Despite the starkly different management styles that did not always play nice together, Ōbi and Hinawa had long since acknowledged that the other not only brought something to the table that they were—sometimes sorely—lacking, but that their rookies needed, often desperately.

Even when it caused him headaches and a higher blood pressure than was healthy, Takehisa appreciated Ōbi's soft heart. He was open, and personable, and that held a more powerful sway than Takehisa originally put stock in, even taking soldier morale into account (which he did; he took everything into account, just clearly not always in the correct amounts).

Because sometimes Shinra and Arthur could not even pretend to get along when within thirty damned meters of each other, even when Takehisa sent them very pointed glares over his shoulder that promised a couple grueling hours of "retraining," and Ōbi would just huff, grab the both of them by the scruffs of their necks, and start walking. All Takehisa would get was a, "be back in forty-five!" as the captain dragged their problem children out the door with him. At least he knew where the three of them were going. And no later than fifty-five minutes afterwards (because Ōbi liked to take the leisurely way back from his favorite ramen stop) the three of them would return, with Ōbi's arms over both their shoulders and with such a blissful lack of arguing that Takehisa stopped questioning the methods, and just enjoyed the ensuing quiet.

Because Maki had gained a workout partner with far more expertise than Takehisa himself could provide. He was pretty knowledgeable, but Ōbi absolutely blew him—and everybody else—clean out of the water in that regard, and the results were measurable, namely when he was using her to demonstrate a technique to block and her fist blew right passed his hand to pop him directly in the chin, and sent his glasses spinning across the deck. He barely heard her apologizing profusely, too busy sorting his stunned surprise from the sheer amount of pride that he had to swiftly bundle away to inspect later, because that was usually the technique he could use to stop her when they sparred with each other, when nothing else worked. Ōbi had grinned for almost an hour when he had found out.

Because Iris was quiet and shy, and contrary to popular belief Ōbi could be quiet, too, and they had spent a couple hours putting a few trays of plants into pots up on the roof. Mostly flowers, but a few young vegetable seedlings, with particular care given towards Iris' new tomatoes. She was ecstatic. It was an interesting thing to watch, because any time Ōbi picked up a tool Takehisa felt his gut clench, and he was almost always right to be worried, but when it came to living things the man was always gentle. There were never any accidents. And then he watched as Iris had smothered her laughter in her sleeve as apparently Ōbi managed to cause a massive terracotta pot to disintegrate in his hands by doing almost nothing with it— Takehisa was not shocked in the slightest—and he had looked right at her with a perfect deadpan and said, "well, clearly this one is defective." Takehisa had never heard her laugh that hard before or since.

And he had managed to tame Vulcan's skittishness of fire soldiers with a broad grin and an afternoon in the apparatus bay of pealing music that was nothing but electric guitar, drums and something synthetic that had threatened to scramble Takehisa's nerves something fierce.

And he deliberately never made a big deal out of Tamaki's lucky lecher lure, for which she seemed exceedingly grateful.

He did it all just on instinct, too, very little of it seemed premeditated, and he gave all of them what many had been missing for part—or most—of their lives. Their soft place to fall was here, would always be here, and he made sure they knew it. Once they had realized what he was offering, their youngest three orphans had clung to it with a tenacity bordering on savagery. Yes, even Iris, if that was the only way to possibly justify her determination to get herself all the way to the cathedral of another district, a good hour away, without telling anyone, in the dead of night, to give an enemy captain a verbal what-for. Which would have sent Takehisa into a poignant, confused sort of fury except that it had conveniently moved his plans for a confrontation up a whole week. But that was neither here nor there, because Ōbi had simply made sure she was uninjured, dragged a promise out of her to never do that again, and gave her a warm pat on the head that was the most paternal thing many of these kids had ever experienced. And he doled those out freely, along with all manner of other familial flavors of physical affection. That was beyond Takehisa's particular expertise or inclination, but he was acutely aware of the wonders it worked on the spirits of his crew.

