Endurance
This story would not have been possible without the hard work of my beta, Vally27.
1.
On the eve of her final mission together with Yoruichi, Soi Fon wondered if she was in love with her Captain.
This was en route to the briefing site, escorted by thirty-five of members of her divisional subunit, where the thought resurfaced, like an insect repeatedly assaulting her despite the swatting warnings of the task that lay ahead. Taught to think analytically, she clutched her hands to her sides, entertaining warm, somewhat vague images of her Captain's muscular, quivering neck when she distributed orders; she initiated questionable fantasies of the warmth of Yoruichi-sama's panting breath after a Shunpo session, as delicately hot as a veil being pried from her face. They had been that close.
But she also imagined Kisuke Urahara, newly promoted captain of the 12th, and his hands glued to dark glossy terrain of Yoruichi's throat, his face crushed under the luscious spread of Yoruichi's lips –
Love, she understood, was something serious, something which deserved much more importance than a discussion with her own officers over tea. No, such matters were not proper for someone like her – commander of the most efficient squad in the Division and current probationary Lieutenant – to even consider with her men, who flanked her with the discipline of statues in a thrashing typhoon. She flushed her entire theory of love away first. She adjusted her rank, and when the portal opened, tried not to look surprised at the madness flourishing in front of her.
Her men trailing her like an extra tail from her robes, she fought her away past sprinting medics and Shinigami to Yoruichi's side.
"Yoruichi-sama," she addressed, lowering her voice gracefully under the weight of the honorific. "Please bring me up to speed on the situation."
But Yoruichi fingered for one of her officers instead and said through the corner of her mouth:
"Tell her."
The man with the face-cloth had already begun to speak but Soi Fon – at that point in time – had eyes only for her Captain and the severity of the snub. Yoruichi had always briefed her personally, so her indifference ripped at her with a sharp stroke of concern. As the man continued to move his mouth in shapes suggesting urgent emergency, Yoruichi continued instead, Soi Fon saw, to stare at the wounded Shinigami crawling back from the line and fire twisting itself into a blaze – the colour of the chaos seemed scrubbed into her face like an extra tattoo. And Soi Fon, for the first time that day, correctly guessed: something is bothering Yoruichi-sama.
She felt entitled to know. Yoruichi's unrelenting, glazed-over face made her nervous. Was she anxious because she loved her Captain? She could not tell.
After all, Soi Fon was just a girl. Love, was the great mystery she had yet to master. And she could not help but wonder.
2.
Every Division in the Gotei 13 had earned its status and reputation through centuries of fighting and maintaining the balance of souls in the universe. As a consequence, each Division acquired for itself its own motto, imposed by onlookers and fellow comrades. These slogans were the first thing new trainees are taught to remember upon their recruitment into the Division. 11th Division instructors have, for years, made their rookies shout their motto – FIRST ONE IN, LAST ONE OUT – as they embarked on their maiden skirmishes. The 4th Division, too, calls for each medic to remember, to LEAVE NO MAN BEHIND.
When Soi Fon collapsed to the ground, her lungs crying out for oxygen, on her first day at the selection trials for the 2nd Division, she saw the words carved on the wall which casually observes the main training grounds. The 2nd Division motto sunk and rose as she adjusted her vision, as her instructors beat her back to her feet. It seemed highlighted with a reddish edge of someone's overly formal strokes, as if the words had been scraped onto skin:
ENDURE AND EXCEL.
Most 2nd Division officers never questioned the abstract philosophy behind the claim to endure/ excel, preferring instead to trust in it with a quiet faith. Partly because they were pleased at their long, hard-fought positions in the Onmitsukido. Partly because they knew, with a prickling guilt: everything about being in the Onmitsukido is about endurance.
They endured the solemn responsibility of undergoing their selection trials, 2nd Division being the only one among the Gotei 13 to insist upon one, in addition to standard training at the academy. They endured the intent of their seniors to ensure they were fully prepared for what they were going to undertake. Soi Fon, for example, has continued to feel guilty at the unnerving memory of her falling to a ground on her first day at the trials, an offense punishable by a month's confinement for recruits. She endured the swarm of insults and taunts by her instructors on that first day. So that when she returned as an instructor herself, she amended the rules: falling to the ground unauthorized would from her time be an offense punishable by two months' confinement.
