Last time on Hunting Death Itself...
Rouga interrogated the Jäger prisoner Hans Maier, forcing him to tell everything he knew about their plans. Senny confronted him about Kida's hatred, and Rouga told of their history, in addition to the story of what happened to his pack. Senny later accused him of being a coward, bringing his wolf side to the surface and getting tossed unceremoniously from Rouga's office. Now, Rouga and Ant plan their strategy for the upcoming war, and a new enemy reveals himself...
“You’re late, Rouga,” Ant’s toneless voice stated as the Squad 7 Captain crossed the threshold of his laboratory. “0.084 microseconds, to be precise.”
Rouga scoffed, following it up with a yawn appropriate to being up at 0700 hours. “That’s so infinitesimal that even my nervous system can’t compensate for it,” he commented, giving Ant a halfhearted glare.
“I said to arrive
precisely on time, not any sooner or later.”
Rouga paused; wondering briefly if that was Ant’s version of humor before dismissing it. “Well, I’m here now. Let’s get on with it.”
Ant nodded, standing from his all-metal desk and walking to the center of the cold steel chamber, where a device that looked like a steel pool table had been set up. He pressed a panel on the side, the scanner inside verifying both his biometrics and his computer codes before the whole table shimmered to life, displaying a 3D hologram of the Soul Society. “I took the liberty of creating a holographic map to prepare our strategy.”
Rouga nodded. “Move it to grid square 107-51,” he murmured. The hologram flashed, as though responding to his voice, and the image shifted to a canyon lined with high cliffs and a narrow pass. “This is the key to our initial strategy. The Jäger would go through this pass, with its well-defended approach and the impossibility of using the upper cliffs to gain any advantage; they’re too tall and steep to mount an attack from and with the number of lower cliffs it would be impossible to get good aim with powerful ranged attacks. Bringing the canyon down on them wouldn’t work either, their leaders are too strong for that to stop them, and they’d destroy the whole canyon before we could execute the plan.”
“That would make a formidable defense,” Ant murmured. “We’d be forced to wait until they came out of the canyon to attack.”
“Normally, I’d agree with you,” Rouga replied. “However, if we place a small force of Shinigami here…” He pointed to a grid point near the end of the canyon, which immediately lit up with black unit markers in the shape of triangles. “…and set up Kuukanten’i Kidou circles at their position, they’ll turn back as soon as they receive reports from their scouts. The threat of us bottlenecking and surrounding them in the pass is too great.”
“I assume you’ll want the Kidou Corps to man this position, correct?” Ant asked.
Rouga shook his head. “No, just round up a group of Kidou-capable Shinigami and fashion some sort of key to activate those portals. We’ll need the Kidou Corps for the main part of the battle.”
“Speaking of which,” Ant stated. “How many Jäger will we be facing? I’ve heard what the prisoner supplied you with, but I’d like to hear your thoughts on the matter.”
“According to Hans Maier, we’ll be facing just under 600 Jäger under the command of their respective division commanders, compared to roughly 2,000 Shinigami in the combat arena. That’s four mid-strength companies, plus Zeruda and the rest of the Innen Kreis, the original Jäger; we have 11 Captains, the hundred-man Kidou Corps, and about 150 Shinigami from each company, save for Squad 4, which will have only 100 on the battlefield itself. If I’m right, we’ll also be facing roughly 100 or so of the shadow creatures that attacked Squad 7 on the day of Seijuro’s death.”
“The smaller or larger ones?”
“Larger, most likely. However, they’ll be spread out across the battlefield, so we won’t have to worry about forming another task force to get at them.” Rouga smiled grimly. “Unfortunately, if I’m right, we won’t be facing a number less than half our own. There’s no way Zeruda has taken so few recruits from the World of the Living during the past five centuries. In fact, I’m almost certain that, when her reinforcements arrive, they will outnumber us by roughly 1,000 soldiers.”
Ant now looked mildly alarmed.
Mildly. “You can’t be serious.”
“I am. The number of recruits she probably has stationed in the World of the Living for training and the collection of more soldiers are from centuries of just buildup and no real combat, meaning unlike us, they’re not losing members to fighting off Hollows and god knows what else.” Rouga shrugged. “It doesn’t matter too much in this case. We possess five distinct advantages over the Jäger in this kind of combat.”
