spira_rp | Here I stand

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Here I stand

Kadaj had given Hojo a wide berth.

It hadn't been that hard. Hojo had seemed to be extending him the same courtesy, but Kadaj wasn't taking chances. He'd been vigilant so far about following Even's advice and trying to leave as little trace of himself behind as he could. Nel helped, too, making sure he got his things washed and returned to his room quickly, and his crockery and utensils were quickly washed, or at least put in to soak. She'd bought him some bleach, too, and showed him how to soak his toothbrush and hairbrush in it so that, if Hojo did break into his room, he probably wouldn't get anything useful anyway.

It was weird and unpleasant to try and live while being mindful of everything you might leave behind for someone unscrupulous to collect evidence without your consent, but Kadaj felt like he was managing.

He'd also taken to training his bankai against Yylfordt. Not the full of its abilities, of course; he wasn't about to flash those around in the Palace, but improving the techniques he'd learned while he was out in the world was useful. Yylfordt wasn't as difficult as Kyuzo had been, but he had more brute force to put into a fight, and he used different tactics, even if they did mostly consist of relying on brute force.

Kadaj couldn't beat him consistently yet, but he was getting there. He'd be able to beat Yylfordt without taking a scratch if he used Reunion, of course, but he needed to keep training at dual wielding. He could practice Reunion out in the wider world, away from prying eyes, on Fiends that people wanted destroyed and the Gotei squads hadn't got around to yet.

Still, Kadaj was running up against a snag that he knew was going to be a solid wall in the way of his training. Yylfordt used brute force, yes, and Kadaj had to use his speed to circumvent that, but eventually he'd come up against someone that could use magic, or that he couldn't defeat without using magic himself, and that was when Kadaj was going to struggle.

He could ask Gin. Gin he was fairly sure would have taught him before now if he'd asked, but Kadaj would rather not end up owing Gin a lot of favours, and a part of him knew it wasn't smart to let Gin know every single ability he had in his arsenal. Plus, Gin would probably respect him more for finding another way.

Kuja had tried, but Kadaj had got frustrated easily, and tantrums had usually ensued if Kuja continued to push him, and Kuja's patience had worn thin. Kadaj had ended up learning every one of Kuja's favourite plays and poems by heart, because that was easier than learning to read them, and he'd mentioned no more about learning magic since.

He could ask Aizen, but Kadaj was wary of admitting such a weakness to Aizen. Ienzo wasn't to be considered. Nel was nice, but Kadaj wasn't sure of how she'd be as a teacher, and anyway, going to someone else's subordinates with a weakness was as bad as going to them.

Then Even had come along, and Kadaj had been set to hate him because they'd fought each other in the past, but he'd found that, really, he didn't. Even was a bit stuck up, sure, but he'd also been almost nice in the face of Hojo's interest in Kadaj. Kadaj had since afforded him respect, and Even had been respectful in return, which was new territory for Kadaj. If he was honest, he kind of liked Even, in the same way that he liked Nel.

So it was in this atmosphere of growing respect and the sown seeds of affability that Kadaj, after a training session with Yylfordt and subsequent shower, went to track Even down. It wasn't a safe conversation to have in the kitchen, or somewhere else public, so Kadaj want to find Even in his own quarters. He'd made his home, so to speak, in a distant end of the Palace, where no one else really went. They hadn't known it was here before Even came, or at least, they'd known it was here but hadn't known how to get to it, and had little reason to venture down here now. As a result, the whole area felt like Even. The rest of the Palace was a mishmash of other reiatsu signatures, but here was as definitely Even's domain as Orochimaru's labs had been his, and as Kuja's quarters were his.

Kadaj felt like an intruder in someone else's territory, and he knocked politely when he could feel Even on the other side of a door in that unmistakable sense of glaciers and icicles emanating from beyond it as if you could open it onto winter.

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Yylfordt threw Kadaj a challenging look. "You're on," he told him, "and let me know when you intend to take on Luppi. I wanna see that."

Luppi had a nasty release that would, admittedly, be really good for training Kadaj's brand of dual wielding against, but still, it was a nasty release.

"You should add her to your list, too," he said, jabbing his thumb in Apache's direction with a sneer. If she was such a fucking expert she could get her ass handed to her by Kadaj, too.

"Yeah," Apache said. "'cos there's nothing like having your subordinate beaten up to show what a hardass you are, right?"

She flipped Yylfordt off, glaring at him with what looked suspiciously like loathing for a moment.

It irritated her that Yylfordt was being a pussy about being beaten up by somebody, but suggesting that that same somebody take his turn with her, just to make him feel better? She thought that was pretty low.

"You wanna see me get my ass kicked, you can do it yourself." She snapped. "I'd sooner take my chances with you than Kadaj."

