Title: Sleeping Arrangements
Author: jordannamorgan
Fandom: Kabaneri of the Iron Fortress
Characters: Ikoma.
Setting: The end of episode seven.
Rating: G.
Length: 696 words.
Summary: The morning after Tanabata, Ikoma reflects.



Ikoma didn’t remember when he fell asleep after the Kotetsujo’s Tanabata festivities. He only knew that he had when a nearby sharp snore made him start awake.

Blinking his eyes into focus, the first thing he saw was Takumi, sprawled belly-up on a blanket in the middle of the aisle between bunks. The nasal symphony issuing from him was familiar enough; back at Aragane Station, he’d often slept over at Ikoma’s place when the two became engrossed in engineering minutiae until the small hours. Now though, his snores were mingled with several other somnolent gurgles and sighs. Sukari was sleeping at Ikoma’s left in what looked like a very uncomfortable position, while at his right, Mumei was snuggled in a pile with Kajika and her orphan foundlings.

That was nothing new at this point. Ikoma was once a loner, but in the train’s close quarters, he’d grown accustomed to being surrounded by these friends and others in the steamsmiths’ section where he normally slept.

However, other breaths he could hear around him were somewhat different than the sound of his usual bunkmates.

Looking past Takumi, he saw Kurusu on the other side of the car, sleeping upright with arms wrapped possessively around the sword Ikoma had given to him. Judging by its sheer size, the blanket-covered lump at the warrior’s side could only have been Kibito as well.

It wasn’t the first time Ikoma had awakened in mixed company of steamsmiths and bushi, either. After Miss Ayame chose to approve the presence of the Kabaneri on the train, Kurusu had still wanted them to be where he could watch them. To that end, he’d arranged for himself and Kibito to sleep opposite them in an isolated compartment. His unspoken but painfully obvious logic was that they could be contained there if they suddenly turned violent.

In protest of the samurai’s caution, and to demonstrate their own trust in the Kabaneri, Takumi and Kajika had taken up the compartment’s remaining bunks. …It made for some very awkward evenings at first.

After a while though, Kibito and then Kurusu simply stopped returning there to sleep at night. It was an oddly mute and gradual concession that Kurusu had decided the Kabaneri no longer needed such close minding. Soon Takumi convinced Ikoma to take a bunk in the steamsmiths’ section instead, and Mumei followed suit, presumably to stay close to Kajika and the orphans.

Yet now he was waking to see the bushi sharing space with him again; and there was more than that. The soft, steady sighs of breath that Ikoma heard from somewhere above him…

That was Miss Ayame herself.

Ikoma’s heart skipped a beat. He leaned out and looked up, to glimpse the slim, pale hand of Aragane’s young leader dangling from a hammock slung above the upper bunk.

The one soul Kurusu most fiercely protected was sleeping among the Kabaneri, even after Ikoma had once unwittingly come so close to doing her terrible harm. It said much that she trusted them enough to let herself be so vulnerable with them—and it said even more that Kurusu trusted her to be.

A warm sensation filled Ikoma’s heart cage. He smiled and sat back, looking around at the resting faces that surrounded him, as he tried to capture forever the memory of what he was feeling. It was something he hadn’t felt since his sister’s death.

This was the feeling of belonging; the feeling of home. The feeling of being welcomed by people who felt safe with him.

Somehow, it made him feel safer too: safer from himself, from his fears of what the future held, of what he could yet become. The inevitability of becoming a monster that Mumei spoke of so lightly could not be true. These people who had chosen to believe in the Kabaneri could not possibly be so wrong in their judgment.

Ikoma would protect them all. He would do for them what he hadn’t been able to do for Hatsune—because now he was strong enough.

Leaning his head back, Ikoma closed his eyes, and let himself sleep amidst the warmth of his friends for just a little while longer.

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<2021 Jordanna Morgan