Love, Trust and Water.
"Always be like a water. Float in the times of pain or dance like waves along the wind which touches its surface." ― Santosh Kalwar
"Trust is an extension of love. When we truly love someone, we give them our heart to hold in their hands. And when that love is returned, that very trust is balm to our souls." ― Julie Lessman.
"Pardon?" Rukia Kuchiki, small and fatigued stumbled over the randomness and unexpectedness of his question.
"I asked you if you could swim, pay more attention." He looks down at her, his tanned, experienced face torn between annoyance and amusement.
"Ah, no, Kaien-dono I cannot."
She trudges beside him exhausted and aching from the training he put her through but truly happy as they begin the trip back to Seireitei. Behind them the midsummer sun is setting and the sky blazes orange and pink and over the trees rich with bright green beauty she can still see the top peak of Mt. Koifushi.
"Seriously! Haven't you ever wanted to jump in a lake or something?" Kaien Shiba sounds indignant and Rukia laughs internally knowing that this man would likely jump into just about anything if he thought it would be fun.
"I never really thought it would be a pleasant experience." Rukia answers him honesty.
"Who doesn't love swimming?" he demands, sounding like he is personally offended.
Rukia breaks his gaze like she is ashamed and continues- "The Rivers in Rukongai's outer districts are contaminated by sewage and run off from tanneries and illegal distilleries. You could barely drink it let alone swim." She still looks at the ground, face hidden. Kaien has noticed this is a habit of his subordinate when she speaks of her past and can only assume it is the pressure to sweep the reality of her origins under the rug that the Kuchiki clan have instilled in her.
In these rare, fragile moments Kaien again feels incredible sympathy for Rukia but at the same time his pride and respect for her swells. To have survived such a harsh and derogatory life and yet still emerge as remarkable and pure as she had, was a miracle in itself. He makes a rash, good decision, and grabs Rukia by her collar.
"Come on then." He takes her by the back of her uniform and swings her around to lead her back the way they came.
"Shouldn't we be getting back Kaien-dono it's getting late." He sees that the gold light is fading but it only softens everything around them.
"Kuchiki if we did go back to the squad you'll only go and find extra paperwork to do to avoid going home so what's the problem of procrastinating here?" he is excited about his spur of the moment plan her shitty Kuchiki rules or curfew time or whatever her reason is, is not going to get in the way.
"Miyako-dono will worry." She murmurs.
That's her concern? He thinks."Narr she thinks I'm with my siblings today." Kaien admits.
Rukia looks shocked for a second then angry.
"You shouldn't be so light about deceiving people, especially your wife!"
"Relax Kuchiki" he smacks her lightly over the head, partly for shouting at him and partly because she's right "I didn't deceive her Kuchiki, stop with the condemning words, I just took a detour and then found you."
Rubbing her little head where he struck she frowns "You told me to meet you at the White Road Gate."
"Details, details. Look I can't stand my sister at the minute okay? She's got all moody and violent and I didn't feel like a kick in the head today." It's an excuse lie but who cares? He wants to spend time with Rukia, someone should want to. She is lonely, that's all, and it's all fucking Byakuya that's making her freeze her heart this way. So he guides her along and helps her glow when she recedes into to desolate darkness of her brother's shadow.
Rukia sighs and follows her superior into the trees, she really should be back, Nii-sama will be angry. He will not notice I am missing. She reminds herself vindictively.
Tucked into a pocket of forest Kaien wondered if anyone but himself even knew of this secret treasure. Through the emerald ferns and plump trees was a small lake of pure water. It was like someone had reached down and scooped out a handful of forest, and then the rain had come and filled it with liquid crystal. He could hear the burble and clink of running water somewhere to his right and luminous fireflies hovered low over the water creating a shimmering golden-green reflections.
"What do ya think Kuchiki? Like it?" he says without taking his eyes from the water, inside his soul Nejibana laughs like the crash of waves, her ecstatic anticipation increasing Kaien's own.
"Yes." Rukia murmurs, looking around herself in awe. Kaien is a little disappointed with her simple answer but Rukia rarely ever revealed how she really felt unless he took careful time to unravel the chains that constricted her, but tonight he is impatient.
"Okay Kuchiki take your clothes off."
"What Kaien-dono!?" Rukia splutters, had he really just asked me that? She was blushing in such an undignified and emotional state that the Kuchiki tutors would surely slap her across the face.
