AN: This story is very much inspired by "The Island of Dr. Moreau" and the movie version of "Planet of the Apes", that being said, it won't be particularly action oriented and more of a human relations story. I hope you enjoy it.

Beta: Confusion no Hime

Chapter One: The Man Who Had No Where To Go

There were broken pieces of the ceiling all around them, the flattest parts showing the same illumination of that giant dome he and Grimmjow fought in; and helped destroy with Ulquiorra. The vertigo he felt when sitting up didn't help the sick feeling in his stomach and the burning up in his throat. It wasn't Ichigo's proudest moment when he lost all that control and attacked everybody. His friends couldn't even look at him in the eye.

Besides the glow in the room all Ichigo could see was the bright white of what was left of the walls and gaps in the roof. It was still night time. He wasn't alone in the room but with his head spinning he hadn't been able to take a good look at who was laying on the floor with him. There were bandages tossed around carelessly and covered in blood, vials and ointments that didn't look familiar, but had the same smell as stuff his dad used in the clinic. It even had the same smell of antiseptic floating around.

"Ah, Ichigo, you're awake. Careful now. Grimmjow and Ulquiorra are still... well they're getting better." The world stood still and he saw the messes to the right of him. There was Grimmjow, covered in blood but looking much better than when he last saw him. Nnoitra's gash through his stomach was almost completely healed. Ichigo couldn't tell how Ulquiorra was. His skin was as white as even, but pink lines that looked like shredded pieces were all over his exposed chest and arms, wrappings were stained with some of the worst spots along his arms.

"But how is he alive?" He didn't want to, but Ichigo remembered almost everything he did up there. He saw Ulquiorra die and disintegrate. Why was he here anyway? Neliel, the one who'd just walked in, sat down next to him and watched the other two in silence. She, too, was looking better than before, considering that she was in her apparently 'normal' age and the crack in her mask was sealed up. The only part that made him feel uncomfortable was how she easily slipped next to him and was in the white outfits of the- of his enemies.

"Inoue did it. While you and that Kenpachi ran off to fight Yammy, she stayed and healed us, your archer friend too. It took her longer but Ulquiorra's body was brought back. Neither of them has woken up since then. Grimmow's going to be just fine. Maybe his pride will be bruised but now he's being a lazy cat." Neliel still wasn't looking at him but made herself comfortable on the sheets laid out for him on the floor. They weren't the only ones here either, now that he was really awake and looking around. Looking anywhere but at the men next to him.

Ichigo saw some of the strangest looking people around in a corner, laid out like dead bodies, including Dordonii. Another corner had the normal sized Yammy just laying there with bits of his arms and legs stitched on. Byakuya, who had joined them fight, and Kenpachi really didn't hold back against him. What happened after then was still fuzzy.

"And everybody else?" He meant his friends and the other Shinigami that came there to help him. Nel obviously didn't.

"We, who are some of the surviving arrancar and the healers, thought that you three had the best chance of making it through. Yammy is basically done for. Even the most optimistic of the healers, Branche, you'd like her, gave up on trying to get him better days ago. The Privaron's over in the other corner aren't much better either. Gantenbainne, the afro haired fellow, looks to be the best. Cirucci is worse off than Yammy. All of her reiatsu was sealed off. Dordonii is barely alive now. So really we're all just waiting for you and the others to wake up and get better." This was obviously their make shift infirmary but Nel still wasn't answering the questions he wanted to know. He knew she liked to play games with people but that was only when things weren't so tense.

"What about Ulquiorra?"

Nel didn't answer and nudged her foot in front of his to show him where Zangetsu was. Whoever had laid them out left their swords nearby.

You know, in case Grimmjow woke up first or something.

"Nel please just tell me what happened?" Ichigo might have felt better but his head was still pounding and everything in his body felt raw and pulled apart. Like if he moved his arms too much, they might just snap off. Worse yet, that his skin would peel off and show the hollow body again.

"No one knows if Ulquiorra is alive. Inoue might have just been able to restore his body after... after what you did to him Ichigo. I didn't think you would be the one to loose it like that." There it was. In a way it was better to hear it from Nel instead of someone else, like his friends and shinigami friends, who couldn't tell when his humanity started and ended.

