damned_institute | Day 40: Greenhouse [Fourth Shift]

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Day 40: Greenhouse [Fourth Shift]

Most days, fish and chips (and a cold beer or three) was pretty goddamned high on S.T.'s list of perfect expense-account lunches. Today, the idea of picking at greasy hunks of unidentified bottom-feeder odds-and-ends (politely known as scrod, to the delight of teenagers all across the Northeast) didn't appeal.

He begged off and collapsed into his bed, after using his damp shirt as an excuse to surreptiously check the contents of his closet. Bingo. His nurse watched his little show, unimpressed but (more importantly) unsuspicious. Not that his hairy chest was much of a catch today, pale and sweating from fever. At least she didn't tuck him in.

The intercom woke up up right on schedule, and pulling the sheets back over his head almost won. But a handful of unanswered missives and a vague sense of duty dragged him out to the bulletin, and from there it was easier to stagger over to the greenhouse.

It was warm inside -- a deep, humid warmth that actually penetrated to the aches in more joints and muscles than he could remember the names of. Like a sauna, without the hassle of finding someplace to look that wasn't a mound of pasty middle-management cellulite. Or a sweat lodge, without the opposite hassle of being conscious that he was the only white guy in the room. In fact, besides the nurses in holding patterns, he was the only person in the room.

He located a tray of tomato seedlings going rootbound in their tiny six-packs, and a potting bench whose location was a quick-and-dirty approximation of equidistantly far from anything blooming. He assured his nurse he knew what he was doing, and after a couple of successful repottings, gently sliding the little seedlings out and loosening the tangled roots, she seemed to agree and backed off. It was, by far, the most fucking theraputic thing he'd found in this hellhole so far, and he let himself sink into the rhythm of the task.

[Free!]

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[But of course, young master. There is always candy in the ~~van~~ parlour.]

"It does. Forgetting your manners is tantamount to becoming a barbarian," Okita teasingly said. He went back to pruning away the dead leaves now that he'd given Jaime a token, the smile never leaving his lips. He giggled a bit at Jaime's introduction though. At least the boy had a sense of humor - that would make this conversation much easier to handle. "It's a pleasure to meet you, Jaime-san of El Paso. It's true I gave you two names, but there is a reason for that. I come from a time when people who knew my name had two reactions - run in fear or try and kill me. If you think that knowing is half the battle, then you will understand my need for secrecy. I assure you, however, that my name truly is Okita Souji."

And Kaneyoshi Fujiwara, but that was inconsequential. No one really needed to know how long his name really was. It'd just make things all complicated and messy. Especially if he ever mentioned his name wasn't Kaneyoshi at all. Such was the joy of being born into a samurai household - future generations had no idea what to call you.

The dead leaves were gathered from his lap and placed alongside the leaves. Okita patted his hands together to brush the dirt off and then casually leaned over to grab a new plant. As he did so, he whispered, "We've acquired something that may be of great importance. As of yet, we've been unable to investigate it fully, but soon enough, I believe we will."

Leaning back with his new plant in hand, Okita pushed the old one out of the way. Smiling brightly, as if he hadn't said anything at all, Okita started digging the weeds out of this plant, too. He continued speaking, pretending like his previous statement had never existed. "There is always more to it than what I can saw in public, or to those who are not part of the club and trusted among its members, Jaime-san. One never knows where the enemy lurks and while we are all working toward a common goal, everyone differs in their methods - which causes strife among the patient body. Our group in particular is noted for its rather...extreme methods and personalities, which don't sit well with the other clubs all the time. Does that answer your question?"

"My mother would agree with that part anyway," Jaime said with a laugh. The rest though, that sounded ominous. "Why would they do something like that?" he asked cautiously. He didn't think Okita really meant it to be intimidating or a warning, at least not yet anyway. And Jaime was curious about the story behind that statement; it might be something worth knowing about on the off chance he ended up on the club's bad side. While the Scarab gave him a definite advantage in a fight, knowing about his enemies was always worth the effort.