"You're not going to swim in your uniform are you? You'll regret it when you have to squelch all the way back to the barracks with wet clothes." He laughed and then began pulling apart his Shihakusho right in front of her. Rukia caught one flash of bare chest before she turned around, tiny hands covering her tomato red faced. Flustered and distracted she thought that Miyako-dono would surely be unhappy if she found them at this moment. Wait- Swim?
"Ah, Kaien-dono I already told you I could not swim…"
"Well here's your opportunity to learn, I'm going to teach you!"
"I really don't want to learn and I don't think it is very essential for a shinigami to have training on how-"
"I'll tell you what needs training and what doesn't, what are you going to do if a hollow dribbles on you and you can't swim?"
"That's ridiculous hollows can't salivate to the amount in which-"
"They can if your 4 foot 8! I order you to-"
Furious at his attack on her pathetic height Rukia finds herself yelling right back at him.
"You can't order that, it an abuse of authority!"
Kaien, now only in his hakama strides over to loom over her. Rukia, pre-empting an inevitable slap for disobedience tenses up and scrunches her eyes closed. But instead of cuffing her over the head his hand lands gently on her shoulder.
"Trust me, Kuchiki, you'll love the water." She opens her eyes to see he is grinning that smile that makes her heat flutter in a way it never has for anyone else before. He then turns and breaks into a run that brings him to a raised bank, launching himself in a clear streamlined arc into the water yet still manages to cause a splash that reaches to where she stands. She refrains from either squealing of cursing and instead glares in the best imitation of the way her brother does.
When his spikey head bobs back up he looks back over to her and laughs. "We can do this the easy way or the hard way, and I will throw you in."
Grumbling inelegantly as she sits down and unties her woven sandals and yanks off her tabi socks. She can hear him splashing around as she tugs away her outer Shihakusho and only leaves her thin white shitagi underneath. Prudently laying her outer layers of uniform over the bough of a tree with her shoes at the base and then doing the same for Kaien's uniform where he had left it strew everywhere. When she carefully picked up his lieutenant badge she wondered if her brother would be proud if she could ever achieve such a rank -laughable- she couldn't even get a seat. I'm so hopeless, I'm sick of being pathetic. Crossing her arms over her chest protectively and steeling herself, Rukia makes her way nervously towards the shimmering inky water.
Kaien stops swimming to watch as the adopted noble girl stands nervously at the shore, her bare feet inches from the precious spring water. Kaien smiles encouragingly at her as she steps slowly in
"It's cold." She calls but he won't let her grasp that as a pretext to flee.
"You have an ice Zanpaktou Kuchiki, get in here." He keeps his voice soft; he will push her through her fears but never shove. She gulps and he sees the determination flicker across her pale fine-boned face briefly before she dons her noble mask to hide her fear. His heart clenches in dejection as she conceals her emotions. With kind intention and the instinct to help he swims back as Rukia is now up to her hips in the water and her mask is slipping and the raw unease and insecurity washes over her in a pathos expression.
"You're doing well Kuchiki, it's good to face your fears like this." He waits just ahead of her, encouraging but knowing she has to do this herself in order to overcome it. Now up to her neck she reaches out to him with her eyes wide and breaths rapid.
"I can't touch the bottom!" she gasps alarm heightening the pitch of her voice and Kaien reaches out to her grasping fingers and pulls her to safety.
"There Kuchiki that was the hardest part over with, just relax." He has lifted her slightly because his upper torso is still above the surface of the water. Cradled like a small child in his powerful arms she appears to calm then her face heats up and she looks away.
"You spend half your time blushing, is my good looks?"
Rukia ducks down to hide as she tries to control her flittering emotions. His bare chest is pressed against my cheek!
Kaien holds them both still a moment as he tries to make sense of the din in his head. Nejibana is now calling to him but Kaien can't distinguish her voice from the wash of waves and the screeching of seagulls. As he tugs Rukia further into the deep waters she begins to panic for a second time, clutching his arms and her reiatsu jitters with unease and fright.
"It's okay, I've got you." His voice reassures her and Rukia clutches tighter to her vice-captain. And he has got her, his arms are around her and Rukia cannot remember the last time someone held her in such a way. The water is cold but Rukia is pressed to a warm chest.
He holds Kuchiki by her waist, discovering how tiny she really is and how his fingers can almost encircle her entirely. As they drift deeper and it gets cooler he brings her again to press against his bare chest. He tells himself that his actions are only to keep her comforted and warm but he know that he enjoys when Rukia is near him more then he should.
