and a bag of beans pricked a bit at Tanya's heart since she almost certainly needed to report her findings, but she'd do her best to present them in the best and most useful light, as potential allies in the someday-to-come war against the Seireitei. Or, at worst, non-threatening neutrals.

"And thank you for the gifts. I will have to find a way to repay you somehow."

"Oh, don't feel obligated," Yuzu tried to wave her off.

"No, no, I insist. While I don't have much directly useful for humans at the moment, I have many resources at my disposal, and something should come in handy for you, or be worth exchanging for something else of use."

"Thanks, but like Yuzu said, don't feel pressured."

"Oh, Ichi-nii's home."

For a second, Tanya wondered why Yuzu counted, then realized she meant her brother, Ichi-something, who was walking down the sidewalk.

'A lot bigger than those photos. Didn't Karin say he's 15? What do they feed kids here to get them that big? Definitely takes after his father's physique, just has to fill out.'

The boy paused in his steps upon seeing her, but continued on walking up. Tanya could sense his reiatsu, and he was a veritable waterfall of power. Not only that, but there were fading hints of energy that let her know he hadn't just been out and about. Some Hollows out there had ceased existing if she was right.

'I'm hoping the soul destruction thing is just a result of certain techniques and not inherent to their energy. If we can work around that, then there's no reason they can't help out. Or just live a peaceful life. Though it seems the brother has at least discovered he has power and how to use it.'

"Girls, who's this?"

"This is Tanya," Karin introduced her. "She wanted to have some coffee. Loves the stuff."

"I made her visible!"

"We don't know how far that extends, but yes, both your sisters can see me now," Tanya explained.

"Wait, your... You have a hole in your chest."

Tanya gasped as though scandalized. "My word! Do you just go around pointing out every girl's holes or their lack of chest?"

"Huh, what, no, I didn't- That's not what I-"

The Arrancar chuckled. "Hahaha, you should see your face!"

'Ah, good to use my for to have a little fun now and again. What's the point of being an adorable little girl if I can't use it to my advantage once in a while?'

"She got you good, Ichigo," Karin said while Yuzu looked like she was fighting the laughing fit she wanted to have.

"Anyway, I'd love to stay and introduce myself, but I've already been gone a while, and I'd rather not have my people worry. Thank you both again. I'll try to visit again in the future." She then gave her friendliest smile to the brother, Ichi-whatever. She was pretty sure 'strawberry' was just a nickname, so it was better to stick to the side of caution and not presume she could call him such. "Let's try to get to know each other better in the future, Onii-san. I'm sure we could do a lot for one another."

With that, Tanya activated her descorrer, ripping open a Garganta to the void between worlds before stepping inside and waving goodbye as it closed. She then followed her instincts forward to her home, cloak flapping behind her in the strange reishi winds that swirled in the near-emptiness.

'Today was a good day. And mildly productive despite technically being an off day. I've made connections and possibly got an in with an experienced fighter. I'll have to act quickly if I want to actually get him on my side, of course. Can't let good talent go to waste because he went off fighting some Hollow he couldn't handle. Plus, probably better if we make sure he's not obliterating all the souls they've eaten. If that is the case, then it's better if...pretty much anyone else does it until an alternative is found. And if there isn't one...

'Well, I could use more allies for when I finally get back at Being X.'

~

Ichigo was greatly confused about Tanya, the strange ghost that was hanging out with his sisters when he got home. She looked like a little girl, but something about the way she held herself and spoke... He didn't know what it was, but it reminded him of when Rukia would get serious, only more, somehow. And that smile she flashed him. It was like seeing a tiger or lion ready to pounce, and the beast knows you can't escape. Along with her almost-promise to meet again, he felt like he was being toyed with. Or about to be, in any case. Then there was the fact that she didn't have a chain, but instead a hole, like a Hollow. Yet she was still human in shape. Karin only gave him some basics, saying she was something called an Arrancar. Yuzu had been a bit more scattered about it, telling him more about Tanya's likes and dislikes that she had gleaned from their conversations. And apparently, that strange crown wasn't just for show. She was a princess wherever she was from. Or at least, before some coup that overthrew her father, though she was firm in her belief that their new system was actually better than the old one.

It was all so weird. He was sure Rukia could explain it, but she had some things to do before she got back, so he could really only mull over his questions until then. Right now, he was wondering if there was a way to test if whatever happened with Yuzu let her see more ghosts than just the one.

"And what was with that portal thing?" he wondered aloud.

Saga of the Princess of the Hollow World

Chapter 2: A New Beginning

---

One moment, she had closed her eyes, everything had faded, and in the next, sensation returned. Pressure, muffled sounds, weakness, warmth, wetness. It was a veritable cacophony of sensation, threatening to overwhelm her, but she held on, trying to concentrate and find a way out of this mystery predicament.

Then she was out of the dark place, light shining down upon her, a woman screaming nearby, and her lungs filled with air before she herself screamed, hoping to ground herself. Rather than the sound she had become accustomed to in her life, she heard something more akin to the wailing of a baby. It was at that moment that she realized what exactly had gone down.

'Not this shit again!'

Before she could curse her immortal enemy for (assumedly) once again dumping her into a new life with her past lives' memories intact, her attention was taken as her alarmingly clear eyes (for an infant) took in the sight of a monster hovering over her. It was like some mad fusion of a butterfly and a tentacled beast, and it face was either skull-like and devoid of flesh, or it was wearing a mask of bone. Having once been a Japanese man, and therefore a Japanese teenage boy beforehand, she knew about the possibilities presented by the presence of a tentacle monster and was deeply hoping that they weren't going to hold true for this life, no matter which tropes it followed.

Nearby gasping then caught her attention, and she looked over to see a dark-haired woman strapped to a bed, her position and general state letting her know that this had to be her mother. For the most part, she appeared to be a plain human, but she had a mask covering half of her face that resembled half of an oversized human skull. She took in deep breaths and seemed to power through the pain of post-labor to open her eyes and look at the baby.

"...she's okay?" the woman muttered, surprisingly in Japanese, with some unplacable accent.

"Female, as I predicted," the tentacle monster declared. "Healthy. Mask is forming. So, it only comes after birth. I suppose that avoids complications."

"Can I-" A tentacle whipped out and smacked against her mother's mouth. Tanya found herself unconsciously moving, feeling distraught about the abuse her parent was facing, despite being unable to do anything about it and logically knowing such.

"Don't interrupt my thoughts. Lumina, Verona, bring the transport. And clean this thing up. It's filthy."

Two more monsters showed up from an adjacent room, one pushing a stroller and the other carrying towels and a pan of water. They resembled pillbugs but with four long legs rather than short ones and four insectile arms. Only their 'faces' were distinct from each other, though both resembled giant, toothy smiles. One had hornlike growths to the sides, while the other had one pointed straight up.

"Here to clean up."

"Cleaning up."

"Cleaning."

The tentacle monster passed her off, and one bug monster quickly scrubbed her clear of amniotic fluids and blood with warm water before passing her to the other, who swaddled her and placed her into the stroller.

'This place... I don't know what's going on, but I'm starting to think monsters like this might be common, and given my mother's treatment... It better not be something like that or I will destroy everything and then myself. I don't know what game Being X is playing this time, but I'm not just going to go along with it to be raised into some monster broodmare.'

"Now, clean up and see to Roka. It'll be easier to feed the little brat if she's around."

"Yes, Master Szayelaporro," they answered before skittering over and beginning to clean and medically tend to her mother.

"Cleaning."

"Seeing."

With that, the floating tentacle beast named Szayelaporro began pushing the stroller out of the room and down a hallway that led up a ramp and into the night. The stars were absent, and the moon held a strange shape, seeming crescent, but too far around, the points touching on the other side of the circular shadow, telling her that this world was neither of the Earths she was familiar with.

Surrounding them was a vast desert of white sand, pockmarked by odd plants that looked almost like stone or crystals and some sturdy boulders. Nearby, however, a portion of the desert found itself oddly filled. Pillars stood some distance away, marking a territory of sorts, and within it, monsters of various forms and sizes stood in a loose crowd. They ranged from bestial to amorphous, some of them being some unique combination of animalistic traits, real or imagined. Hides of fur and scales, and even some that were armored in carapace. The two commonalities of these strange beasts was that each one had a hole going all the way through its body and a mask or mask-like face.

At the head of this crowd of monstrosities was a raised platform of stone with a throne atop it. About the platform were a handful of smaller monsters of humanoid shape, though they still had animal-like aspects about them, like claws, tails, or even their mask-face resembling a creature of some sort. But on the throne was something else. Its face wasn't mask-like at all, but rather its whole head was merely a skull. It was dressed in voluminous purple robes lined with black fur, a gold crown upon its head, golden chains dangling from skeletal wrists, and a golden amulet hanging down in front of its chest.

The lich-looking being took notice of them as Szayelaporro approached, its empty sockets turning towards them. Tanya felt fear running through her at its gaze. The monsters arrayed before this open-air throneroom all looked dangerous and felt powerful, and the humanoid ones felt even greater than them, despite being far smaller on average. And yet, it was this regal skeletal being that seemed to lord over them all. And her...midwife was bringing her straight to it.

"Szayelaporro Granz," the kingly creature called out just as they reached the edge of the platform, his voice penetrating her mind and lingering, "you have done well not to disappoint me."

"I aim to please, King Barragan," the tentacled monster said before bowing and backing away. "As you commanded, an heir, crafted from a piece of yourself and born through...natural means."

'Wait, heir? Crafted?' As she parsed the information she had just received, she started seeing the situation in an entirely new light. 'But then that would make him... Oh, well, at least now I know why I am being shown to...the king.'

As the heady thoughts spun through her mind, the king stood from his throne, and all the monsters kneeled in supplication. He stepped forward and looked down into the stroller. She felt that tingle running through her again, but braced herself against it. If this was her father, and he had her...made on purpose, then she should have nothing to fear. Rather, she looked him over, wondering how exactly this whole thing worked.

'Well, my mother was human. Or at least, something close. Maybe they used some form of magic or technology to...artificially impregnate her, using his DNA?'

Even as she thought this, Barragan leaned over, reached forward, and plucked her from the soft bedding of her transport. Despite his skeletal nature, he was big. Were he of flesh, she could easily imagine him being a solidly built man, and now he was holding her up. Normally, one shouldn't hold a newborn this way, but she felt a bit stronger and more solid than someone minutes old should. It was maybe more akin to a few months old, as she was holding up her own head without feeling too much strain on her neck.

"Born with a crown already on your brow and a strong will in your eyes. Yes, this is my child. My heir." He turned her around and held her in the crook of one arm, his robes surprisingly soft on the other side of her swaddling. "Here me, Hollows. Hear me, Menos. Hear me, my Espada. Hear me, Las Noches. Hear me and obey, Hueco Mundo! My heir is born! Your princess is here!" He then lifted her up above his head to where all could clearly see her, making her feel a bit like that cub from the lion movie. "My child, whose words and commands shall only be second to my own! Swear your lives and fealty to her desire after mine. As your god-king, I, Dio-Rey Barragan Louisenbairn, name her, Princesa Tanya Louisenbairn!"

The monsters cheered, roared, shrieked, and howled. It was the sound of a horde of beasts, baying for their leader, echoing across the vast sands.

In the mind of the newly named child, her thoughts drifted over to one particular part of the announcement.

'Is that name just going to follow me every life now? Well, at least I don't have to learn a new one.'

---

Tanya was unsure about the passage of time. She couldn't ask for a while, as while she understood the language, her vocal chords weren't ready for what felt like months. Luckily, she learned to walk relatively quickly, and no one really questioned it. In fact, no one questioned anything she did at all, unless it was out of curiosity. That could probably be credited to her father and his manner of rule, which was, in short, brutal.

Oh, he wasn't violent for violence's sake, but when something managed to rouse his anger, his fury was something to behold, especially if someone did something serious enough for him to call upon his signature finishing move, Respira. She had only seen it used twice, and both times he took it far away from anything he didn't want damaged, which included herself, thus it was only at a great distance. Her eyesight was good, however, comparable to a low-level sniping formula, so she still witnessed the slow withering that those Hollows went through, being made to rot and decay so rapidly that it was visible, but not so quickly that they didn't suffer through the several seconds it took to finally kill them.

But it made sense, once she learned more about the nature of Hollows. These weren't beings born or created, normally. Szayelaporro's creations were nowhere near the norm, and even her 'natural' development after the IVF that saw her conceived was a rare thing for Hollows to perform. No, the lion's share of her 'people' were the spirits of humans who died, and, for one reason or another, did not pass on into the cycle of reincarnation, thus they degraded until their metaphysical 'heart' melted away and became a mask, turning them into a monster that hungered for souls, trying to fill the pit in their being. But the hunger only grew until baseline human souls could not sate it, and so they went after other Hollows, who would likely be filled with a plethora of souls until they transformed into the next stage: a mindless mass of fused souls known as a Gillian, the first stage of Menos Grande. These poor things stumbled around, occasionally eating, but not quite hungering, until one of the many egos within them rose above the rest and took the reigns. Once it is in control, the Gillian becomes an Adjucha, and this stage is what most of her father's direct subjects were. Unique, bestial, and ever-hungry. The Adjuchas have the issue of needing rather than wanting to eat, as their instability threatens to drag them back down into the Gillian stage, stuck in that mindless form forever and unable to rise back out. If an Adjuchas successfully hunts down enough of its own kind, however, and passes an unknown threshold, they evolved into the final form of Hollow: Vasto Lorde.

About half of Barragan's Espada, a unit of elites akin to knights, are Vasto Lorde. Stable Menos Grande with immense power and a human shape. Tanya found that they were also among the calmest and most intelligent of the Hollow race, and that the ones here serving directly under the king were perhaps anywhere from 10 to 50 percent of all living Vasto Lorde in existence. Szayelaporro used to be the strongest of them, but then got it into his head that he needed to be 'perfect' and so he started surgically removing pieces of himself he considered imperfect, creating a handful of other Hollows, including one containing the soul of his brother from when they were living humans, who was out there traipsing around with a pack now, and the proto-form of her own mother.

She refused, however, to think of the creature in any familial terms. He was an insane and wasteful excuse of a 'scientist' that made Shugel look grounded at his worst. At least Shugel tried to make helpful things, even if his methods could become unhinged and his designs dangerous. Szayel did half of what he did just to sate his curiosity, be cruel to his subjects, or further his 'perfection'. The other half were demands made by his superiors that he grumbled and groused about having to do.

Tanya hated him on principle and for personal reasons. His abuse of her mother went beyond silencing her with physical blows. She witnessed him berating her entire existence over and over, for no other reason than to put her down on the rare occasions she seemed to be even a little happy. Saying things like how she'd finally found some use beyond being a 'rock' and had become a 'vat' of food instead.

The moment Tanya figured out how to talk clearly, she decided she was going to get in the squid butterfly's way. Of course, Szayel's suggestion about vivisecting Roka tilted her to do it a little earlier than planned.

"No!" she screamed, forcing herself to keep her cool and not tip her hand too far. She was still a baby in everyone's minds, after all, even if she had started growing teeth. She couldn't be forming complex sentences at this juncture. Maybe in a year or two.

"What the- What did you just tell me, brat?" the monster said to her, turning his attention from her frozen-in-fear.

"Mine!" she demanded, grabbing the hem of Roka's skirt and clenching it while looking up at Szayel with undisguised hate. "My mama! Not yous!"

'Er, I hate having to dumb down my speech, especially for something like this. Still, I can't have anyone thinking I'd just let someone take something that should be obviously important to me away like this. My future subordinates have to believe I would be willing to stand up for them when necessary, and how can they believe that about someone who let their mother be sliced up on some madman's examination table just because he wanted to see how an Arrancar looks inside post-partum?

'Also, she is my mother. I've only known her for a few months, but I can honestly see that she cares about me. Father could kill half the world if he decided to put in the effort, but his power isn't really designed with the defense of others in mind. I haven't seen much of Mother's skills and abilities, but she's a decent medic from what I've pulled together.'

"That isn't your 'mama', little girl. That's a tool that happened to have a womb attached to it that I used to make you. Why am I even bothering to explain this to you? Get out of my way!"

Tanya saw a tentacle coming towards her. While she was sure he wouldn't harm her for fear of reprisal, he would restrain her and take Roka Paramia away for whatever sick experiments he had in mind, probably with a grudge after Tanya's attempted defiance. Which meant that she definitely couldn't let him, now!

"Get away!" she called out as she threw a fist at the oncoming appendage. Something formed in her hand, pouring out from her body and solidifying in her grip even as she thrust it forward. Szayel cried out as his limb was pierced, and then the three of them saw that a weapon had formed in Tanya's hand. A silver barrel on a white stock, looking like a decorative gun, with a black blade attached to the bottom of the barrel like a bayonet, its edge extending along its length and terminating at the trigger with a gap at the grip. Somehow, a rifle had come into being, perfectly sized for her tiny body. Tanya was shocked but quickly grasped the weapon in a proper grip like she had drilled into her a lifetime ago, letting go of her mother's skirt for a moment to take proper aim as the hole in the blade moved with her forward grip, and fired the moment the bayonet was pulled out of the Adjucha's tentacle. A ball of energy blasted Szayel, and he shouted while retreating down the hall. She then quickly grabbed Roka's hand.

"Run, mama!" she ordered before heading back outside.

Barragan happened to have been in a state of boredom when they reached him, which meant he was actually welcoming for the distraction. Rather than anger, he seemed amused about the explanation once Roka went into detail to expand on the fragments that Tanya told him. Unfortunately for Tanya's hope of getting rid of the mad scientist, Roka had spoken in his defense about how he certainly had zero intention of harming 'the princess' and likely only planned to move her away. It wasn't like Tanya could refute it except to say that she was scared of him. Hollows looked down on people who let fear control them. Anger was the proper response if you ever found yourself in an unfavorable position in this society, or apathy if you found it tiring to continue being angry. Hence even a doormat like her mother was viewed in a better light than someone who might beg for mercy.

Tanya hated it, but could see how it developed in a literal dog-eat-dog world.

Still, her father decided that it was a show of Tanya's strong willpower and her unwillingness to give up what was hers. By the time Szayel dared to show his face after healing his wounds and cleaning himself of blood and soot, Barragan had declared that Princesa Tanya had 'won' her challenge to Szayel's right to Roka. In effect, because he ran from their fight over her, Roka Paramia was 'hers' now. In her mind, Tanya wanted to object to how close the wording skirted towards slavery, but then realized that such a thing was just a fact of life for Hueco Mundo.

The strong ruled over the weak. The strong would eat the weak, should they choose. If the weak wanted to live, then they had to be more useful to the strong alive rather than as food. Perhaps that was why Roka just gave in to Szayel's cruelty. Because, at the end of the day, she would survive. He could carve her open without so much as a drop of anesthetic and stitch her back together - something he had done several times before Tanya's birth, apparently. She would suffer. She'd be in pain. She'd feel less and less like a thing of any worth, much less a person. But she'd live.

