A Split in The River of Time

Part 5: The Aftermath

(Its been a couple of weeks since the massive fight with UPM 6 and Giyuu has been training as much as possible even though he's basically on deaths door. Some peering into Shinobu's insecurities and some buildup to the next hashira meeting.)

Tengen woke up to Giyuu in the hospital bed beside him, and his wives asleep in various positions on the other beds in the room.

"...Hello, Uzui." The other slayer greeted him in a surprisingly warm tone. Uzui moved to wave to him, as his throat still seemed like it was on fire from the smoke.
"You don't have that hand anymore, Tengen." Shinobu greeted him from the entrance of the room, with a warm and captivating smile, while walking with what looked like a slight limp. Looking up at his arm, he saw that he indeed had lost the hand in the battle. He sighed.
"That battle was less flamboyant than I had hoped." Tengen said, his head actually hung low for once.

"What's all the commotion about?" Hinatsuru muttered, rubbing her eyes.
"Tengen!" Suma shouted beside her. After a brief reunion, the women stepped out so Shinobu could talk about their conditions.
"Uzui. You lost an eye, as you can- or can't see..." She chuckled, and he raised an eyebrow.
"Lost a hand, you suffered from various poisons, a couple broken bones, and several minor and major cuts and slashes all over your body." Tengen just nodded his head, waiting for her to get to the point.
"I'll say the same thing I told Tomioka when he lost his arm, I believe-"
"-That I should retire? I had already planned on it with my wives, Kocho." Uzui nodded in agreement with... himself?
"Well, would you like for me to send Ubuyashiki your letter of resignation with Tomioka's?" Tengen felt the room grow heavy with Someone's anger. Uzui simply stood up (albeit with some struggle, his legs were in mostly good condition) and walked towards the door. He noticed Kocho's gaze was fixed on the water pillar's face, a soft smile on her own, yet he decided against opening that can of worms today.
"That would be excellent, Kocho. Thank you." He said instead.
"If you leave now, don't expect to come back into my mansion because your injuries aren't healing, I'm not helping you." she replied to his sudden leave.
"Understood." He walked out of the door.
"I will see you both at the next Hashira meeting, where I say my goodbyes, but I must thank the both of you personally first. For your assistance in defeating the upper moons, I am deeply grateful. If either of you need anything, you simply need to visit my estate and see me and I will try my best to help. Goodbye to the both of you." Shinobu nodded, that damn sad smile on her face. Giyuu breathed in, before he spoke.
"Our pleasure, Tengen." The sound hashira's lips curled into a smile as he walked outside to meet his wives. Silence filled the room once the door closed, and Shinobu knew exactly what was coming.
"I'm not retiring, Kocho."
"Yes, you are." she said matter of factly.
"And why is that?" Giyuu said, annoyed.
"You have several broken ribs, massive cuts on your face, body and legs, you had a piece of wood stabbed into your side that you didn't tell me about until the wound got infected, and you, unlike Tengen, had no poison resistance, so that almost killed you as well." She was angry with him, but it wasn't typical Shinobu rage. He went silent for a moment before resuming the conversation with an odd sentence;
"I'm making a new technique for water breathing." he stated plainly.
"What?" She asked, confused at the sudden topic jump.
"You already perfected your technique, right?" she continued.
"Yes, but when I woke up from my battle with Uppermoon 3, I wondered if I would need to adapt any forms to suit my new abilities, so I improvised." She eyed him.

He really made another technique while he was supposed to be recovering? No wonder Aoi was so stressed. He probably came into the medical room after training all day asking for her help, or something dumb like that.

This man would be the death of himself. Choosing to create a new technique while injured so heavily? You continue to impress, Giyuu. With your stupidity, of course.
"Kami, Tomioka. Is this why your wounds haven't been healing very fast? Stressing your body out for nothing. You are also stressing Aoi out, coming in all battered and bruised." She sat on the bed by his feet, warmly smiling at him despite her teasing.

"You are truly very dense, Tomioka-san. Maybe this is why people don't like you." she said with a grin.
"I know I'm dense, but people do like me." he responded quickly. She raised an eyebrow. Tomioka decided to trust Tengen's advice for once, and he spoke.
"You are very..." She gazed at him as he seemed to prepare something, concerned with what he might say.
"...Beautiful... when you smile. Your real smile." Shinobu paused, red faced, and gazed at him. Did he mean what he said on the way back to the estate?

"Thank you..." Memories of her sister flashed in her mind. Remembering just why she wore that smile, every day.

. . .

"Your smile is beautiful Shinobu. Do better than I did, okay?" Kanae smiled up at Shinobu.

"Nee-chan please, just hold on a bit longer. We are almost at the estate, and stop talking like that..." Shinobu pleaded with her sister. They both knew it was too late, her sister had lost too much blood even with the bandages and they weren't moving fast enough to get to the mansion. After some silence, Kanae began speaking.

"He was tall, with rainbow colored eyes." Shinobu looked at her sister as tears streamed down her face.
"Shinobu?" Her sister's voice rang in her ears. It sounded deeper than usual.
"Shinobu!" Her shoulder was heavy as if somebody was grabbing it, and her sister called out to her without even moving her mouth.

. . .
"SHINOBU!" Giyuu called, shaking the slayer back to her senses. Shinobu blinked and looked at him, confused. Giyuu just sat there, holding onto her shoulder as if he might lose her if he let go. He didn't dare mention the tears welling in her eyes. Shinobu looked at Giyuu in a daze.
"Shinobu?" he asked, concerned.
"Ah-" She said, clearing her throat.
"Sorry about that, Tomioka-san."
"Are you alright, Shinobu?" The first time really understanding the words out of his mouth, came with realizing he was using her given name, the word sounding extremely out of place and causing her to make a face.

"Sorry, that was just the only thing you responded to after I tried to compliment you." The man mentally kicked himself, unpleased that he had taken Tengen's advice and it only made Shinobu cry.
"It's fine, just a bit odd." She added.
"If it makes it weird, I can go back to calling you Kocho?" He said, shrugging.
"No... It's alright. Giyuu." She said, seeing the odd look on his face as well. She chuckled at this for a moment, before resuming the conversation.
"I'm fine. Just, what you said reminded me of something somebody told me." Tomioka mildly cursed himself quietly again. Probably something reminding her of a bad time in her life, great going.

"I'm sorry, I just believed it would be a nice thing to say. I didn't know it was rude or anything like that."

"Rude? No, thank you for the compliment, Tomioka." The two sat in silence for a moment.

"We have another Hashira meeting in two weeks. I won't put in your resignation, but the other Hashira may want to question your skills now that you are... crippled." She teased. As much as she wished to hide it, Shinobu was very close to falling apart as she walked away from his hospital bed and into the hallway. She kept trying to do what her sister said, be better, and keep people from death in this line of work. Do what Kanae couldn't, But they always went back. If this truly is what Kanae wanted,  She was letting her sister down. The question of how Tomioka would preform even if some of the other slayers wanted to validate his skills as a hashira was a difficult one to tackle alone, ontop of a bad mindset? He'd probably be fine anyway, he's been training often afterall.

(What did Kanae really mean by "Be better then I did"? You'll never know >:) Atleast not this early. Got alot more chapters planned and ready, just having a writers block. Still gunna be releasing stuff tho. This chapter is alittle shorter, and I will make up for it by posting the next one tomorrow or maybe two days time.)