You are delusional Kaien dear! Nejibana laughs inside his mind from where she sits on her rocky throne. Her voice is now clear as the water he immersed in. You love this child. Her turquoise-jade gold flecked tail flails the salty sea water.
I'm just giving her someone to trust.
Love and trust are one and the same inside a person's heart.
"Kaien-dono?" A quiet voice pulls him back to the twilit water, fading sun and the little hand touching his shoulder.
"Yeah?" he asks just as quietly.
"You zoned out Sir " Rukia giggles, "And you say I day dream."
He squeezes her in retaliation, "I was talking with Nejibana." He then realises his starting objective. "Right Kuchiki I'm gonna let you go so I can demonstrate what to do."
"No don't Kaien-dono. Please." He pries her away so she is held at arm's length.
"Kuchiki stop being a wimp. It will be really quick and I'll make sure you don't drown"
"Please don't." she is fastened like a limpet to his wrists. Her dark eyes are wide and yearning and pleading. Kaien realises it is more than her fear of the deep water. Rukia Kuchiki is frightened of rejection. By the sadness in her eyes someone very close to her has let her go before.
He sighs softly and brings her back into his arms and she eagerly wraps her little arms around his neck.
"Never thought you'd ever make someone else do all the work," he shifts her around so she is on his back- "Hold on tight lazy ass."
He dives and relishes the exhilarating feeling of submerging his head into the cold fresh depths. After diving he finally persuades Rukia to let him teach her. She is thrashes around at first but after he shows her how to kick into the water and paddle in arcs with her arms she can finally manage to keep her head above the water enough that he doesn't have to hold her. But she continues to swim back to him for comfort. Or maybe it's simply to use him as an island.
The sun has dipped entirely under the mountainous horizon and night had turned the water into fathomless ocean. The fireflies now glow as bright as little stars and Rukia has busied herself in the shallows with scooping the unfortunate souls of drowning moths out of the water. She tries to save each little life, eyes resolute with compassion. Kaien watches her with something close to adoration.
Nejibana wades into his thoughts, her words rippling inside his head.
The Snowqueen pretends different, but I know she likes the water in this form.
Don't hassle her, Rukia becomes agitated when you poke fun too much at Shirayuki.
HE makes the child agitated; his expectations and pressure dull her.
Kaien shakes away these thoughts like he would water from his hair and looks back to Rukia who has started towards dryland.
"You getting tired Kuchiki?"
"Yes Sir, and cold." She calls back. Her little form reaches the shore and she scrambles up the rocks and disappears into the shadow blanketed trees. Beginning to kick and rotate his arms to glide through the water Kaien wishes he could spend more time like this, away from duty, protocol, FAR away from Sentaro and Kiyone. Out here everything was much more relaxed.
Rukia is dressed when he finds her, she is brushing her fingers through her wet hair. She blushes when she sees him
"Your clothes are over there Kaien-dono."
"Okay, thanks Kuchiki."
He finds his uniform draped over a low branch and his shoes at the foot of the tree. Shrugging into the worn black material Kaien ties his obi and pulls on his socks and sandals. He walks back to where he left his little companion but in the dimly lit forest he snags his foot on a tree root and cashes into the undergrowth.
"Shit!" he growls.
Kaien struggles to his feet and suddenly Rukia is in front of him.
She is laughing, the sound rich with amusement and she's shivering, her hair clings to her pale throat. Kaien leans forward before he can think and swiftly grabs her under her arms. Lifting her high and ignoring her squeal of surprise so he can kiss her. It is brief and sweet and he misses her lips in his haste and instead catches the corner of her mouth. Pulling back and seeing the shock in her eyes Kaien realises what he nearly just did. But Rukia smiles, pure and genuine.
"Thank you for teaching me to swim Kaien-dono." For teaching me to trust again.
"No problem Kuchiki."
Things are left unsaid but Kaien wants it that way. Miyako will worry if he is out any longer and Rukia's shivering has become more pronounced so they walk fast, to keep her warm.
End.
Nejibana I think personally, is a mermaid. With a gold-green tail and long wild hair who sits on rocks. Her domain (or Kaien's innerworld) is a rocky, chaotic, sunny, seagull infested beach with seaweed and shells everywhere :)
The abandonment issues Rukia had stemmed from Renji. While writing this I listened to: Regina Spektor "On the Radio", Len and Rin Kegamine "Electric Angel" and Norah Jones "Don't Know Why" Via YouTube on repeat.
Genuinely my first ever fanfiction, I hope you enjoyed reading, leave a review if you want.