And no, he did not know where that "World's #1 Dad" mug had come from, but he had a rabidly dwindling theory of how it had found its way into the cupboard. Ōbi stubbornly did not touch it for a good two weeks out of denial, until "just this one time, and because it's huge! I can pour a quarter of the entire coffee pot in here," and he had used it every single day since.

If nothing else, Takehisa figured that Ōbi's warmth balanced his own rigid coldness.

Akitaru, however, had long since come to appreciate the windfall he'd been given when he and Hinawa crossed paths. Sure, they sometimes ruffled each other's feathers—which he would admit was probably more true for Hinawa than for him, as the amount of things that rankled the lieutenant's nerved numbered higher than what grated Akitaru's—but he was far more pleased than not with the dynamic.

Even if his ability to frighten compliance into their crew was a bit much.

It was still better than when he would shoot them into compliance.

They were working on that.

Even in light of all that, Akitaru was still well aware that Hinawa gave his recruits what some of them had lacked for a lot of their life: steady, predictable, constructive discipline. Despite his razor-edged tongue, Hinawa wasn't mean spirited, quite the opposite. He didn't just worry about them; he planned for it, planned around it, planned for as many scenarios as he could fathom, and tried to compensate for the rare few he couldn't. Hinawa's concern directly correlated to how short their leashes got. Because over his dead body would he lose one of them, and if he had to tighten the muzzles and bring them to heel for them to survive, then so be it.

Regardless, his firm grip did their rookies more good than not. This was far and away the most noticeable in Shinra and Arthur, who had gone through what Akitaru figured was a long list of authoritarians in their lives, but only the rare few who decided to invest quite so much work in them. And it was clear that putting the polish on their probies was Hinawa's personal investment. He spent hours writing individualized lesson plans, because of course he did, and he probably had each one memorized, because he could change tacks on a dime and not miss a beat. And despite the flinching to his face and quiet, exhausted sighs behind his back, both Shinra and Arthur rose to the occasion. At a damned-near exponential rate, too. His drills were harsh, but fair, in that the target didn't move. He made sure they were taught once what he was looking for, and they pushed to meet it. They didn't always succeed, but the metric they were measured against never changed without him telling them in advance, typically when he changed his lesson plans for the week to match their growth. The army must have hated to lose this one from their cadre.

Maki was an excellent example of what prolonged exposure to Hinawa's training could do for a person who was strong-willed enough to survive it. No amount of verbal abrasion could put a damper on that marshmallow heart, but she had long since learned how to parse his blunt demeanor from what he was otherwise trying to teach, and oh boy was it effective. Mixed with her iron determination, the result was exceedingly lethal; definitely a student of Hinawa's combat style, her technique was geared towards maximum effectiveness at maximum efficiency, and did what he expected any army-vetted technique to do: remove an opponent from play as quickly and completely as possible. It meant that watching them spar together was amazing. Which also meant that he was somewhat sorry that he missed them cleaning house during the raid on Company 5, because that must have been a damned spectacle. This had been reinforced during the "party" afterwards when Hibana had huffed into her wine glass with a disappointed, "and then your stone-faced attack dog and his favorite puppy ate my soldiers alive in my own courtyard. You're all animals, I swear." Except for Iris and Shinra, apparently. He ignored the backhanded insult, and took the Princess-Flavored compliment for what it was.

And he did love getting compliments on his crew's behalf, which was mostly all Hinawa's work, too. One call saw them on scene with one of Akitaru's old peers, an academy buddy and longtime crewmate, and they'd kept in touch since their mutual promotions sent them to different houses. After the Infernal from the initial call had been dispatched, he had a few moments to talk. Of course, most of it veered towards work. The firefighter captain made a gesture towards the rest of Akitaru's crew.

"And here I was wondering how you were gonna find it in you to discipline a house full of armed soldiers, and you take the easy route."

Akitaru shrugged, grinning.

"I think you mean the efficient route. Having somebody else to do it for me is the best."

His friend snorted, rolled his eyes, but nodded towards Hinawa all the same.

