Forgetting what it was I came to find...

[thechillyacademic]

Even, after his discussion with Szayel early in the morning, had stepped out into the garden to experience it properly.

It was a curious place. The sky, be it projected or a magical window to somewhere far away, felt real. The temperature had risen as time progressed, but it hadn't got too hot. The height of Summer was long gone and things were cooling down. The breeze was like a breath of cool air, not the stagnant atmosphere that ordinarily lingered and loitered in caves. The grass smelled pleasant, but there was another scent there, the subtle odour of dull decay mixed with the sweet smell of fallen fruit, as though Autumn was on the horizon.

He found that he wasn't sure whether those particular notes were borne on the light wind blowing in from who knows where, or whether they came from the garden itself, the tangible expanse he could see before him. Almost everything seemed so ... normal. There was grass, both mown short and left long, there were cultivated flowerbeds close to the kitchen door, not far from the little slab-covered patio that the doors opened out directly onto. Once upon a time there must have been a canopy or veranda, he noted, for there were pillars at the corners of the brickwork that stood freely and supported nothing. Further away from the palace he could see the heads of the season's last wildflowers bobbing back and forth in the wind.

Flowers hadn't surprised him much. He was used to them, given his original home. Their beauty wasn't lost on him, but it wasn't something he cared for. Flowers carried memories best forgotten, and not all of them were of Radiant Garden.

It was the trees that had shocked him. According to what he'd heard, the garden had been discovered late, and yet trees grew tall and thick trunked. Not immense, old trees, but ones large enough to be too big to have been grown naturally in the time that was reputed to have passed between the garden's discovery and the present. He didn't doubt that Marluxia had a hand in encouraging their growth. The ivy that climbed up old ruined buildings dotted out further afield appeared, at least, to be natural.

The low hum of an insect caught his attention and made him wonder whether the miles and miles between the location he stood in and the place where the weather came from was able to be crossed by creatures coming in from the air. Perhaps they had been imported in from somewhere manually, in little boxes with tiny air-holes and kept in hives. He wouldn't put that past Marluxia -- he, of all people, would know that insects were important for pollination. Insects and birds, he had thought, and listened, in a pause between steps, to the musical posturing competition that was birdsong.

More than the garden, Even was paying attention to the palace itself. He had walked some distance, but not far enough to arouse the Malboros' ire. They were larger close up, but not the biggest he'd had the misfortune of meeting. The palace extended up to and beyond the position of the greenhouse, he'd seen. The windows were black and lightless and a layer of dust was visible on the insides thanks to the light of a faraway sun. Nothing past a peculiar glass sunhouse positioned near where a deep ditch dropped away from the palace seemed to be inhabited.

Upon returning to the building itself, he worked out that the area of the Palace that those ground-level windows corresponded to were not occupied, but he hadn't yet worked out how to reach them. It was entirely possible that they were blocked off entirely. It would make sense that the palace might not be entirely whole after sinking beneath the ground, but it would take further investigation to confirm that. He had a brief look in the general area, but found nothing of use.

Since he would need help to try and work out the route, he decided to explore already charted areas of the palace instead.

Even's first port of call was, of course, the library. He pushed open the doors and looked around from the doorway. It was ... large. Probably not as big as the one in Radiant Garden, but it spanned two floors and extended some distance under the mezzanine layer. Heavy curtains covered the windows, but the room was already lit despite the fact that it appeared to be quite unoccupied.

Comments

[declaregamuza]

Nel made a face, and murmured, "Lucky you," when Even mentioned being shown the Malboros. Although the Malboros were slightly more tolerable company than Marluxia.

"Better," she answered, "for a hot cup of tea, and a bath." She held one hand out and examined her nails with a frown. "And a nail file." She smiled genuinely, and returned the question, "You?"

[thechillyacademic]

"I could use more sleep," he admitted. "I can't say that Daguerreo's beds were as comfortable as the one here, so I'm finding myself craving more now I've had a little. I'm mostly just happy not to smell like a Chocobo any more."

He didn't much like the birds. They smelled bad, they could be noisy right up into the unpleasant decibels and they had a lurching gait that made it difficult relax for the duration of any ride.

"But mostly, I think I just need to get used to the Palace." He looked around the kitchen with the eyes of somebody at a friend's house for the first time. He kept noticing things that he'd not spotted the first time he was there, new equipment, new containers, new imperfections. It would take a little while before he was accustomed enough to the new surroundings to not feel the need to look around any more.