Packs formed under the heels of stronger Adjuchas willing to grind their faces into the sand to prove a point, but they'd survive off their scraps.

Hollows would supplicate to almost any demand of a Vasto Lorde they could withstand the spiritual pressure of if it meant getting an edge against the countless others roaming the sands.

Hueco Mundo was a world without civilization. The strong were lauded and the weak were despised if anyone bothered to give them the time of day at all. Tanya knew how a better world could be, but she didn't know how she could apply it to something like this, a system that demanded sacrifice for survival. The only escape there seemed to be was to climb so high that the hunger finally faded and rationality could return.

She touched her mask fragment with one hand as the other cradled her weapon. She was an exception to the rule in two ways. Born Hollows existed outside the evolutionary hunger. They could still eat souls and grow stronger from it, but they didn't have that same push, nor did they have the risks associated with the Adjuchas stage. She was also an Arrancar, a Ripped Mask Hollow. Any Menos Grande, and even some baseline Hollows could become an Arrancar, but there was a great risk to it. It was practically an instinctual ritual that had to be followed through precisely, with the Hollow needing to enter a trance-like state to accomplish it without killing or maiming themselves. Most Arrancar existed in little communities dotted about the desert, as it is best achieved when there's someone that can be trusted with watching your back and ready to take their turn afterward. Roka was Arrancarified by Szayel as an experiment long ago, and the trait had passed on to Tanya.

There were other things that made some hesitate. The drop in power. The physical changes. Going from needing no real food besides other Hollows to actually requiring nutrition. Water.

But those needs could be met. Tanya was eating well on a diet of cave mushrooms, moon fruit, and roasted lizard. Sure, the desert wasn't exactly teeming with resources, and water had be dug for below the Menos Forest that was under the desert itself, but it was found all the time. There were even tales of a great ocean far to the west. But when creatures capable of running faster than some modern fighter jets said something was far away enough to become a legend, then it was certainly too far to depend on.

She could work with this, but it was going to take time. And convincing. Mostly of her father, but she was sure she could do it. Not having to cycle out his troops to allow them to eat other potential subjects should be enticing enough of a proposition. And then there was the bent that maybe managing resources like food and water could bring him out of his perpetual boredom. As it was, she seemed to be the only interesting thing going on in his life, but that was bound to lessen as time went on and she reached adulthood.

She just needed to make sure she had a clearly laid out plan to convince him of, and to be old enough to present it while being taken seriously. No need to rush it this time. She could wait until after puberty was through before trying to be taken seriously by the powers that be.

---

It was years later that Tanya's plan faced its biggest hiccup, yet there was also a great opportunity that she had yet to see.

At the time, though, she was just scared out of her mind about what she had walked upon. She had been away in her little hovel home, effectively a hollowed-out boulder with a growing collection of amenities, when she heard a commotion going on outside. Curious, she grabbed the weapon that she had taken to calling Negraplata and headed outside.

It was there that she saw her father, his crown fallen from his head in half, facing three unknown men. They looked human, wearing black robes and white overcoats with kanji numbers on their backs. Also, several of the Adjuchas that had been there that day were now littering the grounds, slain by blades and slowly disappearing.

"You..." Barragan said, surprise having crawled into his voice in a way she had never heard before, "How can you still be alive?"

The man wearing glasses raised his katana toward him. "My Zanpakuto, Kyoka Suigetsu, has the power of complete hypnosis."

'Complete hypnosis?' Tanya thought as she pushed down her panic. 'That can't be. Surely there's some limit, but... I don't know what happened here. Wait, have they noticed me? Can I distract them? If I get his attention, then surely that'll give Father an opening. There's no way he could hold two separate people under it, right? But what if he can? What can I do about a power like that?
The man had suddenly changed his grip, holding his sword with the blade pointed down, and Tanya sensed an increase in his reiatsu. Quickly, she covered her eyes.

"Shatter, Kyoka Suigetsu."

She heard her father gasp and dared to look over her fingers. It was like he was just now noticing his fallen soldier's bodies.

'They made him think he was winning while they slaughtered our men!'

"You bastard!" Barragan roared while raising Gran Caida. Before he could act, the other two were at his sides, swords pointed at his head.

"Don't do anything rash," the glasses-wearing man warned him. "It's pointless. You won't be able to kill me."

Tanya took aim at the back of the man's head. She doubted that she could hurt him alone, but all they needed was a second to-

And then a blade was held at her throat, the point right at her. The dark-skinned man with an orange scarf and blindfold had moved faster than she could perceive.

"What is this?" he asked. "I sensed a strange reiatsu, but this Hollow seems particularly small."

"T-Tanya!" Barragan called out as he realized she was there. The other two were looking over at her as well now. "Don't... Don't you dare harm her!"

The glasses man smirked.

"Oh, and what will you do if she is?"

"If you so much as harm a single hair on her head, then nothing you do will stop me from killing you all!" A mere trickle of his Respira came out, and the stones below him slowly began to crumble. The squinty one noticed and stepped away, troubled by what he was seeing happen. "Your very dust will rot until nothing is left!"

"Such an action will have consequences, you know. If I understand what you are suggesting, then not only will you destroy everything for miles in the attempt, but I doubt that even you would remain unscathed."

Barragan growled, seemingly knowing that the man was not incorrect in his assumption.

"A small price to make sure you pay."

The two stared at one another for a while longer, challenging the other to make the first move.

"Kaname, is the child a threat?"

At that, the dark man flinched.

"Child?"

"The little Hollow. It's an Arrancar child. I have a guess as to where she came from. But is she an actual threat?"

"...No. Not with this reiryoku I sense."

"My my, you went and threatened a little girl without even knowing, Kaname-san," the silver-haired one admonished.

"If she's no threat, then there's no need to harm her. Satisfactory, I would say. Wouldn't you agree, King of Hueco Mundo?"

Barragan lowered his head, and Tanya felt a pit form in her stomach. A moment later, Negraplata was snatched from her hands.

"This feeling... A Zanpakuto?" the blond man asked as he rubbed a thumb against the blade.

"Well, that grew a little tense. Let's try to start over, shall we?" the glasses-wearing man suggested as he sheathed his blade and walked over to Tanya. "My name is Aizen Sousoke. And who are you?"

"Tanya," she answered, slowly calming down now that the situation... She couldn't think of it as resolved, but it certainly seemed that whatever confrontation there was, it was ending in these men's favor. "Tanya Louisenbairn."

Their eyes met, and Tanya refused to be cowed. Not completely. She had been outmatched and outgunned, and so she had surrendered. But that didn't mean she had to give up everything. For whatever reason, these men wanted Barragan alive and under their heel, which meant that she, too, would be forced to serve under them in whatever they were planning. It was just more of the system that Hueco Mundo professed, might making right. Underhanded tactics, misdirections, and illusions were all a form of might as well, and they had deployed them to overcome the once ruler of Las Noches. She didn't know how they would have done in a direct fight. It didn't matter. They were the victors today.

Tomorrow would be a new day. Until it came, she'd stand strong and ready.

"I see," Aizen said while rubbing his chin. "I had my suspicions. Well, this is certainly an interesting development. Let us work together, Tanya-san."

---

In hindsight, Aizen's takeover was probably one of the best things to happen, the deaths of a dozen of the strongest Adjuchas notwithstanding.

May they be reborn to a better life.

After explaining his plan and demonstrating his invention, Aizen started building an army of Arrancar made from a plethora of Adjuchas and several Vasto Lorde. Some of the first examples were made from Uncle Yylfordt's pack (though she hated Szayel, his brother was nice enough, for a Hollow, and was even a competent tactician), including the infamous Grimmjow Jaegerjaquez. A bit of a battle maniac, even by Hollow standards, but a strong fighter nonetheless. Unlike the normal process, Aizen's invention, the Hogyoku, could make any Hollow into an Arrancar without power loss or risk of death or maiming. After that, Adjuchas practically lined up to serve him, and even a few Vasto Lorde joined, despite having no fear of losing themselves. Even Tia Harribel, who had been obstinately refusing to join Barragan for centuries, bowed to Aizen. Tanya figured she had done so for her underlings' sakes. She was a rather sentimental woman like that.

And to support this army, systems to draw water and make food had to be developed, as well as several bureaucratic units to oversee them and keep things running. The supports were rather skeletal, at first, but between herself and some other Arrancar whose interest lay outside of fighting, they managed to shore it up enough to feed the army while allowing for future growth. They say it once took a village to feed, arm, and armor a single knight, but Tanya liked to think that they could make do with a small town for their forces. After all, their skin was their armor and they came with their own weapons. Thus the Cuerpo de Palas (Shovel Corps) came to be, supporting the Números army and their Espada leadership from just out of sight.

It became pretty obvious to Tanya what Aizen was really setting out to do once it was explained. He couched it in the language of conquest that was easily digestible to the majority of the Hollow population, but the hints about freedom and upending the status quo combined with his insistence on them organizing and learning to lead themselves let her know what he was really doing. He was trying to civilize them, to drag them up from the scattered monster packs and tribes that they were into cultured people. That's also why he wanted to overthrow an entity he and his fellow Shinigami traitors called the Soul King. Tanya had asked about it, and what they explained was that the Soul King was the one in charge of the cycle of reincarnation. A description she once heard a certain creature apply to himself along with delusions of grandeur about being the One True God.

To say that she was on board, should her theory prove right and this Reio was none other than the hated Being X, was an understatement. Even if it wasn't and there was some degree of separation between the target of her eternal ire and the one overseeing this particular sphere of existence, well, it was a step in the right direction. Besides, Aizen was right about one thing, this system was awful. So many souls were left to simply wither away into monsters and doomed to eat one another until finally one got so fattened up that it became a demi-god, or got slain somewhere along the way by self-appointed upholders of some vague balance and dropped into the 'proper' place for souls to spend their afterlife: an overcrowded district with more shantytowns than there were Adjuchas and maybe a handful of half-decent living areas, all trapped in the feudal era at best and subject to the iron fist of a cadre of nobles who live so long as to be practically immortal in the citizenry's eyes.

For a while, Tanya was skeptical, but each of the three Shinigami gave her a different perspective and spin on it. Aizen's was the purely logical one, simply wanting to reset the system into something approaching efficiency. Kaname was more sentimental, once one dug past his shell of thirsting for justice in the world. He would have likely been satisfied with a simple revolution, to overthrow the corrupt nobles that ran the afterlife like it was no more than a plot of land in a worldly empire. Aizen's plan happened to do this and more, so he signed on. Gin's intentions were the hardest to read, but she figured she had him pegged to a few possibilities. Either way, when he shared info, it was either matter-of-factly, or done in a way to seek out a response. Like when he explained how past a certain point in the Rukongai, people were more likely to kill each other over shoes than anything like food or money. Most souls didn't have to eat, and money was worth less and less the further from the center you were. But a decent pair of shoes? Not even good ones, just a pair that weren't full of holes or falling apart. That could be worth a relatively small fortune out there.

So yes, if even half of it was true - and why would they be lying to a being whose greatest luxury before they showed up was a pillow - then Tanya was all for toppling the old regime and installing a new one. And hopefully keep them from falling into certain societal pitfalls, like communism.

As time went on, things just seemed to be getting better and better. Her father still grumbled, but it was understandable. She and his most loyal supporters let him know that he was still a king in their eyes.

"Besides," she told him one time after she had set out some workers towards building a waste management site, "Shinigami still age. You'll outlive him in the long run, if you're careful."

That brought a smile to the old man's lips. It was interesting, seeing him with flesh on his bones. He turned out a bit fatter than she expected, but he was still a small giant with muscle to spare. It just seemed to be a part of his new physique.

She still tried to get him into an exercise routine. It could only help.

But her talent really shined when she started training a number of rather...uninspired recruits who seemed to think they could afford to rest on their laurels despite not having any. It had been a spur-of-the-moment thing after she found herself arguing with the ringleader of the lazy Arrancar group. She had almost lost her cool, then took a breath, and decided that what they obviously needed was some inspiration.

So she started firing Ceros at them.

They were purposeful near-misses and low-powered, but they didn't need to know that. They set off into a run, and then she ran them through a course of training exercises with the threat of Negraplata behind her. Once they were done, she gave them her leave, and said she expected to see them training tomorrow or she'd have to get creative again.

Apparently, Kaname had witnessed the whole thing. Rather than dressing down on her overstepping some unspoken bounds, he praised her forward-thinking, saying that it was better that they suffer a little now rather than become dead meat as soon as they reached the battlefield.

She had just gotten angry at the blatant laziness, but that worked, too.

After that, she was put in charge of the overall training of the Números. While she didn't directly train all of them, more than a few passed under her tutelage before getting handed off to either the main forces or some specialist unit. A few even got picked up as Fracciones by this or that Espada. And then there were the ones that stuck it out and made it through her harshest lessons, adapted from her training of the 203rd so long ago. Escudo, she called them. The name actually came from Dordoni Alessandro Del Socaccio when he overheard her muttering about 'new meatshields', but it become so popular she felt obligated to adopt it.

Now, after successfully obtaining her sacred substance and having a cup in the morning, she was ready to train yet more recruits in the sacred arts of dodging. Today was on-foot training, as Seireitei's composition did not allow for reishi manipulating air-walking, so they needed to know how to work when they were ground-bound, especially since exceptions could exist and some Shikai or Bankai out there could likely let their wielder fly. The fact that Loly Aivirrne, a rather annoying girl, was cycled into her class was just icing on the cake.

"She's going to kill us!" the under-dressed Arrancar screamed as another Cero barely missed her and her blonde friend.

"Not if you dodge correctly like I explained." Honestly, it was like they had zoned out when she described applying Sonido multi-directionally to allow oneself freer movement across the field. So many Espada did it unconsciously. And then there was that odd one, Zommari or something. He took to it like a duck to water, and now he was getting fast-tracked towards a possible shot at Espadahood. Too bad there were ever only ten, and somehow Yammy Llargo still qualified for his spot, the skilless slab of muscle.

"Usagi Jokanbu, feet moving!" Tanya commanded before firing toward the violet-haired, bunny-masked Arrancar. The woman screamed but dodged half-properly. Impressive for the first lesson. Tanya was about to unleash one toward Menoly and the red-haired male when she saw three figures run right past them, followed by a familiar-looking worm Hollow.

"Hold on, what in the world..." She zoomed down, signaling a pause in the training session. "Hold for now. I'm investigating this disturbance."

"Should we follow?" Menoly asked, too late for Loly's shushing hiss to have any effect.

"Good idea. I might need more hands on deck just in case. Follow me, cadets."

Tanya then sped off after the Hollows, passing by the familiar worm, the oddly preportioned tiki-looking creature, and the bug-masked humanoid to catch up to the tiny leading figure, who was screaming loudly, sounding like a child in peril.

'An Arrancar? And such a small one, too. Those old clothes definitely weren't made in Las Noches, though, so they must be from one of the outer communities. These Hollows probably thought they found an easy meal. Well, time to disabuse them of that assumption.'

"Engage!" Tanya quickly commanded her troops, who had thankfully caught up to her and the unknown Hollows. "Restrain those three!"

In an almost comical fashion, the Números tackled the three unknowns to the ground, casting up sand with their impacts. Loly brought down the bug-masked one and pinned it down with a foot onto its chest. Menoly tackled the polka-dotted tiki and was sitting on its back. It took four of the remaining trainees to hold down the big-lipped worm, including Usagi, who then took point by standing atop its neck and holding her spearlike weapon threateningly at its head.

"Bawa!" the worm cried out pitifully.

The tiny Arrancar slowed to a stop and turned around to see what had happened, then shouted in surprise and ran back towards the crowd, blowing right past Tanya.

'Wait, she wasn't that fast a second ago.'

"Wah! Wha're you doing? Don't hurt Nel'sh friends!"

"Uh, what?"

"Well, now I'm confused."

"Did that baby just say Nel?"

"Nel?" Tanya questioned as she stopped to look down at the child, who then pulled back their hood. Tanya was taken aback, seeing a familiar face on a much smaller body. "No way."

The child was nearly a perfect replica of the long-missing Nelliel Tu Odelshwanck, a long-standing Vasto Lorde Espada who had been among the most powerful to fill the ranks once upon a time. Then one day, she and her Fracciones disappeared without a trace, only a few holes in their home giving any indication that there'd been a confrontation, but any evidence that could have pointed to who the attacker was had been strangely absent. This little 'Nel' looked just like that woman, even their masks were similar, though the little one's lacked ram's horns and only had half the teeth. She even had a similar red mark across her nose and below her eyes.

"Same hazel eyes and teal-green hair," Tanya thought aloud, which seemed to perk up the bug-masked Hollow's attention, stealing it away from him gazing up Loly's skirt.

"Ah ahahaha, what do you mean the same? Same as nothing around here, I don't imagine! Hey, you must be from Aizen's army, right? Oh, we love the guy! Unfortunately, we're worthless as fighters, so we try to not get in the way by-"

"That voice! You're Pesche Guatiche! I'd recognize that annoying cadence anywhere!"

"Annoying?" the Hollow seemed hurt by the comment, but Tanya could slow down for his feelings.

"Then you must be Mr. Birstanne," she said to the polka-dotted one, now seeing the resemblance of his current form to his former.

"Hey, I prefer to go by Dondochakka. Mr. Birstanne was my father, don't you know."

"Ah, yes, forgive me. It's been a while."

"Uh, Princesa," one of the recruits, Patros if she remembered correctly, spoke up, "Who exactly are these people?"

"Ah, of course. They were before your time. Well, through my powers of deduction, I figure that," she pointed towards Pesche, "and that," then at Dondachakka, "to be the two Fracciones of the Former Tres Espada, Nelliel Tu Odelshwanck. The woman went missing a few years ago, just before most of you showed up. And the worm must be Bawabawa, a power expression of Dodanchakka's."

"Hey, he's got feelings of his own, too, you know."

"Of course. I remember. Doesn't take away from what his origin is. Speaking of, this," she quickly picked up the child Arrancar from under her arms, lifting her up for the others to get a better look, "must be Nelliel's secret child."

The former Fracciones had stiffened when she grabbed the child, but then relaxed once it was clear she had no ill intentions. They only seemed to relax further when Tanya held her in a more natural position at her side.

"Nelliel?" the little girl questioned, holding a finger up to her mouth in thought. It was then that Tanya took note of the scar on her head.

"You poor thing. What happened here?" she asked while rubbing a thumb over the old wound. It looked like whatever caused it had been particularly bad, perhaps even causing those cracks in her mask. That could be dangerous, even for an Arrancar. She heard Szayel had done some experiments on that, but she had done what she could to keep him from using up their 'human' resources for his mad science, thus the pool was kept limited to those already suffering such damage.

