Whoosh.
Soifon stood at the edge of the eaves. The wind swept across the hem of her Shihakushō. Unohana Retsu stood half a step to her side, and the breeze carried the faint scent of medicinal herbs from Unohana's clothing to Soifon's nose.
"I'm sorry for making Captain Soifon wait — that was terribly rude of me..."
Unohana had pushed herself to keep pace with Soifon's movements, but she had very nearly lost her even so.
Soifon shook her head. After a few seconds of silence, she spoke — quietly, as though the words were carried to Unohana's ears on nothing more than the faintest tremor of air:
"I'm the one who should be apologizing, Captain Unohana."
Unohana tilted her head to one side without speaking, her smile saying simply: I'm listening.
"For everything that happened..."
"And for striking you as hard as I did. I'm sorry."
"If there's anything you'd like me to do to make it right... please, don't hesitate."
Soifon's eyes were filled with remorse, unable to meet Unohana's gaze directly.
"Anything at all?"
Unohana drew closer, a dangerous little smile curving her lips, a mischievous glimmer dancing in her eyes.
"..." Soifon leaned back slightly. "Yes — as long as it's something I'm capable of..."
The words were already out. There was no taking them back now.
Unohana placed both hands on Soifon's shoulders and leaned in close beside her cheek, her voice dropping to a low, intimate murmur:
"Then..."
Gulp.
Soifon swallowed involuntarily.
The warm breath Unohana Retsu exhaled stirred the loose strands of hair at Soifon's ear, carrying with it that distinctive herbal fragrance of hers — it grazed Soifon's cheek and raised a soft, tingling sensation across her skin.
"Captain Soifon... could you stab me?"
Unohana Retsu parted her lips, and what emerged from them was a sentence that obliterated the romantic atmosphere entirely.
"—?"
Soifon froze. Her eyes blinked slowly, blankly.
Stab me. Yes — that was a sentence that could only have come from Unohana Retsu.
Pfft.
Taking in Soifon's rare, stupefied expression, Unohana covered her mouth and let out a quiet laugh.
"So you see, Captain Soifon — it really is better not to make such sweeping promises so easily."
"Saying you can do 'anything' is just handing someone the perfect opening to catch you off guard, you know?"
In the end, that boomerang had come flying right back around to hit Soifon squarely in the face.
Unohana Retsu shook her head, straightened up again, and gathered Soifon into her arms — pulling her into a warm, unhurried embrace.
"Captain Soifon had her reasons for doing what she did, didn't she?"
Her voice was gentle. One hand moved in slow, soothing strokes across the back of Soifon's head.
Buried in that soft, enveloping warmth, Soifon instinctively nuzzled in slightly — and then drew a long, deep breath.
After a moment, the two parted, and a brief silence fell between them once more.
Unohana reached out and gently pinched a single slender black strand of hair from Soifon's cheek. "I'm sorry — it seems my hair brushed across Captain Soifon's face."
A slightly stronger gust of wind passed between them, sweeping up a withered, yellowed leaf.
The leaf tumbled through the air several times, its path drifting by chance toward Soifon. She raised her hand and caught it in her palm.
Soifon studied the leaf for two quiet seconds. Then she turned and held it out toward Unohana Retsu.
Unohana blinked in mild surprise — and then the corner of her lips curved upward. She reached out and took the leaf, her fingertips brushing Soifon's palm for just an instant before parting.
"This is..."
Unohana Retsu turned the leaf over in her palm, her smile deepening. "Captain Soifon — don't tell me you're offering this fallen leaf as an apology for deceiving everyone and leaving without a word?"
She looked up, Soifon's reflection caught in her eyes. "That's a little... too much of a cheat, isn't it?"
Soifon brushed back the stray wisps of hair the wind had blown loose around her ear, her gaze returning to the leaf in Unohana's hand:
"Of course not, Captain Unohana."
"I just... haven't seen fallen leaves in a long time. I suppose it made me a little nostalgic."
The smile on Unohana's face gradually softened into something more subdued. "Hueco Mundo isn't a very pleasant place to be, is it."
Soifon gave a small nod, then clapped her hands together lightly. "Right — Captain Unohana, I'll come with you to look over the hot spring blueprints that Senior Kirinji passed along."
However, Unohana did not agree immediately.
She tucked the fallen leaf carefully into her sleeve, then raised her eyes — and fixed Soifon with a look of warm, teasing amusement.
"Before we worry about building Kirinji's hot springs..." she said, smiling, "Captain Soifon — shouldn't the more pressing matter right now be reporting back to the Second Division barracks?"
Soifon's expression visibly stiffened.
Watching every flicker of her reaction, Unohana's smile grew a fraction deeper. "Could it be that Captain Soifon is... avoiding Rukia and Momo Hinamori?"
