R a v e n o u s

  Forms on the ground began to shift, the pile of eight individuals that he knew in varying degrees stirring from their forced stasis. It reminded him of a long ago memory, of bodies, too numerous to properly mourn for individually, some still alive but their fate sealed, piled up to be burned together. Teeth grit behind lips, the corner curling as if the blond could smell the traces of flesh infused smog.

  Hopefully, this wouldn’t be the case, he could help them, but he had to know what happened to them first; know how they work now, or if there’s even a trace of their consciousness’s left to scrape up and work with. If not, well. It would be a lie if he said he’d just put them down. What Aizen had infected them with, the hollow essence was fascinating, and if he could learn more about the process in practical form instead of just theory like he had--

  There’s that feeling again-- But this time, he remembered what guilt felt like. You had a hand in this, you did this to them.

  Someone’s arm jerked in the mass, a strange movement that caught brown eyes, sharp and like a glitch in a mechanical system. Muscles flexed and tendons bulged against dark skin, fingers digging into the ground of the storage space Uruhara created.

  Love, that’s Love’s arm, the Captain of the seventh. Or, the former now.

  A low rumble seemed to shake the Earth, a tremble under the scientist’s feet and his eyes went wide, drinking in the the movement of his previous coworkers with calculated fascination.

  It was short lived with the long, curved bird like mask over the third division captain’s face split open like an egg cracking perfectly in half-- a horrendous, ear shattering scream ripped through it. It was metal on metal, moving rapidly to produce the high, shrill screeches that pierced through anything, not even covering his ears instinctively could save Uruhara from it as it reached a frequency that made something in his head pop. Vision blurred, the mass so clear before now shifting violently, his heard rung, and something warm caressed the side of his face-

  The scream was a shofar to herald a nightmare, seeming to wake all the others around them as it screeched in an agony. The hollow energy was overwhelming, nauseating him immediately, bile bubbling in his throat as he teetered on his feet. All he could hear now was his own heartbeat wildly thrumming in his mind, even as his vision came back in focus.

 Just in time to watch a hand smash down on Rose, crushing their already damaged back. Kensei, dragging himself from the mass, wrapped fingers around that long neck, to silence them. But the beak, lined with glass like fangs sunk into the meat of his forearm—Rose’s neck bent grotesquely to accomplish this, the vertebrae of their neck jutting and twisting in and inhuman way, as if his spine was suddenly made from the flexible branch of a birch.

  Blood was spilled, and that just seemed to make things worse, exciting the beasts more. Uruhara could only watch, in his now silent world, bile escaping passed his slacked jaw as Lisa’s body rose from the ground, her stance limp and loose as her muscles convulsed; something seemed to crawl under her skin—But there was little time to observe that, as she had grabbed the silver hair of Kensei and ripped him fluidly from Rose, as if he was nothing more than a rag doll, slamming him against the energy barrier that trapped them in this area and ‘safe’ to observe. But it wouldn’t keep them safe from themselves. Teeth shredding his arm, nearly skinning free of flesh. It hung like tattered rags from the birds maw, and Uruhara almost convinced himself, that he imagined the long blue tongue that curled around the hanging tatters to pull them further into bloodied jaws.

  But the loss seemed to matter very little to Kensei; with how fast new sheets of skin began to spider web rapidly and form over the exposed, stringy muscle; seemingly syphoning the fallen blood back into himself, as if time itself had reversed on the wound.

  There was too much to focus on in the mass of chaos, Hiyori, still monstrous and cruel on a good day, was now ramming the long horn of her particularly demonic mask into the gut of Mashiro. She, in turn, twisted her self upon it just to kick the blond back with a force that if Uruhara could still hear, he was sure the sound would be of ribs shattering.

  But someone was missing from this picture, this painting in progress, blood splattering to the floor in arcs with each new violent attack, dotted like ink from the spilling burden of an over saturated calligraphy brush. Looking down only for a moment to expel a mouth full of bile, two, illuminated, deep set golden eyes would be staring back at him. Something cold settled in Uruhara, something unsettling and icy, slowly frosting over his insides that compressed his chest as all the air in it fled, as if to escape the monster before him.

  It seemed like a strange reaction, for the hollow that stood a hairs length away from him was the calmest of them all—but perhaps, that’s what made it the most terrifying. It’s breaths were even, something Uruhara could feel, the lukewarm air that escaped around pearled teeth to puffs against his face.

   It seemed he was paralyzed, locked eyes with the other, unable to blink or move away, as if completely frozen, even as a hand rose, the long digits of his friend flexing slowly, reminding him of a tarantula carefully feeling the area around it before the pad of a finger fell to the side of his face. It dragged down, as if savoring the feel of his skin, and Urahara could see the teeth clack together minutely. Red stained it’s fingers when it pulled them away, and to the former Captain’s horror, watched as the mask parted, and a strange black ooze seemed to dribble down the sides like molasses, and a long blue tongue, saturated in the tar licked at the substance.

  Uruhara could feel something, something akin to snakes sliding over his shoulders, cold and smooth; wrapping around his neck, slowly coiling and getting tighter and tighter, cutting blood off from his head and making him dizzy, but the colors that seemed to blossom in his vision didn’t just seem from blood loss. His head was light and dizzy, everything dream like and Uruhara’,s hands came forward on their own accord, pressing against the haori adorned shoulders of his old friend--  He didn’t hear the possessed man’s name fall form his own lips, but there was something, the widening of black and gold, the flicker of brown, and he knew.

  They’re still there, and it was Shinji that pulled away from him, backing away and it was only then did Uruhara realize that somehow, the creature he had met briefly had effortlessly passed through the protection barrier Tessai had put up around the group.     That level of power is in the territory of the divine.