[declaregamuza]

Nel nodded, smiling softly as she looked into her cup. "It takes some getting used to," she admitted. "It was different when we first got here, but it's a bit more populated now." That wasn't always a good thing, especially given some of the inhabitants, but it made the place less samey. "And we have the garden now," she added.

They hadn't found that when Nel and most of the Arrancar had arrived. It had just been the deep darkness of underground beyond windows. No one had tried going out because you didn't know what you were going outside to, or that there was an outside.

And then Aizen had found the weather machine in the training facility, and the world outside the windows had lit up. The place had started to seem less oppressive and gloomy then. "Marluxia installed most of it from scratch, but he keeps the dangerous things to the corner with the greenhouse."

Because his alternative was going through a lot of Malboros very quickly.

[thechillyacademic]

"How considerate of him," he said over the tinkling din of a cup being stirred with a metal spoon.

He sat down at the table, cup held loosely in both hands, and barely resisted glancing around the room. He didn't want to feel as much like a tourist as he was sure he looked.

"It's quite remarkable though," he glanced out of the window as he said it. "I don't think anybody would expect to find such a vast underground garden beneath the sand."

[declaregamuza]

"We certainly didn't," Nel said, cheerfully. Even looked like a stranger in a friend's new house with the way he kept looking around. He was welcome, and he knew it, but he was still totally unfamiliar with everything. "The windows had just been dark, and the doors were locked until someone found the weather machine." She smiled, sweetly. "It was all dead, until Marluxia and Wonderweiss started bringing in the plants and animals." Like the bees, and butterflies, and everything else they'd captured in the wild and shipped in piece by piece.

"Of course, if you think that's impressive, you should see the training facility." Which was like a vast, temperate desert, that shared a sky with the garden, despite being in the palace basement.

[thechillyacademic]

"Oh?" He asked, bringing his cup to his lips and blowing away the steam. "I find it hard to believe that a ..." the word 'gymnasium' came to mind "training facility could be more impressive than that."

He didn't expect that he'd be spending much time in a training facility, gym or otherwise, no matter how impressive it was. Still, it might be worth a look.

[declaregamuza]

Nel grinned like a cheshire cat at Even's response. The training facility was somewhere an Arrancar could let loose, and she knew that Grimmjow's little squad had practiced their summoning down there. "You wouldn't think it was indoors," she said. "The weather machine works in there, too," she explained. "Honestly, I could spend an hour telling you what we know about this place, and then we'll find something new next week."

[thechillyacademic]

"I'm starting to get that idea," he said, smiling a little bit.

The palace was clearly very vast. It wasn't particularly surprising, considering it used to be occupied periodically by members of the region's royal family, back before it sank. It was unclear how much was unreachable, but for the most part the structure of the building seemed sound enough.

"I met Szayel earlier," he said, changing the subject. She had warned him about him, after all.

[declaregamuza]

Nel murmured as if Even had just told her how he'd received a paper cut on the webbing between every single one of his fingers on both hands. "I bet that was fun," she said, even though 'fun' was almost certainly the wrong word to use. "Did he make a pass at you?" She asked, with a hint more genuine amusement.

[thechillyacademic]

"He did," he said, wrinkling his nose. "He's either an opportunist or he has low standards."

Or both. That was always possible.

He shook his head and, impatient with his tea, blew cold breath onto it to cool it more quickly before taking a sip. Life was too short to sit about waiting for tea to cool, especially if you happened to be sitting about in Clan Khamja.

[declaregamuza]

Nel waved a hand dismissively. "You're not that bad," she said, "but he is an opportunist. As well as a tart." She smiled and shrugged. "Sometimes I think he does it just to see how people react," she told him. "Did he have anything else to say for himself, or was it all him making you feel welcome as only Szayel can?"

If Nel was asked to put money on it, she'd guess that Szayel had shared some of the gossip, but since it was Szayel, he'd share a very biased version of the gossip that painted all parties other than himself in the worst possible light.

Which piece of gossip he might have chosen for this, however, was harder to discern.

[thechillyacademic]

"He mentioned some of the more ... unpleasant aspects of the palace," he said, giving a shrug of his shoulders. "Expanded upon the, ah, 'violent lunatics' you mentioned back in Luxerion."

Which was fun to know in a way that was not fun at all, but something that he undoubtedly did need to know, especially as a former associate of Grimmjow's best friend.

[declaregamuza]

Nel nodded slowly at her cup of tea. "Nnoitra and what happened to Orochimaru, by any chance?" She asked, although she knew the answer already. It was Szayel, and he'd have told Even enough to make Orochimaru seem like a victim and skipped out on explaining the extenuating circumstances.

