If This is a Bad Time... [Closed]

"Heh." Gray smirked as he watched Xavier get knocked down by his kick. That'll teach ya. He thought, before snapping his attention over to Ophelia to see if she had taken advantage of his temporary distraction. But she hadn't. In fact, now she wanted to team up with him. At first, he was sceptical; he really shouldn't be taking sides. But it was true that Xavier was the common enemy, and she didn't attack Gray when she could have.

"All right." He said, nodding. He was not unaware of the energy blast that was travelling towards him. That was precisely why he had started to form the hammer earlier, to block or counter if he needed to. Now the mass of ice was as solid as it could get, and he slammed it down towards the blast with surprising force, which nullified and dispersed the attack before it could reach Gray. After that, the hammer was smoking and partially melted, but he could still use it. Another flash of sickly green light, and he vanished in a burst of speed. He reappeared a few feet in front of Xavier and swung the massive hammer down towards the top of his head. Since part of it had been melted, it wasn't hard enough to actually kill someone, but he could potentially knock the togabito out cold (no pun intended). It would most likely break in contact with any hard objects.

Gray knew, as soon as his swing missed, that he could expect a counter attack. There was also the cero that he had to deal with. Since he was used to letting the ice objects break in favour of other ones, he simply let go of the ice hammer as soon as Xavier dodged it. So it smashed into the pavement and disintegrated, while Gray himself was still standing on the air slightly above Xavier. As soon as the hammer was gone, an icy white radiance beginning to shimmer in front of Gray. It quickly formed into a shield of sorts, although since it was a rush job, it wouldn't last long. The cero slammed into the shield first, shattering it almost instantly. It did manage to block most of it, though. What sent Gray flying back and luckily, out of range of Xavier's attack, was the force of the collision. After a brief flight, Gray hit the pavement and slid back a few feet. Luckily, he hadn't been too high off the ground, so it wasn't too big of a deal. The only problem now, was the amount of fighting he had already done today. He had already used his fullbring multiple times earlier before. If this kept up, he was going to start getting fatigued.

He recovered quickly and got to his feet. He looked up, only to see that Xavier was attacking the hollow again. "You're talking about using dirty tactics, and then calling us cowards?" Gray said in a puzzled tone, thinking that maybe the togabito was getting his words mixed up; either that, or he was just dense. Either way, Xavier was leaving himself open, again. A mass of unrefined ice began to form near Gray's hands, and he used the Bringer Light to once again jump up to where Xavier and Ophelia were tussling.

This time keeping Ophelia's attacks in mind, Gray attacked from the side, so that he would not be struck by the bala if Xavier happened to dodge it. To the right of Xavier, he descended, slamming the block of ice down towards him. If it hit, not only could the immense force and weight behind the attack injure him, but it could freeze him in place if he tried to resist it.

After Gray's ice impact missed the togabito, he caught his balance on the air and let the chunk of ice fall, in the hopes that it would hit the togabito on the way down. It didn't, as the togabito was now leaving, but Gray thought it would be great to get in one last shot at him as he retreated. "Maybe that'll teach you not to run your mouth. Nice excuses, pussy." He called over his shoulder with a smirk. To him, the fight had not been a big deal; he never bothered to take it seriously from the start. It was more of a minor spat to him, although that may not have been the case with Ophelia.

After his remark to Xavier, who was gone now, Gray turned back to Ophelia. "It's okay..." He said, not really caring much about what she had said earlier. He, like her, had been more focused on Xavier. "Yeah, that's right." Gray said, wondering how she could be familiar with fullbring powers. Fullbringers weren't exactly common. He figured that if she planned on explaining, then she would shortly, while the topic was still fresh. Gray wasn't one to pry, most of the time.

He noticed that the rain seemed to be gradually letting up, but it made no difference to him now; he was already soaked.

After a moment, Gray realized what Ophelia was really saying. "You... were happy to turn into a hollow?" He asked, with only a bit of scepticism in his tone. He was more surprised than anything. It was widely known that becoming a hollow was one of the worst fates there was for a soul. But Ophelia did seem different from other hollows. For one, she wasn't trying to eat him for his spiritual energy like others before he had. Plus, she seemed a lot more intelligent, compared to other hollows.

Then she said something that was even more odd than what she had said before. She wanted to be friends. "Well... sure, if you want." Gray said, not knowing what else to say. He seemed to be making a lot of friends lately, most of them females, curiously.

"Oh, no. Well I get where you're coming from..." Gray said awkwardly. After Ophelia's words, Gray felt bad that he hadn't acted at least a little more enthused about it. He was well aware of the fact that Hollows were the mortal enemies of almost every other race, but some of them brought it on themselves. Then again, he wasn't familiar with the world of Hollows, so he couldn't exactly pass judgement.