“Those being?” Ant asked, the hologram shifting around to compute Rouga’s figures for the troop count.
“First is our technology, which the Jäger utterly lack. Second is our strategic minds and our forward planning, which the Jäger can’t match. Third is that we picked the battlefield, which gives us an immediate tactical advantage. Fourth is that the Jäger’s foot soldiers are common rabble, little better than thugs, while ours are better trained and will be co-ordinated on multiple levels. And fifth is that, while their five leaders are certainly a match for our strongest Captains, we will have 11 Captains directly involved with the battle, which means that we can drive back their superior numbers and fight their leaders on even terms at the same time.”
Ant nodded, noting each of these points and feeling a slight glimmer of pride that Rouga had seen fit to list his technology as their first advantage. Still, he could see Rouga’s reasoning behind each point, and he knew that against such overwhelming numbers, it would still be a stretch. “Now comes the actual plan.”
Rouga nodded, giving out several commands to the table to adjust the hologram to show their units and positioning according to his strategy. “After they turn away from the canyon route, they’ll pass through the forests at the base of the mountainous zone. In doing so, they’ll cross our battlefield of choice.” The image blurred and changed, showing a large, hilly plain bordered on all sides by a forest. “This place is an ancient battlefield from a time before I even existed; trees still cannot grow within its boundaries because the chaotic forces of the spirit energy expended there have made the ground partially infertile, unable to support much more than the hardiest of grasses. It’s the perfect site for the type of warfare we’ll need here.”
Ant cocked his head to the side, contemplating this. “Would it not be more prudent to pick a densely forested area?” he asked. “Aren’t guerilla tactics the usual response when one is facing a numerically superior enemy?”
“Not with these kinds of numbers in play,” Rouga grunted. “Guerilla tactics with this many combatants on both sides just turns into a massive clusterf
uck. It’d be a bloodbath for everyone involved, and we’d likely suffer upwards of 80% casualties even if we won, which we’d probably never recover from.” He chuckled darkly. “Just trust me; open combat is the way to go here.”
“Very well,” Ant sighed. “What about organization and placement?”
“Each Squad will be divided into five platoons, each numbering thirty Shinigami or thereabouts, with every platoon led by the first five seated officers in each division. They will operate by Squad in cohesive groups under the joint command of their respective lead officers, and will defer to their Captain should the need arise.” He shrugged. “This is unlikely, however, so most often they will left to act autonomously.”
Rouga pointed out several clusters of units, distributed throughout the battlefield in ones, twos, and threes. “Squad 4 members will be interspersed to each platoon as field medics, while Arc and fifty of his most trusted staff will man the field hospital at the very rear of the line to act as combat surgeons.”
“And the system for evacuating our injured back there?” Ant asked.
“Unfortunately, we have to resort to runners; carrying them back,” Rouga replied stiffly. “We don’t have many other options. We don’t have enough Kidou Corps personnel to set up a Kukanten’i large enough for the whole battlefield, and we lack a separate force to act as corpsmen.”
Ant’s face twisted slightly into what might have generously been called a scowl. “Unacceptable,” he stated, tone flat and solid, dropping a deadweight on the notion. “Half those troops will die before you get them back to the field hospital, and even then we’d be losing two troops to get one back to the hospital.”
Rouga sighed, rubbing his temples to stave off the slowly building headache. “I know,” he admitted. “I was hoping you had something up your sleeve for this.”
“I can certainly create a panic button of sorts that will teleport the wounded back to the field hospital in the event of an emergency.”
Now the Squad 7 Captain raised an eyebrow. “I had thought of something similar, but I decided that the risk of desertion would be too great.”
Ant raised his own brow, a monumental show of emotion from the stoic Captain. “Desertion hasn’t been a problem for the Gotei 13 since Golde took over as Head Captain two-hundred years ago.” The eyebrow dropped, and the slightest tug of his lips showed that he was smirking. “Besides which, they’d be teleported to the hospital. If they came back without injuries, Arc would send them back to the front in nothing but their undergarments.”
Rouga could only stare for a few seconds, then he broke out into a weak chuckle from the mental image. “Remind me never to make him mad.”
“Gladly.”
