Shadows of the Past

Chapter II

To her somewhat surprise and overall relief, they passed through the new gate with no trouble. Walking into the familiar atmosphere of home was a breath of much needed fresh air. The spirit particles that made up everything around them rejuvenated her, bringing her back to life. Naturally, a permanent gate directly connected to the human world couldn't be placed in the heart of Seireitei, so they were currently standing just outside the brilliant white walls of the city. She and her captain walked casually up to the enormous gate and announced their presence.

With their symbols of power in plain sight, as well as the fact that they were expected, the gate was raised immediately. The massive giant lifted the gate above his head granting them entrance, the guards inside the gate stood at attention offering formal greetings and welcomes as they entered.

"Thank you Jidanbo!" She called up to the giant patting his massive leg in thanks. She knew despite his very intimidating appearance the gate guardian was a big softy and she could see the visible blush come over his face at her thanks.

"No problem Hinamori-san, welcome home."

Her brief moment of calm was quickly brought to a halt though as the third seat from their division approached looking quite stressed.

"Welcome home," he started with a formal bow before matching their pace and walking with them back towards the base. "We have all of your work laid out for you so you can sort through it quickly, we have forty five applicants all of which need your attention. Your acceptance list must be turned in before the ceremony this evening. "

Yes, yes, we're aware of what we have to do so you can give it a rest. Have you picked up each applicants scores from their testing?" The sudden pale, blank expression that came over the third seat's face was answer enough. "Baka…"

"I apologize sir I'll go get them right away."

"Don't bother, I need things to get done right. Hinamori," He said turning his attention to her, "As soon as you've dropped off your stuff head over to the academy and collect all the score sheets and any personal notes the testers have on each of them."

"Hai!" She took off as soon as she had her assignment, shunpoing across the rooftops toward her home. Squad members she was familiar with called out warm greetings as she walked across the courtyard to her room and her smile grew despite the long day ahead of her.

She tossed her small pack of belongings onto the bed where she would deal with them later. The short walk from her quarters to the office was filled with more kind welcomes and some sort conversations about her mission. She loved each of her squad members, and had a soft spot for the younger ones remembering how terrifying it could be entering a division… she made sure to try and make each of them feel comfortable when she saw each of them.

The smile that had taken its normal place faded slightly at the sight of their office. The paperwork was piled high, casting a daunting shadow on each of their desks. She took a moment to move around the clutter and open the window shade hoping to make the space a bit more bearable. Satisfied with her work, she sighed and went to her desk searching for a list of their applicants before she headed off to the academy.

But she was caught off guard by a single white rose, pure and thriving, clearly placed there this morning as it showed no signs of withering. She picked up the flower and smelled its crisp and intoxicating scent, it was only then that she noticed the small folded notecamouflaged by the mess of papers on her desk. Still holding the delicate gift up to her growing smile she opened the note, handwritten in his familiar handwriting.

Welcome Home

T.H.

It was such a simple message, only two words, but to her it said so much more. It said he missed her, and loved her, and he was truly happy she had returned. She remembered the fond memory behind the significance of the white rose…

They had been enjoying the beautiful Saturday together, walking along the road looking through the various shops and booths. She had had to drag him away from his work, and it had been like pulling teeth… His normal bored, and borderline annoyed expression was visible on his face as she gushed over each of the trinkets or clothes she found. Despite his demeanor, anytime she let on that the wanted something, the moment she looked away he would buy it for her. She didn't like him spending money on her, but anytime she protested he simply rolled his eyes and said he didn't mind. Around the end of their day, they happened to pass a flower shop and she couldn't help but stop to take in the amazing sights and smells that were even evident from outside.

"Pick some." He had said. She was somewhat taken aback at the request, this was the first time he had offered they visit any of the shops.

"Oh, no that's ok Shiro-kun. I just wanted to smell them, I don't need one!"