...
---
Before the gates of the Second Division barracks.
No matter how formidable her strength had become, she still couldn't hide what was in her heart from Unohana.
In the end, Soifon's intention to make a quiet escape was exposed by Unohana Retsu without a shred of mercy.
A few squad members who happened to be walking out of the barracks caught sight of the figure at the gate. They stopped dead — and then, a heartbeat later, snapped into deep ninety-degree bows in Soifon's direction.
"Captain Soifon!"
"Welcome back, Captain!"
It seemed the Captain-Commander had reinstated her rank with remarkable speed — which was why there was no awkward confusion to navigate.
Once the salutes were done, the squad members shuffled hastily past Soifon, clustering together, their voices dropping to urgent, excited whispers.
"Did you hear? The news that came down from above..."
"No wonder! I always said there was no way Captain Soifon would betray us..."
"Shh! Keep it down!"
The commotion at the gate quickly drew attention from inside. Heavy, impatient footsteps thundered down the corridor, accompanied by a sharp, irritable bark:
"Stop whispering in the hallway and get back to work! The Second Division doesn't carry deadweight!"
"Have your mission reports been filed? Have your patrol routes all been checked?!"
Marechiyo Ōmaeda's towering silhouette filled the doorway. One hand on his hip, the other clutching a half-eaten snack, he surveyed his territory like a lion making his rounds.
Then his gaze dropped to the bottom of the entrance steps — and his expression froze solid.
The stern authority drained from Ōmaeda's face at a speed visible to the naked eye. His pupils contracted sharply. His mouth fell open on its own. The snack bag slipped from his fingers and hit the ground unnoticed.
His enormous frame swayed — and his knees buckled:
"CAPTAIN SOIFON——!"
"When did you get back?! Why didn't you tell me so I could come meet you?!"
"I heard you went undercover alongside that terrifying Sōsuke Aizen — but of course, of course! Only someone as brilliant and perceptive as Captain Soifon could possibly..."
Finally, Soifon looked at him in silence for two beats, then pinched the bridge of her nose and shook her head.
"Ōmaeda. There's really no need for all that."
"You've worked hard while I was away."
With that, Soifon stepped past Ōmaeda's broad frame — giving his shoulder a single pat as she went — and walked through the gates of the Second Division.
She had no choice. With Ōmaeda bellowing at the top of his lungs out front like that, Momo and Rukia had absolutely heard the news that she was back.
---
Inside the Second Division Captain's office, Momo Hinamori and Rukia were bent over a mountain of paperwork, heads bowed.
Both of them stopped writing at the exact same moment. They lifted their heads and looked at each other.
"Is that... Teacher Soifon?"
Momo's voice carried the faintest tremor.
"She really... came back?"
Rukia's eyes widened slightly.
But in the next instant, both of them pressed a hand to their chest — as though trying to hold down a heart that had suddenly lurched into a gallop.
Was Teacher Soifon coming back now... to answer them?
The thought had barely surfaced before a far more turbulent anxiety came crashing down to smother it.
Would Teacher Soifon... really accept them?
Momo drew a sharp breath — and then slammed both palms flat on the desk with a resounding smack.
"Why are we the ones being nervous?!" Momo grabbed Rukia's arm. "Teacher Soifon is the one who should be nervous!"
Rukia blinked, momentarily startled by her friend's sudden surge of spirit.
"She just went off on her mission without saying a single word, and left us here worrying ourselves half to death the entire time..."
"And another thing! After Senior Rangiku and Teacher Soifon released their Bankai that day, they were both being super weird about something, weren't they?! Rukia, you noticed too, right?!"
Had they? Really?
Rukia was a little overwhelmed by the rapid-fire barrage, but she found herself nodding almost on reflex. "I mean... a little..."
With that nod secured, Momo grabbed Rukia's hand and pulled her toward the door:
"You see!"
"We're already so far behind! If we don't work up the nerve to charge in right now, who knows how many more people we'll fall behind!"
Rukia was yanked half a stumbling step forward — and the hesitation that had been written across her face began, slowly, to be replaced by a resolution that matched Momo's exactly.
"Hearing you say that, Momo — it's like the clouds have parted!"
"Momo! Let's go!"
She grabbed Momo's hand in return. The two of them locked eyes — and nodded at precisely the same moment.
The next instant, the office door was wrenched open.
At the far end of the corridor, a small but straight black figure had just stepped into the captain's courtyard.
Two silhouettes came racing around the corner of the corridor.
Their footsteps ground to a halt simultaneously.
Six eyes met.
The tearful accusations, the sobbing, the desperate embraces they had each imagined — none of it happened. The air seemed to freeze solid in that single moment.
