Animal or Vegetable? [Incomplete, Closed]

[machitobaye]

Characters: Machi Tobaye, Itsuki Koizumi
Setting: Catacombs, Morgue
Time: Day 003, Unknown Afternoon
Summary: Machi finds a morgue, Koizumi finds a morgue, Raile does some backlog because it's been bugging the HELL out of him.
Warnings: Some creepiness.

Comments

[facetooclose]

It was a little disgruntling that a child would be so incredulous about his map. Granted, it was unlikely to be actually helpful. But he didn't expect a boy so young to be so eager to brush off the endeavor as useless. Koizumi hadn't acquired that sort of cynicism until he was at least- ah- well, that is- perhaps Koizumi wasn't the best example to use after all. The point was, your average child should not be this cynical

Editing happened because fractured Raile is fractured.

[machitobaye]

Hidden rooms or passages? Machi's brow furrowed a little bit as he crossed the room to grab his sunglasses, unfolding them with practised precision. "Whatever you are think... is work," he replied, not really of a mind to disagree. To be honest, it sounded like a possibly reasonable solution, but Machi didn't know enough to know, and he knew... well, he knew that he didn't know this, so he tried to abstain from passing judgment. All those notes, though

[facetooclose]

The answer was still skeptical, but Koizumi was willing to let it slide. Particularly since bringing up the bodies made Machi seem uncomfortable. Which was ironic, considering that he was the first to be down here inspecting them. But it was a topic worthy of consideration, since it was one more unexplained mystery.
"From before? That's an interesting thought. But if it were from before, that would mean that the house periodically unbuilds itself and then rebuilds itself. Hmm- that's actually a fascinating idea. So if this house is in a cycle, what happens to the residents at the end of it?"
The obvious answer hit him as soon as the words left his mouth; they were, after all, standing in a morgue.
"....Oh," he said in a small voice. But he didn't expand on that; if Machi was intelligent enough to reach the same conclusion, there was no use in stating it for him. If he wasn't, then there was no use in scaring him.

But this blind acceptance of the house and the way it was? That was not acceptable. There was method even in madness.

[machitobaye]

Machi's impassive face didn't show whether or not he had reached any conclusion of the sort, not behind the sunglasses, though in fact he had--he had come to what was pretty much the exact same conclusion, any differences were minor, definitively personal, and entirely detail-related. He was preoccupied enough with other things, though, other thoughts--a persistent mental image of a corpse he didn't want to find or see, for example (he didn't want to think about that person at all, ever, and yet here he was), as well as an eerie image of his own corpse, which peculiarly had a large bullet hole in his imagination. He took the small "...oh," as a sign of understanding and let it go wearily, too ill to care, and feeling a small amount of exasperation at Koizumi's delay--he didn't have the English to try an explain anything, so it was a good thing the older boy had reached something. He was feeling sick still, no thanks to the joint (and obvious) conclusion

[facetooclose]

Koizumi quashed his initial irritation with the boy's reply. No shit? Well yes, it may be obvious that the house had a logic to it, but Machi was satisfied to not reveal the logic, and that was as good as not thinking there was logic at all. But that was beside the point

[machitobaye]

Koizumi's distracted, rambling answer was only half-listened to, although Machi absorbed all the information just fine--Koizumi repeated himself a fair amount in there, after all, and it wasn't particularly hard. The strain was audible to Machi and he counted it as very suspicious, though he wondered if it might instead be nerves--if that was the case, it was likely his fault, and he regretted saying anything at all instead of keeping silent as was his habit; it still made him suspicious, but he tried to overlook it, knowing most people meant nothing by their behaviour, even when he had the skill to pick up on it. The offer was oddly welcome--Machi had his own methodology, but he recognised a valid idea when he saw it...or heard it, as the case may have been. Surprisingly, he smiled a little, in part to apologise, in part in reciprocation of Koizumi's own manner, which was still rather condescending and--in a way, once he stopped being annoyed--a little funny

[facetooclose]

There were no marks on the bodies. That was-
Bewildering, exciting, fascinating?

"Well, this is unexpected," he said. He traced the smooth skin with his eyes, opened an "If there are no marks on the body, then this was not done by monsters. None of these were violent deaths. Then how..." Koizumi was stumped. He ran his fingers through his hair, trying to think of some explanation. "It's also possible that the bodies were repaired. I don't know why or how, but at this point I'm not willing to rule out anything. We should cut open the bodies to investigate further."
His eyes widened as he realized that yes, he really had just said that. Oh. That was bad. That was not acceptable. He had been away from Haruhi for too long, for something like that to have just slipped out- he should know better. He should be more in control of himself. But.... it was a valid suggestion. And if he wanted to find out more, he needed to investigate closer

[machitobaye]

... at that, Machi turned around and looked at Koizumi, flatly. He wasn't visibly surprised, or horrified, or disgusted, or bothered, or happy, or sad, or any emotive response at all. He just turned around and looked at him. Then, silently, the pianist left the drawer he had just opened (it contained an anonymous black-haired woman with a dark birthmark) and crossed the room, opening the cabinets he had gone through earlier