They endured the Onmitsukido's own special training: a collection of perfectly physical endurance tests affectionately labeled by practicing officers as Hell Week. Every officer who had graduated from that training would remember – with the fondness of a close friend's passing – the obstacle courses, simulated incursions and the notoriously fabled Prisoner-of-War training exercise.
The whole purpose of this, the instructors said – while they took turns shoving Soi Fon's face into the trench of water laced with mud and their own spittle – was a lesson in endurance. Endurance as an Onmitsukido. Endurance to die for Soul Society. Soi Fon had heard their self-righteous banter through the realm of water, and they repeated it to her again as they strung her on a pole and began to use her ribs to practice roundhouse kicks. For all the pain, however, Soi Fon honestly believed it would make her stronger – and she believed it eventually did. For example, on her last mission with her Captain, she lasted all fifteen minutes of torture without giving her enemies a single shred on her Captain's positions when she was captured.
For the most part, 2nd Division officers were not allowed to lose their knife-edge alertness, their specialized skills. No Onmitsukido should die helpless in battle, the legendary Yoruichi Shihoin had announced. As a consequence, from her tenure as commander-in-chief of both the 2nd Division and Onmitsukido, she put into practice a policy of constant rotation of duties to prevent the Special Forces from losing their combat potential. By the time Soi Fon took over as commander, she had rephrased her predecessor's mantra into a personalized worldview applicable to the entire Division:
"I think one should be antagonistic to one's underlings. It keeps them on their toes."
Being an Onmitsukido meant, therefore, enduring constant scrutiny, persistent critique, an eternity of being compared to others. No one was exempt. Even Soi Fon, herself, endured her Captain's policy. As probationary Lieutenant on the eve of her Captain Yoruichi Shihoin's disappearance, she had just completed her third round of training in siege tactic. And she demonstrated her talent for leading her men in such tough situations by successfully forcing her way through the targeted structure. However, she had yet to learn that, in actual combat, storming a building is much more than just blowing its front door.
3.
On her final mission together with Yoruichi, Soi Fon knew she needed to go through every detail of their operation carefully. She did not want Yoruichi to step in to supervise; she wanted to prove the Lieutenant's armband deserved its perch on her bicep.
Her men listened without reaction to her interpretation of the situation: a pack of Shinigami traitors, along with their Hollow allies, had barricaded themselves in the building, a religious school. They had consumed the souls of all humans present within, attracted by the intense spiritual pressure generated by these human "religious types". No motive, no purpose, possible hostages, plenty of chaos. She thought these rogues were simply wrecking and having fun sharing death with others.
Her commands were absolute, perfectly according to protocol for that time: storm the front door under the cover of a Kido blast and leave no enemy standing. She articulated these instructions with frequent glances at the building, as if anxious she was missing out on the action.
A curling tongue of smoke ascending from a fire deep within the school cast a pall over them, but her officers regarded her every word with a tense eyebrow-ed acceptance. Soi Fon looked at them: their screened eyes, dusty veils, the pale slabs of skin showing from where their uniform ended. And for that moment she felt honoured to be among such seasoned fighters.
"Put up a show for our commander, and her friends," she had twitched in the direction of where Yoruichi stood, the blank slate of her face like a scroll waiting for some beautiful stroke of calligraphy to be impressed by. Behind her, looking equally (if not more) emotionless, stood Ukitake Junshiro, face pulled so tight it seemed as if any expression might shatter his muscles.
"Remember what you've been taught by our commander," Soi Fon pressed them.
One of her officers – a girl, whose voice still had a sweet, preteen honesty to it, her ponytail wagging from the cut in her veil – chorused:
"When you're with the 2nd Division, everybody else is a spectator."
They all laughed.
At Soi Fon's orders her fifteen men were split into three smaller units: two to blast the front door open with Kido, eleven to enter the front door with her and two others to sweep in after the initial attack to dispose to of any stragglers. As they took their positions before the bolted doors of the school, her men joked about being the first to die, standing face to face with death and enduring the full blow of the defenders. Soi Fon tried to laugh too, but she felt pointless riding their false bravado. Instead, she signaled her Kido experts, her hand loitering at the brink of execution.
"GO!"
