And He Will Not Mourn (Nnoitra/Nel)

[storypaint]

Title: And He Will Not Mourn
Fandom: Bleach
Length: 239 words
Pairing: Nnoitra/Nel
Prompt: Christmas card fic for duskcolor
Other: PG for themes (violence, hatred, abuse)

Excerpt: There is a number tattooed on his tongue, a skull heavy on his head, and he cannot remember what being human felt like.

He hates children.

He hates everyone, everyone who dares not be stronger than he is, but especially children. There is a number tattooed on his tongue, a skull heavy on his head, and he cannot remember what being human felt like.

There are no children here. None, except the one that he himself made from rage and passion. He has destroyed the woman he could not defeat, forced her into this parody of her old self.

And still he is not happy. Still he is furious. Still she has a hold on him.

He's a fighter, not a babysitter, and if someone else bothers to keep her alive, he doesn't care. Let them. The day she grows up again (those cool eyes, round breasts, red streak across her nose), he will find her. He will beat her. But there's no point in defeating a child. It's not the same. She is not Nelliel, not anymore.

He thought he would be happy if he didn't have to fight her anymore. Now he fights her in his mind, turning their battles over in his mind as if something would have changed. It doesn't. He loses, loses, loses.

She has no heart, he thinks. Her hole must be there, between her breasts, where no one will see. It is the only explanation.

She breaks him every time, even with that little girl's smile.