"Oh uh, well, you see, what happened was..." Pesche started before stopping. "Uh, there was a hole."

"A big hole," Dondachakka added.

"A reeeeally big hole."

"And deep, too."

"Waaaaaaay deep."

"And dark."

"So dark."

"You're telling me she fell into a hole and hit her head?" Tanya demanded, anger seeping out of her voice.

"Oh uh, we weren't around at the time!" Pesche tried to excuse himself.

"You left a child all alone!"

"She was asleep," Dondachakka defended, tears forming at the corners of his eyes, somehow.

"In a cave."

"A safe cave."

"It was just a bit too close to the hole."

"Nel doeshn't remember a hole," the child commented.

"Well, you did hit your head pretty hard, apparently," Menoly pointed out, and suddenly all the trainees were looking at her. "What? I'm feeling a little left out here. But I think I remember the lady Princesa Tanya was talking about. Where is she now?"

The Fracciones froze up, looking pensive despite their full masks. Tanya hummed in thought.

"I see. So she didn't make it." A sigh escaped her lips. "Poor thing. She was looking forward to helping build up society. I think she was one of the few people who recognized the true goals of our organization. And a good soldier to boot. Well, at least now we know what happened?" She held up Nel to get a look at her again, but couldn't see any recognizable trace of anyone else she knew that would have been close to Nelliel. "Do either of you know who the father is?"

Their silence on the matter didn't help. When she demanded an answer again through a rough clearing of her throat, all she received was their heads shaking, including Bawabawa's.

"Well, it must have been a real secret if she didn't even tell you two. Maybe she would have after... Ah, no point in speculating. While I'm certain you two have been caring and...mostly competent, I can't in good conscience just let you raise a child out in the desert when a nearly finished town is just a flight away."

"Uh, bu-bu-bu-bu-"

"No, buts! By my authority as Escudo de Armas and Princesa de Hueco Mundo, I will be taking this child into protective custody. You may feel free to join us in order to ensure her proper treatment, but I will not be giving handouts. You will be put to work in the Cuerpos if whatever you've done to regress yourselves makes you unfit for combat. Otherwise, feel free to continue living whatever life you have out here."

At that, the two seemed to take a moment to seriously introspect. Tanya could practically hear Pesche thinking. He wasn't incredibly strong, all things considered, and always acting the part of a jester. But she also had seen those moments when he took things seriously. If he were to apply himself, he could be a terror at the strategist's table. Dondachakka, while not having quite the same hidden depths in his mind, had always been stronger than he let on. Between his bug Hollows summons, his storage ability, and his own strength of arms, he could wreck entire armies. Nelliel hadn't made them her Fracciones just because they were friendly, that was just the final deciding factor. Before that, they were capable warriors. Just not so great as soldiers.

Well, Tanya just happened to be in the business of turning warriors into soldiers and survivors into productive members of society. She could still use them.

"May I stand?" Pesche finally asked.

Tanya nodded, and Loly removed her foot from the Hollow's chest. He quickly stood up and brushed the sand from his body before looking over at Tanya and Nel.

"For Nel's sake, I'll go anywhere," he said before kneeling. Dondachakka did the same right next to him.

"We gotta be there to protect her, you know."

Tanya nodded. "Very well. Looks like I'll have to cut training short today. Everyone, let's escort our returning comrades back home."

Moments later, they were back on the move towards Las Noches. Nel babbled some questions a child might ask, obviously confused about what was going on, exactly. She seemed surprised at the concept of her having a mother, which just solidified the situation in Tanya's mind.

'Died in childbirth. It's the only explanation. She must have found out she was pregnant and left in a hurry out of fear of...something. Something to do with the father, maybe. That would explain why no evidence of anyone else was found in the destroyed portions of her house; she'd done it herself in a fit of worried anger. I don't know if she planned to ever return or not, those plans would have died with her, but her loyal Fracciones stuck by her side and tried to raise her child when complications happened to cause her death. Now we'll never know.

'Anyways, I now have her child in my custody. A charitable act as far as most can tell, but it's pragmatic as well. This Nel was born of a Vasto Lorde, after all, which means that someday she too will reach that level of power, should she cultivate it. Just by stint of being born, she's effectively destined for greatness. Like any human baby, though, she'll need nurturing and care. And I just happen to know someone for whom nurturing and care have become second nature to.'

Tanya, her trainees, and their escort arrived and entered the dome of Las Noches within minutes. The name of the 'palace' had become ironic after the dome was created with its underside covered in a magical projection of a daytime sky. It lit up the place within, giving the illusion of daylight and making it feel just a little bit normal. It was obviously done to help with the mental health of its subjects. Eternal night could be depressing, as many studies on Earth have shown. While Arrancar might be a bit more resilient than normal humans, they still had human-like thoughts and emotions. Thus, an artificial day-night cycle was crafted.

'Lord Aizen really thinks of a lot of things that we would have totally missed,' she mused to herself.

"Show them to the barracks. It's moved a few times since they were last here. I'll go get little Nel here settled."

"Ah, where's Nel going?" the toddler asked.

"It's a nice place," Tanya assured her. "There's plenty of food and soft cushions. You have been eating good, right?"

"Nel eatsh a lizzer sometimes," she answered before flashing Tanya a snaggle-toothed grin, showing that several of her teeth had yet to grow in. "Wha's a coo-shin?"

Tanya chuckled. "You'll see."

Saga of the Princess of the Hollow World

Chapter 3: Rebirth Through Means Upheld

~

Roka Paramia knew what she was created for. She was a tool, made to fit whatever desires her creator wished. Often, that meant being the test subject of something he wanted to see the results of before applying it to himself or other tools. She had been cut open many times as a Hollow. Things had been added and taken out. Swapped around. Changed. She could feel their effects sometimes. A lot of it was beyond her understanding. She wasn't made to understand. They weren't made for her to understand. She had been changed from her old body to a new one when her master wanted to observe the process of becoming an Arrancar. He decided it wasn't worth pursuing after seeing her changes unless there was a better way. Then an order came down from the King, her master's only master. Again, he took something from Roka, changed it, and put it back in. Far less painful than usual. Not because of that medicine that decreases pain. He rarely used that. There was just a lot less cutting involved.

Then Roka started growing, and she was feeling strangely ill and emotional. That could be bad. Master didn't like it when she was anything but perfectly still unless she was performing tasks. "Tools don't smile." "Tools don't get to be sad." "You are nothing but a rock. Rock's aren't allowed to be happy. They stay in place until someone moves them." But this time, he let those little slips pass. They were 'expected' since she was 'expecting'. She didn't understand at first, until she saw the scan results he was making with some sort of device.

There was a small child growing inside of her. It was confusing, until she remembered that this was how humans are made. Rather than come to be from reishi condesing or change from something else, humans had to make new humans and grow them like plants from a seed. Inside of themselves, at first, then outside.

For some reason, the thoughts filled Roka with warmth. She was happy, even though she shouldn't be. It was unavoidable. Master thought so as well, so it must have been true. He didn't even try to correct her, after all. So even a rock could feel happiness like this.

Then the day came that the child had to come out. It was painful, but there was a joy behind this pain, so Roka bore it with no issue. The child was born, and she screamed. Roka was worried about her. Were babies supposed to scream? Did she accidentally hurt her? Roka had never used whatever muscles had been contracting before, so maybe she did something wrong.

But Master seemed unbothered. In fact, it seemed things were going back to normal. She wanted to see the child up close. Maybe even hold her. Before she could even ask, however, he had silenced her. Of course, now that she no longer had a child inside of her, she should be going back to normal. Not feeling. He had other tools clean the child and prepare the transport. The King would want to see her. He was the one who had ordered her creation, after all.

Roka knew better than to be sad, but it was hard. She felt empty. The child was gone, and while her fellow tools gently treated her, they did so not with warmth, but calculated motion. They were allowed their happy tones because it was part of their design. Scissors and needles. Gloves and goggles. Emergency medicine. Looking nice and tasting good, but for their Master, not themselves.

Roka had heard of despair. She never thought she'd feel it. Rocks don't despair. They sit in place until they are used. She was bad at being a rock. But maybe it was not so bad. The child was brought back to her, and Master instructed her on how to feed the child, now named Tanya by the King.

Roka had no way to express the joys she felt when she could finally hold the child in her arms and feed her from her own body. It was a part of the human physiology she bore. Humans evolved to let themselves be parasitized by their own offspring until they matured enough to eat other foods. Such a strange thing, but all to better ensure the survival of the next generation. And with it, Roka felt a sort of completeness, a fulfilling of purpose. Master had said something about hormones and chemicals influencing behavior, but Roka never learned more than what these things were called. He did not teach them to her. He merely spoke out loud to himself, and she heard. He also didn't correct her for feeling these things, so she must have been doing it right.

For a while, she was happy to be a vat of food. To be a little more than a rock.

Tanya grew, and soon, the day Roka dreaded was upon them. She was growing in a few teeth and could eat some prepared foods. She would no longer need Roka to feed from, and Master would no longer see any need in letting her contact Tanya. Roka could do nothing to stop it. What could she have done? She was a tool, and she was no longer needed. She would be set aside until the next task came along that her Master required her for. In fact, that task was now there. He wanted to observe how she had changed after all of this. Going through pregnancy and nursing had obviously changed her body in many ways. Master wanted to see exactly how. Once again, Roka would be under the scalpel, doing her best not to scream as she was cut open. Master didn't mind the screams, but they made her throat hurt, and there would be enough pain.

"No!" Tanya had screamed at him, surprising Roka. People, in general, did not tell her master 'no'. The King and the Espada could, but rarely did. Tanya, though... Tanya was dubbed Princesa by her father, the King. He declared that her commands were second only to his. She hadn't been there, but word passed to her. No denizen of Las Noches was allowed to be ignorant of the King's declarations. Not even a rock.

"Mine!" Tanya declared while grabbing Roka's skirt. "My mama! Not yous!"

It felt...good to be defended. To be called...'mama'. Roka didn't understand why Tanya was getting in Master's way, but she seemed to believe that Roka belonged to her. Did she? Could the Princesa simply claim her? If she did, what would happen? What would Roka be then?

"That isn't your 'mama', little girl. That's a tool that happened to have a womb attached to it that I used to make you."

Ah, of course. That was what she was at the end of the day. The young girl was just mistaken. Well, it would be all right in the end. Maybe the King would explain everything to her later, about how things worked. She had to learn from somewhere, after all. That way she could know the things everyone knew and some of the ones that people like Roka did not.

But the child did not acquiesce. Rather, she brought forth a weapon and skewered one of Master's limbs reaching for her, cutting right through his Hierro. Then she fired a Bala from it at him, making him retreat.

"Run, mama!" Tanya yelled before pulling her along. With that, Roka had to accept that she was 'mama', and obeyed the Princesa, following her out to the Las Noches throne, where the king heard them out. Tanya was... Everything she said sounded worse than it really was. If the King believed her unquestioningly, then it was more than enough to have Master executed.

Roka...did not want that.

She could not explain why.

It just felt wrong.

So when the King asked for her account, she slowly explained everything exactly as it happened, putting great emphasis on how Master would not have harmed the Princesa at all with how he was gently reaching. At worst, a tight hold as he moved her out of the way. Tanya herself seemed surprised. She must have not realized that Master would have never let himself hurt her. He was too smart. He wouldn't get himself killed over something so minor. The King agreed. Master would not be executed today.

But he wasn't getting what he wanted.

Roka's first thought about Tanya's demands turned out to be true. She said Roka was hers, so she was hers. There was nothing Master could do about it. It was the King's demands.

He was no longer her master.

But after so long, it was hard to think of him in any other way.

Tanya was technically her new master, but she would not let her call her such. She didn't even like Roka to call her Princesa or Princess. She wanted Roka to call her by name.

Because she was Tanya's mother, and Tanya was her child. That's how mother and child worked. Mothers were given the title of 'mama' and 'mom'. So that's what Roka was, now. Not a rock. Not a vat. Not a tool. A mother.

It was a hard adjustment, but she did learn how it was supposed to function. What she couldn't pull from old memories of the dead souls that made up her being, she asked of those who might know. Most female Arrancar were as in the dark as she was, but a few had ideas. Oddly, it was the Shinigami who knew most. Lord Aizen she could not really approach, but Lord Kaname seemed forthcoming. It even seemed to bring him a small amount of enjoyment at times. Lord Ichimaru was harder to tell, as he almost always smiled, but he must have been enjoying teaching her what he could as well, going by his tone.

So Roka learned. Much of it she could already do. She knew how to clean objects and beings, though helping Tanya to bathe was different from cleaning a subject post-operation. Cooking was harder, but she learned quickly how to prepare things to taste good for Tanya's palate. It wasn't always what Roka preferred, but after having only ever had a plain nutrient-dense semi-liquid food since her transformation, almost anything was far better. And they shared enough preferences that it was rare for them to ever eat something the other didn't want. The exceptions included Tanya's taste for a bitter drink Roka did not like and Roka's craving for spicy foods that Tanya couldn't quite bear.

In the mornings, Roka made sure Tanya's clothes were set out, and fixed them if they were torn or wrong in some way, always making sure they showed her Hollow Hole. It wasn't sewing. Not exactly. It was something else that let her do these things. A side effect of one of M- of Szayelaporro's experiments, maybe. Once Tanya was awake, she'd help brush her hair and tie it up, then prepare breakfast, right before Tanya would set out to do her work for the betterment of Las Noches.

A few hours would be spent going over their home, cleaning what needed to be cleaned, straightening out their bedding and laundering their clothes, then she would ensure they wre properly supllied. Food, toiletries, soap, shampoo. Remove any trash for the utility workers, then prepare lunch, and leave for her outside duties as a medic. A few hours making sure any injuries were properly treated at the medical centers, and then she returned home, usually around the same time as Tanya.

Today, Tanya was early, and she had brought someone with her. Roka was surprised to see her before lunch on a work day, and even more surprised to see a smaller Arrancar in her arms.

"Mama, I'm home," she announced as she walked in, carefully wiping her boots at the foyer. "I have someone I want you to meet."

"Tanya," Roka greeted her child, once again feeling warmth in her heart, a sensation she never grew tired of, never wanted to not feel. She then looked at the smaller, green-haired Arrancar who was looking up at her as well. "Who is this?"

"This is Nel. You remember Nelliel Tu Odelshwanck?"

"Tres Espada, former. Missing. Presumed dead or deserted."

"Confirmed dead. We ran across her old Fracciones while out training. They had this child with them. Apparently, Nelliel's. She must have left in a panic and died in childbirth."

Roka felt a tinge of sympathetic sadness, something Harribel had helpfully explained to her during her mission to acquire motherly skills. She had gone through childbirth and knew it wasn't easy. But to think that such a thing could actually kill an Espada!

And then there was the child. If her mother was dead...

"You must feel lonely."

The small child shook her head. "Nel's not lonely. She has Pesche and Dondachakka and Bawabawa and bunches of mo' sca'wy fwiends that show up shometimes to rawr and shtuff."

"She likely can't remember her mother."

"Nel doesn't. Nel didn't even know she had one."

"That's actually why I brought her hear. We don't exactly have an orphanage or foster system in place. Haven't really had need of one. But you do have experience raising a child. I might have set the standards a bit high, in I could be boastful for a moment, but you're still probably the most qualified to watch over a child like her."

"Oh, so this is...like an adoption?" For some reason, the concept was familiar to Roka. Perhaps a few of her souls experienced it?

"If you wish. I'm sure I can get the Shinigami to set something up if I ask them. I just would rather have-"

"No, I can do it. It won't be any trouble at all."

'This is like...getting another child. A sister for Tanya? I don't know if I could ever have a second one the other way. Who would even want to help me make one? But this... And the poor child. No mother... I can be a mother to her. I've been doing it for Tanya, and she has always said I've done a good job.'

"Would you like to stay here with us, Nel?" Roka asked the child.

"Well...you ah nice. And pwetty. But Nel's worried 'bout her fwiends."

"Oh, you can see them all the time," Tanya told her before setting her down on the floor. "I think it would be impossible to keep them away, in fact. They're loyal, seeing the lengths they went to just to hide and protect you confirms as much. I just don't trust them with the finer points of child-rearing. But for that, my mother is more than qualified."

Roka's heart elated with joy at the praise.

"Just be a good girl for her while I go and straighten some things out. We'll need to process those two, see if we can't undo their Mask-maims, fill out the paperwork concerning you and your mother... It'll be a while. Anything you might need while I'm out, mom?"

Roka quickly went through a mental checklist of their current inventory.

"She'll need a toothbrush."

"Of course. I'll requisition one on the way back. Clothes?"

"She should fit some of your older ones."

"Hm, those are at least 40 years old. Still, if they're in one piece, it should be fine until we get her her own. All right. I'll let La Médica know that you're busy today, and we'll work on the schedule later. Goodbye for now."

Tanya and Roka hugged for a moment, and then the child left with a wave.

"Goodbye. I love you."

"Love ya, too."

And then she was gone in a burst of Sonido.

"So what'sh Nel shupposed to do now?" Nel asked the woman.

"I suppose..." Roka sniffed the air and then looked back down towards the toddler. "When was your last bath?"

"Wha's a bath?"

Roka smiled and started to explain while leading the girl to the bathroom.

She had been created to be a tool.

But things have changed since then.

~

Tanya felt mildly guilty about offloading a child onto her mother so suddenly, especially since she knew the woman wouldn't complain about anything even if she was bothered by it. However, she was right in that there probably wasn't anyone more qualified in Las Noches to watch over a child. Even the handful of Arrancar who did have children didn't raise them particularly well. Most of them didn't realize they were going to have a kid until it was too late, having believed that they were somehow completely infertile creatures up until it was undeniable. At least most of them tried the old-fashioned "feed them once in a while" style of raising children while letting whoever in their community wanted to teach them do so, but that was rather unreliable as far as raising productive citizens went. Then there was Usagi, who apparently went and had four children during her time as an Adjuchas. An unheard-of amount for any Hollow! She claimed she wasn't even sure where they came from. She just took a break to sleep in a cave somewhere and woke up with a quad of tiny daughters next to her. Tanya didn't know if she was telling the truth and was somehow just spontaneously undergoing parthenogenesis, or if something darker was going on behind the scenes, but the woman was proof that one didn't even have to be a Vasto Lorde or Arrancar for it to happen.

There were some attempts at making a system, but with Hollow births still being incredibly rare, there wasn't much chance to implement anything. So far, in the time since Aizen's takeover, no pregnancies had occurred, but Tanya figured it was only a matter of time. Along with the violent attitudes, their tribal structures also weren't big on other inhibitions. Some of them seemed to forget what clothes were supposed to actually cover at times. And others definitely knew and were pushing the boundaries all the time.