Momo was still holding Rukia's wrist in both hands, her chest rising and falling slightly from the sprint. Both of them opened their mouths — and the courage they had just worked so hard to summon, now that it was faced with the real Soifon, deflated all at once, like a balloon that had been pricked by a pin.
A thousand things to say — all of them jammed at the back of their throats, and not a single word would come out.
After a moment, the bamboo pipe in the corner of the courtyard filled with water and tipped — striking the stone beneath it with a clean, crisp knock — and the world seemed to press play again.
"I'm home."
Soifon stepped forward into the space between them and spoke.
A stinging, bittersweet ache rose to the tips of their noses. In the same instant, Rukia and Momo lurched forward — and buried themselves in Soifon's arms, holding on tight.
Soifon said nothing. She simply stood there, still and steady, and let the two girls press their faces into her shoulder and her chest.
Very soon, through the fabric of her Shihakushō, she felt the warm spread of wet heat.
No wailing. No heaving sobs. Only the quiet, broken sound of tears being held back — suppressed, stuttering — and the burning warmth of them soaking slowly through the Shihakushō that Senjumaru Shutara had made specially for her.
Soifon was silent for a moment. Then she lifted both hands and let them settle — gently, one on the back of each girl's head, and one on each of their backs — stroking slowly, again and again, with quiet tenderness.
"I'm sorry..." Soifon said, more softly than was her habit. "I'm sorry..."
She could feel it — both of them shaking their heads against her shoulder with force, their hair brushing back and forth against the side of her neck.
The sunlight from beyond the corridor stretched their three shadows long across the ground, weaving them together.
How much time passed, neither could say — but eventually, the sound of voices and footsteps drifted down from the far end of the corridor: a patrol team making their rounds.
The two in her arms gave a sudden start. In the same breath, they pulled quickly away from Soifon, scrubbing at their faces with the backs of their hands — eyes red, noses pink, eyelashes still trembling with fine, clinging drops.
Soifon settled an arm around each of their shoulders and led them easily down the corridor — familiar as breathing — until she stood before the door of her own quarters and pushed it open.
The room was spotless. Everything in its place, arranged just so — the kind of order that spoke of someone tending it with care, regularly, over a long time.
"We always knew Teacher Soifon would come back someday." Rukia tugged at Soifon's sleeve. "So... every day, we took turns coming to clean."
Soifon stepped inside and settled onto the edge of the bed. Then she patted the space on either side of her.
Momo and Rukia exchanged a glance — and sat down, one on each side, close enough that their knees nearly touched Soifon's legs.
Soifon raised her hands and rested them, palms down, gently on each of their knees.
"You've both worked hard while I was away, too—"
Before she could finish, her lips were stopped by two fingers — still faintly salt-damp with tears.
"Don't say sorry."
"What we want to hear... isn't an apology, Teacher Soifon."
When those words were spoken, Rukia drew a slow, steadying breath, and laid her hand gently over the back of Soifon's.
She pressed down — holding Soifon's hand in place. "Now... surely Teacher Soifon can give us an answer, can't she?"
Rukia paused, exchanged a glance with Momo, and the two of them spoke at the same time:
"Will you... accept our feelings for you? Both of us?"
Soifon's gaze moved slowly from one face to the other. Her fingertips curled — just slightly — against the centers of their palms.
"Are you both truly certain..."
"...that what you feel for me is love?"
The moment the words left her lips, two distinct, warm fragrances closed in from either side — and in the same instant, a soft, gentle warmth pressed against both her cheeks.
Not a fleeting brush. A long, lingering impression — held against Soifon's skin, breath washing over her in a warm, gentle tide.
And yet the tender moment did not last long.
With a boldness that was perfectly synchronized, two pairs of hands began sliding quietly along the front of Soifon's Shihakushō — only to collide with each other just before they reached somewhere they shouldn't — and recoil as though they'd touched a live wire.
They shot glares at each other across Soifon's face.
A few more seconds passed — and finally, both of them broke the kiss.
Soifon held still, feeling the warmth that lingered on her cheeks, and the brief, flustered contact at her chest. Because she felt she owed Rukia and Momo a debt, she had not moved to stop their small, reckless impulses just now.
She let herself fall backward — sinking into the soft give of the bed.
She stared up at the familiar ceiling. Then she looked at the two still perched on the edge of the bed beside her, and all at once something in her chest let go — and she smiled.
Soifon raised her right hand and rested the back of it against her forehead, as though musing aloud — or perhaps, finally, giving them the answer they had been waiting for:
"At this point..."
"If I kept pretending I didn't understand, I'd be the unreasonable one."
"I accept your confessions."
"Starting today — we're together."
____
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