"Chill out," Grimmjow said, looking at Yylfordt more than Apache when he said it. "So you got beaten, and what? It still makes you one of the ... what? Top hundred or so fighters in Spira?."

If not, it was a pretty close run thing. The Gotei Captains, the Kages, the absurdly powerful individuals, like Kuja, the Mist Swordsmen, Ryoka, combat-ready members of Khamja and Akatsuki... regardless of whether Kadaj beat Yylfordt or not, he was still pretty up there in the grand scheme of things.

Somebody having a Bankai was rare. It was a requirement of Captaincy in the Gotei 13, with one notable exception, and there weren't many lieutenants that could boast having their own. That Yylfordt stood against somebody with one made him absurdly powerful by normal people standards, even if Kadaj was new to it and not yet at Captain level himself.

Yylfordt, now looking thoroughly tetchy, threw Grimmjow a glance. "Rao, E ghuf E's dra faygacd Espada, pnu, pid ev cra fyhdc du yld mega cra'c cilr y vilgehk aqband eh fryd E cruimt pa ypma du payd cra cruimt dno ed rancamv," he groused. "Syopa kaddehk ran ufh ycc gelgat femm ghulg cusa uv dra pedlr uid uv ran."

It seemed unlikely, but it was always worth a shot. The fact was, Kadaj was faster than he remembered, and adding a second sword to that speed meant Kadaj had the ability to be a torrent of bladed attacks. He was a real pain in the ass to fight against, now.

"Actually," Kadaj said, speaking to Apache in a toned down version of his appealing-to-adults voice, "I would like to spar against you sometime." He shrugged a little, offering her a small smile. "It's not all about strength, I need to work against different fighting styles, too."

He'd never seen Apache fight, but that would just mean he had to think on his feet if he went up against her. It'd be an interesting, and useful, challenge.

Tayuya could tell Apache was getting pissed off, and the fact that Yylfordt had just been bitching about her in another language wasn't going to help.

She looked at him, sourly. "Not everyone in the room speaks Al Bhed, dickhead, don't use it to hide when you're calling people shit." That just made him sound like a pussy as far as she was concerned.

Apache heard Kadaj out, but turned to Tayuya before she responded to him, snapping every word.

"He only speaks in it around me so he can insult me without me knowing what he's saying," she snarled. "He ain't brave enough to insult me in a language I can understand."

She took a breath in through her nose, short and irritated, and released it through gritted teeth before turning back to Kadaj.

"I mostly fight unarmed," she said, giving a shrug. "Dunno how much use I'll be training against you."

Grimmjow managed, against all the odds, not to wince when Yylfordt launched into his Al Bhed tirade about his Fracción. He was about to open his mouth to tell him to knock it off, when Tayuya did it for him. She got pissed off when they spoke Al Bhed when the common language would suffice, too.

He did wince when Apache snapped at Tayuya about him. He knew that Yylfordt wasn't going to let that go.

He wasn't sure how good Apache would be against Kadaj, either. She was a strong fighter, surprisingly so, from what he had seen, but most of her abilities were Hollow-based. He did, however, know that she was lightning-fast. That might be useful, if nothing else.

Yylfordt rolled his eyes and turned to glare at Apache, his expression sour and irritated. "I called you a bitch, okay? 'Pedlr' means 'bitch', you'll hear it a lot."

It wasn't, exactly, that Yylfordt didn't want Apache to know what he was saying about her. It was more than he was sick of arguing, and Al Bhed was his first language, so it came easily when he wanted to say something without continuing the argument.

But Apache was pissing him off. "If you're such a vilgehk expert you should try getting your own ass kicked. It might do you some good to get some training in."

Kadaj shook his head at Yylfordt's outburst, and he didn't press the issue of sparring with Apache again.

"The point isn't to kick someone's ass, Yylfordt," he said, wearily. He found himself longing for the calm if uncomfortable environment of Even's office. At least there he'd managed to have a conversation without someone else making it a contest of egos.

Apache gritted her teeth again. "I'm supposed to train against you, jackass."

But ... that hardly ever happened and all of the other Arrancar were considered too high-level for her to be put up against. She was never going to get stronger at this rate.

"No wonder that never happens," she spat. "You're too worried about your ego getting bruised."

"My ego's just fine," Yylfordt retorted, "I just don't beat up girls."

And not because they'd beat him, either. Yylfordt just had too much respect for people like his mom to be able to swing a sword or throw a punch at a girl without feeling guilty as hell about it afterwards.

It was different if said girl was actively trying to kill you, but if they weren't....

Tayuya curled her upper lip. "Now I wanna kick your fucking ass for saying that," she told Yylfordt.