The force of the Kido spell punched through the doors, splitting them down the middle, and spat a blinding orb of light into the building. Before the blaze could subside, Soi Fon's men were screaming their way into the hole. A clatter of swords, the hissing clutter of Zanpakuto coming undone, the girlish shriek of someone's throat being sliced –
By the time Soi Fon obtained a visible sense of the inside, she could tell they were winning. A heap of her men were stacked by the blasted-away door, wounded but still alive. She spun aside, her feet moving with the graceful, unpredictable ferocity of lightning in a clear sky, and dodged the combined attacks of Shinigami traitors. A sword's sharp edge bloated in front of her face, but the tip of her big toe connected with the assailant's mouth first. A resounding crack, the blade singing past her, the chime of a dozen enamel teeth spilling to the ground –
She timed her steps to land at the corner of the wall. It allowed her to vault off the vertical surface, escape the desperate chops of a second assailant and rush back at him from above. Her knee, extended, soundlessly deflected off the side of his skull, and his entire face condensed into that single blow, reduced to a wound.
When feet touched the ground, they had obtained control of the school's lobby.
Her men were cleaning up those who had survived. There were more of them than she expected: almost fifty Shinigami defectors in this small entrance alone. Returning to the one whose entire mouth she dislodged, Soi Fon flipped him over to face her and put her foot on his throat until it ceased to cushion her weight. He let out a gasp, sounding as if someone had squeezed all the air out of his body. Her feet sinking into the shallows of skin, the soles of her feet burnt with exertion and splintered bone, the man's distorted mouth kissing her instep –
Soi Fon let out a shout of triumph. Her men echoed her. She had not even drawn her blade yet.
They had put up, in her opinion, a pretty good show.
4.
From their earliest days in the Academy, all Shinigami were trained to accept that the ritualistic, melee slaughter of hollows was instinct, a necessary duty to keep the spiritual world from falling apart. 2nd Division officers, however, were taught that this principle extended to all beings – hollows, fellow Shinigami, humans, any soul – who threatened the safety and security of Soul Society.
This amended worldview was endured, with a twisted sense of accomplishment, by the Onmitsukido. In principle, an Onmitsukido's rite-of-passage was secured when he returned from his first Special Operations mission, which mainly involved the slaying of traitors, Shinigami suspected of collaboration with Hueco Mundo and humans deemed too "spiritually-attuned" to their hollow natures to be left alive. Apathy in the face of constant butchering was a quality many 2nd Division officers boasted of, including Soi Fon, who insisted that her subunit be composed only of men who had completed at least 100 Special Operation tours.
But with the enduring acclaim which came with being on the secret front in the battle against hollows came other emotions. They endured the unexplained uncertainty of taking lives which, supposedly dangerous, were innocent in their own right. There were the questions which needed to be phrased to superiors properly – why is killing people the only response Soul Society can give to those who threaten its stability? – lest they be considered insubordination or even treason.
They endured the barely sleeping fear, the natural protests of a conscience – of unchecked assassinations of people whom looked more ordinary than ordinary. And then there came the shame, the bitter feeling post-mission: they disposed of their enemies' corpses, took care of their families, wrote their reports. They endured the reality of assassination: not as just the simple glimpse of a face, but the struggling of the tongue, the drowned eyes, a face sometimes clawed into two, the wrecked scream intoxicated by a mixture of both surprise and death –
They took everything – the apathy, doubts, fear and shame – with a flicker of concern. These were abstract things; they still could be ignored. But then dreams came. They would pull through cloudless nights seeing their victim's faces reflected in the sky, cries for mercy replacing the creaks in the floorboard. When the dreams came, they knew they had reached that place – the place where every 2nd Division officer knew that he had endured enough to be called endurance.
The dreams eventually drifted away into other more pressing things over time. But they still remained in vague, if not faded view. Hours before she was due on the battlefield on her last mission together with Yoruichi, Soi Fon dreamt of everything desirable about her Captain. But she also dreamt of something she had never seen before: a man, burnt till his bones gnawed white through the black sheet of his skin, his face arched into the ghost of yell so desperate she felt it burst her ears awake. But her room was dark and the curtains were trembling with a light touch of wind.
