The blade slipped through her chest, and she knew absolute bliss.

"Splendid, Kenpachi Zaraki..." said Yachiru Unohana, sometimes known as Retsu, former Captain of the 11th Division, Captain of the 4th Division, first Kenpachi, swordmistress and healer, as her long life ended. "With this... we finally have... proper closure..."

Her sword slipped from her numb fingers, her Bankai fading as she fell backwards. Zaraki, her greatest foe, her greatest pupil, the one man she'd ever truly respected, leaned forward to catch her. His blade had been the one to cut her down, and yet his strong arms cradled her as gently as if she were made of glass, lowering her to the floor. She was beyond hearing, at this point, but she could read his lips, see the desperate pleas for her to live on, to not deny him further bouts with the greatest opponent he'd ever found.

Cute, she thought. You're still that child I met years ago...

He was so childish, truly. He thought that her death would deny him future joy in battle, but she knew better. Greater foes yet awaited him, and friends to battle beside. Not only that, but with his true power and will finally free, she knew that the blade in his hands would finally, finally speak to him. Most importantly, though, the title of Kenpachi, that of the greatest of all warriors, was now with the warrior who had truly earned it... by tearing it from the cold, dead hands of the one who had been the first to claim it.

My death may be near, Kenpachi Zaraki, but this is a time of joy... she thought, as her eyes closed for what she knew would be the last time.

Three hours later...

Yachiru Unohana, AKA Retsu Unohana, AKA Confused Unohana, opened her eyes and blinked. "Is this reincarnation?" she asked groggily, but the ache in her chest made her suspect otherwise.

"Oh, Captain!" her vice-captain, Isane Kotetsu, said with a relieved smile on her face as she entered the room carrying some fresh blankets. "I'm glad to see you finally woke up! You took quite a nasty tumble there, but you seem to be recovering nicely. You just wait here and I'll get you a nice glass of water."

"A... a nasty tumble?" Unohana asked.

"You were not looking well at all when you were brought in, no," Isane said cheerfully. "But I think you're gonna be just fine with some rest and bandages. Would you like some hot soup?"

"Um... Isane..." Unohana said softly. "I actually died."

Isane chuckled, shaking her head. "I swear, sir, you have the weirdest sense of humor. Though I suppose after that horror with the Quincies, we're all in for a bit of gallows humor..."

"No, I'm not actually j—" Unohana began.

"Captain," Isane said, setting a reassuring hand on hers. "You just focus on getting better, okay? We need you bright and chipper again."

"Bright. And chipper," Unohana repeated flatly.

"Yessir! You were always such an inspiration to all of us in the medical corps... why, I don't know how we'd go on without you, saving lives and acting as beacons of peace and harmony to all of Seireitei."

Unohana, whose chest was still throbbing from her psychotic duel to the death with a barbarian madman over which of them was the more brutal killer, sighed. "Um... yes. Of course. That's... that. Look, Isane, I am being quite serious here. My wounds were mortal."

Isane blinked. "You just got stabbed through the chest, ma'am."

"Yes, and that's... lethal."

Isane blinked a few more times... and started to giggle. "L-lethal?! Since when, sir? Oh, you and your odd sense of humor, Captain, such a silly woman..."

"I'm not joking!" Unohana protested.

"But it's just a little stab, sir! Why, remember that time that Captain Hitsugaya was hacked open across his entire chest by Aizen? Twice? Or of course poor Momo and all her impalements, and there was the time Captain Komamura got flayed alive, and then there was the time that Renji got sliced to bloody ribbons during the last Ryoka invasion... again, twice. In the space of a week. And don't even get me started on that poor Ichigo and his gang... I swear, poor little Rukia gets impaled at least once a month. And Chad! Does Chad even own any shirts that aren't soaked in his own blood at this point? Oh, and remember that time that Ichigo got sliced through the stomach so deep his spine was exposed? That was really-"

"Yes, yes, I get your point," Unohana said, rubbing her temples. "I confess, I may have gotten a bit too into the drama of the moment. But my wounds should have been lethal if I didn't get treatment down there, so..."

