WARNING: Violence, Gore, and Swearing 

A/N: a rematch between Paulo and Kera. I feel that the calibre of my writing isn't as smooth as it was in other fight scenes but I liked the way it worked out (since I lost all my other great notes on this chapter somewhere in my computer or my ten million notebooks). ALL THOUGHTS APPRECIATED! 

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A low growl left my lips, the fury bubbling up in my veins. A faint, blue sheen covered my skin. "Don't insult my captain."

"Oh? Your captain? I thought you were banished, Kera. Surprised you even made it back in but they must have let you in cause you're weak enough for a student to topple."

My reiatsu spiked and the air around me crackled with energy.

"Kera, step back! Kenpachi's going to blast a hole – wait, what's going on?" Ikkaku called.

"Don't break down that wall, Zaraki!" I shouted back, glaring at Paulo. He widened his stance to attack, left hand squeezing into a fist. The teeth in my lower leg sunk deeper still, muscle giving way beneath it. It took every ounce of control I possessed not to scream when I opened my mouth next. "I have a little matter to exterminate. Continue without me."

'We can't leave without you," Orihime proclaimed.

"You don't have a choice!" My voice cracked and Paulo's lips peeled back into a sadistic grin. 

"No, I'm not leaving."

"Get her out of here, Zaraki!" This was my fight and no one was getting in the way of this. 

"Can you beat him?" Ikkaku asked. 

"It'll be easier than beating you," I replied which earned me a few choice words. "The others need you more. Now get going! I'll catch up before you even realise I was missing."

There was a scuffle but I dared not break eye contact with Paulo. He raised an eyebrow at me. The sting in my leg was like I'd stepped into a fire, ebbing in waves that had me shuddering on the spot. Hollowfied liquid coated my calf but it couldn't heal around the thorns.

"This time I won't just break your nose. I'll tear you to pieces," I threatened. "Chiya, are you there?"

I was met with silence from the dragon. Well wasn't that just peachy? I ran through my options: I was low on power so Kido was out of the question, Dorangoháto was nowhere to be found, Chiya wasn't answering me.

All that left were my fists. Again. Really wished I'd brought another weapon on this trip.

Paulo raked his blade along the wall of the alley and the prongs came back wicked sharp, glinting in the sun. "I really don't see how," he said, tutting. "Can't you feel the difference in our abilities? You'd barely rank in another squad while I'm seat ten in the fifth highest division."

I stayed silent, eyes roaming our surroundings. Space enough to move but those flowers covered the ground haphazardly. I had a feeling that standing on another would trigger the same reaction and I wasn't in the mood to fall for the same trick twice.

Considering I had no way of getting out of the first one. I gave a surreptitious tug and sent a bout of roaring fire all the way to my hip. Brute force was out of the question.

"I thought Squad Five's motto had something to do with 'humility'. Funny how they let scum like you in," I said, mind whirring for ideas.

"Ah, Aizen did preach about something like that but it's really so simple these days to fake humility. Kind of like how you're trying to fake how little it hurts being in my trap."

I glared at him. He stepped forward, slowly, a predator toying with its prey. Unfortunately for him, my squad's motto was 'fight' and I wasn't about to roll over and submit any time soon.

He drew nearer. "Sounds like your friends have ditched you. Funny, thought they'd at least wait around to see if you survived."

"You're just a minor inconvenience; there's much more pressing matters they needed to attend to."

"What? Stopping the execution?"

I stiffened. He laughed, head tipped back. "You think the Captains and Lieutenants are daft or something? Your friends are about to run headlong into three of them and the rest are waiting for the Lieutenant of Squad 13 to die. Makes you wish you didn't let your pride get in the way and you'd let your Captain come to your rescue," he leered.

I lunged forward and tried to grab his uniform but he was painfully out of reach. The jaws tightened and I was forced to release the pressure.

"I'll kill you."

"No, you won't be able to."

He launched at me and I pitched all my weight onto the leg still trapped, sending the other into a roadhouse kick that caught his shoulder. He skidded left and came at me again from the side I knew I couldn't twist to. With a sickening churn, I forced myself to pivot, thorns grinding on bone, and lashed out again with a kick.

He dodged but didn't come in for another attack. His blade hung loose at his side. He was playing with me! Back and forth this went, him circling, attacking from all angles with no intention. I beat him back yet the damage to him each time was low because I could barely land a hit. I lost all feeling from the knee down in my trapped leg and cold sweat slicked my body.