Soi Fon had no problems with killing. She knew she could not show weakness. She and her men were detached, professional, and they once massacred fifty outgunned traitors in the entrance of the school without so much as a stray doubt. And while she had long dismissed dreams as irrelevant fantasy, it was beyond her own power to realise she would meet that man face-to-face that very day.
5.
"There are more of them holed up in the hall, Lieutenant."
Halfway through her final mission together with Yoruichi, Soi Fon admitted she was astounded at the resilience of their opponents. They had barricaded themselves in the school's prayer hall, after being driven from every single room by Soi Fon's officers. Her men, though exhausted, were still at full strength. Many were injured, but they refused to stop fighting.
She had inquired on the status of their operation, and the intelligence officers attached to her replied positively: all classrooms secured, plus the outside of the building and the canteen. They indicated only one room, the prayer hall, left unconquered – with at least six beings, possibly hollows, holed up inside, with the leader. And as a precautionary addition, the evident reiatsu was at its minimum.
She sent the intelligence officer away, and turned to her men. Their Zanpakutos drawn, their eyes pruned to obey her orders.
"Watch my back. I'll break this door myself."
As she crouched before the final door where the remaining traitors waited to be eliminated, Soi Fon could not have known it was all too easy. On any other day, twenty-nine years of tactical training would have told her the storming of the school had been a cover for something else. But today, on the very eve of Yoruichi's departure from Soul Society, on the opportunity to impress her Captain, she shouldered her way into the final room thoughtlessly, her officers gliding in behind her like ghosts.
When Soi Fon rushed into the centre of the hall, she realised a disturbing, unsettling current: the over-abundance of decay. Men, women, children – laid littered across the floor in blank-eyed decay. The prominent lack of blood was something else. Their spiritual energy had been collected – perhaps, plundered – from them at such intensity that the hall itself seemed stripped bare of any feeling. Stepping into the hall, Soi Fon felt as if she plunged headfirst into a blinding swarm of smoke, gutting her of all the ability to sense.
Precisely at that moment, she finally saw the source of the fire and smoke: before her stood what she thought was a man, his shoulders smoldering, and producing a stream of ember fragments, a fountain of endlessly replenishing ash. From his shoulders a fire stoked so severely it had melted the roof and released its stringy slips of smoke into the sky from outside.
And then Soi Fon noticed the hole – the free-falling spiritual abyss – in the centre of his chest.
She made an effort to draw her sword, but the man – the Vastro Lorde, the Arrancar – sprinted across the distance covering them, the coils of smoke flaking from his back tightening into a spiral at his speed. Her Shunpo steps allowed her to avoid a collision, but he breezed through till he stood at the door. In the blink of an eye, in the stutter of her own breath, in the flash of the fire – all her men laid quartered at his feet with that single move, all of them separated cleanly in two by the waist.
There was absolutely no bloodshed. Just the absolute, thrilling commitment to carnage.
She felt it too eventually: even shunpo taught by Yoruichi was not enough for her to escape uninjured. As the Arrancar and his men turned to her, probationary Lieutenant Soi Fon collapsed to the ground, both thighs split down the middle by the Arrancar's strike. She eyed her wounds, first fascinated by the absence of crimson, then numbed and made nauseous by the pain. She watched while the Arrancar poked at her Lieutenant's badge, smirked and said:
"This one's a good catch. Shall we make sure she lasts?"
Soi Fon had already been taught to endure all kinds of torture imaginable. But her eyes dimmed, then grew, with a blinking fear when the Arrancar held his fingers inches from her still unwounded arm and began to – draw – in mid-air, as if sketching a formless number. And on her skin, she felt a number appear – her skin stripped bare to the bone with the intense heat dancing out from him.
She screamed so hard she thought she had depleted her voice.
But the wound was merely a longitudinal cut. Then the Arrancar moved his cero-ready fingers to the hovering space between her eyes.
"Tell us everything you know, Shinigami Lieutenant. We are eager to hear," he said. "Or else I will show you how easy it is for me to remove your eyes from your face."
For a while, she saw, and she could still see: behind the glowering frame of the burning Arrancar, she saw the charred walls. Pasted on it was a black cross which occupied the space from the floor to the ceiling; and upon it stood the man with the soundless scream. She saw his head bent double under the weight of his suffering, and his arms flailed apart like her. His naked agony made his face even more terrible.
