Mortal Inferno [Aina/Safira]

Fire and wreckage were on the Rio de Janeiro beach as debris, bodies, and flames scattered across the sand. Moments before this happened, a plane was seen crashing down to the earth as a mechanical malfunction had caused the small plane to smash head into the earth.

Were there any survivors? Well, that number is abysmally low. The pilots were deceased, but a lone woman was seen covered in scratches, burns, and blood as she groaned and slowly came to her senses. With a tiny bit of purple energy fading from her body, it seemed whatever instinct was in her aura had protected her.

Limping upwards, she grabbed her rib and coughed as all this was a lot for her to take in. She was confused, a bit scared, and uncertain of where she even was. After pulling out her phone, she saw that the location was somewhere in Brazil, and she knew this was a dead man's land.

So, after glancing at the pilots' burning bodies, a more mortified expression came over the woman's face before a scream followed. She tried to limp away from the flames, get to safety, and assess the situation more as she tried to calm her nerves after seeing such a brutal scene.

Life can change in the flick of an eye, and that sense of death is always around the corner. One minute Aina was on her way to travel to another county; the next, she was surrounded by fire and death.

Aina knew these realities existed, but until recently, she had been able to avoid such a thing. Now, with it staring her dead in the face, it was an ugly sight, and she just turned to her behind and felt the presence of another. Without hesitation, she asked:

"Please, whoever you are, you have to be able to help them...!"

"Help them? They're already dead."

Safira mused, she'd seen the old plane crash happen and it's a damn shame that it happened in her neck of the woods. Other countries would want to snoop, the balancers would come and the like. May as well pick it clean in the process though. She looked over from the coast of the crater, water and more water like a wonderful moat. How were they already dead? It wouldn't matter if they died because they'd be pluses except they weren't.

The toxic reiatsy of Safira hitting at the distressed souls that had recently parted, the poison taking root in them and eroding their chain of fates rapidly until if Aina looked around there were silhouettes of newly made hollows standing over her but unable to approach with Safira's presence.

"See? They've already succumbed to become hollows."

The arrancar explained off-handedly, acting as if this had happened naturally and she had not turned them into hollows herself.

Ah, ah...too much terror. There was a lot to process from the sudden descent of the crash, the explosion, her powers activating, the death of the pilots, and this strange new person around her.

So, for a moment, the woman was frozen in confusion and fear. All she could do was observe as the pair started to turn into hollows before her, and she just continued to gaze at the ghastly sight with a bit of sadness.

After glancing back at Safira, she could see how the woman would be calm since they were her own kind. Why be afraid of your own kind? Still, that was an off reaction even in her state of injury, disarray, and woe. But she wasn't about to voice that just yet, given the stark difference in power between the two.

Remaining quiet for some time, Aina just looked at her feet and just asked a simple question in a hurt voice:

"....what should we do?"

What should we do? Oh, darling that is just too much and the serpentine arrancar's lips curled up in a grin. This one was a real jester and a half, right?

"Well, I don't know what you're going to do but I know I'm going back over there."

Safira's thumb shot up to point in the general direction of the makeshift island that was the only thing in Brazil nowadayd for the most part. She could probably expand it but what need was there? The island served more than enough for her needs of a popular holiday resort.

"You can come along or you can play with the hungry hollows, that's up to you."

Aina glanced back at the newly turned hollows as they began to snarl, growl, and fly off in the distance as if to hurry and get a start on their new lives. A twinge of sadness washed over her face as she knew the process of turning into a hollow wasn't a pretty or painless thing to go through. Yet, she hoped that their souls could find some solace and perhaps turn into a hollow like her own Cala was as they at least seemed...human?

Regardless, a heavy sigh escaped the woman's lips as she didn't want to abandon them and wanted to heal or do something for them, but they were already dead, and she felt somewhat banged up herself. And being that she was in the middle of nowhere and unfamiliar with the country, it was best to follow along with things, heal up and then figure out how to get the hell out of here.

"Fuck, I feel bad for them...."

With a resigned voice, she grabbed her rib and looked back at Safira and nodded.

"...but I can do nothing for them. Feels horrible, but I hope they find peace somehow...."

As plum energy started to flow from her, Aina followed along the Arrancar.

"Do you have anything at this place to help patch me up? It's fine if you don't...."

"Feel bad for them?"

It was a question with a hint of confrontation to it, after all she herself was a hollow. Even if she existed in this human form that didn't change the fact she'd spent millennia as one of those creatures that Aina decidedly pitied. The serpentine lady turned on her heel, stopping their little train and ignoring her request for aid too. There was a more pressing matter to correct about this girl.