"Baka… I'm going to get you one either way, so you may as well pick out one you like. I have no idea the difference." She giggled at his confused expression as they moved into the shop and he inspected the various flowers. She would tell him the different names of the ones he seemed to look at and a little bit about them. After a while of browsing she looked around the shop once more until she spotted the one she wanted.

"This…" she mused as she picked a pure white rose out of a vase on the shop counter.

"That? But it's so dull, doesn't have any color, and it just smells like water. Pick out the one you really want, don't worry about the cost baka."

"No!" She said in defense of the beautiful flower. "First of all, it doesn't just smell like water; Second, this is the one I want…"

He rolled his eyes, but smiled and paid for the flower before they left. She had carried it close to her heart the rest of the evening only letting go of it when he took her to dinner.

"I still don't understand why you picked that stupid flower…" He had said as they walked alone through the dark streets of Seireitei together after dinner.

"Baka… because it reminds me of you." She smiled up at him as they walked, loving the confused and apologetic expression coming over his face. And as they walked underneath the stars he took her hand as she leaned into his embrace for the rest of their walk.

"Lieutenant?" She was quickly yanked out of the memory by the sudden appearance of the confused shinigami.

"Ah, er, do you know where the list of applicant's is?" She asked stuffing the note into her inside pocket and running across the room to get something to put the rose in.

"Oh yes ma'am," the young man said rummaging through the papers on the captains desk until he found the right one, "here it is." He handed her the paper as she returned with a slender vase now filled with water and the rose and cleared a place on her desk for it. She thanked him before stealing one last glace at the beautiful flower and leaving for the academy.

"MATSUMOTO!" His voice echoed down the halls of his squads sleeping quarters, it was the middle of the day otherwise everyone would have been woken up for sure. The tall orange haired woman appeared almost instantly looking quite perturbed until she noticed where he was standing. No doubt also noticing his expression of anger. "You were supposed to make sure all these rooms for the new squad members were cleaned out and ready weeks ago! Now I find you've been using them for your personal closets?!"

"Captain I can explain!" She said with an unconvincing laugh to try and play it down. "I was coming to take care of that right now, it won't take me but a second."

"It had better take you less than a second! Get it taken care of!" He left the hall walking away from her as she pouted and mumbled something incoherent after him. It was already going to be a full day, but now he had to go over everything his lieutenant was in charge of to make sure it was done!

He reentered his office to get on with his regular schedule, he would have to deal with Matsumoto's jobs later… Seated in the couches in front of his desk were Caide and the 4th, 5th, and 6th seat all awaiting their schedules for the upcoming week.

"Thank you all for coming, I thought we'd get our times straight early since all these new recruits will be moving in Sunday evening. Caide, you, Rangiku and I will be evaluating them all day Monday so we can see where they all stand. And you three will be leading teams two and three in combat training in the sparing hall."

He had his squad split into teams, like most others did, grouping his shinigami into them based on their skill and experience. Team one consisted of his best men and he was its leader. But this team was rarely needed, and the members of this team also headed the other teams. Caide was the commanding official of team two, his fourth seat headed team three and so on.

The lower teams were all stationed in the world of the living most of the time, carrying out regular hollow assignments. The others remained here and trained, guarded Soul Society and were sent off to the real world to cover serious hollow threats.

After running through the agenda for the rest of the week, he dismissed his men just as Rangiku entered the office with a very proud look on her face. "I'm all done taicho! All the rooms are perfect and ready to go!"

"About time, where did you file all those personnel files, I need to look over them before we send in our list of acceptances tonight."

"Geeze, you're in such a bad mood lately captain…" She pouted as she moved to retrieve the files. Handing them to him, her expression changed into a sly smile. "I saw Hinamori this morning…"

"She's back?"

"Yep! She was running back and forth with paperwork between her office and the academy all morning. She and her captain hadn't been able to start their work on the graduation papers at all till they got back today."

So that's why she hadn't come by… that made sense, all that paperwork left for one day would certainly be a headache, even for Hinamori. He had been worried she hadn't gotten his gift. Lost in his thoughts of her he almost didn't catch the most important factor of his lieutenant's story.