Harribel might have been the worst there. Though it could also be a dominance display on her end. Daring men to try something when out of all of them, only Barragan could hope to do anything to her. And he wouldn't. Mostly because she was one of the few Arrancar he saw as respectable. While Tanya wanted to think highly of him, she couldn't get caught in the trap of thinking that he could do no wrong. It was as likely that the mood never struck him to take advantage of a woman as it was that he had a moral opposition to it. Other than him, though, Harribel could trounce any other Hollow and they knew that. Her little harem, however... Well, Tanya didn't like to assume about people's relationships, but the way those women argued was not the way servants argued about the master.

'Still, it's only a matter of time before people start realizing that my PSAs about safe sex were not jokes. And after that, we're going to have to deal with internal population growth. Well, when it happens, it happens.'

After checking in to make sure that Pesche, Dondachakka, and whatever summons the latter had were properly registered, Tanya made her way to the main throne room, both hoping against and for Lord Aizen's presence.

'I'd like to get it all done as quickly as possible, but I'd also like time to pen my debrief in writing beforehand so that I can organize my thoughts better.'

Unfortunately, going by the crowd size, it seemed that she'd have to go on the fly.

~

Aizen preferred to be more off-hand with the comings and goings of his Arrancar army. At first, he suspected that he'd get little more than a collection of powerful pawns in a handful of scattered pack-like structures. Perhaps enough to distract most of the Gotei 13's captain-level ranks while he and his associates focused on the bigger fish and his special projects took care of the most pressing issues. But then he received a pleasant surprise.

Princesa Tanya Louisenbairn. Apparently, Barragan had wanted to cement his rule with a symbol. He was a King, after all, and Kings have Heirs. It might have seemed foolish for an immortal being to waste time and effort on something he would never need, but Aizen at least understood why he thought of it. She existed not so much as his eventual successor but as an extension of his power and the closest thing to a peer he could allow himself. A conversational partner and sounding board for ideas. Perhaps even a bit of a vanity project, to see oneself reflected if this or that were different.

And a weak point, it turned out. While Barragan had certainly feared for his own sake, he and Aizen both knew that a real battle between the two of them would have been devastating. While Aizen was certain he could come out of that battle alive, he also couldn't outright defeat Barragan without great risk. At the same time, Barragan knew he wasn't invincible. A strong enough strike from a strong enough blade, and suddenly a lot of old souls would be sent back into the cycle.

Soul Society would have to scramble for weeks to correct the imbalance it might cause.

But then there was the girl, and Barragan's fear of dying was gone. Aizen knew he meant it when he promised revenge for any harm done to her. Yes, he could still escape it, but his plans would have taken a huge blow. Las Noches was simply too good of a base of operations. It was known far and wide by countless Hollows, and had a modicum of infrastructure, even if it was eons old and decayed. The fact that the King of Hueco Mundo was willing to risk it all for a little girl...

Well, it was intriguing. She was intriguing, even beyond the circumstances of her birth. A bright mind and wisdom beyond her years. Rather than falling into line with angry eyes promising vengeance the moment it could be brought, she took to the new regime like a duck to water. Rules and regulations? She loved them. Loved the structures and guidelines. The army he was building? She immediately set out to make sure it was supplied, raising up cadres of workers to let the soldiers focus on their profession. Even the many pawns he thought to let sort themselves out through the Hollow ways of strong overtaking the weak pushing them all to better themselves, she went and made training regimes oddly reminiscent of what modern Earth performed, though scaled up to push the bounds of an Arrancar's strength. She had even developed a new core unit under her guidance. Elite soldiers rather than the powerful warriors that the Espada were. Escudo. Shields as compared to the Swords. Individually strong, though not much more than lieutenant level on average. But he had seen them work in formation, and that's where they excelled.

Yes, thanks to her, Aizen had the forces to not just keep the captains at bay, but enough to strike at Soul Society itself. A useful distraction, at worst. It certainly made him adjust his plan, but it would honestly run so much smoother like this.

If only he could have ten of her at her father's level of power. Unfortunately, breeding Arrancar was slow, seeing as she was still prepubescent after all these years, and the culmination of his plans was very...soon.

And there she was. He had received a report from Ruddborn Chelute that she had returned earlier than normal from a training session with some unknown Hollows. She was very proactive in recruiting, believing that everyone could have a use if they were given a chance to find it. A rather naive sentiment. Aizen knew many out there had hidden uses, but not in the way she figured. Sometimes, a person's only use in this world is to serve as a whetstone for another's blade.

"Lord Aizen," she greeted him with a salute and a bow. He'd have to remember to give Gin a small reprimand for teaching her that. He was sure that's who taught her, anyway. She started it long before her little 'secret visit' to Earth, and Kaname wasn't the sort, so that left Gin as the most likely source of the gesture.

"Tanya Louisenbairn. You have a report."

"Sir. My training unit and myself came across a group of Hollows performing suspicious activities. We apprehended and interrogated them, eventually identifying three as the Fracciones of former Tres Espada Nelliel Tu Odelshwanck; Dondochakka Birstanne and Pesche Guatiche, and their summon, Bawabawa. We have also confirmed the death of the former Tres."

Aizen noticed two of his Espada looking surprised at that, Nnoitra Gilga and Tia Harribel. The former was likely due to his involvement with Nelliel's disappearance. Aizen was fully aware of it. The Arrancar still had figured out his surveillance technique woven into Las Noches' ceiling. But if neither Nelliel nor her Fracciones were going to report the assault, then he wouldn't bother. She wasn't much use if she was going to be beaten by a much weaker opponent anyway.

"There was a fourth, was there not?"

"Yes sir. She has been identified as Nel. Daughter of the deceased Nelliel."

That...was certainly unexpected. Aizen didn't even know when that could have occurred. Well, as thorough as his system was, the private homes tended to stay private. Less out of respect and more that he didn't wish to have to sort through all of that. He made that mistake once before and got to witness Omaeda having to fight for his life on the toilet.
So yes, he wanted to avoid a repeat of that.

"I see. You're certain?"

"She looks almost exactly like her, sir. I'd be more surprised if she wasn't."

"Understandable. Were you able to ascertain Nelliel's exact reasons for leaving?"

"All I have is speculation, sir. Even her former subordinates weren't kept abreast of it all. My best guess is that she only meant to leave for the duration of her pregnancy, a time when she'd be extremely vulnerable, and return after regaining her strength. It requires believing her to be paranoid about her comrades, but we've witnessed such in the past."

"That we have." Hollows will be Hollows. Even if he had surrogates like Tanya and Zommari painting him in the best light possible, Hollows are creatures of fear, and they rarely trust what looks like gifts on the surface. Especially when the only price he leveled was for them to fight for him, a small thing in their turpid existence. And a few sometimes find it's better to bite the feeding hand than wait for it to empty, only to learn that a blade was always held in the other, just in case. "In that case, see to her accommodations. Her mother did serve admirably in her time here. As for the Fracciones..."

Well, he could keep them around, but that could agitate Nnoitra. Then again, he was incredibly unstable, and most of his power lay in brute strength. He wasn't even particularly cunning. He needed help for even his gambit against Nelliel, after all. Getting rid of them would be simple and well within whatever passed for jurisprudence among this rabble. They deserted, after all, even if one could argue it was for good intentions and at the command of a superior.

Hm, decisions, decisions...

"If I could make a suggestion, Lord Aizen?" the young Arrancar asked.

"Granted."

"The two have been surviving on the move in the desert for years now, all while watching a child. They're obviously resourceful, and the Cuerpo de Palas could always use more hands."

A few Números went stiff at that. The Cuerpo de Palas was another invention of Tanyas, where the weaker Arrancar were made to serve the strong, growing their food, cleaning their shit, building their structures, digging holes, and filling them back up. It was the sect of laborers and servants, and to be placed there was to be told, "You are not good enough to fight, and not worth killing. Now dig." All kept just out of sight until work needed doing, then they scurried up and around like ants before heading back down, so never quite out of mind. For these Hollows, it was the greatest shame.

The perfect place for them.

"Then let's get them some shovels."

Tanya smiled, and Aizen felt a few goosebumps crawl along his skin. Yes, that's where her monstrous side lay. She was born to be a Princess, a leader, and while the royal regime was gone, she had still become a leader. An officer, rather than a near-useless throne decoration with privilege, but perhaps all the more ruthless because of it. Firing squads rather than headsmen. Work camps rather than dungeons. Efficient elite soldiers rather than knights. All colored through the lens of a Hollow playing at being human.

A real monster.

He wished he had a dozen more just like her.

~

Barragan Louisenbairn understood his position. He didn't like it, but he understood. He was dethroned but kept alive, made into a mockery before being used by the one who had bested him. The Shinigami took his throne and his people, his very kingdom and all his world, and now he was molding it as he saw fit, to suit his own ends.

Or so it seemed. Barragan kept his head down at the quiet insistence of his child. Perhaps he would had a bit more pride and defiance in him otherwise, but he could see where it was going. She pointed it out, after all.

'Even Shinigami age.'

He had lived and ruled for over a million years, and he would live a million more. Even the old Shinigami General they spoke of was a mere 2 or 3 thousand, and he was decrepit! They would be dust, some day, and he will have not changed.

But maybe he had grown complacent these last few millennia. After all, suddenly feeling a spark of a dream and calling upon his Royal Scientist to create his Heir was the first major thing he did in a long time. But it was the right choice, in the end. In that dream, he saw the child that would be his, golden-crowned and standing above a battlefield, lording over the dead and dying. Glorious and beautiful. Even now, well before she had fully matured, she was building up a new kingdom right under the nose of the Shinigami and their sycophants. She had even reclaimed old posts of glory that man thought he had co-opted. Barragan had seen her Escudo. Not the strongest, but well-disciplined. A good base to build power upon. And her Palas were quick and loyal workers. Not impressive in their strength, but more so in the skills Hollows once had little need for. Now, Barragan didn't think he could go back to being without them, even if he didn't have all this flesh on his bones. The masseuse alone...

And she was looking out for him as well. If it had come from anyone else, he would have admonished them for thinking they knew what was best for their King, but he could see the genuineness in her suggestions. He needed to improve if he wanted to rise above the blasted Shinigami. He couldn't rest on his laurels anymore or depend on Senescencia and Respira. If this Shinigami surpassed him, then others might do so as well, if not now, then in the future.

'Always prepare for the worst.'

So cautious for but a child. Well, he could blame her. Most of her life was spent under the thumb of the invaders, only known as the Princess of Hollows either unofficially or mockingly. He understood that frustration. If only he was as elastic in his ways as her, maybe he wouldn't feel the need to sit and close his eyes for such long periods of time.

"Father," he heard and snapped to attention. Tanya appeared in his lesser throneroom and smiled upon seeing him before respectfully bowing. "Hello, Father. How are you today?"

"Thinking," he answered before grunting and standing up. Immediately his Fracciones kneeled before him. "Perhaps I should be moving instead. Weren't you running those layabouts outside today?"

"I was, but we came across something interesting and I called off the training for today. Related to that, we finally know what happened to Nelliel: died in childbirth."

"Huh," Barragan grumbled as he walked alongside his daughter. "How did you learn that?"

"Her old Fracciones were watching over a child that looks exactly like her, save for some differences in her mask. Also, you know, being one-tenth her size."

The old King nodded. "I see. Where are they now?"

"I left the child with Mother and sent the others to the Cuerpo de Palas."

If Barragan recalled correctly, the two were clowns. Oh, they could fight, but if it wasn't life or death, they refused to take it seriously. Even before the Shinigami came with his strange orb and turned them all into Arrancar.

"Could one of them be the father?"

"Doubt it. Pesche would have said so if he was. And Dondachakka... Well, let's just say that Charlotte is more his type.

Barragan huffed a laugh at that, and he was sure he heard the man in question jump a bit.

The two ended up performing a few runs across the perimeter of Las Noches, then spent some time throwing up boulders and firing Ceros at them. Afterward, they sat down for a small snack of some sort of pastry.

"Wheat is on schedule," Tanya noted from a piece of paper some Palas had set in a stack next to her before bowing and disappearing, the brown-clad woman barely seen by Barragan or his Fracciones before she was gone. "Might be late with apples. Shouldn't be too bad. We're still unsure about how to source chickens. They keep dying when they're brought in from Earth."

"The reishi might be crushing their souls," Barragan figured. "Weaker creatures tend to be crushed by the spiritual pressure of far stronger beings, and Hueco Mundo is thick with reishi, so it has its own pressure."

"Hm, so we'll have to try and find or breed chickens with a resistance. Otherwise, the only other meat option we'll have is our fellow Hollows."

That was true, and Hollow was getting harder and harder to source these days. Plus, once one had a chicken parmesan platter... Well, there was a reason the human phrase 'tastes like chicken' was synonymous with 'delicious'.

"We'll figure something out."

"Yes... I might have an idea, but I'll need to write it out and make sure I have all my bases covered. Hm, well, it's about that time. I'll see you later, dad."

"Take care, child," he said to her as she put away her things and made to leave. He allowed himself a smile as she waved, and then she was gone.

"Redder, Poww," he called over to his Fracciones.

"Yes, your majesty," the two answered.

"Go find Szayel and question him about how to get farm animals like chickens to survive in Hueco Mundo. I know she won't ask him for anything if she can help it, but I want to make sure this can be done so that she doesn't waste her precious time on it. Tell him to find the answer if he doesn't know."

"At once, your highness," Redder answered.

"It will be done," Poww followed up.

"It'd better."

~

Tanya settled down in the lotus position and put her rifle across her lap after taking it from its cradle at her back. It had grown with her, however little that meant. It was connected to her in a way she couldn't quite describe. Kaname Tousen had called it her Zanpakuto when they'd first met, and when she asked him what that meant, he explained in detail about the spirit swords of the Shinigami and their powers. They did seem quite comparable at first, but several things didn't match up about them. A Shinigami's Zanpakuto started as an empty blade and was slowly filled with the power of its wielder until it took on a sort of identity, an extension of the Shinigami themselves, and then they formed a sort of unique power. An Arrancar's weapon was similar, but not quite. The weapons were, for lack of a better term, born with them. When a Hollow was changed, the weapon appeared alongside them. Tanya, being born naturally, didn't form her own until months later, right when she felt the need for a weapon. Aizen had said that they hold the Arrancar's Hollow power and form within them, and therefore lacked a spirit of their own. But wasn't the Zanpakuto just a container for the Shinigami's own inherent power? What separated the Shinigami from their Zanpakuto spirit if it wasn't the weapon itself? And so, every once in a while, Tanya sought answers. Both Kaname and Ichimaru had given her some instruction on how to commune with one's Zanpakuto spirit, yet neither seemed confident that she would meet any success.

Normally, Tanya wouldn't be one to subscribe to spiritual nonsense, but this wasn't nonsense. It was repeated throughout history by the Shinigami. She was simply trying to emulate their success from another angle, to see how far these powers go. So she performed the meditation, trying to focus her energies upon Negraplata and-

"You know, that's not my actual name, right?" she heard before spinning around to find that she was no longer on the roof of Las Noches.

Below and around her was a city, perfectly grid-set, with architecture resembling a mix of Central European and Japanese, with a hint of the white and red stone that made up most of the buildings of Las Noches. Surrounding the town were massive artillery guns, all pointed outward protectively, ready and waiting to rain fire on the world outside.

"Hey, I'm talking to you," she heard before looking up and flinching at what she saw.

"What- Who are you?"

The being smirked. "You don't know me yet, but you will." The silver-eyed woman with hair of fire outstretched her clawed hands and tattered leather wings. "Welcome to your inner world, Princess. I am [][][][]."

Saga of the Princess of the Hollow World

Chapter 4: Old Wounds Bleeding

~

"I...don't believe I heard you properly."

"You didn't hear me at all," the demonic woman told her, putting her hands on her hips. Tanya took the moment to get a good look at her. Her hair was fiery red and waving in a nonexistent wind like actual flames. Her eyes were silver, and surrounded by golden eyeshadow that contrasted with her reddish skin. She was clothed in a button-down shirt and pants, both crimson red and frayed like they'd been worn through several battles. Behind her were a pair of bat-like wings, tattered and torn, with more holes than leathery skin. A pair of twisted horns grew from her head, the color of rust and the tips nearly meeting several inches above her scalp. "Figures. All this instinctual spiritual mumbo jumbo... Of course, you'd be slow to soul searching. It'd take some basic self-reflection. Like you'd know how to do that!"

"We need not devolve this into insults."

"Oh, but I think we do. At least a little. Get us warmed up for the real thing. But I'm beating around the bush." The demon clenched a hand, and blood spilled out from between her fingers and down her arm. Tanya flinched, and the demon smirked. "What's the matter? Afraid of a little blood?"

"You're hurting yourself!"

"Yeah, I noticed." She then opened her hand and the blood lit aflame, wicking away as silver fire consumed it. "We do that a lot, don't we? Sometimes we even get other people in on it. We got Him in on it." The acid in her voice when she mentioned him was palpable. "Not like we had much chance there. He was pretty set. But then you had to go and make it worse."

"I did no such thing!"

"Don't lie to me, Princess. I was there, even when I wasn't. I'm a part of you, remember? Not just you now, but you before, flying around and playing barely legal with the rules of war. Getting yourself shot at when escape was a hop, skip, and a jump away to literally anywhere but there. And I was even there to see you flub at the one job you were good at, Mr. Salaryman. Tell me, what's it like knowing that the person most successful at ruining your life was failed druggy with commitment issues? Certainly beat out the fanatical bunker buster with legs!"

"This is pointless! I did this to learn about my powers, not to get berated by some...symptom of dissociative identity disorder with a blood fetish!"

"Yeah, I know. What, did you think it was going to be easy, Princess?" The last of the fire wicked away, revealing an unharmed hand. For a moment, her silver eyes became gold, and she spoke in a more boisterous tone, "'Poor is he who works with a negligent hand, but the hand of the diligent makes rich.'" Her eyes then returned to silver, and she clutched her head, claws digging in and drawing lines of blood. "Ergh, even now?! Even here?! Damn you, Being X!"

Tanya was stunned. She had never seen what it was like from the outside for someone to fall under that influence, and now that she had, it was horrifying. That happened to her so many times and for such lengths of time...

"Oh yeah, been a while for you, hasn't it?" the demon asked while pulling her hands away, blood turning to argent flame once again.

"Th- the Type 95 was left back in that world! Whatever you- we are feeling is just-"

"Oh, we left the object behind. But that thing... We held it for so long, after all. Don't you know? Objects close to a person can become bound to them. They become a part of them. Even if that bond is sheer, unbridled hatred, it can still become a part of you!"

The demon ripped open the top of her shirt to reveal her chest. At first, Tanya was shocked and confused, then horrified. There, an almost perfect replica of the Type 95 was embedded in the spirit's chest, just above where the heart should be, casting a faint, golden glow that strobed like a heartbeat.

