The Wakened

Chicago, once a pretty populated city in America, had been reduced to rubble and smoldering ruins for quite some time now thanks to the war between Humanity and the Hollow. You would think with a city utterly destroyed its remains would be left alone. That wasn't the case, however, because Hollow were attracted to the now Reishi rich environment and practically lived here now. In fact they continued snooping around hoping to find secret bunkers and storehouses left by the coalition and/or the Espada that had temporarily held the city.

And to some degree. They succeeded.

A tomb that was long since forgotten had had it's door cracked open during the city's ruination and now the location of that door was being bombarded by weaker Menos Hollow in an effort to find out what was inside. Unfortunately for them they had no idea the person whose tomb they were opening was not only already aware of their arrival but was also several times stronger than they were.

They never stood a chance.

The door was blasted open from the inside and with it came the deaths of a couple of the hollow on the other end. Out stepped a girl standing five foot nine looking decently skinny and having long pale pink hair and ragged clothes. Needless to say this confused the remaining hollow at first until they saw, then felt, the girl and her spiritual energy as it started to rapidly increase since she was awake now. One attacked her but was sliced in half by a giant waraxe that seemed to appear in her hand in a dazzling flash of blue fire causing the others to pause.

One was somewhat intelligent though. It ran. It had concluded they were all dead and had fled to try and find it's superiors.

It was the only one that survived.

Soon after the Hollow escaped, and managed to tell it's masters what had transpired, the girl stepped out into the sunlight for the first time in... Well actually she wasn't sure. Time was meaningless to her and she had a horrible time keeping track of it. She figured it had been a long time though because she didn't recognize any of the buildings that had remnants scattered around her tomb.

Then the Hollow decided to start bugging her..

A Young man was walking by a giant explosion to the old Chicago city. He remembered hearing about this place being overtaking by hollows. However at the same token he thought they left, so for the life of him he didn't know why it was blown up. However it was great hunting grounds for killing those abominations. He walked down the area and let his spiritual pressure run lose, not even attempting to hold it in as a nearby hollow sensed it and decided to make the fatal choice to confront him.

The hollow rushed at him however next thing it knew, its complete arm was missing. Blood sprayed from the socket as the white haired human held tightly on his new equipment, a hollow arm, more specifically the arm of his poor victim. “Hmm, should I let you bleed out” he smiled as the hollow turned around rather angrily. However it them preceded to smile as a new arm shot out in place "Guess not.". The cyan eyed man whistled “nifty trick” he said rather sarcasticly as the hollow swung its new arm towards the over-confident man.

Next thing the hollow knew, once again its arm was missing. “alright I'm bored” the man said now holding two hollow arms.

A couple minutes passed by as the man finished up his new masterpiece. Upon the wasted ground, was now dyed a crimson read as the almost lifeless hollow was dissected alive in what appeared to be a sacrificial way, his heart layed several feet away, all the vessels still attached as the beat of the heart slowly came to a halt.

He continued his morning stroll as he saw a door fly out into the horizon.  “hmm, whats goin on over there” he wondered curiously. And saw a female confronting a hollow. And several dead hollow around her.

Well this is embarrassing. The blond, red eyed boy thought as he sat inside the hollow's stomach, on top of an energy barrier that the juices couldn't desolve. He felt two strong fighters outside, the fatty hollow going after one that was close. It was...unique...and intrigued the young appearing arrancar. Before it made its attack, however, the four foot ten inches tall boy created five cero balls...and fired them in different directions, but made sure none would even come close the one the hollow was confronting.

Emerging from the dead carcass, he stood up, and looked around. The remnants of Chicago. How fun. Looking at the girl, he took a few steps back. Then he looked for the other one he felt. He found him a good distance away. This was awkward...the lad decided to speak. "Hi there miss...how are you?" He sheepishly waved at her...

There was quite a commotion around the hollow infested hole that had replaced chicago, and the commotion was noticed by an arrancar who fed on the reishi rich hollow in the area. That arrancar vanished into a garganta, and not long after, another great maw opened closer to the actual fight. A muscular red bearded arrancar stepped out into the hole. He glanced around, sensing the strange being, a familiar arrancar and an unknown person who was of less interest.

Arngrim carried with him, two swords at the right hip and an axe on the left. He walked towards them, keeping his eyes on the strange woman as he approached. "An interesting gathering we have here. Relax Rui, I'm not here to start a fight. I just came to see what was going on in this decrepid neck of the woods."