Okita finished with one plant and made to reach for another. Jaime started to move out of his way, but stopped as the whisper reached his ears. Definitely interesting, but without more information it could just have easily been only talk. Saying you had something that might be important didn't really mean much, when you got down to it.

Thinking it over a bit while Okita talked, Jaime pulled a plant over to himself and began meticulously pulling out the weeds. Just like helping out around home, he thought with a pang of longing. No, there'd be time for that later, he reminded himself. Homesickness wasn't going to help much here.

"It answers part of it," he began, "but it raises more. Like what kind of 'extreme methods' are we talking about?"

Apparently Jaime of El Paso didn't know of the Shinsengumi. He would have recognized the name otherwise and would have understood the need for Okita's secrecy. Checking over his plant for any more weeds, Okita started to pull out the ones he'd missed. "Simply put, my country is at war, Jaime-san. I am on one side of it, and my name is well known among our enemies. If given the chance to kill me and eliminate the threat of my presence in the war, they will strike at me and anyone around me. Thus, it imperative that I remain hidden in order to save the people I hold dear."

Heiji, Homura, Ayumu, the entire History Club was in danger should any Choushuu appear. Himura was here already, but Okita had a feeling someone else was in the area. He didn't have a clear idea of who, but he could feel it in the air somehow. "Do you understand now?"

Jaime was smart enough not to ask about the whispered secret. It was good because Okita wasn't about to reveal any more. If Jaime wanted to know how true his statement was, he'd have to work for that information. People had shed blood for the accomplishments the History Club had made and Okita wasn't about to give up something so precious just to get Jaime to like them. He pulled at a particuarly stubborn weed, frowning a little at how hard it was to remove. "We're composed of war gods, generals, samurai and killers, Jaime-san. What sort of extreme methods do you--"

The weed suddenly broke free, sending up a small spray of dirt. Normally, it wouldn't have bothered Okita besides the fact that he had some smudges on his shirt now. However, at the same time, he felt something give in his lungs and he dropped the weed, covering his mouth as he started to cough. He'd been doing so well and now, it was all for naught. He felt like he was choking and he couldn't get air in. Why now? Why now?! Squeezing his eyes shut, he pressed a hand against his chest until the coughing stopped. Swallowing, Okita lowered the hand over his mouth and sighed, brushing the dirt from his clothes. His throat felt raw and now his chest ached like he'd been punched.

"...My apologies, Jaime-san. Some of the dirt got into my mouth. What was I saying...?" He closed his eyes as he tried to concentrate on the conversation again, but he could hear the difference in his voice. It wasn't as strong as it had been and it would take a bit for his throat to recover. While he didn't visually check, he couldn't feel anything wet on his hand, so he hadn't expelled any blood yet. He was still safe - for a little while longer at least. "Ah, yes. As I was saying, our methods are usually of the 'eliminate the enemy and ask questions later' variety. It doesn't sit well with the more intellectually driven groups here."

Jaime paused in pulling away a weed and glanced over at Okita. "I might be out of the loop a bit," he said casually. "But I'd remember if there were any wars going on in Japan right now. It'd be all over the news for one thing." Even if he wasn't a superhero in his spare time, that kind of thing was hard to miss. Of course, it was entirely possible that there was a war going on in Okita's version of Earth, but Jaime didn't want to let on that he already knew about the alternate dimensions deal. It hadn't been widely mentioned over the bulletin board, so he wasn't sure if bringing it up might cause more problems.

Jaime frowned at the next part, and was about to ask for more information, specially about the 'war gods' part, when Okita started having a sort of coughing fit. As soon as it was clear that the man was having difficulties, Jaime was at his side, one hand on his back as he kept an eye on Okita. If it went on for too long, he'd have to get the nurses...

The Scarab spoke up suddenly in his head, rapidly filling Jaime in on what was wrong with Okita. "Tubercu..." he began, momentarily surprised, but clamped down on the rest of the word. Okita might be having a coughing fit, but he wasn't deaf or an idiot. And Jaime couldn't afford to give away too much about the Scarab.

