How the Jackal Got Back His Coat, Part 3

Oct 31, 2010 14:13

Title: How the Jackal Got Back His Coat
Disclaimer: I don’t own Get Backers in any shape or form. And I do not profit from this in any way that involves currency. And I have to admit that the title is a rip-off of a story of Neil Gaiman's.
Summary: The unthinkable has happened: Akabane Kuroudo's black coat has gone missing. And when something needs getting back, who you gonna call? XD
Characters: Full cast, mostly
Rating: safe
For amethyst_hunter

Part 3 - Wherein the Hat is Unhappy with Certain Choices

The coat. The coat was. The magnificent, long black coat. It was covered in blotchy, discolored patches of bleach stains. They spread across the shoulders, dribbled down the lapels, and liberally dotted the coat so that it looked like a diseased Dalmatian in negative.

All in all, it was ruined.

The hat, however, had managed to escape unscathed. A box of dryer sheets had knocked it off before the bleach hit. It really was the little things: there was only one hat, with much more sentimental value to it, and it would have been so much more difficult to replace than the coat.

But the coat.

Akabane had been deeply embarrassed. He had spent a full minute simply standing in shock and disbelief that such a klutzy mishap could happen to him. And he had had to let the laundryman get away with just a very bad scare. Jackal just hadn’t the heart to call down a vengeful Bloody Rain after that. Especially not since the man had not taken advantage of the situation to run away, but had rather saved the hat from an advancing puddle of bleach, helped Akabane remove the coat while making sure that no bodily damage had been done, and had even called a taxi to take the Transporter home. All the while promising to replace both coats (and bobbing up and down like a bowl of unsettled jelly, but you had to give the man some leeway).

And so Akabane sat stiffly in the back of the taxi, the hat on the seat next to him, and the coat folded over on his lap. The situation was unacceptable. He supposed that he could stand losing face at the dry cleaner’s. Only one person had seen it happen, and he supposed that he could ensure that nobody else would ever find out with a simple, well-worded phone call. But the coat. The lack of a coat. He tried not to imagine what his colleagues would say (or think because if they valued their lives they wouldn’t say anything about it out loud where he could hear it) and failed. It wouldn’t matter if he had decided on a wardrobe change, he supposed, but being coatless through a series of ridiculous accidents…

Even when he was still a practicing doctor, he had had a coat, albeit one that was white (and thus wouldn’t have been prone to the ravages of bleach).

He supposed that he must still have that coat around somewhere. It was the next best thing. And it would probably even work with the hat.

***

He did still have his doctor’s coat. It had taken some searching, but it was there, folded neatly in a box in the inner recesses of his closet. Akabane pulled it on and inspected his reflection critically. There was something sentimental about wearing it again after so long, a relic of the days when he had been committed to saving lives rather than taking them. It didn’t even look half bad - it hung a little looser than it had during his medical days, but that was all right.

But it wasn’t the same. Jackal felt like he had stepped into someone else’s skin, and his body was just about to launch a massive immune response in protest. And the hat, judging by the look of things, wasn’t too happy either. It looked like it missed the black coat, drooping disconsolately at being paired with another garment.

“You’ll have to make do,” Jackal told it, and himself. “You have no choice.”

He could have sworn that the hat sagged a little bit more at that.

Well, he actually did have a choice. He could cancel all his engagements until his new coats were delivered (he had already called his tailor’s, telling them to send the bill to the dry cleaner), and sit around the house in a dressing gown for four weeks.

But.

It grated him to the depths of his soul to do something so unprofessional as to leave off work because of a disaster in the wardrobe department. And the mere thought of four weeks of doing nothing was enough to bestir
the beginnings of cabin fever. He had to get his coat back, and he had to have it now.

A smile crept across his lips at the thought of ‘getting back’ his coat. Akabane was surprised that he hadn’t thought of it sooner. His coat needed retrieving. And when something needed retrieving, who better to call on than Shinjuku’s finest?

The Get Backers could expect another client very, very soon.

End of Part 3

***

aquarius_galuxy: You keep getting things right! I’m going to have to work to keep ahead of you! XD

amethyst_hunter: See, the Hat’s okay! Glad you like it so far. :)

to be continued...
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