"Oh, well, of course the medical team brought you in," Isane said, as though this were obvious.

Unohana stopped. "What medical team?"

"The one Captain Kyoraku... oh, I'm sorry, Captain-Commander Kyoraku, almost forgot his promotion... assigned to wait outside the chamber you and Captain Zaraki were doing your training exercise in," Isane said cheerfully. "You know, just in case of accidents."

"What?!"

"Why are you so shocked?" Isane asked. "I mean, it's pretty standard to have that sort of thing set u-"

"I specifically requested no medical presence!" Unohana snapped.

"Yesssss..." Isane said patiently. "And your boss said to send a team anyway."

"Get him here."

"Um... Captain, you might be a little sick still, but I can't actually order him to do anything..." Isane said delicately. "He's... y'know. The Captain-Commander. And I'm not."

"Isane," Unohana said gently. Softly. Delicately. "Are you more afraid of him, or me?"

"... … I'll go get him right now, Captain," Isane said, shuffling back out of the room.

Captain-Commander Shunsui Kyoraku, the newly-minted commander of the Gotei 13, strode into Unohana's hospital room like he'd owned the place. "Retsu!" he said warmly. "Feeling better?"

"Yes. Thanks to you," Unohana said, her tone colder than liquid nitrogen.

"Why do you sound unhappy about that...?" Kyoraku asked.

"Because this was a sacred duel to determine the title of Kenpachi's true holder!" Unohana snapped. "Why would you deny me my glorious death on the sword of my one superior?"

"... Because it really was just a little stab wound. It wasn't even that bad. I mean, did you see Byakuya after the Vandenreich left? He was basically just a pool of blood with a vaguely human-shaped lump of meat in the middle. They had to scrape him off the wall, and I think they found his liver like, six meters away fr-"

"Yes, I was there," Unohana interrupted.

"Well, he survived. Why did you think you wouldn't?" Kyoraku asked, his tone legitimately confused. "I mean, you just got stabbed. We've all been at least stabbed. I got shot at point-blank range by a laser-pistol, and I got up and finished the fight like twenty minutes later."

"It was supposed to be a duel to the death!" Unohana snapped.

"Um... why?"

"Because I was passing on the title of Kenpachi to a glorious new wielder!"

"Well, you did that," Kyoraku said cheerfully, pouring himself a glass of water from her bedside pitcher. "I mean, he won fair and square. You were out like a light. Luckily we were able to save you after, since it was just a stab wound..."

"I wasn't supposed to be saved! I was supposed to die at the hands of my successor! That was the whole reason you sent me down there!"

Kyoraku spat out the water in shock. "What?! You thought I sent you down there to die!"

"Of course! The title of Kenpachi can only truly be handed over in a duel to the death, and-"

"And? I didn't want you to give him the title of Kenpachi! I just wanted you to teach the doofus how to fight better!" Kyoraku protested. "Are you nuts?! You thought I sent my best medical expert to die in a hole so that Zaraki could become slightly better at smacking things? Because I don't know how that sounds to you, but to me it sounds batshit insane."

"Well, I assumed that... I mean, clearly in order to bring him to his full potential, I would have to be killed, so..."

"In what universe does this make sense?!" Kyoraku snapped, his eyes... well, eye... wide in clear disbelief. "You're the best doctor in my entire army, which I might remind you just got its ass kicked. Do you know how many of my Shinigami are currently horribly wounded? Eighteen hundred. Medics are kind of a key thing right now."

"Well... yes, I suppose you'd need medical personnel, b-"

"Yes. Yes I do. They are important at the moment, to help with all the people who got hacked up by Quincies. You remember the Quincies, right? Shot down out of the sky in waves of blue fire? Blew everyone's arms off and such? I understand if you were too busy thinking about how important passing on your title properly was to notice them, but they kind of blew up all the buildings, so the rest of us considered them showing up a big thing."

"Well... erm... of course you have a point, but..."

"It was a major event on everyone's calendar, you might say. Particularly for anyone who had plans to be inside a building anytime soon," Kyoraku said.

