Author's Notes: Another scene from the 8th Division's anime ending.
Sleeping Young
They find him asleep, slumped over a table littered with too many empty sake cups and bottles. His cheeks are flushed and she thinks he might be drooling onto the tabletop but it's hard to see from where she's standing. Either way, she knows she won't be spending the night with the other female Vice Captains, not with her Captain sprawled so inelegantly in such a public place.
Sighing a little to herself, she flashes a brief smile at the others and tells them to have a good night, she'd better check on Shunsui and make sure he's still breathing. They laugh and say they'll visit tomorrow. Nanao doesn't hear them, however, because she's already at Shunsui's side, wondering exactly what she's going to do with him.
She decides not to wake him. He's sleeping deeply and in his state wouldn't get far anyway, nevermind back to the their headquarters. So she closes the sliding doors and dims the lights, clearing the saucers and bottles away until she's satisfied with the state of things.
She also pulls Shunsui's robe up further around his shoulders, taking his straw hat off his head and placing it to the side soundlessly. His face is bare to her now and she tilts her head, watching him expressionlessly for a moment. He's a child when he sleeps, she thinks. He can act juvenile in the daylight, of course, and does, but when he sleeps he really is younger, all the years melting away. She can't say as it's a very comforting thought. After all, those were years they had fought for, that were precious.
Still, it must be nice to shed that weight, every once in awhile.
A small smile crosses her face and she sits down across from him, watching the moonlight find the shine in his hair, highlight the stubble on his jaw. When he wakes, she'll give him a lecture about drinking in public.
For now, she'll let him sleep young.
The End