tampered | Log; Complete

Log; Complete

When: February 24th, Evening

Rating: PG-13 - R (Violence, Ahoy)

Characters: Fakir [

duck_duck_girl ], and Cirucci [

thunderwitch ]

Summary: In possession of the Hatred shard of Rue's shattered heart, Cirucci refuses to give the piece back unless she's granted a dance specifically with Ahiru. Fakir begrudgingly agrees, seeing no other way to get the shard returned, and accompanies Ahiru to Cirucci's apartment to get the job done. But in having lost a rematch to Fakir in a fight a few days prior to this visit, is the female arrancar's requested dance as innocent as it seems?

Log:

Fakir's feet felt unusually heavy as he led Ahiru to Cirucci's apartment. He had doubts - many of them - and each seemed to be weighing his shoulders down and slowing his footsteps through the rapidly-darkening streets. It was just one dance, he kept telling himself. Cirucci had only chosen Ahiru just to make him upset and see the look on his face while they pranced around. So she had said, herself. And even if he didn't want the arrancar female to so much as touch the redhead, Cirucci denied every other suggestion he'd made for returning Rue's heart shard. Unfortunate as it was, this was really all they could do.

One clammy hand rested on the hilt of Lohengrin's sword, gripping the end of the handle taughtly. The ex-knight merely hoped it wouldn't come to another fight. This time he didn't have anything written to back them up. Though he could bluff it, if need be. Perhaps Cirucci still feared what she didn't know, or so he could hope. The ex-knight spared a glance at the redhead walking uncharacteristically quiet at his side. Yes, he could always hope.

His other hand, which was intwined with Ahiru's, gave a light squeeze as they reached the arrancar's apartment. Fakir hoped that would be a sort of reassurance for her. It was all he could really offer, for now. His throat was a little too try to speak words of encouragement.

Unwrapping his left hand from the hilt of his blade, he lifted it to the door, curling the fingers together before he did as requested: Knocked, and listened.

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To say Cirucci was excited... may have been the right word. But she hid the emotion behind a facade of condescension and amusement. Because, of course, she was only dancing with the Opera Rat's woman to make him irritable. Other motives? Never. And loving making the mortal uncomfortable? No~

So she answered the door still with her skirt hiked up and adjusting garters, the front of her dress only half done up.

"Ah, there you are~" She crooned, opening the door wider to admit the two, painted lips twisting into a smile. Never a soft smile, always something that reeked of sadistic, of twisted. Her apartment was clean, meticulously so, and arranged with the tastes of a hedonist, with pillows, shining baubles, and other such things strung all about in tasteful arrangement.

"Come in." Said the spider to the flys.

Ahiru hoped more than anything that the shiver in her knees wouldn't make her fall down. It's alright. Fakir is here. We will dance, I'll get Ruechan's heart shard back and right after we will leave. The soon arrived right at the doorstep. The shiver and now worked it's way down to her feet.

The touch of Fakir's hand for a moment stilled everything. She looked into his face to see worry and concern. This is just as scary for Fakir. But...we are together. Ahiru squeezed his hand back.

Pins and needles broke lightly over her as Fakir knocked. The feeling intensified when the aparment door opened. Ahiru had never spoken much less seen the arrancar before. "H-hello, Cirucci."

Feet! Move!

The ex-Knight didn't even spare Cirucci a vocal greeting - he opted instead to merely pass a steely glare. One that warned he would take action if she dared to try anything.

Ahiru's hand still held tightly in his own, he led her inside at the arrancar's bidding. He wished more than anything he could do more to ease the duck-girl's fear, but...

Well, hopefully the dance would occur quickly, shard be removed successfully, and they could go straight back to the Opera House together. "Alright," he muttered impatiently. "Let's get this over with."

"Oh, let's~" Cirucci crooned, fastening closed the front of her dress as she closed the door behind them with a small click of finality. She took in the sight of the two, smiling broadly now, but without warmth.

"Well, then," She murmured sweetly, holding out her hand, gloved in white except the fingers that ended in neatly trimmed nails, eyes calculating as she shot a smug look to Fakir before turning back to Ahiru. "Shall we?"

The door shut and Ahiru fought the impulse to jump at the sound. Fakir was not happy at all, she knew well that he was not the trusting sort but usually in this sort of situation had something to say. Not this time. Ahiru swallowed in attempts to ease the lump in her throat.

"Y-yes," she answered. With one last squeeze of Fakir's hand she stepped away from him and closer to Cirucci. "Let's dance."