"OI! What were you doing in the square this morning anyway!" Matsumoto's apologetic smile returned as she inched towards the door.

"Oh! Will you look at the time! I'm pretty sure I'm supposed to be at the training grounds! Bye taicho!" She made her exit quickly leaving him alone for the first time all day.

"Baka…" But he couldn't help but let a small smirk form on his face at the thought of Momo being home. A few more hours and all the forms would be sent in, all the paperwork complete and they would both have to be at the graduation.

She was pretty sure she had never wanted to set her paperwork on fire before, but Tobiume was definitely seeming like a good option right about now. Her captain seemed to be facing similar frustrations as she shuttled papers in between their desks to get both their signatures.

"Hinamori if that's not the last stack I'm resigning…" He glared at the papers in her hand as she placed them in front of him. Judging by his tone, he was nowhere near kidding. She smile she had struggled to keep up all day widened at his reaction.

"I'm happy to say it is sir! All that's left to do is for me to run all this to the academy, just in time!"

As he signed his name on the final paper, he let out a very dramatic sigh. "Wait what time is it?"

"The ceremony starts in an hour sir."

"Ah well crap… well don't worry about the papers, I'll have them sent to the academy, you've been over there enough times today." He rolled his eyes thinking of how many important papers their subordinates hadn't thought to gather for them.

"Are you sure sir? I really don't mind, and I'd feel better if I knew they got there."

"Yeah, don't worry about it, I'll carry them down there myself if I have to, besides, don't girls need like two days to prepare for something like this?"

She giggled at his exaggeration, "Well I suppose I could use the extra time, arigato taicho!"

"No problem, but so help me if I have to see one paper tomorrow It'll be the end of the one that brings it to me… Same goes for you, don't you dare come in, cause then it'll make me look like a slacker." He gathered up the papers and moved toward the door as he spoke, finally leaving the office.

Her smile persisted at his rant, and she moved back to her desk to file away their work and tidy up her desk. After a couple of minutes things were relatively back to normal and she grabbed the vase to carry it back to her room.

She didn't realize how little time she had until she got back to her room and after setting down her rose, looked in the mirror. The busy day had taken its toll on her and the fact that she hadn't slept well since leaving didn't help either… She jumped in the shower and then did her best to tame her long dark hair. Luckily the captains and lieutenants wore their traditional garb so she didn't have to worry about what to wear. She rarely wore much makeup, but today was an exception. Not only was it a formal event, but the nightmares she'd been having wasn't kind to her complexion. Her natural pale skin seemed bruised by the dark circles under her eyes. By the time she was satisfied with her appearance she would have to shunpo just to make it to the academy on time. But just as she was about to leave she took a moment to cut the delicate stem of the rose and pin the flowering bud to her chest, right over her heart where it belonged.

The graduation director had already sent the captains out to the started ceremony by the time she rushed into the room. Luckily she was too busy directing the events to notice her late entrance into the waiting room where the rest of her peers were.

"Peachy-san!" The small pink haired girl abandoned her place in their line to run up and hug her legs almost causing her to fall.

"Hey Yachiru!"

"I'm so bored Peachy-san, do we really have to do this? Cause Ken-chan didn't want to either, but he promised me snacks if I came…" The run-on ramblings of the little girl brought a smile to her face, reminding her that she was indeed home. The rest of her friends greeted her then, the men asking how the mission went, and the girls saying how much they missed her. Before she could really speak to any of them however, the stressed out director came back and snapped at them to all return to their line. She quickly took her place in between Isane and Renji as the room fell silent. They could hear the ceremony then as Captain Ukitake was announced and the following applause subsided.

Then the speaker for the evening went on with some speech about how each of the new graduates should strive to live after the lieutenants as they have worked just as they will have to in order to succeed. Then after some more formal words he started to name off the lieutenants one after another.