The attack was over a moment later and Jaime settled back down once it was clear that Okita was going to be alright. "You don't sound well," he said. Even Okita had to be able to tell that one. "Are you sure you don't want to see if the nurses will let you go back inside? I don't want you to push yourself just to answer me."

His breathing had returned to normal, but he could feel the heaviness remain in his chest. And he hadn't missed Jaime's rather acute observation - too sharp for someone who didn't know him and had only heard him cough once. He'd made the usual excuse that he'd choked, which is what it usually sounded like, so why had Jaime been able to immediately point out his disease?

"I'm fine - it was just some dust in my throat," Okita said, chasing Jaime's hands away. Of all the things he hated, it was being treated like an invalid. "And there is a war in Japan, Jaime-san; just not in the time you think. I come from the first year of Genji, or 1864 by your calendar."

Leaning down to pick the weed up, Okita set it on the table and then dusted his hands off on his pants. There was something wrong with Jaime - or something odd, at the very least. He went back to pruning the plant with the scissors, but it was obvious his attention was on the boy beside him. "What are you, Jaime Reyes?"

Looking a little doubtful and ready to move in close to support Okita again if need be, Jaime settled back down to picking at the weeds around his plant. He stopped, one hand closed around a large weed, as Okita spoke again.

"1864? You're from the past?" he asked in surprise. That made things even more complicated, and he cast his mind back quickly to what he remembered the Scarab saying when he'd first arrived here. It hadn't said anything about time travel, but that could just mean he hadn't gone through time, or that the Scarab couldn't tell. It seemed like that was happening too much of late.

Another thing that had been happening a lot was the Scarab making it more difficult for him to keep things secret. Around home and at school it only really piped up to warn him of something big, which he could ignore or find a way to get away from others if need be. Here there were a lot more metas and aliens and magic users and who knew what else, not to mention that the Scarab was acting more paranoid than normal, so Jaime just keeping quiet when it started talking was going to take more effort. He was either going to have to work on that or work out how much he could afford to tell others here.

He thought all this over as he worked at the weeds and debated how to best answer Okita. It would just be insulting to reiterate that he was just a normal kid from El Paso, and Okita hadn't been treating him like a kid anyway. But all the same the other man would have to realise that Jaime himself wasn't just going to be open about everything.

"There's more to me than I'd want to say in public too," he said eventually, paraphrasing Okita's answer from earlier. "Things I won't tell people I don't trust."

"Yes, I'm from the past. Is it so surprising? Considering some of us come from different planets, if not alternate realities?" The scissors snipped a final time and Okita sighed, thinking back to his conversation with Hijikata on the bulletin board. Things had gone so very wrong with the other Vice Commander and Okita feared there was no way to patch them up again. Setting the shears down, Okita reached out and touched one of the smallish yellow blooms. "We're all trapped, one way or another."

Standing up, Okita moved the plant to be by the other he finished and pulled a third one forward. The monotony of gardening was good for him now that he needed a distraction. It allowed him to think without looking like he was too preoccupied. He could pull weeds out of a pot rather automatically, having spent so much time in the gardens at Mibu. Back then, it hadn't been for gardening purposes so much as to amuse Saizou while the piglet chased after the little dirt clods the weeds had attached to them, but the principle was the same. And he needed this time to think of a proper response to Jaime. Threatening the boy to keep quiet wouldn't do much good, but he had to make sure that whoever could tell he was sick was sworn to secrecy.

Homura, Kenren, Himura and the late Sanosuke all knew his secret, but beyond that, he wanted to keep his disease silent. People would lose faith in him or they'd avoid him. He wouldn't be allowed to play or even speak with people anymore. The fear of the red death drove people apart and Okita wanted to stay with the friends he'd made here. "I understand, Jaime-san. I hope you also understand that whatever ability it is you have that let you see the truth, you'll keep what you've learned to yourself. It's a matter of honor, and a matter of life or death for me. You know more about me than I know of you, and while I may find that unfair, there isn't much I can do. Perhaps one day you'll trust me enough to let me know your secret, as I've already shared mine with you."