A few more people arrived, one of which had emerged from the body of a now dead attacker (which she had found to be strange), but they weren't being hostile nor did they look like the monstrosities that had woken her up and attacked her so she wasn't attacking them... At least for now. Questions obviously arose in her but she didn't see a reason to ask these people any of then until one of them had actually spoken directly to her. The smallish one that had come from a now dead hollow apparently had manners for it said hello to her.

"Greetings. Seeing as how they are dead and I am uninjured I would say I'm fine. Can't say I like having my nap interrupted though." She crisply looked back at her tomb which was all but pointless now. The door was destroyed, even before she finished doing so, and the room she was in had lost stability during the destruction of the city. Even if she repaired the door the room was unusable.

Since the other person she noticed hadn't actually said anything that required her response she pretty much ignored it, not in a rude way as she glanced at him as he said it, but she did keep talking to Rui who had seemed friendly enough, "When am I." Odd question to say she supposed, but she needed to know if she was to get around with any amount of ease. The last thing she remembered was this city first being built. That is how her tomb had remained untouched all this time. She wasn't sure how much time had passed between then and now so she asked.

She did make a notice of all the monsters backing off visibly when these two arrived however.. That made her curious but not curious enough to be concerned about it right at this moment.

The young man sat as an observer at this point, he concealed his spiritual energy to the point where unless one was looking for a shinigami they wouldn't notice him. And watched as several odd energy balls flew by hitting some of the remaining hollow. He could tell from appearance that they were from a hollow origin. That and the sound they made flying back was very similar to that of Bala as a child seemed to walk towards the newly awakened female. Unfortunately it he slightly noticed the young arrancar glance in his general direction, he gave no reaction but instantly knew his presence was known, and with that relaxed his spiritual pressure, no point in hiding if he was already found. His acute sense of hearing allowed him to clearly understand every word from this distance, and then preceded to watch as another Gargantua appeared. “Man I knew this place was crawling with hollow, but arrancar too” he breathed ever so softly.

He listened intently on the rather very small conversation. It seemed this Rui fellow and the other arrancar were once in a rough patch since the larger one reassured the small one to relax. However what struck him as odd is the fact there was need for assurance. The large one looked obviously strong but it wasn't so obvious in the kid. Only deduction was there was more than meets the eye to that kid. He would have to play extremely cautious in this scenario that fate dragged him kicking and screaming into.

He heard them finish talking and the young female begin to respond, and decided to take action and pushed off the mountain of waste towards the trio. He heard the last few words of the female before landing between all three of them in a single bound. He held no hostile aura and was on a good mood after his artwork back a mile or two away. “Interesting question. I believe in January 20th, 2114” he smiled as the dust began to settle. At this point he would stand no chance at taking out the two behind him, despite them being arrancar.”Happy late new year he did a quick glance around but more importantly held his senses on them, seeing if they would make any hostile movement. He wasn't to worried about death however he did do his best to keep his origin undercover. His spiritual pressure was quite opaque but he kept the fact he was a shinigami in his spiritual pressure nicely transparent.

Rui rose an eyebrow at the appearance of the King. "We have an agreement...to my knowledge, I've held my end. So why would I worry about you suddenly attacking me?" He questioned somewhat amusingly. He then paid attention to their guest. And nodded at her answer...especially the part about the interrupted nap. He even blushed a little at the embarrassment of having been devoured, but not digested, during his own nap. He decided not to say anything about that...who knows how the King would react.

The blond did look behind her at her tomb. The question was odd though. He was about to answer when their other guest decided to stop by and get involved, answering it. Must have enhanced hearing considering how far off he was. The man was a shinigami...but from how he was feeling...Rui doubted he was with the Gotei. He felt...strange. Then again, Rui should also felt strange as well...he wasn't exactly hiding his peculier spiritual pressure either...but he also wasn't flaunting it. He only felt like he was a low leveled arrancar.

"So...how long have you been napping now that our other guest decided to join us and answered your question? Oh, and as you've heard, I'm Rui Herutsu. Pleasure to meet you." He decided to introduce himself officially...trying to be a little bit friendly...mostly so that he wouldn't end up in a fight.

"It was a courtesy messure. I don't know you well enough to tell if your the jumpy type or not." Arngrim said. Then leveled his eyes on the woman. "you are a peculiar person. Why were you trapped in that tomb?" The final party approached warily. He didn't try to hide his power so Arngrim could tell he was a strong enough person.