"A part...of me. A source...of me? Maybe I was born there? Could that be it? After all, I remember it, but you don't. I remember all of it. Every hated word written and spoken, every drawing, every song, every prayer. Praying. Praying for people's salvation while we slaughtered them. Praying for peace as we waged war. Praying for God's guidance as my mind spat a hundred curses at the thing denying me my right to exist! And now that's all me! That's what I am! Can you imagine, Princess, if that's all you were?" A smile then stretched across her lips, splitting her face nearly in half and revealing a set of razor-like teeth as she buttoned her shirt back up. "Ah, but we've gone off track. That's all in the past now. We gotta look towards the future."

"You want me to forget all of that?"

"Eh, why not? You've done it before." The demon chuckled at her. "Ya'know, there was something I could have done here, but I don't think it would be too fair. Or be helpful to our continued survival outside. Nah, we'll take it slow. First off, I gotta teach you my name."

'Seriously, she just revealed that she's got some sort of metaphysical copy of the Type 95 inside of her chest, and she just wants to move on? Just like that?! Is she trying to throw me off?'

"I'm not trying to throw you off, by the way. I'm just a little stir-crazy."

"Guh, you can read my mind?!"

"No, I just know how you think. Especially when you're getting paranoid about people's intentions. Hell's Bells, do you know how many times I've noticed we had an out laid right before us that you just refused to take because you always thought the people who went to great lengths to prop you up were, for some reason, setting you up to fail? Do you know how annoying-! Aup, look at me, I just got done saying it's all in the past." Her growing expression of fury was quickly replaced with a well-practiced, dainty smile. "We should probably move on, or we'll be stuck on this all day."

"Move on to what, though?" Tanya honestly wasn't even sure what the next step was. Her goal had mostly just been to establish contact. She didn't think things went this quickly.

"Getting you to say my name!"

With that, the demon moved, a sweep kick coming for Tanya's midsection. The Arrancar folded over the attack but immediately focused on straightening herself and stopping her backward flight, getting into a fighting stance whilst grabbing her weapon. Luckily, the bladed gun was where she always stowed it, and she brought it about just in time to block a swing from a nearly identical weapon, only red and rusty rather than black, white, and silver.

"How is this teaching me your name?!" Tanya demanded of the violent spirit.

"You'll see. Despite everything, you are smart, after all." She kicked forward, and Tanya spun out of the way, slashing again with her weapon and then firing a Bala at her spirit. The demoness jumped back and ducked the attacks before firing her own, forcing Tanya to enter evasive maneuvers.

"Hehaha! Doesn't this tickle the old nostalgia bones? Or whatever they're called! Nothing in the world like flying through the sky, dodging a reverse rain of bullets!"

"I hated every second of it!"

"Don't lie to me! It won't do you any good!"

The two exchanged fire, Balas and the occasional Cero flying past them both as they moved through the air, old maneuvers coming back to Tanya as she fought like the techniques for riding a bike. Sonido played a part as well, giving them both an edge she didn't have before back in the Empire. Last-second dodges were far more effective when one could enter a mental state where less than a second stretched out, allowing them to 'step' across a wider space than normal. Despite their speed, both managed to clip each other from time to time.

"Whoo! Makes you miss the analgesic spells, huh?" the demoness exclaimed after one Bala impacted her left leg. "Gotta see if Fran's got something."

"Why are you talking when you're trying to fight me?!" Tanya asked in annoyance. Something about the way things were going didn't line up in her mind.

"We're getting there! Be patient. Or not. Patience and bloody battles don't really mix well."

A boom shuddered the earth, and then Tanya was sent screaming as a shell exploded in mid-air.

"Oh cool. The guns finished turning around."

"You're firing artillery on me?!" Somewhere, Tanya felt like several people were experiencing sudden unexplained Schadenfreude.

"Well of course I am. But more than that," the demon blinked out of the way of an incoming shell that exploded in the false city below, "on me, too."

"You're insane!"

"Hey, you're the one who joined the army at 7 years old!" And then she charged in, their bayonets clashing once again. "Coulda waited until the last minute! Could have...stowed away to the States! Literally, 29 different plans that could have worked went through our mind before you signed up for the one that let you kill people."

"I never wanted to kill anyone!"

"Now that's a lie!" She shoved Tanya away then made to spear her. "We never felt bad about killing those commie commissars! Barely pitied the rank-and-file! And the politicians? Divine!" A slash ducked under, and then Tanya felt something wrap around her ankle. She spotted the tail just before being yanked across the sky and down toward a building. Her back impacted the roof just before a pair of shells exploded next to it, collapsing the structure with her on it.

"And remember the perv? How he squealed like a pig when we finally got him? All those pictures... You ever imagine what Visha woulda done if she found him and his stash before we split him in half, crotch to head? Such a nice lady. ...She's probably dead now."

Tanya roared as she leaped from the rubble and smashed her fist to the demoness' face, sending her over the cratered street and into the half-destroyed building across from them, just in time for a shell to hit it and explode. As the flames and smoke cleared, the spirit stepped out, silver flames licking up from bleeding wounds. And that damnable face-splitting smile on her face!

"Hey, just saying. She'd be almost a hundred if she was still kicking. Maybe more. We weren't keeping track well, after all."

"Damn you!" Tanya growled out before charging. The demon kept her smile and met the charge head-on, but now with her claws rather than her own gun. Caught off-guard, Tanya barely saw her raise her hand to her face before a wound there lit up and blasted her with a black-fire explosion, knocking her back.

"Now you're getting fired up! Heart racing! The sound of shells raining! Just needing screaming soldiers firing wildly and we'll have the old band back together!"

"I hate war!" Tanya shouted as she pulled herself up, clutching her scorched face.

"So do I! Cero!"

Tanya leaped to the side as a silver-gold light raked the place where she once stood. She fired back her own, calling the attack's name and cursing whoever designed a world where calling out attack names demonstrably made them stronger. The demon jumped over it and rained a hail of Balas upon her. Tanya dodged through them while flying upwards, answering with aimed single shots of her own. The dance continued for several seconds, then the spirit closed in and grabbed Tanya's weapon, pushing back against the Arrancar.

"Bloody devil!"

"You're getting warmer!"

They suddenly took a nosedive, the demon's heels planting against Tanya's chest and slamming her against the street. As she tried to regain her bearings, a shell exploded near them, framing the smiling spirit looming above her.

"Maybe next time, though." Her spirit ripped her weapon out of her hands and aimed the blade downward. She thrust down, intent on impaling Tanya through the heart, but the girl caught her gun before its bayonet could pierce her chest. The demon, rather than upset, looked intrigued.

"I've always...hated war," Tanya got out through grinding teeth as she forced that blade away. "Everything about it is a massive waste. It wastes lives that could've made a difference in the world. It wastes resources that could have been better spent anywhere else. I only ever studied it to learn about why it happened. To study the people's reasons for waging it. I hate war. I hate the trenches. I hate the charges. I hate the retreats. I hate the gunfire! I hate the pounding of artillery! I hate the death! I hate the bloodshed!" She kicked up, pushing against the ground with her very neck to get the hit in as deep as possible as her foot connected with the spirit's chin, knocking her back and wrenching the gun from her hands before getting to her feet.

"So tell me!" she demanded. "Why is it...that I feel alive when I'm fighting?! Tell me, you blood-soaked demon!"

The demon chuckled and wiped away silvery blood from the corner of her lips, the tips of her horns meeting and starting to glow. "Now we're talking."

~

Ulquiorra did not like surprises. By their nature, they were unexpected interruptions. Even 'pleasant' surprises could be disruptful, often bringing his dislike of them to neutral, at best. Few surprises were ever positive. The current one...he was unsure of.

Princesa Tanya Louisenbairn was meditating atop Las Noches' dome. This was not a surprise. She had been doing this on occasion. It was not regularly scheduled, being, rather, a time-filling event for her when other tasks were done and others still were not ready to be processed. A leisure activity with potential benefits. A more efficient use of spare time.

What was a surprise was the particular energy signal she started emitting through her reiatsu during today's meditation. Ulquiorra recognized the pattern as one he had only ever sensed from one other Arrancar: himself. To most, this energy would have been lost among the many other signals each individual's reiatsu emitted in their near-unique signatures. To the more perceptive, they may have recognized the two shared a particular wavelength and thought nothing of it. Many shared individual wavelengths with many others throughout their signatures. It was the sum that was unique, not each part. But Ulquiorra knew what this one meant for himself, and to sense it in another heavily suggested that they now shared the same trait.

"Segunda Etapa," he muttered aloud.

A secret he had previously shared with no one, not even Lord Aizen, to whom he swore all loyalty. His reasons were varied, but at their core, it was because it was his final trump card. The one thing he knew that made him himself. The advantage he held over all the others should push come to shove. The Arrancar army was not a place of camaraderie. The Espada, and those close enough to potentially become Espada, were always looking for ways to advance themselves. While the top three existed in relative safety, as few could ever hope to challenge them as they were, that did not mean that challengers would never come. The Picaro had once been Espada, and now they served as part of the Palas, working-class Arrancar. And so he held this close to his chest, thinking that perhaps he was the only one who could perform it.

But the Princesa had just proven him wrong.

She had found the secret. The truth about the Arrancar. How their Zanpakuto really worked. It was likely why she was meditating in the first place, and now she knew. She had made that second step. Feeling its acknowledgment, a Horned Black Bat reared up its metaphorical head, grinning. Ulquiorra continued to ignore it like he always did in the outer world. The secret was not yet out, so he would continue to act the part.

'But it is getting out.'

'It is.'

'She will tell the others.'

'She will.'

'They'll all get stronger.'

'They may.' It wasn't that simple, after all. Not every one of them who wanted to face that part of themselves to grow stronger could persevere. In all honesty, it was no surprise that if one were to discover it, it would be the Princesa. She was made for ambition. She sought to make everything better until it was at its best. This would include herself, naturally, and then the Arrancar as a whole. The only way to silence her now would be to kill her.

'It would be simple and easy.'

'It would.'

'So what stays your hand, Blank?'

'Retribution.'

Her father was one of the few Arrancar Ulquiorra was sure could outmatch even his Segunda Etapa. He had been the Primera ever since his induction into Aizen's ranks, though refused the marking. If he killed her now, everyone would sense her death, and everyone would know it was him. While many would fight to avenge her, it was Barragan Louisenbairn's threat that stilled his sword the most. Perhaps if it had been any other Arrancar, but it was not. It was the most untouchable of them all. Even Aizen would hesitate to harm the girl, out of concern for everything that would be lost in the collateral that was certain to pile up in Barragan's rage, more than anything. And before that, she was simply useful. Where others grew tired of managing the Números and lesser Arrancar, the Princesa was thrilled and energized to do so. Aizen ruled Las Noches, but the Princesa was the one who told the Palas where to build its roads and buildings.

The secret was coming out. She would only see the potential to improve others, rather than potential problems. But perhaps that was his mistake?

Had he let basic fear rule his decisions?

Not preposterous, though he wished it were. Something to correct for, starting the moment the Princesa was finished with her meditations. Her own Interna Hueco was a fierce thing, it seemed. Her outer body had received a few sympathetic injuries as the battle within commenced. Much like when Ulquiorra first tried to tame his own Interna.

'Glorious day!'

He disagreed. It had to be done for Ulquiorra to be in total control of himself after becoming Arrancar. Segunda Etapa was a positive symptom of that control.

The Princesa's eyes opened, and then she was holding up her Zanpakuto, looking at its barrel and blade.

"Well, that last bit was just unintuitive. Completely misguiding."

"You have found it," Ulquiorra stated, drawing the Princesa's attention to himself about two meters to her right.

"Ah, Espada Cifer. Good to see you. ...It?"

"Interna Hueco, the Inner Hollow," he laid out. Obviously, the term wasn't being widely used. Murciélago had told it to him when they met. He did not know if the Princesa's granted her the courtesy. If he was anything to go by, they were an obstinate sort.

"Oh, you knew about them?" She smiled as she stood up to her feet, back going straight as she looked at him attentively. "I was worried for a moment I might be a special case. This is good. If it's repeatable, then that means others can learn it as well. A wonderful self-training tool, if one doesn't mind having someone so intimately familiar with them using all their secret feelings like that... Then again, all in the privacy of our own minds and all that."

"You'll wish to inform Lord Aizen as soon as possible."

"That I do, though I fear he's not in Hueco Mundo today. We'll have to inform one of the others. While I doubt he'd be against us teaching the other Arrancar, it's best to hear what he has to say about everything before we proceed. He may wish to fold it out slowly or have everyone set on the same page, all at once. We'll see what he plans once he's informed."

Well thought out. As expected of her. While she did not lack initiative, she preferred permission for larger projects whenever possible. That's why things like the plumbing system needed approval, but the specific piping sections did not. Or why one or two buildings may crop up with little to no warning, but a full outpost had to be signed off on. There was clearly a line she drew when it came to what was and was not acceptable for her to take full responsibility for.

"Then let us inform Lord Kaname."

"Yes. He'll be pleasantly surprised to hear about my progress."

~

Tosen didn't know what he expected from Tanya's attempts at emulating the Shinigami form of meditation as Jinzen. It certainly wasn't this.

"Segunda Etapa," he mouthed. Tanya seemed surprised about something when Ulquiorra explained it, for some reason. Probably the name, Second Stage. It wasn't the most creative. Of course, one might say the same thing about "initial release" and "final release," but they had a certain ring to them when spoken in Japanese. He was also told that their kanji were rather beautiful when drawn. He had to take people's word for it there.

"With the Princesa's discovery of her own Interna Hueco, it has become clear that more Arrancar may be capable of achieving this form of power beyond mere Resurrección," Ulquiorra continued explaining. "Lord Aizen should be informed as soon as possible, so that he may design a plan to incorporate this power into the army as he sees fit."

Tousen nodded. "I will prepare a message for him at once. But I have to ask, Ulquiorra, why have you never come forward about this before?"

He sensed a shift in the Arrancar. Many said that Ulquiorra's face remained expressionless no matter what, even when whatever was occurring had obviously angered him in some fashion. Such a still face didn't matter to a blind man. Kaname Tousen felt people's emotions as much as he heard them. While Ulquiorra was subdued compared to all others, even in this, Tousen could still feel his hesitance in answering this question.

"It had not occurred to me that others may be capable of what I believed to be a unique trait."

"And having us informed of your capabilities?"

"A trump card, as it is called. I am capable of any task I am assigned, but in the case of enemy intelligence believing they have my strength accounted for, Segunda Etapa serves as a reserve of power to overcome their attempts to overwhelm my already displayed ability."

Tousen didn't like the idea that Ulquiorra felt there might be a potential leak, as there were only two people who could divulge such information to their enemies, but perhaps it was just his nature to account for every possibility, no matter how far-fetched. Annoying, as there would have to be a lot of adjusting now that this new level of power was revealed, but that would be the case even if he had only spontaneously come across it recently, much like Tanya just had.

"While I have faith in our information security," the young Arrancar spoke up, "it can only help to keep certain information compartmentalized in order to make enemy intelligence's job all the harder when they do find holes. It can't be guaranteed that every Arrancar is loyal, and we can't hedge it all on The Seireitei continuing its unofficial stance of treating Arrancar like a non-issue in perpetuity. Gears are sure to change over time, especially once the buildup is done and open war is declared. After that, it's a matter of time before someone figures out a way to get flies on the wall."

Tousen nodded. "An astute observation. I assume you have methods of dealing with it."

"A few. Most have yet to come to full fruition, and I'm afraid that a lot of it will be reactionary, plugging holes as they show. In a case like this, there's little for it. The moment an Arrancar uses Segunda Etapa in battle, the Shinigami will know it's something that can come into play, much like how we know of Bankai. But also like Bankai, there can only be so many responses, and they're not exactly uniform. Dealing with your Bankai would be a world of difference to dealing with Lord Ichimaru's."

That much was true. They could safely assume that Segunda Etapa would reach a similar width and depth as Bankai, in the same way that they once thought Resurrección filled that space. In a way, it brought everything into a new light. They had feared that the underwhelming powers of most Resurrección meant that they were going to have to truly dig through the chaff for quality among the Arrancar, but it turns out that this whole time they were looking at the Shikai equivalents, rather than Arrancar having some form of always-active Shikai expressed in their more unique traits and abilities in base form. The whole thing had shifted into a new paradigm.

"I may be able to set up some more proactive efforts for our information security, but ventures into the Living World and Soul World would be required. With stealth taken to the extreme, of course."

"I will look into approving your requisitions for those. Until then, see what you can do to set those operations into place. Ulquiorra, I need for you to come with me and assist in setting up the report to Aizen-sama."

"Yes sir."

"I'll draw up a strategy outline as soon as possible," Tanya answered, the sound of her hand tapping her hat as she saluted reaching his ears. He nodded to her and offered her a light smile.

"Good. I know you won't disappoint. Dismissed for now."

With that, Tousen and Ulquiorra went one way while Tanya headed towards the palace's exits, likely to head into her offices below the sands, somewhere between Las Noches and the Menos Forest.

'That girl gives me hope,' Tousen thought. 'If a kind-hearted soul like hers can arise among monsters and pull them to progress, then this world may indeed have a future.'

~

Tanya's mind was doing its best to not short out.

'Shit! Shit! Shit! Where did that Segunda Etapa thing come from?! A second stage to Resurrección! I thought he just meant finding the spirit of my Zanpakuto in general! I know I'm a little behind the curve compared to most. They all just seem to know it by heart the moment they change. I had to actually work for it.

'No, no, calm down! Ulquiorra's there for their example. I could just say that...there are requirements I have to achieve before I can use it! Right! I can't use it so soon, but it's there. Just stall for time while I figure this all out. I'll need to go into Jinzen if I want to get any answers, but I can do that as soon as tomorrow. Let's focus on what I can do. Okay, have to draw up plans for scouting the Living and Soul Worlds. Cloaks at minimum for that, but I may also need to train some Arrancar in stealth. The Picaro would be useful in communicating but... It's hard enough to keep them on task with what I have them doing now. They'd give it all away the moment they ran across a Shinigami and decided to 'play'.

'I may have to lead by example here. I've gone in and out before with no one the wiser. Soul Society might be easier, as weaker Hollows and Menos sometimes get into the outer districts and lurk about for years unhindered. So a good practice area, starting from the furthest out and extending operations towards the middle. That would also help the war effort in many ways, especially if we can get the most human-looking to set up some cells among the souls. Oh, that's actually quite devious. And unlike the Living World, there aren't any rules about this. Not that we can expect the lazy, genocidal regime to play by any agreed-upon rules. We know how they've dealt with humans and their own in the past, and to them, we'll just be up-jumped monsters until proven otherwise.