"But doesn't his blood pump or something? There has to be a way. Does he breathe?" It was incomprehensible that he wanted someone so horrible to still be alive. But if Ulquiorra was still alive then that meant that he could still fix things and make something better. Neliel wasn't so sure about that.

"No. He's always been fairly dead. We'll just have to wait and see." Despite what she said about him Neliel was content to just sit there with Ichigo as he started putting things back together.

She had said that they had been there for days. The last recollections Ichigo had was losing himself at the top of the dome and wrecking everything in sight. Ulquiorra dying had been another clear point; so was him leaving to go fight Yammy while he still could. Somewhere during the flailing the other shinigami arrived. He's seen Byakuya fight the others and only assumed that it was either Hanataro or Unohana healing him but it was possible that it was just in his imagination.

But days had passed since then. No mention of his friends, except Orihime, and absolutely nothing about the shinigami. It wasn't like he expected Nel to get really close with them but she would mention something if they were still here. She must have picked up on Ichigo's discontent because she finally got up from the mat on the floor.

"Come on we should talk more in a better place. There are still sick people here you know." Sighing, Ichigo followed her out of the room and into the hallways that were relatively undamaged. As they got further and further away from the infirmary, the noise level picked up making him feel a bit more at eased with everything. They didn't say much through the trip only passing a few arrancars down the hall. None of them seemed keen on talking for long, especially when they caught sight of him.

"Here, change into something." They got to a room and Ichigo thought he would be able to find it again easily. For how large Las Noches was, it was mostly corridors and large rooms that the hollows usually fought in.

"Uh...Nel, I'm not wearing that." There wasn't anything wrong with the outfit. It actually looked quite comfortable, but he wasn't going to start walking around Aizen's palace in the arrancar's colors, especially after that stunt that he pulled hours- Days- ago. The smirk on Neliel's face seemed out of place. The next thing he saw was her standing right next to him and the top of her mask grazing his ear.

"Well fine then. I appreciate a good show!" She giggled and Ichigo felt what she meant. Her hand slapped his ass.

"AHH?!" Faster than he'd ever moved before Ichigo pressed his back against the wall and felt his face just start to burn. Nel was just standing there, leering at him and laughing. His shirt was just gone and the hakama he was wearing were only considered as such because he knew what they were supposed to be. Most of the leg was gone and barely enough material was still tied around his waist to keep his modesty.

"NEL! Why didn't you tell me?!" Ichigo's face was still bright red but Neliel seemed to be enjoying herself.

"Ha, Ichigo it's nothing I haven't seen before. Plus you've already seen me like that. It's only fair." To punctuate her point she stuck her tongue out at him and kept laughing when he dashed behind a door to get changed. It might be the enemy's uniform but it was better than what he had left.

"But it's not like I did that!" He was still red in the face. Neliel was proving to be worse than Yoruichi and Matsumoto since she let him wander down the halls half naked. He groaned when he realized how many people had seen him with barely anything on.

"Oh relax Ichigo. It's not like you had anything to be ashamed of, I mean to clean you properly I had to see your--"

"NEL!" The blood was rushing into his face again and his footsteps got just the slightest bit heavier. Even through all of his embarrassment he felt better. Neliel still had that slight smile on her face and Ichigo wondered if this entire thing was a set up to make him feel better. The mood died again when a familiar looking girl saw him and ran back into the room she came from- Neliel didn't pay her any mind.

"This really isn't something funny. Why is everybody avoiding us?" They had left the room behind and now she was just showing him the different areas that weren't destroyed. Every time they came up to a group huddled together or even just passing by, they would pale and shrink back before moving faster down the hall.

"You're not stupid Ichigo. They're terrified of you." Neliel was being serious again. Part of Ichigo wonders if that was how it was going to be with her for a while, going back and forth from someone with child like mischief to one of Aizen's top Espada with no time for games and play. Ichigo thought for a moment and wondered how hard it must have been for Neliel to get used to everything again. From what he could see Aizen and his followers were still gone, as were his friends and numbers three through one. She had to wake up to a lonely place and make things work again.

