End Result

Vision began to blur through tears as Hinamori clung to Aizen with ragged sobs shaking her body. He's alive! Her whole sense of being, lit up with the fire that came from her belly, the passion she always had for him as she sobbed into his comforting arms.

"Goodbye." He whispered above her and pain shot through her chest as a knife plunged into it, her blood exploding from the wound, dripping on the floor.

"I.. why?" Hinamori rasped, whimpering softly as she collapsed to the ground, vision blurring anew and then darkness.

Hinamori awoke once more, in the sick bay of the Seireitei. Shinigami with healing skills fluttered around the beds, tending to the sick and injured, the mess left in the wake of the trespassers. Her mind replayed the movie in her mind again, Aizen, her captain, the man she most admired stood before her in the flesh.

He betrayed me. He made me think...

"SHIRO-CHAN!" She shouted and sat up quickly. One of the healers came and pushed her back onto the cot.

"Please don't move around yet, Fifth Lieutenant." Her voice was calm and sweet and she gave Hinamori a smile.

"But... I... accused him. Where is he? Where is Captain Hitsugaya?"

"We're still working on him. Please calm down, Lieutenant."

Hinamori calmed down because she didn't have a choice but she didn't like it. Somewhere deep inside, she felt that she knew Toshirou had been hurt and tears welled in her eyes, threatening to fall over onto waiting cheeks. She didn't know how he was hurt, but that he was, and she was unhappy with that. He tolerated her accusations, and still he took care of her. He was always taking care of her.

It was a source of gossip among the caregivers. They murmured and whispered about how Captain Hitsugaya took on Captain Aizen and lost.

"There was ice everywhere," One shinigami whispered, as though it were a secret. "We had to pull shards of ice out of him like glass."

It was true when shinigami were close to death their bankai dissipated without control, without dismissal, but to think Toshirou's skills turning against him? Horrible.

Hinamori heard the whispers, but she pretended she didn't. She didn't want to know what he'd done for her. He was always doing things like this, always protecting her. Always getting hurt for her, the rare occasion he did. Who did he think he was, anyway?

Hinamori had a lot of time to reflect.

When she was finally released from her bed, she lingered on the thought that she might visit her best friend in the hospital. She mulled it over in the room, lips pressed firmly together as she paced, walking the room end to end.

He won't forgive me for believing the worst about him.

Hinamori sighed. She had done that, and she regretted it because she was wrong.

He won't forgive me for attacking him. He won't want to look after me anymore, or be by my side or...

Her thoughts trailed off and yielded to sobs and tears running down her cheeks and into her hands. Hinamori's body shuddered and trembled as she cried into her hands, falling to her knees in the middle of the room. She'd been horrible, she'd betrayed her best friend and she believed he'd betrayed her. How could she have been led by the nose so blindly.

Toshirou's face flashed through her mind. He was concerned, and then angry.

Not at me, no... at Captain Ichimaru.

Her tears began to subside, and she wiped them on her long black sleeves.

He... was never mad at me. Why wasn't he mad at me? I have to go visit him.

Hinamori, with her resolution in place, picked herself up off the floor and marched out of the room. She walked with determination, right up to Toshirou's room and her knee stiffened and shook, breath hitched and she gasped a little and her hands trembled as she reached for the handle. A few beads of sweat dotted her forehead and trickled down gently as she stared at the door.

The door opened and Hinamori gasped in surprise. The force had taken the handle her fingertips brushed right out of her reach and there before her stood Hitsugaya Toshirou, looking cool, pale and collected, Hyourinmaru on his back, and his white jacket absent from his shoulders. His eyes widened comically as he stared at her, clearly surprised.

"H-Hinamori!" He stuttered and caught himself before speaking again. "Are you alright? Are you healed? Why aren't you lying down? Were you released already?" Toshirou fretted over her for a moment gently tugging the gi aside to check that blood wasn't seeping through the bandages on her chest.

"Shiro-chan!" Hinamori exclaimed, full of emotion.

Toshirou paused, his hands still on her lapels, blinking up at her curiously.

Hinamori dove and hugged him as tight as she could, crying into his shoulder, her whole body shook as she sobbed.

Although Toshirou was surprised, he wrapped his arms around her after a moment and held her. In that moment, in that room, he finally had her attention on him, but he couldn't find himself happy about it. He hadn't wanted it like this, not at all.

But when she smiled at him through her tears, his resolve softened and he smiled back. It would be alright, and they could both move on with their eternity.