"Keep it to myself?" Jaime asked, his voice a mix of disbelief and annoyance. "Ignoring how I found out, which I admit is a lot to ignore but work with me here, what you've got will kill you if left untreated. Not to mention you risk infecting other people! Is your honour more important than keeping others safe?"

Jaime's voice was inevitably getting louder and it was with some difficulty that he dropped back to the conversational tone they'd been maintaining so far. While he couldn't agree with Okita's wish to keep this a secret, it just didn't make any sense for one thing, starting a panic here wouldn't help matters either.

"Look," he tried again. "I know you're from the past, but now? We have medicine to cure this. The treatment might take a while, but isn't it better to come out about it and get some help? Keeping it to yourself is just going to hurt yourself and others and..." He frowned, the plant he'd been working on ignored now as he concentrated instead on Okita. "...I won't let you do that."

Disbelief was fine. There was no way Jaime could know the truth of what would be his demise. But the moment Jaime raised his voice, Okita's smile disappeared beneath an icy mask. Okita didn't look around to see who had heard the boy, and frankly he didn't care. As long as he didn't say the name of the disease or raise his voice again, Jaime would be spared the full brunt of Okita's wrath.

"Don't assume you know so much, Jaime Reyes," Okita said, his voice never raising above its usual level, but the tone so much colder than before. This was something he never wanted to discuss with anyone, let alone some child he didn't even know. Jaime had no right to get uppity about his disease without knowing the truth behind it. "If you must know, it's a custom-made disease and it's not contagious. The doctors here made sure of that when they infected me with it."

Taking the scissors in hand, Okita slowly squeezed them to release the anger that grew with each word he said. If he didn't have something inanimate to focus on, he'd slap Jaime - or worse. How dare a child chide him on something that he knew all too much about? Did he think Okita was stupid? Did he really think he'd risk everyone here for himself? He'd sooner throw himself upon his sword and end his life than allow the disease to travel to any of his companions. And to think Okita was ignorant simply because he was from the past? Unforgivabl--

The spring snapped and the shears in Okita's hand collapsed under the pressure. Okita winced as the sharp end of the wire bit straight into his hand and he looked down. "There is no cure and there is no treatment," he said, leaving no room for doubt or questioning. The doctors had made sure of that as well. It was custom-fit and unbeatable. That disgusting man with his horrible laugh had said as much and so far, Okita had no reason to doubt him. Okita dropped the shears beneath the bench where the nurses couldn't see it and then pressed his hand against his pant leg to stop the bleeding. "You know less than I do about what's happening to me, so don't you dare try and even think for a moment that you have any authority to tell me what to do."

That Okita was angry was obvious, but Jaime found that less important compared to the implications of what the man told him. "The doctors..." His eyes narrowed, and for a moment he looked genuinely angry. "The experiments. That's what this is about."

A sick feeling settled in his stomach. It was too much like what the Reach had been doing on Earth. Messing around with people's lives and futures just to further their own goals. To make a profit out of his world. The things they'd done and the lengths they'd gone to had been mind-boggling in a way, and while a custom-made disease probably seemed insignificant in comparison, it was close enough to remind him of it all over again. And no matter what he might think or know about Okita and the club he was a part of, Jaime didn't think anyone deserved something like that.

There was a metallic snapping sound as the wire of the shears Okita was holding gave away and Jaime started slightly both from surprise at how tightly the other man must have been gripping them and from the flash of pain across Okita's face. But then he relaxed again and nodded once in agreement.

"You're right," he said apologetically. "I do know less about it than you do." Or at least less about how it had happened. As for actual physical effects, the Scarab would be able to figure out a lot of that on its own, not that Jaime was about to tell Okita that part. "But can you really blame me for getting worried?"

He felt sick to his stomach. Not only had he been forced to reveal what the experiments did to him, but he had done it to a man he barely knew, let alone trusted. He had no guarantee that Jaime wouldn't go asking about it on the bulletin board, or telling other people about it. He was someone who asked questions and those sorts of people were great at gathering information, sometimes not so great at keeping it secret.

