Too Dry | Carrla

Boredom...

Boredom like no other. It had only been a couple of days since my encounter with the Primera. There wasn't much thinking to be done about the matter; in the bargain I was exchanging loyalty for power. Nothing more, nothing less. There truly wasn't anything else to think about. The castle, grand as it was, bustling as it was, garnered absolutely no entertainment. I spent day after day, just like the days preceding the encounter, waiting for something. In this case I awaited something that could perhaps cure this unending lack of attention, negative or not. Then again, there were little things that could satiate my thirst for Mayhem.

That day was dominated by sleeping, and as I was currently, pacing back and forth before my exquisite throne, comprised of naught but blades. The mound of skulls surrounding it belonged to all of my victims. The most valuable of skulls, and thus the most valuable of kills, were boasted near the front of the mounds. Every time I spared the inelegant pile a glance it reminded me of much more interesting days. Days that hadn't gone forgotten - days that were ultimately yearned to be emulated in any way, shape, or form.

A knock.

By means of sensing I already knew who the approaching party was, but the tiny of piece of paper, which I briefly sauntered over to soak up the details of, eased recognition. However, I didn't sense the company this part was usually with, the Cuatra Espada. It was fairly unusual to see a Fraccion around on their own accord, but it was none of my concern. Truth be told, I didn't have anything else to do today. "Open the doors."

Just like our first encounter, the doors parted open through the efforts of the large hollow behind them. With the amount of visitors as of late, I figure it'd be more convenient to keep the doors open. That would leave those door slaves unemployed, and as they would have no more use to me, I would simply obliterate them for fun, or use them as attractions in the Coliseum I host.

"Trael."

I always found her etiquette interesting. When things got me thinking, I became a lot less bored; or at least to a degree. In my human life as I recall it, I didn’t do anything to figure out what I liked. That carried over to this new life, if that’s what you want to call it. The only practice I thoroughly enjoyed was crime. It got my heart pumping, adrenaline rushing – and truth be told, it paid. I wasn’t in it for the money, of course. Naturally, I was in it just for the enjoyment. But things like food were mandatory in that plane of existence, so I took whatever cash I could off of my victims.

She was interesting because on this plane of existence, you didn’t get this modesty often. Egomania and violence ran rampant – you couldn’t expect things like civility in the realm of the wolves. Which was why it piqued my curiosity. The part that made it not boring was because it was done seemingly not out of a need to savour her life for as long as possible, but it was entirely genuine. My malicious nature may have limited the extent I could appreciate such behaviour, but it ultimately kept me entertained whenever she was around.

She was getting better at speaking. Admittedly, I was starting to wonder what was up with that. Memories, more often than not, weren’t retained accurately after death, so I originally assumed that it was one of those things she’d just have to learn again. It was impossible for anyone to decipher the cause, and I wasn’t interested in prying in affairs that didn’t concern me; matters that were none of my business unless otherwise told about it. She was getting better at things, it’d seem.

“Can’t say that I am. Is there something you need?”

“Ah, I gotcha,” Carrla said in response. It usually wasn’t the tone of voice she used that denoted her feelings – she was always rather dry and eccentric in tone – but the wording itself and the existence of a response altogether, and the frequency of it tended to give those who knew her well a good idea of whether or not she enjoyed their presence. Despite being a Fraccion, a Fraccion who wasn’t part of her own Fraccion, she had begun to develop a bond with her – something she didn’t think was quite possible. But hey, just because she liked to slaughter and blow things up without batting an eye didn’t mean she couldn’t like things other than that. I ain’t that one dimensional.

“Not much happened yet; I still got a couple of days left before I gotta head out for a certain errand I gotta attend to…” That included meeting up with those who told her to rendezvous with them in a different part of Hueco Mundo. Well, she had come in contact with multiple people who wished she would do such a thing in varying locations. It would suffice to remedy some of her boredom, and perhaps, in the long run, quench her vicious desire to improve herself. She could no longer be the one sitting at the wrong end of the food chain.

She still had that scar on her cheek. A reminder.

Carrla scoffed. “You don’t gotta be sorry! And you ought to climb out of that kneel and come hither,” The Queen pushed herself up from her elaborate throne. She began rummaging through her pocket for her pack of cigs. She was always, always going to smoke in excess. “The best way to work on a skill is to employ it in a real scenario. But first, I should help you develop some kind of basic grasp on the art. Should we start with hand-to-hand, or is there a technique that piques your interest?”

"It is always.. a-a.. a pleasure to see you u-up close, M.. Miss.. Octava."

"Mmn..."

Carrla soaked up every detail of Trael's body the moment she arrived — and especially when she provoked her with that comment. The albino purposely made no effort to hide the effort. She wouldn't ever get tired of looking at her; she recalled remarking once upon a time that the unorthodox pigment her skin boasted only enhanced the attractiveness. Again disrupting any sense of pragmatism, she mischievously ran her tongue over her lips. While crafting her response, her gaze was firmly placed on her to-be pupil's lips.

