: Chapter 3- Nanao's Secret :

Shunsui sighed, flipping his worn bamboo hat out of his eyes with one hand while he ran the other through his mop of brown hair. He opened his eyes again, staring tiredly at the prone figure lying on the bleached white hospital bed. He jerked his vision away with effort, and resumed pacing, feet making muffled thumps against the wooden floor of the 4th division's hospital ward. For the past two days he had barely eaten or slept, but no one had dared disturb him. It wasn't that he didn't want to sleep— he just couldn't. Every time he closed his eyes he saw her, saw her falling, saw her dying, all because of him.

He replayed the scene over and over, for the thousandth time. Why had he left her? Were they not supposed to stay together? Of all the stupid, stupid mistakes…

:.:

"Noo!" He was racing towards her, but she had already fallen into a broken heap on the ground. The Hollow leered sadistically at her body from behind its mask. Like two poisonous fangs into raw flesh, Shunsui sank his swords into its mask before it could move; his arms a blur as they twirled his swords around to slay the fiend. The second the Hollow dissolved into nothing, he raced to where his Fukutaicho lay bleeding on the grass.

"Nanao," he whispered, gently stroking back a piece of hair that had fallen out of place. He heard cheers in the background and knew that reinforcements had arrived, but it was all a dull roar. It didn't matter. Nothing mattered. What had mattered lay before him, staining the green grass red.

"Nanao," he murmured again. A single tear landed on her badly scratched glasses.

"Kyouraku-taicho!" Someone ran up to him, shaking his shoulder. "Please move. We need to transport Ise-fukutaicho to the 4th division as soon as possible."

"Nanao." Strong arms were pulling him away. He fought them, as her body moved farther and farther away from his line of sight. He growled in frustration and shame and sheer exasperation at all the feelings welling up and spilling over inside him, fighting against whatever evil was trying to separate him from his Nanao-chan.

"Shunsui stop." His best friend, Ukitake, put his hand on Shunsui's shoulder. "We have to get her out of here if she is to be saved." He stopped flailing, his brain still moving too fast. He felt lightheaded, faint. He couldn't think.

"Nanao…"

:.:

He looked down at her, sleeping peacefully. Her glasses had been removed, and her black hair pooled around her shoulders, framing her face like a halo and giving her an ethereal beauty as the light from the window shone through. She looked calmer sleeping than she ever had awake. Her face still hinted at a scowl, as if something in her dreams was unsatisfying. He sighed, averting his gaze, wondering if the only reason he had never seen her smile was because he kept her agitated all the time.

"You're going to wear a hole into the floor." A female voice came from the door. Shunsui looked up from staring at his sandaled feet. The Fourth Division's captain, Unohana, closed the door behind her, cutting off the voices that drifted in from the hall.

"I don't care," he muttered. "Just tell me how she is."

"She'll be fine, if not mad at the extra paperwork she'll have to finish on the hole in the floor." Shunsui sighed, taking the hint, and dropped into a worn wooden chair.

"But…" His head gave a small jerk. "She'll be very weak and confused for a few days. I suggest you restrain her from doing any work. Her leg was pretty torn up when she arrived."

"Unohana-san," he said slowly. "Thank you." She bowed and left. The door closed with a click behind her and Shunsui turned his attention back to his Vice-Captain.

He moved his chair closer to Nanao's bed and lightly put his hand on her forehead. It was still warmer than normal, but at least the fire that had previously consumed her had gone. She shivered when he withdrew his hand, as though he had taken the warmth she so desperately needed away. When her eyelids fluttered ever so slightly, he did not give a second thought before draping his most prized possession over her.

"Go back to sleep, Nanao-chan," he whispered as he gently patted her hand.

: Nanao's dream :

Kyouraku Shunsui found his newly appointed fukutaicho sitting under his favorite sakura tree, buried deep within a large tome. The pink petals from the tree overhead fell like rain, cascading down in graceful swirls and turns. They coated the spring air with their flowery scent, the true essence of nature.

However, Nanao was obviously not here to enjoy the flowers. No, she was here for the peace and quiet this isolated place offered. She was so intent on her reading that she did not notice the arrival of her captain.