"You fucking know what, Apache?" She asked, turning to her friend in a moment of solidarity, "We need to fuck off out and leave this fucktard behind for once, and then when we come back, you should kick his ass and Kadaj's."

Kadaj looked at Tayuya as if she'd just kicked his puppy. "What did I do?" He asked, sounding offended to be lumped into the same pool as Yylfordt at this precise moment.

"That sounds like a plan," she said acidly, getting to her feet. "I'm done sitting around here and getting insulted by that idiot."

Yylfordt, she was sure, went out of his way to make her feel bad. She was one of only two non-Espada Arrancar in the Palace and she was newer than most, too. She hadn't had much time to hone any of her skills, new or old, since she'd subjugated her Hollow. She'd barely even been evaluated. Having the Espada she was supposed to answer to, and who was supposed to train and look after her, insult her for pointing out that somebody like Kadaj shouldn't be able to beat him was too much.

Especially since he was obviously being a little bitch about getting beaten by somebody else.

"Pretty sure Nel'll be up for it," she huffed.

Grimmjow shrugged at Kadaj's question, but stayed quiet, awaiting Yylfordt's meltdown and what he thought was going to be a spectacular display of him inserting his foot so far into his own mouth that even his brother'd be awed by it.

Tayuya, Grimmjow knew, was happy to have another girl in the group. It wasn't that hanging around with all guys was bad, it was just that she'd been stuck with that dynamic forever. Having somebody new to side with in arguments was probably a novelty.

That, and Yylfordt was being a dick.

Yylfordt sneered. "Yc ev cra't vilgehk syhyka du bid y clnydlr uh sa, pnu," he said, his expression as dismissive as his tone was derisive.

He was pissy, he knew, and being mean for the sake of it, but she'd pissed him off. Kadaj had always been one of the weak ones of the group. He didn't mind being the weakest Espada, he'd made his peace with that, but realising he was being overtaken by Kadaj had bruised his ego.

Not that he'd admit to that, even to himself.

Tayuya growled at Yylfordt's inflammatory answer. Despite being told not to use Al Bhed, he was doing it again, probably to be deliberately aggravating.

"Do you want the honour of punching him, or can I?" She asked Apache.

Kadaj scowled, eyeing Yylfordt, but he kept his mouth shut. He genuinely wanted to spar with Apache, and it didn't matter that she was unarmed, he needed to work on his defensive skills a lot because they were newer to him which made an unarmed Apache an ideal partner, really. He also really needed to corner Tayuya about tags and ink for Even.

But with Yylfordt winding them both up, now wasn't the time.

He was going to have to beat him good and hard next time they sparred. His ego needed more than just bruising.

Grimmjow had a feeling that a lack of self-preservation instinct probably ran in the Granz family. Szayel was famous for it, but Yylfordt had shades of it himself, especially where Apache was concerned.

"Ghulg ed uvv. Ajah ev cra lyh'd payd oui eh y vekrd, cra lyh cdemm cdyp oui eh ouin cmaab, telgrayt."

"Feel free," she said, glaring at him. "If I did it, I might have to put in for a transfer."

Not that that didn't sound appealing, at the moment. Working under Nel, or Halibel, or even Nnoitra seemed more appealing than suffering Yylfordt's teddy-throwing tantrums.

"Ni'm vomd e twat," she bit out, not giving a toss that nobody else in the room could understand her. "Uw ni zem era lyhi yw e pussy ni't nefi dy zeq num fuckin' cubm."

"Frydajan, pnu," Yylfordt said, in response to Grimmjow. "Cra'mm lremm dra vilg uid frah cra'c hud uh dra nyk."

He didn't understand what Apache had said, but he also knew she'd probably done that deliberately, so he refused to comment on it. It would only be letting her win.

Tayuya scowled, taking Apache by the arm, partly to lead her towards the door, and partly to keep her from lunging for Yylfordt. Letting her beat the snot out of Yylfordt right now probably wasn't the smartest idea, she was right. Even though Tayuya doubted Aizen would consider it an unprovoked attack.

"E ruba ouin lulg nudc uvv," she spat at Yylfordt, her Al Bhed less fluent and smooth than his own, or Grimmjow's.

He was deliberately trying to piss people off, and now he was just getting offensive.

Apache left the sunhouse, incensed.

She stood in the corridor for a moment, fuming.

"I really hate him sometimes," she snarled. "Maybe I should ask Aizen for a transfer. Dunno why I got stuck with him anyway."

"Stop pissing her off, man." Grimmjow said, after the two girls had left the room. "It ain't her fault you got beaten by Kadaj."

He flopped back in his chair, a grouchy expression on his face. He hoped that Apache's spat with Yylfordt didn't end up being Tayuya's spat with him.

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