damned_institute | Dayshift 42: Bus 2

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Dayshift 42: Bus 2

Before anyone could come to any decisions for their next move, the room suddenly filled with a thick fog. Faster than he could realize what was happening, it had filled up the entire room and swallowed every single one of his friends. Then there was that undeniable stench of iron, blood and... he last remembered taking a step back and feeling that slippery skid and the realization of what that was. By the time he yelled, he was sitting straight up in his bed like he'd bolted awake. Like it'd been nothing more than a bad dream. ...What the hell just happened?!

"Oh! Good morning!" The nearby voice made him yelp with a half squeak-like noise. Oh, for hell's sake. It was one of those freaking nurses again. She was beaming at him like nothing had happened at all. Before he could so much as ask one question, the hag started blathering real fast about some field trip and buses and getting changed and hurrying up before everyone left without him and... OH MY GOD, WHAT WAS SHE DOING?! She was grabbing at his shirt like she was about to start helping him get dressed (or undressed in this case).

He flailed in a desperate attempt to get away from her and yelled his consent to go along if she would get out and let him change HIMSELF. What was the matter with her?! Thankfully, she left but told him to hurry. Hell if he knew what she'd do if he took too long. So for the sake of not getting freaking stripped, he quickly changed into the clothes she'd left on the bed. Clothes being the ugliest looking white-and-black track pants he'd ever seen and a bright blue sweatshirt with a cute little penguin design on the front. This was some kind of joke, right? ...Not to say the penguin wasn't cute or anything but there was no way, no way, he was wearing something like this in public.

But the nurse had burst right in again, and before Kanji could offer much protest, he was being pulled down the hallways and through the doors of the bus. He'd yelled some things her way, but she totally wasn't listening at all. By the time they stopped, he was standing at the front of the bus with a paper bag and the nurse had run off to cart another poor sap along. Frickin' PERFECT. For the sake of not standing up there like some kind of zoo animal for everyone to stare at, he plopped himself into one of the seats by the front and sighed in complete exasperation.

[Free. No limit.]

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He was so cute. It was like Tetsu when he was being a kicked puppy. You just couldn't help but laugh and want to tease him worse. Or maybe that was just Okita. And Nagakura. And -- well, all of the Trio. And, hmmm, everyone in the Shinsengumi. Maybe they just had a weird sense of humor. Probably because they'd been together for too long.

Okita's smile brightened when Hanatarou confirmed his new 'allegiance' and happily started back on his oranges. They were almost all pulled off the rinds now, meaning they'd be easier to eat with one hand. He lifted one to his mouth and was about to take a bite when Hanatarou mentioned he had no plans (something Okita needed to tell Homura immediately) and asked if he needed healing.

He did, but he'd asked Yuffie for that. And since he didn't know Hanatarou's healing method, he wasn't sure what to do. "Yes, eventually, I suppose. But wouldn't it tire you out?" He grinned and wagged the orange at the boy next to him teasingly. "You don't want to fall asleep when we're going on a trip, now do you?"

"Well, um, it depends on the injury. It seems like." Hanatarou blinked a little, then turned his attention back to the bag on his lap. He fished out the juice box and very carefully poked the straw into place, the tip of his tongue sticking out a little as he did, remembering Keman's instructions from the week before.

Once finished, he examined the box with a faintly triumphant air and took a sip of juice before continuing. "Back home it was a lot easier and I could do more, but here, it's. Well, harder. And the gigai they gave me is faulty and, and it seems to get damaged when I try to do things."

He glanced over at Okita with a hesitant smile and lifted one shoulder slightly. "Last night was the first time it made me so tired, though. A-and after I woke up I think I could have healed someone else, too, but. There were only two of them."

That seemed to hold with what MOMO had experienced. More severe injuries tired her out, while small things seemed to go over fairly quickly. Of course, when she had healed any of the club members, it was usually a serious injury. Okita was tempted to ask Hanatarou to heal him, but he thought better of it for now. If he was able to catch the healer later, then he'd ask. For now, things would have to wait. "Oh? And how do you do it anyway? I'm really fascinated by how people can heal without medicines and band...a..."

Okita trailed off as he watched Hanatarou pluck out the strange box and stick the plastic tube in it. Now that was fascinating. He'd never figured out what the boxes were for, usually having discarded them somewhere in town. But if they were for eating, that was an entirely different thing! He was so enthralled with this new discovery that he almost missed the conversation as it continued.

"Ah, what is a gigai? I'm afraid I don't know much about where you are from, so I apologize." Reaching into his own bag, he took out the box and turned it over in his hands until he found the plastic tube. It seemed to be encased in something and now this just looked complicated. As he wrestled with getting his box to resemble Hanatarou's box, he smiled to himself. "Then you're powerful indeed. Most people can't do much more than one or two a night, if that."

