He'd almost forgotten, how annoying this silver-haired bastard was. Still, even having only just gotten into this battle, Kassander could tell the silver-haired one was weaker than he used to be. (Perhaps the silver one should be an it; the hormone levels were a bit low, and it didn't smell particularly male or female.) Try as his opponent might, the shooting Zanpakutou wasn't hitting its intended target. (Shinso? Was that its name? What a strange arrangement of sounds.) Once, actually, the silver one had hit him a few times; Kassander was actually rather pleased he - it - didn't seem to be able to hit him anymore. The release was a bit different, but, it felt the same, so it'd probably hurt the same, too. Kassander was not terribly interested in repeating that mistake. It was somewhat difficult to tell if the silver one had gotten weaker and slower, or if Kassander had gotten stronger and faster, though.
To its credit, it was almost hitting him, so Kassander wasn't that much stronger and faster than the last time they'd clashed.
What was really interesting was, the silver one seemed to be trying to keep him away from the other one. (Never did learn his name; Kassander didn't care, albeit he smelled a bit like the jackal, come to think of it.) Kassander didn't really sense a particular bond between these two before. It was more like the one had a silver-haired dagger behind him, back then, and Kassander, being as he was old, and tired, and mother fucking bored, was really curious to know what had changed. He knew enough to know the grating ones in black had invaded the sand world, long enough to fight these two, and then they both had disappeared. Most of the cluster of mask-less Hollows that they'd gathered together had been defeated (so things went, glad he'd skipped out of that), and then everything went back to the way it'd been, almost.
Ah, wait... Kassander stopped, for a moment, arching an eyebrow at the dark-haired one, and then busted the magic he'd just used almost lazily. Was he trying to help the silver one? "I forgot how annoying your attack dog is," he mumbled, in Latin. The silver one looked befuddled for a moment. Kassander raised an arm, pooling energy together; it was a pale golden tone, and formed a spear-like shape.
"SHIT," the silver one said, quickly zipping across the space between itself and the dark one, just as the Cero Lanza fired at the dark one. Rather unceremoniously, Gin bumped into Sosuke, shoving him out of the way, and the spear buried itself in his shoulder. "... aw crap -"
That was all the time he had before the spear exploded, the force of it throwing him backward and into a tree. Surprisingly, at least to Kassander, it got up after that, albeit it took a few extra seconds to stand all the way, and when it did, it was hunched over slightly, like it was in pain. Blood snaked down his arm, slipping under Shinso's gauntlet, but Gin wasn't quite ready to give up, either.
"... that should've blown your other arm off," Kassander murmured, loosing a low whistle. Perhaps it was stronger than Kassander thought it was.
"Look," Gin started, huffing, "I don'care where ya go, jus'anywhere'at ain'ere, cause you can'take'im at all. Th'fas'er you go, th'quicker I can let Kamishini loose an'fuck'is guy's day up. 'ere's a hun'red miles more'a distric'seven'y nine. Pick a direction!" Sosuke's reiatsu, hopefully, was weak enough, Kassander wouldn't follow him. He could hope. ... fuck, his back hurt, okay, Kassander wasn't moving, though... once again, Gin raised his arm, reaching for his invisor.
"Ah, no, bad dog," Kassander huffed, lazily throwing a Cero at him. Gin had no choice but to drop his arm again, dodging the Cero; Kassander kept tossing them. Some of them, Gin dodged, others he shot Shinso's blade at and redirected, but it seemed he'd dodge when he happened to be in a position where redirecting it may send it at Sosuke, and otherwise would block. At a break in them, Gin threw Shinso's blade at him. Kassander wasn't quite expecting it, and it actually managed to cut his upper arm. "... very bad dog," the arrancar hissed. Within a handful of seconds, though, the wound closed.
"Jesus CHRIST I forgot'e could do'at," Gin hissed. Kassander threw another Cero Lanza at him, but he ducked under it, zipping across the space, and then reached out and got a hold of Kassander's shirt. A little smirk, and a flash of silver, and Shinso's blade went straight through Kassander's neck, unfortunately a bit too quick up close for him to manage to escape. Finally -
The victory was short-lived. Just like the arm wound, the neck wound was closing, albeit a bit slower. Kassander twisted, roundhouse kicking Gin across the clearing. This time, surprisingly, Gin didn't get back up, though he was making quiet little pained sounds. A second or two later, a small, red light started blinking on his right ear, and Gin sat up a bit, enough to spit blood. That hadn't gone well.
"And I thought you couldn't get any dumber," Kassander mumbled. What was that blinking light... Kassander paused a moment, his eyes narrowing in thought, and he tilted his head to the side a bit. Then, strangely, he looked amused. Logically, that must be the little earring Kassander was keeping it from touching. He didn't know what it was, just that when the black-clad people activated the earring, it made this weird coloured window, and then there were more black-clad people. He assumed it somehow summoned backup. Kassander wondered if he'd get someone more interesting than these two. That was a lot easier than it should've been. He hadn't even released Juvencum.
Boring. Eh, he'd always hated these two, anyway. Kassander moved toward the silver one, but there was a strange shift of energy, and the gauntlet on his arm shimmered, and a white-scaled, dark-skinned, long silver-haired naga materialised between the arrancar and the silver one. Kassander's gaze narrowed. That felt like the weapon. Those damned things were sentient? Since the fuck when...
"I'll distract pretty boy," Shinso said, speaking to Sosuke. "He's partially paralysed, but his invisor just sent a distress signal to the Gotei. They should get here in a few minutes. You may really want to go, now."
Without further preamble, Shinso raised his spear, a pure white metal weapon, and then swung it, turning it into a whip. Kassander moved to dodge, but it turned out, the naga had a lot more command over the damn thing than the silver one did, and he ended up dodging almost constantly. Yes, Shinso himself was a lot better at being a distraction.