"Yes, well..."

"Or to, y'know, anyone who liked having all their limbs. What with those pesky Quincies running around hacking off all the limbs," Kyoraku said.

"I... understand what you mean, but..."

"And the people who enjoyed being not cut in half were really upset, because about a hundred people? Just plain got cut in half," Kyoraku said. "Like, right in half. At the waist and the long way. Quincies were not discriminating."

"I get the idea!" Unohana snapped.

"So you maybe get that I was not planning to kill off my greatest medical asset, who keeps my soldiers able to fight at their full potential and is the only reason most of my Captains still have hands... in order to make one really good swordsman better at being good," Kyoraku said, his tone dripping with annoyance.

"Shunsui, I feel that you are really not seeing things from my perspective here..."

"Well," Kyoraku began. "I confess, I have been a bit short-sighted lately. On account of only having one goddamn eye."

"... That was maybe not the best wording to use, I admit," Unohana said delicately.

"The other eye got shot out, you see."

"Yes, I was there for the after-action repo-"

"By Quincies."

Unohana winced. "Yes, I helped with the treatment of i-"

"Because, you see, Quincies invaded and blew up all the buildings and shot everyone. You might have noticed it."

"You are being so unreasonable here..."

"Having my eye shot out makes me grumpy," Kyoraku grumbled. "Especially when my chief medic, rather than healing it, just gives me an eyepatch. Because she was busy being super upset about how sad she was that she got into a fight with a little crazy sword-boy like, a thousand years ago."

"Shunsui, the thrill of battle and the passing of the title of Kenpachi are a holy duty to me," Unohana said.

"You were a doctor for a thousand years! You can't have been that excited about them!"

"... I... needed to... pass the time."

"For a thousand years?! Zaraki actually got here a long time ago! If it was so important you 'perform your holy duty,' why didn't you, hmmmmmm... I dunno... do it?!"

Unohana murmured something that sounded like, "Cake,"

"What? I didn't hear you."

"Cake," she grumbled. "There's this bakery next to my Captain's Quarters that sells really good cake, and... well, it was like, every time I walked to go find Zaraki, really get that Kenpachi thing down, I smelled it on the breeze, and I'm like, 'Well, I have time for a slice, it's not like invaders are going to come in and kill everyone, we have those big walls.'"

"... Yeah, those walls aren't great, are they."

"They really don't seem to stop anyone."

"You think if we put some spikes on top of them, or..."

"I was actually wondering if we should get some kind of dome. Like, it seems everyone who comes in gets there by coming in through the air, and..."

"But then won't we run out of air?" Kyoraku asked.

"We can put some holes in the bottom. To let wind in," Unohana suggested.

"Wind that carries the scent of cake?" Kyoraku suggested.

"God, I knew I shouldn't have mentioned that. That is just the sort of thing you would latch onto when I'm trying to make an important point," Unohana growled.

"Important point, please," Kyoraku said, rolling his eyes... well, okay, again, eye. "You were putting it off because you just didn't want to do it. Not that I blame you, who would want to spend time with Zaraki? He's pretty horrible."

"I said it was the holy duty of the Kenpachi. It was not the fast duty of the Kenpachi," Unohana said firmly. "I just had to get it done eventually. But when it was done, I was definitely supposed to die. That's clear."

"Oh, that's just bullshit and we both know it," Kyoraku said flatly. "For starters, you are the one who made up the title of Kenpachi. So the only one who decided it had any duties at all was you. And let's be frank here, when you made up the title it was basically just an excuse for you to go around beating random people up."

"Oh, so what, I'm not supposed to follow my own rules?"

"Not when they tell you to die and take away my single most useful Captain in the middle of a war, no!"

"Well, now you're just asking me to be a hypocrite."

"You're asking yourself to die! How is that worse?" Kyoraku snapped.

"Because as the Kenpachi, the greatest of all swordswomen, death holds no fear to me so long as I can face the greatest of all battles and pass on my title to a worthy successor," Unohana said piously.