Seconds later, the man on the cross and Soi Fon began to trade their anguish.
6.
They needed to complete their duties. They held a tight, almost unbreakable responsibility to the Gotei 13, to Soul Society – endurance at all costs, success at any price, complete unquestioned submission to the gospel truth of what they were doing was right.
Most 2nd Division officers endured their physical training (and torture), their hidden shame, their justified slaughter of innocents and their adherence to the greater purpose by believing in the intangible, sometimes the absurd. Many believed in the safety of their Zanpakuto, others transferred their trust in the eternal truth of the rules, whatever they were.
They endured the dreams and fears, the tears and the doubts, with their own faith. Urahara Kisuke believed in the spiritual improvement of souls, till there were no need for conflict and war. Yoruichi Shihoin, the goddess of flash, preferred to believe in the ability of her subordinates, but since such belief was not infallible, she chose to believe Urahara. And Soi Fon, to the end, decided to put her faith in her beloved Yoruichi-sama.
The objects of their trust were, however, not perfect or completely dependable. Zanpakutos and swords could be broken and shattered; rules, more often than not in the 2nd Division, were breached and twisted with a mind-numbing flexibility; Urahara Kisuke had to endure injustice for the sake of what he believed in, without even seeing redemption a century later; Yoruichi Shihoin sacrificed everything to attempt to correct that injustice.
And Soi Fon, whose unshakeable faith in her goddess of a Captain which seemed so secure, beheld that belief disintegrate into a grim morning with the Shihoin residence devoid of life. Her faith had been betrayed, her trust had been used, everything had been heretical –
But not before she caught a glimpse of the divine.
7.
Just before the conclusion of her final mission together with Yoruichi, Soi Fon refused to betray her Captain, the 2nd Division, the Gotei 13, and the entire Soul Society. After the Arrancar had made the threat, she had already set her mind on perishing with not so much as a word wrenched from her tongue.
Still the Arrancar and his men were persistent. She floated in and out of consciousness, passing out in agony – the Arrancar's palm on her temple, his fingers trailing liquid flames along her scalp – only to be revived again for more torture. Her Lieutenant's badge melted into a smudge on her shoulder. She was sure she would have been flushed red in the unbearable heat. The Arrancar closed his fingers around her eyes – and she waited to disappear –
But, in the transfixed world of her torture, she felt an explosion of reiatsu so potent it forced her eyes open. The energy struck at her like debris from a gale, blasting the walls with strokes of reiatsu-borne graffiti. It even extinguished the Arrancar's flickering form.
"What is that?" someone bellowed.
And then a voice, barely containing its emotion:
"I believe you have something that belongs to me."
Through her hazy vision, attempting to focus and refocus itself in the midst of her pain, she saw the hollows and traitor Shinigami around the Arrancar burst into tattered swirls of blood and spiritual particles. She saw the Arrancar's eyes hit the ceiling, and then raise his arms to defend himself. His assailant completely evaded his pitiful defense and struck a blow to his forehead, sending him flying, where he landed at the foot of the man on the cross.
Soi Fon forced her neck to swivel, and she saw it: in the blown apart doorway, panting but standing erect, stood Yoruichi. An enormous halo of fiery reiatsu crowned her face; the bare skin of her shoulders producing an intense, heavenly light; fair flowers of condensed energy bloomed around the shattered wooden floor at her feet, so she looked as if she were walking on water.
The Arrancar attempted a counterattack; Soi Fon could feel both of their forms collide just beside her, triggering a tremor which almost propelled her into standing position. She faced the battle, which appeared nothing more than deflecting stains of bright light against the dull red walls. In the interlude between their moves, fought without weapons, she watched as her entire world hung on the outcome of that fight. She choked on her own breath as the Arrancar delivered a blow which made Yoruichi's face spin away from her –
And then Yoruichi streamed off the ground and the tip of her left foot struck on the back of the Arrancar's neck.
The Arrancar seemed to lurch forward, and his face collided into the ground, sending debris flying in all directions. Soi Fon could not exactly remember what happened next, but when her vision returned after a short interval, Yoruichi was gone and the Arrancar still remained where he was – the back of his head cleaved in two – and then he began to evaporate –
Behind him, the man on the cross had acquired a new coat of crimson. His face, however, had endured the spray and remained black as ever.
