Thank you again to everyone who reviewed/favorited/alerted! Warning: Dark and sort of twisted. Rating bumped to M, though it's kind of on the border. Thanks.
The next morning, as Rukia woke, she found the door of her room wide open. It was odd for she distinctly remembered shutting and locking it tightly. Only one person, or more correctly, demon, would have the power to unlock her door. She briefly wondered why he had done it and what he had done. It was no serious matter, since if he had wanted her dead, she probably would not have woken up that morning.
"Kuchiki-san?"
"Hai?"
"I brought your breakfast here", Kiyone entered slowly with a shy smile on her face. "Thank you very much for yesterday!"
"It's fine, Kiyone", Rukia smiled. "What do you say to adventuring again, today?"
"I don't know", Kiyone said, brushing her short blond hair to the side. "Ulquiorra-sama wouldn't be happy about that. But if you'd like, you can take a bath today. I finally found some extra towels."
"That's a great idea", Rukia said, realizing that she hadn't taken a bath since she'd left the hospital. "Thanks Kiyone."
"It's nothing compared to what you have done for me", the blond haired girl bowed and escorted Rukia out of the room with her breakfast.
As Rukia settled into the warm water contained in a regular bathtub, she sighed. There was a scent in the bathroom. It reminded her of her own large bathroom in the Kuchiki Mansion.
You must stop thinking like that, Rukia! She chided herself and strove to forget. Remembering those things will only bring pain. Nii-sama always said that one should not dwell on the past because we cannot change what has already happened and instead one should look towards the future, since that can be changed.
"Nii-sama", Rukia whispered, remembering her stoic brother, who was cold yet oddly caring. He had never fully looked her in the eye, but every time he walked away, she could sense some sadness radiating from him.
She took the bath in silence, trying to think of something else. Even thinking of Helmet-head would be better than thinking of Nii-sama.
Ulquiorra lazily walked through the halls trying to recall where it was he was heading to. The stupid servant girl that was apparently of nobility, had tried to tell him, without actually speaking, where his visitor was. It had been too confusing, so Ulquiorra was trying to sense for a large or compressed energy somewhere. Demons had a special sort of spiritual pressure and humans with large ones were easily detected.
He sensed a very faint trace of spiritual pressure coming from a nearby bathroom. It couldn't possibly be his visitor, so it had to be the girl. He headed towards the bathroom when he faintly smelled a metallic scent in the air.
Rukia had slipped while getting out of the bathtub and slammed her shoulder and back against a sharp edge. Even though the wound was located in a place where she couldn't really see, she could tell it was bleeding. First, the violet-eyed girl washed the blood off her backside and used her towel to wipe off the water and remaining blood. She pulled on a pair of loose fitting pants and then took a robe from a side drawer and began to tie the golden sash around her thin waist.
"Are you bleeding?"
Rukia turned around, the sash halfway wrapped around her body, towards the voice. It was Helmet-head. He had entered so quietly and quickly that she hadn't even noticed. The difference in their power was so immense it wasn't simply the difference of human and demon, but master and slave.
"Why do you ask?" Rukia danced around his question, taunting him subtly.
The pale demon walked closer towards her and said, "I can smell it."
"I slipped", Rukia didn't know why, but her voice came out defensive, as if she had done something wrong. He turned his head to the side suddenly and his eyes widened in alarm. With a flash he was gone, leaving an open-mouthed Rukia behind in the bathroom, and left towards where a steadily growing spiritual pressure was coming from.
"Was he worried about me?" Rukia could not help but wonder aloud.
"Grimmjow", Ulquiorra snapped angrily. "Lower your spiritual pressure right now!"
The electric blue-haired demon bared his teeth in a feral grin, "You were taking too long."
"What is it now?" It was very clear that the pale demon wasn't in the mood for anymore jokes, but Grimmjow wasn't one to settle for less than he could give.
"So, what were you doing that delayed your arrival?" Grimmjow leaned forward with his impossibly wide grin, enhanced even more by the bone fragments shaped as a jawbone set on his right jaw. His eyes trailed towards the doorway where a human girl had appeared. Ulquiorra didn't show any sign of acknowledging the human's appearance and so Grimmjow followed suit.
"Well, Ulquiorra?" The blue-haired demon raised his eyebrow as his matching light blue eyes danced in danger. Ulquiorra made no move to answer Grimmjow and instead sat down in a chair facing away from the doorway that the girl was standing in. She was still there, listening to them, watching them.