"You already did. There's been like, four other Kenpachis since you. You've been a doctor for seriously like a thousand years while everyone else ran around being Kenpachis," Kyoraku pointed out.

"... Yes. Well. Um. They weren't real Kenpachis."

"Define a real Kenpachi."

"Someone who killed the Kenpachi before them!"

"A rule you made up."

"Well obviously, I made up the idea of Kenpachis!" Unohana snapped.

"Then if you made up the rules, you can just change them. I mean, that's how rules work. They can be amended later if they're found flawed, or outdated, or, just as an example, batshit insane," Kyoraku said.

"You are being seriously oppressive of my role as Kenpachi," Unohana said flatly.

"You haven't been Kenpachi in 1,000 years!"

"No, see, those other Kenpachis were fakes, s-"

"Unohana. Retsu," Kyoraku said, very softly. "I'm going to be clear on this, because you are clearly not having some trouble grasping the key concepts. I don't care about who is Kenpachi. I don't care about anyone's holy duties. I don't care about you and Zaraki's weird psychotic sadomasochist crush on each other... in fact, that one's pretty gross. But I have a lot of half-dead people out there, and I need all the doctors I can get patching them up. You're the best doctor. So stop trying to kill yourself for like, a month and help us deal with that whole war thing, m'kay?"

Unohana turned her face from him, her arms cross obstinately. "Racist."

"Kenpachis are not a race."

"I never had this problem with the old Captain-Commander. He understood how difficult it can be to be a Kenpachi. All the problems society heaped on us," Unohana said petulantly. "He would be congratulating me on how well I followed the rules."

"Oh. Oh, of course. I'm sorry, I should clearly be trying to do more like Old Man Yama," Kyoraku said. "His tenure as Captain-Commander is clearly the best example of how we should run the post. In fact, why I don't go get him, and ask him what he thinks we should do next."

Kyoraku stood up, and left the room for a few minutes, returning with what appeared to be a badly scorched sandal.

"What's that?" Unohana asked.

"This," Kyoraku said flatly, "Is literally the only thing left of Captain-Commander Yamamoto. So tell me, Captain-Commander, what do you think of how well the Gotei 13 is going right this moment? Hmmm, what's that? You don't think anything? Because you were vaporized? So do you suppose maybe that means your leadership was lacking a certain something, and maybe Unohana should shut up and do as she's told on the off-chance I do a better job?"

"... You got mean since you got promoted," Unohana pouted.

"I'm sorry. It turns out that my eye getting shot out and my father figure being, again, vaporized, does a number on my mood," Kyoraku drawled. "Now. Get your ass out of bed and start fixing people again, m'kay? And no suicide. That's an order."

Unohana sighed and slipped on her sandals. "Wound should have been lethal anyway..."

"It was only one stab wound, you baby. Remind me to tell you about the time that Momo..."

"Yes, I was there for the Momo thing," Unohana muttered.

"Yes, because you're the doctor," Kyoraku said cheerfully. "So get to it, doc."

"Honestly. A girl tries to pass on her title of amazing swordswoman and die, and you act like she's doing something unreasonable..." she muttered.

Kyoraku sighed. "Honestly. If you're going to grumble so hard over this, how are you going to react to knowing that cake shop you love so much got wrecked in the invasion..."

There was a sudden rush of wind, and Unohana was gone. Kyoraku blinked, looking around the empty room, before turning to the entrance... to see her in the triage hall, going from patient to patient as if there was nothing in the world but the wounded.

"Um... Retsu..."

"Can't talk, sir," Unohana growled, her tone a feral snarl. "Have to get every soldier we can back on the battlefield to wipe those bastards out. This is war, after all. We all need to do our part."

Kyoraku blinked a few times in confusion once again (well, actually, it might count as winking) before just sighing in resignation. "Whatever you say, 'Kenpachi.'"

"Oh, shut up."

Author's Note: It's been awhile since Bleach has inspired me to write anything. But, well... someone had to do it.

As always, please check my profile for both other fanfics, and links to my own original works. Thank you so much for reading, and I hope you enjoy!