Okita glanced down at his hand, noting that the bleeding was stopping, if slowly. He must have hurt himself worse than he'd thought. His attention had been elsewhere, so his mind hadn't registered the pain as clearly as it should have. Okita pressed two fingers against the palm of his hand, watching as the blood welled up. He then wiped his hand off on his pants again, not caring that it left dark spots behind.

The sickness gave way to tiredness and Okita sighed, rolling his shoulders to release the tension. He hated getting angry during the day. There were too many eyes to see the happy mask slip, and too many people he had to protect from seeing that side of himself. "I don't blame you for getting worried, but I do expect that next time, you'll think before you let that sense of justice of yours endanger a person's life." Reaching forward, Okita started picking the dead leaves off the plant by hand. "I don't like repeating myself, but I do ask you to remain absolutely silent on my condition, Jaime-san. I don't want people to mourn me before I die - if you know what I mean."

Jaime watched as Okita forced more blood out of his injury but wasn't sure what, if anything, to say. He didn't need to wonder that much about what was bothering the other man. The safe bet was on the stranger that knew all about his illness. The situation was making Jaime feel more than a little uneasy. He didn't like the idea of having such a huge advantage over anyone like this, but there wasn't much he could actually do to level the playing field.

"Okay," he agreed eventually. "I'll keep it to myself. It's the least I can do." He knew a little too well what it was like to have people mourning when you weren't dead. Or more accurately in his case, coming back to find people had thought you were dead and having to deal with their reactions to you not only being alive after all, but also being different from what they remembered. It wasn't exactly the same, but both were difficult to deal with.

His smile returned and Okita added the dead leaves to the pile of weeds and other trimmings he'd been making. So long as Jaime never mentioned the sickness again, he was certain they wouldn't have many more problems. Or so he hoped. The last thing Okita wanted to do was to harm a young boy. He'd done enough of that in the war; killing countless roshi who had only been fighting for what they believed in. "Thank you," he said, the sincerity in his voice evident for once.

It had been bad enough watching Hijikata put on a brave face as the medicines and teas he prepared did nothing to stop the pain. Okita didn't want to see Homura do the same thing. He not only didn't know how to cure the disease, but despite being half-mortal, he had probably never seen someone die of sickness. It would be traumatic, for him and for Okita's other friends, and the swordsman wanted to spare them the realization of that horror as long as possible.

But it never did any good to dwell and Okita wasn't particularly fond of doing it. Resting his chin in his uninjured hand, Okita smiled pleasantly at Jaime and asked, "So... Did you have any other questions about the History Club?"

Jaime relaxed now that it seemed the worse of the situation was over and went back to pulling out weeds, the activity providing something of a distraction while he thought. The conversation so far had given him a lot to think about, both in regards to Okita and the club he was a part of, but he needed some time to work through all the information he had gathered today before going any further. He already had the beginnings of a few different plans though, which was definitely a good start.

"No," he said eventually. "You've given me a lot of help already, even if some of it you would have preferred not to. So... thanks." He smiled, perfectly sincere in what he said. They both knew Okita had been forced to share a lot more than he would have normally, and Jaime wanted to avoid making the situation worse if possible.

"But if I think of anything else, can I contact you or someone else from you club to talk about it?"

"Let's not mention that last part, hm?" Okita pulled the last dead leaf off his plant and sat back to examine his handiwork. It looked healthy enough and it was flowering despite the weather turning colder outside. Okita figured he was finished and leaned forward, resting his chin in one hand while the other tapped the yellow flowers. "I'm glad I was able to answer your questions though."

Smiling in childish amusement as the flowers bobbed under the weight of his finger, the swordsman nodded along with them. "If you need anything else, contact Kaneyoshi on the bulletin board. I'll be sure to answer it. You're welcome to speak to the other members of the club, however, if you so wish."

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Day 40: Greenhouse [Fourth Shift]

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