A Demon in the Courtyard

KenShuu

Shuuhei had, admittedly, been avoiding his captain. It was a tactical avoidance — there were always things to be done at the ninth that others weren't doing. It had been easy to slip out to the third to deliver papers, to stop by the fourth and check on the injured, to take up a few extra training sessions with the recruits (the third seat had been slacking off with his training sessions to mourn the death of the fourth seat — the two had been an item; Shuuhei took the slack of them both and felt the ache of the loss, too.) A bonus to innumerable training sessions, aside from the obvious betterment of the division through hands-on assistance from their vice-captain, was that often Shuuhei would be so tired at the end of the day that he could go to sleep early and sink further into the void of isolation which had become both his comfort and his own personal hell.

Shuuhei wanted both nothing and everything to do with Muguruma-taichou and inched closer to the precipice of self destruction with each step he took away from the ninth.

Kensei tried to ignore Shuuhei, too. He spent a good bit of his time talking with Mashiro and disregarding the other man's existence. Not out of hatred for Hisagi, not even resentment or awkwardness. Kensei could feel it on both sides, though; there had been a tug of defiance by the two of them against one another. Shuuhei was an unfamiliar thing; some foreign object lodged deep in the heart of the ninth division that Kensei's body rebelled against even as his instincts latched on to it, welcoming it further in. And Kensei could not choose between the logic of denying Shuuhei his place at the ninth, and this other thing which only wished to be as close as possible to him. So he'd taken the coward's road (as Shuuhei had done, that was a stroke against him) and simply avoided the conflict of the situation in its entirety.

There would come a time, Kensei knew, when they wouldn't be able to deny each other anymore.

Shuuhei sensed for Muguruma-taichou's spiritual pressure, and satisfied with its absence, pushed the door open to the communications building of the ninth. The Seireitei Bulletin and its place of publication were something of a solace to Shuuhei. Muguruma-tachiou, despite having been its original creator, rarely checked on the venture and so Shuuhei threw himself into the publication with a vigor the soul society sometimes feared (Shuuhei was a decent enough writer, but he was a bit eccentric on paper.) Shuuhei walked around the printing press, cleaning out the ink so it wouldn't clog, straightening papers, busying his hands with doodles when nothing else needed attention. His inability to sleep had been an issue of late. Kazeshini lurked, now, at the edge of unconsciousness, hissing hateful things, like a gatekeeper into dreams and Shuuhei often wandered with distress into nightmares about Tousen and war.

The ink Shuuhei had been using to draw manifested itself into the spirit on his paper and, startled and aggravated, Shuuhei summoned the kido to his hand and lit the parchment ablaze. The fire was so intense it burnt his hand and singed the hair on his forearms, which only angered Shuuhei more. When had everything gotten so bleak? When had life become meaningless?

Kensei met Shuuhei at the gates of the division.

"Late night," he seemed to want to ask, but it came out gruff and uninviting. Shuuhei wanted to shove past him, wanted to kill him … no, no. Kazeshini purred in pleasure. Kazeshini lived in those thoughts, was born from Shuuhei's greatest dissatisfaction and inability to distinguish the pain of killing from the pleasure of dying.

"I," Shuuhei stopped, assessed himself, "I was making a last minute correction to tomorrow's post," he lied. He didn't want to tell Kensei anything, not really. In a way, it was like torture, to hold oneself at arm's length from that which could save them. Shuuhei found himself wanting his greatest idol to reject him; as everyone he'd cared about had rejected him, in their own way.

Kensei grunted in disbelief and crossed his arms over his chest. It was a subtle move, but he placed himself between Shuuhei and the exit in something like a defensive stance.

"I should go home now, Muguruma-taichou," said Shuuhei.

"I can feel your spiritual pressure spiking, kid," said Kensei. Shuuhei frowned.

"You're going to burst, you're holding yourself together by stitches."

"I'm fine," Shuuhei said, his voice came with an eerie calmness and Shuuhei could feel Kazeshini clawing inside him.

"I don't believe it," Kensei had moved his hand to the hilt of his sword and Shuuhei felt the last of his will to fight on crumble around him. His taichou, as he'd always known, didn't trust him. Equated something in Shuuhei with the traitor who had been his mentor. Kensei was a smart man, of course he would look to minimize the loose ends of such a personal and life-ruining series of events.

"Will you fight me?" Asked Shuuhei, his voice a resigned whisper, laced with hurt.

"Give me a reason not to, kid," Kensei responded, almost pleaded. He seemed to be searching Shuuhei's eyes. Shuuhei's hand fell to Kazeshini almost of its own accord, just because he wanted so bad to hurt something. And he went for Kensei in a lunge that was equal parts reckless and self-destructive. Kazeshini whistled through the air above him and Kensei blocked both the sword and the man with ease. It was clear to him that Shuuhei had anticipated being gutted and Kensei revolted against the idea of Shuuhei wanting to die in that way. His fukutaichou had clearly been putting himself through hell, or at least attempting to get there. Tachikaze skirted across the metal of the other weapon and sent it flying from Shuuhei's loose grip halfway across the field. It landed in soft grass with a dull thunk.

"Idiot." Kensei stared hard at his subordinate and thought, idly, about what it might feel like to kiss him. Shuuhei stared hard back at Kensei, and taking advantage of the disarming look in his captain's eye, threw a punch which connected squarely with Kensei's jaw.

"What do you want from me?" Shuuhei growled. Kensei sidestepped the next punch, it was half-assed at best, and grabbed his fukutaichou by the shoulders, Shuuhei didn't fight it.

And Kensei felt the turmoil under Shuuhei's tan skin, felt the instability and the inferiority and the insomnia. Felt his own unsureness wisp away from him. Hisagi wasn't a thorn lodged in the heart of the ninth, he was the heart itself. Of course he was. Kensei smirked, gripping at Shuuhei's shoulders tighter, unwilling to let go of this new thing he'd discovered.

"I want you to be strong," he barked, "… and to smile, Hisagi Shuuhei."

An anon on tumblr requested some KenShuu hurt/comfort angst. I, of course, am not one to deny anyone. Especially if that someone likes KenShuu. This was written in about an hour, is rather rough, and is probably in need of some serious editing. I'll do that some other day. In the mean time, enjoy and tell me what you think (via Review if you'd like. ;)