As Isane name was called her friend looked at her with a nervous expression and she returned it with a reassuring smile. She watched after her and got an idea of the layout the large ceremony room was prepared in this year.

The room was huge, lined with enormous white stone pillars that reached up to the high ceiling. They never really decorated, but simply let the beauty of the room itself be the decoration. The intricate designs that adorned the walls gave depth beyond the pillars, and hanging an equal space apart were banners proudly bearing the symbols of each division in the Gotei 13.

The only part of the room that ever really changed was the stage and how it was set up. This year the captains were standing on a slightly raised portion of the area where they seemed to tower as an incomprehensible force above the rest of the room. The lieutenants were being ushered to take their places standing in front of their captains.

"5th Division Lieutenant, Momo Hinamori." She was so lost in the sight that she was surprised when her name was called and Renji had to give her a nudge back into reality. She walked, gracefully into bright lights of the stage as applause sounded at her arrival. She had to walk in front of each of the captains to take her place, and her eyes naturally found and focused on him.

It felt like years since she had seen him, but at the same time it felt like only a moment. He was such a normal part of her, it seemed like things were only right when he was there. He had grown so much taller in the past year, now quite a bit taller than her and most others. His short, white hair was in a perfect mess, as she liked to call it, with its strands just barely covering the left side of his face. She couldn't get over how handsome he had grown to be… His gaze was fixated ahead, as all the other captains were, but she thought she noticed him let out a large breath at the sound of her approach, and a slight quiver as she passed. She couldn't possibly smile anymore, she was home.

Waiting for the ceremony to start was as boring as usual, crammed in a small waiting room with the other captains did provide some slight entertainment though. Kenpachi was growling about what a waste of time all this was and Byakuya was calmly arguing its importance, only irritating the former more.

Finally a very busy looking woman with a headset entered the room, obviously not willing to let anything go against her plans.

"Alright everyone! I need everyone to line up in order so we can begin. We're going to call you out one at a time and you're going to go stand right up there! Any questions?"

"Yeah I've got one!" Kenpachi called out much to the dismay of everyone… "How did the old man get out of this? I don't have time for this crap!"

The petite woman moved directly in front of the man who towered before her. "You are here because you are all the faces of power and leadership to each and every one of those young shinigami. The captain commander is not here because they cannot graduate straight into the 1st squad, so naturally there is no reason for him to be here! Any other questions?" She said almost threateningly, "Good, then wait for your names to be called." The woman left quickly, whispering urgently into her headset.

"I like her. Whose squad is she in?" Kenpachi said with a sadistic smile.

"She's not a shinigami! You can't fight her Zaraki." Captain Unohana said with a definitive look. "Now if everyone would be so kind as to move into your spots I'm sure we will be getting started soon." Zaraki glared at her but complied taking his spot next to him. Shunsui took his place on the other side of him as well, and he couldn't help but let out a defeated sigh. He had to spend the rest of the evening next to him…

"Ah Toshiro, you look as serious as ever!" The older captain said in amusement.

"No reason to get excited over a required ceremony." He replied just as Sui fang's name was called and she exited the room.

It took quite a while for the announcer to call out his name, the regular applause followed and he moved out onto the stage into his place. The room was filled with the new shinigami all dressed in their newly acquired uniforms, it was like a sea of black contrasting the white room. Out of the corner of his eye he could see the woman with the headset move quickly but silently through the room back towards the room he had just left. The lieutenants must be gathering in the same room… With this thought he realized who would be in that room, who was probably in that room at this very moment. Suddenly he was very anxious for this ceremony to move on… He knew she was here, Shinji was here, and Matsumoto had seen her, but for some reason it wouldn't be true until he saw her with his own eyes.

After an obnoxiously long speech following their entrance, the lieutenants names were called out as well. He absent mindedly thought he was thankful the 5th squad wouldn't take long to be called…

"5th Division Lieutenant, Momo Hinamori." He hadn't realized he had been holding in a breath until he heard her graceful footsteps and he let the air escape. He didn't allow himself to turn and look at her, but as she passed him he couldn't help but tremble slightly as all the anticipation was over and he knew she was there. All of the built up tension in his body relaxed and it felt as though a weight was lifted off his shoulders.