Rouga chuckled again, then cleared his throat. “Right then… anyway, back to it.” He pointed to an area of the map, on a particularly large hill well behind their lines where roughly 100 units had been labeled ‘K. Corps’. “The Kidou Corps will be stationed on this hill.” He turned to Ant with a slight grin on his face. “This is where you first come into play. You might want to take notes; most things you’ll have to build from scratch.”
“I doubt that,” Ant stated, the barest hint of a smirk rising on his face. “I have at least one of everything in existence lying around in storage.”
Rouga let out a sharp bark of laughter. “I can believe that. You wouldn’t happen to have any Kidou-powered artillery lying around, eh?”
“No, but I could certainly rework that bazooka I made about twenty years ago…”
Rouga nodded. “Do so, then. Make twenty-five howitzers; they’ve gotta be powerful enough to fire projectiles equivalent to a Soren Sokatsui.”
Ant frowned, but nodded in reply. “It should be possible, provided that the howitzer itself doesn’t supply all of the output.”
Rouga inclined his head. “The Kidou Corps can provide half of that with a Sokatsui, meaning you only need the howitzer with the output of another one.”
“Fair enough.”
Rouga turned his attention back to the holographic battlefield. “Obviously, they’ll be providing the bulk of our artillery support.” He pointed to another section. “Squad 7 will be here; for them, I’d like you to build something special.”
“What would that be?”
Rouga grinned and whispered it into his ear. “Keep it under wraps as much as possible, got it?” he said with a huge face-splitting smirk.
Ant stared bemusedly at Rouga. “You’ll have to help me build it, though.”
He chuckled excitedly. “Sure, why not?” He shook his head, focusing back on work. “Anyway, we’ll be leading the charge later on. We’ll need long-range and high-accuracy Kidou rifles for Squad 2; I want them to act as sniper teams. I also want you, Dauc, and Squad 12 to be able to act as command and control for this battle and I’d like every operator to have the combat situation on their consoles at all times. Think you can pull all of that off?”
Ant scoffed. “Don’t underestimate me. It will simply take time.”
“We’ve got two weeks.”
“Adequate.”
Rouga chuckled at the uniquely Aielpy response. “What else do you have up your sleeve?”
“Personal Kidou shields and Kidou communicators. The Kidou Shield is roughly the strength of an Enkousen binding spell, and it will recharge in ten seconds after being dispersed or weakened. The communicator has a 5km radius, and carries the signal strength of a chantless Tenteikura.” Ant shrugged. “I figured we’d be getting into large-scale combat at some point, so I made plenty of them.”
“Good man,” Rouga said, giving Ant a smack on the back. “That’s exactly the kinds of things we need for this. Now then…” He focused on the hologram, inputting all the variables as they would occur.
“I’ll assume the worst-case scenario here; Zeruda having every single one of her available troops amassed at once.” The figures popped up on the battlefield. “Hans revealed that their formation will consist of the four groups, which in this scenario are mid-strength battalions with roughly 625 soldiers apiece, spread out across the battlefront in a staggered line to prevent them from being picked off in large groups by artillery support. We only have a single overstrength battalion, which amounts to just over three of theirs, but our organization is much better than theirs.”
He noted a unit of eleven figures placed upon a hill overlooking the field from the center of combat. “This is where the Captains will be. Dre, Zam, Golde, Senny, Saiga, and Rotrum will be doing as much damage as possible to the Jäger’s lines.”
Ant glanced up, surprised, but not letting it show in his face. “You’re not making Golde fight Zeruda? Despite the fact that he’s the only one who can match her in power?”
Rouga scoffed. “Hell no. Zeruda is my fault; she’s my responsibility.” He leaned over the table, focusing intently on the figures in the hologram. “Plus, I’m probably the only one who can beat her. Her full fusion is beyond most Shinigami; the only reason I can keep up is because of my reflexes and sensory abilities in Bankai. Even Golde’s Bankai wouldn’t stand a chance in a straight-up fight; his lightning attacks would just get ripped to shreds or blocked before they could take effect.”
Ant looked confused. “Wouldn’t she be able to compensate for that? For your reaction time, I mean.”