"I see..." He said. After a brief pause, he continued. "Well, you do seem different from other hollows." He said, and it was a pretty big understatement. At this point, he was just grasping at straws. It wasn't that he didn't like Ophelia, he just didn't know her, and so, he had no idea what to talk about.

"Yeah, sure. I wasn't heading anywhere in particular though..." Gray said. He had been planning to go home before, but there was no point now. The night was still young, and if Ophelia wanted to go sightseeing, who was he to say no? There was one problem, though. "What if a Shinigami comes along. No matter what, they'll try to kill you." Gray said, well aware of the frequency of Shinigami visits to the area. He would help her, of course, but that could result in them both being killed.

[OCC: if you want more momentum, I think having a shini, captain or lieutenant, show up would bump it right back up.]

"Yeah, of course." Gray said, with some optimism. It wasn't that he was worried too much about losing, but what would happen afterwards. Even if they won, the Soul Society would send more to hunt them down. They were known to be somewhat unreasonable in such cases. He noticed that Ophelia seemed to be more at ease. He was glad for that. She seemed like a genuinely good person, well hollow. But with the way she acted, he thought of her more as a person. "I'll keep that in mind." Gray said, knowing that she was probably warning him from when he had failed to take note of her cero earlier, during the fight. "So, where do you want to go first?" He asked.

[OCC: Wait for Nikolai and Daxel before posting.]

Before Ophelia could answer Gray's question, the two were alerted to the presence of another when the newcomer spoke about eating Ophelia. What the hell? He thought; the guy looked like a human, sort of. Before he could even respond to that, yet another presence made itself known, this one was significantly stronger than his own. He looked up towards the source, seeing someone walk out of a strange rip in the sky; a Garganta, if he remembered correctly.

"What are you talking about?" He asked, wondering why the male, who he quickly identified as an Arrancar, was going on about faith. "I'm not going anywhere unless there's a damn good reason to." He snapped back, not liking the condescending manner in which the Arrancar spoke. He didn't know what was going on, or why this Arrancar wanted him, but he could tell that something serious was about to go down. He needed to be prepared.

He spared a glance in Ophelia's direction. As he suspected, the other newcomer was attacking her, now. It looked like the match-ups had been decided. But how had they both come at the same time? They didn't seem to know each other... That's not the issue! Gray thought, forcing himself to keep his gaze trained on the Arrancar. He wanted to help Ophelia, but that was not possible now that Daxel had shown up. Stronger or not, Gray would just have to beat him quickly so that he could then help fend off the hungry Bount. He could guess that the Arrancar was going to attack him now that he had blatantly refused to go with him. Since he had not yet deactivated his Fullbring from earlier, he could call on his power at any time, should Daxel attack unexpectedly.

In the heat of the moment, Gray almost failed to notice the tugging sensation around his neck and right wrist. But when the minor weight on his wrist -- the chain he wore around it -- vanished without warning, he looked down. "What the hell?" He wondered aloud, seeing the familiar chain gone. He saw something shine out of the corner of his eye, and found that it was his chain, now floating down towards Nikolai's Doll. It wasn't that important to him. Fortunately, the necklace that contained his Fullbring would not be taken so easily. Those bonds were much harder to break. It was still annoying, though. He grabbed the sword pendant in an attempt to keep it still, and made note to distance himself from Nikolai's Doll as soon as possible.

Looking back up towards Daxel, he smirked a little, as if trying to goad him on. "Oh really? You sure it's gonna be that easy?" He asked loudly. However, he was slightly caught off guard by what the Arrancar said next. "Lover...?" Gray repeated Daxel's term. His expression could best be described as a 'what the fuck' look. Why do I keep getting put in these situations...? He thought with exasperation, remembering how Eva had acted towards him earlier that day.

However, there was no time to dwell on that, as there was now a Bala speeding toward him. Thinking fast, Gray did not bother to try and make a new object. Instead, he called on the leftover pieces of ice from when he had used Ice Impact on Xavier. They half-melted ice shot towards him at high speeds and formed into a roughly constructed shield, which the Bala hit almost as soon as it formed. A good portion of the shield was blown away, but a lot of ice had gone into making it in the first place. Really, what Gray's Fullbring made, was art. Art that hurt when it hit you in the face. A lot. Now was his time to get a little creative with how he used it, although what he was about to do was more crude than anything.

He grabbed the undamaged side of the shield and levelled it towards the Arrancar. As he grabbed it, he modified it a little more, causing spikes of ice to erupt around the edges. Now the thing looked more like a saw blade. With brute force, he threw the giant projectile towards Daxel horizontally, the momentum causing it to spin so fast that it became a blur. If he was careful enough, he could even call the blade back much like a boomerang, but that was only if he had no distractions. Seeing as Daxel was obviously going to keep attacking, there was a low chance of that.