"That's pretty amazing though. He just whistles and gestures and something gets demolished. And in almost choreographed tandem, too." He grunted and waved his hand broadly in their general direction. "I mean, just look at that. There's no words being said here, just snapping and finger pointing." He gave Akitaru a look. "I'm way over here, haven't yet made eye contact, and he has no idea who I am, but I'm already a little afraid of him."

Because most of the time Hinawa didn't even have to crack the whip; just the knowledge that it was there, somewhere, was enough. That, and because the kids did good work, and were rightfully proud of it.

"Yeah, it's actually frightening what he can get them to do. And he only has to bark orders at them once. If my staff was bigger, I'd be just a couple steps from a conquering warlord, just from the soldiers he'd train for me."

The other captain gave him a rough, friendly punch to the shoulder.

"Except that you have the battle-hardened edges of a wool blanket. The warlord of a kindergarten, perhaps."

Akitaru gave him a gentle shove back.

"You have no idea. Far more than half my crew are still teenagers. It's just like this," and he gestured to the highly efficient mop-up job Hinawa had them doing, "and then we go home, and it turns into advanced childrearing in the span of minutes. They'll fight fifteen-foot tall Infernals without any hesitation, go face first into an IDLH environment to save someone, and then I'll hear bloodcurdling screams from the shower room when there's a spider in there."

"I mean this with all seriousness, no joke in it at all: this sounds like the perfect job for you."

"I know, right? Why didn't I switch sooner?" He was serious, too. Even when he had to rescue his mighty soldiers from errant bugs—normal, regular bugs that did bug things, not the White Clad kind—these were the best days of his life.

And the only reason he had it so easy was because his horrifically intelligent lieutenant spent a lot of time polishing off the rough spots. Hinawa liked to give Akitaru the credit of simply not recruiting anyone weak, but he was sure it was because the former soldier wasn't really looking to break anyone.

Mostly.

It wouldn't be long before Akitaru was forced to choke on a little enlightenment, because, of course, his two most potent kids could barely stand each other, even over stupid stuff, and occasionally it boiled over. He wasn't sure what, or how, but one afternoon there was a heavy thud that shook the walls of the base, followed by something crashing to the floor.

There was a lot of highly suspicious, deep silence immediately thereafter.

Akitaru was going to get up and check to make sure nobody was injured, but Hinawa sighed, adjusted his glasses, and was down the hall before he could do much more than stand up from his chair. Never mind. It couldn't possibly be anything that required both COs to fix it. There was almost a long enough silence for him to forget that there was anything happening at all, before the sound of a lot of boots echoed up the hall towards the stairs. A mass exodus towards the roof.

Well. Oops.

He made a fierce effort to block everything out and just focus on the paperwork in front of him; he had never directly interfered with Hinawa's style of enforcement, and it would not be happening today as long as it looked like everyone was going to walk away from it. Or crawl away; that had happened once, during one of his more… aggressive cures for unprofessionalism.

And then Maki did an Almost March into Akitaru's open office door, back straight and throwing him a salute before sliding effortlessly into one of her perfect, inspection-ready parade rests, and asked which of his weights he wasn't going to be using for the next two hours; she was going to bring them to Lt. Hinawa up on the roof.

Oh dear Sol, what had happened?

He gestured to a couple bars and several plates bracketed neatly behind the pull-up structure, before sliding his paperwork to the side and propping his chin on his hand.

"Is this something I should know about?"

She paid him only partial attention, too busy picking out the plates she was going to take, before apparently deciding against that and just starting to gather all of them.

"Probably, sir. When he is done with us, I'm sure the lieutenant will give you a detailed report about it."

That wasn't what he wanted to hear.

"…Can you give me the short version?"

She sighed, straightened, and fell back into her parade rest. Really, now…

"Shinra and Arthur had an argument, got ahead of themselves, and snapped a table in the mess hall in half."