He seemed content to continue this tactic until I tired.

"Coward," I hissed, clenching and unclenching my fists. I was so riled up I was practically vibrating on the spot. It was hard to keep my flurry of emotions calm. "Are you that scared of me, standing so far away? Or are you afraid your blade won't be able to cut me?"

He pointed his blade at me, and my accursed body flinched. The skin along my forearms twitched, the pull of reiatsu around them surging and sizzling.

This feeling...

With a start, I realised then what I had to do.

"Says the one who flinched."

Paulo came in for another attack, blade arcing down. I put my arms up to protect my face. Ice cold power filled me and I knew in that moment that I had the speed to dodge it, to counter with a fist or a knee or an elbow.

Instead I let the blade hit. The three prongs gouged through my wrist and I tried incredible hard not to scream at the agony. Paulo's lips curled, the look of triumph testing my patience.

"Already tired? Guess your goading was all for show. I shouldn't have expected so much from a woman in the first place anyway," he crowed, whipping the blade back and coming for another attack.

I succumbed to his flailing, choking back the sting of tears as the skin of my forearms was shredded until it was tattered and blood choked the flowers around me. My own blood drenched me until I was spitting it out. He changed tactics multiple times, aiming for my sides but I blocked them all with my arms and held my ground.

"This is too easy!" Through the blood mist hanging in the air around us, he looked demonic. "All that time in the World of the Living and you don't even stand a chance against me! I should have attacked you earlier. Squad Eleven, my arse. You're not even fit for the title of fourth seat. I could beat you with one hand tied behind my back!"

Then I caught his slash in my hand. We froze, locked in combat. Paulo was practically hissing with rage, spittle flying from his clenched teeth. I smiled and curled my fingers tight around the tip of one of the prongs.

If he hadn't been so preoccupied with the bloodbath, he might have noticed that the liquid running down my arms wasn't red anymore.

His face registered shock before I punched him square in the gut with my other hand, sending him flying through a wall. Slate and stone rained down over his coughing form. I flexed my hands which were now covered in jagged Hollow bone from fingertips to my elbows, the same Hollow casing from our fight against Jirobo, the ability I'd struggled to use since the day in the Pit at Kisuke's. I slashed at the thorny trap's stem with talons tinged blue then prised open the jaws. Hollow bone covered from knee to ankle in an armour plate in a breath. The plant shrivelled away into dead, crunchy leaves.

I prowled towards Paulo, holding my protected and unblemished hands up to the sides. "Would you look at that?"

"What the fuck, bitch?" he growled, throwing part of the wall off him and standing. He brandished his blade to keep me back. "You're a Hollow?"

"Women, bitch, hollow... the name calling is starting to get old, Paulo," I goaded. "Why not be a man and attack me? Then you'd find out what I truly am."

With a roar, he swung at me. I deflected the blade with my forearm, swiped at his throat. He reared his head back and swiped at my side. I blocked with a hand, grabbed the blade and pulled across my body, driving my elbow into his nose. He swore and hooked his leg around mine, shoving forward while jerking his leg back. 

My adrenaline went from bravado to panic real quick as I tried to regain my balance. He swiped again and opened the side of my uniform, blood following the trail of steel. I screeched and kicked out, landed a foot on his chest. But he'd been at my full extension range and he merely staggered back, cackling.

I went in with fists blazing, throwing punches so fast that they started to blur. He blocked what he could with his blade and the armour casing around his arm; until he threw the weapon to the side and before I could react, socked me in the side of the head. I fell over, head fuzzy. His blade whistled towards me and I kicked the blade with a growl, throwing him off-balance. With a vicious grin, I brought my foot down and kicked him square in the family jewels.

His blood-speckled face went as white as a sheet.

'Kera!'

Chiya's voice rang in my ears as I sprung to my feet and raked my hand across Paulo's chest. His uniform shredded, blood welling immediately in four jagged gashes from shoulder to shoulder.

"Now you appear!" I screamed at her. Paulo recovered alarmingly fast for someone who'd been maimed and aimed a knee at my gut. I jabbed my elbow into the top of his leg and headbutted as hard as possible on his chin just as he brought the hilt of his blade down on my shoulder.