Rouga chuckled darkly. “No. That’s how we’re going to win. There are certain loopholes in every Jäger’s unique Vereinigung, and that’s how we’re going to defeat them. They’re stronger, but we have more options.” He flashed what was supposed to be a grin, but it really just made him look like a hungry tiger. “Ironically enough, Zeruda’s abilities, which she modeled to ‘outmatch’ mine, are what make it possible for me to defeat her.”
Ant muttered something under his breath that sounded like ‘too many secrets’. “We’ll discuss this later,” he stated.
Rouga rolled his eyes. “I’m sure,” he stated dryly. “In any case, the strategy is this.” He touched the remaining five Captains on the hill, highlighting them in red. “Each one of the highlighted Captains will take on one of the Innen Kreis and defeat them. We can’t afford to spare anything else; our resources will be spread thin by the all-out combat.” He grimaced. “In fact, I’d say that we can only afford to lose one battle out of the five. If we lose any more… well, then we won’t be able to stop either the hordes or the remaining Innen Kreis. One or the other, or both, will get us.”
Ant gave him a look of irritation and barely-concealed contempt. “You are an idiot if you think we can go with a plan like that,” Ant snapped.
“And do
what instead?” Rouga snarled in reply, gesturing at the holo-table. “This is all we can do. You have no concept of the other Jägers’ abilities. It’s not like the Seireitei, where the Head Captain is leagues beyond the rest.
All of the Innen Kreis are as strong or stronger than Zeruda is in her Vereinigung form when they’ve released. The only reason she’s the leader is because she’s the only one with a second release.” He sighed heavily, the dimming of his eyes showing his considerable age. “
That’s why we have to choose suitable matchups to fight them; we’d be clobbered otherwise. Golde has to stay with the main army because he’s the leader and you, Arc, and Dauc are already out of the picture because of your other responsibilities.”
Ant stopped, stymied. His brain, speeding with supercomputer-esque efficiency, quickly decided that Rouga was indeed correct in how limited their options were. “Aozora had better not be hurt by your ridiculous plan,” he muttered, leaving the implied ‘or else’ hanging.
Rouga snorted a laugh. “Your girlfriend can take care of herself. She fought me to a draw, even if it was just on the basis of power and nothing else. She’ll be fine.”
Ant sighed, pinching the bridge his nose with his mechanical hand and closing his eyes as he tried to let go of his irritation. Rouga cocked his head, curious. “Doesn’t it hurt to do that?”
“My arm is a simple biomechanical prosthetic, not an enhanced bionic one,” Ant grumbled, his hand slightly muffling his voice. “Just… just get on with it before my brain short-circuits in exasperation.”
Rouga chuckled, turning back to the table. “If you insist.”
***
“You are certain that this is the best plan you can come up with?”
Rouga sighed, now hanging over the table tiredly. “I’m sure,” he whispered, too weary to raise his voice. “The only possible way this could go wrong is if I completely lose to Zeruda or more than two of us fall against the Innen Kreis.”
“And if that happens?” Ant asked, his posture still perfect even after several hours of intense strategizing.
“I’ll have a contingency in place,” he promised, “but don’t expect me to explain it to you. You’re not going to like it.”
Ant scoffed. “
More secrets?”
“Oh blow it out your a
ss,” Rouga growled, turning and walking out of the lab. “We’re done for today. If you have any other questions, we can continue tomorrow.”
Ant shook his head noncommittally before he turned and walked back to his computer.
***
A few hours later, Rouga groaned as he woke up, rolling himself out of his bed in the Squad 7 Captain’s quarters. He sat up with a yawn, checking his alarm clock.
Dang, only 7:00 PM? No wonder I’m still tired, it’s only been about two hours.
He stood and stretched, grabbing his sword from where he’d propped it against the wall and secured the harness over his left shoulder.
I can’t stand just sitting around waiting. Now it all depends on how fast Aielpy can get the technology assembled. Rouga took a deep breath, exhaling slowly.
I’ve waited five centuries for this. Surely I can wait two more weeks.
He walked out into the courtyard of his division, watching the golden light of the setting sun. At this angle, the dark shadows drew harsh trenches throughout the courtyard, almost like scars cutting through the dusky light of the evening. He suddenly felt old, older and wearier than he had in centuries.
