Closed, Complete

[artiglio]

Who : Ken Hidaka ( artiglio) and Muraki ( medico_male )
What: Zombie First meeting after Muraki comes back
Where : Kokakuro (Oriya's place)
When : Early New Years eve

Comments

[medico_male]

He looked the same as ever as he sat at a table in the private section of his friend's restaurant. Oriya had complained a little about him having a meeting here, but there was no other place for Muraki to talk to the young man who had trusted him once, not until his clinic was completely repaired.

When the door opened, Muraki quickly swallowed the pills Jezebel had told him to take for months to prevent a quick relapse into death and smiled politely at Ken. "As you can see, I'm not attacking you for your brain and I can think very clearly. I am not a zombie, Ken."

[artiglio]

Ken was a little startled at this type of greeting. He hadn't really expected Muraki to come right out and say it. Cautiously, he came over, and sat in the seat, glad to have the door at his back.

"You have to admit, it kinda applies to your case Doctor." Ken replied, a bit stiffly. Oh he knew zombie's weren't real, that they were the fodder of legends and awesomely bad monster movies, but resurrection from the dead, wasn't that supposed to not be real either.

[medico_male]

He made no attempt to hide the faint pink scar that still lingered around his neck. It would fade more as time passed, of course, but it wasn't a badge of shame at all. Muraki kept an eye on Ken, trying to figure out what sort of things ran through his mind right now.

Muraki sat down again and pointed at the menu, should his former employee want anything to eat or drink. "Usually, people would consider a man who died and came back with all his senses to be a vampire." And in a sense, that much wasn't far from the truth. But Ken didn't know that; at least, he didn't think that Ken had any idea about that.

[artiglio]

"That would be stupid, everyone knows vampires sleep during the day, and I think you've posted stuff during then." Ken said, giving Muraki a look over the top of his menu. "Zombie makes much more sense."

He sighed and scrolled through the menu, and finally decided on just having some tea. Booze would just be a bad idea at this point.

[medico_male]

He had to chuckle at that. "I'm awake all day and most of the night. What did you hear to think that I'm a monster, anyway?" Muraki's memories about Ken were completely clear, a fact which made him more than a little annoyed at Jezebel's obvious tweaking with other parts of his mind.

His order was for soup, since he hadn't eaten much yet today and Oriya would be annoyed if he avoided food until dinner.

[artiglio]

Ken gave Muraki a sober look. "I found that basement of yours." Was all that he said, a little bit of guilt for the breaking and entering act of it entering his eyes.

"I mean come on! It smelt like rotting blood and there were fingers in the trash can!" This was all said in a hiss, with a special emphasis on the word 'fingers'. "That plus all the rumors, and now you come back from the fucking dead! What the hell am I supposed to believe." Ken huffed. "I didn't want to think you were like that but..." He shook his head, unwilling to end that sentence.

[medico_male]

He blinked. Muraki knew that his basement had been opened and raided quite thoroughly, of course, but he hadn't thought that Ken had been one of the people to go in there.

"The blood, sadly, was from a body I'd stored down there until I could arrange for a funeral home to pick it up. Nobody came to claim it after a couple of days, so I was going to pay for cremation. I assume the AMC or my murderers claimed it as evidence of 'crimes' And the fingers were from another patient, a chef who had an accident with a very shap knife."

Hopefully he'd believe the story.

[artiglio]

"Do you never clean?!" Ken asked incredulously. "You don't get blood on the floor like that with just a fucking leaky body!" Like hell he'd know how much blood a body would loose just left to itself for a few days but still.

"And why would you just throw someones fingers in the garbage." Ken wasn't the brightest person in the world, but he did have some common sense at least.

[medico_male]

"You haven't seen something sit around and drip for days. There is more blood in the human body than people often realize." He'd do all he could to convince Ken that he was no monster, although technically he was. "I admit I should have put the fingers in with biological waste, but I was in a bit of a hurry that night."

Muraki stayed calm despite the young man's obvious annoyance and desire for answers.

[artiglio]

Ken stared at Muraki for a long, silent moment as he weighed the evidence he had verses the man he had gotten to know. A sigh escaped his lips, and his posture relaxed. "Alright, alright. I'm sorry I went half cocked like that." A small, self depreciating smile appeared on his lips. Ken was well aware of his fault of being too impulsive at times.

"As for working for that other doctor, I needed the money. I kinda got myself fired from the tea shop and well...yeah."

[medico_male]

"I'm sure you were upset about my death and that combined with rumors and strange findings to give you a poor impression of me. There's been no harm done, and I'm not mad at you for jumping to conclusions." Muraki smiled as warmly as he truthfully could and listened to the rest of Ken's words.

"And as for that, why did you need money? I left you plenty...." He had an idea of what had happened to it, given misgivings about him, but it was better to know for sure than to be left in the dark.

[artiglio]

There was a blink, and then an embarrassed laugh. "Gave it to charity, at that time I still had my job so....yeah." Ken said, rubbing the back of his neck. "I just couldn't keep it, you know? I don't regret it though, it went to a good cause. I have more tenants now, so I don't think I'll have to rent out the shop front just yet."

A finger started to tap, and play a bit with the napkin, fidgeting was a sure sign that he had fully relaxed.

[medico_male]

"The work you did for him earlier helped bring me back, though if you'd known that at the time you would have refused. I'm sure the charity enjoyed their donation." That was what he'd thought, and it didn't seem to bother him, but he was annoyed that Ken had wasted it on a cause that was probably useless.

[artiglio]

If Muraki had voiced that 'useless cause' comment, Ken probably would have punched him. In specific, it had been a kids charity, and he didn't think anything that helped out kids to be 'useless'. But, the comment wasn't voiced so it didn't need to be defended.

"So what are you gonna do with your second chance doc? Are you gonna go back to the clinic? The window's are still busted you know."

[medico_male]

"The apartment is no longer home now that I'm living with Oriya, but he's assured me that repairs on the clinic are nearly complete. I'll go back to working there once the final touches are put on it. That's the second time I've had to repair the place."

Muraki disliked charity on principle. What point was there in helping the weak when they had the chance to do what they needed to make themselves strong? Even children had the chance, but they rarely realized it.

[artiglio]

Ken generally thought that almost everyone needs a boost once in a while. After all, that's why such charities existed, right? He nodded at Muraki's comment.

"That's a good idea. This city always will need more doctors." Ken said after a moment. "Its gonna be a bit of a commute now that you're not living right above anymore."