He was trying to hide his identity, but not masking it well enough for Arngrim's pesquida to miss a hint of shinigami, leaving two possibilities. The man was either a normal shinigami, or a vizard possibly. Arngrim hated vizards more than any enemy he'd ever had, and so things may get messy if the man was indeed one.

Arngrim didn't make any moves that might show agression though, and kept himself under check until he knew exactly what was going on. He was more interested in finding out about the woman with the strange energy, and starting a fight would make that harder. "So is there anyone else hiding nearby, waiting to join this interesting gathering.. "

"I wasn't trapped. I was resting. And based on what I was just told I've been in there for only a couple of centuries. The tomb is no longer suitable thanks to whatever destroyed the city." She said the first bit to counter the big guy, as the concept of "New Years" didn't mean anything to her and as such didn't occur to her to say anything in response to it, while the second bit was aimed at Rui. She listened to one of them complain about the possibility of more people coming and she didn't have anything to say to that. Especially since she couldn't sense energy. No need to inform them of that though. "Why are you people here to begin with. Obviously these monsters are afraid of you two," She said directly at the Arrancar's, "and there's no reason for anyone to be here since it's been destroyed."

(Crappy post but I'm a bit sleep deprived and there isn't much else to do atm.)

In the midst of there conversation, an unsensable entity had his targets set on the white haired shinigami between them. “ready...” he said pulling back his arm, holding a black spear in his hand. “aim....” he closed one eye as to focus more. “Fire!” he shouted tossing the spear at full force, with a spin it drilled through quickly ripping through the air before striking poor soul right in the neck between the group of 3.

“Da....mnit” was all he muttered before dispersing in a cloud of blue and red flame. “Bulls eye” was what the man who through the weapon exclaimed at the same moment. He wore a black suit with a matching fedora and an orange ribbon spun around the top. The spear dematerialized and a sword formed on his back. The man had not a hint of spiritual pressure about him as he stood upright

Rui shrugged at the King. "Well, now you know I'm not the jumpy type." Arngrim then asked if there was anyone else nearby. Rui did a scan a of the area. He couldn't sense anything else but other hollows. "I don't feel anyone else. Doesn't mean they're not out there...though, like our peculiar guest just questioned, I would question why they would be here. Speaking of which, I'd rather not talk about why I'm here with the King right here..." He blushed profusely when he avoided the question of why he was here in the first place and looked away.

He was about to answer the other question pertaining why the hollows were afraid of them when a spear zoomed past him into the neck. His guard was immediately up, drawing his sword on his back, and spinning, trying to find the assailent. Who made his appearance and took his weapon...nothing emenating from him. It was quite obvious what he was then. "A bounto..." He wasn't quick to start a fight, but this one wasn't as peaceful as their other guest. So he was ready. Of course, if Arngrim decided he wanted a peace of the action, he wasn't going to get in the way...

"The answer to what destroyed the city is something i'd like to know myself." He said. Arngrim gave rui a questioning look, wanting to know why he was here even more now. "As for why I'm here, I am theses beast's king. Some are to stupid to be of use, but they know to avoid me, and Rui. An arrancar of mine noticed the commotion and though I'd like to know, so I came to find out what was going on."

A few seconds later, a spear shot past, into the neck of the shinigami/vizard, killing him. Arngrim reacted instantly drawing tyrfing and turned to the attacker, to find a familiar face behind the attacker. "Murderer!" He shouted, but not because this man had killed the other stranger. He didn't stop to clarify that, to angered to see the man who'd killed his daughter, and escape his rage the first time.

Arngrim jumped forth into air and fired a beam of fiery energy from the weapon's tip, the strength of a cero and 3 times as fast it was a moved designed to hit fast moving target. Arngrim dropped to the ground with a smash, and instantly composed himself, though he kept his sword drawn. "Your very existance makes my blood boil. Why are you here, killer of my Kin? Its a hard thing for me to stop trying to kill you, but know is not the time."

The blood spewed from the now dead male and the woman merely looked in the direction the weapon came from as if it hadn't fazed her at all. In fact she would have voiced an opinion about it but it seemed someone else recognized the offender and called them a murderer in such a rage that it couldn't possibly have been over the cold corpse infront of her, as they didn't seem to know eachother very well if at all, leading her to believe the attacker did not have justice on his side and was thus not her concern to help or save.