This scene is just like me, in a way. Light well past its prime, forever marred by the shadows inherent in their being, and yet it still somehow comes off as normal, if slightly odd. He shook his head; waxing philosophical was a death trap he couldn’t afford to fall into right now.
“Feeling nostalgic, Rouga Kouken?”
Rouga whirled as he heard the soft yet powerful voice, finding himself staring at a young man, probably no older than twenty in appearance, with midnight black hair and clothing of a similar color. A large falchion sword sat comfortably behind him in his belt, and a black gauntlet covered his left arm. “Noctal Himmeler,” he growled, recognizing the man as Zeruda’s second-in-command. “How the hell did you manage to get into the Seireitei without being detected?”
Noctal chuckled, his eyes changing from midnight blue to crimson as he disappeared in a flicker of light, only to reappear behind Rouga, sword at his throat. “I’ll give you a hint, Rouga Kouken. You never clean your sheath out.”
Rouga’s breath hitched as he realized what Noctal was getting at. “Unbelievable,” he muttered, “that you managed to slip a piece of your abilities in there without me noticing. You can even activate it without materializing your Vereinigung… remind me why you’re not the leader again?”
“How surprising,” Noctal breathed, enough malice flowing from the words that it almost made Rouga shiver. “The great Rouga Kouken doesn’t understand my motives. Perhaps you’re not as much of a threat as I thought.”
“Maybe you don’t recognize sarcasm,” Rouga said flatly, totally unfazed by Noctal’s sword as he turned and glared directly into his eyes. “I know exactly how you manipulated Zeruda. You bred hatred in her heart, turned her conscience to stone by forcing her to kill and slaughter at an incredibly young age. She’s a killing machine, setting up the fall of the Shinigami so you can step in and take over.”
Noctal’s expression remained impassive, but he raised an eyebrow casually, his eyes glittering with suppressed amusement. “How did you know?”
“You were the Quincy’s assassin. You don’t play fair. You backstab, disguise yourself behind the powers of others, and lurk in the shadows, only striking at the right time.” He chuckled mirthlessly. “I can see why Kurai had no chance against you. You probably killed him when he had you at swordpoint, didn’t you?”
The Jäger gave a sarcastic smirk. “Unfortunately for you, you don’t have that possibility.”
“Neither do you, not this time at least,” a deep voice interjected, and Rouga glanced around Noctal’s head to lock eyes with Senshuken, his own blade inches from Noctal’s skull. “You alright, Rouga?”
“Yeah,” he said, still turned away from both of them. “Now what, Noctal? You’re stuck.”
“Not with the shard of my
Kristallnacht embedded in your sheath.”
Noctal flickered out of existence again, appearing next to Senshuken, who slashed at him on reflex. The Jäger ducked under the wild swing, but Rouga was already in his face, his boot slamming into Noctal head-on and throwing him backwards, clutching his face as he guttered out and appeared some twenty feet behind Rouga. “Damn you,” he hissed, letting his hands leave his bloody nose, his expression murderous and twisted into a rictus of hate. His burning crimson eyes focused on Rouga’s back, widening in shock when he realized that his sword had changed and a blue and silver shield now hung from his sheath.
He released his Shikai without uttering a sound… without even drawing his sword!
“Leave now, Noctal Himmeler,” Rouga stated, turning to him with slit-pupiled eyes glowing gold in the fading evening light. “You’re not going to make any headway with assassinating me here. If you really want to kill me, face me on the battlefield.” He smirked lazily, turning and walking away, motioning for Senshuken to follow. “I’ll pencil you in, right after Zeruda.”
Noctal ground his teeth angrily, but he knew a lost cause when he saw one. He stood, wiping blood from his nose as he focused his power for a long-range jump.
You are not to be underestimated, Rouga Kouken. His pupils narrowed into slits, mirroring Rouga’s own.
It seems my instincts were correct.
***
Senshuken glanced over his shoulder just as Noctal departed, turning back to Rouga with a puzzled expression on his face. “You want to explain to me what I just saved you from?”