"But you're not scared of me anymore, right?" It would be worse, somehow, if she thought that he was a monster like Nnoitra.

"Not of what you did on the dome. I feel a whole lot better now that you're out of that stupid shinigami uniform." She said it all carelessly like he didn't rip someone apart. They reached one of the many rooms they had for food. The Espada had their own spaces but for the most of them there was a public eatery, bringing back ill memories of school food.

Neliel told him to not really look at some of the food and just to eat the slop. He tried to find some food he would like but she quickly stopped him.

"But that looks like sushi."

"Exactly. It just looks like sushi, but we're in the middle of a desert. How did they make it look like that?" When she put it that way Ichigo put the small tray back and picked the very basics. They couldn't do something to rice. Most people were eating it like that- dishes of rice scattered around and sauces just being poured over.

"It's..." It was pasty like something that sat in the water for too long and kind of tasteless. The different flavors of sauce were making sense then and Ichigo poured something that looked like teriyaki over the food.

"Yeah, but you'll get used to it. I'd say you already got used to a few things here." Neliel said he would, but Ichigo wasn't so sure. The honey he wanted to add next wouldn't open so he tried biting it off, making his voice muffled. The rest of the afternoon passed easily and Ichigo was able to take his mind off of everything else.

Three days passed in that fashion, of Ichigo following Neliel around to understand what goes on in Las Noches. Aside from herself and the few other still unconscious, they were the only Espada left and the strongest around too. Dozens of numerous and unnumbered arrancar and hollows wandered around, repairing the building and keeping things in order. It disturbed Ichigo to see that so many of them looked like children.

"He's stronger than he looks." They were watching a Pigfinn, a mohawked fellow that was practically a mane, toss the illusionary boulders up in the air for others to catch. To Ichigo, he couldn't have been more than thirteen years old.

"But they all look like that. The ones that don't are either animal like or they just act like kids." Neliel shrugged and watched them go back to work. The arrancar around them had gotten used to Ichigo's presence and realized that he wasn't going to kill them if they looked too long.

They were outside, for once, still talking and chatting about things on top of one of the pillars that were left standing. Neliel had mentioned several times how he needed to play nicer with others and to stop damaging everything that came in his general direction. Ichigo wanted to ask her again what had happened with his friends when somebody walked out of Las Noches and started heading towards them.

"Aw crap." For his poor ability at control he could tell people apart by their reiatsu.

"Well if I'm that bad of a company I could just leave you with Loly and Menoly." Neliel couldn't tell yet and got huffy at the implied insult.

"Not you. Grimmjow's up." They waited for a few minutes before they saw the light blue of his hair stand out against the rest of the sand. Ichigo could practicably feel the sadistic grin that Grimmjow was wearing when he looked up at them. Asshat probably woke up and immediately went to look for him. Or Nnoitra, but he was very, very dead.

"Any chance I could convince him not to fight?" He was already leaping alongside what was left of the building and reaching the top with them. Neliel peered over the edge only to have the dust from sand impact hit her in the face.

"No." She spit out some of the sand in her mouth.

Grimmjow made it to the top and crouched down like he wanted to rip their heads off. "Found you and you're all fixed up this time. I haven't forgotten what you said." Of all the things Grimmjow chose to remember, it was the promise of a fight even if neither of them were up to it.

"Look, Grimmjow, not now. I don't..." Grimmjow got up off of his haunches and stood up straight. Instead of that almost playful look he got before their fights (the ones that even Ichigo could admit he enjoyed) there was anger. The sight didn't intimdate him like it had weeks ago but just the idea of trying to fight off someone right now didn't appeal to him at all. Even Nel was skirting closer to the end of the pillar for a quick escape.

"I don't give a fuck what you want right now. I've been waiting for this fight to continue and you made me put it off." Ichigo felt like he was in Urahara's basement again; raw inside from the three days of hollowification and having his sword right there but no will to use it.

---

Grimmjow was absolutely excited. He wasn't going to fess up to needing as much time to recover as the shinigami, but he did wake up after the bastard interrupted their fight, only to be put away again. It was okay that almost everybody was gone because now it'd just be the things that mattered, him, his prey, and a few others to occupy time. To say he was disappointed when he saw what Kurosaki had become was putting it mildly.