Okay. He expected worse, really. But yes, that was exactly the kind of thing that would stir Hinawa's temper, as it implied a weapon made of fire where no fire should be in the building, bare feet on a table, or both. And Hinawa's ill moods were to be avoided at all costs, hence Maki's current very good defensive cover as a Perfect Soldier.

But here in Akitaru's office right now…

"Maki." And her gaze moved from just to the side of his head to actually meet his eyes. "Breathe, and relax." She didn't budge a centimeter. "I'll let you know if I hear him stalking down the hall."

It took a couple moments, as if she thought she was being tested, but soon she let her posture slouch, arms falling down by her sides, and letting out a groan that carried the weight of a great deal of apprehension. Now he was getting somewhere, but he wasn't sure he was going to like it.

"We had a name for this, sir. Back in the army. Our entire squad was wary of it, and even other sergeants in our platoon steered clear when he was in a mood." She rubbed at her neck; it was barely even eleven o'clock, and she already looked exhausted. "Sergeant Hell is back, and I had hoped to never see him ever again for the rest of my life."

What.

She had to be overreacting.

"Sergeant– … I mean, he can't be that much madder than any other time, can he?"

"Have we ever broken a perfectly good table in half doing stupid things, sir?"

"No, touché, but his edge is nothing new. Now it's just a little more acute."

"I am mentally preparing to sleep outside this evening, as we may be too tired to even crawl back down the stairs to bed. Please tell Iris, Vulcan and Licht that I said 'good night.'"

What.

He scrubbed a hand down his face. That told him several things, none the least of which was exactly who had been frog-marched up the stairs.

"He got Tamaki, too?"

"Everybody present in that room when he walked in is about to become intimately familiar with the tiles on the deck." She shifted her weight, and put her hands on her hips. "You are probably accustomed with it from your academy too, since the fire department has always been paramilitary, but if one member of a group screws up, it's like everybody has screwed up. He used to have our squad in the drill yard until we fainted."

He would admit, that did sound like Hinawa, just turned way up past ten.

"Yikes. But you're stronger now. All of you, really, but you've got a bit of a head start with this. You survived him once, you will again." And he believed it, too. According to the lieutenant himself, Maki had thrived under the pressure.

She clearly did not agree.

"We're all doomed."

Akitaru huffed.

"Well, I think you'll be fine. Really."

He was entirely unprepared for exactly how strongly she felt about this.

Maki fished a hand into her pocket, pull out her wallet, and slid a bill across his desk to him that had enough zeros on it to make Akitaru's back straighten. And made him a bit uncomfortable.

"Before the day is done, you are going to hear him say the words, 'sometimes you have to break a soldier so you can build what you want over the mistakes,' and when you do, I want you to keep us in your prayers. I'll bet you anything." She made an uncomfortable sound as she eyed the weights. "And with that, I am going to get these weights to him before he comes looking for me, because that will crank the unpleasantness right up to eleven."

He looked from her face, to the money, and back to her face. She was not intimidated.

"You can't be serious." She stared at him and opened her wallet again, and Akitaru held up his hands in partial surrender, if only to get her to put it away. That was the kind of confidence that either made someone much wealthier, or ruined them, and her bet hinged on one very specific thing happening. He did not feel like taking her money at all. "Never mind. Yes, you are. You need a hand carrying all of this?"

She looked very much like she wanted to take him up on the offer, but shook her head anyways.

"I'd better not. He'll be pissed if he knew I came in and bothered you."

"I'm not feeling very bothered…"

She managed nonetheless, not that he ever doubted it, and with two empty bars and a very heavy box of plates began to make her way towards the stairwell.

"Good luck!" He waved after her. She nodded in return.

And then it was just himself, his work, and some very uncomfortable cash alone in his office. He didn't really even want to acknowledge its existence; when he won—and he would, not because he didn't believe her dread, but because he didn't believe Hinawa was ever that brutally punitive just because he could be—he was going to have to find a way to make it come back around to her. How much ramen would it take to pay that back?

The bill just sat there, unhelpful.

"I guess it's a bet, then."