Nel wasn't sure if that was because Szayel didn't believe the extenuating circumstances, or just because he liked to wield it over Nnoitra that he didn't believe him. Szayel took whatever weaknesses he could find in his victims.

Nnoitra and Grimmjow were the ones she'd warned Even about, she remembered. They were the Arrancar he'd have to watch, although Grimmjow more than Nnoitra. Nnoitra probably wouldn't bother with Even; he wasn't openly combative enough to catch Nnoitra's eye.

Grimmjow... Well, hopefully he considered the berserker to be his target, and not just anyone the berserker had associated with.

[thechillyacademic]

"However did you guess?" He raised his eyebrows.

Szayel was, as far as Even could work out, the sort of cretin that would do his best to rattle people while staying, at least outwardly, halfway pleasant about it.

That he'd decided to talk about the one who had murdered a scientist didn't surprise him in light of that.

[declaregamuza]

Nel's smile was crooked and humourless in response. She could almost guess at what Szayel had told Even about that one. It had probably consisted of Orochimaru being a scientist, and Kadaj and Nnoitra teaming up to take him out, but she'd put all of her money on Szayel not having told Even why.

"Well, truthfully, he's short on material, so there are only so many options to try and frighten you with." She looked away from her tea and met Even's eyes, "Even," she said, softly, "Orochimaru was a child molester, and Nnoitra was one of his victims. Kadaj too," she added, considering that Szayel probably wouldn't have left his involvement out because it'd make Szayel look like a liar if Even quickly found out Kadaj was the one people focused on where that whole business was concerned. "Not that they like to talk about it," she said, frowning and dipping her head in silent indication that Even should probably refrain from bringing it up, too, "but together they made sure he never had another."

Whether that had been the plan, or it had been opportunistic Nel didn't know, and didn't really consider it important. What they'd done hadn't been wrong, as far as she was concerned, even if it had been against the rules.

"So while it might have been a shock that they killed him, it didn't exactly come out of nowhere. None of the violence that has happened here has been unprovoked," she said, and it wasn't intended as reassurance, exactly, just reassurance that Szayel had just been trying to scare him.

[thechillyacademic]

Even listened, scowling initially, and then frowning deeper as Nel's explanation lined up with the story Szayel had given him.

In fairness, he had not lied, but his omission of that one, all-important factor in the attack, or battle, whichever it was, had made it seem much more serious a crime than it had ended up being.

He didn't know much about Orochimaru. Marluxia had given him information as to what he chose to study, and Szayel had given a few details of the fight, but it was only Nel that had provided a reason. Such a crime made Even's skin crawl. Perhaps it was the general revulsion of such a thing, though more likely it was due to the fact that he had once practically raised a child. The notion angered him.

"So he deserved it," he said, quietly. "And so long as I don't provoke anybody, there should be nothing to worry about?"

He wasn't entirely sure about that.

"Here's hoping that Saix's quarrels don't become mine in lieu of his presence," he said, referring to Grimmjow's well known quarrel with him.

[declaregamuza]

Nel smiled softly and took a drink of her tea before she confessed, "I can't speak for Grimmjow, but" she shrugged, "I don't think he'll bother you much." If at all, to be honest, depending upon how closely Grimmjow associated Even with his prime quarry. "He might goad you into arguing, to see if you give him an excuse, or someone else in his group might, but if you don't rise to it they should get bored pretty quickly."

She sighed, and threw Even a look as if they were both the keepers of boisterous children who never stopped doing things they were advised against until they get hurt. "Grimmjow's quite single minded about," she hesitated before she said, "Saix," her instinct being to refer to him as 'the berserker'. "I was with him when they ran into each other, once. Grimmjow completely ignored what was going on around him," Saix hadn't, she remembered; he'd gone for her when she'd hurt one of his party, forgetting about Grimmjow, or wanting to go through him, "but I don't think either of them really wanted to kill each other. They'd rather get the other one to back down and admit defeat." Not that either of them would. "Hurting you wouldn't scratch that itch, for Grimmjow."

She smiled at Even, brightly, "Besides which, I outrank him, so if he starts trying to pick a fight with you, I'll give him a thick ear."

[thechillyacademic]

"I rather hope you're right," he said, sipping at his cooled tea.

He looked out of the glass panel in the kitchen door, out across the garden's expanse. The sun was high now, and occupying that transitional place between real morning and afternoon. He stared, glassy eyed, and thought about the fights that had taken place between Saix and Grimmjow with him present, and how the vicious posturing had been more teeth and claws than fists.