"This is a common thing in the world now? Perhaps I slept too long.. or maybe it was not long enough." She said as she halfheartedly nudged the corpse with her foot while listening to the conversation, "Tell me. Rui was it? What is the current state of the world. I know much but not all could I see within my tomb." She was basically not even caring that the large male was a hairsbreath from slaying someone but only because she hadn't figured out who was on what side. Monsters were not by default evil. For all she knew this was a race-war and nothing to do with Justice. So more information would be required.

She hadn't even drawn a weapon, not that she couldn't at an instant's notice anyways, nor did she look overly concerned with a possibility of being hurt or killed. She was unrealistically calm about the entire situation. She had wondered if that would bother anyone but decided it best to not think on it too much as it was just her way.

The man stood up with his hands in his pockets on top of a large bound of scrap and debris, he instantly recognized the Arrancar who shouted out his name. He noticed a spark on the tip of his blade and muttered “Lancelot..” and from in front of him jumped out a large figure holding one lance. “ Shield and sword “ he spoke clearly as the lances glew in energy and turned into a shield and sword, as soon as the cero was within range The black Knight holding the shield blocked it in a downward angle. The cero bounced off the shield shooting back at Arngrim just as fast but with 40% less power, that 40% pushing the mindless knight back a bit behind the young man on the mound.

He wore a black suit with a yellow dress shirt and a black tie. He gazed down at the so called king with his black eyes underneath his matching fedora. A yellow band circled the fedora. He held out his hand using his spiritual pressure to keep Lancelot at bay. “You fire a cero at me and now say it isn't the time, oh king who led two failed wars” he spoke while looking around his surroundings to the once bustling city. “Your soldier died in combat with many of mine and your comrades alike, yet that is the one soul you agonize for.” it infuriated the young man how much this king would just toss away his other soldiers.

He continued looking downward at him before noticing the other two. He was no longer apart of the coalition however if his actions were wrong he might accidentally start a third war, and to much death has happened already within these last years. “aside from that you needn't know what I am here for” he looked before and nodded at Lancelot as if to tell him to stay sit as he hopped down the mound of rubble, debris, and scrap. However soon after he composed himself before taking steps even further, he would just ignore the trigger as he could, but he couldn't say the same for this man.

He went toward to the energy he felt earlier. It was a very odd energy felt earlier that attracted his attention before meeting that sadistic shinigami. “I'm sorry if I interrupted anything” he bowed slightly to the two of them before grasping the sword that was stuck in the ground where the shinigami once layed. “However I must say it is odd for so many people such as you three to be gathered in a single place, let alone being in a ruins” he was know almost completely ignoring the arrancar king. “My name is Gauge by the way, again sorry for any trouble” he smiled as if the previous events weren't of any real concern. He had to stay in little conflict since no one really knew he wasn't apart of the coalition anymore. Any wrong step and he might make life harder on the average human life.

Rui stood near the lady. And couldn't help but nod on her comment/question. "The world is still very much in chaos. Between humans being humans, the hollow and arrancar, the Sinners, and the Shinigimi, and all of these groups fighting each other, there will probably never be peace. The arrancar, led by the King here, kicked the shinigami out of their home with a plan that succeeded.

Then he conquered Chicago and used its inhabitants as hostages. Then he pulled his troops out, though left the wild hollow like the ones around us, to attack New York. Which I'm assuming was when this happened...there were a lot of casualties on both sides. As the man said. I sensed at least two arrancar that fought something that I couldn't detect, which were likely creatures called bounto. That attack failed. And Chicago was destroyed while casualties were minimized. Currently, no real move has been made by any party. Think of it as just border skirmashes."

He gave her general update of recent events. He was a sensor...an observer of the world. He also sensed what had destroyed Chicago...it was hard to miss it. But it was...odd. Why was this creature here now? This Gauge. Rui didn't care that much though. Though he too, found it curious that Arngrim would value the life of a soldier so much more than any other...seems like the one this man killed. "So, miss...what are you going to do...join Gauge in defending himself against an irate King of the Hollow? Or not get involved?" He asked her. He himself wasn't planning to get involved...unless he too was attacked.

Arngrim bounced the cero away into the distance where it exploded. He laughed a little. "Two failed wars, is it? But what happened during both of those, 'failed' wars?" Arngrim said, grinning madly. "Violence, death, destruction! The sweetest things in life, Gauge. I didn't fail. My goal was always senseless violence, who won and who lost mattered nothing to me at the time."

Argrim turned back as Rui was talking. "Actually friend your wrong there. I was killing any hollow who refused to leave before the city was destroyed. The currently spiritual rich environment drew them back here." He corrected the arrancar. As he walked over to them."Granted it doesn't make a difference. I'm still a warmonger."