It would be almost three hours later, when Akitaru got up for coffee, before he would hear anything from the crew outside. He went to the kitchen, partially so that he could see the damage to the table. Hoo boy, yeah, cracked clean in half. No wonder Hinawa was peeved. Upside, Vulcan was already all over the repairs, which looked to be going…"smoothly." For Vulcan, anyways. At least they were probably going to have the single most unique wooden table in any company. He also went because he needed to stretch his legs, and because there were just some days when even his natural state of high energy needed a coffee boost by mid-afternoon. Also because paperwork was mighty dull and sometimes threatened to put him to sleep right on his desk.

The last thing Hinawa needed to see today was him face down on the files he was supposed to be reviewing.

Speaking of, he was not alone in the kitchen for very long. His lieutenant slid through the door not long after he did, looking not too worse for the wear—granted, it wasn't Hinawa he was particularly worried about.

"So. I haven't heard from you since you left my office this morning."

His lieutenant grunted in acknowledgement as he pulled a mug from the cupboard.

"Some of our junior crewmembers decided to engage in some highly unprofessional behavior in the dining hall. They are now putting all that extra energy to good, constructive use."

That was one way to put it, he supposed.

"Maki took quite a few weights with her."

"And everybody is getting well acquainted with them. Thank you for lending your assistance."

Akitaru didn't think that really qualified as "assistance," in this case.

He changed topics slightly.

"I saw the table."

"Hm." Hinawa sipped his coffee. "When?"

"Just now."

"So you also saw what Vulcan did to it?"

"Yes." He grinned into his own cup. "I love it."

"It could use at least seventy percent fewer spikes."

"I love the spikes."

Hinawa shot him a look over the edge of his coffee cup.

"They are impractical on a table."

"They look so metal, though."

The look hardened.

"Don't say that. Don't say that ever again."

"I'm going to have Vulcan redo my desk the same way."

"No."

"What do you mean, 'no?' It's my desk, I want skulls and spikes on it."

"That is not the image we want to project at all." Hinawa took another swallow of his coffee. "Sister Iris may never enter your office again if you do."

"I want one big spike right in the middle of my desk."

Hinawa sighed, set down his coffee, and took off his hat to set it on the back of a chair.

"Dare I ask… why?"

"So that as I finish paperwork, I can have the cathartic pleasure of impaling it. On the spike."

Hinawa just stared at him like he had grown a second face.

"Absolutely not."

"Upside, if they are impaled on spikes, the files can never be knocked off the desk."

"That is the most backwards, barbaric, ineffective filing system I have ever heard of." Hinawa threw back the last of his coffee, and put his cup in the sink. "We are not doing it."

"Just let me enjoy the idea of my medieval, gothic spike desk, please."

The man sighed.

"At least the idea cannot accidentally gouge someone's hand open." He ran his hand through his hair, put his hat back on, and turned for the door. "If you'll excuse me, I have to make sure they aren't taking any breaks up there."

Akitaru shot a look at the clock on the wall.

"It is almost fourteen hundred hours, I'm pretty sure you've made your displeasure perfectly clear."

Hinawa huffed.

"More important than my displeasure, that is not behavior becoming of any young adult, especially not those enlisted in public service." He adjusted his glasses. "They are going to learn it today, and never forget it."

Well, yikes. Akitaru relaxed into a chair, intent to enjoy the last of his coffee in peace. Maybe spend these next few minutes imagining the stacks of paperwork hanging from spikes. The lieutenant was right, though; the giant holes would make filing forms an absolute pain.

Hinawa paused in the doorway, glancing back over his shoulder.

"Besides—"

And Akitaru had a terrible feeling about where this was going.

"—even though they are all good Fire Soldiers, sometimes you just need them to step up their game."

Oh no.

"It's a little bit like remodeling, but with habits, and conditioning."

No.

"In that you have to break what's already there, and build something better on top of it."

And it took every ounce of willpower Akitaru had to not let his head hit the counter until long after Hinawa had left the kitchen and was out of earshot.