"He was worried about me", the girl said suddenly with a defiant edge to her tone. Grimmjow's head snapped automatically to her in surprise at the statement and at the fact that she had spoken at all. On the other hand, Ulquiorra maintained his stoic look and played around with the hilt of his sword.
Grimmjow smiled widely and laughed, "Is that so? I guess Ulquiorra really is getting soft!"
The pale demon's brow set downwards at a 30 degree angle as he hoisted himself out of the chair. Then he turned towards the girl slowly and deliberately. As Ulquiorra looked into her eyes, he saw nothing but determination.
"Grimmjow", Ulquiorra spoke quietly with his eyes still locked with the human girl's.
"What is it, you big puppy?"
"I suggest you state whatever it is you came here to state and leave immediately", Ulquiorra's tone left no room for argument.
The blue-haired demon gave a violent smirk and said, "I don't know, this looks pretty interesting."
Without any warning, Ulquiorra flashed over to where the other demon stood so quickly that even Grimmjow had trouble tracing his movement in time. The tip of Ulquiorra's blade was barely piercing Grimmjow's throat and a little trickle of blood ran down the length of his blade.
"Is it still interesting, Grimmjow?"
Staggering back a few steps, Grimmjow held a hand over the wound on his neck and answered, "I'm going to fucking destroy you, Ulquiorra."
"Not now", was the shocking reply.
Grimmjow narrowed his eyes dangerously, but then as he reached down towards the hilt of his own sword, he stopped abruptly. Then another demon flashed in, bowing down low towards the electric blue-haired demon and whispered something so quiet that Ulquiorra had trouble catching the words.
"Looks like your lucky day", Grimmjow spat on the ground and sneered, "Bastard."
With another quick breeze of wind, Grimmjow and the other demon had left.
Ulquiorra stood with his sword hanging loosely in his right hand, still watching the wall opposite the girl with unmatched intensity. Then very slowly, he pivoted all the way around to where the girl was still standing, her eyes blazing.
"Little girl, are you trying to provoke me?"
"No."
"Then I suggest that you keep your distance from me", Ulquiorra stood there with his eyes boring into hers. The girl brought up her hand to the collar of her robe and shifted nervously.
"Leave", the pale demon demanded, uncomfortable with the long silence.
The girl looked up at him oddly and said, "I don't get it."
"What?"
"Why are you concerned about me?"
Ulquiorra's eyes widened a little as he thought about her words. "Why do you think that I am...concerned...for you?"
"You asked about my well being", the girl answered without hesitation.
The pale demon nodded slowly and whispered, "I was not 'concerned', but merely wondering if you were about to escape with an easy death."
"Bastard", she hissed. Ulquiorra wasn't even fazed and left the room with his long and confident strides, barely brushing by the human girl.
Rukia watched Helmet-head's retreating figure, still confused about everything. Then she remembered that the wound on her back was still open and bleeding. She quickly ran to find Kiyone and after a quick search, she found Kiyone in the kitchens.
"Kiyone! I have a wound on my back, can you wrap it for me?" Rukia asked her loudly.
"Of course, Kuchiki-san", Kiyone answered, her head bobbing up and down. The two went into the nearby bathroom and Kiyone helped Rukia wrap a long strip of cloth around her body sideways multiple times. It was a little uncomfortable and so she used even more of the strip to make a makeshift bra so that it wasn't pressing down too tight at the edges. Kiyone was a little embarrassed at Rukia's half-nudity, but the violet-haired girl wasn't too fussy.
"Thanks Kiyone", Rukia smiled. "How has your day been?"
"The usual." Kiyone answered quietly with a sad expression on her face. Rukia noted that her voice sounded stronger than before.
"Oh."
"Kuchiki-san, how did you cut open your back?"
"Oh, I was stepping out of the bathtub and I was careless. I lost my footing and slipped. Somewhere in between my fall and landing, I grated my back against something sharp." Rukia recounted her accident in the bathroom.
"That's unfortunate."
"You got that right, Kiyone", Rukia laughed quietly.
A shadow began to move from the corner and it spoke, "So she isn't a noble after all."
"Huh?" Both Rukia and Kiyone twirled towards the intruder and very surprised to see Helmet-head standing in the doorway.
"You", the demon barked at Kiyone rudely. "Leave."
Kiyone scurried away and was gone in record time for a human girl. Rukia stood there clutching the end of the cloth wrapped around her body and feeling a little foolish.
"Little girl", Helmet-head's voice was harsher than it had been when he had spoken to Kiyone. "Don't lie to me again."
Rukia gripped the cloth tighter and her knuckles went white as the pale demon turned to leave again.