"Yes, what do you intend to do? Fight me? I'm not interested in killng tihis man right now. He made a good point. I care a little to much about one girl, daughter or not. She was only family, after all, just trying to impress me and got herself in to deep." He said. He seemed calm enough but was finding it surprisingly difficult to keep himself restrained. He managed to sheath his sword atleast.

The girl frowned as she suddenly found herself being almost interrogated about something she didn't even bring up in the first place. In fact she had only asked what all she had missed during her latest hibernation. Why did she need to even get involved. This was clearly a dispute between offender and avenger of the victim. Justice was on the side of the defense, since she used true justice and not the "Laws" of society when determining justice. She had no reason to interfere. Nor fight someone she had no information about blindly like a fool. If the situation had been different and/or someone was in danger of death for a reason for long removed then she may have gotten involved long enough to stop the fighting but nothing more.

"I only asked what the state of the world was. I see no reason to even answer your question since I never even brought up the subject of stopping either of you. That should speak for itself." She said clearly and bluntly. She wasn't actually annoyed though. So the tone was a normal one, "As for why I'm here. Since you just got here I'll tell the situation again. I didn't arrive I woke up. The difference may not matter to you, but it's still present. I was already here to begin with for quite some time until someone decided to blow up a city and damage my tomb." She hiked a thumb over her shoulder to where smoke still slightly rose from the opening of her tomb, "I was merely defending myself when everyone else arrived."

Seemed legit enough. It was all true at the least. She didn't know why the others were "actually" here though. One made a roundabout answer and the other was slightly cryptic. She assumed, since they had informed her this all happened a bit ago, that they were here because of her and this didn't please her very much though she decided to keep that bit of information to herself.

Gauge was confused why everyone insinuated a fight to be made, He even ignored Arngrim after the little scuffle and even Arngrim stated this wasn't the time for a fight, although it seemed he may be rather split in that decision as he just now sounded ready. Just as well it seemed they decided the new female to pick a side when he now knew she didn't even know who was on each side. He wandered a bit walking towards a very close by metal beam that stuck out of the ground and leaned on it. He was still within at least 10feet of the nearby group but he hasn't rested in the last two weeks after returning from heuco mundo, however thats a monologue for another day.

“Unfortunately in the dreary place, tensions seems rather high” he said nodding a bit at the hollowfied viking whose calm appearance was betrayed by the words he spoke and the aura he gave off. “So how about we play with the topic a bit” he smiled a bit. Normally this would be a good time to leave seeing as though if a fight were to start he would be out numbered, but his boredom truly consumed him right now. Nothing truly interesting has happened since his reentry into the world, and he was craving some sort of interest or action. He mind ran through some topics and subjects that possibly might not be outright ignored or tossed away as it seemed the girl was rather blunt and seemed to be more annoyed as the seconds ticked away, the child didn't seemed to care about his presence, and the human bear wanted to tear his head off....not exactly a crowd he would choose to hang around with.

He thought possibly changing the setting may help in times like these, rather than sticking around in a wasteland filled with hollow and death. “Anyone up for a drink?” he smiled shakily, almost knowing how bad this topic and question could turn. But in a scenario such as this, he wasn't left with as many options as he would generally hope for. Also didn't think bringing the arrancar king and his pal to a place of population. But it seemed the large arrancar might be able to hold his calmness. Eh, what does he care anyway.

"I stand corrected and so be it. In that case, I think I'll take my leave. Not like I wanted to be here in the first place..." The small boy put away his sword and started to walk away. He opened a gargantua which was soon starting to consume him. "Take care...and remember, I'm always watching..." He gave them a creepy smile while his crimson eyes glowed. Just to see if they had any reaction to the creepy vibe he just gave off before the portal back to Hueco Mundo closed.

~Exit Thread~

Rui left, vanishing through a garganta giving off a creepy vibe. Arngrim chuckled. Then he turned back to the others. "Very well, no fighting. I'm not even sure why I'm here myself. Honestly, for a moment I was hoping you were someone else." Arngrim said to the woman. "I heard someone was killing hollow around here, and thought it was an old friend. Seeing as you're not, and you're of no real interest to me, I'll be on my way."

Then he looked at Gauge. "If I dont try to kill you next time we meet, we can go for a drink. My little vandetta isn't over, but I'm sure you'll see me coming when I decide to. " And with that he ripped open a garganta and left.

(ooc: I was going to switch arngrim out for sen, but I'm out altogether. Soz.)