She felt herself moving – she thought, finally, her departed spirit was evaporating, too, through realms of endless daylight – but no, she felt arms, strong and steady attach themselves to the sides of her body. Her body tilting, she looked up and saw Yoruichi's face, nose crushed and lips swollen, but still angelic, saintly.
"You shouldn't have troubled yourself –" she wanted to say. But Yoruichi spoke first:
"Don't speak."
Her voice scampered away under Yoruichi's instructions.
"It is finished."
Soi Fon found herself deposited in the care of 4th Division medics outside. She watched as Yoruichi turned her back on her, whispered something to a concerned-looking Ukitake and dissolved into the crowds of men at the scene.
She felt she had seen salvation, she felt she had been blessed with a vision beyond measure. She drifted into a comfortable peace, then dreamless sleep, as the medics tried to treat her wounds.
And when she woke up Yoruichi was gone.
8.
On the morning after her last mission with Yoruichi, a beard of translucent fog dressed the 2nd Division's headquarters at the Seireitei. Soi Fon, still walking with a limp and her right arm stiff in two different places, climbed the stairs leading to the commander's private quarters. She had been here twice in the night and countless times before; she knew the stairs were steep, so she took her time.
She ghosted past the two protective doors and streamed past the veil of ebony-laced silk which cut off the commander's private quarters from the briefing room. There, she separated the thick curtains, unlatched the doors, soaking the room with pale, fog-heavy morning sunlight. Flecks of dust danced in the light. Her bare arms embraced the cool morning air. The room and its adjoining balcony, once tinged with scattered remains of jasmine and lavender, surrendered itself to the crisp wet scent of dew on the magnolia trees outside.
Soi Fon had been instructed never, except upon request, to enter the room. Now, sitting in the shadow of the overhang, after breaking and entering a commander's locked quarters, she thought it did not matter. It seemed somehow ironic that, with Yoruichi gone, she would be willing to commit this grievous trespass.
She fingered dry leaves jammed into the wooden slats of the balcony. She got to her feet and surveyed the view: in the encroaching fog, she could not see four kilometres out into the Rukongai as on a clear day. Instead, she ran her eyes through Yoruichi's private garden – the jasmine tree where her Captain plucked flowers to plant in her hair, the spidery orchids she help tend and the sickly, algae green stream which dribbled a steady, watery echo through her meditation. On the railings, caked with dust, Soi Fon found fingerprints – hers and Yoruichi's – fossils of their last time together on this balcony, where they had talked about her getting the Lieutenant post.
Nothing really matters now, she imagined herself saying aloud. Nothing at all.
She closed her eyes and let the advancing fog overwhelm her, the faint aroma of damp grass accompanying it.
Soi Fon did not know how long she remained there, as if deep in prayerful repose. But when she immediately became conscious of a spike of reiatsu, she tiredly opened her eyes. She flicked out her right hand as if to warn she was aware of the other man's presence.
"You don't need to tell me, Captain Ukitake," she said, a little louder so her voice would be carried easily to him. "I know that the entire 2nd Division has been sent back to barracks and all missions were cancelled."
"Really, Soi Fon –"
"And I also know you've been entrusted to lock down the 2nd Division's headquarters." She sighed. She controlled it – but only just – before it could break down into a sob. Her right hand went to rest on the railings. "Do what you must. I won't take longer than a minute here."
She heard his steps approaching; the audible groan of the wooden planks which told her he was on the balcony with her. She half-turned. She did not feel in the mood to talk.
"There's something which you haven't heard yet," he said, his voice softer, generous.
From his coat he unfurled a white haori. She saw the speckled edges of black, and then – visibly – the logo of the 2nd Division emblazoned behind. Ukitake hung the uniform on his arm, and said:
"The Captains of the Gotei 13 had a meeting on who would lead 2nd Division. And the decision was unanimous –"
"Take that thing away from me," she whispered. "I don't want to see it."
She returned to her viewing of the gardens, only now the fog had limited visibility to just a few metres ahead. Her fists, clamped on the railing, gripped the wooden ledge till splinters started to burn her unrecovered palms. She squinted, hardened her face, tried to block out Ukitake's presence –
"I was at your headquarters just now, and I saw the logo on the wall," he said, quietly. "Endure and excel."