She wished Trael was part of her Fraccion.

"Nah, no harm done. You know what they say about teachers, though, they like to teach the same way they were taught." Carrla began as she pushed herself up from her mighty seat. She withdrew one of the cigarettes from the pack and dipped its end into the flame produced by her zippo lighter. Wedging the alabaster stick between her pale lips and taking a drag, she began to saunter over in the direction of the door. She hoped for and expected Trael's pursuit.

"I don't think I've ever really took the time to just routinely practice specific martial arts all by my lonesome," she slowly took a drag and exhaled. "It's more of an instinctual thing. All of the time I spent fighting, and fighting, and fighting some more, I was forced to get better, evolve, or die. I had to improve it. And I might just have an idea to emulate that kinda practice."

She turned around and faced her favorite Arrancar.

"I need to get some new chumps for my Coliseum. Wanna go hunting?"

Her ego was eating up all of the flattery she was receiving like a fat kid on cake. Carrla was loving this. One of the most irreplaceable feelings in the universe was the feeling of being a powerful entity that was capable of vaporizing any and all opposition. One was bound to gain a big ego if they were exposed to such power and when it was continuously stroked, well, to summarize it was pretty awesome. Which made Trael increasingly so.

As she heard Trael's question about a certain affectionate and good luck provoking gesture, she momentarily came to a halt. She blinked because she didn't expect it from Trael, but her lips progressively tied into a light smirk as she turned to face her blue skinned company. She sure as hell didn't mind providing her with one of those; who in the right mind would? As long as she could contain herself and stifle any compulsion to allow it to stray off into anything more. They currently had things to do.

All in all, the opportunity was irresistible. Which was exactly why she stepped in closer to Trael after having come to that halt, leaned in real close until their lips were almost touching. Moving even an inch closer would result in the desired gesture, but she parted her lips to speak foremost. She was going to savor this moment. "You do. And if you do good with the hunting, you'll get something more, too." Of course, without further ado, she'd lock their lips together after that bold statement, and trailed her arms around Trael.

I could get lost in those eyes, Carrla reminded herself as she reciprocated both the kiss and the eye contact. The cool touch of Trael's body and the familiar taste of her lips produced a sound of unadulterated pleasure in the albino. More, was the only coherent thought that waded around in the contours of Carrla's mind. Her hands kneaded around Trael's shoulders, trailing along her upper back, feeling along every ounce of her flawless curvature they could manage.

Carrla thought that Trael was filled with unwarranted humility. She was comprised of a color scheme that closely resembled ice, an element unmatched in its elegance and beauty, bearing no rival. A frailty, a crisp coolness. Not only this, but winter was the season that signified the end. A season associated with death, an icy harbinger that eradicates so many different organisms that depends on warmth for sustenance. A season that jailed animals into caves, bugs into the ground, and the earth under ice and snow. A beautiful force to be reckoned with.

Right before she was about to digress, say fuck it, and, well, do exactly that, the kiss at last concluded. How dreary; I truly can't wait until we get back, The Sexta thought inwardly, as she continued to fix her eyes onto Trael. Her arms were still around her; one could easily deduce her reluctance to release herself from the embrace, but she needed to, and she did, when they resigned to the intended schedule.

"They're rare, but a Vasto Lorde class would be ideal. That way, it's both a remarkable challenge that'll push you to your limits so you can progress, and it allows you to apply hand-to-hand to something with a human shape," she said as she started to walk down the corridor outside of the throne room. "And I can only help if it really looks like things are getting bad."

“No, you will,” I immediately said in response to Trael. The reason I placed as much emphasis on the key term of that sentence was to try to bolster the Fraccion’s confidence. Things like fear, or lack of belief in one’s own ability could easily degrade chances of survival in combat. Ambitious as I was, sometimes I doubted even my own effectivity when pertaining to making the blue-skinned Arrancar believe in herself. There wasn’t a big elaborate reason behind my thoughts, I just didn’t want Trael to perish and that was that. Henceforth I found myself compelled to try and make sure she was ready mentally for what was to follow.

“Because if you don’t do it, if you die on me, I won’t forgive you,” Don’t let the shape of my heart’s remainder, a botanic piece of bone sprouting out of my eye socket, fool you. I was a poor romancer. ‘Tough love’, I do suppose that is what it would be referred to as. Anyone could hear the sincerity behind my crude words despite how they were fashioned. It was selfish, was it not? Should she leave my company, should she condemn me to an existence without her presence, then I would continue to haunt her with my lack of forgiveness for an eternity. She can’t go—I don’t want her to go—ever.

The castle was like a maze for those who didn’t know the layout. Knowing it, in all honesty, required you to be there a couple of times to identify where to go. It was probably made like that to confuse intruders, but the architect likely failed to consider the size of any respectable Cero or Kido that rendered the ramblings of Sun Tzu ultimately obsolete. Still, without increased speed, it still took a good five minutes to get from the hallway before the throne room, and finally back outside.

“Can you use sonido, Trael?”