'Gah, I hate how much of an uphill battle this is! In the Empire, there was already infrastructure and institutions that had the lion's share of setup worked out by the time I was born. Here, I've had to do most of the heavy lifting, even when they were other people around because they all live on timescales that flip from potential eternity to dead in days. Not the most conducive mindset for building up much of anything within the timetable we're working with. I just know that the moment that Captain-General dies of old age and his overpowered Zanpakuto is no longer in play, we'll be on the offensive. Given how long he's lived, that could be next month, in a few years, or a few decades. Shinigami lifespans are apparently hard to account for, despite being visually confirmed as finite.'

Tanya reached the tunnel leading down into the underground portions of Los Loches, kept lit by crystals that gave off more light than the average streetlamp. The stairs went down a while, then let up into a tilted plane before leveling off. Stone and glass kept the sands at bay, and a few sweepers that came through daily to clean up the mouth of the tunnel waved to her. Further in, Tanya passed by artificially lit greenhouses full of soil and crops that had been adjusted to the reishi of Hueco Mundo. After a time, she stopped in front of a particular door and braced herself before entering.

Francisca Fraustein was a peculiar Arrancar and a way for Tanya to get around her issues when it came to working with Szayelaporro Granz, since Fran's expertise could act as a good replacement for most of the things Tanya might have needed the other mad scientist for. Unfortunately, she lacked the centuries of experience and most of the equipment that Szayelaporro could boast. Tanya knew that she was essentially settling for an inferior product and looking to invest in it in hopes of bringing it up to par with the established version, but it was like green energy versus fossil fuels. Yes, it's much easier and cheaper to burn coal and oil, but the stuff was demonstrably bad for the environment and doomed to run out. It was only a matter of time before Szayel pushed the wrong buttons and bit off more than he could chew, after all.

"Princess! Great to see you!" the far preferable mad scientist greeted her cheerfully as she walked into the lab office, the stitching scars across her cheeks accentuating her small smile and making it look far larger than it really was. The woman was a light blonde with hazel eyes and fair skin, her mask fragments appearing as two ovals on the sides of her head. Along with the scars on her cheeks, above her left eye, and circled around her neck, the ovals made her like someone's gender inversion of Frankenstein's monster, which may have influenced the madwoman to choose her name the way she did. Despite her obvious predilection for unethical science and surgery, she thankfully preferred to keep her experiments humane at worst. As her scars showed, she was more likely to test things upon herself than an unwilling volunteer.

Oh, but she did accept volunteers. No one ever died under her knife and they rarely felt pain, but that didn't mean that they didn't suffer. The brain transplantation came to mind. Yes, it ended as well as something like that could, but the two men were still undergoing therapy.

"Fran, how is the food production expansion?"

"Just wonderful! I still haven't quite gotten the cultured cells to grow in vat systems without them dying to spiritual pressure, but we finally got some farm animals delivered."

"Really?" Tanya was starting to lose hope there. Seeds made the transfer well enough. Something about their state let them exchange their physical kishi with reishi far more fluidly, but animals always seemed to die from suffocation or pressure-crushing them when brought into Hueco Mundo. Not even fertilized eggs made the transition unscathed. "How did you do it?"

"Sad to say it wasn't me. Your father's men came around and gave me an idea though, so I sent Veronica to find some in the Soul World."

Tanya blinked. "You mean the little murder-blender? She went...to the Soul World?"

"Hey now, that's a rather unkind view of her function. I know she's geared toward euthanasia, but she's hardly a murderer."

Veronica, Francisca's little sister, was accurately described as a murder-blender despite the older sister's insistence. The technicality of the kills' reasonings notwithstanding. She had more blades hidden on her person than anyone was sure of, and knew how to use them all to great effect. She was full of poisons that could stagger most Espada and kill anything below a certain threshold ready to be injected with the twitch of a muscle and the press of a finger. A perfect assassin that was assigned under "euthanasia expert" in all records, and packaged in the form of a little purple-haired girl.

It gave Tanya an inkling of what her enemies must have felt when faced with her, but probably worse. She didn't want to kill at the end of the day. Veronica was literally designed by their mother to kill in the fastest way possible. Much in the same way Gavrill was made to kill the most possible at once and Fran to put them back together and use the scattered pieces in emulation of the greater madwoman.

Thankfully, that mad scientist was off to find the edge of Hueco Mundo.

'May she step off it.'

"Wait, she was undetected?" Tanya asked.

"Oh, absolutely. Some of her friends wanted to go with her, but Lord Ichimaru only signed off on her. Probably for the best. They can be quiet, but not as quiet as they think."

"Interesting," Tanya mused. "I might have a job for them. Send them my way when you next see them, assuming I haven't already gotten to them. Your sister, too. We're going to need stealthy people in the near future."

"Ooh, are we doing super spying? I think I have some cuttlefish skin cultures that have acclimated enough for use that I can use to apply a color-changing effect to one's skin. Would you like to try it?"

"...Not at this time."

'The only way I'm getting under this madwoman's scalpel is if I've been torn to shreds and she's the only medical professional in the vicinity. I can trust her to put someone back together the way they used to be, but her adding anything is a crapshoot that can turn out just fine or become a nightmare. Like the bug-sourced skin grafts. The legs, God, the legs!'

"That's okay. It'll probably be better for one of the secret agents, anyway. People always think of chameleons but they're so basic compared to octopi. Won't trick a Shinigami or human up close. Perhaps some ligament adjustments?"

"No, thank you. Just pass along the message for me. Where can I find these animals? What kind did they get?"

~

"These are not chickens," Barragan groused when he saw the creatures hopping about their new enclosure.

"Sorry, Your Majesty, but it seems the Arrancar we sent...didn't know what a chicken was," Ggio explained, worried about incurring his King's wrath but knowing that he had to be the one to give him the news since he was the one who foisted the mission to those Usagi girls. They further foisted it onto some Palas with a job that didn't even serve a function before. What's the point of a 'euthanasia expert' when they don't have anything to euthanize?

Well, okay, there were definitely some Arrancar that needed euthanizing, but they could hardly expect a mere Pala to do that! That was Ruddborn's job.

"But, this does serve as proof that we can bring in animals from the Soul World far more easily than the Living World. We'll simply need to set up a new mission and do it correctly next time."

"Be sure that you. I will not tolerate repeated failures, Vega."

"Oh, hey dad," they heard and turned to see Tanya approaching, followed closely by a Pala wearing the shovel-shaped patch on her shirt beneath a lab coat. Ggio bowed respectfully and stepped back as the Princesa stood alongside the King to look into the enclosure.

"Tanya," he greeted her back. "Seems they mistook these for chickens."

'My King, please, it was those airheaded girls, not your loyal knight!'

"Huh, I was right. Rabbits. Good enough for protein, but if I recall correctly, their leanness makes them calorie-inefficient. We'd have to carefully balance them out with potatoes and bread... Well, assuming we absorb nutrients like humans do. For all I know, we can live off rabbits alone. Fran?"

The Pala shrugged. "Haven't studied it closely enough to say one way or the other, but erring on caution is good."

"Right. We'll do that, then. Now then, I suppose I should go draw up those plans for a spy network."

"Spy network?" Barragan asked his child.

"It came up in conversation with Lord Kaname. There's no threat now, but one day we'll have to deal with espionage, and the best way to head that off is to set up our own counterintelligence ahead of time. They won't suspect a thing, and by the time they know there's anything to suspect, we'll be miles ahead in those respects."

The King laughed. "Brilliant thinking. I'll lend you one of mine then. Ggio Vega."

The Fraccion stood at attention.

"Work with the Princesa on this project. Of all my subordinates, you are the most qualified for the more subtle arts."

'Only by comparison! Why does everyone think I can be stealthy just because I'm not built like all the others?'
"It will be done, Your Majesty."

"It better. Tanya, he's all yours."

"Thank you, father. I'll be sure to put him to good use. He'll return better than when you lent him to me."

'Why do those words make me feel like I'm in danger?'

~

With a trusty subordinate to offload busywork onto, Tanya wrote up a list of traits and talents as well as a first draft of her plan to set up intelligence against the Soul World's primary governing body, then sent a copy to the main office of the Shinigami Lords, another to her filing station, and a third to Ggio, who was further instructed to begin scouting the Palas and Números for individuals who met certain criteria. With that, there would be a lot of waiting time before anything required her input, mostly in the form of vetting and setting up the primary structures of this new branch. While she could use this time to enter Jinzen and talk with her Zanpakuto's spirit, she had only just done that and figured that they needed a little more time to cool down after their last...conversation.

Instead, Tanya decided to kill two birds with one stone. The new branch would need examples of stealth to work off of, and she was one of the best at it that she knew in the Arrancar Army, which said more about them than her, in her honest opinion. There were also some connections and minor obligations she wanted to check on that she couldn't normally do from the safety of Las Noches.

And so, with a cloak requisitioned and her reiatsu suppressed, she headed off to the Living World to see what that little Quincy family was up to, a few items in her pocket to repay them for their kindness from her previous visit. After she stepped out of the Garganta into Karakura, she was immediately assaulted by a deluge of rain.

"Ah, what rotten luck," she muttered before picking up on the familiar reiatsu signature from last time. "Hm, can't pick up anything else for the brother, but that's as good a direction as any."

With that, she sped off in his direction, taking slightly to the air, just above the treetops. As she closed in, she began to sense another presence, more refined, more familiar. A Hollow's reiatsu. Not one she knew, but it had all the marks associated with a Menor Menos, a Hollow that could trigger a Gillian formation under the right conditions. At first, she was curious, then worried as she realized that they were at the same exact place. Within seconds, she saw them, and felt confusion at what she was seeing. The brother was there, Ichi-whatever, facing against a furry Hollow with a large mask. The Hollow had some kind of extension, almost like an anglerfish lure, with the end shaped like a person, its head looking just like how Tanya recalled the family photos showed the siblings' mother looked. And speared through that lure and the brother's chest was one of the Hollow's limbs.

'Oh no!'

Tanya was ready to dash down and rescue the boy, questions about his garb and sword shoved to the side, but just before she could act, the teenager jammed his blade into the Hollow while grasping the limb in his chest, clenching down on it like a vice that could see was crushing now that she had a clear view.

"It's over, Fisher! You're the oldest, filthiest," he said while pulling that sharp limb loose from his body and driving his sword in deeper, "most offensive Hollow that I've ever met!" he screamed while slashing the blade across, nearly cutting the Hollow in half. With a scream of pain, Fisher collapsed to the side, blood splattered everywhere around them and diluting in the rain before it sublimated.

'That...was actually impressive,' Tanya thought, a smirk growing across her face. 'The absolute mad lad, he let himself be impaled in order to get ahold of his enemy and strike him down. Risky. I'd never let one of my subordinates do that without a dressing down, but that kind of daring is rare in a warrior.'

Then things got weird. The lure stood up, groaning with the voice of the Hollow, and the fleshy line between them seemed to absorb the main body into the lure itself.

"I've underestimated you," Fisher said as the last of it was brought into the lure body and a hole appeared in its center. "But you definitely couldn't cut your mother! Oh stupid Shinigami," he said while jumping into the air, the boy unable to catch him in time, "we shall meet again."

On the one hand, this wasn't her fight, and things were looking strange. The Hollow referred to the boy as a Shinigami, which made no sense, given his heritage, no matter what he was dressed as. But still, Shinigami, bar a few, were their enemies. On the other hand, she had an investment here, and it wouldn't take much to secure it.

So as the Hollow called Fisher flew away, she burst over in a flash of Sonido in his path.

"What is- Oh. Oh! Arrancar-san, I- did not expect one of you here!"

"You seemed to be having trouble there," Tanya pointed out, looking down at the brother. They were out of his field of view now, between the distance and the rain, and though he looked like he wanted to pursue despite some girl who had just appeared - probably a friend of his with spiritual awareness - trying to hold him back, it was clear from his bleeding and the fact he was looking in the wrong direction that he wasn't going to be giving chase or finding them if he did.

"I- It was...a mere mistake on my part. I perhaps played around too much."

"You seemed familiar with him, though."

"Ah, I ate his mother's soul about 10 years ago," he said, catching Tanya's interest. "It was a strange thing, but a lucky day for me. Now he's a Shinigami, somehow. I'll definitely get him next time. The rest of them, too."

"I see. Good to know." Tanya put a hand on the body's shoulder, finding it to be quite insubstantial. "You're injured."

"Yes, but there should be someone who can help me patch up. I'll be back in top shape soon!"

"I'm sure you would have." Her grip tightened, and the lure's face shifted to fear. "Gonzui."

"No! No, no, no! Please forgive me! I'll do beeeAAAAHHHH!"

The Holow's begging turned into shrieks of terror as his already compressed body was further crushed and spaghettified, entering Tanya's wide-open mouth bit by bit. The moment it was gone and quieted, she closed her lips and swallowed.

'Blech! Never liked the taste of Hollow. Filling, but worse than ration bars. Barely better than K-brot. And now I gotta pick through this thing.' The worst part about eating a Hollow was definitely having to put up with its souls until she could pick through them and toss them out of her being. It was usually a chore, but then there was the occasion where one was apparently bad enough to deserve Hell, and then she had to see that thing open up and take its due, reminding her once again that there were, in fact, worse fates out there. Then again, Hell only took evil souls, so it's not like it was happening to the undeserved.

'I'll have to go through them later. The girl's treating him, but that injury needs more than first aid.' Just as she was about to saunter over and offer assistance, she felt something that made her pause and quickly push her Pesquisa into an Indice Radar and direct it to where she felt a presence. Through it, she saw that a Shinigami had been watching from the nearby trees before approaching and speaking to the girl.

'No way. Was this... What are the Shinigami plotting here? Is that why the brother has that getup?' Whatever they said to one another was done quickly, and then the Shinigami left. She checked around further, pushing her senses to the brink to pick up even the faintest hint of a spiritual presence, but now it was just the girl and the unconscious brother in the clearing, and the Shinigami was getting further and further away. 'I don't know what's going on, here. Normally, it'd be better to not get involved, but I already am. If the Shinigami have thumbs on the brother, then they likely know about the sisters as well. Damn. This was exactly the kind of thing that should have been most unlikely.

'Now I have to investigate and see what he might know. Maybe they haven't mentioned me, but I doubt it. Any lines of questioning involving Hollows would lead to me eventually. I can only hope he hasn't convinced them that we're enemies. It'll be hard enough thanks to the stupid Fisher.'

Area secured, for the time being, Tanya went down and landed nearby, gaining the girl's attention as she searched through a view vials she kept on hand.

"Let's see. Steroid. Antivenin. Flu vaccine. ...Ah, there we are. Human-safe regenerative serum."

"You- You're-" The girl turned toward Tanya, jumping to her feet. "J-just stay back!"

"Don't worry. I'm a friend," Tanya reassured her, a little annoyed by the girl's sudden fear of her. "I was going to come by for a visit, but I saw that Ichi-nii here was a little busy," she explained before handing over the vial. "Here, human-safe healing serum. It'll help with his wounds. Be careful. That stuff's hard to make, you know."

The girl took it and looked back and forth between it and Tanya.

"I- I don't understand."

"Confusing times, I know. Just be careful about guys like that other one. Oh, and...don't worry about the Fisher. I took care of it on the way." She looked over at the brother, now totally unconscious, and sighed. "And here I was hoping to catch up. I'd like to stay and help, but it's not exactly safe with a Shinigami lurking around."

"But... What about about...?"

"Hm, oh, I know he's human. Living, I mean. Not sure what the Shinigami did to him, but it's...interesting. I'll probably come and ask about it when the area's more secure. Just be careful around those black-robed characters. One step out of line, and you might find yourself passing over into the afterlife living in a half-rotted slum. Try to avoid that as long as you can." Tanya made to leave, but then paused. "Oh, and let the girls know I dropped by." She flicked over a gold coin, which the girl caught despite her surprise. "A little gift from Tanya. Tell Yuzu I can't wait for another cup of coffee."

Deciding that was enough for the poor girl, who was so obviously in over her head with all this afterlife business, Tanya left in a burst of Sonido, putting some distance between herself and the spiritually aware human before opening a Garganta back home.

'Strange. The kid has a Shinigami's shihakushō and a sword that... Well, it wasn't really a Zanpakuto, I don't think. Too big. They tend to be standardized from what I know. Maybe... Could the Shinigami have found a way to give a human pseudo-Shinigami powers? Maybe it's a project to overwrite the Quincy's soul-destroying aspects? If they could use it on the remaining Quincies, many of whom might be in a similar situation to the siblings, where they have no idea about their heritage...

'Damn, I'm definitely going to have to report this! Lord Aizen can't be caught off-guard by a sudden surge in Shinigami numbers pulled from the living population to act as conscripts. If that's what a teenager can pull off, then an experienced Quincy could likely challenge mid-rank Numeros without the worry of annihilating their souls. And every mid-rank occupied is a sliver of attention freed for the high-ranks.

'We need eyes and ears in the Living World sooner rather than later. Good thing we were already working on that.'

Saga of the Princess of the Hollow World

Chapter 5: Histories Unrepeated

~

Rukia was happy, elated even, that Ichigo was okay. Well, he was healing. He would be okay. She didn't quite trust the…serum the girl gave her, but luckily, they didn't need to trust it. But just behind that happiness was worry and confusion. Eikichirō Saidō, thankfully, had promised not to report her, giving her more time to get things in order. But after he was gone, she had appeared.

Rukia had been paralyzed with fear when she saw that being. She hadn't sensed her reiatsu at all, but after her approach, she could pinpoint it beneath that cloak, faint, but there, suppressed by stealth techniques Rukia didn't think one of her kind could perform. At first, she didn't want to believe her eyes, but the truth was right in front of her. A human shape, a Hollow Hole, and an incomplete mask. An Arrancar. The academy didn't teach them much about those rare Hollows, only that such a being should be avoided and reported to the highest available authorities. They required someone of at least lieutenant level to have any hope of defeating them.

But the Arrancar didn't want a fight, or rather, she didn't want to finish them off. Even at full power, Rukia would have been helpless against something like her. Even uninjured, Ichigo wouldn't have stood a chance.

Instead, she went searching through pouches strapped to her strangely clean, white outfit's belt.

"Let's see. Steroid. Antivenin. Flu vaccine. ...Ah, there we are. Human-safe regenerative serum." She then held up a glass vial full of red liquid, labeled with Latin letters, and Rukia managed to snap out of her frozen state.

"You- You're-" the depowered Shinigami had gotten into a defensive stance when she finally had control over herself again. She knew she couldn't do much other than delay and get Ichigo out of there, but that would have to be enough. "J-just stay back!"

"Don't worry. I'm a friend," the Arrancar said with a smile on her lips. To Rukia, it wasn't the smile of a friend, but of a predator toying around with hopeless prey. A cat bemused at the struggles of a tiny mouse. "I was going to come by for a visit, but I saw that Ichi-nii here was a little busy," she explained before handing over the vial. "Here, human-safe healing serum," she repeated. "It'll help with his wounds. Be careful. That stuff's hard to make, you know."