"You'll have to be gentle with me, dear~" Cirucci tried to keep the hiss from her voice, letting it come out sultry and low. Seductive.

"Your love tells me I cannot dance how I'm accustomed, so walk me through it, hmm?" It was hard, supressing the overwhelming hatred bubbling in her throat, but she had to. For a time.

{ooc: Fakir skipped, and whoah, sorry for weird posting there}

Ahiru stole a glance at Fakir. "My love." she blushed heavily and shook her head. She's teasing! Still, she had never thought to herself that Fakir was her love. But...he was. Wasn't he? Ahiru smiled and for the time being didn't feel the need to be afraid. Not with Fakir close by.

"It isn't so hard, Cirucci." Her pink ballet slippers bushed the floor falling into first position as she held out her hand. "Do as I do."

Fakir blinked when Ahiru glanced in his direction, noting the pinkness to her cheeks and the words on her lips. He felt his own cheeks grow a little warm. She certainly seemed...a little more confident now.

The small light of hope she'd blessed his heart with grew. Everything would be fine.

Fakir briefly smiled back at her, leaning against the wall in casual stance as he crossed his arms. It didn't make him feel any better about Cirucci dancing with her or touching her, but Ahiru's determinaton was not something to be doubted. Afterall, she'd managed to change someone like him.

He would believe in her.

"Lead the way, fledgeling." It was Cirucci could do to keep sweetness in her voice as she delicately lay her hand in Ahiru's, body held erect and ready to follow as it was lead. Oh, but by the blush on those cheeks...

This would be good.

Ahiru very lightly curled her fingers around Cirucci's. "There are many dark things in this world, and many light things." She wasn't sure who she was talking to, or if the arrancar woman would be reached by her words. Ruechan's heart was in the balance.

"Black and white, good and bad. There is a balance, and if it is tipped the wrong way the results are terrible."

"True." Cirucci murmured, careful not to let her disgust show. Words, words of an idealist, words of someone who'd never known the horrid truth of how the world worked.

"I am the white, and the bad." She wondered why this talking was neccessary, but went along. "The shinigami are the black, and the good." But tip the balance? Oh, did the Arrancar plan to do that.

Ahiru shook her head, "it isn't so simple." She lightly turned in a circle, leading Cirucci the same way. "You will do as you will, good or bad. What is in a person's heart makes them as they are--capable of great good and horrible evil. We can love and hate."

She slowly rose to reach upward. "Surely, you can't let all the negativity, the hate ruin what you care for most. Friends...family...our passions."

Not that simple? Of course it was. Ah, compromise never had been a strong suit of hers.

"I've no heart." The Arrancar said with a small smile, turning as she was lead. "As for whom I care for-" She actually paused to think about that one. It wouldn't do to let this mess things up there, she supposed.

"I care for only a few."

"Everyone has a heart, however large or small, it speaks to us in whispers and screams. Sometimes we can't hear our own heart because it speaks so softly." Ahiru's leg slowly parted from the other to stretch outward, easing upward.

"The special few you care for definately don't get to taste your anger or hatred easily. But with so much hostility for others, the overwhelming feeling can spread like a poison. Those you care for don't deserve that. And you don't deserve to be separated from those you care about."

That must be what is frightening Fakir right now. Please let us get the shard and go home...

"..." Cirucci had nothing to say to that which could not be frightening. Considering she could say that hatred and hostility were things routinely involved in her sexual life, or that it was what she and her brothers and sister lived for. ... It would be best to keep that to herself.

So the Privaron merely nodded, not denying that she had no heart. Quite literally.

Ahiru glanced into Cirucci's face. "Please, won't you surrender the emotion that isn't yours?" Her opposite hand, not clasping Cirucci's hand lightly reached to her as she bent at the waist in a bow.

"Let another's heart have what you have too much of and correct the balance."

Cirucci's hand reached to her chest, hovering over the place where a heart should be and smiling as softly as she could manage.

"She can have it."

Out from the white of Cirucci's dress, a blood red spectre of Rue stood before Ahiru. "Please, return to Ruechan." The emotion glared coldly at Ahiru. "Return and make her heart whole, Hatred."

The spectre twirled and fell into Ahiru's hand as a red crystaline shard. The duck girl smiled as she slowly let go of Cirucci's hand. "Thank you."