"What are you reading Nanao-chan?" he said loudly from behind. She instinctively yelped and hit him with her book. She glanced up, stunned: she had hit her commanding officer. "I must say you have good reflexes." He smiled.

"My sincerest apologies Kyouraku-taicho, sir." She bowed her head. He chuckled and sat down next to her. Unaccustomed to anyone being so close, she scooted away from him. "And please," she adjusted her glasses, "call me Ise-fukutaicho."

"Nanao-chan! You would take away the best part of my day." He pulled a sake bottle out of the confines of his robe and took a long sip. "Unless of course you'd agree to call me Shunsui-kun."

"Never, Kyouraku-taicho." She re-opened her book and began to read.

A silence fell between them, neither having anything else to say, the tranquility broken only by the turn of pages or the occasional sip of sake. She never moved her gaze from her book; he never stopped looking at her, taking every detail in from where he lay in the grass. The sun traveled across the sky, but time did not touch the pair sitting beneath the tree. He spoke as the last rays of the sun shone across the horizon, basking the world in its orange glow.

"A present for my lovely Nanao-chan."

"Excuse me?" She turned around, unaware that he had woken up. He was sitting up now, legs crossed beneath him, sake bottle out of sight.

He held out his closed fist to her. She shook her head, but he urged her on, eyes never leaving her face. After a moment of consideration, she slowly closed her book and tucked it under her arm.

Little by little, he opened his closed hand. In the center of his calloused palm was a perfect blossom, neither wrinkled nor torn. Her delicate fingers shook slightly as she tentatively plucked it from his hand.

"Taicho…" But he was already gone…

: End of Nanao's dream :

"Kyouraku-taicho." Shunsui opened his eyes. He had fallen asleep with his hand on his knee, chin resting on his hand. At first he thought he had imagined Nanao's voice, that his imagination had caught him off-guard. She mumbled a bit more and he leaned in closer, interested.

"Taicho…" Her voice was soft, but he heard it loud and clear. He grinned inwardly; she's having dreams of me.

He reached over to grab his sake bottle in celebration but knocked over Nanao's secretive kidō book in the process. Normally he would've respected her privacy, her personal space. But he had seen something that stirred the pools of curiosity within him.

In the second that the pages had come to life in their fall toward the ground, he had seen it… Frowning, he picked up the book and held it in one hand, the other hovering over the cover. He shouldn't be doing this; he should just put it back as if nothing had happened. Hadn't Jūshirō told him something about curiosity before?

"Curiosity killed the cat Shunsui, and with Nanao around, you are that cat. Let her keep her privacy. No doubt she needs it with you around all the time."

At the time he had laughed at that statement, but now he took his friend's words into consideration. Curiosity may have killed the cat, but satisfaction brought it back. He knew would not be satisfied until he figured out what was in her book.

I'm looking. He decided, pushing away the small nagging guilt in his head. He cast one last glance at Nanao, asleep on the bed, before opening the large volume. His fingers shook slightly as he turned the pages. The first half of the book was dedicated to kidō spells of every kind. Some, no doubt, had been invented by Nanao herself. Her neat handwriting filled every blank space with writing, descriptions of each and every spell.

After flipping past these with little interest, he reached the end. After were pages, all devoid of ink. He frowned, thinking he had possibly just imagined...

His eyes widened. He had been absentmindedly flipping through the remaining blank pages when he found it. There, in the center of a page near the end of the book, was a perfectly preserved sakura blossom. He had no doubt that it was the same one from the first day he had met her, the first day she had started working as his Vice-captain. She kept it all this time...

He flipped to the next page, but it was blank. None of his other gifts, none of the many poems, and none of her thoughts were there. Mind whirling, he carefully replaced the book on the small nightstand beside her bed and took a moment to look at her. He found himself feeling guiltier than ever, but he would fix that. Or, at least, that's what he hoped to accomplish.

"Nanao Ise, you are such a mystery to me." He whispered. Picking up his bamboo hat, he slipped quietly out into the moonless night.

: End Chapter 3 :