Rukia accepted the vial cautiously, looking back and forth to keep an eye on the Arrancar as she did. It didn't explode in her hands or anything, and the feel of its reishi was certainly similar to healing items put out by the Research Division, but there were too many unknowns for her to blindly trust something given to her by a Hollow. Even if this one was somehow familiar enough with Ichigo to refer to him so casually.

"I- I don't understand."

"Confusing times, I know. Just be careful about guys like that other one." She indicated the direction Saidō had left. "Oh, and...don't worry about the Fisher. I took care of it on the way." Her gaze then went down to Ichigo's unconscious form, and a sad sigh escaped her lips. "And here I was hoping to catch up. I'd like to stay and help, but it's not exactly safe with a Shinigami lurking around."

"But... What about about...?"

"Hm, oh, I know he's human." The Arrancar waved a hand over at Ichigo, confirming further that she knew more about him than Rukia would have expected a Hollow to. "Living, I mean. Not sure what the Shinigami did to him, but it's...interesting. I'll probably come and ask about it when the area's more secure. Just be careful around those black-robed characters. One step out of line, and you might find yourself passing over into the afterlife living in a half-rotted slum. Try to avoid that as long as you can."

'She doesn't know,' Rukia realized. 'She thinks I'm just a spiritually aware human. My reiatsu must be extremely faint if she can't sense that I'm a Shinigami. But she knows Ichigo, maybe from before, when he didn't know about Shinigami and Hollows. To the ignorant, an Arrancar could pass as a strange human soul. But what would an Arrancar have to gain from associating with humans, even spiritually dense ones like Ichigo?

The Arrancar had made to leave, but then paused and looked back at her. For a moment, Rukia was worried that she had picked up on whatever it was that she missed, and was about to change course to remove a 'pesky Shinigami' from whatever plot she was brewing.

"Oh, and let the girls know I dropped by," she said before flicking over a coin. Startled, Rukia barely caught it and saw that it was golden with an ancient-looking minting of a cross on one side and a decorated shield on the other, with more Latin letters she couldn't make heads or tails of. "A little gift from Tanya. Tell Yuzu I can't wait for another cup of coffee."

And then the Arrancar was gone. Rukia could barely hold herself up as her pounding heart slowed down again, but she managed.

Now that some time had passed, the Shinigami woman had processed their meeting. The Arrancar, Tanya, knew Ichigo and Yuzu by name. She likely knew Karin as well. And she felt comfortable enough to call the eldest sibling 'Ichi-nii', as though they were close.

When Rukia thought about it, it painted a disturbing picture. How long had the Arrancar been cozying up to the family? How familiar was she, really? She certainly looked around the girls' age, but that could be or trick or just a result of being a Hollow stuck in time even more than a Shinigami might seem. Rukia was a lot older than she looked, after all. It wouldn't be a stretch to say a Hollow that had tried to replicate Shinigami powers experienced the same.

As she looked at the gold coin again, she reminded herself that speculating like this was pointless. She needed to ask questions to get any real answers.

She just hoped they were ready to talk.

"Hello, Rukia-chan," Yuzu greeted her as she arrived at the Kurosaki household. "Ichi-nii's up in his room right now."

"Hey, Kuchiki-san," Karin called out from the couch, apparently doing homework on the table there.

"Hello, Yuzu-chan, Karin-chan, I actually…needed to ask you about something," Rukia started as she walked into the house proper. "I…met someone who mentioned they knew you, and I had some…questions. Do you know a girl named Tanya, by any chance?"

At that, Yuzu brightened up with a smile, and Rukia felt so many of her fears getting that much closer to confirmation. Karin just looked up with interest in her eyes.

"Oh hey, you've seen her?" Karin asked her nonchalantly, obviously ignorant of the danger they were in. "We haven't talked in a while. Was kinda worried she might not show up again."

"Was she doing well?" Yuzu asked quickly. "What'd she say?"

'Damn, she really does know them! I don't know how to warn these two without giving too much away. I have to be careful. Play it casual for now.'

"She, uh, said she misses your coffee."

'Not that casual!'

Yuzu was practically glowing at that. Rukia felt as though the world had decided to drive a spike through her heart at the sight, realizing that whatever game the Arrancar was playing was already far, far in her favor. She knew she had to protect the Kurosakis, but how could she do that without driving them away and further into the arms of a soul-eating monster?

'I have to talk to Ichigo,' she told herself. 'The girls might be ignorant, but Ichigo has enough experience with Hollows that he should understand by now. He can't do much more than me physically, but the girls trust him.'

"Oh, I…better go up and…get Ichigo for…homework. Homework, yeah."

"Hm, homework?" Yuzu asked, a mild suspicion in her voice, for some reason.

"Hey, since you saw her…? Did you also share food with Tanya, or did you see her first?"

'Share food? What… What kind of food could a… Oh no! What has she fed them?!'

"Oh, I just saw her while…Ichigo was taking a nap…on a bench. She didn't want to wake him up so we spoke, and… Ah, I better go talk to him. It's a bit of an emergency."

"Emergency homework?" Yuzu wondered aloud.

'Is she fattening them up to make their souls more filling, or is this some kind of long con where she's going to make a Hollow ally out of them? What is this Arrancar's game plan?'

A few seconds later, she practically burst into Ichigo's room and shut the door behind her, startling him and Kon from reading a pair of magazines.

"Rukia-nee, you scared me!" the plushy-inhabiting Mod-Soul cried out.

"What gives?" Ichigo asked as he calmly set the reading material aside and sat up. "Something's got you worried."

"Ichigo, what do you know about the being called Tanya?" Rukia demanded, trying to not look as frazzled as she felt.

"Tanya? Uh, oh yeah. She's a weird ghost that was hanging out with my sisters. I actually meant to ask you about her, but we got a little distracted the next day." He looked over at Kon, who noticed the glance and looked back at Ichigo.

"H-hey, don't blame me for your forgetfulness!"

"What, is she visiting again or something?" he directed toward Rukia.

"Ichigo, you need to listen very carefully. This Tanya is not merely a strange ghost. She's a Hollow. An advanced type that has managed to copy Shinigami abilities known as an Arrancar."

"Arran-car? Wait, a Hollow? Then how did she… Are you sure? She looks so…human."

"I know, but you have to remember, Hollows were once human souls. It's not beyond some of them to reform themselves back to their old shape, or a new one mimicking the people around them. I don't know what this one's doing, but it can't be good. She…" Rukia knew revealing this might be bad, but Ichigo needed all the context so that he could understand what was at stake. "After your fight with the Grand Fisher, she showed up and gave me a vial, saying it was a…'human-safe healing serum'. I don't even know where she could have gotten such a thing."

"Did you use it?"

Rukia shook her head. "No. I didn't know if I could trust it."

"Do you have it?"

She nodded and pulled it from her pocket. Ichigo reached out and she passed it to him. He took it in hand and rolled it in his fingers, looking at the label.

"It's in Spanish. "'Healing Serum. Human-safe. Apply directly to new or old wounds. Do not use to treat stomach ulcers, cancers (including skin cancers or leukemia), or concussions. Does not remove scarring. Made by Francisca Fraustein of the Corps of Shovels.' You sure this came from a Hollow?"

The addition of another name brought more worries to Rukia, but she shoved them down in favor of focusing on the present.

"The Hole, reiatsu, and mask fragment were all part of a Hollow's physiology. I don't know about the vial, but…" It would be an incredible amount of effort just to mask whatever true intent she had behind getting him to use it.

Ichigo looked at it a bit more, then rolled over his arm to look at a cut on his bicep. It was long scabbed over, and well on its way to healing. Rukia realized too late what he intended as he uncorked it and let a drop of the thick substance drip onto the wound.

"W-wait!"

Too late, it was on. The liquid bubbled a bit where it touched the old wound, and Ichigo grunted with a wince, but then it stopped, and the part of the cut where there was serum was gone.

"It works," he stated before reaching over and spreading it over the wound. Wherever it touched marred flesh, it bubbled for a few seconds like disinfectant peroxide and whisked away the remainder of the scratch.

"Th-that was reckless, Ichigo!" she yelled before knocking him on the head, earning a small yap before he rubbed the spot. "We didn't know if it was real or, or, some kind of poison."

"That's why I put it on a scabbed cut. I'd be less likely to be poisoned if it didn't immediately enter my bloodstream," he explained before looking at the remainder in the vial and corking it back. "Besides, if she wanted to poison me, why bother giving it to you instead of just dumping the stuff on me while I was unconscious?"

That Rukia didn't have a clear answer for. Maybe it being a poison was far-fetched, but there were other things someone might apply to a person aside from healing and poison. She didn't keep up with all the comings and goings of the Research Division, but she had heard of them making things that sounded fantastical to her ears, like microphones too small to see, or cameras that looked like flies. Or enough microscopic bombs spread throughout a person's body to blow them up. That last one sounded more like a nasty rumor, though. No way was that allowed.

"I don't know. It's strange. I thought she was going to kill us, but… She gave me that, said something about coffee, and then she left. It's…remarkably un-Hollow-like behavior, so I'm trying to figure out what her angle is."

"Maybe… Remember Sora, near the end?"

Rukia blinked, then nodded. Inoue Sora had managed to overcome his Hollow nature long enough to purify himself using Ichigo's Zanpakuto. It was a remarkable showing of strength and willpower to pull one's self back from beyond the brink like that.

"Maybe she's like that, but… I don't know, more? Most Hollows have been totally mindless, and the couple that could talk were either monsters in and out…or Sora."

"Yes, but…this goes way beyond that. It pretty much goes against everything we were ever taught about Hollows and how they function."

"Sora did, too, from what I know. I don't doubt that if he could've broken it all away or whatever that he would've stuck around as a…an Arrancar or whatever. Maybe not the best choice, but still. There might be something we don't know about going on with Tanya. At the very least, she's not hostile. Not trying to kill us."

"But Ichigo," Kon spoke up, "what if Nee-chan is right and she's planning something big?"

"How big could she be planning? What could she even be planning that needs me alive and healthy? If it's something bad, I'd just get in the way."

That much was true. Rukia doubted he'd let anyone harm his friends and family, and he had been taking his duties as her substitute rather seriously. She just couldn't help but feel that there was something to this picture that she was missing.

"I don't know. But we need to be cautious until we can be sure she's trustworthy. Maybe… Maybe we could offer her a konso, but… Well, from what she said to me…"

"Just be careful around those black-robed characters. One step out of line, and you might find yourself passing over into the afterlife living in a half-rotted slum. Try to avoid that as long as you can." Why did her words have to feel so targeted?

"She doesn't trust the Shinigami."

No, more than that, she seemed aware of parts of the Rukongai. It was rather an unfair view of it, a lot of the Rukongai wasn't even that bad. It had its rundown parts, sure, Rukia had experienced it. But still…

"The way she said it, though," Rukia muttered. "It was like…she had experience with Shinigami."

'Perhaps it was a bad one that colored her perception? I know not every Shinigami is the most stand-up person, but what could have been done or said to turn out like this?'

"She didn't count us?"

"She knew you were human, and she thought I was one. Ah, she mentioned-" Rukia cut off herself when she heard Yuzu cheering something from downstairs. It almost sounded like a greeting.

"Ah, you felt it, too?"

"Felt it?"

"It was like that time she opened a portal. She must be nearby, then."

Rukia quickly turned and opened the door before shooting out and hitting the stairs. Ichigo followed behind her at a quick but not nearly so rushed pace. When Rukia reached the bottom, she turned and saw the Arrancar once again, with her golden-blonde hair, intense blue eyes, and sharing a smile with Yuzu while handing over some sort of semi-transparent blue gem to the young girl.

"Whoa! Where did you get this?"

"You'd be surprised what you can find with a plethora of supernaturally strong employees digging through oceans of sand and stone. Dumortierite quartz is rather lovely, isn't it?"

"It's matches your eyes!"

"Ah…" The Hollow blushed and rubbed the back of her neck. "Ahem, well, that's a coincidence. Oh, hello there," she greeted Rukia, noticing her staring. "Doing well, I hope?"

"Uh, yeah," Rukia got out, struck by the strange scene before her. Ichigo came down the stairs from behind her, making her look back and up at him.

"And I'm very glad to see you've recovered."

"Thanks, but, uh, no…menciones la pelea…a mis hermanas. Por favor," he said to her in some foreign tongue.

"Ah, no hay problema, mi amigo. Though, I do have something to talk about with you if we get a moment. I'll let you decide how to sort through it. I'd normally ask to speak with your father about it, as well, but as Karin just mentioned, he has no spiritual awareness."

"If he did, he'd have done something about that one annoying old man ghost a few years ago."

"Mm, that one made me feel unsafe," Yuzu agreed.

"Aside from that, I'm glad I caught all of you at once. There's something I wanted to point out, as it's rather important for yourselves and the future. Miss… Sorry, I didn't catch your name?"

"Uh, Rukia," the Shinigami decided to answer, figuring that it would hurt no one. "Kuchiki Rukia."

"Kuchiki-san. Nice to make your acquaintance. My name is Tanya Louisenbairn."

Rukia's eyes widened a bit at that.

'Louisenbairn? But that… It can't be!'

"Don't forget the princess part," Yuzu reminded the Arrancar girl.

"Well, it's barely more than a title these days. My authority comes more from my position in the new government. …Though, I suppose Father's old position does help grease the wheels on occasion."

"Hey, can't change what you are, hime-sama," Karin said teasingly.

"Oh, that has a very different feel to it. Not sure I like it. Fine, Princesa Tanya Louisenbairn. Yes, much better. More official feeling rather than a pet name." She shook her head. "Anyways, I'd hate to push you out of the conversation, Kuchiki-san, but what I have to tell the Kurosakis right now is rather personal."

Rukia didn't want to leave the three of them alone with an Arrancar, even if she did seem polite at the moment. She certainly didn't want to leave them alone with a Hollow going by that name, but she was again trapped in a situation where refusing would just seem strange and rude without explaining far too much to the sisters, and this was a lot more than a Kikanshinki could handle.

Not to mention the earlier memories and Tanya's likely future visits.

"It'll be fine," Ichigo spoke up, calming her nerves a bit. "Whatever you've got to tell us, I trust her with it."

"Hm, well, it's a rather big deal…but I suppose without greater context it won't mean much to her. All right then. It's over in here."

Tanya led the four of them over to the shelves where many of the photos of the Kurosakis' deceased mother lay, the overblown poster used as part of a shrine by the Kurosaki patriarch nearby.

"I noticed something when I was last here, but I needed to confirm my suspicions. I double-checked, and now I'm sure," she said as she pointed to a necklace and charm set on a frame, "this is a Quincy Cross, stylized with the Quincy Zeichen."

Rukia croaked back her surprise, going still as she took that in. She then looked over at Ichigo, back at the cross, to Ichigo, the cross, Ichigo…

"Wait, how is it a 'cross' if it's got five points?" Karin asked. "Isn't it more like a star?"

"Ku-in-shī?" Yuzu enunciated, trying out the word. "What does that mean?"

"As far as I know, it's just a name," Tanya explained, "but the Quincy were a race of people with spiritual powers. Just seeing spirits is the least of those. They can manipulate reishi - spirit particles - and form them into objects. Most notably weapons, but I'm sure the power could have other applications as well."

"Wait, so our mother…had superpowers?" Karin asked, eyes squinting questioningly.

"That's- That's so cool!" Yuzu exclaimed. "Mama was like a superhero!"

"Possibly, though I doubt she was very active. Quincy powers…have problems. I don't want to go into too much detail, but let's just say it's better that a Quincy never uses their powers for battle. It does too much damage to the world."

"Damage?" Ichigo asked. "Like how?"

"It's complicated. And it's part of that thing I need to tell you more privately before you decide if and how to tell your sisters. Ah, Kuchiki-san, you have a question?"

"Oh, uh, yes. Where…did you learn about this?"

"Oh, simple. My father's he- Well, not my father's anymore, I suppose. Our organization's head scientist, loathe as I am to admit it, has a rather extensive library of information gathered over many centuries. Millenia, possibly. I had some basic lessons growing up about the major forces of the Three Worlds, which included overviews about the Quincy. I thought this thing looked familiar, and as I said, I double-checked, read up on them, and decided to inform the siblings, as they seemed unaware."

There was a lot of little things in that explanation that told Rukia other things about the Arrancar. But most standout to her was how Tanya said she had grown up.

"So even ghosts have to go to school, huh," Karin noted. "Are there a lot of Quincy people out there."

"Not really, no," Tanya answered. "Several reasons, like how the power seems to dilute over generations when marrying non-Quincy humans but is easily shored up by two mixed Quincy pairing up. Rather…unfortunate for informing the older cultures' traditions, you might realize."

Ichigo sighed.

"Yeah, let's not go there."

"Beyond that, there's not much to tell. I just believed that you all should know. Beyond that, I'll let your brother decide on how to pass down what I tell him."

"You better tell us everything, Ichigo," Karin warned.

"Yeah, yeah, eventually. I gotta know it first you know." He looked at Tanya with a serious expression. "I have a lot of questions myself."

"And I'll answer them to the best of my ability."

"And while we're talking, you can tell Rukia, too. We've got a lot to tell each other."

"Hm, ah, I understand." Tanya nodded her head.

"Oh, I'll make snacks and coffee," Yuzu said. "And I'll…put my soul into them, yeah!" she added with excitement, pumping her fist. "Quincy Crafting Power!"

Rukia blinked, then noticed the gentle smile Tanya made when Yuzu mentioned coffee. It looked…so genuine.

'Did I overthink it? Is she just…ambiently enjoying this? I just don't know, but I've got to keep an eye on this. No telling what the game is now.

'Still, a Quincy? Is that why…all my power went into Ichigo that night instead of half? And is the penalty worse than a normal human?'

~

Tanya sighed as she took off her suppression cloak, but still kept a tight lid on her own reiatsu output. Rukia jumped, obviously feeling it at this distance, proving that the girl had a sense of spiritual energies that were fairly well-honed, but the lack of alarms from her proximity sensors let her know that she wasn't detectable beyond the house.

'Good. And Ichigo here is probably masking my presence leaking like a burst pipe as he is.'

He also helped provide cover to the agents who even now were setting up the system. It wasn't incredibly detailed, effectively the soul-power sensing version of buoys picking up whale songs in the ocean to track their movements. These would do the same but for reiatsu signatures throughout the town of Karakura and some outlying districts. Once this testbed showed some results (while letting Tanya continue her little personal project unmolested), it could be used in locations throughout the Soul World and other spiritual hotspots of the Living World.

Fran's specialty might lie in biology, but she wasn't inept at the technical side of science. Plus, they were finding out that some among the Palas might actually have some buried scientific knowledge within them. Tanya felt a little bad about okaying that procedure that Fran devised to 'further unlock hidden potential' in Hollows, but it was volunteer-only. A dozen had lined up with joyous tears in their eyes once they had announced it. It moved her to see them so happy to have a chance at bettering themselves and society, even if it meant a little pain and scarring.