Well, guess he'd better pick up that phone.

Because Maki had called it.

Despite all that, Hinawa still had them back downstairs before fifteen hundred hours. Akitaru heard the whole group shuffle back, the sweaty cluster made up of Tamaki-Shinra-Arthur doing a strange, almost impossible combination of both supporting and dragging each other. And limping. They weren't crawling, yet, but he expected the entire freezer's worth of ice packs to be in use at some point this evening.

Maki came in a short while later, returning all his equipment (which of course, was absolutely pristine, and he could safely guess that Hinawa made them all clean his stuff before returning it). He took everything from her as she entered his office, despite her feeble protests, and stopped her before she could leave his office.

"Congratulations." And he passed her the bill back, plus extra. "I know when I've gotta pay up."

She stared at the bill, and at the matching one with it. She looked genuinely surprised.

"Sir, you didn't have to—"

"Yeah, I did. That's how bets work."

"But I'm the only one who made a bet, you didn't make your own offer, we didn't set exact conditions—"

"Trust me, I didn't expect you to nail down exactly where today was going with such perfect accuracy, but hey. I'm impressed." He grinned. "And look! You're still standing. No fainting or sleeping outside or anything."

She smiled despite herself, which he considered another good sign. It meant she was still in good enough spirits.

"We must have not bottomed-out his pity well as much as I thought. That, or listening to our stomachs growl got on his nerves."

He shot a look at the clock.

"Yeah, you all did skip lunch. Dinner isn't for another few hours, though, I would definitely eat something."

"Urgh, empty stomach or not, I'm not sure I could hold down anything heavy."

"It doesn't have to be heavy. You need to put calories back in, or your body won't have anything to recover with."

"Yeah…"

He wasn't overwhelmed by her enthusiasm, but considering she was exhausted, hungry, possibly dehydrated, itching for a shower, and had limbs like wet noodles, he probably wasn't going to get excited cheering.

Better make the ramp nice and easy, then.

"Tell you what. Shower, change, and there will be a blueberry protein shake in the kitchen with your name on it that you are going to drink at least half of. Deal?"

Maki looked unsure.

"Didn't I already take your money? Don't worry about the shake."

"Correction: you won my money, you didn't take it. And I will do what I have to if it gets some food back in all of you."

The sentiment was much appreciated, at the very least, and she nodded.

"Thank you, sir. Deal."

He gave her a pat to the shoulder, spun her around, and pushed her out the door.

"Off you go. And where is everybody else? Anybody who's been up on the roof gets a protein shake, Captain's orders."

He found them in a semi-state of collapse in the hallway outside the dining room where the ill-fated Table Incident (as it would be known as henceforth) took place, as they could admire Vulcan's handiwork from the floor there as well as anywhere else. He recruited Sister Iris to usher Tamaki off to the showers with Maki, and dragged Shinra and Arthur to the kitchen. Almost literally. He could at least start by putting calories back in these two.

There were only enough blueberries for one batch though, and he made sure those were spoken for.

A/N:

Sooo... this what not at all what I was anticipating chapter four to be. I was all geared up to give Tamaki some screen time, but dear sweet Primus she is hard to write. Just about busted my head on my keyboard before I gave up and changed tactics. I promise I will get back to you, Tamaki. T^T

I have not been productive at all during the lockdown. I still have to go to work (I'm an EMT at a zoo, my shifts largely haven't budged), so one would think my inspiration would stay constant.

NOPE.

NOT AT ALL.

What have I been doing? Goddamn Animal Crossing, like a maniac. Like, I've barely even been playing WoW, I've spent hours catching bugs and fish to pay off my home loans. Thanks, Nintendo, like I didn't have enough ways to kill my own creativity. XDDD (but also thank you because this game is a dream)

May 4th was International Firefighter Day, so making sure this chapter happened seemed highly appropriate. I'm still not entirely satisfied with how it came out, but eh.

There are typos everywhere, friends, I can feel it.