"Now, why would you say that?"

Did Aina have any capacity to empathise with a hollow? Had she known their physical pain and instinct to hunt and devour? Yet she had the audacity to sympathise with them like they were deserving of it. What nonsense, to pity another soul because they had changed into something else. Would she view a shinigami in the same light? The poor soul that once had a human life, lost it all and started anew to become one of the very beings that called themselves a God.

Aina gazed at Safira and took a moment to think about what she did say. Considering the woman was a hollow, and an arrancar at that, it's natural that she'd be kind of...pissed at what Aina said. So this caused the woman to briefly look away and shake her head.

"I don't mean that as disrespect. It just seems like a painful and lonely process to become hollow."

At least, that's what she thought. Considering the stench of another hollow was marked all over Aina, the time spent with Cala at least made her think it wasn't a pleasant process.

"And...the fact that they died a violent death isn't a good thing."

Feeling somewhat nervous and unsteady, Aina didn't know if this person was friend or foe and was trying to approach the situation by wording things carefully as she knew she was never really the best at this type of thing. So, after mulling it over, she continued.

"I guess death, in general, is terrifying. You never know what you'll turn into and if you'll retain any essence of what you were prior. God forbid you aren't killed by a Quincy and go into oblivion.

How peculiar to fear death in this day and age, Safira thought that the whole process was trivial now. Though also problematic, prey was difficult to acquire now that everything was public and she hoped that the shinigami found it just as much of a struggle to convince wayward souls to move on now that their loved ones could see and watch them be torn from their hands post-mortem.

"Doesn't sound that crazy to me. After all, as far as any of you humans were concerned in my days death was just to be taken by a Quincy."

Kind of, humans rationalised to themselves everything beyond death. Some right and some wrong. At the end of the day though no human that wasn't spiritually aware was ever truly able to have certainty about their existence.

"You sound like you're biased about it. I've felt nothing but satisfaction upon becoming a hollow. It's the path of freedom, the power to revolt against a system of arrogant gods that want to keep a delicate quota. Though a little human like yourself probably doesn't get it, never walked in their shoes for a day let alone centuries."

Safira explained, reprimanding the little gnat who seemed to view compliance as positive. Anything that was compliant to her was positive but if Aina rejected the hollows then there was only two other paths to walk. The shinigami or the quincy, and even the latter was little more than a more troublesome human for the shinigami.

"I'm closer to a Plus than a human, but I get your point..."

Aina kept looking at Safira and she could tell the woman didn't seem too fond of her. So she just continued to listen to her words as the woman seemed to enjoy being a hollow and found freedom in revolting against the system of the gods and the soul cycle as a whole. With a raised eyebrow, she figured she'd just take an interest and ask her to explain things.

"Then explain yourself: why do you think the current system is unfair to you?"

After coughing a bit due to her body's pain, the woman used a small energy construct to sit on and recover before her plum eyes rested on Safira.

"And better yet: explain to me what it is like to walk the shows of a hollow if I don't understand. Some of the closet people in my life are hollows, but it never seemed like the process was exactly gentle."

"Unfair to me? That's quite naive. You occupy a system which is only beneficial to a small group of souls called shinigami, you said yourself that you're a plus so shall I discuss the worth of your existence? You are a statistic, a soul that exists to live or be culled to keep the scales level. I am a hollow, we exist to tip the scales and deny that reality."

She mused at the purple-haired soul who seemed so content. Safira would've thought that the unrest would last longer since the world had become spiritually aware, not because people were in mass hysteria as their way of life broke down but the fundamental nature of them being water going in circles.

No one cared what each drop was worth when it was all just a flowing current but each hollow was a drop that mattered, a drop that tried to destroy the pipes that the water was running through.

"You shouldn't think of it as being unfair to me, it's unfair to you."

Safira used the explanation as a means to mask her thoughts on what she was trying to twist for an explanation to what it was like to be a hollow. Aina was right, not many hollows enjoyed the change so how did she make it sound all wonderful?

"Well, I suppose it depends on how you look at it. A soul that willingly becomes a hollow retains their ego but one that goes unwillingly develops a new sense of self to cope with the change. So I wonder, how do you want to die? Become a hollow and retain yourself, become one that doesn't, or have a shinigami purify you and try to survive in the Rukongai as a slave to aristocracy?"

How does a human think nowadays when they know that there is life after death, and the pathways it might lead to, are so transparent to them? She wondered if human children who once spoke about their careers in schools now also spoke about what they wanted to be when they died as well.