Chapter 241: Bless You for Understanding
Isshin Shiba made his escape with one parting complaint trailing behind him.
"What are you, a matchmaker?!"
Matsushita Yusuke very much wanted to fire something back. He held it in.
More important things to deal with.
He tidied up briefly and headed back to the compound. Administrative work was waiting, as it always was, but with Soifon handling most of it the load had become considerably more manageable.
Plan for the afternoon: two cups of sake at a comfortable pace, then clean up and go report to Aizen.
He was still working through the details with some satisfaction when he turned into his office and sat down.
He had barely settled when the door came off its hinges.
BANG!
A figure shot through the opening at full speed.
The standard Squad uniform, nipped in at the waist, made the contrast sharper: the energy of someone twice the size coming in from someone clearly not that size.
An extremely high-velocity entrance in an extremely compact frame. The contrast was, in its own way, something.
"Hey!"
The shout from across the desk made Matsushita Yusuke's head drop about three centimeters on reflex, the way a soldier ducks when something goes off nearby.
"Oh, oh, yes, I'm here..."
"This year's new member applications. Read through them yourself."
Thwack.
A stack of documents landed on the desk. Matsushita Yusuke inched his head back up with the careful expression of someone negotiating with a trip wire.
"N-no problem..."
"Good. I'm leaving."
"Ah... wait."
"What?!"
She had stopped mid-turn. Half-facing him. He could see her expression from here.
Matsushita Yusuke let his face do something conciliatory.
"Just... thank you. I genuinely don't know what I'd do without you."
Soifon.
Vice-Captain of Squad 11. She had been in that role for several decades now, and in that time, essentially nothing about her had changed in any visible way.
She had not gotten taller.
The bone structure had clearly finished what it was doing a long time ago. Perfectly proportioned by any reasonable standard.
The look itself was the same: the face, the posture, the general outline. What had changed was the habit she had developed over the years of wearing a fitted dark undersuit beneath the standard uniform. It was a practical modification, apparently, something about improving reiatsu-particle contact with the skin.
From a distance the difference was barely visible. Up close you could see the black lining at the collar and sleeve edges.
Against the standard uniform, the effect was actually more restrained than the canon version. The expression she wore most of the time, the flat, faintly contemptuous look she reserved for anyone she considered beneath her attention, gave the whole thing a very specific quality.
Matsushita Yusuke found it entirely to his taste.
In response to the thank-you, Soifon's expression of extreme distaste remained.
Unchanged.
She tilted her head. Crossed her arms. Turned just slightly to the side and lifted her chin in a way that said, without requiring words: so what about it?
No softening. But the fact that she was still standing there was already a good result.
"I shouldn't have gone drinking with Captain Kyoraku in the entertainment district?"
"..."
"Next time I'll finish the paperwork before slipping out?"
"..."
"Is there anything else I'm forgetting to say?"
"No."
Soifon stood where she was, rolled her eyes, and exhaled through her nose.
"It's not like I ever had high expectations for you in the first place. Decades now, and you just keep getting less reliable."
She turned to leave.
She made it two steps before the door swung shut on its own.
Matsushita Yusuke had wrapped both arms around her from behind.
Coming in from outside the arms, closing in front. The starting position for a very particular throwing technique. An extremely dangerous hold.
"Hey! Let go!"
Soifon struggled. Matsushita Yusuke sounded cheerful.
"Heh. Am I forgiven?"
Several decades of shared history meant both of them understood each other's rhythms pretty thoroughly by now. The ones who were hardest on the outside were always the most manageable.
After a while, the struggling began to wind down. Soifon exhaled, something like resignation in it.
"You know... it didn't matter that you were unreliable before. But Squad 11 actually has some dignity now. Shouldn't we be making more of an effort to keep it that way?"
"Yes, yes, you're right."
"I know the captain meetings and the Captain-Commander both put pressure on you, so I don't usually say anything about all of this. But at least keep up appearances where people can see you, alright? You're a captain."
"Agreed, fully agreed."
"And another thing, you..." A pause. "Hey! Where do you think your hands are going?!"
"Hm? They just... ended up there. Sorry about that."
"If you're sorry, move them!"
Matsushita Yusuke dropped his chin toward her and laughed quietly, bringing his mouth close to her ear, and breathed out softly.
"What's the problem?"
"Mm..."
The expression wasn't visible from this angle, but the color rising across her cheek said everything about her current state of mind.
"At least... lock the door."
"Already done. I think ahead. This time of day, the captain's office isn't receiving visitors."
"Ugh. Hearing you say that is somehow annoying."
"I prefer to think of it as being considerate."
"Fine. Hey. Are you going back to drink in the entertainment district again next time?"
"You might not believe this, but it's actually a necessary social obligation. Captain Kyoraku is difficult to manage. He seems easygoing but getting close enough to him to actually work with him takes real effort."
"So you're saying this is work."
"It sounds like an excuse, doesn't it."
"..."
Soifon tilted her head back to look at him, and what was in her eyes was some combination of helplessness and something she wasn't going to name.
"What am I supposed to do with you. Just be careful."
"Bless you for understanding."
And then.
Soifon stepped back half a pace. She looked him over for a moment, then raised both hands.
Her thumbs moved from his shoulders upward, tracing along either side of his neck, then curling around behind his ears and gathering the half-length hair there into both hands.
She pressed it together. Straightened it. Tied it off with a cord.
A few strands fell loose across his forehead and swept across the tip of her nose as she leaned in. Her cheeks were faintly flushed. She exhaled once, quietly.
She dropped into a slight crouch. The look in her eyes had shifted: something faintly annoyed, something faintly resigned, somewhere underneath that something she hadn't said.
She spoke quietly.
"You impossible person. Get over here yourself. Or are you expecting me to ask nicely?"
The day was looking up.