A thorn the size of a dagger skewered through bone and muscle and I screeched, shoving him away. The blade came clear with a disgusting squelch and blood gushed over the fingers I pressed to the gaping hole.

We drew apart from each other, a tense respite, panting and almost bent double in pain. Paulo failed to stem blood flow to a gash on his head, the rest of him faring no better; Hollow bone tried to stitch me back together but the rate in which it worked had slowed to almost a stand-still.

'I was trying to make sure you didn't die and look what I find now!'

"Berate me later! Have I got enough strength for your sword?"

'There's barely enough left to heal you!'

"Then stop healing me," I commanded. Paulo began to circle and I noticed with horror that my vision was beginning to blur at the edges. "I want this over now. Get the sword." Chiya's full form unfurled and tried to take control but I beat her back. "No, this is my fight."

'Stubborn bitch," she hissed but backed down. 'You have to draw the sword.'

It was almost like she was giving me a damn riddle. I looked quickly at the scabbard at my waist but it was empty. Paulo feinted forward and I jumped to the side. "It's no-"

CRUNCH.

I leapt up again like a startled cat, the thorn trap snapping shut with a vengeance on the empty air where my good leg had been.

"Always getting distracted so easily," Paulo said, and I spun as I landed, his blade crashing down on me with the full force of his spiritual pressure.

Tch! How could I be so careless? Two prongs wedged in the jagged Hollow bone of my blocking arm; the third strained dangerously before my forehead. Paulo laughed, eyes voidless black and bloodshot. Sweat dripped off the end of his nose. He was so close I could have kicked him in between the legs again but he'd forced me to a knee with the blow, left hand braced on the ground.

My muscles quivered with fatigue and it was then that I realised how washed out I felt, how drained and sickly. I could sense Chiya feeding me her strength but she was waning too.

This was supposed to be an easy battle but I probably just thought so because I'd beaten him so easily before. Now the scales had tipped.

"I told you I'd make you beg for surrender." He pressed harder, his green reiatsu swimming in my vision.

The sounds of the world faded out and my eyes shut. My own reiatsu flared then grew dimmer and dimmer. I didn't want to give up – every part of me was revolting against it – but I was beginning to wonder if I had a choice.

No.

My name is Kera Senbonsai. I didn't fight so hard to come back here just to be beaten by Paulo of all people.

A pulse of heat beat against the palm of my left hand. My eyes flew open and locked with Paulo's.

'Draw the sword!'

The heat at my hand grew and grew but I dared not look down; instead I fanned my reiatsu until it was blazing around me. Stronger than his, brighter and more vicious. He recoiled, a flash of panic in his eyes that he couldn't hide, yet his blade was stuck fast.

Dorangoháto.

Impossible as it seemed, the hilt of the blade rose up into my hand and I curled my fingers around its comforting form.

"And I told you," I spat, baring my teeth in an unholy grin, "that I'd make you wish you were never born."

Then I slashed upwards, opening him from right hip to left shoulder. His shikai fell away as he stumbled back, pressing his hands to the bloodied wound. His zanpakuto clattered to the ground and he soon followed.

Bones aching, joints creaking, I stood over him, head cocked to the side. Dorangoháto's tip trailed on the ground, painting a line of crimson on the stone. Paulo breathed heavily through his nose, hands fumbling over the wound. It wasn't as extensive as I expected – his shikai outfit must have provided protection from the cutting power.

"You're damn well lucky," I growled, brandished the blade over his throat, "that I have a heart." I let it drop to the side and I saw the relief in his features.

I wanted to kill him. The anger and adrenaline were singing a cacophony in my head to do it, end his life. I took a few steps back then sheathed Dorangoháto, the world topsy-turvy under my leaden legs.

For once, Paulo had been right. I wasn't a murderer of my own kind.

'We have incoming!' Chiya warned and I spun just as a group of Squad four members rounded the corner. Their leader held a hand out to stop them and the last of my strength fled my body.

Unohana stood still, quietly assessing the situation. When her eyes landed on me, a shiver went from head to toe and I made to stumble away. Her eyes were lifeless and the sheer strength of her reiatsu, I could feel it wanting to force me to my knees.

Chiya took control, pulling me back so harshly that I went spinning. When I righted myself, Chiya was lifting Paulo up by the arm.

"My guess is you've come for this?" she asked, teeth bared in a grin.