"It's not like you'd know the difference anyway", Rukia shot at his slowly departing form. This time she didn't regret the biting tone and rude words. The demon always had the apathetic expression on his face and while he made her angry as hell, it seemed she couldn't make him feel anything.
"What did you say?" His voice sounded a little incredulous, but his face betrayed nothing.
"Don't you ever feel any emotions!?!"
"Emotions", Helmet-head whispered quietly. "They are something that humans foolishly believe in."
"What do you mean?"
The demon turned his green eyes towards his own hand and said, "I cannot see these emotions, so they must not exist."
"Of course they exist!", Rukia yelled back in frustration and anger, with her hands fisted by her side.
"Where do they exist, little girl? In your heart? Can you see these emotions?" Helmet-head's words were softly spoken as if treading on dangerous grounds.
Rukia's knuckles were already impossibly white, but she continued to grip her pants as she yelled, "I can fucking feel it! That's how I know emotions exist!"
"Ridiculous."
SLAP!
That was the second time she had slapped him and if she had paid more attention to Nii-sama's fighting lessons, she would've attacked him. The unconcealed fury in her eyes jumped around with ease.
The demon's eyes were suddenly contracting and expanding rapidly at an alarming rate. Rukia backed away slowly as he started to have a seizure or something. Suddenly his pale hands were gripping her shoulder tightly in an almost painful way.
"What are you doing?!" Rukia struggled to pull away, but his clutch on her grew tighter as she struggled more. Her world spun around 180 degrees abruptly. The demon was behind her now, holding her shoulders and pushing her against the countertop. Rukia used her arms to brace against the counter so that she wasn't completely thrown over it.
Panic began to set in as she realized her compromising position against the demon, but the feelings grew more insistent when his fingernails started to claw off the blood soaked bandages around her form. The wound must've opened itself again when she had slapped him.
"Stop!!!" Rukia prayed that someone would hear and save her, but she knew that this was his domain, not hers. No one was going to save her. Hell, she had been saved, according to Helmet-head.
"Shut-up!" For the first time since she had met him, he was showing an emotion. It was odd to hear his voice twisted into a snarl.
The bandages covering her back and breasts came off and fell to the floor. Rukia would've covered herself, but she was busy using her arms to brace herself against the countertop. The demon wasn't particularly interested in her topless body, so she decided that her modesty was probably preserved.
"Ah!" Rukia gave a sharp gasp as an unexpected pain jolted from her already wounded back. Apparently the pale demon had widened the jagged half-forming wound across her back with his sharp nails. The blood was pouring down her back and staining the loose pants she was wearing. His fingers played across her back covering them both in her dripping, warm blood.
"That hurts", Rukia weakly protested as he continued to smear her blood across her back. She didn't expect him to stop and he fulfilled her expectations. Her head was starting to spin a little from the blood loss. It was surprising that the demon was going to kill her like this.
Startling, she felt something cold and wet trail along her back and wound. Looking behind herself, she saw his long tongue running along her spine. It should've been disgusting and horrifying, but Rukia could only watch in awe. The demon collected her blood with his tongue and drew into his mouth as if slowly tasting it.
"I can taste your blood", the demon's voice had become an inhuman sound that echoed terribly. "I can taste your pain, your anger, your sorrow."
Their eyes met for the briefest of moments before the demon bent his head down lapping at her back once again. This time Rukia accidently let out a low moan without knowing why.
"More." The demon hissed his demand and began to suck at her back for more blood.
"Stop", Rukia tried again, feebly, while stifling another moan. "Please. If you take anymore blood, I might die."
It hit her then that Helmet-head had been right, she didn't really want to die. The pale demon stopped and looked at her oddly, with yellowish pupils.
"But I want more", he said with the same even expression he always showed.
"If I die, you'll only have that amount of blood", Rukia tried reasoning with the half-stable demon. "If you let me live, you'll get lots more blood."
Suddenly the demon's pupils began to contract and expand again. Then Helmet-head gripped the wall to his right to support himself.
"Ugh", he groaned slightly and looked up at her. He was back to normal, or at least he wasn't trying to be a vampire anymore. This time she could see a slight anger and hatred in his eyes when he looked at her, not bloodlust.
The demon wiped her blood off his mouth with the back of his hand. "Leave."
Rukia couldn't hear the next sentence that came streaming from his mouth as she slowly felt a hazy fog creep over her vision. It was then that the blood loss caught up to her and she fainted clean away.
Thanks you for reading. Please review if you feel inclined.