"You've done everything you could. You've endured and came out of every battle in good shape. You've not let anyone down, Soi Fon."
She wanted him desperately to be quiet.
"From what I saw yesterday, I can understand that endurance is a trait of your Division. Endurance in the face of battle, endurance despite the odds, endurance till the end. And when things don't seem too good, your men just keep going."
Old men's ramblings, she thought. What an excellent candidate for Captain Commander.
"I once read somewhere that love is just as enduring – "
Soi Fon tensed. Self-conscious, she wanted to know where Ukitake was coming from, whether he had snuck into her mind and extracted all the thoughts that should not be made visible. But instead, the older man continued as if quoting from some mysterious source:
"Love, and I suppose it doesn't always need to be romantic love," he cleared his throat, "suffers long and is kind. It does not envy – does not parade itself – is not puffed up – does not behave rudely – does not seek its own – is not provoked – thinks no evil."
The words fell headlong into the air, still murky with distant sunlight.
"Whichever may you interpret it, I guess, the message is still the same: love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
"I know you loved Yoruichi a lot – your behaviour last night proved it. But I believe that, you, a leader from the 2nd Division, are the best person to endure her disappearance without completely collapsing."
A devotional pause. A moist feeling on her face. She thought the fog had brought with it a sheet of low-lying rain. But when she turned to face Ukitake she realised, from the downcast but clear look on his face, there was no rain – only her own silent tears. When the older Captain opened his arms, she fell into them, her blurred vision enmeshed with the whiteness of his haori.
"There is one last thing I will have to ask you to endure."
As she slashed her hand to her eyes to dry her tears, she felt fabric breezing over her shoulders, her arms lifted and softly placed in their positions in the sleeves. She felt him straighten her collar. And Ukitake lowered himself to his knees; she could not bring herself to meet him face to face.
"Captain Soi Fon, remember this," his voice gained the quality of a doctrine. "A lot of things abide with us after in the aftermath of this mess, but remember, the greatest of these is love."
Ukitake left her as she damped out her face on the sleeve of her white Captain's haori. Alone once again, she felt the new robe tight around her back, an invisible weight creeping up her spine.
Another sob threatened, but she held it back forcefully, her fists again shaking. A Captain should not cry, she thought. As Captain she needed to put on a front to face what laid ahead, as Captain she would be required to attend the inquiries on Yoruichi's disappearance with the other leaders of the Gotei 13 and the Central 46. As Captain, she needed to be with her men, to comfort and teach them to endure this harsh change of leadership.
Yes. As Captain she knew: she should not be alone weeping. She needed to conduct training right away, to make up for the mutiny of their most powerful officer in a century. But most importantly, as Captain, she needed to be one: her behaviour, her command, her strength, her skills.
As Captain, Soi Fon told herself that she would endure everything without a blink of sorrow or without the weakness of complaint. As she walked out of Yoruichi's – now her own – quarters, she required of herself to endure the dagger to her heart, Yoruichi's shameful betrayal with a straight face. That name should not be mentioned in my sight.
At the gates, though, she remembered something else: a lot of things abide with us after in the aftermath of this mess, but remember, the greatest of these is love. She tried to remember the very thought of love. It seemed dulled now, filtered away beneath the weight of her Captain's robes, an abstract theory. Was Ukitake really making sense, she thought, walking out to see her men.
Her final thought was: love endures? What philosophical things was he talking about?
She could not know it, but her denied love would endure for another hundred years, till she saw her Yoruichi-sama's face again.
First Edit: 18.06.09.
Beta-edit: 21.06.09.
NOTES:
In real life, "Endure and Excel" is the motto of the Physical Training Wing, Singapore Police Force.
Ukitake Junshiro's dialogue with Soi Fon about love is taken from 1 Corinthians chapter 13, verses 6-7 and 13, (13: 6, 7, 13) New King James Version. There is nothing religious about this fic, so I do apologize if it makes anyone uncomfortable. I just decided to use religious imagery to highlight the nature of the Yoruichi/ Soi Fon relationship.
This story is dedicated to my beta Vally27, who is going through some tough times. May you endure through them, & come out stronger than you are, God willing.