Toshiro Hitsugaya is a fun combination of an upstart kid and a grouchy old man. He's also a wet kitten. I don't know. I just think he's neat, and that feeling hasn't changed in all the years I've been a fan of this franchise.

I think he's most fun when he's annoyed.

.

Considering how often he did it, one would be forgiven for assuming that Toshiro Hitsugaya enjoyed staring up at the wide expanse of space; he did not. It felt like he was drowning whenever he did it, and it was quite possibly the most fundamentally unpleasant sensation he'd ever felt. The reason Hitsugaya felt comfort whenever he called for Hyorinmaru to reign over Heaven was because it finally allowed him to believe—at least for a while—that there was some sense of control over that vast, black, eternal ocean.

He forced himself to watch the night sky because he hoped, in some way, that he might one day do it and not feel the sort of dread that led men to so many stupid decisions.

During one such exercise, while he ran through a numbered list of every insecurity he'd ever had, from the moment he first stepped into Rukongai to the moment he stepped out of his barracks tonight and climbed up onto the roof, Hitsugaya very nearly lost himself in the horror of it all. He was inching closer and closer to a panic attack with every moment; when Matsumoto's face appeared above him, and she stared down at him with her auburn hair cascading over his shoulders, Hitsugaya felt his heart immediately slow, and he found himself centered again. To think there'd been a time when seeing that face made him angry.

". . . Rangiku."

"Are you punishing yourself again, Captain?"

"If I said no, would you believe me?"

"I would not."

"Then no. I am definitely not doing that right now."

Matsumoto frowned at him. "What's on your mind? Still beating yourself up about what to do to deal with our mysterious shadow man?"

"I'm . . . ruminating on the fact that I was dressed down by a boy whose entire lifetime barely covers the amount of time it took me to perfect my basic sword forms." Hitsugaya paused, then added: "I spoke to Kurosaki today."

Recognition, then understanding, flowed across Matsumoto's face. She sat down beside her commander and patted his leg. "Aha," she said. "I see. Well, we can't all be brilliant masterminds like me, you know. Sometimes it's important to listen to the younger generations, you know. They have a different perspective, and it can be really easy to forget that."

"Haven't you used that same argument to convince Kuchiki to listen to me?"

"I have no idea what you're insinuating."

Hitsugaya groaned, then tossed himself up to a sitting position. "I've been staring up at the void for the past three hours, and I think I've come to the same conclusion I had when I first heard him say it: the rookie is right."

"Oh?"

"I refuse to be suspicious of children," Hitsugaya said. "I will guide them, I will train them, I will protect them. If they turn out to be the key to this . . . Nishi . . . infiltrating our court, then we're just going to have to deal with that. If that's what leads to our downfall, we deserve it."

"That's pretty much the precise opposite of what you told me a few nights ago."

"Why do you think I'm so irritated about it?"

"I mean, in fairness, that's how you are, no matter what decision you make. You always second-guess yourself, whether a human boy got you to do it or not."

Hitsugaya glared at Matsumoto's benign little smile, then shook his head and rolled his eyes.

He flopped back down onto his back.

"Just because you're correct doesn't make you right."