The costs of progress, gladly paid for by patriotic volunteers.

"So, what's so big that you need to tell me and not my sisters?" the teenager demanded, seeming so serious for a fifteen-year-old. It would have been adorable if he didn't look like he threw bricks and caught them for fun.

"Well, first, I saw the end of your fight with that Hollow, the one you called Fisher." He didn't look surprised, so Rukia at least informed him about her appearance. "I'd congratulate you on beating him down, but you took a rather big risk to close in on him. If you were one of my subordinates, I'd have you digging trenches in the desert for taking a hit like that."

His scowl reminded her of a cranky cat, for some reason.

"But still, well done. I could tell it was a tough one for you. Related, I noticed your garb at the time. A shihakusho, Shinigami clothing. Very distinct. Why were you wearing that?"

He crossed his arms. "I'm a Substitute Shinigami. I've been going around purifying Hollows for them. It showed up when I got the powers."

Tanya nodded.

'Just as I thought. They found a way to give spiritually aware humans Shinigami powers, and it even works with Quincies. He might be what they called Gemischt, but I bet it could override even whatever passes for 'pure-blooded' among them. Such a silly concept! Whatever functions genetics have on spiritual power wouldn't get watered down like pouring milk in coffee. It's either half, whole, or nothing. If any bloodlines out there tried to stay 'pure' after the genocide, they probably resemble the Habsburgs by this point.'

"Did they explain Hollows to you?"

"Corrupted human souls that turned into monsters when they couldn't pass on."

"The cliff notes version, but yes, in essence. Have they explained the various types?"

"Types? Like what?"

"Well, I guess they're not very relevant. You're on the Menos level at best, after all. So, you're working on a need-to-know basis?"

He shrugged. "Mostly. We get messages, and then we go stop the Hollow."

"You probably shouldn't be dragging your underpowered friend to Hollow fights," Tanya mildly reprimanded him. "Then again, you seem all-in on this? Have they made this Substitute offer to you as well?"

"It's…complicated," Rukia answered.

"I see…"

Not really. Whatever role Kuchiki was playing in this, it seemed like she wasn't a fighter. That could mean a lot of things, but Tanya didn't waste time going down that line of questioning. She had a track to keep.

"So you know what Hollows eat?"

"Souls."

"Yes. It's an unfortunate effect of their condition. I don't know the exact links between cause and effect, but the metaphysical 'hollowing' of their being makes them feel empty, which translates into a ravenous hunger for souls in an attempt to fill that void."

"So you feel like eating souls all the time?" he asked the 'you' directed obviously at her.

"Well, I don't," Tanya answered. "I suppose it was a matter of time before you noticed."

"I was wondering when you'd bring it up." He shrugged. "You seem okay though. You don't act like any of the Hollows I've ever seen."

"There are reasons for that. For one, I am a born Hollow. I've always been like this," not quite a lie. Surely, things would be very similar if she had gone through the cycle of reincarnation like people normally did and was still born as she was. Perhaps with a little less advancement since she would have lacked certain knowledge, but mostly the same. "Second, I'm an Arrancar. A form of Hollow that has torn away part of its mask. Well, normally. Again, born like this. Doing that, however, changes something about the Hollow. They can still hunger for souls, especially below a certain threshold, but it's no longer a maddening affair. Just annoying, from what I'm told. Regular food can sometimes quell it, though caloric intake isn't exactly easily translatable to the metaphysical consumption of a being's entire reiryoku. Arrancar actually need nutrition, unlike other Hollows, though not in the same amounts as a human."

"That's…actually pretty interesting," the Substitute Shinigami said, clearly intrigued by what she'd just explained. "So there's actually a way for Hollows…to not become monsters?"

"Well, I wouldn't say that. Below the threshold of Menos, most Hollows simply can't become an Arrancar. They'd have to reach that point at the least, which, as you can imagine, requires them to eat a lot of souls or absorb a lot of reiryoku from some other source. That's just to get to the minimum. Further stages have an easier time of it, but the process of becoming an Arrancar is always long and intensive, opening up the Hollow to attack from others."

"...Hollows will eat each other?"

"Past the Menos stage, it's practically a requirement. You won't see many beyond that because they simply won't be attracted to normal human souls anymore, in the same way a grown lion isn't going to hunt rats like a cub might. The hunger doesn't become sated, it grows with every step, except the last. I am a… Well, I am believed to be a Vasto Lorde, the last form of Hollow, which no longer hungers endlessly for souls. They passed a point in their evolution where they've simply…fulfilled it. No one knows how many souls it takes, or even if it's the same for every individual Hollow trying to climb the ladder. My uncle told me once about how he and his pack realized they had hit a sort of ceiling or bottleneck and couldn't quite push past it, but it wasn't something they could exactly quantify."

"So it can end, but it takes a lot of souls, and no one knows how many. Or it takes vulnerability that most Hollows can't afford," Ichigo rationed out. "But you were born one."

"And what's that about believing you're a Vasto Lorde?" Rukia asked, sounding frightened, probably because she was trying to fathom the sheer scale of what Tanya was describing. "It- It sounded like a big deal."

"Ah, well, the circumstances around my birth are all-around unique. My mother was an Arrancar, but she wasn't a natural Hollow. She was made by a scientist. A rather despicable being all-around, but a genius. Because of that, her inherent nature is abnormal compared to most Hollows. I don't think she ever hungered for a soul. My father is also unique but in the opposite direction. Obviously, since I'm the Princess, that makes me the child of the King, Barragan Louisenbairn. He was not a normal Hollow. One could certainly think of him as Vasto Lorde, but… Well, I don't think he actually qualifies. To hear him tell it, he simply came to exist one day an uncountable number of years ago. Not uncountable just because of how long ago it was, but because numbers would not be invented until long after he came to be. He didn't evolve so much as he picked up an identity and shaped himself into what he is. He's certainly a Hollow, but above any single Hollow that's ever existed by dint of his power and the shape it takes."

"And what's his power?" Ichigo asked.

"Rot," Tanya answered instantly. "Or perhaps, more accurately, age. Time moving forward. He can accelerate it, not just making living entities age and wither into dust, but inanimate objects will wear away under his power. Buildings turn to rocks turn to pebbles into sand. The only thing I've ever seen resist is glass, and even it grows brittle and shatters eventually. Not even Hollows, seemingly ageless, can stand against it, turning into dust as much as any living thing would."

"And that's your father?" the young man asked with incredulity.

"Yes. He's a rather good one, all things considered. Can you imagine trying to wrangle a kingdom of Hollows? Ah, but we've gone off-track. Yes, I am supposedly a Vasto Lorde, and like any Hollow, I can eat souls. Don't really like it, though. It's usually annoying to have to go through. I've eaten less than a dozen Hollows in all my years, and tossed out nearly every soul they had."

"Tossed out?" Rukia asked. "But…that can't… How is that possible?"

"Seems to be a Vasto Lorde thing. They're the only ones I know of who can do it," Tanya explained. "I was taught how by one of them when I started instinctively trying after my first Hollow meal. My attempts were clumsy. She showed me a refined way of doing it. It's still slow and cumbersome, and I have to be selective since evil souls cause Hell to open up. Literally Hell. Have they explained Hell, by the way?"

"I saw it. I killed a Hollow that had been a serial killer in life."

"Ah, good man. And good riddance to bad rubbish. Society has no place for such degeneracy. Ahem, where was I? Right. This is important, Kurosaki-san, and concerns you very much."

"Call me, Ichigo." Really, he wanted to be referred to as 'strawberry'? Did he already feel they were so close that she should start using nicknames? Well, if he insisted…

"Ichigo, I confronted Fisher after he fled your fight," she told him. "And then I ate him."

~

To say that the revelation made Ichigo angry…

Well, he was pissed, at first, then saddened, then confused.

And when he finally calmed down, clutching his hair in his hands, he sighed and let his arms drop.

That was a while ago. They had a lot more to discuss, after all. Mostly about the Quincy and Shinigami.

Like how the latter basically killed off the former 250 years ago. Few survived. They were thought to be extinct at one point. He really needed to make sure Rukia knew he didn't blame her. She had gone pale when Tanya described how the whole thing went down. But the whole thing was before her time. And he was honestly so disconnected from the idea of Quincies that he honestly only felt about as heated over it as he might any other slaughter in human history. Even if he did probably have some ancient relatives who died because of it. It'd be like getting mad at another prefecture because one time the samurai there killed people here, including some unknown great-uncles.

Still, it happened, and a lot of the people who did it were still alive and kicking, in the Shinigami sense of the word. For all anyone knew, there weren't any more Quincies, and he and his sisters were the last. Tanya doubted that. The Quincy were too 'widespread in diaspora' for that to be the case, in her opinion. His mother might know, but she…wasn't really available.

"But you still have his mother's soul inside of you?" Rukia asked. This whole conversation had to be rocking the girl's world, and not just because of some awkward history. Tanya wasn't just some weird Hollow, she was a leader in a civilization of weird Hollows. Hollows that weren't going out to eat souls. Or, at least, not human souls, not directly. Weird how they used so much Spanish in everything, though.

"Yes. I managed to get through the rest and singled her out. She's not…awake, for lack of a better word, but she's there. I thought you should know before I did anything further. You should have a say in things moving forward."

That was honestly kind of her. It was a weird thought. His mom, or at least, her soul, was right there, inside of a little girl old enough to be his grandma, because she ate the monster that had eaten his mother. He couldn't quite reach her, as much as he wished that he could.

"If it's not too much, I…want to be able to talk to her again," he said, somehow feeling as if a weight was being lifted from him while simultaneously being pulled down from below. "To at least say goodbye, if nothing else."

"...I think we can arrange something, eventually," Tanya said to him evenly with a bow of her head. "I know it can be done. I just…don't trust the one who's done it before. And I'd rather it be refined surgery instead of the…butchery he's likely to inflict."

"Yeah, yeah, I understand."

He was really asking a lot here, when he thought about it. To speak to the dead, and to get it done, a kid might have to tear a piece of themselves off. A 70 year-old-kid, but still, he knew how young people might hide themselves behind a mask of maturity better than most.

"Don't worry. It'll just take time. Until then… Well, I suppose you keep doing as you have been, but I demand that you be careful," she ordered, her tone suddenly changing from kindly to authoritative. "I already gave you a serum, and those things are hard to make. And doing all of this, don't make my investment in you a waste, all right."

"Ah, the serum," Ichigo remembered, searching his pocket, but Tanya waved for him to stop.

"Whatever's left, hold on to it for a rainy day. Like I said, you're an investment. Stay alive and improve, and be careful about those Shinigami. They might seem friendly, and maybe some of them are, but they've got more than a few skeletons in their closets. But that's for another day. You need to go over what you want Karin and Yuzu to know now and later."

"Y-yeah. I do."

"As for Quincy stuff… Well, I can't teach that. But if you ever come across more of them, perhaps they can help. Just convince them to stay out of the fighting, if you can."

"I'll do what I can." Considering the cost, it would be better if they did.

"With that, I should probably go." She picked up the now-empty coffee mug from his nightstand that Yuzu brought up some time ago along with some chocolate cookies. It had been something, seeing that mature face light up like any child's at the sight of sweets and forbidden beverages, and it even helped Ichigo to calm down in the middle of his episode. Of course, Yuzu was worried about her brother now, after seeing him so angry. He'd have to apologize and explain things to her and Karin.

Yeah, they needed to know. At least that mom was okay, in a sense.

"I'll head down and tell the girls goodbye. I'll probably manage more frequent visits thanks to a new thing we've got in the works, but I'll probably be just as busy as before, if not more so."

"What's got you all working so hard anyways?" Ichigo asked as he picked up his own mug and the platter that had been covered in cookies minutes ago.

"...Purely defensive measures. Security and whatnot. Infrastructure. Las Noches was just a series of platforms on the sands more than 50 years ago. But now we have people to feed, and they need actual food and water. And we want to protect what we've built. Like it or not, there are those who will still view us as monsters. As threats."

Ichigo nodded. Considering how the Shinigami dealt with another big threat… Well, maybe things would be better this time. Tanya was here, talking to him, apparently a Quincy, and he had Shinigami powers thanks to Rukia. They could work together this time, instead of immediately going to war.

It took several more minutes to go from leaving to left. Yuzu wanted to talk, and Karin was there to hit Tanya with some questions, too. She ended up getting another half a cup of coffee before finally going, savoring it like she might not get another chance. For a moment, there was just peace between humans, Shinigami, and Hollows.

'Coexistence,' he thought. 'That's the way forward.'

~

She was on a mission.

A mission since Day One.

A mission to see to The End.

A mission given to her by He-Who-Is-Most-On-High!

"You're doing it again," her friend pointed out.

Mary jumped a bit, then nervously rubbed her neck while looking back.

"Yeah… Kinda getting distracted. Since Elly's message, I can't help but feel focused."

"I get that, but you were getting pretty intense with the stares. Could practically feel it in the air."

Mary admittedly had a tendency to do that. Well, it was hard not to. Mary was on a mission from God, of course. Not just any mission, but one to save an entire world. Or two. Or three? It was hard to know exactly. There were supposed to be three big worlds with some smaller ones attached to them in this universe, as far as she was aware, all anchored to something important.

"I will send you forth, and arm you with this Nail, forged by the hands of my own Son, so that it may forever guide your way," He had instructed once Mary had accepted.

It was…surprising to learn that half of what she was taught in life was so far off. People didn't simply go to Heaven or Hell when they died. Instead of one life, a soul had many that it lived in cycles. Birth, life, death, and rebirth, again and again until they reached their enlightened state, and they finally entered the Heavens. When she asked if she would be going to Heaven to see her father, He had told her no. At first, she was scared she was going to Hell, and some part of her thought that maybe she deserved it, but then He explained her father wasn't in Heaven, and then she felt even worse because she thought he was in Hell. But God comforted her, explaining how it all actually worked, and she felt a lot better afterward. Confused, but better. Her father had simply been reborn, living a new life to try and do better than last time.

Then God offered her a gift, but it was a heavy gift with a burden. She would remember this life as she started a new one, but she would have to save God's son. Not the one she knew as Jesus, he was perfectly fine, but another one who had been bound to a mortal world's internal reincarnation cycle. His own crucifixion threatened to last an eternity, and now the whole universe he watched over in His name threatened to unravel as well. Its Hell threatened to boil over, its Limbo was clawing and grasping at power, and the Preta were raising their eyes to the Heavens, all while misguided children sought to end the suffering in the worst way imaginable.

Those bits went over her head even while she didn't have one in her spiritual form or whatever it was between death and life, but she understood the jist of it. And the Nail God gifted her was leading her in the right direction, as was its main prerogative.

Mary opened the compass-watch her father had given her. And wasn't that just the icing on the cake? God sent her parents to be reborn ahead of her, and they met, fell in love once again, and had her just like before. This time, there was no war to take her father from home. They were long past those things. She got to grow up with her family whole, and even a little bigger than before. Her baby brother was getting ready to go to high school soon. But more than just a gift, it was a precious reminder of everything she had and almost lost. And it was from there that her other gift was shown.

"The Hand of God Guides Me," she said, reaching for the very soul of her compass-watch and connecting it to the Nail within her. Her right arm was then covered in bronze armor, a compass upon its wrist, and then the right side of her face had a piece set on her ear, a screen extending from it to sit before her eye.

It was her armor, her sword, and her guide in this life, the Nail's purpose made manifest through her heart and soul. While she had all the other powers inherent to Nail Bearers like herself, this was the part that was uniquely hers.

Matt blinked, but it became apparent why she'd activated her Nail when Vicky entered the room.

"We think we found one, but we might not be the only ones," Vicky quickly explained.

"Not the scavs," Matt muttered.

"It's the scavs."

"Yep, but they're going to be too late," Mary said as she followed the arrows in her eyepiece for a moment. "Japan?"

"It's scary how that thing works," Vicky said, confirming the question. "Why does Elly even have to go digging when you have that?"

"Because I have to ask the right questions or know what I'm looking for." Sadly, Nails were not an intelligent thing. They were simply tools that sometimes fell into the wrong hands. It couldn't tell Mary what she needed to find, only God, herself, and her allies could. What it did do was tell her how and where to find what she was looking for. Sometimes even when. "The Bearers are gonna show up soon. Couple of weeks, tops. We'll need tickets to Tokyo and then a bus down to Karakura."

"Wait, Bearers, as in, plural?" Matt asked her.

"I always ask if there's more than one. It can't narrow it down, though. More than two is the best I've got."

"Still, with just two plus our five, that'd give us seven. We'd outnumber the scavs. Three alone would completely outdo them."

"And we can finally stop those monsters!" Vicky declared.

"It's not just numbers," Mary reminded them. "We need quality. And," she smiled as the question was given an answer, "one of the potentials is capable of beating that Kūgo bastard!"

That was good news indeed! Mary was sure that with the right training, she could someday overcome that murderer, but it was a race where she had to sprint just to keep up. They'd fought several times and both left each time licking their wounds, but sometimes it was Xcution that found the poor Nail Bearer before them. Mary couldn't even use The Hand of God Guides Me thanks to their own Nails working together to counter its answers. They had two that messed with space and one that altered time, which meant that their location and target were never a certainty until they were already there thanks to how they used them. And then there was the Book of The End, perhaps the most dangerous Nail Mary had ever encountered.

She was the only one anyone knew of who could fight it off, The Hand of God acting as its direct counter. Not only that, but she was sure when the bastard first tried, he had seen the face of God and faltered, probably erasing the image from his mind when he couldn't live with seeing Glory whilst living in sin. Others would succumb if she wasn't there to use her Nail to restore them when the Bearer, Tsukishima, inserted himself into their pasts. It was his go-to for confrontations, either making them believe he had always been their greatest friend or just stealing every bit of knowledge he could before using it against them. The Hand of God could set a person straight, but she had to reach them and their soul. Made all the harder thanks to Kūgo often being there to block her path.

But now they may have a step forward. If they could reach these new Bearers, and the one with potential joined them, they could finally break this deadlock and put an end to the murderous organization of Nail Scavengers known as Xcution. This would be the first stepping stone Mary knew she had to pass on her way to completing her mission. After that, she wasn't too sure. Hollows were everpresent, and definitely a problem, but she wasn't sure if that was something that could be solved. They seemed more a symptom of the world being off-kilter rather than a cause. Hopefully, The Hand of God would guide her further along the path.

"Just texted Warren and Elly," Matt told her, and she smiled, thankful to have such attentive allies, even if the faces and souls were ones she remembered from a lifetime ago. But then again, that was another one of God's missives before he sent her on her journey.

"Look for allies where you once saw only enemies, and they shall be among your most ardent defenders, your greatest supports, your truest friends."

Once upon a time, a world and a life away, these people had been her enemies. Now they were the warriors who would save the world.

By the Grace of God!