"You're welcome, fledgeling." Cirucci smiled, even as she did so reaching out for the sword Golondrina, close at hand, concealed by a pillow. "At least I don't have to worry about that shard any-" And then her fingers closed around the sheath and the blade was drawn, metal point quivering just inches from the small girl's eye. Oh, but killing like that was no fun. And she knew the Knight would be moving.

"Behead them, Golondrina." She shrieked in excitement, the metal sword exploding and reforming as the bones of her avian Hollow release, the wings extending and whipping out just as they were formed, the metal feathers falling where she willed, pinning Fakir against the wall.

"Fakir~" She crooned, reaching out with her boned talons, one hand herding the Ahiru closer and the other simply ramming three sharp bones through her chest. Easy. Too easy.

Fakir's eyes widened in horror, but he saw the danger too late. Before Lohengrin's sword could be unsheathed, he found himself nailed up to the wall, arms and legs pinned, immobile. He bit back the sharpness of the pain, wild gaze alight with a mixture of desperate fury and fear.

"You-YOU-" he snarled like an animal. "You swore not to harm her! What do you think you're doing!?" He struggled with everything - pulling and pushing against the binds that held him. But he couldn't move! He couldn't see through that damn smoke! What was going on!?

He promised to protect her. He promised nothing would ever happen to her! He had to do something! He had to break free!

"AHIRU!" the ex-Knight called out desperately. "RUN! RUN!"

Somewhere in the back of his half-crazed mind as he watched the smoke start to clear, Fakir could hear snickering that sounded distinctly like Drosselmeyer, whispering two simple words: "Useless Knight."

Ahiru had looked up from the shard to see a sword in her face and her mouth fell open, unable to scream or even breath. She took a step back and watched in horror as Cirucci shifted and changed.

And Fakir! Fakir was pinned against the wall. He kept shouting at her to run away, but not without him! Her mind raced while her terror striken body was fighting to function. All at once a fast shooting pain jolted through her. Ahiru felt as if she had fallen down a staircase.

She looked down to see red, red all over her white outfit and a very large trio of talons piercing her right through. Ahiru's vision blurred as her head felt heavy and tears rolled down her cheeks. "Ngh...wh-why?" Her legs trembled and gave out. She hit the floor with a thud.

"F-Fakir..."

Hatred surged through the Privaron when the girl asked why. Why? She didn't need that shard to be consumed with hate. It was easy for her to fall to darker emotions. She was made from them, after all.

The smoke caused by her release dissipated as she kneeled down, the wings forming a sort of canopy over her, cramped as they were with the roof in the way. Bloodied talons stroked the girl's face, a sadistic smirk on her face. "Why?~" She whispered. "Why? Tell your little knight this is what happens when he dares deal with Cirucci Thunderwitch." But the eyes she spoke to were glazing lifeless. Shame, that. Too easy.

Shooting a glance at the immobilized Fakir, the Privaron stood, thick tail's maw carelessly grasping the human girl and dragging her behind Cirucci's path to the door, that she opened and simply let the tail toss out into the hallway. As she walked, she had begun to sing a little, the words unable to be deciphered, but it sounded like a happy little tune.

For a moment after the haze disappeared, time seemed to freeze - and so did Fakir. His heart seized up into his throat, the image of Ahiru, covered in blood, lifeless, causing his pupils to dialate in utter disbelief.

This wasn't happening...This...wasn't happening!

"AHIRU!" he yelled out her name repeatedly, tears stinging at the corners of his eyes and blurring his vision. Words were passed from the arrancar that he couldn't hear as she smeared blood on Ahiru's face, but he didn't bother to listen. He had to get to her, had to save her before it was too late!

But it's already too late, the voice in his head told him. Fakir's blood ran cold, beads of sweat breaking out over his forehead.

When Cirucci stood, her tail ruthlessly taking hold of Ahiru, dragging her carelessly, and throwing her out the door, Fakir finally broke free of his detainment, stumbling toward the exit in hysterical panic and ruthlessly shoving the female arrancar out of his way. Tears freely feel down his cheeks as he stooped and picked up the body, not even glancing back as he ran out of the apartment building as fast as his feet could take him, the bloodied form of the one most important person in his life held tightly, securely against him. He had to get help! Someone had to heal her before she...!

Fakir stumbled and fell to his knees outside the building, one horribly-anguished cry escaping him into the night as he clutched her motionless form.

She was dead. His Ahiru was dead. Cirucci killed her and he'd been rendered helpless to do anything. He promised to protect her and he failed her completely.

Pulling her limp body back into his arms bridal style, Fakir stood and trudged, truly defeated, back to the Opera House.

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