Gender-bent reunion time

[kansaikami]

DATE: Day 106
CHARACTER(S): Tatsumi and Watari
STATUS: Closed, ongoing
SUMMARY: A talk between friends
LOCATION: Watari's lab

Comments

[ofhiddenthings]

It had seemed like a very, very long two days since his arrival on the ship, though in all honesty, he knew it couldn't have been as bad as he was making it out to be. He was just-- thrown off by the change to his routine, and it was never a good idea for Tatsumi to change his routine. At least, not anymore. When he'd been alive, it had been one thing, but.. after-- after everything had happened, and then his death.. well. It was just safer for everyone involved when the Kagetsukai had order in his life. It helped him keep control, helped him keep his powers from reacting to his mood.

So being taken from Meifu, thrown on a ship with a near-suicidal Tsuzuki and two of his overprotective Shikigami, being forced to hide what he was again, Tatsumi was understandably just a little frazzled. He wouldn't say that Watari ever made him less frazzled, but Watari at least was fairly predictable. He didn't change, and Tatsumi could always expect the same brand of insanity from the blond scientist, the same effortless cheer.

He could use a little stability at the moment, to be honest.

Stepping through the door of the laboratory, he closed it quietly behind himself, crossing the room to offer the other Shinigami a polite, friendly--for him, at least--nod, settling onto the seat that had obviously been meant for him. (Obviously only because it was cleared of papers, and definitely not Watari's-- he wasn't sure the other man ever slowed down long enough to sit.)

"This is.. new," he said after a moment, gaze flickering briefly over the softer form of the younger Shinigami, the feminine shape, before fixing on his face again with an arched brow. "It may take some time for me to remember to refer to you in the feminine." Tatsumi himself was the same as usual--the tall, slender, serious man with the pretty, Western features--except, of course, for the slightly weary glance and the line between his brows that indicated one of his headaches. Also: the shadows beneath the stool were spiking out across the floor, as well, shifting into strange shapes beneath his feet, the darkness crawling up his ankles before falling away again like the tide.

[kansaikami]

He'd settled back into his routine easily enough, since all of his work was left exactly as it had been in his absence. No matter where he was or what was going on in the world around him, Watari would be in a good mood as long as he had a lab and things to research and build. Even when he'd been alive, the lab, not his apartment, felt like home.

Watari couldn't help Tsuzuki and didn't know if the shikigami wanted to do much with anyone other than their owner, but he could listen to Tatsumi, whatever his sometimes-partner had to talk about.

Once the door opened, he grinned and set the fake eggs down on the table nearest to him, still standing as usual. Watari's hair was the same blond mess, hastily pulled back with a ribbon already looser than it had been just a few hours ago. "I dressed up to celebrate the machine turning on last time, but I can't do that when I'm working." He could decide to buy clothes that fit his changed body even better, but that took common sense Watari likely didn't have.

Watari didn't miss the way the shadows moved around under Tatsumi or the look on his face. "What's wrong, Tatsumi-san?"

[ofhiddenthings]

Watari might not have had the common sense, but then again, that's why Tatsumi was around, wasn't it? He had enough for the whole department, it seemed, or at least enough practicality. He'd been taking care of people for so long that he didn't know how not to. --In life, it had been his mother and sister, and in death.. Tsuzuki, Hisoka, Watari and the rest. "You need something that fits better," he decided with a musing note, eyes narrowed thoughtfully behind his glasses. "I'll see what I can find."

At the question, though, he stilled for a moment, frozen, hands folded neatly in his lap and expression flickering between its usual closed-off look and uncertainty. At last, though, he seemed to deflate somewhat, gaze turning slightly away as he finally noticed the darkness. With some effort, he stilled them, and they settled again into normal, everyday, commonplace shadows.

"If I'm to continue helping Tsuzuki-san while we're here," he said after a moment, the tone a touch embarrassed but masking it, he hoped, with his usual no-nonsense manner, "I believe I may need a sleeping aid, myself." He reached up, sliding his glasses off his face and polishing them on the sleeve of his shirt, carefully not looking at Watari. "Not-- not often, you understand--" because if he was sleeping, how on earth could he be certain Tsuzuki wasn't having nightmares? "--but something that.. promotes deep sleep." Preferably without dreaming, but he wasn't about to say that.

[kansaikami]

Stereotypes existed because they were true and Watari tended to be the embodiment of the airheaded engineer most of the time. There were moments where he proved that there was more to him than just that, but they only came about in periods of high stress for everyone, like when Tsuzuki had tried to kill himself in Kyoto. "Fits better? Oh...at least my shirts didn't get too tight!" Watari was too slender to have developed a large chest.

He chewed on the end of a pencil and waited for Tatsumi to say something once he'd decided on just the right words to explain himself words. The darkness wasn't going to hurt either of them, it was just there.

Watari petted 003, removed the pencil from his mouth, and jotted down something to tell himself what Tatsumi had just said. "It would be easier to ask one of the medics for something, but if you want me to make something I can do that!" Deep sleep shouldn't be hard to induce, and if he kept it simple the chances of things blowing up in classic Watari fashion were lessened. Lessened, but not completely eliminated.

[ofhiddenthings]

"I don't trust anyone else to know what I'll need," the older Shinigami admitted after a moment, still very subdued and a little uncertain. "I prefer to avoid medication altogether when I can." He could be suspicious when in the human world-- it apparently also extended to strange ships in the middle of space. "And anyway, medications don't always react with me the way they would with someone else. I imagine that's true for all Shinigami that aren't quite.." That weren't quite normal, perhaps. A delicate shrug, and he lifted tapered fingers to push longish, dark brown strands of hair from his eyes, sliding his glasses back onto his face.

Glancing back up at Watari again, he crossed one leg neatly over the other, hands resting loosely against the top of his thigh-- the very portrait of composure again.

"I may also need to ask you to check in on Tsuzuki-san for me when I cannot," he added after a moment, vivid eyes lifting to meet the younger man's. "It seems as if Touda has decided that I am too dangerous to allow near his master." A pause, and he tilted his head slightly, hair sliding forward and into his eyes again. "That won't stop me, of course, but it's best to prepare for anything."

[kansaikami]

Watari didn't know what to think of Tatsumi saying he trusted him. On one hand, he knew it already because it was hard to work with someone off and on for the twenty years Watari had been dead without trust, but Tatsumi almost never said things like that, they were implied from his actions instead. He settled for smiling wider as he thought of possible things that might work and scribbled them down on the piece of paper. "Medication can't be helped sometimes, Tatsumi-san. I'm not a doctor but I'll do what I can to make a mix that works on you without any weird side effects." Or with a side effect that wasn't as terrible as some of his past creations.

A wayward bit of hair fell into his face and stayed there even when he looked up from his plans. 003 pecked at his ribbon as a warning when it slipped further down his back. "I tried to take care of Tsuzuki-san before you came here, so I can check on him once in a while!" Touda wasn't likely to see him as a threat unless Tsuzuki ended up less than thrilled with the effects of one of Watari's experiments.