How did he do it? That kind of thing would be far easier to explain to another shinigami, and to an ordinary human as Okita seemed to be...well, it would be complicated. To say the least. And Hanatarou was certain that any explanation he gave would sound even more confusing than it needed to be. "It's, um, just kidou. Er." The healer paused a moment, absently chewing on his lower lip. "Using my spiritual energy to heal. Basically. But, ah, I can do the kind with the, the bandages, and, that too."

He watched Okita struggle with the juice box for a moment and wondered if he dared to offer some help with the thing. After all, he'd only just figured it out himself, and what if he caused another mishap like what had happened last week?

"Oh. Sorry, um. It's a, an artificial body. We use them when in the human world, since normal humans can't see shinigami or anything. But this one," he continued, absently gesturing toward his chest, "it's, well, not right. It shouldn't interfere with...things. But it does."

The suggestion that he was powerful startled him into silence again, though, and he blinked a couple of times before hesitantly holding out his own juice box to demonstrate, in an attempt to change the subject. "You have to take this straw here out of the wrapping, and, um. See, this is where it goes..." He certainly wasn't anywhere near powerful, that was for certain.

Hm, not exactly the response Okita had been hoping for, but then his question had been rather vague. He didn't want to go further into specifics, however, so he would have to ask Kenren about it later. Okita hated to think that he would need to explain to Kenren as he had to Homura about his aversion to touch healing, but since he didn't understand the mechanics of it all, he had to be careful. Not only did he not want more people to know, he didn't want the healers to know.

There was nothing they could do about someone with this sort of disease and the realization that they couldn't save everyone always weighed heavily on doctors. The profession was so difficult; Okita didn't envy them their work at all. He could live with the blood of dozens of men on his hands because death was the only skill he had. But for a man dedicated to saving lives? Even one man lost was like the weight of a thousand stones.

Okita froze for a moment when Hanatarou admitted he was a shinigami. The word was still enough to cause fear to run through him. As practical as he could be, he was still a man of his era and that meant meeting gods of death was something that was only supposed to happen once in a person's lifetime. "Ah...I see."

Get it together! You're being rude! Okita laughed a little and shook his head. "I'm sorry, you startled me. It isn't often that I run into shinigami, as you said. Although, I don't think it has to do with your body, so much as this place here. My friends also have powers that are strange to me, and they say being here has affected them."

But off that subject and onto something a little more pleasant. Okita watched as Hanatarou showed him how to open the box and then did as he was told. First he unwrapped the 'straw' and then he carefully poked it through the little shiny opening at the top. The straw dropped in rather quickly and then Okita looked at it, mimicking Hanatarou's earlier motions by sucking on the straw.

And he nearly choked when the juice jumped up into his mouth.

Coughing and tapping his chest, Okita paused for a moment to make sure the coughing wouldn't worsen and then grinned wide. "Amazing! So that's how these work! Thank you for explaining them to me!"

Hanatarou was somewhat taken aback by Okita's reaction; he hadn't thought anything of saying he was a shinigami, given that there were apparently quite a few here, and not just others from Soul Society. And it wasn't often that he dealt with ordinary humans, as Okita appeared to be (not that he was about to try to check, considering what happened every time he tried to look at someone's spirit thread).

"Oh. Er. Sorry, I didn't mean to, it's...ah." At least he hadn't started asking strange questions like Sam had the day before. Hanatarou still didn't quite know what he could have wanted, even if he did have strange ideas about shinigami. "Well. That could be it?"

He jumped a little when Okita coughed, peering at the man with a worried expression that slowly turned into a hesitant smile in response to his grin. "They're very different," he replied, sounding quite serious about it. "Someone showed me on the trip last week. You have to be careful not to squeeze the box too tight, though, because then the juice will get all over."

Okita didn't know what shinigami could tell, but he hoped the boy next to him couldn't feel the disease in him. But why would harbingers of death need a medic? Or was the afterlife just like the living world? Was it full of fighting and turbulence, too? That was sort of disappointing to think about, considering all that he'd been told about the resting spirits of the dead. It didn't seem restful at all if shinigami needed to keep staff on hand.

"There's no need to apologize," Okita replied, sipping the juice from the box slowly. He gave the healer a smile and tilted his head to the side, so he could see him a little better. "I like meeting all the different sorts of people here. It's very interesting."

He went back to drinking, but paused when Hanatarou suddenly seemed so serious. Apparently squeezing the box was a bad idea, which definitely meant that Hanatarou had done that exact thing last week. Okita was hard-pressed to hide his amusement at Hanatarou's warning, but he did his best, his smile just barely widening as he listened attentively. "Oh, I see. I'll be sure not to do that then, Hanatarou-san. Thank you for warning me."

Laughing quietly inside his head, Okita set the box down and started rifling through the rest of his sack breakfast. Okay, he couldn't help himself. He had to tease the boy a bit. "Was it very difficult to clean up when you did it?"

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Dayshift 42: Bus 2

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