Rouga sucked in a deep breath, shuddering as he exhaled. He looked up, every second of his nearly 700 years showing on his face. “His name is Noctal Himmeler, second-in-command of the Jäger. His power is his
Vereinigung, Kristallnacht, which he can apparently control without actually releasing it.” He grimaced at the oversight; it was his job to know these things. “It allows him to shatter his sword intro shards of crystal, easily formed into weapons, razor sharp on their own, and he can teleport into a twenty foot radius of any single shard. It is, in effect, the most adaptable weapon, a near-perfect shield, and one of the fastest abilities in existence all rolled into one.”
“And he’s the
second-in-command?” Senshuken asked, incredulous.
“Not really,” Rouga grunted. “Noctal is the Jäger most responsible for the current situation. He was the one who set Zeruda on the path of revenge, and even now he continues to use her strings like she’s a puppet. The man is a strategist of my own caliber, and he was once an assassin to boot.” He shrugged his sheath off his back, his shield disappearing and his sword turning back to normal. “That reminds me, I’d better get rid of that shard he implanted in my sheath.” His fist suddenly glowed with burning flames of reiatsu, immolating the scabbard in his hand with blue energy as he drew his sword roughly. It fizzled out quickly, but Rouga turned his sheath upside-down and let a trail of glittering dust fall onto the ground before grinding it into the dirt with his boot.
Senshuken raised an eye at the unusually pointless show of force. “Ok, what’s wrong?” he sighed, shaking his head. “You’re aggravated about something."
“Nothing is wrong,” Rouga replied flatly, sheathing his sword and replacing it on his back. “I am fine.”
“Six words and two lies, Rouga. I may not be able to smell lies like you can, but I’m not stupid.”
“What, now Senny told all of you about the Fenrir?” Rouga glared at Senshuken with halfhearted venom. “It’s none of your concern.”
“Yes, it damn well is my concern,” Senshuken snapped back, grabbing Rouga’s shoulder roughly. “You’re an ally of mine, and you were a friend of Seijuro’s. If this is affecting you so much, then I need to know.”
Rouga shrugged off the hand, but looked down. “Noctal… was once known as Nokuto Roen. He was a Fenrir of unparalleled power, a warrior given the title of
Fenrir Ultima. Even Gintakai, who is truly a monster, would pale in comparison to Roen.” He sighed heavily, shaking his head. “We’re extremely lucky that Noctal has only a fraction of Roen’s power. Thanks to Noctal’s human base, Roen’s power is highly diluted, and only his abilities have manifested, and even then only in his fusion form.”
“How powerful are we talking here?”
“In Roen’s case, on the scale of a god, according to legends at least. In Noctal’s, merely the strength of a high-level Captain-class Shinigami.”
“Quite a difference.”
Rouga snorted a laugh. “His Shinigami side is the reincarnation of a legendary Fenrir. Actually, he himself is likely Roen’s reincarnation; his spiritual essence probably rewrote whatever Zanpaktou he stole into Roen’s.”
Senshuken’s eyes almost popped out of his head. “Is that even
possible?”
Rouga shrugged. “It makes sense,” he admitted. “I don’t know if it’s truly possible, but reading all the clues, it’s the logical conclusion.” He walked away into the night, giving Senshuken a casual wave. “By the way, he’s your opponent during the war. No pressure.”
Senshuken watched his friend’s retreating back, flooded with an intense foreboding of the battle to come.
___________________
NOCTAL APPEARS! I've actually been waiting for this for quite a while; Noctal is one of my all-time favorite characters and if I hadn't already changed my Zanpaktou an inordinate number of times, I would be him. He's loosely based on Noctis Lucis Caelum, the protagonist of Final Fantasy Versus XIII. His personality is unique to him, but he has Noctis' appearance and his powers are based extremely loosely on Noctis' abilities.
Noctal will play a rather large role in the sequel to this fic as well, as will his past self, Nokuto Roen.
So, Ant and Rouga seem to butt heads more than is healthy or reasonable, both of them think up tons of stuff and set the stage for the climactic battle between the Shinigami and the Jäger. I didn't reveal everything now because I wanted some things to be a surprise.
Senshuken has to face Noctal, who may be more than his match in this case. Still a line from my last fic comes to mind: "We're the good guys, so we always win by default." Take that for what you will.
Also, if you're interested,
here's an AMV that showcases Noctis' abilities, which should give you an idea of what Noctal will be capable of here. The music is also a major plus, Lust for Blood by Camui Gackt, if you know who that is.