He was roused from his thoughts by the sight of a teetering Dreamhare waddling unsteadily across his vision.

"I won't be picking any fights with him, regardless." He looked back at Nel, then away. "I know what his Limit Break feels like."

He didn't care to repeat that experience.

[declaregamuza]

Nel stared at Even. Despite herself she looked impressed, if slightly horrified. Grimmjow was vicious and powerful in a fight, and she might have seen Even act as Sentinel in a fight but still....

"You stood against Grimmjow's limit?" She asked. "And there was me worried about you standing up to a Wyrm," she said, with a note of amusement.

It didn't even matter which Limit it was, either. None of Grimmjow's limit techniques were easy on the recipient.

[thechillyacademic]

"Barely," he admitted. "He ... caught me off guard. I attacked one of his associates, the Fire Elemental girl, and he got rather ... angry."

It wasn't a particularly fond memory, but it was a useful one. Grimmjow was a savage fighter and the limit break he had chosen to use on him consisted, to Vexen's hazy recollection, of a brutal barrage of attacks. He had barely managed to increase his defense enough to survive it, but he was nonetheless able to measure the power used in it. Grimmjow and Saix really were evenly matched.

"I won't be making that mistake again," he said, sipping at his tea. "Here's hoping that he doesn't decide to hold it against me."

[declaregamuza]

Realisation dawned, and Nel found herself nodding. "Tayuya," she said. "She's his girlfriend, or at least, she is now." Even was Ice elemental, so he'd have done some serious damage to Tayuya if he attacked her elementally.

Tayuya might hold something like that against Even. Grimmjow might, too, Nel thought. He was a dickhead, but he was protective of his group. "Just don't give him an excuse and he shouldn't try anything," she reiterated. "Our boss's patience with Grimmjow and his ongoing feud wore thin a while ago, so he's already on thin ice there."

She wondered if anyone had told Even who their boss was, yet. He may not have been told, and if he had, it may not have meant much to him anyway.

[thechillyacademic]

"I fully intend to stay out of the way," he said, finishing his tea. "Your boss seems to have a lot of unruly subordinates, doesn't he?"

He got up from the table and went back to the kettle. You could never have enough tea, in his opinion. He turned to Nel and cocked his head to the site a little. "Tea?" He asked.

[declaregamuza]

Nel murmured appreciatively. "Yes please," she answered. There was a mouthful or two left in the bottom of her cup, but it was cooling quickly during the conversation. She drained the last of it anyway, and turned to look at Even by the kettle.

"And my boss has a lot of subordinates," she said, with a smile. "They're a bit of a grab bag when it comes to temperaments."

Although she was the only one that had slapped Aizen, as far as she knew.

[thechillyacademic]

"I know what kind of environment that can lead to," he said, with only the smallest trace of humour.

He filled the kettle and switched it on, moved the milk jug and sugar to the table, and picked up Neliel's cup. There was no need to use another when she already had one.

"Are they the only group likely to cause trouble..?" He asked, swilling out her cup when he'd finished speaking. "They seem to be the only ones I hear about."

[declaregamuza]

Nel thought about the question, and how best to answer. "Grimmjow's clique are probably the biggest troublemakers," she said, after a little consideration. "They consist of him, Yylfordt, Apache now, Tayuya, and Kadaj. Nnoitra is an aggressive dickhead but he won't bother with you unless he thinks you could beat him in a fight, or you tell him you could beat him in a fight," she said, drily. "You've met Szayel," she added, "and there's Luppi, who is Szayel Lite." She smiled, then, "Other than those, Wonderweiss will only hurt you if you attack his Dreamhares, Ulquiorra will only do it if he's told to, and then there's me, Halibel, and Stark, and we're not even the kind of people that would be sent to kill someone, let alone trying it of our own volition. The only other Arrancar is Lilinette, who is more likely to hide your socks and put salt in the sugar pot," she said, cheerfully.

"Tayuya is part of the Sound Five," she paused, and corrected herself, "Four, but the others don't venture into this end of the Palace much. Honestly, your biggest problems will be the other clan members, not their subordinates."

Aizen was dangerous, or could be, when he wanted to be. Midgar had proven that, and she hoped Even wasn't taken in by the harmless but politically interested teacher facade Aizen exuded. Then there was Gin, who was a whole other kettle of fish, and Kuja who was one of the least complicated. Nel wasn't sure what she made of L, yet, because the incident with Ulquiorra had thrown her judgement, and there was someone new around that she hadn't met yet.

At least Even had the leg up of being familiar with the other Ryoka.