The ceremony became bearable then, and even pleasant when he remembered that the captains and lieutenants would be seated across from one another for the bulk of the evening forming the walkway to the stage for the graduates. They filed off the stage at the appropriate time, the captains exiting to the right and the lieutenants to the left. In order to keep their exits as smooth as possible the director had planned it so the lieutenants would sit in descending order in the seats which put her almost even with him across the small gap.

That was the first chance he had had to look at her… even through the dim lighting he could discern her beauty, and more importantly her well being. She looked radiant, her long brown hair was down as it normally was, but slightly held back by two small braids that were tied behind her head. She was wearing the same thing as all the other lieutenants but somehow she still managed to stand out. One difference she held was the small bud of a white rose pinned over her chest and tied with a thin decorative purple ribbon. He almost smirked at the sight, it was just like her to wear it…

Then he noticed the barely visible darkness surrounding her bright brown eyes. She had covered it with makeup, and to anyone else it wouldn't be noticeable. She must have had to work very hard to get all those kido barriers up in the human world and decided he would recommend another to assist next time she was called upon to take on a specialty kido assignment.

The ceremony seemed to pass quickly then, whenever he had the chance he couldn't help but steal a glance at her, lost in her smile. Occasionally he would catch her doing the same and she would blush when she saw him looking at her.

As the occasion finally came to its close, he was reminded of the rest of his duties. Now he and the other captains would have to meet with the head of the academy to confirm all of the graduate's future homes. Those that were not accepted by the squad they had applied were discussed and one by one assigned to a division. It was a very tedious process and took longer than normal as there were so many to go through. Luckily the lieutenants were exempt from this particular process, it would be good for Hinamori to get some rest.

After the final folder was closed each of the captains eagerly rose from the large table and formal thanks were given, he was more anxious than most and evaded as much conversation as he could before quietly making his exit.

It was late by now, and unless Matsumoto had dragged her out to some ridiculous outing, the safe bet was that she was at her room. He took the rooftops to save time, and made it there quickly. He could feel her reiatsu the moment he approached the division, but as he neared her door noticed the steady fluctuations indicating she was asleep. Disappointment crept over him but at the same time he was glad she was resting. With another quick glance at the door, he headed back to his own division.

"No!" She awoke yet again from a mind numbing nightmare and sat up to search the room. She must have fallen asleep waiting for the captain's meeting to end… looking at the clock beside her bed she saw it was around 2am. The bed no longer looked inviting, so she rose and left to try and wash away the nightmare with a cold splash of water on her face. Upon looking up at the mirror once she was done, she realized she absolutely had to get some sleep and reach a solution quickly.

She gathered fresh clothes and a night robe and silently left her room. Most of Seireitei was asleep, and she luckily met no one during her short trip. Within a couple of minutes she was in front of his door, suddenly self conscious about entering. Ignoring the feeling she slipped in the door and made her way down the hallway of his home and into his bedroom. The door was cracked open and she could see him resting peacefully. She almost felt guilty that she might disturb him, he looked so content.

She moved into the room, careful not to make any noise that might bother him, and changed into her night robe and letting down the braids that had held back her messy hair. As gently as she could, she pulled back the blanket that was draped across the large bed blushing as she admired his perfect bare chest. As soon as she slipped into the bed and pulled the blanket over her Toshiro wrapped his arms around her pulling her close to him.

"I'm sorry Shiro-kun, I didn't mean to wake you…" She whispered and relaxed within his embrace.

"I'll never mind being woken by you, are you alright?" She smiled at his knowing and concerned tone.

"Of course, now go back to sleep Shiro-kun."

"Alright, but you're telling about it tomorrow…" He tightened his embrace on her and kissed the back of her head as she closed her eyes to enjoy her first night without nightmares since leaving him.