Sitting on the top of their god damn world with Neliel and looking absolutely defeated and dead. There was nothing from the man he fought and wanted to fight again. But he knew how to fix that just like all the other times. Kurosaki needed to be coaxed out of his shell before he really came out to tear carnage and ravage everything; and he was all too happy to submit to some foreplay.

He smiled and rushed his fist into the other's face, only to have his stomach pinned down to the floor. Kurosaki tackled him and was using both of his arms to pin him down, otherwise being left wide open. It was a stupid mistake.

"You're so off this isn't even fun." Grimmjow set off a Bala into Kurosaki's back making him gasp for breath and brought his knee into his stomach. He was just lying there, heaving, trying to get a breath. When did he get so weak?

The other was still for only a second more before trying to kick out Grimmjow's feet from under him. He tumbled forwards and Kurosaki caught his arm. The man froze in front of him and just hung there with a grip on his arm.

"What is this? This isn't what I've been waiting for or even what you promised me. Get it together now!" By all means, the other should have avoided the cero but the fight was over when Kurosaki's body went back through the dome.

"Grimmjow you ass! He's going to be seriously hurt again."That was another thing Grimmjow had to think about, now that he was up and had time. It wasn't like Kurosaki would be good for anything.

"Who cares? You've been gone for years and you just waltz right back into Las Noches like you owned the place. You're even worse than the other woman, always babying Kurosaki. Bet you haven't even told him what his friends decided to do with him." They got up and ran to where Ichigo should have landed, Grimmjow finally noticing all the rebuilding going on and snorted.

"Now I remember why I didn't care about you going missing. You're about as much of a bootlicker to Aizen as Ulquiorra is."

They found Ichigo sprawled on the ground unconscious but burnt around his middle from the Cero. Grimmjow saw that he wasn't wearing anything like a shinigami uniform. Neliel told him to carry Kurosaki all the way to the damn infirmary like he was an invalid or something. What was the difference between sleeping on the ground and sleeping around a bunch of weak things that can't even get themselves up? But Neliel never changed and bossed him around, throwing her weight where she shouldn't. He'd humor her, for now. Mostly because she was the only one around that knew anything.

"Used to be." He and Neliel were never friends and kept far away from each other even when she was still active though he knew enough that this little sombre attitude wasn't normal with her. He didn't have a clue about what she meant.

"You ain't a kiss ass anymore?" He couldn't believe that. Just like he couldn't believe that Aizen was waiting this damn long to show himself and punish all of them. Or that even Kurosaki and he were able to wander around after all the shit they pulled. They got back to the infirmary and he dropped Kurosaki down on a pile of blankets he had left in the efforts to get to the less than adequate fight.

"I was never like that, no matter what you say. But Ulquiorra might be dead. Ichigo...he lost control and just ripped him to pieces. It took a lot out of Inoue to even put him back together."

"That's what's wrong with them?!" Seeing Ulquiorra all scraped up and in off worse than he was great but he didn't know what did that to him. Neliel still didn't find any of it amusing and shoved his shoulder into the doorway.

"They don't need the kind of abuse you'd give to them so leave, now." Grimmjow still didn't like her, her uppity manners, and her just acting like she was better than him. He wasn't the one that was beaten by a lame ass trick of Nnoitra's (though, he wasn't missing the Bastard much at all).

"Tch. Don't know what the shinigami's so surprised about. I told him why he came here in the first place and it had nothing to do with that woman; he's not staying here for your ass either. Kurosaki just doesn't know who he's supposed to be fighting anymore." Neliel was starting to glare at him but Grimmjow knew he was right. They just didn't get what made people like him and Kurosaki tick, especially those like Neliel and Ulquiorra that liked to believe that they choose their actions.

Ulquiorra stuck to the woman like glue because she was the only person able to stand him for more than a few minutes. Neliel coddled and mothered everything she saw alone for too long. At least he and Kurosaki didn't have to pretend to enjoy or even like other people.

Grimmjow was going to go along with Neliel's bitching for now. The sooner Kurosaki was back to normal, the sooner they could really fight again (and he ignored any altruistic outcomes of this).